Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule (28 page)

That night the Confederate fleet again came down the James and mounted another attack, but before the sun rose, they were forced to retreat after meeting with disastrous fire from the
Onondaga
and Union batteries on the riverbanks.

In the morning, the crisis over, Julia woke to the sound of voices outside the cabin window. She peered outside and discovered Ulys sitting at the campfire with Lieutenant Colonel Porter, smoking and drinking coffee.

“If I may say so, sir,” Porter said, “the excitement of the past few days has had everyone in a stir, and yet from the moment the attack began, Mrs. Grant was one of the most composed people in the room.”

“Don’t let her sweet kindness and gentle nature deceive you,” Ulys warned, smiling. “Mrs. Grant witnessed the running of the blockade at Vicksburg. She narrowly escaped capture at Holly Springs. She’s not one to be rattled by the threat of a few gunboats on the James.”

“She seems the ideal general’s wife, sir.”

Ulys inclined his head to acknowledge the compliment. “She’s always been the ideal wife for me regardless of my rank, and when I had no rank at all.”

Tears sprang into Julia’s eyes. The quiet, matter-of-fact praise from her darling husband meant more to her than had President Lincoln himself awarded her a medal for gallantry in the field.

J
ANUARY
–F
EBRUARY
1865

I
n the middle of January, the Union navy captured Fort Fisher, closing the port of Wilmington in North Carolina and severing supply lines to the Confederacy from abroad. As Washington City rejoiced, Jule’s thankfulness that the end of the war seemed imminent was tempered by worrisome rumors circulating among the worshipers at Union Bethel Church, concerns that the residents of her boardinghouse shared. After the war was won, what was to become of their enslaved brothers and sisters in states that had remained loyal to the Union?

Jule grew apprehensive anew whenever conversation turned to the Emancipation Proclamation. She had never fully trusted it, that piece of paper that had freed slaves in rebellious states where no one obeyed President Lincoln’s laws anyway and kept them enslaved in places where he had the power to declare them free. How could she have any faith in the proclamation when she still stung from anger when she recalled Julia’s halfhearted explanations about exemptions and geography? For months Jule had assumed that the end of the war would bring freedom to all, but increasingly, that once bright future seemed to have been built on unsteady ground.

When General Grant defeated General Lee and the rebellious states returned to the Union, would the Emancipation Proclamation be abandoned as a war measure no longer necessary in peacetime? Would Jule remain a fugitive, subject to return to Missouri and the old master? Would Annie and Dinah and Polly and Tom and the others remain the Dent family’s slaves? What would be the fate of any children born to them and their enslaved brethren in the years to come?

Would Gabriel be considered legally free in a defeated, once rebellious Texas, but remain forever beyond her reach?

The previous spring, Jule recalled, Washington’s colored neighborhoods had hummed with excitement as a new amendment to the Constitution eradicating slavery throughout the nation once and for all had passed the Senate—only to have their rising hopes dashed when the measure failed to pass the House. At the time, Jule had been too preoccupied with finding her own way to dwell upon the crushing defeat, but her interest was rekindled when her minister announced in his sermon one Sunday that President Lincoln had urged Congress to reconsider the amendment. Then, scarcely a week into the new year, a Congressman from Ohio reintroduced the measure in the House.

“The vote will be close, if it comes to a vote at all,” warned Joshua, one of Jule’s boardinghouse neighbors. He overheard scraps of many significant conversations in his job as a bellboy at the Willard, and he knew who was holding clandestine meetings with whom.

“I’m tired of waiting for other folks to do what’s right,” Jule fretted to Emma one afternoon as they braved a snow shower to go marketing, arms linked, heavy shawls drawn tightly around their heads, sturdy baskets dangling from their elbows.

“Give it time,” Emma urged, tirelessly optimistic. “Justice moves slowly, but it moves ever forward.”

Jule understood why Emma trusted the laws and the courts that had eventually freed her and her mother, but she did not share her friend’s faith. Even sunny Emma admitted that time was of the essence. The Thirteenth Amendment had to pass before the war was won if it was to pass at all.

On the last day of January, Jule and Emma walked to Capitol Hill, where they hoped to observe the debate from the House gallery. Hundreds of others had preceded them, and when they tried to gain entrance they were told that every inch of space in the galleries and on the floor had been claimed. Joining the ordinary citizens who had squeezed their way inside were the justices of the Supreme Court, several members of the president’s cabinet, dozens of senators, and many foreign ministers. There was not room enough for Jule and Emma and hundreds of others who crowded around the entrances, speaking in small groups in hushed, urgent voices, listening intently for sounds of cheers or derision from within, eagerly awaiting messengers who came running now and then with news of the debate’s progress.

