AFTER FREDERICKSBURG--REMINISCENCES
Fredericksburg after the battle--Flag of truce--Burying dead--General
Wadsworth, U. S. A.--Again on enemy's side with flag of truce--At
their picket fire--Colonel Brown, of Rhode Island--Bitter cold--All
night in their camp--Luxuries for the wounded--First Georgia
Regulars--They are ordered home--Want of shoes--Captain Cuthbert, of
South Carolina.
The battle was indeed fought and finished, and although the triumph of
victory rested with us, and the enemy was back in his lines, beaten and
dispirited, yet it cannot be said that there had been achieved a result
so decisive as to bring us near the end of the war.
We were caring for our dead. The enemy was to do so for his. They lay
in great numbers on the plain. General Lee wrote Burnside and I carried
the letter under a flag of truce through the town to the ferry, where
was found a pontoon, and my men took me across. It was pitiful riding
through the town, considerably damaged as it was by the artillery fire
from Stafford Heights, but more still from the plundering and looting
that had gone on while in possession of the United States troops.
Furniture, bedding, mattresses, carpets, china, domestic utensils,
indeed all that went to make up those comfortable homes, were strewn
helter skelter, broken and ruined about the streets. The streets were
filled with distressed women and children, both black and white. But
we passed on--"C'est à la guerre comme à la guerre!" My pontoon
landed me at the foot of a steep road that ascended the hill and I was
immediately met by a number of officers in brilliant uniforms. For
myself I must have been awfully shabby; never at any time given to
military finery, while campaigning, I think I was worse off than usual
here at Fredericksburg. The weather had been atrocious, and mud and I
were closely acquainted day and night. There was, too, so much to do
that one had no time for repairing damages.
But my reception by the Federal officers was extremely courteous
while awaiting an answer to General Lee's missive, now on its way to
Burnside, whose headquarters were near by.
There were Major-General Park, chief of staff to the army;
Major-General Wadsworth (whom I was to see in eighteen months at the
"Wilderness" under different circumstances); Brig.-Gen. Jim Hardie, and
many others, all having some inquiries to make for friends on our side.
General Wadsworth asked me how many dead I thought lay on our front. "I
ask, Major," he said, "so as to make my burying parties strong enough."
I said: "I cannot possibly guess with any approach to accuracy. I have
only ridden through the slain in front of Marye's Hill, and it seemed
that there must be at least 800 there awaiting burial." "My God, my
God!" groaned the old officer, deeply impressed by such mortality.
Instead of 800, they buried nearly 1,200 men in that small front,
besides some 300 in front of Jackson's position. General Burnside's
answer soon came, and saluting my Federal acquaintances I was quickly
on our own side of the river and the Federal commander's letter in
Lee's possession.
Strong burial parties immediately came across for their ghastly duty.
General Wadsworth was a wealthy, middle-aged man from the lovely
Genesee Valley, New York, owning great tracts of land; but considered
it his patriotic duty to raise some battalions for the army and did so,
placing himself at their head. The Government showed him all honor,
conferring at once high rank.
A day or two later it became necessary to see the Northerners again.
Their burying parties were making hideous work with the dead soldiers;
throwing them in heaps in shallow trenches, barely covered; filling the
country ice houses and wells with them; indeed, doing this work most
brutally for themselves, and intolerably for our citizens. General Lee
called Burnside's attention to the revolting conduct of the latter's
men and I went across the river, with also some verbal details.
The pontoon had been drawn in by the owners and was in the Union rear
with the bridge train. There was naught to cross in except a broken,
leaky little batteau that was found in a cellar. The river was smooth
and one of my men managed to paddle the crazy thing safely across.
There I was met by Colonel Brown, commanding a Rhode Island regiment
on picket duty, who civilly invited me to the comfort of his camp fire
while awaiting the communication from his army headquarters, now quite
a distance off. I was detained some time, and the Colonel (a lawyer
of high reputation from Providence, Rhode Island), had time for much
general talk. At last, making my thanks and farewell, I started back,
only to find my man at the river's edge almost frozen and the batteau
sunk out of sight with darkness on us! A pretty kettle of fish, indeed!
The water rough, wind strong, and already freezing. There was nothing
for it but to take my man back with me to the picket and get a message
to headquarters of my plight, with request of assistance to cross.
After another considerable wait there came an officer and several
mounted orderlies leading a good horse; this was for me. The officer
brought a civil message from the adjutant-general regretting that they
had nothing at hand to float (their pontoons being in the rear), and
hoping I could be made comfortable for the night. Leaving my soldier
to the good care of the friendly pickets, I mounted and was led to the
large house on the hill, at that time in use as a hospital. There my
escort left me and I found myself for the night in the great kitchen of
the establishment, filled with bright warmth and savory smells of good
food.
