CHAPTER II.
There was great excitement at Oakland during the John Brown raid, andthe boys' grandmother used to pray for him and Cook, whose pictureswere in the papers.
The boys became soldiers, and drilled punctiliously with guns whichthey got Uncle Balla to make for them. Frank was the captain, Willythe first lieutenant, and a dozen or more little negroes composed therank and file, Peter and Cole being trusted file-closers.
A little later they found their sympathies all on the side of peaceand the preservation of the Union. Their uncle was for keeping theUnion unbroken, and ran for the Convention against Colonel Richards,who was the chief officer of the militia in the county, and was asblood-thirsty as Tamerlane, who reared the pyramid of skulls, and ashungry for military renown as the great Napoleon, about whom the boyshad read.
There was immense excitement in the county over the election. Thoughthe boys' mother had made them add to their prayers a petition thattheir Uncle William might win, and that he might secure theblessings of peace; and, though at family prayers, night and morning,the same petition was presented, the boys' uncle was beaten at thepolls by a large majority. And then they knew there was bound to bewar, and that it must be very wicked. They almost felt the "invader'sheel," and the invaders were invariably spoken of as "cruel," and theheel was described as of "iron," and was always mentioned as engagedin the act of crushing. They would have been terribly alarmed at thiscruel invasion had they not been reassured by the general belief ofthe community that one Southerner could whip ten Yankees, and that,collectively, the South could drive back the North with pop-guns. Whenthe war actually broke out, the boys were the most enthusiastic ofrebels, and the troops in Camp Lee did not drill more continuously norindustriously.
Their father, who had been a Whig and opposed secession until the verylast, on Virginia's seceding, finally cast his lot with his people,and joined an infantry company; and Uncle William raised and equippedan artillery company, of which he was chosen captain; but the infantrywas too tame and the artillery too ponderous to suit the boys.
They were taken to see the drill of the county troop of cavalry, withits prancing horses and clanging sabres. It was commanded by a cousin;and from that moment they were cavalrymen to the core. They flungaway their stick-guns in disgust; and Uncle Balla spent two grumblingdays fashioning them a stableful of horses with real heads and "sure'nough" leather bridles.
Once, indeed, a secret attempt was made to utilize the horses andmules which were running in the back pasture; but a prematurediscovery of the matter ended in such disaster to all concerned thatthe plan was abandoned, and the boys had to content themselves withtheir wooden steeds.
The day that the final orders came for their father and uncle to go toRichmond,--from which point they were ordered to "the Peninsula,"--theboys could not understand why every one was suddenly plunged into suchdistress. Then, next morning, when the soldiers left, the boys couldnot altogether comprehend it. They thought it was a very fine thing tobe allowed to ride Frank and Hun, the two war-horses, with their new,deep army saddles and long bits. They cried when their father anduncle said good-bye, and went away; but it was because their motherlooked so pale and ill, and not because they did not think it was allgrand. They had no doubt that all would come back soon, for old UncleBilly, the "head-man," who had been born down in "Little York," whereCornwallis surrendered, had expressed the sentiment of the wholeplantation when he declared, as he sat in the back yard surrounded byan admiring throng and surveyed the two glittering sabres which he hadno one but himself to polish, that "Ef them Britishers jest sees deseswodes dee'll run!" The boys tried to explain to him that these werenot British, but Yankees,--but he was hard to convince. Even Lucy Ann,who was incurably afraid of everything like a gun or fire-arm, partookof the general fervor, and boasted effusively that she had actually"tetched Marse John's big pistils."
Hugh, who was fifteen, and was permitted to accompany his father toRichmond, was regarded by the boys with a feeling of mingled envy andveneration, which he accepted with dignified complacency.
Frank and Willy soon found that war brought some immunities. The housefilled up so with the families of cousins and friends who wererefugees that the boys were obliged to sleep in the Office, and thusthey felt that, at a bound, they were almost as old as Hugh.
There were the cousins from Gloucester, from the Valley, and familiesof relatives from Baltimore and New York, who had come south on thedeclaration of war. Their favorite was their Cousin Belle, whosebeauty at once captivated both boys. This was the first time that theboys knew anything of girls, except their own sister, Evelyn; andafter a brief period, during which the novelty gave them pleasure,the inability of the girls to hunt, climb trees, or play knucks, etc.,and the additional restraint which their presence imposed, caused themto hold the opinion that "girls were no good."
Two Little Confederates Page 2
