HOW THE SOLDIERS WERE SHELTERED.
The heath this night must be my bed,
The bracken curtain for my head,
My lullaby the warder’s tread,
Far, far from love and thee, Mary.
To-morrow eve, more stilly laid,
My couch may be my bloody plaid,
My vesper song, thy wail, sweet maid.
It will not waken me, Mary.
LADY OF THE LAKE.
[Illustration]
After enlistment, what? This deed done, the responsibility of the citizen
for himself ceased in a measure, and Uncle Sam took him in charge. A word
here to make clear to the uninformed the distinction between the militia
and the volunteers. The militia are the soldiers of the State, and their
duties lie wholly within its limits, unless called out by the President
of the United States in an emergency. Such an emergency occurred when
President Lincoln made his call for 75,000 militia, already alluded to.
The volunteers, on the other hand, enlist directly into the service of
the United States, and it becomes the duty of the national government to
provide for them from the very date of their enlistment.
Before leaving the State these volunteers were _mustered into service_.
This often occurred soon after their enlistment, before they had been
provided with the garb of Union soldiers.
The oath of muster, which they took with uplifted hand ran as follows:—
“I, A⸺ B⸺, do solemnly swear that I will bear true allegiance to the
United States of America, and that I will serve them honestly and
faithfully against all their enemies and opposers whatsoever, and observe
and obey the orders of the President of the United States, and the orders
of the officers appointed over me according to the rules and articles for
the government of the armies of the United States.”
[Illustration: MUSTERING IN RECRUITS.]
The provision made for the shelter of these troops before they took
the field was varied. Some of them were quartered at Forts Warren
and Independence while making ready to depart. But the most of the
Massachusetts volunteers were quartered at camps established in different
parts of the State. Among the earliest of these were Camp Andrew, in
West Roxbury, and Camp Cameron, in North Cambridge. Afterwards camps
were laid out at Lynnfield, Pittsfield, Boxford, Readville, Worcester,
Lowell, Long Island, and a few other places. The “Three-months militia”
required no provision for their shelter, as they were ordered away soon
after reporting for duty. Faneuil Hall furnished quarters for a part of
them one night. The First Massachusetts Regiment of Infantry quartered
for a week in Faneuil Hall; but, this not being a suitable place for so
large a body of men to remain, “on the first day of June the regiment
marched out to Cambridge, and took possession of an old ice-house on the
borders of Fresh Pond, which had been procured by the State authorities
and partially fitted up for barracks, and established their first camp.”
But this was not the first camp established in the State, for three years
troops had already been ordered into camp on Long Island and at Fort
Warren.
[Illustration: READVILLE (MASS.) BARRACKS.
_From a Photograph._]
Owing to the unhealthiness of the location selected for the First
Regiment, their stay in it was brief, and a removal was soon had to North
Cambridge, where, on a well-chosen site, some new barracks had been
built, and, in honor of President Lincoln’s Secretary of War, had been
named “Camp Cameron.”
Barracks then, it will be observed, served to shelter some of the troops.
To such as are not familiar with these structures, I will simply say
that they were generally a long one-storied building not unlike a
bowling-alley in proportions, having the entrance at one end, a broad
aisle running through the centre, and a double row of bunks, one above
the other, on either side. They were calculated to hold one company of a
hundred men. Some of these buildings are still to be seen at Readville,
Mass., near the old campgrounds. But while barracks were desirable
quarters in the cooler weather of this latitude, and sheltered many
regiments during their stay in the State, a still larger number found
shelter in tents prior to their departure for the field. These tents were
of various patterns, but the principal varieties used were the _Sibley_,
the _A_ or _Wedge Tent_, and the _Hospital_ or _Wall Tent_.
[Illustration: SIBLEY TENTS.]
