USA > Vermont > A history of the Tenth Regiment, Vermont Volunteers, with biographical sketches of the officers who fell in battle. And a complete roster of all the officers and men connected with it--showing all changes by promotion, death or resignation, during the military existence of the regiment > Part 2
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so warm and so true, and its expression so oft-repeated, that the hearts of children became imbued with it. I saw a little girl skipping about this place, where all loved so well to meet, and with her innocent face turned up to mine she asked, "Ou doing to war?" "Yes, my darling," I said. " Dod bless ou," she replied. And the picture never faded away. Many times, in hours of danger, in camp and on dreary marches, and when the battle raged, it came in vis- ions, the same innocent face and earnest utterance, and with it the Father's blessing. God bless the citizens of Philadel- phia ! said we all, and so say we now.
At Baltimore we met with the same welcome, and were entertained in a manner that testified to the fidelity and patriotism of the Union people of that intensely rebel city. They did the best they could, and did well. It was danger- ous, probably, at that time, to make too great a demonstra- tion on the side of the Union ; yet the Union men, although trembling at the fearful odds they knew existed against them, and might break out at any time, were quietly firm, and gave every soldier of the Republic a deep and honest welcome, and thought that he deserved a tithe of all that they possessed. All honor to the Baltimore Unionists !
We halted in the railroad station on Pratt street, where, on the nineteenth of April preceding, the Sixth Massachu- setts Regiment gave the first martyrs to the cause of Uni- versal Freedom in America. The bullet-holes in the roof of the station-house were the fierce, fiery eyes of the seces- sion spirit that looked down upon us, and that we faced steadily to the end.
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CHAPTER II.
W HILE we lay at Camp Chase the Army of the Potomac was marching to resist the invasion of Maryland by the Rebel Army of Northern Virginia, and preparing to fight the battles of South Mountain and An- tietam. The second battle of Bull Run had just been fought and lost under the generalship of Pope. We had already listened to many a thrilling incident of that strange succession of fights by some of the participants in one or more of its engagements. We therefore the more eagerly read the newspaper accounts of the movements of the army under General McClellan's leadership. In the anxiety ex- pressed concerning the campaign, our enthusiasm rose, and we wondered if we should join the march and share in the impending conflict - wondered and wished we might. We listened to the booming of the distant cannon at South Mountain and at Harper's Ferry. The Ninth Vermont Regiment, just preceding us from the State, had been sta- tioned at Harper's Ferry, and the day after we left Camp Chase were disgracefully surrendered, with ten thousand others, to Stonewall Jackson, by Colonel Miles, of the Reg- ular Army, who had once before proved himself a traitor. These were the first guns we had ever heard discharged in actual war, and it is well remembered how the men wished to be there.
But before the fields of South Mountain and Antietam were won, we had broken camp and were off on a long march. Our destination was thirty or forty miles up the Potomac River, at Edwards Ferry, Seneca Lock, and inter-
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mediate points ; our duty, to guard the Maryland side of the stream. The march was a long and tedious one for us, re- quiring several days to accomplish it. The men had never marched before, had no idea of its hardships, and were easily discouraged upon their first trial. Although they started off briskly and joyfully, yet they soon began to bend under the weight of their heavy knapsacks and old Belgium muskets. Three miles from camp they stacked the former in an old barn by the road, and three miles beyond bivou- acked for the night. The next day's march was little less fatiguing, on account of the weariness and lameness caused the day before, and from which one night's rest, unaccus- tomed to such business as the men were, was insufficient for them to wholly recover. Still we plodded on, not knowing what we were to meet, nor was it known whither we were going, except to the officers. This uncertainty and vague- ness among soldiers, always necessary, perhaps, was then, as ever afterwards, a great source of annoyance. The com- manding officer, of course, had his orders tolerably well defined, and some other officers generally knew the sub- stance of these orders, but it was impossible that all the men should know.
" Theirs but to do and die."
