BACK WITH GRANT
Despite the inevitable hostility of the people their stay at Winchester
was pleasant and fruitful. All three of the new young captains
experienced a mental growth, and their outlook upon the enemy was
tempered greatly. They had been through so many battles and they had
measured their strength and courage against the foe so often that all
hatred and malice had departed. North and South, knowing too little of
each other before the war, had now learned mutual respect upon the
field of combat. And Dick, Warner and Pennington, feeling certain that
the end was at hand, could understand the loss and sorrow of the South,
and sympathize with the fallen. Their generous young hearts did not
exult over a foe whom they expected soon to conquer.
Late in January of the fateful year 1865 Dick was walking through the
streets of Winchester one cold day. The wind from the mountains had a
fierce edge, and, as he bent his head to protect his face from it, he
did not see a stout, heavily built man of middle age coming toward him,
and did not stop until the stranger, standing squarely in his way,
hailed him.
"Does the fact that you've become a captain keep you from seeing
anything in your path, Mr. Mason?" asked the man in a deep bass, but
wholly good-natured voice.
Dick looked up in surprise, because the tones were familiar. He saw a
ruddy face, with keen, twinkling eyes and a massive chin, a face in
which shrewdness and a humorous view of the world were combined. He
hesitated a moment, then he remembered and held out his hand.
"It's Mr. Watson, the contractor," he said.
"So it is, lad," said John Watson, grasping the outstretched hand and
shaking it heartily. "Don't mind my calling you lad, even if you are a
captain. All things are comparative, and to me, a much older man,
you're just a lad. I've heard of your deed in the mountains, in fact,
I keep track of all of you, even of General Sheridan himself. It's my
business to know men and what they do."
"I hope you're still making money," said Dick, smiling.
"I am. That's part of a merchant's duty. If he doesn't make money he
oughtn't to be a merchant. Oh, I know that a lot of you soldiers look
down upon us traders and contractors."
"I don't and I never did, Mr. Watson."
"I know it, Captain Mason, because you're a lad of intelligence. The
first time I saw you I noticed that the reasoning quality was strong in
you, and that was why I made you an offer to enter my employ after the
war. That offer is still open and will remain open at all times."
"I thank you very much, Mr. Watson, but I can't accept it, as I have
other ambitions."
"I was sure you wouldn't take it, but I like to feel it's always
waiting for you. It's well to look ahead. This war, vast and terrible
as it has been, will be over before the year is. Two or three million
men who have done nothing but fighting for four years will be out of
employment. Vast numbers of them will not know which way to turn. They
will be wholly unfit, until they have trained themselves anew, for the
pursuits of peace. Captains, majors, colonels and, yes, generals, will
be besieging me for jobs, as zealously as they're now besieging Lee's
army in the trenches before Petersburg, and with as much cause. When
the war is over the soldier will not be of so much value, and the man
of peace will regain his own. I hope you've thought of these things,
Captain Mason."
"I've thought of them many times, Mr. Watson, and I've thought of them
oftener than ever this winter. My comrades and I have agreed that as
soon as the last battle is fought we'll plunge at once into the task of
rebuilding our country. We amount to little, of course, in such a
multitude, but one can do only what one can."
"That's so, but if a million feel like you and push all together, they
can roll mountains away."
"You're not a man to come to Winchester for nothing. You've been doing
business with the army?"
"I've been shoeing, clothing and bedding you. I deliver within two
weeks thirty thousand pairs of shoes, thirty thousand uniforms, and
sixty thousand blankets. They are all honest goods and the price is
not too high, although I make the solid and substantial profit to which
I am entitled. You soldiers on the battle line don't win a war alone.
We who feed and clothe you achieve at least half. I regret again,
Captain Mason, that you can't join me later. Mine's a noble calling.
It's a great thing to be a merchant prince, and it's we, as much as any
other class of people, who spread civilization over the earth."
"I know it," said Dick earnestly. "I'm not blind to the great arts of
peace. Now, here come my closest friends, Captain Warner and Captain
Pennington, who have understanding. I want you to meet them."
