The Blue and The Gray

CHAPTER I. THE BEGINNING OF WAR

THE early spring days of 1861 were dreams of beauty. The skies smiled blandly upon the earth, and every heart was glad that the long winter was over, and the charms of outdoor life could be enjoyed once more. Surely nature had done her part in making men happy.

A spirit of unrest and uncertainty, however, brooded in the air. The long conflict between opposing ideas, which had waged so long and bitterly in politics and churches, and through the columns of the press, had come to a focus, and dread murmurs were abroad, of an impending war, and its attendant horrors. Men looked in each other's faces, and asked, with sad forebodings—"What is coming next?"

The South made ample preparations to seize two South Carolina forts, Moultrie and Sumter, as early as December, 1860.

Lieutenant-Colonel Gardner was the commander of Fort Moultrie, and, loyal to the government, he sent to Washington asking for reinforcements to help him hold that fort. This request offended the Southern members of Congress, who construed it into an insult, and demanded his removal. This demand was acceded to by Secretary of War Floyd, and Major Robert Anderson of Kentucky was appointed to supersede Colonel Gardner.

Major Anderson, faithful to the trust reposed in him by the government, soon decided that Fort Moultrie could not be held against a vigorous assault, and he moved his garrison secretly to Sumter, a fortress across the harbor. This fort could not be approached by land, and, consequently, from this fact, was deemed more secure against any opposing force. The undertaking was a dangerous one. The harbor was full of guard boats, vigilant and watchful, and only their supposition that the little rowboats containing Major Anderson and his men were laborers going to the other fort to work on it, prevented their detection and arrest.

Moultrie's guns had been trained to protect this transfer in case the Major's intention was discovered, and the fort, whose defense rendered the gallant Anderson immortal, was occupied by his troops at only twenty minutes' notice! We think that was the quickest "moving time" on record.

A siege gun which was turned upon Fort Sumter is shown on page 20. Its carriage is broken, and it was thus rendered useless by the Confederates, when they abandoned the fort in 1864.

France and England would not acknowledge the South as an independent nation, but the Confederate government did all possible to bring this about by sending Messrs. James M. Mason of Virginia and John Slidell of Louisiana to London and Paris with the hope that their claims would be recognized. Henry Ward Beecher, when in the height of his fame, afterward went to England, addressing immense audiences, and setting forth the true condition of American affairs.

The hope of the Southerners was that the government would allow a peaceable withdrawal of the dissatisfied States, and that no bloodshed would be necessary, but as time went by and the most active preparations for keeping them in the Union were made by the general government, they commenced hostilities, and the first gun of the war was fired by the Confederates under General Beauregard on the morning of April 12, and while the officers and men within the fort were eating their breakfast, a perpetual bursting of shells and shot kept them awake to the fact that the peace had been broken, and war had begun.

After breakfast the force was divided up into firing parties and the first reply on the part of the Union was made by Captain Abner Doubleday. But their guns were very light.

A bombardment followed, and on the 14th of April, 1861, General Robert Anderson evacuated the fort.

Blockade running was so common it became necessary to fit out out an expedition to close the most valuable of the openings, Hatteras Inlet. The first expedition projected for this purpuse was fitted out near Fortress Monroe and was under the command of Flag Officer Silas H. Stringham. The engagement lasted three hours with a complete victory for Stringham, and several blockade runners entered the inlet and were captured.

The news fell like a pall upon the North. It was impossible so many and old man urged, that Americans, our own people could be so disloyal. Why had they done it? What did it mean? And when, in consequence of this act, President Lincoln ordered them to disperse within twenty days, and called for 75,000 men from the various States, to enlist to "suppress this combination against the laws," the response came swiftly.

In every town and village the patriotic fires were kindled, and boys and old men pressed on, side by side, willing to give their lives, if need be, to uphold their country's flag.

Many a smooth-cheeked lad, loved dearly and tenderly reared, went forth from his home, never again to enter its portal. Alas, for those sad days!

Recruiting went swiftly on. Speech-making and passionate appeals to the people were heard in every quarter of the North.

Women could not fight, but they could organize sewing societies, and work untiringly for those who had gone to the front. Many an article found its way to the army that was useful, and when blood had been spilled, these same patient and tearful women sent lint, and bandages, and medicines, for the sick and wounded.

As the call for soldiers awoke the boys and men of the North, so did a like summons from their leaders arouse the spirit of the South. They had orators in their midst, whose tones swayed them, and they, too, enlisted to form an army which should repel the "encroachments" of those whom they deemed their enemies.

Boys went forth from luxurious homes, and stood shoulder to shoulder with the humblest, clad in the gray, all equally ready to sacrifice life and home to their idea of duty.

One lad, in his Western home, a dreamer thus far, the light of his widowed mother's life, heard the war cry, and the blood tingled in his veins as he listened to stirring arguments day by day, and saw one after another of his companions leave their homes to join the forces that were being hurried forward to headquarters.

