by Angela Moody
She trudged back to the well, confused and frightened. As she drew more water, the two men left the house and rejoined their comrades. She prayed they wouldn’t find the officer.
Tillie carried the bucket back to the side of the road.
Three men on horseback rode up and stopped in front of her. A man with a round face and blue eyes, heavy with rings of fatigue, gazed down at her. A graying beard covered the lower half of his face. He removed his hat, revealing his balding head. Despite the dusty road, his immaculate uniform showed no sign he’d spent the night riding to Gettysburg.
“Miss, may I have a drink of water?” He extended his hand.
“Of course.” She offered a brimming cup. “Please forgive my tin cup. It’s a bit dirty.”
“Certainly, that’s all right.”
The general drank. “Thank you kindly.”
Tillie took the cup. She wanted to ask about the major, but didn’t dare. “Would you like some more?”
“No, thank you.”
Tillie asked the other two men if they wanted any water. They declined.
“Well, gentleman.” The general shifted in his saddle. “We must be going.” He nodded his thanks to Tillie, turned his horse, and headed toward Cemetery Ridge. The men marching up the road cheered.
Someone shouted, “Three cheers for General Meade.” The men huzzahed and lifted their caps, waving them above their heads.
Turning back to the men, he saluted them before riding toward town, his two aides-de-camp right behind him.
“Excuse me.” Tillie reached out a hand to gain the attention of a passing soldier. “Who did you say that man is?”
“General Meade.”
* * * *
An hour passed while Tillie continued her water ministry. When the sun bore down overhead, she calculated the time near noon. Hot and thirsty, she ignored her needs in favor of the never-ending stream of blue marching to battle.
One of General Meade’s aides rode back. He pulled his horse up short and removed his hat. Working by rote, she held the cup up to him when he stopped in front of her.
“No, thank you.” He put his hand up, palm out. “The general wishes me to inform you that you need to get under cover now, miss. He thanks you kindly for your ministration of water, but he fears the situation is becoming dangerous.” He rode away.
All around her the steady tramp, tramp of marching feet, the clanking of bullet pouches and eating utensils bouncing against men’s bodies, mixed with the dust of the road from the dried mud, hanging at knee level. In the distance, men shouted and horses neighed. The low rumble of distant guns carried on the breeze. The sun shone from a clear, blue summer sky. She didn’t sense imminent danger, but dropped the cups into the bucket and returned them to the barn. She hung the pail and proceeded across the farmyard. As she walked, the hair on her neck rose, and despite the heat, her skin goose pimpled. Remnants of her dream slipped through her consciousness. A feeling someone watched her make her way across the farmyard crept over her. She placed one foot in front of the other and steeled herself not to run.
Tillie entered the kitchen. “You’ll never guess what happened to me just now.”
Beckie stood at a waist high baking table, mixing dough, her hands squeezing and pushing. Flour streaked her nose and cheeks, and bread dough splotched her apron. “What happened to you?”
“Well,” Tillie waved a hand toward the road, “three officers stopped at the gate, and one of them asked for a drink of water. General Meade!”
“How do you know? You’ve met the man before?”
Tillie stared at her. What had she done to deserve such a nasty response?
“Beckie.” Mrs. Schriver’s brows drew together. “What’s the matter with you?”
Beckie shrugged and continued to knead the dough.
Tillie’s gaze went from Beckie to Mrs. Schriver and back again. “Nooo.” Her shoulders drooped. “The soldiers told me.” None of the women reacted. She studied each woman in the room. “Should I be working in here?”
“There’s no room for you, child.” Mrs. Weikert slapped some dough into a loaf pan to bake. “Hettie and Beckie know what needs doing and what we keep where. You’re better off doing what you’re doing.”
“General Meade told me to come inside. Is there another task I can do?”
They turned at a loud knock on the door. Three officers removed their hats when the women acknowledged them.
“Are you the lady of the house?” The leader entered the kitchen, stopping in front of Tillie.
She giggled.
