Ten years in the ranks, U.S. Army

by Augustus Meyers

My captain resided with his family in a house on Bridge Street; the unmarried officers boarded around town; the married soldiers had located their wives and children in cheap apartments where some of them remained to the end of the war. Some wives never saw their husbands again after we went into Virginia. The captain in his capacity of commanding officer sometimes visited the guard late at night and had it turned out for him and put us through the usual formalities. I was always thankful that he omitted the inspection of arms, for at times I would have hated to trust him with the handling of a loaded gun. He sent for me occasionally to report to him at his house and when I appeared he put me through a kind of catechism commencing with, "Who made you a corporal?"

"The captain," I replied.

"Why did I make you a corporal?"

To which my answer was, "Because I was in the line of promotion, I presume."

"No! because I then believed you to be a good and reliable soldier. I see by the guard report that you were corporal of the guard at the ferry on Tuesday night when a lot of common soldiers were drinking in a saloon on Cherry Street and wrecked the place. Why didn't you go there and arrest them?"

"I could not hear the disturbance, it was too far away; besides, the regulations for the army forbid my leaving the guard without orders."

"I am the provost-marshal of this town and I make the regulations. Don't let this happen again. I will not allow any more common soldiers to go into saloons and will issue an order to that effect. Remember, I can break you. Go back to your quarters!"

He never issued that order—he couldn't; neither did he break me, although he used to send for me if there was any scrape in town; no matter if I didn't have the remotest connection with it, he suspected I was concerned in it.

A tragedy happened while we were quartered in Forrest Hall. A soldier of Company A was on post No. 2 on the Gay Street side of the building one winter night when Sergeant Brennan of his company, who was the sergeant of the main guard that night, went out of the guard-room and passed around the corner of the building towards sentinel No. 2. In a few minutes a shot was heard, and some of the guard running out found Sergeant Brennan on the sidewalk, dead, with a bullet through his heart, while the sentinel, with his gun in his hands, calmly stood there awaiting arrest. What transpired between them during the few minutes they were alone never became known. The soldier admitted shooting the sergeant, but made no explanation. It was well known, however, that there was a bitter enmity between them dating back to the time when they were on the frontier service. The body was carried up into the Hall and laid out on some benches on the second floor among the sergeant's sleeping comrades. A screen was erected around the body next morning and some nuns from Georgetown watched and prayed by it, until the next day when the funeral services were held in the Catholic church. The murderer was incarcerated in Washington and was speedily tried by a general court-martial which sentenced him to be hanged. A few weeks after the tragedy the entire regular brigade marched to a field on the north side where many of the finest houses are now built and formed a square about an elevated gallows which had a flight of steps leading up to the platform. The hangman (a soldier) was there adjusting and soaping the rope. Presently the prisoner arrived in a closed carriage, accompanied by a priest and a cavalry guard. The culprit mounted the steps unassisted, and when he reached the platform he stood erect, waved his right hand and exclaimed in a firm voice, "Good-bye, soldiers! Good-bye!" His limbs were quickly bound and a black cap drawn over his face; the trap was sprung and we saw the contortions of the lower part of his body. In a few minutes his struggles ceased and the soldiers marched silently back to their quarters.

We found the winter climate of Washington mild and agreeable, as compared with our experience in Nebraska and Dakota Territories. Our food was fairly good. We drew bread from the Government bakeries; fresh beef was issued to us at the foot of the unfinished Washington Monument, where all the beef cattle for the troops in or about Washington were slaughtered. Other provisions we drew from the general commissary depot.