The Sibley tent was invented by Henry Sibley, in 1857. He was a graduate
of the United States military academy at West Point, and accompanied
Capt. John C. Fremont on one of his exploring expeditions. He evidently
got his idea from the _Tepee_ or _Tepar_,—the Indian wigwam, of poles
covered with skins, and having a fire in the centre,—which he saw on
the plains. When the Rebellion broke out, Sibley cast in his fortune
with the South. He afterwards attained the rank of brigadier-general,
but performed no services so likely to hand down his name as the
invention of this tent. It has recently been stated that Sibley was not
the actual inventor, the credit being assigned to some private soldier
in his command. On account of its resemblance to a huge bell, it has
sometimes been called a _Bell Tent_. It is eighteen feet in diameter
and twelve feet high, and is supported by a single pole, which rests on
an iron tripod. This pole is the exact radius of the circle covered by
the tent. By means of the tripod the tent can be tightened or slackened
at pleasure. At the top is a circular opening, perhaps a foot in
diameter, which serves the double purpose of ventilation and of passing
a stove-pipe through in cool weather. This stove-pipe connected with a
cone-shaped stove suited to this shape of tent, which stood beneath the
tripod. A small piece of canvas, called a _cap_, to which were attached
two long guys, covered the opening at the top in stormy weather. It
was not an unusual sight in the service to see the top of one of these
tents in a blaze caused by some one having drawn the cap too near an
over-heated stove-pipe. A chain depended from the fork of the tripod,
with a hook, on which a kettle could be hung; when the stove was wanting
the fire was built on the ground.
These tents are comfortably capacious for a dozen men. In cold or
rainy weather, when every opening is closed, they are most unwholesome
tenements, and to enter one of them of a rainy morning from the outer
air, and encounter the night’s accumulation of nauseating exhalations
from the bodies of twelve men (differing widely in their habits of
personal cleanliness) was an experience which no old soldier has ever
been known to recall with any great enthusiasm. Of course the air was of
the vilest sort, and it is surprising to see how men endured it as they
did. In the daytime these tents were ventilated by lifting them up at the
bottom. Sibley tents went out of field service in 1862, partly because
they were too expensive, but principally on account of being so cumbrous.
They increased the amount of impedimenta too largely, for they required
many wagons for their transportation, and so were afterwards used only in
camps of instruction. I believe they are still used to some extent by the
militia of the various States. I remember having seen these tents raised
on a stockade four feet high by some regiments during the war, and thus
arranged they made very spacious and comfortable winter quarters. When
thus raised they accommodated twenty men. The camp for convalescents near
Alexandria, Va., comprised this variety of tent stockaded.
[Illustration: A, OR WEDGE TENTS.]
The A or Wedge tents are yet quite common. The origin of this tent is
not known, so far as I can learn. It seems to be about as old as history
itself. A German historian, who wrote in 1751, represents the Amalekites
as using them. Nothing simpler for a shelter could suggest itself to
campers than some sort of awning stretched over a horizontal pole or bar.
The setting-up of branches on an incline against a low horizontal branch
of a tree to form a rude shelter may have been its earliest suggestion.
But, whatever its origin, it is _now_ a canvas tent stretched over a
horizontal bar, perhaps six feet long, which is supported on two upright
posts of about the same length. It covers, when pitched, an area nearly
seven feet square. The name of these tents is undoubtedly derived from
the fact of the ends having the proportions of the Roman letter A, and
because of their resemblance to a wedge.
[Illustration: SPOONING TOGETHER.]
Four men was the number usually assigned to one of them; but they were
often occupied by five, and sometimes six. When so occupied at night, it
was rather necessary to comfort that all should turn over at the same
time, for six or even five men were a tight fit in the space enclosed,
unless “spooned” together. These tents when stockaded were quite spacious
and comfortable. A word or two just here with regard to stockading. A
stockade proper is an enclosure made with posts set close together. In
stockading a tent the posts were split in halves, and the cleft sides all
turned inward so as to make a clean and comely inside to the hut. But
by far the most common way of logging up a tent was to build the walls
“cob-fashion,” notching them together at the corners. This method took
much less time and material than the other. But whenever I use the word
stockade or stockading in any descriptions I include either method. I
shall speak further of stockading by and by.
The A tents were in quite general use by the State and also by the
general government the first two years of the war, but, like the Sibley,
they required too much wagon transportation to take along for use in the
field, and so they also were turned over to camps of instruction and
to troops permanently located in or near important military centres or
stations.
[Illustration: THE HOSPITAL OR WALL TENT.]
