Brevet Martyrs

I SOMETIMES think we have, each one of us, a kind of private gold mine, which affords us a store of pleasant memories and fancies. It is strictly our own property, and may be as devoid of interest to mankind in general as are, to the unpracticed eyes, the desert places of a treasure-bearing soil. It would puzzle us to be asked the “ open sesame ” to this secret store, for often the perfume, the color, the strain, the chance grouping of familiar objects which worked the spell, cannot be recalled at will. There is an old record book in numerous volumes, with dingy covers and wellthumbed pages adorned with many a blot and rectifying finger-mark, which contains for me such hidden treasure. It is the record of the sixty thousand enlisted men who, in the far-off war times, were fed, clothed, lodged, and generally sustained at a sanitary commission “ Soldiers Home" in northern Ohio, situated on one of the great centres of railroad travel.

To eyes unanointed with the true, particular balsam there is nothing to attract or interest in what seems a mere business ledger, but to those of us who can still recall the recorded as clothed in flesh and blood these ill-spelt names are characters, recalling almost as many histories, grave and gay. They are names now entered on earthly and heavenly rolls of honor, and of the story of their lives circumstance has too often given us only stray pages, a prologue, an entr’acte, a finale. Can nothing be done to rescue these memories from certain oblivion, — nothing to save John Smith, martyr, and once private in the 20th Alaska Infantry, from being known solely as the recipient of one lodging in a Soldiers’ Home, three meals, and a flannel shirt ? It is something to remember that his name and rank are recorded in that carefully cherished volume ; but how can this John Smith, saint, preserve his identity in the immediate neighborhood of John Smith, sinner, since both are represented only by certain thick strokes of the enactic pen of that recording official who, for unknown cause, signs himself " per J. Jardine, Superintendent Soldiers’ Home ” ?

The ink fades, the page discolors; time is stealing away distinctness of form and clearness of outline. Virtues and faults are melting on memory’s horizon into a gentle haze of tender blue. In that sanctified region incipient halos are dawning over even the least worthy brows. Before it is too late, let us reanimate some of those shadowy personalities, beginning with a handful of memories of people who, while really but common flints, aspired to be estimated as gems from the old mine.

THE REFUGEE.

There was a time — now far removed within the mists of the dim 1860s — when the loyal public heart responded promptly to the watchword “refugee.” It was less stirred than at the mention of the stars and stripes, or at sight of the familiar pale blue of the faded army coats, even when in intimate association with barrel-organs, but still it is undeniable that for the thronging exiles from the Land of Dixie, whose number increased so enormously and so unaccountably during the last year of the war, the sympathy of the Northern public was prompt and ever on draught.

In those stormy days, indeed, the mantle of charity was broad, and in the case of the refugees covered many deserters from the South, who, while claiming to have suffered on account of the imputed righteousness of Union proclivities, were really, politically, neither fish, flesh, nor fowl. In the second year of the rebellion a slender stream of emigration trickled northward, which at last became a mighty torrent overflowing the land. We believed — how willingly ! — that all of these Southern refugees had seen the error of their ways; we forgot the parable of the rats and the sinking ship. We prepared for the manifold prodigal the robe and the ring, and introduced him to the heritage of the beloved elder son.

We inhabitants of the Border States can well remember those dismal wagon trains of emigration which crept along our white roads by day, and at night encamped under that strictly neutral flag, the star-set sky. What a vast proportion of women and children the caravans contained ! What mystery too often shrouded the absent husbands and brothers ! I believe we knew as well then as we know now the probable color of the absentees’ uniforms, convinced that the wearers were even then confronting loyal cannon, or, mustered out, lying under Virginia sod.

