James D. Porter, Confederate Military History, a library of Confederate States Military History: Volume 7.1, Tennessee
Clement Anselm Evans, Ed.

---

[334] shared his fate as a prisoner of war. General Bate, in his report, said of Smith that he bore himself with heroic courage, both through good and evil fortune, always executing orders with zeal and alacrity, and bearing himself in the face of the enemy as became a reputation theretofore bravely won.

---

General Otho French Strahl

General Otho French Strahl, one of the choicest spirits that embraced the cause of the South, and finally offered all upon her altar, was a native of Ohio, who had settled in Tennessee and was practicing law at Dyersburg when the great war of States began. Although of Northern birth, both of his grandmothers were Southern women, and perhaps had much to do with moulding the sentiments which made him such an ardent sympathizer with the South. When Tennessee was making ready to cast in her lot with the Southern Confederacy, the young lawyer entered the Fourth Tennessee regiment as a captain (May, 1861). Early in 1862 he became lieutenant-colonel of the regiment. As such he shared in the hardships and glories of the campaigns of Shiloh, Bentonville and Murfreesboro, in which he so conducted himself as to be promoted colonel early in 1863, and then to the rank of brigadier-general, July 28, 1863. In the hundred days campaign from Dalton to Atlanta in 1864, he and his men added to their already magnificent record. Mr. S. A. Cunningham, who was a boy soldier in his brigade at Franklin, November 30, 1864, has given in his magazine a graphic account of the conduct and death of his commander on that fateful day. Mr. Cunningham being that day right guide to the brigade, was near Strahl in the fatal advance, and was pained at the extreme sadness in his face. He was surprised, too, that his general went into the battle on foot. The account of Mr. Cunningham continues: ‘I was near General Strahl, who stood in the ditch and handed up guns to those posted to fire them. I had passed to him my short Enfield (noted in ’