She stiffened, nodded, but her face was still buried in her hands.
He knelt down, picked up his boy, and carried him to the side of the road, to the entry of a livery stable. A couple of hands in the stable looked at him nervously, bitterness in their eyes.
He gazed at them, saying nothing as he reached into his haversack, drew out a pad and a pencil, wrote the name of his son and their address on it, then tucked the paper into the boy's breast pocket
In a way he could not believe what he was doing, so casually marking the body of his son before walking away. He folded the boy's hands and kissed him lightly on the forehead, drew out five dollars from his pocket nearly all he had, and put it into the boy's pocket then stood back up.
"His name is John Miller Junior. I put five dollars in his pocket for his burying."
"So what?" the younger of the stable hands growled.
John looked around meaningfully then back to the two.
"If you have any Christian sense to you, you'll see that my son is buried proper."
"And if not?" the young one laughed.
"I'm going to join the army now. And after this is over, I'll be back. If he isn't buried as I want, I'll track both of you down and kill you."
The older of the two, gaze lowered, nodded his head.
"I'll see to it. I'm sorry for your loss."
"Thank you."
John turned without looking back down at his boy. He knew if he did so he'd break, and there was no time, no luxury for that now.
He gathered Martha under his arm, his two sobbing daughters clinging to her skirts.
Hundreds were still passing over the barricade, which was carpeted with a score of dead and wounded, black and white. Lying on the ground was a rifle, a new Springfield. He looked down at it, and the man still clutching the weapon, the man who had killed his son. He picked the gun up, testing its heft, then bent back over to pull off the cartridge box the man was wearing, the brass plate on its side an oval with us stamped in the middle. He put it on, picked up the cap box, and slipped it on to his belt.
He had seen it done often enough. He drew a cartridge, tore it open, poured in the powder, rammed a ball down, half cocked the gun, and capped the nipple with a percussion cap.
Some had stopped to look at him, wide-eyed. None had ever seen a colored man do this or seen a colored man with a cartridge box stamped us on his hip.
He scrambled over the barricade, then turned to help his wife and daughters. Shouldering his rifle, he headed north.
Mount Vernon Square, Baltimore
My 21, 1863 6:30 P.M.
You, sir, have let this go out of control," General Lee snapped, looking up at the quaking civilian standing before him.
The Honorable George Brown stood crestfallen, shirt open, tie gone, fine broadcloth jacket streaked and burned. "Sir, if only I could explain."
"You've tried to explain," Lee said, "and I find your explanation unacceptable.
"Young Lieutenant Kirby here tells me that you were told to help us enter the city but to keep things under control. Do you call that control down there?"
Lee pointed back down toward the center of the city, which was a raging inferno. Fort McHenry beyond was concealed in the smoke.
"General Lee, we did not want this, either."
"I should hope not."
"Sir, you have not been here these past two years," Brown said defensively. "It has been a place seething with hatred, with midnight arrests, a city under occupation. The passions simply exploded, sir."
Lee sighed wearily. He had no authority to deal with this man, but if he did, he'd have him under arrest, if for no other reason than to set an example.
"I want you to go back out there. General Stuart will provide you with an escort. You are to try and help us stop this, because if you don't, my provost guards most certainly will. I have issued orders to shoot to kill anyone caught looting or setting fires, and I don't care which side they are on."
"What about the Loyal League?" Brown asked. "Aren't you going to arrest them?"
"No, I will not. Do you want to set off yet another explosion? They are to go home. Tomorrow I will offer them amnesty if they turn in their arms."
"Amnesty, sir? They should be thrown in jail the way we were!"
"Don't you understand, Mr. Brown? I am trying to restore order here. I will not follow the practices of the Lincoln government in the process. If we act with forebearance now, it will reap rewards later. As long as they comply with military law, they and their property will not be harmed."
"At least round up their ringleaders. I have their names, sir," and Brown fumbled in his pocket, pulled out a sheet of paper, and placed it on Lee's desk, which had been set up under an awning right in the middle of the square.