But Union colors were always flying at the peak, and the wagon trains coming to us from Tennessee brought many and many a family of loyal people, driven from their homes, insulted, persecuted, exiled by local tyranny. What sad freight those humble processions often bore ! — the pitiful wrecks of modest homes, those few household goods of the Tennessee mountaineers, endeared by inherited possession, made sacred by the usage of a lifetime, shabby and poor enough when torn from familiar association and unveiled to indifferent eyes. There was also that other freight of shadowy personal possessions which occupied no place in the crowded caravan, — the memory of things still more precious, destroyed in the course of the domiciliary visits made by neighbors of differing political creed, and warranted by Heaven knows what martial code. Some of the sad stories we heard and remember: of that cherry bureau, the boast of the Tennessee mountain home, chopped to pieces by the axes of suspicious acquaintances ; of the weddingquilt, the fireside chair, which had met the fate of common destruction.

But of these loyal refugees I do not propose to write. They have nothing in common with the martyrs of brevet rank whom I have in mind, and association with those who left their homes from motives of purest self-interest, unanimated by a spark of political principle, would but degrade the noble character of men who staked in defense of patriotism and loyalty all that can make life dear. We must earnestly wish that the history of those obscure men, remote from the sympathy of their fellows, to whom the expression of duty meant the surrender of home, of daily bread, often of life, may be worthily written. Our brevet martyr is one whom neither North nor South can honor.

The wandering caravans of refugees were like meteors in the orderly regions of planetary space. They roamed aimlessly from county to county, from town to town, and when the conditions appeared favorable made deposits of one or more families, who remained, generally the charge of the citizens, unassimilated, foreign, distinct, until the return of peace restored them to their former homes. Wherever the tents of these nomads were pitched in the unknown, despised North, some sweet spring of charity was sure to bubble up to the wayfarers’ refreshment. How many of these strangers were loyal through inward conviction, or were converts to the Union plenty, we were wise enough not to inquire too closely. The immediate question regarding those pinched, hatchet-faced men and women, with complexions of café-au-lait, was the one so satisfactorily answered by Mr. Dick, who, when asked by Miss Betsey Trotwood what to do with David Copperfield, replied, “ Give him something to eat.” The Soldiers’ Homes of the Sanitary Commission were ordinarily the objective point of all or any whose sufferings could be traced even indirectly to the war. In the hurry, the hot haste, of stirring times, these Homes afforded the relief of immediate want even to those who applied with all their equipment of public and private prejudice.

With the opening of 1864 came an influx of deserters from the Confederate army, and the passing charity of a meal or a lodging was never refused them by the Soldiers’ Homes. There were sometimes almost as many gray as blue coated men in the common sitting-room of these institutions, where, gathered about the huge stove, war stories were told and favorite commanders discussed and compared. But the strangers were silent, these men seemingly of alien race, posing as that historic prodigal, confessing sin and imploring protection, — men who had fought three years for a cause, and deserted only when success under its flag became uncertain. They contributed nothing to the fervid discussions as to which general was the best leader: Grant, who “led his men straight up to fortifications,” or Sherman, who “always flanked ’em.” The prodigals were on other thoughts intent : how to get away from the drafting-wheel of Union provost-marshals, and on what degree of the map of the Northern States the line of perfect safety from enlistment could be drawn. Anything more hopeless can hardly be imagined than the attempts made by the local officers of the Sanitary Commission to help these “ truly loyal ” applicants, who had no remotest idea how to help themselves. If further progress northward could not be effected, employment must be obtained for the brevet martyr, a peaceful old age spent by the fireside of a Soldiers’ Home being the alternative. Philanthropy has ever a weighty profit-andloss account to keep, and even subsequent enlightenment cannot induce vain regrets over the occasional unworthy recipients of the bounty, so broad and free, of the great North.

Here is a typical specimen of the genus brevet martyr, species Virginiensis, entered on memory’s ledger. Behold “Jeems” Brown redivivus, loose-jointed, shambling, inert, butternut in complexion as in coat. Do you not wonder that energy was developed in that limp personality to procure his escape from the Confederate States, the necessary crawling through hostile lines, the struggling through nature’s sterner defenses of marsh and tangled forests ? He has his credentials from the Confederate authorities, descriptive list unrecorded, unsigned, but unmistakable. His history as verbally related is simple : Jeems, born near Petersburg, Virginia, the son of a small planter, or farmer, who was the owner of fifteen slaves, was drafted into the Confederate army in 1862, deserted virtuously and repeatedly, was three times conscripted with ever-fresh zeal, and, in view of the inevitable, discovered that he could not “ fight against the old flag; ” so, summoning his brothers five, who had also, apparently, passed the time in endeavoring to avoid the draft and cultivating the arts of peace, they took to their heels one fine night, swam rivers, waded swamps, hid by day, progressed by night, deftly eluded sentinels, and reached at last the land of safety, with only a bullet-hole through Jeems’s right sleeve and a corresponding vacuum in the flesh of the right arm as a parting token of esteem from a watchful Confederate picket.

