Gone with the Wind, A Book Report
Gone with the Wind
by Margaret Mitchell
A Book Report
by Bobby Everett Smith
Spoiler Alert
January 29, 2019
Setting
Georgia, 1861—Tara, a Southern Plantation 5 miles outside Jonesboro, GA and 30 miles south of Atlanta.
Characters
Scarlett O’Hara, a 16-year-old, Southern Belle, in 1861 living on the plantation Tara, south of Atlanta, GA. Scarlett, like her spoiled southern friends, was served by 100 slaves on the Tara Plantation. She was charming, spoiled, and lusty with life.
Ashley Wilkes, a Southern Gentleman, who lived at Twelve Oaks the next large plantation from Tara. Scarlett was in love with Ashley and he was engaged to marry Melissa Hamilton.
Melissa Hamilton, engaged to Ashley Wilkes, friend and enemy of Scarlett’s.
Ellen (Robillard) O’Hara, 32 years old in 1861, Scarlett’s mother and matriarch of Tara Plantation
Gerald O’Hara, Immigrating from Ireland at age 21, Scarlett’s father and patriarch of Tara Plantation
Pittypat Hamilton, aunt of Scarlett and social leader of women in Atlanta during and after Civil War.
Pork, slave at Tara, Butler to the plantation
Charlie Hamilton, Scarlett’s first husband and father to her first son, Wade Hampton. Age 20. Brother to Melanie.
India Wilkes, sister to Ashley Wilkes.
Mammy, slave at Tara, Scarlett’s nanny.
Suellen O’Hara, Scarlett’s sister.
Careen O’Hara, Scarlett’s other sister.
Dilcey, slave at Tara, daughter of Mammy
Prissy, slave at Tara, Scarlett’s maid.
Jonas Wilkerson, overseer of Tara.
Slattery’s, riffraff neighbors of Tara.
Rhett Butler, handsome, 45 years old, blockade runner during the war and speculator, scalawag after the war. Third husband of Scarlett and father to Bonnie.
The Story
Pre-War Tara
In 1861, all the young men in the South of the United States and most of the older men believed that war was imminent and justified and that the southerners could wipe out those sissies from the North in a month or so.
Scarlett O’Hara lived with her mother and father on a southern plantation called Tara only five miles from Jonesboro, Georgia and about 30 miles south of Atlanta. The young girls and boys on the plantations enjoyed a life of parties and luxury with abundant slaves catering to their every whim. Tara had 100 slaves assigned to the house, the garden and the cotton fields. Life was not so good for them as they were considered property to their owners and subject to physical punishments if they did not adhere to their owners’ commands.
Scarlett was 16 and just coming on the age of courtship and marriage in 1861. She was in love with Ashley Wilkes who lived in the plantation next door. The only problem was that Ashley was engaged to marry Melanie Hamilton of the next plantation just down the road from Tara. Ashley had no idea that Scarlett, the most attractive of the local young women, had her eyes on him.
Marriages were on the docket in 1861. Ashley was planning to marry Melanie; Honey Wilkes was set to marry Charles Wilkes, and Suellen had her eye on Frank Kennedy. Scarlett was determined to let Ashley know that she was in love with him and she knew, deep down, that he was in love with her. Too bad for Melanie.
John Wilkes held his annual barbeque, inviting almost everyone who was anyone, from Atlanta to Macon to Jonesboro. Scarlett had plans to make Ashley jealous by attracting as many of the other boys as she could. In addition to the flirting was the eating, drinking, and talk of war. Rhett Butler showed up and expounded on his belief that the south was not prepared for a Civil War. He was soundly rebuffed by the other men at the party.
Arguments flared. “Of course, we’ll fight. We can lick them in a month. One southerner can lick 20 yankees. We’ll teach them a lesson they won’t soon forget.” These were the announcements agreed to by most of the men present. The women were not interested in war or politics. A few like Rhett Butler had a different perspective on the outcome of future hostilities between the North and South.
Scarlett confronted Ashley and told him she loved him and wanted to marry him. He confirmed that he was going to marry Melanie. Scarlett got angry and slapped him. Ashley walked out of the room and Scarlett thought her life was over. Coincidentally, Rhett Butler was lying down on the couch in the living room of the Wilkes estate. He told Scarlett that he had heard the entire confrontation. Scarlett was embarrassed.
Paul Wilson rode into the party grounds. Lincoln has called for volunteers, 75,000 of them. The Civil War was on. Charles proposed to Scarlett and after thinking about how much money Charles had and the adverse effect, she thought her marriage to Charles would do to Ashley, she said, “Yes, I’ll marry you, but I don’t want to wait until after the war. I want to do it now.”
