I bought a journal and a traveler’s ink and quill set, just as I’d said I would, but I didn’t dare write as Deborah, in case it fell into the wrong hands, and I was careful to say nothing revelatory. Still, I addressed the entry the way I’d done for years, needing the comfort of my friend, even if she couldn’t answer me.
Dear Elizabeth,
I saw my father in New Bedford. I was warned away from him, though I had no intention of boarding his ship. I want to be a soldier, not a sailor. It seems he’s become a captain after all, but a woman in the tavern told me he’s “a bad one.”
She also told me to go north, to a place called Bellingham, though it’s fifty miles away. She said they were mustering troops and the bounty was good. I caught a ride for most of the first day and ate my fill of turnips, though I’ve never liked them much. The farmer was kind and his wife took one look at me and burst into tears. They lost their son in Germantown too.
I have so much to tell you, though I wonder if you already know. I like to think you are following along, an angel on my shoulder. I am alone, but I’m not lonesome. My heart is too full of hope for sadness. It’s like nothing I’ve felt before, and as Solomon says, my desire is a tree of life. I’ve nothing to do but walk, and my mind is strangely quiet, my restlessness appeased. People have been kind. They think me too young, but no one has stopped me, and I am seized by continual wonder in this new adventure. —RS
I did not speak of my identity or the specifics of my struggle. I did not write of my menses or the contraption I’d fashioned to bind my breasts. I wanted to. I wanted to document it all, but I dared not do it, and left my entries vague. It comforted me all the same, and when I signed RS at the bottom of each page, it did not feel like a lie.
The innkeeper’s warning, “They will’na take you,” haunted me all the way, but when I reached Bellingham, I was sent on to Uxbridge, where the numbers were low and recruits needed. The man behind the table did not challenge me in any way. He made me stand up to the measuring post and asked if I wanted to be a soldier. I said I did, most fervently so, and I was gratified that it was the truth.
“What’s your business?” he asked.
“I was a weaver . . . and I taught school.” Weaving was not simply a woman’s profession. The Bradfords came from a long line of weavers. William Bradford brought a loom on the Mayflower.
The speculator made a note on the rolls, indicating I could read and write. Then he directed me to sign on the line, and in a moment of panic, I misspelled Shurtliff. It hardly mattered, as he didn’t know the difference, but I may as well have written Shirtless, as naked as I felt. He handed me my bounty and moved on to the man behind me. I told Elizabeth of my triumph in an entry dated April 20, 1781.
I am a private in the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment. Not only did they take me, they have assigned me to a company of light infantrymen under Captain George Webb. The light infantry are those able to advance quickly, and I wish I could tell the brothers that this proves, once and for all, that I am truly one of the swiftest.
Three years or the end of the war. That is what I agreed to. My hand shook a bit when I signed the roll, but it was not fear that made me tremble. I am not the smallest soldier, nor the tallest, but my stride is just as long and my heart just as willing. I was told to report to Worcester in three days—yet another fifteen-mile walk—where I’ll be mustered in.
Proverbs 13:19 says that desire accomplished is sweet to the soul.
I’ve never experienced anything sweeter. —RS
9
DECLARE THE CAUSES
Every soldier was issued a uniform to immediately change into and a haversack filled with a week’s worth of rations—salted pork and hard biscuits—to carry on our backs. We were told we would forage along the way as well, and I would soon learn that there was never enough food.
The men around me began to shuck off their outer layers, the soiled and mostly tattered piles rising up around their feet. I did the same, gritting my teeth and moving quickly. I could not run off behind a tree or erect a partition every time I was faced with such a situation. I had on drawers that looked no different from those of every man around me, and the half corset that kept me bound was laced tight beneath my shirt. No one was looking at me. No one had the slightest inkling that I had something to hide. Best that I not act as if I did.
The fit of the breeches gave every man the look of a plucked chicken, skinny legs and indeterminate sex, the folds and the extra fabric designed for movement obscuring what was between their legs. That was good, but I felt scandalous, my hips and my thighs clearly defined by the fit.