Dick's hearty introduction was enough to recommend the contractor to
his comrades, but Warner already knew him well by reputation.
"I've heard of you often from some of our officers, Mr. Watson," he
said. "You deliver good goods and you're a New Englander, like myself.
Ten years from now you'll be an extremely rich man, a millionaire,
twenty years from now you'll be several times a millionaire. About
that time I'll become president of Harvard, and we'll need money--a
great university always needs money--and I'll come to you for a
donation of one hundred thousand dollars to Harvard, and you'll give it
to me promptly."
John Watson looked at him fixedly, and slowly a look of great
admiration spread over his face.
"Of course you're a New Englander," he said. "It was not necessary for
you to say so. I could have told it by looking at you and hearing you
talk. But from what state do you come?"
"Vermont."
"I might have known that, too, and I'm glad and proud to meet you,
Captain Warner. I'm glad and proud to know a young man who looks ahead
twenty years. Nothing can keep you from being president of Harvard,
and that hundred thousand dollars is as good as given. Your hand
again!"
The hands of the two New Englanders met a second time in the touch of
kinship and understanding. Theirs was the clan feeling, and they had
supreme confidence in each other. Neither doubted that the promise
would be fulfilled, and fulfilled it was and fourfold more.
"You New Englanders certainly stand together," said Dick.
"Not more than you Kentuckians," replied the contractor. "I was in
Kentucky several times before the war, and you seemed to be one big
family there."
"But in the war we've not been one big family," said Dick, somewhat
sadly. "I suppose that no state has been more terribly divided than
Kentucky. Nowhere has kin fought more fiercely against kin."
"But you'll come together again after the war," said Watson cheerfully.
"That great bond of kinship will prove more powerful than anything
else."
"I hope so," said Dick earnestly.
They had the contractor to dinner with them, and he opened new worlds
of interest and endeavor for all of them. He was a mighty captain of
industry, a term that came into much use later, and mentally they
followed him as he led the way into fields of immense industrial
achievement. They were fascinated as he talked with truthful eloquence
of what the country could become, the vast network of railroads to be
built, the limitless fields of wheat and corn to be grown, the mines of
the richest mineral continent to be opened, and a trade to be acquired,
that would spread all over the world. They forgot the war while he
talked, and their souls were filled and stirred with the romance of
peace.
"I leave for Washington tonight," said the contractor, when the dinner
was finished. "My work here is done. Our next meeting will be in
Richmond."
All three of the young men took it as prophetic and when John Watson
started north they waved him a friendly farewell. Another long wait
followed, while the iron winter, one of the fiercest in the memory of
man, still gripped both North and South. But late in February there
was a great bustle, portending movement. Supplies were gathered,
horses were examined critically, men looked to their arms and
ammunition, and the talk was all of high anticipation. An electric
thrill ran through the men. They had tasted deep of victory since the
previous summer, and they were eager to ride to new triumphs.
"It's to be an affair of cavalry altogether," said Warner, who obtained
the first definite news. "We're to go toward Staunton, where Early and
his remnants have been hanging out, and clean 'em up. Although it's to
be done by cavalry alone, as I told you, it'll be the finest cavalry
you ever saw."
And when Sheridan gathered his horsemen for the march Warner's words
came true. Ten thousand Union men, all hardy troopers now, were in the
saddle, and the great Sheridan led them. The eyes of Little Phil
glinted as he looked upon his matchless command, bold youths who had
learned in the long hard training of war itself, to be the equals of
Stuart's own famous riders. And the eyes of Sheridan glinted again
when they passed over the Winchesters, the peerless regiment, the
bravest of the brave, with the colonel and the three youthful captains
in their proper places.
The weather was extremely cold, but they were prepared for it, and when
they swung up the valley, and forty thousand hoofs beat on the hard
road, giving back a sound like thunder, their pulses leaped, and they
took with delight deep draughts of the keen frosty air.
