Documenting the American South: The Southern Experience in 19-th Century America

How a One-Legged Rebel Lives:
Reminiscences of the Civil War: The Story
of the Campaigns of Stonewall Jackson, as Told by a High Private
in the "Foot Cavalry": From Alleghany Mountain to Chancellorsville:
With the Complete Regimental Rosters of Both
the Great Armies at Gettysburg:
Electronic Edition.

Robson, John S., b. 1844

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University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
1998.
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Library of Congress Subject Headings, 21st edition, 1998

LC Subject Headings:

Robson, John S., b. 1844.
Jackson, Stonewall, 1824-1863.
Confederate States of America. Army. Virginia Infantry Regiment, 52nd. Company D.
Soldiers -- Confederate States of America -- Biography.
Confederate States of America. Army -- Military life.
Virginia -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Personal narratives.
Virginia -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Regimental histories.
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Personal narratives, Confederate.
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Regimental histories.

How a One-Legged Rebel Lives.
REMINISCENCES OF
THE CIVIL WAR.

THE STORY OF THE CAMPAIGNS OF
STONEWALL JACKSON,
AS TOLD BY A
HIGH PRIVATE IN THE "FOOT CAVALRY."
From Alleghany Mountain to Chancelorsville.
WITH THE COMPLETE REGIMENTAL ROSTERS OF BOTH THE
GREAT ARMIES AT GETTYSBURG.

JOHN S. ROBSON,
LATE OF THE 52d REGIMENT VIRGINIA INFANTRY.

DURHAM, N. C.:
THE EDUCATOR CO. PRINTERS AND BINDERS,
1898.

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PREFACE.

To the Reader - Greeting:

My chief object in this work is to get something to support myself with - in fact, it is a scheme founded on food, raiment and shelter, which I find hard to come at by one in my situation, there being so few positions open to a man maimed as I am, with no more education and business training than I possess; but, nevertheless, I am no applicant for charity.

I honestly believe that my little book is well worth its price, and I claim for it strict historic accuracy in all its details.

I have been materially aided in its preparation by gentlemen well posted by experience and reading in the history of the war, and not one-half of the collected data has been used, because space could not be afforded, but I hope to follow this by another, if this candidate for public favor should be successful, and my experience in the past with the big-hearted, generous people of this country - North and South - justifies my promise to finish the work now begun, and add some pages to the history of the "Cruel War" which would otherwise be forgotten.

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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year, 1898,
BY JOHN S. ROBSON.

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HOW A ONE-LEGGED REBEL LIVES.

CHAPTER I.

In fulfilling the promise of my title page, I must begin at the beginning, and tell how I came to be a "one- legged" rebel, which interesting result was brought about by the skill and enterprise of certain surgeons of the C. S. A., who amputated the other leg; but it goes without telling that the reason I was a rebel, "so-called," was my Old Virginia birth, which occurred in Rappahannock county on the 26th of March, 1844.

I do not contemplate autobiography, nor very much of general history, and if, in putting my story together, I should fail to round my periods handsomely and omit the high-toned and classic allusions to Achilles and Hector, the Trojan Horse and Ulysses, Richard and Saladin, these, more or less, of the boys who figured in ages past, and which should adorn my pages, I hope my lenient reader will travel the road far enough with me to learn that I am, unfortunately, lacking in classic lore, and cannot compare in erudition with a "Mosby," a Gen. "Dick" Taylor or a John Esten Cooke, who

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would fight you a battle, gloriously, to-day with the sword, and fight it over again for you to-morrow as gracefully with the pen. I was "nothing but a private," and a very junior one at that, when the late disturbance between the top and bottom of the map of the United States occurred, but I took a very lively interest in the arbitration from its very commencement.

At that time I was a sixteen-year-old, under instruction at Mossy Creek Academy, in Augusta county - just the right age to have a good deal of fool in my composition, and at exactly the right place to pevelop that quality, for if there was any one point more than another, in all Virginia, where the war fever struck hard, as an epidemic, it was in Augusta county; and it required long time and strong medicine, too, to cure it up there in the valley; but it was cured, and now we no more wish or expect to see the armed legions of sectional hate wheeling and clanking through blood and desolation in the beautiful Valley of Virginia.

On the 16th of June, 1861, my patriotism boiled over, and I volunteered under Capt. Joseph Huddel, in Company D, 52d Regiment Virginia Infantry, commanded then by that noble Virginia gentleman, statesman and soldier, Col. John B. Baldwin, of Staunton, and we remained near that place until the 10th of September; being licked into soldier

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shape by dint of discipline, drill, and duty, when we marched, by way of Buffalo Gap, to Crab Bottom, in Highland county, at the head of Jackson River.

At this place stands a barn, the property of Jacob Hebner, from the eaves of which the water flows north and south - one way into the Potomac and the other into the James, the head-springs of the two rivers being here only a stone's-throw apart; and, like the sentiment of the country at that time, taking the widest divergent direction to be brought together again, after measuring their full course, in one common destiny at the ocean.

It is interesting, sometimes, to the old veterans, to go back, in retrospect, to the days of 1861, when soldier-life was gilded with the glory that was to be, and we were making our first preprarations for the field in a war which we were taught to think would be a very short one - ninety days at most, but which tried our faith, nerve and patience, for four of the longest years that are ever crowded into the lifetime of one generation. And believing that some account of what we did and how we managed at that time, will be of interest to the general reader, and especially to the children of the old soldiers, I have ventured to draw on the treasury of memory, and the intererting little book of my friend, Carlton McCarthy, for what is fast fading away. We

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who passed through it can smile now at our crude ideas of what was then necessary to make up the outfit for war of the infantry soldier, but it won't be long until we shall all have passed "over the river," and the memory of those little things which made the Confederate soldier what he was, will die too; and though the historians will tell, with eloquent pen, of the grand movements of armies and of the deeds of the Generals, he will hardly stop to explain how the private soldier was evolved from the farmer, the clerk, the mechanic, the school-boy, and transformed into the perfect, all-enduring, untiring and invincible soldier, who broiled his bacon on a stick and baked his bread on a ramrod.

The volunteer of 1861 was a very elaborate institution, and entertained the idea that he was little, if any inferior to Napoleon, in his capacity and possibilities, and he of the South was very sure that he was a match, in the field, for any five Yankees in the United States; an idea which was, to a certain extent, eliminated along with other erroneous ones which, at the outbreak of the disturbance, were entertained.

In his preparation for the campaign the Confederate soldier was forced to depend upon home resources, and in the first place he thought big boots, the higer the better, were essential to his military appearance; but he learned after awhile that a broad

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bottomed shoe was very much lighter to carry and easier on his ankles.

He also thought he must wear a very heavy padded coat, with long tails and many buttons, but this too proved an error, and a very short experience induced him to lay aside the coat and substitute a short-waisted, single-breasted jacket, which transformation gave the "Rebs" the universal title of "Gray Jackets" by the neighbors over the way - the Yankees.

We went in heavy on fancy caps, wavelocks and other cockady and stately head-gear, but these early gave way to the comfortable slouch hat, and to this day the Confederate veterans are much mystified when they read of the French and Prussians wearing the little caps and heavy helmlets on the march and in the field, but the volunteer of '61 was a fearfully and wonderfully gotten up representative of the Sons of Mars in the first flush of his warfever. He carried more baggage then than a major-general did afterwards, and many of these "high privates" were followed by their own faithful bodyservants, who did their cooking, washing and foraging, blacked those imposing boots, dusted his clothes, and bragged to the other negroes of what a noble soldier and gentleman "Massa Tom" or "Masse Dick" was.

The knapsack was a terror, loaded with thirty

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to fifty pounds of surplus baggage, consisting of all manner of extra underwear, towels, combs, brushes, blacking, looking-glasses, needles, thread, buttons, bandages, everything thought of as necessary, and strapped on the outside were two great, heavy blankets and a gum or oilcloth. His haversack, too, hung on his shoulder, and always had a good stock of provisions, as though a march across the Sahara might at any time be imminent. The inevitable canteen, with contents more or less, was also slung from the shoulder, and most of the boys thought a bold soldier's outfit for the war was absolutely incomplete unless he was supplied with long gloves. In fact, the volunteer of '61 made himself a complete beast of burden, and was so heavily clad, weighted and cramped that a march was absolute torture, and the wagon trains of mess-chests and camp equipage were so immense in proportion to the number of men that it would have been impossible to guard them in an enemy's country, or anywhere else, against enterprising cavalry. However, wisdom is born of experience, and before many campaigns have been worried through the private soldier, reduced to the minimum, consisted of one man, one hat, one jacket, one pair pants, one pair draws, one pair socks, one pair shoes, and his baggage was one blanket, one gum-cloth and one haversack, while the wonderfully-constructed mess-chests,

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with lids convertable into cozy dining tables, and with numerous divisions and sub-divisions in nooks and cases for the holding of all imaginable necessaries and luxuries, of tea and coffee, spices and condiments, dishes, cups, vases and spoons, were stored nevermore to see the light in the army again, and the company property consisted of two or three skillets and frying-pans, which didn't take up much wagon room - for the infantryman generally preferred to stick the handle of the mess frying-pan into the barrel of a musket and thus be sure of having it at a given point on the march when the minimum weight soldier got there, for the wagon got to be very unreliable for the transportation of anything but amunition; but sometimes they carried a small quantity of commissary stores, generally for the use of the train quartermaster and his staff.

The most important appearing personage in the army was the aforesaid quartermaster, who always managed to have saved for his own use, out of the scanty supplies, an abundance of the best, and as all drivers and assistants in his department held their "bomb-proofs" at his supreme pleasure, he had it in his power at all times to control freights. His handsome, fiashy, lace-trimmed uniform of fine gray cloth, adorned with the star or bar of his rank, caused the folks along the line of march to

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imagine they had the privilege of gazing at some of the famous generals - Longstreet, Hill, Pickett, or perhaps Lee himself - when in fact the generals, in their dingy dress, had passed unnoticed, and this gayly caparisoned cavalier was only a quartermaster marshaling a little wagon train in rear of the army.

The Confederate soldier held on to his haversack, not to carry food in as is popularly supposed, but it was the ever present recepticle for tobacco, pipes, strings, buttons and the like, and very often, when, with great display and bluster by the commissaries, three days' rations were issued to the men, they would cook and eat the whole lot at one meal, which was decidedly the most convenient way of carrying it, and besides it was usually the case that they had been without food for from two to five meals, and it was not much of an exploit to consume the small quantity issued for what was termed "three days' rations," and after eating it, they would trust to luck and strategy for meals, or go hungry, as usual, till the next ration day.

