In Camp with L Company, Second Regiment New Jersey Volunteer Infantry

by George W. Petty

Soon after our arrival at camp orders had been issued prescribing a method of drying the ground under the tents, which had been provided with board floors. Strange to say, this order had been overlooked up to the present time, when it was enforced, and during the day the tents were shifted and the floors raised. Lime which was obtained at the Commissary's was liberally sprinkled around. The deaths in our Company proved that it was not the best thing in the world to sleep near the ground, from which rose malarial vapors. Sergeants Clift, Dabinett, Collins and Baxter, and Corporals Rusk and myself slept on cots and in hammocks and we kept good health, while, on the other hand, Corporals Cohen and Roe and Privates Kotzenberg and Newman had slept on the ground. One evening my hammock broke and I lay on the floor the rest of the night. The next morning I awoke with a decidedly heavy, listless feeling and made haste to mend my hammock, for I attributed that feeling to lying so near the earth. The camps all around had their tent floors two and three feet off the ground, and in nearly all the regiments which were under trees platforms were built in them on which the boys slept.

PABLO BEACH, FLA.
"AND SOON NOT FORTY MEN OUT OF 101 ANSWERED THE ROLL."

One morning, instead of a monotonous drill, the Company marched out into the country past the camps of regiments which had departed. In the Fourth Illinois camp the pools of water were knee deep and a bridge had been built to connect two battalions. This Regiment suffered greatly. It was under such conditions as these that the welcome order was received directing our Company to proceed to Pablo Beach on provost duty. This beach is one of the finest along the Atlantic coast and extends for eighteen miles north and south. Parties frequently make the trip to St. Augustine in carriages along its entire length. Bright and early Friday, August 23d, baggage and knapsacks were loaded on army wagons and eight o'clock found us moving towards Jacksonville to take ferry and train to the seashore. The handsome uniform of our regiment was always a subject of remark whenever we turned out for parade. This consisted of buff campaign hats, dark blue blouse, light blue trousers, with white stripes for the officers and non-coms, brown leggings, and in beautiful contrast was our red blanket in a roll from the left shoulder to the right hip. Our fancy friends of the Twenty-second and Twenty-third New York Regiments could not beat that combination.

Our spirits had been rising higher and higher and on the boat songs and jests livened things up. A curious incident of this trip is the fact that we crossed on the old ferryboat "Commodore Barney," built in 1857 for passenger service between New York and Brooklyn. It was transposed during the civil war, so the story runs, into a mushroom gunboat and stationed somewhere near Norfolk, Va. It was used also as a transport, and five years ago it took the trip south. On our left, tied up to wharves, were the filibusters "Three Friends" and "Dauntless," both of which did about as much toward bringing on the war as anything else. On the east side of the river were two wrecks, one a ferryboat, the other a sloop, both of which have been laying there for years and apparently in pretty good condition yet, typical of the want of energy to build up and prosper in spite of obstacles so often seen in the far south.

We were loaded on lumber cars. The smoke from the engine nearly suffocated us as we shifted in our seats to relieve ourselves from the rocking and jolting we got from the uneven tracks and springless cars. We covered the seventeen miles in about forty-five minutes. This included stops to take on wood for the engine. This stopping for wood must always be included in the time of traveling on the railroads of the Black belt, and it never failed to bring forth bright comments and jests from the boys, who found a great deal of amusement in it. We arrived safe and sound. It was this trip, however, that completely broke me down and I reported at the hospital soon after our arrival.

That night demons, snakes and alligators lurked in every corner. Fortunately my efforts at dislodging them threw me into a drenching perspiration, which broke up the high fever, after which I felt better. I was off duty for five days and afterwards enjoyed our stay at this place. The salt air brought out all the evil fevers which had gotten into our systems at Jacksonville and soon not forty men out of one hundred answered the roll. The duty was light, but we often found it necessary at times to appeal to the other companies on duty with us to help us out, so that some of our men should not go on duty two days in succession. We were particularly short in our non-commissioned officers. Out of six Sergeants and ten Corporals only Sergeant Baxter and myself were available for a whole week, Corporal Rusk having charge of the Quartermaster's Department, the rest being either sick or on furlough. A great many of our friends have been in hospitals, but have any of them seen the effects of typhoid after the most rigorous measures have been taken? Over four hundred men were at a convalescent hospital near the beach and they were in all stages of recovery. A few did not get well. On the ground floor were men who had fought the malady sufficiently to walk around and fold up their mattresses every morning. The floor space these occupied was needed in the day time. At every meal nourishing food was served and nearly two hundred young men stood in line, some with camp stools to rest upon every few steps. Oatmeal, rice and soups formed the principal diet, varied sometimes on Sunday by something more solid. But it was the general appearance of the poor fellows that sent a wave of sadness over me. "Who knows," said I, "but I may be like one of these myself some day." These invalids were improving, however. But upstairs, the more recent arrivals were lying upon cots, helpless, gazing into space, their teeth showing between bands of white skin once full red lips, a wasted arm thrust out with the flesh between the bones shrunken. A terrible sight. The boys who so bravely marched to war wanted now only to see the dear home once more.

The food issued to the company at this time was about the same as it had always been, but once or twice a day we were sure of some combination of the coarse food that would astonish and delight us, thanks to the skill of a competent black cook, Bob by name, who had seen considerable service on board tugs and other craft around the city of Jacksonville, and also to the tireless persistent devotion to his duty of our Quartermaster, who succeeded in obtaining oat meal, sugar, raisins and other things not on Uncle Sam's bill of fare. Oat meal and milk, which savored of our northern homes, was furnished to the sick of the company.