The Hospital or Wall tent is distinguished from those already described
by having four upright sides or walls. To this fact it probably owes
the latter name, and it doubtless gets the former from being used for
hospital purposes in the field. These tents, also, are not of modern
origin. They were certainly used by Napoleon, and probably long before
his day. On account of their walls they are much more comfortable and
convenient to occupy than the two preceding, as one can stand erect or
move about in them with tolerable freedom. They are made of different
sizes. Those used as field hospitals were quite large, accommodating
from six to twenty patients, according to circumstances. It was a common
occurrence to see two or more of these joined, being connected by ripping
the central seam in the two ends that came in contact. By looping back
the flaps thus liberated, the tents were thrown together, and quite
a commodious hospital was in that way opened with a central corridor
running its entire length between a double row of cots. The smaller size
of wall tent was in general use as the tent of commissioned officers, and
so far as I now recall, was used by no one else.
While the Army of the Potomac was at Harrison’s Landing, under McClellan,
he issued a General Order (Aug. 10, 1862) prescribing among other
things wall tents for general field and staff officers, and a single
shelter tent for each line officer; and the same order was reissued by
his successors. But in some way many of these line officers managed to
smuggle a wall tent into the wagon train, so that when a settled camp was
entered upon they were provided with those luxurious shelters instead of
the shelter tent.
[Illustration: OFFICER’S WALL TENT WITH FLY.]
Over the top an extra piece of canvas, called a _fly_, was stretched as
additional protection against sun and rain. These tents are generally
familiar. Massachusetts now provides her militia with them, I believe,
without distinction of rank.
The tents thus far described I have referred to as used largely by the
troops before they left the State. But there was another tent, the most
interesting of all, which was used exclusively in the field, and that was
_Tente d’Abri_—the _Dog_ or _Shelter Tent_.
[Illustration: THE DOG OR SHELTER TENT.]
Just why it is called the shelter tent I cannot say, unless on the
principle stated by the Rev. George Ellis for calling the pond on Boston
Common a Frog Pond, _viz._: because there are no frogs there. So there
is little shelter in this variety of tent. But about that later. I can
imagine no other reason for calling it a dog tent than this, that when
one is pitched it would only comfortably accommodate a dog, and a small
one at that. This tent was invented late in 1861 or early in 1862. I am
told it was made of light duck at first, then of rubber, and afterwards
of duck again, but _I_ never saw one made of anything heavier than
cotton drilling. This was _the_ tent of the rank and file. It did not
come into general use till after the Peninsular Campaign. Each man was
provided with a _half-shelter_, as a single piece was called, which he
was expected to carry on the march if he wanted a tent to sleep under.
I will describe these more fully. One I recently measured is five feet
two inches long by four feet eight inches wide, and is provided with a
single row of buttons and button-holes on three sides, and a pair of
holes for stake loops at each corner. A single half-shelter, it can be
seen, would make a very contracted and uncomfortable abode for a man; but
every soldier was expected to join his resources for shelter with some
other fellow. It was only rarely that a soldier was met with who was so
crooked a stick that no one would chum with him, or that he cared for no
chum, although I have seen a few such cases in my experience. But the
rule in the army was similar to that in civil life. Every man had his
chum or friend, with whom he associated when off duty, and these tented
together. By mutual agreement one was the “old woman,” the other the “old
man” of the concern. A Marblehead man called his chum his “chicken,” more
especially if the latter was a _young_ soldier.
By means of the buttons and button-holes two or more of these
half-shelters could be buttoned together, making a very complete roofing.
There are hundreds of men that came from different sections of the same
State, or from different States, who joined their resources in this
manner, and to-day through this accidental association they are the
warmest of personal friends, and will continue so while they live. It
was not usual to pitch these tents every night when the army was on
the march. The soldiers did not waste their time and strength much in
that way. If the night was clear and pleasant, they lay down without
roof-shelter of any kind; but if it was stormy or a storm was threatening
when the order came to go into camp for the night, the shelters were then
quite generally pitched.
[Illustration: SHELTERS AS SOMETIMES PITCHED IN SUMMER.]
