Dinner over, we gathered some of the beautiful autumn leaves, and rode on our way until we reached the renowned original “Crow’s Nest” signal station. This was a huge tree seventy-five feet high, surmounting which was the “Crow’s Nest,” reached by rude ladders from one platform to another. This “Nest” resembled a thatched bird’s nest on a large scale, about four feet square, and it was almost hidden by surrounding trees. A new skeleton station erected on the opposite side of the road left unused the “Old Nest.” Several gunboats were lying in the river, below the banks of the James, ready for action.
Entering the ambulance, we continued our ride over hills and through ravines, at the risk of an upset, until we safely reached Dutch Gap, General Butler’s famous canal. This was nearly completed at the cost of much time and labor, and only waited the blasting of a rock at the other end, to complete the work which would form an island of the narrow peninsula dividing the River James into two branches, to be connected by the canal.
Along both shores were heavy guns and strong fortifications, quite formidable, showing much labor and ingenuity. Despite the almost constant courtesy of interchanging shells passing overhead, the “Johnny Rebs,” on one side of the river, and the Yanks on the other bank, had many quiet talks across the narrow stream. Talks like this were quite usual, and were even winked at by officers.
“Hello Yank, hev u’uns got any good coffee?”
“Well I guess! It can’t be beat. Say, Johnny, how are you off for tobac?”
“O, we’ve got heaps of that. I reckon u’uns had better just float some of that coffee across.”
“All right, Johnny, you get your tobac ready!”
By a little practice in watching the current, they became quite expert in floating across many exchanges besides the tobacco and coffee. They even risked being shot from their own side as deserters, and swam across after dark to enjoy a supper of “hot pone” on the “Reb” side, or hot coffee and some luxuries on the “Yank” side, where the sutler often consumed a month’s pay at a time in selling good things to some “Boy in Blue.”
Returning, we stopped only at the embalmer’s, where many bodies were daily prepared to be sent to friends at home. The morbid fancy which is manifested by so many to possess dead bodies, especially those which have long laid buried, seems one of the most barbarous customs permitted in a civilized country.
We reached our hospital just as “night drew on her sable mantle and pinned it with a star.” The camp fires and chimneys were throwing over the scene a bright and cheering glow. A good supper was prepared by our contraband Hannah, who, with a broad smile, declared in her own peculiar vernacular: “I’s jes goin’ gib you alls up; t’o’t de rebs done got you dis time shoo nuff—I’se so glad.”