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CHAPTER XIII
GLIMPSES OF OUR BELEAGUERED SOUTH LAND

WHILE few, I think, perceived it clearly at that early day, yet in the spring of '62 the fortunes of the Confederacy were declining. Many of our wisest men were already doubtful of the issue even where belief in the justice of our cause never wavered. Looking back upon the prophecies of ultimate defeat that were uttered in those days, by men accustomed to sound the security of governments, I am thrilled at the flood of patriotic feeling on which our men and women were borne to continue in arms against such overwhelming forces and conditions as were brought against them. For months before that first Congress adjourned, from every part of our federated States, eager petitioning, complaints and ominous news reached us. Gold, that universal talisman, was scarce, and Confederate currency began to be looked upon with a doubtful eye. So far-seeing a man as Judge John A. Campbell, writing to Mrs. Campbell from New Orleans early in April, 1862, said: "In the event of the restoration of Northern rule, Confederate money may be worthless. I proceed on that assumption. It will certainly depreciate more and more. Hence, your expenditures should be Confederate money, and, in any event, the bank-notes of Georgia, Virginia and Louisiana are preferable to Confederate bills. If the war should last another year, the embarrassments of everyone will be increased tenfold!"

Within a few months the face of our capital had changed. McClellan's ever- swelling army in the peninsula became more and more menacing. The shadow of

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coming battles fell over the city, and timid ones hastened away to points that promised more security. Some went to the mountain resorts "to escape the hot term" in Richmond, but many of the wives and daughters of non-householders, even among those known to possess a cool courage, moved on to the Carolinas or returned to their native States. As the close of the Congressional session drew near, there was a continual round of good-byes and hand-shakings, and even an attempt now and then at a gaiety which no one actually felt.

Our markets grew suddenly poor, and following quickly upon the heels of a seeming prosperity, a stringency in every department of life in the city was felt. The cost of living was doubled, and if, indeed, any epicures remained, they were glad to put aside their fastidiousness. Within a year our vermicelli, when we had it at all, would have warranted an anglicising of its first two syllables, and our rice, beans, and peas, as well as our store of grains and meal, began to discover a lively interest in their wartime surroundings. We heard tales of a sudden demand for green persimmons, since a soldier, feeding upon one of these, could feel his stomach draw up and at once forget that he was "hawngry." I remember hearing the story of a certain superficial lady who spoke disdainfully, in the hearing of Mrs. Roger A. Pryor, of a barrel of sorghum which some friend had sent her from a distance. Full of contempt, she ordered the offending gift to be taken away. "Horrid stuff!" she said.

"Horrid?" asked Mrs. Pryor, gently. "Why! in these days, with our country in peril, I am grateful when I am able to get a pitcher of sorghum, and I teach my children to thank God for it!"

Our mail, from many quarters, was now become a Pandora's box, from which escaped, as we opened it, myriad apprehensions, dissatisfactions or distresses. "Pray," wrote a friend from New Orleans, "when you see

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the President, beg him to give some attention to the disloyal element in the cities, and particularly in this city, which is filledwith strangers who appear and disappear in the most mysterious manner, go to private boardinghouses, examine the defenses, etc., etc."

"I am thus far on my way home," wrote William L. Yancey, from the same city, in a letter dated March 14, 1862, "having left Havana on the 26th ultimo on a small schooner, and arrived at Sabine Pass on the 6th. Two of Lincoln's vessels had been anchored in the channel of that harbour for a week and only left twenty-four hours before my arrival. . . . This city is almost in a state of revolution," he added. "Fifteen hundred of its weathiest and most respectable citizens and good Southerners have organised an association and resolved to assume executive and judicial functions to arrest, try, imprison, banish or hang! . . . .There is undoubtedly a deep-seated feeling of wrong done them and of anxiety for the city's safety at the bottom of all this, and this association should not be treated as a mere lawless mob. Their success, however, would be the knell of our cause in England, and perhaps on the Continent. I am doing all I can to throw oil on the troubled waters, and I hope with some effect."

Shortly after his arrival in Richmond, Mr. Yancey, whom my husband greatly admired, spent a morning in our chamber - space was too costly at this time to admit of our having a private parlour - in conference with Mr. Clay, and a more hopeless and unhappy statesman I never saw. The people in England, he declared, were for, but Parliament opposed to us, and his mission, therefore, had been fruitless. Every action and each word he uttered demonstrated that he knew and felt the ultimate downfall of the Confederacy.

By a singular coincidence, almost under the same circumstances but some months later, a similar conference

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took place in our rooms, but Mr. Lamar was now the returned diplomat. But recently home from an unfinished mission to Russia, our long-time friend talked, as had Mr. Yancey, with a conviction that our cause was hopeless. Mr. Lamar had proceeded only so far as London and Paris, when, observing the drift of public feeling abroad, he took ship again, arriving, as did many of our returned foreign emissaries, on the top of a friendly wave. The sea was peculiarly inimical to the cause of the Confederate States, sinking many of the merchant ships we succeeded in sending through the blockading fleets that beset our coast, and wrecking our ambassadors wherever it could grapple them, even on our very shores.

By the time Congress closed in the spring of '62 the news from the Tennessee Valley was distracting. The enemy had succeeded in reaching our home, and Huntsville was now become the headquarters of General O. M. Mitchell. If that gentleman had taken delight in anything besides the vigorous exercise of an unwelcome authority, he might have found there an ideal spot for the prosecution of his astronomical researches. The span that rests upon the opposite apices of Monte Sano and Lookout Mountain is one of gorgeous beauty. Upon a clear night the planets glow benignly upon the valley, the little stars laugh and leap and go shooting down great distances in a manner unparalleled in more northerly latitudes. Though generally loyal to the cause of the Confederacy, the people of Huntsville were not indisposed to look upon the author-soldier with considerate eyes, had that General adopted a humane course toward them. Unfortunately, his career in our valley from beginning to end was that of a martinet bent upon the subjugation of the old and helpless and the very young, our youths and strong men being away in the field.

The accounts that reached us by letter and by eye-witnesses of the scenes in the Clay home were alarming.

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Everything belonging to the Clays, it was rumoured, was to be confiscated. "Judge Scruggs told Stanley," wrote mother, "that the Clays are to be stript of all." Father's negroes, and most of our own, were conducting themselves in an insolent manner, taking to the mountains when there was work to be done, or wandering in the train of straggling Union soldiers, but returning when hungry to feed upon their master's rapidly diminishing stores. In some instances, relying upon the protection of the soldiers, the negroes of the town would take possession of the home of an absent master, revelling in an opportunity to sleep in his bed or to eat from the family silver and china.

A dozen times a day, and at unreasonable hours, if the invading soldiery saw fit, they entered the houses of the citizens in what was often merely a pretended search for some concealed Confederate, or to demand food or drink or horses. They were constantly on the lookout for the possible visits, to their families, of the distinguished citizens in temporary banishment from Huntsville. The presence of General Pope Walker being suspected (though no longer Secretary of War, he would have been a desirable prize to take, since he had issued orders for the firing of the first gun at Fort Sumter), for months the home of our friend ex-Governor Chapman, in which the family of General Walker had taken refuge, was searched daily, the vigilante being so scrupulous in their investigations that even the leaves of a dictionary were parted, lest the wily late Secretary should spirit himself away between its covers.(*)

(* I asked Mrs. Milton Humes, daughter of ex-Governor Chapman concerning these war-time search-parties. "I remember distinctly," she answered, "seeing them look into preserve jars and cut glass decanters, until my mother's risibles no longer could be repressed. 'You don't expect to find General Walker in that brandy bottle, do you?' she asked." A.S.)

"The enemy came demanding food or horses," wrote

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mother, "taking all they could of breadstuffs, meat stock, and all the able-bodied negroes, whether willing or not. Our men hid, but they took the horses and mules, and promised to return in a week and take everything!"

Alas, poor little mother! Those were but the beginning of bitterer days and yet sterner deprivations! For months the only hope of our beleagured neighbours in Huntsville lay in the prayed-for advance of General Bragg, though their prayers, too, were interdicted when made in the church; and, upon the investment of the town, our pastor, Doctor Bannister,(*) was quickly instructed as to the limited petitions with which he might address his God on behalf of his people.

(* Dr. J. M. Bannister, at the ripe age of eighty-six, still continues in active pastoral charge of the Church of the Nativity in Huntsville. A. S.)

In the meanwhile, the courage of our citizens was kept alive by General Roddy, who lay over the crest of Monte Sano. The forays of his men were a perpetual worry to the Federals in the valley. So audacious, indeed, did they become that the Federal general razed the houses on "The Hill" and threw up breastworks, behind which he built a stout fort, the better to resist the possible attacks from the mountain side by brave General Roddy and his merry men.

During General Mitchell's investment of Huntsville he was accompanied by his daughters, who, in the ransacking of our home, fell heiresses to certain coveted and "confiscated" articles of my own, but the possession of which could scarcely have been an unmixed pleasure. I heard of my losses first through a letter written late in August. "Mr. Hammond," began the epistle, "says in Atlanta he saw a lady just from Nashville who told him that Miss Mitchell rode out in your green habit on your mare! This part of the story," continued my witty sister, "may be true, but there is another: that the other Miss Mitchell

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rode in my habit on my mare! I'm glad I had no mare, and am sorry for poor 'Jenny Lind'!"

Months afterward I heard (and any who asks may still hear the story in the town, for it has become one of Huntsville's war-time annals) an account of Miss Mitchell's outings in my now celebrated green habit. Her path, it seems, as she trotted my pretty mare about the streets, was not strewn with roses; for, though absent from our beloved little city, I was not forgotten. One day the horsewoman, passing proudly on her way, saw, looking over the garden gate of a pretty cottage, the laughing face of sweet Alice Spence, a right loyal admirer of my undeserving self. Alice looked upatthepassingapparition, and, full of daring, half mischievously, half indignantly, cried out after it, "Hey! Git off 'Ginie Clay's mare! Git - off - 'Ginie Clay's ma - are!"

At the sound of these words Miss Mitchell galloped away in great anger. While Alice was still regaling her mother with a jubilant account of her championship of my property, a proof reached her of General Mitchell's implacability. That afternoon her brother was ordered into arrest, and for months thereafter was kept in custody as a guarantee for his sister's good behaviour!

When, later, Mr. Clay and I were enabled to visit Huntsville (the Federals having been beaten back for a time), I heard of an amusing encounter which took place at the home of the Spences between Mrs. Spence and John A. Logan. A swarthy stripling in appearance, the young officer stood carelessly about, whilst several soldiers of his command were engaged in a search of the premises. As Mrs. Spence entered the room in which the officer stood, she eyed him with genuine curiosity.

"Whose boy are you?" she asked at last. Her daughter, who was beside her, caught her mother's arm in alarm.

