Christmas Bells

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  Compounding his dissatisfaction, Charley had not yet received the parcels of supplies Henry had sent weeks before, nor any of the boxes his loving father, siblings, and aunts had sent to him since. He was also still making do with a borrowed horse and a reluctant enlisted man in place of a servant, although army regulations required him to provide his own. Demand for both horses and servants exceeded supply in the vicinity of the army, so Henry purchased two mares in Boston, a bay and a black, and hired William Locklin, an Irish-born Cambridge laborer in his early fifties, to transport the horses to the cavalry’s encampment and to stay on to serve Charley for twenty dollars a month. The horses were the very ideal, Charley noted when he wrote home to thank his father, but regrettably, Locklin had quickly proven poorly suited for the military life. He and the horses had arrived in a torrential downpour, which lasted several days and made it impossible for anyone to dry out. “This rather dampened Locklin’s courage,” Charley wrote, “and gave him the rheumatism so that nothing will do but he must go home. He is a very nice man but rather an old bird for the army. You see the young ones stand it the best. I lent him ten dollars to help him home as he had only twelve dollars at hand.”

  Henry hired another man to serve Charley in the field as quickly as the matter could be accomplished, frustrated that he could do no more for his son than to conduct such business, send parcels of food and necessities, and write encouraging letters. Charley’s letters from the encampment were invariably sanguine and confident despite the dull routine of his duties—preparing official documents for the colonel, exercising his horses, drilling his men, and debating past battles, campaigns yet to come, and the arcane workings of the War Department around the campfire. He expressed great indignation when his general, Fighting Joe Hooker, came under sharp criticism in the press for his failures of command at the Battle of Chancellorsville. “It is wonderful how the papers lie,” he wrote. “They praise up fellows whom we know to be miserable sneaks and others who have done very brave and splendid things are never so much as mentioned.”

  Yet neither the controversies encircling his commanding officers nor the failure of the Union Army to win a decisive battle diminished Charley’s enthusiasm for the military life. His letters home revealed that despite his experience of the discomforts of camp and the grim aftermath of battle, somehow he still perceived war as romantic and exciting, and he still considered soldiering the greatest expression of heroism. He longed to ride with General George Stoneman, whose splendid attack on General Lee’s rear before the Battle of Chancellorsville had won him great acclaim from Northerners desperate for a Union victory. He expressed great regret that the cavalry had not descended upon Richmond while General Lee was distracted by General Hooker on the Rappahannock, and he overflowed with praise and pride for the First Massachusetts Cavalry. “I hope for the honor of the Regiment that we shall have a good slap at the Rebs yet,” he declared, “as I think our men can whip them all to pieces as we are much better drilled.”

  Henry was glad for Charley’s good spirits—how much more anxious he would be if his son were demoralized and miserable—but he winced at Charley’s hubris and prayed it would not prove to be a fatal flaw.

  • • •

  Henry had long supported an idea that Sumner had championed on the floor of the Senate and elsewhere, that men of color ought to be permitted to take up arms in defense of their country and the liberation of their race. Like thousands of abolitionists throughout the North, he had rejoiced when President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation had declared slaves in lands under rebellion henceforth and forever free, and he had welcomed the provision that men of suitable condition among the newly freed slaves would be received into military service.

  For months, Henry knew, Governor Andrew and prominent abolitionists from Boston and throughout Massachusetts had been working quietly, diligently, to organize an infantry regiment of worthy men of color. Henry had contributed to the appeals to raise funds for publicity and travel, and he followed with great interest reports of recruitment efforts, which extended beyond the borders of the Commonwealth into northern cities such as New York, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh. The Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth, as it would be called, would be under the command of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, the twenty-five-year-old son of one of Boston’s most prominent, prosperous, and staunchly abolitionist families.

  On the morning of May 28, vast throngs of Bostonians, white and colored alike, their expressions eager and earnest, lined the sidewalks as Henry made his way to the Appleton residence at 39 Beacon Street. There, from an upstairs window in the company of Appletons, Curtises, and other friends, he observed a spectacle that would have been inconceivable only a year before—colored soldiers marching through the streets of Boston to the Common, where they would be reviewed by Governor Andrew before embarking for duty in South Carolina.

  Smartly dressed, splendidly equipped, and preceded by a full band of musicians, the men of the Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts marched proudly and well, their expressions stern and stoic, their backs straight and eyes bright. The city resounded with glad shouts and thunderous applause so that Henry and his companions anticipated the regiment’s arrival well before they turned onto Beacon Street.

  When Colonel Shaw appeared on horseback at the head of the column, Henry watched him pass, marveling that someone so young would be called upon to fulfill so great a duty. Then his gaze traveled across the street and down the block to 44 Beacon Street, where the young officer’s family watched proudly from the second-story balcony of the Shaw residence as the newly appointed colonel led his troops to meet the governor. Henry had never witnessed a more imposing spectacle, and he found it somehow both wild and strange and invigorating, as if a hazy, distant dream had sprung to vivid life.

