28th. People began to come into town for their property. Six prisoners were released. Somebody shot at them. I am tired of this barbarous way of soldiering. Doubleday returned to Fort Scott with body guard.

APRIL 28th.—We have rumors of an important cabinet meeting, wherein it was resolved to advise or command Gen. Johnston to evacuate Yorktown and retire toward Richmond! Also that Norfolk is to be given up! I don’t believe it; Lee’s name is not mentioned.

Monday Morning, April 28.

Where do you think I am? On the “Daniel Webster No. 1,” which the Sanitary Commission has taken as a hospital ship. We are now on the way down to Cheeseman’s Creek, near Ship Point, and when you receive this we shall be lying just there. Saturday afternoon the gentlemen of the Commission, Mr. Olmsted and Mr. Knapp, came over to see us, and to our great surprise and pleasure proposed to us to come down with them in the ship as “nurses at large,” or matrons, or what not–to do of course all we can for the sick and wounded men in the approaching battle. They had telegraphed to Mrs. William P. Griffin and Mrs. Lane of New York to come on at once, and go too. We only had one night’s notice, as they were to leave early Sunday morning, but we accepted the offer at once, and here we are! We four are the only women on board except a colored chambermaid, but there are 30 or 40 men nurses and hospital dressers, and several members of the Commission–Mr. Olmsted, Mr. Knapp, Mr. Lewis Rutherford, Mr. Strong, Dr. Agnew, Dr. Grymes, etc. They have two boats, this and the Elm City. The latter is to be a receiving ship and permanent floating hospital, and this one the transporting one, in which the wounded will be carried at once by sea to New York, Philadelphia, or Baltimore and Washington, as the case may be. It is an old ocean steamship, and used to run on the Aspinwall route; is stanch and seaworthy, but now wretchedly dirty. A dozen stout contrabands are at work night and day scrubbing and cleaning, and, as they finish, the whitewashers and carpenters succeed them, and by degrees it will be put in good condition. . . . I saw Mrs. Franklin the night before we started and have a note for the General. We left our little dog Mopsey with her. . . . If you are still off Ship Point we shall be very near each other. . . . There is a P. O. station at Cheeseman’s Creek to which please direct your letters to me, care of Fred. Law Olmsted, Hospital Ship of Sanitary Commission.

New York, April 28.

My dear Sisters: Mother’s letter of Sunday morning, giving the startling intelligence of your having gone off suddenly to Fort Monroe, came before breakfast. Since it was your very earnest wish, and, as Mr. Prentiss tells us, you might have chafed at being held back–why I am glad you have gone. But it seems to me a very trying position for you: you will work yourselves sick. Joe will be the most surprised person, and I don’t believe he will approve of your being on a hospital boat. It is very satisfactory that Mrs. Griffin is on board; as long as she stays you will not need either man or woman protector. . . . Georgy’s letter to Charley came with Mother’s. He will see to the wire camp-beds, and we will put the other stores, your hats, etc., etc., all in a trunk and have them ready for the first opportunity. If you write for Charley he will take them on at once. . . . It is strange that Mr. Olmsted should have had you in mind, without having known of your desire to go. It shows that, as Georgy says, “Heaven had opened the door.” . . . Our best love to you two dear brave girls; you are doing what you love to do, and I hope will take care of yourselves as well as of the soldiers.

28th.–Marched out this morning, to support our pioneers, who are cutting out a brushy ravine, which has afforded cover to the enemy’s pickets, from which to inflict much damage to ours. We met with resistance, and have had quite a brush of a fight over it, but succeeded in driving the enemy out. Here, again, I am astonished at our men’s indifference to danger, and their apparent insensibility to the suffering of their comrades. During the fight, our whole regiment were lying on the ground, laughing, talking, whittling and cracking jokes, as unconcernedly as if they were preparing for a frolic; and, yet we were constantly receiving intelligence of comrades falling within a few rods of us. So near were we to the fight that we could occasionally hear the rebels calling to the “damn-d Yankees to come on.” Sometimes when a wounded or dead soldier was brought by on a litter, the soldiers would discuss the question whether they would rather be litter-bearers or litter-borne, and would even get one of their number on a litter, with litter-bearers, and “play wounded.” Such is the demoralization of war, and it is one of the least of its evils. War may be necessary, but–

“Och! it hardens a’ within,
An’ petrifies the feeling.”