"Why, ma!" she gasped. "That's General Logan!"

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"General Logan!" repeated her mother, contemptuously. "I tell you he's nothing of the kind! He's black!"

It was already early summer when we left the troubled capital, where everyone was keyed to a high pitch of excitement by the manoeuvrings of the enemy, now so near that the reverberating sound of distant cannon was plainly audible. Our way was southward. Though withdrawing, as I supposed, for a change of scene during the Congressional recess only, in reality my refugee days had now begun; for, notwithstanding I made several later stays of varying duration at Richmond, the greater part of the two succeeding years was spent at the homes of hospitable kin far away from that centre of anxiety and deprivation. Upon leaving Richmond, in May of '62, Senator Clay and I, stopping en route at the home of my uncle, Buxton Williams, in Warrenton, North Carolina, proceeded by easy stages to Augusta, Macon and Columbus, where many of our kinfolks and friends resided, and to which cities I often returned, when, from time to time, the exigencies of the war compelled my husband and me to separate. Georgia, save when Sherman's men marched through it, two years later, was the safest and most affluent State in the Confederacy; but in the summer of '62 there were few localities which did not retain, here and there at least, an affluent estate or two. Until almost the end of hostilities the home of my uncle Williams in Warrenton continued to be with us in Richmond the synonym for plenty. When I had starved in the capital, I dropped down to "Buxton Place," whence I was sure to return laden with hampers of sweets and meats and bread made of the finest "Number One" flour, which proved a fine relief to the "seconds" to which the bread-eaters of the Confederate capital were now reduced. In the course of a year molasses and "seconds" (brown flour with the bran still in it) came to be regarded as luxuries by many

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who but a short time ago had feasted capriciously upon the dainties of a limitless market.

My uncle Williams was an astute man, and when he was assured that war had become a settled fact, instead of hoarding his means for the benefit of invading soldiers, he retired to his country home, bought out the contents of a local store, which he transferred to his own cupboards and pantry, and made "Buxton Place" to "kith and kin" the most generous and hospitable of asylums. It was a peaceful, happy place, set among ample grounds, with noble trees rising about, in which birds carolled as they coquetted among the foliage and squirrels gambolled at their will through the long, lazy days. No chicory and sugar, adopting the alias of coffee, found place on that sumptuous board in those first years, but only the bona fide stuff! We had sugar in abundance, and pyramids of the richest butter, bowls of thick cream, and a marvellous plenitude of incomparable "clabber."

Once, during our wandering that autumn, we slipped over to "Millbrook," the home of my cousins the Hilliards, and thence to Shocco Springs, long a famous North Carolina resort, where, to the music of a negro band, the feet of a merry little company went flying over the polished floor as if the world were still a happy place, despite its wars and wounds and graves and weeping women.

Life at dear old "Millbrook," rich with a thousand associations of my childhood and family, still ran serenely on. The loudest sound one heard was the hum of the bee on the wing as it rushed to riot in the amber honey sacs of the flowers. But whether at "Millbrook" or "Buxton Place," whether we outwardly smiled or joined in the mirth about us, inwardly my husband and I were tortured with fears born of an intimate knowledge of our national situation. We watched eagerly for our despatches, and, when they came, trembled as we opened

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them. Some of our communications rang with triumph, others with an overwhelming sadness.

A thrilling letter from Richmond reached us after the terrible "Battle of Seven Pines." A mere mention of that deadly conflict for years was enough to start the tears in Southern eyes, and sons and daughters, as they grew up, were taken back to look upon the bloody field as to a sacred mausoleum. The letter was written by Robert Brown, our erstwhile Sir Lucius, of Mrs. Ives's famous performance, and now serving as aide-de-camp to General Winder.

"I have been beholding scenes of carnage," he wrote on the 10th of June. "On the afternoon of the 31st ult. Winder and myself rode down to the battle-field. The reports of the cannon were distinctly heard here, and as we approached the field, the firing became terrific! We met wounded and dying men, borne upon litters and supported by solicitous friends. The scene was revolting to me, but, singular to say, in a very short time I became accustomed to this sight of horror, and the nearer we approached the line of battle, the nearer we wished to get; but we were quite satisfied to get so near the line (proper) as the headquarters of General Longstreet, which was under a fine old oak tree on a slight elevation. The General was there, sitting most complacently upon a fine horse, surrounded by his staff, who were riding away at intervals bearing his orders to the line and returning. We were about a quarter of a mile from the engagement, and we could distinctly hear the shouts of victory of our gallant troops, literally driving the enemy before them. Entrenchment and battery after battery were wrested from the Yankees by our splendid troops, old North Carolina leading them!

"Imagine the powder burnt! I tell you, the firing was awful, but glorious! Near the headquarters of Longstreet were regiments of splendid, eager troops drawn up

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in line as a reserve. Amid the heavy firing, the glorious cheering of our troops, squad after squad of Yankee prisoners were brought up to Longstreet under guards buoyant with victory; and, as each reached headquarters, I tell you that the reserve force would send up a yell of delight that split the air and made old earth tremble! One little brave band of fifty-five South Carolinians brought in one hundred and sixty-six live Yankees and a Captain whom they had taken! The excitement was intense! The firing ceased at seven o'clock. I remained in the field until the last gun was fired. Our troops occupied the enemy's camp that night and all the next day; and Monday our military talent thought it prudent and best to fall back and give the enemy the vantage ground we had gained!

"General Johnston was wounded, but not seriously, it is said. Smith's horse was shot in two places, on the shoulder and just back of the saddle; the General's coat-tail, they say, was seriously injured. Lieutenant-Colonel Sydenham Moore was wounded; the ball struck his watch, literally shattering it! General Pettigrew was not killed, but seriously wounded, and fell into the hands of the enemy. They, thank God, lost two brigadier generals and one seriously wounded. Our total loss, killed and wounded, was thirty-five hundred. The enemy acknowledge eight hundred killed and four thousand wounded. It was a fearful fight!

"We have good news every day from Jackson! To-day brings us the news of his having 'completely routed the enemy, taking six pieces of artillery!' Old Stonewall is certainly the Hero of the War, and unless our Generals Beauregard and Johnston look sharp, he will entirely take the wind out of their sails and leave them in the Lee-ward!"

"The city is filled with the wounded and dead," echoed our cousin John Withers. "It is fortunate you are away

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and saved the necessity of beholding the horrible sights which are now so common here! Great numbers of Alabamians are killed and wounded. . . ." And he added in a letter, written in an interval of the awful Seven Days Battles: "For four days I have been awaiting some decisive move on the part of our forces, but nothing has been done yet to settle affairs. McClellan has not been routed, but his army is, no doubt, demoralised to such an extent as to render any other demonstration against Richmond out of the question for many weeks. . . .The President has come up from the battle-field, and I hear that a courier from the French and British Consuls is to leave here for Washington to-night or in the morning. We will secure between thirty and forty thousand small arms by our late operations; many of them much injured by being bent. The enemy have a position now which we cannot well assail successfully. They are under their gunboats and have gotten reinforcements. . . . There is a report to-night that Magruder has captured eight hundred Yankees to-day, but I place no reliance upon any rumour until it is confirmed as truth. General Beauregard has made a most successful retreat to Baldwin, thirty-five miles south of Corinth, on the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. The move was necessary, and I have no doubt will be a great blow to the enemy. He carried all his heavy guns, tents, and so on. General Lee is in command of the army hereabouts, and I am sure we will whip McClellan's army when the grand contest shall take place. The rain of last night will forbid any movement for two or three days. When the fight opens again, we will have thousands upon thousands of wounded here!"

Such were the accruing records of woe and of personal and national loss which followed Senator Clay and me throughout those autumn months of '62. The inroad made upon the gallant regiments of our own State were

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frightful. The ranks of the splendid Fourth Alabama Regiment, picked men of our finest blood, the flower of our hopes, as handsome a body as a State might muster, were terribly thinned. Wherever a call came our Alabamians were found in the front, the envy and admiration of the army, quickening the courage and firing the imaginations of every company that beheld them. But oh! our men had need of a mighty courage, for soon the very seed corn of our race became a sacrifice. The picture rises before me of a youthful cousin(*) who fell at Malvern Hill, shot down as he bore aloft the banner which he fondly hoped would lead to victory. His blood- stained cap, marked by a bullet hole, was all that returned of our fair young soldier boy. Another youth,(**) on whom the love and hope of a dear circle was settled, fell with his heart pierced, and so swift was the passing of his soul that he felt no pain nor sorrow. They say an eager smile was on his face when they found him. For years his loved ones, gazing upon it with weeping eyes, treasured the blood-stained, bullet-torn handkerchief that had lain over the wounded heart of the boy!

(* Harry, son of Buxton Williams.)
(** James Camp Turner, of Alabama, died at Manassas.)

The tears start afresh when, looking into my memory, there passes before me that army of the dead and gone. Oh! the sorrow that overcame all who knew him (and the circle was wide as half the South itself) when the news came of the death of Colonel Sydenham Moore, who fell at Seven Pines; and even the enemy spoke solemnly at the passing of our beloved General Tracy, who died so courageously fighting in the battle of Port Gibson, within three-quarters of a year! "I have little active service at this post," he complained from Vicksburg, in March of '63, "and the very fact incapacitates me for the discharge of duties of other kinds. In fact, I am ennuied past description!" So, chafing impatiently to

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write his name in brave deeds across some page of the Confederate States' history, he sprang to meet the call when it came, and fell, crowned with immortal glory in the hearts of a loving people.

General Tracy's young wife was awaiting him, an infant at her bosom, when we returned late in November of '62 for a brief stay at Huntsville, from which, for a time, the Union soldiers had been beaten back. By this time our valley seemed so safe that families from other threatened districts came to take refuge in it. Colonel Basil Duke, among others, brought his wife to Huntsville. Numerous absentee householders came back; and interest in local enterprises was resumed. When, in December, my husband returned to his duties in the Senate, ther ewas small reason to apprehend an early reappearance, in Huntsville, of the Federals. "North Alabama," General Bragg assured my husband, "is as secure now as it was when I held Murfreesboro!" And on this assurance our spirits rose and we departed again, promising ourselves and our parents we would return within a few months at most.

Mr. Clay proceeded at once to Richmond, beset now with deadly enemies within as well as without. Smallpox and scarlet fever raged there, as in many of our larger cities, and I pleaded in vain to be allowed to accompany him. I turned my way, therefore, in company with others of our kin, toward Macon, where was sojourning our sweet sister, Mrs. Hugh Lawson Clay, at the home of Major Anderson Comer, her father. Thence it was proposed I should proceed with her later to Richmond under the escort of Colonel Clay.

