USA > Maine > History of the First Maine cavalry, 1861-1865, V. 1 > Part 3
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36
12
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
others for battery and transportation purposes. I would most strongly advise the dismounting of that regiment, both in an economical and military point of view.
Most truly and resp'y your obt. servt., BENJ. F. BUTLER, Maj. Gen. Com.
.
It is desirable that the First Maine Cavalry be dismounted, the men being given the option either to be transferred to the regular dragoons, or to enlist in any other arm of the service, either volunteers or regulars, or be discharged, the officers mustered out of service, and the horses taken either to mount the artillery or for transportation service.
B. F. BUTLER, Maj. Gen. Com.
So it seems that there came very near being no history of the First Maine Cavalry to write. It is evident that the War Department tried hard, but was unable to make an advantage- ous disposition of the regiment in the field that winter, and so it remained where it was. This was very severe on the men. The hospital was quickly filled up, and " Winthrop Hall " was taken for hospital purposes for the sick of the several regiments and batteries in camp at Augusta, and many of the comrades of this regiment were in that hospital. The reports of the sur- geons of the different regiments of Thursday, January twenty- eighth, show that out of 1,160 men then in camp belonging to the cavalry, 261 were in the hospital; of the 960 men in camp belonging to the Thirteenth Infantry, 163 were on the sick-list ; of the 957 men of the Fourteenth Infantry then in camp. 120 were sick; of the 933 men of the Fifteenth Infantry then in camp, 158 were in the hospital; total, 4,010 men in camp, of whom 702 were on the sick-list.
The first death in the regiment was that of Thomas Hollis. Co. L. of Dead River Plantation, who died January third. (One of the band died earlier. but he was not mustered in, and his death does not appear upon the records.) During the winter there were several deaths, hardly a company escaping the loss of one or more of its members, while some of them lost two or three. and several who were left there sick when the regiment departed in the spring, died shortly after. The impression left by those sad funeral processions. with none but the comrades as mourners, with the horse of deceased loaded with his arms
13
THE WINTER'S HARDSHIPS.
and equipments, and with his horse led in the line with his boots reversed in the saddle, with an absence of everything pertaining to such occasions that the men had before been in the habit of seeing, and the remembrance of their feelings as they thus fol- lowed their comrade to bis last home, will never be effaced.
It was estimated by good authority that the regiment lost that winter more than two hundred men, by death and disabil- ity, on account of the cold weather and the insufficient means of protection. The condition of the troops in camp attracted the attention of some of the members of the Legislature, and a bill was introduced to give each man an extra blanket, at the expense of the state; but, after some discussion, it was so amended as to authorize the governor to give one to such as he thought deserved it ; and with this amendment the bill passed. This regiment, at least, got no extra blankets, the knowledge that every man had a horse blanket, and that many had quilts, comforters, and blankets furnished from home, being generally understood to be the reason why. The last of November or the first of December, sheet-iron stoves were put in each tent, attached to a hollow iron tent-pole, which served as a chimney. But the heat thus obtained was, from the nature of the case. irregular, and many took colds by the sudden changes in the temperature, from which they never recovered. The weather was extremely cold, even for Maine, and "big snow storms" were the rule rather than the exception. Add to all these the fact that portions of the uniform were not received till the last of November or first of. December, and that many of the men were up to that time insufficiently clothed for such a mode of life in such a climate, and it will be seen that the boys of the First Maine Cavalry early learned to meet hardships, or, as they themselves expressed it, to " stand grief." That the men suffered severely, and needlessly, too, that winter, is simply a matter of fact.
The horses were nearly or quite all received by the first of November. On the eighth of that month the regiment spent a whole day in counting them, when they were all taken out on the track. They were counted over and over again, and at the close of the day's work the quartermaster was not quite sure
٠٠.
