University of Virginia Library

XVIII
COLUMBIA, S. C.

XVIII. July 6, 1864—January 17, 1865

COLUMBIA, S. C., July 6, 1864.—At the Prestons'
Mary was laughing at Mrs. Lyons's complaint—the
person from whom we rented rooms in Richmond.
She spoke of Molly and Lawrence's deceitfulness. They
went about the house quiet as mice while we were at home;
or Lawrence sat at the door and sprang to his feet whenever
we passed. But when we were out, they sang, laughed,
shouted, and danced. If any of the Lyons family passed
him, Lawrence kept his seat, with his hat on, too. Mrs.
Chesnut had said: "Oh!" so meekly to the whole tirade,
and added, "I will see about it."

Colonel Urquhart and Edmund Rhett dined here; charming
men both—no brag, no detraction. Talk is never pleasant
where there is either. Our noble Georgian dined here.
He says Hampton was the hero of the Yankee rout
at Stony Creek.[1] He claims that citizens, militia, and lame
soldiers kept the bridge at Staunton and gallantly repulsed
Wilson's raiders.

At Mrs. S.'s last night. She came up, saying, "In
New Orleans four people never met together without dancing."
Edmund Rhett turned to me: "You shall be
pressed into service." "No, I belong to the reserve corps—

too old to volunteer or to be drafted as a conscript." But I
had to go.

My partner in the dance showed his English descent; he
took his pleasure sadly. "Oh, Mr. Rhett, at his pleasure,
can be a most agreeable companion!" said someone. "I
never happened to meet him," said I, "when he pleased to
be otherwise." With a hot, draggled, old alpaca dress, and
those clod-hopping shoes, to tumble slowly and gracefully
through the mazes of a July dance was too much for me.
"What depresses you so?" he anxiously inquired. "Our
carnival of death." What a blunder to bring us all together
here!—a reunion of consumptives to dance and sing
until one can almost hear the death-rattle!

July 25th.—Now we are in a cottage rented from Doctor
Chisolm. Hood is a full general. Johnston[2] has been removed
and superseded. Early is threatening Washington
City. Semmes, of whom we have been so proud, risked the
Alabama in a sort of duel of ships. He has lowered the flag
of the famous Alabama to the Kearsarge.[3] Forgive who
may! I can not. We moved into this house on the 20th of

MRS. CHESNUT'S HOME IN COLUMBIA IN THE LAST YEAR OF THE WAR.

Here Mrs. Chesnut entertained Jefferson Davis.

July. My husband was telegraphed to go to Charleston.
General Jones sent for him. A part of his command is on
the coast.

The girls were at my house. Everything was in the
utmost confusion. We were lying on a pile of mattresses
in one of the front rooms while the servants were reducing
things to order in the rear. All the papers are down on the
President for this change of commanders except the Georgia
papers. Indeed, Governor Brown's constant complaints, I
dare say, caused it—these and the rage of the Georgia people
as Johnston backed down on them.

Isabella soon came. She said she saw the Preston sisters
pass her house, and as they turned the corner there was
a loud and bitter cry. It seemed to come from the Hampton
house. Both girls began to run at full speed. "What is
the matter?" asked Mrs. Martin. "Mother, listen; that
sounded like the cry of a broken heart," said Isabella;
"something has gone terribly wrong at the Prestons'."

Mrs. Martin is deaf, however, so she heard nothing and
thought Isabella fanciful. Isabella hurried over there, and
learned that they had come to tell Mrs. Preston that Willie
was killed—Willie! his mother's darling. No country ever
had a braver soldier, a truer gentleman, to lay down his
life in her cause.

July 26th.—Isabella went with me to the bulletin-board.
Mrs. D. (with the white linen as usual pasted on her chin)
asked me to read aloud what was there written. As I slowly
read on, I heard a suppressed giggle from Isabella. I know
her way of laughing at everything, and tried to enunciate
more distinctly—to read more slowly, and louder, with
more precision. As I finished and turned round, I found
myself closely packed in by a crowd of Confederate soldiers
eager to hear the news. They took off their caps, thanked
me for reading all that was on the boards, and made way
for me, cap in hand, as I hastily returned to the carriage,
which was waiting for us. Isabella proposed, "Call out to

them to give three cheers for Jeff Davis and his generals."
"You forget, my child, that we are on our way to a funeral."

Found my new house already open hospitably to all
comers. My husband had arrived. He was seated at a pine
table, on which someone had put a coarse, red table-cover,
and by the light of one tallow candle was affably entertaining
Edward Barnwell, Isaac Hayne, and Uncle Hamilton.
He had given them no tea, however. After I had remedied
that oversight, we adjourned to the moonlighted piazza.
By tallow-candle-light and the light of the moon, we made
out that wonderful smile of Teddy's, which identifies him
as Gerald Grey.

We have laughed so at broken hearts—the broken hearts
of the foolish love stories. But Buck, now, is breaking her
heart for her brother Willie. Hearts do break in silence,
without a word or a sigh. Mrs. Means and Mary Barnwell
made no moan—simply turned their faces to the wall and
died. How many more that we know nothing of!

When I remember all the true-hearted, the light-hearted,
the gay and gallant boys who have come laughing, singing,
and dancing in my way in the three years now past; how I
have looked into their brave young eyes and helped them
as I could in every way and then saw them no more forever;
how they lie stark and cold, dead upon the battle-field, or
moldering away in hospitals or prisons, which is worse—I
think if I consider the long array of those bright youths
and loyal men who have gone to their death almost before
my very eyes, my heart might break, too. Is anything
worth it—this fearful sacrifice, this awful penalty we pay
for war?

Allen G. says Johnston was a failure. Now he will wait
and see what Hood can do before he pronounces judgment
on him. He liked his address to his army. It was grand
and inspiring, but every one knows a general has not time
to write these things himself. Mr. Kelly, from New Orleans,

says Dick Taylor and Kirby Smith have quarreled.
One would think we had a big enough quarrel on hand for
one while already. The Yankees are enough and to spare.
General Lovell says, "Joe Brown, with his Georgians at his
back, who importuned our government to remove Joe Johnston,
they are scared now, and wish they had not."

