Corn Silk Days Part 13

"I should have told him but I never connected him to this family. Benjamin lied to me. He had told me his last name was Sturme. I didn't have a clue until we met at Robert and Mary's. I was in shock. I guess he was, too."

"I can imagine the shock."

"Why did he lie to me about his name?"

"I don't know. You probably know Benjamin better than I do. He doesn't spend much time around here since he came back from Chicago. Silas doesn't welcome him. He's disappointed in his brother. You know, the drinking. Silas has talked with him about that and Benjamin gets defensive."

"He hadn't been drinking when I saw him at Robert's or the day he found me."

"As far as Silas is concerned it's more than the drinking. He says his brother does not take responsibility and that irritates Silas. So there's been tension between them since Benjamin came back home."

Lucinda rose from the chair and went to the porch railing. She leaned on it and looked out to the clear night sky. "Janie, I'm afraid this will come out during the trial. I'm scared they will think Benjamin had a reason to kill Thomas."

"You mean jealousy?"

She spun around. "Yes, if they know we knew each other in the past." Her tears returned. "What do I do, Janie? What am I going to do?"

Elizabeth Jane had many thoughts running through her mind. What would people think? After all, Benjamin would be facing a jury. Would they question the status of their current relations.h.i.+p if they knew about their past? She could not come up with a reasonable or comforting answer. Finally she said, "I don't know, Lucinda."

"Oh dear G.o.d, I don't know either. I'm so worried about Benjamin. It was terrible to see him locked in that jail cell."

Elizabeth Jane did not know what to say to Lucinda. She was worried about her brother-in-law, Benjamin, too. More worried than she had previously been.

And right now, as they sat quietly on the porch, both caught up in the silence of the night, broken only by the call of a night bird, the chirping of crickets, and the intrusion of their own thoughts, Elizabeth Jane wished she had not learned Lucinda had once been in love with Benjamin.

And James?

She didn't want to think about that.

The light of the early morning sun was filtering through a thin, milky cloud cover over the Shenandoah Valley. At Taylor Hills, Nicholas was in the horse stables forking hay for the horses when Madeline entered. "Morn'ng, Ma'am," he said in greeting.

"Good morning, Nicholas. I'm ready to go riding."

"Yes, Ma'am. I get your horse ready right now."

Madeline had awakened earlier than normal after a night of restless sleep. She was feeling nervousness but her heartbeat quickened in antic.i.p.ation of what was to come. She had risen from bed, dressed, and sat in her bedroom awaiting daybreak. And while waiting, many things had gone through her mind. She was about to embark on a life-changing event. Not only was it life-changing but could be life-threatening. She wanted to be sure she was ready to take such a risk. Shortly before dawn broke, she nearly decided to go back to bed, to forget about the craziness of what she was about to do. Many scenarios of danger had flashed through her mind. What if her husband found out? What would he do? Oh, G.o.d, would he beat her? Once she felt Lawrence came close to hitting her because she had defied his wishes in some small way. He was a jealous man, always uncalled for, that is, until now. After all, in his mind, she was his possession, and if he felt any threat to that she would be in grave trouble. Would he kill her? Would he kill Lieutenant Edson? That thought sent a cold chill up her spine.

Before the sun came up she had made up her mind. She would go riding as she did most mornings, and if she 'accidentally' ran into a handsome Confederate Lieutenant she would follow her heart wherever it took her.

Nicholas a.s.sisted her up onto the saddle. He frowned, his dark eyes level under drawn brows as he looked up at her. "Ma'am, I knows I saiz this ever' time you go a'ride'n but I worry. There's danger out there."

She smiled down at Nicholas from atop the horse. "Nicholas, thank you for your concern. I'll be just fine. Don't you worry."

Nicholas nodded but the frown did not leave his face. "Yes, Ma'am. If you say." He handed her the reins.

Madeline rode away from Taylor Hills, her heart still beating fast in antic.i.p.ation of what was to come.

She rode through the peach orchard and beyond, followed the trail on the hillside, and within a few minutes she saw William on horseback in a stand of trees on the trail ahead. As she approached he dismounted his horse, and gave a warm welcoming smile.

He walked along side her horse, reached up to help her dismount, and as she fell into his arms she heard him whisper, "Madeline, you are so beautiful."

And by the time they finished making love, she believed every word of it and was filled with an amazing sense of completeness.

Chapter Fifteen: Sat.u.r.day, the 4th Day of July 1863.

