by John Beauchamp Jones
MAY 21ST.—Sun all day, but a little hazy; perhaps a battle.
There was quite a battle yesterday on the south side. The accounts in the morning’s paper fall short of the whole of our success. The enemy, it is said to-day, did not regain the works from which they were driven, but are now cooped up at Bermuda Hundred. Nothing is feared from Butler.
Nothing from Lee, but troops are constantly going to him.
I saw some 10,000 rusty rifles, brought down yesterday from Lee’s battle-field. Many bore marks of balls, deeply indenting or perforating the barrels. The ordnance officer says in his report that he has collected many thousands more than were dropped by our killed and wounded. This does not look like a Federal victory!
May 21. Saturday. — Rations of coffee, sugar, hard bread, etc., filled our camp with joy last night. It now looks as if Grant had failed to crush Lee merely on account of rain and mud. We seem to have had the best of the fighting and to have taken the most prisoners. I suspect we have gained the most guns and lost the most killed and wounded. General Crook thinks Grant will force the fighting until some definite result is obtained.
May 21, 1864.
The 23d Army Corps moved South yesterday. I hear that they found the enemy on the south bank of the Etowah river, and that he disputes the crossing. Grant seems to be checked in his “on to Richmond.” It seems that Rebel Iverson, whom I saw dead near Adairsville, was a brigadier general and a son of the ex-Congressman. This Kingston has been a gem of a little town, but the Rebels burned most of it when they left. Our railroad men are very enterprising. The cars got here the same night we did, and a dozen or 20 trains are coming per day, all loaded inside with commissary stores and outside with soldiers.
