Having for a long time intended to write some recollections of my service in the War between the States—of course in the Confederate Army—thinking after I am dead and gone it would be a pleasant and useful legacy to my children, I now try to proceed to that task, being admonished that I am growing old and may at any time be prevented by the Great Reaper. I am especially aroused too to this task by the revival of war memories and scenes by the organization of our old veterans in Camp Hennegan and the reunion of same at Richmond, Va., to lay the cornerstone of the monument to our grand old leader Jefferson Davis.
Commenced July 14, 1896
My first enlisting in the Confederate Army was in Capt. J. A. Peterkins Company, Maj. A. D. Sparks1 Battalion of Cavalry, at Mount Pleasant, near Charleston, S. C Later on when this command was disbanded I volunteered in and joined Company H,Hampton Legion, mounted infantry. My captain was Jack Palmer, of Orangeburg; first lieutenant, A. M. Snyder, now of Kingstree, S. C.
The last year or more of the war I was detailed for special duty and taken from active duty in my company and sent to Gen. Mart W. Gary's headquarters to act as courier and especially to act as clerk to Lieutenant R. W. Boyd, of Darlington, S. C, and courier, who was on the staff of General Gary and was his ordnance officer. In times of battle I had to keep the ordnance train of wagons near the front and supplied with ammunition, during battle to keep in touch with Lieutenant Boyd and General Gary and keep the wagon train where they ordered it, and after battle to collect rifles and ammunition captured, assort the different kinds of arms and deliver them to the government laboratory in Richmond, Va.
My oldest brother, W. D. Crosland, volunteered from Wofford College into the Holcombe Legion, Captain Walche's company; was captured on a scouting raid and put in Point Lookout prison until near the end of the war. His regiment was fused into our brigade, the Seventh S. C. Cavalry.
When South Carolina Seceded.
When South Carolina seceded I was quite a boy and as my parents were very strict with me I did not have the run of the little town like many boys, but my father's patriotism on grand occasions when speech making was the order of the day got the best of him and I was allowed to venture out and hear the speeches. These speeches fired my young heart, and like other boys and men, too, I donned a red star cut from red patent-leather and attached to coat lappel with a small Palmetto button.
This soon gave place to a genuine Palmetto rosette which I wore with the pride of a grown citizen. In rapid order followed the secession of other States, then the capture of Fort Sumter by the Federals and its recapture by South Carolina troops, then the call for volunteers for the war. My father was a strong secessionist and came home every day from town and talked to the family about the war and its results, read us the papers, and no one can imagine the tumultuous feelings aroused in a boyish heart. I remember when calmer scenes gave place to these passionate interviews I would steal upstairs by myself and buckle my father's old militia sword around me and stick an old pepper-box six-chamber revolver in my pocket and strut around the room with a martial air and imagine slaughter to the Yankees and glory to myself. I would have given five years of my life to have paraded around the plantation with these gewgaws in bombastic attire before the younger brothers and negroes. I would have felt like a hero, but my sensible mother, who never saw any success for our caurse from the first, though intensely Southern in sympathies, always nipped my folly in the bud. My mother, I must say in justice to her memory, was a native of Vermont, was highly educated and knew the temper of the Northern people and their vast resources, and believed the contest to be an unequal one and our failure inevitable at last. Wise woman.
Call for South Carolina Troops.
The next great event was the call for a company of soldiers for our county. One was raised at once of over a hundred men, many of them our immediate neighbors and friends and the flower of the country. They were soon armed and uniformed and daily drills and target firing on the public square was the big excitement. Finally, when all was ready these soldiers were off to scenes of action, only in a few weeks to be followed by calls for other companies. My eldest brother, W. D. Crosland, was off at Wofford College and he, too, soon enlisted in a company at Spartanburg and went to the front, so our family was at once into it.
