The Gates of Light: Chapter 2

 

CHAPTER 2

 

Hell Opened Before Us

The Peninsula, 1862

 

“The sorrows of hell compassed me about:

the snares of death prevented me.”

Ps. 18:5

 

Time speaks through its hushed and solemn voice of memory.  But a few short months had transpired since the Prescott family had celebrated the Christmas of 1860.  The events of that season, in which were inextricably mixed the glad message of Heaven and the sad tidings of earth, were now entombed in an irretrievable past.  Yet they lived, enshrined in the warm glow of memory.  Memory is time’s way of redeeming its destructiveness.

 

It was now April, 1862.  Many, and great, events had occurred in the previous year of 1861.  In January and February of that year six other southern states‑-Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas‑-joined with South Carolina to form the Confederate States of America.  Jefferson Davis became the provisional president of the new republic and organized a central government and army.

 

Monday, February 11, was Lincoln’s last day in Springfield, Illinois.  The single-car train was waiting at the station, scheduled to leave for Washington at 8 o’clock.  It was raining as the President-elect boarded the train.  Tomorrow would be his fifty-second birthday.  He was the youngest man to serve the presidency of the nation.  He stood at the rail of his car, and, with a voice laden with sadness and melancholy, spoke a few words to those who had come to wish him well in his new and awesome responsibilities as chief executive of a broken commonwealth:

 

My friends, no one not in my situation can appreciate my feelings of sadness at this parting.  To this place and the kindness of these people I owe everything.  Here I have lived for a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young to an old man.  Here my children have been born, and one is buried.  I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington.  Without the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended him, I cannot succeed.  With that assistance I cannot fail.  Trusting in Him who can go with me and remain with you and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be well.  To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell.

 

 

Three weeks later, Monday, March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as the sixteenth President of the United States.  Howard Hamlin, a close friend of the Prescotts, became Vice-President.  In his inaugural address, Lincoln announced the policy that would govern his presidency.  He gave assurances to the South, but all-the-while making it clear that he would recognize his constitutional responsibilities:

 

I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists.  I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. . . .  It is safe to assert that no government proper, ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination. . . .  It follows from these views that no State, upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union,‑-that resolves and ordinances to that effect are legally void; and that acts of violence, within any State or States, against the authority of the United States, are insurrectionary or revolutionary, according to circumstances.

I therefore consider that, in view of the Constitution and the laws, the Union is unbroken; and, to the extent of my ability, I shall take care, as the Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States.  Doing this I deem to be only a simple duty on my part; and I shall perform it, so far as practicable, unless my rightful masters, the American people, shall withhold the rightful means, or in some authoritative manner direct the contrary. . . .  The power confided in me will be used to hold, occupy and possess the property and places belonging to the government, and to collect the duties and imposts. . . .

In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow country-men, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.  The government will not assail you.  You can have no conflict, without being yourselves the aggressors.  You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to “preserve, protect and defend” it.

I am loth to close.  We are not enemies, but friends.  We must not be enemies.  Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.  The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

 

On the afternoon of April 14, a Sunday, Fort Sumpter, situated on a sand-spit at the mouth of Charleston Harbor and three miles from the city of that name, was surrendered to the Confederacy.  On the following day, Monday the 15th of April, President Lincoln asked the loyal states to supply 75,000 militia for a period of ninety days.  The northern states quickly filled, even overfilled, their quotas.  Within a few days, four more southern states withdrew from the Union: Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina.  The Confederacy now consisted of eleven states.

 

The Federal army and navy gained control of the southeastern seaboard in late 1861 and early 1862.  In the West, an Illinois Brigadier-General, Ulysses S. Grant, captured two forts on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers‑-Fort Henry and Fort Donelson.  This enabled Federal forces to enter Tennessee, which was then brought back into the Union.  However, at Shiloh Grant barely saved his army from defeat.  A joint military and naval expedition, under the commands of Commodore David G. Farragut and General Benjamin F. Butler, reduced the Confederate forts in the lower Mississippi river and captured New Orleans.

 

 

General Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson, with a small and ill-equipped army, created a brilliant diversion in the Shenandoah Valley of Western Virginia.  He posed a threat to Washington, thus drawing forces from the Union Army in the East, the Army of the Potomac, now under the command of Major- General George B. McClellan.  In fact, Union fortunes in the East had, over the preceding few months, been extremely disappointing.  In late July of 1861, the Union army under the command of Brigadier-General Irwin McDowell had been routed at Bull Run.  In October four regiments commanded by Colonel Edward D. Baker, concurrently the Senator from Oregon and a close friend of Lincoln, met disaster at Ball’s Bluff, on the Virginia side of the Potomac about half way between Washington and Harper’s Ferry.  Baker himself was killed in this engagement.

 

The portentous events of the past year were in the minds of John and Rhoda Prescott as they sat on the porch swing at eventide, watching the shadows moving slowly upward on the mountains to the east.  The deciduous trees were awakening from their naked sleep and tender leaves of a subdued light green were making their appearance.  The fields of timothy and alfalfa were becoming carpets of translucent green.  The buds adorning the branches of fruit trees were almost to blossom in flowering beauty.  The day, filled with the activities of home and farm, had been a cloudless one, cool and crisp.  It was now the gloaming time of evening, when the last traces of light were slowly disappearing, a time to pause from the day’s labors and to dwell upon the larger concerns of life: the course of ones’s life, the companionship of love, the children and their promise and destiny.

 

“It has been a year now,” John remarked to Rhoda, “since Asa and William enlisted in the Union army.”

 

“Yes, and it was so hard to see them go.  But it was inevitable that they would volunteer.  Don’t you remember the times, before the children’s bedtime, when you told them the remarkable stories of those Prescotts, their own relatives, who fought and died to forge a new nation devoted to the ideals of democracy and freedom?  How their faces glowed with pride, as they listened to those stories of Dr. Samuel Prescott, who rode with Paul Revere that April night so long ago, and of Col. William Prescott at Bunker Hill.  I remember when William, whom we named after the William of Bunker Hill, was small, how he glowed with pride that his namesake was such a hero.  The children were taught to love the Union.  And now they, and we also, are paying the price of that love.  How strange‑-wonderfully strange‑-life is.  It is a veritable mixture.  We sorrow that the boys are in the war, with all of its dangers, yet we rejoice, as I know they do, that we can give of ourselves for the Union.”

 

Amanda, followed by Rover, soon came out and joined her parents.  The three sat in silence, each absorbed in thought.

 

“Well,” Rhoda said, turning to Amanda, “you might as well come clean, because you can’t keep it from us much longer.  I have a way, as you know, of reading my children’s thoughts.”

 

“Yes, I suppose so.  I’m going to do my share.  I’m going into the army as a nurse.  I’m not sure when, but in a few months.  Maybe in the early fall, after the summer’s work here is over.  I don’t want it said that for this family only the boys have served the Union in its time of need.  Furthermore, the work that they are doing is by nature destructive; I want to be the one in our family whose work is constructive.  I want to lighten the load of sadness, suffering, and death.”

 

 

John sighed softly, reluctant to lose the “baby” of the family.  She would, in his eyes, always be the baby, although she was now twenty-one years of age.  Soon three of the children would join hands in the great struggle.  And, he now knew, as did the entire North, that it would be a great struggle.  The days when people talked of a short, “three-months” war were gone; everyone, North and South, knew that a terrible fury was even now lashing the American continent.

 

First, Asa; then William, the youngest son; and now Amanda, the youngest child.  And what of the other boys?  When would they too be leaving?  These were the thoughts that burdened the minds and hearts of John and Rhoda Prescott that April evening.

 

Just a year ago William had been in Medway, Massachusetts, visiting Asa and Eliza.  As boys the two had been, and now remained, very close.  There were five years between their ages.  As lads they had played together and had been assigned the same tasks on the farm, the more strenuous work having been reserved for the older boys.  In mid-April of that year, President Lincoln had issued his call to the states for 75,000 militia.  When this news reached them, both boys immediately announced their intention to enlist.  Five days after Lincoln’s call, on April 20, Asa enlisted in the 12th regiment of Massachusetts volunteers.  Two weeks later, early in May, William enlisted in the 1st regiment of Massachusetts volunteers.  If his beloved brother was to be a Massachusetts volunteer, then so would he, although a resident of Maine, William said to himself.

 

Asa, now twenty-eight years of age, was rather small in stature, five feet four inches in height, and weighed 128 lbs.  He had light brown hair, which was quite fine in texture, and which was parted on the left side.  His nose was high at the bridge, descending from a wide brow.  His eyes were a pale, light blue.  They gleamed with flashing intensity as if charged with the hue of northern lights; yet they often twinkled, and with lips slightly parted, as if almost ready to form a smile, radiated contentment of self-possession and kindness of outlook.  He was intellectual, contemplative, serious-minded, and soft-spoken.

