Two Girls of Gettysburg Read online

  Two Girls of Gettysburg

  LISA KLEIN

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Part 1

  Lizzie Chapter 1 1861

  Lizzie Chapter 2

  Lizzie Chapter 3

  Lizzie Chapter 4

  Lizzie Chapter 5

  Lizzie Chapter 6

  Lizzie Chapter 7

  Lizzie Chapter 8

  Lizzie Chapter 9 1862

  Lizzie Chapter 10

  Lizzie Chapter 11

  Lizzie Chapter 12

  Rosanna Chapter 13

  Rosanna Chapter 14

  Lizzie Chapter 15

  Lizzie Chapter 16

  Rosanna Chapter 17

  Rosanna Chapter 18

  Lizzie Chapter 19

  Rosanna Chapter 20

  Lizzie Chapter 21

  Rosanna Chapter 22 1863

  Lizzie Chapter 23

  Rosanna Chapter 24

  Part 2

  Lizzie Chapter 25

  Lizzie Chapter 26

  Lizzie Chapter 27

  Rosanna Chapter 28

  Lizzie Chapter 29

  Lizzie Chapter 30

  Lizzie Chapter 31

  Lizzie Chapter 32

  Rosanna Chapter 33

  Lizzie Chapter 34

  Lizzie Chapter 35

  Lizzie Chapter 36

  Rosanna Chapter 37

  Lizzie Chapter 38

  Lizzie Chapter 39

  Lizzie Chapter 40

  Rosanna Chapter 41

  Lizzie Chapter 42

  Rosanna Chapter 43

  Lizzie Chapter 44

  Lizzie Chapter 45

  Rosanna Chapter 46

  Lizzie Chapter 47

  Lizzie Chapter 48

  Rosanna Chapter 49

  Author’s Note

  For Further Reading and Research

  Acknowledgments

  Also By Lisa Klein

  Imprint

  In memory of Jan Reed,

  and in gratitude for her son

  Part 1

  Lizzie

  Chapter 1

  1861

  For the first fifteen years of my life nothing remarkable happened to me, Lizzie Allbauer, a shy, plain girl growing up in the ordinary town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. But all that began to change in the fall of 1860 when my cousin Rosanna McGreevey came up from Virginia to live with her widowed sister, Margaret, and her two little children on Baltimore Street. Rosanna was barely sixteen, with masses of curly black hair, flashing blue eyes, and a drawl that could charm a wooden plank, not to mention every boy in town. I set my sights on becoming her best friend.

  Then, in November Abraham Lincoln was elected president, and the United States began to pull apart like a too-tight jacket ripping at the seams. South Carolina broke away, followed by Mississippi, Georgia, Louisiana, and Florida. People were saying a war was inevitable between the Union and this new country, the sinister-sounding Confederacy. With a toss of her black curls, Rosanna announced she would go back to Richmond if Virginia seceded. I prayed that wouldn’t happen. I waited anxiously for the rumbling of war to shake the ground and split our town of Gettysburg right in half, sending my pretty cousin southward again.

  But that didn’t come to pass, not even after rebels attacked Fort Sumter in April 1861 and war was declared. My papa, the town’s best butcher, still went to his shop every day, I attended the public school, and Mama kept house. At home I still bickered with my twin brother, Luke, and coddled Ben, who was eleven and still a little boy. In May, Virginia joined the Confederacy, but Rosanna did not go back to Richmond. She said she was too fond of me to even think about leaving. I was both relieved and delighted.

  Life in Gettysburg continued on its usual course until a warm day in June 1861, the summer before I turned sixteen. I was lazing in a field near the brickyard with Rosanna, my head pillowed on my book, perfectly contented. Through half-closed eyes, I watched the clouds and sun battle in the sky. First the sun poured its warmth on us; then the wind blew the clouds across the sun, casting shade over us. Rosanna lay on her stomach, propped up on her elbows. In the sun’s brightness, she reminded me of an exotic flower blooming among the cabbages and potatoes of a plain kitchen garden. We seemed to grow happily together side by side, though we were as different as two cousins could be. And even after months of friendship, there was still much about Rosanna that was a mystery to me.

