23, 1861 - Memphis Military Committee Informs General Leonidas Polk of orders issued suspending cotton shipments
September 23, 1861.
By authority in us vested by Maj. Gen. Leonidas Polk, commanding Military Department No. 2, the following orders are issued by the committee, consisting of W. B. Greenlaw, R. C. Brinkley, Sam. Tate, M. J. Wicks, and E. W. Munford:
HDQRS. MILITARY COMMITTEE, Memphis, September 23, 1861.
Maj. Gen. L. POLK:
Permit us to suggest the propriety of your either issuing an order yourself or authorizing us to do so, to the effect that shipments of cotton to this port be suspended until further instructions. Cotton is now coming in, and you will readily perceive the danger of a heavy concentration of that important article at a point so near the enemy as Memphis.
Very respectfully,
M. J. WICKS, Chairman pro tempore.
OR, Vol. 52, pt. II, p. 154.
23, 1862 - A young White County woman’s fears
....My life is passing swiftly away and I am doing nothing. I do not grieve at the passing of my life, but at the manner in which I am spending it. If I could do anything for the good of mankind, the glory of my Maker, I should be content. But I am too weak an instrument to do much, but if I do what little lies in my power, I hope to have the reward of a good conscience at least. But I do not do all that is in my power. I fear I shall have to answer for my negligence in many instances, though I don’t remember any in particular where I have been remiss. I wish I could rouse my mind from its sluggish stupor, but I have indulged it till it will be a hard matter. I keep thinking I will try and sometimes I do get it wakened a little, but it soon returns, and day after day passes and nothing is done.
Diary of Amanda McDowell.
23, 1863 - Excerpt from a letter of George H. Cadman, a soldier with the 39th Ohio Volunteer Infantry and on occupation duty in the Bluff City, to his wife, relative to female pulchritude in Memphis
As for pretty girls in Memphis there are very few to be seen, what with Chawing [sic] Snuff and tight Lacing [sic] the women are all more or less ugly. I have heard and read a great deal of the beautiful daughters of the South, but must confess that I have not seen them yet, they are mostly sallow Complexion and to remedy this they lay paint on so thick that to me it appears disgusting. I have had a good chance of seeing the Ladies since we have been here at Church and on the Public Roads and at their dwellings, and there is the same mark of listlessness. I believe Tight-Lacing is the principal cause for what seems to be carried on to a greater extent here, than any place I was ever at.
George Hovey Cadman Correspondence.
23, 1864 - “Judge Trigg and a Memphis Grand Juror.”
The Memphis Bulletin says that quite a scene occurred during the session of the United States District Court on Thursday, in which his Honor, Judge Trigg, and Mr. Gay, one of the Grand Jurors were the principal actors. Mr. Gay had written a letter to the Court, declaring that he was opposed to, and would not indict any one for having borne arms in the Confederate army against the United States, alleging as his reasons that the South was recognized as a belligerent power, and that he believed a State had a right to secede. Mr. Gay was summoned to the court room and in the presence of the Court dismissed from the Grand Jury, and his conduct most severely animadverted upon by his Honor the Judge, who pronounced the sentiments of the letter anything else but those of a loyal man. The affray created no little excitement.
We trust the authorities will see that they insolent traitor shall receive some other rebuke than a verbal one, however severe. He should be put to hard labor upon the streets, with a chain and ball to his leg, during the war, and hung afterward.
Nashville Daily Times and True Union, September 23, 1864.
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