Rev. J.M. Lucye:-
I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of your truly kind letter. It makes me feel, in my old age, that my sainted wife and myself still have friends who remember them in their young days, and I will try and comply with your request.
Mrs. Harriette Amanda Cabell was Miss Harriette Amanda Rector, daughter of Major Elias and Catherine Rector, of Fort Smith, Arkansas. Col. Rector was U.S. Indian agent and subsequently U.S. Marshall. She was born the 3rd of June, 1837, and when a babe was given the name of "Shingo" by the Old Head Chief of the Osage Indians, Claremore. She was always called by that name until the day of her death. She was educated early at her old home school and graduated at the Sacred Heart Academy, at St. Louis, Mo. She was a great favorite with her classmates as well as with all who know her, being noted for her great wit, and sweet, pretty manners. She was reigning belle of Arkansas and had many admirers before her marriage to Lieutenant William L. Cabell, of the 7th Regiment United States Infantry, July 22, 1856. Soon after their marriage, Lieutenant Cabell carried his bride to Fort Gibson, in the Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory, and lived at different forts on the frontier until the war between the States, when she went to Virginia, in April 1861, with her husband.
She blessed her husband with seven children, two dying as infants. Four sons and one daughter grew to womanhood and manhood. Three sons and one daughter now live to bless the memory of their sainted mother.
Mrs. Shingo Cabell was one of the sweetest and most intellectual women of the South. She was a woman of great common sense and of remarkable firmness of character, with a heart full of love and affection. She was above all things a true Southern woman, in fact one of the queens of the South, and so proud of the Confederacy, and the Confederate soldier, that she never failed to administer to the wounded and comfort the dying. She would not enter in any social gatherings during the war, but devoted her time and that of her servants to preparing lint bandages, knitting socks and sending them to the soldiers.
At one time when I was a prisoner of war, General McGruder gave a ball in Washington, Hempstead county, Arkansas, and sent a special invitation to Mrs. Cabell to attend. She wrote him a very polite note declining, stating that he had better look after the comfort of nearly two hundred badly wounded soldiers of Cabell's Brigade; and take the money to be expended at the ball and buy condiments and other necessaries for the comforts of the wounded and dying; that she would devote all her time to the sick and wounded soldier until her husband returned, if it was to the day of her death.
Those were the sentiments that made her beloved by the Confederate soldier. She was a woman of great firmness, as brave as a lion, and at the same time as gentle as a lamb. No one knew her but to love her. She belonged to a number of charitable associations and was always doing good in her home in Arkansas and her home in Texas. So much was she beloved by the Arkansas soldiers that they would cheer her on all public occasions whenever she made her appearance.
She died on the 16th of April, 1887, while on a visit to her friends and relatives in Arkansas. She was brought back and buried in the cemetery in Dallas, Texas, in the presence of two thirds of the citizens of Dallas. She was laid gently in her tomb covered with flowers. Her children have erected a monument over the grave and on one side is engraved in beautiful letters the name "Shingo" Cabell.
Your friend,
W.L. CABELL
An incident was related to the writer in 1863 at Fort Smith, where Mrs. Cabell had her home, which illustrates her strength of character and her ready wit. General Cabell was reported to be very sick at Clarksville, Ark. Some ladies went to her one day and said: "Oh, Mrs. Cabell, we have heard some awful things and we think we ought to tell you. General Cabell is very sick in the Clarksville hospital and what do you think, several young ladies who were waiting on him fell in love with him. The consequences may be terrible." Mrs. Cabell replied: "Is that all, ladies? Why I cannot see how those young ladies could have done otherwise than fall in love with General Cabell, I did it myself."
J.M.L.
The day after her marriage at Fort Smith, July 22, 1856, Mrs. Cabell yielded to urgent solicitation and had her pictur taken. It was a daguerreotype, and this is the only instance when she would consent to have any form of picture taken. When General Cabell was captured, 1864, and carried as a prisoner to Johnson Island, a small photo was made from the old daguerreotype and sent to him. It reached him safely and was the most cherished thing that he had in his prison life. He was reluctant, even now, to part with it for a few days, but consented to allow it to be used for the cut that appears in this book, so that the face of his beloved wife might have a place among the loved and loving Arkansas Daughters of the Confederacy.
Mrs. Katie Cabell Muse, only daughter of General and Mrs. Cabell, has been a prominent figure in all the women's movements for the preservation of the glories of the Confederacy. In 1877, she was elected National President of the U.D.C. organization at Baltimore, Md., and in 1898, at Hot Springs, Ark., she was re-elected by acclamation.
General Gordon tells of a simple-hearted country Confederate woman who gave a striking idea of the straits to which our people were reduced later in the war. She explained that her sons's only pair of socks did not wear out, because, said she; "When the feet of the socks get full of holes, I just knit new feet to the tops, and when the tops wear out I just knit new tops to the feet."