Strange True Stories of Louisiana Part 32

What struck us both was the absence of that concern to be expected, and a sort of relief or suppressed pleasure. After twelve some worn-out-looking men sat down under the window.

"What is the news?" I inquired.

"Retreat, retreat!" they said, in broken English--they were Louisiana Acadians.

About 3 o'clock the rush began. I shall never forget that woful sight of a beaten, demoralized army that came rus.h.i.+ng back,--humanity in the last throes of endurance. Wan, hollow-eyed, ragged, footsore, b.l.o.o.d.y, the men limped along unarmed, but followed by siege-guns, ambulances, gun-carriages, and wagons in aimless confusion. At twilight two or three bands on the court-house hill and other points began playing Dixie, Bonnie Blue Flag, and so on, and drums began to beat all about; I suppose they were rallying the scattered army.

XIV.

THE SIEGE ITSELF.

_May 28th, 1863_.--Since that day the regular siege has continued. We are utterly cut off from the world, surrounded by a circle of fire. The fiery shower of sh.e.l.ls goes on day and night. H.'s occupation, of course, is gone, his office closed. Every man has to carry a pa.s.s in his pocket.

People do nothing but eat what they can get, sleep when they can, and dodge the sh.e.l.ls. There are three intervals when the sh.e.l.ling stops, either for the guns to cool or for the gunners' meals, I suppose,--about eight in the morning, the same in the evening, and at noon. In that time we have both to prepare and eat ours. Clothing cannot be washed or anything else done. On the 19th and 22d, when the a.s.saults were made on the lines, I watched the soldiers cooking on the green opposite. The half-spent b.a.l.l.s coming all the way from those lines were flying so thick that they were obliged to dodge at every turn. At all the caves I could see from my high perch, people were sitting, eating their poor suppers at the cave doors, ready to plunge in again. As the first sh.e.l.l again flew they dived, and not a human being was visible. The sharp crackle of the musketry-firing was a strong contrast to the scream of the bombs. I think all the dogs and cats must be killed or starved, we don't see any more pitiful animals prowling around.... The cellar is so damp and musty the bedding has to be carried out and laid in the sun every day, with the forecast that it may be demolished at any moment. The confinement is dreadful. To sit and listen as if waiting for death in a horrible manner would drive me insane. I don't know what others do, but we read when I am not scribbling in this. H. borrowed somewhere a lot of d.i.c.kens's novels, and we reread them by the dim light in the cellar. When the sh.e.l.ling abates H. goes to walk about a little or get the "Daily Citizen," which is still issuing a tiny sheet at twenty-five and fifty cents a copy. It is, of course, but a rehash of speculations which amuses half an hour. To-day we heard while out that expert swimmers are crossing the Mississippi on logs at night to bring and carry news to Johnston. I am so tired of corn-bread, which I never liked, that I eat it with tears in my eyes. We are lucky to get a quart of milk daily from a family near who have a cow they hourly expect to be killed. I send five dollars to market each morning, and it buys a small piece of mule-meat. Rice and milk is my main food; I can't eat the mule-meat. We boil the rice and eat it cold with milk for supper. Martha runs the gauntlet to buy the meat and milk once a day in a perfect terror. The sh.e.l.ls seem to have many different names; I hear the soldiers say, "That's a mortar-sh.e.l.l. There goes a Parrott.

That's a rifle-sh.e.l.l." They are all equally terrible. A pair of chimney-swallows have built in the parlor chimney. The concussion of the house often sends down parts of their nest, which they patiently pick up and reascend with.

_Friday, June 5th, 1863. (In the cellar.)_--Wednesday evening H. said he must take a little walk, and went while the sh.e.l.ling had stopped. He never leaves me alone long, and when an hour had pa.s.sed without his return I grew anxious; and when two hours, and the sh.e.l.ling had grown terrific, I momentarily expected to see his mangled body. All sorts of horrors fill the mind now, and I am so desolate here; not a friend. When he came he said that pa.s.sing a cave where there were no others near, he heard groans, and found a sh.e.l.l had struck above and caused the cave to fall in on the man within. He could not extricate him alone, and had to get help and dig him out. He was badly hurt, but not mortally. I felt fairly sick from the suspense.