The commissary department of the Southern Confederacy was most scandalously mismanaged from the beginning, and the commissary general was the worst and most complete failure, North or South, of the whole war, in consequence of which the men were forced to forage for themselves. As the war progressed and this stern "mother of invention"

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and "neutralizer of all law," Necessity and Hunger, her child, made themselves felt in all their force, it was no uncommon sight to see a whole brigade marching in solid column along a road one minute and the next scattered over a big briar field picking the blackberries, but as soon as the gleaning was done all would return to the ranks and resume the march as though nothing had happened to break it, and in the Fall of the year a persimmon tree would halt a column as long as a 'simmon was on it.

We had no sutlers in our army; the blockade and dearth of marketable funds prevented that, the nearest approach to it being the occasional old darkey with his cider cart or basket of pies and cakes - so called - and it was almost marvelous to see how quick the old contraband's stock would be cleaned out.

The rebel soldier depended much upon the supplies he could get from the enemy in battle, for the Yankees were always abundantly supplied, and thus we had a double incentive to win the fight.

A federal officer who was conversing with General Jackson in the street of Harper's Ferry, at its surrender in September, 1862, says that an Orderly galloped up to "Stonewall" and said: "General, I am ordered by General McLaws to report to you that McClellan's whole army is within six miles, and

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coming this way." Jackson took no notice of it at all, and the Orderly turned to ride back when the General called to him, "has General McClellan a drove of cattle or a wagon train with him?" The Orderly replied that he had. "All right," said Jackson, "I can whip any army that is followed by a drove of cattle;" alluding to the hungry condition of his men, and the good fighting qualities thereby developed when beef was in sight.

Stealing is a low vice, no matter who does it, but that hungry men should take whatever they found in the eating line is not to be wondered at, and the old Irish adage, "There is no law for a hungry man," should be borne in mind when judging the soldier.

In the early days, when the volunteers were being mustered for "twelve months, unless sooner discharged," and the idea of a short war was being industriously promulgated by the big men of the cross roads, and the newspaper generals at the county seats, the boys were very uneasy about it, for fear it would wind up before they could get in.

When the first Manassas was fought, the 52d Virginia was sorely disgruntled, believing they had been left out for a purpose, and jealously rankled hot in our hearts at sight of the battery boys, and others, from Staunton, who were sporting around town with bullet-wounds and bloody bandages, the idols of the girls and made heroes of by everybody. Fate

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was against us, for we had not even seen the smoke of that first great battle from afar, and we would have resigned a kingdom without a murmur to have had one of those wounds; even a very small wound would have been thankfully received, and we noticed also that the accounts and descriptions of the battle were considered much more accurate and authentic when related by some fellow with his arm in a sling and a general air about him of - "stand aside! I am holier than thou," "been wounded at Manassas;" although it might be that he got crippled under a waggon, and never saw a Yankee.

But every one of these veteran heroes of that battle was supposed to have slain at least four Yankees, and fought Sherman's battery with bowie knife. "Charging" the batteries of the enemy was the favorite amusement of the lucky fellows who were at Manassas, and every one of them had "charged," more or less, batteries that day, and the men who captured the "Long Tom" rifle-piece were wonderfully numerous.

CHAPTER II.

I must now return to the camp at Crab Bottom, because our stay was brief, and the rumors of the operations of our great Generals in the mountains were numerous. There was always news, and

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Floyd, Wise, Loring, Lee, Johnston, and other great commanders of the Confederacy, were measuring lances with Milroy, Roscrans, McClellan, Cox, Tyler, Schenck, etc., of the Federal Army, for the control of the empire of Western Virginia, and the time has come, in my story, for the 52d to "mix in," as Forrest, the famous cavalryman, would say.

We marched towards Moorefield, but stopped at a camp called "Straight Creek," in Highland county, and were joined by Captain Shumaker, with his battery from "Camp Bartow," and here we did have a most glorious time of it, in the perfect autumn weather of the mountain glades and vales, and oh! such living! The memory of the buckwheat and honey, the cakes, pies, roast beef and wild turkey, lingers lingeringly, and I would I were a boy again in camp with the old 52d; but the regiment has made its last march on this side the shadow land, and nothing is left but the glorious memory of the good time gone.

While here, an incident occurred which made quite an impression on my boyish mind, and I very much doubt if it has been forgotten by the oldest survivor. Our camp was on the bank of a creek and just below the point where a mill dam was located. It was quite a large dam and had been sufficient, up to this time, to hold the accumulated water in check, but now it chose to give way, and

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sweeping like a mighty flood through the camp it overwhelmed tents, barracks, bunks, and all pertaining to our little military, in one universal ruin. We were completely washed out, and the disaster served in a measure, to reconcile us, to the movement we were soon called to make to Alleghany mountain; and now our soldier life began to lose its gilding.

Our regiment was ordered to report to Gen. H. R. Jackson, of Georgia, a veteran of the Mexican war, in which he was a Colonel of Volunteers, who had been left with two brigades, by General Lee, to hold the crossing at Greenbriar River of the turnpike leading from Staunton to Parkersburg across Cheat Mountain, and after passing through the intervening valley, and then the Alleghany Mountain into our own Valley.

Jackson's camp here was called "Camp Bartow," from one of the heroes of Manassas, the lamented Colonel of the 8th Georgia.

The Southern camp was on the south bank of the river, here not more than twenty yards wide, but Colonel Baldwin had by order of General Jackeon, posted our regiment at the Alleghany Pass, in our rear. When the Federals learned of the withdrawal of the large body of Southern troops towards the Kanawha, they determined to move the balance of us, and General Reynolds, of brilliant Gettysburg

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fame, organized a force of 6,000 troops, with twelve pieces of artillery, and moving from their camp, on the summit of Cheat Mountain, on the 2d of October, came down on Camp Bartow with great gallantry; but Jackson's two little brigades, commanded by Colonels Johnson and Taliferro, stood their ground so stubbonly that, after exhausting all their means to drive them from the field, in a battle commencing early on Thursday morning October 3, and continuing till half-past two o'clock p. m., the Federals retreated in confusion, losing over 300 men killed and wounded, while Jackson's loss was 6 killed, 31 wounded and 12 missing.

General Reynolds had intended to clear the turnpike, and march to Staunton, but not succeeding in getting "Camp Bartow," he failed to approach our post at Alleghany Pass and, to our chagrin, we had lost another opportunity to fight the Yankees, so we grumbled savagely - fully satisfied now that the war would end and we would not have any show at all to distinguish ourselves. However, we "roughed it," soldier-fashion, and grew very familiar with the mountains; in fact, we might have been mistaken, from our language, for a corps of topographical engineers, so extensively did we talk of what was being done in our department. Go where you would about the camp, such geographical remarks as "General Lee is moving on the Yanks at Elkwater."

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'General Floyd is going to cut them off at Meadow Bluffs," "Old Governor Wise will knock 'em out at Sewell Mountain," "Rosecrans whipped at Lewisburg;" "we will flank them by way of Carnifax Ferry;" and we used to bet largely on what "Ned" Johnson would do when Taliaferro's brigade joined him. We had an idea that a regiment of Southern troops was something fearful to run against, and as for a brigade - well, it was simply irresistible - in fact every man was a general, and knew exactly what to do next, no matter what had been the result of the last movement. But discouraging days were at hand, and when winter came upon us great numbers of the men got sick, and the mountain fogs and frosts were harder to contend with than the enemy.

When General Floyd made his march from the Gauley River to Fayette Court-house, he had to transport more than 800 sick men, and although he was for twenty days engaged in skirmishing and fighting the Yankees for the right of way, his killed and wounded only amounted to 14. After the fight at Greenbrier River, General H. R. Jackson was sent on duty to Georgia; Taliaferro's brigade was withdrawn towards Staunton; Camp Bartow was only occupied by scouts and pickets, and our line of defence was drawn back to Alleghany Mountain, fourteen miles from Greenbriar River and the same

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distance from Montery, with Colonel Edward Johnson in command, with about 1,200 men, consisting of the 12th Georgia, 31st Virginia, the 52d Virginia under Colonel Baldwin, the battallions of Hansborough and Riger, and two batteries of four 6-pounders under Captains Anderson and Miller, also one company of cavalry under Captain Flournoy, and here, with a scanty supply of blankets and rations, in the keen, frosty air of the mountains we actually suffered.

About this time a name, afterwards well known in the Valley was much talked of, and on the 13th of December it owner, Gen. R. H. Milroy, appeared in our front, with a force which, his own people said, amounted to 8,000.

His first move on our line was made at Slavin's Crossing, about three miles from Camp Bartow, on the 18th, where Major Ross, with the volunteers of the brigade, with 100 men, met the advance of the enemy and checked their movement long enough for Colonel Johnson to get ready for them; and the next morning the great General Milroy's army came up hunting a fight, and I am of the opinion to this day that nobody had to waste time hunting a fight around old Ed Johnson without getting as much as was good for them before night.

The Virginians and Georgians had a hot breakfast all ready for Milroy's folks as soon as they got

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there, and the 31st Virginia, especially, was very hospitable in their reception. This regiment was mostly composed of Northwest Virginia men, and Milroy stood between them and home, which appeared to make them particularly severe on him, and their gallant commander, Major Boykin, led them with dauntless spirit. I had a splendid position in this battle and could see the whole fight without having to take any part in it, and I remember how I thought Colonel Johnson must be the most wonderful hero in the world, as I saw him at one point, where his men were hard pressed, snatch a musket in one hand and, swinging a big club in the other, he led his line right up among the enemy, driving them headlong down the mountain, killing and wounding many with the bayonet and capturing a large number of prisoners; but the "boys in blue" fought stubbornly, and many of our men were killed here on the left of the road. On the right, the enemy, in strong force, posted in a mountain clearing, among the fallen timber, stumps and brush, was too much for the Rebs, until the veteran, Captain Anderson, brought his battery into position and thundered a storm of round shot and canister among them, knocking their timber defences about their heads, and making their nest too hot to hold them; and they, too, retreated to Cheat Mountain, but for quite awhile they were

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pelted by Anderson's guns and by Miller's battery, which got in in the nick of time.

Captain Anderson was killed just as the Yankees were breaking up into the retreat by a party he mistook for some of our own infantry lying between his guns and the enemy, and riding forward he called them to come back into the line, at the same time beckoning to them with his head, when they fired a full volley at him, which killed him instantly. He had been through three wars, and had taken part in fifty-eight pitched battles.

Lieutenant Raines, of Lynchburg, took command of Anderson's battery, and the other battery, under Captain Miller, had been originally mustered into the 52d, but was taken out and organized as artillery during the preceding summer.

