SACK AND T)T:STKrCTI()N OF THE CrT i)¥ ('OLI VBIA. S. C. T(» WHICH IS ADDED A LIST (IF THE FHOPHHTV DESTROYED. ()!i!<, INAI.lv published IX THE \ ^' ; (U) L r M H I A 1) A 1 L y F H (E NIX. COLUMBIA, S. C. : roWEK PBESS OF DAILY PHCEIJIX. 1865. PERKINS LIBRARY Uuke University SACK AND DESTKUCTION OP THE CITY OF COLUMBIA. S. C. TO WHICH IS ADDED A LIST OF THE PROPERTY DESTROYED. COLUMBIA, S. C. : POWER PRESS OF DAILY PHCENIX, 1865. HOME, SWEET HOME. A correspondeut of the Augusta Constitntionalist states that a youug lady, whose house waH destroyed and burned by Sherman's army while at Columbia, a day or two after the conflagi-atiou, visited the ruins, in hopes of finding some little relic to remind her of the trials through which she had ]iassed. She searched in vain, until her eye fell on a small piece of paper, which she picked up. It proved to bo a remnant of John Howard Payne's .song of "Home, Sweet Home," and the only words that were left iintouched by the flames, were : ■' THERE IS NO PL.\rE LIKE HOME." Not one little relic — not a souvenir left ! Of all that she lov'd by the mad flames bereft ! The ruins, all blackoii'd, loom up on the sky, And the South wind sings softly their sad lullaby. She looks here, she looks there, for one little thing ; A letter, a trinket, a libband or ring ; Perchance there may be 'mid the rubbi.sh and dust, The miniature features of him she loved first. No, nothing I the flames, in their savage career, H^ve swallow'd up all that her heart holds most dear ; ' Of'her Once happy home not a vestige is seen. The still wind nov/ moans through the crimpt evergi-eeu. A slip of white paper lay trembling alone Amid the charr'd timber and smoke-blacken'd stone ; Like a .snow-flake on Hecla, it shone in the light, Or a peaii that was set in the dark brow of night. The lady took up the lano Slri^ fi'om the ground, And gazing upon its white surface she found These six little words, (as if traced by some gnome To mock her deep grief,) ''There is no place like home.'" Aye, sing of sweet home, 'mid its ashes and smoke, 'Twas bless'd till the spoiler its Availiugs awoke ; 'Twas happy till Northmen, with wild fiendish hate. Gave towns to the flames and made fields desolate. J. H. H. ^■1 DESTRUCTIOi^ OF OOLdMBlA. CHAPTER I. I N T K O D U C T I O N It has pleased God, in that Providence Avhich is so iuserutable to man, to visit our beautiful city -with the most cruel fate which can ever befall S,tates or, cities. He has pe;mitted an invading army to penetrate our country almost Avithont impediment ; to rob and ravage our dwellings, and to commit throe-fifths of our city to the flumes. Eighty-four squares, out of one hundred and twenty-four (?) which the city contains, have been destroyed, with scarcely the exception of a single house. The ancient capitol building of the State — that venerable structure, which, for seventy years, has echoed with, the eloquence and wisdom of the most famous statesmen — is laid in ashes ; six temples of the Most High God have shared the same fate ; eleven banking establishments ; the schools of learning, the shops of art and trade, of invention and manufacture ; shrines equally of religion, benevolence and industry ; are all btiried together, in one cpngregated ruin. Humiliation sijreads her ashes over our homes and . garments, and the universal wreck exhibits only one coinmon aspect of despair. It is for us, as succinctly but as fully as possible, and in the . simplest language, to endeavor to make the melancholy record of our . ■ wretchedness as complete as i^ossible. DESTKUCTION OF COLUMBIA. CHAPTER n. KAT.VL BLIXDEK — REMOVAL OF OEXEKAL. JOHN8TOK FBOM THE COMMAND OF THE CONFEDERATE ARMY. When, by a crime, no le.ss than blunder, GeneralJohnston was removed from the command of the Confederate armies in Georgia, which he had conducted with such .signal ability, there were not a few of our citizens who felt the imjjending danger, and trembled at the disastrous conse- quences which they partly foresaw. The removal of a General so fully in the confidence of his troops, who had so long bafiied the conquests, if he could not arrest the march, of the opposing army, was of itself a proceed- ing to startle the thoughtful mind. General Sherman declared his satis- faction at the event, and on rejieated occasions since has exjiresscd himself to the same effect. He was emboldened by the change, and almost in- stantly after, his successes became rapid and of the most decided character. General Johnston was by nature, no less than training and education, the very best of the Confederate generals to be opi)osed to General Sher- man. To the norvo-sanguinc temperament, eager and impetuous, of the latter, he opposed a moral and physical nature — calm, sedate, circumspect ; cool, vigilant and wary — always i:)atient and watchful of his moment — never rash or precipitate, but ever firm and decisive — his resources all regulated by a self-possessed will, and a mind in full possession of that military coup (V veil y^'hich, grasping the remotest relations of the field, is, probably, the very first essential to a general having the control of a large and various army. The error whicli t(^ok Hood into the ccjlder regions of Tennessee, at the beginning of winter, was one Avhich the Yankee general was slow to imi- tate, esijecially as, in «o moving. Hood necessarily left all the doors mde open which conducted to the seaboard. It required no great effort of genius to promjit the former to take the pathways which were thus laid open to him. Even had he not already conceived the jiropriety of forcing his way to the Atlantic coast, and to a junction with his shipping, the policy of then doing so would have been forced upon him l)y the proceed- ing of his rival, and by the patent fact that there were no impediments to such a i:)r-\vhere, eonsisted of little more than a series of small skimvishes, Anthout result on either side. No pass was held with any tenaeity ; no battle fought ; Sherman was allowed to travel one hundi'ed and fifty miles of our State, through a region of swamp and thicket, in no portion of which could a field be found adequate to the display of ten thousand men, and where, under good j'jartisan leaders, the Federals might have been cut off in separate bodies, their sui)i)lies stopped, their mareh constaiitly embarrassed by hard fighting, and where, a bloody toll exacted at everj' defile, they must have found a Thermo^jylie at every five miles of their march. The Confederates had uo partisan fighting, as in days of old. Tbey had a system, which insisted upon artUlcry as paramount — insisted upon arbitrary lines for defence, chosen witliout any regard to the topogi'aphy of the country. "We will make a stand," said tlie Con- federate chiefs, ' ' at this river crossing or that ; then fall back to the next river, and so on to the last," Although in a thousand places of dense swamp, narrow defile, and almost impenetrable thicket, between these rivers, it would have been easy to find spots where three hundred men, under competent commanders, Avho knew the countiy, might most effec- tually have baffled three thousand. CHAPTEK W. SHER3tAN'« ENTRA^'CE INTO SOUTH (lAliOMNA — DESTBUCTION OF 1»K0PEHTY IN THE liOW COUNTBT. The march of the Federals into our State waa characterized by such scenes of license, plunder and general conflagration, as rerv soon showed DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. 7 that the threats of the Northern press, and of their soldiery, -wiere not to be regarded as mere hi-ulvmfnlmen. Day by day brought to the people of Columbia tidings of atrocities committed, and more extended progress. Daily did long trains of fugitives line the roads, with "wiviss and chilftten, and horses and stock and cattle, seeking refuge f^oin the pursuers. Loiig lines of wagons covered the highways. Half-naked people cowered from tlie winter under bush tents in the thickets, iinder the eaves of houses, under the railroad sheds, and in old cars left them along the route. All these repeated the same story of suft'ering, violence, poverty and naked- ness. Habitation after habitation, village after village — one sending up its signal flames to the other, i^resaging for it the same fate — Lighted the winter and midnight sky with crimson horrors. No language can describe nor can any catalogue furnish an adequate detail of the wide-spi-ead destrxictiou of homes and property. Gl'aiftries were emptied, and where the grain was not canied off, it was strfewri to waste under the feet of the cavalry or consigned to the fire "which con- sumed the dwelling. The negroes were robbed equally with the whites of food and clothing. The roads were covered with Ijutchered cattle, hogs, mules and the costliest furniture. Valuable cabinets, rich pianos, were not only hewn to pieces, but bottles of ink, turpentine, oil, whatever c'btiid efihce or desti'oy, was employed to defile and niin. Horses wete ridden into the houses. People were forced from their beds, to pfermit the sfeartih ."iter hidden treasures. The beautiful homesteads of the parish country, Avith their • wonderful tropical gardens, were ruined ; ancient dwellings of black cypress, ohe hundred years old, which had been l-eared by the fathers of the reptiblic — men whose names were famous in Revolutionary histoiy — were given to the torch as recklessl.y as were the rude hovels ; choice pictul-es and works of art, from Europe, select and numerous libraries, objects of i)eace wholly, were all destroyed. The inhabitants, black no less than white,' vrere left to starve, compelled to feed only upon the garbage 'to' be found in k' of C'olnmliia, and might have prepared them for the treatment tliey were destined to receive. Daily accessions of fngitives, bringing with them their valuables and i^rovisions, made ample report of the progress of the Federal army. Hundreds of families had seasonably left long before, in auticiimtiou of the danger. Columbia was naturally held to bo one of the most secure places of refuge. It was never doubted that this capital city, which contained so many of the manufactures of the Confederate (Tovernment, the Treasui'y, iVc, would be defended with all the concentrated vigor of which the Confed- eracy was capable, especially, too, as iii)on the several railroads connected with the city, the armj- of Lee and the safety of Richmond were absolutely dej^endent. Young women of family Avere sent in large numbers to a city, Avhere numbers seemed to jiromise a degree of security not to be hoped for in any obscure rural abode. The city was accordingly doubled in population, and here also was to ha found an accumulation of wealth, in jjlate, jewels, pictures, books, manufactures of art and virtu, not to be estimated — not, j^erhaps, to be iJaralleled in any other town of the Con- federacy. In many instances, the accumulations were those of a hundred years — of successive generations — in the hands of the oldest families of the South. A large jiroportion of the wealth of Charleston had been stored in the capital city, and the owners of thesc^ treasures, in many instances, were unable to effect any farther remove. If apprehensive of the danger, they could only fold their hands, and, hojDiug against hope, pray for escajDe from a peril to which they could ojipose no farther vigilance or effort. Still, the lurking belief with most jiersons, who apprehended the aji- proach of the Federal army, encouraged the faith that, as the city was wholly defenceless, in the event of a summons, it a\ ould be suireudered DESTEUCTION OF COLUMBL\. 9 upon the usual terms, and that these ■\vt)ukl necessarily insure the safety of non-combatants and protect their property. But, in tinith, there was no small portion of the inhabitants who denied or doubted, almost to the last moment, that Sherman contemplated any serious demonstration upon the city. They assumed — and this idea was tacitly encouraged, if not believed, by the authorities, militaiy and ci\'il — that the movement on Columbia was but a feint, and that the bulk of his army was preparing for a descent upon Chai-leston. This also seemed to l>i' the opinion in Charleston itself. CHAPTER VI. THE FEDERAIi AR:vIY APPROACHIKG COLtTVIBIA — SKIBMISHIKG — CHEATHAM AND STEWART EXPECTED. All these conjectures were speedily set at rest, when, on the 13th Feb- ruary, (Monday,) the Federal army was reported to have reached a point in Lexington District, some ten miles above Jeffcoat's. On the lith, their progress brought them to Thorn's Creek, the stream next below Congaree Creek, and about twelve miles below the city. Here the Confederate troops, consisting of the mounted men of Hampton, Wheeler, Butler, &c., made stubborn head against Sherman, holding him in check by constant skirmishing. This skirmishing continiied throughout Wednesday, but failed to arrest his i^rogi-ess ; and as the Federal cannon continued mo- mently to sound more heavily upon our ears, we were but too certainly assured of the hopelessness of the struggle. The odds of force against the Confederates Avere too vast for any valor or generalshiiJ to make head against it ; and yet, almost to this moment, the hope was held out to the people, in many quarters, that the city could be saved. It was asserted that the coi-ps of Cheatham and Stewart were making forced marcl^es, with the view to a junction with the troops under Beauregard, and, such was the spirit of the Confederate troops, and one of the Generals at least, that almost at the moment when Sherman's advance was entez'ing the town, Hampton's cavaliy was in order of battle, and only waiting the command to charge it. But the horrors of a street fight in a defenceless city, filled with women and childi'en, were jH-udently avoided ; and the Confederate troops were drawn off from the scene at the very hour when the Federals were entering upon it. But Re anticii>ate. 10 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. CHAPTER ^^I. THE BOMBARDMENT OF OOLITMBIA — THE CITY I'NDER MAliTIAL luVW — WANT OF TRANSPORTATION — ROBUERIES. "UTiatever hoj^es miglit have boeu cutertainod of tlio ultimate success of our defences, they •were all dissipated, when, l)y daylight, on the 16tb, (Thursday,) the Confederate troops re-entered the city, burning the several bridges over the Congaree, the Broad and Saluda Rivers. They were quartered throiigh the day about the streets, and along their several bivouacs they dug slight excavations in the earth, as for rifle pits and for l^rotection from the .shells, which foil fiust and thick about the town. The shelling commenced the CTcning before, and continued throughout the night and the next day. No siimmons for surrender had been made ; no warning of any kind was given. New batteries were in rapid progress of erection on the West side of the Congaree, the more effectually to press the work of destruction. The damage was comparatively slight. The new capitol building was .struck five times, but .suffered little or no injury. Numerous .shells fell into the inhabited portions of the town, yet wo hear of only two persons killed — one on the ho.spital square, and another near the South Carolina Railroad Depot. The venerable Mr. S. J. Wagner, from Charleston, an aged citizen of near eighty, narrowly escaped with life, a shell bursting at his feet. His face was excoriated by the fragments, and for awhile his cj-e-Eight was lost ; but avc are hai)py to state that the liurts were slight, and he is now as well as ever. On Wednesday, the 15th, the city was placed under martial law, and the authority confided to General E. M. Law, assisted by Mayor Goodwyu and Captains W. B. Stanley and John McKenzie. With characteristic energy, this officer executed his trusts, and Avas emi^loyed day and night in the maintenance of order. This, with some few exceptions, was surprisingly maintained. There was some riotous conduct after night. Some highway robberies were committed, and several stores broken open and robbed. But, beyond these, there were but few instances of crime and inisubordina- tion. Terrible, meanwhile, was the press, the shock, the rush, the hun-y, the universal confusion— such as might naturally be looked for, in tlie circum- DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 11 stances of a city from which thouaauds were preparing to fly, without ikevious preiiarations for flight — burdened with pale and trembling women, their children and portable chattels — trunks and jewels, family Bibles and tlie lures f am iliare!:. The railroad depot for Charlotte was crowded with anxious waiters upon the train — mth a wilderness of luggage — miilions, perhaps, in value — much of which was left finally and lost. Throughout Tuesday. Wednesday and Thursday, these scenes of struggle were iu constant performance. The citizens fared badly. The Governments of the State and of the Confederacy absorbed all the modes of conveyance. Transportation about the city could not be had, save by a rich or favored few. No love could persuade where money failed to convince, and sEiiF, growing bloated in its dimensions, stared one from every hurrying aspect, a« you traversed the excited and crowded streets. In numerous instances, those who succeeded in getting away, did so at the cost of trunks and lug- gage ; and, Tinder what discomfort they departed, no one who did not see «»n readily conceive. CHAPTER VIII. EVACUATION OF COLLTMBIA BY THE CONFEDERATE TROOPS — TERRIBLE EXlTXtSION AT THE SOUTH CABOIJNA EAILRO.M) DEPOT — THE COMMISSARY AND QUARTER- MASTER STORES THROWN OPEN — THE SURRENDER 01* THE CiTt BY THE MAYOR — THE MAYOR's LETTER — ASSURANCES OF PROTECTION BY THE FKDERAIi OFFICERS. The end was rapidly approaching. The guns were resounding at the pates. Defence was impossilile. At a late hour on Thursday night, the Governor, with his suite and a large train of officials, departed. The Con- federate army began its evacuation, and by daylight few remained who were not