 

William, at age twenty-two, was in many respects the opposite of Asa.   William was six feet in height.  His skeletal frame was heavy-boned.  He weighed 160 pounds.  He had deep blue eyes.  Set under prominent, dark brown eyebrows that matched his hair, they gave the impression of a wry inquisitiveness, tempered with a skeptical view of things.  His chin was prominent, evincing a strength of determination.  He was an extrovert, a man of independent resolve and action.  He revelled in outdoor life and the challenges that it afforded him.  His spirit was that of the rugged pioneer.  Unlike Asa, whose gaze was inward, penetrating to the core of selfhood, William forever gazed outward beyond the horizons of self.  He saw in vision, and longed for, the vastness of the untamed and unspoiled West as the realm against which to match his great strength.

 

After his enlistment, Asa joined the 12th Massachusetts at Fort Warren in Boston Harbor, where the regiment, 1,040 young men, trained.  The regiment’s commander was Colonel Fletcher Webster, the son of Daniel Webster.  During this time of camp training, the regulars came across a snappy, southern camp-meeting tune, “Say Brothers Will We Meet You Over on the Other Shore?”  They changed the words, however, replacing them with “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave . . . and we go marching on.”  The song was eventually picked up by other troops and sung from the eastern seacoast to the Mississippi River.  Finally, Julia Ward Howe heard the song one day while riding in her carriage, liked the tune, but decided that better words could be found.  So she wrote her version, destined to become the great song of the Civil War and the immortal heritage of the American people, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.”  Asa, and his comrades in arms, had started it all.

 

The regiment was reviewed on a clear summer afternoon on the Boston Common.  The famous orator, Edward Everett, delivered an impressive oration.  The ladies of Boston presented a silk flag, which they had made, to the regiment.  It was edged with blue and gold, and on one side bore the Massachusetts coat of arms and on the other, a quotation from the famous orator, “Not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured.”

 

Some days later the regiment, singing its song, marched through Boston and boarded the train for New York.  There the soldiers paraded up Broadway, where multitudes lined the sidewalks and peered out of office windows, and heard, for the first time, the great song, lifted by a thousand voices and set to the cadence of drum roll and marching feet.  When they reached Washington, again they sang their song.  Soon all of the troops stationed around Washington, a city now besieged by rebels just across the Potomac, were singing it.

 

Asa had enlisted on the 20th of April, the day after the 6th Massachusetts had been mobbed as it marched through Baltimore, leaving four dead and packed in ice for shipment back to Boston.  The 6th went on, however, and arrived in Washington carrying the wounded on stretchers.  Both Asa and William had read Massachusetts Governor Andrews’ pathetic telegram, ordering that the four dead be “preserved in ice and tenderly sent forward,” and therewith decided that the time had come to enlist.  This Asa did the following day, while William waited another few days.  But his turn came with the new month, the month of May.

 

William had spent a sleepless night, thinking, again, of the brickbats hurled against the 6th Massachusetts, the bodies packed in ice‑-all of which seemed so far removed from the “glory” of war.  He arose with the first light and shaved.  He always shaved before engaging in any act of great resolve.  Then he went to the recruiting office, and as he stood by the door, heard the usual promises about “promotion” and “travel.”  As it eventually turned out, he would get no promotion but a great deal of travel.  He turned the knob, entered the room, and stood before the officer, who said, “What do you want, my boy?”  “I want to enlist,” he answered.  He was then stripped and examined, and given an ill-fitting uniform.

 

The movements of the 1st Massachusetts were similar to those of the 12th.  The regiment trained in Boston.  William thought that the drill-master was overly fussy about shouldering, ordering, and presenting arms.  At first the regiment was drilled in company and regimental evolutions before it learned the manual of arms, because it lacked muskets.  Soon, however, these were obtained.  Now William was glad that he was tall and strong, since the muskets were heavy.

 

One day he heard one of the soldiers, who was tired and hungry, say to the old, grizzled drill-sergeant, “Let’s stop this fooling and go over to the grocery store and get something to eat.”  The reply was quick, for the drill-sergeant turned to the corporal, “Corporal, take this boy out and drill him like hell.”  There William, who himself had a streak of independence in him, learned that in the army one doesn’t think or suggest; he takes orders.

 

 

Finally, the word came: On to Washington!  The ladies brought the boys some good things to eat: pies, cakes, doughnuts, and jellies.  They also gave each soldier a small kit, made of leather or cloth, in which were needles, pins, thread, buttons and scissors.  So each soldier had his own portable tailor’s shop.  One elderly lady who had come to bid her son goodby gave him an umbrella, which occasioned considerable laughter.  As it happened, this was witnessed by the old drill-sergeant, who broke out in a paroxysm of laughter, remarking to those of his boys around him, “By thunder, it’s going to take more than umbrellas before this thing is over.”  The regiment then took the train to New York, and, after the customary parade up Broadway, embarked for Washington, where it set up camp beside other regiments guarding the capitol.

 

By now the shadows had extended to the top of the eastern hills, the night air had become chilly, and the three left the outdoor porch and went into John’s study.

 

“I’d like to read William’s letter to us,” he said to the others, as he took it out of the desk.  Both Rhoda and Amanda knew at once which letter it was.  It had been written nearly a year ago, but, since it had been read and reread many times, it now assumed the character of antiquity.  It was destined to remain in the family for coming generations.  He sat down, then read aloud:

 

Camp Fourth Brigade

Washington City

August 5, 1861

Dear Ones at Home:

 

You have by now, of course, read the news about the first large battle of the war, which has not gone well for us, to say the least.  You have learned that many of our soldiers forgot what little training they, as all of us, received and gave way to fear and ran under pressure from the enemy.  But I want you to know that our company of the 1st Massachusetts, Company I, was not one that bears such a shame.

I am in the Union Army commanded by Brigidier-General Irvin McDowell, in the First Division, Brigidier-General Daniel Tyler; Fourth Brigade, Colonel Israel B. Richardson; 1st Massachusetts, Colonel Robert Cowdin; Company I, Charles E. Rand.  My address is Camp Fourth Brigade, Washington City.  I am near southern soil, but Richmond seems such a long way off, much farther than it seemed just a few days ago.

Father always told us to be observing, so I’ll say something about our two general officers, since you have probably read about them in the papers.  In another letter I’ll tell you about Colonel Richardson, Colonel Cowdin, and Captain Rand.  General McDowell is young, in fact only forty-three years of age.  He is a large, heavy set man, six feet tall.  He has thick brown hair and wears a moustache, the corners of which flow symmetrically into a short-cut beard, which is interspersed with grey.  He has been in France; this is where he got the idea for his beard.  Our division commander, General Tyler, looks like one of the Old Testament patriarchs that father used to tell us about when we were children at home.  His hair, which is thinning in front, is quite grey. But as it flows back and over the sides of his head, it is thick, and hangs in loose waves almost to his shoulders.  His cheeks and chin are covered with a neatly-trimmed beard.  His eyes are deep-set under prominent eyebrows, sometimes turned upward as if he were checking to see if his eye brows were still where they belonged.  He has a penetrating gaze.  He is rugged and stern; just one look at him and you know that you’d better pay attention and do your work well

Our army had been kept in Washington while the volunteers from the northern states were continually coming in.  The army, organized into five divisions, numbered 30,000 men.  The rebel army, under General Pierre Beauregard, was larger by one or two thousand men.  It was located at Manassas Junction, a junction of two railroads some thirty-five miles southwest of Washington.  Three miles east of Manassas there is a small creek, flowing in a southeasterly direction.  It is a winding stream, quite sluggish, and in many places has high, rocky banks.  The southern army was positioned on an eight-mile line on the western side of the stream.

On July 16 we got our orders to move.  We left Washington, crossed the Potomac on the Chain Bridge, and marched southwest on the turnpike that runs from Washington to Warrenton.  We made ten miles that day and

 

 

 

 

 

 

made camp.  The next day we pushed on another ten miles to Fairfax Court House.  We ran into some rebels, but they soon skedaddled.  We marched through the town four abreast with bands playing and flags flying.  We felt that, so far, war wasn’t too difficult.  The following morning, July 18, our division, the first, was ordered to move upon the town of Centreville.  At 9:00 my brigade, the fourth, entered the town and found that the enemy had already left.  Centreville is on a hill, and from this position we saw the entire valley in front of us, with Manassas on a high plateau beyond.

We left Centreville on the road leading to Manassas, found some water at a spring and quenched our thirst.  Thirst and dust!  I’ve had enough of these the last two days to last a lifetime.  Pretty soon General Tyler came up and with Colonel Richardson took a squadron of cavalry and two companies, one being mine, and moved down the road to a ford on Bull Run, known as Blackburn’s Ford.  We soon saw a battery, but not many troops, on theother side of the stream.  Tyler’s instructions had been merely to observe the enemy, but not to bring on an engagement.  But General Tyler isn’t called, even by us when he isn’t around to hear, “Fighting Dick” for nothing.  Despite his instructions not to bring on an engagement, he placed two 20-pounder rifled guns on the crest of a hill and opened fire.  A few shots were exchanged with the enemy’s batteries.

