by Karen Abbott
“as grand a flirt as ever lived”: Hassler, Colonel John Pelham, 53.
The army was experiencing daily desertions: Harrisburg Patriot, November 14, 1861.
Alcohol was at times rationed out to the men: Hambucken and Payson, Confederate Soldier, 63.
Beauregard served special guests: Williams, P. G. T. Beauregard, 99.
“bloody fracas”: Leavenworth (KS) Daily Times, November 23, 1861.
more than twice the number of casualties: New York Times, November 24, 1861.
Dark and Gloomy Perils
“by no means a person of sharp”: Washington Evening Star, December 4, 1862.
the widow shared Rose’s secessionist sympathies: National Aegis, December 13, 1862.
At least, she thought, she would enjoy even greater access: Greenhow, seized correspondence.
“A number of prominent gentlemen”: E. J. Allen (Pinkerton) to Brigadier General Porter, November 1861, OR, ser. 2, 5:566–69.
“Tell me what to send you”: Greenhow, seized correspondence.
“a distinguished member of the diplomatic corps”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 53.
“Those men will probably arrest me”: Ibid.
“The fate of some of the best and bravest”: Ibid., 54–55.
“a German Jew”: Ibid., 203.
“Is this Mrs. Greenhow?”: Ibid., 54.
“I have no power”: Ibid.
“That would have been wrong”: Ibid.
“Mother has been arrested!”: Taft Bayne, Tad Lincoln’s Father, 62.
“Take charge of this lady”: Mortimer, Double Death, 105.
unlettered scribblings: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 56.
concerning his “feebleness”: Greenhow, seized correspondence.
“Wants to see Mrs. G very much”: Ibid.
“a beautiful woman”: Mortimer, Double Death, 105.
“winning way”: Ibid.
“If I had known who you were”: Ibid.
“The revolver has to be cocked”: Ibid.
“one of those India rubber dolls”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 62.
“I began to realize”: Ibid., 65.
“I did not know what they had done”: Ibid., 58.
“slaves of Lincoln”: Mortimer, Double Death, 106.
“nice times”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 65.
house on fire: Ibid., 66.
beneath her mattress: Ibid., 68.
“allowed the clue to escape them”: Ibid., 77.
“so noble a lady”: Ibid., 70.
“I led Pat a dance”: Ibid., 71.
“sublime fortitude”: Ibid.
“know that you had forgiven me”: Ibid.
“Little Bird”: Ibid., 110. Family members later suspected the intermediary Rose called “Little Bird” to be Little Rose; Blackman, Wild Rose, 194.
invariably peering inside: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 72.
to send an armada: Ibid., 110.
known derisively as the Mosquito Fleet: Wright, e-mail, June 2011.
“Tell Aunt Sally that I have some old shoes”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 92.
“for a clever woman”: Ibid.
“artillery is constant and severe”: Proceedings of the Commission Relating to State Prisoners.
“I have signals”: Ibid.
corresponding with the enemy: Blackman, Wild Rose, 193.
“complimented as being equal to”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 81.
after taking an oath of allegiance: William H. Seward to Col. Martin Burke, OR, ser. 2, 2:597.
“fashionable woman spies”: McCurry, Confederate Reckoning, 100.
“The ‘heavy business’ in the war of spying”: Albany Evening Journal, October 5, 1861.
calls to condemn her to the ducking stool: Weekly Wisconsin Patriot, September 7, 1861.
“Let it come”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 96.
“I felt now that I was alone”: Ibid., 101.
“she had had too much of my teachings”: Ibid., 134.
“Your whole bankrupt treasury”: Ibid., 83.
“beyond a woman’s ken”: Ibid., 120.
“cruel and dastardly tyranny”: Wallenstein and Wyatt-Brown, Virginia’s Civil War, 126.
“almost irresistible seductive powers”: E. J. Allen (Pinkerton) to Brig. Gen. Andrew Porter, OR, ser. 2, 2:567.
“I crushed down the impulse”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 166.
“a party well known to the government”: Ibid., 210.
Unmasked
“But the doctor must be consulted”: Edmonds, Nurse and Spy, 60.
“a mixture of awful consternation”: Walt Whitman’s Civil War, 25.
“brilliant beyond description”: Lesser, Rebels at the Gate, 239.
