From the Burlington (Vt.) Weekly Free Press, 7/20/1883, p. 3, c. 6

Miss Van Lew, who has been lately appointed to a position in the Postoffice Department, is noted for her pluck. During the war, Union soldiers confined in the notorious Libby warehouse were frequently aided by Miss Van Lew to escape, and her house was a refuge in the latter days of the Rebellion for numerous escaped prisoners. So offensive had Miss Van Lew become to her rebel neighbors that two nights before the evacuation of Richmond a mob was organized to burn her house down. She pluckily defied them, and, calling the ringleaders by name, she informed them that General Grant would be in Richmond within twenty-four hours, and that if a shingle of her house was disturbed, she would retaliate in kind when the Union forces arrived.

• Prev
• Next