In this connection, I will relate an anecdote told on our gallant Lieutenant Colonel Rutherford, of the Third, by a friend of his.
When the Third South Carolina Regiment of Infantry was in East Tennessee, in the month of January, 1864, not only did the soldiers find it difficult to get enough to eat, but their supply of shoes and clothing ran pretty low. Those who had extra pants or jackets helped their needy friends. Lieutenant Colonel Rutherford had turned over his extra pair of pants to some one, which left him the pair he wore each day as his only stock on hand in the pants line. Heavy snows fell. The regiment was encamped very near a pleasant residence, where a bevy of pretty girls lived. After an acquaintance of sometime, a snow-balling [327] was indulged in. It was observed that Colonel Rutherford used his every endeavor to constantly face the girls, who were pelting him pretty liberally on all sides. After awhile he slipped up and fell, but in his fall his face was downward, when lo! the girls discovered that he had a hole in his pants. Too good-natured to appear to see his predicament, no notice was seemingly taken of his misfortune; but as the officers were about going off to bed that night, the married lady said to him:
"Colonel, lay your pants on the chair at your room door tonight, and you will find them there again in the morning. We hope you won't mind a patch."
The Colonel, who was always so gallant in actual battle, and could not bear to turn his back to the Federal soldiers, was just as unwilling to turn his back to snow-balls, who happened to be Confederate lasses, and the reason therefor, although never told, was discovered by them.
The weather had gotten down to two degrees below zero, the ground frozen as hard as brick-bats, and the winds whistled gaily through our tattered tents, our teeth beating tattoo and our limbs shivering from the effects of our scanty clothing and shoes. But our wagons were gathering in supplies from the rich valleys of the French Broad and the Nolachucky, and while we suffered from cold, we generally had provisions sufficient for our want. By the middle of January we had to temporarily break up camp to meet the enemy, who had left Knoxville with the greater part of the army, and was marching up on the right banks of the French Broad to near Dandridge. General Foster seeing the penalty put upon General Burnside for not driving out Longstreet from East Tennessee, the former undertook to accomplish in this bitter weather what the latter had failed to do in comparative good season. Our cavalry, with Jenkins' Division, headed direct towards the moving column of the enemy, while McLaws' Division marched in the direction of Strawberry Plains, with a view to cutting off the enemy and forcing him to battle in an open field. But General Granger, in command of the Federal column, was too glad to cross the French Broad and beat a hasty retreat to Knoxville. We returned to our old camps, and waited, like Micawber, "for something to turn up."
By some disagreement or want of confidence in General McLaws by [328] the commanding General, he was relieved of his command, and General Kershaw being the senior Brigadier General of the division, was placed in command. What the differences were between General Longstreet and his Major General were never exactly understood by the soldiers. While General McLaws may have been a brave soldier and was well beloved by officers and men, still he was wanting in those elements to make a successful General of volunteer troops—dash, discipline, and promptness in action.
General Longstreet had bent all his energies to the repairing of the railroad through East Tennessee and Virginia, and as soon as this was accomplished, a limited number of soldiers were furloughed for twenty-one days. A large lot of shoes and clothing was sent us from Richmond, and this helped to make camp life more enjoyable. Not all the men by any means could be spared by furlough even for this brief period, for we had an active and vigilant foe in our front. Most of the men drew their furloughs by lot, those who had been from home the longest taking their chances by drawing from a hat, "furlough" or "no furlough."
While in winter quarters, during the spasm of chicken fighting, a difficulty occurred between Lieutenant A and Private B, of the Third, both good friends, and no better soldiers were ever upon a battlefield. These are not the initials of their names, but will answer the purpose at hand, and that purpose is to show the far-reaching results of the courtmartial that followed, and a decision reached under difficulties, that the most learned jurist might feel proud of.
I will say for the benefit of those not learned in the law of army regulations, that for an officer to strike a private he is cashiered, and for a private to strike an officer the penalty is either death or long imprisonment with ball and chain attachments.
Now it appeared to the officers who composed the courtmartial, Captain Herbert, Lieutenant Garlington, and the writer of this (all parties of the Third), that Lieutenant A had knocked Private B down. The officer appeared in his own defense, and gave in extenuation of his crime, that Private B had hit his (Lieutenant A's) chicken a stunning blow on the head while they were "petting" them between rounds. Now that decision of the courtmartial astonished our Colonel as much as the men [329] who were parties to the combat themselves. Now it read something like this—time, dress parade: