Page:The woman in battle .djvu/559

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CHAPTER XLIII.

THE SURRENDER OF LEE.

Another Expedition to the West. Hiring out as a House Servant. A Termagant Mistress-. Obtaining a Situation in a Copperhead Family. Introduction to Confederate Sympathizers. A Contribution to the Fund for the Relief of Confederate Prisoners. I go to Canada, and from there to New York, with Orders for various Confederate Agents. Sherman's March through the Carolinas. I am induced to go to London on a financial Mission. Unsatisfactory News received, and I hasten Home. The News of Lee's Surrender brought on board the Steamer by the Pilot. Excitement in Wall Street. A Settlement with my Partner, and the Last of my secret Banking.


MAKE no pretence of relating in detail my movements while acting as a Confederate secret-service agent at the North, as such a course would but increase the bulk of this volume with out adding to its interest, and would be apt to weary, rather than entertain the reader. I was coming and going constantly, my principal line of travel being between New York and Washington, although I made a number of trips to Canada, and to various points in the States. While conducting the operations which have just been narrated, I was, also, as will readily be understood, transacting business of a varied nature on account of the Confederacy, and sometimes was kept very steadily on the road. A narration of my movements just previous to the close of the war will give a sufficient notion of the kind of work I was engaged in, and will serve to complete the story of this portion of my career.

Shortly after my interview with Colonel Baker at the Astor House, and my consequent withdrawal from all connection with the bounty and substitute brokerage business, I was requested to make a journey to the West, for the purpose of procuring some information which my associates deemed of importance.

A number of the Confederate agents were maturing another

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