That winter the weather was peculiarly cold, so much so that on the plantations where wheat had been sown, a fear was general lest the grain be killed in the ground. The journey to Macon, therefore, was anything but comfortable, but it had

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its amusing sides nevertheless. We were a party of women.

"We arrived safely (self, Kate, Alice and servants)," I wrote in a kaleidoscopic account which I gave my husband of the indications of the times as seen en route. "We rode from Stevenson to Chattanooga on the freight train, the baggage- cars on the passenger-train being unable to receive a single trunk. Arriving at Chattanooga, we would have been forced to go to the small-pox hotel or remain in the streets but for the gallantry of an acquaintance of ours, an army officer of Washington memory, who gave up his room to us, and furnished some wagons to have our baggage hauled to the depot. At Atlanta there was a scatteration of our forces. . . . When night came" (being fearful of robbery, for hotels were unsafe) "I stuffed in one stocking all my money, and in the other, mine and Alice's watches, chains, pins, and charms. I felt not unlike Miss Kilmansegg, of the precious Leg. We fumigated the room, had a bed brought in for Emily, and retired. At breakfast Colonel Garner told me that Uncle Jones [Withers] was in the house, and in a few minutes he presented himself. He got in at three that morning, en route for Mobile with thirty days' leave; looked worn, and was sad, I thought. Colonel George Johnson, of Marion, also called, and we had them all and Dr. W., of Macon, to accompany us to the cars. The guard at the gate said 'Passport, Madam,' but I replied, 'Look at my squad; General Withers, Colonel Garner of Bragg's staff, and a Colonel and Lieutenant in the Confederate service. I think I'll pass!'" And I passed!

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CHAPTER XIV
REFUGEE DAYS IN GEORGIA

OUR stay in Macon, where it had been my intention to remain but a few weeks, lengthened into months; for, upon his arrival in Richmond, Senator Clay found the conditions such as to render my joining him, if not impracticable, at least inadvisable. The evils of a year agone had multiplied tenfold. Food was growing scarcer; the city's capacity was tested to the uttermost, and lodgings difficult to obtain. The price of board for my husband alone now amounted to more than his income. Feeling in legislative circles was tense, the times engendering a troublesome discontent and strife among eager and anxious politicians. Complaints from the army poured in. Our soldiers were suffering the harshest deprivations. Wearing apparel was scarce. Many of our men marched in ragged and weather- stained garments and tattered shoes, and even these were luxuries that threatened soon to be unattainable. Our treasury was terribly depleted, and our food supply for the army was diminishing at a lamentable rate.

"You will be surprised to know," wrote General Tracy from Vicksburg, in March, 1863, "that in this garrisoned town, upon which the hopes of a whole people are set, and which is liable at any time to be cut off from its interior lines of communication, there is not now subsistence for one week. The meat ration has already been virtually discontinued, the quality being such that the men utterly refuse to eat it, though the contract

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continues to be worth between one thousand and fifteen hundred dollars per diem."

"A general gloom prevails here because of the scarcity and high price of food," ran a letter from my husband, written in the same month from Richmond. "Our soldiers are on half rations of meat, one-quarter pound of salt, and one-half pound of fresh meat, without vegetables, or fruit, or coffee or sugar! Don't mention this, as it will do harm to let it get abroad. Really there is serious apprehension of having to disband part of the army for want of food. In this city the poor clerks and subaltern military officers are threatened with starvation, as they cannot get board on their pay. God only knows what is to become of us, if we do not soon drive the enemy from Tennessee and Kentucky and get food from their granaries. . . . I dined with the President yesterday at six P. M., en famille, on beef soup, beef stew, meat pie, potatoes, coffee and bread. I approved his simple fare and expressed the wish that the army in the field had more to eat and that out of the field less!"

The receipt of this news stirred me to the core. Spring was in its freshest beauty in Macon. Its gardens glowed with brilliant blossoms. A thousand fragrant odours mingled in the air; the voices of myriad birds sang about the foliaged avenues. I thought Aunt Comer's home a terrestrial Paradise. The contrast between the comfort in this pretty city of lower Georgia, a city of beautiful homes and plentiful tables, and our poverty-stricken capital and meagre starving camps, was terrible to picture. I wrote impulsively (and, alas! impotently) in reply to my husband's letter:

"Why does not the President or some proper authority order on from here and other wealthy towns, and immediately at that, the thousands of provisions that fill the land? Monopolists and misers hold enough meat and grain in their clutches to feed our army and Lincoln's!

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Put down the screws and make them release it! Talk of disbanding an army at a time like this? No! empty the coffers and graneries and meat houses of every civilian in the land first!"

Many an eager and impatient hour my sister and I spent in those months of waiting for the call from our husbands to join them in the capital. Her sprightly wit and unfailing courage made her a most enjoyable companion, and a great favourite with all who knew her. "Give my love to your sunbeam of a sister," Secretary Mallory wrote me during those dark days. "If not one of the lost Pleiads, at least she is a heavenly body!" And when I quoted this to dear "Lushe" Lamar, he answered from the fulness of his heart: "Mallory's compliments grow languid in their impotence to do justice to that beautiful embodiment of bright thoughts and ideal graces, your sister, Celeste." I found her all this and more in that spring we spent together in Macon, as we daily sat and planned and compared our news of the battle-fields, or discussed the movements of the army. We did a prodigious amount of sewing and knitting for our absent husbands, to whom we sent packages of home-made wearing apparel by whomsoever we could find to carry them. I remember one such which gave us considerable anxiety; for, proving too large to impose upon General Alf. Colquitt, who had undertaken to deliver another to Senator Clay, we sent the bundle by express. The robe which General Colquitt carried was soon in the hands of its future wearer, but not so the express package, which contained a pair of much-needed boots for Colonel Clay. It lingered provokingly along the road until we were filled with apprehension for its safety.

"Won't it break us if all those things are stolen?" I wrote my husband. "A thousand dollars would not buy them now!" And I said truly, for the prices of the commonest materials were enormous. "Men's boots

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here are from sixty to eighty dollars," wrote Mr. Clay from Richmond; and in Macon all goods were a hundred per cent. higher than they had been in Huntsville. Ordinary fifteen-cent muslin now sold in Georgia at two and a half dollars per yard, and "sold like hot-cakes" at that. My sister and I bought what we could and made our husband's shirts - knitting the heavier ones - and hemmed their handkerchiefs; and we rose to such a proficiency with the needle that we did not hesitate to undertake the manufacture of vests and trousers of washable stuffs. I made a pair of the last-named for my husband's god-son, Joe Davis, and sent them to Richmond by Colonel Lamar; but I think the dear child did not live to don them. He died tragically at the Executive home within a year, the waves of the war quickly obscuring from the world about the remembrance of the sweet baby face.

April had arrived when, journeying from Macon to Richmond, I had my first real experience of war-time travel. By this time people were hurrying from place to place in every direction, some to seek refuge, and some to find or bring back their dead. The country beyond the Georgia boundary was alert, apprehending the approach of the steadily advancing Federals. Throughout the spring the feeling had been rife that a crucial period was approaching. My husband wrote cautioning me to prepare to meet it. "During the months of April and May," he said in a letter dated March 22d, "the result of the war will be decided by at least four of the greatest battles the worldhaseverwitnessed,nearCharlestonorSavannah, Fredericksburg, Murfreesboro, and Vicksburg or Port Hudson. If they triumph on the Mississippi, the war will continue for years; if they fail there, I cannot think it will last longer than Lincon's administration, or till March of 1865.(*) I

(* It ended in April, 1865.)

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regard events there as the most important, because the Northwest will not aid the war much longer if the Mississippi is not opened to their trade. The result of the grand battle to come off at the first opportunity between Bragg and Rosencrans will determine our movements during the recess of Congress, and, it may be, our destiny for life. If we whip the enemy, our home will again be open to us; if he whips us, it will fall under his dominion for many months to come, and nothing will be left to us that he can use or destroy." Almost as Mr. Clay wrote, Huntsville was again invested by Federal soldiery, and we could not, if we had wished, have returned to it.

When my sister and I departed from Georgia, passenger-cars generally were impressed for the use of soldiers, sick or wounded, or for those who were hurrying to the front. I heard instances in which travellers, unable to find room in the regular cars, and eager to get to some given point, begged for the privilege of squeezing into the car in which express packages were carried.

Having held ourselves for some months in readiness for the journey, we had kept informed as to the presence of possible escorts in Macon. Once we planned to travel under the protection of Captain Harry Flash, a poet who had won some distinction for his affecting lines on the death of General Zollicoffer, and his stirring verses on the Confederate Flag. It fell to our lot, however, to travel with two poets, who in days to come were to be known to a wider world. They were Sidney and Clifford Lanier, young soldiers, then, on their way to Virginia. Sidney's sweetheart lived in the town, and the brothers had stopped at Macon to make their adieux. Upon learning of the objective destination of the young men, my sister and I held out the bribe to them, if they would undertake to escort us, of a fine luncheon en route; "broiled partridges, sho' nuf' sugar and sho' nuf'butter, and spring chickens, 'quality size,'" to which allurements,

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I am glad to say, the youthful poets succumbed with grace and gallantry, and we began our journey.

The aisles of the cars were crowded. At many stations, as we came through North Carolina, women entered the car with baskets of "big blues," the luscious native huckleberries, with full, deep bloom upon them; these and other tempting edibles were brought aboard at almost every station along the way. When our pleasant party separated at Lynchburg, and the youths sat alone in their tents, they recalled in pages truly characteristic the memories of that long journey, in which, like tired children, they had sometimes fallen asleep, Clifford's head upon my sister's shoulder, and Sid's upon mine.

"I will wait no longer," wrote Clifford,(*) from the camp near Suffolk (Virginia), on April 17th, "but at once, and without cérémonie, write the little love letter I have promised, disarming (if men, as some one says of flowers, 'be jealous things') the jealousy of your Lieges, by addressing it to my Two Dear Friends and quondam fellow-travellers. What a transition is this - from the spring and peace of Macon, to this muddy and war- distracted country! Going to sleep in the moonlight and soft air of Italy, I seem to have waked imbedded in Lapland snow. Yet, as I would not be an Antony, with a genius bold, and confident in Egypt, but a trembler and white-livered, in presence of Octavius at Rome, I summon all my heroism, doff that which became me when environed by flowers, poetry, music and blooming maidens, and don shield and mail (that's figurative for Kersey), prepared to resist ruder shocks than those of love's arrows. Par parenthese, how the Yankees would suffer, if we could do our devoirs as bravely and as heartily in the heat and dust and smoke of battle, as in the charmed air of ladies!

(* Then in the Mounted Signal Service, Milligan's Battalion, from Georgia, and on the staff of General S. D. French, now of Florida. A.S.)