All these dangers past, and full three hundred miles stretching between themselves and possible capture, the Brown brothers presented themselves at the Sanitary Commission Soldiers’ Home of a flourishing and patriotic Northern town as candidates for the sympathy of the loyal, as suffering Unionists, — in short, as brevet martyrs in defense of constitutional right.

What could be done with them ? We of the Sanitary Commission were not unused to having various species of distress gently assisted to our observation by a loyal but preoccupied public. We found it absolutely necessary to remove that solid presentment of martyrdom in six divisions, seated in helpless despondency by the stove of our office. That was, indeed, a circle of hopeless figures, with shabby coats of dead-leaf shades, boots, with autobiographic soil attached, extended to the reviving heat, drooping forms, shock heads, bad hats; the only sentiment discernible a mild revival of vital force, as the warmth and sense of comfort penetrated the outer mail of wretchedness. But let us remember that around the youngest Brown brother, a boy of fifteen, the solitary warm garment, an old shepherd’s plaid, was pinned.

Yes, the problem was there, not to be ignored, — a many-headed problem, which must be fed, clothed, warmed, and suitably established on the high-road to fortune. Thank Heaven, at that period we still kept open the Soldiers’ Home, whose charity was broad as its white face, and into that fold the wandering flock was turned, while the next step was anxiously discussed.

The Brown brothers were open to any proposition from any quarter whatever on the question of employment, provided the exact kind of work suited to their capacity and experience could be found.

“ What can you do ? ” we asked of Jeems. “ What have you done ? ” “ Merchandising,” was the too frequent reply from the brevet martyr.

But we had already ten exiles registered upon the books of our Sanitary Commission Employment Agency for that particular industry. In 1864 we had systematized our efforts to find occupation for the disabled discharged soldiers, a task imperative and disheartening, opened the books of an employment agency, and provided our office with a blackboard at its door, setting forth the nature of our wants.

Ben Brown’s tastes and habits inclined him to the profession of horsedealing, and we were again discouraged. Another exile proposed to borrow from the “ Sanitary ” the money wherewith to build an attractive saloon commanding the Union railroad depot, and sure to ensnare returning paid-off soldiers. With these propositions the way was blocked on the part of the brevet martyrs. But what were benevolent and distracted institutions to do, with ten exiles on their hands to be fed, lodged, and salaried ?

Emphatic and startling notices were chalked upon our bulletin-board, bristling with capitals and underscored with triple lines: —

“WANTED!

Situations for ten able-bodied men as clerks, merchants, tailors, draymen, blacksmiths, shoemakers. Apply at Employment Agency, Sanitary Commission Office, No. 20 Independence Street.”

Now they really could do one of these things as well as the other.

Our friends were personally entreated : —

“ Dear Mr. Railroad Superintendent, good Mr. Engineer, kind Mr. BridgeBuilder, can you not find something to do for a refugee or two, or possibly nine or ten ? The poor fellows have had a hard time of it, and are quite destitute, — loyal, too, you know; Southern Unionists, rare species,” etc., etc. Then followed the singular and oft-told tale of loyalty and flight, — nouns in unpleasant conjunction.

Hearts of stone could not resist such a plea, and a personal interview was appointed with a tenth part of the applicants. Alas that the outward man of our brevet martyr did not always convey conviction of inward worth! But perhaps we were at last so fortunate as to find an employer whose requirements were modest enough to be filled by our Jeems, and a fractional part of the burden was lifted from our soul. Let it not be supposed that the object of so much solicitude had shared our anxiety. His confidence in the protecting properties of the old flag was quite childlike. He dined, lounged, and possessed his soul in peace.

