Our time here was fully occupied in building houses for the winter, standing picket, doing guard and fatigue duty more or less exposed to the enemy's fire, day and night.
On the 8th of December the 37th, in company with the 109th N. Y. were ordered to move to the rear and report to Brevet Col. Robinson, commanding Provisional Brigade. We moved out soon after dark on a bitter cold night, a cutting north-east wind sweeping over the bare surface of the country with a chill that went to the marrow. All that night and the next day and night, when a mingled storm of rain and snow set in, as if to cap the climax and add what little was wanting, of making our situation as uncomfortable as possible, we remained on a bare open common, without any tents, a good many without blankets, and with nothing at hand with which to build a fire.
The Sanitary Commission, with its well-known generosity, sent down a pair of woolen mittens and a cup of hot milk punch for each man in the brigade, on the evening of the second day, which added materially to our comfort and rendered our situation somewhat more endurable.
At length, at about 3 o'clock of the afternoon of the third day, the orders came to march. It was drawing towards the close of a dull, raw winter's day as our men, stiff and cold with exposure and want of rest, started wearily off down the Jerusalem Plank Road. The road was almost knee deep in half frozen mud and sleet, the broken planks lay round in every direction, and as we blundered on through the darkness that, accompanied by a drizzling rain, soon fell on us, many "a curse not loud but deep" was vented on Virginia, her roads and her rebels. Once, and once only did we rest that night, and daylight, or as much of it as could struggle through a dull, leaden looking sky, found us at the end of our march, at Hawkin's Tavern, on the Nottoway River, the scene of the defeat of Kautz and Wilson in their raid during the summer of '63. And here, for the first time, we learned the nature and object of our expedition.
The second and fifth corps had started off on a raid along the line of the Weldon R. R. which they had struck at Jarrett's Station, and had torn up and destroyed the track from that point to the North Carolina line, burning the bridge over the Meherrin River, and pushing on, almost to Weldon. Our mission was to reinforce them and protect their rear, on the homeward march, if the disposition of the enemy's force should seem to menace their safety, and we were ordered to wait at Hawkin's till their rear had passed.
About 3 o'clock the Second Corps passed through our camp and immediately afterwards the Provisional Brigade was put in motion and followed them at a rapid rate. About two miles from Hawkin's we passed through the midst of the 2d corps, camped on each side the road, but no orders were given us to halt and our command was pushed on, without a halt and without a rest, until the thirty miles between us and camp were accomplished. This was the severest marching we ever undertook, the distance being accomplished in about seven hours by men in heavy marching order, carrying sixty rounds ammunition and four days rations, besides their knapsacks and accoutrements, and chilled and stiffened by exposure to three days and nights very inclement weather. On our return, in retaliation for the murder of two of its number by citizens of Sussex county, the 2d corps fired every house and building along the line of march, from the Nottoway river to our rear line of works, in front of Petersburg, drove off large numbers of oxen, sheep, pigs, horses, mules, &c., and brought in with them a large number of negroes.
After our return to the inside of our lines in front of Petersburg, we remained for two days in a temporary camp, in rear of the Jones House, after which we returned to our old camp on the Baxter Road, where we remained in winter quarters till the opening of the campaign of '65.