Saturday, December 13, 2014

Major-General George G. Meade to Margaretta Sergeant Mead, October 11, 1864

Headquarters Army Of The Potomac, October 11, 1864.

I have been occupied all day riding round the lines, showing them to Major General Doyle, of the British Army, Governor of Nova Scotia, who has done this army the honor to visit it. The general is a very clever, intelligent and educated Irish gentleman. He is a brother to the then young Doyle, who, some thirty years since, was in this country attached to the British Legation under Sir Charles Vaughn.

The general expressed himself very much amazed at the length of our lines and the amount of engineering work we had done, and said that in Europe they had no conception of the character of the war we are engaged in, the obstacles we have to encounter, and the completeness of our organization. De Chanal, indeed all our foreign visitors, say the same thing; and say it is impossible for us to realize the ignorance that exists in Europe of America and American affairs. General Doyle is the person who behaved so well recently at Halifax when the steamer Chesapeake was seized and carried in there, he giving up the vessel and crew to a United States vessel of war that was after her. Another visitor whom I had yesterday was a Mr. McGrath, a Commissioner from Pennsylvania, sent down to take the soldiers' vote to-day. He seemed rather disgusted with the result of his mission; said very few of the soldiers had qualified themselves to vote and altogether appeared quite indifferent. He seemed to think the soldiers' vote would be very insignificant. I have noticed this fact myself, that is the indifference to politics on the part of officers and men. They don't seem to have much respect for either party, and are of the opinion that the safety and honor of the country are more dependent on what we do here than on the success of any political party. I don't say this is a very healthy or proper state of feeling, but I say it exists, and is due, I believe, in a great measure, to a want of confidence in the integrity and patriotism of party leaders.

SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Vol. 2, p. 233-4

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: March 10, 1861

Mrs. Childs was here to-night (Mary Anderson, from Statesburg), with several children. She is lovely. Her hair is piled up on the top of her head oddly. Fashions from France still creep into Texas across Mexican borders. Mrs. Childs is fresh from Texas. Her husband is an artillery officer, or was. They will be glad to promote him here. Mrs. Childs had the sweetest Southern voice, absolute music. But then, she has all of the high spirit of those sweet-voiced Carolina women, too. Then Mr. Browne came in with his fine English accent, so pleasant to the ear. He tells us that Washington society is not reconciled to the Yankee regime. Mrs. Lincoln means to economize. She at once informed the major-domo that they were poor and hoped to save twelve thousand dollars every year from their salary of twenty thousand. Mr. Browne said Mr. Buchanan's farewell was far more imposing than Lincoln's inauguration.

The people were so amusing, so full of Western stories. Dr. Boykin behaved strangely. All day he had been gaily driving about with us, and never was man in finer spirits. To-night, in this brilliant company, he sat dead still as if in a trance. Once, he waked somewhat — when a high public functionary came in with a present for me, a miniature gondola, “A perfect Venetian specimen,” he assured me again and again. In an undertone Dr. Boykin muttered: “That fellow has been drinking.” “Why do you think so?” “Because he has told you exactly the same thing four times.”  Wonderful! Some of these great statesmen always tell me the same thing — and have been telling me the same thing ever since we came here.

A man came in and some one said in an undertone, “The age of chivalry is not past, O ye Americans!” “What do you mean?” “That man was once nominated by President Buchanan for a foreign mission, but some Senator stood up and read a paper printed by this man abusive of a woman, and signed by his name in full. After that the Senate would have none of him; his chance was gone forever.”

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 16-7

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: April 21, 1861

Received several letters to-day which had been delayed in their transmission, and were doubtless opened on the way. One was from my wife, informing me of the illness of Custis, my eldest son, and of the equivocal conduct of some of the neighbors. The Rev. Mr. D., son of the late B___p, raised the flag of the Union on his church.

The telegraphic wires are still in operation.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 25

Diary of Judith W. McGuire: June 15, 1861

Yesterday was set apart by the President as a day of prayer and fasting, and I trust that throughout the Confederacy the blessing of God was invoked upon the army and country. We went to church at Millwood, and heard Bishop Meade. His sermon was full of wisdom and love; he urged us to individual piety in all things, particularly to love and charity to our enemies. He is full of enthusiasm and zeal for our cause. His whole heart is in it, and from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, for he talks most delightfully and encouragingly on the subject. He says that if our ancestors had good reason for taking up arms in 1775, surely we had much better, for the oppression they suffered from the mother-country was not a tithe of the provocation we have received from the Government at Washington.

SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern Refugee, During the War, p. 29-30

Diary of Private Alexander G. Downing: Saturday, February 13, 1864

We left Decatur early this morning and marched fifteen miles before going into bivouac. The Sixteenth Corps corralled their train and leaving a brigade to guard it pushed forward after the rebels. Skirmishing in the front continued and was brisk at times. The weather is pleasant and the roads are fine for marching. There is still plenty of forage along the way. This morning I saw a woman with her children forcibly moved out of her residence, all the household goods and the house set on fire. The deed was ordered by our officers, for they had been informed that her husband was out in the brush with his rifle, killing Union soldiers at every opportunity. The plantation home had the appearance of wealth.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 168

Simon Cameron to Wilder Dwight and George L. Andrews, April 28, 1861

washington City, April 28, 1861.

To Messrs. Wilder Dwight And George L. Andrews: —

The plan which you communicated for raising a regiment in Massachusetts for service during the war meets my approval. Such a regiment shall be immediately enlisted in the service of the government, as one of those which are to be called for immediately. The regiment shall be ordered to Fort Independence, or some other station in Boston Harbor, for purposes of training, equipment, and drill, and shall be kept there two months, unless an emergency compels their presence elsewhere.

I am, gentlemen, very respectfully,
Simon Cameron,
Secretary of War."

SOURCE: Elizabeth Amelia Dwight, Editor, Life and Letters of Wilder Dwight: Lieut.-Col. Second Mass. Inf. Vols., p. 42-3

John Lothrop Motley to Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, March 29, 1860

Oatlands Park Hotel, Walton-on-Thames,
March 29, 1860.

My Dear Wendell: I am not going to make one word of apology for my long silence. If you will forgive it and write me again at once, I promise faithfully that I will write to you as often as once a quarter if you will do the same. I cannot do without letters from you, and although I have a special dislike to writing them myself, I am willing to bore you for the sake of the reward. I really believe that you are the only one of my friends to whom I have not expressed in rapturous terms the delight with which I have read and re-read your “Autocrat.” We were quite out of the way of getting the “Atlantic” in our foreign residences—in Nice, Switzerland, and Rome. But one day after it had been collected into a volume some traveler lent it to us, and we carefully forgot to return it — a petty larceny combined with breach of trust which I have never regretted, for no one could appreciate it more highly than I, in the first place, and then all my family. It is really even better than I expected it to be, and that is saying much, for you know how high were my anticipations, and if you do not, poor Phillips, now no more, who always so highly appreciated you, could have told you how surely and how often I predicted your great and inevitable success. The “Autocrat” is an inseparable companion, and will live, I think, as long certainly as anything which we have turned out on our side. It is of the small and rare class to which Montaigne's “Essays,” “Elia,” and one or two other books belong, which one wishes to have forever under one's thumb. Every page is thoughtful, suggestive, imaginative, didactic, witty, stimulating, grotesque, arabesque, titillating — in short, I could string together all the adjectives in the dictionary without conveying to you an adequate expression of my admiration.

In order that you shall not think me merely a devourer and not an appreciator, I will add that the portions which give me the most pleasure are those, by far the largest, which are grave, earnest, and profound, and that the passages least to my mind are those which in college days would have most highly delighted me, viz., the uproariously funny ones. But, as Touchstone observes, “we that have good wits cannot hold, we must be flouting,” and I do not expect to bottle you up. I have not the book at my elbow at this moment, and am too lazy to go down-stairs to fetch it, but, as an illustration of what I most enjoy, take such a passage as about our brains being clockwork. I remember nothing of the diction at this instant, but the whole train of thought is very distinct to me. Also the bucketful of fresh and startling metaphors which the Autocrat empties on the head of the divinity student in return for his complimentary language as to the power of seeing analogies. Also — but I shall never get any further in this letter if I once begin to quote the “Autocrat,” so I will only add that I admire many of the poems, especially “The Voiceless,” which I am never tired of repeating. It is scarcely necessary for me to add that it is always with a deep sensation of pride and pleasure that I turn to page 28 and read the verses therein inscribed. Strange to say, I have not yet read “The Professor at the Breakfast-Table.” I tried to buy it the other day at Sampson Low's, one of the chief American republishers or importers, but he said that it had been done by (gentlemen who have, among others, done me the same favor).

Is there no chance of ever getting an international copyright bill and hanging these filibusters, who are legally picking the pockets of us poor-devil authors, who would fain become rich devils if we could? Why do you not make use of your strong position, having the whole American public by the button, to make it listen to reason? If I were an autocrat like you, I would issue an edict immediately. Or I would have a little starling that should say nothing but “Copyright” and let the public hear nothing else. Let me not omit to mention also with how much pleasure I read your poem on Burns. It is magnificent, and every verse rings most sympathetically upon the heart. So you see we do not lose the run of you, although I have been so idle about writing, and I am promising myself much pleasure from “The Professor at the Breakfast-Table,” which I shall have sent to me from Boston. By the way, I bagged the other day a splendid presentation copy of the “Autocrat,” which you had sent to TrΓΌbner for some one else, and I gave it to Mrs. Norton (of whom you have heard often enough, and who is a poet herself), who admires it as much as I do. I do not know whether I shall like the novel as well as your other readers are likely to do, because the discursive, irresponsible, vagrant way of writing which so charms me in the “Autocrat” is hardly in place in a narrative, and, for myself, I always find, to my regret, that I grow every year less and less capable of reading novels or romances. I wish it were not so. However, I doubt not you will reclaim me, but I do not mean to read it until it is finished.

