My story began in the summer between my 12th and 13th birthday, or the summer of 1961. As usual for me, the weekend following the end of the school year meant traveling to Southeastern North Carolina to the Ward (Dad’s side of the family) and Thompson (Mom’s side of the family) farms.
It was during such a summer that I discovered a staircase hidden behind a closet door in the Ward family farmhouse. On one Sunday afternoon, with nearly everyone catching an afternoon nap after church and a big farm lunch, I climbed the staircase to find another door. Behind that second door, I found an attic which was not unlike many attics. I saw old furniture, wooden boxes, several hanging framed portraits, and clothes hanging on makeshift lines.
My attention was quickly drawn to a medium sized sea chest. It was made of wood slats bound by metal strips. It had a large metal lock on the front side. Being curious, I eased the metal lock open and lifted the top of the chest. It is dusty in the attic of most farmhouses. As I lifted the chest lid, dust swirled in the air, and some got into my eyes. With lots of blinking and wiping away tears, I was able to see the contents of the chest.
A tray covered the top inside the chest. I could see lots of letters and other documents bundled into small packages bound with colored ribbons, tobacco twine, and thick strings. What really got my attention was a large bayonet and some military medals and decorations. As I lifted the tray of bound letters, I found other military equipment, most of it much older than that of the then-current military wear. Even at that early age, I recognized it was from a different era.
I returned to examine the tray and noticed some of the letters at the top of each of bundle. I saw the year 1861 and many other later dates. I untied the ribbon of one bundle and read a letter from Private James Ward of Company E, 26th Regiment of North Carolina Troops. Most of that afternoon, while most of my extended family continued napping, I realized I had history in my hands – not history from a textbook, but actual history directly from someone who had been there. I made many more visits up the attic before mentioning anything to my Grandmother Gertrude Ward.
Eventually, I couldn’t contain my discovery. “Grandma, I found a chest in the attic with letters and things. Where did it come from?” I asked. She looked at me with a wrinkled brow, “Where have you been boy?” I explained finding the secret closet door and the hidden staircase to the attic. She listened intently and remarked, “Son, I had completely forgotten about that old chest. The family has had it for so many years that I’ve lost track of the last time I saw it.”
Grandma Gertrude went on to further explain that the family all knew about James Ward and his exploits, as she referred to them, in the “War between the States.” She also offered that my grandfather, her husband, Brice Ward had gone to war in Europe in 1917. In a lowered her voice she said, “He wasn’t the same man I sent to that place when he got back. He changed a lot.” In today’s vernacular, my grandfather had PTSD from the trenches of Europe.
I asked her if I could continue reading the letters and she said, “Yes, but don’t mention it to anyone else and do it only after all of your chores are done each day.” It was a promise I was most happy to agree upon.
Over the next several summers I found time to read every letter. Some were more virtuous and universal than others, while some were of a more private nature, between a man and his wife back home. In either case it was emotionally moving to read his accounts of his life in war and her life on the farm.
This adventure in history fueled an even greater curiosity for history, US History in particular. For the next sixty years of my life, I spent large amounts of time on battlefields and in museums and libraries, and purchased nearly everything I could find about the period leading up to, though, and after the US Civil War.
I was in the Army when I received a call from my mother informing me that the Ward family farmhouse had gone up in flames on a cold winter night. The entire house had burned to the ground. Nothing other than the family had survived the fire.
My treasure trove in the attic was gone, but the letters I read and the messages they conveyed were not lost. My better-than-average memory retained most of the letters, and in 2023 I used them as the basis for my historical novel For Twenty Dollars in Gold – A Story of the Civil War. I only slightly modified some of the content, removing some of the more explicit horrors and my descendants’ personal exchanges.
While in the Army I was sent to the Combat Studies Institute at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas where I was trained and certified to be an Assistant Professor of Military Science. With this training, I could instruct and train future Army officers in the Army’s ROTC at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. I also learned the Battlefield Staff Ride, which uses the nine principles of war taught as our military doctrine today, as an excellent technique to place the contemporary soldier into another time and place. I have conducted battlefield staff rides in Guam, South Korea, Bastogne (Belgium), Fulda Gap (Germany), Gettysburg, The Little Blue River, Nashville, Shiloh, Antietam, Manassas, Vicksburg, Guilford Courthouse, New Bern, Fort Fisher, and Bentonville.
Finally, after numerous visits to the North Carolina Museum of History, I was able to track down nearly every major record of the 26th Regiment of North Carolina Troops. I have poured through and noted thousands of citations and attended lectures by renowned authors and historians such as Shelby Foote, Bruce Canton, and Stephen Ambrose. On one occasion I had the privilege of an extended conversation with Ken Burns, Executive Producer of the ultimate presentation of the Civil War on PBS.