resigned to the necessity of seeing the tragedy played out. After all the depletion, the city contained, according to our estimate, at least twenty thousand inhabitants, the larger proportion being females and children and negroes. Hampton's cavah-y, as we have already mentioned, liugei-ed till near 10 o'clock the next day, and scattered groups of Wlieeler's command hovered about the Federal army at their entrance into the town. The inhabitants were startled at daylight, on Friday morning, by a heavy explosion. This was the South Carolina Railroad Depot. It was 12 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. accidentally bl(j\vii uji. Broken opcu by a Ijuud uf i^lunderers, among whom -were many females and negroes, their reckless greed precipitated their fate. Tliis building had been made the receptacle of supplies from sundry quarters, and was crowded ^\ith stores of merchants and planters, tnmks of treasure, innumerable waros and goods of fugitives — all of great Tftlue. It appears that, among its contents, were some kegs of powder. The i)luuderers paid, and suddenly, the penalties of their crime. Usiug their hghts freely and hurriedly, the Ijetter to 2^''-'^'> tlicy tii-ed a train of powder leading to the kegs. The explosion followed, and the number of persons destroyed is variously estimated, from seventeen to fifty. It is probable that not more than tliirty-livc suffered, but the actual number perishing is unascertained. At an early hour on Friday, the commissary and <|uartermaster stores were thrown wide, the contents cast out into the streets and given to the people. The negroes e-si^eciaUy loaded themselves with plunder. All this might have been saved, had the officers been duly warned by the military authorities of the i)robable issue of the struggle. Wheeler's cavalry also shared largely of this phinder, and several of them might be seen, bearing oflf huge bales upon their saddles. It was proposed that the white flag should be displayed from the tower of the City Hall. But General Hamjiton, whose command had not yet left the city, and who was still eager to do battle in its defence, indignantly declared that if displayed, he should have it torn down. The following letter from the Mayor to General Sherman Avas the initi- ation of the surrender : MAYOE'S OFFICE, Columbia, S. C, Februaiy 17, 1865. To Ma.tor-Generajj Sherman : The Confederate forces having evacuated Columbia, I deem it my duty, as Mayor and re^jreseutative of the city, to ask for its citizens the treatment accorded by the usages of civihzed war- fare. I therefore respectfully request that you will send a sufficient guard in advance of the army, to maintain order in the city and i>rotect the per- sons and property of the citizens. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, T. J. GOODWYN, Mayor. At 9 o'clock, on the painfully memorable morning of the 17th February, (Friday,) a deijutation from the City Council, consisting of the Mayor, Aldermen McKenzie, Bates and Stork, in a carriage bearing a white flag, DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 13 proceeded towards the Broad River Bridge Roatl. Arriving at the forks of the Winusboro Road, they discovered that the Coufederate skirmishers were still busy with their guns, playing upon the advance of th6 Federals. These were troops of General Wheeler. This conflict was continued sim- ply to affoi'd the main arm^" all jiossible advantages of. a start iii th6ir re- treat. General Wheeler apprised the deputation that his men AYOuld now l>e withdraAvn, and instructed them in what manner to proceed. The deputation met the column of the Federals, under . Captain Piatt, who sent them forwai'd to Colonel Stone, Avho finally took his seat with them in the carriage. The advance belonged to the 15th cori)s. The Mayor reports that on surrendering the city to Colonel Stone, the latter assured him of the safety of the citizens and of the protection of their i)roperty, while vixk'i'J/is commioid. He could not answer for General Sherman, who was in the rear, but he expressed th.:-> conviction that he Avould fully confirm the assurances which he (Colonel Stone) had given. Subsequently, General Sherman did confirm them, aiid that ni^it, seeing that the Mayor w-as exhausted by his labors of the day, he counselled him to retire to rest, saying, "Not a finger's l)readth, Mr. Mayor, of your city shall be harmed. You may lie down to sleep, satisfied that your town shall be as safe in my hands as if Avholly in your own." Such Avas very nearly the language in which he spoke ; such was the substance of it. He added : "It will become my duty to destroy some of the public or Govern- ment buildings ; but I will reserve this performance to another day. It shaU be done to-morrow, provided the' day be calm." And the Mayor retii-ed with this solemnly asserted and repeated assurance. . CHAPTER IX. OCCUPATION OF COLUMBIA. UY THE FEDEKAL /VKMY — THE ADVANCE GUARD FIRED UPON — PLUNDERING PRIVATE PROPERTY — THE JAIL FIRED — BI'KN- ING COTTON — THE " R.AID " ON WATCHES — THE CONVENT — CLERGYMEN ABUSED BY THE SOLDIERS. About 11 o'clock, the head of the column, following tlie deputation — the Hag of the United States surmounting the carriage — reached Market Hall, ou Main street, Avhile that of the corps was carried in the rear. On their way to the city, the carriage was stopped, and the officer was inforni«d that 1* DESTRUCTION OF COLUxMBIA. a large body of Confederate cavalrj- was flanking them. Colonel Stone said to the Mayor. " We Khali hold you responsible for this !" The Mayor explained, that the road leading to "VTinnsboro, by which the Confederates wer« retreating, i-an nearly parallel for a short distance -with the river road, which aooutatiun, (having crossed the river at a point directly oi)i)osite the city,) were fired upon by one of Wheeler's cavalry. We are particular in mentioning this fact, as we learn that, sub- sequently, the incident was urged as a justification of the sack and burning of the city. Hardly had the troojis reached the head of Main street, When the work of pillage was l)eg>in. Stores were broken open within the first hour after tlieir arrival, and gold, silver, jewels and liquors, eagerly sought. The authorities, oflieers, soldiers, all, seemed to consider it a matter of course. And woe to hinx who carried a watch with gold chain pendant ; or who wore a choice hat, or overcoat, or boots or shoes. He was stripped in the twinkling of an eye. It is computed that, from first to last, twelve hundred Avatches were transferred from the jiockets of their owners to those of the soldiers. Purses shared the same fate ; nor was the Confederate currency repudiated. But of all these things liereafter, in more detail. At about 12 o'clock, the jail was discovered to be on fire from within. This building was immediately in rear of the Market, or City Hall, and in a densely biiilt portion of the city. The supposition is that it was fired by some of the prisoners — all of whom Avere released and subsequently fol- lowed the army. The fire of the jail had been preceded by that of some cotton piled in the streets. Both fires were soon .subdued by the firemen. At about half-past 1 P. M., that of the jail was rekindled, and was again <'xtinguished. Some of the prisoners, who had been confined at the Asy- lum, had made their escape, in some instances, a few days before, and were secreted and jjrotected by citizens. No one felt safe in his own dwelling ; and, in the faith that General Sher- man w(Uild respect the Convent, and have it properly guarded, numbers of young ladies were confidtnl to the care of the Mother Superior, and even trunks of (;lothes and treasure were sent thither, in full confidence that they would find safety. Vain illusions ! The Irish ('atholic troojjs, it appears, were not brought into the city at all ; Avere kept on the other side of the river. But a few Catholics were collected among the corps which occupied th(i city, and of the conduct of these, a favorable account is given. One of them rescued a silver goblet of the church, used as a drinking cui3 by a soldier, a^d restored it to the Rev. Dr. O'Connell. This i)riest, by DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. IS the way, was severely handled by the soldiers. Such, also, was the fortune of the Kev. Mr. Shaud, of Trinity (the Episcojial) Church, who sought in vain to save a trunk containing the sacred vessels of his church. It was violently wrested from his keeping, and his struggle to save it oidy pro- voked the rougher usiige. We are since told that, on reaching Camden, General Sherman restox'ed what he believed were these vessels to Bishop Da%'is. It has since been discovered that the plate belonged to St. Peter's Church in Charleston. And here it may bo well to mention, as suggestive of many clues, an incident which jiresented a sad commentary on that confidence in the security of the Convent, which was entertained by the great portion of the people. This establishment, under the charge of the sister of the Right Rev. Bishop Lynch, was at once a convent and an academy of the highest class. Hither were sent for education the daughters of Protestants, of the most wealthy classes throughout the State ; and these, with the nuns and those young ladies sent thither on the emergency, jirobably exceeded one hundred. The Lady Superior herself entertained the fullest confidence in the immunities of the establishment. But her confidence was clouded, after she had enjoyed a conference with a certain major of the Yankee army, who described himself as an editor, from Detroit. He visited her at an early hour in the day, and annouuced his friendly sympa- thies with the Lady Superior and the sisterhood ; professed his anxiety for their safety — his purpose to do all that he coidd to insure it — declared that he would instantly go to Sherman and secure a chosen guard ; and, alto- gether, made such professions of love and sei-vice, as to disarm those susiiicions, which his bad looks and bad manners, inflated speech and pomx50US carriage, might otherwise have provoked. The Lady Superior, with such a charge in her hands, Avas naturally glad to welcome all shows and prospects of support, and expressed her gratitude. He disappeared, and soon after re-appeared, bringing -n-ith him no less than eight or ten men— none of them, as he admitted, being Catholics. He had some specious argument to show that, perhaps, her guard had better be one of Protestants. This suggestion staggei-ed the lady a little, but he seemed to convey a more potent reason, when he added, in a whisper : " For I must leU you, my sister, that Columbia is a doomed city .'" Terrible doom ! This officer, leaving his men behind him, disai)peared, to show himself no more. The guards so left behind were finally among the most busy as plunderers. The moment that the inmates, di-iven out by the fire, were forced to aban- don their house, they began to revel in its contents. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? — who shall guard the guards ?— asks the « DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. proverb. In a immbor of cases, the guards provided for the citizens were among the most active phiuderers ; were quick to betray their trusts, abandon their posts, and bring their comrades in to join in the general pillage. The most dextrous and adroit of these, it is the ojiiuion of most persons, wore cliiefly Eastern men, or men of immediate Eastern origin. The AYesteru men, including the Indiana, a portion of the Illinois and Iowa, were neither so dextrous nor unscrupulous — were frequently faithfid and respectful :.and, perhaps, it would be safe to assert that many of tht- houses which escaped the sack and tii*e, owed their safety to the presence or the contiguity of some of these men. But we must retrace our steps. CHAPTER X. FTRINO THE CITY r.\ SHEKMAX'.S TROOPS — THE DISCIPLINE OP THE MEN — CITIZENS APPLYING rOK A GUAllD — "A KEIUN OE TEltROK " — THE IIKESIEN INTERRTTPTED A TERRIBLE SIGHT — SOLDIERS BURNT TO DEATH — THE CITY fLOf'K GTVES ITS LAST SOUND. It may be well to remark that the discipline of the soldiers, upon tlieii- first entry into the city, was perfect and most admirable. There was no disorder or irregularity ou the line of march, .showing that their ofticers liad them comijletel}' in hand. They were a fine looking body of men, mostly young and of vigorous formation, well clad and well shod, seemingly wanting in nothing. Their arms and accoutrements wea-e in bright order. The negroes accompanying them were not numerous, and seemed mostly to act as drudges and body servants. Thej- groomed horses, waited, earned burdens, and, in almost every in.stauce under our eyes, ajipeared in a purely servile, and not a military, capacity. The men of the "West treated them generally with scorn or iudiffei-ence, sometimes harshly, and not unfre- (pieutly with blows. But, if the entrance into town and while on duty, was indicative of admirable drill and discipline, such ceased to be the case the moment the trooi)s were dismissed. Then, whether by tacit ijcrmission or direct com- juaud, their whole deijortment underwent a sudden and rapid change. The saturnalia soon began. We have shown that the robbery of. the persona of the citizens and the plunder of their homes commenced within one hour after they had reached the Market Hall. It continued without inteiTuption throughout the day. Sheruiaii, at the head of his cavalry, DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 17 traversed the streets everywhere — so did his officers. Subsequently, these officers were everywhere on foot, yet beheld nothing which required the intei-positiou of authoritj-. And yet robbery was going on at every corner — in nearly every house. Citizens generally applied for a guard at their several houses, and, for a time, these guards were allotted them. These might be faithfid or not. In some cases, as akeady stated, they were, and civil and respectful ; considerate of the claims of Avomen, and never tres- passing upon the privacy of tlie family ; but, in numbers of cases, they were intrusive, insulting and treacherous — leaving no privacy undisturbed, passing without a word into the chambers and prying into every crevice and corner. But the reign of terror did not fairly begin till night. In some instances, where parties complained of the misrule and robbery, their guards said to them, with a chuckle : "This is nothing. Wait till to-night, and you'll see h — 11." Among the first fires at evening was one about dark, whicli broke out in a filthy purlieii of low houses, of wood, on Gervais street, occupied mostly as brothels. Almost at the same time, a body of the soldiers scattered over the Eastern outskirts of the city, fired severally the dwellings of Mr. Secretary Trenhohn, General Wade Hampton, Dr. John Wallace, J. U. Adams, Mrs. Starke, Mr. Latta, Mrs. English, and many others. There Avere then some twenty fires in full blast, in as many different quarters, and while the alarm sounded from these quarters, a similar alarm was sent up almost simultaneou.sly from Cotton Town, the Northermost limit of the city, and from Main street in its very centre, at the several stores or houses of O. Z. Bates, C. D. Eberhardt, and some others, in the heart of the most densely settled portion of the town ; thus enveloping in' flames almost every section of the devoted city. At this period, thus early in the evening, there were few shows of that drunkenness which prevailed at a late hour iu the night, and only after all the grocery shops on Main street had been rifled. The men engaged in this Avere Avell prepared with aU the appliances essential to their work. They did not need the torch. They carried with them, from house to house, pots and vessels containing com- 1 bustible liquid.