  He watched, inexpressibly moved, as the regiment reached the bottom of the hill, turned left onto Charles Street, and marched toward the gate of Boston Common, where Governor Andrew and other dignitaries awaited them. In that glorious moment it seemed as if there might be no limit to what the colored race could accomplish in the years to come, unhindered by slavery, when peace reigned over a united nation.

  Henry knew that when the ceremonies concluded at noon, the Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts would march down State Street to Battery Wharf, board the steamer De Molay, and set out for South Carolina and for war. There was no doubt that their actions would be closely, even skeptically, observed and reported, and many people, North and South alike, would expect them to fail. Henry knew he was not alone in his glad satisfaction that men of color were at long last allowed to take part in the great conflict that would free their people from bondage. With their success and sacrifice, in victory and defeat, they would prove to a judgmental world the true strength, courage, and intelligence of their race, and not only freedom but true equality would surely follow.

  • • •

  A few days later, on a lovely spring morning ripe with the warm breezes and abundant flowers of early June, Henry and the girls sent off a box full of gifts to Charley, who would mark his nineteenth birthday one week hence. As the day approached, Henry felt his son’s absence, and that of the beloved mother who had brought him into the world, ever more sharply. Henry could not explain why he found the summer even gloomier and more lonely than the winter, full of bittersweet memories and difficult to bear.

  For some time Alice, Edith, and Anne had been imploring him to take them to Portland to visit their dear aunt Anne, and Henry was inclined to oblige them. He delighted in pleasing his sweet little daughters—their smiles and kisses broke like sunbeams through his skies overcast with sorrow—and he believed a change of scene might do him some good.

  Two days after Charley’s birthday, Henry took the girls north to Portland, where family and friends welcomed them with affectionate joy. In the company of his sympathetic, compassionate sister, he felt something too long tightly bound up in his heart and head gently loosening, enabling him to sit
quietly, peacefully, to breathe more deeply.

  He scarcely had time to marvel at the unfamiliar sensation of contentment when it was brutally shattered by word from Dr. Dalton that Charley had been stricken with camp fever, and was so desperately ill that he was being evacuated to a military hospital in Washington.

  Fighting off overwhelming dread, Henry entrusted his daughters to his sister’s care and departed immediately for the capital. His train arrived at ten o’clock in the morning on June 13, but even in his haste to make inquiries and locate his ailing son, Henry was startled to discover that the city was so packed full of soldiers’ tents and overcrowded hospitals that it seemed to be one vast military encampment.

  At last Henry found his eldest son, not in one of the makeshift military hospitals as he had feared and expected, malodorous and full of stomach-turning horrors and disease, but in the private F Street residence of the Reverend James Richardson, Massachusetts-born Unitarian minister, prominent official with the United States Sanitary Commission, and good friend of Henry’s brother Samuel.

  Charley struggled to sit up in bed when Henry hurried into the sickroom. “No, my dear boy. Lie back,” Henry urged, easing him down upon the pillow.

  “I’m not as ill as I might seem,” said Charley hoarsely.

  “I’m sure you’re not,” said Henry. His son’s cheeks were flushed, his skin seeming taut and strangely translucent, his fever no doubt exacerbated by the stifling heat and humidity of the city. “But rest benefits even the healthiest of men, so you have no reason not to make good use of this comfortable bed.”

  “It is far better than a cot in a tent,” Charley acknowledged, his voice no more than a rough whisper.

  As dreadful as it was to see his firstborn ill, finding Charley able to speak, and even to joke, relieved Henry greatly, for he had expected to find him barely clinging to consciousness, tossing and turning, soaked through with fever sweat, delirious. As soon as Charley dozed off, Henry sought out the doctor, who assured him that although the fever was nothing to dismiss lightly, Charley presented no alarming symptoms that suggested his life was in danger. “He was doing far better this morning, until he decided to disobey orders and leave his bed,” Dr. Clymer said wryly. “Reverend Richardson managed to talk him out of taking a turn in the garden, but even descending the staircase was enough to bring about a relapse. He needs rest, Mr. Longfellow, rest and quiet.”

  “He shall have them,” Henry replied firmly, “whether he wants them or not.”

  For the next few weeks, Henry remained with Charley in Washington in the home of their generous host, rarely leaving his son’s bedside. He arranged for a tent of blue gauze to be draped over his bed to keep off the harassing flies, and fed him a steady, nutritious diet of beef tea, blancmange, and ice cream, an especially welcome dish, sweet and soothingly cool upon the patient’s sore throat. As a staunch homeopath, Henry was astounded by the vast quantity of mixtures, powders, and mysterious draughts Dr. Clymer insisted upon pouring into Charley. It staggered belief, but Henry held his tongue and followed instructions, for the doctor had an excellent reputation for curing such cases and Henry dared not put Charley’s recovery at risk. Even so, he preferred the prescriptions of Miss Dorothea Dix, the Superintendent of Women Nurses and occasional visitor to Charley’s sickroom, who provided pure Bermuda arrowroot and homeopathic cocoa and recommended that they remove Charley from the oppressive climate of Washington as soon as he was able to travel.

  Day by day Charley improved, and they began to hope that Dr. Clymer would soon release him so they might travel to Nahant. Miss Dix agreed that the fresh sea breezes and sunshine would quicken Charley’s convalescence, but Dr. Clymer was reluctant to discharge him, warning that any disturbance could bring about another relapse.

