Perhaps no one but Stonewall Jackson could have lived up to the stern Puritanism which made him so indifferent to external things—always more rigidly uncompromising for himself than for others. The same sturdy determination which had led the untrained boy years before to seek and obtain an appointment to West Point in the face of a multitude of discouragements was shown in Stonewall's famous requisition, "Send me twenty thousand men and no orders." The spirit which held Lieutenant Jackson to his guns in Mexico after all his men had been killed or driven away, and had won for him two promotions in one day, was the same spirit in which, having received an order that upset his well-matured plans, he promptly obeyed and as promptly sent in his resignation. The South had then learned his worth and her protest led him to withdraw his resignation, but he was never again hampered by instructions from the War Department.
It was said in the army that General Jackson was afraid of nothing but his own soldiers. Their expressions of devotion alarmed him. Riding his chestnut sorrel, his tall, powerful form bent forward, his long, solemn face, with high cheek bones half lost in heavy reddish-brown beard, his gray eyes cast downward, when he unexpectedly came upon his men the first cheer would cause him to straighten back, hold his shoulders erect, doff the old fatigue cap that concealed his receding forehead, spur up his horse and dash off at full speed, followed by ringing shouts until he was lost to view.
Soon after this meeting with our "Stonewall" I returned to school, and in October my Soldier reported for duty, his empty sleeve dangling, for it was two months before he was able to draw it over his wounded arm.
Sheltered by academic walls, absorbed in our budding ambitions, we were yet shaken by the thunders of Antietam and thrilled with triumphant, though awesome, joy by the lightnings of Fredericksburg that seemed to flash a fiery road to the goal of our dreams.
Then came Chancellorsville with its thrill of triumph, followed by the knowledge of the immeasurable cost of the victory.
In the Executive Mansion I helped Lizzie Letcher, the daughter of the Governor, and Miss Missouri Godwin, now the widow of General Ordway, pin tuberoses tied with crêpe on the lapels of those who with sad hearts followed their honored leader for the last time. At the grave each soldier took off his flower and laid it on the sacred mound.
The question asked in '61, "Who is this T. J. Jackson?" had been answered from many a battlefield. When the shot that struck him down sent its mournful message around the world the fullest response to that query came from the mourning hearts of friend and foe alike. Beyond the sea he was recorded as "one who took to a soldier's grave the love of the whole world and the name of Stonewall Jackson."
General Garnett was one of those who had been hurt by the severity of the hero's military discipline. My Soldier had charge of General Jackson's funeral and Garnett came to him and asked permission to take part. Of all who followed the great soldier to his grave there was no mourner more sincere. All antagonisms were drowned in the flood of veneration which surged around his name and fame.