University of Virginia Library

X. The Students

The number of students who matriculated at the University,
during the course of the war, fluctuated but
little from year to year. The attendance was as follows:
during the session of 1861–2, sixty-six were present;
during the session of 1862–3, forty-six; of 1863–
64, fifty; and of 1864–5, fifty-five. Of the first sixty-six,
sixteen only were passing through their second year,
and three through their third; of the second forty-six,
five were entered for their second year, and three for
their third; of the third fifty, nine were in their second
year and two in their third; and the proportion for the
attendance in 1864–5, when forty-one students were present,
was ten in their second year, and three in their

third. The total number of matriculates admitted during
the four years of war was two hundred and seventeen.
Of these, forty reached their second year in their
attendance; eleven, their third; three, their fourth.

The regulation which required that the academic student
should enroll his name in three schools at least was
relaxed during the war. He seems to have entered as
few or as many as he chose; now we find one attending
the lectures on Greek or chemistry; now another, the
lectures on Latin and mathematics. Sometimes a student
would be satisfied to apply himself to Latin only,
or moral philosophy, or anatomy, or natural philosophy,
or chemistry, or history and literature. The entire number
of students entered in each school during the whole
of this period was as follows:

   
   

   

School of Latin	90	Department of Physiology and Surgery	52
School of Greek	50
School of Modern Languages	76	Department of Anatomy and Materia Medica	55
School af Mathematics	98	School of Moral Philosophy	19
School of Natural Philosophy	73	School of History and Literature	20
Department of Medicine	52	School of Law	31

The number of graduates from year to year was small.
In 1862, there were only eight, and, in 1863, only fifteen.
Several won the diploma of bachelor of laws and several
the diploma of doctor of medicine, but no one remained
long enough to win the degree of master of arts.

One hundred and sixty-six of the two hundred and
seventeen matriculates during the war were Virginians.
The remainder were drawn from the other Southern
States, with the exception of one who was enrolled from
Canada,—doubtless, the son of a Confederate agent

stationed in that distant country. Of those admitted who
had not yet taken, but were afterwards to take, an
energetic part in the prevailing conflict, Joseph Bryan,
William A. Anderson, and Robert E. Lee, Jr., may be
mentioned. Among others present who were also to become
men of prominence in after-life, were Micajah
Woods, James N. Dunlop, John B. Whitehead, James
L. Greenlee, W. M. Perkins, Philip P. Pendleton, Robert
L. Harrison, and J. J. Pretlow. George L. Christian
matriculated after receiving a wound so severe that
he was incapacitated for performing further military service.

We learn from a student who has published his recollections
of these four years, that his companions comprised
"only a few boys and poor fellows who were disabled
in their first battles, and who had to fit themselves
to be lawyers and teachers to make a living."
And another witness, during these unhappy times, has
spoken of the "pitiful array of boys of fifteen too young
to enlist, and pale, wasted veterans of twenty, minus an
arm or leg," who walked or stumped along the almost
deserted arcades on their way to the almost empty lecturerooms.
Of those enrolled in the School of Law, during
the session of 1864–5, there were four who had lost
a leg in battle, and two, an arm. Four, in addition, bore
on their bodies the scars of terrible wounds that had
permanently crippled them. These ten made up three-fourths
of the group who were sitting under Professor
Minor. The matriculates who had not yet joined the
army rarely passed, young as they were, more than
twelve months in the University,—the next year found
them private soldiers in the ranks, and exposed to all the
dangers of the field. If they returned the third year, it

was because they had been so maimed by shot or shell,
that they were no longer capable of rendering service to
the Confederate cause.

The Faculty perceived the need, in those impoverished
times, of relaxing the rule that required a prompt payment
of the matriculation fee; and they also permitted
a settlement graduated to the months or weeks of actual
attendance. Some of the students who were refugees
from homes situated within the Federal lines obtained
the privilege of entering without the exaction of any fee
at all at the moment. The right of gratuitous enrollment
was still possessed by State scholars and candidates
for the ministry. The number of the former had, by
1861, sunk to two. Under the provisions of the enactment
of March, 1864, young men who had been incapacitated
by wounds were relieved of all charges for
tuition, should they be able to show that they were lacking
in the means to defray them.

It is one of the interesting facts in the University's
history during this arrested period,—a fact too which
proves that the foremost aim of the Faculty was not to
assure their own personal profit, but the continued maintenance
of the institution as a working entity,—that the
tuition fees were not increased as the purchasing power
of the Confederate currency declined. Towards the
end of the war, they would have been justified in demanding
hundreds and even thousands of dollars where before
a very modest sum would have been asked; but no change
was made, in spite of the enormous advance in the prices
of all the articles which the professors were compelled to
buy for the support of their families. The only modification
in the charges for the lectures that was suggested
was that they should be paid in the form of agricultural
products, like corn and wheat, or in manufactured

products, like bacon, flour, and meal. The Board were
of the opinion that this plan of exchange was practicable;
but they announced that no one desiring to enter the
University should be excluded because he insisted on following
the normal rule of paying his fees in Confederate
greenbacks. This was in August, 1864, when that currency
was already tending to sink to the valuation of mere
paper.

