The Face of Heaven

by Murray Pura

  “I love the smell of your hair. All around you is blood and mud and dying and you always manage to smell like a bouquet of lilacs.”

  “I discipline myself to wash my hair every morning. Though sometimes I confess I wonder if it’s worth the effort.”

  “It’s worth the effort to me. Even if I’m not there every morning to enjoy it. I miss brushing your hair out for you.”

  “Well, if we stay here long enough perhaps we can get back to our old married-couple routines like that.” She smiled. “I miss hearing you say you love running your hands through the flames.”

  But he didn’t smile, though his eyes came from the river to rest firmly on hers. “There will be some time. I don’t know how much. Weeks, I think—you see the men have shoveled out walkways and ditches and put up tents with awnings made from woolen blankets and pine boughs. I believe it will be the same as last year—Lee licked us at Manassas Junction, the brigade covered the army’s retreat, and Lee came after us into Maryland and we had a fight. Now he’s licked us at Chancellorsville, the brigade’s covered the army’s retreat a second time, and it’s only a matter of time before Lee comes north. He has Harrisburg on his mind again, I’m sure of it. And Washington. If there’s one flaw in Lee’s makeup it’s pride. He means to complete what he wasn’t able to complete in ’62—the invasion of Pennsylvania, the capture of Harrisburg, the entrapment of Washington, and the destruction of the Army of the Potomac.”

  “Is this what you’ve found out by your reconnoitering on horseback?”

  “Partly from that. Also from prisoners. From other sources. Stonewall’s death will set Lee back a few weeks. But then he’ll gather the Army of Northern Virginia together and strike as hard as he can. He’s not afraid of us.”

  “Should he be?”

  “Of generals like Hooker and Burnside and McClellan? No. But when the Iron Brigade gets a chance to fight he should reckon on the backbone Stonewall saw in us. The men are in a sour mood because we’re frustrated, Lyndy. At Fredericksburg only the 24th Michigan got to put up a fight. At Chancellorsville the 6th Wisconsin and 24th Michigan led the brawl on the other side of the river there and that was it. We didn’t do anything else. The great battles are being decided without us.

  “The Lord knows I hate the killing, but the Lord also knows I want the fighting if the fighting can end this war more quickly. At Brawner’s Farm we fought Stonewall and Lee to a standstill. We did it again at South Mountain. We did it a third time at Antietam Creek. Let Lee come after us, Lyndy, and may God give us a chance to stand squarely in his path this time like David.”

  Lyndel watched the green fire tear through her husband’s eyes. He seemed to burn the air that moved around him as he spoke. She felt a pricking of fear in her stomach.

  “You talk as if the 19th Indiana and the Iron Brigade are ready to change the course of the war and take on Lee’s army single-handed,” she said.

  A softer color came into his eyes and he touched her cheek, playing with a loose strand of her hair and twisting it around his fingers. “We have some time. God has given us a second honeymoon. Let’s make the most of it.”

  Now he smiled again and strong warmth filled her as she saw his love for her.

  “A virtuous woman who can find?” he recited. “For her price is far above rubies.”

  He removed her kapp and began to pull the pins from her hair until it fell in a scarlet shower upon her shoulders and down her back. She didn’t stop him. Nor did she look about her to see if anyone was watching as he ran his hands through her hair and placed his lips against hers.

  “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth,” she murmured, “for thy love is better than wine. Oh, Nathaniel, I wish we had our log cabin back.”

  “Perhaps,” he said as he moved his lips over her long shining hair, “the army will consider letting out the Fitzhugh mansion to us for thirty days. I think I can just swing it on a second lieutenant’s pay.”

  23

  The army didn’t let the Fitzhugh House out to Lyndel and Nathaniel but it didn’t bother them when they met there for privacy. Nathaniel repaired a table and chairs that had been abandoned and set them up in a back parlor. Sometimes the two of them ate there, sometimes they just sat together and talked. It could never be like the log house, for Nathaniel refused to room with his wife while his men slept in the field.