 

Our brigade was ordered to move down the hill into the bottom of Bull Run.  When we reached the bottom, we found ourselves in thick woods.  I was bent low, walking as rapidly as I could and yet keep a sharp lookout for the enemy.  We finally moved out of the woods and onto the road close to the ford without bringing much fire from the rebels.  General Tyler then moved some additional artillery down to the bottom of Bull Run.  As soon as the artillery opened fire the enemy replied with devastating fire, both musketry and artillery.  The Twelfth New York Regiment, which was on our left, fell back under heavy fire in disorder.  Our regiment and two Michigan regiments, on the right, stood fast.  Colonel Richardson wanted to take these regiments and charge the enemy, but General Tyler said that further attack was unnecessary, since our mission was one of reconnaissance and we had found out where the strength of the enemy lay.  When night came we fell back to Centreville.  The next morning, the 19^th, found us back on the high ground before Bull Run.

On Saturday, the 20th, our company was ordered to move to our left and secure a log barn as a position on which to post artillery.  We remained here that day and the next.

Our work at Blackburn’s Ford served its purpose; it showed that we could not attack the enemy at this location.  The Command decided to attack the enemy on their extreme left.  Three and a half miles west of Centreville a stone bridge spans Bull Run.  On Sunday, July 21, the second and third divisions, under Hunter and Heintzelman, moved their forces on a road located halfway between Centreville and the Stone Bridge.  These forces moved northeast to Sudley Road, then southwest on that road, where they crossed Bull Run at a ford, Sudley Ford.  General Tyler, with other elements of his division, demonstrated at the Stone Bridge, to give the impression that the attack on the Confederates would come from this place.  At 10:30, Burnside’s Second Brigade of Hunter’s Division opened fire on the enemy.  The main battle had begun.

The battle, which lasted all day, was fought at a branch of Bull Run known as Young’s Branch.  This branch crosses both Sudley Road and the Warrenton Turnpike where they intersect, about a mile and a half west of the Stone Bridge.  Here it forms an arc, flowing northeast then southeast into Bull Run.

The battle progressed in our favor.  The rebels were pushed back to the high ground south of the turnpike.  Two brigades of my division crossed Bull Run north of the bridge and entered the fight.  It seemed that we would be victorious.  But the retreating Confederates consolidated their forces in a semicircle on a second ridge farther south of the turnpike.  At mid-afternoon two Union batteries, those of Griffin and Ricketts,  were moved across the valley of Young’s Branch to the top of a hill.  Soon after they were in position, the Confederates poured heavy fire upon them.  These two batteries now became the center of the battle.  Back and forth the infantry of the two armies swept in the attempt to possess the batteries, which were finally lost to us.  The loss of these critical batteries caused the troops to become discouraged.  Our army was exhausted, but now the Confederate army received reinforcements from two directions: west from the Shenandoah and south from Aquia.  At about 4:30 in the afternoon the Union army began to melt away.  What began as a sullen retreat became a frantic panic as  many of the troops headed, completely confused and disorganized, for the Potomac.  However, not all of the troops retired from the battle in this manner.  In each organization there remained a nucleus, and several brigades, including ours, remained intact.

 

The retreat of the army was hindered, and made more complicated, by civilians, including members of Congress, who had come out during the morning to watch what they thought would be an easy Union victory and a march on Richmond.  Evidently, they thought that the battle would be a victory parade, since many people, men and women, came in their carriages as far as Centreville to watch the battle and enjoy a noon picnic.  Many people went beyond Centreville toward the Stone Bridge so as to watch the battle from closer vantage points.  A considerable number of military wagons filled with provision, baggage, and ammunition had been sent down towards the Stone Bridge and were there at this time.  When reports of Union reverses were brought by the retreating soldiers, there occurred a grand melee of troops, army wagons, and private vehicles, all frantically attempting at the same time to move swiftly on the turnpike back to Washington and its presumed safety.  It is here that the panic and disgraceful flight, of which you no doubt have read, mainly occurred.  Arms and clothing were discarded by the infantry, wagons, even ambulances filled with the wounded, were abandoned by the teamsters, while they rode away at headlong speed on horses unhitched or cut loose from their harness.  The Confederate army‑-it being exhausted from the day’s fighting‑-made only desultory attempts to pursue and capture the

Federal troops, although it did succeed in capturing a number of guns and wagons.

Our brigade was the last unit to leave the scene of battle.  At about 10 o’clock that night the order was given to the army to retreat.  We were placed in position on the left of the road from Centreville to Blackburn’s Ford, facing the enemy, so as to keep him from falling upon the rear of the retreating army.  At 2 o’clock on the morning of the 22nd we left our position and moved to Fairfax and continued to cover the rear of the army.  At 2 o’clock on the afternoon of that day we arrived at Arlington.  I don’t think that I’ve ever been as tired as I was that afternoon.  I thought of the old days at home, when we would swim in the river, refreshed by its cool waters, before we jumped in our woodshed bunks for a dreamless sleep.  How I wished that this might once again be mine to enjoy.  But it was not to be.  I did, however, soon fall asleep.

This is the record of my action at the Battle of Bull Run.  I had heard the bullets whizzing by me, but was untouched.  I’m thankful for that.  Our regimental casualties at Blackburn’s Ford were: one officer and nine enlisted men killed; eight enlisted men wounded and fourteen missing.

We now have a new commander to replace McDowell, who has been assigned to the defense of the Potomac on the Virginia side.  He is Major-General George B. McClellan.  A young man, thirty-four years of age, he is about average in height, five feet nine and a half.  He is quite stocky, with a massive chest and thick neck, so that he appears shorter than he actually is.  So they call him “Little Mac.”  His eyes are blue.  His hair is a dark auburn, parted far down the left and brushed straight across the right.  He seems almost boyish, and the soldiers all love him.  His face is handsome, clean-shaven except for a bushy mustache.

McClellan is whipping our army into shape, and doing it swiftly.  He has taken two regiments of military police and brought in, from Washington hotel bars and lobbies, all the stragglers and deserters that he could find.  No one is allowed to leave his unit unless he has the proper authorization.  The hills around Washington are fortified, and tent cities, holding the various units, are clustered around the city.  We are continually being drilled and instructed in the science of war.  He is out every day, riding among the troops, and we shout, cry “huzzah”, and cheer him.  He throws back his head and laughs heartily, letting us know that, although he is our commander, he is one of us and cares for us and wants us to be triumphant, and safe, in future battles.  And they will be coming in the future.

I must close this all-too-lengthy letter.  I think of you always.  I’m happy that I am able to carry on in this work for the Union, but I do look forward to a day, which I hope may come soon, when the war will be over, peace brought to a divided nation, and all of us be together with our loved ones.  May it come in God’s own good time.

 

All my love,

William

 

 

A few days prior to that pleasant evening when John had read William’s “Bull Run” letter, William was encamped at Washington with the 1st Massachusetts.  It was early Sunday morning, the 9th of March, 1862.  It had been almost a year since that fateful Sunday when the Union forces were routed at Bull Run.  Since that time, the Union army had been reorganized, and the 1st Massachusetts was now in the First Brigade (Brigadier-General Cuvier Grover), Second Division (Brigadier-General Joseph Hooker), Third Corps (Brigadier-General Samuel Heintzelman).  The sun had just risen, its rays transforming the opaque morning mists into an irradiant sheen.  The waters of the Potomac, brilliant as a sheet of glass, were at rest.  In the stillness of the dawn, every sound could be heard.  William was on guard duty.  As he looked over the waters, to the west, he saw large billows of smoke slowly ascending and besmirching the clear, morning air.  It could mean, he thought, but one thing: the southern army was burning its stockpiles at Manassas, where it had been positioned since that earlier Sunday, preparatory to its departure south.

 

At midnight, orders came down to get ready to march.  William, along with his comrades, got busy cooking three-days rations.  The regiment left its camp at 7 o’clock, Monday, March 10, and soon joined its division on the road.  The division crossed the Potomac on the Chain Bridge, its frame shaking with the cadence of marching feet.  The soldiers were glad to be on the move, and some were joking and laughing.  Others, like William, were pensive, thinking of that earlier time when they had marched over the same bridge to that first great land battle of the war.

 

The division reached the Virginia side of the river and passed the fort that commanded the western side of the bridge.  The men soon encountered a new, and unexpected, enemy‑-Virginia mud.  The mud was knee deep.  William put his foot down, and when he finally managed to retrieve it, his boot had suddenly increased twice its original size and weight.  He wondered if he really had a foot, but when he saw that whatever it was it was attached to his leg he began to feel better about it all.

 

The army was not really marching; it was more like a swarm of flies crawling through thick molasses.  Joe Murphy, a close friend of William’s, remarked, “‘On to Richmond!’ that’s the slogan of the Washington politicians.  I’d just like some of them to try it, ‘On to Richmond!, in this mud.”  No soldier was found who took issue with this observation.