In our democratic Republic, if one rises to be its head,
whomever he displeases takes a Turkish revenge and defiles
the tombs of his father and mother; hints that his father
was a horse-thief and his mother no better than she should
be; his sisters barmaids and worse, his brothers Yankee
turncoats and traitors. All this is hurled at Lincoln or
Jeff Davis indiscriminately.

August 2d.—Sherman again. Artillery parked and
a line of battle formed before Atlanta. When we asked
Brewster what Sam meant to do at Atlanta he answered,
"Oh—oh, like the man who went, he says he means to stay
there!" Hope he may, that's all.

Spent to-day with Mrs. McCord at her hospital. She is
dedicating her grief for her son, sanctifying it, one might
say, by giving up her soul and body, her days and nights, to
the wounded soldiers at her hospital. Every moment of her
time is surrendered to their needs.

To-day General Taliaferro dined with us. He served
with Hood at the second battle of Manassas and at Fredericksburg,
where Hood won his major-general's spurs. On
the battle-field, Hood, he said, "has military inspiration."
We were thankful for that word. All now depends on that
army at Atlanta. If that fails us, the game is up.

August 3d.—Yesterday was such a lucky day for my
housekeeping in our hired house. Oh, ye kind Columbia
folk! Mrs. Alex Taylor, née Hayne, sent me a huge bowl
of yellow butter and a basket to match of every vegetable
in season. Mrs. Preston's man came with mushrooms freshly
cut and Mrs. Tom Taylor's with fine melons.

Sent Smith and Johnson (my house servant and a carpenter

from home, respectively) to the Commissary's with
our wagon for supplies. They made a mistake, so they said,
and went to the depot instead, and stayed there all day. I
needed a servant sadly in many ways all day long, but I
hope Smith and Johnson had a good time. I did not lose
patience until Harriet came in an omnibus because I had
neither servants nor horse to send to the station for her.

Stephen Elliott is wounded, and his wife and father
have gone to him. Six hundred of his men were destroyed
in a mine; and part of his brigade taken prisoners: Stoneman
and his raiders have been captured. This last fact
gives a slightly different hue to our horizon of unmitigated
misery.

General L—told us of an unpleasant scene at the
President's last winter. He called there to see Mrs. McLean.
Mrs. Davis was in the room and he did not speak to
her. He did not intend to be rude; it was merely an oversight.
And so he called again and tried to apologize, to
remedy his blunder, but the President was inexorable, and
would not receive his overtures of peace and good-will.
General L—is a New York man. Talk of the savagery
of slavery, heavens! How perfect are our men's manners
down here, how suave, how polished are they. Fancy one
of them forgetting to speak to Mrs. Davis in her own drawing-room.

August 6th.—Archer came, a classmate of my husband's
at Princeton; they called him Sally Archer then, he was so
girlish and pretty. No trace of feminine beauty about this
grim soldier now. He has a hard face, black-bearded and
sallow, with the saddest black eyes. His hands are small,
white, and well-shaped; his manners quiet. He is abstracted
and weary-looking, his mind and body having been deadened
by long imprisonment. He seemed glad to be here,
and James Chesnut was charmed. "Dear Sally Archer,"
he calls him cheerily, and the other responds in a far-off,
faded kind of way.

Hood and Archer were given the two Texas regiments
at the beginning of the war. They were colonels and Wigfall
was their general. Archer's comments on Hood are:
"He does not compare intellectually with General Johnston,
who is decidedly a man of culture and literary attainments,
with much experience in military matters. Hood,
however, has youth and energy to help counterbalance all
this. He has a simple-minded directness of purpose always.
He is awfully shy, and he has suffered terribly, but
then he has had consolations—such a rapid rise in his profession,
and then his luck to be engaged to the beautiful
Miss—."

They tried Archer again and again on the heated controversy
of the day, but he stuck to his text. Joe Johnston
is a fine military critic, a capital writer, an accomplished
soldier, as brave as Cæsar in his own person, but cautious to
a fault in manipulating an army. Hood has all the dash
and fire of a, reckless young soldier, and his Texans would
follow him to the death. Too much caution might be followed
easily by too much headlong rush. That is where the
swing-back of the pendulum might ruin us.

August 10th.—To-day General Chesnut and his staff departed.
His troops are ordered to look after the mountain
passes beyond Greenville on the North Carolina and Tennessee
quarter.

Misery upon misery. Mobile[4] is going as New Orleans
went. Those Western men have not held their towns as we
held and hold Charleston, or as the Virginians hold Richmond.
And they call us a "frill-shirt, silk-stocking chivalry,"
or "a set of dandy Miss Nancys." They fight desperately
in their bloody street brawls, but we bear privation
and discipline best.

August 14th.—We have conflicting testimony. Young

Wade Hampton, of Joe Johnston's staff, says Hood lost
12,000 men in the battles of the 22d[5] and 24th, but Brewster,
of Hood's staff, says not three thousand at the utmost.
Now here are two people strictly truthful, who tell things
so differently. In this war people see the same things so
oddly one does not know what to believe.

Brewster says when he was in Richmond Mr. Davis said
Johnston would have to be removed and Sherman blocked.
He could not make Hardee full general because, when he
had command of an army he was always importuning the
War Department for a general-in-chief to be sent there
over him. Polk would not do, brave soldier and patriot as
he was. He was a good soldier, and would do his best for
his country, and do his duty under whomever was put over
him by those in authority. Mr. Davis did not once intimate
to him who it was that he intended to promote to the head
of the Western Army.

Brewster said to-day that this "blow at Joe Johnston,
cutting off his head, ruins the schemes of the enemies of the
government. Wigfall asked me to go at once, and get Hood
to decline to take this command, for it will destroy him if
he accepts it. He will have to fight under Jeff Davis's orders;
no one can do that now and not lose caste in the Western
Army. Joe Johnston does not exactly say that Jeff
Davis betrays his plans to the enemy, but he says he dares
not let the President know his plans, as there is a spy in the
War Office who invariably warns the Yankees in time. Consulting
the government on military movements is played
out. That's Wigfall's way of talking. Now," added
Brewster, "I blame the President for keeping a man at
the head of his armies who treats the government with
open scorn and contumely, no matter how the people at
large rate this disrespectful general."

