We left all the passengers at Crockett except the
Louisianian Judge, a Government agent, and the ex-boatswain of the Harriet
Lane, which vessel had been manned by the Confederates after her capture; but
she had since been dismantled, and her crew was being marched to Shrieveport to
man the iron-clad Missouri, which was being built there.
The food we get on the road is sufficient, and good enough
to support life; it consists of pork or bacon, bread made with Indian corn, and
a peculiar mixture called Confederate coffee, made of rye, meal, Indian corn or
sweet potatoes. The loss of coffee afflicts the Confederates even more than the
loss of spirits; and they exercise their ingenuity in devising substitutes,
which are not generally very successful.
The same sort of country as yesterday, viz. — large forests
of pines and post-oaks, and occasional Indian corn-fields, the trees having
been killed by cutting a circle near the roots.
At 3 P.M., we took in four more passengers. One of them was
a Major ——, brother-in-law to ——, who hanged Mongomery at Brownsville. He spoke
of the exploit of his relative with some pride. He told me that his three
brothers had lost an arm apiece in the war.
We arrived at Eusk at 6.30 P.M., and spent a few hours
there; but notwithstanding the boasted splendour of the beds at the Cherokee
Hotel, and although by Major ——'s influence I got one to myself, yet I did not
consider its aspect sufficiently inviting to induce me to remove my clothes.
SOURCE: Sir Arthur James Lyon Fremantle, Three
months in the southern states: April-June, 1863, p. 76-7
