General Meade was a man of personal bravery and experience, highly respected, but not very popular in the army. However, the Army of the Potomac was loyal to him, as it had been to all its commanders, and the soldiers proved their loyalty by tremendous sacrifices. It has been said that this fine army was always better than its commanders, of whom General Meade was the fifth within less than two years. McDowell, McClellan, Burnside and Hooker preceded him; Pope had commanded only a part of the army at the second Bull Run. I have always held the opinion that, if the unfortunate Army of the Potomac could have had General William T. Sherman for its commander in its earlier days, the war would have terminated successfully for the North much sooner, providing he had been given a free hand to plan his own campaigns.

Although it was a delicate time to change commanders in the presence of the enemy, not a ripple occurred to disturb the harmony or movements of the army. General Meade was a favorite with General Halleck and took it upon himself to break up the garrison at Harper's Ferry, which had been denied to Hooker, and no notice was taken of his action at Washington. On June twenty-ninth the army, which had been chiefly concentrated at Frederick, was put into motion on several roads towards Gettysburg.

General Meade's promotion caused some changes in the Fifth Army Corps; General Sykes became the corps commander; General Romeyn B. Ayres commanded the Second (Regular) Division; Colonel Hannibal Day the First, and Colonel Sidney Burbank the Second Brigade. The Third (Volunteer) Brigade was in command of General Stephen H. Weed. All of these commanders were good and experienced officers, who had served in the army before the war.

The supply train of the Fifth Corps followed the troops as far as Westminster, about twenty miles southeast of Gettysburg, where there was a branch railroad, connecting with the main road from Baltimore to Harrisburg. An engagement with Stuart's cavalry had taken place at Westminster on the previous day, and some dead horses were still strewn along the road and the streets of the town. The train was kept at Westminster during the three days' battle at Gettysburg, it is said, because General Meade intended to fall back to the strong line of Pipe Creek, not far from Westminster, had he been unsuccessful. On the third day of the battle we could hear very plainly the firing of the two hundred and thirty guns, which preceded General Pickett's famous charge that afternoon. On the evening of the third of July the supply train left Westminster and, after traveling all night, arrived at Gettysburg on July fourth and halted in the rear of Little Round Top, as near to the Fifth Corps as we could get. Here I issued rations to our brigade and when that was completed I left my horse with the train and ascended Little Round Top to view the great battle-field. It commenced to rain hard soon after and continued to do so all day. My view was very limited, owing to the rain, but I could see burying parties at work in some of the places where fierce fighting had taken place.

When I found my regiment I learned that Lieutenant Goodrich had been killed, three officers wounded, five soldiers killed and about fifty wounded. The losses in the Fifth Corps had been very heavy on the second day's battle. The corps had arrived on the field early that morning.

The Fourth of July passed quietly, both armies holding their positions, but General Lee was sending his trains away; and on the morning of the fifth General Meade found that the Rebel Army had disappeared—the same thing that had happened to McClellan at Antietam. General Lee retreated rapidly by the shortest route to Williamsport on the Potomac, where he found his pontoon bridges destroyed and the river so high from recent rains as to be unfordable. General Meade pursued leisurely by a much longer route. This gave the Rebels at least four days' time to take up a strong position and fortify it, when they discovered that they could not cross the Potomac.

The Fifth Corps left Gettysburg on the afternoon of the fifth of July and moved by way of Emmitsburg and Middletown across the South Mountain range at Fox's Gap to Williamsport, where it arrived about the eleventh. Part of this route was familiar to us, as we had gone over it the previous year. General Meade directed a strong reconnaissance to be made on the morning of the fourteenth, which developed the fact that the enemy had slipped across the Potomac during the previous night. The authorities at Washington were angry at the escape of the enemy without another battle; and the army, whose hopes had been raised to a high pitch by their victory at Gettysburg, grumbled audibly. General Meade wrote to General Halleck asking to be relieved of the command of the Army of the Potomac, but his request was not granted. Military critics claim that in allowing Lee to escape from Gettysburg and again at Williamsport, General Meade missed the greatest opportunity of the war to rout the Rebel Army and end the struggle nearly two years sooner.

My horse, which had become a great pet, grew fat while traveling through the rich farming lands of Maryland and Pennsylvania, where there was an abundance of the finest clover and corn. On night marches I often snatched a little sleep along the road by leaning forward in the saddle, resting my head on his neck and encircling it with my arms. Sometimes I fell asleep sitting up straight in the saddle when slowly jogging along, until awakened by a low branch of a roadside tree brushing my face or knocking off my cap. At such times the horse seemed to be asleep also, and moved along mechanically.

The people in this section treated the soldiers kindly; some women baked bread and biscuits to give away; others sold us bread, butter, eggs and pies at most reasonable prices. And how good that bread tasted! I remember reporting for orders at brigade headquarters camp one evening when the officers were having supper and overhearing the General remark that he would like to marry the woman who baked the bread he was eating, no matter what her looks might be. In some of the small villages and farmhouses the natives understood but little English and spoke only Pennsylvania Dutch.

General Meade put the army in motion on the fifteenth of July for Harper's Ferry, where we crossed the Potomac, and I had an opportunity to see John Brown's Fort. Some of the troops crossed at Berlin, about six miles below. We marched east of the Blue Ridge, over much of the same road McClellan had traveled the previous fall, while the Rebels passed down the Shenandoah Valley, guarding all the passes. At Manassas Gap the Confederates were overtaken and an attempt was made to bring on an engagement, which resulted in a lively skirmish until darkness came on, but next morning the enemy had disappeared. We resumed our march leisurely, by way of Warrenton, and about the sixth of August went into permanent camp at Beverly Ford on the Rappahannock, drawing our supplies from Culpeper on the Orange and Alexandria railroad.

While on this march, near Centreville, we noticed a horse in a field some distance off the road. His condition was deplorable, he hobbled most painfully, and I suppose the greater part of the army had seen him in passing, but no one cared to have such a lame and sorry-looking animal. One of my men was curious enough to go out into the field to look at him, and discovered that his foot was wedged fast into an empty tomato can; and when that was removed he was no longer lame. The horse was cleaned and fed and became a useful extra riding-horse. He was known by the name of "Centreville."

About this time we read in the papers about serious riots in New York city called the "Draft Riots." Congress had passed an act to enroll all available citizens of the loyal states for military duty, to enable the states to furnish their quota, when called upon for additional troops by the Government. Names were to be drawn by lottery, and each man so drawn was to serve in the army or furnish an acceptable substitute. This had to be done; all the two-year volunteers had been discharged and, after the defeats at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, there were few voluntary enlistments. The regulars were unable to obtain any recruits to fill up their skeleton regiments, owing to county and town bounties offered for volunteers. The riots in New York had been controlled for the time being, but there was much uneasiness in the city as to what would occur when the actual drawing of names began, for the Government needed soldiers and was bound to enforce the draft. It was therefore decided to send the two small brigades of regulars and a few volunteer regiments to New York city to report there for duty to General John A. Dix, commanding the Department of the East.

Accordingly on August thirteenth the troops destined for New York city, under the command of General R. B. Ayres, left their camps for Alexandria, some of the soldiers going on freight-cars from Culpeper, while others marched with the supply train to Alexandria. On our arrival there, after issuing rations, I was ordered to turn over all Government property to the depot commissary, make out transfers and take receipts for it for Lieutenant Greeley. It cost me a severe pang to part with my horse Tommy, to whom I had become much attached. He was so gentle that often after a hard march when he was unsaddled and fed he would lie on the grass and I would lie down with him, resting my head on his neck and we would both go to sleep.

