Part 1

Transcriber’s Note

Italic text has been surrounded by _underscores_. Some corrections have been made to the original text. They are listed in a second transcriber’s note at the end of the book.

RECOLLECTIONS

OF

THE CIVIL WAR

FROM A CHILD’S POINT OF VIEW

PRICE 50 CENTS

RECOLLECTIONS

OF

THE CIVIL WAR

BY

MAUD E. MORROW

LOCKLAND, OHIO JOHN C. MORROW 1901

_To The 43d O. V. I. and to all who were engaged in the battle of Corinth, and to every boy who wore the blue, these pages are respectfully and patriotically dedicated by the Author._

PREFACE OR APOLOGY

When one writes a book, a preface is in order. Mine shall be by way of explanation. The only apology I have to offer for writing this little personal pronoun “I” story is the very simple one that it is true. It has been said that “we never talk so well as when talking of ourselves.” Be that as it may, in telling my own story, I can tell it only in the first person. It is a story that is very dear to me, probably much more so than it will ever be to any one else. In writing it I have lived it all over, and it has been so real to me that I have seemed to be again within hospital walls, peopled by those whom I have called up from the shadows of the past. In fancy, my mother, whose name is interwoven as a golden thread throughout the fabric of the story, has been with me, and I have almost felt the “touch of a vanished hand” and heard the “sound of a voice that is still.” Page after page has been written beneath her picture on the wall, and as I have lifted my tear-blinded eyes with yearning gaze to her sweet face, the brown eyes have looked lovingly down upon me as though smiling approval upon my work. Oh, that I had undertaken it while she was yet with me!

It may be questioned that I have written from memory—or it may be a matter of surprise that I have remembered so well. While my mother lived this period in our lives was often talked of and its memory kept green. My father, being ill in the second story of the hospital, knew little or nothing of the experiences I underwent at Corinth, but was more familiar with what took place at Jackson. Five or six letters written by my mother to friends in the North have been carefully preserved. They were mostly hurriedly written and contain only brief allusions to our doings, but from them I have gathered dates and hours of arrival and departure, and by them my memory has been refreshed on several points. But for the most part I have been entirely dependent upon my own memory. I have written only of scenes and events that I remember best. Many of them are as clear to me as the happenings of yesterday, while some half-faded memories have struggled vainly for utterence and have necessarily been forever consigned to oblivion. There is a possibility that I may be mistaken in a few of my statements, but it must be remembered that it is a long and dusty bridge over which I have traveled to reach and gather them up.

As this is not a story of fiction, I have given the names of all that I remember who were in any way connected with it, in the hope that there are yet some of the number living who will read my little narrative and recognize their own part in it. Should such be the case, my joy at hearing from any or all of them could not be expressed. I have written, that there might be a record of the facts, that my sister and brothers might become familiar with them, and because I love to dwell upon the incidents of my “army life,” as I sometimes term it. Lastly, I have written that it might be as a memorial to my brave, courageous mother, who, with her own hands, ministered so tenderly to the sick and wounded with whom she was brought in close contact. Whether this ever reaches the public eye is a question. Should it be so fortunate, I ask the public to read with kindly criticism, remembering that it is the story of the child told in the language of the adult.

INTRODUCTORY

1862-1899. The line between the dates represents a bridge as it were of thirty-seven planks, and each plank a year. It takes but a single stroke of the pen to make the little bridge of ink representing the years; but can I measure the smiles and tears, the joys and sorrows, that are crowded into each year? Can I retrace my steps, passing on the way the graves that have opened and closed on some of earth’s best and dearest treasures, and gather from the past a few memories that the corroding cares of life and the ever onward-rushing “flood of years” have not wholly obliterated from my mind? I can but try, and in so doing I feel constrained to cry out,

“Backward, turn backward, O, time in your flight, Make me a child again just for tonight.”

But alas! this and my hungry heart-cry of

“Mother, come back from that echoless shore,”

are alike vainly uttered. Having long had this in mind, I now for the first time give to the world a simple little story of the early part of my life. It is a story of the war without much war in it. My first recollections of the Civil War (which I always thought very uncivil) are of the days of ’61, after Sumter had been fired upon, when each night one of the neighbors would come into our home, and she and my parents would discuss the prospects of war, which at first though a cloud no bigger than a man’s hand, was even then lowering darkly upon us. We didn’t get the newspapers daily then as we do now, but whenever one could be obtained, my mother would read the news aloud, while I lay in my trundle bed, listening and cowering with fear. Who shall say that children do not enter into the spirit of current events? I had all a child’s fear of war, and that fear hung over me, for a time, as a dark cloud, for I thought the battles would be fought at our very doors.

