LAREDO--MEXICAN ESCORT TO PIEDRAS NEGRAS--THE CUSTOM-HOUSE--A
NORTHER--SAN ANTONIO--SCARCITY OF NECESSARIES.
On the fourth day at noon we camped amid sand and prickly-pear, to
brush up and make ourselves presentable to appear before strangers. An
hour afterward we drove into the scattering town of Laredo, amid the
plaudits of numberless little, half-naked _muchachos_ who never had
seen an ambulance, never had seen anything but themselves and the muddy
river, and at long intervals a lonely wagon. So they hung on to the
traces, ran by the wheels, and caught on behind, at the imminent risk
of bodily injury. If they had ever heard of Queen Victoria, they might
have thought she was coming to town, for I was the first _white_ woman
and my attendant the first _black_ one the generation had seen.
I often think of the days we spent in quaint Laredo--of the old priest
who three times a day solemnly issued from his adobe hut and tolled
off the hours from the big, harsh-sounding bell that surmounted a
tall staff beside the little mud-covered church--of the courtesy and
kindness of the women who brought me almost daily presents of little
loaves of bread, alas! full of caraway-seed, but sweet and warm from
the adobe ovens that were scattered at convenient distances through
the village--of the men, wrapped in blankets like Indians, standing
aside and giving me a courteous, deep salaam, _sombrero_ in hand, when
necessity compelled me to take the quart-cup and go to the public pen
for goat’s milk--of the dexterous manner with which said goats were
milked, all herded in a crowded pen: the milker fastened his eye on a
certain nanny, made a rapid dart, caught her by the left hind-foot,
which he secured under his right arm, thereby lifting the struggling
creature quite off her legs; with a quick stoop and a few lightning
strokes the cup foamed over and Mrs. Goat was released. This trick
was repeated with an accuracy and dexterity quite bewildering. All
the animals looked alike to me, but the milker never seemed to make
the mistake of catching the same one twice. I sometimes stood and
watched the whole process, until the froth and foam of my cup settled
down, revealing very little milk. Daily I went to the pen, both
because I could ask for it in their mixture of Spanish and Indian, and
because Delia with her ebony face was such a curiosity as to excite a
commotion every time she stepped out of the house, and therefore she
was reluctant to go. I need not tell of the hours I sat at the only
window of our temporary home, and wrote letters that were never sent,
or made entries in a diary that was subsequently lost, while a crowd
of inquisitive urchins gathered about, until I was forced to retreat
inside and put the writing away; nor of days that I wandered to the
bluff, and met long processions of women returning from the river,
with curiously shaped jars of water deftly balanced on their heads,
or suspended by one hand over the shoulder, and watched other women
washing clothes without soap or hot water, by spreading them on rocks
over which the waters of the river lapped, and beating and turning and
beating them again with queer wooden mallets, while the naked children
paddled in and out, diving, ducking, floating, and splashing around as
though water was their native element; nor of other days when I stood
on the bank to see the long-expected cotton-wagons cross the ford to
the Mexican side; nor of the startling rumor that the Federals, who
seemed to be sweeping over the country like a swarm of locusts, were
rapidly marching up the Rio Grande!
The alarm was premature, but we immediately crossed into Mexico.
My husband’s first business venture, when still a youth, was the
superintendence of a “stage line” in the West, for which he had a
“mail contract.” In Laredo he found one of his old employés, who had
drifted there after the war with Mexico, married an olive beauty,
and settled down to a life of masterly inactivity. Through his kindly
offices we had been able to obtain quite comfortable quarters, but when
we crossed to “foreign parts” were not so well housed, albeit we found
more life and animation. The frolicsome men of American Laredo, to
avoid conscription had emigrated also. Here they amused themselves with
feats of horseback-riding and lofty tumbling, some of which were quite
astonishing. It was a frequent exploit for a rider to lean over and
pick a silver dollar from the ground while his horse was in full gallop
under whip and spur. During the annual festival of their patron saint,
“Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe,” we walked through the plaza, filled
with gaily decked booths, and saw both men and women win and lose bags
of money at the gambling-tables with a _sang-froid_ that indicated
familiarity with the game.
