Company B, recruited in Concord, Massachusetts, by Captain (afterward Brevet-Brigadier-General) George L. Prescott, was mustered in November 15th, 1861. Cyrus L. Tay, First Lieutenant, and Isaiah F. Hoyt, Second Lieutenant.
Company C, recruited in Boston by Captain Jonathan Pierce, was mustered in November 16th, 1861. Joseph Austin, First Lieutenant, and Robert Hamilton, Second Lieutenant.
Company D was recruited in Gloucester, and was almost entirely composed of fishermen and sailors. It was commanded by Captain James P. Draper. The late Adjutant-General James A. Cunningham was First Lieutenant, and Stephen Rich, Second Lieutenant.
These companies were rapidly recruited, and were immediately despatched to their post, no time being allowed for drill, and hardly time to say good-bye. It may be presumed that when they reported, their discipline was nothing, and their ideas of military order exceedingly crude.
Perhaps this was more particularly the case with Company D, which, as we have already said, was composed almost entirely of Gloucester fishermen,—or it may have been the excessive hospitality of the friends of that company, that led to a little scene immediately upon its arrival.
The more jovial of the soldiers were weeded out at the landing, and quietly deposited in the guard-house; the remainder were marched into the fort, and soon after to the cook house, where an ample supper of soft bread and tea awaited them. A few months later such a repast would have been hailed as the height of luxury, but by the raw sailor-soldiers it was now regarded with contempt. The loaves, instead of being devoted to their proper use as the staff of life, were converted into missiles, and the air was alive with them,—the dim evening light favoring an impartial distribution.
In the midst of the racket, Colonel Dimmock appeared upon the scene, lantern in hand, and immediately received plump in the head one of the finest of the loaves, which, with a refinement of ingenuity, had been dipped in hot tea. The scene which followed was one not easily to be forgotten. The outraged old soldier dashed in among the turbulent men, and by his habit of command at once overawed and controlled them. Ordering them into a line, throwing some into position apparently by main strength, he passed along the ranks, throwing his light into each face until he came to the real culprit, six solid feet of man and tar, whose face declared his guilt. Seizing the burly giant by the arm, the old colonel fairly dragged him out of the casemate, as if he had been a child; but when the man had humbled himself sufficiently, protesting that “he didn’t mean anything,” the commandant dismissed him after a brief but forcible lecture on discipline, and an injunction to beware of any second offence.
Late in November the battalion organization was completed by the appointment of the Field and Staff, Francis J. Parker, Major; Charles K. Cobb, Adjutant; and George W. Pearson, Quartermaster; and the Major assumed command December 2d, 1861.
The Post-Commander, Colonel Justin E. Dimmock, was also Colonel of the First United States Artillery, and the headquarters of the regiment was with him; but with the exception of the excellent band of the regiment, there were none other of its officers or men at the post.
Fort Warren at this time was occupied as a depot for Confederate war and state prisoners—the former consisted mainly of some 800 men, captured in North Carolina, and included also a number of Confederate officers, among whom were Commodore Barron and Colonel Pegram; and among the latter were the Confederate ambassadors, Mason and Slidell, Mayor Brown, Chief of Police Kane of Baltimore, and others.