First they tried to dig a ditch. The officers called it a canal, but it looked like a ditch to you. The idea was to pour the Mississippi down that thing, and float every boat on the river up and down. That way they could just bypass Vicksburg and its plunging cannon fire.
They had tried it before, actually, but when Grant took charge everybody tried it again. A lot of sweat went into that ditch, but then the winter rains came, and washed out the cofferdam. The Mississippi came through, alright, and filled the whole thing with silt.
Then they tried another canal, a shorter one this time, from the Mississippi through to Lake Providence. That way they could sail down to the Red River and get around the Vicksburg defenses. They only had enough boats, though, for a few thousand men, not enough for the job. So the whole thing was another boondoggle.
The next idea, then, was to blow up the levee. If there was one thing the Army was good for, it was blowing things up. It worked, sort of. They flooded so much land they could take their gunboats clear to the Coldwater, down the Tallahatchie, and into the Yazoo. They would have made it the whole way, but the water ended up so high, they couldn’t get through the branches of the trees. Limbs were knocking down smokestacks, cabins, men off the deck... The whole effort was a mess. It got even worse when the rebels got wind of the idea, and started chopping down trees to block the path completely.
So they thought if they couldn’t go down the Yazoo, maybe they could go up, which meant going through Steele’s Bayou. That was even thicker than going the other way, and to make matters worse, there were snakes and panthers falling out of the low-hanging branches and attacking the men. And, of course, a few rebel axes made it impossible once more.
So then they decided to go back to the ditch-digging idea, this time from Duckport Landing to Walnut Bayou. At least the lighter boats might get through, if not the ironclads. Naturally, by then, the winter rains had ended, and the water wasn’t high enough to float a skiff.
The whole winter had ended up with one failure after another. The good news was that now that things were drying up, you could just go ahead and march your way to Vicksburg. So that’s just what you and the Army of the Tennessee did. There was fighting, of course. Skirmishes here, bigger fights there. Sherman feinted. The Navy feinted.
Then came a big fight on Champion Hill. It seemed to you like a good name of a place to have a fight - Champion Hill. You were giving it your all, too, when something hit you on your shoulder, knocking you down.
You get back up. Everybody else is fighting, so you’re not about to give up yourself. Yet your knees start to turn to mud, and you find yourself inexplicably falling forward again. Men are running by you now, and you can’t seem to get back up again no matter how much you try. Most of the men run past, but now there are a couple of men standing over you. They rip open your shirt and when you look down, you see that what you thought was sweat was really blood.
You’re vaguely aware that you’ve been shot, but it’s hard to keep a train of thought when you’ve lost so much blood. All you really want to do is get back to the fight, but they won’t seem to listen to you no matter how many times you tell them.
The stretcher-bearers come and carry you on the long walk back to the field hospital. There are only two of them, a drummer boy and a freed negro who has been following the camps, and the kid has to stop several times to rest. It’s a journey of several miles. Weird, nightmarish thoughts run through your head as you’re jostled along, with nothing to do but stare up through the green leaves at the blue sky.
Through none of this are you afraid. The fear comes once you get to the hospital tent. It spreads faster than any infection. It’s the screaming that does it. The scream of men mangled by minie ball and shrapnel, waiting their turn to see a doctor. The screams of the men meeting the doctor now are loud, but not loud enough to drown out the sound of saws cutting through bone and the sobbing, whimpering screams after it’s all over. Other stretcher bearers carry the men past the bloody pile of their severed limbs.
The fear is so strong that you nearly leap from your stretcher when they bring you inside, despite the loss of your blood. The doctor comforts you, though, once he examines the wound. He finds the ball easily; it practically falls out, he tells you while probing the wound. And it’s missed the bones, so he won’t be taking your arm. It’s too high up for amputation anyway, he says with a strange, carefree smile, and unless gangrene sets in, you should be just fine. Then they’re carrying you past that pile of arms and legs, taller than a standing man, and they take you to another tent and give you a cot to lie in. You’d pass out there, if it wasn’t for the pain keeping you awake. They have nothing to treat your pain except for the good news that you’ve kept your arm.
The next day you remain in bed. You’ve got a sickly, greenish-pale color, your tent mates tell you. Yet they’ve got you on double rations and you feel stronger with every bite. Hardtack and greasy bacon that hasn’t even gone rancid yet, and a whole cup of genuine coffee. Your shoulder is swollen to twice its usual size, but every time they change the bandages it looks a little better, the discharge a little cleaner. You’re able to lift small objects. Another day and you can go back to camp, they tell you, a couple more and you can get back to the front. That’s fine with you, there are men hurt a lot worse than this.
That’s when the fever hits. You can feel it coming from a long way off. It’s like one of those thunderstorms they get in this part of the country. With the tops so high they must reach heaven, and the bottom so black it looks like coal smoke. You’ve been in storms like that before, and it seems as if it’s the end of the world when you’re in them. You suffer the bruising hail and horrible rain, with nowhere to run except under a tree, and you can’t do that with the lighting crashing all around you, thick as mortar fire and just as deadly.
The analogy of the thunderstorm is in your head as the fever sets in. It keeps racing around your brain, over and over in some awful sort of nauseating loop while the delirium takes hold of you. As hellish as it feels now, this is only the calm before the storm.
