land had fallen, and snowballing became a common sport. Finally an
organised contest was proposed between our regiment and two others of
the brigade. We were so much stronger in numbers than the older
regiments that this apparently one-sided arrangement only equalised
forces, and as an offset we were given the doubtful advantage of the
defensive. Both sides were drawn up in rigid military array with
officers in their places of command. As for ourselves, we made piles of
snowballs and awaited the onset. It came like a whirlwind; those
veterans had not been through a dozen real battles for nothing, and as
their line approached and the missiles began to fly, it was like a
hailstorm. The snowballs were wet and hard, often icy; both sides were
in hot earnest and like the ancient Romans we aimed at the faces of our
foes. I hardly know how it all looked for I was in the thick of it and
almost blinded, but I know how it felt. If the snowballs had been
bullets, I should have been riddled from head to foot.
We stood our ground manfully for a little while; but the too subtle
strategy of our commander had divided our force; we were outnumbered at
the critical point and the superior discipline of our opponents
prevailed. We had to confess ourselves beaten; and from the way our
veteran friends crowed over us I almost think they were tempted to
inscribe that snowball victory on their battle-flags.
An even better antidote for the blues was the work which became
necessary as the army went into winter quarters. There is no pleasanter
occupation than home building, be it ever so rude, and we took much
pains and found great enjoyment in the making and furnishing of our
little houses. Some regiments whose location was near suitable timber
built good-sized log huts; we were compelled to be more modest. The
dwelling which my own group of four tent-mates erected and occupied may
serve as a fair example. Four pieces of shelter tent buttoned together
made the roof which covered a log structure twelve feet long and five
or six feet wide. The log walls were about three feet high; but as the
ground sloped away from the company street we dug out the rear half of
our hut, and there we had a little room in which we could stand erect.
This served for our kitchen. The more elevated part was occupied by a
broad bed of poles covered with dried grass and our blankets. This made
a springy couch on which the four of us could sleep comfortably side by
side; and the edge of the bed was just high enough to make a convenient
seat with our feet resting on the kitchen floor. About the sides of the
house were shelves and pegs for our belongings.
In the kitchen end, beside the door, we built a fireplace and chimney.
Now a wooden fireplace and chimney may seem ludicrously impractical,
yet that is what we and thousands of others actually built from green
pine sticks. But we fireproofed it with a coating of clay on the
inside, and it answered its purpose perfectly. It "drew" finely and
gave us no end of solid comfort. Some of the chimneys did not work so
well and then the draught was increased by the precarious expedient of
an empty, headless barrel placed on top. This generally served for a
short time; but the barrel was pretty sure to take fire and then there
would be a grand excitement and much merriment over the frantic effort
to extinguish the blaze.
Not the chimneys alone played tricks on the householders. Mischievous
comrades have been known to drop a handful of cartridges down a chimney
from the outside, with the result of a smothered explosion and a great
scattering of ashes and embers over everything and everybody within.
The spirit of fun also found outlet in the adornment of the gables of
our dwellings with various legends suggestive of the personal
peculiarities of the inmates. For instance, of two queerly assorted
tent-mates, one had been a church sexton and a conspicuous functionary
at village funerals; the other had worked in a silverware factory. Over
their door some wag tacked a sign with the inscription:
DOWD AND GRIFFITH,
JEWELLERS AND UNDERTAKERS.
As few of us were content with the wholesale and not too dainty work of
the company cooks, we did most of our cooking ourselves by our kitchen
fires, and those of us who survived the war learned enough to make us
useful to the women who were wise enough to choose us as husbands,
though I fear the details of our housekeeping would have shocked them.
Many a pleasant evening we spent about our little fireplace. We talked
about home, the girls we loved, religion, politics, literature, camp
gossip, everything. Or we read, when we had books or papers from home,
or wrote letters or our journals.