  “Rosanna, do you ever miss living in Richmond?”

  “Sometimes,” she admitted, tipping her head sideways. “But not when I’m with my favorite cousin.”

  I smiled. “If you were back home, what would you be doing on a day like today?”

  “I wouldn’t be sitting in view of the town brickyard, reading a book, that’s for certain! I might be strolling in the park, along walkways lined with flowers.” She sounded wistful.

  “Then let’s go for a walk,” I suggested. “Evergreen Cemetery is as lovely as any park, with its paths and wrought-iron fencing.”

  Rosanna laughed. “It’s a cemetery, Lizzie. It’s where dead people go.” She rolled over and laid her head on my outstretched arm, so that we looked up at the sky together. “You are too serious, my dear cousin. We must liven you up with an adventure.”

  “I don’t see many opportunities for adventure here in Gettysburg.”

  I felt disloyal saying this, for I was proud of my town. We had ten churches, three newspapers, eight hotels, and two thousand residents. We had a new railroad depot, a new court house, and gas lamps on the main streets. Still, in Rosanna’s presence I felt restless, for I had never traveled farther than the next county. Richmond, Virginia, seemed to me as exotic and distant as London, England.

  “Well perhaps we can find you a fellow,” said Rosanna with a sly smile. “That would bring some excitement to your life.”

  “No thank you!” I said. I could not imagine what I would even say to a boy. Rosanna, on the other hand, was a skillful flirt. The boys listened avidly to her Virginia accent and eyed her shapely bosom. My own blunt figure and straight, wheat-colored hair would never draw such attention.

  “Some day you will thank me, Lizzie Allbauer.” She sat up and began to pluck at a daisy.

  I often wondered why Rosanna had come to Gettysburg. Did she miss her sister that much? Did her parents send her? Rosanna’s father hadn’t even written, for he and my mother had fallen out years ago. But when Margaret’s husband, Joseph Roth, had died, Mama insisted on helping with little Jack and Clara, saying that we were all family.

  “Don’t you miss your parents sometimes? And your Richmond friends?”

  Rosanna pulled the petals from her daisy, one after the other.

  “The girls at my old school were insufferable snobs. That’s why I like you, Lizzie. You’re not at all pretentious. Plainspoken, I would say.” She looked at me with her eyebrows lifted. I had asked enough questions, I decided.

  “We’ll be going to the same school this fall,” I said to change the subject. “Papa has agreed to send me to the Ladies’ Seminary so that I can study to become a teacher. You and I can walk to classes together!”

  I looked expectantly at Rosanna. In the distance I heard the faint trill of a fife, high-pitched like the call of a bird. Rosanna held up a tiny fluttering petal.

  “See?” she said in a triumphant voice.

  “I see a piece of a mangled daisy. You’re not listening to me!”

  “It’s proof that he cares for me.”

  “Who?” I asked, curious despite myself.

  “Why Henry Phelps, of course! Come, Lizzie. Let’s walk by the carriage shop. If he is working today, perhaps he will come out and
speak to me.” Her blue eyes pleaded with me.

  I groaned. “Last time we waited there, it was only the seminary boys passing by who gave you their attention. I could have died in my shoes, such foolish things they said to you.”

  “If you’d only smiled, they would have noticed you too, Lizzie,” she said, pulling me to my feet.

  Now the sound of the fife was louder, accompanied by the sharp, fast beat of a drum.

  “Let’s find out why the band is playing,” I said. “Then we can go in search of your Henry Phelps.”

  Rosanna agreed. We followed the sound toward the Diamond, the town square. People were coming out of their houses and shops as if called by the pied piper’s tune. I pulled off a handbill tacked to a fence. A Call to Arms! its wide black letters cried. The wind riffled the edges, nearly tearing it from my hands. At the town square, where the Baltimore Pike intersected the east-west road between Chambersburg and York, a military band played. The gazebo was hung with red, white, and blue bunting. The wind made our skirts billow and threw men’s hats from their heads. A few heavy raindrops plopped into the dirt, even while the sun shone against the metallic gray blue sky.