Unluckily there seemed no affinity between man and place. Can this be the refugee returning to the home, expectant of robes and fatted calf ? ’Tis he, a little depressed, yet calmly resigned. We receive him with mild displeasure. We begin to cast longing glances at the recruiting office over the way, but on that point our Jeems can be firm. We suspect that an armed neutrality may not be the best method of showing devotion to the oft-adjured “ old flag.” “ Why don’t you enlist ? ” “ Cos I’d be hung ef I was kotched.” “ But need you be caught ? ” we murmur.

One lucky investment relieved us of several stalwart but unresolvable refugees, who, replying to the advertisement of a new railroad company, were provided with axes and pitted against those primeval forests which are currently supposed to be stepping on the toes of our young Western cities. But our brevet martyrs speedily reduced themselves to a pensionable condition, and we knew that there was no pension law applicable to their case, yet we were briefly, rapturously happy. This happiness not even the periodical return of one and another refugee, on foraging intent, who appeared by favor of a passing train or other fortunate circumstance, could reduce to its antecedent despair. A lean, lank, shambling figure still haunts the door of memory’s chamber, as — how often !—it leaned against a palpable door casing, the features of the brevet martyr contorted into what was supposed to be an engaging expression.

“ Jeems, are you here again ? ”

“ Yes, 'um. I dun come for to tote some stores. Could yer gimme a tin cup ? ”

“ No ! ” firmly. “ Everything necessary was given you when you went down on the railway.”

“ Any sugar ? Jes’ a chaw of terbaccer ?”

“ No ! ” crescendo.

“Well, missus, can’t yer gimme some coffee ? ”

“ No, no ! ” with an attempt to interpose the door between ourselves and that horrible leer.

“ Butter ? “ is inserted between the jaws of the closing door, and a faint murmur of “ Cheese ? ” dies away in the distance.

So much for the brevet martyr in outline. Numerous, indeed, were the variations of that type. Like the captive Israelites, the brevet-martyr host dwelt in the land of strangers, a separate people, relinquishing none of the strange habits of life which mark the wide divergence of their species ; viewing the comfort and luxury of the North with more than the stolid indifference of the Indian, — with the silent contempt of the resident in Jackson County, Florida. It was not an unusual spectacle, that of a cracker family established under a tent pitched on a vacant lot in the heart of the city, or settled in an empty shed, the centre of every small eddy of passing curiosity, unconscious of it all; dipping, smoking, chewing, squatting about a small fire; eating how, when, and what fate might direct; throwing the responsibility of continuing this half existence upon the “ Yankee,” because of that shadowy flag which, like the shadow of the cross, blessed all beneath its shelter.

Indeed, the generic name “ refugee ” seemed that typical omnibus which was always able to contain one more variety of the species.

Let me recall another example, — a brevet martyr from the Tennessee Mountains, he claimed, — unfortunately and mistakenly visited with the wrath of his disloyal neighbors, and suffering martyrdom most unjustly and to his own amazement.

He was a man of tall, commanding presence, shabby black alpaca coat, over which streamed age’s flag of truce in silvered locks. So organically connected with his personality was his black leather portmanteau that it emphasized his sentences, and served to elucidate descriptive statements. He was a mendicant of rare ability, and poured forth to the auditor his tale of woe, from the first inexplicable but unlucky conviction of loyalty in his Tennessee home to the consequent destruction of his personal property and his own too hasty flight.

The crisis of the story was heralded and accompanied invariably by frantic wavings of the black portmanteau, as the martyr drew near and still nearer to his audience in the élan of narration, which always culminated in this peroration denunciatory of “ the neighbors ” at home: “An’ when Gabriel blows, dear, what’ll they do then, dear, when they see me a-coming up to judgment ? ” What, indeed ?

THE SPY.

A strange variation of the species brevet martyr was Charlotte Anderson ; hardly to be classed among the refugees, although pleading suffering and loss through the war as a claim for the honors of the type.

