The fighting was prolonged until late into the evening, and the usual amount of ammunition taken into the battle was exhausted before we left the field. I remember Barlow’s saying, “If the enemy make another attack, we will meet them with the cold steel.”
Gradually things quieted, and about 12 o’clock we fell back a few rods and lay down on our arms. We were not disturbed till daylight, when we could see that the retreat movement was still in progress.
Finally we took our turn in the march. We had not gone far when one of the men came to me and said that our flag was back where we had rested after the fight, and he asked if he had better go back for it. I said to him, “By all means get the flag!” He did as requested, and that same bunting waved on a good many hard fought fields afterward. I do not know, but presume that this flag was finally replaced by another. It was, even then, much delapidated, and at Antietam it was mercilessly pierced and torn. The road we finally reached, for Harrison’s Landing soon entered a narrow place between two bluffs. Two or three columns were using the road and when they came to this sort of gorge it became almost a jam. I remember hearing a few guns fired at this time, and the effect on the men was to cause them to crowd faster to the rear. At the time it came to my mind with painful force, “If the rebels should attack us with a brave, fresh division, they would stampede us.” From what I have since read, I think each army considered itself whipped and was glad to get into a place of safety!
At all events, we were not further molested in our march to Harrison’s Landing. We reached the place about noon and went into camp. The James River, from ten miles below Richmond down to Bermuda Hundred, is about as tortuous as a river ever runs. At that point it widens out, a distance of from one to two miles; much of that space is, of course, shallow water.
The next day the enemy run down a battery or two, on the south side of the river, and gave us a lively shelling. Our division general, Richardson, wanted to change the location of some of us, and became very impatient at the slow movements of the men. He roared out: “Make haste, men! make haste! every minute is an hour!” and the men hustled at a livelier gait.
Richardson steadily grew in the esteem of his men. The story had got noised about that while we lay in camp just before Fair Oaks, a loafer about his headquarters addressed insulting language to a woman who was employed in doing certain domestic work and who followed up the army. The general heard the vile talk of the fellow from his tent. He hastily made his appearance, and, in words expressed his disapproval of such conduct, and, in acts he kicked the offender a number of times with such power as to raise him at every kick a number of feet into the air, and then sent him to his regiment. That offence was not again committed at those headquarters.
In a few days the army was in position at Harrison’s Landing. The James at this point bends in slightly on the North bank and is very wide. A line of breastworks was thrown up surrounding the encampment. I presume the place was made secure against any attack from the enemy. As McClellan was an engineer officer, he was, doubtless, good for entrenchments, if for nothing else.
On the Fourth of July President Lincoln came to us and we were reviewed by him and the commander of the army. Mr. Lincoln was dressed in black clothes and wore a silk hat. That hat on the top of his six feet four made him a very tall man. Recently the newspapers have published a story purporting to have been told by Gen. Lew Wallace, to this effect: He was one day at the White House. It was just after the Army of the Potomac had got to its new base. The president was so obviously sad and cast down that the general ventured to remark upon it. The president took him across the room where no one could hear what he said and there told him that in an hour he was to start for the Army of the Potomac to prevent its commander from surrendering it to Lee. While I think McClellan was a fearful incompetent, I am slow to believe, if the above ever took place, that Mr. Lincoln had good grounds for his belief. In those early years of the war, no doubt, much was reported that, later, would not be listened to. Whatever may have been the moving cause, the president was with us that day, and we cheered his presence to the echo.
During the weeks we were here encamped, we went to the James for occasional bathing, but we did not have facilities for washing our clothes in boiling water. The result was that we were all well stocked with body lice. The men generally were diligent in picking off and destroying the lives of these little animals by pressure between the thumb nails. The slaughter of all in view one day, left enough back in concealment so that the next day’s hunt was always rewarded by abundant captures.
The only time I was excused from duty while in the service on account of sickness was while we were in camp here. One day I took a company of sick to the doctor. I staid by till he had passed out the last dose. We had three remedies, one of which would hit any possible case. They were opium pills, castor oil and quinine. The pills cured all bowel troubles; castor oil lubricated and opened up the internal functions, and quinine cured everything else. I remarked to the doctor that I would rather like to experience the sensation of being excused from duty and placed on the sick list for one day. Nothing in particular was doing, so the obliging surgeon said, “All right, you may go to your quarters sick and be excused from duty for one day.” I am now glad to say, that was the first and last time I was ever so favored.