Some weeks after the pay-day, I found myself stretched upon a bed, in a little shanty, at Tigerville. I had some hazy recollections of having moved my quarters to Tigerville—of having left my tent one evening, after dress-parade, for a ride—of having ridden to the hospital and dismounted, with a dizzy head and aching frame—of the surgeon telling me, that I was very ill and must not go back—and then of horrible fever-visions. The long days travelled slowly, and the sultry nights wore away wearily, but they rolled into weeks ere anything was gained. Then I was carried to Brashear, and placed in a house which had been the mansion of an old Louisiana family. In front was a strip of lawn shaded by large oaks moss-hung and spreading. Beneath them the view opened on the waters of the Atchafalaya, which here had widened into Berwick Bay, and beyond, on the little village of Berwick. Around were the remains of the finest garden of western Louisiana. There still lingered thickets of the fig and orange, of lemon and banana; and there still flowered oleanders, and catalpas, and jasmin, with many other specimens of tropical fruits and flowers. As I sat observing these remnants 38of other times, an old New York friend and his wife came in. The lady looked around on the grass-grown walks, broken and effaced; on the long rows of fruit trees to which horses were picketed; on the rare flowerbeds trampled out by droves of mules; on the smooth grass-plots covered with heaps of rubbish.
“You have been here before,” I said, as I marked the careful looks that travelled so closely over every part of the sad, disordered scene.
“I have passed the most of my life here,” she replied. “This is my mother’s house.”
It was the story of another divided family. All of her own relations were in the Confederate lines, and she had remained with her husband to await the coming of the union army.
The enemy were gathering above us on the Teche. Those oath-taking patriots, whose sons were in the enemy’s army and crops within our lines; who, heretofore, had stood aloof and scowled sullenly at us when we passed, now came into camp, and for once were communicative. They asked us if we knew what was coming, and hinted at Southern conscription, and the damage the Wild Texans would do the growing crop. They feared the rough riders from the prairies, and told many tales of their lawless cruelty. There came in, too, refugees and contrabands, all speaking of the enemy’s increasing strength; of boats collecting for some night attack, and of the reckless fierceness of those Wild Texans. On the opposite side of the river, the Wild Texans 39began to move in open day. They came down in little scouting parties, hiding behind houses and bushes, but constantly on the alert. We must have presented tempting marks for a long-range Enfield, yet they never fired, but flitted silently about, always observing us, yet never responding to our many shots.
I watched these indications of the gathering storm, with the nervous irritability inseparable from convalescence. But every slight exertion brought on a slight relapse, and I was soon forced, so far as I could do so, to abstract myself from these excitements, and try to gather back my strength in time to be of service in the coming trouble. To this end, I took up the contents of some captured mails. There were a few of the ridiculous letters, that once found their way freely into our newspapers, with bad spelling, and false syntax, and bombastic rhetoric, but the most of them were sad. More woeful letters were never read than these Wild Texans wrote. There were such mournful yearnings for home—for peace—for those they had left behind, that, insensibly, the mind changed from exultation into pity. There was a slight compunction, too, in running the eye over the secrets of our enemies; a more than reluctance to look upon these hidden words, which love and duty had written for loving eyes, and coldly appropriate them as our own. There were tales of want and tales of love—tidings of weddings and of deaths. Here was a letter from a father in Port Hudson, to his “dear little daughters;” and here one from a mother to her “own beloved 40son.” This is a family letter, written by the parents and sisters, to their “two dear boys,” who now are watching us from the other shore. And this one is the reverse, for it is addressed to “father, mother, wife, and sisters.” The rebel soldier has filled his “last sheet” with sad forebodings, with few hopes, much love, and many prayers. A widow’s letter tells me, that her only child fell at Iuka; and a father’s, that his eldest son died before Dalton. “What wonder,” each letter asks, “that I wish to die and be at rest?” Among so many, of course a love-letter can be found, breathing a first avowal. It is written to some village beauty, and hints at rivals, and her sometime smiles and sometime frowns. The village beauty is, I judge, a slight coquette, who has led her lover along with little encouragements and little rebuffs. His letter is written in a manly strain, and tells her that he had hoped to gain an honorable name, and come back to win her in an early peace. But the peace has not come. He can bear this suspense no longer. He begs her to deal frankly and truly with him, and, if she loves him, to answer this letter. The letter will never be answered! I laid it away, and thought that I would send it, by some flag of truce, to the unknown belle. But my papers were captured, and this letter, on which so many hopes hung, was lost.
