Hardtack and coffee

by John Davis Billings

It was a little annoying to have every box opened and inspected at brigade or regimental headquarters, to assure that no intoxicating liquors were smuggled into camp in that way, especially if one was not addicted to their use. There was many a growl uttered by men who had lost their little pint or quart bottle of some choice stimulating beverage, which had been confiscated from a box as “contraband of war,” although the sender had marked it with an innocent name, in the hope of passing it through unsuspected and uninspected. Yet the inspectors were often baffled. A favorite ruse was to have the bottle introduced into a well roasted turkey, a place that no one would for a moment suspect of containing such unique stuffing. In such a case the bottle was introduced into the bird empty, and filled after the cooking was completed, the utmost care being taken to cover up all marks of its presence. Some would conceal it in a tin can of small cakes; others inserted it in a loaf of cake, through a hole cut in the bottom. One member of my company had some whiskey sent for his enjoyment, sealed up in a tin can; but when the box was nailed up a nail was driven into the can, so that the owner found only an empty can and a generally diffused odor of “departed spirits” pervading the entire contents of food and raiment which the box contained.

It was really vexing to have one’s knick-knacks and dainties overhauled by strangers under any circumstances, and all the more so when the box contained no proscribed commodity. Besides, the boxes were so nicely packed that it was next to impossible for the inspector to return all the contents, having once removed them; and he often made more or less of a jumble in attempting to do so. I think I must have had as many boxes sent as the average among the soldiers, and simple justice to those who had the handling of them requires me to state that I never missed a single article from them, and, barring the breakage of two or three bottles, which may or may not have been the fault of the opener, the contents were always undamaged. Sometimes the boxes were sent directly from brigade headquarters to the headquarters of each company without inspection, and there only those were opened whose owners were known to imbibe freely on occasion.

A WAGON-LOAD OF BOXES.

The boxes came, when they came at all, by wagon-loads—mule teams of the company going after them. I have already intimated that none were sent to the army when it was on the move or when a campaign was imminent; and as these moves were generally foreshadowed with tolerable accuracy, the men were likely to send their orders home at about the same time, and so they would receive their boxes together. In this way it happened that they came to camp by wagon-loads, and a happier, lighter-hearted body of men than those who were gathered around the wagons could not have been found in the service. I mean now those who were the fortunate recipients of a box, for there was always a second party on hand who did not expect a box, but who were on the spot to offer congratulations to the lucky ones; perhaps these would receive an invitation to quarters to see the box unpacked. This may seem a very tantalizing invitation for them to accept; but, nevertheless, next to being the owner of the prize, it was most entertaining to observe what some one else was to enjoy.

I think the art of box-packing must have culminated during the war. It was simply wonderful, delightfully so, to see how each little corner and crevice was utilized. Not stuffed with paper by those who understood their business, thus wasting space, but filled with a potato, an apple, an onion, a pinch of dried apples, a handful of peanuts, or some other edible substance. These and other articles filled the crannies between carefully wrapped glass jars or bottles of toothsome preserves, or boxes of butter, or cans of condensed milk or well roasted chickens, and the turkey that each box was wont to contain. If there was a new pair of boots among the contents, the feet were filled with little notions of convenience. Then, there was likely to be, amid all the other merchandise already specified, a roll of bandages and lint, for the much-feared but unhoped-for contingency of battle. It added greatly to the pleasures of the investigator to come now and then upon a nicely wrapped package, labelled “From Mary,” “From Cousin John,” and perhaps a dozen other relatives, neighbors, school-mates or shop-mates, most of which contributions were delicious surprises, and many of them accompanied by notes of personal regard and good-wishes.

There were some men in every company who had no one at home to remember them in this tender and appreciative manner, and as they sat or stood by the hero of a box and saw one article after another taken out and unwrapped, each speaking so eloquently of the loving care and thoughtful remembrance of kindred or friends, they were moved by mingled feelings of pleasure and sadness: pleasure at their comrade’s good-fortune and downright enjoyment of his treasure, and sadness at their own lonely condition, with no one to remember them in this pleasant manner, and often would their eyes fill with tears by the contrast of their own situation with the pleasant scene before them. But these men were generally remembered by a liberal donation whenever a box came to camp.

Still, there were selfish men in every company, and, if they were selfish by nature, the war, I think, had a tendency to make them more so. Such men would keep their precious box and its precious contents away from sight, smell, and taste of all outsiders. It was a little world to them, and all their own. “Send for a box yourself, if you want one,” appeared in their every look, and often found expression in words. As a boy I have seen a school-mate munching an apple before now with two or three of his less favored acquaintances wistfully watching and begging for the core. But the men of whom I speak never had any core to their apples; they absorbed everything that was sent them.

I knew one man who, I think, came uncomfortably near belonging to this class of soldiers. The first box he ever received contained, among other delicacies, about a peck of raw onions. Before these onions had been reached in this man’s consumption of the contents of his box a move was ordered. What was to be done? It was one of the trying moments of his life. Nineteen out of every twenty men, if not ninety-nine out of every hundred, would at this eleventh hour have set them outside of the tent and said, “Here they are, boys. Take hold and help yourselves!” But not he. He was the hundredth man, the exception. So, packing them up with some old clothes, he at once expressed them back to his home. But, as I have intimated, such men were few in number, and, while war made this class more selfish, yet its community of hardship and danger and suffering developed sympathy and large-hearted generosity among the rank and file generally, and they shared freely with their less fortunate but worthy comrades.