"All of Us Smelled Bacon"

Monday, February 24, 1862, on picket duty

The news from Tennessee has arrived and none of it can be called good. Fort Henry and Fort Donelson have fallen to Grant. These forts, well positioned and well garrisoned, were supposed to secure western Tennessee and prevent the Yankees from invading Alabama and Mississippi. Now, both have fallen in less than two weeks. With the forts gone, can Nashville stand? Our entire defensive line in the west has crumbled. What is happening to our country and our cause? Someone must be held to blame for this but who? We have some bad generals including ours. Who is this Grant and why don't we have someone like him?

I would suppose that many of us will be transferred to the west to establish some sort of line to protect the country's interior. Donelson's brigade of Tennesseans will probably be the first to go. I did not know that the Fort was named after him. Perhaps he should have been in command. I think they will send many of us South Carolinians but then who would be left to turn all this earth? We noticed that the fires around the officers tents were burning later than usual last night. I feel good that they are agitated as they have done so little to be agitated about.

This is a sickly place. The plantation plutocrats, during the sickly season, leave for more healthful climes. We others, having no wealth and no title save citizen must go where we are told and stay there. Our numbers are decreasing due to illness and we are not likely to have these fellows replaced. Things will just get worse as the demands for troops in other places cause our numbers to be further depleted. We will all imbed our spades in the earthworks, place our caps on the handles and march off to Tennessee. The Yankees here will see that our works are still manned and will leave them alone. Let the Yankees get all sick and die. It will serve them right. They could have stayed home and avoided the black vomits and bloody fluxes but they would rather invade the homes of others. How would they like it if we did the same to their homes?

The grumbling of our bellies will give away our positions. One moonless night, while on picket duty, Hancock, Holton, White and myself took a bit of leave from our picket post. Duncan, Castles and Lynn stayed behind to make things look good. All of us had seen the glow of lights coming from a farmhouse a bit about a mile away. We were hoping that where there was a farm, there would be victuals.


We dusted ourselves off to make us look presentable. Holton, being the youngest at seventeen tender years, knocked at the door. It took a moment but a lady of some years answered gruffly. Holton pleaded our case, citing that we few defenders of our country's liberties were in need or some simple repast. Appealing to her sense of patriotism made not a dent in her defense of her larder which she claimed was bare. Our noses told us different. All of us smelled bacon. Holton and White between them offered the woman forty dollars in Confederate paper money. She remained steadfast in her denials as we grew weaker being so near and yet so far.


Before I left my home in Beaufort to go and join up in Columbia, I had closed out my account at the bank and took my entire fortune in coin. Calling the woman's attention to myself, I produced three silver dollars from the old country from my pocket and rustled them noisily.
The noise attracted a man who I took to be her husband. The sight and sound of hard money overwhelmed the both of them. We left the farmhouse with full haversacks. I was a bit poorer but certainly fatter.


We ate nothing until we reunited with the others. Their eyes bulged as big as our haversacks as we disgorged their contents. There was bacon, beans and corn for all. A rhubarb pie did not travel well in my haversack but no one cared. We ate everything and saved nothing. We slept very well that night. May the Yankees rot.