From The Iowa 2d Regiment

STEAMER S. L. McGILL, bound for Dixie, February 12.

EDITOR GAZETTE. – On the 10th the 2d Iowa left St. Louis in a manner not in accordance with our usual custom.  General Hamilton saw fit to issue an order to disgrace the regiment, for acts that it had no cognizance of until they were read as we were ready to march through the city.  If the acts of vandalism were committed by members of the regiment, they kept it a secret from their comrades.

Last September, while on the march from Ironton to Cape Girardeau, a soldier, while intoxicated, took possession of a horse.  He was drummed out and an example made of him before the regiment.  That case is similar to the present, except that now the innocent must suffer with the guilty.

The regiment cannot but feel the injustice done them and the Iowa troops in general.  Citizens never have complained of our behavior while we have been stationed among them.  We have some men in the regiment that are not as they should be.  What regiment has not?  What city, town, or school district has not men that reflect discredit upon the community?  Never have we shown better discipline than we did by the quiet, orderly manner in which we submitted to an order that all felt to be so unjust.  All marched with a soldierly bearing, feeling conscious that they held their fame in their own hands, and that it was not in the power of any General to make or unmake their reputation.

We will be in Paducah to-morrow morning, but will continue our journey to Dixie’s land with as little delay as possible.  We hope you will hear from us in the field of action in a few days; but we have been disappointed so often that we have but little faith that we will meet with an opportunity of trying our steel with the enemy.

We are in good fighting condition at present, and feel able to give a good account of ourselves.  We know we must fight to win laurels, after the fierce encounters of the 1st and Springfield and the 7th at Belmont.  We left all the sick at the St. Louis general hospital, where they will be taken care of.

DISCIPLINE,

2nd Iowa Regt.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Thursday Morning, February 20, 1862, p. 2