Southern Historical Society Papers/Volume 40/Appendix
APPENDIX
HYMN TO ROBERT E. LEE.
O Robert Lee! O Robert Lee!
How shall thy servant speak of thee?
Whom humbly, lowly, and afar,
He followed in the track of War,
Twas thine, almost, his soul to save,
When sunk, well nigh, beneath the wave
Of Doubt, that fierce his faith assailed.
And other lights were hid, or failed.
'Twas thy grand life that told me then
That God, indeed, doth dwell with men;
'Twas thine to show His truth and grace,
In bright reflection, on thy face.
How oft, amid War's fiercest storm,
I've gazed upon thy noble form;
And, marking how serene and high
Thy mien, or how thy gentle sigh
Was breathed o'er corpse of gallant brave,
Who fell near thee, his land to save;
How oft the thought that thou wast sign
Of Might and Majesty Divine;
And token, too, of that deep love
That rules the .heart of God above ;
So deep, so wide, embracing all,
Yet caring for the sparrow's fall.
Prayer now to Heaven is humbly breathed
Sometime, somewhere, to see thee wreathed
In crown of glory, fadeless, bright,
Beyond the stars, in realms of Light.
C. H. Scott.
MRS. "STONEWALL" JACKSON.
By James Power Smith, General Jackson's Staff.
Mrs. Mary Anna Jackson, the honored widow of General "Stonewall" Jackson, came to the close of a long, faithful and happy life in her home in Charlotte, N. C, on Wednesday, March 24, 1915.
She was a gentlewoman by birth and nature, a lady of simplicity of character and cheerfulness of spirit, and most amiable and pleasing- manner. Modest and unaffected, she was cordial and considerate toward all with whom she came in contact. Small in stature and well rounded in form, she was in striking contrast with the erect and soldierly man whose bride she became in her youth, and whose home and life she made so happy in the few years of married life given to them. She became the wife of Major Jackson of the Virginia Military Institute in 1857. She remembered with amusement that when they were married the bridegroom was asked to promise that he would be an "indulgent husband" and the bride was told to be "an obedient wife," and the vows were kept without a shade of question or hesitation, and to the unmingled happiness of both. The stern and disciplined soldier was gentle indulgence itself, and the happy wife at his side was most happy in the strong-willed, heroic man whom she loved, admired and trusted supremely.
In the trying days of war she came to him whenever in his judgment conditions and duties permitted. During the last winter of his life, when his command was encamped in the Rappahannock Valley, one of his major-generals, an incorrigible old bachelor, complained that there were too many ladies visiting their husbands in the vicinity of the camp, and asked that they be compelled to withdraw. But the general walked the floor of his headquarters office and said with some heat: "I will do no such thing. I wish that my wife could come to see me."
The first winter of the war Mrs. Jackson spent two or three months with the general in Winchester. And she came again for a week at Hamilton's Crossing, just before the battle of Chancellorsville, and at the last was at his bedside when he "crossed over the river" at the Chandler home at Guineas Station, May 10, 1863.
For more than fifty years she has been a widow, a patient, cheerful, Christian woman, honoring and loving the good and great man who was her husband, submissive to the will of God, faithful to every duty, having her own sickness and her own more painful sorrow, but gentle, steadfast, biding the time when she would find her appointed rest "under the shade of the trees."
It will be a pleasing and abiding memory with the people of Richmond and Virginia that last May, at our earnest solicitation, Mrs. Jackson came to join us in the honor we wished to give to the memory of General Jackson on our "Stonewall" Jackson Memorial Day. Thinking not at all of herself, but only of him, she was as gentle, unaffected and cheerful as we had always known her. More frail in body, showing the traces of her many years, she was uncomplaining, placid in countenance and peaceful in spirit. Happy in the enthusiasm of our hero worship, she was biding the time when she would enter in through the gates and find those whom by the wise and loving will of her heavenly Father she had lost awhile.
The women of the South have been teaching us that "love makes memory eternal," and with us all the loving memory of this most womanly woman, this widow so greatly widowed, this faithful and fruitful follower of Christ, will endure to the end of our days, and make the world better and our lives sweeter because she was given to us through half a century.
JEWS IN THE CIVIL WAR.
From "Justice to the Jews," by Dr. Madison C. Peters, page 98.
"It was left for the Civil War to bring out the qualities of the Jew as a genuine soldier, as one whom no terrors could daunt, no dangers intimidate, no sufferings weaken, an automation of flesh and bone impervious to fatigue and hunger. The Civil War tried the souls of men as well as their bodies, yet the Jew did not shrink. When Lincoln called for volunteers, the sons of Israel rushed to don the Blue and followed the flag to death or victory. Great numbers were also in the ranks of the Confederacy, a fact which stifles the calumny that the Jew when he does fight has no heart in the struggle, but merely fights perfunctorily and with no object in view. For the time being, Judaism was forgotten and the Jew in Blue faced the Jew in Gray with a deadly earnestness, each believing heart and soul in the cause for which he had unsheathed is sword. 'Stonewall' Jackson and Robert E. Lee gallantly fought for the 'Lost Cause' and though they were defeated, they were not conquered, and of all the brave sons of the South who fought and bled beneath their leadership, none put up a more stubborn fight than the Jewish Confederates."