Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, Charles Wright Wills, (8th Illinois Infantry)

Cairo, September 1, 1861.

We had blankets given us this last week and new accoutrements throughout. If they would only change our guns now we would have nothing but a move to ask for. A uniform was also furnished us last week. It is of excellent all-wool goods, and not so heavy as to be uncomfortable. The color is very fine grey, the pants are fashionably cut and equal to such as would cost six dollars in Peoria. The coats have short skirts and are rather fancifully trimmed with blue. It is much the best uniform I have seen yet, although it costs but $13. We will have a fatigue suit shortly. Yesterday we were mustered for pay. We will get our first month’s wages this week “they say.” There are wagons and mules here now by the hundreds, and when our tents are ready (they are here now) we will be ready to move. I think there must be near 10,000 men here now. Logan’s, Pugh’s, Buford’s, and another’s regiment; Hick’s and Raritan’s came in last week. The first three belong to McCormick’s¹ Brigade. General McClernand is here now. Every one thinks we will move in a very few days. I kind o’ feel it in my bones, too, but it is too good to be true, so I’m taking all the bets I can from 10 cents worth of peanuts to a half bushel of apples, I betting that we are here two weeks from now. I’ve got them any way, for if we move, I hope to be able to borrow apples, etc., from the seceshers to pay my little bills, and if I stay here I’ll have some eatables free for consolation. We Canton boys have hired a cook for ourselves and are living much better than I ever did before in camp.

Our cook is a jewel, and by trading off rations keeps us in clover all the time. He sets a better table for us than the Peoria house boarders eat from, honestly. An old schoolmate of mine in our mess furnishes us with milk. He and John Wallace go out every night about 2 or 3 o’clock and—somebody’s cow don’t milk well next morning. We’ll never have such times sojering again, but you can’t imagine how we do want to get over into Missouri or Arkansas. We don’t have half as easy times as these at home and but for the discipline it wouldn’t seem like soldiering. I’ve been bored like sin the last two weeks drilling new recruits, but I’m glad of it, for it is rather pleasant to me to have something disagreeable when I’m bored feeling good. John Keefer and John Wallace, so far, make as good soldiers as any men in camp, Keef’s game leg working against him, too. All our boys are just the men for soldiers. It comes perfectly naturally to Sid. and Sam. Theo. has been in bad health for a week, but I think he is improving now. Fred Norcott is a splendid boy. He and Sam match well. Charley Cooper is acting as post orderly, that is, stays at headquarders of the Post Commandant, preserves order there and carries messages, dispatches, etc., to the different colonels. A good place but very confusing.

I have been visiting Colonel Raritan’s and Hick’s Camp this p.m. They have no guns yet and their sentinels stand guard with sticks. Looks funny.

We have about 50 prisoners here now. They think they are treated splendidly and say that if any of our boys fall into their hands they will remember it. Several of them are very intelligent-appearing men. One of them is about as big as—a house with a foot like a cooking stove. Charley Maple wrote down to us that he wants to join our company; Keefer wrote him to come. I have to remark once more that the “health of camp is better than ever before,” your sarcastic remark not having affected our sanitary condition in the least. You will please make no more impertinent remarks or comments on my letters!

A. H. White was down here last Sabbath, and he and I found Frank Smith in Smith’s Artillery. I have been here right by him four months without knowing it and lived. He is a corporal. He, A. H., and I drank some beer, discussed the affairs of the nation and adjourned. Do you remember Enos Lincoln? He is here in the 12th.

We have had some fighting in camp lately. An artillery man stabbed one of the 9th and got knocked, kicked and bayoneted for it. The artillery have sworn to have revenge and every hickory man (the 9th have a fatigue suit of hickory) they see they pounce onto. They have a skirmish every day. One of our company got drunk to-day, got to fighting, was sent to the guardhouse, tried to break out, guard knocked him down with a gun, cut his cheek open, etc. He then got into a fight with four other men in the guard house and of all the bunged eyes and bloody faces they beat the record.

