by Lynn Austin
The horrific thundering finally stopped that evening, then resumed the next morning. By the time the battle ended the following afternoon, a long line of ambulances and farm wagons was already rolling into the city carrying the wounded and the dying.
“I’m going to Chimborazo Hospital to help,” I told Aunt Anne after lunch. She stared at me in surprise.
“You always did have a tender heart, Caroline. I remember how you nursed those little colored babies through the measles. But frankly, it surprises me that you’re able to go to such a dreadful place and see . . . that sort of thing.”
I forced myself to say what I had been thinking since the artillery fire began. “Charles and Jonathan are fighting out there somewhere. These soldiers might be from their company. If I don’t go and help them, who will?”
“I’d like to join you,” she said simply.
Chimborazo resembled a scene from Dante’s Inferno. I lost what little lunch I had eaten after I glimpsed a dying soldier whose entire lower jaw had been blown away. But from the men who were less seriously wounded, whose faces I cooled with water and whose thirst I helped ease, I learned that yesterday’s battle had been fought at Seven Pines, a few miles east of the city. Charles, along with the First Virginia Infantry, had taken part in a Confederate assault that attempted to push back the Union forces. The engagement had been successful the first day, then ended in a bloody draw the second. Among the wounded was the Rebel commander General Joe Johnston.
Before returning home, Aunt Anne and I drove downtown together, holding our breath and each other’s hands as we scanned a list of the four thousand men who had been killed, wounded, or taken prisoner. We sagged against each other in relief when we saw that Jonathan and Charles were not on it.
“You’ve changed, Caroline,” Aunt Anne said as we drove back up Church Hill afterward. “You’ve become a very strong young woman.”
I shook my head, my tears of relief still falling onto my lap. “No. I’m not strong at all. The fact that this war is so close terrifies me. Reading those lists and waiting to hear news of my loved ones is an agonizing ordeal. I’m not strong at all, Aunt Anne . . . but I’m learning to lean on a God who is.”
Chapter Sixteen
June 1862
All of Richmond was a hospital again. I spent every spare moment during the next week caring for wounded soldiers at Chimborazo Hospital. Then one quiet afternoon after the crisis eased and the hospital no longer needed me, a messenger came to our door. The man was gone again before I could hurry out to the foyer, but Gilbert handed me the note he had brought, scribbled on a folded scrap of greasy brown paper.
Dear Caroline,
I know that we are supposed to be at war with each other, but I cannot believe you would consider me your enemy. In Philadelphia, we were once dear friends, and I appeal to you now on the basis of that friendship.
I am being held here in Richmond as a prisoner of war. My fellow prisoners and I are suffering under dreadful conditions. Many of us are ill and near starvation. I remember your kindness and your Christian charity, and I ask for any shreds of mercy that you can spare my comrades and me. I am confined in a warehouse known as Libby Prison, in the east building.
Sincerely,
Lieutenant Robert Hoffman
United States Army
Eli and I went down to Libby Prison together. We parked the buggy on a side street and walked across the vacant lot beside the building beneath a broiling sun. The brick tobacco warehouse, which overlooked the canal, consisted of three conjoined buildings, four stories high, filling half a city block on the corner of Cary and Dock Streets. A faded sign, “L. Libby & Son, Ship Chandlers,” which had been hung by former owner Luther Libby, gave the prison its name. Behind the barred windows on the upper floors, I glimpsed shadowy figures, passing like ghosts. The sentries standing guard outside made Eli raise his arms as they searched him, then they searched the basket of food he carried. They directed us to Major Turner’s office on the ground floor.
The first thing I noticed was the smell. I had thought the hospital odorous, but Libby Prison’s hot, stifling air reeked—worse than any charnel house—of filth and death and human waste. I had to pull out my handkerchief and hold it over my nose and mouth to keep from gagging.
Major Turner scrambled to his feet when we entered his office. “Miss, you have obviously come to the wrong place. Let me escort you—”
“No, thank you, sir,” I said firmly. “I have come to Libby Prison to see one of your inmates.”
