Day Nine

by Clayton Spann

Wednesday, June 24

  The soldiers bellowed the chorus as the band at the head of the column played the stirring music.

  Hurrah!

  Hurrah!

  For Southern rights, hurrah!

  Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star.

  Though they were the enemy, Mauer could not help but be impressed. These lean young men strode over the cobblestones of Chambersburg as if they owned the world. Their long unkempt beards and ragged uniforms only added to their air of lethality.

  Mauer had to admit it, these men were probably the finest combat troops the country ever produced. In both courage and skill they excelled. Against a foe always more numerous and better supplied, these men of the Army of Northern Virginia had not yet lost a battle.

  Along with many townspeople Mauer watched the men of Rodes’ division tramp three abreast through the town square. A nearby civilian voiced the general hope, that the rebels would not burn the town. Another said a ransom demand was more likely. A third said any ransom would break their pocketbooks.

  A hefty ransom Chambersburg would indeed pay. Fire the town would escape. It would be next summer that the Confederates torched this prosperous town, half again as large as Gettysburg. Two-thirds of Chambersburg would end up gutted.

  At the head of each regiment a bearer held the Confederate battle flag high. The infamous flags, faded after so many campaigns, were now more pink than red. No one however called that to the attention of the troops. On many flags a strip of golden cloth proclaimed participation in this battle and that.

  Regiment after regiment passed through the town square. Mid morning sun flashed on the rows of swaying bayonets. Drums beat and brass blared and the troops sang. We are here, it all shouted. We are here on your soil to fight the battle that will whip you damned Yankees for good. You don’t have a chance, and you know it.

  Townspeople looked on glumly. They probably expected Lee to shortly administer the coup de grace to Northern hopes. Given the track record of the Army of the Potomac, who could blame them?

  Some people watched with other than resignation. They were mainly women, somberly clad. Several had pinned a black ribbon to a sleeve shoulder. These women had undoubtedly lost loved ones to combat, and now their eyes flung hate at the men responsible.

  Across the square from Mauer stood the Franklin Hotel. He checked his pocket watch. Half past ten neared.

  He looked south down Front Street, toward the Reformed Church. Within a minute a big carriage pulled by two horses crested the slope. Mounted staff officers flanked the carriage.

  Lieutenant General Richard Ewell was right on time. The carriage neared, then separated from the advancing troops to park at the hotel entrance. A staff officer hustled from his horse to the carriage. The gray clad major helped the general out, then handed Ewell a crutch.

  Mauer bet the boyish looking major was Sandie Pendleton. Which was as it should be, Ewell had kept Pendleton on as an adjutant for the Second Corps. Mauer could detect no sign of anticipation on the face of Pendleton, that he might shortly meet the man he so revered. Of course, he might not know Jackson still lived.

  Ewell swung on his crutch toward the hotel entrance. Ewell, “Old Baldy”, had lost a leg at Second Bull Run. He endured a long recovery and had not returned to duty until just after Chancellorsville. During his convalescence Ewell gained a wooden leg, upon which he now—with crutch—struggled to walk.

  Even across the square Mauer could detect the bulging eyes of the man. The general definitely looked strange. Thin sideburns ended in a thick mustache and a thicker goatee. His head drooped to the side. And underneath his slouch hat lay utter baldness. Some likened his barren top to an egg or a bomb.

  Dick Ewell was almost as eccentric as the man he had replaced. He couldn’t lie flat in a bed and to sleep he curled up on the floor around a chair or stool. Like Jackson, he thought his digestive system was awry. Ewell tried to placate it by eating only a mix of wheat boiled in milk. Unlike Jackson, he was not pious and could match any of his troops in profanity.

  Ewell finally made it onto the covered porch of the three-story brick building. The Franklin Hotel would temporarily become his headquarters. Within the hour he would issue a demand for an impossible amount of cash and supplies. When officials and storeowners failed to comply, Confederate troops would take what they wanted anyway.

  Mauer had kept a watch on the hotel since arriving in Chambersburg on Monday. The hotel would be the logical place for Jackson to meet Ewell today, and Lee when he arrived Friday. Mauer had not yet spotted Naylor, Price or Jackson in or around the hotel, but that meant nothing.