I have not a great deal to talk about now that I find myself face to face with you. We have been, by stress of circumstances rather than choice, driven to England, and we have seen a great deal of English society, both in town and country. We have received much kindness and sat at many “good men's feasts”; and I must say that I have, as I always had, a warm affection for England and the English. I have been awfully hard at work for the last year and a half, with unlucky intermissions and loss of time, but I hope to publish a couple of bulky volumes by the beginning of next year. There is a cartload of MS. already in Murray's hands, but I do not know how soon we shall begin to print.

I wish when you write — and you see that I show a generous confidence in your generosity by assuming that you will write notwithstanding my delinquencies — you would tell me what is going on in your literary world, and also something about politics. One can get but little from the newspapers; but I should really like to know what chance there is of the country's being rescued from the government which now oppresses us. But I forget, perhaps you are not a Republican, although I can hardly conceive of your being anything else. With regard to my views and aspirations, I can only say that if Seward is not elected (provided he be the candidate) this autumn, good night, my native land! I admire his speech, and agree with almost every word he says, barring of course the little sentimentality about the affection we all feel for the South, which, I suppose, is very much like the tenderness of Shylock — “Kind sir, you spat on me on Thursday last, you spurned me such a day, and another time you called me dog, and for these courtesies,” etc., etc. However, if Mr. Seward thinks it worth while to stir in a little saccharine of this sort, he knows best. The essential is to get himself nominated and elected. Now please write and tell me what the chances are, always provided you agree with me, but not if you are for the pro-slavery man, whoever he may be. I have not yet succeeded in suppressing Louis Napoleon, who bamboozles the English cabinet and plays his fantastic tricks before high heaven with more impunity than ever. Of a truth it may be said now, — three hundred years ago it was uttered by one of the most illustrious of her sons, — “Gallia silvescit.” What can be more barbarous than the condition of a country relapsed of its own choice under a military despot?

Pray remember us most kindly to your wife and children, and believe me always

Most sincerely yours,
J. L. Motley.

Pray remember me most affectionately to all the fellows at the club.

SOURCE: George William Curtis, editor, The Correspondence of John Lothrop Motley in Two Volumes, Library Edition, Volume 2, p. 81-5

Charles Eliot Norton to Mrs. Gaskell, August 12, 1861

Newport, 12 August, 1861.

My Dear Mrs. Gaskell, —  . . . Your note came to me just at the time of a great sorrow in the sudden and terrible death of our dear friend Mrs. Longfellow. You have no doubt seen some notice of it. The fatal accident took place on one of our hot summer days in July. It was in the afternoon. She was with her two youngest little girls in the library, and having just cut the hair of one of them she was amusing them by sealing up some packets of the pretty curls. By some unexplained accident one of the wax tapers she was using set fire to her dress. It was of the lightest muslin, and the flame almost instantly spread beyond her power to extinguish it. Her first thought was to save her little girls from harm, and she fled from them into her husband's study, where he was lying asleep on a sofa. Hearing her call to him he sprang up, seized a rug from the floor, wrapped it round her and tried in vain to put out the fire. Before he could succeed the flames had done their work. She was taken upstairs, and the physicians were very soon with her. There was nothing to be done but to alleviate her suffering which for an hour or two was intense. She was rendered unconscious by ether, — and when its use was discontinued the suffering was over and did not return. Through the night she was perfectly calm, patient and gentle, all the lovely sweetness and elevation of her character showing itself in her looks and words. In the morning she lost consciousness and about eleven o'clock she died. Poor Longfellow had been very severely burned in trying to put out the flames, and for several days was in a state of great physical suffering and nervous prostration. I have never known any domestic calamity so sad and tragic as this. Of all happy homes theirs was in many respects the happiest. It was rich and delightful not only in outward prosperity but in intimate blessings. Those who loved them could not wish for them anything better than they had, for their happiness satisfied even the imagination.

Mrs. Longfellow was very beautiful, and her beauty was but the type of the loveliness and nobility of her character. She was a person whom everyone admired, and whom those who knew her well enough to love loved very deeply. There is nothing in her life that is not delightful to remember. There was no pause and no decline in her. It was but a very few days before her death that Lowell and I, as we came out from a morning party where we had met her, agreed that she had never been more beautiful or more charming. She had a fine stateliness and graciousness of manner. Reserved in expression, but always sweet and kind, it was only those who knew her well who knew how quick and deep and true her sympathies were, how poetic was her temperament, how pure and elevated her thoughts. Longfellow was worthy of such a wife.

