Jan. 23, '62.
I don't know whether the newspapers, which have so many
facts to telegraph, have said anything about the rainy, muddy thaw which has
been the most important fact in the Army of the Potomac since the first of
January. It is particularly hard on cavalry, encamped on a clay bank — the
horse splashed with wet clay after three hours' drill is not a cheerful
spectacle to the recruit who has to clean him — it opens his eyes to some of
the advantages of infantry. Our fellows, however, are kept in spirits by the
constant hope of an “advance” — an advance where, or upon what, they do not
stop to think; the regular cavalry in the Army of the Potomac are brigaded
together under General Cooke,1 and are all kept upon this side of
the river: for more than three weeks they have had orders to be in readiness at
a few hours' notice: but the country on the other side is so unfavourable to
mounted troops, except in small bodies, as vedettes and patrols, that I am
inclined to think these orders were only a ruse to deceive Congressmen, and
perhaps to get into the papers, and so find their way to the rebels.
You will be glad to hear that the Colonel is sometimes
pleased to compliment me, and has even talked of rearranging the squadrons so
as to give me command of one — to get a squadron is the height of a Cavalry
Captain's ambition. My chance for some time, however, is still a very slim one.
_______________
1 Brigadier-General Philip St. George Cooke
commanded, during the Peninsular Campaign (under General Stoneman, Chief of
Cavalry), the Cavalry Reserve, consisting of Emory's and Blake's brigades.
Major Laurence Williams then commanded the Sixth Cavalry.
SOURCE: Edward Waldo Emerson, Life and Letters of
Charles Russell Lowell, p. 220-1, 406-7
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