Headquarters U. S. Forces,
Natchez, Miss., July 19, 1863.
My Dear Wife:
To-day is Sunday, one week since I wrote you from Vicksburg.
I had then just returned from Port Hudson, and a reconnoissance of the river,
bringing with me the news of the reduction or rather surrender of Port Hudson,
and despatches from General Banks. Having impressed upon General Grant the
importance of occupying this point, I was sent back to take possession of
Natchez, by aid of General Ransom and his brigade. This was accomplished
without opposition, to the immense and mingled surprise, grief, and indignation
of the people, as well as officers and soldiers whom we took as prisoners. We
captured some five thousand head of fine cattle, three thousand of which we
have shipped to Port Hudson and to Vicksburg. We captured and destroyed large
quantities of ordnance and ordnance stores, and great numbers of small arms. We
are in the process of taking large quantities of sugar, molasses, corn, and
cotton, belonging to the so-called Confederate government; also immense
quantities of lumber, at this time of large value to our army. Our occupation
has been most fertile in results. The plan of operations was suggested, and carried
into effect by me. I shall never be known in it to the world at large, nor is
it of vast moment, but it has been an expedition fraught with success, and I
congratulate myself at least, so let it pass.
Natchez is a beautiful little city of about seven thousand
or eight thousand inhabitants, a place for many years past of no great business
significance, but rather a congregation of wealthy planters and retired
merchants and professional men, who have built magnificent villas, along the
bluffs of the river and in the rear, covering for the city a large space of
ground. Wealth and taste, a most genial climate and kindly soil have enabled
them to adorn these in such manner as almost to give the Northerner his
realization of a fairy tale. Tourists, who, in times past, have visited the
South, have usually selected winter as the season for their journeyings, and
for the most part, have confined themselves to the limits of city and
steamboat. They have told us little of rural life amid the opulent of the
South, their efforts give but faint ideas of the clime or country. The grand
luxuriance of foliage and flower and fruit of which this sunny clime can boast,
has been denied them, and is seen in its perfection now and where my footsteps
lead me.
The house of . . . where I have been quartered for the past
week, is one of the largest and most elegantly appointed mansions in all the
South. Any description that I can give of its superb appointments will be but
feeble. The proprietor counts his plantations by the dozens, his slaves by the
thousands, those people, I mean, who were his slaves. He has travelled most
extensively all over Europe; his summers, for almost his lifetime, have been
passed in Europe or at our Northern watering places. His family consists only
of himself and wife, a lady of some thirty-five years, not beautiful, but
thoroughbred, tall figure, fine eyes, good refined features, a gentle, musical
voice, and a sweet smile. He, fifty. The mansion is very large, great rooms
with high ceilings, long wide halls, ample piazzas, windows to the floor and
opening upon grassy terrace. Walls hung with chefs d'ceuvre of Europe's
and America's best artists. Busts from Powers and Crawford, paintings from
Landseer and Sully and Peal. Everything that ministers to refined taste almost
is here. For the grounds, you must imagine a chain of very high and steep bluffs,
bordering a wide river which winds in silvery sheen far below, and is so
serpentine in its course, that miles and miles away, . . . you can see its
waters glittering in the last sun rays, while intervening there are plain and
forest, plantations highly cultivated, and dotted with the whitewashed negro
quarters, and the damp green swamp land. The river disappears amid waving,
moss-grown trees, to reappear tortuously ribboned amid canebrake and plain,
always on calm days a mirror of the bright blue skies, and fleecy clouds of
ever-changing forms of beauty. As you approach upon the broad carriage way that
gracefully sweeps past the high-columned portico, which is shaded by the
cypress and magnolia and crape myrtle, gorgeous in its bloom and blooming always,
your feet crackling the gravel and sea shells, you are almost lost in
labyrinthine ways which pass over terrace and undulating sward, over rustic
bridges, through cool and verdurous alleys of gloria mundi, Japan plum,
the live and water oak, making literally a flowery pathway of exotics of
gorgeous coloring and startling magnificence, and almost indigenous to the soil
in which they grow, the river view bursts suddenly upon you, and in the
beautiful summer house you sit down entranced, wondering if it is all real, or
if the scene has not been suddenly conjured by an enchanted wand. Flowers and
bloom and fruit are all around, and almost sick with perfume one can dream away
the hours in ecstacy of enjoyment, the air so soft and balmy, all so still, so
peaceful, apparently ; one must here awhile forget the lurking serpent.