  At night Nathaniel lay on the ground next to Lyndel’s brother Levi while his wife slept in a wagon next to Morganne. Yet to Lyndel the evenings in the Fitzhugh House by the Rappahannock had a charm and wonder all their own, and no experience surpassed sitting in the parlor with the door shut and one candle between her and her husband—his rugged face and green eyes glowed like gold.

  By day she nursed the sick and wounded of the 19th Indiana, the Iron Brigade, and the First Corps while Nathaniel drilled his men. For five days in late May, the 19th Indiana and three other regiments were sent out to rescue the 8th Illinois Cavalry but they only marched in a circle for one hundred miles and came back, finding nothing they’d been told they would find.

  Sometimes Nathaniel left for days on reconnaissance missions as the Union did its best to keep an eye on the movements of Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia. She was aware that the cavalry were normally used for this sort of work and wasn’t sure what Nathaniel’s role was, except it didn’t take people long to see that he was an exceptional rider. He wouldn’t talk about where he went but now and then there was the whiff of burnt powder on his uniform when she hugged him, and twice she watched him reloading his revolver at the parlor table with lead balls.

  At the end of May the commander of the Iron Brigade, Long Sol Meredith, designated the Fitzhugh House as a sleeping residence for the only two women traveling with the army, Lyndel and Morganne. Nathaniel and Levi and the others in the platoon cleaned up two of the bedrooms on the second floor after repairing the staircase, and a pair of beds was put together with the help of some of the carpenters in the company. The women washed and hung curtains they found in an old trunk, and extra blankets donated by various soldiers were laundered and used as bedding.

  “We live like queens,” Morganne said one night as she stretched herself out upon her bed. “It’s soon going to feel like the Palmers’ home in Washington if we pick up a few more pieces of furniture.”

  “Hiram would have a story in this,” Lyndel replied, finishing the stitches on a pillowcase. “When do you hope to see him again?”

  “I have no idea. His last letter was two weeks ago. He’s more enamored of General Grant than he is of me.”

  “Oh, I doubt that, Davey.”

  “I don’t know if I’m that interested in Mr. Hiram Wright anymore anyway.”

  But the next day, June 4th, Hiram did show up in an unexpected way, when newspapers came into camp with the story of an assault by Union troops on Port Hudson on the Mississippi. He had written the account for the Philadelphia paper that employed him. What made this battle different from all others before it was that the soldiers who charged the Rebel fort were African-Americans. Lyndel read several accounts in the Boston and New York newspapers but liked Hiram’s writing the best and clipped it for the diary she had begun to keep. Her spirit was a swirl of joy and pain as she pasted the columns of type in her small book.

  So this day, Wednesday, May 27, 1863, must go down in American history as a day of greatness. No matter that the Rebel fort at Port Hudson wasn’t taken—it’s under siege now just like Vicksburg and will drop to its knees before the Federal forces at the appointed time. No matter that many a brave man fell on the field this day never to rise until the last judgment when God calls the righteous home—their courage will inspire many another to take up arms against despotism and cruel slavery. The 1st and 3rd Louisiana must be remembered as a force that proved in the most heroic manner the manhood of their race. You may call them blacks or Negroes or Africans or colored, it matters not. God knows them by their heart and he knows them by their soul. He sees no co
lor. Only men.

  I spoke with a number of the soldiers before the battle. All of them were eager to take the fight to the enemy and, by so doing, display that they wished to see President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in force from the Mississippi to the Potomac. Alas, not one of the men I interviewed survived the clash of arms. In particular I mourn Captain Andre Cailloux who fell in battle about one o’clock in the afternoon as he urged his troops forward. I also grieve the loss of a soldier who was always at his side and who led the 1st Louisiana on their final attack, proudly gripping the staff that flew the Stars and Stripes as he ran into the mouths of the guns. This man was Sergeant First Class Moses Gunnison.