Two weeks later, Scarlett and Charles were married at the end of April 1861. A week after the wedding, Charles left for the Wade Hampton Legion where he was scheduled to participate in the Confederate Army.
At the end of the seventh week, Scarlett received a letter—Charles was dead. He had not died in combat but from pneumonia following measles. Scarlett was now a widow who was scheduled to give birth to her first child in a few months.
Scarlett Moves to Atlanta
Atlanta, 30 miles north of Jonesboro, had grown into a thriving city, nourished by trains, manufacturing plants, and a busy social life. Scarlett, with her nurse Prissy, left Tara in 1862 to go to Atlanta where she planned to live with her aunt PittyPat and her baby. Everyone expected the War to be over in short order.
Atlanta was an exciting city to Scarlett and Prissy as they passed trains, hospitals, weapons manufacturing plants, and soldiers busily executing the war. Pittypat lived on Peachtree Street on the north side of town. Scarlett now owned half of the house through her inheritance after Charles had died. She had no idea how long she would stay in Atlanta but her first impression was positive as she prepared to work in one of many hospitals as her contribution to the war.
Melanie, Ashley’s wife and Charles’s sister also lived with Pittypat. Scarlett did not like her, but she was a most likeable individual. Melanie liked Scarlett and she, along with Pittypat and the slave staff all doted on Wade Hampton.
Scarlett reluctantly worked at the hospital. She was not allowed to flirt with the patients, which was her nature, because of her status as a grieving widow. Even though she did not like her work with the injured soldiers, she liked Atlanta and settled down for a long stay.
Scarlett remained jealous of Melanie and she made up a plan to break into Melanie’s room and find Ashley’s love letters. She wanted to know what he had to say that Melanie did not share with her, if anything.
Scarlett found the letters and was astonished at what Ashley had to say. “What are we fighting for?” he asked. “Not for honor or glory. War is a dirty business. We have been betrayed, betrayed by our arrogant southern selves, believing that one of us could whip a dozen Yankees, believing that King Cotton could rule the world. Betrayed by words, King Cotton, slavery, States Rights, Damn Yankees. But as I think of it, I know that none of those are the reasons that I am fighting. I long for the days at Twelve Oaks. Love of home and country. That’s why I am fighting. But those are just symbols. I am really fighting for the old days and the old ways. I fear those things are now gone forever and win or lose, we all lose. I am not afraid of battle or even death, but I fear the loss of the past. I do not know what the future will bring but it cannot be as beautiful and satisfying as the past.”
If the Yankees whip us, the future will be one of incredible horror. And my dear, they may well whip us.
What is in my heart? The fear of defeat is there.
Do you remember at the barbeque when we got engaged when Rhett Butler said the south had no foundries, ships, factories, or mills? The twins wanted to shoot him. Rhett Butler was right. The Yankees have us bottled up in our ports. We are fighting with Revolutionary rifles where the Yankees have the most modern weapons available in the world. The South had nothing with which to wage a war except cotton and arrogance.
Scarlett was bored with these heartfelt and accurate thoughts. She slipped the envelopes back into the packets that Melanie had organized and left the room. “He writes such uninteresting letters,” Scarlett thought. “Why even Charlie writes better letters than these.”
The War went on successfully for the most part, but people stopped saying that one more victory and the war will be won by the south. The Yankees were certainly not sissies. And it would take more than one victory to defeat them. The hospitals and homes of Atlanta were filled with sick and injured soldiers. Rows of soldiers’ graves at Oakland Cemetery were growing daily. Women in black in mourning were in abundance on the streets of the city.
The value of confederate money had dropped alarmingly, and the price of food and clothing had risen accordingly. Food was scarce but there was still plenty of hog meat, chickens and vegetables. The blockade was working for the north and luxuries such as coffee, tea, and silk were hard to find.
Whenever Rhett Butler was in Atlanta, he called at the Hamilton residence, brought presents to Scarlett and took her on carriage rides throughout the city. He escorted her to balls and other social events. He was not well respected in Atlanta, but he made plenty of money, running the blockade and speculating on the sale of hard-to-get items.
As the war evolved into 1863, speculators such as Rhett Butler were making more and more money by focusing on scarce goods that people wanted to buy at the expense of war goods that the armies needed or that people needed to satisfy civilian needs for food and medicine. Rhett was barred socially in Atlanta from every home except the Hamilton’s. He was still welcome there. “
Butler stated, “the Confederacy is doomed.”
On January 1, 1863, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This act added a major objective to the Civil War, the freeing of slaves, in addition to the prevention of secession from the United States.
