CHAPTER V
Shortly after the battle of Fredericksburg, Captain Henry C. Weir, the adjutant-general of the division to which General D. McM. Gregg had then been assigned, asked an orderly who happened to be a member of my company, and who was then engaged carrying a despatch to his headquarters, if he could suggest a man in his regiment whom he could detail to act as clerk to make out returns and reports, his former clerk having gone home with the body of General Bayard. The man suggested me, and was told to request me to report to division headquarters. I remember being quite startled at this order, and, anxious to look as presentable as possible, I stripped and bathed in a brook, on the edges of which the ice had formed, before calling on Captain Weir. He questioned me as to my occupation before entering the army, which had been that of a clerk in my uncle's firm, T. B. Coddington & Co., metal importers, whom he knew by reputation. He also stated that he knew of my father's home on the Hudson River. Indeed, he manifested an interest in me, and, after giving me a copy of a tri-monthly report to look at, asked me if I thought I could consolidate the several regimental reports, copies of which he showed me. I made the attempt and succeeded, whereupon he said he would ask General Gregg to have me detailed at his headquarters. That detail was made out in December, 1862. Though my rank was still that of a private, my position was much improved and my surroundings much more pleasant. I was treated with great consideration by Captain Weir, and was thereafter busily engaged while in winter quarters in performing the duties of an adjutant-general's clerk, which included such writing as General Gregg required of me.
BREVET LIEUTENANT COLONEL H. C. WEIR
At the time of the battle of Chancellorsville, Gregg's division went on what was known as the Stoneman raid to Richmond. On this movement and subsequently on the march, and in all engagements as long as I was with the General, I was sent with messages and orders the same as a staff-officer.
On this raid I attracted the attention of General Gregg and the headquarters staff by my ability to sleep on horseback when on the march. Captain Weir had given me a fine horse, which happened to be a very fast walker. It was General Gregg's custom to ride alone at the head of his staff, occasionally inviting Dr. Phillips, the medical director of the division, to ride alongside of him. As soon as I would fall asleep, the bridle reins would naturally slacken and the horse begin to forge ahead. My position in the column was in rear of the officers of the staff, and with the General's orderly and bugler. Instead of restraining the horse, my comrades and the staff officers would open the way and urge him along while I, sitting upright but fast asleep, would ride alongside of our dignified General and sometimes ahead of him before he noticed me, when invariably he would wake me up, grabbing me by the arm and saying, "Meyer, wake up." Chagrined I would return to my place, the staff officers and orderlies greatly amused. This incident occurred so frequently on this Stoneman raid that it evidently made an impression on the General, because, meeting him some twenty years after the war at a reunion in Philadelphia he, on greeting me, introduced me to a group of officers and immediately recalled the fact of my so often being asleep on horseback. One day my horse strayed from the road and followed a fence up a bank until he came to a point where the slope reached the fence and he could go no farther, when the General called out, "Wake him up, he will break his neck." The jolt of the horse, however, sliding down the slope into the road awakened me, though I did not fall off. The only penalty I suffered from sleeping on horseback was the occasional loss of a cap and the scratching of my face by the branches of trees, but it undoubtedly had much to do with my being able to withstand the fatigue incident to our campaigns, since the fact is that I never was off duty for a single hour, by reason of sickness, during my whole term of service.
CHAPTER VI
On the 9th of June, 1863, occurred the battle of Brandy Station, in which more cavalry were engaged than in any battle of the Civil War. General Buford's division had crossed the Rappahannock River at Beverly Ford early in the morning. General Gregg's division crossed at Kelly's Ford, and General Duffie farther down the river, the latter being under General Gregg's command and supposed to accompany him. As we were approaching Brandy Station we heard the heavy cannonading of Buford's attack, when General Gregg, with the brigades of Colonel Windham and Colonel Kilpatrick, hurried to the battlefield. Around the station and between Culpeper and the Rappahannock the country was open and favorable for cavalry engagements. Indeed, there was one there at every advance and retreat of the army during 1862 and 1863, I being present at three of them.
As soon as we emerged from the woods near the station we saw the enemy on a hill near the Barber House, which was General Stuart's headquarters. We were approaching them practically in their rear; their artillery, however, firing at us. General Gregg at once ordered Colonel Windham to charge with his three regiments—the First New Jersey, the First Pennsylvania, and the First Maryland; Kilpatrick's brigade at the time was coming on the field to our right. Windham charged this hill in columns of regiments, and it was a very thrilling sight to see these troops going up the slope in the bright June sun, their sabres glistening. As they neared the enemy General Gregg showed an enthusiasm that I had never noticed before. He started his horse on a gallop toward the house, swinging his gauntlets over his head and hurrahing, at the same time telling Captain Weir to ride over and direct Kilpatrick to charge at once. Captain Weir happened to be riding a horse that would always refuse a fence unless another went first. At this critical moment his horse shied twice, when mine took the fence and I started to carry the order. As soon as my horse went over Captain Weir's immediately followed. As he was the adjutant-general and directed to take the order, I rode up the hill supposing that when Kilpatrick's brigade got there the enemy would be routed and I might get a prisoner. On arriving at Stuart's headquarters I found Windham's brigade in a hand-to-hand fight around the house. Here I met a flanking party of the enemy, who were driving back a portion of General Windham's command, Kilpatrick's men not then having reached that point.