Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Monday, December 30, 1861

We made all the citizens at this place take the oath; they have to take the oath not to aid or shelter those who are fighting against the Union. There are but few men left in this locality, they having enlisted, some of them in the Union army, but most of them with the South.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 27