By the time they reached Richmond the man beside him had stopped breathing.
7.
April 26, 1862. Baton Rouge
IN THE AFTERNOON the wagons and drays started arriving. Everyone heard the heavy grinding of wheels, the steady clopping of hooves. The wagons were stacked high with cotton bales that swayed with the motion, or packed with oak barrels, shoulder to shoulder. The horses had patches of dark sweat on their shoulders and haunches. They moved slowly, all heading for the river. As the wagons converged, the drivers nodded soberly. They were from plantations, up and down the river, out in the countryside. They knew each other, but they didn’t speak.
At the water’s edge, the wagons drew up along the levee. Get on, the drivers called, urging their teams closer. The mules flattened their ears, ready to kick. The horses stretched their necks and nosed forward.
The levee was lined with wagons, all piled high with the cotton crop: every barn and shed and warehouse had been emptied. The oak barrels held whisky, rum, molasses. The drivers began heaving the bales onto the ground, rolling the barrels to the water’s edge. They grunted at the weight.
When the bales were piled next to the edge the men picked up axes, swinging them high overhead and bringing them down on the bales. The big swings, and the satisfying plunge of the axe into the bale, started them calling. Chop that cotton! Chop it, now! The cotton spilled out like dirty stuffing. The barrels stood behind the bales, and men walked along the line of them, raising their axes, smashing open the tops. Each stroke made a thundering crunch, splinters flew into the air. Horses threw up their heads, alarmed; mules kicked restively and a dog began to bark. As each barrel was stoven in, it was hoisted and tilted over the chopped-open bales, drenching the cotton with liquor or sugar. The planters walked behind the wagons, calling out, gleeful and angry. The mood was turning darkly festive. A federal order had been issued, promising to hang anyone who burned a single bale of cotton. All of Baton Rouge was complicit.
A planter in a wide-brimmed hat held up a burning torch; someone cheered. He dipped the flame into an opened bale, pressing against the whisky-drenched cotton until it caught. A Negro walked behind him and, as each bale flared up, he swung it, off the dock, into the water. The flaming bales began drifting out into the current, a regatta of floating pyres.
“There it goes!” someone shouted. “They want our cotton, they got it!”
“Let them pick it out of the river!”
“All that good whisky. Hope they choke!”
“Have at it, Yankees!”
Sarah and Lilly watched from the street overlooking the water. Charlie Lanoue was in charge of the burning. He stood beside a flatboat moored against the levee. Whisky-soaked bales of cotton were carried onto the flatboat, until the deck was covered. Charlie and two other planters boarded, carrying torches. The flatboat was tied to a steam launch which, when the men were aboard, towed it out into the river. There the launch stopped, the engine holding it steady. The flatboat swung with the current until it hung motionless below the launch, the towline taut. Tied to it was a skiff.
The sun was lowering over the far banks, and shafts of light slanted against the dark surface of the river. Charlie and the others began to move across the deck, pressing their torches against the rum-soaked bales until the flames rose, flickering and growing. Black smoke roiled upward, muscular, thrusting. The deck became a glowing yellow grid, and the flames leaped together. The fire became a mountain, red and roaring: the men ran for the skiff and climbed in. Charlie stumbled as he climbed into it, but righted himself and sat down. They began to pull for shore. When they were clear, the launch let go the towline.
Freed, the burning boat slowly swiveled into the center of the current and began to slide downstream. As it gathered speed, its own wind fanned the flames, and it became a bright floating inferno, crackling and roaring. The heat rolled outward, scorching the faces of the watchers.
Along the shore, people cheered. The drivers hooted and whistled and beat sticks against the wagon sides. All over town dogs began to bark. The flaming boat moved with the dark water, down the river, around the bend. The first headland was low, and after the boat rounded it, for a while the flames were visible on the far side, while the boat was hidden, as though a wildfire were moving across the land without consuming it.
Sarah and Lilly stood watching.
“Aren’t you proud, Lilly?” Sarah asked.
