This brief history of the military career of a remarkable man would not be complete without some account of his life subsequent to the dissolution of the great army of volunteers. Willard Glazier's conduct as a soldier formed an earnest of his future good citizenship—his devotion to duty at the front, a foreshadow of his enterprise and success in the business of life.
Having been honorably mustered out, he lost no time in looking about for an occupation. Joining the volunteer army when a mere youth, his opportunities of learning a profession had been very limited, and he consequently now found himself without any permanent means of support. His education had been necessarily interrupted by the breaking out of the war, and his chief anxiety, now that the struggle was over, was to enter college and complete his studies.
This desire was very intense in our young citizen-soldier, and absorbed all his thoughts; but where to find the means for its accomplishment he was at a loss to discover. In ponderings upon this subject from day to day, an idea suddenly occurred to him, which formed an epoch in his life, and the development of which has proved it to have been the basis of a successful and useful career. The idea that has borne fruit was this: During the period of his service in the war he had kept a diary. Herein he had recorded his experiences from day to day, adding such brief comments as the events called for, and time and opportunity permitted. This diary he always kept upon his person, and while on a long and hurried march, or in a battle with the enemy, his vade mecum would be, of necessity, occasionally neglected, no sooner did the opportunity offer than his mind wandered back over the few days' interval since the previous entry, and each event of interest was duly chronicled. Again during the period of his confinement in Southern prisons, sick, and subjected to most inhuman treatment and privation, and while escaping from his brutal captors, concealed in the swamps during the day, tired, hungry, and cold, his diary was never forgotten, albeit, the entries were frequently made under the greatest difficulties, such as to most men would have proved insurmountable.
This journal was now in his possession. He had stirred the souls of relatives and friends by reading from it accounts of bloody scenes through which he had passed; of cruelties practised upon him and his brother-patriots in Southern bastiles; of his various attempts to escape, and pursuit by blood-hounds and their barbarous masters. The story of his war experiences entranced hundreds of eager listeners around his home, and the idea that now occurred to him, while anxiously pondering the ways and means of paying his college fees, was, that his story might possibly, by the aid of his diary, be arranged in the form of a book, and if he were fortunate enough to find a sale for it, the profits would probably furnish the very thing he stood so much in need of.
Prompt in everything, the thought no sooner occurred to the young candidate for college honors than he proceeded to reduce it to action. He forthwith commenced arranging the facts and dates from the diary; constructed sentences in plain Saxon English; the work grew upon him; he "fought his battles o'er again;" was again captured, imprisoned and escaped; the work continued to grow, and at the end of six weeks' hard application, always keeping his object in view, Willard Glazier, the young cavalryman, found himself an author—i. e., in manuscript.
Not a little surprised and gratified to discover that he possessed the gift of putting his thoughts in a readable form, he now felt hopeful that the day was not distant when the desire of his soul to enter college would be realized.
CHAPTER XXVII.
CAREER AS AN AUTHOR.
Glazier in search of a publisher for "Capture, Prison-Pen and Escape." — Spends his last dollar. — Lieutenant Richardson a friend in need. — Joel Munsell, of Albany, consents to publish. — The author solicits subscriptions for his work before publication. — Succeeds. — Captain Hampton. — R. H. Ferguson. — Captain F. C. Lord. — Publication and sale of first edition. — Great success. — Pays his publisher in full. — Still greater successes. — Finally attains an enormous sale. — Style of the work. — Extracts. — Opinions of the press.