A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital Part 29

DECEMBER 26TH.--We have no news to-day--not even a rumor. We are ready for anything that may come. No doubt the a.s.sailants of Mobile, Wilmington, or Charleston, will meet with determined resistance.

The President will be in Richmond about the first day of January. I saw a man who traveled with him in Alabama.

Vicksburg, I understand, cannot be taken by water. And Grant, the Federal general, is said to be retreating out of Mississippi.

DECEMBER 27TH.--The successes in the West have been confirmed. Morgan captured 2000 and Van Dorn 1500 prisoners at Holly Springs. They likewise destroyed a large amount of stores.

We have intelligence of a great armament, under Gen. Sherman, sailing from Memphis against Vicksburg. At the last accounts the President was at Vicksburg; and he may be witness of this decisive struggle for the possession of the Mississippi River, the result of which involves immense interests. We await with much anxiety the issue of the naval operations during the ensuing month. We are content with the land achievements of this year; and if we should be equally successful in resisting the enemy's fleets, we shall deem ourselves fortunate indeed.

The agents of the Commissary and Quartermaster-General make grievous complaints against Lieut.-Gen. Pemberton, at Grenada, Mississippi; they say he interferes with their arrangements to procure supplies--for cotton; and it is intimated that he has some little arrangements of his own of that nature. This illicit trade is very demoralizing in its nature.

Oh, that peace would return! But with INDEPENDENCE!

DECEMBER 28TH.--We have no news to-day from the West. If the great battle has been fought at Vicksburg, we ought to know it to-day or to-morrow; and if the enemy be beaten, it should be decisive of the war. It would be worse than madness to continue the contest for the Union.

Several fine bra.s.s batteries were brought down from Fredericksburg last night, an indication that the campaign is over for the winter in that direction.

If we should have disasters in the West, and on the Southern seaboard, the next session of Congress, to begin a fortnight hence, will be a stormy one.

DECEMBER 29TH.--We have a dispatch from Vicksburg at last. The enemy, 25,000 strong, were repulsed three times yesterday, and finally driven back seven miles, to their gun-boats. It was no battle, for our loss was only 30, and that of the enemy 400. It will be fought to-day, probably.

It is said an attempt will be made this week on Weldon, as well as Charleston.

Our Morgan has been in Kentucky again, and captured 1200 men. Glorious Morgan!

The accounts from the United States are rather cheering. The _Herald_ proposes a convention of all the "loyal States," that reconstruction may be tried in that way. A dispatch from Tennessee says, even the New York _Tribune_ expresses the opinion that our independence must be recognized. The Philadelphia _Press_ proposes another route to Richmond _via_ the rivers, and thinks Richmond may be taken yet, and the rebellion crushed.

The surgeon in charge of the Howard Hospital reports that the small-pox is greatly on the increase, and terminating fatally in almost every case. He says men die of it without eruptions on the surface, the disease striking inward. It is proposed to _drive_ away the strangers (thousands in number), if they will not leave voluntarily. There are too many people here for the houses, and the danger of malignant diseases very great.

My vaccination was not a success; very little inflammation and a small scab being the only evidences. But I have a cough, and much la.s.situde.

DECEMBER 30TH.--We have another crisis. Dispatches from Murfreesborough state the hostile armies are facing each other, and not a mile apart; the skirmis.h.i.+ng increases, and a decisive battle may occur at any moment.

From Vicksburg we have no further intelligence; but from the Rappahannock we learn that both artillery and infantry were distinctly heard yesterday in the direction of Dumfries. Is Stuart there?

DECEMBER 31ST.--There were more skirmishes near Vicksburg yesterday; and although several of the Louisiana regiments are said to have immortalized themselves (having lost only two or three men each), I suppose nothing decisive was accomplished. I have not implicit faith in Western dispatches; they are too often exaggerations. And we have nothing further from Murfreesborough.

But there is reliable intelligence from Albemarle Sound, where a large fleet of the enemy's transports appeared yesterday. We must look now for naval operations. Perhaps Weldon is aimed at.