Ever since I was a very little boy he has been one of our nearest friends, and for many years our lives have been closely connected with theirs. Their home is a little more than a mile from ours, but in affection they have been our nearest neighbours. It was a touching coincidence that her funeral took place on the eighteenth anniversary of her wedding day. Such a short time as it seemed! Such a happy time as it had been!

The next week we came to Newport, and here we have been living for the last four weeks very quietly, — save that I went to Cambridge a fortnight ago to see Longfellow. He was still confined to his bed, but his hands, which had been most badly burned, were becoming serviceable once more; and he was suffering more from feebleness than from pain. I have never seen any one who bore a great sorrow in a more simple and noble way. But he is very desolate, — and, however manfully and religiously he may bear up, his life must hereafter be desolate. I hope he may find happiness in his children; his three little girls are very dear and charming, and his two boys are just growing into young-manhood.

I have never known a private sorrow affect the community as this did. It went to the heart of every person, — and for a time even the pressing interest of our public affairs seemed remote. . .

SOURCE: Sara Norton and  M. A. DeWolfe Howe, Letters of Charles Eliot Norton, Volume 1, p. 238-41

Samuel Gridley Howe to John M. Forbes, August 19, 1861

Boston, August 19,1861.

. . . The public need something, or somebody, some word, or some blow, to magnetize them, or else they will be fearfully demoralized in a month. The word must be emancipation, and war upon slaveholders as such — as a distinct class — as the authors of all the present ills.

Can you not confer with the governor about this? You cannot keep up public interest, much less public enthusiasm, about an abstraction (at least of a worldly and temporal nature), and Union is a mere abstraction now; it touches not, and cannot touch, the public heart.

As one blow, I suggest what I vainly suggested last spring, an expedition to land in or about Albemarle Sound, composed mainly of blacks, who would go into the Dismal and other swamps and raise the thousands of refugees there to go out and make sallies and onslaughts upon the enemy; and so make a diversion.

It would at least cause a worse than Bull Run panic. There are plenty of men in Canada, resolute and intelligent refugees, who would enlist in such an enterprise. It cannot, however, be done by private means. Can any other be had, think you?

I have mentioned the matter of expedition to the Dismal Swamp to the governor, but to him only. Please not speak of it to any one else.

SOURCE: Sarah Forbes Hughes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, Volume 1, p. 238

George William Curtis to Charles Eliot Norton, December 15, 1862

New York, December 15, '62.

I am at my mother's, — a house of mourning. On Saturday afternoon my brother Joe fell dead at the head of his regiment, ending at twenty-six years a stainless life in the holiest cause and in the most heroic manner. God rest his noble soul, and grant us all the same fidelity! My mother, who has felt the extreme probability of the event from the beginning, is as brave as she can be; but it is a fearful blow. She does not regret his going, and she knew the risk, but who can know the pang until it comes?1
­­­­­_______________

1 Joseph Bridgham Curtis was born in Providence, R. I., October 25, 1836. Educated as a civil engineer at the Lawrence Scientific School, Cambridge, Mass., he entered the Union service at the outbreak of the war in 1861 as engineer on the staff of the Ninth Regiment of the New York State National Guard. On the organization of the Fourth Rhode Island Regiment, he was appointed Adjutant. He served with Burnside at Roanoke and in the Army of the Potomac. The regiment was cut to pieces at Antietam, and fell back in disorder. Lieutenant Curtis seized the colors, shouting, “I go back no further! What is left of the Fourth Rhode Island, form here!” But there was not enough left to form, and Curtis, for the rest of the day, fought as a private in an adjoining command. He was made Lieutenant-Colonel on the reorganization of the regiment, and was in command at Fredericksburg. He was instantly killed at the head of his men on the evening of the battle of December 13,1862.

SOURCE: Edward Cary, George William Curtis, p. 160-1

1st Lieutenant Charles Fessenden Morse, August 5, 1861

Maryland Heights, August 5, 1861.

We still are in the same place my last letter was dated from, but instead of being in tents, we are bivouacking again. Last Thursday afternoon, the order came that, as we were the advance guard, we should not have our wagons and baggage liable to being cut off. Everything was moved off in a hurry, and the men set to work building shelters of bushes.

They are built like long sheds, have posts every little distance, rafters and string pieces connecting them. For the reason that we have two architects at the head of our company, ours was the soonest and best built. Captain Curtis and I had an elegant little bower made for ourselves where we live cool and comfortable.

SOURCE: Charles Fessenden Morse, Letters Written During the Civil War, 1861-1865, p. 14

Colonel Charles Russell Lowell to Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Sturgis Russell*, May 16, 1863

Camp E. Of Capitol, Washington, D. C.
May 16, '63.

