In this company were all classes of society and all grades of intelligence, from the most cultured scholars to the lowest degree of illiteracy. We had men who had formerly been gentlemen of leisure, lawyers, physicians, students of divinity, teachers, merchants, farmers and mechanics, ranging in age from boys of seventeen to matured men in the forties and from all parts of the South and several from Northern States, as well as Irish and Germans. At one camp-fire could be heard discussions on literature, philosophy, science, etc., and at another horse-talk. The tone of the company was decidedly moral, and there was comparatively little profanity. In addition to the services conducted by the chaplain of the battalion, Rev. Henry White, prayer-meetings were regularly held by the theological students. Then we had men that swore like troopers. "Irish Emmett," whose face was dotted with grains of powder imbedded under the skin, could growl out oaths through half-clenched teeth that chilled one's blood.
One man, Michael, a conscript from another county, a full-grown man, weighing perhaps one hundred and seventy-five pounds, was a chronic cry-baby; unfit for other service, he was assigned assistant at the forge, and would lie with face to the ground and moan out, "I want to go home, I want to go home," and sob by the hour.
Another, a primitive man from the German forests, whose language was scarcely intelligible, lived entirely to himself and constructed his shelter of brush and leaves—as would a bear preparing to hibernate. In his ignorance of the use of an axe I saw him, in felling a tree, "throw" it so that it fell on and killed a horse tied nearby. On seeing what he had done, his lamentation over the dying animal was pathetic.
As a school for the study of human nature, that afforded in the various conditions of army life is unsurpassed—a life in which danger, fatigue, hunger, etc., leave no room for dissimulation, and expose the good and bad in each individual to the knowledge of his associates.
It sometimes fell to my lot to be on guard-duty with Tom Martin, an Irishman who was over forty-five and exempt from military service, but was soldiering for the love of it. Sometimes he was very taciturn and entirely absorbed with his short-stemmed pipe; at other times full of humor and entertaining. He gave me an account, one night while on post, of what he called his "great flank movement"—in other words, a visit to his home in Rockbridge without leave. After Doran, another Irishman, had been disabled at Malvern Hill and discharged from service, he became a sort of huckster for the battery and would make trips to and from Rockbridge with a wagon-load of boxes from our homes and also a supply of apple-brandy. While camped at Bunker Hill in the fall of 1862, shortly after Doran arrived with his load, Captain Poague, observing more than an ordinary degree of hilarity among some of the men, had the wagon searched, the brandy brought forth, confiscated, and emptied on the ground. Martin, greatly outraged at the illtreatment of a fellow-son of Erin, and still more so at the loss of so much good liquor, forthwith resolved to take his revenge on the Captain by taking "French leave."
To escape the vigilance of provost-guards and deserter-hunters, he made his way to the foothills of the North Mountain, and in the course of his journey stumbled on a still-house in one of its secluded glens. To the proprietor, who was making a run of apple-brandy, and who proved to be "a man after me own heart," Martin imparted his grievances. "I tould him," said he, "I hadn't a cint, but he poured me a tin chuck-full. With thanks in me eyes I turned off the whole of it, then kindled me pipe and stood close by the still. Ah! me lad, how the liquor wint through me! In thray minits I didn't care a domn for all the captins in old Stonewall's army!"
With various adventures he made his way home, returned to the company of his own accord, was wounded at Gettysburg, captured, and spent the remainder of war-time in prison.
Rader, who drove the lead-horses at my gun almost throughout the war, is mentioned elsewhere, but his record, as well as his pranks and drollery, coupled with his taciturnity, were interesting. While sitting on his saddle-horse in one battle he was knocked full length to the ground by a bursting shell. When those nearby ran to pick him up they asked if he was much hurt. "No," he said, "I am just skeered to death." At Sharpsburg, while lying down, holding his gray mares, a shell tore a trench close alongside of him and hoisted him horizontally into the air. On recovering his feet he staggered off, completely dazed by the concussion. In the first battle of Fredericksburg he was struck and disabled for a time. At Gettysburg, as the same animals, frightened by a bursting shell, wheeled to run, he seized the bridle of the leader just as it was struck by a shell, which burst at the moment, instantly killing the two grays and the two horses next to them, and stunning Rader as before. But, with all of his close calls, his skin was never broken. Instead of currying his horses during the time allotted for that work he seemed to occupy himself teaching them "tricks," but his was the best-groomed team in the battery.
While on guard one cold night, as the wagon drivers were sleeping quietly on a bed of loose straw near a blazing fire, I saw Rader creep up stealthily and apply a torch at several places, wait until it was well ignited, and then run and yell "Fire!" then repeat the sport an hour later. Vanpelt carried an enormous knapsack captured from Banks and branded "10th Maine." While halting on the march it was Rader's amusement, especially when some outsider was passing by, to set his whip-stock as a prop under it, go through the motions of grinding, and rattle off the music of a hand-organ with his mouth until chased away by his victim. He mysteriously vanished from Rockbridge after the war, and has never since been located.
One of the most striking characters in the company was "General" Jake, as we called him, whose passion for war kept him always in the army, while his aversion to battle kept him always in the rear. After serving a year with us, being over military age, he got a discharge, but soon joined the Rockbridge cavalry as a substitute, where six legs, instead of two, afforded three-fold opportunities. An interview between the "General" and one of our company, as he viewed the former and was struck with his appearance, was as follows: