American Struggle

by Veda Boyd Jones

  Andrew took the pick and carefully cleaned Bordeaux’s hooves and checked his shoes, while Philip untangled the mane and forelock and Daria combed his tail. When they were finished, Philip asked, “Do you think Mrs. Fisk would mind if I sat in on your family prayer time this evening?”

  Daria closed the stall door and fastened it tightly with the wire. “She wouldn’t mind. You already seem like one of the family.” Daria smiled as she said the words. It really did seem like Philip Harnden belonged.

  Mr. Martin was now the only person in the Fisk Boardinghouse who never lifted a finger to help. Having both Philip and Mrs. Ryan as boarders made things easier, because their rooms were always neat and because they enjoyed lending a hand, even when it was time to clean. Over Mama’s protests, of course.

  As March warmth began to chase winter’s barrenness from the air, Mama’s countenance changed. The worry lines were vanishing.

  When she sat at her secretary to work on the account books, she came away with a smile on her face. Daria had to admit, her mother’s decision to open a boardinghouse had been wise.

  One gloriously sunny Saturday after the cleaning was finished, Daria and Andrew asked their mother if they could go riding with the corporal. “But, Andrew, we have to do the repairs you promised you would help me with today.”

  Andrew sighed and nodded. “Daria,” Mama continued, “why don’t you and Philip go for a ride? It’ll be all right. Andrew can join you when we finish.”

  Philip went to the livery to rent a mount. “Slim pickings,” he told Daria with a laugh when he returned with the horse. Daria had to agree. The horse’s coat was dull. His bearing was saggy and his manner listless. “All the good horses have gone to war, just as all the good men have,” Philip joked.

  “Where shall we go?” Daria asked as she saddled Bordeaux.

  “I should like to meet your brother, Christian. Let’s head out in that direction.”

  “He may not be there,” Daria warned. “We never know if he’s away with a train or home between trips.” “The ride will be enjoyable either way.”

  “I’ll take you through the hills,” Daria said as she mounted Bordeaux. “Christian’s cabin is at the edge of town.”

  It was a perfect day to be out, and Daria was thankful, too, for the sense of hope Philip seemed to have given the entire family. She breathed deeply of the spring air and was lulled by the gentle squeaking of the leather saddle and clopping of the hooves. She led the way through the sparser neighborhoods on Mount Auburn and Mount Adams.

  “How’s your leg faring?” she asked as they came through a cool stand of trees at the foot of Mount Adams. She’d noticed that Philip stuck his cane through the loops on the saddle so he’d have it handy.

  “I wasn’t sure at first how riding would affect it, but it’s not too bad. Nothing I can’t tolerate.”

  Philip never said too much about the leg, and Daria wondered if he was in pain much of the time. The man never complained.

  “How’s school?” Philip asked.

  Daria smiled. “I don’t mind school so much, but I would rather be helping with the war effort.” “What’s your favorite subject?”

  “I love to read. I read almost anything I can get my hands on.”

  “I didn’t like school for a long time,” Philip confessed.

  “You didn’t?”

  “I surely did not.”

  Daria was always surprised when someone told her they did not like school. And yet she knew how much her twin hated the classroom. Maybe there was hope for Andrew yet, if Philip, too, had had trouble in school. “What did you do about it?”

  “A kindly teacher got me interested in reading. ‘Books,’ she said to me, ‘are our windows to the world.’ At first I didn’t believe her. But she was patient with me.”

  “I don’t remember never liking to read. But Andrew—he has a lot of problems with reading.”

  “Maybe I can help him.”

  Daria pulled Bordeaux to a stop and let Philip’s weaker horse catch up. “Do you think you could? He knows that Mama and Papa are disappointed when he doesn’t get good marks, and it makes Andrew so sad. I try to help him, but …” How could she explain the walls that had risen between her and her brother?

  Philip smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “If he gives me a chance. And gives himself a chance. Think he could do that?”

