The upcoming 150th anniversary of the American Civil War will provide Arkansans with an opportunity to reflect on the importance of that signal event in our history and how it affects our lives today. It also gives us an opportunity to look back at our city in the 1860s and how it appeared to the men and women who lived in and visited the capital. To that end, let’s look at a day (actually two) in Little Rock from a pair of soldiers who took the time to record their impressions of the city.
The first is Joseph Blessington, an Irish immigrant who made his way to Texas and in 1862 was stationed in Little Rock as a private with the 16th Texas Infantry Regiment. The capital obviously made quite an impression on the young Texan, as he wrote in his diary on September 23, 1862:
“The city of Little Rock is built on the banks of the Arkansas River. …The country surrounding it is rich and productive. …It is adorned with many fine buildings; among the most noted are the State House, Arsenal, Penitentiary, St. John’s College, and Gas-Works. It is famed likewise for its beautiful churches; also for its magnificent private residences, with their lovely flower-gardens, which savored of Oriental ease and luxury.
“It is hard to conceive a city more beautifully situated or more gorgeously embellished, with splendidly shaded walks and drives, with flowers, shrubberies, and plantations. Most of its stores and public buildings were of brick, while most of the private residences were framed, neatly painted, with piazzas hanging with plants and creepers. A spell of ease and voluptuous luxury seem to pervade the place.”
Two years later, Little Rock was once again a Union town, but even after three years of war it still had the ability to impress visitors. Lieutenant Joseph H. Trego was a veteran of the 5th Kansas Cavalry, one of the toughest Federal outfits to serve in Arkansas. Little Rock’s beauty still moved him, though, as evidenced in an April 11, 1864, letter to his wife:
“This place has never been one for business and but few store houses are in it, but it is the handsomest and pleasantest town I have ever yet seen to live in. The lay of the ground is unexceptionable, blocks laid off in perfect squares with broad streets and generally paved sidewalks, though where they are not the surface is sand and gravel so that they never muddy. There is an abundance of shade trees—native growth—oaks that are beginning to look green and a large proportion of pines and cedars.
“It has been the home of many a cotton planter who formerly lived here in great luxury and splendor. The residences are generally very large and expensive but not of the Yankee styles; they are massive and heavy looking in the finish and the grounds around them in many instances extending over an entire block, with graveled walks and carriage roads, with plenty of fine oaks and pines, of native growth and cedars, arborvitae, magnolia, pomegranate, fig, palmetto & besides—to me—nameless flowering shrubs, make up a grand and beautiful residence.”
Both Blessington and Trego survived the war and returned to their homes. There is no record of whether either of them ever returned to the town that so captivated them in the midst of the Civil War, but we today can be thankful to both of them for sharing a day in Little Rock.