Judith White McGuire, Diary of a southern refugee during the war, by a lady of Virginia

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[300] the rooms that we looked at for a week, and that a gentleman, a third party, had been up the day before to claim the rooms, and said that the party occupying them had no right to them, and must be turned out. The servant added, that this third gentleman had sent up a dray with flour which was now in the house, and had put his coal in the coalcel-lar. All this seems passing strange. Thus have we but three weeks before us in which to provide ourselves with an almost impossible shelter. The “Colonel” has written to Mr.---for an explanation, and the M's have been apprised of their dashed hopes. I often think how little the possessors of the luxurious homes of Richmond know of the difficulties with which refugees are surrounded, and how little we ever appreciated the secure home-feeling which we had all enjoyed before the war began. We have this evening been out again in pursuit of quarters. The advertisements of “Rooms to let” were sprinkled over the morning papers, so that one could scarcely believe that there would be any difficulty in our being supplied. A small house that would accommodate our whole party, five or six rooms in a large house, or two rooms for ourselves, if it were impossible to do better, would answer our purpose-any thing for a comfortable home. The first advertisement alluded to basement rooms-damp, and redolent of rheumatism. The next was more attractive-good rooms, well furnished, and up but two flights of stairs; but the price was enormous, far beyond the means of any of the party, and so evidently an extortion designed to take all that could be extracted from the necessity of others, that we turned from our hardfeatured proprietor with disgust. The rooms of the third advertisement had been already rented, and the fourth seemed more like answering our purpose than any we had