I Make a Present of My Evening Clothes—En Route on the Shreveport Stage—Wearing Boots to Bed—Northwestern Federal Troops Are Best—My Fellow Travelers Talk about Slavery—Brief Halt at Shreveport—Crayfishing with General Kirby Smith’s Wife—Confusion at Monroe—The Yankees Close at Hand—By Sternwheeler to Harrisonburg—Sneaking along the Mississippi—Dodging Snakes, Alligators and Gunboats—I Get the Immense Luxury of a Bed to Myself
4th May (Monday)—General Scurry’s servant John had been most attentive since he had been told off to me. I made him a present of my evening clothes, which gratified him immensely; and I shook hands with him at parting, which seems to be quite the custom.1 The Southern gentlemen are certainly able to treat their slaves with extraordinary familiarity and kindness. John told me that the General would let him buy his freedom whenever he chose. He is a barber by trade, and was earning much money when he insisted on rejoining his master and going to the wars.
I left Houston by train for Navasoto at 10 A.M. A Captain Andrews accompanied me thus far. He was going with a troop of cavalry to impress one fourth of the Negroes on the plantations for the government works at Galveston, the planters having been backward in coming forward with their darkies.
Arrived at Navasoto (70 miles) at 4 P.M., where I took a stage for Shreveport (250 miles). I started at 4:30 P.M., after having had a little dispute with a man for a corner seat, and beating him.
It was the same sort of vehicle as the San Antonio one—eight people inside. During the night there was a thunderstorm.
5th May (Tuesday)—We breakfasted at Huntsville at 5:30 A.M. The Federal officers captured in the Harriet Lane are confined in the penitentiary there, and are not treated as prisoners of war. This seems to be the system now with regard to officers since the enlistment of Negroes by the Northerners.
My fellow travelers were mostly elderly planters or legislators, and there was one judge from Louisiana. One of them produced a pair of boots which had cost him $100; another showed me a common wide-awake hat which had cost him $40. In Houston, I myself saw an English regulation infantry sword exposed for sale for $225 (£45).
As the military element did not predominate, my companions united in speaking with honor of the depredations committed in this part of the country by their own troops on a line of march.
We passed through a well-wooded country—pines and post-oaks—the road bad. Crossed the river Trinity at 12 noon, and dined at the house of a disreputable-looking individual, called a Campbellite minister, at 4:30 P.M. The food consisted almost invariably of bacon, corn bread, and buttermilk: a meal costing a dollar.
Arrived at Crockett at 9:30 P.M., where we halted for a few hours. A filthy bed was given to the Louisianian Judge and myself. The Judge, following my example, took to it boots and all, remarking, as he did so, to the attendant Negro, that “they were a d—d sight cleaner than the bed.”
Before reaching Crockett, we passed through the encampment of Phillipps’s regiment of Texas Rangers, and we underwent much chaff.2 They were en route to resist Banks.
6th May (Wednesday)—We left all the passengers at Crockett except the Louisianian Judge, a government agent, and the ex-boatswain of the Harriet Lane. This vessel had been manned by the Confederates after her capture; but she had since been dismantled, and her crew were being marched to Shreveport to man the ironclad Missouri, which was being built there.
The food we get on the road is sufficient, and good enough to support life. It consists of pork or bacon, bread made with Indian corn, and a peculiar mixture called Confederate coffee, made of rye, meal, Indian corn, or sweet potatoes. The loss of coffee afflicts the Confederates even more than the loss of spirits; and they exercise their ingenuity in devising substitutes, which are not generally very successful.
The same sort of country as yesterday—large forests of pines and post-oaks, and occasional Indian corn fields, the trees having been killed by cutting a circle near the roots. At 3 P.M., we took in four more passengers. One of them was a Major ——, brother-in-law to——, who hanged Mongomery at Brownsville. He spoke of the exploit of his relative with some pride. He told me that his three brothers had lost an arm apiece in the war.
We arrived at Rusk at 6:30 P.M., and spent a few hours there; but notwithstanding the boasted splendor of the beds at the Cherokee Hotel, and although by Major ——’s influence I got one to myself, yet I did not consider its aspect sufficiently inviting to induce me to remove my clothes.