  “It’s a war rally!” cried Rosanna, breathless. “Do you see Henry here?” She balanced on her toes and scanned the crowd. “He would be so handsome in a uniform.”

  I pretended to look for Henry Phelps, though I couldn’t understand why she was so wild about the boy. He was just one of my brother Luke’s rowdy friends. He worked, when he felt like it, to support his widowed mother and went to school only occasionally. I didn’t see Henry, but I saw Luke in a tree beside Mr. Swan’s shop, his legs in their too-short trousers dangling from the lower branches. He must have been shooting peas through a narrow reed, because I noticed a large woman rub her arm and look around her, frowning.

  “If Papa saw that, he’d haul Luke out of that tree and whip him. He sure could use it,” I muttered.

  “Lizzie, you’re always griping about your twin brother.”

  “I can’t help it. Mama said we were fighting and kicking each other even before we were born.”

  “Maybe you’ll get your wish, Lizzie. I see your father now.”

  “It can’t be. He never leaves his shop during the day.”

  Papa worked hard every day of the week except Sunday, in order to keep up his reputation. But there he was, standing near the gazebo, wearing a vest over his stained apron as if he had come in a hurry. Seeing him, I felt a surge of pride. Beside him was Amos Whitman, his hired man, who had once been a slave. The muscles in Amos’s arms were thick, his hair coal black. Papa, though he wasn’t yet forty, had gray strands in his hair, which used to be sandy like mine.

  “You don’t see Mama, do you?” I asked Rosanna. “I hope she’s at home resting. And Ben is supposed to be doing his chores.” I looked around, but Mama and Ben were not in the crowd.

  Mr. Kendlehart, the town council president, climbed the steps of the gazebo. He was followed by the recruits, who wore everything from tattered work clothes to their best suits. Some carried old muskets, swords, or pistols. While Mr. Kendlehart spoke, I watched the men, who didn’t seem to know quite how to react to the cheering crowd. Some waved while others stood motionless. I shivered as the sun disappeared behind a thick bank of clouds.

  “Our noble cause, the cause of freedom, will endure. The Union will not be shaken, nor human rights abridged, not by the false claims and the foul wrongs of the secessionists!” Mr. Kendlehart shouted. Then the captain of the company, wearing a brass-buttoned blue coat, began his appeal.

  “Step up now! Our company is in need of still more men,” he called. At the wave of his hand, the band played again. The bugler sounded off-key. The crowd moved like something thick stirred in a pot. Mr. Stover, the carpenter, stepped up, along with Samuel Pierpont. His mother owned the Ladies’ Seminary where Rosanna went to school—where I would soon study too.

  Then Rosanna gripped my arm and cried out, “There goes Henry. Hurrah!”

  We watched as Henry Phelps leaped lightly onto the stage with the other volunteers.

  “Isn’t he brave?” Rosanna said, blowing kisses toward the gazebo.

  “But he’s only seventeen—,” I began, when the band struck up “Rally Round the Flag” and everyone began singing.

  “Do you think your brother Luke will enlist, now that Henry has?”

  My stomach felt like I’d eaten something sour.

  “Of course not. Anyway, he can’t. He isn’t sixteen yet.”

  Rosanna was bouncing on her toes to the music.

  “Lizzie, don’t you think it would be exciting to live in a camp and march to the sound of the band? Oh, I would go in a minute if I were a man!”

  “You must be crazy,” I murmured, wondering why Rosanna, a girl from Virginia, was cheering at a Union rally. I folded the handbill I had been clutching all along and handed it to her. “Here. At least you can take this for a souvenir.”

  The speeches went on, interrupted by applause and cheers. I saw Rosanna wave to Annie Baumann, the grocer’s daughter, whose hair always formed perfect brown ringlets. Even the wind that day couldn’t budge them.

  “You’ve been at the Ladies’ Seminary only a few months and you’ve already won over Annie,” I said, amazed. “I’ve known her for years, but she doesn’t have the time of day for a public-school girl.”

  “She thinks it’s romantic that I’m from the South,” said Rosanna, rolling her eyes. “As if I lived on a plantation and was waited on by hundreds of Negroes! My father doesn’t even own slaves.”