Young's Point, Louisiana Beloved wife, I again write a few lines to let you know that I am tolerable good and I hope when this letter arrives in your hands that it will find you in good spirits. I received your likeness and that of the children in one of your last letters and I was well pleased with it. You told me to be careful and not lay on the picture. Well I had no intention of laying on it. I keep it close to my heart and I feel so proud of the picture as though it were gold. I have never seen anything as sweet as that picture. It would do me so good to get a few kisses from your sweet lips.

I did not tell you before but last month our regiment went with prisoners up to Memphis and when returning our boat was fired on and three men were wounded. That was done by guerillas. They are getting so they fire on every boat that pa.s.ses. At that time the Vicksburg fight had been going on about eighteen days since we had attacked the burg and we did not think then it could last much longer. We have been fighting since the first day of May. There has been a great many men killed and wounded on both sides.

I received two letters from you, dated June 10th and June the 17th. Nothing gives me more pleasure than to know the money I sent got through safe. I got very uneasy about that. I have not drawn any money since I sent that home. It is not very safe to send money from here.

I must tell you about Vicksburg but I suppose you will hear the news before my letter gets to you. Vicksburg is ours at last. It was surrendered sometime last night. I have not heard any particulars about it. The Steamer, John H. d.i.c.key had just pa.s.sed up the river with a dispatch for the upper country and if you are taking newspapers you will hear the particulars of the surrender. It is rejoicing news to me and I suppose more so to the boys who were fighting them. If it was peace declared I can hardly hold myself. I heard we lost two more boys out of our company since they went to Vicksburg but I did not learn who they are.

Our regiment went in the fight at Milliken's Bend with one hundred and forty men and about one half was killed and wounded. Four men out of Company K were killed dead and one died of a wound afterwards. I do not suppose that there is a hundred and fifty men able for service at the present time and there will be less if we stay down here this summer.

I would like to come home and see you but I can not tell you when it will be. I am going to stay on this boat as long as I can. We will be apt to move to Vicksburg soon. I would like to see the place very much.

So no more at present. Send me a postage stamp once in awhile. I can not get them here.

From your loving husband, Silas

Chapter Sixteen: Lincoln.

Although rumor had it that President Lincoln would not be taking part in any Fourth of July celebrations, the opportunity for festivity was not pa.s.sed up by families of many communities across the North.

The Collins towns.h.i.+p decided to go forward with their traditional celebration and Alexander Storm had been one of the elder town's people who encouraged the usual festivities of Independence Day. He had argued pa.s.sionately that a day of togetherness and joyful activities would and should be a welcome change from the sadness and anxiety that the war had manifested.

There were only a handful of people who felt the festivities should not occur, and Mr. and Mrs. Randolph Bennet had been among the few.

Randolph Bennet had loudly protested against the festival during the town meeting and as usual he had been drinking to excess.

Mayor Hampton, although not a timid man, had lost control of the meeting, unable to calm the outbursts of the Bennets. Alexander, as frustrated as others, finally took charge and escorted Mr. Bennet from the meeting. He told Mrs. Bennet to take her drunken husband home where he belonged and if they did not see fit to attend the Fourth of July festival that would be fine by him, as most in the community would not welcome their presence anyway.

The festivities began at noon on Sat.u.r.day, July 4th at the town meeting hall. Inside the hall, tables, covered with bright cotton cloths, were filled with food-baskets of homemade breads, garden fresh vegetables, fruits, sponge cakes, pies, puddings, and sliced ham and beef, still hot from the barbeque. Outside, children played, and younger babies were inside the hall playing on blankets spread out on the wooden plank floor. The Stars and Stripes decorated the hall, and several buckets of small flags were scattered here and there.

Catherine, known for her delicious pies, was placing pies on the tables and Elizabeth Jane was cutting them into slices and arranging them on several tables.

Lucinda carried a pot of beans as she joined her sister-in-law. She asked, "Anywhere special for these beans?"

"Right there is fine," Elizabeth Jane replied. She glanced up to see Mayor Hampton straighten his tie as he walked to the front of the hall. She whispered to Lucinda, "Time for the mayor's usual speech. I know it by heart now. I don't think he ever changes a word of it."

As Elizabeth Jane believed, Mayor Hampton's speech was word for word, pause by pause, grin by grin, exactly the same as it always was. He folded up the paper he had read from and then introduced Alexander.

That brought a smile to both Lucinda and Elizabeth Jane. Elizabeth Jane leaned close to Lucinda. "Now we'll hear something worthwhile."

Alexander stepped onto the platform, nodded at the mayor and turned to the audience. Tall and lean, Alexander towered over the short and stocky Mayor Hampton. Hampton left the stage to Alexander.