7th May (Thursday)—We started again at 1:30 A.M., in a smaller coach, but luckily with reduced numbers—the Louisianian Judge (who is also a legislator), a Mississippi planter, the boatswain, the government agent, and a Captain Williams, of the Texas Rangers.
Before the day broke we reached a bridge over a stream called Mud Creek, which was in such a dilapidated condition that all hands had to get out and cover over the biggest holes with planks.
The government agent informed us that he still held a commission as adjutant general to ——. The latter, it appears, is a cross between a guerrilla and a horse thief, and even by his adjutant general’s account, he seems to be equally adept at both professions. The accounts of his forays in Arkansas were highly amusing, but rather strongly seasoned for a legitimate soldier.
The Judge was a very gentlemanlike nice old man. Both he and the adjutant general were much knocked up by the journey; but I revived the former with the last of the Immortalité rum. The latter was in very weak health, and doesn’t expect to live long; but he ardently hoped to destroy a few more “bluebellies”* before he “goes under.”
The Mississippi planter had abandoned his estate near Vicksburg, and withdrawn with the remnant of his slaves into Texas. The Judge also had lost all his property in New Orleans. In fact, every other man one meets has been more or less ruined since the war, but all speak of their losses with the greatest equanimity. Captain Williams was a tall, cadaverous backwoodsman, who had lost his health in the war. He spoke of the Federal General Rosecrans with great respect.3 He also passed the following high encomium upon the Northwestern troops, under Rosecrans’s command:
“They’re reg’lar great big h—llsnorters, the same breed as ourselves. They don’t want no running after—they don’t. They ain’t no Dutch cavalry—** you bet!”
To my surprise all the party were willing to agree that, a few years ago, most educated men in the South regarded slavery as a misfortune and not justifiable, though necessary under the circumstances. But the meddling, coercive conduct of the detested and despised abolitionists had caused the bonds to be drawn much tighter.
My fellow travelers of all classes are much given to talk to me about their “peculiar institution.” They are most anxious that I should see as much of it as possible, in order that I may be convinced that it is not so bad as has been represented, and that they are not all “Legrees,” although they do not attempt to deny that there are many instances of cruelty. But they say a man who is known to ill-treat his Negroes is hated by all the rest of the community. They declare that Yankees make the worst masters when they settle in the South. All seem to be perfectly aware that slavery, which they did not invent but inherited from us English, is and always will be the great bar to the sympathy of the civilized world. I have heard these words used over and over again.
All the villages through which we passed were deserted except by women and very old men. Their aspect was most melancholy. The country is sandy, and the land not fertile, but the timber is fine.
We met several planters on the road, who with their families and Negroes were taking refuge in Texas, after having abandoned their plantations in Louisiana on the approach of Banks. One of them had as many as sixty slaves with him of all ages and sizes.
At 7 P.M. we received an unwelcome addition to our party, in the shape of three huge, long-legged, unwashed, odoriferous Texan soldiers, and we passed a wretched night in consequence. The Texans are certainly not prone to take offense where they see none is intended. When this irruption took place, I couldn’t help remarking to the Judge, with regard to the most obnoxious man who was occupying the center seat to our mutual discomfort—“I say, Judge, this gentleman has the longest legs I ever saw.” “Has he?” replied the Judge; “and he has got the d—dest, longest, hardest back I ever felt.” The Texan was highly amused by these remarks upon his personal appearance, and apologized for his peculiarities. Crossed the Sabine river at 11:30 P.M.
8th May (Friday)—We reached Marshall at 3 A.M., and got four hours’ sleep there. We then got into a railroad for sixteen miles, after which we were crammed into another stage.
Crossed the frontier into Louisiana at 11 A.M. I have therefore been nearly a month getting through the single state of Texas. Reached Shreveport at 3 P.M.; and, after washing for the first time in five days, I called on General Kirby Smith, who commands the whole country on this side of the Mississippi.
He is a Floridian by birth, was educated at West Point, and served in the United States Cavalry. He is only thirty-eight years old. He owes his rapid rise to a lieutenant general to the fortunate fact of his having fallen, just at the very nick of time, upon the Yankee flank at the first battle of Manassas.***
He is a remarkably active man, and of very agreeable manners. He wears big spectacles and a black beard.