Yesterday morning a note was brought H. from a bachelor uncle out in the trenches, saying he had been taken ill with fever, and could we receive him if he came? H. sent to tell him to come, and I arranged one of the parlors as a dressing-room for him, and laid a pallet that he could move back and forth to the cellar. He did not arrive, however. It is our custom in the evening to sit in the front room a little while in the dark, with matches and candles held ready in hand, and watch the sh.e.l.ls, whose course at night is shown by the fuse. H. was at the window and suddenly sprang up, crying, "Run!"--"Where?"--"_Back_!"

I started through the back room, H. after me. I was just within the door when the crash came that threw me to the floor. It was the most appalling sensation I'd ever known. Worse than an earthquake, which I've also experienced. Shaken and deafened I picked myself up; H. had struck a light to find me. I lighted mine, and the smoke guided us to the parlor I had fixed for Uncle J. The candles were useless in the dense smoke, and it was many minutes before we could see. Then we found the entire side of the room torn out. The soldiers who had rushed in said, "This is an eighty-pound Parrott." It had entered through the front and burst on the pallet-bed, which was in tatters; the toilet service and everything else in the room was smashed. The soldiers a.s.sisted H. to board up the break with planks to keep out prowlers, and we went to bed in the cellar as usual. This morning the yard is partially plowed by two sh.e.l.ls that fell there in the night. I think this house, so large and prominent from the river, is perhaps mistaken for headquarters and specially sh.e.l.led. As we descend at night to the lower regions, I think of the evening hymn that grandmother taught me when a child:

"Lord, keep us safe this night, Secure from all our fears; May angels guard us while we sleep, Till morning light appears."

_June 7th, 1863. (In the cellar.)_--I feel especially grateful that amid these horrors we have been spared that of suffering for water. The weather has been dry a long time, and we hear of others dipping up the water from ditches and mud-holes. This place has two large underground cisterns of good cool water, and every night in my subterranean dressing-room a tub of cold water is the nerve-calmer that sends me to sleep in spite of the roar. One cistern I had to give up to the soldiers, who swarm about like hungry animals seeking something to devour. Poor fellows! my heart bleeds for them. They have nothing but spoiled, greasy bacon, and bread made of musty pea-flour, and but little of that. The sick ones can't bolt it. They come into the kitchen when Martha puts the pan of corn-bread in the stove, and beg for the bowl she has mixed it in. They shake up the sc.r.a.pings with water, put in their bacon, and boil the mixture into a kind of soup, which is easier to swallow than pea-bread. When I happen in they look so ashamed of their poor clothes. I know we saved the lives of two by giving a few meals. To-day one crawled upon the gallery to lie in the breeze. He looked as if sh.e.l.ls had lost their terrors for his dumb and famished misery. I've taught Martha to make first-rate corn-meal gruel, because I can eat meal easier that way than in hoe-cake, and I prepared him a saucerful, put milk and sugar and nutmeg--I've actually got a nutmeg. When he ate it the tears ran from his eyes. "Oh, madam, there was never anything so good! I shall get better."

_June 9th, 1863_.--The churches are a great resort for those who have no caves. People fancy they are not sh.e.l.led so much, and they are substantial and the pews good to sleep in. We had to leave this house last night, they were sh.e.l.ling our quarter so heavily. The night before, Martha forsook the cellar for a church. We went to H.'s office, which was comparatively quiet last night. H. carried the bank box; I the case of matches; Martha the blankets and pillows, keeping an eye on the sh.e.l.ls. We slept on piles of old newspapers. In the streets the roar seems so much more confusing, I feel sure I shall run right into the way of a sh.e.l.l. They seem to have five different sounds from the second of throwing them to the hollow echo wandering among the hills, which sounds the most blood-curdling of all.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PRINTED ON WALL PAPER IN THE SIEGE OF VICKSBURG.]

_June 13th, 1863_.--Sh.e.l.l burst just over the roof this morning. Pieces tore through both floors down into the dining-room. The entire ceiling of that room fell in a ma.s.s. We had just left it. Every piece of crockery on the table was smashed. The "Daily Citizen" to-day is a foot and a half long and six inches wide. It has a long letter from a Federal officer, P.

