Part 5

In this camp I was subjected to discipline by Col. Barlow. The evening before, on dress parade, I was named to take charge of a police detail from the Sixty-first, which was to report at brigade headquarters the next morning at five o'clock. I had slept but little during the night. Toward morning I fell into a drowse, and was awakened out of it by the reveille. I hurried out of my tent and was getting my detail together, hoping that the colonel would not notice my tardiness. I got to the place of rendezvous the first of any one in the brigade, and had to wait for an hour before a start was made. Our party worked through the forenoon, picking up all litter, looking after sinks, burying dead animals and doing whatever came in view to make our section of the country sanitary and look tidy. This performed we returned to our respective regiments. Having dismissed my detail, I was going to my tent when Sergeant Major Greig sang out, "Sergeant Fuller, the colonel says you may consider yourself under arrest, and you will confine yourself to your tent." I knew of course the reason for this. I stayed within for a couple of days, and then wrote a statement of the case and got a drummer to take it to the colonel. It came right back with an endorsement that if I had any communication to make, it could be done through the regular channel. I then sent the paper to Lieut. Keech and he forwarded it to the colonel. In a few moments I received from him a line that I was relieved from arrest and could resume my duties. These disciplinary matters were needful to keep the men up to their duties, and the organization instructed, and in working order.

One evening Barlow took the regiment and started for the front. We passed our intrenchments, and, it was said, we marched in the direction of Malvern Hill. We advanced a number of miles, discovered no enemy and returned to camp before morning.

About the eighth of August signs appeared that a change was coming. The siege guns were withdrawn and shipped, as were the heavier camp equipage and extra baggage. Aug. 16th about noon we broke camp and moved out, we did not know where to, nor where for. It proved to be a march down the peninsula. The first day out we made but about four miles, and halted near a corn field. The corn was fit for roasting and the men had a feast. I suppose the strict rules of McClellan's army, probably, were violated as there was some foraging done.

August 17th we made twelve miles, and passed Charles City Court House. Inexcusable vandalism was here committed. The books and records of the county seat were scattered about in profusion. Many documents two hundred years old were passed about, and there were those with Washington's signature. We crossed the Chickahomony, I was told, near its junction with the James, on a pontoon bridge, I should think one-eighth of a mile in length. It was the longest stretch of bridge of the kind I ever saw.

The road we took on this march was not the one by which we went up, on our way to the Richmond we did not see until about three years after. The country does not vary much from prairie level. The soil is light, with no stone in it to speak of. In a dry time, with considerable travel it powders up so that in going through it the dust rises in almost solid columns. A good part of the Potomac army, horse, artillery, foot and baggage trains, had preceded us. This made the dust as deep as it could be. Much of the road was through forests. I well remember this march from the dust experience. It exceeded anything I ever heard of. We would march for long distances when a man could not see his file leader--the dust so filled the air as to prevent seeing. Of course, the men had to breath this air. The nostrils would become plugged with the dust so moistened as to make slugs. Every now and then the men would fire them out of their noses almost as forcibly as a boy snaps a marble from his fingers. I remember having serious forbodings that taking in such quantities of road dirt would cause lasting injury. I do not know that my apprehensions of evil from this cause were ever realized. I suppose the dust that got into the lungs worked out in some way.

Aug. 19th we passed through Williamsburg, the site of William's and Mary's College and the capital of the colony in the days when Patrick Henry told the House of Delegates that, "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the third--might profit by their example." At this time the place was very delapidated. As I remember there was but one good looking house. The place had been well fortified against our approach as we were going up in May.

Aug. 20th we reached Yorktown and went into camp on the same piece of ground we had used about three months before. Those three months had wrought great changes in our circumstances as a regiment and an army. "We had met the enemy" and he was NOT ours. After stacking arms I wandered around and in so doing came across a quantity of split peas, which doubtless had been left by our army on the upward march. With others I concluded to try a change of diet and prepare a banquet for mastication that evening. I took enough of the peas to cook my quart cup full, and patiently sat by the camp fire through the evening looking after the cooking. It was quite late when they were boiled tender. I was hungry from the waiting, they touched the spot in the way of relishing, and, in a brief time the bottom of that old quart cup was bare. The prevailing complaint with the men was diarrhoea, and I was one of the prevalents, so to speak. This was not hygenic food for such a case, and, without further words, I was not very well the remainder of the night. The weather had been hot for that latitude. The next morning it was like the furnace of Nebuchadnezzar--several times hotter than it had been. I felt more like being petted by a nurse than to shoulder my traps and tramp. I could hardly stand, but to go was a necessity. We made that day a march of twenty miles, I think. Not being able to step out squarely, but rather drag and shuffle along, I began to chafe badly, which made the marching very painful. I kept up with the boys till towards the close of day and about a mile from where camp was made, when I grew dizzy. I saw all sorts of colors. I staggered out one side and went down like a bundle of old clothes. I lay there in semi-consciousness, until the rear guard came along, when I was accosted with the question, "What are you here for?" I said I couldn't go another step. "Well, but you must. Come, get up, or we'll prick you." I made the effort under this pressure, and did work my way over that mile to where the regiment had stacked arms. This was the first and only time I ever failed to be present with the regiment when it stacked arms and I was with it.