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"Enough about us. I wonder what this will find our friends doing? My dear Mrs. Celeste? Embroidering the Senatorial laticlave or musing on sweet Macon, sweeter Huntsville? Mrs. Virginia? In whatever mood or occupation, it is agreed you have this advantage of us: you carry your sunshine with you; we men, being but opaque and lunatic bodies, can give light only by reflection. Imagine, then, in what 'Cimmerian darkness' we revolve here. If you would throw a ray through this darkness, show us one glimpse of the blue sky through all this battle-smoke, write to us, directing care General French, Franklin, Virginia. I shall regard, most affectionately, the carrier who brings such intelligence from that office to these headquarters. The huge shell that has just shrieked across the intervening distance from the enemy's trenches to our pickets, and exploding, is not yet done reverberating, reminds me that I might tell you a little of our situation here.

"The reticence of our General forbids all knowledge of his plans and ultimate designs. I can only say that our army, embracing three divisions, closely invests Suffolk on three sides, its water and railroad communications into Norfolk being still complete, except that General French, having possession of one bank of the river, is working hard to get into position guns of sufficient calibre to destroy their gun-boats. That, in the meantime, large foraging parties and immense wagon-trains have been sent out for provisions. So that this of forage may be the grand design after all, and instead of living that we may fight, are fighting that we may live, the latter being a very desperate situation, but the more laudable endeavour of the two, perilling our lives, not only for the vitality of our principles as patriots, but for the very sustenance of our lives as men, seeking corn and bacon as well as the 'bubble reputation at the cannon's mouth.' But I began a love-letter; I fear I am

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ending most unetherially. Starting to wing a flight across the sea, Icarus-like, my wings have proved to be of wax, melting with a too near approach to the sun, and I find myself floundering, and clearing my nose and eyes and mouth of the enveloping salt water. Being not even a swimmer, I escape drowning by ending (Icarus found nereids and yellow-haired nymphs to assist him), with much love to your husbands, and an infinite quantity to yourselves,

"Yours,
"CLIFF LANIER."

"God bless you both. Write to us!" said Sid., our dear Orpheus of the South. "Have you ever, my Two Good Friends, wandered, in an all-night's dream, through exquisite flowery mosses, through labyrinthine grottoes, 'full of all sparkling and sparry loveliness,' over mountains of unknown height, by abysses of unfathomable depth, all beneath skies of an infinite brightness caused by no sun; strangest of all, wandered about in wonder, as if you had lived an eternity in the familiar contemplation of such things?

"And when, at morning, you have waked from such a dream and gone about your commonplace round of life, have you never stopped suddenly to gaze at the sun and exclaimed to yourself, 'what a singular thing it is up there; and these houses, bless me, what funny institutions, not at all like my grottoes and bowers, in which I have lived for all eternity, and those men and women walking about there, uttering strange gibberish, and cramming horrid messes of stuff in their mouths, what dear, odd creatures! What does it all mean, anyhow, and who did it, and how is one to act, under the circumstances?'. . .

"If you have dreamed, thought and felt so, you can realise the imbecile stare with which I gaze on all this life that goes on around me here. Macon was my two-weeks'

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dream. I wake from that into Petersburg, an indefinitely long, real life. . . .

"SID LANIER."

Of the after months of '63, the story of my life is one of continuous change. I migrated between Richmond and our kin at Petersburg, paying an occasional visit to Warrenton, North Carolina, so long as the roads were open, or sometimes visiting our friends, the McDaniels, at Danville; sometimes, accompanied by our sister, I made a visit to the near-by camps, or to the multiplying colonies of the sick and wounded. He was a fortunate soldier in those terrible days, who fell into the hands of private nurses. Patients in the hospitals suffered, even for necessary medicines. Sugar was sold at fifty Confederate dollars a pound. Vegetables and small fruits were exceedingly scarce. My visits to the hospital wards were by no means so constant as those of many of my friends, yet I remember one poor little Arkansas boy in whom I became interested, and went frequently to see, wending my way to his cot through endless wards, where an army of sick men lay, minus an arm, or leg, or with bandaged heads that told of fearful encounters. The drip-drip of the water upon their wounds to prevent the development of a greater evil is one of the most horrible remembrances I carry of those days. I went through the aisles of the sick one morning, to see my little patient, a lad of seventeen, not more. Above the pillow his hat was hung, and a sheet was drawn over the cot - and the tale was told.

In Richmond, Miss Emily Mason (sister of John Y. and James M. Mason), and Mrs. General Lee were indefatigable in their hospital work; and Mrs. Phoebe Pember, sister of Mrs. Philip Phillips, was a prominent member of a regularly organised Hospital Committee, who, afterward, recorded her experiences in an interesting volume, reflecting

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the gay as well as the grave scenes through which she had passed; for, happily, in the experiences of these self-sacrificing nurses there was often a mingling of the comical with the serious which had its part in relieving the nerve-tension of our noble women. On every side the inevitable was plainly creeping toward us. The turmoil in the governmental body augmented constantly. The more patriotic recognised that only in increased taxation lay the prolonging of our national life; but, at the mention of such measure, protests poured in from many sides. Our poor, wearied citizens could ill sustain a further drain upon them. To the credit of my sex, however, we never complained. No Roman matron, no Spartan mother, ever thrilled more to the task of supporting her warriors, than did we women of the South land! To the end we held it to be a proud privilege to sacrifice where by so doing we might hold up the hands of our heroes in field or forum.

"I pity those who have no country to love or to fight for!" wrote Mrs. Yulee, the "Madonna of the Wickliffe sisters," from her home in Florida. "It is this very country of yours and mine that induces me to write this letter. I want you to use your influence (you have much) to induce those law-makers to come up to our necessities. Tax! tax! tax our people to half we have, if necessary, but let the world know we are paying! Ten victories will not give the Yankees such a blow as this fact. Now, Mrs. Clay, God has given you many friends. Stir them up to their duty! . . . Bragg's defeat fills us all with gloom, yet we are not discouraged. I have never felt a doubt of my country, but dark and painful trials are yet before us, perhaps!"

Alas! Alas!

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CHAPTER XV
C. C. CLAY, JR., DEPARTS FOR CANADA

I WAS in Richmond at my husband's side when Dahlgren's raid was made. Early one morning the cry of danger came. We were still at breakfast, when Senator Henry, of Tennessee, hurried in. "No Senate to-day, Clay!" he cried. "A big force of the enemy is at Lyons's, and every man in the city is needed! Arm yourself, and come on!" and he hastened on his way to warn others. Members of Congress shouldered guns, where they could get them, and mounted guard around the capital. They were an untrained mass, but they came back victors and deliverers of the city.

The armies having gone into winter quarters, as the close of Mr. Clay's Senatorial career in Richmond drew near, he seriously contemplated a period of needed rest from public duties. Bent upon this, he declined a judgeship in the Military Court, which had been pressed upon him by Mr. Davis. We dallied with enticing invitations that reached us from Florida, and planned what was to be a veritable vacation at last, together.

"Mr. Yulee is delighted with the hope of seeing you!" wrote the lovely chatelaine of "Homosassa." "He will fish with Mr. Clay, and we will do the same! Just think how good oysters will be in these sad times! Do come, dear Mr. and Mrs. Clay, just as soon as Congress adjourns! My dear sister, Mrs. Holt, had a tender and sincere affection for you. . ."

The prospect of a visit to that lovely retreat, built upon an island, deep in the green glades of Florida and

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far away from the political and martial strife of the intervening States, was very tempting to my wearied husband, a true lover of woods and trees and the sweet solitudes of a bucolic life; but we were destined not to enjoy it. Early in the spring of '64, Mr. Clay felt it his duty to accept the high responsibility of a diplomatic mission to Canada, with a view to arousing in the public mind of this near-by British territory a sympathy for our cause and country that should induce a suspension of hostilities. Despite the failure of our representatives in European countries to rouse apathetic kings and dilly-dallying emperors to come to our aid, it was hard for us to believe that our courage would not be rewarded at length by some powerful succour, or yielding.

"I send you my speech," wrote dear Lamar to me from his sick-bed in Oxford, Georgia, so late as June, '64. "The views presented in reference to Louis Napoleon may strike you as at variance with some of the acts, in which his Imperial Highness has done some very uncivil things in a very civil way. But his sympathy is with us. It is his policy to frighten the Yankees into acquiescence in his Mexican enterprise, and he no doubt would be glad to give French neutrality in American affairs for Yankee neutrality in Mexican affairs. In this he will fail, and he will sooner or later find his policy and inclinations jump together. After all, the British people are more friendly to us than all the world besides, outside of the [question of] Southern Confederacy. This friendship, like most national friendships, is mixed up with a large part of alloy, fear of the Yankees forming the base. But respect for the South and admiration of her position is the pure metal, and there is enough of it to make their good- will valuable to us."

So thought many of our noblest statesmen, when, early in the Spring, Mr. Clay started on his way through our blockaded coast for Canada. "I earnestly desire that

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his services may prove effectual in securing a permanent peace to our bleeding country; that his efforts may be recorded as one of the brightest pages in its history," wrote one; and from every quarter Mr. Clay and his companions were followed by the prayers of a people wrung from hearts agonised by our long, exhausting strife. When the parting came, the shadow of impending evil fell so blackly upon my soul, I hastened away from disturbed Petersburg, accompanied by my faithful maid, Emily, and her child, determined to act upon Mr. Clay's suggestion and seek my kin in Georgia. Petersburg was in the greatest confusion, guns resounding in every direction. Our dear Aunt Dollie Walker, the saint, whose faith (her Bishop said) had kept Episcopalianism alive in Virginia through those troublous times, told us in after days of having been literally chased up the streets by cannon balls. It was one of the best cities in the Confederacy at that period to get away from.

I began my journey southward, pausing a day or two at Danville; but, fearing each moment to hear news of the appearance of impeding armies, blocking my way through the Carolinas, I hastened on. The news from the capital which reached us while in Petersburg had been of the worst.

"You have no idea of the intense excitement," wrote my sister. "I am so nervous I know not what to write! No one goes to bed here at night. For several nights past no one could have slept for the confusion and noise. The city has been in a perfect uproar for a week. We have heard firing in two directions all the morning, on the Brook Turnpike and at Drewry's Bluff. The wounded are being brought into the city in great numbers. General Walker is wounded! Poor General Stafford's death cast a gloom over the city. I went with Mr. Davis to his funeral, and carried flowers! . . . General Benning is wounded, and Colonel Lamar, our dear L. Q. C.'s

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brother, also. . . . At the wedding" [of Miss Lyons] "you never saw such disorder in God's house before in your life. Mrs. Davis and Mrs. Mallory and Mrs. Most-everybody-else, stood up in the pews, and you could not hear one word of the service for the noise. Mr. Davis was there - Mrs. Chestnut sat with me. She is going home very soon, so the Colonel told me. He said it was impossible for her to remain in Richmond with nothing to eat!"