It is an old saying that corporations have no souls, but the war gave evidence to the fallacy of that proposition as upon many another disputed point. Only those who, as agents of the people’s bounty to its soldiers, had occasion to ask the help of the great railroad companies of the West know the enormous sum of unheralded good done by their officers to the penniless wives and children of men sick in hospital, and to discharged soldiers returning from the front. We of northern Ohio fully appreciate the tax upon the charity of the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati and the Cleveland and Pittsburg railroad companies from the beginning to the end of the war.¹ We remember that no favor for soldier, for his wife or widow, was ever refused when the plea was supported by the reasonable judgment of the officers of the local Sanitary Commission, who, on this account, pledged themselves to the utmost care in protecting the generous companies from imposition.

In the winter of 1865, the number of spies and deserters had marvelously increased, the government’s plans of campaigns were frequently and mysteriously betrayed, and undoubtedly too many of the refugee recipients of Northern bounty, in their safe and comfortable places of refuge, were discharging the debt of hospitable reception by eager and accurate reports of observations to the authorities of the Confederate States; in short, it was impossible at that period to know who might not be taking treasonable notes. On a day of this year two women entered the rooms of the Sanitary Commission in the very city of northern Ohio of which we have been writing. The ladies who were the officers of the local Sanitary Commission were just leaving the great storehouse of hospital supplies, those articles of awful significance with which custom had made them familiar. There were the huge receptacles lining the sides of the room, marked for the collection of the rags, lint, compresses, invoiced by the donors as garments; there on the desk lay the day-book, wherein a patriotic and faithful woman, disciple of order, had labored to reconcile those discrepancies between debit and credit which were too often forced by hasty ardor. There were the boxes of hospital stores, unloaded, but yet unpacked, containing the gifts of a self-devotion and self-sacrifice of which our Western world had hitherto known nothing. A pile of neat packing-cases, which was then awaiting shipment, occupied its own space, wherein, classified, reconstructed hospital stores were sent to the front. Struggling with the shadows which sought to combine and confuse outline and shape was the great castellated stove, looking eight ways at once with its circle of unwinking eyes.

The more delicate-looking of the two strangers told their story. Mrs. Charlotte Anderson, of central New York, claimed to be the wife of a private soldier, who had recently been ill in a hospital in Louisville, Kentucky. She said she had gone to him on hearing of his illness, had nursed him until he was able to return to his regiment, and was going back to her own home, when on the train her pocket was picked, and she found herself penniless in a strange city. She said enough, and no more, and the customary close inquiry failed to shake her story on any most trivial point. She was thoroughly familiar with her Louisville surroundings, replied quietly and courteously to any searching query made, and by her appearance personally vouched for the correctness of her position. Charlotte was essentially ladylike and refined, fair-haired, slight, and of delicate complexion. Her story was by no means improbable; indeed, was not uncommon. The general unspoken verdict was in her favor.

“ But,” said the shrewd little president of the Sanitary Commission, " who is this other person ? ”

“ Oh,” replied Mrs. Charlotte, “ she is a soldier’s wife, too. I met her on the cars ; she is out of money, and would like to get a ticket for transportation.”

“ Well,” decided the president, “I think we may promise you a ticket, but hardly this other woman, unless she can prove as good a claim as you present.”

“ But we can’t be separated ! ” broke suddenly and unexpectedly from soldier’s wife Number Two. The emphatic exclamation startled the little company, and a moment later the quickest witted of women, the secretary, quietly moved to the other side of the stove, to ascertain the condition of the fire. As she threw open the stove door, a broad shaft of flame-light fell full on the fair and gentle face of Mrs. Charlotte Anderson.

“ It is late,” said the secretary, " and the train does not leave until ten o’clock in the morning ; we will talk the matter over, and let you know our decision in your friend’s case early to-morrow.”

Well content, the women departed, and hurriedly and secretly the secretary imparted to her associates what she had read in Mrs. Charlotte Anderson’s face by the light of the tell-tale flame, — that the decorous soldier’s wife from Central New York was a man in disguise, and most probably a rebel spy. The ardor of the companion’s exclamation had excited the secretary’s suspicion, and closer scrutiny revealed a truth which the other Sanitary Commission officers accepted as a matter of faith, unsupported by a particle of personal conviction.