“Well,” William said, “when I was a boy at home my father made me decline Latin nouns.  ‘Mud’ isn’t exactly a Latin noun, but it is one that I’d like to decline, in another sense of the term.  Anyway, I’ve got a new declension I’m going to send him: ‘mud, mudder, murder.'”  This, too, brought a laugh from those nearby.

 

Another soldier, not to be outdone by the exercise in the logical mysteries of ambiguity, remarked, “Virginia was once in the Union but is now in the mud.”  This, too, no one seemed interested in contesting.

 

The troops camped that night in a sheltered ravine through which ran a small brook.  The little stream was soon muddied when the men pulled off their boots and washed their weary feet.  After a scanty supper of hard-tack and coffee, they turned in to sleep.  Feet wet, heads laid on boots for a pillow, the mud oozing around rubber blankets, they slept the dreamless sleep of tired men.

 

 

Early the next morning, after a breakfast of hard-tack and coffee, the men were once again, as one soldier put it, “pulling mud.”  Around four o’clock the division came to Manassas Junction.  Soon the soldiers were busy inspecting the fortifications, which had so long protected the rebels and kept the Union army penned up around Washington.

 

“The Rebs have left their cannons,” Joe exclaimed to William.

 

William squinted long and hard, “Joe, those aren’t cannon; they’re logs painted black and set on old wheels to look like cannon.”

 

“Don’t be ridiculous, Will,” Joe said, “no army in its right mind would build fortifications with log guns.”

 

“That may be so, but I’ve been in this army long enough to recognize a cannon when I see it, and I’ve lived long enough in Maine to know a log when I meet one.  Those are nothing but logs.  Just wait until the politicians get wind of this; they’ll make mince-meat out of General McClellan, claiming that he’s been whipped by fake guns.”

 

When the men came closer, they saw nothing but logs upended over wheels, made to look like guns.  “Quaker guns,” the soldiers called them.

 

After a more thorough inspection of their enemies, the logs, the soldiers turned to face once again their more formidable enemy, the Virginia mud.  They reformed their ranks and began the trek back to Washington.  It began to rain heavily, coming down in veritable sheets, and soon the men were thoroughly doused.  A good soldier can stand almost anything; but one thing he can’t stand is to have the seat of his trousers wet.  Around 10 o’clock that evening they made camp by the side of the road, as wet and bedraggled a lot as one could find anywhere.  The following evening they arrived at their old camp near Washington.

 

During the days immediately following the army’s return from Manassas, William witnessed a sudden increase in the tempo of activity.  His regiment was constantly drilled and disciplined, orders were repeatedly given to brighten arms and polish buttons, and inspections were made by regimental and company officers with an exasperating fussiness.

 

“Some one higher up in the command is punching them to punch us,” William remarked one day.  On the Potomac, steam tugs were pushing and pulling large sailing vessels back and forth.  Huge transports, filled with soldiers, horses, bales of hay, and munitions, were steaming majestically down the Potomac.  It was all more than a hint: the army was on the move to a destination as yet unknown to the soldiers.

 

Friday morning, March 14, found William, with others, reading an exhortation that General McClellan had just caused to be distributed to the troops.

 

 

For a long time I have kept you inactive, but not without a purpose . . . .  I have held you back that you might give the death-blow to the rebellion that has distracted our once happy country. . . .  The period of inaction has passed.  I will bring you now face to face with the rebels, and only pray that God may defend the right.  In whatever direction you may move, however strange my actions may appear to you, ever bear in mind that my fate is linked with yours, and that all I do is to bring you, where I know you wish to be,‑-on the decisive battlefield.  It is my business to place you there.  I am to watch over you as a parent over his children; and you know that your General loves you from the depth of his heart.  It shall be my care, as it has ever been, to gain success with the least possible loss; but I know that, if it is necessary, you will willingly follow me to our graves, for our righteous cause.  God smiles upon us, victory attends us, yet I would not have you think that our aim is to be attained without a manly struggle.  I will not disguise it from you: you have brave foes to encounter, foemen well worthy of the steel that you will use so well.  I shall demand of you great, heroic exertions, rapid and long marches, desperate combats, privations, perhaps.  We will share all these together; and when this sad war is over we will all return to our homes, and feel that we can ask no higher honor than the proud consciousness that we belonged to the ARMY OF THE POTOMAC.

 

GEO. B. MCCLELLAN

Major General Commanding

 

Three days later, March 17, the Third Corps under General Heintzelman broke camp and marched to the banks of the Potomac.  It was the first unit to move out.  William’s regiment, as was the case with others, underwent a final, and thorough, inspection.  The adjutant, an old-timer in the regular army, gave the order in a staccato of sharp verbal explosions, “Preparrre to open rrranks.”

 

William observed a civilian, who was entirely ignorant of military decorum, pass between the open ranks.  This infuriated the old adjutant, who forthrightly took out after the transgressor in the attempt to land a swift kick on the unlucky citizen’s hind end.  The distance between the adjutant’s toe and the swiftly retreating target was so great that he had to exercise a series of violent kicks into the air, until finally he did land one, but with such great force that he fell backward into the mud.

 

This, William thought, was certainly an inauspicious beginning of a great campaign of the Army of the Potomac.  He hoped that it was not an evil omen of things to come.

 

The troops were then marched on board a steamer.  William joined a little knot of his fellows on the deck.  The group discussed the probable destination, but no one knew anything except that the ship was proceeding down the placid waters of the Potomac to carry the men to a future fraught with uncertainty.

 

 

The steamer joined the fleet at Alexandria, where it anchored for the night.  William looked out and saw what he judged to be a fleet of over a hundred vessels.  There was very little sleep for the soldiers that night, as it was spent in singing.  The next morning two schooners loaded with horses were attached to the ship.  The fleet moved on down the river, flags unfurled and waving in the pleasant, spring air.  To William it all looked more like a great pleasure excursion rather than a military expedition in search of an enemy.  As the fleet passed Fort Washington, on the left, a band played “The Red, White, and Blue.”  Mount Washington appeared on the right, and the ship’s band saluted the historic site with “Washington’s March.”

 

Early the following morning, the steamer docked at Fort Monroe, and the troops marched ashore.  They camped that night at Hampton.  It had once been a beautiful, aristocratic village, but it now lay in blackened and charred ruins.  Only the old Episcopal church was standing.  Washington had worshipped here in bygone years, and armed men of the old Revolution had walked its broad aisles.  But it was now a victim of war.  The shore extending down to Fort Monroe was a scene of much activity: artillery, baggage-wagons, pontoon trains and boats, and soldiers’ tents profusely dotted the landscape.  Not the least to add to the confusion were the irrepressible army mules, eating grain out of pontoon boats, and when the grain was gone even trying, with some success, to eat the boats.

 

The 1st Massachusetts remained at Hampton for several days.  On one particular day William and Joe decided to explore the surrounding countryside  in the hope of getting a change of culinary diet.  They felt that they were deserving of a better fare than that afforded by the commissary.  They came to a small, unpretentious house and knocked at the door.

 

A lady answered the door, and after looking with contempt at the “foreign” uniforms of the two, asked, “What do yer two want?”

 

“We’d like something to eat,” Joe replied.  “We’ll be glad to pay you for it.”

 

“Come in yer, I reckon I can give ye something,” was the reply.

The matron of the house soon began cooking a couple of johnny-cakes in a spider elevated to face a fire that was burning on an open hearth of a fireplace.

 

“I suppose that you’n Yanks will take our property away,” she queried, while glancing at a young negro slave girl.

 

“Well, if we do we’ll pay for it,” replied William.  “How much do you think your black girl is worth?”

 

“IT is worth about five hundred dollars,” was the reply.

 

The boys left the house, munching their johnny-cakes.  William remarked to Joe, “That says it, even better, and certainly with more economy, than all the lectures we’ve heard.  Slavery is wrong because it makes a human being an it.”

 

The army began its move from Fort Monroe up the Peninsula on April 4.  It was the largest army yet to take the field.  It numbered nearly 67,000 men, 55,000 of whom could be put on the firing line.  It had nineteen batteries of field artillery and an artillery reserve.  William was happy to be on the move, notwithstanding the fact that, after a recent rain, the roads were quite poor and muddy.  They were crowded with a vast assemblage of war materiel.  The day was pleasant and sunny.  The grass was with

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

blossoms of white and pink, and the birds singing in the trees.  It was a pastoral scene that seemed so far removed from human conflict, were it not for the fact that it was marked by the ugly devices of war.

 

The troops got acquainted with the features of the Peninsula.  It was a fifty-mile extension of land extending east of Richmond to the Chesapeake Bay, bounded on the north by the York River and on the south by the James River.  It was a low-lying piece of land, across which transversed several streams.  Much of the country was heavily forested.  The soil seemed to have no bottom, and when it rained the roads became but avenues of mud.  This was the bottomless sponge that General McClellan had chosen as a theater of war.