The threatening trouble drew nearer. There were frequent alarms—the cannon rung out their warnings often during the night—the long rolls were beaten and the troops assembled and stood on their arms. One 41night I awoke at the call of the cannon near my window, and heard the men assembling and the ammunition wagons rolling past. To one accustomed to act at such times, such forced inaction is the severest of trials. I watched from habit, expecting the rattling small arms of an attack, but the night wore away in unusual silence. The next morning I was told that all our troops save the sick and a few on guard, had gone. The sick men whispered each other that we were defenceless, and it was well that we had the telegraph and railroad, and could call our troops back in case of an attack from across the river. A few hours passed and then the telegraph suddenly ceased its ticking—the railroad was cut and the enemy was between us and our forces at La Fourche.
No relief came, and after three days of suspense, Brashear was carried by assault. Some of our sick men formed a line and behaved well, but they were quickly overpowered. The red flag of our hospital was not understood by the assaulting party, and for a little while it looked as if no quarter would be given by the Wild Texans to our sick and wounded. I had risen and mounted my horse after the attack commenced, and I now dismounted at the hospital, and with Captain Noblet of the 1st Indiana Artillery stood awaiting the result. The Captain was full of wrath, and vowed that he would put the two or three charges, still in his revolver, in places where two or three of the murdering villains would feel them. A wild-looking squad, with broad hats and jangling 42spurs, rushed, revolver in hand, upon the building. In no very decided mood at the time, and acting chiefly from the military habit of looking to some one in authority, I asked sharply if there was an officer among them. They stopped, looked, a trifle disconcerted, and one answered that he was a sergeant.
“This is a hospital,” I said, authoritatively. “Sergeant, put two men on guard at the door, and don’t let any but the wounded pass in.”
“Well then, Bill,” said the sergeant, “you and John stand guard here. And now see you don’t let nobody go in unless they be wounded.”
This was the first and last order I ever gave to a Confederate soldier, and it is due to the sergeant to say that he executed it promptly and well.
About the same instant another squad rushed to a side window and poked their rifles through the sash. Dr. Willets, the surgeon of the 176th, at the moment was operating on a wounded soldier. With professional coolness he turned to the window, and in the decided manner that one would speak to a crowd of small boys, said—
“This is a hospital; you mustn’t come here. Go away from the window and get out of my light.”
The rifles were withdrawn; the party looked at the window a moment in a somewhat awe-struck manner, and then saying to each other, “You mustn’t go there,” they withdrew.
The wounded of both sides were brought in, and our 43surgeons, with scrupulous impartiality, treated all alike. From beside their operating table I was moved to an upper room with Lieutenant Stevenson of the 176th. A minnie ball had torn through the entire length of his foot, leaving a frightful wound that threatened lockjaw and amputation. On the next cot lay a wounded Confederate named Lewis—a plain, simple-hearted man, who, for the next week, proved a useful and trustworthy friend. As we thus lay there, my regimental colors, by some strange chance, were brought into the room. Our conversation stopped—the sick and wounded raised themselves from their cots, and all eyes were fastened upon the inanimate flag as though it were a being of intelligence and life. The Texan soldier first broke the silence.
“That,” he said, in a dreamy way—half to himself and half to us—“that has been the proudest flag that ever floated.”
“And is still, sir,” said my wounded lieutenant, proudly.
