ROBERT PAINE SHAPARD (Chapter 5) 1863-1865 Exodus to Louisville, Kentucky

CHAPTER 5

EXODUS TO LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

1863-1865

In June of 1863, R.P. Shapard and C.G. Mitchell left Tennessee together for the safety of Louisville, Kentucky. Leaving Shelbyville, they crossed the Union line at Murfreesboro and made their way to Nashville; whereby, they boarded a train and traveled to Kentucky, via Bowling Green, to Louisville. They traveled as refugees with their families and slaves. Kentucky was similar to Tennessee in that it had both pro-union and pro-confederate sentiment and slavery remained legal. The Emancipation Proclamation only “freed” slaves within the Confederate States, although Kentucky was a slave state, it had remained with the Union; thus the Emancipation did not apply to the State and slavery remained legal there until the Thirteenth Amendment was passed in December of 1865. 
R.P. Shapard and C.G. Mitchell carried on their business, as commission merchants and wholesale grocers, as they had in Shelbyville. Mr. Shapard purchased a house and servants quarters in Louisville near the southeast corner of Walnut Street, and 8^th Street, for his family to permanently reside for the remainder of the war. However, Mr. Shapard himself traveled back and forth from Louisville to Shelbyville throughout the war, residing in both locations part of the time. After his arrival in Louisville in 1863, Robert obtained a store front location for his business, at 637 Main Street, on the north side of the road near the Seventh Street corner, and did business under the name of ‘R.P. Shapard Wholesale Grocer’. 
Due to the retreat of the Confederate Army south of the Tennessee River, all of middle Tennessee was again within the Federal lines, which allowed him to travel that area for business. While on a business trip, on August 14, 1863, Mr. Shapard was a victim of the perils of travel when he was caught, 11 miles from Fayetteville, by a band of robbers who relieved him of his hat, money and saddle. A posse was organized among the citizens to catch the bandits and Mr. Shapard informed Tennessee Military Governor Andrew Johnson, of whom he had an acquaintance, that the citizen posse was after thieves and not a threat to the Federal troops. His letter read:

“Shelbyville, August 23, 1863

Gov. A. Johnson

Sir,

            Nine days since I was caught by a band of robbers, 11 miles beyond Fayetteville and my money and hat were taken from me[.] A few days after the citizens geatherin their squirrel guns and went in persuit of the robbers captured the horse of the chief and one of his men – last accounts have the same citizens are in persuit of some horse thieves – if the citizens should come a cross a federal force I fear they will be takin for bushwhackers[.] I have advised them to adopt some badge and let it be known to the Union Armey and citizens[.] The citizens are becoming aroused and feel a determination to put down bushwhackers & thieves if some plan can be adopted [.] Cant you advise some plan and put it in operation[.] The citizens with a little help  can do the work more affectually than the armey[.] If you do not recollect me enquire of Thos. A. Kerchival Esq. at the Provost Office in the Capital[.] I am anxious to hear from you on this subject and will do all I can to advance the object named[.] Hopeing to hear from you soon. I remain yours truly, R.P. Shapard”

While residing in Louisville, Kentucky, Robert Paine Shapard cared for and housed his wife, Parthenia, and their children; David Green, Robert Addison and Sallie, as well as, his four slaves; Esther , Fanny, Hellen, and John. David assisted in his father’s grocery business as a clerk and for any purpose he could be useful. Robert Addison Shapard worked as a clerk for ‘Isaac Lewis Shapard, at a house across the street from his parents home on Walnut Street. Robert Paine Shapard enrolled his daughter, Sallie, at Louisville Female College, a Methodist institution located on 7^th Street between Chestnut and Broadway, which she attended until 1866. Her roommate at school was Miss. Imogene Hill, who met Robert Addison Shapard while he was visiting his sister. Robert and Imogene dated and eventually married on January 3, 1866.

As the war dredged on, money was becoming scarce. Robert’s grocery business was surviving but his savings had been greatly depleted. As a means to boost his resources, on April 2, 1864, Robert Paine Shapard sold to Mrs. Jane P. Black, for the sum of one thousand five hundred dollars, his former house in Shelbyville on Lot no. 97, which he had purchased in 1856.