August 19th.—Began my regular attendance on the
Wayside Hospital. To-day we gave wounded men, as they
stopped for an hour at the station, their breakfast. Those
who are able to come to the table do so. The badly wounded
remain in wards prepared for them, where their wounds are
dressed by nurses and surgeons, and we take bread and butter,
beef, ham, and hot coffee to them.

One man had hair as long as a woman's, the result of a
vow, he said. He had pledged himself not to cut his hair
until peace was declared and our Southern country free.
Four made this vow together. All were dead but himself.
One was killed in Missouri, one in Virginia, and he left one
at Kennesaw Mountain. This poor creature had had one
arm taken off at the socket. When I remarked that he was
utterly disabled and ought not to remain in the army, he
answered quietly, "I am of the First Texas. If old Hood
can go with one foot, I can go with one arm, eh?"

How they quarreled and wrangled among themselves—
Alabama and Mississippi, all were loud for Joe Johnston,
save and except the long-haired, one-armed hero, who cried
at the top of his voice: "Oh! you all want to be kept in
trenches and to go on retreating, eh?" "Oh, if we had
had a leader, such as Stonewall, this war would have been
over long ago! What we want is a leader!" shouted a
cripple.

They were awfully smashed-up, objects of misery,
wounded, maimed, diseased. I was really upset, and came
home ill. This kind of thing unnerves me quite.

Letters from the army. Grant's dogged stay about
Richmond is very disgusting and depressing to the spirits.
Wade Hampton has been put in command of the Southern
cavalry.

A Wayside incident. A pine box, covered with flowers,
was carefully put upon the train by some gentlemen. Isabella
asked whose remains were in the box. Dr. Gibbes replied:
"In that box lies the body of a young man whose

family antedates the Bourbons of France. He was the last
Count de Choiseul, and he has died for the South." Let
his memory be held in perpetual remembrance by all who
love the South!

August 22d.—Hope I may never know a raid except
from hearsay. Mrs. Huger describes the one at Athens.
The proudest and most timid of women were running madly
in the streets, corsets in one hand, stockings in the other—
déshabillé as far as it will go. Mobile is half taken. The
railroad between us and Richmond has been tapped.

Notes from a letter written by a young lady who is riding
a high horse. Her fiancé, a maimed hero, has been
abused. "You say to me with a sneer, 'So you love that
man.' Yes, I do, and I thank God that I love better than all
the world the man who is to be my husband. 'Proud of
him, are you?' Yes, I am, in exact proportion to my love.
You say, 'I am selfish.' Yes, I am selfish. He is my second
self, so utterly absorbed am I in him. There is not a
moment, day or night, that I do not think of him. In point
of fact, I do not think of anything else." No reply was
deemed necessary by the astounded recipient of this outburst
of indignation, who showed me the letter and continued
to observe: "Did you ever? She seems so shy, so
timid, so cold."

Sunday Isabella took us to a chapel, Methodist, of
course; her father had a hand in building it. It was not
clean, but it was crowded, hot, and stuffy. An eloquent
man preached with a delightful voice and wonderful fluency;
nearly eloquent, and at times nearly ridiculous. He
described a scene during one of his sermons when "beautiful
young faces were turned up to me, radiant faces
though bathed in tears, moral rainbows of emotion playing
over them," etc.

He then described his own conversion, and stripped himself
naked morally. All that is very revolting to one's innate
sense of decency. He tackled the patriarchs. Adam,

Noah, and so on down to Joseph, who was "a man whose
modesty and purity were so transcendent they enabled him
to resist the greatest temptation to which fallen man is exposed."
"Fiddlesticks! that is played out!" my neighbor
whispered. "Everybody gives up now that old Mrs. Pharaoh
was forty." "Mrs. Potiphar, you goose, and she was
fifty!" "That solves the riddle." "Sh-sh!" from the
devout Isabella.

At home met General Preston on the piazza. He was
vastly entertaining. Gave us Darwin, Herodotus, and Livy.
We understood him and were delighted, but we did not know
enough to be sure when it was his own wisdom or when wise
saws and cheering words came from the authors of whom
he spoke.

August 23d.—All in a muddle, and yet the news, confused
as it is, seems good from all quarters. There is a row
in New Orleans. Memphis[6] has been retaken; 2,000 prisoners
have been captured at Petersburg, and a Yankee raid on
Macon has come to grief.

At Mrs. Izard's met a clever Mrs. Calhoun. Mrs. Calhoun
is a violent partizan of Dick Taylor; says Taylor
does the work and Kirby Smith gets the credit for it. Mrs.
Calhoun described the behavior of some acquaintance of
theirs at Shreveport, one of that kind whose faith removes
mountains. Her love for and confidence in the Confederate
army were supreme. Why not? She knew so many of the
men who composed that dauntless band. When her husband
told her New Orleans had surrendered to a foe whom
she despised, she did not believe a word of it. He told her
to "pack up his traps, as it was time for him to leave
Shreveport." She then determined to run down to the
levee and see for herself, only to find the Yankee gunboats
having it all their own way. She made a painful exhibition
of herself. First, she fell on her knees and prayed; then

she got up and danced with rage; then she raved and
dashed herself on the ground in a fit. There was patriotism
run mad for you! As I did not know the poor soul, Mrs.
Calhoun's fine acting was somewhat lost on me, but the
others enjoyed it.

Old Edward Johnston has been sent to Atlanta against
his will, and Archer has been made major-general and, contrary
to his earnest request, ordered not to his beloved
Texans but to the Army of the Potomac.

Mr. C. F. Hampton deplores the untimely end of McPherson.[7]
He was so kind to Mr. Hampton at Vicksburg
last winter, and drank General Hampton's health then and
there. Mr. Hampton has asked Brewster, if the report of his
death prove a mistake, and General McPherson is a prisoner,
that every kindness and attention be shown to him.
General McPherson said at his own table at Vicksburg that
General Hampton was the ablest general on our side.

Grant can hold his own as well as Sherman. Lee has a
heavy handful in the new Suwarrow. He has worse odds
than any one else, for when Grant has ten thousand slain,
he has only to order another ten thousand, and they are
there, ready to step out to the front. They are like the
leaves of Vallambrosa.

