CONDITIONS IN 1863–’4
By the autumn of 1864 the Southern States found themselves ravaged of
everything either edible or wearable. Food was enormously high in cities
and in locations which proved tempting to foragers. Delicately bred
women were grateful when they were able to secure a pair of rough brogan
shoes at one hundred dollars a pair, and coarse cotton cloth from the
Macon Mills served to make our gowns. For nearly three years the
blockade of our ports and frontier had made the purchase of anything
really needful, impracticable. Nor could we utilise the stores in
Southern cities once these had fallen into the enemies’ clutches. A
correspondent, Mrs. Captain du Barry,[34] who in December, 1863, was
permitted to visit Memphis, now in the enemy’s possession, wrote, “I
deeply regretted not being able to fill your commissions. I put them on
my list that I sent in to General Hurlburt, when I requested a passport,
but they were refused. All the principal stores were closed and their
contents confiscated. There is a perfect reign of terror in Memphis. Not
even a spool of cotton can be purchased without registering your name
and address, and “swearing it is for personal or family use,” and no
_number_ of articles can be taken from the store without, after
selection, going with a list of them in your hand, to the “Board of
Trade,” accompanied by the clerk of the store, and there swearing on the
Bible that the articles mentioned are for family use and not to be taken
out of the United States. So many necessary articles are pronounced
contraband by the United States authorities, that one is in momentary
chance of being arrested, by ignorantly inquiring for them. The place is
swarming with detectives who make a trade of arresting unfortunate
people. They are paid by the United States Government two hundred and
fifty dollars for detecting and arresting a person, and that person pays
the Provost Marshal fifteen hundred to two thousand dollars to get off,
that being the way matters are conducted in Memphis!”
All over the South old spinning wheels and handlooms were brought out
from dusty corners, and the whirr of the wheel became a very real song
to us. Every scrap of old leather from furniture, trunk, belt or saddle
was saved for the manufacture of rough shoes, often made by the mother
who had been fortunate enough to have hoarded them, for herself and
children. I, myself, saw my aunt, Eloisa, wife of General Jones M.
Withers, putting soles on the tops of once cast-off shoes of her
children’s, and she, who had known so well the luxuries of life, was
compelled to perform her task by the meagre light of a precious tallow
candle. Complaints, however, were few, from our Spartan-spirited women.
Writing to my husband, in November, 1864, I said, “A lady told me
yesterday that she fattened daily on Confederate fare—for, since she
could obtain no useless luxuries, her health, heretofore poor, has
become perfect.”
The country was stripped not alone of the simpler refinements of life,
but of even so necessary a commodity as salt. Scarcely a smoke-house in
the South having an earthen floor, which had received the drippings from
the hams or bacon sides of earlier days, but underwent a scraping and
sifting in an effort to secure the precious grains deposited there. It
happened that my host at “Redcliffe,” just previous to the breaking out
of hostilities, had ordered a boat-load of salt, to use upon certain
unsatisfactory land, and realising that a blockaded coast would result
in a salt famine, he hoarded his supply until the time of need should
come. When it became known that Senator Hammond’s salt supply was
available, every one from far and near came asking for it. It was like
going down into Egypt for corn, and the precious crystals were
distributed to all who came, according to the number in each family.
Compared with those of many of my friends in other parts of the South,
our surroundings and fare at Beech Island were sumptuous. Save at my
Uncle Williams’s home, I had nowhere seen such an abundance of good
things as “Redcliffe” yielded. Meats and vegetables were plenty; the
river nearby was full of shad which were caught readily in seines; and
canvas-backs and teal, English ducks and game birds, especially
partridges, abounded. “Indian summer is here in all its glory,” I wrote
to my husband late in ’4. “The hues of the forests are gorgeous, the
roses wonderful! Millions of violets scent the air, and everything is so
peaceful and lovely on this island it is hard to realise War is in the
land. Splendid crops prevail, and the spirit of the people is
undaunted!”