On the third day from Camp Chase, the left wing halted at Seneca Lock, on Seneca Creek, a place on the Chesa- peake and Ohio Canal; the right wing went to Edwards Ferry. Company C remained at regimental head-quarters, which were established at a pleasant place on the river, be- tween the two wings, called Pleasant's Meadows. Each wing sent out companies towards the centre ; the left wing one, Company G, below, so the line of pickets extended from Edwards Ferry to Muddy Branch. In this position, or rather in these positions, we remained from the seven- teenth of September till the middle of October, Lieutenant-
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Colonel Edson commanding the right wing, and Major Henry the left. The Colonel, Surgeons, Quarter-Master and Chaplain were all stationed at head-quarters, whence they radiated in the discharge of their various duties.
On this line we began to learn something of the routine of camp life, while there was little to vary its monotony except now and then the cackling and fluttering of fowls and the squealing of pigs that had carelessly strayed into camp. At this early period of our service the Colonel, with a marvelous attempt at discipline which soon exhausted itself, undertook to hold the men responsible for the pres- ence of these pigs and fowls in their quarters, conduct for which of course they were in no wise responsible; and when these same straying quadrupeds and bipeds began to flock to his own mess table he no doubt learned his mistake.
"Head-quarters" was the most attractive point along the picket line. Here the suttle - that most indispensable source of a soldier's comfort, while it furnishes a sure if not safe means for the investment of his spare funds-was sta- tioned. Men and officers came here from their various posts to impart their observations and receive instructions, and here they came to see the "Doctor."
While here we experienced our first "scare." This was an event that happened to most regiments at some time or other, usually not long after they came into the service. Connected with our scare was a somewhat amusing inci- dent, which will come in in its place.
One Sunday morning-it was the fifth of October-we were all called out by a fierce beating of the long roll, and it was announced that the enemy was crossing the river in considerable force, to attack us. This report went along the whole line, and the men were rallied at the different posts and prepared to resist his crossing or fight a battle. Private baggage was packed hurriedly, and the teams put in readi- ness to move camp equipage and stores. Companies I and
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D, under the cautious command of the Lieutenant-Colonel, were ordered from their camp and thrown towards the river, where, stationed in the cut of the canal, which the rebels had sometime before made tenable by draining it of water, they awaited the further orders of their gallant leader, who was with them, standing bravely at their head, urging them to "hold steady." Now follows the amusing part of the story. To the officers of these companies the position was one of great trial, as they were compelled to remain there several hours after the necessity for doing so had passed, if indeed it ever existed, and it was rendered still more trying by certain recollections of a fine fat, smoking pig, which they had procured the day before, and that was then roasting before the fire for their breakfast. The excite- ment of meeting an armed foe having somewhat subsided, their thoughts instinctively turned to this porcine preparation going on at camp for a right good Sunday feast. While in undisturbed waiting, before they were so hastily summoned to arms, they had anticipated the onslaught upon his pigship with considerable relish, and with this brown, smoking vision before them, while they lay on the cold ground in this wet and foggy October morning, their appetites were made even sharper for the pig. Soon it appeared that there was no enemy within miles of them, and it was idle to remain there longer. Still the Colonel was unwilling to withdraw his command, though he himself returned to the camp, where he found the pig well roasted, and awaiting the return of his subalterns. Alas, then, for the pig! Alas for the fond anticipations of these gallant gentlemen ! They were soon relieved, but there has been a tradition handed down to us by the Captain and Lieutenants, that while they guarded the ford and clung with sublime devotion to the position that had been assigned them on the river bank for hours after the Colonel had left them, that he was banqueting alone.
It was at this place that the first of that long list of men
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who fell victims to disease died in camp. He belonged to Company C, Charles H. Dayton, and was ill but five days. It may be spoken of because it created such a sensation among his comrades at the time. They immediately raised money among themselves to defray the expenses of embalm- ing his body and sending it home. I have often thought of that noble charity which then said: "Yes, Charlie, we will send you to your distant friends, to sleep where their vigilance may guard your sepulchre." But it was soon changed to a nobler self-devotion that thought it gain, and even a coveted sacrifice, to die, though left beneath a thin covering of earth, far from home, and upon a spot they had consecrated by a patriot's death.
