How I Met Dan Grey

[dawna]

<u>HOW I MET DAN GREY</u>
From: A Virginia Girl in the Civil War

"HAVE you met Dan Grey?"

Charlie Murray and I were galloping along a country road.

"I haven't, Charlie. I met his brother Dick in Norfolk, and didn't like him at all."

"Well, Nell, you'd like Dan - everybody does. I wonder you haven't met him. Dan never fails to meet every pretty girl that comes here."

I had heard that before. Indeed, I had heard a great deal about Dan Grey that made me long to get even with him. Everybody had a way of speaking as if Petersburg wasn't Petersburg with Dan Grey left out.

"You ought to meet Dan Grey," Charlie repeated.

"I don't think so," I rapped out. "I think I can get along very nicely without meeting Dan Grey" - Dan Grey seemed to be getting along very nicely without meeting me - "I know as many nice men now as I have time to see."

So I dismissed Dan, whipped up my horse, and raced Charlie along the old Jerusalem Plank Road - that historic thoroughfare by which the Union troops first threatened Petersburg, and near which Fort Hell and Fort ****ation are still visible. We ran our horses past the old brick church, built of bricks brought from England to erect a place of worship for the aristocratic colonists, past the quiet graves in Blandford; and turning our horses into Washington Street, slackened their pace and, chatting merrily the while, rode slowly into the city toward the golden sunset. A few years later I was to run along this street in abject terror from bursting shells.

"You ought to meet Dan Grey."

It came from George Van B - this time. George was the poet laureate of our set. Afterward he was Colonel Van B - , and as gallant a soldier as ever faced shot and shell. I had been playing an accompaniment for him; he was singing a popular ditty of the day, "Sweet Nellie is by my Side"; I wheeled around on the piano-stool and faced him.

"What is the matter with that man? He must be a curiosity?"

"He is just the nicest fellow in town,"

George asserted with mingled resentment and amusement.

"He must be something extraordinary. One would think there was just one man in town and that his name was Dan Grey."

Before the week was out I heard it again. This time it was Willie. He spoke oracularly, and as if he were broaching an original idea. Page, the best dancer in our set, repeated the recommendation, looking as if I were quite out of the swim in not knowing Dan Grey. (If Governor - reads this chapter, will he please overlook the familiar use of his name? Boys and girls who have played mumble-peg together and snowballed each other, do not attach handles to each other's names until they are more thoroughly grown up than we were then.)

"I am sure it must be my duty to meet Dan Grey," I said gravely. "I am continually being told that I 'ought to meet Dan Grey' just as I might be told that I ought to go to church."

"Dan isn't a bit like a church, Nell," laughed Willie. "But he is a splendid fellow, generous to a fault - and then, you know, Dan is the handsomest man in town."

"Oh, no!" I retorted, "I left the handsomest man in town in Norfolk."

I can't begin to tell how terribly tired I got of "You ought to meet Dan Grey," "Haven't you met Dan Grey?" Evidently Dan Grey was in no hurry to meet me. I knew that he was the toast of our set and that he ignored me as completely as if I were not in it - and I had never been ignored before. I also knew, without being continually told, that he was a broad-shouldered, magnificent-looking fellow, fair-haired, blue-eyed, and "the handsomest man in town." My girl friends talked about him almost as much as the men did. And I did not even know the lion! I took great pains not to want to know him. I impressed it upon Willie and Charlie and George and the rest that they were not to bring Dan Grey to see me.

"Why, what will we say if he asks us to bring him? You are unreasonable, Nell. How did you ever pick up such a prejudice against Dan? Nobody can object to Dan Grey. If he asks any of us to bring him, I don't know what we can do."

"Oh, of course you can't be rude. If you are asked to bring him, you will have to do as you are asked, but I don't think you will be asked. I'm sure I hope you won't, for I have heard of Dan Grey until I am sick of the very name."

Meanwhile I resolved privately if I ever did lay my hands on Dan Grey I would wreak a full vengeance. He says that I have done it.

A Catholic fair was to be held in Petersburg, but as dearly as we loved Father Mulvey (all Petersburg loved him), and as much as we longed to do everything possible for our poor little Church of St. Joseph, we could not go to the fair rooms and sell things and make merry. We were in deep mourning; mother said that our going was out of the question. Then her old friend, Mrs. Winton, came out to persuade and convince.