How to meet the charges for food was a far more
perplexing question for the student to decide. Naturally,
the boarding-house keepers, who had to make all their
purchases in open market, were unwilling to overlook the
fall in the value of the Confederate dollar. Their rates
must follow the shrinkage, or they would be compelled
to become bankrupts. Miss Mary Ross was the only
hotel-keeper who held out until 1864, and she then announced
that she would be forced to advance her terms
from one hundred dollars to one hundred and fifty by the
month. A committee, composed of Professors Maupin
and Davis, called upon her, with some solemnity and
formality, to ascertain whether there was not at least
one bill of fare which could be adopted that would stave
off the threatened additional expense. She replied emphatically,
that, without this augmented charge, she would
have to face the certain prospect of an increasing deficit,
which she would be unable to make up.

For the most graphic picture of the conditions that
surrounded the student at the University, during the latter
part of the war, we are indebted to George L. Christian,
afterwards a lawyer and judge of distinction, and still
surviving. Christian had been a gallant soldier, and at
the Bloody Angle had lost one entire foot and the heel
of the other, in the storm of balls and shells which were
fired by the two hostile lines at close quarters. He matriculated

along with three soldiers who had been maimed
or severely wounded like himself. It was only by the use
of crutches that he was able to walk; and all the clothing
which he possessed he had brought with him from camp.
It consisted of one suit, one blanket and one oil-cloth. A
sum of money, amounting nominally to one hundred dollars,
but, in reality, to two dollars and a half in gold, made
up, with his monthly pay,—equal in value to thirty-five
cents,—the entire extent of his financial resources. He
had borrowed the one hundred dollars from a friend for
the purpose of covering his most pressing expenses in entering
the School of Law.

Professor Minor received him with the tenderest consideration,
and insisted upon his remaining under his roof
until he could find a place of permanent shelter. Christian,
in the end, obtained the use of a dormitory at the
rate of twenty dollars a month; but it was unfurnished;
and there was, at the moment, no money left to be spent
in the purchase of the few articles which he would need.
His roommate was W. C. Holmes, of Mississippi, who
had been so crippled in his right arm by a ball that he
was unable to copy Professor Minor's notes from the
blackboard. The two young men made an exchange of
such of their respective physical powers as remained unimpaired,
—Christian assisted Holmes in taking down
the notes, and Holmes aided Christian in walking.

Like Christian, Holmes still possessed his army blanket.
At night, the two youthful heroes would make a bed for
themselves by spreading Christian's blanket out on the
floor, and then covering themselves up with the blanket
which belonged to Holmes; and the floor continued to be
their bed during the remainder of the session. These
hardships aroused in them not the smallest feeling of soreness
or discontent. "As we did not have to get up when

it rained to fetch our tents," said Christian, "or what was
worse, were not awakened by the water running in under
us, which we had so often experienced in the army, we
deemed ourselves fortunate and slept soundly." They
borrowed a basin from Professor Minor, until, with a renewal
of their limited funds, they were able to purchase
one of their own. A blacking brush cost them six dollars
in paper money,—a very reasonable price at that inflated
hour. By hook or by crook, they contrived to procure
two split-bottom chairs and also a small, rudely made pinetable
to hold their books. Their only candlestick was
an empty bottle. There was no other furniture, either
for use or ornament, to be found in the room.

Their fuel consisted of chestnut sticks supplied by the
University. The fagots into which these were split, were
disposed while burning, to pop with some violence, but as
there was no carpet on the floor to be burnt, this characteristic
was taken with philosophy. The two young soldiers
lighted their own fire in the morning, and replenished
it themselves, from time to time, throughout the day.
They swept their own floor; brought from the cistern the
water which they needed for bathing; and cut their own
wood to the proper lengths. As Christian lacked a foot
and Holmes practically an arm, the wielding of the axe
was accompanied with difficulties. Christian could only
handle it successfully by leaning on his knee on the floor.
Fortunately for his comfort in this attitude, a friend had
presented him with some pieces of sheepskin, which he now
used as pads. While he chopped away at the chestnut
sticks, his friend would be sweeping the dust from the
floor.

As disabled soldiers, they were entitled to a small fixed
quantity of rations from the Confederate commissary department;
and this they obtained once every fortnight

from the supplies collected at the Delavan Hospital in
Charlottesville. Their only store-room was a large pinebox,
which they kept in a corner of their dormitory. The
food was neither abundant nor nourishing, but "as it was
the best that our poor country had to offer," said Christian,
they accepted it with grateful feelings, and contrived
by means of it to satisfy their appetites. They studied
their text-books assiduously, sang the popular Confederate
songs with fervor, and were not unhappy, in spite of
their privations and hardships. "We knew," said
Christian, "that we had done our duty to our country,
and were then honestly striving as best we could to fit
ourselves for the further struggles and duties of life,
looking forward confidently to the time when our country
would have won its independence, and be able to care
for us when old age had rendered us unable to care for
ourselves. We never dreamed for an instant that the
just cause for which we had fought, and sacrificed so
much, could by any possibility fail."