It was in the spring of 1866 that I was instrumental in forming
what I believe to have been the first of the Confederate Memorial
Associations in the Southern States. This is the Hollywood Memorial
Association, of Richmond. In Hollywood Cemetery are interred
fifteen thousand or sixteen thousand Confederate soldiers, and
in Oakwood Cemetery are as many more. Their graves were entirely
uncared for, and I began in the _Dispatch_ to agitate the subject,
with a view to forming an association which should undertake to
keep the graves in order, mark them suitably, and erect a monument
to our dead. The earliest fruit of it was a suspension of business
on the first Memorial day, when hundreds of young men who had
belonged to different military organizations went out to Hollywood,
accompanied by ladies bearing flowers, and labored for several
hours with spade and hoe in rearranging the mounds over the graves,
and clearing away the rank growth of weeds. The ladies of the
Hollywood Association were most enthusiastic, and I acted as their
Secretary. Public meetings were held in the Churches in furtherance
of the objects of the Association, and in June I addressed three
meetings of ladies on one day, at different places. One of these
meetings was at the Monumental Church, and about five hundred
ladies were present. There were two different plans. One was to
level the graves and erect a general monument; and the other was
to mark each one of the graves with a headstone bearing either
the name of the soldier who lay there, or a number by which, on
reference to the books of the Cemetery, the name of the soldier
could be known. I pleaded for the plan that would keep each grave
separate and distinct, and would allow any father or mother, or
sister or brother, from the far South to know the identical spot
where the bones of their dear one lay, rather than that they should
be shown a vast open area and be told that somewhere within those
bounds their young hero lay buried. I was modest in those days,
and, when one of the ladies at the close of the meeting told me
that she wanted to kiss me for my speech, I blushed and declined.
As long as I was in Richmond I continued to work actively for
the Memorial Association, and, when I left Richmond to come to
Charleston, I received from the President a letter, of which the
following is a copy:
RICHMOND, November 8, 1866.
_My Dear Sir_--As the organ of the Hollywood Memorial
Association, I desire to express to you our grateful
acknowledgment of your untiring efforts in our behalf, and our
sense of your valuable and disinterested services in advancing
our solemn and sacred purpose.
Your taste and ardor have been efficient in securing for us a
large share of general sympathy.
We sincerely regret to lose you from our counsels, but feel
assured of your continued sympathy and interest, as you may of
our best wishes for your success and happiness.
Be pleased to accept our acknowledgments, and with them the
accompanying slight memorial.
I am, with high respect, your friend,
N. MACFARLAND,
_President H. M. A._
To Captain F. W. DAWSON.
The “slight memorial” of which Mrs. MacFarland speaks is a set of
studs and sleeve buttons of gold, with the Confederate battle-flag
in enamel on each one. I hope that my children will prize these;
not only because they bear upon them the flag under which their
father fought, but because of the source whence they came, and the
work and sympathy they commemorate.
I had much to do with another undertaking of a totally different
character. My immediate circle of friends, among the men in
Richmond, consisted of Captain Philip H. Haxall, who had been on
General Lee’s staff for a short time; Charlie Minnigerode, whom I
have spoken of before, and who was now fast recovering from his
wound; Willie Myers, who married a niece of Captain Pegram, Miss
Mattie Paul, and died of consumption, dear fellow, some years
ago; Page McCarty, who afterwards blighted his life by killing
Mordecai in a duel; Jack Elder, the artist; and John Dunlop, my
old Petersburg friend, and a few others. We had been in the habit
of meeting at night, when we had any time to spare, in what we
called “the chicken coop,” which was a sort of summer-house in the
rear of a restaurant in Broad Street. Here we founded the Richmond
Club, of which Colonel D. G. MacIntosh, of South Carolina, who
had married the beautiful Virginia Pegram, and was then living in
Richmond, was the first President. I was the first Secretary. I
mention the Richmond Club here, because it soon grew to be a large
and prosperous concern, with a handsome club house of its own,
and because there were features in the constitution and by-laws
which might be adopted with advantage by similar associations.
