The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Secret Service., by Albert D. Richardson
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Title: The Secret Service.
The Field, The Dungeon, and The Escape
Author: Albert D. Richardson
Release Date: February 10, 2014 [EBook #44865]
Language: English
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[Illustration: _Photo by Brady._ _Eng^d by Geo E Perine N.Y._
Albert D. Richardson]
THE
SECRET SERVICE,
THE FIELD, THE DUNGEON,
AND
THE ESCAPE.
"Wherein I spoke of most disastrous chances,
Of moving accidents, by flood and field;
Of hairbreadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach;
Of being taken by the insolent foe,
And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence."
OTHELLO.
BY
ALBERT D. RICHARDSON,
TRIBUNE CORRESPONDENT.
Hartford, Conn.,
AMERICAN PUBLISHING COMPANY.
JONES BROS. & CO., PHILADELPHIA, PA., AND CINCINNATI, OHIO.
R. C. TREAT, CHICAGO, ILL.
1865.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865,
BY ALBERT D. RICHARDSON,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for
the District of Connecticut.
TO
Her Memory
WHO WAS NEAREST AND DEAREST,
WHOSE LIFE WAS FULL OF BEAUTY AND OF PROMISE,
THIS VOLUME
IS TENDERLY INSCRIBED.
List of Illustrations.
I.--PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR Facing Title-page.
II.--A GROUP OF ARMY CORRESPONDENTS: Facing page 17
Portraits of Messrs.
Charles C. Coffin, Boston _Journal_;
Junius H. Browne, New York _Tribune_;
Thomas W. Knox, New York _Herald_;
Richard T. Colburn, New York _World_;
L. L. Crounse, New York _Times_;
William E. Davis, Cincinnati _Gazette_, and
William D. Bickham, Cincinnati _Commercial_
III.--THE MISSISSIPPI CONVENTION VIEWED BY A Opposite page 83
TRIBUNE CORRESPONDENT
IV.--OPENING OF THE BATTLE OF ANTIETAM.--GENERAL Opposite page 281
HOOKER
V.--FACSIMILE OF AN AUTOGRAPH LETTER OF PRESIDENT page 321
LINCOLN
VI.--THE CAPTURE, WHILE RUNNING THE REBEL BATTERIES Opposite page 343
AT VICKSBURG
VII.--INTERIOR VIEW OF A HOSPITAL IN THE SALISBURY Opposite page 415
PRISON
VIII.--THE MASSACRE OF UNION PRISONERS ATTEMPTING Opposite page 419
TO ESCAPE FROM SALISBURY, NORTH CAROLINA
IX.--ESCAPING PRISONERS FED BY NEGROES IN THEIR Opposite page 441
MASTER'S BARN
X.--FORDING A STREAM Opposite page 471
XI.--"THE NAMELESS HEROINE" PILOTING THE ESCAPING Opposite page 501
PRISONERS OUT OF A REBEL AMBUSH
CONTENTS.
I.--THE SECRET SERVICE.
CHAPTER I. 17
Going South in the Secret Service.--Instructions from
the Managing Editor.--A Visit to the Mammoth Cave of
Kentucky.--Nashville, Tennessee.--Alabama Unionists.--How
the State was Precipitated into the Rebellion.--Reaching
Memphis.--Abolitionists Mobbed and Hanged.--Brutalities of
Slavery.
CHAPTER II. 31
In Memphis.--How the Secessionists Carried the Day.--Aims
of the Leading Rebels.--On the Railroad.--A Northerner
Warned.--An Amusing Dialogue.--Talk about Assassinating
President Lincoln.--Arrival in New Orleans.--Hospitality
from a Stranger.--An Ovation to General Twiggs.--Braxton
Bragg.--The Rebels Anxious for War.--A Glance at the
Louisiana Convention.
CHAPTER III. 43
Association with Leading Secessionists.--Their Hatred of
New England.--Admission to the Democratic Club.--Abuse of
President Lincoln.--Sinking Buildings, Cellars and Walls
Impossible.--Cemeteries above Ground.--Monument of a
Pirate.--Canal Street.--The Great French Markets.--Dedication
of a Secession Flag in the Catholic Church.--The Cotton
Presses.--Visit to the Jackson Battle-ground.--The
Creoles.--Jackson's Head-Quarters.--A Fire in the
Rear.--A Life Saved by a Cigar.--A Black Republican
Flag.--Vice-President Hamlin a Mulatto.--Northerners leaving
the South.
CHAPTER IV. 57
How Letters were Written and Transmitted.--A System of
Cipher.--A Philadelphian among the Rebels.--Probable fate
of a _Tribune_ Correspondent, if Discovered.--Southern
Manufactures.--A Visit to a Southern Shoe Factory.--Where
the Machinery and Workmen came from.--How Southern Shoes
were Made.--Study of Southern Society.--Report of a
Slave Auction.--Sale of a White Woman.--Girls on the
Block.--Husbands and Wives Separated.--A most Revolting
Spectacle.--The Delights of a Tropical Climate.
CHAPTER V. 71
A Northerner among the Minute Men.--Louisiana Convention.--A
Lively Discussion.--Boldness of the Union Members.--Another
Exciting Discussion.--Secessionists Repudiate their Own
Doctrines.--Despotic Rebel Theories.--The Northwest
to Join the Rebels.--The Great Swamp.--A Trip through
Louisiana.--_The Tribune_ Correspondent Invited to a Seat in
the Mississippi Convention.
CHAPTER VI. 81
The Mississippi State-House.--View of the Rebel
Hall.--Its General Air of Dilapidation.--A Free-and-Easy
Convention.--Southern Orators.--The Anglo-African
Delegate.--A Speech Worth Preserving.--Familiar Conversation
of Members.--New Orleans Again.--Reviewing Troops.--New
Orleans Again.--Hatred of Southern Unionists.--Three
Obnoxious Northerners.--The Attack on Sumter.--Rebel Bravado.
CHAPTER VII. 91
Abolition Tendencies of Kentuckians.--Fundamental
Grievances of the Rebels.--Sudden Departure from New
Orleans.--Mobile.--The War Spirit High.--An Awkward
Encounter.--"Massa, Fort Sumter has gone Up."--Bells
Ringing.--Cannon Booming.--Up the Alabama River.--A
Dancing Little Darkey.--How to Escape Suspicion.--Southern
Characteristics and Provincialism.--Visit to the Confederate
Capital.--At Montgomery, Alabama.--Copperas Breeches _vs._
Black Breeches.--A Correspondent under Arrest.
CHAPTER VIII. 105
A Journey Through Georgia.--Excitement of the
People.--Washington to be Captured.--Apprehensions about
Arming the Negroes.--A Fatal Question.--Charleston.--Looking
at Fort Sumter.--A Short Stay in the City.--North
Carolina.--The Country on Fire.--Submitting to Rebel
Scrutiny.--The North Heard From.--Richmond, Virginia.--The
Frenzy of the People.--Up the Potomac.--The Old Flag Once
More.--An Hour with President Lincoln.--Washington in
Panic.--A Regiment which Came Out to Fight.--Baltimore
under Rebel Rule.--Pennsylvania.--The North fully
Aroused.--Uprising of the whole People.--A _Tribune_
Correspondent on Trial in Charleston.--He is Warned to
Leave.--His Fortunate Escape
II.--THE FIELD.
CHAPTER IX. 125
Sunday at Niagara Falls.--View from the Suspension
Bridge.--The Palace of the Frost King.--Chicago, a
City Rising from the Earth.--Mysteries of Western
Currency.--A Horrible Spectacle in Arkansas.--Patriotism
of the Northwest.--Missouri.--The Rebels bent on
Revolution.--Nathaniel Lyon.--Camp Jackson.--Sterling Price
Joins the Rebels.--His Quarrel with Frank Blair.--His
Personal Character.--St. Louis in a Convulsion.--A Nashville
Experience.--Bitterness of Old Neighbors.--Good Soldiers for
Scaling Walls.--Wholesome Advice to Missouri Slaveholders
CHAPTER X. 141
Cairo, Illinois.--A Visit from General McClellan.--A little
Speech-making.--Penalty of Writing for _The Tribune_.--A
Unionist Aided to Escape from Memphis by a Loyal Girl.--The
Fascinations of Cairo.--The Death of Douglas.--A Clear-headed
Contraband.--A Review of the Troops.--"Not a Fighting Nigger,
but a Running Nigger."--Capture of a Rebel Flag
CHAPTER XI. 151
Missouri Again.--The Retributions of Time.--A Railroad
Reminiscence.--Jefferson City.--A Fugitive Governor.--"Black
Republicanism."--Belligerent Chaplain.--A Rebel Newspaper
Converted by the Iowa Soldiers.--Two Camp Stories of the
Marvelous
CHAPTER XII. 157
Chicago.--Corn, not Cotton, is King.--Curious Reminiscences
of the City.--A Visit to the Grave of Douglas.--Patriotism of
the Northwestern Germans.--Their Social Habits.--Cincinnati
in the Early Days.--A City Founded by a Woman.--The
Aspirations of the Cincinnatian.--Kentucky.--Treason and
Loyalty in Louisville.--A Visit to George D. Prentice.--The
first Union Troops of Kentucky.--Struggle in the Kentucky
Legislature.--What the Rebel Leaders Want.--Rousseau's
Visit to Washington.--His Interview with President
Lincoln.--Timidity of the Kentucky Unionists.--Loyalty of
Judge Lusk.
CHAPTER XIII. 173
Western Virginia.--Campaigning in the Kanawha Valley.--A
Bloodthirsty Female Rebel.--A Soldier Proves to be a Woman
in Disguise.--Extravagant Joy of the Negroes.--How the
Soldiers Foraged.--The Falls of the Kanawha.--A Tragedy of
Slavery.--St. Louis.--The Future of the City.--A disgusted
Rebel Editor.
CHAPTER XIV. 181
The Battle of Wilson Creek.--Daring Exploit of a
Kansas Officer.--Death of Lyon.--His Courage and
Patriotism.--Arrival of General Fremont.--Union Families
Driven Out.--An Involuntary Sojourn in Rebel Camps.--A
Startling Confederate Atrocity.
CHAPTER XV. 189
Jefferson City, Missouri.--Fremont's Army.--Organization
of the Bohemian Brigade.--An Amusing Inquiry.--Diversions
of the Correspondents.--A Polite Army Chaplain.--Sights
in Jefferson City.--"Fights mit Sigel."--Fremont's
Head-Quarters.--Appearance of the General.--Mrs.
Fremont.--Sigel, Hunter, Pope, Asboth, McKinstry.--Sigel's
Transportation Train.--A Countryman's Estimate of Troops.
CHAPTER XVI. 199
A Kid-gloved Corps.--Charge of Fremont's Body-guard.--Major
White.--Turning the Tables.--Welcome from the Union Residents
of Springfield.--Freaks of the Kansas Brigade.--A Visit to
the Wilson-Creek Battle-Ground.--"Missing."--Graves Opened
by Wolves.--Capture of a Female Spy.--Fremont's Farewell to
His Army.--Dissatisfaction Among the Soldiers.--Spurious
Missouri Unionists.--The Conduct of Secretary Cameron and
Adjutant-General Thomas.
CHAPTER XVII. 213
Rebel Guerrillas Outwitted.--Expedition to Fort
Henry.--Scenes in the Captured Fort.--Commodore Foote in
the Pulpit.--Capture of Fort Donelson.--Scenes in Columbus,
Kentucky.--A Curious Anti-Climax.--Hospital Scenes.
CHAPTER XVIII. 225
Down the Mississippi.--Bombardment of Island Number
Ten.--Sensations under Fire.--Flanking the Island.--Daily
Life on a Gunboat.--Triumph of Engineering Skill.--The
Surrender.
CHAPTER XIX. 235
The Battle of Shiloh.--With the Sanitary Commission.--A
Union Orator in Rebel Hands.--Grant and Sherman in
Battle.--Hair-breadth 'Scapes.--General Sweeney.--Arrival of
Buell's Army.--The Final Struggle.--Losses of the Two Armies.
CHAPTER XX. 243
Grant under a Cloud.--He Smokes and Waits.--Military
Jealousies.--The Union and Rebel Wounded.
CHAPTER XXI. 247
An Interview with General Sherman.--His Complaints about
the Press.--Sherman's Personal Appearance.--Humors of the
Telegraph.--Our Advance upon Corinth.--Weaknesses of Sundry
Generals.--"Ten Thousand Prisoners Taken."--Halleck's
Faux Pas at Corinth.--Out on the Front.--Among the
Sharp-shooters.--Halleck and the War Correspondents.
CHAPTER XXII. 259
Bloodthirstiness of Rebel Women.--The Battle of
Memphis.--Gallant Exploit of the Rams.--A Sailor
on a Lark.--Appearance of the Captured City.--The
Jews in Memphis.--A Rebel Paper Supervised.--"A Dam
Black-harted Ablichiness."--Challenge from a Southern
Woman.--Valuable Currency.--A Rebel Trick.--One of Sherman's
Jokes.--Fictitious Battle Reports.--Curtis's March through
Arkansas.--The Siege of Cincinnati.
CHAPTER XXIII. 275
With the Army of the Potomac.--On the War-Path.--A Duel in
Arizona.--How Correspondents Avoided Expulsion.--Shameful
Surrender of Harper's Ferry.--General Hooker at
Antietam.--"Stormed at with Shot and Shell."--A Night Among
the Pickets.--The Battlefield.
CHAPTER XXIV. 287
The Day after the Battle.--Among the Dead.--Lee Permitted
to Escape.--The John Brown Engine-House.--President Lincoln
Reviewing the Army.--Dodging Cannon Balls.--"An Intelligent
Contraband."--Harper's Ferry.--Curiosities of the Signal
Corps.--View from Maryland Hights.
CHAPTER XXV. 299
Marching Southward.--Rebel Girl with Sharp Tongue.--A Slight
Mistake.--Removal of General McClellan.--Familiarity of the
Pickets.--The Life of an Army Correspondent.--A Negro's Idea
of Freedom.--The Battle of Fredericksburg.--A Telegraphic
Blunder.--The Batteries at Fredericksburg.--A Disappointed
Virginian.--The Spirit of the Army under Defeat.
CHAPTER XXVI. 311
Reminiscences of President Lincoln.--His Great Canvass
with Douglas.--His Visit to Kansas.--His Manner of Public
Speaking.--High Praise from an Opponent.--A Deed without
a Name.--Sherman's Quarrel with the Press.--An Army
Correspondent Court-Martialed.--A Visit to President
Lincoln.--Two of his "Little Stories."--His familiar
Conversation.--Opinions about McClellan and Vicksburg.--Our
best Contribution to History.
CHAPTER XXVII. 327
Reminiscences of General Sumner.--His Conduct in Kansas.--A
Thrilling Scene in Battle.--How Sumner Fought.--Ordered Back
by McClellan.--Love for his Old Comrades.--Traveling Through
the Northwest.--A Visit to Rosecrans's Army.--Rosecrans in a
Great Battle.--A Scene in Memphis.
III.--THE DUNGEON.
CHAPTER XXVIII. 337
Running the Vicksburg Batteries.--Expedition Badly
Fitted Out.--"Into the Jaws of Death."--A Moment of
Suspense.--Disabled and Drifting Helplessly.--Bombarding,
Scalding, Burning, Drowning.--Taking to a Hay
Bale.--Overturned.--Rescued from the River.--The Killed,
Wounded, and Missing.
CHAPTER XXIX. 347
Standing by Our Colors.--Confinement in the Vicksburg
Jail.--Sympathizing Sambo.--Parolled to Return Home.--Turning
the Tables.--Visit from Many Rebels.--Interview with Jacob
Thompson.--Arrival in Jackson, Mississippi.--Kindness of
Southern Rebels.--A Project for Escape.
CHAPTER XXX. 357
A Word with a Union Woman.--Grierson's Great Raid.--Stumping
the State.--An Enraged Texan Officer.--Waggery of a Captured
Journalist.--The Alabama River.--Atlanta Editors Advocate
Hanging the Prisoners.--Renegade Vermonters.
CHAPTER XXXI. 365
Arrival in Richmond.--Lodged in Libby Prison.--Sufferings
from Vermin.--Prisoners Denounced as Blasphemous.--Thieving
of a Virginia Gentleman.--Brutality of Captain
Turner.--Prisoners Murdered by the Guards.--Fourth of July
Celebration.--The Horrors of Belle Isle.
CHAPTER XXXII. 373
The Captains Ordered Below.--Two Selected for Execution.--The
Gloomiest Night in Prison.--Glorious Revulsion of
Feeling.--Exciting Discussion in Prison.--Stealing Money
from the Captives.--Horrible Treatment of Northern
Citizens.--Extravagant Rumors among the Prisoners.
CHAPTER XXXIII. 381
Transferred to Castle Thunder.--Better than the
Libby.--Determined Not to Die.--A Negro Cruelly Whipped.--The
Execution of Spencer Kellogg.--Steadfastness of Southern
Unionists.
CHAPTER XXXIV. 387
A Waggish Journalist.--Proceedings of a Mock Court.--Escape
by Killing a Guard.--Escape by Playing Negro.--Escape by
Forging a Release.--Escaped Prisoner at Jeff Davis's Levee.
CHAPTER XXXV. 393
Assistance from a Negro Boy.--The Prison Officers
Enraged.--Visit from a Friendly Woman.--Shut up in a
Cell.--Stealing from Flag-of-Truce Letters.--Parols
Repudiated by the Rebels.--Sentenced to the Salisbury
Prison.--Abolitionists before the War.
CHAPTER XXXVI. 401
The Open Air and Pure Water.--The Crushing Weight of
Imprisonment.--Bad News from Home.--The Great Libby
Tunnel.--Escape of Colonel Streight.--Horrible Sufferings
of Union Officers.--A Cool Method of Escape.--Captured
through the Obstinacy of a Mule.--Concealing Money when
Searched.--Attempts to Escape Frustrated.--Yankee Deserters
Whipped and Hanged.
CHAPTER XXXVII. 411
Great Influx of Prisoners.--Starving in the Midst of
Food.--Freezing in the Midst of Fuel.--Rebel Surgeons
Generally Humane.--Terrible Scenes in the Hospitals.--The
Rattling Dead-Cart.--Cruelty of our Government.--General
Butler's Example of Retaliation.
CHAPTER XXXVIII. 419
Attempted Outbreak and Massacre.--Cold-blooded Murders
Frequent.--Hostility to _The Tribune_ Correspondents.--A
Cruel Injustice.--Rebel Expectations of Peace.--The Prison
Like the Tomb.--Something about Tunneling.--The Tunnelers
Ingeniously Baffled.
IV.--THE ESCAPE.
CHAPTER XXXIX. 427
Fifteen Months of Fruitless Endeavor.--A Fearful Journey
in Prospect.--A Friendly Confederate Officer.--Effects
of Hunger and Cold.--Another Plan in Reserve.--Passing
the Sentinel.--"Beg Pardon, Sir."--Encountering Rebel
Acquaintances.
CHAPTER XL. 435
"Out of the Jaws of Death."--Concealed in Sight of the
Prison.--Certain to be Brought Back.--Commencing the Long
Journey.--Too Weak for Traveling.--Severe March in the Rain.
CHAPTER XLI. 441
A Cabin of Friendly Negroes.--Southerners Unacquainted
with Tea.--Walking Twelve Miles for Nothing.--Every Negro
a Friend.--Touching Fidelity of the Slaves.--Pursued by a
Home-Guard.--Help in the Last Extremity.--Carried Fifteen
Miles by Friends
CHAPTER XLII. 449
A Curious Dilemma.--Food, Shelter, and Friends.--Loyalty of
the Mountaineers.--A Levee in a Barn.--Visited by an Old
Friend.--A Day of Alarms.--A Woman's Ready Wit.--Danger
of Detection from Snoring.--Promises to Aid Suffering
Comrades.--A Repentant Rebel
CHAPTER XLIII. 461
Flanking a Rebel Camp.--Secreted among the Husks.--Wandering
from the Road.--Crossing the Yadkin River.--Union
Bushwhackers.--Union Soldiers "Lying Out."--An Energetic
Invalid
CHAPTER XLIV. 469
Money Concealed in Clothing.--Peril of Union
Citizens.--Fording Creeks at Midnight.--Climbing the Blue
Ridge.--Crossing the New River at Midnight
CHAPTER XLV. 477
Over Mountains and Through Ravines.--Mistaken for Confederate
Guards.--A Rebel Guerrilla Killed.--Meeting a Former
Fellow-Prisoner.--Alarm about Rebel Cavalry.--A Stanch old
Unionist.--The Greatest Danger.--A Well Fortified Refuge
CHAPTER XLVI. 487
Dan Ellis, the Union Guide.--In Good Hands at Last.--Ellis's
Bravery.--Lost! A Perilous Blunder.--A most Fortunate
Encounter.--Rejoining Dan and His Party.--A Terrible March
CHAPTER XLVII. 495
Fording Creeks in the Darkness.--Prospect of a Dreary
Night.--Sleeping among the Husks.--Turning Back in
Discouragement.--An Alarm at Midnight.--A Young Lady for a
Guide.--The Nameless Heroine.
CHAPTER XLVIII. 503
Among the Delectable Mountains.--Separation from
Friends.--Union Women Scrutinizing the Yankee.--"Slide
Down off that Horse."--Friendly Words, but Hostile
Eyes.--Hospitalities of a Loyal Patriarch.--"Out of the Mouth
of Hell."
[Illustration: RICHARD T. COLBURN, "NEW YORK WORLD". CHARLES C. COFFIN,
"CARLETON" - "BOSTON JOURNAL". WILLIAM E. DAVIS, "CINCINNATI GAZETTE".
JUNIUS H. BROWNE, "NEW YORK TRIBUNE". L. L. CROUNSE, "NEW YORK TIMES".
W. D. BICKHAM, "CINCINNATI COMMERCIAL". THOMAS W. KNOX, "NEW YORK
HERALD". A GROUP OF ARMY CORRESPONDENTS. Eng^d. by Geo. E. Perine,
N.Y.]
THE FIELD, THE DUNGEON, AND THE ESCAPE.
I.
THE SECRET SERVICE.
CHAPTER I.
I will go on the slightest errand now to the antipodes that
you can desire to send me on.--MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
Early in 1861, I felt a strong desire to look at the Secession movement
for myself; to learn, by personal observation, whether it sprang from
the people or not; what the Revolutionists wanted, what they hoped, and
what they feared.
But the southern climate, never propitious to the longevity of
Abolitionists, was now unfavorable to the health of every northerner,
no matter how strong his political constitution. I felt the danger of
being recognized; for several years of roving journalism, and a good
deal of political speaking on the frontier, had made my face familiar
to persons whom I did not remember at all, and given me that large and
motley acquaintance which every half-public life necessitates.
Moreover, I had passed through the Kansas struggle; and many former
shining lights of Border Ruffianism were now, with perfect fitness,
lurid torches in the early bonfires of Secession. I did not care
to meet their eyes, for I could not remember a single man of them
all who would be likely to love me, either wisely or too well. But
the newspaper instinct was strong within me, and the journalist who
deliberates is lost. My hesitancy resulted in writing for a roving
commission to represent THE TRIBUNE in the Southwest.
[Sidenote: THE MANAGING EDITOR.]
A few days after, I found the Managing Editor in his office, going
through the great pile of letters the morning mail had brought him,
with the wonderful rapidity which quick intuition, long experience, and
natural fitness for that most delicate and onerous position alone can
give. For the modern newspaper is a sort of intellectual iron-clad,
upon which, while the Editorial Captain makes out the reports to his
chief, the public, and entertains the guests in his elegant cabin, the
leading column, and receives the credit for every broadside of type
and every paper bullet of the brain poured into the enemy,--back out
of sight is an Executive Officer, with little popular fame, who keeps
the ship all right from hold to maintop, looks to every detail with
sleepless vigilance, and whose life is a daily miracle of hard work.
The Manager went through his mail, I think, at the rate of one letter
per minute. He made final disposition of each when it came into his
hand; acting upon the great truth, that if he laid one aside for future
consideration, there would soon be a series of strata upon his groaning
desk, which no mental geologist could fathom or classify. Some were
ruthlessly thrown into the waste-basket. Others, with a lightning
pencil-stroke, to indicate the type and style of printing, were placed
on the pile for the composing-room. A few great packages of manuscript
were re-enclosed in envelopes for the mail, with a three-line note,
which, while I did not read, I knew must run like this:--
"MY DEAR SIR--Your article has unquestionable merit; but by
the imperative pressure of important news upon our columns,
we are very reluctantly compelled," etc.
[Sidenote: PRELIMINARY INSTRUCTIONS.]
There was that quick, educated instinct, which reads the whole from
a very small part, taking in a line here and a key-word there. Two
or three glances appeared to decide the fate of each; yet the reader
was not wholly absorbed, for all the while he kept up a running
conversation:
"I received your letter. Are you going to New Orleans?"
"Not unless you send me."
"I suppose you know it is rather precarious business?"
"O, yes."
"Two of our correspondents have come home within the last week, after
narrow escapes. We have six still in the South; and it would not
surprise me, this very hour, to receive a telegram announcing the
imprisonment or death of any one of them."
"I have thought about all that, and decided."
"Then we shall be very glad to have you go."
"When may I start?"
"To-day, if you like."
"What field shall I occupy?"
"As large a one as you please. Go and remain just where you think best."
"How long shall I stay?"
"While the excitement lasts, if possible. Do you know how long you
_will_ stay? You will be back here some fine morning in just about two
weeks."
"Wait and see."
Pondering upon the line of conduct best for the journey, I remembered
the injunction of the immortal Pickwick: "It is always best on these
occasions to do what the mob do!" "But," suggested Mr. Snodgrass,
"suppose there are two mobs?" "_Shout with the largest_," replied Mr.
Pickwick. Volumes could not say more. Upon this plan I determined to
act--concealing my occupation, political views, and place of residence.
It is not pleasant to wear a padlock upon one's tongue, for weeks, nor
to adopt a course of systematic duplicity; but personal convenience and
safety rendered it an inexorable necessity.
[Sidenote: A RIDE THROUGH KENTUCKY.]
On Tuesday, February 26th, I left Louisville, Kentucky, by the
Nashville train. Public affairs were the only topic of conversation
among the passengers. They were about equally divided into enthusiastic
Secessionists, urging in favor of the new movement that negroes
already commanded higher prices than ever before; and quasi Loyalists,
reiterating, "We only want Kentucky to remain in the Union as long
as she can do so honorably." Not a single man declared himself
unqualifiedly for the Government.
A ride of five hours among blue, dreamy hills, feathered with timber;
dense forests, with their drooping foliage and log dwellings, in the
doors of which women and little girls were complacently smoking their
pipes; great, hospitable farm-houses, in the midst of superb natural
parks; tobacco plantations, upon which negroes of both sexes--the women
in cowhide brogans, and faded frocks, with gaudy kerchiefs wrapped like
turbans about their heads--were hoeing, and following the plow, brought
us to Cave City.
I left the train for a stage-ride of ten miles to the Mammoth Cave
Hotel. In the midst of a smooth lawn, shaded by stately oaks and
slender pines, it looms up huge and white, with a long, low, one-story
offshoot fronted by a deep portico, and known as "the Cottages."
[Sidenote: THE CURIOSITIES OF WHITE'S CAVE.]
Several evening hours were spent pleasantly in White's Cave, where
the formations, at first dull and leaden, turn to spotless white
after one grows accustomed to the dim light of the torches. There are
little lakes so utterly transparent that your eye fails to detect
the presence of water; stone drapery, hanging in graceful folds, and
forming an exquisitely beautiful chamber; petrified fountains, where
the water still trickles down and hardens into stone; a honey-combed
roof, which is a very perfect counterfeit of art; long rows of
stalactites, symmetrically ribbed and fluted, which stretch off in a
pleasing colonnade, and other rare specimens of Nature's handiwork
in her fantastic moods. Many of them are vast in dimension, though
the geologists declare that it requires _thirty_ years to deposit a
formation no thicker than a wafer! Well says the German proverb "God is
patient because he is eternal."
With another visitor I passed the next day in the Mammoth Cave.
"Mat," our sable cicerone, had been acting in the capacity of guide
for twenty-five years, and it was estimated that he had walked more
than fifty thousand miles under ground. The story is not so improbable
when one remembers that the passages of the great cavern are, in the
aggregate, upwards of one hundred and fifty miles in length, and that
it has two hundred and twenty-six known chambers. The outfit consisted
of two lamps for himself and one for each of us. Cans of oil are kept
at several interior points; for it is of the last importance that
visitors to this labyrinth of darkness should keep their lamps trimmed
and burning.
[Sidenote: THE MAMMOTH CAVE.--LUNG COMPLAINTS.]
The thermometer within stands constantly at fifty-nine Fahrenheit; and
the cave "breathes just once a year." Through the winter it takes one
long inspiration, and in summer the air rushes steadily outward. Its
vast chambers are the lungs of the universe.
In 1845, a number of wood and stone cottages were erected in the
cavern, and inhabited by consumptive patients, who believed that the
dry atmosphere and equable temperature would prove beneficial. After
three or four months their faces were bloodless; the pupils of their
sunken eyes dilated until the iris became invisible and the organs
appeared black, no matter what their original color. Three patients
died in the cave; the others expired soon after leaving it.
Mat gave a vivid description of these invalids flitting about like
ghosts--their hollow coughs echoing and reechoing through the cavernous
chambers. It must have looked horrible--as if the tomb had oped its
ponderous and marble jaws, that its victims might wander about in this
subterranean Purgatory. A cemetery would seem cheerful in comparison
with such a living entombment. Volunteer medical advice, like a motion
to adjourn, is always in order. My own panacea for lung-complaints
would be exactly the opposite. Mount a horse or take a carriage, and
ride, by easy stages at first, across the great plains to the Rocky
Mountains or California, eating and sleeping in the open air. Nature is
very kind, if you will trust her fully; and in the atmosphere, which is
so dry and pure that fresh meat, cut in strips and hung up, will cure
without salting or smoking, and may be carried all over the world, her
healing power seems almost boundless.
The walls and roof of the cave were darkened and often hidden by
myriads of screeching bats, at this season of the year all hanging
torpid by the claws, with heads downward, and unable to fly away, even
when subjected to the cruel experiment of being touched by the torches.
[Sidenote: METHODIST CHURCH.--FAT MAN'S MISERY.]
The Methodist Church is a semi-circular chamber, in which a ledge forms
the natural pulpit; and logs, brought in when religious service was
first performed, fifty years ago, in perfect preservation, yet serve
for seats. Methodist itinerants and other clergymen still preach at
long intervals. Worship, conducted by the "dim religious light" of
tapers, and accompanied by the effect which music always produces in
subterranean halls, must be peculiarly impressive. It suggests those
early days in the Christian Church, when the hunted followers of Jesus
met at midnight in mountain caverns, to blend in song their reverent
voices; to hear anew the strange, sweet story of his teachings, his
death, and his all-embracing love.
Upon one of the walls beyond, a figure of gypsum, in bass-relief, is
called the American Eagle. The venerable bird, in consonance with
the evil times upon which he had fallen, was in a sadly ragged and
dilapidated condition. One leg and other portions of his body had
seceded, leaving him in seeming doubt as to his own identity; but the
beak was still perfect, as if he could send forth upon occasion his
ancient notes of self-gratulation.
Minerva's Dome has fluted walls, and a concave roof, beautifully
honey-combed; but no statue of its mistress. The oft-invoked goddess,
wearied by the merciless orators who are always compelling her to leap
anew from the brain of Jove, has doubtless, in some hidden nook, found
seclusion and repose.
We toiled along the narrow, tortuous passage, chiseled through the
rock by some ancient stream of water, and appropriately named the Fat
Man's Misery; wiped away the perspiration in the ample passage beyond,
known as the Great Relief; glanced inside the Bacon Chamber, where the
little masses of lime-rock pendent from the roof do look marvelously
like esculent hams; peeped down into the cylindrical Bottomless Pit,
which the reader shall be told, confidentially, _has_ a bottom just one
hundred and sixty feet below the surface; laughed at the roof-figures
of the Giant, his Wife, and Child, which resemble a caricature from
Punch; admired the delicate, exquisite flowers of white, fibrous
gypsum, along the walls of Pensacola Avenue; stood beside the Dead Sea,
a dark, gloomy body of water; crossed the Styx by the natural bridge
which spans it, and halted upon the shore of Lethe.
[Sidenote: A RIDE DOWN THE LETHE.]
Then, embarking in a little flat-boat, we slowly glided along the
river of Oblivion. It was a strange, weird spectacle. The flickering
torches dimly revealed the dark inclosing walls, which rise abruptly a
hundred feet to the black roof. Our sable guide looked, in the ghastly
light, like a recent importation from Pluto's domain; and stood in the
bows, steering the little craft, which moved slowly down the winding,
sluggish river. The deep silence was only broken by drops of water,
which fell from the roof, striking the stream like the tick of a clock,
and the sharp _ylp_ of the paddle, as it was thrust into the wave to
guide us. When my companion evoked from his flute strains of slow
music, which resounded in hollow echoes through the long vault, it grew
so demoniac, that I almost expected the walls to open and reveal a
party of fiends, dancing to infernal music around a lurid fire. I never
saw any stage effect or work of art that could compare with it. If one
would enjoy the most vivid sensations of the grand and gloomy, let him
float down Lethe to the sound of a dirge.
[Sidenote: THE STAR CHAMBER.--MAGNIFICENT DISTANCES.]
We first saw the Star Chamber with the lights withdrawn. It revealed
to us the meaning of "darkness visible." We seemed to _feel_ the dense
blackness against our eye-balls. An object within half an inch of them
was not in the faintest degree perceptible. If one were left alone
here, reason could not long sustain itself. Even a few hours, in the
absence of light, would probably shake it. In numberless little spots,
the dark gypsum has scaled off, laying bare minute sections of the
white limestone roof, resembling stars. When the chamber was lighted
the illusion became perfect. We seemed in a deep, rock-walled pit,
gazing up at the starry firmament. The torch, slowly moved to throw a
shadow along the roof, produced the effect of a cloud sailing over the
sky; but the scene required no such aid to render it one of marvelous
beauty. The Star Chamber is the most striking picture in all this great
gallery of Nature.
My companion had spent his whole life within a few miles of the cave,
but now visited it for the first time. Thus it is always; objects which
pilgrims come half across the world to see, we regard with indifference
at our own doors. Persons have passed all their days in sight of Mount
Washington, and yet never looked upon the grand panorama from its
brow. Men have lived from childhood almost within sound of the roar of
Niagara, without ever gazing on the vast fountain, where mother Earth,
like Rachel, weeps for her children, and will not be comforted. We
appreciate no enjoyment justly, until we see it through the charmed
medium of magnificent distances.
[Sidenote: POLITICAL FEELING IN KENTUCKY.]
Throughout Kentucky the pending troubles were uppermost in every heart
and on every tongue. One gentleman, in conversation, thus epitomized
the feeling of the State:--
"We have more wrongs to complain of than any other slave community, for
Kentucky loses more negroes than all the cotton States combined. But
Secession is no remedy. It would be jumping out of the frying-pan into
the fire."
Another, whose head was silvered with age, said to me:--
"When I was a boy here in this county, some of our neighbors started
for New Orleans on a flat-boat. As we bade them good-by, we never
expected to see them again; we thought they were going out of the
world. But, after several months, they returned, having come on foot
all the way, through the Indian country, packing[1] their blankets and
provisions. Now we come from New Orleans in five days. I thank God to
have lived in this age--the age of the Railroad, the Telegraph, and the
Printing Press. Ours was the greatest nation and the greatest era in
history. But that is all past now. The Government is broken to pieces;
the slave States can not obtain their rights; and those which have
seceded will never come back."
[1] Vernacular for carrying a load upon the back of a man or animal.
An old farmer "reckoned," as I traveled a good deal, that I might know
better than he whether there was any hope of a peaceable settlement.
If the North, as he believed, was willing to be just, an overwhelming
majority of Kentuckians would stand by the Union. "It is a great pity,"
he said, very earnestly, in a broken voice, "that we Americans could
not live harmoniously, like brethren, instead of always quarreling
about a few niggers."
My recollections of Nashville, Tennessee, include only an unpalatable
breakfast in one of its abominable hotels; a glimpse at some of its
pleasant shaded streets and marble capitol, which, with the exception
of that in Columbus, Ohio, is considered the finest State-house on the
continent.
Continuing southward, I found the country already "appareled in the
sweet livery of spring." The elm and gum trees wore their leafy
glory; the grass and wheat carpeted the ground with swelling verdure,
and field and forest glowed with the glossy green of the holly. The
railway led through large cotton-fields, where many negroes, of both
sexes, were plowing and hoeing, while overseers sat upon the high,
zig-zag fences, armed with rifles or shot-guns. On the withered stalks
snowy tufts of cotton were still protruding from the dull brown
bolls--portions of the last year's crop, which had never been picked,
and were disappearing under the plow.
[Sidenote: COTTON-FIELDS.--AN INDIGNANT ALABAMIAN.]
A native Kentuckian, now a young merchant in Alabama, was one of
my fellow-passengers. He pronounced the people aristocratic. They
looked down upon every man who worked for his living--indeed, upon
every one who did not own negroes. The ladies were pretty, and often
accomplished, but, he mildly added, he would like them better if they
did not "dip." He insisted that Alabama had been precipitated into the
revolution.
"We were _swindled_ out of our rights. In my own town, Jere
Clemens--an ex-United States senator, and one of the ablest men in the
State--was elected to the convention on the strongest public pledges
of Unionism. When the convention met, he went completely over to the
enemy. The leaders--a few heavy slaveholders, aided by political
demagogues--dared not submit the Secession ordinance to a popular vote;
they knew the people would defeat them. They are determined on war;
they will exasperate the ignorant masses to the last degree before they
allow them to vote on any test question. I trust the Government will
put them down by force of arms, no matter what the cost!"
The same evening, crossing the Alabama line, I was in the "Confederate
States of America." At the little town of Athens, the Stars and Stripes
were still floating; as the train left, I cast a longing look at the
old flag, wondering when I should see it again.
[Sidenote: "OUR CORRESPONDENT" AS A NEW MEXICAN.]
The next person who took a seat beside me went through the formula
of questions, usual between strangers in the South and the Far West,
asking my name, residence, business, and destination. He was informed,
in reply, that I lived in the Territory of New Mexico, and was now
traveling leisurely to New Orleans, designing to visit Vera Cruz and
the City of Mexico before returning home. This hypothesis, to which
I afterward adhered, was rendered plausible by my knowledge of New
Mexico, and gave me the advantage of not being deemed a partisan.
Secessionists and Unionists alike, regarding me as a stranger with no
particular sympathies, conversed freely. Aaron Burr asserts that "a lie
well stuck to is good as the truth;" in my own case, it was decidedly
better than the truth.
My querist was a cattle-drover, who spent most of his time in traveling
through Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. He declared emphatically
that the people of those States had been placed in a false position;
that their hearts were loyal to the Union, in spite of all the arts
which had been used to deceive and exasperate them.
At Memphis was an old friend, whom I had not met for many years, and
who was now commercial editor of the leading Secession journal. I knew
him to be perfectly trustworthy, and, at heart, a bitter opponent of
Slavery. On the morning of my arrival, he called upon me at the Gayoso
House. After his first cordial greeting, he asked, abruptly:
[Sidenote: A HOT CLIMATE FOR ABOLITIONISTS.]
"What are you doing down here?"
"Corresponding for _The Tribune_."
"How far are you going?"
"Through all the Gulf States, if possible."
"My friend," said he, in his deep bass tones, "do you know that you are
on very perilous business?"
"Possibly; but I shall be extremely prudent when I get into a hot
climate."
"I do not know" (with a shrug of the shoulders) "what you call a
hot climate. Last week, two northerners, who had been mobbed as
Abolitionists, passed through here, with their heads shaved, going
home, in charge of the Adams' Express. A few days before, a man was
hung on that cottonwood tree which you see just across the river, upon
the charge of tampering with slaves. Another person has just been
driven out of the city, on suspicion of writing a letter for _The
Tribune_. If the people in this house, and out on the street in front,
knew you to be one of its correspondents, they would not leave you many
minutes for saying your prayers."
After a long, minute conversation, in which my friend learned my plans
and gave me some valuable hints, he remarked:
[Sidenote: AIMS AND ANIMUS OF SECESSIONISTS.]
"My first impulse was to go down on my knees, and beg you, for God's
sake, to turn back; but I rather think you may go on with comparative
safety. You are the first man to whom I have opened my heart for years.
I wish some of my old northern friends, who think Slavery a good thing,
could witness the scenes in the slave auctions, which have so often
made my blood run cold. I knew two runaway negroes absolutely starve
themselves to death in their hiding-places in this city, rather than
make themselves known, and be sent back to their masters. I disliked
Slavery before; now I hate it, down to the very bottom of my heart."
His compressed lips and clinched fingers, driving their nails into his
palms, attested the depth of his feeling.
CHAPTER II.
Thus far into the bowels of the land Have we marched on
without impediment.--RICHARD III.
While I remained in Memphis, my friend, who was brought into familiar
contact with leading Secessionists, gave me much valuable information.
He insisted that they were in the minority, but carried the day because
they were noisy and aggressive, overawing the Loyalists, who staid
quietly at home. Before the recent city election, every one believed
the Secessionists in a large majority; but, when a Union meeting was
called, the people turned out surprisingly, and, as they saw the old
flag, gave cheer after cheer, "with tears in their voices." Many,
intimidated, staid away from the polls. The newspapers of the city,
with a single exception, were disloyal, but the Union ticket was
elected by a majority of more than three hundred.
[Sidenote: SECESSION AIMS AND GRIEVANCES.]
"Tell me exactly what the 'wrongs' and 'grievances' are, of which I
hear so much on every side."
"It is difficult to answer. The masses have been stirred into a vague,
bitter, 'soreheaded' feeling that the South is wronged; but the leaders
seldom descend to particulars. When they do, it is very ludicrous.
They urge the marvelous growth of the North; the abrogation of the
Missouri Compromise (done by southern votes!), and that Freedom has
always distanced Slavery in the territories. Secession is no new or
spontaneous uprising; every one of its leaders here has talked of it
and planned it for years. Individual ambition, and wild dreams of a
great southern empire, which shall include Mexico, Central America,
and Cuba, seem to be their leading incentives. But there is another,
stronger still. You can hardly imagine how bitterly they hate the
Democratic Idea--how they loathe the thought that the vote of any
laboring man, with a rusty coat and soiled hands, may neutralize that
of a wealthy, educated, slave-owning gentleman."
"Wonder why they gave it such a name of old renown,
This dreary, dingy, muddy, melancholy town."
[Sidenote: SPRING-TIME IN MEMPHIS.]
Thus Charles Mackay describes Memphis; but it impressed me as the
pleasantest city of the South. Though its population was only thirty
thousand, it had the air and promise of a great metropolis. The long
steamboat landing was so completely covered with cotton that drays and
carriages could hardly thread the few tortuous passages leading down
to the water's edge. Bales of the same great staple were piled up to
the ceiling in the roomy stores of the cotton factors; the hotels were
crowded, and spacious and elegant blocks were being erected.
A few days earlier, in Cleveland, I had seen the ground covered with
snow; but here I was in the midst of early summer. During the first
week of March, the heat was so oppressive that umbrellas and fans were
in general use upon the streets. The broad, shining leaves of the
magnolia, and the delicate foliage of the weeping willow, were nodding
adieu to winter; the air was sweet with cherry blossoms; with
----"Daffodils
That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty; violets dim,
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,
Or Cytherea's breath."
[Sidenote: CAPTAIN MCINTIRE, LATE OF THE ARMY.]
On the evening of March 3d I left Memphis. A thin-visaged,
sandy-haired, angular gentleman in spectacles, who occupied a car-seat
near me, though of northern birth, had resided in the Gulf States
for several years, as agent for an Albany manufactory of cotton-gins
and agricultural implements. A broad-shouldered, roughly dressed,
sun-browned young man, whose chin was hidden by a small forest of
beard, accepted the proffer of a cigar, took a seat beside us, and
introduced himself as Captain McIntire, of the United States Army, who
had just resigned his commission, on account of the pending troubles,
and was returning from the Texian frontier to his plantation in
Mississippi. He was the first bitter Secessionist I had met, and I
listened with attent ear to his complaints of northern aggression.
The Albanian was an advocate of Slavery and declared that, in the
event of separation, his lot was with the South, for better or for
worse; but he mildly urged that the Secession movement was hasty and
ill advised; hoped the difficulty might be settled by compromise,
and declared that, traveling through all the cotton States since Mr.
Lincoln's election, he had found, everywhere outside the great cities,
a strong love for the Union and a universal hope that the Republic
might continue indivisible. He was very "conservative;" had always
voted the Democratic ticket; was confident the northern people would
not willingly wrong their southern brethren; and insisted that not more
than twenty or thirty thousand persons in the State of New-York were,
in any just sense, Abolitionists.
Captain McIntire silently heard him through, and then remarked:
"You seem to be a gentleman; you may be sincere in your opinions;
but it won't do for you to express such sentiments in the State of
Mississippi. They will involve you in trouble and in danger!"
[Sidenote: AN AMUSING COLLOQUY.]
The New-Yorker was swift to explain that he was very "sound," favoring
no compromise which would not give the slaveholders all they asked.
Meanwhile, a taciturn but edified listener, I pondered upon the German
proverb, that "speech is silver, while silence is golden." Something
gave me a dim suspicion that our violent fire-eater was not of southern
birth; and, after being plied industriously with indirect questions, he
was reluctantly forced to acknowledge himself a native of the State of
New Jersey. Soon after, at a little station, Captain McIntire, late of
the Army of the United States, bade us adieu.
At Grand Junction, after I had assumed a recumbent position in
the sleeping-car, two young women in a neighboring seat fell into
conversation with a gentleman near them, when a droll colloquy ensued.
Learning that he was a New Orleans merchant, one of them asked:--
"Do you know Mr. Powers, of New Orleans?"
"Powers--Powers," said the merchant; "what does he do?"
"Gambles," was the cool response.
"Bless me, no! What do you know about a gambler?"
"He is my husband," replied the woman, with ingenuous promptness.
"Your husband a gambler!" ejaculated the gentleman, with horror in
every tone.
"Yes, sir," reiterated the undaunted female; "and gamblers are the best
men in the world."
"I didn't know they ever married. I should like to see a gambler's
wife."
"Well, sir, take a mighty good look, and you can see one now."
The merchant opened the curtains into their compartment, and
scrutinized the speaker--a young, rosy, and rather comely woman, with
blue eyes and brown hair, quietly and tastefully dressed.
"I should like to know your husband, madam."
"Well, sir; if you've got plenty of money, he will be glad to make
_your_ acquaintance."
"Does he ever go home?"
"Lord bless you, yes! He always comes home at one o'clock in the
morning, after he gets through dealing faro. He has not missed a single
night since we were married--going on five years. We own a farm in this
vicinity, and if business continues good with him next year we shall
retire to it, and never live in the city again."
All the following day I journeyed through deep forests of heavy
drooping foliage, with pendent tufts of gray Spanish moss. The
beautiful Cherokee rose everywhere trailed its long arms of vivid
green; all the woods were decked with the yellow flowers of the
sassafras and the white blossoms of the dogwood and the wild plum.
Our road stretched out in long perspective through great Louisiana
everglades, where the grass was four feet in hight and the water ten or
twelve inches deep.
[Sidenote: FEELING TOWARD PRESIDENT LINCOLN.]
It was the day of Mr. Lincoln's inauguration. One of our passengers
remarked:
"I hope to God he will be killed before he has time to take the oath!"
Another said:
"I have wagered a new hat that neither he nor Hamlin will ever live to
be inaugurated."
[Sidenote: WHAT A MISSISSIPPI SLAVEHOLDER THOUGHT.]
An old Mississippian, a working man, though the owner of a dozen
slaves, assured me earnestly that the people did not desire war; but
the North had cheated them in every compromise, and they were bound to
regain their rights, even if they had to fight for them.
"We of the South," said he, "are the most independent people in the
universe. We raise every thing we need; but the world can not do
without cotton. If we have war, it will cause terrible suffering in the
North. I pity the ignorant people of the manufacturing districts there,
who have been deluded by the politicians; for they will be forced to
endure many hardships, and perhaps starvation. After Southern trade is
withdrawn, manufactures stopped, operatives starving, grass growing in
the streets of New York, and crowds marching up Broadway crying 'Bread
or Blood!' northern fanatics will see, too late, the results of their
folly."
This was the uniform talk of Secessionists. That Cotton was not
merely King, but absolute despot; that they could coerce the North
by refusing to buy goods, and coerce the whole world by refusing to
sell cotton, was their profound belief. This was always a favorite
southern theory. Bancroft relates that as early as 1661, the colony of
Virginia, suffering under commercial oppression, urged North Carolina
and Maryland to join her for a year in refusing to raise tobacco, that
they might compel Great Britain to grant certain desired privileges.
Now the Rebels had no suspicion whatever that there was reciprocity
in trade; that they needed to sell their great staple just as much as
the world needed to buy it; that the South bought goods in New York
simply because it was the cheapest and best market; that, were all the
cotton-producing States instantly sunk in the ocean, in less than five
years the world would obtain their staple, or some adequate substitute,
from other sources, and forget they ever existed.
[Sidenote: WISCONSIN FREEMEN VS. SOUTHERN SLAVES.]
"I spent six weeks last summer," said another planter, "in Wisconsin.
It is a hot-bed of Abolitionism. The working-classes are astonishingly
ignorant. They are honest and industrious, but they are not so
intelligent as the nig-roes of the South. They suppose, if war comes,
we shall have trouble with our slaves. That is utterly absurd. All my
nig-roes would fight for me."
A Mississippian, whom his companions addressed as "Judge," denounced
the Secession movement as a dream of noisy demagogues:
"Their whole policy has been one of precipitation. They declared: 'Let
us rush the State out of the Union while Buchanan is President, and
there will be no war.' From the outset, they have acted in defiance
of the sober will of the masses; they have not dared to submit one of
their acts to a popular vote!"
Another passenger, who concurred in these views, and intimated that he
was a Union man, still imputed the troubles mainly to agitation of the
Slavery question.
"The northern people," said he, "have been grossly deceived by their
politicians, newspapers, and books like 'Uncle Tom's Cabin,' whose very
first chapter describes a slave imprisoned and nearly starved to death
in a cellar in New Orleans, when there is not a single cellar in the
whole city!"
Midnight found us at the St. Charles Hotel, a five-story edifice, with
granite basement and walls of stucco--that be-all and end-all of New
Orleans architecture. The house has an imposing Corinthian portico,
and in the hot season its stone floors and tall columns are cool and
inviting to the eye.
[Sidenote: HOSPITALITY OF A STRANGER.]
"You can not fail to like New Orleans," said a friend, before I left
the North. "Its people are much more genial and cordial to strangers
than ours." I took no letters of introduction, for introduction was
just the thing I did not want. But on the cars, before reaching the
city, I met a gentleman with whom I had a little conversation, and
exchanged the ordinary civilities of traveling. When we parted, he
handed me his card, saying:
"You are a stranger in New Orleans, and may desire some
information or assistance. Call and see me, and command me,
if I can be of service to you."
He proved to be the senior member of one of the heaviest wholesale
houses in the city. Accepting the invitation, I found him in his
counting-room, deeply engrossed in business; but he received me with
great kindness, and gave me information about the leading features of
the city which I wished to see. As I left, he promised to call on me,
adding: "Come in often. By the way, to-morrow is Sunday; why can't you
go home and take a quiet family dinner with me?"
I was curious to learn the social position of one who would invite
a stranger, totally without indorsement, into his home-circle. The
next day he called, and we took a two-story car of the Baronne street
railway. It leads through the Fourth or Lafayette District--more like
a garden than a city--containing the most delightful metropolitan
residences in America. Far back from the street, they are deeply
imbosomed in dense shrubbery and flowers. The tropical profusion of the
foliage retains dampness and is unwholesome, but very delicious to the
senses.
The houses are low--this latitude is unfavorable to climbing--and
constructed of stucco, cooler than wood, and less damp than stone. They
abound in verandas, balconies, and galleries, which give to New Orleans
a peculiarly mellow and elastic look, much more alluring than the cold,
naked architecture of northern cities.
[Sidenote: AN AGREEABLE FAMILY CIRCLE.]
My new friend lived in this district, as befits a merchant prince.
His spacious grounds were rich in hawthorns, magnolias, arbor-vitæs,
orange, olive, and fig trees, and sweet with the breath of
multitudinous flowers. Though it was only the tenth of March, myriads
of pinks and trailing roses were in full bloom; Japan plums hung ripe,
while brilliant oranges of the previous year still glowed upon the
trees. His ample residence, with its choice works of art, was quietly,
unostentatiously elegant. There was no mistaking it for one of those
gilt and gaudy palaces which seem to say: "Look at the state in which
Cr[oe]sus, my master, lives. Lo, the pictures and statues, the Brussels
and rosewood which his money has bought! Behold him clothed in purple
and fine linen, faring sumptuously every day!"
Three other guests were present, including a young officer of the
Louisiana troops stationed at Fort Pickens, and a lady whose husband
and brother held each a high commission in the Rebel forces of Texas.
All assumed to be Secessionists--as did nearly every person I met in
New Orleans upon first acquaintance--but displayed none of the usual
rancor and violence. In that well-poised, agreeable circle the evening
passed quickly, and at parting, the host begged me to frequent his
house. This was not distinctively southern hospitality, for he was born
and bred at the North. But in our eastern cities, from a business man
in his social position, it would appear a little surprising. Had he
been a Philadelphian or Bostonian, would not his friends have deemed
him a candidate for a lunatic asylum?
NEW ORLEANS, _March 6, 1861_.
Taking my customary stroll last evening, I sauntered into Canal
street, and suddenly found myself in a dense and expectant crowd.
Several cheers being given upon my arrival, I naturally inferred that
it was an ovation to _The Tribune_ correspondent; but native modesty,
and a desire to blush unseen, restrained me from any oral public
acknowledgment.
[Sidenote: TRIBUNE LETTERS.--GENERAL TWIGGS.]
Just then, an obliging by-stander corrected my misapprehension by
assuring me that the demonstration was to welcome home General Daniel
E. Twiggs--the gallant hero, you know, who, stationed in Texas to
protect the Government property, recently betrayed it all into the
hands of the Rebels, to "prevent bloodshed." His friends wince at the
order striking his name from the army rolls as a coward and a traitor,
and the universal execration heaped upon his treachery even in the
border slave States.
They did their best to give him a flattering reception. The great
thoroughfare was decked in its holiday attire. Flags were flying, and
up and down, as far as the eye could reach, the balconies were crowded
with spectators, and the arms of long files of soldiers glittered in
the evening sunlight. One company bore a tattered and stained banner,
which went through the Mexican war. Another carried richly ornamented
colors, presented by the ladies of this city. There were Pelican flags,
and Lone Star flags, and devices unlike any thing in the heavens above,
the earth beneath, or the waters under the earth; but nowhere could I
see the old National banner. It was well; on such occasion the Stars
and Stripes would be sadly out of place.
[Sidenote: BRAXTON BRAGG.--MR. LINCOLN'S INAUGURAL.]
After a welcoming speech, pronouncing him "not only the soldier of
courage, but the patriot of fidelity and honor," and his own response,
declaring that _here_, at least, he would "never be branded as a
coward and traitor," the ex-general rode through some of the principal
streets in an open barouche, bareheaded, bowing to the spectators. He
is a venerable-looking man, apparently of seventy. His large head is
bald upon the top; but from the sides a few thin snow-white locks,
utterly oblivious of the virtues of "the Twiggs Hair Dye,"[2] streamed
in the breeze. He was accompanied in the carriage by General Braxton
Bragg--the "Little-more-grape-Captain-Bragg" of Mexican war memory. By
the way, persons who ought to know declare that General Taylor never
used the expression, his actual language being: "Captain Bragg, give
them----!"
[2] In Mexico, General Twiggs, while applying some preparation to a
wound in his head, found it restoring his hair to its natural color.
An enterprising nostrum-vender at once placed in market and advertised
largely something which he styled the "Twiggs Hair Dye." Dr. Holmes
makes the incident a target for one of his Parthian arrows:--
"How many a youthful head we've seen put on its silver crown!
What sudden changes back again, to youth's empurpled brown!
But how to tell what's old or young--the tap-root from the sprigs,
Since Florida revealed her fount to Ponce de Leon Twiggs?"
President Lincoln's Inaugural, looked for with intense interest, has
just arrived. All the papers denounce it bitterly. _The Delta_, which
has advocated Secession these ten years, makes it a signal for the
war-whoop:--
"War is a great calamity; but, with all its horrors, it is
a blessing to the deep, dark, and damning infamy of such
a submission, such surrenders, as the southern people are
now called upon to make to a foreign invader. He who would
counsel such--he who would seek to dampen, discourage, or
restrain the ardor and determination of the people to resist
all such pretensions, is a traitor, who should be driven
beyond our borders."
"Foreign invader," is supposed to mean the President of our common
country! The "submission" denounced so terribly would be simply the
giving up of the Government property lately stolen by the Rebels, and
the paying of the usual duties on imports!
_March 8._
[Sidenote: LOUISIANA CONVENTION.]
The State convention which lately voted Louisiana out of the Union,
sits daily in Lyceum Hall. The building fronts Lafayette Square--one
of the admirable little parks which are the pride of New Orleans. Upon
the first floor is the largest public library in the city, though it
contains less than ten thousand volumes.
In the large hall above are the assembled delegates. Ex-Governor
Mouton, their president, a portly old gentleman, of the heavy-father
order, sits upon the platform. Below him, at a long desk, Mr. Wheat,
the florid clerk, is reading a report in a voice like a cracked bugle.
Behind the president is a life-size portrait of Washington; at his
right, a likeness of Jefferson Davis, with thin, beardless face, and
sad, hollow eyes. There is also a painting of the members, and a copy
of the Secession ordinance, with lithographed _fac similes_ of their
signatures. The delegates, you perceive, have made all the preliminary
arrangements for being immortalized. Physically, they are fine-looking
men, with broad shoulders, deep chests, well-proportioned limbs, and
stature decidedly above the northern standard.
CHAPTER III.
I will be _correspondent_ to command, And do my spiriting
gently.--TEMPEST.
[Sidenote: INTRODUCTION TO REBEL CIRCLES.]
The good fortune which in Memphis enabled me to learn so directly
the plans and aims of the Secession leaders, did not desert me in
New Orleans. For several years I had been personally acquainted with
the editor of the leading daily journal--an accomplished writer, and
an original Secessionist. Uncertain whether he knew positively my
political views, and fearing to arouse suspicion by seeming to avoid
him, I called on him the day after reaching the city.
He received me kindly, never surmising my errand; invited me into
the State convention, of which he was a member; asked me to frequent
his editorial rooms; and introduced me at the "Louisiana Democratic
Club," which had now ripened into a Secession club. Among prominent
Rebels belonging to it were John Slidell and Judah P. Benjamin, of
Jewish descent, whom Senator Wade of Ohio characterized so aptly as "an
Israelite with Egyptian principles."
Admission to that club was a final voucher for political soundness. The
plans of the conspirators could hardly have been discussed with more
freedom in the parlor of Jefferson Davis. Another friend introduced
me at the Merchants' Reading-room, where were the same sentiments and
the same frankness. The newspaper office also was a standing Secession
caucus.
[Sidenote: INTENSITY OF THE SECESSION FEELING.]
These associations gave me rare facilities for studying the aims
and animus of the leading Revolutionists. I was not compelled to ask
questions, so constantly was information poured into my ears. I used
no further deceit than to acquiesce quietly in the opinions everywhere
heard. While I talked New Mexico and the Rocky Mountains, my companions
talked Secession; and told me more, every day, of its secret workings,
than as a mere stranger I could have learned in a month. Socially,
they were genial and agreeable. Their hatred of New England, which
they seemed to consider "the cruel cause of all our woes," was very
intense. They were also wont to denounce _The Tribune_, and sometimes
its unknown Southern correspondents, with peculiar bitterness. At first
their maledictions fell with startling and unpleasant force upon my
ears, though I always concurred. But in time I learned to hear them
not only with serenity, but with a certain quiet enjoyment of the
ludicrousness of the situation.
I had not a single acquaintance in the city, whom I knew to be a Union
man, or to whom I could talk without reserve. This was very irksome--at
times almost unbearable. How I longed to open my heart to somebody!
Recently as I had left the North, and strongly as I was anchored in
my own convictions, the pressure on every hand was so great, all
intelligence came so distorted through Rebel mediums, that at times I
was nearly swept from my moorings. I could fully understand how many
strong Union men had at last been drawn into the almost irresistible
tide. It was an inexpressible relief to read the northern newspapers at
the Democratic Club. There, even _The Tribune_ was on file. The club
was so far above suspicion that it might have patronized with impunity
the organ of William Lloyd Garrison or Frederick Douglass.
[Sidenote: REBEL NEWSPAPERS AND PRESIDENT LINCOLN.]
The vituperation which the southern journals heaped upon Abraham
Lincoln was something marvelous. The speeches of the newly elected
President on his way to Washington, were somewhat rugged and uncouth;
not equal to the reputation he won in the great senatorial canvass with
Douglas, where debate and opposition developed his peculiar powers and
stimulated his unrivaled logic. The Rebel papers drew daily contrasts
between the two Presidents, pronouncing Mr. Davis a gentleman, scholar,
statesman; and Mr. Lincoln a vulgarian, buffoon, demagogue. One of
their favorite epithets was "idiot;" another, "baboon;" just as the
Roman satirists, fifteen hundred years ago, were wont to ridicule the
great Julian as an ape and a hairy savage.
The times have changed. While I write some of the same journals, not
yet extinguished by the fortunes of war, denounce Jefferson Davis
with equal coarseness and bitterness, as an elegant, vacillating
sentimentalist; and mourn that he does not possess the rugged common
sense and indomitable perseverance displayed by Abraham Lincoln!
While keeping up appearances on the Mexican question, by frequent
inquiries about the semi-monthly steamers for Vera Cruz, I devoted
myself ostensibly to the curious features of the city. Odd enough it
sounded to hear persons say, "Let us go _up_ to the river;" but the
phrase is accurate. New Orleans is two feet lower than the Mississippi,
and protected against overflow by a dike or levee. The city is quite
narrow, and is drained into a great swamp in the rear. In front, new
deposits of soil are constantly and rapidly made. Four of the leading
business streets, nearest the levee, traverse what, a few years ago,
was the bed of the river. Anywhere, by digging two feet below the
surface, one comes to water.
The earth is peculiarly spongy and yielding. The unfinished Custom
House, built of granite from Quincy, Massachusetts, has sunk about
two feet since its commencement, in 1846. The same is true of other
heavy buildings. Cellars and wells being impossible in the watery
soil, refrigerators serve for the one, and cylindrical upright wooden
cisterns, standing aboveground, like towers, for the other.
[Sidenote: CEMETERIES ABOVE THE GROUND.]
In the cemeteries the tombs are called "ovens." They are all built
aboveground, of brick, stone, or stucco, closed up with mortar and
cement. Sometimes the walls crack open, revealing the secrets of the
charnel-house. Decaying coffins are visible within; and once I saw a
human skull protruding from the fissure of a tomb. Here, indeed,
"Imperial Cæsar, dead, and turned to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away."
Despite this revolting feature, the Catholic cemeteries are especially
interesting. About the humblest of the monuments, artificial wreaths,
well-tended rose-beds, garlands of fresh flowers, changed daily, and
vases inserted in the walls, to catch water and attract the birds,
evince a tender, unforgetful attention to the resting-place of departed
friends. More than half the inscriptions are French or Spanish. Very
few make any allusion to a future life. One imposing column marks the
grave of Dominique You, the pirate, whose single virtue of patriotism,
exhibited under Jackson during the war of 1815, hardly justifies, upon
his monument, the magnificent eulogy of Bayard: "The hero of a hundred
battles,--a chevalier without fear and without reproach."
In New Orleans, grass growing upon the streets is no sign of
decadence. Stimulated by the rich, moist soil, it springs up in
profusion, not only in the smaller thoroughfares, but among the bricks
and paving-stones of the leading business avenues.
[Sidenote: THE FRENCH QUARTER OF NEW ORLEANS.]
Canal street is perhaps the finest promenade on the continent. It is
twice the width of Broadway, and in the middle has two lines of trees,
with a narrow lawn between them, extending its entire length. At night,
as the long parallel rows of gas-lights glimmer through the quivering
foliage, growing narrower and narrower in perspective till they unite
and blend into one, it is a striking spectacle--a gorgeous feast of
the lanterns. On the lower side of it is the "French Quarter," more
un-American even than the famous German portion of Cincinnati known
as "Over the Rhine." Here you may stroll for hours, "a straggler from
another civilization," hearing no word in your native tongue, seeing
no object to remove the impression of an ancient French city. The
dingy houses, "familiar with forgotten years," call up memories of old
Mexican towns. They are grim, dusky relics of antiquity, usually but
one story high, with steep projecting roofs, tiled or slated, wooden
shutters over the doors, and multitudinous eruptions of queer old
gables and dormer windows.
New Orleans is the most Parisian of American cities. Opera-houses,
theaters, and all other places of amusement are open on Sunday nights.
The great French market wears its crowning glory only on Sunday
mornings. Then the venders occupy not only several spacious buildings,
but adjacent streets and squares. Their wares seem boundless in
variety. Any thing you please--edible, drinkable, wearable, ornamental,
or serviceable--from Wenham ice to vernal flowers and tropical
fruits--from Indian moccasins to a silk dress-pattern--from ancient
Chinese books to the freshest morning papers--ask, and it shall be
given unto you.
[Sidenote: FRENCH MARKET ON SUNDAY MORNING.]
Sit down in a stall, over your tiny cup of excellent coffee, and you
are hobnobbing with the antipodes--your next neighbor may be from
Greenland's icy mountains, or India's coral strand. Get up to resume
your promenade, and you hear a dozen languages in as many steps; while
every nation, and tribe, and people--French, English, Irish, German,
Spanish, Creole, Chinese, African, Quadroon, Mulatto, American--jostles
you in good-humored confusion.
Some gigantic negresses, with gaudy kerchiefs, like turbans, about
their heads, are selling fruits, and sit erect as palm-trees. They look
like African or Indian princesses, a little annoyed at being separated
from their thrones and retinues, but none the less regal "for a' that."
At every turn little girls, with rich Creole complexions and brilliant
eyes, offer you aromatic bouquets of pinks, roses, verbenas, orange
and olive blossoms, and other flowers to you unknown, unless, being a
woman, you are a botanist by "gift of fortune," or, a man, that science
has "come by nature."
Upon Jackson Square, a delicious bit of verdure fronting the river,
gloom antique public buildings, which were the seat of government in
the days of the old Spanish _régime_. Near them stands the equally
ancient cathedral, richly decorated within, where devout Catholics
still worship. Its great congregations are mosaics of all hues and
nationalities, mingling for the moment in the democratic equality of
the Roman Church.
Attending service in the cathedral one Sunday morning, I found the
aisles crowded with volunteers who, on the eve of departure for
the debatable ground of Fort Pickens, had assembled to witness the
consecration of their Secession flag, a ceremonial conducted with great
pomp and solemnity by the French priests.
In the First Presbyterian Church, the Rev. Dr. Palmer, a divine of
talent and local reputation, might be heard advocating the extremest
Rebel views. The southerners had formerly been very bitter in their
denunciation of political preaching; but now the pulpit, as usual, made
obeisance to the pews, and the pews beamed encouragement on the pulpit.
[Sidenote: PRESSING COTTON BY MACHINERY.]
If I may go abruptly from church to cotton--and they were not far apart
in New Orleans--a visit to one of the great cotton-presses was worthy
of note. It is a low building, occupying an entire square, with a
hollow court in the center. It was filled with heaped-up cotton-bales,
which overran their limits and covered the adjacent sidewalks. Negroes
stood all day at the doors receiving and discharging cotton. The bales
are compressed by heavy machinery, driven by steam, that they may
occupy the least space in shipping. They are first condensed on the
plantations by screw-presses; the cotton is compact upon arrival here;
but this great iron machine, which embraces the bales in a hug of two
hundred tons, diminishes them one-third more. The laborers are negroes
and Frenchmen, who chant a strange, mournful refrain in time with their
movements.
The ropes of a bale are cut; it is thrown under the press; the great
iron jaws of the monster close convulsively, rolling it under the
tongue as a sweet morsel. The ropes are tightened and again tied,
the cover stitched up, and the bale rolled out to make room for
another--all in about fifty seconds. It weighs five hundred pounds, but
the workmen seize it on all sides with their iron hooks, and toss it
about like a schoolboy's ball. The superintendent informed me that they
pressed, during the previous winter, more than forty thousand bales.
[Sidenote: THE BARRACKS.--THE NEW ORLEANS LEVEE.]
The Rebels, with their early _penchant_ for capturing empty forts and
full treasuries, had seized the United States Branch Mint, containing
three hundred thousand dollars, and the National barracks, garrisoned
at the time by a single sergeant. Visiting, with a party of gentlemen,
the historic Jackson battle-ground, four miles below the city, I
obtained a glimpse of the tall, gloomy Mint, and spent an hour in the
long, low, white, deep-balconied barracks beside the river.
The Lone Star flag of Louisiana was flying from the staff. A hundred
and twenty freshly enlisted men of the State troops composed the
garrison. Three of the officers, recent seceders from the Federal army,
invited us into their quarters, to discuss political affairs over
their Bourbon and cigars. As all present assumed to be sanguine and
uncompromising Rebels, the conversation was one-sided and uninteresting.
We drove down the river-bank along the almost endless rows of ships
and steamboats. The commerce of New Orleans, was more imposing than
that of any other American city except New York. It seemed to warrant
the picture painted by the unrivaled orator, Prentiss, of the future
years, "when this Crescent City shall have filled her golden horn." The
long landing was now covered with western produce, cotton, and sugar,
and fenced with the masts of hundreds of vessels. Some displayed the
three-striped and seven-starred flag of the "Southern Confederacy,"
many the ensigns of foreign nations, and a few the Stars and Stripes.
We were soon among the old houses of the Creoles.[3]
[3] Creole means "native;" but its New Orleans application is only to
persons of French or Spanish descent.
These anomalous people--a very large element of the
population--properly belong to a past age or another land, and find
themselves sadly at variance with America in the nineteenth century.
They seldom improve or sell their property; permit the old fences and
palings to remain around their antique houses; are content to live
upon small incomes, and rarely enter the modern districts. It is even
asserted that old men among them have spent their whole lives in New
Orleans without ever going above Canal street! Many have visited Paris,
but are profoundly ignorant of Washington, New York, Philadelphia, and
other northern cities. They are devout Catholics, sudden and quick in
quarrel, and duelling continues one of their favorite recreations.
[Sidenote: VISIT TO THE JACKSON BATTLE-GROUND.]
We stopped at the old Spanish house--deeply embowered in
trees--occupied as head-quarters by General Jackson, and saw the upper
window from which, glass in hand, he witnessed the approach of the
enemy. The dwelling is inhabited, and bears marks of the cannon-balls
fired to dislodge him. Like his city quarters--a plain brick edifice,
at one hundred and six, Royal-street, New Orleans--it is unchanged in
appearance since that historic Eighth of January.
A few hundred yards from the river, we reached the battle-ground
where, in 1815, four thousand motley, undisciplined, half-armed
recruits defeated twelve thousand veterans--the Americans losing
but five men, the British seven hundred. This enormous disparity is
explained by the sheltered position of one party behind a breastwork,
and the terrible exposure of the other in its march, by solid columns,
of half a mile over an open field, without protection of hillock or
tree. A horrible field, whence the Great Reaper gathered a bloody
harvest!
[Sidenote: INCIDENTS OF THE BATTLE.]
The swamp here is a mile from the river. Jackson dug a canal between
them, throwing up the earth on one side for a breastwork, and turning
a stream of water from the Mississippi through the trench. The British
had an extravagant fear of the swamp, and believed that, attempting
to penetrate it, they would be ingulfed in treacherous depths. So
they marched up, with unflinching Saxon courage, in the teeth of
that terrible fire from the Americans, ranged four deep, behind the
fortification; and the affair became a massacre rather than a battle.
The spongy soil of the breastwork (the tradition that bales of cotton
were used is a fiction) absorbed the balls without any damage. It first
proved what has since been abundantly demonstrated in the Crimean
war, and the American Rebellion--the superiority of earthworks over
brick and stone. The most solid masonry will be broken and battered
down sooner or later, but shells and solid shot can do little harm to
earthworks.
Jackson's army was a reproduction of Falstaff's ragamuffins. It was
made up of Kentucky backwoodsmen, New Orleans clergymen, lawyers,
merchants and clerks; pirates and ruffians just released from the
calaboose to aid in the defense; many negroes, free and slave, with
a liberal infusion of nondescript city vagabonds, noticeable chiefly
for their tatters, and seeming, from their "looped and windowed
raggedness," to hang out perpetual flags of truce to the enemy.
Judah Trouro, a leading merchant, while carrying ammunition, was
struck in the rear by a cannon-ball, which cut and bore away a large
slice of his body; but, in spite of the awkward loss, he lived many
years, to leave an enviable memory for philanthropy and public spirit.
Parton tells of a young American who, during the battle, stooped
forward to light a cigar; and when he recovered his position saw that
a man exactly behind him was blown to pieces, and his brains scattered
over the parapet, by an exploding shell.
[Sidenote: A PECULIAR FREE NEGRO POPULATION.]
More than half of Jackson's command was composed of negroes, who were
principally employed with the spade, but several battalions of them
were armed, and in the presence of the whole army received the thanks
of General Jackson for their gallantry. On each anniversary the negro
survivors of the battle always turned out in large numbers--so large,
indeed, as to excite the suspicion that they were not genuine.
The free colored population, at the time of my visit, was a very
peculiar feature of New Orleans. Its members were chiefly of San
Domingo origin; held themselves altogether aloof from the other
blacks, owned numerous slaves, and were the most rigorous of masters.
Frequently their daughters were educated in Paris, married whites, and
in some cases the traces of their negro origin were almost entirely
obliterated. This, however, is not peculiar to that class. It is very
unusual anywhere in the South to find persons of pure African lineage.
A tinge of white blood is almost always detected.
Our company had an invaluable cicerone in the person of Judge
Alexander Walker, author of "Jackson and New Orleans," the most clear
and entertaining work upon the battle, its causes and results, yet
contributed to American history. He had toiled unweariedly through
all the official records, and often visited the ground with men who
participated in the engagement. He pointed out positions, indicated
the spot where Packenham fell, and drew largely upon his rich fund of
anecdote, tradition, and biography.
A plain, unfinished shaft of Missouri limestone, upon a rough brick
foundation, now marks the battle-field. It was commenced by a
legislative appropriation; but the fund became exhausted and the work
ceased. The level cotton plantation, ditched for draining, now shows
no evidence of the conflict, except the still traceable line of the
old canal, with detached pools of stagnant water in a fringe of reeds,
willows, and live oaks.
A negro patriarch, with silvery hair, and legs infirm of purpose,
hobbled up, to exhibit some balls collected on the ground. The bullets,
which were flattened, he assured us, had "hit somebody." No doubt they
were spurious; but we purchased a few buckshots and fragments of shell
from the ancient Ethiop, and rode back to the city along avenues lined
with flowers and shrubbery. Here grew the palm--the characteristic tree
of the South. It is neither graceful nor beautiful; but looks like an
inverted umbrella upon a long, slender staff. Ordinary pictures very
faithfully represent it.
[Sidenote: ALL ABOUT A "BLACK REPUBLICAN FLAG."]
NEW ORLEANS, _March 11, 1861_.
We are a good deal exercised, just now, about a new grievance. The
papers charged, a day or two since, that the ship Adelaide Bell, from
New Hampshire, had flung defiant to the breeze a Black Republican flag,
and that her captain vowed he would shoot anybody attempting to cut it
down. As one of the journals remarked, "his audacity was outrageous."
_En passant_, do you know what a Black Republican flag is? I have never
encountered that mythical entity in my travels; but 'tis a fearful
thing to think of--is it not?
The reporter of _The Crescent_, with charming ingenuousness, describes
it as "so much like the flag of the late United States, that few would
notice the difference." In fact, he adds, it _is_ the old Stars and
Stripes, with a red stripe instead of a white one immediately below
the union. Of course, we are greatly incensed. It is flat burglary,
you know, to love the Star Spangled Banner itself; and as for a Black
Republican flag--why, that is most tolerable and not to be endured.
Captain Robertson, the "audacious," has been compelled, publicly,
to deny the imputation. He asserts that, in the simplicity of his
heart, he has been using it for years as a United States flag. But the
newspapers adhere stoutly to the charge; so the presumption is that the
captain is playing some infernal Yankee trick. Who shall deliver us
from the body of this Black Republican flag?
If it were possible, I would like to see the "Southern Confederacy"
work out its own destiny; to see how Slavery would flourish, isolated
from free States; how the securities of a government, founded on the
right of any of its members to break it up at pleasure, would stand
in the markets of the world; how the principle of Democracy would
sustain itself in a confederation whose corner-stones are aristocracy,
oligarchy, despotism. This is the government which, in the language of
one of its admirers, shall be "stronger than the bonds of Orion, and
benigner than the sweet influences of the Pleiades."
[Sidenote: VICE-PRESIDENT HAMLIN A MULATTO.]
A few days since, I was in a circle of southern ladies, when one of
them remarked:
"I am glad Lincoln has not been killed."
"Why so?" asked another.
"Because, if he had been, Hamlin would become President, and it would
be a shame to have a mulatto at the head of the Government."
A little discussion which followed developed that every lady present,
except one, believed Mr. Hamlin a mulatto. Yet the company was
comparatively intelligent, and all its members live in a flourishing
commercial metropolis. You may infer something of the knowledge of
the North in rural districts, enlightened only by weekly visits from
Secession newspapers!
We are enjoying that soft air "which comes caressingly to the brow, and
produces in the lungs a luxurious delight." I notice, on the streets,
more than one premonition of summer, in the form of linen coats. The
yards and cemeteries, smiling with myriads of roses and pinks, are
carpeted with velvet grass; the morning air is redolent of orange and
clover blossoms, and nosegays abound, sweet with the breath of the
tropics.
[Sidenote: NORTHERNERS LIVING IN THE SOUTH.]
_March 15._
Men of northern nativity are numerous throughout the Gulf States.
Many are leading merchants of the cities, and a few, planters in the
interior. Some have gone north to stay until the storm is over. A
part of those who remain out-Herod the native fire-eaters in zeal for
Secession. Their violence is suspicious; it oversteps the modesty
of nature. I was recently in a mixed company, where one person was
conspicuously bitter upon the border slave States, denouncing them as
"playing second fiddle to the Abolitionists," and "traitors to southern
rights."
"Who is he?" I asked of a southern gentleman beside me.
"He?" was the indignant reply; "why, he is a northerner, ---- him!
He is talking all this for effect. What does he care about our
rights? He don't own slaves, and wasn't raised in the South; if it
were fashionable, he would be an Abolitionist. I'd as soon trust a
nigger-stealer as such a man!"
CHAPTER IV.
'Tis my vocation, Hal; 'tis no sin for a man to labor in his
vocation.--KING HENRY IV.
The city was measurably quiet, but arrests, and examinations of
suspected Abolitionists, were frequent. In general, I felt little
personal disquietude, except the fear of encountering some one who knew
my antecedents; but about once a week something transpired to make me
thoroughly uncomfortable for the moment.
[Sidenote: PREPARING AND TRANSMITTING CORRESPONDENCE.]
I attended daily the Louisiana Convention, sitting among the
spectators. I could take no notes, but relied altogether upon memory.
In corresponding, I endeavored to cover my tracks as far as possible.
Before leaving Cincinnati, I had encountered a friend just from New
Orleans, and induced him to write for me one or two letters, dated in
the latter city. They were copied, with some changes of style, and
published. Hence investigation would have shown that _The Tribune_
writer began two or three weeks before I reached the city, and thrown a
serious obstacle in the way of identifying him.
My dispatches, transmitted sometimes by mail, sometimes by express,
were addressed alternately to half a dozen banking and commercial firms
in New York, who at once forwarded them to _The Tribune_ editorial
rooms. They were written like ordinary business letters, treating of
trade and monetary affairs, and containing drafts upon supposititious
persons, quite princely in amount. I never learned, however, that they
appreciably enlarged the exchequer of their recipients. Indeed, they
were a good deal like the voluminous epistles which Mr. Toots, in his
school-boy days, was in the habit of writing to himself.
[Sidenote: GUARDING LETTERS AGAINST SCRUTINY.]
I used a system of cipher, by which all phrases between certain private
marks were to be exactly reversed in printing. Thus, if I characterized
any one as "patriot and an honest man," inclosing the sentence in
brackets, it was to be rendered a "demagogue and a scoundrel." All
matter between certain other marks was to be omitted. If a paragraph
commenced at the very edge of a sheet, it was to be printed precisely
as it stood. But beginning it half across the page indicated that it
contained something to be translated by the cipher.
The letters, therefore, even if examined, would hardly be comprehended.
Whether tampered with or not, they always reached the office. I never
kept any papers on my person, or in my room, which could excite
suspicion, if read.
In writing, I assumed the tone of an old citizen, sometimes remarking
that during a residence of fourteen years in New Orleans, I had never
before seen such a whirlwind of passion, etc. In recording incidents I
was often compelled to change names, places, and dates, though always
faithful to the fact. Toward the close of my stay, the correspondence
appearing to pass unopened, I gave minute and exact details, designing
to be in the North before the letters could return in print.
[Sidenote: A PHILADELPHIAN AMONG THE REBELS.]
Two incidents will illustrate the condition of affairs better than any
general description. Soon after Mr. Lincoln's election, a Philadelphian
reached New Orleans, on a collecting tour. One evening he was standing
in the counting-room of a merchant, who asked him:--
"Well, now you Black Republicans have elected your President, what are
you going to do next?"
"We will show you," was the laughing response.
Both spoke in jest; but the bookkeeper of the house, standing by, with
his back turned, belonged to the Minute Men, who, that very evening,
by a delegation of fifty, waited on the Philadelphian at the St. James
Hotel. They began by demanding whether he was a Black Republican.
He at once surmised that he was obtaining a glimpse of the hydra
of Secession, beside which the armed rhinoceros were an agreeable
companion, and the rugged Russian bear a pleasant household pet. His
face grew pallid, but he replied, with dignity and firmness:
"I deny your right to ask me any such questions."
The inquisitors, who were of good social position and gentlemanly
manners, claimed that the public emergency was so great as to justify
them in examining all strangers who excited suspicion; and that he
left them only the alternative of concluding him an Abolitionist and
an incendiary. At last he informed them truthfully that he had never
sympathized with the Anti-Slavery party, and had always voted the
Democratic ticket. They next inquired if the house which employed him
was Black Republican.
"Gentlemen," he replied, "it is a _business_ firm, not a political one.
I never heard politics mentioned by either of the partners. I don't
know whether they are Republicans or Democrats."
He cheerfully permitted his baggage to be searched by the Minute
Men, who, finding nothing objectionable, bade him good-evening. But,
just after they left, a mob of Roughs, attracted by the report that
an Abolitionist was stopping there, entered the hotel. They were very
noisy and profane, crying--"Let us see him; bring out the scoundrel!"
His friend, the merchant, spirited him out of the house through a back
door, and drove him to the railway station, whence a midnight train
was starting for the North. His pursuers, finding the room of their
victim empty, followed in hot haste to the dépôt. The merchant saw them
coming, and again conveyed him away to a private room. He was kept
concealed for three days, until the excitement subsided, and then went
north by a night train.
[Sidenote: SECESSION VS. SINCERITY.]
One of the clerks at the hotel where I was boarding had been an
acquaintance of mine in the North ten years before. Though I now saw
him several times a day, politics were seldom broached between us. But,
whenever they came up, we both talked mild Secession. I did not believe
him altogether sincere, and I presume he did me equal justice; but
instinct is a great matter, and we were cowards on instinct.
During the next summer, I chanced to meet him unexpectedly in Chicago.
After we exchanged greetings, his first question was--
"What did you honestly think of Secession while in New Orleans?"
"Do you know what I was doing there?"
"On your way to Mexico, were you not?"
"No; corresponding for _The Tribune_."
His eyes expanded visibly at this information, and he inquired, with
some earnestness--
"Do you know what would have been done with you if you had been
detected?"
"I have my suspicions, but, of course, do not know. Do you?"
"Yes; you would have been hung!"
"Do you think so?"
"I am sure of it. You would not have had a shadow of chance for your
life!"
My friend knew the Secessionists thoroughly, and his evidence was
doubtless trustworthy. I felt no inclination to test it by repeating
the experiment.
[Sidenote: A MANIA FOR SOUTHERN MANUFACTURING.]
The establishment of domestic manufactures was always a favorite theme
throughout the South; but the manufactures themselves continued very
rudimentary. The furniture dealers, for example, made a pretense of
making their own wares. They invariably showed customers through their
workshops, and laid great stress upon their encouragement of southern
industry; but they really received seven-eighths of their furniture
from the North, having it delivered at back-doors, under cover of the
night.
Secession gave a new impetus to all sorts of manufacturing projects.
The daily newspapers constantly advocated them, but were quite
oblivious of the vital truth that skilled labor will have opinions, and
opinions can not be tolerated in a slave community.
One sign on Canal-street read, "Sewing Machines manufactured on
Southern Soil"--a statement whose truth was more than doubtful. The
agent of a rival machine advertised that his patent was _owned_ in New
Orleans, and, therefore, pre-eminently worthy of patronage. Little
pasteboard boxes were labeled "Superior Southern Matches," and the
newspapers announced exultingly that a candy factory was about to be
established.
But the greatest stress was laid upon the Southern Shoe Factory, on
St. Ferdinand-street--a joint stock concern, with a capital of one
hundred thousand dollars. It was only two months old, and, therefore,
experimental; but its work was in great demand, and it was the favorite
illustration of the feasibility of southern manufactures.
[Sidenote: VISIT TO THE SOUTHERN SHOE FACTORY.]
Sauntering in, one evening, I introduced myself as a stranger, drawn
thither by curiosity. The superintendent courteously invited me to go
through the establishment with him.
His physiognomy and manners impressed me as unmistakably northern; but,
to make assurance doubly sure, I ventured some remark which inferred
that he was a native of New Orleans. He at once informed me that he was
from St. Louis. When I pursued the matter further, by speaking of some
recent improvements in that city, he replied:
"I was born in St. Louis, but left there when I was twelve months old.
Philadelphia has been my home since, until I came here to take charge
of this establishment."
The work was nearly all done with machinery run by steam. As we walked
through the basement, and he pointed out the implements for cutting
and pressing sole-leather, I could not fail to notice that every one
bore the label of its manufacturer, followed by these incendiary words:
"Boston, Massachusetts!"
Then we ascended to the second story, where sewing and pegging
were going on. All the stitching was done as in the large northern
manufactories, with sewing-machines run by steam--a combination of
two of the greatest mechanical inventions. Add a third, and in the
printing-press, the steam-engine, and the sewing-machine, you have the
most potent material agencies of civilization.
[Sidenote: WHERE ITS FACILITIES CAME FROM.]
Here was the greatest curiosity of all--the patent pegging-machine,
which cuts out the pegs from a thin strip of wood, inserts the awl,
and pegs two rows around the sole of a large shoe, more regularly and
durably than it can be done by hand--all in less than twenty-five
seconds. Need I add that it is a Yankee invention? One machine for
finishing, smoothing, and polishing the soles came from Paris; but
all the others bore that ominous label, "Boston, Massachusetts!" In
the third story, devoted to fitting the soles and other finishing
processes, the same fact was apparent--every machine was from New
England.
The work was confined exclusively to coarse plantation brogans,
which were sold at from thirteen to nineteen dollars per case of
twelve pairs. Shoes of the same quality, at the great factories in
Milford, Haverhill, and Lynn, Massachusetts, were then selling by the
manufacturers at prices ranging from six to thirteen dollars per case.
In one apartment we found three men making boxes for packing the shoes,
from boards already sawed and dressed.
"Where do you get your lumber?" I asked.
"It comes from Illinois," replied my cicerone. "We have it planed and
cut out in St. Louis--labor is so high here."
"Your workmen, I presume, are from this city?"
"No, sir. The leading men in all departments are from the North,
mainly from Massachusetts and Philadelphia. We are compelled to pay
them high salaries--from sixty to three hundred dollars per month. The
subordinate workmen, whom we hope soon to put in their places, we found
here. We employ forty-seven persons, and turn out two hundred and fifty
pairs of brogans daily. We find it impossible to supply the demand, and
are introducing more machinery, which will soon enable us to make six
hundred pairs per day."
[Sidenote: HOW "SOUTHERN" SHOES WERE MADE.]
"Where do you procure the birch for pegs?"
