And Other Memories of the Sixties BY MRS. JAMES MADISON WASHINGTON ( Mrs. A. A. Washington ) New York and Washington THE NEALE PUBLISHING COMPANY 1907 Green and golden memories Of the thrilling time When hearts and hands were true as steel In our sunny Southern clime. A. A. W....

HOW BEAUTY WAS SAVED In the summer of 1862, in the Bayou Manchac country near Baton Rouge, Louisiana, there was a modest little schoolhouse called the "Dove's Nest." To that school came two young girls to complete a course of study begun in Baton Rouge before the Federals captured that city. The country was visited quite often by bands of Confederates, "Jayhawkers," [1] and Federals; the slaves on the vast sugar plantations were in a demoralized condition from being so near the enemy's lines; ye

THE TELLTALE GLOVES The Federals having left, and Beauty being safe, we proceeded with our exercises that summer day at the "Dove's Nest." We passed a good examination, and just as we were singing our gayest songs a party of Confederates rode up. They tied their horses to the windows and doors, came in, and enjoyed the little concert. After the last melody had died away and the shades of evening were falling, we rode slowly homeward, each girl with a soldier boy beside her. One of the soldiers,

THE MAGIC SIGN " I have come to destroy your tannery and burn down your house." The officer spoke calmly, and my father did not answer for a moment. After school closed I had returned to my home, which was about nine miles from the Federal lines. We had a small, rude tannery, for our family, including the servants, was quite large, and, as there was no place to get shoes in that part of Louisiana, my father employed a shoemaker and tanned his own leather. Our home was beautiful, with spacious gr

A LABOR OF LOVE One day a little girl was reading a story-book on the green lawn in front of a Southern home; two gentlemen were seated near under a wide-spreading magnolia tree talking about the political situation, the number of Presidential candidates, and the possible results of the election. Suddenly one of them said, "Yes, there is trouble ahead. Before that child is grown this country will be plunged into bloody war." The child was startled. The prophetic words were indelibly stamped on h

THE "JAYHAWKERS" On New Year's Day, 1862, one of the coldest days ever known in Louisiana, we were all seated around a bright wood fire talking as usual of the war, and of our absent boys. All were gone to the front—not a man was left, except my father, an aged clergyman. As we talked, we were startled by the furious barking of dogs, the tramp of horses, and a loud "Hello" at the front gate. When the door was opened we saw about twenty or twenty-five men muffled up to their eyes, muffled quite b

MEMORIES OF SLAVE DAYS Rows and rows of white-washed cottages constituted the "quarters," with narrow streets between them, many of the little homes adorned with bright-hued, old-fashioned flowers in the front yards, or with potato and melon patches. On cold winter evenings bright firelight shone from every door and window. Inside, the father sitting in the chimney corner, smoking his pipe while he deftly wove white-oak splints into cotton baskets; the mother, mending, or knitting, while the fat

A NARROW ESCAPE One bright, beautiful day, we were all made happy by a visit from the oldest son of the family, a surgeon in the Confederate army. The river, winding almost around the plantation, was "up to its banks" from recent heavy rains, all the bridges had been destroyed, and we felt comparatively safe from the Federals on the other side, though Baton Rouge was only nine miles away. The Doctor, who wore Confederate gray ornamented with Louisiana pelican buttons, rode a fine large horse, wh