My father employed always a private tutor and allowed the better families to send to our school in a small academy standing under the oaks where A. J. Bristow now lives. Rev. A. J. Stafford of the Methodist ministry was our teacher at that time, and he volunteered in the first company raised as a private and was soon elected chaplain of the regiment, the Eighth South Carolina Volunteers. The regiment was stationed at Florence, S. C, temporarily, and it became my duty for weeks to carry Mr. Stafford to Society Hill, our nearest depot, every Saturday morning so that he might preach to soldiers on Sunday, and I would meet him at the depot early Monday morning to bring him home to teach the remainder of the week. We had to cross the river on a tedious old ferry boat, as there was no bridge then. These trips lasted until the regiment was called into active service. This left us without a school. My heroic mother, with the care of house-hold duties, four house servants to look after, and the weaving and spinning of cloth for the plantation negroes (some 100) as well as her social duties, undertook to teach four of us in the family. She was in poor health, but her devotion to duty and indomitable determination and energy conquered all obstacles and she taught us well and kept all other duties up. She soon saw the loose rein that the war spirit was giving me, a license hitherto not allowed and was detrimental to my best interest, so when any cause interrupted school she put me to carding cotton with the common old cotton cards and then spinning it into thread on the old spinning wheel. I had my task to perform. From this I learned to weave cloth, and the discipline was good for me. My father's health was beginning to fail, which added greatly to my poor mothers duties, but bravely did she bear all on before her. She was so ambitious for her children that no obstacle would stop her. She took the idea to heart that I must be accomplished, and with all on her hands and heart that would have broken down most strong and healthy women she started me to studying French. Though I never looked into a book before, she made such progress that I soon learned to read it well and speak it fairly. I remember that I read the novel "Corinne" as a pastime by myself.
Time wore on this way, when to add to all my parents' other troubles news came that my brother, who belonged to the Holcomb Legion, then in Virginia and afterward made into the Seventh South Carolina Cavalry and transferred to Gary's Brigade, had been captured in the peninsula while doing scout duty.
All were much distressed, because his band of scouts had given the enemy much trouble for a long time by their daring and brave deeds. They had long threatened to kill them if ever captured.
After a long time we got a letter from him from Point Lookout prison, where he was carried after a personal examination and threat from Beast Butler. Here he languished and came finally more dead than alive out of prison by exchange in February, 1865. The horrors and torture of this imprisonment told severely on my mother, but she hoped and prayed for the best.
Conscript Act Passed.
The strain of war was calling for all able-bodied men, and finally the conscript act was passed, which forced all parties of 18 years and over to go into the war. I was now nearing this period and my parents looked forward to more trouble, for the land was full of trouble, many dead and households in mourning, and nursing wounded soldiers who were well enough to get home to relieve the military hospitals. I remember I often helped mother tear up old linen and bolts of cotton and sew and wind bandages to send to the front, and can now see my poor mother again as her eyes at times would fill with tears as her mind would take hold of the thought that she might be performing this service for one of her own children. All these trials made her and father very solicitous about my approaching eligibility for service. They were especially so about me because I had been very delicate from early childhood. I came very near losing my eyesight from constitutional weak eyes. Such was my trouble that at three different times I learned to read and three times forgot it all again, as I was banished from books and all light.
Once I remained one year in a dark room with blankets (dark ones) hung over the windows and lived in darkness and perpetual night. I remember now (he anguish I endured with my eyes. My sight was despaired of, but finally good nursing and heroic treatment pulled me through. I recollect wearing a seaton (a scale of silk punctured in skin to keep up inflammation) in back of neck for about a year. Added to this I was very dyspeptic and suffered from intense sick headache spells, and was a wreck generally. My parents, though patriotic and willing to give their children to the service, felt that my going forward was a pure and speedy sacrifice of life to no purpose, and coming after older brothers uncertain fate, for often months passed with no tidings and all felt that he must be dead, made them loath to give me up. But the question pressed upon us. I, fired with patriotic ambition and tired of home restraints, was eager to go, while parents reasoned with me. Father urged me to remain.
Being rich and influential he offered time and again to get me an honorable medical and military exemption, but I objected. I think he did, too, for I remained at home without protest some four or five months after I was 18 years old, but I became so restive under the restraint that finally father gave up and I enlisted at once in a cavalry company raised a short time before by J. A. Peterkin, which was located then at Mount Pleasant, S. C. How my poor parents suffered no one can tell now, as they never had any idea but that I would speedily return a corpse.
