Neither the white nor the colored people comprehended the change which had taken place in their fortunes. The whites forgot that they were no longer slave-drivers. Passing down Rutledge Street one morning I saw a crowd around the door of a building. A friend who was there in advance of me said that he heard an outcry, looked in, and found a white man whipping a colored woman. Her outcries brought a colored sergeant of the Provost Guard and a squad of men, who quietly took the woman away, told her to go where she pleased, and informed the man that that sort of thing was "played out." Two white women were passing at the time. "O my God! To think that we should ever come to this!" was the exclamation of one. "Yes, madam, you have come to it, and will have to come to a good deal more," was the reply of my friend.
There were a few Union men in the city, who through the long struggle had been true to the old flag. They were mostly Germans. Many Union officers escaping from prison had been kindly cared for by these faithful friends, who had been subjected to such close surveillance that secretiveness had become a marked trait of character.
I saw a small flag waving from a window, and wishing to find out what sort of a Union man resided there, rang the bell. A man came to the door, of middle age, light hair, and an honest German face.
"I saw the stars and stripes thrown out from your window, and have called to shake hands with a Union man, for I am a Yankee."
He grasped my proffered hand and shook it till it ached.
"Come in, sir. God bless you, sir!"
Then suddenly checking himself, he lowered his voice, looked into the adjoining rooms, peeped behind doors, to see if there were a listener near.
"We have to be careful; spies all about us," said he, not fully realizing that the soldiers of the Union had possession of the city. He showed me a large flag.
"Since the fall of Sumter," said he, "my wife and I have slept on it every night. We have had it sewed into a feather-bed."
He gazed upon it as if it were the most blessed thing in the world.