A Civil War Christmas

by John C. Rigdon

A Civil War CHRISTMAS

Introduction ~ 3 Is Jingle Bells a Confederate Carol? ~ 4 The Story Behind I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day ~ 7 Within the Lines ~ 10 The W artime Journal of a Y oung Georgia Girl ~ 19 Wartime Young Christmas in the Confederate White House ~ 33 Letters F rom Home ~ 39 From Epilogue ~ 50

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“The South is a land that has known sorrows; it is a land that has broken the ashen crust and moistened it with tears; a land scarred and riven by the plowshare of war and billowed with the graves of her dead; but a land of legend, a land of song, a land of hallowed and heroic memories.

“T o that land every drop of my blood, every “To fiber of my being, every pulsation of my heart, is consecrated forever forever.. I was born of her womb; I was nurtured at her breast; and when my last hour shall come, I pray GOD that I may be pillowed upon her bosom and rocked to sleep within her tender and encircling arms.”

Edward Carmack United States House of R epresentatives Representatives

“ When my bones they lay down In the cold cold ground Have someone play Dixie for me.”

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Is Jingle Bells a Confederate Carol?

by Hu Daughtry

O.K. This is one great story: brace yourself yourself.. Jingle Bells is not a Christmas song. - And it’s VERY Southern.

Written by James P ierpont in 1857, and republished in 1859, it Pierpont memorializes the ‘cutter ‘cutter’’ drag races in Boston, where spiffed out sleighs would race between Medford and Malden Squares, and the drivers would try to pick up the local chicks.

Young James was a rogue; he abandoned his family several times, took up arms for the Confederacy (his father was a Boston Abolitionist minister), and, after his first wife died, he aban doned his children to take another wife, who may or may have already been pregnant with Pierpont’s child. He was living the fast times in the horse and buggy days, but if you really look hard, you’ll see that rock-and-roll was out there, even before it had a beat.

James Lord P ierpont once belonged to that elite, fighting equestrian unit Pierpont known as The F ifth Georgia Cavalry Fifth Cavalry.. He served in Company H, well known to Northern adversaries as “The Lamar R angers.” Since his Rangers.” compiled service records list him as “a company clerk,” it is doubtful that he eexperienced xperienced a substantial amount of combat. But, P rivate Private Pierpont was not “your prototypical Confederate Horse Soldier;” being a native of New England (Massachusetts), he was the son of a radical abolitionist, who was also a poet and a Unitarian Minister Minister.. During “That W ar Of The R ebellion,” P astor John P ierpont served as Chaplain War Rebellion,” Pastor Pierpont of The 22nd Massachusetts R egiment. At the time, he was 76 years of Regiment. age.

Born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1822, James P ierpont moved to SaPierpont vannah Georgia circa 1853. His older brother ierpont, Jr ., had brother,, John P Pierpont, Jr., accepted a pastoral post with The Savannah, Georgia Unitarian Congregation. Y oung James accompanied his brother as the organist / music Young director for The Church.

Following the death of his first wife ( in the mid 1850’s from that malady known as tuberculosis), James married a local girl, who just happened to be the daughter of Savannah Mayor Thomas P urse. Hence, his roots Purse. were now deeply embedded in Savannah’s Southern soil!

By the time the decade of the 1860’s rolled around, The Unitarian Church of Savannah, 5 Georgia had ceased to eexist. xist. Of course, this was directly related to its radical abolitionist leanings and inclinations — which weren’t incredibly popular down South in Savannah, Georgia during those final Ante-Bellum years. As one might readily eexpect, xpect, R everend John Reverend Pierpont, Jr Jr.. packed his bags and headed “Due North.” His younger brother brother,, James, remained in Savannah. In April of 1862, James joined an outfit known as “The Isle of Hope Volunteers.” Subsequently Subsequently,, as alluded to earlier earlier,, this unit would be designated as “Company H of The F ifth Georgia Cavalry .”

Fifth Cavalry.”

In 1857, James wrote a jingle called ONE HORSE OPEN SLEIGH. A couple of years later later,, he changed the name of the composition to JINGLE BELLS. Initially Initially,, in 1859, it wasn’t a Christmas Carol. F or decades, it remained little more than an obscure sleighing For song.

By the time James L. P ierpont passed away in 1893, JINGLE BELLS had generated precious Pierpont few royalties. It did not become a popular Christmas Carol until the days of radio broadcasts and phonograph records. inter Haven, Florida, he is interred in Laurel Grove Although James died in W Winter Cemetery in Savannah. He lies in a state of eternal rest beside his brother-in-law brother-in-law,, irst Manassas. urse, who was killed in action at F Thomas P First Purse, Here’s the original lyrics: Dashing thro’ the snow snow,, In a one-horse open sleigh, O’er the hills we go, Laughing all the way; Bells on bob tail ring, Making spirits bright, Oh what sport to ride and sing A sleighing song to night.

Chorus: Jingle bells, Jingle bells, Jingle all the way; Oh! what joy it is to ride In a one horse open sleigh.

Jingle bells, Jingle bells, Jingle all the way; Oh! what joy it is to ride In a one horse open sleigh.

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A day or two ago, I thought I’d take a ride, And soon Miss F annie Bright Fannie Was seated by my side, The horse was lean and lank; Misfortune seemed his lot, He got into a drifted bank, And we, we got upsot.

Chorus A day or two ago, The story I must tell I went out on the snow And on my back I fell; A gent was riding by In a one-horse open sleigh, He laughed as there I sprawling lie, But quickly drove away away..

Chorus Now the ground is white Go it while you’re young, Take the girls to night And sing this sleighing song; Just get a bob tailed bay Two forty as his speed.

Hitch him to an open sleigh And crack, you’ll take the lead.

James P ierpont also wrote and composed numerous other tunes; during Pierpont the four years of hostilities between North and South, he further eexhibxhibited his Southern P atriotism by composing music for His Beloved ConPatriotism federacy TTLE FLAG, STRIKE federacy.. Such pseudo-anthems as OUR BA BAT FOR THE SOUTH, AND WE CONQUER OR DIE are musical creations penned by P rivate P ierpont.

Private Pierpont.

It is quite simple to ascertain why many New Englanders (who were ierpont to be a familiar with The P ierpont F amily) considered James P Pierpont Family) Pierpont rebellious musician with a bad reputation! One Massachusetts Mayor even referred to him as “a bit of a rogue!”

In closing, “is JINGLE BELLS a R ebel T une?” Y ou bet it is!

Rebel Tune?”

You Daughtry, Hu. Published in the December, 2008 edition of the Dispatch, Newsletter of the Dixie Guards SCV, Metter, GA. Used by permission.

The Story Behind I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day One of America’s best known poets, Henry W adsworth Longfellow Wadsworth (1807-1882), contributed to the wealth of carols sung each Christmas season, when he composed the words to “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day ” on December 25th 1864.

The carol was originally a poem, “Christmas Bells,” containing seven stanzas. T wo stanzas were omitted, which contained references to the Two Civil W ar War ar,, thus giving us the carol in its present form. The poem gave birth to the carol, “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day ,” and the reDay,” maining five stanzas were slightly rearranged in 1872 by John Baptiste Calkin (1827-1905), who also gave us the memorable tune.

When Longfellow penned the words to his poem, America was still months away from Lee’s surrender to Grant at Appomatto x Court Appomattox House on April 9th 1865; and, his poem reflected the prior years of the war ’s despair war’s despair,, while ending with a confident hope of triumphant peace.

As with any composition that touches the heart, “I Heard the Bells on xperience of Longfellow– involving Christmas Day ” flowed from the eexperience anny and the crippling injury of his son the tragic death of his wife F Fanny Charles from war wounds. rances Appleton on July 13th 1843, and they settled Henry married F Frances down in the historic Craigie House overlooking the Charles River in Cambridge, Massachusetts. They were blessed with the birth of their first child, Charles, on June 9th 1844, and eventually eventually,, the Longfellow household numbered five children– Charles, Ernest, Alice, Edith, and Allegra.

Alice, the Longfellows’ third child and first daughter daughter,, was delivered, while her mother was under the anesthetic influence of ether– the first in North America.

Tragedy struck the Longfellow family in 1861. F anny Longfellow was Fanny fatally burned in an accident in the library of Craigie House on July 10th.

The day before the accident, F anny Longfellow recorded in her journal: Fanny “ We are all sighing for the good sea breeze instead of this stifling land one filled with dust. P oor Allegra is very droopy with heat, and Edie has Poor

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8 to get her hair in a net to free her neck from the weight.”

After trimming some of seven year old Edith’s beautiful curls, F anny decided to preserve the Fanny clippings in sealing wax. Melting a bar of sealing wax with a candle, a few drops fell unnoticed upon her dress. The longed for sea breeze gusted through the window window,, igniting the light material of F anny ’s dress– immediately wrapping her in flames. In her attempt to protect Fanny Edith and Allegra, she ran to Henry ’s study in the ne xt room, where Henry frantically atnext tempted to eextinguish xtinguish the flames with a nearby nearby,, but undersized throw rug.

Failing to stop the fire with the rug, he tried to smother the flames by throwing his arms around F rances– severely burning his face, arms, and hands. F anny Longfellow died the ne xt Frances– Fanny next morning. T oo ill from his burns and grief Too grief,, Henry did not attend her funeral. (Incidentally (Incidentally,, the trademark full beard of Henry W adsworth Longfellow arose from his inability to shave after Wadsworth this tragedy .) tragedy.)

The first Christmas after F anny ’s death, Longfellow wrote, “How ine xpressibly sad are all Fanny inexpressibly holidays.” A year after the incident, he wrote, “I can make no record of these days. Better leave them wrapped in silence. P erhaps someday God will give me peace.” Longfellow ’s jourPerhaps Longfellow’s nal entry for December 25th 1862 reads: “‘ A merry Christmas’ say the children, but that is no “‘A more for me.”

Almost a year later later,, Longfellow received word that his oldest son Charles, a lieutenant in the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry Cavalry,, had been severely wounded with a bullet passing under his shoulder blades and taking off one of the spinal processes. The Christmas of 1863 was silent in Longfellow ’s journal.

Longfellow’s Lt. Charles Longfellow (1863)

Finally inally,, on Christmas Day of 1864, he wrote the words of the poem, “Christmas Bells.” The reelection of Abraham Lincoln or the possible end of the terrible war may have been the occasion for the poem.

Lt. Charles Longfellow did not die that Christmas, but lived. So, contrary to popular belief belief,, the occasion of writing that much loved Christmas carol was not due to Charles’ death.

“Christmas Bells”

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(The original poem, complete with all seven stanzas)

“I heard the bells on Christmas Day Their old familiar carols play play,, And wild and sweet The words repeat Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head; “There is no peace on earth,” I said; “F or hate is strong, “For And mocks the song Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

And thought how how,, as the day had come, The belfries of all Christendom Had rolled along The unbroken song Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: “God is not dead; nor doth he sleep!

The W rong shall fail, Wrong The Right prevail, With peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Till, ringing, singing on its way way,, The world revolved from night to day day,, A voice, a chime A chant sublime Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

The original stanzas 4 and 5 (below) speak of the battle, and are usually omitted from hymnals:

Then from each black accursed mouth The cannon thundered in the South, And with the sound The carols drowned Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent The hearth-stones of a continent, And made forlorn The households born Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

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"W ithin The Lines" "Within Exerpts from..

