The North came on as invaders; the South stood firm as defenders; and in all the histories of the struggle this fact should be pre-eminent.

Of the hundred battles fought only that of Gettysburg was on Northern soil.  The beautiful lands of the garden spot of earth, as I have said, were torn and pillaged and ruined, not alone by the fortunes of civilized warfare, but by the ghastly horrors of cruelty and needless vandalism.  It is not the purpose of this paper to fight those battles over.  The strife lasted four years.  The population of the North was 22,000,000; that of the South 9,000,000, of whom three and one-half millions were slaves.  The North was four times as great in numbers as the South.

The North had three times as many armies.  The South could not get enough small arms for many months.  All foundries for cannon, and all except two powder mills were in the North.  The North had food and provisions in abundance.  The South planted cotton and tobacco, but could not even in times of peace, raise enough food, but were accustomed to buy from the North and from Europe.

The Union had a treasury and a navy:  the Confederacy had neither.  The North could renew supplies from abroad.  The Southern ports were blockaded and many necessaries of life were shut off.  The Confederacy set to work to make arms, ammunitions, blankets, saddles, harness, and other necessities.  Bells from churches and halls, dinner bells, plantation and fire bells, along with stray pieces of metal, were melted and cast into cannon.  Old nails were saved and blacksmiths made of them clumsy needles, pins and scissors.

For coffee was used burnt rye, okra, corn, bran, chickory and sweet potato peelings.  For tea, raspberry leaves, corn fodder and sassafras root.  There was not enough bacon to be had to keep the soldiers alive.  Sorghum was used for sugar.

The women and girls helped in every possible manner.  Silk dresses were made into banners, woolen dresses and shawls into soldiers’ shirts—­carpets into blankets—­curtains, sheets, and all linens, were made into lint and bandages for the wounded.  Soft white fingers knitted socks, shirts and gloves, to keep the cold from the men in the trenches.  Calico was $10 per yard quite early in the strife.  Homespun was made upon the old colonial wheels and looms that had been kept as souvenirs and curios.  Buttons were obtained from persimmon seeds with holes pierced for eyes.  Women plaited their hats from straw or palmetto leaf, and used feathers from barnyard fowls.

One mourning dress would be loaned from house to house as disaster came.  Shoes were made of wood, or carriage curtains, buggy tops, saddle tops or any thing like leather.  There were thin iron soles like horse shoes.  They were patched with bits of old silk dresses.  For little children shoes were made from old morocco pocket-books.  Flour was $250 per barrel; meal, $50 a bushel; corn, $40 a bushel; oats, $25; black-eyed peas, $45; brown sugar, $10; coffee, $12; tea, $35 a pound; French merino or mohair sold at $800 to $1,000 a yard; cloth cloak, $1000 and $1500; Balmoral boots, $250 the pair; French gloves, $125 and $150.  The stores came to be opened only on occasions.