On this occasion whiskey had been issued. The first time since it had been given us when stationed behind the breastworks at Fair Oaks. Some one of my friends had saved for me my ration and it was a big one. I should think there was nearly a tumbler full of it, and it was the rankest, rottenest whiskey I ever saw, smelled or tasted. My legs were raw and bloody from the chafing, and I was sick all over. I divided my whiskey into two equal parts, one half I used on the raw flesh, and it took hold like live coals. This done I nerved myself to drink the balance, and, by an effort, kept it down. I rolled up in my blanket, went to sleep, and so remained till roll call next morning. When I stirred I was somewhat sore and stiff, but was essentially well, and made that day's march as easily as I ever did. During this day's march we had one of the hardest showers I was ever out in. In a short time every rag on the men was drenched. Shortly after the sun came out and before halting the heat of the sun and bodies had dried everyone, and we felt as though we had been washed and ironed--thoroughly laundered. This day's march brought us to Newport News, where shipping was at anchor to transport us somewhere.

We took a steamer which headed for the Potomac. During the time since we left Harrison's Landing Lee had cut across the country and was making it warm for Gen. Pope in the Shenandoah. The army of the Potomac, in place of following in the rear of Lee, made its slow way down the peninsula, and then shipped up the Chesapeak and Potomac, unloading at Aquia Creek, Alexandria, etc.

On the 27th of August, at about two p. m., our steamer stopped at Aquia Creek landing. We went ashore and marched inland some five or six miles and went into camp. Here we heard artillery firing. No doubt from some one of the numerous conflicts Pope was then having.

About ten p. m. orders were given to "fall in." We returned to the Landing, took our steamer, and proceeded up the river to Alexandria. Here we again went ashore, and were marched out to the grounds of Camp California, the same spot we had wintered on. We remained in this camp till about 6. p. m. of the 29th of August, when we marched and went into camp near Arlington. Here we remained till about three p. m. next day, when hurried orders were received to march with nothing but guns and ammunition. Our shelter tents were left standing, and our blankets in them, but the men had hungered and thirsted too much within the last six months to leave haversacks and canteens. It may be that this order to take nothing but our arms and cartridges had got distorted in transmission from headquarters, as it would seem that no general officer would start men out without food and water. At all events, the men knew enough to disobey such an order.

Heavy firing was going on in the direction of Centreville, some twenty miles away. We had not drawn shoes since setting out on the peninsula campaign, and the soles of our shoes were worn almost through. This road to Centreville was full of small round stones and they were hard on our feet. We stepped out on a rapid march and made very few halts till we were within sight of the heights of Centerville. Then the column was halted, and the weary men lay down in the road where they were halted, and went to sleep.

Early in the morning we were aroused and met an endless stream of men hurrying to the rear. These were of Pope's army who the day before had fought the battle of Second Bull Run. It has always been a mystery to me why old Sumner and his second corps were not in the fight. Surely from the time we landed at Aquia Creek on the 27th, there was abundant time to have gone to Pope. In place of doing that we were lounging around for about three precious days. Gen. Porter may have been wrongfully convicted of disobedience to Pope's orders. Gen. Grant came to be of that opinion, but I have never seen anything to make me doubt that the, so to speak, McClellan officers were so disgruntled at the practical retirement of their "beloved chief" that they gave no cordial support to Gen. Pope. I never supposed that Edwin V. Sumner was one of them, and I have always believed that he was ever ready TO FIGHT for the Union, whoever commanded.

We pushed out beyond the old fortified line held by the enemy the winter before, and there the Second corps was deployed in line of battle. This morning there was a steady rain that drenched us. When night came there were no blankets, and it was cold and the ground soaked. The men lay down together as closely as they could pack themselves, but it was an uncomfortable night. Under such hardships men become impatient and reckless, and prefer a fight to the discomfort. We occupied this ground next day. Towards night a very hard rain came down, which gave us another rinsing. We moved back a piece where there were large fresh brush piles. These we fired and, while they lasted we had comfortable warmth. Then we lay down on the wet ground and courted sleep. About 9 p. m. orders were passed along to get up and move. We were all night in making a very few miles.