“I am.” Mrs. Weikert wiped her hands on her apron and stepped from behind the table. “What can I do for you?”
He turned to her and addressed her with a short bow. “If you please, ma’am.” He gestured toward the staircase. “We’d like permission to go up to your roof and take a look around.”
“Of course.” Mrs. Weikert gestured to Tillie. “Take them upstairs and show them where the trap door is.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
They thanked Mrs. Weikert, and then followed Tillie to the highest level of the house.
On the third floor, she stopped below the trap door. She found the pole with which to grab the handle in Mr. and Mrs. Weikert’s bedroom. When the door came down, a ladder slid from its mooring. The men scrambled to the roof, pulled out their field glasses, and turned in every direction.
Tillie stood at the base of the steps. One of them beckoned. “Would you like to join us?”
“Oh, may I?”
“Come on up.”
She climbed the ladder, and when she grabbed their proffered hands, they lifted her to the roof. She held tight to their hands until she steadied herself enough to let go. Even so, her stomach lurched at the dizzying height.
“Don’t look down.” They laughed.
The soldier on her left handed her his field glasses. “Tell me what you see.”
She accepted the glasses and put them to her eyes. “How astonishing!” She lowered the glasses and gazed at the field. She raised them again, took them away, and held them to her eyes again, marveling at the change in perspective. “It’s as if I can almost reach out and touch things that are, in reality, so far away.” She put her hand out as if expecting to touch the man galloping across a field more than a half mile away.
While the men chuckled over her wonderment, Tillie played with the glasses for a long time, fascinated. She trained the glasses on one group of men out near Mr. Codori’s wheat field, adjacent to Mr. Weikert’s property. Uniformed men filled the country for miles around. Horses and men hauled artillery pieces from one place to another as infantry support formed into a line. Men on horseback rode back and forth gesturing. “What are they doing?” She focused the glasses toward Mr. Sherfy’s peach orchard, where men in blue formed up and adjusted their weapons.
“Well, they are forming up, preparing for battle.” One of the observers held his glasses to his eyes and turned in the direction Tillie pointed.
Her smile disappeared, and she removed the glasses from her eyes. “Where are the Rebs?” She raised them again.
“That’s what we came up here to ascertain.” The officer stood next to her, his glasses trained on the trees, across Emmitsburg Road, on a low ridge to the west. “Can you detect movement behind those trees?” He faced her in the direction of the stand of trees on a low ridge about a mile away.
“That’s Mr. Pitzer’s property,” she told them, as if imparting important information. “Mr. Pitzer won’t like rebel soldiers in his woods.”
“We don’t either,” they teased.
Heat crept up her neck and face. Chastising herself for saying something stupid, she focused the glasses in another direction. “And what are those men doing in Mr. Sherfy’s peach orchard? Why are they out so far in front of the others?” She pointed northwest where Mr. Sherfy’s property also bounded Mr. Weikert’s beside the Emmitsburg Road. A solid, straight formation of Union soldiers had advanced fro
m the wheat field and moved into the orchard, leaving a yawning gap on either side.
The two other men jumped at her question and turned toward the area she indicated. She handed her glasses back to the soldier who loaned them to her and stepped aside.
He put the glasses to his eyes and appraised the situation before sliding them in a special pouch at his hip.
“General Meade needs to hear about this,” the leader muttered, his glasses glued to his eyes, as though unable to believe what he saw. He muttered under his breath. He returned his glasses to his pouch. A dark look passed between them.
Behind him, one man started down the steps. Halfway down he reached up for Tillie’s hand and helped her down. The other two men waited at the top for her to get to the hallway. Tillie turned as the second man descended the ladder. Before descending himself, the third raised his glasses one more time and cast a last long stare toward the peach orchard. He swore.
Her cheeks burned, and she cast her gaze to the floor. She never meant to get those men into trouble.
Once they reached the kitchen, the men left without a word.
