REMINISCENCES AND HORSES
Visit to Mr. Francis Sorrel's country-seat--Interment of Captain
Tillinghast, U. S. A.--Sir William Howard Russell, _Times_
correspondent--McDowell and July 21st--Seward and the French
princes--Army begins to march to Peninsula.
Not long after the battle I set out on a visit to my father's country
place, Ireland, fifteen miles from our camp. Hitching up two good
mules to a light army ambulance, what we needed was put in, our
intention being to bring back some delicacies for the messes. Captain
Thompson, of Mississippi, one of the aids, accompanied me. He was an
extraordinary looking person. Nature had been unkind. The son of Jacob
Thompson, Buchanan's Secretary of the Interior, he had much to hope
for, but for his affliction. His teeth and jaws were firmly set and
locked, and no surgical ingenuity had yet succeeded in opening them.
Liquids could be conveniently taken, but mechanical arrangements had to
be made for solid food by the removal of some teeth.
This young officer showing a great desire to go along with me, was
taken, although I could not help picturing some surprise on the part of
my father and young sisters. We were made very welcome, as fresh from
the glorious battlefield, and the day was a happy one. The girls had
made a captain's coat for me out of homespun cloth; but such a fit! big
enough for two captains of my thickness, it hung at all angles and
flapped furiously in high winds. But love had prompted its making and I
would never suffer any ugly remarks about it.
Something better soon came. My brother, Doctor Sorrel, in Richmond, was
always mindful of his juniors in the field, and getting possession of
a blockade bolt of fine gray cloth, he soon had enough snipped off to
make me two good Confederate suits, suitably laced and in regulation
trim, besides a long gray cape, or cloak, well lined, which was to do
me good service for years.
At "Ireland" they loaded our ambulance with good things and there were
shouts of joy when we reached the camp with the delicacies.
Captain Thompson was not subject to military duty and soon returned to
his home.
It should be said here that these jottings are without the aid of a
scrap of notes or other memoranda. The memory alone is called on, and
as the events go back forty years it is something of a test; but I
hope I am rather strong on that point and do not fear falling into
inventions or imaginations. There were some dry notes of dates and
marches, but they cannot be found, and they would be of no use with
these jottings, as no attempt at dates is made. It is a lasting regret
to me that as a staff officer with opportunities of seeing and knowing
much, I did not keep up a careful diary or journal throughout the war.
It should be made one of the duties of the staff.
This is odd. The day after the battle I came across the body of Captain
Tillinghast at the Federal field infirmary near the stone bridge. The
year previous I had been much in Baltimore at the Maryland Club and had
there played billiards with Tillinghast, then a captain of Artillery,
U. S. A., and an agreeable acquaintance; consequently there could be
no mistake when I recognized his dead body. The Federal surgeon also
identifying him, I set about giving him decent burial, and managed it
finally by the help of some men of Bartow's Savannah company who knew
me. The ground was baked hard and we could not make the grave deep,
but it was enough; and with my own hands I carved his name on the bark
of a tree, under which the soldier found his last bivouac--"Otis H.
Tillinghast."
Some time after, a blockade-runner, passing the lines took a letter
from me to my cousin, Robert Fisher, in Baltimore, a friend also
of Tillinghast. It was on other matters, but I let him know that
Tillinghast's body had been recognized on the field, had received
decent burial, and the spot marked. I described the location and then
the matter passed out of my mind.
After peace came I was with Fisher in Baltimore and learned from him
that my letter had been received and the information as to Captain
Tillinghast considerately conveyed to his family. Fisher was answered
soon after with thanks, "but there was some mistake," Captain
Tillinghast was buried by his old classmate Samuel Jones, a Confederate
brigadier-general, in a different part of the field and his body later
removed to the family vault. Astonishing! If they got a body from a
spot not where I had laid him they got the wrong husband. Sam Jones
quite likely saw Tillinghast, but he had no hand in our burial of him.
Stranger things, however, have happened.
* * * * *
Here are some trifles of talk remembered as coming from the famous
war correspondent, Sir William Howard Russell, whose letters from the
Crimea broke the Aberdeen Ministry and made him one of the leading
men of the Kingdom. He was not long ago knighted at great age for his
service all over the world in that field of letters. I met him several
years ago in New York, in the train of the notorious Colonel North, the
Chilean nitrate king. Russell had always some good stories on hand, and
laughed at his chase from Bull Run battlefield, whither he had gone
with the Federal army to write up their victory pictures. It gave him
the name of "Bull Run Russell," which stuck to him. He admitted being
very far to the rear, but said there were some generals and colonels
who outstripped him to Washington! Some years after the war he met
in Europe General McDowell, who said, "Russell, do you know what day
this is?" "No, I don't recall any special occurrence." "It is," said
McDowell, "the 21st of July, and had I succeeded on that day in '61 I
should have been the greatest man in America and you the most popular."
Russell also had something about the French princes come to join
McClellan's army. The two young men, Comte de Paris and Duc de
Chartres, were under the care and tutelage of their uncle, the Prince
de Joinville, who did not follow them to the army. On landing they
received their commissions as captains, and quickly equipped themselves
with handsome regulation uniforms and military appointments.