His wife is an extremely pretty woman from Baltimore, but she had cut her hair quite short like a man’s. In the evening she proposed that we should go down to the river and fish for crayfish. We did so, and were most successful, the General displaying much energy on the occasion.4
He told me that M’Clellan might probably have destroyed the Southern army with the greatest ease during the first winter, and without running much risk to himself. The Southerners were so much overelated by their easy triumph at Manassas that their army had dwindled away.
I was introduced to Governor More, of Louisiana, to Lieutenant Governor Hyams, and also to the exiled governor of Missouri, Reynolds.
Governor Moore told me he had been on the Red River since 1824, from which date until 1840 it had been very unhealthy. He thinks that Dickens must have intended Shreveport by “Eden.”****
Governor Reynolds, of Missouri, told me he found himself in the unfortunate condition of a potentate exiled from his dominions; but he showed me an address which he had issued to his Missourians, promising to be with them at the head of an army to deliver them from their oppressors.
Shreveport is rather a decent-looking place on the Red River. It contains about 3000 inhabitants, and is at present the seat of the Louisianian Legislature instead of Baton Rouge. But only twenty-eight members of the Lower House had arrived as yet, and business could not be commenced with less than fifty.
The river now is broad and rapid, and it is navigated by large steamers; its banks are low and very fertile, but reputed to be very unhealthy.
General Kirby Smith advised me to go to Monroe, and try to cross the Mississippi from there. He was so uncertain as to Alexandria that he was afraid to send a steamer so far.
I heard much talk at his house about the late Federal raid into the Mississippi,***** which seems to be a copy of John Morgan’s operations, except that the Federal raid was made in a thinly populated country, bereft of its male inhabitants.
9th May (Saturday)—Started again by stage for Monroe at 4:30 A.M. My companions were the Mississippi planter, a mad dentist from New Orleans (called by courtesy, doctor), an old man from Matagorda, buying slaves cheap in Louisiana, a wounded officer, and a wounded soldier.
The soldier was a very intelligent young Missourian, who told me (as others have) that at the commencement of these troubles, both he and his family were strong Unionists. But the Lincolnites, by using coercion, had forced them to take one side or the other—and there are now no more bitter Secessionists than these people.
This soldier (Mr. Douglas) was on his way to rejoin Bragg’s army. A Confederate soldier when wounded is not given his discharge, but is employed at such work as he is competent to perform. Mr. Douglas was quite lame; but will be employed at mounted duties or at writing.
We passed several large and fertile plantations. The Negro quarters formed little villages, and seemed comfortable. Some of them held 150 or 200 hands. We afterwards drove through some beautiful pine forests, and were ferried across a beautiful shallow lake full of cypresses, but not the least like European cypress trees.
We met a number more planters driving their families, their slaves, and furniture, towards Texas—in fact, everything that they could save from the ruin that had befallen them on the approach of the Federal troops.
At 5 P.M. we reached a charming little town called Mindon, where I met an English mechanic who deplored to me that he had been such a fool as to naturalize himself, as he was in hourly dread of the conscription.
I have at length become quite callous to many of the horrors of stage traveling. I no longer shrink at every random shower of tobacco juice; nor do I shudder when good-naturedly offered a quid. I eat voraciously of the bacon that is provided for my sustenance, and I am invariably treated by my fellow travelers of all grades with the greatest consideration and kindness. Sometimes a man remarks that it is rather “mean” of England not to recognize the South; but I can always shut him up by saying that a nation which deserves its independence should fight and earn it for itself—a sentiment which is invariably agreed to by all.6
10th May (Sunday)—I spent a very rough night in consequence of the badness of the road, the jolting of the carriage, and having to occupy a center seat.
In the morning we received news from everyone we met of the fall of Alexandria.
The road today was alive with Negroes, who are being “run” into Texas out of Banks’s way. We must have met hundreds of them, and many families of planters, who were much to be pitied, especially the ladies.
On approaching Monroe, we passed through the camp of Walker’s division (8000 strong). It was on the march from Arkansas to meet Banks. The division had embarked in steamers, and had already started down the Ouachita towards the Red River, when the news arrived of the fall of Alexandria, and of the presence of Federal gunboats in or near the Ouachita itself. This caused the precipitate return and disembarkation of Walker’s division. The men were well armed with rifles and bayonets, but they were dressed in ragged civilian clothes. The old Matagorda man recognized his son in one of these regiments—a perfect boy.
