Sunday, July 24th.
Ever since the 14th we have maintained our camp, and been occupied in building brush houses and log huts; in digging great holes in the ground and sinking cracker boxes at the bottoms to catch what little water soaks out of the sand, and in drilling and assisting in the construction of field works. On the 19th rain, so long prayed for, came, and for a few hours at least everybody was happy. My own brush house at the head of my company street is really quite comfortable. It contains three bunks made of small saplings for the use of Lieutenants Edmonston and Parkhurst and myself, and a cracker box for a table, and we have actually been able to indulge in the luxury of having our shoes polished every morning, and of occasionally reading the New York papers. In addition to woodticks and “graybacks,” there is a large blue fly indigenous in these parts, the feet of which are so constructed that when it alights it cannot be brushed off without the most persistent scraping, and Lynch, the hero of the Major’s tent, has been instructed to lay a newspaper over the face of each of us when he comes for our shoes at daylight, for it is then that these flies are most troublesome. I had noticed that for several mornings when we were ready for our modest breakfast, Lynch’s breath indicated that he had indulged in a morning nip, and occasionally he would be quite unsteady on his pins, as well as original in his ideas, for once when I gave him a knife to clean he deliberately stropped it on the greasy leg of his trousers and handed it back for my use, and as we had each been careful to give him no orders on the Commissary, I could not imagine where his supplies came from. One morning when he spread the papers as usual I happened to be awake, though he did not know it, and there being a hole through the paper just in front of one of my eyes, I saw him stretch up over the sleeping Edmonston, whose bunk was across the house at the foot of my bunk, take down his canteen and regale himself with a generous swig. Taking up my shoes he went out and polished them, and on returning for Edmonston’s shoes he again reached for the canteen, but just as his arm was fully extended I sat up and shouted ’bout face,” and he obeyed the order instantly, his arm still in the air and an expression on his face utterly impossible to describe. The two lieutenants, startled out of their slumbers, sat up and enjoyed the poor fellow’s discomfiture when caught in the act, quite as much as I did, and I doubt if Edmonston ever again leaves his canteen so exposed.
Private Blair, the man who, as already described, disappointed the “Johnny Reb” who wanted to make a prisoner of him, is one of the best men in the company, and when there is any fighting or other duty to be done he is always on hand, but he has a decided weakness for foraging, and he and his immediate friends always seem to have something in their haversacks. On one occasion when I was some distance from the front, I saw Blair prowling about in a little grove near which I observed two or three sheep running about. Of course I knew what he was after for he had his rifle with him, and the moment he saw me he dodged behind a tree and remained until I was out of sight. That night our cook gave us some very tender lamb for our supper, saying that it had been presented by some one who did not care to have his name mentioned, and when I was making my usual rounds through the company street after “taps,” I was amused to hear from behind Blair’s quarters the recital to his tent-mates of the incidents of the day, the most satisfactory of which to him seemed to be, that owing to his strategy the Captain hadn’t caught him, though he asserted that if the Captain had actually seen him shoot the sheep, he didn’t think anything would have been said about it, as that officer had himself had some of the mutton. And I incline to think that Blair was right, for a few days before I had done some foraging on my own hook, and no officer should criticise an enlisted man for doing what he does himself. Taking Joe Solomon with me one day, I went to a house situated some distance from our camp where I was credibly informed that there was a barn full of chickens, and attempted to negotiate with the lady of the house for a pair of them at any price in greenbacks which she might be pleased to name, but she was very decided in her refusal to oblige me, and moreover declared that “Yankee money was no good.” General Patrick, the Provost Marshal of the army, had posted a squad of infantry under command of a Captain as a guard at this house, and realizing that so long as the guard should remain the woman would have the better of the argument, I quietly waited until the guard was relieved, when I renewed my application and, meeting with no success, sent Joe with a darky who had confidentially informed me that there were “fifty of ’em dar,” to select two of the finest specimens, and in the meantime vainly endeavored to persuade the woman to accept my proffered two dollars. When the men returned from the barn with the chickens I gave the money to the grinning “contraband,” but before Joe and I were out of sight on the way to camp, the woman was fighting him for its possession. That night the birds were served for supper, and proved to be two of the very toughest old tooth-defying cacklers that could have been found in all Virginia, and it seemed to me that retributive justice had rubbed it in with unnecessary emphasis.