There was, however, little real privacy in those huts so close together
with their canvas roofs. Any loud talk could be heard from one to the
other and in the evening after "retreat" the camp became a very babel
of men singing, talking, laughing, swearing, telling stories; a chorus
in one tent, a game of cards in another; in three or four at once loud
discussions of the doings in the regiment or of the state of the
country.
At nine o'clock "taps" sounded, and the officer of the day went the
rounds to see that all lights were out. This was early bed-time in the
long winter nights, and by various ruses we managed to conceal the
glimmer of candles re-lighted after the officer had returned to the
guard-house. The Bible and Shakespeare were responsible for some of
these evasions of military regulations, quiet little games of cards for
more of them.
Speaking of cards and Bibles brings up the image of the chaplain.
A friend in a regiment distinguished for its high discipline and its
severe losses in many battles said to me one day: "A good chaplain
makes a good regiment." Then, in illustration he told me the story of
their own chaplain, a man of fine culture, high social position and
great devotion to his calling. In his pastoral visits through the camp
if he surprised a group engaged in a game of "bluff," he would quietly
scoop up the stakes, put the money in his own pocket and say: "Boys,
this is for the hospital fund." Strange to say, the boys never
murmured. The cheerful but shamefaced reply was always, "All right,
chaplain."
I think no one will wonder who hears the rest of the story.
On the eve of battle this chaplain took personal command of the
stretcher-bearers and when the combat was raging he would lead his
little band of helpers into the thickest fire to succour the wounded.
My friend told me: "I have known him to creep out between the opposing
lines to bring off wounded men. The boys all knew that if they got into
trouble, Chaplain H---- would be there to help if this was in the power
of mortal man." There were other chaplains of like spirit. Our own was
not only untiring in his care for the sick and wounded in the
hospitals, but always ready for any kindly service he could render to
the members of the regiment or to their families at home. But it must
be confessed that they were not all of this stamp. It was quite
possible for the chaplain to be the most useless officer in a regiment.
It could not be said of our regiment that we were like the men of
Cromwell's "new model," yet we came from communities in which
Puritanism was traditional and in almost every company there were at
least a few examples of strong Christian character. The two serjeants
in our own company who died in the service, one by sickness and the
other in battle were men of this sort, and one of our captains who fell
in battle was a man whose Christian life was a benediction to the
regiment.
But occasionally one met with what good people might consider strange
inconsistencies. I have heard swearing euphemistically described as the
utterance of "short prayers." One of our field officers was a man whose
godly life was known to all, yet in intense moments short prayers of
startling character would escape him.
On a Sunday, so it was said, a group of officers gathered in his tent
fell into warm discussion of some troublesome regimental affair. The
lieutenant colonel paced back and forth with his hands behind him
taking no part in the conversation but biting his bristly moustache, as
was his wont when annoyed. Suddenly he stopped short and, facing them
exclaimed: "Well, gentlemen, let's stop this damned quibbling and go
and worship God awhile." Then picking up his Bible he strode off by
himself into the woods, leaving his guests to their reflections.
Religious men were apt to be more intense in the army than at home, and
those who frequented the prayer-meetings in the tents or, in pleasant
weather, under the trees, will never forget their atmosphere of warm
and solemn earnestness.
On the night before we stormed Marye's Hill the moon shone through
fleecy clouds and it was only partly dark. We lay in line of battle at
rest, the most of us trying to sleep. Presently, out toward the front
between us and the skirmish line voices were heard. The watchful major
anxiously asked: "What is that? Who is talking out there?" One of the
men answered, "Major, it is only some of the boys having a
prayer-meeting;" and the major says that instantly, in place of his
fears and vexation, a feeling of deep thankfulness came over him as he
thought of the prayers ascending for us all on the verge of battle.