"From Massachusetts. It comes to us cut in strips and rolled, ready for
use."
"Where do you get your leather?"
"Well, sir" (with a searching look, as if a little suspicious of being
quizzed), "_it_ also comes from the North, at present; but we shall
soon have tanneries established. The South, especially Texas, produces
the finest hides in the country; but they are nearly all sent north, to
be tanned and curried, and then brought back in the form of leather."
Thanking the superintendent for his courtesy, and wishing him a very
good evening, I strolled homeward, reflecting upon the _Southern_ Shoe
Factory. It was admirably calculated to appeal to local patriotism, and
demonstrate the feasibility of southern manufacturing. Its northern
machinery, run by northern workmen, under a northern superintendent,
turned out brogans of northern leather, fastened with northern pegs,
and packed in cases of northern pine, at an advance of only about one
hundred per cent. upon northern prices!
New Orleans afforded to the stranger few illustrations of the
"Peculiar Institution." Along the streets, you saw the sign, "Slave
Dépôt--Negroes bought and sold," upon buildings which were filled
with blacks of every age and of both sexes, waiting for purchasers.
The newspapers, although recognizing slavery in general as the
distinguishing cause which made southern gentlemen gallant and
"high-toned," and southern ladies fair and accomplished, were yet
reticent of details. They would sometimes record briefly the killing
of a master by his negroes; the arrest of A., charged with being an
Abolitionist; of B., for harboring or tampering with slaves; of C.--f.
m. c. (free man of color)--for violating one of the many laws that
hedged him in; and, very rarely, of D., for cruelty to his slaves.
But their advertising columns were filled with announcements of slave
auctions, and long descriptions of the negroes to be sold. Said _The
Crescent_:
[Sidenote: STUDYING SOUTHERN SOCIETY.]
"We have for a long time thought that no man ought to be
allowed to write for the northern Press, unless he has passed
at least two years of his existence in the Slave States of
the South, doing nothing but studying southern institutions,
southern society, and the character and sentiments of the
southern people."
There was much truth in this, though not in the sense intended by the
writer. Strangers spending but a short time in the South _were_ liable
to very erroneous views. They saw only the exterior of a system, which
looked pleasant and patriarchal. They had no opportunity of learning
that, within, it was full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.
Northern men were so often deceived as to make one skeptical of
the traditional acuteness of the Yankee. The genial and hospitable
southerners would draw the long bow fearfully. A Memphis gentleman
assured a northern friend of mine that, on Sundays, it was impossible
for a white man to hire a carriage in that city, as the negroes
monopolized them all for pleasure excursions!
One of my New Orleans companions, who was frank and candid upon
other subjects, used to tell me the most egregious stories respecting
the slaves. As, for instance, that their marriage-vows were almost
universally held sacred by the masters; the virtue of negro women
respected, and families rarely separated. I preserved my gravity,
never disputing him; but he must have known that a visit to any of the
half-dozen slave auctions, within three minutes' walk of his office,
would disprove all these statements.
[Sidenote: REPORTING A SLAVE AUCTION.]
These slave auctions were the only public places where the primary
social formation of the South cropped out sharply. I attended them
frequently, as the best school for "studying southern institutions,
southern society, and the character and sentiments of the southern
people."
I remember one in which eighty slaves were sold, one after another. A
second, at which twenty-one negroes were disposed of, I reported, _in
extenso_, from notes written upon blank cards in my pocket during its
progress. Of course, it was not safe to make any memoranda openly.
The auction was in the great bar-room of the St. Charles Hotel, a
spacious, airy octagonal apartment, with a circular range of Ionic
columns. The marble bar, covering three sides of the room, was doing a
brisk business. Three perturbed tapsters were bustling about to supply
with fluids the bibulous crowd, which by no means did its spiriting
gently.
The negroes stood in a row, in front of the auctioneer's platform, with
numbered tickets pinned upon their coats and frocks. Thus, a young
woman with a baby in her arms, who rolled his great white eyes in
astonishment, was ticketed "No. 7." Referring to the printed list, I
found this description:
"7. Betty, aged 15 years, and child 4 months, No. 1
field-hand and house-servant, very likely. Fully guaranteed."
In due time, Betty and her boy were bid off for $1,165.
[Sidenote: SALE OF A WHITE GIRL.]
Those already sold were in a group at the other end of the platform.
One young woman, in a faded frock and sun-bonnet, and wearing gold
ear-rings, had straight brown hair, hazel eyes, pure European features,
and a very light complexion. I was unable to detect in her face the
slightest trace of negro lineage. Her color, features, and movements
were those of an ordinary country girl of the white working class in
the South. A by-stander assured me that she was sold under the hammer,
just before I entered. She associated familiarly with the negroes, and
left the room with them when the sale was concluded; but no one would
suspect, under other circumstances, that she was tinged with African
blood.
The spectators, about two hundred in number, were not more than
one-tenth bidders. There were planters from the interior, with broad
shoulders and not unpleasing faces; city merchants, and cotton factors;
fast young men in pursuit of excitement, and strangers attracted by
curiosity.
Among the latter was a spruce young man in the glossiest of broadcloth,
and the whitest of linen, with an unmistakable Boston air. He lounged
carelessly about, and endeavored to look quite at ease, but made a very
brilliant failure. His restless eye and tell-tale countenance indicated
clearly that he was among the Philistines for the first time, and held
them in great terror.
There were some professional slave-dealers, and many nondescripts who
would represent the various shades between loafers and blacklegs, in
any free community. They were men of thick lips, sensual mouths, full
chins, large necks, and bleared eyes, suggesting recent dissipation.
They were a "hard-looking" company. I would not envy a known
Abolitionist who should fall into their unrestrained clutches. No
prudent life-insurance company would take a risk in him.
The auctioneer descanted eloquently upon the merits of each of his
chattels, seldom dwelling upon one more than five minutes. An herculean
fellow, with an immense chest, was dressed in rusty black, and wore a
superannuated silk hat. He looked the decayed gentleman to a charm, and
was bid off for $840. A plump yellow boy, also in black, silk hat and
all, seemed to think being sold rather a good joke, grinning broadly
the while, and, at some jocular remark, showing two rows of white
teeth almost from ear to ear. He brought $1,195, and appeared proud of
commanding so high a figure.
[Sidenote: WOMEN ON THE BLOCK.]
Several light quadroon girls brought large prices. One was surrounded
by a group of coarse-looking men, who addressed her in gross language,
shouting with laughter as she turned away to hide her face, and rudely
manipulating her arms, shoulders, and breasts. Her age was not given.
"That's the trouble with niggers," remarked a planter to me; "you never
can tell how old they are, and so you get swindled." One mother and her
infant sold for $1,415.
Strolling into the St. Charles, a few days later, I found two sales
in full career. On one platform the auctioneer was recommending
a well-proportioned, full-blooded negro, as "a very likely and
intelligent young man, gentlemen, who would have sold readily, a year
ago, for thirteen hundred dollars. And now I am offered only eight
hundred--eight hundred--eight hundred--eight hundred; _are_ you all
done?"
On the opposite side of the room another auctioneer, in stentorian
tones, proclaimed the merits of a pretty quadroon girl, tastefully
dressed, and wearing gold finger and ear rings. "The girl, gentlemen,
is only fifteen years old; warranted sound in every particular, an
excellent seamstress, which would make her worth a thousand dollars,
if she had _no other qualifications_. She is sold for no fault, but
simply because her owner must have money. No married man had better buy
her; she is too handsome." The girl was bid off at $1,100, and stepped
down to make way for a field-hand. Ascending the steps, he stumbled and
fell, at which the auctioneer saluted him with "Come along, G-d d--n
you!"
[Sidenote: MOTHERS AND CHILDREN.--"DEFECTS."]
Mothers and their very young children were not often separated; but I
frequently saw husbands and wives sold apart; no pretense being made
of keeping them together. Negroes were often offered with what was
decorously described as a "defect" in the arm, or shoulder. Sometimes
it appeared to be the result of accident, sometimes of punishment. I
saw one sold who had lost two toes from each foot. No public inquiries
were made, and no explanation given. He replied to questions that his
feet "hurt him sometimes," and was bid off at $625--about two-thirds of
his value had it not been for the "defect."
Some slaves upon the block--especially the mothers--looked sad and
anxious; but three out of four appeared careless and unconcerned,
laughing and jesting with each other, both before and after the sale.
The young people, especially, often seemed in the best of spirits.
[Sidenote: A MOST REVOLTING SPECTACLE.]
And yet, though familiarity partially deadened the feeling produced
by the first one I witnessed, a slave auction is the most utterly
revolting spectacle that I ever looked upon. Its odiousness does not
lie in the lustful glances and expressions which a young and comely
woman on the block always elicits; nor in the indelicate conversation
and handling to which she is subjected; nor in the universal infusion
of white blood, which tells its own story about the morality of the
institution; nor in the separation of families; nor in the sale of
women--as white as our own mothers and sisters--made pariahs by an
imperceptible African taint; nor in the scars and "defects," suggestive
of cruelty, which are sometimes seen.
All these features are bad enough, but many sales exhibit few of them,
and are conducted decorously. The great revolting characteristic lies
in the essence of the system itself--that claim of absolute ownership
in a human being with an immortal soul--of the right to buy and sell
him like a horse or a bale of cotton--which insults Democracy, belies
Civilization, and blasphemes Christianity.
In March, there was a heavy snow-storm in New York. Telegraphic
intelligence of it reached me in an apartment fragrant with orange
blossoms, where persons in linen clothing were discussing strawberries
and ice-cream. It made one shiver in that delicious, luxurious climate.
Blind old Milton was right. Where should he place the Garden of Eden
but in the tropics? How should he paint the mother of mankind but in
----"The flowing gold
Of her loose tresses,"
as a blonde--the distinctive type of northern beauty?
CHAPTER V.
There's villany abroad; this letter shall tell you
more.--LOVE'S LABOR LOST.
[Sidenote: NORTHERNERS AND THE MINUTE MEN.]
Nearly every northerner whom I heard of in the South, as suffering
from the suspicion of Abolitionism, was really a pro-slavery man,
who had been opposing the Abolitionists all his life. I recollect an
amusing instance of a man, originally from a radical little town in
Massachusetts, who had been domiciled for several years in Mississippi.
While in New England, during the campaign after which Mr. Lincoln was
elected, he expressed pro-slavery sentiments so odious that he was with
difficulty protected from personal violence.
He was fully persuaded in his heart of hearts of the divinity of
Slavery; and, I doubt not, willing to fight for it. But his northern
birth made him an object of suspicion; and, immediately after the
outbreak of Secession, the inexorable Minute Men waited upon him,
inviting him, if he wished to save his life, to prepare to quit the
State in one hour. He was compelled to leave behind property to the
amount of twenty thousand dollars. His case was one of many.
Even from a Rebel standpoint, there was an unpleasant injustice about
this. Perhaps Democrats were almost the only northerners now in the
South--Republicans and Abolitionists staying away, in the exercise of
that discretion which is the better part of valor.
I well remember thinking, as I strolled down to the post-office one
evening, with a long letter in my pocket, which gave a minute and
bitterly truthful description of the slave auctions:
[Sidenote: A LIVELY DISCUSSION.]
"If the Minute Men were to pounce upon me now, and find this dispatch,
no amount of plausible talking could save me. There would be a vacancy
on _The Tribune_ staff within the next hour."
But when the message was safely deposited in the letter-box, I
experienced a sort of relief in the feeling that if the Rebels were
now to mob or imprison me, I should at least have the satisfaction of
knowing they were not mistaking souls; and that, if I were forced to
emulate Saint Paul in "labors more abundant, in stripes above measure,
in pains more frequent, in deaths oft," I should, in their code, most
richly have earned martyrdom.
NEW ORLEANS, _March 17, 1861_.
Yesterday was a lively day in the Convention. Mr. Bienvenu threw a hot
shot into the Secession camp, in the shape of an ordinance demanding
a report of the official vote in each parish (county) by which the
delegates were elected. This would prove that the popular vote of the
State was against immediate Secession by a majority of several hundred.
The Convention would not permit such exposure of its defiance of the
popular will; and, by seventy-three to twenty-two, refused to consider
the question.
A warm discussion ensued, on the ordinance for submitting the
"Constitution of the Confederate States of America" to the popular
vote, for ratification or rejection. The ablest argument against it
was by Thomas J. Semmes, of New Orleans, formerly attorney-general of
Louisiana. He is a keen, wiry-looking, spectacled gentleman, who, in
a terse, incisive speech, made the best of a bad cause. The pith of
his argument was, that Republican Governments are not based upon pure
Democracy, but upon what Mr. Calhoun termed "concurring majorities."
The voters had delegated full powers to the Convention, which was
the "sublimated, concentrated quintessence of the sovereignty of the
people."
[Sidenote: BOLDNESS OF UNION MEMBERS.]
The speaker's lip curled with ineffable scorn as he rang the changes
upon the words "mere numerical majorities." Just now, this is a
favorite phrase with the Rebels throughout the South. Yet they all
admit that a majority, even of one vote, in Mississippi or Virginia,
justly controls the action of the State, and binds the minority. I wish
they would explain why a "mere numerical majority" is more oppressive
in a collection of States than in a single commonwealth.
Mr. Add Rozier, of New Orleans, in a bold speech, advocated submitting
the constitution to the people. On being asked by a member--"Did you
vote for the Secession ordinance several weeks ago?" he replied,
emphatically:--
"No; and, so help me God, I never will!"
A spontaneous outburst of applause from the lobby gave an index of the
stifled public sentiment. Mr. Rozier charged that the Secessionists
knew they were acting against the popular will, and dared not appeal to
the people. Until the Montgomery constitution should become the law of
the land, he utterly spurned it, spat upon it, trampled it under his
feet.
Mr. Christian Roselius, also of this city, advocated the ordinance
with equal boldness and fervor. He insisted that it was based on
the fundamental principle of Republicanism--that this Convention
was no Long Parliament to rule Louisiana without check or limit;
and he ridiculed with merciless sarcasm Mr. Semmes's theory of the
"sublimated, concentrated quintessence of the sovereignty of the
people."
The inexorable majority here cut off debate, calling the previous
question, and defeated the ordinance by a vote of seventy-three to
twenty-six.
This body is a good specimen of the Secession Oligarchy. It appointed,
from its own members, the Louisiana delegates to the Convention of all
the seceded States which framed the Montgomery Constitution, and now it
proposes to pass finally upon their action, leaving the people quite
out of sight.
[Sidenote: ANOTHER EXCITING DISCUSSION.]
_March 21._
Another exciting day in the Convention. Subject: "The adoption of the
Montgomery Constitution." Five or six Union members fought it very
gallantly, and denounced unsparingly the plan of a Cotton Confederacy,
and the South Carolina policy of trampling upon the rights of the
people. The majority made little attempt to refute these arguments,
but some of the angry members glared fiercely upon Messrs. Roselius,
Rozier, and Bienvenu, who certainly displayed high moral and physical
courage. It is easy for you in the North to denounce Secession; but to
oppose it here, as those gentlemen did, requires more nerve than most
men possess.
The speech of Mr. Roselius was able and bitter. This was not a
constitution; it was merely a league--a treaty of alliance. It sprung
from an audacious, unmitigated oligarchy. It was a retrogression of
six hundred years in the science of government. We were told (here
the speaker's sarcasm of manner was ludicrous and inimitable, drawing
shouts of laughter even from the leading Secessionists) that this
body represented the "sublimated, concentrated quintessence of the
sovereignty of the people!"
He supposed that Cæsar, when he crossed the Rubicon--Augustus, when
he overthrew the Roman Republic--Cromwell, when he broke up the Long
Parliament--Bonaparte, when he suppressed the Council of Five Hundred
at the point of the bayonet--Louis Napoleon, when he violated his
oath to the republic, and ascended the imperial throne--were each
the "sublimated, concentrated quintessence of the sovereignty of the
people."
[Sidenote: SECESSION IN A NUTSHELL.]
Like the most odious tyrannies of history, it preserved the forms of
liberty; but its spirit was crushed out. The Convention from which
this creature crept into light had imitated the odious government of
Spain--the only one in the world taxing exports--by levying an export
duty upon cotton. He was surprised that the Montgomery legislators
failed to introduce a second Spanish feature--the Inquisition. One was
as detestable as the other.
Mr. Roselius concluded in a broken voice and with great feeling. His
heart grew sad at this overthrow of free institutions. The Secession
leaders had dug the grave of republican liberty, and we were called
upon to assist at the funeral! He would have no part in any such
unhallowed business.
Mr. Rozier, firm to the last, now offered an amendment:
That in adopting the Montgomery Constitution, "the sovereign
State of Louisiana _does expressly reserve the right to
withdraw from the Union created by that Constitution,
whenever, in the judgment of her citizens, her paramount
interests may require it_."
This, of course, is Secession in a nutshell--the fundamental principle
of the whole movement. But the leaders refused to take their own
medicine, and tabled the proposition without discussion.
Mr. Bienvenu caused to be entered upon the journal his protest
against the action of the Convention, denouncing it as an ordinance
which "strips the people of their sovereignty, reduces them to a
state of vassalage, and places the destinies of the State, and of the
new Republic, at the mercy of an uncommissioned and irresponsible
oligarchy."
The final vote was then taken, and resulted in one hundred and one yeas
to seven nays; so "the Confederate Constitution" is declared ratified
by the State of Louisiana.
[Sidenote: DESPOTIC THEORIES OF THE REBELS.]
_March 25._
The Revolutionists can not be charged with any lack of frankness. _The
Delta_, lamenting that the Virginia Convention will not take that State
out of the Union, predicts approvingly that "some Cromwellian influence
will yet disperse the Convention, and place the Old Dominion in the
Secession ranks." _De Bow's Review_, a leading Secession oracle, with
high pretensions to philosophy and political economy, says, in its
current issue:
"All government begins with usurpation, and is continued by
force. Nature puts the ruling elements uppermost, and the
masses below, and subject to those elements. Less than this
is not a government. The right to govern resides with a very
small minority, and the duty to obey is inherent with the
great mass of mankind."
To-day's _Crescent_ discusses the propriety of admitting northern
States into the Southern Confederacy, "when they find out, as they soon
will, that they can not get along by themselves." It is quite confident
that they will, ere long, beg admission--but predicts for them the fate
of the Peri, who
----"At the gate
Of Eden stood, disconsolate,
And wept to think her recreant race
Should e'er have lost that glorious place."
They must not be permitted to enter. Upon this point it is inexorable.
It will permit no compunctious visitings of nature to shake its fell
purpose.
[Sidenote: THE NORTHWEST TO JOIN THEM.]
I know all this sounds vastly like a joke; but _The Crescent_ is
lugubriously in earnest. In sooth, these Rebels are gentlemen of
magnificent expectations. "Sir," remarked one of them, a judge, too,
while conversing with me this very day, "in seven years, the Southern
Confederacy will be the greatest and richest nation on earth. We
shall have Cuba, Central America, Mexico, and every thing west of the
Alleghanies. We are the natural market of the northwestern States, and
they are bound to join us!"
Think of that, will you! Imagine Father Giddings, Carl Schurz, and
Owen Lovejoy--the stanch Republican States of Wisconsin, Michigan, and
even young Kansas--whose infant steps to Freedom were over the burning
plowshare and through the martyr's blood--knocking for admission at the
door of a Slave Confederacy! Is not this the very ecstasy of madness?
_March 26._
That virtuous and lamented body, the Louisiana Convention, after a very
turbulent session to-day, has adjourned until the 1st of November.
_The Crescent_ is exercised at the presence here of "correspondents
of northern papers, who indite _real falsehoods and lies_ as coolly
as they would eat a dinner at the Saint Charles." _The Crescent's_
rhetoric is a little limping; but its watchfulness and patriotism are
above all praise. The matter should certainly be attended to.
[Sidenote: THE SWAMP--A TRIP THROUGH LOUISIANA.]
We are still enjoying the delights of summer. The air is fragrant with
daffodils, violets, and roses, the buds of the sweet olive and the
blossoms of the orange. I have just returned from a ride through the
swamp--that great cesspool of this metropolis, which generates, with
the recurrence of summer, the pestilence that walketh in darkness.
It is full of sights strange to northern eyes. The stagnant pools
of black and green water harmonize with the tall, ghastly dead
trees, from whose branches depend long fleeces of gray Spanish moss,
with the effect of Gothic architecture. It is used in lounges and
mattresses; but when streaming from the branches, in its native state,
reminds one of the fantastic term which the Choctaw Indians apply to
leaves--"tree-hair."
The weird dead trunks, the moss and the water, contrast strikingly
with the rich, bright foliage of the deciduous trees just glowing
into summer life. The balmy air makes physical existence delicious,
and diffuses a luxurious languor through the system. Remove your hat,
close your eyes, and its strong current strokes your brow lovingly and
nestles against your cheek like a pillow.
* * * * *
During the last week in March, I went by the New Orleans and Great
Northern Railway to Jackson, Mississippi, where the State Convention
was in session.
There is not in Louisiana a hill two hundred feet high. Along the
railroad, smooth, grassy everglades give place to gloomy swamps, dark
with the gigantic cypress and the varnished leaves of the laurel.
On the plantations, the white one-story cabins of the negroes stood
in long double rows, near the ample porched and balconied residences
of the planters. Young sugar-cane, resembling corn two or three weeks
old, was just peering through the ground. Noble live-oaks waved their
drooping boughs above the fields. The Pride-of-China tree was very
abundant about the dwellings. It produces a berry on which the birds
eagerly feed, though its juice is said to intoxicate them. As they do
not wear revolvers or bowie-knives, it is rather a harmless form of
dissipation.
[Sidenote: LIFE IN THE CITY OF JACKSON.]
Jackson was not a paradise for a man of my vocation. Containing four
or five thousand people, it was one of those delightful villages,
calling themselves cities, of which the sunny South by no means enjoys
a monopoly--where everybody knows everybody's business, and where, upon
the advent of a stranger, the entire community resolves itself into a
Committee of the Whole to learn who he is, where he came from, and what
he wants.
In a great metropolis, espionage was easily baffled; but in Jackson, an
unknown chiel, who looked capable of "takin' notes," to say nothing of
"prentin' 'em," was subject to constant and uncomfortable scrutiny.
Contrasted with the bustle of New Orleans, existence seemed an unbroken
seventh-day rest, though a dire certainty possessed me, that were my
errand suspected, e'en Sunday would shine no Sabbath day for me.
Some months later, a refugee, who had resided there, pictured vividly
to me the indignant and bewildered astonishment of the Jacksonians,
when, through a stray copy of _The Tribune_, they learned that one of
its correspondents had not only walked with them, talked with them, and
bought with them, but, less scrupulous than Shylock, had been ready to
eat with them, drink with them, and pray with them.
At this time the Charleston papers and some northern journals declared
_The Tribune's_ southern correspondence fictitious, and manufactured at
the home office. To remove that impression touching my own letters, I
wrote, on certain days, the minutest records of the Convention, and of
affairs in Jackson, which never found their way into the local prints.
Mournfully metropolitan was Jackson in one respect--the price of
board at its leading hotel. The accommodations were execrable; but I
suppose we were charged for the unusual luxury of an unctuous Teutonic
landlord, who bore the formidable patronymic of H-i-l-z-h-e-i-m-e-r!
"----Ph[oe]bus, what a name,
To fill the speaking-trump of future fame!"
[Sidenote: REPORTING THE MISSISSIPPI CONVENTION.]
The Convention was discussing the submission of the Montgomery
Constitution to the people. The chief clerk, with whom I formed a
chance acquaintance, kindly invited me to a chair beside his desk, and
as I sat facing the members, explained to me their capacity, views,
and antecedents. Whether an undue inquisitiveness seemed to him the
distinguishing quality of the New Mexican mind, he did not declare; but
once he asked me abruptly if I was connected with the press? With the
least possible delay, I disabused his mind of that peculiarly unjust
misapprehension.
After a long discussion, the Convention, by a vote of fifty-three
to thirty-two, refused to submit the Constitution to the people, and
ratified it in the name of Mississippi. Seven Union members could not
be induced to follow the usual practice of making the action unanimous,
but to the last steadfastly refused their adherence.
CHAPTER VI.
----My business in this State Made me a looker-on here in
Vienna.--MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
I whipped me behind the arras, and there heard it agreed
upon.--MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
JACKSON, MISS., _April 1, 1861_.
[Sidenote: THE MISSISSIPPI STATE HOUSE.]
The Mississippi State House, upon a shaded square in front of my
window, is a faded, sober edifice, of the style in vogue fifty years
ago, with the representative hall at one end, the senate chamber at the
other, an Ionic portico in front, and an immense dome upon the top.
Above this is a miniature dome, like an infinitesimal parasol upon a
gigantic umbrella. The whole is crowned by a small gilded pinnacle,
which has relapsed from its original perpendicular to an angle of
forty-five degrees, and looks like a little jockey-cap, worn jantily
upon the head of a plethoric quaker, to whom it imparts a rowdyish air,
at variance with his general gravity.
The first story is of cracked free-stone, the front and end walls of
stucco, and the rear of brick. As you enter the vestibule two musty
cannon stand gaping at you, and upon one of them you may see, almost
any day, a little "darkey" sound asleep. Whether he guards the gun, or
the gun guards him, opens a wide field for conjecture.
Ascending a spiral stairway, and passing along the balustrade which
surrounds the open space under the dome, you turn to the left, through
a narrow passage into the representative hall. Here is the Mississippi
Convention.
[Sidenote: VIEW OF THE REPRESENTATIVE HALL.]
At the north end of the apartment sits the president, upon a high
platform occupying a recess in the wall, with two Ionic columns upon
each side of him. Before him is a little, old-fashioned mahogany
pulpit, concealing all but his head and shoulders from the vulgar gaze.
In front of this, and three or four feet lower, at a long wooden desk,
sit two clerks, one smoking a cigar.
Before them, and still lower, at a shorter desk, an unhappy Celtic
reporter, with dark shaggy hair and eyebrows, is taking down the speech
of the honorable member from something or other county. In front of his
desk, standing rheumatically upon the floor, is a little table, which
looks as if called into existence by a drunken carpenter on a dark
night, from the relics of a superannuated dry-goods box.
Upon one of the columns at the president's right, hangs a faded
portrait of George Poindexter, once a senator from this State. Further
to the right is an open fire-place, upon whose mantel stand a framed
copy of the Declaration of Independence, now sadly faded and blurred,
a lithographic view of the Medical College of Louisiana, and a pitcher
and glass. On the hearth is a pair of ancient andirons, upon which a
genial wood fire is burning.
[Sidenote: GENERAL AIR OF DILAPIDATION.]
The hypocritical plastering which coated the fireplace has peeled
off, leaving bare the honest, worn faces of the original bricks. Some
peculiar non-adhesive influence must affect plastering in Jackson. In
whole rooms of the hotel it has seceded from the lath. Judge Gholson
says that once, in the old State House, a few hundred yards distant,
when Seargeant S. Prentiss was making a speech, he saw "an acre or
two" of the plastering fall upon his head, and quite overwhelm him for
the time. The Judge is what Count Fosco would call the Man of Brains;
he is deemed the ablest member of the Convention. He was a colleague
in Congress of the lamented Prentiss, whom he pronounces the most
brilliant orator that ever addressed a Mississippi audience.
On the left of the president is another fire-place, also with a sadly
blurred copy of the great Declaration standing upon its mantel. The
members' desks, in rows like the curved line of the letter D, are
of plain wood, painted black. Their chairs are great, square, faded
mahogany frames, stuffed and covered with haircloth. As you stand
beside the clerk's desk, facing them, you see behind the farthest row a
semi-circle of ten pillars, and beyond them a narrow, crescent shaped
lobby. Half-way up the pillars is a little gallery, inhabited just now
by two ladies in faded mourning.
In the middle of the hall, a tarnished brass chandelier, with pendants
of glass, is suspended from the ceiling by a rod festooned with
cobwebs. This medieval relic is purely ornamental, for the room is
lighted with gas. The walls are high, pierced with small windows, whose
faded blue curtains, flowered and bordered with white, are suspended
from a triple bar of gilded Indian arrows.
Chairs of cane, rush, wood and leather seats--chairs with backs, and
chairs without backs, are scattered through the hall and lobby, in
pleasing illustration of that variety which is the spice of life. The
walls are faded, cracked, and dingy, pervaded by the general air of
mustiness, and going to "the demnition bow-wows" prevalent about the
building.
The members are in all sorts of social democratic positions. In the
open spaces about the clerk's desk and fire-places, some sit with
chairs tilted against the wall, some upon stools, and three slowly
vibrate to and fro in pre-Raphaelite rocking-chairs. These portions
of the hall present quite the appearance of a Kentucky bar-room on a
winter evening.
[Sidenote: A FREE AND EASY CONVENTION.]
Two or three members are eating apples, three or four smoking cigars,
and a dozen inspect their feet, resting upon the desks before them.
Contemplating the spectacle yesterday, I found myself involuntarily
repeating the couplet of an old temperance ditty:
"The rumseller sat by his bar-room fire,
With his feet as high as his head, and higher,"
and a moment after I was strongly tempted to give the prolonged,
stentorian shout of "B-O-O-T-S!" familiar to ears theatrical. Pardon
the irreverence, O decorous _Tribune_! for there is such a woful dearth
of amusement in this solemn, funereal city, that one waxes desperate.
To complete my inventory, many members are reading this morning's
_Mississippian_, or _The New Orleans Picayune_ or _Delta_, and the rest
listen to the one who is addressing the Chair.
They impress you by their pastoral aspect--the absence of urban
costumes and postures. Their general bucolic appearance would assure
you, if you did not know it before, that there are not many large
cities in the State of Mississippi. Your next impression is one of
wonder at their immense size and stature. Of them the future historian
may well say: "There were giants in those days."
All around you are broad-shouldered, herculean-framed,
well-proportioned men, who look as if a laugh from them would bring
this crazy old capitol down about their ears, and a sneeze, shake
the great globe itself. The largest of these Mississippi Anakim is a
gigantic planter, clothed throughout in blue homespun.
[Illustration: THE MISSISSIPPI CONVENTION VIEWED BY A TRIBUNE
CORRESPONDENT.]
You might select a dozen out of the ninety-nine delegates, each of whom
could personate the Original Scotch Giant in a traveling exhibition.
They have large, fine heads, and a profusion of straight brown hair,
though here and there is a crown smooth, bald, and shining. Taken for
all in all, they are fine specimens of physical development, with
frank, genial, jovial faces.
[Sidenote: SOUTHERN ORATORS--ANGLO-AFRICAN DIALECT.]
The speaking is generally good, and commands respectful attention.
There is little _badinage_ or satire, a good deal of directness and
coming right to the point, qualified by the strong southern proclivity
for adjectives. The pungent French proverb, that the adjective is the
most deadly enemy of the substantive, has never journeyed south of
Mason & Dixon's line.
The members, like all deliberative bodies in this latitude, are mutual
admirationists. Every speaker has the most profound respect for the
honest motives, the pure patriotism, the transcendent abilities of the
honorable gentleman upon the other side. It excites his regret and
self-distrust to differ from such an array of learning and eloquence;
and nothing could impel him to but a sense of imperious duty.
He speaks fluently, and with grammatical correctness, but in the
Anglo-African dialect. His violent denunciations of the Black
Republicans are as nothing to the gross indignities which he offers
to the letter _r_. His "_mo's_," "_befo's_," and "_hea's_" convey
reminiscences of the negress who nursed him in infancy, and the little
"pickaninnies" with whom he played in boyhood.
The custom of stump-speaking, universal through the South and West,
is a capital factory for converting the raw material into orators. Of
course there are strong exceptions. This very morning we had an address
from one member--Mr. D. B. Moore, of Tuppah county--which is worthy
of more particular notice. I wish I could give you a literal report.
Pickwick would be solemn in comparison.
[Sidenote: A SPEECH WORTH PRESERVATION.]
Mr. Moore conceives himself an orator, as Brutus was; but in attempting
to cover the whole subject (the Montgomery Constitution), he spread
himself out "very thin." I will "back" him in a given time to quote
more Scripture, incorrectly, irreverently, and irrelevantly, than any
other man on the North American continent.
His "like we" was peculiarly refreshing, and his history and classics
had a strong flavor of originality. He quoted Patrick Henry, "_Let_
Cæsar have his Brutus;" piled "Pelion upon _Pelion_!" and made Sampson
kill Goliah!! He thought submitting the Secession ordinance to the
people in Texas had produced an excellent effect. Previous to it, the
_New York Tribune_ said: "Secession is but a scheme of demagogues--a
move on the political chess-board--the people oppose it." But afterward
it began to ask: "How is this? What does it all mean? The people seem
to have a hand in it, and to be in earnest, too." The tone of Mr.
Seward also changed radically, he observed, after that election.
Mr. Moore spoke an hour and a half, and the other members, though
listening courteously, betrayed a lurking suspicion that he was a
bore. In person he resembles Henry S. Lane, the zealous United States
Senator-elect from Indiana. The sergeant-at-arms, who, in a gray coat,
and without a neckerchief, walks to and fro, with hands in his pockets,
looks like the unlovely James H. Lane, Senator-expectant from Kansas.
Shall I give you a little familiar conversation of the members, as
they smoke their post-prandial cigars in the hall, waiting for the
Convention to be called to order? Every mother's son of them has a
title.
[Sidenote: FAMILIAR CONVERSATION OF MEMBERS.]
JUDGE.--Toombs is a great blusterer. When speaking, he seems determined
to force, to drive you into agreeing with him. Howell Cobb is another
blusterer, much like him, but immensely fond of good dinners. Aleck
Stephens is very different. When _he_ speaks, you feel that he desires
to carry you with him only by the power of reason and argument.
COLONEL.--I knew him when he used to be a mail-carrier in Georgia. He
was a poor orphan boy, but a charitable society of ladies educated him.
He is a very small man, with a hand no wider than my three fingers,
and as transparent as any lady's who has been sick for a year. He
always looked like an invalid. If you were to cut his head off, I don't
believe he would bleed a pint.[4]
[4] He never weighed over ninety-six pounds, and, to see his attenuated
figure bent over his desk, the shoulders contracted, and the shape of
his slender limbs visible through his garments, a stranger would select
him as the John Randolph of our time. He has the appearance of having
undergone great bodily anguish.--_Newspaper Biography of Alexander H.
Stephens._
MAJOR.--Do you know what frightened Abe Lincoln out of Baltimore?
Somebody told him that Aleck Stephens was lying in wait for him on a
street corner, with a six-pounder strapped to his back. When he heard
that, he _sloped_. [Loud laughter from the group.]
JUDGE.--Well, Lincoln has been abused immensely about his flight
through Baltimore; but I believe the man acted from good motives. He
knew that his partisans there meant to make a demonstration when he
arrived, and that they were very obnoxious to the people; he had good
reason to believe that it would produce trouble, and perhaps bloodshed;
so he went through, secretly, to avoid it.
[Sidenote: NEW ORLEANS AGAIN--REVIEWING TROOPS.]
NEW ORLEANS, _April 5, 1861_.
The Second Louisiana Zouaves were reviewed on Lafayette Square last
evening, before leaving for Pensacola. They are boyish-looking, and
handle their muskets as if a little afraid of them, but seem to be
the raw material of good soldiers. They are luridly grotesque, in
closely-fitting, blue-tasseled, red fez caps, blue flannel jackets and
frocks, faced with red, baggy red breeches, like galvanized corn-sacks,
and gutta-percha greaves about their ankles.
_April 6._
All the Secession leaders except Senator Benjamin declare there will
be no war. He asserts that war is sure to come; and in a recent speech
characterized it as "by no means an unmixed evil."
The Fire-Eaters are intensely bitter upon the border States for
refusing to plunge into the whirlpool of Secession. They are bent
on persuading or driving all the slave States into their ranks.
Otherwise they fear--indeed, predict frankly--that the border will
gradually become Abolitionized, and extend free territory to the Gulf
itself. They are quite willing to devote Kentucky and Virginia to the
devastation of civil war, or the embarrassment of a contiguous hostile
republic, which would not return their run-away negroes.[5] But they
will move heaven and earth to save themselves from any such possible
contingency.
[5] By the last census report, the whole number of escaping fugitives
in the United States, in the year 1860, was eight hundred and three,
being a trifle over _one-fiftieth of one per cent._ upon the whole
number of slaves. Of these, it is probable that the greater part
fled to places of refuge in the South, the Dismal Swamp, everglades
of Florida, southern mountain regions, and the northern States of
Mexico.--_Everett's New York Oration, July 4, 1861._
_April 8._
The recent warlike movements of the National Government cause
excitement and surprise. At last, the people begin to suspect that they
have invoked grim-visaged war. The newspapers descant upon the injury
to commerce and industry. Why did they not think of all this before?
[Sidenote: THREE OBNOXIOUS NORTHERNERS.]
It is vouchsafed to few mortals to learn, before death, exactly what
their associates think of them; but your correspondent is among
the favored few. The other evening, I was sitting with a Secession
acquaintance, in the great exchange of the St. Charles Hotel, when
conversation turned upon the southern habit of lynching people who
do not happen to agree with the majority. He presumed enough upon my
ignorance to insist that any moderate, gentlemanly Republican might
come here with impunity.
"But," he added, "there are three men whose safety I would not
guarantee."
"Who are they?"
"Governor Dennison, of Ohio, is one. Since he refused to return that
fugitive slave to Kentucky, he would hardly be permitted to stay in New
Orleans; at all events, I should oppose it. Then there is Andy Johnson.
He ought to be shot, or hanged, wherever found. But for him, Kentucky
and Tennessee would have been with us long ago. He could not remain
here unharmed for a single hour."
"And the third?"
"Some infernal scoundrel, who is writing abusive letters about us to
_The New York Tribune_."
"Is it possible?"
"Yes, sir, and he has been at it for more than a month."
"Can't you find him out?"
"Some think it is a Kentuckian, who pretends to be engaged in
cattle-trading, but only makes that a subterfuge. I suspect, however,
that it is an editor of _The Picayune_, which is a Yankee concern
through and through. If he is caught, I don't think he will write many
more letters."
I ventured a few words in palliation of the Governor and the Senator,
but quite agreed that this audacious scribbler ought to be suppressed.
[Sidenote: ATTACK ON SUMTER--REBEL BOASTING.]
_April 12._
Telegraphic intelligence to-day of the attack upon Fort Sumter causes
intense excitement. _The Delta_ office is besieged by a crowd hungry
for news. The universal expectation of the easy capture of the fort is
not stronger than the belief that it will be followed by an immediate
and successful movement against the city of Washington. The politicians
and newspapers have persuaded the masses that the Yankees (a phrase
which they no longer apply distinctively to New Englanders, but to
every person born in the North) mean to subjugate them, but are arrant
cowards, who may easily be frightened away. Leading men seldom express
this opinion; yet _The Crescent_, giving the report that eight thousand
Massachusetts troops have been called into the field, adds, that if
they would come down to Pensacola, eighteen hundred Confederates would
easily "whip them out."
"God help them if the tempest swings
The pine against the palm!"
CHAPTER VII.
----Thou sure and firm-set earth, Hear not my steps,
which way they walk, for fear Thy very stones prate of my
whereabout.--MACBETH.
[Sidenote: ABOLITION TENDENCIES OF KENTUCKIANS.]
There were two of my acquaintances (one very prominent in the Secession
movement) with whom, while they had no suspicion of my real business,
I could converse with a little frankness. One of them desired war, on
the ground that it would unite the inhabitants of all the border slave
States, and overpower the Union sentiment there.
"But," I asked, "will not war also unite the people of the North?"
"I think not. We have a great many earnest and bold friends there."
"True; but do you suppose they could stand for a single week against
the popular feeling which war would arouse?"
"Perhaps you are right," he replied, thoughtfully, "but it never
occurred to me before."
My other friend also talked with great frankness:
"We can get along very well with the New England Yankees who are
permanently settled here. They make the strongest Secessionists we
have; but the Kentuckians give us a great deal of trouble. They were
born and raised where Slavery is unprofitable. They have strong
proclivities toward Abolitionism. The constituents of Rozier and
Roselius, who fought us so persistently in the Convention, are nearly
all Kentuckians."
[Sidenote: TWO CHIEF CAUSES OF SECESSION.]
"Slavery is our leading interest. Right or wrong, we have it and we
must have it. Cotton, rice, and sugar cannot be raised without it.
Being a necessity, we do not mean to allow its discussion. Every thing
which clashes with it, or tends to weaken it, must go under. Our large
German population is hostile to it. About all these Dutchmen would be
not only Unionists, but Black Republicans, if they dared."
Perhaps it is the invariable law of revolutions that, even while the
revolters are in a numerical minority, they are able to carry the
majority with them. It is certain that, before Sumter was fired on,
a majority in every State, except South Carolina, was opposed to
Secession. The constant predictions of the Rebel leaders that there
would be no war, and the assertions of prominent New York journals,
that any attempt at coercion on the part of the Government would be met
with armed and bloody resistance in every northern city and State, were
the two chief causes of the apparent unanimity of the South.
The masses had a vague but very earnest belief that the North, in some
incomprehensible manner, had done them deadly wrong. Cassio-like, they
remembered "a mass of things, but nothing distinctly; a quarrel, but
nothing wherefore." The leaders were sometimes more specific.
"The South," said a pungent writer, "has endured a great many wrongs;
but the most intolerable of all the grievances ever thrust upon her was
the Census Report of 1860!" There was a great deal of truth in this
remark. One day I asked my New Orleans friend:
"Why have you raised all this tempest about Mr. Lincoln's election?"
[Sidenote: FUNDAMENTAL GRIEVANCE OF THE REBELS.]
"Don't deceive yourself," he answered. "Mr. Lincoln's election had
nothing to do with it, beyond enabling us to rouse our people. Had
Douglas been chosen, we should have broken up the Union just as
quickly. Had Bell triumphed, it would have been all the same. Even if
Breckinridge had been elected, we would have seceded before the close
of his term. There is an essential incompatibility between the two
sections. _The South stands still, while the North has grown rich and
powerful, and expanded from ocean to ocean._"
This was the fundamental grievance. Very liberal in his general
views, he had not apparently the faintest suspicion that Slavery was
responsible for the decadence of the South, or that Freedom impelled
the gigantic strides of the North.
Yet his theory of the Rebellion was doubtless correct. It arose from
no man, or party, or political event, but from the inherent quarrel
between two adverse systems, which the fullness of time had ripened
into open warfare. His "essential incompatibility" was only another
name for Mr. Seward's "Irrepressible Conflict" between two principles.
They have since recorded, in letters of blood, not merely their
incompatibility, but their absolute, aggressive, eternal antagonism.
During the second week in April, I began to find myself the object of
unpleasant, not to say impertinent, curiosity. So many questions were
asked, so many pointed and significant remarks made in my presence, as
to render it certain that I was regarded with peculiar suspicion.
At first I was at a loss to surmise its origin. But one day I
encountered an old acquaintance in the form of a son of Abraham,
who had frequently heard me, in public addresses in Kansas, utter
sentiments not absolutely pro-slavery; who knew that I once held a
modest commission in the Free State army, and that I was a whilom
correspondent of _The Tribune_.
[Sidenote: SUDDEN DEPARTURE FROM NEW ORLEANS.]
He was by no means an Israelite without guile, for he had been chased
out of the Pike's Peak region during the previous summer, for robbing
one of my friends who had nursed him in sickness. Concluding that he
might play the informer, I made an engagement with him for the next
afternoon, and, before the time arrived, shook from my feet the dust of
New Orleans. Designing to make a _détour_ to Fort Pickens on my way, I
procured a ticket for Washington. The sea was the safer route, but I
was curious to take a final look at the interior.
On Friday evening, April 12th, I left the Crescent City. In five
minutes our train plunged into the great swamp which environs the
commercial metropolis of the Southwest. Deep, broad ditches are cut for
draining, and you sometimes see an alligator, five or six feet long,
and as large as the body of a man, lying lazily upon the edge of the
green water.
The marshy ground is mottled with gorgeous flowers, and the palmetto
is very abundant. It does not here attain to the dignity of a tree,
seldom growing more than four feet high. Its flag, sword-shaped leaves
branch out in flat semicircular clusters, resembling the fan palm. Its
tough bulbous root was formerly cut into fine fragments by the Indians,
then bruised to a pulp and thrown into the lake. It produced temporary
blindness among the fishes, which brought them to the surface, where
they were easily caught by hand.
With rare fitness stands the palmetto as the device of South Carolina.
Indeed, it is an excellent emblem of Slavery itself; for, neither
beautiful, edible, nor useful, it blinds the short-sighted fish coming
under its influence.
To them it is
----"The insane root, Which takes the reason prisoner."
A ride of four miles brought us to Lake Pontchartrain, stretching away
in the fading sunlight. Over the broad expanse of swelling water,
delicate, foamy white caps were cresting the waves.
[Sidenote: THE WAR SPIRIT IN MOBILE.]
We were transferred to the propeller Alabama, and, when I woke the next
morning, were lying at Mobile. With a population of thirty thousand,
the city contains many pleasant residences, embowered in shade-trees,
and surrounded by generous grounds. It is rendered attractive by its
tall pines, live oak, and Pride-of-China trees. The last were now
decked in a profusion of bluish-white blossoms.
The war spirit ran high. Hand-bills, headed "Soldiers wanted," and
"Ho! for volunteers," met the eye at every corner; uniforms and arms
abounded, and the voice of the bugle was heard in the streets. All
northern vessels were clearing on account of the impending crisis,
though some were not more than half loaded.
Mobile was very radical. One of the daily papers urged the imposition
of a tax of one dollar per copy upon every northern newspaper or
magazine brought into the Confederacy!
The leading hotel was crowded with guests, including many soldiers _en
route_ for Bragg's army. It was my own design to leave for Pensacola
that evening, and look at the possible scene of early hostilities.
A Secession friend in New Orleans had given me a personal letter to
General Bragg, introducing me as a gentleman of leisure, who would be
glad to make a few sketches of proper objects of interest about his
camps, for one of the New York illustrated papers. It added that he had
known me all his life, and vouched completely for my "soundness."
[Sidenote: SUSPICIONS AROUSED--AN AWKWARD ENCOUNTER.]
But a little incident changed my determination. Among my
fellow-passengers from New Orleans were three young officers of the
Confederate army, also bound for Fort Pickens. While on the steamer, I
did not observe that I was an object of their special attention; but
just after breakfast this morning, as I was going up to my room, in the
fourth story of the Battle House, I encountered them also ascending the
broad stairs. The moment they saw me, they dropped the subject upon
which they were conversing, and one, with significant glances, burst
into a most violent invective against _The Tribune_, denouncing it as
the vilest journal in America, except Parson Brownlow's _Knoxville
Whig!_ pronouncing every man connected with it a thief and scoundrel,
and asserting that if any of its correspondents could be caught here,
they would be hung upon the nearest tree.
This philippic was so evidently inspired by my presence, and the eyes
of the whole group glared with a speculation so unpleasant, that I felt
myself an unhappy Romeo, "too early seen unknown and known too late." I
had learned by experience that the best protection for a suspected man
was to go everywhere, as if he had a right to go; to brave scrutiny; to
return stare for stare and question for question.
So, during this tirade, which lasted while, side by side, we leisurely
climbed two staircases, I strove to maintain an exterior of serene and
wooden unconsciousness. When the speaker had exhausted his vocabulary
of hard words, I drew a fresh cigar from my pocket, and said to him,
"Please to give me a light, sir." With a puzzled air he took his cigar
from his mouth, knocked off the ashes with his forefinger, handed it to
me, and stood regarding me a little curiously, while, looking him full
in the face, I slowly ignited my own Havana, returned his, and thanked
him.
They turned away apparently convinced that their zeal had outrun their
discretion. The look of blank disappointment and perplexity upon the
faces of those young officers as they disappeared in the passage will
be, to me, a joy forever.
Pondering in my room upon fresh intelligence of the arrest of
suspicious persons in General Bragg's camp, and upon this little
experience, I changed my plan. As Toodles, in the farce, thinks he
"won't smoke," so I decided not to go to Pensacola; but ordered a
carriage, and drove down to the mail-boat St. Charles, which was to
leave for Montgomery that evening.
I fully expected during the afternoon to entertain a vigilance
committee, the police, or some military officials who would invite
me to look at Secession through prison bars. It was not an inviting
prospect; yet there was nothing to do but to wait.
The weather was dreamy and delicious. My state-room looked out upon the
shining river, and the rich olive green of the grassy shore. Upon the
dull, opaque water of a broad bayou beyond, little snowy sails flashed,
and a steamer, with tall black chimneys, left a white, foamy track in
the waters, and long clouds of brown smoke against the sky.
[Sidenote: "MASS'R, FORT SUMTER'S GONE UP!"]
At three o'clock in the afternoon, while I was lying in my state-room,
looking out drowsily upon this picture, a cabin-boy presented his sooty
face at the door and said, "Mass'r, Fort Sumter's gone up!"
[Sidenote: BELLS RINGING AND CANNONS BOOMING.]
The intelligence had just arrived by telegraph. The first battle of
the Great War was over, and seventy-two men, after a bombardment of
two days, were captured by twelve thousand! In a moment church and
steamboat bells rang out their notes of triumph, and cannon belched
forth their deep-mouthed exultation. A public meeting was extemporized
in the street, and enthusiastic speeches were made. Mindful of my
morning experience, I did not leave the boat, but tried to read the
momentous Future. I thought I could see, in its early pages, the
death-warrant of Slavery; but all else was inscrutable.
There was a steam calliope attached to the "St. Charles." That evening,
when the last bell had rung, and the last cable was taken in, she left
the Mobile landing, and plowed slowly up the river to the shrill notes
of "Dixie's Land."[6]
[6] Dixie's Land is a synonym for heaven. It appears that there was
once a good planter named Dixie, who died at some period unknown, to
the intense grief of his animated property. They found expression for
their sorrow in song, and consoled themselves by clamoring in verse
for their removal to the land to which Dixie had departed, and where
probably the renewed spirit would be greatly surprised to find himself
in their company. Whether they were ill treated after he died, and thus
had reason to deplore his removal, or merely desired heaven in the
abstract, nothing known enables me to assert. But Dixie's Land is now
generally taken to be the Seceded States, where Mr. Dixie certainly is
not at the present writing.--_Russell's Diary in America._
The Alabama is the "most monotonously beautiful of rivers." In the
evening twilight, its sinuous sweep afforded a fine view of both
shores, timbered down to the water's edge. Dense foliage, decked in the
blended and intermingled hues of summer, gave them the appearance of
two soft, smooth cushions of variegated velvet.
After dark, we met the descending mail-boat. Our calliope saluted her
with lively music, and the passengers assembled on the guards, greeting
each other with the usual huzzas and waving of hats and handkerchiefs.
On Sunday morning, the inevitable calliope awoke us--this time,
with sacred music. At many river landings there was only a single
well-shaded farm-house on the bank, with ladies sitting upon the
piazzas, and white and negro children playing under the magnificent
live-oaks. At others, a solitary warehouse stood upon the high,
perpendicular bluff, with an inclined-plane railway for the conveyance
of freight to the water. At some points the country was open, and a
great cotton-field extended to the river-bank, with a weather-beaten
cotton-press in the midst of it, like an old northern cider-mill.
[Sidenote: A TERPSICHOREAN YOUNG NEGRO.]
Planters, returning from New Orleans and Mobile, were met at the
landings by their negroes. The slaves appeared glad to see them, and
were greeted with hearty hand-shakings. At one landing the calliope
struck up a lively strain, and a young darkey on the bank, with the
Terpsichorean proclivity of his race, began to dance as if for dear
life, throwing his arms and legs in ludicrous and extravagant fashion.
His master attempted to cuff his ears, but the little fellow ducked his
head and danced away, to the great merriment of the lookers-on. The
negro nurses on the boat fondled and kissed the little white children
in their charge most ardently.
I saw no instance of unkind treatment to slaves; but a young planter on
board mentioned to me, as a noteworthy circumstance, that he had not
permitted a negro to be struck upon his plantation for a year.
A Texian on board the boat was very bitter against Governor Houston,
and, with the usual extreme language of the Rebels, declared he would
be hanged if he persisted in opposing the Disunionists. An old citizen
of Louisiana, too, became so indignant at me for remarking I had always
supposed Douglas to sympathize with the South, that I made haste to
qualify the assertion.
[Sidenote: LEADING CHARACTERISTICS OF SOUTHERNERS.]
Our passengers were excellent specimens of the better class of
southerners. Aside from his negrophobia, the southern _gentleman_
is an agreeable companion. He is genial, frank, cordial, profoundly
deferential to women, and carries his heart in his hand. His social
qualities are his weak point. To a northerner, passing through his
country during these disjointed times, I would have said:
"Your best protection is to be 'hail fellow, well met;' spend money
freely, tell good stories, be liberal of your private brandy-flask,
and your after-dinner cigars. If you do this, and your manners are,
in his thinking, gentlemanly, he can by no means imagine you a Yankee
in the offensive sense. He pictures all Yankees as puritanic, rigid,
fanatical, and talking through the nose. 'What the world wants,' says
George William Curtis, 'is not honesty, but acquiescence.' That is
profoundly true here. Acquiesce gracefully, not intemperately, in the
prevailing sentiment. Don't hail from the State of Massachusetts; don't
'guess,' or use other northern provincialisms; don't make yourself
conspicuous--and, if you know human nature, you may pass without
serious trouble."
Our southerner has little humanity--he feels little sympathy for a man,
_as_ a man--as a mere human being--but he has abundant warmth toward
his own social class. Not a very high specimen himself, he yet lays
infinite stress upon being "a gentleman." If you have the misfortune to
be poor, and without credentials, but possess the manners of education
and good society, he will give you kinder reception than you are likely
to obtain in the bustling, restless, crowded North.
[Sidenote: SOUTHERN PROVINCIALISMS.]
He affects long hair, dresses in unqualified black, and wears kid
gloves continually. He pronounces iron "_i_-ron" (two syllables), and
barrel "barl." He calls car "kyah" (one syllable), cigar "_se_-ghah,"
and negro "_nig_-ro"--never negro, and very rarely "nigger." The
latter, by the way, was a pet word with Senator Douglas. Once, while
his star was in the ascendant, some one asked Mr. Seward:
"Will Judge Douglas ever be President?"
"No, sir," replied the New York senator. "No man will ever be President
of the United States who spells negro with two g's!"
These southern provincialisms are sometimes a little startling.
Conversing with a young man in the senior class of a Mississippi
college, I remarked that men were seldom found in any circle who had
not some sympathy or affinity with it, to stimulate them to seek it.
"Yes," he replied, "something to _aig them on_!"
The forests along the river were beautiful with the brilliant green
live-oak festooned with mistletoe, the dark pine, the dense cane, the
spring glory of the cottonwood and maple, the drooping delicate leaves
of the willow, the white-stemmed sycamore with its creamy foliage, and
the great snowy blossoms of the dog-wood.
With a calliope, familiarity breeds contempt. Ours became an
intolerable nuisance, and induced frequent discussions about bribing
the player to stop it. He was apparently animated by the spirit of the
Parisian who set a hand-organ to running by clockwork in his room,
locked the apartment, went to the country for a month, and, when he
returned, found that two obnoxious neighbors, whom he wished to drive
away, had blown out their brains in utter despair.
While I was pleasantly engaged in a whist-party in the cabin, this
fragment of a conversation between two bystanders reached my ears:
"A spy?"
"Yes, a spy from the North, looking about to obtain information for old
Lincoln; and they arrested one yesterday, too."
[Sidenote: CONFEDERATE CAPITOL AT MONTGOMERY.]
This was a pleasing theme of reflection for the timid and contemplative
mind. A passenger explained the matter, by informing me that, at one of
the landings where we stopped, telegraphic intelligence was received
of the arrest of two spies at Montgomery. The popular impression
seemed to be, that about one person in ten was engaged in that
not-very-fascinating avocation!
In Indian dialect, Alabama signifies, "Here we rest;" but, for me, it
had an exactly opposite meaning. We awoke one morning to find our boat
lying at Montgomery. Reaching the hotel too early for breakfast, I
strolled with a traveler from Philadelphia, a pretended Secessionist,
to the State House, which was at present also the Capitol of the
Confederacy.
Standing, like the Capitol in Washington, at the head of a broad
thoroughfare, it overlooks a pleasant city of eight thousand people.
The building is of stucco, and bears that melancholy suggestion of
better days which seems inseparable from the Peculiar Institution.
The senate chamber is a small, dingy apartment, on whose dirty walls
hang portraits of Clay, Calhoun, and two or three Alabama politicians.
The desks and chairs were covered with antiquated public documents, and
the other _débris_ of legislative halls. While returning to the hotel,
we heard from a street loafer a terse description of some model slave:
"He is just the best nigger in this town. He knows enough to work well,
and he knows nothing else."
We were also informed that the Virginia Convention had passed a
Secession ordinance.
"This is capital news; is it not?" said my Philadelphia companion, with
well-assumed glee.
For several days, in spite of his violent assertions, I had doubted his
sincerity. This was the first time he broached the subject when no one
else was present. I looked steadily in his eye, and inquired:
"Do you think so?"
His half-quizzical expression was a satisfactory answer, even without
the reply:
"I want to get home to Philadelphia without being detained on the way."
[Sidenote: "COPPERAS BREECHES" VS. "BLACK BREECHES."]
In the hotel office, two well-dressed southerners were discussing the
omnipresent topic. One of them said:
"We shall have no war."
"Yes, we shall," replied the other. "The Yankees are going to fight for
a while; but it will make no difference to us. We have got copperas
breeches enough to carry this war through. None of the black breeches
will have to shoulder muskets!"
The reader should understand that the clothing of the working whites
was colored with a dye in which copperas was the chief ingredient;
while, of course, the upper, slaveholding classes, wore "customary
suits of solemn black." This was a very pregnant sentence, conveying in
a few words the belief of those Rebels who instigated and impelled the
war.
[Sidenote: A CORRESPONDENT IN DURANCE VILE.]
The morning newspapers, at our breakfast-table, detailed two
interesting facts. First, that "Jasper,"[7] the Charleston
correspondent of _The New York Times_, had been seized and imprisoned
in the Palmetto City. Second, that Gen. Bragg had arrested in his
camp, and sent under guard to Montgomery, "as a prisoner of war," the
correspondent of _The Pensacola_ (Fla.) _Observer_. This journalist was
an enthusiastic Secessionist, but had been guilty of some indiscretion
in publishing facts touching the strength and designs of the Rebel
army. His signature was "Nemo;" and he now bade fair to be No One,
indeed, for some time to come.
[7] This gentleman went to Charleston openly for _The Times_, and
constantly insisted that a candid and truthful correspondent of
any northern paper could travel through the South without serious
difficulty. He was daily declaring that the devil was not so black as
he is painted, denying charges brought against Charlestonians by the
northern press, and sometimes evidently straining a point in his own
convictions to say a kind word for them. But, during the storming of
Sumter, he was suddenly arrested, robbed, and imprisoned in a filthy
cell for several days. He was at last permitted to go; but the mob had
become excited against him, and with difficulty he escaped with his
life. No other correspondent was subjected to such gross indignities.
"Jasper" reached Washington, having obtained a good deal of new and
valuable information about South Carolina character.
CHAPTER VIII.
I reckon this always, that a man is never undone until he be
hanged.--TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
I now began to entertain sentiments of profound gratitude toward the
young officer, at Mobile, who kept me from going to Fort Pickens.
Rejecting the tempting request of my Philadelphia companion to remain
one day in Montgomery, that he might introduce me to Jefferson Davis, I
continued my "Journey Due North."
[Sidenote: EFFECT OF CAPTURING FORT SUMTER.]
When we reached the cars, my baggage was missing. The omnibus agent,
who was originally a New Yorker, and probably thought it precarious for
a man desiring to reach Washington to be detained, even a few hours,
kindly induced the conductor to detain the train for five minutes while
we drove back to the Exchange Hotel and found the missing valise. The
event proved that delay would have been embarrassing, if not perilous.
A Georgian on the car-seat with me, while very careful not to let
others overhear his remarks, freely avowed Union sentiments, and
asserted that they were predominant among his neighbors. I longed to
respond earnestly and sincerely, but there was the possibility of a
trap, and I merely acquiesced.
The country was intoxicated by the capture of Sumter. A newspaper on
the train, several days old, in its regular Associated Press report,
contained the following:
[Sidenote: WASHINGTON TO BE CAPTURED.]
MONTGOMERY, Ala., Friday, _April 12, 1861_.
An immense crowd serenaded President Davis and Mr. Walker,
Secretary of War, at the Exchange Hotel to-night. The former
was not well, and did not appear. Secretary Walker, in a
few words of electrical eloquence, told the news from Fort
Sumter, declaring, in conclusion, that before many hours the
flag of the Confederacy would float over that fortress. No
man, he said, could tell where the war this day commenced
would end, but he would prophesy that the flag which here
streams to the breeze would float over the dome of the old
Capitol at Washington before the first of May. Let them test
Southern courage and resources, and it might float eventually
over Faneuil Hall itself.
An officer from General Bragg's camp informed me that all preparations
for capturing Fort Pickens were made, the United States sentinels on
duty upon a certain night being bribed; but that "Nemo's" intimation of
the intended attack frustrated it, a copy of his letter having found
its way into the post, and forewarned and forearmed the commander.
Everybody was looking anxiously for news from the North. The
predictions of certain New York papers, that the northern people would
inaugurate war at home if the Government attempted "coercion," were
received with entire credulity, and frequently quoted.
There was much admiration of Major Anderson's defense of Sumter; but
the opinion was general, that only a military sense of honor dictated
his conduct; that now, relieved from a soldier's responsibility, he
would resign and join the Rebels. "He is too brave a man to remain with
the Yankees," was the common remark. Far in the interior of Georgia, I
saw fragments of his flag-staff exhibited, and highly prized as relics.
We dined at the little hamlet of West Point, on the line between
Alabama and Georgia, and stopped for two evening hours at the bustling
city of Atlanta. Our stay was enlivened by a fresh conversation in
the car about northern spies and reporters, who were declared to be
infesting the country, and worthy of hanging wherever found.
[Sidenote: APPREHENSION ABOUT ARMING THE NEGROES.]
We spent the night in pursuit of sleep under difficulties, upon a rough
Georgia railway. The next morning, the scantiness of the disappearing
foliage indicated that we were going northward. In Augusta, we passed
through broad, pleasant shaded streets, and then crossed the Savannah
river into South Carolina. Companies of troops, bound for Charleston,
began to come on board the train, and were greeted with cheering at all
the stations. A young Carolinian, taking me for a southerner, remarked:
"The only thing we fear in this war is that the Yankees will arm our
slaves and turn them against us."
This was the first statement of the kind I heard. Persons had said many
times in my presence that they were perfectly sure of the slaves--who
would all fight for their masters. In the last article of faith they
proved as deluded as those sanguine northerners who believed that slave
insurrections would everywhere immediately result from hostilities.
At Lee's Station we met the morning train from Charleston. Within
two yards of my window, I saw a dark object disappear under the
cow-catcher; and a moment after, a woman, wringing her hands, shrieked:
"My God! My God! Mr. Lee killed!"
Lying on the track was a shapeless, gory mass, which only the clothing
showed to be the remains of a human being. The station-keeper,
attempting to cross the road just in advance of the train, was struck
down and run over. His little son was standing beside him at the very
moment, and two of his daughters looking on from the door of his
residence, a few yards away. In the first bewilderment of terror, they
now stood wildly beating their foreheads, and gasping for breath. In
strange contrast with this scene, a martial band was discoursing lively
music, and people were loudly cheering the soldiers. Buoyant Life and
grim Death stood side by side and walked hand in hand.
Our train plunged into deep pine woods, and wended through large
plantations, whose cool frame houses were shaded by palmetto-trees. The
negro men and women, who stood in the fields persuading themselves that
they were working, handled their hoes with indescribable awkwardness. A
sketch of their exact positions would look ridiculously unnatural. They
were in striking contrast with the zeal and activity of the northern
laborer, who moves under the stimulus of freedom.
[Sidenote: LOOKING AT THE CAPTURED FORTRESS.]
In the afternoon, we passed through the Magnolia Cemetery, and in view
of the State Arsenal, with the palmetto flag waving over it. The Mills'
House, in Charleston, was crowded with guests and citizens, half of
them in uniform. After I registered my name, a brawny fellow, with
a "plug-ugly" countenance, looked over my shoulder at the book, and
then regarded me with a long, impudent, scrutinizing stare, which I
endeavored to return with interest. In a few seconds his eyes dropped,
and he went back to his seat.
I strolled down the narrow streets, with their antiquated houses, to
the pleasant Battery, where several columbiads, with pyramidal piles of
solid shot between them, pointed at Fort Sumter. Down the harbor, among
a few snow-white sails, stood the already historic fortress. The line
of broken roof, visible above the walls, was torn and ragged from Rebel
shots. At the distance of two miles, it was impossible, with the naked
eye, to identify the two flags above it. A bystander told me that they
were the colors of South Carolina and of the Confederacy.
The devices of treason flaunting in the breeze where the Stars and
Stripes, after being insulted for months, were so lately lowered in
dishonor, were not a pleasant spectacle, and I turned slowly and sadly
back to the hotel. In its reading-room, among the four or five papers
on file, was a copy of _The Tribune_, whose familiar face was like the
shadow of a great rock in a weary land.
[Sidenote: A SHORT STAY IN CHARLESTON.]
The city reeled with excitement. In the evening martial music and
huzzas came floating up to my window from a meeting at the Charleston
Hotel, where the young Virginian Hotspur, Roger A. Pryor, was one of
the prominent speakers. Publicly and privately, the Charlestonians were
boasting over their late Cadmean victory. They had not heard from the
North.
I hoped to remain several days, but the public frenzy had grown so
uncontrollable, that every stranger was subjected to espionage. One
could hardly pick up a newspaper without seeing, or stand ten minutes
in a public place without hearing, of the arrest of some northerner,
charged with being a spy. While the lines of retreat were yet open, it
was judicious to flee from the wrath to come.
Designing to stop for a while in North Carolina, whose Rip Van Winkle
sleep seemed proof against any possible convulsion, I took the midnight
train northward. A number of Baltimoreans on board were returning
home, after assisting at the capture of Sumter. They were voluble and
boisterous Rebels, declaring in good set terms that Maryland would
shortly be revolutionized, Governor Hicks and Henry Winter Davis
hanged, and President Lincoln driven out of Washington. They averred
with great vehemence and iteration that the Yankees were all cowards,
and could easily be "whipped out;" but when one, whose denunciations
had been peculiarly bitter, was asked:
[Sidenote: THE COUNTRY ON FIRE.]
"Are you going home through Washington?"
"Not I," was the reply. "Old Abe might have us nabbed!"
We were soon on the clayey soil of the Old North State, which, to the
eye, closely resembles those regions of Ohio near Lake Erie. Hour after
hour, we rode through the deep forests of tall pines, from which the
bark had been stripped for making rosin and turpentine.
My anticipations of quiet proved altogether delusive. President
Lincoln's Proclamation, calling for seventy-five thousand soldiers,
had just arrived by telegraph, and the country was on fire. It was the
first flush of excitement here, and the feeling was more intense and
demonstrative than in those States which had become accustomed to the
Revolution. Forts were being seized, negroes and white men impressed
to labor upon them, military companies forming, clergymen taking up
the musket, and women encouraging the determination to fight the
"Abolitionists." All Union sentiment was awed into utter silence.
While the train was stopping at Wilmington, a telegram, announcing that
Virginia had passed a Secession ordinance, was received with yells
of applause. Sitting alone at one end of the car, I observed three
fellow-passengers, with whom I had formed a traveling acquaintance,
conferring earnestly. Their frequent glances toward me indicated
the subject of the conversation. As I had said nothing to define my
political position, I resolved to set myself right at once, should they
put me to the test. One of them approached me, and remarked:
"We just have news that Virginia has seceded."
I replied, with considerable emphasis: "Good! That will give us all the
border States."
Apparently satisfied, he returned to his friends, and they said no
more to me upon the all-absorbing question.
[Sidenote: SUBMITTING TO REBEL SCRUTINY.]
A fragment of conversation which occurred near me, will illustrate the
general tone of remark. A young man observed to a gentleman beside him:
"We shall have possession of Washington before the first of June."
"Do you think so? Lincoln is going to call out an army of one hundred
and fifty thousand men."
"Oh, well, we can whip them out any morning before breakfast. Throw
three or four shells among those blue-bellied Yankees and they will
scatter like a flock of sheep!"
Up to this day I had earnestly hoped that a bloody conflict between
the two sections might be averted; but these remarks were so
frequent--the opinion that northerners were unmitigated cowards seemed
so universal,[8] that I began to look with a great deal of complacency
upon the prospect which the South enjoyed of testing this faith. It was
time to ascertain, once for all, whether these gentlemen of the cotton
and the canebrake were indeed a superior race, destined to wield the
scepter, or whether their pretensions were mere arrogance and swagger.
[8] Of course the folly was not all on one side. Few northerners, up
to the attack on Sumter, thought the Rebels would do any thing but
threaten. And long after this error was exploded, our ablest journals
were fond of contrasting the resources of the two sections, and
demonstrating therefrom, with mathematical precision, that the war
could not last long; that the superiority of the North in men and money
would make the subjugation of the South a short and easy task. But they
did not commit the egregious blunder of imputing cowardice to any class
of native-born Americans.
It seemed impossible for the southern mind to comprehend that he
who never blusters, or flourishes the bowie-knife, who will endure a
great deal before fighting, who would rather suffer a wrong than do
a wrong, is, when roused, the most dangerous of adversaries--a fact
so universal, that it has given us the proverb, "Beware the fury of a
patient man."
[Sidenote: THE NORTH HEARD FROM.]
New York papers, issued after receiving intelligence of the fall of
Sumter, now reached us, and both in their news and editorial columns
indicated how suddenly that event had aroused the whole North. The
voice of every journal was for war. _The Herald_, which one morning
spoke bitterly against coercion, received a visit during the day from
several thousand tumultuous citizens, who left it the alternative of
running up the American flag or having its office torn down. By the
presence of the police, and the intercession of leading Union men,
its property was saved from destruction. In next morning's paper
appeared one of its periodical and constitutional somersaults. Its four
editorial articles all cried "War to the knife!"
The Rebels were greatly surprised, half appalled, and doubly
exasperated at the unexpected change of all the northern papers which
they had counted friendly to them; but they also shouted "War!" even
louder than before.
At Goldsboro, where we stopped for supper, a small slab of marble,
standing upon the mantel in the hotel office, had these words upon it:
"Sacred to the memory of A. Lincoln, who died of a broken
neck, at Newburn, April 16, 1861."
[Sidenote: AN INEBRIATED PATRIOT.]
Before the train started again, a young patriot, whose articulation was
impeded by whisky, passed through it, asking:
"S'thr any ---- Yankee onth'strain? F'thr's a ---- Union man
board these cars, Ic'nwhip him by ---. H'rahfr Jeff. Davis
nth'southrncnfdrcy!" He afterward amused himself by firing his revolver
from the car door. At the next station he stepped out upon the
platform, and repeated:
"H'rah fr Jeff. Davis n'th'Southrn Confdrcy!" Another patriot among the
bystanders at the station promptly responded:
"Good. Hurra for Jeff. Davis!"
"Yre th'man fr me," responded our passenger; "Come 'n' takeadrink. All
fr Jeff. Davis here, ain't you?"
"Yes, sir."
"Thatsallrightth'n. But what d'you elect that ---- Abolitionist, Murphy,
t'th' Leg'slature for?"
"_I'm_ Murphy," replied the patriot, who had been standing in the
group, but now sprang forward belligerently. "Who calls _me_ an
Abolitionist?"
"Beg y'r padon sr. Reck'n you ain't the man. But who _is_ that
Abolitionist you 'lected here? 's name's Brown, 'sn't it? Yes, that's
it. ---- Brown; y'ought t'hang _him_!"
Just then the whistle shrieked and the train moved on, amid shouts of
laughter.
At six o'clock next morning, we reached Richmond. Here, also, I had
hoped to stop, but the caldron was seething too hotly. Rebel flags were
everywhere flying, the newspapers all exulted over the passage of the
Secession ordinance, and some of them warned northerners and Union men
to leave the country forthwith. The tone of conversation, too, was very
bitter. The farther I went, the intenser the frenzy; and, beginning to
wonder whether there was any safe haven south of Philadelphia or New
York, I continued northward without a moment's unnecessary delay.
The railway accommodations grew better in exact ratio to our approach
to Mason and Dixon's line, and northern physiognomies were numerous
on the train. At Ashland, a few miles north of Richmond, the first
palatable meal since leaving the Alabama River was set before us. All
the intervening distance, to the epicurean eye, stretched out in a
dreary perspective of bacon and corn bread.
[Sidenote: THE OLD DOMINION IN A FRENZY.]
Half the passengers were soldiers. Every village bristled with
bayonets. At Fredericksburgh, one of the polished F. F. V.'s on
the platform presented his face at our window, and asked what the
unmentionable-to-ears-polite all these people were going north for? As
the passengers maintained an "heroic reticence," he exploded a fresh
oath, and went to the next car to pursue his investigations.
A citizen of Richmond, who occupied the seat with me, satisfied that I
was sound on the Secession question, assured me that it had been very
difficult to get the ordinance through the Convention; that trouble
was anticipated from Union men in Western Virginia; that business in
Richmond was utterly suspended, New York exchange commanding a premium
of fifteen per cent.
"We are fearful," he added, "of difficulty with our free negroes. There
are several thousand in Richmond, many of whom are intelligent, and
some wealthy. They show signs of turbulence, and we are perfecting an
organization to hold them in check. I sent the money to New York this
morning for a quantity of Sharp's rifles, ordering them to be forwarded
in dry-goods boxes, that they might not excite suspicion."
He added, that Ben McCulloch was in Virginia, and had perfected a
plan by which, at the head of Rebel troops, he was about to capture
Washington. As we progressed northward, the noisy Secession element
grew small by degrees, and beautifully less. At Acquia Creek, we left
the cars and took a steamer up the Potomac.
[Sidenote: THE OLD FLAG ONCE MORE.]
A quiet gentleman, who had come on board at Richmond, impressed
me, through that mysterious freemasonry which exists among
journalists--indeed, between members of all professions--as a
representative of the Fourth Estate. In reply to inquiries, he informed
me that he had been reporting the Virginia Convention for _The Richmond
Enquirer_, but, being a New Yorker, had concluded, like Jerry Blossom,
he wanted "to go home." He described the Convention, which at first
had an emphatic majority for the Government; but in time, one Union
man after another was dragooned into the ranks, until a bare Secession
majority was obtained.
The ordinance explicitly provided that it should not take effect until
submitted to the popular vote; but the State authorities immediately
assumed that it would be ratified. Senator Mason wrote a public letter,
warning all Union men to leave the State; and before the time for
voting arrived, the Secessionists succeeded in inaugurating a bloody
conflict upon the soil, and bringing in armies from the Gulf States. It
was then ratified by a large majority.
We steamed up the Potomac, passed the quiet tomb at Mount Vernon, which
was soon to hear the clangor of contending armies, and early in the
afternoon came in sight of Washington. There, at last, thank God! was
the old Starry Banner, flying in triumph over the Capitol, the White
House, the departments, and hundreds of dwellings. Albeit unused to the
melting mood, my heart was full, and my eyelids quivered as I saw it.
Until that hour, I never knew how I loved the old flag!
Walking down Pennsylvania avenue, I encountered troops of old friends,
and constantly wondered that I had been able to spend ten weeks in the
South, without meeting more than two or three familiar acquaintances.
[Sidenote: AN HOUR WITH PRESIDENT LINCOLN.]
A body-guard for the President, made up entirely of citizens of Kansas,
armed with Sharp's rifles, was on duty every night at the White House.
It contained two United States Senators, three members and ex-members
of Congress, the Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court, and several
editors and other prominent citizens of that patriotic young State.
With two friends, I spent an hour at the White House. The President,
though overwhelmed with business, received us kindly, and economized
time by taking a cup of tea while conversing with us, and inquiring
very minutely about affairs in the seceding States.
"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,"
though the crown be only the chaplet of a Republic.
This man had filled the measure of American ambition, but the
remembered brightness of his face was in strange contrast with the
weary, haggard look it now wore, and his blushing honors seemed pallid
and ashen. There was the same honest, kindly tone--the same fund of
humorous anecdote--the same genuineness; but the old, free, lingering
laugh was gone.
"Mr. Douglas," remarked the President, "spent three hours with me
this afternoon. For several days he has been too unwell for business,
and has devoted his time to studying war-matters, until he understands
the military position better, perhaps, than any one of the Cabinet.
By the way," continued Mr. Lincoln, with his peculiar twinkle of the
eye, "the conversation turned upon the rendition of slaves. 'You know,'
said Douglas, 'that I am entirely sound on the Fugitive Slave Law. I
am for enforcing it in all cases within its true intent and meaning;
but, after examining it carefully, I have concluded that a negro
insurrection is a case to which it does not apply.'"
[Sidenote: PANIC IN WASHINGTON.]
I had not come north a moment too early. The train which brought me
from Richmond to Acquia Creek was the last which the Rebel authorities
permitted to pass without interruption, and the steamer, on reaching
Washington, was seized by our own Government, and made no more regular
trips. Before I had been an hour in the Capital, the telegraph wires
were cut, and railway tracks in Maryland torn up. Intelligence of
the murderous attack of a Baltimore mob on the Sixth Massachusetts
regiment, _en route_ for Washington, startled the town from its
propriety.
Chaos had come again. Washington was the seat of an intense panic. An
attack from the Rebels was hourly expected, and hundreds of families
fled from the city in terror. During the next two days, twenty-five
hundred well-officered, resolute men could undoubtedly have captured
the city. The air was filled with extravagant and startling rumors.
From Virginia, Union refugees were hourly arriving, often after narrow
escapes from the frenzied populace.
Massachusetts soldiers, who had safely run the Baltimore gantlet of
death, were quartered in the United States Senate Chamber. They had
mustered with characteristic promptness. At 5 o'clock one evening,
a telegram reached Boston asking for troops for the defense of the
imperiled Capital. At 9 o'clock the next morning, the first company,
having come twenty-five miles from the country, stacked arms in
Faneuil Hall. At 5 o'clock that night the Sixth Regiment, with full
ranks, started for Washington. They were fine-looking fellows, but
greatly embittered by their Baltimore experience. In a very quiet,
undemonstrative way, they manifested an earnest desire for immediate
and active service.
[Sidenote: "CAME OUT TO FIGHT!"]
The bewilderment and terror which had so long rested like a nightmare
on the National authorities--which for months had left almost every
leading Republican statesman timid and undecided--was at last over.
The echoes of the Charleston guns broke the spell! The masses had been
heard from! Then, as at later periods of the war, the popular instinct
was clearer and truer than all the wisdom of the politicians.
During the three days I spent in Washington, the city was virtually
blockaded, receiving neither mails, telegrams, nor re-enforcements.
Martial law, though not declared, was sadly needed. Most of the
Secessionists had left, but enough remained to serve as spies for the
Virginia Revolutionists.
I left for New York, by an evening train crowded with fleeing
families. Most of them went west from the Relay House, deterred from
passing through Baltimore by the reign of terror which the Rebels had
inaugurated. The most zealous Union papers advocated Secession as
their only means of personal and pecuniary safety. The State and city
authorities, though professedly loyal, bowed helpless before the storm.
Governor Sprague, with his Rhode Island volunteers, had started for
Washington. Mayor Brown telegraphed him, requesting that they should
not come through Baltimore, as it would exasperate the people.
"The Rhode Island regiment," was Sprague's epigrammatic response,
"came out to fight, and may just as well fight in Maryland as in
Virginia." It passed unmolested!
[Sidenote: BALTIMORE UNDER REBEL RULE.]
We found Baltimore in a frenzy. The whole city seemed under arms. The
Union men were utterly silenced, and many had fled. The only person I
heard express undisguised loyalty was a young lady from Boston, and
only her sex protected her. Several persons had been arrested as spies
during the day, including two supposed correspondents of New York
papers.
Baltimore, for the time, was worse than any thing I had seen in
Charleston, New Orleans, or Mobile. Through the evening Barnum's hotel
was filled with soldiers. Stepping into the office to make arrangements
for going to Philadelphia, I encountered an old acquaintance from
Cincinnati, now commanding a Baltimore company under arms:
"If Lincoln persists in attempting to send troops through Maryland,"
said he, "we are bound to have his head!"
Another Baltimorean came up and began to question me, but my
acquaintance promptly vouched for me as "a true southern man," and I
escaped annoyance. The same belief was expressed here which prevailed
throughout the whole South, that northern men were cowards; and persons
actually alluded to the attack upon the unarmed Massachusetts troops as
an act of bravery.
Leaving Baltimore, I took a carriage for the nearest northern railway
point. The roads were crowded with families leaving the city, and
infested by Rebel scouts and patrols. Union citizens were helpless. One
of them said to us:
"For God's sake, beg the Administration and the North not to let us be
crushed out!"
We hoped to take the Philadelphia cars, twenty-six miles out, but a
detachment of Baltimore soldiers that very morning had passed up the
railroad, destroying every bridge; smoke was still rising from their
ruins. We were compelled to press on and on, until, in the evening,
after a ride of forty-six miles, we reached York, Pennsylvania.
[Sidenote: THE NORTH FULLY AROUSED.]
Here, at last, we could breathe freely. But both railroads being
monopolized by troops, we were compelled, wearily, to drive on to the
village of Columbia, on the Susquehanna river. There we began to see
that the North, as well as the South, was under martial rule. Armed
sentinels peremptorily ordered us to halt.
On identifying the driver, and learning my business, they allowed us to
proceed. At the bridge, the person in charge declined to open the gate:
"I guess you can't cross to-night, sir," said he.
I replied by "guessing" that we could; but he continued:
"Our orders are positive, to let no one pass who is not personally
known to us."
He soon became convinced that I was not an emissary of the enemy; and
the sentinels escorted us across the bridge, a mile and a quarter in
length. We proceeded undisturbed to Lancaster, arriving there at two
o'clock, after a carriage-ride of seventy miles. Thence to New York,
communication was undisturbed.
The cold-blooded North was fully aroused. Rebel sympathizers found
themselves utterly swept away by a Niagara of public indignation. In
Pennsylvania, in New York, in New England, I heard only the sentiment
that talking must be ended, and acting begun; that, cost what it might,
in money and blood, all must unite to crush the gigantic Treason which
was closing its fangs upon the throat of the Republic.
[Sidenote: UPRISING OF THE WHOLE PEOPLE.]
The people seemed much more radical than the President. In all public
places, threats were heard that, if the Administration faltered,
it must be overturned, and a dictatorship established. Against the
Monumental City, feeling was peculiarly bitter. All said:
"If National troops can not march unmolested through Baltimore, that
city has stood long enough! Not one stone shall be left upon another."
I had witnessed a good deal of earnestness and enthusiasm in the South,
but nothing at all approaching this wonderful uprising of the whole
people. All seemed imbued with the sentiment of those official papers
issued before Napoleon was First Consul, beginning, "In the name of the
French Republic, _one and indivisible_."
It was worth a lifetime to see it--to find down through all
the _débris_ of money-seeking, and all the strata of politics,
this underlying, primary formation of loyalty--this unfaltering
determination to vindicate the right of the majority, the only basis of
republican government.
The storm-cloud had burst; the Irrepressible Conflict was upon us.
Where would it end? What forecast or augury could tell? Revolutions
ride rough-shod over all probabilities; and who has mastered the logic
of civil war?
Here ended a personal experience, sometimes full of discomfort, but
always full of interest. It enabled me afterward to look at Secession
from the stand-point of those who inaugurated it; to comprehend Rebel
acts and utterances, which had otherwise been to me a sealed book. It
convinced me, too, of the thorough earnestness of the Revolutionists.
My published prediction, that we should have a seven years' war unless
the country used its utmost vigor and resources, seemed to excite a
mild suspicion of lunacy among my personal acquaintances.
[Sidenote: A TRIBUNE CORRESPONDENT ON TRIAL.]
I was the last member of _The Tribune_ staff to leave the South. By
rare good fortune, all its correspondents escaped personal harm, while
representatives of several other New York journals were waited upon by
vigilance committees, driven out, and in some cases imprisoned. It was
a favorite jest, that _The Tribune_ was the only northern paper whose
_attachés_ were allowed in the South.
Its South Carolinian correspondence had a peculiar history. Immediately
after the Presidential election, Mr. Charles D. Brigham went to
Charleston as its representative. With the exception of two or three
weeks, he remained there from November until February, writing almost
daily letters. The Charlestonians were excited and indignant, and
arrested in all five or six persons whom they unjustly suspected.
Finally, about the middle of February, Mr. Brigham was one day
taken into custody, and brought before Governor Pickens and his
cabinet counselors, among whom Ex-Governor McGrath was the principal
inquisitor. At this time the Southern Confederacy existed only in
embryo, and South Carolina claimed to be an independent republic.
The correspondent, who had great coolness and self-control, and knew
a good deal of human nature, maintained a serene exterior despite
the awkwardness of his position. After a rigid catechisation, he was
relieved to find that the tribunal did not surmise his real character,
but suspected him of being a spy of the Government.
His trial took place at the executive head-quarters, opposite the
Charleston Hotel, and lasted from nine o'clock in the morning until
nine at night. During the afternoon, the city being disturbed by one
of its daily reports that a Federal fleet had appeared off the bar, he
was turned over to Mr. Alexander H. Brown, a leading criminal lawyer,
famous for his skill in examining witnesses. Mr. Brown questioned,
re-questioned, and cross-questioned the vagrant scribe, but was
completely baffled by him. He finally said:
"Mr. Brigham, while I think you are all right, this is a peculiar
emergency, and you must see that, under the circumstances, it will be
necessary for you to leave the South at once."
[Sidenote: HE IS WARNED TO DEPART.]
The "sweet sorrow" of parting gladdened his journalistic heart; but, at
the bidding of prudence, he replied:
"I hope not, sir. It is very hard for one who, as you are bound to
admit, after the most rigid scrutiny, has done nothing improper, who
has deported himself as a gentleman should, who sympathizes with you as
far as a stranger can, to be driven out in this way."
The attorney replied, with that quiet significance which such remarks
possessed:
"I am sorry, sir, that it is not a question for argument."
The lucky journalist, while whispering he would ne'er consent,
consented. Whereupon the lawyer, who seemed to have some qualms of
conscience, invited him to join in a bottle of wine, and when they had
become a little convivial, suddenly asked:
"By the way, do you know who is writing the letters from here to _The
Tribune_?"
"Why, no," was the answer. "I haven't seen a copy of that paper for six
months; but I supposed there was no such person, as I had read in your
journals that the letters were purely fictitious."
"There _is_ such a man," replied Brown; "and thus far, though we have
arrested four or five persons, supposing that we had found him, he
completely baffles us. Now, when you get home to New York, can't you
ascertain who he is, and let us know?"
[Sidenote: TRIBUNE REPRESENTATIVES IN CHARLESTON.]
Mr. Brigham, knowing exactly what tone to adopt with the "Chivalry,"
replied:
"Of course, sir, I would not act as a spy for you or anybody else.
However, such things have a kind of publicity; are talked of in saloons
and on street-corners. If I can learn in that way who _The Tribune_
correspondent is, I shall deem it my duty to advise you."
The lawyer listened with credulity to this whisper of hope, though
a well-known Rebel detective, named Shoubac--a swarthy, greasy,
uncomfortable fellow, with a Jewish countenance--did not. He remarked
to the late prisoner:
"You haven't fooled _me_, if you have Brown."
But Mr. Brigham was allowed to depart in peace for New York.
_The Tribune_ afterward had in Charleston five or six different
correspondents, usually keeping two there at a time for emergencies.
Often they did not know each other personally; and there was no
communication between them. When one was arrested, there was always
another in reserve to continue the correspondence. Mr. Brigham, who
remained in the home editorial rooms, retouched the letters just enough
to stamp them as the work of one hand, and the baffled authorities went
hopelessly up and down to cast out the evil spirit which troubled their
peace, and whose unsuspected name was legion.
II.
THE FIELD.
CHAPTER IX.
Cry Havoc! and let slip the dogs of War.--JULIUS CÆSAR.
Sancho Panza passed away too early. To-day, he would extend his
benediction on the man who invented sleep, to the person who introduced
sleeping-cars. The name of that philanthropist, by whose luxurious aid
we may enjoy unbroken sleep at the rate of twenty-five miles an hour,
should not be concealed from a grateful posterity.
[Sidenote: A SUNDAY AT NIAGARA FALLS.]
Thus I soliloquized one May evening, when, in pursuit of that "seat
of war," as yet visible only to the prophetic eye, or in newspaper
columns, I turned my face westward. It were more exact to say, "turned
my heels." Inexorable conductors compel the drowsy passenger to ride
feet foremost, on the hypothesis that he would rather break a leg than
knock his brains out.