The Texan said nothing. I expected an outbreak, for there had been no little defiance in the lieutenant’s reply, but none came. Some old emotion had evidently touched his heart and carried him back to earlier and better days.
As he turned away my color-sergeant whispered to me a plan for destroying the colors, which, however, I did not approve. He pleaded that he knew every thread of that flag, and that it would almost kill him to see it borne away by rebel hands. “No, Sergeant,” I was 44obliged to reply, “we must keep our colors by fighting for them, and not by a dirty trick.” The answer satisfied neither the sergeant nor my fellow officers. Yet before my own imprisonment was over, I had the great happiness of learning that the undestroyed flag, honorably recaptured, was restored to its regiment.
An officer soon appeared charged with the duty of paroling our men. His quiet and courteous manner said plainly that he was a gentleman, and he introduced himself as Captain Watt, of Gen. Mouton’s staff. The Captain and I looked at each other as men do who think they have met before. He then informed me that formerly he had spent his summers at Saratoga and Newport, and that he thought we must have known each other there. For this slight reason—so slight that many men would have made it a good excuse for dropping an acquaintance, if any had existed—Captain Watt called on me repeatedly, procured an order for my being retained in the Brashear hospital, and for several months carefully transmitted to me such letters as found their way through the lines. His family had been one of the wealthiest in New Orleans, and were now refugees in Europe. He had entered the army under the belief that it was a duty to his State, and on the capture of the city had beheld the ruin of all who were dearest to him. Yet he made no ill-timed allusions to this, and in our conversations always selected pleasant topics and spoke kindly of the hours he had spent and the acquaintances he had made in the North.
The chief Confederate surgeon (Dr. Hughes, of Victoria, 45Texas,) next arrived, and assumed command at the hospital. It caused at first but little change. Our own surgeons continued in charge of our wounded—our steward continued to dispense the stores, and the stores continued to be forthcoming. The Confederate surgeons were polite and kind, doing all they could to make us comfortable, and expressing thanks for the treatment previously bestowed on their own wounded. Thus, in a few hours, our affairs had settled down in their new channels; and we, with a strange, new feeling of restriction upon us, set ourselves to wait for the bad news, and fresh reverses likely to come. From our window we could see the Confederate forces crossing the river. They waited not for tardy quarter-masters or proper transportation, but, in flat boats and dug-outs, pressed steadily across. A little steamer dropped out of one of the narrow bayous, and worked ceaselessly, bringing over artillery. Ere sunset, we estimated that five thousand men and four batteries had crossed, and were moving forward to break our communications on the Mississippi, and compel us to raise the siege of Port Hudson.
From this early day, there was a strong resolve in the minds of most of us, to be cheerful before the enemy, and, whatever we felt, not to let them see us down-cast. When the mind is really roused and in motion, a little effort will turn it into almost any channel. We made the effort, and succeeded. One individual who came in last, and ventured to say, with solemn visage, that this 46calamity was awful, was immediately frowned down, and warned that, if he talked such nonsense here, he should be moved to some other ward. The effect was magical, and in ten minutes he became rather a merry, careless kind of fellow. This treatment, I believe, saved many lives; and I found that my own convalescence, which had been slow and changeful in the previous quiet, was now rapid and steady.
There were sorrows enough to see, if one chose to look toward them. So many causes never united to depress, and never produced so little effect. Neither the shameful loss of the post, nor the presence of the sick and wounded filling every room, nor our unburied dead who lay around the building, nor the prospect of a long captivity, nor the helplessness of disease, nor the suffering of wounds, were sufficient to make us appear sad. I marvelled then, and cannot understand now, how the mind was able to throw off these troubles, and how real this enforced cheerfulness became. A sense of duty dictated it at the beginning, and redeemed it from heartlessness afterward. Once, indeed, my spirits failed me, as I searched some private letters to find an address. They were so light-hearted and happy, and dwelt on the belief, as on a certainty, that he, to whom they were written, would return crowned with honor. It was a happy and brief illusion. An only sister had given her only brother to the war—the orphan pair had made this great sacrifice of separation; and now I had to write to the young girl, and say that he had been my most 47trusted officer, and had fallen for the honor of his flag.[1]
There was a class of captives who saw the loss of Brashear with heavier hearts than those who possessed the rights and hopes of “prisoners of war.” The unhappy contrabands were agitated before the blow fell, but met it with the tearless apathy of their race. “The niggers don’t look as if they wanted to see us,” I heard one Confederate soldier say to another.
