I am Instructed to Capture and Search a Female Smuggler--
I Protest in Vain--The Terrible Ordeal--Beauty Behind the
Pulpit--Pills, Plasters, Quinine--The Pathetic Letter--
We Meet Under Happier Stars.
It was at this time that the hardest duty that it was my lot to perform
during my service, fell to me, and the only wonder to me is that I am
alive today to tell of it. If I ever get a pension it will be on
account of night sweats, caused by the terrible and trying work that was
assigned to me. One day the colonel sent for me, and I knew at once that
there was something unusual in the wind. After seating myself in his
tent he opened the subject by asking me if I wasn't something of a hand
to be agreeable to the ladies. I told him, with many blushes, that
if there was one thing on this earth that I thought was nicer than
everything else, it was a lady, and that a good woman was the noblest
work of God. He said he was on to all of that, but it wasn't a good
woman that he was after. That startled me a little. I had heard the
officers had a habit of fooling around a good deal with certain females,
and I told the colonel that any duty that I was assigned to I would
perform to the best of my poor ability, but I could not go around with
the girls as officers did, because I couldn't afford it, and it was
against my principles, anyway. He showed me a picture of a beautiful
woman, and asked me if I would know her if I saw her again. I told him I
could pick her out of a thousand. He said she was a smuggler. She had a
pass from a general, who seemed to be under her influence to a certain
extent, for some reason, and went in and out of the lines freely. The
general didn't want to order her arrest, because she would squeal on
him, but he wanted her arrested all the same, and the idea was to have
some corporal in charge of a picket post take the responsibility of
arresting her without orders, refuse to recognize her pass, take the
quinine and other medicines, and money away from her, and then be
arrested himself for exceeding his authority. He said they wanted a
corporal who had every appearance of being a big-headed idiot, and yet
who knew what he was about, who knew something about women, and who
could do such a job up in shape, and never let the woman know that the
general or anybody had anything to do with her arrest. The idea was
to catch her in the act of smuggling quinine through the lines to the
rebels, by the act of a fresh corporal who took the matter into his
own hands, and who claimed that the pass she had from the general was a
forgery. When the general could, when the woman was brought before
him, be indignant at the corporal for insulting a woman, and order him
arrested, and he could also go back on the woman, and have her sent
away, after which he would release the corporal, and perhaps promote
him, and all would be well. It was as pretty a scheme as I ever listened
to, and I consented to do the duty, though I wouldn't do it again for
a million dollars. The colonel told me to take four men and go to a
particular place on an unfrequented road, near a school house, and
put out a picket. The female would be along during the afternoon, on
horseback, and when she showed her pass, one of the men must take hold
of her horse and hold him, while I kicked about the pass, made her
dismount, and searched her for quinine. I turned ashy pale when the
colonel said that, and I said to him:
“Colonel, for heaven's sake don't compel me to search a woman. I have a
family at home, and they will hear of it. My political enemies will use
it against me at home when I run for office, after the war. Let me bring
her here to your tent, and you search her.”
“No, that would spoil all,” said the colonel. “We want her searched
right there at the little school house, by a corporal without apparent
authority, and every last quinine pill taken off of her. If she was
brought here she would cry, and rave, and we should weaken, because we
know her, and have been entertained at her house. You are supposed to
be a heartless corporal, with no sentiment, no mercy, no nothing, just
a delver after smuggled quinine. Besides, I too, have a family, and I
don't want to search no females. By the way, one of the general's start
saw her last night, and drew the cartridges from her revolver, and put
in some blank cartridges. If the worst comes, she will draw her revolver
on you, and perhaps fire at you, but there are no balls in her revolver,
so you needn't be afraid.”
“But suppose she has two revolvers,” I asked, “and one is loaded with
bullets?”
“I don't think she has,” said the colonel. “But we have to take some
chances, you know. Now go right along. Treat her like a lady, disbelieve
everything she says and insist on searching her. The general says she
wears an enormous bustle, and probably that is full of quinine. Use your
judgement, but get it all. Pretend to be an ignorant sort of a corporal
who feels that the success of the war depends on him, act as though you
outranked the general, and tell her you would not let her pass with that
quinine if the general himself was present. Just display plenty gall
and when you have go the quinine, bring the girl here, and I will abuse
you, and you take it like a little man, and all will be well. If she
bites and scratches, some of you will have to hold her, but the best
way will be to argue with her, and persuade her by honied words, to come
down with the quinine. Go!”
“One word, colonel, before I go,” I said. “About how many men should you
think it would take to hold this woman? You suggested three, but if one
holds her horse, it seems to me, from my knowledge of female kicking,
biting and scratching, that I would need one man for each arm and foot,
one to hold her head and choke her, if necessary, and one with a roving
commission to work around where he would be apt to make himself useful.
What do you say if I take five men!”
“All right, take six,” said the colonel. “One may be disabled, or have
his jaw kicked off, or something. But don't detail anybody to search
her. Do that yourself, and do it like a gentleman. And above all things,
do not let her kanoodle you with soft words and looks of love, because
she is full of em. If she can't scare you, with her indignation at the
outrage of arresting and searching her, she will try to capture you and
make you love her. You must be as firm as adamant. Now hurry up.”
I picked out six men, four of whom were young Americans, rather
handsome, and very polite, regular mashers.
Then I had an Irishman named Duffy, and a German named Holzmeyer, who
was a butcher. We went out on the road, to the school house, and I put
the Irishman on picket, and instructed the German about taking the horse
by the bridle at the proper time. Then the rest of us got behind the
school house and waited. For two hours we waited, and I had a chance to
think over the situation. Here I was, putting down the rebellion, laying
for a woman, who was loaded. At home, I was a polite man, and full of
fun, a person any lady might be proud to meet and talk with, but here I
was expected to do something, for thirteen dollars a month, to put down
the rebellion, which there was not money enough in the whole state
of Wisconsin to hire me to do. Was it such a crime to carry a little
quinine to a sick friend? Suppose a rebel was sick with ague, and I had
quinine, would I see him shake himself out of his boots and not give him
medicine? No, I would divide my last quinine powder with him. So would
any soldier. If it was not treason to give one rebel a quinine powder,
when he was sick, why should it be treason to take along enough for
a whole lot of sick rebels? Did our government want to put down the
rebellion by keeping medicines away from a sick enemy? Were we to gloat
over the number of rebels who died of disease, that we could save by
sending them medicines? It seemed to me, if I was in command of the
army, instead of arresting women for carrying medicine to their sick
brothers, I would load up a wagon with medicine and send it to them,
and say, “Here, you fellows, fire this quinine down your necks, and get
well, and then if you want to fight any more, come out on the field and
we will give you the best turn in the wheel-house.” It seemed to me that
would be the way to win the enemy over, and that they would be thankful,
take the medicine, get well, and then say, “Boys, these Yankees are
pretty good fellows after all. Let's quit fighting, and call it quits.”
But I was not running the war, and had got to obey orders, if I broke
heartstrings and corset strings. I would have given anything to have
got out of the job. The idea of arresting a woman and searching her,
and seeing her cry, and have her think me a hard-hearted wretch, was
revolting, and I found myself wishing she would take some other road.
May be she looked like somebody that I knew at home, and may be she had
a big brother in the Confederate army who would look me up after the war
and everlastingly maul the life out of me for insulting his sister. I
made up my mind if anything of that kind happened I would tell on the
general and the colonel, and get them whipped, too.
“Phat the divil is it coming,” said the Irishman. “Corporal of the
guaod, the quane of all the South is coming down the road, riding a high
stepper. Phat will I do, I dunno?”
“Stop her,” I yelled with my teeth chattering.
“Halt right fhere yez are,” said the Irishman, with a look on his face
that showed he was--well, that he was an Irishman, and had an eye for
beauty. The German had taken the horse by the bit, and I stepped out
from behind the school house.
Great heavens, but she was a beautiful woman, and she sat on her horse
like a statue. I had never seen a more beautiful woman. She was a
brunette, with large black eyes, and her face was flushed with the
exercise of riding.
She smiled and showed two rows of the prettiest teeth that ever were put
into a female mouth, and one ungloved hand, with which she handed me the
pass had a dimple at every knuckle, and was as white as paper, and soft
as silk. I know it was soft, because it touched my red, freckled hand
when I took the pass. I did not blame the general for being in love with
her, or for wanting to saw off the unpleasant duty of breaking up her
smuggling, on to a poor orphan like me. She said:
“Captain, I have a pass from the general, to go through the lines at any
time, unmollested.”
“It is no good,” I said, examining it. “This pass is evidently a
forgery.”
“But, my dear captain,” she said, with a smile that I would give ten
dollars for a picture of, “The pass is not a forgery. I have used it for
months.”
“I am not a dear captain, only a cheap corporal,” I said, with an
attempt to be at my ease, which I wasn't.
“There has been at least a wagon load of quinine smuggled through the
lines on this pass, and it has got to stop; you cannot go.”
“The dickens you say,” said she as she drew her revolver, and sung out,
“let go that horse,” and firing at the German.
“Kritz-dunnerwetter,” said the German, as he got down by the horse's fore
feet, and held on to the bridle, “vot vor you choot a man ven he holt
your horse?”
“Madame,” I said, “your revolver is loaded with blank cartridges, and
you can do no harm. Try another one on the Irishman.”
“Hold on,” said the Irishman, “and don't experiment on a poor man who
has a wife and six children. Shoot the corporal.”
But I had reached up and taken the revolver from her, and she was weak
as a kitten. Her nerve had forsaken her, and when I told her to dismount
she was like a rag, and had to be helped down. If she was beautiful
before, now that she had started her tear mill, she was ravishingly
radiant, and I felt like a villain. She leaned on my shoulder, and it
was the loveliest burden a soldier ever held. I seated her on the steps
of the schoolhouse, and I thought she would faint, but she didn't. She
was evidently taken by surprise, and wanted a little time to think it
over, and form a plan. So did I. As I looked her over, and thought what
I was expected to do, I wondered where it would be best to commence. She
began to recover, smiled at me and asked me to have the other soldiers
go away, so she could talk with me. I wished she wouldn't smile like
that, because it unnerved me. She asked me what I was going to do with
her, what caused me to suspect her, if I would not believe her if she
told me she was not a smuggler, if I had orders to arrest her, and all
that. I said, “Madame, my orders are to arrest all quinine smugglers, and
you are one. I am Hawkshaw, the detective. For months I have shadowed
you, and I know you have concealed about your person a whole drug store.
In that innocent looking bustle I feel that there is quinine for the
million. Your heaving bosom contains, besides love for your friends and
hatred of your enemies, a storehouse of useful medicines, contraband
of war. In your stockings there is much that would interest the seeker
after the truth, your corset that fits you so beautifully is liable
to be full of revolver cartridges, while in your shoes there may be
messages to the rebels. I shall search you from Genesis to Revelations,
and may the Lord have mercy on both of us. To begin, please let me
examine the hat you have on.”
With some reluctance she took off a sort of half-stovepipe hat, and
covered her face with her handkerchief while I looked into it. I found
a package of newly printed confederate bonds, and a quantity of court
plaster. That settled it. She cried a little, and wanted to go into the
schoolhouse. I went in with her, and two of my soldiers.
I told her that it was a duty that was pretty tough, but it was
necessary for her to disrobe, as I must have every article she had. She
cried, and said if I searched her, or molested her, I would do it at
my peril, and that I wouldn't know how to go to work to take off her
clothes, anyway, and that I ought to be ashamed of myself. I told her I
felt as ashamed as any gentleman could, and though I knew little about
the details of the female apparel, I had some general ideas about
bustles, polonaise, socks, skirts, and so forth, and while I might be
awkward, and uncouth, and nervous, as long as there were buttons to
unbutton, hooks to unhook, and safety-pins to unpin, I thought I could
eventually get to the quinine, if she would give me time, and I did not
faint by the wayside, but my idea was that it would save all trouble,
her modesty would not receive a shock, nor mine either, if she would go
behind the little pulpit in the schoolhouse, out of sight of us, take
off her clothes, and hand them over the pulpit to us to examine. She
said she would die first, besides, she knew we would peek around the
pulpit at her. I was getting very nervous, and perspiring a good deal,
and wishing it was over, and I swore, upon my honor, that if she would
go behind the pulpit and disrobe, she should be as safe from intrusion
as though she was in her own room. She swore she would not, and I went
up to her to commence unraveling the mystery. Her dress hooked up in the
back, which I always _did_ think a great nuisance, and I began to unhook
it. I wondered that she stood so quietly and let me unhook it, but
after it was unhooked from the neck to the small of her back, and I was
wishing I was dead, she said:
“There, now that you have got my dress unhooked, a feat I never could
accomplish myself, I will go behind the pulpit and take off my dress, if
you will promise not to look, and that you will help me hook up my dress
when this cruel quinine war is over.”