On the eleventh of October these various detachments were called in, and the regiment went into camp at Seneca Creek, near the place formerly occupied by the left wing. The camp was established about five hundred yards back from the river, and perhaps a little more than that distance below the Creek, upon a strip of land sloping down from a wooded bluff to a swamp in front, between us and the river. This place was once a cultivated field, open at both ends. On the north it reached out beyond the swamp to a broad plain ; on the south also it extended beyond this oblong piece of swamp to an undulating field still beyond.
Our tents just filled this space, the officers' and company quarters reaching clear across from the woods to the swamp, and just covered the entire length of the swamp, so that from any point forty yards to the front or to the rear, we were completely shielded from observation. On the right the troops were daily exercised in company and battalion drill. On the left there were some of them daily buried.
Did this location have anything to do with the sickness that prevailed there, and from which large numbers died? Every tenth man was sick - a hundred men were on the
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sick-list at a time. Five died in a single night ; it was a cold and stormy night, and it blasted some of the weaker ones in an hour. For a month scarcely a day passed that the Dead March did not lead us to a fresh grave. We could not procure hospital accommodations for them, and many were obliged to lie in quarters, and perhaps endanger the health of others. It cannot be shown that any one was responsible for this large sick-list. Surgeon Child said there was an epidemic. If it arose from the location, other regiments were as unfortunate as we, although they were deemed to be in better positions, that is, more healthy local- ities. So no serious attempt was ever made to change the camp for one less sheltered from the sun and for a less time during the day shrouded in fog. Somehow it seemed to be a time in the period of our acclimation for many of the men to die. It was a sort of inuring period-a crisis in which the physical constitution was passing from that of a com- mon man, unaccustomed to unusual exposure, to a tough- ened soldier. If this is a possible theory, the metamorphosis was too tough for many of them to bear. There was one case, and it is said there were many similar cases about this time, such as I never heard of before. Medical records may furnish many such cases. One young man died whom the surgeons declared had not a single symptom of disease about him. His conduct was strange and pitiable. His name was Frederic D. Whipple, of Company H. He came up to surgeon's-call, and one of the surgeons, after thor- oughly examining him and discovering no signs of disease, asked him why he was there ?- what ailed him? He said that he wanted to go home. His orderly-sergeant could do nothing with him in his company, and he was finally put into the Hospital, where, refusing to be nursed, after a few days he died, moaning piteously all the time, " I want to go home-I want to go home." Poor fellow! Just before
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enlisting he had married a young wife, and his body was sent to her after his spirit had gone to its long home. Sur- geon Clark declared that it was a clear case of nostalgia.
While here we were brigaded with the Thirty-ninth Massachusetts, Twenty-third Maine, and Fourteenth New Hampshire Regiments, and put under command of Briga- dier-General Grover. These regiments were scattered about up and down the river, and thrown back into the country, guarding the cross-roads.
On the thirteenth of November, General Grover having been assigned to some other command, Colonel Davis, of the Thirty-ninth Massachusetts, coming into command of the brigade, assembled all his regiments at Offut's Cross- Roads, within fifteen miles of Washington, where we re- mained until the twenty-first of December, doing little else except practice in company drill, take care of the sick, and bury the dead.
The scourge of death which had been upon us at Seneca Creek followed us to this place, and twenty-five died in five weeks, although we were on high ground in the open field, well sheltered with tents, and under good police regulations. But many of the men were thoroughly disheartened, so many of their comrades had died; many began to think that they were certainly doomed to the same fate. One half of the officers were also sick, and some of them had become so completely discouraged that their usefulness was already at an end.
The weather was cold and wet; snow had fallen on the fifteenth of December, and was piled up in drifts twenty inches deep around the tents, but in three days was gone, so sudden were the changes. The climate was as coquettish as a silly maiden ; sometimes it smiled upon us and then it pouted. Little exercise could be taken, and the men had too much time to think of themselves; perhaps they were too much disposed to magnify the evils of their con-
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dition, and too willing to conjure up the ghosts of misery. They had not yet learned to be soldiers, nor had they the opportunity.
