Prince Jerome1 has gone to Washington. Now the Yankees
so far are as little trained as we are; raw troops are they as yet. Suppose
France takes the other side and we have to meet disciplined and armed men,
soldiers who understand war, Frenchmen, with all the elan we boast of.
Ransom Calhoun, Willie Preston, and Doctor Nott's boys are
here. These foolish, rash, hare-brained Southern lads have been within an ace
of a fight with a Maryland company for their camping grounds. It is much too
Irish to be so ready to fight anybody, friend or foe. Men are thrilling with
fiery ardor. The red-hot Southern martial spirit is in the air. These young
men, however, were all educated abroad. And it is French or German ideas that
they are filled with. The Marylanders were as rash and reckless as the others,
and had their coat-tails ready for anybody to tread on, Donnybrook Fair
fashion. One would think there were Yankees enough and to spare for any killing
to be done. It began about picketing their horses. But these quarrelsome young
soldiers have lovely manners. They are so sweet-tempered when seen here among
us at the Arlington.
_______________
1 Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, a grandson of
Napoleon Bonaparte's brother Jerome and of Elizabeth Patterson of Baltimore. He
was a graduate of West Point, but had entered the French Army, where he saw
service in the Crimea, Algiers, and Italy, taking part in the battle of
Balaklava, the siege of Sebastopol, and the battle of Solferino. He died in
Massachusetts in 1893.
SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin
and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 98-9
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