University of Virginia Library

IV
CAMDEN, S. C.

IV. April 20, 1861—April 23, 1861

CAMDEN, S. C., April 20, 1861.—Home again at Mulberry.
In those last days of my stay in Charleston
I did not find time to write a word.

And so we took Fort Sumter, nous autres; we—Mrs.
Frank Hampton, and others—in the passageway of the
Mills House between the reception-room and the drawing-room,
for there we held a sofa against all comers. All the
agreeable people South seemed to have flocked to Charleston
at the first gun. That was after we had found out that
bombarding did not kill anybody. Before that, we wept
and prayed and took our tea in groups in our rooms, away
from the haunts of men.

Captain Ingraham and his kind also took Fort Sumter
—from the Battery with field-glasses and figures made with
their sticks in the sand to show what ought to be done.

Wigfall, Chesnut, Miles, Manning, took it rowing about
the harbor in small boats from fort to fort under the
enemy's guns, with bombs bursting in air.

And then the boys and men who worked those guns so
faithfully at the forts—they took it, too, in their own way.

Old Colonel Beaufort Watts told me this story and
many more of the jeunesse dorée under fire. They took the
fire easily, as they do most things. They had cotton bag
bomb-proofs at Fort Moultrie, and when Anderson's shot
knocked them about some one called out "Cotton is falling."
Then down went the kitchen chimney, loaves of

bread flew out, and they cheered gaily, shouting, "Bread-stuffs
are rising."

Willie Preston fired the shot which broke Anderson's
flag-staff. Mrs. Hampton from Columbia telegraphed him,
"Well done, Willie!" She is his grandmother, the wife,
or widow, of General Hampton, of the Revolution, and the
mildest, sweetest, gentlest of old ladies. This shows how
the war spirit is waking us all up.

Colonel Miles (who won his spurs in a boat, so William
Gilmoore Simms[1] said) gave us this characteristic anecdote.
They met a negro out in the bay rowing toward the city
with some plantation supplies, etc. "Are you not afraid
of Colonel Anderson's cannon?" he was asked. "No,
sar, Mars Anderson ain't daresn't hit me; he know Marster
wouldn't 'low it."

I have been sitting idly to-day looking out upon this
beautiful lawn, wondering if this can be the same world
I was in a few days ago. After the smoke and the din of
the battle, a calm.

April 22d.—Arranging my photograph book. On the
first page, Colonel Watts. Here goes a sketch of his life;
romantic enough, surely: Beaufort Watts; bluest blood;
gentleman to the tips of his fingers; chivalry incarnate.
He was placed in charge of a large amount of money, in
bank bills. The money belonged to the State and he was
to deposit it in the bank. On the way he was obliged to
stay over one night. He put the roll on a table at his bedside.
locked himself in, and slept the sleep of the righteous
Lo, next day when he awaked, the money was gone. Well!
all who knew him believed him innocent, of course. He
searched and they searched, high and low, but to no purpose.
The money had vanished. It was a damaging story,

in spite of his previous character, and a cloud rested on
him.

Years afterward the house in which he had taken
that disastrous sleep was pulled down. In the wall, behind
the wainscot, was found his pile of money. How the rats
got it through so narrow a crack it seemed hard to realize.
Like the hole mentioned by Mercutio, it was not as deep as
a well nor as wide as a church door, but it did for Beaufort
Watts until the money was found. Suppose that house had
been burned, or the rats had gnawed up the bills past
recognition?

People in power understood how this proud man suffered
those many years in silence. Many men looked
askance at him. The country tried to repair the work of
blasting the man's character. He was made Secretary of
Legation to Russia, and was afterward our Consul at
Santa Fé de Bogota. When he was too old to wander far
afield, they made him Secretary to all the Governors of
South Carolina in regular succession.

I knew him more than twenty years ago as Secretary
to the Governor. He was a made-up old battered dandy,
the soul of honor. His eccentricities were all humored.
Misfortune had made him sacred. He stood hat in hand
before ladies and bowed as I suppose Sir Charles Grandison
might have done. It was hard not to laugh at the purple
and green shades of his overblack hair. He came at
one time to show me the sword presented to Colonel Shelton
for killing the only Indian who was killed in the Seminole
war. We bagged Osceola and Micanopy under a flag
of truce—that is, they were snared, not shot on the wing.

To go back to my knight-errant: he knelt, handed me the
sword, and then kissed my hand. I was barely sixteen and
did not know how to behave under the circumstances. He
said, leaning on the sword, "My dear child, learn that it is
a much greater liberty to shake hands with a lady than to
kiss her hand. I have kissed the Empress of Russia's hand

and she did not make faces at me." He looks now just as
he did then. He is in uniform, covered with epaulettes,
aigulettes, etc., shining in the sun, and with his plumed hat
reins up his war-steed and bows low as ever.

Now I will bid farewell for a while as Othello did to all
the "pomp, pride, and circumstance of glorious war," and
come down to my domestic strifes and troubles. I have a
sort of volunteer maid, the daughter of my husband's
nurse, dear old Betsy. She waits on me because she so
pleases. Besides, I pay her. She belongs to my father-in-law,
who has too many slaves to care very much about their
way of life. So Maria Whitaker came, all in tears. She
brushes hair delightfully, and as she stood at my back I
could see her face in the glass. "Maria, are you crying
because all this war talk scares you?" said I. "No,
ma'am." "What is the matter with you?" "Nothing
more than common." "Now listen. Let the war end
either way and you will be free. We will have to free you
before we get out of this thing. Won't you be glad?"
"Everybody knows Mars Jeems wants us free, and it is
only old Marster holds hard. He ain't going to free anybody
any way, you see."

And then came the story of her troubles. "Now,
Miss Mary, you see me married to Jeems Whitaker yourself.
I was a good and faithful wife to him, and we were comfortable
every way—good house, everything. He had no
cause of complaint, but he has left me." "For heaven's
sake! Why?" "Because I had twins. He says they are
not his because nobody named Whitaker ever had twins."

Maria is proud in her way, and the behavior of this bad
husband has nearly mortified her to death. She has had
three children, in two years. No wonder the man was
frightened. But then Maria does not depend on him for
anything. She was inconsolable, and I could find nothing
better to say than, "Come, now, Maria! Never mind, your
old Missis and Marster are so good to you. Now let us

look up something for the twins." The twins are named
"John and Jeems," the latter for her false loon of a husband.
Maria is one of the good colored women. She deserved
a better fate in her honest matrimonial attempt.
But they do say she has a trying temper. Jeems was tried,
and he failed to stand the trial.

April 23d.—Note the glaring inconsistencies of life.
Our chatelaine locked up Eugene Sue, and returned even
Washington Allston's novel with thanks and a decided
hint that it should be burned; at least it should not remain
in her house. Bad books are not allowed house room, except
in the library under lock and key, the key in the Master's
pocket; but bad women, if they are not white, or serve in a
menial capacity, may swarm the house unmolested; the
ostrich game is thought a Christian act. Such women are
no more regarded as a dangerous contingent than canary
birds would be.

If you show by a chance remark that you see some particular
creature, more shameless than the rest, has no end
of children, and no beginning of a husband, you are
frowned down; you are talking on improper subjects.
There are certain subjects pure-minded ladies never touch.
upon, even in their thoughts. It does not do to be so hard
and cruel. It is best to let the sinners alone, poor things.
If they are good servants otherwise, do not dismiss them;
all that will come straight as they grow older, and it does!
They are frantic, one and all, to be members of the church.
The Methodist Church is not so pure-minded as to shut its
eyes; it takes them up and turns them out with a high hand
if they are found going astray as to any of the ten commandments.