Under the guns — Context and Discussion

A Carriage Under Fire

One of the most striking episodes involves a silver-mounted carriage captured at Jackson, which Wittenmyer uses for hospital visits during the siege of Vicksburg. The carriage draws enemy fire because Confederates mistake it for a high-ranking officer's vehicle. A captain of sharpshooters later confesses that his men fired over a hundred shots at it, and the wheels are 'chipped till they were quite a curiosity.' The anecdote illustrates how the author's presence on the battlefield is both practical and perilous, and it reveals the ironic misperceptions of war. Wittenmyer reports the story with a mix of wry humor and understated horror, noting that the captain was 'very much shocked' to learn he had been shooting at a lady.

Learning to Live Under the Guns

When a shell bursts near her, Wittenmyer describes a visceral reaction: 'I could feel my flesh crawl in the most uncomfortable way, and every hair on my head seemed to stand upright.' The surgeon's blunt reply—'all the hospitals are under fire'—forces her to confront the reality that she must work daily under a 'rain of lead.' Her response is a shift in narrative pace: from shock to a night of prayer, then to a resolute courage. She writes, 'I seemed immortal; not a bullet had been moulded that could hit me.' This transformation is rendered in a compressed, almost breathless sequence, contrasting with the earlier detailed descriptions of the carriage and the shell burst.

Night and Day: The Sounds of Siege

Wittenmyer's account of life under siege includes sensory details that convey the constant threat. She describes shells with 'burning fuses' sailing up 'like stars of the first magnitude' and bursting into 'a shower of sparks and fragments, setting the heavens ablaze.' The language becomes almost lyrical, yet she immediately undercuts it with a practical observation: 'We became so accustomed to the horrid sounds of war that the absence or abatement of it would awaken us out of our sleep.' This rhythm—heightened description followed by matter-of-fact commentary—characterizes her narrative voice throughout the excerpts, balancing the extraordinary with the quotidian.

Lizards and Tents: Domestic Details

Amid the bombardment, Wittenmyer includes homely details that ground the narrative in a woman's perspective. She stays in a tent with Mrs. General Stone, where the feet of their cots are placed in jars of water to keep lizards away. She notes, 'We could hear their little feet scratching as they raced after each other over the tents.' The contrast between the grand spectacle of war and these small, intimate annoyances—'we women shrank from contact with anything so nearly akin to the serpent family'—adds texture to the memoir. These details also slow the pace, offering respite from the thunder of explosions before returning to the relentless battle.

Wittenmyer's narrative moves between the immediate, physical experience of war and a reflective, spiritual framework. Readers should attend to how she juxtaposes moments of terror with domestic routines, and how her voice shifts from plain reportage to heightened description. The preface's promise of 'heart histories' is fulfilled in these small, vivid scenes—the chipped carriage wheels, the scratching lizards, the sleepless nights when the guns fall silent.

I remember shelving Under the Guns years ago, Mrs. Wittenmyer's hand steady on the page, war’s raw heart-beat in her quiet words. It made me think of another stubborn soul, fighting for a lost cause, in Owen Glyndwr and the Last Struggle for Welsh Independence With a Brief Sketch of Welsh History — A Reader’s Guide. Both are testaments to fierce, quiet hope against the terrible weight of things.