My little staff of assistants was dispersed and sent to their companies; and so was I, but not to do duty with them, only to be accounted for. I was still brigade commissary sergeant and was to be at Lieutenant Greeley's call when needed. We had to wait for transportation in Alexandria, where my regiment was on a block in a private street. We stacked arms in the street, and in the daytime sat on the curbstone under the shade trees or loafed about the neighborhood. We did our cooking by little fires in the street and at night lay down on the brick sidewalks in front of the houses. This we did for two nights. Fortunately it did not rain. In the house before which my company was stationed there were some ladies who had a piano and they sang secession songs after dark; and we retaliated by singing all the Union songs we knew. They kept their blinds closed and we saw none but negro servants enter or leave the house while we were there. On the third day we marched to the wharf and embarked on a freight steamer—the worst old tub I was ever on! As usual, we were crowded and I preferred to remain on deck and camped near one of the masts. This steamer was a very slow propeller. The weather was fine and we got along fairly well down the Potomac and the Chesapeake Bay, until we passed the Capes and entered the Atlantic, when we discovered that she was a high-roller and hadn't ballast enough. Soon more than half of the command was seasick. The ship had no bulwarks, only an open pipe railing through which it would be quite easy to roll over-board. As I was not seasick I remained on deck, taking the precaution to tie myself to the mast in the night-time. We were a long time getting to New York, where we arrived in the middle of the day and landed at a dock at the foot of Canal Street.

Parts of our brigades, who were on faster boats, had arrived on the preceding day. The command was scattered throughout the city; some regiments encamped in Battery Park; others in Washington, Union, Madison and Tompkins Squares. Some companies were stationed on the upper part of Fourth Avenue along the New Haven Railroad tracks and elsewhere. My regiment and another encamped on the block bounded by Fifth and Sixth Avenues, Forty-eighth and Forty-ninth Streets. This block was vacant except for a row of four-story buildings on the Sixth Avenue side, still standing. The block had been filled in and graded fairly level a few feet above the street, and had a picket fence on the other three sides. There were few houses in the neighborhood; close by, on Fifth Avenue, were the foundations of St. Patrick's Cathedral which had just been begun. The nearest horse-car line was on Sixth Avenue, where we noticed an occasional car, smaller than the others and painted yellow, bearing a sign in large letters, on either side of the car, which read: "Colored people allowed in this car."

We left the dock at Canal Street during the afternoon and marched up-town by way of Hudson Street, up Sixth Avenue to our destination at Fifth Avenue and Forty-ninth Street, where the men were obliged to sleep on the ground without tents that night. I went to my home. We still had our band, though reduced in numbers. It played during our march uptown, and we had many spectators and the usual juvenile following. We did not look as pretty as the militia the people had been accustomed to see; we were sunburnt, dirty and ragged-looking; but, nevertheless, we received many cheers on the way. The arrival of the soldiers from the Army of the Potomac restored peace of mind to many people in New York and allayed their fears of rioting and destruction of property, while enforcing the draft. No disturbance occurred while that went on; if there had been, the rioters would have received a severe lesson, for we had no sympathy for them.

The next day was a busy one in camp; tents were received and put up; sinks were dug and a water supply arranged for; and guards were posted at the gates to keep the soldiers in and the overwhelming public out. Crowds of people, who seemed to have nothing else to do, lined the fence and crowded the sidewalks from reveille to tattoo, watching the soldiers. In the afternoons the nursery-maids with their baby carriages appeared, and were made love to by the soldiers on the other side of the fence and forgot their charges. At sunset, when dress parade took place and the band played, the sidewalks around the camp were impassable. At night such of the soldiers as were fortunate enough to possess any money and had not obtained a pass jumped the low fence where it was not guarded and remained away until the small hours. The commander was liberal in granting daily passes to a certain number to be absent from camp.

Lieutenant Greeley made a contract with one of the many caterers who supplied food to the conscripts, substitutes and recruits while they were in the city to provide cooked rations for three meals per day for our brigade for the Government money value of a soldier's rations, as computed in New York city. This proved unsatisfactory from the start, the food being poor and insufficient and often cold—being served by wagons, and at irregular times. In a few days the contract was cancelled and each company drew its rations direct from the New York commissary on Stone Street, and were furnished cooking utensils and fire-wood to cook their own rations in camp. This proved to be another very interesting item to the loiterers about the camp, watching the cooking and serving of meals for the soldiers. Lieutenant Greeley gave me the names and addresses of a few prominent bakers in the city, whom I was to interview with regard to obtaining fresh bread for the brigade. Among them I found one named Wall, at that time located on the lower part of Sixth Avenue, or on Carmine Street, who agreed to give us eighteen ounces of good wholesome bread for the daily Government allowance of eighteen ounces of flour, or its money value—which offer was accepted. I now had no duties of any kind to perform, except to see that the baker kept up the weight of his loaves, and I was absolutely free to come and go, when and where I pleased, during our three weeks' stay in New York. I had some money with me, also some at home, where I had at times sent part of my pay. I took advantage of this short opportunity after the arduous field service to enjoy myself as much as possible.

The brigade's headquarters were in Madison Square, which at that time was enclosed by an iron fence set on a granite coping, and around this the crowds were even denser than in my own camp. Here the Fourteenth Infantry and some other troops were encamped. And here Lieutenant Greeley, to whom I reported almost daily, had his tent. The proprietors of the Fifth Avenue Hotel, opposite Madison Square, generously furnished meals for the officers in this camp free of charge during their stay. Sergeant William J. Milligan of the Sixth Infantry, who was acting as brigade quartermaster sergeant, and who was an old bunkie of mine at Governor's Island, had his tent here, where I slept much oftener than I did in my own camp. The tent was under a large tree, facing the main entrance of the hotel, and I believe that I can still point out the tree.

The drawing for conscripts to fill New York city's quota for the Government's call for troops was completed without any trouble, and one morning in September, after a three weeks' stay, we were ordered, much to our regret, to strike tents and prepare to return to the field again. A paymaster appeared in camp very early and gave us four month's pay, which was due us, and which, I believe, had been purposely withheld until the day of our departure. As we were not to leave until sometime in the afternoon, I had plenty of time to say good-by at home and farewell to my friend, Sergeant Milligan, for his regiment, the Sixth Infantry, was ordered to Fort Hamilton in New York Harbor and did not go to the field again during the war. All of the old infantry regiments—the Third, Fourth, Seventh and Tenth—all mere skeletons, were retained in the forts around New York. For some reason the Second Infantry, consisting of six companies, not half full, had to go back to the field again, along with the newer and larger regiments, the Eleventh, Twelfth, Fourteenth and Seventeenth Infantry.