My sainted and heroic mother at once fitted me out with a warm suit of home-woven woolen gray jeans, overcoat of same, a pair of plantation-made boots—for clothing and shoes from the stores were long since things of the past. The Confederate cavalry had to furnish their own horses, so father gave me choice of all his stables, and as we all had our saddle horses for pleasure I took one I claimed, a fine home-bred sorrel. Thoughtless and fool that I was. I went around and with light heart bade my boy and girl friends good-bye, and while my poor parents' hearts were breaking I was in great glee, and now even am ashamed at the additional sorrow I must have given them by my seeming indifference at the gravity of the situation. Just here I wish to say father gave me a nice little pocketbook which I carried through the war and it is now in my desk as a memento, also the backs of a once nice portfolio that I got in my Christmas stocking a year before.
This I carried through the war and all my letters were written upon it. In said pocketbook is the last bill of money paid me for services as a soldier, also transportation ticket from Richmond home issued under governmental control and certificates from Doctor Baer of my physical condition and orders of transfer from my company to General Gary's headquarters of our brigade to act as a courier. These are mementos worth preserving.
On the Way to the Front.
On the 24th of December, 1868, mounted upon my horse with my clothes packed in father's medical saddlebags he used to practice with in his pioneer horseback professional career, after an affectionate adieu to the loved ones, feeling like a hero, I set out to join T. L. Crosland, who had joined same command and under whose fostering care father wished me to be launched into the wide world, for this was my first trip alone from home. T. L. Crosland then lived on the Peterkin place, now owned by the Alfords, near Maj. Z. A. Drakes and Dr. Lane's. I spent the night of the 24tn at his house, That night a good snow tell, but we set out early in the morning of Christmas day, the first I had ever spent from home. We rode until dinner and after feeding and eating a lunch at Mrs. Murchisons, J. D. and William's mother, we rode on and spent the night at Marion C. H. Pushed on next day through snow and spent the night on the Great Pee Dee River hanks at John J. Stubbs's, a former resident of our county. He was glad to see us and hear from his Marlboro friends. I was getting very tired now with such long rides and felt I was not such a hero at last. Oh, the frivolity of youth!
Next day we crossed the Pee Dee at long ferriage as it was called. A large flat was rowed in deep water by four men and polled along, and in shallower places by iron hooks on polls hooking trees and bushes. It was four miles across and I got pretty scared.
Applied that night for lodging at a very rich rice planter's house, but was refused. We asked as soldiers to be allowed to stable our horses and we would sleep with them in the straw, but were turned away. I rebelled and proposed to stay anyhow, but my Cousin Tom would not agree. Though very tired we rode on some four miles and stopped at a poor woman's house, only two rooms. Her husband was in the war. She took us in and said she had very little to eat but would divide with us. Gave us meat and bread and poor coffee and we laid on the floor before the fire and rested.
In the morning the good woman gave us a bite and would take no pay from travellers or soldiers. We left her with God's benedictions. We contrasted her treatment with that shown us by the Tom would not agree. Though very tired we rode on some four miles and stopped at a poor woman's house, only two rooms. Her husband was in the war. She took us in and said she had very little to eat but would divide with us. Gave us meat and bread and poor coffee and we laid on the floor before the fire and rested.
In the morning the good woman gave us a bite and would take no pay from travellers or soldiers. We left her with God's benedictions. We contrasted her treatment with that shown us by the rich rice planter whose property we were to defend. We keenly felt the indignity. God will reward the poor woman, as she gave us "the cup of cold water in His name."
A long ride and crossing Black River by a rope ferry (afterwards Santee River by ferry four and one-half miles long ferriage, as all the water courses were very full) brought us almost in sight of Georgetown, where we spent the night with a poor man who did all he could for us but would take no pay. After crossing Santee we pushed on to McClellanville next day and were entertained two days by Marlboro men who were camped there doing picket duty, as the Yankee gunboats were hovering around. Lieut. Pet Drake, brother of J. N. and J. A. Drake, was very kind to us.
In Camp at Mt. Pleasant.
