The Calm and the Strife Read online

  THE CALM

  AND

  THE STRIFE

  A Historical Novel

  About Gettysburg

  by

  David J. Sloat

  and

  John W. Sloat

  CCB Publishing

  British Columbia, Canada

  The Calm and the Strife:

  A Historical Novel About Gettysburg

  Copyright ©2012 by David J. Sloat and John W. Sloat

  ISBN-13 978-1-77143-032-6

  First Edition

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Sloat, David J., 1968-

  The calm and the strife [electronic resource] : a historical novel about Gettysburg / by David J. Sloat and John W. Sloat – 1st ed.

  Electronic monograph in PDF format.

  ISBN 978-1-77143-032-6

  Also available in print format.

  Additional cataloguing data available from Library and Archives Canada

  Cover artwork: A cannon at the Gettysburg Battlefield at sunset.

  Picture taken at the “High Water Mark.” ©Dwight Nadig | iStockphoto.com

  Disclaimer: This is a work of historical fiction. It is based on actual events and characters, but many of the motives and relationships in this novel are either products of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Extreme care has been taken by the authors to ensure that all information presented in this book is accurate and up to date at the time of publishing. Neither the authors nor the publisher can be held responsible for any errors or omissions. Additionally, neither is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the express written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For other permission requests, please contact the author.

  Publisher:

  CCB Publishing

  British Columbia, Canada

  www.ccbpublishing.com

  This book is dedicated,

  with love and appreciation,

  to:

  Amy Beth Fox Sloat

  and

  Helen Elizabeth Burdick Sloat

  The Winds of Fate

  by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

  From Poems of Optimism (1919)

  One ship drives east and another drives west,

  With the self-same winds that blow,

  ’Tis the set of the sails

  And not the gales

  That tell them the way to go.

  Like the winds of the sea are the winds of fate,

  As we voyage along through life,

  ’Tis the set of the soul

  That decides its goal

  And not the calm or the strife.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Table of Contents

  Prologue – Homecoming: July 2, 1863

  Chapter 1 – Dreams: July 4, 1856

  Chapter 2 – Resolution: August 1856

  Chapter 3 – Freedom: August 1856

  Chapter 4 – Departure: November 17, 1856

  Chapter 5 – A Gathering Storm: October 4, 1860

  Chapter 6 – Skelly: December 21, 1860

  Chapter 7 – Dissolution: April 11, 1861

  Chapter 8 – Into the Fire: April 13, 1861

  Chapter 9 – A New Alliance: April 17, 1861

  Chapter 10 – Jackson: April 23, 1861

  Chapter 11 – Manassas: July 17, 1861

  Chapter 12 – Promises: July 28, 1861

  Chapter 13 – In the Enemy’s Land: March 1862

  Chapter 14 – A Lost Cause: March 1862

  Chapter 15 – A Soldier’s Return: April 6, 1863

  Chapter 16 – North and South: May 11, 1863

  Chapter 17 – Making Peace: June 14, 1863

  Chapter 18 – The Coming Thunder: June 26, 1863

  Chapter 19 – The First Day: July 1, 1863

  Chapter 20 – The Conquering Hero: July 1-2, 1863

  Chapter 21 – Torment: July 2, 1863

  Chapter 22 – Reunion: July 2, 1863

  Chapter 23 – The Will of Mine Enemies: July 3, 1863

  Chapter 24 – Buried Dreams: July 4, 1863

  Epilogue – A New Birth: November 19, 1863

  Authors’ Afterword

  The Cast of Characters

  Other books by John W. Sloat

  Back cover

  Prologue

  HOMECOMING

  Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

  July 2, 1863

  John Wesley Culp stood watching as Confederate troops swirled past him, moving in obedience to orders from distant commanders. He looked around Gettysburg, the newest prize of Robert E. Lee’s army, and shook his head in disbelief. A wry grin twisted his mouth as he imagined the eyes that peered out behind shuttered windows. To them, he must appear to be just one more gray uniform in a vast sea of gray.

  But Wes Culp knew he was different from all the others as he stood looking silently down Baltimore Street in the twilight. He had been gone for what seemed like a lifetime, but now the pilgrimage that had begun when he turned his back on Gettysburg seven years ago had brought him here again. To the other men in gray uniforms, this was an alien place, enemy country. To Wes, it still looked like home.

  He peered down the road toward the small, two-story building half a mile away. In it was a woman who was unaware of his return, to say nothing of the message in his breast pocket, a message that would change their lives forever. Patting the pocket for the thousandth time, he set off toward the distant house.

  Gettysburg had changed so little that it seemed to Wes as if he was waking from a dream. The buildings, the trees, even the rocks along the street were painfully familiar. The night could have been any night from his childhood – running along these streets, playing in these yards, hiding behind these trees. And yet tonight he saw the town with a startling clarity.

