190

YORKTOIVN AND WILLIAMSBURG.

under the unaccus-tomed burden ofheavy equipmentsand knapsacks, andthe warmth of theweather, the menstraggled along theroads, mingling withthe baggage-wag-ons, ambulances, andpontoon trains, inseeming confusion.

During our secondday’s march it rain-ed, and the muddyroads, cut up andkneaded, as it were, by the teams preceding us, left them in a state of semi-liquid filth hardly possible to describe or imagine. When we arrived at Big-Bethel the rain was coming down in sheets. A dozen houses of very ordi-nary character, scattered over an area of a third of a mile, constituted whatwas called the village. Just outside and west of the town was an insignifi-cant building from which the place takes its name. It did not seem largeenough or of sufficient consequence to give name to a hamlet as small asBig Bethel. Before our arrival it had evidently been occupied as officers’barracks for the enemy, and looked very little like a church.

I visited one of the dwelling-houses just outside the fortifications (if theinsignificant rifle-pits could be called such) for the purpose of obtaining some-thing more palatable than hard-tack, salt beef, or pork, which, with coffee,comprised the marching rations. The woman of the house was communica-tive, and expressed her surprise at the great number of Yanks who had “ comedown to invade our soil.” She said she had a son in the Confederate army, or,as she expressed it, “ in our army,” and then tearfully said she should tremblefor her boy every time she heard of a battle. I expressed the opinion that weshould go into Richmond without much fighting. “No!” said she, with theemphasis of conviction, “ you all will drink hot blood before you all get thar! ”

While wandering about, I came to the house of a Mrs. T-, whose

husband was said to be a captain in the Confederate service and a “fire-eating” secessionist. Here some of our men were put on guard for a shorttime, until relieved by guards from other parts of the army as they came up,whereupon we went on. A large, good-looking woman, about forty years

old, who, I learned, was Mrs. T-, was crying profusely, and I could

not induce her to tell me why. One of the soldiers said her grief wascaused by the fact that some of our inenhad helped themselves to the con-tents of cupboard and cellar. She was superintending the loading of an oldfarm-wagon, into which she was putting a large family of colored people, withnumerous bundles. The only white person on the load as it started away was

MRS. T-’S EXODUS.

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