IX. — TO AND FRO IN THE SPRING OF ‘65.
The months of January and February, 1865, dragged on, sombre and dreary.
Two or three expeditions which I made during that woeful period, gave me a good idea of the condition of the country.
In September, 1864, I had traversed Virginia from Petersburg to Winchester, and had found the people—especially those of the lower Shenandoah Valley—still hopeful, brave, resolved to resist to the death.
In January and February, 1865, my official duties carried me to the region around Staunton; to the mountains west of Lynchburg; and to the North Carolina border, south of Petersburg. All had changed. Everywhere I found the people looking blank, hopeless, and utterly discouraged. The shadow of the approaching woe seemed to have already fallen upon them.
The army was as “game” as ever—even Early’s little handful, soon to be struck and dispersed by General Sheridan’s ten thousand cavalry. Everywhere, the soldiers laughed in the face of death. Each seemed to feel, as did the old statesman with whom I had conversed on that night at Richmond, that he was a sentinel on post, and must stand there to the last. The lava might engulf him, but he was “posted,” and must stand until relieved, by his commanding officer or death. It was the “poor private,” in his ragged jacket and old shoes, as well as the officer in his braided coat, who felt thus. For those private soldiers of the army of Northern Virginia were gentlemen. Noblesse oblige was their motto; and they meant to die, musket in hand!
Oh, soldiers of the army, who carried those muskets in a hundred battles!—who fought with them from Manassas, in 1861, to Appomattox, in 1865—you are the real heroes of the mighty struggle, and one comrade salutes you now, as he looked at you with admiration in old days! What I saw in those journeys was dreary enough; but however black may be the war-cloud, there is always the gleam of sunlight somewhere! We laughed now and then, reader, even in the winter of 1864-’5!
I laugh still, as I think of the brave cannoneers of the horse artillery near Staunton—and of the fearless Breathed, their commander, jesting and playing with his young bull-dog, whom he had called “Stuart” for his courage. I hear the good old songs, all about “Ashby,” and the “Palmetto Tree,” and the “Bonnie Blue Flag”—songs sung with joyous voices in that dreary winter, as in other days, when the star of hope shone more brightly, and the future was more promising.
At Lynchburg, where I encountered a number of old friends, songs still sweeter saluted me—from the lips of my dear companions, Major Gray and Captain Woodie. How we laughed and sang, on that winter night, at Lynchburg! Do you chant your sweet “Nora McShane” still, Gray? And you, Woodie, do you sing in your beautiful and touching tenor to-day,—
“The heart bowed down by deep despair.
To weakest hopes will cling?”
Across the years comes once more that magical strain; again I hear your voice, filled with the very soul of sadness, tell how
“Memory is the only friend
That grief can call its own!”
That seemed strangely applicable to the situation at the time. The memory of our great victories was all that was left to us; and I thought that it was the spirit of grief itself that was singing. Again I hear the notes—but “Nora McShane” breaks in—“Nora McShane,” the most exquisite of all Gray’s songs. Then he winds up with uproarious praise of the “Bully Lager Beer!”—and the long hours of night flit away on the wings of laughter, as birds dart onward, and are buried in the night.
Are you there still, Gray? Do you sing still, Woodie? Health and happiness, comrades! All friendly stars smile on you! Across the years and the long leagues that divide us, I salute you!
Thus, at Staunton and Lynchburg, reader, gay scenes broke the monotony. In my journey toward North Carolina, I found food also, for laughter.
I had gone to Hicksford, fifty miles south of Petersburg, to inspect the cavalry; and in riding on, I looked with curiosity on the desolation which the enemy had wrought along the Weldon railroad, when they had destroyed it in the month of December. Stations, private houses, barns, stables, all were black and charred ruins. The railroad was a spectacle. The enemy had formed line of battle close along the track; then, at the signal, this line of battle had attacked the road. The iron rails were torn from the sleepers; the latter were then piled up and fired; the rails were placed upon the blazing mass, and left there until they became red-hot in the middle, and both ends bent down—then they had been seized, broken, twisted; in a wild spirit of sport the men had borne some of the heated rails to trees near the road; twisted them three or four times around the trunks; and there, as I passed, were the unfortunate trees with their iron boa-constrictors around them—monuments of the playful humor of the blue people, months before.