“No,” said the other; “but you’ll see a herd of fat planters here to-morrow after them. They don’t fight any, but they are always on hand for their niggers.”
It was even so: for days, planter after planter appeared, and party after party of men, women and children, laden with their beds and baggage, tramped sorrowfully past our quarters. The hundreds that remained went, I know not whither.
There was one woman, a quadroon, who had been an attendant in our hospital. With her there were an old mother, darker than herself, and a little daughter so fair, that no one ever suspected her of being tainted with the blood of the hapless race. This woman, through all the turmoil and trial of that time, never lost the little marks of neatness and propriety that tell so plainly in woman of innate dignity and refinement. The tasteful simplicity of her frequently changed dress; the neat collar and snowy cuffs; the pretty work-box, and more especially her quiet reserve, indicated rather the lady 48than the slave. During the fight she had been calm and brave, and when a couple of cowards had rushed into the hospital and begged for a place where they could lie down and hide themselves, this woman, while volleys were firing at the hospital, and men and women falling in the passages, had shown these men to a room and closed the door on them, and walked away so quietly that one might have thought her beyond the reach of the danger that threatened them. An hour or two later, as she passed through the ward where we lay, she stopped at the window and looked out on the scene of the Confederates crossing the river. Of all the persons to whom the capture of Brashear boded grief and wrong, there probably was not one to whom it threatened so much as to her. With her mother and her child, she had been preparing to seek the surer refuge of the North, and this direful calamity had come when the place of safety appeared almost within her reach. Yet she shed no tears, and uttered no complainings. Her large, sad eyes fastened on the river, she stood beside the window and heard the shouts and yells that told of the Confederate triumph. For half an hour she never moved; her face retained its soft composure, and only once the muscles of the lip fluttered and trembled, as though there might be a troubled sea within. Then she turned and went back to her work, as calmly as if she alone had suffered no change. She cheered those men who were struggling for strength to go out on parole; she worked for those officers who 49were to be sent forward into captivity. For herself, she never invited aid or sympathy. We asked her if we might not send for her former master to come and take her back to her old home. But this, for some untold reason, she steadfastly refused. It was urged that she and her child would be sent far into Texas or Arkansas; and that they might be seized, as so much booty, by some of these half-savage strangers. She answered quietly, that she had thought of this. Ere we parted, we asked her what future help we could give, and what plan she would pursue to regain her freedom, or secure some less dangerous home. And she said briefly, that she did not know, and said no more.
1. Captain John S. Cutter.
The captured officers, able to march, were sent forward to Shreveport, and the men were paroled and marched off to our lines. Three officers of my regiment remained with me—two sick, and one severely wounded. Two “citizen prisoners” were also added to our number. One of these, whom I shall call Mr. Stratford, was held as lessee of a confiscated plantation. His wife was permitted to remain with him, and she now visited the hospital daily. The other civilian was Mr. Dwight Parce, of Chenango County, New York, who had just begun business in Brashear. He now witnessed the destruction of his property with undiminished cheerfulness, and, although an invalid, fated to fill a prisoner’s grave in Texas, met the discomforts that awaited him with a serenity and hopefulness that nothing ever disturbed.