Started precisely at 12 M. Tuesday (427 men and officers, 437 horses), reached boat at 5 P. M. (start earlier and feed on pier): boat too small for so many horses, delay in loading, finally started from wharf at ½ A. M. Wednesday — reached Jersey City at 9 A. M. — terrible confusion watering and loading horses, did not leave by train till 5 P. M.: lost ten men here: had to handle all our own baggage here, as also the night before at Stonington. Reached Camden (opposite Philadelphia) at 1 A. M., Thursday; waited two hours while R. R. men handled baggage and transshipped horses, crossed to Philadelphia by ferry, got an excellent breakfast at the Volunteer Relief Rooms;1 left by train at 6 A. M., arrangements excellent. Reached Baltimore at 3 P. M., horses and baggage dragged through city without transshipment; gave men coffee and dinner at Union Relief Rooms (164 Eutaw St., close to Depot). Left Baltimore at 5 P. M. and, after much delay, arrived in Washington at 2 A. M. Friday — breakfast ready for men at barracks near Depot; immediately-after, commenced unloading horses and traps, and at 9 A. M. had horses fed and watered and on picket lines (saddles, &c, by them and company and Quartermaster property in wagons); at 12 M. started for camp, which I selected, and before 6 P. M. officers and men were all in tents, and horses all at permanent lines, — total loss 11 deserters and 1 dead horse,—gain 6 horses! On the whole I recommend this route highly.

I had a very strong guard detailed (70 men and officers) and kept it on duty for the trip — every door (to cars and yards) was guarded before the command entered.
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* Captain Henry S. Russell, of the Second Massachusetts Infantry, had been detailed to help in preparing for the field the Second Cavalry, of which he was to be second in command. He had been left behind to secure and forward recruits to the regiment. I copy the following from Mr. John M. Forbes's Reminiscences: “Harry had distinguished himself in the Second Infantry, under Gordon, as a good soldier, reaching the rank of captain, and then had suffered himself to be captured at the battle of Cedar Mountain, under Banks, where he stood by his mortally wounded friend James Savage, and passed some months in prison.  . . . He left the Second Massachusetts Cavalry, where he was lieutenant-colonel, to recruit the Fifth (coloured) Cavalry, as colonel. This regiment got its first impetus from a telegram which I received one day, when on a visit to Washington, from Governor Andrew, directing me to see Secretary Stanton, and apply for leave to recruit a regiment of coloured cavalry. It was a time when recruiting was beginning to flag, and, taking the message in my pocket, I soon got access to the Secretary, with whom I was always on good terms, and within five minutes of showing the message leave was given to go ahead; and Harry gave up his easier place of lieutenant-colonel in a splendid white regiment to build up the Fifth Massachusetts Cavalry (coloured), which, however, was destined to do most of its work unmounted.” Colonel Russell was wounded, but survived the war. A man of courage and decision, and with a natural dignity and military habit in dealing with men, he was singularly kind and modest. He served the city of Boston to much purpose and with honourable fidelity, first as Commissioner of Police, and later of the Fire Department, for many years.
1 The bounteous hospitality extended to all regiments and soldiers passing through this city, by the Philadelphia Volunteer Relief Association during the war, is held in grateful remembrance.

SOURCE: Edward Waldo Emerson, Life and Letters of Charles Russell Lowell, p. 239-40, 416-7

Diary of Josephine Shaw Lowell: August 11, 1862

Nahant. After that comparatively long time of inaction it begins again, and near home this time. We get the news late here, and we were at the "Sanitary" when Eugenia Mifflin told of a battle in the Shenandoah Valley, in which she said Major Savage and Captain Abbott were killed and Sam Quincy taken prisoner. Rob's safe, as I was sure from the beginning, for being a Staff Officer, any accident would have been reported. There are only two or three officers untouched in the Second, Richard Carey, Dan Oakey and many others being among the wounded.

SOURCE: William Rhinelander Stewart, The Philanthropic Work of Josephine Shaw Lowell, p. 32

John Brown to Edmund B. Whitman, August 1856

Names of sufferers and persons who have made sacrifices in endeavoring to maintain and advance the Free-State cause in Kansas, within my personal knowledge.

1. Two German refugees (thoroughly Free-State), robbed at Pottawatomie, named Benjamin and Bondy (or Bundy). One has served under me as a volunteer; namely, Bondy. Benjamin was prisoner for some time. Suffered by men under Coffee and Pate.

2. Henry Thompson. Devoted several months to the Free-State cause, travelling nearly two thousand miles at his own expense for the purpose, leaving family and business for about one year. Served under me as a volunteer; was dangerously wounded at Palmyra, or Black Jack; has a bullet lodged beside his backbone; has had a severe turn of fever, and is still very feeble. Suffered a little in burning of the houses of John Brown, Jr., and Jason Brown.

