SINGING UNDER FIRE
[A Rebel’s Recollections, pages 72-73.]
They [the women of Petersburg] carried their efforts to cheer and help the troops into every act of their lives. When they could, they visited camp. Along the lines of march they came out with water or coffee or tea—the best they had, whatever it might be; with flowers, or garlands of green when their flowers were gone. A bevy of girls stood under a sharp fire from the enemy’s lines at Petersburg one day, while they sang Bayard Taylor’s “Song of the Camp,” responding to an encore with the stanza:
“Ah! soldiers, to your honored rest,
Your truth and valor bearing;
The bravest are the tenderest,
The loving are the daring!”
Indeed, the coolness of women under fire was always a matter of surprise to me. A young girl, not more than 16 years of age, acted as guide to a scouting party during the early years of the war, and when we urged her to go back after the enemy had opened a vigorous fire upon us, she declined, on the plea that she believed we were “going to charge those fellows,” and she “wanted to see the fun.” At Petersburg women did their shopping and went about their duties under a most uncomfortable bombardment, without evincing the slightest fear or showing any nervousness whatever.