THE STORY
OF THE
Thirty-Second Regiment
MASSACHUSETTS INFANTRY.
WHENCE IT CAME; WHERE IT WENT; WHAT IT SAW;
AND WHAT IT DID.
By FRANCIS J. PARKER, Colonel.

BOSTON:
C. W. CALKINS & CO., PUBLISHERS.
1880.

C. W. CALKINS & CO., Printers,
286 Washington St., Boston.

TO THE OFFICERS AND SOLDIERS
OF THE
THIRTY-SECOND MASSACHUSETTS,
IN MEMORY OF THE DEAD
AND
IN HONOR OF THE LIVING.

ERRATUM.

On page 3, twelfth line, for “Brevet Brigadier-General,” read “Colonel.” Colonel Prescott was never breveted.

PREFACE.

THIS book is not a history of the civil war, nor even of the Army of the Potomac; but merely the story of one of the regiments which composed that Army. It does not relate the biography of the many distinguished generals under whose command the battalion served, and the endeavor has been made to exclude from it not only discussions as to the merits of individuals, but even favorable or unfavorable opinions, save when the facts related implied or seemed to require such reflections.

The book is intended chiefly to collect and present in narrative form, descriptions of some of the experiences of our Regiment, in order to preserve them in the memory of those who were actors in the scenes described, and enable the officers and men of the 32d to place in the hands of their children and friends vivid pictures of the dangers, trials, and pleasures which attended the service of our soldiers in the war for the Union.

In the preparation of the book, I have received, and gratefully acknowledge, the assistance of many of my old comrades, officers, and men, not only by way of incidents related verbally, but also—and this especially concerning events which occurred after my own resignation—by way of written contributions. Many of these are embodied in the text almost in the language of the writers, and others in a more or less condensed form. Among those to whom I am thus indebted should be particularly named General Luther Stephenson, jr., Surgeon Z. B. Adams, Major E. S. Farnsworth, General J. A. Cunningham, Sergeant S. C. Spaulding, Major Ambrose Bancroft, Captains G. W. Lauriat and J. C. Fuller; and last, but by no means least, Surgeon W. L. Faxon and Mrs. Faxon, whose memories have provided stores of incident. To Colonel I. F. Kingsbury I am indebted for the result of time-consuming researches in the Adjutant-General’s Department of the State.

While making these just acknowledgments I absolve all those named from any responsibility for such literary imperfections as may appear herein and, assuming to myself all blame for such defects, must ask my readers to consider in charity to me the difficulties which must attend a work so composed, and at the last somewhat hastily completed.

F. J. P.

Boston, April 30th, 1880.

CONTENTS.

THE STORY OF THE
Thirty-Second Regiment
MASSACHUSETTS INFANTRY.

I.
IN GARRISON.

THE story of the 32d Massachusetts Infantry was, of course, in most respects like that of others, but not in all. The immortal Topsy thought she was not made, but “‘spect she growed.” So our regiment was not made a regiment at the start, but it grew to be one. Other battalions from New England gathered into camps and acquired their preliminary education among neighbors, and cheered by the presence of visitors, who looked on and admired their guard-mountings at morning, and their dress-parades at evening; and these hardened into soldiers by a rough experience in mud or dust on the line of the Potomac, while our beginning was in a walled fort, on a bleak island, isolated even from the visits of friends, and under the most exact discipline of ante-bellum regular-army rule.

Fort Warren, which was our cradle, is the outpost of Boston, and it was very nearly, but not entirely, completed when the war broke out. Until 1861 it had never been occupied as a military post. The 12th and 14th Massachusetts had been in occupation of the island while the organization of those battalions was in progress, during the summer of that year, and when they left, the post was somewhat hurriedly prepared for the reception of prisoners, a large number having been captured in North Carolina by the column under General Burnside.

Early in the autumn of the year 1861 Colonel Justin E. Dimmock was assigned to the command at Fort Warren. At the first outbreak of the rebellion this patriotic officer, fortunately for the cause of the Union, was in command at Fort Munroe, and resisting every attempt made upon his loyalty, he held that important post for the government under whose flag he had fought, and in whose service he had passed his active life.

As the war progressed Fort Munroe became a great centre for the operations of the army, and the duties required of its commandant were too severe for a man of Colonel Dimmock’s age and infirmities, and he was transferred to the more quiet scenes in Boston Harbor. A temporary garrison was detailed from the 24th Massachusetts Infantry, then in process of formation, but upon the application of Colonel Dimmock, a new battalion of four companies of infantry was raised to be used as a garrison until the exigencies of the service required their presence elsewhere, and this body of men, called the First Battalion Massachusetts Infantry, relieved the same number of companies of the 24th.

Company A, recruited in Hingham by Captain (afterward Brevet-Brigadier-General) Luther Stephenson, jr., was mustered into service November 16th, 1861, and reported for duty at the fort on the following day. Charles A. Dearborn, jr., was First Lieutenant, and Nathaniel French, jr., Second Lieutenant.

Company B, recruited in Concord, Massachusetts, by Captain (afterward Brevet-Brigadier-General) George L. Prescott, was mustered in November 15th, 1861. Cyrus L. Tay, First Lieutenant, and Isaiah F. Hoyt, Second Lieutenant.

Company C, recruited in Boston by Captain Jonathan Pierce, was mustered in November 16th, 1861. Joseph Austin, First Lieutenant, and Robert Hamilton, Second Lieutenant.

Company D was recruited in Gloucester, and was almost entirely composed of fishermen and sailors. It was commanded by Captain James P. Draper. The late Adjutant-General James A. Cunningham was First Lieutenant, and Stephen Rich, Second Lieutenant.

These companies were rapidly recruited, and were immediately despatched to their post, no time being allowed for drill, and hardly time to say good-bye. It may be presumed that when they reported, their discipline was nothing, and their ideas of military order exceedingly crude.

Perhaps this was more particularly the case with Company D, which, as we have already said, was composed almost entirely of Gloucester fishermen,—or it may have been the excessive hospitality of the friends of that company, that led to a little scene immediately upon its arrival.

The more jovial of the soldiers were weeded out at the landing, and quietly deposited in the guard-house; the remainder were marched into the fort, and soon after to the cook house, where an ample supper of soft bread and tea awaited them. A few months later such a repast would have been hailed as the height of luxury, but by the raw sailor-soldiers it was now regarded with contempt. The loaves, instead of being devoted to their proper use as the staff of life, were converted into missiles, and the air was alive with them,—the dim evening light favoring an impartial distribution.

In the midst of the racket, Colonel Dimmock appeared upon the scene, lantern in hand, and immediately received plump in the head one of the finest of the loaves, which, with a refinement of ingenuity, had been dipped in hot tea. The scene which followed was one not easily to be forgotten. The outraged old soldier dashed in among the turbulent men, and by his habit of command at once overawed and controlled them. Ordering them into a line, throwing some into position apparently by main strength, he passed along the ranks, throwing his light into each face until he came to the real culprit, six solid feet of man and tar, whose face declared his guilt. Seizing the burly giant by the arm, the old colonel fairly dragged him out of the casemate, as if he had been a child; but when the man had humbled himself sufficiently, protesting that “he didn’t mean anything,” the commandant dismissed him after a brief but forcible lecture on discipline, and an injunction to beware of any second offence.

Late in November the battalion organization was completed by the appointment of the Field and Staff, Francis J. Parker, Major; Charles K. Cobb, Adjutant; and George W. Pearson, Quartermaster; and the Major assumed command December 2d, 1861.

The Post-Commander, Colonel Justin E. Dimmock, was also Colonel of the First United States Artillery, and the headquarters of the regiment was with him; but with the exception of the excellent band of the regiment, there were none other of its officers or men at the post.

Fort Warren at this time was occupied as a depot for Confederate war and state prisoners—the former consisted mainly of some 800 men, captured in North Carolina, and included also a number of Confederate officers, among whom were Commodore Barron and Colonel Pegram; and among the latter were the Confederate ambassadors, Mason and Slidell, Mayor Brown, Chief of Police Kane of Baltimore, and others.

The first duty to be taught and learned under such circumstances was guard duty, and that was no holiday work. The daily detail consisted of about seventy-five men, and was divided into the interior and exterior guard. During the daytime a line of sentinels enclosed a space in front of the prisoners’ quarters, within which they were permitted to exercise, and these sentinels at retreat were drawn in to the casemate entrances. Guards were also placed at the sally-port and postern, and near the staircases leading up to the ramparts. Outside, a picket line entirely surrounded the fortifications; watch being kept not only to prevent escape from within, but also to forbid the approach of boats from the sea or the shore.

Such duty on a bleak island, exposed to the terrible cold and storms of a New England winter, was no pastime. Occasionally some of the outposts would be untenable by reason of the dash of waves, and often inspection and relief of the posts was effected with great difficulty because of the icy condition of the ground. In the most severe storms the guard was replaced by patrols, each of two men, who walked the line, one patrol being despatched every fifteen or twenty minutes.

One dark howling night the sentinel, on post near what was called the grave-yard, reported to the officer that a white form had twice passed between him and the fort, and upon close questioning the soldier admitted that he had not challenged, because he feared it was a ghost. There was considerable stir, in and outside the fort, until an inspection had shown that no prisoner had escaped and no intruder could be found.

The sentinel was allowed two hours of extra guard duty, and an order was posted at the guard-house denouncing severe punishment in any future case where ghosts were allowed to pass a beat without challenge and arrest.

Inasmuch as many who will read these pages may never have seen the inside of a fort, a few words descriptive of Fort Warren, may not be amiss.

The Fort proper is constructed almost entirely of hewn granite. The area enclosed is not far from six acres, of which the parade ground occupies five. The general form of the area is a pentagon, but at each of its five angles a bastion projects in such manner that every portion of the ditch which surrounds the walls, can, in case of need, be reached by musketry and howitzers from the casemates.

This area is surrounded by casemated walls, which are in fact huge bomb-proof buildings, structures of stone with heavy arches of brick to support the great mass of earth which is required to protect them from shells thrown from mortars. In these casemates are quarters for the officers and men of the garrison, magazines for ammunition, storehouses for all manner of supplies, a hospital of generous dimensions, a huge cistern for water, an ice-house, cook, and mess-room, besides space for a large battery of heavy guns facing towards the sea. Some of these vaulted chambers are lighted through the outer walls by means of embrasures calculated for howitzers, or by loop-holes intended for defence by musketry. Others look out upon the parade ground, and have upon that face the appearance of stone dwellings of one storey, entered by ordinary doorways, and lighted through spacious windows. Those which occupy the northwest side of the parade are of two stories, one being below the level of the interior grade. These are for use as officers’ quarters, and during the war, those which are entered from the doors nearest to, and on either side of the entrance arch, were occupied by the civilians and officers among the prisoners confined in the fort.

The interior depth of the casemates, from the inner to the outer wall, does not vary much from sixty feet, giving ample space, equal indeed to the depth of a large city residence. The barracks for the soldiers are divided into rooms, generally about sixty by twenty feet, and during a part of the war many of them were assigned to the enlisted men who were prisoners.

A full garrison for Fort Warren would be not far from twenty-five hundred men, and that number could be quartered in the casemates.

Above these buildings are the ramparts, on which the chief part of the armament is placed, and these ramparts are walled in by a parapet of about five feet in height, of very thick masonry, intended to protect the men while working the guns, from the fire of an enemy. These ramparts are now provided with a full armament of ten inch and fifteen inch guns, placed as near together as convenience in working would permit, but in our day the greater part of the guns were four inch and thirty-two pounders, the casemate battery alone, consisting of eight inch columbiads.

The entire equipment of the Fort comprises over three hundred of these heavy guns, of which some seventy may always be concentrated upon any one point of the channel which they defend. Outside, and immediately surrounding the walls of the casemated fort is a fosse, or ditch, some fifty feet in width, and outside of this are other defences, (which outwardly, are earthworks,) including an exterior curtain on the north, a ravelin on the south, and a water battery on the northwest, the whole composing in fact a fortress of great strength, even in these days of iron-clads and great guns.

To one who thoroughly explores the Island there will recur vivid reminiscences of the mysterious castles of romance and of history. He will find here a sally-port, a postern, a drawbridge, and a portcullis. Here, too, are passages under ground and in the walls; turret staircases, huge vaulted apartments, and safe and dark dungeons, the ways to and through which may be set down upon the plans of the engineer corps, but are familiar to no living man. One can be easily bewildered among the crooks and turns, the ups and downs of the corridors, and it needs only a dark and windy night to make almost real the romantic descriptions of the Castle of Udolfo, with its clanging sounds of chains, its sweeping gusts of air, its strange moanings and howlings, and the startling noise of some sudden clang of a shutting door reverberating among the arches.

More than twelve years had passed since the 32d Regiment left Fort Warren for more stirring scenes, when the writer for the first time since that day, again visited the Island.

Escaping for a time from the courteous hospitality of the officers of the post, he started alone through the once accustomed scenes. Grim visaged war had smoothed his wrinkled front. There were no sentinels to challenge or salute; no familiar faces in the well-remembered quarters. Even the uniforms were changed; officers seemed to be wearing sergeants’ stripes on their trousers, and unknown ornaments on their shoulders. There were women about the landing, newspapers in the guard-house (!), and a peaceful fishing pole and tackle leaned quietly against the sole survivor of all our sentry boxes.