In May 1863, General Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army had scored a victory over the Union Army at Chancellorsville. Confident, Lee took the offensive and invaded the North for a second time (the first invasion at Antietam the previous fall).
Battle of Gettysburg:
On July 4, in heavy rain, the Confederate general withdrew his army toward Virginia. Though the cautious Union General Meade would be criticized for not pursuing the enemy after Gettysburg, the battle was a crushing defeat for the Confederacy and was considered the turning point of the war.
Union casualties in the battle numbered 23,000, while the Confederates had lost some 28,000 men–more than a third of Lee’s army. The North rejoiced while the South mourned, its hopes for foreign recognition of the Confederacy erased.
The Battle of Gettysburg (combined with Ulysses S. Grant’s victory at Vicksburg, also on July 4) irrevocably turned the tide of the Civil War in the Union’s favor.
When Melanie visited Dr. Meade, she learned that she was expecting a child sometimes in the fall of 1864. Scarlett was messermerized but when Rhett Butler learned of her condition, he offered to help, demanding that Melanie take care of herself.
Word came from the battlefront, Ashley is missing. No, missing and thought captured. They really did not know what the fate of Ashley was. The Confederate fate in the Civil War did not look good. Food and other supplies were almost impossible to get and results on the battlefields deteriorated although Atlanta continued to use its railroads effectively.
The War Ends
In May of 1864, the Yankee General Sherman was fighting above Dalton in Northern Georgia near the Tennessee border. No one in Atlanta expected that Sherman would make it all the way down to Atlanta which was a little less than 200 miles away. The Confederates had faith in General Joe Johnson to protect Georgia from the Yankee’s assault.
At a party given by Pittypat, Rhett Butler exclaimed that the South had no justification for any confidence. Sherman had over 100,000 men in North Georgia and the South only had about 40,000 but no matter since the South still believed almost universally that one Southerner could take on a dozen Yankees with no trouble. Results in combat did not really bear out those statistics.
Rhett reminded the members of the party that even if one Southerner could take on a dozen Yankees, they still needed shoes, food, and bullets which were in short supply. The south was also suffering from numerous desertions which made their shortage of men even worse.
Dr. Meade confirmed his belief that the Confederates would drive out Sherman back into Tennessee in one skirmish. Sherman continued to march towards Atlanta, Dalton, Adairsville, Kennesaw, now only 25 miles from the outskirts of Atlanta. Casualties were transported by train, which the Confederates still controlled, to Atlanta where every room in hospitals, hotels, and private residences was filled with injured or sick men from the war.
As the war reached Atlanta at Peachtree Creek, Pittypat abandoned her home and headed for Macon as the next refuge. Milly and Scarlett prepared to go with her, but Dr. Meade forbade Milly from traveling to her impending delivery of her new baby. Scarlett agreed to stay with her in Pittypat’s home.
In August, Scarlett received a letter from a courier. It was from Gerald, still at Tara. Ellen and Scarlett’s two sisters were ill with typhoid and under no condition was Scarlett to come home to Tara and expose herself and Wade to this fatal disease.
The Yankees were on the outskirts of Atlanta by September and Melanie went into labor. Scarlett sent Prissy for Dr. Meade or his wife to help with the birthing. Neither was available and after hours of pain and panic, Scarlett and Prissy delivered a baby boy. The Yankees were still at the gates of the city and Scarlett knew that they would have to get out of town to survive. She sent Prissy for Rhett Butler at the Atlanta Hotel. Prissy was afraid of the dark but she eventually went anyway.
Prissy found Rhett in a bathroom in the hotel and told him that Scarlett needed him. He agreed to steal a horse and wagon and come to pick her up. After several hours, he arrived at Pittypat’s house with an emaciated old horse and a small wagon. Scarlett informed him that she intended to go to Tara. Butler told her it was a suicide mission, but Scarlett was determined, and they started packing the wagon with a small feather bed and Missy, her new baby boy, Wade, and Prissy along with Scarlett and Rhett. The horse was barely able to pull the load, but they started out amongst the fires in the warehouses and residences of Peachtree Street, heading for Tara where the Yankees were sure to capture or kill them.
After an hour or more dodging fire, Yankees and terror, Rhett pulled up the wagon and told her that he was getting off here and that if she wanted to go to Tara, she would have to do it alone with her son, Mellie, Wade and Prissy. Odds were not good that she could find Tara let alone make it through enemy forces. Scarlett was dumbfounded that Rhett would leave her there, but he got out of the wagon and walked away.
