A kind of excellent, dumb discourse.--TEMPEST.
It did not require many days of captivity to teach us the infinite
expressiveness and trustworthiness of the human eye. We began to
recognize Union people by their friendly look before they spoke a word.
[Sidenote: A WORD WITH A UNION WOMAN.]
Our train stopped for dinner at a secluded Mississippi tavern. At the
door of the long dining-room stood the landlady, an intelligent woman
of about thirty-five. When I handed her a twenty-dollar Rebel note, she
inquired--
"Have you nothing smaller than this?"
"No Confederate money," I answered.
"State currency will answer just as well."
"I have none of that--nothing but this bill and United States Treasury
Notes."
The indifferent face instantly kindled into friendliness and sympathy.
"Are you one of the prisoners?"
"Yes, madam."
"Just from Vicksburg?"
"Yes."
"What do you think of the prospect?"
"Grant is certain to capture the city."
"Of course he will" (with great earnestness), "if he only tries! The
force there is incapable of resisting him."
Other passengers coming within hearing, I moved away, but I would
unhesitatingly have trusted that woman with my liberty or my life.
[Sidenote: GRIERSON'S GREAT MISSISSIPPI RAID.]
Grierson's raid, then in progress, was the universal theme of
conversation and wonder. That dashing cavalier, selecting his route
with excellent judgment, evaded all the large forces which opposed
him, and defeated all the small ones, while he rode leisurely the
entire length of Mississippi, tearing up railroads and burning bridges.
Occasionally he addressed the people in humorous harangues. To one old
lady, who tremblingly begged that her property might not be destroyed,
he replied:--
"You shall certainly be protected, madam. It is not my object to hurt
any body. It is not generally known, but the truth is, I am a candidate
for Governor, and am stumping the State."
Our slow progress enabled us to converse much with the people,
constantly preaching to them the gospel of the Union. But they had so
long heard only the gospel according to Jefferson Davis, that they paid
little heed to our threatenings of the judgment which was certain to
come.
In the dense woods which the railways traversed, the pine, the palm and
the magnolia, grew side by side, festooned with long, hairy tufts of
Spanish moss. On the plantations, the young cotton, three inches high,
looked like sprouting beans.
[Sidenote: AN ENRAGED TEXAN OFFICER.]
Colburn's solemn waggery was constantly cropping out. In our car
one day he had a long discussion with a brawny Texan officer, who
declared with great bitterness that he had assisted in hanging three
Abolitionists upon a single blackjack,[16] in sight of his own door. He
concluded with the usual assertion:--
[16] A species of Southern oak.
"We will fight to the last man! We will die in the last ditch!"
"Well, sir," replied Colburn, with the utmost gravity, "if you should
do that and all be killed, we should regret it extremely!"
Like most Southerners, the Texan was insensible to satire.
Understanding this to be perfectly sincere, he reiterated:--
"We shall do it, sir! We shall do it!"
"Well, sir, as I said before, if you do, and all happen to _get_
killed, including the very last man himself, of course we of the North
shall be quite heart-broken!"
Once comprehended, the mock condolence enraged the huge Texan
fearfully. For a few seconds his eyes were the most wicked I ever saw.
He looked ready to spring upon Colburn and tear him in pieces; but it
was the last we heard of his bravado.
One of our fellow-prisoners had manifested great trepidation while we
lay disabled in front of Vicksburg. He was probably no more frightened
than the rest of us, but had less self-control, running to and fro on
the burning barge, wringing his hands, and shrieking: "My God! my God!
We shall all be killed!"
[Sidenote: WAGGERY OF A CAPTURED SCRIBE.]
Three or four days later, Colburn asked him--
"Were you ever under fire before Sunday night?"
"Never," he replied, with uneasy, questioning looks.
"Well, sir," solemnly continued the satirist, "I think, in view of that
fact, that you behaved with more coolness than any man I ever saw!"
While we preserved our gravity with the utmost difficulty, the
victim scrutinized his tormentor very suspiciously. But that serious,
immovable face told no tales, and he finally received the compliment
as serious. From that time, it was Colburn's daily delight, to remark,
with ever-increasing admiration:--
"Mr. ----, I cannot help remembering how marvelously self-possessed you
were during those exciting minutes. I never saw your coolness equaled
by a man under fire for the first time."
Before we reached Richmond, the new-fledged hero received his praises
with complacent and serene condescension. He will, doubtless, tell
his children and grandchildren of the encomium his courage won from
companions, who, "born and nursed in Danger's path, had dared her
worst."
At Demopolis, Alabama, we encountered a planter removing from
Mississippi, where Grierson and Grant were rapidly depreciating slave
property. He had with him a long gang of negroes, some chained together
in pairs, with handcuffs riveted to their wrists.
While the train stopped, a young fellow from Kentucky, captain and
commissary in the Confederate army, took me up to his room, on pretext
of "a quiet drink."
"When I went into the war," said he, "I thought it would be a nice
little diversion of about two weeks, with a good deal of fun and no
fighting. Now, I would give my right arm to escape from it; but there
is no such good fortune for me. When you reach the North, write to my
friends at home, giving them my love, and saying that I wish I had
followed their advice."
A benevolent lady was at the station, with her carriage, distributing
cakes among the Rebel soldiers and the Union prisoners.
At Selma, a new officer took charge of our party. The post commandant
instructed him how to treat the privates, and, pointing to the two
officers and the three journalists, added:--
[Sidenote: THE ALABAMA RIVER AND MONTGOMERY.]
"You will consider these gentlemen not under your guard, but under your
escort."
