by Tim Black
“Take this out to the pile out back, girl!” he ordered Minerva. Her body shaking, Minerva held the leg with both hands, blood dripping between her fingers. Keep it together, Minerva told herself. Keep it together.
“Carry it away!” the surgeon ordered at Minerva’s hesitation.
Minerva grimaced when she saw that the surgeon didn’t even clean the blood from the table before the next patient was placed on the wooden surface. Two orderlies entered the room and removed the one-legged corpse and carried it away to join its severed leg in the alley behind the courthouse. Minerva, unnerved and appalled, placed the dead man’s leg on a pile of limbs, which were stacked like a cord of wood by the back door of the courthouse. The two orderlies followed and carried the dead man to a nearby wagon, which was half-filled with cadavers, bodies which earlier in the day had been living and breathing young men. When Minerva saw the collection of mangled bodies in the wagon, she vomited. What was the glory of war of which men spoke so highly? Minerva wondered. There was no glory in this back alley, only the corpses of someone’s son or husband. “The paths of Glory lead but to the grave,” Minerva mumbled, reciting a line from a poem by Thomas Grey, Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.
A hospital orderly who did not seem to be older than twenty asked her, “Are you alright, missy?”
Minerva, tears running down her face, waved him away. She didn’t want to talk to anyone at the moment. She felt she was hyperventilating. She took a series of deep breaths to regain her composure.
“Don’t feel bad, missy,” the orderly said, trying to comfort her. “I upchucked the first time I saw a dead body, too.”
“C’mon Tom,” the second orderly said. “We can’t dawdle out here. She’ll get her stomach straight in a few minutes.”
Minerva composed herself. She wanted to wash the man’s blood from her hands. She had to wash the man’s blood from her hands. But there was no faucet. There was no running water. She dreaded returning to the courthouse to watch the butchery that passed for medicine. She was afraid that she would scream, or worse yet, start CPR on another patient. They would probably hang her as a witch, Minerva thought, a bit melodramatically.
She walked through the alley and came out onto the Diamond and went to a pump in front of the courthouse. She had to wait in line as other women were there filling buckets of water for the wounded soldiers. One corpulent, matronly woman was working the pump and when Minerva appeared at the front of the line, the woman said to Minerva, “Where is your bucket, child?”
Minerva held up her bloody hands. “I just want to wash my hands. I carried a severed leg out to the pile in back of the courthouse.”
The woman looked at Minerva sympathetically.” We all have had to do things today that we never dreamed of,” she said.
Minerva wanted to weep for the young men. She wanted to hug the motherly fat lady, for the woman reminded Minerva how much she missed her own mother at the moment and how long it would be before she could hug her mother again. It would be months before she saw her mother again, because of the selfishness of two darned ghosts. Minerva wanted to use stronger language when thinking of the ghosts, but her mind would not even allow her to think of curse words. Minerva hated vulgarity and swearing, but after what she had witnessed in that makeshift operating room, she could sympathize with anyone who let forth a string of “F-bombs.”
When she washed the blood from her hands, the matronly woman handed her a towel and she dried her hands. “Thank you,” Minerva said.
“Why don’t you take some time off, child? I have a feeling there will be plenty more boys that will need your help later today.”
Minerva nodded agreement. She turned to return to the courthouse but paused. She saw the Gettysburg Hotel. She headed for the hotel. She had to talk to Mr. Greene.
She knocked on the door to his room.
“Come in,” Mr. Greene called.
“Is it okay to come in, Mr. Greene?” Minerva asked.
Greene looked at his ashen-faced student. “You look like you have visited Dante’s circle of hell, Minerva.”
“I think I have, Mr. Greene, and it is right here on earth.”
Greene nodded.
“I held a severed leg in my hands, Mr. Greene.”
“An amputation?”
“Yes, it was barbaric!”
“By our modern medical standards, I am sure it was. But it was the only way the physicians could stop the spread of infection during the Civil War. Gangrene was the culprit. Remember Dr. Benjamin Rush back in 1776, Minerva?”
“Yes.”
“What did he want to do to me?”
“Bleed you.”