Gen. Wise writes a remarkable letter to the department. His son, just seventeen years old, a lieutenant in 10th Virginia Cavalry, was detailed as ordnance officer of the general's brigade, when that regiment was taken from his father. Now Gen. Cooper, the Northern head of the Southern army, orders him to the 10th Cavalry. The general desires his son to remain with him, or that the lieutenant may be permitted to resign. He says he asks no favors of the administration, and has never received any. His best blood (Capt. O. J. W.) has been given to the country, and his home and property lost by the surrender of Norfolk, etc.

To-day, Gen. Winder's account for disburs.e.m.e.nt of "secret service" money was sent in. Among the persons who were the recipients of this money, I noticed _Dr. Rossvally_, a notorious spy, and S----w, one of his policemen, who, with W----ll, very recently fled to the enemy, and is now in the service of the United States, at Was.h.i.+ngton!

Gen. Lee has given the command in Northwestern Virginia to Gen. W. E.

Jones; and he asks the Secretary to hold a major he has captured as a hostage for the good conduct of the Federal Gen. Milroy, who is imitating Gen. Pope in his cruelties to civilians.

CHAPTER XXII.

Lee in winter quarters.--Bragg's victory in the Southwest.--The President at Mobile.--Enemy withdraw from Vicksburg.--Bragg retreats as usual.--Bureau of Conscription.--High rents.--Flour contracts in Congress.--Efforts to escape conscription.--s.h.i.+ps coming in freely.-- Sneers at negro troops.--Hopes of French intervention.--Gen. Rains blows himself up.--Davis would be the last to give up.--Gov. Vance protests against Col. August's appointment as commandant of conscripts.--Financial difficulties in the United States.

JANUARY 1ST, 1863.--This first day of the year dawned in gloom, but the sun, like the sun of Austerlitz, soon beamed forth in great splendor upon a people radiant with smiles and exalted to the empyrean.

A letter from Gen. H. Marshall informed the government that Gen. Floyd had seized slaves in Kentucky and refused to restore them to their owners, and that if the government did not promptly redress the wrong, the Kentuckians would at once "take the law into their own hands."

We had a rumor (not yet contradicted) that the enemy, or traitors, had burned the railroad bridge between Bristol and Knoxville, cutting our communication with the West.

Then it was said (and it was true) that Gen. Lee had sent his artillery back some 30 miles this side of the Rappahannock, preparatory to going into winter quarters. But this was no occasion for gloom. Lee always knows what is best to be done.

Next there was a rumor (not yet confirmed, but credited) that Stuart had made another of his wonderful reconnoissances, capturing prisoners and destroying much of the enemy's stores beyond the Rappahannock.

Then came a dispatch from Bragg which put us almost "beside" ourselves with joy, and caused even enemies to pause and shake hands in the street. Yesterday he attacked Rosecrans's army near Murfreesborough, and gained a great victory. He says he drove him from all his positions, except on the extreme left, and after ten hours' fighting, occupied the whole of the field except (those exceptions!) the point named. We had, as trophies, thirty-one guns, two generals, 4000 prisoners, and 200 wagons. This is a _Western_ dispatch, it is true, but it has Bragg's name to it, and he does not willingly exaggerate. Although I, for one, shall await the next dispatches with anxiety, there can be no question about the victory on the last day of the b.l.o.o.d.y year 1862. Bragg says the loss was heavy on both sides.

I noticed that one of the bra.s.s pieces sent down by Lee to go to North Carolina had been struck by a ball just over the muzzle, and left a glancing mark toward the touch-hole. That ball, probably, killed one of our gunners.

JANUARY 2D.--A dispatch from Gov. Harris gives some additional particulars of the battle near Murfreesborough, Tenn. He says the enemy was driven back six miles, losing four generals killed and three captured, and that we destroyed $2,000,000 commissary and other stores.

But still we have no account of what was done yesterday on the "extreme left."

Gen. Stuart has been near Alexandria, and his prisoners are coming in by every train. He captured and destroyed many stores, and, up to the last intelligence, without loss on his side. He is believed, now, _to be in Maryland_, having crossed the Potomac near Leesburg.

