Here we remained until the thirteenth, when the regiment was disbanded, and the boys left for their homes. The 32nd was no more, but their deeds will never die.
I went back to Boston to wait for my discharge, made a brief visit home to spend Sunday and returned to Boston, where on the 18th of July 1865, I received my discharge, and was a free man once more, having served Uncle Sam for three years, eight months and sixteen days. I was with my company from the time I enlisted until I was wounded, with the exception of two furloughs. My wound was healed, though I had to use a cane for some time longer.
When I enlisted, my mind was made up to do my duty, whatever the consequences, and I trust it will not seem like boasting when I say that I did so every time. When traitors tried to destroy the best government that ever existed, and dishonor their country’s flag, I felt if was my duty to enlist and do what I could for my native land, and I have never been sorry that I did so.
My health was always good, and I was fortunate in battle, never being laid off duty until I was wounded, just before the last battle in which my regiment participated. In thirty-eight battles, I shared the dangers with my comrades of company B. But where are the 101 men of my company who left Concord for Fort Warren on that cold morning of December 3rd, 1861? I called the roll of company B in 1865, when there were but eight men left of the original company.
Ah, the memories that arise of the brave boys who shared with me the hardships and dangers of those long years of warfare! Brothers could not be dearer than those who have shared their last hardtack with me, helped me off the field when wounded, cheered me on the long and tiresome march when I was about ready to give up and drop by the wayside. I think I used to dread the long marches more than I did the battles, and welcome the sight of a brush with the enemy that would stop the march for a while.
We had each to carry a musket, 40 to 80 rounds of ammunition, haversack with four to six days rations, knapsack, blanket, shelter tent, together with our canteen and other small articles that we could not do without, and to carry this on the march from ten to twenty hours at a time with only a few moments now and then to rest, often seemed more of a trial to me than the hardest fought battle I was ever in.
But the hardest trial of all was to have my comrades shot down on my right and on my left, and have to rush on with the rest in the charge, or in battle, leaving them behind to suffer and die.
No words can do justice to that experience, or the feeling of the battle-worn soldier, when he starts out after the battle is over to hunt up his comrades that have not answered the rollcall, will never answer it again, and he digs a hole in the ground with his bayonet and wrapping a blanket around his dead comrade’s body, lays him to rest in an unknown grave forevermore.
And now my story is told; it is a plain, true tale of my experience in the War of the Rebellion, and may help the future generations to understand just what their fathers suffered, that their native land might remain forever, an undivided nation.
