XXVIII
THE LONGEST WAY ROUND
Having, in a month and ten days, marched four hundred miles, fought fourpitched battles and a whole rosary of skirmishes, made of naught theoperations of four armies, threatened its enemy's capital and relievedits own, the Army of the Valley wound upward toward the Blue Ridge fromthe field of Port Republic. It had attended Shields some distance downthe Luray road. "Drive them!--drive them!" had said Jackson. It haddriven them then, turning on its steps it had passed again thebattlefield. Fremont's army, darkening the heights upon the further sideof that river of burned bridges, looked impotently on. Fremont shelledthe meadow and the wheat fields over which ambulances and surgeons wereyet moving, on which yet lay his own wounded, but his shells could notreach the marching foe. Brigade after brigade, van, main and rear,cavalry, infantry, artillery, quartermaster, commissary and ordnancetrains, all disappeared in the climbing forest. A cold and chilling raincame on; night fell, and a drifting mist hid the Army of the Valley. Thenext morning Fremont withdrew down the Valley toward Strasburg. Shieldstarried at Luray, and the order from Washington directing McDowell tomake at once his long delayed junction with McClellan upon theChickahominy was rescinded.
The rear guard of the Army of the Valley buried the dead of PortRepublic in trenches, and then it, too, vanished. To the last wagonwheel, to the last poor straggler, all was gone. It was an idiosyncrasyof Jackson's to gather and take with him every filing. He travelled likea magnet; all that belonged to him went with him. Long after dark, highon the mountain-side, an aide appeared in the rain, facing the head ofthe rear brigade.
"The general says have you brought off every inch of the captured guns?"
"Tell him all but one unserviceable caisson. We did not have horses forthat."
The aide galloped forward, reported, turned, and galloped back. "GeneralJackson says, sir, that if it takes every horse in your command, thatcaisson is to be brought up before daylight."
The other swore. "All those miles--dark and raining!--LieutenantParke!--Something told me I'd better do it in the first place!"
Brigade after brigade the Army of the Valley climbed the Blue Ridge. Atfirst the rain had been welcome, so weary and heated were the men. Butit never took long for the novelty of rain to wear off. Wet and silentthe troops climbed through the darkness. They had won a victory; theywere going to win others. Old Jack was as great a general as Napoleon,and two or three hours ago it had seemed possible to his soldiers thathistory might rank them with the Old Guard. But the rain was chill andthe night mournfully dark. When had they eaten? They hardly remembered,and it was an effort to lift one leg after the other. Numbers of menwere dropping with sleep. All shivered; all felt the reaction. Back onthe plain by the river lay in trenches some hundreds of their comrades.In the rear toiled upwards ambulances filled with wounded. There werenot ambulances enough; the wounded rode wherever there was room in anywagon. The less badly hurt sat or lay, dully suffering, on caissons. Allas they toiled upward had visions of the field behind them. It had notbeen a great battlefield, as to extent and numbers engaged, but ahorrible one. The height where the six guns had been, the gun which theLouisianians took--the old charcoal kiln where the guns had beenplanted, the ground around, the side of the ravine--these made an uglysight between eyelid and ball! So many dead horses!--eighty of them inone place--one standing upright where he had reared and, dying, had beencaught and propped by a blasted pine. So many dead men, grey and blue,lying as in pattern! And then the plain beneath, and the Stonewall'sdesperate fight, and the battle in the wheat! The Federal cannon hadsheared the heads from the men. The soldiers, mounting through thedarkness in the whistling wind and rain, saw again these headlessbodies. One only, the body of a young soldier of the 2d Virginia, abrother of the colonel of the 65th, the army was carrying with it. Thebrother, wounded himself, had begged the body. At the first villagewhere the army halted, he would get a coffin and lay the boy in a gravehe could mark. His mother and sister could visit it then. Permission wasgiven. It lay now in an ambulance, covered with a flag. Cleave lay uponthe straw beside it, his arm flung across the breast. At its feet sat adark and mournful figure, old Tullius with his chin propped on hisknees.
