Chickasaw, a Mississippi Scout for the Union: The Civil War Memoir of Levi H. Naron, as Recounted by R. W. Surby

Dictated in 1865, when his memory of events was still fresh--as was his passion--Levi Holloway Naron's memoir offers a rare and remarkably vivid first-hand account of a southerner loyal to the Union, operating behind Confederate lines. A well-to-do planter and large slave owner in Chickasaw County, Mississippi, Naron had been driven from his home by his fellow Mississippians at the outbreak of the war because of his agitation against the Confederacy. As the Federal scout, spy, and raider "Chickasaw, ' active primarily in northern Mississippi and western Tennessee, he proved invaluable to Union commanders in the West--including William T. Sherman, William Rosecrans, John Pope, Grenville Dodge, and Benjamin Grierson, among others. Naron stood before Rebel commanders as well-Sterling Price, James Chalmers, and John C. Breckinridge--having bedeviled their security forces and intelligence agents. In these pages, he tells how he maneuvered under their noses, burning bridges and railcars full of supplies intended for Nathan Bedford Forrest and John Bell Hood, recruiting for the Union while clad in a Confederate uniform, chasing down Union deserters and Rebel spies, and, for diversion, suppressing guerrillas and bushwhackers. This long-forgotten historical document, newly edited and annotated, provides indispensable information about Confederate as well as Union espionage and counter-espionage activity. Naron's adventures as "Chickasaw" illuminate this clandestine war in the West.