We sat around, ready and waiting for the order to start, but it was well along towards evening before we left camp and marched down Sixth Avenue to Canal Street, the way we had come. Only about one-half of our officers marched with us; the others were probably having farewell dinners and knew that the steamer would not leave until daylight next morning. Many of our men did not have a cent when they arrived. The four months' pay was burning holes in their pockets, and they were tempted to have a little fling before going back to Virginia. The streets were packed with people and it was quite easy to dodge into the crowd and disappear quickly through the open door of some corner saloon without attracting the attention of the officers. By the time we reached Canal Street it was dusk and many slipped away before we reached the dock. When the roll was called, it was discovered that more than forty men were missing, among them the drum-major, Lovell, and one of the color sergeants, named McConnell, who had the regimental colors with him. A detail was sent out to round up the absentees; but after a search of several hours, they had only captured half a dozen. As many more came back of their own accord, in a more or less muddled condition, and when the steamer sailed in the morning about thirty men were still missing. All but two or three of these men rejoined the regiment about a week later in Alexandria. When they finished their spree, or their money gave out, they reported to the provost-marshal, who held them and sent them on. They had a hard time on the steamer with a disreputable lot of conscripts and substitutes, who were thievish and quarrelsome. The drum-major related that he was awakened on deck one night by a man going through his pockets. He said to the thief, "Friend, if you can find anything there, you are welcome to it!" Our colors remained for two days in a hotel on Canal Street, but were brought safely back. My regiment had to submit to a lot of jollying from the other troops about losing one of our colors in New York; but we never lost them to the enemy, neither did any other regular regiment in the Army of the Potomac. It was supposed that these men would all be tried by court-martial for absence without leave, but directly after our return to the field in the latter part of September, General Lee attempted a flank movement which kept our army very busy marching for some time. These were all good and faithful soldiers, and instead of a court-martial a general order was issued fining each man a month's pay.

The return trip of the regiment to Alexandria was uneventful. We had a better boat and made a quicker trip than we did going up to New York. The two regular brigades remained long enough in Alexandria to be refitted with a supply train and other necessities. I resumed my former duties under a new commissary officer, First Lieutenant James B. Sinclair of the Fourteenth United States Infantry. Of my former detail I had but one, all the others being new men. I could not get my old horse back and had to take another which was not nearly so good. The two brigades then joined the main army near Culpeper, about the time when the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps were withdrawn from the Army of the Potomac to serve in the West. The Rebel Army had also been reduced during the summer by sending Longstreet's corps to Tennessee.

When General Lee learned of the departure of two of our Army Corps, he put his troops in motion to turn our right flank and rear. This was the beginning of a campaign of manoeuvres between Generals Meade and Lee, like the moves in a game of chess. We crossed the Rappahannock and for about two weeks we marched and counter-marched along the familiar line of the Orange and Alexandria railroad, the supply trains along with the troops, until by forced marching we reached Centreville ahead of the enemy, where General Meade offered battle. General Lee retreated, however, south of the Rappahannock, destroying the railroad and burning the stations from Bristoe to the Rappahannock.

For some days we were prevented from following him by a heavy rainstorm which made Bull Run unfordable and pontoons had to be sent for. During these marches in the latter part of September, 1863, we passed one morning through the almost deserted small town of Brentsville, the county-seat of Prince William County, Virginia. The street in front of the court house was littered with books or records and bundles of papers which had been maliciously thrown out through the open door and windows, probably by some of our stragglers, or "coffee-coolers," as they were also called. I dismounted and examined some of the books which I found to contain mainly records of wills and transfers of property. Some of these books and papers were being carried off by passing soldiers who, when they examined them at the next halt, either threw them away or built fires with them. I picked up a few bundles of the papers and carried them with me until I got to camp, where I examined them. The greater part of them proved to be written consents from masters for his slaves, "Caesar and Dinah" or "Rastus and Lucy" to get married. No surnames seemed to be used for the slaves. Among the papers there was one, however, which interested me and is still in my possession. It is a writ for the arrest of William Murphy, as follows:

On the reverse side of the paper is this endorsement:

This paper, yellow with age but well preserved, is five by six inches in size. It is a coarsely executed pen blank with the words in italics inserted in fine clear penmanship. John Crump's endorsement is written in a good plain running hand.

The army now took up positions along the north bank of the Rappahannock, where we encamped for two weeks or more, while the railroad was being repaired; and during that time we had to haul supplies from Bristoe Station until the repairs brought them nearer. A number of skirmishes took place during the two weeks of manoeuvring, but no battles were fought.

While at this camp I witnessed the impressive sight of a military execution. A man from one of the new regular regiments had been sentenced by a general court-martial to be shot for desertion. Near sun-down the brigade was paraded and formed three sides of a square on a level field outside of the camp. At the open end of the square was a rude coffin and a newly made grave. Soon the prisoner and provost-guard approached, preceded by a band playing a dead march, passing through the square towards the coffin. There the prisoner, whose bearing was firm and steady, was blindfolded and made to kneel on the coffin. A firing party of eight took position in front of the condemned man at about ten paces. There was a breathless silence for a few minutes, then suddenly were heard the provost-marshal's commands, "Ready! Aim! Fire!" and the man fell forward over the coffin. A surgeon examined him and pronounced him dead; the brigade marched back to camp, and the man was buried in the grave prepared for him.

On the seventh day of November General Meade again put the army in motion to force the passage of the Rappahannock. At Rappahannock Station, where the Rebels were intrenched, there was a spirited engagement, when the Sixth Corps charged the works and captured about sixteen hundred prisoners with small loss to themselves. The Third Corps was also successful in forcing a passage at Kelly's Ford and capturing some four hundred prisoners. The Confederates, taken by surprise, retired during the night beyond Culpeper.

Next day the supply trains crossed at Kelly's Ford and the army went into camp from there to Brandy Station. The railroad had to be repaired as far as Brandy Station, and an important railroad bridge crossing the Rappahannock rebuilt, which consumed considerable time. We supposed that this was to be our winter camp, as the weather grew very bad and cold, as the season advanced, and the road became worse, but it was not to be so. The authorities at Washington, unmindful of the disastrous ending of Burnside's winter campaigns the previous year, urged upon General Meade to continue offensive operations. Accordingly General Meade on the twenty-sixth of November, after a severe storm, broke up the camps and started the army on its march to the fords of the Rapidan.

The Fifth Army Corps crossed the river on a pontoon bridge at a place called Culpeper Mine Ford on the same day, all of the supply trains, except some ammunition wagons, remaining on the north side of the river. On the twenty-eighth it was discovered that a surprise was out of the question, the enemy having concentrated all their forces in a strong position on the west bank of Mine Run.

General Warren, who had commanded the Second Corps since General Hancock had been wounded at Gettysburg, was ordered to make the main attack on the morning of the thirtieth. He made an early examination of the enemy's works and had the moral courage to suspend General Meade's order to attack, sending him word to that effect. This brought General Meade to make a personal examination, after which he agreed with General Warren as to the hopelessness of the attempt. The men of the Second Corps realized that they were to attack a position as hopeless as that at Marye's Heights at Fredericksburg and knew that few would escape. The night before the attack was to be made each man wrote his name, company and regiment on a piece of paper and pinned it to his clothing.

On the same night I was sent across the river with a few supply wagons and reached the front early in the forenoon, when I issued the rations and rested a few hours. I had a good view of a part of the Rebel position, which appeared very formidable, in front of the Fifth Corps. On my return march in the afternoon a cold rain-storm came on, turning to sleet; then it became so cold that my saturated clothing was frozen stiff before I reached camp. The sufferings of the soldiers before the enemy was dreadful. The next day General Meade decided that the campaign was a failure and began to withdraw the army, which recrossed the Rapidan unmolested and, thanks to General Warren, without a useless slaughter, as in the Burnside campaign of the previous winter.

This ended active operations in the Army of the Potomac for 1863. The troops established winter camps; the Fifth Corps guarded and was encamped along the line of the Orange and Alexandria railroad, by brigades stationed at intervals from Fairfax to Brandy Station. The headquarters of my brigade were at Noakesville Station, a small place no longer on the map. Colonel Burbank, who commanded the brigade, and staff occupied a large farm-house situated a few hundred yards east of the little station on a hill. A small two-story out-house was assigned to the brigade commissary and quartermaster departments. A few regiments of the brigade were encamped in the immediate vicinity, where they made themselves comfortable in their winter huts. I rigged up a store-house and, together with the quartermaster sergeant and our assistants, used the little two-story house as an office and for our sleeping quarters. The house had a good roof, a fireplace and chimney. There was plenty of wood and we were warm and comfortable. My horse was stabled along with the brigade staff horses in one of the farm stables.

