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MY CAVE LIFE IN VICKSBURG.
WITH
_LETTERS OF TRIAL AND TRAVEL_.
BY A LADY.
NEW YORK:
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,
443 & 445 BROADWAY.
LONDON: 16 LITTLE BRITAIN.
1864.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1864, by
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States
for the Southern District of New York.
TO ONE
WHO, THOUGH ABSENT, IS EVER PRESENT,
THIS LITTLE WAIF
IS TENDERLY AND AFFECTIONATELY
Dedicated.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Our Party set out for Vicksburg--The Ride and Scenery--
Scenes during the first Bombardment--View of the City
and River--Opening of a Battery--The Enemy, 9
II. At Night the Signal Gun sounds--The Gunboats are coming
down--The Town Awake--Shell Music--The Boats near us--
Rapid Descent to the Cave--They have passed safely--Why
the Confederate Guns do not fire--The Burning Transport, 15
III. Masked Battery on the Opposite Shore--Taking the Cars--
Fright of the Negro Porters--Major Watts's Party--
Stampede of Ladies, 20
IV. Jackson threatened--Colonel Grierson--General Pemberton
departs--My Mind is made up to go also--Ride on the
Cars--Vicksburg again, 25
V. To Vicksburg again--Aspirations--Troops passing to
Black River--General Pemberton orders all Non-Combatants
to leave the City, 29
VI. Rumors of the Federal Advance on Black River--Gunboats
on the River--Cannonading and Fire at Warrenton--
General Pemberton's Forces engaged at Black River, 35
VII. Sunday, the 17th--After Church--The Demoralized
Army--Soldiers' Stories, 40
VIII. Fresh Troops from Warrenton for the Intrenchments--
"We'll Protect You"--Fears, 46
IX. The Ball in Motion--View from the Court House--Federal
Prisoners sent across the River--Movements of Gunboats, 49
X. Groundless Fear of an Attack by Gunboats--Shells
fall--The Bombardment begins--Cave Shelter--Garrison
Force--Cave and Cave Life, 55
XI. Buried Alive--House Breaking--Appearance of Shell at
Night--Under the Root of a Fig Tree, 63
XII. Fire at Night--A Narrow Escape--Moonlight--Shells
from the Battle Field--Employment and Traffic, 69
XIII. Shells from the Rear of the City--Providential
Deliverance--Pantomime--Pea Meal--Hospital Accident, 73
XIV. Dogs--Horses--Descent of a Shell through a Cave--A
Mother's Cries--Deserted Homes--Silence, 78
XV. An Excitement--Sinking of the Cincinnati--Sky Parlor
Hill--Moving Prospects, 84
XVI. Fall of a Shell at the Corner of my Cave--Music--
Casualties of the Day, 89
XVII. Ride to the Fortifications--Number of Caves along the
Road--Appearance of the New Home--Change of Missiles, 94
XVIII. Morning--Charge of General Burbridge--Horrors of
War--An Important Discovery, 99
XIX. An Acceptable Present--Hunger--Half Rations--In the
Rifle Pits, 105
XX. A Rainy Morning--A Waterspout--Dismal Experience--
Brighter Prospects--An Unfortunate Sleeper, 109
XXI. Weary--The Couriers from General Johnston--Dangerous
Pasturage--Mule Meat--Local Songs--Missed by a Minie
Ball, 114
XXII. A Wounded Horse--Shrapnell Shells--Charge on the
Intrenchments--Fearful Firing, 122
XXIII. An Unhappy Accident--The Unfortunate Ladies of
Vicksburg--Approach of Mortar Shells near the
Intrenchments, 128
XXIV. Death of a Faithful Servant--Blowing up of a Fort--Loss
of Prominent Officers--Surrender of Vicksburg, 135
XXV. A Fright--George my Protector--A Polite Soldier gets
the Tent Fly, 143
LETTERS OF TRIAL AND TRAVEL, 147
MY CAVE LIFE IN VICKSBURG.
MY CAVE LIFE IN VICKSBURG.
CHAPTER I.
OUR PARTY SET OUT FOR VICKSBURG--THE RIDE AND SCENERY--SCENES DURING THE
FIRST BOMBARDMENT--VIEW OF THE CITY AND RIVER--OPENING OF A BATTERY--THE
ENEMY.