3. John, Jr., and Jason Brown. Both burned out; both prisoners for some time, one a prisoner still; both losing the use of valuable, partially improved claims. Both served repeatedly as volunteers for defence of Lawrence and other places, suffering great hardships and some cruelty.

4. Owen and Frederick Brown. Both served at different periods as volunteers under me; were both in the battle of Palmyra; both suffered by the burning of their brothers' houses; both have had sickness (Owen a severe one), and are yet feeble. Both lost the use of partially improved claims and their spring and summer work.

5. Salmon Brown (minor). Twice served under me as a volunteer; was dangerously wounded (if not permanently crippled) by accident near Palmyra; had a severe sickness, and still feeble.

6. Oliver Brown (minor). Served under me as a volunteer for some months; was in the battle of Palmyra, and had some sickness.

7. [B. L.] Cochran (at Pottawatomie). Twice served under me as a volunteer; was in the battle of Palmyra.1

8. Dr. Lucius Mills devoted some months to the Free-State cause, collecting and giving information, prescribing for and nursing the sick and wounded at his own cost. Is a worthy Free-State man.

9. John Brown has devoted the service of himself and two minor sons to the Free-State cause for more than a year; suffered by the fire before named and by robbery; has gone at his own cost for that period, except that he and his company together have received forty dollars in cash, two sacks of flour, thirty-five pounds bacon, thirty-five do. sugar, and twenty pounds rice.

I propose to serve hereafter in the Free-State cause (provided my needful expenses can be met), should that be desired; and to raise a small regular force to serve on the same condition. My own means are so far exhausted that I can no longer continue in the service at present without the means of defraying my expenses are furnished me.

I can give the names of some five or six more volunteers of special merit I would be glad to have particularly noticed in some way.

J. Brown.
_______________

1 Better known as Black Jack.

SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of John Brown, p. 241-2

Friday, December 12, 2014

Diary of Major Rutherford B. Hayes, September 21, 1861

Equinoctial storm today. Our regiment does not move. I am getting ready for my new quarters and duties. Just got ready for bed; a dark, dismal, rainy night. Visited the hospital tonight. Saw several of Colonel Tyler's men who were wounded and taken prisoners in his surprise a month ago and were retaken by us after the fight at Carnifax Ferry. Intelligent men from Oberlin, one Orton; one from Cleveland. They have suffered much but are in good spirits. The enemy boasted that they would soon drive us out and would winter in Cincinnati.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 99

Lieutenant-Colonel Theodore Lyman to Elizabeth Russell Lyman, May 30, 1864

It has been a tolerably quiet day, though there was a quite sharp fight at evening on our left — the Rebels badly used up. The people in Richmond must hear plainly the booming of our cannon: they scarcely can feel easy, for we are closing in on the old ground of McClellan. Fair Oaks was two years ago this very day. What armies have since been destroyed and rebuilt! What marchings and countermarchings, from the James to the Susquehanna! Still we cling to them — that is the best feature. There is, and can be, no doubt of the straits to which these people are now reduced; particularly, of course, in this distracted region; there is nothing in modern history to compare with the conscription they have. They have swept this part of the country of all persons under 50, who could not steal away. I have just seen a man of 48, very much crippled with rheumatism, who said he was enrolled two days ago. He told them he had thirteen persons dependent on him, including three grandchildren (his son-in-law had been taken some time since); but they said that made no difference; he was on his way to the rendezvous, when our cavalry crossed the river, and he hid in the bushes, till they came up. I offered him money for some of his small vegetables; but he said: “If you have any bread, I would rather have it. Your cavalry have taken all the corn I had left, and, as for meat, I have not tasted a mouthful for six weeks.” If you had seen his eyes glisten when I gave him a piece of salt pork, you would have believed his story. He looked like a man who had come into a fortune. “Why,” said he, “that must weigh four pounds — that would cost me forty dollars in Richmond! They told us they would feed the families of those that were taken; and so they did for two months, and then they said they had no more meal.” What is even more extraordinary than their extreme suffering, is the incomprehensible philosophy and endurance of these people. Here was a man, of poor health, with a family that it would be hard to support in peacetimes, stripped to the bone by Rebel and Union, with no hope from any side, and yet he almost laughed when he described his position, and presently came back with a smile to tell me that the only two cows he had, had strayed off, got into a Government herd, and “gone up the road” — that's the last of them. In Europe, a man so situated would be on his knees, tearing out handfuls of hair, and calling on the Virgin and on several saints. There were neighbors at his house; and one asked me if I supposed our people would burn his tenement? “What did you leave it for?” I asked. To which he replied, in a concise way that told the whole: “Because there was right smart of bullets over thaar!” The poorest people seem usually more or less indifferent or adverse to the war, but their bitterness increases in direct ratio to their social position. Find a well-dressed lady, and you find one whose hatred will end only with death — it is unmistakable, though they treat you with more or less courtesy. Nor is it extraordinary: there is black everywhere; here is one that has lost an only son; and here another that has had her husband killed. People of this class are very proud and spirited; you can easily see it; and it is the officers that they supply who give the strong framework to their army. They have that military and irascible nature so often seen among an aristocracy that was once rich and is now poor; for you must remember that, before the war, most of these landowners had ceased to hold the position they had at the beginning of this century. There, that is enough of philosophizing; the plain fact being that General Robert Lee is entrenched within cannon range, in a sort of way that says, “I will fight you to my last gun and my last battalion!” We had not well got our tents pitched before the restless General, taking two or three of us, posted off to General Hancock. That is his custom, to take two or three aides and as many orderlies and go ambling over the country, confabbing with the generals and spying round the country roads. There, of course, was Hancock, in a white shirt (his man Shaw must have a hard time of it washing those shirts and sheets) and with a cheery smile. His much persecuted aides-de-camp were enjoying a noon-tide sleep, after their fatigues. The indefatigable Mitchell remarked that there were many wood-ticks eating him, but that he had not strength to fight them! The firing was so heavy that, despite the late hour, General Meade ordered Hancock and Burnside to advance, so as to relieve Warren. Only Gibbon had time to form for an attack, and he drove back their front line and had a brief engagement, while the other commands opened more or less with artillery; and so the affair ended with the advantage on our side. — The swamp magnolias are in flower and the azaleas, looking very pretty and making a strong fragrance.

