Again in Washington  
By September I had reopened correspondence with many Washington friends. As will have been seen by a perusal of certain preceding letters, the question of giving me permission to return to the capital already had been broached to the President and Secretary of War, by Judge Black and others. It was now again brought to the attention of Mr. Johnson, by Mr. Duff Green, a long-time friend of ex-Governor Clay, of my husband, and of the President’s. It was the first application of all that had been sent to the Government to bring a response. The Executive’s reply was couched as follows:
“I am directed by the President to say that an application for permission to visit Washington, made by Mrs. C. C. Clay, Jr., over her own name, will be considered by him.
R. Morrow,
“Major and A. A. G., Secretary.”
In forwarding this communication to me, Mr. Green wrote:
“We think there is nothing to prevent your coming at once. To wait for permission may delay you weeks, and perhaps months. Your coming would not prejudice either yourself or your husband, and you can do more by a personal application to the President than by an application ‘over your own name.’”
Two months dragged by, however, ere I could complete arrangements for the journey and detach myself from our clinging parents, who, deprived of all of their other children, now placed their dependence upon me. Notwithstanding 301their hearts ached for some assurance of Mr. Clay’s safety, they were ill-disposed to look upon my projected trip with favour. Huntsville was in complete subjugation to the Federal representatives. We had numerous reasons to realise the pitiless and cruel policy that had been inaugurated by our conquerors, and few to lead us to look for kinder things at the hands of the powers at Washington. The reports that reached us of the treatment accorded to those Southerners who had already proceeded to the capital, even allowing for the prejudice of editors unfriendly to us, were not of a kind to encourage a hope for clemency or justice there. The efforts of the wives of other prisoners to communicate with their husbands, their applications to the Government to grant them the right of trial, not only had been of no avail, but, in some instances, had made them the direct objects of attack from those inimical to them. “I have had a weary time,” one wrote late in October, “but of that, if you knew how weary, you would cry out ‘No more an’ you love me,’ rather than bear the infliction of the retrospect, so I will not torment you.” ... President Johnson’s remarks to the South Carolina Delegation, concerning Mrs. Davis’s efforts, became the talk of the country. I was astonished when I learned that she had never written a line without consultation with Mr. Schley and his, in turn, consulting General Steedman upon the tenor of her letters, and receiving the approval of both on the manner of presenting the subject. It was the old fable of the lamb whose grandfather muddied the stream.
Such news served further to convince my husband’s parents of the futility of the trip I was contemplating. They urged that I would be attacked on every side so soon as I entered the Federal capital; they pleaded, too, alas! the stringency of our present means, a very vital objection just then to us whose every possession had either been “confiscated” or otherwise rendered useless 302to us. Nevertheless, every moment anxiety was consuming me. I resolved to act while I had the strength, and made known my resolve to our parents.
The middle of November had arrived ere, by the aid of Mr. Robert Herstein, a kindly merchant of Huntsville (“may his tribe increase”), who advanced me $100 in gold (and material for a silk gown, to be made when I should reach my destination), I was enabled to begin my journey to the capital. Under the escort of a kind friend and neighbour, Major W. H. Echols, of Huntsville, who, having in mind the securing of a certain patent, arranged his plans so as to accompany me to Washington, I bade father and mother “good-bye” and stepped aboard the train. My heart sometimes beat high with hope, yet, at others, I trembled at what I might encounter. Fortunately for the preservation of my courage, I had no forewarning that I had looked, for the last time, upon the sorrowful face of our mother. Her closing words, in that heartbreaking farewell, were of hope that I would soon return bringing with me her dearest son. With the desire to cheer them both, I wrote back merrily as I proceeded on my way; but, indeed, I had small need to affect a spirit of buoyancy; for, from the beginning, I was the recipient of innumerable kindnesses from fellow-travellers who learned my identity. In many instances my fare was refused by friendly railroad conductors.
“I have paid literally nothing thus far,” I wrote from Louisville, Kentucky, which city I reached early in the morning of November 15th. “At Nashville,” my letter added, “we took sleeping cars, which were as luxurious as the bed that now invites me. I had, however, an amusing, and, at first blush, an alarming nocturnal adventure. I was waked by the rattling of paper at my head, and, half unconsciously putting out my hand, it lighted on the hairy back of some animal! I sprang 303out of bed, raised the curtain, and there sat, in the corner of my berth, the most monstrous coon you ever saw! The black around his eyes at first made him appear like an owl, but he proved to be a genuine old ‘zip coon.’ So I got out one of ‘Mammy ’Ria’s’ nice biscuit, which have been greatly complimented by my friends, and asked him please to come out of my bed and eat some supper. But he wouldn’............