Candle in the Darkness (32 page)

“No, Missy Caroline,” he said gently. “You coming with me. That poor boy gonna die, and Massa Jesus wants you and me to be with him.”

Eventually, the deluge of wounded soldiers receded, the makeshift beds in our drawing room emptied. The nursing shortage in Richmond’s hospitals eased when women arrived from all over the South to nurse their wounded husbands, sweethearts, and sons. Tessie and I read in the news that the Confederate Congress had given credit to “The Most High God, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, for the triumph at Manassas.” Congress was convinced that the Union would never continue the war after this stunning defeat.

But the war did continue, slowly spreading to other parts of the country. We read of another Confederate victory at Wilson’s Creek in Missouri and then a victory at Ball’s Bluff, here in Virginia. More captured Yankee prisoners arrived in Richmond, adding to the hundreds that had been captured at Manassas. No one knew what to do with them all. Some of the vacant tobacco warehouses on the waterfront near Daddy’s warehouses had been converted into prisons, but when they quickly overflowed, the prisoners were confined on Belle Isle in the middle of the James River. From Mother’s grave site in Hollywood Cemetery, I could see row upon row of tents and makeshift shacks dotting the six-acre island and thousands of wretched, blue-uniformed men milling around.

In August, Union forces captured Fort Hatteras in North Carolina. This meant that our blockade-runners could no longer use this important route, cutting off the flow of much-needed supplies. I didn’t worry as much about the rising prices or the empty store shelves as I did about Daddy. His work had become even more dangerous now. And we hadn’t heard from him since he’d left home in July.

“Your father has an important job to do overseas,” Mr. St. John assured me as we walked home from St. Paul’s one beautiful fall day. We had been walking a lot more since the war began, but Richmond enjoyed a long spell of beautiful Indian summer weather that year, making our walks pleasant. “It’s more than just English rifles he’s after,” Mr. St. John continued. “England and France depend on the South for their supplies of cotton and tobacco. If we can convince those nations to back our cause and join the war on our behalf, the North will have to concede defeat.”

“You think my father is part of this effort?”

“President Davis is preparing to send diplomats to Europe to negotiate an alliance. But he needs men like your father to keep the trade ships running in the meantime. He’s doing a very important job.”

In November, the Union Navy intercepted the British mail steamer
Trent
on the high seas and captured the two Confederate diplomats, James Mason and John Slidell, en route to Great Britain for President Davis. The British were so outraged by this assault on one of their ships that it seemed as though the
Trent
affair might finally persuade Great Britain to support the South. But President Lincoln recognized the danger of such an alliance and ordered the two diplomats to be released with an apology to England. The Rebels’ hopes were disappointed once more. The war continued. Gilbert returned home again, his digging finished for the winter, and we welcomed him as a hero. But I still heard no word from Daddy.

When wintry weather finally arrived, bringing bone-chilling rain and frigid blankets of snow, the women in Mrs. St. John’s sewing society turned to knitting. I had never knitted in my life, but I learned how to that winter; the need for warm hats, gloves, scarves, and socks for our soldiers was critical. As we crowded around the fireplace in the St. Johns’ smaller parlor, I pictured Charles and Jonathan huddling inside their leaking tents, shivering beneath thin blankets. Hospitals began filling with soldiers again— not casualties of battle but victims of diseases such as pneumonia, typhoid, and dysentery, which spread through the army camps like biblical plagues.

Two years ago, Jonathan and I had celebrated Christmas together at Sally’s party. Last Christmas, Charles and I had celebrated our engagement. This Christmas, Esther sent our turkey and all the trimmings to Jonathan, Charles, and the other “Richmond Blues,” dug in for the winter in northern Virginia. I tried to put on a brave face in public as my clumsy fingers gripped the slender knitting needles and wrestled to master the basics of knitting and purling. I managed to turn skeins of yarn into oddly misshapen socks and mittens, but only Tessie knew how many tears I silently shed in my room.

Chapter Fifteen

March 1862

A gust of wind rattled the shutters outside my bedroom window one cold morning in March, then whistled down the chimney. But it was the words that Tessie had just read from the book of Philippians that made me pause in my knitting to look up at her, not the blustery wind. “Wait . . . read that again, Tessie.”

“ ‘Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus,’ ” she read. “ ‘Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant. . . .’ ”

“A servant,” I repeated. “That’s what Eli was trying to tell me last summer when we nursed all those wounded soldiers. God wants us to be His servants.”

Tessie shook her head as if she couldn’t believe the words either. “Eli always telling us colored folk that Massa Jesus understand us, that He a servant, too. But I ain’t believing it until I read this.”

“You and the others have an advantage over me in this area,” I said, returning to my knitting. “You already know how to be good servants, how to obey your master. No wonder Eli understands Jesus so much better than I do.”

Tessie turned back to the Bible and read, “ ‘He humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. . . .’ ” I stopped her again so I could ponder that thought.
Would I be willing to obey God, even in the face of death?

My thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the sound of footsteps pounding up the stairs and Gilbert shouting, “Missy Caroline! Missy Caroline! Come quick! Come see who’s here!”

When I opened my bedroom door, I couldn’t believe the look of joy on Gilbert’s face. “Come see!” he repeated, and he bounded down the stairs again, ahead of me. When I reached the landing, I saw the front door flung wide open and my father standing in the foyer with his satchel at his feet. I ran downstairs to embrace him.

“Daddy! I can’t believe you’re finally home!”

“I can hardly believe it myself, Sugar. I had quite a time getting here, let me tell you.”

“Thank God you’re safe.”

When Daddy finally released me, Gilbert was still grinning. As he took Daddy’s hat and overcoat from him, the other servants began gathering shyly in the foyer to have a look at Daddy, as if they’d forgotten what he looked like.