The rain came down, fine as needles' points and cold. Somewhere farbelow a mountain stream was rushing, and in the darkness the wind wassighing. The road wound higher. The lead horses, drawing a gun, steppedtoo near the edge of the road. The wet earth gave way. The unfortunatebrutes plunged, struggled, went down and over the embankment, draggingthe wheel horses after them. Gun, carriage, and caisson followed. Theechoes awoke dismally. The infantry, climbing above, looked down the farwooded slopes, but incuriously. The infantry was tired, cold, andfamished; it was not interested in artillery accidents. Perhaps at timesthe Old Guard had felt thus, with a sick and cold depression, kibedspirits as well as heels, empty of enthusiasm as of food, resolutionlost somewhere in the darkness, sonority gone even from "_l'empereur_"and "_la France_." Slowly, amid drizzling rain, brigade after brigademade Brown's Gap and bivouacked within the dripping forest.
Morning brought a change. The rain yet fell, but the army was recoveringfrom the battlefield. It took not long, nowadays, to recover. The armywas learning to let the past drop into the abyss and not to listen forthe echoes. It seemed a long time that the country had been at war, andeach day's events drove across and hid the event of the day before.Speculation as to the morrow remained, but even this hung loosely uponthe Army of the Valley. Wonderment as to the next move partook less ofdeep anxiety than of the tantalization of guessing at a riddle with theanswer always just eluding you. The army guessed and guessed--botheringwith the riddle made its chief occupation while it rested for two daysand nights, beside smoky camp-fires, in a cold June rain, in the crampedarea of Brown's Gap; but so assured was it that Old Jack knew the properanswer, and would give it in his own good time, that the guessing hadlittle fretfulness or edge of temper. By now, officers and men, theconfidence was implicit. "Tell General Jackson that we will go whereverhe wishes us to go, and do whatever he wishes us to do."
On the morning of the twelfth "at early dawn" the army found itselfagain in column. The rain had ceased, the clouds were gone, presently uprose the sun. The army turned its back upon the sun; the army went downthe western side of the mountains, down again into the great Valley. Themen who had guessed "Richmond" were crestfallen. They who had stoutlyheld that Old Jack had mounted to this eyrie merely the better again toswoop down upon Fremont, Shields, or Banks crowed triumphantly. "Knew itTuesday, when the ambulances obliqued at the top and went on down towardStaunton! He sends his wounded in front, he never leaves them behind!Knew it wasn't Richmond!"
Brigade by brigade the army wound down the mountain, passed below PortRepublic, and came into a lovely verdurous country, soft green grass andstately trees set well apart. Here it rested five days, and here thecommanding general received letters from Lee.
"_Your recent successes have been the cause of the liveliest joy in this army as well as in the country. The admiration excited by your skill and boldness has been constantly mingled with solicitude for your situation. The practicability of reinforcing you has been the subject of the gravest consideration. It has been determined to do so at the expense of weakening this army. Brigadier-General Lawton with six regiments from Georgia is on his way to you, and Brigadier-General Whiting with eight veteran regiments leaves here to-day. The object is to enable you to crush the forces opposed to you. Leave your enfeebled troops to watch the country and guard the passes covered by your artillery and cavalry, and with your main body, including Ewell's Division and Lawton's and Whiting's commands, move rapidly to Ashland, by rail or otherwise as you find most advantageous, and sweep down between the Chickahominy and the Pamunkey, cutting up the enemy's communications, etc., while this army attacks McClellan in front. He will then, I think, be forced to come out of his entrenchments where he is strongly posted on the Chickah
ominy, and apparently preparing to move by gradual approaches on Richmond._"
And of a slightly earlier date.
"_Should there be nothing requiring your attention in the Valley, so as to prevent your leaving it in a few days, and you can make arrangements to deceive the enemy and impress him with the idea of your presence, please let me know, that you may unite at the decisive moment with the army near Richmond._"
It may be safely assumed that these directions could have been given tono man more scrupulously truthful in the least of his personalrelations, and to no commander in war more gifted in all that pertainsto "deceiving the enemy and impressing him with an idea of yourpresence." Infantry and artillery, the Army of the Valley rested at Mt.Meridian under noble trees. The cavalry moved to Harrisonburg. Munfordhad succeeded Ashby in command, and Munford came to take his orders fromhis general. He found him with the dictionary, the Bible, the Maxims,and a lemon.
