A Virginia Girl in the Civil War, 1861-1865

Crossing the railroad at Jarrett’s Hotel, I saw a Confederate soldier whom I recognized as an old playmate and friend of Norfolk days. We stopped each other.

“Where did you come from, Harry?”

“Where are you running to, Nell?”

“Why, we were at Miss Anne Walker’s and the shells were bursting in our yard, and we are getting out of the way.”

Zip! a shell passed over my head and burst a few yards away. I didn’t wait to say good-by, but ran along Washington Street for my life. At last we got to Mr. Venable’s house, which was out of the range of the guns, and there we stopped with others. Many people had passed us on our way, and we had passed many people, all running through Washington Street for dear life. Everybody seemed to be running; in Mr. Venable’s house quite a crowd was gathered. His family were from home, but their friends filled the house. We watched from doors and windows, and talked of our friends who had fallen, of the Ninth of June, and of how Fort Hell and Fort Damnation got their names. We spoke of a friend who had kissed wife and children good-by, and gone out that fateful Ninth with the militia up the Jerusalem Plank Road to Fort Hell. Later in the day a wagon had come lumbering up to the door, blood dripping from it as it jolted along. In it lay the husband and father, literally shot to pieces. His little boy walked weeping behind it. His widow had shrouded him with her own hands, and trimmed his bier herself with the fragrant June flowers that were growing in her yard – flowers which he had loved and helped to tend. She had a house full of little ones around her. She had never known how to work, and now she was going about finding tasks to do, bearing up bravely and strengthening her children, she who had been as dependent upon her husband for love and tenderness as his children were upon her.

As the day waned we saw people hurrying past the Venable home bearing the wounded. I remember one poor fellow who was lying on a stretcher that was borne by his friends. He seemed to be shot almost to pieces. Graycoats were passing now, marching into the city.

As we sat at supper that night – a large party it was at that hospitable board – a servant brought a message to the three of us. A gentleman – a soldier – wished to see us. I went into the hall, and there was Walter Taylor. I don’t think I was ever so glad to see anybody in my life. Walter was not only “Walter,” but he was General Lee’s adjutant, and the very sight of him meant help to us. What did mother, Millie, and I do but throw our arms around his neck and kiss him like crazy women.

“I can’t stop a minute,” he said. “I heard you were here, and felt that I must come out to see how you were getting along. But I must go straight back to my command. Let me know if I can do anything for you.”

“Walter, where is Dan?”

“I don’t know, Nell, but I think he will be here to-night – if he is not here already.”

We felt like clinging to Walter and holding him back. I for one had lost my nerve. I was sick of war, sick of the butchery, the anguish, the running hither and thither, the fear. Soon after supper my husband came in. I was tremblingly glad to see him again, to touch his warm living body, to see that he was not maimed and mutilated – yet it hung over me all the time that he must go away in a few minutes – to come back, or be brought back – how? I kept my hand on him all the time he sat beside me. Every time he moved I trembled, feeling that it was a move to go.

“What are you doing out here?” he asked; “I thought you were at Miss Anne’s and went there for you.”

“We left there.”

“What for?”

“The shells were flying all around us, and we were afraid, and ran out here, I tell you.”

“Afraid? Why, Nell, you weren’t afraid?”

“Yes, I am – I’m terrified.”

“A soldier’s wife – a regular campaigner!”

“I can’t help it. I’m scared.”

“After all you’ve been through, like the brave girl you are, to break down like a coward!”

“I can’t help what you call me, I’m scared – I’m scared to death.”

“Nell, I’m ashamed of you.”

“I can’t help it, Dan; I’m scared.”

“What would General Stuart say if he could know?”

“I don’t care what he would think. I’m terrified. I’m going to run from those shells as long as there is a place to run to. I’m not going to stand still and let a shell strike me to please anybody. I’m for getting away from town. If I had my way we’d take to the woods this night, and let the Yankees have it.”

“They’d mighty soon find us in the woods.”

“Then I’d move on. They can have everywhere they come to now, as far as I am concerned.”

