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On Tattoos, Nashville, and the Civil War? (Part 1) - Ep 11
505 Plays7 days ago
In this Episode, David discusses his recent travels to California and Connor’s visit to Nashville the week before.
David and Connor met up with Aaron Deter-Wolf of Archaeology Ink and Danny Riday of Totemic Tattoo in Nashville, who gave David and Connor hand-poked tattoos with bone and stone. David discusses the artistry, history, and process behind Danny’s work and his hand-poked tattoo, that is a memorial to his late dog, Strider.
David then discusses three Civil War era sites he and Connor toured in the Nashville area called the Carter House, Carnton Plantation, the Lotz House, which all were part of the Battle of Franklin. This battle was a major part of the Civil War and the eventual collapse of the confederate army.
In Part 2, David will then discusses the Bellemeade Mansion and the Hermitage in Nashville, and how these powerful Southern families partook in the war.
But mainly, David speaks candidly about how these historic sites have evolved (and not evolved) in their ways of including the story Black Americans and those of the African Diaspora into the landscape of these histories.
Transcripts
- For rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/ethnocynology/11
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Transcript
Introduction to Episode 11
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network.
00:00:14
Speaker
Welcome to episode 11 of Ethnosynology. I'm your host, David Ian Howe. I guess it's Ethnosynology with David Ian Howe.
Travel Stories and Living in Nashville
00:00:21
Speaker
And yeah, today i want to talk about a lot of stuff has happened. I literally just got off the plane from, was flying out of Orange County. I was in l LA the other day, ah visiting my cousin. I haven't met my My cousin is like one of my best friends, but he's my mom's, my mom and his dad are cousins. So whatever the legal term is for what me and him are, but we're like, you know, best friends.
00:00:45
Speaker
i was his best man at his wedding. does This doesn't matter for the podcast. But anyway, I was out there visiting him. And the week before that, ah my friend Connor, who used to be a host of Life in Ruins, came to visit me in Nashville and If you don't know, like me personally, I guess, like i long story, like I'm home base, I'm from New York, but I home base in Nashville.
00:01:06
Speaker
If the IRS is asking, if the Tennessee Department of Business is asking, like, you know, when i do my taxes and stuff, this is where I'm from. um My brother is special needs and he lives with my parents. So part of the year, I just live with my parents and help them take care of my brother. The other half of the year, I'm in Wyoming or a part elsewhere here in Nashville, or, you know, just like
Episode Topics
00:01:28
Speaker
I come in and out. and but Basically, right now, the the other main reason I'm here ah is my parents are moving to Knoxville, Tennessee, ah which is where i went to college, actually.
00:01:38
Speaker
And I'm helping them pack the house and move and stuff. So long story short, ah while Connor was here visiting, because we were... This goes into the other thing. So this this podcast will be three different things. Talking about the tattoo.
00:01:50
Speaker
I'm talking about something to do with the Civil War. And I'm talking about something to do with California. But...
Tattoo Adventures with Connor
00:01:56
Speaker
To condense that real quick, Connor was here ah because we were in town to get a tattoo from Totemic Tattoo.
00:02:01
Speaker
ah His name is Daniel Rude. He does hand poking tattoos. um He lives outside the caves in France. And he was in town working with Aaron Dieter Wolf, who was a guest on A Life in Ruins. I think one of the first 10. He might have been like episode four or five.
00:02:16
Speaker
Really intelligent dude. Great guy. Archaeology Inc. on Instagram. And he has a book called Ancient Inc., which is the archaeology of tattooing. You can look that up. But anyway, Connor was in town for that.
00:02:27
Speaker
And because, you know, the house is being sold, I'm helping my parents pack and move stuff. Connor and I are like moving up moving couches and stuff and then like when the house was being shown or like their moving sale was happening we had to just leave the house so i took connor to all these civil war sites that nashville is a pretty important part of the civil war and franklin more specifically just south of nashville where we live and is very important to the civil war the battle of franklin was a huge part of the civil war is a turning part of the war turning point of the war
00:02:58
Speaker
And i'm I'm segueing here. So i want to talk about the Civil War aspect thing. This is really cool. has to do with the Columbian Exchange, enslaved peoples, museums, and you know how we're working with that today.
00:03:10
Speaker
but was I found this really interesting, ah the way like this has evolved over time. But first, let me get the tattoo aspect out of the way. Connor's in town helping me with that. oro Sorry, Connor's helping help me and my parents move stuff.
00:03:23
Speaker
My parents are old. My brother's like very special needs. so like It just was really handy to have Connor around helping. and We were going to get the tattoos by this guy. and he is from He's from Seattle, um I think, originally, but he moved to New Zealand.
00:03:39
Speaker
ah That's where I you know met him on Instagram when he was living in New Zealand. Now he moved to France, and he lives outside the caves in France. He's your typical... like super dreadlocked dude. Who's just super down to earth has traveled the earth. Like literally he's been to like so many, I think he's said he's been to almost as many countries as his age, which I believe was 38, which is crazy.
00:04:01
Speaker
i did a podcast with him but just you know, record just cause he was tattooing me while, and I figured like might as well record the conversation cause I love talking to tattoo artists, but yeah, and I'll do a whole two hours thing on that on the other show.