I was detained for a day at Suspension Bridge; but life has more
afflictive dispensations, even for the impatient traveler, than a
Sunday at Niagara Falls. Vanity of vanities indeed must existence be to
him who could not find a real Sabbath at the great cataract, laying his
tired head upon the calm breast of Nature, and feeling the pulsations
of her deep, loving heart!
Eight years had intervened since my last visit. There was no second
pang of the disappointment we feel in seeing for the first time any
object of world-wide fame. In Nature, as in Art, the really great,
however falling below the ideal at first glance, grows upon the
beholder forever afterward.
Though the visiting season had not begun, the harpies were waiting
for their victims. Step out of your hotel, or turn a corner, and one
instantly pounced upon you. But, though numerous, they were quiet, and
decorous manners, even in leeches, are above all praise.
Everybody at the Falls is eager to shield you from the extortion of
everybody else. The driver, whom you pay two dollars per hour; the
vender, who sells you Indian bead-work at a profit of one hundred per
cent.; the guide, who fleeces you for leading to places you would
rather find without him--each warns you against the other, with
touching zeal for your welfare. And the precocious boy, who offers a
bit of slate from under the Cataract for two shillings, cautions you to
beware of them all.
[Sidenote: VIEW FROM THE SUSPENSION BRIDGE.]
As you cross the suspension bridge, the driver points out the spot,
more than two hundred feet above the water, where Blondin, of
tight-rope renown, crossed upon a single strand, with a man upon his
shoulders, cooked his aerial omelet, hung by the heels, and played
other fantastic tricks before high heaven.
[Sidenote: PALACE OF THE FROST KING.]
From the bridge you view three sections of the Cataract. First, is the
lower end of the American Fall, whose deep green is intermingled with
jets and streaks of white. Its smooth surface conveys the impression of
the segment of a slowly revolving wheel rather than of tumbling water.
Beyond the dense foliage appears another section, parted in the middle
by the stone tower on Goat Island. Its water is of snowy whiteness,
and looks like an immense frozen fountain. Still farther is the great
Horse-shoe Fall, its deep green surface veiled at the base in clouds of
pure white mist.
Here, at the distance of two miles, the Falls soothe you with their
quiet, surpassing beauty. But when you reach them on the Canada side,
and go down, down, beneath Table Rock, under the sheet of water, you
feel their sublimity. As you look out upon the sea of snowy foam below,
or through the rainbow hues of the vast sweeping curtain above, the
earth trembles with the unceasing thunder of the cataract.
In winter the effect is grandest. Then, from the bank in front of the
Clifton House, you look down on upright rocks, crowned with pinnacles
of ice, till they rise half way to the summit, or catch glimpses of the
boundless column of water as it strikes the torrent below, faintly seen
through the misty, alabaster spray rising forever from its troubled
bed. Hundreds of white-winged sea-gulls graze the rapids above, and
circle down to plunge in the waters below.
Attired in stiff, cold, water-proof clothing, which, culminating in a
round oil-cloth cap, makes you look like an Esquimaux and feel like a
mummy, you follow the guide far down dark, icy stairs and paths.
Look up ninety feet, and see the great torrent pour over the brink.
Look down seventy feet from your icy little shelf, and behold it plunge
into the dense mist of the boiling gulf. Through its half-transparent
sheet, filtered rays of the bright sunshine struggle toward your eyes.
You are in the palace of the Frost King. Ice--ice everywhere, from your
slippery foothold to the huge icicles, fifty feet long and three feet
thick, which overhang you like the sword of Damocles.
Admiration without comparison is vague and unsatisfactory. Less
glorious, because less vast, than the matchless panorama seen from the
summit of Pike's Peak, this picture is nearly as impressive, because
spread right beside you, and at your very feet. Less minutely beautiful
than the exquisite chambers of the Mammoth Cave, its great range and
sweep make it more grand and imposing.
Along the Great Western Railway of Canada, the country closely
resembles northern Ohio; but the people have uncompromising English
faces. A well-dressed farmer and his wife rode upon our train all day
in a second-class car, without seeming in the least ashamed of it--a
moral courage not often exhibited in the United States.
At Detroit, an invalid, pale, wasted, unable to speak above a whisper,
was lying on a bed hastily spread upon the floor of the railway
station. Her husband, with their two little boys bending over her in
tears, told us that they had been driven from New Orleans, and he
was now taking his dying wife to their old home in Maine. There were
few dry eyes among the lookers-on. A liberal sum of money was raised
on the spot for the destitute family, whose broken pride, after some
persuasion, accepted it.
[Sidenote: CHICAGO RISING FROM THE EARTH.]
The next morning we reached Chicago. In that breezy city upon the
lake shore, property was literally rising. Many of the largest brick
and stone blocks were being elevated five or six feet, by a very nice
system of screws under their walls, while people were constantly
pouring in and out of them, and the transaction of business was not
impeded. The stupendous enterprise was undertaken that the streets
might be properly graded and drained. This summoning a great metropolis
to rise from its vasty deep of mud, is one of the modern miracles of
mechanics, which make even geological revelations appear trivial and
common-place.
[Sidenote: MYSTERIES OF WESTERN CURRENCY.]
The world has many mysteries, but none more inscrutable than Western
Currency. The notes of most Illinois and Wisconsin banks, based on
southern State bonds, having depreciated steadily for several weeks,
gold and New York exchange now commanded a premium of twenty per cent.
The Michigan Central Railway Company was a good illustration of the
effect of this upon Chicago interests. That corporation was paying
six thousand dollars per week in premiums upon eastern exchange. Yet
the hotels and mercantile houses were receiving the currency at par.
One Illinois bank-note depreciated just seventy per cent., during the
twelve hours it spent in my possession!
In Chicago I encountered an old friend just from Memphis. His
association with leading Secessionists for some time protected him;
but the popular frenzy was now so wild that they counselled him, as he
valued his life, to stay not upon the order of his going, but go at
once.
The Memphians were repudiating northern debts, and, with unexampled
ferocity, driving out all men suspected of Abolitionism or Unionism.
More than five thousand citizens had been forced or frightened away,
and in many cases beggared. A secret Committee of Safety, made up of
prominent citizens, was ruling with despotic sway.
Scores of suspected persons were brought before it daily, and, if they
could not exculpate themselves, sentenced to banishment, with head half
shaved, to whipping, or to death. Though, by the laws of all slave
States, negroes were precluded from testifying against white men, this
inquisition received their evidence. My friend dared not avow that he
was coming North, but purchased a ticket for St. Louis, which was then
deemed a Rebel stronghold.
[Sidenote: A HORRIBLE SPECTACLE IN ARKANSAS.]
As the steamer passed Osceola, Arkansas, he saw the body of a man
hanging by the heels, in full view of the river. A citizen told him
that it had been there for eight days; that the wretched victim, upon
mere suspicion of tampering with slaves, was suspended, head downward,
and suffered intensely before death came to his relief.
All on board the crowded steamboat pretended to be Secessionists. But
when, at last, nearing Cairo, they saw the Stars and Stripes, first
one, then another, began to huzza. The enthusiasm was contagious; and
in a moment nearly all, many with heaving breasts and streaming eyes,
gave vent to their long-suppressed feeling in one tumultuous cheer for
the Flag of the Free. Of the one hundred and fifty passengers, nearly
every man was a fleeing Unionist.
The all-pervading railroad and telegraph in the North began to show
their utility in war. Cairo, the extreme southern point of Illinois,
now garrisoned by Union troops, was threatened by the enemy. The
superintendent of the Illinois Central Railway (including branches,
seven hundred and four miles in length) assured me that, at ten hours'
notice, he could start, from the various points along his line, _four
miles_ of cars, capable of transporting twenty-four thousand soldiers.
[Sidenote: PATRIOTISM OF THE NORTHWEST.]
The Rebels now began to perceive their mistake in counting upon
the friendship of the great Northwest. Indeed, of all their wild
dreams, this was wildest. They expected the very States which claimed
Mr. Lincoln as from their own section, and voted for him by heavy
majorities, to help break up the Union because he was elected! Though
learning their delusion, they never comprehended its cause. After the
war had continued nearly a year, _The New Orleans Delta_ said:
"The people of the Northwest are our natural allies, and
ought to be fighting on our side. It is the profoundest
mystery of these times how the few Yankee peddlers and
school-marms there have been able to convert them into our
bitter enemies."
On the mere instinct of nationality--the bare question of an undivided
republic--the West would perhaps fight longer, and sacrifice more,
than any other section. Its people, if not more earnest, are much
more demonstrative than their eastern brethren. Their long migration
from the Atlantic States to the Mississippi, the Missouri, or the
Platte, has quickened and enlarged their patriotism. It has made our
territorial greatness to them no abstraction, but a reality.
No one else looks forward with such faith and fervor to that great
future when man shall "fill up magnificently the magnificent designs of
Nature;" when their Mississippi Valley shall be the heart of mightiest
empire; when, from all these mingling nationalities, shall spring the
ripe fruitage of free schools and free ballots, in a higher average Man
than the World has yet seen.
Our train from Chicago to St. Louis was crowded with Union troops.
Along the route booming guns saluted them; handkerchiefs fluttered from
windows; flags streamed from farm-houses and in village streets; old
men and boys at the plow huzzaed themselves hoarse.
Thus, at the rising of the curtain, the northwestern States, worthy
offspring of the Ordinance of Eighty-seven, were sending out--
"A multitude, like which the populous North Poured never from
her frozen loins."
Four blood-stained years have not dimmed their faith or abated their
ardor. "Wherever Death spread his banquet, they furnished many guests."
What histories have they not made for themselves! Ohio, Iowa, Kansas,
Wisconsin--indeed, if we call their roll, which State has not covered
herself with honor--which has _not_ achieved her Lexington--her
Saratoga--her Bennington--though the battle-field lie beyond her
soil?[9]
[9] Now (April, 1865), while we are witnessing some of the closing
scenes of the war, subscriptions to the popular loan of the Government
come pouring in from the West more largely, according to wealth and
population, than from any other section.
[Sidenote: MISSOURI REBELS BENT ON REVOLUTION.]
In St. Louis I found at last a "seat of war." Recent days had been
full of startling events. The Missouri Legislature, at Jefferson City,
desired to pass a Secession ordinance, but had no pretext for doing so.
The election of a State Convention, to consider this very subject, had
just demonstrated, by overwhelming Union majorities, the loyalty of the
masses. Claiborne Fox Jackson, the Governor, was a Secessionist, and
was determined to plunge Missouri into revolution. This flagrant, open
warfare against the popular majority, well illustrated how grossly the
Rebels deceived themselves in supposing that their conduct was impelled
by regard for State Rights, rather than by the inherent antagonism
between free and slave labor.
Camp Jackson, commanded by Gen. D. M. Frost, was established at
Lindell Grove, two miles west of St. Louis, "for the organization and
instruction of the State Militia." It embraced some Union men, both
officers and privates. Frost and his friends claimed that it was loyal;
but the State flag, only, was flying from the camp, and its streets
were named "Davis Avenue," "Beauregard Avenue," etc.
[Sidenote: NATHANIEL LYON AND CAMP JACKSON.]
An envoy extraordinary, sent by Governor Jackson, had just returned
from Louisiana with shot, shell, and mortars--all stolen from the
United States Arsenal at Baton Rouge. The camp was really designed as
the nucleus of a Secession force, to seize the Government property in
St. Louis and drive out the Federal authorities. But the Union men were
too prompt for the Rebels. Long before the capture of Fort Sumter,
nightly drills were instituted among the loyal Germans of St. Louis;
and within two weeks after the President's first call for troops,
Missouri had ten thousand Union soldiers, armed, equipped, and in camp.
The first act of the Union authorities was to remove by night all the
munitions from the United States Arsenal near St. Louis, to Alton,
Illinois. When the Rebels learned it, they were intensely exasperated.
The Union troops were commanded by a quiet, slender, stooping,
red-haired, pale-faced officer, who walked about in brown linen coat,
wearing no military insignia. He was by rank a captain; his name was
Nathaniel Lyon.
On the tenth of May, Capt. Lyon, with three or four hundred regulars,
and enough volunteers to swell his forces to five thousand, planted
cannon upon the hills commanding Camp Jackson, and sent to Gen. Frost
a note, reciting conclusive evidence of its treasonable intent, and
concluding as follows:
"I do hereby demand of you an immediate surrender of your
command, with no other conditions than that all persons
surrendering shall be humanely and kindly treated. Believing
myself prepared to enforce this demand, one-half hour's time
will be allowed for your compliance."
This contrasted so sharply with the shuffling timidity of our civil
and military authorities, usual at this period, that Frost was
surprised and "shocked." His reply, of course, characterized the
demand as "illegal" and "unconstitutional." In those days there were
no such sticklers for the Constitution as the men taking up arms
against it! Frost wrote that he surrendered only upon compulsion--his
forces being too weak for resistance. The encampment was found to
contain twenty cannon, more than twelve hundred muskets, many mortars,
siege-howitzers, and shells, charged ready for use--which convinced
even the most skeptical that it was something more than a school for
instruction.
The garrison, eight hundred strong, were marched out under guard. There
were many thousands of spectators. Hills, fields, and house-tops were
black with people. In spite of orders to disperse, crowds followed,
jeering the Union troops, throwing stones, brickbats, and other
missiles, and finally discharging pistols. Several soldiers were hurt,
and one captain shot down at the head of his company, when the troops
fired on the crowd, killing twenty and wounding eleven. As in all such
cases, several innocent persons suffered.
Intense excitement followed. A large public meeting convened that
evening in front of the Planter's House--heard bitter speeches from
Governor Jackson, Sterling Price, and others. The crowd afterward
went to mob _The Democrat_ office, but it contained too many resolute
Unionists, armed with rifles and hand-grenades, and they wisely
desisted.
[Sidenote: STERLING PRICE JOINS THE REBELS.]
Sterling Price was president of the State Convention--elected as
an Unconditional Unionist. But, in this whirlwind, he went over to
the enemy. An old feud existed between him and a leading St. Louis
loyalist. Price had a small, detached command in the Mexican war.
Afterward, he was Governor of Missouri, and candidate for the United
States Senate. An absurd sketch, magnifying a trivial skirmish into a
great battle, with Price looming up heroically in the foreground, was
drawn and engraved by an unfortunate artist, then in the Penitentiary.
It pleased Price's vanity; he circulated it largely, and pardoned out
the suffering votary of art.
[Sidenote: SEVERE LOSS TO THE UNIONISTS.]
When the Legislature was about voting for United States Senator, Frank
Blair, Jr., then a young member from St. Louis, obtained permission to
say a few words about the candidates. He was a great vessel of wrath,
and administered a terrible excoriation, pronouncing Price "worthy the
genius of a convict artist, and fit subject for a Penitentiary print!"
Price was defeated, and the rupture never healed.
At the outbreak of the Rebellion, Price was far more loyal than men
afterward prominent Union leaders in Missouri. In those chaotic days,
very slight influences decided the choice of many. By tender treatment,
Price could doubtless have been retained; but neither party regarded
him as possessing much ability.
His defection proved a calamity to the Loyalists. He was worth twenty
thousand soldiers to the Rebels, and developed rare military talent.
Like Robert E. Lee, he was an old man, of pure personal character,
sincerity, kindness of heart, and unequaled popularity among the
self-sacrificing ragamuffins whom he commanded. He held them together,
and induced them to fight with a bravery and persistency which, Rebels
though they were, was creditable to the American name. With a good
cause, they would have challenged the world's acclamation.
At this time the President was treating the border slave States with
marvelous tenderness and timidity. The Rev. M. D. Conway declared,
wittily, that Mr. Lincoln's daily and nightly invocation ran:
"O Lord, I desire to have Thee on my side, but I _must_ have
Kentucky!"
Captain Lyon was confident that if he asked permission to seize Camp
Jackson, it would be refused. So he captured the camp, and then
telegraphed to Washington--not what he proposed to do, but what he
_had_ done. At first his act was disapproved. But the loyal country
applauded to the echo, and Lyon's name was everywhere honored. Hence
the censure was withheld, and he was made a Brigadier-General!
[Sidenote: ST. LOUIS IN A CONVULSION.]
Governor Jackson burned the bridges on the Pacific Railroad; the
Missouri Legislature passed an indirect ordinance of Secession, and
adjourned in a panic, caused by reports that Lyon was coming; a Union
regiment was attacked in St. Louis, and again fired into the mob, with
deadly results. The city was convulsed with terror. Every available
vehicle, including heavy ox wagons, was brought into requisition; every
outgoing railway train was crowded with passengers; every avenue was
thronged with fugitives; every steamer at the levee was laden with
families, who, with no definite idea of where they were going, had
hastily packed a few articles of clothing, to flee from the general and
bloody conflict supposed to be impending between the Americans and the
Dutch, as Secessionists artfully termed the two parties. Thus there
became a "Seat of War."
Heart-rending as were the stories of most southern refugees, some were
altogether ludicrous. In St. Louis, I encountered an old acquaintance
who related to me his recent experiences in Nashville. Grandiloquent
enough they sounded; for his private conversation always ran into stump
speeches.
[Sidenote: A NASHVILLE EXPERIENCE.]
"One day," said he, "I was waited on by a party of leading Nashville
citizens, who remarked: 'Captain May, _we_ know very well that you
are with us in sentiment; but, as you come from the North, others,
less intimate with you, desire some special assurance.' I replied:
'Gentlemen, by education, by instinct, and by association, I am a
Southern man. But, gentlemen, when you fire upon that small bit of
bunting known as the American flag, you can count me, by Heaven, as
your persistent and uncompromising foe!' The committee intimated to
me that the next train for the North started in one hour! You may
stake your existence, sir, that the subscriber came away on that
train. Confound a country, anyhow, where a man must wear a Secession
cockade upon each coat-tail to keep himself from being kicked as an
Abolitionist!"
Inexorable war knows no ties of friendship, of family, or of love.
Its bitterest features were seen on the border, where brother was
arrayed against brother, and husband against wife. At a little Missouri
village, the Rebels raised their flag, but it was promptly torn down by
the loyal wife of one of the leaders. I met a lady who had two brothers
in the Union army, and two among Price's Rebels, who were likely soon
to meet on the battle-field.
In St. Louis, a Rebel damsel, just about to be married, separated from
her Union lover, declaring that no man who favored the Abolitionists
and the "Dutch hirelings" could be her husband. He retorted that he had
no use for a wife who sympathized with treason; and so the match was
broken off.
[Sidenote: BITTERNESS OF OLD NEIGHBORS.]
I knew a Union soldier who found at Camp Jackson, among the prisoners,
his own brother, wounded by two Minié rifle balls. He said: "I am sorry
my brother was shot; but he should not have joined the traitors!" Of
course, the bitterness between relatives and old neighbors, now foes,
was infinitely greater than between northerners and southerners. The
same was true everywhere. How intensely the Virginia and Tennessee
Rebels hated their fellow-citizens who adhered to the Union cause!
Ohio and Massachusetts Loyalists denounced northern "Copperheads"
with a malignity which they never felt toward South Carolinians and
Mississippians.
ST. LOUIS, _May 20, 1861_.
When South Carolina seceded, the slave property of Missouri was worth
forty-five millions of dollars; hence she is under bonds to just that
amount to keep the peace. With thirteen hundred miles of frontier, she
is "a slave peninsula in an ocean of free soil." Free Kansas, which
has many old scores to clear up, guards her on the west. Free Iowa,
embittered by hundreds of Union refugees, watches her on the north.
Free Illinois, the young giantess of the prairie, takes care of her
on the east. This loyal metropolis, with ten Union regiments already
under arms, is for her a sort of front-door police. Missouri, in the
significant phrase of the frontier, is _corraled_.[10]
[10] From the Spanish _corral_, a yard. Upon our frontier it is used,
colloquially, as a verb, to signify surrounded, captured, completely in
the power, or at the mercy, of another.
Here, at least, as _The Richmond Whig_, just before going over to the
Rebels, so aptly said: "Secession is Abolitionism in its worst and most
dangerous form."
Rebels glare upon Union men like chained wild beasts. Citizens,
walking by night, remember the late assassinations, and, like Americans
in Mexican towns, cast suspicious glances behind. Secessionists
utter fierce threats; but since their recent severe admonition that
Unionists, too, can use fire-arms, and that it is not discreet to
attack United States soldiers, they do not execute them.
Captain Lyon, who commands, is an exceedingly prompt and efficient
officer, attends strictly to his business, exhibits no hunger for
newspaper fame, and seems to act with an eye single to the honor of the
Government he has served so long and so faithfully.
[Sidenote: GOOD SOLDIERS FOR SCALING WALLS.]
Among our regiments is the Missouri First, Colonel Frank P. Blair.
Three companies are made up of German Turners--the most accomplished
of gymnasts. They are sinewy, muscular fellows, with deep chests and
well-knit frames. Every man is an athlete. To-day a party, by way of
exercise, suddenly formed a human pyramid, and commenced running up,
like squirrels, over each other's shoulders, to the high veranda upon
the second story of their building. In climbing a wall, they would not
require scaling-ladders. There are also two companies from the Far
West--old trappers and hunters, who have smelt gunpowder in Indian
warfare.
Colonel Blair's dry, epigrammatic humor bewilders some of his visitors.
I was sitting in his head-quarters when a St. Louis Secessionist
entered. Like nearly all of them, he now pretends to be a Union man,
but is very tender on the subject of State Rights, and wonderfully
solicitous about the Constitution. He remarked:
"I am a Union man, but I believe in State Rights. I believe a State may
dissolve its connection with the Government if it wants to."
"O yes," replied Blair, pulling away at his ugly mustache, "yes, you
can go out if you want to. Certainly you can secede. But, my friend,
you can't take with you one foot of American soil!"
[Sidenote: MISSOURI AND THE SLAVEHOLDERS.]
A citizen of Lexington introduced himself, saying:
"I am a loyal man, ready to fight for the Union; but I am
pro-slavery--I own niggers."
"Well, sir," replied Blair, with the faintest suggestion of a smile on
his plain, grim face, "you have a right to. We don't like negroes very
much ourselves. If _you_ do, that's a matter of taste. It is one of
your privileges. But if you gentlemen who own negroes attempt to take
the State of Missouri out of the Union, in about six months you will be
the most----niggerless set of individuals that you ever heard of!"
CHAPTER X.
Only we want a little personal strength, And pause until
these Rebels, now afoot, Come underneath the yoke of
Government.--KING HENRY IV.
Cairo, as the key to the lower Mississippi valley, is the most
important strategic point in the West. Immediately after the outbreak
of hostilities, it was occupied by our troops.
As a place of residence it was never inviting. To-day its offenses
smell to heaven as rankly as when Dickens evoked it, from horrible
obscurity, as the "Eden" of Martin Chuzzlewit. The low, marshy,
boot-shaped site is protected from the overflow of the Mississippi and
Ohio by levees. Its jet-black soil generates every species of insect
and reptile known to science or imagination. Its atmosphere is never
sweet or pure.
[Sidenote: GENERAL MCCLELLAN AT CAIRO.]
On the 13th of June, Major-General George B. McClellan, commander of
all the forces west of the Alleghanies, reached Cairo on a visit of
inspection. His late victories in Western Virginia had established his
reputation for the time, as an officer of great capacity and promise,
notwithstanding the high heroics of his ambitious proclamations. This
was before Bull Run, and before the New York journals, by absurdly
pronouncing him "the Young Napoleon," raised public expectation to an
embarrassing and unreasonable hight.
In those days, every eye was looking for the Coming Man, every ear
listening for his approaching footsteps, which were to make the earth
tremble. Men judged, by old standards, that the Hour must have its
Hero. They had not learned that, in a country like ours, whatever is
accomplished must be the work of the loyal millions, not of any one, or
two, or twenty generals and statesmen.
[Sidenote: A LITTLE SPEECH-MAKING.]
McClellan was enthusiastically received, and, to the strains of the
"Star Spangled Banner," escorted to head-quarters. There, General
Prentiss, who had so decided a _penchant_ for speech-making, that
cynics declared he always kept a particular stump in front of his
office for a rostrum, welcomed him with some rhetorical remarks:
* * * * "My command are all anxious to taste those dangers
which war ushers in--not that they court danger, but that
they love their country. We have toiled in the mud, we have
drilled in the burning sun. Many of us are ragged--all of
us are poor. But we look anxiously for the order to move,
trusting that we may be allowed to lead the division."
The soldiers applauded enthusiastically--for in those days the anxiety
to be in the earliest battles was intense. The impression was almost
universal throughout the North that the war was to be very brief.
Officers and men in the army feared they would have no opportunity to
participate in any fighting!
McClellan responded to Prentiss and his officers in the same strain:
* * * "We shall meet again upon the tented field; and
Illinois, which sent forth a Hardin and a Bissell, will,
I doubt not, give a good account of herself to her sister
States. Her fame is world-wide: in your hands, gentlemen, I
am sure it will not suffer. The advance is due to you."
Then there was more applause, and afterward a review of the brigade.
[Sidenote: PENALTY OF WRITING FOR THE TRIBUNE.]
General McClellan is stoutly built, short, with light hair, blue eyes,
full, fresh, almost boyish face, and lip tufted with a brown mustache.
His urbane manner truly indicates the peculiar amiability of character
and yielding disposition which have hurt him more than all other
causes. An officer once assured me that McClellan had said to him: "My
friends have injured me a thousand times more than my enemies." It was
certainly true.
Now, seeing his features the first time, I scanned them anxiously for
lineaments of greatness. I saw a pleasant, mild, moony face, with
one cheek distended by tobacco; but nothing which appeared strong or
striking. Tinctured largely with the general belief in his military
genius, I imputed the failure only to my own incapacity for reading
"Nature's infinite book of secrecy."
One evening, at Cairo, a man, whose worn face, shaggy beard, matted
locks, and tattered clothing marked him as one of the constantly
arriving refugees, sought me and asked:
"Can you tell me the name of _The Tribune_ correspondent who passed
through Memphis last February?"
He was informed that that pleasure had been mine.
[Sidenote: A LOYAL GIRL'S ASSISTANCE.]
"Then," said he, "I have been lying in jail at Memphis about fifty
days chiefly on your account! The three or four letters which you
wrote from there were peculiarly bitter. Of course, I was not aware of
your presence, and I sent one to _The Tribune_, which was also very
emphatic. The Secessionists suspected me not only of the one which I
did write, but also of yours. They pounced on me and put me in jail.
After the disbanding of the Committee of Safety I was brought before
the City Recorder, who assured me from the bench of his profound
regrets that he could find no law for hanging me! I would have been
there until this time, but for the assistance of a young lady, through
whom I succeeded in bribing an officer of the jail, and making my
escape. I was hidden in Memphis for several days, then left the city
in disguise, and have worked my way, chiefly on foot, aided by negroes
and Union families, through the woods of Tennessee and the swamps of
Missouri up to God's country."
The refugee seemed to be not only in good health, but also in excellent
spirits, and I replied:
"I am very sorry for your misfortunes; but if the Rebels must have one
of us, I am very glad that it was not I."
Nearly four years later, this gentleman turned the tables on me very
handsomely. After my twenty months imprisonment in Rebel hands, among a
crowd of visitors he walked into my room at Cincinnati one morning, and
greeted me warmly.
"You do not remember me, do you?" he asked.
"I recognize your face, but cannot recall your name."
"Well, my name is Collins. Once, when I escaped from the South, you
congratulated me at Cairo. Now, I congratulate you, and I can do it
with all my heart, in exactly the same words. I am very sorry for your
misfortunes; but if the Rebels must have one of us, I am very glad that
it was not I!"
After our troops captured Memphis, I encountered the young lady who
aided Mr. Collins in escaping. She was enthusiastically loyal, but her
feeling had been repressed for nearly two years, when the arrival of
our forces loosened her tongue. She began to utter her long-stifled
Union views, and it is my deliberate opinion that she has not stopped
yet. She is now the wife of an officer in the United States service.
[Sidenote: THE FASCINATIONS OF CAIRO.]
CAIRO, _May 29_.
A drizzly, muddy, melancholy day. Never otherwise than forlorn, Cairo
is pre-eminently lugubrious during a mild rain. In dry weather,
even when glowing like a furnace, you may find amusement in the
contemplation of the high-water mark upon trees and houses, the
stilted-plank sidewalks, the half-submerged swamps, and other diluvian
features of this nondescript, saucer-like, terraqueous town. You may
speculate upon the exact amount of fever and ague generated to the
acre, or inquire whether the whisky saloons, which spring up like
mushrooms, are indigenous or exotic.
In downright wet weather you may calculate how soon the streets will be
navigable, and the effect upon the amphibious natives. It is difficult
to realize that anybody was ever born here, or looks upon Cairo as
home. Washington Irving records that the old Dutch housewives of New
York scrubbed their floors until many "grew to have webbed fingers,
like unto a duck." I suspect the Cairo babies must have fins.
Long-suffering, much-abused Cairo! What wounds hast thou not received
from the Parthian arrows of tourists! "The season here," wrote poor
John Phenix, bitterest of all, "is usually opened with great _éclat_ by
small-pox, continued spiritedly by cholera, and closed up brilliantly
with yellow fever. Sweet spot!"
Theorists long predicted that the great metropolis of the Mississippi
valley--the granary of the world--must ultimately rise here. Many
proved their faith by pecuniary investments, which are likely to be
permanent.
Possessed by a similar delusion, Illinois, for years, strove to
legislate Alton into a vast commercial mart. But, in spite of their
unequaled geographical positions, Cairo and Alton still languish in
obscurity, while St. Louis and Cincinnati, twin queens of this imperial
valley, succeed to their grand heritage.
Nature settles these matters by laws which, though hidden, are
inexorable. Even that mysterious, semi-civilized race, which swarmed
in this valley centuries before the American Indian, established their
great centers of population where ours are to-day.
[Sidenote: THE DEATH OF DOUGLAS.]
_June 4._
Intelligence of the death of Senator Douglas, received last evening,
excites profound and universal regret. Though totally unfamiliar
with books, Mr. Douglas thoroughly knew the masses of the Northwest,
down to their minutest sympathies and prejudices. Beyond any of his
cotemporaries, he was a man of the people, and the people loved him.
Never before could he have died so opportunely for his posthumous
fame. Nothing in his life became him like the leaving of it. His last
speech, in Chicago, was a fervid, stirring appeal for the Union and
the Government, and for crushing out treason with an iron hand. His
emphatic loyalty exerted great influence in Illinois. His life-long
opponents forget the asperities of the past, in the halo of patriotism
around his setting sun, and unite, with those who always idolized him,
in common tribute to his memory.
We have very direct intelligence from Tennessee. The western districts
are all Secession. Middle Tennessee is about equally divided. East
Tennessee, a mountain region, containing few slaves, is inhabited
by a hardy, primitive, industrious race. They are thoroughly,
enthusiastically loyal.[11]
[11] Through severest trials, and cruel neglect from our Government,
they never swerved a hair's-breadth. Before our troops opened East
Tennessee, enough left their homes, coming stealthily through the
mountains and enlisting in the Union army, to make sixteen regiments.
[Sidenote: A CLEAR-HEADED NEGRO.]
The felicitous decision of Major-General Butler, that slaves of the
enemy are "contraband of war," disturbs the Rebels not a little,
even in the West. A friend just from Louisiana, relates an amusing
conversation between a planter and an old, trusted slave.
"Sam," said his master, "I must furnish some niggers to go down and
work on the fortifications at the Balize. Which of the boys had I
better send?"
"Well, massa," replied the old servant, shaking his head oracularly, "I
doesn't know about dat. War's comin' on, and dey might be killed. Ought
to get Irishmen to do dat work, anyhow. I reckon you'd better not send
any ob de boys--tell you what, massa, nigger property's mighty onsartin
dese times!"
Scores of fugitives from the South arrive here daily, with the old
stories of insult, indignity, and outrage. Several have come in with
their heads shaved. To you, my reader, who have never seen a case of
the kind, it may seem a trivial matter for a person merely to have one
side of his head laid bare, but it is a peculiarly repulsive spectacle.
The first time you look upon it, or on those worse cases, where
free-born men of Saxon blood bear fresh marks of the lash, you will
involuntarily clinch your teeth, and thank God that the system which
bears such infernal fruits is rushing upon its own destruction.
_June 8._
The heated term is upon us. We are amid upper, nether, and surrounding
fires. At eight, this morning, the mercury indicated eighty degrees
in the shade. How high it has gone since, I dare not conjecture;
but a friend insists that the sun will roast eggs to-day upon any
doorstep in town. I am a little incredulous as to that, though a pair
of smarting, half-blistered hands--the result of a ten minutes' walk
in its devouring breath--protest against absolute unbelief. Officers
who served in the War with Mexico declare they never found the heat so
oppressive in that climate as it is here. The raw troops on duty, who
are sweltering in woolen shirts and cloth caps, bear it wonderfully
well.
A number of Chicago ladies are already here, acting as nurses in the
hospital. The dull eyes of the invalids brighten at their approach, and
voices grow husky in attempting to express their gratitude. According
to Carlyle, "in a revolution we are all savages still; civilization has
only sharpened our claws;" but this tender care for the soldier is the
one redeeming feature of modern war.
[Sidenote: A REVIEW OF THE TROOPS.]
_June 12._
A review of all the troops. The double ranks of well-knit men, with
shining muskets and bayonets, stretch off in perspective for more than
a mile. After preliminary evolutions, at the word of command, the
lines suddenly break and wheel into column by companies, and marching
commences. You see two long parallel columns of men moving in opposite
directions, with an open space between. Their legs, in motion, look for
all the world like the shuttles in some great Lowell factory.
The artillerists fire each of their six-pounders three times a minute.
They discharge one, dismount it, lay it upon the ground, remove the
wheels from the carriage, drop flat upon their faces, then spring up,
remount the gun, ready for reloading or removing, all in forty-five
seconds.
Standing three hundred yards from the cannon, the column of smoke,
white at first, but rapidly changing to blue, shoots out twenty-five or
thirty feet from the muzzle before you hear the report.
The flying flags, playing bands, galloping officers, long lines of our
boys in blue, and sharp metallic reports, impress you with something of
the pomp and circumstance of glorious war.
But Captain Jenny, a young engineer officer, quietly remarks, that
he once witnessed a review of seventy thousand French troops in the
Champ de Mars, and in 1859 saw the army of seventy-five thousand men
enter Paris, returning from the Italian wars. Colonel Wagner, an old
Hungarian officer, who has participated in twenty-three engagements,
assures you that he has looked upon a parade of one hundred and forty
thousand men, whereupon our little force of five thousand appears
insignificant. Nevertheless, it exceeds Jackson's recruits at New
Orleans, and is larger than the effective force of Scott during the
Mexican war.
[Sidenote: A "RUNNIN' NIGGER!"]
Our first contraband arrived here in a skiff last night, bearing
unmistakable evidences of long travel. He says he came from
Mississippi, and the cotton-seed in his woolly head corroborates the
statement. I first saw him beside the guard-house, surrounded by a
party of soldiers. He answered my salutation with "Good evenin',
Mass'r," removing his old wool hat from his grizzly head. He smiled
all over his face, and bowed all through his body, as he depressed his
head, slightly lifting his left foot, with the gesture which only the
unmistakable darkey can give.
"Well, uncle, have you joined the army?"
"Yes, mass'r" (with another African salaam).
"Are you going to fight?"
"No, mass'r, I'se not a fightin' nigger, I'se a runnin' nigger!"
"Are you not afraid of starving, up here among the Abolitionists?"
[Sidenote: CAPTURING A REBEL FLAG.]
"Reckon not, mass'r--not much."
And Sambo gave a concluding bow, indescribable drollery shining through
his sooty face, bisected by two rows of glittering ivory.
_June 13._
A reconnoitering party went down the Mississippi yesterday upon a
Government steamer, under command of Colonel Richard J. Oglesby,
colloquially known among the Illinois sovereigns of the prairie as
"Dick Oglesby."
Twenty miles below Cairo, we slowly passed the town of Columbus, Ky.,
on the highest bluffs of the Mississippi. The village is a straggling
collection of brick blocks, frame houses, and whisky saloons. It
contains no Rebel forces, though seven thousand are at Union City,
Tenn., twenty-five miles distant.
On a tall staff, a few yards from the river, a great Secession flag,
with its eight stars and three stripes, was triumphantly flying.
Turning back, after steaming two miles below, the boat was stopped at
the landing; the captain went on shore, cut down the flag, and brought
it on board, amid cheers from our troops. The Columbians looked on in
grim silence--all save four Union ladies, who,
"Faithful among the faithless only they,"
waved handkerchiefs joyfully from a neighboring bluff.
Each star of the flag bore the name in pencil of the young lady who
sewed it on. The Maggies, and Julias, and Sues, and Kates, and Sallies,
who thus left their autographs upon their handiwork, did not anticipate
that it would so soon be scrutinized by Yankee soldiers. And,
doubtless, "Julia K----," the damsel whose star I pilfered, scarcely
aspired to the honor of furnishing a relic for _The Tribune_ cabinet.
CHAPTER XI.
And thus the whirligig of Time brings in his revenges.--TWELFTH NIGHT,
OR WHAT YOU WILL.
Bloody instructions, which being taught, return To plague the
inventors.--MACBETH.
[Sidenote: THE RETRIBUTIONS OF TIME.]
On the 15th of June I returned from Cairo to St. Louis. Lyon had gone
up the Missouri River with an expedition, which was all fitted out and
started in a few hours. Lyon was very much in earnest, and he knew the
supreme value of time in the outset of a war.
How just are the retributions of history! Virginia originated State
Rights run-mad, which culminated in Secession. Behold her ground
between the upper and nether mill-stones! Missouri lighted the fires
of civil war in Kansas; now they blazed with tenfold fury upon her
own soil. She sent forth hordes to mob printing-presses, overawe the
ballot-box, substitute the bowie-knife and revolver for the civil
law. Now, her own area gleamed with bayonets; the Rebel newspaper was
suppressed by the file of soldiers, civil process supplanted by the
unpitying military arm.
Governor Claiborne F. Jackson, in 1855, led a raid into Kansas, which
overthrew the civil authorities, and drove citizens from the polls.
Now, the poisoned chalice was commended to his own lips. A hunted
fugitive from his home and his chair of office, he was deserted by
friends, ruined in fortune, and the halter waited for his neck. Thomas
C. Reynolds, late Lieutenant-Governor, by advocating the right of
Secession, did much to poison the public mind of the South. He, too,
found his reward in disgrace and outlawry; unable to come within the
borders of the State which so lately delighted to do him honor!
[Sidenote: A RAILROAD REMINISCENCE.]
I followed Lyon's Expedition by the Pacific railway. The president
of the road told me a droll story, which illustrates the folly that
governed the location of the railway system of Missouri. The Southwest
Branch is about a hundred miles long, through a very thinly settled
region. For the first week after the cars commenced running over it,
they carried only about six passengers, and no freight except a live
bear and a jar of honey. The honey was carried free, and the freight
on Bruin was fifty cents. Shut up in the single freight car, during
the trip, he ate all the honey! The company were compelled to pay two
dollars for the loss of that saccharine esculent. Thus their first
week's profits on freight amounted to precisely one dollar and fifty
cents on the wrong side of the ledger.
The Rebels had now evacuated Jefferson City, and our own troops,
commanded by Colonel B[oe]rnstein, a German editor, author, and
theatrical manager, of St. Louis, were in peaceable possession. The
soldiers were cooking upon the grass in the rear of the Capitol,
standing in the shade of its portico and rotunda, lying on beds of
hay in its passages, and upon carpets in the legislative halls. They
reposed in all its rooms, from the subterranean vaults to the little
circular chamber in the dome.
[Sidenote: UNTAINTED WITH "B. REPUBLICANISM."]
Governor and Legislature were fled. With Colonel B[oe]rnstein, I went
through the executive mansion, which had been deserted in hot haste.
Sofas were overturned, carpets torn up and littered with letters
and public documents. Tables, chairs, damask curtains, cigar-boxes,
champagne-bottles, ink-stands, books, private letters, and family
knick-knacks, were scattered everywhere in chaotic confusion. Some of
the Governor's correspondence was amusing. The first letter I noticed
was a model of brevity. Here it is--its virgin paper unsullied by the
faintest touch of "B. Republicanism."
"JEFFERSON CITY, fed. 21nd 1861.
"_to his Honour Gov._ C. F. JACKSON.--Please Accept My
Compliments. With a little good Old Bourbon Whisky Cocktail.
Made up Expressly in St Louis. fear it not. it is good.
And besides it is not even tainted with B. Republicanism.
Respectfully yours,
"P. NAUGHTON."
There was a ludicrous disparity between the evidences of sudden flight
on all sides and the pompous language of the Governor's latest State
paper, which lay upon the piano in the drawing-room:
"Now, therefore, I, C. F. Jackson, Governor of the State
of Missouri, do issue this my proclamation, calling the
militia of the State, to the number of FIFTY THOUSAND, into
the service of the State. * * * Rise, then, and drive out
ignominiously the invaders!"
Beds were unmade, dishes unwashed, silver forks and spoons, belonging
to the State, scattered here and there. The only things that appeared
undisturbed were the Star Spangled Banner and the national escutcheon,
both frescoed upon the plaster of the gubernatorial bedroom.
As we walked through the deserted rooms, a hollow echo answered to the
tramp of the colonel and his lieutenant, and to the dull clank of their
scabbards against the furniture.
General Lyon opened the war in the West by the battle of Booneville.
It lasted only a few minutes, and the undisciplined and half-armed
Rebel troops, after a faint show of resistance, retreated toward the
South. Lyon's command lost only eleven men.
[Sidenote: A BELLIGERENT CHAPLAIN.]
During the engagement, the Rev. William A. Pile, Chaplain of the First
Missouri Infantry, with a detail of four men, was looking after the
wounded, when, coming suddenly upon a party of twenty-four Rebels, he
ordered them to surrender. Strangely enough, they laid down their arms,
and were all brought, prisoners, to General Lyon's head-quarters by
their five captors, headed by the reverend representative of the Church
militant and the Church triumphant.
Messrs. Thomas W. Knox and Lucien J. Barnes, army correspondents,
zealous to see the first battle, narrowly escaped with their
lives. Appearing upon a hill, surveying the conflict through their
field-glasses, they were mistaken by General Lyon for scouts of the
enemy. He ordered his sharpshooters to pick them off, when one of his
aids recognized them.
BOONEVILLE, MO., _June 21_.
The First Iowa Infantry has arrived here. On the way, several slaves,
who came to its camp for refuge, were sent back to their masters.
[Sidenote: HUMORS OF THE IOWA SOLDERS.]
The regiment contains many educated men, and that large percentage of
physicians, lawyers, and editors, found in every far-western community.
On the way here, they indulged in a number of freaks which startled
the natives. At Macon, Mo., they took possession of _The Register_, a
hot Secession sheet, and, having no less than forty printers in their
ranks, promptly issued a spicy loyal journal, called _Our Whole Union_.
The valedictory, which the Iowa boys addressed to Mr. Johnson, the
fugitive editor, in his own paper, is worth perusing.
"VALEDICTORY.
"Johnson, wherever you are--whether lurking in recesses of
the dim woods, or fleeing a fugitive on open plain, under
the broad canopy of Heaven--good-by! We never saw your
countenance--never expect to--never want to--but, for all
that, we won't be proud; so, Johnson, good-by, and take care
of yourself!
"We're going to leave you, Johnson, without so much as
looking into your honest eyes, or clasping your manly
hand--even without giving utterance, to your face, of 'God
bless you!' We're right sorry, we are, that you didn't stay
to attend to your domestic and other affairs, and not skulk
away and lose yourself, never to return. Oh, Johnson! why did
you--how could you do this?
"Johnson, we leave you to-night. We're going where bullets
are thick and mosquitos thicker. We may never return. If we
do not, old boy, remember us. We sat at your table; we stole
from your 'Dictionary of Latin Quotations;' we wrote Union
articles with your pen, your ink, on your paper. We printed
them on your press. Our boys set 'em up with your types, used
your galleys, your 'shooting-sticks,' your 'chases,' your
'quads,' your 'spaces,' your 'rules,' your every thing. We
even drank some poor whisky out of your bottle.
"And now, Johnson, after doing all this for you, you won't
forget us, will you? Keep us in mind. Remember us in your
evening prayers, and your morning prayers, too, when you
say them, if you do say them. If you put up a petition at
mid-day, don't forget us then; or if you awake in the solemn
stillness of the night, to implore a benison upon the absent,
remember us then!
"Once more, Johnson--our heart pains us to say it--that
sorrowful word!--but once more and forever, Johnson, GOOD-BY!
If you come our way, Call! Johnson, adieu!"
One of the privates in the regular army has just been punished with
fifty lashes on the bare back, for taking from a private house a lady's
furs and a silk dress.
This morning I passed a group of the Iowa privates, resting beside the
road, along which they were bringing buckets of water to their camp.
They were debating the question whether a heavy national debt tends
to weaken or to strengthen a Government! These are the men whom the
southern Press calls "ignorant mercenaries."
ST. LOUIS, _July 12_.
_The Missouri State Journal_, which made no disguise of its sympathy
with the Rebels, is at last suppressed by the military authorities. It
was done to-day, by order of General Lyon, who is pursuing the Rebels
near Springfield, in the southwest corner of the State. Secessionists
denounce it as a military despotism, but the loyal citizens are
gratified.
[Sidenote: CAMP TALES OF THE MARVELOUS.]
Are you fond of the marvelous? If so, here is a camp story about
Colonel Sigel's late engagement at Carthage:
A private in one of his companies (so runs the tale), while loading
and firing, was lying flat upon his face to avoid the balls of the
Rebels, when a shot from one of their six-pounders plunged into the
ground right beside him, plowed through under him, about six inches
below the surface, came out on the other side, and pursued its winding
way. It did not hurt a hair of his head, but, in something less than a
twinkling of an eye, whirled him over upon his back!
If you shake your head, save your incredulity for _this_: A captain
assures me that in the same battle he saw one of Sigel's artillerists
struck by a shot which cut off both legs; but that he promptly raised
himself half up, rammed the charge home in his gun, withdrew the
ramrod, and then fell back, dead! This is, at least, melo-dramatic, and
only paralleled by the ballad-hero
----"Of doleful dumps,
Who, when his legs were both cut off,
Still fought upon his stumps."
CHAPTER XII.
Who can be * * * * * Loyal and neutral in a moment? No
man.----MACBETH.
Why, this it is when men are ruled by women.----RICHARD III.
It was a relief to escape the excitement and bitterness of Missouri,
and spend a few quiet days in the free States. Despite Rebel
predictions, grass did not grow in the streets of Chicago. In sooth, it
wore neither an Arcadian nor a funereal aspect. Palatial buildings were
everywhere rising; sixty railway trains arrived and departed daily;
hotels were crowded with guests; and the voice of the artisan was heard
in the land. Michigan Avenue, the finest drive in America, skirting
the lake shore for a mile and a half, was crowded every evening with
swift vehicles, and its sidewalks thronged with leisurely pedestrians.
It afforded scope to one of the two leading characteristics of
Chicago residents, which are, holding the ribbons and leaving out the
latch-string.
[Sidenote: CORN NOT COTTON IS KING.]
I did not hear a single cry of "Bread or Blood!" As the city had over
two million bushels of corn in store, and had received eighteen million
bushels of grain during the previous six months, starvation was hardly
imminent. War or peace, currency or no currency, breadstuffs will find
a market. Corn, not cotton, is king; the great Northwest, instead of
Dixie Land, wields the sceptre of imperial power.
The elasticity of the new States is wonderful. Wisconsin and Illinois
had lost about ten millions of dollars through the depreciation of
their currency within a few months. It caused embarrassment and
stringency, but no wreck or ruin.
Reminiscences of the financial chaos were entertaining. New York
exchange once reached thirty per cent. The Illinois Central Railroad
Company paid twenty-two thousand five hundred dollars _premium_ on a
single draft. For a few weeks before the crash, everybody was afraid of
the currency, and yet everybody received it. People were seized with
a sudden desire to pay up. The course of nature was reversed; debtors
absolutely pursued their creditors, and creditors dodged them as
swindlers dodge the sheriff. Parsimonious husbands supplied their wives
bounteously with means to do family shopping for months ahead. There
was a "run" upon those feminine paradises, the dry-goods stores, while
the merchants were by no means anxious to sell.
Suddenly prices went up, as if by magic. Then came a grand crisis.
Currency dropped fifty per cent., and one morning the city woke up
to find itself poorer by just half than it was the night before. The
banks, with their usual feline sagacity, alighted upon their feet,
while depositors had to stand the loss.
[Sidenote: CURIOUS REMINISCENCES OF CHICAGO.]
Persons who settled in Chicago when it was only a military post, many
hundred miles in the Indian country, relate stories of the days when
they sometimes spent three months on schooners coming from Buffalo.
Later settlers, too, offer curious reminiscences. In 1855, a merchant
purchased a tract of unimproved land near the lake, outside the city
limits, for twelve hundred dollars, one-fourth in cash. Before his
next payment, a railroad traversed one sandy worthless corner of it,
and the company paid him damages to the amount of eleven hundred
dollars. Before the end of the third year, when his last installment
of three hundred dollars became due, he sold the land to a company of
speculators for twenty-one thousand five hundred dollars. It is now
assessed at something over one hundred thousand.
[Sidenote: VISIT TO THE GRAVE OF DOUGLAS.]
On a July day, so cold that fires were comforting within doors, and
overcoats and buffalo robes requisite without, I visited the grave of
Senator Douglas, unmarked as yet by monumental stone. He rests near his
old home, and a few yards from the lake, which was sobbing and moaning
in stormy passion as the great, white-fringed waves chased each other
upon the sandy shore.
With the arrival of each railway train from the east, long files of
immigrants from Norway and northern Germany come pouring up Dearborn
street, gazing curiously and hopefully at their new Land of Promise.
One of the many railroad lines had brought twenty-five hundred within
two weeks. There were gray-haired men and young children. All were
attired neatly, especially the women, with snow-white kerchiefs about
their heads.
They were bound, mainly, for Wisconsin and Minnesota. Men and women
are the best wealth of a new country. Though nearly all poor, these
brought, with the fair hair and blue eyes of their fatherland, honesty,
frugality, and industry, as their contribution to that great crucible
which, after all its strange elements are fused, shall pour forth the
pure and shining metal of American Character.
[Sidenote: SOCIAL HABITS OF THE GERMANS.]
Missouri, at the commencement of the war, had two hundred thousand
Germans in a population of little more than one million. Almost to a
man, they were loyal, and among the first who sprang to arms.
In the South, they were always regarded with suspicion. The Rebels
succeeded in dragooning but very few of them into their ranks. Honor to
the loyal Germans!
According to some unknown philosopher, "an Englishman or a Yankee is
capital; an Irishman is labor; but a German is capital and labor both."
Cincinnati, at the outbreak of the Rebellion, contained about seventy
thousand German citizens, who for many years had contributed largely to
her growth and prosperity.
A visit to their distinctive locality, called "Over the Rhine," with
its German daily papers, German signs, and German conversation, is a
peep at Faderland.
Cincinnati is nearer than Hamburg, the Miami canal more readily crossed
than the Atlantic, and that "sweet German accent," with which General
Scott was once enraptured, is no less musical in the Queen City than
in the land of Schiller and Göethe. Why, then, should one go to
Germany, unless, indeed, like Bayard Taylor, he goes for a wife? The
multitudinous maidens--light-eyed and blonde-haired--in these German
streets, would seem to remove even that excuse.
When Young America becomes jovial, he takes four or five boon
companions to a drinking saloon, pours down half a glass of raw brandy,
and lights a cigar. Continuing this programme through the day, he
ends, perhaps, by being carried home on a shutter or conducted to the
watch-house.
But the German, at the close of the summer day, strolls with his
wife and two or three of his twelve children (the orthodox number in
well-regulated Teutonic families) to one of the great airy halls or
gardens abounding in his portion of the city. Calling for Rhein wine,
Catawba, or "_zwei glass lager bier und zwei pretzel_," they sit an
hour or two, chatting with friends, and then return to their homes like
rational beings after rational enjoyment. The halls contain hundreds
of people, who gesticulate more and talk louder during their mildest
social intercourse than the same number of Americans would in an affray
causing the murder of half the company; but the presence of women and
children guarantees decorous language and deportment.
The laws of migration are curious. One is, that people ordinarily go
due west. The Massachusetts man goes to northern Ohio, Wisconsin, or
Minnesota; the Ohioan to Kansas; the Tennesseean to southern Missouri;
the Mississippian to Texas. Great excitements, like those of Kansas
and California, draw men off their parallel of latitude; but this is
the general law. Another is, that the Irish remain near the sea-coast,
while the Germans seek the interior. They constitute four-fifths of the
foreign population of every western city.
[Sidenote: THE EARLY DAYS OF CINCINNATI.]
In 1788, a few months before the first settlement of Cincinnati,
seven hundred and forty acres of land were bought for five hundred
dollars. The tract is now the heart of the city, and appraised at
many millions. As it passed from hand to hand, colossal fortunes were
realized from it; but its original purchaser, then one of the largest
western land-owners, at his death did not leave property enough to
secure against want his surviving son. Until 1862, that son resided
in Cincinnati, a pensioner upon the bounty of relatives. As, in the
autumn of life, he walked the streets of that busy city, it must have
been a strange reflection that among all its broad acres of which his
father was sole proprietor, he did not own land enough for his last
resting-place. "Give him a little earth for charity!"
Many high artificial mounds, circular and elliptical, stood here when
the city was founded. In after years, as they were leveled, one by
one, they revealed relics of that ancient and comparatively civilized
race, which occupied this region before the Indian, and was probably
identical with the Aztecs of Mexico.
Upon the site of one of these mounds is Pike's Opera House, a gorgeous
edifice, erected at an expense of half a million of dollars, by a
Cincinnati distiller, who, fifteen years before, could not obtain
credit for his first dray-load of whisky-barrels. It is one of the
finest theaters in the world; but the site has more interest than the
building. What volumes of unwritten history has that spot witnessed,
which supports a temple of art and fashion for the men and women of
to-day, was once a post from which Indian sentinels overlooked the
"dark and bloody ground" beyond the river, and, in earlier ages, an
altar where priests of a semi-barbaric race performed mystic rites to
propitiate heathen gods!
[Sidenote: A CITY FOUNDED BY A WOMAN.]
Cincinnati was built by a woman. Its founder was neither carpenter nor
speculator, but in the legitimate feminine pursuit of winning hearts.
Seventy years ago, Columbia, North Bend, and Cincinnati--all splendid
cities on paper--were rivals, each aspiring to be the metropolis of
the West. Columbia was largest, North Bend most favorably located, and
Cincinnati least promising of all.
But an army officer, sent out to establish a military post for
protecting frontier settlers against Indians, was searching for a
site. Fascinated by the charms of a dark-eyed beauty--wife of one of
the North Bend settlers--that location impressed him favorably, and he
made it head-quarters. The husband, disliking the officer's pointed
attentions, came to Cincinnati and settled--thus, he supposed, removing
his wife from temptation.
[Sidenote: THE ASPIRATIONS OF THE CINCINNATIAN.]
But as Mark Antony threw the world away for Cleopatra's lips, this
humbler son of Mars counted the military advantages of North Bend as
nothing compared with his charmer's eyes. He promptly followed to
Cincinnati, and erected Fort Washington within the present city limits.
Proximity to a military post settled the question, as it has all
similar ones in the history of the West. Now Cincinnati is the largest
inland city upon the continent; Columbia is an insignificant village,
and North Bend an excellent farm.
In architecture, Cincinnati is superior to its western rivals, and
rapidly gaining upon the most beautiful seaboard cities. Some of its
squares are unexcelled in America. A few public buildings are imposing;
but its best structures have been erected by private enterprise. The
Cincinnatian is expansive. Narrow quarters torture him. He can live
in a cottage, but he must do business in a palace. An inferior brick
building is the specter of his life, and a freestone block his undying
ambition.
From the Queen City I went to Louisville. Though communication with
the South had been cut off by every other route, the railroad was open
thence to Nashville.
[Sidenote: TREASON AND LOYALTY IN LOUISVILLE.]
Kentucky was disputed ground. Treason and Loyalty jostled each
other in strange proximity. At the breakfast table, one looked up
from his New York paper, forty-eight hours old, to see his nearest
neighbor perusing _The Charleston Mercury_. He found _The Louisville
Courier_ urging the people to take up arms against the Government.
_The Journal_, published just across the street, advised Union men to
arm themselves, and announced that any of them wanting first-class
revolvers could learn something to their advantage by calling upon its
editor. In the telegraph-office, the loyal agent of the Associated
Press, who made up dispatches for the North, chatted with the
Secessionist, who spiced his news for the southern palate. On the
street, one heard Union men advocate the hanging of Governor Magoffin,
and declare that he and his fellow-traitors should find the collision
they threatened a bloody business. At the same moment, some inebriated
"Cavalier" reeled by, shouting uproariously "Huzza for Jeff. Davis!"
Here, a group of pale, long-haired young men was pointed out as
enlisted Rebel soldiers, just leaving for the South. There, a troop of
the sinewy, long-limbed mountaineers of Kentucky and East Tennessee,
marched sturdily toward the river, to join the loyal forces upon
the Indiana shore. Two or three State Guards (Secession), with
muskets on their shoulders, were closely followed by a trio of Home
Guards (Union), also armed. It was wonderful that, with all these
crowding combustibles, no explosion had yet occurred in the Kentucky
powder-magazine.
While Secessionists were numerous, Louisville, at heart loyal,
everywhere displayed the national flag. Yet, although the people tore
to pieces a Secession banner, which floated from a private dwelling,
they were very tolerant toward the Rebels, who openly recruited for
the Southern service. Imagine a man huzzaing for President Lincoln and
advertising a Federal recruiting-office in any city controlled by the
Confederates!
[Sidenote: PRENTICE OF THE LOUISVILLE JOURNAL.]
"The real governor of Kentucky," said a southern paper, "is not Beriah
Magoffin, but George D. Prentice." In spite of his "neutrality," which
for a time threatened to stretch out to the crack of doom, Mr. Prentice
was a thorn in the side of the enemy. His strong influence, through
_The Louisville Journal_, was felt throughout the State.
Visiting his editorial rooms, I found him over an appalling pile of
public and private documents, dictating an article for his paper. Many
years ago, an attack of paralysis nearly disabled his right hand, and
compelled him ever after to employ an amanuensis.
His small, round face was fringed with dark hair, a little silvered by
age; but his eyes gleamed with their early fire, and his conversation
scintillated with that ready wit which made him the most famous
paragraphist in the world. His manner was exceedingly quiet and modest.
For about three-fourths of the year, he was one of the hardest workers
in the country; often sitting at his table twelve hours a day, and
writing two or three columns for a morning issue.
At this time, the Kentucky Unionists, advocating only "neutrality,"
dared not urge open and uncompromising support of the Government. When
President Lincoln first called for troops, _The Journal_ denounced his
appeal in terms almost worthy of _The Charleston Mercury_, expressing
its "mingled amazement and indignation." Of course the Kentuckians were
subjected to very bitter criticism. Mr. Prentice said to me:
"You misapprehend us in the North. We are just as much for the Union as
you are. Those of us who pray, pray for it; those of us who fight, are
going to fight for it. But we know our own people. They require very
tender handling. Just trust us and let us alone, and you shall see us
come out all right by-and-by."
The State election, held a few weeks after, exposed the groundless
alarm of the leading politicians. It resulted in returning to Congress,
from every district but one, zealous Union men. Afterward the State
furnished troops whenever they were called for, and, in spite of her
timid leaders, finally yielded gracefully to the inexorable decree of
the war, touching her pet institution of Slavery.
[Sidenote: FIRST UNION TROOPS OF KENTUCKY.]
I paid a visit to the encampment of the Kentucky Union troops, on the
Indiana side of the Ohio, opposite Louisville. "Camp Joe Holt" was on
a high, grassy plateau. Unfailing springs supplied it with pure water,
and trees of beech, oak, elm, ash, maple, and sycamore, overhung it
with grateful shade. The prospective soldiers were lying about on the
ground, or reading and writing in their tents.
General Rousseau, who was sitting upon the grass, chatting with a
visitor, looked the Kentuckian. Large head, with straight, dark hair
and mustache; eye and mouth full of determination; broad chest, huge,
erect, manly frame.
His men were sinewy fellows, with serious, earnest faces. Most of them
were from the mountain districts. Many had been hunters from boyhood,
and could bring a squirrel from the tallest tree with their old rifles.
Byron's description of their ancestral backwoodsmen seemed to fit them
exactly:
"And tall and strong and swift of foot were they,
Beyond the dwarfing city's pale abortions,
Because their thoughts had never been the prey
Of care or gain; the green woods were their portions.
Simple they were, not savage; and their rifles,
Though very true, were yet not used for trifles."
The history of this brigade was characteristic of the times. Rousseau
scouted "neutrality" from the outset. On the 21st of May, he said from
his place in the Kentucky Senate:
"If we have a Government, let it be maintained and obeyed. If
a factious minority undertakes to override the will of the
majority and rob us of our constitutional rights, let it be
put down--peaceably if we can, but forcibly if we must.
* * * Let me tell you, sir, Kentucky will not 'go out!' She will
not stampede. Secessionists must invent something new, before
they can either frighten or drag her out of the Union. We
shall be but too happy to keep peace, but we cannot leave the
Union of our fathers. When Kentucky goes down, it will be in
blood! Let that be understood."
[Sidenote: STRUGGLE IN THE KENTUCKY LEGISLATURE.]
In that Legislature, the struggle between the Secessionists and the
Loyalists was fierce, protracted, and uncertain. Each day had its
accidents, incidents, telegraphic and newspaper excitements, upon which
the action of the body seemed to depend.
In firm and determined men, the two parties were about equally divided;
but there were a good many "floats," who held the balance of power.
These men were very tenderly nursed by the Loyalists.
The Secessionists frequently proposed to go into secret session, but
the Union men steadfastly refused. Rousseau declared in the Senate that
if they closed the doors he would break them open. As he stands about
six feet two, and is very muscular, the threat had some significance.
Buckner, Tighlman, and Hanson[12]--all afterward generals in the Rebel
army--led the Secessionists. They professed to be loyal, and were very
shrewd and plausible. They induced hundreds of young men to join the
State-Guard, which they were organizing to force Kentucky out of the
Union, though its ostensible object was to assure "neutrality."
[12] The leniency of the Government toward these men was remarkable.
For many months after the war began, Breckinridge, in the United
States Senate, and Burnett, in the House of Representatives, uttered
defiant treason, for which they were not only pardoned, but paid by the
Government they were attempting to overthrow. As late as August, 1861,
after Bull Run, after Wilson Creek, Buckner visited Washington, was
allowed to inspect the fortifications, and went almost directly thence
to Richmond. When he next returned to Kentucky, it was at the head of
an invading Rebel army.
[Sidenote: WHAT REBEL LEADERS PRETENDED.]
"State Rights" was their watchword. "For Kentucky neutrality," first;
and, should the conflict be forced upon them, "For the South against
the North." They worked artfully upon the southern partiality for the
doctrine that allegiance is due first to the State, and only secondly
to the National Government.
Governor Magoffin and Lieutenant-Governor Porter were bitter Rebels.
The Legislature made a heavy appropriation for arming the State,
but practically displaced the Governor, by appointing five loyal
commissioners to control the fund and its expenditure.
In Louisville, the Unionists secretly organized the "Loyal League,"
which became very large; but the Secessionists, also, were noisy and
numerous, firm and defiant.
On the 5th of June, Rousseau started for Washington, to obtain
authority to raise troops in Kentucky. At Cincinnati, he met Colonel
Thomas J. Key, then Judge-Advocate of Ohio, on duty with General
McClellan. Key was alarmed, and asked if it were not better to keep
Kentucky in the Union by voting, than by fighting. Rousseau replied:
"As fast as we take one vote, and settle the matter, another, in some
form, is proposed. While we are voting, the traitors are enlisting
soldiers, preparing to throttle Kentucky and precipitate her into
Revolution as they have the other southern States. It is our duty to
see that we are not left powerless at the mercy of those who will
butcher us whenever they can."
[Sidenote: ROUSSEAU'S VISIT TO WASHINGTON.]
Key declared that he would ruin every thing by his rashness. By
invitation, Rousseau called on the commander of the Western Department.
During the conversation, McClellan remarked that Buckner had spent the
previous night with him. Rousseau replied that Buckner was a hypocrite
and traitor. McClellan rejoined that he thought him an honorable
gentleman. They had served in Mexico together, and were old personal
friends.
He added: "But I did draw him over the coals for saying he would not
only drive the Rebels out of Kentucky, but also the Federal troops."
"Well, sir," said Rousseau, "it would once have been considered pretty
nearly treason for a citizen to fight the United States army and levy
war against the National Government!"
When Rousseau reached Washington, he found that Colonel Key, who had
frankly announced his determination to oppose his project, was already
there. He had an interview with the President, General Cameron, and Mr.
Seward. The weather was very hot, and Cameron sat with his coat off
during the conversation.
As usual, before proceeding to business, Mr. Lincoln had his "little
story" to enjoy. He shook hands cordially with his visitor, and asked,
in great glee:
"Rousseau, where did you get that joke about Senator Johnson?"
"The joke, Mr. President, was too good to keep. Johnson told it
himself."
It was this: Dr. John M. Johnson, senator from Paducah, wrote to
Mr. Lincoln a rhetorical document, in the usual style of the Rebels.
In behalf of the sovereign State, he entered his solemn and emphatic
protest against the planting of cannon at Cairo, declaring that the
guns actually pointed in the direction of the sacred soil of Kentucky!
[Sidenote: HIS INTERVIEW WITH PRESIDENT LINCOLN.]
In an exquisitely pithy autograph letter, Mr. Lincoln replied, if he
had known earlier that Cairo, Illinois, was in Dr. Johnson's Kentucky
Senatorial District, he certainly should not have established either
the guns or the troops there! Singularly enough--for a keen sense of
humor was very rare among our "erring brethren"--Johnson appreciated
the joke.
While Rousseau was urging the necessity of enlisting troops, he
remarked:
"I have half pretended to submit to Kentucky neutrality, but, in
discussing the matter before the people, while apparently standing upon
the line, I have almost always _poked_."
This word was not in the Cabinet vocabulary. General Cameron looked
inquiringly at Mr. Lincoln, who was supposed to be familiar with the
dialect of his native State.
"General," asked the President, "you don't know what 'poke' means? Why,
when you play marbles, you are required to shoot from a mark on the
ground; and when you reach over with your hand, beyond the line, that
is _poking!_"
Cameron favored enlistments in Kentucky, without delay. Mr. Lincoln
replied:
"General, don't be too hasty; you know we have seen another man to-day,
and we should act with caution." Rousseau explained:
"The masses in Kentucky are loyal. I can get as many soldiers as are
wanted; but if the Rebels raise troops, while we do not, our young men
will go into their army, taking the sympathies of kindred and friends,
and may finally cause the State to secede. It is of vital importance
that we give loyal direction to the sentiment of our people."
At the next interview, the President showed him this indorsement on the
back of one of his papers:
"When Judge Pirtle, James Guthrie, George D. Prentice,
Harney, the Speeds, and the Ballards shall think it proper
to raise troops for the United States service in Kentucky,
Lovell H. Rousseau is authorized to do so."
"How will that do, Rousseau?"
"Those are good men, Mr. President, loyal men; but perhaps some of the
rest of us, who were born and reared in Kentucky, are just as good
Union men as they are, and know just as much about the State. If you
want troops, I can raise them, and I will raise them. If you do not
want them, or do not want to give me the authority, why that ends the
matter."
Finally, through the assistance of Mr. Chase, who steadfastly favored
the project, and of Secretary Cameron, the authority was given.
[Sidenote: TIMIDITY OF KENTUCKY UNIONISTS.]
A few Kentucky Loyalists were firm and outspoken. But General Leslie
Coombs was a good specimen of the whole. When asked for a letter to Mr.
Lincoln, he wrote: "Rousseau is loyal and brave, but a little too much
for coercion for these parts."
After Rousseau returned, with permission to raise twenty companies,
_The Louisville Courier_, whose veneer of loyalty was very thin,
denounced the effort bitterly. Even _The Louisville Journal_ derided it
until half a regiment was in camp.
[Sidenote: LOYALTY OF JUDGE LUSK.]
A meeting of leading Loyalists of the State was held in Louisville,
at the office of James Speed, since Attorney General of the United
States. Garrett Davis, Bramlette, Boyle, and most of the Louisville
men, were against the project. They feared it would give the State to
the Secessionists at the approaching election. Speed and the Ballards
were for it. So was Samuel Lusk, an old judge from Garrard County, who
sat quietly as long as he could during the discussion, then jumped up,
and bringing his hand heavily down on the table, exclaimed:
"Can't have two regiments for the old flag! By---! sir, he shall have
thirty!"
A resolution was finally adopted that, when the time came, they all
wished Rousseau to raise and command the troops, but that, for the
present, it would be impolitic and improper to commence enlisting in
Kentucky.
Greatly against his own will, and declaring that he never was so
humiliated in his life, Rousseau established his camp on the Indiana
shore. After the election, some Secession sympathizers, learning
that he proposed to bring his men over to Louisville, protested very
earnestly, begging him to desist, and thus avoid bloodshed, which they
declared certain.
"Gentlemen," said he, "my men, like yourselves, are Kentuckians. I
am a Kentuckian. Our homes are on Kentucky soil. We have organized
in defense of our common country; and bloodshed is just the business
we are drilling for. If anybody in the city of Louisville thinks it
judicious to begin it when we arrive, I tell you, before God, you shall
all have enough of it before you get through!"
The next day he marched his brigade unmolested through the city.
Afterward, upon many battle-fields, its honorable fame and Rousseau's
two stars were fairly won and worthily worn.
CHAPTER XIII.
The hum of either army stilly sounds, That the fixed
sentinels almost receive The secret whispers of each other's
watch.--KING HENRY V.
[Sidenote: CAMPAIGNING IN THE KANAWHA VALLEY.]
I spent the last days of July, in Western Virginia, with the command of
General J. D. Cox, which was pursuing Henry A. Wise in hot haste up the
valley of the Kanawha. There had been a few little skirmishes, which,
in those early days, we were wont to call battles.
Like all mountain regions, the Kanawha valley was extremely loyal.
Flags were flying, and the people manifested intense delight at the
approach of our army. We were very close upon the flying enemy; indeed,
more than once our cavalry boys ate hot breakfasts which the Rebels had
cooked for themselves.
At a farm-house, two miles west of Charleston, a dozen natives were
sitting upon the door-step as our column passed. The farmer shook
hands with us very cordially. "I _am_ glad to see the Federal army,"
said he; "I have been hunted like a dog, and compelled to hide in the
mountains, because I loved the Union." His wife exclaimed, "Thank God,
you have come at last, and the day of our deliverance is here. I always
said that the Lord was on our side, and that he would bring us through
safely."
[Sidenote: A BLOODTHIRSTY FEMALE SECESSIONIST.]
Two of the women were ardent Rebels. They did not blame the
native-born Yankees, but wished that every southerner in our ranks
might be killed. Just then one of our soldiers, whose home was in that
county, passed by the door-step, on his way to the well for a canteen
of water. One of the women said to me, with eyes that meant it:
"I hope _he_ will be killed! If I had a pistol I would shoot him. Why!
you have a revolver right here in your belt, haven't you? If I seen it
before, I would have used it upon him!"
Suggesting that I might have interfered with such an attempt, I asked:
"Do you think you could hit him?"
"O, yes! I have been practicing lately for just such a purpose."
Her companion assured me that she prayed every night and morning for
Jefferson Davis. If his armies were driven out of Virginia, she would
go and live in one of the Gulf States. She had a brother and a lover
in General Wise's army, and gave us their names, with a very earnest
request to see them kindly treated, should they be taken prisoners.
When we parted, she shook my hand, with: "Well, I hope no harm will
befall you, if you _are_ an Abolitionist!"
An old citizen, who had been imprisoned for Union sentiments, was
overcome with joy at the sight of our troops. He mounted a great rock
by the roadside, and extemporized a speech, in which thanks to the
Union army and the Lord curiously intermingled.
Women, with tears in their eyes, told us how anxiously they had
waited for the flag; how their houses had been robbed, their husbands
hunted, imprisoned, and impressed. Negroes joined extravagantly in the
huzzaing, swinging flags as a woodman swings his ax, bending themselves
almost double with shouts of laughter, and exclamations of "Hurrah for
Mass'r Lincoln!"
Thirteen miles above Charleston, at the head of navigation, we left
behind what we grandiloquently called "the fleet." It consisted of
exactly four little stern-wheel steamboats.
The people of these mountain regions use the old currency of New
England, and talk of "fourpence ha'pennies" and "ninepences."
Our road continued along the river-bank, where the ranges of
overhanging hills began to break into regular, densely timbered,
pyramidal spurs. The weather was very sultry. How the sun smote us in
that close, narrow valley! The accoutrement's of each soldier weighed
about thirty pounds, and made a day's march of twenty miles an arduous
task.
[Sidenote: A WOMAN IN DISGUISE.]
A private who had served in the First Kentucky Infantry[13] for three
months, proved to be of the wrong sex. She performed camp duties with
great fortitude, and never fell out of the ranks during the severest
marches. She was small in stature, and kept her coat buttoned to her
chin. She first excited suspicion by her feminine method of putting
on her stockings; and when handed over to the surgeon proved to be a
woman, about twenty years old. She was discharged from the regiment,
but sent to Columbus upon suspicion, excited by some of her remarks,
that she was a spy of the Rebels.
[13] So called, though nearly all its members came from Cincinnati.
[Sidenote: EXTRAVAGANT JOY OF THE NEGROES.]
At Cannelton, a hundred slaves were employed in the coal-oil works--two
long, begrimed, dilapidated buildings, with a few wretched houses
hard by. Nobody was visible, except the negroes. When I asked one of
them--"Where are all the white people?" he replied, with a broad grin--
"Done gone, mass'r."
A black woman, whom we encountered on the road, was asked:
"Have you run away from your master?"
"Golly, no!" was the prompt answer, "mass'r run away from _me_!"
The slaves, who always heard the term "runaway" applied only to their
own race, were not aware that it could have any other significance.
After the war opened, its larger meaning suddenly dawned upon them. The
idea of the master running away and the negroes staying, was always to
them ludicrous beyond description. The extravagant lines of "Kingdom
Coming," exactly depicted their feelings:
Say, darkies, hab you seen de mass'r,
Wid de muffstach on his face,
Go 'long de road some time dis mornin',
Like he's gwine to leave de place?
He seen de smoke way up de ribber
Where de Linkum gunboats lay;
He took his hat and left berry sudden,
And I 'spose he runned away.
De mass'r run, ha! ha!
De darkey stay, ho! ho!
It must be now de kingdom comin',
An' de year ob Jubilo.
"Dey tole us," said a group of blacks, "dat if your army cotched us,
you would cut off our right feet. But, Lor! we knowed you wouldn't hurt
_us_!"
At a house where we dined, the planter assuming to be loyal, one of
our officers grew confidential with him, when a negro woman managed to
beckon me into a back room, and seizing my arm, very earnestly said: "I
tell you, mass'r's only just putting on. He hates you all, and wants to
see you killed. Soon as you have passed, he will send right to Wise's
army, and tell him what you mean to do; if any of you'uns remain here
behind the troops, you will be in danger. He's in a heap of trouble,"
she added, "but, Lord, dese times just suits _me_!"
At another house, while the Rebel host had stepped out for a moment, an
intelligent young colored woman, with an infant in her arms, stationed
two negro girls at the door to watch for his return, and interrogated
me about the progress and purposes of the War. "Is it true," she
inquired, very sadly, "that your army has been hunting and returning
runaway slaves?"
Thanks to General Cox, who, like the sentinel in Rolla, "knew his duty
better," I could reply in the negative. But when, with earnestness
gleaming in her eyes, she asked, if, through these convulsions, any
hope glimmered for her race, what could I tell her but to be patient,
and trust in God?
[Sidenote: HOW THE SOLDIERS FORAGED.]
Army rations are not inviting to epicurean tastes; but in the field
all sorts of vegetables and poultry were added to our bill of fare.
Chickens, young pigs, fence-rails, apples, and potatoes, are legitimate
army spoils the world over.
"Where did you get that turkey?" asked a captain of one of his men.
"Bought it, sir," was the prompt answer. "For how much?" "Seventy-five
cents." "Paid for it, did you?" "Well, no, sir; told the man I would
pay _when we came back_!"
"Mass'r," said a little ebony servant to a captain with whom I was
messing, "I sees a mighty fine goose. Wish we had him for supper."
"Ginger," replied the officer, "have I not often told you that it is
very wicked to steal?"
The little negro laughed all over his face, and fell out of the ranks.
By a "coincidence," worthy of Sam Weller, we supped on stewed goose
that very evening.
Seen by night from the adjacent hills, our picturesque encampments
gave to the wild landscape a new beauty. In the deep valleys gleamed
hundreds of snowy tents, lighted by waning camp-fires, round which
grotesque figures flitted. The faint murmur of voices, and the ghostly
sweetness of distant music, filled the summer air.
[Sidenote: THE FALLS OF THE KANAWHA.]
At the Falls of the Kanawha the river is half a mile wide. A natural
dam of rocks, a hundred yards in breadth, and, on its lower side,
thirty feet above the water, extends obliquely across the stream--a
smooth surface of gray rock, spotted with brown moss.
Near the south bank is the main fall, in the form of a half circle,
three or four hundred yards long, with a broken descent of thirty feet.
Above the brink, the water is dark, green, and glassy, but at the verge
it looks half transparent, as it tumbles and foams down the rocks,
lashed into a passion of snowy whiteness. Plunging into the seething
caldron, it throws up great jets and sheets of foam. Above, the calm,
shining water extends for a mile, until hidden by a sudden bend in the
channel. The view is bounded by a tall spur, wrapped in the sober green
of the forest, with an adventurous corn-field climbing far up its steep
side. At the narrow base of the spur, a straw-colored lawn surrounds a
white farm-house, with low, sloping roof and antique chimneys. It is
half hidden among the maples, and sentineled by a tall Lombardy poplar.
Two miles above the fall, the stream breaks into its two chief
confluents--the New River and the Gauley. Hawk's Nest, near their
junction, is a peculiarly romantic spot. In its vicinity our command
halted. It was far from its base, and Wise ran too fast for capture. We
had five thousand troops, who were ill-disciplined and discontented.
General Cox was then fresh from the Ohio Senate. After more field
experience, he became an excellent officer.
[Sidenote: A TRAGEDY OF SLAVERY.]
When I returned through the valley, I found Charleston greatly excited.
A docile and intelligent mulatto slave, of thirty years, had never been
struck in his life. But, on the way to a hayfield, his new overseer
began to crack his whip over the shoulders of the gang, to hurry them
forward. The mulatto shook his head a little defiantly, when the whip
was laid heavily across his back. Turning instantly upon the driver,
he smote him with his hayfork, knocking him from his horse, and laying
the skull bare. The overseer, a large, athletic man, drew his revolver;
but, before he could use it, the agile mulatto wrenched it away, and
fired two shots at his head, which instantly killed him. Taking the
weapon, the slave fled to the mountains, whence he escaped to the Ohio
line.
ST. LOUIS, _August 19, 1861_.
In the days of stage-coaches, the trip from Cincinnati to St. Louis
was a very melancholy experience; in the days of steamboats, a very
tedious one. Now, you leave Cincinnati on a summer evening; and the
placid valley of the Ohio--the almost countless cornfields of the
Great Miami (one of them containing fifteen hundred acres), where
the exhaustless soil has produced that staple abundantly for fifty
years--the grave and old home of General Harrison, at North Bend--the
dense forests of Indiana--the Wabash Valley, that elysium of chills
and fever, where pumpkins are "fruit," and hoop-poles "timber"--the
dead-level prairies of Illinois, with their oceans of corn, tufts
of wood, and painfully white villages--the muddy Mississippi,
"All-the-Waters," as one Indian tribe used to call it--are unrolled in
panorama, till, at early morning, St. Louis, hot and parched with the
journey, holds out her dusty hands to greet you.
[Sidenote: THE FUTURE OF ST. LOUIS.]
No inland city ever held such a position as this. Here is the heart
of the unequaled valley, which extends from the Rocky Mountains to
the Alleghanies, and from the great lakes to the Gulf. Here is the
mighty river, which drains a region six times greater than the empire
of France, and bears on its bosom the waters of fifty-seven navigable
streams. Even the rude savage called it the "Father of Waters," and
early Spanish explorers reverentially named it the "River of the Holy
Ghost."
St. Louis, "with its thriving young heart, and its old French limbs,"
is to be the New York of the interior. The child is living who will see
it the second city on the American continent.
Three Rebel newspapers have recently been suppressed. The editor of one
applied to the provost-marshal for permission to resume, but declined
to give a pledge that no disloyal sentiment should appear in its
columns. He was very tender of the Constitution, and solicitous about
"the rights of the citizen." The marshal replied:
"I cannot discuss these matters with you. I am a soldier, and obey
orders."
"But," remonstrated the editor, "you might be ordered to hang me."
"Very possibly," replied the major, dryly.
"And you would obey orders, then?"
"Most assuredly I would, sir."
The Secession journalist left, in profound disgust.
CHAPTER XIV.
----He died, To throw away the dearest thing he owed, As
'twere a careless trifle.---MACBETH.
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.--MERCHANT OF
VENICE.
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF WILSON CREEK.]
On the 10th of August, at Wilson Creek, two hundred and forty miles
southwest of St. Louis, occurred the hardest-fought battle of the
year. General Lyon had pursued the Rebels to that corner of the State.
He had called again and again for re-enforcements, but at Washington
nothing could be seen except Virginia. Lyon's force was five thousand
two hundred men. The enemy, under Ben McCulloch and Sterling Price,
numbered over eleven thousand, according to McCulloch's official
report. Lyon would not retreat. He thought that would injure the Cause
more than to fight and be defeated.
To one of his staff-officers, the night before the engagement, he said:
"I believe in presentiments, and, ever since this attack was planned,
I have felt that it would result disastrously. But I cannot leave the
country without a battle."
On his way to the field, he was silent and abstracted; but when the
guns opened, he gave his orders with great promptness and clearness.
He had probably resolved that he would not leave the field alive unless
he left it as a victor. By a singular coincidence, the two armies
marched out before daybreak on that morning each to attack the other.
They met, and for many hours the tide of battle ebbed and flowed.
Lyon's little army fought with conspicuous gallantry. It contained the
very best material. The following is a list--from memory, and therefore
quite incomplete--of some officers, who, winning here their first
renown, afterward achieved wide and honorable reputation:
AT WILSON CREEK. AFTERWARD.
Frederick Steele Captain Major-General.
F. J. Herron Captain Major-General.
P. J. Osterhaus Major Major-General.
S. D. Sturgis Major Major-General.
R. B. Mitchell Colonel Major-General.
Franz Sigel Colonel Major-General.
D. S. Stanley Captain Major-General.
J. M. Schofield Major Major-General.
Gordon Granger Captain Major-General.
J. B. Plummer Captain Brigadier-General.
James Totten Captain Brigadier-General.
E. A. Carr Captain Brigadier-General.
Geo. W. Deitzler Colonel Brigadier-General.
T. W. Sweeney Captain Brigadier-General.
Geo. L. Andrews Lieutenant-Colonel Brigadier-General.
I. F. Shepard Major Brigadier-General.
[Sidenote: DARING EXPLOIT OF A KANSAS OFFICER.]
During the battle, Captain Powell Clayton's company of the First
Kansas Volunteers, becoming separated from the rest of our forces,
was approached by a regiment uniformed precisely like the First Iowa.
Clayton had just aligned his men with this new regiment, when he
detected small strips of red cloth on the shoulders of the privates,
which marked them as Rebels. With perfect coolness, he gave the order:
"Right oblique, march! You are crowding too much upon this regiment."
By this maneuver his company soon placed a good fifty yards between
itself and the Rebel regiment, when the Adjutant of the latter rode up
in front, suspicious that all was not right. Turning to Clayton, he
asked:
"What troops are these?"
"First Kansas," was the prompt reply. "What regiment is that?"
"Fifth Missouri, Col. Clarkson."
"Southern or Union?"
"Southern," said the Rebel, wheeling his horse; but Clayton seized him
by the collar, and threatened to shoot him if he commanded his men to
attack. The Adjutant, heedless of his own danger, ordered his regiment
to open fire upon the Kansas company. He was shot dead on the spot by
Clayton, who told his men to run for their lives. They escaped with the
loss of only four.
[Sidenote: THE DEATH OF LYON.]
Toward evening Lyon's horse was killed under him. Immediately
afterward, his officers begged that he would retire to a less exposed
spot. Scarcely raising his eyes from the enemy, he said:
"It is well enough that I stand here. I am satisfied."
While the line was forming, he turned to Major Sturgis, who stood near
him, and remarked:
"I fear that the day is lost. I think I will lead this charge."
Early in the day he had received a flesh-wound in the leg, from which
the blood flowed profusely. Sturgis now noticed fresh blood on the
General's hat, and asked where it came from.
"It is nothing, Major, nothing but a wound in the head," replied Lyon,
mounting a fresh horse.
Without taking the hat that was held out to him by Major Sturgis, he
shouted to the soldiers:
"Forward, men! I will lead you."
Two minutes later he lay dead on the field, pierced by a rifle-ball
through the breast, just above the heart.
Our officers held a hurried consultation, and decided not only to
retreat, but to abandon southwest Missouri. Strangely enough, the
coincidence of the morning was here repeated. Almost simultaneously,
the Rebels decided to fall back. They were in full retreat when they
were arrested by the news of the departure of the Federal troops, and
returned to take possession of the field which the last Union soldier
had abandoned eight hours before.
They claimed a great victory, and with justice, as they finally held
the ground. Their journals were very jubilant. Said _The New Orleans
Picayune_:
"Lyon is killed, Sigel in flight; southwestern Missouri
is clear of the National scum of invaders. The next word
will be, 'On to St. Louis.' That taken, the whole power of
Lincolnism is broken in the West, and instead of shouting
'Ho for Richmond!' and 'Ho for New Orleans!' there will
be hurrying to and fro among the frightened magnates at
Washington, and anxious inquiries of what they shall do to
save themselves from the vengeance to come. Heaven smiles on
the armies of the Confederate States."
[Sidenote: LYON'S COURAGE AND PATRIOTISM.]
Lyon went into the battle in civilian's dress, excepting only a
military coat. He had on a soft hat of ashen hue, with long fur and
very broad brim, turned up on three sides. He had worn it for a month;
it would have individualized the wearer among fifty thousand men. His
peculiar dress and personal appearance were well known through the
enemy's camp. He received a new and elegant uniform just before the
battle, but it was never worn until his remains were clothed in it,
after the brave spirit had fled, and while our forces were retreating
from Springfield by night.
Notwithstanding his personal bravery and military education, he always
opposed dueling on principle. No provocation made him recognize the
"code." Once he was struck in the face, but he had courage enough to
refuse to challenge his adversary. For a time this subjected him to
misapprehension and contempt among military men, but, long before his
death, his fellow-officers understood and respected him.
He seemed to care little for personal fame--to think only of the Cause.
Knowing exactly what was before him, he went to death on that summer
evening "as a man goes to his bridal." Losing a life, he gained an
immortality. His memory is green in the nation's heart, his name high
on her roll of honor.
[Sidenote: ARRIVAL OF GENERAL FREMONT.]
On the 25th of July, Major-General John C. Fremont reached St. Louis,
in command of the Western Department. His advent was hailed with great
enthusiasm. The newspapers, West, predicted for him achievements
extravagant and impossible as those which the New York journals had
foretold for McClellan. In those sanguine days, the whole country made
"Young Napoleons" to order.
With characteristic energy, Fremont plunged into the business of his
new department, where chaos reigned, and he had no spell to evoke
order, save the boundless patriotism and earnestness of the people.
His head-quarters were established on Chouteau Avenue. He was overrun
with visitors--every captain, or corporal, or civilian, seeking to
prosecute his business with the General in person. He was therefore
compelled to shut himself up, and, by the sweeping refusal to admit
petitioners to him, a few were excluded whose business was important.
Some dissatisfaction and some jesting resulted. I remember three
Kansas officers, charged with affairs of moment, who used daily to be
merry, describing how they had made a reconnoissance toward Fremont's
head-quarters, fought a lively engagement, and driven in the pickets,
only to find the main garrison so well guarded that they were quite
unable to force it.
[Sidenote: UNION FAMILIES DRIVEN OUT.]
ST. LOUIS, _August 26, 1861_.
A long caravan of old-fashioned Virginia wagons, containing rude
chairs, bedsteads, and kitchen utensils, passed through town yesterday.
They brought from the Southwest families who,
"Forced from their homes, a melancholy train, are seeking in
free Illinois that protection which Government is unable to
afford them in Missouri. At least fifty thousand inoffensive
persons have thus fled since the Rebellion."
