A Fight at Huntsville

Private letters from Huntsville mention a fight at that place between an officer of one of the Ohio regiments and Col. Davis, of Huntsville, a law partner of Jere Clemens.  Davis was a member of the Alabama Secession Convention, and a Union man.  In the Convention he told Yancey, who threatened to coerce North Alabama, which was disposed to remain in the Union, that if he wanted a fight he should not have it in North Alabama, but on the dividing line.  After the Act of Secession, however, Davis took up arms for the Southern Confederacy.  The meeting between Col. Davis and the Ohio officer, who was of equal rank, took place at the quarters of Major McCook.  Some Champagne was opened and the discussion of the state of the country presently grew warm.  The Alabama Colonel told the Ohio Colonel he was a d----d liar, and Ohio told him that if he were not the guest of Major McCook, he would knock him down. – Alabama begged Ohio not to have any scruples of that sort, and repeated the epithet.  So at it they went.  Fair play was shown, and Ohio soon made his word good, knocking Alabama down and giving him a severe pelting when he was down.  Ohio’s damage consisted chiefly in a badly torn shirt.  Alabama received a pair of black eyes and enlarged nose and mouth.  Jere Clemens met the Ohio officer a few days afterward and told him he had inquired into the particulars of the affray, and that his partner (Davis) had been served exactly right.  Davis afterward acknowledged that he had got no more than he deserved.  This little circumstance has contributed largely to the popularity of the Ohioan in Huntsville.

P. S. – The three first letters of the Ohio Colonel’s name are Len. A. Harris. – {Cincinnati Commercial

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, June 7, 1862, p. 1