The repeated rumors of Federal advance soon caused the order to be
issued to close the custom-house at Laredo and open one at Piedras
Negras, still farther up the Rio Grande, and on the Mexican side of
the river, to which point all cotton-trains were now directed. Our
Confederate official procured from the Governor of the State of Nuevo
Leon an armed escort, and we eagerly embraced the opportunity of safe
convoy through that wild and lawless region by joining his party. I
presume there were valuables, perhaps specie, in his train, from
the extraordinary precautions observed against attack. Away in front
of our _cortège_, the striped _serape_ of the Mexican captain was
always visible, fluttering in the wind, as he rode rapidly forward
reconnoitring the country, while we followed in single file, surrounded
by his armed men. It was a four-days’ journey, if my memory serves me.
Sometimes we halted in the middle of the day, scarcely having scored
a dozen miles, and sometimes rode until quite dark, in order to avoid
dangerous and exposed camping-places.
Arrived at Piedras Negras, the party was directed to the only public
building in the town, to which it had been assigned by the courtesy of
the Mexican governor, and I believe, also, the only one that boasted
a fireplace, a tiny grate in an inconvenient corner, that could hold
about two chips and a handful of coals. The weather, though late in
December, gave no indications, however, that even a small fire would
be necessary for our comfort. The building consisted of one long,
narrow room, with a small window, innocent of glass at one end, and
two doors opening on opposite sides, one to the narrow, sandy lane
that represented a street, and the other to an uninclosed yard, at the
extreme end of which a dead dog lay swollen to the size of a calf,
but so pure was the air, no odor from the disgusting object--which,
of course, was now quickly removed--had invaded the premises. Our
building was stucco, with some attempt at ornamentation, in the way of
whitewashed walls, with daubs of blue here and there. The floor, of
Mother Earth, well trodden and quite smooth, was tesselated with an
ever-moving panorama of fleas; here we spread the wagon-cover, and upon
some rough boxes, collected with no small cost of energy and money,
was placed our still comfortable though long-used ambulance-mattress.
Chairs were so scarce that none could be procured; fortunately, I had
retained in all our wanderings a little splint-bottomed rocking-chair,
brought from Arlington, and this was doubly appreciated as the “woman
in the case” was comfortably provided for (when we left Mexico, for the
last time, I gave that chair to a friend, and twenty years after, in
New Orleans, sat in it again). The scarcity of furniture arose from the
fact that the natives, even when in comfortable circumstances, slept
on rawhides spread upon the floor, and squatted about in uncomfortable
attitudes, oblivious of the luxury of chairs.
In these quarters we remained two months. The accommodating collector
gave the room to us entirely at night, but during the day it was his
office. There he had a table for his papers and a store-box to sit on,
and there he dispatched his business as “collector of the customs for
the Confederate States.” That high-sounding title meant a great deal
to us then, empty as it is now. Here teamsters were paid for hauling
Government cotton to the Rio Grande, and here permits were granted for
various purposes. The collector made me feel very important at first,
but I was fearfully burdened afterward by his appointing me custodian
of the specie. There was no bank, of course, nor any other place of
deposit for valuables in Piedras Negras, as the natives to the manor
born could carry on their persons without effort everything they owned,
clothes and all.
Mexican silver dollars arrived in stout coffee-sacks, consigned to
the Confederate officer, to pay cartage. I opened and emptied my
only trunk, and the money was rattled in like stones turned from a
wheelbarrow, until the trunk was full to bursting; then I locked it,
sat on it during the day, and slept on it at night, as it was dragged
under the lower edge of our mattress at bed-time. I was almost afraid
to wink, the responsibility of my charge so overwhelmed me. Rapidly
those clumsy dollars were paid out to big-booted, red-shirted men,
with pistols in their belts and fire in their eyes, who tied them in
coarse handkerchiefs and heavy stockings, though mostly in bags made of
pantaloon-legs. In very many instances the men, not yet ready to start
on the home journey--though I was an entire stranger--begged me to keep
their bags until called for.
