At Rousseau's we found a large number of staff and line officers. The demijohn was introduced, and all paid their respects to it. The ludicrous incidents, of which there are more or less even in battles, of the last five days, were referred to, and much merriment prevailed.
6. The army is being reorganized, and we are busily engaged repairing the damages sustained in the battle.
Visited the hospitals, and, so far as possible, looked after the wounded of my brigade. To-morrow the chaplains will endeavor to hunt them all up, and report their whereabouts and condition.
7. I was called upon late in the evening to make a report of the operations of my brigade immediately, as General Rousseau intends to leave for Louisville in the morning. It is impossible to collect the information necessary in the short time allowed me. One of my regimental commanders, Colonel Foreman, was killed; another, Colonel Humphrey, was wounded, and is in hospital; another, Lieutenant-Colonel Shanklin, was captured, and is absent; but I gathered up hastily what facts I could obtain as to the casualties in the several regiments, and wrote my report in the few minutes which remained for me to do so, and sent it in. I have not had an opportunity to do justice either to my brigade or myself.
13. Move in the direction of Columbia, on a reconnoitering expedition. My brigade stops at Salem, and the cavalry pushes on.
14. Have been exposed to a drenching rain for thirty hours. The men are cold, hungry, and mutinous.
15. Ordered back to Murfreesboro, and march thither in a storm of snow and sleet. It is decidedly the coldest day we have experienced since last winter.
I find two numbers of Harper's Weekly on my return. They abound in war stories. The two heroes, of whom I read to-night, received saber cuts on the face and head, obtained leave of absence, returned home, and married forthwith. Saber cuts are very rare in the Army of the Cumberland, and if young officers were compelled to defer entering into wedlock until they got wounds of this kind, there would be precious few soldiers married. Bullet wounds are common enough; but the hand-to-hand encounters, knightly contests of swords, the cleaving of head-pieces and shattering of spears, are not incidents of modern warfare.
The long rain has completely saturated the ground. The floor of my tent is muddy; but my bed will be dry, and as I have not had my clothes off for three days, I look forward to a comfortable night's rest.
The picture in Harper, of "Christmas Eve," will bring tears to the eyes of many a poor fellow shivering over the camp-fire in this winter season. The children in the crib, the stockings in which Santa Claus deposits his treasures, recall the pleasantest night of the year.