Death Piled Hard: A Tale of the Confederate Secret Services

by W. Patrick Lang

  Devereux knew that someone else must act for him. Someone else must strike the tall, bearded man. He could not do it.

  The women in his family circle suspected something hidden in Lincoln’s nature. They hinted at something unnatural in the president’s deep interest in the Devereux brothers. Claude did not think that Lincoln had a “lavender streak,” but this was of no great importance to him. He was as secure in his own sensuality as any man who ever lived. Lincoln might be whatever he was. That had nothing to do with Devereux.

  The increasing difficulty of dealing with his two women was of much greater importance. Hope did not believe him faithful to her. Nevertheless, the memory of her sweet and passionate self called him home even now as he sat in the cold Pennsylvania wind. At the same time, Amy Biddle’s body had become something which he could not imagine giving up. Her sad and needy devotion to him was matched by the heat of the newly discovered sexuality that he had awakened in her. The foolishness of his reckless philandering impressed him in his soberer moments. He was certain that the triangle he had created would end in emotional disaster, but he was powerless to help himself, a prisoner of the very qualities and characteristics that made him such a formidable spy.

  The clouds came over fast, soaring across the sky. They colored those listening below with a harlequin succession of light and darkness.

  Must be something symbolic in that... I ought to be able to think of a quotation… He could not. Everett droned on. There were a lot of people in the audience, all sitting on those round backed chairs often seen in cafés or church basements. There were graves everywhere. The work of reinterring the Yankee dead went on. Across the field where Pickett’s men had attacked there were open holes. The bodies had been buried there just after the battle. The fresh dirt on a lot of the graves looked grayish brown. Yankee dirt. There were caskets along one wall of the new cemetery.

  Across the new burial ground, Claude could see the red brick arch on the road leading into the town’s burial ground. “Evergreen Cemetery” was inscribed on the arch. He remembered that Bill White and he had taken refuge there when they arrived with Howard’s Corps on the first day of the battle. He remembered the Sanitary Commission wagon they had ridden. He looked down the ridge again. A red bird settled on a branch in his line of vision to the group of trees.

  What the hell are you doing here this time of year? he thought and smiled. Is that you, Pat, come back to visit us on this day of days? What should I do? Tell me. Is it my task to kill this man? Is that what you are here to tell me? Surely not? I have no taste for murder. Tell me I have no taste for blood.

  Do I?

  Everett’s voice rose to a closing note. “But they, I am sure, will join us in saying, as we bid farewell to the dust of these martyr heroes, that wheresoever throughout the civilized world the accounts of this great warfare are read, and down to the latest period of recorded time, in the glorious annals of our common country, there will be no brighter page than that which relates the Battles of Gettysburg.”

  The applause was polite but less than deafening. Devereux was struck by a moment of doubt as he thought of the last draft of Lincoln’s remarks. The copy that Lincoln had given him, written in Devereux’s hand and covered with Lincoln’s notations, was in his breast pocket.

  I should keep this as a souvenir of the occasion he thought.

  The tall bearded man approached the speaker’s rostrum. He began by putting on his spectacles and after looking at the crowd, spoke these words. “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

  Applause was sustained and thunderous. With lead in his heart Devereux knew that he had failed. He had made the speech better. He had encouraged Lincoln to make extravagant claims of the justice of the Union cause in the belief that any fool would see the irony of such claims for a cause so patently aggressive and revolutionary. He had been wrong. The Yankee fools accepted the words at face value and felt the better for them. This speech had wings for them.

  Lincoln looked at him amid the applause and nodded in gratitude. Devereux knew then that he could never escape responsibility for what this president would do to the Southern people. He did not want that responsibility but it was his portion, and not to be avoided.

  The little red bird flew away toward the other side of the valley, toward Seminary Ridge.

  --------------------------------------------------------------------------Jubal Early came to Thanksgiving dinner. He sat on a saw horse in the barn where they ate, a tin plate of venison and wild turkey in one hand, a tea cup of whiskey beside him.

  The troops sat in the hay eating happily. Balthazar had taken charge of the cooking; supervising the half dozen black cooks that Harris recruited in Hays’ brigade.

  The day the cooking started, he was pleased to have several men volunteer to help. Among them was Smith, the "D" Company commander. After watching his creation of an admirable kettle of turkey soup, Balthazar was sure that Smith, like Harris, was professionally trained.

  Early complimented them on the stuffing, said he had never had anything quite like it, and accepted a second helping.

  He had a chaplain with him, a French Jesuit who worked in the military hospitals in Lynchburg.2

  The priest and Balthazar chatted in their own language during dinner. The men listened to this with interest, turning from one to the other, examining their commander, seeking assurance of something they could not name.