_August 29._
We were lately surprised and gratified to learn that a gentleman from
Minnesota had offered an unasked loan of forty-six thousand dollars to
the Government authorities--gratified at such spontaneous patriotism,
and surprised that any man who lived in Minnesota should have forty-six
thousand dollars. The latter mystery has been explained by the
discovery that he never took his funds to that vortex of real estate
speculation, but left them in this city, where he formerly resided.
Moreover, his money was in Missouri currency, which, though at par here
in business transactions, is at a discount of eight per cent. on gold
and New York exchange. The loan is to be returned to him in gold. So,
after all, there is probably as much human nature to the square acre in
Minnesota as anywhere else.
_September 6._
"Egypt to the rescue!" is the motto upon the banner of a new Illinois
regiment. Southern Illinois, known as Egypt, is turning out men for
the Mississippi campaign with surprising liberality; whereupon a fiery
Secessionist triumphantly calls attention to this prophetic text, from
Hosea: "Egypt shall gather them up; Memphis shall bury them!"
The aptness of the citation is admirable; but he is reminded, in
return, that the pet phrase of the Rebels, "Let us alone," was the
prayer of a man possessed of a devil, to the Saviour of the world!
[Sidenote: AN INVOLUNTARY SOJOURN WITH REBELS.]
I have just met a gentleman, residing in southwestern Missouri, whose
experience is novel. He visited the camp of the Rebels to reclaim a
pair of valuable horses, which they had taken from his residence. They
not only retained the stolen animals, but also took from him those
with which he went in pursuit, and left him the alternative of walking
home, twenty-three miles, through a dangerous region, or remaining
in their camp. Fond of adventure, he chose the latter, and for three
weeks messed with a Missouri company. The facetious scoundrels told him
that they could not afford to keep him unless he earned his living;
and employed him as a teamster. He had philosophy enough to make the
best of it, and flattered himself that he became a very creditable
mule-driver.
Early on the morning of August 10th, he was breakfasting with the
officers from a dry-goods box, which served for a table, when bang!
went a cannon, not more than two or three hundred yards from them, and
crash! came a ball, cutting off the branches just above their heads.
"Here is the devil to pay; the Dutch are upon us!" exclaimed the
captain, springing up and ordering his company to form.
My friend was a looker-on from the Southern side during the whole
battle. He gives a graphic account of the joy of the Rebels at finding
the body of General Lyon, lying under a tree (the first information
they had of his death), and their surprise and consternation at the
bravery with which the little Union army fought to the bitter end.
Twenty leading Secessionists are in durance vile here. There is a
poetic justice in the fact that their prison was formerly a slave-pen,
and that they are enabled to study State Rights from old negro quarters.
_September 7._
[Sidenote: A STARTLING CONFEDERATE ATROCITY.]
The Rebels have just perpetrated a new and startling atrocity. They cut
down the high railroad bridge over the Little Platte River near St.
Joseph. The next train from Hannibal reached the spot at midnight, and
its locomotive and five cars were precipitated, thirty feet, into the
bed of the river. More than fifty passengers were dangerously wounded,
and twenty instantly killed. They were mainly women and children; there
was not a single soldier among them.
_September 15._
General Fremont is issuing written guarantees for their freedom to the
slaves of Rebels. They are in the form of real-estate conveyances,
releasing the recipient from all obligations to his master; declaring
him forever free from servitude, and with full right and authority
to control his own labor. They are headed "Deed of Manumission,"
authenticated by the great seal of the Western Department, and the
signature of its commander. Think of giving a man a warranty-deed for
his own body and soul!
In compliance with imperative orders from the Government, several
regiments, though sadly needed here, are being sent eastward. To the
colonel commanding one of them, the order was conveyed by Fremont in
these characteristic terms:
"Repair at once to Washington. Transportation is provided for
you. My friend, I am sorry to part with you, but there are
laurels growing on the banks of the Potomac."
[Sidenote: ORGANIZATION OF THE "BOHEMIAN BRIGADE."]
CHAPTER XV.
Why should a man, whose blood is warm within, Sit like his
grandsire cut in alabaster?----MERCHANT OF VENICE.
In October, General Fremont's forming army rendezvoused at the capital
of Missouri. From afar, Jefferson City is picturesque; but distance
lends enchantment. Close inspection shows it uninviting and rough. The
Capitol, upon a frowning hill, is a little suggestive of the sober
old State House which overlooks Boston Common. Brick and frame houses
enough for a population of three thousand straggle over an area of a
mile square, as if they had been tossed up like a peck of apples, and
left to come down and locate themselves. Many are half hidden by the
locust, ailantus, and arbor-vitæ trees, and the white blossoms of the
catalpas.
The war correspondents "smelled the battle from afar off." More than
twenty collected two or three weeks before the army started. Some of
them were very grave and decorous at home, but here they were like boys
let out of school.
They styled themselves the Bohemian Brigade, and exhibited that
touch of the vagabond which Irving charitably attributes to all
poetic temperaments. They were quartered in a wretched little tavern
eminently First Class in its prices. It was very southern in style.
A broad balcony in front, over a cool brick pavement; no two rooms
upon the same level; no way of getting up stairs except by going out
of doors; long, low wings, shooting off in all directions; a gallery
in the rear, deeper than the house itself; heavy furniture, from the
last generation, with a single modern link in the shape of a piano in
the ladies' parlor; leisurely negro waiters, including little boys
and girls, standing behind guests at dinner, and waving long wands
over the table to disconcert the omnipresent flies; and corn bread,
hot biscuits, ham, and excellent coffee. The host and hostess were
slaveholders, who said "thar" and "whar," but held that Secessionists
were traitors, and that traitors ought to be hung.
[Sidenote: AN AMUSED AFRICAN.]
The landlord, who was aged, rheumatic, and half blind, labored under
the delusion that he kept the house; but an intelligent and middle-aged
slave, yclept John, was the real brain of the establishment.
"John," asked one of the correspondents, "does your master really think
he is alive?"
"'Live, sir? I reckon so."
"Why, he has been dead these twenty years. He hobbles around,
pretending he exists, just to save funeral expenses."
John's extravagant enjoyment of this sorry jest beggared description.
He threw himself on the floor, rolled over and over, and roared with
laughter for fifteen minutes. He did not recover his usual gravity for
weeks. Again and again, while waiting upon guests, he would see his
master coming, and suddenly explode with merriment, to the infinite
amazement of the _habitués_ of the house, who suspected that the negro
was losing his wits.
[Sidenote: DIVERSIONS OF THE CORRESPONDENTS.]
The Bohemians took their ease in their inn, and held high carnival,
to the astonishment of all its _attachés_, from the aged proprietor
down to the half-fledged negro cherubs. Each seemed to regard as his
personal property the half-dozen rooms which all occupied. The one who
dressed earliest in the morning would appropriate the first hat, coat,
and boots he found, remarking that the owner was probably dead.
One huge, good-natured brother they called "the Elephant." He was
greatly addicted to sleeping in the daytime; and when other resources
failed, some reckless quill-driver would say:
"Now, let's all go and sleep with the Elephant."
Eight or ten would pile themselves upon his bed, beside him and upon
him, until his good-nature became exhausted, when the giant would toss
them out of the room like so many pebbles, and lock his door.
There was little work to be done; so they discussed politics, art,
society, and metaphysics; and would soon kindle into singing, reciting,
"sky-larking," wrestling, flinging saddles, valises, and pillows. In
some recent theatrical spectacle, two had heard a "chorus of fiends,"
which tickled their fancy. As the small hours approached, it was
their unceasing delight to roar imitations of it, declaring, with
each repetition, that it was now to be given positively for the last
time, and by the very special request of the audience. How they sent
that demoniac "Ha! ha! ha!" shrieking through the midnight air! The
following account of their diversions was given by "J. G." in _The
Cincinnati Gazette_. The scenes he witnessed suggested, very naturally,
the nomenclature of the prize-ring:
Happening to drop in the other night, I found the
representatives of _The Missouri Republican_, _The Cincinnati
Commercial_, _The New York World_, and _The Tribune_, engaged
in a hot discussion upon matrimony, which finally ran into
metaphysics. _The Republican_ having plumply disputed an
abstruse proposition of _The Tribune_, the latter seized an
immense bolster, and brought it down with emphasis upon the
glossy pate of his antagonist. This instantly broke up the
debate, and a general _mêlée_ commenced. _The Republican_
grabbed a damp towel and aimed a stunning blow at his
assailant, which missed him and brought up against the nasal
protuberance of _Frank Leslie_. The exasperated _Frank_
dealt back a pillow, followed by a well-packed knapsack.
Then _The Missouri Democrat_ sent a coverlet, which lit
upon and enveloped the knowledge-box of _The Herald_. The
latter disengaged himself after several frantic efforts,
and hurled a ponderous pair of saddle-bags, which passed
so close to _The Gazette's_ head, that in dodging it he
bumped his phrenology against the bed-post, and raised a
respectable organ where none existed before. Simultaneously
_The Commercial_ threw a haversack, which hit _Harper_ in
the bread-basket, and doubled him into a folio--knocking
him against _The World_, who, toppling from his center of
gravity, was poising a plethoric bed-tick with dire intent,
when the upturned legs of a chair caught and tore it open,
scattering the feathers through the surging atmosphere. In
falling, he capsized the table, spilling the ink, wrecking
several literary barks, extinguishing the "brief candle"
that had faintly revealed the sanguinary fray, thus abruptly
terminating hostilities, but leaving the panting heroes
still defiant and undismayed. A light was at last struck;
the combatants adjusted their toilets, and, having lit the
calumets of peace, gently resigned themselves to the soothing
influence of the weed.
[Sidenote: A POLITE ARMY CHAPLAIN.]
They did not learn, for several days, that a meek chaplain, with his
wife and three children, inhabited an adjacent apartment. He was at
once sent for, and a fitting apology tendered. He replied that he had
actually enjoyed the novel entertainment. He must have been the most
polite man in the whole world. He is worthy a niche in biography,
beside the lady who was showered with gravy, by Sidney Smith, and who,
while it was still dripping from her chin, blandly replied to his
apologies, that not a single drop had touched her!
When in-door diversions failed, the correspondents amused themselves by
racing their horses, which were all fresh and excitable. That region,
abounding in hills, ravines, and woods, is peculiarly seductive to
reckless equestrians desiring dislocated limbs or broken necks.
One evening, the "Elephant" was thrown heavily from his horse, and
severely lamed. The next night, nothing daunted, he repeated the
race, and was hurled upon the ground with a force which destroyed his
consciousness for three or four hours. A comrade, in attempting to stop
the riderless horse, was dragged under the heels of his own animal. His
mild, protesting look, as he lay flat upon his back, holding in both
hands the uplifted, threatening foot of his fiery Pegasus, was quite
beyond description. One correspondent dislocated his shoulder, and went
home from the field before he heard a gun.
[Sidenote: SIGHTS IN JEFFERSON CITY.]
JEFFERSON CITY, MO., _October 6, 1861_.
These deep ravines and this fathomless mud offer to obstinate mules
unlimited facilities for shying, and infinite possibilities of miring.
Last night, six animals and an army wagon went over a small precipice,
and, after a series of somersaults, driver, wagon, and mules, reached
the bottom, in a very chaotic condition.
Jefferson is strong on the wet weather question. When Lyon got here
in June, he was welcomed by one man with an umbrella. When Fremont
arrived, a few nights ago, he was taken in charge by the same
gentleman, who was floundering about through the mud with a lantern,
seeking, not an honest man, but quarters for the commanding general.
Most of the troops have gone forward, but some remain. Newly mounted
officers, who sit upon their steeds much as an elephant might walk a
tight rope, dash madly through the streets, fondly dreaming that they
witch the world with noble horsemanship. Subalterns show a weakness for
brass buttons, epaulettes, and gold braid, which leaves feminine vanity
quite in the shade.
In the camps, the long roll is sometimes sounded at midnight, to
accustom officers and men to spring to arms. Upon the first of
these sudden calls from Morpheus to Mars, the negro servant of a
staff-officer was so badly frightened that he brought up his master's
horse with the crupper about the neck instead of the tail. The mistake
was discovered just in season to save the rider from the proverbial
destiny of a beggar on horseback.
[Sidenote: "FIGHTS MIT SIGEL."]
Here is a German private very shaky in the legs; he swears by Fremont
and "fights mit Sigel." Too much "lager" is the trouble with _him_;
and, in serene though harmless inebriety, he is arrested by a file
of soldiers. A capital print in circulation represents a native and
a German volunteer, with uplifted mugs of the nectar of Gambrinus,
striking hands to the motto, "One flag, one country, _zwei lager!_"
Here is a detachment of Home Guards, whose "uniform is multiform." To
a proposition, that the British militia should never be ordered out of
the country, Pitt once moved the satirical proviso, "Except in case
of invasion." So it is alleged that the Missouri Home Guards are very
useful--except in case of a battle; and I hear one merciless critic
style them the "Home Cowards." This is unjust; but they illustrate the
principle, that to attain good drill and discipline, soldiers should be
beyond the reach of home.
Camp Lillie, upon a beautiful grassy slope, is the head-quarters
of the commander. In his tent, directing, by telegraph, operations
throughout this great department, or upon horseback, personally
inspecting the regiments, you meet the peculiarly graceful, slender,
compact, magnetic man whose assignment here awoke so much enthusiasm
in the West. General Fremont is quiet, well-poised, and unassuming.
His friends are very earnest, his enemies very bitter. Those who know
him only by his early exploits, are surprised to find in the hero of
the frontier the graces of the saloon. He impresses one as a man very
modest, very genuine, and very much in earnest.
[Sidenote: A PHYSIOLOGICAL PHENOMENON.]
His hair is tinged with silver. His beard is sprinkled with snow,
though two months ago it was of unmingled brown.
"Nor turned it white
In a single night,
As men's have done from sudden fears;"
but it did blanch under the absorbing labors and anxieties of two
months--a physiological fact which Doctor Holmes will be good enough to
explain to us at his earliest convenience.
Mrs. Fremont is in camp, but will return to Saint Louis when the
army moves. She inherits many traits of her father's character.
She possesses that "excellent thing in woman," a voice, like Annie
Laurie's, low and sweet--more rich, more musical, and better
modulated, than that of any _tragédienne_ upon the stage. To a broad,
comprehensive intellect she adds those quick intuitions which leap to
results, anticipating explanations, and those proclivities for episode,
incident, and bits of personal analyzing, which make a woman's talk so
charming.
How much rarer this grace of familiar speech than any other
accomplishment whatever! In a lifetime one meets not more than four
or five great conversationalists. Jessie Benton Fremont is among the
felicitous few, if not queen of them all.
_October 8._
The army is forty thousand strong. Generals Sigel, Hunter, Pope,
Asboth, and McKinstry command respectively its five divisions.
[Sidenote: SIGEL, HUNTER, POPE, ASBOTH, MCKINSTRY.]
Sigel is slender, pale, wears spectacles, and looks more like a student
than a soldier. He was professor in a university when the war broke out.
Hunter, at sixty, and agile as a boy, is erect and grim, with bald head
and Hungarian mustache.
Pope is heavy, full-faced, brown-haired, and looks like a man of brains.
Asboth is tall, daring-eyed, elastic, a mad rider, and profoundly
polite, bowing so low that his long gray hair almost sweeps the ground.
McKinstry is six feet two, sinewy-framed, deep-chested, firm-faced,
wavy-haired, and black-mustached. He looks like the hero of a
melodrama, and the Bohemians term him "the heavy tragedian."
WARSAW, MO., _October 22_.
An officer of New York mercantile antecedents, recently appointed
to a high position, reached Syracuse a few days since, under orders
to report to Fremont. He would come no farther than the end of the
railroad, but turned abruptly back to St. Louis. Being asked his
reason, he made this reply, peculiarly ingenuous and racy for a
brigadier-general and staff-officer:
"Why, I found that I should have to go on horseback!"
With two fellow-journalists, I left Syracuse four days ago. Asboth's
and Sigel's divisions had preceded us. The post-commandant would not
permit us to come through the distracted, guerrilla-infested country
without an escort, but gave us a sergeant and four men of the regular
army.
On the way we spent the supper hour near Cole Camp. Our Falstaffian
landlord informed us that two brothers, Jim and Sam Cole, encamped
here in early days, to hunt bears, and that the creek was named in
remembrance of them. Being asked with great gravity the extremely
Bohemian question, "_Which_ of them?" he relapsed into a profound
study, from which he did not afterward recover.
We made the trip--forty-seven miles--in ten hours. This is a strong
Secession village. Half its male inhabitants are in the Rebel army.
Our officers quarter in the most comfortable residences. At first
the people were greatly incensed at the "Abolition soldiery," but
they now submit gracefully. One of the most malignant Rebel families
involuntarily entertains a dozen German officers, who drink lager-beer
industriously, smoke meerschaums unceasingly, and at night sing
unintermittently.
We are quartered at the house of a lady who has a son in Price's army,
and a daughter in whom education and breeding maintain constant warfare
with her antipathies toward the Union forces. Being told the other
evening that one of our party was a Black Republican, she regarded him
with a wondering stare, declaring that she never saw an Abolitionist
before in her life, and apparently amazed that he wore the human face
divine!
[Sidenote: SIGEL'S TRANSPORTATION TRAIN.]
Sigel, as usual, is thirty miles ahead. He has more _go_ in him
than any other of our generals. Several division commanders are
still waiting for transportation, but Sigel collected horse-wagons,
ox-wagons, mule-wagons, family-carriages, and stage-coaches, and
pressed animals until he organized a most unique transportation train
three or four miles long. He crossed his division over the swift Osage
River--three hundred yards wide--in twenty-four hours, upon a single
ferry-boat. The Rebels justly name him "The Flying Dutchman."
[Sidenote: A COUNTRYMAN'S ESTIMATE OF TROOPS.]
The Missourians along our line of march have very extravagant ideas
about the Federal army. We stopped at the house of a native, where ten
thousand troops had passed. He placed their number at forty thousand!
"I reckon you have, in all, about seventy thousand men, and three
hundred cannon, haven't you?" he asked.
"We have a hundred and fifty thousand men, and six hundred pieces of
artillery," replied a wag in the party.
"Well," said the countryman, thoughtfully, "I reckon you'll clean out
old Price _this_ time!"
[Sidenote: A "KID-GLOVED" CORPS.]
CHAPTER XVI.
Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close
the wall up with our English dead!----KING HENRY V.
General Fremont's Body Guard was composed of picked young men of
unusual intelligence. They were all handsomely uniformed, efficiently
armed, and mounted upon bay horses. They cultivated the mustache, with
the rest of the face smooth--at least, not a more whimsical decree than
the rigid regulation of the British army, which compelled every man
to shave and wear a stock under the burning sun of the Crimea. Many
denounced the Guard as a "kid-gloved," ornamental corps, designed only
to swell Fremont's retinue.
Major Zagonyi, commandant of the Guard, with one hundred and fifty of
his men, started with orders to reconnoiter the country in front of us.
When near Springfield, they found the town held by a Rebel force of
cavalry and infantry, ill organized, but tolerably armed, and numbering
two thousand.
Zagonyi drew his men up in line, explained the situation, and asked
whether they would attack or turn back for re-enforcements. They
replied unanimously that they would attack.
They _did_ attack. Men and horses were very weary. They had ridden
fifty miles in seventeen hours; they had never been under fire before;
but history hardly parallels their daring.
[Sidenote: CHARGE OF THE BODY GUARD.]
The Rebels formed in line of battle at the edge of a wood. To approach
them, the Guard were compelled to ride down a narrow lane, exposed to a
terrible fire from three different directions. They went through this
shower of bullets, dismounted, tore down the high zig-zag fence, led
their horses over in the teeth of the enemy, remounted, formed, and,
spreading out, fan-like, charged impetuously, shouting "Fremont and the
Union."
The engagement was very brief and very bloody. Though only in the
proportion of one to thirteen, the Guard behaved as if weary of their
lives. Men utterly reckless are masters of the situation. At first, the
Confederates fought well; but they were soon panic-stricken, and many
dropped their guns, and ran to and fro like persons distracted.
The Guard charged through and through the broken ranks of the Rebels,
chased them in all directions--into the woods, beyond the woods,
down the roads, through the town--and planted the old flag upon the
Springfield court-house, where it had not waved since the death of Lyon.
Armed with revolvers and revolving carbines, members of the Guard had
twelve shots apiece. After delivering their first fire, there was no
time to reload, and (the only instance of the kind early in the war)
nearly all their work was done with the saber. When they mustered
again, almost every blade in the command was stained with blood.
Of their one hundred and fifty horses, one hundred and twenty were
wounded. A sergeant had three horses shot under him. A private received
a bullet in a blacking-box, which he carried in his pocket. They lost
fifty men, sixteen of whom were killed on the spot.
"I wonder if they will call us fancy soldiers and kid-gloved boys any
longer?" said one, who lay wounded in the hospital when we arrived.
[Sidenote: TURNING THE TABLES.]
On a cot beside him, I found an old schoolmate. His eye brightened as
he grasped my hand.
"Is your wound serious?" I asked.
"Painful, but not fatal. O, it was a glorious fight!"
It _was_ a glorious fight. Wilson Creek is doubly historic ground.
There first a thousand of our men poured out their blood like water,
and the brave Lyon laid down his life "for our dear country's sake."
Two months later, the same stream witnessed the charge of the Body
Guard, which, in those dark days, when the Cause looked gloomy,
thrilled every loyal heart in the nation. It will shine down the
historic page, and be immortal in song and story.
Major Frank J. White, of our army, was with the Rebels as a prisoner
of war during the charge. Just before they were routed, fourteen men,
under a South Carolina captain, started with him for General Price's
camp. At a house where they spent the night, the farmer boldly avowed
himself a Union man. He supposed White to be one of the Rebel officers;
but, finding a moment's opportunity, the major whispered to him:
"I am a Union prisoner. Send word to Springfield at once, and my men
will come and rescue me."
The Rebels, leaving one man on picket outside, went to bed in the same
room with their prisoner. Then the farmer sent his little boy of twelve
years, on horseback, fourteen miles to Springfield. At three o'clock in
the morning, twenty-six Home Guards surrounded the house, and captured
the entire party. Major White at once took command, and posted _his_
guards over the crestfallen Confederates.
While they sat around the fire in the evening, waiting for supper, the
Rebel captain had remarked:
"Major, we have a little leisure, and I believe I will amuse myself by
looking over your papers." Whereupon he spent an hour in examining the
letters which he found in White's possession. In the morning, when the
party, again sitting by the fire, waited for breakfast, the major said,
quietly:
"Captain, we have a little leisure, and I think I will amuse myself by
looking over _your_ papers." So the Rebel documents were scrutinized
in turn. White returned in triumph to Springfield, bringing his late
captors as prisoners. A friendship sprang up between him and the South
Carolina captain, who remained on parole in our camp for several days,
and they messed and slept together.
[Sidenote: WELCOME FROM UNION RESIDENTS.]
When our troops entered Springfield, the people greeted them with
uncontrollable joy; for they were intensely loyal, and had been under
Rebel rule more than eleven weeks. Scores and scores of National flags
now suddenly emerged from mysterious hiding-places; wandering exiles
came pouring back, and we were welcomed by hundreds of glad faces,
waving handkerchiefs, swinging hats, and vociferous huzzas.
Fremont had now modified his Proclamation; but the logic of events was
stronger than President Lincoln. The negroes would throng our camp,
and Fremont never permitted a single one to be returned. One slave
appropriated a horse, and, guiding him only by a rope about the nose,
without saddle or bridle, blanket or spur, rode from Price's camp to
Fremont's head-quarters, more than eighty miles, in eighteen hours.
A brigade of regular troops, under General Sturgis, having marched
from Kansas City, joined us in Springfield. They were under very rigid
discipline, and all their supplies, whether procured from Rebels or
Unionists, were paid for in gold. Sturgis was then very "conservative,"
and some of our people denounced him as disloyal. But, like hundreds of
others, inexorable war educated him very rapidly. His sympathies were
soon heartily on our side. He afterward, in the Army of the Potomac,
won and wore bright laurels.
[Sidenote: FREAKS OF THE KANSAS BRIGADE.]
The Kansas volunteer brigade, under General "Jim" Lane, also joined us
at Springfield. Their course contrasted sharply with that of Sturgis's
men. They had a good many old scores to settle up, and they swept
along the Missouri border like a hurricane. Sublimely indifferent to
the President's orders, and all other orders which did not please
them, they received over two thousand slaves, sending them off by
installments into Kansas. When the master was loyal, they would
gravely appraise the negro; give him a receipt for his slave, named
----, valued at ---- hundred dollars, "lost by the march of the Kansas
Brigade," and advise him to carry the claim before Congress!
By some unexplained law, dandies, fools, and supercilious braggarts
often gravitate into staff positions; but Fremont's staff was an
exceedingly agreeable one. Many of its members had traveled over the
globe, and, from their wide experiences, whiled away many hours before
the evening camp-fires.
On the 31st of October, the correspondents, under cavalry escort,
visited the Wilson Creek battle-ground, ten miles south of Springfield.
The field is broken by rocky ridges and deep ravines, and covered with
oak shrubs. Picking his way among the brushwood, my horse's hoof struck
with a dull, hollow sound against a human skull. Just beyond, still
clad in uniform, lay a skeleton, on whose ghastliness the storms and
sunshine of three months had fallen. The head was partially severed;
and though the upturned face was fleshless, I could not resist the
impression that it wore a look of mortal agony. It was in a little
thicket, several yards from the scene of any fighting. The poor fellow
was carried there, dying or dead, during the progress of the battle,
and afterward overlooked. Among our lost his name was probably followed
by the sad word "Missing."
"Not among the suffering wounded;
Not among the peaceful dead;
Not among the prisoners. MISSING--
That was all the message said.
"Yet his mother reads it over,
Until, through her painful tears,
Fades the dear name she has called him
For these two-and-twenty years."
Many graves had been opened by wolves. Bones of horses, haversacks,
shoes, blouses, gun-barrels, shot, and fragments of shell, were
scattered over the field. The trees were scarred with bullets, and
hundreds were felled by the artillery. A six-inch shot would cut down
one of these brittle oaks a foot in diameter.
[Sidenote: CAPTURE OF A FEMALE SPY.]
A few miles south of Springfield one of our scouts encountered a
young woman on horseback. Suspecting her errand, he informed her
confidentially that he was a spy from Price's army, who had been
several days in Fremont's camp. Falling into this palpable trap,
the girl told him frankly that _she_ was sent by Price to visit our
forces, and obtain information. She was taken immediately to Fremont's
head-quarters. Her terror was very great on finding herself betrayed.
She told all she knew about the Rebels, and was finally allowed to
depart in peace. The employment of female spies was very common upon
both sides.
[Sidenote: FREMONT'S FAREWELL TO HIS ARMY.]
On the 2d of November our whole army was at Springfield. Fremont had
progressed farther south than any other Union commander, from the
Atlantic to the Rio Grande. Detachments of Rebels were within ten miles
of our camps. Emphatic, but entirely false reports from the colonel at
the head of Fremont's scouts,[14] had given the impression that Price's
entire command was very near us; and a great battle was hourly expected.
[14] This officer was a native Missourian, deemed trustworthy, and
thoroughly familiar with the country. He reported officially to Fremont
that the whole Rebel army was within eleven miles of us, when it was
really fifty miles away. Then, indeed, much later in the war, accurate
information about the enemy seemed absolutely unattainable. Scott,
McClellan, Halleck, Grant, all failed to procure it. Rosecrans was the
first general who kept himself thoroughly advised of the whereabouts,
strength, and designs of the Rebels.
Fremont was in the midst of an important campaign. His army was most
patriotic, enthusiastic, and promising. His personal popularity among
his troops was without parallel.
At this moment the official ax fell. He received an order to turn over
his command to Hunter. It was a trying ordeal, but he did a soldier's
duty, obeying silently and instantly. The first intelligence which the
army received was conveyed by this touching farewell:
SOLDIERS OF THE MISSISSIPPI ARMY: Agreeably to orders this
day received, I take leave of you. Although our army has
been of sudden growth, we have grown up together, and I have
become familiar with the brave and generous spirit which you
bring to the defense of your country, and which makes me
anticipate for you a brilliant career.
Continue as you have begun, and give to my successor the
same cordial and enthusiastic support with which you have
encouraged me. Emulate the splendid example already before
you, and let me remain, as I am, proud of the noble army
which I have thus far labored to bring together.
[Sidenote: DISAFFECTION AMONG THE SOLDIERS.]
Soldiers! I regret to leave you. Sincerely I thank you for
the regard and confidence you have invariably shown me. I
deeply regret that I shall not have the honor to lead you
to the victory which you are just about to win, but I shall
claim to share with you in the joy of every triumph, and
trust always to be fraternally remembered by my companions in
arms.
Fremont's name had been the rallying-point of the volunteers. Officers
and entire regiments had come from distant parts of the country to
serve under him. All felt the impropriety and cruelty of his removal
at this time. Many officers at once wrote their resignations. Whole
battalions were reported laying down their arms. The Germans were
specially indignant, and among the Body Guard there was much bitterness.
The slightest encouragement or tolerance from the General would
have produced wide-spread mutiny; but he expostulated with the
malcontents, reminding them that their first duty was to the country;
and, after Hunter's arrival, left the camp before daylight, lest his
appearance among the soldiers, as he rode away, should excite improper
demonstrations.
A few days moderated the feeling of the troops; for, like all our
volunteers, they were wedded not to any man, but to the Cause.
In St. Louis, Fremont was received more like a conquering hero than a
retiring general. An immense assembly greeted him. In their enthusiasm,
the people even carpeted his door-step with flowers.
For weeks before his removal the air had been filled with clamors,
charging him with incompetency, extravagance, and giving Government
contracts to corrupt men. The first attacks upon him immediately
followed his Emancipation Proclamation, issued August 31, 1861.
[Sidenote: SPURIOUS MISSOURI UNIONISTS.]
There were many half-hearted Unionists in Missouri. For example,
shortly after the capture of Sumter, General Robert Wilson, of Andrew
County, in a public meeting, served upon the committee on resolutions
reporting the following:
"_Resolved_, That we condemn as inhuman and diabolical the
war being waged by the Government against the South."
Eight months after, this same Wilson claimed to be a Union leader, and,
as such, was sent to represent Missouri in the Senate of the United
States! Of course all men of this class waged unrelenting war upon
Fremont. Afterward there was a rupture among the really loyal men; a
fierce quarrel, in which the able but unscrupulous Blairs headed the
opposition, and some zealous and patriotic Unionists co-operated with
them. The President, always conscientious, was persuaded to remove the
General; but afterward tacitly admitted its injustice by giving him
another command.
Mr. Lincoln also countermanded the Emancipation Proclamation, which was
a little ahead of the times. Still it gratified the plain people, even
then. Tired of the tender and delicate terms in which our authorities
were wont to speak of "domestic institutions" and "systems of labor,"
they were delighted to read the announcement in honest Saxon:
"The property of active Rebels is confiscated for the public
use; and their slaves, if any they have, are hereby declared
Free Men."
It was a new and pure leaf in the history of the war.
Of course Fremont made mistakes, though the abuses in his department
were infinitely less than those which disgraced Washington, and which
in some degree are inseparable from large, unusual disbursements of
public money.
[Sidenote: CONDUCT OF CAMERON AND THOMAS.]
But he was very earnest. He was quite ignorant of How Not to Do it.
He took grave responsibilities. When red tape hampered him, he cut
it. Unable to obtain arms at Washington--which, in those days, knew
only Virginia--he ransacked the markets of the world for them. When
a paymaster refused to liquidate one of his bills, on the ground of
irregularity, he arrested him, and threatened to have him shot if he
persisted. Able to leave but few troops in St. Louis, he fortified the
city in thirty days, employing five thousand laborers.
Secretary Cameron and Adjutant-General Thomas visited Missouri, after
Fremont started upon his Springfield campaign. General Thomas did not
hesitate, in railway cars and hotels, to condemn him violently--a
gross breach of official propriety, and clearly tending to excite
insubordination among the soldiers. Cameron dictated a letter, ordering
Fremont to discontinue the St. Louis fortifications as unnecessary,
informing him that his official debts would not be discharged till
investigated, his contracts recognized, or the officers paid whom he
had appointed under the written authority of the President.
In due time they _were_ recognized and paid. The St. Louis
fortifications proved needful, and were afterward finished. Yet Cameron
permitted the contents of this letter to be telegraphed all over the
country four days before Fremont received it. It seemed designed to
impugn his integrity, destroy his credit, promote disaffection in his
camps, and prevent his contractors from fulfilling their engagements.
Thomas officially reported that Fremont would not be able to move
his army for lack of transportation. Before the report could reach
Washington, the army had advanced more than a hundred miles!
[Sidenote: DISREGARD OF THE ARMY REGULATIONS.]
Time, which at last makes all things even, vindicated Fremont's leading
measures in Missouri. His subsequent withdrawal from the field, in
Virginia, was doubtless unwise. It was hard to be placed under a
junior and hostile general; but private wrongs must wait in war, and
resignation proves quite as inadequate a remedy for the grievances of
an officer, as Secession for the fancied wrongs of the Slaveholders.
Brigadier-General Justus McKinstry, ex-Quartermaster of the Western
Department, was arrested, and closely confined in the St. Louis
arsenal for many months. His repeated demands for the charges
and specifications against him were disregarded. He was at last
court-martialed and dismissed the service, on the charge of malfeasance
in office. Brigadier-General Charles P. Stone was for a long time kept
under arrest in the same manner. These proceedings flagrantly violated
both the Army Regulation, entitling officers to know the charges and
witnesses against them, within ten days after arrest, and the spirit of
the Constitution itself, which guarantees to every man a speedy public
trial in the presence of his accusers.
Equally reprehensible was the arrest and long confinement of many
civilians without formal charges or trial. States where actual war
existed, and even the debatable ground which bordered them, might be
proper fields for this exercise of the Military Power. But the friends
of the Union, holding Congress, and nearly every State Legislature
by overwhelming majorities, could make whatever laws they pleased;
therefore, these measures were unnecessary and unjustifiable in the
North, hundreds of miles from the seat of war. Utterly at variance with
personal rights and republican institutions, they were alarming and
dangerous precedents, which any unscrupulous future administration may
plausibly cite in defense of the grossest outrages. President Lincoln
was always very chary of this exercise of arbitrary power; but some
of his constitutional advisers were constantly urging it. Secretary
Stanton, in particular, advocated and committed acts of flagrant
despotism. He was a good patent-office lawyer, but had not the faintest
conception of those primary principles of Civil Liberty which underlie
English and American institutions. Even the Magna Charta, in sonorous
Latin, declared:
"No person shall be apprehended or imprisoned, except by the
legal judgment of his peers, or the law of the land. To none
will we sell, to none will we deny, to none will we _delay_
right or justice."
[Sidenote: MILITARY POWER AND THE PRESS.]
Kindred questions arose touching the Military Power and the Liberty of
the Press. Each northern city had its daily journal, which, under thin
disguise of loyalty, labored zealously for the Rebels. Soldiers could
not patiently read treasonable sheets. On several occasions military
commanders suppressed them, but the President promptly removed the
disability. The sober second thought of the people was, that if editors
and publishers in the loyal North could not be convicted and punished
in the civil courts, they should not be molested.
General Hunter, succeeding Fremont, evacuated southwestern Missouri.
Before leaving Springfield, besieged with applications for runaway
slaves, he issued orders to deliver them up; but soldiers and officers
in his camps hid them so safely that they could not be found by their
masters.
[Sidenote: RUDENESS OF GENERAL HALLECK.]
Hunter's little brief authority lasted just fifteen days, when
he was succeeded by General Halleck--a stout, heavy-faced, rather
stupid-looking officer, who wore civilian's dress, and resembled a
well-to-do tradesman. On the 20th of November appeared his shameful
General Order Number Three:
"It has been represented that important information
respecting the numbers and condition of our forces is
conveyed to the enemy by means of fugitive slaves who are
admitted within our lines. In order to remedy this evil, it
is directed that no such persons be hereafter permitted to
enter the lines of any camp, or of any forces on the march,
and that any now within our lines be immediately excluded
therefrom."
Its inhumanity outraged the moral sense, and its falsehood the common
sense, of the country. The negroes were uniformly friends to our
soldiers. After diligent inquiry from every leading officer of my
acquaintance, I could not learn a single instance of treachery. To the
cruelty of turning the slave away, Halleck added the dishonesty of
slandering him.
When Charles James Fox was canvassing for Parliament, one of his
auditors said to him:
"Sir, I admire your talents, but d--n your politics!"
Fox retorted: "Sir, I admire your frankness, but d--n your manners!"
Many who had official business with Halleck uttered similar
maledictions. To his visitors he was brusque to surliness. Dr. Holmes
says, with great truth, that all men are bores when we do not want
them. Like all public characters, Halleck was beset by those grievous
dispensations of Providence. But a general in command of half a
continent ought, at least, to have the manners of a gentleman; and he
was sometimes so insulting that his legitimate visitors would have
been justified in kicking him down stairs. None of our high officials
equaled him in rudeness, except Mr. Stanton, Secretary of War.
In January, as a Government steamer approached the landing at
Commerce, Missouri, two women on shore shouted to the pilot:
"Don't land! Jeff. Thompson and his soldiers are here waiting for you."
The redoubtable guerrilla, with fifty men, instantly sprang from behind
a wood-pile and fired a volley. Twenty-six bullets entered the cabin
of the retreating boat; but, thanks to the loyal women, no person was
killed or captured.
[Sidenote: A DROLL FLAG OF TRUCE.]
One day, a seedy individual in soiled gray walked into Halleck's
private room at the Planter's House, in St. Louis, and, with the
military salute, thus addressed him:
"Sir, I am an officer of General Price's army, and have brought you a
letter under flag of truce."
"Where's your flag of truce?" growled Halleck.
"Here," was the prompt reply, and the Rebel pulled a dirty white rag
from his pocket!
He had entered our lines, and come one hundred and fifty miles,
without detection, passing pickets, sentinels, guards, and
provost-marshals. Halleck, who plumed himself on his organizing
capacity and rigid police regulations, was not a little chagrined. He
sent back the unique messenger with a letter, assuring Price that he
would shoot as a spy any one repeating the attempt.
CHAPTER XVII.
Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm
by erecting a grammar-school.--KING HENRY VI.
O, 'twas a din to fright a monster's ear, To wake an
earthquake!--TEMPEST.
[Sidenote: REBEL GUERRILLAS OUTWITTED.]
In January, Colonel Lawson, of the Missouri Union forces, was captured
by a dozen Rebels, who, after some threats of hanging, decided to
release him upon parole. Not one of them could read or write a line.
Lawson, requested by them to make out his own parole, drew up and
signed an agreement, pledging himself never to take up arms against the
United States of America, or give aid and comfort to its enemies! Upon
this novel promise he was set at liberty.
On the 3d of February a journalistic friend telegraphed me from Cairo:
"You can't come too soon: take the first train."
Immediately obeying the summons, I found that Commodore Foote had gone
up the Tennessee River with the new gunboats. The accompanying land
forces were under the command of an Illinois general named Grant, of
whom the country knew only the following:
Making a reconnoissance to Belmont, Missouri, opposite Columbus,
Kentucky, he had ventured too far, when the enemy opened on him.
Yielding to the fighting temptation, he made a lively resistance, until
compelled to retreat, leaving behind his dead and wounded. Jefferson
Davis officially proclaimed it a great Confederate success, and Rebel
newspapers grew merry over Grant's bad generalship, expressing the wish
that he might long lead the Yankee armies!
----"We, ignorant of ourselves, Beg often for our own harms;
so find we profit By losing of our prayers."
[Sidenote: EXPEDITION TO FORT HENRY.]
As the gunboats had never been tested, intense interest was felt
in their success. Approaching Fort Henry, three went forward to
reconnoiter. At the distance of two miles and a half, a twenty-four
pounder rifled ball penetrated the state-room of Captain Porter,
commanding the Essex, passing under his table, and cutting off the feet
of a pair of stockings which hung against the ceiling as neatly as
shears would have cut them.
"Pretty good shot!" said Porter. "Now we will show them ours." And he
dropped a nine-inch Dahlgren shell right into the fort.
The next day, a large number of torpedoes, each containing seventy-five
pounds of powder, were fished up from the bottom of the river. The
imprudent tongue of an angry Rebel woman revealed their whereabouts.
Prophesying that the whole fleet would be blown to atoms, she was
compelled to divulge what she knew, or be confined in the guard-house.
In mortal terror she gave the desired information. The torpedoes were
found wet and harmless. Commodore Foote predicted
"I can take that fort in about an hour and a half."
The night was excessively rainy and severe upon our boys in blue in
their forest bivouacs; but in the well-furnished cabin of General
Grant's steamer, we found "going to war" an agreeable novelty.
[Sidenote: ITS CAPTURE BY COMMODORE FOOTE.]
At mid-day on the 6th, Foote fired his first shot, at the distance
of seventeen hundred yards. Then he slowly approached the fort with
his entire fleet, until within four hundred yards. The Rebel fire was
very severe; but he determined to vindicate the iron-clads or to sink
them in the Tennessee. The wood-work of his flag-ship was riddled by
thirty-one shots, but her iron plating turned off the balls like hail.
All the boats were more or less damaged; but they fully established
their usefulness, and their officers and men behaved with the greatest
gallantry. One poor fellow on the Essex, terribly scalded by the
bursting of a steam drum, learning that the fort was captured, sprung
from his bunk, ran up the hatchway, and cheered until he fell senseless
upon the deck. He died the same night.
With several fellow-correspondents, I witnessed the fight from the top
of a high tree, up on the river-bank, between the fortification and the
gun-boats. There was little to be seen but smoke. Foote's prediction
proved correct. After he had fired about six hundred shots, just one
hour and fifteen minutes from the beginning, the colors of Fort Henry
were struck, and the gunboats trembled with the cheers and huzzas of
our men.
The Rebel infantry, numbering four thousand, escaped. Grant's
forces, detained by the mud, came up too late to surround them.
Brigadier-General Lloyd Tilghman, commanding, and the immediate
garrison, were captured.
In the barracks we found camp-fires blazing, dinners boiling, and
half-made biscuits still in the pans. Pistols, muskets, bowie-knives,
books, tables partially set for dinner, half-written letters,
playing-cards, blankets, and carpet-sacks were scattered about.
Our soldiers ransacked trunks, arrayed themselves in Rebel coats,
hats, and shirts, armed themselves with Rebel revolvers, stuffed their
pockets with Rebel books and miniatures, and some were soon staggering
under heavy loads of Rebel whisky.
From the quarters of one officer, I abstracted a small Confederate
flag; the daguerreotype of a female face so regular and classic that,
without close inspection, it was difficult to believe it taken from
life; a long tress of brown hair, and a package of elegantly written
letters, full of a sister's affection. A year afterward I was able to
return these family mementoes to their owner in Jackson, Mississippi.
[Sidenote: A DELIGHTED NEGRESS.]
Our shots had made great havoc. Carpet-sacks, trunks, and tables were
torn in pieces, walls and roofs were pierced with holes large enough
for a man to creep through, and cavities plowed in the ground which
would conceal a flour-barrel. A female Marius among the ruins, in the
form of an old negress, stood rubbing her hands with glee.
"You seem to have had hot work here, aunty."
"Lord, yes, mass'r, we did just dat! De big balls, dey come whizzing
and tearing 'bout, and I thought de las' judgment was cum, sure."
"Where are all your soldiers?"
"Lord A'mighty knows. Dey jus' runned away like turkeys--nebber fired a
gun."
"How many were there?"
"Dere was one Arkansas regiment over dere where you see de tents, a
Mississippi regiment dere, another dere, two Tennessee regiments here,
and lots more over de river."
"Why didn't you run with them?"
"I was sick, you see" (she could only speak in a whisper); "besides, I
wasn't afraid--only ob de shots. I just thought if dey didn't kill me I
was all right."
"Where is General Tilghman?"
"You folks has got him--him and de whole garrison inside de fort."
"You don't seem to feel very badly about it."
"Not berry, mass'r!"--with a fresh rub of the hands and a grin all over
her sable face.
[Sidenote: SCENES IN THE CAPTURED FORTRESS.]
In the fort, the magazine was torn open, the guns completely shattered,
and the ground stained with blood, brains, and fragments of flesh.
Under gray blankets were six corpses, one with the head torn off and
the trunk completely blackened with powder; others with legs severed
and breasts opened in ghastly wounds. The survivors, stretched upon
cots, rent the air with groans.
The captured Rebel officers, in a profusion of gold lace, were taken
to Grant's head-quarters. Tilghman was good-looking, broad-shouldered,
with the pompous manner of the South. Commodore Foote asked him:
"How could you fight against the old flag?"
"It was hard," he replied, "but I had to go with my people."
Presently a Chicago reporter inquired of him:
"How do you spell your name, General?"
"Sir," replied Tilghman, with indescribable pomposity, "if General
Grant wishes to use my name in his official dispatches, I have no
objection; but, sir, I do not wish to appear at all in this matter in
any newspaper report."
"I merely asked it," persisted the journalist, "for the list of
prisoners captured."
Tilghman, whose name should have been Turveydrop, replied, with a lofty
air and a majestic wave of the hand:
"You will oblige me, sir, by not giving my name in any newspaper
connection whatever!"
One of the Rebel officers was reminded of the predominance of Union
sentiments among the people about Fort Henry.
"True, sir," was his reply. "It is always so in these hilly countries.
You see, these d----d Hoosiers don't know any better. For the genuine
southern feeling, sir, you must go among the gentlemen--the rich
people. You won't find any Tories there."
[Sidenote: COMMODORE FOOTE IN THE PULPIT.]
The gunboats returned to Cairo for repairs. On the next Sunday morning,
the pastor of the Cairo Presbyterian Church failing to arrive,
Commodore Foote was induced to conduct the services. From the text:
"Let not your hearts be troubled; ye believe in God; believe
also in me,"
he preached an excellent practical discourse, urging that human
happiness depends upon integrity, pure living, and conscientious
performance of duty.
The land forces remained near Fort Henry. A few days after the battle,
I stepped into General Grant's head-quarters to bid him good-by, as I
was about starting for New York.
"You had better wait a day or two," he said.
"Why?"
"Because I am going over to capture Fort Donelson to-morrow."
"How strong is it?"
"We have not been able to ascertain exactly, but I think we can take
it. At all events, we can try."
The hopelessly muddy roads and the falling snow were terrible to our
troops, who had no tents; but Grant marched to the fort. On Wednesday
he skirmished and placed his men in position; on Thursday, Friday, and
Saturday, he fought from daylight until dark. On Saturday night, the
sanguine General Pillow telegraphed to Nashville:
"The day is ours. I have repulsed the enemy at all points,
but I want re-enforcements."
[Sidenote: THE CAPTURE OF FORT DONELSON.]
Before dawn on Sunday, the negro servant of a Confederate staff officer
escaped into our lines, and was taken to General Grant. He insisted
that the Rebel commanders were consulting about surrender, and that
Floyd's men were already deserting the fort. A few hours later came a
letter from Buckner, suggesting the appointment of commissioners to
adjust terms of capitulation. Grant wrote in answer:
"I have no terms but unconditional surrender. I propose to
move immediately upon your works."
Buckner's response, exquisitely characteristic of the Rebels,
regretfully accepted what he described as Grant's "ungenerous and
unchivalrous terms!" So the North was electrified by a success which
recalled the great battles of Napoleon.
Grant first invested the garrison with thirteen thousand men. The
enemy's force was twenty-two thousand. For two days, Grant's little
command laid siege to this much larger army, which was protected by
ample fortifications. At the end of the second day, Grant received
re-enforcements, swelling his forces to twenty-six thousand.
From three to four thousand Rebels, of Floyd's command, escaped from
the fort; others escaped on the way to Cairo, and several thousand were
killed or wounded; but Grant delivered, at Cairo, upward of fifteen
thousand eight hundred prisoners.
I was in Chicago when these captives, on their way to Camp Douglas,
passed through the streets in sad procession. Motley was the only wear.
A few privates had a stripe on the pantaloons and wore gray military
caps; but most, in slouched hats and garments of gray or butternut,
made no attempt at uniform. Some had the long hair and cadaverous faces
of the extreme South; but under the broad-brimmed hats of the majority,
appeared the full, coarse features of the working classes of Missouri,
Tennessee, and Arkansas. The Chicago citizens, who crowded the streets,
were guilty of no taunts or rude words toward the prisoners.
Columbus, Kentucky, twenty miles below Cairo, on the highest bluffs of
the Mississippi, was called the Gibraltar of the West, and expected to
be the scene of a great battle.
On the 4th of March, a naval and land expedition was ready to attack
it. Before leaving Cairo, hundreds of workmen crowded the gunboats,
repairing damages received on the Tennessee River--
"With busy hammers closing rivets up, And giving dreadful
notes of preparation."
Commodore Foote, lame from his Donelson wound, hobbled on board upon
crutches. A great National flag was taken along.
"Don't forget that," said the commodore. "Fight or no fight, we must
raise it over Columbus!"
[Sidenote: ARMY AND NAVY OFFICERS CONTRASTED.]
The leading commanders of the flotilla were from the regular
navy--quiet and unassuming, with no nonsense about them. They were
far freer from envy and jealousy than army officers. Before the war,
the latter had been stationed for years at frontier posts, hundreds
of miles beyond civilization, with no resources except drinking and
gambling, nothing to excite National feeling or prick the bubble of
their State pride. Naval officers, going all over the world, had
acquired the liberality which only travel imparts, and learned that,
abroad, their country was not known as Virginia or Mississippi, but
the _United_ States of America. With them, it was the Nation first,
and the State afterward. Hence, while nearly all southerners holding
commissions in the regular army joined the Rebellion, the navy almost
unanimously remained loyal.
The low, flat, black iron-clads crept down the river like enormous
turtles. Each had attending it a little pocket edition of a steamboat,
in the shape of a tug, capable of carrying fifty or sixty men, and
moving up the strong current twelve miles an hour. They were constantly
puffing about among the unwieldy vessels like a breathless little
errand-boy.
[Sidenote: The "Gibraltar of the West."]
Nearing Columbus, we found that the Rebels had evacuated it twelve
hours before. The town was already held by an enterprising scouting
party of the Second Illinois Cavalry, who had unearthed and raised an
old National flag. Our colors waved from the Rebel Gibraltar, and the
last Confederate soldier had abandoned Kentucky.
The enemy left in hot haste. Half-burned barracks, chairs, beds,
tables, cooking-stoves, letters, charred gun-carriages, bent
musket-barrels, bayonets, and provisions were promiscuously lying about.
The main fortifications, on a plateau one hundred and fifty feet high,
mounted eighty-three guns, commanding the river for nearly three miles.
Here, and in the auxiliary works, we captured one hundred and fifty
pieces of artillery.
[Sidenote: SCENES IN COLUMBUS, KENTUCKY.]
Fastened to the bluff, we found one end of a great chain cable,
composed of seven-eighths inch iron, which the brilliant Gideon J.
Pillow had stretched across the river, to prevent the passage of our
gunboats! It was worthy of the man who, in Mexico, dug his ditch on
the wrong side of the parapet. The momentum of an iron-clad would have
snapped it like a pipe-stem, had not the current of the river broken it
long before.
We found, also, enormous piles of torpedoes, which the Rebels had
declared would annihilate the Yankee fleet. They became a standing
jest among our officers, who termed them original members of the Peace
Society, and averred that the rates of marine insurance immediately
declined whenever the companies learned that torpedoes had been planted
in the waters where the boats were to run!
In the abandoned post-office I collected a bushel of Rebel newspapers,
dating back for several weeks. At first the Memphis journals
extravagantly commended the South Carolina planters for burning their
cotton, after the capture of Port Royal, and urged universal imitation
of their example. They said:--
"Let the whole South be made a Moscow; let our enemies find
nothing but blackened ruins to reward their invasion!"
But when the capture of Donelson rendered the early fall of Memphis
probable, the same journals suddenly changed their tone. They
argued that Moscow was not a parallel case; that it would be highly
injudicious to fire their city, as the Yankees, if they did take it,
would hold it only for a short time; that those who urged applying the
torch should be punished as demagogues and public enemies! But they
abounded in frantic appeals like the following from _The Avalanche_:
[Sidenote: EXTRACTS FROM REBEL NEWSPAPERS.]
"For the sake of honor and manhood, we trust no young
unmarried man will suffer himself to be drafted. He would
become a by-word, a scoff, a burning shame to his sex and
his State. If young men in pantaloons will sit behind desks,
counters, and molasses-barrels, let the girls present them
with the garment proper to their peaceable spirits. He that
would go to the field, but cannot, should be aided to do so;
he that can go, but will not, should be made to do so."
_The Avalanche_ was a great advocate of what is termed the "aggressive
policy," declaring that:
"The victorious armies of the South should be precipitated
upon the North. Her chief cities should be seized or reduced
to ashes; her armies scattered, her States subjugated, and
her people compelled to defray the expenses of a war which
they have wickedly commenced and obstinately continued.
* * * Fearless and invincible, a race of warriors rivaling
any that ever followed the standard of an Alexander, a Cæsar,
or a Napoleon, the southerners have the power and the will
to carry this war into the enemy's country. Let, then, the
lightnings of a nation's wrath scathe our foul oppressors!
Let the thunder-bolts of war be hurled back upon our
dastardly invaders, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, until
the recognition of southern independence shall be extorted
from the reluctant North, and terms of peace be dictated by a
victorious southern army at New York or Chicago."
General Jeff. Thompson, a literary Missouri bushwhacker, was termed the
"Swamp Fox" and the "Marion of the Southern Revolution." I found one of
his effusions, entitled "Home Again," in that once decorous journal,
_The New Orleans Picayune_. Its transition from the pathetic to the
profane is a curious anticlimax.
"My dear wife waits my coming,
My children lisp my name,
And kind friends bid me welcome
To my own home again.
My father's grave lies on the hill,
My boys sleep in the vale;
I love each rock and murmuring rill,
Each mountain, hill, and dale.
I'll suffer hardships, toil, and pain,
For the good time sure to come;
I'll battle long that I may gain
My freedom and my home.
I will return, though foes may stand
Disputing every rod;
My own dear home, my native land,
I'll win you yet, by ---!"
[Sidenote: INMATES OF THE UNION HOSPITALS.]
Our hospitals at Mound City, Illinois, contained fourteen hundred
inmates. A walk along the double rows of cots in the long wards
revealed the sadder phase of war. Here was a typhoid-fever patient,
motionless and unconscious, the light forever gone out from his glazed
eyes; here a lad, pale and attenuated, who, with a shattered leg, had
lain upon this weary couch for four months. There was a Tennessean,
who, abandoning his family, came stealthily hundreds of miles to enlist
under the Stars and Stripes, with perfect faith in their triumph, and
had lost a leg at Donelson; an Illinoisan, from the same battle, with
a ghastly aperture in the face, still blackened with powder from his
enemy's rifle; a young officer in neat dressing-gown, furnished by the
United States Sanitary Commission, sitting up reading a newspaper,
but with the sleeve of his left arm limp and empty; marines terribly
scalded by the bursting boiler of the Essex at Fort Henry, some of
whose whole bodies were one continuous scar. Sick, wounded, and
convalescent were alike cheerful; and twenty-five Sisters of Mercy,
worthy of their name, moved noiselessly among them, ministering to
their wants.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of
barren ground. The wills above be done! but I would fain die
a dry death.--TEMPEST.
If it should thunder as it did before, I know not where to
lay my head.--IBID.
[Sidenote: STARTING DOWN THE MISSISSIPPI.]
On the 14th of March, the flotilla again started down the Mississippi,
steaming slowly by Columbus, where Venus followed close upon Mars, in
the form of two women disbursing pies and some other commodities to
sailors and soldiers. The next day we anchored above Island Number Ten,
where Beauregard had built formidable fortifications.
A fast little Rebel gunboat, called the Grampus, ran screeching away
from the range of our guns. Below her we could read with glasses the
names painted upon the many steamers lying in front of the enemy's
works, and see the guns upon a great floating battery.
Our gunboats fired one or two experimental shots, and the mortar-rafts,
with tremendous explosions, began to throw their ten-inch shells,
weighing two hundred and fifty pounds each. Great results were expected
from these enormous mortars, but they proved inaccurate. Our shots
fell among the batteries and steamboats of the enemy, throwing up
clouds of dirt and sheets of water. The Rebel guns replied with great
puffs of smoke; but their missiles, bounding along the river, fell
three-quarters of a mile short.
Light skirmishing in closer range continued for several days. My
own quarters were on the Benton, Commodore Foote's flagship. She was
the largest of the iron-clads, one hundred and eighty-three feet by
seventy, and contained quite a little community of two hundred and
forty men.
Standing upon the hurricane roof, directly over our bow-guns, we caught
the first glimpse of each shot, a few feet from the muzzle, and watched
it rushing through the air like a round, black meteor, till it exploded
two or three miles away. After we saw the warning puff of smoke, the
time seemed very long before each Rebel shot struck the water near us;
but no more than ten or fifteen seconds ever elapsed.
When ready to attack the batteries, Commodore Foote said to me:
"You had better take your place with the other correspondents, upon a
transport in the rear, out of range. Should any accident befall you
here, censure would be cast upon me for permitting you to stay."
Haunted by a resistless curiosity to learn exactly how one feels under
fire, I persuaded him to let me remain.
[Sidenote: BOMBARDMENT OF ISLAND NUMBER TEN.]
Two other iron-clads, the St. Louis and the Cincinnati, were lashed
upon either side of the Benton. Hammocks were taken down and piled
in front of the boilers to protect them; the hose was attached to
reservoirs of hot water, designed for boarders in close conflict;
surgeons scrutinized the edges of their instruments, while our triple
floating battery moved slowly down, with the other iron-clads a short
distance in the rear. We opened fire, and the balls of the enemy soon
replied, now and then striking our boats.
A deafening noise from the St. Louis shook every plank beneath our
feet. A moment after, a dozen men rushed upon her deck, their faces
so blackened by powder that they would have been taken for negroes.
Two were carrying the lifeless form of a third; several others were
wounded. Through the din of the cannonade, one of her crew shouted to
us from a port-hole that an old forty-two pounder had exploded, killing
and mutilating several men.
[Sidenote: "HERE COMES ANOTHER SHOT."]
We obtained the best view from the hurricane deck of the Benton, where
there could be no special danger from splinters. While we stood there,
one of the party was constantly on the look-out, and, seeing a puff of
smoke curl up from the Rebel battery, he would shout:
"Here comes another!"
Then we all dropped upon our faces behind the iron-plated pilot-house,
which rose from the deck like a great umbrella. The screaming shot
would sometimes strike our bows, but usually pass over, falling into
the water behind us.
While the Rebels fired from one battery, there was just sufficient
excitement to make it interesting; but when they opened with two
others, stationed at different points in the bend of the river, their
range completely covered the pilot-house. Dropping behind that shelter
to avoid the missiles in front, we were exposed to a hail of shot from
the side. Thereupon the commodore peremptorily ordered us below, and we
went down upon the gun-deck.
A correspondent of _The Chicago Times_, who chanced to be on board,
took a position in the stern of the boat, under the impression that
it was entirely safe. A moment after he came rushing in with blanched
face and dripping clothing. A shot had struck within three feet of him,
glancing into the river, and drenching every thing in the vicinity.
That long gun-deck was alive with action. The executive officer,
Lieutenant Bishop, a gallant young fellow, fresh from the naval school,
superintended every thing. Swarthy gunners manned the pieces; little
powder-boys rushed to and fro with ammunition, and hurrying men crowded
the long compartment.
There came a tremendous crashing of glass, iron, and wood! An
eight-inch solid shot, penetrating the half-inch iron plating and
the five-inch timber, near the bows, as if they were paper, buried
itself in the deck, and rebounded, striking the roof. In that manner
it danced along the entire length of the boat, through the cabin, the
ward-room, the machinery, the pantry--where it smashed a great deal of
crockery--until, at the extreme stern, it fell and remained upon the
commodore's writing-desk, crushing in the lid.
A moment before the noisy, agile visitor arrived, the whole deck seemed
crowded with busy men. A moment after, I looked again. A score of
undismayed fellows were comfortably blowing splinters from their mouths
and beards, and brushing them from their hair and faces; but, by a
fortunate accident, not a single one of them was hurt.
[Sidenote: HOW ONE FEELS UNDER FIRE.]
As the shot screamed along very near me, my curiosity diminished. I had
a dim perception that nothing in this gunboat life could become me like
the leaving of it. A mulatto cabin-boy, whose face turned almost white
when the missile tore through the boat, shared my sensations.
"I wish that I was out of it," he said, confidentially; "but I put my
own neck into this yoke, and I have got to wear it."
Toward evening, some of the enemy's batteries were silent, and
we idlers once more sought the hurricane deck, dodging behind the
pilot-house whenever the smoke puffed from the hostile guns. Once, some
one cried, "There she comes!" and we dropped as usual. Looking up, I
noticed a second engineer standing beside me.
"Lie down, Blakely!" I said, sharply.
He replied laughingly, with his hands in his pockets:
"O no, there is no need of it; one is just as safe here."
While he spoke, the Rebel shot passed within fifteen inches of his
bloodless face, shaved a sheet-iron ventilator, tore through the
chimney, severed a large wrought-iron rod, struck the deck, plowed
through a half-inch iron plate, neatly cutting it in two, passed under
the next plate, and then came out again, with its force spent, and
rolled languidly against a sky-light. When he felt the rush of air,
Blakely bent back almost double, and thereafter he was among the first
to seek the shelter of the pilot-house.
[Sidenote: FIFTY SHOTS TO THE MINUTE.]
From the mortars and the guns on both sides, there were sometimes fifty
shots to the minute. The jarrings and explosions induced head-ache for
hours afterward. The results of the day's bombardment were not very
sanguinary. Our iron-clads were struck scores of times, but few men
were injured. This desultory fighting was kept up for two or three
weeks.
Meanwhile, General Pope, moving across the country from Cairo with
great enterprise and activity, had defeated the Rebels and captured
their forts at New Madrid, on the Missouri shore of the Mississippi,
eight miles below Island Number Ten. He thus held the river in the rear
of the enemy, preventing steamboats from ascending to them; but he had
not even a skiff or a raft in which he could cross to the Tennessee
bank, and reach the rear of the fortifications. How to supply him with
boats was the great problem.
Pope was anxious that the commodore should send one of the iron-clads
to him, past the Rebel fortifications. Foote hesitated, as running
batteries was then an untried experiment.
Pope had an active, hard-working Illinois engineer regiment, which
began cutting a canal, to open communication between the flotilla and
New Madrid; and we waited for results.
[Sidenote: DAILY LIFE ON A GUNBOAT.]
I found life on the Benton full of novelty. More than half of her crew
were old salts, and the discipline was the same as on a man-of-war.
Half-hour bells marked the passage of time. Every morning the deck was
holystoned to its utmost possibilities of whiteness. Through each day
we heard the shrill whistle of the boatswain, amid hoarse calls of "All
hands to quarters," "Stand by the hammocks!" etc.
Even the negro servants caught the naval expressions. One of them,
playing on the guitar and singing, broke down from too high a pitch.
"Too much elevation there," said he. "I must depress a little."
"Yes," replied another. "Start again on the gun-deck."
Exchanging shots with the enemy grew monotonous. Reading, writing, or
playing chess in the ward-room, we carelessly noted the reports from
the Rebel batteries, and some officer from the deck walked in, saying:
"There's another!"
"Where did it strike?" asked some one, quite carelessly.
"Near us," or "Just over us in the woods," would be the reply; and the
idlers returned to their employments.
My own state-room was within six feet of a thirty-two pounder, which
fired every fifteen minutes during the day. The explosions in no wise
disturbed my afternoon naps.
On Sunday mornings, after the weekly muster, the men in clean blue
shirts and tidy clothing, and the officers, in full uniform, with all
their bravery of blue and gold, assembled on the gun-deck for religious
service. Hat in hand, they stood in a half circle around the commodore,
who, behind a high stool, upon which the National flag was spread, read
the comprehensive prayer for "All who are afflicted in mind, body, or
estate," or acknowledged that "We have done the things which we ought
not to have done, and left undone the things which we ought to have
done."
Among the groups of worshipers were seen the gaping mouths of the black
guns, and the pyramidal piles of grape and canister ready for use.
During prayer, the boat was often shaken by the discharge of a mortar,
which made the neighboring woods resound with its long, rolling echoes.
The commodore extemporized a brief, simple address on Christian life
and duty; then the men were "piped down" and dispersed.
[Sidenote: THE CARONDELET RUNS THE BATTERIES.]
On a dark April night, during a terrific thunder-shower, the iron-clad
Carondelet started to run the gantlet. The undertaking was deemed
hazardous in the extreme. The commodore gave to her commander written
instructions how to destroy her, should she become disabled; and
solemnly commended him to the mercy and protection of Almighty God.
The Carondelet crept noiselessly down through the darkness. When the
Rebels discovered her, they opened with shot, shell, and bullets. All
her ports were closed, and she did not fire a gun. It was too dark to
guide her by the insufficient glimpses of the shore obtained from the
little peep-holes of her pilot-house. Mr. D. R. Hoell, an old river
pilot, volunteered to remain unprotected on the open upper deck, among
the rattling shots and the singing bullets, to give information to his
partners within. His daring was promptly rewarded by an appointment as
lieutenant in the navy.
Upon the flag-ship above intense anxiety prevailed. After an hour,
which seemed a day, from far down the river boomed two heavy reports;
then there was silence, then two shots again. All gave a sigh of
relief. This was the signal that the Carondelet had lived through the
terrible ordeal!
[Sidenote: WONDERFUL FEAT OF POPE'S ENGINEERS.]
The Rebels had made themselves very merry over Pope's canal. But, at
daylight on the second morning after this feat of the iron-clad, they
saw four little stern-wheel steamboats lying in front of Pope's camps.
The canal was a success! In two weeks the indefatigable engineers had
brought these steamers from Foote's flotilla, sixteen miles, through
corn-fields, woods, and swamps, cutting channels from one bayou to
another, and felling heavy timber all the way. They were compelled to
saw off hundreds of huge trees, three feet below the water's edge. It
was one of the most creditable feats of the war.
"Let all the world take notice," said a Confederate
newspaper, "that the southern troops are gentlemen, and must
be subjected to no drudgery."
The loyal troops, like these Illinois engineers, were men of skilled
industry, proud to know themselves "kings of two hands."
The Confederates felt that Birnam wood had come to Dunsinane.
Declaring that it was useless to fight men who would deliberately
float gunboats by the very muzzles of their heavy guns, and could run
steamers sixteen miles over dry land, they began to evacuate Island
Number Ten. But Pope had already ferried the greater part of his army
across the river, and he replied to my inquiries:
"I will have every mother's son of them!"
[Sidenote: THE REBELS EFFECTIVELY CAGED.]
He kept his promise. The Rebels were caged. They fled in haste across
the country to Tiptonville, where they supposed their steamboats
awaited them. Instead, they found two of our iron-clads lying in front
of the town, and learned that Pope held the river even ten miles
below. The trap was complete. On their front was Tiptonville, with
the cavernous eyes of the Carondelet and the Pittsburgh ominously
scrutinizing them. At their left was an impassable line of lake and
slough; at their right a dry region, bounded by the river, and held by
our troops; in their rear, Pope's army was hotly pursuing them. Some
leaped into the lake or plunged into the swamps, trying to escape.
Three times the Rebel forces drew up in line of battle; but they
were too much demoralized to fight, and, after a weary night, they
surrendered unconditionally.
At sunrise, long files of stained, bedraggled soldiers, in butternut
and jeans, began to move sadly into a great corn-field, and stack
their arms. The prisoners numbered twenty-eight hundred. We captured
upward of a hundred heavy guns, twenty-five field-pieces, half a dozen
steamboats, and immense supplies of provisions and ammunition. The
victory was won with trifling loss of life, and reflected the highest
credit both upon the land and water forces. The army and the navy,
fitting together like the two blades of the scissors, had cut the
gordian knot.
Pope telegraphed to Halleck that, if steamboats could be furnished
him, in four days he would plant the Stars and Stripes in Memphis.
Halleck, as usual, engrossed in strategy, declined to supply the
transportation.
[Sidenote: THE NORTHERN FLOOD ROLLING ON.]
But the great northern flood rolled on toward the Gulf, and in its
resistless torrent was no refluent wave.
CHAPTER XIX.
Of sallies and retires; of trenches, tents, Of palisadoes,
frontiers, parapets; Of basilisks, of cannon, culverin; And
all the currents of a heady fight.--KING HENRY IV.
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF SHILOH.]
Simultaneously with the capture of Island Number Ten occurred the
battle of Shiloh. The first reports were very wild, stating our loss
at seventeen thousand, and asserting that the Union commander had been
disastrously surprised, and hundreds of men bayoneted in their tents.
It was even added that Grant was intoxicated during the action. This
last fiction showed the tenacity of a bad name. Years before, Grant was
intemperate; but he had abandoned the habit soon after the beginning of
the war.
General Albert Sydney Johnson was killed, and Beauregard ultimately
driven back, leaving his dead and wounded in our hands; but Jefferson
Davis, with the usual Rebel policy, announced in a special message to
the Confederate Congress:
"It has pleased Almighty God again to crown the Confederate
arms with a glorious and decided victory over our invaders."
I went up the Tennessee River by a boat crowded with
representatives--chiefly women--of the Sanitary Commissions of
Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Chicago.
[Sidenote: THE REVEREND ROBERT COLYER.]
One evening, religious services were held in the cabin. A clergyman
exhorted his hearers, when they should arrive at the bloody field, to
minister to the spiritual as well as physical wants of the sufferers.
With special infelicity, he added:
"Many of them have doubtless been wicked men; but you can, at least,
remind them of divine mercy, and tell them the story of the thief on
the cross."
The next speaker, a quiet gentleman, wearing the blouse of a private
soldier, after some remarks about practical religion, added:
"I can not agree with the last brother. I believe we shall best serve
the souls of our wounded soldiers by ministering, for the present,
simply to their bodies. For my own part, I feel that he who has fallen
fighting for our country--for your Cause and mine--is more of a man
than I am. He may have been wicked; but I think room will be found for
him among the many mansions above. I should be ashamed to tell him the
story of the thief on the cross."
Hearty, spontaneous clapping of hands through the crowded cabin
followed this sentiment--a rather unusual demonstration for a
prayer-meeting. The speaker was the Rev. Robert Colyer, of Chicago.
With officers who had participated in the battle, I visited every part
of the field. The ground was broken by sharp hills, deep ravines, and
dense timber, which the eye could not penetrate.
The reports of a surprise were substantially untrue. No man was
bayoneted in his tent, or anywhere else, according to the best evidence
I could obtain.
But the statements, said to come from Grant and Sherman, that they
could not have been better prepared, had they known that Beauregard
designed to attack, were also untrue. Our troops were not encamped
advantageously for battle. Raw and unarmed regiments were on the
extreme front, which was not picketed or scouted as it should have been
in the face of an enemy.
Beauregard attacked on Sunday morning at daylight. The Rebels greatly
outnumbered the Unionists, and impetuously forced them back. Grant's
army was entirely western. It contained representatives of nearly every
county in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin.
Partially unprepared, and steadily driven back, often ill commanded and
their organizations broken, the men fought with wonderful tenacity. It
was almost a hand-to-hand conflict. Confederates and Loyalists, from
behind trees, within thirty feet of each other, kept up a hot fire,
shouting respectively, "Bull Run!" and "Donelson!"
Prentiss' shattered division, in that dense forest, was flanked before
its commander knew that the supporting forces--McClernand on his right
and Hurlbut on his left--had been driven back. Messengers sent to him
by those commanders were killed. During a lull in the firing, Prentiss
was lighting his cigar from the pipe of a soldier when he learned that
the enemy was on both sides of him, half a mile in his rear. With the
remnant of his command he was captured.
[Sidenote: A UNION ORATOR CAPTURED.]
Remaining in Rebel hands for six months, he was enabled to indulge in
oratory to his heart's content. Southern papers announced, with intense
indignation, that Prentiss--occupying, with his officers, an entire
train--called out by the bystanders, was permitted to make radical
Union speeches at many southern railway stations. Removed from prison
to prison, the Illinois General continued to harangue the people, and
his men to sing the "Star-Spangled Banner," until at last the Rebels
were glad to exchange them.
[Sidenote: GRANT AND SHERMAN IN BATTLE.]
Throughout the battle, Grant rode to and fro on the front, smoking his
inevitable cigar, with his usual stolidity and good fortune. Horses
and men were killed all around him, but he did not receive a scratch.
On that wooded field, it was impossible for any one to keep advised of
the progress of the struggle. Grant gave few orders, merely bidding his
generals do the best they could.
Sherman had many hair-breadth 'scapes. His bridle-rein was cut off by a
bullet within two inches of his fingers. As he was leaning forward in
the saddle, a ball whistled through the top and back of his hat. His
metallic shoulder-strap warded off another bullet, and a third passed
through the palm of his hand. Three horses were shot under him. He was
the hero of the day. All awarded to him the highest praise for skill
and gallantry. He was promoted to a major-generalship, dating from
the battle. His official report was a clear, vivid, and fascinating
description of the conflict.
Five bullets penetrated the clothing of an officer on McClernand's
staff, but did not break the skin. A ball knocked out two front teeth
of a private in the Seventeenth Illinois Infantry, but did him no
further injury. A rifle-shot passed through the head of a soldier in
the First Missouri Artillery, coming out just above the ear, but did
not prove fatal. Dr. Cornyn, of St. Louis, told me that he extracted a
ball from the brain of one soldier, who, three days afterward, was on
duty, with the bullet in his pocket.
More than a year afterward, at the battle of Fredericksburg, Captain
Richard Cross, of the Fifth New Hampshire Infantry, noticed one of his
men whose skull had been cut open by the fragment of a shell, with a
section of it standing upright, leaving the brain exposed. Cross shut
the piece of skull down like the lid of a teapot, tied a handkerchief
around it, and sent to the rear the wounded soldier, who ultimately
recovered. The one truth, taught by field experience to army surgeons,
was that few, if any, wounds are invariably fatal.
[Sidenote: A GALLANT FEAT BY SWEENEY.]
At Shiloh, Brigadier-General Thomas W. Sweeney, who had lost one arm
in the Mexican War, received a Minié bullet in his remaining arm, and
another shot in his foot, while his horse fell riddled with seven
balls. Almost fainting from loss of blood, he was lifted upon another
horse, and remained on the field through the entire day. His coolness
and his marvelous escapes were talked of before many camp-fires
throughout the army.
Once, during the battle, he was unable to determine whether a battery
whose men were dressed in blue, was Rebel or Union. Sweeney, leaving
his command, rode at a gentle gallop directly toward the battery until
within pistol-shot, saw that it was manned by Confederates, turned in
a half circle, and rode back again at the same easy pace. Not a single
shot was fired at him, so much was the respect of the Confederates
excited by this daring act. I afterward met one of them, who described
with great vividness the impression which Sweeney's gallantry made upon
them.
The steady determination of Grant's troops during that long April
Sunday, was perhaps unequaled during the war. At night companies
were commanded by sergeants, regiments by lieutenants, and brigades
by majors. In several regiments, one-half the men were killed and
wounded; and in some entire divisions the killed and wounded exceeded
thirty-three per cent, of the numbers who went into battle.
I have seen no other field which gave indication of such deadly
conflict as the Shiloh ridges and ravines, everywhere covered with a
very thick growth of timber--
"Shot-sown and bladed thick with steel."
In one tree I counted sixty bullet-holes; another bore marks of more
than ninety balls within ten feet of the ground. Sometimes, for several
yards in the dense shrubbery, it was difficult to find a twig as large
as one's finger, which had not been cut off by balls.
A friend of mine counted one hundred and twenty-six dead Rebels,
lying where they fell, upon an area less than fifty yards wide and
a quarter of a mile long. One of our details buried in a single
trench one hundred and forty-seven of the enemy, including three
lieutenant-colonels and four majors.
But our forces, overpowered by numbers, fell farther and further back,
while the Rebels took possession of many Union camps. At night, our
line, originally three miles in length, was shortened to three-quarters
of a mile.
[Sidenote: BUELL'S OPPORTUNE ARRIVAL.]
For weeks the inscrutable Buell had been leisurely marching through
Kentucky and Tennessee, to join Grant. He arrived at the supreme
moment. At four o'clock on that Sunday afternoon, General Nelson, of
Kentucky, who commanded Buell's advance, crossed the Tennessee, and
rode up to Grant and his staff when the battle was raging.
"Here we are, General," said Nelson, with the military salute,
and pointing to long files of his well-clad, athletic, admirably
disciplined fellows, already pouring on the steamboats, to be ferried
across the river. "Here we are! We are not very military in our
division. We don't know many fine points or nice evolutions; but if you
want stupidity and hard fighting, I reckon we are the men for you."
That night both armies lay upon their guns, and the opposing pickets
were often within a hundred yards of each other. The groans and cries
of the dying rendered it impossible to sleep. Grant said:
"We must not give the enemy the moral advantage of attacking to-morrow
morning. We must fire the first gun."
Just at day-break, the Rebels were surprised at all points of the line
by assaults from the foe whom they had supposed vanquished. Grant's
shattered troops behaved admirably, and Buell's splendid army won
new laurels. The Confederates were forced back at all points. Their
retreat was a stampede, leaving behind great quantities of ammunition,
commissary stores, guns, caissons, small arms, supply-wagons and
ambulances. They were not vigorously followed; but as no effective
pursuit was made by either side during the entire war (until Sheridan,
in one of its closing scenes, captured Lee), perhaps northern and
southern troops were too equally matched for either to be thoroughly
routed.
[Sidenote: Beauregard Finally Routed.]
Beauregard withdrew to Corinth, as usual, announcing a glorious
victory. He addressed a letter to Grant, asking permission, under flag
of truce, to send a party to the battle-field to bury the Confederate
dead. He prefaced the request as follows:
"Sir, at the close of the conflict of yesterday, my forces
being exhausted by the extraordinary length of the time
during which they were engaged with yours on that and the
preceding day, and it being apparent that you had received
and were still receiving re-enforcements, I felt it my
duty to withdraw my troops from the immediate scene of the
conflict."
Grant was strongly tempted to assure Beauregard that no apologies for
his retreat were necessary! But he merely replied in a courteous note,
declining the request, and stating that the dead were already interred.
[Sidenote: THE LOSSES ON BOTH SIDES.]
The losses on both sides were officially reported as follows:
Killed. Wounded. Missing. Total.
Union 1,614 7,721 3,963 13,298
Rebel 1,728 8,012 959 10,699
The excess of Rebel wounded was owing to the superiority of the
muskets used by the Federal soldiers; and the excess of Union missing,
to the capture of Prentiss' division.
CHAPTER XX.
How use doth breed a habit in a man.--TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
----But let me tell the world, If he outlive the envy of
this day, England did never owe so sweet a hope So much
misconstrued.--HENRY IV.
It was long after the battle of Shiloh before all the dead were buried.
Many were interred in trenches, scores together. A friend, who was
engaged in this revolting labor, told me that, after three or four
days, he found himself counting off the bodies as indifferently as he
would have measured cord-wood.
General Halleck soon arrived, assuming command of the combined forces
of Grant, Buell, and Pope. It was a grand army.
[Sidenote: GRANT UNDER A CLOUD.]
Grant nominally remained at the head of his corps, but was deprived
of power. He was under a cloud. Most injurious reports concerning his
conduct at Shiloh pervaded the country. All the leading journals were
represented in Halleck's army. At the daily accidental gatherings of
eight or ten correspondents, Grant was the subject of angry discussion.
The journalistic profession tends to make men oracular and severely
critical.
Several of these writers could demonstrate conclusively that Grant was
without capacity, but a favorite of Fortune; that his great Donelson
victory was achieved in spite of military blunders which ought to have
defeated him.
[Sidenote: HE SERENELY SMOKES AND WAITS.]
The subject of all this contention bore himself with undisturbed
serenity. Sherman, while constantly declaring that he cared nothing for
the newspapers, was foolishly sensitive to every word of criticism. But
Grant, whom they really wounded, appeared no more disturbed by these
paper bullets of the brain than by the leaden missiles of the enemy. He
silently smoked and waited. The only protest I ever knew him to utter
was to the correspondent of a journal which had denounced him with
great severity:
"Your paper is very unjust to me; but time will make it all right. I
want to be judged only by my acts."
When the army began to creep forward, I messed at Grant's
head-quarters, with his chief of staff; and around the evening
camp-fires I saw much of the general. He rarely uttered a word upon the
political bearings of the war; indeed, he said little upon any subject.
With his eternal cigar, and his head thrown slightly to one side, for
hours he would sit silently before the fire, or walk back and forth,
with eyes upon the ground, or look on at our whist-table, now and then
making a suggestion about the play.
Most of his pictures greatly idealize his full, rather heavy face. The
journalists called him stupid. One of my _confrères_ used to say:
"How profoundly surprised Mrs. Grant must have been, when she woke up
and learned that her husband was a great man!"
He impressed me as possessing great purity, integrity, and amiability,
with excellent judgment and boundless pluck. But I should never have
suspected him of military genius. Indeed, nearly every man of whom,
at the beginning of the war, I prophesied a great career, proved
inefficient, and _vice versâ_.
[Sidenote: JEALOUSIES OF MILITARY MEN.]
Military men seem to cherish more jealousies than members of any other
profession, except physicians and _artistes_. At almost every general
head-quarters, one heard denunciations of rival commanders. Grant was
above this "mischievous foul sin of chiding." I never heard him speak
unkindly of a brother officer. Still, the soldier's taint had slightly
poisoned him. He regarded Rosecrans with peculiar antipathy, and
finally accepted the command of our combined armies only on condition
that he should be at once removed.
Hooker once boasted that he had the best army on the planet. One
would have declared that Grant commanded the worst. There was little
of that order, perfect drill, or pride, pomp, and circumstance, seen
among Buell's troops and in the Army of the Potomac. But Grant's
rough, rugged soldiers would fight wonderfully, and were not easily
demoralized. If their line became broken, every man, from behind a
tree, rock, or stump, blazed away at the enemy on his own account. They
did not throw up their hats at sight of their general, but were wont to
remark, with a grim smile:
"There goes the old man. He doesn't say much; but he's a pretty hard
nut for Johnny Reb. to crack."
Unlike Halleck, Grant did not pretend to familiarity with the details
of military text-books. He could not move an army with that beautiful
symmetry which McClellan displayed; but his pontoons were always up,
and his ammunition trains were never missing.
Though not occupied with details, he must have given them close
attention; for, while other commanding generals had forty or fifty
staff-officers, brilliant with braid and buttons, Grant allowed himself
but six or seven.
[Sidenote: THE UNION AND REBEL WOUNDED.]
Within ten days after the battle of Shiloh, nineteen large steamers,
crowded with wounded, passed down the river. In the long rows of cots
which filled their cabins and crowded their guards, Rebel and Union
soldiers were lying side by side, and receiving the same attendance.
Scores of volunteer physicians aided the regular army surgeons.
Hundreds of volunteer nurses, many of them wives, sisters, and mothers,
came from every walk of life to join in the work of mercy. Hands
hardened with toil, and hands that leisure and luxury left white and
soft, were bathing fevered brows, supporting wearied heads, washing
repulsive wounds, combing matted and bloody locks.
Patient forms kept nightly vigils beside the couches; gentle tones
dropped priceless words of sympathy; and, when all was over, tender
hands closed the fixed eyes, and smoothed the hair upon the white
foreheads. Thousands of poor fellows carried to their homes, both
North and South, grateful memories of those heroic women; thousands
of hearts, wrung with the tidings that loved ones were gone, found
comfort in the knowledge that their last hours were soothed by those
self-denying and blessed ministrations.
One man, who had received several bullets, lay undiscovered for eight
days in a little thicket, with no nourishment except rain-water. After
discovery he lived nearly two weeks. At some points the ground was so
closely covered with mutilated bodies that it was difficult to step
between them. One soldier, rigid in death, was found lying upon the
back, holding in his fixed hand, and regarding with stony eyes, the
daguerreotype of a woman and child. It was terribly suggestive of the
desolate homes and bleeding hearts which almost force one to Cicero's
conclusion, that any peace is better than the justest war.
CHAPTER XXI.
They are the abstract and brief chronicles of the
time.--HAMLET.
[Sidenote: AN INTERVIEW WITH GENERAL SHERMAN.]
General Sherman was very violent toward the Press. Some newspapers had
treated him unjustly early in the war. While he commanded in Kentucky,
his eccentricities were very remarkable, and a journalist started the
report that Sherman was crazy, which obtained wide credence. There
was, at least, method in his madness; for his supposed insanity which
declared that the Government required two hundred thousand troops in
the West, though hooted at the time, proved wisdom and prophecy.
Nevertheless, he was very erratic. When I first saw him in Missouri,
during Fremont's administration, his eye had a half-wild expression,
probably the result of excessive smoking. From morning till night he
was never without his cigar. To the nervous-sanguine temperament,
indicated by his blonde hair, light eyes, and fair complexion, tobacco
is peculiarly injurious.
While many insisted that no correspondent could meet Sherman without
being insulted, I sought him at his tent in the field; he was absent
with a scouting party, but soon returned, with one hand bandaged from
his Shiloh wound. A staff-officer introduced me:
"General, this is Mr. ----."
"How do you do, Mr. ----?" inquired Sherman, with great suavity,
offering me his uninjured hand.
"Correspondent of _The New York Tribune_," added the lieutenant.
[Sidenote: HIS COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE PRESS.]
The general's manner changed from Indian summer to a Texas norther, and
he asked, in freezing tones:
"Have you not come to the wrong place, sir?"
"I think not. I want to learn some facts about the late battle from
your own lips. You complain that journalists misrepresent you. How
can they avoid it, when you refuse to give them proper information?
Some officers are drunkards and charlatans; but you would think it
unjust if we condemned all on that account. Is it not equally absurd to
anathematize every man of my profession for the sins of a few unworthy
members?"
"Perhaps it is. Sit down. Will you have a cigar? The trouble is, that
you of the Press have no responsibilities. Some worthless fellow,
wielding a quill, may send falsehoods about me to thousands of people
who can never hear them refuted. What can I do? His readers do not know
that he is without character. It would be useless to prosecute him. If
he would even fight there would be some satisfaction in that; but a
slanderer is likely to be a coward as well."
"True; but when some private citizen slanders you on the street or
in a drinking-saloon, you do not find it necessary to pull the nose
of every civilian whom you meet. Reputable journalists have just as
much pride in their profession as you have in yours. This tendency to
treat them superciliously and harshly, which encourages flippant young
staff-officers to insult them, tends to drive them home in disgust, and
leave their places to be supplied by a less worthy class; so you only
aggravate the evil you complain of."
[Sidenote: SHERMAN'S PERSONAL APPEARANCE.]
After further conversation on this subject, Sherman gave me a very
entertaining account of the battle. Since I first saw him, his eye had
grown much calmer, and his nervous system healthier. He is tall, of
bony frame, spare in flesh, with thin, wrinkled face, sandy beard and
hair, and bright, restless eyes. His face indicates great vitality and
activity; his manner is restless; his discourse rapid and earnest. He
looks rather like an anxious man of business than an ideal soldier,
suggesting the exchange, and not the camp.
He has great capacity for labor--sometimes working for twenty
consecutive hours. He sleeps little, nor do the most powerful opiates
relieve his terrible cerebral excitement. Indifferent to dress and to
fare, he can live on hard bread and water, and fancies any one else
can do so. Often irritable, and sometimes rude, he is a man of great
originality and daring, and a most valuable lieutenant for a general
of coolness and judgment, like Grant or Thomas. With one of them to
plan or modify, he is emphatically the man to execute. His purity
and patriotism are beyond all question. He did not enter the army to
speculate in cotton, or to secure a seat in the United States Senate,
but to serve the country.
Military weaknesses are often amusing. A prominent officer on Halleck's
staff, who had served with Scott in Mexico, had something to do with
fortifying Island Number Ten, after its capture. An obscure country
newspaper gave another officer the credit. Seeking the agent of the
Associated Press at Halleck's head-quarters, the aggrieved engineer
remarked:
"By the way, Mr. Weir, I have been carrying a paper in my pocket for
several days, but have forgotten to hand it to you. Here it is."
And he produced a letter page of denial, upon which the ink was not
yet dry, stating that the island had been fortified under the immediate
direction of General ----, the well-known officer of the regular army,
who served upon the staff of Lieutenant-General Scott during the
Mexican war, and was at present ----, ----, and ---- upon the staff of
General Halleck.
"I rely upon your sense of justice," said this ornament of the staff,
"to give this proper publicity."
[Sidenote: HUMORS OF THE TELEGRAPH.]