They proceeded to Washington to make formal calls of ceremony before
reporting to McClellan. Among their first visits was that to Seward,
the Secretary of State. On that evening he was holding a large
reception. Seward himself leaving the ceremony to his son Frederick,
was upstairs with some cronies drinking whiskey. "Seward was screwed,
you know," said Russell, "undoubtedly screwed." When the two princes
entered the hall, trim in their new uniforms, erect and soldierly, they
were met by Frederick Seward, who at once went to announce them. "Tell
them to come right up," said the old politician; "bring them right up
and they shall have some good whiskey." "That will never do," said
his son. "You must come down to them; it is etiquette and strictly in
rule." And down the Secretary went. "Screwed" a little, for as soon as
he spied the Frenchmen, out he broke: "Captain Chatters, glad to see
you; welcome to Washington. And you too, Captain Paris. I am pleased to
have you in my house. Both of you come up with me. You won't dislike
the whiskey you shall taste." But the watchful Frederick came to the
rescue and carried off the astonished princes with all propriety.
Russell declared this to be literally true; but if not, it at least as
the Italians say, "ben trovato." Sir William was then a picturesque
figure in dark blue dress coat, brass buttons, and ruffled shirt.
Always interesting, he had exhaustless stores of information and
adventure. A pretty young Italian wife accompanied him.
Something as to horses. I had left a good one in Savannah, in care of
a member of the troop. Hearing that the horse was with him in Virginia
I sent over for my property and got for answer that he was not mine;
that he belonged to the man in Savannah, who not being able to enlist
had contributed this fine animal to the outfit of the troop. A nice
business indeed. It was easy to be patriotic with my horse, but it was
soon settled. Captain Waring heard the statement, and recognizing the
animal as mine had him sent to me; but the horse had been so neglected
and diseased that he was no good and I was obliged to leave him by
the roadside. I had, during the war, many horses, some good, some very
poor. Among the best was the tough-looking clay-bank I took from my
father when joining the army. He was capable of anything in speed and
endurance, but with a walk so slow and a trot so bone-breaking that I
had to swap him for one not so good. Many of my animals broke down from
hard staff service in campaign, and a magnificent mare was killed under
me in Pickett's charge at Gettysburg. A shell burst directly under
her and the poor beast was instantly done for. I was not touched. In
Tennessee, in 1864, I picked up a delightful little white mare, sound,
fleet and enduring. I could not always get to my other horses at the
outbreak of firing, and the mare's color was against us both. It was
always among the soldiers, "Fire at the fellow on the white horse." She
was at my brigade quarters at Appomattox and my brother rode her to
Savannah. When the two appeared in front of our residence, my sisters
rushed out, but could not believe that the poor, tired little mare was
their brother's war horse. Their imagination had been at work.
My brother Claxton, my junior, was a fine, well set up young fellow
and eager for the fray. He was also a private in the Hussars, and like
myself had not waited for the company, but came on to Richmond. Here
he fell in with some young Georgians from Athens, the Troop Artillery,
a six-gun battery under command of Captain Carlton. Claxton joined and
became a good artillerist and was a corporal when transferred. The
First Georgia Regulars was organized by the State among the first,
its officers being appointed by the Governor and the men enlisted
anywhere. Its drill and discipline were supposed to be severer than
that of other troops. This regiment was brought to Virginia and
assigned to G. T. Anderson's (Tige Anderson) Georgia Brigade. With some
influence and much hard work, my brother, Doctor Sorrel, succeeded
in getting a commission as second lieutenant in this regiment for
Claxton. Its officers were not elected; they were appointed by the
Executive. Claxton's service was thenceforward with this regiment, its
officers showing some of the best names in Georgia, and its reputation
correspondingly high. Later I gave Captain Sorrel a temporary detail
on the staff of Brigadier-General Garnett, and still later he was
appointed captain in the Assistant Adjutant-General's Department and
served with General John Bratton.
When we moved from Centerville my father had long since returned to
Savannah with his family, and his "Ireland" place was unoccupied (it
was later burned by the Union soldiers). But my cousin, Mrs. Lucy
Green, and children, were at their place, "The Lawn," which would be
in the enemy's territory after our withdrawal. Our first halt was near
Gainesville and after getting the troops comfortably into camp I rode
over to see her, about three miles. The situation was clearly described
and he decided to pack her carriages and wagons and move to Richmond.
I gave her a safe escort in a man from Lynchburg, Mr. Paxton, a member
of Blackford's cavalry company. With farewells I rode back through the
night, the better by a pair of English boots my cousin gave me. She
and the children, with servants, under good Paxton's charge, made next
morning a start for Richmond, where they arrived safely.
Referring again to horses, the hussar horse had been my mount at the
short service on Skidaway. Henry Taylor was my messmate and rode next
me on a good bay precisely the same color as mine, with considerable
resemblance between them. Taylor was rich, lazy, despised discipline,
and was a trial to the captain. He gave his horse no attention and the
beast would have starved but for others. The captain could stand it no
longer. Sending for Taylor he read him a severe lecture and promised
punishment if the horse was not kept clean and tended.
Taylor was persuaded he must do something, and the next morning he was
up at stable-call at the picket ropes, brush and curry comb in hand.
It was very early and misty. My horse was picketed next to Taylor's
and I had the satisfaction of seeing my lazy friend give him the best
morning's rub he had received for many days. When Taylor woke up to
what he had done and that his own horse was still to be tended he could
not immediately see the joke, but soon took it in good part and had
something ready for me not long after, which he thought squared us.