10 0 The American Civil Waris very plain we should have felt the evils in
a short time very severely - that we are
fighting for the good of posterity, that we
may prevent a servile war, etc' Having listed
the usual arguments in favour of secession
and founding a new slaveholding republic,
she admitted to 'being unpatriotic enough to
feel a little selfish sometimes and regret our
peace and comfort in the old Union.'
Betty's ante bellum society had rested on a
system of slavery that underwent enormous
change in the midst of war. White
southerners lost a measure of control over
their slaves as Union military forces drew
near, and thousands of black people in
Virginia fled to Union lines. In mid-March
1862, as rumours of Union advances swirled
through Fredericksburg, Betty noted that
'seventeen of Mr Mason's servants have run
off. They stole all of cousin Nanny's dresses
but three, and took both cloak and shawl.
One party of them went off in a wagon and
carried their feather beds.'
In late April, after Federal troops had
reached Fredericksburg, Maury wrote that
the 'negroes are going off in great numbers,
and are beginning to be very independent
and impudent. We hear that our three are
going soon.' The reality of war mocked the
notion, so often trumpeted by white
southerners, that slaves were happy with
their lot. Indeed, the specter of slaves
wreaking vengeance on their old masters
haunted Confederates such as Betty Maury. 'I
am afraid of the lawless Yankee soldiers,' she
wrote, 'but that is nothing to my fear of the
negroes if they should rise against us.'
Maury had moved to Richmond by the
time of the Battle of Fredericksburg. She
celebrated Lee's victory over Burnside, but
lamented the destruction of much of the
city. In the neighborhood where she had
lived, reports indicted that 'almost every
house has six or eight shells through it, the
doors are wide open, the locks and windows
broken and the shutters torn down.' Two
blocks of buildings had been burned, and
'our house was a hospital.'
Maury soon faced a more personal
challenge. Pregnant with a second child in
the spring of 1863, she learned that cousins
from whom she rented rooms in Richmond
meant to turn her out. 'No one will be
willing to take us,' she wrote, 'when told
that I expect to be confined in a month or
two. It is most unchristian and uncharitable
treatment.' An aunt in central Virginia
declined to provide a place for Betty and her
daughter, after which the pair endured a
difficult trip to Charlottesville, where the
new child was born on 7 June. Betty Maury
lived another 40 years, having experienced
in full measure the traumatic events of the
Civil War era.