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Part of the American
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Eliza (Yonge) Wilkinson
A vivid picture of the part borne by
many women through Revolutionary trials and privations may be
found in the letters of a young and beautiful widow living in
the city of Charleston at the time of its occupation by the
British under Prevost and the approach of Lincoln to its relief.
The period was one of almost continual skirmishing and of
harrowing the inhabitants by the British, and the young woman's
graphic description of the occurrences makes one no less
interested in her personality than in the stirring events of
which she writes.
This was Eliza Wilkinson. Her father was an emigrant to America
from Wales named Francis Yonge. He took possession of an island
some thirty miles south of Charleston, calling it Yonge's
Island. Mrs. Wilkinson was his only daughter. She had been
married only six months when her husband died, and when the
Revolutionary warfare swept down into her section of the
country, exciting days came to her in protecting her property
and escaping before British invasion and aiding our own wretched
soldiers. At one time, when she had taken refuge in an inland
plantation, she writes of the distressing condition of refugees
passing that way. A large boatload of women and children
hurrying for safety to Charleston stayed with them for a day or
two and presented a sad spectacle of the miseries brought in the
train of war. One woman with seven children, the youngest but
two weeks old, preferred venturing her own life and that of her
tender infant to captivity at the hands of a merciless foe.
''The poorest soldier," says another letter, "who would call at
any time for a drink of water, I would take pleasure in giving
it to him myself; and many a dirty, ragged fellow have I
attended with a bowl of milk, for they really merit everything
who will fight from principle alone; for from what I could
learn, these poor creatures had nothing to protect and seldom
got their pay; yet with what alacrity will they encounter danger
and hardships of every kind."
At another time, two men belonging to the enemy rode up to the
house and asked many questions, saying that Colonel McGirth and
his soldiers were coming and that the inmates might expect no
mercy. The family remained in a state of cruel suspense for many
hours. Then, as Mrs. Wilkinson writes to a friend: "The horses
of the inhuman Britons were heard coming in such a furious
manner that they seemed to tear up the earth, the riders at the
same time bellowing out the most horrid curses imaginable, oaths
and imprecations chilled my whole frame. 'Where are these women
rebels?' That was their first salutation." Nor was the fear of
the household unfounded for Mrs. Wilkinson continues: "They
plundered the house of everything they thought valuable or worth
taking; our trunks were split to pieces and each mean, pitiful
wretch crammed his bosom with the contents, which were our
apparel." And when Mrs. Wilkinson ventured to beg that just a
few articles be left to her, the soldier she addressed, so far
from relenting, cast his eyes on her shoes and immediately knelt
at her feet but to wrench the buckles from them. "While he was
busy doing this," the letter continues, ''a brother villain
bawled out 'Shares there, I say shares.' So they divided the
buckles between them. The other wretches were employed in the
same way, taking not only buckles from the other women but
earrings and rings, and when one protested against surrendering
her wedding ring, they presented a pistol at her and swore if
she did not deliver it immediately they would fire." But the
ready wit of Mrs. Wilkinson appears to have suffered no eclipse
even in such dire straits and she closes this letter with a
quip: "So they mounted their horses, but such despicable
figures! Each wretch's bosom stuffed so full, they appeared to
be all afflicted with some dropsical disorder. Had a party of
rebels (as they call us) appeared, we should have seen their
circumference lessen."
After such unwelcome visitors, it is not surprising that the
unprotected women could not sleep or eat. They went to bed
without undressing and started up at the least noise, while the
days were spent in anxiety. And yet one morning when Mrs.
Wilkinson with her eyes fixed on the window, for she was
continually on the watch, saw a party of Whigs dragging along
seven Royalist prisoners, notwithstanding the injuries she had
received from some of these very men, her kind heart relented at
the sight of their worn-out condition, and, when the American
soldiers had brought one of the Tory officers into her house,
she took from her neck the only remaining handkerchief the
British marauders had left her and with it bound up a wound in
his arm.
The siege and capitulation of Charleston brought the evils under
which the land had groaned to their height Mrs. Wilkinson was in
the city at this time and her letters tell of the hardships
borne by those in the beleaguered community, the gloomy
resignation to inevitable misfortunes and the almost abandonment
of hope for relief. Yet with indomitable patriotism, Mrs.
Wilkinson's independent spirits would find vent in sarcastic
sallies at the enemy's expense. "Once," she writes, "I was asked
by a British officer to play the guitar."
I cannot play, I am very dull," she replied. "How long do you
intend to continue so, Mrs. Wilkinson?" "Until my countrymen
return, sir."
"Return as what, " madam, prisoners or subjects?"
"As conquerors, sir."
The officer affected a laugh. 'You will never see that, madam"
"I live in hopes, sir, of seeing the thirteen stripes hoisted
once more on the bastions of this garrison."
"Do not hope so, but come, give us a tune on the guitar."
"I can play nothing but rebel songs." "Well, let us have one of
them."
"Not to-day, I cannot play, I will not play; besides, I suppose
I should be put into the Prevost for such a heinous crime as
chanting my patriotism!"
Like many others, Mrs. Wilkinson refused to join in the
amusements of the city while in possession of the British but
gave her energies to the relief of her friends. The women were
the more active when military efforts were suspended, and we
learn through Mrs. Wilkinson's letters of the many ingenious
contrivances they adopted to carry supplies from the British
garrison to the gallant defenders of their country. Sometimes
doth for a military coat, fashioned into an appendage to
feminine attire would be borne away unsuspected by the vigilant
guards whose business it was to prevent smuggling, the cloth
afterwards being converted into regimental shape. Boots "a world
too wide" for the small feet that passed the sentry in them were
often conveyed to the partisan who could not procure them for
himself. A horseman's helmet has been concealed under a
well-arranged bead-dress, and epaulettes delivered from the
folds of a matron's ample cap. Other articles in demand for
military use were regularly brought away by some stratagem or
other. And one can well imagine the cheer diffused about a
desolate camp by the visits of women as sprightly and courageous
as Mrs. Wilkinson.
The last of her letters of public interest is joyous with
congratulations on the glorious victory of Washington over
Cornwallis, so that the woman who had lived a brave, helpful
life, through the darkest trial of her country, lived to know
the glory of its independence and peace.
Women of
America
Source: The Part Taken by Women in
American History, By Mrs. John A. Logan, Published by The Perry-Nalle
Publishing Company, Wilmington, Delaware, 1912.
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