THE JOURNEY

IN September, 1862, my father, Dr. Coridon Morrow, offered his services to his country, and was appointed Assistant Surgeon of the 43d O. V. I. His first work was at the battle of Corinth, Miss., which occurred on the 4th and 5th of October. Soon after the battle, owing to bad water and change of climate, he was taken dangerously ill, and wrote my mother an almost illegible scrawl, begging her to come to him at once. We had broken up housekeeping at our home in the village of Bainbridge, Ohio, and gone to Aberdeen, on the Ohio river, to spend the winter with relatives.

It was almost an accident that I was taken on this never-forgotten journey. There were four children of us; two were taken and two were left. I was at this time but little more than eight years old, my baby sister, blue-eyed Mary, but five months. At first thought, it seemed that my mother could take but one, the baby, but here I made the plea of my life to be allowed to go, promising to be good and to help after we should get there. There was little time for parley, and the question was soon settled in my favor. We started on Friday, October 31st, leaving the little brother and sister to the care of kind friends in the little brown cottage, on the banks of La Belle Ohio. The river being at a low stage, no boats were running, and we were compelled to go by stage-coach to Georgetown, where we took supper and remained till 3 o’clock the next morning, when we were hurriedly aroused from our slumbers, and without waiting for breakfast, we took another stage-coach which conveyed us to Bethel. After a hurried breakfast there, we took passage in a four-horse omnibus which bore us to Cincinnati. I remember many of the incidents of this ride: how we stopped to take in passengers, some of whom were women going into the city with their Saturday marketing; and I can yet recall the appearance of the stout old gentleman who, with cane in hand, occupied the seat opposite me.

Arrived at Cincinnati, my first impression of that great city was that we would be run over and crushed by some of the numerous vehicles which were constantly crossing and recrossing the crowded streets, and through which we slowly threaded our way to the Henrie House. At this hotel I had my first experience with waiters. Soup was served as the first course at dinner, and while looking leisurely about me, a waiter came along and removed my plate of soup, which I had barely tasted. I do not remember what followed, as I had lost all interest in the dinner, and I have never yet become reconciled to the loss of that plate of soup.

We could not get a train out of the city until 5 o’clock in the evening. There were a number of guests in the parlor of the hotel, among them a sweet-faced lady who sought to entertain and amuse me. There was also a young man in the custody of officers of the law, though for what offense I am unable to say. His mother, a sad looking little woman, was there to bid him goodby. He played on the piano and sang beautiful songs for the entertainment of those in the room. “All things come to him that waits,” and as we waited, this long afternoon came to an end. We were taken to the depot in a cab, and this little ride cost my mother one dollar. We traveled all night, reaching Odin, Ill., about daylight, where we remained until Monday evening, waiting for a train over the Illinois Central railroad.

Odin at that time comprised the hotel, postoffice and depot. There was a long board walk leading from the hotel to the depot, which I traversed many times during our enforced stay, scraping acquaintance with the telegraph operator, giving him my history, past, present and future so far as I knew it. The country here was one vast expanse of prairie land, and the wind raged ceaselessly. Many long trains passed over the road on Sunday, bearing troops to the South. I stood on the little upper porch of the hotel, counting the cars and watching the trains until they passed beyond my vision. At this distant day I remember the appearance of the room we occupied, even to the position of the bed and stove, and in my mind’s eye I can see my baby sister lying asleep on the bed, and my mother sitting in a rocking chair near the center of the room, engaged in conversation with a lady from Mound City, Mo., who, like ourselves, was waiting for a train.

An amusing incident comes to my mind as I speak of this lady. She was a later arrival than ourselves, and had not yet heard the gong. As it sounded the call to supper, she threw up her hands in alarm, exclaiming, “Mercy on us, what is that!” My mother told her what it meant, when with a sigh of relief, she said, “Why, it’s enough to raise the dead.”

On Monday evening, November 3, after we had partaken of supper by lamplight, the long waited for train arrived, which we hailed with joy after our long, and to my mother, wearisome, delay. Soon after stepping aboard I fell asleep, and knew no more until 4 o’clock in the morning. Having reached Cairo, Ill., at the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, we left the train, and in the semi-darkness of the early morning, we were hurried down the bank and on board the steamer City of Alton, a magnificent floating palace of the Mississippi, which conveyed us to Columbus, Ky., a distance of twenty miles. We were landed at the foot of a long line of steep bluffs.

Here occurs the first break in my memory of this journey. I only know that it was completed by rail, and that we traversed the entire length of the State of Tennessee, from north to south, and that I was a very tired little girl when we arrived at Corinth, at 8 o’clock on the night of November 4th. We were met at the depot by an ambulance, and driven to the Corona College Hospital, a mile distant from the town.

As we neared the building and surrounding battle-field, a horrible odor, as of burning flesh, greeted our nostrils, which the driver informed us was caused by the burning of horses and mules killed in the late battle.

