The Sentinels of Andersonville Read online

  When Andersonville had been selected as the site of a Federal prison camp, a hue and cry went up in Americus not seen since the passage of conscription. No one wanted a stockade full of murdering Yankees only ten miles off. Who could sleep at night? One little prison break and they were dead in their beds—and likely to get that way through vile ordeals unimagined. Despite a ruckus much publicized and editorialized by the papers in Americus, plans went through, and the prison opened to receive its first group of five hundred prisoners in February.

  The train carrying Violet Stiles thundered into a crowded depot. As Violet had spent the journey vision-dazzled with cards of buttons replacing cards of thread, she’d only been vaguely aware of occasional gusts of fetid odor, as if the train had gone over a foul swamp. The smell persisted, however, and finally made its way into Violet’s notice, for as the iron horse reared to a stop in a spray of cinders and soot, it was as if the train had come into the smell. As she stepped down to the small platform, she dug into her pocket for a handkerchief and pressed it to her nose.

  She had never been to Andersonville alone. She had never been anywhere alone, not by rail, and though the town was only ten miles northeast, it occurred to her what a fine, daring thing she had done. She fastened her bonnet strings and set her chin as if she knew exactly what she was doing and where she was going and stepped into the crowd.

  The fine feeling soon began to crumble, and not because she couldn’t decide which building was the parcel warehouse in the thronging confusion of men on the platform and all about the depot; not because of the pervasive odor she tried to keep at bay with a press of thin linen; not because it finally came upon her that she would have to spend the entire day here, without food, until Papa came for the horse and carriage provided by the benevolent Maxwells, which took him home every Thursday to Americus. It was because she was suddenly aware that she was the only woman in the biggest collection of men she had ever seen, and because most of those men, she realized with a thrill of horror and shock, were Yankees.

  —

  “Not much longer, Lew. You get to reunite with your men and put up your heels while the rest of us poor devils see this thing through.”

  Lew Gann did not answer. He studied the landscape rolling by at all the speed the train could muster, maybe six or eight miles an hour. The terrain, endless stands of pine trees and corn, was a different sight from northern Georgia, where the mountains reminded him of home. The view was interesting to a farmer in love with the land, but interesting too because Lew had never been so far south; before the war he’d never been farther south than Maryland, and then he’d only stepped over the line to say he had been out of state.

  “I could do for a rest m’self,” Emery Jones commented in that easy, pleasing way of Alabamian speech: soft r’s, extra syllables, and no hurry to go anywhere. “No rest for the weary. Or is it the wicked? I mix that up.”

  The train shuddered over a length of track warped out of alignment, and righted itself before too much brain rattling had occurred. From the Battle of Kennesaw, as they were now calling it, it had been a long, weary journey on rolling stock because the so-called axle grease, a fly-specked concoction which smelled like rendered hog, had to be applied ten times as often as proper grease. The Confederate army had commandeered all the grade-one grease for the hotter spots of the war to keep supply lines intact; and just how did this make sense, Lew wondered, this close to Atlanta? They didn’t consider this area hot? Well, they didn’t know old Billy T. then, did they. Maybe Sherman hadn’t done so well at Kennesaw, but a few flanking moves and before you could say Jefferson Finis Davis he’d be on Atlanta’s front porch sipping lemonade.

  Lew decided to keep that last thought to himself, and found it easy; the farther south they went, the less he talked. Yes, Lew had heard of Andersonville, and so had Emery, but grim as it sounded it didn’t mean much to Lew right now. All he knew after three years of fighting was the cold reality of war, and cold reality said he’d never see Emery Jones again. It hit him as hard as losing a man from his company.

  “You once said you have two boys and two girls. Yet you do not know the name of the last. How can you know if it is boy or girl, yet not know the name? I have thought on this for a month.”

  A whole month they had been together, where Lew almost died, and then he lived, and then they started their journey south on a series of miserable train trips: Kennesaw to Atlanta, Atlanta to Forsyth, Forsyth to Macon, and Macon just about to Andersonville. All that time, they talked.

