Southern Women Record the Civil War Part 2

The Civil War As Seen Through The Eyes Of The Women Who Lived Through It

by Rochelle Ramga

Kate Stone's mother was managing their plantation Brokenburn alone when the war began. The family was forced to leave as Grant's troops advanced on Vicksburg in the spring of 1863, and the Stones spent the last two years of the war in Texas. As the war began, Kate wrote in May of 1861, "Men are hurrying by thousands, eager to be led to battle against Lincoln's hordes ...Never can we join hands with the North, the people who hate us so."20Later that month she added, "We should make a stand for our rights-and a nation fighting for its own homes and liberty cannot be overwhelmed. Our cause is just and must prevail." 21 On July 26, 1861 she wrote, "Received telegraphic accounts of our first pitched battle fought at Manassas Junction-our side victorious, of course."22 On November 27, she mourned the loss of her young uncle who had died of swamp fever while with the army near Vicksburg, "Ashburn, our darling, has gone, never to return. . . brilliant with the very joy of living such a little while ago, and now dead-dead to it all."23 In the spring of 1862, at the approach of the Union army, she writes, "The planters look upon the burning of the cotton as almost ruin to their fortunes, but all realize its stern necessity and we have not heard of one trying to evade it.. . How much better to burn our cities than let them fall into the enemy's hands. 24 As the family started on their way west, word was received of the death of her brother, "I can hardly believe that our bright, merry little brother Walter has been dead for seven weeks ...I hope he did not realize Death was so near and all he loved so far away ...He was eighteen in December and died in February. He was but a boy and could not stand the hardships of a soldier's life. Four months of it killed him. ,25 Life in Texas is not easy and she writes, "It does not look like we will be crowded with company. Not a native man or lady has called." 26 The losses continue and on December 10, 1863 she writes, "Again we are called on to mourn one of our dearest and best. Brother Coley has crossed the Dark Valley, free from all pain and trouble. He lies at rest and we are desolate indeed." 27 In May of 1864, she was cheered as `Banks with his insolent boasts and vainglorious columns. . . is met at glorious Mansfield and Pleasant Hill [La.] by our brave soldiers and meets only defeat and disgrace. ,28 As with the McDonalds, a young son, Jimmy, joined the war in 1864 at the age of seventeen serving only eight months. As the end came, she wrote on May 15, 1865, "The best and bravest of the South sacrificed-and for nothing. Yes, worse than nothing. Only to rivet more firmly the chains that bind us." 29 The family returned to Brokenburn in November of 1865 and Kate wrote, "Nothing is left but to endure." 30 She did make a few later entries, but ended her diary in September 1868, "So this is the end-shall I ever care to write again?"31