We all effected some captures of baggage. Captain 50Watt sent me an order for the delivery of mine if it could be found, and Dr. Hughes, with ever ready kindness, advised me to take his ambulance and search for it at the fort, where some captured property was stored. The guard consisted of a young gentleman in his shirt-sleeves and no shoes, who, when requested to go, whistled violently, and perched himself on the rear of the ambulance, with his face toward the hospital and his back toward me. I asked him, with some surprise, if he was not going to take his rifle; at which he stopped whistling and said, he reckoned not. After whistling a few minutes, he further defined his position by saying, that if I ran away he reckoned he could run after me; and then, that he reckoned the climate had been a heap too much for me. After another whistle his stiffness wore away a trifle, and he manifestly tried to put me at my ease by saying, “Dog gone the Lousanny climate, and the bayous, and the beef, and dog gone the Lousanyans: they’re the meanest set of people ever I see. I’d just as soon shoot one of ’em as a Yank.” This put me quite at my ease, and we then had a very interesting conversation. The etymology of “dog gone” my guard was ignorant of; he suggested that it meant pretty much what something else did, but wasn’t quite so bad, in which opinion I coincided. Since then I have learnt that this expressive phrase is derived from the threat of putting a dog on you, and that it saves annually, in Texas, an immense amount of swearing, and is found to answer just as well.
51On the morning of the third of July, the Officer of the Day appeared. He was a Captain in Colonel Bates’ Texan Battalion, and he blandly begged that we would prepare to move in the afternoon; the boat would be ready at five, and we would be sent to the hospital at Franklin, where we would be much more comfortable. The boat did not come, however, and we remained to celebrate the “Fourth” at Brashear. We went round among our sick men who remained, to cheer them with the certainty of their early release; we read the Declaration, and we drank a bottle of wine, which Mrs. Stratford, with patriotic devotion, smuggled in for us. Our friend, the ex-officer of the day, re-appeared to apologize; the boat had been detained—he knew he must have caused us much trouble—he had come to beg us to forgive him—he deeply regretted that he had not known of the delay in time to inform us. To-day he believed that there would be no delay, and he had just requested the new Officer to order the boat up to the hospital, so that we should not have the trouble of walking down to where she lay. Nothing could have been more elegant, chivalric, and delightful. If he were one of my own officers and I were the Lieutenant-General, he could not have been more courteous and respectful.
We started on our “Fourth of July excursion” in the afternoon. While the boat was lying at the wharf, an officer, with long white hair and of imposing appearance, came slowly down the saloon. As he drew near I observed a Colonel’s insignia on his collar, and one of 52the guard whispered me, that it was Colonel Bates, the commanding officer at Brashear. The Colonel marched up to me, extended his hand, and with grand solemnity, in keeping with his dignified bearing, said:
“Colonel, I have come down now to apologize for not having waited upon you before. I ought to have done so, sir—I ought to have done so. But I have been over-occupied. I pray you to excuse me, sir.”
“When I consider our difference in years, and the different circumstances that surrounded each, I do not know of any incident that could have pleased me more than this stately courtesy of the old Colonel. An interesting conversation followed, in which I learnt that he was an Alabamian by birth. He spoke highly of the Texan character, which, he said, excelled in bravery and simplicity; but he warned me that the country could furnish few comforts, such, he said, as Northerners have at home. Then, when the boat was ready to start, he called up the officer of the guard, and said to him:
“Captain, your orders are strict, I know; but these gentlemen are invalids; they are too weak to escape, sir. You must construe your orders liberally, sir, in favor of the sick. Do not let the guard trouble these gentlemen, and make them as comfortable as you can.”
There was another Colonel who succeeded Colonel Bates, at Brashear; he was a citizen of a New England State, and had been an ice merchant in New Orleans. When the war came, he went, not “with his State” but with his property. All the indignities, ill-treatment, 53meanness and cruelty that we met with at Brashear and Franklin, came directly from him. While the real Southern officers were showing us unsought kindness and attention—while they were overlooking what they sincerely believed to be the needless ruin of their homes, and the wanton destruction of their property, this miserable Northern renegade was bullying Northern ladies—“bucking and gagging” unfortunate prisoners, and sending sick and wounded officers out of the hospital by orders as cowardly as they were cruel.