There was a young soldier in our company to whom his mother, when she
parted from him, gave a little book of daily Scripture selections. She
said to him: "I have another just like this and we will both read the
same verses every day." The soldier kept true tryst with his absent
mother and, no matter where he was read his text every day. As we lay
in the sunken road on that fateful morning after the moonlight
prayer-meeting and the bullets began to speak their deadly whispers in
our ears and we were all feeling the chill and dread of the plunge into
battle, he opened his little book. The text for the day was, "Fear not,
for I am with thee: be not dismayed, for I am thy God!" He has told me
that if a voice from heaven had spoken it could not have been more
clear, and for the remainder of that terrible day all fear was gone.
We believed in our cause, in the war, and in final victory; but we
were not soldiers for the love of it. The end of fighting and _home_
was the goal of the hope of the army--a vain hope to thousands of us,
yet the star that beckoned us all forward. How eagerly our thoughts
turned northward might be seen on mail days. Letters came with varying
regularity; in settled camp we could generally count on them, but in
times of active campaign mails were uncertain and when one arrived it
was pathetic to see the wave of expectation that would sweep through
the ranks. Often a cheer would go up when the postman with mail bags
slung across his horse, came in sight. Then there was impatient waiting
until the letters for the company came down from headquarters and an
anxious crowd around the captain as he called them off. The
disappointment of those who received none was often pitiful. You would
hear one and another say: "Captain, isn't there one for me?" "Captain,
are you sure? I know I ought to have one this time."
Then, tired and hungry as we were after the day's march, supper would
go untasted until we could read the news from home; and long afterward
by our camp-fires we would talk it over; and you might hear letterless
Tom come to Bill and ask, "What does your wife say about my folks? Has
she seen them lately? Are they all well?" The most of us would read our
letters with quiet gladness; but now and then you might see some poor
fellow bending with tear-stained face over his message from home and
hear his comrades saying in hushed tones of sympathy, "Jim has bad
news; his little girl is dead."
The outgoing mail was far lighter than the incoming: we wrote under
difficulties; yet there were times when the whole camp seemed filled
with scribes. But our letters were apt to be brief, and when any
important movement was at hand we knew that they would not be promptly
forwarded. Inconvenient information sometimes travelled in army
letters.
Our turn at picket duty was, with some of us, a favourite time for
writing up our correspondence. In pleasant weather it was only at the
outposts that the work was trying. "On the reserve," or even "the
support," we had only to hold ourselves in readiness for emergencies.
Picket duty was often a positively enjoyable change from the monotony
of camp. When fires were allowed we would fell great oaks for the mere
fun of it, cut off their tops and branches for our fire and let the
trunks lie. War is wasteful in ways little thought of. Yet the scars of
the picket posts were as nothing compared with the deserts made by the
great camps.
But picket duty must be done regardless of weather, and at the outposts
no fires were permitted at any time. I remember once leaving camp in a
snow-storm which, by the time we reached our post had changed into a
cold rain. Night was falling, we had no tents, none were allowed on the
picket line; but a German comrade and I managed to prop up a rubber
blanket upon sticks so that it gave a scanty shelter from the rain, and
as we crept under it my friend exclaimed, "Ach, here dees is nice under
an injun-rubber himmel!"
Some of the nights on the picket line will always dwell in my memory.
There was one when our post was in the heart of a forest of giant
pines. A wild north-wester was blowing and its elfin music roared among
the tree-tops as if the myriad spirits of the power of the air were let
loose. Yet down below where we stood, all was peace; not a breath
stirred the feathery branches or the soft carpet of pine-needles under
our feet. Even now I can feel the deep and solemn repose, the sense of
mighty, restful shelter from the war of elements with which the shadowy
forest pillars enwrapped us.
During our winter in camp along the Rappahannock the only danger on the
picket line was from bushwhackers. But nothing is more trying to the
nerves than the chance of being picked off in the dark by unseen
skulkers. In the face of the enemy it is different: you then expect to
be shot at and to shoot. It is far more dangerous, but scarcely less
exciting. Soldiers are not fond of picket work, but they hate the
monotonous restraint and night work of ordinary and yet perfectly safe
camp-guard duty. A common punishment for slight delinquencies is to
give a man an extra turn on guard. Severe punishments, such as "ball
and chain," or even tying a man up by the thumbs so that his feet
barely touch the ground were not uncommon, though I am glad to say that
this cruel torture was never permitted in our own and many other
regiments.