The mayor of our city, Jos. Mayo, meeting two friends last night, whom he recognized but who did not recognize him, playfully seized one of them, a judge, and, garroter fas.h.i.+on, demanded his money or his life.

The judge's friend fell upon the mayor with a stick and beat him dreadfully before the joke was discovered.

The President was at Mobile on the 30th December, having visited both Murfreesborough and Vicksburg, but not witnessing either of the battles.

We are in great exaltation again! Dispatches from Gen. Bragg, received last night, relieve us with the information that the stronghold of the enemy, which he failed to carry on the day of battle, was abandoned the next day; that Forrest and Morgan were operating successfully far in the rear of the invader, and that Gen. Wheeler had made a circuit of the hostile army after the battle, burning several hundred of their wagons, capturing an ordnance train, and making more prisoners. Bragg says the enemy's telegraphic and railroad communications with his rear have been demolished, and that he will follow up the defeated foe. I think we will get Nashville now.

JANUARY 3D.--To-day we have a dispatch from Vicksburg stating that the enemy had re-embarked, leaving their intrenching instruments, etc., apparently abandoning the purpose of a.s.saulting the city. This is certainly good news.

Gen. Stuart did not cross the Potomac, as reported in the Northern press, but, doubtless, the report produced a prodigious panic among the Yankees. But when Stuart was within eight miles of Alexandria, he telegraphed the government at Was.h.i.+ngton that if they did not send forward larger supplies of stores to Burnside's army, he (Stuart) would not find it worth while to intercept them.

Capt. Semmes, of the Alabama, has taken another prize--the steamer Ariel--but no gold being on board, and having 800 pa.s.sengers, he released it, under bonds to pay us a quarter million dollars at the end of the war.

A large meeting has been held in New York, pa.s.sing resolutions in favor of peace. They propose that New Jersey send a delegation hither to induce us to meet the United States in convention at Louisville, to adopt definitive terms of peace, on the basis of the old Union, or, that being impracticable, separation. Too late!

JANUARY 4TH.--We have nothing additional from Murfreesborough, but it is ascertained that the bridges burned by the enemy on the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad cannot be repaired in a month.

It really does seem that some potent and malign influence, resident at the capital, some high functionary, by some species of occultation, controlling the action of the government, a Talleyrand in the pay of both governments, and balancing or equalizing disasters between them to magnify his importance and increase his reward, has been controlling many events since the beginning of this war, and is still engaged in the diabolical work. It now appears that several regiments were withdrawn from the vicinity of Bristol, whose presence there was necessary for the protection of the railroad and the bridges. They were brought hither _after Lee's defeat of Burnside_, for the protection of the capital! The President was away, and Mr. Seddon was now in the War Office. But Gen.

Cooper is _old_ in office, and should have known better; and Gen. G. W.

Smith certainly must have known better. Just suppose we had been beaten at Murfreesborough, and our communications cut, west and east and south!

There would have been no escape.

It had even been proposed to take a large portion of Lee's men from him, so that he must be inevitably defeated on the Rappahannock, but Lee's resignation would have shocked the people unbearably. Great injury was done him by abstracting some 20,000 of his men by discharges, transfers, and details. Nothing but his generals.h.i.+p and the heroism of his men saved us from ruin. The disasters of Donelson, Newbern, Nashville, Memphis, Roanoke, New Orleans, Norfolk, etc. may be traced to the same source. But all new governments have been afflicted by a few evil-disposed leaders.

Our people in arms have upheld the State; they have successfully resisted the open a.s.saults of the invader, and frustrated the occult machinations of the traitors in our midst. We have great generals, but what were they without great men to obey them? Generals have fallen, and divisions and brigades have fought on without them. Regiments have lost their field officers and continued the fight, and companies have maintained their position after all their commissioned officers were stricken down. The history which shall give the credit of their achievements to others will be a vile calumny. Our cause would have been ruined if it had not been for the bravery and heroism of the people--_the privates in our armies_.