Mr. Weir, with a keen sense of the ridiculous, sent the long dispatch
word for word to the Associated Press, adding: "You may rest assured
that this is perfectly reliable, because every word of it was written
by the old fool himself!" All the newspaper readers in the country had
the formal dispatch, and all the telegraph corps had their merriment
over this confidential addendum.
Halleck's command contained eighty thousand effective men, who were
nearly all veterans. His line was ten miles in length, with Grant on
the right, Buell in the center, and Pope on the left.
The grand army was like a huge serpent, with its head pinned on our
left, and its tail sweeping slowly around toward Corinth. Its majestic
march was so slow that the Rebels had ample warning. It was large
enough to eat up Beauregard at one mouthful; but Halleck crept forward
at the rate of about three-quarters of a mile per day. Thousands and
thousands of his men died from fevers and diarrh[oe]a.
There was great dissatisfaction at his slow progress. Pope was
particularly impatient. One day he had a very sharp skirmish with the
enemy. Our position was strong. General Palmer, who commanded on the
front, reported that he could hold it against the world, the flesh, and
the devil; but Halleck telegraphed to Pope three times within an hour
not to be drawn into a general engagement. After the last dispatch,
Pope retired, leaving the enemy in possession of the field. How he did
storm about it!
The little army which Pope had brought from the capture of Island
Number Ten was perfectly drilled and disciplined, and he handled it
with rare ability. Much of his subsequent unpopularity arose from his
imprudent and violent language. He sometimes indulged in the most
unseemly profanity and billingsgate within hearing of a hundred people.
[Sidenote: WEAKNESSES OF SUNDRY GENERALS.]
But his personal weaknesses were pardonable compared with those of some
other prominent officers. During Fremont's Missouri campaign, I knew
one general who afterward enjoyed a well-earned national reputation
for skill and gallantry. His head-quarters were the scenes of nightly
orgies, where whisky punches and draw-poker reigned from dark until
dawn. In the morning his tent was a strange museum of bottles, glasses,
sugar-bowls, playing-cards, gold, silver, and bank-notes. I knew
another western officer, who, during the heat of a Missouri battle,
according to the newspaper reports, inspirited his men by shouting:
"Go in, boys! Remember Lyon! Remember the old flag!"
He did use those words, but no enemy was within half a mile, and he was
lying drunk on the ground, flat upon his back. Afterward, repenting in
sackcloth and ashes, he did the State some service, and his delinquency
was never made public.
At Antietam, a general, well known both in Europe and America, was
reported disabled by a spent shell, which struck him in the breast.
The next morning, he gave me a minute history of it, assuring me that
he still breathed with difficulty and suffered greatly from internal
soreness. The fact was that he was disabled by a bottle of whisky,
having been too hospitable to that seductive friend!
[Sidenote: "JOHN POPE, MAJOR-GENERAL COMMANDING."]
After the evacuation of Corinth, Pope's reputation suffered greatly
from a false dispatch, asserting that he had captured ten thousand
prisoners. Halleck alone was responsible for the report. Pope was
in the rear. One of his subordinates on the front telegraphed him
substantially as follows:
"The woods are full of demoralized and flying Rebels. Some of
my officers estimate their number as high as ten thousand.
Many of them have already come into my lines."
Pope forwarded this message, which said nothing about taking prisoners,
to Halleck, without erasing or adding a line; and Halleck, smarting
under his mortifying failure at Corinth, telegraphed that Pope reported
the capture of ten thousand Rebels. Pope's reputation for veracity was
fatally wounded, and the newspapers burlesqued him mercilessly.
One of my comrades lay sick and wounded at the residence of General
Clinton B. Fisk, of St. Louis. On a Sunday afternoon the general was
reading to him from the Bible an account of the first contraband. This
historic precedent was the servant of an Amalekite, who came into
David's camp and proposed, if assured of freedom, to show the King of
Israel a route which would enable him to surprise his foes. The promise
was given, and the king fell upon the enemy, whom he utterly destroyed.
While our host was reading the list of the spoils, the prisoners,
slaves, women, flocks and herds captured by David, the sick journalist
lifted his attenuated finger, and in his weak, piping voice, said:
"Stop, General; just look down to the bottom of that list, and see if
it is not signed John Pope, Major-General commanding!"
[Sidenote: HALLECK'S FAUX PAS AT CORINTH.]
At last, Halleck's army reached Corinth, but the bird had flown. No
event of the war reflected so much credit upon the Rebels and so much
discredit upon the Unionists as Beauregard's evacuation. He did not
disturb himself until Halleck's Parrott guns had thrown shots within
fourteen feet of his own head-quarters. Then, keeping up a vigorous
show of resistance on his front, he deserted the town, leaving behind
not a single gun, or ambulance, or even a sick or wounded man in the
hospital.
Halleck lost thenceforth the name of "Old Brains," which some
imaginative person had given him, and which tickled for a time the ears
of his soldiers. The only good thing he ever did, in public, was to
make two brief speeches. When he first reached St. Louis, upon being
called out by the people, he said:
"With your help, I will drive the enemy out of Missouri."
Called upon again, on leaving St. Louis for Washington, to assume the
duties of general-in-chief, he made an equally brief response:
"Gentlemen: I promised to drive the enemy out of Missouri; I have done
it!"
HALLECK'S ARMY, BEFORE CORINTH, }
_April 23, 1862_. }
Heavy re-enforcements are arriving. The woods, in luxuriant foliage,
are spiced with
"----a dream of forest sweets,
Of odorous blooms and sweet contents,"
and the deserted orchards are fragrant with apple and
cherry blossoms.
[Sidenote: OUT ON THE FRONT.]
_May 11._
Still we creep slowly along. Pope's head-quarters are now within the
borders of Mississippi. Out on his front you find several hundred
acres of cotton-field and sward, ridged with graves from a recent hot
skirmish. Carcasses of a hundred horses, killed during the battle, are
slowly burning under piles of rails, covered with a layer of earth,
that their decay may not taint the atmosphere.
Beyond, our infantry pickets present muskets and order you to halt.
If you are accompanied by a field-officer, or bear a pass "by order
of Major-General Halleck," you can cross this Rubicon. A third of a
mile farther are our vedettes, some mounted, others lying in the shade
beside their grazing horses, but keeping a sharp look-out in front.
In a little rift of the woods, half a mile away, you see through your
field-glass a solitary horseman clad in butternut. Two or three more,
and sometimes forty or fifty, come out of the woods and join him,
but they keep very near their cover, and soon go back. Those are the
enemy's pickets. You hear the drum beat in the Rebel lines, and the
shrill whistle of the locomotives at Corinth, which is three miles
distant.
_May 19._
Along our entire front, almost daily, the long roll is sounded, and the
ground jarred by the dull rumble of cannonade. The little attention
paid to these skirmishes, where we lose from fifty to one hundred men,
illustrates the magnitude of the war.
We feel the earth vibrate, and look inquiringly into the office of the
telegraph which accompanies every corps.
"It is on Buell's center, or on Grant's right," the operator replies.
If it does not become rapid and prolonged, no further questions are
asked. At night, awakened by the sharp rattle of musketry, we raise our
heads, listen for the alarm-drum, and, not hearing it, roll over in our
blankets, to court again the drowsy god.
Ride out with me to the front, five miles from Halleck's head-quarters.
The country is undulating and woody, with a few cotton-fields and
planters' houses. The beautiful groves open into delicious vistas of
green grass or rolling wheat; luxuriant flowers perfume the vernal air,
and the rich foliage already seems to display--
----"The tintings and the fingerings of June,
As she blossoms into beauty and sings her Summer tune!"
Here is a deserted camp of a division which has moved forward. Three or
four adjacent farmers are gathering up the barrels, boxes, provisions,
and other _débris_, left behind by the troops.
[Sidenote: DRILLING, DIGGING, AND SKIRMISHING.]
Here is a division on drill, advancing in line of battle, the
skirmishers thrown out in front, deploying, gathering in groups, or
falling on their faces at the word of command.
Beyond those white tents our soldiers, in gray shirts and blue pants,
are busily plying the spade. They throw up a long rampart notched with
embrasures for cannon. We have already built fifty miles of breastworks.
A little in the rear are the heavy siege-guns, where they can be
brought up quickly; a little in front, the field artillery, with the
horses harnessed and tied to trees, ready for use at a moment's notice.
Near the workmen, their comrades, who do the more legitimate duty of
the soldier, are standing on their arms, to repel any _sortie_ from the
enemy. Their guns, with the burnished barrels and bayonets glistening
in the sun, are stacked in long rows, while the men stand in little
groups, or sit under the trees, playing cards, reading letters or
newspapers. More than twenty thousand copies of the daily papers of the
western cities and New York are sold in the army at ten cents each. The
number of letters which go out from the camps in each day's mail is
nearly as large.
When this parapet is completed, we shall go forward a few hundred
yards, and throw up another; and thus we advance slowly toward Corinth.
Ride still farther, and you find the infantry pickets. The vedettes
are drawn in, if there is any skirmishing going on. From the extreme
front, you catch an occasional glimpse of the Rebels--"Butternuts," as
they are termed in camp, from their cinnamon-hued homespun, dyed with
butternut extract. They are dodging among the trees, and, if you are
wise, you will get behind a tree yourself, and beware how you show your
head.
[Sidenote: EXPERIENCES AMONG THE SHARP-SHOOTERS.]
Already one of their sharp-shooters notices you. Puff, comes a cloud
of smoke from his rifle; in the same breath you hear the explosion,
and the sharp, ringing "ping" of the bullet through the air! Capital
shots are many of these long, lank, loose-jointed Mississippians and
Texans, whose rifles are sometimes effective at ten and twelve hundred
yards. Yesterday, one of them concealed himself in the dense foliage of
a tree-branch, and picked off several of our soldiers. At last, one of
our own sharp-shooters took him in hand, and, at the sixth discharge,
brought him down to the ground. This sharp-shooting is a needless
aggravation of the horrors of war; but if the enemy indulges in it, you
have no recourse but to do likewise.
[Sidenote: HORSES STOLEN EVERY DAY.]
Stealing is the inevitable accompaniment of camp life--"convey, the
wise" call it. I have a steed, cadaverous and bony, but with good
locomotive powers. There was profound policy in my selection. For
five consecutive nights that horse was stolen, but no thief ever kept
him after seeing him by day-light. In the morning, he would always
come browsing back. My friend and tent-mate "Carlton," of _The Boston
Journal_, had a more vaulting ambition. He procured a showy horse,
which proved the most expensive luxury in all his varied experience.
The special aptitude of the animal was to be stolen. Regularly, seven
mornings in the week, our African factotum would thrust his woolly head
into the tent, and awaken us with this salutation:
"Breakfast is ready. Mr. Coffin, your horse is gone again."
By hard search and liberal rewards, he would be reclaimed during
the day from some cavalry soldier, who averred that he had found
him running loose. After being impaled and nearly killed upon a
rake-handle, the poor brute, hardly able to walk ten paces, was stolen
again, and never re-appeared. My friend now remembered his showy steed,
and the last five-dollar note which he sent in fruitless pursuit, among
blessings which brightened as they took their flight.
CAIRO, ILL., _May 21_.
[Sidenote: HALLECK EXPELS THE WAR CORRESPONDENTS.]
General Halleck has expelled all the correspondents from the army,
on the plea that he must exclude "unauthorized hangers-on," to keep
spies out of his camps. His refusal to accept _any_ guaranties of their
loyalty and prudence, even from the President himself, proves that this
plea was a shallow subterfuge. The real trouble is, that Halleck is not
willing to have his conduct exhibited to the country through any other
medium than official reports. "As false as a bulletin," has passed into
a proverb.
The journalists received invitations to remain, from friends holding
commissions in the army, from major-generals down to lieutenants; but,
believing their presence just as legitimate and needful as that of
any soldier or officer, they determined not to skulk about camps like
felons, but all left in a body. Their individual grievances are nothing
to the public; but this is a grave issue between the Military Power and
the rights of the Press and the People.
CHAPTER XXII.
----Whose tongue Outvenoms all the worms of Nile.--CYMBELINE.
[Sidenote: BLOODTHIRSTINESS OF REBEL WOMEN.]
No history of the war is likely to do full justice to the bitterness
of the Rebel women. Female influence tempted thousands of young men to
enter the Confederate service against their own wishes and sympathies.
Women sometimes evinced incredible rancor and bloodthirstiness. The
most startling illustration of the brutalizing effect of Slavery
appeared in the absence of that sweetness, charity, and tenderness
toward the suffering, which is the crowning grace of womanhood.
A southern Unionist, the owner of many slaves, said to me:
"I suppose I have not struck any of my negroes for ten years. When they
need correcting, my wife always does it."
If he had a horse or a mule requiring occasional whipping, would he put
the scourge in the hands of his little daughter, and teach her to wield
it, from her tender years? How infinitely more must it brutalize and
corrupt her when the victim is a man--the most sacred thing that God
has made--his earthly image and his human temple!
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF MEMPHIS.]
Before we captured Memphis, the sick and wounded Union prisoners were
in a condition of great want and suffering. Women of education, wealth,
and high social position visited the hospitals to minister to Rebel
patients. Frequently entering the Federal wards from curiosity, they
used toward the groaning patients expressions like this:
"I would like to give you one dose! You would never fight against the
South again!"
In what happy contrast to this shone the self-denying ministrations of
northern women, to friend and enemy alike!
In Memphis, on the evening of June 5th, General Jeff. Thompson,
commanding the Rebel cavalry, and Commodore Edward Montgomery,
commanding the Rebel flotilla, stated at the Gayoso House that there
would be a battle the next morning, in which the Yankee fleet would be
destroyed in just about two hours.
Just after daylight, the Rebel flotilla attacked ours, two miles above
the city. We had five iron-clads and several rams, which were then
experimental. They were light, agile little stern-wheel boats, whose
machinery was not at all protected against shots. The battle occurred
in full view of the city. Though it began soon after daylight, it was
witnessed by ten thousand people upon the high bluff--an anxious,
excited crowd. The Rebels dared not be too demonstrative, and the
Unionists dared not whisper a word of their long-cherished and earnest
hopes.
[Sidenote: GALLANT EXPLOITS OF THE RAMS.]
While the two fleets were steaming toward each other, Colonel Ellet,
determined to succeed or to die, daringly pushed forward with his
little rams, the Monarch and Queen of the West. With these boats,
almost as fragile as pasteboard, he steamed directly into the Rebel
flotilla. One of his rams struck the great gunboat Sterling Price with
a terrific blow, crushing timbers and tearing away the entire larboard
wheel-house. The Price drifted helplessly down the stream and stranded.
Another of Ellet's rams ran at full speed into the General Lovell,
cutting her in twain. The Rebel boat filled and sunk.
From the shore, it was a most impressive sight. There was the Lovell,
with holiday decorations, crowded with men and firing her guns, when
the little ram struck her, crushing in her side, and she went down
like a plummet. In three minutes, even the tops of her tall chimneys
disappeared under water. Scores of swimming and drowning Rebels in the
river were rescued by boats from the Union fleet.
One of the rams now ran alongside and grappled the Beauregard, and,
through hose, drenched her decks with scalding water, while her
cannoneers dared not show their heads to Ellet's sharpshooters, who
were within a few feet of them. Another Rebel boat came up to strike
the ram, but the agile little craft let go her hold and backed out. The
blow intended for her struck the Beauregard, which instantly went down,
"hoist with his own petar."
The Sumter and the Little Rebel, both disabled, were stranded on the
Arkansas shore. The Jeff. Thompson was set on fire and abandoned by her
crew. In a few minutes there was an enormous dazzling flash of light, a
measureless volume of black smoke, and a startling roar, which seemed
to shake the earth to its very center. For several seconds the air was
filled with falling timbers. Exploding her magazine, the Rebel gunboat
expired with a great pyrotechnic display.
The General Bragg received a fifty-pound shot, which tore off a
long plank under her water-mark, and she was captured in a sinking
condition. The Van Dorn, the only Rebel boat which survived the
conflict, turned and fled down the river.
The battle lasted just one hour and three minutes. It was the most
startling, dramatic, and memorable display of the whole war. On our
side, no one was injured except Colonel Ellet, who had performed such
unexampled feats with his little rams. A splinter, which struck him in
the leg, inflicted a fatal wound.
As our fleet landed, a number of news-boys sprang on shore, and, a
moment after, were running through the street, shouting:
"Here's your _New-York Tribune_ and _Herald_--only ten cents in silver!"
The correspondents, before the city was formally surrendered, had
strolled through the leading streets. At the Gayoso House they
registered their names immediately under those of the fugacious Rebel
general, and ordered dinner.
The Memphis Rebels, who had predicted a siege rivaling Saragossa and
Londonderry, were in a condition of stupor for two weeks after our
arrival. They rubbed their eyes wonderingly, to see Union officers and
Abolition journalists at large without any suggestions of hanging or
tarring and feathering. Remembering my last visit, it was with peculiar
satisfaction that I appended in enormous letters to my signature upon
the hotel register, the name of the journal I served.
[Sidenote: A SAILOR ON A LARK.]
On the day of the capture, an intoxicated seaman from one of the
gun-boats, who had been shut up for several months, went on shore
"skylarking." Offering his arms to the first two negro women he met,
he promenaded the whole length of Main street. The Memphis Rebels were
suffering for an outrage, and here was one just to their mind.
"If that is the way, sir," remarked one of them, "that your people
propose to treat southern gentlemen and ladies--if they intend to
thrust upon us such a disgusting spectacle of negro equality, it will
be perilous for them. Do they expect to conciliate our people in this
manner?"
I mildly suggested that the era of conciliation ceased when the era of
fighting began. The sailor was arrested and put in the guard-house.
[Sidenote: APPEARANCE OF THE CAPTURED CITY.]
Our officers mingled freely with the people. No citizens insulted our
soldiers in the streets; no woman repeated the disgraceful scenes of
New Orleans by spitting in the faces of the "invaders." The Unionists
received us as brothers from whom they had long been separated. One
lady brought out from its black hiding-place, in her chimney, a
National flag, which had been concealed there from the beginning of the
war. A Loyalist told me that, coming out of church on Sunday, he was
thrilled with the news that the Yankees had captured Fort Donelson;
but, with a grave face, he replied to his informant:
"That is sad business for us, is it not?"
Reaching home, with his wife and sister, they gave vent to their
exuberant joy. He could not huzza, and so he relieved himself by
leaping two or three times over a center-table!
There were many genuine Rebels whose eyes glared at us with the hatred
of caged tigers. Externally decorous, they would remark, ominously,
that they hoped our soldiers would not irritate the people, lest
it should deluge the streets with blood. They proposed fabulous
wagers that Sterling Price's troops could whip the whole Union army;
circulated daily reports that the Confederates had recaptured New
Orleans and Nashville, and talked mysteriously about the fatality of
the yellow fever, and the prospect that it would soon break out.
Gladness shone from the eyes of all the negroes. Their dusky faces
were radiant with welcome, and many women, turbaned in bright bandanas,
thronged the office of the provost-marshal, applying for passage to
the North. We found Memphis as torpid as Syria, where Yusef Browne
declared that he saw only one man exhibit any sign of activity, and he
was engaged in tumbling from the roof of a house! But stores were soon
opened, and traders came crowding in from the North. Most of them were
Jews.
Everywhere we saw the deep eyes and pronounced features of that
strange, enterprising people. I observed one of them, with the
Philistines upon him, marching to the military prison. The pickets
had caught him with ten thousand dollars' worth of boots and shoes,
which he was taking into Dixie. He bore the miscarriage with great
philosophy, bewailing neither his ducats nor his daughter, his boots
nor his liberty--smiling complacently, and finding consolation in
the vilest of cigars. But in his dark, sad eye was a gleam of latent
vengeance, which he doubtless wreaked upon the first unfortunate
customer who fell into his clutches after his release.
Glancing at the guests who crowded the dining-hall of the Gayoso, one
might have believed that the lost tribes of Israel were gathering there
for the Millennium.
[Sidenote: GRANT ORDERS AWAY THE JEWS.]
Many of them engaged in contraband traffic, supplying the Rebels with
food, and even with ammunition. Some months after, these very gross
abuses induced Grant to issue a sweeping ukase expelling all Jews from
his department--an order which the President wisely countermanded.
The Rebel authorities had destroyed all the cotton, sugar, and
molasses they could find; but these articles now began to emerge from
novel hiding-places. One gentleman had fifty bales of cotton in his
closed parlor. Hundreds of bales were concealed in the woods, in lofts,
and in cellars. Much sugar was buried. One man, entombing fifteen
hogsheads, neglected to throw up a mound to turn off the water; when he
dug for his sugar, its linked sweetness was _too_ long drawn out! The
hogsheads were empty.
On the 17th of June, a little party of Union officers came galloping
into the city from the country. They were evidently no gala-day
soldiers. Their sun-browned faces, dusty clothing, and jaded horses
bespoke hard campaigns and long marches.
One horseman, in a blue cap and plain blouse, bore no mark of rank, but
was noticeable for the peculiar brilliancy of his dark, flashing eye.
This modest soldier was Major-General Lew. Wallace; and his division
arrived a few hours after. He established his quarters at the Gayoso,
in the same apartments which had been occupied successively by four
Rebel commanders, Pillow, Polk, Van Dorn, and Price.
[Sidenote: A REBEL PAPER SUPERVISED.]
_The Memphis Argus_, a bitter Secession sheet, had been allowed to
continue publication, though its tone was very objectionable. General
Wallace at once addressed to the proprietors the following note:
"As the closing of your office might be injurious to you
pecuniarily, I send Messrs. Richardson, of _The New York
Tribune_, and Knox, of _The New York Herald_,--two gentlemen
of ample experience--to take charge of the editorial
department of your paper. The business and management will be
left to you."
The publishers, glad to continue upon any terms, acquiesced, and
thereafter every morning, before _The Argus_ went to press, the
proof-sheets were sent to us for revision.
The first dress-parade of Wallace's original regiment, the Eleventh
Indiana Infantry, was attended by hundreds of Memphians, curious to
see northern troops drawn up in line. They wore no bright trappings
or holiday attire. Their well-kept arms shone in the fading sunlight,
a line of polished steel; but their soiled uniforms had left their
brightness behind in many hard-fought battles. They went through the
drill with rare precision. The Rebel bystanders clapped their hands
heartily, with a certain unconscious pride that these soldiers were
their fellow-Americans. The spectacle dimmed their faith in their
favorite five-to-one theory.
"Well, John," asked one of them beside me, "how many regiments like
that do you think one of ours could whip?"
"I think that whipping one would be a pretty hard day's work!" was the
reply.
[Sidenote: "A DAM BLACK-HARTED ABLICHINESS."]
Months before our arrival, a Union employé of the Memphis and Ohio
Railroad sold a watch to a Secession comrade. Vainly attempting to
collect the pay, he finally wrote a pressing letter. The debtor sent
back the dun with this reply:
"SIR: My privet Apinion is Public express is that you ar A
Dam Black harted ablichiness and if I ever hear of you open
you mouth a gane you will get you head shave and cent Back to
you free nigar Land Whar you be along these are fackes and
you now I can prove them and I will Doet."
The Loyalist pocketed the affront, "ablichiness" and all, and nursed
his wrath to keep it warm. Meeting his debtor on the street, after the
arrival of our forces, he administered to him a merciless flagellation.
Before our Provost-Marshal it was decided to be a case of "justifiable
assault," and the prisoner was discharged from custody.
[Sidenote: CHALLENGE FROM A SOUTHERN WOMAN.]
In the deserted office of _The Appeal_ we found the following
manuscript:--
"A CHALLENGE
"where as the wicked policy of the president--Making war upon
the South for refusing to submit to wrong too palpable for
Southerners to do. And where as it has become necessary for
the young Men of our country, My Brother, in the number To
enlist to do the dirty work of Driving the Mercenarys from
our sunny south. Whose soil is too holy for such wretches to
tramp And whose atmosphere is to pure for them to breathe
"For such an indignity afford to Civilization I Merely
Challenge any abolition or Black Republican lady of character
if there can be such a one found among the negro equality
tribe. To Meet Me at Masons and dixon line. With a pair of
Colt's repeaters or any other weapon they May Choose, That I
May receive satisfaction for the insult."
"Victoria E. Goodwin."
"Spring Dale, Miss., April 27, 1861."
Confederate currency was a curiosity of literature and finance.
Dray-tickets and checks, marked "Good for twenty-five cents," and a
great variety of shinplasters, were current. One, issued by a baker,
represented "twenty-five cents in drayage or confectionary," at the
option of the holder. Another guaranteed to the bearer "the sum of five
cents from the Mississippi and Tennessee Railroad Company, in freight
or passage!"
[Sidenote: A DROLL SPECIES OF CURRENCY.]
One of my acquaintances had purchased in Chicago, at ten cents a
dozen, lithographic _fac-similes_ of the regular Confederate notes,
promising to pay to the bearer ten dollars, six months after a treaty
of peace between the United States and the Confederate States. A
Memphis merchant, knowing that they were counterfeit, manufactured only
to sell as curiosities, considered their execution so much better than
the originals, that he gladly gave Tennessee bank-notes in exchange
for them. My friend subsisted at his hotel for several days upon the
proceeds of these _fac-similes_, and thought it cheap boarding. While
Curtis's army was in northern Arkansas, our officers found at a village
druggist's several large sheets of his printed promises to pay, neither
cut nor signed. At the next village one of them purchased a canteen of
whisky, and offered the grocer a National treasury note in payment. The
trader refused it; it was, doubtless, good, but might cause him trouble
after the army had left. He would receive either gold or Confederate
money. The officer exhibited one of these blanks, and asked if he would
take _that_. "O yes," he replied; "it is as good money as I want!" And
he actually sold two hundred and fifty canteens of whisky for those
unsigned shinplasters, cut off from the sheets in his presence!
Late in June, General Grant, accompanied only by his personal staff,
often rode from Corinth to Memphis, ninety miles, through a region
infested by guerrillas.
The guests at the Gayoso House regarded with much curiosity the quiet,
slightly-stooping, rural-looking man in cotton coat and broad-brimmed
hat, talking little and smoking much, who was already beginning to
achieve world-wide reputation.
A party of native Arkansans, including a young lady, arrived in
Memphis, coming up the Mississippi in an open skiff. When leaving
home they expected to encounter some of our gun-boats in a few hours,
and provided themselves only with one day's food, and an ample supply
of champagne. Accustomed to luxury, and all unused to labor, in the
unpitying sun they rowed for five days against the strong current of
the Mississippi, burnt, sick, and famishing. For five nights they slept
upon the ground on the swampy shore, half devoured by musquitoes. At
last they found an ark of safety in the iron-clad St. Louis.
During a fight at St. Charles, on the White River, the steam-drum of
the gun-boat Mound City was exploded by a Rebel shot. The terrified
gunners and seamen, many of them horribly scalded, jumped into the
water. The Confederates, from behind trees on the bank, deliberately
shot the scalded and drowning wretches!
[Sidenote: A CLEVER REBEL TRICK.]
Halleck continued in command at Corinth. From some cause, his official
telegrams to General Curtis, in Arkansas, and Commodore Davis, on
the Mississippi, were not transmitted in cipher; and the line was
unguarded, though leading through an intensely Rebel region. In July,
the Memphis operators, from the difficult working of their instruments,
surmised that some outsider must be sharing their telegraphic secrets.
One day the transmission of a message was suddenly interrupted by the
ejaculation:
"Pshaw! Hurra for Jeff Davis!"
Individuality reveals itself as clearly in telegraphing as in the
footstep or handwriting. Mr. Hall, the Memphis operator, instantly
recognized the performer--by what the musicians would call his
"time"--as a former telegraphic associate in the North; and sent him
this message:
"Saville, if you don't want to be hung, you had better leave. Our
cavalry is closing in on all sides of you."
After a little pause, the surprised Rebel replied:
"How in the world did you know me? I have been here four days, and
learned about all your military secrets; but it is becoming a rather
tight place, and I think I _will_ leave. Good-by, boys."
He made good his escape. In the woods he had cut the wire, inserted one
of his own, and by a pocket instrument perused our official dispatches,
stating the exact number and location of United States troops in
Memphis. Re-enforcements were immediately ordered in, to guard against
a Rebel dash.
[Sidenote: A BIT OF SHERMAN'S WAGGERY.]
Later in July, Sherman assumed command. One day, a bereaved man-owner
visited him, to learn how he could reclaim his runaway slaves.
"I know of only one way, sir," replied the general, "and that is,
through the United States marshal."
The unsuspecting planter went up and down the city inquiring for that
civil officer.
"Have you any business with him?" asked a Federal captain.
"Yes, sir. I want my negroes. General Sherman says he is the proper
person to return them."
"Undoubtedly he is. The law prescribes it."
"Is he in town?"
"I rather suspect not."
"When do you think he left?"
"About the time Sumter was fired on, I fancy."
At last it dawned upon the planter's brain that the Fugitive Slave
Law was void after the people drove out United States officers. He
went sadly back to Sherman, and asked if there was no other method of
recovering his chattels.
"None within my knowledge, sir."
"What can I do about it?"
"The law provided a remedy for you slaveholders in cases like this; but
you were dissatisfied and smashed the machine. If you don't like your
work, you had better set it to running again."
On the 7th and 8th of March, 1862, occurred the battle of Pea Ridge,
in Arkansas. Our troops were commanded by General Curtis. Vandeveer's
brigade made a forced march of forty-one miles between 2 o'clock A. M.,
and 10 P. M., in order to participate in the engagement. The fight was
very severe, but the tenacity of the western soldiers finally routed
the Rebels.
There chanced to be only one New York correspondent with Curtis's
command. During the battle he was wounded by a fragment of shell. He
sent forward his report, with calm complacency, presuming that it was
exclusive.
[Sidenote: FICTITIOUS BATTLE REPORTS.]
But two other New York journalists in St. Louis, hearing of the battle,
at once repaired to Rolla, the nearest railway point, though one
hundred and ninety-five miles distant from Pea Ridge. Perusing the
very meager official dispatches, knowing what troops were engaged, and
learning from an old countryman the topography of the field, they wrote
elaborate accounts of the two days' conflict.
Indebted to their imagination for their facts, they gave minute details
and a great variety of incidents. Their reports were plausible and
graphic. _The London Times_ reproduced one of them, pronouncing it
the ablest and best battle account which had been written during the
American war. For months, the editors who originally published these
reports, did not know that they were fictitious. They were written only
as a Bohemian freak, and remained the only accounts manufactured by any
reputable journalist during the war.
After the battle, Curtis's army, fifteen thousand strong, pursued
its winding way through the interior of Arkansas. It maintained no
communications, carrying its base of supplies along with it. When out
of provisions, it would seize and run all the neighboring corn-mills,
until it obtained a supply of meal for one or two weeks, and then move
forward.
[Sidenote: CURTIS'S GREAT MARCH THROUGH ARKANSAS.]
Day after day, the Memphis Rebels told us, with ill-concealed glee,
that Curtis's army, after terrific slaughter, had all been captured, or
was just about to surrender. For weeks we had no reliable intelligence
from it. But suddenly it appeared at Helena, on the Mississippi,
seventy-five miles below Memphis, having marched more than six hundred
miles through the enemy's country. Despite the unhealthy climate, the
soldiers arrived in excellent sanitary condition, weary and ragged, but
well, and with an immense train of followers. It was a common jest,
that every private came in with one horse, one mule, and two negroes.
The army correspondents, disgusted with the hardships and unwholesome
fare of Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi, often
predicted, with what they thought extravagant humor:--
"When Cincinnati or Chicago becomes the seat of war, all this will
be changed. We will take our ease at our inn, and view battles
æsthetically."
But in September, this jest became the literal truth. Bragg, leaving
Buell far behind in Tennessee, invaded Kentucky, and seriously
threatened Cincinnati.
Martial law was declared, and all Cincinnati began arming, drilling,
or digging. In one day, twenty-five thousand citizens enrolled their
names, and were organized into companies. Four thousand worked upon the
Covington fortifications. Newspaper proprietors were in the trenches.
Congressmen, actors, and artists, carried muskets or did staff duty.
A few sneaks were dragged from their hiding-places in back kitchens,
garrets, and cellars. One fellow was found in his wife's clothing,
scrubbing away at the wash-tub. He was suddenly stripped of his
crinoline by the German guard, who, with shouts of laughter, bore him
away to a working-party.
New regiments of volunteers came pouring in from Indiana, Michigan,
and the other Northwestern States. The farmers, young and old, arrived
by thousands, with their shot-guns and their old squirrel-rifles. The
market houses, public buildings, and streets, were crowded with them.
They came even from New York and Pennsylvania, until General Wallace
was compelled to telegraph in all directions that no more were needed.
One of these country boys had no weapon except an old Revolutionary
sword. Quite a crowd gathered one morning upon Sycamore street, where
he took out his rusty blade, scrutinized its blunt edge, knelt down,
and carefully whetted it for half an hour upon a door-stone; then,
finding it satisfactorily sharp, replaced it in the scabbard, and
turned away with a satisfied look. His gravity and solemnity made it
very ludicrous.
Buell, before starting northward in pursuit of Bragg, was about to
evacuate Nashville. Andrew Johnson, Military Governor of Tennessee,
implored, expostulated, and stormed, but without effect. He solemnly
declared that, if all the rest of the army left, he would remain with
his four Middle Tennessee regiments, defend the city to the last,
and perish in its ashes, before it should be given up to the enemy.
Buell finally left a garrison, which, though weak in numbers, proved
sufficient to hold Nashville.
[Sidenote: "THE SIEGE OF CINCINNATI."]
The siege of Cincinnati proved of short duration. Buell's veterans, and
the enthusiastic new volunteers soon sent the Rebels flying homeward.
Then, as through the whole war, their appearance north of Tennessee
and Virginia was the sure index of disaster to their arms. Southern
military genius did not prove adapted to the establishment of a navy,
or to fighting on Northern soil.
[Sidenote: GLOOMIEST DAYS OF THE WAR.]
Maryland invaded, Frankfort abandoned, Nashville evacuated, Tennessee
and Kentucky given up almost without a fight, the Rebels threatening
the great commercial metropolis of Ohio--these were the disastrous,
humiliating tidings of the hour. These were, perhaps, the gloomiest
days that had been seen during the war. We were paying the bitter
penalty of many years of National wrong.
"God works no otherwise; no mighty birth
But comes with throes of mortal agony;
No man-child among nations of the earth
But findeth its baptism in a stormy sea."
CHAPTER XXIII.
He that outlives this day and comes safe home, Will stand a
tip-toe when this day is named.--KING HENRY V.
Much work for tears in many an English mother, Whose sons lie
scattered on the bleeding ground.--KING JOHN.
[Sidenote: ORDERED TO WASHINGTON.]
During the siege of Cincinnati, the Managing Editor telegraphed me thus:
"Repair to Washington without any delay."
An hour afterward I was upon an eastern train.
At the Capital, I found orders to join the Army of the Potomac. It was
during Lee's first invasion. In Pennsylvania, the governor and leading
officials nearly doubled the Confederate army, estimating it at two
hundred thousand men.
Reaching Frederick, Maryland, I found more Union flags,
proportionately, in that little city, than I had ever seen elsewhere.
The people were intensely loyal. Four miles beyond, in a mountain
region, I saw winding, fertile valleys of clear streams, rich in broad
corn-fields; and white vine-covered farm-houses, half hidden in old
apple-orchards; while great hay and grain stacks surrounded--
"The gray barns, looking from their hazy hills
O'er the dim waters widening in the vales."
The roads were full of our advancing forces, with bronzed faces and
muscles compacted by their long campaigning. They had just won the
victory of South Mountain, where Hooker found exercise for his peculiar
genius in fighting above the clouds, and driving the enemy by an
impetuous charge from a dizzy and apparently inaccessible hight.
[Sidenote: ON THE WAR-PATH.]
The heroic Army of the Potomac, which had suffered more, fought harder,
and been defeated oftener than any other National force, was now
marching cheerily under the unusual inspiration of victory. But what
fearful loads the soldiers carried! Gun, canteen, knapsack, haversack,
pack of blankets and clothing, often must have reached fifty pounds
to the man. These modern Atlases had little chance in a race with the
Rebels.
There were crowds of sorry-looking prisoners marching to the rear;
long trains of ambulances filled with our wounded soldiers, some of
them walking back with their arms in slings, or bloody bandages about
their necks or foreheads; Rebel hospitals, where unfortunate fellows
were groaning upon the straw, with arms or legs missing; eleven of our
lost, resting placidly side by side, while their comrades were digging
their graves hard by; the unburied dead of the enemy, lying in pairs or
groups, behind rocks or in fence corners; and then a Rebel surgeon, in
bluish-gray uniform, coming in with a flag of truce, to look after his
wounded.
All the morning I heard the pounding of distant guns, and at 4 P.
M., near the little village of Keedysville, I reached our front. On
the extreme left I found an old friend whom I had not met for many
years--Colonel Edward E. Cross, of the Fifth New Hampshire Infantry.
Formerly a Cincinnati journalist, afterward a miner in Arizona, and
then a colonel at the head of a Mexican regiment, his life had been
full of interest and romance.
[Sidenote: A NOVEL KIND OF DUEL.]
While living in Arizona he incurred the displeasure of the pro-Slavery
politicians, who ruled the territory. Mowry, their self-styled Delegate
to Congress, challenged him--probably upon the hypothesis that, as a
Northerner, he would not recognize the code; but Cross was an ugly
subject for that experiment. He promptly accepted, and named Burnside
rifles at ten paces! Mowry was probably ready to say with Falstaff--
"An' I thought he had been valiant and so cunning in fence,
I'd have seen him damned ere I had challenged him."
Both were dead shots. Their seconds placed them across the strong
prairie wind, to interfere with their aim. At the first fire, a ball
grazed Mowry's ear. At the second, a lock of Cross's hair was cut off.
"Rather close work, is it not?" he calmly asked of a bystander.
At the third fire, Mowry's rifle missed. His friends insisted that he
was entitled to his fire. Those of the other party declared that this
was monstrous, and that he should be killed if he attempted it. But
Cross settled the difficulty by deciding that Mowry was right, and
stood serenely, with folded arms, to receive the shot. The would-be
Delegate was wise enough to fire into the air. Thus ended the bloodless
duel, and the journalist was never challenged again.
A year or two later, I chanced to be in El Paso, Mexico, shortly after
Cross had visited that ancient city. An old cathedral, still standing,
was built before the landing of the Pilgrims on Plymouth Rock.
Ascending to the steeple, Cross pocketed and brought away the clapper
of the old Spanish bell, which was hung there when the edifice was
erected.
The devout natives were greatly exasperated at this profanation, and
would have killed the relic-hunting Yankee had they caught him. I heard
from them a great deal of swearing in bad Spanish on the subject.
Now, when I greeted him, his men were deployed in a corn-field,
skirmishing with the enemy's pickets. He was in a barn, where the balls
constantly whistled, and occasionally struck the building. He had just
come in from the front, where Confederate bullets had torn two rents
in the shoulder of his blouse, without breaking the skin. A straggling
soldier passed us, strolling down the road toward the Rebel pickets.
"My young friend," said Cross, "if you don't want a hole through you,
you had better come back."
Just as he spoke, ping! came a bullet, perforating the hat of the
private, who made excellent time toward the rear. A moment after, a
shell exploded on a bank near us, throwing the dirt into our faces.
[Sidenote: HOW CORRESPONDENTS AVOIDED EXPULSION.]
We spent the night at the house of a Union resident, of Keedysville.
General Marcy, McClellan's father-in-law and chief of staff, who supped
there, inquired, with some curiosity, how we had gained admission to
the lines, as journalists were then nominally excluded from the army.
We assured him that it was only by "strategy," the details whereof
could not be divulged to outsiders.
One of the _Tribune_ correspondents had not left the army since the
Peninsular campaign, and, remaining constantly within the lines,
his position had never been questioned. Another, who had a nominal
appointment upon the staff of a major-general, wore a saber and passed
for an officer. I had an old pass, without date, from General Burnside,
authorizing the bearer to go to and fro from his head-quarters at all
times, which enabled me to go by all guards with ease.
Marcy engaged lodgings at the house for McClellan; but an hour after,
a message was received that the general thought it better to sleep upon
the ground, near the bivouac-fires, as an example for the troops.
[Sidenote: SHAMEFUL SURRENDER OF HARPER'S FERRY.]
Last night came intelligence of the surrender, to Stonewall Jackson, of
Harper's Ferry, including the impregnable position of Maryland Hights
and our army.
Colonel Miles, who commanded, atoned for his weakness with his life,
being killed by a stray shot just after he had capitulated. Colonel
Thomas H. Ford, ex-Lieutenant-Governor of Ohio, who was stationed on
the Hights, professed to have a written order from Miles, his superior
officer, to exercise his own discretion about evacuating; but he could
not exhibit the paper, and stated that he had lost it. He gave up that
key to the position without a struggle. It was like leaving the rim
of a teacup, to go down to the bottom for a defensive point. He was
afterward tried before a court-martial, but saved from punishment, and
permitted to resign, through the clemency of President Lincoln. In any
other country he would have been shot.
On September 16th, General McClellan established his head-quarters in a
great shaded brick farm-house.
Under one of the old trees sat General Sumner, at sixty-four erect,
agile, and soldierly, with snow-white hair. A few yards distant, in an
open field, a party of officers were suddenly startled by two shells
which dropped very near them. The group broke up and scattered with
great alacrity.
"Why," remarked Sumner, with a peculiar smile, "the shells seem to
excite a good deal of commotion among those young gentlemen!"
It appeared to amuse and surprise the old war-horse that anybody should
be startled by bullets or shots.
Lying upon the ground near by, with his head resting upon his arm, was
another officer wearing the two stars of a major-general.
"Who is that?" I asked of a journalistic friend.
"Fighting Joe Hooker," was the answer.
With his side-whiskers, rather heavy countenance, and transparent
cheeks, which revealed the blood like those of a blushing girl, he
hardly looked all my fancy had painted him.
[Sidenote: A CAVALRY STAMPEDE.]
Toward evening, at the head of his corps, preceded by the pioneers
tearing away fences for the column, Hooker led a forward movement
across Antietam Creek. His milk-white horse, a rare target to Rebel
sharpshooters, could be seen distinctly from afar against the deep
green landscape. I could not believe that he was riding into battle
upon such a steed, for it seemed suicidal.
In an hour we halted, and the cavalry went forward to reconnoiter. A
few minutes after, Mr. George W. Smalley, of _The Tribune_, said to me:
"There will be a cavalry stampede in about five minutes. Let us ride
out to the front and see it."
Galloping up the road, and waiting two or three minutes, we heard three
six-pound shots in rapid succession, and a little fifer who had climbed
a tree, shouted:
"There they come, like the devil, with the Rebels after them!"
From a vast cloud of dust, emerged soon our troopers in hot haste and
disorder. They had suddenly awakened a Rebel battery, which opened upon
them.
"We will stir them up," said Hooker, as the cavalry commander made his
report.
"Why, General," replied the major, "they have some batteries up there!"
"Well, sir," answered Hooker, "haven't we got as many batteries as
they have? Move on!"
[Illustration: OPENING OF THE BATTLE OF ANTIETAM.--GENERAL HOOKER.]
[Sidenote: "FIGHTING JOE HOOKER" IN BATTLE.]
McClellan, who had accompanied the expedition thus far, rode back to
the rear. Hooker pressed forward, accompanied by General Meade, then
commanding a division--a dark-haired, scholarly-looking gentleman in
spectacles. The grassy fields, the shining streams, and the vernal
forests, stretched out in silent beauty. With their bright muskets,
clean uniforms, and floating flags, Hooker's men moved on with assured
faces.
"'Twere worth ten years of peaceful life,
One glance at their array."
With a very heavy force of skirmishers, we pushed on, finding no enemy.
Our line was three-quarters of a mile in length. Hooker was on the
extreme right, close upon the skirmishers.
As we approached a strip of woods, a hundred yards wide, far on our
extreme left, we heard a single musket. Then there was another, then
another, and in an instant our whole line blazed like a train of
powder, in one long sheet of flame.
Right on our front, through the narrow belt of woods, so near that it
seemed that we might toss a pebble to them, rose a countless horde of
Rebels, almost instantly obscured by the fire from their muskets and
the smoke of the batteries.
My _confrère_ and myself were within a few yards of Hooker. It was a
very hot place. We could not distinguish the "ping" of the individual
bullets, but their combined and mingled hum was like the din of a great
Lowell factory. Solid shot and shell came shrieking through the air,
but over our heads, as we were on the extreme front.
Hooker--common-place before--the moment he heard the guns, loomed up
into gigantic stature. His eye gleamed with the grand anger of battle.
He seemed to know exactly what to do, to feel that he was master of the
situation, and to impress every one else with the fact. Turning to one
of his staff, and pointing to a spot near us, he said:
"Go, and tell Captain ---- to bring his battery and plant it there at
once!"
The lieutenant rode away. After giving one or two further orders with
great clearness, rapidity, and precision, Hooker's eye turned again
to that mass of Rebel infantry in the woods, and he said to another
officer, with great emphasis:
"Go, and tell Captain ---- to bring his battery here instantly!"
Sending more messages to the various divisions and batteries, only a
single member of the staff remained. Once more scanning the woods with
his eager eye, Hooker directed the aid:
"Go, and tell Captain ---- to bring that battery here without one
second's delay. Why, my God, how he can pour it into their infantry!"
By this time, several of the body-guard had fallen from their saddles.
Our horses plunged wildly. A shell plowed the ground under my rearing
steed, and another exploded near Mr. Smalley, throwing great clouds of
dust over both of us. Hooker leaped his white horse over a low fence
into an adjacent orchard, whither we gladly followed. Though we did not
move more than thirty yards, it took us comparatively out of range.
[Sidenote: THE REBELS WAVER AND BREAK.]
The desired battery, stimulated by three successive messages, came up
with smoking horses, at a full run, was unlimbered in the twinkling of
an eye, and began to pour shots into the enemy, who were also suffering
severely from our infantry discharges. It was not many seconds before
they began to waver. Through the rifting smoke, we could see their line
sway to and fro; then it broke like a thaw in a great river. Hooker
rose up in his saddle, and, in a voice of suppressed thunder, exclaimed:
"There they go, G-d d--n them! Forward!"
Our whole line moved on. It was now nearly dark. Having shared the
experience of "Fighting Joe Hooker" quite long enough, I turned toward
the rear. Fresh troops were pressing forward, and stragglers were
ranged in long lines behind rocks and trees.
Riding slowly along a grassy slope, as I supposed quite out of range,
my meditations were disturbed by a cannon-ball, whose rush of air
fanned my face, and made my horse shrink and rear almost upright. The
next moment came another behind me, and by the great blaze of a fire
of rails, which the soldiers had built, I saw it _ricochet_ down the
slope, like a foot-ball, and pass right through a column of our troops
in blue, who were marching steadily forward. The gap which it made was
immediately closed up.
Men with litters were groping through the darkness, bearing the wounded
back to the ambulances.
[Sidenote: A NIGHT AMONG THE PICKETS.]
At nine o'clock, I wandered to a farm-house, occupied by some of our
pickets. We dared not light candles, as it was within range of the
enemy. The family had left. I tied my horse to an apple-tree, and lay
down upon the parlor floor, with my saddle for a pillow. At intervals
during the night, we heard the popping of musketry, and at the first
glimpse of dawn the picket-officer shook me by the arm.
"My friend," said he, "you had better go away as soon as you can; this
place is getting rather hot for civilians."
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF ANTIETAM.]
I rode around through the field, for shot and shell were already
screaming up the narrow lane.
Thus commenced the long, hotly-contested battle of Antietam. Our line
was three miles in length, with Hooker on the right, Burnside on the
left, and a great gap in the middle, occupied only by artillery; while
Fitz-John Porter, with his fine corps, was held in reserve. From
dawn until nearly dark, the two great armies wrestled like athletes,
straining every muscle, losing here, gaining there, and at many points
fighting the same ground over and over again. It was a fierce, sturdy,
indecisive conflict.
Five thousand spectators viewed the struggle from a hill comparatively
out of range. Not more than three persons were struck there during the
day. McClellan and his staff occupied another ridge half a mile in the
rear.
"By Heaven! it was a goodly sight to see, For one who had no
friend or brother there."
No one who looked upon that wonderful panorama can describe or forget
it. Every hill and valley, every corn-field, grove, and cluster of
trees, was fiercely fought for.
The artillery was unceasing; we could often count more than sixty
guns to the minute. It was like thunder; and the musketry sounded like
the patter of rain-drops in an April shower. On the great field were
riderless horses and scattering men, clouds of dirt from solid shot and
exploding shells, long dark lines of infantry swaying to and fro, with
columns of smoke rising from their muskets, red flashes and white puffs
from the batteries--with the sun shining brightly on all this scene of
tumult, and beyond it, upon the dark, rich woods, and the clear blue
mountains south of the Potomac.
[Sidenote: FEARFUL SLAUGHTER IN THE CORN-FIELD.]
We saw clearly our entire line, except the extreme left, where Burnside
was hidden by intervening ridges; and at times the infantry and cavalry
of the Rebels. We could see them press our men, and hear their shrill
yells of triumph. Then our columns in blue would move forward, driving
them back, with loud, deep-mouthed, sturdy cheers. Once, a great
mass of Rebels, in brown and gray, came pouring impetuously through
a corn-field, forcing back the Union troops. For a moment both were
hidden under a hill; and then up, over the slope came our soldiers,
flying in confusion, with the enemy in hot pursuit. But soon after, up
rose and opened upon them two long lines of men in blue, with shining
muskets, who, hidden behind a ridge, had been lying in wait. The range
was short, and the fire was deadly.
The Rebels instantly poured back, and were again lost for a moment
behind the hill, our troops hotly following. In a few seconds, they
reappeared, rushing tumultuously back into the corn-field. While
they were so thick that they looked like swarming bees, one of our
batteries, at short range, suddenly commenced dropping shots among
them. We could see with distinctness the explosions of the shells, and
sometimes even thought we detected fragments of human bodies flying
through the air. In that field, the next day, I counted sixty-four of
the enemy's dead, lying almost in one mass.
Hooker, wounded before noon, was carried from the field. Had he not
been disabled, he would probably have made it a decisive conflict.
Realizing that it was one of the world's great days, he said:
"I would gladly have compromised with the enemy by receiving a mortal
wound at night, could I have remained at the head of my troops until
the sun went down."
On the left, Burnside, who had a strong, high stone bridge to carry,
was sorely pressed. McClellan denied his earnest requests for
re-enforcements, though the best corps of the army was then held in
reserve.
The Fifteenth Massachusetts Infantry took into the battle five hundred
and fifty men, and brought out only one hundred and fifty-six. The
Nineteenth Massachusetts, out of four hundred and six men, lost all but
one hundred and forty-seven, including every commissioned officer above
a first lieutenant. The Fifth New Hampshire, three hundred strong, lost
one hundred and ten privates and fourteen officers. Colonel Cross, who
seldom went into battle without receiving wounds, was struck in the
head by a piece of shell early in the day, but with face crimsoned
and eyes dimmed with blood, he led his men until night closed the
indecisive conflict.
[Sidenote: BEST BATTLE-REPORT OF THE WAR.]
At night, the four _Tribune_ correspondents, who had witnessed the
battle, met at a little farm-house. They prepared hasty reports, by a
flickering tallow candle, in a narrow room crowded with wounded and
dying.
Mr. Smalley had been with Hooker from the firing of the first gun.
Twice his horse had been shot under him, and twice his clothing was cut
by bullets. Without food, without sleep, greatly exhausted physically
and mentally, he started for New York, writing his report on a railway
train during the night, by a very dim light.
Reaching New York at seven in the morning, he found the printers
awaiting him; and, an hour later, his account of the conflict,
filling five _Tribune_ columns, was being cried in the streets by
the news-boys. Notwithstanding the adverse circumstances of its
preparation, it was vivid and truthful, and was considered the best
battle-report of the war.
CHAPTER XXIV.
----Our doubts are traitors. And make us lose the good we oft
might win, By fearing to attempt.--MEASURE FOR MEASURE.
In a lull of the musketry, during the battle of Antietam, McClellan
rode forward toward the front. On the way, he met a Massachusetts
general, who was his old friend and class-mate.
"Gordon," he asked, "how are your men?"
"They have behaved admirably," replied Gordon; "but they are now
somewhat scattered."
"Collect them at once. We must fight to-night and fight to-morrow. This
is our golden opportunity. If we cannot whip the Rebels here, we may
just as well all die on the field."
[Sidenote: THE DAY AFTER THE BATTLE.]
That was the spirit of the whole army. It was universally expected that
McClellan would renew the attack at daylight the next morning; but,
though he had many thousand fresh men, and defeat could only be repulse
to him, while to the enemy, with the river in his rear, it would be
ruin, his constitutional timidity prevented. It was the costliest of
mistakes.
Thursday proved a day of rest--such rest as can be found with three
miles of dead men to bury, and thousands of wounded to bring from the
field. It was a day of standing on the line where the battle closed--of
intermittent sharp-shooting and discharges of artillery, but no general
skirmishing, or attempt to advance on either side.
Riding out to the front of General Couch's line, I found the Rebels and
our own soldiers mingling freely on the disputed ground, bearing away
the wounded. I was scanning a Rebel battery with my field-glass, at the
distance of a quarter of a mile, when one of our pickets exclaimed:
"Put up your glass, sir! The Johnnies will shoot in a minute, if they
see you using it."
In front of Hancock's lines, a flag of truce was raised. Hancock--erect
and soldierly, with smooth face, light eyes, and brown hair, the
finest-looking general in our service--accompanied by Meagher, rode
forward into a corn-field, and met the young fire-eating brigadier of
the Rebels, Roger A. Pryor. Pryor insisted that he had seen a white
flag on our front, and asked if we desired permission to remove our
dead and wounded. Hancock indignantly denied that we had asked for a
truce, as we claimed the ground, stating that, through the whole day,
we had been removing and ministering to both Union and Rebel wounded.
He suggested a cessation of sharp-shooting until this work could be
completed. Pryor declined this, and in ten minutes the firing reopened.
"A great victory," said Wellington, "is the most awful thing in the
world, except a great defeat." Antietam, though not an entire victory,
had all its terrific features. Our casualties footed up to twelve
thousand three hundred and fifty-two, of whom about two thousand were
killed on the field.
[Sidenote: DOWN AMONG THE DEAD MEN.]
Between the fences of a road immediately beyond the corn-field,
in a space one hundred yards long, I counted more than two hundred
Rebel dead, lying where they fell. Elsewhere, over many acres, they
were strewn singly, in groups, and occasionally in masses, piled up
almost like cord-wood. They were lying--some with the human form
undistinguishable, others with no outward indication of wounds--in
all the strange positions of violent death. All had blackened faces.
There were forms with every rigid muscle strained in fierce agony, and
those with hands folded peacefully upon the bosom; some still clutching
their guns, others with arm upraised, and one with a single open finger
pointing to heaven. Several remained hanging over a fence which they
were climbing when the fatal shot struck them.
It was several days before all the wounded were removed from the field.
Many were shockingly mutilated; but the most revolting spectacle I saw
was that of a soldier, with three fingers cut off by a bullet, leaving
ragged, bloody shreds of flesh.
[Sidenote: LEE PERMITTED TO ESCAPE.]
On Thursday night the sun went down with the opposing forces face to
face, and their pickets within stone's throw of each other. On Friday
morning the Rebel army was in Virginia, the National army in Maryland.
Between dark and daylight, Lee evacuated the position, and carried his
whole army across the river. He had no empty breastworks with which to
endow us; but he left a field plowed with shot, watered with blood,
and sown thick with dead. We found the _débris_ of his late camps, two
disabled pieces of artillery, a few hundred of his stragglers, two
thousand of his wounded, and as many more of his unburied dead; but not
a single field-piece or caisson, ambulance or wagon, not a tent, a box
of stores, or a pound of ammunition. He carried with him the supplies
gathered in Maryland and the rich spoils of Harper's Ferry.
It was a very bitter disappointment to the army and the country.
[Sidenote: THE JOHN BROWN ENGINE-HOUSE.]
BOLIVAR HIGHTS, MD., _September 25, 1862_.
Adieu to western Maryland, with the stanch loyalty of its suffering
people! Adieu to Sharpsburg, which, cut to pieces by our own shot and
shell as no other village in America ever was, gave us the warm welcome
that comes from the heart! Adieu to the drenched field of Antietam,
with its glorious Wednesday, writing for our army a record than which
nothing brighter shines through history; with its fatal Thursday,
permitting the clean, leisurely escape of the foe down into the valley,
across the difficult ford, and up the Virginia Hights! Our army might
have been driven back; it could never have been captured or cut to
pieces. Failure was only repulse; success was crowning, decisive, final
victory. The enemy saw this, and walked undisturbed out of the snare.
Three days ago, our army moved down the left bank of the Potomac,
climbing the narrow, tortuous road that winds around the foot of
the mountains; under Maryland Hights; across the long, crooked ford
above the blackened timbers of the railroad bridge; then up among the
long, bare, deserted walls of the ruined Government Armory, past the
engine-house which Old John Brown made historic; up through the dingy,
antique, oriental looking town of Harper's Ferry, sadly worn, almost
washed away by the ebb and flow of war; up through the village of
Bolivar to these Hights, where we pitched our tents.
Behind and below us rushed the gleaming river, till its dark, shining
surface was broken by rocks. Across it came a line of our stragglers,
wading to the knees with staggering steps. Beyond it, the broad
forest-clad Maryland Hights rose gloomy and somber. Down behind me, to
the river, winding across it like a slender S, then extending for half
a mile on the other side, far up along the Maryland hill, stretched a
division-train of snowy wagons, standing out in strong relief from the
dark background of water and mountain.
Two weeks ago shots exchanged between the army of Slavery and the army
of Freedom shrieked and screamed over the engine-house, where, for two
days, Old John Brown held the State of Virginia at bay. A week ago its
walls were again shaken by the thunders of cannonade, when the armies
met in fruitless battle. Last night, within rifle-shot of it, the
President's Proclamation of Emancipation was heard gladly among thirty
thousand soldiers.
[Sidenote: PRESIDENT LINCOLN REVIEWS THE ARMY.]
_October 2._
President Lincoln arrived here yesterday, and reviewed the troops,
accompanied by McClellan, Sumner, Hancock, Meagher, and other generals.
He appeared in black, wearing a silk hat; and his tall, slender form,
and plain clothing, contrasted strangely with the broad shoulders and
the blue and gold of the major-general commanding.
He is unusually thin and silent, and looks weary and careworn. He
regarded the old engine-house with great interest. It reminded him, he
said, of the Illinois custom of naming locomotives after fleet animals,
such as the "Reindeer," the "Antelope," the "Flying Dutchman," etc. At
the time of the John Brown raid, a new locomotive was named the "Scared
Virginians."
The troops everywhere cheered him with warm enthusiasm.
_October 13._
The cavalry raid of the Rebel General Stuart, around our entire
army, into Maryland and Pennsylvania, and back again, crossing the
Potomac without serious loss, is the one theme of conversation. It was
audacious and brilliant. On his return, Stuart passed within five miles
of McClellan's head-quarters, which were separated from the rest of the
troops by half a mile, and guarded only by a New York regiment. Some of
the staff officers are very indignant when they are told that Stuart
knew the interest of the Rebels too well to capture our commander.
CHARLESTOWN, VIRGINIA, _October 16_.
A reconnoissance to the front, commanded by General Hancock. The column
moved briskly over the broad turnpike, through ample fields rich with
shocks of corn, past stately farm-houses, with deep shade-trees and
orchards, by gray barns, surrounded by hay and grain stacks--beyond our
lines, over the debatable ground, past the Rebel picket-stations, in
sight of Charlestown, and yet no enemy appeared.
[Sidenote: DODGING REBEL CANNON-BALLS.]
We began to think Confederates a myth. But suddenly a gun belched forth
in front of us; another, and yet another, and rifled shot came singing
by, cutting through the tree-branches with sharp, incisive music.
Two of our batteries instantly unlimbered, and replied. Our column
filled the road. Nearly all the Rebel missiles struck in an
apple-orchard within twenty yards of the turnpike; but our men would
persist in climbing the trees and gathering the fruit, in spite of the
shrieking shells.
I have not yet learned to avoid bowing my head instinctively as a shot
screams by; but some old stagers sit perfectly erect, and laughingly
remind me of Napoleon's remark to a young officer: "My friend, if that
shell were really your fate, it would hit you and kill you if you were
a hundred feet underground."
We could plainly see the Rebel cavalry. Far in advance of all others,
was a rider on a milk-white horse, which made him a conspicuous mark.
The sharpshooters tried in vain to pick him off, while he sat viewing
the artillery drill as complacently as if enjoying a pantomime. Some of
our officers declare that they have seen that identical steed and rider
on the Rebel front in every fight from Yorktown to Antietam.
After an artillery fire of an hour, in which we lost eight or ten men,
the Rebels evacuated Charlestown, and we entered.
[Sidenote: "HIS SOUL IS MARCHING ON."]
The troops take a very keen interest in every thing connected with
the historic old man, who, two years ago, yielded up his life in a
field which is near our camp. They visit it by hundreds, and pour into
the court-house, now open and deserted, where he was tried, and made
that wonderful speech which will never die. They scan closely the
jail, where he wrote and spoke so many electric words. As our column
passed it, one countenance only was visible within--that of a negro,
looking through a grated window. How his dusky face lit up behind its
prison-bars at the sight of our column, and the words--
"His soul is marching on!"
sung by a Pennsylvania regiment!
[Sidenote: AN EMINENTLY "INTELLIGENT CONTRABAND."]
Our pickets descried a solitary horseman, with a basket on his arm,
jogging soberly toward them. He proved a dark mulatto of about
thirty-five, and halted at their order.
"Where are you from?"
"Southern army, Cap'n."
"Where are you going?"
"Goin' to you'se all."
"What do you want?"
"Protection, boss. You won't send me back, will you?"
"No, come in. Whose servant are you?"
"Cap'n Rhett's, of South Caroliny. You'se heard of Mr. Barnwell Rhett,
Editor of _The Charleston Mercury_; Cap'n is his brother, and commands
a battery."
"How did you get away?"
"Cap'n gave me fifteen dollars this morning. He said: 'John, go out and
forage for butter and eggs.' So you see, boss" (with a broad grin),
"I'se out foraging. I pulled my hat over my eyes, and jogged along on
the cap'n's horse, with this basket on my arm, right by our pickets.
They never challenged me once. If they had I should have shown them
this."
And he produced from his pocket an order in pencil from Captain Rhett
to pass his servant John, on horseback, in search of butter and eggs.
"Why did you expect protection?"
"Heard so in Maryland, before the Proclamation."
"What do you know about the Proclamation?"
"Read it, sir, in a Richmond paper."
"What is it?"
"That every slave is to be emancipated after the first day of next
January. Isn't that it, boss?"
"Something like it. How did you learn to read?"
"A New York lady stopping at the hotel taught me."
"Did you ever hear of Old John Brown?"
"Hear of him! Lord bless you, yes; I've his life now in my trunk in
Charleston. I've read it to heaps of colored folks. They think John
Brown was almost a god. Just say you are a friend of his, and any slave
will kiss your feet, if you will let him. They think, if he was only
alive now, he would be king. How he did frighten the white folks! It
was Sunday morning. I was waiter at the Mills House, in Charleston.
A lady from Massachusetts breakfasted at my table. 'John,' she says,
'I want to see a negro church. Where is the best one?' 'Not any open
to-day, Missus,' I told her. 'Why not?' 'Because a Mr. John Brown has
raised an insurrection in Virginny, and they don't let the negroes go
into the street to-day.' 'Well,' she says, 'they had better look out,
or they will get their white churches shut up, too, one of these days.'"
[Sidenote: "THE LORD BLESS YOU, GENERAL!"]
This truly intelligent contraband, being taken to McClellan, replied
very modestly and intelligently to questions about the numbers and
organization of the Rebel army. At the close of the interview, he asked
anxiously:
"General, you won't send me back, will you?"
"Yes," replied McClellan, with a smile, "I believe I will."
"I hope you won't, General" (with great earnestness). "I come to you'se
all for protection, and I hope you won't."
"Well, then, John, you are at liberty to stay with the army, if you
like, or to go where you please. No one can ever make you a slave
again."
"May the Lord bless you, General! I thought you wouldn't drive me out.
You'se the best friend I ever had. I shall never forget you till I die."
BOLIVAR HIGHTS, _October 25_.
"The view from the mountains at Harper's Ferry," said Thomas Jefferson,
"is worth a journey across the Atlantic."
[Sidenote: CURIOSITIES OF THE SIGNAL-CORPS.]
Let us approach it at the lower price of climbing Maryland Hights. The
air is soft and wooing to-day. It is the time--
----"just ere the frost
Prepares to pave old Winter's way,
When Autumn, in a reverie lost,
The mellow daylight dreams away;
When Summer comes in musing mind
To gaze once more on hill and dell,
To mark how many sheaves they bind,
And see if all are ripened well."
Half way up the mountain, you rest your panting horse at a battery,
among bottle-shaped Dahlgrens, sure at thirty-five hundred yards, and
capable at their utmost elevation of a range of three miles and a half;
black, solemn Parrotts, with iron-banded breech, and shining howitzers
of brass. Far up, accessible only to footmen, is a long breast-work,
where two of our companies repulsed a Rebel regiment. How high the tide
of war must run, when its waves wash this mountain-top! Here, on the
extreme summit, is an open tent of the Signal-Corps. It is labeled:
"DON'T TOUCH THE INSTRUMENTS. ASK NO QUESTIONS."
Inside, two operators are gazing at the distant hights, through fixed
telescopes, calling out, "45," "169," "81," etc., which the clerk
records. Each number represents a letter, syllable, or abbreviated word.
Looking through the long glass toward one of the seven signal-stations,
from four to twenty miles away, communicating with this, you see a
flag, with some large black figure upon a white foreground. It rises;
so many waves to the right; so many to the left. Then a different flag
takes its place, and rises and falls in turn.
By these combinations, from one to three words per minute are
telegraphed. The operator slowly reads the distant signal to you:
"Two--hundred--Rebel--cavalry--riding--out--of--Charlestown--this--
way--field-piece--on--road," and it occupies five minutes. Five miles
is an easy distance to communicate, but messages can be sent twenty
miles. The Signal-Corps keep on the front; their services are of great
value. Several of the members have been wounded and some killed.
[Sidenote: BEAUTIFUL VIEW FROM MARYLAND HIGHTS.]
You are on the highest point of the Blue Ridge, four thousand feet
above the sea, one thousand above the Potomac.
Along the path by which you came, climbs a pony; on the pony's back a
negro; on the negro's head a bucket of water; then a mule, bearing a
coffee-sack, containing at each end a keg of water. Thus all provisions
are brought up. Here, in the early morning, you could only look out
upon a cold, shoreless sea of white fog. Now, you look down upon all
the country within a radius of twenty miles, as you would gaze into
your garden from your own house-top.
You see the Potomac winding far away in a thread of silver, broken
by shrubs, rocks, and islands. At your feet lies Pleasant Valley, a
great furrow--two miles across, from edge to edge--plowed through the
mountains. It is full of camps, white villages of tents, and black
groups of guns. You see cozy dwellings, with great, well-filled barns,
red brick mills, straw-colored fields dotted with shocks of corn and
reaching far up into the dark, hill-side woods, green sward-fields,
mottled with orchards, and a little shining stream. A dim haze rests
upon the mountain-guarded picture, and the soft wind seems to sing with
Whittier:
"Yet calm and patient Nature keeps
Her ancient promise well,
Though o'er her bloom and greenness sweeps
The battle's breath of hell.
"And still she walks in golden hours
Through harvest-happy farms,
And still she wears her fruits and flowers,
Like jewels on her arms.
"Still in the cannon's pause we hear
Her sweet thanksgiving psalm;
Too near to God for doubt or fear,
She shares the eternal calm.
"She sees with clearer eye than ours
The good of suffering born,--
The hearts that blossom like her flowers,
And ripen like her corn."
See the regiments on dress parade; long lines of dark blue, with
bayonets that flash brightly in the waning sunlight. When dismissed,
each breaks into companies, which move toward their quarters like
monster antediluvian reptiles, with myriads of blue legs.
[Sidenote: BURNSIDE AT HIS TENT.]
On that distant hill-side, just at the forest's edge, in the midst of a
group of tents, are Burnside's head-quarters. Through your field-glass,
you see standing in front of them the military man whose ambition has
a limit. He has twice refused to accept the chief command of the army.
There stands Burnside, the favorite of the troops, in blue shirt, knit
jacket, and riding-boots, with frank, manly face, and full, laughing
eyes.
Under your feet are Bolivar Hights, crowned with the tents of Couch's
Corps--dingy by reason of long service, like a Spring snow-drift
through which the dirt begins to sift. You see the quaint old
village of Harper's Ferry, and glimpses of the Potomac--gold in the
sunset--with trees and rocks mirrored in its mellow face.
The sun goes down, and the glory of the western hills fades as you
slowly descend; but the picture you have seen is one which memory
paints in fast colors.
CHAPTER XXV.
A woman moved is like a fountain troubled, Muddy,
ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty.--TAMING OF THE SHREW.
[Sidenote: ON THE MARCH SOUTHWARD.]
When the army left Harper's Ferry, on a forced march, it moved, with
incredible celerity, thirty miles in nine days!
The Virginians east of the Blue Ridge were nearly all hot
Secessionists. The troops, who had behaved well among the Union people
of Maryland, saw the contrast, and spoiled the Egyptians accordingly.
I think if Pharaoh had seen his homestead passed over by a hungry,
hostile force, he would have let the people go.
In the presence of the army, many professed a sort of loyal neutrality,
or neutral loyalty; but I did not hear a single white Virginian of
either sex claim to be an unconditional Unionist.
At Woodgrove, one evening, finding that we should not go into camp
before midnight, I sought supper and lodging at a private house of the
better class. My middle-aged host and his two young, unmarried sisters,
were glad to entertain some one from the army, to protect their
dwelling against stragglers.
[Sidenote: REBEL GIRL WITH A SHARP TONGUE.]
The elder girl, of about eighteen, was almost a monomaniac upon the
war. She declared she had no aspiration for heaven, if any Yankees were
to be there. She would be proud to kiss the dirtiest, raggedest soldier
in the Rebel army. I refrained from discussing politics with her, and
we talked of other subjects.
During the evening, Generals Gorman and Burns reached the house to seek
shelter for the night. The officers, discovering the sensitiveness of
the poor girl, expressed the most ultra sentiments. Well educated, and
with a tongue like a rapier, she was at times greatly excited, and the
blood crimsoned her face; but she out-talked them all.
"By-the-way," asked Burns, mischievously, "do you ever read _The
Tribune_?"
She replied, with intense indignation:
"Read it! I would not touch it with a pair of tongs! It is the most
infamous Abolition, negro-equality sheet in the whole world!"
"So a great many people say," continued Burns. "However, here is one of
its correspondents."
"In this room?"
"Yes, madam."
"He must be even worse than you, who come down here to murder us! Where
is he?"
"Sitting in the corner there, reading letters."
"I thought you were deceiving me. That is no _Tribune_ correspondent. I
do not believe you." (To me:) "This Yankee officer says that you write
for _The New York Tribune_. You don't, do you?"
"Yes, madam."
"Why, you seem to be a gentleman. It is not true! It's a jest between
you just to make me angry."
At last convinced, she withheld altogether from me the expected
vituperation, but assailed Burns in a style which made him very glad to
abandon the unequal contest. She relentlessly persisted that he should
always wear his star, for nobody would suspect him of being a general
if he appeared without his uniform--that he was the worst type of the
most obnoxious Yankee, etc.
At Upperville, the next day, I inquired of a woman who was scrutinizing
us from her door:
"Have you seen any Rebel pickets this morning?"
She replied, indignantly:
"No! Why do you call them Rebels?"
"As you please, madam; what do you call them?"
"I call them Southern heroes, sir!"
[Sidenote: THE NEGROES "WATCHING AND WAITING."]
The negroes poured into our lines whenever permitted.
"Well, Uncle," I asked of a white-haired patriarch, who was tottering
along the road, "are you a Rebel, like everybody else?"
"No, sir! What should I be a Rebel for? I have been wanting to come to
you all a heap of times; but I just watched and waited."
Watching and waiting! Four millions of negroes were watching and
waiting from the beginning of the war until President Lincoln's
Proclamation.
On the march, Major O'Neil, of General Meagher's staff, started with a
message to Burnside, who was a few miles on our left. Unsuspectingly,
he rode right into a squad of cavalry dressed in United States uniform.
He found that they were Stuart's Rebels in disguise, and that he was
a captive. O'Neil had only just been exchanged from Libby Prison, and
his prospect was disheartening. The delighted Rebels sent him to their
head-quarters in Bloomfield, under guard of a lieutenant and two men.
But, on reaching the village, they found the head-quarters closed.
"I wonder where our forces are gone," said the Rebel officer. "Oh, here
they are! Men, guard the prisoner while I ride to them."
And he galloped down the street to a company of approaching cavalry.
Just as he reached them, they leveled their carbines, and cried:
"Surrender!"
He had made precisely the same mistake as Major O'Neil, and ridden
into our cavalry instead of his own. So, after spending three hours in
the hands of the Rebels, O'Neil found himself once more in our lines,
accompanied by three Rebel prisoners.
The slaveholders complained greatly of the depredations of our army. A
very wealthy planter, who had lost nothing of much value, drew for me a
frightful picture of impending starvation.
"I could bear it myself," exclaimed this Virginian Pecksniff, "but it
is very hard for these little negroes, who are almost as dear to me as
my own children."
He had one of the young Africans upon his knee, and it was quite as
white as "his own children," who were running about the room. The only
perceptible difference was that its hair was curly, while theirs was
straight.
[Sidenote: REMOVAL OF GENERAL MCCLELLAN.]
At Warrenton, on the 7th of November, McClellan was relieved from the
command of the Army of the Potomac. He issued the following farewell:
"An order from the President devolves upon Major-General
Burnside the command of this army. In parting from you, I
cannot express the love and gratitude I bear you. As an army,
you have grown under my care; in you I have never found doubt
or coldness. The battles you have fought under my command
will brightly live in our nation's history; the glory you
have achieved, our mutual perils and fatigues, the graves
of our comrades fallen in battle and by disease, the broken
forms of those whom wounds and sickness have disabled, make
the strongest associations which can exist among men. United
still by an indissoluble tie, we shall ever be comrades
in supporting the Constitution of our country and the
nationality of its people."
McClellan's political and personal friends were aggrieved and indignant
at his removal in the midst of a campaign. Three of his staff officers
even made a foolish attempt to assault a _Tribune_ correspondent,
on account of the supposed hostility of that journal toward their
commander. General McClellan, upon hearing of it, sent a disclaimer and
apology, and the officers were soon heartily ashamed.
The withdrawal was worked up to its utmost dramatic effect. Immediately
after reading the farewell order to all the troops, there was a final
review, in which the outgoing and incoming generals, with their long
staffs, rode along the lines. Salutes were fired and colors dipped.
At some points, the men cheered warmly, but the new regiments were
"heroically reticent." McClellan's chief strength was with the rank and
file.
[Sidenote: PICKETS TALKING ACROSS THE RIVER.]
Burnside pushed the army rapidly forward to the Rappahannock. The
Rebels held Fredericksburg, on the south bank. The men conversed freely
across the stream. One day I heard a dialogue like this:
"Halloo, butternut!"
"Halloo, bluebelly!"
"What was the matter with your battery, Tuesday night?"
"You made it too hot. Your shots drove away the cannoneers, and they
haven't stopped running yet. We infantry men had to come out and
withdraw the guns."
"You infantrymen will run, too, one of these fine mornings."
"When are you coming over?"
"When we get ready to come."
"What do you want?"
"Want Fredericksburg."
"Don't you wish you may get it?"
Here an officer came up and ordered our men away.
The army halted for some weeks in front of Fredericksburg.
[Sidenote: HOW ARMY CORRESPONDENTS LIVED.]
By this time, War Correspondence was employing hundreds of pens.
_The Tribune_ had from five to eight men in the Army of the Potomac,
and twelve west of the Alleghanies. My own local habitation was the
head-quarters of Major-General O. O. Howard, who afterward won wide
reputation in Tennessee and Georgia, and who is an officer of great
skill, bravery, and personal purity.
My dispatches were usually prepared, and those of my associates sent
to me, at night. Before dawn, a special messenger called at my tent
for them, and bore them on horseback, or by railway and steamer, to
Washington, whence they were forwarded to New York by mail or telegraph.
Correspondents usually lived at the head-quarters of some general
officer, bearing their due proportion of mess expenditures; but they
were compelled to rely upon the bounty of quartermasters for forage for
their horses, and transportation for their baggage.
Having no legal and recognized positions in the army, they were
sometimes liable to supercilious treatment from young members of staff.
They were sure of politeness and consideration from generals; yet,
particularly in the regular army, there was a certain impression that
they deserved Halleck's characterization of "unauthorized hangers-on."
To encourage the best class of journalists to accompany the army, there
should be a law distinctly authorizing representatives of the Press,
who are engaged in no other pursuit, to accompany troops in the field,
and purchase forage and provisions at the same rates as officers. They
should, of course, be held to a just responsibility not to publish
information which could benefit the enemy.
Nightly, around our great division camp-fire, negroes of all ages pored
over their spelling-books with commendable thirst for learning.
[Sidenote: I'D RATHER BE FREE.]
One boy, of fourteen, was considered peculiarly stupid, and had seen
hard work, rough living, and no pay, during his twelve months' sojourn
with the army. I asked him: "Did you work as hard for your old master
as you do here?"
"No, sir."
"Did he treat you kindly?"
"Yes, sir."
"Were you as well clothed as now?"
"Better, sir."
"And had more comforts?"
"Yes, sir; always had a roof over me, and was never exposed to rain and
cold."
"Would you not have done better to stay at home?"
"If I had thought so, I should not have come away, sir."
"Would you come again, knowing what hardships were before you?"
"Yes, sir. I'd rather be free!"
He was not stupid enough to be devoid of human instinct!
[Sidenote: THE BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG.]
In December occurred the battle of Fredericksburg. The enemy's position
was very strong--almost impregnable. Our men were compelled to lay
their pontoons across the river in a pitiless rain of bullets from the
Rebel sharpshooters. But they did it without flinching. Our troops,
rank, file, and officers, marched into the jaws of death with stubborn
determination.
We attacked in three columns; but the original design was that the
main assault should be on our left, which was commanded by General
Franklin. A road which Franklin wished to reach would enable him to
come up in the rear of Fredericksburg, and compel the enemy to evacuate
his strong works, or be captured. Franklin was very late in starting.
He penetrated once to this road, but did not know it, and again fell
back. Thus the key to the position was lost.
In the center, our troops were flung upon very strong works, and
repulsed with terrible slaughter. It proved a massacre rather than a
battle. Our killed and wounded exceeded ten thousand.
I was not present at the battle, but returned to the army two or
three days after. Burnside deported himself with rare fitness and
magnanimity. As he spoke to me about the brave men who had fruitlessly
fallen, there were tears in his eyes, and his voice broke with emotion.
When I asked him if Franklin's slowness was responsible for the
slaughter, he replied:
"No. I understand perfectly well that when the general commanding an
army meets with disaster, he alone is responsible, and I will not
attempt to shift that responsibility upon any one else. No one will
ever know how near we came to a great victory. It almost seems to me
now that I could have led my old Ninth Corps into those works."
Indeed, Burnside had desired to do this, but was dissuaded by his
lieutenants. The Ninth Corps would have followed him anywhere; but that
would have been certain death.
Burnside was, at least, great in his earnestness, his moral courage,
and perfect integrity. The battle was better than squandering precious
lives in fevers and dysentery during months of inaction. Better a
soldier's death on the enemy's guns than a nameless grave in the swamps
of the Chickahominy or the trenches before Corinth.
Ordered to move, Burnside obeyed without quibbling or hesitating, and
flung his army upon the Rebels. The result was defeat; but that policy
proved our salvation at last; by that sign we conquered.
Every private soldier knew that the battle of Fredericksburg was a
costly and bloody mistake, and yet I think on the day or the week
following it, the soldiers would have gone into battle just as
cheerfully and sturdily as before. The more I saw of the Army of
the Potomac, the more I wondered at its invincible spirit, which no
disasters seemed able to destroy.
[Sidenote: CURIOUS BLUNDER OF THE TELEGRAPH.]
In January, among the lookers-on in Virginia, was the Hon. Henry J.
Raymond, of _The Times_. He had a brother in the service, and one day
he received this telegram:--
"Your brother's corpse is at Belle Plain."
Hastening to the army as fast as steam could carry him, to perform the
last sad offices of affection, he found his relative not only living,
but in vigorous health. Through the eccentricities of the telegraph,
the word _corps_ had been changed into _corpse_.
On the 22d of January, Burnside attempted another advance, designing
to cross the Rappahannock in three columns. The weather for a long time
had been fine, but, a few hours after the army started, the heavens
opened, and converted the Virginia roads into almost fathomless mire.
Advance seemed out of the question, and in two days the troops came
back to camp. The Rebels understood the cause, and prepared an enormous
sign, which they erected on their side of the river, in full view of
our pickets, bearing the inscription, "STUCK IN THE MUD!"
[Sidenote: THE BATTERIES AT FREDERICKSBURG.]
ARMY OF POTOMAC, NEAR FALMOUTH, VA., }
_Monday, Nov. 24_. }
Still on the north bank of the Rappahannock! Upon the high bluffs,
along a line of three miles, twenty-four of our guns point
threateningly toward the enemy. In the ravines behind them a hundred
more wait, ready to be wheeled up and placed in position.
Upon the hills south of the river, distant from them a thousand to five
thousand yards, Rebel guns confront them. Some peer blackly through
hastily-built earthworks; some are just visible over the crests of
sharp ridges; some almost hidden by great piles of brush. Already we
count eighteen; the cannonading will unmask many more.
"Ah, what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary,
When the Death-angel touches these swift keys!
What loud lament and dismal _miserere_
Will mingle with their awful symphonies!"
In front of our right batteries, but far below and hidden from them,
the antique, narrow, half-ruined village of Falmouth hugs the river. In
front of the Rebel batteries, in full view of both sides, the broad,
well-to-do town of Fredericksburg, with its great factories, tall
spires, and brick buildings, is a tempting target for our guns. The
river which flows between (though Fredericksburg is half a mile below
Falmouth), is now so narrow, that a lad can throw a stone across.
Behind our batteries and their protecting hills rests the infantry of
the Grand Division. General Couch's corps occupies a crescent-shaped
valley--a symmetric natural amphitheater. It is all aglow nightly
with a thousand camp-fires; and, from the proscenium-hill of General
Howard's head-quarters, forms a picture mocking all earthly canvas.
Behind the Rebel batteries, in the dense forest, their infantry
occupies a line five miles long. By night we just detect the glimmer of
their fires; by day we see the tall, slender columns of smoke curling
up from their camps.
[Sidenote: A DISAPPOINTED VIRGINIAN.]
All the citizens ask to have guards placed over their houses; but very
few obtain them. "I will give no man a guard," replied General Howard
to one of these applicants, "until he is willing to lose as much as I
have lost, in defending the Government." The Virginian cast one long,
lingering look at the General's loose, empty coat-sleeve (he lost his
right arm while leading his brigade at Fair Oaks), and went away, the
picture of despair.
ARMY OF POTOMAC, _Sunday, Dec. 21_.
The general tone of the army is good; far better than could be
expected. There is regret for our failure, sympathy for our wounded,
mourning for our honored dead; but I find little discouragement and no
demoralization.
This is largely owing to the splendid conduct of all our troops. The
men are hopeful because there are few of the usual jealousies and
heart-burnings. No one is able to say, "If this division had not
broken," or "if that regiment had done its duty, we might have won."
The concurrence of testimony is universal, that our men in every
division did better than they ever did before, and made good their
claim to being the best troops in the world. We have had victories
without merit, but this was a defeat without dishonor.
In many respects--in all respects but the failure of its vital
object--the battle of Fredericksburg was the finest thing of the
war. Laying the bridge, pushing the army across, after the defeat
withdrawing it successfully--all were splendidly done, and redound
alike to the skill of the general and the heroism of the troops.
[Sidenote: HONOR TO THE BRAVE AND BOLD.]
And those men and officers of the Seventh Michigan, the Nineteenth and
Twentieth Massachusetts, and the Eighty-ninth New York, who eagerly
crossed the river in open boats, in the teeth of that pitiless rain of
bullets, and dislodged the sharpshooters who were holding our whole
army at bay--what shall we say of them? Let the name of every man of
them be secured now, and preserved in a roll of honor; let Congress see
to it that, by medal or ribbon to each, the Republic gives token of
gratitude to all who do such royal deeds in its defense. To the living,
at least, we can be just. The fallen, who were left by hundreds in line
of battle, "dead on the field of honor," we cannot reward; but He who
permits no sparrow to fall to the ground unheeded, will see to it that
no drop of their precious blood has been shed in vain.
CHAPTER XXVI.
He hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been So clear in
his great office, that his virtues Will plead like angels,
trumpet-tongued, against The deep damnation of his taking
off.--MACBETH.
[Sidenote: REMINISCENCES OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN.]
The assassination of President Lincoln, while these chapters are in
press, attaches a sad interest to everything connected with his memory.
During the great canvass for the United States Senate, between Mr.
Lincoln and Mr. Douglas, the right of Congress to exclude Slavery from
the Territories was the chief point in dispute. Kansas was the only
region to which it had any practical application; and we, who were
residing there, read the debates with peculiar interest.
No such war of intellects, on the rostrum, was ever witnessed in
America. Entirely without general culture, more ignorant of books than
any other public man of his day, Douglas was christened "the Little
Giant" by the unerring popular instinct. He who, without the learning
of the schools, and without preparation, could cope with Webster,
Seward, and Sumner, surely deserved that appellation. He despised
study. Rising after one of Mr. Sumner's most scholarly and elaborate
speeches, he said: "Mr. President, this is very elegant and able, but
we all know perfectly well that the Massachusetts Senator has been
rehearsing it every night for a month, before a looking-glass, with a
negro holding a candle!"
[Sidenote: HIS GREAT CANVASS WITH DOUGLAS.]
Douglas was, beyond all cotemporaries, a man of the people. Lincoln,
too, was distinctively of the masses; but he represented their sober,
second thought, their higher aspirations, their better possibilities.
Douglas embodied their average impulses, both good and bad. Upon the
stump, his fluency, his hard common sense, and his wonderful voice,
which could thunder like the cataract, or whisper with the breeze,
enabled him to sway them at his will.
Hitherto invincible at home, he now found a foeman worthy of his
steel. All over the country people began to ask about this "Honest Abe
Lincoln," whose inexhaustible anecdotes were so droll, yet so exactly
to the point; whose logic was so irresistible; whose modesty, fairness,
and personal integrity, won golden opinions from his political enemies;
who, without "trimming," enjoyed the support of the many-headed
Opposition in Illinois, from the Abolition Owen Lovejoys of the
northern counties, down to the "conservative" old Whigs of the Egyptian
districts, who still believed in the divinity of Slavery.
Those who did not witness it will never comprehend the universal and
intense horror at every thing looking toward "negro equality" which
then prevailed in southern Illinois. Republican politicians succumbed
to it. In their journals and platforms they sometimes said distinctly:
"We care nothing for the negro. We advocate his exclusion from our
State. We oppose Slavery in the Territories only because it is a curse
to the white man." Mr. Lincoln never descended to this level. In his
plain, moderate, conciliatory way, he would urge upon his simple
auditors that this matter had a Right and a Wrong--that the great
Declaration of their fathers meant something. And--always his strong
point--he would put this so clearly to the common apprehension, and
so touch the people's moral sense, that his opponents found their old
cries of "Abolitionist" and "Negro-worshiper" hollow and powerless.
His defeat, by a very slight majority, proved victory in disguise. The
debates gave him a National reputation. Republican executive committees
in other States issued verbatim reports of the speeches of both
Douglas and Lincoln, bound up together in the order of their delivery.
They printed them just as they stood, without one word of comment, as
the most convincing plea for their cause. Rarely, if ever, has any man
received so high a compliment as was thus paid to Mr. Lincoln.
[Sidenote: HIS VISIT TO KANSAS.]
In Kansas his stories began to stick like chestnut-burrs in the
popular ear--to pass from mouth to mouth, and from cabin to cabin. The
young lawyers, physicians, and other politicians who swarm in the new
country, began to quote from his arguments in their public speeches,
and to regard him as the special champion of their political faith.
Late in the Autumn of 1859 he visited the Territory for the first and
last time. With Marcus J. Parrott, Delegate in Congress, A. Carter
Wilder, afterward Representative, and Henry Villard, a Journalist,
I went to Troy, in Doniphan County, to hear him. In the imaginative
language of the frontier, Troy was a "town"--possibly a city. But, save
a shabby frame court-house, a tavern, and a few shanties, its urban
glories were visible only to the eye of faith. It was intensely cold.