“For God’s sake heed this”: Jordan to Beauregard, OR, ser. 1, 5:1038.
“No living man ever made such a desperate effort”: Ibid.
Mary Todd Lincoln had donated all unsolicited gifts: Harvey Baker, Mary Todd Lincoln, 186.
The Defenseless Sex
“Nothing is so hideous”: Richmond Dispatch, August 14, 1861.
John and Elizabeth refused to entrust their education: Hall, e-mail, April 2013.
“If one Confederate soldier kills 90 Yankees”: Wiley, Life of Johnny Reb, 123.
“I will try to do the best I can by her”: Varon, Southern Lady, Yankee Spy, 30.
first-class cabin instead of steerage: Ibid. Elizabeth’s request was not honored.
“perambulating the streets”: Ibid.
earned $137 per year: Lebergott, “Wage Trends, 1800–1900,” 453.
“trumpery”: Varina Davis, Jefferson Davis, 576.
Every evening before bed: Allen, Jefferson Davis, 292.
dark skin and “tawny” looks: Richmond Dispatch, December 11, 1861.
calling her a mulatto and a “squaw”: Cashin, First Lady of the Confederacy, 119.
most men “dressed right”: Wright, e-mail, June 2013.
“half-breed Yankee on one side”: Cashin, First Lady of the Confederacy, 299.
“harbinger of gladness in the future”: Richmond Whig, December 2, 1861.
how fortunate that her injuries weren’t grave: Richmond Enquirer, October 5, 1861.
“an excellent house servant”: Dorothy Lewis Grant, “Lady of Refinement,” Torch Magazine, Spring 1997, 23. Van Lew’s descendant Bart Hall suggests that Elizabeth didn’t place Mary Jane in the Confederate White House with the specific intention of conducting espionage, and that her servant’s role as a spy evolved over time. Considering that Rose Greenhow and female spies in general were national news at the time Elizabeth visited Varina Davis, I believe Mary Jane’s placement was intentional. In 1905, Varina Davis wrote a letter to Isabelle Maury, regent of the Confederate White House Museum, denying that she had ever employed “an educated negro woman whose services were ‘given or hired by Miss Van Lew’ as a spy in our house during the war. . . . My maid was an ignorant girl born and brought up on our plantation who, if she is living now, I am sure cannot read, and who would not have done anything to injure her master or me if even she had been educated. That Miss Van Lew may have been imposed upon by some educated negro women’s tales I am quite prepared to believe.” Eleanor S. Brockenbrough Library, American Civil War Museum.
Not Your Ideal of a Beautiful Soldier
Martinsburg’s law against traveling faster than at a canter: Wood, History of Martinsburg, 9.
busy building earthworks fortifications along its perimeter: New York Evening Post, January 2, 1862.
“She is quite a favorite with me”: Sigaud, “More About Belle Boyd,” 176.
“Not what I call a beauty”: James Webb Papers, #760, Southern Historical Collection, University of North Carolina.
She also had a brief romance with one Dr. Cherry: Susan Earle Glenn (Belle Boyd’s aunt) to “Nat,” January 10, 1962, Sigaud Papers.
“perils and its pleasures”: Boyd, In Camp and Prison, 215.
serenade
s from a regimental brass band: Richmond Examiner, January 4, 1862.
“I am in great distress”: Hansen, Civil War, 174.
“I beg your pardon”: Boyd, In Camp and Prison, 84–86. Most Union forces in the vicinity of Martinsburg were in Hancock, about twenty-five miles away and too far for the purposes of Belle’s story. It is possible, however, that a Union cavalry unit had sent out patrols, pickets, and scouts, extending its actions and awareness in that general area, and that Belle had come into contact with some of those officers. Gaddy, e-mail, November 2013.
“If this Valley is lost”: Tanner, Stonewall in the Valley, 36.
blankets freezing: Selby, Stonewall Jackson, 232; Wright, e-mail, December 2013. Some of the luckier soldiers had waterproof sheets.
“when, all of a sudden”: Coffin, Stories of Our Soldiers, 47.
“sorrowfully upon me”: Boyd, In Camp and Prison, 272.
“I was dumb or I should have spoken”: Ibid.
“‘It is time for us to go’”: Ibid.
more scarecrow than human: Commire, Historic World Leaders, 376.
