"C Lorain Ruggles was a member of the 20th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, serving in the Mississippi-Tennessee theater as a scout, spy & detective. He claimed to be the brother of a Confederate General, in whose command he sometimes operated. Ruggles expressed his philosophy as follows: "People often ask me "What is the essential
qualification of a good spy ?" My answer is "It requires an accomplised liar". I mean by that a man that can successfully practice deception. I do not mean that a man must be a habitual liar. There is nothing that I despise more than a man whose word cannot be relied upon. Whether deception, as I have practiced it in the discharge of my duty as a spy, is a moral wrong, I shall not attempt here to argue. Of this much I am sure; it has many times saved my life and perhaps the lives of thousands of others, besides saving immense sums of money to the Government.
One of Ruggles' superiors, Brigadier General Wiles, stated that "I never knew him to give false information," and Ruggles' book contains several official comments on his success. Ruggles' book is titled, Four Years a Scout and Spy. It was ghost written for him by one of his officers, Major Edward C Downs, who enlisted Ruggles in 1861. The book went through severel editions and in a later edition, Ruggles listed himself as the author and eliminated Major Downs' introduction. The title was also changed to Perils of Scout-Life"
Repository, Canton Ohio, Fri. Aug. 27, 1880, Page 3
"Thursday afternoon Lorain Ruggles, employed on the Connotton Northern Railroad, near Kent, had a leg badly smashed and broken by a heavy log fall on it."
"C Lorain Ruggles was a member of the 20th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, serving in the Mississippi-Tennessee theater as a scout, spy & detective. He claimed to be the brother of a Confederate General, in whose command he sometimes operated. Ruggles expressed his philosophy as follows: "People often ask me "What is the essential
qualification of a good spy ?" My answer is "It requires an accomplised liar". I mean by that a man that can successfully practice deception. I do not mean that a man must be a habitual liar. There is nothing that I despise more than a man whose word cannot be relied upon. Whether deception, as I have practiced it in the discharge of my duty as a spy, is a moral wrong, I shall not attempt here to argue. Of this much I am sure; it has many times saved my life and perhaps the lives of thousands of others, besides saving immense sums of money to the Government.
One of Ruggles' superiors, Brigadier General Wiles, stated that "I never knew him to give false information," and Ruggles' book contains several official comments on his success. Ruggles' book is titled, Four Years a Scout and Spy. It was ghost written for him by one of his officers, Major Edward C Downs, who enlisted Ruggles in 1861. The book went through severel editions and in a later edition, Ruggles listed himself as the author and eliminated Major Downs' introduction. The title was also changed to Perils of Scout-Life"
Repository, Canton Ohio, Fri. Aug. 27, 1880, Page 3
"Thursday afternoon Lorain Ruggles, employed on the Connotton Northern Railroad, near Kent, had a leg badly smashed and broken by a heavy log fall on it."
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