Emma Holmes was living in Charleston as South Carolina seceded and the war began. On April 13, 1861 she wrote, "the great body of citizens [seems] to be so impressed with the justice of our cause that they place entire confidence in the God of Battles. 32 In December 1861 much of Charleston was destroyed by fire, including the Holmes home. Help was received from other areas of the Confederacy, and Emma wrote on December 17, "I look beyond to brighter times & firmly believe that God has permitted this to unite us still more closely than before & to prepare and purify us through suffering for the great position he means us to occupy."33 For a while the family remained in Charleston with relatives. While there Emma worries about Gen. Pemberton's defense of the city and hopes that Gen. Beauregard will return "for his presence alone will inspire that confidence which Pemberton fails to give. 34 Pemberton "is a Pennsylvanian. "35 In June of 1862, Emma and her family moved to Camden, South Carolina. Four of Emma's five brothers served the Confederacy during the war. The oldest brother Henry was a doctor. Only John, born in 1848 did not serve. Even the next youngest born in 1847 entered in1864. Fortunately all survived, although many friends and relatives did not. The Holmes family had a difficult time finding suitable housing and moved more than once. Emma mourned the losses as when she writes on July 3, 1862, "The tide of sorrows grows fearfully great-a telegram. . . announces the death of cousin Henry-he the idolized son, brother, husband, and father of four little boys-it is too terrible. 36 She also described the problem of shoes; "Alester could not go to school today, for want of a pair of shoes, so he borrowed mother's carpet slippers." 37 On May 8, 1863 she wrote, "The news from Virginia is most cheering-decisive victories being gained on Saturday and Sunday at Chancellorsville."38 The next day she was "too shocked to learn by the paper that Gen. Earl Van Dom has been murdered, " 39 and on May 11 mourning, "Stonewall Jackson is dead. The mournful tidings are swept over the length and breadth of our land by the electric wires with crushing effect."40 On July 9, 1863, she is saddened by the news from Vicksburg and Gettysburg, but cheered by the news 'from Charleston's Fort Wagner. "We learned what a tremendous assault had been made and how gloriously repulsed."41 By the end of December, she wrote, "I sometimes think my journal will be merely a catalogue of deaths."42 Emma tutored though the war years helping to meet the high expenses and as Sherman's army approached in 1865 "still carried on school amidst constant false alarms & interruptions."43 In the wake of the Union army, she writes on March 11,"Homeless exiles we are now indeed in the bitterest sense, when our very graves & altars are profaned and ruined by the vilest of hands.'44 She ends her diary in March 1866, while "Despair is laying its icy hand on all. Day by day it becomes harder to get money.. . for the necessaries of life, 45 and is still mourning, now the deaths of "the Gallant Gen. Ste. [phen] Elliott" and "the Rev. Stephen Elliott, scarce three weeks after he had laid his beloved son among the graves of his kindred."46

The Morgan family, as many others, was divided by the war. Of the five brothers of Sarah Morgan, one took the Federal oath of office while refusing to serve against the South, and of the remaining four, only one survived the war. Sarah did not begin her diary until March 1862, and on April 12, she recalls a party given for soldiers the previous year, writing, "All those dancing there that night have undergone trial and affliction since. Father is dead, and Harry. Mr. Trezevant lies in Corinth with his skull fractured by a bullet; every young man there has been in at least one battle since, and every woman has cried over her son, brother, or sweetheart, going away to the wars, or lying sick and wounded. 47 In August of 1862, the family left their Baton Rouge home as Union troops approached. On August 28, Sarah returned to her home and recorded, "As I looked for each well known article, I could hardly believe that Abraham Lincoln's officers had really come so low down as to steal on such a wholesale manner. 48 She describes glasses and mirrors broken, clothes and letters strewn about and books stolen concluding, `Bah! What is the use of describing such a scene?"49 As Grant approached Vicksburg, she wrote, "It has come at last! What an awful sound! I thought I had heard bombardment before; but Baton Rouge was child's play compared to this ....There is a burning house in the distance, the second one we have seen to-night. For Yankees can't prosper unless they are pillaging honest people."50 The Morgans had stayed with various relatives and friends, but in April 1863 they feel they have no choice but to move to New Orleans with Sarah's Unionist brother. As the city was under Federal occupation, a loyalty oath was required. Sarah writes, "How about that oath of allegiance? is what I frequently ask myself, and always an uneasy qualm of conscience troubles me. Guilty or not guilty of perjury? According to the law of God in the abstract, and of nations, Yes; according to my conscience, Jeff Davis, and the peculiar position I was placed in, No. Which is it? Had I any idea that such a pledge would be extracted, would I have been willing to come? Never! The thought would have horrified me ....A forced oath, all men agree is not binding. It is entirely optional; you have only to take it quietly or go to jail. If perjury it is, which will God punish: me, who was unwilling to commit the crime, or the man who forced me to it?"51 In March 1865, the family receives word that two of the boys are now dead, and Sarah cries out, "Dead! Dead! Both dead! O my brothers! What have we lived for except you? We, who would have so gladly laid down our lives for yours, are left desolate to mourn over all we loved and hoped for, weak and helpless; while you, so strong, noble, and brave, have gone before us without a murmur. God knows best. But it is hard--O so hard! To give them up."52 Later she pleads, "How will the world seem to us now? What will life be without the boys? When this terrible strife is over, and so many thousands return to their homes, what will peace bring us of all we hoped? Jimmy! Dear Lord, spare us that one!" 53 Jimmy did come home alive. On May 20, she wrote "Last Saturday, the 29th of April, seven hundred and fifty paroled Louisianians from Lee's army were brought here-the sole survivors of ten regiments who left four years ago so full of hope and determination." 54