P. Hill, who was on the gun-boat _Cincinnati_, that was sunk May 27th.

Says it was found in his floating trunk. The editorial says, "The utmost confidence is felt that we can maintain our position until succor comes from outside. The undaunted Johnston is at hand."

_June 18th_.--To-day the "Citizen" is printed on wall paper; therefore has grown a little in size. It says, "But a few days more and Johnston will be here"; also that "Kirby Smith has driven Banks from Port Hudson," and that "the enemy are throwing incendiary sh.e.l.ls in."

_June 20th_.--The gentleman who took our cave came yesterday to invite us to come to it, because, he said, "it's going to be very bad to-day." I don't know why he thought so. We went, and found his own and another family in it; sat outside and watched the sh.e.l.ls till we concluded the cellar was as good a place as that hill-side. I fear the want of good food is breaking down H. I know from my own feelings of weakness, but mine is not an American const.i.tution and has a recuperative power that his has not.

_June 21st, 1863_.--I had gone upstairs to-day during the interregnum to enjoy a rest on my bed and read the reliable items in the "Citizen," when a sh.e.l.l burst right outside the window in front of me. Pieces flew in, striking all round me, tearing down ma.s.ses of plaster that came tumbling over me. When H. rushed in I was crawling out of the plaster, digging it out of my eyes and hair. When he picked up beside my pillow a piece as large as a saucer, I realized my narrow escape. The window-frame began to smoke, and we saw the house was on fire. H. ran for a hatchet and I for water, and we put it out. Another (sh.e.l.l) came cras.h.i.+ng near, and I s.n.a.t.c.hed up my comb and brush and ran down here. It has taken all the afternoon to get the plaster out of my hair, for my hands were rather shaky.

_June 25th_.--A horrible day. The most horrible yet to me, because I've lost my nerve. We were all in the cellar, when a sh.e.l.l came tearing through the roof, burst upstairs, and tore up that room, the pieces coming through both floors down into the cellar. One of them tore open the leg of H.'s pantaloons. This was tangible proof the cellar was no place of protection from them. On the heels of this came Mr. J., to tell us that young Mrs. P. had had her thighbone crushed. When Martha went for the milk she came back horror-stricken to tell us the black girl there had her arm taken off by a sh.e.l.l. For the first time I quailed. I do not think people who are physically brave deserve much credit for it; it is a matter of nerves. In this way I am const.i.tutionally brave, and seldom think of danger till it is over; and death has not the terrors for me it has for some others. Every night I had lain down expecting death, and every morning rose to the same prospect, without being unnerved. It was for H. I trembled. But now I first seemed to realize that something worse than death might come; I might be crippled, and not killed. Life, without all one's powers and limbs, was a thought that broke down my courage. I said to H., "You must get me out of this horrible place; I cannot stay; I know I shall be crippled." Now the regret comes that I lost control, for H. is worried, and has lost his composure, because my coolness has broken down.

_July 1st, 1863._--Some months ago, thinking it might be useful, I obtained from the consul of my birthplace, by sending to another town, a pa.s.sport for foreign parts. H. said if we went out to the lines we might be permitted to get through on that. So we packed the trunk, got a carriage, and on the 30th drove out there. General V. offered us seats in his tent. The rifle-bullets were whizzing so _zip, zip_ from the sharp-shooters on the Federal lines that involuntarily I moved on my chair. He said, "Don't be alarmed; you are out of range. They are firing at our mules yonder." His horse, tied by the tent door, was quivering all over, the most intense exhibition of fear I'd ever seen in an animal.

General V. sent out a flag of truce to the Federal headquarters, and while we waited wrote on a piece of silk paper a few words. Then he said, "My wife is in Tennessee. If you get through the lines, give her this. They will search you, so I will put it in this toothpick." He crammed the silk paper into a quill toothpick, and handed it to H. It was completely concealed. The flag-of-truce officer came back flushed and angry. "General Grant says that no human being shall pa.s.s out of Vicksburg; but the lady may feel sure danger will soon be over. Vicksburg will surrender on the 4th."

"Is that so, general?" inquired H. "Are arrangements for surrender made?"

"We know nothing of the kind. Vicksburg will not surrender."