Then traders on their own business intent, Jews, and that class of men
of peace always found where there is a chance of money-making, came
out of the Confederacy to Piedras Negras, with their precious bags of
hoarded gold, _en route_ for the interior of Mexico, to purchase goods.
These wary men quickly learned there was an American woman in town who
could be persuaded to take care of their money till they were ready
to start. So to the office they came, with courteous though cautious
manner, casting keen glances at my face and around the room, asking
occasional questions as to its being lonesome in there, if I never
went out to walk, or left the place for any length of time. Then they
would slyly bring out the inevitable bag from a deep pocket and ask me
to keep it “till to-morrow,” adding they had to sleep in their wagons,
where it was not safe to keep valuables. Two months I sat on money,
slept on money, watched by money, not knowing the amount, the names,
nor often the faces even of the trusting depositors.
It was not always spring-like and balmy on that sandy bank. One night
we were roused by a knock at the back door, with news that Mr. W----
was frozen stiff in his wagon! There was a shuffling and a rush in
the intense cold, the door hastily opened and as rapidly closed on
the “good collector,” in a very dazed and half-frozen condition, his
overcoat and blanket wrapped about him, yet so benumbed and helpless
that he could only move by the aid of two men who supported him.
Laying him on the floor, before the “two chips and a handful of coals,”
we retired once more to bed. Then came a big _bump_ at the front door.
We thought it was a belated native, and that he might as well go home;
but another bump and a sharp rattle gave positive indications that he
was going no farther. To my husband’s call, “Who’s there?” came the
chattering utterance: “Simmes, just arrived; let me in for Heaven’s
sake! I’ve got lumbago, and can’t stay out here!” So poor Mr. Simmes
was admitted, and, wrapped up like a mummy, he lay as close to the fire
as he could. The next morning, when I awoke, our thawed guests had
departed. I arose, shook out my skirts, and the toilet was complete.
The provisions were frozen, eggs were solid, so was the fresh beef, and
they had to be brought inside and thawed before the fire. The cold was
accompanied by high winds, that blew the fine sand in blinding clouds
up the narrow streets, drifting it into every crack and crevice of
the house, though the shutters were tightly closed, so that a candle
was needed all that day. Delia brought the kitchen-utensils inside to
prepare our meals, yet, notwithstanding all these precautions, sand
sifted into the coffee-pot and over the food, making everything gritty.
In the midst of our work, one of the _depositors_ called to say that a
friend of his was ill in a wagon outside. We immediately thawed some
eggs, and with a cup of milk made the invalid the most attractive
delicacy that the circumstances would admit, and sent it, with the
promise of some beef-tea in an hour or two.
During the following day the wind subsided, the room was cleared of the
sandy dust, that covered everything with a whitish coat, and we were
soon again quite comfortable.
Later we went into Texas for several months’ sojourn, fording the Rio
Grande in a terrible wind-storm. The blinding sand swept in great gusts
over the river and down the level, desolate road, whirled through the
ambulance in stinging blasts, and blew into the faces of the frightened
mules. Starting in the forenoon after a hurried, unsatisfactory,
gritty breakfast, a floundering drive of ten miles brought us to the
chaparral, where we were obliged to halt and camp. The _personnel_
of the party was the most agreeable we had met in all our camping
experiences. Besides a very jovial, entertaining physician from New
Orleans, there were two intelligent, genial young Englishmen, members
of commercial houses in London, regular cockneys, on their first trip
through a rough country; everything new and novel was attractive to
them, and even exceedingly unpleasant occurrences were accepted with
good-nature.