Before the war, Robert’s commitment to his beloved Methodist Episcopal Church, South was unquestionable. He had been a dedicated Steward, who had build up the church from its infancy, and was very involved in the operations of the Sunday School, which he spearheaded. When the war broke out, The Methodist Episcopal Church, South came under the watchful eye and scrutiny of the Federal officials. Being a religious organization of mainly southern membership, it became a target for radical abuse.  The carpetbag officials of the northern Methodist Episcopal Church, who were staunch Federalists, threatened to rid the South of this church. Under the protection of the radical militia, they terrorized the southern parishioners and ministers and attempted to scare, intimidate and threaten them to abandon their faith and join the northern version of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Many southern Methodist churches were confiscated by the northern Methodists, who refused admittance to southern ministers and refused to relinquish the property to the southern trustees. In the north, such as Louisville, Kentucky, the Methodist Episcopal Church, South was under the watchful eye of the local citizens. Despite the tension, Robert and his family attended services at the Methodist Episcopal Church located near their house on the southwest corner Walnut and 5^th Street.

On the evening of October 22, 1864, while the Shapard family was retiring for bed at their house on Walnut Street, Robert Addison Shapard went outside to use the outhouse. He heard strange voices and noises coming from their Negro house where their slaves were boarded behind the main house. Robert ran back inside the main house and grabbed the only weapon he could find on short notice, a biscuit roller, and then proceeded to determine the source of the commotion. Upon entering the servant’s quarters, he encountered a white man among the slaves. The man threatened to shoot Robert if he wouldn’t let him go, upon which Robert knocked him out with a solid hit from the biscuit roller. It was later determined that the intruder was a man named John McCarthy, who was an established Substitute Broker in Louisville.  
During the Civil War, drafted men with wealth could pay to procure a “substitute” to fight in their place. Generally poor whites and slaves were prime candidates for being coerced into such a deadly proposition by a substitute broker. The broker would be paid by the drafted man to find and procure a suitable substitute. Out of that payment, the broker would keep a portion for his fee and would pay the remainder to the substitute for three years of service in the military. Apparently, on the night of the incident at the Shapard house, Mr. McCarthy was entering slave quarters in the neighborhood to procure new substitutes. 
In the days that followed the incident, to save his reputation, Mr. McCarty made a public statement that Robert Addison Shapard and David Green Shapard had attacked him for the purpose of robbing him, and that the crime occurred, not on the Shapard property, but one street over on Chestnut. Mr. McCarty also slanderously accused both Robert and David of being “Rebels,” which brought about the attention of the authorities. Bench warrants were issued for the arrest of the two boys, in order for them to answer the indictments brought against them. Robert Paine Shapard did everything in his power to protect his sons and to prove the truth of what had occurred during that night in question. Despite months of anguish, stress, and public criticism, the court eventually exonerated the Shapard boys of all criminal behavior and revealed the slander brought against their family.

The war came to an end on April 9, 1865, after four long and heart-wrenching years. Robert Paine Shapard had survived and more importantly, he had kept his family close, protecting them from harm. By the grace of God, his sons, who had enlisted to fight, had all survived and returned without serious physically injury. Throughout the war, Robert had frequently traveled the area of Middle Tennessee on business. He had witnessed, with his own eyes, the near total devastation of his former hometowns of Murfreesboro, Shelbyville and Fayetteville, which lay in utter ruin. While the city of Louisville, Kentucky offered him an existence, it was not his home. He longed for his friends and what remained of his society before the war and decided to return to Shelbyville, Tennessee to help rebuild what had been lost. The Shapard slaves also returned with the family to Shelbyville, harboring hopes of locating friends and acquaintances and finding a semblance of home. On December 6, 1865, they were emancipated by the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution that legally freed all slaves, thus ending an institution of servitude spanning at least 130 years in the Shapard family’s daily life for five consecutive generations.