__________

¹ Probably McClernand.

Cairo, August 11, ’61.

Our Canton boys came down on time, and right glad I am to have them here. Colonel Ross’s 17th Regiment got here the same day by the river. The boys were sworn into our company the day after they arrived, and the day following a lieutenant in the Fulton Blues came over to get them to join his company. I am glad he was too late. We have all been over to the Point to visit the Canton boys of the 17th, and found them looking very well. Will Trites, alone, looks unwell. A few weeks at home is what he really needs, for he will not give up work and go on the sick list as he ought to, as long as he can stand. Billy Stockdale, Chancey Black, George Shine, Billy Resor and Jesse Beeson are in No. 1 condition. Their tents are pitched in old Bird’s cornfield from which the corn has just been cut and you can imagine that the stubble is not equal to feathers to lie upon. They call us boys that live in barracks in Cairo, Sunday soldiers and Fourth of July braves; the same names we applied to them when they were in Camp Mather. The Canton boys in our company get along finely. They are in the best of spirits and already appear quite soldierly. They are well satisfied with the company which now numbers 90 men and will be full this week. We all room together except John Wallace and Milo Farewell. We are now drilling about six hours a day, but the greenhorns act as though they think it fun. We don’t suffer from the heat as much as one would think, and can you believe it the health of the camp is better now than ever before. We have not in our company a man on the sick list. Major Smith (our old friend Marion), says that the 17th have been healthier at Bird’s Point than they ever were before; and so every regiment says that comes here. If there are any very old people in Canton that want to live 50 or 60 years longer, advise them to come to Cairo. Mosquitoes and fleas are around these times. The whole family are here.

Cairo, August 2, 1861.

Hot! You don’t know what that word means. I feel that I have always been ignorant of its true meaning till this week, but am posted now, sure. The (supposed-to-be) “never failing cool, delicious breeze” that I have talked about so much, seems to be at “parade rest” now and—I can’t do justice to the subject. The health of the camp is much better now than at any time before, since we have been here. There is not a sick man in our company. My health remains gorgeous. We drill now five hours a day, under a sun that cooks eggs in 13 minutes, but we think we feel the heat no more walking than lying around the quarters.

The seceshers this morning took the packet that has been plying between here and Columbus, and have run her off down to Memphis. I thought that Prentiss stopped her sometime since, but this at last closes all communication between the North and South at this point. Our “ossifers” we think are really scared about an attack here, but you could not make the soldiers believe in the like till they see the fight begin. About a thousand of our men were rushed off to Bird’s Point to-day to work on intrenchments, and won’t they sweat?

My chum heard Colonel Oglesby tell an officer two hours ago that there were 17,000 Rebels within 15 miles of the Point. The scouts reported this body at New Madrid, 40 mile’s down the Mississippi, two days since. Yesterday 12 men from the Pekin company and 12 from our’s with some artillerymen went 30 miles up the Mississippi to collect all the boats we could find on the Missouri shore. We found three large flats tied up to trees along the shore which we confiscated. One of them wasn’t very good so we sunk it. The object was to prevent marauders from visiting Illinois. I had charge of the men from our company.

Cairo, July 27, 1861

We number now about 60 and have 25 days in which to fill up to 100. Two hundred and fifty of our regiment of three-months’ men have re-enlisted. Two hundred and fifty out of 680, which is considerably better than any eastern regiment that I have seen mentioned. There was not a sick man in our company when we returned, and there is not now. One of the boys just tells me that day before yesterday morning there were but eight in the regiment hospital. Three men from our regiment have died in three and a half months. One of these I know killed himself with imprudence. I have telegraphed to the boys to be in Peoria Wednesday. I have not the least idea that any of them will back out. It does seem real good to be back here again where a fellow can swing himself and lay around loose with sleeves up, collar open, (or shirt off if it suits him better) hair unkempt, face unwashed and everything un-anything. It beats clerking ever so much! We were paid off yesterday. The privates received $56.72 each in gold, silver and copper, which is $24.00 more than we expected.

We are having some more excitement in camp to-day. A rumored attack in prospect on Bird’s Point is the subject. We are putting the recruits through in two-forty-style to get them ready. Twenty rounds of cartridges were served to us at noon to-day, and Prentiss’ aids are galloping round as if tight. About one quarter of the recruits have their accoutrements on, and some of them scoot up on the levee every ten minutes to look at the Point. We have all kinds of rumors of from 2,000 to 15,000 Rebels within from 6 to 15 miles of us, but if 20 preachers would swear to the truth, there’s not one man that has been here three months would believe it. Been fooled too often! Our officers are careful though, and treat every thing from head-quarters as reliable till the contrary is proven.

It is a horrid trip from Peoria to Cairo as the trains run now. We laid oyer three hours in El Paso, and eleven hours in Centralia; from 11 p.m. till 10 a.m. Awful! and rode down from Centralia in an accommodation freight. The bed was excellent at home, but I think that sleeping on boards rests me better and I know I sleep sounder.

Have worked two hours hard at cleaning up quarters and eating supper since my last period. Supper consisted of coffee, bread and butter, and cold steak pickled in vinegar. Vinegar is a great improvement on cold beef, I wonder you never adopted it. We have a prime lot of boys this time. There are not ten out of the whole company that I would not like to have for associates at home. I don’t believe that one of them will ever take quarters in the guard-house.

I think our company will be full in ten days. We have refused lots of roughs here in camp also in Peoria, but three or four little ones have crept in through acquaintances’ influence. Those men we have will learn to drill in half less time than any other lot of recruits on the ground, because they have a pride in their appearance and dress, and that has given them a better carriage and command of themselves than rougher customers have.

We will have in a few days nothing but new recruits here except the fractions of regiments that have re-enlisted; the 10th, which calls itself the crack regiment of the post, will all leave for home day after to-morrow. If it does not come back full in 30 days it will be disbanded. This is Prentiss’ old regiment.

Tattoo 9 p.m.—They are really expecting an attack on Bird’s Point, and we will all be kept close in quarters evenings after sunset till the scare dies away. One of our boys that stood guard at the hospital this morning says the surgeon told him that the sick would be brought from the Point, to Cairo to-day. Don’t know whether they did it or not.

We were coming on the cars when we heard of the Manassas rout. The boys gave three cheers, for they imagined it would bring us marching orders. I would like very much to hear such orders, but would a devilish sight rather march with men that have had three months’ drill than with these new recruits. You can’t imagine what a difference there is in one’s confidence in a drilled and undrilled company of men. Don’t say anything about our expectations of an attack here for there has been a great deal too much said already on going-to-be attacks on this Point

We pay five cents a pint here for milk, and I found a wiggler in a pint this morning. Don’t you think they ought to mix clean water with the cow juice?

Sunday, 1 p.m.—I have just woke up from a two hours’ sleep that had more dreams than all the sleeping I ever did before. I dreamed everything from being a partner of Adam and Eve in their orchard down to seeing Stephens’ iron battery.

Cairo, July 1, 1861.

Writing letters is getting to be harder work than drilling, and is more dreaded by the boys. Lots of people are visiting the camp now, many of them ladies, but I tell you that they use their fans more than their spy-glasses after a very few looks.

I was up to Mound City yesterday with nine others of our company on a United States boat that has three cannons on her. Mound City is a beautiful little place, and takes it name from a mound about 30 feet in diameter and 10 feet high, on which grow a dozen spindling locusts. I have been about 12 miles up each river from the point here. At that distance the river banks are, say 25 feet high, and slope down to the point, and run into a broad wide sandbar that ends Illinois.

Fishing is a principal amusement or time-killer now. I have fished about four days and caught nary a “minner.”

There is no outside influence used to induce a man to re-enlist. Officers tell every man to use his own judgment, and each fellow does his own thinking and—another long dash or words to that effect.

Cairo, June 23, 1861.