Rhett told her that he was off to the wars. I love you, he said, and kissed her. Scarlett, terrified returned the kiss but then slapped Rhett across the face with all the force that she could muster. Rhett walked off into the darkness leaving her alone, with the Yankee army between her and home.
Dodging soldiers, getting lost, fighting a sick and reluctant horse through the night, Scarlett turned the horse lose when he finally refused to go another step. Melanie asked for water and Scarlett told her there was none. Scarlett went to sleep as did the rest of her crew. They awoke at dawn. Scarlett found the horse lying on his side, but he was alive as was Melanie, her baby, Prissy, and Wade. Scarlett recognized they were at the Mallory estate, burned to the ground with only two chimneys sticking up.
They found the well and hauled the bucket full of water up. They all drank water and now they needed to find some food. The apple orchard provided the only nourishment and even that was black and rottened.
When they were within one mile of Tara, they found a cow. Scarlett did not know how to milk a cow, but she needed milking and they needed food, especially the baby and Melanie. Scarlett tore up her petticoat and tied the strips together to form a rope of sorts. They tied the cow to the wagon and urged the horse to make the last mile to Tara.
The plantation was still standing but totally dark and empty except for Gerald who was alive but who had lost his mind. Pork was there too.
“Where’s mother?” Scarlett asked.
“She died yesterday,” Pork replied. The girls are recovering.
Mammy and Dilcey are there but all the rest of the darkies have run off,” Pork said.
There was no food except a field of yams which the Yankees forgot. Pork went off to harvest enough for dinner. They found a bottle of corn whiskey that the Yankees had also missed. Dilcey had a baby and was able to nurse Melanie’s young child giving him the milk he needed to stay alive.
Scarlett was back home, a widow, with a child, an estate to manage a pile of people depending on her to make things happen so that they could survive. Scarlett was determined to stay at Tara and take care of Melanie, her baby, her two sisters and Gerald.
Scarlett took charge. They needed food and the only source of food they had was the cow which had just delivered a calf and a sow which had a littler of piglets but was somewhere about the plantation and Pork would have to go out and round them up much to his regret (I’m a house nigger, he said.)
Scarlett headed for Twelve Oaks to see if she could find some food there. Confederate taxes would become a worry later but for now getting food was top priority. Scarlett was the leader and no one else was there to assume that role.
As Scarlett took charge, she exercised her new-found authority and began to bully everyone around. Wade retreated to the kind arms of Melanie, Mammy, Prissy, Pork and the two sisters reluctantly followed orders which were primarily aimed at finding food.
Two weeks after they arrived from Atlanta, a lone Yankee soldier rode up on his horse to the front door of Tara. Scarlett was terrified as he entered the house and began to prowl around. In fear, Scarlett pulled a pistol from the drawer and aimed it at the Yankee. She pulled the trigger and the gun recoiled back towards Scarlett’s face; the soldier was dead.
Melanie and Scarlett searched the dead soldier’s pack and found money, a ten-dollar gold piece and two five-dollar gold pieces along with a substantial amount of Confederate money, enough to buy food for a while. Scarlett dragged the body to the edge of the garden where she dug a small grave and buried, he man.
Scarlett now had a horse and after a few days, she mounted up and headed for the neighbors. She found three women at the Fontaine residence. They had not been ruined by the Yankees and they had food and provisions but no men. They were more than happy to see Scarlett and realize that at least someone at Tara had survived.
The Fontanes, the Tarleton’s and the Calvert’s had survived. The Fontanes offered to share their food with the nine survivors of Tara.
The following week a patrol of Sherman’s army came through. They stole everything they could find but Scarlett had been able to get the horse and some of the pigs down to the swamp before the soldiers arrived. She hid the wallet with all the money in the baby’s diaper. She talked the sergeant into returning Wade’s sword. The soldiers burned the cotton and set fire to the kitchen of Tara, but Scarlett and Melanie were able to extinguish it before the whole place burned.
In April 1865, the war was over. Soldiers walking home began to stop at Tara to spend the night and eat a meal or two. Mealie received a letter—Ashley was alive and heading home. In September, a lone soldier came walking down the drive; it was Ashley.
Reconstruction
After the war, the South was overtaken by carpetbaggers, scalawags, and all sorts of criminals who were trying to make a fortune off the defeat of the Confederacy. Scarlett had hopes that her life at Tara would return to what it was before the war. She also hoped that Ashley would recognize his love for her and save her from all the treachery of the reconstruction. All of that was not happening.
