JAMES R. McINTYRE
© Karen McCann Hett All Rights Reserved 2003-2014
James R. McIntyre was born in January, 1832, in Anson County, North Carolina. He is said to have been the son of Malachi Stokes McIntyre and Elizabeth Murray and was the brother of Jesse C. McIntyre. He was married to Elizabeth Ann Spear, a native of Montgomery County, Alabama, on January 13, 1857. She was the sister of T. J. Spear, and the Spear Family Bible notes her name as Elizabeth Annis and her birth date as April 18, 1836. The couple was enumerated in the town of Waverly, Walker County in 1860, which was counted both in Walker and in Montgomery Counties that year. They had two small children under four. The couple had at least one more child after 1860.
On April 26, 1862 at Danville, James enlisted in the Second Texas Lancers, which became the 24th Regiment Texas Cavalry. He rode the fifty miles from his home to the place of rendezvous at Camp Carter, Hempstead. The value of his horse was $150.00 and his equipment was worth $20.00.
James rode his horse with the other men to Arkansas, and there at Pine Bluff he was dismounted with the others, spending the remainder of his service time as infantry. He fought in the Battle of Arkansas Post, where he was captured and sent to prison at Camp Butler, Illinois. He was on the Roll of Prisoners for Camp Butler, and on the Roster of Confederates Captured at Ft. Hindman, Arkansas Post.
James has the distinction of being one of the few prisoners to escape from Camp Butler and to find his way back to Texas. He made his escape in February, possibly in the confusion of the two thousand Confederate prisoners being received there on February 26, 1863. Or James may have used one of the other methods to escape, One was to pretend to be dead, be carried out in a coffin, and then to break the coffin lid during the night and escape from the Dead House. Another method was to bribe the guards and be assisted in making good one�s escape.
Although there is no record of the method James used to escape, both the Union prison muster roll and the parole muster note that he escaped. The Company B muster roll on April 30, 1863, taken following the men�s parole from prison, has a notation that James was �absent, having escaped at Camp Butler, Illinois.� The June and August rolls have similar notations, and the October roll states that he �escaped from prison in February of 1863 and has not since rejoined.�
Meanwhile, James Lindley had managed to get out of prison at Camp Butler by taking the Oath of Allegiance to the Union, pledging not to take up arms against the Union and not to go beyond its boundaries. Lindley also managed to find his way back home to Montgomery County.
There, the two Jameses met with pressure to rejoin the Confederate army. Any members of the 24th Regiment who made their way back to Texas were to report to Capt. R. S. Poole at Camp Groce at Hempstead, where they would either be sent back to their respective companies or be reassigned to other duty in the Trans-Mississippi Department.
Presumably, James McIntyre had arrived back in Texas in the spring or summer of 1863. He did not report for duty. In September, Capt. Poole, hearing about James, sent a detachment of men to arrest him along with James Lindley. The detachment brought the two men to Camp Groce.
Once the men were in camp, the two cooked up a scheme to join the Texas State Troops, surely knowing they would be less likely to be sent back to the battle front if they were in the TST.
They then went AWOL from Camp Groce, presented themselves to Captain J. Evans of Barnes' Battalion of the State Troops, who introduced them to Major Barnes. Barnes gave them a letter of introduction to Col. Sayles, who was on his way to Houston. They headed for Houston on October 1st to talk to Col. Sayles.
Meanwhile, Captain Poole discovered what the men were up to and wrote a letter to General Magruder, the commander of the Trans-Mississippi, in which he detailed the escapades of the two. He sent along a �Wanted� notice for Macgruder to publish.
Apparently, the two men were apprehended and were returned to Camp Groce. By the time of the muster roll of February, 1864, the company commander on the battlefront had learned that the two had joined the CSA again. The notation on James�s roll states, Now in Trans-Mississippi Department. The next roll was taken in January 1865 and shows James to be a private in Company I, 24th Texas Cavalry recruiting service for regiment. But on a regimental return for February, James was again listed as AWOL. This was the last record in James McIntyre�s file.
We know that James returned to Montgomery County. He signed the Amnesty Oath in Montgomery County, a pledge of loyalty to the Union; this oath paved the way for former Confederate soldiers or government office holders to become voters again.
James�s wife, Elizabeth, died on March 28, 1868 at age thirty and is buried at Shepard Hill Cemetery at Old Danville, next to their infant daughter.
On 19 November 1868, James married Augusta C. Hall in Montgomery County. They are said to have had one child.
I do not know James�s whereabouts until 1907. In January of that year, he was a resident of Roan�s Prairie, Grimes County, Texas. He filed for a pension based on his Civil War service, stating that he was seventy-five years of age and had resided in Grimes County for eight years. He was in poor health. His only property consisted of one old horse and colt, worth about 50 dollars.
R. L. Wood filed a deposition stating that he �personally knew him while he was in service and he did not desert the Confederacy.� The application was filed at Anderson in May, 1907, and approved by the Texas pension board in September of that year.
Two years later, on 29 July 1909, James filed a deposition in the pension application of W. W. Forrest, stating that he had known Forrest at the time of his service. At this time, James gave his age as seventy-eight years, and indicated that he was living with his son, J. M. McIntyre, at Roans Prairie.
According to research of Lynna Kay Shuffield, James was admitted to the Confederate Home in Austin on July 5, 1910, suffering from apoplexy. His religion was given as Methodist. He was discharged at his own request on the 17th of May, 1911. His next of kin was listed as his daughter, Mrs. C. D. Lee, of Roans Prairie, Grimes County, Texas.
There is no record of James�s death in his pension file. However, Lynna Kay Shuffield's research shows that there is a Confederate marker for him in the Oakland Cemetery in Grimes County, but that it has no dates inscribed on it.
It is interesting to note that the son of Elizabeth Ann Spear and James McIntyre, James M. McIntyre, married Hattie, the daughter of James Lindley and Mary Irvine.
Note: the information on James R. McIntyre was compiled from county records; from the Compiled Service Records, on file at the National Archives in Washington, D. C.; and from the Texas Confederate Pension records in the Texas State Archives. Some family information was found on �My Loose Ends� Family Tree Database by Lynna Kay Shuffield, dated August 29, 2003. Information on James's Confederate Home Records is from Lynna Kay Shuffield by e-mail dated December 23, 2007.
For further information and records of all Confederate soldiers of Montgomery County, Texas, as well as histories of the regiments they served in, see Montgomery County, Texas, CSA by Frank M. Johnson. The book may be purchased by visiting Frank's website at frankmjohnson.net or by contacting Frank at [email protected].
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