Charleston, March 14, 1865.
I hope my last safely reached you, and I know you feel anxious about us, so I will get —— to smuggle this through the lines. You will be relieved to know that we are once more in our house in Charleston.
By dint of mother's representations of our unprotected condition on the plantation to the officer in command, and her frequent reminders that by their confiscation of all our animals and destruction of our vehicles we had been deprived of all means of transporting ourselves to the city, she obtained transportation.
As soon as the Northeastern Railroad was put in running order, which was within a few days after Charleston was evacuated, the major informed us that we might ride down in a box-car. He also gave us permission to carry in the car whatever household goods we could.
It was hard to choose from the accumulation of years what furniture to take with us, as we knew that all that was left would be stolen, our presence only having kept out the vagrant negroes and camp followers, who, we heard from the servants, complained very much that our house had not been gutted as had others in the neighborhood. We had a very short time for choosing, as we had notice only in the afternoon, that we must be off in the morning. Mother had a time among us, as each had something very untransportable, which, to quote dear Aunt Anna, "it would be sacrilege to leave."
I fought hard for all the books and the old sofa, which had been in the house since the Revolution, and was said to have been Washington's favorite seat when he visited the plantation in 1791; but I had to content myself with only the books that I could get into a trunk, and when our friendly Irish soldier, McManus, who volunteered to help us move the things, seized our valued sofa to hoist it into the car, it proved its antiquity by breaking in pieces. I could have cried over the loss, but mother said, "This is no time for sentiment; it has served from one Revolution to be wrecked in another."
The last night we spent at the plantation was truly forlorn. The servants warned us to expect an attack from some vagrant negroes, who had come from the up-country, and were roving about, as Maum Martha expressed it, "free till dey fool," robbing and destroying, unchecked by the authorities.
We asked the officer in command to give us a guard for the night, but he refused; so mother decided that we must spend the night together in the parlor. The men servants promised to watch outside, and both Fanny and Rachel begged to be allowed to stay with us in the house. You may imagine that it was a weary vigil, as none of us slept, and we put out the light, fearing lest it might guide some evil-doer.
Paul, Quash and Jack walked around the house by turns all night; and I am sure that it was owing to their faithful watchfulness that the dawn found us unmolested.