Next day, after a long and sandy ride, we arrived at Mount Pleasant, where our company was camped. We were gladly received and assigned quarters and arms and uniforms. Next day we went out on drill, battalion cavalry drill, Capt. A. D. Sparks, major commanding. I was green, but soon caught on, and fell into camp life as naturally as if I had been cut out for it. After drill was over we would run horse races on a large level field where we held battalion drill. Sometimes 30 or 40 horses would run at a time. So much for fun, but when it came to duty such as patroling the beach on Sullivan's Island on lookout for Yankee gunboats, or rowboats filled with soldiers, the fun disappeared. We would have to ride a mile up and down the water's edge three or four hours at a time until relieved, the wind blowing off the cold waves as it only can blow on the seashore.
I would get so cold I would almost fall from my horse, then I began to wish I was at home. I have often seen a level spot on the sand by morning be blown into little hills. The only fire we could have when off duty was behind sand banks and made from boards torn from magnificent dwellings abandoned because under fire of the enemy's guns. Many of these houses were riddled with shot and shell.
While camped at Mount Pleasant the old Irish women's horses would be turned loose to forage on us, and all sorts of tricks were tried upon them to rid us of their eating our horses' feed. One night a lot of our boys tied an old camp kettle to one of these horse's tail hard and fast and filled the kettle with brickbats and turned him loose with a whip start. The old horse ran like mad all over the town, arousing every dog to barking and following—and there seemed to be a thousand; citizens turned out to see and join in the yell. Thousands of soldiers camped around caught on and yelled. It raised such a commotion that the Yankees, hearing the noise, concluded some demonstration was on hand. They threw up calcium lights from gunboats and land batteries, lighting up the islands so we could read print, and then began to shell every point. The roar was grand. General Ripley, in command, turned out all troops and appeared on hand with staff to know the cause, but no one would tell, and after midnight all got quiet again. So much for soldiers' pranks. They were like boys away from home and order and restraints. Many of them were men.
Courier Duty on Long Island.
After some weeks had passed with this sort of life, volunteers were called to go over on Long Island to do courier duty, and a love of adventure caused me to volunteer with five or six others.
We crossed in a large flat rowed with oars from north end of Sullivan's Island, where a large fort and battery was located called Battery Marshall, over the inlet to Long Island. The tide was running out very strong and our men in charge of the flat came near losing control of it, and we came near being carried out to sea where a large gunboat was ready to pick us up. It was a life and death struggle. The waves were running high, we got so far out, and I was frightened in an inch of my life, but finally we got on terra firma safely. Our duty here was to go up on the far end of the island some ten miles and simply be ready to carry an alarm signal to Battery Marshall for a detail of infantry pickets there in case the enemy tried to land there or Bulls bay or Dewes' inlet, all of which were right at us. The gunboats were riding at anchor just off the beach all the time. We rendezvoued down a steep bluff covered with thick oaks and palmetto trees and slept, ate and did our cooking and warming here out of sight of the enemy.
We had a comfortable place and were protected against the wind, but it was very lonesome away from all companions and the busy scenes about camp. We had an easy and lazy time here for a month. When off duty we would be quartered on the south end of the island in the only house on it and under the guns of Battery Marshall. Here we had a jolly time. The house belonged to a Mr. Sweeny, who ran an oyster farm. We would take his flat and large grabbs ten feet long and go out on the back inlet on low tide and grapple up boat loads of large single oysters to our hearts' content. We caught sheepshead fish, coons and opossums, as they could be killed with a stick they were so numerous. I went over to camp one day in a row boat after our mail, and on being delayed getting back at the appointed hour I was left. I was in a peck of trouble and feared discipline for being out of place. I tried to get several boatmen to row me over, but all said they could not without orders. One man told me to go and ask Captain Warley, captain of a hattery near Marshall, to help me, and he would do so as he was a kind-hearted man. I was a timid and unsophisticated boy, but under compulsion I went to his headquarters, made my request and stated my difficulty. He was very kind, saw my youth and timidity and asked me who I was. When I told him, he asked if I was Doctor Crosland's son. I told him I was. He then became more kind than ever, said he knew my father well, would take pleasure in helping me then or any other time I needed it and to call upon him; gave me an order to some boatmen to row me over at once. I left him with many thanks and will always feel kindly to his memory.