The doorways to the officers’ casemates were shielded from the hot sun by gaily painted, veranda-like porches, about which shrubs and vines, with bright foliage and blossoms, glistened in the sunlight, and in the very room where erstwhile Mason and Slidell pursued the warlike game of poker, and spat upon the bare flooring, there was a most ladylike parlor, with carpets, mirrors, and an attractive-looking case of book-shelves, well loaded with seemly books.

Again was paced the line of our outposts. Every step awakened old memories—every pebble seemed a friend; but there was no ice upon the glacis or the “shelf” at post eighteen, and instead of the cold winds, came grateful breezes from the sea, which no longer leaden in color dashed against the rock, but blue and smooth basked in the hot noon-day, and laughingly rippled on the beach. It would have been a sad walk but for the beauty of the summer scenes—it would have been a joyous one but for clinging memories.

During the time of our stay in garrison at Fort Warren, the battalion was increased to six companies by the addition of Companies E and F, recruited during the winter.

Company E was raised in the Old Colony by Captain Cephas C. Bumpus. First Lieutenant, Josiah C. Fuller; Second Lieutenant, Lyman B. Whiton. The Company was mustered into service December 7th, 1861, and joined immediately.

Company F was enlisted in Boston, also by Captain Bumpus, who was detailed for the duty, and was mustered in about the first of March, 1861, its officers being, Captain, James A. Cunningham; First Lieutenant, Charles K. Cobb, (Adjutant); Second Lieutenant, William H. Gertz.

The breaking in of the men was upon the regular-army system; first each man was “set up” by himself, then the drill was in squads, in increasing numbers, and afterward in company and battalion. When the weather was such as absolutely to forbid out-of-door drill, the men were taught in the school of artillery, and practiced on the great guns in the casemate battery.

The most exact discipline was necessarily maintained, and as soldierly discipline is only to be obtained by close attention to minutiæ—not even things apparently trifling were neglected. The fact that one button of a soldier’s overcoat was not fastened, was noted and the parade was stopped until the defect was remedied. No soldier was allowed to sit in the presence of an officer. The regulation salutes proper to each rank were required and paid by officers and men, sentinels and the guard. Adhering to the letter of the regulations, our manual was that of Scott, because we were armed with muskets, not rifles. Every nook and corner of every barrack and bunk, and every portion of the dress of every officer and man, must at all times be satisfactory to the keen and critical eye of an “old army” Colonel.

All of this was needed to make perfect soldiers, and all of it was readily accepted and observed by the men, more than nine-tenths of whom were American born, in order that they might become good soldiers. Singularly enough it was more difficult to bring the officers to exact the honors due to rank, than the soldiers to yield them.

Army officers often expressed their surprise at the rapidity with which a command so essentially native, was brought to the extreme of army discipline, and almost without punishment. This result was a complete proof that intelligent Americans can be brought into a state of thorough and exact discipline more readily, by reason of their intelligence, than the uneducated immigrants who were once thought to make better soldiers because of their comparative ignorance. Of course there were occasional extra hours of guard duty for men returning from leave on shore—people on the mainland were so very hospitable—but rarely was any more serious correction requisite.

There was one case, a second offence perhaps, where the sinner was put on special log duty, and he has since declared that it was sufficiently severe to keep him dry for six months. Two or three sticks of four-foot firewood, not excessively large, but good fair size, were placed in the bastion near the officers’ quarters, and as many more at the extreme end of the parade, near the postern. The offender was ordered to shoulder a billet from one bastion, and to carry it in “common time” to the other; there to lay it down, and taking up another, to return over his beat and deposit it at the place of departure—and so on for several hours. The punishment consisted, not in the laborious character of his occupation, but in the fact that he knew it was useless labor, and that everybody else knew it also. The occasional inquiries or remarks of comrades about the profits of the carrying trade in fuel, may very likely have aggravated the penalty.

Bearing in mind the fact that Great Britain was wroth at the seizure of the rebel envoys, and connecting that with the other fact that a large fleet of British men-of-war was gathering at Halifax, it seemed possible that a demonstration might be made for the recovery of the lost plenipos; and it was, perhaps, natural that some interest should be felt as to our ability to repel attack, or to endure blockade, and, of course, as to the amount of our stores of food and ammunition.

Perhaps it was just as well for us at this time that no enemy appeared, for our stock of fixed ammunition consisted of thirty rounds, borrowed from Fort Independence. We were unable to salute the Governor, on his visit, for want of powder, and months passed before our magazines contained shot, shell, or powder in any more respectable quantity.

The duties of our battalion at Fort Warren were of course entirely military. The affairs of the prisoners were administered by Colonel Dimmock and his staff,—one of whom inspected the quarters every day to see that all of the prisoners were present; and all their correspondence and communications with the outside world passed under the eye of the post officers.

No prisoners could be better cared for or more considerately treated. Each was allowed the full ration of a soldier, and was even allowed to commute the ration and expend the money for other food. A liberal portion of the lading of the steamer, whose daily visit was our only tie to the continent, was made up of purchases and gifts for these guests of the nation, and their messes were always abundantly supplied both with solids and fluids.

Mr. Mason was a portly gentleman, evidently accustomed to good living; rather jovial in his appearance, and courteous in his manner. He took matters very easily, and seemed in no haste to depart. Mr. Slidell, on the contrary, a lean and dyspeptic looking man, was fretful and impatient, and evidently chafed much under his confinement.

Mayor Brown, of Baltimore, whose case was one of those which perhaps could not be entirely avoided, of unjust confinement, was always easy and bland in manner, and genial and affable to all about him, contrasting very decidedly with Kane, the Chief of the Baltimore Police, who was a thoroughly ugly specimen of a Maryland rebel.

Later on we had the pleasure, for a time, to see with us General Tilghman, a merry, happy-go-lucky officer, and General Buckner, an excellent specimen of the ramrod soldier.

The two last named were, for a time, by special order from Washington, kept in solitary confinement,—that is to say, each was assigned to a separate apartment in the basement of the commandant’s quarters. Their rooms and their doors were exactly opposite each other, and a sentinel was posted in the passage to prevent escape or communication between them. Occasionally, when the weather was warm, they were allowed to leave their doors open, and on one such occasion the officer on his rounds at night found the sentinel slumbering on the floor, and the solitary prisoners having a good time together in one of the apartments. That soldier was not allowed to sleep a great deal for the next day or two.

Colonel Dimmock declined an earnest invitation to pass Christmas eve and day in Boston, because, as he said, he knew that among southern people it was held to be a Christian duty to be royally drunk at yule tide, and his presence might be important. It was our impression that no violence was done to southern principles on that occasion.

The first day of January, 1862, came, bringing with it a brisk gale of wind from the eastward, thick lead-colored clouds, and occasional dashes of rain. It brought also a great excitement to our humdrum community. A steam tug came to the wharf early in the morning, and its sole passenger, a civilian, was escorted to the quarters of the Commandant; then the Colonel went in person to the quarters of our Major, and there was a conference; then the drum-call sounded for parade earlier than usual, and by so many extraordinary occurrences our population was “convulsed with excitement.” Very soon everybody knew that an order had been received for the release of Mason and Slidell. There was a great stir among the first circles of the prisoners, and we afterward learned that they and the envoys imagined that honors and salutes would be paid upon their departure. But in this expectation they were destined to disappointment. The precautions of Colonel Dimmock entirely prevented any semblance of honors, and even suppressed the exhibition of such curious interest as would naturally have attended the incident.

Two sections of men, specially detailed, were so posted as to prevent any person ascending to the ramparts. The battalion was kept under arms and exercise upon the parade, and the prisoners were notified that unless they would give their parole not to make any noisy demonstrations, they would be confined to their casemates. And so it happened, that, except a noiseless waving of hands and handkerchiefs from their fellow-prisoners, the envoys received no attention from any one. As they passed out from the fort, escorted only by the Commandant, the officer of the day, and the agent of the State Department, the battalion stood in line of battle, with their backs to the envoys, with ordered arms and at parade rest. As they passed the guard house, the guard also stood at parade rest, Colonel Dimmock having waived the salute due to his rank, for fear that it might be claimed as an honor to his departing guests.

The prolonged gale had caused the tide to flood the wharf, so that it was not easy or pleasant to pass over it to the tug boat. When underweigh not one person, except the sentinels on the outposts, could be seen on the island, and the driving rain and wind soon forced the passengers to seek the shelter of the cabin, which they found profusely decorated with the American flag. It is said that Mason spat and Slidell swore the whole of the rough voyage to Provincetown, in which secluded harbor a British man-of-war received them from the tug, without any demonstration, and at once put to sea.

Among the prisoners at the fort was one Keene (?), who was kept in close confinement in a small, triangular room in the casemates, the only light to which came through a loophole in the masonry. He was a sailor, and it was said that he had attempted to blow up the frigate Congress with all on board, with which horrible design he had enlisted in our navy. He was offered greater liberty if he would promise not to attempt an escape, but the offer was declined. Afterward he refused to take an oath of allegiance as the only condition for his release, and he was probably let loose at last without condition.

We had a great desire to ascertain what time would be required for the formation of the battalion in case of night alarm, but Colonel Dimmock would not permit the beating of the long-roll for a mere experiment, because false alarms were forbidden by the regulations. Happily that invaluable code placed no restriction on the hours for parade, and when, by the absence of the Colonel, our Major was left in command of the post, the information was obtained.

Tattoo had been sounded, roll-call was over, lights in the barracks were all out, and the men in bed and generally asleep. An extra guard was quietly posted in front of the prisoners’ quarters, and a verbal message summoned the officers to headquarters.

When all were assembled they were told that it was desirable to know how soon, under such circumstances, the battalion could be assembled, properly equipped and ready for duty.

The order was given at eight minutes past ten,—the officers were obliged to equip themselves and to turn out, form and march their men on to the parade; but in less than five minutes the line was formed, with three-fourths of the whole force present. The inspection showed few deficiencies (one man, to be sure, forgot his trousers), and the experiment was quite satisfactory.

We were not without occupation, nor even without our amusements through the long winter. The officers were fully occupied, in the intervals of duty, in bonfing over the tactics. To learn and teach both the infantry and artillery manual, as well as battalion movements, and at the same time to perform the various duties of the post, implied no great amount of leisure,—on the part of the officers at least. But time was found for an occasional evening entertainment, including one or two excellent concerts.

One evening there was a musical soiree in the quarters of Mr. Buell, one of the post staff, and two or three of the prisoners were present by his invitation; among them was Colonel Pegram, of Virginia, who, being invited to sing, complied, and to the surprise of everybody selected the disloyal song, “My Maryland,” which he sang well to his own guitar accompaniment. When he stopped, there ensued for a minute or two an absolute and ominous silence, which was broken by our Captain Draper, who, with his ringing voice, began the patriotic song, “Vive l’America.” The chorus was taken up by all the Union officers present, singing perhaps with more fervor than accuracy:—

“United we stand, divided we fall,
Union forever—freedom to all,
Throughout the wide land our motto shall be
Vive l’America, land of the free.”

At the close of the song Colonel Pegram complimented the singing, and frankly apologized for his discourtesy.

At times the interior of the fort seemed better adapted for use as a skating rink than as a parade-ground. In the worst of such times the dress-parades were omitted, and guard-mounting took place in the casemates; but the marching of the reliefs over glare ice, in a high wind, did not convey the idea of an exact military movement.

One of the men, engaged on a job of repairs, loaded up a light hand-cart with five or six boards, and essayed to push the load before him from the north-west bastion to the opposite side of the fort, while the ice was as smooth as a mirror, and a northwest gale blowing furiously. It was a slow process at the start, but when the team emerged from under the lee of the walls, the gale seized the whole concern, boards, cart, and man, and sent them in detached parties, whirling over the ice field.

Our winter was a new experience to the North Carolina men, and no doubt they have yet great stories to tell of the snow and ice and cold, of a sea-coast everywhere bounded by rocks, and of a country where the woods were not all pines. And no doubt their hearers try to look as though they believed it all, but mutter, possibly, some truisms about soldiers’ stories.

One day in February, 1862, just after the mail-boat had left the fort not to return until the next day, we saw all about us on the main land indications that some joyful incident had occurred. All day long flags were profusely displayed and salutes were fired up and down the coast, and at night the horizon sparkled with fireworks and bonfires. For twenty-four hours we were left to guess at the cause of this rejoicing, but at last we too heard of the capture of Fort Donelson and had our celebration.

We always gave Colonel Dimmock credit for an act of kind thoughtfulness on this occasion. When the news came he remembered that he had an engagement “on shore,” and announced that he should be absent for a day. “Of course,” he said, “you will fire a salute, and I don’t like the sound of great guns.” The fact was, no doubt, that he feared that his presence might be a restraint upon our joviality, and for that reason he took himself away. There had been no talk of anything except the salute, but as he left the fort he turned to the Major and said, in his absent-minded way, “By the by, Major, when the men are allowed a little unusual liberty, unusual discretion is needed on the part of the commanding officer, you know.”

From the time required to prepare for that salute, it was evident that the Alabama might have steamed up the channel and into Boston harbor before we could have brought any guns to bear upon her, but at noon the guns were manned and the salute was fired. While the preparations were in progress, the band-master of the 1st Artillery presented himself at headquarters to ask a favor. The last gun he had fired was the last from Fort Sumter, and he now requested permission to fire the first gun of the salute for the victory. Of course he was allowed to do so, and he was cheered as he went to his station.

