field more numerous than that with which Napoleon achieved the glory of France, an army

standing among its homesteads, an army in which each individual is superior in warlike
quality to the individual who opposes him
When the tumult and applause had died away did he realize in the secret places of his heart
that the spirit of the South had been broken by the terrible experiences of four years of blood
and fire and death His iron will gave no sign. To him the manhood of the Southern soldier
was unconquerable, his courage dauntless forever. Six months after Shermans sword had
pierced the heart of the South from Atlanta, Lees army in the trenches before Petersburg had
reached the
End of their endurance. Lee wired Davis that his men were living on parched corn and the
thin line could hold back Grants hosts but a few days and that Richmond must fall.
The President hurried to the White House and slipped his arm around his wife. You must
leave the city, my dear. Please let me stay with you, she pleaded. Impossible, he answered
firmly. My headquarters must be in the saddle. Your presence here could only grieve and
distress me. You can take care of our babies. I know you wish to help and comfort me. You
can do this in but one way go and take the children to a place of safety He paused, overcome
with emotion. If I live, he continued slowly, you can come to me when the struggle, is over,
but I do not expect to survive the destruction of our liberties.
He drew his small hoard of gold from his pocket, removed a fivedollar piece for himself, and
gave it all to his wife together with the Confederate money he had on hand. You must take
only you clothing, he said after a moments silence. The flour and supplies in your pantry
must be left. The people are in want. He had arranged for his family to settle in North
Carolina. The day before his wife left, he gave her a pistol and taught her trembling hands to
load, aim and fire it. The danger will be, he warned, that you may full into the hands of
lawless bands of deserters from both armies who are even now pillaging and burning. You
can at least, if you must, force your assailants to kill you. If you cannot remain undisturbed in
your own land make for the coast of Florida and take a ship for a foreign country.
Their hearts dumb with despair, his wife and children boarded the train or the thing that once
had been a train the roof of the cards leaded and the engine wheezed and moved with great
distress. The stern face of the Southern leader was set in his hour of trail. He felt that he
might never again look on the faces of those he loved. His little girl clung convulsively to his
neck in agonizing prayer that she might stay. The boy begged and pleaded with tears raining
down his chubby face. Just outside of Richmond the engine broke down and the heartsick
family sat in the dismal daycoach all night. Sleepers had not been invented. They were twelve
hours getting to Danville a week on the way of Charlotte. The reign of terror had already
begun. The Presidents wife avoided seeing people lest they should be compromised when the
invading army should sweep over the State. They found everything packed up in the house
that had been rented, but Weill, the bighearted Jew who was the agent, sent their meals from
his house for a week, refusing every suggestion of pay. He offered his own purse or any other
service he could render. When Burton Harrison had seen them safety established in Charlotte
he returned at once to his duties with the President in Richmond.