April 28, 1862.—This evening has been very lovely, but full of a sad disappointment. H. invited me to drive. As we turned homeward he said:

“Well, my arrangements are completed. You can begin to pack your trunks to-morrow, and I shall have a talk with Max.”

Mr. R. and Annie were sitting on the gallery as I ran up the steps.

“Heard the news?” they cried.

“No! What news?”

“New Orleans is taken! All the boats have been run up the river to save them. No more mails.”

How little they knew what plans of ours this dashed away. But our disappointment is truly an infinitesimal drop in the great waves of triumph and despair surging to-night in thousands of hearts.

Note: To protect Mrs. Miller’s job as a teacher in post-civil war New Orleans, her diary was published anonymously, edited by G. W. Cable, names were changed and initials were generally used instead of full names—and even the initials differed from the real person’s initials. (Read Dora Richards Miller’s biographical sketch.)

27th.–The country is shrouded in gloom because of the fall of New Orleans! It was abandoned by General Lovell—necessarily, it is thought. Such an immense force was sent against the forts which protected it, that they could not be defended. The steamer Mississippi, which was nearly finished, had to be burnt. We hoped so much from its protection to the Mississippi River. Oh, it is so hard to see the enemy making such inroads into the heart of our country! it makes the chicken-hearted men and women despondent, but to the true and brave it gives a fresh stimulus for exertion. I met two young Kentuckians to-night who have come out from their homes, leaving family and fortunes behind, to help the South. After many difficulties, running the blockade across the Potomac, they reached Richmond yesterday, just as the news of the fall of New Orleans had overwhelmed the city. They are dreadfully disappointed by the tone of the persons they have met. They came burning with enthusiasm; and anything like depression is a shock to their excited feelings. One said to me that he thought he should return at once, as he had “left every thing which made home desirable to help Virginia, and found her ready to give up.” All the blood in my system boiled in an instant. “Where, sir,” said I, ” have you seen Virginians ready to give up their cause?” “Why,” he replied, “I have been lounging about the Exchange all day, and have heard the sentiments of the people.” “Lounging about the Exchange! And do you suppose that Virginians worthy of the name are now seen lounging about the Exchange? There you see the idlers and shirkers of the whole Southern army. No true man under forty-five is to be found there. Virginia, sir, is in the camp. Go there, and find the true men of the South. There they have been for one year, bearing the hardships, and offering their lives, and losing life and limb for the South; it is mournful to say how many! There you will find the chivalry of the South; and if Virginia does not receive you with the shout of enthusiasm which you anticipated, it is because the fire burns steadily and deeply; the surface blaze has long ago passed away. I honour you, and the many noble young Kentuckians who have left their homes for the sake of our country, but it will not do for Kentucky to curl the lip of scorn at Virginia. Virginia blushes, and silently mourns over her recreant daughter, and rejoices over every son of hers who has the disinterestedness to leave her and come to us in this hour of our bitter trial.”

I do not believe that this young man really means, or wishes, to return; he only feels disheartened by the gloom caused by our great national loss.

APRIL 27th.—Gen. Lee is calm—but the work of preparation goes on night and day.

Sunday, 27th–Today we had company inspection. We had to go to work and clean up our camp and parade ground. The camp is in the timber. The water is very scarce and poor at that.

April 27th.