I told her by the great Jehosephat, and the continental congress, I
would help her, and that I would kill anybody who looked, and she went
behind the schoolhouse pulpit, where a country preacher, very likely,
preached on Sundays, and bent over out of sight, and it wasn't half a
minute before she handed the dress over to me. In the pockets I found
several papers of some kind of medicine, and a few small bottles, sealed
up with red sealing-wax.
“Now, the bustle, please, I said, in a voice trembling with emotion.
“Take your old bustle,” she said, as she whacked it on the top of the
pulpit.
Well, if anybody had told me that a bustle could be made to hold stuff
enough to fill a bushel-basket, I would not have believed it. We filled
three nose-bags, such as cavalrymen feed horses in, with paper packages
and bottles of quinine. There were thirty bottles of pills, and salves
and ointments, and plasters.
“This is panning out first rate,” I said, with less emotion. The emotion
was somehow getting out of me, and the affair was becoming more of a
mercantile transaction. It was like a young druggist going from the side
of his beloved, to the drug store, to take an inventory. “Now hand out
that other lot.”
She evidently knew what I referred to, for she handed out over the
pulpit a package just exactly the shape of what I had supposed, in my
guileless innocence, was a portion of the female form. That is, I had
suspected it was not all human form, but didn't know. That was also full
of medicines, of which quinine was the larger part, though there was
about a pint of gun caps.
“Speaking about stockings,” I said, “please take them off and hand them
over.”
[Illustration: Two very long stockings, came over the pulpit 185]
She kicked about taking off her shoes and stockings, and said no
gentleman would compel a lady to do that. I said I would wait about two
minutes, and then, if it was too much trouble for her to take them off,
I would come around the pulpit and help. Bless you, I wouldn't have
gone for the world, as I was already more than satisfied with what I had
found. She said I needn't trouble myself, as she guessed she could
take off her shoes without my help. I heard her unlacing her shoes, and
pretty soon two dainty shoes and two very long stockings, came over the
pulpit, the heel of one shoe hitting me in the ear. As I picked up the
shoes I heard the crumpling of a letter behind the pulpit, and I told
her I must have all the messages she had. She said it was only a letter
to one she loved. I told her I must have it, and she handed it over. I
read, “My darling husband,” and handed it back, saying I would not pry
into her family secrets. She began to cry, and insisted on my reading
it, which I did. It was to her husband, an officer in the Confederate
army, and was about as follows:
“My Darling Husband:--This life of deception is killing me.
I want to do all in my power to help our cause, but I am
each day more nervous, and liable to detection. The Yankee
officers are frequently at our house, and I have to treat
them kindly, but it is all I can do to keep from crying, and
I am expected to laugh. I fear that I am suspected of
smuggling, as the subject is frequently brought up in
conversation, and I feel my face burn, though I try hard not
to show it. I think of you, away off in Virginia, with your
armless sleeve, our children in New Orleans, and I wonder if
we will ever be united again. O, God, when will this all
end. I have no fault to find with the Federal troops. The
officers are very kind and through one fatherly general I am
allowed to pass into our lines. I feel that I am betraying
his kindness every trip I make, and only the urgent need
that our dear boys have for medicines could induce me to do
as I do. After this trip I shall go to New Orleans,{*}
where I fear Madge is sick, as shew as not at all well the
last I heard from her. Pray earnestly, my dear husband,
every day, as I do, that this trouble may end soon, some
way, and I beg of you not to have a feeling of revenge in
your heart towards your enemies, on account of the loss of
your arm, as there are thousands of federals similarly
afflicted. I shall love you more, and I will wrap your empty
sleeve about my neck, and try never to miss the strong arm
that was my support. Adieu.