Monroe is on the Ouachita (pronounced Washtaw), which is a very pretty and wide stream. After crossing it we arrived at the hotel after dark.
Universal confusion reigned there; it was full of officers and soldiers of Walker’s division, and no person would take the slightest notice of us.
In desperation I called on General Hebert, who commanded the post. I told him who I was, and gave him a letter of introduction, which I had fortunately brought from Kirby Smith. I stated my hard case and besought an asylum for the night, which he immediately accorded me in his own house.
The difficulty of crossing the Mississippi appeared to increase the nearer I got to it, and General Hebert told me that it was very doubtful whether I could cross at all at this point. The Yankee gunboats, which had forced their way past Vicksburg and Port Hudson, were roaming about the Mississippi and Red River. Some of them were reported at the entrance of the Ouachita itself, a small fort at Harrisonburg being the only impediment to their appearance in front of Monroe.
On another side, the enemy’s forces were close to Delhi, only forty miles distant.
There were forty or fifty Yankee deserters here from the army besieging Vicksburg. These Yankee deserters, on being asked their reasons for deserting, generally reply—“Our government has broken faith with us. We enlisted to fight for the Union, and not to liberate slaves.” Vicksburg is distant from this place about eighty miles.
The news of General Lee’s victory at Chancellorsville had just arrived here. Every one received it very coolly. People seemed to take it quite as a matter of course; but the wound of Stonewall Jackson was universally deplored.7
11th May (Monday)—General Hebert is a good-looking Creole.****** He was a West-Pointer, and served in the old army, but afterwards became a wealthy sugar planter. He used to hold Magruder’s position as commander in chief in Texas, but he has now been shelved at Monroe, where he expects to be taken prisoner any day. From the present gloomy aspect of affairs about here, it seems extremely probable that he will not be disappointed in his expectations. He is extremely down upon England for not recognizing the South.†
He gave me a passage down the river in a steamer, which was to try to take provisions to Harrisonburg. At the same time, he informed me that she might very probably be captured by a Yankee gunboat.
At 1 P.M. I embarked for Harrisonburg, which is distant from Monroe by water 150 miles, and by land 75 miles. It is fortified, and offers what was considered a weak obstruction to the passage of the gunboats up the river to Monroe.
The steamer was one of the curious American river boats which rise to a tremendous height out of the water, like great wooden castles. She was steered from a box at the very top of all, and this particular one was propelled by one wheel at her stern.
The river is quite beautiful; it is from 200 to 300 yards broad, very deep and tortuous, and the large trees grow right down to the very edge of the water.
Our captain at starting expressed in very plain terms his extreme disgust at the expedition, and said he fully expected to run against a gunboat at any turn of the river.
Soon after leaving Monroe, we passed a large plantation. The Negro quarters were larger than a great many Texan towns, and they held three hundred hands.
After we had proceeded about half an hour, we were stopped by a mounted orderly (called a courier). From the bank, he roared out the pleasing information, “They’re a-fighting at Harrisonburg.” The captain, on hearing this, turned quite green in the face, and remarked that he’d be “dogged” if he liked running into the jaws of a lion, and he proposed to turn back. But he was jeered by my fellow travelers, who were all either officers or soldiers, wishing to cross the Mississippi to rejoin their regiments in the different Confederate armies.
One pleasant fellow, more warlike than the rest, suggested that as we had some Enfields on board, we should make “a little bit of a fight,” or at least “make one butt at a gunboat.” I was relieved to find that these insane proposals were not received with any enthusiasm by the majority.
The plantations, as we went further down the river, looked very prosperous; but signs of preparations for immediate skedaddling were visible in most of them. I fear they are all destined to be soon desolate and destroyed.
We came to a courier picket every sixteen miles. At one of them we got the information, “Gunboats drove back.” At this there was great rejoicing, and the captain, recovering his spirits, became quite jocose, and volunteered to give me letters of introduction to a “particular friend of his about here, called Mr. Farragut.” But the next news, “Still a-fightin’,” caused us to tie ourselves to a tree at 8 P.M., off a little village called Columbia, which is halfway between Monroe and Harrisonburg.
We then lit a large fire, round which all the passengers squatted on their heels in Texan fashion, each man whittling a piece of wood, and discussing the merits of the different Yankee prisons at New Orleans or Chicago. One of them, seeing me, called out, “I reckon, Kernel, if the Yankees catch you with us, they’ll say you’re in d—d bad company”; which sally caused universal hilarity.