What a day! Last night came a dispatch that New Orleans was under British protection, and could not be bombarded; consequently, the enemy’s gunboats would probably be here this morning, such few as had succeeded in passing the Forts; from nine to fifteen, it was said. And the Forts, they said, had not surrendered. I went to church; but I grew very anxious before it was over, feeling that I was needed at home. When I returned, I found Lilly wild with excitement, picking up hastily whatever came to hand, preparing for instant flight, she knew not where. The Yankees were in sight; the town was to be burned; we were to run to the woods, etc. If the house had to be burned, I had to make up my mind to run, too. So my treasure-bag tied around my waist as a bustle, a sack with a few necessary articles hanging on my arm, some few quite unnecessary ones, too, as I had not the heart to leave the old and new prayer books father had given me, and Miriam’s, too; – pistol and carving-knife ready, I stood awaiting the exodus. I heaped on the bed the treasures I wanted to burn, matches lying ready to fire the whole at the last minute. I may here say that, when all was over, I found I had omitted many things from the holocaust. This very diary was not included. It would have afforded vast amusement to the Yankees. There may yet be occasion to burn them, and the house also. People fortunately changed their minds about the auto-da-fé just then; and the Yankees have not yet arrived, at sundown. So, when the excitement calmed down, poor Lilly tumbled in bed in a high fever in consequence of terror and exertion.

27th. At 7 A. M. marched to Carthage leaving Co. “G” to guard cattle. Arrested some men in town. Our boys occupied Court House. We (of the staff) set up in a boot and shoe store and boarded at Mr. Hueston’s a little out of town–pleasant people. Issued rations to the boys.

April 27th.–New Orleans gone¹ and with it the Confederacy. That Mississippi ruins us if lost. The Confederacy has been done to death by the politicians. What wonder we are lost.

The soldiers have done their duty. All honor to the army. Statesmen as busy as bees about their own places, or their personal honor, too busy to see the enemy at a distance. With a microscope they were examining their own interests, or their own wrongs, forgetting the interests of the people they represented. They were concocting newspaper paragraphs to injure the government. No matter how vital it may be, nothing can be kept from the enemy. They must publish themselves, night and day, what they are doing, or the omniscient Buncombe will forget them.

This fall of New Orleans means utter ruin to the private fortunes of the Prestons. Mr. Preston came from New Orleans so satisfied with Mansfield Lovell and the tremendous steam-rams he saw there. While in New Orleans Burnside offered Mr. Preston five hundred thousand dollars, a debt due to him from Burnside, and he refused to take it. He said the money was safer in Burnside’s hands than his. And so it may prove, so ugly is the outlook now. Burnside is wide awake; he is not a man to be caught napping.

Mary Preston was saying she had asked the Hamptons how they relished the idea of being paupers. If the country is saved none of us will care for that sort of thing. Philosophical and patriotic, Mr. Chesnut came in, saying: “Conrad has been telegraphed from New Orleans that the great iron-clad Louisiana went down at the first shot.” Mr. Chesnut and Mary Preston walked off, first to the bulletin-board and then to the Prestons’.

______

¹ New Orleans had been seized by the Confederates at the outbreak of the war. Steps to capture it were soon taken by the Federals and on April 18, 1862, the mortar flotilla, under Farragut, opened fire on its protecting forts. Making little impression on them, Farragut ran boldly past the forts and destroyed the Confederate fleet, comprising 13 gunboats and two ironclads. On April 27th he took formal possession of the city.

Ebbitt House, April 27.

Everybody was delighted with what you left in Washington for the hospitals. Some of the jellies and wine (I found a whole box of it left without orders), and some shoes, I took over to Georgetown to Mrs. Russell, who was just out of all. Mother is going about the room indignant still at the Bank, and “expects to have every policeman in the city tapping her on the shoulder to know the facts of the case.” We try not to miss you, but yesterday was very like Sunday, much more quiet and Sabbath-like than when you were here; to-day we have had the bank excitement to keep us busy.