A Diary by Mary Jones P olk Polk

"...T o this record I have added my memories of the home of my youth, "...To under Southern skies. Then later the eexperiences xperiences of a Southern woman during the Civil W ar War ar.. This long retrospect of mine faithfully portrays life in the South as it was in ante-bellum times, and then afterward in her mourning vestments. The beautiful. heroic South~ I write with a loving hand as I pay this tribute to the past."

Mary Jones P olk Polk Around Christmastime, after the return of my cousin and myself to T ennessee our lives could Tennessee be described as like most Southern girls of that period. W ealthy Southerners usually resided Wealthy on their plantations and visited friends in their carriages, many miles apart, staying two or three days or sometimes longer longer..

The Old Southern Mammy Mammy..

In the "quarters," as the negro cabins were called, there was usually a band, which played at night for the "white folks" to dance. "Old Maseel." irginia R ter" always led off in the "V Reel."

"Virginia Our nurses we always called "Mammy ," and it was not considered "Mammy," good manners to address any old negro man or woman otherwise than as "uncle" or "aunt," adding the name whatever that might be - the surname was always the master's.

We were taught to treat them with respect. There was such a kindly feeling on both sides between the owners and their slaves - inherited kindly feelings. How could it be otherwise? Many were descendants of those who had served in the same family for generations - for instance, the nurse who nursed my children was the daughter of my nurse, and irginia (I cannot her grandmother had nursed my mother maid,Virginia mother.. My maid,V recall the time when she was not my maid) was a very handsome young mulatto to whom I was especially attached.

When she was married in her white dress and long veil flowing to her feet, the ceremony was performed in our back parlor Otey,, parlor,, and Bishop Otey ennessee, officiated. the first bishop of T Tennessee, How great the pride the negroes felt in the wealth and importance of their owners, and interest indeed in all of their affairs, amusingly so, sometimes! I recall an old woman, coal black, a red bandanna handker

oung missis chief tied over her kinky locks, and great dignity of manner "Young manner,, she said to me: "Y ." should marry her cousin, Marse T om, and keep our family likeness in our family family."

Tom,

Our Social Life.

Indeed, ours was a gay and free-from-care life. I can recall delightful summers at Old P oint Point Comfort, and the Greenbrier White, in V irginia - winters in which I journeyed from my Virginia father's plantation, near Helena, Ark ansas, to New Orleans.

Arkansas, There were palatial boats on the Mississippi river then, for there was no other way to reach New Orleans. At each landing, often at night, lighted by the pine torches on the bank, the roustabouts would roll aboard the heavy bales of cotton, singing as they crossed the gangway their gay songs. At their nearest landing, planters would come aboard with their wives and daughters to do their annual shopping in the "city ," and the big boat would plow "city," its way down the broad river with gay passengers laughing, dancing, singing, and many a love tale, told upon the guards until it rounded at the dock of delightful New Orleans - the city of camelias, cape jasmines and violets. New Orleans, the beautiful metropolis of the South.

At Greenville, Mississippi, a large party came on board, of young planters paying their annual visit to their commission merchants, or with their sisters and sweethearts, going to enjoy the gaieties of the city ormerly all families of prominence in the South knew of each city.. F Formerly other so we quickly formed one party party,, and they added much to our enjoyment.

The ne xt summer I went to the "Greenbrier White," in V irginia, next Virginia, with my uncle, Andrew P olk, his wife and daughter Polk, daughter,, then a child, Antoinette P olk, afterward the Baronne de Charette. There could Polk, not have been a more delightful place. Brilliant belles from all over the South - gay cavaliers, chivalric and courteous. I recall my saying: "There is nothing more Iovely - Brilliant belles from all over the South - gay cavaliers, chivalric and courteous. I recall my saying: "There is nothing more I wish for on earth; I am perfectly happy ." happy."

It was on the morning of November 29, 1859, that Col. Joseph Branch and I were married at "Buena V ista," my father's, home, at Vista," Columbia, T ennessee. Colonel Branch was finely educated, benevoTennessee. lent and honorable, and I may be eexcused xcused for saying, handsome.

Upon my arrival as a bride at the plantation I found the house servants drawn up in a line on the front porch to greet me and the house brilliantly illuminated. Among them was "Aunt Beck," a dignitary

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12 of great importance, my husband's nurse and then his cook. She was a privileged character character..

Colonel Branch's mother had left the children to the care of this devoted nurse on her deathbed, and her affection for them was boundless.

As Governor Branch's cook in W ashington, where he was Secretary of the Navy Washington, Navy,, she had also been their consoler in many an escapade. The summer after my marriage, 1860, I spent in the East and I had no idea of the feeling in the North against the South. My maid was soon enticed away at Niagara. F rom thence we went to the Continental Hotel, in Philadelphia.

From The hotel was filled with Southerners.

A few evenings after our arrival a procession of a thousand men, bearing torches, stopped in front of the Continental, and were addressed from a platform in front of the hotel by Charles Frances Adams. I remember a part of his speech in which he said: "The North should be made a haven to the oppressed negro of the South," and his other remarks were to the same purpose.

We felt wantonly insulted, and for the first time I had a foreboding for the future, which grew stronger during our visit to the Greenbrier White Sulphur Springs, of V irginia, soon after Virginia, after..

The "White" was different from what I had ever known it before. There was the "German" in the morning and the ball at night, but there was a tone of seriousness underneath it all.

The young men, and the old, could be seen in groups discussing some point that was evidently rom White exciting them. W From Wee felt the gathering clouds that foreboded the coming storm. F ennessee. Everything there seemed beautifully peaceful Sulphur we returned to our home in T Tennessee. and calm.

Tennessee's first vote against secession was sixty thousand, as the old Whig party ennessee, was opposed to it, party,, which had great strength in T Tennessee, but when her sister States seceeded, T ennessee went with them, and her Tennessee best blood flowed freely in the cause.

Tennessee was a border State and she and V irginia bore the brunt of Virginia the war war.. It is stated that one-fifth of the dead of both armies was on Tennessee soil.

The T ragedy Begins Tragedy Oh, the horrors of civil war! My mother was a Spartan mother mother,, and she said to her four boys, "Go and do your duty duty.. There was my gay and om, who left his wife and children; Lucius, whose handsome brother Tom, brother,, T ufus. name I can not write without a pang; Cadwalader Rufus.

Cadwalader,, and R ennessee, Colonel Branch was in jail for a few days in Columbia, T Tennessee, xiled by General Negley with the penalty then eexiled penalty,, if ever caught in federal lines, to be hung as a spy spy,, and property confiscated. In the meantime my ista. mother and I were alone at Buena V Vista.

There were five hundred soldiers - a cavalry command- encamped about the place, but the officers were kind and placed pickets at the doors for our safety et, notwithstanding, safety.. Y Yet, we had nightly alarms and the house often searched. I recall one occasion, as my mother and I weredriving from Columbia, with many contraband articles, we were stopped by two pickets, who proceeded to search the carriage.

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As one soldier picked up some trifling article of my mother's, she eexclaimed, xclaimed, "W ould you "Would deprive me of that small pleasure?" The other soldier soldier,, at the same time, saw a pair of soldier's gauntlets, I intended for General Cleburne. He looked at me, saw the terror in my face, a vision before me of Irving Block, in Nashville, where rebel women were confined, and then turning to the other soldier he winked at me and said, "Come away away,, there is nothing there, let these ladies go on."

Many letters and supplies and these same gauntlets we carried to Florence, Alabama, to soldiers there. Of course, we ran a great risk, but we relied upon our coachman, who was very loyal to us, and secreted some of the letters upon his person.

A federal raid had just taken place in the country through which we passed, and houses, farms and fences burned, the fire still smouldering where food had been cooked. It became dark and our coachman was blind at night, and the road so covered with autumn leaves we lost our way way.. I walked in front, putting aside the leaves, to find traces of the road, and calling out, "Drive to the right, drive to the left." At last I saw a fence and, following it up, we came to a substantial log house, and were barely in it before a cavalry company came dashing up, demanding if some of "Wheeler's soldiers were not there." F ortunately for us, our host was a Fortunately well-known Union man, and the house was not searched. The few Union men were occasionally of great service to their friends and relations.

My brother-in- law ussel Houston, for instance, whose brother law,, Judge R Russel brother,, Governor Houston, of Alabama, and all of his own and his wife's family were "secessionists," stood very high among the federals (as Union men of his ability and social prestige in the South were very rare), and, in consequence, there was a great deal in his power power..

My sister was very loyal to her husband, but natural feeling would assert itself window,, when a cavalry itself.. I recollect standing with her at a window company of General Wheeler's, who had been burning bridges between Columbia and Nashville to prevent the approach of the enemy enemy,, came dashing through the town, closely pursued by a federal company company.. My xclaimed, "Oh, if xcitement, clasped her hands and eexclaimed, sister sister,, in her eexcitement, they had but wings to fly!"

But amidst this gloom there were occasional flashes of sunlight. When the Confederates were in possession how gay it was, and the soldiers such toasts.

14 My brother Lucius went into the battle as a first lieutenant. His regiment, the first Ark ansas Arkansas was cut to pieces, the captain of the company made a prisoner prisoner,, and left with but one officer officer.. olk took command and led the regiment for two days. The ne xt day after the Lieutenant P Polk next battle he was elected colonel by the men unanimously and appointed afterwards. Of that heroic brother what could I not tell? There was never a nobler and more magnanimous spirit, united to a tenderer and more merciful one - to write of him even in the "so long ago" sends a pang to my heart.

On December 15, 1864, I started for the plantation in Ark ansas with my nurse and small Arkansas family to see my husband. Nashville was in F ederal lines, but I had a permit to go to MemFederal phis, via Louisville. There, through the influence of my brother-in-law ussel Houston, brother-in-law,, Judge R Russel then of Louisville, whose handsome home in Nashville had just been burned to the ground to build F ort Houston, I was permitted to take with me many contraband articles. I had a shoe Fort trunk filled with sugar and medicines, and an overcoat for my husband, with tobacco in the pockets to give the provost marshal the impression that I was carrying an old, worn coat.

These articles were sealed by the provost marshal to prevent inspection. W Wee embarked upon the Golden Eagle, a boat which on the trip before had carried negro soldiers. In consequence,we were fired upon all the way down the river river,, a flash from the bushes on the banks and a volley of shot. I was in the pilot house, and it was the object to disable the pilot of our boat - the shot flew thick and fast around us. W floor,, and lay Wee all fell uponthe floor trembling until the guerillas were out of sight.

At last we arrived at Memphis and changed our boat for the Commonwealth. The captain refused to take pay from a Southern woman, until I assured him I was well supplied with money money..

Ne xt we stopped at Helena, where General Buford, of K entucky Next Kentucky entucky,, who was in command and noted for his petty tyranny tyranny,, refused to let me proceed farther farther.. I pleaded, and then wept, but soon restrained my tears when I noticed the eexpression xpression of his face.

He was indignant, and replied, "Madam, my refusal was in kindness, ointer with your Uncle Leonidas, but now you return est P as I was a W Pointer West to Memphis on the first boat that lands here."