The commissary depot for the Fifth Corps was at Catlett's Station, about five miles from our camp. I was sent there once a week with a wagon-train to draw supplies for the brigade, and was always accompanied by an infantry escort, as there were guerrillas about. One morning as I was starting off with my train, Captain Samuel A. McKee, of my regiment, and Lieutenant Edwin E. Sellers, of the Tenth United States Infantry, who, with an orderly, were going to Catlett's Station, asked me to ride with them in advance of my train. They soon began to ride very fast and I found that my horse could not keep up with theirs; frequently they were out of sight and I was a quarter of a mile behind in the lonely woods. Then I thought of the guerrillas, but we arrived safely at the station. About a week later, April eleventh, 1864, Captain McKee, accompanied by an orderly, made the same journey and was shot dead on his way to Catlett's; his body was found lying on the road, stripped of his arms and valuables and most of his clothing. The orderly escaped.

About this time many brevet ranks were conferred on officers—the greater part of them for gallantry in the field; others for efficiency in various lines of duty; and some for no particular reason that anyone could discover. So generous was the War Department in distributing brevet ranks that they seemed to lose dignity and sometimes became a joke. The army mule was dubbed a "brevet horse" and the camp follower became a "brevet soldier." Some officers were advanced several grades above their lineal rank by supplementary brevets. It was no uncommon occurrence to find a lieutenant who was a brevet major or colonel; and I know of a few cases where first lieutenants held the honorary rank of brigadier-general.

Lieutenant Sinclair, the commissary officer, was an easygoing, very pleasant man, much liked by both officers and soldiers. He was a first lieutenant and brevet major—a very brave officer, who had the peculiar experience of being wounded in the same leg in three different engagements, but never very seriously—each time able to resume his duties after being discharged from the hospital. He remained in the service for some years after the war. Lieutenant Sinclair was a New Yorker. He had been with the Singer Sewing Machine Co. before the war.

During this winter and spring a large number of recruits joined the Army of the Potomac, among them many conscripts and substitutes, who as a class were not the equals of volunteers of 1861 and 1862. The armies needed still more men and on February first President Lincoln ordered a draft for five hundred thousand men to be held on March tenth, and another on March fifteenth for two hundred thousand more, to be held April fifteenth, 1864. Recruiting for the regular army almost ceased, owing to the large bounties paid for substitutes, and the fact that the enlistments among the volunteers were only for three years, or the duration of the war. I had a short furlough at this time and spent four days very pleasantly in Washington with comrades of my regiment, who had been detailed as clerks in the War Department or were employed as civilians after their discharge from the army.

On March twelfth, 1864, Lieutenant General U.S. Grant was made commander-in-chief of all the armies of the United States, deposing General Halleck, to the great satisfaction of many of the officers and the rank and file in the armies. General Grant visited the Army of the Potomac for a few days in March, consulting General Meade, its commander. Soon after many changes and consolidations were ordered. The five corps were reduced to three, viz: the Second, Fifth and Sixth, commanded respectively by Generals Hancock, Warren and Sedgwick. The Fifth Corps lost its old commander, that sterling old soldier, Major General George Sykes, who had commanded the regular brigade at the beginning of the war and had risen to the command of the Fifth Army Corps. We lost him with profound feelings of regret, which were only compensated by the confidence we had in Major General Gouverneur K. Warren, who had long been a brigade and division commander of the corps. Skeleton companies and regiments were consolidated, brigades and divisions were enlarged. All of the regular infantry soldiers who remained in the field at this time were placed in the First Brigade of the First Division of the Fifth Corps, along with four regiments of volunteers; the One Hundred and Fortieth and One Hundred and Forty-sixth New York and the Ninety-first and One Hundred and Fifty-fifth Pennsylvania, which when combined, out-numbered the regulars considerably. Brigadier-General Romeyn B. Ayres, an old regular artillery officer, commanded the brigade.

General Meade remained in the immediate command of the Army of the Potomac, now increased to ninety-nine thousand, four hundred and thirty-eight officers and enlisted men present for duty, equipped; while General Lee's army, composed of the corps of Longstreet, Ewell and Hill, with Stuart's cavalry, was estimated to number about sixty-two thousand.

General Grant arrived on April twenty-sixth and established his headquarters at Culpeper; with his coming preparations for a forward movement were begun; there was bustle and tumult in all the camps, and a week later, May fourth, the Fifth Corps crossed the Rapidan with the Second Division in the lead preceded by a division of cavalry.

  PART XIII.

In Grant's Campaign, 1864.

A few days before the breaking up of our winter camp on the Orange and Alexandria railroad an order was issued from corps headquarters to discontinue our brigade commissary department and turn over all property to the commissary of subsistence of the First Division, Fifth Corps. Lieutenant Sinclair was ordered to rejoin his regiment as soon as the transfers were completed, and I expected to be sent back to my company to shoulder a musket among my comrades once more. I was busy for a couple of days in making out the transfer papers. When they were completed Lieutenant Sinclair sent me to Captain M. R. Came, the division commissary officer, to obtain the necessary receipts and acknowledgements. Captain Came was an elderly man and very peculiar. He glanced at the papers and in a drawling voice with a strong "down-East" accent asked me if I had made them out and if I understood them, to which I replied in the affirmative. He then slowly and carefully put on a huge pair of spectacles and taking another short look at the papers, turned to me and said. "Young man, your threes and your fives, your sevens and your nines I can tell apart, which is of great importance; but I have seen better writing."

Then without further examination he signed the receipts on his camp table and I saluted and departed.

On my arrival at camp I made preparations for my return to my company on the following day, and was greatly surprised when that evening I was ordered to report to Captain Came the next day as acting division commissary sergeant. When I reported for duty the following day he seemed to be pleased to see me. He asked me to sit down in his tent and talked with me about the duties I was to perform, telling me to keep a daily journal for his private use of the marches we made, when and where we drew supplies or issued them, and of all incidents worthy of note. Then he told me to go and make myself comfortable and become acquainted with his "boys," as he called his assistants, of whom, he said, I was to be the "boss." I kept the journal for the Captain during the time I served with him and also a copy of it for myself. When I left him to serve elsewhere I continued the journal as long as I remained with the Army of the Potomac and I still possess it. I have often regretted not having kept a diary all through my war service, which would have made the task of writing this book much easier than relying upon my memory, after the lapse of half a century.

The Captain's "boys" consisted of a civilian clerk, a relative of his, to whom the Government paid seventy-five dollars per month and the allowance of one ration. He was a genial, careless young man, who hated work and passed his on to an assistant, a soldier of a Pennsylvania regiment, who was a bright, smart fellow, detailed as a clerk, and very efficient when he could not get any whiskey. Between the two they kept the "old man," as he was called, in trouble on account of delays in rendering reports and accounts to headquarters, and in having them returned for correction, with which the Captain himself was not very familiar.