The sweeping prairie wind rocked the crazy buildings, and cut the faces
of travelers like a knife. Mr. Wilder froze his hand during our ride,
and Mr. Lincoln's party arrived wrapped in buffalo-robes.
[Sidenote: HIS MANNER OF PUBLIC SPEAKING.]
Not more than forty people assembled in that little, bare-walled
court-house. There was none of the magnetism of a multitude to inspire
the long, angular, ungainly orator, who rose up behind a rough table.
With little gesticulation, and that little ungraceful, he began, not to
declaim, but to talk. In a conversational tone, he argued the question
of Slavery in the Territories, in the language of an average Ohio or
New York farmer. I thought, "If the Illinoisans consider this a great
man, their ideas must be very peculiar."
But in ten or fifteen minutes I was unconsciously and irresistibly
drawn by the clearness and closeness of his argument. Link after
link it was forged and welded like a blacksmith's chain. He made few
assertions, but merely asked questions: "Is not this true? If you admit
that fact, is not this induction correct?" Give him his premises, and
his conclusions were inevitable as death.
His fairness and candor were very noticeable. He ridiculed nothing,
burlesqued nothing, misrepresented nothing. So far from distorting the
views held by Mr. Douglas and his adherents, he stated them with more
strength probably than any one of their advocates could have done.
Then, very modestly and courteously, he inquired into their soundness.
He was too kind for bitterness, and too great for vituperation.
His anecdotes, of course, were felicitous and illustrative. He
delineated the tortuous windings of the Democracy upon the Slavery
question, from Thomas Jefferson down to Franklin Pierce. Whenever
he heard a man avow his determination to adhere unswervingly to the
principles of the Democratic party, it reminded him, he said, of a
"little incident" in Illinois. A lad, plowing upon the prairie, asked
his father in what direction he should strike a new furrow. The parent
replied, "Steer for that yoke of oxen standing at the further end of
the field." The father went away, and the lad obeyed. But just as he
started, the oxen started also. He kept steering for them; and they
continued to walk. He followed them entirely around the field, and came
back to the starting-point, having furrowed a circle instead of a line!
[Sidenote: HIGH PRAISE FROM AN OPPONENT.]
The address lasted for an hour and three-quarters. Neither rhetorical,
graceful, nor eloquent, it was still very fascinating. The people of
the frontier believe profoundly in fair play, and in hearing both
sides. So they now called for an aged ex-Kentuckian, who was the
heaviest slaveholder in the Territory. Responding, he thus prefaced his
remarks:--
"I have heard, during my life, all the ablest public speakers--all the
eminent statesmen of the past and the present generation. And while I
dissent utterly from the doctrines of this address, and shall endeavor
to refute some of them, candor compels me to say that it is the most
able and the most logical speech I ever listened to."
I have alluded in earlier pages, to remarks touching the reports that
Mr. Lincoln would be assassinated, which I heard in the South, on the
day of his first inauguration. Afterward, in my presence, several
persons of the wealthy, slaveholding class, alluded to the subject,
some having laid wagers upon the event. I heard but one man condemn the
proposed assassination, and he was a Unionist. Again and again, leading
journals, which were called reputable, asked: "Is there no Brutus to
rid the world of this tyrant?" Rewards were openly proposed for the
President's head. If Mr. Lincoln had then been murdered in Baltimore,
every thorough Secession journal in the South would have expressed its
approval, directly or indirectly. Of course, I do not believe that the
masses, or all Secessionists, would have desired such a stain upon the
American name; but even then, as afterward, when they murdered our
captured soldiers, and starved, froze, and shot our prisoners, the men
who led and controlled the Rebels appeared deaf to humanity and to
decency. Charity would fain call them insane; but there was too much
method in their madness.
[Sidenote: A DEED WITHOUT A NAME.]
Their last, great crime of all was, perhaps, needed for an eternal
monument of the influence of Slavery. It was fitting that they who
murdered Lovejoy, who crimsoned the robes of young Kansas, who aimed
their gigantic Treason at the heart of the Republic, before the
curtain went down, should crown their infamy by this deed without a
name. It was fitting that they should seek the lives of President
Lincoln, General Grant, and Secretary Seward, the three officers most
conspicuous of all for their mildness and clemency. It was fitting
they should assassinate a Chief Magistrate, so conscientious, that his
heavy responsibility weighed him down like a millstone; so pure, that
partisan rancor found no stain upon the hem of his garment; so gentle,
that e'en his failings leaned to virtue's side; so merciful, that he
stood like an averting angel between them and the Nation's vengeance.
The Rebel newspapers represented him--a man who used neither spirits
nor tobacco--as in a state of constant intoxication. They ransacked
the language for epithets. Their chief hatred was called out by his
origin. He illustrated the Democratic Idea, which was inconceivably
repugnant to them. That a man who sprang from the people, worked with
his hands, actually split rails in boyhood, should rise to the head
of a Government which included Southern gentlemen, was bitter beyond
description!
[Sidenote: SHERMAN'S QUARREL WITH THE PRESS.]
On the 28th of December, 1862, Sherman fought the battle of Chickasaw
Bayou, one of our first fruitless attempts to capture Vicksburg.
Grant designed to co-operate by an attack from the rear, but his long
supply-line extended to Columbus, Kentucky, though he might have
established a nearer base at Memphis. Van Dorn cut his communications
at Holly Springs, Mississippi, and Grant was compelled to fall back.
Sherman's attack proved a serious disaster. Our forces were flung upon
an almost impregnable bluff, where we lost about two thousand five
hundred men, and were then compelled to retreat.
In the old quarrel between Sherman and the Press, as usual, there was
blame upon both sides. Some of the correspondents had treated him
unjustly; and he had not learned the quiet patience and faith in the
future which Grant exhibited under similar circumstances. At times he
manifested much irritation and morbid sensitiveness.
[Sidenote: AN ARMY CORRESPONDENT COURT-MARTIALED.]
A well-known correspondent, Mr. Thomas W. Knox, was present at the
battle, and placed his report of it, duly sealed, and addressed to a
private citizen, in the military mail at Sherman's head-quarters. One
"Colonel" A. H. Markland, of Kentucky, United States Postal Agent, on
mere surmise about its contents, took the letter from the mail and
permitted it to be opened. He insisted afterward that he did this by
Sherman's express command. Sherman denied giving any such order, but
said he was satisfied with Markland's course.
Markland should have been arrested for robbing the Government mails,
which he was sworn to protect. There was no reasonable pretext for
asserting that the letter would give information to the enemy;
therefore it did not imperil the public interest. If General Sherman
deemed it unjust to himself individually, he had his remedy, like any
other citizen or soldier, in the courts of the country and the justice
of the people.
The purloined dispatch was left for four or five days lying about
Sherman's head-quarters, open to the inspection of officers. Finally,
upon Knox's written request, it was returned to him, though a map which
it contained was kept--as he rather pungently suggested, probably for
the information of the military authorities!
Knox's letter had treated the generalship of the battle very tenderly.
But after this proceeding he immediately forwarded a second account,
which expressed his views on the subject in very plain English. Its
return in print caused great excitement at head-quarters. Knox was
arrested, and tried before a military tribunal on these charges:--
I. Giving information to the enemy.
II. Being a spy.
III. Violating the fifty-seventh Article of War, which forbids the
writing of letters for publication from any United States army without
submitting them to the commanding general for approval.
The court-martial sat for fifteen days. It acquitted Knox upon the
first and second charges. Of course, he was found guilty of the third.
After some hesitation between sentencing him to receive a written
censure, or to leave Grant's department, the latter was decided upon,
and he was banished from the army lines.
When information of this proceeding reached Washington, the members
of the press at once united in a memorial to the President, asking
him to set aside the sentence, inasmuch as the violated Article of
War was altogether obsolete, and the practice of sending newspaper
letters, without any official scrutiny, had been universal, with the
full sanction of the Government, from the outset of the Rebellion.
It was further represented that Mr. Knox was thoroughly loyal, and
the most scrupulously careful of all the army correspondents to write
nothing which, by any possibility, could give information to the enemy.
Colonel John W. Forney headed the memorial, and all the journalists in
Washington signed it.
[Sidenote: A VISIT TO PRESIDENT LINCOLN.]
One evening, with Mr. James M. Winchell, of _The New York Times,_ and
Mr. H. P. Bennett, Congressional Delegate from Colorado, I called upon
the President to present the paper.
After General Sigel and Representative John B. Steele had left, he
chanced to be quite at liberty. Upon my introduction, he remarked:--
"Oh, yes, I remember you perfectly well: you were out on the prairies
with me on that winter day when we almost froze to death; you were then
correspondent of _The Boston Journal_. That German from Leavenworth was
also with us--what was his name?"
[Sidenote: TWO "LITTLE STORIES."]
"Hatterscheit?" I suggested. "Yes, Hatterscheit! By-the-way"
(motioning us to seats, and settling down into his chair, with one
leg thrown over the arm), "that reminds me of a little story, which
Hatterscheit told me during the trip. He bought a pony of an Indian,
who could not speak much English, but who, when the bargain was
completed, said: 'Oats--no! Hay--no! Corn--no! Cottonwood--yes! very
much!' Hatterscheit thought this was mere drunken maundering; but a
few nights after, he tied his horse in a stable built of cottonwood
logs, fed him with hay and corn, and went quietly to bed. The next
morning he found the grain and fodder untouched, but the barn was quite
empty, with a great hole on one side, which the pony had gnawed his way
through! Then he comprehended the old Indian's fragmentary English."
This suggested another reminiscence of the same Western trip. Somewhere
in Nebraska the party came to a little creek, the Indian name of
which signified weeping water. Mr. Lincoln remarked, with a good
deal of aptness, that, as laughing water, according to Longfellow,
was "Minne-haha," the name of this rivulet should evidently be
"Minne-boohoo."
These inevitable preliminaries ended, we presented the memorial asking
the President to interpose in behalf of Mr. Knox. He promptly answered
he would do so if Grant coincided. We reminded him that this was
improbable, as Sherman and Grant were close personal friends. After a
moment's hesitancy he replied, with courtesy, but with emphasis:--
"I should be glad to serve you or Mr. Knox, or any other loyal
journalist. But, just at present, our generals in the field are more
important to the country than any of the rest of us, or all the rest
of us. It is my fixed determination to do nothing whatever which can
possibly embarrass any one of them. Therefore, I will do cheerfully
what I have said, but it is all I can do."
There was too much irresistible good sense in this to permit any
further discussion. The President took up his pen and wrote, reflecting
a moment from time to time, the following:--
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, _March 20, 1863_.
_Whom it may concern_:
_Whereas_, It appears to my satisfaction that Thomas W.
Knox, a correspondent of _The New York Herald_, has been,
by the sentence of a court-martial, excluded from the
military department under command of Major-General Grant,
and also that General Thayer, president of the court-martial
which rendered the sentence, and Major-General McClernand,
in command of a corps of the department, and many other
respectable persons, are of the opinion that Mr. Knox's
offense was technical, rather than wilfully wrong, and that
the sentence should be revoked; Now, therefore, said sentence
is hereby so far revoked as to allow Mr. Knox to return to
General Grant's head-quarters, and to remain if General
Grant shall give his express assent, and to again leave the
department, if General Grant shall refuse such assent.
A. LINCOLN.
[Illustration]
Reading it over carefully, he handed it to me, and gave a little sigh
of relief. General conversation ensued. Despondent and weighed down
with his load of care, he sought relief in frank speaking. He said,
with great earnestness: "God knows that I want to do what is wise and
right, but sometimes it is very difficult to determine."
[Sidenote: MR. LINCOLN'S FAMILIAR CONVERSATION.]
He conversed freely of military affairs, but suddenly remarked: "I am
talking again! Of course, you will remember that I speak to you only as
friends; that none of this must be put in print."
Touching an attack upon Charleston which had long been contemplated, he
said that Du Pont had promised, some weeks before, if certain supplies
were furnished, to make the assault upon a given day. The supplies were
promptly forwarded; the day came and went without any intelligence.
Some time after, he sent an officer to Washington, asking for three
more iron-clads and a large quantity of deck-plating as indispensable
to the preparations.
"I told the officer to say to Commodore Du Pont," observed Mr. Lincoln,
"that I fear he does not appreciate at all the value of time."
[Sidenote: OPINIONS ABOUT MCCLELLAN AND VICKSBURG.]
The Army of the Potomac was next spoken of. The great Fredericksburg
disaster was recent, and the public heart was heavy. In regard to
General McClellan, the President spoke with discriminating justice:--
"I do not, as some do, regard McClellan either as a traitor or an
officer without capacity. He sometimes has bad counselors, but he is
loyal, and he has some fine military qualities. I adhered to him after
nearly all my Constitutional advisers lost faith in him. But do you
want to know when I gave him up? It was after the battle of Antietam.
The Blue Ridge was then between our army and Lee's. We enjoyed the
great advantage over them which they usually had over us: we had the
short line, and they the long one, to the Rebel Capital. I directed
McClellan peremptorily to move on Richmond. It was eleven days before
he crossed his first man over the Potomac; it was eleven days after
that before he crossed the last man. Thus he was twenty-two days in
passing the river at a much easier and more practicable ford than that
where Lee crossed his entire army between dark one night and daylight
the next morning. That was the last grain of sand which broke the
camel's back. I relieved McClellan at once. As for Hooker, I have
told _him_ forty times that I fear he may err just as much one way
as McClellan does the other--may be as over-daring as McClellan is
over-cautious."
We inquired about the progress of the Vicksburg campaign. Our armies
were on a long expedition up the Yazoo River, designing, by digging
canals and threading bayous, to get in the rear of the city and cut off
its supplies. Mr. Lincoln said:--
"Of course, men who are in command and on the spot, know a great deal
more than I do. But immediately in front of Vicksburg, where the river
is a mile wide, the Rebels plant batteries, which absolutely stop our
entire fleets. Therefore it does seem to me that upon narrow streams
like the Yazoo, Yallabusha, and Tallahatchie, not wide enough for a
long boat to turn around in, if any of our steamers which go there ever
come back, there must be some mistake about it. If the enemy permits
them to survive, it must be either through lack of enterprise or lack
of sense."
A few months later, Mr. Lincoln was able to announce to the nation:
"The Father of Waters again flows unvexed to the sea."
Our interview left no grotesque recollections of the President's
lounging, his huge hands and feet, great mouth, or angular features.
We remembered rather the ineffable tenderness which shone through his
gentle eyes, his childlike ingenuousness, his utter integrity, and his
absorbing love of country.
[Sidenote: OUR BEST CONTRIBUTION TO HISTORY.]
Ignorant of etiquette and conventionalities, without the graces of form
or of manner, his great reluctance to give pain, his beautiful regard
for the feelings of others, made him
"Worthy to bear without reproach The grand old name of
Gentleman."
Strong without symmetry, humorous without levity, religious without
cant--tender, merciful, forgiving, a profound believer in Divine love,
an earnest worker for human brotherhood--Abraham Lincoln was perhaps
the best contribution which America has made to History.
His origin among humble laborers, his native judgment, better than the
wisdom of the schools, his perfect integrity, his very ruggedness and
angularities, made him fit representative of the young Nation which
loved and honored him.
[Sidenote: A NOBLE LIFE AND HAPPY DEATH.]
No more shall sound above our tumultuous rejoicing his wise caution,
"Let us be very sober." No more shall breathe through the passions
of the hour his tender pleading that judgment may be tempered with
mercy. His work is done. Nothing could have assured and enlarged his
posthumous fame like this tragic ending. He goes to a place in History
where his peers will be very few. The poor wretch who struck the blow
has gone to be judged by infinite Justice, and also by infinite Mercy.
So have many others indirectly responsible for the murder, and directly
responsible for the war. Let us remember them in no Pharisaic spirit,
thanking God that we are not as other men--but as warnings of what a
race with many generous and manly traits may become by being guilty of
injustice and oppression.
Some of the President's last expressions were words of mercy for his
enemies. A few hours before his death, in a long interview with his
trusted and honored friend Schuyler Colfax, he stated that he wished to
give the Rebel leaders an opportunity to leave the country and escape
the vengeance which seemed to await them here.
America is never likely to feel again the profound, universal grief
which followed the death of Abraham Lincoln. Even the streets of her
great Metropolis "forgot to roar." Hung were the heavens in black.
For miles, every house was draped in mourning. The least feeling was
manifested by that sham aristocracy, which had the least sympathy with
the Union cause and with the Democratic Idea. The deepest was displayed
by the "plain people" and the poor.
What death is happier than thus to be wept by the lowly and oppressed,
as a friend and protector! What life is nobler than thus to be filled,
in his own golden words, "with charity for all, with malice toward
none!"
CHAPTER XXVII.
----It is held That valor is the chiefest virtue and Most
dignifies the haver. If it be, The man I speak of cannot in
the world Be singly counterpoised.--CORIOLANUS.
[Sidenote: REMINISCENCES OF GENERAL SUMNER.]
During the month of March, Major-General Edwin V. Sumner was in
Washington, apparently in vigorous health. He had just been appointed
to the command of the Department of the Missouri. One Saturday evening,
having received his final orders, he was about leaving for his home
in Syracuse, New York, where he designed spending a few days before
starting for St. Louis.
I went into his room to bid him adieu. Allusion was made to the
allegations of speculation against General Curtis, his predecessor in
the West. "I trust," said he, "they are untrue. No general has a right
to make one dollar out of his official position, beyond the salary
which his Government pays him." He talked somewhat in detail of the
future, remarking, "For the present, I shall remain in St. Louis; but
whenever there is a prospect of meeting the enemy, I shall take the
field, and lead my troops in person. Some men can fight battles over a
telegraph-wire, but you know I have no talent in that direction."
With his friendly grasp of the hand, and his kindly smile, he started
for home. It proved to him Home indeed. A week later the country was
startled by intelligence of his sudden death. He, who for forty-eight
years had braved the hardships of campaigning and the perils of battle,
until he seemed to have a charmed life, was abruptly cut down by
disease under his own roof, surrounded by those he loved.
"The breast that trampling Death could spare,
His noiseless shafts assail."
For almost half a century, Sumner had belonged to the Army of the
United States; but he steadfastly refused to be put on the retired
list. Entering the service from civil life, he was free from
professional traditions and narrowness. Senator Wade once asked him,
"How long were you at the Military Academy?" He replied, "I was never
there in my life."
The bluff Ohioan sprang up and shook him fervidly by the hand,
exclaiming, "Thank God for one general of the regular Army, who was
never at West Point!"
[Sidenote: HIS CONDUCT IN KANSAS.]
During the early Kansas troubles, Sumner, then a colonel, was stationed
in the Territory with his regiment of dragoons. Unscrupulous as
were the Administrations of Pierce and Buchanan in their efforts to
force Slavery upon Kansas, embittered as were the people against the
troops,--generally mere tools of Missouri ruffians--their feelings
toward Sumner were kindly and grateful. They knew he was a just man,
who would not willingly harass or oppress them, and who sympathized
with them in their fiery trial.
From the outbreak of the Slaveholders' Rebellion his name was one of
the brightest in that noble but unfortunate army which illustrated
Northern discipline and valor on so many bloody fields, but had never
yet gathered the fruits of victory. He was always in the deadliest of
the fighting. He had the true soldierly temperament. He snuffed the
battle afar off. He felt "the rapture of the strife," and went into it
with boyish enthusiasm.
[Sidenote: A Thrilling Scene in Battle.]
In exposing himself, he was Imprudence personified. It was the chronic
wonder of his friends that he ever came out of battle alive. At last
they began to believe, with him, that he was invincible. He would
receive bullets in his hat, coat, boots, saddle, horse, and sometimes
have his person scratched, but without serious injury. His soldiers
related, with great relish, that in the Mexican War a ball which
struck him square in the forehead fell flattened to the ground without
breaking the skin, as the bullet glances from the forehead of the
buffalo. This anecdote won for him the _soubriquet_ of "Old Buffalo."
At Fair Oaks, his troops were trembling under a pitiless storm of
bullets, when he galloped up and down the advance line, more exposed
than any private in the ranks.
"What regiment is this?" he asked.
"The Fifteenth Massachusetts," replied a hundred voices.
"I, too, am from Massachusetts; three cheers for our old Bay State!"
And swinging his hat, the general led off, and every soldier joined in
three thundering cheers. The enemy looked on in wonder at the strange
episode, but was driven back by the fierce charge which followed.
[Sidenote: HOW SUMNER FOUGHT.]
This was no unusual scene. Whenever the guns began to pound, his
mild eye would flash with fire. He would remove his artificial teeth,
which became troublesome during the excitement of battle, and place
them carefully in his pocket; raise his spectacles from his eyes and
rest them upon the forehead, that he might see clearly objects at a
distance; give his orders to subordinates, and then gallop headlong
into the thick of the fight.
Hundreds of soldiers were familiar with the erect form, the snowy,
streaming hair, and the frank face of that wonderful old man who, on
the perilous edge of battle, while they were falling like grass before
the mower, would dash through the fire and smoke, shouting:--
"Steady, men, steady! Don't be excited. When you have been soldiers as
long as I, you will learn that this is nothing. Stand firm and do your
duty!"
Never seeking a dramatic effect, he sometimes displayed quiet heroism
worthy of history's brightest pages. Once, quite unconsciously
reproducing a historic scene, he repeated, almost word for word, the
address of the great Frederick to his officers, before the battle of
Leuthen. It was on the bloody field of Fair Oaks, at the end of the
second day. He commanded the forces which had crossed the swollen
stream. But before the other troops came up, the bridges were swept
away. The army was then cut in twain; and Sumner, with his three
shattered corps, was left to the mercy of the enemy's entire force.
On that Sunday night, after making his dispositions to receive an
attack, he sent for General Sedgwick, his special friend and a most
trusty soldier:--
"Sedgwick, you perceive the situation. The enemy will doubtless open
upon us at daylight. Re-enforcements are impossible; he can overwhelm
and destroy us. But the country cannot afford to have us defeated.
There is just one thing for us to do; we must stand here and die like
men! Impress it upon your officers that we must do this to the last
man--to the last man! We may not meet again; good-by, Sedgwick."
The two grim soldiers shook hands, and parted. Morning came, but the
enemy, failing to discover our perilous condition, did not renew the
attack; new bridges were built, and the sacrifice was averted. But
Sumner was the man to carry out his resolution to the letter.
[Sidenote: ORDERED BACK BY MCCLELLAN.]
Afterward, he retained possession of a house on our old line of
battle; and his head-quarter tents were brought forward and pitched.
They were within range of a Rebel battery, which awoke the general
and his staff every morning, by dropping shot and shell all about
them for two or three hours. Sumner implored permission to capture or
drive away the hostile battery, but was refused, on the ground that
it might bring on a general engagement. He chafed and stormed: "It is
the most disgraceful thing of my life," he said, "that this should be
permitted." But McClellan was inexorable. Sumner was directed to remove
his head-quarters to a safer position. He persisted in remaining for
fourteen days, and at last only withdrew upon a second peremptory order.
The experience of that fortnight exhibited the ever-recurring miracle
of war--that so much iron and lead may fly about men's ears without
harming them. During the whole bombardment only two persons were
injured. A surgeon was slightly wounded in the head by a piece of shell
which flew into his tent; and a private, while lying behind a log for
protection, was instantly killed by a shot which tore a splinter from
the wood, fracturing his skull; but not another man received even a
scratch.
After Antietam, McClellan's ever-swift apologists asserted that his
corps commanders all protested against renewing the attack upon the
second morning. I asked General Sumner if it were true. He replied,
with emphasis:--
"No, sir! My advice was not asked, and I did not volunteer it. But I
was certainly in favor of renewing the attack. Much, as my troops had
suffered, they were good for another day's fighting, especially when
the enemy had that river in his rear, and a defeat would have ruined
him forever."
[Sidenote: LOVE FOR HIS OLD COMRADES.]
At Fredericksburg, by the express order of Burnside, Sumner did not
cross the river during the fighting. The precaution saved his life. Had
he ridden out on that fiery front, he had never returned to tell what
he saw. But he chafed sadly under the restriction. As the sun went down
on that day of glorious but fruitless endeavor, he paced to and fro in
front of the Lacy House, with one arm thrown around the neck of his
son, his face haggard with sorrow and anxiety, and his eyes straining
eagerly for the arrival of each successive messenger.
He was a man of high but patriotic ambition. Once, hearing General
Howard remark that he did not aspire to the command of a corps, he
exclaimed, "General you surprise me. _I_ would command the world, if I
could!"
He was called arbitrary, but had great love for his soldiers,
especially for old companions in arms. A New York colonel told me a
laughable story of applying to him for a ten days' furlough, when the
rule against them was imperative. Sumner peremptorily refused it. But
the officer sat down beside him, and began to talk about the Peninsular
campaign--the battles in which he had done his duty, immediately under
Sumner's eye; and it was not many minutes before the general granted
his petition. "If he had only waited," said the narrator, "until I
recalled to his memory some scenes at Antietam, I am sure he would have
given me twenty days instead of ten!"
His intercourse with women and children was characterized by
peculiar chivalry and gentleness. He revived the old ideal of the
soldier--terrible in battle, but with an open and generous heart.
To his youngest son--a captain upon his staff--he was bound by unusual
affection. "Sammy" was his constant companion; in private he leaned
upon him, caressed him, and consulted him about the most trivial
matters. It was a touching bond which united the gray, war-worn veteran
to the child of his old age.
We have had greater captains than Sumner; but no better soldiers, no
braver patriots. The words which trembled upon his dying lips--"May God
bless my country, the United States of America"--were the key-note to
his life. Green be the turf above him!
[Sidenote: Traveling Through the Northwest.]
LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY, _April 5, 1863_.
For the last week I have been traveling through the States of the
Northwest. The tone of the people on the war was never better. Now that
the question has become simply one of endurance, their Northern blood
tells. "This is hard pounding, gentlemen," said Wellington at Waterloo;
"but we will see who can pound the longer." So, in spite of the
Copperheads--"merely the dust and chaff on God's thrashing-floor"--the
overwhelming sentiment of the people is to fight it out to the last man
and the last dollar.
You have been wont to say: "The West can be depended on for the war.
She will never give up her great outlet, the Mississippi." True; but
the inference that her loyalty is based upon a material consideration,
is untrue and unjust. The West has poured out its best blood, not on
any petty question of navigation, or of trade, but upon the weightier
issues of Freedom and Nationality.
The New-Yorker or Pennsylvanian may believe in the greatness of the
country; the Kansan or Minnesotian, who has gone one or two thousand
miles to establish his prairie home, walks by sight and not by faith.
To him, the Great Republic of the future is no rhetorical flourish
or flight of fancy, but a living verity. His instinct of nationality
is the very strongest; his belief the profoundest. May he never need
Emerson's pungent criticism: "The American eagle is good; protect it,
cherish it; but beware of the American peacock!"
Have you heard Prentice's last, upon the bursting of the Rebel bubble
that Cotton is King? He says: "They went in for cotton, and they got
worsted!"
[Sidenote: A Visit to Rosecrans's Army.]
MURFREESBORO, TENNESSEE, _April 10_.
A visit to Rosecrans's army. I rode yesterday over the historical
battle-ground of Stone River, among rifle-pits and breastworks, great
oaks, with scarred trunks, and tops and branches torn off, and smooth
fields thickly planted with graves.
It is interesting to hear from the soldiers reminiscences of the
battle. Rosecrans may not be strong in planning a campaign, but the
thundering guns rouse him to the exhibition of a higher military genius
than any other general in our service has yet displayed. The "grand
anger of battle" makes him see at a glance the needs of the occasion,
and stimulates those quick intuitions which enable great captains, at
the supreme moment, to wrest victory from the very grasp of defeat.
Peculiarly applicable to him is Addison's description of Marlborough:--
"In peaceful thought the field of death surveyed;
To fainting squadrons sent the timely aid;
Inspired repulsed battalions to engage,
And taught the doubtful battle where to rage."
[Sidenote: ROSECRANS IN A GREAT BATTLE.]
During the recent great conflict which began with disaster that would
have caused ordinary generals to retreat, he seemed omnipresent. A
devout Catholic, he performed, before entering the battle, the solemn
rites of his Church. A profound believer in destiny, he appeared like
a man who sought for death. A few feet from him, a solid shot took off
the head of Garasche, his loved and trusted chief of staff.
"Brave men must die," he said, and plunged into the battle again.
He had a word for all. Of an Ohio regiment, lying upon the ground, he
asked:--
"Boys, do you see that strip of woods?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, in about five minutes, the Rebels will pour out of it, and come
right toward you. Lie still until you can easily see the buttons on
their coats; then drive them back. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, it's just as easy as rolling off a log, isn't it?"
They laughingly assented, and "Old Rosy," as the soldiers call him,
rode along the line, to encourage some other corps.
This is an army of veterans. Every regiment has been in battle,
and some have marched three thousand miles during their checkered
campaigning. Their garments are old and soiled; but their guns are
bright and glistening, and on review their evolutions are clockwork.
They are splendidly disciplined, of unequaled enthusiasm, full of faith
in their general and in themselves.
Rosecrans is an erect, solid man of one hundred and seventy-five
pounds weight, whose forty-three years sit lightly on his face and
frame. He has a clear, mild-blue eye, which lights and flashes under
excitement; an intensified Roman nose, high cheek-bones, florid
complexion, mouth and chin hidden under dark-brown beard, hair faintly
tinged with silver, and growing thin on the edges of the high, full,
but not broad, forehead. In conversation, a winning, mirthful smile
illumines his face. As Hamlet would take the ghost's word for a
thousand pounds, so you would trust that countenance in a stranger
as indicating fidelity, reserved power, an overflowing humor, and
imperious will.
[Sidenote: A SCENE IN MEMPHIS.]
MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE, _April 20_.
Riding near the Elmwood Cemetery, yesterday, I witnessed a curious
feature of Southern life. It was a negro funeral--the _cortège_,
a third of a mile in length, just entering that city of the dead.
The carriages were filled with negro families, and, almost without
exception, they were driven by white men. If such a picture were
exhibited in Boston, would those who clamor in our ears about negro
equality ever permit us to hear the last of it?
III.
THE DUNGEON.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
We were all sea-swallowed, though some cast again, And by
that destined to perform an act, Whereof what's past is
prologue.--TEMPEST.
On Sunday evening, May 3d, accompanied by Mr. Richard T. Colburn, of
_The New York World_, I reached Milliken's Bend, on the Mississippi
River, twenty-five miles above Vicksburg. Grant's head-quarters were
at Grand Gulf, fifty-five miles below Vicksburg. Fighting had already
begun.
[Sidenote: RUNNING THE VICKSBURG BATTERIES.]
We joined my associate, Mr. Junius H. Browne, of _The Tribune_, who
for several days had been awaiting us. The insatiate hunger of the
people for news, and the strong competition between different journals,
made one day of battle worth a year of camp or siege to the war
correspondent. Duty to the paper we represented required that we should
join the army with the least possible delay.
We could go over land, down the Louisiana shore, and, if we safely
ran the gauntlet of Rebel guerrillas, reach Grand Gulf in three days.
But a little expedition was about to run the Vicksburg batteries. If
it survived the fiery ordeal, it would arrive at Grant's head-quarters
in eight hours. Thus far, three-fourths of the boats attempting to run
the batteries had escaped destruction; and yielding to the seductive
doctrine of probabilities, we determined to try the short, or water
route. It proved a very long one.
[Sidenote: EXPEDITION BADLY FITTED OUT.]
At ten o'clock our expedition started. It consisted of two great barges
of forage and provisions, propelled by a little tug between them. For
some days, Grant had been receiving supplies in this manner, cheaper
and easier than by transportation over rough Louisiana roads.
The lives of the men who fitted out the squadron being as valuable
to them as mine to me, I supposed that all needful precautions for
safety had been adopted. But, when under way, we learned that they
were altogether inadequate. Indeed, we were hardly on board when we
discovered that the expedition was so carelessly organized as almost to
invite capture.
The night was one of the lightest of the year. We had only two buckets,
and not a single skiff. Two tugs were requisite to steer the unwieldy
craft, and enable us to run twelve or fifteen miles an hour. With one
we could accomplish only seven miles, aided by the strong Mississippi
current.
There were thirty-five persons on board--all volunteers. They
consisted of the tug's crew, Captain Ward and Surgeon Davidson of the
Forty-Seventh Ohio Infantry, with fourteen enlisted men, designed to
repel possible boarders, and other officers and citizens, _en route_
for the army.
For two or three hours, we glided silently along the glassy waters
between banks festooned with heavy, drooping foliage. It was a scene
of quiet, surpassing beauty. Captain Ward suddenly remembered that he
had some still Catawba in his valise. He was instructed to behead the
bottle with his sword, that the wine might not in any event be wasted.
From a soldier's cup of gutta-percha we drank to the success of the
expedition.
[Sidenote: INTO THE JAWS OF DEATH.]
At one o'clock in the morning, on the Mississippi shore, a rocket shot
up and pierced the sky, signaling the Rebels of our approach. Ten
minutes later, we saw the flash and heard the boom of their first gun.
Much practice on similar expeditions had given them excellent range.
The shell struck one of our barges, and exploded upon it.
We were soon under a heavy fire. The range of the batteries covered the
river for nearly seven miles. The Mississippi here is very crooked,
resembling the letter S, and at some points we passed within two
hundred yards of ten-inch guns, with point-blank range upon us. As we
moved around the bends, the shots came toward us at once from right and
left, front and rear.
Inclination had joined with duty in impelling us to accompany the
expedition. We wanted to learn how one would feel looking into the
craters of those volcanoes as they poured forth sheets of flame and
volleys of shells. I ascertained to my fullest satisfaction, as we lay
among the hay-bales, slowly gliding past them. I thought it might be a
good thing to do once, but that, if we survived it, I should never feel
the least desire to repeat the experiment.
We embraced the bales in Bottom's belief that "good hay, sweet hay hath
no fellow."
Discretion was largely the better part of my valor, and I cowered
close in our partial shelter. But two or three times I could not resist
the momentary temptation to rise and look about me. How the great
sheets of flame leaped up and spread out from the mouths of the guns!
How the shells came screaming and shrieking through the air! How they
rattled and crashed, penetrating the sides of the barges, or exploding
on board in great fountains of fire!
[Sidenote: A MOMENT OF SUSPENSE.]
The moment hardly awakened serene meditations or sentimental memories;
but every time I glanced at that picture, Tennyson's lines rang in my
ears:--
"Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered;
Stormed at by shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of death,
Into the mouth of hell
Rode the six hundred!"
"Junius" persisted in standing, all exposed, to watch the coming shots.
Once, as a shell exploded near at hand, he fell heavily down among the
hay-bales. Until that moment I never knew what suspense was. I could
find no voice in which to ask if he lived. I dared not put forth my
hand in the darkness, lest it should rest on his mutilated form. At
last he spoke, and relieved my anxiety. He had only slipped and fallen.
Each time, after being struck, we listened for the reassuring puff!
puff! puff! of our little engine; and hearing it, said: "Thus far, at
least, we are all right!"
Now we were below the town, having run five miles of batteries. Ten
minutes more meant safety. Already we began to felicitate each other
upon our good fortune, when the scene suddenly changed.
A terrific report, like the explosion of some vast magazine, left us
breathless, and seemed to shake the earth to its very center. It was
accompanied by a shriek which I shall never forget, though it seemed
to occupy less than a quarter of the time consumed by one tick of the
watch. It was the death-cry wrung from our captain, killed as he stood
at the wheel. For his heedlessness in fitting out the expedition, his
life was the penalty.
[Sidenote: DISABLED AND DRIFTING HELPLESSLY.]
We listened, but the friendly voice from the tug was hushed. We were
disabled, and drifting helplessly in front of the enemy's guns!
For a moment all was silent. Then there rose from the shore the shrill,
sharp, ragged yell so familiar to the ears of every man who has been in
the front, and clearly distinguishable from the deep, full, chest-tones
in which our own men were wont to give their cheers. Many times had I
heard that Rebel yell, but never when it was vociferous and exultant as
now.
Seeing fire among the hay-bales about us, Colburn and myself carefully
extinguished it with our gloved hands, lest the barge should be burnt.
Then, creeping out of our refuge, we discovered the uselessness of our
care.
That shot had done wonderful execution. It had killed the captain,
exploded the boiler, then passed into the furnace, where the shell
itself exploded, throwing up great sheets of glowing coals upon
both barges. At some stage of its progress, it had cut in twain the
tug, which went down like a plummet. We looked for it, but it had
disappeared altogether. There was some _débris_--chairs, stools, and
parts of machinery, buoyed up by timbers, floating upon the surface;
but there was no tug.
The barges, covered with bales of dry hay, had caught like tinder, and
now, at the stern of each, a great sheet of flame rose far toward the
sky, filling the night with a more than noonday glare.
Upon the very highest bale, where the flames threw out his pale face
and dark clothing in very sharp relief, stood "Junius," in a careless
attitude, looking upon the situation with the utmost serenity. My first
thought was that the one thing he required to complete the picture
was an opera-glass. To my earnest injunction to leave that exposed
position, he replied that, so far as safety was concerned, there now
was little choice of places.
Meanwhile, we were under hotter fire than at any previous moment. In
the confusion caused by our evolutions in the eddies, I had quite lost
the points the of compass, and asked:--
"In which direction is Vicksburg?"
"There," replied "Junius," pointing out into the lurid smoke.
"I think it must be on the other shore."
"Oh, no! wait here a moment, and you will see the flash of the guns."
Just then I did see the flash of more guns than I coveted, and four or
five shots came shrieking toward us.
Colburn and myself instinctively dropped behind the nearest hay-bales.
A moment after, we were amused to observe that we had sought shelter on
the wrong side of the bales--the side facing the Rebel guns. Our barge
was so constantly changing position that our geographical ideas had
become very confused.
[Sidenote: BOMBARDING, SCALDING, BURNING, DROWNING.]
It does not often happen to men, in one quarter of an hour, to see
death in as many forms as confronted us--by bombarding, scalding,
burning, and drowning. It was uncomfortable, but less exciting than one
might suppose. The memory impresses me far more deeply than did the
experience. I remember listening, during a little cessation of the din,
for the sound of my own voice, wondering whether its tones were calm
and equable. There was hurrying to and fro, and groans rent the air.
"I suppose we can surrender," cried a poor, scalded fellow.
"Surrender--the devil!" replied Colburn. "I suppose we will fight them!"
It was very creditable to the determination of our _confrère_; but, to
put it mildly, our fighting facilities just then were somewhat limited.
[Sidenote: TAKING TO A HAY-BALE.]
My comrades assisted nearly all wounded and scalded men down the sides
of the barge to the water's edge, and placed them carefully upon
hay-bales. Remaining there, we had every thing to lose and nothing to
gain, and I urged--
"Let us take to the water."
"Oh, yes," my friends replied, "we will after awhile."
Soon, I repeated the suggestion, and they repeated the answer. It was
no time to stand upon forms. I jumped into the river--twelve or fifteen
feet below the top of our barge. They rolled over a hay-bale for me.
I climbed upon it, and found it a surprisingly comfortable means of
navigation. At last, free from the instinctive dread of mutilation by
splinters, which had constantly haunted me, I now felt that if wounded
at all it must, at least, be by a clean shot. The thought was a great
relief.
With a dim suspicion--not the ripe and perfect knowledge afterward
obtained--that clothing was scarce in the Southern Confederacy, I
removed my boots, tied them together with my watch-guard, and fastened
them to one of the hoops of the bale. Taking off my coat, I secured it
in the same manner.
[Sidenote: OVERTURNED BY A SHOT.]
I was about swimming away in a vague, blundering determination not to
be captured, when, for the first time in my life, I saw a shot coming
toward me. I had always been sceptical on this point. Many persons had
averred to me that they could see shots approaching; but remembering
that such a missile flying toward a man with a scream and a rush would
not quicken his vision, and judging from my own experience, I supposed
they must be deceived.
Now, far up the river I saw a shot coming with vivid distinctness.
How round, smooth, shining, and black it looked, ricochetting along,
plunging into the water, throwing up great jets of spray, bounding like
a schoolboy's ball, and then skimming the river again! It struck about
four feet from my hay-bale, which was now a few yards from the burning
barge.
The great sheet of water which dashed up quite obscured me from Colburn
and "Junius," who, upon the bows of the barge, were just bidding me
adieu. At first they thought the shot an extinguisher. But it did me
no greater harm than partially to overturn my hay-bale and dip me into
the river. A little more or less dampness just then was not of much
consequence. It was the last shot which I saw or heard. The Rebels now
ceased firing, and shouted--
"Have you no boats?"
Learning that we had none, they sent out a yawl. I looked about for
a plank, but could find none adapted to a long voyage. Rebel pickets
were on both sides of the river, and Rebel batteries lined it ten or
twelve miles below, at a point which, by floating, one could reach at
daylight. Surrender seemed the only alternative.
At Memphis, two days before, I had received a package of letters,
including two or three from the _Tribune_ office, and some which
treated of public men, and military strength, movements, and prospects,
with great freedom. One of them, from Admiral Foote, containing some
very kind words, I sorely regretted to lose; but the package was quite
too valuable to be submitted to the scrutiny of the enemy. I kept it
until the last moment, but when the Rebel yawl approached within twenty
feet, tore the letters in pieces and threw them into the Mississippi.
[Illustration: THE CAPTURE, WHILE RUNNING THE REBEL BATTERIES, AT
VICKSBURG.]
[Sidenote: RESCUED FROM THE RIVER.]
The boat was nearly full. After picking me up, it received on board two
scalded men who were floating near, and whose groans were heart-rending.
We were deposited on the Mississippi shore, under guard of four or five
soldiers in gray, and the yawl went back to receive the remainder.
Among the saved I found Surgeon Davidson. He was unable to swim, but
some one had carefully placed him upon a hay-bale. On reaching the
shore, he sat down upon a stool, which he had rescued from the river,
spread his overcoat upon his knee, and deposited his carpet-sack
beside him. It was the first case I ever knew of a man so hopelessly
shipwrecked, who saved all his baggage, and did not even wet his feet.
The boat soon returned. To my infinite relief, the first persons who
sprang to the shore were "Junius" and Colburn. Sartorially they had
been less fortunate than I. One had lost his coat, and the other was
without shoes, stockings, coat, vest, or hat.
There, in the moonlight, guarded by Rebel bayonets, we counted the
rescued, and found that just sixteen--less than half our number--were
alive and unharmed. All the rest were killed, scalded, or wounded.
Some of the scalded were piteous spectacles. The raw flesh seemed
almost ready to drop from their faces; and they ran hither and thither,
half wild from excruciating pain.
None of the wounded were unable to walk, though one or two had broken
arms. The most had received slight contusions, which a few days would
heal.
[Sidenote: THE KILLED, WOUNDED, AND MISSING.]
The missing numbered eight or ten, not one of whom was ever heard of
afterward. It was impossible to obtain any correct list of their names,
as several of them were strangers to us and to each other; and no
record had been made of the persons starting upon the expedition.
We were two miles below the city, whither the lieutenant of our guard
now marched us.
CHAPTER XXIX.
It is not for prisoners to be too silent.--LOVE'S LABOR LOST.
[Sidenote: STANDING BY OUR COLORS.]
On the way, one of our party enjoined my colleague and myself--
"You had better not say _Tribune_ to the Rebels. Tell them you are
correspondents of some less obnoxious journal."
Months before, I had asked three Confederate officers--paroled
prisoners within our lines:--
"What would you do with a _Tribune_ correspondent, if you captured
him?" With the usual recklessness, two had answered:--
"We would hang him upon the nearest sapling."
This remembrance was not cheering; but as we were the first
correspondents of a radical Northern journal who had fallen into the
enemy's hands, after a moment's interchange of views, we decided to
stand by our colors, and tell the plain truth. It proved much the wiser
course.
One of the rescued men, coatless and hatless, with his face blackened
until he looked like a native of Timbuctoo, addressed me familiarly.
Unable to recognize him, I asked:--
"Who are you?"
"Why," he replied, "I am Captain Ward."[15]
[15] Commander, not of the tug, whose captain was killed, but of the
soldiers guarding it and the barges.
[Sidenote: CONFINEMENT IN THE VICKSBURG JAIL.]
When the explosion occurred, he was sitting on the hurricane roof of
the tug. It was more exposed than any other position, but the officers
of the boat had shown symptoms of fear, and he determined to be where
his revolver would enable him to control them if they attempted to
desert us.
Some missile struck his head and stunned him. When he recovered
consciousness, the tug had gone to the bottom, and he was struggling
in the river. He had strength enough to clutch a rope hanging over the
side of a barge, and keep his head above water. Permitting his sword
and revolver, which greatly weighed him down, to sink, he called to his
men on the blazing wreck. Under the hot fire of cannon and musketry,
they formed a rope of their belts, and let it down to him. He fastened
it under his arms; they lifted him up to the barge, whence he escaped
by the hay-bale line.
At Vicksburg, the commander of the City Guards registered our names.
"I hope, sir," said Colburn, "that you will give us comfortable
quarters."
With a half-surprised expression, the major replied, dryly:--
"Oh! yes, sir; we will do the best we can for you."
"The best" proved ludicrously bad. Just before daylight we were taken
into the city jail. Its foul yard was half filled with criminals and
convicts, black and white, all dirty and covered with vermin. In its
midst was an open sewer, twelve or fifteen feet in diameter, the grand
receptacle of all the prison filth. The rising sun of that sultry
morning penetrated its reeking depths, and produced the atmosphere of a
pest-house.
We dried our clothing before a fire in the yard, conversed with the
villainous-looking jail-birds, and laughed about this unexpected result
of our adventure. We had felt the danger of wounds or death; but it
had not occurred to either of us that we might be captured. One of the
private soldiers had paid a dollar for the privilege of coming on the
expedition. To our query whether he deemed the money well invested,
he replied that he would not have missed the experience for ten times
the amount. One youth, confined in the jail for thieving, asked us the
question, with which we were soon to grow familiar:--
"What did you all come down here for, to steal our niggers?"
At noon we were taken out and marched through the streets. "Junius's"
bare and bleeding feet excited the sympathy of a lady, who immediately
sent him a pair of stockings, requesting if ever he met any of "our
soldiers" suffering in the North, that he would do as much for them.
The donor--Mrs. Arthur--was a very earnest Unionist, with little
sympathy for "our soldiers," but used the phrase as one of the habitual
subterfuges of the Loyalists.
[Sidenote: THE FIRST GLIMPSE OF SAMBO.]
While we waited in the office of the Provost-Marshal, I obtained a
first brief glimpse of the inevitable negro. Just outside the open
window, which extended to the floor, stood an African, with great
shining eyes, expressing his sympathy through remarkable grimaces and
contortions, bowing, scraping, and
"Husking his white ivories like an ear of corn."
Rebel citizens and soldiers were all about him; and, somewhat alarmed,
I indicated by a look that he should be a little less demonstrative.
But Sambo, as usual, knew what he was doing, and was not detected.
The Provost-Marshal, Captain Wells, of the Twenty-eighth Louisiana
Infantry, courteously assigned to us the upper story of the
court-house, posting a sentinel at the door.
[Sidenote: PAROLED TO RETURN HOME.]
Major Watts, the Rebel Agent of Exchange, called upon us and
administered the following parole:--
CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA.
VICKSBURG, MISSISSIPPI, _May 4, 1863_.
This is to certify, that in accordance with a Cartel in
regard to an exchange of prisoners entered into between
the Governments of the United States of America and the
Confederate States of America, on the 22d day of July, 1862,
Albert D. Richardson, citizen of New York, who was captured
on the 4th day of May, at Vicksburg, and has since been held
as a prisoner of war by the military authorities of the said
Confederate States, is hereby paroled, _with full leave to
return to his country_ on the following conditions, namely:
that he will not take up arms again, nor serve as military
police or constabulary force in any fort, garrison, or
field-work, held by either of said parties, nor as a guard of
prisoners, dépôts, or stores, nor discharge any duty usually
performed by soldiers, until exchanged under the Cartel
referred to. The aforesaid Albert D. Richardson signifying
his full and free consent to said conditions by his signature
hereto, thereby solemnly pledges his word and honor to a due
observance of the same.
ALBERT D. RICHARDSON.
N. G. WATTS, _Major Confederate States Army, and Agent for
Exchange of Prisoners_.
This parole was regular, formal, and final, taken at a regular
point of exchange, by an officer duly appointed under the express
provisions of the cartel. Major Watts informed us that he was prevented
from sending us across the lines at Vicksburg, only because Grant's
operations had suspended flag-of-truce communication. He assured us,
that while he was thus compelled to forward us to Richmond, the only
other point of exchange, we should not be detained there beyond the
arrival of the first truce-boat.
[Sidenote: TURNING THE TABLES HANDSOMELY.]
These formalities ended, the major, who was a polite, kind-hearted,
rather pompous little officer, made an attempt at condolence and
consolation.
"Gentlemen," said he, with a good deal of self-complacency,
"you are a long way from home. However, do not despond; I
have met a great many of your people in this condition; I
have paroled some thousands of them, first and last. In
fact, I confidently expect, within the next ten days, to see
Major-General Grant, who commands your army, a prisoner in
this room."
We knew something about that! Of course, we were familiar with the size
of Grant's army; and, before we had been many hours in the Rebel lines,
we found Union people who told us minutely the strength of Pemberton.
So we replied to the prophet, that, while we had no sort of doubt of
his seeing General Grant there, it would not be exactly in the capacity
of a prisoner!
Colburn--who had the good fortune, for that occasion, to be attached to
_The World_, and who, on reaching Richmond, was sent home by the first
truce-boat--came back to Vicksburg in season to be in at the death. One
of the first men he met, after the capture of the city, was Watts, to
whom he rehearsed this little scene, with the characters reversed.
"Major," said he, with dry humor, "you are a long distance
from home! But do not despond; I have seen a good many of
your people in this condition. In fact, I believe there
are about thirty thousand of them here to-day, including
Lieutenant-General Pemberton, who commands _your_ army."
[Sidenote: VISITS FROM MANY REBELS.]
We stayed in Vicksburg two days. Our noisy advent made us objects
of attention. Several Rebel journalists visited us, with tenders of
clothing, money, and any assistance they could render. Confederate
officers and citizens called in large numbers, inquiring eagerly about
the condition of the North, and the public feeling touching the war.
Some complained that Northern officers, while in confinement, had said
to them: "While we are in favor of the Union, we disapprove altogether
the war as conducted by this Abolition Administration, with its
tendencies to negro equality;" but that, after reaching home, the same
persons were peculiarly radical and bloodthirsty.
As political affairs were the only topic of conversation, we had
excellent opportunity for preventing any similar misunderstanding
touching ourselves. Courteously, but frankly, we told them that we were
in favor of the war, of emancipation, and of arming the negroes. They
manifested considerable feeling, but used no harsh expressions. Two
questions they invariably asked:--
"What are you going to do with us, after you have subjugated
us?" and, "What will you do with the negroes, after you have
freed them?"
They talked much of our leading officers, all seeming to consider
Rosecrans the best general in the Union service. Nearly all used the
stereotyped Rebel expression:--
"You can never conquer seven millions of people on their own
soil. We will fight to the last man! We will die in the last
ditch!"
We reminded them that the determination they expressed was by no means
peculiar to them, referring to Bancroft, in proof that even the Indian
tribes, at war with the early settlers of New England, used exactly
the same language. We asked one Texan colonel, noticeably voluble
concerning the "last ditch," what he meant by it--if he really intended
to fight after their armies should be dispersed and their cities taken.
"Oh, no!" he replied, "you don't suppose I'm a fool, do you? As long as
there is any show for us, we shall fight you. If you win, most of us
will go to South America, Mexico, or Europe."
[Sidenote: INTERVIEW WITH JACOB THOMPSON.]
On Monday evening, Major-General Forney, of Alabama, sent an officer to
escort us to his head-quarters. He received us with great frigidity,
and we endeavored to be quite as icy as he. With some of his staff
officers, genial young fellows educated in the North, we had a pleasant
chat.
Jacob Thompson, of Mississippi, Buchanan's Secretary of the Interior,
and now a colonel on the staff of Lieutenant-General Pemberton, was
at the same head-quarters. With the suavity of an old politician,
he conversed with us for two or three hours. He asserted that some
of our soldiers had treated his aged mother with great cruelty. He
declared that Northern dungeons now contained at least three thousand
inoffensive Southern citizens, who had never taken up arms, and were
held only for alleged disloyalty.
Many other Rebel officers talked a great deal about arbitrary arrests
in the North. Several gravely assured us that, in the South, from the
beginning of the war, no citizen had ever been arrested, except by due
process of law, under charges well defined, and publicly made. We were
a little astounded, afterward, to learn how utterly bare-faced was this
falsehood.
On Tuesday evening we started for Jackson, Mississippi, in company
with forty other Union prisoners. They were mainly from Ohio regiments,
young in years, but veteran soldiers--farmers' sons, with intelligent,
earnest faces. Pemberton's army was in motion. Our train passed slowly
through his camps, and halted half an hour at several points, among
crowds of Rebel privates.
The Ohio boys and their guards were on the best possible terms,
drinking whisky and playing euchre together. The former indulged in a
good deal of verbal skirmishing with the soldiers outside, thrusting
their heads from the car windows and shouting:--
"Look out, Rebs! The Yankees are coming! Keep on marching, if you don't
want old Grant to catch you!"
"How are times in the North?" the Confederates replied. "Cotton a
dollar and twenty-five cents a pound in New York!"
"How are times in the South? Flour one hundred and seventy-five dollars
a barrel in Vicksburg, and none to be had at that!"
After waiting vainly for an answer to this quenching retort, the
Buckeyes sang "Yankee Doodle," the "Star-Spangled Banner," and "John
Brown's Body lies a-moldering in the Ground," for the edification of
their bewildered foes.
[Sidenote: ARRIVAL IN JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI.]
Before dark, we reached Jackson. Though a prisoner, I entered it with
far more pleasurable feelings than at my last visit; for my tongue was
now free, and I was not sailing under false colors. The dreary little
city was in a great panic. Before we had been five minutes in the
street, a precocious young newsboy came running among us, and, while
shouting--"Here's _The Mississippian_ extra!" talked to us incessantly
in a low tone:--
"How are you, Yanks? You have come in a capital time.
Greatest panic you ever saw. Everybody flying out of town.
Governor Pettus issued a proclamation, telling the people to
stand firm, and then ran away himself before the ink was dry."
[Sidenote: KINDNESS FROM SOUTHERN EDITORS.]
We remained in Jackson three days. Upon parole, we were allowed to
take our meals at a boarding-house several squares from the prison,
and to visit the office of _The Appeal_. This journal, originally
published at Memphis, was removed to Grenada upon the approach of our
forces; Grenada being threatened, it was transferred to Jackson; thence
to Atlanta, and finally to Montgomery, Alabama. It was emphatically a
moving _Appeal_.
Its editors very kindly supplied us with clothing and money. They
seemed to be sick of the war, and to retain little faith in the Rebel
cause, for which they had sacrificed so much, abandoning property in
Memphis to the amount of thirty thousand dollars. They now published
the most enterprising and readable newspaper in the South. It was
noticeably free from vituperation, calling the President "Mr. Lincoln,"
instead of the "Illinois Baboon," and characterizing us not as Yankee
scoundrels, but as "unwilling guests"--
"Gentlemen who attempted to run the batteries on Sunday
night, and after escaping death from shot and shell, from
being scalded by the rushing steam, from roasting by the
lively flames that enveloped their craft, were found in the
river by a rescuing party, each clinging tenaciously to a
bale of hay for safety."
Grant's army was moving toward Jackson. We longed for his approach,
straining our ears for the booming of his guns. The Rebels, in their
usual strain, declared that the city could not be captured, and would
be defended to the last drop of blood. But on the night before our
departure, we were confidentially told that the Federal advance was
already within twenty-five miles, and certain to take the town.
[Sidenote: A PROJECT FOR ESCAPE.]
With forty-five unarmed prisoners, we were placed on an ammunition
train, which had not more than a dozen guards. The privates begged
Captain Ward to lead them, and permit them to capture the train. We
all deemed the project feasible. Ten minutes would suffice to blow up
the cars. With twelve guns, we could easily march twenty miles through
those sparse settlements to Grant's forces.
But there were our paroles! A careful reading convinced us that if we
failed in the attempt, the enemy would be justified, under the laws of
war, in punishing us with death; and, after much debate, we abandoned
the project.
Rebel officers in Vicksburg had assured us that crossing the
Confederacy from the Mississippi to the Atlantic, upon the Southern
railroads, was a more hazardous undertaking than running the river
batteries. The rolling stock was in wretched condition, and fatal
accidents frequently occurred; but we traveled at a leisurely,
old-fashioned rate, averaging eight miles per hour, making long stops,
and seldom running by night.
CHAPTER XXX.
A kind of excellent, dumb discourse.--TEMPEST.
It did not require many days of captivity to teach us the infinite
expressiveness and trustworthiness of the human eye. We began to
recognize Union people by their friendly look before they spoke a word.
[Sidenote: A WORD WITH A UNION WOMAN.]
Our train stopped for dinner at a secluded Mississippi tavern. At the
door of the long dining-room stood the landlady, an intelligent woman
of about thirty-five. When I handed her a twenty-dollar Rebel note, she
inquired--
"Have you nothing smaller than this?"
"No Confederate money," I answered.
"State currency will answer just as well."
"I have none of that--nothing but this bill and United States Treasury
Notes."
The indifferent face instantly kindled into friendliness and sympathy.
"Are you one of the prisoners?"
"Yes, madam."
"Just from Vicksburg?"
"Yes."
"What do you think of the prospect?"
"Grant is certain to capture the city."
"Of course he will" (with great earnestness), "if he only tries! The
force there is incapable of resisting him."
Other passengers coming within hearing, I moved away, but I would
unhesitatingly have trusted that woman with my liberty or my life.
[Sidenote: GRIERSON'S GREAT MISSISSIPPI RAID.]
Grierson's raid, then in progress, was the universal theme of
conversation and wonder. That dashing cavalier, selecting his route
with excellent judgment, evaded all the large forces which opposed
him, and defeated all the small ones, while he rode leisurely the
entire length of Mississippi, tearing up railroads and burning bridges.
Occasionally he addressed the people in humorous harangues. To one old
lady, who tremblingly begged that her property might not be destroyed,
he replied:--
"You shall certainly be protected, madam. It is not my object to hurt
any body. It is not generally known, but the truth is, I am a candidate
for Governor, and am stumping the State."
Our slow progress enabled us to converse much with the people,
constantly preaching to them the gospel of the Union. But they had so
long heard only the gospel according to Jefferson Davis, that they paid
little heed to our threatenings of the judgment which was certain to
come.
In the dense woods which the railways traversed, the pine, the palm and
the magnolia, grew side by side, festooned with long, hairy tufts of
Spanish moss. On the plantations, the young cotton, three inches high,
looked like sprouting beans.
[Sidenote: AN ENRAGED TEXAN OFFICER.]
Colburn's solemn waggery was constantly cropping out. In our car
one day he had a long discussion with a brawny Texan officer, who
declared with great bitterness that he had assisted in hanging three
Abolitionists upon a single blackjack,[16] in sight of his own door. He
concluded with the usual assertion:--
[16] A species of Southern oak.
"We will fight to the last man! We will die in the last ditch!"
"Well, sir," replied Colburn, with the utmost gravity, "if you should
do that and all be killed, we should regret it extremely!"
Like most Southerners, the Texan was insensible to satire.
Understanding this to be perfectly sincere, he reiterated:--
"We shall do it, sir! We shall do it!"
"Well, sir, as I said before, if you do, and all happen to _get_
killed, including the very last man himself, of course we of the North
shall be quite heart-broken!"
Once comprehended, the mock condolence enraged the huge Texan
fearfully. For a few seconds his eyes were the most wicked I ever saw.
He looked ready to spring upon Colburn and tear him in pieces; but it
was the last we heard of his bravado.
One of our fellow-prisoners had manifested great trepidation while we
lay disabled in front of Vicksburg. He was probably no more frightened
than the rest of us, but had less self-control, running to and fro on
the burning barge, wringing his hands, and shrieking: "My God! my God!
We shall all be killed!"
[Sidenote: WAGGERY OF A CAPTURED SCRIBE.]
Three or four days later, Colburn asked him--
"Were you ever under fire before Sunday night?"
"Never," he replied, with uneasy, questioning looks.
"Well, sir," solemnly continued the satirist, "I think, in view of that
fact, that you behaved with more coolness than any man I ever saw!"
While we preserved our gravity with the utmost difficulty, the
victim scrutinized his tormentor very suspiciously. But that serious,
immovable face told no tales, and he finally received the compliment
as serious. From that time, it was Colburn's daily delight, to remark,
with ever-increasing admiration:--
"Mr. ----, I cannot help remembering how marvelously self-possessed you
were during those exciting minutes. I never saw your coolness equaled
by a man under fire for the first time."
Before we reached Richmond, the new-fledged hero received his praises
with complacent and serene condescension. He will, doubtless, tell
his children and grandchildren of the encomium his courage won from
companions, who, "born and nursed in Danger's path, had dared her
worst."
At Demopolis, Alabama, we encountered a planter removing from
Mississippi, where Grierson and Grant were rapidly depreciating slave
property. He had with him a long gang of negroes, some chained together
in pairs, with handcuffs riveted to their wrists.
While the train stopped, a young fellow from Kentucky, captain and
commissary in the Confederate army, took me up to his room, on pretext
of "a quiet drink."
"When I went into the war," said he, "I thought it would be a nice
little diversion of about two weeks, with a good deal of fun and no
fighting. Now, I would give my right arm to escape from it; but there
is no such good fortune for me. When you reach the North, write to my
friends at home, giving them my love, and saying that I wish I had
followed their advice."
A benevolent lady was at the station, with her carriage, distributing
cakes among the Rebel soldiers and the Union prisoners.
At Selma, a new officer took charge of our party. The post commandant
instructed him how to treat the privates, and, pointing to the two
officers and the three journalists, added:--
[Sidenote: THE ALABAMA RIVER AND MONTGOMERY.]
"You will consider these gentlemen not under your guard, but under your
escort."
We took a steamer up the Alabama River. As we sat looking out upon the
beautiful stream, it was amusing to hear the comments of the negro
chamber-maids:--
"How mean the Southern soldiers look! But just see those Yankees!
Anybody might know that they are God's own people!"
The pilot of the boat, a native Alabamian, took me aside, stating that
he was an unconditional Union man, and inquiring eagerly about the
North, which, he feared, might abandon the contest.
We spent Sunday, May 11th, in the pleasant city of Montgomery:
strolling at pleasure through the shaded streets, and at evening taking
a bath in the Alabama, swimming round a huge Rebel ram, then nearly
completed. We gained some knowledge of its character and dimensions,
which, after reaching Richmond, we succeeded in transmitting to the
Government.
The officer in charge of our party spent the night in camp with his
men, but we slept at the Exchange Hotel. When we registered our names,
the bystanders, with their broad-brimmed hats, long pipes, and heavy
Southern faces, manifested a good deal of curiosity to see what they
termed "two of old Greeley's correspondents." They asked us many
questions of the North, and of our army experiences. Several said
emphatically that, ere long, the people would "take this thing out of
the hands of politicians, and settle it themselves."
[Sidenote: ATLANTA EDITORS ADVOCATE HANGING US.]
Reaching Atlanta, we were placed in the filthy, vermin-infested
military prison. Encouraged by the courtesies we had received from
Rebel journals, we sent, through the commandant, a card to one of
the newspaper offices, asking for a few exchanges. The blundering
messenger took it to the wrong establishment, leaving it at the office
of an intensely bitter sheet called _The Confederate_. The next
morning we were not allowed to purchase newspapers. Learning that _The
Confederate_ commented upon our request, we induced an _attaché_ of the
prison to smuggle a copy to us, and found the following leader:--
"Last evening some correspondents of _The New York World_
and _New York Tribune_ were brought here among a batch of
prisoners captured at Vicksburg a few days ago. They had not
been here a half hour before the impudent scamps got one
of the sentinels guarding the barracks to go around to the
newspaper offices in this city with their 'card,' requesting
the favor of some exchange-papers to read. Their impudence is
beyond comprehension, upon any other consideration than that
they belong to the Yankee press-gang. Yankees are everywhere
more impudent than any honest race of people can be, and a
Yankee newspaper-man is the quintessence of all impudence. We
thought we had seen and understood something of this Yankee
accomplishment in times gone by (some specimens of it have
been seen in the South); but the unheard-of effrontery that
prompted these villains, who, caught in company with the
thieving, murdering vandals who have invaded our country,
despoiled our homes, murdered our citizens, destroyed our
property, violated our wives, sisters, and daughters, to
boldly claim of the press of the South the courtesies and
civilities which gentlemen of the press usually extend to
each other, is above and beyond all the unblushing audacity
we ever imagined. They had come along with Northern vandals,
to chronicle their rapes, arsons, plunders, and murders, and
to herald them to the world as deeds of heroism, greatness,
and glory. They are our vilest and most unprincipled
enemies--far more deeply steeped in guilt, and far more
richly deserving death, than the vilest vandal that ever
invaded the sanctity of our soil and outraged our homes and
our peace. We would greatly prefer to assist in hanging these
enemies to humanity, than to show them any civilities or
courtesies. The common robber, thief, and murderer, is more
respectable, in our estimation, than these men; for he never
tries to make his crimes respectable, but always to conceal
them. These men, however, have come into our country with the
open robbers and murderers of our people, for the express
purpose of whitewashing their hellish deeds, and presenting
them to the world as great deeds of virtuous heroism. They
deserve a rope's end, and will not receive their just deserts
till their crimes are punished with death."
[Sidenote: A PAIR OF RENEGADE VERMONTERS.]
The Rebel authorities were very sensitive to newspaper censure. With
unusual rigor, they now refused us permission to go outside the prison
for meals, though offering to have them sent in, at our expense, from
the leading hotel. They told us that _The Confederate_ was edited by
two renegade Vermonters.
"I am not very fond of Yankees, myself," remarked Hunnicutt, the
heavy-jawed, broad-necked, coarse-featured lieutenant commanding the
prison. "I am as much in favor of hanging them as anybody; but these
Vermonters, who haven't been here six months, are a little too violent.
They don't own any niggers. 'Tisn't natural. There's something wrong
about them. If I were going to hang Yankees at a venture, I think I
would begin with them."
An Irish warden brought us, from a Jew outside, three hundred
Confederate dollars, in exchange for one hundred in United States
currency. For a fifty-dollar Rebel note he procured me a cap of
southern manufacture, to replace my hat, which had been snatched from
my head by a South Carolina officer, passing upon a railroad train
meeting our own. The new cap, of grayish cotton, a marvel of roughness
and ugliness, elicited roars of laughter from my comrades.
On the journey thus far, we had gone almost wherever we pleased,
unguarded and unaccompanied. But from Atlanta to Richmond we were
treated with rigor and very closely watched. A Rebel officer begged
of "Junius" his fine pearl-handled pocket knife. Receiving it, he at
once conceived an affection for a gold ring upon the prisoner's finger.
Even the courtesy of my colleague was not proof against this second
impertinence, and he contemptuously declined the request.
[Sidenote: TREATED WITH UNUSUAL RIGOR.]
The captain in charge of us stated that his orders were imperative to
keep all newspapers from us; and on no account to permit us to leave
the railway carriage. But, finding that we still obtained the daily
journals from fellow-passengers, he made a virtue of necessity, and
gracefully acquiesced. At last, he even allowed us to take our meals at
the station, upon being invited to participate in them at the expense
of his prisoners.
CHAPTER XXXI
----Give me to drink mandragora, That I may sleep out this
great gap of time.--ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
[Sidenote: ARRIVAL IN RICHMOND.]
At 5 o'clock on the morning of Saturday, May 16th, we reached Richmond.
At that early hour, the clothing-dépôt of the Confederate government
was surrounded by a crowd of poor, ill-clad women, seeking work.
We were marched to the Libby Prison. Up to this time we had never been
searched. I had even kept my revolver in my pocket until reaching
Jackson, Mississippi, where, knowing I could not much longer conceal
it, I gave it to a friend. Now a Rebel sergeant carefully examined
our clothing. All money, except a few dollars, was taken from us, and
the flippant little prison clerk, named Ross, with some inquiries not
altogether affectionate concerning the health of Mr. Greeley, gave us
receipts.
As we passed through the guarded iron gateway, I glanced instinctively
above the portal in search of its fitting legend:--
"Abandon all hope who enter here."
Up three flights of stairs, we were escorted into a room, fifty feet
by one hundred and twenty-five, filled with officers lying in blankets
upon the floor and upon rude bunks. Some shouted, "More Yankees!--more
Yankees!" while many crowded about us to hear our story, and learn the
news from the West.
[Sidenote: INCARCERATED IN LIBBY PRISON.]
We soon found friends, and became domesticated in our novel quarters.
With the American tendency toward organization, the prisoners divided
into companies of four each. Our journalistic trio and Captain Ward
ceased to be individuals, becoming merely "Mess Number Twenty-one."
The provisions, at this time consisting of good flour, bread, and salt
pork, were brought into the room in bulk. A commissary, elected by the
captives from their own number, divided them, delivering its quota to
each mess.
Picking up two or three rusty tin plates and rheumatic knives and
forks, we commenced housekeeping. The labor of preparation was not
arduous. It consisted in making little sacks of cotton cloth for
salt, sugar, pepper, and rice, fitting up a shelf for our dishes, and
spreading upon the floor blankets, obtained from our new comrades, and
originally sent to Richmond by the United States Government for the
benefit of prisoners.
The Libby authorities, and white and negro _attachés_, were always
hungry for "greenbacks," and glad to give Confederate currency in
exchange. The rates varied greatly. The lowest was two dollars for one.
During my imprisonment, I bought fourteen for one, and, a few weeks
after our escape, thirty were given for one.
A prison sergeant went out every morning to purchase supplies. He
seemed honest, and through him we could obtain, at extravagant prices,
dried apples, sugar, eggs, molasses, meal, flour, and corn burnt and
ground as a substitute for coffee. Without these additions, our rations
would hardly have supported life.
In our mess, each man, in turn, did the cooking for an entire day. In
that hot, stifling room, frying pork, baking griddle-cakes, and boiling
coffee, over the crazy, smoking, broken stove, around which there was a
constant crowd, were disagreeable in the extreme. The prison hours were
long, but the cooking-days recurred with unpleasant frequency.
We scrubbed our room two or three times a week, and it was fumigated
every morning. At one end stood a huge wooden tank, with an abundant
supply of cold water, in which we could bathe at pleasure.
[Sidenote: SUFFERINGS FROM VERMIN.]
The vermin were the most revolting feature of the prison, and the one
to which it was the most difficult to become resigned. No amount of
personal cleanliness could guard our bodies against the insatiate lice.
Only by examining under-clothing and destroying them once or twice a
day, could they be kept from swarming upon us. For the first week, I
could not think of them without shuddering and faintness: but in time I
learned to make my daily entomological researches with calm complacency.
In Nashville, two weeks before my capture, I met Colonel A. D.
Streight, of Indiana. At the head of a provisional brigade from
Rosecrans's army, he was about starting on a raid through northern
Alabama and Georgia. The expedition promising more romance and novelty
than ordinary army experiences, now grown a little monotonous, I
desired to accompany him; but other duties prevented. I had been
in Libby just four hours, when in walked Streight, followed by the
officers of his entire brigade. We had taken very different routes, but
they brought us to the same terminus.
Streight's command had been furnished with mules, averaging about two
years old, and quite unused to the saddle. Utterly worthless, they soon
broke down, and with much difficulty, he remounted his men upon horses,
pressed from the citizens; but the delay proved fatal.
The Rebel General Forrest overtook him with a largely superior
force. Streight was an enterprising, brave officer, and his exhausted
men behaved admirably in four or five fights; but at last, near
Rome, Georgia, after losing one third of his command, the colonel
was compelled to surrender. The Rebels were very exultant, and
Forrest--originally a slave-dealer in Memphis, and a greater falsifier
than Beauregard himself--telegraphed that, with four hundred men, he
had captured twenty-eight hundred.
Lieutenant Charles Pavie, of the Eightieth Illinois, who commanded
Streight's artillery, came in with his coat torn to shreds; a piece of
shell had struck him in the back, inflicting only a flesh wound. Upon
feeling the shock, he instinctively clapped his hands to his stomach,
to ascertain if there was a hole there, under the impression that the
entire shell had passed through his body!
[Sidenote: PRISONERS DENOUNCED AS BLASPHEMOUS.]
The prisoners bore their confinement with good-humor and hilarity.
During the long evenings, they joined in the "Star-Spangled Banner,"
"Old Hundred," "Old John Brown," and other patriotic and religious
airs. _The Richmond Whig_, shocked that the profane and ungodly Yankees
should presume to sing "Old Hundred," denounced it as a piece of
blasphemy.
Captain Brown and his officers, of the United States gunboat
Indianola, were pointed out to me as men who had actually been in
prison for three months. I regarded them with pity and wonder. It
seemed utterly impossible that I could endure confinement for half that
time. After-experiences inclined me to patronize new-comers, and regard
with lofty condescension, men who had been prisoners only twelve or
fifteen months! "The Father of the Marshalsea" became an intelligible
and sympathetic personage, with whom we should have hobnobbed
delightfully.
[Sidenote: THIEVERY OF A "VIRGINIA GENTLEMAN."]
Simultaneously with our arrival in Richmond, a Rebel officer of the
exchange bureau received a request from the editor of _The World_, for
the release of Mr. Colburn. It proved as efficient as if it had been
an order from Jefferson Davis. After ten days' confinement in Libby,
Colburn was sent home by the first truce-boat. A thoroughly loyal
gentleman, and an unselfish, devoted friend, he was induced to go, only
by the assurance that while he could do no good by remaining, he might
be of service to us in the North.
At his departure, he left for me, with Captain Thomas P. Turner,
commandant of the prison, fifty dollars in United States currency. A
day or two afterward, Turner handed the sum to me in Confederate rags,
dollar for dollar, asserting that this was the identical money he had
received. The perpetrator of this petty knavery was educated at West
Point, and claimed to be a Virginia gentleman.
"Junius" suffered greatly from intermittent fever. The weather was
torrid. In the roof was a little scuttle, to which we ascended by a
ladder. The column of air rushing up through that narrow aperture was
foul, suffocating, and hot as if coming from an oven. At night we
went out on the roof for two or three hours to breathe the out-door
atmosphere. When the authorities discovered it, they informed us,
through Richard Turner--an ex-Baltimorean, half black-leg and half
gambler, who was inspector of the prison--that if we persisted, they
would close the scuttle. It was a refined and elaborate method of
torture.
On one occasion, this same Turner struck a New York captain in the
face for courteously protesting against being deprived of a little
fragment of shell which he had brought from the field as a relic. A
Rebel sergeant inflicted a blow upon another Union captain who chanced
to be jostled against him by the crowd.
For slight offenses, officers were placed in an underground cell so
dark and foul, that I saw a Pennsylvania lieutenant come out, after
five weeks' confinement there, his beard so covered with mold that one
could pluck a double handful from it!
[Sidenote: PRISONERS MURDERED BY THE GUARDS.]
Prisoners putting their heads for a moment between the bars of the
windows, and often for only approaching the apertures, were liable
to be shot. One officer, standing near a window, was ordered by
the sentinel to move back. The rattling carriages made the command
inaudible. The guard instantly shot him through the head, and he never
spoke again.
Colonel Streight was the most prominent prisoner. He talked to the
Rebel authorities with imprudent, but delightful frankness. More than
once I heard him say to them:--
"You dare not carry out that threat! You know our Government will never
permit it, but will promptly retaliate upon your own officers, whom it
holds."
When our rations of heavy corn-bread and tainted meat grew very short,
he addressed a letter to James A. Seddon, Confederate Secretary of War,
protesting in behalf of his brigade, and inquiring whether he designed
starving prisoners to death! The Rebels hated him with peculiar
bitterness.
The five Richmond dailies helped us greatly in filling up the long
hours. At daylight an old slave, named Ben, would arouse us from our
slumbers, shouting:--
"Great news in de papers! Great news from de Army of Virginny! Great
tallygraphic news from the Soufwest!"
[Sidenote: FOURTH-OF-JULY CELEBRATION INTERRUPTED.]
He disbursed his sheets at twenty-five cents per copy, but they
afterward went up to fifty.
A lieutenant in Grant's army, while charging one of the batteries in
the rear of Vicksburg, received a shot in the face which entered one
eye, destroying it altogether. Ten days after, he arrived in Libby. He
walked about our room with a handkerchief tied around his head, smoking
complacently, apparently considering a bullet in the brain a very
slight annoyance.
We attempted to celebrate the Fourth of July. Captain Driscoll, of
Cincinnati, with other ingenious officers, had manufactured from shirts
a National flag, which was hung above the head of Colonel Streight, who
occupied the chair, or rather the bed, which necessity substituted.
Two or three speeches had been made, and several hours of oratory were
expected, when a sergeant came up and said:--
"Captain Turner orders that you stop this furse!"
Observing the flag, he called upon several officers to assist him in
taking it down. Of course, none did so. He finally reached it himself,
tore it down, and bore it to the prison office. A long discussion
ensued about obeying Turner's order. After nearly as much time had
been consumed in debate as it would have required to carry out the
programme, and speak to all the toasts--dry toasts--it was voted to
comply. So the meeting, first adopting a number of intensely patriotic
resolutions, incontinently adjourned.
[Sidenote: THE HORRORS OF BELLE ISLE.]
The Rebel authorities confiscated large sums of money sent from home
to the prisoners, and sometimes stopped the purchase of supplies,
asserting that it was done in retaliation for similar treatment of
their own soldiers confined in the North. Still our officers fared
incomparably better than the Union privates who were half starved upon
Belle Isle, in sight of our prison. We did not fully accredit the
reports which reached us touching the sufferings of these prisoners,
though the engravings of their emaciation and tortures in the New
York illustrated papers, which sometimes drifted to us, so enraged
the Rebels, that we often called their attention to them. But our
own paroled officers, who were permitted to distribute among the
privates clothing sent by our Government, assured us that they were
substantially true.
CHAPTER XXXII.
Who was so firm, so constant, that this coil Would not infect
his reason?--TEMPEST.
When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in
battalions.--HAMLET.
[Sidenote: THE CAPTAINS ORDERED BELOW.]
On the 6th of July, an order came to our apartments for all the
captains to go down into a lower room. At this time, as usual, there
was constant talk about resuming the exchange. They went below with
light hearts, supposing they were about to be paroled and sent North.
Half an hour after, when the first one returned, his white, haggard
face showed that he had been through a trying scene.
After being drawn up in line, they were required to draw lots, to
select two of their number for execution, in retaliation for two Rebel
officers, tried and shot in Kentucky by Burnside, for recruiting within
our lines.
[Sidenote: TWO SELECTED FOR EXECUTION.]
The unhappy designation fell upon Captain Sawyer, of the First New
Jersey Cavalry, and Captain Flynn, of the Fifty-first Indiana Infantry.
They were taken to the office of General Winder, who assured them
that the sentence would be carried out; and without pity or decency,
selected that hour to revile them as Yankee scoundrels who had "come
down here to kill our sons, burn our houses, and devastate our
country." In reply to these taunts, they bore themselves with dignity
and calmness.
"When I went into the war," responded Flynn, "I knew I might be
killed. I don't know but I would just as soon die in this way as any
other."
"I have a wife and child," said Sawyer, "who are very dear to me, but
if I had a hundred lives I would gladly give them all for my country."
In two hours they came back to their quarters. Sawyer was externally
nervous; Flynn calm. Both expected that the order would be carried out.
We were confident that it would not. I predicted to Sawyer--
"They will never dare to shoot you!"
"I will bet you a hundred dollars they do!" was his impulsive reply. I
said to Flynn--
"There is not one chance in ten of their executing you."
"I know it," he answered. "But, when we drew lots, I took one chance in
thirty-five, and then lost!"[17]
[17] Our Government, upon learning of this, ordered the commandant at
Fortress Monroe, the moment he should learn, officially or otherwise,
that Sawyer and Flynn had been executed, to shoot in retaliation two
Rebel officers--sons of Generals Lee and Winder. On the reception of
this news in the Richmond papers at daylight one morning, the prisoners
cheered and shouted with delight. As they supposed, that settled the
question. Nothing more was heard about executing our officers; and
soon after, Sawyer and Flynn were exchanged, months before their less
fortunate comrades.
On the same evening came intelligence that, at an obscure town in
Pennsylvania called Gettysburg, Meade had received a Waterloo defeat,
was flying in confusion to the mountains of Pennsylvania after losing
forty thousand prisoners, who were actually on their way to Richmond.
It was entertaining to read the speculations of the Rebel papers as to
what they could do with these forty thousand Yankees--where they could
find men to guard them, and room for them--how in the world they could
feed them without starving the people of Richmond.
[Sidenote: THE GLOOMIEST NIGHT IN PRISON.]
We did not fully believe the report, but it touched us very nearly.
Those reverses to our army came home drearily to the hearts of men who
were waiting hopelessly in Rebel prisons, and weighed them down like
millstones.
Success kindled a corresponding joy. I have seen sick and dying
prisoners on cold and filthy floors of the wretched hospitals filled
with a new vitality--their sad, pleading eyes lighted with a new hope,
their wan faces flushed, and their speech jubilant, when they learned
that all was going well with the Cause. It made life more endurable and
death less bitter.
Already suffering from anxiety for Flynn and Sawyer, and disheartened
by the reports from Pennsylvania, we received intelligence that Grant
had been utterly repulsed before the works of Vicksburg, the siege
raised, and the campaign closed in defeat and disaster. It was a very
black night when this grief was added to the first. The prison was
gloomy and silent many hours earlier than usual. Our hearts were too
heavy for speech.
But suddenly there came a great revulsion. Among the negro prisoners
was an old man of seventy, who had particularly attracted my attention
from the fact that when I happened to speak to him about the National
conflict, he replied, after the manner of Copperheads, that it was a
speculators' war on both sides, in which he felt no sort of interest;
that it would do nobody any good; that he cared not when or how it
ended. I wondered whether the old African was shamming, lest his
conversation should be reported, to the curtailing of his privileges,
or whether he was really that anomaly, a black man who felt no interest
in the war.
[Sidenote: GLORIOUS REVULSION OF FEELING.]
But about five o'clock, one afternoon, he came up into our room, and,
when the door was closed behind him, so that he could not be seen by
the officers or guards, he made a rush for an open space upon the
floor, and immediately began to dance in a manner very remarkable for a
man of seventy, and rheumatic at that. We all gathered around him and
asked--
"General" (that was his _soubriquet_ in the prison), "what does this
mean?"
"De Yankees has taken Vicksburg! De Yankees has taken Vicksburg!" and
then he began to dance again.
As soon as we could calm him into a little coherence, he drew from his
pocket a newspaper extra--the ink not yet dry--which he had stolen
from one of the Rebel officers. There it was! The Yankees _had_ taken
Vicksburg, with more than thirty thousand prisoners.
Good tidings, like bad, seldom come alone. Shortly after, we learned
that there was also a slight mistake about Gettysburg--that Lee,
instead of Meade, was flying in confusion; and that, while our people
had captured fifteen or twenty thousand Rebels, those forty thousand
Yankee prisoners were "conspicuous for their absence."
How our hearts leaped up at this cheering news! How suddenly that foul
prison air grew sweet and pure as the fragrant breath of the mountains!
There was laughing, there was singing, there was dancing, which the
old negro did not altogether monopolize. Some one shouted, "Glory,
hallelujah!" Mr. McCabe, an Ohio chaplain, whose clear, ringing tones,
as he led the singing, cheered many of our heaviest hours, instantly
took the hint, and started that beautiful hymn, by Mrs. Howe, of which
"Glory, hallelujah" is the chorus:--
"For mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."
Every voice in the room joined in it. I never saw men more stirred and
thrilled than were those three or four hundred prisoners, as they heard
the impressive closing stanza:--
"In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy, let _us_ die to make men free!"
[Sidenote: EXCITING DISCUSSION IN PRISON.]
Despite reading, conversing, and cutting out finger-rings,
napkin-rings, breast-pins, and crosses, from the beef-bones extracted
from our rations, in which some prisoners were exceedingly skillful,
the hours were very heavy. A debating-club was formed, and much time
was spent in discussing animal magnetism and other topics. Occasionally
we had mock courts, which developed a good deal of originality and wit.
Late in July, a mania for study began to prevail. Classes were formed
in Greek, Latin, German, French, Spanish, Algebra, Geometry, and
Rhetoric. We sent out to the Richmond stores for text-books, and all
found instructors, as the motley company of officers embraced natives
of every civilized country.
July 30th was a memorable day. The prisoners had become greatly excited
on the momentous question of small messes _versus_ large messes. There
were only three cooking-stoves for the accommodation of three hundred
and seventy-five officers. A majority thought it more convenient to
divide into messes of twenty, while others, favoring small messes of
from four to eight each, determined to retain those organizations. The
prisoners now occupied five rooms, communicating with each other.
A public meeting was called in our apartment, with Colonel Streight
in the chair. A fiery discussion ensued. The large-mess party insisted
that the majority must rule, and the minority submit to be formed into
messes of twenty. The small-mess party replied:--
"We will not be coerced. We are one-third of all the prisoners. We
insist upon our right to one-third of the kitchen, one-third of the
fuel, and one of the three cooking-stoves. It is nobody's business but
our own whether we have messes of two or one hundred."
I was never present at any debate, parliamentary, political, or
religious, which developed more earnestness and bitterness. The meeting
passed a resolution, insisting upon large messes; the small-mess party
refused to vote upon it, and declared that they would never, never
submit! The question was finally decided by permitting all to do
exactly as they pleased.
Prisoners kept in the underground cells heard revolting stories. They
were informed by the guards that the bodies of the dead, usually left
in an adjoining room for a day or two before burial, were frequently
eaten by rats.
[Sidenote: STEALING MONEY FROM THE CAPTIVES.]
From want of vegetables and variety of diet, scurvy became common.
With many others, I suffered somewhat from it. On the 13th of August,
Major Morris, of the Sixth Pennsylvania Cavalry, died suddenly from a
malignant form of this disease. His fellow-prisoners desired to have
his body embalmed. The Rebel authorities had one hundred dollars in
United States currency, belonging to the major, but they refused to
apply it to this purpose. Four hundred dollars in Confederate currency
was therefore subscribed by the prisoners. Several brother-officers of
the deceased were permitted to follow the remains to the cemetery.
[Sidenote: HORRIBLE TREATMENT OF NORTHERN CITIZENS.]
Thirty or forty Northern citizens were confined in a room under us.
They were thrust in with Yankee deserters of the worst character, and
treated with the greatest barbarity. Their rations were very short;
they were allowed to purchase nothing. We cut a hole through the floor,
and every evening dropped down crackers and bread, contributed from
the various messes. When they saw the food coming, they would crowd
beneath the aperture, with upturned faces and eager eyes, springing to
clutch every crumb, sometimes ready to fight over the smallest morsels,
and looking more like ravenous animals than human beings. Some of
them, accustomed to luxury at home, ate water-melon rinds and devoured
morsels which they extracted from the spittoons and from other places
still more revolting.
Several schemes of escape were ingenious and original. Impudence was
the trump card. Four or five officers took French leave, by procuring
Confederate uniforms, which enabled them to pass the guards. Captain
John F. Porter, of New York, obtaining a citizen's suit, walked out of
the prison in broad daylight, passing all the sentinels, who supposed
him to be a clergyman or some other pacific resident of Richmond. A
lady in the city secreted him. By the negroes, he sent a message to his
late comrades, asking for money, which they immediately transmitted.
Obtaining a pilot, he made his way through the swamps to the Union
lines, in season to claim, on the appointed day, the hand of a young
lady who awaited him at home. He was an enterprising bridegroom.
During the long evenings, when we were faint, bilious, and weak from
our thin diet, some of my comrades, with morbid eloquence, would
dwell upon all luxuries that tempt the epicurean palate,--debating,
in detail, what dishes they would order, were they at the best hotels
of New York or Philadelphia. These tantalizing discussions were so
annoying that they invariably drove me from the group, sometimes
exciting a desire to strike those who _would_ drag forward the
unpleasant subject, and keep me reminded of the hunger which I was
striving to forget.
[Sidenote: EXTRAVAGANT RUMORS AMONG THE PRISONERS.]
The exchange was altogether suspended, and new prisoners were
constantly arriving, until Libby contained several hundred officers.
Extravagant rumors of all sorts were constantly afloat among the
captives; hardly a day passing without some sensation story. They were
not usually pure invention; but in prison, as elsewhere during exciting
periods, the air seemed to generate wild reports, which, in passing
from mouth to mouth, grew to wonderful proportions.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
I had rather than forty pound I were at home.--TWELFTH NIGHT,
OR WHAT YOU WILL.