The next morning we learned that we were near Chantilla, where the night before we had a brush with the enemy in which we sustained a serious loss in the death of Gen. Philip Kearney. He was one of the men that had won the reputation of loving the terrors of battle. He had lost an arm in Mexico, but single handed he would go into a fight, as an eater would go to a banquet. Kearney was a grandson of Judge Watts, who owned land and had a house in the town of Sherburne, and, in his boyhood days, Kearney spent some time here with his grandfather.

We lay in the vicinity of Fairfax Court House through the day. Towards evening we marched to Hall's Hill, not far from Chain Bridge. On the way we got a few shells from the enemy, which hastened our footsteps.

Sept. 3rd, we crossed Chain Bridge and marched about five miles to Tanleytown, where we remained until Sept. 5th. At this place our tents, knapsacks and blankets came to us, and were received with thanks. Campaigning in August and September in Virginia without shelter and blankets was a hardship. Such exposure uses up men as speedily as fighting. While in this camp the men lived "sumptously every day." It was but five miles from Washington, and the pie and cake vendors were out in sufficient numbers to supply all demands.

On the 5th we were marched about nine miles and camped near Rockville, a flourishing village in Maryland. Our company was placed on picket. The next morning I discovered a cow near by, and persuaded her to allow me to borrow my old quart cup full of her milk. As I drank it I vowed, if ever I got home, I would make a specialty of drinking fresh milk as long as I relished it.

Sept. 6th we marched beyond Rockville about six miles and formed in line of battle. Batteries were posted and, so far as we knew, there was to be a fight, but it blew over. Such "scares" are of frequent occurance in a soldier's experience. We remained in this place until the 9th, then marched about six miles and camped. After all was quiet some of my friends went out, and late returned with a supply of potatoes and "garden sass." On the 10th a march of four miles was made. On the 11th five miles, and we camped at a small place called Clarksvill. Here our company was detailed as provost guard. We remained at this place through the day. Someone purchased or TOOK a duck. We had a most delicious meal in the shape of a stew. Potatoes, onions and such like, were boiled with it, until the whole substance was a tender mush. I know that after that meal the feasters were almost too full for utterance.

At this time the little Sixty-first regiment was commanded by Colonel Barlow and Lieut. Col. Miles. For field purposes the regiment was divided into three companies. First, the company commanded by Capt. Angel and Lieut. Keech, in which was my Company C. (Capt. Broady was at this time away on sick leave.) Second company was commanded by Capt. Walter H. Maze and the third by Capt. Geo. D. H. Watts. There were about 35 men to the company. In other words, there were but one hundred and five muskets for all of these officers to direct. I have often remarked on what I deemed to be a very idiotic policy pursued by the authorities of the State of New York at this time, and I have believed that Gov. Morgan was equally to blame with Seymour. What I refer to is this. When troops were to be furnished by the State of New York, these governors would, as I understand it, organize new regiments of raw men, when there were scores of veteran organizations in the field with the rank and file greatly depleted. The Sixty-first was not the only skeleton New York regiment in the field. This regiment always had enough officers to have commanded in battle five hundred men, and, by experience in battle, they had come to know how to handle them. It would have been an immense saving to have filled up and made these weak regiments strong by sending to them from rendezvous camps recruits by the fifties. The new men would have rapidly taken up and learned their duties in the field from contact with the men who had learned what they knew from actual service. Then, the officers in these old regiments had got weeded out. The cowards and weaklings had, generally, been discharged, and their places filled by SOLDIERS who had come from the ranks. I was never informed why this common sense plan was not adopted. I imagine that the powers were not so much for the good of the cause, as to make themselves strong politically throughout the state from the appointment of a great number of officers. In state politics it was as powerful as in national politics to have the appointment of a horde of civil and military officers. If a governor was influenced by such considerations and understood how detrimental to the country such a course was, morally he was a traitor, and ought to suffer the odium of treason committed. Some of the states had the wisdom and the patriotism to adopt the plan of keeping the regiments at the front filled up. It was a crying shame to allow Frances C. Barlow to command a regiment carrying but a little over one hundred muskets. Someone should have seen to it that the Sixty-first should never have been long with less than five hundred men in the ranks.

On the tenth we marched ten miles, passing through Hyattstown. On Saturday, the 13th, we marched through one of the finest towns I had seen in the South--Frederick, Md. We camped on the further side of the town. Sunday we hoped would be a day of rest. In the morning a field of ripe potatoes was discovered close by, and notwithstanding McClellan's savage order against taking anything, in a short time that field had upon it, almost a man to a hill of potatoes. It did not take long to dig that field. Our anticipations of a day of rest, with a vegetable diet, were disappointed. The bugles sounded "Strike tents," and we were soon on our way on the road over South Mountain.