Yankee Gunboat Blown Up.
One night while on duty on the upper end of the island we heard a most terrific explosion and knew some unusual event had occurred and in the morning we went out on the beach and found it was the Yankee gunboat Housatonic that had been blown up by one of our daring torpedo boats. The whole upper deck of said gunboat that day floated out onto the beach. A detail of hands were sent from Sullivan's Island and they cut away hundreds of dollars' worth of the rigging, brass and copper and her bell and sent all over to Charleston. I sent home a flat strip of the painted deck, with name and date, in a letter as a memento.
We were relieved soon after this and went back to camp, and it felt like going home, a soldier gets so attached to camp and its surroundings.
Soon after this Charleston was stripped of every command possible, the troops being sent to Florida to the campaign there, and to cover our destination our company was ordered up the coast to Ten Mile Church, Porchers and other points to make a feint to draw attention of the enemy to prevent his sparing any troops. We went out every night on the beach and sent up military skyrockets of all colors to mystify the enemy. This was fun and there were many amusing incidents connected with it. There were alarms of the enemy landing several times, and as it was always late in the night there was much bustle getting out to the point. I remember one night some of us slept in Porcher's abandoned house piaza, and some of the boys sewed up each other's pants legs, and in the hurry to get under arms they had to carry their pants in their hands, and it was quite a joke. All the harm I saw we did was to scare some low-country negroes so badly by our demonstrations that they took boats and went out to the Yankee fleet. We soon went back to camp again.
Yankees Attempt to Capture "The Little Ida."
Soon after this a Yankee gunboat ran into the town of McClellanville, some thirty miles above us, after a blockade runner, and we were ordered up there (two companies and a battery of artillery). We got up there on short notice, burning for a fight. The rowboats full of marines from the gunboat had rowed with muffled oars up to the blockade steamer, captured her and got up steam and had started out to sea when, on being hailed by one of our sentries she refused to heave to, our battery put a shot or two through her deck, when she stopped. Our boats all were aroused and full of soldiers and made for the steamer.
The marines were falling out of her and taking to their rowboats to get back to their gunboat some distance down the stream, but we caught the most if not all of them, put the steamer back to port again, and sent the Yankees prisoners under guard to Charleston. This was the first live Yankee enemy I ever saw, and they created quite an excitement in camp and aroused our martial spirit highly. We felt as large as if we had taken a city.
It was quite an event in our quiet coast life. The steamers name was "The Little Ida." She lay there, having put her cargo ashore, some time and after all got quiet left, and I heard got captured.
A Great Outrage.
We remained here several weeks looking for a renewed expedition from the gunboats, and then were put on duty by details going up some ten miles to the mouth of Santee River to look out for passing of gunboats up the Santee. We were put on picket up in the third story of an immense rice mill owned by a Mr. Blake, an Englishman. From there we could plainly see any passing into the broad mouth of the Santee. This was the largest and richest plantation I ever saw, the canals were ten feet wide and deep and had the finest fish in them. The soil was a foot or more deep and cornstalks grew as large as a man's wrist or ankle, as thick in drill as cane almost, and was as blue as indigo it was so rich. The owner had gone back to England, the plantation abandoned, slaves all gone, and everything looked as lonesome and dreary as death. There were over an hundred negro houses, two rooms and piazza, on long streets fronting each other, and under large live oaks. I have always wanted to see this place under cultivation and visit it again. Soon after this we were ordered to Mount Pleasant again, and then occurred an event that shaped my life differently and has ever been felt as then, one of the greatest outrages perpetrated on free men.
Hampton's Legion Recruited.
Hampton's Legion had returned from Tennessee very much cut up and decimated and was to be recruited, and Col. M. W. Gary was promoted to brigadier general if he could make a full regiment and mount his men. By some State manoeuvering and military conniving it was ordered that our company and Captain Vennings' of our battalion of cavalry should be disbanded as organizations and merged into the Hampton Legion, giving our men choice of giving up our horses to old Legion men, enlisting where we pleased, and twenty days' furlough, or go to Hampton Legion retaining our horses. Our officers got an inkling of this at McClellanville and our captain, instead of telling his men and letting them quietly go home and re-enlist elsewhere, kept it quiet and carried us into camp at Mt. Pleasant as though nothing unusual was on tapis. That night our camp was suddenly surrounded by a company of Confederate soldiers with fixed bayonets and loaded guns, our horses put under guard, and we were informed of the status of affairs. We felt greatly humilated at this action. We having been accepted as soldiers by the government and had done honorable and hard duty for months, and then to be treated this way was more than we could bear.