"You will draw a cordon quite across, north of Harrisonburg. See, fromhere to here." He drew a map toward him and touched two points with astrong, brown finger.
"Very well, sir."
"You will arrest all travellers up and down the Valley. None is to pass,going north or going south."
"Very well, sir."
"I wish the cavalry outposts to have no communication with the infantry.If they know nothing of the latter's movements they cannot accidentallytransmit information. You will give this order, and you will be heldaccountable for its non-obedience."
"Very well, sir."
"You will proceed to act with boldness masking caution. Press theoutposts of the enemy and, if possible, drive him still furthernorthward." He broke off and sucked the lemon.
"Very well, sir."
"Create in him the impression that you are strongly supported. Drive itinto his mind that I am about to advance against him. General Lee issending reinforcements from Richmond. I do not object to his knowingthis, nor to his having an exaggerated idea of their number. You willregard these instructions as important."
"I will do my best, sir."
"Good, good! That is all, colonel."
Munford returned to Harrisonburg, drew his cordon across the Valley, andpushed his outposts twelve miles to the northward. Here they encountereda Federal flag of truce, an officer with several surgeons, and a demandfrom Fremont for the release of his wounded men. The outposts passed theembassy on to Munford's headquarters at Harrisonburg. That cavalrymanstated that he would take pleasure in forwarding General Fremont'sdemand to General Jackson. "Far? Oh, no! it is not far." In the meantime it was hoped that the Federal officers would find such and such aroom comfortable lodging. They found it so, discovered, too, that it wasnext to Munford's own quarters, and that the wall between wasthin--nothing more, indeed, than a slight partition. An hour or twolater the Federal officers, sitting quietly, heard the Confederatecavalryman enter, ask for writing materials, demand of an aide if thecourier had yet returned from General Jackson, place himself at a tableand fall to writing. One of the blue soldiers tiptoed to the wall, founda chair conveniently placed and sat down with his ear to the boards. Forfive minutes, scratch, scratch! went Munford's pen. At the expiration ofthis time there was heard in the hall without a jingling of spurs and aclanking of a sabre. The scratching ceased; the pen was evidentlysuspended. "Come in!" The listeners in the next room heard morejingling, a heavy entrance, Munford's voice again.
"Very good, Gilmer. What did the general say?"
"He says, sir, that General Fremont is to be told that our surgeons willcontinue to attend their wounded. As we are not monsters they will be ascarefully attended to as are our own. The only lack in the matter willbe medicines and anaesthetics."
"Very good, Gilmer, I will so report to the officer in charge of theflag of truce.--Well, what is it, man? You look as though you werebursting with news!"
"I am, sir! Whiting, and Hood, and Lawton, and the Lord knows whobesides, are coming over the Rockfish Gap! I saw them with my own eyeson the Staunton road. About fifteen thousand, I reckon, of Lee's best.Gorgeous batteries--gorgeous troops--Hood's Texans--thousands ofGeorgians--all of them playing 'Dixie,' and hurrahing, and askingeverybody they see to point out Jackson!--No, sir, I'm not dreaming! Iknow we thought that they couldn't get here for several days yet--buthere they are! Good Lord! I wouldn't, for a pretty, miss the huntingdown the Valley!"