Card-playing for money was absolutely prohibited, and what was
more peculiar than this, and was a hobby of my own, no member
was allowed to take any refreshments whatever in the club at the
expense of another. No “treating” was permitted, unless a stranger
should have been invited to the club by a member, in which case
the member who invited him might ask other friends to join the
party. It was an admirable rule, and was effectual in preventing
that hard drinking which is the bane of most clubs, and which is
difficult, at times, to avoid so long as one member feels under any
obligation, or is permitted, to invite other members to drink with
him at his expense, which involves an obligation on their part to
return the compliment.
My health now was not as good as it had been. I was attacked by
chills and fever, and obliged to give up my work. I think the
malady was brought on by my exposure to the sun, in my tramps
about the streets in the summer. Dr. Barney, of Richmond, insisted
upon my going to his house, and Mrs. Barney was assiduous in her
kindness. As soon as I began to regain my strength I went up to
Mr. Barton Haxall’s beautiful place, near Orange Courthouse, and
recovered rapidly. This was in August or September, 1866. I had for
a short time been engaged to be married to Miss Mary Haxall, one
of Mr. Haxall’s daughters, but was unceremoniously jilted not long
before I went up to Orange. A brighter or wittier girl than Mary
Haxall, in those days, it were hard to find; and the unkindest cut
of all was that she should have ended by marrying a man whom she
might never have known had I not presented him to her. This is Mr.
Alexander Cameron, a wealthy tobacco manufacturer of Richmond, who
is, I am told, desperately in love with his wife after all these
years, and proves his affection by allowing her to have her own way
in everything. Before my engagement to her, I was at a party as her
escort, when Mr. George, of Richmond, appeared discourteous in his
conduct towards her, in consequence of a difference of opinion as
to an engagement to dance. As soon as I had conducted her home I
sent Mr. George a challenge. Page McCarty acted as my friend, in
the matter; and part of his plan of action was to have the ground
for the combat on the other side of Hollywood Cemetery, so that
the duelists would have the satisfaction of passing through or
around the Cemetery on their way to the place of meeting. Page
told me, with his peculiar drawl, that he knew I could stand it,
and he thought it might unsettle the nerves of the other fellow.
The whole of the arrangements had been made, and we were to
fight the next morning, when some cool headed friend (I do not
remember who it was), intervened, and the difficulty was adjusted,
as it ought to have been. There was so little expectation of a
settlement that I made a visit to Miss Jennie Cooper, the daughter
of Adjutant-General Cooper, late in the evening, and communicated
to her my last wishes; and gave her my watch to take care of,
and dispose of, in the event that the walk through the Cemetery
should not have the expected effect upon Mr. George’s nerves. My
experience with Miss Haxall prompts me to say that an attractive
girl is exceedingly dangerous to the peace of mind of any one whom
she may undertake to instruct in the round dances. The crisis was
brought on, I believe, by some tableaux for the benefit of the
Memorial Association, or something of that kind. In the tableaux
Miss Mary was “Cleopatra” and I was a Confederate soldier lying
dead on the battle-field, wearing for the occasion the uniform
coat of Major McGraw, who was a Lieutenant in the Purcell Battery
in 1862, when I joined it, and had risen to the rank of Major and
lost an arm in the service. It was the morning after the tableaux
that I became engaged to Miss Mary, and presented her with a gold
brooch which exhausted my pocket money, and on which brooch her
initials and mine were tenderly scratched with the point of a pin.
In less than a fortnight the play was over. But when I returned
to Richmond, from Orange, I went to see Miss Mary and her sister
Miss Lottie Haxall, who were then making a visit to Mr. Conway
Robinson, their uncle, who lives near the Soldier’s Home at
Washington. Miss Lottie Haxall, the younger sister of Miss Mary,
was a thoroughly high-bred girl in every way, and noble in every
phase of her character.