"I really can not let the girls go," mother protested. "They can make fancy articles and send them to the fair, or do any home work that you can put them to; we are willing to help just as much as we can. I will send pickled oysters and shrimp salad after my Norfolk recipes, and cake and cream and anything you like that I can make."

"We want the oysters and the salad and the cake and everything else you choose to send, but above all things we want the girls. I didn't come here for your pickled oysters and shrimp salad, if they are the best I ever tasted. I want Milicent and Nell - I want Nell for my booth and Milicent for Mrs. Lynn's. Mrs. Lynn has set her heart on Milicent - but, there! Mrs. Lynn may do her own begging. Do let me have Nell."

"My dear, I don't see how I can."

"Oh, you must! We really need them. You know how few girls there are in our little congregation."

Mother was too good a Catholic not to yield - Milicent and I were given over to the cause of St. Joseph's.

"But they are to work, not to amuse themselves," she stipulated. "They are not to promenade - just to stand behind tables and sell things."

"Just send them," pleaded Mrs. Winton. "I'll promise not to let them enjoy themselves. I'll keep Nell busy, and Mrs. Lynn will do her duty by Milicent."

But work is fun when you are young enough, and there was plenty of both in getting the booths ready. The old Library Hall on Bollingbrook Street was a gay and busy scene for several days before it was formally opened to the public who came to spend money and make merry.

On one never-forgotten morning the hall was filled with matrons and maidens weaving festoons of pine-beard, running cedar, and ivy. I had purposely donned my worst dress, and was sitting on the floor Turkish fashion, with evergreens heaped around me, when I saw a party of gentlemen entering the hall.

I tried to sink out of sight, but they saw me, demolished my barricade, and began to tease me. The quartet were Charlie Murray, George Van B - , Willie, and Page. Behind them came a fifth gentleman, and before this fifth gentleman and I knew what was happening we were being presented to each other. And that is how I met Dan Grey - sitting on the floor in my shabbiest dress and half hidden by evergreens. I soon had the whole party hard at work festooning the hall, and what a good, if late, laborer, Dan Grey made in my vineyard!

"You see how useful I am," he said - he was standing on a box and I was handing up wreaths of cedar which he was arranging on the wall. "Now, why didn't you let me come to see you?"

"Me?" I asked in utter bewilderment.

"Yes, 'me'!"

"Why, I never had a thing to do with your not coming to see me."

He gave George, Charlie, and Willie a withering look.

"I reckon somebody else didn't want me to."

The boys looked dumfounded.

"I heard," said Dan from his box, "that you didn't want me to come to see you, that you had an unaccountable prejudice against me because you didn't like Dick, that you asked all your friends by no means to bring me to see you."

I was as mad as I could be with George, Willie, and Charlie.

"Why," I said, "you are not your brother Dick. And then, I don't dislike Dick at all."

Again the trio looked at me as if they doubted the evidence of their senses.

"Nell, what did you tell such a story for?" George asked me privately later.

"Why, I didn't tell any story at all," I declared. "He isn't his brother Dick, is he? And I don't dislike Dick now."

The night of the fair I wore a black bombazine, cut low in the neck and with long angel sleeves falling away from my arms above the elbow to the hem of my dress, and around my neck a band of black velvet with a black onyx cross. I sat or stood behind Mrs. Winton's booth, and Mr. Grey haunted the booth all the evening, and bought quantities of things he had no use for.

After the fair he saw me or reminded me of his existence in some way every day. Mother took me, about this time, on a visit to some cousins in Birdville, and every day Mr.Grey rode out on Dare Devil, the horse that he was to ride into his first fight. There was another fair. I went in from Birdville to help, and had the same coterie of assistants. "Ben Bolt" was a great favorite then. It was a new song and divided honors with "Sweet Nellie is by my Side." My assistants used to sit on a goods box that was later to be converted into an ornamental stand, and sing, "O don't you Remember Sweet Alice, Ben Bolt?"

Well, to make a long story short - as Dan and I did - we were married in exactly four months and a half from the day on which he was introduced to me as I sat cross-legged among the evergreens; and when Willie and George and Charlie came up to congratulate us, every wretch of them said, "Didn't I tell you that you should meet Dan Grey?!

