Death Piled Hard: A Tale of the Confederate Secret Services

by W. Patrick Lang

  In his mind's eye, he compared the atmosphere of relaxed companionship in the freight car with the wild charge cross Flat Creek. There was something wrong about this juxtaposition in his mind, something he must understand.

  The lieutenant sat at the far end of the car between two colored men. One was so light in skin and hair color that Farinelli had not at first understood the difference. The other was much older than either of the others, and dark. The three bent together, enjoying what seemed to be a long, perhaps unending, joke.

  Looking at them, he was troubled. He was sure he had seen the two blacks before, but could not remember them as individuals. In Europe, Africans were such a rarity that they always stuck in the mind. In the North, they were really more of an abstraction than anything else. There were few in the cities, except Washington, of course. The Negroes that he had seen with the army in the field had nearly all been “contrabands,” men and women who understood the precariousness of their position and who typically kept their eyes away from his. This was quite different. The Rebel infantrymen paid no attention to the two blacks, did not seem to be aware of them.

  Colonel Herbert had brought the 17th Virginia's combat train8 forward to carry the wounded back a mile to a place convenient for loading the cars. Farinelli noticed that the wagoneers were all blacks.

  Unexpectedly, he remembered the older Negro as the man who had handed him a plate and his supper. A short, heavily bearded corporal detached himself from a card game and rising stiffly made his way the length of the car toward the lieutenant. He limped on feet gone dead from sitting cross legged on the straw.

  The floor of the car swayed and bumped over the rough roadbed. Two hanging lanterns made weak patterns of shifting light on the floor and walls.

  The lieutenant and his Negroes raised their heads to watch him approach.

  The corporal bent beside them to say something.

  The three searched their pockets.

  The dark man found a twist of tobacco.

  Returning, the corporal seated himself in the doorway next to Farinelli. He cut himself a plug, and turned to the prisoner. "You don't chew, do you?" he asked.

  "No."

  "I didn’t think so. I never saw any French or Italians who did chew. Some English, but they'd been here a long time."

  Farinelli was intrigued by this statement. "And you know some Italian and French men, caporale?"

  The soldier glanced at him from the corner of an eye. "I wouldn't be laughin' at us...”

  "I meant no offense."

  The corporal nodded. "I was bo'sun in a three masted schooner belonged to the Devereuxs." He looked embarrassed. "If we had more navy, that’s where I’d be..."

  "The Devereuxs?"

  8 The collection of wagons and impedimenta which sustained the regiment's life in the field. "Yes. That's Jake Devereux over there with Bill and Snake." He pointed with his nose at the lieutenant.

  Farinelli saw that the three were watching him now.

  "The 'Elizabeth Mayo', a sweet little ship, tender beatin' to windward, but fast as hell!"

  "And where did you voyage in this vessel?"

  "Cherbourg, Genoa, the West Indies. Mostly we went to Europe, bringin' back fancy goods for the big stores in Washington and Baltimore. Those were good times."

  Farinelli thought for a minute. “The Devereuxs are rich?”

  The corporal laughed aloud, causing everyone in the car to turn and stare. "Good God, Yes! Jake over there could buy and sell you and me with pocket change. Ain't that right lootenant?" he yelled across the car.

  Devereux cupped one ear.

  "I was tellin' the Yank that you're filthy rich!"

  The lieutenant grinned. "That's right! I'm thinking of buying this whole company champagne and oysters as soon as we get to Richmond," he called back.

  The soldiers hooted at that. A general discussion of methods of oyster cookery began.

  "Banking, shipping, merchandising. The Devereuxs are in all that. They even have a farm around somewhere. I forget where, maybe out in the Shenandoah Valley. They're half French, the Devereux boys, Jake, Claude and Pat. Their ma's French. Pat's dead now. We heard that a while back. Claude used to be our comp'ny commander. He's gone. We don't know when he's comin' back..

  "And the Captain Fowle? Is he rich as well?"

  The soldier mumbled something inaudible to himself.