One night I was serjeant of the guard at brigade headquarters. The
guard-house was a log building divided by a loosely built partition
with wide crevices into two rooms: one for the guard, the other for a
prison, in which at that time three deserters were confined. My duty
compelled me to keep awake, and the prisoners, with the shadow of the
death-penalty upon them spent the whole night in talk.
Without heeding the guard, they laid bare their lives to each other as
men will sometimes do when the end seems near. They talked about their
families--one at least was a married man--and about the doings of
younger days when they were boys on the farm, and they seemed to hunt
out every bit of wrong or shame in their lives as though it must be
confessed, at least to each other. One of them was evidently a very
decent man; but another, who had been a serjeant in his regiment and
plainly the ring-leader, was, judging from his talk a desperado. Once,
after he had told of some wild deed he said: "But I have done worse
things than that; things that would hang me if they were known." Then,
in answer to an inquiry of his companions: "No, I won't tell you even
now about that."
In the morning I saw this man. He was strikingly handsome, a most
soldierly-looking fellow. He talked with me freely and pleasantly;
there was something fascinating about him.
The deserters were not shot. With sentence suspended they were replaced
in the ranks and told that, if they did their duty the next time their
regiment was called into action, they would be pardoned.
Shortly afterward came the bloody but brilliant little battle at
Franklin's Crossing. In the first boat which left the shore--the same
in which our noble Captain D---- was killed--was the dare-devil
ex-serjeant. Before the boat reached the opposite bank he was out of
it, and without waiting for any one, he rushed straight at the enemy's
earthwork alone. We expected to see him drop, but he bore a charmed
life; he was one of the first to enter the works, and by sheer boldness
he brought off half-a-dozen prisoners and coolly marched them before
him to the rear.
We never saw a military execution; but that which I remember as the
saddest scene of our army life was the degradation of an officer. He
had been condemned for cowardice before the enemy.
The division was drawn up in a great hollow square, and the officer in
full uniform was marched under guard into the centre where all could
see him. There in loud tones the finding of the court-martial and its
sentence were read, after which the adjutant approached the condemned
officer, tore off his shoulder-straps, took his sword from him, ran it
half way into the ground and broke it before his face. The guard then
closed about the disgraced and degraded man and marched him away.
I had never seen him before--he was from another brigade--but as he
passed near and I could look into the deathly pale face of that young
man with the heart-break of despair written on every feature, I said to
myself, "This is a hundred times worse than death"; and I found myself
wildly wishing that he had been shot dead in battle! When the parade
was dismissed we went back to our quarters in awe-struck silence,
broken only by expressions of deep compassion.
In strong contrast with this, the grandest and most impressive scene we
witnessed was the review of the army by President Lincoln.
It was on a dull wintry day. We marched several miles from our camp
before we came, early in the morning to the reviewing ground, which was
a vast, desolate, open space, mostly level but with little hillocks
here and there. Upon one of these we halted waiting for the mustering
of the gathering host. For hours the dark lines of men in blue poured
in from every direction until all the plain and every little hilltop
was alive with them.
For six or seven months we had been members of the great army; we had
shared its toils and perils, we had lived its life, we had felt the
throbbing of its mighty pulse in our own blood, we had been part of its
long line of battle; yet we had never as yet seen the assembly of our
brethren in arms. Now the plain was growing black with them; a hundred
thousand men were forming in apparently solid masses, the battle-flags
of the regiments waving close together.
The scene was the more impressive because there were no idle
spectators. This was no gala day for curious, gazing, merry-making
crowds, and brilliant costumes, and feasting and huzzas; but solemnly,
silently save for the measured tramp of battalions and the rolling of
the drums a nation's strength was massing as if to weigh itself, to
feel itself and ask its own soul if it were fit for the mighty work and
the awful sacrifices awaiting it.