Alexander had the attention of all in the hall. He began, "Ladies, gentlemen, and young-uns, we again gather today in celebration of our nation. To the many brave soldiers who are fighting in the cause and liberties of this country and to those who have died, we pray the good Lord will watch over them. Today, these men are not out of our memory but right here with us in our hearts and minds-and we will have a day of celebration of the anniversary of our National birthday-and a celebration of those of our men, our families, our townfolk, who are engaged in this war to preserve our Nationality."

"Some people seem to doubt the propriety of celebrating the Fourth of July as we usually have done. Because we are thus engaged, and there is great anxiety as to the result of the war, when the Capitol is in danger, while our gallant armies in the Mississippi Valley are exposed to grave dangers and are liable to meet great disaster, I say to you, it is only right that we celebrate our Union and celebrate this fine country."

"The principles of our Revolutionary fathers are still strong and the Declarations have not failed us. We will stop the rebellion and today we will celebrate the virtues and achievements won for us and giving us the inestimable blessings of civil freedom-and those blessings will continue next year and every year after. The Stars and Stripes will fly over our nation, G.o.d willing."

"So let's partake of good food and good company."

Cheers and applause broke out and a festive mood was in motion.

It was Monday afternoon, a day still hot from the searing sun and clear skies, when Alexander found his son, Michael in the yard behind the mill, sorting lumber.

Alexander called out, "How's it going, Michael?"

Michael stopped his work, removed his hat and wiped sweat from his brow with his handkerchief. He replied, "Busy, shouldn't have taken Sat.u.r.day off. Too much work to be done."

Alexander told him, "We all needed a break, good for the mind."

"I don't know about that. Makes no difference in what is happening with this d.a.m.n war."

"Sat.u.r.day, old man Haag told me he got a post from his son, Jake. Jake is in James's company. You know how news travels in these parts. James heard what happened to Lucinda, and what Benjamin did."

"Oh, yeah?" Michael returned his hat to his head and his handkerchief to his hip pocket.

"I just got back from Haag's. He let me read the letter from his son. James didn't take it well. According to Jake, James was ready to abandon his post and come back home. Some of the men had to hold James down for a bit. Some worthless soul from Marshalltown spread a rumor that Lucinda and Benjamin were involved with each other and said Benjamin killed the boy in a rage of jealousy."

"Ah, s.h.i.+t!"

"Said James went into a fit of anger and was a threat'n to come back home and kill Benjamin. Said the men had to talk him down and even the Officer had to take him aside and calm him a bit."

"Has Lucinda heard this?"

"Not yet, that I know of."

Michael's mood veered sharply to anger, "Did you tell Benjamin?"

"I will. I think he needs to know so as to be prepared when James does come back home."

His features hardened. "You see the trouble Benjamin causes! Maybe he should rot in jail!"

"Watch your tongue, Michael."

His expression bordered on mockery. "Watch my tongue-"

"That's what I said. You're gonna let go of this resentment toward your son and support him, ya hear?"

Michael's voice was rough. "How can I support him, Pap? He's always causing pain for others!"

Alexander studied him a moment as he sucked on his pipe, then replied, "Seems he only causes pain for you, and it's time you figure out why that is."

Michael turned away from Alexander, kicked at the dirt with his boot, and walked several feet out.

Alexander told him, "I expect you to be in that courtroom in support of your son when the time comes. And I'll take no excuses, ya hear that?"

Michael remained silent as his father turned and left the mill.

By Tuesday, July 7, 1863, President Lincoln received at the White House, General Grant's dispatch announcing the capture of Vicksburg, Mississippi, on July 4th. Word spread quickly through the streets, businesses, and hotels of Was.h.i.+ngton, and by evening a military band paraded up Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House accompanied by hundreds of citizens to give congratulations to President Lincoln. Lincoln, in an impromptu speech addressed the people. The next morning the Was.h.i.+ngton and New York papers printed his speech, as did many newspapers across the country.

Fellow-citizens: I am very glad to see you to-night, and yet I will not say I thank you for this call. But I do most sincerely thank Almighty G.o.d for the occasion on which you have called. How long ago is it? Eighty odd years since, upon the Fourth day of July, for the first time in the world, a union body of representatives was a.s.sembled to declare as a self-evident truth that all men were created equal.

