A LESSON IN HISTORY
"So that, from point to point, now have you heard
The fundamental reasons of this war;
Whose great decision hath much blood let forth,
And more thirsts after."--SHAKESPEARE.
The doctor brought me a small pocket memorandum-book, thinking that I would require many notes.
"Now," said he, "where shall we begin? You remember October fifty-nine?"
"Yes."
"What date?"
"Eighteenth; the papers contained an account of John Brown's seizure of Harper's Ferry."
"And you know nothing of the termination of the Brown episode?"
"Nothing."
I took brief notes as he unfolded the history of the war.
In the course of his story he spoke of the National Democratic Convention which was held in Charleston. I remembered the building of which he spoke--the South Carolina Institute Hall--and interrupted him to tell him so."
"Maybe your home is in Charleston."
"I don't think so, Doctor; I remember being in Charleston, but I don't remember my home."
He brought out a map and told me the dates of all the important actions and the names of the officers who had commanded or fought in them in '61 and '62, both in Virginia and the West.
"So we have come down to date, Doctor?" I said.
"Yes; but I think that now I ought to go back and tell you something about your own command."
"Well, sir."
"There was more fighting while these Richmond movements were in progress. Where is Fredericksburg? Here," looking at the map.
"Well."
"A Yankee army was there under McDowell, the man who commanded at the battle of Manassas. We had a small army facing McDowell. You were in that army; it was under General Anderson--Tredegar Anderson we call him, to distinguish him from other Andersons; he is president of the Tredegar Iron Works, here in Richmond. Well, you were facing McDowell. Now, look here at the map. McClellan stretched his right wing as far as Mechanicsville--here, almost north of Richmond; and you were between McClellan and McDowell. So Anderson had to get out. Don't you remember the hot march?"
"Not at all; I don't think I was there."
"I thought I'd catch you napping. I think that when you recover your memory it will be from some little thing that strikes you in an unguarded moment. Your mind, when consciously active, fortifies itself against your forgotten past, and it may be in a moment of weakness that things will return to you; I shouldn't wonder if a dream proves to be the beginning. However, some men have such great strength of will that they can do almost anything. If ever you get the smallest clew, you ought then and there to determine that you will never let it go. Your friends may find you any day, but it is strange they have not yet done it They surely must be classing you among the killed."
A Lesson In History
Map of Chesapeake Bay and Environs
"Do you think that my friends could help me by telling me the past? Would my memory return if I should find them?"
"No; they could give you no help whatever until you should first find one thing as a starting-point. Find but one little thing, and then they can show you how everything else is to be associated with that. Without their help you would have a hard time in collecting things--putting them together; they would be separate and distinct in your mind; if you remember but one isolated circumstance, it would be next to impossible to reconstruct. Well, let's go on and finish; we are nearly at the end, or at the beginning, for you. Where was I?
"Anderson retreated from Fredericksburg. When was that?"
"The twenty-fourth of May or twenty-fifth--say the night of the twenty-fourth."
"Well, sir."
"We had a brigade here, at Hanover Court-House--Branch's brigade. While you were retreating, and when you were very near Hanover, McClellan threw a column on Branch, and used him very severely. You were not in the fight exactly, but were in hearing of it, and saw some of Branch's men after the fight. That is how we know what brigade you belong to, although it will not claim you. You know that you are from South Carolina, and your buttons prove it; and your diary shows that you were near Branch's brigade while it was in the fight; and the only South Carolina brigade in the whole of Lee's army that had any connection with Branch, is Gregg's. Do you see?"
"I see," said I, "what is the date of that battle?"
"May 27th; your diary tells you that."
"Yes, sir."
"You continued to retreat to Richmond. So did Branch. The division you are in is A.P. Hill's. It is called the Light division. Branch's brigade is in it."
"Yes, sir; now let me see if I can call the organization of the army down to the company."
"Go ahead."
"Lee's army--"
"Yes; Army of Northern Virginia."
"What is General Lee's full name?"
"Robert E.--Robert Edward Lee, of Virginia; son of Light-Horse Harry Lee of Revolution times."
"Thank you, sir; Lee's army--A.P. Hill's division--Gregg's brigade--what is General Gregg's name?"
"Maxcy."
"Gregg's brigade--First South Carolina, Colonel Hamilton--"
"How did you know that?"
"Bellot told me; what is Colonel Hamilton's name?"
"D.H.--Daniel, I believe."
"Company H, Captain Haskell--"
"William Thompson Haskell."
"Thank you, sir; any use to write the lieutenants?"
"No."
"Well, Doctor, that brings us to date."
"Now read what you have written," he said.
I read my notes aloud, expanding the abbreviations I had made. My interest and absorption had been so intense that I could easily have called over in chronological order the principal events he had just narrated.
"Now," asked Dr. Frost, "do you believe that you can fill in the details from what you can remember of what I said?"
"Yes, sir," said I; "try me."
He asked some questions, and I replied to them.
My memory astonished him. "I must say, Jones, that you have a phenomenally good and a miraculously bad memory. You'll do," he said.
His account of the fight of the ironclads had interested me.
"What has become of the Merrimac?" I asked him.
"We had to destroy her. When Yorktown was evacuated, Norfolk had to follow suit. The Federal fleet is now in James River, some halfway down below Richmond. A blockade has been declared by Lincoln against all the ports of the South. We are exceedingly weak on the water."