You return to the house by the orchards and cultivated lands
by the greenhouse, hothouse, and pineries. A house that cost a small fortune
has been built to shelter a single banana tree that grows within its hot
atmosphere, bears fruit and puts forth its great green leaves three feet or
more in length. Unheard-of plants are clambering about the conservatories; the
more ordinary beauties of the greenhouse and of the parterre smile in boundless
profusion and perfection of bloom. Pines and figs of three or four varieties,
melons I should be afraid to tell you how large, for you would not credit me.
Cantaloupes, peaches, pears, and the most delicious nectarines are brought
fresh to the table every day. Shooting galleries and billiard rooms, elegantly
fitted up for ladies as well as gentlemen, are placed in picturesque positions
in the grounds and gardens. Stables and offices all concealed, nothing to
offend the most fastidious taste. One continually wonders that such a Paradise
can be made on earth.
. . . My duties are very nominal. Indeed, I have nothing to
do but represent General Grant ... I ride a little way morning and evening for
exercise. I take good care of myself, and do not suffer much from the heat. I
should be very happy if you were with me, for amid all this almost voluptuous
luxury, I have no one to love me; they minister from fear, not affection. Amid
the busiest throng I am very lonely. The “months that are passing slowly away
into years” are hurrying us forward to the sea of eternity. The prime and vigor
of my life is going oh, so fast! And all these months I have laid in the saps,
and trenches, and swamps, and by the roadside and in the forest. Sometimes like
a stag at bay, ever ready to spring upon an assailant, a heart so longing for
home and sweet home affections, yet so hardened to suffering, so strange to all
that is homelike.
I sit me down in quiet and think. I have not the excitement
of the battle and skirmish, bivouac and march, to drain all my physical
energies and keep my heart from throbbing, at times anxiously throbbing with
anguish unspeakable. I think of you all at home, of you and my dear little
children, of my darling mother and sweetest sister. How I am blessed in all of
you, how proud I am of all of you, and yet sweetest intercourse by hard sad
fate is denied. I must work on in the storm of battle, borne forward on the
wings of the whirlwind of the strife of the people, the tornado of political
elements, far behind I leave you all in flowery meads and pastures green. The
storm has passed you and all is serene, only on either side you see the wreck
of those who have fallen. My mission is not yet done. I go to prepare you all a
way, if not for you, for my children, if not for them, still for those who come
after. God's hand is in all this, be of good cheer, and fear not. I complain a
little to myself; sometimes I could cry aloud in very agony of spirit; I have
been so desolate, but it is all wrong. I have been selected for some purpose or
I should not be here and hindered as I am from the heart's best affections; it
is meet that I should suffer. I propose to bear my cross gracefully and without
murmur. As for you all, all who are dear, oh, how dear to me, sister, mother, children,
wife, weld your affections, be all in all to one another, bear with each other,
it will be but a little while; in all your sufferings, there will be much joy,
and soon, if not in this world, in another we shall be together and at peace.
How long I shall stay here, I am uncertain. I want to go to
Mobile and shall try to get in with a flag of truce, if I cannot arrange it
otherwise. We sent there yesterday, by steamboat City of Madison, a
large number of wounded and sick rebel officers. I shall return to Vicksburg
first, however, and perhaps before the close of this week. Simultaneously with
the reception of this letter, if I am fortunate enough in getting it off, you
will have heard of General Sherman's success at Jackson, where Johnson had
fortified himself. The victory is complete. Now we have the Mississippi River
open, we have the capital and two principal towns of his State, the control of
the whole State, I wonder how Mr. Jefferson Davis feels. My plans may be
altered upon my return to Vicksburg. I cannot tell yet.
SOURCE: Walter George Smith, Life and letters of
Thomas Kilby Smith, p. 323-7