The Colonel was very chary of that band and we had never had any benefit from it; but the Post being pro tempore under the command of our Major, they were turned out and made useful. All drills were suspended for the day. The men, in small parties, were allowed to stroll outside the walls. Some luxuries were added to the ration. The band played and the men danced to its music and skylarked generally. At night there was an illumination, masquerading, and singing, and for once tattoo did not sound at the time set down in the orders.

A week later a detachment of prisoners from Fort Donelson was added to our establishment, mostly long, gaunt men, given to wearing sombrero hats, and chewing tobacco. With this party came Generals Buckner and Tilghman.

In February too, the last of the private soldiers, held at the fort as prisoners of war, were sent south to be exchanged. When the transport was ready for the embarkation, four negroes, servants to officers who were about to return home, asked to be allowed to accompany their masters. Colonel Dimmock, becoming satisfied that they preferred to go back to North Carolina, consented to allow them to do so, but took the not unnecessary precaution to have other evidence of the fact that they returned to slavery on their own motion, sending them with his orderly to the Major with the request that he would examine the “boys” and satisfy himself as to whether they went of their own accord—which they certainly did.

As good-weather days became more frequent, our battalion, now of six companies, settled down more regularly to its work. At the request of our commanding officer the full code of discipline, with no abatement because we were volunteers, was the rule by which we were governed, and no one was more surprised at the result than Colonel Dimmock.

With the end of April, 1862, we had fairly drilled through the book, and on the first day of May the battalion was reviewed by Governor Andrew, and exercised in battalion movements in presence of the Governor and a staff which had become critical in military movements. At the close of the parade, Colonel Dimmock, who was not wont to abound in compliments, publicly congratulated the Major as the commander of a body of thoroughly-disciplined soldiers.

The Union armies were now everywhere victorious, and at the North we expected every day to hear that the rebels had come to that “last ditch.” Wearying of the monotony, and in expectation of an early peace, the Major resigned, and on the 2d of May was relieved from duty and returned to his business life. To him the parting was unexpectedly trying, but people cannot be shut up together for five months without loving or hating each other.

For weeks the duty went on, the command devolving upon Captain Stephenson, and the warm spring weather and longer days were improved to the utmost in keeping away the possibility of rust.

The official acceptance of the Major’s resignation had been received at the Post, but had not been promulgated, when on the night following Sunday, May 25th, at an hour or more past midnight, a steam tug landed him at the Post, and a half hour later everybody was awake, and the fort was alive with the news that since the last sundown the 1st Battalion had become the 32d Massachusetts Infantry—that Major Parker was promoted to the Lieutenant Colonelcy—that marching orders had been received—that Banks had been driven down the Shenandoah Valley—that Washington was menaced by the forces under Stonewall Jackson—that the country had again been summoned to the defence of the capital—that at last our time had come.

Whoever may read these sketches will pardon so much digression as will be required to describe one of the critical scenes of those exciting days. Sunday evening, after ten o’clock, this writer was sitting in his library, having just finished the last cigar before bed-time, when there came a ring at the doorbell—one of those rings that tell a story of haste and excitement.

At the door was a messenger, who informed the Major that the Governor desired to see him without delay, and that a carriage waited his convenience.

There was a word to say to the wife above stairs—there were boots and overcoat to be donned, but in two or three minutes the carriage was whirling through the empty streets, and soon pulled up at the rear entrance to the Capitol.

In the office of the Adjutant-General was Governor Andrew, busily writing at his desk and alone. His Excellency had remembered a parting request upon the occasion of the review, that the 1st Battalion should not be allowed to go to the front under a stranger’s command. The Major was shown the dispatches of the night, and in them read a story of frantic terror at Washington and earnest pleading for speedy succor. By them the Governor was, within the limits of Massachusetts, invested with all of the President’s power to command the United States forces, to raise troops, to transfer garrisons, to provide supplies and transportation, and through them all ran the tones of extremest panic and most earnest entreaty for help—speedy help.

The Governor stated his intention under this authority to order away the six hundred men of the 1st Battalion and offered to reappoint the commander. The offer was of course accepted and an hour quickly passed in drawing orders and requisitions, and completing arrangements for the earliest possible departure of the command. The company of heavy artillery at Fort Independence was ordered to remove to Fort Warren, and the independent companies of Cadets were ordered there for garrison duty. There were orders, too, for levy en masse of the state militia for active service, and provision made for their equipment, subsistence, and rapid transportation.

Officers of the Governor’s and of the army staff came and went. Red tape broke at every order, and during this hour, as also for one nearer morning, while everybody strove to do his utmost to accomplish results which seemed almost impossible, Governor Andrew was the busiest of the workers, radiant with the joy of one who possesses great powers, and who knows that he is wielding them effectually. All through the night came over the wires appeals for help and for haste, and always the Governor was cheery and full of faith, that, although the end might be farther away than we had hoped, that end would be our success.

It was a night, too, of hard work at Fort Warren—there were rations to be issued and cooked for the march; there were equipments to be supplied, knapsacks to be packed, property to be turned over, unnecessaries to be rid away, and last letters to be written; but all was done before the relief garrison reported. At noon on Monday the regiment was relieved, and for the last time passed out of the sally-port and was on the march—glad to be out of jail, some said—glad to be moving to the front; all desiring to see that actual war for which they had passed through long and careful training, and anxious as new troops can be, for a share in the realities of the campaign.

And so, embarking on the ferry-boat Daniel Webster, we left Fort Warren, our cradle, with cheers for the good old Colonel, and with all the verses of the John Brown chorus ringing from six hundred throats to the accompaniment of our own drum corps.

II.
ON OUR OWN HOOK.

SUNDAY, May 25th, 1862, the sun went down on a people rejoicing in the confident expectation of coming victory and an early peace. That sun next rose on a population deeply agitated with news of military disaster, but more warlike and more determined than ever. The appeals of the War Office at Washington, and the summons of our own Governor, met with an enthusiastic response; the militia flocked to the rendezvous in Boston, and the city scenes were almost a repetition of the Lexington Day of the previous year.

Not knowing that the Regiment was expected to appear on the Common, but knowing that our orders were urgent, the 32d marched by the most direct route through the city and to the railway, its wide platoons occupying the full space in the widest streets, bearing no flag, marching to its own field music, everywhere cheered by the excited populace, and drawing attention and applause by its unpretentious but soldierly appearance.

At the Old Colony station, where a train was waiting, we stacked for the last time our smooth-bore muskets, and turned them over to Quartermaster McKim. A long delay, occasioned by the unexpected celerity of our movements, gave officers and men an opportunity to exchange greetings with and take leave of their friends, of whom the vast crowd seemed chiefly to be composed.

There were meetings and partings between parents and children, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters; there were friends of the men who desired to enlist and to go with them, and others who asked brief furloughs for those they loved, that the suddenness of departure might be a little softened to those at home; but on the part of the soldiers there were no such applications. There were messages from many a quivering lip, sent to those who had not heard of the marching orders; there was grasping of hands, man with man, which meant more than tongues could say; and wives were folded by husband’s arms so tenderly as may never be but either in days of early love or at the approach of final separation.

And yet there was no cloud of sadness in the scene; on every side were words of cheer and encouragement—of loving hope and patriotic devotion; and when a light-hearted soldier, whose home was so far away that none of his kin were there to say good-bye, asked if there was nobody there to kiss him, he came near being smothered by a crowd of volunteers ready to officiate, not only for his mother, but for all the rest of his female ancestry.

At last came the regimental stores, for which we had waited, and with the call for “all aboard,” the last ties were broken, the last cheers were given, and the train drew slowly out from the station and from the city. But not away from tokens of good will. The country, too, was alive. Flags were streaming from every flag-staff, waving from the windows of the houses, and drooping from the spires of churches.

Men, women, and children of all ages were at cottage doors and roadway crossings, and crowded the platforms at every station, to say or wave good-bye and God-speed to the foremost of the transport trains. We were soon at Fall River, on the steamer, and weary with excitement, the men speedily turned in and slept.

For us there was next day no Broadway parade in New York city, but landing at Jersey City there was a haversack breakfast, and after some delay, another train, and we were off for Philadelphia, through a country whose people, in hamlet and in town, cheered the unknown soldiery, who all day long poured through toward the seat of war. At Philadelphia we shared the bounteous hospitality of the citizens, who provided most thoughtfully for all the troops who passed their gates. There was a long march through wide and straight streets, then another railway embarkation, and then a long, tedious, hesitating ride, reaching through the night, and it was early morning when we arrived at Baltimore and woke the drowsy people with the sound of Yankee Doodle as we marched through to the Washington railway. Here we found the 7th New York militia waiting in the street for transportation to the Capital. More successful than they, we secured a train, which, after several hours, delivered us safely in Washington, where we were glad to learn that we were the first troops to arrive on the call of the President, and that again Massachusetts was in the advance.

Then followed a prolonged struggle with red tape, which would have told us, even if there had been no other source of information, that the scare was over and Washington safe. Before we could present our requisitions for camp equipage, the office hours had passed, the officials were deaf to all our entreaties, and although we arrived as early as 2 P. M., we were compelled that night to occupy the hard floors of one of the railway buildings.

When we came to look about us we were surprised to find that ours was the only infantry regiment at Washington, and we were poor lone orphans. We wanted tents, supplies, and a wagon train, but our requisitions were denied, because our Brigadier General had not endorsed his approval. We attempted to explain that we had no Brigadier, and all Staff-dom stood aghast,—unable to take in the idea that there could be such a thing as a regiment with no brigadier.

Verily, we might have died of starvation but for the kindness of Adjutant General Townsend, who officially made a special order from the headquarters of the army, to suit our case, and personally suggested a site near the Washington Navy Yard, known as Camp Alexander, as a convenient locality for our camp. The site was inspected, approved, and speedily occupied by us, and here passed four weeks of halcyon days. Our camp was pitched on a high bluff overlooking the eastern branch of the Potomac. The air was that of balmy June. No brigadier worried us—no up-and-away orders disturbed us, and thanks to General Townsend’s special order, our supplies were ample and regular.

But it was no idle time. A battalion which had always been restricted to the limits of an island fort, had occasion for much new practice, and the drills went briskly on. Especially was there need for practising in the use of legs, before marching orders should come, and therefore, every other day the drills of the battalion comprised also a march, growing longer day by day, until an eight-mile march was easily accomplished.

Our evening parades became quite an attraction for visitors. Congressmen, senators, and even cabinet secretaries came to be frequent guests, and the sunshine of ladies’ presence, unknown to our previous experience, gave brilliancy to our lines and encouragement to our men.

Washington was at this time in a state of siege, or according to our American phrase, under martial law. The great army, which a few months earlier had given to the district the appearance of a military camp, had moved on toward Richmond. One column was wading up the Peninsular, one was watching in the Shenandoah Valley, one was guarding the Piedmont Gaps, while McDowell, on the banks of the Rappahannock, was waiting the turn of events, and hoping for orders to join the force under McClellan, and so on to Richmond.

The chain of detached forts about the Capital, were, however, fully garrisoned, and in the city a force of cavalry was doing the work of a provost guard. Mounted sentinels were stationed at the street corners, and detachments patrolled the outlying wards. The railway station was guarded, and passengers leaving town were obliged to pass the inspection of the soldiery. At the depots of the commissary’s and the quartermaster’s stores, at the entrances to hospitals, about the offices of the departments, and at the door of the Executive Mansion, sentries were posted day and night. One was rarely out of sight and hearing of officers and orderlies, as they galloped over the rough pavements or trailed their sabres on the walks, and everywhere came and went the springless supply-wagons of the army, with their six-mule teams and postilion drivers.

All this appearance of military rule and ward was no useless show. The city was full of enemies and spies. A large part of the resident population was hostile to the North. Very frequently at the approach of uniformed men, ladies gathered their skirts to prevent contaminating touch, and children shook their tiny fists and made grimaces of dislike.

If there seemed to be exceptional cases where officers were welcomed by secessionists, men or women, the attentions were apt to end in a request for aid to procure passes through our lines, or in wily cross-examination about posts or movements of the troops. There was but little tinsel; except at the barracks of the marine corps, where old traditions were preserved, there were no epaulettes, no chapeaux, no plumes, but everything spoke of real war service.

He who visits Washington now will find it hard to realize that that beautiful capital is the same as the dust and mud-covered town of 1862. He who has known it only as the beleaguered city of the war, would almost fail to recognize it in its changed condition.

It seemed at times as if we had been lost or forgotten by the war department; but an occasional order, or the call for some report, betrayed a semi-consciousness of our existence. None of the authorities could take in the idea that we had only six companies, and when a funeral escort was wanted for the body of Lieutenant-Colonel Palmer, of the engineers, the order came to detail six companies, under a Lieutenant-Colonel, for that duty, and our commanding officer thereupon detailed himself and his full command.

This escort was, in all our history, the only instance of show duty. Our newly-joined Assistant-Surgeon Faxon, with such daring as could come only from raw ignorance, volunteered to take the compliments of our commander to the General commanding the Marine Corps, and to ask for the loan of his celebrated band. Whether the General was stunned by our impudence or flattered by the Doctor’s blandishments, may never be known, but the request was complied with, and our march through the crowded city was made dazzling by the great band, with their plumed caps, scarlet coats, white trowsers, and gorgeous equipments.