[Sidenote: TRANSFERRED TO CASTLE THUNDER.]
On the evening of September 2d, all the northern citizens were
transferred from Libby to Castle Thunder. The open air caused a strange
sensation of faintness. We grew weak and dizzy in walking the three
hundred yards between the prisons.
That night we were thrust into an unventilated, filthy, subterranean
room, nearly as loathsome as the Vicksburg jail. But we smoked our
pipes serenely, remembering that "Fortune is turning, and inconstant,
and variations, and mutabilities," and wondering what that capricious
lady would next decree. At intervals, our sleep upon the dirty floor
was disturbed by the playful gambols of the rats over our hands and
faces.
The next morning we were drawn up in line, and our names registered
by an old warden named Cooper, who, in spectacles and faded silk hat,
looked like one of Dickens's beadles. His query whether we possessed
moneys, was uniformly answered in the negative. When he asked if we had
knives or concealed weapons, all gave the same response, except one
waggish prisoner, who averred that he had a ten-inch columbiad in his
vest pocket.
The Commandant of Castle Thunder was Captain George W. Alexander,
an ex-Marylander, who had participated with "the French Lady"[18]
in the capture of the steamer St. Nicholas, near Point Lookout, and
was afterward confined for some months at Fort McHenry. He formerly
belonged to the United States Navy, in the capacity of assistant
engineer. He made literary pretensions, writing thin plays for the
Richmond theaters, and sorry Rebel war-ballads. Pompous and excessively
vain, delighting in gauntlets, top-boots, huge revolvers, and a red
sash, he was sometimes furiously angry, but, in the main, kind to
captives. He caused us to be placed in the "Citizens' Room," which he
called the prison parlor. Its walls were whitewashed, its four windows
were iron-barred, its air tainted by exhalations from the adjoining
"Condemned Cell," which was fearfully foul. It was lighted with gas,
and had a single stove for cooking, a few bunks, and a clean floor.
[18] Captain Thomas, in the character of a French lady, took passage
on the steamer at Baltimore, with several followers disguised as
mechanics. Near Point Lookout they overpowered the crew and captured
the vessel, converting her into a privateer. Afterward, while
attempting to repeat the enterprise, they were made prisoners.
Castle Thunder contained about fifteen hundred inmates--northern
citizens, southern Unionists, Yankee deserters, Confederate convicts,
and eighty-two free negroes, captured with Federal officers, who
employed them as servants in the field.
[Sidenote: MORE ENDURABLE THAN LIBBY.]
The prison's reputation was worse than that of Libby; but, as usual, we
found the devil not quite so black as he was painted. We missed sadly
the society of the Union officers, but the Commandant and _attachés_,
unlike the Turners, treated us courteously, never indulging in epithets
and insults.
In the Citizens' Room were two northerners, named Lewis and Scully,
sent to Richmond in the secret service of our Government, by General
Scott, before the battle of Bull Run, and confined ever since. One of
them was a Catholic, through the influence of whose priest both had
thus far been preserved. But they held existence by a frail tenure, and
I could not wonder that long anxiety had turned Lewis's hair gray, and
given to both nervous, haggard faces.
In all southern prisons I was forced to admire the fidelity with which
the Roman Church looks after its members. Priests frequently visited
all places of confinement to inquire for Catholics, and minister both
to their spiritual and bodily needs. The chaplain at Castle Thunder was
a Presbyterian. He scattered documents, and preached every Sunday in
the yard or one of the large rooms. He would have given tracts on the
sin of dancing to men without any legs.
The Rev. William G. Scandlin and Dr. McDonald, of Boston--agents of the
United States Sanitary Commission--were held with us. The doctor was
dangerously ill from dysentery. The Commission had never discriminated
between suffering Unionists and Confederates, extending to both the
same bounty and tenderness; yet the Rebels kept these gentlemen, whom
they had captured on the way to Harper's Ferry with sanitary supplies,
for more than three months.
[Sidenote: DETERMINED NOT TO DIE.]
"Junius" was very feeble; but during the weary months which followed,
he manifested wonderful vitality. His indignation toward the enemy, and
his earnest determination not to die in a Rebel prison, greatly helped
his endurance. Like the Duchess of Marlboro', he refused either to be
bled or to give up the ghost.
A Virginia citizen was brought in on the charge of attempting to trade
in "greenbacks,"--a penitentiary offense under Confederate law. Before
he had been in our room five minutes one of the sub-wardens entered,
asking:
"Is there anybody here who has 'greenbacks?' I am paying four dollars
for one to-day."
The negroes were used for scrubbing and carrying messages from the
office of the prison to the different apartments. Invariably our
friends, they surreptitiously conveyed notes to acquaintances in the
other rooms, and often to Unionists outside.
[Sidenote: A NEGRO CRUELLY WHIPPED.]
While we were at Libby, an intelligent mulatto prisoner from
Philadelphia was whipped for some trivial offense. His piercing shrieks
followed each application of the lash; one of my messmates, who counted
them, stated that he received three hundred and twenty-seven blows. A
month afterward I examined his back, and found it still gridironed with
scars.
At the Castle the negroes frequently received from five to twenty-five
lashes. I saw boys not more than eight years old turned over a barrel
and cowhided. One woman upward of sixty was whipped in the same manner.
This negress was known as "Old Sally;" she earned a good deal of
Confederate money by washing for prisoners, and spent nearly the whole
of it in purchasing supplies for unfortunates who were without means.
She had been confined in different prisons for nearly three years.
The next oldest inmate was a Little Dorrit of a cur, born and raised in
the Castle. Notwithstanding her life-long associations, she manifested
the usual canine antipathy toward negroes and tatterdemalions.
[Sidenote: THE EXECUTION OF SPENCER KELLOGG.]
Soon after our arrival, Spencer Kellogg, of Philadelphia, one of our
fellow-prisoners, was executed as a Yankee spy. He had been in the
secret service of the United States, but belonged to the western navy
at the time of his capture. He bore himself with great coolness and
self-possession, assuring the Rebels that he was glad to die for his
country. On the scaffold he did not manifest the slightest tremor.
While the rope was being adjusted, he accidentally knocked off the hat
of a bystander, to whom he turned and said, with great suavity: "I beg
your pardon, sir."
[Sidenote: STEADFASTNESS OF SOUTHERN UNIONISTS.]
The loyalty of the southern Unionists was intense. One Tennessean,
whose hair was white with age, was taken before Major Carrington, the
Provost-Marshal, who said to him:
"You are so old that I have concluded to send you home, if you will
take the oath."
"Sir," replied the prisoner, "if you knew me personally, I should think
you meant to insult me. I have lived seventy years, and, God helping
me, I will not now do an act to embitter the short remnant of my life,
and one which I should regret through eternity. I have four boys in
the Union army; they all went there by my advice. Were I young enough
to carry a musket I would be with them to-day fighting against the
Rebellion."
The sturdy old Loyalist at last died in prison.
There were many kindred cases. Nearly all the men of this class
confined with us were from mountain regions of the South. Many were
ragged, all were poor. They very seldom heard from their families.
They were compelled to live solely upon the prison rations, often a
perpetual compromise with starvation. Some had been in confinement for
two or three years, and their homes desolated and burned. Unlike the
North, they knew what war meant.
Yet the lamp of their loyalty burned with inextinguishable
brightness. They never denounced the Government, which sometimes
neglected them to a criminal degree. They never desponded, through
the gloomiest days, when imbecility in the Cabinet and timidity in
the field threatened to ruin the Union Cause. They seldom yielded an
iota of principle to their keepers. Hungry, cold, and naked--waiting,
waiting, waiting, through the slow months and years--often sick, often
dying, they continued true as steel. History has few such records of
steadfast devotion. Greet it reverently with uncovered head, as the
Holy of Holies in our temple of Patriotism!
CHAPTER XXXIV.
----One fading moment's mirth, With twenty watchful, weary,
tedious nights.--TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
[Sidenote: A WAGGISH JOURNALIST.]
We consumed many of the long hours in conversing, reading, and
whist-playing. Night after night we strolled wearily up and down our
narrow room, ignorant of the outer world, save through glimpses, caught
from the barred windows, of the clear blue sky and the pitying stars.
Still, endeavoring to make the best of it, we were often mirthful and
boisterous. Two correspondents of _The Herald_, Mr. S. T. Bulkley
and Mr. L. A. Hendrick, were partners in our captivity. Hendrick's
irrepressible waggery never slept. One evening a Virginia ruralist,
whose intellect was not of the brightest, was brought in for some
violation of Confederate law. After pouring his sorrows into the
sympathetic ear of the correspondent, he suddenly asked:
"What are you here for?"
"I am the victim," replied Hendrick, "of gross and flagrant injustice.
I am the inventor of a new piece of artillery known as the Hendrick
gun. Its range far exceeds every other cannon in the world. A week
ago I was testing it from the Richmond defenses, where it is mounted.
One of its shots accidentally struck and sunk a blockade runner just
entering the port of Wilmington. It was not my fault. I didn't aim at
the steamer. I was just trying the gun for the benefit of the country.
But these confounded Richmond authorities insisted upon it that I
should pay for the vessel. I told them I would see them ---- first, and
they shut me up in Castle Thunder; but I never will pay in the world."
"You are quite right. I would not, if I were you," replied the innocent
Virginian. "It is the greatest outrage I ever heard of."
[Sidenote: PROCEEDINGS OF A MOCK COURT.]
A fellow-prisoner had been elected commissary of our room, to divide
and distribute the rations. One evening a court was organized to try
him for "malfeasance in office." The indictment charged that he issued
soup only when he ought to issue meat--stealing the beef and selling
it for his personal benefit. One correspondent appeared as prosecuting
attorney, another as counsel for the defense, and a third as presiding
judge.
An extract from a Richmond journal being objected to as testimony, it
was decided that any thing published by any newspaper must necessarily
be true, and was competent evidence in that court. A great deal of
remarkable law was cited in Greek, Latin, German, and French. Counsel
were fined for contempt of court, jurors placed under arrest for going
to sleep. When the spectators became boisterous, the sheriff was
ordered to clear the court-room, and, during certain testimony, the
judge requested that the ladies withdraw.
The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and, after being harangued
in touching terms upon the enormity of his offense, the culprit was
sentenced to eat a quart of his own soup at a single meal. It was an
hilarious affair for that loathsome place, which swarmed with vermin,
and where the silence was broken nightly by the clanking and rattling
of the chains of convicts.
Many prison inmates exhibited daring and ingenuity in attempting to
escape. Castle Thunder was vigilantly and securely guarded, with a
score of sentinels inside, and a cordon of sentinels without.
[Sidenote: ESCAPE BY KILLING A GUARD.]
In the condemned cell adjoining our room was a Rebel officer named
Booth, with three comrades, under sentence of death on charge of
murder. All were heavily ironed. Nightly, as the time appointed for
their execution approached, they surprised us by dancing, rattling
their chains, and singing. At one o'clock on the morning of October
22d, we were awakened by shouts and musket-shots. The whole Castle was
alarmed, and the guard turned out.
With a saw made from a case-knife, Booth had cut a hole through the
floor of his cell, his comrades the while singing and dancing to drown
the noise. They were compelled to be very cautious, as a sentinel paced
within six feet of them, under instructions to watch them closely.
Filing off their irons, they descended cautiously through the aperture
into a store-room, where they found four muskets. In the darkness they
removed the lock from the door, and each taking a gun, crept into
another room opening to the street; struck down the sentinel, and
felled a second with the butt of a musket, knocking him ten or twelve
feet. At the outer door, a guard, who had taken the alarm, presented
his gun. Before he could fire, Booth shot him fatally through the head.
The three late prisoners ran up the street, several ineffectual shots
being fired after them by the guards, who dared not leave their posts.
At the long bridge across the James River they knocked down another
sentinel, who attempted to stop them. Traveling by night through the
woods, they soon reached the Union lines.
A considerable number of prisoners smeared their faces with croton-oil
to produce eruptions. The surgeon, called in at exactly the right
stage, pronounced the disease small-pox. They were driven toward the
small-pox hospital in unguarded ambulances, from which they jumped
and ran for their lives. It was a profound mystery to the physician
that patients should be so agile, until, examining one face after the
eruptions began to subside, he detected the imposition.
In Tennessee two Indiana captains were found within the Rebel
lines. They were actually in the secret service of the Government,
reconnoitering Confederate camps; but they passed themselves off as
deserters, and were brought to the Castle. One told me his story,
adding:
"They offer to release us if we will take the oath of allegiance to
the Southern Confederacy; but I cannot do that. I want to rejoin my
regiment, and fight the Rebels while the war lasts. I must escape, and
I cannot afford to lose any time."
He kept his own counsel; but the next night took up a plank and
descended to a subterranean room, whence he began digging a tunnel.
After several nights' labor, when almost completed, the tunnel was
discovered by the prison authorities. He immediately commenced another.
That also was found, a few hours before it would have proved a success.
Then he tried the croton-oil, and in ten days he was again under the
old flag.
[Sidenote: ESCAPE BY PLAYING NEGRO.]
One prisoner, procuring from the negroes a suit of old clothing, a
slouched hat, and a piece of burnt cork, assumed the garments, and
blackened his face. With a bucket in his hand, he followed the negroes
down three flights of stairs and past four sentinels. Hiding in the
negro quarters until after dark, he then leaped from a window in the
very face of a sentinel, but disappeared around a corner before the
soldier could fire.
Another was sent to General Winder's office for examination. On the way
he told his stolid guard that he was clerk of the Castle, and ordered
him:
"Go up this street to the next corner and wait there for me. I am
compelled to visit the Provost-Marshal's office. Be sure and wait. I
will meet you in fifteen minutes."
The unsuspecting guard obeyed the order, and the prisoner leisurely
walked off.
Captain Lafayette Jones, of Carter County, Tennessee, was held on the
charge of bushwhacking and recruiting for the Federal army within
the Rebel lines. If brought to trial, he would undoubtedly have been
convicted and shot. He succeeded in deluding the officers of the prison
about his own identity, and was released upon enlisting in the Rebel
army, under the name of Leander Johannes.
[Sidenote: ESCAPE BY FORGING A RELEASE.]
George W. Hudson, of New York, had been caught in Louisiana, while
acting as a spy in the Union service. Returning to the prison from a
preliminary examination before General Winder, he said:
"They have found all my papers, which were sewn in the lining of my
valise. There is evidence enough to hang me twenty times over. I have
no hope unless I can escape."
He canvassed a number of plans, at last deciding upon one. Then he
remarked, with great nonchalance:
"Well, I am not quite ready yet; I must send out to buy a valise and
get my clothes washed, so that I can leave in good shape."
Three or four days later, having completed these arrangements, he
wrote an order for his own discharge, forging General Winder's'
signature. It was a close imitation of Winder's genuine papers upon
which prisoners were discharged daily. Hudson employed a negro to leave
this document, unobserved, upon the desk of the prison Adjutant. Just
then I was confined in a cell for an attempt to escape. One morning
some one tapped at my door; looking out through the little aperture, I
saw Hudson, valise in hand, with the warden behind him.
"I have come to say good-by. My discharge has arrived." (In a whisper,)
"Put your ear up here. My plan is working to a charm. It is the
prettiest thing you ever saw."
He bade me adieu, conversed a few minutes with the prison officers, and
walked leisurely up the street. A Union lady sheltered him, and when
the Rebels next heard of Hudson he was with the Army of the Potomac,
serving upon the staff of General Meade.
[Sidenote: ESCAPED PRISONER AT JEFF. DAVIS'S LEVEE.]
Robert Slocum, of the Nineteenth Massachusetts Volunteers, was taken
to Richmond as a prisoner of war. In two days he escaped, and procured,
from friendly negroes, citizen's clothing. Then passing himself off
as an Englishman recently arrived in America by a blockade-runner, he
attempted to leave the port of Wilmington for Nassau. Through some
informality in his passport, he was arrested and lodged in Castle
Thunder. Employing an attorney, he secured his release. Still adhering
to the original story, he remained in Richmond for many months. He
frequently sent us letters, supplies, and provisions, and made many
attempts to aid us in escaping. One day he wrote me an entertaining
description of President Davis's levee, at which he had spent the
previous evening.
CHAPTER XXXV.
Misery acquaints a man with strange bed-fellows.--TEMPEST.
[Sidenote: ASSISTANCE FROM A NEGRO BOY.]
Several days of our confinement in Castle Thunder were spent in a
little cell with burglars, thieves, "bounty-jumpers," and confidence
men. Our association with these strange companions happened in this
wise:
One day we completed an arrangement with a corporal of the guard,
by which, with the aid of four of his men, he was to let us out at
midnight. We had a friend in Richmond, but did not know precisely where
his house was situated. We were very anxious to learn, and fortunately,
on this very day, he sent a meal to a prisoner in our room. Recognizing
the plate, I asked the intelligent young Baltimore negro who brought it:
"Is my friend waiting below?"
"Yes, sir."
"Can't you get me an opportunity to see him for one moment?"
"I think so, sir. Come with me and we will try."
The boy led me through the passages and down the stairs, past four
guards, who supposed that he had been sent by the prison authorities.
As we reached the lower floor, I saw my friend standing in the street
door, with two officers of the prison beside him. By a look I beckoned
him. He walked toward me and I toward him, until we met at the little
railing which separated us. There, over the bayonet of the sentinel,
this whispered conversation followed:
"We hope to get out to-night; can we find refuge in your house?"
"Certainly. At what hour will you come?"
"We hope, between twelve and one o'clock. Where is your place?"
[Sidenote: THE PRISON OFFICERS ENRAGED.]
He told me the street and number. By this time, the Rebel officers,
discovering what was going on, grew indignant and very profane. They
peremptorily ordered my friend into the street. He went out wearing a
look of mild and injured innocence. The negro had shrewdly slipped out
of sight the moment he brought us together, and thus escaped severe
punishment.
The officers ordered me back to my quarters, and as I went up the
stairs, I heard a volley of oaths. They were not especially incensed
at me, recognizing the fact that a prisoner under guard has a right to
do any thing he can; but were indignant and chagrined at that want of
discipline which permitted an inmate of the safest apartment in the
Castle to pass four sentinels to the street door, and converse with an
unauthorized person.
[Sidenote: VISIT FROM A FRIENDLY WOMAN.]
Ten minutes after, a boy came up from the office, with the
message--this time genuine--that another visitor wished to see me. I
went down, and there, immediately beyond the bars through which we
were allowed to communicate with outsiders, I saw a lady who called me
by name. I did not recognize her, but her eyes told me that she was
a friend. A Rebel officer was standing near, to see that no improper
communication passed between us. She conversed upon indifferent
subjects, but soon found opportunity for saying:
"I am the wife of your friend who has just left you. He dared not come
again. I succeeded in obtaining admission. I have a note for you. I
cannot give it to you now, for this officer is looking; but, when I bid
you good-by, I will slip it into your hand."
The letter contained the warmest protestations of friendship, saying:
"We will do any thing in the world for you. You shall have shelter at
our house, or, if you think that too public, at any house you choose
among our friends. We will find you the best pilot in Richmond to take
you through the lines. We will give you clothing, we will give you
money--every thing you need. If you wish, we will send a half dozen
young men to steal up in front of the Castle at midnight; and, for a
moment, to throw a blanket over the head of each of the sentinels who
stand beside the door."
At one o'clock that night, the Rebel corporal came to our door and
said, softly:
"All things are ready; I have my four men at the proper posts; we can
pass you to the street without difficulty. Should you meet any pickets
beyond, the countersign for to-night is 'Shiloh.' I know you all, and
implicitly trust you; but some of my men do not, and before passing out
your party of six, they want to see that you have in your possession
the money you propose to give us" (seventy dollars in United States
currency, together with two gold watches).
This request was reasonable, and Bulkley handed his portion of the
money to the corporal. A moment later he returned with it from the
gas-light, and said:
"There is a mistake about this. Here are five one-dollar notes, not
five-dollar notes."
My friend was very confident there was no error; and we were forced
to the conclusion that the guards designed to obtain our money without
giving us our liberty. So the plan was baffled.
The next morning proved that the corporal was right. My friend _had_
offered him the wrong roll of notes. We hoped very shortly to try
again, but considerable finessing was required to get the right
sentinels upon the right posts. Before it could be done we were placed
in a dungeon, on the charge of attempting to escape. We were kept there
ten days.
[Sidenote: SHUT UP IN A CELL.]
Our fellows in confinement were the burglars and confidence men--"lewd
fellows of the baser sort," without principle or refinement, living
by their wits. They frankly related many of their experiences in
enlisting and re-enlisting for large bounties as substitutes in the
Rebel service; decoying negroes from their masters, and then selling
them; stealing horses, etc. But they treated us with personal courtesy,
and though their own rations were wretchedly short, never molested our
dried beef, hams, and other provisions, which any night they could
safely have purloined.
Small-pox was very prevalent during the winter months. An Illinois
prisoner, named Putman, had a remarkable experience. He was first
vaccinated, and two or three days after, attacked with varioloid. Just
as he recovered from that, he was taken with malignant small-pox, while
the vaccine matter was still working in his arm, which was almost an
unbroken sore from elbow to shoulder. In a few weeks he returned to the
prison with pits all over his face as large as peas. Small-pox patients
were sometimes kept in our close room for two or three days after
the eruptions appeared. One of my own messmates barely survived this
disease.
We were allowed to purchase whatever supplies the Richmond market
afforded, and to have our meals prepared in the prison kitchen, by
paying the old negro who presided there. These were privileges enjoyed
by none of the other inmates. Supplies commanded very high prices; it
was a favorite jest in the city, that the people had to carry money
in their baskets and bring home marketing in their porte-monnaies.
Our mess consisted of the four correspondents and Mr. Charles
Thompson, a citizen of Connecticut, whose Democratic proclivities,
age, and gravity, invariably elected him spokesman when we wished to
communicate with the prison authorities. As they regarded us with
special hostility, we kept in the back-ground; but Mr. Thompson's quiet
tenacity, which no refusal could dishearten, and the "greenbacks" which
no _attaché_ could resist, secured us many favors.
[Sidenote: STEALING FROM FLAG-OF-TRUCE LETTERS.]
Northern letters from our own families reached us with considerable
regularity. Those sent by other persons were mostly withheld. Robert
Ould, the Rebel Commissioner of Exchange, with petty malignity, never
permitted one of the many written from _The Tribune_ office to reach
us. All inclosures, excepting money, and sometimes including it,
were stolen with uniform consistency. I finally wrote upon one of my
missives, which was to go North:
"Will the person who systematically abstracts newspaper
slips, babies' pictures, and postage-stamps from my letters,
permit the inclosed little poem to reach its destination,
unless entirely certain that it is contraband and dangerous
to the public service?"
Apparently a little ashamed, the Rebel censor thereafter ceased his
peculations.
For a time, boxes of supplies from the North were forwarded to us with
fidelity and promptness. Supposing that this could not last long, we
determined to make hay while the sun shone. One day, dining from the
contents of a home box, in cutting through the butter, my knife struck
something hard. We sounded, and brought to the surface a little phial,
hermetically sealed. We opened it, and there found "greenbacks!"
Upon that hint we acted. While it was impossible to obtain letters from
the North, we could always smuggle them thither by exchanged prisoners,
who would sew them up in their clothing, or in some other manner
conceal them. We immediately began to send many orders for boxes; all
but two or three came safely to hand, and "brought forth butter in a
lordly dish." Treasury notes were also sent bound in covers of books
so deftly as to defy detection. One of my messmates thus received two
hundred and fifty dollars in a single Bible. The supplies of money,
obtained in this manner, lasted through nearly all our remaining
imprisonment, and were of infinite service.
[Sidenote: PAROLES REPUDIATED BY THE REBELS.]
All the prisoners who were taken to Richmond with us had received
identically the same paroles. In every case, except ours, the Rebels
recognized the paroles, and sent the persons holding them through the
lines. But they utterly disregarded ours. We felt it a sort of duty to
keep them occasionally reminded of their solemn, deliberate, written
obligation to us. We first did this through our attorney, General
Humphrey Marshall, of Kentucky. His relations with Robert Ould were
very close. Upon receiving heavy fees in United States currency, he
had secured the release of several citizens, after all other endeavors
failed. The prisoners believed that Ould shared the fees.
General Marshall made a strong statement of our case in writing, adding
to the application for release:
"I am instructed by these gentlemen not to ask any favors at
your hands, but to enforce their clear, legal, unquestionable
rights under this parole."
Commissioner Ould indorsed upon this application that he repudiated the
parole altogether. In reporting to us, General Marshall said:
"I don't feel at liberty to accept a fee from you, because I consider
your case hopeless."
[Sidenote: SENTENCED TO THE SALISBURY PRISON.]
Early in the new year, we addressed a memorial to Mr. Seddon, the
Rebel Secretary of War, in which we attempted to argue the case upon
its legal merits, and to prove what a flagrant, atrocious violation of
official faith was involved in our detention. We plumed ourselves a
good deal on our legal logic, but Mr. Seddon returned a very convincing
refutation of our argument. He simply wrote an order that we be sent to
the Rebel penitentiary at Salisbury, North Carolina, to be held until
the end of the war, as hostages for Rebel citizens confined in the
North, and for the general good conduct of our Government toward them!
Like the historic Roman, content to be refuted by an emperor who was
master of fifty legions, we yielded gracefully to the argument of the
Secretary who had the whole Confederate army at his back; and thus we
were sent to Salisbury.
[Sidenote: "ABOLITIONISTS BEFORE THE WAR."]
On the night before our departure, the warden, a Maryland refugee,
named Wiley, ordered us below into a very filthy apartment, to be ready
for the morning train. We appealed to Captain Richardson, Commandant of
the Castle, who, countermanding the order, permitted us to remain in
our own more comfortable quarters during the night. Ten minutes after,
one of the little negroes came to our room, and, beckoning me to bend
down, he whispered:
"What do you think Mr. Wiley says about Captain Richardson's letting
you stay here to-night? As soon as the Captain went out, he said: 'It's
a shame for Richardson and Browne to receive so many more favors than
the other prisoners. Why, ---- them, they were Abolitionists before
the war!'"
On the way to Salisbury we were very closely guarded, but there were
many times during the night when we might easily have jumped from the
car window.
At Raleigh, a pleasant little city of five thousand people, named in
honor of the great Sir Walter, the temptation was very strong. In
the confusion and darkness through which we passed from one train to
another, we might easily have eluded the guards; but we were feeble,
a long distance from our army lines, and quite unfamiliar with the
country. It was a golden opportunity neglected; for it is always
comparatively easy for captives to escape while _in transitu_, and very
difficult when once within the walls of a military prison.
On the evening of February 3d we reached Salisbury, and were taken
to the Confederate States Penitentiary. It was a brick structure, one
hundred feet by forty, four stories in hight, originally erected for
a cotton-factory. In addition to the main building, there were six
smaller ones of brick, which had formerly been tenement houses; and a
new frame hospital, with clean hay mattresses for forty patients. The
buildings, which would hold about five hundred prisoners, were all
filled. Confederate convicts, Yankee deserters, about twenty enlisted
men of our navy and three United States officers confined as hostages,
one hundred and fifty Southern Unionists, and fifty northern citizens,
composed the inmates.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
The miserable have no other medicine, But only hope.--MEASURE
FOR MEASURE.
Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased, Pluck from the
memory a rooted sorrow?--MACBETH.
Truly saith the Italian proverb, "There are no ugly loves and no
handsome prisons." Still we found Salisbury comparatively endurable.
Captain Swift Galloway, commanding, though a hearty Confederate, was
kind and courteous to the captives. Our sleeping apartment, crowded
with uncleanly men, and foul with the vilest exhalations, was filthy
and vermin-infested beyond description. No northern farmer, fit to be a
northern farmer, would have kept his horse or his ox in it.
[Sidenote: THE OPEN AIR AND PURE WATER.]
But the yard of four acres, like some old college grounds, with great
oak trees and a well of sweet, pure water, was open to us during the
whole day. There, the first time for nine months, our feet pressed the
mother earth, and the blessed open air fanned our cheeks.
Mr. Luke Blackmer, of Salisbury, kindly placed his library of several
thousand volumes at our disposal. Whenever we wished for books we had
only to address a note to him, through the prison authorities, and, in
a few hours, a little negro with a basket of them on his head would
come in at the gate. It seemed more like life and less like the tomb
than any prison we had inhabited before.
[Sidenote: THE CRUSHING WEIGHT OF IMPRISONMENT.]
And yet those long Summer months were very dreary to bear, for we had
upon us the one heavy, crushing weight of captivity. It is not hunger
or cold, sickness or death, which makes prison life so hard to bear.
But it is the utter idleness, emptiness, aimlessness of such a life. It
is being, through all the long hours of each day and night--for weeks,
months, years, if one lives so long--absolutely without employment,
mental or physical--with nothing to fill the vacant mind, which always
becomes morbid and turns inward to prey upon itself.
What exile from his country Can flee himself as well?
It was doubtless this which gave us the look peculiar to the
captive--the disturbed, half-wild expression of the eye, the
contraction of the wrinkled brow which indicates trouble at the heart.
We were most struck with this in the morning, when, on first going out
of our sleeping quarters, we passed down by the hospital and stopped
beside the bench where those were laid who had died during the night.
As we lifted the cloth, to see who had found release, the one thing
which always impressed me was the perfect calm, the sweet, ineffable
peace, which those white, thin faces wore. For months I never saw it
without a twinge of envy. Until then I never felt the meaning of the
words, "where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at
rest." Until then I never realized the wealth of the assurance, "He
giveth his beloved sleep."
[Sidenote: BAD NEWS FROM HOME.]
Some prisoners had an additional weight to bear. They were southern
Unionists--Tennesseans, North Carolinians, West Virginians, and
Mississippians--whose families lived on the border. They knew that
they were liable any day to have their houses robbed or burned by the
enemy, and their wives and little ones turned out to the mercy of the
elements, or the charity of friends. This gnawing anxiety took away
their elasticity and power of endurance. They had far less capacity for
resisting disease and hardship than the northeners, and died in the
proportion of four or five to one. I could hardly wonder at the fervor
with which, in their devotional exercises, night after night, they sung
the only hymn which they ever attempted:
"There I shall bathe my weary soul
In seas of heavenly rest;
And not a wave of trouble roll
Across this peaceful breast."
The cup of others, yet, had a still bitterer ingredient, which filled
it to overflowing. I wonder profoundly that any one drinking of it ever
lived to tell his story. They had received bad news from home--news
that those nearest and dearest, finding their load of life too heavy,
had laid it wearily down. During the long prison hours, such had
nothing to think of but the vacant place, the hushed voice, and the
desolate hearth. Hope--the one thing which buoys up the prisoner--was
gone. That picture of home, which had looked before as heaven looks to
the enthusiastic devotee, was forever darkened. The prisoner knew if
the otherwise glad hour of his release should ever come, no warmth of
welcome, no greeting of friendship, no rejoicing of affection, could
ever replace for him the infinite value of the love he had lost.
[Sidenote: THE GREAT LIBBY TUNNEL.]
Early in the Spring we were delighted to learn from Richmond that
Colonel Streight had succeeded in escaping from Libby. The officers
constructed a long tunnel, which proved a perfect success, liberating
one hundred and fourteen of them. Streight, whose proportions tended
toward the Falstaffian, was very apprehensive that he could not work
his way through it. Narrowly escaping the fate of the greedy fox which
"stuck in the hole," he finally squeezed through. The Rebels hated him
so bitterly that, by the unanimous wish of his fellow-prisoners, he was
the first man to pass out. A Union woman of Richmond concealed him for
nearly two weeks. The first officers who reached our lines announced
through the New York papers that Streight had arrived at Fortress
Monroe. This caused the Richmond authorities to relinquish their
search; and finally, under a skillful pilot, having traveled with great
caution for eleven nights to accomplish less than a hundred miles,
Streight reached the protection of the Stars and Stripes.
Our prison rations of corn bread and beef were tolerable, in quantity
and quality. The Salisbury market also afforded a few articles, of
which eggs were the great staple. We indulged extravagantly in that
mild form of dissipation--our mess of five at one time having on hand
seventy-two dozen, which represented, in Confederate currency, about
two hundred dollars.
We soon made the acquaintance of several loyal North Carolinians.
Citizens of respectability were permitted to visit the prison. Those of
Union proclivities invariably found opportunity to converse with us.
Like all Loyalists of the South, white and black, they trusted northern
prisoners implicitly. The reign of terror was so great that they often
feared to repose confidence in each other, and cautioned us against
repeating their expressions of loyalty to their neighbors and friends,
whose Union sympathies were just as strong as theirs.
[Sidenote: HORRIBLE SUFFERINGS OF UNION OFFICERS.]
Captains Julius L. Litchfield, of the Fourth Maine Infantry, Charles
Kendall, of the Signal Corps, and Edward E. Chase, of the First Rhode
Island Cavalry, were imprisoned in the upper room of the factory.
Held as hostages for certain Rebel officers in the Alton, Illinois,
penitentiary, they were sentenced to confinement and hard labor during
the war. In one instance only was the hard labor imposed. In the prison
yard they were ordered to remove several heavy stones a few yards and
then carry them back. For some minutes they stood beside the Rebel
sergeant, silently and with folded arms. Then Chase thus instructed the
guard:
"Go to Captain Galloway, and tell him, with my compliments, that
perhaps I was just as delicately nurtured as he--that, if he were in
my place, he would hardly do this work, and that I will see the whole
Confederacy in the Bottomless Pit before I lift a single stone!"
Chase and his comrades were never afterward ordered to labor. Other
Union officers, held as hostages, arrived from time to time. Eight, who
came from Richmond, had been confined one hundred and forty-five days
in that horrible Libby cell where the mold accumulated on the beard of
the Pennsylvania lieutenant. While there they suffered intensely from
cold, ate daily all their scanty ration the moment it was issued, and
were compelled to fast for the rest of the twenty-four hours, save when
they could catch rats, which they eagerly devoured. Some came out with
broken constitutions, and all were frightfully pallid and emaciated.
Starving and freezing are words easily said, but these gentlemen
learned their actual significance.
Four of them were held for Kentucky bushwhackers, whom one of our
military courts had sentenced to death, which they clearly deserved
under well-defined laws of war. Had they been promptly executed, the
Rebels would never have dared, in retaliation, to hurt the hair of a
prisoners head. But Mr. Lincoln's kindness of heart induced him to
commute their sentence to imprisonment, and made him unwittingly the
cause of this barbarity toward our own officers.
The hostages were plucky and enterprising, frequently attempting to
escape. One night they suspended from their fourth-story window a rope
which they had constructed of blankets. Captain Ives, of the Tenth
Massachusetts Infantry, descended in safety. A daring and loyal Rebel
deserter, from East Tennessee, named Carroll, who designed to pilot
them to our lines, attempted to follow; but the rope broke, and he fell
the whole distance, striking upon his head. It would have killed most
men; but Carroll, after spending the night in the guard-house, bathed
his swollen head and troubled himself no further about the matter.
Captain B. C. G. Reed, from Zanesville, Ohio, was constantly trying
to secure his own release. It always seemed to make him unhappy when
he passed two or three weeks without making attempts to escape. They
usually resulted in his being hand-cuffed and ballasted by a ball and
chain, or confined in a filthy cell.
[Sidenote: A COOL METHOD OF ESCAPE.]
But, sooner or later, perseverance achieves. Once, while so weak
from inflammatory rheumatism, contracted in a Richmond dungeon, that
he could hardly walk, he made a successful endeavor, in company with
Captain Litchfield. At nine o'clock, on a rainy March night, with their
blankets wrapped about them, they coolly walked up to the gate. They
rebuked the guard who halted them, indignantly asking him if he did not
know that they belonged at head-quarters! Impudence won the day. The
innocent sentinel permitted them to pass. They went directly through
Captain Galloway's office, which fortunately happened to be empty;
reached the outer fence; Litchfield helped over his weak companion,
and the world was all before them, where to choose. They traveled one
hundred and twenty miles, but, in the mountains of East Tennessee, were
recaptured and brought back.
Nothing daunted, Reed repeated the attempt again and again. Finally, he
jumped from a train of cars in the city of Charleston, found a negro
who secreted him, and by night conveyed him in a skiff to our forces at
Battery Wagner. Reed returned to his command in Thomas's Army, and was
subsequently killed in one of the battles before Nashville. Entering
the service as a private, and fairly winning promotion, he was an
excellent type of the thinking bayonets, of the young men who freely
gave their lives "for our dear country's sake."
[Sidenote: CAPTURED THROUGH AN OBSTINATE MULE.]
Early in the summer, our mess was agreeably enlarged by the arrival
of Mr. William E. Davis, Correspondent of _The Cincinnati Gazette_
and Clerk of the Ohio Senate. Davis owed his capture to the stupidity
of a mule. Riding leisurely along a road within the lines of General
Sherman's army, more than a mile from the front, he was compelled to
pass through a little gap left between two corps, which had not quite
connected. He was suddenly confronted by a double-barreled shot-gun,
presented by a Rebel standing behind a tree, who commanded him to halt.
Not easily intimidated, Davis attempted to turn his mule and ride for
a life and liberty. With the true instinct of his race, the animal
resisted the rein, seeming to require a ten-acre lot and three days
for turning around--wherefore the rider fell into the hands of the
Philistines.
Books whiled away many weary hours. As Edmond Dantes, in the Count of
Monte Christo, came out from his twelve years of imprisonment "a very
well-read man," we ought to have acquired limitless lore; but reading
at last palled upon our tastes, and we would none of it.
[Sidenote: CONCEALING MONEY WHEN SEARCHED.]
Our Salisbury friends supplied us liberally with money. The editors
of the migratory _Memphis Appeal_ frequently offered to me any amount
which I might desire, and made many attempts to secure my exchange.
The prison authorities sometimes searched us; but friendly guards, or
officers of Union proclivities, would always give us timely notice,
enabling us to secrete our money. One (nominally) Rebel lieutenant,
after we were drawn up in line and the searching had begun, would
sometimes receive bank-notes from us, and hand them back when we were
returned to our own quarters.
Once, as we were being examined, I had forty dollars, in United States
currency, concealed in my hat. That was an article of dress which
had never been examined. But now, looking down the line, I saw the
guard suddenly commence taking off the prisoners' hats, carefully
scrutinizing them. Removing the money from mine, I handed it to
Lieutenant Holman, of Vermont; but, turning around, I observed that
two Rebel officers immediately behind us had witnessed the movement.
Holman promptly passed the notes to "Junius," who stood near, reading
a ponderous volume, and who placed them between the leaves of his
book. Holman was at once taken from the line and searched rigorously
from head to foot, but the Rebels were unable to find the coveted
"greenbacks."
The prison officers, under rigid orders from the Richmond authorities,
would sometimes retain money received by mail. Two hundred dollars in
Confederate notes were thus withheld from me for more than a year.
Determined that the Rebel officials should not enjoy much peace of
mind, I addressed them letter after letter, reciting their various
subterfuges. At last, upon my demanding that they should either give me
the money, or refuse positively over their own signatures, the amount
was forthcoming. Thousands of dollars belonging to prisoners were
confiscated upon frivolous pretexts, or no pretext whatever.
[Sidenote: ATTEMPTS TO ESCAPE FRUSTRATED.]
Persistent ill-fortune still followed all our attempts to escape.
Once we perfected an arrangement with a friendly guard, by which, at
midnight, he was to pass us over the fence upon his beat. Before our
quarters were locked for the night, "Junius" and myself hid under
the hospital, where, through the faithful sentinel, escape would be
certain. But just then, we chanced to be nearly without money, and
Davis waited for a Union _attaché_ of the prison to bring him four
hundred dollars from a friend outside. The messenger, for the first
and last time in eleven months, becoming intoxicated that afternoon,
arrived with the money five minutes too late. Davis was unable to join
us; we determined not to leave him, expecting to repeat the attempt on
the following night; but the next day the guard was conscribed and sent
to Lee's army.
These constant failures subjected us to many jests from our
fellow-prisoners. Once, in a dog-day freak, "Junius" had every hair
shaved from his head, leaving his pallid face diversified only by a
great German mustache. He replied to all _badinage_ that he was not the
correspondent for whom his interlocutors mistook him, but the venerable
and famous Chinaman "No-Go."
[Sidenote: YANKEE DESERTERS WHIPPED AND HANGED.]
The Yankee deserters, having no friends to protect them, were treated
with great harshness. During a single day six were tied up to a post
and received, in the aggregate, one hundred and twenty-seven lashes
with the cat-o'nine-tails upon their bare backs, as punishment for
digging a tunnel. Many of them were "bounty-jumpers" and desperadoes.
They robbed each newly-arriving deserter of all his money, beating him
unmercifully if he resisted. After being thus whipped, at their own
request their _status_ was changed, and they were sent as prisoners of
war to Andersonville, Georgia. There the Union prisoners, detecting
them in several robberies and murders, organized a court-martial, tried
them, and hung six of them upon trees within the garrison, with ropes
furnished by the Rebel commandant.
For seven months no letters, even from our own families, were
permitted to reach us. This added much to our weariness. I never knew
the pathos of Sterne's simple story until I heard "Junius" read it one
sad Summer night in our prison quarters. For weeks afterward rung in my
ears the cry of the poor starling: "I can't get out! I can't get out!"
CHAPTER XXXVII.
----- Not a soul But felt a fever of the mad, and played Some
tricks of desperation.--TEMPEST.
All trouble, torment, wonder, and amazement Inhabit
here.--IBID.
[Sidenote: GREAT INFLUX OF PRISONERS.]
Early in October, the condition of the Salisbury garrison suddenly
changed. Nearly ten thousand prisoners of war, half naked and without
shelter, were crowded into its narrow limits, which could not
reasonably accommodate more than six hundred. It was converted into a
scene of suffering and death which no pen can adequately describe. For
every hour, day and night, we were surrounded by horrors which burned
into our memories like a hot iron.
We had never before been in a prison containing our private soldiers.
In spite of many assurances to the contrary, we had been skeptical as
to the barbarities which they were said to suffer at Belle Isle and
Andersonville. We could not believe that men bearing the American name
would be guilty of such atrocities. Now, looking calmly upon our last
two months in Salisbury, it seems hardly possible to exaggerate the
incredible cruelty of the Rebel authorities.
When captured, the prisoners were robbed of the greater part of their
clothing. When they reached Salisbury, all were thinly clad, thousands
were barefooted, not one in twenty had an overcoat or blanket, and many
hundreds were without coats or blouses.
[Sidenote: STARVING IN THE MIDST OF FOOD.]
For several weeks, they were furnished with no shelter whatever.
Afterward, one Sibley tent and one A tent was issued to each hundred
men. With the closest crowding, these contained about one-half of them.
The rest burrowed in the earth, crept under buildings, or dragged out
the nights in the open air upon the muddy, snowy, or frozen ground.
In October, November, and December, snow fell several times. It was
piteous beyond description to see the poor fellows, coatless, hatless,
and shoeless, shivering about the yard.
They were organized into divisions of one thousand each, and subdivided
into squads of one hundred. Almost daily one or more divisions was
without food for twenty-four hours. Several times some of them received
no rations for forty-eight hours. The few who had money, paid from
five to twenty dollars, in Rebel currency, for a little loaf of bread.
Some sold the coats from their backs and the shoes from their feet to
purchase food.
When a subordinate asked the post-Commandant, Major John H. Gee, "Shall
I give the prisoners full rations?" he replied: "No, G-d d--n them,
give them quarter-rations!"
Yet, at this very time, one of our Salisbury friends, a trustworthy and
Christian gentleman, assured us, in a stolen interview:
"It is within my personal knowledge that the great commissary
warehouse, in this town, is filled to the roof with corn and pork. I
know that the prison commissary finds it difficult to obtain storage
for his supplies."
After our escape, we learned from personal observation that the region
abounded in corn and pork. Salisbury was a general dépôt for army
supplies.
[Sidenote: FREEZING IN THE MIDST OF FUEL.]
That section of country is densely wooded. The cars brought fuel
to the door of our prison. If the Rebels were short of tents, they
might easily have paroled two or three hundred prisoners, to go out
and cut logs, with which, in a single week, barracks could have been
constructed for every captive; but the Commandant would not consent. He
did not even furnish half the needed fuel.
Cold and hunger began to tell fearfully upon the robust young men,
fresh from the field, who crowded the prison. Sickness was very
prevalent and very fatal. It invariably appeared in the form of
pneumonia, catarrh, diarrh[oe]a, or dysentery; but was directly
traceable to freezing and starvation. Therefore the medicines were of
little avail. The weakened men were powerless to resist disease, and
they were carried to the dead-house in appalling numbers.
By appointment of the prison authorities, my two comrades and myself
were placed in charge of all the hospitals, nine in number, inside the
garrison. The scenes which constantly surrounded us were enough to
shake the firmest nerves; but there was work to be done for the relief
of our suffering companions. We could accomplish very little--hardly
more than to give a cup of cold water, and see that the patients were
treated with sympathy and kindness.
Mr. Davis was general superintendent, and brought to his arduous duties
good judgment, untiring industry, and uniform kindness.
"Junius" was charged with supplying medicines to the "out-door
patients." The hospitals, when crowded, would hold about six hundred;
but there were always many more invalids unable to obtain admission.
These wretched men waited wearily for death in their tents, in
subterranean holes, under hospitals, or in the open air. My comrade's
tender sympathy softened the last hours of many a poor fellow who had
long been a stranger to
"The falling music of a gracious word,
Or the stray sunshine of a smile."
[Sidenote: REBEL SURGEONS GENERALLY HUMANE.]
I was appointed to supervise all the hospital books, keeping a record
of each patient's name, disease, admission, and discharge or death.
At my own solicitation, the Rebel surgeon-in-chief also authorized me
to receive the clothing left by the dead, and re-issue it among the
living. I endeavored to do this systematically, keeping lists of the
needy, who indeed were nine-tenths of all the prisoners. The deaths
ranged from twenty to forty-eight daily, leaving many garments to be
distributed. Day after day, in bitterly cold weather, pale, fragile
boys, who should have been at home with their mothers and sisters,
came to me with no clothing whatever, except a pair of worn cotton
pantaloons and a thin cotton shirt.
Dr. Richard O. Currey, a refugee from Knoxville, was the surgeon in
charge. Though a genuine Rebel, he was just and kind-hearted, doing his
utmost to change the horrible condition of affairs. Again and again he
sent written protests to Richmond, which brought several successive
inspectors to examine the prison and hospitals, but no change of
treatment.
We were reluctantly driven to the belief that the Richmond authorities
deliberately adopted this plan to reduce the strength of our armies.
The Medusa head of Slavery had turned their hearts to stone. At this
time, they held nearly forty thousand prisoners. In our garrison the
inmates were dying at the rate of thirteen per cent. a month upon the
aggregate. About as many more were enlisting in the Rebel army. Thus
our soldiers were destroyed at the rate of more than twenty-five per
cent. a month, with no corresponding loss to the enemy.
[Sidenote: TERRIBLE SCENES IN THE HOSPITALS.]
Frequently, for two or three days, Dr. Currey would refrain from
entering the garrison, reluctant to look upon the revolting scenes from
which _we_ could find no escape. I am glad to be able to throw one ray
of light into so dark a picture. Nearly all the surgeons evinced that
humanity which ought to characterize their profession. They were much
the best class of Rebels we encountered. They denounced unsparingly
the manner in which prisoners were treated, and endeavored to mitigate
their sufferings.
To call the foul pens, where the patients were confined, "hospitals,"
was a perversion of the English tongue. We could not obtain brooms to
keep them clean; we could not get cold water to wash the hands and
faces of those sick and dying men. In that region, where every farmer's
barn-yard contained grain-stacks, we could not procure clean straw
enough to place under them. More than half the time they were compelled
to lie huddled upon the cold, naked, filthy floors, without even that
degree of warmth and cleanliness usually afforded to brutes. The wasted
forms and sad, pleading eyes of those sufferers, waiting wearily for
the tide of life to ebb away--without the commonest comforts, without
one word of sympathy, or one tear of affection--will never cease to
haunt me.
At all hours of the day and night, on every side, we heard the terrible
hack! hack! hack! in whose pneumonic tones every prisoner seemed to be
coughing his life away. It was the most fearful sound in that fearful
place.
[Sidenote: THE RATTLING DEAD-CART.]
The last scene of all was the dead-cart, with its rigid forms piled
upon each other like logs--the arms swaying, the white ghastly faces
staring, with dropped jaws and stony eyes--while it rattled along,
bearing its precious freight just outside the walls, to be thrown in a
mass into trenches and covered with a little earth.
When received, there were no sick or wounded men among the prisoners.
But before they had been in Salisbury six weeks, "Junius," with better
facilities for knowing than any one else, insisted that among eight
thousand there were not five hundred well men. The Rebel surgeons
coincided in this belief.
The rations, issued very irregularly, were insufficient to support
life. Men grew feeble before living upon them a single week; but
could not buy food from the town; and were not permitted to receive
even a meal sent by friends from the outside. Our positions in the
hospitals enabled us to purchase supplies and fare better. Prisoners
eagerly devoured the potato-skins from our table. They ate rats, dogs,
and cats. Many searched the yard for bones and scraps among the most
revolting substances.
They constantly besieged us for admission to the hospitals, or for
shelter and food, which we were unable to give. It seemed almost sinful
for us to enjoy protection from the weather and food enough to support
life in the midst of all this distress.
On wet days the mud was very deep, and the shoeless wretches wallowed
pitifully through it, seeking vainly for cover and warmth. Two hundred
negro prisoners were almost naked, and could find no shelter whatever
except by burrowing in the earth. The authorities treated them with
unusual rigor, and guards murdered them with impunity.
No song, no athletic game, few sounds of laughter broke the silence of
the garrison. It was a Hall of Eblis--devoid of its gold-besprinkled
pavements, crystal vases, and dazzling saloons; but with all its
oppressive silence, livid lips, sunken eyes, and ghastly figures, at
whose hearts the consuming fire was never quenched.
[Illustration: INTERIOR VIEW OF A HOSPITAL IN THE SALISBURY PRISON.]
Constant association with suffering deadened our sensibilities. We were
soon able to pass through the hospitals little moved by their terrible
spectacles, except when patients addressed us, exciting a personal
interest.
[Sidenote: CREDULITY OF OUR GOVERNMENT.]
The credulity and trustfulness of our Government toward the enemy
passed belief. Month after month it sent by the truce-boats many tons
of private boxes for Union prisoners, while the Rebels, not satisfied
with their usual practice of stealing a portion under the rose, upon
one trivial pretext or other, openly confiscated every pound of them.
At the same time, returning truce-boats were loaded with boxes sent
to Rebel prisoners from their friends in the South, and express-lines
crowded with supplies from their sympathizers in the North.
The Government held a large excess of prisoners, and the Rebels were
anxious to exchange man for man; but our authorities acted upon the
cold-blooded theory of Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War, that we
could not afford to give well-fed, rugged men, for invalids and
skeletons--that returned prisoners were infinitely more valuable to the
Rebels than to us, because their soldiers were inexorably kept in the
army, while many of ours, whose terms of service had expired, would not
re-enlist.
The private soldier who neglects his duty is taken out and shot.
Officials seemed to forget that the soldier's obligation of obedience
devolves upon the Government the obligation of protection. It was
clearly the duty of our authorities either to exchange our own
soldiers, or to protect them--not by indiscriminate cruelty, but by
well-considered, systematic retaliation in kind, until the Richmond
authorities should treat prisoners with ordinary humanity. It was very
easy to select a number of Rebel officers, corresponding to the Union
prisoners in the Salisbury garrison, and give them precisely the same
kind and amount of food, clothing, and shelter.
[Sidenote: GENERAL BUTLER'S EXAMPLE OF RETALIATION.]
When the Confederate Government placed certain of our negro prisoners
under fire, at work upon the fortifications of Richmond, General
Butler, in a brief letter, informed them that he had stationed an equal
number of Rebel officers, equally exposed and spade in hand, upon _his_
fortifications. When his letter reached Richmond, before that day's sun
went down, the negroes were returned to Libby Prison and ever afterward
treated as prisoners of war. But, by the mawkish sensibilities of a
few northern statesmen and editors, our Government was encouraged to
neglect the matter, and thus permitted the needless murder of its own
soldiers--a stain upon the nation's honor, and an inexcusable cruelty
to thousands of aching hearts.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
I have supped full with horrors.--MACBETH.
The weariest and most loathed worldly life That ache, age,
penury and imprisonment Can lay on nature.--MEASURE FOR
MEASURE.
[Sidenote: ATTEMPTED OUTBREAK AND MASSACRE.]
On the 26th of November, while we were sitting at dinner, John Lovell
came up from the yard and whispered me:
"There is to be an insurrection. The prisoners are preparing to break
out."
We had heard similar reports so frequently as to lose all faith in
them; but this was true. Without deliberation or concert of action,
upon the impulse of the moment, a portion of the prisoners acted.
Suffering greatly from hunger, many having received no food for
forty-eight hours, they said:
"Let us break out of this horrible place. We may just as well die upon
the guns of the guards as by slow starvation."
A number, armed with clubs, sprang upon a Rebel relief of sixteen men,
just entering the yard. Though weak and emaciated, these prisoners
performed their part promptly and gallantly. Man for man, they wrenched
the guns from the soldiers. One Rebel resisted and was bayoneted where
he stood. Instantly, the building against which he leaned was reddened
by a great stain of blood. Another raised his musket, but, before he
could fire, fell to the ground, shot through the head. Every gun was
taken from the terrified relief, who immediately ran back to their
camp, outside.
Had parties of four or five hundred then rushed at the fence in half
a dozen different places, they might have confused the guards, and
somewhere made an opening. But some thousands ran to it at one point
only. Having neither crow-bars nor axes they could not readily effect a
breach. At once every musket in the garrison was turned upon them. Two
field-pieces opened with grape and canister. The insurrection--which
had not occupied more than three minutes--was a failure, and the
uninjured at once returned to their quarters.
The yard was now perfectly quiet. The portion of it which we occupied
was several hundred yards from the scene of the _mêlée_. In our
vicinity there had been no disturbance whatever; yet the guards stood
upon the fence for twenty minutes, with deliberate aim firing into the
tents, upon helpless and innocent men. Several prisoners were killed
within a dozen yards of our building. One was wounded while leaning
against it. The bullets rattled against the logs, but none chanced to
pass through the wide apertures between them, and enter our apartment.
Sixteen prisoners were killed and sixty wounded, of whom not one in ten
had participated in the outbreak; while most were ignorant of it until
they heard the guns.
[Sidenote: COLD-BLOODED MURDERS FREQUENT.]
After this massacre, cold-blooded murders were very frequent. Any
guard, standing upon the fence, at any hour of the day or night, could
deliberately raise his musket and shoot into any group of prisoners,
black or white, without the slightest rebuke from the authorities. He
would not even be taken off his post for it.
One Union officer was thus killed when there could be no pretext that
he was violating any prison rule.
[Illustration: MASSACRE OF UNION PRISONERS ATTEMPTING TO ESCAPE FROM
SALISBURY, NORTH CAROLINA.]
Moses Smith, a negro soldier of the Seventh Maryland Infantry, was shot
through the head while standing inoffensively beside my own quarters,
conversing with John Lovell. One of many instances was that of two
white Connecticut soldiers who were shot within their tents. We induced
one of the surgeons to inquire at head-quarters the cause of the
homicide. The answer received was, that the guard saw three negroes in
range, and, knowing he would never have so good an opportunity again,
fired at them, but missed aim and killed the wrong men! It seemed to be
regarded as a harmless jest.
[Sidenote: HOSTILITY TO "TRIBUNE" CORRESPONDENTS.]
Though my comrades and myself, either by _finesse_ or bribery, often
succeeded in obtaining special privileges from the prison officers, the
hostility of the Confederate authorities was unrelenting. Our attorney,
Mr. Blackmer, after visiting Richmond on our behalf, returned and
assured us that he saw no hope of our release before the end of the
war, unless we could effect our escape. Robert Ould, who usually denied
that he regarded us with special hostility, on one occasion, in his
cups, remarked to the United States Commissioner:
"_The Tribune_ did more than any other agency to bring on the war. It
is useless for you to ask the exchange of its correspondents. They are
just the men we want, and just the men we are going to hold."
Our Government, through blundering rather than design, released a
large number of Rebel journalists without requiring our exchange.
Finally, while among the horrors of Salisbury, we learned that
Edward A. Pollard, a malignant Rebel, and an editor of _The Richmond
Examiner_, most virulent of all the southern papers, was paroled to the
city of Brooklyn, after confinement for a few weeks in the North. This
news cut us like a knife. We, after nearly two years of captivity, in
that foul, vermin-infested prison, among all its atrocities--he, at
large, among the comforts and luxuries of one of the pleasantest cities
in the world! The thought was so bitter, that, for weeks after hearing
the intelligence, we did not speak of it to each other. Mr. Welles,
Secretary of the Navy, was the person who set Pollard at liberty.
I record the fact, not that any special importance attaches to our
individual experience, but because hundreds of Union prisoners were
subjected to kindred injustice.
[Sidenote: A CRUEL INJUSTICE.]
At the Salisbury penitentiary was a respectable woman from North
Carolina, who was confined for two months, in the same quarters with
the male inmates. Her crime was, giving a meal to a Rebel deserter! In
Richmond, a Virginian of seventy was shut up with us for a long time,
on the charge of feeding his own son, who had deserted from the army!
In September, a number of Rebel convicts, armed with clubs and knives,
forcibly took from John Lovell a Union flag, which he had thus far
concealed. After the prisoners of war arrived they vented their
indignation upon the convicts, wherever they could catch them. For
several days, Rebels venturing into the yard were certain to return to
their quarters with bruised faces and blackened eyes.
[Sidenote: REBEL EXPECTATIONS OF PEACE.]
During the peace mania, which seemed to possess the North, at the time
of McClellan's nomination, the Rebels were very hopeful. Lieutenant
Stockton, the post-Adjutant, one day observed:
"You will go home very soon; we shall have peace within a month."
"On what do you base your opinion?" I asked.
"The tone of your newspapers and politicians. McClellan is certain to
be elected President, and peace will immediately follow."
"You southerners are the most credulous people in the whole world. You
have been so long strangers to freedom of speech and the press, that
you cannot comprehend it at all. There are half a dozen public men and
as many newspapers in the North, who really belong to your side, and
express their Rebel sympathies with little or no disguise. Can you
not see that they never receive any accessions? Point out a single
important convert made by them since the beginning of the war. Before
Sumter, these same men told you that, if we attempted coërcion, it
would produce war in the North; and you believed them. Again and again
they have told you, as now, that the loyal States would soon give up
the conflict, and you still believe them. Wait until the people vote,
in November, and then tell me what you think."
In due time came news of Mr. Lincoln's re-election. The prisoners
received it with intense satisfaction. I conveyed it to the Union
officers, from whom we were separated by bayonets--tossing to them
a biscuit containing a concealed note. A few minutes after, their
cheering and shouting excited the surprise and indignation of the
prison authorities. The next morning I asked Stockton how he now
regarded the peace prospect. Shaking his head, he sadly replied:
"It is too deep for me; I cannot see the end."
A private belonging to the Fifty-ninth Massachusetts Infantry, had
left Boston, a new recruit, just six weeks before we met him. In the
interval he participated in two great battles and five skirmishes, was
wounded in the leg, captured, escaped from his guards, while _en route_
for Georgia, traveled three days on foot, was then re-captured and
brought to Salisbury. His six weeks' experience had been fruitful and
varied.
That hope deferred which maketh the heart sick, began to tell seriously
upon our mental health. We grew morbid and bitter, and were often upon
the verge of quarreling among ourselves. I remember even feeling a
pang of jealousy and indignation at an account of some enjoyment and
hilarity among my friends at home.
[Sidenote: THE PRISON LIKE THE TOMB.]
Our prison was like the tomb. No voice from the North entered its
gloomy portal. Knowing that we had been unjustly neglected by our own
Government, wondering if we were indeed forsaken by God and man, we
seemed to lose all human interest, and to care little whether we lived
or died. But I suppose lurking, unconscious hope, still buoyed us up.
Could we have known positively that we must endure eight months more
of that imprisonment, I think we should have received with joy and
gratitude our sentence to be taken out and shot.
Frequently prisoners asked us, sometimes with tears in their eyes:
"What shall we do? We grow weaker day by day. Staying here we shall be
certain to follow our comrades to the hospital and the dead-house. The
Rebels assure us that if we will enlist, we shall have abundant food
and clothing; and we may find a chance of escaping to our own lines."
I always answered that they owed no obligation to God or man to remain
and starve to death. Of the two thousand who did enlist, nearly all
designed to desert at the first opportunity. Their remaining comrades
had no toleration for them. If one who had joined the Rebels came
back into the yard for a moment, his life was in imminent peril. Two
or three times such persons were shockingly beaten, and only saved
from death by the interference of the Rebel guards. This ferocity was
but the expression of the deep, unselfish patriotism of our private
soldiers. These men, who carried muskets and received but a mere
pittance, were so earnest that they were almost ready to kill their
comrades for joining the enemy even to escape a slow, torturing death.
[Sidenote: SOMETHING ABOUT TUNNELING.]
We grew very familiar with the occult science of tunneling. Its _modus
operandi_ is this: the workman, having sunk a hole in the ground
three, six, or eight feet, as the case may require, strikes off
horizontally, lying flat on his face, and digging with whatever tool
he can find--usually a case-knife. The excavation is made just large
enough for one man to creep through it. The great difficulty is, to
conceal the dirt. In Salisbury, however, this obstacle did not exist,
for many of the prisoners lived in holes in the ground, which they were
constantly changing or enlarging. Hence the yard abounded in hillocks
of fresh earth, upon which that taken from the tunnels could be spread
nightly without exciting notice.
After the great influx of prisoners of war in October, a large
tunneling business was done. I knew of fifteen in course of
construction at one time, and doubtless there were many more. The
Commandant adopted an ingenious and effectual method of rendering them
abortive.
In digging laterally in the ground, at the distance of thirty or
forty feet the air becomes so foul that lights will not burn, and men
breathe with difficulty. In the great tunnel sixty-five feet long,
by which Colonel Streight and many other officers escaped from Libby
prison, this embarrassment was obviated by a bit of Yankee ingenuity.
The officers, with tacks, blankets, and boards, constructed a pair of
huge bellows, like those used by blacksmiths. Then, while one of them
worked with his case-knife, progressing four or five feet in twelve
hours, and a second filled his haversack with dirt and removed it (of
course backing out, and crawling in on his return, as the tunnel was a
single track, and had no turn-table), a third sat at the mouth pumping
vigorously, and thus supplied the workers with fresh air.
[Sidenote: THE TUNNELERS INGENIOUSLY BAFFLED.]
At Salisbury this was impracticable. I suppose a paper of tacks could
not have been purchased there for a thousand dollars. There were none
to be had. Of course we could not pierce holes up to the surface of the
ground for ventilation, as that would expose every thing.
Originally there was but one line of guards--posted some twenty-five
feet apart, upon the fence which surrounded the garrison, and
constantly walking to and fro, meeting each other and turning back at
the limits of each post. Under this arrangement it was necessary to
tunnel about forty feet to go under the fence, and come up far enough
beyond it to emerge from the earth on a dark night without being seen
or heard by the sentinels.
When the Commandant learned (through prisoners actually suffering for
food, and ready to do almost any thing for bread) that tunneling was
going on, he tried to ascertain where the excavations were located;
but in vain, because none of the shaky Unionists had been informed.
Therefore he established a second line of guards, one hundred feet
outside of those on the fence, who also paced back and forth in the
same manner until they met, forming a second line impervious to
Yankees. This necessitated tunneling at least one hundred and forty
feet, which, without ventilation, was just as much out of the question
as to tunnel a hundred and forty miles.
IV.
THE ESCAPE.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
"A good wit will make use of any thing: I will turn diseases
to commodity."--KING HENRY IV.
[Sidenote: FIFTEEN MONTHS OF FRUITLESS ENDEAVOR.]
We were constantly trying to escape. During the last fifteen months of
our imprisonment, I think there was no day when we had not some plan
which we hoped soon to put in execution. We were always talking and
theorizing about the subject.
Indeed, we theorized too much. We magnified obstacles. We gave our
keepers credit for greater shrewdness and closer observation than
they were capable of. We would not start until all things combined to
promise success. Therefore, as the slow months wore away, again and
again we saw men of less capacity, but greater daring, escape by modes
which had appeared to us utterly chimerical and impracticable.
Fortune, too, persistently baffled us. At the vital moment when
freedom seemed just within our grasp, some unforeseen obstacle always
intervened to foil our plans. Still, assuming a confidence we did not
feel, we daily promised each other to persist until we gained our
liberty or lost our lives. After the malignity which the Richmond
authorities had manifested toward us, escape seemed a thousand-fold
preferable to release by exchange.
I should hardly dare to estimate the combined length of tunnels in
which we were concerned; they were always discovered, usually on the
eve of completion. My associate was wont to declare that we should
never escape in that way, unless we constructed an underground road to
Knoxville--two hundred miles as the bird flies!
Even if we passed the prison walls, the chance of reaching our lines
seemed almost hopeless. We were in the heart of the Confederacy.
During the ten months we spent in Salisbury, at least seventy persons
escaped; but nearly all were brought back, though a few were shot in
the mountains. We knew of only five who had reached the North.
[Sidenote: A FEARFUL JOURNEY IN PROSPECT.]
"Junius," certain to see the gloomy side of every picture, frequently
said: "To walk the same distance in Ohio or Massachusetts, where we
could travel by daylight upon public thoroughfares, stop at each
village for rest and refreshments, and sleep in warm beds every night,
we should consider a severe hardship. Think of this terrible tramp
of two hundred miles, by night, in mid-winter, over two ranges of
mountains, creeping stealthily through the enemy's country, weak,
hungry, shelterless! Can any of us live to accomplish it?"
When at last we did essay it, the journey proved nearly twice as long
and infinitely severer than even he had conceived.
Among the officers of the prison, were three stanch Union men--a
lieutenant, a surgeon, and Lieutenant John R. Welborn. They were our
devoted friends. Their homes, families, and interests, were in the
South. Attempting to escape, they were likely to be captured and
imprisoned. Remaining, they must enter the army in some capacity,
and they preferred wearing swords to carrying muskets. Hundreds of
Loyalists were in the same predicament, and adopted the same course.
[Sidenote: A FRIENDLY CONFEDERATE OFFICER.]
These gentlemen were of service to us in a thousand ways. They supplied
us with money, books, and provisions; bore messages between us and
other friends in the village; and kept us constantly advised of
military and political events known to the officials, but concealed
from the public.
Lieutenant Welborn came to the garrison only about a month before our
departure. He belonged to a secret organization known as the Sons of
America, instituted expressly to assist Union men, whether prisoners or
refugees, in escaping to the North. Its members were bound, by solemn
oath, to aid brothers in distress. They recognized each other by the
signs, grips, and passwords, common to all secret societies.
We soon discovered that Welborn was not only of the Order, but a very
earnest and self-sacrificing member. He was singularly daring. At our
first stolen interview he said: "You shall be out very soon, at all
hazards." Had he been detected in aiding us, it would have cost him his
life; but he was quite ready to peril it.
Beyond the inner line of sentinels, which was much the more difficult
one to pass, stood a Rebel hospital, where all medicines for the
garrison were stored. When we were placed in charge of the Union
hospitals, Mr. Davis was furnished with a pass to go out for medical
supplies. It was the inflexible rule of the prison that all persons
having such passes should give paroles not to escape. Davis would
have assumed no such obligation. But in the confusion incident to the
great influx of prisoners of war, and because it was the business of
several Rebel officers--the Commandant, the Medical Director, and the
Post-Adjutant--instead of the duty of one man to see it done, he was
never asked for the parole.
A few days later, the prison authorities gave similar passes to
"Junius" and to Captain Thomas E. Wolfe, of Connecticut, master of
a merchant-vessel, who had been a prisoner nearly as long as we. We
attempted to convince them, through several deluded Rebel _attachés_,
that it was essential to the proper conduct of the medical department
that I too should be supplied with a pass. Doubtless we should have
succeeded in time, had not an incident occurred to hasten our movements.
On Sunday, December 18th, we learned that General Bradley T. Johnson,
of Maryland, had arrived, and on the following day would supersede
Major Gee as Commandant of the prison. Johnson was a soldier who knew
how business should be done, and would doubtless put a stop to this
loose arrangement about passes. Not a moment was to be lost, and we
determined to escape that very night.
I engaged several prisoners, without informing them for what purpose,
in copying from my hospital books the names of the dead. I felt that,
to relieve friends at home, we ought to make an effort to carry through
this information, as long as there was the slightest possibility of
success.
[Sidenote: EFFECTS OF HUNGER AND COLD.]
My own books only contained the names of prisoners who died in the
hospitals. "Out-door patients"--those deceased in their own quarters,
or in no quarters whatever, were recorded in a separate book, by the
Rebel clerk in the outside hospital. I dared not send to him for their
names on Sunday, lest it should excite his suspicion. But the list
from my own records was appalling. It comprised over fourteen hundred
prisoners deceased within sixty days, and showed that they were now
dying at the rate of thirteen per cent. a month on the entire number--a
rate of mortality which would depopulate any city in the world in
forty-eight hours, and send the people flying in all directions, as
from a pestilence! Yet when those prisoners came there, they were young
and vigorous, like our soldiers generally in the field. There was not a
sick or wounded man among them. It was a fearful revelation of the work
which cold and starvation had done.
When I put on extra under-clothing for the possible journey, it was
without conscious expectation--almost without any hope whatever--of
success. I had assumed the same garments for the same purpose, at
the very least, thirty times before, within fifteen months, only to
be disappointed; and that was enough to dampen the most sanguine
temperament.
We believed that our attempt, if detected, would be made the excuse for
treating us with peculiar rigor. But, in the event of discovery, we
were likely to be sent back to our own quarters for the night, and not
ironed or confined in a cell until the next morning.
[Sidenote: ANOTHER PLAN IN RESERVE.]
Lieutenant Welborn was on duty that day. We made him privy to our plan.
He agreed, if it proved unsuccessful, to smuggle in muskets for us; and
we proposed to wrap ourselves in gray blankets, slouch our hats down
over our eyes, and pass out at midnight, as Rebel soldiers, when he
relieved the guard. Once in the camp, he could conduct us outside.
On that Sunday evening, half an hour before dark (the latest moment at
which the guards could be passed, even by authorized persons, without
the countersign), Messrs. Browne, Wolfe, and Davis, went outside, as if
to order their medical supplies for the sick prisoners. As they passed
in and out a dozen times a day, and their faces were quite familiar
to the sentinels, they were not compelled to show their passes, and
"Junius" left his behind with me.
[Sidenote: STOPPED BY THE SENTINEL.]
A few minutes later, taking a long box filled with bottles in which
the medicines were usually brought, and giving it to a little lad who
assisted me in my hospital duties, I started to follow them.
As if in great haste, we walked rapidly toward the fence, while,
leaning against trees or standing in the hospital doors, half a dozen
friends looked on to see how the plan worked. When we reached the gate,
I took the box from the boy, and said to him, of course for the benefit
of the sentinel:
"I am going outside to get these bottles filled. I shall be back in
about fifteen minutes, and want you to remain right here, to take them
and distribute them among the hospitals. Do not go away, now."
The lad, understanding the matter perfectly, replied, "Yes, sir;" and I
attempted to pass the sentinel by mere assurance.
I had learned long before how far a man may go, even in captivity, by
sheer, native impudence--by moving straight on, without hesitation,
with a confident look, just as if he had a right to go, and no one had
any right to question him. Several times, as already related, I saw
captives, who had procured citizens' clothes, thus walk past the guards
in broad daylight, out of Rebel prisons.
I think I could have done it on this occasion, but for the fact that it
had been tried successfully twice or thrice, and the guards severely
punished. The sentinel stopped me with his musket, demanding:
"Have you a pass, sir?"
"Certainly, I have a pass," I replied, with all the indignation I could
assume. "Have you not seen it often enough to know by this time?"
Apparently a little confounded, he replied, modestly:
[Sidenote: "EXCUSE ME FOR DETAINING YOU."]
"Probably I have; but they are very strict with us, and I was not quite
sure."
I gave to him this genuine pass belonging to my associate:
HEAD-QUARTERS CONFEDERATE STATES MILITARY PRISON, }
SALISBURY, N. C., _December 5, 1864_. }
Junius H. Browne, Citizen, has permission to pass the inner
gate of the Prison, to assist in carrying medicines to the
Military Prison Hospitals, until further orders.
J. A. FUQUA,
Captain and Assistant-Commandant of Post.
We had speculated for a long time about my using a spurious pass, and
my two comrades prepared several with a skill and exactness which
proved that, if their talents had been turned in that direction, they
might have made first-class forgers. But we finally decided that the
veritable pass was better, because, if the guard had any doubt about
it, I could tell him to send it into head-quarters for examination. The
answer returned would of course be that it was genuine.
But it was not submitted to any such inspection. The sentinel spelled
it out slowly, then folded and returned it to me, saying:
"That pass is all right. I know Captain Fuqua's handwriting.
Go on, sir; excuse me for detaining you."
I thought him excusable under the circumstances, and walked out. My
great fear was that, during the half hour which must elapse before I
could go outside the garrison, I might encounter some Rebel officer or
_attaché_ who knew me.
[Sidenote: ENCOUNTERING REBEL ACQUAINTANCES.]
Before I had taken ten steps, I saw, sauntering to and fro on the
piazza of the head-quarters building, a deserter from our service,
named Davidson, who recognized and bowed to me. I thought he would
not betray me, but was still fearful of it. I went on, and a few
yards farther, coming toward me in that narrow lane, where it was
impossible to avoid him, I saw the one Rebel officer who knew me better
than any other, and who frequently came into my quarters--Lieutenant
Stockton, the Post-Adjutant. Observing him in the distance, I thought
I recognized in him that old ill-fortune which had so long and
steadfastly baffled us. But I had the satisfaction of knowing that
my associates were on the look-out from a window and, if they saw
me involved in any trouble, would at once pass the outer gate, if
possible, and make good their own escape.
When we met, I bade Stockton good-evening, and talked for a few minutes
upon the weather, or some other subject in which I did not feel any
very profound interest. Then he passed into head-quarters, and I went
on. Yet a few yards farther, I encountered a third Rebel, named Smith,
who knew me well, and whose quarters, inside the garrison, were within
fifty feet of my own. There were not half a dozen Confederates about
the prison who were familiar with me; but it seemed as if at this
moment they were coming together in a grand convention.
Not daring to enter the Rebel hospital, where I was certain to be
recognized, I laid down my box of medicines behind a door, and sought
shelter in a little outbuilding. While I remained there, waiting for
the blessed darkness, I constantly expected to see a sergeant, with a
file of soldiers, come to take me back into the yard; but none came. It
was rare good fortune. Stockton, Smith, and Davidson, all knew, if they
had their wits about them, that I had no more right there than in the
village itself. I suppose their thoughtlessness must have been caused
by the peculiarly honest and business-like look of that medicine-box!
CHAPTER XL.
----Wheresoe'er you are That bide the pelting of this
pitiless storm, How shall your houseless heads and unfed
sides, Your looped and windowed raggedness, defend you?--KING
LEAR.
[Sidenote: "OUT OF THE JAWS OF DEATH."]
At dark, my three friends joined me. We went through the outer gate, in
full view of a sentinel, who supposed we were Rebel surgeons or nurses.
And then, on that rainy Sunday night, for the first time in twenty
months, we found ourselves walking freely in a public street, without a
Rebel bayonet before or behind us!
Reaching an open field, a mile from the prison, we crouched down upon
the soaked ground, in a bed of reeds, while Davis went to find a friend
who had long before promised us shelter. While lying there, we heard
a man walking through the darkness directly toward us. We hugged the
earth and held our breaths, listening to the beating of our own hearts.
He passed so near, that his coat brushed my cheek. We were beside a
path which led across the field from one house to another. Davis soon
returned, and called us with a low "Hist!" We crept to the fence where
he waited.
"It is all right," he said; "follow me."
He led us through bushes and lanes until we found our friend, leaning
against a tree in the rain, waiting for us.
"Thank God!" he exclaimed, "you are out at last. I wish I could extend
to you the hospitalities of my house; but it is full of visitors, and
they are all Rebels. However, I will take you to a tolerably safe
place. I have to leave town by a night train in half an hour, but I
will tell ---- where you are, and he will come and see you to-morrow."
[Sidenote: HIDING IN SIGHT OF THE PRISON.]
He conducted us to a barn, in full sight of the prison; directed us how
to hide, wrung our hands, bade us Godspeed, and returned to his house
and his unsuspecting guests.
We climbed up the ladder into the hay-mow. Davis and Wolfe burrowed
down perpendicularly into the fodder, as if sinking an oil-well, until
they were covered, heads and all. "Junius" and myself, after two hours
of perspiring labor, tunneled into a safe position under the eaves,
where we lay, stretched at full length, head to head, luxuriating in
the fresh air, which came in through the cracks.
Wonderfully pure and delicious it seemed, contrasted with the foul,
vitiated atmosphere we had just left! How sweet smelled the hay and the
husks! How infinite the "measureless content" which filled us at the
remembrance that at last we were free! Hearing the prison sentinels,
as they shouted "Ten o'--clock; a--ll's well!" we sank, like Abou Ben
Adhem, into a deep dream of peace.
Our object in remaining here was twofold. We desired to meet Welborn,
and obtain minute directions about the route, which thus far he had
found no opportunity to give us. Besides, we anticipated a vigilant
search. The Rebel authorities were thoroughly familiar with the habits
of escaping prisoners, who invariably acted as if there were never to
be any more nights after the first, and walked as far as their strength
would permit. Thus exhausted, they were unable to resist or run, if
overtaken.
[Sidenote: CERTAIN TO BE BROUGHT BACK.]
The Commandant would be likely to send out and picket all the probable
routes near the points we could reach by a hard night's travel. We
thought it good policy to keep _inside_ these scouts. While they
held the advance, they would hardly obtain tidings of us. We could
learn from the negroes where they guarded the roads and fords, and
thus easily evade them. Our shelter, in full view of the garrison,
and within sound of its morning drum-beat, was the one place, of all
others, where they would never think of searching for us.
On the second morning after our disappearance, _The Salisbury Daily
Watchman_ announced the escape, and said that it caused some chagrin,
as we were the most important prisoners in the garrison. But it added
that we were morally certain to be brought back within a week, as
scouts had been sent out in all directions, and the country thoroughly
alarmed. Some of these scouts went ninety miles from Salisbury, but
were naturally unable to learn any thing concerning us.
II. _Monday, December 19._
Remained hidden in the barn. There was a house only a few yards
away, and we could hear the conversation of the inmates whenever the
doors were open. White and negro children came up into the hay-loft,
sometimes running and jumping directly over the heads of Wolfe and
Davis.
At dark, another friend, a commissioned officer in the Rebel army,
came out to us with a canteen of water, which, quite without food, we
had wanted sadly during the day. He was unable to bring us provisions.
His wife was a Southern lady. Reluctant to cause her anxiety for his
liberty and property, imperiled by aiding us, or from some other
reason, he did not take her into the secret. Like most frugal wives,
where young and adult negroes abound, she kept her provisions under
lock and key, and he found it impossible to procure even a loaf of
bread without her knowledge.
With his parting benediction, we returned to the field where we had
waited the night before, and found Lieutenant Welborn, punctual to
appointment, with another escaped prisoner, Charles Thurston, of the
Sixth New Hampshire Infantry.
Thurston had two valuable possessions--great address, and the uniform
of a Confederate private. At ten o'clock, on Sunday night, learning
of our escape, and thinking us a good party to accompany, he walked
out of the prison yard behind two Rebel detectives, the sentinel
taking him for a third officer. Slouching his hat over his face, with
matchless effrontery he sat down on a log, among the Rebel guards. In a
few minutes he caught the eye of Welborn, who soon led him by all the
sentinels, giving the countersign as he passed, until he was outside
the garrison, and then hid him in a barn, half a mile from our place
of shelter. The negroes fed him during the day; and now here he was,
jovial, sanguine, daring, ready to start for the North Pole itself.
[Sidenote: COMMENCING THE LONG JOURNEY.]
Welborn gave us written directions how to reach friends in a stanch
Union settlement fifty miles away. It was hard to part from the noble
fellow. At that very moment he was under arrest, and awaiting trial by
court martial, on the charge of aiding prisoners to escape. In due time
he was acquitted. Three months later he reached our lines at Knoxville,
with thirty Union prisoners, whom he had conducted from Salisbury.
We said adieu, and went out into the starry silence. Plowing through
the mud for three miles, we struck the Western Railroad, and followed
it. Beside it were several camps with great fires blazing in front of
them. Uncertain whether they were occupied by guards or wood-choppers,
we kept on the safe side, and flanked them by wide _détours_ through
the almost impenetrable forest.
[Sidenote: TOO WEAK FOR TRAVELING.]
We were very weak. In the garrison we had been burying from twelve to
twenty men per day, from pneumonia. I had suffered from it for more
than a month, and my cough was peculiarly hollow and stubborn. My lungs
were still sore and sensitive, and walking greatly exhausted me. It
was difficult, even when supported by the arm of one of my friends,
to keep up with the party. At midnight I was compelled to lie, half
unconscious, upon the ground, for three-quarters of an hour, before I
could go on.
We accomplished twelve miles during the night. At three o'clock in the
morning we went into the pine-woods, and rested upon the frozen ground.
III. _Tuesday, December 20._
We supposed our hiding-place very secluded; but daylight revealed that
it was in the midst of a settlement. Barking dogs, crowing fowls, and
shouting negroes, could be heard from the farms all about us. It was
very cold, and we dared not build a fire. None of us were adequately
clothed, and "Junius" had not even an overcoat. It was impossible to
bring extra garments, which would have excited the attention of the
sentinel at the gate.
We could sleep for a few minutes on the pine-leaves; but soon the
chilly air, penetrating every fibre, would awaken us. There was a road,
only a few yards from our pine-thicket, upon which we saw horsemen and
farmers with loads of wood, but no negroes unaccompanied by white men.
[Sidenote: SEVERE MARCH IN THE RAIN.]
Soon after dark it began to rain; but necessity, that inexorable
policeman, bade us move on. When we approached a large plantation,
leaving us behind, in a fence-corner, Thurston went forward to
reconnoiter. He found the negro quarters occupied by a middle-aged man
and woman. They were very busy that night, cooking for and serving the
young white people, who had a pleasure-party at the master's house,
within a stone's throw of the slave-cabin.
But when they learned that there were hungry Yankees in the
neighborhood, they immediately prepared and brought out to us an
enormous supper of fresh pork and corn-bread. It was now nine o'clock
on Tuesday night, and we had eaten nothing since three o'clock Sunday
afternoon, save about three ounces of bread and four ounces of meat to
the man. We had that to think of which made us forget the gnawings of
hunger, though we suffered somewhat from a feeling of faintness. Now,
in the barn, with the rain pattering on the roof, we devoured supper in
an incredibly brief period, and begged the slave to go back with his
basket and bring just as much more.
About midnight the negro found time to pilot us through the dense
darkness and pouring rain, back to the railroad, from which we had
strayed three miles. The night was bitterly cold, and in half an hour
we were as wet as if again shipwrecked in the Mississippi.
For five weary miles we plodded on, with the stinging rain pelting
our faces. Then we stopped at a plantation, and found the negroes.
They told us it was unsafe to remain, several white men being at home,
and no good hiding-place near, but directed us to a neighbor's. There
the slaves sent us to a roadside barn, which we reached just before
daylight.
[Illustration: ESCAPING PRISONERS FED BY NEGROES IN THEIR MASTER'S
BARN.]
CHAPTER XLI.
I am not a Stephano, but a cramp.--TEMPEST.
Let every man shift for all the rest, and let no man Take
care for himself; for all is but fortune.--IBID.
The barn contained no fodder except damp husks. Burrowing into these,
we wrapped our dripping coats about us, covered ourselves, faces and
all, and shivered through the day, so weary that we drowsed a little,
but too uncomfortable for any refreshing slumbers.
Rising at dark, with skins irritated by atoms of husk which
had penetrated our clothing, we combed out our matted hair and
beards--a very faint essay toward making our toilets. Hats, gloves,
handkerchiefs, and haversacks, were hopelessly lost in the fodder.
Hungry, cold, rheumatic, aching at every joint, we seemed to have
exhausted our slender endurance.
[Sidenote: A CABIN OF FRIENDLY NEGROES.]
But a walk of ten minutes took us to a slave-cabin, where, as usual,
we found devoted friends. The old negro killed two chickens, and
then stood outside, to watch and warn us of the patrols, should he
hear the clattering hoofs of their approaching horses. His wife and
daughter cooked supper, while we stood before the blazing logs of the
wide-mouthed fireplace, to dry our steaming garments.
It was the first dwelling I had entered for nearly twenty months. It
was rude almost to squalor; but it looked more palatial than the most
elegant and luxurious saloon. There was a soft bed, with clean, snowy
sheets. How I envied those negroes, and longed to stretch my limbs upon
it and sleep for a month! There were chairs, a table, plates, knives,
and forks--the commonest comforts of life, which, like sweet cold
water, clean clothing, and pure air, we never appreciate until once
deprived of them.
[Sidenote: SOUTHERNERS UNACQUAINTED WITH TEA.]
We eagerly devoured the chickens and hot corn-bread, and drank steaming
cups of green tea, which our ebony hostess, unfamiliar with the
beverage that cheers, but not inebriates, prepared under my directions.
Before starting I had taken the precaution to fill a pocket with
tea, which I had been saving more than a year for that purpose. In
commercial parlance, tea was tea in the Confederacy. The last pound we
purchased, for daily use, cost us one hundred and twenty-seven dollars
in Rebel currency, and we were compelled to send to Wilmington before
we could obtain it even at that price.
It is an article little used by the Southerners, who are inveterate
coffee-drinkers. All along our route we found the women, white and
black, ignorant of the art of making tea without instructions. Captain
Wolfe assured us that his father once attended a log-rolling in South
Carolina, where, as a rare and costly luxury, the host regaled the
workers with tea at the close of their labors. But, unacquainted with
its use, they were only presented with the boiled leaves to eat! After
this novel banquet, one old lady thus expressed the views of the rural
assembly: "Well, I never tasted this before. It is pleasant enough; but
except for the name of it, I don't consider tea a bit better than any
other kind of greens!"
Experience on the great Plains and among the Rocky Mountains had
taught me the superiority of tea over all stronger stimulants in
severe, protracted hardships. Now it proved of inestimable service to
us. After a two-hours' halt, refreshed by food and dry clothing, we
seemed to have a new lease of life. Elastic and vigorous, we felt equal
to almost any labor.
"May God bless you," said the old woman, bidding us adieu, while
earnest sympathy shone from her own and her daughter's eyes and
illumined their dark faces. To us they were "black, and comely too."
The husband led us to the railroad, and there parted from us.
[Sidenote: WALKING TWELVE MILES FOR NOTHING.]
At midnight we were twenty-three miles from Salisbury, and three from
Statesville. We wished to avoid the latter village; and leaving the
railway, which ran due west, turned farther northward. In two miles we
expected to strike the Wilkesboro road, at Allison's Mill. We followed
the old negro's directions as well as possible, but soon suspected that
we must be off the route. It was bitterly cold, and to avoid suffering
we walked on and on with great rapidity. Before daylight, at a large
plantation, we wakened a slave, and learned that, since leaving the
railway, we had traveled twelve miles circuitously and gained just one
half-mile on the journey! There were two Allison's Mills, and our black
friend had directed us to the wrong one.
"Can you conceal us here to-day?" we asked in a whisper of the negro
who gave us this information from his bed, in a little cabin.
"I reckon so. Master is a terrible war-man, a Confederate officer,
and would kill me if he were to find it out. But I kept a sick Yankee
captain here last summer for five days, and then he went on. Go to the
barn and hide, and I will see you when I come to fodder the horses."
We found the barn, groped our way up into a hay-loft, under the eaves,
and buried ourselves in the straw.
[Sidenote: EVERY BLACK FACE A FRIENDLY FACE.]
V. _Thursday, December 22._
The biting wind whistled and shrieked between the logs of the barn,
and, cover ourselves as we would, it was too cold for sleep. The
negro--an intelligent young man--spent several hours with us, asking
questions about the North, brought us ample supplies of food, and a
bottle of apple-brandy purloined from his master's private stores.
At dark he took us into his quarters, only separated by a narrow
lane from the planter's house, and we were warmed and fed. A dozen
of the blacks--including little boys and girls of ten and twelve
years--visited us there. Among them was a peculiarly intelligent
mulatto woman of twenty-five, comely, and neatly dressed. The poor girl
interrogated us for an hour very earnestly about the progress of the
War, its probable results, and the feeling and purposes of the North
touching the slaves. Using language with rare propriety, she impressed
me as one who would willingly give up life for her unfortunate race.