“Yes, Minerva, and you stopped him from bleeding me by telling Benjamin Rush that I was a hemophiliac, although you used the term ‘bleeder.’ Why was that?”
“Because I thought the doctor would be suspicious of any girl who knew the word ‘hemophilia,’ Mr. Greene.”
“That was wise, Minerva. You lived up to your given name that day and you undoubtedly saved my life…well, no one bleeds anymore, and they stopped bloodletting way before the Civil War. Perhaps as barbaric as it seems, let’s try not to judge these physicians harshly. Medical training was just coming out of what was called ‘the heroic era,’ when doctors advocated not only bloodletting but purging and blistering to treat the humors of the body. Physicians treated syphilis with mercury for heaven’s sake, making things worse instead of better. But medicine advanced because of the Civil War. It was Dr. Letterman, the chief doctor for the Army of the Potomac, who developed ambulances and emphasized the need for a centralized hospital among all the field hospitals. After the battle is over, Camp Letterman will be erected outside of Gettysburg to coordinate care for the thousands of wounded men from the Battle of Gettysburg. It will be close to the railroad lines. You know, Minerva, railroads were often used to move the more severely wounded to better facilities. Many of the men wounded at Gettysburg would later be sent by railroad to hospitals in Baltimore and Philadelphia, something that Benjamin Rush could have never dreamed of. For none of this, as bad as it may seem to we people of the twenty-first century, was available in Benjamin Rush’s day, and yet as President Lincoln will so eloquently begin his Gettysburg address, 1776 was only ‘four score and seven years ago.’”
“So that is what Lincoln was referring to in his speech…1776?”
“Yes, 1776 and the Declaration of Independence. Four score and seven is eighty-seven, and if you subtract eighty-seven from 1863 you get…”
“1776!” Minerva said, pleased with her arithmetic.
“So basically, within one lifetime, medicine advanced, and by the end of the Civil War, the triage was improved, as was sanitation and hygiene. They realized the benefits of proper ventilation. Once a soldier was wounded on the battlefield, he was bandaged quickly, given some whiskey for his shock and even morphine if the man was in serious pain. If his wounds required, he was removed from the battlefield by ambulance. They separated wounded men into three categories: mortally wounded, slightly wounded, and surgical cases. Yes, the amputations in the field hospitals or courthouses were grisly affairs, but they were also life-saving. I think Ken Burns said that after the war the state of Mississippi spent more on artificial arms and legs than it did education. But no, most men didn’t bite a bullet during an amputation. That’s more Hollywood movie nonsense. In a couple weeks Dorthea Dix’s nurses will appear in Gettysburg, among them will be a nurse named Sophronia Bucklin…did you read her nursing diary?”
“Yes, Mr. Greene.”
“Good, perhaps after she arrives and Camp Letterman is built, we can somehow get you to work with her. She was ahead of her time, as were most of Dorthea Dix’s nurses.”
Greene moved to the window and looked out as Confederates took possession of the Diamond. He and Minerva watched as the Stars and Stripes was lowered from the town square flagpole and the Rebels raised the battle flag of the Army of Northern Virginia, the flag which had stir
red such controversy in the time from whence Minerva came.
“The Stars and Bars,” Minerva said, pointing to the flag flying over the town square.
“Well, that’s not the Stars and Bars, Minerva. The original Stars and Bars had only seven stars, for the original seven states that seceded. But at the start of the war the official Confederate flag had a field of blue with seven white stars and then a red bar, a white bar and a second red bar. Today, people mistake the Confederate battle flag with the official Confederate flag, so that is why most people call it the Stars and Bars. You see, Minerva, in the first major battle of the Civil War, Bull Run, or as the Southerners called the battle, ‘First Manassas,’ there was a good deal of uncertainty. Since the Confederate flag resembled the Union flag, that banner confused many of the soldiers as to who was on whose side. To add to the general mess of things, at Bull Run some of the Confederates wore blue and some of the Yankees wore gray. So after the battle, General P.G.T. Beauregard, whose troops had opened fire on Fort Sumter and started the war, suggested the battle flag, which in our time has become the symbol of the Confederacy and appears on a good many pickup trucks around Cassadaga. But that battle flag that the Army of Northern Virginia waved, has been misnamed the Stars and Bars. How many stars to you see on the flag, Minerva?”