 

General Heintzelman’s Third Corps, of which the 1st Massachusetts was a unit, marched on the right of the Peninsula, on the York River side, on the direct road leading to Yorktown, the scene of Cornwallis’ surrender just eighty-one years earlier.  As the march progressed, William got fleeting glimpses of rebel pickets, who faded back as the troops came upon them.  At noon the regiment stopped and lined both sides of the road while General

McClellan and his staff galloped by.  As he took off his cap and waved to the men, the troops gave him a hearty cheer.  When they got to Big Bethel, a village named for the old church just outside of the town, the troops were halted for a short time.  With the

 

 

exception of the church, the little village was in ruins.  William and his buddy, Joe, had a chance to peek inside the church.  They saw on one wall a rude sketch of a hotel, the words “Richmond” written on its sign.  Jeff Davis, wearing very large boots, was in the doorway and kicking McClellan out the door.  Underneath the sketch were the words, “Merry Mack!”

 

“Well, anyway, we’re ‘On to Richmond,” William exclaimed.  “I hope it all fares better than what’s on this wall.”

 

They camped that night by the side of the road at Cockletown, a small village on a branch of the Pequosin River, which flows into an estuary of the Chesapeake.  They dined on their usual marching fare: hard-tack, salt beef, and coffee.

 

It rained heavily the next morning, the fifth of April.  Once again, the troops were obliged to labor through heavy mud, the road having been cut up by the teams and heavy wagons preceding the men, so that it was well-nigh impassable.

 

Soon after his regiment got moving, William, who was guarding pontoon and baggage trains, noticed that the march was slowing down, finally to come to a complete stop.  He hurried to the front and found that one of the leading team of mules was mired, but not badly enough to bring everything to a halt.  He soon saw what the trouble was: the colored driver was sound asleep in the saddle of the mule that he was riding.

“Get that team moving,” William yelled to the lazy driver.

 

He flicked his long whip over the mules, emitted a loud yell, and the mules began pulling, but not in unison.

 

“Can’t you make those mules pull together?” William asked.

 

“Dem mules can pull together right smart, when dey wants to.”

 

William cocked his unloaded musket and leveled it at the astonished driver, and again commanded him, “Well, do something to make them want to pull together and get that wagon out of the mud!”

 

The negro driver rolled his eyes wildly, woke up, and let out a string of expletives, the likes of which William had never before heard or even thought possible, and that he was sure, if the enemy had heard the performance, would have caused them to abandon their lines immediately and bring the campaign to a successful termination.  The mules seemed to understand this sort of “language” clearly and fully, because they immediately pulled together and brought the wagon forward with no difficulty whatsoever.

 

 

By ten o’clock the Third Corps reached the junction of the Yorktown road and the road running southwest to Warwick Court House on the Warwick River.  There the men took the first shots of the enemy, coming from their works in front of Yorktown.  There was some exchange of artillery fire and skirmishing until evening, when the Corps made camp near Wormley’s Creek, on the extreme right of the Union forces.  The Second Corps, commanded by Brigidier-General Sumner, and the Fourth Corps, commanded by Brigidier-General Keyes, were on the left, toward the James River, extending along the Warwick River to Lee’s Mill.  As night fell, the two armies faced each other across the river.

 

McClellan decided that the best way to get at the enemy was to lay Yorktown under siege.  Accordingly, he wrote his wife to send his books on the siege of Sevastapol in the Crimea, so as to perfect the plans for his own siege.  It was necessary, therefore, to bring up his siege-train.  He had seventy heavy rifled pieces, some weighing in excess of 8 tons.  After getting them in place, he intended to fire them simultaneously and devastate the rebel fortifications with 7,000 pounds of metal at each firing.

 

During the weeks of April, batteries were dug for the heavy guns, as well as trenches and redoubts.  Much of the work was done at night.  There would be a thousand men, strung along like ants, shoveling dirt, while occasionally a shell burst overhead.  The heavier artillery was brought up the York and Wormley’s Creek to the front.  To position the guns in their batteries it was necessary to corduroy existing roads with logs, to build new roads and bridges.

 

One morning, Captain Rand, the commander of William’s company, Co. I, said to him, “Evidently word has got out that, as you said awhile back at Manassas, you ‘know a log’ when you meet it.  Well, we’re going to meet some logs today, because we have been ordered to help the engineers build roads with corduroy.”

 

“Well, whatever that means, that’s a new one to me,” William replied.

 

The troops soon found out what “corduroying” was.  Their task was to prepare a road over which to bring several two-hundred pound guns to a battery fronting Yorktown near the river.  The men located trees of large enough diameter to serve as stringers and they laid them longitudinally several feet apart.  They then cut small trees, about four inches in diameter, and laid them next to each other across the stringers.  In this manner, a corduroy of logs served as a roadway.

 

During the month of April, the work of road and bridge building continued.  The heavy artillery was brought up to batteries that were continually prepared for them.  A series of parallels was dug at the front lines.  Defensive devices were installed: for example, the chevaux-de-frise, a log transversed with wooden spikes, used as a defense against cavalry; the abatis, a row of large branches of trees, sharpened and laid close together with points outward, the butts pinned to the ground.

 

 

There had been one attempt to breach the rebel lines on the left of the Union position.  The incident occurred in mid-April at what was known as Dam No. 1, between Lee’s and Wynn’s Mills.  Units of General Erasmus Keyes’ Fourth Corps succeeded in crossing the Warwick and captured the rifle-pits of the enemy, but, without reinforcements, were soon pushed back across the river and into the Union lines.  The bullets fairly boiled the water as they waded across, and nearly half of the men involved in the operation were killed.  One of the men wrote in his diary, “This Battle took place at Dam no. 1 in Warwick creek and it was a Dam failure.”  In no other place and at no other time did General McClellan make any attempt to breach the left of the Confederate line, which was weakly held.  Although he did not know it, he outnumbered the Confederates three to one.  The southern commander at that time, Major-General John Magruder, had formerly been an actor.  Now he added something new to his repertoire.  He marched a few units back and forth, repeatedly, and convinced McClellan that great numbers of reinforcements were continually coming in to increase his strength.

 

The two armies continued to face each other throughout the siege routine, which lasted until the first days of the new month of May.  There were numerous times when the men at the front arranged informal truces.  There was a great deal of parlay between the lines, enemies shouting to each other and bantering back and forth.  When the advanced pickets on one side were being changed, they would caution those on the other side to keep their heads down and exercise caution, since the incoming pickets might not withhold their fire.  It was truly “a war of brother against brother.”

 

On the night of May 3, the Confederates shelled the Union forces all along their line with heavy guns.  Finally the guns were silent, for the first time in a month.  The next morning General Heintzelman went up with Professor Lowe in his reconnaissance balloon and saw that the Confederate fortifications had been abandoned.  The Confederate forces had withdrawn on the road toward Williamsburg.  The long siege was over; Yorktown had been taken without a pitched battle.

 

On that Sunday morning, May 4, William was with his regiment in the trenches confronting the enemy lines.  Colonel Cowdin told the troops of the 1st Massachusetts that word had just been received that the Rebels had abandoned Williamsburg, and that portions of the fortifications had been occupied by Federal forces.  Soon the order was received to get ready to march in pursuit of the southern army, which was even then fleeing toward Richmond.

 

General Hooker’s Second Division set out shortly after noon on the Yorktown to Williamsburg road.  General Heintzelman’s headquarters accompanied the division.  Its orders were to support the cavalry and artillery, under Brigadier-General George Stoneman, which were to advance toward Williamsburg.  As the men moved through the enemy’s works at Yorktown, they saw a number of sticks stuck in the ground with white flags attached.  These marked the places of buried torpedoes.  William was careful to avoid them, since he had been told that some men had been wounded and killed by accidentally stepping on them.  He later learned that these devices were used here for the first time in war.

 

Williamsburg is about twelve miles from Yorktown.  As the men marched along, they were anxious to know just how far they had to march until they reached their destination.  William came upon an old slave, and inquired of him, “How far is it to Williamsburg?”

 

“Right smart distance, massa,” the slave replied.

 

A little later, not satisfied with that indefinite answer, he asked a white man, “How many miles?”  “A right smart number of them, I recon, stranger.”

 

The men laughed, now realizing that the natives were not very glad to see them or willing to offer them much help.

 

Late in the afternoon it began to rain.  The division was held up by another force that had preceded it.  It waited in the rain and mud until 5 o’clock, then turned left onto Hampton road, a road leading to the Lee’s Mill road.  The troops marched that dark and rainy night, over frightful roads, until nearly midnight, when, bone-tired, they lay down in their blankets, wet and hungry, chewing their hard-tack for a modicum of nutrition.

 

“My heavens, Joe,” William exclaimed, “just look at that!”

 

The two young soldiers, standing that morning of May 5 on the left of Lee’s Mill road, peered through the thick forest and got their first glimpse of Fort Magruder, a large earthen redoubt, which was flanked on both sides by a series of smaller redoubts.  The trees at some distance from the front of the fort had been cut down, leaving a cleared swath a half a mile wide.  Between this and the fort there was a clear area about 700 yards wide, filled with rifle-pits.