SOURCE: George R. Agassiz, Editor, Meade’s Headquarters, 1863-1865: Letters of Colonel Theodore Lyman from the Wilderness to Appomattox, p. 132-4

Major-General George G. Meade to Margaretta Sergeant Mead, October 9, 1864

                            Headquarters Army Of The Potomac, October 9, 1864.

We have at last heard of the fate of poor young Parker, who was on my staff. An officer recently returned from Richmond says he was captured by guerrillas near Bristol Station, a few days after Parker's disappearance; that when they were taking him off they cautioned him not to attempt to escape, for if he did they would be obliged to serve him as they had done General Meade's aide a few days before, who in spite of their cautions tried to get away, and they were forced to shoot him. I have no doubt this is a true statement of the poor fellow's fate. I have sent it to Cortlandt Parker.

SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Vol. 2, p. 233

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: March 8, 1861

Judge Campbell,1 of the United States Supreme Court, has resigned. Lord! how he must have hated to do it. How other men who are resigning high positions must hate to do it. Now we may be sure the bridge is broken. And yet in the Alabama Convention they say Reconstructionists abound and are busy. Met a distinguished gentleman that I knew when he was in more affluent circumstances. I was willing enough to speak to him, but when he saw me advancing for that purpose, to avoid me, he suddenly dodged around a corner — William, Mrs. de Saussure's former coachman. I remember him on his box, driving a handsome pair of bays, dressed sumptuously in blue broadcloth and brass buttons; a stout, respectable, fine-looking, middle-aged mulatto. He was very high and mighty. Night after night we used to meet him as fiddler-in-chief of all our parties. He sat in solemn dignity, making faces over his bow, and patting his foot with an emphasis that shook the floor. We gave him five dollars a night; that was his price. His mistress never refused to let him play for any party. He had stable-boys in abundance. He was far above any physical fear for his sleek and well-fed person. How majestically he scraped his foot as a sign that he was tuned up and ready to begin!  Now he is a shabby creature indeed. He must have felt his fallen fortunes when he met me — one who knew him in his prosperity. He ran away, this stately yellow gentleman, from wife and children, home and comfort. My Molly asked him “Why? Miss Liza was good to you, I know.” I wonder who owns him now; he looked forlorn. Governor Moore brought in, to be presented to me, the President of the Alabama Convention. It seems I had known him before; he had danced with me at a dancing-school ball when I was in short frocks, with sash, flounces, and a wreath of roses. He was one of those clever boys of our neighborhood, in whom my father saw promise of better things, and so helped him in every way to rise, with books, counsel, sympathy. I was enjoying his conversation immensely, for he was praising my father2 without stint, when the Judge came in, breathing fire and fury. Congress has incurred his displeasure. We are abusing one another as fiercely as ever we have abused Yankees. It is disheartening.
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1 John Archibald Campbell, who had settled in Montgomery and was appointed Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court by President Pierce in 1853. Before he resigned, he exerted all his influence to prevent Civil War and opposed secession, although he believed that States had a right to secede.