His horse, Fancy: Robertson, Stonewall Jackson, 230.
rode him with his feet drawn up: Ibid., 300.
“O my god!”: Greene, Wherever You Resolve to Be, 88.
“out of balance”: Davis, Civil War, 126.
A partial deafness in one ear: James I. Robertson Jr., “Stonewall in the Shenandoah: The Valley Campaign of 1862,” Civil War Times Illustrated, May 1972, 4–49.
he self-medicated with a variety of concoctions: Robertson, Stonewall Jackson, 85.
“My afflictions”: Ibid., 90.
Twice a day, rain or shine: Addey, Stonewall Jackson, 233–34; Corsan, Two Months in the Confederate States, 101.
“my little dove”: Ward, Burns, and Burns, Civil War, 115.
“He would have a man shot”: Ibid.
“Very commendable”: Ibid., 234.
“Really, ladies”: Chase, Story of Stonewall Jackson, 442; Hall, Patriots in Disguise, 101. There is a record of such an incident with Stonewall Jackson at Ramer’s Hotel in Martinsburg on September 11, 1862. The diary of Susan Nourse Riddle, of Martinsburg, Virginia, includes the following entry: “September 11 (1862)—I had scarcely gotten home with a dreadful headache when the Rebels began to come in, and before dinner the whole army was here. The girls all went to see General Jackson at Mr. Ramer’s and stripped his coat of its buttons.” Belle Boyd specified that her first meeting with Jackson occurred before First Manassas, when he was still a colonel and not yet known as “Stonewall.” Either there were two separate such incidents, or Belle incorrectly recalled the timing of her encounter. Thanks to Keith Hammersla, director of information services at the Martinsburg Public Library, for sending the Riddle diary excerpt.
“won’t you give me a button?”: Coffin, Stories of Our Soldiers, 47.
“He did not look old”: Ibid.
She Will Fool You out of Your Eyes
She yanked the cake from the platter: Boston Daily Adviser, January 3, 1862.
“I trust that in the future”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 206.
real means of communication: Ibid., 216.
“same strange fancy of the eye”: Ibid., 207.
barred with wood latticing: Davis, “‘Old Capitol,’” 206–34.
a farm called Conclusion: Blackman, Wild Rose, 59.
the final e was dropped from the family name: Ross, Rebel Rose, 3.
a particular taste for: Blackman, Wild Rose, 60.
thrown from his horse and lying on the ground: Ibid., 61.
the “extra” ones: Ibid., 68.
occasional lessons in a classroom: Tidwell, April ’65, 58.
“She was a celebrated belle and beauty”: Blackman, Wild Rose, 72.
“kindest and best friend”: Calhoun, Papers, 26:366.
“short, ugly, and slovenly in his dress”: Davis, “‘Old Capitol,’” 211.
“You have one of the hardest little rebels here”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 207.
“Rose, you must be careful”: Ibid.
“dirty enough”: Ibid., 213.
located across the prison yard: James I. Robertson Jr., “Prison for the Capital City,” UDC Magazine, August 1990, 18–19.
“she will fool you out of your eyes”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 214.
“not to shoot the damned Secesh woman”: Ibid., 218.
“Massa Lincoln”: Ibid., 220.
“The tramping and screaming”: Ibid., 222.
“indomitable rebel”: Ibid., 230.
“Oh Mamma, never fear”: Ibid., 216.
“Oh Mamma, the bed hurts”: Ibid., 222.
“To-day the dinner for myself and child”: Ibid., 217.
“round chubby face, radiant with health”: Ross, Rebel Rose, 171.
one of every seven Confederates serving in northern Virginia had contracted measles: McArthur, Burton, and Griffin, A Gentleman and an Officer, 54.
“unless it be the intention of your Government”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 244.
“Cyclops”: Ibid., 260.
“I command you to go out” to “It was farcical in the extreme”: Ibid., 245–46.
an involuntary jerking of the head: William Preston Johnson wrote to his wife that Greenhow “looked nervous and careworn. . . . Her eyes have a dim and somewhat faded look . . . and her head has a jerking motion, which the President says was not her manner, before her imprisonment.” Papers of Jefferson Davis, 8:245.
“vivacity is considerably reduced”: New York Times, April 15, 1862.
pried loose a plank in the floor: Beymer, On Hazardous Service, 158.
