Call to Arms

by Frederick Nolan

  ‘In a while, Daddy,’ she said, without taking her eyes away from Andrew’s. McCabe nodded and put down the lamp on the washstand. He went out of the room without another word. Moments later they heard the sound of his bedroom door closing.

  ‘Tell me about it,’ Jessica said.

  ‘It’s just a dream. ‘

  ‘Do you want to talk about it?’

  ‘I’ve had it ever since Shiloh,’ he said. ‘Do you remember it? Pittsburgh Landing?’

  ‘I remember it,’ Jessica said. ‘It was a pretty place. The peach trees were all in blossom. And there was a calliope playing.’

  ‘It wasn’t pretty for long.’

  The battle had started soon after dawn. Forty thousand Confederate troops attacking along a front of three miles. Most of the Federal soldiers were still asleep when the attack started, he told her.

  ‘I was with Grant at Savannah. Downriver. We were having breakfast when we heard the cannon. We rushed up to the Landing, and got there just as Prentiss’ line broke. McLernand’s men – they had fought at Donelson, they were veterans by comparison with most of the troops there – steadied the line at the Purdy Road. But most of our lads were green kids. Half of them didn’t even know how to load their rifles.’

  Hurlbut took the left flank, defending a peach orchard. Prentiss and W.H.L. Wallace took positions on his right in a sunken farm lane sheltered by a crest which was crowned with dense brush. It could only be approached across open fields. This was the place the soldiers later called the Hornet’s Nest. Between the two flanks lay a scummy pond, fringed by brush and trees.

  Against this line, the Confederate general, Albert Sidney Johnston, hurled his men, from nine in the morning until nearly five in the afternoon. Long before nightfall brought the first day’s battle to a close, the giant Johnston was dead and the hundreds of wounded and dying men who had crawled to the scummy pond had turned it red with their blood. Bloody Pond, they named it afterwards.

  ‘We didn’t know Johnston was dead, then, of course,’ Andrew continued. ‘We only knew that we had been rolled back to the river, and that we were as damned nearly defeated as made no odds. Prentiss had been flanked and surrendered with over two thousand men. Wallace was mortally wounded in a place they called Hell’s Hollow. Our people fell back behind the line of artillery that I had set up the preceding day on the bluffs. The day you left.’

  ‘I remember,’ Jessica said. She shivered slightly but he did not notice. He was back on that bloody battlefield, seeing the dreadful sights and hearing the awful sounds.

  During the night, he said, it rained in torrents. Grant and his staff huddled miserably beneath a tree. There were no fires. The river purled past the drenched bluffs, beneath which, shivering with cold and terror, crouched four thousand men who had fled the battle. At around midnight the rain grew so intense that Grant elected to shelter in the log house which stood near the Landing, below the bluffs. But when they reached the house they found it had been commandeered as a hospital. A constant stream of bearers brought screaming, mangled wounded to be lifted unceremoniously on to the blood-slick operating tables. There was not enough of anything: not enough surgeons, not enough orderlies, not enough bandages, not enough morphia. The scene was as bad as the bowels of Hell itself. The torn, bloody bodies lay everywhere, the living screaming and weeping and the dead. Piles of amputated limbs, gouts of flesh, puddles of blood which the rain turned to red mud gave off a horrible stench. The suffering was unendurable. After an hour they all gladly chose to go out again into the driving rain.

  ‘The following morning, we counter-attacked,’ Andrew said. ‘Buell had come up in the night, with nearly twenty thousand men and Lew Wallace with another five. We needed every one of them. General Grant told me that our casualties on the first day had been estimated at around seven thousand. What we didn’t know was that we had Beauregard outnumbered by two to one.’

  By mid-afternoon of that second day it was all over. The Confederate Army was in full flight back to Corinth. Grant had won the day, but the cost was stunning.

  ‘We had nearly two thousand men dead and over eight thousand wounded,’ Andrew said. ‘The other people about the same. The nurses tore up their clothes to make dressings, everything they had on. In the end they were using leaves and grass to dress wounds; there was nothing else. Nine-tenths of our wounded were still lying on the field on Tuesday, some of them untouched since early Sunday morning.’

  ‘And that was what you were dreaming about?’

  ‘There was one field,’ he told her. ‘Below the Hornet’s Nest. It was carpeted with Confederate soldiers, dead, dying, wounded, two and three deep.’