Lee angrily brushed the note aside.
"No, sir. No! I want their help at this moment. If they will help us to restore order, no matter how naive that might sound, then they are free to live peacefully. I would think that together, both sides would wish to save this city before it burns down around your ears."
Brown said nothing.
"Now go do your duty, sir."
Brown, obviously shaken by the interview, withdrew.
Lee stood up and walked out from under the awning. The city he had loved so much was going under. The entire central district was in flames, the fire department all but helpless to contain it, since so many of the firemen had fallen in with one side or the other during the rioting.
He now had most of Pickett's division either fighting the fires or struggling to suppress the rioting. A report had come in of one company from the Fourteenth Virginia all but wiped out in an ambush, dozens more injured or killed fighting either the rioters or the flames.
It was early twilight, and as he watched the fire, he wondered if this was now symbolic of their entire nation, North and South, so consumed with growing hatred that they would rather destroy all in a final orgy of madness than band together to save what was left.
If this is indeed what we are sinking to, then we are doomed, he thought Even in victory we will be doomed, for God will surely turn away from us.
We have to retrieve something out of this, he thought. There has to be something saved out of these ashes. I must still set the example and lead if we are to restore what we have lost.
July 23 1963 8.00am
The constant stream of engines pulling the long convoy of trains coming down through the gap above Marysville, Pennsylvania, filled the Susquehanna Valley with smoke. The shriek of train whistles echoed and reechoed. The mood all along the trackside was jubilant, civilians out to watch the spectacle, boys waving and racing alongside the long strings of flatcars and open-sided boxcars packed with troops.
The veterans of McPherson's corps, riding east to save the Union, seemed to be delighted by the spectacle as well. Regimental flags were unfurled, hoisted up, the staffs tied securely in place, each train thus festooned with battle-torn standards from Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, emblazoned on them in gold letters the names of campaigns that to the Easterners were a mystery, except for the freshly lettered, triumphant VICKSBURG.
Rumbling down out of the mountain gap toward the broad, open plain of the Susquehanna Valley just ahead, the veterans looked about with approval at the rich farmlands, the open vista, the cool air of the mountains wafting down around them. It was indeed a far cry from the heat, swamps, ague, and snake-infested landscape of the lower Mississippi. These farms looked much more like the neat, well-kept farms of their Midwest.
They were, as well, coming now as saviors and heroes, and they basked in the glory of it. At crossroads and whistle-stop stations young women waved, sang patriotic airs, and passed up baskets of fresh-baked bread, biscuits, pitchers of
cool water and buttermilk, and older men, with a glimmer in their eye and a wink, would hand off bottles of stronger stuff. The reception across the Midwest had been a warm one, especially when a regiment was passing
through its home state, but here at the edge of the front lines the outpouring of enthusiasm was bordering on the ecstatic. These were the men who were going to save central Pennsylvania from the Confederate army, and the local citizens were thrilled by their arrival.
The trains passed over the massive viaduct that spanned the Susquehanna a dozen miles north of the city. Earthworks and freshly built blockhouses guarded the approach to the bridge on the western shore. Fortunately, this bridge had not
been dropped, the furthest advance of the Confederates stopping down at the gap just above the city.
Along the narrow road just south of the bridge more fortifications were in place, two batteries of rifled pieces guarding this precious crossing in case any rebel raiders should now try to attack.
The river beneath the bridge was still swollen and turbulent from the torrential rains of the previous three weeks, the water dark, littered with debris that tossed on the waves. As the lead train shifted through a switch and on to the bridge, they passed out of the morning light on the west bank of the river into the shade on the steep slopes of the eastern side, the air cool and refreshing.