He felt that he must go with them. Why not? His eye was as keen, his brain as clear, his arm as strong to do whatever his country required of him, as were theirs.

This longing haunted him by day and night, until it became unbearable. He went to his mother, and with earnest words begged her to send him. Alas, that mother was not equal to the task. She was loving, gentle and shrinking, and when he urged her to let him go, her answer was—"Ralph, you know not what you ask. Do you forget that I am a Southern woman, whose childhoods days were spent in that beautiful country? All my people are there. Would you have me send my boy away to fight those I love, and whose feelings I must share? You are asking too great a sacrifice at my hands."

"Mother, it is true that you were born and educated there. But did you not love my father so dearly that you left your home and all your friends to come to the North with him, where I was born?"

A tender smile flitted across her still beautiful face. "Yes, I did love him," she said softly to herself, "and I honor his memory. What shall I do?—I cannot forget my dear childhood's home. It is too hard a question for me to decide."

"Let me decide for you, mother. You surely love your Northern home and friends. The people of the South have fired upon our forts in Charleston harbor, and driven the garrison away. I, too, am a Southerner in many ways. Are you not my mother, and do you not know I honor every thought or wish of yours?"

"There must be some other way to bring them back, rather than by fighting. War is a cruel and unnatural alternative. Why, they will be firing upon their own people—like brothers in one family falling out, and seeking to do each other deadly harm."

Ralph was silent. His heart burned with patriotic fire, and it seemed to him that it was his duty to help swell the numbers of those who were ready to respond to the President's call. But he also knew that his mother loved her early home, and that it seemed to her unnatural for him to be so ready to take up arms against "her people," and he respected her too deeply to wound her willingly. That mother had been gently born, and when she met the young Northern lawyer, she had loved him from the first, and cheerfully shared his humble but peaceful home. She was now left alone in the world, with her three girls and this boy, the youngest. The fortunes of war were too varying. She might never see him again, and how could she live without him?

To Ralph was presented a problem that he was called unexpectedly to solve. He pondered over it in the silence of night, and in the busy hours of day. Was it right to fly in the face of his beloved mother's prejudices by joining the Federal forces? On the one hand he felt that he, too, was Southern in feeling and in birth. His father was a Northern man, and he would uphold the old flag; but which side it was his duty to join, he could not determine. He was resolved to go into one of the two armies. In the crisis that had come, it was clearly every one's duty to come to the front.

The boy talked with every one whom he could interest. He was not able to study out the problem alone. One of his schoolmates had the proud distinction of having an uncle who was a commissioned officer, and he took the bold step of meeting him one day when he was walking past his home.

"Sir," he said timidly, "may I speak to you?"

"Certainly," the officer replied. And then and there he poured forth his doubts, his desire to do what was right, his mother's objections—all, he told the waiting gentleman whose opinion he so desired.

The officer laid his hand kindly on the boy's shoulder.

"Your wish does you credit. The fortunes of war are too varying for me to decide for you. Try and work out the proper answer yourself, and may you be helped to make a wise decision."

Alas, the question was too hard for a boy like him to answer. He was humbly trying to see where his duty lay, and then he was ready to enlist on whichever side called him. On one hand was his mother and her early teachings, on the other his dead father, with all his views. "What side would he choose were he here?" was the ever-recurring thought in his anxious brain.

But after weeks of this long, weary struggle, he decided to join the Union army. His mother saw that he believed he was shirking a duty, and that he longed for action.

She thought she would make one more effort to change his purpose. She said to him suddenly one day, when she saw his troubled face: "Ralph, you are only seventeen. You have never been away from your home, and know nothing about hardships and privations. Do you think you could face a cannon, and know that its deadly mouth might lay you low on the field, mangled and torn?"

"Oh, mother, I never think of such things. If I enlist, I must take my chances with the rest. I want to go with the other boys. Eddie Downing and George Martin have and are going into camp to-morrow, at Readville."

"But will the government accept you? Eddie and George are three or four years older than you. There are plenty of men, without taking a boy who is his mother's chief comfort."

"I am strong and well. When I come back, you will be the proudest mother in the land, to think you sent your boy away. I may go with your blessing, may I not? That will protect me."

The boy's eyes were moist with emotion. His mother, with a sigh, gave her reluctant consent, and though many a bitter tear was shed in the loneliness of her room, she bravely hid them from the boy she loved.

Now that the decision was final, she made every preparation for the comfort of the boy who was to leave them so soon. His sisters wept continually—not a very cheerful parting, but Ralph was the idol of his home.

"Mother," he said to her a day or two after she had given her consent, "do not worry about me. I shall do my duty. This war can't last long. Then I'll come back to you, and stay at home as long as I live, depend on that."

His beaming face half reassured her, and she began to share his enthusiasm. He was enrolled as a soldier. Although his youth was at first objected to, his earnestness carried the day, and he was told to report at Camp Hale at once.

He was a real soldier at last! A genuine soldier, who must fight. He did not belong to the would-be soldiers, such as they used to call the "militia," who simply paraded on the open green, or turned out on dress occasions, with the curious for an audience, who would watch and be astonished at their evolutions and their showy uniforms, when the Fourth of July or kindred days made their demands upon them.

