Colonel Bradley Johnson has been with us for some days. He
is nephew to Bishop J., and as bright and agreeable in private as he is bold
and dashing in the field. Our little cottage has many pleasant visitors, and I
think we are as cheerful a family circle as the Confederacy can boast. We are
very much occupied by our Sunday-schools — white in the morning, and
coloured in the afternoon. In the week we are often busy, like the “cotter's”
wife, in making “auld claes look amaist as weel as new.” “New claes” are not attainable at
present high prices; we are therefore likely to become very ingenious in fixing
up "auld anes.” My friend who lately arrived from Washington looked on
very wonderingly when she saw us all ready for church. “Why, how genteel you
look!” at last broke from her; “I had no idea of it. We all thought of you as
suffering in every respect.” I told her that the Southern women were as
ingenious as the men were brave; and while we cared little for dress during
such anxious times, yet when our husbands and sons returned from the field we
preferred that their homes should be made attractive, and that they should not
be pained by the indifferent appearance of their wives, sisters, and mothers.
She was still more surprised by the neatly fitting, prettily made dresses of
Southern manufacture. “Are they of Virginia cloth?” she asked. No, poor
old Virginia has no time or opportunity for improving her manufactures, while
almost her whole surface is scarred and furrowed by armies; but Georgia and
North Carolina are doing much towards clothing the first ladies in the land.
Sister M. has just improved my wardrobe by sending me a black alpaca dress,
bought from a Potomac blockade-runner. We, ever and anon, are assisted in that
way: sometimes a pound of tea, sometimes a pair of gloves, is snugged away in a
friendly pocket, and after many dangers reaches us, and meets a hearty welcome;
and what is more important still, medicine is brought in the same way, having
escaped the eagle eyes of Federal watchers. A lady in Richmond said laughingly
to a friend who was about to make an effort to go to Baltimore, “Bring me a
pound of tea and a hoop-skirt;” and after a very short absence he appeared
before her, with the tea in one hand and the skirt in the other. It is pleasant
to see how cheerfully the girls fall into habits of economy, and occupy
themselves in a way of which we never dreamed before.
SOURCE: Judith W. McGuire, Diary of a Southern
Refugee, During the War, p. 185-6
