The Union Quilters (15 page)

“He had to keep them in the Union or all might have been lost,” Dorothea explained. “He knew that winning the war and preserving the Union would lead to the end of slavery. He had no choice but to wait until he thought the people would accept the proclamation. He and his party will still suffer for it in the fall elections, I fear, but not enough to throw the nation off this noble course.”

That all made sense, more or less, but her friends’ joy still perplexed Anneke. She had read a copy of the Emancipation Proclamation posted outside the Waterʹs Ford courthouse, and it seemed full of ambiguity and uncertainty. What would become of the men, women, and children enslaved in the loyal Union border states of Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri? Why were Tennessee and entire counties within Louisiana exempted simply because they had returned to Union control? What practical good did it do to declare slaves free in areas where the people didn’t even consider Mr. Lincoln to be their president and therefore were highly unlikely to obey his laws? Anneke acknowledged that she might have missed something as she read the English words and translated them into German in her head, but it seemed to her that Mr. Lincoln had emancipated slaves where the Union could not free them and kept them enslaved in places where the Union did enjoy the power to give them liberty. She failed to see how that was cause for celebration.

Two weeks later, even Gerda and Dorothea had their elation sharply cut short at alarming news from the southern part of the state. On October 10, Confederate general Jeb Stuart led eighteen hundred cavalry across the border into southern Pennsylvania on a mission to capture horses, take hostages to hold for ransom, and burn a railroad bridge over Conococheague Creek at Scotland, five miles north of Chambersburg and about one hundred miles south of Waterʹs Ford, in order to cut off Union General McClellan’s supply lines. In Mercersburg, the raiders looted stores of boots and shoes, seized horses, captured several hostages, and terrified the people. In St. Thomas, a small band of defenders scattered when fired upon, but two fled to warn the citizens of nearby Chambersburg. That evening, Stuart set up his cannons on a hill above the town, demanded its surrender, and occupied Chambersburg without incident. His men cut telegraph wires and captured wounded Union soldiers recovering in local hospitals, though Stuart promptly paroled them. When Stuart sent out a party to burn the Cumberland Valley Railroad bridge, the men returned with the disappointing report that the bridge, made of iron, would not burn. Fortunately for the Union, Stuart’s men did not bother to confirm the clever townspeople’s story, for the bridge was actually made of wood, and quite flammable. The Rebel rearguard found other resources to burn as General Stuart led his men out of Chambersburg—the railroad depot, railroad cars, warehouses storing military supplies, machine shops, business—and they managed to avoid Union troops led by General Stuart’s own father-in-law as they made off with goods, several hostages, and more than twelve hundred horses.

Word of the daring raid did not reach the Elm Creek Valley until after General Stuart and his men had already left Pennsylvania and crossed White’s Ford into Virginia, but it left them badly shaken. Until then the war had seemed far away, their homes and farms never truly in danger. Their men had marched off to enlist little more than a year before, but never had the women and children and elderly left behind felt their absence more keenly.

The war did not pause to give them time to catch their breath and allow their fears to subside, and neither did politics. On the same day General Stuart left Pennsylvania, the congressional elections were held. Dorothea’s prediction came true, for the Democrats made gains in Pennsylvania as well as several other states. For the first time too, Pennsylvania had not met its federal enlistment quota and had begun enrollment for a draft. Recruiters urged men to volunteer while they could, because if they were drafted, they could be stuck in any regiment anywhere rather than with men they knew and trusted. Although Hans dismissed such talk as scare tactics, other men were thus compelled to enlist. But not everywhere. Not long after the election, resistance to the unpopular militia draft erupted in several Pennsylvania counties, the most severe occurring about 125 miles to the east in Luzerne County, where troops were called in to put down opposition. Further dismaying Anneke was talk of a growing Copperhead movement in the state, especially among the German population. Dissent amongst their countrymen would only cast additional suspicion upon Hans. Another man might decide to enlist to prove his loyalty, but not Hans. He was stubborn, and he didn’t care that their neighbors believed him to be a coward or glared jealously at Anneke in the market or around the sewing circle because her husband was safe at home.