The “bank excitement” is the little incident recounted in the Evening Star as follows:

A Cool Operation.–This morning, Mrs. C. W. Woolsey went to the Bank of the Metropolis to draw the money for two checks of a hundred dollars each. Unacquainted, apparently, with business of the sort, she stepped into the bank, and instead of applying at the counter, presented them to a person who was standing at a desk outside, and returned to her coach. This person presented the checks to the paying teller, who refused to pay because they lacked Mrs. Woolsey’s endorsement. He took a pen and went out to the coach and returned with the checks properly endorsed. They were paid, and the fellow made off with the money, leaving the lady minus.

27th.–We hear very heavy firing to-day, in the direction of Yorktown, but at night, have not learned the purport of it; though there is a rumor that several of our gun boats arrived there this morning, and that the enemy’s batteries opened on them. Our whole Division is ordered out at 6 A. M. tomorrow. What means it?

APRIL 26th.—Gen. Lee is doing good service in bringing forward reinforcements from the South against the day of trial—and an awful day awaits us. It is understood that he made fully known to the President his appreciation of the desperate condition of affairs, and demanded carté blanche as a condition of his acceptance of the position of commanding general. The President wisely agreed to the terms.

Saturday, 26th–Our regiment is now brigaded with Iowa soldiers, the brigade being completed today. Our brigade is composed of the Eleventh, Thirteenth, Fifteenth and Sixteenth Iowa Infantries, with Colonel Crocker in command.^[1] We were inspected today by the general inspector of the army, and had all our accouterments on.

[1] The brigade dating from April 27, 1862, became known as “Crocker’s Iowa Brigade.” It remained together throughout the war and maintains an organization to this day.–A. G. D.

April 26th. The Mayor of the city has surrendered it to Flag-officer Farragut, and a battalion of marines, under Capt. J. L. Broome, went ashore to raise the Stars and Stripes, but were opposed by the citizens and returned to the ship. In the afternoon we went up to Carrollton and captured sixty or eighty guns without firing a shot, they having been deserted and the gun carriages destroyed.

April 26th, 1862.

There is no word in the English language that can express the state in which we are, and have been, these last three days. Day before yesterday, news came early in the morning of three of the enemy’s boats passing the Forts, and then the excitement began. It increased rapidly on hearing of the sinking of eight of our gunboats in the engagement, the capture of the Forts, and last night, of the burning of the wharves and cotton in the city while the Yankees were taking possession. To-day, the excitement has reached the point of delirium. I believe I am one of the most self-possessed in my small circle; and yet I feel such a craving for news of Miriam, and mother, and Jimmy, who are in the city, that I suppose I am as wild as the rest. It is nonsense to tell me I am cool, with all these patriotic and enthusiastic sentiments. Nothing can be positively ascertained, save that our gunboats are sunk, and theirs are coming up to the city. Everything else has been contradicted until we really do not know whether the city has been taken or not. We only know we had best be prepared for anything. So day before yesterday, Lilly and I sewed up our jewelry, which may be of use if we have to fly. I vow I will not move one step, unless carried away. Come what will, here I remain.

We went this morning to see the cotton burning –a sight never before witnessed, and probably never again to be seen. [continue reading…]

26th. Sunday. In the morning separated and went by companies. Nettleton and staff went with Co. “G” to “Turkey Creek,” stopped at nearly every house. Took what arms, horses and cattle we could find. The guides deceived several families making them think we were secesh to capture Carthage. All people here are rebels, loud in their praises of the rebel soldiery and in their imprecations against the Union boys. The girls sang the “Army Wagon.” Was much amused. Had a good visit with them–”Challes” by name, said I was the only gentleman in the lot–asked my name and said possibly they could some time do me some good. Our men brought into camp cattle and horses. Eight prisoners were brought in, including John Dale, State Senator from Jasper County. Lots of interesting incidents.

April 26th.–Doleful dumps, alarm-bells ringing. Telegrams say the mortar fleet has passed the forts at New Orleans. Down into the very depths of despair are we.

Washington, April 26.

