EDITOR’S NOTE: Matagorda County historian Carol Sue Gibbs suggested an interesting story for the Bay City Sentinel’s History Page – Confederates buried in Palacios’ cemetery.
One story stood out in the Matagorda County history and genealogy page that Gibbs manages – A.P. Clark.
Clark was in every major engagement that the Army of Northern Virginia fought in up through the Battle of Gettysburg, where he was captured – at the Little Round Top.
He escaped from being prisoner of war cells, was recaptured, then returned to the CSA and his Alabama home, only to find it destroyed.
He went on in life to become a prominent banker in Texas, took part in the Alaska gold rush and ended up in Palacios and Bay City.
In Memory of A. P. Clark
Palacios Beacon, January 10, 1929
Mr. A. P. Clark, formerly of Palacios, died at 2:20 p. m. Wednesday, Dec. 26, 1928, at the home of his son, Joe W. Clark, in Melrose, New Mexico, at the age of 88 years, 11 months and 8 days.
He was born in Georgia but when a small child his parents moved to Jacksonville, Calhoun County, Alabama, where he grew to young manhood.
He was educated in the schools of the county.
When the war waged between the States he cast his fortune with his beloved Southland, and at the age of 19, he was mustered into the State service in February 1861.
He went with the State troops to Mobile, and took possession of Ft. Morgan on Mobile Bay, remaining there until the Confederate Government was organized.
The State troops were then discharged, and he returned home where he found the country actively preparing for war. Ft. Sumpter [Sumter] had been captured and the war dogs turned loose.
He at once enlisted in Company D, 10th Ala. Regt. C.S.A., under Capt. F. Woodruff and Col. John H. Farney.
The regiment was at once ordered to Richmond, and from that time on private Clark was in every engagement of the army of northern Virginia up to the battle of Gettysburg.
Private Clark was in Gen. R.H. Anderson’s Division, Gen. C.M. Wilcox’s Brigade, whose position was on the right of Pickett’s Division in the attack of Cemetery Ridge, July 3, ’65 [63].
In this bloody charge up “Little Round Top,” private Clark was captured - he being among the boys who did not know the extent of the repulse, remained too long after the retreat of the Confederates, and could not escape as the enemy’s line had been formed in the rear.
He, with other prisoners, was taken to Baltimore, thence to the northern prison at Ft. Delaware, N. J. Here he and his friend, C.C. Cook, of the 51st Ala., planned to escape.
The prisoners were granted the privilege of bathing in the Bay within marked limits.
If any prisoner passed these limits he was at once fired upon by the guards, and many who made the venture were killed and left for the fish.
After about three weeks of earnest daily practice at swimming they made the attempt on the night of August 12, ’63.
They passed through a closet which extended over the water with a sentinel at each end.
But they were not seen and entered the water and swam away with the lights of Delaware City as their objective point.
But the tide was against them and drifted them out into the channel.
After hours of hard swimming the direction of the tide was drifting them, they saw a light on the shore, and they swam for the newly discovered light.
In a short time they reached the shore. The place proved to be New Castle, Del.
The fast approaching dawn warned them that something must be done, and that quickly. Bare-footed and bare-headed and insufficiently clad, they agreed to enter the first house and steal some clothing.
They had walked only a short distance when they came to a good looking house with the doors standing wide open.
Cook passed and waited a short distance from the house, with the understanding if Clark was captured he would make his escape.
Clark ventured into the yard. With light steps his bare feet approached the gallery.
He stopped to listen. All was quiet. He cautiously assends [ascends] the steps and stops again. He goes to the door and listens. All is quiet except for the heavy breathing of sleepers.
He enters the room and feels cautiously around for men’s wearing apparel and finds a pair of pants and a coat hanging on the wall.
With these trophies, he quietly leaves the sleepers to enjoy their morning nap.
After joining his companion one put on the coat the other the pants; then one was dressed in a coat and a pair of drawers, the other in a shirt and a pair of pants.
By this time the light of the new day was spreading over the earth and they hurried out of the city into the woods.