  A wounded corporal wanted to take the time to help Andrew. Daria felt confident. “If you’re willing, Andrew would be a dunce to refuse.”

  They had reached a creek in a wooded area at the edge of town, and they let their horses stop for a drink. From there, it was only a short distance to Christian’s old cabin.

  “There it is.” Daria pointed. “That’s where Christian lives.”

  The cabin was made of squared logs with a rock chimney at one end. The area around it was cross-fenced. Several horses grazed in one of the corrals.

  “Smoke’s coming from the chimney. That means someone’s there,” Daria said.

  As they approached, the front door of the cabin opened. There stood Christian. “Hey there, Daria. What’s going on? Welcome!”

  “Christian! I have someone I want you to meet.” Quickly Daria slid out of the saddle. She wondered if Philip needed assistance, but she didn’t know how to offer help without embarrassing the man. But Philip slid off, landed on his good leg, and quickly grabbed the cane to steady himself. Daria reached over and took the reins and hitched both horses to the rail out front.

  “Christian, I’d like you to meet our newest boarder, Corporal Philip Harnden. He was with Papa at Fort Donelson.”

  Daria could tell from Christian’s expression that he was pleased by this. “You’ve seen Captain Fisk?”

  The two shook hands as Philip said, “That I have. He’s a good man and a fine doctor.”

  Christian led the way inside the cabin. It was dim inside and mostly in a state of disarray. Not much of Mama’s teachings on cleanliness seemed to have rubbed off on Christian. But then, two other railroad men lived there, as well. A rough-hewn table sat in the middle of the room with two cots off to the side. A straight ladder led to the loft, where the third bed was located. On another wall, wooden shelves held Christian’s books.

  “Lucky for you I got coffee on,” Christian told them. He fetched three tin cups and proceeded to fill them from the pot on the wood-burning stove. After Christian sat down, he asked Philip a number of questions about Tennessee and the fighting there.

  “I never go that way,” Christian told him, “and the newspapers back East act like that area doesn’t exist. All they write about is the Army of the Potomac.”

  Then it was Philip’s turn to ask questions. “So what’s McClellan planning now that the winter is over?”

  Christian shook his head. “No one knows. I don’t think the president even knows. But most people are getting pretty impatient to have something happen to get this war over with.”

  “I’ve heard the number of troops Lincoln has amassed. Are there really that many? And where are they all?”

  Christian went to his bureau and came back with a piece of brown wrapping paper and the stub of a pencil. He drew lines and diagrams, explaining where all the troops were deployed. As Daria listened and sipped the bitter coffee, she wondered which little part of that map marked Roy’s whereabouts.

  Christian and Philip seemed to take to one another just fine, and this made Daria even more pleased. Christian told a few tales that Daria knew he would never tell in Mama’s presence for fear of worrying her. For instance, Christian explained how the engineers had lined their cabins with boilerplate to protect themselves from the bullets of Rebel snipers. One time, they nearly ran into a stretch of tracks where Rebels had torn up the rails.

  “If we’d hit it, I probably wouldn’t be sitting here telling about it,” Christian said matter-of-factly.

  As she sat there listening, Daria suddenly realized that her brother was a war hero just as much as t
hose who carried guns into battle. She couldn’t wait to tell Andrew.

  The afternoon sped by as the two men swapped stories by the dozens. All too soon it was time to leave. As they rode back into town a different way, Daria suggested they go to the livery to return Philip’s mount and then ride home double on Bordeaux.

  It didn’t seem right to have Philip sit on the rump behind her, so Daria offered the saddle to Philip and hoisted herself up on the back. She never thought she’d want another person to be in control of Papa’s horse. But with Philip, it just seemed right.

  All the way home from the livery stable, Philip joked about the difference between the old nag from the livery and the regal Bordeaux.

  One afternoon, a week after the visit with Christian, Daria went into Philip’s room to do the sweeping. Philip, Mama had told her, was downtown at the bookstore for the day. Daria took up the rugs, placed them out in the hall, and began sweeping the floor. Suddenly, a book on the bureau caught her eye. She dropped the broom and went to pick it up. On the cover were the words Base Ball Guidebook by Henry Chadwick.

