Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 24.djvu/173

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to the Confederacy. Afterwards he was in command of the blockade- runiu-rs Lillian, (>;</. and other vessels rngagi-d in bringing suppli. > and munitions ut" war for the South. At the close of the war, his property confiscated and he an exile, he applied for a command in the Knglish merchant service, and was given the command of a fine strainer, running between Liverpool and Rio Janeiro. She \va-> subsequently sold to the Brazilian Government and used as an army transport. While conveying several hundred soldiers to the scene of action, small-pox broke out among them, and as the well refused to nurse the sick, or bury the dead, those duties devolved upon Captain Maffitt, and a fearful time he had "sickening to the last degree," he described it and the soldiers were mutinous and with- out discipline. He retained command of this steamer for eighteen months, when, at the urgent entreaty of his family, he resigned the command and came home. He soon after purchased a small farm near Wilmington, where he resided for nearly eighteen years. In July, 1885, he moved to Wilmington. For a year or two his health had been failing, but he determined to make a brave effort to retrieve his fortunes and provide for his young family. The disappointment of that hope was too great a shock for his feeble frame; the thought that he could no longer provide for his loved ones broke his heart. After an illness of more than three months, he died on the I5th ot May, 1886, in the sixty-eighth year of his age.

[From the Richmond Dispatch, April 36, 1896.]

THRILLING INCIDENT.

Capture of the Federal Steamer Maple Leaf.

A BOLD DASH FOR LIBERTY.

The Plot Carried Out in a Minute. Then the Confederate

Yell. Narrow Escapes from being Retaken.

A Series of Adventures. Experiences

in the Dismal Swamp.

To the Editor of the Dispatch:

There occurred many incidents during the late war between the North and the South that are worthy of mention, and among which none are more so than the coup de main enacted on the coast in