Every point of military etiquette was observed in the ceremonial; the command was in the best of condition, and we heard with great satisfaction the favorable comments from the crowds that thronged our way. “It takes the regulars,” “volunteers never could do that,” etc. And no doubt as we marched back to our camp of spacious tents, with the full assurance of ample rations prepared by company cooks awaiting our arrival, our breasts swelled with undue pride, for we saw in the future no premonitions of the tattered and hungry crew, who bearing our name and number, were to assist in puddling down the sacred soil of Virginia.

Within the limits of our camp was a small and old cottage house, which being entirely unoccupied, we took for our hospital use. Although nearly worthless for any purpose, the owner was hunted up and the endeavor was made to come to a settlement with him and pay rent during its occupancy, but the proprietor declined even to name a price, giving as his reason that he could get more by making a claim for it before the department, after we were gone.

At this hospital we first lost a man from our ranks by death. Hiram Varney of Gloucester, a plucky fellow, although too ill to have left the Fort, prevailed upon the post surgeon to allow him to go with the Regiment, but worn with the excitement and fatigue of the march, he fell into typhus fever and died. He was a soldier to the last. So long as he could raise his hand, he endeavored to salute his officers who came to the cotside, and when told of approaching death, he regretted that it had not been his fate to meet it in battle.

There were other incidents not so lugubrious. The waters of the Branch washed the foot of the bluff on which our camp was pitched, and when the days grew exceeding hot, Surgeon Adams advised that bathing should be prohibited through the heat of the day. Accordingly an order was published, appointing the hours for morning and evening bathing, and forbidding it at other times.

At noon one blistering hot day, two men being overtempted by the cool waters, were in the act of enjoying a stolen bath, when the sergeant with a file of the guard appeared and ordered the bathers to the shore. Upon coming to land, they found to their disgust that their clothing had preceded them to the guard tent. Attended by the sergeant and his men, the culprits were marched in puris up the bluff and through the whole length of the parade ground, running the gauntlet of the jokes and gibes of their comrades, who turned out in force to enjoy the exhibition.

For a day or two after our arrival the cows of our secession neighbors were very troublesome. Turned out by their owners after milking in the morning, a herd of some twenty-five or thirty head fed through the day along the waste grounds of that part of Washington City, and returned at evening to their cribs. Both going and coming they habitually passed through our lines, and about among the tents, causing some trouble to the police guard, and much annoyance to the men. Sentinels could not leave their posts to chase cows, and no provision was to be found in the tactics or regulations applicable to this case. A provision was therefore invented. At noon a notice was posted at the guard tent, stating that thereafter it might be presumed that any cows found within the limits of the camp were sent thither by their owners, in order that the men should supply themselves with fresh milk.

When the herd returned that evening there was exhibited a scene which defies description. Upon each cow there attended upon the average about five men, who with soothing words and quieting gestures, sought an opportunity to drain the happy beeves! A view of the camp was one of a confusing medley of cows, and of men with tin cups, slowly and quietly but almost continually waltzing about in every direction. All their exertions must have resulted in a considerable success, for the herd troubled us no more.

The guard served with loaded rifles, and when relieved were marched to a convenient spot by the waterside, where they emptied their guns one by one, firing at a target; and to encourage careful practice, he who made the best shot was allowed a furlough for the rest of the day. It was of course a matter of interest to the officers to watch the practice and the improvement of the men. On one occasion after the guard practice was ended, the Colonel desiring to test the new pieces, took a rifle from the sergeant, and by some accident his bullet hit the bull’s eye of the target. He was complimented and perhaps a little surprised by the unanimous shout from the old guard, “give him a furlough.”

The East Branch here must have been not far from a quarter of a mile wide. Our shore, as has been stated, was a high bluff, but the opposite bank was a low interval, cultivated as a market garden, and near the river stood the unpretentious cottage of the cultivator. As the colonel sat one day at his tent door, in such position that the edge of the bluff showed in sharp relief against the blue waters of the branch, there appeared coming up over the cliff, escorted by a corporal, a semblance of Neptune arising from the Sea. It was after all only the garden farmer from over the river. He had crossed in his punt, and his resemblance to Neptune was owing in part to his sailor-like form and hat, but more to the precaution he had taken to bring his paddle along with him.

His errand at headquarters was to complain that the rifle balls at the time of target practice had a disagreeable way of glancing over the water and whistling about his premises, and he asked meekly if this could not be avoided, as it “made the women-folks nervous.” Of course his wish was granted, and thereafter the guard discharged their rifles at a target in the bank on our side of the water. This compliance with his request resulted in a second appearance of our Neptune, who at this time brought two boxes of choice strawberries as a present to the commanding officer, and an expression of his thanks, to which he added the statement that there never had been such a regiment encamped near him,—“they were all gentlemen.” We wondered what kind of troops had preceded us, that we rose so high in his good graces merely because we refrained from shooting at his women-folks,—but the berries were thankfully accepted and warmly appreciated in the mess.

It was about this time that this delicious berry became so plentiful that three hundred quarts were issued as a special ration to the men.

June 24, 1862. Orders were received to move over to Alexandria, where a new brigade comprising the 32d was to be organized; the order stated that the Regiment would be met at Alexandria by a staff officer who would conduct us to our camping ground.

Alexandria being a township about ten miles in length, the order was rather indefinite, but we marched to the town where we found no brigadier, no brigade, and no staff officer, and thereupon we proceeded to make an excursion through the township in search of one of them. We soon found an aide-de-camp who conducted us to the locality intended, and pointed out the ground assigned to us, which was half a mile from any water.

This, our first real march, is worthy of notice, as being almost the only one which was made without loss by straggling, and the only one made in accordance with army regulations.

Six months afterward, when the allowance of wagons was only three to each regiment, we laughed as we remembered the twenty-three wagons which were required for this first movement of ours. Our route covered sixteen miles, when, if the order had been decently explicit, only eight miles would have been required, but we soon learned that it was one of the customs of the service to make the orders as blind as possible.

Before nightfall our camp was made and our guards posted. No military authority had ever notified us of a countersign, we therefore as usual made our own, and consequently before morning bagged a half dozen of the officers from the neighboring forts, who were ignorant of it.

A Rhode Island Regiment, (Colonel Bliss’,) and one from Pennsylvania arrived the next day, and for several days we were in constant expectation of a brigadier, but before he turned up, June 29th, an order came for the 32d to be mustered early on the 30th by its commanding officer, and thereafter to proceed forthwith to Alexandria, where transportation would be in readiness to take the command to Fort Monroe. At 11 A. M., we were in the street at Alexandria with all our baggage train, but the General commanding there was drunk, the Post Quartermaster insolent, and nobody had ever heard anything about us or our transportation. After waiting until 4 P. M., receiving no orders nor even replies from Washington to our telegrams, we concluded to operate on our own hook, and when the Steamer Hero came to a landing near by, we took possession of her as a “military necessity,” coaled her and started for our destination.

We found the aforesaid “military necessity” to be a poor shattered concern, already deeply laden with ammunition. The captain and crew were not in an amiable frame of mind at being so unceremoniously gobbled up. They refused to allow the men to make coffee at the boiler fires, and when ordered to do so, the engineers and firemen left their posts in high dudgeon; but when they found that we had a plenty of men competent to run the boat, and that it was their rations, not ours, that were stopped, they very submissively returned to their duty.

We arrived at Fort Monroe early on the 2d of July, and reported to General Dix, commanding that post. Here we heard of the seven days fighting across the Peninsula, and found the air full of exciting and contradictory rumors as to the incidents and result of the battles. Even General Dix had no precise information as to the whereabouts of General McClellan, but he knew that he wanted more men and wanted them quick, and we were directed without disembarking to proceed up the river until we found the army. Facilities were provided for cooking the necessary rations, and early in the afternoon, after receiving repeated injunctions to take every precaution against falling into the hands of the enemy, we weighed anchor and steamed away up the James. Our heavily-laden boat could not make the distance by daylight, and we passed the night at anchor in the river, with steam up and a large guard on duty, and with the early dawn were again underweigh, in search of the army.

To this time the Regiment had practically lived by itself; it had known nothing of generals, and not much of army men, but the time had come when it was to be absorbed into the army as a drop into the ocean.

III.
ON THE PENINSULA.

IT was yet early morning when we steamed over Harrison Bar, and saw evidences of the vicinity of the Army of the Potomac. We had previously met quite a number of steamboats bound down the river, apparently heavily loaded with passengers; and now, as the river widened out into a lake or bay, we came upon a large fleet of various kinds of crafts, freighted with ordnance, quartermaster’s and commissary stores, some at anchor in the river, and some hauled up to the left bank unloading their freight. The river banks were too high to enable us to see beyond, but all along them were men sitting or lying on the slopes, or bathing in the water. There were teams of mules driven down to drink, and wagoners using heavy whips and great oaths to persuade their beasts to draw the loaded wains up the rough tracks, cut diagonally into the faces of the bank.

As our steamer entered upon this stirring scene the musicians were ordered to the bows of the boat, and we moved on with our drums beating cheerily. We passed one long wharf, reaching out into the river, and thereabout saw a few tents and great piles of stores on the shore; then pushing our reconnoissance up the river, saw the army signs gradually disappear from the banks, until at length opening a reach of the river we could see the gunboats, the slow booming of whose guns had been heard long before; and here a guard-boat hailed to warn us to go no farther.

Satisfied that the wharf, which we had passed, was the proper place for our landing, we turned and steamed slowly in that direction. Presently a boat put off from the bank with an officer who signalled for the steamer to stop, came alongside, and delivered to our Colonel a torn fragment of a second-hand and soiled envelope, on which, in pencil, was scrawled the following order, our first from the headquarters of the Army of the Potomac:—

“To commanding officer of troops on steamer. Land your men at once and move direct up the road, and report to me at my headquarters, where you will be stopped. Come up with arms and ammunition (40 or 60 cartridges each man).

“This order is from General McClellan.
“F. J. PORTER, Brig. Gen.”

In obedience to the order we hauled up to the wharf, and the men being already supplied with ammunition, but little time was lost in forming upon the pier. Leaving there a few men to unload and guard the baggage, we moved up to the shore.

It is General Trochu who writes, that upon approaching an army from the rear in time of battle, one always sees the same sights, conveying to one’s mind the idea of a disorderly mob, and the fear of a great disaster. Our approach to the Army of the Potomac was from the rear in time of battle, and our experience confirms Trochu.

At the head of the wharf a mass of men were striving to pass the guard, hoping to get away on the steamer which had brought us. Passing them, we looked for the road up which we were ordered to move “direct.” In every direction, and as far as we could see, the soil which twenty-four hours before had been covered with promising crops of almost ripened grain, was trodden into a deep clay mud,—so deep and so adhesive as, in several cases, to pull the boots and stockings from the soldiers’ feet, and so universal as to have obliterated every sign of the original road. Everywhere were swarms of men in uniform, tattered and spattered with mud, but with no perceptible organization, wading through the pasty ground. On and near the river bank were open boxes, barrels, casks, and bags of provision and forage, from which each man supplied himself without the forms of requisition, issue, or receipt. Everywhere too were mule-wagon teams struggling in the mire, and the air resounded with the oaths of the drivers, the creaking of the wagons, the voices of men shouting to each other, the bray of hungry mules, and the noise of bugle and drum calls, with an accompaniment of artillery firing on land and water.

To all these were added, when we appeared, shouts, not of hearty welcome and encouragement, such as we might naturally have expected from an overtasked army to its first reinforcement, but in derision of our clean dress and exact movements—warnings of terrible things awaiting us close at hand—questions as to how our patriotism was now—not one generous cheer.

Officers and men alike joined in this unseemly behavior, and even now when we know, as we did not then, the story of the terrible days of battle through which they had passed, and the sufferings that they had patiently endured, we cannot quite forgive their unmannerly reception of a recruiting force.

Through all this we succeeded in finding General Porter’s headquarters, and by his direction were guided to a position a mile or more distant, and placed in line of battle with other troops in face of a thick wood, and then learned that we were assigned to the brigade of General Charles Griffin, division of General Morell, in Fitz John Porter’s, afterward known as the Fifth army corps.

As soon as we were fairly in position our Colonel sought for the brigadier. The result was not exactly what his fancy may have painted. On a small heap of tolerably clean straw he found three or four officers stretched at full length, not very clean in appearance and evidently well nigh exhausted in condition. One of them, rather more piratical looking than the others, owned that he was General Griffin, and endeavored to exhibit some interest in the addition to his command, but it was very reluctantly that he acceded to the request that he would show himself to the Regiment, in order that they might be able to recognize their brigade commander.

After a time however, the General mounted and rode to the head of our column of divisions. The Colonel ordered “attention” and the proper salute, and said: “Men, I want you to know and remember General Griffin, our Brigadier General.” Griffin’s address was perhaps the most elaborate he had ever made in public. “We’ve had a tough time men, and it is not over yet, but we have whaled them every time and can whale them again.”

Our men, too well disciplined to cheer in the ranks, received the introduction and the speech, so far as was observed, in soldierly silence, but months afterward the General told that he heard a response from one man in the ranks who said, “Good God! is that fellow a general.” We all came to know him pretty well in time, and to like him too, and some of us to mourn deeply when he died of the fever in Texas, after the surrender.