“Out of the question.”
I felt an immediate dislike for Major Turner. He hadn’t even taken the time to consider my request. Not much taller than me, Turner had a boyish face and a permanent frown—adopted, I guessed, to make himself appear more manly. My first impression was that he was a bully, and I determined to stand up to him— backed by Eli, of course, who towered over the man.
“My name is Caroline Fletcher,” I said. “My father is George Fletcher, owner of several warehouses in this district and recently commissioned by President Davis as a Captain in the Confederate Navy. My fiancé is Charles St. John, serving with the First Virginia Infantry. Surely you’ve heard of the St. John family, Major Turner? Proprietors of the city’s largest flour mill and one of Richmond’s most prominent families?”
“What is your business here, Miss Fletcher?” His voice was high-pitched, boyish.
“I’ve learned that a relative of mine is imprisoned here. I’ve come to see him on a mission of charity.”
“Leave your package. I’ll see that he gets it.”
“I don’t intend to leave until I’ve spoken with him, sir.”
Turner’s frown deepened. “This prison is not a suitable venue for social calls. We do not have the proper facilities for visitors to—”
“Then I’ll wait until a suitable room is prepared,” I said, seating myself on the chair in front of Major Turner’s desk. “I would hate to bother President Davis at such a busy time as this, just for a request to meet with my cousin. But I will do it, sir, if you force me to.” I saw Turner’s resolve weakening and added, “My cousin’s name is Lieutenant Robert Hoffman. I believe you’ll find him in the east building.”
The guards readied a small storeroom on the ground floor and escorted Robert inside. The windowless room quickly filled with his stench. I would have run forward to embrace him but he held out both hands, stopping me with a cry of horror.
“No, Caroline! No! I’m crawling with vermin!”
The skin on his hands and neck was scaly and raw from ringworm and scabbed insect bites. As I stepped closer I could see lice moving through his black hair. Robert was pale and thin; dark circles rimmed his mournful eyes. His infested hair was long and matted and dirty, his face unshaved. But he smiled and briefly gripped my fingers in a quick, reassuring squeeze.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. But heaven knows how I would defile you if we embraced.”
“Robert . . . I . . . I don’t know what to say. . . .” I could barely speak, barely see him through my tears. He was so horribly changed, a figure from a nightmare. Yet his voice, his sweet nature, were the same.
“You don’t need to say a word, Caroline. Just your beautiful presence . . . the fact that you came . . . they will sustain me for a year.”
The major had provided us with two wooden benches. Robert and I sat down, and I gave him the basket of food I had brought. It was meager fare by pre-war standards—a square of Esther’s corn bread, some cold boiled potatoes, a piece of leftover fish, a slice from one of Aunt Anne’s hams that we had been stingily doling out—but the sight of it, the aroma of it, caused Robert to break down and weep.
“I’m sorry . . . I’m sorry,” he repeated as he vainly tried to wipe his tears. “I don’t know what’s come over me . . . forgive me. . . .”
I longed to hold him, to comfort him, but I didn’t dare. I silently cursed the war, the stupidity and hatred that had reduced gentle Robert
to such a state. “It’s okay,” I murmured. “There’s nothing to forgive.”
The food trembled in Robert’s hands as he slowly began to eat. He lifted each bite to his nose first, closing his eyes and inhaling, before tasting each morsel. I knew by his appearance that he must be half-starved, but he took his time eating, allowing his shrunken stomach to adjust to food again.
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Since early last November. I was part of a Federal expedition that crossed the Potomac at Ball’s Bluff, above Leesburg, Virginia. We were ordered to probe the Rebels’ defenses, but they proved stronger than we expected. The Rebs drove us back to the river, then mowed us down as we tried to get into our boats and escape.” He paused, struggling with his emotions. “I . . . I surrendered my unit rather than watch everyone die. Even so . . . I lost too many men.”