As times grew more and more stringent, tea and coffee proved to be our
greatest lack, and here, as we had done in the last days at Warrenton,
we were glad to drink potato coffee and peanut chocolate. The skin of
the raw potato was scraped off—to pare it might have been to waste
it—and the potato cut into slices or discs as thin as paper. It was then
carefully dried, toasted and ground, and made into what proved to be a
really delicious beverage.[35] Our chocolate was made in this wise:
Peanuts, or pinders, or goobers, as they were variously called, were
roasted and the skin slipped off. They were next pounded in a mortar;
when, blended with boiled milk and a little sugar (a sparing use of this
most costly luxury was also necessary), the drink was ready for serving,
and we found it delightful to our palates.
There were spinners and weavers on Beech Island, too, and unceasing
industry was necessary to prepare and weave cloth, both cotton and wool,
sufficient for the clothing of the army of slaves and the family on the
great plantation. One of the island residents, Mrs. Redd, was a
wonderful worker, and wove me a cotton gown of many colours which had
all the beauty of a fine Scotch plaid. She spun her own cotton and made
her own dyes, gathering her colours from the mysterious laboratories of
the woods, and great was the fame her handiwork attained wherever it was
seen. Calico of the commonest in those days was sold at twenty-five
dollars a yard; and we women of the Confederacy cultivated such an
outward indifference to Paris fashions as would have astonished our
former competitors in the Federal capital. Nor did our appearance, I am
constrained to think, suffer appreciably more than our spirits; for the
glories of an unbleached Macon Mills muslin gown, trimmed with
gourd-seed buttons, dyed crimson, in which I appeared at Richmond in the
spring of ’4, so impressed the mind of an English newspaper
correspondent there, that he straightway wrote and forwarded an account
of it to London, whence our friends who had taken refuge there sent it
back to us, cut from a morning journal.
Not that our love for pretty things was dead; a letter preserved by Mr.
Clay is fine testimony to the fact that mine was “scotched, and not
killed.” It was dated Beech Island, November 18, 1864, and was addressed
to Mr. Clay, now on the eve of departure from Canada.
“Bring me at least two silk dresses of black and purple. I prefer the
purple to be _moire antique_, if it is fashionable. If French
importations are to be had, bring me a spring bonnet and a walking hat,
for the benefit of all my lady friends as well as myself, and do bring
some books of fashions—September, October, and November numbers (_Ruling
passion strong in war_), and bring——.” The list grew unconscionably. In
after years I found a copy of it carefully made out in my husband’s
handwriting, and showing marks of having been carried in his pocket
until each article I had indicated for myself or others had been
selected, Here it is:
1. At least, 2 silk dresses, black and purple (for ’Ginie).
2. French spring bonnet.
3. Walking hat.
4. Some books of fashion.
5. Corsets—4—6, 22 inches in waist.
6. Slippers with heels, No. 3 1–2.
7. Gloves—1 doz. light coloured, 1 doz. dark.
8. Handkerchiefs, extra fine.
9. Two handsome black silk dresses for Lestia.
10. Flannel, white and red.
11. A set of fine, dark furs, not exceeding $25.
12. Set of Hudson Bay Sables, at any price, for Victoria, large cape,
cuffs and muff.
13. Two Black Hernanis or Tissue dresses, one tissue dress to be
brochetted for ’Ginie.
14. 3 or 4 pieces of black velvet ribbon, different widths.
15. Bolt of white bonnet ribbon; ditto pink, green and magenta.
16. French flowers for bonnet.
17. Shell Tuck comb for ’Ginie.
18. Present for little Jeff Davis, Claude and J. Winter.
19. Needles, pins, _hairpins_, tooth-brushes, coarse combs, cosmetics,
hair oil, cologne.
20. Domestic, linen, muslin, nainsook, swiss, jaconet, mull muslin,
each a full piece.
21. Dresses of brilliantine.
22. Black silk spring wrapping.
23. Chlorine tooth wash and Rowland’s Kalydor.
24. A cut coral necklace.
25. Lace collars, large and pointed now worn.
Alas! my husband’s zeal in fulfilling my commissions all went for
naught, for the boxes containing them (save two, which were deposited
with Mrs. Chestnut, at Columbia, and later fell prey to the Federals or
to the flames, we never knew which) were swallowed by the sea, and only
he himself came home with the Government papers he had guarded, as the
sole baggage he was able to save from the wreck of the _Rattlesnake_ of
all he had carried. And yet not all, for a long-lost pet which he had
been enabled to reclaim for General Lee[36] was also brought safely to
shore.