One morning not long after Ashley returned, a sleek new carriage drove up to the front steps of Tara. It was Jonas Wilkerson and his lady, the white trash Emmie Slattery. Scarlett told them to get off her property, but Jonas would not listen. Instead, he told Scarlett that he was there to make an offer to buy Tara. He said he knew that Scarlett did not have the $300 for taxes that year and that he would either buy the property from Scarlett at a good price or he would buy it when it was auctioned for non-payment of taxes.
Scarlett thought that she would rather burn Tara to the ground than sell it to Jonas and Emmie.
When the scalawags left, Scarlett got to thinking what she could do to raise the money for the taxes, not only this year but next year and beyond. Her only solution was to go to Atlanta and get Rhett Butler to marry her. He had the money to rescue Tara and she was determined to do whatever she needed to keep from losing the plantation.
She needed a new dress, but she did not have the money for one even if one were available. She searched throughout the house and decided to make a new dress out of the living room curtains. She and Mammy started cutting and sewing. Soon she had a new green velvet dress which she would wear to Atlanta to ask Rhett Butler for the money to pay her taxes and she was prepared to marry him if that was necessary to get the money. Scarlett would do whatever it took when she made up her mind to get something and she was determined to get the money to pay this year’s taxes on Tara, at the very least.
In Atlanta, during conversation with Aunt Pittypat, the older woman told Scarlett that Rhett Butler was in jail and likely to be hung. Rhett was accused of having killed a black man who had insulted a white woman. The court case had not been finalized but the rumor was that Rhett would be convicted and hung.
“Hugh Elsing told me that he did not think they would hang Captain Butler because the Yankees think he knows where the Confederate collection of gold was hidden. Millions of dollars in gold which some thought Jefferson Davis had escaped with, but others thought that Rhett Butler had gotten his hands on it and had it hidden away and he was not going to tell where it was hidden no matter what they did to him.
Scarlett made her way to the jail in her new dress. She conned the officers at the jail into letting her see Captain Butler. She lied to him at first, telling him that things were going well at Tara and with her family. He knew better and before long, she confessed that she needed $300 immediately or she would lose Tara in a tax confiscation. Rhett said that he needed collateral and that he would not take the diamond earrings or a mortgage on Tara for the collateral. “What else do you have?” he asked.
“I’ve got me,” she said.
“Does that mean you will become my mistress if I loan you the money?”
“Yes,” she answered.
“Well, I don’t have the money here and although I have plenty of money in England, I cannot give it to you now.”
Scarlett and Rhett argued, and Scarlett got very angry. She had promised to prostitute herself to get the money and he was only bluffing to get her to make the promise. They ended the conversation by Rhett promising to put her in his will which would become effective after the hanging.”
“That will be too late,” she said.
As Scarlett was walking back to Aunt Pittypat’s, it was pouring rain, ruining her new dress. Shortly after leaving the jail, Frank Kennedy pulled up by her and offered a ride. As they drove the carriage back to Pittypat’s, Frank, who was engaged to Suellen, that he had fought in the army for a while but had mostly worked for the Confederates supplying the commissary around Atlanta. He had opened a store with surplus materials he stole from the Yankees and was on the verge of buying a sawmill. Financially, he was doing well.
Scarlett thought, “God denied me help from Captain Butler, but he had given me Frank Kennedy. She did not hesitate to tell Frank that Suellen was going to marry someone else instead of him. Frank was shocked but he liked Scarlett who made a play for him as they drove home.
Scarlett invited him to escort her to a wedding at Pittypat’s that evening. It was the first social affair that Scarlett attended since the war started. Frank was dumbfounded that Scarlett would pay attention to him and he was too naïve to understand that she was just after his money.
Two weeks later, Frank and Scarlett were married just in time to make the annual payment of real estate taxes for Tara, $300 which would have been a high price but not too much different for services at the local brothel in downtown Atlanta.
Scarlett listened to Frank attentively as he described the profits he was making at the store and the future wealth he anticipated from his operation of the sawmill. Scarlett could hardly wait to obtain that kind of money in her life. Frank was not anxious to notify Suellen of his marriage to Scarlett and when Scarlett received a venomous letter from Suellen criticizing her for stealing Frank away, to Scarlett, it was a small price to pay for the safety of Tara from the tax collector.
Much to Frank’s disliking, Scarlett had a good head for figures, and she was strong-willed too. As long as Frank gave Scarlett her way, things went well, but when he crossed her, she got mad quickly and stayed mad longer.
Not long after their marriage, Frank got sick and was taken to bed. Scarlett offered to go to the store and manage it until he could get back on his feet. Scarlett found the ledger that Frank kept of his sales and she went trough it only to find that many customers owed him money, $500 or more and that he was doing nothing to collect from them. In fact, he continued to sell to them without payments.
