Grant read through the letter quickly. “Other than New York, I can’t see any problems for the President.” He put the letter down. “But there’s no military reason why you should stay here right now, so I think you should go immerse yourself in the Washington social sea.”
“I don’t even have a dress uniform anymore.”
“They have tailors in Washington that can make one for you in an afternoon. Gold-tasseled shoulder boards and all. Send a wire to Nicolay and tell him you’re coming and another to your lady friend Miss Murray to ask her for her company.”
“Bah.” Robert snatched the letter from Grant’s desk and walked out, slamming the door behind him.
November 8, 1864
Washington, D.C.
Elizabeth Murray walked to meet Robert Van Buskirk as he came out onto the street. “I was afraid that I’d missed you.”
“How did you know I’d be here?”
“It was just a lucky guess.” She took his arm.
“I suppose the next question is: why are you here?”
“I’ve been evicted from my hotel and couldn’t think of where to go,” she said.
“What?”
She shrugged. “I was warned when I checked in that I might have to leave because they’d booked reservations for VIP election-night visitors.”
“What about your clothes? Your luggage?”
“They were kind enough to store that for me until I found somewhere else to stay. Since there don’t seem to be any vacancies anywhere, I was thinking that I could stay with you at the Willard.”
He looked uncomfortable.
“You said that there were two bedrooms.”
“Yes,” he nodded. “I use my wife’s bedroom. Anna’s bedroom is just how she left it. I haven’t let the maids do anything other than dust occasionally.”
She squeezed his arm, looked up at him and smiled. “It doesn’t matter. The fact that there are two bedrooms satisfies propriety. No one needs to know that I’m sharing your bed.”
His face colored and he looked away.
“Don’t tell me that you’re not interested. A woman knows these things.”
He looked at her for a moment, then looked away again. “I want to ask you a question and I need an honest answer.”
“Of course.”
He looked into her eyes. “I’m very serious about this. Lie to me and I’ll know it.”
“I’ve never lied to you, Robert. What’s the question?”
“What do you see in me?” He raised his hand. “Think before you answer and tell me the whole truth.”
“I don’t have to think about it. You’re handsome, honest, brave…”
“Old.”
She nodded. “Not quite. But I realize that I’m likely to spend my middle age caring for you and my dotage alone. Unless, of course, we have children.”
“There are dozens – no – hundreds of men who would make better husbands and fathers.”
“I haven’t found one.”
He shook his head. “I wish I could believe that.”
She looked around, then back at him. “I’ve known more than my share of men but I’ve never met a better man than you. Never. And I don’t think he exists.” She watched his face for a moment. “I knew who you were and quite a bit about you when I met you on that train in Atlanta. After that trip, when I got to Washington, I did some more checking. A lot more checking. If I told you all the things I learned about you, you’d be shocked.”
He chuckled. “I might be at that, because, other than my military career, there’s almost nothing to learn about me.”
“That in itself is very revealing.”
“In what way?”
“You knew that your wife was unfaithful to you, didn’t you?”
He blushed. “Nancy was – yes. I knew. I knew that she would be before we were married. I forgave her in advance.”
“But you were never unfaithful to her.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“It doesn’t matter. I just know.”
He sighed. “I’m likely to be a disappointment to you in bed.”
“I doubt that, but if it proves to be true I’ll leave quietly and you’ll never be bothered by me again.”
He nodded. “Fair enough.”
“But if you’re not a disappointment, I expect a proposal of marriage.”
He looked at her and looked away.
“I want a baby, Robert. I think I want your baby. But I don’t want it out of wedlock.”
He nodded. “All right. It’s a bargain.”
November 9, 1864
Washington, D.C.
Elizabeth Murray staggered out of the bedroom with a sheet wrapped around her. “What time is it?” Her hair was in an impossible tangle and her eyes were puffy.
Robert was seated in the small dinette, reading a newspaper. “It’s not quite noon. In case you’re interested, President Lincoln was reelected with a comfortable margin.
She pulled out a chair and grimaced as she sat down. “Oh my. I’m so sore that I can hardly walk.”
Robert poured coffee into her cup. “I don’t recall any complaints last night, Elizabeth.”
She sipped her coffee and waggled her eyebrows at him. “I think you should call me Betty, now that we’re so much better acquainted.”
He nodded. “Will you marry me, Betty?”
She spit coffee on the table and dribbled it down the front of the sheet that was not quite covering her bare breasts. “Yes,” she choked. “Yes, yes, yes.”
November 14, 1864
Kingston, Georgia
Quincy ran his horse along the length of the column and reined in as he drew abreast of Sherman. “It’s done,” he shouted. “As far as we could tell the whole city was successfully evacuated. If anyone gets hurt it’ll be their own stupid fault.”
Sherman turned in his saddle to look back at the columns of thick smoke rising above Atlanta. “Go back and make sure no one gets stupid. We’ll bivouac up ahead for the night and then, in the morning, we’ll proceed toward Savannah. I’d like you to stay with us as far as Covington, then join General Thomas at Nashville.”
“Yes, sir.”