The time soon came, however, when this cloud of despair, which sat visibly upon the faces of many, began to break away. It came about on Thanksgiving Day, which occurred that year in Vermont on the fourth of December, and of course at the same time in our camp, in Maryland. Some of the simplest and some of the most uncouth, or at least grotesque, amusements were the means of this change. All who were able to stand engaged in some one of them, and from that hour began the improvement of our sanitary ·condition. Every man's blood was stirred, and we soon learned that we had not forgotten how to laugh or to shout, and we did both lustily. The day was charmingly beauti- ful, one of those golden Indian summer days, such as are frequently seen in the more southern of the Middle States, as late as December. The sun came out at first so dry and warm that it absorbed all the frost from the air and earth, and then seemed like a sponge filled with hot water, leaking down upon us all day through a misty sheen, and departed at night in the red glory of a conqueror.
The amusements began by a grand game of foot-ball, some participating in the game who had been off duty for a month, and who thought they might never again be fit for duty. One man in particular who had done nothing for several weeks but to attend "surgeon's call" and then re- turn to his tent, to mope the days and weeks away, became conspicuous in the play. He came to Surgeon Rutherford's tent, having thought himself too weak to walk two hundred yards further on to the Dispensary, where the sick in quar- ters were treated, and asked for a prescription. He came bent half double, leaning upon a stick, one of the most woe- begone looking creatures ever beheld. The surgeon threw him down a foot-ball and told him to kick that. The fellow
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was amazed, and said that he could not do it. But he did, and before noon he was observed as a tolerably active sol- dier-alive and kicking.
We had a foot race, and a shooting match with revolv- ers. But the most grotesque thing of all was a hog race. Colonels Jewett and Henry purchased a shoat weighing about two hundred and fifty pounds-a real razor-back racer, yet in very good condition. This shoat was thor- oughly greased, and let loose for any man to catch who chose to enter the contest and run the risk of greasing him- self. The man who should succeed in catching him, and should hold him till the pig said die, was to receive a bounty of one dollar, while the porker should belong to the company that furnished the successful pursuer. All things ready, away went the slushed pig and a hundred men shouting in pursuit, the rest looking and cheering on. At first the bristling quadruped was bewildered ; he ap- peared to think that they meant to drive him, and swine like he stood at bay and faced the noisy multitude. But he saw death in their eyes, and away he went on a race for life. Betting was brisk, with odds on the pig. Two men led in the pursuit, and nothing daunted the rest pressed on, making up in shouts what they lacked in pace. Now one came so near as to clutch at him ; down went the man sprawling on the ground, and off again went the greasy monster. Soon he turned, as if to lead his pursuers in a circle. Alas! it was a fatal turn, for that moment he was a dead hog. The foremost man struck him in the flank, and he rolled over, with his four pedal extremities erect in the air, all sanded for two men to grasp and hold firmly, which they did, both at the same time.
The bounty was divided equally between the captors, and very soon the pig was in twain. One half went to Company F, and the other to Company A. But he was not eaten at once, and it was currently reported that A stole F's
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half at night. Doubtless they preferred to go the whole hog.
After the racing was all over, the field and staff officers entertained the line officers at a Thanksgiving dinner in real New England style. We had roast turkey and plum pud- ding, vegetables, sauce and jellies. I doubt if the caterer can tell where they all came from. But it was home-like. Three ladies, wives of officers, then in camp, were present. The occasion was one to be remembered by all who partici- pated in the sports of the day, or in any way observed this time-honored festival.
Little else occurred in this camp which can be noticed here.
On the night of the fifteenth of November, Colonel Da- vis, commanding the brigade, was warned of the approach of White's Guerrillas, and he ordered off a company from each regiment to look after them. Company B was detailed from the Tenth. On the twenty-ninth, Companies B and H went to Rockville, on the same business, under command of Charles G. Chandler, who had just been promoted to the majority. On the twenty-first of December, the whole bri- gade was marched to Pooleville, once a thriving village about thirty miles from Washington, but now somewhat depopulated, and showing everywhere the ravages of war. Here the Thirty-ninth Massachusetts and the Fourteenth New Hampshire were encamped, while the Twenty-third Maine went below to picket the river, and the Tenth Ver- mont above to do the same duty.