  They talked religion and politics, army life and women, peacetime and war, and they let each other in on the curious ways of the North and of the South. They argued and debated the reasons for the War of Northern Aggression—as Emery put it—a usual thing for soldiers around a campfire but far less usual if campfiring with the enemy. They talked even when Lew was delirious with fever in a Negro cabin near Atlanta, and then, Emery told him, conversation was interesting indeed.

  It was an uncommon friendship, and both knew it.

  “I lost some of Carrie’s letters in a battle,” Lew finally said, after regaining his balance from a particularly hard jolt. “She’d told me the baby’s name, but I couldn’t remember it. I was too ashamed to own it to her, so I took to calling him Little Mite. ‘How’s Little Mite?’ I’d say in a letter, and here’s the funny part: she’d answer, ‘Little Mite’s just fine.’ Never said his name again like I hoped, because the nickname stuck. What is more, I’ve received letters from my mother, and guess what she calls him? Little Mite. It is a hard thing, Emery, to not know the name of your own child. He’s almost a year old.”

  “That is rough,” Emery said.

  Landscape rolled by, corn and pine and pine and corn. Not much else out there. Some rice, looked like, and beans. Peas, they called them down here. He wondered what they called actual peas. He went to ask Emery, but asked him something else.

  “You never did explain that very curious inspection you gave when we first met, face-to-face. As we are about to part, I’d like to know what it meant. ’Cause it was more than fixing words to my face.”

  “Well, Lew, I was trying to discover if you were worth the oath I gave.”

  “Oath? What oath?”

  Emery took off his hat and put his finger through a hole. “The first man you killed in that standoff was a childhood friend of Captain Graves, and Graves wanted you dead. Offered fifty Federal greenbacks to the man who killed you, and made it clear it should be done even if we took you prisoner. Your Harris Gill gave a decorated opinion that that would be murder, not fair war, and so he ended up with a split mouth, courtesy of Captain Graves.

  “By this time I’d taken a shine to you, ’cause of the word perpetuity, and the other boys did not hold it against you that you were fighting so hard to live. They admired your courage, with a more fearful admiration of your marksmanship, and even found some amusement in that smart mouth of yours. We counted the loss of Graves’s friend toward war, nothing more.

  “Captain Graves, howsoever, was not of our mind. Never was. It was his daddy who got up the regiment, and stuck him in charge by right of wealth alone. Well. Some money spends well, and some don’t. We came up short in Graves. He wanted your Yankee head on a pike, but as the men were, in your particular case, reluctant to despoil Federal property—” Emery shrugged—“I made a proposal, and Graves accepted.”

  “What on earth did you propose?”

  “Well, part of that configuration entailed seeing you and Harris Gill to Andersonville. When you took sick, I sent Gill on with Corporal—”

  “I know that part,” Lew said impatiently. “Get to the oath part.”

  “Well, I ain’t gonna tell you.”

  “What do you mean you’re not gonna tell me?” Lew demanded.

  Emery replaced his hat. “Tell you what. You take care of yourself in the pen, keep yourself healthy and don’t make anybody mad, and I promise you this: I’ll meet up with you in Ezra when this war is done a
nd I’ll tell you then. And you better be satisfied with that, ’cause this is the last oath I am makin’ on your behalf.”

  “You’re taking the job.”

  “You ain’t rid of me yet. I aim to fruit-farm. You can teach me.”

  “I am glad to hear it. But Emery? What is that stench?”

  “Well, I was tryin’ not to notice ’cause of our earnest conversation. I thought it was you.”

  “I will not own such a pestilential stink as that. Smells like the sinks of the entire camped Army of the Potomac.”

  The rest of the men in the boxcar noticed it, too, and the train finally pulled into the Andersonville depot.

  3

  VIOLET FIRST WENT to the small platform depot, less than half the size of the Americus depot, on the east side of the tracks. There she was informed she’d have to check with the commissary agent at the large building on the west side of the tracks, because the clerk could not find a box for Miss Violet Wrassey Stiles; it was likely thrown in with the box for Dr. Stiles, and any boxes on military business went to the commissary building.

