"I envy not the Northern girl,
Her robes of beauty rare;
Though diamonds grace her snowy neck
And pearls bedeck her hair.
"My homespun dress is plain, I know,
My hat's palmetto, too,
But then it shows what Southern girls
For Southern Rights will do."
The war dragged on. New Orleans fell. Baton Rouge was in the hands of the enemy. Some of the Baton Rouge people refugeed to the country, living in churches, schoolhouses and deserted log cabins; others were compelled to remain, as they had no shelter and no means of living outside of the city. Then followed the sieges on the Mississippi River, Port Hudson, and Vicksburg. Night after night and all day long we could hear the heavy guns booming and the deadly shells hissing, and we had no means of knowing how our armies were faring. I remember the sad and anxious dread which came over me every time a gun was fired, and how I covered my head with pillows to shut out the fearful sound.
One day in August the news came that Gen. John C. Breckinridge was on his way to attack Baton Rouge; that his army of less than three thousand were tired and in need of food, and would be glad if the citizens would send out something to the road on which they were marching. Every family in the country began to prepare food; quantities of green corn, potatoes, vegetables, egg-bread, chickens, in fact, everything that could be had was cooked, packed in baskets, and carried out to meet the army.