One morning Lieut. Parkhurst did not turn out of his blankets with his customary promptness, and on inquiry Lieut. Edmonston informed me that he had had a “presentiment,” an experience not uncommon in the army. Thereupon I went and sat on the side of his bunk, and tried to encourage him to throw off the depressing apprehension which possessed him that he was to be killed in our next engagement. I met with little success at first, for, while as brave an officer as there is in the army, his anxiety for the welfare of his wife, and of others near and dear to him, had overmastered him for the time being, and when I remembered that Artificer Benedict had told me of a similar “presentiment” which he had had the day before he was killed at the battle of Harris Farm, near Spottsylvania, I confess that I was not without some misgivings as to the credence to be accorded to premonitions. Parkhurst was the first man whom I promoted when I took command of Company H, making him a corporal much against his preferences after he had served as a private in the company for nearly two years, and he had won his commission as a Lieutenant after an examination and solely on his merits, though it did not actually reach him until he had served as a non-commissioned officer during a large part of the campaign, and when I succeeded in having him assigned to my company as Second Lieutenant, I felt that in Edmonston and Parkhurst I had the best two all-around officers in the regiment. Hence I was more than usually concerned about Parkhurst being thus apparently stampeded, but after having argued with him for some time, citing cases where “presentiments” had proved false, and assured him that if anything should happen to him Edmonston or I would see that all his expressed wishes with reference to his family were carried out, he gradually recovered control of himself, and I am happy to say that until this time at least he is as good as new, though he has since been under fire.
And while throwing some sidelights on our camp life for the past ten days, I must not omit to mention an incident which furnishes all the elements of a nice little Sunday school story, and has the advantage of most of such stories in actually being true. Dropping into one of the larger brush houses one day, I found several of my brother officers sitting on cracker boxes around a table formed by two larger boxes covered with canvas, engaged in a game of draw-poker. Among them was the Captain whose men had sought cover in the ditch during the charge of the 18th of June, as hereinbefore described, and he was anathematizing his luck at cards in language characteristically lurid and vigorous. After watching the game for a little while, I told him that his remarks reminded me that I had a question which I wanted to ask him, and without interrupting his “straddling of blinds” and “going five better,” he bade me “fire away.” “Well,” I said, “you remember how your men dropped into that ditch on the 18th—” and I got no farther before he let off a volley of verbal pyrotechnics at his men for disgracing themselves and him, which fairly charged the atmosphere with linguistic sulphur and attracted the attention of every player at the table. Before he could catch his breath I broke in with—”Yes, I know, but I noticed at the time that although you were greatly humiliated and distressed at the conduct of your men, and were begging them most abjectly to get into line, you never indulged in a single cuss word, and the fact was so remarkable that right there in the midst of the fight, I made up my mind that if you and I should survive, I would ask you why it was that you maintained such complete control of your variegated and iridescent vocabulary, when I expected a perfect aurora borealis of vituperation.” Slapping his cards face down upon the table he turned to me and said, very seriously, “Yes, you are right. I remember it perfectly. I did not swear. I noticed it myself, and, to tell you the truth, the reason was that I was too d—d scared to swear.” Not a man who heard him, however, accepted that explanation, for all knew that he was one of the bravest of the brave, and knew, for they had been there and knew how it was themselves, that the simple fact was that at that particular time he realized the possibilities of the situation, and did not court the combination of a bullet in his heart and an oath on his lips.
After the hand was played out the Captain turned again to me and said: “It was that whiskey on an empty stomach that did the business for my boys, but tell me, Chaplain (I was sometimes addressed as Chaplain because I wore, a long blue overcoat and did not indulge in stimulants while in the field), for I, too, have a question to ask, Is it true that when you refused an order to your Commissary Sergeant for a ration of whiskey for Company H, you told him that we were just going into a fight, and that if you or any of your company should go to heaven or hell that day, you proposed that the detail should go cold sober?” Of course, he did not quote me correctly, but it was the fact that I refused the order when sought, though I had a ration issued immediately after the fight was over and when we got back to the sunken road.
To-day two of our battalions were engaged from five o’clock in the morning until eight o’clock in the evening in building earthworks for mortar batteries.