We halted with dry and parched throats by a brackish well, the water of
which was scarcely fit to cleanse our faces from the gritty dust, and
still less desirable for making coffee, though improvised filtration
somewhat improved it. While a fire was kindling, and preparations
for dinner were being made, our doctor in utter despair was heard to
exclaim, “I would give a thousand dollars for a good drink of brandy!”
to which I promptly replied, “There’s a whole bottle of cognac in my
trunk to be had for less than that.” My husband, knowing full well the
importance of keeping a small supply on hand, looked very anxious, and
shook his head; but the offer was renewed, only exacting the promise,
as it was a full bottle, the cork never having been disturbed, that
the contents should be equally divided among all the gentlemen. Of
course, the proposition met with universal approval, and the doctor,
with smacking lips, readily accepted the conditions. To the insinuation
that the existence of the brandy was a myth, the ready reply came,
“The collector gave me a bottle full of brandy on New Year’s, with
the injunction not to open it except in dire emergency. That time has
come.” From my trunk in the wagon was then produced, amid the intense
hilarity of the crowd, a dainty toy-bottle holding perhaps a wine-glass
of liquor, and the disappointed doctor was compelled to fulfill the
agreement, by which each gentleman of the party received about “forty
drops.”
Following the old routine of travel and camping-out, I often became
stiff and weary from the tedious rides, and found the change to a brisk
walk very refreshing. When the teams rested beside a stream or well at
noon, I frequently walked long distances on the lonely and desolate
roads before the ambulance overtook me. We halted on the pebbly bank of
the Frio to rest and refresh the mules and soak the wheels, whose tires
in the long, dusty drive had become loose and unsafe. I walked up the
road, perhaps a mile, enjoying the quiet and relief which a change of
locomotion afforded. Suddenly was perceived at the top of a slight rise
a “solitary horseman” slowly approaching. While I was still looking at
him, uncertain what to do, he sprung from his horse, and advanced with
rapid steps, leading the animal by the bridle.
Having been so often warned of the hazard incurred by these lonely
walks, I was paralyzed with alarm, till the spell was broken by the
familiar voice of Mr. Crossan, our commissary and _chef_ of months ago:
“Mrs. ----! I would have known that bonnet on Mount Ararat!”
We found San Antonio to be the most attractive and interesting town
we had visited in all our journeyings. Though laid out with some
regularity, and ornamented by several modern structures, its narrow
streets, many low stone houses, quaint churches, and busy plaza, mark
its Spanish origin.
The San Antonio River, clear as crystal, heads from two springs a
short distance above the town, and through its tortuous channel and
irrigating canals the water is carried in easy access to most of the
houses. The _missions_ are curiosities. Those of Conception, San
José, San Juan, and La Espada, are within a couple of miles of the
city. Although now in dilapidated condition, they bear full evidence
of the substantial architecture and elaborate finish of the immense
establishments erected nearly two centuries ago to extend the power and
authority of the Roman Catholic Church.
Here stands the Alamo, celebrated in the history of Texan independence
as the scene of the desperate struggle between the Mexican army under
General Santa Anna and one hundred and fifty Texans, in which every one
of the latter was slaughtered, among them the eccentric Davy Crockett
and the heroic Bowie.
San Antonio was now the business point to which all the wagon-trains
from Mexico converged. Hundreds of huge Chihuahua wagons were to be
seen “parked” with military precision outside the city, waiting their
turn to enter the grand plaza, deliver their packages of goods, and
load with cotton for their outward trip. Everything was hurry, bustle,
and confusion. The major-domo, urging his train of wagons through the
streets, was loud and vociferous in his language, and each driver and
outrider added copiously to the babel of tongues. Merchants of every
clime were here, anxious to sell or exchange for cotton, or to procure
transportation for their goods far into the interior of Louisiana and
Arkansas.
Hearing there were men in town with a miscellaneous assortment of
dry-goods, with a friend I went to the warehouse where they were
stored to make some purchases. We were told “the goods were not even
to be opened in San Antonio. They were imported especially for the
Louisiana trade.” We implored the privilege of buying some much-needed
articles, and at last moderated the request to “just one set of
knitting-needles.” The Jew was polite, but inexorable; he protested
“he did not own the goods--they were simply in his keeping; the owner
lived in Shreveport; there were no knitting-needles in the stock that
he knew of; and really the ladies could not be accommodated; he had not
the power.” My disappointed friend exclaimed, “Well, Mrs.---, we will
have to give it up!” Quick as thought the man turned his searching eyes
to my face. “Are you the lady who was in Piedras Negras last January?”