My recollections of Col. Edward Johnson, as he appeared that day, is very distinct, partly, perhaps, because it was the first real battle I had ever witnessed, but mainly, I think, because he acted so differently from all my preconceived ideas of how a commander should act on the field of battle. He was a native of Chesterfield county, Virginia, but at the opening of the war was living in Georgia, and came from there at the first outbreak of hostile preparations in command of the 12th Georgia regiment. After this battle he was made brigadier, and in February, 1863, was promoted to major-general,

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and commanded a division in Ewell's corps, composed of the brigades of Walker, Stewart, J. M. Jones and Nicholls.

He was noted all through the war as a stubborn fighter, and was known throughout the country after this victory as "Alleghany" Johnson.

In the battle of Alleghany Mountain the Federals admitted a loss of four hundred killed and wounded, while ours, by actual returns, was twenty-five killed and ninety-seven wounded - not more than skirmishing afterwards, but we rated it as a big battle then.

The next day I was on detail with the burial party, and while putting away two dead Yankees who had been in the party that killed Captain Anderson, we found in their pockets the first greenbacks I had ever seen. We considered the bills curiosities in the way of currency and only valued them as such, not believing that such money would be of any more value than the continental currency was after the Revolution, for of course the North was to be defeated and impoverished by the war, and not able to redeem her promise to pay. In fact, at that time, we would not have given ten cents on the dollar for it in Confederate money, which goes to sustain the statement elsewhere made that I, as a type of the volunteer of 1861, had a considerable touch of fool in my composition, because

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any person of common sense must have known that the war money of an already established government must, of necessity, have a better show for value than that of an experiment, no matter who might be the final winner in the contest, but the faith that was in us was strong indeed.

After the battle of Alleghany Mountain some half dozen of our company died; in fact, nearly all the wounded died from cold and exposure to the inclement winter weather, and we all suffered severely. We soon moved our camp to Shenandoah Mountain, where General Johnson left us for awhile to attend to important business in Richmond, and Colonel Baldwin commanded the department, and we remained here until the general movement of armies took place in March, 1862. We made our winter quarters as comfortable as we knew how, but we were green campaigners, and the best we knew was awkward enough. We had got some tents, and these, with log huts and plenty of fire, kept us in some sort of comfort, but during this bleak winter the boys talked a good deal about their "twelve months'" term of enlistment expiring in the spring, and not quite so much of their fear that the war would be too short to give to them a taste. Our next movement was to the old camp at West View, six miles from Staunton, and in preparing for this we burned up completely our

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camp at Shenandoah Mountain, tents and all, which puzzled exceedingly the generals of the rank and file, and it has always remained a mystery to me why we did it, for there was no enemy in threatening distance so far as we knew.

While waiting for developments, "us generals" were passing through an ordeal of electioneering, because the term of service for nearly the whole army had expired and the time for reorganization of companies and regiments had arrived, and enlistments "for the period of the war."

To offer a man promotion in the early period of the war was almost an insult, and the higher the social position, the greater the wealth, the more patriotic it would be to serve in the humble position of private in the ranks; and I have seen many men of education and ability refusing promotion, and carrying their muskets under command of officers greatly their inferiors, mentally and morally, as soldiers. It was not uncommon to see ex-congressmen and judges, as well as preachers, tramping along in ranks as privates, but one year of soldiering had engendered a desire for commissions in the hearts of many, and, in some cases, much trickery was resorted to by aspirants to secure the soldier vote for company offices. Our regiment, at reorganization, had been changed somewhat, Colonel Baldwin having been retired to a seat in the Confederate States Congress.

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Col. M. G. Harman commanded, with Lieut.-Col. J. H. Skinner and Major Ross as field officers, and Lieutenant Lewis, from the Institute (V. M. I.), was Adjutant; Company A was commanded by Captain Garber; Company B by Captain Long; Company C by Captain Dabney; Company D by Captain Airhart; Company E by Captain Watkins; Company F by Captain Cline; Company G by Captain Bateman; Company H by Captain Lilly; Company I by Captain Humphreys, and Company K by Captain Walton.

I could not give the roll of each company in the 52d if I would, but I would if I could, for I think it ought to be preserved, and I hope the names of the gallant boys will yet be saved.

CHAPTER III.

Every story should have its hero, and as I have no idea myself of posing as such, I can't think it at all improper to make, for my central figure in this part of my little book which treats of the war, the immortal "Stonewall" Jackson, whose fortunes as a commander I am proud to have followed from the day of McDowell to that of his death. We had not heard much of him, apart from the record he made at Manassas, until reports of his crazy battle at

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Kernstown, as it was called, were received; and although it was the custom in that war for both sides to magnify their victories and depreciate their defeats, we were pretty strongly impressed with the belief that Jackson had been pretty badly worsted at Kernstown, by that fighting Irishman, General Shields, whom we rated always as a gentleman and a soldier; and when we learned that Jackson was retreating up the Valley before Banks, our faith was visibly weakened, for we knew Milroy was pushing towards our own position with a much larger force than we could muster.

Our accounts from Jackson were not all painted in black, for we learned that he had matched his four thousand "foot cavalry" against Shields' ten thousand, and had fought so fierce and fast that the high-blooded Irishman thought Jackson had two thousand the most men, and we trusted largely in his skill; and were not totally dissatisfied when he turned up at West View, as though to cut out some work for "Alleghany" Johnson's men, which, of course, we thought unnecessary, all of us being generals, and able to lay our plans without his supervision, but he seems to have been arranging matters to suit General Banks, who, about this time, telegraphed McClellan that he "had forced the Rebel, Jackson, to permanently abandon the Valley and retreat on Gordonsville in Eastern Virginia."

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This is a verbatim report of Banks' message, and shows that he knew very little about Mr. Jackson, and it also shows that Jackson had succeeded - so far as the Federal generals knew - in getting completely lost, a thing he took a great deal of interest in doing repeatedly, during the progress of the war; but General Milroy, marching from the west towards Staunton for the express purpose of crushing Johnson, found Jackson at McDowell, in Highland county, with his chaplain, Dr. Dabney, holding worship in his camp.

On May 7, 1862, General Johnson, with his six regiments, was ready for the fray, and Jackson's Valley division, formed of the brigades of Taliaferro, Winder and Campbell, with the Lexington Cadets under Gen. F. H. Smith, of the Institute, were on hand to back us up with aid and comfort.

General Johnson, who knew the country almost as well as if he had made it, led the advance and drove four regiments of the enemy from Shenandoah Mountain, capturing their camps, with tents, clothes, arms and commissary stores, and placed his men in bivouac on the camp ground of the enemy. He had already formed his forces into two brigades, commanded by Colonels Scott and Connor, our boys being under Colonel Scott, who had the 44th, 52d and 58th Virginia.

The 52d took position on Sutlington Hill. When

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the enemy advanced to the attack we received the full assault of their first line and repulsed it, thus giving time for the arrival of the other regiments. The enemy, after being driven back, opened on us with their artillery a rapid and incessant fire of case shot and shell, but "us boys" laid low among the rocks and trees, which afforded us ample protection, and also the angle of elevation of their guns being so great, no damage, except to the timber, resulted from this cannonade, and the noise was all on the Yankees' side, we having no artillery in position.

About 5 o'clock General Milroy, having been joined by General Schenck, advanced his whole force of 8,000 men, and the battle roared and raged along the side of the hill with terrific force for a long time, but our two little brigades held them back until Jackson got his flank movement worked out, and then the Federals gave way, as a matter of course. In the final closing up of the business, just as Taliaferro's brigade reached the field, the 52d, backed up by the 10th Virginia, made a charge which drove them headlong down the hill, and the battle ended at 8 o'clock p. m. It seemed to me we had been at it about a week, but the other boys spoke as though it was a very short half a day.

The fight had been hotly contested, but Milroy made it perfectly clear to all on both sides that he was no match for Jackson in handling troops in battle, notwithstanding his superiority in numbers.

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Our loss was 71 killed and 390 wounded, but we could not learn that of the enemy, as they still held their main camp and carried away their dead and wounded during the battle, with their well served ambulance corps, but we found 103 dead on the mountain side next morning; and during the night Milroy set the woods on fire behind him, and retreated towards Franklin, whither General Jackson followed the next day.

On the 14th of May, about three miles from the town, he drew up his little army in a small valley and spoke a few words of commendation of their gallantry at McDowell, in his short, curt tone, and appointed 10 o'clock that day as an occasion of prayer and thanksgiving for the victory - which was duly observed - notwithstanding the firing of Milroy's cannon-balls over our heads, but many of us, during the exercises, prayed with real devotion, by the book, "from battle, murder, and sudden death, good Lord deliver us."

General Jackson stood motionless, with bent, bare head, and as soon as the meeting was over, marched his army back to McDowell, and the next day crossed the Shenandoah Mountain, halting at Lebanon Springs, where he gave his men some much needed rest, and an opportunity to observe the day appointed by the President for fasting and prayer.

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But I must repeat that I am not attempting a history of the war, only trying to follow in a weak, one-legged, halting manner, the boys of the 52d, in doing which I must call to mind the pleasant bivouac in the lovely Mossy Creek valley, with headquarters at Major M. G. McCue's house, and where all the people were so hospitable and kind to the jaded Rebels, and from whence we moved to Mt. Zion Church, near Mt. Solon, and I had the pleasure of a day at my uncle's, Dr. Geo. T. Robson, which place I had left one year before, a gay young volunteer, marching to the war and very much afraid I was too late to get any fighting; but I confess I was not now so very much afraid of missing a battle as I had been, and I think that year had taken some of the conceit out of me.

However, we could not tarry long in our pleasant quarters, for "Stonewall" was restless, and the Federal generals - Banks, Fremont, Shields, McDowell and Milroy - were either in, or threatening his beloved Valley of Virginia, to surrender which, he declared, was to give up Virginia; and in this compaign we soon found that events were hurrying fast, and we must do likewise or get left; which recalls to mind a true story of Col. William Smith, of the 49th Virginia, universally known as "Extra Billy."

On one occasion he was endeavoring to get his

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men in marching order as quick as possible, but they were very dilatory about it, and paid so little attention to his oft-repeated command to "fall in here, men, fall in, I say!" as to excite the Colonel's ire, whereupon he testily exclaimed, "If you don't fall in here right away now, I'll march the regiment off and leave every d--d one of you behind!"