The officers of our Field and Staff found in the edge of the wood just in front of the Regiment, a spot somewhat drier than the average, and occupied it, but not without opposition. A long and very muddy corporal was gently slumbering there, and on waking, recognized his disturbers by their clean apparel as new comers, and thought they might be raw. Pointing to an unexploded shell which lay near him on the ground, he calmly advised the officers not to stop there, as “a good many of them things had been dropping in all the morning.” His strategy proved unsuccessful, for he was ranked out of his comfortable quarters and told to join his regiment.

After all, the day passed without an engagement, and the sound of guns gradually died away, until near evening, when the Brigade was moved about two miles away and bivouacked in a wood of holly trees, the men making beds of green corn-stalks, and going to them singing and laughing.

After the excitement of the day all slept soundly, but before midnight the Colonel was aroused by an orderly to receive a circular order which stated that owing to certain movements of the enemy, commanding officers were to hold their commands on the alert. Not knowing what commanding officers were expected to do when they “held their commands on the alert,” the Colonel accompanied the General’s orderly to the headquarters of the 9th Massachusetts near by, and waited while its commander was aroused, and until he had perused the same order. Observing that after reading it the veteran quietly turned over and settled himself for a fresh nap, our Colonel returned to his repose, merely taking the precaution to have the horses saddled and bridled, by which bit of innocent faith in orders for alert, he lost the use of his saddle which had made an excellent pillow. The next day we received our baggage and moved out of the wood, pitching our camp in regulation shape.

I fear that the display of a full allowance of round Fremont tents may have caused some heart burnings among our neighbors, who had nothing but shelter tents. It is certain that they were still inclined to scoff at our peculiarities, and already the demoralizing effect of the prevalent negligence was felt in our ranks, for one of our captains, always before rather distinguished for the nicety of his dress, soon appeared splashed with mud from head to foot, and when asked why he did not remove it, he pleaded that it was the uniform of the Army of the Potomac.

Whoever, without a vast preponderance of forces, makes war to capture Richmond, must have the James River for his base of supply and must be able to control Harrison Landing.

When the campaign of the Army of the Potomac began, the iron-clad Merrimac barred access to the James, and the Army, which by way of that River might, without delay or loss, have flanked Magruder back to Malvern Hill, landed at Harrison’s and operated on Richmond over a healthy and dry country, comparatively free from natural obstacles,—was compelled to resort to the narrow and tortuous Pamunkey, and to flounder among swamps and river crossings, always exposed to fight at disadvantage, and always weakened physically and mentally by the malaria of the marshes.

When, by the destruction of the Merrimac, the James was made available, the mind of General McClellan reverted to his original preference. For a long time he waited and stretched out his right wing to facilitate junction with McDowell, but when the last hope of that aid had disappeared, he hastened to abandon the Pamunkey for the broader and safer James. The movement was actually in progress when Johnston attacked what was already the rear of McClellan’s column. During each day of that battle-week, the trains moved and the army fought, and every night the army abandoned the scene of a successful defence to close in upon the banks of the river, where alone they could hope for the supplies which they needed and the repose they had won.

The day before we joined, these rough and grimy troops had fought at Malvern perhaps the hardest of their fights, and had won the most complete of all their victories. And now they were again in communication with the North—in possessions of the very key to Richmond—holding Lee as it were by a cord from any movement North, and needing only the assistance of a tithe of the new levies to drive or flank him further south. But it pleased God that this should not be until years had passed away.

If there be on the face of the earth a place intended for breeding pestilence, the country about Harrison’s and Westover was ordained to that use. One of our officers who had travelled the wide world all over, declared that the climate resembled no place except Sierra Leone on the African coast. Its reputation as an unwholesome spot is established even among the natives of Virginia, and whoever desires any additional testimony, need only to apply to one who has sweltered there through July and August.

To the natural disadvantages of the locality, were now added those many sources of sickness which always accompany an army. The effect of the climate was not only debilitating to the body, but was enervating to the will, and negligence of proper precautions against camp diseases was added to all other predisposing causes in reducing the strength of the army.

The 32d, almost fresh from the sea air of New England, suffered undoubtedly more than those regiments which had been in some degree acclimated. Almost every officer and man was affected. For weeks over one-third of the command was on the sick list, and not less than a hundred and fifty men who then left the Regiment for hospital or on sick leave, never returned to our colors.

Such a mixture of moisture and drouth, of mud and dust, cannot be conceived. The air was filled at times with an impalpable dust which was actually a visible malaria. The marsh near our camp was beautiful to see, white with its vast numbers of plants like lilies which threw up great spikes of flowers, but the excess of perfume was so sickening as but little to be preferred to the odor of carrion, which came to us when the wind changed to the westward.

Men sickened and died in a day, and the whole Regiment lost its brisk military ways and degenerated very nearly to the shiftless, listless level of the rest of the army. Drills could not be kept up, parades were discontinued, and the attention of the officers was concentrated upon the preservation of cleanliness in the camp, the improvement of the food, and the necessary duties. Here occurred the first death among our officers, for Lieutenant Nathaniel French, jr., died August 9th of the malarial fever.

Large details were made from the Regiment for guards, our reputation for that duty having become unpleasantly good. Eighty men and three officers were at one time serving as guards over the quartermaster’s stores, on the river bank. It was while they were there, that enterprising John Reb. brought some field pieces down to Coggins’ Point, just opposite to us on the James, and opened fire about midnight, first upon the shipping in the river, and afterward upon our camps.

Two of the officers of our detached party, after the freshness of the alarm had passed, were sitting in their shelter tent with their feet to the foe, watching as they would any pyrotechnic display, the flash of the guns, and the curves described by the burning fuses, when one of the guns was turned and discharged, as it seemed, directly at our friends, who, dodging at the same moment, struck their heads together and fell, each under the impression that the enemy’s shell had struck him.

It was on this occasion that Colonel Sawtelle, the officer in charge of the transportation—our quartermaster said he was the only regular officer within his experience who could do his duty and be civil too—emerged from his tent at the sound of firing and stood upon the bank gazing silently and sorrowfully upon his defenceless fleet, among which the shells were exploding merrily. Soon his silence broke into a shout to his superior, “Look here Ingalls, if this thing isn’t stopped pretty quick, the A. P. is a busted concern.”

In the regimental camp a half mile away, the shelling did no serious damage, but produced some commotion. One of the officers complained that every time that he got comfortably settled for sleep, a shell would knock the pillow out from under his head; in emulation of which story, a sailor in D Company declared that he slept through the whole affair, but in the morning counted twenty-three solid shot piled up against his back, that hit but had not waked him.

Nearly two months had elapsed since we left Massachusetts with the promise that the four Companies required to complete our Regiment should be speedily recruited and forwarded, but we heard nothing of them. The home newspapers told of the 33d Regiment as being full, and of the 34th and 35th as in process of formation, but the 32d seemed to have been forgotten. The Lieutenant Colonel addressed a letter to the Governor upon the subject, and forwarded a copy of his letter to the headquarters of the Army of the Potomac. Within twenty-four hours an order was published in which, among others, was the name of our commanding officer as detailed on recruiting service. Upon application to Adjutant General Williams for an explanation of the detail, he learned that the order meant that he was to go for those four companies, and leaving Captain Stephenson, who for a long time had been Acting Major, in command, the Colonel went to Massachusetts on recruiting duty, from which duty, to the best of his knowledge, he has to this day never been relieved.

He was barely gone before Company G reported, commanded by Captain Charles Bowers—Charles O. Shepard being First Lieutenant, and Edward T. Bouvé, Second Lieutenant. When we got far enough away from the depressing effect of that infamous climate, and attained sufficient animation to joke, we used to call this Company our second battalion.

There may occur no better place than this for a brief dissertation concerning the high and deep mysteries which hung about quartermastering.

When we were at the Fort, the officers—who, by regulation, were allowed a certain number of candles per month—expressed a very unanimous preference for kerosene lamps, which had then recently come in vogue. Lamps, wicks, and oil were benignantly supplied by the quartermaster at the Post, but at the end of a month that officer presented for approval and signature, requisitions and receipts for many candles. We dreamed of a nice job at court-martial on the Q. M., but soon learned that by a fiction of the department, no light was recognized other than that of candles, and receipts given for candles covered lamps, wicks, chimneys, and oil.

Whether the Quartermasters’ Department has yet discovered the use of petroleum, who can tell? Our Quartermaster Pearson never joined the Regiment after it left Massachusetts, but was detailed principally in charge of matters at the recruiting post and camp at Readville. Lieutenant Hoyt of B Company was detailed and served for several years as acting quartermaster. When he was detailed the term of his detail was of course problematical, and there was too much uncertainty, as he thought, to justify the investment required for the purchase of a horse; but he must ride. With that straightforwardness which comes from innocence and ignorance alike, a requisition was made upon the proper officer for a saddle and horse for the use of the quartermaster.

If we had stolen the military chest of the army no greater outcry could have been made; the application was rejected with contumely. For the next day or two Quartermaster Hoyt appeared to be absorbed in the study of the rules and regulations, articles of war, and circulars of his department. From this course of reading he emerged with unclouded brow and a new requisition. This time it was for an ambulance, a horse, and a harness, to which every battalion was entitled, and the articles required were promptly delivered. Two days later he returned the ambulance and harness as not wanted, and kept the horse, which was always ridden by the quartermaster; but was always known as the ambulance horse.

It is a little in advance of our main story, but it may as well be told here how Hoyt flanked the Division Quartermaster. When the regimental property was unloaded from the transport at Acquia Creek, and only the afternoon before we marched, it was found that one of our wagons was sick in a hind wheel, and as it was almost sure to break down if the wagon was loaded, our quartermaster endeavored to turn it in to the Division Quartermaster, and to obtain a sound wagon in its place. There were plenty of new wagons in the Division depot, but the officer was ugly and refused the exchange; when it was persistently urged, the superior grew wroth and vowed vows, and told our quartermaster that he wouldn’t get any wagon out of him, and that he might help himself if he could.

Hoyt did help himself that night by taking, under cover of the darkness, a sound wheel from a wagon in the Division train, and putting our rotten one in its place. There was a great row after we started next morning about the breaking down of a wagon, but our train was all right.

Not many days after our arrival at Harrison’s Landing, July 8th, President Lincoln visited and reviewed the army. Having faith—in some respects resembling a mustard seed—we believe that he reviewed the 32d. What we know is, that after waiting in position with the whole of our division, from four o’clock in the afternoon until nine o’clock in the evening, during the last three hours of which time we mourned our delayed suppers, and possibly spoke evil of dignities, we saw in the uncertain moonlight a party of horsemen ride along our front, one of whom sat his horse like Andrew Jackson, and wore a stove-pipe hat, and then we were allowed to go to our camp and our rations.

Where there are no newspapers, rumors are always plenty, and the army abounded in rumors. One day it was reported that our corps was to cross the river and march on Petersburg; another day we were told the army was about to move on Richmond, and that we were to assault Fort Darling. General Hooker made a reconnoissance in the direction of Malvern, and it was immediately reported that he had penetrated the defences of Richmond.

For two weeks orders were received almost daily with regard to the removal of the sick, and the disposal of camp equipage and all extra baggage, and rumors grew more and more wild and contradictory. After the fearful ordeal of the malarial sickness, it is not surprising that the intimation that the army was about to enter upon a new campaign was hailed with something akin to delight, even by those who realized the dangers of battle, and the toil of more active service. At last the orders came for the movement, and it was not upon Petersburg, or Fort Darling, or Richmond, but toward Fort Monroe.

The orders found us ready and exceedingly willing to leave a spot crowded with sad and bitter experience, such as we can not even now recall without a thrill almost of horror.

The marches of the 32d Regiment might claim quite as much place, if not more, in its history, than the battles in which it took part, but they would hardly be as attractive to the reader. At all events the incidents of a march, exciting or not, stand a much better chance of accurate narration than those of a battle where haste may obscure the memory, and passion confuse the description.

In military campaigns as in civil life, patience and endurance will win as against courage and elan. The first are the qualities of highest value in marches, the second are those conspicuous in battle. And it may be safely said, that the qualities in soldiers which make good marching, are rarer than those which make good fighting. At least the troops which the General will prize the most are those which march the best: i. e., those in whom either esprit-du-corps or discipline is strong enough to prevent straggling on toilsome marches. Those who marched in good form, and came into bivouac at night with full ranks were sure to be ready and available at the moment of battle, whether they fought well or not; and per contra, it was frequently observed that those regiments that straggled most upon the march, were conspicuous among the great army of “bummers” at the rear in the time of battle, and, if engaged with the enemy, were the first to break into rout and dismay.

Now as the 32d Massachusetts was on many occasions rather conspicuous for good solid marching, that fact should not be forgotten in its history.

On the morning of a march the question usually was, “Who has the advance to-day?” In a succession of days’ marching, the regiments took turns in leading, according to an established rule. Breakfast over, the bugle sounded, first at Division-headquarters, then at brigade, and last at each regiment, everybody fell into his place, and the bugle sounded again “forward.” After many halts and hitches, unless we happened to be at the head of the column, we finally swung into the regular marching gait. This was not fast, rarely exceeding three miles an hour and oftener two miles or thereabouts, including halts.