^, composed probably of phosphorous and other similar agents, turpentine, &c. ; and, Avith balls of cotton saturated iu this Hquid, Avith which they also overspread floors and Avails, they conveyed the flames I with wonderful raipidity from dwelling to dwelling. Each had his ready i box of Lucifer matches, and, Avith a scrape upon the Avails, the flames began to rage. Where ^louses Averc closely contiguous, a brand from one I was the means of conveying destruction to the other, 3 18 ' DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. The winds favored. They had been high throiighont the day, and steadily prevailed from South-west by West, and bore the flames Eastward. To this fact we owe the preser\-ation of the portions of the city lying West of Assembly street. The work, begun thus vigorously, went on without impediment and with hourly increase throughout the night. Engines and hose were brought out by the firemen, but these were soon diiven from tlieir labors — which were indeed idle against such a storm of fire — by the pertinacious hostility of the soldiers ; the hose was hewn to pieces, and the firemen, dreading worse usage to themselves, left the field in desjiair. Meanwhile, tlie flames si)read from side to side, from front to rear, from street to street, and where their natural and inevitable progress was too slow for those who had kindled them, they helped them on liy the aiiplicatiou of fresh com- bustibles and more rapid agencies of conflagi-atiou. By midnight, !Main street, from its Northern to its Southern extremity, Avas a solid wall of fire. By 12 o'clock, the great blocks, which included the banking houses and the Treasury buildings, were consumed ; Janney's (Congaree) and Nicker- son's Hotels ; the magnificent manufactories of Evans it Cogswell — indeed, every large block in the bu.siness i:)ortion of the city ; the old Capitol and all the adjacent buildings were in ruins. The range cfl,lled the " Granite" was beginning to flame at 12, and might have been saved by ten A-igorous men, resolutely working. At 1 o'clock, the hour was struck by the clock of the Market Hall, which Avas even then illuminated from Avithin. It was its own last hour which it sounded, and its tongue was silenced forevermore. In less than five minutes after, its spire went down Avith a crash, and, by this time, almost all the buildings Avithin the precinct Avere a mass of ruins. Very grand, and terrible, beyond description, Avas the awful spectacle. It was a scene for the painter of the terril)le. It Avas the blending of a range of burning mountains stretched in a continuous series for more than a mile. Her(> was Mtna, sending up its spouts. of flaming lava ; Vesuvius, emulous of hke display, shooting tip with loftier torrents, and Stromboli,, struggling, Avith awful throes, to shame both by its superior volumes of fluid flame. The Avinds Avere tributaiy to these convulsive eftorts, and tossed the volcanic torrents hundreds of feet in air. Great spouts of flame spread aloft in canopies of snlpliurous cloud— Avreatlis of sable, edged Avith ' sheeted lightnings, Avrapped the skies, and, at short intervals, the falling toAver and the tottering wall, avalanche-like, Avent doAvn Avith thunderous sound, sending up at every crash great billoAvy showers of gloAving fiery embers. DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. ,19 Throughout the whole of this terrible scene the soldiers continued their search after spoil. The houses were severally and soon gutted of their contents. Hundreds of iron safes, warranted "impenetrable to fire and the burglar, " it was soon satisfactorily demonstrated, were not "Yankee proof." They were split open and robbed, yielding, in some cases, Yerry largely of Confederate money and bonds, if not of gold and silver. Jew- elry and plate in abundance was found. Men could be seen staggering off with huge waiters, vases, candelabra, to say nothing of cups, goblets and smaller vessels, aU of solid silver. Clothes and shoes, when new, were approjiriated — the rest left to burn. Liquors were drank with such avidity as to astonish the veteran Bacchanals of Columbia ; nor did the parties thus distinguishing themselves hesitate about the vintage. There was no .idle disorimiiiation in the niatter of taste, from that vulgar liquoi*, which judge Burke used to say always provoked within him "an inordinate pro- pensity to sthale," to the choicest red wines of the ancient cellars. In one vault on Main street, seventeen casks of wine were stored away, which, an "eye-witness tells us, bai-ely sufficed, once broken into, for the draughts of a single hoiir — such were the apiietites at work and the numbers in posses^ sion of them. Bye, corn, claret and Madeira all found their way into the same channels, and we are not to wonder, Avhen told that no less than one hundred aud fifty of the drunken creatures perished mi.sei'ably among the flames kindled by their own comrades, aud from which they were unable to escape. The estimate wiU not be thought extravagant by those who saw'the condition of hundreds after 1 o'clock A. M. Bj others, however the estimate is reduced to thirty; but the number will never be known. Sherman's officers themselves are rel^orted to have said that they lost more nien in the sack and burning of the city (including certain explosions) than in all their fights while approaching it. It is also suggested that the orders which Sherman issued at daylight, on Saturday morning, for the arrest of the fire, were issued in consequence of the loss of men which he had thus sustained. Oiie or more of his men were shot, by parties lankuown, in some dark passages or alley.s — it is snpposed in consequence of some attempted out- rages which humanity could not endure ; the assassin taking advantage of the obscurity of the .situation and adroitly fuiugling with the crowd with- out. And while these scenes were at their worst — while the flames were at their highest and most extensively raging — groups might be seen at the several corners of the streets, drinking, roaring, revelling — while the fiddle aud accordeou were playing their popular airs among them. There was jjo cessation of the work till 5 A, M. on Saturday. 20 DESTEUCTION OF COLUMBL\. CHAPTER XI. UNSUOCESSFUIi ATTEMPTS TO 8A^^E TBOPERTT — FEMALES rLL-TKEATEU — A GUAKU PEBFOEMS HIS DITTY — A PliUCKY CITIZEN — FAMIXitES l^VAiaEEEU IN THE STREETS — A COOL PROCEEDING — "A BIG DBUNK." A single thonglit will suffice to show that the owners or lodgers in the houses thus sacrificed Avere uot sileut or quiet si3ectators of a conflagration which threw them naked and homeless under the skies of night. The male population, consisting mostly of aged men, invalids, decrepits, women and children, M'ere not capable of very active or powerful exertions ; but they did not succumb to the fato without earnest jjleas and strenuous efforts. Old men and women and children were to be seen, even while the flames were rolling and raging around them, while walls were crackling and rafters tottering and tumbling, in the endeavor to save their clothing and some of their most valuable effects. It was not often that they were sxif- fered to succeed. They were driven out headlong. Ladies were hustled from their chambers. — their ornaments plucked from their persons, their bundles from their hands. It was in vain that the mother apjiealetl for the garments of her children. They were torn from her grasp and hurled into the flames. The young girl striA-ing to save a .•jingle frock, had it rent to fibres in her grasi). Men and women bearing off their trunks Avere seized, despoiled, in a moment the trunk burst asun- der with the stroke of axe or gun-butt, the contents laid bare, rifled of all the objects of desire, and the residue sacrified to the fire. You might sec the ruined owner, standing woe-begone, aghast, gazing at his tumbhng dAvelling, his scattered property, with a dumb agony in his face that was inexpressibly toiaching. Others you might hear, as we did, with wild bhisphemies assailing the justice of Heaven, or invoking, with hfted and clenched hands, the fiery wrath of the avenger. But the soldiers i)lun- dcrcd and drank, the fiery Avork raged, and the moon sailed over all with as serene an asi)ect as Avhen she first smiled upon the ark resting against the slopes of Ai'arat. Such Avas the sioectacle for hours on the chief business street of Co- lumbia. We have intimated that, at an early hour in the day, almost eveiy house DESTKUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 21 was visited by groups, averaging iu number from two to six persons. Some of these entered civilly enough, but pertinaciously entered, in some eases, hegf/ing for milk, eggs, bread and meat — in most cases, demanding them. The kitchens were entered frequently by one party, Avhile another penetrated the dwelhug, and the cook was frequently astounded by the audacity by which the turkey, duck, fowl or roast was transferred from the spit to the wallet of the soldier. In the house, parties less meek of temper than these pushed their Avay, and the first intimation of their presence, as they were confronted at the entrance, was a pistol clapped at the head or bosom of the owner, whether male or female. "Your watch!" "Your money!" was the demand. Freipiently, no demand was made. Earely, indeed, was a word spoken, where the watch or chain, or ring or bracelet, presented itself conspicuously to the eye. It Avas incontinently plucked away from the neck, breast or bosom. Hun- dreds of women, still greater numbers of old men, wero thus despoiled. Th(! slightest show of resistance provoked violence to tlie ])ersou. The venerable Mr. Alfred Huger was thus robbed in the chamber and presence of his family, and in the eye of an almost dying wile. He offered resistance, and was coUared and dispossessed by violence. We are told that the venerable ex-Senator, Colonel Arthur P. Hayne, ^vas treated even more roughly. Mr. James Rose, besides his watch, lost largely of choice wines, which had been confided to his keeping. But Ave cannot descend to examples. In the open streets the pickpockets were mostly active. A frequent mode of operating Avas by lirst asking you the hour. If thoughtless t>nough to reijly, producing the Avatch or indi- cating its possessic)n, it Avas quietly taken from hand or ixjcket, and trans- ferred to the pocket of the "other gentleman," Avith some such reniark as this: " A pretty little Avatch that. Til take it myself ; it just suits me." And the appropriation foUoAAcd ; and if you hinted any dislike to the pro- ceeding, a grasp was taken of your collar and the muzzle of a revolver put to your ear. Some of the incidents connected Avith this AvJiolesale system Avere rather amusing. Dr. Templetou, a Avell knoAvu and highly esteemed citizen, passing along the street, was accosted by a coiq)le of these experts, Avho stopped and asked him, pointing to the arsenal building, on tlie hill ()2)posite, "What building is that ?" "The State Arsenal," was his reply, unwisely extending- his arm, as he pointed, in ttirn, to the building, and revealing between tljo fojds of lii« coat the shining links of a vioh gold chain. 22 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. Before he could rocover himself, liis cliain and wiitch were in the grasp of the thief, who was propaiiug to transfer it to his own pocket, (juietly remarking, "A very pretty littlo watch ; just to my liking." "That is very cool," said Templcton. "Just my way," said the follow, walking off". "Stop," said Templeton, half amazed at the coolness of the proceeding, and feeling that he had only to put the best fjice on the matter. "Stop ; that watth will be of no use to you without the key ; won't you take that also ?•■ "All right," replied the robber, returning and receiving the key. The question, " AVhat's o'clock," was the sure forerunner of an attempt upon your pocket. Some parties saved their chronometers by an adroit- ness which deserves to be made known. One individual replied to the question : "You are too late my good fellow.s. I was asked that question already by one of your parties, at the other corner." He left them to infer that the watch was already gone, and they passed him by. We are told of one person who, being thus asked for the time of day by three of them, in a street in which he could see no other of their comrades, thrust a revolver suddenly into their faces, and cocking it quickly, cried out, "Look for yourselves." They sheered off And left him. "We, ourselves, were twice asked the question the morning after the tire, and looking innocently to where the City Hall clock once stood, rexilied' " Our city clock is gone, you see ; but it must be near 11." Mr. J. K. Robinson was assailed with the same question by a pafty in the neighborhood of his house. He denied that he had a watch. " Oh ! look, look !" was the answer of the questioner. "I need not look," quoth Robinson, "since I have not a watch." "Look, look — a man of your appearance inusf own a watch." "Well, I do ; but it is at my home — at my house." " TMiere's your house ? We'll go and see." He took them into his house, suddenly called his guard and said, ' ' These men are pursuing me ; I kuoAv not what they want." The guard drove out the party, with successive thrusts at them of the bayonet, and from the street, defrauded of their spoils, they saluted house guard and owner with all manner of horrid execrations. Hundreds of like anecdotes are told, not merely of loss in watches, but of every other article of property. Hats and boots, overcoats and shawls — these, when new and attractive, were sure to be taken. Even the negroes were des})oiled, whenever the commodity Avas of any value. An incident occurred, which, though amusing to read of, could not have DESTEUCTION OF COLUMBIA. ^^'^ been very pleasant to one of the party engaged at least. A gentleman was directed to break in the heads and enipty the contents of some forty bar- rels of whiskey stored at the Fair Grounds. He had proceeded Avith the job only so far as breaking in the heads of the bai'rels, when a number of soldiers entered the building, and stopped all further proceeding. They charged him with ijoisoning the liquor, and forced him to take a drink from every barrel, before they would touch the contents. The consequence was, that ho was drunk for over a week. CHAPTER XII. SCENE.S AND rNOIDENTS — THE SOLDIER.S AND THE LADIES — "FLUCK" OF THE- SOUTH CAHOLINA TiADIES — THE POOR FRENCH LADY WITH THE SOLDIERS^ — WHAT OCCURRED IN THE HOUSES — " SWAPPINO " «UNS— AN OFFICER PRO- TECTS A HOUSE — SLNGtTLAR INCIDENT. Within the dwellings, the scenes were of more harsh and tragical charac- ter, rarely softened by any ludicrous aspects, as they were screened by the privacy of the apartment, with but few eyes to Avitness. The pistol to the bosom or the head of Avoman, the patient mother, the trembling daughter, was the ordinary introduction to the demand. "Your gold, silver, watch, jewels." They gave no time, allowed no pause or hesitation. It was ui vain that the woman offered her keys, or proceeded to open drawer, or wardrobe, or cabinet, or trunk. It was dashed to pieces by axe or gun- butt, ■n'ith the cry, " We have a shorter way than that !" It was in vain that she pleaded to spare her furniture, and she would give up all its con- tents. All the precious things of a family, such as the heart loves to pore on in quiet hours when alone with memoiy— the dear miniature, the photogi-aph, the portrait — these were dashed to pieces, crushed under foot, and the more the trembler pleaded for the object so precioiis, the more violent the rage which destroyed it. Nothing was sacred in their eyes, save the gold and silver which they bore away. Nor were these acts those of common soldiers. Commissioned oflicers, of rank so high as that of a colonel, were frequently among the most active in .spoliation, and not always the most tender or considerate in the manner and acting of their crimes. And, after- glutting themselves with spoil, would often utter the foulest speeches, 24 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. coupieci -with oftths as condiment, dealing in what they assumed, besides, to be bitter sarcasms upon the cause and country. " And what do you think of the Yankees now?" was a frequent ques- tion. "Do you not fear us, now ?" "What do you think of secession ?" r ! Anything luit tlint. " "We'll make you fear us !" clapping a revolver to the lady's head. Hei' eye never faltered. Her cheek never changed its color. Her lips were firmly compressed. Her arms folded on her })osom. The eye of the assassin glared into her own. She met the encounter without flinching, DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 25 and he lo-vrered the implement of murder, with au oath : ''D— n it ! You have phick enough for a whole regiment !" In a great many cases the guard behaved themselves well, using their utmost endeavors to protect the property under their charge, even'' to the use of the bayonet. An officer. Lieutenant McQueen, stopped with Dr. Wm. Reynolds, and during the fire, worked manfully, and was the means of saving the resi- dence from destruction. His gentlemanly manneis mou the respect and confidence of the family, and when he was on the point of leaving, the doctor gave him a letter, signed by several gentlemen, acknowledging his grateful feelings for the manner in which he had been treated ; saying that the fortunes of war might some time place him in a position that the letter might be of use to him. This proved to be the case. At the skirmish near Lynch's Creek, this officer was wounded and captured. On showing the letter to a friend of Dr. Reynolds, who liappened to be in the hospital, he was removed to a private house, every attention shown him, and when he wasal)le to move, a .special parole was obtained for him, and he returned to his home. The "pluck" of our women was especially a subject of acknowledgment. They could admire u quality with wliich they had not soul to sympathize —or rather the paramount jias-sion for greed and plunder kept iu .subjec- tion all (jther qualities, without absolutely extinguishing them from tlieir minds and thoughts. To inspire terror iu the w^eak, strange to say, seemed to them a sort of heroism. To extort fear and awe appeared to their inordinate vanity a tribute more grateful than any other, and a curious conflict was sometimes carried on in their minds between their vanity and cupidity. Occasionally they gave with one hand, while they robbed with another. Several curious instances of this nature took place, one of which must sTiffiee. A cei-tain Yankee officer happened to hear that an old acquaintance of his, whom he had knoAvn intimately at West Point and Louisiana, was residing in Columlna. He went to see him after the fire, and ascertained that his losses had been very heavy, exceeding two hundred thousand dollars. The parties had not separated for an hour, when a messenger came from the Yankee, bringing a box, which contained one hundred thousand dollars in Confederate notes. This the Yankee begged his Southern friend to accept, as helping to make up his losses. The latter declined the gift, not being altogether satisticd in conscience vrith regard to it. In many cases, Confederate money by the handfull was bestowed by the officers and soldiers upon parties from whom they had 4 26 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. robbed the last purticles of clothing, and even General Sherman could give to parties, whom he knew, the Hour and bacon which had been taken from starving widow.s and orphans. So he left with the people of C-oluni- bia a hundred old muskets for their i)rotection, while emptying their arsenals of a choice collection of beautiful Enfield rifles. And so the starving citizens of Columbia owe to him a few hundred starving cattle, which he had taken from the starving peoi^le of Beaufort, Barnwell, Orangeburg and Lexington — cattle left without food, and for which food could not be found, and dying of exhaustion at the rate of fifteen to twenty head per diem. In this connection and this section, in which we need to devote so much of our space to the cruel treatment of our women, we think it proper to include a communication from the venerable Dr. Sill, one of the most esteemed and well-known citizens of Columbia. It is from his own pen, and tlic facts occurred under his own eyes. We give this as one of a thousand like cases, witnessed by a tliousaud eyes, and taking place at the same time in every quarter of the city, almost from the hour of the arrival of the army to that of its departure. He writes as follows : "On Thursday, the day before the evacuation of the city by the Con- federate forces, I invited a very poor Frencli lady, (Madame Pelletier,) Avith her child, refugees from Charleston, to take .shelter in my house, where they might, at least, have such protection as T could give her, shelter and food for herself and child. She was poor, indeed, having very little clothing, and only one or two implements — a sewing machine and a crimp- ing apparatus — by means of which she obtained a precarious support. My own family (happily) and servants being all absent, and l)eing myself wholly incapacitated by years of sickness from making any exertion, alj that the poor widow woman and myself could remove from my house, besides the few things of hers, consisted of two bags of flour, a peck of meal, and about the same of gi'ist, and about thirty pounds of bacon and a little sugar. These few things we managed to get out of the house, and, by the aid of a wheelbarrow, removed about fifty yards from tUe burning buildings. Waiting then and there, waiting anxiously the progress and direction of the tire, we soon found that we had been robbed of one bag of flour and a trunk of valuable books of account and papers. The fii*e continuing to advance on us, we found it necessary to remove again. About this time, there came up a stalwart soldier, about six feet high, accoutred with pistols. Bowie-knife, &.C., and stooping down over the remaining bag of flour, demanded of the ]X)or French lady what the bag contained. Having lost, but a few moments before, almost evei-ything DESTEUCTION OF COLUMBLi. 