As an avid reader, I have read no less than twenty-nine major books and numerous personal diaries of those who lived to tell their tales of the war which enabled me to piece together For Twenty Dollars in Gold – A Story of the Civil War. That number does not include the more than twenty-five reference books I consulted.
Why this story? What makes it any different than any other story of the Civil War or any other war for that matter? My answer is simple: this is my story. The results of all the people, events, timelines, and decisions came to the very incarnation of my existence, my birth.
If James Ward had not gotten dysentery in camp in the early Fall of 1862, he would not have been at home on furlough. If he had not been on furlough and recovering from his illness, he and his wife would not have made love on those fateful nights in November and early December 1862. It did not end with his death at Gettysburg. If not for that fateful encounter, my direct ancestor would not have been born. My Great-Great Grandfather, Great Grandfather, Grandfather, and my father Howard Carl Ward would not have been born. And finally, I would not have been born for the opportunity to share my family’s story and thoughts with you.
Let it be known, since arriving in North America in the 1600s, the Ward family has nearly always been the direct descendants of farmers. The land was all that we really had other than family.
When the time came to be called to service, a member of our family was at the Battle of Camden in South Carolina during the American Revolutionary War. During the War of 1812, a Ward son volunteered and fought in Maryland and Louisiana against the British. In 1846, a descendent also answered the call to go to Mexico. The Ward family offered several soldiers in the Civil War. My Grandfather went to Europe and fought against Germany in World War I. My father’s older brother Christopher Calhoun Ward, at age eighteen, died on the beaches of Anzio, Italy in 1943. My father served in World War II in the Pacific and as part of the Occupation Force in Japan after the War.
And finally, my turn came. I entered the Army as a Private during the Vietnam War era and for thirty years, I made a career as an officer out of a sense of duty for my country, as was expected by our family traditions.
Why would my family today hinge on such a coincidental moment like the impregnation of an incredibly young bride in North Carolina in the Winter of 1862? I really don’t believe in coincidences. I believe in God. I believe God never makes us do anything. I believe He gave us free will and as such, we create our own hells and heavens. Hell can be on a battlefield. Heaven can be in the arms of the one you love. We only get those moments when we see them in front of us. We can’t plan them, shape them, or delay them. We can only enjoy them when they present themselves to us.
When my father was lying on his death bed, attempting to recover from a stroke, he was unconscious for several hours. For the last six hours of his life, I was holding the only hand he had with any feeling left. He opened his eyes and looked at me. Gently, tears ran down from his eyes. He could not speak clearly, yet I knew exactly what he was thinking at that very moment.
“I tried to make you the best man you could be. I’m sorry if I ever hurt you. Please take care of your mother and the girls. I love you and I’ll see you on the other side.”
I knew this to be his thoughts at that moment because we had both said them when I was thirty-eight years old. We had finally reconciled our grievances with each other after nearly twenty years of hurtful words on both sides of our personal arguments.
The Civil War was necessary. Our Nation was at a critical moment in time, just like my father and me. As a nation our temporary compromises were just that, temporary. It would take a schism like the Civil War and the following period of Reconstruction to remedy the wrongs of the past. The Civil War and the period of Reconstruction were not particularly great successes either.
For me, that schism meant being a member of a community that wanted no part of the Civil War and yet, when put to the task, we did our duty as others dictated to us.
The title of the novel is simple. James Ward did his duty for nothing more than twenty dollars in gold, offered as an enlistment bonus, for windowpanes and his love for his wife. Following the thoughts of many other citizens of the state, he expected to serve his duty in North Carolina and then return home. He thought he was protecting her, his extended family’s life, and the land they worked so hard to make successful, “land rich and cash poor”. They did this with not a slave to be found. They were self-educated by using a family Bible as their teaching aide. They believed in God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, and the prevenient grace provided to all.
In author Richard Paul Evans’ book, The Locket, his protagonist recalls his views on how we gain from our life’s lessons.
“Through the course of my life I have come to believe that life is not lived chronologically, by the sweep of a clock’s hand or the sway of its pendulum, but rather, experientially, as a ladder or stair, each experience stacked upon the previous, delivering us to loftier planes. Perhaps this best describes my concept of God-the architect of that divine ascent, the hidden arm that slashes our swath through the overgrown flora of destiny, best revealed in the evidence of our lives.”
So, we are here, not by coincidence but by the grace of God, still trying to learn our lessons with one experience “stacked upon the previous” lesson.
When will we really learn?