Dan looked aghast. I was completely demoralized. Knowing he must go, I summoned all my strength and braced myself for the parting, but though Dan was sorry for me, my effort to be brave was so comical that he had to laugh. By morning the range of the guns was changed, shells were flying all over the city, and our present quarters were not exempt. Zip! zip! crack! bang! the nasty things went everywhere.

We piled ourselves, pell-mell, helter-skelter into the first ambulance we could get and started out Washington Street again as fast as ever we could get the driver to urge his horses.

Everybody was racing out Washington Street, still running west. Pell-mell, helter-skelter, they ran, any way to get out of the range of the horrid, whizzing, singing, zipping bombs. We met Mr. McIlvaine driving toward town, that is, in the direction from which we were running.

He hailed us.

“Where are you going?”

“We don’t know where we are going. We are not going anywhere that we know of.”

“Go to my house. My family are away, but I can make you welcome. Quite a number of people are out there now.”

We found this to be the literal truth. All the floors were covered with mattresses – if you rolled off your own mattress you rolled on to some one else’s, for they were laid so thick that they touched. But things might always be worse.

Mr. McIlvaine had an excellent cook. She made delicious rolls and wonderful muffins and wafers, and as far as skill went our provisions were turned into delicious food. There was quite a colony – seven women besides ourselves – and we told Mr. McIlvaine that we could not expect him to feed us all, that we were thankful enough for shelter and to have our cooking done, and that we would all throw in and buy provisions. So we made a common fund, and sent for such things as could be had by Mr. McIlvaine whenever he went into town.

My husband came out to see me quite often during the weeks that followed, and Colonel Taylor and many of our military friends remembered us by dropping in to tea and spending an evening with us when they could. There was a piano in the parlor, and our evenings were often gay with singing, music, and dancing. There was but one servant on the place as I remember – the cook I have spoken of, and whom I remember vividly and affectionately for the good things to eat she set before us. To cook for us, however, was about all she could do. We had but few clothes with us, and when these got soiled there was no washerwoman to be had, so when Sue Williams said she was going to wash her clothes herself we all got up our washings, and went down into the back yard with her. We found some tubs ands drew our water, and made up some fire under a pot, as we had seen the negroes do. I can see Sue now, drawing water and lifting buckets back and forth from the well. We tied some clothes up in a sheet and put them into the pot to boil; then we put some other clothes in a tub and began to wash; meanwhile we had to keep up the fire under the pot. It was dinner hour by the time we got thus far. The weather was very hot and we were dreadfully tired, and we hadn’t got any clothes on the line yet. We stopped to swallow our dinner, and went at it again. The sun was going down when we had a pile of clothes washed, rinsed, and wrung, ready for the line. We didn’t know what to do about it. There didn’t seem to be any precedent that we had ever known for hanging clothes out at sundown. On the other hand, if we didn’t spread them out they would mildew – we had heard of such things. If they had to be spread out, certainly there was no better place to spread them than on the line. So at sunset we hung out our clothes to dry. There were handkerchiefs on the line and a petticoat apiece. The rest of the clothes were in the pot and the tub, and they are there now for aught I know to the contrary. I don’t know what became of them, but I know we went into the house and went to bed with the backache and every other sort of ache. I have never in all my life worked so hard as I worked that day trying to wash my clothes out; and the next day the clothes on the line looked yellow for all the labor that was put upon them. I have never known why they looked yellow – not for lack of work, for we had rubbed holes in some of them. We did not undertake to iron them for fear we should make them look still worse, but wore them rough dry.

Early one morning we waked suddenly, and sprang to our feet and reached for each other’s trembling hands. There had been a sudden and terrific noise. The earth was shaking. That awful thunder! that horrible quaking of the earth! as if its very bowels were being rent asunder! What was it? We tried to whisper to each other through the darkness of our rooms, but our tongues were dry and palsied with fear. We feared to draw the curtains of our windows, we dared not move. That was the morning of the 30th of July, the morning when the Crater was made – when an entire regiment was blown into the air, and when into the pit left behind them Federals and Confederates marched over each other, and fought all day like tigers in a hole. If you ever go to the quaint old town of Petersburg, you can drive out the old Jerusalem Plank Road to Forts Hell and Damnation, and you can turn out of it to a large hole in the earth which is called the Crater. The last time I was at the Crater it was lined with grass; some sassafras bushes grew on the sides; down in the hollow was a peach-tree in blossom, a mocking-bird sang in it, and a rabbit hopped away as I looked down.