Some of us tried to cut our horses' throats before we would give them up, but on going to them were not allowed access. Then we intended to foot it home, but we found ourselves fixed and shut up to the two courses above. We were in a tumult, all mad, some determining to do one thing and others another. While we were in this state we assembled in the piazza of a large house we were quartered in, and held an indignation meeting. We felt Capt. J. A. Peterkin had betrayed and deserted us, and I, among others, gave him our opinion and said very hard words to him, hard to take. I was especially insulting, but he took it all quietly.
Since and after the war we have talked it over often and laughed over it. Many gave up their horses and joined bomb-proof commands, and got exempted and in one way or another evaded any further active duty. It was a great mistake for the service, for had we been put in Hampton Legion, or any other command, as an organized body we all would have gone with alacrity and been a power united, but at it was hardly a third went into the Legion or active service anywhere else. Captain Peterkin got a bombproof and was never any more good. I afterwards learned the whole truth about the transaction. He was under compulsion to hold us together till we could be transferred into other commands, and had he not done so would have been hardly handled.
From here on till the close of the war I enlisted and belonged to Company H, Hampton Legion, Gen. M. W. Gary's Brigade. I, among others, including T. L. Crosland, Edwin Coxe, D. C. and P. M. and J. T. John, Travis Pate, C. S. McCall (our orderly sergeant), Robert Stanford, William and Robert and Arthur Calder, P. M. Hamer, Alex Heustiss, Joshua and J. K. Fletcher, and others whom I do not recall now, all concluded on due consideration that we wanted to see active service and did not wish to be forced to give up our horses, so joined Hampton's Legion and went to Virginia. It took some hours to settle all this and write our transfers and furloughs, which done, some went home at once, others, along with a detail from the Legion, took charge of our horses and carried them up to Columbia, where the regiment was stationed. I sent my horse along by my negro boy father gave me for a cook and waitingman and I with T. T. Crosland and others took train for home. We landed at midnight at Society Hill, could get no conveyance home and get out on foot for same; got to the river and could not get old Doub, the ferryman, up to put us over. We shot his house and shouted all to no purpose and laid down on the river bank and slept until daylight when the old coon got up and put us over. We then set out afoot for home. There was a great rejoicing then. I came home a hero instead of dead or half so. I was so fleshy my parents hardly knew me. I had been fed on delicacies all my life, hardly ever sat down to dinner with less than three courses, and then suddenly transferred to active outdoor exercise of the rigid sort, eating the plainest food and less quantities I lost my dyspepsia and fattened like a pig. I remember Miss Constantia Townsend, one of my chums, sent me a large sponge cake in a box mother made up for me, and when I got it I sliced it, fried it in bacon grease with my meat and ate it with greed and thought it the best cake I ever saw. It greatly amused Miss Constantia and the home folks when they heard how the cake was served. Our rations on coast were a little bacon, meal and sometimes flour, changed by rice and blue beef, mostly the latter, and it was tough eating as there was not an eye of grease on the beef and the rice was glue.
The Battle of St. Mary's Church.