Fortunately my duties did not include the keeping of accounts; I was to attend to the drawing of supplies from the depots and the issuing of them at the front and I was also to have a general supervision of the supply train, under the orders of Captain Came. There were also four or five soldiers detailed to do the heavy work, and a cook. All of these men were volunteers; I was the only regular. The "boys" showed very little respect for the "old man," who familiarly addressed them by their Christian names. They seldom saluted him and never stood at attention when he gave them his orders, unless some strange officer was present. The cook was a good one. He belonged to a Massachusetts regiment and was an artist on baked beans. He would dig a hole in the ground and keep up a fire in it all day, and at night put in an army camp-kettle filled with salt pork and beans, cover it over with earth, and next morning dig it up with every bean just done to a turn and none of them burnt.

Captain Came was a native of the State of Maine. He had joined the volunteer army as a commissary of subsistence and had not served with any regiment. He was a man over fifty, of medium stature and heavy build. He wore a grizzled, ill-kept beard and had long gray hair, which together with his carelessness in dress, gave him the appearance of a hard-working old farmer. When in camp he wore a soldier's blouse without any shoulder straps to indicate his rank which, along with an old felt hat, caused him to be mistaken at times for one of the teamsters and to be addressed as such by soldiers who did not know him.

He was an eccentric man, stubborn, but still kind and good-hearted, especially to negroes in distress, for whom he seemed to have a special tenderness. He always spoke of them as "colored boys," and would not tolerate having them called "niggers." On the march we were sometimes pestered by "contrabands"—negro men, women and children—slaves—who had run away and followed the supply trains. These he would care for and feed for days, instead of turning them over to the provost-marshal. One day I saw the Captain almost shed tears while listening to a tale told by a sleek, fat wench, who seemed to be the spokesman for a large party to whom he gave permission to ride in the heavily loaded wagons, and from which they were presently ejected, to the Captain's great regret, by Captain Thomas, the division quartermaster.

He had a negro servant, a lazy, worthless, lying rascal, who imposed on his kind master shamefully. Often when called, though close by, he paid no attention; then the Captain left his tent to go in search of him, calling out "Aleck! Aleck! Alexander Tyler, I want knowledge!" which was one of the peculiar expressions he used when he wanted information about anything. If he found "Aleck," and sometimes gave him a mild reproof, the rascal always had a lying excuse and only grinned at the old man. We wondered sometimes whether the Captain bossed the negro or the servant bossed the Captain, for he slept in his tent and helped to drink his whiskey.

The Captain was rather fond of a little whiskey himself and always kept it in his tent and carried a flask in the holster of his saddle when on the march. He was very free with it when officers visited him and on those convivial occasions he sometimes had me called to his tent on some pretext of wanting "knowledge," and when he dismissed me I could overhear him say, "This is my regular." He seemed to be pleased to have a regular sergeant as one of his assistants. The Captain was an early riser and on fine warm mornings stepped out of his tent dressed only in his undershirt and slippers. In one hand he carried a tin cup containing his "toddy"—whiskey, some sugar and a little water—which Aleck prepared for him every morning; in the other hand he held a stick with which he stirred the toddy, while gravely walking about the camp in his bare shanks and talking to us until Aleck had his breakfast ready. I never saw the Captain unfit for duty; he was always attentive to that. The principal effect that drink had on him was that it made him cranky and ill-tempered at times. The laxity of discipline in Captain Came's department was to me astonishing with the training I had had, and I so expressed myself to my comrades, who cared little about it and were always somewhat jealous of me.

The supply train, heavily loaded with ten days' rations, in addition to the five days' rations issued to the troops just before starting on their march, crossed the Rapidan at Culpeper Mine Ford on a pontoon bridge on the afternoon of May fourth and proceeded a few miles on the other side, where we encamped for the night. The train was guarded by a greater number of cavalry and infantry than I had ever seen employed for that purpose.

The next morning we marched in the direction of the Wilderness until well along in the forenoon, when we halted and remained in that spot for two days; then we made a night march in the direction of Spottsylvania Court House. From our position we plainly heard the firing which opened the battle of the Wilderness of May fifth and sixth, which was the beginning of a series of battles, marching, and almost continuous fighting which lasted for forty-two days, until we had arrived at the James river. General Grant, regardless of tremendous losses, had sent a despatch to Washington in which he used the noted phrase, "I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." He continued his movements to the left to outflank Lee, who met him on ground of his own choosing and fought a defensive battle.

Of the great battles of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, North Anna, Cold Harbor and the historical minor engagements I saw but little, for my issues of rations at the front were sometimes made at night or during a lull in a battle, if in daytime. I was always hurried away quickly, for the white covers of the wagons, if noticed, drew the fire of the enemy's artillery and on a couple of occasions caused the loss of some of the wagons and the wounding of some teamsters. Only at Spottsylvania and at Cold Harbor, while waiting for darkness before returning, was I enabled to see my regiment in the breast-works and something of the battle-field and to hear my comrades' stories of the fight. After the battle of the Wilderness the Army of the Potomac was reinforced by General Burnside's Ninth Army Corps, numbering about twenty-two thousand men, mostly newly raised troops, of whom but a third had ever been in the field.

While the troops were at Spottsylvania the supply train was parked on Stafford Heights, overlooking the town of Fredericksburg, near a large spring of fine water which supplied the town; but there was no fire-wood to be had except by tearing down old and unoccupied houses. From this place, about midway between the front and Belle Plain on the Potomac, the new supply depot where we drew rations, we supplied the troops until they advanced to Cold Harbor. Captain Came was very energetic in trying to keep up his supplies. He nearly always accompanied the train to the depot, of which fact I was very glad, as he could obtain better attention from the officers in charge than I. The depots were busy places. The rule of "first come, first served" was not always observed; favoritism was shown, and sometimes when alone I was unjustly detained for many hours, or an entire day, before I succeeded in getting my wagons loaded. When rations were to be issued at the front the Captain remained in camp with the main part of the train, which sometimes moved before I returned and I had to follow it up—with great trouble at times.

On our first trip to the depot at Belle Plain the Captain and I rode ahead so as to arrive early and get our requisition on file. The Captain rode a large horse named "Ned," to whom he gave commands in a voice loud enough for a squadron of cavalry: "Halt! Forward! Trot!" etc., which caused much laughter as we passed through the streets of Fredericksburg, among the soldiers and citizens, who vainly looked for a squadron to follow him.

Belle Plain was crowded with shipping, arriving troops and wounded soldiers, awaiting transportation, as well as prisoners. A long dock, only wide enough for a single line of wagons, led out to a small wharf, where there was room for but two boats at a time and little room to unload; beef cattle were made to jump overboard and swim ashore. It was after midnight when our last wagon was loaded and we drove off a short distance and rested until daylight. On this occasion we lost two lead-mules, who fell off the narrow dock in the darkness and were drowned.

Reinforcements for the army were being forwarded rapidly. On the way to Belle Plain we passed the First Massachusetts, First Vermont, Second and Eighth New York, all heavy artillery, serving as infantry, and the Thirty-sixth Wisconsin Infantry, full regiments on their way to the front.

Late on the afternoon of May nineteenth the Rebel General Ewell passed around the right wing of our army and made a dash for the supply trains. He captured twenty-seven wagons on the Fredericksburg road, but they were all re-taken. General Ewell was repulsed and his entire command came near being cut off from Lee's army, when darkness afforded him a chance to escape.

Our next supplies were drawn from Port Royal on the Rappahannock river. On May twenty-second the train was at Bowling Green, a fine village, almost deserted except for slaves, who were mostly women. We were now out of the Wilderness in a fine part of the country containing large plantations, which had not been visited by the ravages of war. From Bowling Green we went by way of Milford Station to Chesterfield, crossing the Mattapony river on the way. This river takes its name and is formed by four small rivers, named the Ma, Ta, Po and the Ny.