[bill_torrens]

Hello Dawna,

I don't know whether you remember posting this, but I've just finished reading this book and enjoyed it immensely.

Did you realise that the name "Dan Grey" was a pseudonym? This officer's real name was Joseph Van Holt Nash and, just in case you're interested, here are my notes on him.

NASH, Joseph Van Holt Born in Norfolk, Va., on 8th July 1834. Son of Edward Portlock Nash &amp; Susan Decatur Van Holt. Grew up in Petersburg. Graduated from U.Va. in 1854. Married Margaret Herron Bowden in 1860 [her wartime memoirs were published as “A Virginia Girl In The Civil War”, written by her post-war acquaintance Marta Lockett Avary. In it Nash is given the pseudonym of “Dan Grey”]. Farmer in Surry Co. Pvt., Co.B, 13th Va. Cavalry: April 1861. Detailed to the engineering dept. in 1862. Pvt. &amp; acting O.O. to R.E. Colston: April 1862. Colston wrote that "though a private, he has served on my staff eight months and his services are indispensable. He possesses more military knowledge than nine-tenths of the officers of the officers now in the service..." Wounded in leg at Seven Pines on 31st May 1862. 1st Lieut. &amp; Adjt. of the 13th Va Cav.: 16th August 1862. Particularly distinguished for his performance at Beverly Ford on 15th April 1863. Captain &amp; A.A.G. to Rooney Lee: 2nd November 1863. Served in same capacity under Chambliss. Severely wounded at Petersburg on 16th June 1864. On 15th November 1864 Walter H. Taylor wrote: “I saw Joe Nash on yesterday – have not yet met Mag. [ie his wife Margaret] Joe gets along famously – indeed was very slightly wounded.” Captain &amp; A.A.G. to Beale in 1865. Paroled in Richmond on 27th April 1865. In book trade in Petersburg until 1873; he then moved to Baltimore; in 1878 he moved to Atlanta. In the 1880 census he is listed as a publishing house agent in Atlanta. In December 1894 he was appointed manager of the American Book Company. [Krick suggests that he may have served in the 7th U.S. Cavalry under an assumed name, and that he wa a close friend of Captain Frederick Benteen of Little Big Horn notoriety.] Published the standard work on U.Va. alumni. Died in Augusta, Ga., on 17th November 1900. [Krick, Staff Officers In Gray, p.229; Tower, Lee’s Adjutant: The Wartime Letters Of Colonel Walter Herron Taylor, 1862-1865, pp.206.]

Bill

P.S. Am eagerly awaiting your report to us on your trip to England for Xmas. A recent poll said that 60% of Britons couldn't think of a single positive thing about their country....so lay it on a bit thick, please!

Bill,
Well, Like you I'd love to hear tales from Dawna about her trip. And loads of photos would be nice too. As to the Britons being so cynical, as a guest of your country, I cannot think of anything I didn't like about Britain. Not a thing. I hate beer. By hate I mean unadulterated loathing. But I liked the super thick dark and warm British ales. I tried but I cannot thing of anything I was not pleased with.

Except perhaps for the way your toliets flush. But finally I sort of figured it out. Now I wear my "I know how to flush a British toilet" T-shirt with pride.

[dawna]

Bill:

I do remember posting this excerpt from "A Virginia Girl in the Civil War" and it was good to read it again, and no, I didn't realize that Dan Grey was a pseudonym. Joseph Nash sounds like a person who would have been well worth knowing and one who led a full and interesting life. And thank you for your detailed notes - they added a tremendous new element to Margaret's story. A question...do you know why Joseph Nash was paroled in April of 1865?

I'm sorry to hear that over half of Britons are disenchanted with their country but most people I talked to over the holidays lamented the economy etc...and Tony Blair. But as a tourist, I fell hopelessly in love with England and if it didn't cost so much to ship a horse across the Atlantic, I think I would seriously consider moving. Trust me on this one Bill, your coldest winter day in England is like a balmy spring day in my neck of the woods.

England was even better than I had imagined it to be and it goes without saying that I had the most magical Christmas of my life...a modernized version of Dickens but without the snow. I spent most of my time in just a sweater while everyone else in England roamed the streets in hats, coats and scarves, all the while complaining of the 'bitter cold.'