“Welcome home, Massa Fletcher,” Tessie said softly, and Daddy smiled.

“Here you are home again,” Esther moaned, “and ain’t a bite of meat to eat in this whole house. I’m sorry, Massa Fletcher, but we ain’t had nothing but fish for days and days. Beef you buy in the market cost a fortune, and even then it’s about as tender as Eli’s old shoe.”

Daddy chuckled. “Fish will be just fine, Esther. In fact, Eli’s shoes would probably taste fine, too, if you cooked them. Ah, it’s good to be home!”

The servants went all out for Daddy, setting the dining room table for lunch, even though it was just the two of us, and uncorking a bottle of wine from the cellar. “Ain’t too many bottles left,” Gilbert explained, “since all them wounded soldiers Missy took in needed it so bad. But this here is a celebration.”

Esther set a bowl of potatoes in front of Daddy. “We eating a lot of potatoes, these days. Ain’t no butter to put on them neither, so I had to fix them with vinegar and bacon.”

“They smell wonderful,” he said.

“Don’t your daddy look good?” Tessie whispered as she set the platter of fish in front of me. “Don’t he, though? All that ocean sailing and salty air must agree with him.”

Eli came to stand in the dining room doorway, hat in hand, to welcome Daddy home and to explain to him why his stables housed only one little mare. “You made a good choice,” Daddy told him. “I would have done the same thing if I had been home.”

When we all finished telling Daddy our stories and explaining what had gone on in his absence, he leaned back in his chair and said, “You’ve had quite a time of it here while I was gone, haven’t you? But you’ve all done very well. My thanks to you.”

“I’m so glad you’re home,” I said. “Now you can make the hard decisions from now on.”

He reached for my hand, frowning. “Caroline, I can’t stay. I’m leaving again in a few days.” I stared at him, unable to speak. “I came back to apply for a government commission as a privateer.”

“Daddy! That’s the same thing as being a pirate.”

He laughed. “I suppose Mr. Lincoln and his friends might see it that way, but I consider myself part of the Confederate Navy. Our privateers have already made a big impact on the war effort, raiding Northern ships. And, of course, any goods my ships manage to seize will help the South, too.”

What my father planned was much worse than running the blockade. Attacking Union merchant ships on the high seas was considered piracy, and captured privateers faced execution. “Please don’t do this,” I begged. “It’s too dangerous. If you’re caught they’ll kill you.”

“Then I guess I’d better not get caught.” He smiled, trying to make light of it, but when he saw my expression he sobered. “Caroline, don’t make me feel any worse than I already do for leaving you. I would gladly heed your wishes if this were peacetime. But we’re at war, and every man—every woman, for that matter—has to do what he feels called upon to do. For Charles and Jonathan, that meant going off to fight. For me . . . this is something I really feel I have to do.”

I nodded and pretended to understand. Charles, Jonathan, and now Daddy were all willing to risk death for the Southern cause— but I still didn’t see how it was worth dying for.

“Besides,” Daddy continued, “President Davis had a showdown with Lincoln last November over his treatment of captured privateers. Davis threatened to execute a captured Federal officer for every privateer Lincoln executed. Lincoln finally backed down. Privateers are treated like any other prisoners of war now.”

“That’s a very small comfort, Daddy.”

“I know. But you can be proud that your father is about to become part of the Confederate Navy, Sugar. Did you read in the papers how we took on the Union fleet last week—and won?”

I had read about it, but Daddy was so excited about our victory at Hampton Roads that I let him retell the story of how the Confederate ironclad
Virginia
sank the Union’s most powerful warship, the
Cumberland,
then set the
Congress
on fire and drove the
Minnesota
aground. When the Union ironclad
Monitor
arrived the next day, the
Virginia
battled her for four and a half hours before the duel ended in a draw.

“Our sewing society has been making sandbags all week,” I said. “We’re sending them to General Magruder to fortify Yorktown against the Federal fleet.”

Daddy raised his fist and cheered. “Bravo! And bravo for Magruder. He has the Feds fooled into thinking he has a lot more men at Yorktown than he actually does. If the enemy fleet knew we only have about eight thousand men there, they would have sent landing parties and taken the city a long time ago.”

I thought about his words as Esther brought in a pecan pie for dessert—Daddy’s favorite. If the enemy knew how weak we were, maybe they could attack quickly and end the war before there was any more bloodshed. More than anything else, I wanted the war to end before the men I loved had to die.

“Now, this ain’t gonna taste near as good as usual, Massa Fletcher,” Esther warned as she set the pie in front of Daddy. “Seeing as I had to make it without real sugar. Ain’t no sugar anywhere in Richmond, just sorghum.”

“When I come back, Esther, I promise I’ll bring you a whole boatload of sugar.”

“You going away again, Massa Fletcher?”

“Yes, I can only stay for a couple of days.”

“Well, you make sure you bring yourself back safe, you hear? And don’t be worrying about bringing me no sugar.”

Daddy waited until Esther left the dining room again before turning to me, his expression serious. “The Federals are coming, Caroline, make no mistake about it. McClellan’s army is going to come after Richmond. The northern approach didn’t work for McDowell last summer, so they’re going to try moving up the Peninsula this time, between the James and York Rivers. Word has it that more than one hundred thousand soldiers are on their way to Fortress Monroe by ship—the largest army ever assembled on American shores.”

My stomach rolled over at the thought of such a huge army. “How many men do we have?”

“Not nearly that many. But Joe Johnston’s troops are going to be heading down to the Peninsula pretty soon to help Magruder.”

“That means . . . Charles and Jonathan?”

“Right. Our troops held their own against the Feds at Manassas last year, and they’ll do it again if they have to. You’ll be safe here in Richmond, I promise.” I would think about his promise many times in the months ahead.