“I count thirteen.”
“Yes, but how many states seceded from the Union and joined the Confederacy.”
“Eleven?”
“Yes, so does that mean the Rebels couldn’t count?”
“I don’t know. Why are there thirteen stars, Mr. Greene? I don’t recall that you taught us the reason.”
“Yes, I might have slipped up on the Civil War unit; it was too close to Christmas I think… Well the Southerners expected Kentucky and Missouri to join the Confederacy. They were slave states on the border, or what we call ‘border states.’ But even though many of the men from Kentucky and Missouri fought for the South—Jesse James for example—the states never seceded from the Union. Did you notice the Union flag had 34 stars?”
“Yes,” Minerva said.
“The day after the battle is over there will be 35 states, as West Virginia seceded from Virginia and became its own state in the Union on July 4, 1863.”
“But why didn’t the Union drop eleven stars from the flag when the states seceded, Mr. Greene?”
“Ah, up until this point in the war at least, the argument about the war was the ability of states to leave the Union. Had Lincoln ordered the subtraction of stars from the Union’s flag it would have meant that he conceded that the South had a right to secede, and Lincoln never agreed to the concept of secession. With the Emancipation Proclamation and with the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln changed the meaning of the war from secession to freedom and the abolishment of slavery. That is why he starts his address by quoting from the Declaration of Independence that ‘all men are created equal,’ and ends it with a ‘new birth of freedom.’ Gary Wills wrote a great book called Lincoln at Gettysburg, and Wills contends that Lincoln changed the meaning of the war at the national cemetery dedication. Up until that time, he had really danced around the idea of abolition. The Emancipation Proclamation didn’t free all the slaves, only slaves in states which were in rebellion. The border states remained loyal to the Union and retained their slaves until after the war when the 13th Amendment was adopted. Do you remember in the movie when Thaddeus Stevens and Abraham Lincoln worked together to pass the amendment through Congress?”
“Yes, Lincoln had to make all kinds of deals. It seemed kind of sleazy, Mr. Greene,” Minerva said, remembering the film and the promises the president made to get the congressmen to do the right thing.
“Yes, Congress hasn’t changed much, I’m afraid.”
“Look at the people in the square, Mr. Greene. Many of them are crying,” Minerva said.
“Yes, the residents took it pretty hard. It was the second time within a week the town was occupied by Rebels.”
Chapter 6
Before Mrs. Weikert allowed the three teens to join her table, she sent them to a washbowl in the kitchen where they quickly took turns washing their hands. In the kitchen, helping her mother, was Rebecca Weikert, nineteen years old. Victor noticed that the girl was wearing an engagement ring and she held her hand out to Victor like Queen Victoria, as if expecting him to kiss the stone. He didn’t, but he did take her hand for a moment.
“I’m Becky. I help my mother around here,” she said merrily, pointing around the kitchen. “There were once thirteen of us,” Becky continued. “Now only my older brother Levi and my little brother David remain at home.”
“My name is Victor Bridges. This is my sister Bette. We are refugees from Mercersburg,” Victor said, crossing his fingers that the Weikerts did not know anyone in Mercersburg with the surname “Bridges.” Victor was over introducing Bette as his little brother “Billy,” and he was not about to continue to walk about the Gettysburg battlefield with the Kardashian moniker. That was too insipid to believe. He decided to end Bette’s charade of masculinity because every woman they met saw right through it.
Becky held out her hand to Bette who, in feminine fashion, introduced herself by her first name only and immediately examined the engagement ring and inquired of Rebecca’s fiancé.
“My future husband is First Lieutenant George Kitzmiller of the 30th Pennsylvania Regiment, Company K,” Becky said proudly. “He is around here somewhere, but I think he may be a bit busy and won’t be with us for supper. Please add him to your prayers tonight,” she said, seriously, forcing a wistful smile to her face. “Please pray for his safety for me.”
