Having won control of the York River, McClellan prepared to move his base of operations to White House Landing, twenty-three miles east of Richmond, and begged Lincoln to send reinforcements from the Shenandoah Valley, where Stonewall Jackson and the Confederates were on the offensive. While he waited for troops to arrive he prepared to lay siege to Richmond, mending the lines of the railroad tracks so he could get his guns into place, and bringing up dozens of cars and locomotives by water from Fort Monroe. His engineers soon had the tracks open as far as the Chickahominy River, a marshy ribbon of water that bisected the northern tip of the Peninsula, separating the troops from the Confederate capital. The river was generally fordable by infantry, but the artillery required bridges, which the rebels had destroyed on their retreat from Yorktown. The engineers reconstructed those as well, progressing seven miles all the way to the depot at Fair Oaks, where the church spires of Richmond could be seen poking the sky. McClellan wrote to his wife, sharing his conviction that the final, critical battle of the war would take place imminently on the outskirts of the city, “which must in that event suffer terribly, and perhaps be destroyed.”
The general was desperate to know what waited for him on the other side of the river. A contraband who left Richmond reported that the city was full of sick soldiers and that citizens were flocking in from the surrounding country. The Richmond newspapers quoted Jefferson Davis as saying he did not anticipate the fall of the capital, and believed that the war could be successfully carried on in Virginia for twenty years. Allan Pinkerton delivered estimates by local farmers that the Confederate force numbered anywhere from 100,000 to 150,000 men, nearly three times its actual strength. McClellan believed that “reconnaissances, frequently under fire, proved the only trustworthy sources of information,” and Emma readied herself for another mission behind rebel lines.
She’d decided the slave disguise was both too risky (she could be recognized as the cowardly picket who deserted his post, a crime worthy of death) and too punishing to her skin. Instead she would assume an identity that would come more naturally: an Irish peddler woman. Emma thought of her Irish-born mother, with that voice like clotted cream; she could easily mimic Betsy’s brogue and borrow her expressions. She bought supplies from an Irish peddler who’d been following the Union army: a hood, a basket, green spectacles, several peasant dresses. She packed the disguise in her basket and rode her “noble steed,” Frank, to the edge of the Chickahominy River. The bridges were not yet complete, so she swam Frank across the water, gave him a farewell pat, and sent him back to the other side, where a soldier awaited his return.
She pulled on several peasant dresses, layering them to create girth, and yanked the hood six inches down her face. The clothing was soaked from the river and she roamed the strange territory around the Chickahominy swamps, breathing in the stench of rotting vegetation, starting at every roar of cannon and scream of shell. The sky dimmed and the air cooled and she was plagued by a fever and shaking chills. She had seen dozens of men die from malaria and she recognized it encroaching on her own body. She settled on the dank ground and pillowed her head against the basket. Her brain dipped into delirium, “tortured by fiends of every conceivable shape and magnitude,” tracing each link of her life that brought her to the spot where she now lay. A line from John Greenleaf Whittier’s “Maud Muller” looped through her mind: “For of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: ‘It might have been!’” a wistful earworm that lulled her to fidgety sleep.
For two days Emma remained in the swamp, fighting to lift her body and calm her mind, telling herself she’d rather die upon the scaffold at Richmond than in this inglorious manner. On the third morning she was roused by the snap of gunfire and peeled herself off the ground. Her costume was rancid and stiff and her arms hung like wilted flowers. She walked toward the enemy lines, guiding herself by the sounds of battle, and invented yet another new name, “Bridget.”
She came upon a small white house and circled it. Peering into a window, she spotted a rebel soldier resting upon a straw tick on the floor and let herself in. He’d been ill with typhoid fever for several weeks when he got separated from his company during a skirmish, he told her. Unable to find his way back, he took refuge in this abandoned farmhouse, hoping the Yankees wouldn’t discover him.
Emma could tell he was nearing death. She kindled a fire, rummaged through the kitchen for cornmeal, and made a hoecake, the edges of the batter sizzling into lace. The soldier thanked her “with as much politeness as if I had been Mrs. Jeff Davis” and pleaded for her to stay and talk with him. “Rebel though he was,” she did, asking if he professed to be a Christian.
“Yes, thank God!” the man rasped. “I have fought longer under the Captain of My Salvation than I have yet done under Jeff Davis.”
This was his last conversation, Emma thought, a chance for her to lead his thinking to a different and righteous path. She realized she’d forgotten her brogue only after the words left her mouth: “Can you, as a disciple of Christ, conscientiously and consistently uphold the institution of slavery?”
The sudden shift of her voice seemed to wake him up. His eyes flipped open, darting like fish, skittering across her face and beyond, as if he were seeing two of her. After a moment he asked her to pray with him, and when she said “Amen,” he grasped her hand.
“Please tell me who you are,” he whispered. “I cannot, if I would, betray you, for I shall very soon be standing before that God whom you have just addressed.”
She promised that as soon as he grew stronger she would tell him her story, and forgave herself that lie.