Kate Cumming's mother had died prior to the war. Her father, too old to serve, remained in Mobile while Kate served the Army of Tennessee as a nurse, and her only brother David served in the army. David, although injured, survived. As a nurse, Kate witnessed and recorded the deaths of hundreds. She began service in Corinth following the battle of Shiloh, where the injured reported "that on the bands of their hats was written, `Hell or Corinth;' meaning, that they were determined to reach one of the places. Heaven help the poor wretches who could degrade themselves thus. I can not but pity them, and pray that God will turn the hearts of their living comrades. Can such a people expect to prosper? Are they really mad enough to think that they can conquer us-a people who shudder at such blasphemy; who, as a nation, have put our trust in the God of battles, and whose sense of the magnanimous would make us scorn to use such language?"55 Kate, like many of her country continued to hope for help from abroad. On March 23, 1863, she hears from a friend in England, who "says they have still great hopes of our success, and that the people sympathize a great deal with us. I wish they would show it differently from what they do."56 On June 6th she records, "Vallandigham passed through here a few days ago. He had little or no notice taken of him, as he is not a southerner; but still clings to the delusion that the Union can again be restored. What madness in any sane man! That can never be until the terrible past is wiped out, and sinks into oblivion; or until the many thousands who have been slain shall be brought to life, and the outrages which have been committed on our people undone. I can not but admire him for his independence of character in defying Lincoln and his minions. Would that we had many more like him in the North, then our hopes of peace would be bright indeed." 57 She often records the difficulty of obtaining suitable food for the patients, but records on November 13, "We have had a number of ladies from the country visiting the wounded; many of them have come twenty miles. They bring baskets full of all kinds of eatables. It does me good to see them come, as the very best we can give wounded men is not enough. "58 In November 29P she records that "the Georgia legislature has appropriated a large sum of money for the relief of the soldiers families in their state. I do hope that other states will imitate them. Men can not be expected to fight when their wives and children are starving."59 How prescient a statement! On the same day she also records, "I see by the papers that Lincoln is out with another call for three hundred thousand more troops. . . Lincoln may get men to fill his last call, and yet, if the South is only true to herself, she can never be conquered ...I look around me sometimes, and see so many good intelligent men, and think what a sad thing it would be were we subjugated. I believe such a thing is a moral impossibility, and can never happen." 60 She ends her diary in May, 1865, proud of her city, `Mobile has acted nobly in this contest. The main portion of her arms bearing citizens were in the field, and those who were incapable of taking the field worked assiduously in relieving the wants of those who were in it, and they did every thing that could be done for the relief of the poor in the city. The History of Mobile is, I expect, the history of every city in the South."61 "But all is gone now, and we must try and `let the dead past bury its dead! " 62