The secretary was firm, and as about steadfast objects indeterminate things will collect, so, without the coöperation of her companions, but without objection from them, she summoned the provost-marshal from the adjoining building to advise as to future action.

But Colonel Lee could not be found, nor would he return to his office that night.

At half past eight o’clock on the following morning, the Sanitary Commission corps assembled, and by the office porter, Mike, sent message after message to the provost-marshal, all of which found him still not reported.

With waning time, with obstacles accumulating, the faith of the secretary in her convictions became ever stronger. It survived the shock of seeing Mrs. Charlotte Anderson and her attached companion enter the office about nine o’clock; the former, neat, trim, fragile, delicate as before, the cruel eye of day failing to reveal joints in her armor. The body of the Sanitary Commission officers promptly deserted, but mentally only, to Mrs. Charlotte’s side.

Every courteous method was employed to detain the strangers, the porter being still kept in a state of constant progression from the Sanitary Commission quarters to the office of the provostmarshal. The provost guard lounged on the stairs ; there was everything at hand save the requisite authority. It was ten, twenty, twenty-five minutes past nine ; no valid excuse presented itself for further delay. The order for transportation was given Charlotte, her companion was recommended to the state agent at the depot, and in her own excellent language the former expressed gratitude for the favors, graceful, sufficient. After them, at a safe distance, down the hill to the Union depot, went the faitliful Mike, with orders to the station police officer to arrest the woman who should be pointed out to him, as certainly a man in female dress, and in all probability a deserter or rebel spy. He soon returned, breathless, with this note from Officer Smith Potter : — “ I bin deppo officer here this twenty year, and I know a man when I see him, and I know a woman when I see her. I can’t be tooken in, and I can’t arrest that woman neither.”

I shall always insist that it required in the secretary more than that faith which removes mountains to persevere in her theory, in face of the immense experience of a veteran policeman, and with only the limp support of her associates to back her. Only one precious space of time remained for decision, — one moment, upon whose issues who can say what fate lay trembling ? But fifteen minutes remained before train time, and the station was distant a live minutes’ walk. Just then Colonel Lee sauntered down to his morning duties, and with no deferring now to the rights of private judgment, was requested firmly, on sufficient grounds, to be later explained, to arrest the woman who should be indicated by the energetic Mike.

By ten o’clock Mrs. Charlotte Anderson and her friend were ushered into the provost-marshal’s office, under a strong guard, and the president and vice-president of the Sanitary Commission were summoned to give evidence.

The secretary at her desk in the little glazed-in office behind the Sanitary Commission storehouse awaited the decision which should win her the gratitude of a spy-ridden country, or render her forever the scoff of the police contingent.

Time dragged on, but at last the door opened, and Colonel Lee led in a young, fair-haired man dressed in the uniform of a private in the United States army.

“ Mrs. Charlotte Anderson.”

There was only one unworthy, but she hopes patriotic, woman who turned away her eyes, lest over-curious gaze should increase discomfiture. But it must be said no signs of such emotion were evident on the impassive countenance of Mrs. Charlotte. She, or rather he, had undeniable grit, shown not only during this trying interview, but throughout subsequent confinement in military prisons. Even a year later, when reported at Harper’s Ferry, he had never allowed the natural sound of his voice to be heard, disguised by some unknown but effectual means. So far as known, he had never revealed anything nor betrayed anything of his real personality nor of the nature of his mission.

The inquiries made by the provostmarshal revealed the fact that Charlotte and his companion had been staying in the city for some days, at one of the second-rate respectable hotels. He had received voluminous mail through the post-office, and half an hour before appearing at the Sanitary Commission office, on that fatal morning, had obtained several letters, which he had read and destroyed, telling the postmaster to burn any which might afterwards arrive. None, however, subsequently came for him.