There was so much that I wanted to see but with only 12 days to sight see, shop, meet relatives, and help my daughter cook for 16 people on Christmas Day, my time was very limited and not my own. I did manage to get away and spend a day in London on the Thursday before Christmas and it has now become my favourite city. The Tower of London was a must for me and I spent about three hours on a walking tour under the guidance of the most knowledgable and delightful "Beefeater" - there is nothing quite like the British sense of humour, or their fish and chips! There was no time for the Imperial War Museum and The Palace, but they're on my list for next time, along with Stonehenge.

On Thursday night, I spent some time in Trafalgar Square and a few hours walking up and down The Strand. I just couldn't get enough and at times even I was overwhelmed by my enthusiasm!

I found the British people to be absolutely charming, polite and friendly. It was mandatory that I visit a pub every other night, and I was treated by everyone as if I was their long, lost friend. And I didn't mind being the source of everyone's entertainment...when you're the only Canadian in a small and crowded room, you're bound to be a sitting duck.

History is why I've always wanted to visit England and to have it around every corner and within walking distance, was about as exciting as it gets. I could walk 10 minutes east, cross a bridge, and find myself standing in front of a section of the Roman Wall. Almost every building had a story and having lived my life in 'wide open spaces,' I loved how familiar everything felt, and more contained. I was fascinated by the structure and character of the homes that I visited, and the flowers and vines that still grow in winter.

Having said the above, there isn't a hope that I could ever drive in England, but I thought your subway system was wonderfully modern (ours looks like it was recently blasted out of rock) and I had great fun on your Double Decker buses...but not at Heathrow Airport. Travelling on my own and having survived a 7 hour flight across the pond, (I'm not a good flier), I must admit that I found Heathrow a little daunting, but I survived.

I only saw the English countryside by train (Leicester to London) and I was amazed at how green everything still was, and the miles of stone fences. I was lucky enough to spot some Shires munching away in the middle of a flock of sheep, so I even had my "horse fix" over the holidays.

Well Bill and Tommy, you innocently asked me for a report on my holiday, and I've given you back a novella. But I loved it, beer and all!

Dawna

[bill_torrens]

Dawna,

Thanks so much for your "novella". Yesterday the headline news in my paper was that only one crime in a hundred over here leads to a conviction. So I needed cheering up. The enthusiasm with which you and Tommy speak of England is a real tonic, and I only wish I could see it with your eyes. Because I'm generally every bit as jaundiced as the people in the poll I mentioned.

You mentioned walking up and down The Strand. Here's a little bit of Civil War trivia for you: during the war there was a theatre there whose manager was of strong Southern sympathies. He flew a large Confederate flag from the pole which overhung the street, and caused howls of outrage from Northerners and Northern sympathisers. So Confederate flag controversies are nothing new.

Both sides published newspapers in London during the war. There was a paper called the London American which, before the war, had been the mouthpiece of the American business community in London. When the war began it became an instrument of Union propaganda. And the Confederate Government authorised the founding of a paper called The Index which also came out weekly and which put the best possible Southern spin on all the news of the day. As the war progressed, the journalistic challenge for The Index became proportionately greater! But it didn't throw in the towel until months after Appomattox. At one time the rival papers had offices next door to each other in Fleet Street, which must have made for some interesting confrontations. When I lived in London I made many visits to the National Newspaper Library to delve through the backcopies of both papers....they made fascinating reading.

There is actually quite a lot of Civil War history in London, albeit of a relatively trivial nature. With your interest in women in the war, next time you visit try to get along to the church where Belle Boyd married in 1864.

Re Joseph Nash being paroled, he would have given his word not to take up arms against the U.S. Government until properly exchanged which, in April 1865, obviously meant "never".

Tommy,

The way our toilets flush? Are we talking handles or chains? I didn't know there was a difficulty, and I can't recall an equivalent problem when I used American plumbing. The only difficulties I encountered in the States were in (a) making myself understood and (b) finding a portion of food in a restaurant which was small enough for one person to eat at one sitting. I guess my T-shirt would read "I ate an American meal and didn't put on 5 pounds."

Bill