Edinburgh, 1864
My Dearest Melissa,
Now it is almost over. The hounds of hell are still on my trail but I will fox them yet!
This city is a contrast to the other but underneath the fine buildings and straight lines of the streets the same poverty exists, only Edinburgh hides it better. Beneath its skirts, as it were. Glasgow makes no secret of its privation.
East and West. North and South. Nothing changes.
I find I am beginning to be affected by the strange ways of the people here and the even stranger part I have been asked to play in this war.
The news I receive is not good. The steamer Juno ran the blockade all the way from Greenock into Galveston as you no doubt have heard, but we lost the Emma Henry and the Iona was in offshore collision with another steamer whose captain was drunk as a skunk, and while his own ship survived ours went to the bottom.
Not much justice there, I am afraid.
The Iona now lies in the deep waters of the Clyde with fish swimming all around the great load of coal that she had shipped on board for the Atlantic crossing.
It is as if the Fates have lined up against us, and I know there are those who pour scorn on such superstitious nonsense, but I have seen grotesque events on the field of battle that have made me sometimes doubt my Christian reason.
For instance a bullet that was headed straight for me beside a river was intercepted by the poor unwitting body of one of my own men who had stepped up to return me a newly filled flask of water.
It was my fate to live and his to die. The chance was on my side that moment.
The single shot marksman who had climbed up on a bluff by the water was himself brought down by John Findhorn with a buffalo rifle that had been, so he told me, in his family for generations.
He lost it on the retreat from Gettysburg, along with his life.
But I repeat myself, do I not? I have surely told of John’s death before.
And Fate? What does it mean? A force beyond us that works its will despite our puny efforts to dictate otherwise.
Like God without the beard.
I have been spared. But for what cause?
Ever since I arrived in this dank country, this Scotland that the natives hold in such great esteem that they leave the place in droves while lamenting their lost heritage, I have felt as if it was meant to be.
That every move I made was predestined, ordained, as if there is no other place on earth for me to arrive at and exist.
Is this not a kind of madness?
My mind is fragile. Like a shipwreck that water snakes swim in and out of, through the skeleton bones that once held the hull in place now with great gaps between them.
Between one thought, one action and another, lies eternity.
I am almost ashamed to say how lonely I have become, how desperate my need for solace and warmth; like a starving man. My very hand trembles as I write these words.
Again I have been billeted down by the docks, a rabbit warren of ‘wynds’ as they call the narrow little lanes. At dark they become alive with the creatures of the night that would sell both body and soul for a silver coin.
Tomorrow I meet with the two merchants who have promised ships in return for the cash bonds I have guarded with my life since I arrived on these shores.
I will not hand them over till I am satisfied that the papers are in order and then an exchange will be arranged.
Soon. It will all be over. Soon.
The Federal spies are never far from my trail. I caught a glimpse of my adversary in his long black oilskin cape.
Like myself he wears a wide-brimmed hat; my reason is to conceal the colour of my hair, which howls my name as if a finger were pointing from the sky.
I could dye it, of course, but I’ll be damned if I will.
William Mitchell. My enemy. I wonder what his reason is? Disguise, perhaps. To hide the face of death?
I shall give this letter to Bartholomew Jones. One of my best agents. Wily and wild. They say he is a devil with the ladies.
If anyone survives this, he will. I have charged him to put this letter in your hand but God knows when that will be. It is all in doubt.
I write and yet I feel as if I have nothing much to say that might have meaning for you.
This whole venture is like a dream and I a shadow that moves within. The air of Edinburgh, the very air I breathe, has mixed in with my blood to create strange thoughts and fancies that bewilder me.
As if I am being seduced into a world where nothing is certain. Everything is in suspense. Especially myself.
I must stop now.
If we do not break this blockade, we lose the war.
Another thing I have said before.
I have heard that the ports of Wilmington and Charleston are now closed to our ships. We may have lost it already.
Be brave. I’ll do my best.
Your husband,
Jonathen