Map by Hal Jespersen, www.cwmaps.com
November 15, 1864
City Point, Virginia
Robert Van Buskirk gave a stack of telegraph forms to Grant.
“From Sherman?” Grant riffled the pages.
“Yes.”
“Tell me what he says. I don’t want to read all this.”
Robert nodded. “He issued the special field orders that you approved when he was here.”
“About foraging?”
“Yes. He calls the foraging parties ‘bummers’.” Robert chuckled.
“And these ‘bummers’ confiscate anything of value to the army and destroy everything else as we agreed?”
“Yes. The order’s exactly as you approved it, Sam, verbatim.”
“How many men in each party?”
“It doesn’t say in any of his reports, but we discussed it and decided that fifty enlisted men and two officers would be about right. I imagine that’s what he’s done.”
Grant nodded. “Did he mention the burning of Atlanta?”
“He said that they only spared about four hundred buildings. He didn’t mention what buildings or why they were spared.”
“Anything else?”
“No. Except he mentions that the men have started calling him ‘Uncle Billy’.”
“That’s not something new, is it?” Grant asked.
Robert shook his head. “I suppose it’s possible that Cump never heard it before or that he’s finally decided to accept it as a term of affection instead of an insult. You know how he is.”
“I do indeed,” Grant said. “But I’m not certain that I could say the same of you.”
“What?”
“I heard a rumor last night, but I couldn’t believe it was true.”
“About me?�
��
“About you and a lady named Elizabeth Murray. Apparently she’s telling everyone about an upcoming wedding.”
Robert smiled. “I was working up the courage to ask you if you’d be my best man.”
Grant stood up and shook his hand. “I’d be honored.”
November 17, 1864
Covington, Georgia
Sherman and his entourage camped on the road near Stone Mountain at Lithonia on the 16th. They had brought no tents and the only shelters were canvas rectangles strung between saplings. Smoke from railroad tie fires surrounded the camp as details heated rails and bent them into ‘Uncle Billy’s bow ties’ around trees or telegraph poles.
The following day, as they approached the town of Covington, Sherman closed up the ranks, ordered the flags unfurled and the bands to play. The white citizens came out to watch silently, but many of the local Negroes were ecstatic and ran beside the column trying to touch Sherman or kiss his feet.
Embarrassed by the attention, Sherman, accompanied by Quincy and one of his cavalry troops, turned down a side street and paralleled the main body. “Our designated campsite is at the river crossing, about four miles east of here,” Sherman said to Quincy. “You’re on your own to join Thomas after that.”
“What are you going to do with all the Negroes?” Quincy asked.
“What Negroes?”
“The Negroes that are joining your column.” Quincy gestured toward the sound of band music.
“They’re not joining the column,” Sherman said. He turned toward the sound. “Are they? Do they think we can take them with us?”
Quincy looked around, then pointed to a group of colored people who were gathered in front of a log house. “I’ll be right back, sir.” He eased his horse off the road and walked it toward the people. “Who’s the most influential colored person around here?” He reconsidered his words. “Who does everyone listen to when he or she speaks?”
“That’d be Thaddeus,” a man answered. “He the overseer at Ulcofauhachee Plantation.”
“Where’s this plantation?”
“Down the road a piece where it cross over the river.”
“Thank you.” Quincy touched his hat, then turned to rejoin Sherman. “There’s a plantation near the river crossing and the overseer there is the respected elder of this area. His name is Thaddeus.”
~
Thaddeus and a dozen or more colored people were lined up in front of a cabin, a short distance from the plantation house. Sherman had learned that the planter had fled when learning of the Yankee’s approach. “Do you understand this war and its progress?” Sherman asked.
Thaddeus, who could have been any age from seventy to a hundred, nodded. “We been waiting for the angels of the Lord to set us free since we was knee-high. Reckon y’all is them.”
“Yes,” Sherman agreed. “Our task is to set you free but it’s still unfinished. While we fight on, we must ask all slaves to remain where they are. We need all the food that we carry for our fighting men and cannot afford to feed all the people who have decided to join us. Do you understand what I mean?”
“What about the young and strong who wants to fight?” Thaddeus asked. “Can you take them with you?”
“We can take some as pioneers,” Sherman conceded. “They’d do regular work like digging trenches and cutting down trees. Being a soldier requires training and we don’t have time for training.”
Thaddeus nodded. “Can’t be having no sick or old folks or else you cain’t do the Lord’s work.”
“Right,” Sherman agreed. “Can you pass that along to your people, please?”
“I can. Yes-sir, I can and I will. God bless you, sir.”
“And may God bless you too, sir.” Sherman shook the old man’s hand.
~
Quincy was standing in front of his assembled officers at the edge of Sherman’s busy encampment. “We leave at dawn to join General Thomas who’s cobbling together an army in Nashville from the Army of the Cumberland, the Army of the Ohio, the Army of the Tennessee, the District of Etowah, and the Post of Nashville to defeat the Confederate Army of Tennessee commanded by our old nemesis, General John Bell Hood. That’s four hundred miles through hostile country and we have to feed ourselves and our animals along the way. Any questions?”