27- she had in the way of provisions, she seemed most deeply and keenly alive to her destitute situation, in the event she should lose the remaining bag of flour ; the last and only hope of escape from starvation of her child and herself. She fell uj^ou her knees, with hands ni-)lifted, in a supplicat- ing manner, and most jjiteously and imploringly set forth her situation— an apijeal which, under the circumstances, it would be impossible to con" ceive, more touching or heart-rending. She told him she was not here of her own choice ; that herself and husband had come to Charleston in 18C0 to better their fortunes ; that they had been domiciled in New Jersey, where her husband had taken the necessary steps to become a citizen of the United States. She had in her hand his jiapers vouching the truth of her statement ; that her husband had died of yellow fever in Charleston ; that being unable, from want of the means, to return to New Jersey, she had been driven from Charleston to Columbia, (a refugee, flying from the enemy's shells.) to try to make an honest support for herself and child. To all this, he not only turnetl a deaf ear, but deliberately drew from his breast a huge shining Bowie-knife, brandished it in her face, rudely pushed her aside, using, at the same time, the most menacing and obscene lan- guage ; shouldered the bag of flour, and marched off, leaving the poor starving creature, vntii her heljiless child, overwhelmed with grief and despair. E. SILL." This surely is very piteous to hear, and were the case an isolated one, it would probably move compassion in every heart ; but Avhere the miseries of like and worse sort, of a whole community of. twenty thousand, are massed, as it were, together before the eyes, the sensibilities become obtuse, and the universal sufi'ei'iug seems to destroy the sensibilities in all. We shall not .seek to multiply instances like the foregoing, which would be an endless work and to little proflt. CHAPTER XIII. OENEEAIi SHERMAN ON FOBAGING. General Sherman teUs General Hampton that, could he find any civil authority, and could they provide hini with forage and provisions, he would sufler no foraging upon the people. His logic and memory are equally deficient. Was there no Mayor and Council in Columbia '? They bftd formally swTej^dered the cit^ into his hands. They eouatituted the 28 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. civil authority ; but ho made iio rc(iuisitiou upon them for provisions for his troojis. He did not say to them, ''Suiiplyme with twenty thousand rations in so many hoiu's." Had ho done so, the rations would have been forthcoming. The citizens would have been only too glad, by yielding up one-half of their stores, to have saved the other half, and to have preserved their dwellings from the presence of the soldiers. Nay, did not the in-dwellers of every house — wci Avill say five thousand houses— seek at his hands a sijecial guard — which usually consisted of two men — and were not these fed wholly by the; families where thoy lodged during the whole time of their sta;s' ? Here, by a very simijle computation, we find that ten thousand soldiers were thus voluntarily provided with rations ; and a requisition for twenty thousand men might easily and would probably have been provided, had any such been made ; for the supplies in the city were abundant of every sort — the population generally having laid in largely, and without stint or limit, anticijiating a i)eriod nf general scarcity from the march of the enemy. But, even had the people been unable to supply these provisions — even had the Council failed to resjiond to these requisitions — at whose doors should the blame be laid '? The failure would have been the direct conse- quences of Grenoral Sherman's own proceedings. Had he not ravaged and swept, witli a bosom of lire, all the tracts of countiy upon Avhicli the peo- ple of Columbia depended for their supplies ? Had ho not, himself, (Jut off all means of transportation, in the destruction, not only of the rail- ways, but of every wagon, cart, vehicle, on all the plantations through which he had jjassed — carrying off all the beasts of burden of any value, and cutting the throats of the remainder ? He cuts off the feet and arms of a people, and then demands that they shall bring him food and forage ! But even this i^retext, if well grounded, can avail him nothing. He Avas suffering from no sort of necessity. It was the boast of every officer and soldier in his army, that he had fed fat upon the country through which he had passed ; everywhere finding abundance, and had not once felt the necessity of lifting the cover from his own wagons, and feeding from his own accumulated stores. But the complaint of Hampton, and of our people at large, is not that he fed his followers upon the country, but that he destroyed what he did not need for food, and tore the bread from the famishing mouths of a hundred thousand women and children — feeble infancy and decrepit age, DESTBUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 29 CHAPTEIl XIY. OUTKAGES ON NEGKO WOMEN — X LADY IN ('HIIiD-BE£> FlilGHTENED TO DEATH — FATHEKS PKOTEOTING THEIR DAtTGHTERS — A NEW USE FOR. PARLORS. Wo have adverted to the (.)ntrages whieh were perpetrated within the households of tlie eitizen, wliere, mirestraiued by the rebuking eyes of their own comrades, and unresisted by their interposition, cupidity, malignity and lust, sought to glut their several appetites. The cupidity generally triumphed over the lust. The greed for gold and silver swallowed up the more animal jiassions, and drunkenness supervened in season for the safety of n\any. We have heard of some few outrages, or attempts at outrage, of the worst sort, but the instances, in the case of Avhite femahs, must liave been very few. There was, perhaps, a wholesome dread of goading to despera- tion the people Avhom they had despoiled of all but honor. They could see, in many watchful and guardian eyes, the lui'kiug expression whieh threatened sharp vengeance, should their tresspasses proceed to those extremes which they yet uncpiestionably contemplated. The venerable Mr. H stood ready, with liis t'ouieati de diasse, made bare in his bosom, hovering around the persons of his iimocent daughters. Mr. O — ~, on beholding some too familiar approach to oiie of his daughters, bade the man stand off at the peril of his life ; saying that while he submitted to be robbed of pro])erty, he would saoritiee life without reserve — his own and fliat of tin' assailant — before his eliild's honor should be abused. Mr. James G. (xibbes with uillieulty, pistolin hand, and only with the assistance of a Yankee officer, rescued two young women from the clutches of as many ruffians. We have been told of successful outrages of this unmentionable charac- ter being practiced upon women dwelling in the suburbs. Many are understood to have taken place in remote country settlements, and two cases are described where young negresses were brutally forced by the wretches and afterwards murdered — one of them being thvust, when half dead, head down, into a mud ])ud(lle, nnd there lielcl \vi\M\ sjie y{m svift'Qr eatud. Bui this jiuiat suffice, 30 DBSTRUCTIOX OF COLUIMBIA. The shocking details shoiilcl not now be made, but that we need, for the sake of truth and humanity, to put on record the horrid deeds. And yet. we should grossly err if, while showingthe forbearance of the soldiers in res])ect to our irhitr women, wo .should convoy to any innocent reader the notion that tlu-y exliibited a like forbearance in the case of the black. The poor Uf'groes were terribly victimized by their assailants, many of them, besides the instance mentioned, being left in a condition little short of death. Regiments, in successive relays, subjected scores of these poor women to the torture of their embraces, and — Init we dare not further pursue the subjci^t. There are some horrors Avhich the historian dare not pursue — which tlie painter dare not delineate. They both drop the curtain «>ver crimes which humanity bk-eds to contemplate. 8ome incidents of gross brutality, Avhich show how well prepared were these men for every crime, however monstrous, may be given. A lady, undergoing the pains of labor, had to be borne out on a mattress into the ojien air, to escajie the fire. It was in vain that her situation was described as the soldiers applied the torch within and without the house, after they had penetrated every chamber and robbed them of all that was either valuable (jr portalile. They beheld the situittion of the suflferer, and laughed to scorn the prayer for her safety. Another lady, Mrs. J , Avas but recently confined. Her condition was very helpless. Her life hung upon a hair. The men Avere ajjprised of all the facts in the case. They burst into the chamber — took the rings from the hidy's lingers— plucked the watch from l)eneath her pillow, and SO overwhelmed her with terror, that she sunk under the treatment — sur- yiving their departure but a day or t\v o. In several instances, parlors, articles of crockery, and even beds, Avere uped by the soldiers as if they Avere Avater closets. In one case, a pai'ty used vessels in this Avay, then put them on the bed, fired at and smashed them to pieces, enii)tying the tilthy contents over the bedding. In several cases, neAvly made graves were opened, the coflins taken out, broken open, in search of buried treasure, and the corpses left exposed. Every spot in grave-yard or garden, Avhich seemed to have been recently disturbed, Avas sounded Avith SAvord, or bayonet, or ramrod, in their despe- rate search after s> oil. DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. 3L CHAPTER XV. THE DEAD DOG — GENEBAL SHEKM.VN's AaSURANCE TO THE SIAYOB — THE SIGNAIi ROCKETS. In this gravo connection, Ave have to narrate a somewhat piotxiresque transaction, less harsh of character and less tragic, and preserving a some- what redeeming aspect to the almost uniform brutality of our foes. Mr. M. M. C had a guai-d given him for his home, who not only proved faith- ful to their trust, but showed themselves gentle and unobtrusive. Their comrades, in large numbers, were encamiied on the adjoining and vacant lands. These latter penetrated his grounds, breaking their way through t)ie fences, and it was not possible, wliere there were so many, to prevent their aggression entirely. The guard kei^t them out of the dwelling, and preserved its contents. They were not merely civil, but amiised the chil- dren of the family ; played with tliem, .sympathized in their fun, and contributed to their little sjjorts in sundry ways. The children owned a pretty little pet, a grey-hound, wliich was one of the most interesting of their sources of enjoyment. The soldiers, without, seemed to remark this play of the guard with the children and dog with discontent and displea- sure. They gave several indications of a morose temper in regard to them, and, no doubt, they con.sidered the guard with hostility, per se, as guard, and because of their faithful protection of the family. At length, their displeasure prompted one of them to take an .ictive but cruel part in the pastimes of the children. Gathering up a stone, he watched his moment, and approaching the groujj, where they were at play, suddenly dashed out the brains of the little dog, at the very feet of the children. They were ten-ibly frightened, pf coui-se, at this cruel exhibition of power and malig- nity. Their grief followed in bitter lamentations and tears. To soothe them, the soldiers of the guard took up the remains of the dog, dug for it a gi'ave in one of the flower beds of the garden, tenderly laid it in the earth, and raised a mound over it, precisely as if it had been a human child. A stake at the head and feet rendered the proceeding complete. That night, Mr. C , returning home, his wife remarked to him : "We have lost our silver. It was Iniried in the very spot whore these men have buried the dog. Thev have no doubt found it, and it is lost to ^ DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. It was impossible then to attempt auy search for the relief of their anxiety, until the departure of the troops. AMien they had gone, how- ever, the search was eagerly made, and the buried treasure found untouched. But the escape was a narrow one. The cavity made for the body of the dog api)roached within a few inches the box of silver. Mayor Goodwyn also saved a portion of his plate through the fidelity vi his guard. But he lost his dwelling and evorything besides. We believe tliat, iu every instance where the guard proved faithful, they were Western men. They professed to revolt at the spectacles of crime which they were compelled to witness, and pleaded the necessity of a blind obedience to orders, in justification of their share of the horrors to which they lent their hands. Just before the conflagration began, about the dusk of evening, while the Mayor was conversing Avith one of the Western men, from Iowa, three rockets were shot up by the enemy from the capitol square. As the soldier beheld these rockets, he cried out : "Alas ! alas ! for your poor city ! It is doomed. Those rockets are th^, signal. The town is to be fired." In less than twenty minutes after, the flamf^'.s In'oke out in twenty distinct quarters. Similar statements were made liy other soldiers in difierent quarters of the citv. CHAPTER XVI. THE .STREETS OP THE flTY — THE ( HURCHES r'IRED — SIDNEY PARK. Of the conflagration itself, we have already given a sufficient idea, so far as words may serve for the description of a scene which beggars art and langTiage to portray. We have also shown, in st^me degree, the usual course of proceedure among the soldiers ; how they fifed the dweJliug as they i)illaged ; how they abused and outraged the iu-dwellers ; how they mocked at sufl'ering, scorned the pleadings of women and innocence. As tlie liames sjn'ead from house to house, you could behold, through long A-istas of the lurid emi^ire of flames and gloom, the miserable tenants of the once peaceful home issuing forth in dismay, bearing the chattels most useful or precious, and seeking escape through the narrow channels Avhich the flames left them only in the centre of the streets. Fortunately, the streets of Columbia are very wide, and greatly protected by umbrage- ous trees, set in regular order, and which, during the vernal season, confer DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 33 upon the city one of its most beautiful features. But for tliis width of its passages, thousands must have been burned to death. These families moved in long procession, the aged sire or grand-sire first — a sad, worn and tottering man, walking steadily on, with rigid, set features and tearless eyes — too much stricken, too much stunned, for any ordinary shows of suffering. Perhajis, the aged wife hung upon one arm, while- the other was supported by a daughter. And huddling close, hke terrified laartridges, came the young, each bearing some little bundle — alj pressing forAvard under the lead of the sire, and he witless where to gc. The ascending fire-spouts flamed before them on every hand — shouts assailed them at every step — the drunken soldiers danced around them as they went, piercing their ears with horrid threats and imprecations. The little bundles were snatched from tlie grasp of their trembling bearers, torn open, and what Was not appropriated, was hurled into the contiguous pile of flame. And group after group, stream after stream of fugitives thus pursued their way through the jciths of flaming and howling horror, only too glad to fling themselves on the open ground, whither, in some cuse.", they had succeeded in conveying a feather bed or mattress. The malls, cr open squares, the centres of the wide streets, like Assembly street, weie thus strewn with piles of bedding, on which lay exhausted mothers — some 6t them with anxious physicians in attendance, and girdled by crouchiug children and infants, wild and almost idiotic with their terrors. In one case, as we have mentioned, a woman about to become a mother was thus borne out from a burning dwelling. It was scarcely possible to advise in Avhich direction to fly. The churches were at first sought by manj^ several streams of population. But these were found to afi"ord no security— the churches of God were set on flame. Again driven forth, numbers made their way into the recesses of Sidney Pai'k, and here fancied to find security, as but few houses occupied the neighborhood, and these not sufficiently high to lead to apprehension from the flames. But fii'e-balls were thrown from the heights into the deepest hollows of the park, and the wretched fugitives were forced to scatter, finding their way to other places of retreat, and finding none of them secure. 