s and useless stuff to
silence any question of secret doors. Several closets also were provided
with false backs, where the surplus linen of the household found a safe
hiding-place.

In such an exposed place a company of scouts, or even a regiment, could
appear so unexpectedly that it was necessary to keep everything out of
sight. Even the provisions for the next meal had to be put away, or
before the meal could be prepared a party of marauders might drop in and
carry off the entire supply. In the kitchen a wood-box of large size
stood by the stove. It had a false bottom. In the upper part was "wood
dirt," a plentiful supply of chips, and so much stove-wood that the
impression would be conveyed that at least there was a good stock of
fuel always on hand. The box was made of tongued and grooved boards, and
one of these in the front could be slipped out, thus forming a door.
Into this box all the food and silverware were put. No little ingenuity
was needed in making this contrivance. The nails that were drawn out to
let this board slip back and forth left tell-tale nail-holes, but these
were filled up with heads of nails, so that all the boards looked just
alike. I remember once a soldier was sitting on this box while mother
was cooking for him what seemed to be the last slice of bacon in the
house. She was so afraid that he would drum on the box with his heels,
as boys frequently do, and find that the box was hollow, that she
continually asked him to get up while she took a piece of wood for the
fire. It was necessary to disturb him a number of times before he found
it advisable to take the proffered chair, and in the meantime a hotter
fire had been made than the small piece of meat required.

Of course it was advisable to have at least scraps of food lying
around--their absence at any time would have aroused suspicion and
started a search that might have disclosed all. The large loaves of
bread were put in an unused bed in the place of bolsters; money, when
there was any on hand, was rolled up in a strip of cotton which was tied
as a string around a bunch of hoarhound that hung on a nail in the
kitchen ceiling; the chickens were reared in a thicket some distance
from the house, and, being fed there, seldom left it.

Although this house was searched repeatedly, by day and by night, by
regulars and by guerrillas, by soldiers of the North and of the South,
the only loss sustained were a few eggs, and this loss was not se