We were to have all met at Columbia after ten days' furlough was out and gone to Virginia in a body, but about five days at home found me with a well-developed case of measles, and I was in bed very sick when my furlough was out. Father sent on a doctor's certificate, backed by statement of enrolling officer, and got my time extended. As I had a bad time it was three weeks before I was well enough to go forward, and then left sooner than my parents thought prudent as my extension was out and I feared consequences. On about the 28th of May, 1864, I started equipped again for Virginia via Columbia, S. C. Of course all were loath to see me go again, as now I was to be where there was great carnage and all felt very doubtful if I ever returned. I got to Columbia and found camp, of course, broke and all in Virginia, my boy riding my horse through the country with the regiment. I went direct to Richmond via Danville, and as cars were crowded rode with other soldiers on top the coaches to Richmond from Weldon. My eyes were nearly out when I got there, but as soon as there I was conveyed at once to the soldiers' home at the old Exchange Hotel and there I cleaned up and spent the night, and in the morning started out with others to the front in search of my regiment. I came up with it about June 25th, just after the battle of Cold Harbor was over, found it near Chickahominy River, at Ridley's Shop, near the enemy, in rifle shot, and went on duty at once, our horses being in rear in charge of every fourth man as was usual when we went into action. We lay under cover here a week or more speaking in low voices and whispers, looking for battle every hour. We could not cook or raise the least smoke. All the rations we had was cornbread baked some ten miles in rear and sent us in corn sacks thrown over backs of mules, and raw bacon. When the bread reached us it was mostly sour and broken into small fragments and crumbs. It was hard fare but all we could get, the raw meat was a pill with sour bread, but necessity knew no law and when we were hungry we ate it with relish and learned to love raw meat, and afterward often ate it so from choice when we had all chances to cook it. We organized our Marlboro friends into a mess at once, consisting of T. U Crosland, P. M. Hamer, D. C. and I. M. and J. T. John, Edwin Coxe, Alex Heustiss, Travis Pate and myself. My negro boy and Coxe's boy did our cooking when we were in camp long enough to cook. We remained near Ridley's shop in small skirmishes and picket firing for several days.
After an unusual hot fight all night and day with the enemy on this line we went into camp hungry and worn out, many of us too much so to wait for food, and fell down as soon as horses were unsaddled and fed, and went to sleep. About two o'clock in the morning a courier came up from St. Mary's or Samaria Church, some twenty miles, with orders for us to join Hampton. The bugle rang out for us to saddle up and fall in. I never was so much outdone, it seemed I had just gotten to sleep. We were in our saddle in ten minutes and on the road, and well do I remember that ride. The dust was ankle deep on the horses, and as we rode in two file the dust was so intense that we could not see the horses immediately in our front, nor could we see our hands held up before our faces. It came near suffocating us and I spit out great mouthfuls of pure mud. I thought I would die, and can't now see how I helped it, but a man can get used to anything, and nature became so over exhausted that I fell asleep finally in my saddle and rode on so for miles. Just about sunup we came to our destination, were ordered to graze our horses five minutes, and before we had more than dismounted and given them a bite we were ordered to mount and forward. We filed into a very large field and found many thousand cavalry there all drawn up and under a review by General Hampton. We were among the last to pass him. and as we did so with battle flags waving and bands playing and us hurrahing, the old general uncovered to us, his old regiment, and he told us he knew we would do our duty as of old. As each command passed him they were led out of the field and placed in position for battle. We were marched over a mile to the left and on counting fours were dismounted and with our long Enfield rifles went forward as we always did during an engagement. We crossed a large piece of woods which was fresh burned tiff to destroy the undergrowth to prevent the combatants from being concealed from each other and so take each other unawares. We passed through this woods driving a thin skirmish line in, under a scattering fire till we came to a rail fence around a field. Here we were halted and could plainly see the enemy in large numbers some half mile distant drawn up in line of battle.
They were soon charged by our men on our right flank Georgians and North Carolina troops. We could plainly see each line of battle with their colors in front. Our line swooped down upon them, both firing till they were very near each other, when under a very hot and rapid fire from the enemy our men fell back.