Soon after the explosion occurred, we saw from our windows that the McIlvaine place was swarming with soldiers who were throwing up earthworks everywhere. They were our own soldiers, of course, and we applied for an ambulance and got one, and went back in it to Miss Anne’s in town.

I shall never forget how that deserted house felt when we three women and little Bobby entered it. The dust was on everything and there was a musty smell about everywhere. That night Millie had high fever. Such a wretched night as it was! no servants, no conveniences, little or no food; Millie in a raging fever, little sleepy Bobby crying for his mother and his supper; the shock of the Crater still upon us, danger underneath, overhead, everywhere. The next morning Millie’s fever was lower, and she seemed better.

“We must get her away from here, or she will die,” mother said.

But how? We could hear nothing of Dan, and didn’t know where to find him. Mother sent a note to General Mahone by a passing soldier asking for a pass to Richmond. Her reply was an ambulance and a driver who brought a note from the general, saying that we would be taken outside of the city to the nearest point to where our trains from Richmond were allowed to come. We got Millie into the ambulance and were taken to the Dunlop’s, a beautiful place on the Richmond Railroad. Here we waited for a train which did not come. Night came on; still we waited, but no train. We sent into the house and asked for lodgings. Answer came that the house was full, and no more people could be taken in. Millie’s fever continued to rise. We sent again, saying how ill she was, and begging for shelter for the night. The same answer was returned, and there we were out on the lawn, our shawls spread on two trunks and Millie lying on them, and looking as if every breath would be her last.

“Do you know where Colonel Walter Taylor is stationed?” I asked our driver.

“Yes, ma’am. I know exactly where he is. His camp is about a mile from here.”

“How could I get a note to him?”

“I will go with it. I’ll take one of the horses out of the ambulance.”

I scratched off:

“Dear Walter: We are out in the woods near Dunlop’s without any shelter, and Millie is very ill. Can you help us?

“Affectionately,“Nell.”

The driver took the note and Walter came back with him.

“I don’t know what to do, Nell,” he said. “There is no train to Richmond till noon to-morrow, but you can’t stay out here.”

He went himself to the house, but without effect.

“I will send you a tent and a doctor,” he said. “That is the best I can do for you. I wish I could stay here with you all and help take care of Millie to-night, but I must go back at once.”

The tent came and with it Dr. Newton, and Millie was made as comfortable as was possible on the trunks.

An old negress who was passing saw our strait and brought us her pillow in a clean pillow-case, and we put that under Millie’s head. We gave “aunty” some tea that we had with us, and she took it to her cabin and drew us a cup or two over her fire, and we got Millie to swallow a little of it. We had picked Bobby up off the grass, and dropped him on a pile of bags in a corner of the tent.

At one time that night we thought Millie would die – the doctor himself was doubtful if she could live till morning. When morning came she was alive, and that was all. Dr. Newton sent for a stretcher and had her lifted on it into the train. That was a terrible journey; there were many delays, and we thought we should never get to Richmond, but we were there at last. We went into the waiting-room at the station and sent for Major Grey’s brother. Fortunately, he was quickly found, and took us to the house at which he boarded and where there was a vacant room. The city was crowded, and on such short notice it was the best he could do, but it was a stifling little place.

The room was small, its only window opened on a little dark hallway, there was an objectionable closet attached to the room, and the close, unwholesome air made me sick and faint as we opened the door. We laid Millie on the bed. Suddenly she gasped, moaned something that sounded like “I am dying!” and seemed to be dead.

“Air!” cried mother hopelessly, “she needs air.”

But there was no window for Dick to throw up.

He picked her up in his arms, ran down the steps with her, and into the open street. The ladies in the house all came out to us, offering help and sympathy, and with us got Millie into the parlor, where we laid her on a lounge, and where two physicians worked over her for hours before they were sure she would recover entirely from the attack. They said it was heart failure. That evening we carried her on a stretcher to the Spotswood Hotel. She was ill for two weeks. Then Bobby was ill for five. Our funds ran out. What moneys we had were in the Yankee lines and inaccessible, and Millie determined to put her education and accomplishments to use. She set herself to work to find something to do, and a lady from Staunton who happened to meet us at this time, learning that she wanted work, offered her a position in a young ladies’ school. So Millie and little Bobby went to Staunton.