In the latter part of our journey we had fallen in with a Mrs. Dr. Blaker, whose destination was the same as our own, and who had come to minister to a sick or wounded husband. We entered the hospital together, and were first shown into the Medical Director’s room, where the records were examined. It took but a few moments for Mrs. Blaker to learn that her husband was dead and buried. I can hear her wails of distress yet. We were more fortunate, and were soon ushered into the room occupied by my father and several other sick officers. The hospital was crowded, and there was no extra room for us. Another cot was brought in, an army blanket hung as a screen, and thus we spent our first night in a southern hospital.

CORONA COLLEGE HOSPITAL

IT stood in the midst of the historic battle-field and surrounding encampment. Prior to the war, it was known as The Corona Female College. It was a large, three-story structure of brick, with portico in front supported by massive pillars, and never was hospital more conveniently located with reference to battle-field. To me it was the Castle Beautiful, and even now, as I attempt to write of it, the memories of that time come thronging and surging through my brain, with such forceful rapidity, each clamoring for utterance, that I scarce know how to take up the tangled threads of warp and woof, and weave them into a smooth and readable story. The building was also known by the names of General Hospital and Seminary Hospital.

With the happy freedom of childhood I roamed about at my own sweet will, and I have given the “cup of cold water” to more than one poor sick or wounded soldier, as he lay on his bed of pain. There was one in particular, whose room was opposite our own: the door was mostly open, and he would frequently call to me to come and talk to him or hand him a drink of water. The first day we were in the building, I made the rounds of our ward on the second floor, with a lady nurse, Mrs. Penfield. I afterward called down her wrath upon my head by asking her if she had a field full of pens. One scene of that day’s visit arises vividly before me now, and I can draw a pen picture of the white-faced soldier I saw, propped up in bed with the nurse combing his hair, and bathing his face and hands.

I became familiar with scenes of sadness and suffering, with the sight of pale faces, crutches and armless sleeves, and, ever and anon a stiff form wrapped in a blanket would be carried to the dead house, thence to a soldier’s grave.

The hospital continued crowded, and we occupied the room with the officers several weeks. They were Captain Hensler, of Peoria. Ill.; Captain Armstrong, Lieut. Watt and several others whose names I can not recall. My mother cooked by a large, open fireplace, and shared all she had with these sick men. There was plenty of raw material, but it was so poorly prepared by the negroes about the place that the men could not eat it with any relish. A colored woman, who had been a slave, brought provisions to our room each morning, and her one theme was, “It’s mighty good.” Captain Hensler convalesced rapidly, and with tears in his eyes, he told my mother he owed it all to the nourishing food she prepared for him.

Lieut. Watt and I became great chums. While in this room I wrote a letter to my teacher at home, which he addressed for me, and upon learning that the teacher was a young lady, he laughingly asked me if I thought there would be any chance for him. This letter was read to the school, and for a few days I was quite famous in my native town.

My baby sister and I soon became great favorites in camp and hospital. On the night of our arrival the baby cried, and the word went around from room to room: “There’s a baby in the house. Where did it come from? Bring it in.” And in due time she was taken into the rooms where there were no contagious diseases. The men were much cheered by her presence, and one of the doctors said it was “quite a treat to hear a baby cry.” Dr. Robins, the surgeon in charge of our ward, would carry her about the room at each visit he made, sometimes taking her down stairs into the hall and out into the grounds about the building, I following wherever he went. The doctor called her his “little rosebud.” One day she scratched his face until the blood came, and he bore the marks several days. I can see him now, a slight, fair-haired young fellow, and, strange as it may seem, after the lapse of all these years, I can hear the very sound of his voice, as, upon entering the room, he would throw back his head and laughingly call out “Where is my Little Rosebud?” He told us of the friends he left at home, but alas! for them, he died the following summer of smallpox, in Memphis, Tennessee.

IN CAMP

OVER the roadway leading from hospital to camp, I have doubtless traveled many miles. The large space was thickly dotted with white tents, temporary homes of the brave defenders of our country. Here I became familiar with martial music. I returned with “taps” and arose with “revielle,” and to this day the sound of fife and drum stirs every drop of patriotic blood in my veins and takes me back to the days of camp life at Corinth.

“Whenever I hear the fife and the drum And the bugles wildly play, My heart is stirred like a frightened bird, And struggles to break away: For the tramp of the volunteers I hear And the Captain’s sharp command, Left! left! left! he is near, And drilling his eager band.”