To my sister's panorama of horrors, our brother, who was stationed in Richmond, added a masculine picture.

"The enemy press us sorely with powerful forces of cavalry and infantry," he wrote. "The former cut off our communications everywhere, hoping to reduce Lee to starvation, and the presence of the latter keeps from him reinforcements that otherwise would be promptly sent. We have lost severely around the city. General Stuart was shot by a Yankee soldier who fired upon him at ten paces as he galloped past him. He died last night, about twenty-eight hours after he received the wound. Brigadier General Gordon, also of the cavalry, had his arm shattered yesterday above the elbow, and 'tis said will probably have to suffer amputation. Mr. Randolph, the 'Sir Anthony Absolute' of your play, was wounded yesterday in the shoulder and thigh, and will lose the limb to-day. All the clerks of the office are in the intrenchments and no work goes on!"

Upon learning of my determination to push on to Georgia, our sister put away her anxiety and grew facetious at my expense. "I am inclined to think you are a great coward," she wrote. "Why did you run from Petersburg? . . . I am almost ashamed of you! You never catch me running from Yankees! Georgia is certainly a safe place. . . . When we have killed all the Yankees and the city is perfectly quiet, I invite you to come on and see us. . . . I am weary from walking (not running) to see the wounded!"

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A month or so later and my sweet sister, speeding to overtake me, joined me at Macon, in time to accompany me to the home of our friend, Mrs. Winter, in Columbus. Here, to compensate for the tribulations of the past months, we were promised the most care-free of summers. Refugees were flocking to that land of safety and plenty just then, and whether in Macon or Columbus, our time was spent in welcoming late-comers, in visiting and exchanging news or comment of the times, or making little excursions to near-by towns. Once we formed a party and visited the "White Farm" of Augusta Evans, then unmarried. It was a unique place and celebrated for the unsullied whiteness of every bird and beast on the place.

Upon our arrival at our friend's home in Columbus, we found a very active field awaiting us. It was now mid-summer of '64, somewhat after the bloody battle of Atlanta. In anticipation of our coming, Mrs. Winter had prepared her largest and coolest rooms for us. All was ready and we about due to arrive, when an unforeseen incident frustrated our hostess's plans in regard of our intended pleasuring, and put us all to more serious work. It was in the late afternoonwhen our friend, driving in her calash along the boundaries of the town, came upon a pitiful sight. Near a group of tents a sick man, a soldier, lay writhing upon the ground in a delirium, while near by and watching him stood his alarmed and helpless coloured servant. Mrs. Winter, aroused to pity by the sight, immediately gave orders that the sufferer be carried to her home, where he was placed in the room that had been prepared for me.

When my sister and I arrived, a few hours afterward, our sympathies, too, were at once enlisted for the unfortunate man. He proved to be Captain Octave Vallette, a Creole, who, previous to his enlistment, with his brother, had been a ship-builder at Algiers, Louisiana.

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A physician was already in attendance when my sister and I arrived, and an examination of the invalid's wounds was making.

A week had elapsed since the first hasty dressing of the wound, and the blackened flesh now suggested the approach of the dreaded gangrene.

The cleansing of the dreadful wound was a terrible ordeal. For days the patient raved, and to us, just from the camps and hospitals of Virginia, his frenzied words conveyed most vivid pictures of the experiences our men were meeting in the deadly fray.

"God! What a hole for soldiers to be in!" he would cry; and then would mumble on incoherently until, in an accession of fevered strength, he would burst out, "Give them hell, boys!" while his negro man stood by, blinded by tears.

Finally, however, our care was rewarded, and our invalid began slowly to recover. The first day he was able to endure it, we took the Captain to drive in Mrs. Winter's calash. He was still weak, and very melancholy; the injured arm was stiff and all but a useless member. We tried to cheer him by merry talk. "Surely," we said at last, as we drove by a new-made cemetery, with its bare little whitewashed head-boards, "weak as you are, isn't this a great deal better than lying out there with a board at your head marked 'O. V.'?" At this he smiled, but grimly.

The ensuing months to me were a time of indecision. My sister departed to rejoin her husband in Richmond, and I, feeling quite cut off from those nearest to me, formed numerous plans for leaving the Confederate States. I wished to go to Mr. Clay in Canada, or to England, where so many dear friends were already installed; and so earnestly did this desire fix itself in my mind that wheels were set in motion for the securing of a passport. My friends in Richmond and in Georgia

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urged me to reconsider. Mr. Clay might even then be on his way home; would I not come to the capital and wait? But I declined, and kind Secretary Mallory acceded to my wishes, though cautioning me against our enemies on the seas. "I only wish I could send you abroad in a public vessel," he wrote, as he inclosed Mr. Seddon's passport, "but I have not a blockade runner under my control.

"You will, of course, avoid Bermuda and Nassau. The yellow-fever still rages and embraces new-comers at the very beach; and knowing that nothing on earth would ever fail to embrace you that had the power of doing so, and having a painful experience of his warm and glowing nature, I am anxious that you shall keep out of his way. . . . Angela and Ruby send their love. They regret, with me, that your promised visit to us is not to be paid."

Yet, after all these preparations I remained; for, as the weeks passed, it seemed clear Mr. Clay was likely to arrive at any time. His associate, Professor Holcombe, had already returned, though wrecked off the coast of Wilmington. Whole ship-loads of cotton, which had succeeded in running the blockade and which we fondly hoped would replenish our pocket-books, had gone to the bottom. On the whole, travel by sea grew less and less attractive. I concluded to remain on terra firma, but to go on toward Augusta and Beech Island, South Carolina, that I might be nearer the coast when Mr. Clay should arrive. Ere I left Columbus I had a ludicrous adventure. Upon coming downstairs one morning, I saw, approaching the outer, wide-open door, a large, portly figure clad in Macon Mills muslin. Beyond him, in the street, a wagon stood, or was passing. It was loaded with watermelons. As I noted them and the figure approaching, I connected the two at once, and called back to my hostess, with all the

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enthusiasm for which I was ever famous at the near prospect of a "million," "Cousin Victoria! Don't you want some melons? Here's a watermelon man!" To my surprise, as I neared the door a hearty laugh rang out; a cordial hand was extended to me, and I recognised before me genial, jovial General Howell Cobb, who had left his military duties for the moment, in order to welcome me to Georgia. His long beard, which he declared he never would shave until our cause was won, together with the copperas and unbleached suit of muslin, had quite disguised him for the moment.

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CHAPTER XVI
THE DEPARTED GLORIES OF THE SOUTH LAND

MY memories would be incomplete were I to fail to include in them a description of plantation life that may be taken as a type of the beautiful homes of the South in that long ago before the Civil War. From Maryland to Louisiana there had reigned, since colonial times, an undisturbed, peaceful, prosperous democracy, based upon an institution beneficial alike to master and servant. It was implanted in the South by the English settlers, approved by the English rulers, and fostered by thrifty merchants of New England, glad to traffic in black men so long as there were black men upon the African coasts who might be had in exchange for a barrel of rum. Generations living under these conditions had evolved a domestic discipline in Southern homes which was of an ideal order. Nothing resembling it had existed in modern times. To paraphrase the nursery rhyme, the planter was in his counting-house counting out his money; his wife was in the parlour eating bread and honey; the man servant was by his master's side, the maid with her mistress, the meat-cook at his spit and the bread-cook at the marble block where the delicious beaten biscuit were made in plenty. The laundress was in the laundry (Chinamen then in China), and in the nursery lived, ever at her post, the sable sentinel of cribs and cradles, the skilful manufacturer of possets and potions. None but a Southerner to the manner born can appreciate or imagine the tie that bound us of that old-time South to our dear black mammy, in whose

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capacious lap the little ones confided to her care cuddled in innocent slumber.

Fruitful vineyards and gardens furnished our luxuries, and talent and faithful public service were the criterion of social standing. Of those bygone days, Mr. E. Spann Hammond(*) recently wrote, "To me it seems as if I had been in two worlds, and two existences, the old and the new, and to those knowing only the latter, the old will appear almost like mythology and romance, so thorough has been the upheaval and obliteration of the methods and surroundings of the past."

(* Son of Senator Hammond, of South Carolina.)

Yes! the old glories have passed away, but even those who destroyed them, looking back to that time and that Southern civilisation, recognise to-day how enviable were our solidarity as a people, our prosperity and the moral qualities that are characteristic of the South. "I have learned not only to respect, but to love the great qualities which belong to my fellow citizens of the Southern States," said Senator Hoar, recently. "Their love of home, their chivalrous respect for women, their courage, their delicate sense of honour, their constancy, which can abide by an appearance or a purpose or an interest for their States through adversity,and through prosperity, through years and through generations, are things by which the more mercurial people of the North may take a lesson. And there is another thing," he added, "the low temptation of money has not found any place in our Southern politics."

It was my good fortune during the late autumn and winter of 1864 to be invited to take refuge in a spacious and representative plantation home in South Carolina, where the conditions that obtained were so typically those of the Southern home that I could choose no better example for description, were I to scan here the numberless instances of a similar character, known to

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me before those unquiet days. "Redcliffe," the home of Senator Hammond, is still a point of interest to travellers, and a beautiful feature of the landscape which it is set. It is built upon a high knoll on Beech Island, South Carolina, and is visible to the naked eye at a distance of thirty-five miles. It lies within view of Sand Hill, where the famous Madame Le Vert spent her declining years, and is pointed out to the visitor by the residents of Augusta, Georgia, and the smaller towns about, as an object of local admiration and pride. In the decades preceding the war it was owned by Governor, afterward Senator, James H. Hammond, a wealthy man in his own right, whose possessions were greatly increased by his marriage to Miss Catherine Fitzsimmons. Miss Fitzsimmons was a daughter of one of South Carolina's richest citizens, and brought to Governor Hammond a splendid dowry. Her sister became the wife of Colonel Wade Hampton, who had been on General Jackson's staff at the battle of New Orleans, and whose son, General and Senator Wade Hampton, served in the same Congress with Senator Hammond. While in Washington, the latter, distinguished alike for his reserve and scholarliness, became known as the "Napoleon of the Senate." He was no lover of public life, however, and the senatorial office was literally thrust upon him. Especially as the strenuousness in Congress increased, his desire deepened to remain among his people and to develop what was, in fact, one of the most productive plantations in South Carolina. The estate of "Redcliffe" was stocked with the finest of Southdowns, with sleek, blooded kine, and horses, and a full flock of Angora goats. The prolific "Redcliffe" vineyards yielded unusual varieties of grapes, planted and cared for by white labourers. Four hundred slaves or more were owned by Senator Hammond, but these were set to less skill-demanding duties. For the planting of this vineyard, forty acres of land, sub-soiled

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toa depth of three feet, were set apart, and the clear, straw-coloured wine for which the Senator's cellar was famous came from his own wine- presses.

