Early in June the two armies of Grant and Lee confronted each other at Petersburg. My dear general had bidden a silent and most sad farewell to his little family and gone forth to join his company, when my father entered with great news. "I have just met General Lee in the street." "Passing through?" I asked. "Not at all! The lines are established just here and filled with his veterans." My general soon re?ntered joyfully. He would now be on duty near us.
The next Sunday a shell fell in the Presbyterian Church opposite our house. From that moment we were shelled at intervals, and very severely. There were no soldiers in the city. Women were killed on the lower streets, and an exodus from the shelled districts commenced at once.
As soon as the enemy brought up his siege guns of heavy artillery, they opened on the city with shell without the slightest notice, or without giving opportunity for the removal of non-combatants, the sick, the wounded, or the women and children. The fire was at first directed toward the Old Market, presumably because of the railroad depot situated there, about which the soldiers might be supposed to collect. But the guns soon enlarged their operations, sweeping all the streets in the business part of the city, and then invading the residential region. 200The steeples of the churches seemed to afford targets for their fire, all of them coming in finally for a share of the compliment.
To persons unfamiliar with the infernal noise made by the screaming, ricocheting, and bursting of shells, it is impossible to convey an adequate idea of the terror and demoralization which ensued. Some families who could not leave the besieged city dug holes in the ground, five or six feet deep, covered with heavy timber banked over with earth, the entrance facing opposite the batteries from which the shells were fired. They made these bomb-proofs safe, at least, and thither the family repaired when heavy shelling commenced. General Lee seemed to recognize that no part of the city was safe, for he immediately ordered the removal of all the hospitals, under the care of Petersburg's esteemed physician, Dr. John Herbert Claiborne. There were three thousand sick and wounded, many of them too ill to be moved. Everything that could run on wheels, from a dray to a wheelbarrow, was pressed into service by the fleeing inhabitants of the town. A long, never ending line passed my door until there were no more to pass.
The spectacle fascinated my children, and they lived in the open watching it. One day my little friend Nannie with my baby, nearly as large as herself, in her arms, stood at the gate when a shell fell some distance from them. A mounted officer drew rein and accosted her. "Whose children are these?"
"This is Charles Campbell's daughter," said little 201Nannie, "and this"—indicating the baby—"is General Pryor's child."
"Run home with General Pryor's baby, little girl, away from the shells," he said, and turning as he rode off, "My love to your father. I'm coming to see him."
"Who is that man?" little Nannie inquired of a bystander.
"Why, don't you know? That's General Lee!"
We soon learned the peculiar deep boom of the one great gun which bore directly upon us. The boys named it "Long Tom." Sometimes for several weeks "Long Tom" rested or slept—and would then make up for lost time. And yet we yielded to no panic. The children seemed to understand that it would be cowardly to complain. One little girl cried out with fright at an explosion, but her aunt, Mrs. Gibson, called her and said: "My dear, you cannot make it harder for other people! If you feel very much afraid, come to me, and I will take you in my arms, but you mustn't cry."
Charles Campbell, the historian, lived near us, at the Anderson Seminary. He cleared out the large coal cellar, which was fortunately dry, spread rugs on the floor, and furnished it with lounges and chairs. There we took refuge in utter darkness when the firing was unbearable. My next-door neighbor, Mr. Thomas Branch, piled bags of sand around his house and thus made it bomb-proof. One day a shell struck one of my chimneys and buried itself, hissing, at the front door. Away we went to Mr. Campbell's 202bomb-proof cellar, and there we remained until the paroxysmal shelling ceased.
One night, after a long, hot day, we were so tired we slept soundly. I was awakened by Eliza Page, standing trembling beside me. She pulled me out of bed and hurriedly turned to throw blankets around the children. The furies were let loose! The house was shaking with the concussion from the heavy guns. We were in the street, on our way to our bomb-proof cellar, when a shell burst not more than twenty-five feet before us. Fire and fragments rose like a fountain in the air and fell in a shower around us. Not one of my little family was hurt—and strange to say, the children were not terrified!
Another time a shell fell in our own yard and buried itself in the earth. My baby was not far away in her nurse's arms. The little creature was fascinated by the shells. The first word she ever uttered was an attempt to imitate them. "Yonder comes that bird with the broken wing," the servants would say. The shells made a fluttering sound as they traversed the air, descending with a frightful hiss. When they exploded in mid-air, a puff of smoke, white as an angel's wing, would drift away, and the particles would patter down like hail. At night the track of the shell and its explosion were precisely similar to our Fourth of July rockets, except that they were fired, not upward, but in a slanting direction,—not aimed at the stars, but aimed at us! I never felt afraid of them! I was brought up to believe in predestination. Courage, after all, is much a matter of nerves. My neighbors, Mr. and 203Mrs. Gibson, Mrs. Meade, and Mr. and Mrs. Campbell, agreed with me, and we calmly elected to remain in town. There was no place of safety accessible to us. Mr. Branch removed his family, and, as far as I knew, none other of my friends remained throughout the summer.