CHAPTER XXIV

BY THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH

Not long after they left, mother and I came in from a round of calls one day to find a telegram awaiting me:

“Dan wounded, but not dangerously. Come.

“Gus.”

I hurried into my room and changed my dress – to be careful of wearing apparel had become a pressing necessity – while mother went out to see about trains. We found there was no Petersburg train till next day; there might be one at seven in the morning. I was up at daybreak, got a cup of tea and a biscuit, looked at mother as she lay asleep, and with my satchel and little lunch basket in my hand went to the depot. There were crowds of soldiers there and a train about to start, but no woman was to go on it – it was for soldiers only. I went from one person who seemed to be in authority to another, seeking permission to go, but received the same answer everywhere – only soldiers were allowed on the train.

“But,” I said at last, “I am an officer’s wife, and he is wounded.” I broke down with the words, and in spite of my efforts to keep them back my eyes filled with tears. It was what I should have done in the beginning. I at once got permission. I went into the car, took my seat at the extreme end and shrunk into the smallest space possible. The car was packed with soldiers and I was the only woman on board. When we were about half-way a young lieutenant who occupied part of the seat in front of me said:

“Madam, if I can be of any assistance to you, please command me. I suppose you know that our train stops within three miles of Petersburg.”

“I did not know,” I said, “and I do not know what to expect, or what I shall do, or where I shall find my husband, although I suppose I shall be met.”

“If not,” he said, “I am at your service.”

No one was waiting for me at the depot; but the lieutenant secured an ambulance, got in it with me, and directed the driver to take us to Petersburg. We soon met Gus, Dan’s cousin, coming to meet me in a buggy. While I was getting out of the ambulance into the buggy I was plying Gus with questions about Dan. “Dan is at our house,” Gus told me. “His wound is a very ugly one, but the doctors say that he’ll get well. At first we thought he wouldn’t. He is shot through the thigh, and will be laid up for some time – that’s what he’s kicking about now.”

Our most direct route to Mansfield, where Dan was, lay through Petersburg, but we could not follow that route. The Yankees were everywhere about the city, Gus said, so we went through the outer edge of Ettricks, skirting the city proper. When we reached Mansfield my husband on crutches met me at the door. He looked pale and weak, but he was very cheery and tried to joke.

“He ought not to have got up, Nell,” whispered Grandmamma Grey. “He thought it would shock you to find him in bed – that is why he got up.”

Of course I immediately put him under orders. He returned to bed meekly enough, and from that time I did all I could, and it was all I could do, to keep him still until his wound healed. We read and sang and played on the banjo and had a good time. But as soon as he was able to hobble he would go to camp every day and sit around. General Lee’s headquarters were about a mile and a half from our house. Colonel Taylor and a number of old friends were there, and Dan could talk fight if he couldn’t fight. At last he insisted that he was ready to join his division, and we set out to reach it in an ambulance drawn by three mules.

When we came to Hatchers Run we found that creek very much swollen and the bridge not visible, but there were fresh tracks showing where a wagon had lately gone over.

“That shows well enough where the bridge is,” said Dan, pointing to where the wagon had left a track close to the water’s edge and visible for a short way under the water. “Follow that track,” he commanded our driver, who was three-quarters of a man, being too young for a whole man and too old for a lad, “the mules will find the bridge. They are the most sure-footed animals in the world. Just let them have their heads as soon as they get in the water.”

Jerry obeyed instructions. Sure enough, the mules got along well enough. That is, for a short distance. Then, splash! down they went under the water! We could just see their noses and their great ears wiggling above the surface as they struck out into a gallant swim for the opposite shore. Splash! we went in after them, and mules and ambulance were swimming and floating together. Jerry was terrified, and began to pray so hard that I got to laughing. All we could see of the mules were six ears sticking out of the water and wiggling for dear life, while our ambulance swam along like a gondola.