Scarlett decided too that she wanted to buy the sawmill herself, something that women just did not do in those days. Frank could not think of a single woman anywhere who managed a real business like a sawmill. Some women might sell pies or do seamstress work, but it was not fitting for a woman to own a man’s business.
One day at the store, Scarlett was going through the books, alone, when Rhett Butler cam in. He was now out of jail, not going to be hung and he offered to loan her some money. She and Rhett drove out to the sawmill and with Rhett’s money as a loan, she bought the business and hired the owner to stay on for a while to run it while she learned the business. Rhett confessed to her that he did have a good hunk of money in a bank in Liverpool, one half million dollars. He took a high interest on the loan but relieved Scarlett of the obligation to provide her body as collateral.
Scarlett told Frank that she sold her diamond earrings to Rhett to get the money to buy the sawmill. He believed her but did not at all approve of Scarlett owning a sawmill to herself. She did it anyway and quickly began to make money.
Scarlett began to sell lumber in town and became good at it which infuriated Frank even more. It made him look weak, he thought, and she ought to be staying home and taking care of the house instead of out selling lumber and running a business as if she were a man. Frank thought that maybe if they had a baby, Scarlett would be willing to sell the mill and stay home like a proper wife was expected to do.
As Scarlett made money with the mill, she thought about buying another one, maybe two and a saloon in downtown Atlanta too. “Saloons were good businesses,” she thought. Frank was appalled but when it came to arguments, he mostly lost. People around Atlanta gossiped and criticized both Frank and Scarlett, but she held her ground and continued to make money, most of which went to Tara.
In the spring of 1866, Scarlett told Frank that she was going to have a baby. By June the growth of the child was such that Scarlett could no longer show herself in public. Despite her pregnancy, Scarlett continued to make money with the mill and before long, she had outsold a competitor on Decatur Street and forced him to sell her his mill. Now she had two mills to manage, never mind the oversight that she provided Frank on the store. Scarlett needed some good help to manage and operate the mills.
In June Rhett Butler continued to meet up with Scarlett and on one occasion he told her that he loved her. Later in June Scarlett returned to Tara but not on the terms that she had expected. She got word that Gerald had died.
When Scarlett arrived at Tara, she was informed by Will, the overseer of the plantation, that he wanted to marry Suellen. He also told her that Ashley and Melanie were planning to move up North away from Georgia.
Will continued his discussion of what happened to Gerald. Suellen had heard that the Yankees were paying claims for property they had destroyed during the war. It was a substantial amount of money ($150,000) and Suellen enticed Gerald, despite his mental condition, to apply for the payment, but it required for Gerald to take the “Iron-clad Oath” of loyalty to the Union.
When it came time for Gerald to take the oath and sign the application, he came to his mind and realized that he was pledging allegiance to the Union. He would never do that, and he found a bottle of brandy and started drinking. Soon he was drunk, and he jumped on his horse and started riding up and down the roads at breakneck speed. When Gerald tried to take one of the more venturesome jumps, the horse stopped dead still and Gerald flew over him, breaking his neck and killing him within seconds after the stop.
After the funeral, Scarlett got together with Ashley and offered him a job in Atlanta, managing the mill. Ashley refused; he had made up his mind to move to New York. When Melanie came in the room and asked what was going on, Scarlett told her, and she lit into Ashley. “How could you be so cold as to turn Scarlett down when she needs our help. She saved my life in Atlanta and again here at Tara after the war.” Ashley relented and accepted the job in Atlanta.
Suellen and Will married, and Careen left for the convent in Charleston. Ashley and Melanie bought a house on Ivy Street in Atlanta that was close enough to Pittypat’s backyard to walk over. Melanie turned into the hostess of Atlanta and her house was always crowded with women and some men who came there to talk, sew, gossip and pass the time of day. It never occurred to Melanie that she was becoming the leader of a new society in Atlanta.
Scarlett was anxious to deliver the baby and get back to her two mills. She learned that she could lease convicts to provide labor for the mills at a very good price. Ashley and others criticized her for even considering the use of convicts which many considered to be on a par with prostitution.
Scarlett’s baby was a girl whom they named Ella. During the week of the baby’s birth, the KKK had captured a Negro boy and hung him. Yankees were on the search for members of the Klan. Scarlett did not believe that Frank or Ashley could be a member of the KKK.
Melanie had three extra bedrooms in her house, and she rented them out to ex-cons who had just been released from prison. One of those was Archie, a one-legged man, who met Scarlett on one of her trips to the mills. He offered to be her driver and bodyguard and he assured her that he was good with a pistol and a knife. Scarlett hired him on the spot. When Archie discovered that Scarlett was going to use convicts at her mills, he quit, leaving Scarlett to drive alone around Atlanta. It was not a socially-accepted thing to do.