August 29th.—I take my hospital duty in the morning.
Most persons prefer afternoon, but I dislike to give up my
pleasant evenings. So I get up at five o'clock and go down
in my carriage all laden with provisions. Mrs. Fisher and
old Mr. Bryan generally go with me. Provisions are commonly
sent by people to Mrs. Fisher's. I am so glad to be a
hospital nurse once more. I had excuses enough, but at
heart I felt a coward and a skulker. I think I know how
men feel who hire a substitute and shirk the fight. There

must be no dodging of duty. It will not do now to send
provisions and pay for nurses. Something inside of me
kept calling out, "Go, you shabby creature; you can't bear
to see what those fine fellows have to bear."

Mrs. Izard was staying with me last night, and as I
slipped away I begged Molly to keep everything dead still
and not let Mrs. Izard be disturbed until I got home.
About ten I drove up and there was a row to wake the dead.
Molly's eldest daughter, who nurses her baby sister, let the
baby fall, and, regardless of Mrs. Izard, as I was away,
Molly was giving the nurse a switching in the yard, accompanied
by howls and yells worthy of a Comanche! The
small nurse welcomed my advent, no doubt, for in two seconds
peace was restored. Mrs. Izard said she sympathized
with the baby's mother; so I forgave the uproar.

I have excellent servants; no matter for their shortcomings
behind my back. They save me all thought as to
household matters, and they are so kind, attentive, and
quiet. They must know what is at hand if Sherman is not
hindered from coming here—"Freedom! my masters!"
But these sphinxes give no sign, unless it be increased diligence
and absolute silence, as certain in their action and as
noiseless as a law of nature, at any rate when we are in the
house.

That fearful hospital haunts me all day long, and is
worse at night. So much suffering, such loathsome wounds,
such distortion, with stumps of limbs not half cured, exhibited
to all. Then, when I was so tired yesterday, Molly
was looking more like an enraged lioness than anything else,
roaring that her baby's neck was broken, and howling cries
of vengeance. The poor little careless nurse's dark face
had an ashen tinge of gray terror. She was crouching near
the ground like an animal trying to hide, and her mother
striking at her as she rolled away. All this was my welcome
as I entered the gate. It takes these half-Africans but a
moment to go back to their naked savage animal nature.

Mrs. Izard is a charming person. She tried so to make me
forget it all and rest.

September 2d.—The battle has been raging at Atlanta,[8]
and our fate hanging in the balance. Atlanta, indeed, is
gone. Well, that agony is over. Like David, when the
child was dead, I will get up from my knees, will wash my
face and comb my hair. No hope; we will try to have no
fear.

At the Prestons' I found them drawn up in line of battle
every moment looking for the Doctor on his way to Richmond.
Now, to drown thought, for our day is done, read
Dumas's Maîtres d'Armes. Russia ought to sympathize
with us. We are not as barbarous as this, even if Mrs.
Stowe's word be taken. Brutal men with unlimited power
are the same all over the world. See Russell's India—Bull
Run Russell's. They say General Morgan has been killed.
We are hard as stones; we sit unmoved and hear any bad
news chance may bring. Are we stupefied?

September 19th.—My pink silk dress I have sold for
$600, to be paid for in instalments, two hundred a month
for three months. And I sell my eggs and butter from home
for two hundred dollars a month. Does it not sound well
—four hundred dollars a month regularly. But in what?
In Confederate money. Hélas!

September 21st.—Went with Mrs. Rhett to hear Dr.
Palmer. I did not know before how utterly hopeless was
our situation. This man is so eloquent, it was hard to listen
and not give way. Despair was his word, and martyrdom.
He offered us nothing more in this world than the martyr's
crown. He is not for slavery, he says; he is for freedom, and
the freedom to govern our own country as we see fit. He is
against foreign interference in our State matters. That is
what Mr. Palmer went to war for, it appears. Every day

shows that slavery is doomed the world over; for that he
thanked God. He spoke of our agony, and then came the
cry, "Help us, O God! Vain is the help of man." And
so we came away shaken to the depths.

The end has come. No doubt of the fact. Our army has
so moved as to uncover Macon and Augusta. We are going
to be wiped off the face of the earth. What is there to prevent
Sherman taking General Lee in the rear? We have
but two armies, and Sherman is between them now.[9]

September 24th.—These stories of our defeats in the valley
fall like blows upon a dead body. Since Atlanta fell I
have felt as if all were dead within me forever. Captain
Ogden, of General Chesnut's staff, dined here to-day. Had
ever brigadier, with little or no brigade, so magnificent a
staff? The reserves, as somebody said, have been secured
only by robbing the cradle and the grave—the men too old,
the boys too young. Isaac Hayne, Edward Barnwell,
Bacon, Ogden, Richardson, Miles are the picked men of
the agreeable world.

October 1st.—Mary Cantey Preston's wedding day has
come and gone and Mary is Mrs, John Darby now. Maggie
Howell dressed the bride's hair beautifully, they said, but it
was all covered by her veil, which was of blond-lace, and
the dress tulle and blond-lace, with diamonds and pearls.
The bride walked up the aisle on her father's arm, Mrs. Preston
on Dr. Darby's. I think it was the handsomest wedding
party I ever saw. John Darby[10] had brought his wedding

uniform home with him from England, and it did all honor
to his perfect figure. I forget the name of his London
tailor—the best, of course! "Well," said Isabella, "it
would be hard for any man to live up to those clothes."

And now, to the amazement of us all, Captain Chesnut
(Johnny) who knows everything, has rushed into a flirtation
with Buck such as never was. He drives her every day,
and those wild, runaway, sorrel colts terrify my soul as
they go tearing, pitching, and darting from side to side of
the street. And my lady enjoys it. When he leaves her, he
kisses her hand, bowing so low to do it unseen that we see
it all.

Saturday.—The President will be with us here in Columbia
next Tuesday, so Colonel McLean brings us word.
I have begun at once to prepare to receive him in my small
house. His apartments have been decorated as well as Confederate
stringency would permit. The possibilities were
not great, but I did what I could for our honored chief; besides
I like the man—he has been so kind to me, and his wife
is one of the few to whom I can never be grateful enough for
her generous appreciation and attention.

I went out to the gate to greet the President, who met
me most cordially; kissed me, in fact. Custis Lee and
Governor Lubbock were at his back.

