A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital Part 12

A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital Part 12

MARCH 11TH.--I have summed up the amounts of patriotic contributions received by the army in Virginia, and registered on my book, and they amount to $1,515,898.[1]

The people of the respective States contributed as follows:

North Carolina $325,417 Alabama 317,600 Mississippi 272,670 Georgia 244,885 South Carolina 137,206 Texas 87,800 Louisiana 61,950 Virginia[1] 48,070 Tennessee 17,000 Florida 2,350 Arkansas 950

MARCH 12TH.--Gen. Winder moved the pa.s.sport office up to the corner of Ninth and Broad Streets.

The office at the corner of Ninth and Broad Streets was a filthy one; it was inhabited--for they slept there---by his rowdy clerks. And when I stepped to the hydrant for a gla.s.s of water, the tumbler repulsed me by the smell of whisky. There was no towel to wipe my hands with, and in the long bas.e.m.e.nt room underneath, were a thousand garments of dead soldiers, taken from the hospitals and the battle-field, and exhaling a most disagreeable, if not deleterious, odor.

MARCH 13TH.--Nevertheless, I am (temporarily) signing my name to the pa.s.sports, yet issued by the authority of the Secretary of War. They are filled up and issued by three or four of the Provost Marshal's clerks, who are governed mainly by my directions, as neither Col. Porter nor the clerks, nor Gen. Winder himself, have the slightest idea of the geography of the country occupied by the enemy. The clerks are all Marylanders, as well as the detectives, and the latter intend to remain here to my great chagrin.

MARCH 14TH.--The Provost Marshal, Col. Porter, has had new pa.s.sports printed, to which his own name is to be appended. I am requested to sign it for him, and to instruct the clerks generally.

MARCH 15TH.--For several days troops have been pouring through the city, marching down the Peninsula. The enemy are making demonstrations against Yorktown.

MARCH 16TH.--I omitted to note in its place the gallant feat of Commodore Buchanan with the iron monster Merrimac in Hampton Roads. He destroyed two of the enemy's best ships of war. My friends, Lieutenants Parker and Minor, partook of the glory, and were severely wounded.

MARCH 17TH.--Col. Porter has resigned his provost marshalship, and is again succeeded by Capt. G.o.dwin, a _Virginian_, and I like him very well, for he is truly Southern in his instincts.

MARCH 18TH.--A Mr. MacCubbin, of Maryland, has been appointed by Gen.

Winder the Chief of Police. He is wholly illiterate, like the rest of the policemen under his command.

MARCH 19TH.--Mr. MacCubbin, whom I take to be a sort of Scotch-Irishman, though reared in the mobs of Baltimore, I am informed has given some pa.s.sports, already signed, to some of his friends. This interference will produce a rupture between Capt. G.o.dwin and Capt. MacCubbin; but as the former is a Virginian, he may have the worst of it in the bear fight.

MARCH 20TH.--There is skirmishing everyday on the Peninsula. We have not exceeding 60,000 men there, while the enemy have 158,000. It is fearful odds. And they have a fleet of gun-boats.

MARCH 21ST.--Gen. Winder's detectives are very busy. They have been forging prescriptions to _catch_ the poor Richmond apothecaries. When the brandy is thus obtained it is confiscated, and the money withheld.

They drink the brandy, and imprison the apothecaries.

MARCH 22D.--Capt. G.o.dwin, the Provost Marshal, was swearing furiously this morning at the policemen about their iniquitous _forgeries_.

MARCH 23D.--Gen. Winder was in this morning listening to something MacCubbin was telling him about the Richmond _Whig_. It appears that, in the course of a leading article, enthusiastic for the cause, the editor remarked, "we have arms and ammunition now." The policemen, one and all, interpreted this as a violation of the order to the press to abstain from speaking of the arrivals of arms, etc. from abroad. Gen. Winder, without looking at the paper, said in a loud voice, "Go and arrest the editor--and close his office!" Two or three of the policemen started off on this errand. But I interposed, and asked them to wait a moment, until I could examine the paper. I found no infraction of the order in the truly patriotic article, and said so to Gen. Winder. "Well," said he, "if he has not violated the order, he must not be arrested." He took the paper, and read for himself; and then, without saying anything more, departed.

When he was gone, I asked MacCubbin what was the phraseology of the order that "had been served on the editors." He drew it from his pocket, saying it had been shown to them, _and not left with them_. It was in the handwriting of Mr. Benjamin, and signed by Gen. Winder. And I learned that all the orders, sumptuary and others, had been similarly written and signed. Mr. Benjamin used the pencil and not the pen in writing these orders, supposing, of course, they would be copied by Gen.

W.'s clerks. But they were not copied. The policemen threaten to stop the _Examiner_ soon, for that paper has been somewhat offensive to the _aliens_ who now have rule here.

MARCH 24TH.--Gen. Walker, of Georgia--the same who had the scene with Col. Bledsoe--has resigned. I am sorry that the Confederate States must lose his services, for he is a brave man, covered with honorable scars.

He has displeased the Secretary of War.

MARCH 25TH.--Gen. Bonham, of South Carolina, has also resigned, for being overslaughed. His were the _first_ troops that entered Virginia to meet the enemy; and because some of his three months' men were reorganized into fresh regiments, his brigade was dissolved, and his commission canceled.