The boat came in an hour tow,, another steamboat hour.. It had lashed to it, in tow x patients, soldiers whom they were sending to filled with smallpo smallpox some hospital in the North. The odor was insufferable, although xclude the air there were heavy tarpaulins on that side to eexclude air.. I was terrified (as Laurence, my baby baby,, was sick, and soon broke out with an eruption which proved to be measles), but there was no appeal.

For seven weeks we were compelled to remain in Memphis at the Gayosa Hotel. No one was allowed to pass the lines, to go out or to come in Memphis. I did not know the reason then, but knew afterward - Hood's army was advancing into middle T ennesee.

Tennesee.

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At last, on Christmas day day,, we were permitted to leave. I went with my aunt, Mrs. Andrew Polk, to headquarters to ask a pass to proceed down the river river,, my second attempt. The general was absent, but the officer in command very sternly refused to give it to me, saying the general had left such orders in regard to all applications. I thought it hopeless, and was preparing sadly to leave, when, all at once, there was such a transformation, such a desire to assist, such kindness!

My astonishment was great. My aunt was a beautiful and charming woman.

On the third day after my arrival I was having a pleasant talk in my sitting-room, with an old gentleman, a neighbor neighbor,, when the doors opening upon the front gallery were thrown simultaneously open, and blue-coated soldiers swarmed into the room.

R ealizing the absolute necessity of coolness, I arose, and said to the leader leader,, apparently: "If you will control your men, I will supply what they demand, water water,, towels and food."

"They are helping themselves," he said, as a chicken flew past, followed by half a dozen soldiers in pursuit. He looked at me, and said: "I see that you are a woman of sense, so I will give you a little advice. Behave as you are doing now now,, and you will have no trouble. Here comes the captain now!" Looking out I saw advancing down the road an officer at the head of a hundred cavalry cavalry.. He behaved with great politeness, and remarked that at the plantation above us (the Douglas), "the house had been set on fire three times, as the ladies had been so insulting to the soldiers that he had found difficulty in controlling them."

They stayed two days, the men encamped upon the place, the officers in the house.

One of them picked up an album, and looking at a photograph, said: illow "Who is this?" I said: "General P illow,, an uncle of Colonel Branch's Pillow first wife."

"And this?" olk, the uncle of Colonel "That," I said, "is General Leonidas P Polk, Branch's second wife. This," I went on to say say,, as he turned another olk, my brother leaf brother,, and this, General Polk, leaf,, "is General Lucius P Laurence Branch, killed at Sharpsburg."

16 "What a nest of rebels!" he eexclaimed, xclaimed, and closed the book in disgust.

I left soon after to weep and wring my hands in the retirement of my room, and then to appear composed and calm before the soldiers.

The war had ended - the long agony was over over,, and again we met in our mother's home, in Columbia, T ennessee.

Tennessee.

First came Lucius, bravest of the brave, on crutches. Ne xt, Cadwalader Next, Cadwalader,, whose horse was shot from under him, and he left for dead on the battle-field at P rairie Grove. Ne xt, R ufus, Prairie Next, Rufus, who spent his seventeenth birthday in a prison on Johnson's Island.

We met again, in the parlor ranklin, Generals Cleburne, parlor,, where, after the battle of F Franklin, Granberry and Stahl had been laid, before they were interred at St. John's churchyard.

A bloody handkerchief was over General Cleburne's face, but one of his staff took from his pocket an embroidered one, and said: "Cover his face with this; it was sent him from Mobile, and I think that he was engaged to the young lady ." lady."

No wonder that it is said that the jingle of spurs and the measured tread of a Confederate soldier is often heard in the hall of the old house at night!

We separated, for yet another battle - the battle for our daily bread, and with no resources, and the debt of five years, growing in interest, before us!

The men who were in that war have not been long- lived, as a rule.

Sickness, hardship and wounds impaired their vitality vitality.. They worked with the same doggedness of purpose, uncomplaining and in silence, as did Lee, their great leader leader..

But hope was gone - no longer there to vivify their souls. econstruction days. It would have been very different if Then came R Reconstruction the negroes had been left to themselves, and not listened to the "carpet-baggers" who swarmed over the South, but by them they were incited to lawlessness and insult. ista," which My husband and I went to our beautiful home, "Buena V Vista," had been my father's. It was endeared to me by a thousand memories of childhood and girlhood. There had I been married, and there had my children been born. It was a large, old- fashioned brick house, on an elevation. On one side, a garden bordered with the Microfilla rose, and one side, a garden bordered with its summer house and arbor

festooned with wreaths of yellow jasmine - its garden beds in the old style, with borders of 17 bo x, trimmed square. In front of the house a climbing rose, twenty feet high, still hung from box, an oak, in which were embedded the bullets of the enemy enemy.. Upon the gallery had stood a Confederate soldier soldier,, a mere youth, who had fired from behind the pillars, until the boy fell dead, riddled with bullets.

In the joy of meeting, we tried to forget the past - and we were happy happy.. My husband, big in heart as well as stature, and the four children, mere babies, and the father's delight in them.

He was of so bright and sanguine a nature, it was an inspiration to be with him. I, leaning on him for love and protection! In my checkered life was it not a dream of heaven! I carry it with me when days are dark, and turn to that picture of the past.

Two years of this ideal life passed, and a summons came from the plantation in Ark ansas, and Arkansas, he must leave.

Colonel Branch left our home on November 11, 1867. I wished to go with him, but the care of the little children and the place prevented, and crippled by the war war,, our means were not what they had been. I had a premonition of ill, as I gave him the farewell kiss.

Two days after he arrived at the plantation, he walked the main road to examine a bridge over the bayou, which needed repairs. As he stood there, endleton, in it, came up. a buggy with the physician on the place, Doctor P Pendleton, Doctor P endleton had charge of the hospitals of the two plantations.

Pendleton He had been drinking heavily and was seeking a quarrel, so he called to Colonel Branch, making an insulting remark, and drew his pistol.

The Death of Colonel Branch.

My husband raised his hand and cried out: "I am unarmed"; but the fatal shot was fired, passing completely through his body body.. He fell upon the bank, partially paralyzed, and the negroes, rushing from the cotton-field, bore him to the house. They filled his room, weeping, and ill no crying aloud, while his old nurse knelt beside him. He said: "W "Will one write to my wife, and tell her 'farewell' for me."

The crying of the negroes distressed him, so he said: "Let only a few come in at a time to bid me farewell." This they did, and so he passed away away..

The negroes were wild, they declared he should be avenged. Many of them had been in his family for generations, and some in mine. None had left during the war; this was two years afterward, and still all were there, faithful to the close.

18 They armed themselves with guns, anything with which they could kill, and started to Judge Fletcher's plantation, where Doctor P endleton had just arrived. The old judge had turned to Pendleton him, and said: "If you killed Colonel Branch, get out of my house this moment," when an overseer from our place, came dashing through a short cut to the house, and cried out: "Go, for your life; the Branch negroes are on your track, and they will kill you , as sure as there is a God in heaven."

Communication was very slow in those days, and a week had passed before I arrived at the plantation. I wished my husband to be interred in St. John's Cemetery ennesCemetery,, at Columbia, T Tennessee. I traveled on the Henry Ames, the boat on which I had gone down the river on my bridal trip eight years before, and on the anniversary anniversary.. I had only heard that he was wounded, but as we met each Ark ansas River packet, the captain would call out for news through his speakArkansas ing-trumpet: "How is Colonel Branch?" At last I heard the answer ...the answer came, "He is answer...the dead."

Many years have passed since then, and my days glide serenely by by,, only speed more swiftly swiftly,, as rivers hurry when they near their destination, the ocean's depths. I can not tear my thoughts from that past life and those I loved so much, and I sometimes feel that they are very near me, and I recall the words of Isaiah: itnesses Encompass Us About."

"Seeing What a Cloud of W Witnesses My mother mother,, may she be near me; may her sweet eyes gaze in mine.

Does she watch and pray beside me, with a mother's love divine?

Can He be near near,, my dearest? The world seemed a dream of bliss, When, alas! so soon he left me to the bitterness of this.

A witness, may be, my brother brother,, with his wounds a tale to tell Of battle-fields where heroes fought and the conquered banner fell.

Silent and grand, like sculptured knight, he waits in his lowly bed, The sound of the reveillĂŠ to call soldier from the dead.

They come on silent wing through the blue realms of space, With a glory caught from Heaven, upon each radiant face.

We feel their presence near us, and a rapture, as of yore, Comes o'er us, as they whisper "Love is love forever more."

God's messengers, sent to us in the silent hour of prayer prayer,, In whispers and in dreams - it may be in visions rare eace, They soothe us with the thought of that blessed land of P Peace, Where tears shall never flow and all life's troubles cease.

The spirits are about us, but, alas, we cannot see, For our vision's dim and blinded to Heaven's great mystery mystery..

But with dying eyes we'll see them, as we leave this world of sin. aradise that we may enter in.

They'll ope' the gates of P Paradise

Time Journal of arThe W ar-T Waroung Georgia Girl AY Young

19

by Eliza F rances Andrews 1864-1865 Frances “In the fall of 1864, while Sherman’s army was lying around Atlanta like a pent up“ torrent ready to burst forth at any moment, my father was afraid to let us get out of his sight, and we all stood waiting in our defenseless homes till we could see what course the destroying flood would take. Happily for us it passed by without engulfing the little town of W ashington, where our home Washington, was situated, and after it had swept over the capital of the State, reaching Milledgeville November 23d, rolled on toward toward Savannah, where the sound of merry Christmas bells was hushed by the roar of its angry waters.”

Eliza F rances Andrews was born in W ashington, Georgia in 1840. The daughter of a Frances Washington, prominent judge and accustomed to all the niceties of life, she was caught up in the Civil War as an enthusiastic supporter of her home under Southern skies. She kept a simple diary of what was going on around and in her life. And she was very verbal about her feelings of the war and the treatment of the Southern people both during the war and through the “reconstruction.” The diary was written in a time of storm and tempest, of bitter hatreds and fierce animosities, and its pages are saturated with the spirit of the time. Attesting to the fact that the Old South was not the monstrosity that some would have us believe, but merely a case of belated survival.

I have read this diary from start to finish, and was totally captivated. his was a true daughter of the South, and so very proud of her heritage. I have tried to pick a few of the entries from her diary which began as Sherman was making his march across Georgia. This can in no way even begin to document the events which happened in this young girl’s life in such a brief but everlasting time in 1864-65. The last entry was made August 29, 1865.

She and her sister were making a trip to her older sister ’s home in sister’s Albany for safety reasons, only to get there and learn that the sleepy ashington, Georgia had become the very little town they had left,W left,Washington, center or mecca of the war as the Confederacy was crumbling. There are “shades of Scarlett” in this lady ’s life!

20 By the middle of December December,, communication, though subject to many difficulties and discomforts, was so well established that my father concluded it would be practicable for us to make the journey to our sisters. W Wee were eager to go, and would be safer safer,, he thought, when once across the line, than at home.

Sherman had industriously spread the impression that his ne xt move would be on either next Charleston or Augusta, and in the latter event, our home would be in the line of danger danger..

