Mrs. Constance W...'s Letters 04

All of the people and names included are fictitious. None of these people existed either now or in 1862.

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I included both of these letters together as they were dated together.

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The names and addresses have been changed to protect reputations of the descendants.

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Hazel Park
E..., Virginia
Saturday
May 10th, 1862

Major Hastings
Regimental Headquarters
1st Virginia Battalion
F..., Virginia

Dear Sir,

Thank you, Sir, for your visit to my home during your tour of the Valley. I am doubly confident in my safety thanks to your assurances. I look forward to the regular visits from our brave boys in the weeks ahead and I assure you that their every need will be satisfied as far as it is within my power or the ability of my staff to provide. I have secured the apple press in E... for my own purposes, and I expect the conversion to individual rooms as well as a gentleman's taproom to be completed shortly. Please tell your officers that they are welcome here and that temporary lodging can be arranged at their expense. They can also make appointments for individual services on the premises or by messenger. Of course, you, Major, are always welcome at my home whenever you are in the area.

It may be of interest to you that my servant Millicent has been a model of decorum since your visit. She wished me to convey her utmost gratitude to you for your manly intrusion. For myself, your enormity took my breath away. I too would be glad to once again enjoy you. If an opening can be found for you the pleasure would be all mine.

The authorization you so generously secured for me to trade in goods and services has bourn considerable fruit. I have been able to take in three younger sisters cast adrift and give them shelter and purpose as well as purchase essential discreet domestic servants. I know this last bit will be of interest to you. I expect the arrival of a mulato free woman from New Orleans, whose services I was able to negotiate, within the month to assume a position of importance in my establishment.

Your Intimate Servant,

Mrs. Constance W...

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Hazel Park

Saturday

May 10th, 1862

E..., Virginia

Captain Thomas W...,

Army of Northern Virginia,

13th Virginia Cavalry,

37th Battalion Virginia Cavalry,

Company E

Dear Brother,

It is a great comfort to me that you have been spared up to this time any harrowing experience. Though I know that you will acquit yourself with all satisfaction to your unit and to the admiration of our fellow Virginians and me, it is best to not be in harm's way. When the time comes I feel confident you will play the man. Thank you for providing the names of the men you are serving with. You do know how I love to pray for those entrusted to our care.

It is a matter of deep spiritual concern that I write you now. I fear that the LORD has some horrible design for you. In all things you have shown yourself to be guided by the fine principles of integrity delivered to us in holy writ up to this time. Your personal devotions and demonstrable faith has been a comfort to me and an example to others of less stalwart hope. Many a reprobate has been confronted by his Savior through your example. That is why I am un-nerved by the apparent wrath of the LORD toward you made manifest by the presence in our parent's home of that ill-begotten strumpet that is now your wife. Brother, she is a veritable Jezebel. I dare say she would lay with the anti-Christ himself.

It is my sad duty to inform you that Miss Constance B... has not kept her marriage vows. She has dis-honored herself by committing unspeakable acts of carnal wantonness with weak minded heathen masquerading as gentlemen officers. I would gladly presume that these are errant boys left without proper spiritual guidance tempted and consumed by this adulterous woman, but the enthusiasm in which they throw themselves into the pit bespeaks of their own lost condition. I have myself confronted her in this matter. Thomas, she will literally take them into her mouth! I saw her do so on more than one occasion. And she will not keep faith with even one, rather displaying her goods to the next that same night. She has been plowed more in the three months she has been your bride than the corn field by the river in the last decade.

This is tragic news I know. Be not ashamed for He who knows our state has not left us without remedy. Cast the harlot out! Notify Sidney Green to file papers of annulment. She must not have any share with the children of promise. "What part does darkness have with light or Bilial with the LORD." I will take measures to restrain her gluttony and preserve our inheritance.

Dearest Thomas, I have groaned in your absence. With fondness I recall the quiet companionship we shared before. The manly tenderness you showed me after our parent's passing comforted me during that dark hour. Your haunted, eager face hovering over me in the dark when I awoke suddenly from some terror of the mind to find you already there holding me has continued to comfort me. I long to be there with you in your tent to hold you now as you read this letter carrying the news of your dis-honor. I would hold you to my bosom.

Pray for me also brother. I am trapped in a shrine to Baal. I cannot shut out the noise of sinful play. The profane and vulgar utterances she and her paramours cry out assault my ears and contaminate my mind as I witness her lewdness. I am overcome. Afterward, I continue to lay awake in the small hours, sleep eluding me, as the images continue to pass before my eyes. I fear that I am in jeopardy in this din of sin. Temptation is all around me. I can feel the urges in side of me. Pray for me!

One thing more, the negro girl she brought with her has shown herself to be of the same spirit as her mistress. She may even be a source of the obscene happenings. Some three weeks ago I spied her leading one of our valiant men, a major or colonel I think, dumbstruck to the barn with her mistress in tow. She was clearly in charge. I approached the barn where we keep the chase on stealthy feet. I saw them in the midst of unspeakable rites. She had bewitched him, unclothed him and turned his mind to that of a beast. He drooled and growled. Constance sat at his feet and serviced his manhood, she too being under a spell. I could not see clearly, but I believed that I saw the materialization of a fiend from the pit. It entered the man and then he thrust himself in an unnatural way into the girl. Instead of being injured, she reveled in the offence. At the conclusion they returned to the house, Constance being guided in a trance by the witch, and the officer shambled away as one who is senseless. I only barely managed to regain the house without being discovered.

I included a parcel with new socks and suspenders as well as an itemization of the expenses she has incurred. Fear not in the face of the Canaanite for the LORD fights for you this day. Drive the infidel from our beloved Virginia and come home to me whole.

Your Devoted Sister,

Gertrude W...