00:04:15
Speaker
i I guess I could do it here on ethno, but it's like like three hours. i don't think it would work for this one. and yeah no kind I'll figure that out. I'll talk to you guys after this. but Yeah, he said du but the the main thing that he does is he does hand poke tattoos and he learned from the Maori and he learned from other people in different places and he's apprenticed under people, but he hand pokes tattoos, which if you're not familiar with that phrase, when you think of a tattoo parlor, you hear like that when people are tattooing you, that's an electric machine that's like poking a needle back and forth, kind of like a sewing machine into your arm, you know, without putting thread. It's just dipping ink into your arm really fast, poking you.
00:04:53
Speaker
And what tattooing is, is you're like piercing the dermis, and the epidermis, I should say, into the dermis. I could be mistaking that. But you're you're putting ink into the that. And a machine does that extremely fast. And because of that, it really hurts. Like it like can burn. and It feels... You've never had a tattoo and you're curious. It feels like a constant concentrated sunburn.
00:05:15
Speaker
Like if you could just take... the worst sunburn you've had but like, you know, when you're in the sun and you know, you're being burned, like you get like, you know, that you hear yourself sizzling, but you're like, yeah, I need to put sunscreen on or get out of this gut sun.
00:05:27
Speaker
It's that just like at the head of a pin. And like, as your tattoo, it's just, you know, a raw open wound on your arm as it's, you're poking into the dermis or the epidermis and the ink is going in there.
00:05:39
Speaker
It's like filling the hole that it made with ink and that heals over. And that's
Tattoo Significance and Experiences
00:05:43
Speaker
what a tattoo is. Yeah. And it it really hurts with a metal one, but with the, the hand poke one, he used metal and then bone and then stone, which is why, like, I really wanted this guy to do it. He's also and extremely talented artist. Like he's a, the genuine artist, this guy, Daniel Rodei, totemic tattoo on Instagram.
00:06:03
Speaker
And Yeah, it like so surprisingly did not hurt. Like it it kind of felt like a massage like when he was poked. And it's still, know, your skin's getting poked for sure.
00:06:14
Speaker
But it it did not hurt as much as I thought it would. And it was just very like, you know, it's an intimate thing. We're like at Aaron Deterwolf's house and in his like... so It's almost like gazebo back porch, closed in black back porch, but that's also like in the backyard.
00:06:31
Speaker
He called it his COVID hut or something similar because he was out there during COVID just because it was separate from the house and the kids could do schoolwork out there in silence and stuff. But yeah, it was nice. I could like see the sky while I was getting tattooed, like laying down in this nice little room with like cool like world music going on. And Daniel's just talking to me and her Danny talking to me as he's doing it. And it was a tattoo of Strider with some wolves in it. It's,
00:06:54
Speaker
It's beautiful. It's really cool. I hate like being like, this tattoo I have is beautiful, but I'm saying that the art that this guy put on my arm is beautiful, I'll say. And it hurt very little. And we talked Danny and I talked the whole time about like, um well, he tattooed Connor first. I should say that. He tattooed him the Lisko horse on Connor's back. Like the typical, you think of Lisko and the horse there, that's the one you're thinking of. It's i got a big fat belly, little legs and a big head. um And it's like kind of rusty colored, like not ochre, but it's like a tan, orangish brown but color. Yeah.
00:07:29
Speaker
That was what Connor got. And I watched him do that as I was setting up my podcast stuff, which takes me like three freaking hours because nothing's ever in the spot I'm supposed to put it in and in my bag when I bring And then, of course, I forgot things.
00:07:41
Speaker
But yeah, he did that. And then eventually after the metal poking and he got most of the tattoo done, he then used a bone needle, which was deer bone. And like Aaron sharpened it with some sandpaper.
00:07:56
Speaker
And it had already been like prefiled down to like a shape to be poking with. ah pokey shape, a stabbing shape. And what he did was sharpen that and then dips that in ink and then puts that on my arm.
00:08:08
Speaker
And like that really hurt. The most pain I felt from that whole session was the big bone needle poking in. And this is going to be just trigger warning for people that aren't cool with like blood or, you know, poking or skin stuff.
00:08:23
Speaker
It's not violent by any means, but like you could feel the skin uh, I can't explain it. You know when your ears pop and you can like kind of hear your ears like the water in your ears moving around or you can feel your stomach kind of gurgling like but you hear it in your head.
00:08:41
Speaker
kind of just You're hearing sounds inside your body, right? When he would take the bone needle and poke my skin, I could feel like my skin pop. like It was like a visceral like in my head. It was just like...
00:08:54
Speaker
As he was doing it. Insane. And I can imagine if you aren't into that, you would like kind of puke. But like it was a cool feeling because it's like I am being like aboriginally tattooed right now. like This is how people used to do it.
00:09:07
Speaker
And it was like... pretty surreal experience. And then Aaron was telling us, you know, like the Plains Cree and like other tribes and nations and people around the world that, cause basically Aaron said being not not being tattooed was abnormal in the past. Like it seems everybody probably was tattooed to some extent or with body modification of some kind with piercings or ah stigmata or just scarring.
00:09:32
Speaker
And we get into this in the other episode, but you're, you're scarring. Basically a tattoo comes from the way it was invented. More or less was probably somebody got a big cut and they threw dirt in it and it happened to be ash or something. And the ash didn't like eject as well. Like the dirt will like push out of your skin, ah but like the ash color stayed behind over the scar and they were like, Oh, that's cool.
00:09:54
Speaker
And like, like it might be an independently invented thing around the world because it's just easy enough to do that. And people already put like, you know, herbs or different plants and medicines in their arm or in cuts and and stuff when you get those. Yeah.