Our "Stonewall" was no such Irishman as that, for when he marched his army off he was pretty sure to take it all along, and at this time, with all the odds the fortune of war had arrayed against him, he surely needed every man. It is, perhaps, not out of place here to attempt a description of the impression "Stonewall" Jackson made upon me and my comrades who had never seen him, until he got lost from Mr. Banks and turned up at Valley Mills near McDowell. I shall not attempt any description of his person or appearance, for that has been done so often that everybody who reads Southern history at all know all about it, but on first view I thought it hardly possible that he could be much of a general, and if the vernacular of to-day had been in vogue then, I think I should have reported that I had seen a "crank," and I believe most of the men of the 52d would have pronounced the opinion correct; but my reader must remember that most of us were still generals ourselves to some extent, though we did not consider our generalship quite so infallible as we formerly thought, and the

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killing and wounding of our comrades at Alleghany and McDowell had opened our eyes wonderfully to the probabilities of what might eventually grow out of this war if something or somebody didn't stop it. Col. M. G. Harman (Colonel of 52d Virginia) was wounded severely in the arm, and many others of Company D (the Company to which I belonged). But memory fails me now, and I can not record, as my heart prompts me to do, the names of the gallant boys who fought and fell for the cause they loved so well and thought was right.

When the thought of our noble dead rolls over my heart, I love to read the lines of Father Ryan, and get comfort from the sentiments so beautifully expressed by our charming soldier-poet:

                        'Tis o'er, the fearful struggle o'er,
                        The bloody contest past,
                        And hearts oppressed with anxious care
                        Throb peacefully at last.
                        Those who were spared are with us now,
                        Some are in heaven, we trust;
                        But though the victory is not ours,
                        They're glorious in the dust.

                        How many fell whose names and deeds
                        Are unrecorded here,
                        Save in some lonely, widowed heart,
                        Or by the orphan's tear!
                        Yet these were they who swelled the ranks
                        Of our brave Southern host,
                        And though no stone now marks their graves,
                        They're glorious in the dust.

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                        Long shall we mourn for those whose lives
                        Were offered up in vain;
                        We miss them in our vacant homes,
                        Nor can from tears refrain.
                        Forever cherished in our hearts,
                        Their names nor deeds can rust,
                        And tho' they sleep beneath the sod,
                        They're glorious in the dust.

                        And there are names we may not speak,
                        But yet to all how dear,
                        For them our daily prayers ascend,
                        May God, in mercy, hear.
                        How have they suffered, maimed for life!
                        Their highest hopes, how crushed!
                        But with a manly spirit borne,
                        They're glorious in the dust.

                        Bravely we fought and bravely fell,
                        Nor gained the victor crown,
                        Still we will prove that Southern hearts
                        Can suffer and be strong -
                        Strong in affection, honor, truth,
                        Strong in the Christian's trust;
                        'Tis trial brightens faith and hope,
                        We're glorious in the dust.

If in my power, the names of those who fought and fell for the "Lost Cause," should be graven in golden letters on a granite monument, to endure as time; as a tribute to pure patriotism and unselfish devotion to home and native land, in withstanding for all those bloody years the assaults of myriads of all nations and tongues, marshalled for the desolation of our loved Southern land and the subjugation of our people.

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The principles for which the Confederate soldier fought and died, are to-day the harmony of this country, and so long as those principles were held in obeyance the country was in turmoil and almost ruin.

The heart is greater than the mind, and it is not fair to demand reasons for actions which are above reason, and the people of the South, refusing to receive the dogmas of fanaticism as gospel, and to submit to the tyranny of fanatics, they became Rebels. Being such they must be punished, and for resistance they died; but their soldier boys died with their "boots on," and smoking guns in their hands. And they fought all the odds of overwhelming numbers, thoroughly armed and equipped with all the latest inventions of warfare; fought all the host of ills which came from blockaded ports, empty treasury vaults, the wails of distress from home, cold, hunger, nakedness; fought, without pay, the legions of the Northern army, who had regular monthly pay, in good money, with big bounties, plenty to eat, and abundance of clothing, blankets and tents, and superb hospital outfits, with all that sanitary commission could suggest for the comfort of sick and wounded; while the Confederate soldier could get no medicine when sick; nor, often, when amputation was necessary, even chloroform to numb the agony caused by the knife and

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saw of the surgeon. The Confederate soldier fought against the commerce of the United States, and all the facilities for war which Europe could supply, and laid down life for life with hireling hosts of Germans, Irish, Italians, English, French, Chinese, Japanese, white, black and brown.

CHAPTER IV.

I had almost forgotten that we are on the march with "Stonewall" Jackson down the Valley, and we want to keep up, for although the complicated movements of McClellan on the Peninsula, McDowell in front of Washington, Banks in the Valley, Shields along the Blue Ridge, and Fremont and Milroy in the mountains of Western Virginia, were enough to puzzle the brain of the most thorough master of the art of war in any age, they do not appear to have disquieted or embarrassed Jackson in the least. He looked right through the cloud of mystery to the plain object to be attained, viz: the diversion of re-enforcements from McClellan's "grand army," and he went at the accomplishment of this purpose with the mathematical accuracy and resistless force of a Corliss engine in motion. Past Harrisonburg we tramped rapidly, and by the 20th had reached New Market, on the

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Valley pike, where the road to Luray across the Massanutton - the glory of the Valley - leads into the Page valley, and here, for the first time, we up-country boys saw General Ashby, whose fame as a cavalry leader had reached us so brilliantly, and thenceforward the troopers of Ashby hung as an impenetrable veil in front and flank, so perfectly screening our movements that General Banks never knew where to look for his tormentor - Jackson - and it is doubtful if he yet knew whether or not this "Rebel" was still at Gordonsville, in Eastern Virginia.

We took the right-hand road at New Market, and at night united with General Ewell's division, which had come down the river from Swift Run Gap.

On the afternoon of the next day - 23d May, 1862, when we had passed Luray a long distance - a funny incident occurred, which, perhaps, General Jackson may have been expecting. The column was marching along at a swinging gait - getting over ground pretty lively - when a young and rather good-looking woman rushed out of the woods, so agitated and out of breath that she could scarcely speak, but coming up to the General, who had turned to meet her, she soon began to talk with great volubility. We, of course, could not hear what she was saying, nor could we even conjecture

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the import of her mission, but it was subsequently made known that this was the famous woman spy and scout, Belle Boyd, and the information she detailed right there to General Jackson with the precision of a staff officer, was to the effect that Front Royal was just beyond the woods, a short distance ahead; that the town was full of Federal troops; that their camp was on the west side of the river, where they had cannon in position to cover the wagon bridge, but none to protect the railroad bridge below; that the Yankees believed Jackson's army was west of the Massanutton near Harrisonburg, and knew nothing of the movement of Ewell's division; that Banks had moved his headquarters to Winchester, twenty miles northwest of Front Royal, and was looking for the Rebels to advance by the Valley pike, and when they did he intended to strike their flank and rear with his Front Royal detachment, all of which was absolutely trne, but it was known to General Jackson the night we left New Market and only needed Belle Boyd to confirm it; and when the "foot cavalry" got knowledge of this matter, as they did in a few days, their opinion of their leader changed, and blind, awkward and queer as he seemed they knew he was anything but a crank.

The movement to Front Royal was nearly to a focus now, and Gen. "Dick" Taylor started his

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Louisiana brigade - a "daisy" she was, too - at a double, closely followed by the whole force, and pretty soon we broke cover down a steep by-path into the Gooney Manor road, not half a mile from town. Some cavalry was first encountered, but almost instantly brushed away, and our cavalry, making a sweep, captured and brought out many prisoners.

The Louisianians, led by the gallant General, went at the railroad bridge, and then came Col. Bradley T. Johnson, with his regiment, the 1st Maryland, in a fair, square attack straight into Colonel Kenly's 1st Maryland, of Bank's army, when "Greek literally met Greek," and the tug of war was desperate. Generals Jackson and Ewell galloped along the field, like knights of the olden time, cheering on their men; the "Tigers," of Major Wheat, and the Louisiana boys "waded in" yelling, firing, fighting; while the Virginians joined in the chorus, the 52d well up and doing her duty equal to any on the field, and no man, woman or child, all the way from Luray, knew we were coming until we had passed, except Belle Boyd.

I wish I could give a description of the battle of Front Royal, with all the preceding incidents and operations, showing the inspiration by which General Jackson planned and brought through to complete success his audacious movement right into the camps of the enemy which surrounded him, and I

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have always believed it was a piece of one of the sublimest pictures of strategy ever performed in war.

The enemy was pretty soon driven across the river, and tried hard to destroy the bridge, but the pressure in the rear was too great to give them time, and moreover Ashby, with part of his cavalry, had crossed above, cut the railroad and telegraph wires to Strasburg, and prevented any help coming to the enemy from that point, while at Buckton he drove them from the strong position in the railroad cut and captured a train of cars. Other portions of the cavalry overtook the retreating Federals at Cedarville, and some companies of the 6th Virginia cavalry, led by Captain Grimsley, of Culpeper, in two gallant charges, broke them up completely, but many good men of the cavalry were killed - among them Captain Baxter, Company K, 6th Virginia, and Captains Sheets and Fletcher of the Ashby Legion.

There was considerable jealousy on the part of the infantry against the cavalry, the "foot-pads" thinking the riders had the easiest time, and seldom omitted an opportunity to make game of them, especially when the cavalry would be passing them on a march, and the old chaff of "Come down out o' that hat, know yo're thar; see your legs a hanging down!" "Get from behin' them boots! needn't

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say you aint thar; see your ears a workin'!" will be remembered while any of the old soldiers live. But I think the cutest thing I ever heard was by an old infantry man, on the Valley pike, in 1863. He was resting, his arms crossed on the muzzle of his musket, when a dashing-looking cavalry man, wearing considerable gold lace and feathers, rode up. The infantryman eyed him quizzically, for a few minutes, and then accosted him with, "Say, Mister, did you ever see a dead Yankee?" and paused to enjoy the contemptuously dignified, silent stare of the cavalier. The old knapsack-toter then continued: "Cause if you didn't, and you'll go along with us for about an hour we'll show you one." This failing to elicit any response, he began again, in a very reassuring tone: "You needn't be afeered, Mister, 'cause there haint none of our cavalry got killed yet, and I hain't never heered of but one of 'em gittin' hurt, and he was kicked while he was currying of his creeter." Of course there was a yell, as the "wore out" cavalryman rode off as lively as he could, and the footman set his trap for the next one.

We boys didn't make so much sport of the cavalry after Front Royal, and it was no uncommon sight to see a dead man with spurs on during the Valley campaign. The artillery, too, under the famous commanders, Poague, Chew, Courtney, Carpenter,

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Lattimer, Caskie, Raines, Luck, Miller, Cutshaw, Wooding, and others, did splendid service.

I do not think I ever saw a list of the regiments in Jackson's first campaign in the Shenandoah Valley, and believing it will interest the reader, will endeavor to give, from memory and reading, what I believe to be a correct statement of them:

From Virginia, there were the 2d, 4th, 5th, 10th, 13th, 21st, 23d, 27th, 31st, 33d, 37th, 42d, 44th, 48th, 52d, and 58th regiments, and the 1st (Irish) battalion, infantry.