Not far from our own door ran a sunken street, with the hill, through which it was cut, rising each side of it. Into this hill the negroes burrowed, hollowing out a small space, where they sat all day on mats, knitting, singing, and selling small cakes made of sorghum and flour, and little round meat pies.
The antiphonal songs, with their weird melody, still linger in my memory. At night above the dull roar of the guns, the keen hiss of the shells as they fell, the rattle and rumble of the army wagons, a strong voice from the colony of hillside huts would ring out:—
"My brederin do-o-n't be weary,
De angel brought de tidin's down.
Do-o-n't be weary
For we're gwine home!
"I want to go to heaven!
(Answer) Yas, my Lawd!
I want to see my Jesus!
(Answer) Yas, my Lawd!
(Chorus) My brederin do-o-n't be weary,
De angel brought de tidin's down.
Do-o-n't be weary
For we're gwine home."
The sorghum cakes were made to perfection in our own kitchen, but the meat pies were fascinating. 204I might have been tempted to invest in them but for a slight circumstance. I saw a dead mule lying on the common, and out of its side had been cut a very neat, square chunk of flesh!
With all our starvation we never ate rats, mice, or mule meat. We managed to exist on peas, bread, and sorghum. We could buy a little milk, and we mixed it with a drink made from roasted and ground corn. The latter, in the grain, was scarce. Mr. Campbell's children picked up the grains wherever the army horses were fed, washed, dried, and pounded them for food.
My little boys never complained, but Theo, who had insisted upon returning to me from his uncle's safe home in the country, said one day: "Mamma, I have a queer feeling in my stomach! Oh, no! it doesn't ache the least bit, but it feels like a nutmeg grater."
Poor little laddie! His machinery needed oiling. And pretty soon his small brother fell ill with fever. My blessed Dr. Withers obtained a permit for me to get a pint of soup every day from the hospital, and one day there was a joyful discovery. In the soup was a drumstick of chicken!
"I cert'nly hope I'll not get well," the little man shocked me by saying.
"Oh, is it as bad as that?" I sighed.
"Why," he replied, "my soup will be stopped if I get better!"
Just at this juncture, when things were as bad as could be, my husband brought home to tea the Hon. Pierre Soulé, General D. H. Hill, and General Longstreet. 205I had bread and a little tea, the latter served in a yellow pitcher without a handle. Mrs. Meade, hearing of my necessity, sent me a small piece of bacon. I had known Mr. Soulé in Washington society—of all men the most fastidious, most polished. When we assembled around the table, I lifted my hot pitcher by means of a napkin, and offered my tea, pure and simple, allowing the guests to use their discretion in regard to a spoonful or two of dark brown sugar.
"This is a great luxury, madam," said Mr. Soulé, with one of his gracious bows, "a good cup of tea."
We talked that night of all that was going wrong with our country, of the good men who were constantly relieved of their commands, of all the mistakes we were making.
"Mistakes!" said General Hill, bringing his clenched fist down upon the table, "I could forgive mistakes! I cannot forgive lies! I could get along if we could only, only ever learn the truth, the real truth." But he was very personal and used much stronger words than these.
The pictures my general had brought from Europe had been sent early from Washington to Petersburg, and I had opened one of the boxes which contained a large etching of Michelangelo's "Last Judgment." General Longstreet stood long before this picture, as it hung in our living room. Turning to Mr. Soulé and General Hill he exclaimed: "Oh, what does it all signify? Here is the end for every one of us!"—the end of all the 206strife, the bloodshed, the bitterness—the final victory or defeat.
They talked and talked, these veterans and the charming, accomplished diplomat, until one of them inquired the hour. I raised a curtain.
"Gentlemen," I said, "the sun is rising. You must now breakfast with us." They declined. They had supped!
In the terrible fight at Port Walthall near Petersburg, my husband rendered essential service. Among the few papers I preserved in a secret drawer of the only trunk I saved, were two, one signed Bushrod Johnson, the other D. H. Hill. The latter says: "The victory at Walthall Junction was greatly due to General Roger A. Pryor. But for him it is probable we might have been surprised and defeated." The other from General Johnson runs at length: "At the most critical juncture General Roger A. Pryor rendered me most valuable service, displaying great zeal, energy, and gallantry in reconnoitring the positions of the enemy, arranging my line of battle, and rendering successful the operations and movements of the conflict." At General Johnson's request my husband served with him during the midsummer. Such letters I have in lieu of medal or ribbon,—a part only of much of similar nature; but less was given to many a man who as fully deserved recognition.
Having been in active service in all the events around Petersburg, my husband was now requested by General Lee to take with him a small squad 207of men, and learn something of the movements of the enemy.
"Grant knows all about me," he said, "and I know too little about Grant. You were a school-boy here, General, and have hunted in all the by-paths around Petersburg. Knowing the country better than any of us, you are the best man for this important duty."
Accordingly, armed with a pass from General Lee, my husband set forth on his perilous scouting expeditions, sometimes being absent a week at a time. During these scouting trips he had had adventures, narrow escapes, and also some opportunities for gratifying, what has ever been the controlling principle of his nature, the desire to help the unfortunate. Once he brought me early in the mornin............