12th May (Tuesday)—Shortly after daylight three Negroes arrived from Harrisonburg, and they described the fight as still going on. They said they were “dreadful skeered.” One of them told me he would “rather be a slave to his master all his life, than a white man and a soldier.”
During the morning some of the officers and soldiers left the boat, and determined to cut across country to Harrisonburg, but I would not abandon the scanty remains of my baggage until I was forced to do so.
During the morning twelve more Negroes arrived from Harrisonburg. It appears that three hundred of them—the property of neighboring planters—had been engaged working on the fortifications, but they all with one accord bolted when the first shell was fired. Their only idea and hope at present seemed to be to get back to their masters. All spoke of the Yankees with great detestation, and expressed wishes to have nothing to do with such “bad people.”
Our captain coolly employed them in tearing down the fences, and carrying the wood away on board the steamer for firewood.
We did nothing but this all day long, the captain being afraid to go on, and unwilling to return. In the evening a new alarm seized him—viz., that the Federal cavalry had cut off the Confederate line of couriers. During the night we remained in the same position as last night, head up stream, and ready to be off at a moment’s notice.*******
13th May (Wednesday)—There was a row on board last night. One of the officers having been too attentive to a lady had to skedaddle suddenly into the woods, in order to escape the fury of her protector. He has not thought it advisable to reappear. My trusty companion for several days, the poor young Missourian, was taken ill today, and he told me he had a “right smart little fever on him.” I doctored him with some of the physic which Mr. Maloney had given me, and he got better in the evening.
We had pickets out in the woods last night. Two of my fellow travelers on that duty fell in with a Negro, and pretending they were Yankees, asked him to join them. He consented, and even volunteered to steal his master’s horses. He then, received a tremendous thrashing, administered by the two soldiers with their ramrods.
At 9 P.M., to the surprise of all, the captain suddenly made up his mind to descend the river at all hazards. He thought, I suppose, that anything was better than the uncertainty of the last twenty-four hours.
The further we went, the more beautiful was the scenery.
At 4 P.M. we were assured by a citizen on the bank that the gunboats really had retreated; and at 5:30 our doubts were set at rest. To our great satisfaction, we saw the Confederate flag flying from Fort Beauregard, high above the little town of Harrisonburg. After we had landed, I presented my letter of introduction from General Hebert to Colonel Logan, who commands the fort. He introduced me to a German officer, the engineer.
They gave me an account of the attack and repulse of the four Federal gunboats under Commodore Woodford, and supposed to have been the Pittsburg (ironclad), the General Price, the Arizona, and another.
Fort Beauregard is a much more formidable looking work than I expected to see, and its strength had evidently been much underrated at Monroe.
A hill 190 feet high, which rises just in rear of Harrisonburg, has been scarped and fortified. It is situated at an angle of the river, and faces a long “reach” of two miles.
The gunboats, after demanding an unconditional surrender which was treated with great contempt by Colonel Logan, opened fire at 2 P.M. on Sunday. They kept it up till 6:30, throwing about one hundred and fifty 9 and 11 inch shell. The gunboats reopened again for about an hour on Monday afternoon, when they finally withdrew, the Arizona being crippled.
The fort fired altogether about forty-five 32-pound shot (smooth bore). The range was about a mile.
The garrison thought that they had loosened several of the Pittsburg’s iron plates. They felt confident they could have sunk the wooden vessels if they had attempted to force the passage. They were naturally much elated with their success, which certainly had not been anticipated on board my steamer or at Monroe.
I had not time to visit the interior of the fort, but I saw the effect of the shell upon the outside. Those which fell in the sand did not burst. Only three men were wounded in the garrison. They told me the deck of the Pittsburg was furnished with a parapet of cotton bales for riflemen.
The river at Harrisonburg is about 160 yards broad, and very deep, with a moderate current. The town, being between the vessels and the fort, had, of course, suffered considerably during the bombardment.
When the works are complete they will be much more formidable.
To our great joy, Colonel Logan decided that our vessel should proceed at once to Trinity, which is fifteen miles nearer Natchez (on the Mississippi) than Harrisonburg. We arrived there at 8 P.M., and found that the gunboats had only just left, after having destroyed all the molasses and rum they could find, and carried away a few Negroes.