00:10:08
Speaker
Like around the world in indigenous cultures. So that's probably where it comes from. But anyway, yeah, incredibly weird sensation to hear that. And it it genuinely hurt because it was like it was bigger than a metal needle, of course.
00:10:20
Speaker
But it was a lot cleaner of a poke because it was bone. I can't really describe it, but you could hear it in your head. And he was telling us that... You know, other cultures, like, they'll do this as a whole ceremony and, like, there's people singing and it's, like, there's a whole pomp and circumstance to this. Whereas we just, like, come in and I'm like, all right, see you Tuesday at 11. You know, that's, like, how tattoos go now.
00:10:40
Speaker
But it's cool. And I've always said, too, like, tat tattoo artists are, like, not your therapist or not a doctor. But I go to get a tattoo when I want to permanently change my body, you know? Like, it's, like...
00:10:52
Speaker
This person's making ah a lifelong change to your arm and you're allowing them to do that. Like I'm, you're allowing that person to do that to you, which is quite, Intense.
00:11:03
Speaker
Like I allowed my doctor to do a so what's septoplasty thing is what I had. My steviated septum. That's a permanent change to my face. I don't think it did anything. i like It didn't help. All I did was hurt after the surgery.
00:11:16
Speaker
he might have just wanted money. And then i got my tonsils taken out when I was younger. had a cyst taken out of my chest when I was younger too. i had to go under for that. And it was like deep in there.
00:11:28
Speaker
And yeah, that's like a permanent body. That was TMI. Permanent body modification, right? So is a tattoo. And then usually a tattoo is very transactional. You walk in and you're like, all right, see you Tuesday at 11.
00:11:39
Speaker
And you just already have the design planned out. It's easy. He uses the machine. It's kind of quick, like two hours, unless you're doing a huge piece, which can take like six. This took eight. And I had to lay there on my back for eight hours like while he did this. I wouldn't say eight. It was from like noon to 7 p.m.
00:11:55
Speaker
So i guess that's eight. It was just like, yeah it was like almost 730. And then just like, like poking into my arm. I'm going on a tangent now, but just letting you know, like the anthropological aspect of this and where I'm going with the doctor aspect here is he, know, you're laying there for eight hours with this guy who's traveled the world. He's a genuinely intriguing person. He lives outside the caves in France, like let's go and Chauvet and Rolfignac, I think is the one he mentioned that several times. And,
00:12:25
Speaker
Yeah, like just so like cool. Like it not like in a shaman sense, I guess. Like he might be like weirded out if I called him a shaman. But, you know, in that kind of sense, just like he was a. was an artist. du He was a tattooist. Like I can't describe it. And I just allowed him.
00:12:40
Speaker
And I'm an idiot and I forgot. ah Well, half an idiot. I forgot to bring Strider's ashes. I was very hesitant to put them in there because I already have health issues already. And I was like i don't need like my dead dog's ashes in an open wound. of a hand-poked tattoo.
00:12:53
Speaker
but just I'm going to lose my arm. um But also, due to the circumstances of Strider's inhalating when he was being cremated, there's a lot of gravel in it because, there're again, his bones weren't there.
00:13:06
Speaker
it was just meat in a bag. That's a whole thing, too. I think I talked about that on the episode. i brought like four bags of dog meat to this lady, and she was like, are you serious? was like, yes. dead serious. She's like, whoa.
00:13:17
Speaker
And like, I think there wasn't as much to put in the cream. So there's like some extra gravel in the bag, the, you know, it whatever. Uh, probably not the safest thing to put his ashes in my arm, but it was a thought that counts. But Danny's like, just an incredibly kind and like clearly just down to earth, dude.
00:13:31
Speaker
And he, this was about Strider and he's followed me for Danny's followed me for like, Since the start of my Instagram, dude, like he's been, he's been like ride or die the whole time. um i think he was, he was a guest on Ruins as well. Totally forgot. I had missed that episode because I was out of town. i don't remember which episode it was. I'll, I'll put that in here in a minute.
00:13:48
Speaker
Carlton interviewed him. Really cool guy. he he knew it was for Strider. It was a piece about Strider. He'd seen Strider for years on my like you know Instagram. And like when Strider died, and I did this. And I originally wanted a hyena from him because I love hyenas.
00:14:02
Speaker
And he was like, hyenas kind of have like a weird energy. like You wouldn't want wouldn't want that on your arm forever. What about wolves? And i was like, all right, let's just do a tribute to Strider. And we did that. And it's just a beautiful piece of art. But he also asked me like in the middle of it, like...
00:14:15
Speaker
Do you want to say any words for Strider? And I tried my best not to cry. it was just me, Connor, and then Aaron walked back in. And I don't know Aaron as well. um Not that I like, I completely comfortable with my masculinity enough to just cry in front of anybody. But like, it was just like,
Instagram Connections and Tattoo Meaning
00:14:30
Speaker
the circumstances of like the whole situation, i just wasn't about to just like start bawling and I'm past it, you know, but like, it was just like,
00:14:37
Speaker
And you're you're actively being poked and tattooed at the same time, so I wasn't trying to like get into that headspace, but just was like... I should have. That probably would it more powerful to me, but... Yeah, just like... You're getting poked by him tattooing you, and like we're talking about like my dead dog, which...
00:14:55
Speaker
The whole, my whole account, this podcast, everything has to do with Strider. ah My account exists because of Strider. And Aaron Dieter Wolf called me one day. and He's like Hey man, like, what should I do? and I was like, make an Instagram. And like, he made an Instagram and that's how he met Danny.
