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John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 10 (search)
fifty-six thousand four hundred and ninety-nine horses and mules in it. Either of these is a large number to provide with water. But of course they were not all watered at the same pond or stream, since the army stretched across many miles of territory. In the summer of 1864, the problem of water-getting before Petersburg was quite a serious one for man and beast. No rain had fallen for several weeks, and the animals belonging to that part of the army which was at quite a remove from the James and Appomattox Rivers had to be ridden nearly two miles (such was the case in my own company, at least; perhaps others went further) for water, and then got only a warm, muddy, and stagnant fluid that had accumulated in some hollow. The soldiers were sorely pressed to get enough to supply their own needs. They would scoop out small holes in old water courses, and patiently await a dipperfull of a warm, milky-colored fluid to ooze from the clay, drop by drop. Hundreds wandered through the
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, X. Raw recruits. (search)
s of young men were doing at that time, and had been doing for months, as it leads up directly to the theme about to be considered. After I had obtained the reluctant consent of my father to enlist,--my mother never gave hers,--the next step hecessary was to make selection of the organization with which to identify my fortunes. I well remember the to me eventful August evening when that decision to enlist was arrived at. The Union army, then under McClellan, had been driven from before Richmond in the disastrous Peninsular campaign, and now the Rebel army, under General Lee, was marching on Washington. President Lincoln had issued a call for three hundred thousand three-years' volunteers. One evening, shortly after this call was made, I met three of my former school-mates and neighbors in the chief village of the town I then called home, and, after a brief discussion of the outlook, one of the quartette challenged, or stumped, the others to enlist.. The challenge was promptly a
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 12 (search)
where the horses were tied, and there, in a pile of manure thrown up behind them, quickly concealed the case, and, at the bugle signal, was prompt to fall into line. Under cover of darkness, the same night, the plunder was taken from the manureheap and carried to a hill in front of the camp, where it was buried in a manner which would not disclose it to the casual traveller, and yet leave it easily accessible to its unlawful possessor, and here he resorted periodically for a fresh supply, until it was exhausted. I have quoted a few of the prices charged by sutlers. Here are a few of the prices paid by people in Richmond, during the latter part of the war, in Confederate money:-- Potatoes $80 a bushel; a chicken $50; shad $50 per pair; beef $15 a pound; bacon $20 a pound; butter $20 a pound; flour $1500 a barrel; meal $140 a bushel; beans $65 a bushel; cow-peas $80 a bushel; hard wood $50 a cord; green pine $80 a cord; and a dollar in gold was worth $100 in Confederate money.
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 13 (search)
er secured by regular foraging parties was hams, bacon sides, flour, sweet potatoes, corn-meal, corn on the cob, and sometimes corn-shooks as they were called, that is, corn-leaves stripped. from the stalks, dried and bundled, for winter fodder. The neat cattle in the South get the most of their living in the winter by browsing, there being but little hay cured. In traversing fresh territory, the army came upon extensive quantities of corn in corn-ricks. At Wilcox's Landing, on the James River, where we crossed in June, 1864, the Rebel Wilcox, who had a splendid farm on the left bank of the river, had hundreds of bushels of corn, I should judge, which the forage trains took aboard before they crossed over; and on the south side of the James, east from Petersburg, where Northern troops had never before pene- A corn-barn and hay-rick. trated, many such stores of corn were appropriated to feed the thousands of loyal quadrupeds belonging to Uncle Sam. In this section, too, an
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 14 (search)
rm from that of the Ninth Corps, with which it was for a time associated, and which led it to adopt a similar badge. The following General Order tells the story of the next Corps' badge:-- Headquarters twenty-Fourth Army Corps, before Richmond, Va., March 18, 1865. [General Orders No. 32.] By authority of the Major-General commanding the Army of the James, the heart is adopted as the badge of the Twenty-Fourth Army Corps. The symbol selected is one which testifies our affectionate d Christian, and the White plume of Murat, that crested the wave of valor sweeping resistlessly to victory. Soldiers! to you is given a chance in this Spring Campaign of making this badge immortal. Let History record that on the banks of the James thirty thousand freemen not only gained their own liberty but shattered the prejudice of the world, and gave to the Land of their birth Peace, Union, and Liberty. Godfrey Weitzel, [Official.] Major-General Commanding. W. L. Goodrich, A. A