Rebel Vixens of the Slave States
“as a soldier, Frank Thompson was effeminate looking”: Edmonds, pension file.
“The mail was even more heartily received”: Dannett, She Rode with the Generals, 93.
“I will bring you now”: Sears, Young Napoleon, 166.
It would take three weeks: Ward, Burns, and Burns, Civil War, 95.
“stride of a giant”: Kagam and Hyslop, Eyewitness to the Civil War, 132.
“a fair specimen of Virginia mud”: Edmonds, Nurse and Spy, 75.
“black as midnight”: Ibid., 74.
“Why should blue eyes and golden hair”: Ibid., 73.
“rebel vixens of the slave states”: Ibid., 90.
which lasted up to two and a half years: Schroeder-Lein, Encyclopedia of Civil War Medicine, 81.
“To what fortunate circumstance”: The scene between Emma and the “rebel vixen” is depicted in Edmonds, Nurse and Spy, 90–94.
he had staged a performance of Othello: Settles, John Bankhead Magruder, 41.
a masterly display of special effects: Eicher, Longest Night, 216.
“making balloon reconnaissances”: Edmonds, Nurse and Spy, 90.
“It seems clear I have the whole force”: Sears, Young Napoleon, 178.
“I think you had better break”: McClellan’s Own Story, 265.
“The President very coolly telegraphed me”: Sandburg, Lincoln: The Prairie Years and the War Years, 287.
“No one but McClellan”: Catton, This Hallowed Ground, 138.
“I know of a situation I could get”: Edmonds, Nurse and Spy, 105.
“The subject of life and death”: Ibid.
Wise as Serpents and Harmless as Doves
“I suffer a double death”: Richmond Examiner, April 30, 1862.
“designing men in this City”: W. S. Ashe to Jefferson Davis, February 28, 1862, Letters Received by the Confederate Secretary of War, 1861–1865, RG 109, National Archives.
the arrest of thirty suspected Northern sympathizers: Speer, Portals to Hell, 20.
“It is the universal conviction”: Richmond Examiner, March 4, 1862.
“If you are going to imprison”: Ibid., March 3, 1862.
disloyalty and giving aid: Mortimer, Double Death, 179.
“die like a man”: Pinkerton, Spy of the Rebellion, 5
52.
“poor agonized creature”: Van Lew, “Occasional Journal.”
“desperate brigand looking villain”: Ibid.
winning three matches against full-grown bears: Speer, Portals to Hell, 94.
“The body of Webster has been brought back”: Van Lew, “Occasional Journal.”
oddly polite tone: Ibid.
was even picked as a juror: Richmond Whig, April 29, 1862.
a washer and ironer and a seamstress: Richmond Dispatch, August 7, 1862.
In an attempt to secure it further: Wheelan, Libby Prison Breakout, 32.
The place was overrun with vermin: Ibid., 45.
“sporting for Yankees”: Speer, Portals to Hell, 91.
“To ‘lose prisoners’ was an expression”: Van Lew, “Occasional Journal.”
“utter depravity”: Glazier, The Capture, 45.
kicking dying prisoners: Speer, Portals to Hell, 91.
threatened to shoot if he didn’t get up: Ibid.
“He never called the rolls”: Parker, Chatauqua Boy, 54–64.
She stationed two more of her bravest: Ibid.
he refused to allow her into Libby Prison: Van Lew, “Occasional Journal.”
Most escapees had cut their blankets into thirds: Casstevens, George W. Alexander, 89.
“I think I’ll have a look”: Horan, Desperate Women, 134.
“You have been reported several times”: Van Lew, “Occasional Journal.”
“I wish to tell you something”: Ibid.
“Nothing of that sort”: Ibid.
“Let me board here”: Ibid.
“We have to be watchful and circumspect”: Ibid.
A few days later she saw the same man: Ibid.; Furgurson, Ashes of Glory, 246.
A Woman Usually Tells All She Knows
“was obscured by clouds as dark”: Greenhow, My Imprisonment, 268.
“ethereal ear inhalator”: Washington Evening Star, January 15, 1862.
the senator and his wife had spent $75,000 annually: Ross, Proud Kate, 56.
“the most magnificent entertainments of the kind”: Alexandria Gazette, April 12, 1858.
“one of the few Northern politicians”: Blackman, Wild Rose, 216.