  He had run so hard to get away from this place, from the memories and the people – his father, his family. He had run from the other children and their cruel taunts. And, he now saw clearly, he had also run from her.

  But the running would stop tonight. The past had snared him so securely that he could no longer struggle against it. He smiled at the irony. Back in the very place he had been so desperate to leave, he no longer felt the need to escape; he had brought with him a whole new future. It was a boy who had run away from this place, too frightened to stand up to its challenges; but the man who stood here tonight was no longer afraid.

  He had just come from visiting his sisters in a house half a mile back. Annie and Julia had greeted him as if he was still one of them, and the excitement of their meeting gave hope that they might recapture something of the old days. But it quickly became obvious that the naïve happiness of the past was gone forever. There had been too many changes.

  His brow creased as he wondered what kind of reception awaited him at the house to which he was now headed. Ginnie Wade’s reaction was much more important to him than that of his sisters’. He was certain that, regardless of all that had happened between them, their dreams were still within reach. No longer would they talk of places or houses or wealth, but only of being together. Now, each step down Baltimore Street brought him that much closer to their final goal.

  The cries of the day’s wounded echoed from several temporary hospitals, marked by red flags that now hung limply in the July dusk. The air was laden with smoke and the acrid smell of gunpowder. But Wes was oblivious to it all. Up
on the crest of the rise to his left, Federal cannon boomed into the night, firing occasionally at targets that were becoming invisible. Wes smiled as he watched the cannons belch their fire, feeling not fear but an exuberant joy. The hill upon which the guns sat was as familiar to him as the streets he now walked. It was known as Culp’s Hill, named after his family which had settled on the land generations ago. Tomorrow, his brigade would capture the hill and take those guns, winning the battle and probably ending the war.

  He had reached the bottom of the hill, only a few hundred yards from the house where Ginnie was staying temporarily, when a guard sitting on a fence rail to his right hailed him.

  “Where you headed there, boy?”

  Wes stopped and turned to the man. In the dark, he could make out only a huge, featureless form in gray. The man moved forward, clearly suspicious, his rifle lying easily in the crook of his arm. As he approached, his gray hair and ruddy face suddenly flared in the phosphorescent glow of a match. He lit the pipe clenched in his teeth, then eyed Wes. “I say again, where you headed?”

  Wes pointed to the house. “There. My girl is staying there.”

  The guard nodded thoughtfully, sucking on the carved pipe in his bandaged hand. “Northern girl, eh?”

  Wes nodded, impatient to be on his way. He took a few steps but the guard’s voice halted him again. “You might have a rough time of it if you go much farther, son. The Yankees hold that house. It’s inside their lines.” After a moment, he added thoughtfully, “Course, I suppose they’ll be more’n happy to entertain a visitor who’s dressed in gray.” He grinned, then asked in a tone that left the next move up to Wes, “You reckon she’s worth it?”

  Wes stopped in the middle of the street, squinting hard to make out the house. He could see fires burning behind it up the hill, and could just make out a crude barricade adjacent to the house, thrown up to protect Federal sharpshooters. He stood silently for a long time, staring at the house. He had anticipated this meeting for so long; it was torture to get this close and then be barred from going the last few feet.

  “Been a long time since you’ve seen her?” The guard’s voice broke into Wes’ frustration. The man smiled sadly, apparently entertaining memories of his own. Wes nodded.

  “Yep. It’s been a lifetime.” He spoke quietly, not so much to the old man as to himself.

  After a time, the man gave a single, resolute nod and turned to hitch himself back up onto the fence. “Then, you can wait one more day to see her, can’t you, son?”

  Wes sighed. He was right. One more day was nothing. But the thought did not calm his clawing disappointment. Finally, he turned grudgingly and started to walk back the way he had come.

  The guard laughed, his cackle stinging Wes. “You’ll just have to fight harder tomorrow, boy. She’ll still be there. Unless the Yankees get to her first.” His bitter laughter crackled through the night air.

  Wes took a breath to respond angrily, then thought better of it. Like it or not, the old man was right. He was just going to have to wait one more day.

  Chapter 1

  DREAMS

  Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

  July 4, 1856

  The normally quiet town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania was awash in a sea of red, white and blue. Shouting figures waved at the parade of wagons moving slowly down Baltimore Street. Even from his vantage point on the hill, half a mile to the south, Wes Culp could sense the bonds that united the tiny forms into a single celebrating mass. He was alone by choice, preferring to watch the festivities from a distance, away from the crush of people, perched in his favorite tree.

  It was expected to be the greatest day in Gettysburg’s history: a dual celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the town’s incorporation and the eightieth anniversary of the country’s founding. The students had worked for weeks to build floats for the parade, and now those floats, their sides draped with children happily waving to the crowd, made their way through town. They were coming slowly south from the Diamond, the town square, where the largest group of spectators had gathered to view the parade. Wes watched as each wagon arrived at the lower end of Baltimore Street, heading in the direction of his hill.

  There had been no end of preparation in the past weeks, and it seemed that everyone was caught up in the excitement. Even Wes’ father, Jesse, who was usually somewhat reserved, had been chattering about it. But when the day arrived and the crowds began to gather, Wes slipped away by himself. He knew that his mother would be searching for him, wondering why he wasn’t with the family. It rankled that she still felt it necessary to look out for him. He was seventeen, well past the age that required a mother’s supervision, and he no longer attended school since he started working with his brother, Will, at the Hoffman carriage factory. Even so, Margaret Culp still treated him like her baby although he was the third of four children.

  A cruel prank of nature had made him much shorter than most other boys. This, compounded with an almost painful shyness, made it difficult for him to get along with others his age. Children, and even some adults, teased him relentlessly. His mother had counseled him not to worry about it, telling him that he would eventually grow taller, like Will and their father. But, as time passed, it became apparent that he would never be like Will. And he had no desire at all to be like his father. As a result, he fell into the habit of keeping mostly to himself.

  The frown on Wes’ face grew deeper as his dark eyes watched the joy in the valley below. He flicked the brown hair back from his forehead and squinted at the float now coming into view down Baltimore Street. The wagon, filled with children, bore a banner proudly heralding the handiwork of the eighth grade class. Wes knew that his younger sister, Julia, was one of those aboard. She would be disappointed that he wasn’t in the crowd watching her. Of course, she would forgive him as she always did, but he still felt a twinge of guilt. It was the only thing he regretted. Except...that Ginnie Wade would be there too. She and Julia would be sitting beside each other, their legs hanging over the wagon’s decorated sides.

  The July heat was beginning to build as the parade came to an end. Many of the young people escaped from the confines of their families and climbed the hill toward Wes, heading for the cool waters of Rock Creek. Wes’ family had settled along this ridge generations ago, and people in Gettysburg referred to it simply as Culp’s Hill. Wes felt somewhat proprietary about the land, even though his father had no claim to it. His father’s cousin, Henry Culp, was the current owner. But Wes had played there since he could walk, and he knew the hill from top to bottom, every rock, every tree.

  He watched silently as the line of teenage boys stormed up the hill toward him, finally veering off to his right toward the creek. Afraid of being seen by the invaders, Wes moved back among the branches to watch from his hiding place as the swimmers frolicked and splashed in the water. He resented the way they felt at ease with each other; he wanted to be able to jump into the creek along with them. But they all knew him and took delight in humiliating him, making fun of his size and his nervous stutter. He had earned a reputation for being yellow, because he had run away so many times from fights with bigger boys. He wore the pain of his continual rejection like a dead weight around his neck, allowing it to drag him further into his own isolated world. Eventually, his resentment built itself into a hatred of everything about Gettysburg.

  He often imagined running away from home, leaving his family and his tormentors behind, searching for some place where no one knew him, where no one treated him like a child or made fun of his small stature. People would see him for what he was inside, and would not judge him for what he looked like on the outside. In this dream place, he would become rich and powerful, the town’s most important citizen, and everyone would know him and like him and seek out his company. Then and only then would he come back to Gettysburg to let everyone discover how wrong they had been about him. He smiled as he imagined these boys, now playing in the creek, respectfully coming before him on some future day
to apologize for the way they had treated him, then begging him for favors or money.

  “Where were you?”

  Wes, startled out of his reverie, looked down to see Julia climbing the hill toward him with a look of disappointment on her face. Her blue dress was dotted with red and white buttons, and a matching ribbon pulled back her dark brown hair. She stood with arms akimbo and stared for a moment at Wes.

  “I l…l…left,” he stuttered.

  “It was a bore anyway,” she said with a shrug. Wes knew she didn’t mean it, but it was her way of forgiving him. She looked back toward the swimming hole, adding casually, “Ginnie was wondering where you were.”

  Wes slid closer toward her along the branch. “W…what did she say?” he asked with poorly disguised excitement.

  “She just asked where you were.”

  “And what did you say?”

  “I said you were probably up here. I told her you don’t much like crowds.” Wes could feel the heat rising up his neck, embarrassed at the thought of having his personal feelings exposed to Ginnie. She went on, “I also told her that you were madly in love with her.”

  Wes’ head snapped up, but then he realized that she was teasing. “No, you didn’t,” he laughed.

  “But you wish I had, don’t you?” She giggled, looking wise beyond her thirteen years. She found her brother’s infatuation with her best friend extremely entertaining and, while she would never deliberately hurt him, she frequently joked about the relationship when they were alone. “She’s down at the swimming hole, waiting for me, if you want to tell her.” When he failed to respond, she set off toward the creek. Glancing back to confirm that he wasn’t coming down, she called, “All right, suit yourself. I’ll see you at home.”