Price, Beauregard, Walker, Bonham, Toombs, Wise, Floyd, and others of the brightest lights of the South have been somehow successively obscured. And Joseph E. Johnston is a doomed fly, sooner or later, for he said, not long since, that there could be no hope of success as long as Mr. Benjamin was Secretary of War. These words were spoken at a dinner-table, and will reach the ears of the Secretary.

MARCH 26TH.--The apothecaries arrested and imprisoned some days ago have been tried and acquitted by a court-martial. Gen. Winder indorsed on the order for their discharge: _"Not approved, and you may congratulate yourselves upon escaping a merited punishment."_

MARCH 27TH.--It is said Mr. Benjamin has been dismissed, or resigned.

MARCH 28TH.--Mr. Benjamin has been promoted. He is now Secretary of State.

His successor in the War Department is G. W. Randolph, a lawyer of modest pretensions, who, although he has lived for several years in this city, does not seem to have a dozen acquaintances. But he inherits a name, being descended from Thomas Jefferson, and, I believe, likewise from the Mr. Randolph in Washington's cabinet. Mr. Randolph was a captain at Bethel under Magruder; and subsequently promoted to a colonelcy. Announcing his determination to quit the military service more than a month ago, he entered the field as a compet.i.tor for the seat in Congress left vacant by the death of President Tyler. Hon. James Lyons was elected, and Col. Randolph got no votes at all.

MARCH 30TH.--Gen. Lee is to have command of all the armies--but will not be in the field himself. He will reside here. Congress pa.s.sed an act to create a commanding general; but this was vetoed, for trenching on the executive prerogative--or failed in some way. The proceedings were in secret session.

MARCH 31ST.--Gen. Joseph E. Johnston is to command on the Peninsula. The President took an affectionate leave of him the other day; and Gen. Lee held his hand a long time, and admonished him to take care of his life.

There was no necessity for him to endanger it--as had just been done by the brave Sydney Johnston at Shiloh, whose fall is now universally lamented. This Gen. Johnston (Joseph E.) I believe has the misfortune to be wounded in most of his battles.

CHAPTER XIII.

Gen. Beauregard succeeds Gen. Sydney Johnston.--Dibble, the traitor.-- Enemy at Fredericksburg.--They say we will be subdued by the 15th of June.--Lee rapidly concentrating at Richmond.--Webster, the spy, hung.

APRIL 1ST.--Gen. Sydney Johnston having fallen in battle, the command in the West devolved on Gen. Beauregard, whose recent defense at Island No.

10 on the Mississippi, has revived his popularity. But, I repeat, he is a doomed man.

APRIL 2D.--Gen. Wise is here with his report of the Roanoke disaster.

APRIL 3D.--Congress is investigating the Roanoke affair. Mr. Benjamin has been denounced in Congress by Mr. Foote and others as the sole cause of the calamities which have befallen the country.

I wrote a letter to the President, offering to show that I had given no pa.s.sport to Mr. Dibble, the traitor, and also the evidences, in his own handwriting, that Mr. Benjamin granted it.

APRIL 4TH.--The enemy are sh.e.l.ling our camp at Yorktown. I can hear the reports of the guns, of a damp evening. We are sending back defiance with our guns.

The President has not taken any notice of my communication. Mr. Benjamin is too powerful to be affected by such proofs of such small matters.

APRIL 5TH.--Newbern, N. C., has fallen into the hands of the enemy! Our men, though opposed by greatly superior numbers, made a brave resistance, and killed and wounded 1000 of the invaders.

The enemy were piloted up the river to Newbern by the same _Mr. Dibble_ to whom I refused a pa.s.sport, but to whom the Secretary of War granted one.

The press everywhere is commenting on the case of Dibble--_but Mordecai still sits at the gate_.

APRIL 6TH.--Two spies (Lincoln's detective police) have been arrested here, tried by court-martial, and condemned to be hung. There is an awful silence among the Baltimore detectives, which bodes no harm to the condemned. They will not be executed, though guilty.

APRIL 7TH.--R. G. H. Kean, a young man, and a connection of Mr.

Randolph, has been appointed Chief of the Bureau of War in place of Col.

Bledsoe, resigned at last. Mr. Kean was, I believe, a lieutenant when Mr. Randolph was colonel, and acted as his adjutant.

APRIL 8TH.--Col. Bledsoe has been appointed a.s.sistant Secretary of War by the President. Now he is in his glory, and has forgotten me.

APRIL 9TH.--There are several young officers who have sheathed the sword, and propose to draw the pen in the civil service.

To-day I asked of the department a month's respite from labor, and obtained it. But I remained in the city, and watched closely, still hoping I might serve the cause, or at least prevent more injury to it, from the wicked facility hitherto enjoyed by spies to leave the country.

APRIL 10TH.--The condemned spies have implicated _Webster_, the letter-carrier, who has had so many pa.s.sports. He will hang, probably.

Gen. Winder himself, and his policemen, wrote home by him. I don't believe him any more guilty than many who used to write by him; and I mean to tell the Judge Advocate so, if they give me an opportunity.

APRIL 11TH.--The enemy are at Fredericksburg, and the Yankee papers say it will be all over with us by the 15th of June. I doubt that.