From Louisiana, the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th regiments, and Major Wheat's "Tiger" battalion, infantry.

From Georgia, the 12th and 21st regiments, infantry.

From North Carolina, the 21st regiment, infantry.

From Alabama, the 15th regiment, infantry.

From Mississippi, the 16th regiment, infantry.

From Maryland, the 1st regiment, infantry.

The cavalry of General Ashby was the 7th and 12th regiments, and the 17th battalion, Virginia, and the brigade which came over with General Ewell was the 2d and 6th Virginia, with one company, under Ewell's special orders, commanded by Capt. E. V. White, from Loudoun county, Va. - making 27 regiments and 2 battalions of infantry, 4 regiments and 1 battalion of cavalry, and, I think, 11 batteries, of about 44 guns altogether.

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Of course I am rambling, moving along the route towards the point where I became a "one-legged Rebel," and I got there soon enough, but it took me by Winchester, on Sunday morning, May 25, 1862, where I helped all I could to crush the life out of General Banks' army, and such a glorious welcome as met us from the warm-hearted people of that famous old town. There was some fighting in the streets, but the happy inhabitants wouldn't stay indoors, not even the women and babies; but almost almost frantic with delight, they with one breath blessed us for coming, and the next blamed us for letting so many Yankees get away. They evidently expected impossible things from "Stonewall's" men, such as catching crows on the wing, or the "wild gazelle on Judah's hills," either of which was as possible as to overtake General Bank's runaways.

The singularly brilliant idea of Gen. Geo. H. Stuart, who commanded the little cavalry brigade, composed of the 2d and 6th regiments, that inasmuch as he belonged to Ewell's division he was not subject to General Jackson's immediate command, permitted many of the enemy to make their escape, and the whole cavalry force was so scattered as not to be available for pursuit of the flying Federals, at the proper moment, which was unfortunate for us, but we told the Winchester folks that we had

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done our best, and they showed their appreciation of our efferts by standing on the streets with quantities of good things to eat, which they pressed upon the eagerly moving soldiers, and here allow me to say, from personal experience, that it was perfectly safe, under any circumstances, to force nice, roast beef, ham, buiscuit, pies, cakes, pickles and the like upon any marching column of Confederate soldiers, whether they were pursuing a routed enemy or fighting him in the streets of a town, and no person who did it was ever hurt.

We had done the best we could for Mr. Banks, and were pretty well pleased with ourselves once more, so that the old spirit of "generalship" again spread its mantle over each soldier in the line, and he knew exactly how to manage the campaign thenceforward notwithstanding our ideas had not been strictly followed by General Jackson in the opening of it, but we did not fully agree as to preliminaries now, some of us being strongly in favor of taking immediate march to Harrisburg, Pa., and operating from that point as a base, while many thought we should make an instant attack on Washington City itself, and thereby draw General McClellan out of his intrenched lines on the Chicahominy, thereby giving General Johnston the opportunity he was looking for to ruin him as we had done the armies opposed to us.

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We knew we were going to hold the Valley anyhow, for of course the war was almost over now - and how we did pity the fellows at home, youngsters and the like, who wouldn't get any experience in camping, marching and fighting, nor any share of the glory that radiated around and all about "Stonewall" Jackson's men.

We had nearly made up our minds to elect "Stonewall" President of the Confederate States at the next election, although Beauregard was still the soldiers' idol, and, as yet, we had heard very little of "Marse Robert," for Seven Pines had not been fought, and "Joe Johnston," the "great retreater," was still falling back somewhere about the Peninsula. But we were not falling back - were not of that kind! Come to stay we had, and like Alexander, were sedulously looking out for other armies to conquer. So it passed, and we trotted about to hurry Banks' demoralized legions over the border, and swelling with pride in our generalship.

While the fighting at Winchester was in progress, one of the staff suggested to General Jackson that he was exposing himself too much, and the answer was, "Tell the troops to push right on to the Potomac," and this became a kind of watchword with us; but General Banks got there first, and promptly reported to his government that "he had accomplished

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a premeditated march of nearly sixty miles, in the face of the enemy, defeating his plans and giving him battle wherever found;" that he "had not suffered an attack or rout," but he naively added that "it is seldom a river-crossing of such magnitude is achieved with greater success, and there were never more greateful hearts in the same number of men than when, on the 26th, we stood on the opposite shore." These quotations are taken verbatim, by John Easton Cooke, from the records of the War Department at Washington, and if, after reading them, anybody has anything to say, I give them liberty to say it. It may be that "Stonewall" had some idea of making a "premeditated march" himself, but if so he said nothing to "us generals" about it; but we noticed that he took the unnecessary precaution - as we thought - to start Colonel Cunningham with his regiment, the 21st Virginia, up the pike from Winchester, as quick as he could get the stuff together, with 3,000 prisoners, 100 cattle, and a great train of wagons loaded with 34,000 pounds of bacon, with flour, salt, bread, coffee, sugar, cheese, etc., in proportion, and $125,185.00 worth of commissary stores, $25,000 worth of sutler's goods, an immense quantity of medical and hospital supplies, and 9,354 small arms, with two pieces of artillery and a great many cavalry horses and equipments. All such

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goods as this, though rated on the quartermaster's inventory as actual cash value, had been bought and paid for in another currency, more precious to many than greenbacks, gold or silver, and we go to another ledger to learn that price, as shown by the list of killed and wounded.

On this advance movement down the Valley every man was pressing to the front with a vim and enthusiasm which gave the enemy no rallying point or time to prepare a line of defence, and General Jackson said that "the battles of Front Royal and Winchester had been fought without a straggler."

Our loss was 68 killed, 327 wounded and three missing, but I do not know that of the enemy. We paroled 700 of their wounded and left them at Winchester in their own hospitals, but I will not attempt any calculation of their loss from the data. The letter of a Northern correspondent at the time says: "Banks lost over $2,000,000 in property," and we know that Colonel Connor, who was left by Jackson with one regiment at Front Royal, destroyed nearly $300,000 worth of property at that place when he was driven from there by McDowell in advance. The Philistines had broken up the political Sampson, but he "hadn't suffered defeat," so he told the Secretary of War. I hope my readers will pardon my apparent exultation in passing over this part of the road, because I can't help being

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proud of the deeds my comrades did, and when I get to campaigning in memory's fields with "Stonewall the Great," my pulses quicken like a race-horse.

I don't mean any disrespect to anybody - but am a little like the old "grayback" who, after the surrender, went to the Provost Marshal, at Charlottesville, to be paroled. After taking all the oaths required of him, he asked the Provost if he wasn't all right. "Yes, " said the Captain, "you are." "Good a Union man as anybody, ain't I." "Yes," replied the Captain, "you are in the Union now as a loyal citizen, and can go ahead all right." "Well, then," said the old sinner; "didn't 'Stonewall' use to give us h--l in the Valley." You see he was one of "Stonewall's foot cavalry," and couldn't help being proud of it.

But I must return to the army of generals who were going to hold the Valley. We did not hold it until the 30th of May, down at the bottom end of it - Charleston, Bunker Hill and vicinity - but a Courier came to General Jackson, and among other curious matters, related that Colonel Connor's force at Front Royal had been captured by General Shields, who was advancing by that route, that the "great pathfinder," Fremont, was moving from the west, both aiming to unite at Strasburg with a combined force of nearly 40,000, which was interesting

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if true, and most of it proved true, for Jackson had only 15,000 effective men - all generals, however - and under the circumstances each general unanimously resolved to withdraw from the lower end of the Valley, if he could, and abandon for the present any further demonstrations on Harrisburg and Washington, thereby relieving those threatened points from the pressure which we had nearly resolved to bring upon them. In fact, the pressure appeared to have been, for the moment, applied in a totally different, and, to us generals, a very unexpected locality, for we had not had time in those four days' stay to familiarize ourselves with the capacity and resources of that part of the country. We managed to "hit the road" brisk enough to become familiar with that though, so much so that the last of us made fifty miles, walked too, from late in the afternoon of the 30th to the night of the 3Ist, which put us at Strasburg.

CHAPTER V.

On Sunday morning, June 1st, 1862, we walked out on the Wardonsville road and held service with General Fremont's advance, which we checked, and finally drove his people back so far as to give us wagon room and let all of our trains get safely past this dangerous point.

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We fully expected General Shields to take part in the exercises, which would have rendered them much more interesting to us, and knowing him to have been at Front Royal we knew it would be comparatively easy for him to do, but his failure to appear satisfied us that he had taken the Page Valley route, and now we were in for a race to New Market Gap. It is related, on good authority, that "once upon a time" a traveler, found a boy, with hoe and crowbar, hard at work digging under a big rock, and inquiring what he was after. "Ground-hog under here," was the sententious reply. "Do you expect to get him out?" asked the traveler. "Expect to get him!" said the boy - "got to get him; preacher be at our house to-day, and we're out out of meat."

It was a "ground-hog case" now with "Stonewall," for this fourteen-mile wagon train carried the visible fruits of our victory over Banks, and we "got to get" to New Market Gap ahead of Shields or he'd cut our train off. We did get there, but it was a busy job, especially for Ashby and the rear guard, and the light batteries and the sharp-shooters kept up one continual roar all the way - day and night - as they contested, mile by mile, the advance of Fremont's column, which had taken the road in our rear when we left Strasburg. I don't believe he could have saved his train from us, if the conditions

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had been reversed, and Fremont had been conducting the retreat, with Jackson leading the advance, which brings up another pretty good war anecdote; whether true or not, makes no difference so far as the illustration is concerned:

During the long and bloody battle of Cold Harbour, between Grant and Lee, in 1864, a Yankee soldier went to his Captain for a pass to army headquarters, saying he had a plan for ending the war, which he knew would work if he could get the authorities to adopt it, but he positively refused to communicate it to any but the commanding general. The Captain gave him the pass, and after considerable difficulty in keeping his secret, passing regimental, brigade, division and corps commanders, the soldier reached Grant's headquarters - and returned. His Captain observed that he seemed very much depressed in spirit, and promptly interviewed him as to the result of his mission, and by coaxing got a report. He said the General was absent when he reached headquarters, but the staff was so urgent, and made him believe that it was his duty to immediately give such important information to the chief that he did so. Here he stopped, but the Captain insisted upon knowing what occurred, and finally the man said; "Well Captain, they don't want the war to stop nohow, for as soon as I told them my plan they kicked me out of the

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tent and kept it up for fifty yards, clear down to the woods; and I came away."

"Now, then," sad the Captain, "What was the plan you proposed ?"

"Well, Sir," replied the soldier, "I told them to let Grant and Lee swap armies and the war would end in three weeks."