  After dinner, the priest offered his thoughts on the meaning of such a remembrance in wartime and the injustice of the war being waged against them by the North.

  The soldiers listened politely.

  When the chaplain finished his talk, Early stood up and announced that General Ewell was gone on sick leave for his old wound, and that he would be

  2 Louis Hippolyte Gache, S.J.

  in command of the Second Corps until Ewell came back. He said that they would be attached for now to corps headquarters. You could see from the soldiers’ faces that they were not sure if that was good or bad.

  The priest offered to say Mass if there were Catholics present. A number raised their hands and he moved off to a corner of the barn with them.

  Balthazar asked Early if he wished to attend the service. After a moments thought, the general shrugged and said he could not see any reason not to do so. "After all," he said, "the Pope has taken note of us. He, at least, recognizes us."

  After Mass, the Jesuit asked if Balthazar wished him to hear his confession.

  The answer was no.

  A courier came at four o'clock that morning with the news that Meade was across the Rapidan, marching southeast through the Wilderness.

  Balthazar had found among his men a soldier who had been a bugler in a
regular U.S. cavalry regiment. "Reveille" sounded sweet and compelling in the darkness of the camp.

  Chapter 10

  Mine Run

  Early formed his command for the march with his own division in the lead. He gave Harry Hays charge of it and Hays, of course, put what was left of his “Tigers” up in front.

  Balthazar arrived with his men at headquarters by five, falling in behind the staff and provost guard on the road.

  They all went down the Orange Turnpike together, Harry Hays’ division in front, followed by those commanded by Robert Rodes and Edward Johnson. All of Second Corps moved off in a long snake of steaming men and horses.

  The soldiers looked like bears in their earth colored clothing. White crystals grew in their beards. The heavy brogans kicked the surface of the macadamized road free of hoarfrost that had settled on it overnight. Soon there were black grooves in the white, formed as the men passed in their fours.

  Time settled into the endless pattern of long route marches. Talk died out after the first hour. The cold gradually released its iron grip on their feet as warm blood reached the extremities. With faces flushed, the riflemen shifted the load across their backs. Ten minutes in each hour they rested by the side of the road, rifles stacked in the center. Early had learned this lesson from his hero, the martyred Stonewall. The men would always get their scheduled breaks so long as he commanded. Four hours passed in the winter morning. A freezing drizzle descended on them. The troops marched doggedly down the road into the unknown. They held their arms as close as possible to their bodies to keep in the warmth of their vitals.

  The head of the column reached the hamlet of Locust Grove at one in the afternoon. They found Yankee pickets taking their ease under tarpaulin shelters in the heavy growth around the junction where the Plank Road led to the southeast.

  Colonel William Monaghan3 shook out his five hundred Tigers in line of battle and swept through the Federal outguard like the wind rattling leaves on a cold day. He drove them east for ten minutes, and then halted astride the turnpike to wait for Hays and Rodes to come up.

  A mile back down the column, Balthazar moved his men off the road to make way for a battery which drove straight up the highway to reach the

  3 Third commander of 6th Louisiana Regiment (The Irish Brigade). This unit had the highest percentage of foreign born of all the Tiger regiments (54%). It was said of them that they "were turbulent in camp and requiring a strong hand, but responding to kindness and justice, and ready to follow their officers to the death." Monaghan, who like most of his men was Irish born, was killed August 25th, 1864.

  “Tigers.” The horses breathed fog and clattered onward without the urging of the drivers. The road was slick and animals scrambled to keep their feet beneath them.

  Smoot stepped up on a stump to see as far down the road as possible. He looked at the battery pushing its way through the hurrying troops ahead. He could see up the tunnel of trees and slash a long way.

  Several hundred feet ahead, Early's mounted staff and cavalry escort towered above the infantry. As Smoot watched, this body of mounted men kicked their animals into motion, and followed the battery toward Wilderness Church, disappearing around a bend in the turnpike.

  The sound of firing around the crossroad ahead died away. Half an hour passed beside the turnpike. Men began to stamp their feet impatiently in the snow, waving their arms and yelling at each other with fog drenched voices.

  The "D" company commander, Smith, built a fire around which his men gathered.

  Seeing this, other companies started looking for wood.

  Balthazar stood at Smith's fire, his hands outstretched to the heat. He held the Sharps carbine under one arm, the muzzle pointing at the flame. In his brown clothing, he might have been a country gentleman out for a day in search of rabbits.

  The men around the fire kept looking at him sideways, talking to each other, but studying him all the same.

  Behind him, to the north of the road, the open ground of a meadow filled with the wagons of the corps' trains. Horses and mules stood patiently, turning their heads to see as others of their kind came to stand beside them, shivering and miserable in the weather.