A blanket or two had to do me for bedding, but I was soon asleep, after
the soldier cooks had given me food, always with full respect to rank
and authority.
To see what they had, its quality, its abundance, filled one's heart
with envy when contrasted with the doled-out, bare necessities of life
the lot of our own uncomplaining fellows.
Here in this great kitchen were huge swinging vessels of odorous real
coffee; immense chunks of fat, fresh beef of all parts of the animal;
great slabs of dessicated vegetables, which, when thrown with knuckles
of meat and good flesh into the boiling cauldron, puffed out, swelling
each vegetable into something like freshness, and then with free dashes
of salt and pepper, behold, a soup of strength and tastiness fit for
Faint Heart to fight on. They gave me of it all and I tasted all,
sleeping well and early up. My man, who had fared well too, was soon
at hand, and the boat raised, bailed out, landed us safely on our own
bank. The soldier with me was Jesse Beall, private from Milledgeville
in a Georgia regiment. I was disposed at first to be vexed by such
rough lodgings (a parlementaire being entitled to the best), but
Colonel Kip explained that there was really nothing else to be done at
that hour of night. Of course they could not carry me through the lines
to their own comfortable staff quarters in the rear.
Many years after, hearing that there was in Savannah, passing through,
a Colonel Brown, of Rhode Island, with his wife, I called on him. It
proved to be my friend of the picket fire, and his wife, with much
enthusiasm, declared he had spoken of the incident fifty times. Colonel
Brown had some more talk this time, quite free, and like very many
Union officers marveled why they were not attacked after a repulse
so bloody and disastrous. He said that want of ammunition could only
explain it to him. Brown was a middle aged, delicate man, a member of
the well-known Brown family of Rhode Island.
He said he had raised his regiment from patriotic convictions and
carried it through the battle of Fredericksburg; then he gave way to
younger, stronger men and resigned. He was a broad, fair-minded man,
with no deep prejudices against the South. Next year he died, his
townsmen showing in every way the honor and respect in which he was
held.
The First Georgia Regulars were posted at Hamilton's Crossing, near
Fredericksburg, and had its ranks much thinned by the casualties of
several campaigns. It could not be recruited like other regiments,
being enlisted from all parts, and the Department therefore ordered it
home to fill its ranks.
I rode myself, orders in hand, to its camp. I had many friends among
the officers and knew how delighted they would be; and so it was, a
wild shout of happiness at seeing old Georgia again, and the skeleton
battalion began packing almost immediately for the route. After doing
some enlistment it took an honorable part in the battle of Olustee,
fought in Florida. Lieutenant Sorrel was with them until a captain's
commission in the Adjutant-General's Department sent him to report in
Virginia to Gen. John Bratton's South Carolina Brigade.
I was in Europe in the summer of 1860, and traveled on the continent
a few weeks with George Cuthbert, of Beaufort, South Carolina. He was
a pleasant fellow, and handsome, of good height and figure, and the
fairest blonde, with beautiful blue eyes. Even in fair-haired Saxony,
people turned to look at him.
The war broke out and I did not know where Cuthbert would be serving.
One day, however, in the winter of 1862-63, riding by the lines of
one of our South Carolina regiments, up rose Cuthbert, and I was
immediately on my feet beside him. He was a line captain, had been
wounded, and was at the moment as shabby a Confederate soldier as could
be found anywhere. Razors had been discarded, and the German girls
who liked to look at the handsome Southerner would not have deigned
him a glance. I resolved to do something for his advancement, but the
channels were such that I could not get him out of them. Soon after,
however, an order came from Richmond to detail 160 shoemakers for the
use of the Quartermaster-General--such was the stress we were in for
shoes. Half the detail was ordered from Jackson's corps and half from
Longstreet's. I sent out orders for our eighty crispins, and when they
were picked out of the whole corps, word was given to Captain Cuthbert
to report at corps headquarters and a brief colloquy opened.
"I say, Cuthbert, would you like to go to Richmond?" "Wouldn't
I!--clean clothes, soap, a bath and a shave!" "Eighty shoemakers
are to be taken there by rail and then turned over to the
Quartermaster-General, and an officer must take the detail. Will you
have it?" "My dear Sorrel, give it to me; for God's sake, give it to
me--such a change after my long trench service. I'd land them safely
with the Q. M. G. if they were eighty raving demons instead of the
happy fellows they doubtless are in getting such a detail." "All right,
old chap, take your fellows off by train to-morrow; here are the
orders. And I say, Cuthbert, while you are in Richmond don't hurry too
much; you can make the duty last you a week or ten days."
He was very grateful for being thought of, performed his work
satisfactorily, and then enjoyed himself hugely.
I was glad to think of this later, since he was one of many personal
friends who gave up his life in battle. The incident also illustrated
the great straits the Confederate supply department was in to keep the
troops equipped for the field. This was especially the case with shoes.