Recollections with the Third Iowa Regiment

by Seymour D. Thompson

At 7 A. M. on the 26th, our regiment marched to the railroad depot. Major Stone was in command Col. Scott having been detailed on a military commission. We waited in the cold till about noon for our baggage wagons to be brought up and loaded on the train. We had no rations in our haversacks; for when we left the barracks we had nothing to cook. Finally, to the great joy of all, the train moved out, and three o'clock in the afternoon found us opposite St. Charles. After many delays, seasoned with jokes, curses and cries of "bread," we succeeded in getting across the Missouri and aboard another train of cars and off. It was worthy of note, that for the first time but one in our experience as military railroaders, we were transported in passenger cars. For the consolation of the inner man, we drew from our quartermaster fifteen loaves of bread to the company, but no "small fishes." With these we appeased our stomachs, outraged by famine since Christmas noon. At length night came, and we could no longer enjoy looking at the scenery through which we were passing: so we hitched ourselves together as best we could (for the cars were crowded to their utmost capacity), and went to sleep. Whenever we awoke, until late in the morning, we could feel the unsteady motion of the carriages. Morn broke upon us at Warrenton. It was not a little amusing to view the scene which daylight ushered in. Some were sleeping on the seats, some between the seats, some in the aisles; lying on top of each other for pillows; horizontal, inclined and vertical; sometimes the head highest, sometimes the heels. Loud were the barkings of incipient consumptives; hoarse the groans of those whose hunger was not yet appeased, and dire the vengeance denounced against the bridge-burners who had put us to all this hardship.

The scenery through which we passed was lovely, even in the gray shroud of winter.

At 10 A. M. we arrived at Florence, and had scarcely finished our breakfasts, when six companies, R, E, F, H, I and K, were ordered to get ready to march. The remaining four companies were left to guard the place, considered an important one; for it was the farthest point northward from St. Charles to which the cars could run, the track being injured and the wires cut beyond it.

We, the battalion that marched, were joined by a company of German cavalry of the 1st Regiment Missouri Reserve Corps, and immediately moved toward the west. A march of three miles brought us to the town of Danville, from which a small column of Union troops, commanded by Brig. Gen. Henderson of the State Militia, had marched an hour previous. We followed him, but by a shorter and less traveled road. The snow which had fallen some days previous, was not yet melted away in the timber, through which, most of the way, our road led us. Night found us marching on. The sky was clear and the stars sparkled brilliantly above us. The keen air quickly congealed the running snow, and rendered the hills so slippery that it was not without much difficulty and danger that the wagons could follow us.

We camped for the night on a meadow, bordering on a small stream of excellent water and surrounded on all sides by timber. It was ten o'clock before the wagons got up, and we then discovered that our quartermaster had no bread for us. By some means the supply which had been furnished for us had been left behind. The quartermaster of course had to shoulder the blame. We cooked a scanty supply of bacon, rice and coffee, and slept in battle line away from our camp-fires, fearing a surprise. Our bed was the frozen ground; our tents the sky. Our thin woolen blankets furnished little protection against the keen air. We lay on our backs, and, if our heads were not smothered in our blankets, watched the stars, but doubtless with different emotions from those of the devout old Chaldean shepherds; and when we slept, we dreamed of—Heaven knows what. Some were at Valley Forge; one retreated all night from Moscow; and many fled to their warm firesides at home.

As morning streaked the east, we shook the stupor of our cold slumber from our limbs, and tried to dispel the gloom from our minds. Some of us had actually been sleeping on four inches of snow. Our breakfast, the same fare as our previous supper, afforded us little cheer. At half past seven o'clock we were again on the move. We marched slowly, doubtless, in order that our bread wagons which were coming could overtake us. In this we were disappointed.

We camped on a beautiful meadow, having made but nine miles. The Major had some hogs killed for our benefit; but this was not the only kind of fresh meat seen in our camp that night. The feeling in our ranks toward the citizens of this section was one of extreme bitterness. We believed that they were guilty, at least in part, of the depredations which had rendered our presence among them necessary. To take up arms against us; to hide in the brush and shoot down our stragglers; to crawl up under cover of night and assassinate our pickets; to prowl about the country in guerrilla bands, and attack our small detachments; to burn railroad bridges and cut telegraph wires; to act as spies for the enemy; to give him shelter, food and cheer; and then, if captured in arms, to claim the rights of a prisoner of war; if without arms, to claim protection as a non-combatant, or, what is still worse, as a Union man; such we knew from experience to be the character of a large portion of the disloyal citizens of Missouri.

A soldier admires open enemies if they are brave. There is nothing that he despises as he despises such enemies as these. "Hang them if they act as spies or bridge-burners. Subsist our armies upon them. Confiscate their property and put it to the use of war. A war waged against such traitors ought to support itself. Give us such a leader as Jim Lane. Nothing short of his policy would do. We never would end the war until we showed traitors that we considered treason a crime." Such sentiments were canvassed freely in our ranks and found no contradictors. But we were only soldiers. We could not shape the policy of the Government in reference to the traitors. We were to execute the will of the commanding general. We could not take a chicken from the premises of an enemy in arms, without violating orders from our superiors. It is a correct maxim, that soldiers should not plunder. It is likewise a correct maxim that an army should not suffer from hunger while marching through the country of men who by acts of treason have forfeited all right to the protection of the Government. We reasoned that the commanding general should authorize impressments of food for our use when we needed it as we did then. At all events we ought not to suffer from hunger, and if food could not be obtained properly, it must at least be obtained. Such was the reasoning which prompted the little nocturnal expeditions which went out from our camp, in spite of the active measures of the Major to prevent them, and which resulted in supplying some of the necessities we lacked.

The following day, December 29th, was clear and beautiful. We waited for the rear wagons till about noon; but they did not arrive and we took up the march. The ground thawed, and before night, the mud was deep and the march difficult. We camped for the night on a broad prairie near Martinsburg Station on the North Missouri Railroad. We obtained water by cutting holes through the ice of a pond which rests against the railway embankment and supplies a tank. The ice was about three inches thick. Most of us pitched tents and pulled grass and made beds. About 7 P. M. we were rejoiced at the appearance of the long expected bread wagons.

December 30th broke soft and balmy, the wind blowing from the south. At ten o'clock we heard dull sounds upon the wind as of a distant conflict of arms. It was not imagination. Every one heard them, and we were all curiosity to know their meaning. Soon after, a number of scouts arrived from Mexico with orders to Major Stone to hurry on to that place. They at the same time brought reports of an engagement in that vicinity. We moved without delay. The column kept the railroad track till within about three miles of Mexico, when it took a wagon road to the left. The mud was deep, and wagons several times stalled and men had to be detailed to lift them out. These accidents caused temporary delays, so that we did not reach Mexico till 9 P. M. We found here a force under Brig. Gen. Schofield, of the State troops. Gen. Henderson had just left in pursuit of the enemy. Of the cause of the firing we had heard, we could learn nothing. It might have been a skirmish. It was more likely a detachment discharging their pieces to get the loads out of them.