Spirits were up. The word had passed that their journey of almost a thousand miles was at an end. Fifers picked up songs. Here and there men joined in, some of the tunes patriotic, more than one off-colored, with loud coughs and throat-clearing at every sight of girls lining the track. A group of young women from a nearby female academy, dressed in patriotic red-white-and-blue dresses, triggered an absolute frenzy of coughing, cheers, and more than one friendly, ribald comment that set the girls to blushing but also giggling in response.
The train thundered out of the pass into the broad, open panorama of the Susquehanna Valley, directly ahead the dome of the state capitol, church spires, and factory smokestacks of Harrisburg. All could see the flame-scorched piers of the destroyed covered bridge dropped during the Gettysburg campaign, and the approaches to the pontoon bridge that had been swept away in the flood. Several artillery batteries lined the bank of the river, the guns well dug in, the crews lounging about, waving as the first train passed, the veterans replying politely but holding themselves a bit aloof. For, after all, they were fresh from victory, and the ones waving were not. The armies of the West were now here to teach them how to do it right
Interestingly, a small knot of horsemen was stationed on the far bank, sitting in a clearing partway up the slope of the mountain... advanced rebel scouts, signal flags fluttering. The Confederate outpost had been dislodged several times by small raiding forces coming over from Harrisburg, but as quickly as the Yankees withdrew, the rebs came back to continue their observations of the goings-on inside the state capital.
At the sight of the rebs, the men stood on the flatcars, taunting and waving, shouting that Grant's boys were now here to set things right. Several of the rebel cavalry waved back.
The lead train began to slow, the engineer merrily playing his whistle with a skilled hand, trying to squeeze out the opening bar to "Rally Round the Flag." The tune didn't carry too well, but the rhythm was plain, and some of the men picked up the song, though this was an army that didn't hold much with such patriotic mush. And anyway, in their minds that had been a marching song of the Army of the Potomac and not of the armies of the West.
The crowds along the siding were increasing, people rushing down side streets, cheering, waving, Union infantry joining in, their greeters dressed in bright, new, unstained uniforms.
In contrast, these boys of McPherson's corps were a hard, grizzled lot. Uniforms had long ago faded in the harsh Mississippi sun, the color all but bleaching out to a light, tattered blue. Pant legs were frayed; many had patches sewn on thighs and knees and had backsides stained darkly from countless nights of sitting around campfires. Headgear was non-distinct; few wore kepis, most favoring broad-brimmed hats of brown, black, or gray, which were just as faded and holed as the uniforms.
Hardly a backpack was to be found, the men having long ago adopted a simple horseshoe collar roll of vulcanized ground cloth, with a shelter half, one blanket, and a few changes of socks and a shirt rolled inside. Haversacks were stuffed with some rations; extra food—such as a heavy slice of smoked ham, or a chicken waiting to be plucked—was tied to the strap of the haversack. Of course cartridge boxes were crammed with forty rounds, ten or twenty extra cartridges stuffed into pockets. Maybe a Bible was in the breast pocket of their four-button wool jackets, sometimes riding alongside a deck of cards, a flask of good corn liquor, or some of the new picture cards from Paris. Given the largesse of civilians along the way, most canteens were filled with a mixture of water and whiskey, rum, applejack, or, from the hills of western Pennsylvania, a good solid load of clear, white mountain lightning.
They were veterans, easy in their self-confidence, inured to hardship, long ago disabused of any vague dreams of glory. They had seen what glory led to. They knew their job and would see it through to the end, but they would do so with a quiet, no-nonsense determination. They had signed on for three years, back in the heady days of 1861. Shiloh, Corinth, Fort Donelson, the swamps of Louisiana had forever dimmed the visions and dreams of those early days. What compelled them now was the pride in their regiments and the friendship of their comrades, and no vainglorious words of beribboned generals would sway them one way or the other. It was their job and that was it. War no longer held any illusions for them.
These veterans of the West held the Eastern soldiers who were greeting them with a sort of bemused contempt. Granted, they were on the same side in this war, but it was beyond their understanding how anyone could let a rebel drive them out Where they came from, it was the rebels who did the running, and so it would be here as well. They had come to save the East and they found that concept amusing. They would lord it over the Eastern boys as was their right but then they would see it through to the finish.