  “A book,” she whispered. “A book about baseball!”

  CHAPTER 12

  Baseball Returns

  When Philip arrived home just before supper, Daria ran out to the omnibus to greet him. “I wasn’t snooping, but I couldn’t help noticing you have a book about baseball in your room. Do you like baseball?”

  “I love the game,” Philip said. “Played it all the time back in Chicago before the war.”

  Daria felt a surge of excitement race through her. “We have a ball and bat!”

  “Well, fancy that.” Philip leaned heavily on his cane as he made his way up the front walk. “You ever heard of Chadwick—the man who wrote that book?”

  “Never.”

  “He’s chairman of the National Association of Baseball Players in New York. Men on the teams there call him Father Chadwick. He’s been writing about baseball for the New York Clipper for a number of years now. Somewhere in my things, I have a few clippings of those writings.”

  Daria could hardly believe what she was hearing. For all these months, baseball had been totally lost to her. She had worried that by the time the war was over and people had time for baseball again, she would be too old to play. Lately, Mama had stopped talking about Daria having to act like a young lady, but Daria knew her reprieve would be temporary. Sooner or later, she would have to grow up. But maybe, just maybe, she’d have the chance to play baseball again first.

  “Seems to me,” Philip said, “we’ve found a good book to begin a little project.”

  “What do you mean?” Andrew had joined them, and now he hopped up the stairs of the porch and opened the door to let Philip come through. Philip took off his hat and hung it on the hall tree. He gave Daria a wink.

  “How about we make a deal, Andrew? You read the book by Chadwick, and then we’ll play some ball.” He looked down at his leg as though he wanted to curse it. “Well, what I mean is, we’ll play as much as I can. And I can give you plenty of pointers. How’s that?”

  Andrew grinned. “A right fair deal, sir.”

  “Then we’ll progress from there to another book, a few more ball practices, another book, and a few more practices.”

  “Sort of like earning the practices by reading a book?”

  “Precisely.” Philip gave Daria another wink, and she grinned back at him. Not only was she going to get to play baseball again, but Philip had found a way to help Andrew with his reading at the same time.

  Daria smiled as she watched the way Andrew could hardly wait until all the chores were done, Bordeaux was taken care of for the night, and prayer time was over. She knew he was eager to start on the book. Imagine, her brother actually wanted to read a book!

  After a couple of days, Andrew had finished the entire book, and they were ready to start playing. Philip decided that he would use a crutch during their playing times. That way his hands would be free for catching the ball. They devised a practice area between the apple orchard and the carriage house. Daria hadn’t been this happy since before the guns first fired at Fort Sumter almost a year ago.

  News from the war early in April told of a terrible battle near a little Methodist church in Tennessee called Shiloh. The Confederates under General Albert S. Johnston attacked General Grant’s lines at Pittsburgh Landing. After an initial success on the part of the Confederates, they were finally driven back.

  Mrs. Voorhees pointed out the places on the map at school. Though it seemed a small victory, with thousands of lives lost, still it meant more than one hundred miles of the Mississippi River had been taken over by the Union forces. It was difficult to cheer for the victories, though, when so many were dead and wounded.

  Nearly every moment of every day, Daria wondered about Papa—where he was and what he was doing and if he was still safe.

  Following the battle at Shiloh, hundreds of wounded began streaming into the hospitals in Cincinnati. Many of the women were asked to help care for the soldiers. Mama and Jenny shifted their work from the sewing circle to helping out at the hospitals. After working all day with the wounded men, they were always very quiet.

  Toward the close of April, the bells across the city pealed for hours as more good news arrived. Commander David Glasgow Farragut had taken the city of New Orleans. Andrew purchased several papers, and at the supper table that evening, Philip read bits and pieces of the news aloud to everyone. Farragut was a Southerner by birth, yet he had chosen to defend the Union.

