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in that camp, had come to the home of her childhood to seek aid for him and his
comrades, not because he is her husband, but because he is fighting the battles
of his country against a tyrant."
On May 29 Mrs. Johnson took her departure from Raleigh with her prize,
stopped at Richmond for a day, and procured from Governor Letcher a number
of tents, blankets and camp equipage, all of which she delivered to her husband,
after an absence of ten days from camp.
The following interf sting paper, still in the possession of Mrs. Johnson, is
perhaps without a parallel:
Received, Ordnance Department, Harper's Ferry, June 3, 1861, of Mrs. B. T. Johnson,
five hundred Mississippi rifles (calibre 54). ten thousand cartridges, and thirty-five hundred
caps.
G.
M.
COCHRAN, Master of Ordnance.
Then the question arose as to how to secure uniforms and necessary clothing
for the men. Once more this noble woman was equal to the emergency, and
very soon, and that entirely through her own exertions, the men were clad in
neatly fitting gray uniforms. And what a change was there! The boys no
longer blushed through the bronze on their cheeks if any of the fair ladies of
Winchester chanced to be in camp, and behind them when the commanders of
companies gave the order, "Parade rest!" they stood erect, a cubit was added
to their stature, and they looked boldly into dark and soft eyes that beamed on
boys in gray. Verily, Carlyle is right; there is a philosophy in clothes.
All the officers worked faithfully to bring the command up to a state of
proficiency, and they were aided and encouraged by the men themselves, who
entered upon their hard and, to nearly all of them, unaccustomed duties with the
greatest alacrity. The result was that the regiment soon became the pride of
General Johnston's army, and was regarded with marked favor by the com-
manding General himself.
It was on July i that orders were received to cook two days' rations and
prepare to move. The cause for this unexpected order was at first mere
conjecture, but it soon became known that the Federal General Patterson had
again crossed the Potomac with an overwhelming force, and was driving Jackson
before him at Falling Waters.
At 4 o'clock on the afternoon of that same day General Johnston's little
army of eleven thousand men marched out of Winchester toward Martinsburg.
The men were in good spirits and eager for an opportunity to try conclusions
with the enemy, despite the fact that they were but poorly armed, and that many
of them did not have half of a dozen cartridges in their pockets, for cartridge
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