We were separated into three divisions - the centre, with Companies C, E, H and I, stationed at White's Ford ; the right wing, Companies A, F and D, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Henry, at the mouth of the Monocacy River, to guard the canal aqueduct passing over that stream ; and the left wing, Companies B, G and K, under the com- mand of Major Chandler, at Conrad's Ferry.
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On the night of our arrival, cold, hungry and weary, report said that the rebels were crossing the river. Such a report disturbed us more in these days than ever afterwards, for the men had not yet seen a rebel, and few of the officers had been formally introduced to one. A troop of White's Guerrillas no doubt had watched our movements and under- took to cross and surprise us ; but a heavy guard had already been sent down to the ford, under Captain Hunt, and they discovered it in season to avoid the warm reception he was cautiously waiting to give them.
Here we spent the remainder of the winter of 1862-3, guarding a line of the river five miles long, with little to vary the scene except such things as naturally suggest them- selves to men in our situation. We visited from post to post, got acquainted with our neighbors, the inhabitants around us, and killed the time as best we could. The men made wooden pipes, and carried on quite a traffic in them with the smok- ers ; and engaged in other light occupation, which other occupation was not altogether confined to the men. All who chose to do so, to the number that came within limits of special orders, went home on furlough. Most of the officers also went away for ten or twenty days at a time, on leave of absence. And so the time passed until the middle of April, not altogether unprofitably. All the books that could be found were thoroughly read. Shakspeare had some improved readings. The Paymaster - the best of all masters - came, and so long as the rebels came not, we were measurably content.
Here Colonel Jewett succeeded to the command of the brigade. But none of the troops were moved until the nineteenth of April, when the brigade was again concen- trated at Pooleville. Still some of the troops were scattered along the river in small detachments as before. Two com- panies of our regiment remained at White's Ford, under command of Captain Sheldon; two at the mouth of the
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Monocacy, under command of Captain Platt; and one, Captain Salisbury's, at Conrad's Ferry.
Soon after we came here the Thirty-ninth Massachusetts left the brigade and went off to Washington, and was soon sent to Virginia. The Fourteenth New Hampshire also went to Washington, and had a very soft time of it all sum- mer. Only the Twenty-third Maine, the Tenth Massachu- setts Battery, one battalion of the Sixth Michigan Cavalry, and "Scott's nine hundred," remained with us. We en- camped a short distance from the village of Pooleville, and named the camp in honor of the General Officer command- ing the defences of Washington - Heintzelman.
Around this camp cluster some of the pleasantest mem- ories of our military experience. It was a beautiful place. We found the citizens kind neighbors, and we were here during the most delightful season of the year. Few men were sick, and their duties were light and the Paymaster came often. The hazy atmosphere that marks the spring and fall of that climate, was in most agreeable contrast with our own more northern latitude, and though possessing less vitality, the light winds bore up the fragrance of green and flowering fields and budding woods, while now they whis- pered none other than messages of peace. We were strangers to war, and for four months life was one heydey of listless, almost idle, pleasure. Only once were we jostled out of our equanimity.
On the night of the eleventh of June, two hundred and fifty "Rebs" crossed the river at Muddy Branch, came up to Seneca Lock, and surprised a troop of the Sixth Michi- gan Cavalry, belonging to our command, drove them away, burned their camp and pursued them to Seneca Mills, a dis- tance of a mile or more, when Captain Dean, in command of the squad, with less than thirty men, disputed their pass- age of the bridge over the creek at that place. A part of the rebels finally crossed the stream below the mills, and the
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brave band was routed, after killing six of the enemy, two of their officers, and losing four of their own men. The rest succeeded in getting away, and came foaming into head- quarters about four o'clock in the morning. The command was immediately turned out to meet the enemy, should he venture further. But he came no further, and we soon ascertained that he had recrossed the river and gone the way he came. But he lurked on the opposite bank for sey- eral days, and we did not know but the days of our peace were numbered. Well we might think so. These "rough riders" were a part of J. E. B. Stuart's command, leading Lee's advance into Maryland and Pennsylvania.
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