“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” by Ambrose Bierce is a haunting piece of literature. Often, stories that dark must come from someone’s haunted mind. Bierce, by some estimation, lived in a haunted world himself, dying under strange circumstances. But, what happened to Ambrose Bierce? And why is the disappearance of Ambrose Bierce so strange? Dissecting his death is actually quite revealing. We find ourselves confronted with a man who lived through traumatic warfare. Additionally, we find a man who committed himself to literary works of bravery, honor, and death.

The Life and Times of Ambrose Bierce

Bierce was born on June 24th, 1842, in Meigs County, Ohio, though he spent his youth in Kosciusko county, Indiana. As a young man, he worked as a printer’s apprentice. Eventually, Bierce fought on the Union side during the Civil War in the Union Army’s 9th Indiana Infantry. Moreover, he took part in the battles of Shiloh and Chickamauga. In 1864, Bierce received a head wound during the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain.

As written by the Ambrose Bierce Letters Project: “It was during the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain that Bierce was wounded in the head by a Confederate sniper and evacuated to a military hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Bierce would later recollect often in his writings about the head wound, stating at one point, that his head had ‘broken like a walnut.'”

From here, he saw himself out of the Civil War.

After the war, he he worked at various newspapers as reporter and editor. These newspapers included the News Letter, the Argonaut, the Wasp, and the San Francisco Examiner. As stated by Ohio History Central: “During his lifetime, Bierce published numerous works. He became well known for his sarcasm and his interest in supernatural topics.” Books by Bierce include Nuggets and Dust: Panned out in California by Dod Grile (1873), Cobwebs from an Empty Skull (1874), The Devil’s Dictionary (1906), and Tales of Soldiers and Civilians (1892).

Bierce’s Writing as Reflection

His Works

Bierce’s writings show his worldview. Though dampened by the horrors of the Civil War, Bierce engaged with fantastical ideas in his stories and books. In discovering what happened to Ambrose Bierce, we can investigate his works.

• “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”: A Confederate sympathizer is hanged after he tries to burn down a Union Bridge. The story deals with the supernatural insofar as what humanity experiences shortly before death.
• Nuggets and Dust: Panned out in California by Dod Grile: Stories of “cynical wit” showcasing Bierce’s dry apathy and resentment.
• Cobwebs from an Empty Skull: Morality vignettes that ere on the side of the macabre. These dark musings show Bierce’s worldview as a product of his wartime understanding.
• The Devils Dictionary: As the description states, “A virtual onslaught of acerbic, confrontational wordplay, The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary offers some 1,600 wickedly clever definitions to the vocabulary of everyday life. Little is sacred and few are safe, for Bierce targets just about any pursuit, from matrimony to immortality, that allows our willful failings and excesses to shine forth.”

Bierce’s Worldview

It is fair to say, as many others have pointed out, that in order to understand what happened to Ambrose Bierce, we must see his personality. For one, he was a scornful person. His view of the world came from the dangers and violence he endured on the battlefield. His sardonic commentary on society and warfare fiercely deconstructed perceptions of honor and the romanticism of warfare. Bierce’s beliefs about such affronts developed from violent experiences. One can only watch so many people suffer wounds and die before they turn their back on the world at large.

In “Blind Superstition, Cursed with Illusions: Masculinity and War in Bierce’s ‘Chickamauga,’” writer Salina Patterson writes that Bierce saw the devilry of the world in the face of plumes of gun smoke and the terrifying screams of his friends and neighbors during battle. “Bierce experienced the death and destruction in some of the most infamous battles of the war and later used that experience with ‘brutality’ to expose the failings of romanticizing and glorifying war in his writings,” she states. In other words, Bierce may have had cause to fit the moniker Bitter Bierce, as he was sometimes referred.

How His Cantankerousness Led to His Demise

Bierce left the United States in 1913 to report on the Mexican Revolution. Before that, he had become reclusive and had written little, aside from The Shadow on the Dial and Other Essays (1909), a collection of his stories, and a book on writing titled “Write it Right.” After sending a note to a relative detailing his intentions, Bierce presumably left to Mexico.

In his letter, he wrote: “Goodbye. If you hear of my being stood up against a Mexican stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease, or falling down the cellar stairs. I shall not be here long enough to hear from you, and don’t know where I shall be next” (MacGowan).

The theories surrounding Bierce’s death aren’t as far-ranging as you would think. Mostly, they fall somewhere in the “he died during the revolution” category.

“One story says Bierce sustained serious wounds at the battle in Ojinaga. He made it to the border and into the States, but he died without identification or any papers in Camp Marfa,” states Doug MacGowan writing for Historic Mysteries. Other sources state that a combatant killed Bierce near the village of Icamole. Still, more accounts claim that he actually continued living long after the Mexican Revolution with eye-witness testimony to prove it (Gander).

In the end, Bierce’s true death may never be known, but if we are to believe his letter–Bierce himself is probably okay with that.

Conclusion

It can be difficult to ascertain the motivations of somebody as complex and forthright as Bierce. Thus, “What happened to Ambrose Bierce?” is a tricky question, and the disappearance of Ambrose Bierce is more revelatory. Thus, some conclusions can be drawn: Bierce spent much of his post-war life writing about the horrors of that conflict; likewise, Bierce’s need for honor and a death that transcended his own disdain for rot, aging, and wallowing in self-pity is clear. In this fashion, heading to Mexico to be apart of something important leads us to conclude that Bierce wanted to go out with a bang. Interestingly enough, his ending perfectly mirrors the often strange and violent endings of his stories.

Works Cited

Ambrose G. Bierce – Ohio History Central. ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Ambrose_G._Bierce.

Gander, Forrest. “Very Trustworthy Witnesses.” The Paris Review, 27 Oct. 2014, theparisreview.org/blog/2014/10/17/very-trustworthy-witnesses/.

MacGowan, Doug. “Disappearance of Ambrose Bierce – Historic Mysteries.” Historic Mysteries, 12 Sept. 2020, historicmysteries.com/disappearance-ambrose-bierce/.

Patterson, Salina. “Blind with Superstition, Cursed with Illusions: Masculinity and War in Bierce ’s ‘Chickamauga.’” The Oswald Review: An International Journal of Undergraduate Research and Criticism in the Discipline of English, 2016, https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1163&context=tor.