But things changed suddenly. Our ambulance was lifted slightly, came down with a jolt, and wouldn’t budge! The mules strained forward, but to no good. The ambulance wouldn’t stir, and their harness held them back.

“The ambulance has caught on some part of the bridge,” said Dan.

We were in a serious dilemma. The road was one in much use, and we pinned our hopes to some passer-by, but as we waited minutes seemed hours. No one came. Perhaps the wagon that had preceded us had given warning that the bridge was wrecked. We sat in the ambulance and waited, not knowing what to do, not seeing what we could do. By some saplings which stood in the water we measured the rise of the tide, and we measured its rise in the ambulance by my trunk – I was getting wet to my knees. Finally I sat on top of my trunk and drew my feet up after me. The situation was serious enough, and Dan began to look very anxious – Hatchers Run was always regarded as a dangerous stream in flood time. Still, no sign of any one coming. The rain continued to fall and the water to rise.

“At this rate we are sitting here to drown,” Dan said. “There’s but one way out of it that I can see. From what I know of the situation of our army there must be an encampment near here. Jerry, climb out of this ambulance over the backs of these hind mules till you get to that leader. Get on him, cut him loose, and swim out of this. Ride until you find an encampment and bring us help.”

But Jerry didn’t look at it that way.

“I’m skeered ter fool ’long dat ar mule. I ain’t nuvver fooled ’long er mule in de water. I kaint have no notion of de way he mought do wid me. You kaint ’pend on mules, Mars Dan, ter do jes lak you want ’em ter on dry land, much less in de water. Arter I git out dar, cut dat ar mule loose, an’ git on him, he mought take out an’ kyar me somewhar I didn’t wanter go. I mought nuvver git ter no camp, nor nowhar, Mars Dan, ef I go ter foolin’ ’long er dat mule out dar in de water.”

The major caught his shoulders, and turned his face to the stream. “Have you watched that water rising out there for nothing?” he asked sternly. “We are sure to be drowned if you don’t do as I tell you – all of us.”

Between certain death and uncertain death Jerry chose the latter, crawled over the hind mules, got on the leader and rode him off. He took this note with him:

“Nearest Encampment of any Division, C. S. A.:

“I am in the middle of Hatchers Run in an ambulance with my wife. The stream is rising rapidly and ambulance filling with water. Send immediate relief.

“Daniel V. Grey,“Adjutant of the Thirteenth.”

After the boy was gone there we sat and waited while the water rose. I got very cold and Dan, who was yet weak from his wound and confinement, got chilled and stiff. After more than an hour of waiting we heard from the woods on the other side a noise as of men running, and then there came rushing out of the woods toward us thirteen men of mighty girth and stature. They were Georgia mountaineers who had been sent to our rescue. When they came to the water they didn’t like the look and feel of it, and evidently didn’t want to get in it.

“What is we uns to do?” they called across.

“Something to get us out of this,” Dan hallooed back, “and be quick about it, or we shall drown.”

“How is we uns to git to you uns?”

“Get in the water and swim here.”

They talked among themselves, but none of them seemed disposed to do this.

“Men!” called my husband, “I am hardly well of a wound, I am stiff and weak. I can not save my wife, who is up to the waist in water. Will you stand there and see a woman drown?”

They seemed ashamed, but none of them made the move to go in. Then the largest of them all – he seemed a mighty giant – stepped forth and took command.

“You say thar’s a lady in that ambulance?”

“Yes, my wife.”

“Wall, I’m blowed! An’ she ain’t a-hollerin’ and a-cryin’?”

“Do you hear her?” asked Dan irritably. “She’s braver than some men I know. But you can count on it that she is wet and cold. We are nearly frozen!”

“Wall, I’m blowed! An’ she’s right out thar in the middle er that run, an’ she ain’t a-hollerin’ and a-cryin’! Tell you uns what I’ll do. I’ll swim out there and bring her back on my back. An’ then I’ll swim back agin an’ bring you on my back.”

“I can’t!” I said. “I’m cold enough to die now, and I can’t get in that water. I’ll die if I do.”

The giant gave orders. The men hung back. Then we heard him roaring like a bull of Bashan.