The blue soldiers heard Munford and the courier go out. An hour laterthey were conducted to the colonel's presence. "I am sorry, major, butGeneral Jackson declines acceding to General Fremont's request. Hesays--"
The party with the flag of truce went back to Fremont. They went likeLieutenant Gilmer, "bursting with news." The next day Munford pushed hisadvance to New Market. Fremont promptly broke up his camp, retired toStrasburg, and began to throw up fortifications. His spies broughtbewilderingly conflicting reports. A deserter, who a little laterdeserted back again, confided to him that Stonewall Jackson was simplyanother Cromwell; that he was making his soldiers into Ironsides: thatthey were Presbyterian to a man, and believed that God Almighty hadplanned this campaign and sent Jackson to execute it; that he--thedeserter--being of cavalier descent, couldn't stand it and "got out."There was an affair of outposts, in which several prisoners were taken.These acknowledged that a very large force of cavalry occupiedHarrisonburg, and that Jackson was close behind, having rebuilt thebridge at Fort Republic across the Shenandoah, and advanced by theKeezletown road. An old negro shambled one morning into the lines."Yaas, sah, dat's de truf! I ain' moughty unlike ol' Brer Eel. Icert'ny slipped t'roo dat 'cordion Gineral Jackson am er stretchin'! Howmany on de oder side, sah? 'Bout er half er million." Fremonttelegraphed and wrote to Washington. "The condition of affairs hereimperatively requires that some position be immediately made strongenough to be maintained. Reinforcements should be sent here without anhour's delay. Whether from Richmond or elsewhere, forces of the enemyare certainly coming into this region. Casualties have reduced my force.The small corps scattered about the country are exposed to sudden attackby greatly superior force of an enemy to whom intimate knowledge ofcountry and universal friendship of inhabitants give the advantage ofrapidity and secrecy of movements. I respectfully submit thisrepresentation to the President, taking it for granted that it is theduty of his generals to offer for his consideration such impressions asare made by knowledge gained in operations on the ground."
South of the impenetrable grey curtain stretched across the Valley begana curious series of moves. A number of Federal prisoners on their wayfrom Port Republic to Richmond, saw pass them three veteran brigades.The guards were good-naturedly communicative. "Who are those? Those areWhiting and Hood and Lawton on their way to reinforce Stonewall. If wedidn't have to leave this railroad you might see Longstreet'sDivision--it's just behind. How can Lee spare it?--Oh, Beauregard's upfrom the South to take its place!" The prisoners arrived in Richmond. Totheir surprise and gratification the officers found themselves paroled,and that at once. They had a glimpse of an imposing review; they passed,under escort, lines of entrenchments, batteries, and troops; theirpassage northward to McDowell's lines at Fredericksburg was facilitated.In a remarkably short space of time they were in Washington, insistingthat Longstreet had gone to the Valley, and that Beauregard was up fromthe South--they had an impression that in that glimpse of a big reviewthey had seen him! Certainly they had seen somebody who looked as thoughhis name ought to be Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard!
In the mean time Hood, Lawton, and Whiting actually arrived in theValley. They came into Staunton, in good order, veteran troops, readyto march against Shields or Fremont or Banks or Sigel, to keep theValley or to proceed against Washington, quite as Stonewall Jacksonshould desire! Seven thousand troops, Georgia, Texas, North Carolina,and Virginia, lean, bronzed, growing ragged, tall men, with eyes setwell apart, good marchers, good fighters, good lovers, and goodhaters.--There suddenly appeared before them on the pike at StauntonStonewall Jackson, ridden through the night fr
om Mt. Meridian.
The three brigades paraded. Jackson rode up and down the line. His famehad mounted high. To do with a few men and at a little cost what, by allthe rules of war, should have involved strong armies and muchbloodshed--that took a generalship for which the world was beginning togive him credit. With Cross Keys and Port Republic began that sustainedenthusiasm which accompanied him to the end. Now, on the march and onthe battlefield, when he passed his men cheered him wildly, andthroughout the South the eyes of men and women kindled at his name. AtStaunton the reinforcing troops, the greater number of whom saw him forthe first time, shouted for him and woke the echoes. Grave andunsmiling, he lifted the forage cap, touched Little Sorrel with the spurand went on by. It is not to be doubted that he was ambitious, and itlies not in ambitious man, no, nor in man of any type, to feel no joy insuch a cry of recognition! If he felt it, however, he did not evince it.He only jerked his hand into the air and went by.
Two hours later he rode back to Mt. Meridian. The three brigades underorders to follow, stayed only to cook a day's rations and to repacktheir wagons. Their certainty was absolute. "We will join the Army ofthe Valley _wherever it may be_. Then we will march against Shields orFremont, or maybe against Banks or Sigel."
