Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1885-06-26
or cUsrER's LIFE.

How the Clusters Passed Their Honey.
Il 80 # Esas y 3E moon.
From Mrs. Custer's Book Boots and Saddles.
Il We had no sooner reached Washing
ton on our wedding journey than tele-
grams came following one another in
quick succession, asking him to give up
the test of his leave of absence and
hasten without an hours delay to the
front. I begged so hard not to be
left behind that [ finally prevailed.
The result was that found myself in a
few hours on the extreme wing Of the ar
my of the Potomac, in an isolated Vir-
giDia farm house, finishing my honey
moon alone. I had 80 besought him to
allow me to come that I did not dare to
own to myself the desolation and fright
felt. In TIE preparation of the hurried
raid which my husband had been or
dered to make he had sent to cavalry
headquarters to provide for my safety,
and troops were in reality NEAR, although
could not see them.
.lhe Generals old colorel servant.
Eliza, comforted me, and the Southern
family in the house took pity upon my
anxiety. It was sudden plunge into q
lie of vicissitudes and danger. and
hardly remem Der the time during the
twelve years that followed when / was
not in fear of some Immediate peril, or
in dread Of some danger that Threatened.
After the raid was ended we spent some
delightful weeks together, and when the
regular spring campaign began l. re-
turned to Washington, where remained
until the surrender and the close of the
wal. n.I
After that we went to Texas for a
year, my husband still acting rs major
general in command Of volunteers. In
1866 we returned to Michigan, and the
autumn of the same year found us in
Kansas, where the General resumed
charge of the 7th (regular) cavalry, to
which he had been assigned with the
rank OF. lieutenant-colonel in the regu-
lar army. We remained in Kansas five
years, during which time I was the only
officers wife who always followed the
regiment. We we're then ordered with
the regiment to Kentucky. After be-
ing stationed in Elizabethtown for two
years, we went to Dakota in the spring
of 1873.
On Sunday afternoon, the 25th of
June. our little group of saddened
women, borne down with the common
weight of anxiety, sought solace in
gathering together in our house. We
tried to find some slight surcease
from trouble in the old hymns;
some Of them dated back to our
childhood days, when our mothers
rocked US to sleep to their soothing
strains. I remember the grief with
which one fair young wife threw herself
on the carpet and pillowed her head on
the lap Of tender friend. Another
sat detected, at the piano, and struck
soft cords that melted into the notes OF
the voices. All we're absorbed in the
same thoughts, aud their eyes we're
filled with iar-away visions of longings.
Indescribable yearnings for the absent,
engrossed each heart The words OF
the hymn
Even though q cross it be,
Nearer, my God, to Thee,
came forth with almost sob from every
throat. At that very hour the fears
that our tortured minds had portrayed
in imagination were realities, and the
souls of those We thought upon were
ascending to meet their Maker. From
that time the life went out of the hearts
of the women who weep" and God
asked them to walk on alone and in the
| shadow.