While they carried food for the entire march, the rest of their
equipment was light, four cannon, ammunition wagons, some ambulances
and pontoon boats. Dick thought they would make fast time, but fortune
for awhile was against them. The very morning the great column started
the weather rapidly turned warmer, and then a heavy rain began to fall.
The hard road upon which the forty thousand hoofs had beat their
marching song turned to mud, and forty thousand hoofs made a new sound,
as they sank deep in it, and were then pulled out again.
"If it keeps us from going fast," said the philosophical sergeant,
"it'll keep them that we're goin' after from gettin' away. We're as
good mud horses as they are."
"Do you think we'll go through to Staunton?" asked Dick of Warner.
"I've heard that we will, and that we'll go on and take Lynchburg too.
Then we're to curve about and in North Carolina join Sherman who has
smashed the Confederacy in the west."
"I don't like the North Carolina part," said Dick. "I hope we'll go to
Grant and march with him on Richmond, because that's where the death
blow will be dealt, if it's dealt at all."
"And that it will be dealt we don't doubt, neither you, nor I nor any
of us."
"Yes, that's so."
While mud and rain could impede the progress of the great column they
could not stop it. Neither could they dampen the spirits of the young
troopers who rode knee to knee, and who looked forward to new
victories. Through the floods of rain the ten thousand, scouts and
skirmishers on their flanks, swept southward, and they encountered no
foe. A few Southern horsemen would watch them at a great distance and
then ride sadly away. There was nothing in the valley that could
oppose Sheridan.
Dick's leggings, and his overcoat with an extremely high collar, kept
him dry and warm and he was too seasoned to mind the flying mud which
thousands of hoofs sent up, and which soon covered them. The swift
movement and the expectation of achieving something were exhilarating
in spite of every hardship and obstacle.
That night they reached the village of Woodstock, and the next day they
crossed the north fork of the Shenandoah, already swollen by the heavy
rains. The engineers rapidly and dexterously made a bridge of the
pontoon boats, and the ten thousand thundered over in safety.
The next night they were at a little place called Lacy's Springs, sixty
miles from Winchester, a wonderful march for two days, considering the
heavy rains and deep mud, and they had not yet encountered an enemy.
How different it would have been in Stonewall Jackson's time! Then,
not a mile of the road would have been safe for them. It was ample
proof of the extremities to which the Confederacy was reduced. Lee, at
Petersburg, could not reinforce Early, and Early, at Staunton, could
not reinforce Lee!
They intended to move on the next day, and they heard that night that
Rosser, a brave Confederate general, had gathered a small Confederate
force and was hastening forward to burn all the bridges over the middle
fork of the Shenandoah, in order that he might impede Sheridan's
progress. Then it was the call of the trumpet and boots and saddles
early in the morning in order that they might beat Rosser to the
bridges.
"I hope for their own sake that they won't try to fight us," said Dick.
"I'm with you on that," said Pennington. "They can't be more than a
few hundreds, and it would take thousands, even with a river to help,
to stop an army like ours."
It was not raining now and the roads growing dryer thundered with the
hoofs of ten thousand horses. The Winchesters had an honored place in
the van, and, as they approached the middle fork of the Shenandoah, the
three young captains raised themselves in their saddles to see if the
bridge yet stood. It was there, but on the other side of the stream a
small body of cavalrymen in gray were galloping forward, and some had
already dismounted for the attempt to destroy it. The arrival of the
two forces was almost simultaneous, but the Union army, overwhelming in
numbers, exulting in victory, swept forward to the call of the trumpets.
"They're not more than five or six hundred over there," said Warner,
"too few to put up a fight against us. I feel sorry for 'em, and wish
they'd go away."
The Southerners nevertheless were sweeping the narrow bridge with a
heavy rifle fire, and Sheridan drew back his men for a few minutes.
Then followed a series of mighty splashes, as two West Virginia
regiments sent their horses into the river, swam it, and, as they
emerged dripping on the farther shore, charged the little Confederate
force in flank, compelling it to retreat so swiftly that it left behind
prisoners and its wagons.
