CIV
Point Lookout, Md.,August 8, 1863.
Point Lookout, Md.,August 8, 1863.
Point Lookout, Md.,August 8, 1863.
Point Lookout, Md.,August 8, 1863.
ED. BAILEY’S FATHERcame down here night before last and is going to be regimental sutler, so they say. There is some pretty sharp talk by some of the Manchester men, who affirm that he would be more at home as sutler for a rebel regiment. I do not know, but I guess we can balance the colonel’s good services against his father’s political shortcomings.
You ask me to tell you about Steve Palmer and —— ——. So the story has got to Manchester, has it? These are the facts: On the first day’s march from Falmouth Steve had some whiskey in his wagon, which he was selling to those who wanted the stuff. —— was officer of the guard that day. He went to Steve and Steve gave him a drink. Then he brought a canteen to Steve and said: “Here, Steve, let me have some whiskey in this canteen and I will pay you when I get some money.” Steve let him have it, and he went directly to the colonel and reported Steve for selling whiskey. Steve was at once taken from his wagon and put into the ranks, and at Gettysburg was very badly wounded, and if he lives will be a cripple for life. [He died of his wounds.] The affair, naturally, has created a good deal of feeling. Steve did wrong in taking liquor upon his team to sell; but there was an element of treachery in what —— did that I wouldn’t want charged up to my credit.
We are living pretty well now, for army rations. Here is our bill of fare for the past three days:
Wednesday:Breakfast—Baked Beans, Coffee. Dinner—Beefsteak. Supper—Coffee.
Thursday:Breakfast—Potatoes, Boiled Pork, Boiled Fresh Beef, Boiled Salt Beef, Coffee. Dinner—Soup, Parsley Greens. Supper—Coffee.
Friday:Breakfast—Potatoes, Boiled Beef, Coffee. Dinner—Boiled Dish of Potatoes and Parsley Greens.
In addition, we have, each day, a loaf of “soft tack,” baked here on the Point, and occasionally a ration of molasses. We call that high living. And Company I is going to have something extra for dinner today—roast beef and potatoes. The beef is roasting in two Dutch ovens.
A big school of porpoises went up the river yesterday. They came so near in shore that some of the boys fired at them, and I should judge hit some, from the commotion that was created and the way they dug away from shore. Ed. Bailey and I struck up the beach for an old boat that lay there, in which to get out and have a crack at them. The colonel had a carbine and an old stocking full of cartridges, and I picked up an ancient oar. We got the craft afloat and I paddled it out quite a piece. But the waves ran high and the water poured through the boat in a dozen places, until it was a question of pull about or swim for it. So we put about and got ashore before the old tub sank. Sixteen of us took a sail out to the mouth of the river two or three days ago. It was very rough and the boat was terribly overloaded, and it was only by good seamanship that we saved ourselves from going under.
I have just run across another Manchester fellow—James, who used to be City Messenger. He is with the Twelfth Regiment sutler.
Now I must tell you the story of Bill Ramsdell, for it is decidedly interesting, although rather rough on Bill. A short time after we came on from New Hampshire Bill went to Concord and reported to Major Whittlesey. Well, no sooner has he reported than he goes away again and is not seen about Concord for two or three days, when he again reports; but this time the major puts him under arrest as a deserter, and when the squad of deserters leave New Hampshire under a guard of convalescents Bill is packed off with the rest. They go to Boston and stop at Fort Warren for a time, and while there the prisoners are put to all sorts of menial work. Part of the time Bill was haying on the parapet, which was not at all bad, but after that he was given a mule’s job, hauling coal. A dozen of the prisoners would load a cart, hitch on and drag it along, dump their load, and so on. All this I learned from George Cilley, who was left in New Hampshire, sick, and who was guarding prisoners three or four weeks. He said Bill took it all very philosophically—he couldn’t help himself. He is now in Washington and will probably be sent to the regiment before long.
The guard duty is divided now so that we do it one week and the Twelfth the next. During our week every man is on guard every other day, but we are not overworked, as we have no drilling to do.
My tentmate, Dan. Desmond, is one of the quaintest old Irishmen you ever met. He loads me with his adventures and experiences until my ribs fairly ache from the laughing. Every night he regales me with some story—and a good one—to go to bed on.
The Seventeenth fellows will be discharged within a few days. Two in my company have died in the service—Tibbetts, killed at Gettysburg, and Ingalls, died of disease.
The laugh is on Steve Smiley, and it is too good to keep. The day we came down from Washington Steve ran down to some place on the street to get some papers—I don’t know just what. But he didn’t get them, because the colonel had been there before him. On his way back to the barracks—only a little ways—he ran into the provost guard, and as he had no pass they gathered him in and chucked him into the central guard house, where they kept him over night. The next morning they let him out and he got on a boat and came down. He is pretty touchy about it, and the boys like to thorn him about patronizing the “Central Hotel.”
The boys catch some nice fish here, among which are sea trout, which the natives tell us will be very plenty in a short time. There is a big kettle of beans on the fire, parboiling, which will be ready baked for breakfast. You see I have to keep bringing up grub matters; but it does seem good to have a plenty.