tions for an army. Owing to the force of the current, a large rope-cable was stretched from shore to shore fifty feet above the bridge, and the upper end of each boat ־was stayed to the cable by a smaller rope. The rushing bent the bridge into a half-moon curve. The clock-like precision ־with ־which these men worked showed them to be the drilled engineers and pontoniers of the regular army. After the bridge was built, a slight, short man, with sandy hair, in military dress, came out upon it and congratulated the engineers on their success. This unassuming man was George B. McClellan, commander of the Army of the Potomac.
It was on this boat-bridge that the army of General Banks crossed to the Virginia shore in 1862. Officers were not allowed to trot their horses; troops in crossing were given the order, “ Route step,” as the oscillation of the cadence step or trotting horse is dangerous to the stability of a bridge of any kind.
I crossed the bridge soon after it was laid, visited Jefferson Rock, the ruins of the burned armory, and the town in general. The occasional crack of a musket among the hills on the other side of the Shenandoah told that the enemy's scouts were still there. Colonel Geary’s men were engaged in driving them from the hills, preparatory to the advance of General Banks. During the day fifteen or twenty were captured and marched through the town, presenting a generally shabby and unmilitary appearance. They did not impress me as they did afterward, when charging on our lines with their unmusical yell and dauntless front.
The ruins of the burned armory of the United States were noticeable from the Maryland shore ; also the masses of men moving in . ceaseless tramp over the long and	|
almost crescent - like bridge. The	|
murmur of many voices, the mellow, abrupt call of the negro drivers to &“ their mules, the glistening arms of H the infantry reflected in the sunlight, a the dull rumble of artillery wheels 1! and baggage - wagons, live in memory to-day as one of the pictures of “war’s wrinkled front,” framed in the routine of more ordinary scenes.
The next day we were sent by rail back to Washington, and into camp upon our old grounds. A few mornings afterward an inspection was ordered. It came with the usual hurry and parade. Knapsacks and equipments were in shining order; every musket, bayonet, and button, boot, and belt, as bright as rubbing and fear of censure or police duty could make them. Inspection over, the last jingle of ramrod in resounding musket was heard, and we were dismissed, with an intimation that on the morrow we were to go on a march. . . .
A CONFEDERATE OF 1862.
CONFEDERATE PRISONERS.
canal and the river. There were no rations awaiting our arrival, and we were suffering from the hunger so common to soldiers. Who ever saw one off duty who was not in pursuit of something to eat? We could n’t get anything for love or money. We had at last reached a place where the people showed some of the distress incident to war, and a strong disinclination to feed or believe in us. We were grieved, but it could n’t be helped.
The bridge from the Maryland to the Virginia or Harper’s Ferry shore had been destroyed by fire, leaving only the granite abutments (which were afterward built upon again), and we were soon set at work conveying some flat-bottomed scows from Sandy Hook to Harper’s Ferry. As early as 9 o’clock about one hundred men came down opposite the ferry, just above the old bridge, and broke into little groups, in military precision. Four or five with spades and other implements improvised a wooden abutment on the shore; another party rowed against the stream, moored a scow, and let it drift down until it was opposite the wooden abutment; then a party of ten advanced, each two men carrying a claw-balk, or timbers fitted with a claw, one of which held the gunwale of the boat, the other the shore abutment. Twenty men now came down on the left with planks, one inch thick, six inches wide, and fifteen feet long, narrowed at each end; these they laid across the five joists or balks, and returned on the right. Another party meanwhile moored another boat, which dropped down-stream opposite the one already bridged; five joists, each twenty feet long, were laid upon the gunwale by five men; these were fastened by those in the boat, by means of ropes, to cleats or hooks provided for the purpose on the side of the scows, which were shoved off from the shore until the shore end of the balk rested upon the shore boat. These were covered with planks in the same manner as before ; side-rails of joists were lashed down with ropes to secure the whole. So one after another of the boats was dropped into position until a bridge several hundred feet long reached from the Maryland to the Virginia shore, for the passage of artillery and every description of muni-
spotlessly white, and, handing them to the corporal, said: “Put on those; I washed them myself!”
This was an unforgotten lesson to the whole regiment that it was a soldier’s duty to attend himself to his personal neatness.
In a camp of soldiers, rumor, with her thousand tongues, is always speaking. The rank and file and under-officers of the line are not taken into the confidence of their superiors. Hence the private soldier is usually in ignorance as to his destination. What he lacks in information is usually made up in surmise and conjecture ; every hint is caught at and worked out in possible and impossible combinations. He plans andfights imaginary battles. He manceuvers for position, with pencil and chalk, on fanciful fields, at the same time knowing no more of the part he is actually performing in some great or little plan than the knapsack he bears. He makes some shrewd guesses (the Yankee’s birthright), but he knows absolutely nothing. It is this which makes the good-will and confidence of the rank and file in the commander so important a factor in the morale of an army.
How we received the report, or whence it came, I know not, but it was rumored one morning that we were about to move. The order in reality came at last, to the distress and dismay of the sutlers, and the little German woman who kept the grocery round the corner. We left her disconsolate over the cakes, pies, and goodies which had been liberally purchased, but which were yet unpaid for, when we fell into two ranks, were counted off, and marched to conquer the prejudices of other sutlers.
We took the ears on February 25th, and were hurried through a number of little sleepy-looking villages of Maryland. The next morning found us at Sandy Hook, about half a mile from Harper’s Ferry; thence, after about three hours’ delay, we marched to a place opposite the promontory on and around which is situated the picturesque village of Harper’s Ferry, at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers.
It was cold at our camping-place, between the
81
CAMPAIGNING TO NO PURPOSE.
RECOLLECTIONS OF A PRIVATE.—II. BY WARREN LEE GOSS.
WHILE we were in camp at Washington in February, 1862, we were drilled to an extent which to the raw “thinking soldier” seemed unnecessary. Our colonel was a strict disciplinarian. His efforts to drill out of us the methods of action and thought common to citizens, and to substitute in place thereof blind, unquestioning obedience to military rules, were not always appreciated at their true value. In my company there was an old drill-sergeant (let us call him Sergeant Hackett) who was in sympathetic accord with the colonel. He had occasion to reprove me often, and, finally, to inflict a blast of profanity at which my self-respect rebelled. Knowing that swearing was a breach of discipline, I waited confidently upon the colonel, with the manner of one gentleman calling upon another. After the usual salute, I opened complaint by saying: “Colonel, Mr. Hackett has — ” The colonel interrupted me angrily, and, with fire in his eye, exclaimed : ‘ ‘ Mister ? There are no misters in the army.” “I thought, sir — ” I began apologetically. “ Think ? think ? ” he cried. ‘‘ What right have you to think ? /do the thinking for this regiment! Go to your quarters !”
I did not tarry. There seemed to be no common ground on which he and I could argue questions of personal etiquette. But I should do injustice to his character as a commander if I failed to illustrate another manner of reproof which he sometimes applied.
One day, noticing a corporal in soiled gloves, he said : “ Corporal, you set a bad example to the men with your soiled gloves. Why do you ? ”
“ I’ve had no pay, sir, since entering the service, and can’t afford to hire washing.”
The colonel drew from his pocket a pair of gloves
TROOPER OF THE VIRGINIA CAVALRY, 1861.