Immediately after breakfast (the Presidential party
arrived a little before daylight) General Chesnut drove
off with the President's aides, and Mr. Davis sat out on
our piazza. There was nobody with him but myself. Some
little boys strolling by called out, "Come here and look;
there is a man on Mrs. Chesnut's porch who looks just like
Jeff Davis on postage-stamps." People began to gather at
once on the street. Mr. Davis then went in.

Mrs. McCord sent a magnificent bouquet—I thought, of

course, for the President; but she gave me such a scolding
afterward. She did not know he was there; I, in my mistake
about the bouquet, thought she knew, and so did not
send her word.

The President was watching me prepare a mint julep
for Custis Lee when Colonel McLean came to inform us that
a great crowd had gathered and that they were coming to
ask the President to speak to them at one o'clock. An immense
crowd it was—men, women, and children. The
crowd overflowed the house, the President's hand was nearly
shaken off. I went to the rear, my head intent on the dinner
to be prepared for him, with only a Confederate commissariat.
But the patriotic public had come to the rescue.
I had been gathering what I could of eatables for a month,
and now I found that nearly everybody in Columbia was
sending me whatever they had that they thought nice
enough for the President's dinner. We had the sixty-year-old
Madeira from Mulberry, and the beautiful old china,
etc. Mrs. Preston sent a boned turkey stuffed with truffles,
stuffed tomatoes, and stuffed peppers. Each made a dish
as pretty as it was appetizing.

A mob of small boys only came to pay their respects to
the President. He seemed to know how to meet that odd
delegation.

Then the President's party had to go, and we bade them
an affectionate farewell. Custis Lee and I had spent much
time gossiping on the back porch. While I was concocting
dainties for the dessert, he sat on the banister with a cigar
in his mouth. He spoke very candidly, telling me many a
hard truth for the Confederacy, and about the bad time
which was at hand.

October 18th.—Ten pleasant days I owe to my sister.
Kate has descended upon me unexpectedly from the mountains
of Flat Rock. We are true sisters; she understands
me without words, and she is the cleverest, sweetest woman
I know, so graceful and gracious in manner, so good and unselfish

in character, but, best of all, she is so agreeable. Any
time or place would be charming: with Kate for a companion.
General Chesnut was in Camden; but I could not
wait. I gave the beautiful bride, Mrs. Darby, a dinner,
which was simply perfection. I was satisfied for once in
my life with my own table, and I know pleasanter guests
were never seated around any table whatsoever.

My house is always crowded. After all, what a number
of pleasant people we have been thrown in with by war's
catastrophes. I call such society glorious. It is the windup,
but the old life as it begins to die will die royally. General
Chesnut came back disheartened. He complains that
such a life as I lead gives him no time to think.

October 28th.—Burton Harrison writes to General Preston
that supreme anxiety reigns in Richmond.

Oh, for one single port! If the Alabama had had in the
whole wide world a port to take her prizes to and where
she could be refitted, I believe she would have borne us
through. Oh, for one single port by which we could get at
the outside world and refit our whole Confederacy! If we
could have hired regiments from Europe, or even have imported
ammunition and food for our soldiers!

"Some days must be dark and dreary." At the mantua-maker's,
however, I saw an instance of faith in our future;
a bride's paraphernalia, and the radiant bride herself, the
bridegroom expectant and elect now within twenty miles of
Chattanooga and outward bound to face the foe.

Saw at the Laurens's not only Lizzie Hamilton, a perfect
little beauty, but the very table the first Declaration of
Independence was written upon. These Laurenses are
grandchildren of Henry Laurens, of the first Revolution.
Alas! we have yet to make good our second declaration of
independence—Southern independence—from Yankee meddling
and Yankee rule. Hood has written to ask them to
send General Chesnut out to command one of his brigades.
In whose place?

If Albert Sidney Johnston had lived! Poor old General
Lee has no backing. Stonewall would have saved us from
Antietam. Sherman will now catch General Lee by the rear,
while Grant holds him by the head, and while Hood and
Thomas are performing an Indian war-dance on the frontier.
Hood means to cut his way to Lee; see if he doesn't.
The "Yanks" have had a struggle for it. More than once
we seemed to have been too much for them. We have been
so near to success it aches one to think of it. So runs the
table-talk.

Next to our house, which Isabella calls "Tillytudlem,"
since Mr. Davis's visit, is a common of green grass and very
level, beyond which comes a belt of pine-trees. On this open
space, within forty paces of us, a regiment of foreign deserters
has camped. They have taken the oath of allegiance
to our government, and are now being drilled and disciplined
into form before being sent to our army. They are
mostly Germans, with some Irish, however. Their close
proximity keeps me miserable. Traitors once, traitors forever.

Jordan has always been held responsible for all the foolish
proclamations, and, indeed, for whatever Beauregard
reported or proclaimed. Now he has left that mighty chief,
and lo, here comes from Beauregard the silliest and most
boastful of his military bulletins. He brags of Shiloh; that
was not the way the story was told to us.

A letter from Mrs. Davis, who says: "Thank you, a
thousand times, my dear friend, for your more than maternal
kindness to my dear child." That is what she calls her
sister Maggie Howell. "As to Mr. Davis, he thinks the best
ham, the best Madeira, the best coffee, the best hostess in
the world, rendered Columbia delightful to him when he
passed through. We are in a sad and anxious state here
just now. The dead come in; but the living do not go out
so fast. However, we hope all things and trust in God as
the only one able to resolve the opposite state of feeling into

a triumphant, happy whole. I had a surprise of an unusually
gratifying nature a few days since. I found I could
not keep my horses, so I sold them. The next day they were
returned to me with a handsome anonymous note to the
effect that they had been bought by a few friends for me.
But I fear I can not feed them. Strictly between us, things
look very anxious here."

