A Confederate Leader Contemplates War's End
Excerpts from the Journals of Josiah Gorgas

Thursday May 4, [1865]
The citizens here [Winnsborough, South Carolina] are destroying powder in Store here lest worse befal[l] & the whole town be blown up. I have suggested that some of the common powder be reserved for blasting.

We are discussing the propriety of setting out again on our progress Southward, & will probably leave on Saturday. I desire to set forward to Alabama, as my adopted State, before again coming under the control of the authority of the U. S. Govt. We took tea at Mr. Jos. Aikens last night, & are to dine with Mr. Taft to-day.

The calamity which has fallen upon us in the total destruction of our government is of a character so overwhelming that I am as yet unable to comprehend it. I am as one walking in a dream, & expecting to awake. I cannot see its consequences, nor shape my own course, but am just moving along until I can see my way at some future day. It is marvelous that a people that a month ago had money, armies, and the attributes of a nation should to-day be no more, & that we live, breathe, move, talk as before. Will it be so when the Soul leaves the body behind it?

Sunday, [May] 14th [1865]
Heard that the enemy were at Elberton [Ga.] in force; & crossed Broad River at Bakers Ferry, taking the road to Washington & Centreville [Ga.]. Met a squad of 6 Yankees whom we mistook for our own people. [Thomas L.] Bayne asked them whether there were any "Yankees" at Washington! They seemed to be quite as willing as we were to pass them. B. & I rode on to Washington while the wagons went on to Centreville. We got paroles for ourselves & the two others, met Gen. Alexander and talked for an hour, rode on and reached C a little after dark . . . .

Friday, [May 26, 1865]
[R]eached Montgomery passing by many large fields of corn in which the grain was growing at 1 o'clock. Stopped to see Gov [Thomas Hill] Wat[t]s who is of course deposed. Went to the Exchange [Hotel] -- too late for dinner -- took tea with Yankee officers at the same table. The sensation is novel, but we must get used to the presence of our late enemies, now our masters. The town is full of Yankees, & the negros abound everywhere, idle tho not insolent. Three thousand are in camp on the opposite side of the [Alabama] River, & the smallpox is making sad havoc among them. Poor victims of their northern friends.

Saturday, [May 27 1865]
Saw [U. S.] Gen. A. J. Smith & asked him as to the policy of his Govt toward the members of Conf. Congress & Govt. & also toward army officers. [He] Tho't army officers would not be molested, & has no orders to make arrests. He has grown very old & gray since I saw him 20 years ago. He is a man of moderate calibre a good soldier no doubt and seems to give satisfaction. Talked with freedom as to my coming South at the beginning of the war. He is himself from Tenn. Found Dr. Potts at his room, who is also from the old Army, & had served with Smith. Left M[ontgomery] at 4 p.m. by Steamer Coquette (U.S. Qr.M Dept.) with horses and ambulance on board. Ex Gov. A. B. Moore [at the time of Alabama's secession convention], & Col [George W.] Gayle came on board, the first accompanied by a Yankee officer, & in arrest; the second under guard, two sentinels constantly sitting over him with muskets. He foolishly it seems published an offer to be one of a number that should make up a purse of a million dollars, as a reward to assassinate Lincoln [Seward, and Andrew Johnson. Gayle was jailed for several months until officials decided he had nothing to do with Lincoln's death]. Gov M[oore] kindly said to me as I left him that if he came back safely he could be of service to me.

Sunday [May] 28th, [1865]
Left Selma at 7 p.m. & drove to Marion, taking with us Mr. [William M.] Brooks, who was the President of the convention which voted this State out of the union. We stopped all night at his house. Mrs. B[rooks] is a very charming woman & refined. Mr. B[rooks] thinks we will all be arrested, & talks of leaving the home which he had hoped to embellish for his children. . . .

Friday June 2d, [1865]
Drove to Demopolis. The roads thro the swamp developed some of the worst mud holes I ever rode thro'. Found Mr. Lyon ill with a severe chill. He was well enough however to see us & left his bed on Sunday. The slaves are of course in great commotion. Their freedom has been announced to them, & they are in a state of excitement & jubilee not knowing what responsibilities their new condition brings with it. They are idle but not insubordinate nor disrespectful. It is a curious problem which is being solved by the sword -- this freedom of the African race. It will cause many a cruel pang on both sides. The master sees his property suddenly swept away, & the negro does not find in his freedom compensation for the ills it brings upon him. But the world will wag on & his freedom will cling to him and the master will continue to cultivate his land, with black labor or that failing with white. The energies of the white race will halt but temporarily before this catastrophe. . . .
As we were going . . . to the boat we met Mr. Ross just from Mobile with the "Amnesty Proclamation" which allows all except a couple hundred thousand people to take the oath of allegiance. The most curious & significant "exception" [from the amnesty] is that of all [persons] worth over $20,000. I expected the rest. Another amnesty will follow later which may prehaps include me. At present I am a hopeless traitor -- with no right to life, liberty or property! I have debated gravely with myself whether I should leave the country or not. My decision is for the present to remain, & take the consequences, unless I find that my life is really in danger, which I cannot think.

Tuesday June 6th, [1865]
Drove back to Eutaw alone. Crossed the Warrior river 2 miles from town, after driving thro thick swamp. There is a Yankee picket, to prevent desertion no doubt, for they ask for no passes. Dined at Col. Thornton's -- half way -- who is the owner of a very large estate. It struck me very uncomfortably that his conviction should be so largely interladed with retrospection of his opposition to the doctrine of secession, & the necessary deduction that we fought so valiantly & bled so freely in a cause radically wrong. He has I learn however done his share to sustain the war, & perhaps that consciousness makes him talk the more freely of his former views. . . .

Thursday [June] 15th, [1865]
[Mr. Walton] is a wealthy planter owning some 7 or 8 plantations, & is much troubled at the present condition of things -- his slaves all freed & his past life as he seems to think wasted. This state of mind is most natural, & leads to despondency in his case, but not so in the case of most planters, and nothing surprises me more than the equanimity with which they meet existing facts. Their slaves are suddenly made their (almost) equals & they contract, with them; they are withdrawn from their control & they talk to them & advise them. A Yankee Captain (Crydenwise of the Freedmen's Bureau) makes an appointment to meet them & their slaves, & expound the views of the Yankee govt. & they attend and listen to declarations made to their slaves that they & their children are free for all time, & will be protected and maintained in that freedom! And they stand and ask questions of this yankee Captain as to their new relations toward their Slaves! It seems a gigantic dream. Four months ago that Yankee capt. attempting to make such an address to their Slaves, would have been hung on the nearest tree, & left there. It is a good omen for the future of this country. Where sense & discretion guide & direct the masters they will be sure to regain in time the sway, in some shape which they have at present lost, thro' the total failure of military operations. We may still hope for a future I think.

Source: Sarah Woolfolk Wiggins, editor, The Journals of Josiah Gorgas, 1857-1878 (Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press, 1995), pages 167-176.