One week ago to-night—Tuesday, August 2d—the order was issued about 9 p.m. for the regiments constituting this division to break camp at 8 a.m. the next day. Morning came, and a hotter day has not dawned this hot season. An hour's delay, under heavy marching orders, was not rest. At 9 o'clock the Third Missouri, or rather two battalions of it, less the men who were bare-footed and sick, marched out of Camp Alger with the first Rhode Island, Second Tennessee, One Hundred and Fifty-ninth Indiana, Third New York, Twenty-second Kansas, Sixth Pennsylvania, Seventh Illinois, Ninth Massachusetts and the recruits of Duffield's separate brigade. Such forced marching was perhaps never required of soldiers not beating a retreat or hurrying to a strategic point or an imperative attack.
Within one hour after leaving camp the men were "killed." This is the way they express it. The sweltering heat, the dust, the humid atmosphere, the narrow, deep-cut, dusty roads, closed in by thick woods, combined to make the marching difficult. Besides each man carried a burden of not less than seventy pounds—gun, knapsack, haversack, blanket, poncho, field-tent, canteen, mess outfit and day's rations—what wonder that they fell out by dozens and scores? Experienced army men said they never knew of such a day's march. It was not the distance, for that was not so great. It was the conditions that have been only barely indicated, and the absence of any apparent reason for it all.
When Burk Station was reached three-fourths of all the men had fallen out. This is a conservative estimate.
When the Third Missouri marched to Difficult Run a few weeks before—a distance nearly as great—not 3 per cent of its men fell out. Company K, for example, lost not a single man on that march. This company arrived at Burk Station with fifteen men, all told, out of eighty-five that started. Other companies fared much worse.
Rest the next day was simply imperative. Most of the men who had no shoes had been left behind in the old camp. Now many others were in their bare feet on stony ground. Besides this, rations were inadequate. I saw men look at their petty dole of two onions, two potatoes, six hardtacks and a chunk of fat salt pork—the issue for a day—and in disgust toss it to the ground. Of course, the country was foraged. Those who fell out on the march were not going to starve in a land of plenty, even if a commandment, which they had respected hitherto, did say, "Thou shalt not steal." Nor was it likely that those who came into camp would be content with such scanty fare when corn in the fields about was in roasting-ear and potatoes were abundant, and chickens and turkeys at the farm-houses around threatened to make a night attack upon the camp unless they themselves were first surprised and captured.
The boys did not always stop with the confiscation of this small game. As they marched along the next day they amused the country people, who flocked to the roadside to see them pass, by asking, "Who killed the cow?" "Who killed the sheep?" and so on, and answering, "Such-and-such a regiment."
From Camp Alger to Thoroughfare Gap, where we are now sunk in yellow mud, not many farms within a mile of the road escaped a visit from soldiers, who took or were given something to satisfy their hunger. I rode on horseback behind the troops and made frequent side-excursions. My statements are based on what I saw with my own eyes and learned from the citizens and from the soldiers—the soldiers making no secret of the fact as they deemed themselves justified by the circumstances.
The march from Burk Station to Bull Run was through mud. The night before a heavy rain fell and every man in camp, possibly, got drenched. Still the marching was improved, but rations were shorter and shoes were more worn. But the boys kept up their spirits surprisingly, only saying they would never forget the Maine, not adding "to —— with Spain." It was Sunday. I don't know that this made them swear less—who could have told it was the Lord's day? If it had been in '62 and Stonewall Jackson had been just beyond the Berkshire Hills, advancing on one of his alarming maneuvers toward Washington, it would have been justifiable to order tents struck at 5 o'clock Sunday morning that we might advance and hold Thoroughfare Gap against the enemy. As it was—others besides the chaplain simply submitted.
Our camp on Bull Run was well situated. It could not have been healthier, the water supply for bathing purposes was the best we have ever had, and for drinking purposes was adequate and fairly good. But we were ordered to advance, and that night the soldiers who volunteered to serve their country in a Christian cause slept tired, hungry and wet, for another rain-storm beat through their little canvas kennels. Our camp this time was on Broad Run, near Bristow. Remaining here over Monday, we broke camp again this (Tuesday) morning, notwithstanding the fact that the rain had poured in torrents during the night that the sky was still overcast and lowering. As the men were marched out I asked a surgeon what he thought of it. His answer was one word, "Murder."