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- Deaths of Reese and Benjamin Bowers
We have been unable to obtain the date, or many of the particulars of this tragedy.
They were the sons of Rev. Valentine Bowers, who was an old and highly respected Baptist minister. They had two brothers, William C. and Joseph P. Bowers. Reese Bowers was a Baptist minister at one time. The father and sons were all Union men. Reese and Benjamin were very active in the Union cause and assisted in piloting Union men and refugees to Ellis.
On the day previous to their death they received word from L. W. Hampton, a prominent Union man of the Doe River Cove, that there were some refugees near his home who were wanting a man to pilot them. These men had some experience in that line and left their homes in what was called the Neck, crossed the mountain to a point on the Watauga river near the Fish Spring, intending to go from there to Mr. Hampton's. They requested a woman, Mrs. Smith, to set them across the river in a canoe. A company of rebel soldiers had made a raid down in the vicinity of Elizabethton, and were returning just as the Bowers' got across the river. The latter seeing them started to run, when the soldiers opened fire on them as they ran towards the hills near by; the soldiers pursued them and overtook them. It was told to us that the elder Bowers, Reese, prayed and begged for his life, while Benjamin fought and cursed them with his dying breath; but the fate of each was the same. We have heard different stories as to who killed these men, one that they were killed by the Johnson county home guards under Parker, but their cousin, Isaac Bowers, now a resident of Elizabethton, and whose character for truth is unquestionable, informs us that they were killed by Bozen's men, and that he recognized a pistol taken from them by Motte, whom we have mentioned as having been connected with a number of other tragedies.
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Abt 1833 - 1863 (~ 30 years)