From Chesterfield I was sent with a part of the train to supply rations to the division at Mount Carmel Church, which the Fifth Army Corps was to pass during the night of the twenty-sixth. It had rained most of the day; the roads were bad, but I reached the place and waited for hours before the division arrived near midnight and halted until rations were issued, when they resumed their night march. The mules were fed but not unhitched, for at daylight I started on the return march. When I arrived at Chesterfield, where I had left the supply trains, I found that they had been ordered away, and I had to make a march of thirty miles that day over bad roads to catch up with them that evening near New Town.

I was kept exceedingly busy during this campaign; every three or four days the troops had to be supplied and six days' rations had to be kept in the wagons. This kept me on the go all the time, to the front or to the depots, which were often far apart. Much of the marching was done in the night-time, and often the only sleep I got was dozing in the saddle or snatching a few hours in an empty wagon when almost exhausted from fatigue.

We had much rain during the month of May and the early part of June. The roads—some of them bad enough in dry weather—were in a horrible state. At Spottsylvania I lost two loads of hard bread—the wagons upset in a deep puddle and one of them we were unable to extricate and had to abandon. The horses and mules, ill-fed, hard-worked night and day, and often suffering for water, sometimes succumbed. There were times when we did not dare to lose time to let them drink while fording a stream, no matter how they suffered. Often they were hitched up for forty-eight hours at a time and my horse did not have his saddle removed.

When the army reached Cold Harbor, the base of supplies was changed to the White House Landing on the Pamunkey river, a locality familiar to us in McClellan's time. On our march we passed through Dunkirk, Aylets, Newcastle and Old Church, a fertile region with many plantations. In passing through this section many contrabands abandoned the plantations and joined our train. A few times we took down fences and parked the train in a great clover-field, which was a rare treat for our hungry animals.

On our route we encountered General W. F. Smith's four divisions of sixteen thousand men, of the Eighteenth Army Corps, from General Butler's Army of the James, whence they had come to the White House in transports and were marching to reinforce Grant's army at Cold Harbor. We also met strong regiments of heavy artillery, withdrawn from the defenses of Washington, marching to the front. The authorities at Washington had given General Grant a free hand, which no former commander had had, to recruit his great losses in this campaign.

While the opposing armies faced each other at Cold Harbor for a period of twelve days, I made frequent trips with supplies from the White House depot to the front, and on my return journeys, which generally took place at night, we drove to the field hospitals and filled the empty wagons with the less seriously wounded and took them to the White House depot. This was also done at the Wilderness and at Spottsylvania, the supply of ambulances being inadequate to remove the great numbers of wounded men. The roads being bad during rainy weather, and the army wagons having no springs to lessen the hard jolts, the poor fellows suffered intense pain and I often heard them cry out in agony as I rode past the wagons. It was pitiful to hear them. When I was in charge of the train I made frequent halts to rest them, but this was all that could be done. Sometimes one or two of the unfortunates died during the night, the body remaining in the wagon among the living until we reached our destination. Upon arriving at the White House, the wounded were delivered at the general hospital, where thousands of wounded soldiers were cared for and rested for a few days in large hospital tents, before being shipped in especially adapted transport vessels to Northern hospitals or convalescent camps.

The great depot at the White House was a busy place. The narrow river was congested with vessels of all kinds, including some gun-boats. Great quantities of stores for the army were discharged and newly arrived troops came ashore. Departing vessels carried away wounded soldiers and Rebel prisoners, many of whom seemed pleased at the prospect of getting enough to eat; for they had been ill-supplied all through this campaign, as they informed us.

On June ninth we learned that a change of base to the James river was to take place. On the following day we loaded the wagons with all the supplies they would carry and by way of Tunstall's Station proceeded to the vicinity of Cold Harbor, over ground familiar to us. Some of the conflict at Cold Harbor took place on the battlefield of Gaines's Mill, only the position of the two armies was now reversed. After supplying the division the train left camp at three P.M. June twelfth, an exceedingly hot day, for the James river.

After dark on the same day the Army of the Potomac was withdrawn from the trenches at Cold Harbor, where they had such a deplorable experience that General Grant himself in his Memoirs says: "I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made; no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained."

On the fifteenth of June the Army of the Potomac crossed the James on a pontoon bridge at Wilcox's Landing, just six weeks after crossing the Rapidan. It had failed to capture Richmond or to destroy Lee's army, and the campaign ended at the James, as in 1862, but with an immensely greater sacrifice. Conservative historians compute our losses at 7,289 killed, 37,406 wounded and 9,856 missing; a total of 54,551. Others claim that these figures do not include the losses in Burnside's Ninth Army Corps and make the grand total upwards of sixty thousand,—a loss on our side nearly as great as General Lee's entire army at the opening of the campaign. None of the authorities place the Confederate losses over twenty thousand, or about one to three. This sanguine campaign, its awful sacrifices without any advantages, caused mutterings of discontent and had a gloomy and depressing effect, not only in the army but throughout the North. The army had lost thousands of its most capable officers and veteran soldiers, who could not be replaced, and it no longer seemed to be the same army.

When Generals Grant and Meade, whom I encountered a few times, appeared among the troops there was but feeble applause, and the hearty cheers received by some of our former commanders were no longer heard. At this period of the war the only bright spot was the masterly strategy and successful campaign of General Sherman against the Confederate General Joseph E. Johnson in the West from Chattanooga to Atlanta. In the Histories of the Wilderness,—Cold Harbor campaign, written after the conclusion of the Civil War by officers still in the service or on the retired list—histories most carefully written—there is an absence of criticism of the military strategy in this campaign. When all participants have passed away, some future historian will write an unbiased story of the war and its strategy.

Anxiety as to the safe withdrawal of the supply trains was felt, but they were well protected. So skillfully was the withdrawal of the army and its trains accomplished that General Lee was unable to determine for two days whether the objective point of the Army of the Potomac was the investment of Richmond or a movement to the James river. Except for some cavalry skirmishes, the march was unmolested.

The train arrived at the Chickahominy on the morning of the fourteenth and encamped at Wilcox's farm until the following day, waiting for the pontoon bridge and approaches to be completed, for an insufficient number of boats had been provided, causing twenty-four hours' delay. The river is wide and deep at that point. We crossed on the afternoon of the fifteenth. I counted forty-four large wooden pontoons and sixteen smaller canvas pontoons, all of which appeared to be spaced at greater distances apart than usual.

We halted at some distance on the opposite side and resumed our march at seven P.M., reaching the vicinity of the pontoon bridge over the James at Wilcox's Point before midnight. We were halted there to allow the Ninth Army Corps to cross before us. The train commenced crossing about two o'clock on the morning of the sixteenth of June. It was a beautiful, clear, moonlight night and I had no difficulty in counting the one hundred and one pontoons composing the bridge over the James, more than two thousand feet wide at this point. It was daylight when we parked in a cornfield on the other side, and men and animals were glad to get some rest. The teams were not unhitched, for we were liable to be ordered forward at any moment.

All day long the road was crowded with marching troops and trains coming across the bridge, and by midnight of the sixteenth the entire army with all its artillery and trains had reached the right bank of the James. After sun-down our train was ordered to pull out on the road, and after proceeding a few hundred yards it was halted and did not go on again until eleven P.M. After that we moved by fits and starts and at daylight had accomplished only about three miles on the congested road.

