Gazed northward very wistfully
For him that ne'er would come again."
The next morning broke cold and threatening. We resumed our march and had proceeded but a few miles when the rain began to fall. Later in the day it came down in torrents, and the wind was blowing gales. About dark, in the midst of this storm, we were halted in a large hickory grove on the side of the Blue Ridge, near the small village of Upperville. Our men comprehended the situation at once, and, though thoroughly drenched and chilled, soon had their axes ringing in the forest, and large log fires were ablaze over the camp. The storm continued with fury all night, to sleep was impossible, and we were forced to pass the most disagreeable night we had ever experienced.
On the 29th we retraced our steps to Paris. On the following morning, acting as an escort to a foraging party, we proceeded to Middleboro. At night we returned to camp, rich in wagon loads of corn and provender, also securing a large lot of fine beeves. On the next day, leaving Paris, we moved by way of Salem in the direction of Culpepper Court-House, which place we reached on the 2d of November, and remained there until the 4th. Sergeant Harper Lindsay, while here, accepted the position of adjutant of the 45th North Carolina regiment, and Sergeant Chas. Campbell was promoted to orderly sergeant in his stead.
On the night of the 4th, after a tiresome day's march, we went into camp on the top of Cedar Mountain. We were halted on a bleak and barren hill with no fuel within our reach. Col. Cooke, under the circumstances, suspended "special orders" in reference to destroying private property, and gave the men permission to burn the rails from the fences near by. For this necessary disobedience some spiteful person reported him and he was placed in arrest, from which he was released next day without a court martial. After our company had made its fires and were busy trying to make a supper from their scanty rations, I strolled over to Cooke's headquarters and found him sitting moodily over his fire of rails. We began to discuss the officers of the brigade, and while he was idly turning a splinter he held in his fingers, it fell from his hand and stuck upright in the ground. He turned quickly to me, slapped me on the back and laughingly said: "John, that is an omen of good luck." I surmised to what he had reference—a probability of his promotion had been whispered—and replied, I did not take much stock in splinters, but I hoped in this instance the omen might be realized. In a few moments, several men from the regiment, with their canteens, passed near us and one of them, a lank, lean soldier, inquired of Cooke if he could tell him where the spring of water was. With some irritability in his tone he replied, "No, go hunt for it." The thirsty questioner, possibly recognizing him, made no reply, but turned away thinking, no doubt, under other circumstances, he would have answered him differently. The soldier had gone but a short distance when Cooke called him back, apologized for his hasty speech and indifference, and informed him kindly where he could find the water.
Not many days afterwards the splinter omen was interpreted, and Col. John E. Cooke, of the 27th North Carolina regiment (though junior colonel of the brigade), was promoted for gallantry to brigadier general, and assigned to the command of Gen. J. G. Walker's brigade, who was transferred to the Mississippi department. I have introduced these incidents, merely to illustrate the noble traits of character of this gallant and courteous gentleman and soldier, who was acknowledged by Gen. Lee himself to be the brigadier of his army. Of his services with his North Carolina brigade history already leaves him a record. He is a man of chivalric courage, and possesses that magnanimity of heart which ever wins the affections of a soldier. He was beloved by his entire command. A truer sword was not drawn in defence of the South and her cause, and a more untarnished blade never returned to its scabbard when the unhappy conflict was over.
Upon the promotion of Col. Cooke—Lieut.-Col. Singletary having resigned on account of wounds—Major John A. Gilmer was promoted to Colonel, Capt. George F. Whitefield, of Company C, to Lieutenant-Colonel, and Capt. Jos. C. Webb, of the Orange Guards, to Major. The brigades in our division were also changed, and under the reassignment of regiments, Cooke's command consisted entirely of North Carolina troops, and was well known in Lee's army as "Cooke's North Carolina Brigade."
On the 8th of November we were moved to Madison Court-House, where we remained until the 18th. About the 15th the army of the Potomac was reported in motion, and their gun-boats and transports had entered Aquia Creek in their "on to Fredericksburg." On the morning of the 18th, our division received marching orders, and we also set out for Fredericksburg. The weather was very cold, and our march was made through rain and sleet; the ground was frozen, and some of our men being barefooted, their feet cut by the ice, left their bloody tracks along the route. The men, under all these hardships and exposures, were in excellent spirits, and no one escaped their gibes and jokes. Every few miles, growing in the corner of the fences and in the old field, the persimmon tree ever dear to a North Carolinian's soul appeared, and immediately discipline was forgotten, ranks broken, and the tree besieged. Sam Hiatt once remarked that the green persimmon was invaluable to an ordinary soldier, as a few of them would always draw his stomach to the proportions suited to a Confederate ration. On long marches the brigades marched by turns to the front. On one occasion, while we were seated on both sides of the road waiting for the rear brigades to pass to the front, a young and clever officer of our command, who had assiduously cultivated his upper lip, and by the aid of various tonsorial applications made pretense of possessing a mustache, stepped out into the middle of the road and commenced, as is usual with beginners, to toy with his hairs; presently a rough specimen of a soldier came trotting along astride of a pack mule, and as he neared the officer he halted his steed with a loud and long "whoa!" Leaning forward, with a quizzical look, he politely but firmly requested the officer "to please remove that mustache from the main highway and allow him and his mule to pass." [The mustache was raze-rd at Fredericksburg.]
On the 23d we reached the vicinity of Fredericksburg, and employed the interval—before the advance made by the enemy on the 11th of December—in strengthening our line, which reached from the Rappahannock, about one mile above Fredericksburg, along the hills in rear of that city to the Richmond & Fredericksburg Railroad.
About 11 o'clock on the morning of the 13th, Burnside, "whose turn it now was to wrestle with General Lee," massed his forces under cover of the houses of Fredericksburg and moved forward with his grand divisions to seize Marye's and Willis' Hills—