Maryland Heights, October 20, 1862.
To-night I am all alone and naturally feel a little blue, so
my letter may not be very cheerful. Bob Shaw is on picket; so is Captain
Robeson; Tom Fox is sick with a light fever down in Sandy Hook, and his brother
has gone down to see him; my tent, therefore, is deserted. To-day I have been
out again with one hundred axe-men; it is an interestsing sight to see so many
men at work at once felling trees; we began our labor at the bottom of a ravine
and worked up a steep hill. Sometimes there would be as many as twenty or
thirty fine trees falling at once; they reminded me of men falling in battle,
that same dead, helpless fall. The effect was still stronger from the fact that
the choppers were almost always concealed by underbrush. I very nearly lost one
of my men in an accident to-day. He had just given the coup de grace to
a large, heavy ash tree, and had cleared himself from the fall of it, when
another tree falling from above, struck it, changing the direction of the fall
of the first and bringing it down with tremendous force where the man was
standing. He attempted to dodge, but had not time and was thrown to the ground.
I was near by, and ran up to him. I found him perfectly senseless, and I
thought, at the time, dying. He proved to be a man of my company named Conlan,
one of my very best soldiers, the only one that I mentioned as having
distinguished himself by bravery at the battle of Antietam. I had him moved to
a comfortable place and sent for our surgeon and a stretcher. After lying
insensible for about half an hour, he came to himself for a little and was
moved to our hospital. I was much relieved by Dr. Stone's telling me that there
were no bones broken; his shoulders and back were terribly bruised, though, and
it will be a long time before he gets about again.
Major Higginson of the First Massachusetts Cavalry made us a
passing call the other day, on his way to Washington, arriving last Friday
night about ten o'clock and taking breakfast with us and spending the forenoon
Saturday; he gave us all the latest news of our friends in his regiment. They
are having considerable work to do now, scouting about over the country. I had
one of the pleasantest times, Sunday, that I've had for some time; after
inspection, Shaw and I mounted our steeds and rode off into Pleasant Valley.
The road was very pleasant and the day beautiful, a genuine October one, with a
hot sun but a bracing air. The country is looking its best now, though the trees
don't change here as they do around home. Yet there was some bright color on
the sides of the mountains. We made our first call on Captain Charles Lowell at
General McClellan's headquarters. We found Major Higginson there, and a Mr.
Bancroft of Boston, who is visiting his friends in the army. After spending an
hour very pleasantly there, we proceeded to accept an invitation we had
received a few days before, to take dinner with a friend of ours, Johnny
Hayden, of Captain Edwards' battery, Third United States Artillery. We met some
pleasant, jolly officers there, who had been all through the Peninsular
campaign. Of course, there were plenty of yarns told on both sides, and
experiences compared. We had a nice dinner and rode back to camp at sunset
satisfied that we had had a thoroughly good time.
Days like these are like oases in our ordinary dull routine,
and they come rarely enough to be enjoyed.
So many of our officers are sick, absent or on some extra
duty, that there are only about seven of us in the line left to do all picket
and fatigue duty, bringing each one of us on once in three or four days. There
are at least two hundred men detailed from our regiment every day now for
guards, or other purposes.
SOURCE: Charles Fessenden Morse, Letters Written
During the Civil War, 1861-1865, p. 99-101
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