Anneke was determined to give no one any reason to question her loyalty. She worked at quilting bees and fairs and entertainments at Union Hall to raise money for the soldiers, baby Albert in her arms. She served on the committee for the Harvest Dance, an annual Waterʹs Ford celebration that the Union Quilters took over from the town and turned into a fund-raiser for the Veterans’ Relief Fund. After President Lincoln delivered his annual address to Congress on the first of December, a month before the Emancipation Proclamation would take effect, Anneke arranged for a distinguished professor from the University of Pennsylvania to present a lecture on the subject. Despite the snow falling outside, a curious and eager crowd filled Union Hall to hear the scholar’s interpretation of the address, his analysis of the president’s proposed constitutional amendments, and his predictions for the future. At twenty-five cents apiece, the admission charges paid for the professorʹs fee and travel expenses, with a healthy sum left over to purchase enough supplies to knit two pairs of warm wool socks for each soldier in Company L.

In addition to raising money, the professor’s lecture prompted other questions for Anneke, especially regarding President Lincoln’s proposed constitutional amendment that Congress provide federal funds for the voluntary colonization of free persons of color abroad. “Would you want to go?” she asked Constance, the only colored person she knew well enough to feel comfortable asking.

Constance seemed taken aback by the very idea. “I was born in this country. My husband and children were born free in this country. What are we going to do, sell our farm, load Abel’s cattle and goats on a boat, and start dairying somewhere in Africa? I’m sorry, but unless Mr. Lincoln plans to change that ‘voluntary colonization’ to ‘forced,’ he’s stuck with us colored folks for the long haul.”

Anneke knew Constance was far more concerned about a certain provision of the Emancipation Proclamation that would definitely take effect on the first day of January than a proposed amendment that might not go anywhere: the statement that all emancipated slaves “of suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.” If freed slaves could serve in that manner, wouldn’t freeborn men of color in the North be permitted to as well? Anneke almost envied Constance, who might soon be the proud wife of a Union soldier—sooner than Anneke would, at any rate.

The Union Quilters hosted a lucrative Christmas Fair at the hall, made another five dozen quilts for a second new military hospital in Washington, and sewed a banner for the men of Company L to carry into battle. Anneke participated in every cause, thinking that surely any reasonable person would conclude that Hans was no Copperhead, or he would not permit his wife to engage in such activities.

The New Year began with prayers for a better year than the one before. The men of the 49th Pennsylvania wrote home about the ill-fated Mud March under General Burnside and their encampment at White Oak Church in Virginia. At the end of February, Congress passed a new conscription bill declaring that all able-bodied male citizens and men of foreign birth between the ages of twenty and forty-five who had declared their intention to become citizens were liable to perform military duty in service to the United States. Some exceptions were made for the infirm, officials within the highest levels of government, the only son of widows, the only son of aged parents dependent upon his labor, and felons, among others, but the remainder would be subject to the draft. Quotas for each district would be established based upon the population and the number of residents already engaged in the service. Once drafted, a man could hire a substitute or buy his way out of the service for three hundred dollars. Dorothea found this provision appalling. “It is bad enough that any man should go to war,” she said, “but now rich men will avoid service while poor men fight in their stead.”

Hans thought the threat of the draft alone would increase volunteering, but Anneke wasn’t so sure. “Perhaps you should pay the exception fee,” she suggested.

“What for?” Hans replied. “I never declared my intention to become a citizen, I’ve never voted in this state, and I’m in no danger of being drafted.”

“But this would be an honorable way out.”

Hans’s expression became stormy. “Standing by my convictions is my honorable way out. If you want me to give three hundred dollars to the cause, I’ll sell a horse and send the money to Jonathan. The army is desperate for horses, and God knows Jonathan has great need of cash to improve those tents in the mud that pass for field hospitals.”