It has been said that the peasants of the Campagna, in their semi-annual
visits to the Pontine marshes, arrive piping and dancing; but it is seldom
they return in the same merry mood, the malaria fever being sure to affect
them more or less. Although I did not leave Jackson on the night of the
15th piping and dancing, yet it was with a very happy heart and very
little foreboding of evil that I set off with a party of friends for a
pleasant visit to Vicksburg. Like the peasants, I returned more serious
and with a dismal experience. How little do we know with what rapidity
our feelings may change! We had been planning a visit to Vicksburg for
some weeks, and anticipating pleasure in meeting our friends. How gladly,
in a few days, we left it, with the explosions of bombs still sounding in
our ears! How beautiful was this evening: the sun glowed and warmed into
mellow tints over the rough forest trees; over the long moss that swung in
slow and stately dignity, like old-time dancers, scorning the quick and
tripping movements of the present day! Glowing and warming over all, this
evening sun, this mellow, pleasant light, breaking in warm tints over the
rugged ground of the plantation, showed us the home scenes as we passed;
the sober and motherly cows going home for the evening's milking through
the long lanes between the fields, where the fences threw shadows across
the road; making strange, weird figures of the young colts' shadows, lean
and long-limbed and distorted; the mothers, tired of eating the grass that
grew so profusely, were standing in quiet contentment, or drank from the
clear runs of water. And so we passed on by the houses, where the planter
sat on his veranda, listening to the voice of his daughter reading the
latest paper, while round her fair head, like a halo, the lingering beams
of the sun played.
And on to Black River, "Big Black," with its slow, sluggish tide! Dark,
like the Stygian stream, it flowed in the mist of the evening, the
twilight. And soon we see Vicksburg, classic ground forever in America.
The Hudson must now yield the palm to the Father of Waters. Our interest
will centre around spots hallowed by the deeds of our countrymen. I had
thought, during the first bombardment of Vicksburg, that the town must
have been a ruin; yet very little damage has been done, though very few
houses are without evidence of the first trial of metal. One, I saw, with
a hole through the window; behind was one of corresponding size through
the panel of the door, which happened to be open. The corner of the piano
had been taken off, and on through the wall the shot passed; one, also,
passed through another house, making a huge gap through the chimney. And
yet the inhabitants live in their homes (those who have not lost some
loved one) happy and contented, not knowing what moment the house may be
rent over their heads by the explosion of a shell.
"Ah!" said I to a friend, "how is it possible you live here?" "After one
is accustomed to the change," she answered, "we do not mind it; but
becoming accustomed, that is the trial." I was reminded of the poor man in
an infected district who was met by a traveller and asked, "How do you
live here?" "Sir, we die," was the laconic reply. And this is becoming
accustomed. I looked over this beautiful landscape, and in the distance
plainly saw the Federal transports lying quietly at their anchorage. Was
it a dream? Could I believe that over this smiling scene, in the bright
April morning, the blight of civil warfare lay like a pall?--lay over the
fearful homesteads--some, even now, jarred by the shock of former
conflicts--lay by the hearthstones, making moan in many a bereaved heart
looking forward with vague fears to the coming summer.
What soul in the land but has felt and witnessed this grief--this
unavailing sorrow for the brave and untimely dead? I thought of the letter
from the sorrowing one in Iowa, whose son, a prisoner, I had nursed,
receiving with the last breath words for the distant, unconscious mother;
of her sorrow in writing of him in his distant grave; of her pride in him,
her only son. How many in the land could take her hand and weep over a
mutual sorrow! And in the hospital wards, men, who still hold the name of
Americans, together were talking of battles, prisoners, and captors, when
each told the other of acts of bravery performed on hostile fields, and
took out pictures of innocent babes, little children, and wives, to show
each other, all feeling a sympathy and interest in the unknown faces.
Verily, war is a species of passionate insanity. While standing and
thinking thus, the loud booming of the guns in the water batteries
startled me, the smoke showing that it was the battery just below me, that
opened, I was told, on what was thought to be a masked battery on the
opposite shore. No reply was elicited, however; and on looking through the
glass, we saw in the line of levee, between the river and the Federal
canal, a spot where new earth seemed to have been thrown up, and branches
of trees to have been laid quite regularly in one place. This was all.
General Lee, however, had ordered the spot to be fired on, and the firing
continued some little time. Our ride that evening had been delightful. We
sat long on the veranda in the pleasant air, with the soft melody and rich
swell of music from the band floating around us, while ever and anon my
eye sought the bend of the river, two miles beyond, where the Federal
transports, brought out in bold relief by the waning, crimson light of the
evening, lay in seeming quiet. Still, resting in Vicksburg seemed like
resting near a volcano.