  When they met after the news had swept through the Iron Brigade and the First Corps, Nathaniel and Lyndel did not speak. They gripped each other’s hands, the rings on their fingers strong and golden in the sunlight. Several times Nathaniel tried to say something to her but failed at each attempt. Finally he blurted out, “Charlie and Moses.” Then he brought her into the embrace of his arms.

  “I’m riding out on Libby in a few minutes. We will be gone for a few days.”

  “I will pray.”

  “You wonder what it is I do on these excursions—”

  “You don’t have to explain yourself.”

  “I’m not sure why I was chosen. There are only a handful of us. The others are all cavalry officers. We ride hard and fast and get in as close as we can to Lee’s army. Often we elude the pickets and are on the edges of the camps. We look for unit standards, estimate brigade size, watch for movement north or west. There was a time when we thought Lee might march on the Mississippi to try to lift the siege at Vicksburg. But he has no intention of leaving Virginia except to come after us.”

  “Is he coming now?”

  “There are reliable reports that have just started arriving from our agents and Virginians loyal to the Union that the Army of Northern Virginia began to march yesterday, on the 3rd. They say Lee is going up through the Shenandoah Valley to make it more difficult for us to track him. I and the other officers have to find out if the reports are true.”

  He grew quiet. Lyndel raised her head. “You have something else to tell me. What is it?”

  “None of it has been corroborated.”

  “Yet it worries you.”

  “Some say Lee is headed for Pennsylvania as well as Baltimore and Washington. He may go through Lancaster County to get at Harrisburg and Philadelphia.”

  “Our home.”

  “Lee is a gentleman. He will not allow his soldiers to lay waste to villages and farms.”

  “But war is no gentleman.”

  Nathaniel didn’t respond.

  “Can he do it?” she asked. “Does he have the men?”

  Nathaniel’s eyes were the green of a deep forest. “We are pretty sure he has over seventy thousand troops.”

  “Oh, Nathaniel—”

  “I must go.” He kissed her on the forehead. “I hope to be back by Monday.”

  He walked to where Libby was tethered, stepped up into the saddle, and rode off through the throng of soldiers and wagons and tents. Levi and Joshua saw him go and approached Lyndel, who watched as her husband disappeared among the trees.

  “Ginger,” Levi asked, “what’s going on?”

  “Nathaniel’s just doing what he always does.”

  “Which is what?”

  “I’m sure he’s told you.”

  “No,” replied Joshua, “he doesn’t tell us anything about his rides.”

  “Why are you asking me? If he wanted the platoon or company to know he’d have said something.”

  Levi folded his arms over his chest. “He went out of here like a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders. Grow him a beard and dress him in black and gain him another half foot in height and he’d win the Abe Lincoln look-alike contest sure.”

  “Rumor in camp has him scouting for Hooker,” Joshua prodded. “You think that’s so?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “It’s Lee, isn’t it?” Her brother was staring at her, hoping to catch a flicker in her face that would tell him the truth. “He’s on the move. We don’t see any Rebel pickets posted on the riverfront today.”

  Lyndel dropped her eyes to avoid his. “Even if General Lee were on the march, Nathaniel wouldn’t talk about it. He would be afraid of causing a panic.”

  “A panic? That would be a cause for celebration in this camp! Ever since South Mountain and Antietam, the brigade’s been shoved to one side or left in reserve. We want to fight, Lyndy. All we do is sit around here eating salt pork and potatoes and hardtack. Why, those of us who were new recruits to the 19th Indiana last year never even fought at Brawner’s or South Mountain. So we want to look Lee straight in the face like we did at Antietam Creek. We want to knock the Army of Northern Virginia so far south they’ll have to change their name.”

  “Strange words to come from the mouth of an Amish boy and a bishop’s son.”

  She looked up as she said these words. His eyes burned black.