14
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
whether there were one thousand and thirty-five or one thou- sand and thirty-six government horses on the ground. It was conceded on all hands that a better lot of horses were never collected together. Col. Goddard from the first took an active interest in the care of the horses, and succeeded in infusing this spirit into the officers of the regiment. Indeed, it was a common remark around camp that the horses were of more account than the men, as they cost money, and the men didn't ; and those who remember getting up long before light those cold mornings, crawling out of those overheated tents into the cold morning air, putting on their white stable frocks, and after shivering through roll-call, marching to the stables and there remaining half or three-quarters of an hour while the horses ate their early breakfast, and repeating the oper- ation at eight o'clock in the evening, or standing "switch guard " through the long, cold nights, or leading the horses down that slippery hill through the woods to water twice a day, whether they would drink or no, rain or shine, cold or warm, sick or well. perhaps may consider that they have a right to think so. The adjutant general of the state, in his annual report for that year. says: " The saving to the government in the lives of horses, from the rigid enforcement of Col. God- dard's rules in this respect, must be several thousand dollars." The erection of stables was commenced with the arrival of the first squad of men at the camp, and they were ready for occu- pancy by the time the horses began to arrive, and the animals had quarters that winter more comfortable than did the men. in comparison with the usual accommodations for man and beast. They soon got used to sleeping without lying down. and appeared to suffer no ill effects from so doing. They were fed with grain. groomed, and watered twice a day, and given hay in ample quantities for lunch. On occasions when the weather did not allow of mounted drills for several days, they were taken out and exercised. It is safe to say they never, before nor since. got butter care than they did in Camp Penobscot. They were assigne to the several companies according to their color, three companies being given bay horses, two brown, two sorrel, two Black, and one each being given gray, roan, and
15
THE FIRST MOUNTED DRILLS.
chestnut horses ; and this arrangement was maintained as far as was practicable, as long as the regiment remained in the service.
Dismounted drill commenced at an early day. Lieut. Col. Hight and Adjt. Tucker ._ both excellent and efficient drill masters, and both from the regular army, although doing a large amount of work in organizing, found time to attend to this matter, and these two gave the greater portion of the enlisted men of the original regiment their first lessons in cavalry drill. The horse equipments were not received till late in November, and not all till the middle of December, when the men at once commenced to learn to drill on horseback. Those first mounted drills -will they ever be forgotten, so long as one lives who saw them? Most of the horses had never before been ridden on the back, and most of the men knew as little about it as did the horses. There was kicking and rearing, and running and jumping, and lying down and falling down, on the part of the horses, and swearing and yelling, and get- ting thrown and being kicked, and getting hurt and sore in various ways, by the men. There was crowding in the ranks, and getting out of place and striving to get back into place, and pushing forward and hanging back, and going backwards and sideways, and all ways but the right way, and all sorts of haps and mishaps, which, though amusing to look back upon how, and amusing at the time to all but the unfortunate ones, were anything but pleasant then to those immediately con- cerned. These difficulties, however, were rapidly overcome, and but few of the horses proved unfit for the cavalry service, and such as did were made to do duty as draught horses.
During these first lessons as troopers many incidents oc- curred worthy of record, could they only be recovered from the storehouse of memory. Among them is one which illus- trates the unpleasantness of the situation, and shows some of the stuff American volunteers were made of. A "sailor on Worseback" has been from time immemorial the butt of ridi- enle, yet Company K was largely composed of sea-faring men. add Capt. Prince was himself an old sea captain. On the version of a review of the regiment by Gov. Washburn, Joe
16
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
Gatchell of this company found himself and horse crowded out of his place in the line, and his best efforts failed to navigate the horse back into place. Capt. Prince noticed his situation, and forgetting his military in his anxiety that his company should present a correct appearance before His Excel- leney, he called out in the old quarter-deck tone and manner, "Come up there ! what in hell are you falling astern for?" This put Joe in sailing trim at once, and quicker than thought he replied, "Why, captain, I can't get the damn thing in stays!" "Well, give her more headway, then!" was the reply. Another sailor, on climbing to the horse's back for the first time, re- marked that he should have to have "a lanyard to keep him from falling off."