Hill and Hampton had attacked and driven them back; from the dead horses, as elsewhere, rose the black vultures on flapping wings: but it is no part of my purpose, reader, to weary you with these war-pictures, or describe disagreeable scenes. It is an odd interview which I had on my return toward Petersburg that my memory recalls. It has naught to do with my narrative—but then it will not fill more than a page!
I had encountered two wagons, and, riding, ahead of them, saw a courier of army head-quarters, whose name was Ashe.
I saluted the smiling youth, in return for his own salute, and said:—
“Where have you been, Ashe?”
“To Sussex, colonel, on a foraging expedition.”
“For the general?”
“And some of the staff, colonel.”
Ashe smiled; we rode on together.
“How did you come to be a forager, Ashe?” I said.
“Well this was the way of it, colonel,” he said. “I belonged to the old Stonewall brigade, but General Lee detailed me at the start of the war to shoe the head-quarters horses. It was old General Robert that sent me with these wagons. I was shoeing the general’s gray, and had just pared the hind-hoof, when he sent for me. A man had started with the wagons, and had mired in the field right by head-quarters. So old General Robert says, says he, ‘Ashe, you can get them out.’ I says, ‘General, I think I can, if you’ll give me a canteen full of your French brandy for the boys.’ He laughed at that, and I says, ‘General, I have been with you three years, and if in that time you have ever seen me out of the way, I hope you will tell me so.’ ‘No, Ashe,’ says he, ‘I have not, and you shall have the brandy.’ And his black fellow went into the closet and drew me a canteen full; for you see, colonel, old General Robert always keeps a demijohn full, and carries it about in his old black spring wagon, to give to the wounded soldiers—he don’t drink himself. Well, I got the brandy, and set the boys to work, building a road with pine saplings, and got the wagons out! From that time to this, I have been going with them, colonel, and sometimes some very curious things have happened.”
I assumed that inquiring expression of countenance dear to story-tellers. Ashe saw it, and smiled.
“Last fall, colonel,” he said, “I was down on the Blackwater, foraging with my wagons, for old General Robert, when a squadron of Yankees crossed in the ferryboat, and caught me. I did not try to get off, and the colonel says, says he, ‘Who are you?’ I told him I was only foraging with General Lee’s head-quarters teams, to get something for the old general to eat, as nothing could be bought in Petersburg; and, says I, ‘I have long been looking to be captured, and now the time has come.’ As I was talking, I saw an uncle of mine among the Yankees, and says he, ‘Ashe, what are you doing here?’ ‘The same you are doing there,’ I says; and I asked the colonel just to let me off this time, and I would try and keep out of their way hereafter. He asked me, Would I come down there any more? And I told him I didn’t know—I would have to go where I was ordered. ‘Well,’ says he, ‘you can’t beg off.’ But I says, ‘step here a minute, colonel,’ and I took him to the wagon, and offered him my canteen of brandy. He took three or four good drinks, and then he says, says he, ‘That’s all I want! You can go on with your wagons.’ And I tell you I put out quick, colonel, and never looked behind me till I got back to Petersburg?"{1}
{Footnote 1: In the words of the narrator.}
I have attempted to recall here, reader, the few gleams of sunshine, the rare moments of laughter, which I enjoyed in those months of the winter of 1864-’5.
I shrink from dwelling on the events of that dreary epoch. Every day I lost some friend. One day it was the brave John Pegram, whom I had known and loved from his childhood; the next day it was some other, whose disappearance left a gap in my life which nothing thenceforth could fill. I pass over all that. Why recall more of the desolate epoch than is necessary?
For the rest that is only a momentary laugh that I have indulged in. Events draw near, at the memory of which you sigh—or even groan perhaps—to-day, when three years have passed.
For this page is written on the morning of April 8, 1868.
This day, three years ago, Lee was staggering on in sight of Appomattox.