  "I am sorry," Farinelli said, "but I did not hear."

  "I said he's the richest of all. His daddy, William, owns a piece of everything

  around; the water works, the gas works, the railroad to Washington City, just about everything, or did before all this." He began to look suspicious. "Why do you want to know?"

  "I try to understand... You are not what I thought..." The Union officer felt oddly awkward. He had felt this way as a boy when forced by his parents to contemplate something which demonstrated the inadequacy of his views. "Who are the black men?" he demanded, rather more forcefully than was required by the moment.

  The corporal turned to look at the three.

  They stared back. "Snake Davis, the one on the right is our comp'ny cook, a damn good cook. He doctors us some too. I've known him all my life. The other one's Bill White. He isn't really in the comp'ny anymore. Runs all the drivers for the reg'ment. He's Jake's...” The soldier stopped himself in the middle of a thought.

  "Jake's? The man shook his head slowly. "I don't believe you'd understand." With that he moved away, rejoining his messmates in a game centered on a small pile of Confederate bills of large denomination.

  The Italian thought about the possibilities, looked at the three men again, pondered one possibility while watching them talk and decided against it. After an hour he began to see something in two of the faces. Thinking about the circumstances of Southern life, he decided that he did understand. With that he rolled over on his side, facing the board wall of the car to seek sleep. He had almost reached that blessed state, had almost found release from a day that would never end when he felt someone sit down behind his back. He rolled over to peer upward through sleep-blurred vision at Jake Devereux who sat cross legged beside him.

  “Yes?” he said in surprise. “I have made the impression that you gentlemen do not wish to speak with me...”

  Jake cocked his head and nodded in agreement. “That’s right. We don’t want to be your friends. Why should we? On the other hand, courtesy demands...”

  Farinelli sat up and looked at the other man, looked at his face. In spite of the weathered tan and worn field clothing, the lieutenant looked every inch the gentleman that the corporal had implied. “I am told that your family are big people in your native town.”

  Jake was pained by that, embarrassed by the custom among his people that such things may be known but are never referred to in the presence of the fortunate themselves. His discomfort did not show in the face. “Well, Charlie has always liked to talk...”

  The corporal sat nearby listening.

  “It must be that he misses the chance to pass the time with interesting foreign folks...” The eyes regarded Farinelli with a mildness that hid some secret purpose.

  “And you have not been abroad?”

  “Not too much, England once...”

  The corporal turned his head, looking out the boxcar door at nothing in

  particular.

  “You are Captain Fowle’s second in command?”

  “That’s right. These men were foolish enough to elect me to be lieutenant

  a while back. I used to carry a rifle in this company. Charlie was my squad leader...” Farinelli was now really interested. “This is not a difficulty?” In the Union units he had served with the same practice prevailed and he had always marveled at its existence.

  Jake shrugged while pulling his knees up and wrapping his arms around his ankles. “No, not for me, but I don’t think I’m anyone special. They just elected me. Actually, life was easier before...

  What are we playing at? Farinelli w
ondered. “I am told that you have lost a brother,” he asked looking for a conversational opening.

  The red-blonde beard twitched.

  God damn you Charlie, Jake thought, we need a muzzle for you.

  “Yes, he was killed at Gettysburg.”

  The Italian tried to remember what Charlie had said. “And he was commanding of this company before?”

  Jake Devereux willed himself into impassivity, resisted successfully the urge to look at Charlie Bowen. His guts had turned to ice.

  Bowen kept his gaze riveted on the black rectangle of the car door. He saw now that he had placed Claude Devereux in danger.

  I knew Claude was on Secret Service duty in Washington. Why did I say that? Why?

  He kept his eyes on the door.

  “My brother? Oh, he must mean Claude. Claude was in charge when this was a militia company before the war. That must be it... Is that what you mean, Charlie?”

  Bowen glanced at them. “That’s right, ‘59 or ‘60 it would have been.” He looked away.