On the plantation was a large grist-mill, from which every human creature in that vast family was fed. It was a big, heavy timbered building, grey even then with age, and run by water. Here the corn was crushed between the upper and the nether mill-stones, and so skilful was the miller that each could have his hominy ground as coarse or as fine as his fancy dictated, and all the sweetness of the corn left in it besides. The miller could neither read nor write, but he needed no aid to his memory. For years he had known whose mealbag it was that had the red patch in the corner. He knew each different knot as well as he knew the negros' faces, and if any of the bags presented had holes in it the miller would surely make its owner wait till the last.

Lower down on the same water-course was the sawmill, which had turned out all the lumber used in the building of "Redcliffe." On one occasion it happened that this mill, needing some repairs, a great difficulty was encountered in the adjustment of the mud-sills, upon which the solidity of the whole superstructure depended. The obstacles to be removed were great, and it cost much time and money to overcome them. While Mr. Hammond was Senator, and in the official chamber was grappling with the problem of labour and capital, his experience with the mud-sills was opportunely recalled, and his application of that name to certain of the labouring classes at once added to his reputation for ready wit.

On the "Redcliffe" plantation the blacksmith was to be found at his forge, the wheelwright in his shop, and the stock-minder guarding the welfare of his charges. Measured by the standard that a man has not lived in vain who makes two blades of grass to grow where but

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one grew before, Senator Hammond might have been crowned King of agricultural enterprise, for his highest producing corn-lands before he rescued them had been impassible swamp-lands. Drained and put under cultivation, their yield was enormous, no less than eighty bushels of corn being the average quantity to the acre. There was scarcely a corner of the old "stake-and-rider fences" in which Mr. Hammond did not cause to be planted a peach or apple or other fruit tree.

Our cousin Miss Comer, who late in the fifties married the son of Senator Hammond, and made her home at "Redcliffe," though accustomed to affluent plantation life, was at once impressed by the splendid system that directed the colony of slaves at Beech Island. Each marriage and birth and death that took place among them was registered with great exactness. The Senator's business ability was remarkable. He knew his every possession to the most minute particular. The Hammond slaves formed an exclusive colony, which was conducted with all the strictness of a little republic. They were a happy, orderly, cleanly, and carefree lot, and Mr. Hammond was wont to say that if the doctrine of transmigration of souls was true, he would like to have his soul come back and inhabit one of his "darkies."

I have said they were an exclusive colony. My pretty little cousin realised this upon her arrival at "Glen Loula," a charming residence named for her, and set apart for the young couple by the owner of "Redcliffe."

"The Hammond negro, as I have found him," she wrote, "has a decided personal vanity, and nothing will offend him more than to have you forget his name. For a long time after coming I felt I was not exactly admitted by the different servants as 'one ob de fambly.' In fact, it was plain I was on trial, being 'weighed in the balance!' How I wished I knew all about diplomacy!

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I never saw a more august appearance than Daddy 'Henry,' an old African, who remembers the slave ship on which he was brought over, his foreign name, and, perhaps, many things which he never tells about. He cleans the silver, polishes the floors and windows and the brasses in the fireplaces, and, besides this, claims the boys' guns as his by some divine right.

"In order to hasten an expression of their good-will, I thought one day of making a Sterling exchange with the aid of some Washington finery; and, with a black silk dress to one servant and a morning-robe to another, I have pulled through famously, even with Marm Jane, the cook, who is supreme in her kitchen. I have heard her turn my husband out. But the silk dress brought me a carte blanche. 'Come on, Missy, jes w'en you feels like it!' is the way she greets me now.

"I cannot help seeing the wise arrangement of every part of this extensive plantation, especially for the negroes. The house of the overseer is in the midst of a grove of live oaks, and in each street are a certain number of cabins, each in the midst of a little garden with space in which to raise chickens. The hospital is well arranged, and there is a separate house where the children, especially the babies, are left to be fed and cared for while their mothers are at work.

"My poor memory for faces would be my undoing but for Paul, who always tells me as we come upon any of the negroes, 'Now this is Jethro! Be sure to call him distinctly.' I fall in with this righteous deception and it works like a charm. They admire what they think wit, and especially love to memorise some easy little rhyme. Every one makes the same atrocious wish to me:

'God blass you, ma Missie. I wishes you joy
An' every year a gal or a boy.'

"I thought I would die when I heard it first, but I've

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gotten over it now. Senator Hammond gives a barbecue to the slaves every Fourth of July and Christmas, and the dances of the negroes are very amusing. There is a tall black man, called Robin, on this plantation, who has originated a dance which he calls the turkey-buzzard dance. He holds his hands under his coat-tails, which he flirts out as he jumps, first to one side, and then to the other, and looks exactly like the ugly bird he imitates."

In the uncertain days of the war, Huntsville being unapproachable, and we having no fixed abode in the intervals between Congressional sessions at Richmond, Senator Clay and I made several enjoyable visits to the sheltered home of Mr. Hammond, even while battles raged and every heart was burdened with apprehension. The hospitality of the owner of "Redcliffe" was well known. It was his custom in those uncertain days, whether guests were known to be coming or not, to send his carriage daily to Augusta to meet the afternoon train, and the unexpected or chance arrival who might be seeking a conference or a refuge at "Redcliffe"; and once a year, like a great feudal landlord, he gave a fête or grand dinner to all the country people about, at which he always contrived to have some distinguished guest present. Senator Clay and I had the good fortune to be visiting Mr. Hammond on such an occasion, when every neighbour, poor or rich, for miles about was present. They made a memorable picture; for the majority were stiff and prim and of the quaint, simple, religious class often to he found in back districts. They seemed ill at ease, if not consciously out of place, in Senator ammond's parlours, filled as those great rooms were with evidences of a cosmopolitan culture, with paintings and statuary, bronze and marble groups.(*)

(* Many of these possessions are still retained by Messrs. Spann and Harry Hammond.)

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In their efforts to entertain their guests, our host and hostess's ingenuity had been tested to its utmost, when suddenly Senator Hammond's eye twinkled, and he turned to Senator Clay.

"I remember once seeing you dance at our home in Washington, Mr. Clay," he began, and then proceeded to recall an amusing evening, where, strictly en famille, Senator Butler, of South Carolina, together with Secretary and Mrs. Cobb, Senator Clay and myself, had dined, finishing up the hours together by singing our favourite ballads. Upon my playing a merry tune, Secretary Cobb, rotund and jolly, suddenly seized my husband, slender and sedate, and together they whirled madly about the room to the music of the piano, and the great amusement of dear old Senator Butler, who laughed until the tears rolled down his cheeks.

When Mr. Hammond at "Redcliffe" proposed that Mr. Clay repeat his terpsichorean success for the pleasure of the Beach Islanders there gathered, my husband at first (emulating the distinguished artist wherever he is encountered) demurred. He "could not dance without music," he said.

"Well," said our host, "Mrs. Clay can play!"

"But I need a partner!" my husband persisted. At last, however, he yielded to Senator Hammond's persuasion and danced an impromptu Highland fling, abandoning himself completely to the fun of the moment. As the music went on and his spirit of frolic rose, the faces of some of the spectators around us grew longer and longer, and, I am sure, those good people felt themselves to be a little nearer to the burning pit than they had ever been before. Their prim glances at my husband's capers increased the natural sedateness of our hostess, who, seeing the expressions of alarm, plainly was relieved when at last the terrible Bacchanalian outburst was over! I felt sure it would be a difficult task to try to convince my husband's

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audience that his own religious feelings and convictions were of the deepest and most spiritual quality.

For his black dependents, Senator Hammond had built several churches; the favourite one, called St. Catherine's (named for Mrs. Hammond), being nearest the "Redcliffe" residence and most frequently visited by the family. Once a month a white preacher came, and all the slaves gathered to listen to the monthly sermon. Senator Hammond's views for the civilising of the negroes led him to forbid the presence of exciting negro preachers, for the religion of the black man, left to himself, is generally a mixture of hysteria and superstition. The conversion of the negroes under their own spiritual guides was a blood-curdling process in those days, for they screamed to Heaven as if the Indians with their tomahawks were after them, or danced, twisting their bodies in most remarkable manner.(*) As their emotion increased, as they "got feelin'," and the moment of conversion approached, as a rule they fell all in a heap, though in thus "coming through" the wenches were altogether likely to fall into the arms of the best-looking young brother who happened to be near. By reason of Senator Hammond's wise discipline, such religious excesses were impossible at "Redcliffe," and I can recall no church service at once more thrilling and reverential than that I attended, with Senator Clay, at quaint St. Catherine's on the "Redcliffe" plantation shortly before my husband's departure for Canada.

(* To overcome these conditions, the Right-Reverend William Capers, distinguished in the Methodist Church, organised a wide system of missionary work among the plantation negroes, whereby preaching and catechising by white ministers took place once a month. Many of the great planters assisted in this good work, Senator R. Barnwell Rhett, Sr. being prominently associated with Bishop Capers. Senator Rhett built a large church, which was attended by the negroes from five plantations, and regularly by his own family. A.S.)

The negroes, clean, thrifty, strong, all dressed in their best, vied with each other in their deference to Mars'

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Paul's guests, as we entered the church. They listened quietly to the sermon as the service proceeded.

It was a solemn and impressive scene. There was the little company of white people, the flower of centuries of civilisation, among hundreds of blacks, but yesterday in the age of the world, wandering in savagery, now peaceful, contented, respectful and comprehending the worship of God. Within a day's ride, cannon roared, and a hunter, laying his ear to the ground, might have heard the tread of armies, bent upon the blotting out of just such scenes as these. Only God might record our thoughts that morning, as the preacher alluded in prayer and sermon to the issues of the times. At the close of the morning, the hymn "There is rest for the weary" was given out, and when the slaves about us had wailed out the lines

"On the other side of Jordan
. . . . . . . . . . .
Where the tree of life is blooming
There is rest for you!"

my husband, at the signal for prayer, fell upon his knees, relieving his pent-up feelings in tears which he could not restrain. My own commingling emotions were indescribably strange and sad. Would abolitionists, I thought, could they look upon that scene, fail to admit the blessings American "slavery" had brought to the savage black men, thus, within a few generations at most, become at home in a condition of civilisation.

There were many fine voices on the plantation at "Redcliffe," and as they followed their leader down the row "chopping out" cotton, or, when later they worked in gangs at picking it, it was their custom, seeming to act from instinct in the matter, to sing. One voice usually began the song, then another would join him, and then another, until dozens of voices blended in weird and melodious harmonies that floated from the distant cotton

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fields to the house of the master, and the music of the unseen choristers, a natural and rhythmic song, was of a kind we shall not hear again in these later practical times. Sometimes, one by one, all would drop out of the song, until only the leader's high voice was heard; then, gradually, they would join in again, and often, when all seemed finished, a challenge would come from some distant gang, and a fuller and freer antiphonal song would be heard, answering from field to field.