He looked down, concentrating on his food as if to distract himself. Robert had been raised in a wealthy home with the finest of table manners, but I watched him eat fish with filthy hands, then lick every precious drop of oil and juice off his fingers.
“The Rebels marched us through their lines to the rear,” he said when he could continue. “I was angry, humiliated. The war had barely begun and I was already a prisoner. They marched us double-quick, but I observed all their defenses, their reserves and artillery and gun emplacements. When the guards looked away, I hid my money, my watch, and any other valuables I owned in my clothing. I was glad I did. They found some of my money when they searched me, but not all of it. One of the Rebel guards took my haversack with all my rations, then tried to pump me for information in exchange for food and other favors. Another stole my boots and gave me his worn-out shoes to wear in their place.
“As we traveled south, more prisoners from other captured units joined us. I remember marching through one small town along a river and all the young boys came out to pelt us with stones and manure as we passed. The women jeered and spit at us. When we finally arrived in Richmond, they separated the other officers and me from the enlisted men and brought us here. I don’t know what they did with my men . . . I hope they’re being treated better than we are.”
“They’re being held on an island in the middle of the James River,” I said. “It’s called Belle Isle. You can probably see it from the windows that overlook the canal.” I didn’t tell him that he and the other officers were fortunate to be housed inside a building, that the only shelter the enlisted men had against the winter’s cold and the summer’s heat was a tent.
“I’ve watched men die in this place,” Robert said. “I’ve seen others lose their minds. It can easily happen in this hellhole where men who are ill and delirious scream all night until we wish them dead. We have no doctors, no medicine. All of us suffer from dysentery. At times I’ve been so sick with the fever and shakes that I believed I might die. I’ve often wished that I would.”
Robert had saved the corn bread for last, as if savoring it for dessert. He held it close to his chin, careful not to drop any crumbs, but when one accidentally fell to the floor he quickly snatched it up and ate it. I remembered watching the little Negro children at Hilltop do the same thing, eating off the dirt floor.
“You can’t imagine how slowly time passes here, Caroline. Every day is the same. We fight to spend a few moments at the window, just to watch the boats on the canal out front, and the traffic crossing the bridges, and the trees and fields and rolling green hills across the river. We’re not allowed to look out of the windows on the other side. The sentries shoot at us if we do.”
“It’s just as well,” I told him. “The view is only of rooftops, chimneys, warehouses, vacant lots—nothing worth getting shot at to see.”
“For entertainment, we sometimes capture lice off our heads and hold races with them. The winner gets the lump of salt pork in the soup if there happens to be one. This place is filthy beyond imagining. The Negroes sweep the floor and slosh water across it twice a week, but that’s all the cleaning that’s done. We have water but no soap. At night, I sleep jammed into a room with one hundred other men, back to back on the bare floor, like herring in a box. Our daily rations are corncob bread and bean soup flavored with rancid salt pork and garnished with white worms. On special occasions we get tough, boiled beef. At first we all pooled our money and bribed the guards into buying us extra rations, but our money has finally run out. We were hoping for a prisoner exchange, but with the fighting so close by, there’s not much hope of an exchange now. In fact . . . there’s not much hope at all in this godforsaken place. That’s why I wrote to you. I’m sorry . . . but it was either that . . . or go mad.”
Robert’s eyes met mine and I saw his utter despair. I remembered how eager he’d been to study at West Point, how he’d longed to distinguish himself in battle, and I could well imagine the staggering cost to his pride to have the woman he’d once loved see him in such a state. I tried to spare him the remnants of his dignity by not allowing my pity to show.
“I’m glad you wrote,” I told him. “It’s good to see you again.”
“I gave the guard my pocket watch to deliver the note to you. It was the only thing of value I had left. I was afraid you might have fled to safety when the war started, and I hoped for your sake that you had. I’m glad for my sake that you didn’t.”
“Richmond is my home. I couldn’t leave here.”
“Julia wrote and told me you were engaged.” The pain I saw in Robert’s eyes was so intense I could barely keep from looking away.