00:15:10
Speaker
Cause Danny, you know, followed me. And these two guys meet up and go to like mummy conferences and they go to tattoo conventions together. And they've done experimental archeology work together. Not to toot my horn. This sounds weird, but like through me, like they met through me, but all this to say like that all happened because of I posted pictures of my dog on the internet.
00:15:29
Speaker
So it was just kind of wild that this guy lived in New Zealand and i was like, well, If I ever made it to New Zealand, I guess I'll get a tattoo with him. And then he moved to France. And I was like, well, I guess if he moves to France, if we yeah I ever go to France, not Paris, and I go way down in the south of France, like maybe he'll, I can get a tattoo with him.
00:15:46
Speaker
And then one day he was going be in Nashville. you going to be in town? And I was like, yes, I will. So that's how this happened. And with that, we'll be right back. And we're back. And yeah, he was just tattooing me and we just you know saying these words about Strider. And it just was like kind of surreal. like I'm getting poked. like It was just like...
00:16:05
Speaker
five, six years now of doing this Instagram stuff. It's crazy to say. and like, this guy's been there from the beginning and now he's like halfway across the world tattooing me in this really cool situation, like with my best friend who also just got tattooed by him and super cool. And like, I, though the craziest part was the bone needle. Yeah. And then he also used lithics and these lithics flakes were from France and he like scratched into my arm,
00:16:34
Speaker
like There's a sun around Strider's head, kind of like a halo. And the striations and that the rays of the sun are cut in with stone. And parts of Strider, too, like the accents on his like fur and stuff are also with the stone in certain parts.
00:16:49
Speaker
And the way you do that is like when your your skin is just cut open, then you throw the ink in it. And he rubs the ink in and then it heals over, and then you have the ink in it. Then you have a tattoo.
00:16:59
Speaker
And the way his the sun on my arm is like the way it looks, you can only do that. And they know this through experimental tattooing stuff. You can only do that with stone.
00:17:10
Speaker
ah It's pretty cool. So they're trying to look at mummies and stuff now and there's some in Peru and some in Germany where they can and the ones from Germany are from I believe South America somewhere and you can like look at them and heat they're testing different ways of like different items and implements to tattoo with to see like what these people would have been using and it probably was stone and bone obviously and it could have been yucca needles or cactus needles yeah pretty pretty wild experience that'll be on the other show or this show we'll figure it out
00:17:42
Speaker
So enough on on the tattooing there. But yeah, Danny, if you're if you're listening, Aaron, you're listening, thank you again for that. It was like a really cool experience. And then for the audience listening too, and then you guys as well.
Civil War History in Nashville
00:17:53
Speaker
Connor and I went back to my parents' place to shower. Then I met up with some friends from high school and college that were also in town that weekend. It was like a fun weekend. A fun day, I should say. I was exhausted. I just lost like, you know, not a pint of blood. That'd be way too much. But like I lost a tattoo amount of blood. So you're kind of like...
00:18:10
Speaker
You know, you should eat something. Drink some water before you go to a bar. And I went home and, like, showed my parents. Like, oh, that that's cool. And I'm like, yeah, but it's like, this isn't just cool. This is, like, really fucking cool, Mom. And, like, ah she didn't, like, fully grasp it, which I found funny. Anyway, I'm going back to Wyoming in a few weeks. I will be at the SAAs in Denver, by the way, if this comes out before then. Surely it will. And then I'll be out west for the the rest of the year.
00:18:35
Speaker
But... Yeah, enough on the tattooing. The other aspect, like I said earlier, was... i think I said there's three aspects to this episode. It might just be two. The third aspect was that I went to California. i was going to talk about the mission, but I might not get to that.
00:18:49
Speaker
We're going to about the Civil War stuff. So... Yeah, I grew up in Long Island or on Long Island, I should say. like You can get put in jail for saying in. It's an on situation.
00:19:00
Speaker
You get on the subway. You don't get in the subway. You get on Long Island. You don't go in Long Island. ah But I was in Nashville is how you would phrase it. people People get really uptight about that.
00:19:11
Speaker
Linguistics. Yeah, i was born Long Island, grew up there and had all that culture. And then I moved to Nashville when I was the very end of eighth grade. Like I remember...
00:19:22
Speaker
School in New York ends in June, but school in the rest of the country ends in, like, May for some reason, I guess because it's hot and people farm. So, like, I ended school... I got a month less of school because I had started in September and, like, ended in May when I moved to Tennessee. This is all irrelevant stuff, sorry. And then... But we moved to Franklin, and it Like, in Long Island, we had Revolutionary War stuff, and if you remember our, like...
00:19:48
Speaker
The epically failed Revolutionary War episode of Ruins, which you can go back and find. We made a lot of stuff up on accident. I will say Long Island was a British stronghold for most of the war. there's an arsenal stronghold. New York was hell. I think they took the city, but Long Island was always like a British controlled area.
00:20:07
Speaker
there's a lot because of that. A lot of stuff wasn't destroyed in war. There's a lot of like extra like houses and stuff. And like, things you can tour in New York that are on Long Island that are revolutionary war. And I was too young for that to like really care. And I haven't, like when I go back to New York, I'm usually like in the city. I'm not like going back to Long Island to look at like some colonial house, but in Tennessee, Franklin and Nashville, huge part of the civil war.