  To no one’s surprise, as the fever abated and his strength returned, Charley became increasingly restless and bored confined to his sickbed. He chafed at the doctor’s orders so vigorously that Henry quietly rejoiced, thankful to see his son’s familiar restless energy restored. Henry distracted him with letters, which they exchanged in great numbers with family and friends, and by reading aloud Miss Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s novel Lady Audley’s Secret, an immensely popular murder story that was just scandalous enough to make for rather entertaining reading.

  Eventually Charley was allowed out of bed, and soon thereafter he was permitted to sit up in the parlor. Occasionally a friend or acquaintance or even strangers would call, having heard that the son of the illustrious poet was ill and wishing to express their hopes for his swift recovery. Other well-wishers sent flowers and letters, and several charming young ladies of the neighborhood brought him enticing delicacies from their kitchens, but nothing could sweeten Charley’s temper when he learned that the First Massachusetts had engaged the five regiments of the Virginia Cavalry in a fierce battle at Aldie in Loudoun County, Virginia, without him. “I am the most unlucky fellow to have missed it all,” he grumbled, kicking his bedsheets and punching his pillow in frustration. “The war will be over before Dr. Clymer lets me leave this house, much less return to the field.”

  “You have perfectly articulated my most ardent wish,” Henry replied lightly, but Charley merely heaved a sigh and asked for paper and pencil so he could write to his brother.

  The war seemed no closer to its end when Henry finally convinced Dr. Clymer to let him take Charley to Nahant. After thanking Reverend Richardson profusely for his generosity and kindness, Henry and Charley departed Washington by sea and arrived at Nahant on the last day of June. The fresh, cool sea breezes seemed to invigorate Charley, though he was already in good spirits, so delighted was he to be released from his sickroom, but the next morning his fever returned, brought on, no doubt, by the rigors of travel. Henry ordered him back to bed, and Charley, grumbling, obeyed, although by evening Henry relented enough to allow him to move to a reclining chair on the front porch.

  The rest of the family soon joined them at the cottage, and in the cheerful company of his adoring sisters and doting aunt, Charley steadily regained his vitality. By the middle of July, he was enjoying walks on the warm, sandy beaches and refreshing swims in the ocean. He had missed another fierce battle in which the First Massachusetts Cavalry had acquitted themselves with distinction, having engaged Confederate general J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry in Maryland and Pennsylvania, preventing them from joining up with the main body of General Robert E. Lee’s forces at Gettysburg. Charley again lamented his misfortune, and vowed that as soon as he was given leave to rejoin his regiment, he would set out with all haste.

  The day came too soon to suit Henry. On August 14, Charley bade farewell to his family and left Nahant in the company of a newly hired servant, a man called Chamberlain. First they stopped in New Market, Maryland, where Charley’s horses had been stabled during his convalescence, then onward to Washington, where, until the First Massachusetts Cavalry returned to its rear base and he could rejoin them, he was assigned to command the rear guard of a squadron protecting a train of sutlers’ wagons en route to the front. “It was pretty good fun being head of the rearguard,” Charley wrote to Henry on August 22, “as whenever a wagon would break down or get mired the sutlers would treat us to grub to keep us around as they were dreadfully frightened of being left alone to be captured by the rebels.” The rearguard would not have abandoned the wagon train, Charley was quick to point out, but they were too glad for the extra food to emphasize that point to the sutlers.

  By the time Henry received the letter at Nahant, Charley had already reunited with his regiment near Warrington and had joined in the hunt for Confederate colonel John Singleton Mosby—the Gray Ghost—and his band of raiders, the notoriously swift and elusive First Virginia Cavalry.

  Charley was thrilled to be in the thick of it again, but Henry could not share his cheerful enthusiasm. His son had missed violent battles that had cut down thousands of young men like wheat before the scythe. He had
recovered from a serious illness that had claimed the lives of countless thousands more. How many narrow escapes could one young soldier survive before his luck finally ran out?

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Priest’s Tale

  The smell of coffee brewing woke Ryan well before dawn, but even before he glanced at the clock he knew Sister Winifred had yet again tiptoed into his room after he had fallen asleep and had shut off his alarm. Sister Winifred called him “Father,” but she often seemed to think of him as a grandson.

  Yawning enormously, he rose, knelt on the small braided rug beside the window to pray, and then quickly showered and dressed, only a half hour behind schedule. When he went downstairs to the kitchen, he found the elderly nun standing at the counter humming “Angels We Have Heard on High” as she plucked two slices from the toaster and set them on a plate.

  “Sister Winifred,” he admonished mildly, reaching into the cupboard beside the sink for a coffee mug. “This was your day to sleep in. We’re supposed to take turns getting up early to make coffee, remember?”

  “Oh, I was awake anyway, Father.” She smiled brightly and she carried her plate to the small table where the newspaper, a small glass of orange juice, and a steaming cup of milky coffee already awaited her. “A growing boy like you needs his rest.”

  He had to laugh. “Sister, I’m more than a decade beyond fitting that description.”