Bette nodded affirmation. “He is in my prayers, Becky,” she said.
Victor paid no attention to the interchange between Bette and Becky. His nostrils picked up the appealing scent of fried chicken and he glimpsed a heaping bowl of mashed potatoes on a kitchen table waiting to be devoured. Like a Pavlovian dog, he began to salivate. Unfortunately, Victor also noticed a voracious adolescent male rival for the chicken and mashed potatoes, David Weikert, fourteen years old, who had charged the spuds with a wooden spoon, scooping up a mouthful of taters before his older sister swatted his hand away. Victor smiled: David was his kind of kid.
Victor, Bette, and Tillie were offered seats at the dining room table with Mr. and Mrs. Weikert and a woman wearing a wedding band who introduced herself as “Hettie” Shriver, which was short for “Henrietta.” Henrietta Shriver was Tillie Pierce’s Gettysburg neighbor who had hired the fifteen-year-old girl to help babysit her two children. The three Weikert children remaining at the farm, Levi, Rebecca and David, sat at an adjacent table with Mrs. Shriver’s two little girls, Rebecca watching over her two nieces, Sadie and Molly Shriver. Victor noticed that Bette had a perplexed look on her face. He wondered what that was about. Was she mad at him for ending her charade?
Sarah Ikes Weikert looked at Victor and said, “You and your sister can stay here tonight if you wish, young man.”
Mrs. Weikert, whom Victor judged to be in her seventies due to her white hair, was only in her fifties; the rugged life of a mother of thirteen children, two of whom died in infancy, surely altered her hair color, he thought.
Now, Victor noticed Bette was scowling. He sensed he was in trouble with her for introducing her as his sister instead of his brother Billy. She looked at the grinning Mrs. Weikert.
“Did you know I was a girl from the start?” Bette asked. “How did you tell?”
“My yes. I knew by your gait, girl,” Mrs. Weikert replied. “You don’t walk like a boy. I guess your outfit can fool most men though,” she smiled. “If that was your purpose. Men aren’t as good at recognizing things as women,” she added.
“It was my purpose,” Bette replied. “I heard there were some girls fighting with the Rebels, Mrs. Weikert.”
“And you wanted to fight for the Union, girl?”
“Why not?” Bette went on.
“Because it is not lady like,” Sarah Weikert r
eplied. “You mother would have a fit, girl.”
“She’s passed,” Bette lied, using the term “passed” instead of “died.”
“Oh?” Mrs. Weikert said. “How did she pass?”
Suddenly Bette was tongue-tied and looked to Victor for support. Victor had a mouthful of mashed potatoes, which he quickly swallowed and, thinking quickly, said, “She caught pneumonia, Mrs. Weikert,”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Mrs. Weikert said, and returned to her meal. The group ate in silence.
Victor watched. Mrs. Shriver and Mrs. Weikert ate daintily. Mr. Weikert, on the other hand, was all business, shoveling food into his mouth like it was his last meal. He didn’t engage in conversation while he was eating, and even when he was sated, the elderly sixty-six-year-old Jacob Weikert turned out to be taciturn, rarely speaking unless spoken to by his wife.
“What shall we do, Jacob?” Mrs. Weikert asked.
“Whatever the army asks,” Weikert replied succinctly, tamping down tobacco in his pipe, but looking to his wife for permission to light up.
She nodded permission.
Victor, like Mr. Weikert, had been too busy refueling to engage in discourse at dinner. Famished, Victor gobbled down four pieces of chicken and a mountain of mashed potatoes while Mrs. Weikert beamed approvingly, as if to say she liked a man who could eat heartily.
*After supper Victor, Bette and Tillie ventured out to the barn to see how the wounded men were getting along. The soldiers were packed side-by-side like sardines, and the attendants and the nurses seemed to be overwhelmed by the number of patients and the severity of their wounds. The groaning and the crying affected Bette. She heard a death rattle, the last gasps of breath of a soldier, a sound that she had heard at her grandmother’s bedside. It was an unmistakable sound, a raspy gurgle as the body clung desperately to life.