00:20:32
Speaker
And of course, like we did a bunch of field trips there in eighth grade and in high school. And yeah, so Franklin, I guess I'll just start. I'm kind of gearing up to the Civil War thing. You might as well just just start. So the Confederacy secedes, right? It becomes the Confederate States of America.
00:20:51
Speaker
Tennessee is right below the Mason-Dixon line. think it goes through Kentucky. Kentucky was a, i think, neutral state. I could already be messing that up, but it doesn't matter. We're talking about Nashville and Tennessee.
00:21:03
Speaker
Tennessee was considered like the frontier at this point. like it Not like the frontier, like the Wild West. It was just like... Past the Appalachians, it was just dense wooded areas where there were still natives. There was still, in some parts, um there was like a lot of untamed land still. Not to say that it was like straight up Lewis and Clark wilderness, but it was like, it hadn't been, i would just say, quote unquote, civilized yet. Like, it, like,
00:21:30
Speaker
Britain hadn't gotten that far, you know? So it was like still pretty rural, pretty wooded, pretty like, I wouldn't say lawless, but it was definitely like the frontier, if that makes sense. I can't describe it any other way than that.
00:21:44
Speaker
And the Western theater of the war was considered like, you know, far in the frontier because the rest of it happened, you know, on the coast and in Gettysburg and Virginia and south South South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia. Yeah.
00:21:58
Speaker
And after, you know, the the Battle of Georgia and then trying to take Atlanta and there's Lookout Mountain and stuff up there, the Confederacy pushed back to Tennessee and then tried to take Nashville back from Franklin.
00:22:11
Speaker
And the very first year of the war, it might have been 1862, apologies. 1862, before that, might have been 1861. 1861. Basically, to put it lightly, the union was like, no, no, no, no.
00:22:24
Speaker
Nashville's ours. They just came through Kentucky, took Nashville and held it the whole war. And that's why another reason I love Nashville. It's like. The meme of it, you know, in Tennessee, like it's a you it's a liberal city, like all the conservative counties outside of it are like liberals that live there. Like, it's funny.
00:22:41
Speaker
But also, like during the war, the union was like, no, like you're not having Nashville. It's a very like northern city. And Nashville, directly north of that is Louisville, and directly north of that is Cincinnati. And it's not directly north, but like there's a three-city stretch right there.
00:22:59
Speaker
And, of course, if you're going on ah from the Mississippi, there's Memphis, and you go up to St. Louis. It's all like kind of parallel going north that way. um It's like a very – like you're still in the north. I can't describe it other than that. Nashville is just cool. it's like It's music city. It's not too southern. It's not Florida. It's not like the bayou in Louisiana. It's just like a – Your typical like American city, and it has boomed. Nashville is huge now. And like I was trying to try explain to Connor, who's like, the poor guy's trying to navigate me around Nashville with his Apple Maps.
00:23:31
Speaker
He's like why is this road taking us this was like, I don't dude, just follow it. Because Nashville like sprawled so fast because it's a big healthcare care city. And the music industry boomed. And a lot of other businesses and restaurants and stuff were here. So it's a really big town.
00:23:45
Speaker
Thank you to the Union Army who took it back and did not let it go and did it did not burn like Atlanta did. It was kept. And there was a battle of Nashville, I think, I think in the very beginning. But it was just a quick like, get out like the Union Army.
00:24:01
Speaker
And anyway, so that was 1861 or 1862. ah Later on in the war, the Confederacy came from Atlanta going back, and that was, ah what's his name's March to the Sea? Sherman?
00:24:13
Speaker
I believe it was Sherman. Yes, it was Sherman. Sherman had like... Back then it would called be called melancholia. Today it would be called, and back then he was just a silly guy maybe, or an alcoholic that he might have been known as, but he had like manic depressive disorder.
00:24:27
Speaker
And the dude would just sleep for like days and the army would be like, what is happening? And then he would wake up out of his like depressed, drunken stupor. And then for like three days, just rage. He'd be like, we're taking Nashville, we're taking Atlanta.
00:24:40
Speaker
And he pushed people to the sea. um William Tecumseh Sherman, that's right, and suffered from bipolar disorder, previously known as manic depression. There we go. Symptoms include extreme mood swings, creative and resilient leadership skills, hopelessness, which is you know great in your commanders, insomnia, loss of appetite. I'm sure the soldiers love that.
00:24:58
Speaker
And then racing thoughts and speech, irritability, impatience, and aggression. yeah This guy is why the south one the or the North won the Civil War in the South. He was just a wild dude. And that was all going on. So the Confederacy was like, let's sneak up through Franklin and get to Nashville.
00:25:12
Speaker
And Nashville was a union stronghold. And there was some union troops in Franklin that went down south to just scout it out a bit. And Franklin, again, remember, this was important that I said it was kind of the the frontier.
00:25:26
Speaker
There wasn't like cities all over the place. It took like, it took like all day to get from Franklin to Nashville, which is a 20 minute drive. But for them, it would have been like four hours on a horse and carriage.
00:25:38
Speaker
That's kind of irrelevant, but i'm where I'm getting getting at here is the battle ended up um in the front yards of the plantations and the townspeople in Franklin. like and one of the plantations that Connor and I went and took a tour on, and the I think I missed this in the beginning, but...
00:25:55
Speaker
A lot of people come visit in Nashville because it's a cool town. My family lives here. i'm like yeah, you can stay with my parents. Like I'll fly out that weekend too. Or like me when I lived in Georgia, I was like, i meet you there. Or like, no, I'm like, yeah, it just come stay. Like we have an extra room.