“Tell him,” wrote my sister, from Richmond, that “General Lee’s dog
arrived safely. Poor dog! I’m sorry for him, for he will find the
Confederacy a poor place to come to to get anything to eat! I trust for
the country’s sake, he knows how to live without eating!”
For the making of our toilette we discovered the value of certain
gourds, when used as wash cloths. Their wearing qualities were
wonderful; the more one used them the softer they became. Needles were
becoming precious as heirlooms; pins were the rarest of luxuries; for
the greater part of the time locust thorns served us instead. Writing
paper was scarcely to be had, and the letters of that period which were
sent out by private persons were often unique testimony to the ingenuity
of the senders. Wall-paper, perhaps, was most frequently resorted to,
and we made our crude envelopes of anything we could find. We made our
own writing fluids, our commonest resource being the oak ball, a
parasite, which, next to the walnut burr, is the blackest thing in the
vegetable world. Or, this failing us, soot was scooped from the chimney,
and, after a careful sifting, was mixed with water and “fixed” with a
few drops of vinegar. Sometimes we used pokeberries, manufacturing a
kind of red ink, or, made thin with water, some bit of miraculously
saved shoe polish provided us with an adhesive black fluid.
Our difficulties were as great in the matter of transmitting our
letters, when once they were written. We might intrust them to the
mails, but these particularly were prey to our invaders; or we might
charge with the care of them some traveller who was known to be making
his way to the city for which the letters were addressed. Stray
newspapers reached us at “Redcliffe” occasionally, from even so distant
a point as our capital, and efforts were made by local editors to purvey
the news of battles and the movements of the armies, but the supply of
paper necessary for the issuing of a daily journal and even a weekly
edition was difficult to obtain. What at first had appeared as morning
papers were changed to evening editions, as the cost of candles, by
which the compositors must work, had risen in ’3 to three and one-half
dollars a pound. Our brother, J. Withers Clay, who owned and edited the
_Confederate_, turned peripatetic, and issued his paper where he could,
being obliged to keep shifting, printing paraphernalia and all, with the
movements of the army in the Tennessee region. Writing us from
Chattanooga, on August 16, 1863, he thus described his life: “I am
living in camp style. I mess with my office boys and our fare is frugal.
My bed is a piece of carpet, laid on a door, with one end elevated on
two bricks and the other resting on the floor. I lay my blue blanket on
this, and my bones on that, with my head supported by my overcoat and
carpet sack, and cover myself with a Mexican scarf when it is cool!”
On the whole, our condition was almost like that of the ancients who
depended on passing travellers for gossip or news of the welfare or
whereabouts of friends or kin. Thus my sister (by every tie of
affection), writing from Richmond in the spring of ’4, said: “Have no
idea where you are, but send this letter by General Sparrow to Macon,
care of Mrs. Whittle. The last intelligence I had of you was through
Colonel Phillips. He told me he saw you between Augusta and Macon
_somewhere_.”
Nor dared we avail ourselves of our telegraph wires, so costly had the
sending of a few lines become. For the briefest message sent C. O. D.
from Macon to Richmond, my sister paid sixteen dollars and implored me
to send no more! The chief resource of the people was the arrival of the
local train, at which time the railway stations swarmed with inquirers
on foot, hedged in by others as eager, who had driven long distances in
such vehicles as were at their command.
My life was one of continual suspense, notwithstanding the arrival of
special couriers who came from time to time from Richmond bearing
tidings of my absent husband. All lives that lie in close parallels to
governments carry heavy anxieties. Mine, in those days of strife and
terror, was no exception to this general rule. As negotiator at Niagara
Falls with Professor Holcombe and others, the eyes of the North as well
as those of the South for months had been fixed upon Mr. Clay, his
interviews with Horace Greeley and the messengers sent to him by Mr.