“How in the world could a place like that be taken by men whose only armor is their own living flesh?” Joe asked.

 

“You may find out, boys,” responded Captain Rand, beside whom the two were standing.  “Here comes Colonel Cowdin.”

 

“All right, Captain, move your regiment out as skirmishers.”

 

With Joe at his side, William crept stealthily forward through the woods, sheltering himself by the welcoming presence of the large trees, until he came to the edge of the clearing that contained the enemy rifle pits.

 

“Fire!”  It was Rand’s voice, sharp and peircing as William had never before heard.

 

From his position beside a large tree, William fired his rifle into the enemy rifle pits.  Then, a moment after his first shot, he suddenly stopped firing.  He was held in the grip of a soul-searing realization: he, a lad from a world of Christian love, was becoming a demon of human destruction!

 

But it did not last.  The next instant he was deluged with a curtain of heavy dirt from a large shell that fell in front of him.

 

“Are you all right?” he heard Joe shout from a short distance away.

 

“I’m not hurt,” William cried, as he rubbed the dirt from his face and eyes.

 

 

The rain began to fall gently, creating a curtain of dense mist.  Broad streams of battle smoke hung in the air.  Caught by the ground-lying wind, they streamed between the great trees of the forest, ghostly shapes writhing as if to celebrate the agony of death.  Joe crept to William’s side, and the two men, now afraid that they would mistakenly hit their own men, fired at an enemy battle flag.

 

The fire of the enemy grew more intense.  William’s senses became numbed as he heared the constant hissing of bullets, with their sharp ping and their duller thud as they struck human flesh.

 

The men were forced, under this murderous fire, to fall back to the edge of the woods from which they had earlier come.  It was a slow and methodical move from stump to stump and log to log, all-the-while firing at the enemy.  They took position beside two batteries, which soon silenced the enemy’s works and cleared the rifle-pits.  The regiment again moved forward beyond the forest, and to the left of Fort Magruder, when they saw a swarm of Confederates, who, with an unearthly yell, opened with deadly fire.  Again, the troops were forced back, dodging behind trees and stumps, to the edge of the woods.

 

“Why don’t you get behind a tree?” William shouted to Joe, as he saw his companion moving in a small clearing.

 

“Confound it, there ain’t enough for the officers.”

It began to rain heavily.  William and Joe were soaked to their skin.  Yet they fought stubbornly on.  Three times the enemy came within 80 yards of the road in front of which they were fighting.  Three times the Confederates were repulsed.

 

“I’m out of ammunition,” William shouted.  “Do you have some I can use?”

 

“No, I’m out, too,” Joe cried, hardly making himself heard through the whine of shot and thud of shell.

 

They moved a short distance to the rear, until they came to a small clearing where they found a group of wounded and dead comrades.

 

William lifted one of the dead, a soldier with whom he had often conversed, and, holding back the welling tears, took from him the unspent ammunition.  It was an exchange, William thought, of unspent for the spent.

 

The rain now fell in bone-chilling torrents.  William and Joe were back on the road, firing at the enemy, now but shadows in the pending darkness.

 

William glanced to his side and saw a short, stocky, officer riding furiously toward his regiment on a large, black horse.  In his only arm, he waved a sword in broad circles.  After a few minutes, he saw a mass of marching men, fresh and untired, their weapons to the ready.  It was Brigidiar-General Phil Kearney at the head of his Third Division.

 

 

William and Joe joined their weary comrades in resounding cheer after resounding cheer.  They had marched and fought with their fellow-soldiers of the Second Division constantly for thirteen hours.  Wet and exhausted, they were ready to drop in their tracks.

 

At 8 o’clock that night the 1st Massachusetts made camp in the woods about a half a mile from the front.  After a supper of hot coffee and hard-tack, William turned in, content that he had done a good day’s work for the Union.  He was glad to be alive and unharmed, but as he fell asleep he thought of those, many by now close friends, who lay dead on the field of battle.  His eyelids closed, his lips moved in a prayer for his loved ones at home.

 

The next morning, Tuesday the 6th of May, dawned bright and clear.  Birds were singing among the thickets in which lay the dead.  As daylight was breaking, Federal pickets brought back word that the Rebels had left Williamsburg and were on the way to Richmond.  Later in the morning William, with his company, marched through the deserted streets of Williamsburg, and the men stacked arms on the campus of the old College, the College of William and Mary.  It was here, William recalled, from things his father had told him years earlier, that Jefferson was once a student.  At noon the soldiers made a fire of Virginia fences, cooked their coffee, which they drank while eating fresh-cooked pork that had been converted earlier from a wandering Confederate pig.  The men spent the afternoon talking, singing their songs, and were happy for the well-earned respite.

On May 8 the Federal army left Williamsburg and resumed its march toward Richmond.  The road lead northwest, about halfway between the York and James rivers.  It was the Williamsburg road, a road that was destined to be the site of great conflict.  The men tramped through little places that were formerly unfamiliar to them, but that would be forever etched in their memories: Barhamsville, Roper’s Church, and New Kent Courthouse.  The march was a difficult one.  Thick dust rose in clouds, filling the nostrils and throats, and indeed impregnating the clothing, hair, and skin, of the men.  William later remarked that he was always thirsty, never able to drink enough water.  And what water he did drink was often nothing but a mud puddle in the road.  There seemed, he thought, but two options: dust or mud.  One soldier of the regiment described one day’s march as eighteen miles long and one foot deep.

 

 

On the 21st the Army was once again together and in line facing Richmond, from seven to twelve miles to the west.  McClellan had established his headquarters at White House Landing, on the Pamunkey River, twenty-three miles from Richmond.  Even then it was historic ground, for on it stood the house in which George Washington and Martha Custis were married.  It was now the home of General Robert E. Lee’s son, William H. F. “Rooney” Lee.  General Lee’s wife, who was a Custis, had been staying in the house.  When she left just before the arrival of the Yankees, she pinned a note to the door: “Northern soldiers who profess to reverence Washington, forbear to desecrate the home of his first married life‑-the property of his wife, now owned by her descendants.‑-A Grand-daughter of Mrs. Washington.”  General McClellan complied with her wish and placed a guard at the house.  The line of the army was as follows: on the right, near New Bridge, were the Fifth and Sixth Corps, commanded, respectively, by Brig.-Gen. Fitz John Porter and Brig.-Gen. William B. Franklin; at the center, the Second Corps, Brig.-Gen. Edwin V. Sumner; and on the left near Bottom’s Bridge, the Fourth Corps, under Brig.-Gen. Erasmus D. Keyes.  The Third Corps, that of Heintzelman, and in which William served, was placed in reserve.

 

By May 23 the Fourth Corps had crossed the Chickahominy River at the site of Bottom’s Bridge.  The Chickahominy is a small, torpid stream about forty feet wide, flowing east-by-southeast down the center of the Peninsula until it empties in the James.  Swampy lowlands border both sides of the stream, and the trees growing in the swamp are on a level with the bluffs.  During the dry season, the stream can be crossed with little difficulty, but during the rainy season the bottom lands are quickly flooded.  The engineers rebuilt Bottom’s Bridge, and later constructed several other bridges that had been destroyed by the rebel army.

 

On the 25th, the army took up position at the Seven Pines at the junction of the Williamsburg and Nine Mile roads, nine miles from Richmond.   The army occupied a twelve-mile line in the shape of a large fishhook: on the north bank of the river were the three Corps of Porter, Franklin, and Sumner, forming the shank of the fishhook.  Its curve crossed the river at Bottom’s Bridge and passed through Heintzelman’s Corps south of the river.  The barb of the hook was formed by Keyes’ Fourth Corps, just beyond Seven Pines toward Richmond.

The Battle of Seven Pines was fought on May 31, 1862.  The 1st Massachusetts was not engaged, as the regiment, with other units of Hooker’s Division, was positioned south and east to guard the Bridge over the White Oak Swamp, a small, sluggish stream that takes its rise west of Seven Pines and flows southeast until it empties in the Chickahominy.  However, the sounds of battle reached the reserve troops, and William could follow the course of battle to a limited extent.  The fight was initiated by the southern commander, General Joseph E. Johnston.  He envisioned a complex three-pronged attack, but it did not materialize because of difficulties in coordinating the movement of troops.  The attack became a frontal assault on the Federal center by the forces of D. H. Hill.  The fighting was fierce, but the Union lines held, and by 6:30 the battle was over.

 

There was some action during the following morning, Sunday, June 1, in which some units of Hooker’s Division were involved.  The fighting was over by 11:30 that morning, with the Confederates repulsed.  This ended the Battle of Seven Pines.  General Johnston had been wounded late in the previous day of battle.  At 2 o’clock on the afternoon of that Sunday, Robert E. Lee was given command of the southern army, now named the Army of Northern Virginia.

