Stars of the Sultana: Tennessee cavalryman 'Plez' Keeble and a mule competed for a piece of the boat's wreckage. Keeble won out and went on to live a long life. His brother, also on the Sultana, was not as fortunate

Pvt. Pleasant Keeble (left) survived the Sultana disaster; his brother John Keeble (right) did not

Submitted by Norman Shaw

Ahead of the Nov. 14 grand opening of the new Sultana Disaster Museum in Marion, Ark., the Civil War Picket asked experts and descendants for submissions about the people involved in the story – the soldiers, the survivors, the heroes and the scoundrels. The overloaded steamboat exploded and caught fire in the Mississippi River on April 27, 1865. About 1,200 people perished, many of them released Federal POWs heading home at the end of the war. Norman Shaw, a Knoxville, Tenn., resident and founder of the Sultana Association of Descendants and Friends, submitted the following about Pleasant Keeble. (Part 1 of the series is here, Part 2 is here and Part 3 is here)

Pleasant (Plez) Keeble, 17, must have been excited when he learned Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside's Union army had arrived in Knoxville, Tenn., on September 3, 1863, after a grueling march over the rugged Appalachian Mountains from Kentucky. 

This gave Plez the opportunity to join the 3rd Tennessee Cavalry on February 16, 1864, to serve with his older brother, John, who enlisted in the regiment early in the war, on August 10, 1862, and assigned to Company A, the initial company formed. Although placed in Company H, the younger Keeble was probably content to know he would be near his big brother for the remainder of the war.

Neither soldier could imagine the terrible events that awaited them.

First, the remnants of the 3rd Tennessee Cavalry would be sent to the small Rebel prison at Cahaba, Ala., a converted cotton warehouse with little or no roof, following their capture almost en masse by Confederate Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest in September 1864. (The Federal troopers had been positioned in forts at  Athens, Ala., and Sulphur Branch Trestle, seven miles north of Athens on the railroad line.)

Former POW Jesse Hawes' drawing of Cahaba prison in Alabama

Having survived several months of captivity at the Confederate pen at Cahaba, including standing in knee-deep water for three days caused by the flooded Alabama River flowing nearby, the Union survivors were transported in March 1865 to a recovery camp at Camp Fisk, located four miles east of Vicksburg, to regain their strength for a steamboat journey to Cairo, Ill. From here, they would be transported by train to Columbus, Ohio, to be mustered out of the army.

Unfortunately, the Keeble brothers, along with their comrades in the 3rd Tennessee Cavalry, were loaded April 24, 1865, onto the ill-fated steamer Sultana, at Vicksburg, along with other former POWs from several Midwestern states, totaling almost 2,000 men.

Dedication of Sultana monument near Knoxville in July 4, 1916 (courtesy of Norman Shaw)

The overcrowded Sultana would unexpectedly explode on the Mississippi River seven miles above Memphis at 2 a.m. on April 27, 1865, killing nearly 1,200 people, including most of the crew, civilians and soldiers, America's worst maritime disaster.

After the explosion, Plez, sleeping on the hurricane deck, frantically tried but failed to locate John on the nearby Texas deck. John likely perished in the explosion after a large section of the deck was torn away in the blast.

The private, a nonswimmer, survived by beating off a mule with a stick while floating on boat wreckage with several others.

No doubt, teenager Pleasant Keeble was traumatized for life after losing his older brother John.

1920 Knoxville survivors reunion; Pleasant Keeble at far left, John H. Simpson
second from right (Knox County Public Library, McClung Historical Collection)

Eventually, Plez returned home to Knoxville to live a normal life by working, marrying and starting a family. He faithfully attended almost every reunion of Tennessee Sultana survivors who met in Knoxville and the surrounding area. They were in the sister organization to the Midwestern survivors. 

Plez was repeatedly elected adjutant and for many years kept the minutes of the yearly meetings in a school composition book.

Time took its toll on the Tennessee survivors, leaving only Pleasant and his good friend, John Simpson, alive to attend the 1929 reunion. Plez found himself all alone at the 1930 meeting and by 1931 all from the Knoxville area were gone.

To ensure the memory of the Sultana would never be forgotten, the Knoxville veterans collected enough donations to erect a beautiful marble monument in South Knox County that was dedicated on July 4, 1916, the first one in the country, and without any government assistance.

Only the names of the Tennessee men, whether they lived or died on the Sultana, are etched on all four sides of the stone.