When we got to Woodstock we had to stop and give Fremont a lesson, but after passing Mt. Jackson and destroying the bridge over the Shenandoah, we knew we were clear - for the fluttering signals on the Massanutton told us that our cavalry had destroyed the White House bridge on the Luray road, and stopped Shields; so now "Stonewall" "like a weary lion," as Cook puts it, slowly dragged his spoils to his lair, and although the enemy was up with us again we knew our trains were safe. At New Market we got the news of the battle at Seven Pines; the wounding of General Johnson, and the assignment of Gen. R. E. Lee to the command o the Army of Northern Virginia. The war had begun!

We had another brush with Fremont, near Harrisonburg, on the 5th of June, in which General Ashby was killed, which cast a gloom over the whole army, and was felt to be an irreparable calamity by every man in it. Our division, under General Ewell, halted at Cross Keys, on the 7th, and

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made arrangements for battle. In the old times there had stood, at the intersection of several roads, an old-fashioned tavern, upon the swinging sign of which was painted two keys crossed, from which the name was derived; and now it was to be made famous by Ewell's fighting division, and given an enduring name on the page of history.

On Sunday, June 8th, 1862, we were ready again for our usual Sabbath exercises, and Fremont was on hand with his congregation. The 52d regiment got a fair share of business in this engagement, and lost a good many men. Major Ross was among the wounded, so was Lieutenant Samuel Paul, of Company D, whose leg was shivered by a shell, within five steps of me, which caused amputation. He has since been treasurer of Augusta county, and I have often thought I would like to be treasurer of something myself - but all the one-legged Rebels can't get their living the same way, and Lieutenant Paul - gallant soldier and good officer as he was - was equally as good a citizen, and deserves all the success he achieved. Lieutenant King, of Company B, was killed here, and we were quite willing for Fremont's men to retire when they had got as much as they wanted.

Our brigade was commanded in this battle by General George H. Stewart, and was posted on the left centre of Ewell's line, sustaining and repulsing

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four distinct charges, each made by fresh troops; but they were mostly Dutch, and we fought them to the best advantage, behind trees, which General Ewell's judicious selection of the ground gave us.

Fremont's Dutchman were no match for the "foot-cavalry," and although General Ewell himself says he had less than 5,000 muskets, and Fremont's order to march, which was taken from an aid of General Blenker killed by one of Trimble's men, showed six brigades, commanded by Blenker, Milroy, Stahel, Steinwerh, and one other, of infantry, with one brigade of cavalry, numbering in all about 20,000, yet their dread of Jackson caused them to give way under slight pressure, especially when General Trimble struck them in flank.

General Forrest, the famous cavalry commander of Tennessee, was once asked a question as to the cause of his almost constant success in his cavalry operations, when other commanders so frequently failed, and his answer was: "Well, I got thar first, with the most men;" and that in a sentence, gives the key to Jackson's generalship, if you add to it the Cromwellian motto, "Trust in the Lord, and keep your powder dry." We left the battle ground of Cross Keys at midnight, and took the road to Port Republic, where Jackson, with his division, had been holding Shields in check; but the gallant Irishman was now coming on again in such force as

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to make a concentration of our forces necessary. General Fremont reported his total loss at Cross Keys fight as 2,000, while General Ewell's official report of our loss was 300 killed, wounded, and missing; a very encouraging affair to Ewell's boys, who held the battle-ground, and equally discouraging to Fremont's who were forced to retreat.

The village of Port Republic lies in the angle made by the junction of the North and South Rivers, which here form the south fork of the Shenandoah, along the east side of which General Shield's was moving. The Cross Keys road crosses the North River by a good bridge, into the town, and another road runs northeast from the town by a ford in the South River, and down the south fork, by Conrad's store, to Luray. A third crosses at the same ford and running southeast, through Brown's Gap, in the Blue Ridge, leads to Charlottsville. I don't think it any harm to give this much geography, even if all my readers should also be posted in the big histories, but I am satisfied that many will read this who never saw any of the aforesaid big histories; and they will thus be better able to comprehend the successful performance of all the points of Jackson's magnificent strategy.

The position then was, Fremont at Harrisonburg, Shields at Conrad's Store - between which all the bridges were destroyed - and Jackson at Port Republic,

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forming a triangle, with sides fifteen miles long. Behind Jackson was the road through Brown's Gap, clear and open, so that he could fight them separately or fall back to Charlottesville and Richmond, and his operations up to this time had caused the troops of McDowell, Fremont and Shields to be withheld from McClellan, and at the same time put his own army within easy reach of Richmond should General Lee desire his assistance.

Fremont with his 18,000 and Shields with his 15,000, would have been too much odds for Jackson's 12,000, to which he had been reduced since leaving Winchester; and he had no idea of permitting them to double on him, but he had got Fremont whipped by Ewell so easily, at Cross Keys, that he determined to double his own team and give Shields a trial. "Stonewall" was a thorough and consistent Christian, so far as I know, and was reported to do a great deal of praying, but he certainly did practice a great deal of deception on these two estimable gentlemen right here. We crossed the bridge over the North River early in the morning of June 9, 1862, and set it on fire as soon as everything was over - thus preventing General Fremont from coming to Shields' assistance - but the ford of South River, owing to recent rains, was too deep for us, and we made a bridge of wagons and planks to get over on. Jackson's men were already engaged

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with the enemy and needed Ewell's assistance right away, and here was illustrated the influence of trifles on important events.

We could see the "Stonewall Brigade" and Colonel Harry Hayes' gallant 7th Louisiana, with the splendid batteries of Poague and Carpenter hotly fighting, but heavily overmatched, and we were hurrying as fast as we could to their assistance when a plank in our wagon-bridge slipped out, almost breaking up our means of crossing, and did delay us considerably, so much so that by the time we got over, formed our line and commenced our advance upon the enemy, we met General Winder's troops retiring in confusion.

The 44th and 58th Virginia, by General Ewell's directions, made a hot attack on the enemy's flank, but could not hold him long, and the whole line fell back to a piece of woods, losing one of Poague's 6-pounders and a good many men. General Shields put a splendid 6-gun battery in a magnificent position to sweep the field, and I don't think he had an imported Dutchman in his army. They were all Western fellows, and stuck to their ground as if they belonged there, and it is my candid opinion that they were descendants of folks who had, years before, emigrated to the great West, from the Shenandoah Valley. Our advance, under General Elzy, was through a fine field of wheat bordering on the

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river bottom, chin high, and their minnie balls clipped the grain worse than reapers. It was a very bad job of harvesting, the boys said - a harvest of death it proved - and much as we tried to make it short, the time dragged slowly enough, until it did seem that Shields was fully a match for "Stonewall" Jackson.

The two commanders maneuvered their men under fire, just as the old-time warriors used to do before long range weapons came into use, but still that terrible 6-gun battery held the key of the battle, and when General Taylor rode up, Jackson turned to him and said: "Can you take that battery? - it must be taken!"

Taylor's answer was to gallop back to his brigade, and pointing with his sword to the enemy's guns, called out, in a voice like a bugle-blast, for thrilling wildness, "Louisianians, can you take that battery?" They answered, with a yet wilder thrill, "We're the boys that can do that, General. You can bet on your boys!" and the gallant son of "Old Rough and Ready" led them forward.

Three times the Louisiana brigade drove the enemy back and captured the guns, but were as often repulsed, in turn, by the splendid soldiers of Shields. Taylor turned savagely for another trial, and Jackson seeing that Shields was heavily re-enforcing his left to protect the battery, brought all

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he could to his own left, and as the Louisiana boys made their last assault on the guns, threw all he had on Shields' right, breaking it all up, and at the same time Taylor took those dreadful guns, again turned them on the enemy, and the victory was won; but, as Cowan said to the devil - "'twas claw for claw," and we had fought as fine a body of troops as there was on the Continent, fully justifying the assurance of the 6th Louisiana - an Irish regiment - who said, when Fremont was beaten the day before, "This isn't much, but look out for to-morrow, for Shields' boys will be after fighting." The battle of Port Republic was one of the most sanguinary of the war, and we lost nearly 1,000 men killed and wounded. I do not know the loss of the enemy in killed and wounded, but we captured 7 pieces of artillery with limbers and caissons, 975 prisoners, and more than 1,000 small arms. One of the prisoners said to us - "You fired over our heads at Winchester, but you fired under them here."

General Shields returned to Conrad's Store, but he was never routed, and stopped when Jackson did. He was badly crippled though, and Kernstown was atoned for, and the "Great Pathfinder," Fremont, was no longer able to act offensively in the Valley - except towards the citizens - but in this he was far superior in magnanimity to Milroy and others.

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General Shields was a favorite with the people among whom he operated, and treated them with consideration and kindness, but he was a terror when it came to fighting.

And now was accomplished the full purpose of "Stonewall's" strategy, for it was fully guaranteed that not another soldier could be spared from the defences of Washington to arrest McClellan in the Chickahominy, because of the unknown motions of the man who could disappear and reappear so suddenly aud unexpectedly, and while making such audacious marches right into the jaws of his powerful enemies, deliver such fearful blows and get out whole.

The very uncertainty and mystery which hung around him was worth as army, for it kept an army of the enemy unemployed while waiting for Jackson to develop his plan.

CHAPTER VI.

After Port Republic we enjoyed ourselves in our pleasant June camps about Mt. Meridian, and begun our planning and generalship again. There hadn't been quite so much of that among us since we left Strasburg, for the situation appeared to be mixed to such an extent that for some time each individual general had nearly decided that it would

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be as much as the bargain to get his own individual baggage out safe, but now we had shaken off the dogs of war which had howled at our heels and gnashed at our flanks like blood-hounds hunting the lion, and being free again were ready for a new campaign.

I think it best, from this time forward, to deal less in general history, if I can, so long as the war lasts, and give my readers more of the incidents that cluster around the life of the soldier - but I couldn't help talking as I did about the Valley campaign; and now "Stonewall" was our hero and idol. His old, ambling sorrel, was in our eyes, a war charger worthy of a Coeur de Lion; and his dingy coat and mangy cap were glorified. We didn't make game of him any more, but one irreverent fellow started, as a conundrum, "Why is General Jackson a better leader than Moses was?" answering - "because it took Moses forty years to march the children of Israel through the Wilderness, and Jackson would have doubled-quicked them through in three days." The army had suffered all the usual trials of military life - and death too - in time of war, and the men had been hurried by day and by night; in storm and sunshine; in hunger and cold; on picket and camp guard; in the whistling tempest of lead, and the howling, deamon shriek of shell; in the mangling of comrades, and the hasty burial of our

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dead on the field where they fell - and yet so wonderfully recuperative is the mind of man, that as soon as the pressure of adverse circumstances is removed, he lights his candle at the burning torch of hope and leaves the past behind him. Just so did we, the men and boys, who had followed "Stonewall" through his trying campaign, come out bright and fresh, ready to follow again wherever the star of his destiny might lead - for we wanted to follow that destiny wherever it might be.