I gave an assenting nod. “I was the sick man you made custard and soup
for. You and your friend can have anything you want.” A box was quickly
opened, and not only knitting-needles but handkerchiefs were selected.
We took only what was absolutely required, for we expected to pay at
least five dollars for a set of knitting-needles, and perhaps as
much for each handkerchief. We thankfully helped ourselves, and, when
we offered to pay, the grateful Jew declined, saying: “But for your
kindness to a person you never knew or saw, I might have been buried in
the sand at Piedras Negras; a few paltry needles and handkerchiefs are
little to give in return for your goodness to me. Only,” he added, as
with protestations and thanks we retired, “don’t tell anybody, for I
_can not_ open my goods here.”
All household and family goods were scarce during the war, even in
Texas, that had Rio Grande facilities not enjoyed by the other Southern
States, as the great bulk of the importations were specially adapted to
army purposes. The difficulty of procuring stockings, handkerchiefs,
articles of prime necessity, was very great; those for whom I helped
to provide wore for two years home-made stockings, knit of heavy
cotton yarn; and I recall cutting up my only silk dress--a brown
India silk, with white dots--to supply the demand for handkerchiefs,
making my husband a coat of a linen sheet, and helping a friend rip
up a calico bed-comfort that she might make a dress of the material.
Even planters, with large tracts of land and abundant supply of
workmen, often suffered for the necessaries of life other than those
they could raise on the plantation. Through Southern Texas, where
our wanderings led us, railroads were few and the service poor. The
“Houston and Beaumont” afforded a fair specimen of the entire system.
Many plantations were situated twenty miles and more from any railroad
or navigable stream, and often half that distance from a town or
post-office. I spent weeks with a family that could not procure salt to
put up their meat, and were reduced to the necessity of utilizing the
dirt-floor of their smoke-house, which was rich in saline properties
from the accumulation during a series of years of the waste salt and
drippings. First leaching the earth (in the old-fashioned way of making
lye from ashes), then, by evaporating the brine, sufficient salt was
procured to cure a small amount of bacon. Neither lamp-oil nor candles
could be purchased; candle-molds and the material to make them were
extremely scarce, so that families were compelled to exercise their
ingenuity in home production to meet the necessity. The dainty young
ladies who played brilliant sonatas on jangling pianos, filled the
house with melodious song, and read Racine and Molière in the original,
spent hours over the boiling fat, striving with patient perseverance
to make symmetrical tallow-dips, that for lack of adequate supply
of candlesticks would probably shine from the necks of black glass
bottles. The energetic mother, with broad, flattened stick carefully
tested the soap during the process of manufacture, and succeeded in
obtaining a fair saponaceous compound, which had often to be used in
such a crude, immature state that it damaged the linens and faded the
colored garments. On wash-stands in numberless houses little saucers of
soft-soap were placed for toilet-use, salt being too precious for even
a few grains to be spared to harden this domestic production.
Home-made looms were built in many back rooms, and housewives who
had indistinct recollections of the industry, as practiced by their
grandmothers, or a theoretical knowledge of the handicraft, labored to
help black “mammy” recall the forgotten art of weaving cotton cloth for
plantation use.
Many a young girl stepped back and forth to the whirring music of a big
old spinning-wheel, while others with clumsy, clattering cards, costing
fifty dollars the pair, laboriously prepared the fleecy cotton rolls.
A needle dropped or mislaid was searched after for hours; if one was
broken, its irreparable loss was lamented. Needles, pins, hair-pins,
and such insignificant articles, so common in every household that
no reckoning is made of the number used and wasted, rapidly became
very scarce, and occasionally vanished entirely, leaving an “aching
void.” Tooth-brushes were replaced by twigs of shrubs, nicely peeled,
and the ends chewed into brushes. Often one comb did duty for a
whole family, the aid of a hair-brush being entirely dispensed with.