In his neat-fitting suit of blue, the cap setting jauntily upon his head, his musket in hand, and his belt with its bayonet buckled around him, he looked so manly that a thrill of pride flashed o'er his mothers face, as she looked at her boy, her Ralph, in his "soldier clothes."

But when the day came for him to leave the only home he had ever known, and he turned to take a last look at its plain walls, his heart almost failed him. His beloved mother stood in the doorway, her hands pressed over her face, while she strove to keep back the choking sobs, as she bade her boy—"Good-bye, and may God bless and protect you." Those solemn words came back to Ralph in many a lonely hour, and brought him consolation and support.

Thus, in many homes, both North and South, were the heartstrings torn, as mothers and sisters bade farewell to the boys in blue and gray, who went to the front, to lay down their lives for duty's sake.

Ralph was a proud boy when he joined his companions in camp, wearing the blue uniform, with its shining buttons bearing the U. S. stamp upon them.

He was naturally retiring, but now he felt as if the eyes of the world were upon him. He had taken an important step, and he would show his friends and that great big world that he knew exactly what he was doing.

Camp life was one continual drill—so it seemed to him. Readville was a quiet little town, but its people were ablaze with patriotism, and the "boys in blue" were the recipients of perpetual admiration. Every move they made was noticed and approved, and it is not to be wondered at if some of them did greedily swallow considerable flattery, which led them to assume quite lofty airs.

The sameness of life in camp soon wearied, and Ralph longed for something more stirring. When the bugle call rang out, every man sprang up, and, after a hasty ablution, at a second call they made a charge upon their breakfast with vehemence, and tin cups and plates rattled in a most discordant fashion. Then the drill began; first with musket and rifle, and then with the bayonet. A bayonet charge was a fierce reminder of the real thing. When men meet the enemy with fixed bayonets, a dreadful slaughter may always be counted on. This drilling was kept up at intervals, all through the day; first in squads and companies, and then the entire regiment would take part in the use of these weapons, and the various evolutions that the drill-master taught.

Ralph was very anxious to become proficient in their use, and while many of the older men grumbled at this work, he kept on, learning at each repetition something more of their actual value.

"You'll have to know all about this," said Lieutenant Hopkins to them, or you'll be in a nice hole when you're caught out in the field. "We don't know how soon we may be sent to the front, and then there won't be much time for this sort of practice. It'll be march and fight then."

Way down in his heart this quiet stripling, hitherto jealously guarded from a knowledge of the world by a fond mother and sisters, had his own dreams of fame burning brightly and steadily. What if he could plan or assist in some grand sortie, and be mentioned in the dispatches as "the gallant private of Company K– Mass. Volunteers, whose valor turned the tide and carried the day?" Then probably he would be summoned before the commanding officer, and honors would be thrust upon him. Perhaps, if he kept on, he might be a general! What would the dear ones at home say then? The picture was too brilliant; his head fairly grew dizzy at the prospect.

"I'll tell you," he said to a comrade, "we are in no danger of starving here in camp, at any rate, if we don't have much variety."

"That's so. What's the matter with pork, beans, soup, bread, molasses (here he made a wry face), rice and hard tack? If we get enough of these, we'll pull through all right," his companion responded cheerfully.

"And we sleep as sound as kittens in our wooden bunks, with plenty of straw for a bed, and our big army blankets over us," continued Ralph.

"The pillows might be a little softer," said Harvey Phillips. "Overcoats doubled up ain't quite as easy shook up as feathers."

"No, but our captain tells me that we are living in clover just at present. Wait till we go into a battle. Perhaps we'll come out without any heads, then we won't need any pillows," laughed Ralph.

"That's true. Your easy times are right here just now," said a "vet," who had been in many a battle in the far West with the red men, and had "smelt powder" to his heart's content. "War looks very pretty on paper, with the big fellows at Washington moving the men like they're at a chessboard, but wait till the guns speak up on the field, and men to men are hurled against each other, to fight like demons. The real thing ain't so romantic, let me tell you youngsters."

"You can't frighten us," said Harvey. "We are no three months' men. We enlisted for the war and we propose to see the war out."

"Boys, I tell you war aren't no pastime. It means work, and hardest kind of work, at that. It's a great thing to organize an army, and keep its various parts in trim. We don't usually go out to fight the enemy with only a flask of powder, and a knapsack filled with soda crackers. There are men and horses and ammunition to carry along."

"Who takes care of all these matters?" asked Ralph.

"The quartermaster. He looks after the rations, the ammunition, in fact, all the supplies—blankets for the men, medicines for the sick and transportation for the baggage. He is usually a captain or a lieutenant. The government appoints him."

"Does he fight?"

"Oh, no. He's got no time for that. He has to look after the fellows who do the fighting. The quartermasters have excitement and danger enough, however, in protecting their stores They ain't like the sutlers."