The brigade to which my regiment was attached was composed of the 13th Virginia regiment, made up of companies from the counties of Culpeper, Louisia, Orange, Frederick and Hampshire, and was commanded, during the war, by Colonels A. P. Hill, J. A. Walker and Terrell. The 31st Virginia, from Upsher, Randolph, Gilmer, Barbour and Highland, under Colonel Hoffman. The 49th Virginia, from Rappahannock, Prince William, Fauquier, Nelson and Amhurst, under Colonels Smith (extra) and Gibson. And the 52d Virginia - my own old regiment - was from Augusta, Rockbridge and Bath, and had for Colonels, during the war, Baldwin, Harman, Watkins, Skinner and Lilly. Our Brigadiers were Edward Johnson, Elzey, Pegram and Stewart.

These were all gallant soldiers and good officers, whose names have gone into history gloriously, but

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"us boys" made the wreaths of fame that bound their brows, and we are proud that they wore them worthily.

A. P. Hill reached the rank of Lieutenant-General, and was killed near Petersburg, by a straggler, just as the star of peace breaking through the clouds. Terrell and Watkins were both killed, so was Board, and Hoffman, a late judge in West Virginia, lost a foot; but the old hero, Lieutenant-General J. A. Early, more thoroughly lied on than any, and with whom more ability than all his traducers combined, is now dead; while Gibson, of Culpeper, is one of the most prominent lawyers of Middle Virginia, and may yet be Governor, carries on his person the scars of ten wounds received in battle. It used to appear very much as if fate, and not accident, had control of the bullets in battle, for some men went bravely through battle after battle with never a scratch to show for it, and were finally killed in some little insignificant skirmish, where not a dozen shots were fired; and then again there were men who would be wounded in every battle if they came in cannon shot of the field. I know one instance where as good a soldier as fought in the Southern Army got hit with a ball every time he went into a fight, but not one serious wound among them, and his brother, in the same company, equally as good a soldier, who never missed a battle,

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went safely through the war with only one wound.

Some soldiers seemed to move in a charmed circle of safety, while others appeared to be bright particular objects of special favoritism when wounds were to be distributed, and in the latter part of the war the soldier was thought by his comrades to be especially lucky when he got a furlough wound - one that didn't quite kill, but allowed him to stay at home while it was healing.

We remained in the Valley long enough to get rested up good, and then moved through Brown's Gap, and "on to Richmond," for the new general of the army there was tired of McClellan's parallels, redoubts, salients and other engineering schemes on the Chicahominy, and desired to put a "Stonewall" across the road.

I remember picking up a Richmond paper about this time which contained a letter from a young lady in the country to her friend in the city, inviting her to pay a visit, and the ingenious working in of the names of our Generals interested me so much that I retained it in memory. The latter ran thus -

                        "Come, leave the noisy longstreet,
                        And come to the fields with me,
                        Tip o'er the heath with flying feet
                        And skip along the lea.
                        There ewell find the flowers that be
                        Along the stonewall still.

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                        And pluck the buds of flowering pea
                        That bloom on 'appy hill,
                        Across our rodes the forrest boughs
                        A stately archway form
                        Where sadly pipes the early bird
                        Which failed to catch the worm."

Do for a school-girl pretty well I thought.

Coming out of the mountain pass we entered Albemarle county just when the cherries were ripe, and there were oceans of them, too. We got all we could of them, but time was too precious to waste in gathering cherries, for this march was to be made without the knowledge of the enemy, and in order to do this the soldiers were forbidden to tell the citizens what commands they belonged to, and were instructed to answer all questions in regard to the army with - "I don't know."

The people all kept open house in Albemarle, and the "foot cavalry" enjoyed many a good, square meal among them. We sang the song of "Old Virginia Never Tire," and were very proud of our old State when the Alabama, North Carolina and Mississippi boys praised our people for their kindness and hospitality.

General "Dick" Taylor tells of a breakfast he had with some old friends and relatives of his father in Orange county, on this march, which I think of sufficient interest to repeat it in his own language:

" * * * That night we camped between Charlottesville

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and Gordonsville, in Orange county, the birthplace of my father. A distant kinsman, whom I had never met, came to invite me to his house in the neighborhood. Learning that I always slept in camp, he seemed so much distressed as to get my consent to breakfast with him if he would engage to have breakfast at the barbarous hour of sunrise. His home was a little distant from the road, so the following morning he sent a mounted groom to show the way. My aide, young Hamilton, accompanied me, and Tom followed, of course. It was a fine old mansion, surrounded by well-kept grounds. This immediate region had not yet been touched by war. Flowering plants and rose trees, in full bloom, attested the glorious wealth of June. On the broad portico, to welcome us, stood the host with his fresh, charming wife, and, a little retired, a white-hearted butler. Greetings over with host and lady this delightful creature, with ebon face beaming hospitality, advanced holding a salver on which rested a huge silver goblet filled with Virginia's nectar, mint julep. Quantities of cracked ice rattled refreshingly in the goblet, sprigs of fragrant mint peered above its broad rim, a mass of white sugar too sweetly indolent to melt rested on the mint, and, like rosebuds on a snowbank, luscious strawberries crowned the sugar. Ah! that julep! Mars ne'er received such tipple from the hands of Ganymede! Breakfast

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was announced, and what a breakfast! A beautiful service, snowy tablecloth, damask napkins - long unknown; above all, a lovely woman in crisp gown, with more and handsomer roses on her cheek than in her garden. 'Twas an idyl in the midst of the stern realities of war! The table groaned beneath its viands. Sable servitors brought in, hot from the kitchen, cakes of wonderous forms, inventions of the tropical imaginations of Africa inflamed by Virginian hospitality. I was rather a moderate trencherman, but the performance of Hamilton was Gargantuan, alarming. Duty dragged us from this Eden; yet in the hurried adieus I did not forget to claim of the fair hostess the privilege of a cousin. I watched Hamilton narrowly for a time. The youth wore a sodden, apoplectic look, quite out of his usual brisk form. A gallop of some miles put him right, but for days he dilated on the breakfast with the gusto of one of Hannibal's veterans on the delights of Capau."

In order to the better understanding of the allusions to Hamilton and Tom, I will give the information that Lieutenant Hamilton was a grandson of General Hamilton, of South Carolina, and was a cadet, in his second year, at West Point when the war commenced. Tom was the General's servant, three years his senior, and was his foster brother and early playmate. Tom's uncle, Charles Porter

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Strother, had been body servant to General Zachary Taylor, following him in his Indian and Mexican campaigns, and Tom had served as aide to his uncle in Florida and Mexico. The General says Tom could light a fire in a minute, make the best coffee, and was superb at all manner of camp stews and roasts. He was an excellent horse groom as well as an expert at washing and ironing. He was always cheerful, but never laughed, and never spoke unless spoken to. General Taylor thinks there was a mute sympathy between General Jackson and Tom, and gives the following story in evidence of it:

He says he has often noticed them as they sat silent by his camp fire, Jackson gazing abstractedly into the fire and Tom, respectfully withdrawn, gazing at Jackson. When General Taylor's brigade went into action at Strasburg, he left Tom on a hill where all was quiet. After awhile, from some change in the enemy's dispositions, the place became rather hot, and Jackson, passing by, advised Tom to move; but he replied, if the General pleased, his master told him to stay there, and he would know where to find him, and he did not believe the shells would bother him. Two or three nights later, General Jackson was at Taylor's camp fire, and Tom came up to bring them some coffee, whereupon Jackson rose and gravely shook him by

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the hand, and then told General Taylor how Tom had held his position on the hill.

This little "side issue" to my story may not interest my readers, but it did me, very much, and I give it at a venture, and will now resume the march.

Our objective point was Ashland, R. F. & P. R., and our route led us between the army of McDowell and the right wing of McClellan. As before stated, our Generals did not allow us to know anything at all, and so all us private generals gave the thing up and went ahead blindfolded, with no guide but our unswerving faith in General Jackson.

Some of the fellows had got on very familiar terms with him, indeed, so much so that they addressed him in common conversation as "Old Jack!" - that is, when he was not exactly present. When he was present it was our custom to throw up our hats and give him a rolling, rousing cheer, which usually had the effect to hurry him along, and I doubt very much if he liked it, for, although he always took off his cap when passing this ordeal of homage, I noticed he got out of reach of it as fast as the "old sorrel" would take him.

But our pride in our General was still more increased when our sweeping fight, beginning at Mechanicsville, brought the great, high generals of

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Lee's army over to our side of the Chickahominy to report to "Stonewall," and we saw Longstreet, A. P. and D. H. Hill, Hood, Branch, Stuart, Whiting and others, taking their orders gracefully from our great Valley Chieftain; and we noticed the difference in their clothes, too, and notwithstanding they were better dressed, we could see a still brighter glow of glory over the damaged "duds" of our Jackson. We were proud of glorious "Old Dick" Ewell, too, who took everything so calmly, except when he was excited, and was always ready, just as he was in 1847, when he led that squadron of Kearney's dragoons in their wild, dashing charge right up to the gates of the City of Mexico; but I want my reader not to forget that our "Stonewall" is the prince and hero of this little story as far as it has been spun yet, and I want them further to understand that the statements are historically accurate and correct, to the best of my knowledge and belief. I don't think there can be any excuse for "knowingly or willingly" incorporating falsehood in this little retrospective view, and if I do record anything not true, I do it unintentionally. There was but one Jackson.

This Chickahominy country is not much like the royal Valley of Virginia, and we always felt lost in it. No glimpse of the Blue Ridge charmed our eyes, nothing but flat, sedgy fields, piney woods

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with cypress trimmings, and scrubby, tangled mazes of wilderness, and swamps with stagnant, currentless streams of coffee-colored water. The air was not bracing and invigorating like our own grand, mountain country, but came lazily creeping through the woods and sedges in a languid, half-and-half style, and the whole thing bore on our spirits with a depressing influence. We missed the splendid, gushing springs of pure water we had always had at home, but never appreciated until now, and it gave us infinite trouble to rid ourselves of the ticks and chiggers that camped on us and entrenched themselves in our flesh. We knew that our depression was caused by the general sleepiness of this dreary, dismal country, which we had never seen before, for it resembles the whole Southern lowland country from which came those gallant regiments of North Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana, that had helped us redeem the Valley, and the effect of our mountain air and water, with the magnificent views of our rolling Valley, and its clear, bright, rushing rivers upon those whole-souled Southern men, was the very reverse of what this country had upon us, but our boys said it was all right for a battle-ground, because it was impossible to spoil it, and it seemed fit for nothing else.