Mr. Knapp, of the Sanitary Commission, has just been over and offers to take a note for me when he goes to Yorktown to morrow. We like him so much, and shall be in communication with him all summer if we succeed in going down, and we are very likely to go! Mr. Knapp said the Commission had been speaking of us and hoping we might be able to go, and that, if they found women would be allowed, they themselves would be very glad to have us under their charge, and would manage to get us there. We mustn’t call it “our luck.” It is something far better, and I for one shall be truly grateful to God–and the Commission. Mr. Knapp asks as a special favor that we will keep him informed of our movements.

Abby Howland Woolsey to Mother.

New York, April 26th.

My Dear Mother: We are all bright and well this fine morning. Jane and Charley have gone to the Philharmonic rehearsal and Carry is practicing some of her old music on the piano, in a way to make you, who love to hear it, happy. Mr. Prentiss came in last night to see us, looking well, but queer, as he always does in a black stock. He had been hard at work moving his books, and did not intend to go to prayer meeting, and evidently didn’t suppose we had gone, or he wouldn’t have come to spend the evening with us. He told us much that was pleasant and funny about his visit in Washington, which, short as it was, paid him well, he thought, for going. . . . He hopes E. and G. will get their wishes and go to Fort Monroe, as they are in a state of mind to be fretted and troubled if they don’t. . . .

Very few of the wounded brought by the Cossack from Newbern were landed here. . . . All were crazy to get home, all full of spirits and fun. The five or six who were carried to the N. E. Relief only fretted at having to spend a night longer on the road. The man with both legs gone smoked his pipe and read his newspaper. His chief anxiety was to go into New Jersey by a certain train. . . . Five or six ladies were at the rooms, Jane among them, yesterday, a lady apiece and several men to each volunteer. . . . No wonder it dazed an Irishman just released from four months imprisonment in Richmond. “Begor,” he said, “I can’t pay for all this!” . . . Jane says there is nothing much for the present set of ladies to do, except to rearrange the piles of shirts, etc., on the closet shelves–changing them about from the way she had fixed them! They immediately proceeded to that work, and each new set of ladies will have that, at least, to occupy them. As for the Park Barracks, a portion of them have been scrubbed and whitewashed, the bunks taken down, neat iron beds all made and put up. Mrs. Mack is to live there as Matron, and, for the purpose of a mere halting place and infirmary, it is as good an one as they could have, though too many ladies were on hand, switching things over with their hoops, giving unlimited oranges to men with the dysentery, and making the surgeons mad. There were, beside, half the medical students in the city, all staring and eager for jobs;–no difficulty in the men’s having all, and more than all, the attention they want. One good thing Mrs. Woodruff did, at Mrs. Buck’s suggestion,–sent over to the Astor House for a steward, and through him ordered a good dinner brought in of tender beef, fresh eggs, etc., for the twenty or thirty New York and New Jersey men who were resting there. It will be charged to New York State, which supports the Barracks. . . . We have Lloyd’s map of Virginia hung under the front parlor picture of the Virgin, along the back of the sofa, and we sit there and read the papers and study it.

26th.–News reaches us to-night of a pretty severe skirmish two or three miles off, in which it is said about fifty of the enemy were killed. I have very little confidence in these “it is saids.” We lost four men killed. I went to Ship Point to-day, and made the acquaintance of Doctor McClellan, (brother to General,) and Surgeon General Smith, of Pennsylvania–both agreeable men. Our army have done a wonderful work here, in the last few days. They have built a “corduroy road” all the way to Ship Point, eight miles, through a most dismal swamp. Over this road we are now transporting all our supplies and munitions (having got possession of York River, up to the neighborhood of Yorktown.)

APRIL 25th.—Gen. Wise, through the influence of Gen. Lee, who is a Christian gentleman as well as a consummate general, has been ordered into the field. He will have a brigade, but not with Beauregard. The President has unbounded confidence in Lee’s capacity, modest as he is.

Another change! Provost Marshal Godwin, for rebuking the Baltimore chief of police, is to leave us, and to be succeeded by a Marylander, Major Griswold, whose family is now in the enemy’s country.