November 6th.—Sally Hampton went to Richmond with
the Rev. Mr. Martin. She arrived there on Wednesday. On
Thursday her father, Wade Hampton, fought a great battle,
but just did not win it—a victory narrowly missed.
Darkness supervened and impenetrable woods prevented
that longed-for consummation. Preston Hampton rode
recklessly into the hottest fire. His father sent his brother,
Wade, to bring him back. Wade saw him reel in the saddle
and galloped up to him, General Hampton following. As
young Wade reached him, Preston fell from his horse, and
the one brother, stooping to raise the other, was himself shot
down. Preston recognized his father, but died without
speaking a word. Young Wade, though wounded, held his
brother's head up. Tom Taylor and others hurried up. The
General took his dead son in his arms, kissed him, and handed
his body to Tom Taylor and his friends, bade them take
care of Wade, and then rode back to his post. At the head of
his troops in the thickest of the fray he directed the fight for
the rest of the day. Until night he did not know young
Wade's fate; that boy might be dead, too! Now, he says,
no son of his must be in his command. When Wade recovers,
he must join some other division. The agony of such a
day, and the anxiety and the duties of the battle-field—it is
all more than a mere man can bear.

Another letter from Mrs. Davis. She says: "I was
dreadfully shocked at Preston Hampton's fate—his untimely
fate. I know nothing more touching in history than
General Hampton's situation at the supremest moment of
his misery, when he sent one son to save the other and saw

both fall; and could not know for some moments whether
both were not killed."

A thousand dollars have slipped through my fingers already
this week. At the Commissary's I spent five hundred
to-day for candles, sugar, and a lamp, etc. Tallow candles
are bad enough, but of them there seems to be an end,
too. Now we are restricted to smoky, terrabine lamps—
terrabine is a preparation of turpentine. When the chimney
of the lamp cracks, as crack it will, we plaster up the
place with paper, thick old letter-paper, preferring the
highly glazed kind. In the hunt for paper queer old letters
come to light.

Sherman, in Atlanta, has left Thomas to take care of
Hood. Hood has thirty thousand men, Thomas forty thousand,
and as many more to be had as he wants; he has only
to ring the bell and call for them. Grant can get all that
he wants, both for himself and for Thomas. All the world
is open to them, while we are shut up in a bastile. We
are at sea, and our boat has sprung a leak.

November 17th.—Although Sherman[11] took Atlanta, he
does not mean to stay there, be it heaven or hell. Fire and
the sword are for us here; that is the word. And now I
must begin my Columbia life anew and alone. It will be a
short shrift.

Captain Ogden came to dinner on Sunday and in the
afternoon asked me to go with him to the Presbyterian
Church and hear Mr. Palmer. We went, and I felt very

youthful, as the country people say; like a girl and her
beau. Ogden took me into a pew and my husband sat afar
off. What a sermon! The preacher stirred my blood. My
very flesh crept and tingled. A red-hot glow of patriotism
passed through me. Such a sermon must strengthen the
hearts and the hands of many people. There was more exhortation
to fight and die, à la Joshua, than meek Christianity.

November 25th.—Sherman is thundering at Augusta's
very doors. My General was on the wing, somber, and full
of care. The girls are merry enough; the staff, who fairly
live here, no better. Cassandra, with a black shawl over her
head, is, chased by the gay crew from sofa to sofa, for she
avoids them, being full of miserable anxiety. There is
nothing but distraction and confusion. All things tend to
the preparation for the departure of the troops. It rains all
the time, such rains as I never saw before; incessant torrents.
These men come in and out in the red mud and
slush of Columbia streets. Things seem dismal and
wretched to me to the last degree, but the staff, the girls,
and the youngsters do not see it.

Mrs. S. (born in Connecticut) came, and she was radiant.
She did not come to see me, but my nieces. She
says exultingly that " Sherman will open a way out at last,
and I will go at once to Europe or go North to my relatives
there." How she derided our misery and "mocked when
our fear cometh." I dare say she takes me for a fool. I sat
there dumb, although she was in my own house. I have
heard of a woman so enraged that she struck some one over
the head with a shovel. To-day, for the first time in my
life, I know how that mad woman felt. I could have given
Mrs. S. the benefit of shovel and tongs both.

That splendid fellow, Preston Hampton; "home they
brought their warrior, dead," and wrapped in that very
Legion flag he had borne so often in battle with his own
hands.

A letter from Mrs. Davis to-day, under date of Richmond,
Va., November 20, 1864. She says: "Affairs West
are looking so critical now that, before you receive this, you
and I will be in the depths or else triumphant. I confess I
do not sniff success in every passing breeze, but I am so
tired, hoping, fearing, and being disappointed, that I have
made up my mind not to be disconsolate, even though
thieves break through and steal. Some people expect another
attack upon Richmond shortly, but I think the avalanche
will not slide until the spring breaks up its winter
quarters. I have a blind kind of prognostics of victory for
us, but somehow I am not cheered. The temper of Congress
is less vicious, but more concerted in its hostile action."
Mrs. Davis is a woman that my heart aches for in the
troubles ahead.

My journal, a quire of Confederate paper, lies wide
open on my desk in the corner of my drawing-room. Everybody
reads it who chooses. Buck comes regularly to see
what I have written last, and makes faces when it does not
suit her. Isabella still calls me Cassandra, and puts her
hands to her ears when I begin to wail. Well, Cassandra
only records what she hears; she does not vouch for it. For
really, one nowadays never feels certain of anything.

November 28th.—We dined at Mrs. McCord's. She is
as strong a cordial for broken spirits and failing heart as
one could wish. How her strength contrasts with our weakness.
Like Doctor Palmer, she strings one up to bear
bravely the worst. She has the intellect of a man and the
perseverance and endurance of a woman.

We have lost nearly all of our men, and we have no
money, and it looks as if we had taught the Yankees how to
fight since Manassas. Our best and bravest are under the
sod; we shall have to wait till another generation grows up.
Here we stand, despair in our hearts ("Oh, Cassandra,
don't!" shouts Isabella), with our houses burning or about
to be, over our heads.

The North have just got things ship-shape; a splendid
army, perfectly disciplined, with new levies coming in day
and night. Their gentry do not go into the ranks. They
hardly know there is a war up there.

December 1st.—At Coosawhatchie Yankees are landing
in great force. Our troops down there are raw militia, old
men and boys never under fire before; some college cadets,
in all a mere handful. The cradle and the grave have been
robbed by us, they say. Sherman goes to Savannah and not
to Augusta.

December 2d.—Isabella and I put on bonnets and
shawls and went deliberately out for news. We determined
to seek until we found. Met a man who was so ugly, I could
not forget him or his sobriquet; he was awfully in love with
me once. He did not know me, but blushed hotly when Isabella
told him who I was. He had forgotten me, I hope, or
else I am changed by age and care past all recognition. He
gave us the encouraging information that Grahamville had
been burned to the ground.

