In the midst of the war the story was published in the “Atlantic Monthly,” of December, 1863.  In the Southwest the “Atlantic” at once found its way into regions where the real Phil Nolan was known.  A writer in the “New Orleans Picayune,” in a careful historical paper, explained at length that I had been mistaken all the way through, that Philip Nolan never went to sea, but to Texas.  I received a letter from a lady in Baltimore who told me that two widowed sisters of his lived in that neighborhood.  Unfortunately for me, this letter, written in perfectly good faith, was signed E. F. M. Fachtz.  I was receiving many letters on the subject daily.  I supposed that my correspondent was concealing her name, and was really “Eager for More Facts.”  When in reality I had the pleasure of meeting her a year or two afterwards, the two widowed sisters of the real Phil Nolan were both dead.

But in 1876 I was fortunate enough, on the kind invitation of Mr. Miner, to visit his family in their beautiful plantation at Terre Bonne.  There I saw an old negro who was a boy when Master Phil Nolan left the old plantation on the Mississippi River for the last time.  Master Phil Nolan had then married Miss Fanny Lintot, who was, I think, the aunt of my host.  He permitted me to copy the miniature of the young adventurer.

I have since done my best to repair the error by which I gave Philip Nolan’s name to another person, by telling the story of his fate in a book called “Philip Nolan’s Friends.”  For the purpose of that book, I studied the history of Miranda’s attempt against Spain, and of John Adams’s preparations for a descent of the Mississippi River.  The professional historians of the United States are very reticent in their treatment of these themes.  At the time when John Adams had a little army at Cincinnati, ready to go down and take New Orleans, there were no Western correspondents to the Eastern Press.

Within a year after the publication of the “Man without a Country” in the “Atlantic” more than half a million copies of the story had been printed in America and in England.  I had curious accounts from the army and navy, of the interest with which it was read by gentlemen on duty.  One of our officers in the State of Mississippi lent the “Atlantic” to a lady in the Miner family.  She ran into the parlor, crying out, “Here is a man who knows all about uncle Phil Nolan.”  An Ohio officer, who entered the city of Jackson, in Mississippi, with Grant, told me that he went at once to the State House.  Matters were in a good deal of confusion there, and he picked up from the floor a paper containing the examination of Philip Nolan, at Walnut Springs, the old name of Vicksburg.  This was before the real Philip’s last expedition.  The United States authorities, in the execution of the neutrality laws, had called him to account, and had made him show the evidence that he had the permission of the Governor of New Orleans for his expedition.