So then, after careful consultation with my oldest brother red, we set out under brother,, F Fred, the protection of a reliable man whom my brother detailed to take care of us. It may seem strange to modern readers that two young women should have been sent off on such a journey with no companion of their own se x, but the eexigencies xigencies of the times did away with many sex, conventions.

Then, too, the eexquisite xquisite courtesy and deference of the Southern men of that day toward women made the chaperon ofsecondary importance among us. It was the “male protector protector”” who was indispensable.

I have known matrons of forty wait for weeks on the movements of some male acquaintance rather than take the railroad journey of fifty miles from our village to Augusta, alone; and when I was sent off to boarding school, I remember remember,, the great desideratum was to findsome man who would pilot me safely through the awful difficulties of a railroad journey of 200 miles. W omen, young or old were intrusted to the care of Women, any man known to their family as a gentleman, with a confidence as beautiful as the loyalty that inspired it.”

“About three miles from Sparta we struck the “Burnt Country ,” as it Country,” is well named by the natives, and then I could better understand the wrath and desperation of these poor people. I almost felt as if I should like to hang a Y ankee myself .”

Yankee myself.”

There was hardly a fence left standing all the way from Sparta to Gordon. The fields were trampled down and the road was lined with carcasses of horses, hogs, and cattle that the invaders, unable either to consume or to carry away with them, had been want only shot down to starve out the people and prevent them from making their crops. The stench in some places was unbearable; every few hundred yards we had to hold our noses or stop them with the cologne Mrs. Elzey had given us. The dwellings that were standing all showed signs of pillage, and on every plantation we saw the charred remains of the gin-house and packing-screw packing-screw,, while here and there, lone chimney-stacks, “Sherman’s Sentinels,” told of homes laid in ashes.

The infamous wretches! I couldn’t wonder now that these poor people should want to put a rope round the neck of every “devil of them” they could lay their hands on. Hay ricks and fodder stacks were demolished,

21 corn cribs were empty empty,, and every bale of cotton that could be found was burnt by the savages.

I saw no grain of any sort, eexcept xcept for the little patches spilled on the ground when feeding their horses. There was not even a chicken left to eat it.

“ Crowds of soldiers were tramping over the road in both directions; They were mostly on foot, and I saw numbers seated on the roadside greedily eating raw turnips, meat skins, parched corn -anything they could find, even picking up the loose grains that Sherman’s horses had left.”

Jan.1, 1865 Wednesday ednesday.. - I am just getting well of measles, and a rough time I had of it. Measles is no such small affair after all, especially when aggravated by perpetual alarms of Y ankee raiders.

Yankee For the last week we have lived in a state of incessant fear fear.. All sorts of rumors come up the road and down it, and we never know what to believe. I used to feel very brave about Y ankees, Yankees, but since I have passed over Sherman’s track and seen what devastation they make, I am so afraid of them that I believe I should drop down dead if one of the wretches should come into my presence.

Gen.Sherman told Mr Mr.. Cuyler that he did not intend to leave so much as a blade of grass in SouthWest Georgia. They say his soldiers have sworn that they will spare neither man, South-W woman norchild in all SouthWest Georgia. It is only a question of time, I South-W suppose, when all this will be done.

”It begins to look as if the Y ankees can do whatever they please and go Yankees wherever they wish - eexcept xcept to heaven. I do fervently pray the good Lord will give us rest from them there.”

Feb. 12, Sunday Sunday..

Spring is already breaking in this heavenly climate, and the weather has been lovely to-day to-day.. Theyellow jessamine buds begin to show their golden tips, forget-me-nots are peeping from under the wire grass, and the cherry tree by the dairy is full of green leaves. Spring is so beautiful; I don’t wonder the spring poet breaks loose then. Our “piney woods” don’t enjoy a very poetical reputation, but at this season they are the most beautiful place in the world to me.

Feb. 13, Monday Monday..

Letters from home.

Mary Day had typhoid fever in Augusta. She is too weak to make the journey from Mayfield to Macon, and all non-combatants have been ordered to leave Augusta, so mother invited her to Haywood. Oh, that dear old home! I know it is sweeter than ever now now,, with all those delightful people gathered there. One good thing the war has done

22 among many evils; it has brought us into contact with so many pleasant people we should never have known otherwise.

“I know it must be charming to have all those nice army officers around, and I do want to go back. They write us that little W ashington has gotten to be the great Washington thoroughfare of the Confederacy now .R .” now,, since Sherman has cut the Sou. Car Car.. R R.R .R.” Feb. 16, Thursday Thursday..

We started for Albany for Mrs. W elsh’s party Welsh’s party,, soon after breakfast, but were a good deal delayed on the way by having to wait for a train of forty government wagons to pass. W Wee found Mrs. Julia Butler at Mrs. Sims’s, straight from W ashington, with letters for us, and Washington, plenty of news. I feel anxious to get back now ashington is going to be such a center now,, since W Washington of interest. If the Y anks take Augusta, it will become the headquarters of the department.

Yanks Mrs. Butler says a train of 300 wagons runs between there and Abbeville, and they are surveying a railroad route. Several regiments are stationed there and the town is alive with army officers and government officials. How strange all this seems for dear ashingdear,, quiet little W Washington! It must be delightful, with all those nice army officers.

”I am going back home as soon as I can decently change my mind about coming here.

I have been at the rear all during the war war,, and now I have a chance to go to the front.”

Feb. 26, Sunday Sunday.. -Jimmy Callaway and his father have just come from Washington with such glowing accounts of the eexcitement xcitement and gaiety there that I am distracted to go back home. “If father don’t write for us to come soon, I think we will go to Chunnenuggee by way of Eufaula and the Chattahoochee, and if Thomas’s raiders catch us over in Alabama, father will wish he had let us come home.”

April 2, Sunday Sunday..

I went to church at Mt. Enon. After service we stopped to tell everybody good-by good-by,, and I could hardly help crying, for there is no telling what may happen before we come back; the Y ankees may have put an end to our Yankees glorious old plantation life forever forever.. I went to quarters after dinner and told the negroes good-by oor things, I may never see any of them good-by.. P Poor again. and even if I do, everything will be different. W Wee all went to bed crying, sister sister,, the children, and servants.

”F arewells are serious things in these times, when one never ”Farewells knows where or under what circumstances friends will meet again.”

April 3, Monday Monday..

Albany Albany,, Ga. - All of us very miserable at the thought of parting. The news this evening is that Montgomery has gone, and the new capital of the Confederacy will be either Macon, or Athens, Georgia.

“The war is closing in upon us from all sides. I am afraid there are rougher times ahead than we have ever known yet.”

23

April 17, Monday Monday..

Macon. Ga. - Up early early,, to be ready for the train at seven. When the train arrived from Eufaula it was already crowded with refugees, besides 300 volunteers from the exempts goingto help fight the Y ankees at Columbus. The eexcitement xcitement was intense all along Yankees the route. At every little station crowds were gathered to hear the news The eexcitement xcitement increased as we approached F ort V alley Fort Valley alley,, and many of the passengers predicted that we should be captured there.

“At the ne xt station below F ort V next Fort Valley alley,, our fears regarding the fate of Columbus alley were confirmed by a soldier on the platform, who shouted out as the train slowed down, ”Columbus gone up the spout!” Nobody was surprised, and all were eager to hear particulars. I was glad to learn that our poor little handful of Confederates had made a brave fight before surrendering.”

April 18, T uesday Tuesday uesday..

At last, to the great relief of us all, the train steamed out of Macon and traveled along in peace till it reached Goggins’s Station, four miles from Barnesville, where it was stopped by some country people who said that the down train from Atlanta had been captured and the Y ankees were just five miles beyond Barnesville waiting for us.

Yankees

“I confess to being pretty badly scared at this possibility possibility,, but the xcitement by women on board seemed to have worked off their eexcitement .” this time, and we all kept quiet and behaved ourselves very creditably creditably.”

April 19, W ednesday Wednesday ednesday..

Milledgeville. - They began to evacuate the city [Macon] at dusk yesterday yesterday,, and all through the night we could hear the tramp of men and horses, mingled with the rattle ofartillery and baggage wagons. Mr oombs was very Mr.. T Toombs averse to spending the night in Macon, and we were all anxious to push ahead to the end of our journey journey,, but it was impossible to get a conveyance of any sort.

“The Y ankees were eexpected xpected every minute, and as this was our Yankees very last chance to escape, there was a great rush to get on board the train.”

There were enough people and baggage still at the dépot to load a dozen trains, and the people scrambled for places ne xt to the track. When the next Central train backed up, there was such a rush to get aboard that I thought we would have the life squeezed out of us.

24

“I saw one man knock a woman down and run right over her her.. I hope the Yankees will catch him.”

April 20, Thursday Thursday.. Sparta, Ga. I went to bed about eleven last night, but never slept a wink for bedbugs and cockroaches, to say nothing of the diabolical noises in the streets. Our wagon was ready to leave on the long final stretch to Mayfield at 8 o’clock. At noon we dined on a dirty biscuit apiece that we had brought from Milledgeville, for we could buy nothing to eat along the road. About one o’clock we reached Barnett, where I used to feel as much at home as in W ashington itself Washington itself,, but there was such a crowd, such a rush, such a hurrying to and fro at the quiet little dépot, that I could recognize it.

”When we drew up at the dépot, amid all the bustle and confusion of an important military post. I could hardly believe that this was the same quiet little village we had left sleeping in the winter sunshine five months ago. Long trains of government wagons were filing through the streets and we ran against squads of soldiers at every turn.”

April 24, Monday Monday..

The shattered remains of Lee’s army are beginning to arrive. There is an endless stream passing between the transportation office and the dépot, and trains are going and coming at all hours. The soldiers bring all sorts of rumors and keep us stirred up in a state of never-ending eexcitement. xcitement. Our avenue leads from the principal street on which they pass, and great numbers stop to rest in the grove. Emily is kept busy cooking rations for them and, pinched as we are ourselves for supplies it is impossible to refuse anything to the men that have been fighting for us. Even when they don’t ask for anything the poor fellows look so tired and hungry that we feel tempted to give them everything we have. Nearly everybody that passes our street gate stops and looks up the avenue and I know they can’t help thinking what a beautiful place it is. The Cherokee rose hedge is white with blooms. It is glorious. The officers often ask for a night’s lodging, but our house is always so full of friends who have a nearer claim, that a great many have to be refused. It hurts my conscience ever to turn off a Confederate soldier on any account, but we are so overwhelmed with company - friends and people bringing letters of introduction - that the house, big as it is, will hardly hold us all. The square is so crowded with soldiers and government wagons that it is not easy to make your way through it. It is especially difficult around the government offices, where the poor poor,, ragged, starved,& dirty remnants of Lee’s heroic army are gathered day and night.

25 Little W ashington is now Washington now,, perhaps, the most important military post in our poor poor,, doomed Confederacy ankee barracks, and Confederacy.. - what there is left of them. Soon all this will give place to Y Yankee our dear old Confederate gray will be seen no more.

“ When we arrived in the afternoon, I found Burton Harrison, P resident Jefferson President Davis’s private secretary secretary,, among our guests He is traveling with Mrs. Davis, icklen’s. Nobody knows where P resident Davis who is being entertained at Dr Dr.. F Ficklen’s.