  ‘My God,’ Jessica whispered. Her hair hung down like folded wings around her lovely face. The lamplight was dim. He could not see her eyes at all, so did not know that she was silently weeping.

  ‘In the dream … it’s ... all my fault. General Grant was shouting at me that it was all my fault, that all those dead men were lying there because of me. And I went out there and … and … and one of them was my brother. One of them was Jed, and it was my fault he was dead.’

  ‘But you know that it was not so. You won promotion on that field. You were not to blame for the men who died there.’

  ‘I know,’ Andrew sighed. ‘I know it’s just a dream. But I can’t stop it, Jess. I keep thinking, what if Jed is lying dead in some field, somewhere, and we never find him and—’

  ‘Hush, now,’ she said softly. She got up off the bed and went across to the washstand. She blew out the light. He heard the soft, sibilant whisper of silk.

  ‘Are you going now?’ he said.

  ‘No,’ she replied, turning back the bedclothes. ‘No, I’m not going.’ She was naked. Her skin was hot against his.

  ‘But … your father—’

  ‘Hush,’ she said again. ‘We’ve done enough talking.’

  Twenty-One – The Story of Jedediah Strong

  August 1862

  ‘Well, Colonel! How’s the arm?’

  Jed failed to realize for a moment that the words were addressed to him. He was still not accustomed to the brevet rank of lieutenant-colonel which Jackson had bestowed on him for his action in holding the line at Slaughter’s Mountain. He looked up to find Bill Stevenson riding alongside him, smiling.

  ‘You look a bit bedraggled, William,’ Jed observed.

  ‘Blasted weather!’ Stevenson snorted. ‘Choking with dust one minute, drowning in mud the next.’ He pulled a battered cheroot out of his uniform pocket and lit it. ‘You didn’t answer my question.’

  ‘What can I tell you?’ Jed said. ‘Doctor Maguire says I’ve got to keep it in a sling for a while. It’s healing nicely.’

  The bullet had gone clean through the fleshy part of his upper arm, tearing the muscle and leaving a ragged exit hole. Dr Hunter Maguire, Jackson’s personal physician, had tended the wound and done a fine job of it. ‘Bother you much?’

  ‘Hurts like Hell,’ Jed confessed.

  ‘They give you morphia?’

  ‘At night,’ Jed said. ‘Seems to hurt worse at night.’

  ‘Be careful of that damned stuff, Jed.’

  ‘I can handle it. What’s happening?’

  ‘ Jackson’s eager for a fight.’

  ‘I don’t doubt Johnny Pope will oblige him.’

  ‘Could be,’ said Bill. ‘He’s calling all the regimental commanders in for a conference.’ He winked and touched his spurs to the horse’s flanks, lifting the animal into a canter. Tally-ho! again, Jed thought. Old Jack’s on the move. It was no surprise. There had been something in the air ever since General Lee arrived in Gordonsville.

  The Army of Northern Virginia had pulled back south after the fight at Slaughter’s Mountain. Jackson had been on fire to keep going north, to take Culpeper and maybe split Pope’s force in half, but a test of strength a few miles up the road revealed that the Federals were well-entrenched and ready to fight. Not knowing how they were off for reinforcem
ents, Jackson decided not to risk it, and withdrew to Gordonsville. General Lee arrived on August 15, and Jed was one of the honor guard which accompanied Jackson to meet his train.

  He could hardly credit the change in the man. Lee looked much, much older and very, very tired. His cheeks were still ruddy but the hair and beard were now almost snow-white and there were shadows beneath the fine, dark eyes. He wore an old gray coat and a wide-brimmed gray hat, without any kind of insignia. He moved slowly, as though he were afraid of violent exertion.

  Jackson welcomed him warmly. There was obviously a strong bond of affection between the two. Like father and son, Jed thought, watching them. Undemonstrative, maybe; but you could feel the glow. The Spanish would say they were simpatico.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ Lee said, acknowledging their salutes. His eyes brightened when they fell on Jed. ‘Well,’ he smiled. ‘Colonel. That’s something. Colonel Strong. I’m glad to see you well, Jedediah.’