  “Actually, Claude inclines toward the other side.” He grimaced, “a family tragedy, but so common these days...”

  The Italian sensed that something in this was untrue, but had no method available to separate the wheat from the chaff.

  “And Bill White?”

  This was truly a surprise. “What about him?” An edge showed in the young man for the first time.

  “Caporale Bowen said you were related.” By that the Italian meant connected in some way.

  Jake swung around to face Bowen.

  “No, I never,” he protested.

  Farinelli saw that all the nearby soldiers had stopped to listen.

  Jake turned back to him. A smile slowly suffused his face. “Bill’s mother was my nurse, what the Yankees call a ‘mammy’. She is a second mother to me, and Bill is like an older brother, or perhaps a cousin.” He started to get to his feet. “You need some sleep, major, as do we all. Another long day tomorrow I fear. Good night.” He went back to his own end of the car and resumed his place between the two Negroes, pulling his hat down over his eyes to shut out the light.

  Farinelli watched for a minute, then lay back down with his face to the wall resolved to think all this over at some later time. The engine pulled them onward through the darkness. It took them almost to the James, then paused at a junction just south of the river while linemen threw switches and started the string of cars running south toward Petersburg. Early in the morning, before the first light of false dawn, the train stopped at a siding.

  Farinelli stood by the side of the road and watched the regiment disappear into the darkness and mist. The long column of fours slouched forward, the men uncharacteristically quiet in their sleepiness. Their faces were hard to see in the shadow thrown by the broad brimmed hats.

  Corporal Bowen touched his sleeve as he passed. "You be good, now, major!” he said. Don't you be givin' these boys a hard time!" His eyes glowed brightly in the smoky half light of the torches.

  Behind the marching riflemen came the wagons. They rolled along in the night, a continuous procession of horses, mules and rumbling iron tires.

  Bill White walked into the light and stood beside Farinelli as the surgeon's three ambulances went by.

  Doctor Lewis led the little caravan on his old buckskin mare. His soldier assistants rode high on the seats beside the teamsters. Safe from the need to walk, the medical contingent had wrapped themselves in issue ponchos and captured Union Army rubber raincoats.

  The ammunition train followed, each board sided wagon stacked high with rough wooden boxes of cartridges.

  "Are these your people?" Farinelli asked loud enough to make his voice carry over the road noise. He was thinking of the drivers.

  White turned abruptly toward him. "Yes, they are!" Are the Yankees yours?" he asked with some heat.

  Farinelli saw his mistake, but could not immediately find the words to change what he had said. "In European armies, there are many, men of color," he offered lamely.

  "In the colonies mainly," White replied. His eyes held Farinelli unblinkingly. "I hear you are from Rome."

  "Yes, yes. Our house is near the Villa Borghese9." He realized how pointless the last words were.

  White said something.

  Farinelli lost most of it in the clatter of a wagon. "What? Did you say 'zoo'?" he asked incredulously.

  Snake Davis and his wagon approached leading the company kitchens.

  White held up a hand encased in a coarse work glove to stop the wagon. A black man riding beside Davis climbed over the seat, and into the back to make room. White stepped on a front wheel hub to lift himself onto the seat beside the cook. He looked down. "Gazellus Gazellus Arabicus" he said.

  "What?"

  "The Arabian peninsula gazelle, Major. That's what it says on the sign by the pen. They were always my favorites. You should visit them if you get back. Let's go."

  The dark, elderly, cook clucked to his team, slapping their backs with the reins. The wagon rolled on.

  Farinelli watched them go, confusion filling his head. He heard a chuckle behind him, and pivoted to look at the guard detail and wounded prisoners.

  Stony amusement filled most faces.

  9 The principal park of Rome.

  Chapter 22

  Drewry’s Bluff

  - 16 May, 1864

  If the Union Army had prepared adequately for the spring campaign, the general officer who commanded Confederate forces south of Richmond would himself have been considered a major factor.

  Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard was always a man to take seriously and thus far he had endured a frustrating war. Handsome, dark, Catholic, Creole and perfectly fluent in English, Beauregard had always been a symbol of the absorptive capacity of the American republic. First in his class at West Point, he had risen steadily in the elite Corps of Engineers in what could only be called a “distinguished army career.” His old friends called him "Gus". Their awareness of any real “difference” in him was largely limited to their appreciation of his ability as a cook. In 1861, the world had seemed open to him for all things. Nevertheless, in the time of decision he relinquished a newly achieved dignity as Superintendent of West Point to offer his sword to his native Louisiana. When she chose to join the Confederacy, he found himself catapulted to high rank as her most militarily experienced son. At Montgomery, the new government was creating an army, and his name was brought forward early by his friends. Jefferson Davis remembered the man well from his days as Secretary of War.

  Samuel Cooper, the Adjutant General, remembered him as well, but then, he remembered everyone.

  Perhaps that was enough, or possibly the need to placate the New Orleans political fraternity had some effect, but in any case, Beauregard received command at Charleston and the fame of having accepted Major Anderson's surrender of Fort Sumter. Joe Johnston and he then shared the laurels for the First Battle of Manassas, and the Southern people took them both to their hearts.

  He was named in the first appointment of full generals.

  After that, the trouble began. He had always believed in his own intellect. Now he considered it his duty to advise the president. He told him that they should concentrate the available force to fight this terribly strong enemy. He told him that it would be impossible to hold all the ground, everywhere, in all the states.

  Davis was not receptive.

  For his pains Beauregard was exiled to the west. There he planned and conducted the campaign which ended in battle at Shiloh Church, Tennessee. Albert Sydney Johnston had commanded there, and died, but Beauregard had held the reins. In that fight, he had come within a “gnat's eyelash” of destroying Grant forever. At the end of the first day, the Army of the Tennessee had stood with its back to the river with nowhere to go. Only Don Carlos Buell's unexpected arrival with the Army of the Cumberland had saved them.

  It had not mattered to Davis. The chief executive correctly saw him as the military leader of the polit
ical opposition, the "Western Concentration Bloc.”

  His next exile was command in the Carolinas where he held Charleston against all comers, held it against overwhelming odds, held it for a year and a half.

  When Ben Butler landed his Army of the James around City Point, Virginia, on 1 May, it was intended that he would operate directly against Richmond from the south. This would nicely complement Grant's drive straight south from the Rappahannock. His chance of doing that seemed increased by the South’s own organization of its forces.

  In accordance with the system of command which Beauregard had once fatally protested, Confederate Virginia was strangely divided into several military departments. Robert E. Lee's Department of Northern Virginia did not extend farther south than Richmond. Beyond that limit the great Creole's military fiefdom extended to Georgia.

  In the midst of the emergency, it may have occurred to someone in Richmond that a change of boundaries was a possibility, but Lee was wholly occupied from the 4th of May onward with the situation before him.

  Grant crossed the Rapidan that morning. It was out of the question to saddle him with more responsibility.

  Major General George Pickett happened to be in Petersburg when the Army of the James came ashore nearby. He wired Beauregard for instructions.

  "Hold the town. I am coming," was the reply.

  Always the man to follow orders, Pickett assembled a force of Virginia Reserves and militia,10 and with them kept Butler out of the city for several days, thus saving Richmond from quick occupation.

  In fulfillment of his promise, Beauregard stripped his department of every man and artillery piece that could be spared and sent them north, following close behind himself.

  He and Pickett then halted the forward momentum of Butler's movement inland from the James in a series of sharply fought and bloody little battles. Within a week they had caused him to draw to the shelter of his entrenched

  10 Old men and boys. bridgehead at Bermuda Hundred. Having watched Butler’s reactions, Beauregard decided that the commander of the Army of the James was not capable of dealing with an aggressive enemy. With that conviction as basis, he acted to destroy Butler’s army. The plan was simple. He would crush the Army of the James in the jaws of a giant nutcracker.