  “When I say I will plow a straight furrow I plow a straight furrow.” Levi bit out his words. “When it’s time for haying I cut the whole field. When it’s harvest I work all day and all night if necessary to bring the crop into the barn. So our father taught me. When I say I will fight slavery I mean to fight it until the fight is finished. When I say I will die to keep this nation free if necessary I will die to enable men and women to live in liberty within our borders. All men. All God’s children.”

  He stalked away and Joshua followed.

  Long Sol had asked Morganne to lead the men in a sing that night. It was meant to get their minds off gambling, profanity, and whiskey as well as the illicit trade with the Rebels on the far bank of the Rappahannock. It was also an opportunity to celebrate with the 24th Michigan, who had finally got their hands on their black hats a week before, after waiting more than half a year. At the same time the 19th Indiana had received both a new Stars and Stripes and a new regimental flag.

  Morganne had wanted Lyndel to join her but Lyndel, feeling out of sorts after quarreling with her brother, chose to remain at the Fitzhugh House. Standing at her bedroom window she could see the flames of the bonfire and Morganne standing slender and dark in front of the wall of light with her guitar. The men’s voices, some two thousand of them, easily made their way into the mansion. They had just finished singing “The Girl I Left Behind Me” and now were shouting for Morganne to play a song Lyndel knew had become popular in both the North and the South. Her friend’s voice, clear as starlight, reached her before the soldiers joined in like a storm.

  “All quiet along the Potomac,” they say,

  “Except now and then a stray picket

  Is shot, as he walks on his beat to and fro,

  By a rifleman hid in the thicket.

  ’Tis nothing—a private or two now and then

  Will not count in the news of the battle;

  Not an officer lost—only one of the men,

  Moaning out, all alone, the death-rattle.”

  All quiet along the Potomac tonight,

  Where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming;

  Their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon,

  Or the light of the watchfire, are gleaming…

  There’s only the sound of the lone sentry’s tread,

  As he tramps from the rock to the fountain,

  And thinks of the two in the low trundle-bed

  Far away in the cot on the mountain.

  His musket falls slack; his face, dark and grim,

  Grows gentle with memories tender,

  As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep,

  For their mother; may Heaven defend her!…

  He passes the fountain, the blasted pine tree,

  The footstep is lagging and weary;

  Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of light,

  Toward the shade of the forest so dreary.

&nb
sp; Hark! was it the night wind that rustled the leaves?

  Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing?

  It looked like a rifle—“Ha! Mary, good-bye!”

  And the life-blood is ebbing and plashing.

  All quiet along the Potomac tonight;

  No sound save the rush of the river;

  While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead—

  The picket’s off duty forever.

  By the end, the men’s usually thunderous voices had softened. Lyndel didn’t like “All Quiet Along the Potomac Tonight,” for it sang of death. Whenever she heard the words they renewed her fear that Nathaniel would come riding in from his reconnaissance one night and be shot by mistake by a Union picket just as Stonewall Jackson had been shot by his own men. She was grateful that Morganne immediately launched into a more cheerful tune, “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again.” For an instant she was certain she saw Levi get to his feet, clapping his hands to the beat of the song. Soon hundreds joined Levi and blocked him, if it was him, from her sight.

  Lyndel knelt by her bed. It was her place to go her brother and ask forgiveness. She had snapped at him the way their father would have snapped at him. No, she didn’t want him to enjoy the fighting or look forward to the battles. But without soldiers like him, the war couldn’t be won and slavery nailed into its coffin.

  And he was more than the ordinary soldier who fought and slept and wanted to go home. He had been reading the Bible to the men in his platoon daily and answering the questions about God and life after death they put to him. Men from other platoons and companies had begun to join in. Even Rebel prisoners that had not been sent north yet. Their father wouldn’t be proud to see his son in a uniform but he would be proud to see what he was doing with a Bible in his hands.