Instead he began telling his own story. His name was Allen Hall, and he had one last request: If she should ever pass through the Confederate camp between here and Richmond, would she give this gold watch to Major McKee, of General Ewell’s staff?
Emma agreed. Her patient relaxed then, settling into himself.
“Am I really dying?” he asked.
This time she told the truth: “Yes, you are dying, my friend. Is your peace made with God?”
“My trust is in Christ,” he replied. “He was mine in life, and in death He will not forsake me.” They were the same words she once heard a Union soldier say on his deathbed. Allen Hall died at midnight, his hand still in hers. She covered him with a blanket, clipped a lock of his hair, and fell asleep on the floor next to him.
At daybreak she searched the house for anything that might aid her disguise: a new basket, ochre, a bottle of red ink, black pepper, and court plaster, an adhesive cloth used to cover open sores; she affixed a patch the size of a dollar to her cheek. The ochre ruddied her complexion, and the ink etched shadows under her eyes. One final prayer for her rebel friend and she set off down Richmond Road, stopping to bury her pistol for fear she might be searched. She walked five miles before she saw a rebel picket in the distance.
She found the black pepper in her basket, sprinkled some in her handkerchief, and pressed it against her face. Her nose watered and her eyes reddened, dropping fat tears. She hobbled forward, poking her eyes with the handkerchief. In a thick English accent, the guard asked what business she had in the Confederate camp.
A message for Major McKee, she responded in her brogue. It’s from a brave, fallen Confederate soldier, have mercy on his dear soul.
The man seemed less moved by the death of his comrade than by encountering another foreigner. Go anywhere you please, he said, adding, “I wish I was at ’ome with my family . . . Englishmen ’ave no business ’ere.”
Good for you, Emma thought, you are one after my own heart; but she replied, “Och, indade I wish yez was all at home wid yer families.”
She wandered beyond the lines, weaving among the white canvas tents. A banjo twanged and a group of soldiers played baseball, whacking a yarn-wrapped walnut with a strip of fence rail, filched from a nearby farm. Feeling a tap on her shoulder, she turned to find another picket.
“One of our spies has just come in and reported that the Yankees have finished the bridges across the Chickahominy,” he told her, “and intend to attack us either today or tonight.” He warned that it wouldn’t be safe to stay at camp too long, although the artillerymen had prepared a number of masked batteries—pieces of artillery concealed by terrain or trees. “There’s one,” he said, pointing to a brush heap, “that will give them the fits if they come this way.”
She felt a flutter of panic; there wasn’t much time. She hurried to headquarters and asked for Major McKee. “He’s gone to set a trap for the damned Yankees,” an aide told her. For hours she roamed about the camp, assessing troop placements and artillery strength, listening for gossip about plans for the coming battle. Crouching over her basket, she jotted down the number of guns and every plausible rumor. The major returned in the late afternoon. She took another long whiff of pepper before approaching his tent, willing herself to cry.
With a deep curtsy, Emma told McKee that she was the bearer of tragic news. One of his brave soldiers, Allen Hall, had gone home to the Lord, and his last wish was for the major to have his watch. She lowered it into the major’s hands.
He began to sob. Emma waited, patting his arm, and after a moment he lifted his head, looking her up and down. She kept absolutely still.
“You are a faithful woman,” he said, “and you shall be rewarded. Can you go direct to that house and show my men where Allen’s body is?”
Emma said she could.
He pulled a $10 Federal bill from his pocket and pressed it into her hand. “If you succeed in finding the house, I will give you as much more.”
She uncurled his fingers. Thank you, she said, but she couldn’t take the money.
His brows pressed together, flattering his eyes into slits. At once she realized the gravity of her mistake: a poor Irish peddler would never refuse money. Bursting into tears—real ones, this time—she explained, “Oh, Gineral, forgive me! But me conshins wud niver give me pace in this world nor in the nixt, if I wud take money for carrying the dyin missage for that swate boy that’s dead and gone—God rest his soul. Och, indade, indade I nivir cud do sich a mane thing, if I im a poor woman.”
The major nodded, his brows sliding back into place; he believed her. She blew her nose and said she would be glad to show him where Allen Hall had died, so long as he brought her a horse. The farm was a bit of a distance away, and she had not been feeling well.
McKee called for a horse and a number of rebels to escort her. She mounted and turned to say good-bye to the major, who was struggling not to cry. She thought of the intelligence she’d gathered, crammed deep into her basket, and couldn’t separate it from the major’s grief. She felt shamed by her own duplicity, as if reporting the rebels’ plans would kill Allen Hall all over again.
Her guilt dissolved with Major McKee’s very next words: “Now, boys, bring back the body of Captain Hall, if you have to walk through Yankee blood to the knees!”
They covered the five miles in silence, Emma in front, reaching the little white house at sundown. One of the soldiers asked Emma to go on down the road to see if there were any Yankees in sight. She agreed, riding all the way to the Chickahominy River and back to her own lines, keeping her horse, “Reb,” as a souvenir.
While the Union command appreciated the intelligence Emma delivered, some officers began to wonder how “Frank” so convincingly impersonated a woman.