“I don’t want my husband shot,” Lilly said.
“We’re all in this,” Sarah said. “They’d have to shoot every one of us.”
“I don’t want them to start with Charlie.” Lilly held her hand up to shade her eyes against the sunset.
“They can start with me,” said Sarah. “I’ll shoot back.”
“You have a gun?” Lilly turned to look at her.
“A little revolver,” Sarah said. “George got it for me. I carry it in my little bag under my skirt.”
“When will you use it?”
“I don’t know. Emergencies. If a Yankee insults me I’m ready.”
In New Orleans, when the Union soldiers took over the city, women drew their skirts back and wrinkled their noses when a Yankee passed them on the sidewalk. General Butler, whom everyone hated, announced that if the New Orleans ladies refused to act like ladies and insulted his soldiers he would allow his soldiers to insult them back. Everyone knew he meant assault. They called him Beast Butler.
“Would you really shoot one?” Lilly asked.
“I don’t want them here. They say we can’t fly the Bonnie Blue flag, but I’ve made one out of silk and I’m going to pin it to my dress and wear it in the street.” All the seceding states were flying the Bonnie Blue, one brave star on a blue field.
“What if they take you to jail? What will happen to Mother?”
“She’ll have Miriam.”
“What if they shoot you as a traitor?”
“I’ll have died for my country, and I’ll be proud.”
“You’ll be an idiot,” said Lilly.
Men were loading the empty barrels onto the wagons. Drivers were pulling on the reins and calling out. The horses tossed their heads, they didn’t like backing up.
* * *
DURING THE WEEK of the anniversary of Hal’s death she thought of him, remembering those awful days.
That Friday the men had all gone to a meeting about conscription, and afterward they’d gone to a friend’s house and sat on the galerie. Hal asked someone to sing a song. The song was slightly off-color, “Annie Laurie.” At the end old Mr. Sparks said he was going home, and Hal asked if they’d offended him. No, he said, I’m only tired. But after he left young Sparks accused Hal of offending his father. Hal denied it, and then Sparks called him a liar.
That was the word, Sarah wrote in her diary, that no honorable man could endure. No Morgan, certainly.
Hal jumped to his feet, denying the charge. Sparks stood up, too. Hal took his walking stick (his father’s) and brought it down on Sparks’s shoulder. But the cane was a sword stick, and at the impact, the sheath came loose, clattering onto the floor. Sparks shouted foul play, calling Hal a coward for attacking an unarmed man.
Hal threw the sword down on the floor and held out his empty hands, to show he had no weapon. Sparks pulled a knife from his belt and started toward Hal. Two friends jumped at him and held his arms.
After that, there was nothing for it but a duel.
8.
1862. Baton Rouge
SARAH MORGAN’S DIARY
May 9, 1862
This is a dreadful war to make even the hearts of women so bitter! I hardly know myself these last few weeks. I, who have such a horror of bloodshed, consider even killing in self defense murder, who cannot wish them the slightest evil, whose only prayer is to have them sent back in peace to their own country, I talk of killing them! for what else do I wear a pistol and carving knife? I am afraid I will try them on the first one who says an insolent word to me. Yes, an
d repent for ever after in sack cloth and ashes! O if I was only a man! Then I could don the breeches, and slay them with a will! If some few Southern women were in the ranks, they could set the men an example they would not blush to follow. Pshaw! there are no women here! We are all men!
May 30, 1862
Wednesday … we rose very early, and had breakfast sooner than usual, it would seem for the express design of becoming famished before dinner. I picked up some of my letters and papers, and set them where I could find them whenever we were ready to go to [summer cabin at] Greenwell … I was packing up my traveling desk with all Harry’s little articles that were left me, and other things, and saying (to myself) that my affairs were in such confusion, that if obliged to run unexpectedly I would not know what to save, when I heard Lilly’s voice down stairs crying as she ran in—she had been out shopping—“Mr Castle has killed a Federal officer on a ship, and they are going to shell—” Bang! went a cannon at the word, and that was all our warning.