When I remember that throng of well-fed, plump and happy coloured people, and compare it with the ragged and destitute communities common among the freedmen of to-day, the contrast is a sad one. "What's de reason?" asked an old darky of me during Reconstruction days, "dat de Yankees caint make linsey-wolsey like ole Mistis did in de ole time? 'N dose days one par breeches las me mos a year! I could cut trees, roll logs, burn bresh-heaps an' cut briers an' I couldn't wear dem breeches out! Now when I buys dis shoddy stuff de Yankees done bro't an' sets down on de lawg ter eat ma grub, bress Gawd! when I gits up, I leaves de seat o' my breeches on de lawg! I done got down on my knees an' prayed for God ter send me linsey-wolsey clothes so I won't have rheumatiz an' aint none come. Where's dat mule an' forty acres? When is dey a comin', dat's what I wants ter know!"

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CHAPTER XVII
CONDITIONS IN 1863-'64

BY the autumn of 1864 the Southern States found themselves ravaged of everything either edible or wearable. Food was enormously high in cities and in locations which proved tempting to foragers. Delicately bred women were grateful when they were able to secure a pair of rough brogan shoes at one hundred dollars a pair, and coarse cotton cloth from the Macon Mills served to make our gowns. For nearly three years the blockade of our ports and frontier had made the purchase of anything really needful, impracticable. Nor could we utilise the stores in Southern cities once these had fallen into the enemies' clutches. A correspondent, Mrs. Captain du Barry,(*) who in December, 1863, was permitted to visit Memphis, now in the enemy's possession, wrote, "I deeply regretted not being able to fill your commissions. I put them on my list that I sent in to General Hurlburt, when I requested a passport, but they were refused. All the principal stores were closed and their contents confiscated. There is a perfect reign of terror in Memphis. Not even a spool of cotton can be purchased without registering your name and address, and "swearing it is for personal or family use, and no number of articles can be taken from the store without, after selection, going with a list of them in your hand, to the "Board of Trade," accompanied by the clerk of the store, and there swearing on the Bible that the articles mentioned are for family use and not to be taken out of the United States. So many necessary

(* Mother of the unfortunate Mrs. Maybrick.)

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articles are pronounced contraband by the United States authorities, that one is in momentary chance of being arrested, by ignorantly inquiring for them. The place is swarming with detectives who make a trade of arresting unfortunate people. They are paid by the United States Government two hundred and fifty dollars for detecting and arresting a person, and that person pays the Provost Marshal fifteen hundred to two thousand dollars to get off, that being the way matters are conducted in Memphis!"

All over the South old spinning wheels and handlooms were brought out from dusty corners, and the whirr of the wheel became a very real song to us. Every scrap of old leather from furniture, trunk, belt or saddle was saved for the manufacture of rough shoes, often made by the mother who had been fortunate enough to have hoarded them, for herself and children. I, myself, saw my aunt, Eloisa, wife of General Jones M. Withers, putting soles on the tops of once cast-off shoes of her children's, and she, who had known so well the luxuries of life, was compelled to perform her task by the meagre light of a precious tallow candle. Complaints, however, were few, from our Spartan-spirited women. Writing to my husband, in November, 1864, I said, "A lady told me yesterday that she fattened daily on Confederate fare - for, since she could obtain no useless luxuries, her health, heretofore poor, has become perfect."

The country was stripped not alone of the simpler refinements of life, but of even so necessary a commodity as salt. Scarcely a smoke-house in the South having an earthen floor, which had received the drippings from the hams or bacon sides of earlier days, but underwent a scraping and sifting in an effort to secure the precious grains deposited there. It happened that my host at "Redcliffe," just previous to the breaking out of hostilities, had ordered a boat-load of salt, to use upon certain unsatisfactory land,

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and realising that a blockaded coat would result in a salt famine, he hoarded his supply until the time of need should come. When it became known that Senator Hammond's salt supply was available, every one from far and near came asking for it. It was like going down into Egypt for corn, and the precious crystals were distributed to all who came, according to the number in each family.

Compared with those of many of my friends in other parts of the South, our surroundings and fare at Beech Island were sumptuous. Save at my Uncle William's home, I had nowhere seen such an abundance of good things as "Redcliffe" yielded. Meats and vegetables were plenty; the river nearby was full of shad which were caught readily in seines; and canvas-backs and teal, English ducks and game birds, especially partridges, abounded. "Indian summer is here in all its glory," I wrote to my husband late in '64. "The hues of the forests are gorgeous, the roses wonderful! Millions of violets scent the air, and everything is so peaceful and lovely on this island it is hard to realise War is in the land. Splendid crops prevail, and the spirit of the people is undaunted!"

As times grew more and more stringent, tea and coffee proved to be our greatest lack, and here, as we had done in the last days at Warrenton, we were glad to drink potato coffee and peanut chocolate. The skin of the raw potato was scraped off - to pare it might have been to waste it - and the potato cut into slices or discs as thin as paper. It was then carefully dried, toasted and ground and made into what proved to be a really delicious beverage.(*) Our chocolate was made in this wise: Peanuts, or pinders, or goobers, as they were variously called, were roasted and the skin slipped off. They were next

(* A recent writer attributes to those experience, the coffee substitutes which now, forty years later, have "ruined the American coffee trade." A.S.)

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pounded in a mortar; when, blended with boiled milk and a little sugar (a sparing use of this most costly luxury was also necessary), the drink was ready for serving, and we found it delightful to our palates.

There were spinners and weavers on Beech Island, too, and unceasing industry was necessary to prepare and weave cloth, both cotton and wool, sufficient for the clothing of the army of slaves and the family on the great plantation. One of the island residents, Mrs. Redd, was a wonderful worker, and wove me a cotton gown of many colours which had all the beauty of a fine Scotch plaid. She spun her own cotton and made her own dyes, gathering her colours from the mysterious laboratories of the woods, and great was the fame her handiwork attained wherever it was seen. Calico of the commonest in those days was sold at twenty-five dollars a yard; and we women of the Confederacy cultivated such an outward indifference to Paris fashions as would have astonished our former competitors in the Federal capital. Nor did our appearance, I am constrained to think, suffer appreciably more than our spirits; for the glories of an unbleached Macon Mills muslin gown, trimmed with gourd-seed buttons, dyed crimson, in which I appeared at Richmond in the spring of '64, so impressed the mind of an English newspaper correspondent there, that he straightway wrote and forwarded an account of it to London, whence our friends who had taken refuge there sent it back to us, cut from a morning journal.

Not that our love for pretty things was dead; a letter preserved by Mr. Clay is fine testimony to the fact that mine was "scotched and not killed." It was dated Beech Island, November 18, 1864, and was addressed to Mr. Clay, now on the eve of departure from Canada.

"Bring me at least two silk dresses of black and purple. I prefer the purple to be moire antique, if it is fashionable. If French importations are to be had, bring me a spring

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bonnet and a walking hat, for the benefit of all my lady friends as well as myself, and do bring some books of fashions - September, October, and November numbers (Ruling passion strong in war), and bring -." The list grew unconscionably. In after years I found a copy of it carefully made out in my husband's handwriting, and showing marks of having been carried in his pocket until each article I had indicated for myself or others had been selected, Here it is:

1. At least, 2 silk dresses, black and purple (for 'Ginie).
2. French spring bonnet.
3. Walking hat.
4. Some books of fashion.
5. Corsets - 4 - 6, 22 inches in waist.
6. Slippers with heels, No. 3 1-2.
7. Gloves - 1 doz. light coloured, 1 doz. dark.
8. Handkerchiefs, extra fine.
9. Two handsome black silk dresses for Lestia.
10. Flannel, white and red.
11. A set of fine, dark furs, not exceeding $25.
12. Set of Hudson Bay Sables, at any price, for Victoria, large cape, cuffs and muff.
13. Two Black Hernanis or Tissue dresses, one tissue dress to be brochetted for 'Ginie.
14. 3 or 4 pieces of black velvet ribbon, different widths.
15. Bolt of white bonnet ribbon; ditto pink, green and magenta.
16. French flowers for bonnet.
17. Shell Tuck comb for 'Ginie.
18. Present for little Jeff Davis, Claude and J. Winter.
19. Needles, pins, hairpins, tooth-brushes, coarse combs, cosmetics, hair oil, cologne.
20. Domestic, linen, muslin, nainsook, swiss, jaconet, mull muslin, each a full piece.
21. Dresses of brilliantine.
22. Black silk spring wrapping.
23. Chlorine tooth wash and Rowland's Kalydor.
24. A cut coral necklace.
25. Lace collars, large and pointed now worn.

Alas! my husband's zeal in fulfilling my commissions

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all went for naught, for the boxes containing them (save two, which were deposited with Mrs. Chestnut, at Columbia, and later fell prey to the Federals or to the flames, we never knew which) were swallowed by the sea, and only he himself came home with the Government papers he had guarded, as the sole baggage he was able to save from the wreck of the Rattlesnake of all he had carried. And yet not all, for a long-lost pet which he had been enabled to reclaim for General Lee(*) was also brought safely to shore.

(* Shortly after his arrival in Canada, Mr. Clay heard of General Lee's lost favourite. The animal, a fine Newfoundland, had been taken from the Lee home at Arlington by a Federal soldier, who sold it to a Captain Anderson (commanding an English vessel) for one hundred dollars. After some months of inquiry and negotiation, Mr. Clay secured the dog, and personally brought him back to the Confederate States. A.S.)

"Tell him," wrote my sister, from Richmond, that "General Lee's dog arrived safely. Poor dog! I'm sorry for him, for he will find the Confederacy a poor place to come to get anything to eat! I trust for the country's sake, he knows how to live without eating!"

For the making of our toilette we discovered the value of certain gourds, when used as wash cloths. Their wearing qualities were wonderful; the more one used them the softer they became. Needles were becoming precious as heirlooms; pins were the rarest of luxuries; for the greater part of the time locust thorns served us instead. Writing paper was scarcely to be had, and the letters of that period which were sent out by private persons were often unique testimony to the ingenuity of the senders. Wall-paper, perhaps, was most frequently resorted to, and we made our crude envelopes of anything we could find. We made our own writing fluids, our commonest resource being the oak ball, a parasite, which, next to the walnut burr, is the blackest thing in the vegetable world. Or, this failing us, soot was scooped from the chimney, and, after a careful sifting, was mixed with water and "fixed" with a few drops of vinegar. Sometimes we used pokeberries,

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manufacturing a kind of red ink, or, made thin with water, some bit of miraculously saved shoe polish provided us with an adhesive black fluid.

