Memphis, Wednesday, Feb. 25. Rained in torrents all last night and to-day, with thunder and lightning. Health better. No mail from above since Saturday.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Washington Wednesday Feb. 25th 1863.
A bright pleasant day but the Snow has mostly melted and the thin mortar composition lies from four to eight inches in depth in the streets. Little boys are at the crossings broom in hand trying to keep back the flood from a narrow path and saying “Please give me a penny.” I fear they do not get many, few will give a five cent “shin plaster” or “stamp” and cents are scarce which is bad for the boys. Went up to the Capitol after leaving office and the “Enrolment Bill” passed while I was in the chamber of the “House.” It now only needs the signature of the President to become a law. Wrote to my sister Harriet and to (?) today. Sent Agricultural Reports to Capt Budd Sag H. and to Dr Ford of Chemung NY. This evening I have been to hear the celebrated Mason–Jones, the Irish Orator. He was a fine speaker and all that I had expected. He spoke about one hour and a half without the least hesitation and without a note or scrap of writing. His subject was “John Philpot Curran.” The House (Willards Hall) was crowded. Four Soldiers have called upon me today for assistance in getting their discharge papers, or pay, or for clothing. A stream of discharged soldiers has been flowing through the R Road Depot for the past two months, from one to two hundred pr day. It is astonishing how prevalent the heart disease has become since this war began. I think it should in most cases be called the “faint heart” disease.
Wednesday, 25th—Came through Shelbyville to-day. Commenced raining on us just as we got to town and continued. Came out on road to Beech Grove, ten miles, as wet as water. I and Albright went cross Wartrace Creek and staid all night with Mr. Fork—a nervy layout.
February 25th. A continual stream of officers and men going home and returning from leave. It seems to be a general resting time, when it is understood nothing will be done.
On the left of our brigade, and extending back to Hancock’s headquarters, is an immense open field over a hundred acres in extent. It is mostly sand and gravel and therefore always in good order. There is space enough to manœuver a corps, and here we drill as regiment, brigade, and division, and hold our reviews, which, as a rule, occur once in two weeks. In the northwestern part of it, near a small house, the batteries attached to the division are parked, and they, too, use it as a drill ground. Thomas’s battery Fourth artillery, Lieutenant Fields now commanding, and Perth’s and Arnold’s, all excellent commands, officered by a splendid lot of good fellows, who professionally have few equals in the army. The weather is remarkable. Almost like spring, so that all kinds of out door games can be played and horse races and little expeditions for pleasure are the order of the day.
Feb. 25th, 1863.—A long gap in my journal, because H. has been ill unto death with typhoid fever. I nearly broke down from loss of sleep, there being no one to relieve me. It was terrible to be alone at night with a patient in delirium, and no one within call. To wake Martha was simply impossible. I got the best doctor here, but when convalescence began the question of food was a trial. I got with great difficulty two chickens. The doctor made the drug-store sell two of their six bottles of port; he said his patient’s life depended on it. An egg is a rare and precious thing. Meanwhile the Federal fleet has been gathering, has anchored at the bend, and shells are thrown in at intervals.
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Note: To protect Mrs. Miller’s job as a teacher in New Orleans, the diary was published anonymously, edited by G. W. Cable, names were changed and initials were often used instead of full names — and even the initials differed from the real person’s initials.
Captain Theron E. Hall, A.Q.M., Acquia Creek, Va., February 1863.
Photograph: February, 1863
Library of Congress image.
FEBRUARY 25H.—On the 18th inst. the enemy’s battery on the opposite side of the Mississippi River opened on Vicksburg. The damage was not great; but the front of the town is considered untenable.
The Conscription bill has passed the United States Senate, which will empower the President to call for 3,000,000 men. “Will they come, when he does call for them?” That is to be seen. It may be aimed at France; and a war with the Emperor might rouse the Northern people again. Some of them, however, have had enough of war.
To-day I heard of my paper addressed to the President on the subject of an appeal to the people to send food to the army. He referred it to the Commissary-General, Col. Northrop, who sent it to the War Department, with an indorsement that as he had no acquaintance with that means of maintaining an army (the patriotic contributions of the people), he could not recommend the adoption of the plan. Red tape is mightier than patriotism still. There may be a change, however, for Gen. Lee approves the plan.
February 25.—The act for “enrolling and calling out the National forces, and for other purposes,” passed the United States House of Representatives by a vote of one hundred and fifteen yeas to fifty-nine nays.—About noon to-day, Stuart’s rebel cavalry made an attack on a portion of General Averill’s division of cavalry, near Hartwood Church, Va., when a fight ensued, which terminated in the repulse and rout of tho rebels with a loss of one captain, a lieutenant and several privates. General Averill pursued them to Kelly’s Ford, but they succeeded in crossing the river before he arrived.— Philadelphia Inquirer.
—An expedition, consisting of a force of Union troops, under the command of General Rose, left Moon Lake on board several steamers, under Lieutenant Commanding Smith, and proceeded up Yazoo Pass.
—The rebels under Cluke, in their raid through Kentucky, were overtaken at Licktown, twelve miles east of Mount Sterling, and dispersed.—The British steamer Peterhoff, was captured off St. Thomas, W. I., by the United States gunboat Vanderbilt, and sent to Key West, Fla., for adjudication.—The bakers in Charleston, S. C, advanced the price of bread to twenty-five cents for a half-pound loaf. Flour sold at sixty-five dollars a barrel.— Charleston Courier.