With culture and opportunity, she would have been an intellectual
and social power in any circle. She was the wife of a slave; but her
companions told us that she had been compelled to become the mistress
of her master. She spoke of him with intense loathing.
By this time we had learned that every black face was a friendly face.
So far as fidelity was concerned, we felt just as safe among the
negroes as if in our Northern homes. Male or female, old or young,
intelligent or simple, we were fully assured they would never betray us.
[Sidenote: TOUCHING FIDELITY OF THE SLAVES.]
Some one has said that it needs three generations to make a gentleman.
Heaven only knows how many generations are required to make a freeman!
But we have been accustomed to consider this perfect trustworthiness,
this complete loyalty to friends, a distinctively Saxon trait. The very
rare degree to which the negroes have manifested it, is an augury of
brightest hope and promise for their future. It is a faint indication
of what they may one day become, with Justice, Time, and Opportunity.
They were always ready to help anybody opposed to the Rebels. Union
refugees, Confederate deserters, escaped prisoners--all received from
them the same prompt and invariable kindness. But let a Rebel soldier,
on his way to the army, or returning from it, apply to them, and he
would find but cold kindness.
The moment they met us, they would do whatever we required upon impulse
and instinct. But afterward, when there was leisure for conversation,
they would question us with some anxiety. Few had ever seen a Yankee
before. They would repeat to us the bugbear stories of their masters,
about our whipping them to force them into the Union army, and starving
their wives and children. Professing utterly to discredit these
reports, they still desired a little reassurance. We can never forget
their upturned, eager eyes, and earnest faces. Happily we could tell
them that the Nation was rising to the great principles of Freedom,
Education, and an open Career for every human being.
Starting at ten o'clock to-night, we had an arduous march over the
rough, frozen ground. Hard labor and loss of sleep began to tell upon
us. I think every member of the party had his mental balance more or
less shaken. Davis was haggard, with blood-shot eyes; "Junius" was
pallid, and threatened with typhoid fever; Wolfe, with a sprained
ankle, could barely limp; I was weak and short of breath, from the
pneumonic affection. Charley Thurston was our best foot, and we always
put him foremost. With his Confederate uniform and his ready invention,
he could play Rebel soldier admirably.
[Sidenote: PURSUED BY A HOME GUARD.]
Toward morning we were compelled to stop, build a fire in the dense
pine-forest, and rest for an hour. We were uncertain about the roads,
and just before daylight Charley stopped to make inquiries of an old
farmer. Then we went on, and, as the road was very secluded, were
talking with less discretion than usual, when a twig snapped behind
us. Instantly turning around, we saw the old man following stealthily,
listening to our conversation. We ordered him to halt; but he ran away
with wonderful agility for a septuagenarian.
The moment he was out of sight, we left the road, and ran, too, in an
opposite direction, fast as our tired limbs could carry us. It would be
a very nice point to determine which was the more frightened, we or our
late pursuer. We afterward learned that he was an unrelenting Rebel and
a zealous Home Guard. He was doubtless endeavoring to follow us to our
shelter, that he might bring out his company, and capture us during the
day.
Long after daylight we continued running, until we had put five miles
between ourselves and the road. The region was very open, and it seemed
morally certain that we would be discovered through the barking dogs
at some of the farm-houses. But about nine o'clock we halted in a
pine-grove, small but thick, and built a great fire of rails, which,
being very dry, emitted little smoke. There was danger that the blaze
would be discovered; but in our feeble condition we could no longer
endure the inclemency of the weather.
VI. _Friday, December 23._
[Sidenote: HELP IN THE LAST EXTREMITY.]
Hungry and fatigued, with our feet to the fire, we could sleep an hour
at a time upon the frozen ground before the cold awakened us. When,
after a waiting which seemed endless, the welcome darkness came at
last, it lifted a load from our hearts; we no longer listened anxiously
for the coming of the Guard.
Starting again, we toiled on with slow and painful steps. We were
entering a region where slaves were few, and we could find no negroes.
"Junius," in a high fever, was so weak that we were almost compelled to
carry him, and his voice was faint as the wail of an infant. Again and
again he begged us to go on, and leave him to rest upon the ground. We
had sore apprehensions that it might become necessary to commit him to
the first friends we found, and press forward without him.
About eight o'clock Charley entered a little tavern to procure
provisions. He assumed his favorite character of a Rebel soldier, on
parole, going to his home in Wilkes County for the holidays. An old
man was spending the night there. While supper was cooking, he gave to
Charley a recognizing sign of the Sons of America. It was instantly
answered; and, stepping outside, they had an interview.
Then our new friend stealthily led his three mules from the tavern
stable, through the fields to the road, placed three of us upon them,
and guided us five miles, to the house of his brother, another strong
Union man. The brother warmed us, fed us, and "stayed us with flagons"
of apple-brandy; then brought out two of his mules, and again we
pressed forward. They cautioned us not to intrust the secret of their
assistance to any one, reminding us that it would be a hanging matter
for them.
[Sidenote: CARRIED FIFTEEN MILES BY FRIENDS.]
So, on this cold winter night, while we were so stiff and exhausted
that we could barely keep our seats on the steeds they had so
thoughtfully furnished, these kind friends conducted us fifteen miles,
and left us in the Union settlement we were seeking, fifty miles from
Salisbury.
CHAPTER XLII.
----Weariness Can snore upon the flint.--CYMBELINE.
_Montano._ But is he often thus
_Iago._ 'Tis evermore the prologue to his sleep.--OTHELLO.
[Sidenote: CURIOUS CONFUSION OF NAMES.]
It was now five o'clock in the morning of Saturday, December 24th, the
seventh day of our escape. Leaving my companions behind, I tapped at
the door of a log-house.
"Come in," said a voice; and I entered. In its one room the children
and father were still in bed; the wife was already engaged in her daily
duties. I asked:
"Can you direct me to the widow ----?"
"There are two widow ----s, in this neighborhood," she replied. "What
is your name?"
I was seeking information, just then, not giving it; so avoiding the
question, I added:
"The lady I mean, has a son who is an officer in the army."
"They both have sons who are officers in the army. Don't be afraid; you
are among friends."
"Friends" might mean Union or it might mean Rebel; so I accepted no
amendments, but adhered to the main question:
"This officer is a lieutenant, and his name is John."
"Well," said she, "they are both lieutenants, and John is the name of
both!"
I knew my man too well to be baffled. I continued: "He is in the
second regiment of the Senior Reserves; and is now on duty at ----."
"Oh," said she, "that is my brother!"
At once I told her what we were. She replied, with a wonderful light of
welcome shining in her eyes:
"If you are Yankees, all I have to say is, that you have come to
exactly the right place!"
[Sidenote: FOOD, SHELTER, AND HOSTS OF FRIENDS.]
And, in exuberant joy, she bustled about, doing a dozen things at once,
talking incoherently the while, replenishing the fire, bringing me a
seat, offering me food, urging her husband to hurry out for the rest of
the party. At last her excitement culminated in her darting under the
bed, and reappearing on the surface with a great pint tumbler filled to
the brim with apple-brandy. There was enough to intoxicate our whole
party! It was the first form of hospitality which occurred to her.
Afterward, when better acquainted, she explained:
"You were the first Yankee I ever saw. The moment I observed
your clothing, I knew you must be one, and I wanted to throw
my arms about your neck, and kiss you!"
We heartily reciprocated the feeling. Just then the only woman who had
any charms for us was the Goddess of Liberty; and this, at least, was
one of her handmaidens.
We were soon by the great log fire of a house where friends awaited
us. Belonging to the secret Union organization, they had received
intelligence that we were on the way. Our feet were blistered and
swollen; mine were frostbitten. We removed our clothing, and were soon
reposing in soft feather beds. At noon, awakened for breakfast, we
found "Junius" had been sleeping like a child, and was now hungry--a
relief to our anxiety. After the meal was over, we returned to bed.
[Sidenote: LOYALTY OF THE MOUNTAINEERS.]
Our friends were constantly on the alert; but the house was very
secluded, and they were not compelled to watch outside. There, two
ferocious dogs were on guard, rendering it unsafe for any one to come
within a hundred yards of them. Nearly all the people, Loyal and Rebel,
had similar sentinels. Along the route, we had been anathematizing the
canine race, which often prevented us from approaching negro-quarters
on the plantations; but these were Union dogs, which made all the
difference in the world.
At dark, we were conducted to a barn, where, wrapped in quilts, we
passed a comfortable night.
VIII. _Sunday, December 25._
Our resting-place was in Wilkes County, North Carolina, among the
outlying spurs of the Alleghanies--a county so strong in its Union
sentiments, that the Rebels called it "the Old United States." Among
the mountains of every Southern State, a vast majority of the people
were loyal. Hilly regions, unadapted to cotton-culture, contained
few negroes; and where there was no Slavery, there was no Rebellion.
Milton's verse--
"The _mountain_ nymph, sweet Liberty,"
contains a great truth, the world over.
[Sidenote: A LEVEE IN A BARN.]
Our self-sacrificing friends belonged to a multitudinous family,
extending through a settlement many miles in length. They all seemed to
be nephews, cousins, or brothers; and the white-haired patriarch--at
seventy, erect and agile as a boy,--in whose barn we remained to-day,
was father, grandfather, or uncle, to the whole tribe. His loyalty was
very stanch and intense.
"The Home Guards," said he, "are usually pretty civil. Occasionally
they shoot at some of the boys who are hiding; but pretty soon
afterward, one of them is found in the woods some morning with a hole
in his head! I suppose there are a thousand young men lying out in
this county. I have always urged them to fight the Guards, and have
helped to supply them with ammunition. Two or three times, regiments
from Lee's army have been sent here to hunt conscripts and deserters,
and then the boys have to run. I have a son among them; but they never
wounded him yet. I asked him the other day: 'Won't you kill some of
them before you are ever captured?' 'Well, father,' says he, '_I'll be
found a tryin'!_' I reckon he will, too; for he has never gone without
his rifle these two years, and he can bring down a squirrel every time,
from the top of yon oak you see on the hill."
The barn was beside a public road, and very near the house of a woman
whose Rebel sympathies were strong. There was danger that any one
entering it might be seen by her or her children, who were running
about the yard.
But we held quite a _levée_ to-day. I think we had fifty visitors. We
would hear the opening door and stealthy footsteps upon the barn-floor;
then a soft voice would ask:
"Friends, are you there?"
We would rise from our bed of hay, and come forward to the front of
the loft, to find some member of this great family of friends, who had
brought his wife and children to see the Yankees. We would converse
with them for a few minutes; they would invariably ask if there was
nothing whatever they could do for us, invite us to visit their house
by night, and express the warmest wishes for our success. They did
this with such perfect spontaneity, with such overflowing hearts, that
it touched us very nearly. Had we been their own sons or brothers,
they could not have treated us more tenderly. This Christmas may have
witnessed more brilliant gatherings than ours; but none, I am sure,
warmed by a more self-sacrificing friendship.
[Sidenote: VISITED BY AN OLD FRIEND.]
Among others, we were visited by a conscript, who had been one of our
guards at Salisbury. While at the prison, his great portly form would
come laboring and puffing up the stairs to our quarters; with flushed
face, he would sit down, glance cautiously around to assure himself
that none but friends were present, then question us eagerly about the
North, and breathe out maledictions against all Confederates.
The Rebels, suspecting him, determined to send him to Lee's army. But
he was just then taken with rheumatism, and kept his quarters for
six weeks! At last, the day before he was to start for Richmond, he
obtained permission of the surgeon to visit the village. He hobbled up
the street, groaning piteously; but, after turning the first corner,
threw away his crutches, plunged into the woods, and made his way home
by night. He now related his experiences with a quiet chuckle, and was
very desirous of serving us.
He was able to give me a pair of large boots in place of my own, which
lacerated my sore and swollen feet. The sharp rocks, hills, and stumps,
compelled me to have the new boots repaired seven times before reaching
our lines. Two nights' traveling would quite wear out the ill-tanned
leather of the stoutest soles.
To-day, our friends brought us twice as much food as we wanted, and we
wanted a great deal. At dark, alarmed by a rumor that the suspicions
of the Guard had been excited, they took us several miles into a
neighboring county, to a very secluded house, occupied by the wife and
daughters of an officer in the Confederate army. Here we spent the
night in inviting beds.
[Sidenote: A DAY OF ALARMS.]
IX. _Monday, December 26._
Our hostess, a comely lady of thirty-five, was a second Mrs. Katie
Scudder--the very embodiment of "Faculty." Her plain log house, with
its snowy curtains, cheap prints, and engravings cut from illustrated
newspapers, was tasteful and inviting. Her five daughters, all clothed
in fabric spun and woven at home--for these people were now entirely
self-dependent--looked as pretty and tidy to uncritical, masculine
eyes, as if robed in silk and cashmere.
Our pursuit of a quiet refuge proved ludicrously unsuccessful. The day
was diversified by
"More pangs and fears than wars or women have."
But the lady bore herself with such coolness, and proved so ready for
every emergency, that we enjoyed them rather than otherwise.
Early in the morning, while standing a few yards from the house, I saw
her and her daughter suddenly step into the open doorway, quite filling
it with their persons and skirts, and earnestly beckon me to go in
out of sight. Of course, I obeyed. A woman of questionable political
soundness had called; but they attracted her in another direction,
keeping her face turned away from the door, till I was lost to sight.
[Sidenote: READY WIT OF A WOMAN.]
Several parties of Rebel cavalry passed down the road. Breckinridge's
army, in the mountains above, had recently dissolved in a great thaw
and break-up, and these were the small fragments of ice floating down
toward Virginia. A squad of a dozen stopped and entered the house,
which was of one story, the length of three large rooms. But the lady
kept them in the kitchen, while we were shut in the other end of the
building.
Next, the barking dog warned us of approaching footsteps. At her
suggestion, we went up into the corn-loft, above our apartment. The new
visitor was a neighbor, to whom she owed a bushel of corn, and who,
with his ox-cart, had come to collect it. With ready woman's wit, she
said to him:
"You know my husband is away. I have no fuel. Won't you go and haul me
a load of wood, as a Christmas present?"
Who could resist such a feminine appeal? The neighbor went for the
wood, while she came laughing in, to tell us her stratagem. We
descended from the corn-loft, and went into a back room, where there
were two beds, one large and the other small, with an open door between
them. Four of us crept under the large bed, one under the small one;
and here we had an experience, ludicrous enough to remember, but not so
pleasant to undergo.
[Sidenote: DANGER OF DETECTION FROM SNORING.]
One of our party was an inveterate snorer. Whenever he took a recumbent
position, with his head upon the ground or the floor, he would begin
snoring like a steam-engine. Like all persons of that class, when
reminded of it, he steadfastly vowed that he never snored in all his
life! For a time, he regarded our awakening him, with rebuke and
caution, as a sorry practical joke.
Thus far, I believe our danger of detection had been greater from this
source than from any other. We had always traveled in single file,
almost like specters, with our leader thrown out as far ahead as we
could keep him in view. Whenever he thought he saw danger, he raised a
warning hand; every man passed the sign back to those in his rear, and
dropped quietly behind a log, or stepped into the bushes, until the
person had passed or the alarm was explained. We walked with softest
footsteps, no man coughing, or speaking above his breath. During the
day we were often concealed in very public places, only a few feet from
the road, where, the ground being covered with snow, we could not hear
approaching footsteps.
Now, our musical companion chanced to go under the small bed, and
in three minutes we heard his trumpet-tongued snore. At first, we
whispered to him; but we might as well have talked to Niagara. If one
of us went to him, there was danger that the neighbor, who stood upon
the front porch, would see us through the open door; but if we did not,
that fatal snore was certain to be heard. So I darted across the room,
crept in beside my friend, and kept him well shaken until the danger
was over.
At night, the lady told us that more people had come to her house
during the day than ever visited it in a month before; and we were
marched back through the darkness, to our first place of concealment.
X. _Tuesday, December 27._
In the barn through the whole day. A messenger brought us a note from
two late fellow-prisoners, Captain William Boothby, a Philadelphia
mariner, and Mr. John Mercer, a Unionist, of Newbern, North Carolina,
who had been in duress almost three years. They were now hiding in a
barn two miles from us. They escaped from Salisbury two nights later
than we, paying the guards eight hundred dollars in Confederate money
to let them out.
Thurston at once joined them. During the rest of the journey, we
sometimes traveled and hid together for several days and nights; but,
when there was special danger, divided into two companies, one keeping
twenty-four hours in advance--the smaller the party, the less peril
being involved.
Now, for the first time, we began to have some hope of reaching
our lines. But the road was still very long, and fraught with many
dangers. We examined the appalling list of dead, which I had brought
from Salisbury, and talked much of our companions left behind in that
living entombment. Remembering how earnestly they longed and prayed for
some intelligent, trustworthy voice to bear to the Government and the
people tidings of their terrible condition, we pledged each other very
solemnly, that if any one of us lived to regain home and freedom, he
should use earnest, unremitting efforts to excite sympathy and secure
relief for them.
[Sidenote: PROMISES TO AID SUFFERING COMRADES.]
It may not be out of place here to say, that upon reaching the North,
before visiting our families, or performing any other duties, we
hastened to Washington, and used every endeavor to call the attention
of the authorities and the country to the Salisbury prisoners. Before
many weeks, all who survived were exchanged; but more than five
thousand--upwards of half the number who were taken to Salisbury five
months before--were already buried just outside the garrison.
Those five thousand loyal graves will ever remain fitting monuments
of Rebel cruelty, and of the atrocious inhumanity of Edwin M.
Stanton, Secretary of War, who steadfastly refused to exchange these
prisoners, on the ground that we could not afford to give the enemy
robust, vigorous men for invalids and skeletons, and yet refrained
from compelling them to treat prisoners with humanity, by just and
discriminating retaliation upon an equal number of Rebel officers,
taken from the great excess held by our Government.
[Sidenote: BLIND AND UNQUESTIONING LOYALTY.]
To-day, as usual, we saw a large number of the Union mountaineers.
Theirs was a very blind and unreasoning loyalty, much like the
disloyalty of some enthusiastic Rebels. They did not say "Unionist," or
"Secessionist," but always designated a political friend thus: "He is
one of the right sort of people"--strong in the faith that there could,
by no possibility, be more than one side to the question. They had
little education; but when they began to talk about the Union, their
eyes lighted wonderfully, and sometimes they grew really eloquent. They
did not believe one word in a Rebel newspaper, except extracts from the
Northern journals, and reports favorable to our Cause. They thought the
Union army had never been defeated in a single battle. I heard them say
repeatedly:
"The United States can take Richmond any day when it wants to. That it
has not, thus far, is owing to no lack of power, but because it was not
thought best."
They regarded every Rebel as necessarily an unmitigated scoundrel, and
every Loyalist, particularly every native-born Yankee, almost as an
angel from heaven.
How earnestly they questioned us about the North! How they longed to
escape thither! To them, indeed, it was the Promised Land. They were
very bitter in their denunciations of the heavy slaveholders, who
had done so much to degrade white labor, and finally brought on this
terrible war.
They had an abundance of the two great Southern staples--corn-bread and
pork. They felt severely the absence of their favorite beverage, and
would ask us, with amusing earnestness, if they could get coffee when
our armies came. The Confederate substitutes--burnt corn and rye--they
regarded with earnest and well-founded aversion.
They were compelled to use thorns for fastening the clothing of the
women and children. We distributed among them our small supply of pins,
to their infinite delectation. Davis also gladdened the hearts of
all the womankind by disbursing a needle to each. A needle nominally
represented five dollars in Confederate currency, but actually could
not be purchased at any price.
A number of the young men "lying out" desired to accompany us to
the North. Some were deserters from the Rebel army; others, more
fortunate, had evaded conscription from the beginning of the war. But
their lives had been passed in that remote county of North Carolina,
and the two hundred and ninety miles yet to be accomplished stretched
out in appalling prospective. They saw many lions in the way, and,
Festus-like, at the last moment, decided to wait for a more convenient
season. It was not from lack of nerve; for some of them had fought
Rebel guards with great coolness and bravery.
[Sidenote: A REPENTANT REBEL.]
Our friends feared that one slaveholding Secessionist in the
neighborhood might learn of our presence, and betray us. He did
ascertain our whereabouts, but sent us an invitation to visit his
house, offering to supply all needed food, clothing, and shelter. He
said he foolishly acquiesced in the Revolution because at first it
seemed certain to succeed, and he wished to save his property; but that
now he heartily repented.
Possibly his conversion was partially owing to remorse for having
persuaded his two sons to enter the Rebel army. One, after much
suffering, had deserted, and was now "lying out" near home. The other,
wounded and captured in a Virginia battle, was still in a Northern
prison, where he had been confined for many months. The father was very
desirous of sending to him a message of sympathy and affection.
[Sidenote: SANGUINE HOPES OF LOYAL MOUNTAINEERS.]
But he was an index of the change which had recently come over
Rebel sympathizers in that whole region. The condition of our armies
then was not peculiarly promising. We were by no means sanguine
that the war would soon terminate. But the loyal mountaineers, with
unerring instinct, were all confident that we were near its close, and
constantly surprised us by speaking of the Rebellion as a thing of the
past. We fancied their wish was father to the thought; but they proved
truer prophets than we.
CHAPTER XLIII.
Nay, but make haste, the better foot before.--KING JOHN.
On the evening of the eleventh day, Wednesday, December 28, we left the
kind friends with whom we had stayed for five days and four nights,
gaining new vigor and inspired by new hope. Their last injunction was:
"Remember, you cannot be too careful. We shall pray God that you may
reach your homes in safety. When you are there, do not forget us, but
do send troops to open a way by which we can escape to the North."
In their simplicity, they fancied Yankees omnipotent, and that we could
send them an army by merely saying the word. They bade us adieu with
embraces and tears. I am sure many a fervent prayer went up from their
humble hearths, that Our Father would guide us through the difficulties
of our long, wearisome journey, and guard us against the perils which
beset and environed it.
[Sidenote: FLANKING A REBEL CAMP.]
At ten o'clock we passed within two hundred yards of a Rebel camp.
We could hear the neigh of the horses and the tramp of four or five
sentinels on their rounds. We trod very softly; to our stimulated
senses every sound was magnified, and every cracking twig startled us.
Leaving us in the road a few yards behind, our pilot entered the
house of his friend, a young deserter from the Rebel army. Finding no
one there but the family, he called us in, to rest by the log fire,
while the deserter rose from bed, and donned his clothing to lead us
three miles and point out a secluded path. For many months he had been
"lying out;" but of late, as the Guards were less vigilant than usual,
he sometimes ventured to sleep at home. His girlish wife wished him
to accompany us through; but, with the infant sleeping in the cradle,
which was hewn out of a great log, she formed a tie too strong for him
to break. At parting, she shook each of us by the hand, saying:
"I hope you will get safely home; but there is great danger, and you
must be powerful cautious."
At eleven o'clock our guide left us in the hands of a negro, who, after
our chilled limbs were warmed, led us on our way. By two in the morning
we had accomplished thirteen miles over the frozen hills, and reached a
lonely house in a deep valley, beside a tumbling, flashing torrent.
[Sidenote: SECRETED AMONG THE HUSKS.]
The farmer, roused with difficulty from his heavy slumbers, informed us
that Boothby's party, which had arrived twenty-four hours in advance of
us, was sleeping in his barn. He sent us half a mile to the house of a
neighbor, who fanned the dying embers on his great hearth, regaled us
with the usual food, and then took us to a barn in the forest.
"Climb up on that scaffolding," said he. "Among the husks you will find
two or three quilts. They belong to my son, who is lying out. To-night
he is sleeping with some friends in the woods."
The cold wind blew searchingly through the open barn, but before
daylight we were wrapped in "the mantle that covers all human thoughts."
XII. _Thursday, December 29._
At dark, our host, leaving us in a thicket, five hundred yards from
his house, went forward to reconnoiter. Finding the coast clear, he
beckoned us on to supper and ample potations of apple-brandy.
[Sidenote: WANDERING FROM THE ROAD.]
With difficulty we induced one of his neighbors to guide us. Though
unfamiliar with the road, he was an excellent walker, swiftly leading
us over the rough ground, which tortured our sensitive feet, and up and
down sharp, rocky hills.
At two in the morning we flanked Wilkesboro, the capital of Wilkes
County. To a chorus of barking dogs, we crept softly around it, within
a few hundred yards of the houses. The air was full of snow, and when
we reached the hills again, the biting wind was hard to breathe.
We walked about a mile through the dense woods, when Captain Wolfe, who
had been all the time declaring that the North Star was on the wrong
side of us, convinced our pilot that he had mistaken the road, and we
retraced our steps to the right thoroughfare.
We stopped to warm for half an hour at a negro-cabin, where the
blacks told us all they knew about the routes and the Rebels. Before
morning we were greatly broken down, and our guide was again in doubt
concerning the roads. So we entered a deep ravine in the pine-woods,
built a great fire, and waited for daylight.
XIII. _Friday, December 30._
[Sidenote: CROSSING THE YADKIN RIVER.]
After dawn, we pressed forward, reluctantly compelled to pass near two
or three houses.
We reached the Yadkin River just as a young, blooming woman, with a
face like a ripe apple, came gliding across the stream. With a long
pole, she guided the great log canoe, which contained herself, a pail
of butter, and a side-saddle, indicating that she had started for the
Wilkesboro market. Assisting her to the shore, we asked:
"Will you tell us where Ben Hanby lives?"
"Just beyond the hill there, across the river," she replied, with
scrutinizing, suspicious eyes.
"How far is it to his house?"
"I don't know."
"More than a mile?"
"No" (doubtfully), "I reckon not."
"Is he probably at home?"
"No!" (emphatically). "He is _not_! Are you the Home Guard?"
"By no means, madam. We are Union men, and Yankees at that. We have
escaped from Salisbury, and are trying to reach our homes in the North."
After another searching glance, she trusted us fully, and said:
"Ben Hanby is my husband. He is lying out. I wondered, if you were
the Guard, what you could be doing without guns. From a hill near
our house, the children saw you coming more than an hour ago; and my
husband, taking you for the soldiers, went with his rifle to join his
companions in the woods. Word has gone to every Union house in the
neighborhood that the troops are out hunting deserters."
We embarked in the log canoe, and shipped a good deal of water before
reaching the opposite shore. We had two sea-captains on board, and
concluded that, with one sailor more, we should certainly have been
hopelessly wrecked.
A winding forest-path led to the lonely house we sought, where we
found no one at home, except three children of our fair informant
and their grandmother. For more than two hours we could not allay
the woman's suspicions that we were Guards. They had recently been
adopting Yankee disguises, deceiving Union people, and beguiling them
of damaging information.
As indignantly as General Damas inquires whether he _looks_ like a
married man, we asked the cautious woman if we resembled Rebels. At
last, convinced that we were veritable Yankees, she gave us breakfast,
and sent one of the children with us to a sunny hillside among the
pines, where we slept off the weariness and soreness caused by the
night's march of sixteen miles.
[Sidenote: AMONG UNION BUSHWHACKERS.]
At evening a number of friends visited us. As they were not merely
Rebel deserters, but Union bushwhackers also, we scanned them with
curiosity; for we had been wont to regard bushwhackers, of either side,
with vague, undefined horror.
These men were walking arsenals. Each had a trusty rifle, one or two
navy revolvers, a great bowie knife, haversack, and canteen. Their
manners were quiet, their faces honest, and one had a voice of rare
sweetness. As he stood tossing his baby in the air, with his little
daughter clinging to his skirt, he looked
----"the mildest-mannered man, That ever scuttled ship or cut
a throat."
He and his neighbors had adopted this mode of life, because determined
not to fight against the old flag. They would not attempt the uncertain
journey to our lines, leaving their families in the country of the
enemy. Ordinarily very quiet and rational, whenever the war was spoken
of, their eyes emitted that peculiar glare which I had observed, years
before, in Kansas, and which seems inseparable from the hunted man.
They said:
[Sidenote: TWO UNION SOLDIERS "LYING OUT."]
"When the Rebels let us alone, we let them alone; when they come out
to hunt us, we hunt them! They know that we are in earnest, and that
before they can kill any one of us, he will break a hole in the ice
large enough to drag two or three of them along with him. At night
we sleep in the bush. When we go home by day, our children stand out
on picket. They and our wives bring food to us in the woods. When
the Guards are coming out, some of the Union members usually inform
us beforehand; then we collect twenty or thirty men, find the best
ground we can, and, if they discover us, fight them. But a number of
skirmishes have taught them to be very wary about attacking us."
In this dreary mode of life they seemed to find a certain fascination.
While we took supper at the house of one of them, eight bushwhackers,
armed to the teeth, stood outside on guard. For once, at least,
enjoying what Macbeth vainly coveted, we took our meal in peace.
Two of them were United States volunteers, who had come stealthily home
on furlough, from our army in Tennessee. They were the first Union
soldiers we had seen at liberty for nearly two years. Their faces were
very welcome, and their worn, soiled uniforms were to our eyes the
reflection of heaven's own blue. Our friends urged us to remain, one of
them saying:
"The snow is deep on the Blue Ridge and the Alleghanies; the Rebels
can easily trace you; the guerrillas are unusually vigilant, and it is
very unsafe to attempt crossing the mountains at present. I started
for Knoxville three weeks ago, and, after walking fifty miles, was
compelled to turn back. Stay with us until the snow is gone, and the
Guards less on the alert. We will each of us take two of you under our
special charge, and feed and shelter you until next May, if you desire
it."
[Sidenote: TWO ESCAPING REBEL DESERTERS.]
The Blue Ridge was still twenty-five miles away, and we determined to
push on to a point where we could look the danger, if danger there
were, directly in the face. The bushwhackers, therefore, piloted us
through the darkness and the bitter cold for seven miles. At midnight,
we reached the dwelling of a Union man. He said:
"As the house is unsafe, I shall be compelled to put you in my barn.
You will find two Rebel deserters sleeping there."
The barn was upon a high hill. We burrowed among the husks, at first
to the infinite alarm of the deserters, who thought the Philistines
were upon them. While we shivered in the darkness, they told us that
they had come from Petersburg--more than five hundred miles--and been
three months on the journey. They had found friends all the way, among
negroes and Union men. Ragged, dirty, and penniless, they said, very
quietly, that they were going to reach the Yankee lines, or die in the
attempt.
Before daylight our host visited us, and finding that we suffered from
the weather, placed us in a little warm storehouse, close beside the
public road. To our question, whether the Guards had ever searched it,
he replied:
"Oh, yes, frequently, but they never happened to find anybody."
[Sidenote: AN ENERGETIC INVALID.]
After we were snugly ensconced in quilts and corn-stalks, Davis said:
"What an appalling journey still stretches before us! I fear the lamp
of my energy is nearly burned out."
I could not wonder at his despondency. For several years he had been
half an invalid, suffering from a spinal affection. For weeks before
leaving Salisbury, he was often compelled, of an afternoon, to lie upon
his bunk of straw with blinding headache, and every nerve quivering
with pain. "Junius" and myself frequently said: "Davis's courage is
unbounded, but he can never live to walk to Knoxville."
The event proved us false prophets. Nightly he led our party--always
the last to pause and the first to start. His lamp of energy was so far
from being exhausted that, before he reached our lines, he broke down
every man in the party. I expect to suffer to my dying day from the
killing pace of that energetic invalid.
XIV. _Saturday, December 31._
Spent all this cold day and night sleeping in the quilts and fodder of
the little store-house. At evening, Boothby's party went forward, as
the next thirty-five miles were deemed specially perilous.
CHAPTER XLIV.
Pray you tread softly, that the blind mole may not Hear a
foot-fall!--TEMPEST.
There's but a shirt and a half in all my company, and the
half shirt is two napkins pinned together and thrown over the
shoulders.--KING HENRY IV.
Our emaciated condition, hard labor, and the bracing mountain air,
conspired to make us ravenous. In quantity, the pork and corn-bread
which we devoured was almost miraculous; in quality, it seemed like the
nectar and ambrosia of the immortal gods. It was far better adapted
to our necessities than the daintiest luxuries of civilization. In
California, Australia, and Colorado goldmines, on the New Orleans
_levée_, and wherever else the most trying physical labor is to be
performed, pork and corn-bread have been found the best articles of
food.
The Loyalists were all ready to feed, shelter, and direct us, but
reluctant to accompany us far from their homes. They would say:
"You need no guides; the road is so plain, that you cannot possibly
miss it."
But midnight journeys among the narrow lanes and obscure mountain-paths
had taught us that we could miss any road whatever which was not
inclosed upon both sides by fences too high for climbing. Therefore, we
insisted upon pilots.
[Sidenote: MONEY CONCEALED IN CLOTHING.]
Fortunately, I had left Salisbury with a one-hundred-dollar United
States note concealed under the hem of each leg of my pantaloons,
just above the instep, and two more sewn in the lining of my coat.
I had in my portmonnaie fifty dollars in Northern bank-notes, five
dollars in gold, and a hundred dollars in Confederate currency. Davis
brought away about the same amount. We should have left it with our
fellow-prisoners, but for the probability of being recaptured and
confined, where money would serve us in our extremest need. Now it
enabled us to remunerate amply both our white and black friends.
Sometimes the mountaineers would say:
"We do not do these things for money. We have fed and assisted hundreds
of refugees and escaping prisoners, but never received a cent for it."
Those whom they befriended were usually penniless. We appreciated
their kindness none the less because fortunate enough to be able to
recompense them. They were unable to resist the argument that, when our
forces came, they would need "green-backs" to purchase coffee.
[Sidenote: IMMINENT PERIL OF UNION CITIZENS.]
Every man who gave us a meal, sheltered us in his house or barn,
pointed out a refuge in the woods, or directed us one mile upon our
journey, did it at the certainty, if discovered, of being imprisoned,
or forced into the Rebel army, whether sick or well, and at the risk of
having his house burned over his head. In many cases, discovery would
have resulted in his death by shooting, or hanging in sight of his own
door.
During our whole journey we entered only one house inhabited by white
Unionists, which had never been plundered by Home Guards or Rebel
guerrillas. Almost every loyal family had given to the Cause some of
its nearest and dearest. We were told so frequently--"My father was
killed in those woods;" or, "The guerrillas shot my brother in that
ravine," that, finally, these tragedies made little impression upon
us. The mountaineers never seemed conscious that they were doing any
heroic or self-sacrificing thing. Their very sufferings had greatly
intensified their love for the Union, and their faith in its ultimate
triumph.
Drowsily wondering at our capacity for sleep, we dozed through the
first day of the New Year, and the fifteenth of our liberty. After dark
we spent two hours in the house before the log fire. The good woman
had one son already escaped to the North--a fresh link which bound her
mother-heart to that ideal paradise. She fed us, mended our clothing,
and parted from us with the heartiest "God bless you!"
Her youngest born, a lad of eleven years, accompanied us five miles to
the house of a Unionist, who received us without leaving his bed. He
gave us such minute information about the faint, obscure road that we
found little difficulty in keeping it.
[Sidenote: FORDING CREEKS AT MIDNIGHT.]
Through the biting air we pressed rapidly up the narrow valley of a
clear, tumbling mountain stream, whose frowning banks, several hundred
feet in hight, were covered with pines and hemlocks. In twelve miles
the road crossed the creek twenty-nine times. Instead of bridges were
fords for horsemen and wagons, and foot-logs for pedestrians. Cold and
stiff, we discovered that crossing the smooth, icy logs in the darkness
was a hazardous feat. Wolfe was particularly lame, and slipped several
times into the icy torrent, but managed to flounder out without much
delay. He endured with great serenity all our suggestions, that even
though water was his native element, he had a very eccentric taste to
prefer swimming to walking, in that state of the atmosphere.
At one crossing the log was swept away. We wandered up and down the
stream, which was about a hundred feet wide, but could find not even
the hair which Mahomet discovered to be the bridge over the bottomless
pit. But as canoes are older than ships, so legs are more primitive
than bridges. We e'en plunged in, waist deep, and waded through, among
the cakes of floating ice.
[Sidenote: "LOOPED AND WINDOWED RAGGEDNESS."]
Our wardrobes were suffering quite as much as our persons. We did not
carry looking-glasses, so I am not able to speak of myself; but my
colleague was a subject for a painter. Any one seeing him must have
been convinced that he was made up for the occasion; that his looped
and windowed raggedness never could have resulted from any natural
combination of circumstances. The fates seemed to decree that as
"Junius" went naked into the Confederacy (leaving most of his wardrobe
on deposit at the bottom of the Mississippi), he should come out of it
in the same condition.
Overcoat he had none. Pantaloons had been torn to shreds and tatters
by the brambles and thorn-bushes. He had a hat which was not all a
hat. It was given to him, after he had lost his own in a Rebel barn,
by a warm-hearted African, as a small tribute from the Intelligent
Contraband to his old friend the Reliable Gentleman--by an African who
felt with the most touching propriety that it would be a shame for any
correspondent of _The Tribune_ to go bareheaded as long as a single
negro in America was the owner of a hat! It was a white wool relic of
the old-red-sandstone period, with a sugar-loaf crown, and a broad brim
drawn down closely over his ears, like the bonnet of an Esquimaux.
His boots were a stupendous refutation of the report that leather was
scarce among the Rebels. I understood it to be no figure of rhetoric,
but the result of actual and exact measurement, which induced him to
call them the "Seven-Leaguers." The small portion of his body, which
was visible between the tops of his boots and the bottom of his hat,
was robed in an old gray quilt of Secession proclivities; and taken for
all in all, with his pale, nervous face and his remarkable costume, he
looked like a cross between the Genius of Intellectuality and a Rebel
bushwhacker!
[Illustration: THE ESCAPE.--WADING A MOUNTAIN STREAM AT MIDNIGHT.]
Before daylight, we shiveringly tapped on the door of a house at the
foot of the Blue Ridge.
"Come in," was the welcome response.
Entering, we found a woman sitting by the log fire. Beginning to
introduce ourselves, she interrupted:
"O, I know all about you. You are Yankee prisoners. Your friends who
passed last evening told us you were coming, and I have been sitting up
all night for you. Come to the fire and dry your clothes."
[Sidenote: STORIES ABOUT THE WAR.]
For two hours we listened to her tales of the war. The history of
almost every Union family was full of romance. Each unstoried mountain
stream had its incidents of daring, of sagacity, and of faithfulness;
and almost every green hill had been bathed in that scarlet dew from
which ever springs the richest and the ripest fruit.
Concealment here was difficult; so we were taken to the house of
a neighbor, who also was waiting to welcome us. He took us to his
storehouse, right by the road-side.
"The Guard," said he, "searched this building last Thursday,
unsuccessfully, and are hardly likely to try it again just yet."
Soon, lying near a fire upon a warm feather-bed, we wooed the drowsy
god with all the success which the hungry Salisbury vermin, sticking
closer than brothers, would permit.
XVI. _Monday, January 2._
[Sidenote: CLIMBING THE BLUE RIDGE.]
Before night the guide returned from conducting Boothby's party, and
assured us that the coast was clear. After dark, invigorated by tea
and apple brandy, we followed our pilot by devious paths up the steep,
fir-clad, piny slope of the Blue Ridge.
The view from the summit is beautiful and impressive; but for our
weariness and anxiety, we should have enjoyed it very keenly.
A few weeks before, the Unionist now leading us had sent his little
daughter of twelve years, alone, by night, fifteen miles over the
mountains, to warn some escaping Union prisoners that the Guard had
gained a clue to their whereabouts. They received the warning in season
to find a place of safety before their pursuers came.
We were now on the west side of the Ridge. A heavy rain began to
fall, and, though soaked and weary, we were glad to have our tracks
obliterated, and thus be insured against pursuit.
"The labor we delight in physics pain;"
but in this case the effort was so arduous that the panacea was not
very effective. Thomas Starr King tells the story of a little man, who,
being asked his weight, replied:
"Ordinarily, a hundred and twenty pounds; but when I'm mad, I weigh a
ton!"
I think any one of our wet, blistered feet, which, at every step, sunk
deep into the slush, would have counterbalanced his whole body! Like
millstones we dragged them up hill after hill, and through the long
valleys which stretched drearily between. Though not hungering after
the flesh-pots of Egypt, we still thought, half regretfully, of our
squalid Salisbury quarters, where we had at least a roof to shelter
us, and a bunk of straw. But we needed no injunction to remember
Lot's wife; for a pillar of salt would have represented a fabulous
sum of money in the currency of the Rebels; and we had no desire to
swell their scanty revenues or supply their impoverished commissary
department.
[Sidenote: CROSSING THE NEW RIVER AT MIDNIGHT.]
At midnight we reached New River, two hundred and fifty yards wide. Our
guide took us over, one at a time, behind him upon his horse. We were
probably five hundred miles above the point where this river, as the
Great Kanawha, unites with the Ohio; but it was the first stream we
had found running northward, and its soft, rippling song of home and
freedom was very sweet to our ears. Already our Promised Land stretched
before us, and the shining river seemed a pathway of light to its
hither boundary. Better than Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus,
this was the Jordan, flowing toward all we loved and longed for. It
revived the great world of work and of life which had faded almost to
fable.
At two in the morning we reached the house of a stanch Unionist, which
nestled romantically in the green valley, inclosed on all sides by dark
mountains.
[Sidenote: HOSPITALITY AND ORATORY COMBINED.]
Our new friend, herculean in frame and with a heavy-tragedy voice, came
out where we sat, dripping and dreary, under an old cotton-gin, and
addressed us in a pompous strain, worthy of Sergeant Buzfuz:
"Gentlemen," said he, "there are, unfortunately, at my house to-night
two wayfarers, who are Rebels and traitors. If they knew of your
presence, it would be my inevitable and eternal ruin. Therefore, unable
to extend to you such hospitalities as I could wish, I bid you welcome
to all which _can_ be furnished by so poor a man as I. I will place you
in my barn, which is warm, and filled with fodder. I will bring you
food and apple brandy. In the morning, when these infernal scoundrels
are gone, I will entertain you under my family roof. Gentlemen, I have
been a Union man from the beginning, and I shall be a Union man to the
end. I had three sons; one died in a Rebel hospital; one was killed
at the battle of the Wilderness, fighting (against his will) for the
Southern cause; the third, thank God! is in the Union lines."
Here the father overcame the orator; and, with the conjunction of
apple brandy, corn bread, and quilts, we were soon asleep in the barn.
CHAPTER XLV.
No tongue--all eyes; be silent.--TEMPEST.
At nine in the morning our host awakened us.
[Sidenote: OVER MOUNTAINS AND THROUGH RAVINES.]
"Gentlemen, I trust you have slept well. The enemy has gone, and
breakfast waits. I call you early, because I want to take you out of
North Carolina into Tennessee, where I will show you a place of refuge
infinitely safer than this."
For the first time since leaving Salisbury we traveled by daylight.
Our guide led us deviously through fields, and up almost perpendicular
ascents, where the rarefied air compelled us frequently to stop for
breath.
We dragged our weary feet up one hill, down another, through ravines of
almost impenetrable laurels, swinging across the streams by the snowy,
pendent boughs, only to find another appalling hight rising before us.
Nothing but the hope of freedom enabled us to keep on our feet. Once,
when near a public road, our guide suddenly whispered.
"Hist! Drop to the ground instantly!"
Lying behind logs, we saw two or three horse-teams and sleds pass by,
and heard the conversation of the drivers.
Our pilot was not agitated, for, like all the Union mountaineers,
danger had been so long a part of his every-day existence, that he had
no physical nervousness. But it was reported that the Guards would
be out to-day, so he was very wary and vigilant. We crossed the road
in the Indian mode, walking in single file, each man treading in the
footsteps of his immediate predecessor. No casual observer would have
suspected that it was the track of more than one man.
At 4 P.M., we entered Tennessee, which, like the passage of the
New River, seemed another long stride toward home. Approaching a
settlement, we went far around through the woods, persuading ourselves
that we were unobserved. A mile beyond we reached a small log house,
where our friend was known, and a blooming, matronly woman, with genial
eyes, welcomed us.
"Come in, all. I am very glad to see you. I thought you must be Yankees
when I heard of your approach, about half an hour ago."
"How did you hear?"
[Sidenote: MISTAKEN FOR CONFEDERATE GUARDS.]
"A good many young men are lying out in this neighborhood, and my son
is one of them. He has not slept in the house for two years. He always
carries his rifle. At first, I was opposed to it, but now I am glad
to have him. They may murder him any day, and if they do, I at least
want him to kill some of the traitors first. Nobody can approach this
settlement, day or night, without being seen by some of these young
men, always on the watch. The Guard have come in twice, at midnight,
as fast as they could ride; but the news traveled before them, and
they found the birds flown. When you appeared in sight, the boys took
you for Rebels. My son and two others, lying behind logs, had their
rifles drawn on you not more than three hundred yards away. They were
very near shooting you, when they discovered that you had no arms, and
concluded you must be the right sort of people. In the distance you
look like Home Guards--part of you dressed as citizens, one in Rebel
uniform, and two wearing Yankee overcoats. You are unsafe traveling a
single mile through this region, without sending word beforehand who
you are."
After dark we were shown to a barn, where we wrapped ourselves in
quilts. During the last twenty-four hours we had journeyed twenty-five
miles, equal to fifty upon level roads, and our eye-lids were very
heavy.
XVIII. _Wednesday, January 4._
This settlement was intensely loyal, and admirably picketed by Union
women, children, and bushwhackers. We dined with the wife of a former
inmate of Castle Thunder. She told us that Lafayette Jones, whose
escape from that prison I have already recorded, remained in the Rebel
army only a few days, deserting from it to the Union lines, and then
coming back to his Tennessee home.
[Sidenote: A REBEL GUERRILLA KILLED.]
The Rebel guerrilla captain who originally captured him was notoriously
cruel, had burned houses, murdered Union men, and abused helpless
women. He took from Jones two hundred dollars in gold, promising to
forward it to his family, but never did so. After reaching home,
Jones sent a message to him that he must refund the money at once,
or be killed wherever found. Jones finally sought him. As they met,
the guerrilla drew a revolver and fired, but without wounding his
antagonist. Thereupon Jones shot him dead on his own threshold. The
Union people justified and applauded the deed. Jones was afterward
captain in a loyal Tennessee regiment. His father had died in a
Richmond dungeon, one of his brothers in an Alabama prison, and a
second had been hung by the Rebels.
The woman told us that another guerrilla, peculiarly obnoxious to
the Loyalists, had disappeared early in November. A few days before
we arrived, his bones were found in the woods, with twenty-one
bullet-holes through his clothing. His watch and money were still
undisturbed in his pocket. Vengeance, not avarice, stimulated his
destroyers.
[Sidenote: MEETING A FORMER FELLOW-PRISONER.]
Here we met another of our Castle Thunder fellow-prisoners, named
Guy. The Richmond authorities knew he was a Union bushwhacker, and
had strong evidence against him, which would have cost him his life
if brought to trial. But he, too, under an assumed name, enlisted in
the Rebel army, deserted, returned to Tennessee, and resumed his old
pursuit as a hunter of men with new zeal and vigor.
He and his companion were now armed with sixteen-shooter rifles,
revolvers, and bowie-knives. Guy's father and brother had both been
killed by the guerrillas, and he was bitter and unsparing. If he ever
fell into Rebel hands again, his life was not worth a rush-light.
But he was merry and jocular as if he had never heard of the King of
Terrors. I asked him how he now regarded his Richmond adventures. He
replied:
"I would not take a thousand dollars in gold for the experience I had
while in prison; but I would not endure it again for ten thousand."
Guy and his comrade were supposed to be "lying out," which suggested
silent and stealthy movements; but on leaving us they went yelling,
singing, and screaming up the valley, whooping like a whole tribe of
Indians. Occasionally they fired their rifles, as if their vocal organs
were not noisy enough. It was ludicrously strange deportment for hunted
fugitives.
"Guy always goes through the country in that way," said the woman. "He
is very reckless and fearless. The Rebels know it, and give him a wide
field. He has killed a good many of them, first and last, and no doubt
they will murder him, sooner or later, as they did his father."
[Sidenote: ALARM ABOUT REBEL CAVALRY.]
At night, just as we were comfortably asleep in the barn, our host
awakened us, saying:
"Five Rebel cavalry are reported approaching this neighborhood, with
three hundred more behind them, coming over the mountains from North
Carolina. I think it is true, but am not certain. I am so well known
as a Union man, that, if they do come, they will search my premises
thoroughly. There is another barn, much more secluded, a mile farther
up the valley, where you will be safer than here, and will compromise
nobody if discovered. If they arrive, you shall be informed before they
can reach you."
Coleridge did not believe in ghosts, because he had seen too many
of them. So we were skeptical concerning the Rebel cavalry, having
heard too much of it. But we went to the other barn, and in its
ample straw-loft found a North Carolina refugee, with whom we slept
undisturbed. He deemed this place much safer than his home--a
gratifying indication to us that the danger was growing small by
degrees.
XIX. _Thursday, January 5._
This morning, the good woman whose barn had sheltered us mended our
tattered clothing. Her husband was a soldier in the Union service. I
asked her:
"How do you live and support your family?"
"Very easily," she replied. "Last year, I did all my own housework,
and weaving, spinning, and knitting, and raised over a hundred bushels
of corn, with no assistance whatever except from this little girl,
eleven years old. The hogs run in the woods during the summer, feeding
themselves; so we are in no danger of starvation."
Boothby's company, enhanced by the two Rebel deserters from Petersburg,
and a young conscript, formerly one of our prison-guards at Salisbury,
here rejoined us. Our entire party, numbering ten, started again at 3
p.m.
The road was over Stony Mountain, very rocky and steep. As we halted
wearily upon its summit, we overlooked a great waste of mountains,
intersected with green valleys of pine and fir, threaded by silver
streams. Our guide assured us that, at Carter's Dépôt, one hundred and
ten miles east of Knoxville, we should find Union troops. Soon after
dark, to our disappointment and indignation, he declared that he must
turn back without a moment's delay. His long-deferred explanation that
the young wife, whom he had left at his lonely log house, was about to
endure
"The pleasing punishment which women bear,"
mollified our wrath, and we bade him good-by.
[Sidenote: A STANCH OLD UNIONIST.]
After dark we found our way, deviously, around several dwellings,
to the house of an old Union man. With his wife and three bouncing
daughters, he heartily welcomed us:
"I am very glad to see you; I have been looking for you these two
hours."
"Why did you expect us?"
"We learned yesterday that there were ten Yankees, one in red breeches
and a Rebel uniform, over the mountain. Girls, make a fire in the
kitchen, and get supper for these gentlemen!"
While we discussed the meal and a great bucket of rosy apples before
the roaring fire, our host--silver-haired, deep-chested, brawny-limbed,
a splendid specimen of physical manhood--poured out his heart. He
was devoted to the Union with a zeal passing the love of women. How
intensely he hated the Rebels! How his eyes flashed and dilated as he
talked of the old flag! How perfect his faith that he should live to
see it again waving triumphantly on his native mountains! One of his
sons had died fighting for his country, and two others were still in
the Union army.
[Sidenote: THE MOST DANGEROUS POINT.]
The old gentleman piloted us through the deep woods, for three miles,
to a friendly house. We were now near a rendezvous of Rebel guerrillas,
reported to be without conscience and without mercy. Their settlement
was known through that whole region as "Little Richmond." We must pass
within a quarter of a mile of them. It was feared that they might have
pickets out, and the point was deemed more dangerous than any since
leaving Salisbury.
Our new friend, though an invalid, promptly rose from his bed to guide
us through the danger. His wife greeted us cordially, but was extremely
apprehensive--darting to and from the door, and in conversation
suddenly pausing to listen. When we started, she said, taking both my
hands in hers:
"May God prosper you, and carry you safely through to those you love.
But you must be very cautious. Less than six weeks ago, my two brothers
started for the North by the same route; and when they reached Crab
Orchard, the Rebel guerrillas captured them, and murdered them in cold
blood."
After leading us two miles, the guide stopped, and when all came up, he
whispered:
"We are approaching the worst place. Let no man speak a word. Step
lightly as possible, while I keep as far ahead as you can see me. If
you hear any noise, dart out of sight at once. Should I be discovered
with you, it would be certain death to me. If found alone, I can tell
some story about sickness in my family."
We crept softly behind him for two miles. Then, leading us through a
rocky pasture into the road, he said:
"Thank God! I have brought another party of the right sort of people
past Little Richmond in safety. My health is broken, and I shall not
live long; but it is a great consolation to know that I have been able
to help some men who love the Union made by our fathers."
Directing us to a stanch Unionist, a few miles beyond, he returned home.
At three in the morning, we reached our destination. Davis and Boothby
did pioneer duty, going forward to the house, where they were received
by a clamor of dogs, which made the valleys ring. After a whispered
conference with the host, they returned and said:
"There is a Rebel traveler spending the night here. We are to stay in
the barn until morning, when he will be gone."
[Sidenote: THE ALL-DEVOURING VERMIN.]
We burrowed in the warm hay-mow, and vainly essayed to sleep. The
all-devouring vermin by this time swarmed upon us, poisoning our blood
and stimulating every nerve, as we tossed wearily until long after
daylight.
XX. _Friday, January 6._
At nine o'clock this morning our host came to the hay-loft and awoke us:
"My troublesome guest is gone; walk down to breakfast."
He was educated, intelligent, and had been a leader among the
"Conservative" or Union people, until compelled to acquiesce,
nominally, in the war. His house and family were pleasant. But while
we now began to approach civilization, the Union lines steadily
receded. He informed us that we would find no loyal troops east of
Jonesboro, ninety-eight miles from Knoxville, and probably none east of
Greenville, seventy-four miles from Knoxville.
"But," said he, "you are out of the woods for the present. You are on
the border of the largest Union settlement in all the Rebel States. You
may walk for twenty-four miles by daylight on the public road. Look
out for strangers, Home Guards, or Rebel guerrillas; but you will find
every man, woman, and child, who lives along the route, a stanch and
faithful friend."
With light hearts we started down the valley. It seemed strange to
travel the public road by daylight, visit houses openly, and look
people in the face.
Our way was on the right bank of the Watauga, a broad, flashing stream,
walled in by abrupt cliffs, covered with pines and hemlocks. A woman
on horseback, with her little son on foot, accompanied us for several
miles, saying:
"If you travel alone, you are in danger of being shot for Rebel
guerrillas."
[Sidenote: MORE UNION SOLDIERS.]
In the evening a Union man rowed us across the stream. On the left bank
our eyes were gladdened by three of our boys in blue--United States
soldiers at home on furlough. Seeing us in the distance, they leveled
their rifles, but soon discovered that we were not foes.
Our host for the night beguiled the evening hours with stories of the
war; and again we enjoyed the luxury of beds.
XXI. _Saturday, January 7._
[Sidenote: A WELL-FORTIFIED REFUGE.]
A friend piloted us eight miles over the rough, snowy mountains,
avoiding public roads. In the afternoon, we found shelter at a white
frame house, nestling among the mountains, and fronted by a natural
lawn, dotted with firs.
Here, for the first time, we were entirely safe. Any possible Rebel
raid must come from the south side of the river. The house was on the
north bank of the stream, which was too much swollen for fording,
and the only canoe within five miles was fastened on our shore. Thus
fortified on front, flank, and rear, we took our ease in the pleasant,
home-like farmhouse.
Near the dwelling was a great spring, of rare beauty. Within an area
of twelve feet, a dozen streams, larger than one's arm, came gushing
and boiling up through snow-white sand. By the aid of a great fire,
and an enormous iron kettle, we boiled all our clothing, and at last
vanquished the troublesome enemies which, brought from the prison, had
so long disturbed our peace.
Then, bathing in the icy waters, we came out renewed, like the Syrian
leper, and, in soft, clean beds, enjoyed the sweet sleep of childhood.
XXII. _Sunday, January 8._
A new guide took us eight miles to a log barn in the woods. After
dining among, but not upon, the husks, we started again, an old lady
of sixty guiding us through the woods toward her house. Age had not
withered her, nor custom staled, for she walked at a pace which made it
difficult to keep in sight of her.
At dark, in the deep pines, behind her lonely dwelling, we kindled a
fire, supped, and, with fifteen or twenty companions, who had joined us
so noiselessly that they seemed to spring from earth, we started on.
CHAPTER XLVI.
If I have wit enough to get out of this wood, I have enough
to serve mine own turn.--MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.
[Sidenote: DAN ELLIS, THE UNION GUIDE.]
For many months before leaving prison, we had been familiar with the
name of DAN ELLIS--a famous Union guide, who, since the beginning of
the war, had done nothing but conduct loyal men to our lines.
Ellis is a hero, and his life a romance. He had taken through, in
all, more than four thousand persons. He had probably seen more
adventure--in fights and races with the Rebels, in long journeys,
sometimes bare-footed and through the snow, or swimming rivers full of
floating ice--than any other person living.
He never lost but one man, who was swooped up through his own
heedlessness. The party had traveled eight or ten days, living
upon nothing but parched corn. Dan insisted that a man could walk
twenty-five miles a day through snow upon parched corn just as well as
upon any other diet--if he only thought so. I feel bound to say that I
have tried it and do not think so. This person held the same opinion.
He revolted against the parched-corn diet, vowing that he would go to
the first house and get an honest meal, if he was captured for it. He
went to the first house, obtained the meal, and was captured.
After we had traveled fifty miles, everybody said to us, "If you can
only find Dan Ellis, and do just as he tells you, you will be certain
to get through."
[Sidenote: IN GOOD HANDS AT LAST.]
We _did_ find Dan Ellis. On this Sunday night, one hundred and
thirty-four miles from our lines, greatly broken down, we reached a
point on the road, waited for two hours, when along came Dan Ellis,
with a party of seventy men--refugees, Rebel deserters, Union soldiers
returning from their homes within the enemy's lines, and escaping
prisoners. About thirty of them were mounted and twenty armed.
Like most men of action, Dan was a man of few words. When our story had
been told him, he said to his comrades:
"Boys, here are some gentlemen who have escaped from Salisbury, and are
almost dead from the journey. They are our people. They have suffered
in our Cause. They are going to their homes in our lines. We can't ride
and let these men walk. Get down off your horses, and help them up."
Down they came, and up we went; and then we pressed along at a terrible
pace.
In low conversation, as we rode through the darkness, I learned from
Dan and his companions something of his strange, eventful history. At
the outbreak of the war, he was a mechanic in East Tennessee. After
once going through the mountains to the Union lines, he displayed rare
capacity for woodcraft, and such vigilance, energy, and wisdom, that he
fell naturally into the pursuit of a pilot.
Six or eight of his men, who had been with him from the beginning, were
almost equally familiar with the routes. They lived near him, in Carter
County, Tennessee, in open defiance of the Rebels. When at home, they
usually slept in the woods, and never parted from their arms for a
single moment.
As the Rebels would show them no mercy, they could not afford to be
captured. For three years there had been a standing offer of five
thousand dollars for Dan Ellis's head. During that period, except when
within our lines, he had never permitted his Henry rifle, which would
fire sixteen times without reloading, to go beyond the reach of his
hand.
[Illustration: DAN. ELLIS.]
[Sidenote: An Unequal Battle--Ellis's Bravery.]
Once, when none of his comrades, except Lieutenant Treadaway, were
with him, fourteen of the Rebels came suddenly upon them. Ellis and
Treadaway dropped behind logs and began to fire their rifles. As the
enemy pressed them, they fell slowly back into a forest, continuing
to shoot from behind trees. The unequal skirmish lasted three hours.
Several Rebels were wounded, and at last they retreated, leaving the
two determined Unionists unharmed and masters of the field.
Dan usually made the trip to our lines once in three or four weeks,
leading through from forty to five hundred persons. Before starting, he
and his comrades would make a raid upon the Rebels in some neighboring
county, take from them all the good horses they could find, and, after
reaching Knoxville, sell them to the United States quartermaster.
Thus they obtained a livelihood, though nothing more. The refugees and
escaping prisoners were usually penniless, and Ellis, whose sympathies
flowed toward all loyal men like water, was compelled to feed them
during the entire journey. He always remunerated Union citizens for
provisions purchased from them.
To-night was so cold, that our sore, lame joints would hardly support
us upon our horses. Dan's rapid marching was the chief secret of his
success. He seemed determined to keep at least one day ahead of all
Rebel pursuers.
Now that we were safe in his hands, I accompanied the party
mechanically, with no further questions or anxiety about routes; but I
chanced to hear Treadaway ask him:
"Don't you suppose the Nolechucky is too high for us to ford?"
"Very likely," replied Dan; "we will stop and inquire of Barnet."
Upon the mule which I rode, a sack of corn served for a saddle. I was
not accomplished in the peculiar gymnastics required to sit easily upon
it and keep it in place.
[Sidenote: LOST!--A PERILOUS BLUNDER.]
Thirsty and feverish, I stopped at the crossing of Rock Creek for a
draught of water and to adjust the corn-sack. Attempting to remount, I
was as stiff and awkward as an octogenarian, and my restive mule would
not stand for a moment. I finally succeeded in climbing upon his back
two or three minutes after the last horseman disappeared up the bank.
We had been traveling across forests, over hills, through swamps,
without regard to thoroughfares; but I rode carelessly on, supposing
that my mule's instinct would keep him on the fresh scent of the
cavalcade. When we had jogged along for ten minutes, awakening from a
little reverie, I listened vainly to hear the footfalls of the horses.
All was silent. I dismounted, and examined the half-frozen road, but no
hoof-marks could be seen upon it.
I was lost! It might mean recapture--it might mean reimprisonment and
death, for the terms were nearly synonymous. I was ignorant about the
roads, and whether I was in a Union or Rebel settlement.
To search for that noiseless, stealthy party would be useless; so I
rode back to the creek, tied my mule to a laurel in the dense thicket,
and sat down upon a log, pondering on my stupid heedlessness, which
seemed likely to meet its just reward. I remembered that Davis owed his
original capture to a mule, and wondered if the same cause was about to
produce for me a like result.
Mentally anathematizing my long-eared brute, I gave him a part of the
corn, and threw myself down behind a log, directly beside the road.
This would enable me to hear the horse's feet of any one who might
return for me. In a few minutes I was sound asleep.
When awakened by the cold, my watch told me that it was three o'clock.
Running to and fro in the thicket until my blood was warmed, I resumed
my position behind the log, and slept until daylight was gleaming
through the forest.
[Sidenote: A MOST FORTUNATE ENCOUNTER.]
Walking back to the creek, I reconnoitered a log dwelling, so small and
humble that its occupant was probably loyal. In a few minutes, through
the early dawn, an old man, with a sack of corn upon his shoulder,
came out of the house. He evinced no surprise at seeing me. Looking
earnestly into his eyes, I asked him:
"Are you a Union man or a Secessionist?" He replied:
"I don't know who you are; but I am a Union man, and always have been."
"I am a stranger and in trouble. I charge you to tell me the truth."
"I do tell you the truth, and I have two sons in the United States
army."
His manner appeared sincere, and he carried a letter of recommendation
in his open, honest face. I told him my awkward predicament. He
reassured me at once.
"I know Dan Ellis as well as my own brother. No truer man ever lived.
What route was he going to take?"
"I heard him say something about Barnet's."
"That is a ford only five miles from here. Barnet is one of the right
sort of people. This road will take you to his house. Good-by, my
friend, and don't get separated from your party again."
[Sidenote: REJOINING DAN AND HIS PARTY.]
I certainly did not need the last injunction. Reaching the ford, Barnet
told me that our party had spent several hours in crossing, and was
encamped three miles ahead. He took me over the river in his canoe,
my mule swimming behind. Half a mile down the road. I met Ellis and
Treadaway.
"Ah ha!" said Dan, "we were looking for you. I told the boys not to be
uneasy. There are men in our crowd who would have blundered upon some
Rebel, told all about us, and so alarmed the country and brought out
the Home Guards; but I knew you were discreet enough to take care of
yourself, and not endanger us. Let us breakfast at this Union house."
XXIII. _Monday, January 9._
"To-day," said Dan Ellis, "we must cross the Big Butte of Rich
Mountain."
"How far is it?" I asked.
"It is generally called ten miles; but I suspect it is about fifteen,
and a rather hard road at that."
About fifteen, and a rather hard road! It seemed fifty, and a very _Via
Dolorosa_.
We started at 11 A.M. For three miles we followed a winding creek, the
horsemen on a slow trot, crossing the stream a dozen times; the footmen
keeping up as best they could, and shivering from their frequent baths
in the icy waters.
[Sidenote: A TERRIBLE MOUNTAIN MARCH.]
We turned up the sharp side of a snowy mountain. For hours and hours
we toiled along, up one rocky, pine-covered hill, down a little
declivity, then up another hill, then down again, but constantly
gaining in hight. The snow was ten inches deep. Dan averred he had
never crossed the mountain when the travel was so hard; but he pushed
on, as if death were behind and heaven before.
The rarity of the air at that elevation increased my pneumonic
difficulty, and rendered my breath very short. Ellis furnished me with
a horse the greater part of the way; but the hills, too steep for
riding, compelled us to climb, our poor animals following behind. The
pithy proverb, that "it is easy to walk when one leads a horse by the
bridle," was hardly true in my case, for it seemed a hundred times
to-day as if I could not possibly take another step, but must fall out
by the roadside, and let the company go on. But after my impressive
lesson of last night, I was hardly likely to halt so long as any
locomotive power remained.
Our men and animals, in single file, extended for more than a mile in a
weary, tortuous procession, which dragged its slow length along. After
hours which appeared interminable, and efforts which seemed impossible,
we halted upon a high ridge, brushed the snow from the rocks, and
sat down to a cold lunch, beside a clear, bright spring which gushed
vigorously from the ground. I ventured to ask:
"Are we near the top?"
"About half way up," was Dan's discouraging reply.
"Come, come, boys; we must pull out!" urged Davis; and, following that
irrepressible invalid, we moved forward again.
As we climbed hill after hill, thinking we had nearly reached the
summit, beyond us would still rise another mountain a little higher
than the one we stood upon. They seemed to stretch out to the crack of
doom.
[Sidenote: A STORM INCREASES THE DISCOMFORTS.]
To increase the discomfort, a violent rain came on. The very memory
of this day is wearisome. I pause, thankful to end only a chapter, in
the midst of an experience which, judged by my own feelings, appeared
likely to end life itself.
CHAPTER XLVII.
It hath been the longest night That e'er I watched, and the
most heaviest.--TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA.
----But for this miracle--I mean our preservation--few in
millions Can speak like us.--TEMPEST.
As I toiled, staggering, up each successive hill, it seemed that this
terrible climbing and this torturing day would never end. But Necessity
and Hope work miracles, and strength proved equal to the hour.
At 4 P.M. the clouds broke, the sun burst out, as we stood on the icy
summit, revealing a grand view of mountains, valleys, and streams on
every side.
After a brief halt, we began the descent. Our path, trodden only by
refugees and prisoners, led by Dan Ellis, had been worn so deep by the
water, that, in many places, our bodies were half concealed! How Dan
rushed down those steep declivities! It was easy to follow now, and I
kept close behind him.
[Sidenote: FORDING CREEKS IN THE DARKNESS.]
Twilight, dusk, darkness, came on, and again the rain began to
pour down. We could not see each other five yards away. We pressed
steadily on. We reached the foot of the mountain, and were in a dark,
pine-shadowed, winding road, which frequently crossed a swollen,
foaming creek. At first Dan hunted for logs; but the darkness made this
slow work. He finally abandoned it, and, whenever we came to a stream,
plunged in up to the middle, dashed through, and rushed on, with
dripping garments. Our cavalcade and procession must have stretched
back fully three miles; but every man endeavored to keep within
shouting distance of his immediate predecessor.
[Sidenote: PROSPECT OF A DREARY NIGHT.]
"We shall camp to-night," said Dan, "at a lonely house two miles from
the foot of the mountain."
Reaching the place, we found that, since his last journey, this
dwelling had tumbled down, and nothing was left but a labyrinth of
timbers and boards. We laboriously propped up a section of the roof.
It proved a little protection from the dripping rain, and, while the
rest of the party slowly straggled in, Treadaway went to the nearest
Union house, to learn the condition of the country. In fifteen minutes
we heard the tramp of his returning horse, and could see a fire-brand
glimmering through the darkness.
"Something wrong here," said Dan. "There must be danger, or he would
not bring fire, expecting us to stay out of doors such a night as this.
What is the news, Treadaway?"
"Bad enough," replied the lieutenant, dismounting from his dripping
horse, carefully nursing, between two pieces of board, the glowing
firebrand. "The Rebel guerrillas are thick and vigilant. A party of
them passed here only this evening. I tell you, Dan Ellis, we have got
to keep a sharp eye out, if we don't want to be picked up."
All who could find room huddled under the poorly propped roof, which
threatened to fall and crush them. Dan and his immediate comrades, with
great readiness, improvised a little camp for themselves, so thatching
it with boards and shingles that it kept the water off their heads.
They were soon asleep, grasping their inseparable rifles and near their
horses, from which they never permitted themselves to be far away.
With my two journalistic friends, I deemed rest nearly as important as
safety, for we needed to accumulate strength. We found our way through
the darkness to the nearest Union house. There was a great fire blazing
on the hearth; but the little room was crowded with our weary and
soaking companions, who had anticipated us.
[Sidenote: SLEEPING AMONG THE HUSKS.]
We crossed the creek to another dwelling, where the occupant, a
life-long invalid, was intensely loyal. With his wife and little son,
he greeted us very warmly, adding:
"I wish I could keep you in my house; but it would not be safe. We will
give you quilts, and you may sleep among the husks in the barn, where
you will be warm and dry. If the Guards come during the night, they
will be likely to search the house first, and the boy or the woman can
probably give you warning. But, if they do find you, of course you will
tell them that we are not privy to your concealment, because, you know,
it would be a matter of life and death for me."
We found the husks dry and fragrant, and soon forgot our weariness.
XXIV. _Tuesday, January 10._
Breakfasting before daylight, that we might not be seen leaving the
house, we sought our rendezvous. Those who had remained in camp were a
wet, cold, sorry-looking party.
By nine o'clock, several, who had been among the Union people in the
neighborhood, returned, and held a consultation. The accounts of all
agreed that, fifteen or twenty miles ahead, the danger was great, and
the country exceedingly difficult to pass through. Moreover, the Union
forces still appeared to recede as we approached the places where
they were reputed to be. We were now certain that there were none at
Jonesboro, none at Greenville, probably none east of Strawberry Plains.
[Sidenote: TURNING BACK IN DISCOURAGEMENT.]
Eight or ten of our party determined to turn back. Among them were
three Union soldiers, who had seen service and peril. But they said to
us, as they turned to retrace their steps over Rich Mountain:
"It is useless to go on. The party will never get through in the world.
Not a single man of it will reach Knoxville, unless he waits till the
road is clear."
Ellis and Treadaway listened to them with a quiet smile. The perils
ahead did not disturb our serenity, because they were so much
lighter than the perils behind. We had left horrors to which all
future possibilities were a mercy. We had looked in at the windows
of Death, and stood upon the verge of the Life To Be. We doubted not
that the difficulties were greatly magnified, and all dangers looked
infinitesimal, along the path leading toward home and freedom.
Among those who went back was a North Carolina citizen, accompanied
by a little son, the child of his old age. Reluctant to trust himself
again to the tender mercies of the Rebels, he was unaccustomed to the
war-path, and decided to return to the ills he had, rather than fly
to others which he knew not of. Purchasing one of his horses, I was
no longer dependent upon the kindness of Ellis and his comrades for a
steed.
Before noon we started, following secluded valley paths. The rain
ceased and the day was pleasant. At a Union dwelling we came upon the
hot track of eight guerrillas, who had been there only an hour before.
The Rebel-hunting instinct waxed strong within Dan, and, taking eight
of his own men, he started in fierce pursuit, leaving Treadaway in
charge of the company.
Before dark we reached Kelly's Gap, camping in an old orchard, beside
a large farm-house with many ample out-buildings. The place was now
deserted. One of our guides explained:
"A Union man lived here, and he was hanged last year upon that
apple-tree. They cut him down, however, before he died, and he fled
from the country."
Tying our horses to the trees, we parched corn for supper. Fires were
kindled in the buildings, giving the place a genial appearance as night
closed in.
[Sidenote: A REBEL PRISONER BROUGHT IN.]
After dark, Dan and his comrades returned. The whole party of
guerrillas had very narrowly escaped them. They captured one, and
brought him in a prisoner. One of the out-buildings was cleared, and
he was placed in it, under two volunteer guards armed with rifles. He
was not more than twenty-two years old, and had a heavy, stolid face.
He steadily denied that he was a guerrilla, asserting that he had been
in the Rebel army, had deserted from it, taken the oath of allegiance
to the United States while at Knoxville, and was now trying to live
quietly.
Some of Ellis's men believed that he had broken his oath of allegiance,
and was the most obnoxious of the guerrillas. In his presence they
discussed freely the manner of disposing of him. Some advocated taking
him to Knoxville, and turning him over to the authorities. Others, who
seemed to be a majority, urged taking him out into the orchard and
shooting him. This counsel seemed likely to prevail. Several of the men
who gave it had seen brothers or fathers murdered by the Rebels.
The prisoner had little intelligence, and talked only when addressed.
I could but admire the external stolidity with which he listened to
these discussions. One of his judges and would-be executioners asked
him:
"Well, sir, what have you to say for yourself?"
"I am in your hands," he replied, without moving a muscle; "you can
kill me if you want to; but I have kept the oath of allegiance, and I
am innocent of the charges you bring against me."
After some further debate, a Union officer from East Tennessee said.
"He may deserve death, and he probably does. But we are not murderers,
and he shall not be shot. I will use my own revolver on anybody who
attempts it. Let us hear no more of these taunts. No brave man will
insult a prisoner."
It was at last decided to take him to Knoxville. He bore this decision
with the same silence he had manifested at the prospect of death.
During this scene Dan was absent. He had gone to the nearest Union
house to learn the news, for every loyal family in a range of many
hundred miles knew and loved him. We, very weary, lay down to sleep
in an old orchard, with our saddles for pillows. Our reflections were
pleasant. We were only seventy-nine miles from the Union lines. We
progressed swimmingly, and had even begun to regulate the domestic
affairs of the border!
[Sidenote: AN ALARM AT MIDNIGHT.]
Before midnight some one shook my arm. I rubbed my eyes open and looked
up. There was Dan Ellis.
"Boys, we must saddle instantly. We have walked right into a nest of
Rebels. Several hundred are within a few miles; eighty are in this
immediate vicinity. They are lying in ambush for Colonel Kirk and his
men. It is doubtful whether we can ever get out of this. We must divide
into two parties. The footmen must take to the mountains; we who are
riding, and in much greater danger--as horses make more noise, and
leave so many traces--must press on at once, if we ever hope to."
The word was passed in low tones. Our late prisoner, no longer an
object of interest, was allowed to wander away at his own sweet will.
Flinging our saddles upon our weary horses, we were in motion almost
instantly. My place was near the middle of the cavalcade. The man just
before me was riding a white horse, which enabled me to follow him with
ease.
We galloped along at Dan's usual pace, with sublime indifference to
roads--up and down rocky hills, across streams, through swamps, over
fences--everywhere but upon public thoroughfares.
[Sidenote: A YOUNG LADY FOR A GUIDE.]
I supposed we had traveled three miles, when Davis fell back from the
front, and said to me:
"That young lady rides very well, does she not?"
"What young lady?"
"The young lady who is piloting us."
I had thought Dan Ellis was piloting us, and rode forward to see about
the young lady.
There she was! I could not scrutinize her face in the darkness, but it
was said to be comely. I could see that her form was graceful, and the
ease and firmness with which she sat on her horse would have been a
lesson for a riding-master.
[Sidenote: THE NAMELESS HEROINE.]
She was a member of the loyal family to which Dan had gone for news.
The moment she learned his need, she volunteered to pilot him out of
that neighborhood, where she was born and bred, and knew every acre.
The only accessible horse (one belonging to a Rebel officer, but just
then kept in her father's barn) was brought out and saddled. She
mounted, came to our camp at midnight, and was now stealthily guiding
us--avoiding farm-houses where the Rebels were quartered, going round
their camps, evading their pickets.
She led us for seven miles. Then, while we remained in the wood, she
rode forward over the long bridge which spanned the Nolechucky River
(now to be crossed a second time), to see if there were any guards
upon it; went to the first Union house beyond, to learn whether the
roads were picketed; came back, and told us the coast was clear. Then
she rode by our long line toward her home. Had it been safe to cheer,
we should certainly have given three times three for the NAMELESS
HEROINE[19] who did us such vital kindness. "Benisons upon her dear
head forever!"
[19] Nameless no more. The substantial closing of the war, while these
pages are in press, renders it safe to give her name--Miss MELVINA
STEVENS.
[Illustration: THE "NAMELESS HEROINE" PILOTING THE ESCAPING PRISONERS
OUT OF A REBEL AMBUSH.]
CHAPTER XLVIII.
----Fortune is merry, And in this mood will give us any
thing.--JULIUS CÆSAR.
The night is long that never finds the day.--MACBETH.
[Sidenote: AMONG THE DELECTABLE MOUNTAINS.]
Relieved again from immediate danger, every thing seemed like a blessed
dream. I was haunted by the fear of waking to find myself in the old
bunk at Salisbury, with its bare and squalid surroundings.
We were often compelled to walk and lead our weary animals. The rushing
creeks were perilous to cross by night. The rugged mountains were
appalling to our aching limbs and frost-bitten feet. The Union houses,
where we obtained food and counsel, were often humble and rude. But we
had vanquished the Giant Despair, and come up from the Valley of the
Shadow of Death. To our eyes, each icy stream was the River of Life.
The frowning cliffs, with their cruel rocks, were the very Delectable
Mountains; and every friendly log cabin was the Palace called Beautiful.
After our fair guide left us, Dan's foot was on his native heath.
Familiar with the road, he pressed on like a Fate, without mercy to man
or beast. After the late heavy rains it was now growing intensely cold.
A crust, not yet hard enough to bear, was forming upon the mud, and at
every step our poor horses sunk to the fetlocks.
Even with frequent walking I found it difficult to keep up the
circulation in my own sensitive feet; but the severe admonition of one
frost-bite had taught me to be very cautious. A young North Carolinian,
riding a mule, wore nothing upon his feet except a pair of cotton
stockings; that he kept from freezing is one of the unsolved mysteries
of human endurance.
Passing a few miles north of Greenville, at four o'clock in the
morning, we had accomplished twenty-five miles, despite all our
weakness and weariness.
This brought us to Lick Creek, which proved too much swollen for
fording. An old Loyalist, living on the bank, assured us that
guerrillas were numerous and vigilant. Should we never leave them
behind?
Ascending the stream for three miles, we crossed upon the only bridge
in that whole region. Here, at least, our rear was protected; because,
if pursued, we could tear up the planks. Soon after dawn, upon a
hill-side in the pine woods, we dismounted, and huddled around our
fires, a weary, hungry, morose, and melancholy company.
[Sidenote: SEPARATION FROM "JUNIUS."]
XXV. _Wednesday, January 11._
As we drowsed upon the pine leaves, I asked:
"When shall we join the footmen?"
"After we reach Knoxville," was Dan Ellis's reply.
This was a source of uneasiness to Davis and myself, because we had
left "Junius" behind. He was offered a horse when we started, at
midnight. Supposing, like ourselves, that the parties would re-unite
in a few hours, and tired of riding without a saddle, he declined, and
cast his lot among the footmen. It was the first separation since our
capture. Our fates had been so long cast together, that we meant to
keep them united until deliverance should come for one or both, either
through life or death. But Treadaway was an excellent pilot, and the
footmen, able to take paths through the mountains where no cavalry
could follow them, would probably have less difficulty than we.
[Sidenote: UNION WOMEN SCRUTINIZING THE YANKEE.]
I found an old man splitting rails, down in a wooded ravine two or
three hundred yards from our camp. While he went to his house, a mile
distant, to bring me food, I threw myself on the ground beside his
fire and slept like a baby. In an hour, he returned with a basket
containing a great plate of the inevitable bread and pork. He was
accompanied by his wife and daughter, who wanted to look at the Yankee.
Coarse-featured and hard-handed, they were smoking long pipes; but they
were not devoid of womanly tenderness, and earnestly asked if they
could do any thing to help us.
About noon we broke camp, and compelled our half-dead horses to move
on. The road was clearer and safer than we anticipated. At the first
farm which afforded corn, we stopped two or three hours to feed and
rest the poor brutes.
Three of us rode forward to a Union house, and asked for dinner. The
woman, whose husband belonged to the Sixteenth (loyal) Tennessee
Infantry, prepared it at once; but it was an hour before we fully
convinced her that we were not Rebels in disguise.
We passed through Russelville soon after dark, and, two miles beyond,
made a camp in the deep woods. The night was very cold, and despite the
expostulations of Dan Ellis, who feared they belonged to a Union man,
we gathered and fired huge piles of rails, one on either side of us.
Making a bed between them of the soft, fragrant twigs of the pine, we
supped upon burnt corn in the ear. By replenishing our great fires once
an hour we spent the night comfortably.
XXVI. _Thursday, January 12._
At our farm-house breakfast this morning, a sister of Lieutenant
Treadaway was our hostess. She gave us an inviting meal, in which
coffee, sugar, and butter, which had long been only reminiscences to
us, were the leading constituents.
By ten we were again upon the road. Two or three of our armed men kept
the advance as scouts, but we now journeyed with comparative impunity.
[Sidenote: "SLIDE DOWN OFF THAT HORSE."]
Some of our young men, who had long been hunted by the Rebels, embraced
every possible opportunity of turning the tables. No haste, weariness,
or danger could induce them to omit following the track of guerrillas,
wherever there was reasonable hope of finding the game. On the road
to-day, one of these footmen met a citizen riding a fine horse.
"What are you, Southerner or Union?" asked the boy, playing with the
hammer of his rifle.
"Well," replied the old Tennesseean, a good deal alarmed, "I have kept
out of the war from the beginning; I have not helped either side."
"Come! come! That will never do. You don't take me for a fool, do you?
You never could have lived in this country without being either one
thing or the other. Are you Union or Secession?"
"I voted for Secession."
"Tell the entire truth."
"Well, sir, I do; I have two sons in Johnson's army. I was an original
Secessionist, and I am as good a Southern man as you can find in the
State of Tennessee."
"All right, my old friend; just slide down off that horse."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that you are just the man I have been looking for, in walking
about a hundred miles--a good Southerner with a good horse! I am a
Yankee; we are all Yankees; so slide down, and be quick about it."
Accompanied by the clicking of the rifle, the injunction was not to
be despised. The rider came down, the boy mounted and galloped up
the road, while the old citizen walked slowly homeward, with many a
longing, lingering look behind.
We traveled twenty-five miles to-day, and at night made our camp in the
pine woods near Friend's Station.
[Sidenote: FRIENDLY WORDS BUT HOSTILE EYES.]
As the country was now comparatively safe, Davis and myself went in
pursuit of beds. At the first house, two women assured us that they
were good Union people, and very sorry they had not a single vacant
couch. Their words were unexceptionable, but I could not see the
welcome in their eyes. We afterward inquired, and found that they were
violent Rebels.
The next dwelling was a roomy old farm-house, with pleasant and
generous surroundings. In answer to our rap, a white-haired patriarch
of seventy came to the door.
"Can you give us supper and lodging to-night, and breakfast in the
morning? We will pay you liberally, and be greatly obliged beside."
"I should be glad to entertain you," he replied, in tremulous, childish
treble, "but to-night my daughters are all gone to a frolic. I have no
one in the house except my wife, who, like myself, is old and feeble."
[Sidenote: HOSPITALITIES OF A LOYAL PATRIARCH.]
The lady, impelled by curiosity, now appearing, we repeated the request
to her, with all the suavity and persuasiveness at our command, for we
were hungry and tired, and the place looked inviting. She dryly gave
us the same answer, but began to talk a little. Presently we again
inquired:
"Will you be good enough to accommodate us, or must we look farther?"
"What are you, anyhow?"
"Union men--Yankees, escaped from the Salisbury prison."
"Why didn't you say so before? Of course I can give you supper! Come
in, all of you!" The old lady prepared us the most palatable meal we
had yet found, and told us the usual stories of the war. For hours,
by the log fire, we talked with the aged couple, who had three sons
carrying muskets in the Union army, and who loved the Cause with
earnest, enthusiastic devotion. We were no longer apprehensive; for
they assured us that the Rebels had never yet searched their premises.
In this respect they had been singularly fortunate. Theirs was the only
one among the hundreds of Union houses we entered, which had not been
despoiled by Rebel marauders. More than once the Confederates had taken
from them grain and hay to the value of hundreds of dollars; but their
dwelling had always been respected.
XXVII. _Friday, January 13._
My poor steed gave signs of approaching dissolution; and I asked the
first man I saw by the roadside:
"Would you like a horse?"
"Certainly, stranger."
"Very well, take this one."
I handed him the bridle, and he led the animal away with a look of
wonder; but it could not have taken him long to comprehend the nature
of my generosity. Several other horses in the party had died or were
left behind as worthless.
Our journey--originally estimated at two hundred miles--had now grown
into two hundred and ninety-five by the roads. In view of our devious
windings, we deemed three hundred and forty miles a very moderate
estimate of the distance we had traveled.
[Sidenote: "OUT OF THE MOUTH OF HELL."]
At ten o'clock on the morning of this twenty-seventh day, came our
great deliverance. It was at Strawberry Plains, fifteen miles east of
Knoxville. Here--after a final march of seven miles, in which our heavy
feet and aching limbs grew wonderfully light and agile--in silence,
with bowed heads, with full hearts and with wet eyes, we saluted the
Old Flag.[20]
[20] KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE, January 13, 1865.
"Out of the jaws of Death; out of the mouth of Hell."
ALBERT D. RICHARDSON.
_Tribune, January 14, 1865._
A
SONG FOR THE "NAMELESS HEROINE"
WHO AIDED THE ESCAPING PRISONERS.
"Benisons on her dear head forever."
Words and Music composed by B. R. HANBY.
(Published by JOHN CHURCH, JR., 66 West Fourth Street, Cincinnati,
Ohio.)
1.
Out of the jaws of death,
Out of the mouth of hell,
Weary and hungry, and fainting and sore,
Fiends on the track of them,
Fiends at the back of them,
Fiends all around but an an-gel be-fore.
_CHORUS._
Fiends all a-round but an an-gel be-fore!
Blessings be thine, loyal maid, ev-er-more!
Fiends all around, but an an-gel be-fore,
Blessings be thine, lo-yal maid, ev-er-more.
2.
Out by the mountain path,
Down thro' the darksome glen,
Heedless of foes, nor at dan-ger dismayed,
Sharing their doubtful fate,
Daring the tyrant's hate,
Heart of a lion, though form of a maid;
_CHORUS._
Hail to the an-gel who goes on be-fore,
Blessings be thine, loyal maid, ev-er-more!
Hail to the an-gel who goes on be-fore,
Blessings be thine, lo-yal maid, ev-er-more.
3.
"Nameless," for foes may hear,
But by our love for thee,
Soon our bright sabers shall blush with their gore.
Then shall our banner free,
Wave, maiden, over thee:
Then, noble girl, thou'lt be nameless no more.
_CHORUS._
Then we shall hail thee from moun-tain to shore,
Bless thy brave heart, loyal maid, ev-er-more!
Then we shall hail thee from moun-tain to shore,
Bless thy brave heart, lo-yal maid, ev-er-more.
[Illustration: THE "NAMELESS HEROINE."]
[Transcribers' Note:
Spelling has not been modernized, and inconsistent hyphenation is as in
the original. The oe ligature is rendered [oe]. Italics are rendered
between underscores, e.g., _italics_. Small caps are rendered with all
caps e.g., SMALL CAPS. Superscripts are rendered with carat e.g., e=mc^2.
Apparent printer's errors have been corrected. The following table
lists changes made by the transcribers.]
Transcriber's Changes
+----+--------------+------------+
|PAGE|ORIGINAL |CHANGED TO |
+----+--------------+------------+
| 9|People |People. |
| 12|Freedom. |Freedom.-- |
| 29|business?' |business?" |
| 46|interesting |interesting.|
| 49|sieze |seize |
| 50|gentleman |gentlemen |
| 82|Sargeant |Seargeant |
| 110|reply |reply. |
| 110|nabbed!' |nabbed!" |
| 123|Tribune? |Tribune?" |
| 171|'Gu rie |Guthrie |
| 211|Parlia-liament|Parliament |
| 223|IIer |Her |
| 228|feels |Feels |
| 230|care lessly |carelessly |
| 238|briddle |bridle |
| 240|shubbery |shrubbery |
| 267|whose |Whose |
| 267|satis faction |satisfaction|
| 280|have'nt |haven't |
| 300|angry.' |angry." |
| 311|Douglass |Douglas |
| 312|Douglass |Douglas |
| 313|Douglass |Douglas |
| 336|cortége |cortège |
| 370|Gaurds |Guards |
| 375|attraced |attracted |
| 378|curreny |currency |
| 501|suposed |supposed |
+----+--------------+------------+
End of Project Gutenberg's The Secret Service., by Albert D. Richardson
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