Thursday, July 16, 2020

Diary of Private Daniel L. Ambrose: Thursday, February 13, 1862

This is a beautiful still morning, though its stillness is occasionally interrupted by the heavy cannonading on the Cumberland. After hastily eating our breakfast, we are ordered into line.

Soon Colonel Babcock gives the command “forward !” Going a short distance we are ordered to “halt !” “unsling knapsacks!” “draw overcoats !" We throw them in the fence corners, and move forward on double-quick time. Soon we are in the fray. While marching over a hill and down towards a ravine, the Seventh encounters a masked battery. It is our first encounter-our initiation. But oh, how fierce! we are only seventy-five yards from the battery's wrathful front. Grape and canister fall thick and fast. There is a little hesitation, but with their gallant Colonel and enthusiastic Major, the men stand the tempest. Colonel Babcock, with his quick perception, discovers at once the situation of his regiment, and with the ready aid of Major Rowett, succeeds in making a flank movement, passing from the rebel battery's immediate front to a more congenial locality. In this, our first engagement, one noble soldier has fallen. It seems almost a miracle that more did not fall. But only one went down—the gallant Captain Noah E. Mendell, of company I.

The principal fighting to-day has been done by the sharp-shooters. There is a lull now. Nothing is heard save an occasional shot from the gunboats. Darkness has come and we bivouac for the night; soon it commences to rain; then changes from a cold rain to sleet and snow. Oh! how cold the winter winds blow. We dare not build any camp fires, for Grant's edict has wisely gone forth, forbidding it. The soldiers suffer to-night. Some of them have no blankets. During the latter part of the night, Colonel Babcock, with his men, could have been seen pacing up and down a hill to keep from freezing. Oh! what a long cheerless night; and with what anxiousness the soldiers wait for the morning's dawn.

SOURCES: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 31-2

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