  If Jackson was not sequestered in the hotel, she probably had lodged him nearby. She had certainly well disguised him.

  Would Jackson make contact with Ewell today? It was not absolutely necessary. Ewell could be kept ignorant until arriving at Gettysburg. To that point Second Corps operations could remain unchanged.

  The wagon train of the division followed the soldiers. The scores of covered wagons groaned and rumbled on the macadam. Four and six teams of mules drew them. The drivers, most sitting on one of the mules instead of the wagon, were older men and in some cases black. The drivers cracked their whips and shouted terse commands to guide their charges.

  After depositing Chloe at Transit One, Mauer had joined a different type of wagon train. From Hagerstown to Chambersburg refugees filled the Cumberland Valley pike. In buggy, buckboard and Conestoga wagon they fled northward. Each vehicle was crammed to capacity with possessions. Livestock trailed. Mauer also saw many fleeing blacks.

  Men expected they would be robbed; women feared molestation. Some people even said the hungry rebs would eat children.

  The men were right about larceny—though the Confederates pretended to pay, with their worthless script—but the women need not worry. Lee made it clear he not tolerate wanton plundering or violence. Rapists would be hanged. And children were forbidden food.

  Though Mauer detested the man, Lee must be given credit for his treatment of civilians and property during this invasion. During the first two years of war, the Federals had ravaged the Virginia war zone. With little loss of sleep Lee could have ordered similar ruination.

  The Confederates would find rich spoils in this valley. To Mauer the Cumberland looked even more fertile than the Gettysburg area. The broad valley floor between South Mountain to the east and the Appalachians to the west harbored an incredible bounty of grains and animals. The Confederates would also find plenty of dry goods and other sundries to requisition.

  On the pike Mauer had seen many cherry trees, their limbs full of ripened fruit. The refuges hurried past the beckoning produce. Not so the invaders. The troops of Old Baldy would pick the cherry trees clean—emblematic of how thoroughly the Second Corps would strip the land as it progressed through the Cumberland Valley.

  Officers continued to come in and out of the Franklin Hotel. Only a few civilians, all male, were allowed to enter. No one came close to resembling Jackson. Which meant little, Jackson could of course slip in the back entrance. For not the first time Mauer wished he had a second pair of eyes around.

  But Chloe was where she should be. She would live whatever happened to him. These past seven weeks she had done her duty and more.

  He did miss her. Maybe he loved her. If they both made it out of here, that love could well deepen.

  But it wouldn’t matter. He had never loved a woman as much as Teri. Teri was a radiant splendor, his first love, his true love.

  He had a chance now to get his wife back, and live out the years with her that Nina Miller took away. Nina Miller, the most evil bitch that ever lived, who made Allison Naylor look like a saint. He would kill Nina on sight if he could find her in 1996.

  If he and Chloe survived 1863, Mauer would let Chloe down easily as he could. Thank God he had kept his hands off her. Traveling to Transit One he n
early folded. Their parting had been emotional. But somehow they managed not to close the last foot of space between them.

  He wondered how she was doing on the mountain top. She was a tough girl, but it had to be very difficult. She was alone in the wilderness. Every moment she had to watch for swift shrinking—which meant he was dead. She would be too, if she didn’t hustle into the transit.

  There were other dangers. They had not seen anyone going up the mountain or at the top. But that did not mean hunters or even army deserters would not appear in the days to follow. Men finding a young woman alone were capable of anything.

  Mauer had left Chloe well armed. She had two pistols, a shotgun and a rifle at her disposal. He had told her to shoot to kill if in any doubt. Don’t let intruders close; tell them to scat. Her eyes said she understood fully.

  He told her to keep any fire low, and to put it out at night. Stay in her tent after darkness fell. Humans probably would not prowl at night, but animals did. Both wolves and bears could poke around. Again, shoot first and ask questions later.

  Mauer chilled. He wouldn’t be able to take it if he returned to Transit One and found her dead. He prayed Chloe would stay alert and with a finger on the trigger.

  The wagons rattled on. They and the soldiers were heading to camp three miles north of town. Tomorrow the troops of Johnson’s division would join them. After that would come the corps of A. P. Hill, then that of Longstreet. And the head of the whole shebang, supreme traitor to the United States, Robert E. Lee.