The manner and method of the march,—with its object there was seldom any disposition to meddle,—were often severely criticised both by men and officers. For instance, a day’s march of which the objective point might be quite distant, say 25 or 30 miles, would be begun before daylight, and then conducted in great part as though there was no fixed intention of going any where at all. This would be a ground for grumbling. Marching out of a comfortable camp at midnight, moving only a little way, and then halting and lying round without orders for hours, then moving again at day-break at a snail’s pace, without having broken our fast, and keeping on in this way until near noon, with no orders for halt and breakfast; and thus on through a whole livelong day of heat or dust, or it might be of snow or rains or chilling winds, until late in the afternoon; horses not fed or unsaddled, men with blankets and equipments on, flinging themselves on the ground at every wait as if in disgust. Here was more ground for grumbling. At length late in the afternoon, when patience and strength were all but exhausted, we would strike into a pace of three miles or more an hour, which would be kept up hour after hour without a moment’s rest. Then would begin the straggling, men would throw away their overcoats and blankets as too burdensome to carry, although the loss might be bitterly regretted at the next bivouac, and would make their fires, rest and cook their coffee, under the very guns of the enemy, in defiance of danger of death or capture, and in spite of command or threats of court-martial. The regimental column would be reduced to the size of a company, and the men would be found strewed along the roadside, sick or used up, many not rejoining their companies until the bugles sounded “forward” on the following day. This style of marching was frequent in the earlier campaigns of the Army of the Potomac, but was afterwards much amended and improved upon. An excellent rule adopted at a later period was to march the column steadily for one hour, and then call a halt on the bugle for ten or fifteen minutes. But the important point of so ordering a march that the column should move rapidly during the cool hours of the morning and evening, halting for an hour or two at noon, was seldom reached. It is presumable that in many, perhaps in most cases, marches were made loitering and toilsome, (as above described,) by unavoidable and obvious causes. The insufficiency of the roads, there being but one, or their bad condition, crowding the way with cattle sometimes driven in the line of march; troops going to the rear with prisoners, or passing to the front; skirmishing with the enemy; difficult fords, or broken bridges, or the laying of pontoons; all these, or any of them, might cause delay. Or orders might require the troops to be hurried forward, and the march, too hastily begun, would be impeded by crowding or by the necessity of cavalry, artillery, or ammunition being sent forward.

To sketch a march is an exceedingly difficult thing because there is presented to the observer such a multitude of features, none of which can be slighted or left out; and these features are so varied, and present themselves in such endless succession and constantly changing interest, that the mind becomes confused.

On the occasion of our first march with the Army of the Potomac, the men, in the worst possible condition to support fatigue, weakened by sickness, softened by six weeks of inaction, and enervated by a debilitating climate, were marched out of camp at about midnight, then halted and kept in expectation of immediate departure for seven hours, then when the mid-summer sun had attained nearly its full heat, were put upon the route, and with no formal halt, but with much hesitation and frequent delay, were kept in the column fourteen weary hours.

At eleven o’clock at night, on the 15th, the Captain commanding reached the end of the day’s march on the left bank of the Chickahominy, and encamped with less than thirty men, who alone had been able to keep up with the column. All night long the men came toiling in, and by the next daylight nearly all had again joined the command.

From this by easier marches, passing Williamsburg, Yorktown, and Big Bethel, we arrived August 19th at Newport News. Each day’s march showed better results—officers and men gaining in health and strength as they increased their distance from Westover, and when the first breeze came to them over the salt water, the refreshing sensation was quaintly declared to be like breathing ice cream.

An amusing incident is recalled of our start from Yorktown. We broke camp at 7 A. M., 18th August. The headquarters officers’ mess of our Regiment had been fortunate enough to confiscate a “muell” on the previous day; his temper proved to be not child-like nor yet bland. Upon this creature’s back was loaded the kit, consisting of pots, pans, kettles, plates, etc., etc., with whatever bread, sugar, and other rations were in stock. The whole affair was in charge of a darkey. The kit was packed in two large sacks, to be hung across the mule’s back, like panniers, and on top of these were piled a few bulky articles, camp-chairs, and such like nick-nacks. When fully loaded little was to be seen of “the insect,” except his ears and his legs. The darkey being discouraged in the legs had made up his mind, as soon as it could be done without being seen by the officers, to mount upon the top of this pyramid of pots and pans, and to have a ride. The mule, however, had other views. As the column filed off down the hill, rough with stumps, and ending in a morass, we looked back and saw Mr. Mule arguing and expostulating, mule-fashion, with Mr. Cuffy. At length, however, he apparently yielded to the superior forensic skill of the latter, and allowed himself to be mounted. Yet, as the sequel showed, there was a mental reservation. After wheeling round and round several times, as if to look the ground over thoroughly and examine this new question on all sides, the mule laid back his long ears, stretched his neck, and bolted straight down the hill. He stopped suddenly at the edge of the swamp, planted his fore-feet, raised his hindquarters, and sent the other contraband-of-war some distance into the swamp, while the kettles, and coffee, etc., of the headquarters mess strewed the ground in all directions. Thereafter it was remarked that that darkey invariably led that mule; also, that several little utensils, such as cups and saucers, were missing from the table of the mess.

IV.
CAMPAIGNING UNDER POPE.

AT Newport News the Regiment immediately embarked on the transport steamer Belvidere for Acquia Creek, thence by railroad it was forwarded to Stafford Court House, near Fredericksburg, and on the 22d of August encamped in a pleasant grove not far from Barnett’s Ford, on the upper Rappahannock, in which agreeable and comparatively salubrious locality we enjoyed a welcome rest of several days, but we were very hungry. Our position was at too great distance to receive regular supplies from Burnside at Acquia, and General Pope did not consider bases of supplies of any importance.

On Saturday, the 23d, distant firing was heard in the direction of the upper fords of the Rappahannock. On Tuesday, the 26th, one wagon came up for each regiment, and early on the 27th we moved along the river, past roads leading to Kemper’s and Kelly’s Fords, as far as Bealton, on the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, then up the railroad track towards Manassas. The sound of artillery was often audible in advance.

This march was made through a country parched by the heat of a Southern mid-summer, the troops always enveloped in clouds of dust, the few wells and watering-places constantly in possession of a struggling crowd which barred out the weak who needed water most, and it cannot be a matter for surprise, but indeed it was a matter for grief, that hundreds of the soldiers fell exhausted by the wayside, to die in the fields, or in prison to suffer what was worse than death.

That evening we bivouacked near Warrenton Junction, in a large wood, the men as they came in throwing themselves upon the ground, hastening to get their needed sleep. The officers (who could not draw rations) felt the want of food even more than the men. The field and staff mess could offer only some wretched cakes of corn bread.

On the morning of the 28th, before many of us had fairly tasted sleep, we were aroused with orders to prepare for the march. The night was yet intensely dark and it was difficult to find the way out from the wood. The staff officers who, guided by our camp-fires, came to lead us out upon the road, a distance of three hundred yards—were obliged to acknowledge their inability to do so. At last a negro servant of the Surgeon, escorted by soldiers having lighted candles in the muzzles of their rifles, guided the Regiment and the brigade out of the wood to the roadway. Here we found the way blocked by a battery, and resort was had to torches, by whose light the men, in single file, picked their way through the obstructions. Then there was a long wait for Sykes’ division, and after his files had flitted by like shadows in the darkness, there came a grey daylight through the fog, by which, with great trouble we were able to move slowly on our route, winding in and out among the wagons which also had been impeded by thick darkness. At length we moved pretty rapidly in the direction of Manassas, following the line of the railway. At Catlett’s a train of cars was seen which had been fired and partially destroyed; near by we passed a headquarters camp, said to have been General Pope’s, which had evidently been raided by the enemy. At intervals we could hear the sound of fighting, at the north and northeast, sometimes pretty near, and we were hurried forward as rapidly as possible. At Kettle Run we saw evidences of the battle which Hooker had fought there with Ewell’s corps, and saw many prisoners and wounded men. Here the fighting seemed to be northwest from us; as we crossed Broad Run, about sundown, it was nearly due north.

A day of hot sun and stifling dust was this 28th day of August; on every side were evidences that there had been heavy fighting. The railroad track had been torn up and its bridges destroyed, clearly by the rebels. The trains of wagons, the batteries, the troops of all arms that we passed or that passed us this day, were wonderful for number.

We encamped upon a large plain, a half mile beyond the Run, while the sound of artillery and musketry on our left was very distinctly heard.

At dawn next morning, Friday, August 29th, we marched toward Manassas Junction. Rapid and fierce fighting on our left, in the direction of Bull Run. At the Junction, what had been a long train of luggage cars, loaded with army equipments, clothing, and supplies, was found a heap of smouldering ruins, and the track and bridges had been destroyed and were yet burning. Looking to the north the smoke of battle could be plainly discerned, marked by white puffs of bursting shells, and the sound of artillery was faintly heard; a long line of dust extended from Thoroughfare Gap into and apparently beyond the field of battle.

After a brief halt on the heights of Manassas, we countermarched and took the road to Gainesville, which here is nearly parallel to the Manassas Gap Railroad; we passed McDowell’s corps, lying along the roadside a mile or so from the Junction. They cheered and told us to “go in” and said that they had enough of it, etc. All this time we had had no chance to eat or drink, and nobody seemed to understand our movements. The wildest rumors were afloat; now that Pope was cut off and captured—now that Jackson was surrounded, pressed by Siegel, and trying to escape by Aldie—now that there was a large force in our rear, and that we were cut off from Washington. Then, and this seemed true, that Lee or Longstreet was bringing up reinforcements to Jackson by Thoroughfare Gap, and that Siegel, or McDowell, or Banks, or somebody unknown, was trying to prevent this movement.

After passing McDowell’s men we marched rapidly, and when five and a half or six miles out from Manassas Junction, came to a bold elevation of cleared land, extending from the road to the railway, and on a line nearly parallel could see a long line of dust marking the line upon which the enemy was moving; and when there were openings in the wood, which for the most part masked the moving column, we could with a good glass see their artillery, infantry, and trains.

The cloud of dust which revealed the march of the enemy along our front was lost on the right, where it passed over a low wooded ridge, beyond which was seen the battle smoke. The guns could be heard only faintly by us in our high position, and must have been inaudible in the woods of the valley below.

Upon this hill we were deployed, and guns were brought up and placed in position. Our brigade (Griffin’s) started out on the right flank, moved over the railroad track and for some distance into the woods, with skirmishers thrown out in the front and on the flank, but finding no practicable way through the woods returned and drew up on the hill. Two or three regiments were deployed to the front as skirmishers and sent down the hill and across the valley, as if to feel of the enemy, whose column continued to pour down from Thoroughfare, turning to the northeast at a point about two miles away—at or near Gainesville.

Generals Porter and McDowell, with other generals and their staff, stood in a group; the infantry was closed in mass and the batteries ready for action when, from a corn-field in the flank of the marching column in the valley, there suddenly curled a wreath of smoke, and then another and another. A round shot buried itself in the face of the hill, throwing up a cloud of dust; then one after the other two shells burst close to the general officers, killing two men of our brigade. Our own batteries promptly replied and silenced the guns in front, but they opened again further to the right with such a rake upon our infantry as to make it prudent to withdraw them to the cover of the ground. Evidently our General intended an attack, and everything was ready; but the remonstrances of Morell and Marshall prevailed upon Porter to countermand the order, and we finally bivouacked upon the hill.

On the 30th, before day-break, we took the road with orders to proceed to Centreville. Our brigade was to cover the rear in this movement, and of course was preceded in the march by the supply train of the corps. Before breakfast we had crossed Bull Run at Blackburn’s Ford. It seems that orders had been sent to change the destination of our corps, but the officer charged with their delivery having followed back the column until he reached the trains, gave orders to the quartermaster in charge of them to continue on to Centreville, and either did not know or entirely forgot that our Brigade was beyond the wagons; whence it happened that while the rest of our corps was in battle on the Gainesville road, we were waiting at Centreville, wondering where they were, hearing the roar of battle as it drew nearer and nearer to our hillside, and constantly expecting orders.

At about four o’clock we started for the field of battle. Almost immediately we came upon swarms of stragglers, who had left their ranks, and who were full of stories of regiments all cut up, as well as of their individual prowess. Then came crowds of wounded men, ambulances, wagons, empty caissons, until at last the road was fairly blocked with officers and men in no order, horses, wagons, and batteries. Men were running, panting, cursing, and some worn out and exhausted had thrown themselves upon the ground by the roadside utterly indifferent to their fate; and now we knew that this was the route of an exhausted army, and that our duty was to guard their rear.

Forcing our way through all, just as we came to the well-ordered but retreating lines, night came on; and although there were yet sounds of desultory firing, and occasional shot or shells plunging and exploding about us, the fight was over, and in the gloom of night we marched slowly back with the throng of troops to the heights of Centreville.

Next morning, Sunday, August 31st, 1862, it was raining hard. The scene of confusion about us beggars description, and everybody was hungry, wet, and dispirited. Before noon, however, order began to come out of chaos. Men found their colors, and regiments and brigades their appointed stations, and our Brigade moved out upon the Gainesville Pike to receive the first onset of the enemy. Our position was on the right of the turnpike, and the line extended north and east toward Fairfax, with a strong picket two or three hundred yards in front, and here we passed the afternoon in quiet.

