How Can you Subdue Such a Nation as This!

From Three Months in the Southern States, April - June 1863 by Lieut-Col.

Fremantle. Fremantle was an English "tourist" who came to America to see the conflict firsthand.

May 29th, 1863 (With General Polk near Shelbyville)


Before going to bed, General Polk told me an affecting story of a poor widow in humble circumstances, whose three sons had fallen in battle one after the other, until she had only one left, a boy of sixteen. So distressing was her case that General Polk went himself to comfort her. She looked steadily at him, and replied to his condolences by the sentence, " As soon as I can get a few things together, General, you shall have Harry too." The tears came into General Polk's eyes as he related this episode, which he ended by saying, " How can you subdue such a nation as this ! "

General Leonidas Polk, From the Library of Congress Collection