Breaking camp in the afternoon, they moved down the pike, through acountry marvellous to the Georgians and Texans. Sunset came, and stillthey marched; dark, and still they marched; midnight, and, extremelyweary, they halted in a region of hills running up to the stars.Reveille sounded startlingly soon. The troops had breakfast while thestars were fading, and found themselves in column on the pike under thefirst pink streakings of the dawn. They looked around for the Army ofthe Valley. A little to the northeast showed a few light curls ofsmoke, such as might be made by picket fires. They fancied, too, thatthey heard, from behind the screen of hills, faint bugle-calls, bugleanswering bugle, like the cocks at morn. If it were so, they were thinand far away, "horns of elfland." Evidently the three brigades mustrestrain their impatience for an hour or two.
In the upshot it proved that they were not yet to fraternize with theArmy of the Valley. When presently, they marched, it was _up_ theValley, back along the pike toward Staunton. The three brigadiersconferred together. Whiting, the senior, a veteran soldier, staunch anddetermined, was angry. "Reasonable men should not be treated so! 'Youwill start at four, General Whiting, and march until midnight, when youwill bivouac. At early dawn a courier will bring you furtherinstructions.' Very good! We march and bivouac, and here's the courier.'The brigades of Whiting, Hood, and Lawton will return to Staunton.There they will receive further instructions.'" Whiting swore. "We aregetting a taste of his quality with a vengeance! Very well! very well!It's all right--if he wins through I'll applaud, too--but, by God! heoughtn't to treat reasonable men so!--_Column Forward!_"
Under the stately trees at Mt. Meridian, in the golden June weather, theArmy of the Valley settled to its satisfaction that it was about toinvade Maryland. Quite an unusual number of straws showed which way thewind was blowing. Northern news arrived by grapevine, and Northernpapers told the army that was what it was going to do,--"invade Marylandand move on Washington--sixty thousand bloody-minded rebels!"--"Lookhere, boys, look here. Multiplication by division! The Yanks have spliteach of us into four!" Richmond papers, received by way of Staunton,divulged the fact that troops had been sent to the Valley, and opinedthat the other side of Mason and Dixon needed all the men at home. Theengineers received an order to prepare a new and elaborate series ofmaps of the Valley. They were not told to say nothing about it, sopresently the army knew that Old Jack was having every rabbit track andrail fence put down on paper. "Poor old Valley! won't she have ascouring!"
The sole question was, when would the operations begin. The "footcavalry" grew tired of verdant meads, June flowers, and warbling birds.True, there were clear streams and Mr. Commissary Banks's soap, and theclothes got gloriously washed! Uniforms, too, got cleaned and patched."Going calling. Must make a show!" and shoes were cobbled. (Cartridgeboxes surreptitiously cut to pieces for this.) Morning drills occurredof course, and camp duties and divine services; but for all thesediversions the army wearied of Mt. Meridian, and wanted to march. Twentymiles a day--twenty-five--even thirty if Old Jack put a point on it! Thefoot cavalry drew the line at thirty-five. It had tried this once, andonce was enough! In small clasped diaries, the front leaves given overto a calendar, a table of weights and measures, a few 1850 censusreturns, and the list of presidents of the United States, stopping atJames Buchanan, the army recorded that nothing of interest happened atMt. Meridian and that the boys were tired of loafing.
"How long were they going to stay?" The men pestered the companyofficers, the company asked the regimental, field asked staff, staffshook its head and had no idea, a brigadier put the question toMajor-General Ewell and Old Dick made a statement which reached thedrummer boys that evening. "We are resting here for just a few daysuntil all the reinforcements are in, and then we will proceed to beat upBanks's quarters again about Strasburg and Winchester."
On the morning of the seventeenth there was read a general order. "_Campto be more strictly policed. Regimental and brigade drill ordered.Bridge to be constructed across the Shenandoah. Chapel to be erected.Day of fasting and prayer for the success of our arms on theMississippi._"--"Why, we are going to stay here forever!" The regimentalcommanders, walking away from drill, each found himself summoned to thepresence of his brigadier. "Good-morning, colonel! Just received thisorder. 'Cook two days' rations and pack your wagons. Do it quietly.'"
