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The Charlestonians “are much better off here than at Richmond for most things,” Hartington observed to his father. “Though most people have removed their property and slaves … in case of an attack by the enemy.” But being “better off” was not the same as being comfortable. Hartington was more candid about the situation to his mistress, Skittles: “I have lost all my luggage, & I can’t get any things here; at least very few things; & I have had to get along on one suit of clothes for a fortnight & shall for some time longer.… We have had some hunting as they call it, but it is not much like Leicestershire.”22 Apart from the ruined areas from the fire in 1861, the city was clean and orderly. The hotels were not crammed with shabby refugees like those in Richmond. But there was no escaping the fact that Charleston was under siege. The cost of living had risen eightfold since April 1861. Consul Bunch reported that salt was seventy times more expensive, there was no coal at any price, and the only cloth available for purchase was sailors’ blue serge.

Hartington had been inclined to sail out of Charleston in a blockade runner since “there is scarcely any risk at all of being taken in one of them, especially in running out, and it would not do us much harm if we should be caught as they could only take us to some other port and then let us go.”23 Now he feared the ignominy of his position if he were to be thrown into the Old Capitol like Wynne. With the help of their new friends, Hartington and Leslie devised an overland route that relied on safe houses all the way to Washington. On February 9, Edward Malet was woken by sinister noises coming from his garden. He went outside to investigate and found Hartington and Colonel Leslie prowling in the back. They were terrified of being caught by the police; Captain Wynne had escaped from the Old Capitol prison earlier that day, causing a hue and cry in the capital.17.5

Malet took Hartington and Leslie in for the night. “The best advice we could give them,” he wrote, “was to be off as fast as possible and stop nowhere till they were in New York.” Hartington and Leslie arrived in New York a week after their rescue by Malet, having traversed almost three hundred miles without a single incident. Hartington made up for it now by creating a wonderfully embarrassing one: he attended a ball given by the Rothschilds’ banker August Belmont, and either accidentally or purposefully sported a Confederate badge on his lapel. However, when a Union lieutenant on sick leave angrily confronted him, Hartington apologized and removed it, not wishing to be thought of as anti-Northern even though his sympathies now lay with the South.17.6

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The more the blockading squadron tried to tighten its grip, the more Charlestonians enjoyed watching the blockade runners evade them and triumphantly steam into the harbor. The ships brought not only precious supplies but also news and, from time to time, British volunteers for the army. One of the first to arrive in January was Captain Stephen Winthrop, from Warwickshire and formerly of the 22nd Regiment of Foot, who braved the winter mud to seek out Robert E. Lee in Camp Fredericksburg. The general welcomed Winthrop with great courtesy, though he neither needed nor wanted another volunteer on his staff. After a short deliberation over what to do with the Englishman, Lee sent him to General Longstreet with his regards.

Winthrop was shortly followed by two more volunteers: Henry Wemyss Feilden of the Black Watch and Bradford Smith Hoskins, formerly of the 44th Regiment of Foot and the Garibaldi Guard. The latter ended up with Jeb Stuart, who sent him to replenish John Mosby’s staff; Feilden was assigned to the defense of Charleston. Feilden’s background was similar to Colonel Currie’s; both men were public-school-educated career officers with a strong sense of personal honor and public duty. After leaving Cheltenham College in 1857, Feilden had joined the Black Watch, properly known as the 42nd Royal Highlanders. He spent his nineteenth birthday in India preparing to