“Sir. Are we to link up with General Schofield along the way?”
“I doubt it,” Quincy said. “He has a three-day head start on us. Anything else?”
November 29, 1864
City Point, Virginia
Robert kicked open the door to his sleeping quarters, carried his bride to the bed and dropped her on it unceremoniously. “Oh, Lord. I told you that I was too old for this.”
She giggled, rolled off the bed and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him. “Help me out of this dress.”
“Wait. I have to lock the door. Grant has a habit of barging in here any time of the day or night.” He walked out through the office, latched the front door and came back into the bedroom.
“Unbutton me.” Betty turned her back to him.
“As you can see,” he said, beginning with the top button, “the only fireplace is in the office, so if we want any heat in here, we have to leave the bedroom door open. That means you have to stay on this side of the room if you don’t want to be seen from the front window.”
“Why not just hang curtains on the front window?”
“I wouldn’t know where to get curtains or how to hang them.”
“The bed’s out of view of the window so I’ll take care of the curtains some other time.”
“I like the sound of that.” He patted her on the bottom. “There you are. All unbuttoned.”
“Damn,” she said, at the sound of a knock on the door.
“This will only take a moment,” Robert said. “Grant promised not to bother me unless there was a major crisis.” He went to the door, unlatched it and opened it.
“Sorry to bother you, Professor,” Grant said, “but John Bell Hood linked up with Nathan Bedford Forrest while he was in Florence, Alabama, and they caught up with General Schofield this morning before he could reach Thomas in Nashville.”
Robert stepped back to let Grant in. “Where’s Schofield now?”
“Spring Hill.”
“Quincy’s very near there.”
“He’s no match for Forrest.”
“No, but he might be able to screen Schofield well enough to allow him to run for Nashville.”
“There’s a major river at Franklin and the bridges have been destroyed. If Schofield can’t get across before…” Grant looked over Robert’s shoulder and his jaw dropped.
“What’s the matter, Sam?” Robert asked.
“Am I interrupting something?” Betty asked from the bedroom doorway. She was wearing only an hourglass corset and a short shift that showed the tops of her stockings.
“No, no,” Grant stammered. “That is – I can manage this by myself. He backed away toward the door. “I won’t bother you again. Sorry.”
Map by Hal Jespersen, www.cwmaps.com
November 30, 1864
Franklin, Tennessee
It was not quite 5:00 AM when Quincy Van Buskirk arrived at the home of Alpheus Truett. “Is this General Schofield’s headquarters?”
An enlisted man ran forward. “Yes, sir. He’s there in the parlor.”
“Thank you.” Quincy dismounted and gave his reins to the man, then he climbed the steps to the front porch where he was met by a captain. “I’m Quincy Van Buskirk. General Sherman…”
“Come in, sir. General Schofield will be glad to see you. We’re all glad to see you.”
Schofield met him halfway into the parlor. “Pug! Am I glad to see you.” He pumped Quincy’s hand vigorously.
“Nobody’s this glad to see me unless they’re about to get me into a lot of trouble,” Quincy said with a chuckle.
“You got yourself into trouble when you came here,” Schofield said. Men were moving furniture,
rolling up rugs and barricading windows. “Somebody bring us a couple of chairs,” Schofield bellowed. An aide quickly dragged two small chairs to the center of the room. “Sit down, please, Pug.” Schofield looked at the aide. “Do we have any coffee?”
“No, sir. But I can probably find a cook somewhere. Or maybe I could ask one of the family’s servants. I think they’re all down in the cellar.”
“No coffee for me, thank you,” Quincy said, raising his hand. He sat down and waited for Schofield to do the same. “So, what’s your situation, John?”
“Well, as much as it irks me, Sherman sent me to report to George Thomas in Nashville.”
Quincy shook his head. “Irks you? Why?”
“You don’t recall the incident at the Academy when I was wrongly dismissed?”
“No. I’m sorry. I don’t. Was that Thomas’s doing?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Schofield said. “I shouldn’t have mentioned it. The point is that I’ve been trying to get to Thomas at Nashville and I’ve been trying to avoid a battle with John Bell Hood for several days. Now he’s too close to risk a river crossing without pontoon bridges so I’m going to have to make a stand here until Thomas reinforces us or sends us some pontoon bridges.”
“I saw your men digging trenches and building breastworks out there by that cotton gin.”
“That’s the Carters’ cotton-gin,” Schofield said. “Cox got here first and commandeered the Carter farm. Then he started digging some deteriorated entrenchments that were built there during some previous engagement. I’ll have him show you all the fortifications once I fill you in.”
“Okay. Go on. Tell me about Hood.”
“Our first contact with him was between Pulaski and Columbia. He sent Forrest’s cavalry to ride around us and we had to fight our way past Forrest to Spring Hill.”
“If you whipped Forrest you can be proud.”
“General Wilson got lucky and Forrest made the mistake of underestimating him. Anyway, we slipped away from Spring Hill during the night and now we’re here.”
Freedom (Gone For Soldiers) Page 33