00:26:06
Speaker
My parents love showing people around. and um, Other friends aren't like, you know, too stoked on going to see a place where, you know, enslaved people picked cotton. No, not just to just be, you know, blunt.
00:26:19
Speaker
It's not their first thing they fly and land here to do So and I understand that. But Connor being a historian like us was just like, yeah, I want to see this stuff just for like the battles in the historical context of it.
00:26:30
Speaker
And these people really do care about these sites and like. There's stewards of the site. There's like an association town my dad donates to that's like, you know, preserving the Battle of Franklin. So because it's's it's cool and
Battle of Franklin Highlights
00:26:42
Speaker
important. But the the Battle of Franklin, I'll get to this, is the reason why the South lost.
00:26:47
Speaker
They just like it was the last full battle of the South where they're like, yeah, this isn't this ain't happening. So that's when they push north to Gettysburg. Like we're we're just not having this. We're losing. Yeah, so the Union Army, and this is hard to explain without picturing it or seeing a picture or like a video to show it to you. I'm just talking to you right now because this is an audio episode.
00:27:07
Speaker
The South was trying to come forth. Schofield was here. a Hood was this Confederate guy. I can't remember. Nathan Bedford Forrest is involved in this somehow, who was an idiot, and he ended up making the Klan.
00:27:18
Speaker
And he was a terrible you know army commander, and he lost the war for everybody. so Right. OK, so the Confederacy is trying to sneak north to Nashville. ah There's the Battle of Spring Hill, which is just south of Franklin. And then there's Franklin. Then there's Nashville. Well, Brentwood, then Nashville. I think i don't know if Brentwood existed then.
00:27:36
Speaker
They're trying to push north. So the Union comes down a little bit into Franklin just to see what's going on. And they set up some artillery and they bomb the bridges ah so that the Confederacy can't get north.
00:27:47
Speaker
to Nashville. And and ah they they do that, or the Confederacy bombed it, it doesn't matter. i think the Union bombed it, and the Confederates start building bridges to get there, like repair the bridges, and a whole battle ensues, because the art and the Northern Army is just launching artillery down at the Confederates.
00:28:05
Speaker
And it's a huge outnumbered force of Confederates to Union, because it was just a few like green dudes that were in the in Nashville that went south to go check. And they're like, hey, the the boys are coming.
00:28:16
Speaker
And so they just set up artillery. And I think she said Howard Sears. I want to be there. But Napoleons, what they call it, full Napoleons, which is like a a huge cannon, launching into the Confederates. And it's just the Confederates start pushing. And, like, the bridge was messed up.
00:28:32
Speaker
So they had to go around it. And they were like, it's just it's a whole thing. And it was just this gigantic massacre And Nathan Bedford Forrest leads this charge and they just get mowed down by, I don't think it was machine guns at the time. i want to say it's a howitzer. I always think of a howitzer as a machine gun.
00:28:49
Speaker
Think of howitzer as just an artillery. Someone listening is like screaming right now, you know I mean? The, the boys, the union kids are launching just hell fired, like, like If you can think of the most carnage, you could think of Napoleonic era, Civil War era, and then almost World War II. Basically, the the the Civil War in America was the prelude to World War I, like in terms of technology. they were The stuff that they were using here and pioneering ended up being used in World War among many other things. But there was trench warfare.
00:29:19
Speaker
The Battle of Spring Hill had trenches and stuff. And... where I'm going with that is just an utter massacre of Confederate soldier. And this, there's three families that live in Franklin. There was the, I'll just start with the lots family, l O T Z. You can look this up. They were German immigrants that moved to Franklin, Tennessee. And they're like, Oh, we started to be able to house and they built a house.
00:29:41
Speaker
And then cannonball went through it during the battle and they all huddled under and their house is cool. You can see it's just cool. Cause they, uh, Some German immigrant like built the whole thing from scratch with his hands yeah and they lived like pretty much downtown and across the street from them was the Carter house.
00:29:57
Speaker
And the Carter house is a small farmhouse. They had some land belief. They had slaves. I want to say they did. They might not have. I don't, they didn't have like that big of a farm. And they had a basement and like most of the townsfolk around there hung out and hid down in the basement with us right there. Slaves were there in like the lots family, the Germans, the Carter family who had like a few kids, wife, a husband, I think of a cousin hanging out and then some other towns, people and they're enslaved.
00:30:27
Speaker
were hiding out in this basement. And like part of the Carter house, you can look this up is just like one of the walls that are still safe. It's the most bullet ridden wall of the civil war is in Franklin, Tennessee. That's still standing.
00:30:39
Speaker
Cause it just like the whole battle. If you think of like the scene in the Patriot where the battles just kind of coming out in front of their house, it was that, and just like utter carnage, hand to hand combat bayonets. Like it would have been an awful, terrifying thing to hear. And just like,
00:30:55
Speaker
Hell on earth. Like, it would have been bad. And like, you know, and not to get graphic, but like you hear the cannons and you hear people screaming. And then when people are dying, they like gurgle and there's like, you know, screaming for their mothers and shit.
00:31:07
Speaker
And like the way the guy always paints the picture when you do like the tours, it's like, oh my God, like chill. Like, I don't need to hear all that. But and then amputations and people screaming and like... It's the Confederacy, so they're all very you know Christian kids. and like And when I say kids, I know I say kids jokingly usually, but like a lot of Confederate soldiers were like 15.
