Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1866-06-15
Miscellany.
The End of Southern Romance.

In the Spring of 1861, when Fort Sum-
ter had surrendered to the mob which had
surrounded it, there was fervor of ex-
citement in Charleston, relative TO raising
troops to invade the North. A company
of young men belonging to the first fami-
lies in the city had been organizd, and the
ladies belonging to that circle had made it
their province to raise the money necessa-
ry to equip the company, furnish it with
arms, and send it to the seat of war in a
style which should reflect credit upon the
patriotism even of the first families of
Charleston. The excitement was intense,
and the young lady friends of the soldiers
were in fever heat as to which should do
the most towards aiding the cause and
firing the Southern heart. A fair was
held, at which the beauty and chivalry
were present, and from this a large sum
was realized. One young lady, beauti-
full and well-educated girl, daughter of a
| New York merchant who had settled as a
cotton factor in Charleston some twenty
years before, threw her whole soul into the
work. She forgot her relations at the
North, forgot that her father was there
born, forgot everything but her deep in
terest in the cause of aiding the South,
and with a foolish romance which only
the excitement of these times could ex-
plain, at the fair spoken Of offered her
heart and hand as a prize in the rattle,
the only stipulation being that the person
/ who drew them should be of respectable
narentage and soldier. The novelty of
the proposition added a great interest 10
the fair, and an immense sum was real
lied, aided by the rattle, she being pe,ted
child of Southern society, young, gifted,
beautiful and wealthy. The holder of the
prize ticket was young man, gambler
and spendthrift, who had run through his
fortune, and civil war was an excitement
just suited to his nervons temperament.-
He was a member of the company-the
Charlestown Tigers the young la
dies were fitting out, and was scion of
the family of Rhetts. Alter il was known
who the lucky man was, his well-known
propensities, notwithstanding his family
connections, caused every inducement to
be offered by the lady's parents to make
her recede from the promise she had made.
No, she had given her word, and her part
of the contract should be religiously kept.
With great eclat the parties were mar
ried-the occasion was the theme of much
talk for few days, and then disappeared
before the sterner realities of war.
War brings strange revolutions. The
father of the young lady saw his property
wasted and he died in poverty. Poor
now, the folly and romance which had
once been the theme of all praise was
laughed at; but the more singular thing
of all was that the young lady loved the
object upon whom she had SO strangely
placed her heart. He had gone to Vir-
ginia with bis company. She heard of
and from him regularly, until the Summer
of 1864, when all traces of him ceased
The Tigers" were broken as company
organization, and the few of them left
were scattered through other regiments.
Her ceasing TO hear from the man led the
lady to believe that he was dead, and as
a martyr to the cause she loved was he
mourned. When, however, war had ceas-
ed, and the scattering fragments of South
ern chivalry came scattering back, she
learned that her husband had been taken
prisoner near Norfolk, and had enlisted in
company Of United States volunteers,
| composed of dcserters from the Southern
army, and had with them been sent up in
TO Minnesota for duty on the border
This was tragical termination to her ro-
nance, but it did not quench the love
which bad grown up from nothing in her
heart, and few months ago she left
Charleston, selling what little of her Jewell
ry was left to raise the necessary money
went to Washington, searched through the
rolls, but could not find the name of her
husband in the list, and if he had ever
been there it was under an assumed name.
She had expected this, but, laying her
case before President johnson, she was
furnished with the necessary instructions
TO the commanding officer of the depart
ment in which her husband might be, to
secure his release from service, and she
came West with the intention of proceed
ing along the track our troops had taken,
him.
Arriving in Chicago she was fortunate
enough TO meet there man whom she
had known in Charleston, when she was
the belle of that ciiy-a man who had de-
serted the rebel flag and joined the Union
army with her husband. From him she
learned that which she had heard was
true-that both had been mustered out on
surgeons certificate of disability, and had
come back to St. Paul, after the Indian
campaign was over. Both had too much