It was all over in a few minutes, and the whole army, crossing the
river, moved steadily on toward Staunton, where Early had been in camp,
and where Sheridan hoped to find him. The little victory did not bring
Dick any joy. He knew that the Confederacy could now make no stand in
the Valley of Virginia, and it was like beating down those who were
already beaten. He sincerely hoped that Early would not await them at
Staunton or anywhere else, but would take his futile forces out of the
valley and join Lee.
The heavy rains began again. Winter was breaking up and its transition
into spring was accompanied by floods. The last snow on the mountains
melted and rushed down in torrents. The roads, already ruined by war,
became vast ruts of mud, but Sheridan was never daunted by physical
obstacles. The great army of cavalry, scarcely slacking speed, pressed
forward continually, and Dick knew that Early did not have the shadow
of a chance to withstand such an army.
The next day they entered Staunton, another of the neat little Virginia
cities devoted solidly and passionately to the Southern cause. Here,
they were faced again by blind doors and windows, but Early and his
force were gone. Shepard brought news that he had prepared for a stand
at Waynesborough, although he had only two thousand men.
"Our general will attack him at once," said Warner, when he heard of
it. "He sweeps like a hurricane."
"He is surely the general for us at such a time," said Pennington, who
began to feel himself a military authority.
"It's humane, at least," said Dick. "The quicker it's over the smaller
the toll of ruin and death."
Nor had they judged Sheridan wrongly. His men advanced with speed,
hunting Early, and they found him fortified with his scanty forces on a
ridge near the little town of Waynesborough. The daring young leader,
Custer, and Colonel Winchester, riding forward, found his flank
exposed, and it was enough for Sheridan. He formed his plan with
rapidity and executed it with precision. The Custer and Winchester men
were dismounted and assailed the exposed flank at once, while the
remainder of the army made a direct and violent charge in front.
It seemed to Dick that Early was swept away in an instant, and the
attack was so swift and overwhelming that there was but little loss of
life on either side. Four fifths of the Southern men and their cannon
were captured, while Early, several of his generals and a few hundred
soldiers escaped to the woods. His army, however, had ceased to exist,
and Sheridan and his muddy victors rode on to the ancient town of
Charlottesville, which, having no forces to defend it, the mayor and
the leading citizens surrendered.
Dick, Warner and Pennington walked through the silent halls of the
University of Virginia, the South's most famous institution of
learning, founded by Thomas Jefferson, one of the republic's greatest
men.
"I hope they will re-open it next year," said Warner generously, "and
that it will grow and grow, until it becomes a rival of Harvard. We
want to defeat the South, but not to destroy it. Since it is to be a
part of the Union again, and loyal forever I hope and believe, we want
it strong and prosperous."
"I'm with you in that," said Dick, "and I feel it with particular
strength while I am here. There have been many great Virginians and I
hope there'll be many more."
They also visited Monticello, the famous colonial mansion which the
great Jefferson had built, and in which he had lived and planned for
the republic. They trod there with light steps, feeling that his
spirit was still present. Virginia was the greatest of the border
states, but it seemed to Dick that here he was in the very heart of the
South. Virginia was the greatest of the Southern fighting states too,
and it had furnished most of the great Southern leaders, at least two
of her sons ranking among the foremost military geniuses of modern
times. For nearly four years they had barred the way to every Northern
advance, and had won great victories over numbers, but Dick was sure as
he stood on a portico at Monticello, in the very heart of valiant
Virginia, that the fate of the South was sealed.
They did not stay long at Charlottesville and Monticello, but a portion
of the army, including the Winchester men, went on, tearing up the
railroad, while another column demolished a canal used for military
purposes. Then the two forces united at a town called New Market, but
they could go no farther. The heavy rains and the melting snows had
swollen the rivers enormously, all the bridges before them were
destroyed, and their own pontoons proved inadequate in face of the
great rushing streams. Then they turned back.
Dick and his comrades were secretly glad. The rising of the waters had
prevented them from going into North Carolina and joining Sherman.
