Very soon the Fair ground was a camp; we on one side—the 8th N.Y., Colonel Varian, opposite. Tents were up, fires blazing, and cooking and eating going on. As I had not started with the regiment, I had no tent, and none could be had here, so my camping consisted of piling my traps in a heap. But I needed none, and indeed, throughout the whole time was under one but twice. Tents are all very well, when you are quietly encamped for any length, of time; but when, as with us, you are on the more continually, I consider them a humbug and nuisance. You must carry half a one all day, and at night join it with your comrade's half. The common shelter tent, which is the only one that can be so carried, is a poor protection against heavy rain, for the water can beat in at the sides and form pools beneath you; against midday sun you can guard with a blanket and two muskets, and at any other time you need no shelter.
That night I went on guard. Two hours you watch, four for sleep, and then two hours you watch again. All quiet, save that two or three prisoners are brought in from the front to be deposited in limbo, and gazed at in the morning by recruits who have never seen a live rebel.
The most surprising thing I learned in these first days, was that everything one has will certainly be stolen by his own regiment, even by his own company, if he does not watch it carefully. This practice is styled 'winning.' It is simple, naked stealing, in no wise to be excused or palliated, and utterly disgraceful. It imposes, moreover, the grievous nuisance of remaining to guard your property when you would be loafing about, or of carrying everything—no light load—with you, wherever you go. Of course, all colonels should prevent this, and one of any force and energy could easily do so; but Colonel—— is not of that kind. An excellent company officer, as I judge, he has not the activity and nerve required in the commander of a regiment, and many a wish did I hear expressed in those thirty days that his predecessor, Colonel Martin, were still in command. Confidence in his bravery before the enemy, was universal; but many things necessary to the decorum, discipline, health, &c., of the regiment devolve duties finally upon the colonel, for whose discharge other qualities than bravery are needed.
The next afternoon, the 24th, our laziness is disturbed by orders to take three days' rations; our knapsacks are to be sent to Harrisburg; we are to pack up everything, to be ready to move, Nobody knows, of course, what it means; but a decided conviction prevails that 'something heavy is up.' Presently a hollow square is 'up,' formed of the 8th and ourselves, field officers in the centre. Colonel Varian advances. Unquestionably a speech. Perhaps a few Napoleonic words on the eve of battle. No; Colonel Varian wishes to explain that it was nobody's fault that our left wing was deserted at Chambersburg, in order to prevent ill feeling between the regiments. He does so, and appeals to our lieutenant-colonel. Our lieutenant-colonel verifies and indorses. Perfectly satisfactory; in evidence of which the two commands exchange cheers.
Henceforth we and the 8th are fast friends. We have other friends also—Captain Miller's battery, of Pennsylvania, has been in front with us, and though out for 'the emergency,' declares it will stay as long as the 71st. So we all fraternize, hailing any member as '8th,' '71st,' or 'Battery,' and cheer when we pass each other. The 8th are good cheerers, and though we outnumbered them, I think they outdid us in three times three and a 'tiger,' the inevitable refrain. The 'tiger' (sounding tig-a-h-h) is the test of a cheer. If the cheer be a spontaneous burst of hearty good feeling, the tiger concentrates its energy, and is full and prolonged—if it be only the cheer courteous or the cheer civil, the tiger will fall off and die prematurely.
Just at dark we left camp, passed rapidly through the town, along the turnpike about two miles, and halted in a cornfield beside the road, where we formed line of battle. We received orders to 'load at will,' and fire low. The 8th were on the opposite side of the road, and their battery somewhere near us. After some time, nobody appearing, permission was given to thrust our muskets by the bayonets in the ground; and soon after, one by one, the men dropped off asleep. The evening had been extremely sensational. The sudden departure, the rapid march, whither and for what we knew not, yet full of momentary expectation; the orders and preparations indicating the imminence of grim, perhaps ghastly work, in the night hours; the line of men, stretching beyond sight in the darkness, far from home, and, it might be, near to death, sleeping yet waiting:—the total was singularly impressive.
Nevertheless, I too was soon asleep, and slept undisturbed till morning. Then, rebels or no rebels, we must have breakfast. There was none to be had in the regiment; but the farmhouses supplied us, and an ancient dame intermitted packing her goods for flight, to cook the pork which made part of my three days' rations. Then I stretched myself beneath the shade of a roadside house within sound of orders, and having nothing else on hand, went to sleep again.
I was now broken in. Camp rations I could eat; camp coffee, though always sans milk and often sans sugar, I deemed good; a wash was a luxury, not a necessity; and I could sleep anywhere.
When I was aroused, I found a barricade thrown up across the road, and a force of contrabands digging a trench across the field. A cavalry picket reported the enemy within half a mile, advancing. The citizens came out from Carlisle to aid us, and we went in line into the trenches. Two men were detailed from each company to carry off the wounded; the red hospital flag fluttered upon a house behind us, and the colonel, passing in front, told us they were very near, and exhorted us not to let them pass. But the day wore on to evening, and no rebels appeared, and at dark we moved again. Starting in a heavy rain, we marched nine miles to the borders of a town known as New Kingston. Here we halted while quarters were hunted up. Every man, tired with the rapid walking through rain and mud, squatted at once in the road, no matter where, and then along the whole column singing began. A soldier will sing under all circumstances, comfortable or uncomfortable.
At length we moved into the town and took possession of a church, distributing ourselves in aisles, pews, and pulpit. What little remained of the night, we were glad to have in quiet. It had been questionable whether we could reach Kingston, for on the march it was rumored that we were flanked; and a man, emerging from the shade as we passed, had asked a question of the chaplain, and, receiving no answer, had retreated a few yards, and fired his piece in the air, which looked very like a signal. The next morning, the 26th, we went into camp in woods just in front of the town, while the general and the surgeon established headquarters in the town.