They waited, and talked, and prayed. Everyone knew the narrowest of margins separated success from defeat. The vote would fall sharply along party lines, and five Democrats would have to join the Republicans in support of the measure if it was to prevail. When a messenger announced that a few Democrats had taken the floor to justify why they intended to break with their party to support the amendment, cheers went up from one portion of the crowd, contemptuous shouts from another.

“The tally sheets are being handed around,” someone shouted from a high window. Emma seized Jule’s arm, and they clung to each other, hearts pounding, trembling, too anxious to speak. The crowd fell into a breathless hush as the minutes stretched on, the tense stillness broken only by occasional fragments of news passed on from within the chamber.

And then, at last, came a distant roar, the thunder of many voices shouting out in righteous triumph. Emma gasped and clutched Jule’s arm tighter; Jule closed her eyes, bowed her head, and murmured a prayer.

“It’s passed,” a voice rang out from the top of the stairs. Trembling with joy and disbelief, Jule raised her head and glimpsed a young, fair-haired man in a stovepipe hat amid the milling throng, smiling though tears streamed down his face, reading aloud from a piece of paper held open between his two hands. “On the passage of the Joint Resolution to amend the Constitution of the United States the ayes have one hundred nineteen, the nays fifty-six. The constitutional majority of two thirds having voted in the affirmative, the Joint Resolution has passed!”

Jule and Emma cried out in jubilation and fell into each other’s arms, laughing, weeping, praising the Lord. Shouts of exultation rose from the crowd; hundreds of hats flew into the air. A man began to sing “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” in a rich baritone, and just as Jule and Emma chimed in, Capitol Hill shook as a round of artillery signaled the wondrous news to all of Washington.

“It ain’t over,” Jule heard one sour-faced white man declare as he stalked away from the celebration. “This cursed amendment still has to be ratified, and God willing, it won’t be.”

Jeers followed in his wake, but Jule quickly observed that others in the crowd seemed to share his outrage. “What does that mean?” she asked, her mouth close to Emma’s ear so she might be heard over the din. “What’s that word, ‘ratified’?”

“Now it goes to the states,” Emma replied, tears of joy glistening on her cheeks. “Each will hold its own vote, and three-quarters must approve the amendment before it becomes the law of the land.”

Jule stared at her, aghast. “So there’s still a chance it might fail after all?”

“There’s not even the whisper of a chance of it,” declared Emma, her elation undiminished. “The states will approve it. They will. They must!”

Emma’s certainty was so compelling that Jule felt her spirits rising again until they soared. Even so, she knew it would be many months before freedom reached her enslaved friends in Missouri—and only a victorious end to the war would deliver Gabriel.

•   •   •

Rumors of a peace conference had circulated for months, but Julia did not believe them until the last day of January, when delegates from the Confederate states presented themselves at the Union lines around Petersburg and were immediately conducted to City Point and placed under Ulys’s authority.

The commissioners—Alexander Stephens, the vice president of the Confederacy; Judge John Archibald Campbell, assistant secretary of war; and Robert M. T. Hunter, a former United State senator from Virginia and president pro tempore of the Confederate Senate—arrived at Ulys’s headquarters at dusk, so he ordered them escorted to quarters aboard the
Mary Martin,
the steamer Julia herself often used to travel to and from City Point, the one most comfortably fitted up for passengers.

After the commissioners were settled, Ulys telegraphed Washington to inform President Lincoln and Secretary Stanton of their arrival. Ulys had returned to the cabin by the time they telegraphed a reply, which a messenger immediately brought to him. “I’m instructed to detain them here,” Ulys said, letting the paper fall upon his desk, “until the president’s designee should come to meet these representatives of the so-called Confederate government.”

“So-called?” Julia echoed.

“My words, not the president’s or Stanton’s,” Ulys acknowledged. “I’ll never admit that they represent a legitimate government. Too much blood and treasure have been needlessly wasted to concede anything of the kind.”

After that stern judgment, Julia expected Ulys to detain the men as prisoners rather than guests, but instead Ulys directed the captain of the
Mary Martin
to extend every courtesy to the commissioners and make them as comfortable as possible. He set no guard over them, placed no restrictions upon their movements, and required no pledge that they would not abuse these privileges. Since the commissioners were allowed to leave the boat whenever they pleased, they did so often, strolling along the bank, observing the soldiers drill, and, as a gesture of respect, calling on Ulys at the cabin.