  ‘And I you, General,’ Jed said. Two soldiers were leading Lee’s horse, Traveller, down the loading ramp from a stock wagon. Lee climbed up stiffly and they headed out of the depot. A soldier raised his hat and cheered. Wide-eyed boys ran across the street to see their idol, their leader, ride slowly by. Lee nodded once or twice to let them know he’d seen their shy smiles, their waves, their salutes. He looked as if he felt uncomfortable being the center of such attention.

  Well, he and Jackson had obviously come up with something, Jed thought, as he made his way to headquarters to hear the general’s instructions. Jed figured they would want to attack Pope again, before the reinforcements which they now knew were on their way from Washington, reached the Federal Army at Culpeper.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ Lee announced to the assembled officers. ‘The army will move with a view to turning Pope’s left, crossing the Rapidan behind the cover of Clark’s Mountain. General Stuart’s cavalry will precede us. You will cross the Rappahannock at Somerville’s, general, and proceed to Rappahannock Station. If you can destroy the bridge, we shall have Pope’s line of retreat cut.’

  ‘Very good, sir,’ Stuart said.

  ‘The rest of the army will cross the river and attack on Pope’s left. The assault is planned for the eighteenth. You will prepare your brigades accordingly, if you please.’ After the meeting was over, Jackson summoned Jed to his tent. His eyes were brooding, his face serious. He tapped Jed’s arm gently with a stubby forefinger.

  ‘The arm?’ he said.

  ‘Mending, General.’

  ‘No trouble riding?’

  ‘None that I can’t handle, sir.’

  Jackson smiled. ‘All the same, I don’t think you’re quite ready for the front line just yet,’ he said. ‘So I want you to take a squadron and sweep out to the west of Culpeper, along Crooked Run, and come around upon the town from the west, down the Sperryville Pike.’

  Jed looked at his commander. There was no expression on his face. ‘You doing this on purpose, General?’ he asked. He wasn’t sure: but could it possibly be that beneath that great bush of a beard, the dour Jackson’s lips were twitching?

  ‘Doing what, sir?’ Jackson asked, too innocently. He looked almost embarrassed when Jed took his hand and shook it warmly. ‘Now, now, no need for a demonstration!’

  ‘Thank you, anyway, General!’ Jed smiled. ‘I appreciate it!’

  What Jackson was doing by sending him on this ‘scout’ was to give him the opportunity of being the first Confederate soldier to reach Washington Farm. He was little short of amazed that, with the thousands of things Jackson had to remember, he could still hold in his mind the fact that one of his junior staff officers had a father living near Culpeper.

  ‘Go find your people,’ Jackson said. ‘I wish to Heaven I could do the same!’ There was a light in his eye and Jed knew he was thinking of his wife, Anna. ‘Go on, lad! Get out of here!’

  On the afternoon of August 18, Jed led his squadron out of camp, two companies of cavalry at about half strength, seventy-five men in all. The Army of Northern Virginia was on the move all around them, a vast, shambling horde of men, animals and wagons, ambulances, baggage carts, fieldpieces, cannon. The earth seemed to tremble as they passed over it.

  The squadron reached Washington Farm on the morning of the twentieth, having had only one brief skirmish with Federal scouts, a few hastily fired shots that did no damage to either side. Here and there they saw knots of Federal stragglers, who ran for cover in the woods when they saw the approaching cavalry. They were no threat: Jed ignored them. The column splashed through Devil’s Run and up on to the road, turning east. In a few more minutes they came to the gate of Washington Farm. Jed posted half the squadron along the pike and led the rest down the hill towards the house, hidden behind the old trees below. It was not until they came around the bend in the driveway before the house that Jed realized it was gutted, looted, empty. He pulled his horse to a sliding stop in the churned mixture of mud and gravel which the drive had become, and jumped down.

  ‘Captain Foster, kindly send squads to check whether there is anyone in the outbuildings,’ Jed said to young Foster, and left him rapping out orders to the sergeants as Jed ran to the house. The doors hung brokenly ajar. The windows were all smashed, the wooden frames blackened by smoke, splintered.

  He walked inside. Broken glass crunched beneath his feet. Doorways yawned like toothless mouths: the doors had been torn off their hinges. There was still an acrid smell of burned wood. An attempt had obviously been made to fire the house, but it had been unsuccessful.