“Your loving wife.”
That letter knocked me out in one round. I had begun to enjoy the
unpacking of the smuggled goods, and the discomfiture of my female
smuggler, but when I read that loving letter, breathing such a
Christian spirit, and thought of the poor wife-mother behind the pulpit
unravelling herself, I was ashamed, and I said to myself, “she shall not
take off another rag. So I handed back the letter and the dress, and all
of the things she had taken off, and I said:
“Put everything right back onto yourself, and come out at your leisure,
and we took the medicines and went out of the schoolhouse. Presently
She came out, and I told her it was my duty to take her back to
headquarters, but if she had no objections to my taking the letter to
the general, with the medicines, she could go back to the house where
she boarded, and I thought if she took the first boat for New Orleans,
it would be all right, and I would see that the letter was sent through
the lines to her husband. I helped her on her horse, and I said:
“You can escape. Your horse is better than ours, and though you are a
prisoner, we would not shoot at you if you tried to escape. I hope your
prayers will have the effect you desire, and that the trouble will soon
be over. I hope you will and the children well, and that the husband
will be spared to be a comfort to you.”
She bowed her head, as she sat in the saddle, and the look of defiance
which she had shown, was gone, and one of thankfulness, peace, hope,
purity, took its place. She handed me the letter, and asked:
“Can I go?”
I told, her she was free to go. She turned her horse; towards town,
touched him with the whip, and he was; away like the wind. I stood
for two minutes, watching her, when I was recalled to my senses by the
Irishman, who said:
“Fhat are we to do wid the quinane and the gun caps?” We packed the
smuggled goods in our saddle-bags and elsewhere, and rode back to
headquarters. The colonel and the general were in the colonel's tent,
and I took the “stuff” in and reported all the occurrences.
“But where is the lady?” inquired the general, after reading the letter
and wiping his eyes.
“As we were about to start back,” said I, “after taking the smuggled
goods from her, she gave her horse the whip, and rode away. I had no
orders to shoot a woman, and I let her go.”
“Thank God,” said the general. “That's the best way,” said the colonel.
“She will quit smuggling and go to her children.”
*Eighteen months after the lady rode away from me, “leaving”
her quinine, I was in New Orleans, to be mustered in as
Second Lieutenant, having received a commsssion. I had
bought me a fine uniform, and thought I was about as cunning
a looking officer as ever was. I was walking on Canal
street, looking in the windows, and finally went into a
store to buy some collars. A gentleman came in with a gray
uniform on, and one sleeve empty. He was evidently a
Confederate officer. He asked me if I did not belong to a
certain cavalry regiment, and if my name was not so and so.
I told him he was correct. He told me there was a lady in an
adjoining store that wanted to see me. I did not know a
soul, that is, a female soul, in New Orleans, but I went
with him. Any lady that wanted to see me, in my new uniform,
could see me. As we entered the store a lady left two little
girls and rushed up to me, threw her arms around my neck and
--(say, does a fellow have to tell everything, when he writes
a war history?) Well, she was awfully tickled to see me, and
she was my smuggler, the Confederate was her husband, and
the children were hers. The officer was as tickled as she
was, and they compelled me to go to their house to dinner,
and I enjoyed it very much. We talked over the arrest of the
“female smuggler,” and she said to her husband, “Pa, it
was an awfully embarrassing situation for me and this
Yankee, but he treated me like a lady, and the only thing I
have to find fault about, is that he forgot to help me hook
up my dress, and I rode clear to town with it unhooked.” The
Confederate had been discharged at the surrender, and I was
on my way to Texas, to serve another year, hunting Indians.
I left them very happy, and as I went out of their door she
wrapped his empty sleeve around her waist, drew the children
up to her, and said, “Mr. Yankee, may you always be very
happy.”