By evening the troops were in motion, Ewell's leading brigade standingunder arms upon a country road, the red sunset thrown back from everymusket barrel. The brigadier approached Old Dick where he sat Riflebeneath a locust tree. "Might I be told in which direction, sir--"
Ewell looked at him with his bright round eyes, bobbed his head andswore. "By God! General Taylor! I do not know whether we are to marchnorth, south, east, or west, or to march at all!" There was shoutingdown the line. "Either Old Jack or a rabbit!" Five minutes, and Jacksoncame by. "You will march south, General Ewell."
The three brigades of Whiting, Hood, and Lawton, having, like the Kingof France, though not with thirty thousand men, marched up the hill anddown again, found at Staunton lines of beautifully shabby VirginiaCentral cars, the faithful, rickety engines, the faithful, overworked,thin-faced railroad men, and a sealed order from General Jackson. "_Takethe cars and go to Gordonsville. Go at once._" The reinforcements fromLee left the Valley of Virginia without having laid eyes upon the armythey were supposed to strengthen. They had heard its bugles over thehilltops--that was all.
The Army of the Valley marched south, and at Waynesboro struck the roadthrough Rockfish Gap. Moving east through magnificent scenery, it passedthe wall of the Blue Ridge and left for a time the Valley of Virginia.Cavalry went before the main body, cavalry guarded the rear, far out onthe northern flank rode Munford's troopers. At night picket duty provedheavy. In the morning, before the bivouacs were left, the troops wereordered to have no conversation with chance-met people upon the road."If anybody asks you questions, you are to answer, I don't know." Thetroops went on through lovely country, through the June weather, andthey did not know whither they were going. "Wandering in thewilderness!" said the men. "Good Lord! they wandered in the wildernessfor forty years!" "Oh, that was Moses! Old Jack'll double-quick usthrough on half-rations in three days!"
The morning of the nineteenth found the army bivouacked nearCharlottesville. An impression prevailed--Heaven knows how or why--thatBanks had also crossed the Blue Ridge, and that the army was about tomove to meet him in Madison County. In reality, it moved toGordonsville. Here it found Whiting, Hood, and Lawton come in by trainfrom Staunton. Now they fraternized, and now the army numberedtwenty-two thousand men. At Gordonsville some hours were spent inwondering. One of the chaplains was, however, content. The Presbyterianpastor of the place told him in deep confidence that he had gathered atheadquarters that a
t early dawn the army would move toward Orange CourtHouse and Culpeper, thence on to Washington. The army moved at earlydawn, but it was toward Louisa Court House.
Cavalry, artillery, and wagon trains proceeded by the red and heavyroads, but from Gordonsville on the Virginia Central helped the infantryas best it might. The cars were few and the engine almost as overworkedas the train men, but the road did its best. The trains moved back andforth, took up in succession the rear brigade and forwarded them on themarch. The men enjoyed these lifts. They scrambled aboard, hung out ofthe window, from the platform and from roof, encouraged the engine,offered to push the train, and made slighting remarks on the tameness ofthe scenery. "Not like God's country, back over the mountains!" Theyyelled encouragement to the toiling column on the red roads. "Stepspryer! Your turn next!"
Being largely Valley of Virginia Virginians, Louisianians, Georgians,Texans, and North Carolinians, the army had acquaintance slight or nonewith the country through which it was passing. Gordonsville left behind,unfamiliarity began. "What's this county? What's that place over there?What's that river? Can't be the Potomac, can it? Naw, 't aint wideenough!"--"Gentlemen, I think it is the Rappahannock."--"Go away! it isthe headwaters of the York."--"Rapidan maybe, or Rivanna."--"ProbablyPamunkey, or the Piankatank,
Where the bullfrogs jump from bank to bank."