Emma LeConte was a very young woman, only seventeen, when total war came to Columbia, South Carolina. However, she witnessed and recorded one of the most controversial examples of total war. She was the oldest of a family of daughters and her father Joseph LeConte was a science professor at the South Carolina College in Columbia. During the war he served as a chemist in the Confederate States Nitre and Mining Bureau. She did not lose immediate family members in the war, but as her diary begins on December 31, 1864, she writes, "Oh my country! Will I live to see thee subjugated and enslaved by those Yankees-surely every man and woman will die first. . . A sea rolls between them and us-a sea of blood. Smoking houses, outraged women, murdered fathers, brothers, and husbands forbid such a union. Reunion! Great Heavens! How we hate them with the whole strength and depth of our souls."63 Sherman's troops had not yet reached the Carolinas. During the second week of January 1865, Columbia held a Soldiers' Bazaar. Emma had expected to take interest in it, but writes instead. "It seems like the dance of death, and who can tell that Sherman may not get the money that was made instead of our sick soldiers. How long before our beautiful little city may be sacked and laid in ashes." 64 She did not have long to wait. On February 174' she writes, "Well, they are here. I was sitting in the back parlor when I heard the shouting of the troops .... Iran upstairs to my bedroom windows just in time to see the U. S. flag run up over the State House. Oh, what a horrid sight! What a degradation! After four long bitter years of bloodshed and hatred, now to float there at last! That hateful symbol of despotism! I do not think I could possibly describe my feelings. I know I could not look at it."65 Later that day she records, "Gen. Sherman has assured the mayor `that he and all the citizens may sleep as securely and quietly tonight as if under Confederate rule. Private property shall be carefully respected." 66 The next day, she records, "Strange as it may seem, we were actually idiotic enough to believe Sherman would keep his word! A Yankee-and Sherman! It does seem incredible, such credulity, but I suppose we were anxious to believe him-the lying fiend! I hope retributive justice will find him out one day." 67 She describes the fires, "The fire on Main Street was now raging, and we anxiously watched its progress from the upper front windows. In a little while, however, the flames broke forth in every direction. The drunken devils roamed about, setting fire to every house the flames seemed likely to spare. They were fully equipped for the noble work they had in hand. Each soldier was furnished with combustibles compactly put up. They would enter houses in the presence of helpless women and children, pour turpentine on the beds and set them on fire. Guards were rarely of any assistance-most generally they assisted in pillaging and firing." 68 Later, she adds, "I suppose we owe our final escape to the presence of the Yankee wounded in the hospital. When all seemed in vain, Dr Thompson went to an officer and asked if he would see his own soldiers burnt alive."69 Later, she adds, "This is civilized warfare. This is the way in which the `cultured' Yankee nation wars upon women and children! Failing with our men in the field, this is the way they must conquer!"70 On the 25th, still determined, she writes, "The more we suffer, the more we should be willing to undergo rather than submit."71 By this time, the destruction of the food is evident and she writes, "I hope relief will come before famine actually threatens. " 72 Throughout this time, her father had been gone, removing government records, but on the 2e, she reports, "At last I have something joyful to chronicle Father is returned!"73 Her last entry on August 60'° explains why she has written so little, "As to the condition of the country and our unhappy state as a people, it would seem better not to think of that, still less to write of it. It makes me miserable and intensifies the wicked feelings I have too much anyway." 74 Perhaps she spoke for all of these diarists, who discontinued their entries soon after the conclusion of the war.

The diaries are painful reading, especially for one whose ancestors fought for the Union. One must admire these women who endured and survived. All of them lived into the twentieth century, Emma LeConte till 1932; the other five died between 1907 and 1910. Cornelia McDonald eventually moved to Louisville, Kentucky, not having the resources to restore the Winchester home. However, the home has now been restored and is used as a private home. She taught art to support the children and did not remarry. Both Emma Holmes and Kate Cumming remained single and became teachers, Emma back in her hometown of Charleston and Kate relocating with her father to Birmingham. Kate Stone, Sarah Morgan, and Emma LeConte married and raised families. We can only wonder what these women taught the children in their homes and schools. Could the bitterness, anguish and resentment so evident in their diaries not be passed to the next generation? For these women, there were no healing reunions, no handshakes across stone walls. These were the women whose descendents still celebrate their heroes, mourn their dead, and decorate their soldiers' graves. These were also the women expected to raise loyal Americans. These were remarkable women whose diaries bring them and their tragic war years alive for the reader.

Obviously, they made a difference, as they were the reasons for continuing the fight. Defending their families and homes kept the soldiers in the field so long as the families were able to survive. It was only when the women and children began to starve that the men sometimes chose to leave the front. They not only made a difference in the 1860s, but their words speak to us today. In the 1860s or 2000 how does a nation considering itself to be the last best hope of mankind or the enlightened and civilized leader of the world decide to wage war on the defenseless?