No Virginian of the Valley ever ought to make

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a home beyond the view of the mountains, for he will not be content, and will always feel an aching, longing to lay eyes on their billowy blue, no matter how long he may stay away from them. "Absence cannot conquer love."

"Bury me in the Valley of Virginia!" said "Stonewall" Jackson, on his death-bed; and not one of our boys but felt in their hearts the same desire, should the fate of war require the sacrifice of his life, but we didn't think as much of dying as the circumstances surrounding us justified; nor did the soldiers realize the nearness of death, when they were campaigning, more than people do who plod along through their daily duty in the piping times of peace. As it had been in our Alleghany Mountain campaign, in 1861, with the names of mountains, streams and bridges, so now we learned new ones to us, and soon our tongues, glibly rounded off, in conversation, a long string of local names, such as "Grapevine Bridge," "Bottoms Bridge," "Long Bridge," "York River Railroad," "White House," "Pamunky," "Williamsburg Road," "Charles City," "Nine Mile Road," "New Kent," "Hanover," etc. But there was one road, much mentioned too, which made an impression on the mind of the school-boy, and it was known all about as the "Darbytown Road," but spelled Enroughty road. Some of Fremont's Dutchmen

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might have managed to make "Darby" out of that comglomeration of letters, but "us boys" wasn't generals enough for that yet; in point of fact we fell into line at once, as full privates when we struck the "Enroughty-Darbytown Road," and obeyed orders just the same as if we had never held birthrights to general's commissions.

Pawhick Creek was also a very interesting position to us, about the 27th of June, for behind it, beyond the New Bridge Road, we found the skillfully constructed fortifications which, with their massive banks of earth, protected McClellan's men at the now doubly famous Cold Harbour.

In moving down from Mechanicsville to the York River Railroad we came to another of those sluggard streams, known as Tottapotamoi Creek, the bridge over which was burning, and we heard the enemy's axes chopping rapidly in the woods beyond, felling trees to obstruct our march, and making an almost solid barricade, but General Hood put Riley's battery in position, and a few shells broke up the chopping so quick that when we again moved forward we found the axes sticking in the trees, but the choppers had disappeared. That day was as near perfect as it could be; air balmy, sky bright and cloudless, and nature doing her full share to make the "OId Virginia low lands low," looked decent, but we had not come down here

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to enjoy the scenery of nature nor gather the delicious blackberries that lined the swamps and fields.

Just here I will introduce another extract from Gen. "Dick" Taylor, most astonishing I admit; and yet, from the high character of the evidence, not to be set aside without thought, but I must say that I have never, in all my reading of the history of the war, met anything like it:

"At the beginning of operations in the Richmond campaign Lee had 75,000 and McClelland 100,000, in round numbers - these figures taken from official sources. A high opinion has been expressed of the strategy of Lee, by which Jackson's forces were suddenly thrust between McDowell and McClellan's right, and it deserves all praise; but the tactics on the field were vastly inferior in the strategy. Indeed, it may be confidently asserted that from Cold Harbour to Malvern Hill, inclusive, there was nothing but a series of blunders, one after another, and all huge. The confederate commanders knew no more about the topography of the country than they did about Central Africa. Here was a limited district, the whole of it within a day's march of Richmond, the Capital of Virginia and the Confederacy, almost the first spot on the continent occupied by the English people * * * and yet we were profoundly ignorant of the country,

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were without maps or guides, and nearly as helpless as if we had been suddenly transferred to the banks of the Lualaba. The day before the battle of Malvern Hill President Davis could not find a guide with sufficient intelligence to conduct him from one of our columes to another. * * * For two days we lost McClellan's great army in a few miles of woodland, and never had any definite knowledge of its movements. * * * When it is remembered that General McClellan's first operations in the Peninsula indicated the line of the Chicahominy as to the most probable, for the defence of Richmond, the Confederate cammander up to the battle of Seven Pines, General Johnson, had been a topographical engineer in the United States army, while his successor General Lee, also an engineer, had been on duty at the War Office in Richmond, and in constant intercourse with President Davis, who was educated at West Point and served seven years * * * everyone must agree that our ignorance, in a military sense, of the battleground was simply amazing. * * * General McClellan was as superior to us in knowledge of our own land as were the Generals to the French in their war of 1870. * * * And so we blundered on like people trying to read without knowledge of their letters."

I am not conceited enough to give any opinion

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of my own upon this subject even if I had one, but reading what General Taylor has written, and reflecting upon it, calls to mind much that was nearly forgotten, and my revived memory can only account for many things that I saw in the military operations of the "Seven Days" by taking what he says as true. I know we had no pillow of clowd by day or of fire by night to lead us, but we also know that General McClellan moved his army and trains by one single road after he commenced his retreat to the James, and only through ignorance somewhere on our part could he have accomplished it as successfully as he did. That General Lee had beat him in strategy, and "wore out" his grand army with three men to his four is true, and that McClellan had previously determined, after Jackson's Valley campaign had locked up all his hoped-for re-enforcements, to change his base to the James River is also true, but that he was forced by inexorable fate, in the person of Lee, to make that change under pressure and before he was ready is as true as any of it. And he was compelled to face his fate as best he could, but in doing it his army was ruined and the star of the "Young Napoleon" went down in blood among the Chicahominy swamps as the "Great" Napoleon's had done fifty years before amid the snows of Russia and the flames of Moscow.

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The result had proved General Lee to be one of the greatest soldiers of history, and his throne in the hearts of his soldiers was thenceforward secure, but we do not want to lose sight of his admirable Lieutenants: - Longstreet, the "War Horse," as General Lee called him, could always be relied on to hold the centre, where the hardest blows were given; and A. P. Hill, the dashing, chivalric, headlong commander of the "Light Division," who always in feeble health, was never sick on battle days; Ewell, the blunt and fierce bulldog soldier, confided in by Jackson; Magruder, the boiling, tempestous, enterprising leader; Hood the giant Texan, daring and indomitable, "bravest of the brave;" Stuart, the prince of cavalrymen, chivalrous as a knight of the Round Table; and all the way down the line, generals of divisions and brigades, colonels of regiments, commanders of squadrons and battalions, captains of companies, all co-operated with the troops; and the private soldier, "the true hero of the war," without the incentive or motive which controls the officer, who hopes to live in history; without hope of reward, actuated only by duty and patriotism, he claimed the cause as his own, and went into the war to "conquer or die," to be free or not to be at all.

History will yet award the chief glory where it belongs - to the private soldier. All these joined

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and executed the plans of General Lee, which resulted in throwing General McClellan's magnificent army back from the gates of the Southern capital, to tremble and cower beneath the guns of their fleet at Harrison's Landing, and the long agony was over. But we had met soldiers who "fought like brave men, long and well," and their army was not routed, though defeated.

We had worn many trophies from our foes; embracing fifty pieces of artillery, many thousands of small arms, millions of dollars worth of property, and thousands of prisoners; but the supreme result was the deliverance of the city of Richmond.

It had cost us a heavy price to do this, and Jackson's men had poured out precious blood in the lowlands, as they had other precious blood in the Valley and among the Alleghanies.

Many of our gallant comrades slept their last sleep beneath the slopes of Hanover, in the gloomy swamps of the Chickahominy, and under the sighing pines of New Kent and Charles City.

                        "Lowly they lie, forms of spirits departed;
                        Lie, where in battle they struggled and fell,
                        Unknelt by their graves, by the 'reft, broken-hearted.
                        No marble enduring their noble deeds tell."

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CHAPTER VII.

I am no statesman, nor do I wish to be considered one, but I think I represent the rank and file of the Southern Army, and will try, roughly to tell what the private soldiers thought about the war, after a year's experience. We had our own ideas as to what it was for, and I know that the maintenance, or perpetuation of African slavery had no part in the motives which impelled us to endure the privations of the camp, the march, and all the tribulations which a state of war brought to us, including the danger and death of the battlefield. We did not think of slavery at all in connection with the war. Many of us did not think there was sufficient reason for the war anyway, and like our old commander, General J. A. Early, opposed sesession as much, and as far as we could, but we were citizens of Virginia; we, who could, had voted for delegates to the State Convention with an honest determination - as good citizens - to abide by the result of their action. We believe the Federal Government was a creature of the States, ordained for the general good of all, but we felt that we owed paramount allegiance to Old Virginia, and when our State Convention, honestly and fairly elected, decided to withdraw the State from the Union, and there action was endorsed by an overwhelming majority of our people, we would have held ourselves to be

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traitors, ungreatful dogs, and death-deserving rebels, if we had failed to enlist under her "Sic Semper Tyrannis" banner.

We couldn't fight the Union and the State both, nor could we sit still and allow the Federal Government to the throttle, stifle and crush our proud old Commonwealth, for doing that which we believed she had a perfect righ to do, viz: resume all the rights and powers which she had delegated to the Federal Government. There had been no coercion used to compel her to enter the Union which, through her distinguished sons, she had been one of the foremost to promote, nor did we believe that our old-time fathers had knowingly bound her to a hateful partnership with a section bent on her ruin, by a tie which she had no right or power to sever.

We belonged first of all to Virginia, the blood of whose sons had at times been shed from Quebec to Boston, from Boston to Savannah, for the liberty we enjoyed, and now where she required our services we, as loyal children, dared to go. And I know that for the first two years of the war slavery and its abolition did not draw the young men of the West into the Northern army, for I talked with many of them whom the fortune of war had made our prisoners, and without exception they declared they were fighting for the Union and the old Constitution, not to free the negro, who, they said, ought

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not to be free among the white people. Nor do I believe that Abraham Lincoln went into the war to free the slaves, at least he said he did not, and I believe he was honest, and am satisfied that if the South had surrendered any time during the first or second year of the war slavery would not have been abolished. The restoration of the old Union, under the old Constitution, would have left slavery intact, and in order to accomplish its entire removal it was necessary to establish a new covenant and new laws, which was ultimately done, but for four years we were the true defenders of the principles of the Constitution as it was, and if the States of the South had been guided by the counsels of that noble old Virginian, Henry A. Wise, and instead of secession had held on to the old flag, the equal rights of all the States, in the territories and elsewhere, would have been maintained, and the other fellows who equipped and sent forth John Brown on his mission of destruction would have been the rebels in the "irrepressible conflict."

But the hand of the God of Israel was in it, and he led us by a way that we knew not, through the flood and the fire, to the positive and emphatic removal of the disturbing elements which did so torment and distract us, and made the American Union of to-day - what it never was and never could be under the original confederation - a nation!

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And now I know you will say I am wandering from my story, but before I return to "Stonewall," I will tel