We took a steamer up the Alabama River. As we sat looking out upon the
beautiful stream, it was amusing to hear the comments of the negro
chamber-maids:--
"How mean the Southern soldiers look! But just see those Yankees!
Anybody might know that they are God's own people!"
The pilot of the boat, a native Alabamian, took me aside, stating that
he was an unconditional Union man, and inquiring eagerly about the
North, which, he feared, might abandon the contest.
We spent Sunday, May 11th, in the pleasant city of Montgomery:
strolling at pleasure through the shaded streets, and at evening taking
a bath in the Alabama, swimming round a huge Rebel ram, then nearly
completed. We gained some knowledge of its character and dimensions,
which, after reaching Richmond, we succeeded in transmitting to the
Government.
The officer in charge of our party spent the night in camp with his
men, but we slept at the Exchange Hotel. When we registered our names,
the bystanders, with their broad-brimmed hats, long pipes, and heavy
Southern faces, manifested a good deal of curiosity to see what they
termed "two of old Greeley's correspondents." They asked us many
questions of the North, and of our army experiences. Several said
emphatically that, ere long, the people would "take this thing out of
the hands of politicians, and settle it themselves."
[Sidenote: ATLANTA EDITORS ADVOCATE HANGING US.]
Reaching Atlanta, we were placed in the filthy, vermin-infested
military prison. Encouraged by the courtesies we had received from
Rebel journals, we sent, through the commandant, a card to one of
the newspaper offices, asking for a few exchanges. The blundering
messenger took it to the wrong establishment, leaving it at the office
of an intensely bitter sheet called _The Confederate_. The next
morning we were not allowed to purchase newspapers. Learning that _The
Confederate_ commented upon our request, we induced an _attaché_ of the
prison to smuggle a copy to us, and found the following leader:--
"Last evening some correspondents of _The New York World_
and _New York Tribune_ were brought here among a batch of
prisoners captured at Vicksburg a few days ago. They had not
been here a half hour before the impudent scamps got one
of the sentinels guarding the barracks to go around to the
newspaper offices in this city with their 'card,' requesting
the favor of some exchange-papers to read. Their impudence is
beyond comprehension, upon any other consideration than that
they belong to the Yankee press-gang. Yankees are everywhere
more impudent than any honest race of people can be, and a
Yankee newspaper-man is the quintessence of all impudence. We
thought we had seen and understood something of this Yankee
accomplishment in times gone by (some specimens of it have
been seen in the South); but the unheard-of effrontery that
prompted these villains, who, caught in company with the
thieving, murdering vandals who have invaded our country,
despoiled our homes, murdered our citizens, destroyed our
property, violated our wives, sisters, and daughters, to
boldly claim of the press of the South the courtesies and
civilities which gentlemen of the press usually extend to
each other, is above and beyond all the unblushing audacity
we ever imagined. They had come along with Northern vandals,
to chronicle their rapes, arsons, plunders, and murders, and
to herald them to the world as deeds of heroism, greatness,
and glory. They are our vilest and most unprincipled
enemies--far more deeply steeped in guilt, and far more
richly deserving death, than the vilest vandal that ever
invaded the sanctity of our soil and outraged our homes and
our peace. We would greatly prefer to assist in hanging these
enemies to humanity, than to show them any civilities or
courtesies. The common robber, thief, and murderer, is more
respectable, in our estimation, than these men; for he never
tries to make his crimes respectable, but always to conceal
them. These men, however, have come into our country with the
open robbers and murderers of our people, for the express
purpose of whitewashing their hellish deeds, and presenting
them to the world as great deeds of virtuous heroism. They
deserve a rope's end, and will not receive their just deserts
till their crimes are punished with death."
[Sidenote: A PAIR OF RENEGADE VERMONTERS.]
The Rebel authorities were very sensitive to newspaper censure. With
unusual rigor, they now refused us permission to go outside the prison
for meals, though offering to have them sent in, at our expense, from
the leading hotel. They told us that _The Confederate_ was edited by
two renegade Vermonters.
"I am not very fond of Yankees, myself," remarked Hunnicutt, the
heavy-jawed, broad-necked, coarse-featured lieutenant commanding the
prison. "I am as much in favor of hanging them as anybody; but these
Vermonters, who haven't been here six months, are a little too violent.
They don't own any niggers. 'Tisn't natural. There's something wrong
about them. If I were going to hang Yankees at a venture, I think I
would begin with them."
An Irish warden brought us, from a Jew outside, three hundred
Confederate dollars, in exchange for one hundred in United States
currency. For a fifty-dollar Rebel note he procured me a cap of
southern manufacture, to replace my hat, which had been snatched from
my head by a South Carolina officer, passing upon a railroad train
meeting our own. The new cap, of grayish cotton, a marvel of roughness
and ugliness, elicited roars of laughter from my comrades.
On the journey thus far, we had gone almost wherever we pleased,
unguarded and unaccompanied. But from Atlanta to Richmond we were
treated with rigor and very closely watched. A Rebel officer begged
of "Junius" his fine pearl-handled pocket knife. Receiving it, he at
once conceived an affection for a gold ring upon the prisoner's finger.
Even the courtesy of my colleague was not proof against this second
impertinence, and he contemptuously declined the request.
[Sidenote: TREATED WITH UNUSUAL RIGOR.]
The captain in charge of us stated that his orders were imperative to
keep all newspapers from us; and on no account to permit us to leave
the railway carriage. But, finding that we still obtained the daily
journals from fellow-passengers, he made a virtue of necessity, and
gracefully acquiesced. At last, he even allowed us to take our meals at
the station, upon being invited to participate in them at the expense
of his prisoners.