A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 9TH.—A frosty morning, with dense fog; subsequently a pretty day.

            This is the famine month. Prices of every commodity in the market—up, up, up. Bacon, $10 to $15 per pound; meal, $50 per bushel. But the market-houses are deserted, the meat stalls all closed, only here and there a cart, offering turnips, cabbages, parsnips, carrots, etc., at outrageous prices. However, the superabundant paper money is beginning to flow into the Treasury, and that reflex of the financial tide may produce salutary results a few weeks hence.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 8TH.—An application of Capt. C. B. Duffield, for a lieutenant-colonelcy, recommended by Col. Preston, came back from the President to-day. It was favorably indorsed by the Secretary, but Gen. Cooper marked it adversely, saying the Assistant Adjutant-General should not execute the Conscription act, and finally, the President simply said, “The whole organization requires revision.—J. D.” I hope it will be revised, and nine-tenths of its officers put in the army as conscripts.

            Raining this morning, and alternate clouds and sunshine during the day.

            One of the clerks who was in the engagement, Tuesday night, March 1st, informed me that the enemy’s cavalry approached slowly up the hill, on the crest of which the battalion was lying. At the word, the boys rose and fired on their knees. He says the enemy delivered a volley before they retreated, killing two of our men and wounding several.

            Reports from the Eastern Shore of Virginia indicate that Gen. Butler’s rule there has been even worse than Lockwood’s. It is said that the subordinate officers on that quiet peninsula are merely his agents, to tax and fine and plunder the unoffending people,—never in arms, and who have, with few exceptions, “taken the oath” repeatedly. One family, however (four sisters, the Misses P.), relatives of my wife, have not yielded. They allege that their father and oldest sister were persecuted to death by the orders of the general, and they could not swear allegiance to any government sanctioning such outrages in its agents. They were repeatedly arrested, and torn from their paternal roof at all hours of the day and night, but only uttered defiance. They are ladies of the first standing, highly accomplished, and of ample fortune, but are ready to suffer death rather than submit to the behests of a petty tyrant. Butler abandoned the attempt, but the soldiery never lose an opportunity of annoying the family.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 7TH.—Bright and frosty morning; cloudy and warm in the evening. Cannon and musketry were heard this morning some miles northwest of the city. Probably Gen. Hampton fell in with one of the lost detachments of the raiders, seeking a way of escape. This attempt to surprise Richmond was a disgraceful failure.

            The Secretary of War has gone up to his farm for a few days to see the extent of injury done him by the enemy.

            Mr. Benjamin and Assistant Secretary Campbell are already “allowing” men to pass to the United States, and even directly to Washington. Surely the injury done us by information thus conveyed to the enemy hitherto, ought to be a sufficient warning.

            Gen. Bragg has resolved to keep a body of 1500 cavalry permanently within the city and its vicinity.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 6TH.—My birthday—55. Bright and frosty; subsequently warm and pleasant. No news. But some indignation in the streets at the Adjutant-General’s (Cooper) order, removing the clerks and putting them in the army, just when they had, by their valor, saved the capital from flames and the throats of the President and his cabinet from the knifes of the enemy. If the order be executed, the heads of the government will receive and merit execration. It won’t be done.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 5TH.—Clear and pleasant, after a slight shower in the morning.

            The raid is considered at an end, and it has ended disastrously for the invaders.

            Some extraordinary memoranda were captured from the raiders, showing a diabolical purpose, and creating a profound sensation here. The cabinet have been in consultation many hours in regard to it, and I have reason to believe it is the present purpose to deal summarily with the captives taken with Dahlgren, but the “sober second thought” will prevail, and they will not be executed, notwithstanding the thunders of the press. Retaliation for such outrages committed on others having been declined, the President and cabinet can hardly be expected to begin with such sanguinary punishments when their own lives are threatened. It would be an act liable to grave criticism. Nevertheless, Mr. Secretary Seddon has written a letter to-day to Gen. Lee, asking his views on a matter of such importance as the execution of some ninety men of Dahlgren’s immediate followers, not, as he says, to divide the responsibility, nor to effect a purpose, which has the sanction of the President, the cabinet, and Gen. Bragg, but to have his views, and information as to what would probably be its effect on the army under his command. We shall soon know, I hope, what Gen. Lee will have to say on the subject, and I am mistaken if he does not oppose it. If these men had been put to death in the heat of passion, on the field, it would have been justified, but it is too late now. Besides, Gen. Lee’s son is a captive in the hands of the enemy, designated for retaliation whenever we shall execute any of their prisoners in our hands. It is cruelty to Gen. Lee!

