"Vat for you be guerilla for?"
"I'm not a guerilla, sir; I'm in the regular Confederate service."
"Vat for you lay in ambush, den?"
"I didn't lay in any bush, sir; I was standing behind a tree."
"Ha! You be von rascally guerilla, and we vill shtring you up to a tree, ven we arrive in Newbern!"
But it is needless to say this threat was not carried out.
The reg't here received orders to rejoin the division (the 9th army corps) which was about to leave the Department with Gen. Burnside, and started of a Sunday morning 28th (without breakfast) on their return. The weather was intensely hot, and the sand on the road was ankle deep. The case, however, was pressing, and the men were urged to their utmost; but the task was too much for them,—and when the reg't arrived at the landing about 4 P.M., after a march of 22 miles, it numbered little more than a full company—the remaining 400 or 500 being distributed along the road for miles back. They, however, kept coming in squads of from two to twenty during the remaining part of the afternoon and evening—and a more tired and thoroughly used up lot of men it would be difficult to find anywhere. To make matters worse, when the reg't arrived at the landing opposite Newbern, they found no transportation for them, and nothing wherewith to satisfy the cravings of hunger. It was not until about 12 o'clock at night that they received a ration of hard bread and salt meat; but no vessels arrived to transport them across, and they were forced to lay out upon the sandy beach, without shelter, in a pelting, pitiless rain, which had set in early in the evening. Next morning a couple of scows or flat-boats arrived, and they were taken across; but Gen. Burnside pitying their forlorn and used up condition, and thinking it would be an act of cruelty to put men in such a state on board transports, ordered the 6th New Hampshire reg't to take their place. Thus the Seventeenth were cheated by fate out of their share of the glory of South Mountain, Antietam, Bull Run 2d, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Knoxville; and were compelled to silently and doggedly face and fight the most deadly of human foes in its own malarial fens and swamps.
About the first of July the reg't was ordered to camp on the south side of the Trent river near the county bridge, to do picket and outpost duty, which consisted of sending a company to Bray's Ferry and plantation about three miles out, and another to Evans' Mills—seven miles down the railroad towards Beaufort.
About July 25th the regiment went in an expedition to Pollocksville, and constructed a bridge across the Trent river for the entire column to cross upon, after reaching which place, Col. Amory, who was in command, decided to push on to Trenton; but upon approaching to within four miles of the latter place he found the enemy too strong, and withdrew without bringing on an engagement.