Chapter 4: the call for troops.
- Gov. Andrew sees need of military preparation -- legislature appropriates ,000 for an emergency fund -- overcoats for the militia -- military correspondence suppressed -- facts regarding appointment as Brigadier-General -- the start for Washington -- found advisable to go around Baltimore -- a useful pamphlet and George Washington's opinion of it -- preparing to capture the ferry-boat Maryland -- a soldier who was anxious to fight and another who Wasn't -- arrival at Annapolis and the naval Academy -- “Oh, won't you save the Constitution?” -- Militiamen should know how to cook -- arrival of the New York Seventh -- the Colonel's West Point dry nurse -- private Homans and the locomotive -- some remarks on the New York Seventh -- episode of Lieutenant-Colonel Keyes, also of West Point
Filled with apprehension, I returned to Boston about the 28th of December, being delayed one day in a snowstorm. I felt it my duty immediately to call upon Governor Andrew, and state to him that I believed there was to be an attempt, on the 4th of March, to prevent, by armed force, the inauguration of Lincoln, in Washington; and that it seemed to me that Massachusetts should be prepared to meet such a crisis, by having her militia ready to march to the aid of the government. I explained to him that while we were quite well equipped with arms for service, yet there was not to my knowledge a military overcoat in the possession of any volunteer soldier, except some fancy overcoats owned by two or three of the city companies; that the 4th of March was a very inclement season in Washington, and that it would be utterly impossible for the troops to go without overcoats. Besides, there was not, to my knowledge, a haversack among the equipments of our soldiers in which rations could be carried, and their uniforms were holiday affairs, which might, however, stand the rough usage of a short campaign. I then called to his mind the fact that our volunteer soldiers were largely young men, and pretty largely young Democrats, and suggested that if they were called upon to march by the order of a Republican governor to fight their party associates, they might hesitate. Said he:-- “How can this be obviated?” “Let each company,” I replied, “be quietly called to its armory, and the question put to every soldier, ‘Are you ready to march, when called upon to defend the national capital?’ I think the ”
