By: Dr. Michael Bradley
Preachers’ kids are notorious for not always sharing the morals and manners of their minister fathers, and James Benjamin Cowan was no exception. J. B., as he usually was commonly known, was the son of Rev. Dr. Samuel Montgomery Cowan, who served churches in north Alabama before being called to pastor the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in the thriving town of Fayetteville, just a few miles north of Huntsville, Alabama. It was there J. B. was born in 1831 and where he grew up.
In 1831, Reverend Cowan moved to Hernando, Mississippi, a boomtown fueled by the demand for more land to grow more cotton. Elizabeth Cowan Montgomery, a recently widowed relative, and her family also relocated to Hernando. Reverend Cowan became the legal guardian of the minor children in Elizabeth's family. In 1845, one of these now-adult children, Mary Ann Montgomery, married Nathan Bedford Forrest, making Reverend Cowan a surrogate father-in-law to Forrest.
In 1850, the younger Cowan set off for medical school. Within a few months, he completed his studies at Aylett’s Institute and the University Medical College of New York City. At that time, many doctors only studied as apprentices under other physicians, so J. B., as a medical school graduate, was considered highly qualified.
When the Civil War broke out in 1861, J. B. was newly married with a wife and infant son, but he volunteered his services to the Confederacy. Unsurprisingly, when Bedford Forrest began raising a cavalry battalion, J. B. was assigned as the unit's surgeon, a position he would hold throughout the war. As the medical director of Forrest’s cavalry, J. B. treated every wound Forrest suffered.
Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, Confederate States Army
LOC
In mid-December 1862, Forrest embarked on an expedition that would further solidify his reputation as a daring commander. With a force of about 1,800 men, he was sent into western Tennessee to destroy the Mobile & Ohio Railroad, the main supply line feeding Ulysses Grant's advancing army in Vicksburg.
On December 18, 1862, Forrest attacked the U.S. garrison holding Lexington, Tennessee. The Union troops there, including a regiment of Tennessee Unionists, were commanded by Col. Robert Ingersol. Before the war, Ingersol had gained fame as the Great Agnostic, a traveling lecturer advocating agnosticism—the belief that there is no knowledge (a "gnosis") to convince him of God's existence.
Forrest reached the outskirts of Lexington just after dark on the 17th and ordered an attack by elements of the 4th Alabama cavalry at dawn on the 18th. The attack shattered Ingersol’s defense line, allowing the rest of Forrest’s command to flood into the town. The Tennessee Unionists did not wait for the attack; they retreated hastily. Ingersol and about 300 men were captured, including J. B. Cowan.
During his captivity, J. B. made a believer of the Great Agnostic—not in the Christian faith, but in J. B.’s ability to fill an inside straight. J. B. had a reputation as the best poker player in Forrest’s command, and he cleaned out Ingersol’s wallet. When Ingersol was paroled, J. B. loaned him a hundred dollars to cover his travel expenses. This proved to be a very good investment.
In 1887, Ingersol was in Nashville on a lecture tour, and J. B. traveled from his home in Tullahoma, where he was practicing medicine, to hear his old adversary speak. When Ingersol took the stage, he saw J. B. and waved to him. At the conclusion of the lecture, Ingersol went into the audience, shook hands with J. B., and handed him a check for a hundred dollars ... Confederate.
J. B. Cowan died at the town drugstore in Tullahoma in 1909 while waiting for a prescription to be filled.
Sources
Michael Bradley, Nathan Bedford Forrest's Escort and Staff (Arcadia Publishing, 2006)
John Morton, The Artillery of Nathan Bedford Forrest's Cavalry: "The Wizard of the Saddle" (Publishing House of the M.E. Church, South Smith & Lamar, 1909)
|
|