They held Grant in supreme confidence. He was one of them. In the shadows of evening, when he would at times walk through their camps, few would actually notice his passing. He was as rumpled as they were, unshaven, battered hat pulled down low, a man you would never notice in a crowd, the only giveaway the almost-permanent cigar clenched in his teeth, glowing like a smokestack. As quickly as it burned to a stub, another would be lit. On a rainy march you might see him sitting astride his horse by the side of the road, eyes watchful, hat brim soaked and dripping, silent, perhaps offering an occasional word of encouragement, but woe betide the man who cheered him; the response was always an icy stare.
He gave no speeches, disdained reviews, which to both him and them were a waste of time, dealt summarily with fools in command, and though they knew he would not hesitate to feed them into the cauldron, he would do so only when there was something to be gained. Their lives, they thought, did mean something to him.
They were of the armies of the West, a different kind of American than those who dwelled in these lush farmlands and burgeoning cities. Many had helped their fathers to clear land on the edge of the frontier. If they were bom in Ohio or Illinois, the stories of Indian raids, of virgin forests, and trackless wilderness were still real to their families. If they were from western Minnesota or Iowa, the frontier was indeed real to them; just beyond the western horizon was a limitless world yet to be explored. Such a vista affected a man, how he thought, what he believed, what he knew he could do, what a hundred thousand thousand of them could do if ever they set their minds to it.
Most had schooling, but not much. Perhaps, like their president, a few months in "blab school." They usually had four, maybe six years tops in a one-room structure that they walked miles to each day. A few, very few, were schooled in the classics and spoke almost like their cousins in the East. Some of these were now officers, but they learned quickly to speak like the men they commanded, to think like them and respect them, or they did not last for long.
Some came from the emerging cities of Chicago, Springfield, or Indianapolis, while others came from the new factory cit
ies springing up around the Great Lakes, and in those regiments could be found mechanics, iron pourers, toolmakers, men who could fashion anything the army might need, or fix anything broken or taken in conquest Men like these could put twenty miles of track back in operation in a matter of days, salvage a locomotive, restore a gasworks, or repair a burst steam boiler.
A sprinkling of Irish were with them, laborers who bent double fourteen hours a day in prairie heat or driving snow, laying the track that was lacing the country together, and some were river men, working the steamships or guiding the flatboats on the Mississippi, the Missouri, and the Ohio. From the far north, more than a few only spoke German, or Swedish, or Norwegian, farmers who had cleared the cold northern land or lumberjacks still felling the great, silent forests. Their new country reminded them of ancestral farms back in northern Europe. Such men were inured to the harsh winters they had always known in both the Old and New Worlds.
Until the start of the war few had ever traveled farther than their county seat to attend a fair or a Fourth of July parade, and nearly all could remember at least one old man riding there in a carriage, eyes dim, but proud and erect, a man who had so long ago marched with Washington, or Wayne, or Morgan.
They were used to vast, open vistas, the limitless plains, or the deep northern woods. This East was almost a different nation, cities to be mistrusted or hated, rich merchants and counting-houses of the railroads, which even at this time were wringing the profits out of their farms.
Ironically, if given a choice, they would have felt far more in common with their foes from Tennessee, Arkansas, and Texas than their comrades from Boston and New York City. The Southern boy might sound strange, but still, he could talk of crops, and raising hogs, and trying to spark a girl behind the barn at a cornhusking, and knew the feel of the damp, rich earth on bare feet when you did your first plowing of spring.
If they had their eyes set anywhere for when this was finished, it was not to the East but always even farther West, maybe mining in Colorado, or perhaps all the way to California. The East was the past, the West was the future, and they were eager to see this war done so they could embrace that future.
Grant Comes East - Civil War 02 Page 25