Mother had just come in, and was lying down, but sprang to her feet and added her screams to the general confusion. Miriam … ran up to quiet her, Lilly gathered her children crying hysterically all the time, and ran to the front door with them as they were; Lucy [a servant] saved the baby, naked as she took her from her bath, only throwing a quilt over her. I bethought me of my “running” bag which I had used on a former case, and in a moment my few precious articles were secured under my hoops, and with a sunbonnet on, stood ready for any thing.
The firing still continued; they must have fired half a dozen times before we could coax mother off. What awful screams! I had hoped never to hear them again, after Harry died. Charlie had gone to Greenwell before daybreak, to prepare the house, so we four women, with all these children and servants, were left to save ourselves. I did not forget my poor little [canary] Jimmy … I caught up his cage, and ran down, just at this moment mother recovered enough to insist on saving father’s papers—which was impossible, as she had not an idea of where the important ones were—I heard Miriam plead, argue, insist, command her to run, Lilly shriek … the children screaming within, women running by without, crying and moaning, but I could not join in. I was going I knew not where; it was impossible to take my bird, for even if I could carry him, he would starve. So I took him out of his cage, kissed his little yellow head, and tossed him up. He gave one feeble little chirp as if uncertain where to go, and then for the first and last time I cried … O how it hurt me to lose my little bird, one Jimmy had given me, too!
But the next minute we were all off, in safety. A square from home, I discovered that boy shoes [described elsewhere in the diary as “my new boots, too large, and made of alligator-skin”] were not the most comfortable things to run in, so ran back, in spite of cannonading, entreaties, etc, to get another pair. I got home, found an old pair … by no means respectable which I seized … and … thought it would be so nice to save at least Miriam’s, and my toothbrushes, so slipped them in my corsets. These in, of course we must have a comb—that was added—then how could we stand the sun without starch to cool our faces? This included the powder bag, then I must save that beautiful lace collar, and my hair was tumbling down, so in went the tucking comb and hair pins with the rest, until, if there had been any one to speculate, they would have wondered a long while at the singular appearance of a girl who is considered as very slight, usually. By this time, Miriam, alarmed for me, returned to find me … and we started off together. We had hardly gone a square, when we decided to return a second time, and get at least a few articles for the children and ourselves, who had nothing except what we happened to have on when the shelling commenced. She picked up any little thing and threw them to me, while I filled a pillow-case jerked from the bed, and placed my powder and brushes in it … Before we could leave, mother, alarmed for both, came to find us, with Tiche. All this time they had been shelling, but there was quite a lull when she got there, and she commenced picking up father’s papers, vowing all the time she would not leave.
Every argument we could use, was of no avail, and we were desperate as to what course to pursue, when the shelling recommenced in a few minutes. Then mother recommenced her screams and was ready to fly any where, and holding her box of papers, with a faint idea of saving something, she picked up two dirty underskirts and an old cloak, and by dint of Miriam’s vehement appeals, aided by a great deal of pulling, we got her down to the back door …
As we stood in the door, four or five shells sailed over our heads at the same time, seeming to make a perfect corkscrew of the air—for it sounded as though it went in circles. Miriam cried never mind the door! Mother screamed anew, and I staid behind to lock the door, with this new music in my ears. We reached the back gate … when another shell passed us, and Miriam jumped behind the fence for protection. We had only gone half a square when Dr Castleton [appeared and?] begged of us to take another street, as they were firing up that one. We took his advice, but found our new street worse than the old, for the shells seemed to whistle their strange songs with redoubled vigor. The height of my ambition was now attained. I had heard Jimmy laugh about the singular sensation produced by the rifled balls spinning around one’s head, and hear [sic] I heard the same peculiar sound, ran the same risk, and was equal to the rest of the boys, for was I not in the midst of flying shells, in the middle of a bombardment? I think I was rather proud of it.