Camp is very dull now, and we are more closely confined in it than ever. Not a soldier goes out now except in company with a commissioned officer or on a pass from the general. The latter not one in a thousand can get and the former maybe one in five hundred.

We have no drilling now between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m. on account of the heat; so we have plenty of spare time. If I only had some good books! But I can’t send for them now for our colonel keeps us about half excited all the time with a prospect of a move. He says we have two chances: First, if General McClellan suffers anything like a serious repulse in Western Virginia, our whole brigade will move out on two hours’ notice. Second, if any reliable reports come of Arkansas troops moving into Missouri, we will double quick over the river and leave the Point to some other troops. The last is the most likely chance. A thousand of our boys went off on the “City of Alton” at dark last night. We don’t know where to, but ’tis rumored that they went up the Mississippi 25 miles and then marched back into Missouri 30 miles to intercept a train of wagons loaded with provisions going south. The colonel made them a speech; told them they were sure to have a brush and asked them if they would sustain the credit of the 8th. You should have heard them shout! Only two companies went from our regiment under Lieutenant Colonel Rhoads. The Battallion was under Colonel Morgan. The three year question causes more excitement than every thing else now. Nearly our whole company will go. The most worthless fellows are the ones that will go home. I feel as if my place is here. I know I could not content myself at home, and if I could, every young man with no one depending upon him is needed in the army more than anywhere else. I know I have your approval in this resolve, but I would like to have you tell me so. The Americans in our company think some of seceding, filling up from home with American boys and letting the Dutch now in the company paddle their own canoe. I wonder if we could not get a dozen good strong fellows from Canton. We don’t want any poorer men than I am, for we are going to make a crack company.

Cairo, June 13, 1861.

I am converted to the belief that Cairo is not such a bad place after all. The record shows that less deaths have occurred here in seven weeks among 3,000 men, than in Villa Ridge (a higher, and much dryer place with abundant shade and spring water), in five weeks among 1,000. There has been but one death here by disease in that time, and that with miserable hospital accommodations. The soldiers lie like the d___l about Cairo. The days are hot of course, but we do nothing now between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. but cook and eat, so that amounts to not near as much as working all day at home. The mosquitoes and bugs are furious from 6 p.m. to 11, but we are drilling from 7 p.m. to nearly 9, and from that to 11 we save ourselves by smoking, which we all do pretty steadily. The nights after 11 are splendidly cool, so much so that we can cover ourselves entirely in our blankets, which is a block game on the mosquitoes, and sleep like logs. I believe those Camp Mather boys are hard sticks from the accounts we get of their fingers sticking to chickens, vegetables, etc. The citizens here say that the boys have not taken a thing without permission, or insulted a citizen. “Bully for us.”

We had a little fun yesterday. At 8 p.m. we (the Peoria and Pekin companies) were ordered to get ready for marching in ten minutes. So ready we got (but had to leave knapsacks, canteens and blankets) and were marched down to the “City of Alton,” which had on board a six pounder and one 12 pound howitzer. We cast off, fired a salute of two guns and steamed down the Mississippi. After five miles the colonel (Oglesby) called us together, told us that he was out on a reconoitering expedition, and his information led him to think we should be forced into a little fight before we got back. We were then ordered to load and keep in our places by our guns. At Columbus we saw a secesh flag waving but passed on a couple of miles farther where he expected to find a secesh force. Failed and turned back. At Columbus the flag was still waving and the stores all closed, and quite a crowd collected on the levee, but one gun though, that we could see. The colonel ordered the flag down. They said they wouldn’t do it. He said he would do it himself then. They answered, “We’d like to see you try it.” We were drawn up then round the cabin deck guards next the shore in two ranks, with guns at “ready,” and the captain jumped ashore and hauled down the serpent. We were all sure of a skirmish but missed it. Flag was about 15×7, with eight stars and three stripes. I send you some scraps of it. They raised another flag one hour after we left and sent us word to “Come and take it.” The ride on the river was the best treat I’ve had for two years.