The doctor finds you the next morning on his rounds. You’ve got Yellow Jack. Some call it Yellow Fever, but it amounts to the same thing. It’s a killer. You’ve known men who’ve died from this, a lot of men. More, probably, than men you’ve known killed from enemy fire. That’s another of the pestilent thoughts that won’t leave your feverish brain.
You’re still thinking about it, or at least trying to grasp a hold of the thought, the next day when they carry you away. They’re putting you on a steamboat and sending you down river. The field hospital’s getting full from the fighting, and they know you won’t be getting back on your feet any time soon, if ever again. Not that you’re aware of this, even after they explain it to you.
All you know is that you’re being tossed around on a stretcher again, then stuck in some cabin, dimly lit with a little lantern. It gradually dawns on you that you’re on a river boat the next day when, after another stop, they stick you out on the deck because of overcrowding. You watch the forest go by you. The bayous. The trackless jungle, heavy with moss and stagnation. The river water is yellowish brown, and thick, like it’s made more of mud than anything else. It feels like the diseased blood coursing through your brain. The sensation is like you’re floating down the river Styx, and when you get to the underworld you’ll be as dead as all the other souls.
It’s some time later. With the minutes feeling like days, and the days passing like years, it’s impossible to say how long it’s been, but you’re being moved again. You’ve gone all the way down river, down to New Orleans, where there’s a hospital built of wood, and room enough for the dying, like you.
There are little glimmers of lucidity, here and there. You hear the doctors speaking, discussing how most of those who survive this disease would have recovered by now. You realize that it’s been many days and you haven’t eaten once when you see your ribs sticking prominently from your chest. You feel your heart beating in that chest, slow and weak.
You’ve been watching the men around you expire. The nurses cross the dead mens' wrists across their chests, and tie them with bits of string, and tags with their names written on them, getting them ready for burial. When the doctor comes by, you cross your wrists yourself. “Tie me up,” you tell him. “I’m ready.”
You close your eyes and rest. It’s all over, or will be soon. You can feel it coming, like that storm that still hasn’t left your brain. It’s getting worse now, the fever. Soon, no later than tonight, you’re sure you’ll pass on, free at least from suffering. The thought of death won’t go away. Then it does, and you suffer no more.
Once, when you were a kid, you climbed a tall, tall hill. Even though it was the middle of summer below, the wind was cool, even chilly, up top. You’re dead now; you’re sure of it. Your soul has left your body, and now it’s climbing up to heaven, where the air is cool and fresh. You can feel it on your skin, and your goosebumps are rising. There’s sweet bliss all around you, and all you have to do is open your eyes, and you’ll be there.
You open your eyes. There’s an angel over you. You know she’s an angel. First, because she’s in heaven and you’re with her, and second because there’s no mortal, earthly creature like her. Her skin is coal black, as dark as any negro’s, yet she’s more beautiful than any woman that you’ve ever met, either on earth or in your dreams. Her eyes seem to glow with a heavenly countenance. Her mere presence brings you comfort and relief. You want to bend your knees before her, but you find you’re already on your back.
“You’re an angel,” you say, telling her what she already knows.
“No,” she says, parting her lips as she smiles. Her teeth are as white as the lining at the tops of the clouds. Surely this is heaven.
“You’ve saved me,” you say.
“No,” she says. It’s a funny thing. ‘No’ is such a simple word. Only two letters, one sound, infants say it as one of their first words. Yet when this woman says it, it feels so alive and new. There’s a thick accent there, yet it’s perfectly sharp and clear. Her voice has a richness to it, as if there’s infinite knowledge and color behind this woman’s voice. The tone is deep like the river, smooth and thick as molasses. You want her to say it again, you want her to say more.
“You’ve cured me,” you say. “You’re some kind of doctor.”
“No.”
“A nurse then.”
“No,” she says, “I’m only a maid.” Yet she smiles as she says it, and her smile cures you some more.
“You must be an angel,” you say to her again.
She laughs, and now you know you’re alive. Alive, cured, and ready to take on the entire Confederate Army. Trying to sit up lets you know you’re not that ready yet, but still you feel more alive than you can ever remember feeling before. She places a cool wet cloth on your forehead. “I was changing linens,” she says. Her English is perfect, yet the accent still so exotic. “I saw your fever was breaking, so I stopped to sit with you. I am not supposed to speak with the patients, but it is very late at night, and all are asleep, so I do not think they’ll mind.”
“What’s your name?” you ask.
“Zecora,” she says.
Your recovery has been so brief, yet it’s so full of marvels. You once knew a woman named Coraline, who was known as Cora for short. Cora, though, is so plain and so common, like Mary or Eliza. That strange, foreign ‘z’, and that simple vowel... that makes all the difference in the world. You feel as if you’ve been placed under some witch’s enchantment, and you’re completely enthralled.
“Who are you really?” you ask. “Where do you come from? What is your story?” Odd questions, perhaps, coming from a patient, yet your fever seems to have been replaced by another, a burning to know this wonderful being above you.
She laughs, though, and stands. “You should rest,” she turns, “I should go.”
“Zecora...” you call after, and she looks back.
“Tomorrow, perhaps, if you still want to know. The nurses and doctors try to call me Lucy, but I will not let them. Still, you may hear that name spoken of. Good night, soldier. Sleep well, and be sick no more.”
With that, she leaves the room, fading into the deep darkness of the dimly lit hospital. She won’t get out of your mind, though.

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