34 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. CHAPTER XYII. THE NT'N.S LEAVrSG THE CONVENT — ^FEDERAL, OFFICERS PROTECT THEM — A NIGHT IN A GRAVE-YARD — REV. L,. P. o'cONNELLi's STATEMENT. One of these mournful processions of fugitives Avas tliat of the sister- hood of the Convent, the nnns and their pupils. Beguiled to the last moment bj the promises and assurances of officers and others in Sherman's army, the Mother Superior had clung to her house to the last possible moment. It was not merely a home, l)ut in some degi-ee a temple, and, to the professors of one church at least, a shrine. It had been chosen, as we have seen, as the i:>lace of refuge for many of other churches. Much treasure had been lodged in it for safe keeping, and the Convent had a considerable treasure of its own. It was liberally and largely furnished, not only as a domain, but as an academy of the highest standard. It was complete in all the agencies and material for such an academy, and for the accommodation of pei'hajjs two . hundred pupils. Among these agencies for education were no less than seventeen pianos. The liarj), the guitar, the globe, the maj^s, desks, benches, bedding and clothing, were all sujiplied on a scale of equal amplitude. The estab- lishment also possessed some fine pictures, original and from the first masters. The removal of these was impossible, and hence the reluctance of the Mother Superior to leave her house was sufficiently iiatural. As- sured, besides, of safety, she remained until further delay would have jierilled the safety of her inrocent and numerous flock. This lady mar- shalled her procession with great good sense, coolness and decision. They were instructed to secure the clothes most suitable to their protection from the weather, and to take with th3m those valuables which wei-e portable ; and, accompanied by Rev. Dr. O'Connell and others, the damsels filed on, under the lead of their Superior, through long tracts of fire, burning roofs, tumbling walls, wading tlirough billows of flame, and taking, at first, the pathway to St. Peter's (Catholic) Church. Blinding fires left them almost aimless in their march ; but they succeeded in reaching the desired point in safety. Here, on strijjs of bedding, quilts and coverlets, the young girls found repose, protecled by tha vigiLmce of a few gentlemen, their priest, and, we believe, by two officers of the Yankee army, whose names DESTKUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 35 are given as Colonel Corley and Dr. Galaghau. To these gentlemen, both Catholic Irish, the Mother Suj^erior acknowledges her gi'eat indebtedness. They had need of all the watch and vigilance of these persons. It was soon found that several soldiers followed them in their flight, and were making attem^Dts to fire the edifice on several sides. These attempts, repeatedly batiled and as often renewed, showed at length so tenacious a purpose for its destruction, that it was thought best to leave the building and seek refuge in the church-yard, and there, in the cold and chill, and among the grave-stones with the dead, these terrified living ones remained, trembhng watchers through the rest of this dreary night. The Presbyterian grave-yard had a number of families quartered in it for several days after the destruction of the city. Aged ladies and young chil- di-en wei-e also exposed in oi)en lois until after the Federals left the city. We here borrow freely from a communication made by the Kev Lawrence P. O'Connell to the Catholic Pacificator. He so fully reports the fate of St. Mary's CoUege, that nothing need be added to it. We have simply abridged such portions of his statement as might be dispensed with in this connection : "St. Mary's College, founded in 1852, by the Ecv. J. J. O'Connell, Pastor of the Catliolics in Columbia, was robbed, pillaged and then given to the flames. The College was a very fine brick building, and capable of accommodating over one hundred students. It had an excellent library attached, which was selected with great care, and with no limited view to expense. It also possessed several magnificent paintings, executed in Rome, and i^resented to the institution by kind patrons. Besides the pro- IDcrty belonging to St. Mary's College, that of four priests, Avho were its professors and lived there, was also consumed. Each, as is always the case amongst the Catholic clergy, had his individual collection of books, paintings, statuary, sacred jsictures, kc. Nobody who is not a rigorous student and a lover of literature can possibly realize the losses sustained by these gentlemen. Manuscripts of rare value, notes taken from lectures of the most eminent men in Europe and America, Orations, sermons, safety of the South Carolina College library was assured. The buildings were occu- pied by Confederate hospitals, where some three hundred invalids and convalescents found harborage. In a conversation with the Rev. Mr. Porter, regarding the safety of the College Library, General Shevroan indulged in a sneer. "I would rather, " said he, "give you books than destroy them. I am sure yoiu' people need them very much." To this Mr. Porter made no reply, snfferijig the General to rave for awhile upon a favorite text with him, the glories of tua flag and the perpetuation of the Union, which he solemiily pledged himself to maintain agaii^st all the fates. That his own people did not value books, in any proper degree, ma,y be shown by their invariable treatment of libi'a.ries. These were almost universally destroyed, tumbled into the weather, the streets, gutters, hacked and hewn and tr£j,mpled, even when the coUectioos were of the rarest value and immense numbers. Libraries of ten thousand volumes- books such as cannot again be procured — were sacrificed. It will suffice to illustrate the numerous losses of this sort in Columbia, to report tlie fate of the fine collections of Dr. R. W. Gibbes. This gentleman, a man of letters and science, a virtuoso, busied all bis life in the accumulation of works of arts and literature, and rare objects of interest to the amateur, and student, has been long known to the American world, North and So'ifch, in the ohaivxciter of sx savant. Perh;ips no other per.Hou in.Soath CxviUt.! hi^.m )r^ dii*:inT^l<'i 'I hi'n:'^lf b? his soi»a^^iA^ writiu'^^, and by h'l <■ Ills' i!;'. J I ) ) ^' ' . > i, • • I / I .' I 1. 1 . ■..• i' vl . J. • .A. '.>y i.'.ij .lo •;\ m, il iii.)a ^it DESTEUOTION OF COLUMBIA. 37?" preofa from the natural woi'lftl. A friendly correspondent gives us a mourn-)! : ful narrative of the disasters to his house, his home, his manuscripts and his varioixs and valuable collections, from which we condense the following particulars : "Besides the fine mansion of Dr. Gibbes, and its usual contents of fur- niture, his real estate on Main street, &c., his scientific collections and paintings were of immense value, occasioning more regret than could arise from any loss of mere proi>erty. His gallery contained upwards of two hundred paintingss, among wdiich Avere pictures by Washington Allston, SuUy, Inman, Charles Fraser and DeVeaux ; and many originals and copies by European hands, were highly i)rized from their intrinsic excel- lence and interesting associations. The family portraits in the collection were als|o numerous — some ancient, all valuable; and several admirable busts graced his drawing-room. His portfolios contained collections of the best engravings, from the most famous pictures of the old masters and bj-- the most exceilleut engravers of the age. These were mostly a bequest from the venerable C. Fraser, who was one of those who best knew what a gopd engi-avin^ or picture should be, and who had, all his life, been engaged in accumidating the most valuable illustrations of the progress of art. Nor Avas the library of Dr. Gibbes less ricli in stores of letters and science, art and medicine. His histoi'ical collection was particularly rich, especially in American and Soiith Carolina history. His cabinet of South- ern fossils and memorials, along with those brought from the remotest regions, was equally select and extensive. It contained no less than ten thousand specimens. The collectiQU of shark's teeth was i^rouounced by Agassiz to be the finest in the world. His collections of historical docu- ments, original correspondence of the Revolution, especially that of South Carolina, Avas exceedingly large and valuable. From these he had compiled and edited three volumes, and had there ari'ested the publication, in order to transfer his materiel to the Historical Society of South Carolina. Ail are now lost. So, also, was his collection of autographs — the letters of eminent corresi^ondents in every department of letters, science and art. Many relics of our aborigines, others from the pyramids and tombs of Egypt, of Herculauenm, Pompeii and Mexico, with numerous memorials from the Revolutionary and recent battle-tields of our country, shared the same fate — are gone down to the same abyss of ruin. The record.s of the Surgeon-General's Department of the State, from its organization, no longer exist. The dwelling which contained these inestimable treasures w'as deliberately fired by men, forAvhose excuse no Avhiskey influence could be pleaded. Tliey were quite as sober as in a thousand other cases Avhere •38 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBLA.. they sped with tlic torch of the incendian'. It was fired in the ownef^ presence, and when he expostnhited with them, he was laughed to scorn. A friend who souprht to extinKuisli the tire kindh^d in his very park)r, was seized by the coHar and hurled aside, with the ejaculation, "Let the d — d house burn. ' CHAPTER XIX. PROFFEKEX) ASSISTANCE— THE T.APY's PLUME AND RIDING WHIP. It was one almost invariiible feature of the numerous melancholy pro- cessions of fugitive women and children and old men escaping from their l)nrning houses, to be escorted by Federal officers or soldiers — as frequently by the one as by the other — who sometimes pretended civility, and mixed it up with jeering or oflFensive remarks upon their situation. These civili- ties had an ulterior object. To accept them, under the notion that they were tendered in good faith, was to be robbed or insulted. The young girl carrying Avork-box or bundle, who could be persuaded to trust it to the charge of one of the men, very often lost possession of it wholly. " That trunk is small, but it seems heavy," quoth one to a young, lady, who, in the jirocessiou of the nuns, was cari-yiug olT her mother's silver. ' What's in it, I wonder ? Let me carry it." " No, thank you. My object is to save it, if I can." " Well, I'll save it for you ; let me help you." "No ; I need no help of 3'ours, and wish you to understand that I mean to save it, if I can." "You are too jsroud, miss! but we'll humble you yet. You have been living in clover all your life — we'll bring you down to the wash-tub. Those white hands shall be done brown in the sun before Ave're done with you." Officers, even ranking as high as oolonels, were found as active in the work of insults and plunder as any of their common men. One of these colonels came into the; presence of a young girl, a pupil at the C( nvent, and the daughter of a distinguished public man. He wore in his hat her riding plume, attached by a small golden ornament, and in his hands he carried her riding whip. She calmly addressed him thus : " I have been robbed, sir, of every article of clothing and ornaments; even the dress I wear is borrowed. I am resigned to their loss. iJut there are some things that I would not willingly lose. You have in your cap the DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 39 plume from my riding hat — you carry in yoiu- hand my riding -whip. They ■were gifts to me from a precious friend. I demand them from you." "Oh ! these cannot be yours — I have had them a long time." " You never had them before last night. It was then I lost them. They are mine, and tlie gold ornament of the feather engraved with the initials of the giver. Once more I demand them of you." "Well, I'm willing to f/ire them to you, if you'll accept them as a keep- sake." "No, sir ; I wish no keep-.sake of your's ; I shall have sufficiently pain- ful memories to remind me of those whom I could never wilhngly see again — whom I have never wished to see." "Oh ! I rather guess you're right there," -with a grin. "Will you restore me my whip and feather ?" "As a keep-sake ! Yes." " No, sir ; as my proi^ertj^ — which you can only wear as stolen property. " "I tell you, if you'll take them as a keep-sake from me, you shall have them." "You must then keep them, sir — happy, perhaps, that you cannol blush whenever you sport the plume or flourish the whip."' And he boi'e oft' the treasures of the damsel. In these connections, oaths of the most blasphemous kiud were rarely foreborne, even wlieu their talk was had with females. The troops had a large faith in Sherman's generalship. One of their lieutenants is reported to have said : " He's all hell at flanking. He'd flank- God Almighty out of Heaven and the devil into hell." CHAPTER XX. THE CATHEDRAL — " THE WAR TTPON WOMEN " — CURIOfS HOISE-BrrLDING — THE STAYS IN THE WRONG PLACE. But this is enough on this topic, and we must plead the exactions of truth and the necessities of historical e^•idence, to justify us in repeating and recording such monstrous blasphemies. We shall hereafter, from other hands, be able to report some additional dialogues held with the women of Columbia, by some of the Federal officers. Of their temper, one or two more brief anecdotes will suffice. The Convent, among its other possessions, had a very beautiful model 40 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBL\. of the Cathedral, of Charleston. This occupied a place iu the Convent gi-ouud. It was believed to have been destroyed by the soldiers. One of the nuns lamented its fate to the Mother Superior, in the presence of Colonel TavlU, (?) an aid of one of the generals. He muttered bitterly, " Yes ; it is rightly served ; and I could Avish the same fate to befall every cathedral in wliich 7V Deunt has been performed at the do-nnfnll of our glorious flag." A gentleman was e.xpressing to one of the Federal generals the fate of the Convent, and speaking of the losses, especially of the Lady Superior, he replied dryly : " It is not forgotten that this lady is the sister of Bishop Lynch, who had Te Deum performed in his cathedral at the fall of Fort Sumter." A lady of this city .spoke iudignnntly to General Atkins, of Sherman's army, and said of that general, " He wars upon women !" "Yes, "said Atkins, " and justly. It is the women of the South who keep np this cursed rebellion. It gave us the greatest satisfaction to see those proud Georgia women begging crnml)s from Yankee leavings ; and this Avill soon be the fate of all yon Carolina women." Escortin;^ a sad procession of fugitives from the burning dwellings, one of the soldiers said : " WTiat a glorious sight !" "Terribly so," said one of the ladies. " Oi*and !" said he. "Very pitiful," was the reply. Tlie lady added : ' ' How, as men, you can behold the horrors of this scene, and behold the sufferings of these innocents, without terrible pangs of self-condemna- tion and self-loathing, it is difficult to conceive." " We glory in it !" was the answer. "I tell you, madam, that when the people of the North hear of the vengeance we have meted out to your city, there will be one universal shout of rejoicing from man, woman and child, from Maine to Maryland." "You are, then, sir, only a fitting representative of your peojjle." Another, who had forced himself as an escort upon a party, on the morning of Saturday, said, jsointing to the thousand stacks of chimneys, "You are a cui'ious people here in honse-liuilding. You run up yoar ehinmeys before you build the house." One who had been similarly impudent, said to a mother, who was bear- ing a child iu her arms : "Let me cajry the Vmby, madam." DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 41 "Donottoncli him for your life," was the reply. "I would sooner hurl him into the flames and plunge in after him than that he should be polluted by your touch. Nor shall a child of mine ever have even the show of obligation to a Yankee !"' "Well, that's going it strong, by ; but I like yoiir pluck. We like it d — e ; and you'll sec us coming back after the war — every man of us — to get a Carolina wife. Wo hate your men like h — 1, but we love your Avomen !"' "We much prefer your hate, even though it comes in tire. Will you leave us, sir ?" It was not always, however, that our women were able to preserve their coolness and firmness under the assaults. AVe have quite an amusing story of a luckless wife, v.ho was confronted by a stalwart soldier, with