"Why not say the James?"--"Because it isn't. We know the James."--"Maybeit's the Chickahominy! I'm sure we've marched far enough! Think I hearMcClellan's cannon, anyhow!"--"Say, captain, is that the riverDan?"--"_Forbidden to give names!_"--"Good Lord! I'd like to see--no, Iwouldn't like to see Old Jack in the Inquisition!"--"I was down hereonce and I think it is the South Anna."--"It couldn't be--it couldn't beAcquia Creek, boys?"--"Acquia Creek! Absurd! You aren't even warm!"--"Itmight be the North Anna."--"Gentlemen, cease this idle discussion. It isthe Tiber!"
On a sunny morning, somewhere in this _terra incognita_, one of Hood'sTexans chanced, during a halt, to stray into a by-road where anox-heart cherry tree rose lusciously, above a stake and rider fence. TheTexan looked, set his musket against the rails, and proceeded to mountto a green and leafy world where the cherries bobbed against his nose. Avoice came to him from below. "What are you doing up there, sir?"
The Texan settled himself astride a bough. "I don't really know."
"Don't know! To what command do you belong?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know! What is your State?"
"Really and truly, I don't--O Lord!" The Texan scrambled down, salutedmost shamefacedly. The horseman looked hard and grim enough. "Well, sir,what is the meaning of this? And can you give me any reason why youshould not mount guard for a month?"
Tears were in the Texan's eyes. "General, general! I didn't know 't wasyou! Give you my word, sir, I thought it was just anybody! We've hadorders every morning to say, 'I don't know'--and it's gotten to be ajoke--and I was just fooling. Of course, sir, I don't mean that it hasgotten to be a joke--only that we all say 'I don't know' when we askeach other questions, and I hope, sir, that you'll understand that Ididn't know that 't was you--"
"I understand," said Jackson. "You might get me a handful of cherries."
On the twenty-first the leading brigades reached Fredericksburg."To-morrow is Sunday," said the men. "That ought to mean a battle!"While wood and water were being gotten that evening, a rumour went likea zephyr from company to company: "We'll wait here until every regimentis up. Then we'll move north to Fredericksburg and meet McDowell."
The morrow came, a warm, bright Sunday. The last brigade got up, theartillery arrived, the head of the ammunition train appeared down theroad. There were divine services, but no battle. The men rested,guessing Fredericksburg and McDowell, guessing Richmond and McClellan,guessing return to the Valley and Shields, Fremont, Banks, and Sigel.They knew now that they were within fifty miles of Richmond; but if theywere going there anyhow, why--why--why in the name of common sense hadGeneral Lee sent Whiting, Hood, and Lawton to the Valley? Was itreasonable to suppose that he had marched them a hundred and twentymiles just to march them back a hundred and twenty miles? The men agreedthat it wasn't common sense. Still, a number had Richmond firmly fixedin their minds. Others conceived it not impossible that the Army of theValley might be on its way to Tennessee to take Memphis, or even toVicksburg, to sweep the foe from Mississippi. The men lounged beneaththe trees, or watched the weary Virginia Central bringing in the fag endof things. Fredericksburg was now the road's terminus; beyond, the linehad been destroyed by a cavalry raid of McClellan's.
Stonewall Jackson made his headquarters in a quiet home, shaded withtrees and with flowers in the yard. Sunday evening the lady of the housesent a servant to the room where he sat with his chief of staff. "OleMiss, she say, gineral, dat she hope fer de honour ob yo' brekfastin'wif her--"
The general rolled a map and tied it with a bit of pink tape. "Tell Mrs.Harris, with my compliments, that if I am here at breakfast time I shallbe most happy to take it with her."
"Thank you, sah. An' what hour she say, gineral, will suit you bes'?"
"Tell her, with my compliments, that I trust she will breakfast at theusual hour."
Morning came and breakfast time. "Ole Miss" sent to notify the general.The servant found the room empty and the bed unslept in--only thedictionary and Napoleon's Maxims (the Bible was gone) on the table totestify to its late occupancy. Jim, the general's body servant, emergedfrom an inner room. "Gineral Jackson? Fo' de Lawd, niggah! yo' ain'tlooking ter fin' de gineral heah at dis heah hour? He done clar out'roun' er bout midnight. Reckon by now he's whipping de Yankees in deValley!"