  Violet crossed over the tracks on a path of wooden planking, only too aware of the stares from the men milling about her. It was her first time to encounter Yankees—other than a distant view of a few escapees from Andersonville, rounded up by farmers on the outskirts of Americus. Though she was madly curious, she could not observe them when this closely observed herself. At least the July heat answered for the flush in her cheeks.

  Yankees and Rebels alike followed her progress to the commissary building. Confederate soldiers touched their hats and offered pleasantries she barely acknowledged, while the Yanks were staring but silent; they knew enough not to address a Southern woman without risk of recrimination from the nearest Confederate. She ducked into the long wooden building with some relief.

  “I am here to pick up twelve barrels of whiskey, Corporal, not seven.” A man in his forties shoved a paper under the nose of a boy in his teens. “See that signature? This is for the hospital. Do you wish to tell him how five barrels have gone missing between here and Macon?” He snatched the paper back. “This is all the painkiller them poor boys have, even for amputations. How anyone can justify stealin’ from dyin’ men is beyond my education. Yankees or not.”

  “This is all they rolled off the train, mister. I ain’t sayin’ they weren’t stole, but—”

  “Who rolled ’em off the train?”

  “The railroad agent.”

  “Yeah? And who’d he roll them to?”

  The boy nervously scratched his neck. “Well . . . I saw Mr. Duncan with him. . . .”

  The man’s face hardened. He nodded in disgust, as if things made sense. “You been to that Federal hospital, son?”

  “No, sir.”

  “You take a walk in them wards, boy, and you will wish for whiskey just for the look. Now I ain’t gonna sign for this until I have twelve, not seven, so I propose you either look up Duncan or you search the guard tents—”

  “Hello, ma’am,” the young man said, eager for the diversion. “You Miss Stiles?”

  Violet nodded.

  “Got a box right in the back for ya. Lemme get the paper and you can sign for it.” He hurried off.

  Violet looked at the barrels labeled XX WHISKEY XX, and thought of Dance Pickett and his uncharacteristic behavior last Sunday, the first time he’d missed dinner in two months.

  “Is your father Dr. Stiles?” A noticeable softening had come to the man’s face. “Works at the Yankee hospital?”

  “Yes, sir. Every Thursday.”

  He seemed to want to say more, but a train whistle blew, and a black locomotive rumbled into the station.

  Violet looked around the building. It was dark in here, compared to the blazing July sun outside. Close by were several sacks of meal piled against the right wall, while several barrels marked MOLASSES and VINEGAR lined the left. Beyond these were other sacks and boxes and barrels and crates in various states of order and disorder. It was a busy place. Men came and went through the wide entrance facing the train tracks, bringing things in or hauling them out. Outside, Violet could see dozens of men pouring out of the train that had just come in. This, however, was not a passenger train. It was a freight train, and men came out of cattle cars, more blue-clad, dirty, disheveled Yankees, hesitating on the platform, not sure where to go, looking about with wary, sun-squinting interest until a guard ordered them along.

  “Tell your father he needs to be more careful.”

  Startled, Violet found the man had come closer, and had bent to examine the heel of his boot.

  “I beg your pardon?” she said.

  “Here you are, Miss Stiles. Sign here.”

  Violet turned to receive the much-anticipated box—and stared at it.

  “It’s been opened.”

  “Yes, ma’am. We have to search everything.”

  “How do I know I am receiving exactly what was sent?” The boy didn’t answer. Frowning, she took the pen he had dipped and signed where he pointed. “I declare. Postmaster Haines wouldn’t put up with this.”

  He shrugged. “Orders of General Winder.”

  “General Winder or no General Winder,” Violet muttered.

  “Perhaps he knows of the missing barrels.” The man straightened to take up with the clerk once more. Violet took her box from the counter, and after a glance at the man, went outside.