a hoiTid oatli and a cocked revolver at her heail. ; , "Your watch ! your money ! you d — d rebel b — h !" The horrid oaths, the sudden demand, fierce look and rapid action, so terrified her that she cried out, "Oh! my G— d! I have no watch, no money, except what's tied round my waist !" We need not say how deftly the EoMie-knife was applied to loose the stays of the lady. (She was then taught, for the first time in her life, that ihc stays were wrongly placed. They should have been ui^on her tongue. In all their conversation, the officers exhibited a very bombastic manner, and their exaggerations of their strength and performances great and frequent. On their first arrival they claimed generally to have sixty thousand men ; in a few hours after, the number was swollen to seventy- live thousand ; by night, it had reached one hundred thousand ; and on Saturday, the day after, they claimed to have one hundred and twenty-five thousand. We have ah'eady estimated the real number at forty thousand — total cavalry, infantry and artillery. CHAPTER XXT. THE SOUTH CABOLINA COLLEGE — DANGER FROM FALLING SPARKS — EXCITEMENT AMONG THE INMATES — DRUNKEN CAVALRY — A FEDERAL OFFICER DOING HIS DUTY — THE LEGISLATIVE LIBRARY. We have already passingly adverted to the difficulty of saving the South 6 42 DESTRUCTION OF COLU]\IBL\. Carolina College library from the flames, and lest we should have conveyed a false impression in respect to the degree of effort made in saving it, vre give some jiarticulars Avhich may l)e found of interest. We need scarctsly say that the professors clung to tlieir sacred charge with a tenacity which never once abandoniHl it or forehore the exertions necessary for its safety ; while the officers of the several hospitals, to which the College buildings were generally given up, were equally prompt to give their co-operation. Very soon after the entrance of the Federals into the city. Dr. Thompson, of the hospital, with Professors LaBorde, Reynolds and Rivei-s, took tlieir l)laces at the gate of the College C/am]>UR, and awaited their ajiproaeh. Towards noon, a bod}' of soldiers, led by a Captain Young, made their appeai'.auce at the gate, and the surgeon, with the professors, made a special appeal to the captain for the protection of the library and the College biiildings ; to which he rej^lied with a solemn assTirance that the pla guard Avas placed, and no serious occasion for alarm was experienced throughout the day ; but, from an early hour of the night, the buildings began to be endangered by showers of sparks from contiguous houses, which fell ujion their roofs. This danger increased hour by hour, as the flames continued to advance, and finally, the roofs of the several dwellings of Professors LaBorde and Rivers burst out in flames. Their families were forced to fly, and it required all the efforts of professors, surgecms, servants, even aided by a flle of soldiers, to arrest the conflagration. Every building within the campus was thus in danger. The destruction of any one building would to a certainty have led to the loss of all. The most painful apprehensions were quickened into a sense of hon-or, when the feeble inmates of the hospital were remembered. There Avere numbers of noble soldiers, brave Kentuckians and others, desi^erately wounded, to whom — lacking, as the establishment did at that moment, the necessary labor— but little assistance could be rendered. They were required to shift for themselves, Avhile the few able- bodied men within the camjaus Avere on the house-tops fighting the fire. The poor felloAvs Avere to be seen dragging their maimed and feeble bodies, as best they could, along the floors, adoAvn the stairs, and craAvling out, Avith great pain and labor, and by the tardiest process, into that atmos- phere of rtieking flame, Avhich noAV girdled the establishment. Ottipvs, again, unable to leave their beds, resigned themselves to their fate, /W© can better conceive than describe the terrible agonies, to them, of those DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 43 hours of dreadful anticipation in which they lay. Happily, the fires were subdued by 4 in the morning of Satuixiay. But the danger, even then, wa.s not over. About 8 A. M. , the College gate was assaulted by a band of drunken cavab-y, one hundred and fifty or more, bent upon penetrating the campus, and swearing to fire the build- ings. The officer in command of the guard reported to the professors that his force was not adequate to the protection of the establfshment, and that he was about to be overwhelmed. Professors LaBorde and Rivers, followed l)y Surgeon Thompson, at once sped, in all haste, to the headquarters of General Howard, appealing to him, in the most passionate terms, to redeem his pledge for the protec- tion of the College and its li1)i-ary. He promptly commanded his Chief of Stafif, Colonel Stone, to re^jair to the scene and arrest the danger. This — revolver in hand — he promptly did, and succeeded in disjjorsing the incen- diaiy cavalry. It is with jirofound regret that we add that the Legislative library, con- sisting of twenty-live thousand choice volumes, was wholly destroyed in the old Capitol. CHAPTER XXn. THE MASOKS AND ODD FELLOWS — FRATERNIZATION — THE f'ROMWELL SWOBD. Among the moral and charitable institutions which sufi'ered gi-eatly in the fire, were tlxe several Miisouic bodies. Tliey lost everything, with rare exceptions ; houses, lodges, regalias, charts, charters, jewels, and eveiy form of implement and paraphernalia. Much of this i)roi)erty had been accumulated in Columbia from Cha-rlestou and other places — had been sent hither for safe keeping. Their losses will for a long while be wholly irreparable, and cannot be repaired, unless, indeed, through the liberality of remote and wealthy fraternities in other section.s. The furni- ture and jewels were, in the largest number of cases, of the richest and most valuable order, wholly of silver, and in gi'eat proportion were gifts and bec[ue.st3 of favorite brothers who had reached the highest rauk.s in the order. We enumerate the following lodges as the chief sufferers : 1. Richland Lodge No. 39, A. •. F. •. M. ■. 2. Acacia Lodge No. 94, A. •. F. •. M. '. 3. True Brotherhooa Lodge No. Sil, A.'. 'P.: M.-, 44 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. [These all met iu Columbia. ] 1. Union Kilwinning No. 4, A. •. F. •. M. *. 5. Orange No. U, A. •. F. •. M. : [The.se met in Charleston.] H. Carolina Chapter No. 1, l{.-. A.-. M. •. 7. Cohimbia Chapter No. 5, K. •. A. •. M. : 8. Union Council No. 5, E. •. A. •. M. •. 1>. Enoch Lodge of Perfection — Ineffable Degrees. 10. DeMolay Council, Knights of Kadosch — Ineffable Degrees. The ludepeudcut Order of Odd Fellow.s and other orders "Nvere sufferers in like degi-eo with the Masonic liodies. These were : 1 . Palmetto Lodge No. 5. 2. Cougaree Lodge No. 29. 3. Eutaw Encampment Lodge No. 2. 4. Sons of Temperance. 5. Sons of Malta. The buildings, chambers, and lodges which contained the treasures of these bodies, were tirst i)luudei*ed and then given to the flames. The soldiers Avere to be seen about the streets, dressed up in the aprons, scarfs and regalias. Some of the Federal Masons were active iu endeavoring to arrest the robbers in their work, but without success. In a conversation with one of the Western Masons, he responded to the signs and behaved courteously, but he said : "We are told that all fraternization with yoiu" Masonic bodies of the South has been cut off, in consccpieuce of your Masons renouncing all connection or tie between them and the Masons of the North." AVe replied to him tliat the story w^as absurd, and evidently set afloat in order to i^revent the Northern Masons from affording succoi' to a Southern brother in the hour of his distress — that Masonry overrides the boundaries of States, allows of no political or religious ditlereuces, and that its very nature and constitution are adverse to the idea of any such renunciations of the paramount duties of the craft, in all countries and under all circumstances. We add a few iiarticulars in relation to some of these lodges, showing the extent and character of their losses. The minutes of Union Kilwinn- ing Lodge No. 4, were more than a century old ; those of Orange Lodge No. 14, very near a century. These are all gone, and the loss is irremedi- able. A portion of the minutes of Eichland Lodge No. 39 are supposed t o be safe, as they were confided to the keeping of a Masonic Avriter, with a view to the i^reparation of a history. Among the items of loss, "which are particularly lamented, that of the DESTEUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 45 famous sword of State, called "the Crounvcll Sword," belonging to tie Grand Lodge of South Carolina, is particularly dej^lored. This was an antique of pecidiar interest and value. Its history, as given by Dalcho, may be given here, as particularly calculated to gi-atify the curious, as well as the Masonic reader. It was a large, elegant and curious two-edged weapon, iu a rich velvet scabbard, highly ornamented with Masonic emblems, and with tlie arms of the Grand Master. It had been presented to the Grand Lodge Tiy the Provincial Grand Master, after the installation of the grand officers, was given as a consecrated sword, arul received Avith reverent assurances, to keep it safely, so far as human eflfort could accord safety. The weaiiou had been long in the possession of the Grand Master's family, and was said to have once belonged to Oliver Cromwell, a legend to which some degree of probability may be given, from the fact that the Pro\nncial Grand Master was a descendant of Sir Edward Leigh, who was a member of the Long Parliament and a Parliamentary General in the time of the Protector, from whom, perhaps, he received it. The farther history of this sword may as well be giA^en here. Prom the time of the presentation it continued iu the possession of the Grand Lodge, and was borne by the {^rand Sword Bearer, or in loter times, the Grand Pursuivant, in all jjublic processions. At lenglli, at the conflagra- tion which, iu the year 1838, destroyed so large a portion of the city of Charleston, and with other buildings the Masonic Hall, the sword was, with great difficulty, saved by brother Samuel Seyle, the Grand Tiler, Avitli the loss of the hilt, the scabbard, and a small i>art of the extremity' of the Itlade. In the confusion consequent on the fire, the sword thus miitilated was mislaid, and for a long time it Avas supposed to be lost. In 1852, a committee Avas appointed by the Grand Lodge to make every exertion for its recoA-ery, and, at length, in the beginning of the year 1854, it Avas acci- dentally found by the Grand Tiler, in an out-house on his premises, and Avas by him restored to the Grand Lodge iu its mutilated condition. The lost piece of the blade A\-as ingeniously replaced by a cutler iu the city of Charleston, and being sent to New York, AAas returned AAdth ucav hilt and velvet scabbard, and Avas used iu its appropriate place during the centen- nial ceremonies of that year. With such a history, and blended Avith such tradition of its origin, we need not feel surprised at tlic uuiA'er^al and keen feeling occasioned by its lass. 4& DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIAi . ■ CHAPTER XXin. iyNO:?ffi^ DAY OF UQRBORS — WKES WrLL, IT END ? — THE BUGLES — BLACKEKED WALLS — SYMPATHIZING SOLDIEKS. The morfling of Saturday, the IHth of February, opened still with. its hoiTors and terrors, though somewhat diminished in their intensity. A lady said to a an officer at her house, somewhoro about 4 o"" clock that morning : "In the name of God, sir, when is this work of hell to be ended?" He repliem wholly extinguished ; and o'lhers again, to tlieir credit, be it said, who were truly sorrowful and sympathizing, who had labored for tlu; safety of family and pro])erty, and who openly deplored the dreadful crime, which threatened the lives and ^lonors of the one, and destroyed so completely the other. DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. ^ CHAPTER XXIV. THE DESTRUCTION OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS — EXPLOSION OF SHELLS — LOSS OP LIFE— THE STATE CAPITOL — HEAVY LOSS TO THE STATE. ■„; But we have no time for description. The relentless fate Avas IraiTying forward, and the destroyer had still as large a share of his assigned labOts to execute. This day was devoted to the destl-uction of those bnildings of a! pnhlie character whidi had escaped the Avreck of the city proper. The Saluda cotton manufactory, ihe property t)f Colonel L. D. Childs, was burried by the troops prior to their entry of the city' and t>n their approach to it, the previous day. The several powder milla were 'destroyed on Saturday. The Arsenal buildings (State and Confedetaie) drt'Sttildaj, and it is understood that in the attempt to haul away amtiinnition from the latter place, the Federals lost a large nunllier of men, from an utilodk^d for explosion. It is reported in one case that no less thnn forty men, with their officers— one entire company— were blown to pieces in one precih'ct, and half as many in another. But the facts can never be precisely ascei- tained. The body of a Federal captain lay on the bAhks of the ri-s-erfor several days. The magniHcent steam jn-inting'^ estabttsiimeht of Evans & Cogswell— with the house assigned to their engravers, and another house, stored with stationery and book stock— i)erhaps the most complete establishment of the kind in the Southern States— was destroyed on Saturday. These were all private property, mostof it isolated in situation, and deliberately tired. So, the fearful progress of incendiarism ebntiriued throughout Saturday and Sunday, nor did it wholly cease on ISIonday. The gas works— Cnio of the greatest necessities of the people— was then (lelibei'ately destroyed ; and it was Wth some difficulty that the water works wer6 saved. The cotton card manufactory of the State ; the sword factory— a private interest; the stocldng manufactory— private ;. the' buildings at Fair Grounds, adjoining cemetery ; the several riailway depdts ;' AJexaiiddr's foundry ; the South Carolina Railroad foundry and wdrk shops ; the Gor- ernment armory, and other buildings of greater or less value, partly Government and partly jirivate property — all shared a common tate. Major Niernsee, the State Ai-chitect, was a gi-eat loser, ifl hifi iniiplements and valuable scientific and professional library. 48 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. The new Capitol biiilding, being unfinished, and not likely to be finished in many years — useless, accordingly to us — was spared — only suffering from some petty assaults of malice. Here and there, a plinth fractured ; here and there a Corinthian capital. The beautiful pillar of Tennessee marble was thus injured. So, at great pains-taking, the soldiers clambered ujD on ladders to reacli and cfTace the exquisite scroll and ornamental work on the face of the building— disfigiiring the beautiful chiseling which had wrought out the vine and acorn tracery on the several panels ; and the bundles oi fasces, on the Northern part, were fractured or broken away in parts. The statue of Washington, in bronze, oast in 1858, for the city of Charleston, from Houdon's original, in the rotunda at Richmond, received several Ijruises from .brickbats, addressed to face and breast. A shell scratched his back, and the staflf which lie bore in his hand was broken off in the middle. But the bronze seems to have defied destruction and may be considered still jjerfect. The bust of Calhoun, by Power.s, won totally destroyed ; so, also, was the ideal personification, by the sculptor Brown, of the Genius of Liberty. A large collection of complete caiiitrJs, destined for the Capitol, and lying iu the ojDeu square, were destroyed either by the heat of the con- tiguous fire, or by exi^losions of gun-powder introduced among them. Hereafter, such beautiful j^ieces of v.orkuiauship might be kept more safely and certainly, by being buried deeply in excavations of sand. The iron Palmetto tree, that ingenious performance of Werner, of Charleston, dedicated as a monument to the Palmetto Regiment, so re- nowned in the war with Mexico, suffered the loss of a number of its lower and larger branches ; but these, we think, may be restored at comi:)aratively little cost. The apartment in the base was torn open, having been wrenched from its fastenings, but no other mischief seems to have been done to it. It was i^robably spared, as commemorating the deeds of those who had fought under their own flag. An officer connected with the State Capitol, furnishes the following par- ticulars : The new State Capitol presented a ver}' conspicuous mark to tlu' cannon on Lexington heights, yet fortunately sustained but little injury— none, indeed, Avhich cannot be easily repaired. Five shots struck the West end, yet none of them did any serious damage, exceijt ones. This shattex'ed the ornimented sill and ballusters of oiie of the corridors of the principal floor. Another shell injured a fluted column on the centre projection. Two shots hit the interior of the brick arch over the Eastern front centre DESTKUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 49 window, and two otlier shots struck and sliglitlj scaled off the granite jamb division of the treble centre window in the Eastern front. "When in possession, the soldiers tried to deface and defile as much as they could. They wi-ote their names in pencil on the marble, giving their companies and regiments, and sometimes coupling appropriately foul com- ments with their signatures, thus addressed to posterity. They seem to have found considerable sport in their practice, with brick-bats, or frag- ments of rocks, as sharp-shooters ; and making the fine bronze statue of Washington their mark, they won various successes against his