Books: Southern Belle

BELLE BOYD, CONFEDERATE SPY—Louis A. Sigaud—The Diefz Press ($3).

Three years ago Mrs. Louis Sigaud of Brooklyn read an article in a pulp detective-story magazine about a famed Confederate spy named Belle Boyd. Turning to her husband, she remarked that the subject would make a good book. Her husband, who should know, agreed. A World War I counterespionage agent who rose to be a lieutenant colonel in the Military Intelligence Reserve, he proceeded to write the book himself.

Hearts and Information. Born of good family in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley, Belle Boyd made her debut in Washington society at 16. Next year the Civil War began. A bright, black-eyed, self-reliant girl with a figure that North & South agreed was perfect, Belle was no camp follower. She may or may not have won the hearts of some Union officers, but Author Sigaud is sure she was not, as her critics have asserted, a prostitute. She was a spy, attached to the Intelligence section of the Confederate Army, engaged primarily in collecting information about the movements of Union troops.

Most of the time Belle lived in a small house behind the Strickland Hotel in Front Royal, Va. She picked up news from Federal officers quartered in the hotel, sent her messages by Negroes to the troops under Stonewall Jackson. Whatever the value of her information, she was idolized by Confederate soldiers, feared and detested by Yankees, disdained by Southern ladies who noted in their diaries that they were not at home when she called.

Her Great Day. On May 23, 1862, Belle became famous. The Confederates under Jackson and Ewell were advancing on Front Royal. The Federals were planning to retreat to Winchester, after burning their stores. They were scattered in seven small groups. Belle was in the Strickland Hotel in the morning when she heard the first Confederate rifleshot. As she rushed upstairs she met a newspaper reporter coming down. This was a Mr. A. W. Clarke, of the New York Herald, who had been trying for some time to do what is described in books like this as "force his attentions upon her." "Great Heavens!" cried he, "what is the matter?" "Nothing to speak of," she said coldly, "only the Rebels are coming. . . ."

He rushed to his room to pack. Belle locked him in it. Then she ran across an open field between the lines of fire, hitting the dirt when shells exploded 20 yards away and bullets cut her clothing. The information she got to headquarters was invaluable. There were only 1,000 Union troops in Front Royal itself. Assaulted, they lost $300,000 worth of stores they did not have time to burn, also failed to burn the bridge over the Shenandoah. The road to Washington was open, and only the delay of the Confederate cavalry saved Banks's army.

Anticlimax. The rest of Belle's life was anticlimax. Arrested, she fell in love with the Yankee ensign assigned to guard her. He became the first of her three husbands. In England she was a social success for a time, fell into poverty, had to succor herself by writing her guarded memoirs.