Ulys was out the first time they called. Julia had never met any of the commissioners and knew little about them except Mr. Stephens, who had been a good friend of Mr. Lincoln’s when both had served in the House of Representatives. She had heard that Mr. Stephens was a small gentleman in his early sixties, so when the trio arrived, she was surprised to be introduced to a man of rather ample girth. He wore a coarse overcoat of thick gray wool, a heavy weave that had been adopted in the South after the blockade forced masters and servants alike to resort to homespun. When she invited the gentlemen inside and Mr. Stephens removed his coat, she was surprised anew, for all of his apparent bulk had been in his garment, and he turned out to be the slight, wizened fellow she had expected.

Julia invited the gentlemen to sit by the fire while she served coffee and fresh bread with preserves, the only suitable refreshments she had on hand. The men’s great appreciation for the coffee was apparent. She wondered how long it had been since they had enjoyed real coffee, not some weak, unpalatable brew of roasted rice, peas, and chicory.

“General Grant hopes that you will be comfortable aboard the
Mary Martin,
” Julia told them. “You may rest assured that he has personally guaranteed your safety while you’re in camp.”

The other men nodded politely, but Mr. Hunter frowned. “What is General Grant’s opinion of the prospects of the peace conference?” he asked. “Does he believe peace can be achieved through negotiation? Does he know what Lincoln will demand in exchange for peace?”

“I don’t suppose anyone but President Lincoln knows that for certain,” said Julia, unable to resist emphasizing Mr. Lincoln’s title. “President Lincoln is a good, just, and wise gentleman, and I must assume that any decisions he would make on any serious matter relating to the war would reflect that.”

When Mr. Hunter’s frown deepened, Julia decided to steer the conversation elsewhere. “Did you know,” she said lightly, “that although you are the first three Confederate commissioners that I have met, you are not the first that I have known?”

Mr. Hunter and Judge Campbell exchanged bewildered looks, but Mr. Stephens smiled as one did when entertained with a riddle. “My dear lady, how can you know a commissioner whom you have not met?”

“Because I know him only through the post and we have never been properly introduced,” said Julia. “For many months I have been corresponding with the commissioner for the exchange of prisoners at Columbia, South Carolina, where my brother John has been held for almost a year.”

Judge Campbell’s brows drew together in sympathetic bewilderment. “Was General Grant unable to arrange for him to be exchanged?”

“Of course not,” said Julia. “My brother isn’t a soldier. He is, however, as ardent a rebel as there ever has been. We had many an argument on the subject before the war.”

“If he isn’t a soldier,” asked Mr. Stephens, prepared to take on another riddle, “how did he come to be in prison?”

“He was visiting a friend in Louisiana when he was captured,” said Julia. “When it was discovered that he is the brother-in-law of General Grant, he was taken for a spy, despite his many proclamations to the contrary.”

She waited, but while they expressed sympathy, not one of the gentlemen offered to intercede on her brother’s behalf—and so she smiled, poured more coffee, and did not offer to intercede on their behalf to Ulys.

Mr. Lincoln had sent envoys, including Secretary of State William Seward, to meet the commissioners at Hampton Roads in Virginia. On the second day of February, he telegraphed Ulys, “Say to the gentlemen I will meet them personally at Fortress-Monroe, as soon as I can get there.”

The president himself was coming to the conference. Mr. Hunter could not ask for more evidence of Mr. Lincoln’s tremendous desire for peace than that.

Late in the afternoon a few days thereafter, Julia was in the cabin straining her eyes and sewing buttons on Ulys’s dress uniform when a knock sounded on the door. She rose to answer and discovered President Lincoln standing before her, tall and gaunt in a dark suit and stovepipe hat. “Mr. President,” she said warmly, despite her astonishment. “What an honor this is! Do come in.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Grant.” He removed his hat but still had to bend sharply to pass through the doorway. He glanced around their little home, and when a small, cryptic smile appeared on his weary face, Julia remembered that he, too, had once lived in a cabin. “I’d like to speak to General Grant, if he has time.”

“He would always have time for you, Mr. President,” she said. “He’s at his office at present.”

“I thought this was his office.”

“He works here occasionally, but only because he is always working and is sometimes here.”

Mr. Lincoln chuckled. “I understand completely. I believe I can find someone to direct me. Thank you, Mrs. Grant.”

“Mr. President,” Julia quickly said as he turned to go, “I assume you come directly from the conference. Have you reached any agreements in the interests of peace?”