Breakage of china or glassware was a household calamity, and, with
the heedless, scatter-brain darkies who handled such valuables, one of
painful frequency. Alas! it was so easy to wear out, lose, and destroy
insignificant articles that could not be replaced! Garments were often
patched and darned until the original material was so merged in repairs
as to lose its identity. A member of the household, the winter we spent
in Houston, was a valued friend of my father. Week by week I put his
garments through such a series of metamorphoses that, when his wife
arrived, in the spring, she could not tell his linen clothes from the
cotton!
Wheat-flour was brought in limited quantities from Northern Texas,
mostly for army use; very little was offered for sale, and then at such
extravagant prices that hundreds of families were for months entirely
deprived of its use, and, without having made the experiment, it is
difficult to realize what an indispensable household article it is.
“_Corn-meal_ pound-cake” was one of our table luxuries; it is doubtful
if even Marian Harland ever had a recipe that was so frequently copied
and used: it required a peck of coarse, country-ground meal (the only
kind to be had) passed through a wire sieve, a piece of tarlatan, and
finally several thicknesses of muslin, to obtain a pound of corn-flour
fine enough for the cake.
We stopped at many houses where there was no sweetening for coffee--and
such coffee; or rather such substitutes! Peanuts, sweet-potatoes, rye,
beans, peas, and corn-meal were used; the latter was the favorite at
the taverns, all of them wretched imitations, though gulped down, when
chilly and tired, for lack of anything better--a hot, sickening drink,
entirely devoid of the stimulating, comforting effects of the genuine
article.
Tea-drinkers fared no better: weak decoctions of sage or orange-leaves
served for those dependent on the cheering cup, and could only be taken
in moderation, as both are powerful sudorifics. Bitter willow-bark
extracts and red-pepper tea were used as substitutes for quinine by the
poor, shaking ague-patients who lived near miasmatic bayous and swamps.
Paper became so scarce that many newspapers suspended publication
entirely, while others reduced the size of their issues to the
minimum that would contain war and other topics of vital interest.
When the supply of white paper was exhausted, various grades of brown
wrapping-paper met the necessity, and as a final resort, in some
instances, wall-paper, figured on one side, came into use. Reports of
battles, with long lists of killed, wounded, and missing, indistinctly
printed on the uneven surface of this coarse, colored paper, passed
from hand to hand until worn out.
Confederate notes so rapidly depreciated, their purchasing power was
reduced to a minimum. In the interior of the country, where these notes
were current, there were scarcely any goods. San Antonio, the chief
trading-point of Texas, had a working population of thrifty Germans,
who cultivated market-gardens and raised poultry. This shrewd class,
and the ease-loving Mexicans, refused to accept any currency other than
specie in exchange for goods or labor; and buyers whose purses did not
contain the genuine article had to lead lives of great self-denial.
Women whose husbands, in the army or Confederate Congress, were paid in
the depreciated paper currency, fared very badly. I recall meeting, in
those trying days, a very bright, intelligent woman, born in the “White
House” and educated in Europe, whose husband represented the State of
Texas in the Confederate Congress at Richmond, and hearing her say that
her “gude man’s” monthly salary was not sufficient to supply her table
with vegetables for a week! Nothing remarkable was said or thought of
one family in Houston who paid five dollars every day for a measure
of Irish potatoes for their dinner, as it was understood that they
brought a whole bed-tick stuffed with Confederate money from Louisiana!
I remember well paying thirty dollars for a pair of flimsy, paper-sole
Congress shoes, that were not fit to be seen after ten days’ wear. My
crowning extravagance was the last purchase made in that currency, when
ninety dollars was paid for one yard and a half of common blue cotton
denims, to make little Henry a pair of pantaloons! He often says, with
a quaint smile, that he once owned a ninety-dollar pair of trousers,
and wishes he had them now, but, alas! they were too greatly needed to
keep--he had to put them on in a hurry, such was his emergency.