All day Monday, September 1st, trains of ambulances, under flags of truce, were going out to the field of battle and returning loaded with wounded men. The weather continued cold and rainy, with a northeast wind. Toward evening the sound of fighting was heard in the direction of Chantilly. The men were wet to the skin, rations exhausted, no fires allowed. Surgeons coming in from the battle-field reported the enemy in great force a very short distance out on the turnpike, and on the old Warrenton Road, waiting the order to attack. The night was passed in misery; the hazard of our position forbade sleep, and comfort was impossible. The army had moved from Centreville, in our rear, and at 3 A. M. we drew in our pickets and moved quietly away.

Looking back as we left Centreville, we saw the enemy coming into the town in great numbers, but they made no attack. At Fairfax Court House we met large bodies of troops; thence, taking a northeast course, we passed Vienna, and toward evening struck the Leesburg Turnpike. Beyond Levinsville we were met by General McClellan, who was enthusiastically greeted by the troops, and at 11 P. M. we bivouacked at Langley’s, after a march of twenty-eight miles.

Wednesday, September 3d, we encamped on Miners Hill, near Falls Church, which was the locality of Porter’s command previous to the Peninsula campaign.

Our active campaign with the army of Virginia comprised only ten days as almanacs count time, but these were days so full of excitement and of incident that memory recalls a whirl of occurrences and events, succeeding so rapidly one to another that it is with difficulty one can separate them. There are pictures, but they are changing with the rapidity of those of the kaleidoscope.

One scene constantly recurring, not only on this, but on many another march, presents to us again the array of sick or exhausted men, who strewed the route of the hurried columns—their pinched and worn faces—their eyes half closed, gazing into space—their bodies crouched or cramped with pain, supported against trees or fences, or lying prone upon the ground; the men almost always clinging to their rifles. “If one had told me yesterday,” said an officer on his first march with the army, “that I could pass one man so stricken, and not stop to aid or console him, I should have resented the charge as a slander, and already I have passed hundreds.” Many, many such, necessarily abandoned to their fate, crept into the woods and died. Under repeated orders, all men absent and not accounted for, should have been reported as deserters, but Captains were more merciful than the orders, and few were found to brand as ignominious the names of men who deserved rather to be canonized as martyrs.

Another memory is of a gallant Captain of artillery, whose battery marched just in advance of our Regiment—of an aide galloping back and wheeling to the Captain’s side to communicate an order—the quick question, “where?” a short answer, a note of a bugle, and the Captain dashes off to our left, followed by his battery—the thunderous rumble of caissons and gun-carriages dying away as they pass out of our sight over a swell of land. It is strange that as this scene is recalled where a fellow-soldier rushed to immediate death, a prominent feature of the picture is the vivid color of the mass of blue flowers which clothed the entire field through which his battery dashed away from our column.

Another turn of the mnemonic glass, and we see the country about Manassas trodden into a vast highway. Just there Stuart had captured a train laden with quartermaster’s stores, and the ground all about was strewn with broken cases and what had been their contents—new uniforms, underclothing, hats and shoes, from which men helped themselves at will, leaving the old where they found the new. Near by, on the railroad track, waited a long train loaded with sick and wounded—the cars packed full, and many lying on the top unsheltered in the sun.

Yet again, and we are in sight of Thoroughfare, and see the long lines of dust revealing the march of Lee’s army down towards us from the Gap, and we remember the applause we gave when the first shell from Hazlitt’s parrot guns exploded exactly in a line of rebel infantry (scattering them as is rarely done except in cheap engravings), and how little we appreciated the like accuracy of aim by which an enemy’s shot killed two men in one of our own regiments.

And again there comes a mental photograph, date and locality indistinct, which represents nineteen officers gathered about a sumptuous repast, comprising three loaves of old bread, a fragment of cheese and a half canteen of water, almost as stale as the bread, and the careful watch of Field upon Staff and Staff upon Line, to see that only one swallow of water is taken by each in his turn.

And finally, we stand blocking the way to gaze upon a wrecked omnibus, inscribed—“Georgetown and Navy Yard”—one of many vehicles impressed in Washington and sent out as ambulances, and which, after reviving in us memories of civilization, was to become a trophy in the hands of the enemy.

V.
OUR THIRD BATTALION.

WHEN the 32d Regiment left Massachusetts in May, the war fever was raging, and it was supposed that it would be the work but of a few days to recruit the four companies required to complete the Regiment, and it was clearly understood that the first recruits were to be assigned to us. But being out of sight we were indeed out of mind, and the pressure of officers interested in constructing new regiments constantly delayed our claims to consideration.

In two months over three thousand volunteers had been accepted, of whom only one hundred (our Company G) had been assigned to us. The rendezvous for the Eastern part of the State was the camp at Lynnfield, which was placed under the command of Colonel Maggi, of the 33d. His own regiment occupied the chief part of the camp, and the only entrance to it was through his regimental guard. Both he and his Lieutenant Colonel, a young and handsome officer named Underwood, had a quick eye for a promising recruit, and as the constantly arriving volunteers passed within the lines, the best were drafted into the 33d, and the remainder were passed into the command of Major Wilde, whose camp was just beyond.

Dr. Edward A. Wilde, afterward Colonel of the 35th Massachusetts, and yet later Brigadier General of Volunteers, was commissioned, July 24th, 1862, to fill the then vacant majority in the 32d, and had been temporarily placed in charge of the unattached volunteers at Lynnfield, three hundred of whom had been roughly fashioned into companies, and were to be assigned to us.

Upon Colonel Parker’s return to Massachusetts, Governor Andrew gave to our matters his willing attention. Upon inspection of the three companies, the Colonel thought that he could do better than to take Colonel Maggi’s rejected recruits, and they were accordingly transferred to the 35th.

At the urgent request of the authorities of Newton, supported by the Honorable J. Wiley Edmands, a company raised entirely in that town was regimented in the 32d. A company from Charlestown was made the basis of Company I, and taking a lesson from Colonel Maggi, whose regiment happily was now filled, a third company was organized at the camp by selecting from the town quotas the choicest material, and passing over the remainder to the 35th. We were able to accomplish this by the active aid of our Major Wilde. If the Major had known that he was to be the first Colonel of the 35th, that regiment might perhaps have been benefited, but the 32d undoubtedly owed to his want of prophetic vision the fact that its 3d Battalion was composed of men in every respect equal to those of its First.

On the 2d of August the companies were detached from Major Wilde’s recruits and ordered to report to Colonel Parker, who at once moved them some eight hundred yards away, where they encamped in a charming spot, between the pond and the highway, until they should be provided with clothing, arms, and equipments.

The beauty and convenience of that camp has impressed its memory upon every soldier of the Battalion; but the proprietor of the land did not seem to be equally pleased with an arrangement to which very possibly his previous consent was not obtained; but if he expected to drive us away by removing the rope and bucket from the well near by, he was sadly disappointed. He presented to the Colonel a huge bill for the use of the premises, and for damages caused by the cutting down of a sapling elm, and the removal of a rod or two of stone wall. If he never collected it he should have been comforted by the fact that we never charged him for the construction of two good wells on the ground, and the stones of his fence may yet be found in the walls of those wells.

On the 6th Colonel Parker left to rejoin the regiment, leaving the Battalion to follow under Major Wilde, but the Major was promoted to the 35th, and it was not until the 20th that the three companies, commanded by the senior Captain (Moulton), left Lynnfield by railroad to Somerville, thence marching to Charlestown, where a generous entertainment had been provided for them by the citizens. That evening they left by the Providence Railroad—the entire route through the cities of Charlestown and Boston being one ovation. At Stonington they took the steamer, landing the next morning at Jersey City, and taking a train for Philadelphia. Through that good city they marched to the Cooper Refreshment Rooms, and being well fed and otherwise refreshed, moved thence to the Baltimore Station. It was well into the next day before they arrived in that town of doubtful loyalty, and it was morning on the 22d when they landed in Washington, and took up quarters at the railroad barracks.

While the commanding officer was endeavoring to find somebody to give him orders, several hours of liberty were allowed to the men, few of whom had ever seen Washington. It was not the quiet place that it had been when the right wing arrived there months before, but was again astir with signs of active war. The movement to effect a junction between the armies of Generals McClellan and Pope was in progress, and long trains of wagons were moving between Alexandria and the various depots of supplies, and ambulances loaded with sick and wounded streamed to and from the hospitals, while on the walks, men in uniforms, some brand new and some ragged and dirty, jostled each other; new recruits from the North—garrison men from the forts—stragglers and convalescents from the armies in the field.

If at the word hospital there is presented to the mind’s eye of the reader a spacious structure in stone or brick, covered with a dome and expanding into wings, all embosomed in a park-like enclosure, with verdant lawns shaded by trees and mottled with shrubbery, that reader did not go to muster in Virginia in ‘62. Provision thought to be ample had been made in Washington, by the construction in several unoccupied squares, of rows of detached wooden sheds, each of which was the ward of a hospital. Rough and unattractive as these appeared set down among the dusty streets, upon a plot of land from which every green thing was trodden out, their interiors were in fact models of neatness, and in some sort, of comfort. But the battles of the Peninsula had soon filled these, and when there were added to them the sick from McClellan’s army and the invalids from Pope’s, every available building was taken, and finally when within ten days, eight thousand patients were added from the James River, vacant house-lots were occupied, and for want of tents, awnings of sails or boards were laid over rough frames, and the passer-by could see the patients stretched upon the straw. The happy result of this, and other enforced experiments, was to prove that even these wretched makeshifts were better than close-walled houses, for hospital purposes.

On the 23d the Battalion marched over Long Bridge to the town of Alexandria—preferring at night the outside of the building designated to shelter them. The next day tents and wagons were obtained, and on the 25th their first camp was made on the hillside, near the Seminary.

Everything in that neighborhood was in confusion. During the week that the command remained encamped, Franklin’s and Sumner’s corps arrived at Alexandria, and not only was the town crowded with soldiers, but the woods were full of them, and all the energies of the authorities were devoted to endeavors to supply them, and push them out to the rescue of General Pope’s army.

Considering that nobody, not even the General-in-chief, knew where Pope’s army was, it is not surprising that all the efforts made by officers to find our Regiment were fruitless; indeed it mattered little that they were, for the wagons were taken away for the pressing service of more experienced troops, who were unable to move for want of transportation.

At last, on the 3d of September, the locality of Porter’s Corps was ascertained, and the Battalion joined the rest of the Regiment. There was a striking contrast in the appearance of the old and new companies. The three new companies outnumbered all the other seven. The veterans looked with wonder upon the fresh northern faces and the bright new uniforms, while the recruits scanned with at least equal surprise the mud-stained, worn, and weary men who were to be their comrades. So long were the new platoons, that the detachment was christened “Moulton’s Brigade,” but the superiority of numbers was not long with them, and two weeks of campaigning amalgamated the command.

The three companies comprising our “3d Battalion” were—

Company H, recruited at the Lynnfield Camp, commanded by Captain Henry W. Moulton; its Lieutenants were John H. Whidden and Joseph W. Wheelwright.

Company I, recruited in Charlestown, Captain Hannibal D. Norton; Lieutenants, Chas. H. Hurd and Lucius H. Warren, since Brevet Brigadier-General.

Company K, recruited in Newton, Captain J. Cushing Edmands, afterwards Colonel and Brevet Brigadier-General; Lieutenants, Ambrose Bancroft and John F. Boyd.

At Upton’s Hill the complete organization of the Regiment was published in the orders. The Lieutenant Colonel was promoted to be Colonel, Captain Prescott to be Lieutenant Colonel, and Captain Stephenson to be Major. The medical staff consisted of Z. Boylston Adams, Surgeon, with the rank of Major; William Lyman Faxon and W. H. Bigelow, Assistant Surgeons, ranking as First Lieutenants; W. T. M. Odiorne, Hospital Steward. The non-commissioned staff consisted of James P. Wade, Sergeant Major; James A. White, Quartermaster Sergeant; Charles E. Madden, Commissary Sergeant; and Freeman Field, Principal Musician.

Dr. Bigelow, Steward Odiorne, and Sergeant Madden, were new appointments. All the rest had been with the Regiment through all its experience in the field.

No chaplain was ever commissioned in the 32d, no application having ever been made on the part of the line officers, to whom belonged the initiative, and none being desired, so far as was known by any officer or man.

In an army composed of men of many different religious beliefs, as was the case in ours, the chaplains should constitute a staff corps, its members proportioned as to faith, in some degree to the requirements of the army, so that from the headquarters of an army or corps details might be made of the proper men for any required duty. Attached to regimental headquarters, they were very generally utterly inefficient for good professionally. It was the rule with us that, when any of the sick were near death, the fact should be reported to the commanding officer, who was often the first to communicate the tidings, and who invariably enquired of the dying man if he desired the service of a chaplain. When this was desired, an orderly was sent with the compliments of the Colonel, to some chaplain near by, to ask his attendance. With only rare exceptions such services were cheerfully and promptly rendered.

The burial service was usually read by the commanding officer over the bodies of our dead; but in one case, where the man had been a Roman Catholic, it was thought better to ask the attendance of a chaplain of that faith. It happened that the orderly could not readily find one, and could find only one, and returned with the unusual reply that the chaplain could not come.

Upon further inquiry it appeared that the orderly had presented the message, with the compliments of the Colonel, to the chaplain, who was reposing after dinner. “Was he a good Catholic?” enquired the priest. The orderly assured him that he was. “My compliments to the Colonel, then, and tell him he can bury him. It is all right.” With which reply the messenger was compelled to return. Failing the orderly’s assurance of the man’s good and regular standing, of course the chaplain would have escaped the duty too.

