Messengers Ferry, Big
Black River, Miss.,
September 26, 1863.
Pass in your congratulations. We are under marching orders
for Chattanooga. Our whole corps is going. We steam o'er sand-bars to Memphis,
and then will probably “foot it,” though may go by cars as far as Corinth. From
Memphis the march will be some 450 miles. We will pass through my favorite
portion of Dixie, the Tennessee valley in North Alabama. We are all much
rejoiced at the idea of leaving a country where there is no enemy save
mosquitoes and chiggers and ague. We keep up the form of picketing; but I find
it decidedly uninteresting to do such duty, knowing that coons and owls will
cause all our alarms. Aside from knowing there is no enemy near, the picket
duty is delightful here. I have seldom passed a more pleasant night than the one
before last. The moon is about full, and our picket line (the post under my
charge), about one and a half miles long, runs along the river bank through
most beautiful little magnolia and beech groves and open grass plots. But a
knowledge that there are guerrillas in the country is necessary to a thorough
appreciation of picket duty. We are camped on the Messenger plantation. The
owner thereof was very wealthy. Worth $1,000,000.00. Had some 500 negroes, etc.
He armed and uniformed a secesh regiment at his own expense, and was, and is
yet probably, a Rebel to the core. He fled at the approach of our troops,
leaving his wife to manage for him. General Osterhaus called on her and asked
her if she desired Federal protection. She said she didn't ask anything of him
or any of his crew. The general told her she had just an hour to select and
load two wagons with kitchen furniture and start across the river. She moved,
was gone about a month, begged permission to return and is now eating
government rations, which she is too poor to pay for.
SOURCE: Charles Wright Wills, Army Life of an
Illinois Soldier, p. 190
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