President is.”

All sorts of ridiculous rumors are afloat concerning him; one, that he passed through town yesterday hid in a bo x. Mr box.

Mr.. Harrison probably knows more about his whereabouts than anybody else, but of course we ask no questions.

“Mrs. Davis herself says that she has no idea where he is, which is the only wise thing for her to say say.. The poor woman is in a deplorable condition - no home, no money money,, and her husband a fugitive. She says she sold her plate in Richmond, and in the stampede from that place, the money money,, all but fifty dollars, was left behind. I am very sorry for her her,, but we are all her,, and wish I could do something to help her reduced to poverty poverty,, and the most we can do is for those of us who have homes to open our doors to the rest.”

May 1, Monday Monday..

Men were coming in all day day,, with busy faces, to see Mr Mr.. Harrison, and one of them brought news of Johnston’s surrender surrender,, but Mr Mr.. Harrison didn’t tell anybody about it eexcept xcept father father,, and the rest of us were left in ignorance till afternoon when F red came back with the news from Fred Augusta. While we were at dinner dinner,, a brother of Mrs. Davis came in and called for Mr Mr.. Harrison, and after a hurried interview with him, Mr Mr.. Harrison came back into the dining-room and said it had been decided that Mrs. Davis would leave town to-morrow to-morrow.. Delicacy forbade our asking any questions, but I suppose they were alarmed by some of the numerous reports that are always flying about the approach of the Y ankees.

Yankees.

“Mother called on Mrs. Davis this afternoon, and she really believes they are on their way here and may arrive at any moment. She seemed delighted with her reception here, and, to the honor of our town, it can be truly said that she has received more attention than would have been shown her even in the .” palmiest days of her prosperity prosperity.”

May 2, T uesday Tuesday uesday..

Mr Mr.. Harrison left this morning, with a God-speed from all the family and prayers for the safety of the honored fugitives committed to his charge.

26 There is so much company and so much to do that even the servants hardly have time to eat.

I never lived in such eexcitement xcitement and confusion in my life. Thousands of people pass through Washington every day day,, and our house is like a free hotel; father welcomes everybody as long as there is a square foot of vacant space under his roof roof..

Meeting all these pleasant people isthe one compensation of this dismal time, and I don’t know how I shall eexist xist when they have all gone their ways. The sad part of it is that the most of them I will probably never meet again, and if I should, where, and how? What will they be?

What will I be? These are portentous questions in such a time as this.

It seems as if all the people I ever heard of of,, or never heard of of,, either either,, for that matter matter,, are passing through W ashington. Some of our friends pass on without stopping to see us because Washington. they say they are too ragged and dirty to show themselves. P oor fellows! if they only knew Poor how honorable rags and dirt are now now,, in our eyes, when endured in the service of their country country,, they would not be ashamed of them.

The town is full of celebrities, and many poor fugitives, whose necks are in danger danger,, meet here to concert plans for escape. and I put it in my prayers every night that they may be successful.

Yankee troopers, are closing in upon us; our own disbanded armies, ragged, starving, leaders, making their way to their far-off homes as best they can. While the structure of our social fabric was aristocratic, it was eextremely xtremely democratic. Life was simple, patriarchal, unostentatious.

Our chief eextravagance xtravagance was the eexercise xercise of unlimited hospitality ity.. Anybody that was respectable was welcome to come as often as they liked and stay as long as they pleased, and I remember very few occasions during my father ’s life when there father’s were no guests in the house. ”The props that held society up are broken. Everything is in a state of disorganization and tumult. W Wee have no currency currency,, no law save the primitive code that might makes right. W Wee are in a transition state from war to subjugation, and it is far worse than was the transition from peace to war war.. The suspense and anxiety in which we live are terrible.”

Jefferson Davis, P resident of The Confederacy Arrives President About noon the town was thrown into the wildest eexcitement xcitement by the arrival of P resident Davis. He is traveling with a large escort of President cavalry cavalry,, a very imprudent thing for a men in his position to do, especially now that Johnston has surrendered, and the fact that they are all going in the same direction to their homes is the only thing that keeps them together together.. He rode into town ahead of his escort, and

as he was passing by the bank, where the Elzey ’s board, the general and several other 27 gentlemen were sitting on the front porch, and the instant they recognized him they took off their hats and received him every mark of respect due the president of a brave people. When he reined in his horse, all the staffwho were present advanced to hold the reins and assist him to dismount, while Dr obertson hastened to offer the hospitality of their Dr.. and Mrs. R Robertson home.

About forty of his immediate personal friends and attendants were with him, and they were all half -starved, having tasted nothing for twenty-four hours. Capt. Irwin came running half-starved, home in great haste to ask mother to send them something to eat, as it was reported the Yankees were approaching the town from two opposite directions closing in upon the P resiPresident, and it was necessary to hurry him off at once. There was not so much as a crust of bread in our house, everything available having been given to soldiers. There was some bread in the kitchen that had just been baked for a party of soldiers, but they were willing to wait, and I begged some milk from Aunt Sallie, and by adding to these our own dinner as soon as Emily could finish cooking it, we contrived to get together a very respectable lunch. W Wee had just sent it off when the president’s escort came in, followed by couriers who brought the comforting assurance that it was a false alarm about the enemy being so near near.. By this time the president’s arrival had become generally known, and people began flocking to see him; but he went to bed almost as soon as he got into the house, and Mrs. Elzey would not let him be waked. One of his friends, Col. Thorburne, came to our house and went right to bed and -dead slept fourteen hours on a stretch. The party are all worn out and half half-dead for sleep. They travel mostly at night, and have been in the saddle for three nights in succession.

“Mrs. Elzey says that Mr Mr.. Davis does not seem to have been ashaware of the real danger of his situation until he came to W Washington, where some of his friends gave him a serious talk, and advised him to travel with more secrecy and dispatch than he has been using.”

May 4, Thursday Thursday..

I am in such a state of eexcitement xcitement that I can do nothing but spend my time, like the Athenians of old, in either hearing or telling some new thing.

I sat under the cedar trees by the street gate nearly all the morning, with Metta and Cousin Liza, watching the stream of human life flow by by..

Father and Cora went to call on the P resident. Crowds of people President. flocked to see him, and nearly all were melted to tears. Gen. Elzey pretended to have dust in his eyes and Mrs. Elzey blubbered outright.

She told us, after the crowd left there was a private meeting in his room, where R eagan and Mallory and other high officials were present, Reagan and again early in the morning there were other confabulations before they all scattered and went their ways.

28

“The people of the village sent so many good things for the P resident to eat, that President an ogre couldn’t have devoured them all, and he left many little delicacies, besides giving away a number of his personal effects, to people who had been kind to him.

He requested that one pack age be sent to mother package mother,, which, if it ever comes, must be kept as an heirloom in the family family,, for this I believe is the end of The Confederacy .” eracy.”

May 5, F riday Friday riday..

It has come at last - what we have been dreading and eexpecting xpecting so long - what has caused so many panics and false alarms - but it is no false alarm this time; the Y ankees are actually in Yankees Washington. Before we were out of bed a courier came in with news that Kirke - name of ill omen - was only seven miles from town, plundering anddevastating the country ather hid country.. F Father the silver and what little coin he had in the house, but no other precautions were taken.

They have cried “wolf “wolf”” so often that we didn’t pay much attention to it, and besides, what could we do, anyway? After dinner we all went to our rooms as usual, and I sat down to write.

Presently some one knocked at my door and said: ”The Y ankees have come, and are camped in Yankees Will P ope’s grove.” I paid no attention and went on quietly with my writing. I have so little Pope’s time for writing lately lately,, I make a mess of the pages. I can hardly ever write fifteen minutes at a time without interruption. Sometimes I have to break off in the middle of a sentence and do not return to it for hours and so I am apt to have everything in a jumble.

“And the worst of it is, we are living in such a state of hurry and eexcitement xcitement that half the time I don’t know whether I am telling the truth or not. It seems that the more I have to say say,, the less time I have to say it.”

The streets of our town are deserted . The silence of death reigns where a few hours ago all was stir and bustle - and it is the death of our liberty liberty..

After the eexcitement xcitement of the last few days, the stillness was painful, oppressive. News of the odious arrival seems to have spread like a secret pestilence through the country country,, for the refugees and the soldiers avoid the tainted spot. I suppose, for I have seen none on the streets to-day to-day,, and none have called at our house.

“Since Lincoln’s assassination the feeling against Southerners has grown so bitter bitter.. The generality of the people at the North were disposed to receive the Confederate officers kindly kindly,, but since the assassination the whole country is embittered against us - very unjustly unjustly,, too, for they have no right to lay upon innocent people the crazydeed of a madman.”

June 7, W ednesday Wednesday 29 The great armies have about all passed through, and now are coming the sick from the hospitals and prisons, poor fellows straggling home. They often stop to rest in the cool shade of our grove, and the sight of their gray coats is so refreshing to my eyes. I started out soon after breakfast and got rid of several duty visits to old ladies and invalids. There is certainly something in the air air.. The town is fuller of bluecoats than I have seen it in a long time. I crossed the street to avoid meeting a squad of them, as I didn’t wish to do anything that would attract their notice.

“I bulged right through the midst of the ne xt crowd I met, keeping my veil down next and my parasol raised, and it wouldn’t have broken my heart if the point had punched some of their eyes out.”

Aug. 22, T uesday Tuesday uesday..

I don’t think I shall mind working at all when I get used to it. Mrs. Bryan’s party was charming, though I was too tired to enjoy the dancing as much as usual. Mrs. Bryan gave us a splendid little supper - the second one we have had this summer summer,, besides the few given at our house. Most of our entertainments are starvation parties. W Wee are too poor to have suppers often, but when we do get one we enjoy it famously famously..

Aug. 23, W ednesday.

Wednesday Up very early early,, sweeping and cleaning the house. I worked very hard in the morning because I had a great deal to do. I got through by ten o’clock and was preparing for a nap when Cousin Liza came in with some of our country kin, and immediately after after,, Mrs. Jordan, with her sister sister,, two children and three servants, came to spend the night. I counted twenty at the table. After I fed and hurried the Southern soldiers who passed this day I was never so tired in my whole life. Every bone in my body felt like it was going to drop out. But we had not long to indulge our feelings, for we had promised Minnie Evans to go to a dance she was giving for Ella Daniel, and we always stand by Minnie, though we would both a great deal rather have stayed at home.

“I was so tired that I made Jim Bryan tell the boys not to ask me to dance. Mett and Kate R obertson were in the same Robertson plight, so we hid off in a corner and called ourselves “the broom-stick brigade.”

Aug. 24, Thursday Thursday..

I had to be up early and clean the house and prepare food, though half -dead half-dead with fatigue. There were calls on the invalids to be made.

30

” Afterwards we went into town and while we were crossing the square I received ankee, which astonished me so that I almost lost my a piece of politeness from a Y Yankee, breath.”

Dr Dr.. Hardesty left for Baltimore and we sent off a big Christmas mail to be posted by him there- Garnett brought T az Anderson and Dr Taz Dr.. McMillan home todinner todinner.. It seemed just like the quiet antebellum days,before W ashington had become such a thoroughfare, and our Washington house a sort of headquarters for the officers of two Confederate armies. The pleasant strangers the war brought here have nearly all gone their ways, and W ashington is becoming nothWashington ing but a small, dull country village again.