Our men had muzzle-loading rifles and the Yankees had breach loading and rapid firing rifles and had so great advantage over us. Our line reformed and went up on the enemy a little nearer than before only to be repulsed again, but they fell back only a short distance, reformed and charged the third time sweeping all before them. It was a grand and inspiring sight. We knew the enemy was only being driven under cover of his artillery and expected to be called to support this charge each moment, and sure enough we were ordered forward over the fence at double quick. Word passed down the line that we were to charge a battery, which always was dreaded by a soldier who knew what it meant. Many a prayer went up, and aloud, too, but on we went, and as we plunged into a piece of woods on the other side of the clearing I ran right up on a large soldier badly wounded and being carried out by four men. He was streaming blood and groaning loudly. It completely unnerved me, as I said to myself I am going where he came from. I would have run then at once had it not been for my pride, but I pressed on, and we soon fell upon the enemy in a swamp with the gaulberry bushes ten feet high. We halted and fired at each other here at close range till our guns got so hot we could scarcely hold them. We could tell where the enemy were by watching the tops of the bushes shaking. All of a sudden some one gave the alarm "fall back", and we fell back a short distance. When the mistake was discovered we advanced again, driving the enemy before us. We suddenly emerged from the swamp and got into an opening. Our company ran up into a farmers' back lot and I ran into his horse lot and saw the Yankees in full retreat, in fact stampeded. There was a wide lane from this lot toward a field and it was jammed full of a blue mass running for dear life, shedding guns, haversacks and accoutrements as they went. I rested my rifle across a cart in the lot and fired down this lane into the mass as fast as I could load till they got out of sight. We then double-quicked after them, and a mile further on, as expected, found they had run under cover of their batteries. We were ordered to charge these batteries planted on a high crown of hills. On we went amid a storm of grape shot and cannisters and shells till we got about a quarter of a mile of them, when Major Arnold, commanding our regiment, halted us, as we were out of ammunition, and he said he would not sacrifice his men under such a fire. We laid down under orders in a field of wheat just headed out, for protection, until we could get ammunition and support. I was completely broken down now, no food for 24 hours, and an all-night march, and a battle with so much running, the heat intense, and the excitement and yelling together with the intense burning produced by burning powder, caused a reaction as soon as I got quiet.
I was detailed then, with a squad from my company, to go to the rear and bring back a turn of ammunition. We took the back track and when about a half mile to rear we ran across a well of water with about twenty-five soldiers around it almost fighting for their turn to drink. When I came up I begged for water, and moved by my size and youth and pitiful distress, I suppose, all with one accord gave way to me, and said, "Give the boy water, the poor little fellow needs it." I remember how thankful I was and they stood back and saw me drink. I thought I never would get enough. The kind-hearted man who held the bucket warned me I had better not drink too much as it would hurt me, asking me if this was not my first battle, but inexperience and present distress goaded me on, and I drank my fill and sat down to rest a moment, and sure enough soon had cramp in my bowels and could not move. I lay down in great agony and soon knew almost nothing and thought I was dying. Kind passers tried to help me, but could do nothing. I laid on the ground all that evening until late in the night before I came around, then I was so weak and worn-out I could not travel. Near me were three wounded Yankees, one moaning all night, one just breathing, uttering no sound, and the other died very soon. I fell asleep as soon as my pains allowed, and when I awoke the sun was away up. I sprang up and started to search for my command. I soon found it resting and about ready to go back to camp at Malvern Hill, where we started from. This fight we called the battle of St. Mary's Church—some called it Samaria Church.
Grant was crossing to the south side of James River, and his cavalry and some infantry were making this diversion to cover his movements. I omitted to mention that the first time in this battle that we felt the enemy in force was at the church, a neat white-painted building. The Yankees had felled the trees for breastworks, cut off the limbs and taken the benches from the church and pinned them to the logs, and they made it hot for us behind them, but we soon ran them out. We learned after the fight was over that the afore-named battery was captured and driven off, and our mounted cavalry drove the panic-stricken enemy we routed so into the river and many of them were drowned. When we got back to camp we were nearly famished and had an awful ride back through the dust. We went into camp at Malvern Hill, getting our water out of a huge spring at the foot of the hill, running from under a large gum tree; spout of spring was three feet across. We remained here several days doing picket duty along the river, where the Yankee gunboats lay in sight. The marine band discoursed beautiful music every night, which we enjoyed very much. We could hear them giving orders, too, and any common conversation. Under cover of trees and hills intervening we grazed our horses by order and in order each morning early and late in the afternoon in clover fields waist high bought by our quartermaster for the government.
We had to avoid raising any dust to prevent being shelled by the enemy, which was often done. We lay here three or four weeks, having weekly and sometimes daily skirmishes with the marines from gunboats and Federal cavalry raiders who always were harassing our front