When the call for horses was made, Mrs. McCord sent
in her fine bays. She comes now with a pair of mules, and
looks too long and significantly at my ponies. If I were not
so much afraid of her, I would hint that those mules would
be of far more use in camp than my ponies. But they will
seize the ponies, no doubt.

In all my life before, the stables were far off from the
house and I had nothing to do with them. Now my ponies
are kept under an open shed next to the back piazza. Here
I sit with my work, or my desk, or my book, basking in our
Southern sun, and I watch Nat feed, curry, and rub down
the horses, and then he cleans their stables as thoroughly as
Smith does my drawing-room. I see their beds of straw comfortably
laid. Nat says, "Ow, Missis, ain't lady's business
to look so much in de stables." I care nothing for his
grumbling, and I have never had horses in better condition.
Poor ponies, you deserve every attention, and enough to

eat. Grass does not grow under your feet. By night and
day you are on the trot.

To-day General Chesnut was in Charleston on his way
from Augusta to Savannah by rail. The telegraph is still
working between Charleston and Savannah. Grahamville
certainly is burned. There was fighting down there to-day.
I came home with enough to think about, Heaven knows!
And then all day long we compounded a pound cake in
honor of Mrs. Cuthbert, who has things so nice at home.
The cake was a success, but was it worth all that trouble?

As my party were driving off to the concert, an omnibus
rattled up. Enter Captain Leland, of General Chesnut's
staff, of as imposing a presence as a field-marshal, handsome
and gray-haired. He was here on some military errand and
brought me a letter. He said the Yankees had been repulsed,
and that down in those swamps we could give a
good account of ourselves if our government would send
men enough. With a sufficient army to meet them down
there, they could be annihilated. "Where are the men to
come from?" asked Mamie, wildly. "General Hood has
gone off to Tennessee. Even if he does defeat Thomas
there, what difference would that make here?"

December 3d.—We drank tea at Mrs. McCord's; she
had her troubles, too. The night before a country cousin
claimed her hospitality, one who fain would take the train
at five this morning. A little after midnight Mrs. McCord
was startled out of her first sleep by loud ringing of bells;
an alarm at night may mean so much just now. In an instant
she was on her feet. She found her guest, who
thought it was daylight, and wanted to go. Mrs. McCord
forcibly demonstrated how foolish it was to get up five
hours too soon. Mrs. McCord, once more in her own warm
bed, had fallen happily to sleep. Sho was waked by feeling
two ice-cold hands pass cautiously over her face and person.
It was pitch dark. Even Mrs. McCord gave a scream in her
fright. She found it was only the irrepressible guest up

and at her again. So, though it was only three o'clock, in
order to quiet this perturbed spirit she rose and at five
drove her to the station, where she had to wait some hours.
But Mrs. McCord said, "anything for peace at home."
The restless people who will not let others rest!

December 5th.—Miss Olivia Middleton and Mr. Frederick
Blake are to be married. We Confederates have invented
the sit-up-all-night for the wedding night; Isabella
calls it the wake, not the wedding, of the parties married.
The ceremony will be performed early in the evening; the
whole company will then sit up until five o'clock, at which
hour the bridal couple take the train for Combahee. Hope
Sherman will not be so inconsiderate as to cut short the
honeymoon.

In tripped Brewster, with his hat on his head, both
hands extended, and his greeting, "Well, here we are!"
He was travel-stained, disheveled, grimy with dirt. The
prophet would have to send him many times to bathe in
Jordan before he could be pronounced clean.

Hood will not turn and pursue Sherman. Thomas is at
his heels with forty thousand men, and can have as many
more as he wants for the asking. Between Thomas and
Sherman Hood would be crushed. So he was pushing—I
do not remember where or what. I know there was no comfort
in anything he said.

Serena's account of money spent: Paper and envelopes,
$12.00; tickets to concert, $10.00; tooth-brush, $10.00; total,
$32.00.

December 14th.—And now the young ones are in bed
and I am wide awake. It is an odd thing; in all my life
how many persons have I seen in love? Not a half-dozen.
And I am a tolerably close observer, a faithful watcher
have I been from my youth upward of men and manners.
Society has been for me only an enlarged field for character
study.

Flirtation is the business of society; that is, playing at

love-making. It begins in vanity, it ends in vanity. It is
spurred on by idleness and a want of any other excitement.
Flattery, battledore and shuttlecock, how in this game flattery
is dashed backward and forward. It is so soothing to
self-conceit. If it begins and ends in vanity, vexation of
spirit supervenes sometimes. They do occasionally burn
their fingers awfully, playing with fire, but there are no
hearts broken. Each party in a flirtation has secured a
sympathetic listener, to whom he or she can talk of himself
or herself—somebody who, for the time, admires one exclusively,
and, as the French say, excessivement. It is a
pleasant, but very foolish game, and so to bed.

Hood and Thomas have had a fearful fight, with carnage
and loss of generals excessive in proportion to numbers.
That means they were leading and urging their men
up to the enemy. I know how Bartow and Barnard Bee
were killed bringing up their men. One of Mr. Chesnut's
sins thrown in his teeth by the Legislature of South Carolina
was that he procured the promotion of Gist, "State
Rights" Gist, by his influence in Richmond. What have
these comfortable, stay-at-home patriots to say of General
Gist now? "And how could man die better than facing
fearful odds," etc.

So Fort McAlister has fallen! Good-by, Savannah!
Our Governor announces himself a follower of Joe Brown,
of Georgia. Another famous Joe.

December 19th.—The deep waters are closing over us
and we are in this house, like the outsiders at the time of the
flood. We care for none of these things. We eat, drink,
laugh, dance, in lightness of heart.

Doctor Trezevant came to tell me the dismal news. How
he piled on the agony! Desolation, mismanagement, despair.
General Young, with the flower of Hampton's cavalry,
is in Columbia. Horses can not be found to mount
them. Neither the Governor of Georgia nor the Governor
of South Carolina is moving hand or foot. They have given

up. The Yankees claim another victory for Thomas.[12] Hope
it may prove like most of their victories, brag and bluster.
Can't say why, maybe I am benumbed, but I do not feel
so intensely miserable.