            It is already rumored that Gen. Butler has been removed, and a flag of truce boat is certainly at City Point, laden with prisoners sent up for exchange.

            The Commissary-General has sent in a paper saying that unless the passenger cars on the Southern Road be discontinued, he cannot supply half enough meal for Lee’s army. He has abundance in Georgia and South Carolina, but cannot get transportation. He says the last barrel of flour from Lynchburg has gone to the army.

            We have news from the West that Morgan and his men will be in the saddle in a few days.

            After all, Mr. Lyon’s house was not touched by any of the enemy’s shells. But one shell struck within 300 yards of one house in Clay Street, and not even the women and children were alarmed.

            The price of a turkey to-day is $60.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 4TH.—Bright and frosty in the morning; warm and cloudy in the afternoon. The enemy have disappeared.

            On the 17th inst., Gen. Lee wrote the Secretary of War that he had received a letter from Gen. Longstreet, asking that Pickett’s Division be in readiness to join him; also that a brigade of Gen. Buckner’s Division, at Dalton, be sent him at once. He says the force immediately in front of him consists of the 4th, 11th, 9th, and 23d corps, besides a large body of cavalry from Middle Tennessee. Gen. Lee says the railroad from Chattanooga to Knoxville, being about completed, will enable the enemy to combine on either Johnston or Longstreet. He (Gen. Lee) says, however, that the 4th and 11th corps are small, and may have been consolidated; the 23d also is small; but he does not know the strength of the enemy. He thinks Pickett’s Division should be sent as desired, and its place filled with troops from South Carolina, etc., where operations will probably soon cease. The Secretary sent this to the President. The President sent it back today, indorsed, “How can Pickett’s Division be replaced?—J. D.”

            Henly’s Battalion returned this evening; and Custis can resume his school, unless he should be among the list doomed to the rank in the field, for which he is physically incapable, as Surgeon Garnett, the President’s physician, has certified.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 3D.—Bright and frosty. Confused accounts of the raid in the morning papers.

            During the day it was reported that Col. Johnson’s forces had been cut up this morning by superior numbers, and that Butler was advancing up the Peninsula with 15,000 men. The tocsin was sounded in the afternoon, and the militia called out; every available man being summoned to the field for the defense of the city. The opinion prevails that the plan to liberate the prisoners and capture Richmond is not fully developed yet, nor abandoned. My only apprehension is that while our troops may be engaged in one direction, a detachment of the enemy may rush in from the opposite quarter. But the attempt must fail. There is much excitement, but no alarm. It is rather eagerness to meet the foe, and a desire that he may come.

            The Department Battalion returned at 2 P.M. to attend the funeral of Capt. Ellery, and expect to be marched out again this evening toward Bottom’s Bridge, where the enemy is said to be in considerable force.

            Custis, though detailed to duty in the department, threw down his pen to-day, and said he would go out and be in the next fight. And so he left me suddenly. The Secretary, to whom I communicated this, said it was right and proper for him to go—even without orders. He goes without a blanket, preferring not to sleep, to carrying one. At night he will sit by a fire in the field.

            Some of the clerks would shoot Mr. Memminger cheerfully. He will not pay them their salaries, on some trivial informality in the certificates; and while they are fighting and bleeding in his defense, their wives and children are threatened to be turned out of doors by the boarding-house keepers.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 2D.—A slight snow on the ground this morning—but bright and cool. Last night, after I had retired to bed, we heard a brisk cannonading, and volleys of musketry, a few miles distant.

            This morning an excitement, but no alarm, pervaded the city. It was certainly a formidable attempt to take the city by surprise. From the number of disgraceful failures heretofore, the last very recently, the enemy must have come to the desperate resolution to storm the city this time at all hazards. And indeed the coming upon it was sudden, and if there had been a column of 15,000 bold men in the assault, they might have penetrated it. But now, twenty-four hours subsequently, 30,000 would fail in the attempt.

            The Department Clerks were in action in the evening in five minutes after they were formed in line. Capt. Ellery, Chief Clerk of 2d Auditor, was killed, and several were wounded. It rained fast all the time, and it was very dark. The enemy’s cavalry charged upon them, firing as they came; they were ordered to lie flat on the ground. This they did, until the enemy came within fifteen yards of them, when they rose and fired, sending the assailants to the right and left, helter-skelter. How many fell is not yet known.

