Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1866-11-15
From the New York Waterman.
sorrows of the south.

sorrows OF the South.
By the naturalist, the beautiful South,
with its picturesque valleys, hills, and
mountains, is viewed as the land OF the
oak, the palmetto, and the orange; but to
the philanthropist, who looks upon the in
ner life of hearts and honors it is the land
of the cypress and willow, and spreads out
gloomily as wasted panorama of disap-
pointment and sorrow. The casual obser-
YER, mingling for short while with the
busy throngs in the towns and cities, or
speeding by railway along the busting
thoroughfares, sees and learns but little of
the inexorable woes of the stricken victims
of the war of secession. To know these,
one must visit the numberless homes whose
hope and honor and light went down be-
meath the fell stroke of the demon of death
in field and hospital, and listen to the signs
of lone agony, and gaze upon the tears of
unavailing sorrow which thousands of bro
ken hearts increasingly offer to the ever
precious memory of the slain. Could all
the story of the trials and agonies of the
crushed and trampled South be faithfully
revealed and thoroughly appreciated, there
is not bosom in the universe, unblasted
by a devils conscience, that would not be-
come fountain of sympathetic tears
hand upholstered by the fiery chains OF
the world of hate and horror but would
move with mercy and extend its help. And
this is the fate of people whose crime
was desire, resolve, a struggle, to Sc
cure and enjoy what they believed was won
for them by Washington, and warranted
by the genius and laws of the land they
had honored and loved. The worst is, that
the heaviest of their woes are irremediable
for ever. Other homes may possibly be
built over the ashes of the cherished dwell
lings which a ruthless foe consumed, and
other treasures may be won even from the
unmeasured oppression of heartless and
Implying conqueror; but the noble and
loved ones, whose bones lie unburied or
crumble in the grave, were the dearest of
all, and no fortune of life can restore them
again, or heal for a moment the deep
wounds their fall inflicted on the hearts
which embalm them in their hopeless tears.
Look at these pictures, taken from among
hundreds of thousands like them, which
hang in the long gallery of Southern woe.
I am a minister, and few days since a
poor widow sent me the request to COM
memorate the death of her soldier boys at
the church which they once attended, and
where some of them had been converted to
God. She had lost four devoted sons-one
died at Lynchburg, one at Charlottesville,
one at Richmond, and one at Petersburg.
The widows of two of them wept with the
heart broken mother around the altar, while
their little faxen-haired children chung
around them, wearing look of innocence
that troubled the tears of him who thought
of their hapless orphanage in a ruined
land.
saw fair young woman weeping by
the bier of sweet sister, and listened to
her cries as she told of the last visit of her
fallen husband, and of the words of love he
spoke the last time he saw her and his dear
children; and [ learned that she had rel
ative who lost four of her five boys in the
army, and had three daughters all made
widows by the bloody demon.
In the town of o. there was an in
valid widow with only two children-two
manly sons. One fell at the head of his
regiment in that valley that will memorial
ize the infamy of Sheridan till the last fires
consume it. His wife has long been an in
valid, too, and had lost SO many relatives
that her husband and child were almost
her only comfort. Now they are both gone,
and she is left in a world bereft of all that
was precious to her heart The other son
the mothers darling-was known to have
entered the last Inflated battle at Peters
burg, and was never seen or heard of again
AS he was never seen to fall, hope has been
sustained by the fond love of the mothers
heart, and even yet she listens for the dali
ly train with unyielding expectation, and
feebly totters to the easement and gazes to-
ward the station with her faint and failing
eye, still longing and looking for the return
of her brave, atfectionate boy whom she
Will not mourn as dead.
What hearts must they have-have they
op'y hearts-who can feed, harpy-ike, on
what is left to people so desolate, SO
stricken ?