Lincoln having excited varying comments and criticisms that were
anything but reassuring. Our friends in Richmond, however, wrote
cheeringly:
“... I hear occasionally of Mr. Clay,” ran a letter from the
Executive Mansion, dated August 31st, ’4, “but for some time past
nothing has been received from him. The company he keeps[37] as
reported by the newspapers cannot render you apprehensive of his
being too happy to wish to return, though your desire to be with him
may have increased his probable want of more congenial communion
when the day’s work is done. I am assured that his health has
improved by Canadian air, and we may hope that he will bring back
increased ability to labour in the cause of the Confederacy, if it
should not be his portion to relieve us of the need for further toil
such as now is imposed. The carping spirit which prompted the
criticism[38] on his course would have found sufficient cause
whatever he might have done; or, if nothing had been done, that
would have served equally. No one can hope to please everybody. You
would not wish your husband to escape the reviling of those who envy
such as they cannot rival, and strive to drag others down from the
heights to which they cannot rise?”
Messages were numerous, urging my return to Richmond, which our
President and the Mallorys assured me was the safest of places.
“Now that Sherman’s barbarians are in unpleasant proximity to you,”
wrote Secretary Mallory, “why not come to the front where security,
sympathy, mint juleps, an admiring audience, the freshest gossip and the
most unselfish regard, all combine with the boom and flash of guns to
welcome your coming? The correspondence between your lord and master and
Holcombe on one side, and Greeley on the other, is doing good service.
The parties, fragments, cliques and individuals in the United States who
desire peace, but differ upon the _modus operandi_ of getting it, will
now learn that with Lincoln at the head of affairs, no peace is
possible; while our weak brothers in North Carolina and Georgia who have
clamoured so loudly that peace propositions should be made to us, cannot
fail to see that, at present, peace with Lincoln means degradation. I am
very glad Mr. Clay went, for I see that his presence must be beneficial
to our cause.”
These, and other letters as urgent and as desirous of quieting my
apprehensions, came frequently. Nevertheless, my husband’s stay in the
severe climate of Canada caused me constant apprehension. For months my
only direct news of him was through “personals,” variously disguised, in
the Richmond papers, which Colonel Clay was prompt to forward to me.
Occasionally, however, one of the numerous letters each endeavoured to
send to the other successfully reached its destination. “It gives me
great pain,” I wrote on November 18, ’4, “to learn from yours just
received that none of my numerous letters have reached you since the
30th June! I have sent you dozens, my dearest, filled with all the news
of the day, of every character, and more love than ever filled my heart
before!... My last intelligence of you was sent me from Richmond through
the bearer of despatches, I presume, and bore the date of September
fifteenth, more than two months ago!”
In this letter, which was dated from Beech Island, I conveyed
intelligence to Mr. Clay of Senator Hammond’s death, he being, at the
time, a few days less than fifty-seven years of age. It occurred while
all the affluent colourings of the autumn were tingeing his world at
“Redcliffe.” The circumstances attending his decease and burial were
unique, and to be likened only to those which, in mediæval days,
surrounded the passing away of some Gothic baron or feudal lord. Mr.
Hammond had been failing in health for some time, when, feeling his end
drawing near, he asked for a carriage that he might drive out and select
his last resting-place. He chose, at last, a high knoll, from which a
fine view was to be had of Augusta and the Sand Hills; and, having done
this, being opposed to private burial grounds, he bequeathed the
surrounding acres to the town in the precincts of which his estate lay,
on consideration that they turn the plot into a public cemetery. First,
however, he laid an injunction upon his wife and sons, that if the
Yankee army penetrated there (the end of the war was not yet, nor came
for six months thereafter), they should have his grave ploughed over
that none of the hated enemy should see it.
Again and again in the remaining days he reiterated his wish. Fears were
spreading of the approach of Sherman’s devastating army, and the
destruction of “Redcliffe,” conspicuous as it was to all the surrounding
country, seemed inevitable. Marvellous to relate, however, when at last
the spoiler came, his legions marched in a straight line to the sea,
some fourteen miles away from the Hammond plantation, leaving it
untouched by shell or the irreverent hand of the invader.
