November 20.—Paper is scarce, and money is scarcer; and, having neither, I have been unable to keep a record of past events; so I will sum up all I can recollect.
I paid five dollars for ten common hairpins, and three dollars for a ball of common homespun thread.
I do not feel well, and have been taking horseback rides for my health, as I did in Chattanooga. I have been twice on foraging expeditions, with Mr. Yerby. Ho has a little wagon in which he drives out every day, and procures butter, buttermilk, and eggs. The days I went with him he took Sallie and Mrs. Smith’s two children. I rode horseback, and we had quite a delightful time.
We visited the country people; they all seemed pleased to see us, and had a smile of welcome for Mr. Y. One lady gave me some nice cake and home-made wine.
Sorghum grows very plentifully in these regions; we saw fields of it, and the process of making the molasses.
Mr. Y. gets quantities of buttermilk; butter and eggs are not quite so plentiful, ns the foragers from Andersonville buy up every thing of that kind for the hospitals there. We use at least ten gallons of buttermilk per day.
I had another ride, in company with one of Dr. Cross’s daughters and Mr. Moore. Wc visited Mrs. General Anderson, who is now here with her husband.
Many of our nurses have been sent to the army by an examining board. I know few of them are fit for field service. A Mr. Chandler could scarcely walk, from his wound; he was one of our best nurses. One hand of Mr. Holt, who had charge of the linen department, was useless, from the same cause. Many others have been sent off in like condition. If we can not do without such men, I think the country is badly off indeed.
I have made several nice acquaintances, and as we have few patients, I have spent two or three evenings in their company, practicing for our church choir. There is an Episcopal parish here, although there is no church. We have the use of the Presbyterian Church in the afternoons. Rev. Mr. Staley, an excellent preacher, officiates once a month. When he is not here, Dr. Adams has prayers, and sometimes preaches.
The ladies do not feed the men now, as we are doing very well in that respect ourselves. I told them they could do much good by mending the men’s clothes, which they did once or twice; they also made a number of haversacks for the men, who have gone to the front.
We have two wounded officers from General Strahl’s staff; one is Lieutenant Kelly, the other Lieutenant Dupree. The latter is wounded in his leg and foot; he has suffered much from neuralgia. I gave him some of though lotion we had received from Mrs. Dr. Pierce, and it relieved him almost instantly. Mrs. P. has sent as a donation a dozen bottles of it, and we find it invaluable.
We have had a call from Dr. Hunter. The Newsom Hospital has been here, along with many others; all are moving in this direction. The Newsom has gone on to Mississippi.
A number of hospitals from North Georgia are encamped near the depot; the ladies with them are in tents, and I am told that they are more comfortable than our rooms. This I can well believe, as our sitting-room has so many openings that the wind rushes through it in every direction, and in the evenings we find it impossible to prevent our lights being blown out.
A clerk of one of the hospitals called on me the other day, and told me that the steward of his hospital was a young Scotchman, named Ross. He had been but six weeks in the country when the war broke out, and he enlisted in a Louisiana regiment, and lately has been a hospital steward. My friend lauded him very highly, and told me he had had it in his power to make at least fifty thousand dollars in the hospital, but he would not do it. I asked how this could be done, as I had often heard of stewards making fortunes, but could not exactly understand how they managed it. He informed me that men were sent out foraging; the country people, thinking they were giving it to the suffering, and for the cause, let them have their produce at a much lower rate than they sell it to the citizens. The stewards buy the food in this way, and speculate on it.
We have had several days of terror, to be long remembered. It was rumored that a raid had taken Columbus and Macon, and were marching down to free the prisoners at Andersonville, and set them loose to do their worst on us, but it was merely a rumor. I hear the prisoners are being moved away from Andersonville, which news has rejoiced us not a little. There is a good deal of talk about their treatment.
Dr. Hughes informed me that a friend of his— Lieutenant Allen—who is stationed there, and a young man of undoubted veracity, told him that in general the treatment of the prisoners was as good as our means would admit of. There is much suffering among them, but we can expect nothing else; it would be the same if as many of our own men were thrown together where supplies were exhausted. They get the same rations as our own men. The scurvy has broken out among them, but I am told that the country people around here are sending them quantities of vegetables.
I see by the papers, that some who were exchanged, and sent to Atlanta, told their sufferings to their comrades, and they were about to wreak their vengeance on the prisoners in their hands.