face, breast and leg.s. Sundry bruises and aln-asions are to be found upon the head and front, and a part of his cane has been carried away among their spolia opimcu The finely sculptured oak leaf decorations of the marble door pilasters at the main entrance door of the principal floor over the Nortlieru front, as well as the ornaments of the soffit of that door, have W.qw seri- ously defaced. The beaks of the eagles, in the panels above, and to the i-ight and left of that doorway, as also the lower portions of i\\o fasces on each side of the same, have been beaten out. The corner, or groin stones, and basement cornice at the South-western corner of the building, were also damaged to some extent by the fire from the adjacent old State House building. But nil the injuries to the structure were insignificant in comjiarison Avifh that which was done to the finished and raw material M-ithin the i)recinct — the WTought and rude marble, granite, iron and machinery ; the work completed in these materials, and which has been accumulating for the last four years in yard and work-shop— in all this, our loss has been very great. There were destroyed among these accumulations forty beautifully sculp- tured Corinthian capitals, designed for the tv^o large i^orticoes of the edifice, and ANTOught in our own beautiful native granite ; the Corinthian capitals wrought in Italian marl)le for the great marble hall and stair-cases on the principal floor in the interior ; all the pohshed shafts, in Tennessee marble, for the latter ; and nearly all the marble work and pavements for the whole building in Tennessee and Italian marble — together with the granite ballustrade and railings surmounting the main building and for the surrounding terrace. To tliese, add the destruction of hundreds of im- mense un wrought blocks of granite and marble of every description — machinery, tools ; the sculptor's atelier and work-shops, containing all the models and some of the unfinished statues meant for the main gable field or tymjianum of the Northern front ; the original models of the medallion portraits of Hayne and McDuflie, and one of the latest and best casts of the head of Calhoun. But one small storehouse remains iminjurcd 7 50 DESTRUCTION OF COLUltfBIA. throughout the premises, containing some finished marble -n-ork, the mono- lith granite columns of the main porticoes, and some completed work for the main cornice of the structure. The total pecuniary loss to the State, in the damage thus done to the new capitol, and to the material desigaed for it, including tools, instruments, models, Ac, can fall very little short of one million of dollars in specie. CHAPTER XXV. TBEATMENT OF THE KEGEOES — GENERATj SHEBMAN AND THE DEAD KEGRO — ^WHO CAUSED THE WAR. Something should be said in respect to the manner in which the negroes Avere treated by the Federals while in Columbia, and as regards the influ- ences employed by which to beguile or take them from their owners. We have already adverted to the fact that there was a vast difference between the feelings and performances of the men from the West, and those com- ing, or directly emanating, from the Eastern States. The former were adverse to a connection with tliem ; but few negroes were to be seen among these, and they were simply used as drudges, grooming horses, bearing Inirdens, humble of demeanor and rewarded with kicks, cuffs and cui-ses, frequently without provocation. They despised and disliked the negro ; openly professed their scorn or hatred, declared their unwilling- ness to have them as companions in arms or in comjiany at all. Several instances have been given us of their modes of repelling the association of the negro, usually with blow of the fist, butt of the musket, slash of the sword or prick of the bayonet. Sherman himself looked on these things indift'erently, if we are to reason from a single fact afforded us by Mayor Goodwyn. This gentleman, while walking with the general, heard the report of a gun. Both heard it, and immediately proceeded to the spot. There they found a group of soldiers, Avitli a stalwart young negro fellow lying dead before them on the street, the body yet warm and bleeding. Pushing it with his feet, Sher- man said, in his quick, hasty manner : " What does this mean, boys ?" The reply was sufliciently cool and careless. "The d — d black rascal gave us his impudence, and we shot him." " WeU, bury him at once ! Get him out of sight !" DESTKUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 51 As they passed on, one of the party remarked : "Is that the way, General, you treat such a case ?" "Oh !" said he, " we have no time now for courts martial and things of that sort !" A lady showed us a coverlet, with huge holes burned in it, which she said had covered a sleeping negro woman, when the Yankees threw their torches into her bed, from which she was naiTowly extricated with life. Of the recklessness of these soldiers, especially when sharpened by cupidity, an instance is given where they thrust their bayonets into a bed, where they fancied money to be hidden, between two sleeping children — being, it is admitted, somewhat careful not to strike through the bodies of the children. The treatment of the negroes in their houses was, in the larger propor- tion of cases, quite as harsh as that which was shown to the whites. They were robbed in lilie manner, freipiently stripi^ed of every article of cloth- ing and jn-ovisions, and where the wigwam was not destroyed, it was effec- tually gutted. Few negroes having a good hat, good jDair of shoes, good overcoat, but were incontinently deprived of them, and roughly handled when they remonstrated. These acts, wc believe, were mostly ascribed to Western men. They were repeatedly heard to say : "We are Western men, and don't want your d — d black faces among us." When addressing the negi'o, they frequently charged hiui with being the cause of the war. In spealdug to the whites on this subject, especially to South CaroHnians, the cause was ascribed to them. In more than one instance, we Avere told : "Wearegoiug to burn this d^d town. We've begun, and we'll go through. This thing began here, and we'll stack the houses and burn the town." A different role was assigned to, or self-assumed by, the Eastern men. They hob-a-nobbed with the negi-o, walked with him, and smoked and joked with him. Filled his ears with all sorts of blarney ; lured him, not only with hopes of freedom, but all manner of Uceuse. They hovered about the iDremisos of the citizens, seeking all occasion to converse with the negi'oes. They Avould elude the guards, slip into the kitchens, if the gates were open, or climb over the rear fence and converse with all who would listen. No doubt they succeeded in beguiling many, since nothing is more easy than to seduce, with promises of prosperity, ease and influ- t*nce, the laboring classes of any people, white or black. To teach them that they are badly governed and suffering wrong, is the favorite method of demagogueism in all countries, and is that sort of influence Avhich will 52 DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. always prevail with a people at once vain, sensual and ignorant. But, as far as we have been able to see and learn, a large proijortion of the negroes were carried away forcibly. When the beguiler failed to seduce, he resorted to violence. "" The soldiers, in several cases which have been reported to us, pursued the slaves with the tenacity of blood-hounds ; were at their elbows when they went forth, and hunted thorn up, at all hours, on the premises of the OAvner. Very frequent arc the instances where the negro, thus hotly pui*sucd, besought protection of his master or mistress, sometimes volun- tarily seeking a hiding place along the swamps of the river ; at other times, finding it under the bed of the owner ; and not leaving these places of refuge till long after the trooiis had departed. For fully a mouth after they had gone, the negi-oes, singly or in squads, were daily making their way back to Columbia, having escaped from the Federals In' dint of gi-eat perseverance and cunning, generally in wi-etched l)light, half-starved and with little clothing. They represented the difli- ciilties in the Avay of their escape to be very great, the officers placing them finally under guards at night, and that they could only succeed in flight at the peril of life or limb. Many of these were negroes of Colum- bia, but the larger pro2:)ortion seemed to hail from Barnwell. They all sought passports to return to their owners and jjlantations. CHAPTER XXVI. THE AD.TACRNT COUNTKY — HOUSES, MULES, ETC., CABRIED OFF OK KILIiED — VEHICLES DESTKOYED — RAPE — TOKTUlUi. We should not overlook the riivagc and destruction in the immediate precincts of the city, though beyond its corporate boundaries. Within a few miles of Columbia, from two to five miles, it was gu-dled by beautiful country seats, such as those of the Hampton family — Millwood — a jilacc famous of yore for its chai-m and elegance of society, its frank ho-spitaUty and the lavish bounty of its successive hosts. The destruction of this family seat of opulence, and grace, and hospitality, will occasion sensation in Euroi)ean countries, no less than in our own, among those who have enjoyed its grateful privileges, as guests, in better days. The beautiful couutiy seats of Mr. Secretary Trenholm, of Dr. John Wallace, Mrs. Thomas Stark, Colonel Thomas Taylor, Captain James U. DESTEUCTION OE COLUMBIA. 53 Adams, Mr. C. P. Pelbam, (Mill Creek,) as well as homestead— aud many more — all shared the fate of Millwood — all were robbed and ruined, then given to the flames ; aud from these places were carried off all horses, mules, cattle, hogs and stock of eveiy sort ; and the pro%-isions not carried off, were destroyed. In many cases, where mules and horses were not choice, they were shot down. But this was the common history. On all the farms and planta- tions, and along the road sides cverrwhere, for many a mde, horses, mules and cattle, strew the face of the country. Young colts, however line the stock, had their throats cut. One informant tells us that in one pile he counted forty slain mules on the banks of the Saluda. Every vehicle which could not be carried away was destroyed. But there were barbarities rejiorted in the more isolated farm settle- ments and country houses. Horrid narratives of rape are given which we dare not attempt to individualize. Individuals suspected of having concealed largo sums of money, were hung ui> reijeatedly, until, almost in the agonies of death and to escajDe tht\ tortiu'C, they confessed where the deposit had been made. A German baker had a rope put round his neck, and was hftuled up several times ; until, through fear of death, he confessed that he had specie around his person and in a trunk. A famdy of the name of Fox, of Lexington, were treated with e.si^ecial cruelty. The head of the family Avas hung up thrice by the neck till nearly dead, when he yielded nine thousand dollars in specie. Mr. Meetze, of the same District, is reported to have been robbed in like manner and by the same process ; and one poor idiot — a crazy crea- ture, mistaken for another party, was subjected, till nearly dead, to the same treatment. This mode of torture, fro;n what we can learn, was freipientiy resorted to. Other parties were whipped ; others buffeted or knocked down, and, indeed, every form of brutality seems to have been put in practice, when- ever cupidity was sharpened into rage by denial or disappointment. But we sicken at the farther recital of those cruelties. 54 DESTRUCTION OF COLUAIBIA. CHAPTER XXVn. CONCIjTJSION. The reader will have seen that we have brought to a close our narrative of the most consi)iciious eveuts, iu the "cai)tnre, sack, and buruiug of the city of Columbia." We have beeu at great plains to make the state- ments ample, and to Justify them by refex'cnee to the best authorities and witnesses to be found. We believe that the facts are substantially com- plete, and so, true in all respects. The incidents given are selected as typical of large groujis of facts, representative anecdotes, uniform in their variety, and quite too numerous for separate consideration. But the very uniformity, amidst such a numerous collection, is in confirmation of the general authenticity of the Avhole ; and we repeat the conviction that the narrative is wholly true withal, and to be relied on as a history. We have seen, Avith surprise, some attempts, in sundry quarters, to account for the destruction of Columbia by ascribing it to accident, to the drunkenness of straggling parties, to our negroes, and, indeed, to any but the proper cause. It is evidently the design of these writers, without inquiring into the onotives by which they were governed, to relieve General Sherman and his army from the imputation. If it could be shown that one-half of the army Avere not actually engaged in firing the houses iu twenty places at once, while the othpr half were not quiet spectators, indif- ferently looking on, there might l)e some shrewdness in this suggestion. If it c-ould be shown that the whiskey found its M'ay out of stores and cellars, grappled with the soldiers and poured itself down their throats, then they are relieved of the responsibility. If it can be proved that the negroes were not terrified by the presence of these soldiers, iu such lai'ge numbers, and did not, (as they almost invariably did) on the night of the tire, skulk away into their cabins, lying quite low, and keeping as dark as possible, we might listen to this suggestion, and perhaps admit its plausi- bility. But why did the soldiers prevent tlie liremen from extinguishing the fire as they strove to do V NVhy did they cut the hose as soon as it was brought into the streets ? Why did they not assist iu extinguishing the flames ? Why, with twenty thousand men encamped iu the streets, did they suffer tlie stragglers to succeed in a work of such extent ? Why DESTEUCTION OF COLUiMBM. 55 did they suffer the meu to break into the stores and drink the liquor wherever it was found ? And what shall we say to the universal plunder- ing, which was a part of the object attained through the means of fire ? T\Tiy, above all, did they, with their guards massed at every corner, suffer the negi'oes to do this work ? These questions answered, it will be seen that all these suggestions af-e sheer nonsense. To give them plausibility, we have been told, among other mis-statements, that General Sherman himself was burned out of his own selected quarters, no less than four times. This is simply ridiculous. He was burned out in no single instance. None of his generals was burned out. The houses chosen for their abodes, were carefully selected, and the fire was kept from approach- ing them in any single instance. But we have pursued our narrative very imperfectly, if our array of facts be not such as conclusively to show that the destruction of the city was a deUberately designed thing, inflexibly fixed from the beginning, and its fate sufficiently well known to be conceived and comprehended by all the army. Long before the army left Savannah, a lady inquired of one of the Fed- eral Generals in that city, whither she should retire — mentioning her preference of Columbia. His reply was significant. " Go any where but to Columbia." We have stated the conference between the Lady Superior of the Ursuhne Convent, and a certain Major of the Federals, who origin- ally belonged to the press gang of Detroit. He warned her at 11 o'clock of Friday, "that she would need all the guard he had brought, as Columbia was a doomed cUi/. '" A lady in one of our upper districts, expressing sm'prise at the treatment of Columbia in this nineteenth, or boasted century of civilization, was answered : ' ' South Carolina has been long since the i^romised boon of Sherman's army." Masonic brethren told others in the city that an order had been issued to the troops before they crossed the river, giving them license to sack, plunder and destroy for the space of thirty-six hours, and that Columbia was destined to destmction. A sick Federal soldier, who had been fed, nursed and kindly treated by a city lady, told her, on Friday morning, that the place would be destroyed that night. The simultaneous breaking out of the fires, in the heart of the city, and in tlie suburbs in twenty places besides, should conclude aU doubt. 1. Enough that Sherman's army was under perfect discipline. They were, as an army, completely in the hands of the officers. Never was dis- cipline more complete — never authority more absolute. ( I 56 DESTRUCTION OF COLU]\IBL\. 2. That the fire was permitted, whether set by drunken stragglers or negroes, to go on, and Sherman's soldiers prevented, liy their active op- position, efforts of the firemen, while thousands looked on in perfect serenity, seeming totally indiflerent to the event. 3. That soldiers, quite sober, wore seen in hundreds of cases busUy engaged in setting fire, well iirovided with all the implements and agencies. 4. That they treated with -Nnolence the citizens who strove to arrest the flames. 5. Tliat when entreated and exhorted by citizens to arrest the incendia- ries and prevent the catastroi)he, at the very outset, the officers, in many cases, treated the applicants cavalierly, and gave no heed to their appli- cation. G. That, duriug the raging of the flames, the act was justified by a reference to the course of South C!aroliua in originating the secession movement. 7. That the general officei-s themselves held aloof until near the close of the scene and of the night. That General Sherman know what was going on, 3'et kept aloof and made no effort to arrest it, until daylight on Satur- day, ought, of itself, to be conclusive. 