Letter from Rob giving a description of a cavalry charge on
two of their companies, before he reached Winchester, and then of their march
through Winchester. Short but graphic, and Father thinks of having it printed
as being interesting. All the account of brave deeds, bayonet charges, calmly
receiving the fire of the enemy and withholding their own, and all the stirring
accounts of courageous men, make one so long to be with them. I should of all
things enjoy a forlorn hope (I think). Well put in, I suppose, but still I
really do think so, for I'm not an atom afraid of death and the enthusiasm of
the moment would be sublime. An immense body of brave men is grand and I would
give anything to be one of them. I cannot express what a sense of admiration
and delight fills my soul when I think of the noble fellows advancing,
retreating, charging and dying, just how, when and where they are ordered. God
bless them! Mother says she hates to hear me talk so, but I think one loses
sight of the wounds and suffering, both of the enemy and one's own force, in
thinking of the sublime whole, the grand forward movement of thousands of men
marching “into the jaws of death,” calmly and coolly. God bless them! I say
again. I saw today the report of a Lieutenant in the First Massachusetts
expelled for cowardice in the face of the enemy. Such a thing I cannot
understand. I should think a man would be afraid to be a coward in front of his
men, all looking to him for example. I should think he'd go and shoot himself.
I remember hearing it said that . . . would never have been taken prisoner if
he had behaved well. And then, think of a man, with consciousness of such
conduct, daring to come home and show his face in Boston! Bah! Perhaps he did
behave well after all, though.
SOURCE: William Rhinelander Stewart, The
Philanthropic Work of Josephine Shaw Lowell, p. 28-9
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