  “Is he against slavery then?” I asked, but the band had struck up a loud marching tune, and Rosanna seemed not to hear me. A few more men signed their names to the enlistment roll. Finally, people started to drift away.

  It looked like the last volunteer of the day would be a fellow who worked on the Weigel farm. Mr. and Mrs. Weigel always spoke German to each other. One of their sons and their daughter’s husband had already gone off to war. Martin was the only boy left at home. He also attended the public school, though he almost never said anything in class. He stood next to his mother, who gripped his arm tightly. For some reason I felt sorry for him.

  Martin looked in my direction and I lifted my hand to wave, but his eyes passed over me, and my hand fluttered awkwardly back down to my side. Maybe he hadn’t seen me.

  Following my gaze, Rosanna saw the Weigels and said, “That boy’s mother needn’t worry he’ll run off. They wouldn’t take him if he did. Look how scrawny he is.”

  “I think he’s about my age,” I said, unable to say anything else in his defense. Like me, Martin showed little promise of turning out handsome.

  I saw Luke drop out of the tree and look around, and for a heart-stopping moment I thought he was about to enlist. But he sauntered away, and I sighed with relief.

  Papa still stood near the gazebo. His arms were folded and he looked deep in thought. Why hadn’t he gone back to the shop yet? He held up his hand as Amos began to leave. Then he untied his butcher’s apron and handed it to Amos, who reached for his arm as if to detain him, but Papa gently pressed Amos back. I felt fear rise in me. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My father took the steps of the gazebo two at a time.

  “No, Papa! No!” I cried out, but my thin voice was lost on the wind.

  Lizzie

  Chapter 2

  That night our family ate supper in silence. My mother sat stiffly and avoided looking at my father. She did not touch a single bite of bread or pork, though Luke ate with his usual greed. Ben, who knew nothing of the afternoon’s events, tried to tell about a snake he had seen run over by a wagon, but I frowned at him until he fell quiet. He glared back at me like a small devil, his red hair sticking up in tufts.

  Papa chewed his food in a deliberate way, his jaw working hard. Then he placed his fork and knife with a clang across his plate to announce that he was finished eating. My brothers and I stood up. Mama stayed in her chair, holding
the edge of the heavy oak table firmly as if to keep it from drifting away. I began to clear the table, but Mama shook her head, so we left the kitchen and sat on the back porch stoop.

  Luke began to whistle “Yankee Doodle.”

  “Stop that now. How dare you make light of all this?” I hissed at him. He ignored me and kept whistling.

  “Why wouldn’t Mama talk to me at supper?” asked Ben.

  The door was closed, but the windows were wide open, enabling us to hear Papa’s raised voice.

  “I will serve my country in this war!”

  Luke stopped whistling in midnote.

  “How can you go and enlist with no thought of this family? Nothing good can ever come of fighting between brothers. I thought we agreed on that.” Mama’s voice was high with anger. Papa often said she had the McGreeveys’ passionate temper.

  “Like it or not, we are at war,” Papa said, enunciating each word. “It is a man’s duty at such a time to consider the needs of his country.”

  “What about your duty to us? I left my family in Richmond to marry you, Albert. I’ve never looked back. Now you are telling me your country is more important to you than this family?”

  Then I heard Mama sobbing and Papa murmuring.

  “But Albert, we’ve never been apart. How will we get by without you? You know I haven’t been well.”

  I was embarrassed to hear my mother pleading, yet I was angry at my father for being so uncaring. Mama had almost died of a fever when Ben was a baby. She had stayed in her bed for months, and ever since, she often had headaches that lasted for days.

  “Lizzie can take care of the house and garden. Ben is old enough to be useful as well. As for the shop, Luke will manage, with Amos’s help. The boy must learn to be more responsible.”

  I shoved Luke. “Do you hear that? It’s time for you to act your age.”

  “Why don’t you start looking your age?” He pinched the fat at my waist and glanced at my still-flat chest. Scowling, I slid far away from him on the narrow step and pulled Ben next to me as a shield.

  “Amos has agreed to work around the house for additional wages,” I heard Papa say. “It will only be for a few months. The war cannot last longer than that.”