We were alone on the road; all had run away before … When mother was perfectly exhausted … and unable to proceed … we met a gentleman in a buggy who kindly took charge of her … As soon as she was safe we felt as though a load had been removed from our shoulders; and after exhorting her not to be uneasy … and reminding her we had a pistol and dagger—I had secured a “for true” one the day before, fortunately—she drove off, and we trudged on alone, the only people in sight, on foot …
We were two miles away when we sat down … to rest, and have a laugh. Here were two women married, and able to take care of themselves, flying for their lives and leaving two lorn girls alone on the road, to protect each other!… While we were yet resting, we saw a cart coming, and giving up all idea of our walking to Greenwell, called the people to stop. To our great delight, it proved to be a cart loaded with Mrs Brunots affairs, driven by two of her negroes, who kindly took us up with them, on the top of their baggage, and we drove off … Miriam was in a hollow between a flour barrel and a mattress, and I at the end, astride, I am afraid, of a tremendous bundle … These servants were good enough to lend us their umbrella, with out which I am afraid we would have suffered severely, for the day was intensely warm.
Three miles from town we began to overtake the fugitives. Hundreds of women and children were walking along, some bare headed, and in all costumes. Little girls of twelve and fourteen were wandering on alone. I called to one I knew, and asked where her mother was; she didn’t know; she would walk on until she found out. It seems her mother lost a nursing baby too, which was not found until ten that night. White and black were all mixed together, and were as confidential as though related. All called to us and asked where we were going, and many we knew, laughed at us for riding on a cart; but as they had walked only five miles, I imagined they would like even these poor accommodations, if they were in their reach.
The negroes deserve the greatest praise for their conduct. Hundreds were walking with babies, or bundles; ask them what they had saved, it was invariably “My mistress’s clothes, or silver, or baby.” Ask what they had for themselves, it was “Bless your heart honey, I was glad to get away with mistress things; I didn’t think ’bout mine.”
It was a heartrending scene. Women searching for their babies along the road … others sitting in the dust crying and wringing their hands, for by this time, we had not an idea but what Baton Rouge was either in ashes, or being plundered, and we had saved nothing. I had one dress, Miriam two, but Tiche had them, and we had lost her, before we left home.
Presently we came on a Guerilla camp. Men
and horses were resting on each side of the road, some sick, some moving about carrying water to the women and children … They would ask us the news, and one, drunk with excitement or whisky informed us that it was our own fault if we had saved nothing, the people must have been ——— fools not to know trouble would come before long, and that it was the fault of the men who were aware of it, that the women were thus forced to fly. In vain we pleaded that there was no warning, no means of forseeing this; he cried “You are ruined; so am I, and my brothers too! And by ——— there is nothing left but to die now, and I’ll die!” “Good!” I said. “But die fighting for us!” He waved his hand black with powder and shouted “That I will!” after us, and that was the only swearing guerilla that we met; the others seemed to have too much respect for us to talk aloud.
Lucy had met us before this … Lilly had sent her back to get some baby clothes, but a shell exploding within a few feet of her, she took alarm, and ran up another road for three miles …
* * *
About five miles from home, we overtook mother [now walking]. The gentleman had been obliged to go for his wife, so Mary gave her her seat … and walked with Lucy … All the talk by the road side was of burning homes, houses knocked to pieces by balls, famine, murder, desolation; so I comforted myself singing “Better days are coming” and “I hope to die shouting the Lord will provide;” while Lucy … answered with a chorus of “I’m a runnin’, a runnin’ up to Glor-y.”
It was three o’clock when we reached Mr Davids, and found Lilly … A hasty meal, which tasted like a feast after our fatigue, gave us fresh strength, and Lilly and Miriam got in an old cart with the children to drive out [to the cabin], leaving me with mother and Dellie to follow next day. About sunset, Charlie came flying down the road, on his way to town. I decided to go, and after an obstinate debate with mother, in which I am afraid I showed more determination than amiability, I wrung a reluctant consent from her, and promising not to enter if it was being fired or plundered, drove off in triumph … I knew Charlie could take care of me, and if he was killed I could take care of myself; so I went.
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