Civil War Bullets & My Mom’s Sewing Thimbles in the Curio Box from Hallmark upon the Wall

Among all the thimbles and the other little treasures and souvenirs within the wooden curio box from Hallmark, there are three bullets, souvenirs of a visit to one of at the seven American Civil War battlefields that we visited over the years.  Perhaps it was Gettysburg, a battle fought over three days, which proved to be a turning point within the war.  But, regardless of the battle, these bullets were manufactured and shot with the intent to kill or at least maim, from Northern or Southern troops towards the other.

From which side these bullets came, I cannot tell, but I am sure there are Civil War forensic specialists who would know this with certainty, for there might still be worth to some knowing these facts even at this point in history.  For the Civil War is still part of our cultural, historical, and political landscape and it stunned me then, and still does now, when as an early adolescent, U.S. stamps were being issued commemorating the 100th anniversary of various battles and events of the Civil War.  I collected stamps in those years, and I still have some of those commemorative stamps.

When I first held the bullets in my hand in the gift shop, and then decades later when I focused on them in the curio box, I thought of the real intent of these bullets and my mind immediately conjured the images of Matthew Brady’s Civil War photos, especially those that showed the faces of the dead soldiers.  For these bullets were not show-room display models or toys, nor were they ever meant or even imagined to be souvenirs – of a sort – that one could buy in a well-lighted and clean gift shop, either at the visitor center or at some local shop in town, which would be in a quiet, tranquil and attractive landscape, as opposed to the real one of the battlefield turned red by the blood and body parts of thousands of men from both sides of the conflict.  Perhaps souvenir is not the best word to use.  Perhaps a better term would be a meditative remembrance of what went on at these battlefields during the long, bloody, and brutal American Civil War.

And when I gazed upon the bullets, I realized first that they were all of similar shape and size – bullets being bullets – but that they were not identical.  One seemed slightly wider, and all three had rings around the bottom of the bullets, but all the rings were different.  One bullet had very thin grooves dividing the rings, two had wider indented bands between the rings, and one of those had an interesting design that connected two of the wider bands together.

Two of the bullets still have traces of the dirt in which they were found, dried mud that I did not clean or scrape off, as the dirt in my mind portrayed the reality of the use of the bullets in the war, and their connection to the battlefield upon which men bled their blood into the ground, the bullets speeding into the ground as a shot missing its target – a then living, breathing human being.  Perhaps it was the next shot, or the one after that, that finally eventually stopped the beating heart of a man anonymous to us.

For even bullets have a history of which we will know little beyond the manufacturing process, for the fingers and hands that grasped and handled the bullets in loading or firing are no longer able to shout or whisper their stories, as up to 750,000 Union and Confederate soldiers by latest estimates died, not all directly by organs or brains being pierced by bullets or crushed by cannon bursts, but many from infections, disease, and starvation.  However, war is war, and death is death, and being gone, regardless of what remains above ground or buried beneath, is still gone, with another family eventually mourning and suffering loss.  750,000 soldiers.

And then, as now, as I held the bullets again in my hand, these three pieces of history did not fully satisfy or saturate my history major mind with knowledge or understanding, but rather, and better, they continued to be a point – three points – of history to consider and meditate upon, for history has never ended its fascination and allure for me – like a hauntingly beautiful jewel of great worth quietly shimmering in the moonlight.  For as I grow in knowledge and depth of understanding, and not just of history, but of the human spirit and soul, then every time I see the bullets, or see or hear of something similar, I see them with greater clarity and understanding of what they are were,  and what they are to us now.

Now placing the bullets among the thimbles in the curio box, was my wife’s decorative decision, as she was not a history major nor as sentimental as I am, nor given over to meditation upon the deliberate or random things we both just come upon.  For most of the thimbles, I purchased for my wife while on work travel to various places in the U.S., as gifts for her birthday, or Christmas, or perhaps other occasions such as Valentine’s Day. 

However, now viewing the thimbles, the only one I can identify as a gift for a specific occasion, is the thimble just to the right of the bullets with September and flowers upon its front, for September is her birth month and that would have been easy for me to imagine it as a birthday gift.  For my wife was sometimes difficult to buy gifts for, for many of the things I gravitated towards, were not her cup of tea, as my English mom would say.

And over the years, I had passed and seen these little treasures and curios many times, but it was just recently that I had glanced at the display and noticed again the bullets, perhaps because I have been writing on how the war against Ukraine has been affecting my friends and the nation as a whole. 

When you are a history major, everything threads together, one war touching other wars – incessantly it seems in our long history as humans – and persons long gone, they breath still, breathing meaning and understanding into our lives and into the lives of those we know and love, because they were once alive, enjoying life, and the touch of sunlight upon their skin and the shining of moonlight within their eyes, just like us. 

In addition, even within the thimbles there is history and meaning, for on either side of the Sherlock Holmes thimble from England, are two old thimbles of my mom that I found as we prepared to sell her home some years after she passed.  The simple metal one I particularly remember, for if I was misbehaving or acting up as a kid, and my mom was sewing, she would come and stand over me, with her thimbled finger poised over my head ready to give me a ping on my head as soon as she saw an opening.  And I would be yelling and moving my hands and arms all over my head so she couldn’t strike my head, but she was patient, and her aim was good, and I would get pinged on the head a number of times until she was satisfied that interrupting her sewing to stand over me and ping my head, had been worth her time.

Now even though the pings could really sting, I knew that for both of us, it was more a fun game of sorts and I only had to keep up with my antics until she would laugh and then I was safe, much to the annoyance of my older sister, who would always somehow be there trying to supervise, always telling my mom that I always got away with everything when I managed to make her laugh – yes, that was my technique – and it was mostly fun, and I was much more effective in “getting away with things” – though I didn’t quite think of it that way – than my older sister was, for if she was really upset with my mom she would blurt out that my mom should just go back to England to “her cold English relatives” as she went off to her room almost crying.   Ah, choice childhood memories!

And how of human life all of this really is!  Meditation upon a display of bullets in a curio box that missed their target – bullets aimed to kill, though maiming, blinding, and injuring would also take the enemy out of action – and childhood memories centered upon the thimbles my mom used with her sewing.  My mom was always sewing – especially around Easter and Christmas, sewing dresses for my sisters for the holidays – and she would ping me on my head as I tried – always successfully – to save myself and to make her laugh – which looking back on it, was good for both of us, for she did not often have things that made her laugh.  A clever and inventive kid could at times work miracles for others, even for a proper English mom.

And all of this from seeing three lead bullets – manufactured to kill – among the thimbles of my mom, now gone.

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