This operation was performed by the infantry in the following simple
way: two muskets with bayonets fixed were stuck erect into the ground
the width of a half shelter apart. A guy rope which went with every
half-shelter was stretched between the trigger-guards of the muskets, and
over this as a ridge-pole the tent was pitched in a twinkling. Artillery
men pitched theirs over a horizontal bar supported by two uprights. This
framework was split out of fence-rails, if fence-rails were to be had
conveniently; otherwise, saplings were cut for the purpose. It often
happened that men would throw away their shelters during the day, and
take their chances with the weather, or of finding cover in some barn,
or under the brow of some overhanging rock, rather than be burdened with
them. In summer, when the army was not in proximity to the enemy, or was
lying off recuperating, as the Army of the Potomac did a few weeks after
the Gettysburg campaign, they would pitch their shelters high enough to
get a free circulation of air beneath, and to enable them to build bunks
or cots a foot or two above the ground. If the camp was not in the woods,
it was common to build a bower of branches over the tents, to ward off
the sun.
[Illustration: SHADED SHELTERS.]
When cold weather came on, the soldiers built the stockades to which I
have already referred. The walls of these structures were raised from
two to five feet, according to the taste or working inclination of the
intended occupants. Oftentimes an excavation was made one or two feet
deep. When such was the case, the walls were not built so high. Such a
hut was warmer than one built entirely above ground. The size depended
upon the number of the proposed mess. If the hut was to be occupied
by two, it was built nearly square, and covered by two half-shelters.
Such a stockade would and often _did_ accommodate three men, the third
using his half-shelter to stop up one gable. When four men occupied a
stockade, it was built accordingly, and covered by four half-shelters.
In each case these were stretched over a framework of light rafters
raised on the walls of the stockade. Sometimes the gables were built up
to the ridge-poles with smaller logs, but just as often they were filled
by an extra half-shelter, a rubber blanket, or an old _poncho_. An army
poncho, I may here say, is specified as made of unbleached muslin coated
with vulcanized India-rubber, sixty inches wide and seventy-one inches
long, having an opening in the centre lengthwise of the poncho, through
which the head passes, with a lap three inches wide and sixteen inches
long. This garment is derived from the _woollen_ poncho worn by the
Spanish-Americans, but is of different proportions, these being four feet
by seven. The army poncho was used in lieu of the gum blanket.
[Illustration: A PONCHO ON.]
The chinks between the logs were filled with mud, worked to a viscous
consistency, which adhered more or less tenaciously according to the
amount of clay in the mixture. It usually needed renewing after a severe
storm. The chimney was built outside, after the southern fashion. It
stood sometimes at the end and sometimes in the middle of one side of
the stockade. It started from a fire-place which was fashioned with
more or less skill, according to the taste or mechanical genius of the
workman, or the tools and materials used, or both. In my own company
there were two masons who had opportunities, whenever a winter camp was
pitched, to practise their trade far more than they were inclined to do.
The fire-places were built of brick, of stone, or of wood. If there was
a deserted house in the neighborhood of the camp which boasted brick
chimneys, they were sure to be brought low to serve the Union cause in
the manner indicated, unless the house was used by some general officer
as headquarters. When built of wood, the chimneys were lined with a very
thick coating of mud. They were generally continued above the fireplace
with split wood built cob-fashion, which was filled between and lined
with the red clayey soil of Virginia, but stones were used when abundant.
Very frequently pork and beef barrels were secured to serve this purpose,
being put one above another, and now and then a lively hurrah would
run through the camp when one of these was discovered on fire. It is
hardly necessary to remark that not all these chimneys were monuments
of success. Too often the draught was down instead of up, and the
inside of some stockades resembled smoke-houses. Still, it was “all in
the three years,” as the boys used to say. It was all the same to the
average soldier, who rarely saw fit to tear down and build anew more
scientifically. The smoke of his camp-fires in warm weather was an
excellent preparative for the smoking fireplace of winter-quarters.
Many of these huts were deemed incomplete until a sign appeared over
the door. Here and there some one would make an attempt at having a
door-plate of wood suitably inscribed; but the more common sight was a
sign over the entrance bearing such inscriptions, rudely cut or marked
with charcoal, as: “Parker House,” “Hole in the Wall,” “Mose Pearson’s,”
“Astor House,” “Willard’s Hotel,” “Five Points,” and other titles equally
absurd, expressing in this ridiculous way the vagaries of the inmates.
[Illustration: A CHIMNEY ON FIRE.]
