CINCINNATI:
PRINTED BY WALDEN & STOWE,
FOR THE AUTHOR.
1881
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1881, by
R. E. M'BRIDE,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
PREFACE.
In giving this book to the public we do so under the same plea which justifies those pleasant gatherings called "reunions," where men of the same regiment, corps, or army, meet to extend friendly greetings to each other, to friends, and all comrades in arms.
The writer has found it a pleasant task to recall the scenes of fifteen years ago, when, a mere boy in years, he had a part in the events here recorded. He is conscious of a kindly affection toward the men who were his companions during those stirring times. Kindness, thoughtfulness, forbearance, toward the boy-soldier, are not forgotten. If he found any thing different from these in his intercourse with men or officers, it has passed from memory, and he would not recall it if he could.
We trust, also, that this work may have a mission of utility to the generation that has grown up since the war.
There is a certain almost indefinable something, which has been summed up under the expression, "military traditions." This comes not alone from formal histories of the wars of the nation, but more largely from the history which each soldier carried home with him after the war was over. It meant something more than a certain amount of small family vanity, when men used to say, "My father was a soldier of the Revolution;" "My father fought at Lundy's Lane."