In the dark night, several miles from Frederickshall, two riders, oneleading, one following, came upon a picket. "Halt!" There sounded theclick of a musket. The two halted.
"Jest two of you? Advance, number one, and give the countersign!"
"I am an officer bearing dispatches--"
"That air not the point! Give the countersign!"
"I have a pass from General Whiting--"
"This air a Stonewall picket. Ef you've got the word, give it, and efyou haven't got it my hand air getting mighty wobbly on this gun!"
"I am upon an important mission from General Jackson--"
"It air not any more important than my orders air! You get down fromthat thar horse and mark time!"
"That is not necessary. Call your officer of guard."
"Thank you for the sug-ges-tion," said Billy politely. "And don't youmove while I carry it out!" He put his fingers to his lips and whistledshrilly. A sergeant and two men came tumbling out of the darkness. "Whatis it, Maydew?"
"It air a man trying to get by without the countersign."
The first horseman moved a little to one side. "Come here, sergeant!Have you got a light? Wait, I will strike a match."
He struck it, and it flared up, making for an instant a space of light.Both the sergeant and Billy saw his face. The sergeant's hand went up tohis cap with an involuntary jerk; he fell back from the rein he had beenholding. Billy almost dropped his musket. He gasped weakly, then grewburning red. Jackson threw down the match. "Good! good! I see that I cantrust my pickets. What is the young man named?"
"Billy Maydew, sir. Company A, 65th Virginia."
"Good! good! Obedience to orders is a soldier's first, last, and bestlesson! He will do well." He gathered up the reins. "There are four menhere. You will all forget that you have seen me, sergeant."
"Yes, sir."
"Good! Good-night."
He was gone, followed by the courier. Billy drew an almost sobbingbreath. "I gave him such a damned lot of impudence! He was hiding hisvoice, and not riding Little Sorrel, or I would have known him."
The sergeant comforted him. "Just so you were obeying orders andwatching and handling your gun all right, he didn't care! I gather youdidn't use any cuss words. He seemed kind of satisfied with you."
The night was dark, Louisa County roads none of the best. As the cockswere crowin
g, a worthy farmer, living near the road, was awakened by thesound of horses. "Wonder who's that?--Tired horses--one of them's gonelame. They're stopping here."
He slipped out of bed and went to the window. Just light enough to seeby. "Who's there?"
"Two Confederate officers on important business. Our horses are tired.Have you two good fresh ones?"
"If I've got them, I don't lend them to every straggler claiming to be aConfederate officer on important business! You'd better go further.Good-night!"
"I have an order from General Whiting authorizing me to impress horses."
The farmer came out of the house, into the chill dawn. One of the twostrangers took the stable key and went off to the building looming inthe background. The other sat stark and stiff in the grey light. Thefirst returned. "Two in very good condition, sir. If you'll dismountI'll change saddles and leave our two in the stalls."
The officer addressed took his large feet out of the stirrups, tuckedhis sabre under his arm, and stiffly dismounted. Waiting for the freshhorses, he looked at the angry farmer. "It is for the good of the State,sir. Moreover, we leave you ours in their places."
"I am as good a Virginian as any, sir, with plenty of my folks in thearmy! And one horse ain't as good as another--not when one of yours isyour daughter's and you've ridden the other to the Court House and tochurch for twelve years--"
"That is so true, sir," answered the officer, "that I shall takepleasure in seeing that, when this need is past, your horses arereturned to you. I promise you that you shall have them back in a veryfew days. What church do you attend?"
The second soldier returned with the horses. The first mounted stiffly,pulled a forage cap over his eyes, and gathered up the reins. The lighthad now really strengthened. All things were less like shadows. TheLouisa County man saw his visitor somewhat plainly, and it came into hismind that he had seen him before, though where or when--He was allwrapped up in a cloak, with a cap over his eyes. The two hurried away,down the Richmond road, and the despoiled farmer began to think:"Where'd I see him--Richmond? No, 't wasn't Richmond. After Manassas,when I went to look for Hugh? Rappahannock? No, 't wasn't there.Lexington? Good God! That was Stonewall Jackson!"