CHAPTER
XLII
IN
CAMP
Soldier life in camp is always surrounded with
considerable red-tapeism, so much duty is required of the men that might
readily be omitted, but such is human nature, that “man clothed with a brief
bit of authority commits such acts before high-heaven, as to make saints weep.”
The regimental officers had their tents placed in
front of the regiment, immediately alongside of the high-way leading to the
landing, and as the road was very rutty, a guard was placed in the rear of the
quarters facing the street, with instructions to allow no one, officer or
private, to ride past the quarters faster than a walk or a slow trot.
It happened to be the ill-luck, of the writer to be
placed on this beat one day, with the usual instructions made imperative, owing
to the fact that the Adjutant and Sergeant Major, with the aid of the
regimental clerk were making out the muster rolls. Whilst on duty, leisurely pacing backward and forward in the beaten
path we discovered General Geary and his staff approaching at a full gallop and
when within halting distance, we ordered them to halt! The old General paid no attention to the
challenges and galloped past, followed by the rest of the party at the same
speed. Scarce the cloud of dust which
they raised subsided, ere the Colonel made his appearance, and proceeded to
give us one of the roundest cursings we ever received, being a soldier, it was
our duty to take the anger and feel ourselves highly honored for the marked
attention bestowed on one of Uncle Sam’s mud crushers.
A number of the boys of the company saw the
performance and enjoyed the mishap hugely, among those whom it appeared to give
the greatest satisfaction was Sergeant F. M. Stuck, who was the Sergeant in
charge of the guards, and who stood near us and overheard the entire
affair,,....
There is a true saying that “it is a long lane that
has no turn,” and this proved true in this particular case at least.
It is one of the old established military customs that
the camp guards must remain at the company guard-house, where all the
guard-mounts are turned off, and from whence the relief started out every two
hours. It did not take the men long to
discover the disposition of the officer in charge of the guard and then conduct
themselves accordingly.
As a natural consequence the men took advantage of
Stuck’s good nature and went to their quarters as soon as off of post.
At about 2 o’clock , the
Colonel, who by the way was general Officer of the Day, approached the
guard-house. He appeared fully equipped
and it was the duty of the Sergeant in charge of the camp guards to turn out
his men and bring them to a present arms for the Officer of the Day. There was but one man besides the Sergeant at
the guard-house.
As the Colonel came up towards the guard on duty, the
man saluted him, which salute the Colonel returned. Sergeant Stuck was seated on the grass and
the guards had all gone to their own quarters, it was an utter impossibility to
have the men fall in. The Colonel
stopped in front of Stuck and asked:
“Sergeant where is your guard?”
“Gone to get their dinners, ”was Frank’s reply, “I
thought th—”
“You thought, d—m you, you had no mess to think, get
up off of the grass, or I’ll kick the head off of you, now I’ll give you ten
minutes to get the guard here.”
The Sergeant started post-haste for the regiment, his
mind was so much taken up with the Colonel’s command that he did not really
find time to whistle “Kennedy’s reel.”
Suffice it to say he got the men together and had
several minutes of the time allowed him to spare. This little episode taught the Sergeant a
lesson and in the future when our Colonel was officer of day and Frank was on
duty he kept his eyes skinned for the Colonel.
We were on guard and witnessed the occurrence and we
presume that it is almost needless to inform our readers that we enjoyed the
affair fully as much as Frank had the cursing we received but a little while
before, and its occurrence turned the tables and we escaped considerable
teasing.
We made a trip to the landing in company with W. S. Keller for the express purpose of
getting a dinner at one of the numerous hotels or boarding houses which were
then flourishing in the vicinity of the Landing.
We paid one dollar-and-a-half each and took a seat at
the table. The bill of fair consisted of
short cakes and tea, the cakes were so heavy and the tea so weak that when we
would soak a cake in it, the cake would
drop to the bottom with a “thud,” for spread we had butter, --well to smell it
was all that was necessary, there was no danger that the boys would steal any
of it, for it was certainly strong enough to help itself, in conjunction with
this we had a mixture made of boiled peach and apple snits. We determined to stow away all the grub we
possibly cou1d, however greatly in danger of loading ourselves down with
“those” cakes to such an extent that we could not get up from the table.
After finishing our meal we came out of the hotel and
sauntered down along the wharf. Our
surprise may will be imagined when we run across a boat which we at once recognized
as belonging to Selinsgrove, and which we soon discovered was in charge of
Captain Edward McGlinsey.
We got on board the boat and soon had the pleasure of
taking the Captain by the hand. Almost
the first question he asked us was:
“Are you hungry boys?”
Of course we were and we told him so, although we
could yet easily feel the cakes. He
immediately set out his bread and some spreads, and told us to help ourselves
until he could prepare a cooked meal for us.
We thanked him, and told him that we would not spoil our dinner by
eating a piece but would wait until he had his cooked meal ready.
The Captain set to work in good earnest, and soon
placed an excellent dinner, consisting of new potatoes, fried shad, Washington bread, butter and coffee, to all of which we
did ample justice. That meal we have
never forgotten and shall ever remember the captain for his kindness.
Owing to the orders which had been issued forbidding
the selling of fresh fish to the. men, it had been impossible for us to buy
them, but now this difficulty was obviated we gave the Captain money, and he
bought us four fine large shad.
After spending several hours very pleasantly on the
boat, and after partaking, at the urgent request of Mr. McGlinsey, of a little
something more to eat, we watched our opportunity and with our fish left for
the camp without coming in contact with a guard or patrol. We were fortunate enough to reach camp with
our precious load. We had no difficulty
in disposing of one of the pairs to members of the company.
On our arrival from the landing we heard that rumors
were being circulated to the effect that the Army was getting ready to move and
that when we did move it would be towards Washington .
The Army had been greatly reduced by the casualties of
the spring campaign, as well as by the expiration of the term of service of the
nine month men, a large number of men were in the hospital and on the sick
list, so that the strength of the Army of the Potomac all told, did not exceed
80,000. But the men were in good spirits
and anxious for anything that might tend towards the defeat of the Rebel Army
No comments:
Post a Comment