October 31st, 1865.—All this time I have dressed as a school girl. In the time of war we did not make any effort to follow fashion, just so we had a dress, it really mattered very little to what age it properly belonged. If it was suitable and becoming, so much the better, but no one offered criticism of another’s dress; we simply wore what we could get. Now it seems to be different;
I am actually grown up, though they say I do not look it, and now that Sister Mart is to be married in December, I shall be “Miss Bradford” and must dress accordingly.
Father ordered some things from New York and Mother has had some dresses with trains made for me,, and Uncle Arvah will select a cloak and bring with him, when he comes, bringing his winter stock of goods. Of course I felt somewhat elated over these new possessions but I do not know if I like the idea of giving up my free and happy childhood.
October 15,1865.
The people receive the rebels better than we expected, but the reason is that they believe Johnson[1] is going to put them in their old masters’ power again, and they feel that they must conciliate or be crushed. They no longer pray for the President — our President, as they used to call Lincoln — in the church. They keep an ominous silence and are very sad and troubled.
However, one of the best and most powerful of the old rebels returned awhile ago, and has been living in his old home on sufferance. His people all went to tell him “huddy,” and he was convinced of their toleration. So he told them he should get back his land and wanted to know how many would be willing to work for him for wages. They said none. “Why,” he said, “had n’t you as lief work for me as for these Yankees?” “No, sir,” they answered through their foreman; “even if you pay as well, sir, we had rather work for the Yankees who have been our friends.”
On the mainland it is so dangerous for a negro to go about, especially with the United States Uniform on, that orders are out that no more will be allowed to go to recover their families and bring them here as they have been doing. Some of the happiest reunions have come under our observation. But now people well-to-do here have to leave wives, old mothers, and children (sold away) to starve on the mainland, when they are anxious to bring them here and provide for them. It is not true that the negro soldiers do not behave well. Here, at least, they have always been patterns, as every commander of the post will testify. These stories about them are manufactured for a purpose.
[1] President Andrew Johnson.