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 16 (search)
advancement of good morals. In all seriousness, however, dealing only with the fact, without attempting to prove or deny justification for it, it is undoubtedly true that the mule-drivers, when duly aroused, could produce a deeper cerulean tint in the surrounding atmosphere than any other class of men in the service. The theory has been advanced that if all of these professional m. d.‘s in the trains of the Army of the Potomac could have been put into the trenches around Petersburg and Richmond, in the fall of 1864, and have been safely advanced to within ear-shot of the enemy, then, at a signal, set to swearing simultaneously at their level-worst, the Rebels would either have thrown down their arms and surrendered then and there, or have fled incontinently to the fastnesses of the Blue Ridge. There may have been devout mule-drivers in Sherman's army, but I never saw one east. They may have been pious on taking up this important work. They were certainly impious before laying i
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 17 (search)
ion of a personal incident, as it will illustrate in some measure the duties and trials of a stretcher-bearer. It was at the battle of Hatcher's Run, already referred to, or the Boydton Plank Road, as some called it. The guns had been ordered into position near Burgess' Tavern, leaving the caissons and ambulance nearly a half-mile in the rear. Meanwhile, a flank attack of the enemy cut off our communications with the rear for a time, and we thought ourselves sure of an involuntary trip to Richmond; but the way was opened again by some of our advance charging to the rear, and by the destructive fire from our artillery. Soon orders came for the battery to return to the rear. In common with the rest, the writer started to do so when a sergeant asked him to remain and help take off one of our lieutenants, who was lying in a barn near by, severely wounded. So actively had we, been engaged that this was my first knowledge of the sad event. But, alas! what was to be done? Our ambulan
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 18 (search)
ds and thousands on rail and shipboard to the various armies. On their arrival, they were put in a corral. Here they were subject, like all supplies, to the disposition of the commissary-general of the army, who, through his subordinates, supplied them to the various organizations upon the presentation of a requisition, signed by the commanding officer of a regiment or other body of troops, certifying to the number of rations of meat required. When the army was investing Petersburg and Richmond, the cattle were in corral near City Point. On the 16th of September, 1864, the Rebels having learned through their scouts that this corral was but slightly guarded, and that by making a wide detour in the rear of our lines the chances were good for them to add a few rations of fresh beef to the bacon and corn-meal diet of the Rebel army, a strong force of cavalry under Wade Hampton made the attempt, capturing twenty-five hundred beeves and four hundred prisoners, and getting off with the
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, chapter 20 (search)
ary Railroad, which was really a railroad built for the army, and used solely by it. When the Army of the Potomac appeared before Petersburg, City Point, on the James River, was made army headquarters and the base of supplies, that is, the place to which supplies were brought from the North, and from which they were distributed to s, Assistant Adjutant General. Official: Aide-de-Camp. This order quite distinctly shows some of the valuable lessons taught by that eventful campaign before Richmond, more especially the necessity of limiting the amount of camp equipage and the transportation to be used for that purpose. But it further outlines the beginningch was requisite to accompany the army on the Wilderness Campaign have been extended in a straight line it would have spanned the distance between Washington and Richmond, being about one hundred and thirty miles. I presume this estimate includes the ambulance-train also. On the basis of three to a regiment, there must have been
John D. Billings, Hardtack and Coffee: The Unwritten Story of Army Life, XX.
Army road
and bridge Builders. (search)
their labors they did not even wait to pull up anchors, but cut every cable and cast loose, glad enough to see their flotilla on the retreat after the army, and more delighted still not to be attacked by the enemy during the operation, -so says one of their number. One writer on the war speaks of the engineers as grasping not the musket but the hammer, a misleading remark, for not a nail is driven into the bridge at any point, When the Army of the Potomac retreated from before Richmond in 1862 it crossed the lower Chickahominy on a bridge of boats and rafts 1980 feet long. This was constructed by three separate working parties, employed at the same time, one engaged at each end and one in the centre. It was the longest bridge built in the war, of which I have any knowledge, save one, and that the bridge built across the James, below Wilcox's Landing, in 1864. This latter was a remarkable achievement in ponton engineering. It was over two thousand feet long, and the ch
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