With Lee in Virginia: a story of the American Civil War Part 44

"It was well you were not in Richmond, mother, the day of the riots."

"Yes; but we had our trouble here too, Vincent. A number of the slaves from some of the plantations came along this way, and wanted our hands to join them to burn down their quarters and the house, and to march to Richmond. Tony and Dan, hearing of their approach, armed themselves with your double-barreled guns, went down and called out the hands and armed them with hoes and other implements. When the negroes came up there was a desperate quarrel, but our hands stood firm, and Tony and Dan declared that they would shoot the first four men that advanced, and at last they drew off and made their way to Richmond.

"Your plan has succeeded admirably. One or two of the hands went to Richmond next day, but returned a day or two afterward and begged so hard to be taken on again that I forgave them. Since then everything has been going on as quietly and regularly as usual, while there is scarcely a man left on any of the estates near."

"And now, mother, that I find things are quiet and settled here, I shall go down to Georgia and fetch Lucy home. I shall be of age in a few months, and the house on the estate that comes to me then can be enlarged a bit, and will do very well."

"Not at all, Vincent. Annie will be married next month. Herbert Rowsell was here two days ago, and it's all settled. So I shall be alone here. It will be very lonely and dull for me, Vincent, and I would rather give up the reins of government to Lucy and live here with you, if you like the plan."

"Certainly, I should like it, mother, and so, I am sure, would Lucy."

"Well, at any rate, Vincent, we will try the experiment, and if it does not work well I will take possession of the other house."

"There is no fear of that, mother, none whatever."

"And when are you thinking of getting married, Vincent?"

"At once, mother. I wrote to her the day we were disbanded saying that I should come in a week, and would allow another week and no longer for her to get ready."

"Then, in that case, Vincent, Annie and I will go down with you.

Annie will not have much to do to get ready for her own wedding.

It must, of course, be a very quiet one, and there will be no array of dresses to get; for I suppose it will be some time yet before the railways are open again and things begin to come down from the North."

Happily Antioch had escaped the ravages of war, and there was nothing to mar the happiness of the wedding. Lucy's father had returned, having lost a leg in one of the battles of the Wilderness a year before, and her brother had also escaped. After the wedding they returned to their farm in Tennessee, and Mrs. Wingfield, Annie, Vincent, and Lucy went back to the Orangery.

For the next three or four years times were very hard in Virginia, and Mrs. Wingfield had to draw upon her savings to keep up the house in its former state; while the great majority of the planters were utterly ruined.

The negroes, however, for the most part remained steadily working on the estate. A few wandered away, but their places were easily filled; for the majority of the freed slaves very soon discovered that their lot was a far harder one than it had been before, and that freedom so suddenly given was a curse rather than a blessing to them.

Thus, while so many went down, the Wingfields weathered the storm, and the step that had been taken in preparing their hands for the general abolition of slavery was a complete success.

With the gradual return of prosperity to the South the prices of produce improved, and ten years after the conclusion of the rebellion the income of the Orangery was nearly as large as it had been previous to its outbreak. Vincent, two years after the conclusion of the struggle, took his wife over to visit his relations in England, and, since the death of his mother in 1879, has every year spent three or four months at home, and will not improbably ere long sell his estates in Virginia and settle in England altogether.