Madison, Thursday, July 6. In accordance to orders I reported at Madison in company with Sister Mary and Brother John. Found an officer with great difficulty and was told that I was not needed until the 11th.
July 6th, 1865.—Something disagreeable happened today. The Riding class was to meet at Hattie’s and we were going around Lake Iamonia, and as the distance was longer than our rides usually are, we had to make an earlier start.
At four o’clock Cousin Lizzie and I were leaving the grove by the big front gate, which opens on the Thomasville road. “Rebel,” the pony I was riding, has an ugly trick of backing and kicking, if a noise alarms him, and just as we were riding through the gate Lieutenant Zachendorf and a squad of his men came riding past. Their accoutrements made a jingling noise, which offended “Rebel’s” ears and he immediately backed toward the soldiers, kicking with all his might, his heels fairly flying. I could do nothing with him; he paid no attention to either rein or whip and orders were of no avail. I was in despair. Lieutenant Zachendorf halted his squad and ordered me to “Stop that Devil.” I explained that I could not manage him and they rode away, after telling me if it ever happened again he would have me arrested and tried before his court. We went on to Captain Lester’s house, where we joined the party but I did not enjoy the afternoon. I think I shall have to stay at home hereafter.
5th. The little beggar girl, Emma, still comes around. Am sorry for her. Life has but few charms for her. Her father killed at Shiloh, her brother died at Sulphur Springs, a drummer boy, her mother had rheumatism, her little brother another little beggar. A very bad girl. God help the poor and afflicted.
Wednesday, 5th—An order from the War Department came today, ordering the mustering out of all the soldiers of the Army of the Tennessee. All is quiet.
July 5th, 1865.—We had a grand time at Greenwood last night. The Shakespeare Club is the most entertaining mode of amusement I ever tried. I had a sore throat and could not read so my part was given to one of the other girls, Nora Holland, it was. That being the case I had a better opportunity of judging the rest. Most of the readers did remarkably well; all were educated and all were more or less accomplished, and well-read. The readers made a pretty picture as they sat around the big kerosene lamps which were a new acquisition in the Holland household, for four years we have had lights of domestic manufacture only, so these looked quite grand.
I sat in an open window and listened and looked, but I fear my attention was somewhat distracted from the subject in hand, because, just outside, on the porch, some one was kneeling, talking of far different matters. Having heard that the next meeting would be held at Uncle Tom’s we adjourned for supper. Cousin Peggy is a famous housekeeper and this was a fair sample of her skill. It has been a long time since the southern housekeeper felt that she could be spared from the camp and the hospital for entertainments, but our soldiers are at home now and we must give them the very best we have.
4th. After breakfast had a siege of chess with Mr. Barney. A very hot day. A great many friends around St. Louis. Remained in camp till evening when I went to city. Saw fire works and got ice cream. Met Albert Hinman.
July 4th. A great parade and reception to our regiment. The welcome home was a grand time. During the march, on the parade, many people were in tears, and we knew the reason why. Their husbands and boys did not come home. While we were happy we did not forget the good fellows and the homes that contained a vacant chair. It was a great day in old Norwich. A Fourth that cannot be forgotten by those who participated in the parade. It was the last parade of the Eighteenth Regiment, Connecticut Volunteers. Our guns and equipments were laid aside. No more cruel war for us.
July 4th.—Saturday I was in bed with one of my worst headaches. Occasionally there would come a sob and I thought of my sister insulted and my little sweet Williams. Another of my beautiful Columbia quartette had rough experiences. A raider asked the plucky little girl, Lizzie Hamilton, for a ring which she wore. “You shall not have it,” she said. The man put a pistol to her head, saying, “Take it off, hand it to me, or I will blow your brains out.” “Blow away,” said she. The man laughed and put down his pistol, remarking, “You knew I would not hurt you.” “Of course, I knew you dared not shoot me. Even Sherman would not stand that.”
There was talk of the negroes where the Yankees had been—negroes who flocked to them and showed them where silver and valuables had been hid by the white people. Ladies’-maids dressed themselves in their mistresses’ gowns before the owners’ faces and walked off. Now, before this every one had told me how kind, faithful, and considerate the negroes had proven. I am sure, after hearing these tales, the fidelity of my own servants shines out brilliantly. I had taken their conduct too much as a matter of course. In the afternoon I had some business on our place, the Hermitage. John drove me down. Our people were all at home, quiet, orderly, respectful, and at their usual work. In point of fact things looked unchanged. There was nothing to show that any one of them had even seen the Yankees, or knew that there was one in existence.
July 4 — When the first rays of the rising sun gilded the Massanutten I had already commenced my last day’s tramp. About four o’clock this afternoon I stood on top of the Massanutten Mountain, and once more fondly looked with enraptured gaze over the land of my native home, the grand old Valley of the Shenandoah, with its pleasant fields, winding, tree-fringed streams and verdant hills. Man and nature have both been busy in obliterating the ugly scars of war since the last sound of battle has died away.
The broad landscape, dotted with a thousand harvest fields and diversified with fields of growing corn, is fast shaking off the ashes of war and spreading its summer treasures in the golden sunshine, and ere long General Sheridan’s “waste and howling wilderness” will again blossom as the rose. Summer with lavish hand has already spread a verdant robe on the fields and hillsides where charging squadrons devastated nature’s finest handiwork on the ornate and adorning garb and where camp-fires blazing on emerald hearths stained and flecked the living carpet.
If I have written anything that may ruffle the placid temperament of my Northern brethren who stood in the forefront of their country’s ranks and bravely bared their breasts to Southern bullets, I wish them always to remember that the sentiments expressed are but the honest thoughts of a humble private who stood in the ranks and fought for home and native land. There and then these reflections and impressions were woven into a variegated tapestry, while the gloomy war cloud shrouded my native skies and dipped low over the land that gave me birth while now and then the fire of battle flashed fiercely across the forming woof. No, no, I never bowed at the shrine of a Southern fire-eater nor learned at the feet of a political Gamaliel who thought he knew it all; neither did I worship at the footstool of an out-and-out disunionist, nor welcome the last arguments of kings and potentates; nor did I applaud or wink at the expressed sentiments of traitors that boldly proclaimed the Constitution of the United States a “League with Hades.”
I arrived at home this evening, and unslung the very same blanket that I started with to the war, on the 19th of July, 1861. Fifteen days more and I would have been in service just four years, and in all that time I never saw the inside of a hospital.
Now that our common country has been drenched with human blood, may the costly sacrifice so nurture our Liberty-tree that it will bloom brighter and bear sweeter fruit than it ever did before, and may it exhale and diffuse the incense of brotherly love, unity, and harmony, unalloyed by the poisonous breath of sectional hatred, which never fails to breed an arrogant and selfish spirit of I am better and holier than thou.
Tuesday, 4th—General Sherman reviewed the Army of the Tennessee today for the last time, our division passing in review at 9 a. m. He made a short speech—a farewell address—to all the troops. He told us that we had been good soldiers, and now that the war is over and the country united once more, we should go home, and as we had been true soldiers, we should become good citizens. This is a rather dull Fourth. I stayed in camp the rest of the day after the review, but in the evening I went down town to a theater—Wood’s theater—for the first time in my life.
For a while today there was a lively time in camp when a lot of the boys tried to break through the guard line. When they failed at that, they next made a raid on the sutlers, who have been doing a big business since our arrival at Louisville. Before the officer of the day could get guards to the sutlers’ tents, the boys had secured a considerable amount of booty.