“Yes. Have . . . um . . . have you met anyone, Robert?”
He didn’t seem to hear my question. “Is your fiancé fighting for the Rebels?”
“Yes. . . . yes, he is. Charles believes that he is fighting for the South’s freedom.”
“Are you a Rebel, too?”
“No. I . . . I’m not for either side.”
One of the guards suddenly pounded on the door, startling me. “Your time’s up, Miss Fletcher.” I rose to my feet as the key rattled in the lock and the door swung open.
“I’ll be back in a few days, Robert. I promise. I’ll bring you another parcel.”
He didn’t stand, as if hoping to stretch out our visit for as long as he possibly could. His eyes hadn’t left mine. “Your fiancé and the others are deceiving themselves, you know. The Rebels aren’t fighting for freedom, they’re fighting for the right to keep slaves.”
“Let’s go,” the guard shouted. “On your feet.”
At last Robert slowly stood. He handed me the empty basket. “I know that you believe slavery is wrong, Caroline. But maybe what you don’t realize is that if the South wins . . . if your fiancé wins . . . then slavery wins, too.”
I returned to Libby Prison to visit Robert a few days later, bringing him some newspapers and a few books to read—Les Misérables by Victor Hugo and my collection of works by Sir Walter Scott. I also brought him my father’s chessboard, a bar of soap, and Mother’s fine-toothed ivory comb to help get the nits out of his hair. Major Turner gave up trying to dissuade me after my third or fourth visit and routinely sent for Robert, locking us in the storeroom for our allotted half-hour. Within a few weeks, Robert looked stronger, saner, and a good deal cleaner than he had on our first visit.
One day he set the food aside instead of eating it right away and leaned forward to grasp my hands. “We need to talk, Caroline. I have a favor to ask of you.” He kept his voice low, as if not wanting the guard to overhear him. “Some of my fellow inmates are newly imprisoned, captured after the latest fighting at Seven Pines. They’ve told me what’s going on out there—and now I’m going to tell you. General McClellan thinks he’s facing vast numbers of Confederate troops. He’s moving too cautiously, waiting for another forty thousand reinforcements to arrive before he attacks. But the men who have passed through enemy lines on the way here know the truth about the Confederate forces. They know how badly outnumbered you are. If we had a way to get that information back to the Union lines,
McClellan might stop hesitating and attack.” He paused, gripping my hands tighter still. “Caroline . . . we need you to deliver this information to them.”
I yanked my hands from his grip. “Me? Are you out of your mind?”
“Shh . . . shh . . . Listen, if you carried the reports to McClellan, you could help end this war. If the North wins a decisive victory, if we capture Richmond, the war would end tomorrow. President Lincoln’s only goal is to restore the Union.”
I wanted to run from the room, run from the ugliness of what he was suggesting, but I was too stunned to move. “You can’t possibly ask me to betray the Confederate Army. Charles is out there in one of those trenches defending Richmond. It would mean betraying the man I love . . . betraying my cousins . . . my own father. . . .”
“If the war ends quickly, there would be less chance of any of them dying.”
“No, Robert. I can’t help you. I won’t.”
“I know how you feel about slavery, Caroline. If you don’t help me, then you’re betraying your own convictions. You’re helping to keep hundreds of thousands of people in slavery.”
I stood, ready to flee, but my legs trembled so badly I couldn’t take a single step. “I came to help you as an act of charity,” I said. “I never expected you, of all people, to take advantage of my kindness by asking me to do such a terrible thing.”
“Terrible? Wouldn’t it be a greater crime to compromise your beliefs? To betray your God?” He paused. “Here, take this, Caroline.” He shoved a small, pocket-sized Bible into my hands.
“Why? What is this?”
“Look at it carefully. On all of the blank pages and between the lines, my fellow officers and I have written everything we saw and remember of the Confederate forces defending Richmond. We’ve signed our names and ranks to these intelligence reports.”