"Those were General Grant's exact words, sir," said the flag-officer. "Of course it is nothing but their brag."

We went back sadly enough, but to-day H. says he will cross the river to General Porter's lines and try there; I shall not be disappointed.

_July 3d, 1863._--H. was going to headquarters for the requisite pa.s.s, and he saw General Pemberton crawling out of a cave, for the sh.e.l.ling has been as hot as ever. He got the pa.s.s, but did not act with his usual caution, for the boat he secured was a miserable, leaky one--a mere trough. Leaving Martha in charge, we went to the river, had our trunks put in the boat, and embarked; but the boat became utterly unmanageable, and began to fill with water rapidly. H. saw that we could not cross it and turned to come back; yet in spite of that the pickets at the battery fired on us. H.

raised the white flag he had, yet they fired again, and I gave a cry of horror that none of these dreadful things had wrung from me. I thought H.

was struck. When we landed H. showed the pa.s.s, and said that the officer had told him the battery would be notified we were to cross. The officer apologized and said they were not notified. He furnished a cart to get us home, and to-day we are down in the cellar again, sh.e.l.ls flying as thick as ever. Provisions are so nearly gone, except the hogshead of sugar, that a few more days will bring us to starvation indeed. Martha says rats are hanging dressed in the market for sale with mule meat,--there is nothing else. The officer at the battery told me he had eaten one yesterday. We have tried to leave this Tophet and failed, and if the siege continues I must summon that higher kind of courage--moral bravery--to subdue my fears of possible mutilation.

XV.

GIBRALTAR FALLS.

_July 4th, 1863_.--It is evening. All is still. Silence and night are once more united. I can sit at the table in the parlor and write. Two candles are lighted. I would like a dozen. We have had wheat supper and wheat bread once more. H. is leaning back in the rocking-chair; he says:

"G., it seems to me I can hear the silence, and feel it too. It wraps me like a soft garment; how else can I express this peace?"

But I must write the history of the last twenty-four hours. About five yesterday afternoon, Mr. J., H.'s a.s.sistant, who, having no wife to keep him in, dodges about at every change and brings us the news, came to H.

and said:

"Mr. L., you must both come to our cave to-night. I hear that to-night the sh.e.l.ling is to surpa.s.s anything yet. An a.s.sault will be made in front and rear. You know we have a double cave; there is room for you in mine, and mother and sister will make a place for Mrs. L. Come right up; the ball will open about seven."

We got ready, shut up the house, told Martha to go to the church again if she preferred it to the cellar, and walked up to Mr. J.'s. When supper was eaten, all secure, and the ladies in their cave night toilet, it was just six, and we crossed the street to the cave opposite. As I crossed a mighty sh.e.l.l flew screaming over my head. It was the last thrown into Vicksburg.

We lay on our pallets waiting for the expected roar, but no sound came except the chatter from the neighboring caves, and at last we dropped asleep. I woke at dawn stiff. A draught from the funnel-shaped opening had been blowing on me all night. Every one was expressing surprise at the quiet. We started for home and met the editor of the "Daily Citizen." H.

said:

"This is strangely quiet, Mr. L."

"Ah, sir," shaking his head gloomily, "I'm afraid the last sh.e.l.l has been thrown into Vicksburg."

"Why do you fear so?"

"It is surrender. At six last evening a man went down to the river and blew a truce signal; the sh.e.l.ling stopped at once."

When I entered the kitchen a soldier was there waiting for the bowl of sc.r.a.pings. (They took turns for it.)

"Good-morning, madam," he said; "we won't bother you much longer. We can't thank you enough for letting us come, for getting this soup boiled has helped some of us to keep alive, but now all this is over."

"Is it true about the surrender?"

"Yes; we have had no official notice, but they are paroling out at the lines now, and the men in Vicksburg will never forgive Pemberton. An old granny! A child would have known better than to shut men up in this cursed trap to starve to death like useless vermin." His eyes flashed with an insane fire as he spoke. "Haven't I seen my friends carted out three or four in a box, that had died of starvation! Nothing else, madam! Starved to death because we had a fool for a general."

"Don't you think you're rather hard on Pemberton? He thought it his duty to wait for Johnston."