Gone with the Wind: Chapter 33 Summary & Analysis

The next afternoon, Scarlett and Mammy step from the train in Atlanta. The depot is a pile of ruins. Instinctively, Scarlett looks for Uncle Peter, but of course he isn’t here; Aunt Pitty doesn’t know Scarlett is coming. The quietness of the depot is so unlike the hustle and bustle of Atlanta when Scarlett arrived in 1862. A Black man drives by, offering them a ride for money. Mammy glares at him hatefully; doesn’t this “hired black” know that upstanding women don’t ride in hired carriages? The Black man says he’s not a “free issue nigger”; his mistress, Miss Talbot, sent him to earn money for the family. Since Scarlett doesn’t know Miss Talbot, Mammy insists they walk.

Scarlett is dismayed to see how devastated Atlanta is. The warehouses and hotels are gone. The warehouse Charles left her must also be destroyed; someday she’ll have to repay Uncle Henry for the taxes he covered on it. As they continue, Scarlett is sad to see Peachtree Street devoid of its old landmarks. However, she is cheered to see new buildings going up—some of them three stories high. They could burn Atlanta, but they can never beat it.

Peachtree Street is as crowded and energetic as ever. However, the people Scarlett sees aren’t familiar. They are Black people who stare at them “insolently.” Mammy kicks “black trash” out of her way and declares she doesn’t like this town full of Yankees and “free issue country niggers.” They come to the place Scarlett had sat to catch her breath after looking for Dr. Meade while Melanie was having her baby. She’d thought she’d hit rock bottom that day. Now, Scarlett wonders how could she have been so silly as to be afraid of the siege when poverty is so much scarier?

A carriage approaches and Scarlett looks to see if it’s a friend. The red-haired head of Belle Watling appears at the window. She looks at Scarlett with dislike. Mammy asks who she is. Scarlett replies that she is the town’s “bad woman.” Mammy’s jaw drops. It upsets Scarlett to think that, if her plan goes well, she will be like Belle. They pass the Elsings’ house and where the Meades’ and the Whitings’ houses had been. Scarlett is happy when she sees Aunt Pitty’s house. Uncle Peter runs out, smiling; Scarlett tells him to get Miss Pitty.

Miss Pitty serves “hominy” and dried peas for supper. Scarlett swears she’ll never eat these foods again once she has money and asks Pitty about her finances. Pitty explains that everything except the house is gone, and she’s living off Uncle Henry’s generosity. Scarlett knows Henry is struggling to save this property that belongs to Wade at his own expense. Scarlett changes the subject cheerfully to news of old friends. Pitty tells how Mrs. Merriwether and Maybelle were selling pies to Yankees to make ends meet. Pitty understands, but she’d rather starve than deal with Yankees.

Miss Pitty says the Meades don’t want another home now that they have no children, so they are staying at the Elsings’; The Whitings are staying there too. Pitty says it’s a boarding house, which is so dreadful. Scarlett wishes everyone staying at Tara would pay her, but Pitty says Ellen would be horrified to hear that. Then, scandalized, she says everyone has resorted to manual labor to earn money. Scarlett pictures herself in the cotton fields and thinks Pitty is an ignorant fool. Pitty says Fanny Elsing is getting married tomorrow to a man of good birth, but with an ugly limp. Scarlett says women must marry someone. Pitty says she doesn’t know why Fanny must marry a man she doesn’t love when she is loyal to her dead beau the way Scarlett is loyal to Charles.

Scarlett asks Pitty about everyone except Rhett. Pitty says the Republicans are putting ideas in the “poor darkies” heads. They want to let Black men vote! Uncle Peter, she says, is too “well-bred” to vote. Then, she says Rhett Butler is in jail for killing a Black man and he might be hanged. They haven’t proved his guilt, but the Yankees are upset the Ku Klux Klan has been riding around dressed like ghosts and killing so many Black people and Carpetbaggers. The Yankees want to set an example by hanging Rhett. Pitty goes on about how nobody knows where Rhett’s money is; he amassed a fortune blockading for the Confederacy and supposedly has money in overseas banks. Noticing that Scarlett looks faint, Pitty asks if she’s upset to hear about a former beau.

Scarlett says Rhett wasn’t her beau, then asks where he is. Pitty says he’s being held in the firehouse. While Pitty talks about Rhett’s bravery and his pride in being a Southerner, Scarlett thinks how wonderful it is that Rhett is richer than ever and in jail. If she can marry him while he’s in jail, she’ll get all his money after he’s hanged and will never have to deal with him. Mammy walks in, suspicious, and suggests Scarlett go to bed. Scarlett says she feels a cold coming on and asks to be excused from paying visits with Pitty tomorrow. Pitty says Mammy can come instead. Mammy escorts Scarlett to bed, where Scarlett thinks she hears cannons. It’s only thunder.