  He went into the library. Most of the books were gone. A few, battered and torn, lay waterlogged on the floor. Everything that could be taken had gone. Someone had smashed the grand piano into kindling; what was left of the lovely walnut case lay with the tangled iron frame, upside down in a corner. The carpets had all been ripped up and the fine mantelpiece, for which Jedediah Morrison Strong had once paid a thousand dollars, had been torn away from the wall. The portrait of Grandfather Davy Strong hung drunkenly askew, slashed crisscross by bayonets. The moldings on the wall had been broken off by knives or the butts of rifles. There were smears of tobacco juice and filthy graffiti on the walls.

  ‘Jesus,’ Jed said softly, stunned by the sheer, senseless brutality of the damage. He did not bother to go into any of the other rooms: he knew they would all be the same. He went through the doorless aperture where the French windows had been into the rear yard. It was littered with smashed china, glass, the remnants of a crystal chandelier, the embroidered seats of wooden chairs. Feathers lifted and fell in the fitful breeze: the soldiers had even slashed the mattresses open and emptied them.

  Jed made his way down to the old servants’ quarters. He could see squads of his men checking out the barns and stables. There was no sign of life anywhere. The big old oak, under which Jed and his father had sat during his last visit to the farm, had been crudely girdled. Somehow, this wanton act angered Jed more than all the other destruction he had seen. What kind of men killed trees, for Christ’s sake?

  He went across to the cottage in which his father had been living and pushed open the door. Everything was in chaos: the remnants of a bed smashed to kindling, its mattress torn open, pans and pots crushed flat, filthy words written on the white walls. He pulled the door closed. As he did, he thought he heard a movement. He turned very fast, lifting the huge pistol from its holster and cocking it.

  ‘All right!’ he snapped. ‘Come on out of there!’

  Nothing moved.

  ‘I’m going to count to three,’ he said. ‘Then I’m going to set this place on fire! One! Two! —’

  ‘Oh, oh, oh, Jesus, Mahse Jed! Dat you, Mahse Jed? Dat you?’

  It was Aunt Betty. She had been hiding behind the big copper washtub in the kitchen. She stumbled through the piles of wrecked furniture towards Jed, sobbing.

  ‘Oh, Mahse Jed! Thank God you’s come home! Thank God you’s come!’

  She ran into his arms and buried her face in his coat, sobbing
with relief and fear. It was a shock to see her so old and drawn and thin. He put his arms around her and rocked her gently until her sobbing began to subside. There was no point in trying to ask her anything while she was so distressed. After a while she snuffled and then pulled herself away from his supporting arms and wiped her eyes on her pinafore.

  ‘Mahse Jed, Mahse Jed,’ she wailed. ‘Dey killed my Moses, Mahse Jed! Dem soldiers killed my Moses!’ She started sobbing again, her shoulders heaving.

  ‘Why did they kill him, Aunt Betty?’ Jed asked softly.

  ‘He try to stop them wreckin’ de house, stealin’ all yo’ Daddy’s things,’ Aunt Betty said, the tears coming now without sobs, as though without her volition. ‘Dey just shot him an’ th’owed him into de yahd lak a dead dawg! I done buried him up dere on the hill ’longside de fam’ly, Mahse Jed. I didn’ think they’d mind.’

  ‘That was the right thing to do,’ Jed assured her. ‘But where was my father? Why didn’t he?’

  ‘Dey tooken him away, Mahse Jed,’ she explained, eyes wide as if she feared he would be angry with her for telling him bad news. ‘Dey put him in de lockup. Dey say he done somethin’ bad an’ dey goan try him at de co’thouse.’

  ‘Try him? What for?’

  ‘He gotten in some fight, Mahse Holmes say. I don’t know prezackly what. It happen in de tavern.’

  ‘Pa was in a fight?’ Jed said, not believing his ears. ‘In the tavern?’

  ‘Dass what Moses tol’ me, Mahse Jed,’ Aunt Betty wiped her eyes with the apron again. ‘Dass what he said.’

  ‘You stay here, Aunt Betty,’ Jed advised. ‘I’ll go into town and see what I can find out. Have you had anything to eat?’

  ‘No, I ain’t. Not since th’other day.’

  ‘I’ll get one of my men to bring you something.’ Jed turned and ran through the house to where he had left his horse. She came out of the front door as he climbed aboard, having detailed a squad to remain at the house. She watched him lead his men away and then went back inside, an old woman without hope.