Although they were far from home, in an enemy’s country, tired and hungry, yet these unpleasant feelings were subdued by the prospects of a speedy return to Dixie.
They traveled by the stars at night for the south and hid in secluded places in the day.
They raided orchards and spring houses for sustenance, and when almost back to friends and Dixie they were re-captured and sent back to the prison at Ft. Delaware and locked in a dungeon as punishment for leaving the Fort without permission.
Cook died in prison; but after a few months private Clark was transferred to Point Lookout Maryland, where he remained until the next winter, when he was exchanged at Savannah, Ga. and furloughed for 20 days. Over half of his time expired before he could reach home.
At its expiration, he reported to Brig. Gen. Ben Hill and was assigned to the quartermaster’s department.
He laid down his arms when Lee surrendered at Appomattox, and he returned to his home in Ala. to find the country completely devastated and under military rule. His home a wreck, and one brother dead.
But he was not a man to give up. He knew he must live on, hope on and help rebuild the country he loved so well. This was no time for lagging.
He took the oath of allegiance to the U.S. Government and began to do his part to rebuild his home, his country and his state.
Just after the stormy days of this cruel war, he was married Aug. 16, 1865, to Miss Katherine Helen Alexander, the girl he had always loved. To this union eight children were born. Three of whom are dead.
Mr. Clark came to Texas in 1873, and settled in Jacksonville, where he went into the grocery business with J.L. Wright.
The two men remained partners over 30 years, in different businesses in other parts of the state.
Mr. Clark left Jacksonville and spent several years in railroad construction in the central part of the state.
In 1883 he and his youngest brother, and his old partner J. L. Wright, bought land in Williamson County, and engaged in farming and ranching, stocking their ranch with red poll cattle.
He moved his family to the new town of Bartlett, that was laid out on the M.K.&T.R.R., 2 ½ miles from his farm and ranch.
As the town grew a bank was organized and later nationalized. Mr. Bartlett being elected President, and Mr. Clark Vice-President.
He continued in the banking business for a number of years at Bartlett and later at Quanah and McLeon, Tex.
When the gold craze of Alaska was exciting the people of the U.S. in 1898, Mr. Clark and his oldest son, R.E. Clark, decided to prospect in the Klondike Vale.
They spent a year in that desolate, frozen, country with many weird and thrilling experiences.
They scaled the summit of Chillcoot [Chilkoot] Pass, but escaped the many snow slides of immense magnitude.
They helped dig out the dead in one of these snow slides - about 40 people.
It took several months to get a letter to them and Mr. Clark walked 40 miles to mail a letter to his wife.
Mr. Clark has traveled through nearly every state in the Union but always lived in the South.
He took an active part in politics and numbered his personal friends among such men as Rodger Q. Mills, Charles A. Culberson, James S. Hogg and Tom Campbell.
He was a man of highest integrity, a good neighbor and a friend on whom one could depend. His motto to his children was, “always make your word as good as a bond.”
He joined the Christian Church in middle life and became a devout and earnest Bible student.
He read and studied continuously. It has been said of him that he possessed the best biblical library in the county.
He was the proud possessor of a Wycliff translation of the Bible which was over a hundred years old.
Two years ago he became convinced that the Advent Church was teaching the right doctrine and he united with the Seventh Day Advent Church and was baptized by Brother Stewart.
He came to South Texas in 1900 and had lived at Palacios and Bay City until two years ago he bought land in New Mexico, where he moved and lived one year, coming back to Palacios in the winter.
Last July he went to Melrose, New Mexico, to visit his son, where he was stricken a few weeks ago, and died of influenza.
His remains were brought back to Palacios on Dec. 29, 1928, and laid to rest beside his wife, who had preceded him to the great beyond in 1925.
He is survived by three sons, two daughters and five grandchildren. His children are R. E. Clark, of Rochelle, Tex.; Joe W. Clark, of Melrose, New Mexico; R.N. Clark, and Mrs. W. P. Stokes, of Dallas, Tex.; and Mrs. H. B. Douglas, of Palacios.