 

On the afternoon of June 3, the 1st Massachusetts rejoined the division on the Williamsburg road just beyond the Seven Pines.  There the division made camp for the next few days.  One afternoon William and Joe went to the place where the battle had begun.  They saw many of the dead, who were not yet buried.  They saw dead confederates lying draped over rail fences, assuming still the positions in which they had been killed.  They were surprised by the numerous limbs of large trees that been severed by bullets and shot.  They came across some of the enemy dead standing in the swamp in the position in which they had been shot.  They were already far decomposed and their flesh had dropped from their bones.  “All this,” William remarked to his friend, “men who are

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

supposed to be civilized, do to their fellows.”  They were silent as they made their way in the dusk back to camp.

 

The two lines exchanged fire and were constantly engaged in skirmishing.  The entire Union army was kept in battle-readiness, expecting an attack at any time.  The bugler at brigade headquarters would often sound an alarm to “fall in.”  On one day William, in his regiment, heard the alarm ten times.  It often rained, and the Confederates would often fire artillery during a thunder-storm, so as to cover their fire.  But the boys were not caught unawares and kept their arms close in the event of an attack.

 

At 8 o’clock on the morning of June 25, Day One of the Seven Days, Brigadier-General Grover’s First Brigade pushed his line forward toward Richmond.  The brigade was positioned a short distance south of the Williamsburg road.  To the north and east, across the Williamsburg road, was a grove of oak trees called “Oak Grove.”  It fell to Colonel Cowdin’s 1st Massachusetts, in concert with the 11th Massachusetts, to lead the advance as skirmishers.  As the movement commenced, William, alert and his gun ready for quick firing, was cautiously walking by the Colonel’s side, both men crouched and slipping from tree to tree as they moved forward.

 

“This may be a difficult action for us, William,” Cowdin said, “so we must be ready for just about anything.”

 

 

William nodded, and saw a thick forest covering the ground just ahead, through the middle of which ran the head of White Oak Swamp.  This swamp had for days served to divide the picket line of both armies.  Just as William and his fellow skirmishers reached the edge of the woods, the rebels opened heavy fire upon them.

 

“Now, move on,” Cowdin shouted to his men.

 

By now the adrenalin was flowing, and the men pushed on, dodging and firing from tree to tree, until they reached the swamp.  On they rushed, wading waist-deep through brackish water, until they drove the southern pickets from their advanced line.  The entire brigade now caught up with the skirmishers and the men moved forward until they came to a clearing in the woods, where there was a small schoolhouse and a farmhouse.  By now William and Joe were together, both standing in the rear of the house, peering around its corners, and firing at the enemy, who were beginning to counterattack.  In a few minutes, Cowdin came up and joined them.

 

Joe, peering through the rapidly gathering cloud of battle-smoke, saw a swiftly advancing horde of men wearing bright red uniforms.  He was about to fire.

 

“Hold your fire, these are Federal Zouaves,” someone cried.

 

“They can’t be,” William shouted, “if they were, why would they be coming at us from the Richmond side?”  A gust of wind created an opening in the smoke, and the men saw the battle flag of a Georgia regiment fluttering above the heads of the advancing men.  The brigade now took heavy and sustained fire, but it held its ground and returned even sharper fire.  The two lines were very close to each other, and William and Joe, firing side by side, often heard the shouts and groans of the Georgians as they fell.

 

It was now 11 o’clock, when an order went down the line for the men to withdraw.

 

“What in thunder is going on?” William exclaimed, “we’re holding and the Rebs are falling back.”

 

“Who knows,” Joe responded.  “I heard that little Mac is running this affair by telegraph from his headquarters.”

 

“Well, that’s no way to fight a war; telegraphs can’t see what’s going on.”

 

All of the men were thoroughly disgusted, but there was no alternative but to obey orders.  The troops fell back over hard-won ground.

 

 

At 1 o’clock, the order was given, again, to advance over the very same ground of the morning’s battle.  Again the 1st Massachusetts went forward, amidst a storm of bullets whizzing past their heads, men falling profusely from the ranks.  Sometimes, William thought as he was inching his way forward through the forest, it was hard to differentiate between the storm of bullets and the invectives of by-now angry soldiers.  The regiment regained its former position and held it until relieved later in the afternoon.  It was a saddened and wrathful group of dispirited men who returned to their camp.  Of all the regiments engaged in the battle of Oak Grove the 1st Massachusetts had suffered the most heavily.

 

June 26, saw the Battle of Mechanicsville.  It occurred on the north side of the Chickahominy.  Porter’s Fifth Corps were in position facing a small stream, Beaver Dam Creek, which flowed south into the Chickahominy.  After a fitful start, the enemy broke through the Federal lines and caused the Union army to fall back southeast to the vicinity of Gaines’s Mill.

 

On June 27, the Battle of Gaines’s Mill was fought.  In the twilight of that day the Federal forces were routed and fell back south nearer the river.  The 1st Massachusetts was not engaged in these battles, as it, with the rest of Heintzelman’s Corps, was across the river at Seven Pines.

 

At 11 o’clock the night of the 27th of June, General McClellan called his Corps commanders together at his headquarters at Savage’s Station and announced his decision, actually made some days earlier, to abandon the campaign and retreat to the James River.  He had lost his nerve, largely because of Stonewall Jackson, who was now always giving large doses of trouble on the Union right.  After his commanders left, the general sat by his campfire and composed a venomous telegram to Secretary of War Stanton, laying the blame for his defeat on the Administration and accusing it of treason:

 

I again repeat that I am not responsible for this . . . .  I know that a few thousand more men would have changed this battle from a defeat to a victory.  As it is, the government must not and cannot hold me responsible for the result. . . .  If I save this army now, I tell you plainly that I owe no thanks to you or to any other persons in Washington.  You have done your best to sacrifice this army.

 

When the telegraph officer saw this remarkable outburst of personal invective, he deleted that portion of the telegram, with the result that neither Stanton nor Lincoln heard of it.  During the remainder of that long night the troops north of the river made their slow and agonizing trek over the Chickahominy bridges.  The severely wounded were left behind, to fall in enemy hands.

 

The men of the 1st Massachusetts spent the next day, June 28, in camp at their advanced position taken on the 25th.  That night, orders were given to the men to be ready to fall back to a new position at sunrise the next day.  They took up a position behind the second line of Union entrenchments, on the south side of the Williamsburg road.  The men were put in readiness to receive an attack.

 

 

When the men of the 1st Massachusetts were in position, William looked to the east and saw a spectacular, but sad, scene.  McClellan had just abandoned his headquarters at Savage’s Station, taken with him over the newly constructed White Oak Swamp bridge what supplies could be moved, and left vast amounts to be destroyed.  Massive clouds of black smoke covered the sky over the station, as immense piles of food, clothing, and ammunition were burned and smashed.  The men heard a great roar, and looked on as two trains loaded with ammunition and under full throttle hurtled down the track toward each other and met head-on in a violent explosion that nearly fell the appalled spectators.  The boys now knew for sure that the Peninsula campaign was finished for good.  A deep gloom fell over the soldiers.

 

“All this is just unbelievable,” William remarked to one of his comrades, “that such an army with unlimited supplies would fail to capture Richmond.  What is next for the Union and for us?”

 

Later in the day General Lee directed an attack on Sumner’s Corps, on the right of Grover’s First Brigade, but it was soon repulsed.  This was the Battle of Savage’s Station.

At about 3 o’clock on that Sunday afternoon, June 29, Grover’s brigade fell back closer to Savage’s Station to strengthen its defense.  A little later, the entire Corps, Heintzelman’s Third Corps, turned south and crossed White Oak Swamp at Brackett’s ford, a short distance west of the White Oak bridge.  The heat and dust were suffocating.  The retreat was slow, as there were numerous traffic jams between the troops and wagons.  There were times when William found himself swaying in a state of near-sleep.  Officers on horseback were nodding in their saddles.  Wounded men, who were able to accompany the retreating army, stood mute, lame and bleeding, staring with ghostly eyes into the blank of space.  When night overtook the men, the difficulties of the march were merely intensified.

 

The men lurched on through the blackness.  There was a sudden thunderstorm that drenched the soldiers, although William was glad to see the way as it was illumined by flashes of lightning.  This night, never to be erased from memory, would be known as the “blind march.”  Just before midnight the 1st Massachusetts reached the Charles City road, near a small hamlet, Glendale, and there the men bivouacked for the night.

 

All of the roads over which the Federal army was retreating came together at Glendale.  The road leading south of Glendale was the Quaker road, and over it the entire army had to move in its retreat to the James.  It therefore had to be defended at all cost.

 

It was still dark on the early morning of June 30, when the men of the 1st Massachusetts were busy cooking their rations and replenishing their stores of ammunition.  As the sun rose in a cloudless sky, the day promised to be hot and sultry.  At a nearby spring, the men took turns drinking and filling their canteens.  There was little talk; the men stood in small groups, silent and apprehensive.  The order was given to move out and take a position on the west side of the Quaker road.  The brigade, Grover’s, was posted some ways down the road, with the two other brigades of Hooker’s division on the left, farther south on the road.  The area between the brigade and the road was covered with woods.