In November, 1862, our camp hospital offered merely a canvas tent for shelter, and some straw spread upon the frosty ground for bedding. One of the patients, in view of approaching death, expressed to the Adjutant his wish to be baptized, and of course a messenger was sent forth to seek a chaplain, with the customary compliments, and to ask his attendance on a dying man.

A chaplain promptly appeared at our headquarters, was escorted to the hospital tent and left at the side of the sick man. Very soon after, the Colonel, meeting the reverend officer pacing thoughtfully in the open air, stopped and enquired as to the patient’s condition. Evidently considerably embarrassed, the chaplain said “you did not tell me that the man wanted baptism.” “Very true,” was the reply, “but why is that any difficulty?” “Because,” rejoined the clergyman, hesitatingly, “I am of the Baptist persuasion, and this is no case for immersion.”

It was very awkward, but the Colonel, who had thought only of a chaplain as the proper officer for a present duty, apologized for his want of thought, thanked the gentleman, and said that he would try again, or if it became necessary, would himself administer the holy rite. The chaplain, however, requested a few minutes for reflection, at the end of which he decided to officiate himself and did so, first taking the precaution to enquire of the soldier whether he preferred immersion or sprinkling, the latter of which very naturally was elected.

VI.
THE ANTIETAM CAMPAIGN.

UNTIL September 12th, our Division remained at Upton’s Hill, while the rest of the Army of the Potomac drew off into Maryland in observation of General Lee, concerning whose movements no definite information could for a time be obtained.

It was a favorite theory among the authorities in Washington that General Lee would lead McClellan off into Western Maryland, and then slip round into his rear and capture the aforesaid authorities. Of course 80,000 men do not slip about such a country very easily, and of course General Lee would never have dared to place his army between the forts of Washington and the Army of the Potomac; but even such absurd fears required consideration, and in addition to the artillery garrisons in the forts and the new levies inside the defences, Morell’s division was left for a time to watch the approaches to the Chain Bridge, which was the weakest point in the defences of the city.

During these days the various corps of the army whose organization a week before had been almost destroyed, were marching through the town in columns of platoons, with their drums beating and colors flying, their array as fine as it would have been on parade before they had ever seen the enemy, and inspiring all who saw them to a happy augury of the result of the first Maryland campaign.

On the 11th, our Division received orders to join the army in the field with all possible speed, and on the 12th we folded our tents, and took the route in the track of our comrades. As usual the start was delayed until the sun was well up in the sky, and before we were out of the District of Columbia the heat had become oppressive, and the men, especially those of the new companies, were suffering greatly. Our route was from Upton’s Hill past Fort Corcoran, through Georgetown and Washington, and out by 7th street.

Early in the day came a circular order to be read at the head of each company denouncing the penalty of death, without trial, as the punishment for straggling, the utter absurdity of which was shown by the fact that before nightfall one-third of the men had fallen out of their ranks, the order to the contrary notwithstanding. The old soldiers, happily, (or unhappily) had learned that the bark of the orders was worse than their bite, but the new recruits had the impression, as yet, that orders meant what they said, and believed that the officers would shoot down all those who faltered; consequently, what between soldierly ambition and personal fear, the new men would struggle on until they could do so no longer. The day was burning hot, and the last hour before noon was chosen to give the command one pull of three miles without rest; and when at last the bugle sounded “halt,” not less than fifty of our men fell exhausted, fainting or sunstruck, several of them raving with insane imaginings.

Although we tarried at this place for an hour or more, the Colonel assuming the responsibility to fall out with his entire command, it was found necessary at last to leave some twenty men who needed rest and care, the greater part of whom were finally discharged from hospitals disabled for service. Here, too, in order to lighten the march, a quantity of knapsacks and blankets were left stored in a barn, but before our teams could return for them the whole had been gobbled by stragglers.

It was after dark when at last we halted for the night, and the Adjutant’s returns showed that one of the new companies then numbered three officers and seven men, and another no officers and one man[1] present for duty. We bivouacked in columns of companies, and that one man executed under his own command the company right wheel, dressed his ranks, stacked his arm (by plunging the bayonet into the ground), called the roll, broke ranks, supped, and slept the sleep of the just.

[1] Private Isaac W. Thurlow, of Methuen, afterward promoted to be Lieutenant C. T.

The next two days’ march brought us, via Middlebrook, Clarksville, and Hyattstown to Frederick; the weather, though clear, was not so hot as on the 12th, the men were in better condition and, on the whole, we gained in numbers. Many will remember our bivouac that Sunday evening as the place where they indulged in a welcome bath in the clear waters of the Monocacy river. All day on the 14th (Sunday), we heard heavy firing, and on the 15th the sound of heavy guns at Harper’s Ferry continued to assure us that our flag still was there, but its sudden cessation at last told as plainly of the surrender.

Our march of the 15th and 16th, although rapid, was not exhausting; the air was more autumnal, and we were cheered by the evidence of the fact that we were the pursuers. Large numbers of rebel prisoners passed us going to our rear. As we marched through Frederick we were greeted with hearty cheers from civilians and the waving kerchiefs of ladies, and children distributed ripe fruits, which were most welcome to the bilious soldiers. On the South Mountain battle-field a detail was burying the dead, and we saw many bodies in grey uniforms awaiting burial. We had previously met and saluted the dead General Reno, borne to the rear in an ambulance draped with the national colors.

As we passed over one of the mountain ridges, there broke upon our sight a view such as New England cannot offer. A valley stretching far away on either hand, everywhere divided into large fields of rich farming lands, among which the homes of well-to-do farmers stood, with groups of barns and granges and hay ricks gathered about them, the whole testifying to the comfort and wealth of the inhabitants. At every house there were words of welcome and cheer. The entire population evidently was in sympathy with our cause, and their recent sight of the retreating army of the enemy had evidently strengthened their enthusiasm for his pursuers.

It was almost sundown on the 16th when we came up with the main body of our army between Keedysville and Antietam Creek. The air was full of smoke from the camp-fires, and the hillsides alive with the men, who were making ready for their supper and their sleep. Our Division was guided into the field assigned to us, and our men were soon deep in similar preparations.

We knew that the hostile armies were now face to face, and that a great battle was imminent. Curiosity led many to gather on the hilltops and to look over what was to be the battlefield, to the crests of the low hills on the opposite bank of the stream, where we could see the spires of the little town of Sharpsburg sharply defined against the warm sky, and the smoke from the rebel camp-fires glowing in the light of the setting sun. A few well-directed shells from the enemy’s batteries however, dulled our curiosity in that direction, and we turned to our camps to see how an army looks upon the eve of a pitched battle.

The eastward slopes of the hills on the left branch of the Antietam were occupied by the infantry of the army of McClellan, extending some four miles from right to left. Near the tops of these hills a few batteries of artillery were ready for use at a moment’s notice, but more of them were below us, their horses feeding at the picket ropes, the men busy about their supper.

Farther away to the rear the ammunition wagons were parked, those of each division by themselves, and yet farther back the supply trains of the different corps, and the reserve divisions of artillery and cavalry.

There was every show of complete readiness for the morrow, in the array of the troops and the provision for the fight—but everything was busy and cheery. As night fell the smoke became less dense, and the bright light of a thousand glowing fires enlivened the scene. There was no sign of haste or of anxiety; occasionally a mule sounded his trumpet as a signal for more feed, and often the sound of horses’ feet was heard as some officer or orderly galloped leisurely by; there was some singing and much laughter heard from the various camps, and at last the stirring but confused sound of the tattoo along the whole line from the bugles of the distant cavalry and the neighboring artillery, and the drums and fifes of the infantry of the line.

Then came gentle sleep, nowhere more grateful and welcome than in the bivouac of the soldier on the night before the battle.

From dawn to dark no fairer sky was ever seen than that beneath which, on the 17th day of September, 1862, was fought the battle of the Antietam. It may be doubted whether there was in the history of our civil war, any instance of a battle for which the preparation was on both sides so complete, of which the field was more free and open to the movements of the troops and the oversight of the commanders, or in which the result depended so directly upon the ability of the generals and the conduct of the troops, and so little upon purely accidental occurrences.

The Confederate army occupied the crest of the rising ground which lies immediately west of the Antietam, and between it and the Potomac. That portion of this crest in which lay the left and the centre of their army, was for the most part wooded and broken by outcropping ledges, and through it ran roads whose fences and cuts afforded frequent vantage ground for a defensive force. Their right was in an open country, but one intersected by stone walls, and presenting on the side toward the Union lines very abrupt declivities.

The left of our army (directly opposite the rebel right), were posted on low hills, whose western sides were also steep and rough. Between the two positions the gap was just sufficient for the passage of the little river and for a narrow country road on either bank, and here the stream was spanned by a stone bridge of three arches, since known as Burnside’s bridge.

Nearly a mile above, over a similar bridge, the Sharpsburg turnpike crossed the Antietam, cutting by a direct line the centres of both armies. Lying across this road, east of the river, on commanding ground, the corps of Gen. Porter held the centre of the loyal army, connecting with Burnside on the left and with Sumner on the right. On the right of the Union army was Hooker’s corps, on the west bank of the stream, and almost in contact with the rebel left, occupying the ground which they had won from the enemy at nightfall of the day before; both parties in the same wood sleeping on their arms in line of battle.

Taken together, the positions of the two armies described a figure not unlike the letter D, of which the curved portion may represent the Union lines, and the straight part (which was in fact also curved), those of the Confederates. Except at our left (the bottom of the D), our army held both banks of the Antietam, and at both extremes the two armies almost touched.

Standing among the guns of Porter’s batteries, about the centre of the Union lines, one seemed to look down upon the field, the whole of which, except the immediate vicinity of Burnside’s bridge, was open to the view. Directly in our front the Antietam washed the base of the hill, on the rounded summit of which the guns were placed, but from the farther bank the land rose gently rolling to the lines of the army of our enemy. Between us and the rebel centre were cleared fields, many of them bearing crops of nearly ripened corn, bounded to the left by steep hill-sides closing in to the river, but on the right running up to a glade bordered by woodlands. In these woods, and in and over that glade, occurred the severest struggles and the greatest slaughter of this hard-fought battle. Near Porter’s lines, on yet higher land, the headquarters of our army were established for the day.

Of the curving line of the union army, the left was the corps of General Burnside, the centre the corps of General Porter, and the right the corps of General Hooker; but in the rear of Hooker was the corps of General Mansfield, and behind it that of General Sumner, while the force of General Franklin, just up from Pleasant Valley, acted as the reserve.

McClellan’s plan of the battle was to make the principal attack from his right, but as soon as that was well engaged, to throw Burnside from his left against the right of Lee, not absolutely as a real attack, but by menacing the road to the ford which was Lee’s only line of retreat, to occupy and divert certain portions of the Confederate army, and thus reduce its power of resistance to the real attack upon the other flank.

By reason of the curvation of the line, our batteries in its centre could reach effectively the whole extent of the front of the enemy from left to right; and throughout the day, as opportunity offered, the guns did good execution, and more especially upon our right where we could annoy the rebel infantry while in the cover of the woods, and enfilade them whenever they appeared in the open glade.

At break of day the rattling volleys of musketry on the right told that Hooker was opening the great struggle. Soon occasional deep thuds of his cannon were also heard, then nearer and more constant came the sounds approaching from both wings, until our own batteries in the centre joined in the din. Along the whole line gun for gun came back—as if echoed from the other ridge—the voice of the invading army from lips of bronze and iron, and its exploding messengers repeated in our ears the arguments of war, until hundreds of heavy guns were united in one deep quivering roar. And although there was rising and falling in the sound, yet until nightfall the sound of battle never ceased.

Just across the creek the skirmishers of our corps showed like dotted lines upon the fields; now and then we could see the smoke puff from their rifles, although the sound was lost in that of the general conflict. On the left, until afternoon, no movements were visible, but across that open glade, far away on the right, the tide of battle ebbed and flowed.

First from the edge of the woods on our side, appeared a ragged line of men fleeing for their lives, and following them the solid front of Hooker’s corps, firing as it followed.

The fugitives were three brigades of Jackson’s men, and the dark spots before the advancing line were the first fruits of that harvest of slaughter, whose winrows before nightfall traversed the whole of that fatal glade.

Hooker’s men had nearly crossed the open ground when the whole of Jackson’s corps burst from the western wood and met them in the open field; Hooker against Jackson—that was the tug of war. No sign of yielding could be marked on either side. Both lines became involved in the smoke of their rifles, but whenever the breeze wafted the smoke away, the reduced number of the combatants could be noted, and the fringe of wounded men and their too numerous helpers, which always hangs from the rear in the battle line, was constantly visible between each body and its nearest sheltering wood.

There was no moment when this contest ended; no line was seen pursuing or pursued, but little by little both melted away; and when all were gone, out from the edge of the woods on either side belched the fire and smoke of the batteries.

Now seven o’clock by Sharpsburg time. The scattered men of the broken divisions of each army sought the friendly shelter of the lines which were advancing to relieve them. Hood of Longstreet’s command, was marshalling his brigades within the timber on the west, and Mansfield’s corps was moving up through the rough woodland on the east, and for a season the open space between was unoccupied save by the dead and wounded, and the rolling, drifting smoke from the artillery.