The last kind of shelter I shall mention as used in the field, but not
the least in importance, was the _Bomb-proofs_ used by both Union and
Rebel armies in the war. Probably there were more of these erected in the
vicinity of Petersburg and Richmond than in all the rest of the South
combined, if I except Vicksburg, as here the opposing armies established
themselves—the one in defence, the other in siege of the two cities.
These bomb-proofs were built just inside the fortifications. Their walls
were made of logs heavily banked with earth and having a door or wider
opening on the side away from the enemy. The roof was also made of heavy
logs covered with several feet of earth.
[Illustration: A COMMON BOMB-PROOF.]
The interior of these structures varied in size with the number that
occupied them. Some were built on the surface of the ground, to keep
them drier and more comfortable; others were dug down after the manner
of a cellar kitchen; but all of them were at best damp and unwholesome
habitations—even where fireplaces were introduced, which they were
in cool weather. For these reasons they were occupied only when the
enemy was engaged in sending over his iron compliments in the shape of
mortar-shells. For all other hostile missiles the breastworks were ample
protection, and under their walls the men stretched their half-shelters
and passed most of their time in the summer and fall of 1864, when their
lot was cast in that part of the lines nearest the enemy in front of
Petersburg.
A mortar is a short, stout cannon designed to throw shells _into_
fortifications. This is accomplished by elevating the muzzle a great
deal. But the higher the elevation the greater the strain upon the gun.
For this reason it is that they are made so short and thick. They can be
elevated so as to drop a shell just inside a fort, whereas a cannon-ball
would either strike it on the outside, or pass over it far to the rear.
[Illustration: A 13-INCH MORTAR.]
Mortars were used very little as compared with cannon. In the siege of
Petersburg, I think, they were used more at night than in the daytime.
This was due to the exceeding watchfulness of the pickets of both armies.
At some periods in the siege each side was in nightly expectation of
an attack from the other, and so the least provocation—an accidental
shot, or a strange and unusual sound after dark—would draw the fire of
the pickets, which would extend from the point of disturbance all along
the line in both directions. Then the main lines, both infantry and
artillery, thinking it might possibly be a night attack, would join
in the fire, while the familiar Rebel yell, responded to by the Union
cheer, would swell louder as the din and roar increased. But soon the
yelling, the cheering, the artillery, the musketry would subside, and
the mortar batteries with which each fort was supplied would continue
the contest, and the sky would become brilliant with the fiery arches of
these lofty-soaring and more dignified projectiles. As the mortar-shells
described their majestic curves across the heavens every other sound was
hushed, and the two armies seemed to stand in mute and mutual admiration
of these magnificent messengers of destruction and woe.
[Illustration: A BOMB-PROOF IN FORT HELL BEFORE PETERSBURG.]
Sometimes a single shell could be seen climbing the sky from a Rebel
mortar, but ere it had reached its destination as many as half a dozen
from Union mortars would appear as if chasing each other through the air,
anxious to be foremost in resenting such temerity on the part of the
enemy. In this arm of the service, as in the artillery, the Union army
was greatly superior to the enemy.
These evening fusillades rarely did any damage. So harmless were they
considered that President Lincoln and other officials frequently came
down to the trenches to be a witness of them. But, harmless as they
usually were to our side, they yet often enlisted our warm personal
interest. The guns of my own company were several times a mark for their
particular attentions by daylight. At such times we would watch the
shells closely as they mounted the sky. If they veered to the right or
left from a vertical in their ascent, we cared nothing for them as we
then knew they would go one side of us. If they rose perpendicularly,
and at the same time increased in size, our interest intensified. If
they soon began to descend we lost interest, for that told us they would
fall short; but if they continued climbing until much nearer the zenith,
and we could hear the creaking whistle of the fuse as the shell slowly
revolved through the air, _business of a very pressing nature suddenly
called us into the bomb-proofs_; and it was not transacted until an
explosion was heard, or a heavy jar told us that the bomb had expended
its violence in the ground.
These mortar-bombs could be seen very distinctly at times, but only when
they were fired directly toward or from us. They can be seen immediately
after they leave the gun if they come against the sky. Coming towards one
they appear first as a black speck, increasing in size as stated. Besides
mortar-shells I have seen the shot and shell from twelve-pounders in
transit, but never from rifled pieces, as their flight is much more rapid.
[Illustration]