In March, Scarlett was heading down the road to her sawmill passing through a dangerous part of town in Atlanta known as Shantytown. A lone large black man stepped out from the side of the road and stopped her carriage. It frightened her at first but them she realized it was Sam who had worked at Tara when she was living there. They had a friendly greeting and Sam told Scarlett that the Feds were looking for him because he had killed a man. Scarlett agreed to help him get to Tara that night.
When she got to the mill, she met with her supervisor, Johnnie Gallagher. She discovered that Johnnie had been selling part of the food she provided for the convicts and selling it for a profit which he kept for himself. The prisoners were on the verge of starvation and Scarlett was furious. She forced the cook to feed the prisoners ham and peas and molasses. Johnnie said he was quitting if she did not let him run the mill the way he saw fit. After all, he was making a profit and these men deserved whatever punishment they got.
Scarlett agreed to take $20 out of Johnnie’s next month pay in return for the food he had stolen. He would stay at the mill and would feed the prisoners the way Scarlett directed.
When Scarlett reached the edge of Shantytown that evening on the way home, a black man stopped her. It was not, as she expected, Sam. Another man, white and shabby, popped up from the side of the road and they accosted Scarlett. The black man tore open her top to get the money he thought would be hidden in her bra. Scarlett was on the verge of panic when Sam arrived and took on the two men. Sam and Scarlett escaped, and they headed together back to Scarlett’s home.
That night when Sam deposited her, she told Frank that she had been accosted and he was angry but not too much and then he told Scarlett that he was going to a meeting. She was angry that he did not seem to want to go looking for the two men who had attacked her.
Later, Melanie, India and Scarlett were arguing over what they thought the men should have done to vindicate Scarlett when a loud knocking banged on the front door. It was Captain Rhett Butler and he was in a panic. He asked Scarlett where the men were. It’s a matter of life and death, he said and finally Melanie told him where he could find them.
India told Scarlett something that surprised her—Frank and Ashley were members of the KKK, and they were out tonight to kill that nigger and white man who attacked Scarlett that afternoon. India told Scarlett the blood was on her hands; it was all her fault, but Melanie defended Scarlett, saying it was not her fault.
A platoon of Yankee soldiers showed up at the front door. They were there to arrest Frank and Ashley for murder. The three women tried to send the soldiers off in other directions, but Captain Jeffries was not being fooled. After a long discussion, Rhett Butler, Hugh Elsing and Ashley came up the road singing. They appeared to be drunk. Rhett convinced Captain Jeffries that the men were just out drinking and having fun, including being at the whorehouse down town. Frank was dead having been shot through the head while confronting the nigger and the white man.
Rhett Butler decided it was time to ask Scarlett to marry him. She resisted at first but before the conversation was over, she agreed to the marriage. Rhett went off to England for a few months and before long he was back with a beautiful diamond engagement ring, which Scarlett wore proudly.
They married barely a year after Frank’s death.
Return to Tara
They went to New Orleans for their honeymoon and had a wonderful time enjoying good friends, good food, and the wonderful ambiance of jazz and street musicians. Scarlett enjoyed the people and the dinners, but she mostly enjoyed the shopping, the colored frocks, jewelry, and lingerie.
When Rhett and Scarlett returned to Atlanta, they agreed to build a new home in Five Points on a large lot that Rhett had been eyeing for some time. Rhett was very generous with Scarlett, but he made a point, no money for anything that supports Ashley. Scarlett was disappointed because she wanted to add on to one of her mills and Ashley was involved with that.
Times for the newlyweds were good for the most part during their stay in New Orleans and shortly after their return to Atlanta but during construction of the new home on Peachtree, they started to quarrel more frequently. Even so, during a routine visit to her doctor, Dr. Meade, she learned that she was pregnant. Neither Scarlett nor Rhett was particularly happy about having a new child but when the baby girl was delivered, they named her Bonnie and Rhett took a strong liking to her. Scarlett decided she did not want any more babies and she moved into a separate bedroom—the primary form of birth control in the nineteenth century.
Rhett was not happy about the termination of his sex life and he took up trips to the local brothel, Belle Watling’s house, in Atlanta, as a supplement. Rhett owned most or all the facility and he had keys to a secret entrance and a familiar relationship with Belle.
