Till the rebel horde shall bite the dust,
And the North and South encircled be
With the bands of truth and liberty.
Fight on, till our starry flag of blue,
Each glistening fold to its purpose true,
Shall wave from wild Atlantic’s roar
To the golden strands of Pacific’s shore.
At the conclusion of these exercises a bountiful collation was served up, after which the men separated, to await the completion of the papers necessary to the final muster out of service, which took place July twenty-seventh, 1863.
Thus terminated the eventful campaign of the Twenty-seventh Connecticut Volunteers. During this brief term of nine months, the regiment performed marches in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, amounting to no less than five hundred miles, and participated in three of the great battles of the war—Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg—losing in killed and wounded in the first, about one third, and in the last, one half, of those present in action. Very many of our number, on their return, reënlisted in other organizations, and illustrated on new fields the same valor which bore them and their comrades up the fiery slope of Fredericksburg, nerved all hearts calmly to meet disaster in the wilderness of Chancellorsville, and crowned with victory the heights of Gettysburg.