Our difficulties were as great in the matter of transmitting our letters, when once they were written. We might intrust them to the mails, but these particularly were prey to our invaders; or we might charge with the care of them some traveller who was known to be making his way to the city for which the letters were addressed. Stray newspapers reached us at "Redcliffe" occasionally, from even so distant a point as our capital, and efforts were made by local editors to purvey the news of battles and the movements of the armies, but the supply of paper necessary for the issuing of a daily journal and even a weekly edition was difficult to obtain. What at first had appeared as morning papers were changed to evening editions, as the cost of candles, by which the compositors must work, had risen in '63 to three and one-half dollars a pound. Our brother, J. Withers Clay, who owned and edited the Confederate, turned peripatetic, and issued his paper where he could, being obliged to keep shifting, printing paraphernalia and all, with the movements of the army in the Tennessee region. Writing us from Chattanooga, on August 16, 1863, he thus described his life: "I am living in camp style. I mess with my office boys and our fare is frugal. My bed is a piece of carpet, laid on a door, with one end elevated on two bricks and the other resting on the floor. I lay my blue blanket on this, and my bones on that, with my head supported by my overcoat and carpet sack, and cover myself with a Mexican scarf when it is cool!"

On the whole, our condition was almost like that of the ancients who depended on passing travellers for gossip or news of the welfare or whereabouts of friends or kin. Thus my sister (by every tie of affection), writing from Richmond in the spring of '64, said: "Have no idea

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where you are, but send this letter by General Sparrow to Macon, care of Mrs. Whittle. The last intelligence I had of you was through Colonel Phillips. He told me he saw you between Augusta and Macon somewhere."

Nor dared we avail ourselves of our telegraph wires, so costly had the sending of a few lines become. For the briefest message sent C. O. D. from Macon to Richmond, my sister paid sixteen dollars and implored me to send no more! The chief resource of the people was the arrival of the local train, at which time the railway stations swarmed with inquirers on foot, hedged in by others as eager, who had driven long distances in such vehicles as were at their command.

My life was one of continual suspense, notwithstanding the arrival of special couriers who came from time to time from Richmond bearing tidings of my absent husband. All lives that lie in close parallels to governments carry heavy anxieties. Mine, in those days of strife and terror, was no exception to this general rule. As negotiator at Niagara Falls with Professor Holcombe and others, the eyes of the North as well as those of the South for months had been fixed upon Mr. Clay, his interviews with Horace Greeley and the messengers sent to him by Mr. Lincoln having excited varying comments and criticisms that were anything but reassuring. Our friends in Richmond, however, wrote cheeringly:

". . . I hear occasionally of Mr. Clay," ran a letter from the Executive Mansion, dated August 31st, '64, "but for some time past nothing has been received from him. The company he keeps(*) as reported by the newspapers cannot render you apprehensive of his being too happy to wish to return, though your desire to be with him may have increased his probable want of more congenial communion when the day's work is done. I am assured that his health has improved by Canadian air, and we may hope that he will bring back increased ability to labour in the cause of the Confederacy, if it should not be his portion

(* Horace Greeley.)

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to relieve us of the need for further toil such as now is imposed. The carping spirit which prompted the criticism(*) on his course would have found sufficient cause whatever he might have done; or, if nothing had been done, that would have served equally. No one can hope to please everybody. You would not wish your husband to escape the reviling of those who envy such as they cannot rival, and strive to drag others down from the heights to which they cannot rise?"

(* Printed in Richmond Enquirer, and quoted liberally throughout the North.)

Messages were numerous, urging my return to Richmond, which our President and the Mallorys assured me was the safest of places.

"Now that Sherman's barbarians are in unpleasant proximity to you," wrote Secretary Mallory, "why not come to the front where security, sympathy, mint juleps, an admiring audience, the freshest gossip and the most unselfish regard, all combine with the boom and flash of guns to welcome your coming? The correspondence between your lord and master and Holcombe on one side, and Greeley on the other, is doing good service. The parties, fragments, cliques and individuals in the United States who desire peace, but differ upon the modus operandi of getting it, will now learn that with Lincoln at the head of affairs, no peace is possible; while our weak brothers in North Carolina and Georgia who have clamoured so loudly that peace propositions should be made to us, cannot fail to see that, at present, peace with Lincoln means degradation. I am very glad Mr. Clay went, for I see that his presence must be beneficial to our cause."

These, and other letters as urgent and as desirous of quieting my apprehensions, came frequently. Nevertheless, my husband's stay in the severe climate of Canada caused me constant apprehension. For months my only direct news of him was through "personals," variously disguised, in the Richmond papers, which Colonel Clay was prompt to forward to me. Occasionally, however, one of

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the numerous letters each endeavoured to send to the other successfully reached its destination. "It gives me great pain," I wrote on November 18, '64, "to learn from yours just received that none of my numerous letters have reached you since the 30th June! I have sent you dozens, my dearest, filled with all the news of the day, of every character, and more love than ever filled my heart before! . . . My last intelligence of you was sent me from Richmond through the bearer of despatches, I presume, and bore the date of September fifteenth, more than two months ago!"

In this letter, which was dated from Beech Island, I conveyed intelligence to Mr. Clay of Senator Hammond's death, he being, at the time, a few days less than fifty-seven years of age. It occurred while all the affluent colourings of the autumn were tingeing his world at "Redcliffe." The circumstances attending his decease and burial were unique, and to be likened only to those which, in mediæval days, surrounded the passing away of some Gothic baron or feudal lord. Mr. Hammond had been failing in health for some time, when, feeling his end drawing near, he asked for a carriage that he might drive out and select his last resting-place. He chose, at last, a high knoll, from which a fine view was to be had of Augusta and the Sand Hills; and, having done this, being opposed to private burial grounds, he bequeathed the surrounding acres to the town in the precincts of which his estate lay, on consideration that they turn the plot into a public cemetery. First, however, he laid an injunction upon his wife and sons, that if the Yankee army penetrated there (the end of the war was not yet, nor came for six months thereafter), they should have his grave ploughed over that none of the hated enemy should see it.

Again and again in the remaining days he reiterated his wish. Fears were spreading of the approach of Sherman's devastating army, and the destruction of "Redcliffe,"

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conspicuous as it was to all the surrounding country, seemed inevitable. Marvellous to relate, however, when at last the spoiler came, his legions marched in a straight line to the sea, some fourteenmiles away from the Hammond plantation, leaving it untouched by shell or the irreverent hand of the invader.

The funeral of Mr. Hammond was solemn and made especially impressive by the procession of two hundred of the older slaves, who marched, two by two, into the baronial parlors, to look for the last time upon their master's face. Save for this retinue, "Redcliffe" was now practically without a defender, Mr. Paul Hammond being absent much of the time, detailed upon home guard duty. In his absence, my maid, Emily, and I kept the armory of the household, now grown more and more fearful of invasion with its train of insult and the destruction of property. There were many nights when, all the rest in slumber and a dead hush without, I waited, breathless, until I caught the sound of Paul Hammond's returning steps.

Just before the close of my refugee days on Beach Island, a young kinsman, George Tunstall, who filled the sublime post of corporal in Wheeler's Brigade in camp a few hundred miles away, learning of my presence there, obtained leave of absence and made his way, accompanied by another youth, to Mrs. Hammond's to see me. The two soldiers were full of tales of thrilling interest, of hairbreadth escapes and camp happenings, both grave and gay; and, rumours of Sherman's advance being rife, our young heroes urged my cousin to take time by the forelock and bury the family silver. "Redcliffe" being almost in direct line of the Yankee general's march, the advice seemed good, and preparations at once began to put it into operation. Though there was little doubt of the loyalty of the majority of the Hammond slaves, yet it seemed but prudent to surround our operations with

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all possible secrecy. We therefore collected the silver, piece by piece, secreting it in "crocus" bags, which, when all was ready, we deposited in a capacious carry-all, into which we crowded. It was at early dusk when lurking figures easily might be descried in corn-field or behind a wayside tree by our alert eyes. Declaring to those of the servants who stood about as we entered the carriage, that we were taking some provisions to Mrs. Redd, much to Lot's(*) surprise, we dispensed with a coachman, and drove off. We had many a laugh as we proceeded through the woods, at our absurdity in concealing our errand from the family servants and in confiding our precious secret to two of Wheeler's men. They had a terrible reputation for chicken stealing.(**)

(* The family coachman.)
(** A gentleman in the War Department - to whom I spoke of a violent protest uttered against General Wheeler's confiscations, by one Betts (who sent his complaint, long as a Presidential message, to Senator Clay, in Richmond) - smiled a little. "Well," he said, "Wheeler always would feed his men, you know!" A.S.)

When we had driven a mile or more, Mr. Tunstall produced a hatchet and began to blaze the trees. "There!" he said, after instructing us as to the signs he had made, "when you come to where the blaze stops, you'll find your valuables!" and under his directions the silver was silently sunk in the ground and the earth replaced.(***)

(*** Speaking of that episode, Mrs. Hammond said to me: "It was months before we succeeded in finding the silver again. Though we dug the ground over and over in every direction where we thought it was, we couldn't even find the blazes for a long time." A.S.)

Apropos of General Sherman, when a month or two later I was in Macon, I heard a very excellent story. A party of his men one day dashed up to the house of a Mrs. Whitehead, a fine old lady (a sister of my informant), and demanded dinner at once. The lady long since had learned that resistance to such imperative demands would be in vain, and preparations were at once begun for the meal. Notwithstanding her obliging and prompt

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compliance, the men immediately started a forage in the poultry yard and the outhouses beyond. One of the officers penetrated the servants' quarters, and entered a cabin in which a young black woman lay sick.

"What's the matter, Sis?" he asked, in a tone that was meant to convey sympathy.

"Ain't no Sis of yourn!" was the sullen reply. "God knows I ain't no kin to no Yankee!" At that moment an infant's cry was heard.

"Hello!" said the officer. "Got a little pickaninny, hey? Boy or girl?"

"Boy chile! What's that ter you?" snapped the woman.

"What's his name?" persisted the soldier.

"Name's Wheeler, dat's what 'tis!" answered the invalid triumphantly, and the colloquy ended abruptly.

As the soldiers sat down to the table, some one, going to the door, saw Wheeler's men come tearing down the road flat on their horses. Instantly he shouted back to his companions, "Wheeler!" but they, believing the cry to be a ruse, continued to eat. The sounds of the galloping steeds soon became audible, however, and a stampede that was highly amusing to the now relieved household took place through doors and windows. When General Wheeler arrived, he found a steaming repast already prepared, and a cordial welcome from Mrs. Whitehead and her family, including "Sis."