Mr. ––– administered the Sacrament here to-day, the first
time it was ever administered by Episcopalians in Ashland. There were fifty
communicants, the large majority of them refugees. Our society here has been
greatly improved by the refugees from Fredericksburg. The hotel is full. The
Goodwins have rented the last vacant cottage, and are boarding others. The Roberts,
with their three pretty young daughters and son, occupy the ball-room of the
hotel. The dressing-room makes a pleasant chamber, and the long dancing-room,
partitioned off into rooms by the suspension of their handsome crimson damask
curtains, is very pretty, and, for spring and summer use, makes very
comfortable apartments. They saved some of their furniture, and are nicely
fixed for refugees, who must do the best they can, and be thankful it is no
worse. The Chinns seem very happy in the old billiard-rooms; the large room
answers the double purpose of dining-room and parlour, and the smaller rooms,
which I am afraid were once used for card-playing when this place was a summer
resort, are now put to a better use, as sleeping apartments and kitchen for
three most agreeable families. One family in the opposite cottage has
interested us very much. Mr. Wade (the husband) was an Englishman, who had been
in office in Washington; he resigned and came South on the breaking out of the
war, placed his family in Richmond, and joined our army; he was not young or healthy,
and soon was broken down by the service; he was then made clerk in the
Quartermaster's Department, and removed his family to Ashland for cheapness. He
was very highly educated and gentlemanly, and his coming here seems to me very
mysterious. Soon after his removal to this place he grew worse and died. His
wife and five children were left penniless and friendless. They seemed to have
no acquaintances, however slight. The villagers, from their limited resources,
raised a sum for her present support, and after much difficulty procured her a
situation in the Note-signing Department. She goes into the city every morning
on the cars, as do several other ladies to the duties of their offices, leaving
her children to the care of a faithful coloured nurse, whom she never saw until
two months ago. We have taught her the art of making soap of concentrated ley,
and often when she gets on the train, a basket may be seen in the freight-train
filled with soap, which she sells to the grocers or commissaries. She is an interesting-looking
woman, Northern born and educated. Her father, she says, is a Colonel in the
Yankee army. She wrote to him again and again, and one of our gentlemen did the
same, representing her case. After long silence he has written to her a short
letter, which she showed me, inviting her, in rather an indifferent manner, to
come to Georgetown, where her mother is now staying, but remits her no money to
pay her passage or to support her here. Our gentlemen have interested Mr.
Lawley, an Englishman of some note in Richmond, in her case; and her husband
having been a British subject, he may be enabled to get her a passport and a
free passage on the flag-of-truce boat.
SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern
Refugee, During the War, p. 205-7
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