After daylight on the seventeenth we made better progress; we passed through Prince George Court House and halted after noon-time in an oat-field a mile square, which was destroyed in a few hours. There we fed the animals, after a twenty-four-hour fast, and unhitched them for a few hours—they had not had their harnesses off for two days. I also issued two days' rations to our division, which was halted close by. We plainly heard cannonading in the direction of Petersburg during the afternoon.

About six P.M. we resumed our march and for the third night in succession we were on the road until daylight. On the morning of the eighteenth we encamped within about two and a half miles from City Point on the road to Petersburg. All the supply trains of the army, commissary, quartermaster and reserve ammunition were encamped in this vicinity about six miles from the front at Petersburg; all except what was called the "Fighting Train," composed of ammunition wagons, which always followed the troops and supplied ammunition when required, in camp or during a battle. The supply trains were destined to remain in this camp for many months, while the long and tedious operations of the siege of Petersburg went on.

But I was not to remain in camp. A short time previous some further changes and consolidations had been made and my regiment was again placed in the Second Division of the Fifth Corps, and three days after our arrival I was ordered to report at the front as acting ordnance sergeant. The regulars formed the First Brigade, along with the Fifth, One Hundred and Fortieth and One Hundred and Forty-sixth New York Volunteers, under the command of Brigadier-General Joseph Hayes. When I learned of this change I knew that I would have to leave my detail in the First Division and expected to be ordered to join my company; being appointed ordnance sergeant was a complete surprise to me and I never learned to whom I owed the appointment. I left Captain Came on the morning of June twenty-first and I think he was not well pleased at losing his only "regular." He told me to come and see him when I could, and to call on him for anything I needed in the commissary line. For my part I was glad to leave the kindly old man, for during my stay of eight weeks I always felt annoyed at the manner in which my assistants performed their duties.

First Lieutenant Richard H. Pond, of the Twelfth United States Infantry, was the acting ordnance officer of the Second Division, Fifth Corps, to whom I reported at the front. Lieutenant Pond had been appointed from the ranks in May, 1862, and he understood and performed his duties very well. He was a pleasant man, with a taste for literature and spent much of his time in writing.

The ammunition train was encamped close to General Warren's headquarters, in rear of some of the captured redoubts and breast-works, and near the Norfolk and Petersburg railroad. With this train was a permanent detail of a sergeant, a corporal and eighteen privates, whose duties were to guard the train and to assist me in caring for, receiving and distributing the infantry arms and ammunition for the Second Division. There was also a soldier named Ballard, detailed as ordnance clerk, a very staid, pious man, much older than I, who read his Bible when not otherwise occupied. Ballard and I had a wall tent for our use; the ammunition guard had shelter tents, and the wagonmaster and teamsters slept in the wagons on the ammunition boxes. I was provided with a riding horse and accoutrements. I did not like the horse and soon swapped him for a better one at the corral where extra horses were kept.

My duties, while the siege went on, were much easier than in the commissary department, and the reports and accounts, which dealt only with arms, accoutrements and ammunition for infantry, were more simple. Every morning I sent a wagon loaded with twenty thousand rounds of cartridges to the front, a short distance away, accompanied by a file of the guard and sometimes I went with them. This wagon remained at the front until dark, supplying ammunition when needed; and when returning to camp, left a supply for the night.

Artillery firing was going on at some part of the long line all day, sometimes furiously. Picket firing was almost constant along the line in the rifle pits, and at night when the pickets were being relieved, the firing occasionally was increased by the men behind the breast-works on both sides, also by the artillery, until it sounded like a battle. This sometimes kept up for more than a half hour, when it suddenly ceased and only pickets' shot were heard. There were some mortars along our line, firing shells into Petersburg. I watched them at night, when I could distinguish the burning fuses in their curved course through the sky like rockets and could hear the shells burst. After a while I became so accustomed to artillery firing at night that it no longer awakened me, even if close to our camp. The enemy's longer range guns sometimes fired a few shells over our camp, invisible to them, and over General Warren's headquarters close by, without doing any damage.

The troops manned the breast-works and constructed redoubts, bomb-proofs and covered ways by brigades and were relieved by other brigades every few days. When relieved, they retired some distance to the rear, near division headquarters, a short distance in advance of the ordnance train's camp. Lieutenant Pond had his tent with the division staff, where I reported to him every evening about sun-down for orders, unless absent on other duty.

The weather had become intensely hot, and no rain had fallen since June fifth. The heavy cannonading failed to bring it on, as it generally did; with the exception of a few drops from a cloud early in July, there was no rain until July nineteenth—a period of forty-three days. At first we got water from a small stream a long distance from camp, but it soon dried up. We then resorted to wells, as the troops had to do from the beginning of the siege. Five or six feet below the porous surface soil, there was clay containing water. We dug pits and put down barrels with the heads knocked out. As the drought was prolonged, we were obliged to deepen our wells, digging ten to twelve feet or more in depth to get a sufficient amount of water for men and animals. The dust was many inches thick on the roads where, ground into a fine powder by passing troops and trains, it hung in great clouds so dense that often a teamster was unable to see his leading mules. This, and the absence of water along the roads, caused much suffering to man and beast.

The old Petersburg and City Point railroad was repaired for the required distance and a new road, called the United States Military railroad, was connected with it and finally extended south as far as the Weldon and Petersburg railroad. Very imperfect grading and ballasting was done in the hasty building of this road. The soldiers declared that it made them sea-sick to ride on its cars; nevertheless, it proved to be of great service to the investing army.

Once or twice a week I had to go to City Point, about ten miles away, to the ordnance depot with some wagons to replenish the supply of ammunition for our division. By starting early I was generally able to make this trip in a day, if no great delay occurred at the depot, returning in the evening, thickly covered with dust.

We presumed that General Grant would order a bombardment and assault on the enemy's works at Petersburg on July fourth but with the exception of firing a national salute at his headquarters at City Point, the day passed without special incident.

A few days later it was discovered that the Rebel General Jubal A. Early had slipped away and was marching up the Shenandoah Valley, well on his way to Maryland. The Sixth Corps was hastily embarked on transports for Washington and arrived there on the eleventh of July in the nick of time to save the city. General Early had arrived before the northern defenses of the city at an earlier hour on the same day and, finding the works but feebly defended, contemplated an assault on the following day which was frustrated by the timely arrival of the Sixth Corps, which forced him to withdraw.

Shortly after the arrival of the army at Petersburg, City Point assumed the appearance of a large and busy town. Great store-houses and other temporary frame buildings were erected and the wharf extended. General Grant's headquarters were there, the commissary, quartermaster, ordnance and medical depots; the general hospital with its many large tents near the banks of the Appomattox river; undertaking and embalming establishments, conducted by enterprising civilians; and a rapidly increasing graveyard for the many sick and wounded soldiers, who died in the general hospital. The sanitary and the Christian commissions, sustained by the generosity of the Northern people, had large establishments. The two commissions were of incalculable benefit in helping the Government in the care of sick and wounded soldiers and saved many lives. Many sutlers had tents or booths near the bank of the James, which looked like a market-place. It was not until some time later that regimental sutlers were permitted at the front. The river was so full of vessels that it resembled a great shipping port.