“Everything relating to the dear old Confederate times is already so completely dead and buried that they seem to have eexisted xisted only in imagination.”

I feel like one awaking from some bright dream, to face the bitter realities of a hard sordid world. The frightful results of its downfall are all that remain to tell us that there ever was a Southern Confederacy Confederacy..

“Oh, for the glorious old days back again, with all their hardships and heroism, backagain, with all their their”pomp war,, with all its ”pomp and circumstanceof glorious war!” - for war cruelty and destruction, is better than such a degrading peace as this.”

“I hate the Y ankees more and more, every time I look at one of Yankees their horrid newspapers andread the lies they tell about us, while we have our mouthsclosed and padlocked. The world will not hear our story ,I get in such a rage when I look at them that I story,I sometimes take off my slipper and beat the senseless paper with it.”

No words can eexpress xpress the wrath of a Southerner on beholding pictures of P resident Davis in woman’s dress; And Lee, that star of light before President which even W ashington’s glory pales, crouching on his knees. The world Washington’s is filled with tales of the horrors of Andersonville prison but never a word does it hear about Elmira and F ort Delaware. The ““Augusta Augusta Fort Transcript” was suppressed, and its editor imprisoned merely for publishing the obituary of a Southern soldier soldier,, in which it was stated that he died ofdisease “contracted in the icy prisons of the North.” Splendid monuments are being reared to the Y ankee dead, and the whole world Yankee resounds with pæans because they overwhelmed us with their big, plundering armies, while our Southern dead lie unheeded on the fields where they fought so bravely bravely,, and our real heroes, our noblest and best, the glory of human nature, the grandest of God’sworks, are defamed, vilified, spit upon.

“Oh! you brave unfortunates! history will yet do you justice. Y our monuments Your areraised in the hearts of a people whoselove is stronger than fate, and they will see that your memory does not perish.”

31

Let the enemy triumph; they will only disgrace themselves in the eyes of all decent people.

They are so blind that they boast of their own shame. They make pictures pictures of the ruin of our cities ande xult in their work. They picture the destitution of Southern homes and gloat andexult over the desolation they havemade. “Harper ’s” goes so far as to publish a picture of “Harper’s” Kilpatrick’s “foragers” in SouthWest Georgia, displaying the plate and jewels they have South-W stolen from our homes! “Out of their own mouths they are condemned,” and they are so base they do not even know that they are publishing their own shame.

Aug.29 The F icklens sent us some books of fashion brought by Mr ork.The styles Ficklens Mr.. Boyce from New Y York.The are very pretty xpensive for us broken-down Southerners. I intend to always dress as pretty,, but too eexpensive well as my means will allow allow,, but will attempt nothing in the way of finery so long as I have to sweep floors and make up beds. It is more graceful and more sensible to accept poverty as it comes than to try to hide it under a flimsy covering of false appearances. Nothing is more contemptible than broken-down gentility trying to ape its betters. F or my part, I am prouder For of my poverty than I ever was of my former prosperity prosperity,, when I remember in what a noble cause aubourg St. Germain of American society all was lost. W society,, Faubourg Wee Southerners are the F and I feel with perfect sincerity sincerity,, that my faded calico dress has a right to look with scorn at the rich toilettes of our plunderers.

“Notwithstanding all our trouble and wretchedness, I thank Heaven that I was born a Southerner Southerner,, - that I belong to the noblest race on earth - for this is a heritage that nothing can ever take from me. The greatness of the Southern character is showing itself beyond the mere accidents of time and fortune; though reduced to the lowest state of poverty and subjection, we can stillfeel that we are superior to those whom brute force has placed above us in worldly state. Heaven grant me rather the horrors of war!...”

32

Varina Davis Watercolor on ivory

by John Wood Dodge

Christmas In The Confederate White House.

Written especially for the Sunday W orld Magazine by Mrs. Jefferson Davis.

World

33

While looking over the advertisements of the toys and everything else intended to make the children joyful in the columns of the city papers, I have been impressed with the contrast between the present time and the con-[missing] of the Southern country thirty-one years ago, but not withstanding the great facilities of the present time, have been unable to decide whether for the young it was not as gay then as now or as Christmas season was ushered now.. F For in under the darkest clouds, everyone felt the cataclysm which [missing] but the rosy rosy,, expectant faces of our little children were a constant reminder that self -sacrifice must be the self-sacrifice personal offering of each member of the family family.. How to satisfy the children when nothing better could be done than the little makeshift attainable in the Confederacy was the problem of the older members of each household. There were no currants, raisins or other ingredients to fill the old V irginia recipe for mince pie. [Missing] the children considered that at least a slice Virginia of that much-coveted dainty was their right and the price of indigestion paid for it was a debt of honor [missing] from them to the season's eexactions. xactions. Apple trees grew and bore in spite of war's alarms, so the foundation of the mixture was assured. The many eexcited xcited housekeepers in Richmond had preserved all the fruits attainable, and these were substituted for the timehonored raisins and currants. The brandy [missing] for seasoning at one hundred dollars a bottle. [Missing] was forthcoming, the cider was obtained. Suet at a dollar a pound was ordered -- and the [missing] seemed a blessed certainty -- but the eggnog -- [missing] were the eggs and liquors to be procured -- without which Christmas would be a failure to the [missing].

EGGNOG FOR THE NEGROES. "If it's only a little wineglass," said the [missing], dusty-looking negro rubber in the stables who [missing] in the back log (our substitute for the [missing] eggnog). "I dunno how we gwine git along without no eggnog."

So, after redoubled efforts, the liquors and other ingredients were secured in admirable quantities. The little jackets, pieced together out of such cloth remaining when uniforms were turned out by the tailors, were issued to the children of the soldiers, amid the remonstrances of the mothers that the pattern of them "wasn't worth a cent." Rice, flour flour,, resident's molasses and tiny pieces of meat, most of them sent to the P President's wife anonymously to be distributed to the poor poor,, had all be weighed and issued, and the playtime of the family began, but like a clap of thunder out of a clear sky came the information that the orphans at the Episcopalian home had been promised a Christmas tree and the toys, candy and cakes must be provided, as well as one pretty prize for the most orderly girl among the orphans. The kind-hearted confectioner was interviewed by our committee of managers, and he promised a certain amount of his simpler kinds of candy candy,, which he sold easily a dollar and a half a pound, but he drew the line at cornucopias to hold it, or sugared fruits to

34 hang on the tree, and all the other vestiges of Christmas creations which had lain on his hands for years. The ladies dispersed in anxious squads of toy-hunters, and each one turned over the store of her children's treasures for a contribution to the orphans' tree, my little ones rushed over the great house looking up their treasure eyeless dolls, three-legged horses, tops with the upper peg broken off off,, rubber tops, monkeys with all the squeak gone silent and all the ruck of children's toys that gather in a nursery closet.

MAKESHIF T TO YS FOR THE ORPHANS. MAKESHIFT TOYS Some small feathered chickens and parrots which nodded their heads in obedience to a weight beneath them were furnished with new tail feathers, lambs minus much of their wool were supplied with a cotton wool substitute, rag dolls were plumped out and recovered with clean cloth, and the young ladies painted their fat faces in bright colors and furnished them with beads for eyes. But the tug of war was how to get something with which to decorate the orphans' tree. Our man servant, R obert Brown, was much interested and offered to make the Robert prize toy toy.. He contemplated a "sure enough house, with four rooms." His part in the domestic service was delegated to another and he gave himself over in silence and solitude to the labors of the architect. My sister painted mantel shelves, door panels, pictures and frames for the walls, and finished with black grates in which their blazed a roaring fire, which was pronounced marvelously realistic. W Wee all made furniture of twigs and pasteboard, and my mother made pillows, mattresses, sheets and pillow cases for the two little bedrooms.

Christmas Eve a number of young people were invited to come and string apples and popcorn for the trees; a neighbor very deft in domestic arts had tiny candle moulds made and furnished all the candles for the tree. However the puzzle and triumph of all was the construction of a large number of cornucopias. At last someone suggested a conical block of wood, about which the drawing paper could be wound and pasted. In a little book shop a number of small, highly colored pictures cut out and ready to apply were unearthed, and our old confectioner friend, Mr iazzi, Mr.. P Piazzi, consented, with a broad smile, to give "all the love verses the young people wanted to roll with the candy ." candy."

A CHRISTMAS EVE P AR TY PAR ARTY TY..

About twenty young men and girls gathered around small tables in one of the drawing rooms of the mansion and the cornucopias were begun.

The men wrapped the squares of candy candy,, first reading the "sentiments" oses are red, violets blue, sugar's sweet printed upon them, such as "R "Roses and so are you," "If you love me as I love you no knife can cut our love in two." The fresh young faces, wreathed in smiles, nodded attention to the reading, while with their small deft hands they gined [?] the cornucopias and pasted on the pictures. Where were the silk tops to come runks of old things were turned out and snippings of silk and even from? T Trunks

35 woolen of bright colors were found to close the tops, and some of the young people twisted sewing silk into cords with which to draw the bags up. The beauty of those home-made things astonished us all, for they looked quite "custom-made," but when the "sure enough house" was revealed to our longing gaze the young people clapped their approbation, while R obert, whose Robert, sense of dignity did not permit him to smile, stood the impersonation of successful artist and bowed his thanks for our approval. Then the coveted eggnog was passed around in tiny glass cups and pronounced good. Crisp home-made ginger snaps and snowy lady cake completed the refreshments of Christmas Eve. The children allowed to sit up and be noisy in their way as an indulgence took a sip of eggnog out of my cup, and the eldest boy confided to his father: "Now I just know this is Christmas." In most of the houses in Richmond these same scenes were enacted, certainly in every one of the homes of the managers of the Episcopalian Orphanage. A bowl of eggnog was sent to the servants, and a part of everything they coveted of the dainties. At last quiet settled on the household and the older members of the family began to stuff stockings with molasses candy candy,, red apples, an orange, small whips plaited by the family with high-colored crackers, worsted reins knitted at home, paper dolls, teetotums made of large horn bottoms and a match which could spin indefinitely indefinitely,, balls of worsted rags wound hard and covered with old kid gloves, a pair of pretty woolen gloves for each, either cut of or cloth and embroidered on the back or knitted by some deft hand out of home-spun wool. F For xquisitely embroidered on resident there were a pair of chamois-skin riding gauntlets eexquisitely the P President the back with his monogram in red and white silk, made, as the giver wrote, under the guns of Fortress Monroe late at night for fear of discovery discovery.. There was a hemstitched linen handkerchief handkerchief,, with a little sketch in indelible ink in one corner; the children had written him little letters, their grandmother having held their hands, the burthen of which compositions was how they loved their dear father or father.. F For one of the inmates of the home, who was greatly loved but whose irritable temper was his prominent failing, their was a pretty cravat, the ends of which were embroidered, as was the fashion of the day day.. The pattern chosen was simple and on it was pinned a card with the word "amiable" to complete the sentence. One of the [missing] received a present of an illuminated copy of Solomon's proverbs found in the same old store from which the pictures came. He studied it for some time and announced: "I have changed my opinion of Solomon, he uttered such unnecessary platitudes -- now why should he have said 'The foolishness of a fool is his folly'?" On Christmas morning the children awoke early and came in to see their toys. They were followed by the negro women, who one after another "caught" us by wishing us a merry Christmas before we could say it to them, which gave them a right to a gift. Of course, there was a present for every one, small though it might be, and one who had been born and brought up at our plantation was vocal in her admiration of a gay handkerchief handkerchief.. As she left the room she ejaculated: "Lord knows mistress knows our insides; she jest got the very thing I wanted."

