Page 44 - Arkansas Confederate Women

Keminiscences of Mrs. Virginia Cleaver 39

had enough to give to a Confederate soldier. No one who "wore
the gray" was ever sent away hungry from my mother's door.

WHEN CLOTHING WAS SCARCE.

AClothing was very scarce. calico dress was a luxury,

costing more than a silk one does now, and, like all Southern

ladies, we were proud of our homespun dresses. Our hats were

made of the palmetto that grows in the swamps. It was cut

down, boiled and then bleached in the sun until almost snow

white. . It was split fine and braided and sewed into a hat. The

girls grew very expert in braiding palmetto and the hats were

very beautiful. Our shoes we had to make ourselves of various

kinds of cloth, most often of gray jeans. We made the uppers,
and then had them soled by a shoemaker. We made caps for

our soldier boys of grey jeans, and I have made many a pair

of gauntlet gloves of dressed fawn silk. I couldn't weave, but

my mother had learned to weave when a girl, and she wove my

sister and myself some beautiful homespun dresses. She had all

the cotton cloth for our servants woven on our farm by a woman

belonging to us, and there were several persons in the neighbor-

hood who wove the woolen cloth we needed.

We had no coffee (real coffe, I mean), so had to use various

substitutes, such as sweet potatoes, cut, dried and then parched,

burnt molasses, parched meal and rye, etc. Our soldiers, who

were camped near us for some time, were so good to my mother,

who missed her coffee more than the rest of us, that they often

saved their entire rations of coffee instead of drinking it them-

selves and brought it to my mother. Sometimes there would be

hardly a teacup of it, tied up in the corner of a much soiled

handkerchief, but it was coffee, and we were glad to get it; and

after washing it well before roasting it. we enjoyed it very much.

Drugs were very scarce, and we learned to depend on home

remedies. For instance, for chills we used tea made of willow

Abark fodder. teaspoonful of cornmeal in a little water was

taken at intervals, like we do quinine, and strange to say, that

Weoften kept off the chill. learned to do without many things

that now are a necessity, and it was cheerfully done, though

sometimes the flesh would grow weary and sigh for the "flesh-