2 Mrs. Chesnut's father was Stephen Decatur Miller, who was born in South Carolina in 1787, and died in Mississippi in 1838. He was elected to Congress in 1816, as an Anti-Calhoun Democrat, and from 1828 to 1830 was Governor of South Carolina. He favored Nullification, and in 1830 was elected United States Senator from South Carolina, but resigned three years afterward in consequence of ill health. In 1835 he removed to Mississippi and engaged in cotton growing.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 14-6

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: April 20, 1861

The news has been confirmed. It was a brickbat “Plug Ugly” fight — the result of animal, and not intellectual or patriotic instincts. Baltimore has better men for the strife than bar-room champions. The absence of dignity in this assault will be productive of evil rather than good. Maryland is probably lost — for her fetters will be riveted before the secession of Virginia will be communicated by the senseless form of ratification a month hence. Woe, woe to the politicians of Virginia who have wrought this delay! It is now understood that the very day before the ordinance was passed, the members were gravely splitting hairs over proposed amendments to the Federal Constitution!

Guns are being fired on Capitol Hill in commemoration of secession, and the Confederate flag now floats unmolested from the summit of the capitol. I think they had better save the powder, etc.

At night. We have a gay illumination. This too is wrong. We had better save the candles.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 25

Diary of Judith W. McGuire: June 12, 1861

The Briars —We are now in the beautiful Valley of Virginia, having left Chantilly on the 8th. The ride through the Piedmont country was delightful; it looked so peaceful and calm that we almost forgot the din of war we had left behind us. The road through Loudoun and Fauquier was picturesque and beautiful. We passed through the villages of Aldie, Middleburg, and Upperville. At Middleburg we stopped for an hour, and regaled ourselves on strawberries and cream at the house of our excellent brother, the Rev. Mr. K. At Upperville we spent the night. Early next morning we went on through the village of Paris, and then began to ascend the Blue Ridge, wound around on the fine turnpike, paused a moment at the top to “view the landscape o'er,” and then descended into the “Valley.” The wheat, which is almost ready for the reaper, is rich and luxuriant, foreshadowing an abundant commissariat for our army. After driving some miles over the delightful turnpike, we found ourselves at this door, receiving the warm-hearted welcome of the kindest of relatives and the most pleasant of hosts. Our daughters were here before us, all well, and full of questions about “home.” This is all very delightful when we fancy ourselves making a voluntary visit to this family, as in days gone by, to return home when the visit is over, hoping soon to see our friends by our own fireside; but when the reality is before us that we were forced from home, and can only return when it pleases our enemy to open the way for us, or when our men have forced them away at the point of the bayonet, then does our future seem shadowy, doubtful, and dreary, and then we feel that our situation is indeed sorrowful. But these feelings must not be indulged; many are already in our situation, and how many more are there who may have to follow our example! Having no houses to provide for, we must be up and doing for our country; idleness does not become us now — there is too much to be done; we must work on, work ever, and let our country's weal be our being's end and aim.

Yesterday we went to Winchester to see my dear S., and found her house full of refugees: my sister Mrs. C, and her daughter Mrs. L., from Berkeley County. Mrs. C.'s sons are in the army; her eldest, having been educated at the Virginia Military Institute, drilled a company of his own county men during the John Brown raid; he has now taken it to the field, and is its commander; and Mr. L. is in the army, with the rank of major. Of course the ladies of the family were active in fitting out the soldiers, and when an encampment was near them, they did every thing in their power to contribute to the comfort of the soldiers; for which sins the Union people around them have thought proper to persecute them, until they were obliged to leave home — Mrs. L. with two sick children. Her house has been searched, furniture broken, and many depredations committed since she left home ; books thrown Out of the windows during a rain: nothing escaped their fury.

Winchester is filled with hospitals, and the ladies are devoting their energies to nursing the soldiers. The sick from the camp at Harper's Ferrry are brought there. Our climate seems not to suit the men from the far South. I hope they will soon become acclimated. It rejoices my heart to see how much everybody is willing to do for the poor fellows. The ladies there think no effort, however self-sacrificing, is too great to be made for the soldiers. Nice food for the sick is constantly being prepared by old and young. Those who are very sick are taken to the private houses, and the best chambers in town are occupied by them. The poorest private and the officer of high degree meet with the same treatment. The truth is, the elite of the land is in the ranks. I heard a young soldier say, a few nights ago, that his captain was perhaps the plainest man, socially, in the company, but that he was an admirable officer. We heard a good story about a wealthy young private whose captain was his intimate friend, but not being rich, he could not afford to take a servant to camp; it therefore fell to the lot of the privates to clean the captain's shoes. When the turn of the wealthy friend came, he walked up, cap in hand, with an air of due humility, gave the military salute, and said, with great gravity, “Captain, your shoes, if you please, sir.” The ludicrousness of the scene was more than either could stand, and they laughed heartily. But the wealthy private cleaned the captain's shoes.

SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern Refugee, During the War, p. 27-9