00:31:25
Speaker
yeah And like there's pastors and stuff reading their last rites to them and things. All this going on while this family's just like huddled downstairs being like, oh my God. And like the Carter House...
00:31:37
Speaker
and their son was in the battle and he rode and there's always this story of like hero look he rode his horse rode in he got shot 15 fucking times or something dumb um he got shot and he died but he died in his house and his like last thing was like i'm gonna die here and like this story is like it was he passed out and they brought him to the house did he ride home to the house but the sad irony of it is he fought the war for the confederacy and was gone for years came back and he died at his house for nothing you know and it's just like Yeah.
00:32:09
Speaker
Kind of a bummer. You know, he fought to, you know, and they're like, well, it's for states' rights. Yeah, states' rights to own enslaved people. Grow up. Like, that's what it was. So, but he also was defending his home. You can understand it the nuance of that way. And he quite literally was defending his home from the Union Army because his parents were in the basement.
00:32:27
Speaker
His family and his, you know, family slaves and other people in town. So, it's kind of a sad thing. So, that's the Carter House. But right down the road from that is the Carton Plantation. I want to get to Belmead as well.
00:32:39
Speaker
um The carton plantation is a they had didn't... I think they might have had cotton or tobacco. It wasn't like a huge plantation like that. It was just like they had farm fields. They had pigs, they had cows. It wasn't like a giant cash crop thing. And...
00:32:56
Speaker
I want to talk about the the slave aspect of this or like the, you know, the the museum part of this and then ah the the battle part. But again, this battle was at night. So the Battle of Franklin just kind of stumbles onto these people. This is called the Carton Plant. c a r t o n C-A-R-T-O-N. Carton?
00:33:12
Speaker
C-A-R-N-T-O-N. Carton. Carton. There you And... ah The battle stumbles onto their property, and the general this Confederate general, I believe, was Schofield. might have been in the Union. I can't remember, you guys. Just you bear with me. There's like Hood, there's Schofield, there's Sherman, there's like and this was...
00:33:35
Speaker
There was Schofield, who was the opposite to him. There was someone else. There's another guy that a base is named after or a gun is named after. It doesn't matter. There's Union guys and there's Confederate guys, two big names that you know. And they, the Confederate guys come to the house earlier that day and they're like, hey, the battle is going to happen right here. We need your house as a hospital.
00:33:53
Speaker
And it was like at the time, a huge house, like as a plantation home. And they were like, my God. And at this point, the owner of the home, they were Irish immigrants. And they bought all this land um years before, like 18, early 1830s, I want to say.
00:34:09
Speaker
And then the war was 30 years later. And the, they hit our, he had already, the guy here wasn't involved in the war whatsoever, but he had already pledged his loyalty to the union. And he was like,
00:34:21
Speaker
They basically told the Confederate soldiers, like the guys that knocked on the door being like, we I always find this weird because the quartering act is like one of those big things. And it's part of the, ah the constitution that you like, you, you shouldn't have to house soldiers, but this Confederate army was like, Hey, martial law, we need your house. And like, even though you pledged to the union.
00:34:41
Speaker
And so a bunch of surgeons came to the house and the enslaved, And the children of this house had to just hand out bandages while like more and more kids just screaming like in their last moments of life with and this is going to be a graphic again, but it was the Union Army was just raining down modern artillery on that a modern for the time.
00:35:02
Speaker
And that's mini balls. And they had a grape shot and they had those big cannonballs that launched that either just rolled and took out your legs and killed horses and took out wagons and stuff.
00:35:14
Speaker
um And then the ones that exploded with timed fuses. And then the ones that exploded with timed fuses had mini balls in them. And then that would explode. It would go all over the place. And there's an account of one of the the soldier...
00:35:26
Speaker
of the surgeon saying like they found a guy who had no visible wounds, but he just, his internal organs were just mush. And he was just too close to the howitzer when it blew up.
00:35:36
Speaker
Like it, like when it launched and it just killed him. Like, it's just like utter carnage. And the family, like after the war was never the same again. Cause again, like there's people like,
00:35:47
Speaker
but Yeah, there's people screaming and crying, but there's also, like, just not to be gross, but, like, the gurgling and, like, the gasping and, like, the just screaming. And, like, i assume when you die, you probably, like, trip balls in some aspect and, like, you see the light or, like, you know, like, you just see...
00:36:03
Speaker
insane fractals or something like, you know, just shit's going on in your head. Like the neurons in your head are firing every which way and just create, and like, they were just like said, they could never get that out of their head. And the kids were kind of like wrecked the rest of their lives. And the family ended up selling the farm because it was just too much. And also it was too much because they were just thousands of Confederate soldiers like buried outside the house that they couldn't farm anymore. And they like made, they came together with the town to make a bunch of,
00:36:32
Speaker
ah to get people to donate to move all of the bodies into a cemetery that was extended from the family cemetery onto their property. ah extend The family cemetery on their property extended now to buy division. This was interesting too.
00:36:45
Speaker
They were able to identify most of the soldiers because people knew back then like, all right, well, we're going into battle, which means like my arm might be a mile away from my body when they find me. So in the inside of their collars of their shirts, they would sew their name and stuff.