That was the birthday of the United States of America. Since then the fourth day of July has had several very peculiar recognitions. The two most distinguished men who framed and supported that paper, including the particular declaration I have mentioned, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, the one having framed it, and the other sustained it most ably in debate, the only two of the fifty-five or fifty-six who signed it, I believe, who were ever President of the United States, precisely fifty years after they put their hands to that paper it pleased the Almighty G.o.d to take away from this stage of action on the Fourth of July. This extraordinary coincidence we can understand to be a dispensation of the Almighty Ruler of Events.

Another of our Presidents, five years afterwards, was called from this stage of existence on the same day of the month, and now on this Fourth of July just past, when a gigantic rebellion has risen in the land, precisely at the bottom of which is an effort to overthrow that principle "that all men are created equal," we have a surrender of one of their most powerful positions and powerful armies forced upon them on that very day. And I see in the succession of battles in Pennsylvania, which continued three days, so rapidly following each other as to be justly called one great battle, fought on the first, second and third of July; on the fourth the enemies of the declaration that all men are created equal had to turn tail and run.

Gentleman, this is a glorious theme and a glorious occasion for a speech, but I am not prepared to make one worthy of the theme and worthy of the occasion. I would like to speak in all praise that is due the many brave officers and soldiers who have fought in the cause of the Union and liberties of this country from the beginning of this war, not on occasion of success, but upon the more trying occasions of the want of success. I say I would like to speak in praise of these men, particularizing their deeds, but I am unprepared. I should dislike to mention the name of a single officer, lest in doing so I wrong some other one whose name may not occur to me.

Recent events bring up certain names, gallantly prominent, but I do not want to particularly name them at the expense of others, who are as justly ent.i.tled to our grat.i.tude as they. I therefore do not upon this occasion name a single man. And now I have said about as much as I ought to say in this impromptu manner, and if you please, I'll take the music.

Chapter Seventeen: Monday, the 10th Day of August 1863.

Vicksburg, Mississippi Dear Companion, I will now try and write you a letter that is a few more lines than I wrote a few minutes ago concerning the money I sent you for I was in a big hurry to get it ready. Now I will tell you how much I sent and who I sent it by. Our First Lieutenant is going to start home in an hour or two and I thought it would be as safe with him as it would to be expressed from here and he is to put in the Office at Marshalltown and you will then receive it at Collins. I sent you a twenty dollar bill, a ten, and a five, all amounting to thirty-five dollars. I could send you more money but you are not needing it and there is chances for speculation down here if a person has money. You may think I want to spend money foolishly. Well a person is more apt to spend money when they have considerable. Now I will tell you how much money I drew. I drew fifty-two dollars. If you can loan your money at interest to someone that is good and can get good security, I think it would be as good as you could do with it. What money you don't want to use is dead property for it eats nothing or brings in nothing that is while you have it wrapped up and put away in some drawer or other, for fear a dollar would get away and you would not know it. Now you can do as you please as far as the money is concerned but do the best you can with it. You can tell how things run in Iowa and whether it would be safe to loan it or not.

Now I must tell you something about Vicksburg. I suppose you have heard and read a great deal about our mortars tearing the place all to pieces and killing all the people that was in it. I do not believe them mortars done five hundred dollars damage to the town. It was only once in a while that a house was struck with them but in traveling over the town a person would be asked once in a while what made that hole in the ground. The answer would be a mortar sh.e.l.l done that. The small guns done a great deal, the most damage to the town and people, and you heard considerable about them batteries that our men had placed to throw shot in town to burn it up. When we got down here we could not see and hear anything of such a battery. And that ca.n.a.l, what a great thing that was. I have seen that ca.n.a.l. Some places it is ten or fifteen feet deep and it would vary from that to three feet. When I saw it, it was dry and the water in the river lacked eight or ten feet of being up to the ca.n.a.l. That is why the newspapers lie about a great many things.

Now I will give you the price of some produce and what we have to pay for it. Potatoes are from seven to nine dollars per bushel. We can get a four pint tin full for twenty or thirty cents and green apples from five cents a piece or forty or fifty cents a dozen and peaches fifteen to twenty-five cents per dozen and tolerable good sliced onion is worth five cents a piece. Now you can see the contrast between this and Iowa.

I received your very kind letter yesterday and was glad to hear that you were all well. I saw Luther Randles yesterday and he had seen Uncle Perry. He said Uncle Perry's leg was almost well. I am with the regiment now. We have eight or nine men able for duty at present. We have had thirty men killed dead and discharged, that is Company K, six or eight only has been discharged.

You need not send me any stamps for I can buy them here. So I must close. I hope this finds you in good health.

Yours as ever, Silas Oh yes. Watermelons sell from seventy-five cents to three dollars a piece. That's all.