Reminiscences.
After the smoke of the great battle had cleared away and the enemy settled permanently in their old quarters north of the Rappahannock, Lee moved his army some miles south of Fredericksburg, on the wooded highlands, and prepared for winter quarters. This was not a very laborious undertaking, nor of long duration, for all that was necessary was to pitch our old wornout, slanting-roof tents, occupied [204] by six or eight men each. The troops had become too well acquainted with the uncertainty of their duration in camp to go into any very laborious or elaborate preparations. Kershaw had a very desirable location among the wooded hills, but this was soon denuded of every vestige of fuel of every kind, for it must be understood the army had no wagons or teams to haul their fire wood, but each had to carry his share of the wood required for the daily use, and often a mile or mile and a half distant. At the close of the year the Eastern Army found itself in quite easy circumstances and well pleased with the year's campaign, but the fruits of our victory were more in brilliant achievements than material results.
In the Western Army it was not so successful. On the first of the year General Albert Sidney Johnston had his army at Bowling Green, Ky. But disaster after disaster befell him, until two states were lost to the Confederacy, as well as that great commander himself, who fell at the moment of victory on the fatal field of Shiloh. Commencing with the fall of Fort Henry on the Tennessee, then Fort Donaldson on the Cumberland, which necessitated the evacuation of the lines of defense at Bowling Green, and the withdrawal of the army from Kentucky. At Pittsburg Landing Grant was overwhelmingly defeated by the army under Beauregard, but by the division of the army under the two Confederate leaders, and the overpowering numbers of the enemy under some of the greatest Generals in the Union Army, Beauregard was forced to withdraw to Shiloh. Here the two combined armies of Beauregard and Johnston attacked the Union Army under Grant, Sherman, Buell, Lew Wallace, and other military geniuses, with over one hundred and sixteen thousand men, as against an army of forty-eight thousand Confederates. After one of the most stubborn, as well as bloodiest battles of the war, the Confederates gained a complete victory on the first day, but through a combined train of circumstances, they were forced to withdraw the second. After other battles, with varied results, the end of the year found the Western Army in Northern Mississippi and Southern Tennessee.
The Eastern Army, on the other hand, had hurled the enemy from the very gates of the Capital of the Confederacy, after seven days fighting, doubling it up in an indefinable mass, and had driven [205] it northward in haste; on the plains of Manassas it was overtaken, beaten, and almost annihilated, only failing in a repetition of the same, ending as the first battle of that name and place; by the same causes, viz., Sykes' Regulars, the enemy pushed across the Potomac, putting the Capitol, as well as the whole North, in a perfect state of panic; the Confederates entered the enemy's own country, capturing one of their strongholds, with eleven thousand prisoners and munitions of war, enough to equip an army; fought one of the most sanguinary battles of modern times almost within sight of the Capitol itself, if not to a successful finish to a very creditable draw; returned South, unmolested, with its prisoners and untold booty; fought the great battle of Fredericksburg, with the results just enumerated. Could Napoleon, Frederick the Great, or the "Madman of the North" have done better with the forces at hand and against an enemy with odds of two and three to one? So Lee's Army had nothing of which to complain, only the loss of so many great and chivalrous comrades.
We had little picketing to do, once perhaps a month, then in the deserted houses of Fredericksburg. Guard duty around camp was abolished for the winter; so was drilling, only on nice, warm days; the latter, however, was rarely seen during that season. The troops abandoned themselves to base ball, snow fights, writing letters, and receiving as guests in their camps friends and relatives, who never failed to bring with them great boxes of the good things from home, as well as clothing and shoes for the needy soldiers. Furloughs were granted in limited numbers. Recruits and now the thoroughly healed of the wounded from the many engagements flocked to our ranks, making all put on a cheerful face.
That winter in Virginia was one of the most severe known in many years, but the soldiers had become accustomed to the cold of the North, and rather liked it than otherwise, especially when snow fell to the depth of twelve to sixteen inches, and remained for two or three weeks. So the reader can see that the soldier's life has its sunny side, as well as its dark. The troops delight in "snow balling," and revelled in the sport for days at a time. Many hard battles were fought, won, and lost; sometimes company against company, then [206] regiment against regiment, and sometimes brigades would be pitted against rival brigades. When the South Carolinians were against the Georgians, or the two Georgia brigades against Kershaw's and the Mississippi brigades, then the blows would fall fast and furious. The fiercest fight and the hardest run of my life was when Kershaw's Brigade, under Colonel Rutherford, of the Third, challenged and fought Cobb's Georgians. Colonel Rutherford was a great lover of the sport, and wherever a contest was going on he would be sure to take a hand. On the day alluded to Colonel Rutherford martialed his men by the beating of drums and the bugle's blast; officers headed their companies, regiments formed, with flags flying, then when all was ready the troops were marched to the brow of a hill, or rather half way down the hill, and formed line of battle, there to await the coming of the Georgians. They were at that moment advancing across the plain that separated the two camps. The men built great pyramids of snow balls in their rear, and awaited the assault of the fast approaching enemy. Officers cheered the men and urged them to stand fast and uphold the "honor of their State," while the officers on the other side besought their men to sweep all before them off the field.
The men stood trembling with cold and emotion, and the officers with fear, for the officer who was luckless enough as to fall into the hands of a set of "snow revelers," found to his sorrow that his bed was not one of roses. When the Georgians were within one hundred feet the order was given to "fire." Then shower after shower of the fleecy balls filled the air. Cheer after cheer went up from the assaulters and the assaultant—now pressed back by the flying balls, then to the assault again. Officers shouted to the men, and they answered with a "yell." When some, more bold than the rest, ventured too near, he was caught and dragged through the lines, while his comrades made frantic efforts to rescue him. The poor prisoner, now safely behind the lines, his fate problematical, as down in the snow he was pulled, now on his face, next on his back, then swung round and round by his heels—all the while snow being pushed down his back or in his bosom, his eyes, ears, and hair thoroughly filled with the "beautiful snow." After a [207] fifteen minutes' struggle, our lines gave way. The fierce looks of a tall, muscular, wild-eyed Georgian, who stood directly in my front, seemed to have singled me out for sacrifice. The stampede began. I tried to lead the command in the rout by placing myself in the front of the boldest and stoutest squad in the ranks, all the while shouting to the men to "turn boys turn." But they continued to charge to the rear, and in the nearest cut to our camp, then a mile off, I saw the only chance to save myself from the clutches of that wild-eyed Georgian was in continual and rapid flight. The idea of a boy seventeen years old, and never yet tipped the beam at one hundred, in the grasp of that monster, as he now began to look to me, gave me the horrors. One by one the men began to pass me, and while the distance between us and the camp grew less at each step, yet the distance between me and my pursuer grew less as we proceeded in our mad race. The broad expanse that lay between the men and camp was one flying, surging mass, while the earth, or rather the snow, all around was filled with men who had fallen or been overtaken, and now in the last throes of a desperate snow battle. I dared not look behind, but kept bravely on. My breath grew fast and thick, and the camp seemed a perfect mirage, now near at hand then far in the distance. The men who had not yet fallen in the hands of the reckless Georgians had distanced me, and the only energy that kept me to the race was the hope that some mishap might befall the wild-eyed man in my rear, otherwise I was gone. No one would have the temerity to tackle the giant in his rage. But all things must come to an end, and my race ended by falling in my tent, more dead than alive, just as I felt the warm breath of my pursuer blowing on my neck. I heard, as I lay panting, the wild-eyed man say, "I would rather have caught that d——n little Captain than to have killed the biggest man in the Yankee Army."