SOLDIER 31 



Fourche to the main part of the town and spent a couple 

 of hours in exploring it. It must have been an exceedingly 

 beautiful place, though now many of the houses are lying 

 in ruins from the bombardment last summer. 1 Then there 

 is an exceedingly pretty cemetery, embowered in red and 

 white roses which hang in clusters over the monuments. I 

 noticed on many of the tombs fresh wreaths of roses and 

 myrtle, and before many there were pictures hanging, re- 

 presenting the survivors weeping beneath a willow. Blue 

 pinks seem to be a very favorite flower and were planted 

 around almost every monument. 



"March 31. We were packed up and on the move at 8.30 

 A.M. Our road (in fact the whole way to Thibodeaux) lay 

 along the Bayou La Fourche, a very deep and cold stream 

 along which our steamers were passing bearing the sick and 

 baggage. As we wound along under the China-ball and 

 catalpa trees, the inhabitants were all on the piazzas watch- 

 ing us, and that appeared to be their principal occupation 

 everywhere. Such a slovenly, indolent set you never saw, 

 the women especially, with frizzled hair, unhooked 

 dresses, and slipshod shoes. They were evidently poor 

 white trash. But oh, the clover fields we passed ! The heart 

 of an Alderney cow would have leaped into her mouth at 

 the sight, and a butcher's mouth would have watered in 



1 During the summer of 1862 the people of Donaldsonville pursued the 

 uniform practice of firing upon our steamers passing up and down the 

 river. Admiral Farragut reports August 10: "I sent a message to the in- 

 habitants that if they did not discontinue the practice I would destroy 

 their town. The next night they fired on the St. Charles. I therefore 

 ordered them to send their women and children out of town as I certainly 

 intended to destroy the town on my way down the river, and I fulfilled 

 my promise to a certain extent." 19 W. R. 141. 