At this time fortune favored "Little Mac." Gen. Lee's plan of campaign fell into his hands, and he was fully informed as to the purposes of the Confederates. Some generals would have made good use of this important knowledge, but it did the Union commander but little good. This general order of Lee directed one of his corps to take Harper's Ferry. I think the common sense of most people would have said, "Now you concentrate your army and fight and destroy Lee's two-thirds, before he can concentrate." If that would have been good strategy, McClellan did not use it.

We had an uphill march out of Frederick. Having gained the crest of the first range of hills, we halted, and our regiment was deployed on a picket line. While lying about waiting for something to turn up, we discovered a farm house to the front, and sent several of the men to see what could be purchased for the table. In a short time they returned with milk and soft bread. Porter E. Whitney of my company was one of them, and he expressed his contempt for their simplicity in not charging more than they did for the amount furnished.

While we were preparing to cook our foraged potatoes and eat the provision from the farm house, we noticed the movement of troops in line of battle moving up the mountain side ahead of us. Batteries went into position and opened fire, then our men would make a rush, and take and hold an advance position. Then the artillery would follow, and shell the enemy from the advanced position. We had a fair view of this battle of South Mountain, which was regarded as a brilliant affair. It was fought I believe, under the immediate direction of General Reno, who was here killed. While we were thus safely viewing this battle, and watching the potatoes boil, Lieut. Keech made a remark that amused me, and has remained fresh in my memory. We were just ready to squat around the camp fire and lay to, when he said, "Well boys, we'll have one more belly full anyway." Just about as he finished that sentence, the order came "fall in and march." I took my cup of boiled potatoes and carried them in it until we halted at the foot of the mountain about 9 o'clock in the evening, when I ate them in the dark, rolled up in my blanket and went sweetly to sleep.

Monday, the 14th, we were up in good season, and started up the mountain. We advanced in line of battle and frequently halted for the skirmishers to advance, but we met with no opposition, and soon were on the top of the ridge. We passed several field hospital stations, where operations had been performed, and where had been left numerous legs and arms that had been amputated. These sights are not refreshing to advancing troops--they make them think too much of what is likely to happen to any one of them. As we were about to go down the other side of the mountain, a battery of our flying artillery went by on a canter, and we followed after them on the "double quick." Having got down to level ground we soon passed through Boonsborough. Our brigade was in advance this day, and we were close on the rear of the enemy and saw the last of him go over the hill ahead of us. At the time we did not know that we were on the banks of the--to be--celebrated Antietam. We followed the Boonsborough road nearly to the river. At this point the shore on our side was lined by a ridge twenty to thirty feet in height. We turned to the right and deployed part way down the rise of ground back from the river. At first our light artillery took position in front of us on the crest of the hill. By the next day these light guns were replaced by twenty pounders. Most of the time we were in this place artillery firing was going on between these guns and those of the enemy bearing on them. But little damage was done to us as the shells of the enemy went over us. About midnight of this Monday we were aroused and directed to march with our arms, and to leave everything else but our canteens, and to be careful to make no noise.

Lieut. Col. Nelson A. Miles commanded the expedition. We went through the fields to the left of the Boonsborough road, then aimed for the river. When we came to the bank which was high and steep, we worked our way down to the level of the road, entered it and crossed the bridge, which was a single arched stone bridge. We then carefully advanced some distance along the road, met nothing, turned back and made our way into camp. At the time the boys were confident the enemy had again gone on.

Tuesday, the 16th, we remained in the same place. There was much firing by the heavy battery in front of us, which was well replied to. A rebel shell went through the body of Col. Miles's horse. After dark we were moved to the right and near by the ford, which we crossed the next morning.

The morning of the 17th opened somewhat hazy. By 8 o'clock the artillery firing was heavy and Hooker was making his attack on the right. From where we stood we saw the effect of the artillery. Buildings were set on fire by our shells, and the air was full from their broken fragments. While we were in this place a rumor started down the line that we had been detailed as body guard to McClellan. This comforting statement did not last long, as, in a little while we were ordered to move. We forded the river, which in places was a foot deep. On the other side we halted, took off our shoes and stockings, wrung the loose water out of them, and put them on again. I cannot, of course, give the direction of our march. Col. Barlow had under his command, besides his own regiment, the Sixty-fourth New York, which had about two hundred men--giving him a force of about three hundred and fifty.