Here we met brave, grand Mother Bickerdyke, who was such a tower of strength to her “boys,” and indeed, to all who came in touch with her. She had a large tent in the midst of the encampment, where she prepared nourishing food and dispensed hospital stores. When she learned our situation, that my mother prepared food with but a few poor cooking utensils, for ourselves, a nurse and the officers in our room, she immediately invited us to come to her tent for all the cooked food we needed. It fell upon me for the most part to carry it, not only for ourselves, but for some of the other inmates of the hospital. I made countless trips up and down the long, winding stairway, and many nights I could not sleep for tired and aching limbs, but I made no complaint. I was keeping my promise of being useful and was serving my country. My mother, however, saw that it was too much for me, and called a halt on it to some extent. We had a nurse, an artilleryman, whose name was Cole, but unlike “Old King Cole,” he was not a “jolly old soul.” He growled and grumbled constantly, and in these days we would call him a “kicker.” One day I started from the tent with more than I could carry, a glass of cherry preserves fell, the glass was broken and contents spilled. The next day, Cole was sent with me to assist in carrying our dinner. As we passed the cherries still lying in the dust, Cole growled out, “Just look at them good cherries; you ought to be made get down and lick ’em up.” I regretted the loss of the cherries as much as Cole, but I did not feel called upon to “get down and lick ’em up.” Cole meant well, however, and was a brave soldier, and if living I would like to know where he is today, for we took many walks together, from Mother B.’s tent up to the big brick house.

Mother B. had an assistant, whose name was Frank Williams, from St. Paul, Minn. He had been sick, and not being able for field service, was detailed for hospital duty. He and I were great friends, and he often came to our room and talked with my parents. He was a Christian, and sometimes had prayers in our room. One day I entered the tent, when to my dismay I found it full of men, and a prayer meeting in progress. I was about to beat a hasty retreat, when my friend Frank very kindly invited me to come in, found a seat for me, and put in my hands a little leaflet bearing upon its white surface the hymn beginning, “Just as I am, without one plea.” A chaplain conducted the services; my friend and some of the other soldiers offered prayer. I was the only child present. I have no recollection of any woman being there, although Mother B. or one of the lady nurses may have been. That prayer meeting was indelibly impressed upon my childish mind, and even now stands out clear cut and in bold relief, over every other prayer meeting I have ever attended. And, let me be where I may when “Just as I Am” is sung, the mingled joys and sorrows of the long years vanish as it were, and again I am a little child in that prayer tent on a Southern battle-field, and again I hear those bearded men singing as with one voice:

Just as I am: without one plea, But that Thy blood was shed for me And that thou bidds’t me come to Thee, Oh Lamb of God! I come, I come.

TOUR OF BATTLEFIELD AND DINNER TO MR. CROOKS

ONE of our fellow townsmen, Mr. Nathan W. Crooks by name, now a resident of Washington C. H., Ohio, was in camp at Corinth at this time. Escorted by him, my mother and I made the tour of the battle-field. Mr. Crooks carried my little sister in his arms, and to this day, upon occasion, introduces her to friends as the little girl he carried all over the battle-field of Corinth, with the accent on the _inth_. We visited the R. R. cut where my father held his emergency hospital, with shot and shell screaming and bursting all around him; we stood within the enclosure of Fort Robinet, where brave Col. Rogers of the Texas Brigade fell, and was buried with his colors. And little I reck’d the day would come when I would thrill with patriotic pride at the recollection of having stood on the parapet of this historic fort, with “Old Glory” floating proudly in the breeze above me, while at my feet, in the trench surrounding the fort, lay friend and foe, buried in one common grave. As one has fittingly written of them, “They sleep, and glory is their sentinel.”

I have wandered all over this field of battle. My playground was that portion occupied by the 14th Wisconsin during the fight, and of the many minnie balls, grape and cannister I picked up on this memorable spot, but one battered minnie ball remains.

Mr. Crooks had been my Sunday school teacher at home, and the morning he and some of the other “boys” left for the war, I heard my teacher in the public school offer up prayer in behalf of the “brave boys who had gone forth to defend their country’s honor.” As her words fell upon my ears I little dreamed that in a few short months I would follow, and meet with these same “boys.”

After we had been in the hospital some little time my mother invited Mr. Crooks to dinner, and Oh, what a dinner that was! at least Mr. Crooks said it was the first white man’s meal he had eaten since he left home. My mother cooked a portion of it by the fireplace, Mother Bickerdyke made a generous contribution, and the cook of the officers’ mess donated a very fine pudding. The butter—but the less said about it the better—at least in regard to its age and strength. It was of the canned variety, but Mr. Crooks thought it better than no butter at all, and promising to come again another day, jovially walked off with a can of it under his arm. He kept his word and visited us a number of times at the college hospital. Years after the war was over he told us that the mere mention of our father’s name called up visions of an old gray army blanket given him by our father as they were parting on one occasion, when but for it his bed would have been the cold, bare earth, his covering the canopy of heaven.

OUR QUAKER FRIENDS. MY ILLNESS. SUPPER IN THE MESS ROOM