Whip and Spur

by George E. Waring

General Asboth, seeing (by the map) that it commanded two lines of railroad, sent us to occupy this strategic point, and we gradually accumulated to the number of twenty-five hundred cavalry and four thousand infantry, drawing our regular supplies from Columbus; and occupying our time with a happy round of drills, inspections, horse-races, cock-fights, and poker. It was not an elevating existence, but it was charmingly idle, and we passed the serene and lovely autumn of 1863 in a military dreamland, where nothing ever came to disturb our quiet, or to mar our repose with the realities of war. We built ourselves houses, we shot game for our tables, we made egg-nog for our evenings, and we were happy. The charm of camp-life—with just enough of occupation and responsibility, and with enough improvement in the troops for a reward—made even this wilderness enjoyable. I had the advantage of seniority and command, and the physical comforts that naturally gravitate toward a commanding officer did not fail me.

My house, built with the mouse-colored logs of a Rebel block-house, covered with the roof of the post-office, and floored and ceiled with the smoke-mellowed lining of the Methodist church, was broad and low and snug. Its windows, also taken from the sanctuary in question, were set on their sides, and gave to each of the two rooms wide, low-browed outlooks into the woods and over the drill-ground, that would have made worse quarters agreeable. The bricks of an abandoned domestic fireside built a spacious fireplace across an angle of each of the rooms, and the clay of the locality plastered all our chinks “to keep the wind away.” I have seen more pretentious houses and more costly, but never one in which three chosen spirits—I had, in a happy moment, selected Voisin and the Hun for my staff—got more that is worth the getting out of the simple and virtuous life of a cavalry headquarters. We were at peace with all the world (Forrest was in Mississippi), our pay was regular, our rations were ample,—and Asboth had been ordered to Pensacola.

Old A. J., his successor,—every inch a soldier, and a good fellow to the very core,—used sometimes to roll up his camp mattress and run down from Columbus for an inspection. Those are marked days in our memories. He was a lynx in the field, and wry buttoning roused him to articulate wrath; but he unbuckled his sabre at the door, and brought only geniality within,—a mellow geniality that warmed to the influences of our modest hospitality, and lasted far into the night; and then, when the simple and inoffensive game was over, and its scores were settled, the dear old boy—usually with a smile of conquest wandering through his gray beard—would unroll his bundle before the fire and sleep like a baby until reveille. Happy, happy days,—and still happier nights!

Naturally, in such a life as we led at Union City, our horses formed a very important element in our occupation and in our amusements. Soon after our arrival at Columbus,—an event which had taken place a few months before,—a spanking mare that I had bought to replace Ruby had gone hopelessly lame, and it became again important to all who were concerned in my peace of mind, that a satisfactory substitute should be found for her. I had still in my stable a little thoroughbred (Guy), who, though excellent in all respects, was a trifle under my weight, and not at all up to the rough riding that was a necessary part of our army life. He could go anywhere, could jump any practicable barrier, was fleet and sound, and in all respects admirable, but he was made for a lighter weight than mine, and, except for show and parade riding, must mainly be used to carry Ike and the saddle-bags, or to mount a friend when a friend favored me.

In a second search, in which most of the officers of the regiment took a lively interest, there was found, in Frank Moore’s Battalion of the Second Illinois Cavalry, a tall, gaunt, lean, haggard, thoroughbred-looking beast, which had been captured from Merryweather’s men in Western Tennessee. He was not a handsome horse, nor was he to the ordinary eye in any respect promising; but a trial showed that he had that peculiar whalebone character, and wiry, nervous action, which come only with blood, and without which no horse is really fit for the saddle. The chances were very much against him. He did not possess the first element of beauty, save in a clean-cut head, a prominent eye, a quick ear, a thin neck, sloping shoulders, high withers, and the brilliant activity that no abuse had been able to conquer. He was held in abeyance until a careful examination of the two thousand horses at the post showed that, even as he stood, he had no equal there for my purposes. Since he had come into the army he had been in the possession of a private soldier, who had done much scouting duty, and he had been initiated (successfully) into the scrub-racing which Illinois soldiers much affected. The serious amount of one hundred and forty dollars was hazarded in the venture, and he was transferred to our stable. That increment of value which always follows the purchase of a new horse came rapidly in his case, and it needed only a few gallops on the breezy bluffs beyond Fort Halleck, to install him as prime favorite among the headquarters’ mess.

He was deemed worthy of the noble name of Max, and under Ike’s careful grooming he returned daily toward the blooming condition that only Second Illinois abuse had been able to subdue. In an early race with the Hun we were ingloriously beaten; but the Hun rode a marvellous little blood mare, blooming with hundreds of bushels of oats, and with two years of careful handling. Max, though beaten, was not discouraged, and seemed to say that with time and good treatment he would be ready for a more successful trial.

During his period of tutelage, and while he was kept from all excessive exertion, he was inducted into the mysteries of the art, to him quite new, of jumping timber. Columbus had been occupied by Rebel and Union soldiers since the outbreak of the war, and its fences, far and wide, had all disappeared; but nowhere in the world was there a greater variety nor a more ample stock of fallen trees, whose huge boles made capital leaping-bars; and over these, almost daily, for some months, beginning with the smaller ones and going gradually to the largest we could find, Max learned to carry a heavy weight with a power and precision that even Ruby could not have excelled.

During all this time, ample feed, good shelter, regular exercise, and a couple of hours of Ike’s hand-rubbing daily, worked an uninterrupted improvement in limb and wind and sinews and coat, until, by the time we were ordered to Union City, Max had become the pride of the camp. He was over sixteen hands high, of a solid dark bay color, glistening like polished mahogany, and active and spirited as a horse in training for the Derby.

At Union City the headquarters’ horses were stabled under a capital shed, close at hand, and all that master’s eye and servant’s labor could accomplish for their care and improvement was lavished upon them; so that, during our long months’ stay, we were among the best-mounted men in the Western army. Our pleasure-riding and our work lay through swampy wood-roads, over obstructions of every sort, and across the occasional grass farms, with their neglected rail-fences. The weather was almost uninterruptedly fine, our few visiting neighbors were miles away from us, the shooting was good, and the enjoyment we got from our vagabond life in camp was well supplemented by the royal rides we almost daily took.

Naturally, in a camp full of idle men given largely to sport, the elevating entertainment of horse-racing played a prominent part. Both Max and Guy were conspicuous by their successes until, long before the close of our leisurely career, but only after they had hung my walls with spurs and whips and other trophies of their successful competition with all comers, both were ruled out by the impossible odds they were obliged to give. The actual military service required was only enough to convince me that Max was a beast of endless bottom and endurance, and that, accidents apart, he would need no help in any work he might be called on to perform. For the rest of the war, with much duty of untold severity, I habitually rode no other horse for light work or for hard, for long rides or for short ones, on the march or on parade; and with all my sentiment for his charming predecessors, I had to confess that his equal as a campaigner had never come under my leg. He would walk like a cart-horse at the head of a marching column, would step like a lord in passing in review, would prance down the main street of a town as though vain of all applause, would leap any fence or ditch or fallen timber to which he might be put, would fly as though shot from a gun in passing along the line; and when, whether early or late, he was taken to his stable, would eat like a hungry colt and sleep like a tired plough-horse. In all weathers and under all circumstances he was steady, honest, intelligent, and ready for every duty. I had ridden before, at home and in the army, horses ideally good; I have ridden since, over the hunting country of Warwickshire and Northamptonshire, horses that were counted of the best, but never, before or since, have I mounted such a magnificent piece of perfectly trained and perfectly capable horse-flesh.