For some time the regiment was taught the old, double- rank cavalry drill, in which it made slow progress, and it seemed as if anything like perfection never could be attained. Finally the single-rank drill of Gen. Philip St. George Cooke was adopted, and from the first morning that the men were ordered to form in single rank, the regiment advanced rapidly in tactics. And it may be stated here that the efficiency of the regiment in the field and the excellent reputation it won are due, partially, at least, to the use of these tactics, from the facility with which a regiment can be handled and can change its position under them. Few regiments in the service, cer- tainly no one with which this was brigaded, drilled in this manner. Indeed. such was the prejudice against the single- rank drill, that several times the commander of the regiment was ordered to form his men in double ranks, which he per- sistently neglected to do, though by a skilful make-up of his regimental line he conveyed the idea to the casual observer that he had obeyed the command. Drill was the daily order when the weather permitted, by squadron and by regiment, while dress parades. reviews, and parades through the streets of Augusta were of frequent occurrence, and 'tis but just to say that the regiment made a fine appearance on the parade-ground or on the street. The band, the members of which had been enlisted for that purpose. in a short time acquired a good degree of proficiency with their daily practice, and learned to play
17
WOODEN SABRES.
while mounted, and on all parades they rode at the head of the regiment, on their gray horses, a novel as well as pleasing sight to, the thousands of people who watched the evolutions of the regiment that winter. How quickly horses may be trained is Down by the fact that the members of the band received their sudfilles one morning, immediately began practice mounted, and succeeded so far that at dress parade that same evening they "beat off " mounted, and did it wonderfully well, for the time the horses had been under drill with the music.
Nor was dismounted drill neglected, though it occupied a place of secondary importance. Some time during the winter laths were procured, for the purpose of learning and practising the sabre exercise. These were made into swords of the most grotesque shape by the men, and the exercise was looked upon very generally as a farce, was laughed at by outsiders, and was discontinued after a very short time; yet there is no doubt that the rudiments of the use of the sabre learned with the aid of those wooden swords were never forgotten, and proved to be of advantage when the real sabre was put into the hands of the men. No arms were furnished, except a few old muskets for use on guard duty, till the regiment arrived at Washington.
The men for the most part acquired the drill readily, and, although they couldn't quite see what dress parade, and " right dress," and " on first squadron form close column!" and march- ing through the city, and drill, generally, had to do with fight- ing. and had already begun to learn the soldiers' prerogative of Krowling, yet they took an interest in it, and only growled when these interfered with their own private arrangements, or when De tents were more comfortable than the parade-ground. The Bicers, or at least those who meant business, made themselves thoroughly acquainted with the tactics, so far as related to their w.veral duties, and those who did not - who enlisted for show, merely, or were commissioned to serve political ends or for per- sonal reasons, without regard to capability or patriotism, and sach were comparatively few in number -made but a short stay with the regiment after it got into the field, if, indeed, they HIil not leave it before that time.
Of the rations furnished the regiment that winter, but little
18
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
need be said. At first, when they were supplied by contract, they were good enough, and gave general satisfaction to all but chronic growlers. But soon after the muster-in the matter was taken in hand by the regimental quartermaster, and from that time, government furnished the rations. The first morning after this arrangement went into operation the air was filled with flying loaves of soft bread (and it was rumored the colonel was struck by one of these loaves), which the men claimed was not good, and which they refused to eat. This ebullition on the part of the men had the effect to cut off the supply of soft bread for the winter, and they had to do the best they could on hardtack, while their comrades in the field were drawing their daily rations of soft bread. The rations supplied were sufficient, such as they were, but the men could not help feeling that they were ill-treated, to which the fact that they were so treated at the capital of their own state, did not have a mollifying effect. But they made the best of it, and by trading what they drew for what they wanted, and buying what they could, they managed to live through it. Some companies traded the government rations for beans, - government having for some reason cut off the supply of this home production, -thus securing a good hot
dish of baked beans, baked in the ground, every morning, which, with as good a supper as they could get from what was left in the morning, or from hardtack soaked and fried in pork fat and sugar, lasted till the next morning. The rations received after- wards in the field may have been no better than those furnished at Augusta, but they were certainly, as a general thing, more satisfactory, while at Augusta there was no apparent necessity for such treatment.
The regiment was paid off the last of January by Maj. Usher, and the money was very welcome, as it allowed the men to purchase tobacco. articles of food and clothing, and many other luxuries and necessaries, of which they had till then been deprived. The men were paid from the date of enlistment up to the last day of December, and this was the only money they received from government during that winter. And this was not wasted. Very many sent a large portion of their pay home to wives and families, keeping for their own use only what was
19
THE TWENTY-TWO DOLLARS BOUNTY.
absolutely necessary. An express office was opened on the ground, which was liberally patronized. Many availed them- selves of the allotment system, which was strongly recommended by the state officials and others, and allotted a certain amount of their monthly pay to their families, which, they were told, would be forwarded to their families every two months, and would be a most excellent arrangement in case a man was sick in the hospital, or a prisoner, or was by any means unable to be present and receive his pay with his company, as his family would get it regularly, and thus be prevented from suffering. Upon this showing, many allotted certain amounts, the whole amount allotted in the regiment being $9,041.50 per month. only to find afterwards that the system worked, practically, directly opposite to what was intended ; for, if a man was absent from his company when it was paid off, the allotted money was not forwarded to his family until he himself had signed the pay- rolls, while the man in the company found his allotted money going home as regularly as he was paid off, which was as irreg- ularly as possible, six, and even eight months, sometimes inter- vening between payments. It was also found, in practice, that if a man, for any reason, wished to discontinue his allotment, it was almost as much trouble to do so as the money was worth. Four private soldiers of the regiment were detailed to assist the paymaster and his clerk in completing the pay-rolls and prepar- ing them for the payment ; and when the work was done the paymaster complimented them very highly on the excellence and accuracy of their work, saying it was done vastly better than by the men detailed from another cavalry regiment for the same purpose a week or two previous, and better than by many of the troops which he had paid.
There was a project in the Legislature that winter to pay the men of this regiment and the others in camp at Augusta, the twenty-two dollars advance bounty paid to the men of the first ten regiments raised in the state, on the ground that all the volunteers should be treated alike. In opposition it was argued " that the bounty was only offered as a special inducement for enlistments at the commencement of the war, when the greatest haste was demanded by the public exigencies ; that since that
20
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
time two dollars, and additional rations, equal to two dollars more, have been added to the monthly pay of privates; that a bounty of one hundred dollars at the end of the war has since then been secured to volunteers ; that the volunteers have remained at home during the summer season, and have received the large wages of that season, while the earlier volunteers have been in the field : that the late volunteers have six months less time to serve in the war than their brethren; that to pay this would require nearly $200,000, a sum which the state would be obliged to obtain by a new loan; that it would be injustice to the tax-payers to pay out so large an amount, and that as this bounty was offered to the first ten regiments only, the men had not been promised it." How ridiculous the most of these argu- ments appear in the light of subsequent events ! It is true the men were not legally promised this bounty, but they were led to expect it before they enlisted, and it would have been very welcome during that winter, when money was so scarce, and when so much comfort could have been derived, so many real needs supplied. by the aid of the small sum of twenty-two dol- lars each. This action appears all the more unjust when it is considered that in less than six months after it the state was paying three hundred dollars bounty, in addition to the govern- ment bounty of one hundred. for men to enlist.
The moral tone of the men and of the camp was on the whole good. comparing favorably with that of any other regi- ment. Soon after the men began to arrive, the different squads were drawn up in line on the camp-ground, when an order was read to them by the colonel. announcing, among other things. that he would allow no profanity by officers or men. For a day or two afterward . Gen. Jackson " was used as an expletive. and could be heard flying round camp in all directions and at all times, the boys having caught it up in a spirit of fun, from hearing the adjutant use it on drill the morning after the order was read. when he himself came very near violating it. But this soon died out. and it is safe to say that no camp was ever more free from this needless vive than was Camp Penobscot. though the boys were by no means saints, all of them. It is a fact that there were men in the regiment, and they were not.
-----
21
THE TEMPERANCE PLEDGE.
few, whose lips an oath never passed, in the service or out of it. The example and precept of these, backed by the colonel's order, had the effect to make those who were in the habit of swearing more careful, at least, so it cannot be said the order was productive of no good.
Soon after this there was issued another order by the colonel, stating that he would recommend for commission in the regi- ment no man, or recognize as such any non-commissioned officer who did not sign a regimental temperance pledge. This was readily complied with, for a large majority of the men had never acquired intemperate habits, and more than that, they did not mean to. Having been brought under the teachings of the " Maine Liquor Law," they had no idea of going back on them. Indeed, temperance pledges, drawn up by the men, had been circulated in some of the companies days before this order was promulgated, and in one company, at least, such a pledge was signed by every man on the ground. And it is a fact that many a man went through the whole term of service of the regiment without once tasting intoxicating liquor, though their opportu- nities were ample after they got into the field and foraging became a necessity, and they did not all sign the regimental pledge, either. It is of course true that there were men in the regiment who were in the habit of drinking liquors, and who did not renounce the habit. but such were in a decided minor- ity. There is no doubt that the promulgation of this order, and the signing of the temperance pledge which it enforced, did a vast amount of good. as it gave many, for the first time away froma home and home influences, the power to say " No!" and to mean it, when tempted by comrades or by well-meaning friends, to drink and forget their sufferings and hardships. That the pledge then signed was faithfully kept by very many, And that the influence of the example of the officers and non- commissioned officers was felt by the men, no one will doubt. That some did not keep its provisions is also true, but they were so few in number as to make almost exceptional cases ; and many a temperance society in civil life has more of its members prove recreant to their vows during any four years. than did the First Maine Cavalry temperance organization.
22
FIRST MAINE CAVALRY.
While treating of the moral tone of the regiment, it should be stated that one of the first things done by one squad, after their arrival on the camp-ground, was to institute a weekly prayer meeting, and many pleasant and profitable prayer meet- ings were held in different company tents during that winter. There were also members who made a practice of attending Sunday services and prayer and conference meetings at Augusta and Hallowell, whenever they could obtain leave to do so, as well as the meetings, held on the ground or elsewhere, under the direction of Chaplain Teft, and others previous to his appointment as chaplain.
The discipline of the camp was strict. Perhaps not too strict, in a military sense, but the men considered it needlessly so. They had enlisted to obey orders, to conform to military rules, the Army Regulations, and the Articles of War, fully real- izing what that meant, -and their subsequent record proves how well they carried out that intention, -but they could hardly see the need of being obliged to remain so closely in that uncomfortable camp after the day's duty was done, when there were opportunities of comfort and enjoyment outside. Nor could they understand the necessity of their being kept so near home, without the privilege of going home occasionally, when such going, as they could see, would be no disadvantage to the service, and might be the last time they ever would see their homes and their loved ones. Especially was this a hard- ship in the case of men who were sick. And the discipline, or rather the regulations of the camp, were unequal and irregular. At times, the restrictions were partially removed, and passes and furloughs were more free and more easily obtained, and then they would be shut off altogether. The consequence was, running guard was largely, and, on the whole, quite successfully practised. and many were the stories of narrow escapes from arrest related that winter, till it was almost an honor to have narrowly escaped capture -certainly a matter of pride - and simply running guard was considered nothing worthy of telling. Occasionally, a patrol would be sent down town, to pick up runaways; but the victims of this system were comparatively few. As a matter of course, the best men suffered most.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.