Abstract:
July1863. Confederate guerrillas were suspected at the Irish Shanty in Dickson County, Tennessee. The charge by the 8th Kentucky Cavalry was swift. Six southern sympathizers were arrested and taken to Clarksville for military trials. In less than a month, Aaron James and Jonas Spicer were sentenced to death and Euphrates Shelton to five years hard labor. Their fates were soon on appeal before Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt and President Abraham Lincoln. Were they really guerrillas? What would happen to them? The eventual outcome captured the popular imagination at the time and continues to capture the imagination today.