It became a customary daily routine for me to harness this poor animal, start at sundown and drive all night. Where? Why to Augusta to try and get mustered in, but I would always ride back broken hearted and disappointed, my ardor, however, not dampened a bit. I became a guy to my brothers and neighbors. My father and step-sister indulged me in my fancy, helping me all they could—father by furnishing me with money, and step-sister by putting up little lunches for my pilgrimages during the night. They thought me partially insane, and judged it would be best to let me have my own idea, with the hope that it would soon wear off. But it didn’t. I would not give up. The Yankee yearning for fight had possession of me, and I could neither eat, sleep nor work. I was bound to be a soldier. I prayed for it, and I sometimes thought, my prayers were answered; that the war should last ’till I was big enough to be one—for it did.
I had enlisted four times in different towns, and each time I went before a mustering officer, I was rejected. “Too small” I was every time pronounced, but I was not discouraged or dismayed—the indomitable pluck and energy of those downeast boys pervaded my system. I was bound to get there, for what I didn’t know, I did not care or didn’t stop to think. I only thought of the glory of being a soldier, little realizing what an absurd-looking one I would make; but the ambition was there, the pluck was there, and the patriotism of a man entered the breast of the wild dreamy boy. I wanted to go to the front—and I went.
After several unsuccessful attempts to be mustered into the service at Augusta, which was twenty-five miles from our little farm, I thought I would enlist from the town of Freedom and thereby get before a different mustering officer who was located in Belfast. I had grown, I thought, in the past six weeks, and before a new officer, I thought my chances of being accepted would improve; so on a bright morning in September I mounted my “gig,” behind my little old gray horse, who seemed to say, as he turned his head to look at me when I jumped on to the seat, “What a fool you are, making me haul you all that distance, when you know they won’t have you!” but kissing my little step-sister good-bye, with a wave of my hand to father and brothers who stood in the yard and door of the dear old home, I drove away, and as I did so I could see the expressions of ridicule and doubt on their faces, while underneath it all there was a tinge of sadness and fear. They did not think for a moment. I would be mustered into the army, yet fear took possession of them when I drove off, for they knew my determined disposition.
Well, I arrived in Belfast. Instead of driving direct to the stable and hotel, and putting my horse up, I drove direct to the office of the mustering officer. I did not need to fasten my trusty horse, for he knew it would only be a few moments, and as I went to the office door, he turned his head and whinnied as if he were laughing at me. I entered that office like a young Napoleon. I had made up my mind to walk in before the officer very erect and dignified, even to raising myself on tiptoe. On telling the clerk my errand, he ushered me into an inner office, and imagine my surprise—my consternation—when, swinging around in his chair, I found myself in the presence of the very officer who had rejected me in Augusta so many times.
“Damn it,” said he, “will you never let up? Go home to your mother, boy, don’t pester me any more. I will not accept you, and let that end it.”
I tremblingly told him “I had grown since he saw me last, and that by the time I was mustered in I would grow some more, and that I would drum and fight, if it should prove actually necessary.”
Thus I pleaded with him for fully one hour. Finally he said, “Well, damned if I don’t muster you in, just to get rid of you. Sergeant, make out this young devil’s papers and let him go and get killed.” My heart leaped into my mouth. I tried to thank him, but he would not have it. He hurried me through, and at 5:30 P. M., September 15, 1863, I was a United States soldier. And when I donned that uniform, what a looking soldier! The smallest clothes they issued looked on me as if it would make a suit for my entire family, but in spite of the misfit, I took them and put them on, with the pants legs rolled up to the knees, and the overcoat dragging on the ground.
I went out of that office as proud as a peacock, but a laughing-stock for the boys, and all who gazed at me. I think even the old horse smiled and looked askance; he acted as if I was fooling him, and hungry as he was, when he turned towards the stable, he dragged along as if he either were sorry or ashamed to draw me among people; but I cared not for their jeers and laughs. I was now a soldier and anxious to get home. I pictured the feeling and joyous greetings of my brothers and sister as they would see me ride up in my uniform; how the boys would envy me, and how the sister would throw her arms about me and kiss me, and how her bosom would heave with pride as she gazed upon the uniform that covered her hero brother. Oh! I pictured it all in my boyish fancy, and hastened all my arrangements, so full of joy that I could scarcely eat. I would not wait till morning, but started home about midnight, arriving there just at sunrise.
