A Memoir of the Last Year of the War for Independence in the Confederate States of America/Conclusion
In the afternoon of the 30th of March, after having turned over the command to General Echols, I rode to Marion in Smythe county, and was taken that night with a cold and cough so violent as to produce hemorrhage from the lungs, and prostrate me for several days in a very dangerous condition. While I was in this situation, a heavy cavalry force under Stoneman, from Thomas' army in Tennessee, moved through North Carolina to the east, and a part of it came into Virginia from the main column, and struck the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad at New River, east of Wytheville; whence, after destroying the bridge, it moved east, cutting off all communication with Richmond, and then crossed over into North Carolina. As soon as I was in a condition to be moved, I was carried on the railroad to Wytheville, and was proceeding thence to my home, in an ambulance under the charge of a surgeon, when I received, most unexpectedly, the news of the surrender of General Lee's army. Without the slightest feeling of irreverence, I will say, that the sound of the last trump would not have been more unwelcome to my ears.
Under the disheartening influence of the sad news I had received, I proceeded to my home, and I subsequently received a letter from General Lee, dated on the 30th of March, explaining the reasons for relieving me from command. As a copy of that letter has been published in Virginia, without any knowledge or agency on my part, it is appended to this narrative. The letter itself, which was written on the very day of the commencement of the attack on General Lee's lines which resulted in the evacuation of Richmond, and just ten days before the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, has a historical interest; for it shows that our great commander, even at that late day, was anxiously and earnestly contemplating the continuation of the struggle with unabated vigor, and a full determination to make available every element of success. Immediately after the battle of Cedar Creek, I had written a letter to General Lee, stating my willingness to be relieved from command, if he deemed it necessary for the public interests, and I should have been content with the course pursued towards me, had his letter not contained the expressions of personal confidence in me which it does; for I knew that, in everything he did as commander of our armies, General Lee was actuated solely by an earnest and ardent desire for the success of the cause of his country. As to those among my countrymen who judged me harshly, I have not a word of reproach. When there was so much at stake, it was not unnatural that persons entirely ignorant of the facts, and forming their opinions from the many false reports set afloat in a time of terrible war and public suffering, should pass erroneous and severe judgments on those commanders who met with reverses.
I was not embraced in the terms of General Lee's surrender or that of General Johnston, and, as the order relieving me from command had also relieved me from all embarrassment as to the troops which had been under me, as soon as I was in a condition to travel, I started on horseback to the Trans-Mississippi Department, to join the army of General Kirby Smith, should it hold out; with the hope of at least meeting an honorable death while lighting under the flag of my country. Before I reached that Department, Smith's army had also been surrendered, and, without giving a parole or incurring any obligation whatever to the United States authorities, after a long, weary and dangerous ride from Virginia, through the States of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas, I finally succeeded in leaving the country; a voluntary exile rather than submit to the rule of our enemies.