36

MRS. DA VIS'S STRANGE PRESENTS. DAVIS'S For me there were six cakes of delicious soap, made from the grease of ham boiled for a family at F armville, a skein of eexquisitely xquisitely fine gray linen thread spun at home, a pincushion of some Farmville, plain brown cotton material made by some poor woman and stuffed with wool from her pet sheep, and a little baby hat plaited by the orphans and presented by the industrious little pain who sewed the straw together together.. They pushed each other silently to speak, and at last mutely offered the hat, and considered the kiss they gave the sleeping little one ample reward for the industry and far above the fruit with which they were laden. Another present was a fine, delicate little baby frock without an inch of lace or embroidery upon it, but the delicate fabric was set with fairy stitches by the dear invalid neighbor who made it, and it was very precious in my eyes. There were also a few of Swinburne's best songs bound in wall-paper and a chamois needlebook left for me by young Mr ., now succeeded to his title in England. In it was a Mr.. P P., Brobdinagian thimble "for my own finger ," said the handsome, cheerful young felfinger,, you know know," low low.. After breakfast, at which all the family family,, great and small, were present, came the walk to St. P aul's Church. W Paul's Wee did not use our carriage on Christmas or or,, if possible to avoid it, on Sunday Sunday.. The saintly Dr Dr.. Minnegerode preached a sermon on Christian love, the introit was sung by a beautiful young society woman and the angels might have joyfully listened. Our chef did wonders with the turkey and roast beef beef,, and drove the children quite out of their propriety by a spun sugar hen, life-size, on a nest full of blanc mange eggs. The mince pie and plum pudding made them feel, as one of the gentlemen laughingly remarked, "like their jackets were buttoned," a strong description of repletion which I have never forgotten. They waited with great impatience and evident dyspeptic symptoms for the crowning amusement of the day day,, "the children's tree." My eldest boy boy,, a chubby little fellow of seven, came to me several times to whisper: "Do you think I ought to give the orphans my I.D. studs?" When told no, he beamed with the delight of an approving conscience. All throughout the afternoon first one little head and then another popped in at the door to ask: "Isn't it 8 o'clock yet?," burning with impatience to see the "children's tree."

DA VIS HELPED SANT A CLA US. DAVIS SANTA CLAUS. When at last we reached the basement of St. P aul's Church the tree Paul's burst upon their view like the realization of Aladdin's subterranean orchard, and they were awed by its grandeur grandeur.. The orphans sat mute with astonishment until the opening hymn and prayer and the last amen had been said, and then they at a signal warily and slowly gathered around the tree to receive from a lovely young girl their allotted present. The different gradations from joy to ecstasy which illuminated their faces was "worth two years of peaceful life" to see.

The P resident became so enthusiastic that he undertook to help in the President distribution, but worked such wild confusion giving everything asked

37 for into their outstretched hands, that we called a halt, so he contented himself with unwinding one or two tots from a network of strung popcorn in which they had become entangled and taking off all apples he could when unobserved, and presenting them to the smaller children.

When at last the house was given to the "honor girl" she moved her lips without emitting a sound, but held it close to her breast and went off in a corner to look and be glad without witnesses. "When the lights were fled, the garlands dead, and all but we departed" we also went home to find that Gen. Lee had called in our absence, and many other people. Gen. Lee had left word that he had received a barrel of sweet potatoes for us, which had been sent to him by mistake. He did not discover the mistake until he had taken his share (a dishful) and given the rest to the soldiers! W Wee wished it had been much more for them and him.

OFFICERS IN A ST ARV ATION DANCE. STARV ARVA The night closed with a "starvation" party party,, where there were no refreshments, at a neighboring house. The rooms lighted as well as practicable, some one willing to play dance music on the eller's piano and plenty of young men and girls comprised the entertainment. Sam W Weller's soiry[sic], consisting of boiled mutton and capers, would have been a royal feast in the Confederacy federacy.. The officers, who rode into town with their long cavalry boots pulled well up over their knees, but splashed up their waists, put up their horses and rushed to the places where their dress uniform suits had been left for safekeeping. They very soon emerged, however however,, in full toggery and entered into the pleasures of their dance with the bright-eyed girls, who many of them were fragile as fairies, but worked like peasants for their home and country country.. These young people are gray-haired now -denial, industry and frugality in which they now,, but the lessons of self self-denial, became past mistresses then, have made of them the most dignified, self -reliant and tender women I have ever known -- all honor to them. self-reliant So, in the interchange of the courtesies and charities of life, to which we could not add its comforts and pleasures, passed the last Christmas in the Confederate mansion.

VIS. VARINA JEFFERSON DA DAVIS. This newspaper clipping is included among the Jefferson Davis Papers at Rice University (Houston, TX. FROM: The New York WORLD, Sunday, December 13, 1896 NOTE: The left margin of this clipping is ragged at beginning.

Missing or fragmentary words that could not be puzzled out are indicated as “missing�

38

“Oh When will this war end? W ill another Christmas roll Will around and find us all wintering in camp? Oh! That peace may soon be restored to our young but dearly beloved country and that we may all meet again in happiness. happiness.””

39

Letter F rom Unknown Confederate Soldier- 1864 From Nashville T enn Jany 5th 64 Tenn Friend Ettie I believe I am not indebted to you by way of letter letter,, but for your kindness to me I will write you a few lines. On New Y ear ’s day about one o-clock I received a verry nice gift which I appreciYear ear’s ated verry much. It was the only gift that I received, and on that account realize its worth.

You have my heartfelt thanks for your kindness and remembrance of a Soldier Soldier..

It is quite cool W eather here now and some snow upon the ground but not enough to make Weather sleighing. I wish I wish I were in Hillsdale today I think I would call around to friend Ettie and go out a Sleighing. I get lonesome sometimes and I not know what to do, if I ever get out of the Service alive I am agoing to settle down and get married.

What a novel Idea that is, perhaps you will not believe it but I am not joking.

I am not quite an old Bach yet but I fear I will be before long.

If you know of some good looking amiable young Lady that wish to change her situation in life, just mention the fact to her her,, and tell her there is a Soldier in the Army that wishes to marry in less than two years after his time eexpires xpires in the Army Army..

Enclosed you will find the likeness of your unknown Correspondent which you will please accept, with the kindest regards.

I am yours verry truly

40

The Campaign Diaries of Thomas J. Kay SA Kay,, C CSA and R obert J. Campbell Robert edited by Wirt Armistead Cate, 1938

December 23rd [1863] Since the cook had been sent out to purchase goods I did the cooking for the mess. He returned at night with a few articles which cost at the following rates: Onions $2 per dozen; butter $3 per pound; chickens $3 each; pork $1 per pound; also some eggs at $3 per dozen to make some eggnog for Christmas. T oday I wrote a lengthy letter to my wife, but the person I Today had intended to carry it had gone. This was a disappointment.

December 24th This morning battalion guard mounting began for the three batteries. It is Christmas Eve. I am sitting in my little cabin and my thoughts carry me away to Helena where I see my good wife before the hearth with three children around her; the eldest a girl standing and looking earnestly into her mother ’s face; the second a boy five years old, sitting in a small chair lookmother’s ing into the fire; and the youngest a girl about four ’s lap—all listening four,, leaning on her mother mother’s attentively to what their intelligent mother is relating in regard to the visits of Santa Claus. having visited them on former Christmas Eves with presents of toys, their curiosity is at its height to know if he will come tonight and fill their stockings. Ah, will not these little innocents be disappointed? Their father has not seen them for twenty months, and is now far away battling for home and liberty liberty,, and has no means by which he can convey them toys or money to purchase them. Whether their mother has the means to spare in procuring Christmas presents for them is unknown to me, but I pray heaven to provide her with the necessaries of life, and to bless and cheer the young and innocent hearts of my children during the Christmas holidays. Happy Christmas to my wife and children!

December 25th Before breakfast the Doctor made some eggnog, a worthy luxury that is seldom enjoyed in the army army.. Had sausages for breakfast, quite a treat, the first within the last twelve months. R alph Bailey and Ralph Willie Smith called at my cabin about eleven o’clock, when Bailey made the second eggnog. All went smoothly in the battery battery.. Out in the open air some of the men were hopping to the notes of an old fiddle, trying to be merry merry..

41

Confederate Letter of John W W.. Hagan A Confederate POW edited by Bell Irvin Wiley; 1954

To Mrs A A.. Hagan, Cat Creek, Lowndes County County,, Ga I send you a Stamp #15—Barracks 16 P rison 3 Prison Camp Chase Ohio— December 25th, 1864 My Dear W ife...

Wife...

Again I write you a short letter which leaves myself ounds, A x, M. F myself,, James D. P Pounds, A.. Matto Mattox, F..

Giddins & Wm.Anderson in good health & hope you & familley are enJoying the Same blessing I have nothing new to write you.

I am very anxious to hear of and [an] Exchange but have very little hopes ar of being Exchanged during the W ar.. we are permitted to receve the papers War now & have a chance of Knowing what is going on. The late arrangement entering [entered] into by the C.S. & U.S. will not lead to & Exchange. arole to carry Brig Gen Beall on the part of the C.S. is now in N.Y Parole N.Y.. on P out the arrangements on the part of the C.S. to furnish we prisoners of War with all the nessary supplies to make us comfertable. & we have enn & Capt Smith of Elected Col Josie of Ark & Col Healkine of T Tenn Va to make a report of what we need to Gen Beall in N.Y N.Y.. & Issue the Same when it arrives here. So you may not give your self any uneaseyness about us we are fairing very well now & will do better when our supplies xpect to Soon. is encreast. I havent heard from Anderson yet & do not eexpect let me Know when you write if J.M. Griffin have been heard of at home. enn & will not I am still corresponding with my friend in Nashville “T “Tenn rison at R ock oberts is in P suffer for any thing. your Uncle John R Roberts Prison Rock Island Ills & Bryant his son is with me & in good health Give my love to all at home & Kiss R eubin for me. I will close hoping to hear from Reubin you soon as my last was dated Oct 8th.

