Mary Thacher Higginson, Thomas Wentworth Higginson: the story of his life

[218] swore a big oath that he would never swear again! The officers were not allowed to inflict ‘degrading punishments’ on the men, or to indulge in ‘insulting epithets’; the word ‘nigger,’ for instance, was tabooed even in conversation. The soldiers were held to strict obedience, but also treated like men. The result Captain Jackson says was a miracle, and that ‘the affection and reverence of his soldiers for their Colonel were beyond words.’ Captain Jackson once expressed a wish to transfer to canvas a picture of his ‘stately Colonel’ bending with uncovered head to listen to the complaints of a ragged and ignorant Negress. ‘No grand lady,’ he added, ‘could win a more responsive interest or a more royal courtesy.’

As for the officers, it was a new experience to be associated with a man of refinement and culture and they received with delight the books and magazines which he sent to their tents. The Colonel wrote home:—

I wish you could see how pretty our encampment looks, with its 250 tents glimmering white in the moonlight . . . . The white curlews hover and wail all night invisibly around us in the air, like vexed ghosts of departed slave-lords of the soil . . . . This was considered an especially severe plantation and there is a tree which was used as a whipping post, so that the marks of the lashes are still to be see . . . .