At 9 P. M. we reached the Mississippi at Morgan's Bend, or Morganzia. The cattle had been shot down and were lying as they fell. It was everyone for himself. Chunks were cut out and were being eaten before the animal was done kicking. A pack of wolves never acted more ravenous and bloodthirsty. I managed to get my hand between the ribs of one and hold of the liver. I couldn't pull my hand out without straightening the fingers and so only got shreds, but I kept it up until I had taken the edge off my appetite and then lay over on my back and was sound asleep. I suppose a hundred men stepped over me and maybe on me, but nothing disturbed my slumbers. I slept like a dead man.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] Better known as the Plains of Mansura.
CHAPTER XVI
Camp at Morganzia, La.
On picket with the western men—Smallpox appears—A pay-day misunderstanding—Building Fort Morgan—Fourth of July dinner—General Order 88—The army moving away.
May 22, 1864.
Sunday. The sun was shining bright, and the flies were crawling over my bloody face, and hands when I awoke. Tony had got in and had found some hard-tack and a piece of beef for my breakfast. The skeletons of the cattle were picked clean. The field looked like a battleground. Men were stretched on the ground everywhere and in every position, and others were picking their way about among them. But unlike a battlefield, the dead began to rise up and move about. At 8 o'clock the order "Fall in" came and soon after we started again. I had to walk on my heel, for something was grinding the ends of my toes off. No attention was paid to the order of our going; it was simply a question of going at all. We only went about a mile, when we stopped in a grove of big trees between the road and the river, and preparations for camping were soon under way. Captain Laird appeared and took charge of his company. He said he had lost us while fighting fire in Alexandria. I joined the multitude in the river. The dirt our clothes and our bodies had picked up on the way was astonishing. Enough of it to make a garden was soon floating down the river. My feet were in terrible shape, one much worse than the other. The blisters had broken and bled and the dirt had formed a scab, which had acted like a grater on the raw flesh underneath.
A good swim in the river and a good beating of our clothes, together with a good dinner after it, made the world seem different to all of us. The hard tramp was over and we cared little what came next. The 90th had had the hardest time of all. We had to hustle from the rear to the front with the pontoons, marching mile after mile and hour after hour, while others were sleeping soundly by the way. Upon comparing notes I had the satisfaction of knowing I was the only white man in the regiment that had walked the entire distance. Every other one confessed to having ridden some part of the way. From the time we formed in line at Yellow Bayou until we stopped at Morgan's Bend was forty-one hours of hard marching, on scant rations and with less than an hour's sleep all put together. I had heard and read of forced marching, and now that I had taken part in one, I was ready to believe anything that was ever said or written on the subject. Major Palon's prophecy that I would find plenty of filling for my diary had certainly come true. I have only skimmed over the account, but will never forget the rest. It would fill a book if written out, and then only give a faint idea of the reality. The sufferings of the horses and mules made me sick at heart. Men, when they could go no farther, said so and gave up trying, but the poor beasts' sufferings went right on until neither whip nor spur could get another move out of them.