00:37:00
Speaker
to be found that you could at least know like, all right, well, likey if you're that survived the battle, that's who you were in your rank, your, your regiment, where you're from, what state. And if you go to the carton plantation, you can see really nice laid out graves of Confederate
Civil War Surgeries and Realities
00:37:14
Speaker
soldiers. I'm one of the only places too, where you see Confederate flags, like that are like put there by union people, you know, modern Americans in, you know, not in their front yard yelling, hell yeah. But like in a, like these people died for their country, you know, and like,
00:37:28
Speaker
They were like 15. You put the little Confederate flags there. And I think the average age of a Confederate soldier was 22, I want to say, because it was like 50-year-old guys and like kids, ah but mostly younger guys.
00:37:42
Speaker
And sorry, but the carnage of this battle was insane. And you can see in the tour, it's your classic plantation house where it's a huge, big... Imagine the house from Django Unchained, if you've seen that. it just It's that exact style house where...
00:37:56
Speaker
Maximum airflow kind of has this Greek revival style to it. The wallpaper on the inside was imported from Greece, or I want to say Sweden, but it was meant to look like Greece. It was a different, the the hermitage, our Andrew Jackson's house has that, but I'm digressing here, guys. I'm sorry.
00:38:11
Speaker
ah Beautiful on the inside, you know, like a plantation in these houses were made for maximum airflow because the South in the summer is God awful. Like you might as well live in Jamaica. It's bad.
00:38:22
Speaker
And mosquito nets on everything. And like the, yeah yeah, a beautiful home at the time. And like they have a lot of recreations and both this family and the other family want to talk about sold all their belongings after the the plantation kind of died um in the farm and they had to sell it And a lot of people that they could track down who bought what from the house, like the piano and the art, the bookshelf and the different book sets that they had. And they got most of it back, which is pretty cool.
00:38:48
Speaker
And if they don't, didn't get it back, they know from accounts at the time what they would have had. So they bought something period appropriate. So I think the piano in there, they couldn't find the exact piano they have, but they got one from Connecticut that was made the same year.
00:39:02
Speaker
Pretty cool. And they give you like a, you know, rundown of the battle better than I did for sure. Three times better. But I kind of left you on the hanger there with the battle. its just brutal.
00:39:12
Speaker
Went into the night, a hand-to-hand combat, bayonets, like just, it was like one of the most, think they said like the most like violent hand-to-hand, like skirmishes of the Civil
Historical Insights and Comparisons
00:39:24
Speaker
War. Pretty bad. And then just raining artillery down on you and your ears are probably just ringing. It just is terrible. And you can see why when you go to this house,
00:39:33
Speaker
ah They show you all the surgeon's tools that were there and they would just get a barn door and two saw horses or throw you on the dining room table while other people are screaming and crying for their mom. ah You're just getting, you're biting down on a bullet and they're just sawing your arm. ah And it was like an assembly line of soldiers just getting tourniqueted and they're getting there, you know, you're hearing people saw through bones and all that. It's fucking awful.
00:39:58
Speaker
And like these tours are so cool for that reason. Cause you're like, you're sitting in there like, man, this was like, This was crazy. like Back in the day, to right in this little peaceful town. And like we and america if you're listening overseas, like we don't have...
00:40:12
Speaker
you know William the Conqueror didn't come here when we were, you know, we didn't have that. We didn't have the Romans and the the Normans. We just had this is the only thing we had that was that crazy. But I guess besides the Indian Wars later. But yeah, and they didn't they had they had chloroform. So they had to have proper ventilation in the house for the chloroform. So at least some people were knocked out. Other people weren't ah depending on was and they didn't have.
00:40:35
Speaker
They didn't like disinfect anything. They just took the same bloody saw that I used on the other guy and used it on the next guy. So that I think though they said it was a 75% success rate with amputations at this thing because your arms were and legs were just mangled.
00:40:47
Speaker
Like it just a mini ball, a bomb with a mini ball. Multiple mini balls shooting at your eye just nothing left. So it's just meat hanging. So you got to cut it off. And it was a 75% or I want to say it was 80. There was like a little pie chart. I can't remember exactly what the statistic was, but 75% or more of the pie chart was a success rate, you know, ah but they might've died from infection two weeks later because just absolutely dog shit medical practices at the time, but still like was, you know, the height of technology then, know,
Conclusion and Upcoming Topics
00:41:19
Speaker
Pretty bad. So that's Carton. And the battle ended. Sorry, that it goes into the night. They retreat and the Union keeps Nashville and the Confederates like, well, that that's over. So they didn't take Nashville. hi post recording David here.
00:41:32
Speaker
This episode went on for an hour and a half, which means we're going have to split it into two. It's not exactly a great spot to do this, but I think right about here will be where we split it into part one and two.
00:41:43
Speaker
Yeah, so I talked about the the tattoo stuff in Nashville and then moved on to the Civil War aspect. And then in part two will be a lot more about Carter, Bellmead and ah Andrew Jackson's house at the Hermitage, which will be more heavy and and into that. So we're going to cut it right here. Thank you for listening to the podcast. Please rate and review on Spotify, Apple, Stitcher, wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:42:02
Speaker
And ah be sure to listen to the other shows on the APM, which you can find at archipodnet.com. Thank you very much.
00:42:13
Speaker
The Archaeology Podcast Network is 10 years old this year. Our executive producer is Ashley Airy. Our social media coordinator is Matilda Sebrecht. And our chief editor is Rachel Roden. The Archaeology Podcast Network was co-founded by Chris Webster and Tristan Boyle in 2014 and is part of Cultural Media and DigTech LLC. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network.
00:42:34
Speaker
Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.