 

 

On that day Lee’s strategy was to cut the Federal army in two and prevent its escape.  Jackson, on the north, and Holmes, on the south, were to attack the flanks.  Jackson, who was just north of White Oak Bridge, opened the attack at shortly afternoon with a thunderous barrage of artillery.  It was, as one soldier later wrote, as if “hell seemed to have opened upon us.”  Nevertheless, Jackson was unable to force his way over the swamp and did not bring any pressure upon the Federal army.  Holmes, although engaging his artillery, was likewise ineffective.

 

The main attack was directed against Brigadier-General George A. McCall’s division from the Fifth Corps, which occupied the center of the Federal line.  It opened about 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon and continued unabated for two hours.

 

William and his comrades were in their line, ready for any eventuality, when they were suddenly overwhelmed by a horde of men, shouting hysterically and even firing into them.  William was in the act of returning fire, when he saw that these were Union soldiers.  “Hold your fire, you blamed fools, you’re firing on your own men,” he shouted.  They were soon gone, heading for the rear.

 

Coming out of the woods behind the fleeing Federals were broken masses of the enemy, hurling themselves furiously at the entire front of Grover’s brigade.  The two lines drew closer.  The smoke of battle soon obscured the view of the men in the opposing lines.  As it slowly rose, William saw the gray-clad legs of moving men, and then began firing so continuously that his gun became too hot to hold.  He caught a glimpse of the divisional commander, General Hooker, who had ridden up on his white charger, waved his hand at the enemy and called out, “Give them hell, boys.”  They were the men of Branch’s North Carolinians.  The men of the 16th Massachusetts and 69th Pennsylvania threw a murderous fire upon them and forced them to give way.  General Grover came to the head of the 1st Massachusetts and, with Colonel Cowdin, led the regiment in pursuit of the enemy.  William, with his fellows, ran swiftly, stooping down, through the woods, dodging from tree to tree, and firing upon the fleeing enemy.  In this action, the 1st Massachusetts took severe losses.  Joe, who was fighting at William’s side, was hit in the leg, and had to limp back to the rear.  The fighting lasted until dusk.  As the light was fading, William, firing as he ran forward, suddenly felt a tremendous blow upon his chest and was lifted in the air and hurled backwards several feet, his musket lying on the ground beside him.  For a few moments he was stunned and almost lost consciousness.  He recalled the old saying of Descartes, which he had learned in Latin, Cogito, ergo sum, “I think, therefore I am.”  “Well,” he said with a chuckle, “I guess I’m not dead.”  He got up and felt under his uniform and withdrew his New Testament, which he always carried in a breast pocket.  He opened it and saw a bullet that had lodged between its covers.  He had, he realized, been saved by the “Word.”

 

When darkness finally came, the troops of the 1st Massachusetts were withdrawn to their original lines for the night.  The southern flank of the army had been sealed against the rebel threat.  The breach in the center, too, had by then been sealed.

 

 

After rations that evening, William found Joe, whose wound had been dressed.  They bedded down for the night, lying on their arms.  But sleep did not come.  The enemy’s loss had been unusually severe, and the field of battle was littered with the dead and wounded.  The deplorable cries of the wounded were heard throughout the night.  Torches were moving back and forth as the enemy searched for its wounded.  William heard rebel stragglers calling out the names of their regiments, and Union men answering, “here, by the oak,” directing these lost children of the Confederacy into captivity.  Even when morning broke, the heart-rending cries and groans of the enemy wounded were undiminished.

 

During the long night of June 30th, the Fourth Corps and part of the Fifth marched south on the Quaker Road.  By dawn July 1, the commander of the Fifth Corps, General Porter, who now became the de facto commander of the entire Union army, had begun to fortify Malvern Hill.  Later in the morning the remaining portions of the army joined these forces on the hill.  Heintzelman’s Corps was the last unit to make the journey.  Along the march William and others of his regiment came upon fields of ripe grain.  They cut the tops and stuffed them in their haversacks as a supplement to their scanty rations.

 

Union troops ringed the southern slope of Malvern Hill, over which the rebels must charge.  Heavy artillery, including naval artillery on the James, was positioned to support the defenders.

 

Heintzelman’s Third Corps was posted on the east, to defend the right flank from attack.  On the Union side, the battle, which began early in the afternoon, consisted of heavy artillery.  Throughout the afternoon, enemy infantry made charge after charge upon the Union lines, only to be cut down by artillery fire, as if by a large scythe wielded by an angry god of battle.  It went on until nine o’clock that night.  Cheer after cheer filled the stillness of the night, as the victorious army, secure on the heights, gave voice to its victory.

 

Although the commander of that day’s battle wanted to follow it up with a counteroffensive, McClellan ordered the army to continue its retreat to the James.  The Peninsula campaign was over, and Richmond, with Lee’s Army, was saved.

 

The following morning at daybreak, the army began its march to Harrison’s Landing, on the James river.  The road was crowded with infantry, wagons, and beef cattle.  There were times when the men could rest and talk with the southern prisoners.  On one occasion William talked with a soldier from North Carolina.  He told William that he had stayed loyal to the Union as long as he could, but finally had decided to enter the Confederate army to save his property.

 

“There are thousands in the South just like me,” he said.  “We didn’t want the war, and resisted the sentiment of secession as long as we could.  Now it has gone so far we’ve got to fight or sever all the associations with which our lives are linked.  I know it is a desperate chance for the South.  Look at your men, how they are disciplined, fed, and clothed, and then see how our men are fed and clothed.  They are brave men, but they can’t stand it forever.”

 

William met a lad from Stonewall Jackson’s outfit, who was singing the praises of his general.  He asked the southern lad, “Does Stonewall swear at you, to get you to march?”

 

 

“No, he doesn’t swear; he prays.  He’s powerful at prayer, and when he’s working at it we know we’re in for a hard march and a hard fight.”

 

The army remained at Harrison’s Landing for several weeks.  The men settled in for a much-earned rest.  They spent the days talking about the recent campaign and their prospects for the future.  During the evening hours, soldiers from various units met and sang the songs of the day.  Their favorite, which was sung often during those hot July evenings, was “Lorena,” words of tender memories set to melody unmatched in loveliness.  Although now tempered in the fire of battle, William was always touched by the litany of love lost in earth yet regained in heaven.

On one particularly hot evening, the sun an orb of gold on the western horizon, William and his regiment joined with other near-by groups to lift their spirits with song:

 

The years creep slowly by, Lorena,

The snow is on the grass again;

The sun’s low down the sky, Lorena,

The frost gleams where the flowers have been,

But the heart throbs on as warmly now,

As when the summer days were nigh;

Oh, the sun can never dip so low,

Adown affection’s cloudless sky.

The sun can never dip so low,

Adown affection’s cloudless sky.

 

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 

It matters little now, Lorena,

The past is in the eternal Past,

Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,

Life’s tide is ebbing out so fast.

There is a future! O thank God!

Of life, this is so small a part!

‘Tis dust to dust beneath the sod;

But there, up there, ’tis heart to heart.

‘Tis dust to dust beneath the sod;

But there, up there, ’tis heart to heart.

When the singing was over, William and Joe walked slowly, deep in thought, to their tent.  The last traces of light were departing the land.  It had become quiet, as weary men settled down for rest.  Then the two comrades heard, faintly and then with increasing volume, a beautifully haunting melody lifted on the notes of a bugle.  It was a new and different lights-out call.  It was “Taps,” heard this night for the first time.

 

On the 15th of August, the men began their march down the Peninsula and a few days later arrived at Hampton Roads.  There they boarded the steamers and took the return trip to Alexandria, the point from which they had begun their ill-fated odyssey on the Peninsula.

 

ROSTER OF THE ARMIES

 

FIRST BULL RUN, JULY 21, 1861

 

THE UNION ARMY

 

Brigadier-General Irvin McDowell, Commanding

First Division: Brigadier-General Daniel Tyler

Fourth Brigade: Colonel Israel B. Richardson

1st Massachusetts: Colonel Robert Cowdin

Co. I: Captain Charles E. Rand

William Prescott

 

ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, CSA

 

Brigadier-General G. T. Beauregard, Commanding

Fourth Brigade: Brigadier-General James Longstreet

 

ARMY OF THE SHENANDOAH, CSA

 

Brigadier-General Joseph E. Johnston, Commanding

First Brigade: Colonel Thomas J. Jackson

 

* * *

 

THE PENINSULA, 1862

 

ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, USA

 

Major-General George B. McClellan, Commanding

Third Corps: Brigadier-General Samuel P. Heintzelman

Second Division: Brigadier-General Joseph Hooker

First Brigade: Brigadier-General Cuvier Grover

1st Massachusetts: Colonel Robert Cowdin

Co. I: Captain Charles E. Rand

William Prescott

 

ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA, CSA

 

General Joseph E. Johnston, Commanding (Wounded)

General Robert E. Lee, Commanding

Jackson’s Command: Major-General Thomas J. Jackson