One day, after loading my wagons, I went to one of the sutler's booths to buy some crackers and cheese for a lunch before my ride back to camp. As I stood among a crowd of soldiers, waiting to be served, I heard one of them demanding something in a voice that sounded familiar to me. I soon discovered that he was a former drummer of my regiment, in fact one of the two boys who had accompanied me from Governor's Island to Carlisle. He was now a bugler in Captain Haxamer's New Jersey Battery. I was glad to see him again. We conversed a while and then rode together towards the front, his battery being stationed about a mile to the right of the main road to Petersburg. He told me he had a fine flute which he had found in a knapsack on the field of Cold Harbor, which he desired to present to me, having no use for it himself. At the parting of our ways he requested me to wait, while he rode to his camp to get it. He soon returned and handed me a package which I found, when opened, contained the first two joints of a flute and a music book. The third joint, usually made in two sections, was missing. He thought he must have dropped it out of the carelessly wrapped package, when he mounted his horse in camp to return to me. He promised to make diligent search for it, and did find the upper section of the third joint, where he thought he had lost it, and brought it to me. More than a month later, I met him again. He had recovered the last section of the third joint and the flute was finally complete. It appeared that a soldier of his battery had found this part in camp and kept it for weeks in his haversack as a curiosity, until one day my friend recovered it. I have treasured this flute which came to me so curiously in installments; the key on the last joint shows plainly the imprint of a horse's hoof.

Captain Came's camp was close to the City Point road. I called on him a few times, when he invited me to his tent and asked me to take a "little mite," as he expressed it. He seemed pleased to see me, or was pleased at the excuse I afforded for an extra drink. We chatted, and he urged me to stay and have dinner with his "boys." On one of my trips, I fortunately missed by a few hours the explosion of a boat with a cargo of ordnance stores, at the wharf where I loaded my wagons. It killed and wounded about a hundred of the negro stevedores and other persons near-by, demolished some ordnance wagons, and did great damage to the wharf and adjoining vessels. The cause of the explosion remained unknown, but it was surmised that Rebel spies were to blame for it.

Some change in the position of our division caused the removal of our camp nearer to the Jerusalem Plank road. This caused the digging of more and deeper wells to obtain a sufficient supply of water, during the great heat and drought. General Burnside's Ninth Army Corps was on the right of the Fifth and there I saw the first colored troops join the Army of the Potomac, observing the arrival of a new regiment of negroes with their white officers on the road from City Point. Many of them had taken off their shoes and carried them slung on their bayonets while trudging bare-footed along the hot dusty road. In the evening I went to their camp and heard the roll-call of one of the companies. There were so many Jacksons and Johnstons, that the first sergeant numbered them as high as "Johnston number five." They appeared to be very proud of being soldiers and serving with white troops.

There were rumors, late in July, that a mine was being dug at a point in front of the Ninth Army Corps, where the field fortifications of both armies approached the closest. On the night of July twenty-ninth, I was awakened by an orderly who brought me an order from Lieutenant Pond to have the ordnance train ready to move at three o'clock next morning. An hour later the order was changed to have forty thousand rounds of ammunition at the front at daylight. I supposed that the mine was to be blown up under the enemy's works and that a general bombardment would take place.

It was just daylight, when I arrived at the front with one wagon containing the ammunition. I waited, expecting to hear an explosion at any moment. It was a beautiful morning and all was quiet. I must have waited for an hour, when suddenly I felt the earth tremble as the mine was fired, and I heard a dull heavy thud in front of the Ninth Corps close by. The report had not yet died away when our batteries, mortars and great guns opened a tremendous fire on the Rebel works which shook the earth.

An intervening strip of woods prevented me from seeing anything except the great cloud of smoke which arose over the batteries. The teamster and two guards were busy trying to keep the mules from running away, while I endeavored to quiet my horse, which was trying to break the halter by which I had tied him to a tree. I think it was ten minutes or more before there was any reply from the Rebel batteries and longer than that before their fire became general. Occasional shells now began to fly over us and one of them—a twenty-pounder—landed within a few yards of me, kicked around and scattered dirt over me, as I threw myself prone to the ground; but fortunately it failed to explode. The artillery fire was kept up for more than an hour when it slackened, but was vigorously resumed for a time about nine o'clock. By noon it had ceased and I was ordered to return to camp.

We learned later that the springing of the mine was a success, although it took place an hour later than intended, owing to a damp fuse which failed about half way into the mine and had to be replaced. The explosion blew a small Rebel fort, with all its inmates and guns, about two hundred feet up into the air and made a crater in the ground about one hundred and fifty, by sixty feet and twenty-five feet deep, which caused consternation and surprise among the enemy.

It has been conceded that General Meade's plan for a general assault on Petersburg was skillful and should have been a success, had his orders been fully obeyed. General Hancock's Second Army Corps had been sent across the James on the twenty-seventh to make a diversion, which resulted in General Lee's weakening his defenses by several divisions; while the Second Corps was to return on the night of the twenty-ninth to take part in the general assault on Petersburg, which failed to take place. Owing to deplorable delay and mismanagement of the division of the Ninth Corps, which advanced after the explosion of the mine and became huddled in the crater, the attack was doomed to lamentable failure, which caused the loss of nearly four thousand men. Some historians have termed this event "the mine fiasco." A week later General Meade ordered a court of inquiry to investigate the cause of the failure. This court, after the conclusion of its sessions, promulgated its opinion as follows:

That General Burnside had failed to prepare his parapets and abatis for the passage of the assaulting columns and had not given them proper formation; that he had neglected General Meade's order for the prompt advance to the crest and had not provided engineers, working materials and tools, etc., etc. As General Burnside remained at his headquarters, more than a mile away, during the assault, he had no personal knowledge of what was taking place. Brigadier-Generals J. H. Ledlie, commanding the white, and Edward Ferrero, commanding the colored troops of the assaulting columns, were found not to have pushed their divisions forward promptly, according to orders; nor did they accompany them, but remained in the rear in bomb-proofs most of the time and did not know the position of their troops. Two other brigade commanders were less unfavorably commented up. Six months later the congressional committee on the conduct of the war made a more searching and exhaustive inquiry into the "mine fiasco."

Unremitting picket firing and occasional cannonading went on during the sweltering first half of the month of August. On the night of the fifteenth, the Fifth Corps was relieved from duty in the trenches by the extension of the Ninth Corps to the left. General Grant had decided to destroy the Weldon railroad, an important means of supply for Lee's army, some miles to our west, and, if possible, to make a lodgment there and extend our investing lines to that point. The Fifth Army Corps was selected for this movement and was to march on the morning of the Seventeenth, but a torrential rain-storm on the night of the sixteenth had put the roads into such a condition that it was impossible to move artillery the next morning.

Just before midnight on the seventeenth some Rebel batteries opened fire on the Union lines and soon all the guns and mortars on both sides seemed to be engaged. It was the most furious midnight cannonading since the beginning of the siege. All the mortars were firing shells, which made the sky look as though there were a display of fireworks. It lasted for an hour and a half, when the firing slackened and then suddenly ceased on both sides, as if by an agreement.

A few hours later, at four o'clock in the morning on the eighteenth, General Warren started the Fifth Corps on the march to the Weldon railroad. At daylight we broke camp, loaded the wagons and were soon ready to follow the troops, but remained stationary awaiting orders. About noon we heard firing from the direction which General Warren had taken, and by two o'clock the firing had increased enough to indicate a considerable engagement. The day was very hot, although a heavy rain was falling. At five o'clock in the afternoon Lieutenant Pond ordered me to start immediately with nine wagons, loaded with ammunition, for the Weldon railroad and report to Colonel Fred T. Locke, the Adjutant-General of the Corps. I started promptly, taking along half of the guard, mine being the first ordnance train on the road and keeping in the lead all the way. The roads were in a bad condition from recent heavy rains. One of the teamsters broke a wagon tongue but there was no time to improvise a substitute and, as the stalled wagon could be passed, I left it sticking in the deep mud and hastened on.