  A rifle shot rang in the trees beyond the gathering trains, and then another. A ragged fusillade ripped through the wood. White smoke rolled out in clouds.

  Amongst the wagons, the drivers struggled with animals that reared and stared wildly about.

  Bullets hummed and cut canvas.

  A mule went down, kicking and screaming in pain.

  The drivers leapt for their seats, turning the teams and whipping them with the slack ends of reins. With a remarkable show of unanimity they ran their wagons off the field in a clamor of wheels and ringing tires. On a front of two hundred yards they careened through the battalion.

  Men dodged from side to side, seeking shelter behind trees, laughing and throwing rocks at the animals to turn them away.

  With a rush the onslaught passed by into the woods south of the road.

  All were gone from the field except for a Negro teamster alone with the task of cutting a dead mule out of its harness. The bullets kept coming to kick up dirt all around him. He finished up with a big clasp knife and pulled the live mules around to follow the others. Half way across the snow covered grass he met Balthazar's advancing battalion.

  They came on in open order, spread across most of the clearing. The four man fighting teams picked their way over the ground, looking for the nearly invisible folds in the earth that would mean survival if the fire grew heavy.

  The teamster slapped the back of his beasts, urging them through the hole which the infantry made for him.

  The men waved as he passed. “Uncle, you go now. We’ll take care of this...”

  He waved back.

  "Fire at will and then halt in the tree line!" Balthazar yelled loud enough to be heard along his front.

  A scattered volley swept the battalion front as the fours moved ahead, the soldiers taking turns loading, and moving.

  The rolling advance was more than the Federal skirmishers had expected. As the battalion came near, they ran. They did not seem real people. They were blue backs, dimly seen in the winter sun, disappearing quickly in the obscure shadows.

  Balthazar blew a silver whistle that he wore on a chain around his neck.

  Some of the troops, especially the old timers, had objected to its use in training, saying they were not dogs, but he insisted and now they halted as one man just inside the trees.

  An odd silence settled over the wood to their front. Just occasionally, the crisp snap of a stick came to them through the grey wetness of the underbrush.

  At his post behind the left of the line, Smoot wiggled his toes, feeling the cold damp in his socks, wondering how long they would stand still while their feet froze. He noticed soldiers looking back over their shoulders at the road and turned to see Johnson's division coming into sight, marching like a dun colored river into the meadow, forming a wall along the ground over which the battalion had advanced.

  After a minute, the long lines rolled forward stamping over the snow slick grass, to pass Balthazar's men, smiling and nodding in a hearty way as they went by.

  Smoot looked at a battle flag as a colonel and the color sergeant behind him brushed past.

  "33rd Virginia Infantry" was embroidered on the heavy cloth.

  Stonewall Brigade , he thought4.

  In the battalion men looked at each other and smiled. They visibly began to relax, secure in the belief that the irritating skirmishers in front of them would soon be gone.

  Behind the center of the battalion line Balthazar stood quietly watching the backs of Johnson's men disappearing in the gloom, listening to the receding sounds of crackling and spitting.

  Smoot watched him.

  They all watched him.

  Smoot saw a grin break out on the dark face of a corporal who stood beside him. The man was staring down the line at Balthazar's bulky form.
<
br />   "What's so funny?" Smoot asked.

  "The major," the soldier replied. "He's something special...”

  Smoot turned from him to look at Balthazar again.

  The silver whistle shrilled in the heavy winter air. The French soldier looked to right and left and waved them forward.

  The battalion followed Johnson's moving line of infantry through the wood. Mist hung low among the trees. Grey snow lay in miniature drifts against the trunks, climbing the bark, reaching toward the branches. It was early for snow, but there it was.

  They halted at the far side of the wood. Surprisingly, it was only about two hundred yards wide. Beyond the edge of the trees was another meadow, perhaps a quarter mile across.

  Ahead of them, Johnson's division advanced in line against a rail fence in the middle of the open space.

  There was a blue presence behind the fence. It was not clear how many there were.

  Red flags dotted the moving Southern line, outlining the regiments and brigades, marking the skeleton of the division.

  A blue mass rose behind the fence. It stood elbow to elbow to elbow, a solid mass of Yankees. The rifles came up. A wall of dirty grey-white smoke rolled out, covering the Union troops, making them invisible.

  4 The 2nd, 4th, 5th, 27th and 33rd Virginia Infantry were together named by act of Congress, "The Stonewall Brigade". These regiments were raised mainly in the Shenandoah Valley. They were part of the command which Stonewall Jackson assembled at Winchester in 1861 to defend his district. This command, including the brigade, made up a division in Jackson's 2nd Corps. The division came to be known as the Stonewall Division in the way that military nicknames seem to spread.