CHAPTER V.
A Woman's Record




INTRODUCTORY.


Among those who early espoused the Southern Cause, few, perhaps, were
more in earnest than my husband and myself. Our patriotism was at the
very outset put to a crucial test. The duties of a soldier and a
civilian became incompatible. Being in ill health, it was thought best
that I should go to my mother at the North for awhile. My husband,
after preliminary service with the "Minute Men" and the State troops,
as a member of Company A, Crescent Rifles, was, with this company,
regularly mustered into the Confederate service in April, 1861, and
left for Pensacola, Florida, where the Crescent Rifles, with the
Louisiana Guards, Orleans Cadets, Shreveport Guards, Terrebonne
Rifles, and Grivot Guards, were organized into the Dreux Battalion. It
was then supposed that "the affair" would be "settled in ninety days."

From my house of refuge I watched eagerly the course of events, until
at last all mail facilities were cut off, and I was left to endure the
horrors of suspense as well as the irritating consciousness that,
although sojourning in the home of my childhood, I was an alien, an
acknowledged "Rebel," and as such an object of suspicion and dislike
to all save my immediate family. Even these, with the exception of my
precious mother, were bitterly opposed to the South and Secession.
From mother I received unceasing care, thorough sympathy, surpassing