Our special employment at the Fort, outside of the military routine, and to relieve its tedium, was "totin" sand bags. Thad Coleman was our chief of ordnance, and as the duties of this office were important and imperative, Sergeant Howlett and Private A. D. Lindsay were detailed as assistants or aids-de-camp. While waiting the arrival of our artillery to equip the fort, Capt. Guion, our civil engineer, instructed our chief of ordnance and his aids to erect embrasures and traverses, of sand bags, on the parapets. The bags were first tarred, then filled with sand and carried by the men to the parapets. This interesting recreation was indulged in during the dog-days of the hottest August that our boys ever experienced. At the early dawn of every morning, upon the parapet, with a pair of opera glasses, intensely scanning the horizon of the deep, deep blue sea, might have been observed the inclined form of Capt. Guion, on the look-out for a United States man-of-war. But whether a man-of-war or the "idly-flapping" sail of some crab hunter hove in sight, the order for more sand bags was placed on file at the ordnance department. We built traverses day after day. We pulled them down and built them up again, exactly as they were before. At length the raw material, of bag, failed, and Sergeant-aid-de-camp Howlett was dispatched under sealed orders to Greensboro on some mysterious errand. We employed our leisure time which we now enjoyed (thanks to the bag failure and the mysterious errand of Sergeant Howlett), in citing delinquents to appear before a court-martial of High Privates, which we now organized. Among the culprits were Sergeant Howlett and private Summers. It had transpired that Sergeant Howlett's mysterious errand had been to fill a requisition, made by Capt. Guion and approved by Lieut. Coleman, chief of ordnance, for a Grover and Baker sewing machine (extra size) to be employed in the furtherance of the tarred sand-bag business. The prisoner was tried, convicted, and sentenced to change his sleeping quarters to No. 14½. This casemate was occupied by Harper Lindsay, Ed. Higgins, Tom. Sloan, Jim. Pearce, and McDowell. Any man was entitled to all the sleep he could get in these quarters.
Private Summers, who had obtained leave to visit home on what he represented as urgent business, was also arraigned in due form. The charges and specifications amounted substantially to this, that he went home to see his sweetheart. He was permitted by the Court to defend with counsel. "Long" Coble appeared for him, and in his eloquent appeal for mercy—in which his legs and arms played the principal part of the argument—he compared the prisoner to a little ship, which had sailed past her proper anchorage at home and cast her lines at a neighbor's house. The evidence being circumstantial he was acquitted, but was ever known afterwards as "Little Ship" Summers. He served faithfully during the entire war; has anchored properly since, and the little "crafts" around his happy home indicate that he has laid the keels for a navy.
Running the "blockade" to Beaufort was another favorite amusement. The popular and sable boatman for this "secret service" was Cæsar Manson. Cæsar's knowledge of the waters of the sound was full and accurate, and his pilotage around the "pint o' marsh" was unerring. Privates McDowell, Jim Pearce, and Ed Higgins employed Cæsar a dark, rainy night on one of these secret expeditions to Beaufort. Owing to the fog on the sound and the fog in the boat, the return of the party was delayed till late in the night. The faithful sentinel, Mike Wood (of the Goldsboro Rifles), being on post at the wharf that night, and this fact being known to prudent Cæsar, he steered for the creek to avoid him. As these festive revellers were wading ashore, Mike, hearing the splashing in the water, sung out, "who comes there!" receiving no reply, he cocked his gun, and became very emphatic. Pearce, knowing that Mike would shoot, answered very fluently, while in the water to his waist, "don't you shoot me, Mike Wood, I am coming in as fast as I can." Mike escorted the party to head quarters, and they performed some one else's guard duty for several days.
We must not forget to mention our genial commissary, Capt. King, and his courteous assistant, Mike Gretter, of the Grays. "Billy" King and his little cosey quarters were just outside the fort, and so convenient of a cold frosty morning, to call upon him and interview his vial of distilled fruit, hid away in the corner. Vive le Roi, Billie.
On the 8th of September, private James Davis died at the fort.
On September the 28th, private Ed. Sterling, who was absent on furlough, died at his home in Greensboro, N.C.
On the 25th of October, the U.S. Steamer "Union" was wrecked off Bogue Banks near the fort. Her crew was brought to the fort and confined there for a short time. What is of more interest was, that we received valuable stores from the wreck, among others, elegant hair mattresses, which now took the place of our shucks and straw.
These days at the fort were our halcyon days, as the dark hours were to us yet unborn. The war had been so far a mere frolic. In the radiant sunshine of the moment, it was the amusing phase of the situation, not the tragic, that impressed us.
CHAPTER IV.
On the 7th of November, Lieut.-Col. John Sloan was ordered to report for duty, to his regiment at Newberne. Some time in December Col. George Singletary resigned and Lieut.-Col. John Sloan was elected colonel of the regiment; Maj. T. C. Singletary was elected Lieutenant-Colonel, and Lieut. John A. Gilmer, of the Grays—who had been acting as adjutant of the regiment at Newberne—was elected Major. The promotion of Lieut. Gilmer made a vacancy in the offices of our company, and Sergeant John A. Sloan—at the time sergeant-major of the fort—was elected to fill it.