8th. About 8 o’clock started for Benton Barracks. One lady ran out with flag and said “Welcome home.” Learn that we are not to go to Texas. Went out on foot. Got a pleasant boarding place near camp. Chet and I near together.
Monday, June 8, 2015
U. S. Steamer Illinois, off Fort Morgan, Mobile Bay,
Thursday, June 8, 1865.
Dear Sister L.:—
I’ve just time to write a line to say we are so far on our voyage in safety. I was transferred from the Warrior the day we started. Had a lovely trip—couldn’t be better. Shall disembark here to clean the ship—and coal and water again—and then—ho! for Texas or elsewhere.
U. S. Steamer Illinois, off Ft. Morgan, Mobile Bay,
Thursday, June 8, 1865.
Dear Sister L.:—
I wrote you a line this afternoon just in time to get it off by the New Orleans boat. I could not write much in the few minutes of time I had before the boat left, and so to-night I will write a little more extended account of our voyage.
I wrote you from the Warrior expecting to go down in her, but on arriving at Fortress Monroe, the general concluded he couldn’t dispense with my company, and ordered me to the Illinois. I was not sorry to make the change, as my regiment was there with the general and staff, and the Illinois is a floating palace.
I spent a day in Norfolk and then removed my traps to the Illinois, and on the 31st we weighed anchor and steamed out past Cape Henry lighthouse and off to sea. The next morning we were out of sight of land, and steaming southeast to cross the Gulf Stream; our ship drew nineteen feet of water, and we could not go next the coast, so as it would not pay to go against the current all the way, we were forced to go outside. The time passed merrily away. A few were sick enough to make amusement for the others, but none enough to be thoroughly wretched. We had plenty of books, and in the evening we gathered in the spacious saloon and had whist parties and quartettes of euchre or old sledge, and such like abominations.
On Sunday morning we came to the Bahama Banks, where the waters changed from their indigo blue color to azure, light green, purple and almost all the colors of the rainbow. The water was so clear we could see the bottom at thirty feet, and the finny monsters were disporting themselves regardless of the curious eyes that looked at them for the first time. At noon Memory Rock rose in bold relief against the horizon, lone, stern and grim, a sentinel of the sea. In the afternoon we passed the Bahamas, a line of long, low, sandy islands, uninhabited except by a few wreckers, and not very inviting situations for a cottage by the sea. But at dark we saw the cottage by the sea, indeed. It was a little hut on a lonely rock, where dwells the keeper of the Isaac Island Light, an English lighthouse. He has a spice of solitude, he has. State’s prison is nothing to it. I mused on the pleasures of solitude, as I watched his lonely light flash and fade in the darkness, and I concluded that it must be very sweet to have someone to whom you can say—”how sweet is solitude?”
On Tuesday we sighted, away off in the dim distance, the heights of Cuba, and that afternoon passed the Florida Keys and the Dry Tortugas. The last is the penitentiary of the army, where mutinous and other desperate criminals have been sent. It rises like a great castle in the sea, and is a lonely place enough.
This afternoon we sighted the land off Mobile Bay, and at three o’clock we dropped anchor off Fort Morgan, and now I am writing on deck, with my portfolio on my knee, and the scene of the greatest naval battle of the world spread out before me. Within a stone’s throw, I can see the ripple in the current which marks the spot where the ill-fated Tecumseh went down, right under the guns of Fort Morgan, and a little to the left the ribs of the rebel ram are rising above the water. Here the “gallant, grim old Admiral.” ran the gauntlet of the terrible batteries. My words are too tame—I will not attempt to describe it. Read “Our Battle Laureate” in the April or May Atlantic, and you will get some idea of the inspiring scene.
Well, the sun has disappeared in a blaze of glory behind Fort Gaines, and I must bring my letter to a close for want of light and room for more.
To-morrow we disembark, and I hope before we reembark to see how Mobile looks, but I may not make it out. The rumor to-night is that we are to go to Brazos Santiago, at the mouth of the Rio Grande.
Chattanooga, Thursday, June 8. A very hot day. Health very good. Nothing new, one way or another. Received a letter from Thomas which he called “last.” Expects me home in a few days. All those whose terms of service expire prior to October 1, are being mustered out at this post except artillery reserve. We are treated with silent contempt or provoking indifference, at least no orders touching us appear.
June 8th, 1865.
We were discharged at Delaney House, D. C, on the third day of June, and next day took cars for Detroit, where we arrived on the seventh, and were disbanded. We are no longer an organized body. Each individual is at liberty to consult his own interests or inclinations. After exchanging photos and kindly regards with my late comrades, I took the midnight train for Jackson, where I arrived at 5 o’clock in the morning.
It is now five miles to my country home. I lost no time in friendly greetings by the way, but leaped from the cars before they fairly stopped; passed swiftly up the track to the first street crossing; up “Moody Hill” and along the “Gravel;” turned to the left; on down the “Marvin Hill” to the old “Clinton House;” again to the left, past “Markham’s” and “Shipman’s,” to the little school house on the corner. I am now one mile from home. What a beautiful world it is, this bright June morning; and how familiar the sights and sounds that greet my senses.
The trees, dressed in their robes of darkest green, wave me a welcome. The wayside thorn, arrayed in spotless white, doth waft to me its richest perfume. The feathered songsters, their bright plumage flashing in the sunlight, attune for me their sweetest melody, and every nerve and fiber of my being responds to these kindly greetings.
I am almost home; just around the corner. I see the cottage now, set in a grove I planted many years ago, when first my mate and I did build our humble nest. I wrote them yesterday I would break my fast with them this morning. I wonder, did they get it? Yes, they are on the lookout. In the east door, that commands this angle of the road, stands my darling, waving her handkerchief, her dear face transfigured with joy and happiness. In the south door is my eldest daughter, clapping her hands in unaffected delight. Another daughter and my son have climbed the road fence, and are giving vent to their joy in childish boisterousness, while “pet,” the little lass, is running down the street, fast as her little feet can carry her, to leap into her father’s arms and bid him Welcome Home.
.
END
Thursday, 8th—We left Washington City at 1 a. m. and arrived at the junction of the Baltimore & Ohio railroad about 8 o’clock, where we changed to the line running through Harper’s Ferry, which place we passed through. Our brigade is in the rear, the Eleventh Iowa being on the rear train, as we were the last regiment to leave Washington, D. C. The day was very hot and many of us being crowded on the open cars suffered terribly under the hot sun. We arrived at Cumberland about midnight, where we were served with hot coffee by the Sanitary Commission Society.