            To-day Gen. Hampton sent in 77 prisoners, taken six miles above town—one lieutenant-colonel among them; and Yankee horses, etc. are coming in every hour.

            Gov. Vance writes that inasmuch as Judge Pearson still grants the writ of habeas corpus, and discharges all who have put substitutes in the army, on the ground of the unconstitutionality of the act of Congress, he is bound by his oath to sustain the judge, even to the summoning the military force of the State to resist the Confederate States authorities. But to avoid such a fatal collision, he is willing to abide the decision of the Supreme Court, to assemble in June; the substitute men, meantime, to be left unmolested. We shall soon see the President’s decision, which will probably be martial law.

            Last night, when it was supposed probable that the prisoners of war at the Libby might attempt to break out, Gen. Winder ordered that a large amount of powder be placed under the building, with instructions to blow them up, if the attempt were made. He was persuaded, however, to consult the Secretary of War first, and get his approbation. The Secretary would give no such order, but said the prisoners must not be permitted to escape under any circumstances, which was considered sanction enough. Capt. ______ obtained an order for, and procured several hundred pounds of gunpowder, which were placed in readiness. Whether the prisoners were advised of this I know not; but I told Capt. ______ it could not be justifiable to spring such a mine in the absence of their knowledge of the fate awaiting them, in the event of their attempt to break out, —because such prisoners are not to be condemned for striving to regain their liberty. Indeed, it is the duty of a prisoner of war to escape if he can.

            Gen. Winder addressed me in a friendly manner to-day, the first time in two years.

            The President was in a bad humor yesterday, when the enemy’s guns were heard even in his office.

            The last dispatch from Gen. Lee informs us that Meade, who had advanced, had fallen back again. But communications are cut between us and Lee; and we have no intelligence since Monday.

            Gen. Wilcox is organizing an impromptu brigade here, formed of the furloughed officers and men found everywhere in the streets and at the hotels. This looks as if the danger were not yet regarded as over.

            The Secretary of War was locked up with the Quartermaster and Commissary-Generals and other bureau officers, supposed to be discussing the damage done by the enemy to the railroads, etc. etc. I hope it was not a consultation upon any presumed necessity of the abandonment of the city!

            We were paid to-day in $5 bills. I gave $20 for half a cord of wood, and $60 for a bushel of common white cornfield beans. Bacon is yet $8 per pound; but more is coming to the city than usual, and a decline may be looked for, I hope. The farmers above the city, who have been hoarding grain, meat, etc., will lose much by the raiders.

by John Beauchamp Jones

            MARCH 1ST.—Dark and raining.

            As the morning progressed, the city was a little startled by the sound of artillery in a northern direction, and not very distant. Couriers and horsemen from the country announced the approach of the enemy within the outer fortifications; a column of 5000 cavalry. Then Hon. James Lyons came in, reporting that the enemy were shelling his house, one and a half miles from the city. And Gen. Elzey (in command) said, at the department, that a fight was in progress; and that Brig.-Gen. Custis Lee was directing it in person. But an hour or so after the report of artillery ceased, and the excitement died away. Yet the local troops and militia are marching out as I write; and a caisson that came in an hour ago has just passed our door, returning to the field. Of course the city is full of rumors, and no one yet knows what has occurred. I presume it was only distant shelling, as no wounded men have been brought in.

            It is reported that the enemy captured Mr. Seddon’s family twenty-five miles distant,—also Gen. Wise’s. To-morrow we shall know more; but no uneasiness is felt as to the result. In a few hours we can muster men enough to defend the city against 25,000.

            A letter from Gen. Whiting suggests that martial law be proclaimed in North Carolina, as a Judge Pearson—a traitor, he thinks—is discharging men who have in conscripts as substitutes, on the ground that the act of Congress is unconstitutional. The President suggest a General Order, etc., complying with Gen. W.’s request.

            Col. A. C. Myers, late Quartermaster-General, writes again, indignantly resenting the President’s indorsement, etc. as unfounded and injurious, etc.

            The President indorses this letter as follows: “Unless this letter is designed to ask whether Col. M. is still in the army, or discharged by the appointment of a successor, I find nothing which changes the case since my indorsement referred to, as causing resentment and calling for vindication. Your orders were certainly official communications. Not having seen them, I can express no opinion upon their terms.—JEFFERSON DAVIS.”