The funeral of Mr. Hammond was solemn and made especially impressive by
the procession of two hundred of the older slaves, who marched, two by
two, into the baronial parlors, to look for the last time upon their
master’s face. Save for this retinue, “Redcliffe” was now practically
without a defender, Mr. Paul Hammond being absent much of the time,
detailed upon home guard duty. In his absence, my maid, Emily, and I
kept the armory of the household, now grown more and more fearful of
invasion with its train of insult and the destruction of property. There
were many nights when, all the rest in slumber and a dead hush without,
I waited, breathless, until I caught the sound of Paul Hammond’s
returning steps.
Just before the close of my refugee days on Beach Island, a young
kinsman, George Tunstall, who filled the sublime post of corporal in
Wheeler’s Brigade in camp a few hundred miles away, learning of my
presence there, obtained leave of absence and made his way, accompanied
by another youth, to Mrs. Hammond’s to see me. The two soldiers were
full of tales of thrilling interest, of hairbreadth escapes and camp
happenings, both grave and gay; and, rumours of Sherman’s advance being
rife, our young heroes urged my cousin to take time by the forelock and
bury the family silver. “Redcliffe” being almost in direct line of the
Yankee general’s march, the advice seemed good, and preparations at once
began to put it into operation. Though there was little doubt of the
loyalty of the majority of the Hammond slaves, yet it seemed but prudent
to surround our operations with all possible secrecy. We therefore
collected the silver, piece by piece, secreting it in “crocus” bags,
which, when all was ready, we deposited in a capacious carryall, into
which we crowded. It was at early dusk when lurking figures easily might
be descried in corn-field or behind a wayside tree by our alert eyes.
Declaring to those of the servants who stood about as we entered the
carriage, that we were taking some provisions to Mrs. Redd, much to
Lot’s[39] surprise, we dispensed with a coachman, and drove off. We had
many a laugh as we proceeded through the woods, at our absurdity in
concealing our errand from the family servants and in confiding our
precious secret to two of Wheeler’s men. They had a terrible reputation
for chicken stealing.[40]
[Illustration:
GENERAL JOSEPH WHEELER
of Alabama
From a war-time photograph
]
When we had driven a mile or more, Mr. Tunstall produced a hatchet and
began to blaze the trees. “There!” he said, after instructing us as to
the signs he had made, “when you come to where the blaze stops, you’ll
find your valuables!” and under his directions the silver was silently
sunk in the ground and the earth replaced.[41]
Apropos of General Sherman, when a month or two later I was in Macon, I
heard a very excellent story. A party of his men one day dashed up to
the house of a Mrs. Whitehead, a fine old lady (a sister of my
informant), and demanded dinner at once. The lady long since had learned
that resistance to such imperative demands would be in vain, and
preparations were at once begun for the meal. Notwithstanding her
obliging and prompt compliance, the men immediately started a forage in
the poultry yard and the outhouses beyond. One of the officers
penetrated the servants’ quarters, and entered a cabin in which a young
black woman lay sick.
“What’s the matter, Sis?” he asked, in a tone that was meant to convey
sympathy.
“Ain’t no Sis of yourn!” was the sullen reply. “God knows I ain’t no kin
to no Yankee!” At that moment an infant’s cry was heard.
“Hello!” said the officer. “Got a little pickaninny, hey? Boy or girl?”
“Boy chile! What’s that ter you?” snapped the woman.
“What’s his name?” persisted the soldier.
“Name’s Wheeler, dat’s what ’tis!” answered the invalid triumphantly,
and the colloquy ended abruptly.
As the soldiers sat down to the table, some one, going to the door, saw
Wheeler’s men come tearing down the road flat on their horses. Instantly
he shouted back to his companions, “Wheeler!” but they, believing the
cry to be a ruse, continued to eat. The sounds of the galloping steeds
soon became audible, however, and a stampede that was highly amusing to
the now relieved household took place through doors and windows. When
General Wheeler arrived, he found a steaming repast already prepared,
and a cordial welcome from Mrs. Whitehead and her family, including
“Sis.”