December 27th.—Oh, why did we go to Camden? The
very dismalest Christmas overtook us there. Miss Rhett
went with us—a brilliant woman and very agreeable. "The
world, you know, is composed," said she, "of men, women,
and Rhetts" (see Lady Montagu). Now, we feel that if
we are to lose our negroes, we would as soon see Sherman
free them as the Confederate Government; freeing negroes
is the last Confederate Government craze. We are a little
too slow about it; that is all.

Sold fifteen bales of cotton and took a sad farewell look
at Mulberry. It is a magnificent old country-seat, with old
oaks, green lawns and all. So I took that last farewell of
Mulberry, once so hated, now so beloved.

January 7th.—Sherman is at Hardieville and Hood in
Tennessee, the last of his men not gone, as Louis Wigfall
so cheerfully prophesied.

Serena went for a half-hour to-day to the dentist. Her
teeth are of the whitest and most regular, simply perfection.
She fancied it was better to have a dentist look in her mouth
before returning to the mountains. For that look she paid
three hundred and fifty dollars in Confederate money.
"Why, has this money any value at all?" she asked. Little
enough in all truth, sad to say.

Brewster was here and stayed till midnight. Said he
must see General Chesnut. He had business with him.
His "me and General Hood" is no longer comic. He
described Sherman's march of destruction and desolation.
"Sherman leaves a track fifty miles wide, upon which there

is no living thing to be seen," said Brewster before he departed.

January 10th.—You do the Anabasis business when you
want to get out of the enemy's country, and the Thermopylæ
business when they want to get into your country. But
we retreated in our own country and we gave up our mountain
passes without a blow. But never mind the Greeks; if
we had only our own Game Cock, Sumter, our own Swamp
Fox, Marion. Marion's men or Sumter's, or the equivalent
of them, now lie under the sod, in Virginia or Tennessee.

January 14th.—Yesterday I broke down—gave way to
abject terror under the news of Sherman's advance with no
news of my husband. To-day, while wrapped up on the
sofa, too dismal even for moaning, there was a loud knock.
Shawls on and all, just as I was, I rushed to the door to find
a telegram from my husband: "All well; be at home Tuesday."
It was dated from Adam's Run. I felt as lighthearted
as if the war were over. Then I looked at the date
and the place—Adam's Run. It ends as it began—in a run
—Bull's Run, from which their first sprightly running astounded
the world, and now Adam's Run. But if we must
run, who are left to run? From Bull Run they ran full-handed.
But we have fought until maimed soldiers, women,
and children are all that remain to run.

To-day Kershaw's brigade, or what is left of it, passed
through. What shouts greeted it and what bold shouts of
thanks it returned! It was all a very encouraging noise, absolutely
comforting. Some true men are left, after all.

January 16th.—My husband is at home once more—for
how long, I do not know. His aides fill the house, and a
group of hopelessly wounded haunt the place. The drilling
and the marching go on outside. It rains a flood, with
freshet after freshet. The forces of nature are befriending
us, for our enemies have to make their way through swamps.

A month ago my husband wrote me a letter which I
promptly suppressed after showing it to Mrs. McCord. He

warned us to make ready, for the end had come. Our resources
were exhausted, and the means of resistance could
not be found. We could not bring ourselves to believe it,
and now, he thinks, with the railroad all blown up, the
swamps made impassable by the freshets, which have no time
to subside, so constant is the rain, and the negroes utterly
apathetic (would they be so if they saw us triumphant?), if
we had but an army to seize the opportunity we might do
something; but there are no troops; that is the real trouble.

To-day Mrs. McCord exchanged $16,000 in Confederate
bills for $300 in gold—sixteen thousand for three hundred.

January 17th.—The Bazaar for the benefit of the hospitals
opens now. Sherman marches constantly. All the
railroads are smashed, and if I laugh at any mortal thing it
is that I may not weep. Generals are as plenty as blackberries,
but none are in command.

The Peace Commissioner, Blair, came. They say he
gave Mr. Davis the kiss of peace. And we send Stephens,
Campbell, all who have believed in this thing, to negotiate
for peace. No hope, no good. Who dares hope?

Repressed excitement in church. A great railroad
character was called out. He soon returned and whispered
something to Joe Johnston and they went out
together. Somehow the whisper moved around to us
that Sherman was at Branchville. "Grant us patience,
good Lord," was prayed aloud. "Not Ulysses Grant, good
Lord," murmured Teddy, profanely. Hood came yesterday.
He is staying at the Prestons' with Jack. They sent
for us. What a heartfelt greeting he gave us. He can
stand well enough without his crutch, but he does very slow
walking. How plainly he spoke out dreadful words about
"my defeat and discomfiture; my army destroyed, my
losses," etc., etc. He said he had nobody to blame but himself.
A telegram from Beauregard to-day to my husband.
He does not know whether Sherman intends to advance on
Branchville, Charleston, or Columbia

Isabella said: "Maybe you attempted the impossible,"
and began one of her merriest stories. Jack Preston touched
me on the arm and we slipped out. "He did not hear a
word she was saying. He has forgotten us all. Did you notice
how he stared in the fire? And the lurid spots which
came out in his face and the drops of perspiration that
stood on his forehead?" "Yes. He is going over some
bitter scene; he sees Willie Preston with his heart shot away.
He sees the panic at Nashville and the dead on the battlefield
at Franklin." "That agony on his face comes again
and again," said tender-hearted Jack. "I can't keep him
out of those absent fits."

Governor McGrath and General Winder talk of preparations
for a defense of Columbia. If Beauregard can't
stop Sherman down there, what have we got here to do it
with? Can we check or impede his march? Can any one?

Last night General Hampton came in. I am sure he
would do something to save us if he were put in supreme
command here. Hampton says Joe Johnston is equal, if
not superior, to Lee as a commanding officer.

My silver is in a box and has been delivered for safe
keeping to Isaac McLaughlin, who is really my beau-ideal
of a grateful negro. I mean to trust him. My husband
cares for none of these things now, and lets me do as I
please.

Tom Archer died almost as soon as he got to Richmond.
Prison takes the life out of men. He was only half-alive
when here. He had a strange, pallid look and such a vacant
stare until you roused him. Poor pretty Sally Archer
that is the end of you.[13]