Hence, they deduced that so active a man as Sheridan would march for a
junction with Grant, and that was where they wanted to go. They did
not believe that the Confederacy was to be finished in North Carolina,
but at Richmond. They knew that Lee's army yet stood between Grant and
the Southern capital, and, there, would be the heart of great affairs.
Spring was now opening and Sheridan's army marched eastward. Men and
horses were covered with mud, but they still had the flush of victories
won, and the incentive of others expected. They were even yet worn by
hard marching and some fighting, but it was a healthy leanness, making
their muscles as tough as whipcord, while their eyes were keen like
those of hawks.
Dick did not rejoice now in the work they were doing, although he saw
its need. Theirs was a task of destruction. For a distance of more
than fifty miles they ruined a canal important to the Confederacy.
Boats, locks, everything went, and they also made cuts by which the
swollen James poured into the canal, flooding it and thrusting it out
of its banks. They met no resistance save a few distant shots, and
Sheridan rejoiced over his plan to join the Army of the Potomac,
although he had not yet been able to send word of it to Grant.
But the omens remained propitious. They saw now that there were no
walls in the rear of the Confederacy and they had little to do but
march. The heavy rains followed them, roads disappeared, and it seemed
to the young captains that they lived in eternal showers of mud.
Horses and riders alike were caked with it, and they ceased to make any
effort to clean themselves.
"This is not a white army," said Warner, looking down a long column,
"it's brown, although it would be hard to name the shade of brown."
"It's not always brown," said Pennington. "Lots of the Virginia mud is
a rich, ripe red. Bet you anything that before tomorrow night we will
have turned to some hue of scarlet."
"We won't take the wager," said Dick, "because you bet on a certainty."
That afternoon the scouts surprised a telegraph station on the
railroad, and found in it a dispatch from General Early. To the great
amazement of Sheridan, Early was not far away. He had only two hundred
men, but with them the grim old fighter prepared to attack the Union
army. Sheridan himself felt a certain pity for his desperate opponent,
but he promptly sent Custer in search of him. The young cavalryman
quickly found him and scattered or captured the entire band.
Early escaped from the fight with a lone orderly as his comrade, and
the next day the general who had lost all through no fault of his own,
rode into Richmond with his single companion, and from him Jefferson
Davis, President of the Confederacy, heard the full tale of Southern
disaster in the Valley of Virginia.
Meanwhile Sheridan and his victorious army rode on to a place called
White House, where they found plenty of stores, and where they halted
for a long rest, and also to secure new mounts, if they could. Their
horses were worn out completely by the great campaign and were wholly
unfit for further service. But it was hard to obtain fresh ones and
the delay was longer than the general had intended. Nevertheless his
troops profited by it. They had not realized until they stopped how
near they too had come to utter exhaustion, and for several days they
were in a kind of physical torpor while their strength came back
gradually.
"I think I've removed the last trace of the Virginia mud from my
clothes and myself," said Warner on the morning of the second day, "but
I've had to work hard to do it, as time seemed to have made it almost a
part of my being."
"I've spent most of my time learning to walk again, and getting the
bows out of my legs," said Dick. "I've been a-horse so long that I
felt like a sailor coming ashore from a three years' cruise."
"Agreed with me pretty well, all except the mud, since I was born on
horseback," said Pennington. "But I don't like to ride in a brown
plaster suit of armor. What do you think is ahead, boys?"
"Junction with General Grant," said Dick. "They say, also, that
General Sherman, after completing his great work in Georgia and North
Carolina, is coming to join them too. It will be a great meeting, that
of the three successful generals who have destroyed the Confederacy,
because there's nothing of it left now but Lee's army, and that they
say is mighty small."
It was in reality a triumphant march that they began after they left
White House, refreshed, remounted and ready for new conquests. They
soon came into touch with the Army of the Potomac, and the great
meeting between Grant, Sherman and Sheridan took place, Sherman having
come north especially for the purpose. Then Sheridan's force became
attached to the Army of the Potomac, and his cavalry columns advanced
into the marshes about Petersburg. All fear that they would be sent to
cooperate with Sherman passed, and Dick knew that the Winchester men
would be in the final struggle with Lee, a struggle the success of
which he felt assured.
