I arrived at Charleston at 5 A.M., and drove at once in an
omnibus to the Charleston hotel. At nine o'clock I called at General
Beauregard's office, but, to my disappointment, I found that he was absent on a
tour of inspection in Florida. He is, however, expected to return in two or
three days.
I then called on General Ripley, who commands the garrison
and forts of Charleston. He is a jovial character, very fond of the good things
of this life; but it is said that he never allows this propensity to interfere
with his military duties, in the performance of which he displays both zeal and
talent. He has the reputation of being an excellent artillery officer, and
although by birth a Northerner, he is a red-hot and indefatigable rebel. I
believe he wrote a book about the Mexican war, and after leaving the old army,
he was a good deal in England, connected with the small-arms factory at
Enfield, and other enterprises of the same sort. Nearly all the credit of the
efficiency of the Charleston fortifications is due to him. And notwithstanding
his Northern birth and occasional rollicking habits, he is generally popular.
I then called on Mr Robertson, a merchant, for whom I had
brought a letter of introduction from England. This old gentleman took me a
drive in his buggy at 6 P.M. It appears that at this time of year the country outside
the city is quite pestilential, for when we reached the open, Mr Robertson
pointed to a detached house and said, “Now, I am as fond of money as any Jew,
yet I wouldn't sleep in that house for one night if you gave it to me for doing
so.”
I had intended to have visited Mr Blake, an English
gentleman for whom I had a letter, on his Combahee plantation, but Mr Robertson
implored me to abandon this idea. Mr Robertson was full of the disasters which
had resulted from a recent Yankee raid of the Combahee river. It appears that a
vast amount of property had been destroyed and slaves carried off. This morning
I saw a poor old planter in Mr Robertson's office, who had been suddenly and
totally ruined by this raid. The raiders consisted principally of Northern
armed negroes, and as they met with no Southern whites to resist them, they
were able to effect their depredations with total impunity. It seems that a
good deal of the land about Charleston belongs either to Blakes or Heywards. Mr
Blake lost thirty negroes in the last raid, but he has lost since the beginning
of the war about 150.
Mr Robertson afterwards took me to see Mrs –––, who is Mr
Walter Blake's daughter. To me, who had roughed it for ten weeks to such an
extent, Charleston appeared most comfortable and luxurious. But its inhabitants
must, to say the least, be suffering great inconvenience. The lighting and
paving of the city had gone to the bad completely. Most of the shops were shut
up. Those that were open contained but very few goods, and those were at famine
prices. I tried to buy a black scarf, but I couldn't find such an article in
all Charleston.
An immense amount of speculation in blockade-running was
going on, and a great deal of business is evidently done in buying and selling
negroes, for the papers are full of advertisements of slave auctions. That
portion of the city destroyed by the great fire presents the appearance of a
vast wilderness in the very centre of the town, no attempt having been made
towards rebuilding it; this desert space looks like the Pompeian ruins, and
extends, Mr Robertson says, for a mile in length by half a mile in width.
Nearly all the distance between the Mills House hotel and Charleston hotel is
in this desolate state. The fire began quite by accident, but the violent wind
which suddenly arose rendered all attempts to stop the flames abortive. The
deserted state of the wharves is melancholy — the huge placards announcing
lines of steamers to New York, New Orleans, and to different parts of the
world, still remain, and give one an idea of what a busy scene they used to be.
The people, however, all seem happy, contented, and determined. Both the great
hotels are crowded; and well dressed, handsome ladies are plentiful; the fare
is good, and the charge at the Charleston hotel is eight dollars a day.
SOURCE: Sir Arthur James Lyon Fremantle, Three
Months in the Southern States: April-June, 1863, p. 179-82
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