Charlotte Anderson’s trunk, which was seized on board the train, revealed the importance of the mission. It contained disguises of many and diverse kinds : the uniform of a major-general in the United States army, one of an officer of similar rank in the Confederate army, the dress of privates in both services, female attire of various styles and degree, and a handsome citizen dress. The outfit was so costly as to indicate operations of a delicate and dangerous nature.

For one so bold and clever as the prisoner, so provided against detection, and so ready in expedient to founder upon the rock of exposure, for the sake of spoiling the Egyptians to so small an amount as a free railroad journey, is certainly mysterious, and can only be explained on the ground of the recklessness induced by a long course of successful fraud, effected by a disguise so perfect as to defy the criminal experience of a veteran police officer.

The circumstances of the case certainly sustained the assumption that in the capture of Charlotte Anderson the Sanitary Commission had rendered important service to the government.

Upon Charlotte’s arrest he made a curious affidavit, which, although minute in detail, was believed by the provostmarshal to be entirely false. In this affidavit, so called, although unsigned, he claimed to be a member of Company D, 60th Ohio Infantry, first having served in the 39th Pennsylvania V. I. He said he was a native of Hamburg, and enlisted at Erie, Pennsylvania. According to this statement, he had repeatedly deserted under both enlistments, and could not clearly explain whether the present journey was towards his regiment or in full retreat.

It must be said that the story was entirely unworthy of the clever Charlotte, who had so deftly defied inquiry from the Sanitary Commission officials, but the significance of the affidavit lay in the man’s anxiety to profess himself a deserter, — no light charge to be brought against a soldier at that critical period of the war. The character was evidently assumed to hide a graver charge, — that of being a spy and informer; and as such Charles Anderson was regarded, and under that charge held a prisoner.

Emma, as his companion was called, claimed to have known nothing of Anderson’s deception, but admitted the falseness of the first statement regarding her own status. She told wonderful stories of her friend’s accomplishments : that he could sew, knit, crochet, and embroider ; dance, sing, play on the piano, and speak three languages fluently ; and to these attainments he added the unfeminine accomplishment of firing a pistol with perfect aim and of riding admirably.

Emma was allowed to go her own way, because, although false and unreliable, there was no evidence of her being the accomplice of Anderson in his more serious undertakings. One curious admission she is said to have made : that her companion expressed most vindictive feeling against the North, and threatened to kill President Lincoln. He was then, she insisted, on his way to Washington, and this was three months before the President’s death.

The pretended residence of Anderson in Erie, Pennsylvania, was easily disproved, as he betrayed complete ignorance of all local features, and subsequently contradicted his previous statements on this point.

In time, the Soldiers’ Homes rejected the assumed loyalty of these refugees as of base coinage, granting them only the occasional grace of a meal or lodging. Then, by some impalpable but reliable impulse of information, the majority of refugees sought assistance elsewhere. There were strangers’ societies, who took the wanderers in, and by whom the compliment was, as a rule, returned. On the record books of these associations can be found many curious histories : as, for instance, that of Mr. Fly nobly refusing to consider the five dollars granted to his necessities as a gift, but receiving it simply as a loan, which of course relieved him from obligation. Exit Fly from the record and forever ! — and there are many such. It is pathetic to see how faith and purest womanly feeling returned to the encounter, when so often and so brutally knocked out. Martyr after martyr proved the brevet character of his rank, hut his successor was believed in, trusted, helped, encouraged. There were plenty of bright spots in this record, but, as I said before, I am concerned only with the false claimants.

The brevet martyr is a thing of the past, and a gentle curiosity prompts the query, Where and what is he now ? Is he re-assimilated with his old surroundings, unchanged, unimproved? Has the touch of a finer civilization left the denizen of mountains and pine forest where it found him, torpid, inert, or have new and restless impulses disturbed that predeluge quiet?

Time alone can solve this problem, — time to develop insignificant germs of higher life. Something better and loftier did germinate and display vigorous life among equally unfavorable conditions, in the real martyrs which the Border States produced ; in those men who, rising above the petty limitations of state and neighborhood, recognized the environing urgency of the national peril. Is not this an earnest of possible resurrection and revivification even for their brothers of brevet rank?

E. T. Johnson.