As
the playful tenderness he displayed at home was never suspected, so
the consuming earnestness, the absolute fearlessness, whether of
danger or of responsibility, the utter disregard of man, and the
unquestioning faith in the Almighty, which made up the individuality
which men called Stonewall Jackson, remained hidden from all but one.
To his wife his inward graces idealised his outward seeming; but
others, noting his peculiarities, and deceived by his modesty, saw
little that was remarkable and much that was singular in the staid
professor. Few detected, beneath that quiet demeanour and absent
manner, the existence of energy incarnate and an iron will; and still
fewer beheld, in the plain figure of the Presbyterian deacon, the
potential leader of great armies, inspiring the devotion of his
soldiers, and riding in the forefront of victorious battle.
CHAPTER 1.4. SECESSION. 1860 TO 1861.
1861.
Jackson spent ten years at Lexington, and he was just five-and-thirty
when he left it. For ten years he had seen no more of military
service than the drills of the cadet battalion. He had lost all touch
with the army. His name had been forgotten, except by his comrades of
the Mexican campaign, and he had hardly seen a regular soldier since
he resigned his commission.
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