Mrs. Weikert handed Tillie a plate of bread and told her to take Sadie and Mollie outside and serve the bread to the wounded soldiers. Tillie wanted to remind Mrs. Weikert that General Meade told her to stay indoors, but she didn’t dare. She accepted the plate with great reluctance and went outside.
Mollie walked over and held out a plate loaded with sliced bread and jam.
A soldier took a bite and drew in a deep breath. “Sweetest tasting bread I ever ate.”
“Manna from Heaven.” His companion took a bite and chewed, closing his eyes in mock ecstasy.
“It’s Northern bread.” Mollie’s serious blue eyes met his. “That’s why it tastes so good.”
The men laughed and thanked her for the treat.
Tillie stared in the direction of the peach orchard, but a rise in the land blocked her view.
A sharp pop reverberated through the farmyard. Men scattered. Tillie glanced around, confused. Another pop. The man, who moments before thanked Mollie for the bread, fell dead, blood pouring from his temple, the half-eaten bread still in his fingers. Another pop, and a man standing by the barn dropped to the ground.
“Rebel sharpshooters!”
She heard a shout and spun first this way, then another, looking for the danger.
Someone seized her and almost threw her at the house. “Get inside and stay away from the windows. They’re somewhere on that big mountain.”
Tillie needed no further urging. She dropped the plate, grabbed Sadie and Mollie, and dragged them into the house.
The girls screamed and cried. Mrs. Schriver took them into her arms, comforting them as she scooted them under the worktable.
Tillie cowered in a corner of the kitchen, biting her knuckles as sobs racked her body.
As quick as the shooting started, the Rebs ceased their fire.
After some time, she managed to gain control of her terror. She swallowed her sobs, wiped her face, and crawled out of her corner.
Outside, everything fell quiet. She chanced a peek out the window. Her stomach clenched over the men felled by sharpshooters. Only the flies went near them.
As if tolling their doom, the afternoon breeze carried three faint bongs from the courthouse clock.
“Well.” Mrs. Schriver settled the girls under the worktable and got back to bread making. “If that’s the worst to happen today, let us all count our blessings.” As soon as the words left her mouth, their world exploded.
Chapter 16
Tillie cowered in a corner of the basement, squeezed into a tight ball, her head tucked into her knees, arms over her head. She wanted to marry, have children, but instead, someone would find her body among the broken bricks and plaster.
A shell exploded so close, the house gave a violent shudder. She pressed the side of her body against the wall and cringed. Upstairs, something crashed to the floor.
Mr. Weikert and his son flew into the basement as another missile whistled through the air. “They mean business now.” Dan both laughed and shouted, terror and exhilaration fighting for control of his voice as he slammed the door behind him.
The windows rattled from the percussion of hundreds of cannon firing simultaneously.
Outside, artillery shells rained down with unrelenting ferocity. Another shell crashed so close, the wall at her back swayed from the impact. Pots, pans, and dishes smashed on the floor. She didn’t want to die huddled in a corner of the Weikerts’ basement kitchen. I want to go home. I want to go home. Tillie rocked back and forth to the rhythm of the words, too terrified to scream.
Mr. Weikert and Dan paced near the stairs. Another crash upstairs sent Dan’s father running upstairs. He halted halfway up, seemed to change his mind, turned around, and came back down.
Mrs. Schriver crawled beneath the table with the girls, holding them and using her body and the table as a shield from falling objects.
Beckie ran to her father and cowered in his arms. She cried on his shoulder, her hands flat to her ears. He cradled her, one hand over her head in a protective gesture.
Mrs. Weikert continued kneading bread as if nothing happened. As she worked, tears coursed down her lined face.
After what felt like hours, the cannonading stopped. Tillie lifted her head and listened, her face awash with tears.
“Is it over?” Sadie peeked out from her mother’s arms.
Everyone began to stir. “I think so.” Mrs. Schriver climbed out from underneath the table and pushed to her feet.