On one of her trips to visit the mill that Ashley managed, he and Scarlett spontaneously started hugging each other in the office of the mill. No sex or anything dirty–just a passionate but ill-timed hug. Coincidentally, Ashley looked over his shoulder and there stood India, Archie, the one-legged bodyguard, and Mrs. Elsing. It could have been the whole city of Atlanta. The news would-be all-over Atlanta by supper time.
Scarlett cringed when she thought what would happen if India told Melanie who was hosting a large party that night that she had caught Ashley fondling Scarlett in the office of the sawmill. Rhett found out and confronted Scarlett who refused to go to the event at Melanie’s house that night. Rhett insisted that she go even though she did not want to. Rhett called her a coward. Scarlett did not care what any of the others thought but she cared a lot about what Melanie thought.
When Scarlett met Melanie at the party, Melanie invited her to help her in the receiving line, a position of honor. Another example of Melanie’s concern for Scarlett and other people.
The relationship between Scarlett and Rhett continued to deteriorate while the relationship between Rhett and Bonnie continue to grow. Bonnie was the love of his life and the child returned the emotion. After a while, Rhett said he wanted a divorce, but Scarlett vowed not to disgrace her family with a divorce. Rhett settled for an extended trip to Charleston and he took Bonnie with him.
Rhett was gone for three months and Scarlett missed both him and Bonnie; she also learned during that time that she was pregnant again, the fourth time after Wade, Ella, and Bonnie. When Rhett arrived home, she was standing at the top of the stairs wondering if Rhett would kiss her when they met.
When they did finally meet Rhett was somewhat distant and Scarlett decided to wait for a while before telling him about the new expectation. When she finally did tell him, he asked who the father of the baby was, Ashley or him? They argued violently and Scarlett accidentally fell down the stairs injuring herself seriously and creating a miscarriage which killed the new baby.
When Scarlett was well enough to travel, she took Wade and Ella on the train and returned to Tara. In Atlanta, Rhett met with Melanie and made a proposal to lend money to Ashley to buy the sawmills from Scarlett. No one was to know where the money came from. Rhett did not want to be repaid and he did not tell Ashley that he was behind the funding which he sent in an anonymous letter from an army buddy that Ashley had met during the War.
Rhett had proven his great love for Bonnie to the society of Atlanta and he had been forgiven of all the negative attitudes about him that had resulted from his speculations, thefts from the Confederacy, and philandering.
Scarlett sold all her interest in the mills to Ashley. Scarlett was depressed; she had built the business with her own hard work and opposition to the folks in Atlanta who did not believe that owning sawmills was the proper business for a woman. And all this was happening at a time when business in Atlanta was starting to grow after the end of the reconstruction. Scarlett sold the business anyway because she was tired of fighting Rhett and everybody else about her ownership of the mills.
Rhett and Scarlett continued to live in their house on Peachtree, but they were not close. Rhett was close with Bonnie and his love for the child continued to grow as his disdain for Scarlett grew.
On trips around Atlanta, Rhett rode his black stallion and Bonnie rode beside him on her little fat pony. Rhett decided it was time to teach Bonnie to make low jumps on the pony. Bonnie quickly progressed from jumps over a bar just two inches high to jumps that were always more challenging.
“Mother watch me make this one,” Bonnie cried as she spurred her pony to the highest hurdle ever. The pony missed the hurdle and Bonnie went over his neck in the fall which broke her neck and killed her instantly.
Rhett was devastated and his relationship with Scarlett got even worse after Bonnie’s death.
Melanie had not yet told anyone, but she too was pregnant, but it was not going well, and Scarlett got a telegram from Rhett while she was in Marietta visiting friends. “Come home immediately. Mrs. Wilkes is ill.”
Scarlett got the next train back to Atlanta and found that Melanie was indeed ill and not expected to live. Wen Scarlett went in to see her, Melanie asked Scarlett to take care of Beau and Ashley. Scarlett said yes but she was no longer interested in Ashley romantically, but she did not tell Melanie that.
For the first time, Scarlett realized that Ashley did not really love her and that she did not care. When Melanie died, Scarlett realized that she was really in love with Rhett Butler and not Ashley. Rhett on the other hand, had fallen out of love with Scarlett.
Rhett and Scarlett spoke earnestly about their future relationship. Rhett was leaving, going to Europe or Charleston or somewhere for a long time. Scarlett tried to get him to change his mind.
“What am I going to do,” Scarlett asked.
“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
When Rhett left, Scarlett returned to Tara. “Tomorrow is another day,” she thought.
Rating
Five out of five stars. One of the great American novels. Stories about the Civil War, the social lives of Confederates, reconstruction, and civil rights. Written by Margaret Mitchell was voted one of the top five novels in a recent U.S. poll. This is a must-read for everyone.
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