Dr. Abernethy, one of our surgeons, asked them to hear him, and they did. He told them they must not blame our people, but their own, who would not have them exchanged. The crowd quietly dispersed, evidently fully convinced that we were not to blame.
How can they expect us to feed their people, when we can scarcely feed our own? They have destroyed our provisions whenever they have had an opportunity. Sherman, and many of their generals, have issued orders not only to destroy food, but garden implements. And then only think that no entreaties will make them exchange them! Lincoln and his minions have this sin on their consciences.
Some of the exchanged prisoners have held a meeting in Savannah, and denounced their own government for leaving them with us, and fully exonerate ours from all blame.
Dr. Hughes’s youngest son has been to see him, and paid us a visit. He is a fine-looking young man, and a true southerner. He was at school when the clarion of war was sounded through the land; he cast aside his books and entered the army, determined to battle for the right. He is now with General Wheeler, and is very hopeful of our success. He told us that the army had gone into Tennessee, and that ere long we would hear of brilliant exploits being done by it in that quarter. I asked him what was to be done with Sherman, as he is not disposed of? He answered, that if he attempted to march through Georgia, our cavalry was to march before him, and destroy all the food, and his army would be starved out.
I do not know any thing about military matters, but it does seem to me that there might be a better plan adopted than that to rid the country of this marauder.
We hear little or nothing of what is being done in the rest of the Confederacy. I remarked this to a friend in Macon, who said he would like to live here, as he was wearied with listening to war stories. But we hear plenty of reports. Dame Rumor, with her many tongues, is ever on the go.
We have been told that Forrest and Wheeler have Sherman hemmed in, and numerous other things that we can place no dependence upon.
We attended the wedding of Miss Kate Furlough, one of the elite of the town, which took place in the Methodist Church. There were about eighteen young ladies who stood up with the bride, but no gentleman with the groom, as there are none scarcely in the town. The wedding-party was quite a pretty sight.
Dr. Estell, an assistant surgeon in the Bragg Hospital, died lately. He was in his seventy-fifth year, and a most princely-looking man. He was attended by his bosom friends, Drs. Cross and Hughes, who resorted to every means that experienced skill could bring to bear to restore him to health and usefulness, but all in vain; he sank under his disease, and departed this life beloved and regretted by all who knew him.
Colonel Colyer, whom I met in Newnan, is his son-in-law. His daughter, Mrs. C., and his son, Colonel F. Estell, were with him during his illness.
He was from Tennessee, and joined the army at the outbreak of the war, and had served in it ever since. His home is in the hands of the enemy, and his invalid wife was turned out of doors, and has since died. He was a member of the Presbyterian Church in his youth, and, like many others, had forfeited all claim to membership by living for the world.
For some time before his death he had been thinking deeply on the subject of religion, and he died a Christian. After he partook of the Lord’s Supper, he arranged all his worldly affairs, and then told his friends he wished to hear of but one subject—that of the world beyond the grave. He besought his fellow-surgeons not to put off that important subject till the last, and said that he bitterly repented the wasted hours and days of his past life, when he should have been serving the Lord.
I went to see him, but he could scareely speak, he pressed my hand, and murmured faintly, “I am happy.” He was a man of highly cultivated mind and polished address.
One of the ladies, Mrs. Byrom, in the same hospital, lost her husband. He lived a Christian, and died one. He was from Tennessee, and was in that army through the late campaign. After he came here, all thought he only required rest; but not so: he sank under the disease, and death claimed him as his own.
His wife has been in the hospital service for some time. She came out from Tennessee with her parents, who are now living in North Georgia, so she is again separated from them.
A little while ago I met a brother of hers, Dr. Powell, who had just come from Atlanta. He told us that in some instances the Federal soldiers had behaved shamefully to the inhabitants, and he did not think Sherman had it in his power to restrain them.
I suppose, as we have had so little to do, that we have had a better chance of hearing what “they say” than we had before. The good people of this place have fallen into an error that we poor mortals are very apt to commit; that is, talking thoughtlessly about what we are totally ignorant of, and thus doing gross injustice to persons’ characters, and hurting their feelings without ever intending it. Scarcely a day passes that we do not hear some slander against the attachees of the hospitals: all suffer.
We are told that the surgeons had better be at the front, as they kill more than they cure; and that they drink all the liquor and eat all the good things provided for the soldiers.