  She looked for a shaded place to sit away from the crowds of men, but found nothing near the commissary building. Hefting the box, which was only the size of a hatbox but was rather heavy, she threaded her way through groups of men on the expanse of grass behind the commissary, hoping her fixed gaze and lifted chin would ward off any inappropriate comments. There was a well at the edge of the commissary grounds, and across the street from the well, three small buildings. The center building seemed to be some sort of dry goods store, about the only place a woman could be respectably found in Andersonville at the moment, so she made straight for it.

  But the storefront was quite thick with men, so she kept walking and passed between the store and the small building on the right, where a placard on the door said CAPTAIN H. WIRZ. She came out to the back of the buildings.

  It would be a long time until Papa came from the prison, maybe four or five hours, so she took her time selecting a decent place to wait. A stable and corral lay behind the office of Captain Wirz, but the backyard of the dry goods store was free of both man and beast. Gratefully, she took the box to a shaded corner of the store and set it down. It wouldn’t do to sit on the box, as she planned to immediately explore the contents, so she looked about until she spied a very large woodpile beneath several shade trees.

  Some of the wood was stacked as tall as a man, some only knee high, and that would answer perfectly for a stool. It was farther away from the buildings, so even better. She picked up the box and was soon pleasantly situated. It was secluded and much cooler, and from here she could see the Maxwells’ horse in the corral, so she would know when Papa came.

  At last she put her attention on the box from Savannah, tempted to unravel her bonnet strings for thread and . . . and last Sunday, Dance Pickett had drunk whiskey meant for the hospital.

  “Look there, Violet!” Lily had said. “Isn’t that Dance? Why is he walking funny?”

  Papa had gone with Mother to assist a midwife with a difficult birth and Ellen was putting the youngest girls to bed. Lily and Violet were sitting on the porch when Dance came strolling up, none too steadily.

  “Yes, it is I, Miss Lily. As to my ungainliness: It may be due to the fact that my sensibilities at present are somewhat . . . bacchanalian in nature.”

  “You’re sick?” said Lily.

  “Lily, go help Ellen,” said Violet.

  “We missed you for supper!” Lily complained. “It’s dreadfully dull without you. I have a new picture of P. G. T. Beauregard.”

  “Lily, go inside,” Violet said.

  “Hello, Miss
Stiles.” Dance nodded genteelly. “I am drunk.”

  “I can see that.”

  “I will say things I am certain to regret, but, happily, will not remember.”

  “Lily, go inside.”

  “I will certainly not!”

  “Instantly, or Mother will hear of it.”

  Lily gave a small, exasperated shriek, then flounced out of her chair and went inside.

  “What is that you’re carrying?” Violet said, disgusted. “Is your whiskey in there?”

  “This? Heavens, no. This is a sanctuary. Nothing has gone in there since my posting, and nothing has come out, for two sanctuaries cannot exist in the same place. It is a law, don’t you see? Heaven and hell cannot coabide. The whiskey is in this pocket. It is an experiment, this whiskey. That’s what Linney told me.”

  “Linney? That disgusting, vile—”

  “Miss Stiles! How unchristian! Do go on.”

  “An experiment in what?”

  “I wanted to see if he was right.”

  “About what?”

  Dance stopped at the bottom of the porch steps and looked up at her. Slanting rays from the lowering sun came through the magnolia alongside the walk, and showed the expressive brown eyes stained red. He studied the porch steps.

  “Oh dear. I will not attempt those stairs. There are two sets and both are moving. It is unsportsmanlike. Is anyone using this tree?” He took hold of an overhanging limb from the magnolia and steadied himself.

  “What is Mr. Linney right about?”

  “What? Oh, that.” A cagey grin came. “No, you’ll not trick me. We are not to speak to you of it. To you, Miss Stiles, especially you! You must remain a bastion of glorious ignorance, and thus remain for us, a bastion of . . . something . . .” He frowned, thinking. “I forget what. Something very important. The gist of it is you will continue to be the only thing in our lives that shall remain unsullied. We need you to stay who you are, for if you saw it, we would lose you. I would—” He stopped short, and then said, “Oh, I am drunk.”