  The paper explained that Farragut had a fleet of seventeen ships with which he had created a blockade across the mouth of the Mississippi. When Farragut learned that the Union forces were at Vicksburg, he determined to take New Orleans, which was seventy miles upriver. To get there, he had to take his fleet past heavily armed

  Confederate forts. But the brave commander did what he set out to do—he took New Orleans. It was a great day.

  A letter from Papa, which arrived many weeks after Shiloh, told bits and pieces of how terrible that battle had been. When a letter from Papa came, Mama first read it alone. Then the family gathered in private in the parlor to read it together. As Mama read the letter aloud, they knew Papa wasn’t telling a fraction of the details of the bloody battle. Instead, he wrote of the lovely peach orchard that had been in full bloom before the battle:

  Such a small thing it was, to have the lovely trees destroyed, and yet it saddened me to see the pretty blossoms shredded to bits along with all the dear young men.

  Papa also told how in March, while General Grant was inspecting the lines in the rain, his horse fell and pinned the general’s leg. Papa had been the one to tend to the general’s swelling ankle.

  We hear out here that newspapers back East are speaking disparagingly about Grant. But know this from me; he is a fine man and a sterling leader. I would take one Grant over ten McClellans any day.

  Mama looked at each of them. Mary Ellen was Mama’s dear friend, but they knew Papa would never say such a thing unless he truly believed it. Papa never gossiped.

  “Never let that statement go any further than this room,” Mama instructed them firmly. “Poor Mary Ellen has enough grief without our adding to it in any way.”

  In spite of the war, that spring was filled with a number of good things. Philip was invited to several teas about town, where Mama introduced him to Lucy Hayes and Mary Ellen McClellan, as well as to Uncle Jon and Aunt Ellie. In May, Philip decided to take a clerk job at the bookstore to occupy his spare time. Then he joined a literary club that met in the back room of the bookstore.

  The glamour of war seemed to have lessened its grip on the boys at school. As the war progressed, fewer boys remained. When the weather grew warmer, Daria and Andrew were able to organize a few children to at least make a semblance of a ball team. Recess was fun again.

  Daria was glad to see that Andrew was enjoying himself again. She could see that the past year had brought changes to both of them, but
the changes in Andrew had bothered her almost more than the changes in herself. She was proud of her brother, though, because he seemed perfectly content to do “women’s work.” He thought nothing of serving food to their boarders, washing up the dishes, emptying the chamber pots, or shaking out rugs.

  As the end of school drew near, Andrew’s marks had made a definite turnaround. They were still not as good as Daria’s, but they were much better than the failing marks he’d had before. Daria and Philip confessed to her mother that they had planned the “tutoring.”

  “I must admit that I am very happy with Andrew’s progress,” Mama remarked.

  Philip continued to bring books to Andrew. At first Philip made every effort to bring books he knew would interest Andrew, but as their project progressed, he occasionally slipped in a book of essays or poetry.

  When Andrew wrinkled up his nose at them, Philip just laughed. “This is a new step in our project,” he explained. “For every book you read because you like the topic, you must read something in which you have no knowledge or interest. This is how you will stretch your mind.”

  Andrew knew there would be no baseball playing unless he cooperated. But oddly enough, Daria knew he wanted to cooperate. For the first time in Andrew’s life, he wanted to “stretch his mind,” as Philip called it.

  Mrs. Voorhees was delighted over the change in Andrew’s attitude at school and praised him in front of the other students. Daria gave her brother a big smile.

  This year, the city council changed their minds about suspending last-day-of-school ceremonies. For the most part, people were learning that they had to go on living in spite of the fact that war was ravaging the country.

  Though the spring had been unusually rainy, commencement day was dry, sunny, and warm. Marching bands played as all the students filled the street in a mass parade. Spectators lined the streets. Many of the convalescing soldiers stood or sat in front of the military hospital, watching the students file by. At the city square, students gave speeches and performed musical numbers.