So they did, and Jonathan wrote a lengthy letter thanking them and describing in detail every good purpose to which he had put their donation. Even so, Anneke found Hans’s alternative unsatisfying, because only Jonathan and the Bergstroms knew about it. What good was conclusive evidence of Hans’s patriotism if it were not made public? How unlike Abel he was, Abel who followed the news of colored Union regiments forming in Southern states and eagerly awaited his opportunity to carry his rifle into battle.

Spring came to the valley, cool and rainy. The farmers returned to their fields, the women to their gardens. News came of bread riots in Richmond, naval attacks on Charleston, and the death of Stonewall Jackson, who had succumbed to pneumonia after the amputation of his arm. The 49th Pennsylvania saw action at Chancellorsville, Franklin’s Crossing, Bernard House, and other distant towns that Anneke had never heard of and would surely never see. In Boston, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteers set out for Hilton Head, South Carolina, the first colored regiment to be sent from the North. Constance reported that Abel was fairly bursting with anticipation, sure that he would soon find a way to go forth and meet the enemy.

But then, defying all expectations, it seemed that the enemy would come to him.

General Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia was marching steadily toward Pennsylvania.

T
he Virginia countryside was almost deserted, the heat oppressive. On the way to Aquia, the 49th Pennsylvania passed only a few ramshackle houses, occupied by poor whites and some Negroes who watched them march by without surprise or rancor. They had seen armies come and go before and were resigned to them.

“We should go into the Rebel states, take all we can, use it up and destroy the rest,” Abner was saying. “If we don’t, the war will never end. What good do we do ourselves to set guards upon secesh property along the line of our march? After we pass through, the Rebels come back, and they use all those carefully protected goods for their own sustenance. We should leave them nothing to eat, no place to rest, no succor, no comfort.”

It was an old argument, and although Thomas saw some logic in it, he was too parched to spare the breath for rebuttal. Aside from the immorality of stealing or destroying the scarce provisions of women and children, the moment a soldier left the ranks to sack and despoil private homes, he was ruined, unfit for duty. That the Rebels might benefit from what the Union left for those poor innocents was a risk Thomas was willing to take, and he was glad his superiors apparently agreed. Besides, from what he could see, there wasn’t much left in that country to sustain the VI Corps anyway.

They passed through a town, or the remnants of one—a courthouse, a jail, a church, and two other buildings, one of which was on fire. It was past noon when they were called to a halt, to give stragglers a chance to catch up before Rebel snipers picked them off and to allow the ambulance crews to attend to the men who had collapsed from sunstroke. Three had died, Thomas heard as he stumbled to the thin shade offered by a pair of beech trees, a scant coolness he shared with eight other men.

Drinking sparingly from his canteen, he took measure of his surroundings and found that they had come to a stop a few yards from an old farmhouse. A man not ten years his elder watched them from the doorway, silent and dour. A curtain whispered away from a lower window; Thomas glimpsed a woman’s thin cheek and a thick tangle of brown hair on a young girl before the white linen drifted back into place.

The man squinted as he studied the soldiers sprawled out before his home, scowling around the mouthpiece of his pipe, the bowl cold and empty. Even in Virginia, tobacco was scarce, and when it could be found, it was ridiculously overpriced. In the yard, stiff weeds and grass grew where a garden had once been, and among them were tree roots, though there were no trees left nearby, curiously curved and shaped and bleached white by the sun—

“You there,” Thomas called to the man angrily. “Why haven’t you given those men a proper burial?”

“Probably buried them where they fell,” muttered David Barrows. “Why go to the effort to move blasted Yankees?”

“If they
are
Yankees,” another soldier said. “But I guess if they were Rebels, he would have carried them to the churchyard.”

“He could have covered them up, whoever they are,” said Abner, indignant. “It doesn’t look like he threw a single shovelful of earth over them.”

“I buried a heap of them,” the man called back, gesturing with his empty pipe to the east and west. “Rain carried the dirt away.”