Tillie rose and gazed about, dazed and confused. She only thought of the bread she put in the oven seconds before the cannonading started. She lurched across the room on rubber legs. Her hand shook as she opened the door. The loaf continued to bake and brown as though nothing happened. She estimated another ten minutes and shut the stove door. “The bread should be ready—”
The kitchen door flew open and crashed against the wall. The women jumped and screamed. A lieutenant burst into the house. “Get out, all of you!” He made frantic gestures with his arms. “You must leave at once. Enemy artillery has moved into the peach orchard. We expect the shelling to start over at any minute. The shells will land on this house.”
Mr. Weikert pushed Beckie off to her brother, who put his arm around her shoulder.
“No.” He advanced a step toward the lieutenant. “We will not leave here.”
“Sir, you must.” The officer also stepped forward. “If only for the sake of those poor little girls.” He gestured toward Mollie and Sadie still clinging to each other underneath the table.
Mr. Weikert turned to face his granddaughters. The hard lines on his face smoothed out. His piercing blue eyes softened, and he appeared to waver.
Tillie stared at the lieutenant, jaw agape. Did he mean for them to go out there? Did he want them to die? A smug smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, but he pressed his lips together until his features smoothed out. He again waved his arms in frantic haste. “Sir, this is not a request.” He took another step forward when Mr. Weikert still made no move.
The farmer reddened, and the muscle in his cheek twitched. The vein rose in his forehead. “I’ve had it with your orders.” His words hissed through gritted teeth. “You people demand the use of my barn and yard. Your wagons and artillery chewed up my land and destroyed my crops. You tore down all my fences, despite my best efforts to stop you. My pigs escaped. My cow is gone. My spring and well are dry. Your doctors want my house for a hospital, which I absolutely forbid. Now you tell me we must leave?” He pounded his fist the table.
Tillie jumped. Mollie started to cry.
“No!” Mr. Weikert’s shout reverberated through the basement.
The men glared at each other in a standoff.
The lieutenant spoke first. He lowered his voice and used a calm, authoritative tone, as if giving orders to his command. “This is not a request. You are hereby ordered to depart this
house—now.” He started for the door. As if to emphasize his words, a shell crashed behind the barn. Planks disintegrated as hay and body parts flew through the air.
Mr. Weikert blanched. He collected his family and herded them upstairs to the main level, and out the front door.
“Papa.” Mrs. Schriver cried over the noise of the exploding shells, the crackle of gunfire, and men shouting and screaming. Her father didn’t respond. She tapped him on the shoulder. He leaned in, and she said something Tillie didn’t hear.
He nodded, and taking his wife by the hand, shouted something.
Tillie thought his mouth formed the words follow me.
He sprinted east across his fields. The rest followed as shells crashed and exploded around the house and barn, as if to chase them away.
They ran about a quarter of a mile when Mrs. Weikert stopped short. Her hand slipped from Mr. Weikert’s as his forward momentum carried him on.
He turned back, a horrified, frightened expression contorting his face. Horror changed to stunned disbelief.
She stood stock-still. Everyone came to a halt. The crashing roar of battle subsided with the distance, easing their need to shout.
“What’s the matter?” Mr. Weikert shouted anyway.
“Jacob, you need to go back. You must. I can’t leave it.”
“Go back? Are you mad? Go back for what?”
“My quilted petticoat!” Tears coursed down her face. “It’s brand new. For winter. I haven’t even worn it yet. You must go back before they tear it into bandages.”
Mr. Weikert’s breath came in short, hard gasps. He stared at his wife as the twitch began in his cheek muscle again.
Tillie gaped at Mrs. Weikert. How could she muster the nerve to send him back into danger for an article of clothing? Yet she stood in a field of wheat, demanding he do so. Would Mother require this of Father? Mother had sense enough to realize one could replace a petticoat, didn’t she?
Mr. Weikert took a deep breath and exhaled. “Keep going and get to the Bushmans’.” He pushed them in the direction of the Bushman farm. “I’ll meet you there as soon as I can.” He took off running back toward home.