Six of us pigged in one very small room. We paid a dollar each for this luxury to an old woman, who was most inhospitable and told us she “didn’t want to see no soldiers, as the Yanks would come back and burn her house for harboring Rebels.”
I am always taken for a Confederate officer, partly from being in their company, and partly on account of my clothes, which happen to be a gray shooting-suit, almost the same color as most of the soldiers’ coats.
14th May (Thursday)—The officers and soldiers, about thirty in number, who came down the Ouachita in my company, determined to proceed to Natchez today, and a very hard day’s work we had of it.
As the Louisianian bank of the Mississippi is completely overflowed at this time of the year, and the river itself is infested with the enemy’s gunboats which have run past Vicksburg and Port Hudson, the passage can only be made by a tedious journey in small boats through the swamps and bayous.
Our party left Trinity at 6 A.M. in one big yawl and three skiffs. In my skiff were eight persons, besides a Negro oarsman named “Tucker.” This Negro was a very powerful man, very vain and suspectible of flattery. I won his heart by asking him if he wasn’t worth 6000 dollars. We kept him up to the mark throughout the journey by plying him with compliments upon his strength and skill. One officer declared to him that he should try to marry his mistress (a widow) on purpose to own him.
After beating up for about eight miles against one of three streams which unite at, and give its name to, Trinity, we turned off to the right, and got into a large dense swamp. The thicket was so tangled and impenetrable that we experienced the greatest difficulty in forcing our way through it. We were often obliged to get into the water up to our middles and shove, whilst most of the party walked along an embankment.
After two hours and a half of this sort of work we had to carry our boats bodily over the embankment into a bayou called Log Bayou, on account of the numerous floating logs which had to be encountered. We then crossed a large and beautiful lake, which led us into another dismal swamp, quite as tangled as the former one. Here we lost our way, and got aground several times; but at length, after great exertions, we forced ourselves through it, and reached Lake Concordia, a fine piece of water, several miles in extent, and we were landed at dusk on the plantation of a Mr. Davis.
These bayous and swamps abound with alligators and snakes of the most venomous description. I saw many of the latter swimming about exposed to a heavy fire of six-shooters; but the alligators were frightened away by the leading boat.
The yawl and one of the skiffs beat us, and their passengers reached Natchez about 9 P.M., but the other skiff, which could not boast a Tucker, was lost in the swamp, and passed the night there in a wretched plight.
The weather was most disagreeable, either a burning sun or a downpour of rain.
The distance we did in the skiff was about twenty-eight miles, which took us eleven hours to perform.
On landing we hired at Mr. Davis’s a small cart for Mr. Douglas (the wounded Missourian) and our baggage. The rest of us had to finish the day by a trudge of three miles through deep mud, until at length we reached a place called Vidalia. This is on the Louisianian bank of the Mississippi, just opposite Natchez.
At Vidalia I got the immense luxury of a pretty good bed, all to myself, which enabled me to take off my clothes and boots for the first time in ten days.
The landlord told us that three of the enemy’s gunboats had passed during the day; and as he said their crews were often in the habit of landing at Vidalia, he cautioned the military to be ready to bolt into the woods at any time during the night.
There were two conscripts on board my skiff today, one an Irishman and the other a Pole. They confessed to me privately their extreme dislike of the military profession; but at the same time they acknowledged the enthusiasm of the masses for the war.
* The Union soldiers are called “bluebellies” on account of their blue uniforms. These often call the Confederates “graybacks.”
** German dragoons, much despised by the Texans on account of their style of riding.
*** Called by the Yankees “Bull Run.”
**** I believe this is a mistake of Governor Moore. I have always understood Cairo was Eden.5
***** Grierson’s raid.
****** The descendants of the French colonists in Louisiana are called Creoles; most of them talk French, and I have often met Louisianian regiments talking that language.
† General Hebert is the only man of education I met in the whole of my travels who spoke disagreeably about England in this respect. Most people say they think we are quite right to keep out of it as long as we can; but others think our government is foolish to miss such a splendid chance of “smashing the Yankees,” with whom we must have a row sooner or later.
******* One of the passengers on board this steamer was Captain Barney, of the Confederate States Navy, who has since, I believe, succeeded Captain Maffit in the command of the Florida.