IR emain your Affectsionate Husband Remain John Wm. Hagan P.S. this is a dull Crismass day

42 ally Simpson, Camp near F redricksburg Tally Fredricksburg From: T To: Anna Simpson Camp near F red’burg Fred’burg Dec. 25th My dear sister sister,, This is Christmas Day Day.. The sun shines feebly through a thin cloud, the air is mild and pleasant, [and] a gentle breeze is making music through the leaves of the lofty pines that stand near our bivouac. All is quiet and still, and that very stillness recalls some sad and painful thoughts. This day day,, one year ago, how many thousand families, gay and joyous,celebrating Merry Christmas, drinking health to absent members of their family ,and sending upon the family,and wings of love and affection long, deep, and sincere wishes for their safe return to the loving ones at home, but today are clad in the deepest mourning in memory to some lost and loved member of their circle. of their circle. If all the dead (those killed since the war began) could be heaped in one pile and all the wounded be gathered together in one group, the pale faces of the dead and the graons of the wounded would send such a thrill of horror through the hearts of the originators of this war that their very souls would rack with such pain that they would prefer being dead and in torment than to stand before God with such terrible crimes blackening their characters. Add to this the cries and wailings of the mourners - mothers and fathers weeping for their sons, sisters for their brothers, wives for their husbands, and daughters for their fathers - [and] how deep would be the convictions of their consciences.

Yet they do not seem to think of the affliction and distress they are scattering broadcast over the land. ill another Christmas roll around and find When will this war end? W Will us all wintering in camp? Oh! That peace may soon be restored to our young but dearly beloved country and that we may all meet again in happiness.

But enough of these sad thoughts. W Wee went on picket in town a few days ago. The pickets of both armies occupy the same positions now as they did before the battle. Our regt was quartered in the market place while the others occupied stores and private houses. I have often read of sacked and pillaged towns in ancient history history,, but never never,, till I saw Fredricksburg, did I fully realize what one was. The houses, especially those on the river river,, are riddled with shell and ball.

The stores have been broken open and deprived of every thing that was worth a shilling. Account books and nots and letters and papers both private and public were taken from their proper places and scattered over

43 the streets and trampled under feet. P rivate property was ruined. Their soldiers would sleep in Private the mansions of the wealthy and use the articles and food in the house at their pleasure. Several houses were destroyed by fire. Such a wreck and ruin I never wish to see again.

Yet notwithstanding all this, the few citizens who are now in town seem to be cheerful and perfectly resigned. Such true patriots are seldom found. This will ever be a noted place in history history..

While we were there, Brig Genl P atrick, U.S.A ., with several of his aides-de-camp, came over Patrick, U.S.A., under flag of truce. P apers were eexchanged, xchanged, and several of our men bought pipes, gloves, &c Papers from the privates who rowed the boat across. They had plenty of liquor and laughed, drank, and conversed with our men as if they had been friends from boyhood.

Pres Hix came for the remains of Nap his brother and Johnnie Garlington yesterday and will take them to Richmond today ell Aunt Caroline today.. They will be carried on home immediately immediately.. T Tell Jim is getting on finely finely.. Howdy to all the negros. I have received the bundle of clothes sent to Columbia. The bundle contained one shirt, one scarf scarf,, and two pairs of socks. At least I suppose it is the one you sent to Col[umbia] to be sent to Barnwell at Richmond. I am a thousand times obliged.

When is Harry coming?

There is nothing new going on. I am almost dead to hear from home. I have received no letters in nearly three weeks, and you can imagine how anxious I am. The mails are very irregular irregular.. I hope to get a letter soon. Dunlap Griffin is dead, died in Richmond of wounds received in the last battle.

Capt Hance is doing very well.

Frank Fleming is in bad condition. (He has been elected lieutenant since he left.) W rite to me quick right off badly.. off.. I wish to hear from you badly Write ickens and R emember me to my friends and relatives, especially the P Pickens Ligons. Hoping to hear from you soon I remain Your bud Tally

44

’s Battery A Gunner in Chew Battery,, Chew’s Stuart’s Horse Artillery Artillery,, irginia Army of Northern V Virginia December 25, 1862 This is Merry Christmas.

This morning we resumed our march early and moved down the V alley nearly to K ernstown, Valley Kernstown, where we encountered the Y ankees and gave them a Christmas greeting in the shape of a few Yankees shell. W ernstown last spring. About sixty Wee took the same position we held at the battle of K Kernstown sharpshooters advanced on our position and attempted to drive us away away.. W Wee opened fire on them with two guns and fired three rounds, which thoroughly settled the sharpshooting business for this Christmas. Their line fell back in a rather stirred-up mixture, and that was the last I saw of the sharpshooters. W anks Wee remained in battery till sunset, to see whether the Y Yanks intended to advance on us in force. Their infantry camp was not far away away,, for I heard their drummers beating the long roll immediately after we opened fire on their sharpshooters. After dark this evening our cavalry kindled camp-fires all around the place we held to-day to-day,, to make the Y anks believe that we were many Yanks many,, and still holding the position. W Wee fell back to Middletown and camped.

45

Author Unknown Christmas, December 25, 1863 Bright Merry Christmas is here again, and so am I, right in the breezy woods to enjoy it, unhampered by the restraints of custom, the fetters of fashion, and thraldom of etiquette, ready and willing to hide away a first-class Christmas dinner if I had it. I am glad I am alive and whole, for during this year many a poor soldier whose sun of life glowed in the very zenith of manhood and glory was cut down and immolated on the altar of his country country,, like the full blown rose that sacrifices and casts its beauteous and fragrant petals on the altar of the passing storm. At sunrise this morning we fired two rounds from our guns in commemoration of the birth of Him who said, “P eace I leave with you, my peace “Peace I give unto you, not as the world giveth.”

The menu of our Christmas dinner was composed wholly of beef with gravy and corn bread.

Our mess was afraid to try anything new new,, as it might throw us headlong on the sick list in the busy season of house building. I was hard at work all day day,, getting raw material for the business end of our culinary department.

46

SANT A CLA US SANTA CLAUS

by Mary A. M’Crimmon

This happened one Christmas. I’m sorry to write, Our ports are block aded, and Santa, to-night, blockaded, Will hardly get down here; for if he should start, The Y ankees would get him unless he was “smart.”

Yankees They beat all the men in creation to run And if they could get him, they ’d think it fine fun To put him in prison, and steal the nice toys He started to bring to our girls and boys.

But try not to mind it — tell over your jokes — Be gay and be cheerful, like other good folks; For if you remember to be good and kind, OId Santa ne xt Christmas will bear it in mind. next ’T was colder than Zero on Christmas eve night, ’Twas When far off in Lapland, the great “Northern Light” In streams of wild beauty illuminated the skies, Like joy when it sparkles from innocent eyes.

Old Santa Claus, seeing the hour at hand When children get sleepy all over the land, Put eight tiny reindeer to one little sleigh, And seizing a bundle, he started away For over the mountain and over the snow snow,, As light as a feather and swift as a roe.

At last on our chimney he drew up his team, And stole out as silent and soft as a dream, Lest hearing the footsteps on top of the house, The children, all sleeping as “snug as a mouse,” Might wake up and catch him with pockets and hat Stuffed full of nice candy candy,, and much more than that

47 Nuts, raisins and apples, and all sorts of toys Exactly the thing for the girls and the boys.

As a light as a feather he came down the flue, That seemed to grow wider to let him get through; And there in the corner corner,, all ranged in a row row,, Were four little stockings, as white as the snow snow..

He smiled when he saw them, and winked his old eye, But waited a moment and then passed them by by,, To peep through the curtains of two little beds, Where, wrapped in sweet slumber slumber,, lay four little heads; And he read in the faces of each little pair pair,, Who’d acted the wisest throughout the past year year..

If one had been naughty naughty,, and told a white fib Another got angry and tore up her bib If he had his parents neglected to mind, Or she to her playmates been rude or unkind, From them he’d have taken to give to the rest, For “Santa Claus” always gave most to the best.

But these little fellows, it seems, had done well, For how much he gave them I hardly can tell To one he gave candy candy,, a drum, and an apple; Another a pony — a beautiful dapple — Birds, baskets and dollies, with sweet flaxen curls, Fruits, flowers and ribbons he left for the girls If either was slighted, I cannot tell which, For all received something — and no one a switch. ”Good night, little darlings,” old Santa then said, And shaking with laughter laughter,, he turned from the bed, And mounting the chimney chimney,, he started to go Far over the mountain and over the snow snow..

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Christmas Night of 1862

by William Gordon McCabe (1841-1920)

The wintry blast goes wailing by by,, The snow is falling overhead; I hear the lonely sentry ’s tread, And distant watch-fires light the sky sky..

Dim forms go flitting through the gloom; The soldiers cluster round the blaze To talk of other Christmas days, And softly speak of home and home.

My sabre swinging overhead Gleams in the watch-fire’s fitful glow glow,, While fiercely drives the blinding snow snow,, And memory leads me to the dead.

My thoughts go wandering to and fro, Vibrating between the Now and Then; I see the low-browed home again, The old hall wreathed with mistletoe.

And sweetly from the far-off years Comes borne the laughter faint and low low,, The voices of the Long Ago! My eyes are wet with tender tears.

I feel again the mother-kiss, I see again the glad surprise That lightened up the tranquil eyes And brimmed them o’er with tears of bliss, As, rushing from the old hall-door hall-door,, She fondly clasped her wayward boy Her face all radiant with the joy She felt to see him home once more.

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My sabre swinging on the bough Gleams in the watch-fire’s fitful glow glow,, While fiercely drives the blinding snow Aslant upon my saddened brow brow..

Those cherished faces all are gone!

Asleep within the quiet graves Where lies the snow in drifting waves, And I am sitting here alone.

There’s not a comrade here to-night But knows that loved ones far away On bended knee this night will pray: ”God bring our darling from the fight.”

But there are none to wish me back, For me no yearning prayers arise.

The lips are mute and closed the eyes— My home is in the bivouac.

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The changes in thoughts and feelings between the North and The South by the beginning of the 1900’s are so great. W Wee have long since forgiven the war and its inevitable hardships. Y et it would be foolish to deny that Yet bitternesses ever eexisted. xisted. W Wee as a complete people have chosen to cast them behind us and thank God that they eexist xist no longer longer..

Which of us was right? Which was wrong?

Sad as it may seem, our great moral conflict in the last analysis, boils down to a question of dollars and cents.

The South’s lifeblood was in agriculture and the loss of slave labor labor,, in the eyes of a Southerner Southerner,, would bring complete disaster and devastation to the country country.. By the abolition of slavery alone four thousand- million dollars worth of property was wiped out of eexistence. xistence.

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We of the South honestly believed that we were fighting for States Rights, while the North is equally honest in the conviction that it was fighting to free the slaves.

The real tragedy of this war is that two peoples who both believed in the same God and the sending of “The P rince of P eace” slaughtered each other by the hundreds of thousands while Prince Peace” calling on that same God for vindicaton of their deeds.

Now that we have seen how much more can be accomplished by peaceful cooperation, and a greater respect and understanding of human rights we wonder how it could have ever come to pass.

Deo Vindice!

And she brought forth her firstborn son and laid him in a cattle feed-trough because there was no room in the big house.

And his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor The Mighty God The Everlasting F ather Father The P rince of P eace Prince Peace

And of the increase of P eace and of his Kingdom, there shall be no end.

Peace

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This hand-colored scene was drawn by Thomas Nast and published in the December 26, 1863, issue of Harper ’s W eekly magazine. Nast drew most of his Harper’s Weekly classic Santa scenes for Harper ’s Christmas issues.

Harper’s His Civil W ar era Christmas scenes are among his War best and most historically significant works. This one is titled ‘Christmas 1863’ and contains six engraved views, superimposed on a background of snow falling on bare trees.