8. That, with his army under such admirable discipline, he could have arrested it at any moment ; and that he did arrest it, when it pleased him to do so, even at the raising of a finger, at the tap of a dram, at the blast of a single trumi^et. But, what need of these and a thousand other suggestive reasons, to establish a charge which might be assumed from a survey of Sherman's general progi-ess, from the moment when he entered South Carolina ? The march of his army was a continued flame — the tread of his horse was devastation. On what plea Avas the jjicturesque village of Barnwell de- stroA-cd '? AVe had no army there for its defence ; no issue of strength in its neighborhood had excited the jmssions of the combatants. Yet it was plundered — eveiy house — and nearly all burned to the gTonnd ; and this, too, where the town was occupied by women and children only. So, too, the fate of Blaclrville, Graham, Bamberg, Buford's Bridge, Lexington, i'c. , all hamlets of most modest character, where no resistance was offered — where no fighting took place — where there was no provocation of liquor even, and where the only exercise of heroism was at the expense of Avomen, infancy and feebleness. Such, too, was the fate of every farm-house — of six in seven, at least. Surely, when such was the fate and treatment in all cases, there need be no effort now to show that an exception Avas to be made in favor of the State cajjital, Avhcre the offences charged upon South DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA. 57 Carolina bad been necessarily of the rankest character ; and, when they had passed Columbia — greatly bemoaning the cruel fate which, under stragglers and whiskey-drinkers and negi'oes, had brought her to ruin — what were the oflfences of the villages of AUston, Pomaria, Winnsboro, Blackstock, Society Hill, and the towns of Camden and Cheraw ? Thus weeping over .the cruelty which so unhappily destroyed Columbia, was it that she should enjoy fellows^hip iu vroe arid ashes, that they gave all these towns and villages to the flames, and laid waste all the plantations and farms between ? But enough. If the conscience of any man be suflicieutly flexible on this subject to coerce his understanding even into a momentary doubt, all argument will be wasted on him. Our task has ended. Our narrative is di-awn Ijy an eye-witness of much of this terrible drama, and of many of the scenes which it includes, but the chief part has been drawn irom the li^dug mouths of a cloud of wit- nesses, male and female, the best people in Columbia. The following is a list of the owners and occupants, of the hoiises de- stroyed : "^ A LIST OF THE PlIOPEIiTV DESTROYED. RICH.UIDSON (OR MAIN) STREET. COTTON TOWX — WEST STPK. "William Price. "Warelioiise filled with cotton. W. McAlister and R. Keenau, Jr. Dwelling. James Catheart. Store and warehouse filled with cotton. R. O'Neale. Two warehouses filled with cotton. P. P. Chambers. ^Yarehouse filled with cotton. Mrs. J. J. Kinsler. Dwelling. Mrs. Law. Store and warehouse containing provisions belonging to Dr. A. W. Kennedy. EAST SIDE. James Crawford. Dwelling. R. O'Neale. Store and warehouse containiiig a quantity of cotton. J. R. Kennedy. Dwelling. L. D. Childs. Dwelling and out-houses. The houses of A. Civil and James Tarrar saved. UPPEB TO LUMBER — WEST SIDE. Mrs. Kirk. Store, dwelling, &c., occupied by Mrs. Cartwright. Estate James A. Kennedy. Storehouse containing Government pro- visions. Estate James A. Kennedy. Dwelling o(H»u])ic'd by A. Boney, M. P. Brennan and others. P. H. Flanigan. Store and dwelling occupied by J. Milroy. G. B. Nunamaker. Store, dwelling, cotton house, &c. A. Crawford. Cotton warehouse. A, Crawford. Dwelling occupied by Mrs. J. Jacobs and C. Agaew. PBOPEETY DESTEOYED. 59 EAST SIDE. Kraft, Goldsmith & Kraft. Sword Faetoiy. Henry Hunt. Dwelling. Mrs. P. Patterson. Dwelling occupied by Dr. I. D. Durham. at. Mary's College. Government stores, etc. E. Lewis. Store and dwelling occuj)ied by E. Caldwell and Govern- ment goods. • ct • William Lyles. Store and dwelliti^J ^'-'"' 'T -?, -^af-'r:?! ' liXJMBEK TO RIOHJjAND — WEST SIDE. William Heuuies. Store and warehouse used as cooper's sho}) and Gov ernment storehouse. William Henuies. Dwelling occupied by owner, store filled with Gov- ernment goods. H. Hess. Store and dwelling. H. Hess. Store filled -with furniture. Grieshaber & Wolfe. Two stores and dwelling. Dr. T. J. Eoach. Dwelling occupied by JMolIeuhauer. M. McElrone. Dwelling. EAST SIDE. John Judge & Co. Stocking Factory. A. Eiley. Store and dwelling. A. Edey. Dwelling occupied by . W. McGuinnis. Store and dwelling. A. Eiley. Store and dwelling occupied by P. Piukerson. The dwelling owned by A. Eiley and occupied Ijy Mr. Huchet was not burnt. KICHLAND TO liAUKEL WEST SIDE. Estate John Beard. DweUing^ occupied by S. Mathew.s — ^^storq .used by State Commissary. ,r,,,,-i". \ << 'i > m Mi-s. J. Blankenstein. Store and dwelling uccupied hy John Mason. Mrs. J. Blankenstein. Store and dwelling occupied In' M. Tliomer nnd others. M. O'Connell. Store and dwelling. A. J. Barnes. Store and dwelling occupied by M, Thompson. W. W. Purse. Store and dwelling. E. Lewis. Store occupied by J. E^;aser tt Co. E. Lewis. Vacant store. R. Le-wis. Store used for Government stores. ...- 60 PEOPEBXX DESXKOyKP. EAST srpE. Bishop Lynch. Dwellings occupied-by Ponsignou and otiiers. John McCully. Dwelling — store occupied by F. D. Fanning, H. C. Franck. Dwelling. Mrs. Law. Dwelling — store us^d. as Opyeniment wareliouse. liAUKfiL TO BtAHDlSO— W«ST SiBfi. Keatinge -^, diR-sUingsby F! Marks, J. A. Patton and others. Estate John J. Kinsler. Dwelling occupied by Joseph Sampson and others — store by A. Jones. Estate John J. Kinsler. Store occupied by H. Reckling. Da\-id Jacobs. Dwelling. M. Comerford. Store and dwelling occupied by Ii,!iKaufnian. M. Comerford. Store and dwelling. EAST SIDE. Boyne & Sprowl. Stone Yard. Estate C. Beck. Store occupied by J. C. Kenneth — dwelling by N. Thompson and others. James Brown. Government stores. Thomas Boyne. Dwelling. C. Norman. Store occupied by Mrs.; Hertwigi C. Norman. Store occupied by Ji Mendah C. Norman, Dwelling occupied by J. Mendal. E. Stenhouse. Store and dwelling. E. Hope. Store occupied by H. Hunt — dwelling by W. Phelps. E. Hope. Store occupied by A. Miles. E. Hope. Store and dwelling occupied by E. Hunt. E. it G. D. Hope. Store — sleeping rooms occupied by PlSb'hwavfcz, A-: K(Epper and bthei's. IJLANDIKG TO TAYLOR OR CiMDEN — WEST SIDE. R. Bryce. Store occupied by Mutual Supply Association. R. Bryce. Store occupied by Mi's. DuRoss. R. Bryce. Dwelling occupied by Mrs. D. C. Speck as a boarding hou.sc. M. Ehrlich. Shoe store and dwelling. M. Ehrlich, Store occupied by W. Stieglitz. PROPERTY DESTROYED. % John Seeg^Ts. Store occupied by J. Bahlmau. John Seegers. Store occui^ied by Miss K. Frank. Bruns & Eilhardt. Shoe stoye and dwelling. John ^"wls. Store occupied by John- S. Due. John Eawls. Barber's shop occupied by C. Carroll. John Bawls, Stor.e occupied by . John Bawls. Store occupied by P. Pape. W. T. "Walter. Store occupied by Mrs. Zemow, dwelling by . W. T. Waltei'. Express Company, unclaimed freight. W. T. Walter. Dwelling, unoccupied. W. T. Wajter. Store occupied by L. Blum. Estate J. J. Kiusler. Store occupied by L. C. Clarke. Estate J. J. Ivinslejf. Store occupied by Sill & SiU. Estate J. J. Kinsler. Booms in second story, used by Evans & Cogswell as lithographic office, tlxird story, as .Treasury. Note Bureau. i EAST SIDE. Bishop. Lynch. Ursuline Convent and Academy. Bishop Lynch. Store occupied by A. Traeger. Bishop Lynch. Store occupied by J. Blank. S. Pearse. Besidence. S. Pearse. Store occupied by. F. A. Jacobs. S. Pearse. Store occupied by P. G. McGregor, H. N. McGowan. Store pccupied by V. Heidt. H. N. McGowan. Store occupied by Miss Evans. H. N. McGowan. Dwelling occiipied by W. K. Sessford. Fisher &: Heiuitsli. - Store. Fisher & Heinitslj. Dwelling;Occupied by E. Egg. S. Gardner, Store and rasidence. S. Gai-dner. Store occupied by — . S. Peai'se. Store — dwelling occupied by J. Barry. S. Pearse. House occupied by colored families. H. Henrichsou. Store. S. Gardner. Store occupietl by J. J. Browne and W. Ashton. S. Gardner. Dwelling occupied by J. Burnside. S. Gfll'4flei'. Exchange Bank. BliANDING TO PLAIN — WEST SIDE. Cwpimercial Bank. Dwelling occupied by H. E. Scott. (3pmmercial Bank. Store occupied by Farmers & Exchange Bank. 62 PROPERTY DESTROYED. Thomas Davis. Store occupied by M. H. Berry and J. J. Cohen, dwell- iug liy — Adams. Thomas Davis. Store and dwelling occupied by A. Reckling. Henry Davis. Store occupied by Silcox, Bro. & Co., dwelling by George Smith. Henry Davis. Store occupied by Hopson & Sutphen, rooms abore as War Tax Office. Honry Da^^s. Store occupied by T. k R. Flanigan. Henrj' Davis. Store occupied by J. S. Bird fc Co., second floor as Zealy's daguerrean rooms. Henrj- Davis. Store occupied by Madame A. Fillette, residence by Dr. Solomons. Henry Davis. Store occupied by R. Swaffield and P. Wineman & Co. Heni-y Davis. Bank of Charleston. R. C. Anderson. Store occuiiied by D. Goldstein. R. C. Anderson. Store. R. C- Anderson. South-western Railroad Bank. R. C. Anderson. Transportation office, second story as Government offices. EAST SIDE. Southern Ex^jress Company's Office, second and third floors occupied by Madame Rutjes as a boarding house. Southern Express Company. Store occupied by John Veal. Estate C. Beck. Store occupied by Mrs. D. Jacobs. Estate C. Beck. Residence and store occupied by Mrs. M. S. Coopev, Miss M. L Poindexter, J. W. Gaither and family, and others. Isaac Cohen. Store occupied by T. J. Moise and F. C. Jacobs. Isaac Cohen. Store and residence occupied by John McKenzie. G. V. AntweriJ. Store occujjied by W. M. & J. C. Martin, People's Bank and Reynolds & Reynolds, residence of Dr. Wm. L. Reynolds. G. V. Antwerp. Store occupied by Dr. P. M. Cohen, G. Diercks, and George Bruns. Charles Black. Store occuijied by W. S. Harral and J. Marsh, rcsideuco by J. Chrietzberg. Dr. M. M. Sams. Store occupied by J. B. Duval & Son, residence of William Watson. Dr. M. M. Sams. Store occupied ]jy J. F. Eisenmau tt Co. , residenc© by G. V. AntweriJ. PROPERTY DESTROYED. 63 Thomas Davis. Store occupied by John Heise, second aud third floors by J. N. Roach aud J. Richard. Thomas Davis. Store by Mrs. S. A. Smith, rooms by I. C. Morgan. Thomas Davis. Store occupied by R. Henuiug, residence by Misses Saunders. Dr. C. "WeUs. Store occupied by Townsend i% North, residence by J. B. Duval and W. Lalloo. Dr. C. WeUs. Union Bank. PIAIN TO WASHINGTON — "WEST SIDE. C A. Bedel. Store, residence by Dr. D. P. Gregg. C. A. Bedel. Store occupied by Central Association. J. 0. Walker. Residence and store occupied by Dr. John Ingalls. J. C. Walker. Store occupied by H. C. & H. E. Nichols, residence hy A. Feininger. .T. C. Wallcer. Store occupied by P. B. Glass. J. C. Walker. Store occupied by J. C. Walker and Durham it Mason, Confederate Baptist, second and third stories by Dr. Danelly, Sov.thei-n Guar- dian, Masonic Hall, J. B. Irving, J. McGown. - '.■ • > J. C. Walker. Buildings on the alley occuijied by (lum-dian Printing Office, E. R. Stokes' Book Bindery, Commissary stoi-es. W. B. Stanley. Store, rooms occupied by Confederate Treasurer, Quar- termaster's Office, Commandant of Conscripts, Treasury Note Bureau Bingham's Dancing School. Bank of the State. Bank and Branch. Independent Fire Company. Engine House. City of Columbia. Guard House. City of Columbia. Market and City Hall. EAST SIDE. Dr. R. W. Gibbes and J. S. Guignard. Store occupied by Fisher & Aguew .'Ke!lly and others. C. Yolger. Store occupied by L. Hawley,' residence .by-MadBme\Volgei'. C. Volger. Store occupied by Treasury Department. J. C. Jauney. Store occupied by G. Stadtler. J. C. Janney. , Store occupied by A. Feininger. Janney & Leaphart. Congaree Hotel, rooms in basement oeoupied by James R. Heisc and Reese's barber shop. EAST SIDE, Estate C. Beck. Store occupied l)y J. C. Dial. Estate C. Beck. P. L. Valory, hthographic; office. Estate C. Beck. Commissary stores. Estate J. S. Boat-\mght. Store occupied by Dr. C. H. Miot. Estate J. S. Boat^mght. Paymaster's Office. G. V. AntweriJ. Store occupied by J. N. Feaster and J. C. Norris, Naval Agent. G. V. Antwerp. Residence occupied hy S. Kingman. G. V. Antwerp. Planter's and Mechanic's Bank. L. Carr. Bank of South Carolina. L. Carr. Rooms occupied by D. Wadlow and others. Southern Express Company. Store occupied by Joseph Walker. Southern Express Company. Store occupied by D. P. McDonald. Southern Express Company. Rooms occupied by P. Walsh and others. Dr. M. LaBorde. Store occupied by L. T. Levin. PROPERTY DESTROYED. '^5 Dr. M. LaBorde. Medical Purveyor's Office. G. S. Bower. Store occupied by Bee Compain^ houses in rear by O. S. Bower. W. & J. Sliiell. Store occupied by F. Huft'mau. W. & J. Shiell. Store occupied by W. Sheplierd. W. & J. Shiell. Scott's barber shop. W. & J. Shiell. Store occupied by H. k S. Beard. W. & J. Shiell. Residence occupied by J. Shiell. LADY TO GERVAIS OR BRIDGE — WEST SIDE. Mrs. E. Bailey. Store occupied by J. G. Forbes. Mrs. E. Bailey. Residence by . Mrs. E. Bailey. Store occupied by J. K. Friday. Mrs. E. Bailey. Store occupied by Wm. Moore. James Hayes. Residence and store. Henry Davis. Store occupied by . Henry Da^is. Store occupied by P. W. Kraft. W. McGuinnis. Store and residence occupied by E. Beraghi and D. McGuinnis. W. McGuinnis. Re.sideuce and store by C. Brill. W. McGuinnis. Store occupied by Mrs. P. Ferguson, i-esidence byMrf, C. McKenna. James McKenna. Store, etc. Jacob Lyons. Commissary stores. Jacob Lyons. Store occupied by A. L. Solomons. Jacob Lyons. Store occupied by Muller & Senn. Jacob Lyons. Residence occuiiied by R. D. Senn. EAST STDE. T. S. Nickerson. Nickerson's Hotel. T. S. Nickerson. Barber shop by Wm. Inglis. T. S. Nickerson. Residence occupied by H. C. Franck. Store occupied by Franck «fe Wickenberg. T. S. Nickerson. Store occupied by John Fanning. T. S. Nickerson. Commissary State Troops. T. S. Nickerson. State Ordnance Stores. Estate R. Russell. Store occupied by N. Winnstock. Estate R. Russell. Commissary stores. Estate B. Reilly. Residence and store occupied by H. Simons. Estate B. Reilly. Store occupied by . 9 66 PROPERTY DESTROYED. Estate B. Reilly. Store occupied by P. Fogarty. Estate B. Rc-illy. Store occupied by P. Cfiutwcll. GERVALS TO SENATE. Capitol Grouiuls. .Aj-chitoct's Office, etc. Capitol Grounds. Sheds contaiuiug marble aud granite pillars, cornices, machinery, etc. Old Capitol. SENATE TO PENDLETON — W'EST SIDE. Mrs. E. J. Huutt. Residence, etc. EAST SIDE. Keeper Capitol. Residence occupied by T. Starlc. PENDLETON TO MEDIIM. A. Palmer. Residence, etc. Joseph Green (colored). Residence. WHEAT TO BLOSSOM. Mrs. B. Roberts. Residence. Mrs. B. Roberts. Two cottages occupied by . SUMTER. ITPPER TO RICHLAND — WEST SIDE. W. McAlister. Blacksmith slioii occupied liy Kraft, Goldsnuth A- Kraft. Mrs. Beebe. Residence. R. Wearn. Residence occnpied by M. Hislop. R. Wearn. Residence occupied by — Boag. M. A. Shelton. Residence occupied by G. W. Logan. RICHLAND TO LAUREL — WEST SIDE. P. M. Johnston. Residence occujjied by A. T. Cavis. J. Oliver. Residence occupied by John Janes. Mrs. E. Law. Residence occupied by H. Reckling. EAST SIDE. P. G. McGregor. Residence. P. L. Valory. Residence. D. B. Miller. Residence. J. F. Eisenman. Residence. PKOPEKTY DESTROYED. 67 LAUREL TO BLAND1NC4 — WEST SIDE. E.state C. Beck. Residence occupied by -. B. Bailey. Residence occupied by Rev. B. M. Palmer. B. Bailey. Government stables. EAST SIDE. C. A. Barnes. Residence. Presbyterian Lecture Room. A. J. Green. Stables, etc. BLANDlNtf TO I'ENDLETON. Mrs. J. Bryce. Houses occupied by colored families. Mrs. S. Miu'phy. Dwelling, etc. Dr. R. W. Gibbes, Jr. Dwelling. Old Baptist Church. Mrs. J. Friedeburg. Residence, etc. S. Waddel. Residence. G. S. Bower. Residence, etc. W. F. DeSaussure. Residence. A. 0. Squier. Residence. Estate J. S. Boatwright. Residence. J. H. Stelliug. Residence, mill, etc. J. H. SteUing. Residence occujjied by J. Roach and J. Richard. Mrs. C. Neuffer. Residence, etc. F. W. Green. Residence occupied by Miss H. Bulkley. F. W. Green. Residence occupied by . W. B. Broom. Residence occupied by C. C. Trumbo. UPPER. State Agricultural Society. Buildings occupied by Medical Purveyor. LUMBER. BICHAKDSON TO SUMTER. John McCay. Grist mill. W. Riley. Residence occupied by employees of Judge's sock factory, W, Thackam, Dwelling, etc. SUMTER TO MAHION. 14. Wearn. Residence occupied by T. W. Coogler. J. SecgeJS. Residence occupied by A. C. Jacobs. Estate Miss S. Ward, Residence occupied by Mrs. Simons. 68:n PROPERTY DESTROYED. GERVAIS STREET. GISI TO PUIABKI. C'. C. McPhail. Goverumeut Armory. Evans & Cog.swel]. Printing Establishment. PtTLASKI TO UXCOLN. Green%*illo Railroad Comiiany. Office, Dcjiots, Arc. South Carolina Railroad. Depots, office, Avarchouses, kc. Blakely, Williams & Co. Store and warehouse^. Blakel}^ Williams iV Co. Commissary stores. Estate T. Frean. Store, &c., occupied l)y M. Brown. Estate T. Frean. Store occupied l)y O'Nealc & Crawford. James Claflfey. Residence, <.tc. LINCOLN TO GATES. Estate B. Reilly. Residence occupied by negroes. Mrs. Bailey. Residence. R. O'Neale. Residence occupied by negroes. Mrs. Bailey. Residence occupied by Mrs. Harris. Residence occujncd Ijy Mrs. Walker. Mrs. A. Haight. Mary Jones. Sarah CaUioun. Residence. J. Taylor. Residence occujned by Julia McKean. Mrs. E. Glaze. Residence, &c. ASSEMBLY TO SUMTEK. D. Hane. Residence occupied by a colored woman. Estate B. Reilly. DweUing, &c. T. S. Nickerson. Dwelling. Mayor GoodAvyn. Dwelling. SUMTEK TO MAMOK. F. W. Green. Office occupied by WiUiam Patterson. F. W. Green. Residence, itc. J. S. Guignard. Residence occupied by Chancellor CarroD and General Lovell. Lecture Room of Trinity Church. MABION TO BULL. Mrs. B. E. Levy. Residence occupied by W. R. Tabcr and others. PROPEBTY DESTROYED. 6i) RICHLAND. GADSDEN TO LINCOLN. State Arsenal aud Academy. RICHAKDSON TO SUMTEK. Mrs. H. Gill. Residence, s,