We could not know then that Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the
Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, written across the
scroll of a short two years to come were holding in their fateful
though glorious names the doom of death or wounds for more in number
than all the thousands of us who beheld each other that day. But we
felt that a heavy-laden future was swiftly coming toward us; we could
almost hear the rustling of her wings in the air of the leaden sky
under which, apart from the world, alone with ourselves and God, we
stood a great brotherhood of consecrated service.
But now our moment has come. We take our place in the moving ranks. We
marched in close column with double company front, so that each
regiment took up small space. As we neared the reviewing stand the tall
figure of Lincoln loomed up. He was on horseback and his severely
plain, black citizen's dress set him in bold relief against the crowd
of generals in full uniform grouped behind him. Distinguished men were
among them; but we had no eyes save for our revered President, the
Commander-in-Chief of the Army, the brother of every soldier, the great
leader of a nation in its hour of trial. There was no time save for a
marching salute; the occasion called for no cheers. Self-examination,
not glorification had brought the army and its chief together; but we
passed close to him so that he could look into our faces and we into
his.
None of us to our dying day can forget that countenance! From its
presence we marched directly onward toward our camp and as soon as
"route step" was ordered and the men were free to talk they spoke thus
to each other: "Did you ever see such a look on any man's face?" "He is
bearing the burdens of the nation." "It is an awful load; it is killing
him." "Yes, that is so; he is not long for this world!"
Concentrated in that one great, strong yet tender face, the agony of
the life or death struggle of the hour was revealed as we had never
seen it before. With new understanding we knew why we were soldiers.
A Little Battle
The great battles of a war like ours absorb the attention of
historians; yet scattered between these grand climacterics, like local
squalls or thunder-showers in the intervals of sweeping storms, there
were hundreds of little, unrecorded fights which, to those who felt
their fury often meant almost as much as the main tempests.
We found it so in the very last affair in which our regiment took part.
Our term of service was all but ended. The men who had been detailed as
clerks at headquarters, teamsters, ambulance drivers etc., had been
sent back to their companies in anticipation of our speedy mustering
out; everything seemed quiet along the Rappahannock; we reckoned our
battles all fought and dared at last to believe that home-going for
those who were left of us was actually a possibility. "Home again!"--it
was all we talked of by day, it coloured our dreams by night as we
slept in our pleasant camp under the summer moon.
When therefore, early on a June morning the command came to strike
tents and prepare to move, a thrill of expectation went with it through
the regiment. But our vision of home quickly melted as we saw the stir
of preparation spreading like an advancing wave into all the regiments
about us, and its last pathetic remnants were rudely blotted out by the
distribution of the ominous twenty extra rounds of cartridge. We
handled them gingerly, none too willingly, for they said to us, "Not
home this time, boys,--battle once more first; some of you will never
see home."
Late in the afternoon a short march brought our division to the hills
above the fateful river; for the third time we beheld sleepy old
Fredericksburg away at our right, and directly before us the familiar
amphitheatre of fields shut in by distant hills. It seemed incredible
that twice within six months trampling armies had here been locked in
the bloody embrace of mighty battle; no more peaceful sight could be
imagined than those gently rolling, grassy plains with their crown of
wooded, leafy upland all bathed in the slanting rays of sweet June
afternoon sunshine.
A single suspicious blot marred the landscape. Opposite where we stood,
at the farther side of the river guarding our old crossing place, the
yellow mound of a freshly dug earthwork loomed up; yet for all we could
see it might have been a great grave, so silent, so apparently lifeless
was it.
But there was no lingering for the view. Down the hill we went, out
over the level ground beneath, and from every side we could see the
dark lines pouring over the slopes until, with swift and silent
precision the division was formed in battle array. In a few moments as
if by magic the northern side of the river valley had become alive with
the presence of a sternly-marshalled host.