The Franklin Hospital had been the “Franklin House” before the war, and stood close beside the bayou. Lieutenant Stevenson was placed in the wounded ward, and the rest of us were assigned three pleasant rooms in a wing of the building. Our guard consisted of a corporal, named Ingram, and six men of Colonel Bates’ regiment. They bivouacked on the piazza, and completed our confusion as to what Wild Texans are. They did not drink; they did not swear; they did not gamble. They were watchful of us, but did everything kindly and with a willingness that greatly lessened our feeling of dependence.
The surgeon in charge of the hospital, Dr. Marten, was polite and kind. A stylish little French lieutenant of the 10th Louisiana, named Solomon, was assiduous in his attentions. He detailed a contraband as our especial servant; hourly sent us little presents, in the way of fruit and refreshments, and paid us those easy, chatty visits, that Frenchmen pay so much better than any 54other men. There was a sort of Dutch Major-Domo, one Schneider, who took us under his special protection, blowing up the cook and scolding the waiter, on our behalf, a dozen times a day. There was also a sergeant of the Crescent regiment—a soldier and disciplinarian, but easy and communicative toward us. Lastly, there was our contraband, bearing the name of Ben, and very sharp and shrewd was he, and never wanting in good humor or flourishing obeisances.
The ladies of Franklin flocked to the hospital, bringing fruit and flowers, and knick-knacks of their own preparing. They differed considerably with the doctors on questions of diet; and did about as much damage, in their pretty way, as patriotic young ladies have done in other than Confederate hospitals. They carefully avoided the cot of the solitary Yankee prisoner in the wounded ward; the well-bred passing it by as though the slight were casual, and the ill-bred, showing with studied care, that it was intentional. The Wild Texans who had captured us shared not in these patriotic manifestations. They, on the contrary, divided with Lieutenant Stevenson whatever they received, looked after him as though he were a brother soldier, and, once or twice, asked their fair visitors rather angrily, why they didn’t give this or that to that gentleman on the fourth cot. Yet it must not be supposed that this conduct of the Franklin fair proceeded entirely from their own wicked imaginings. The women, like the men of the South, are all slaves of public opinion. After awhile one lady, giving way to 55the natural kindness of her nature, stopped at the prisoner’s cot, and then the others followed the example. The presents flowed in with a free hand, and the sails once fairly round on this tack, the wind seemed to blow as strongly from the chivalric quarter as it had previously blown from the patriotic.
This narrative would not be truthful if I omitted therefrom a statement of the fare, during our fortnight in the Franklin hospital. It was so much better than I had expected; so much better than I had supposed it possible that prisoners could receive at rebel hands; so different from the fare which we knew was to follow, that I carefully noted down the bill on several days, and from these select a favorable specimen.
“Wednesday, July 15. At Sunrise.—French Coffee and Biscuits.
“Breakfast.—Beef Steak, Beef Stew, Cucumbers, Stewed Peaches, Melons, French Bread, Biscuits, Toast and Tea.
“Dinner.—Soup, Roast Beef, Beef a la mode, Cucumbers, Egg Plant, Lima Beans, French Bread, Biscuits, Tea.”
This easy prison-life, however, received a jog, in the shape of an officer of Speight’s Battalion of Texas Cavalry. He was introduced to us as Lieutenant Geo. C. Duncan, and he bore orders to carry us to Niblett’s Bluff, on the Sabine. It appeared therefrom that we were to be moved to the southern side of Texas, and not to follow the officers captured with us.
56The orders were, to carry all the prisoners at the hospital to Niblett’s Bluff; but when the officer saw Lieutenant Stevenson, and heard the surgeon’s statement, he sent down a special report from the surgeon, and waited for further orders. In the meanwhile, our polite French friend, Lieutenant Solomon, drove Mrs. Stratford to New Iberia, and we awaited, with some anxiety, our departure, and discussed the probabilities of marching through, or giving out by the way.