April was not far away. The fierce winter was broken up completely,
but the spring rains were uncommonly heavy and much of the low country
about Petersburg was flooded, making it difficult for cavalry and
impossible for infantry. Nevertheless the army of Grant, with Sheridan
now as a striking arm, began to close in on the beleaguered men in
gray. Lee had held the trenches before Petersburg many months, keeping
at bay a resolute and powerful army, led by an able and tenacious
general, but it was evident now that he could not continue to hold
them. Sheridan's victorious force on his flank made it impossible.
The Winchester men were in a skirmish or two, but for a few days most
of their work was maneuvering, that is, they were continually riding in
search of better positions. At times, the rain still poured, but the
three young captains were so full of expectancy that they scarcely
noticed it. Dick often heard the trumpets singing across the marshes,
and now and then he saw the Confederate skirmishers and the roofs of
Petersburg. He beheld too with his own eyes the circle of steel
closing about the last hope of the Confederacy, and he felt every day,
with increasing strength, that the end was near.
But the outside world did not realize that the great war was to close
so suddenly. It had raged with the utmost violence for four years and
it seemed the normal condition in America. Huge battles had been
fought, and they had ended in nothing. Three years before, McClellan
had been nearer to Richmond than Grant now was, and yet he had been
driven away. Lee and Jackson had won brilliant victories or had held
the Union numbers to a draw, and to those looking from far away the end
seemed as distant as ever. At that very moment, they were saying in
Europe that the Confederacy was invincible, and that it was stronger
than it had been a year or two years earlier.
Dick, all unconscious of distant opinion, watched the tightening of the
steel belt, and helped in the task. He and his comrades never doubted.
They knew that Sherman had crushed the Southeast, and that Thomas, that
stern old Rock of Chickamauga, had annihilated the Southern army of
Hood at Nashville. Dick was glad that the triumph there had gone to
Thomas, whom he always held in the greatest respect and admiration.
He often saw Grant in those days, a silent, resolute man, thinner than
of old and stooped a little with care and responsibility. Dick, like
the others, felt with all the power of conviction that Grant would
never go back, and Shepard, who had entered Petersburg twice at the
imminent risk of his life, assured him that Lee's force was wearing
away. There was left only a fraction of the great Army of Northern
Virginia that had fought so brilliantly at Chancellorsville,
Gettysburg, the Wilderness and on many another battlefield.
"Only we who are here and who can see with our own eyes know what is
about to happen," said the spy. "Even our own Northern states, so long
deluded by false hopes, can't yet believe, but we know."
"Did you hear anything of the Invincibles when you were in Petersburg?"
asked Dick.
"I heard of them, and I also saw them, although they did not know I was
near. I suppose Harry Kenton could scarcely have contained himself had
he known it was my sister who filched that map from the Curtis house in
Richmond and that it was to me she gave it."
"But he was all right? He escaped unhurt from the Valley?"
"Yes, or if he took a hurt it was but a slight one, from which he soon
recovered. He and his comrades, Dalton, St. Clair and Langdon, and the
two Colonels, Talbot and St. Hilaire, are back with Lee, and they've
organized another regiment called the Invincibles, which Talbot and St.
Hilaire lead, although your cousin and Dalton are on Lee's staff again."
"I suppose we'll come face to face again, and this time at the very
last," said Dick. "I hope they'll be reasonable about it, and won't
insist on fighting until they're all killed. Have you heard anything
of those two robbers and murderers, Slade and Skelly?"
"Not a thing. But I didn't expect it. They'd never leave the
mountains. Instead they'll go farther into 'em."
That night many messengers rode with dispatches, and the lines of the
Northern army were tightened. Dick saw all the signs that portended a
great movement, signs with which he had long since grown familiar. The
big batteries were pushed forward, and heavy masses of infantry were
moved closer to the Confederate trenches. He felt quite sure that the
final grapple was at hand.