I can not keep from laughing at all this, although we ladies come in for a share of the scandal. But I am like the Quaker whom the man called a liar. He said, “Friend, prove it; if thee can, I am one; if thee can not, then thee is one.”
Dr. Gore, formerly surgeon of the Bragg Hospital, was an eminent physician in Bloomfield, Kentucky. He gave up every thing for the cause, and since his entering the army has been devoted to his country. Dr. Cross, his successor, was one of the wealthiest men in North Alabama, and is a high-toned gentleman. He joined the army at the outbreak of the war, and has nobly done his duty.
One of his assistant surgeons was Dr, Estell, of whom I have already made mention. Dr. Redwine, another of his assistant surgeons, is a refined gentleman, and was also a man of wealth. Dr. Adams is the third assistant surgeon; of his worldly goods, I am unable to give an account, but I can say that he is rich in all that constitutes true riches. He is a Christian, and an humble and devout one. I feel confident that he never had a patient who would not gladly give him all of his “good things” any day, just to see him eat them, as his health is so bad.
I have already spoken of the surgeons in the Foard; they are on a par with those of the Bragg.
I wonder if it ever strikes these good people, who give such open expression to their views, that surely these gentlemen did not sacrifice so much to come into a hospital, just for the purpose of drinking the liquors and eating the poor diet of the patients.
The first is so bad that I do not believe any of our surgeons could be paid to drink it. And do not these good people know that the surgeons, with the exception of Dr. Adams, who is a patient, all board away from the hospital, and get plenty to eat at their boarding-houses.
Our post chaplain, when we first came here, requested me to see if some of the citizens would not take him to board.
None that I spoke to would do so. After awhile a rich man, and one of his own persuasion, took him. The first month’s board was, I believe, two hundred dollars; the next was to be three hundred. I think his pay from the government is eighty dollars per month, and he does not get all of that, unless he is more fortunate than the rest of us.
As we know him to be a man who, like ourselves, does not care what kind of food he gets, so it is eatable, we asked him to come and board with us. Besides giving his rations, he could pay his board, and that could go into the hospital fund. Dr. Hughes would not give his consent to this arrangement. He said it would be a breach of the hospital regulations.
Mr. M. found a boarding-house with a family, I believe refugees, where he has his rations cooked, and pays what he can afford.
The term “hospital rat” I have often heard applied to our hospital attendants. When I hear men, whom I have known suffer so much as many of our men have done, called by such an odious name, I can not help being indignant .
Mr. Dyson from Kentucky, was severely wounded in battle, and is in bad health. He is one of our head nurses. Mr. Catlet, our baggage-master, is from Kentucky. I believe he served under Morgan, and received a severe wound in battle, from the effects of which I fear he will never recover.
Mr. Williams of Tennessee, our commissary, from all appearances, is a stout, hearty man; but he was wounded badly at Murfreesboro; a ball entered his lungs, and is still lodged there. He can not walk any distance without suffering.
Mr. Bohannon from Georgia assists me in giving the men their meals, and is as good as any lady in that respect. He has little or no use of one of his hands, from a wound.
I could give many more just such examples of our “hospital rats.” Have these men not endured enough, and are they not serving their country now? They are gentlemen, and have not been used to the menial labor they do here; but they do it cheerfully, knowing it is for their country’s good.
“O, many a shaft, at random sent,
Finds mark the archer little meant;
And many a word, at random spoken,
May soothe or wound a heart that’s broken;”
As a whole, the people have been very kind. We have received more assistance from them than at any other place where we have been. Several ladies send us a pitcher of sweet milk daily. A lady, on my telling her that one of our men could not go to church for want of clothes, gave him a nice new suit. And the ladies’ society had a pair of shoes made for a soldier who was barefooted. We are living in a part of a small cottage; the owner, Mrs. Smith, a very nice lady, in the other: her husband has gone to the army. The house is a poor one, clapboarded inside, with daylight peeping through portions of it. The floors of our sleeping-rooms have seams in them at least an inch in width. We have nothing of which to complain in the way of ventilation.
There is a Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian Church here, and on last fast-day they all united and had prayers, but no preaching. Many a solemn prayer was offered up to Him who sitteth in the heavens, in behalf of our foes. The Presbyterian and Methodist ministers have been to call on us. The former has service very often in the hospital, and the men like him very much.
