5 a. m. The cars
shrink, or the men swell, for certainly everybody had less room last night than
before.
Cross and crabbed,
sore in every joint, and mad at everything and everybody, we crawled out of our
beds (?) and shook ourselves together. In spite of strict orders to the
contrary, some fresh pork and some poultry found its way past the guards during
the night. The owners needn't come looking for it, they would find only
bristles and feathers if they did. I suppose the partaker is as bad as the
thief, but I didn't feel guilty at all for accepting a slice of pork. I soon
found a canteen with no owner, melted it apart over a fire and fried my pork
and divided with my chums. There was no question about its being fresh, for we
had no salt to make it otherwise. About 9 o'clock we tumbled into the cars and
with no more adventures reached Camp Millington late in the afternoon. Can any
one imagine our surprise and our great delight at finding the 150th N. Y. in
camp right across the road from our camp? In a twinkling we were together.
Discipline went to the winds. The officers tried to make a show of authority,
but might as well have ordered the wind not to blow. All being from the same
neighborhood, we were one great happy family, reunited after a long separation.
I doubt if there is a man in either regiment who has not a friend, if not a
brother, in the other. They have passed through about the same experiences in
the recruiting camp and passed over the same route to this place. They knew the
same people we knew and could give us late information about them. My own
brother, John Van Alstyne, the same John who scolded me for enlisting, who
called me a "fool" and lots of other bad names, had made the same
sort of a fool of himself and was here with Uncle Sam's uniform on. Dozens of
others I knew almost as well, and the same was the case all through, officers
and men alike. As soon as the first round of handshaking was over and our volleys
of questions about home and home people were answered, we took our turn at
answering as to where we had been and what we had done, and how we liked it,
etc., etc. Then we couldn't help standing up a little straighter, and showing
as best we could the superiority of old bronzed soldiers like us over raw
recruits like them. We had just returned from a sally against the enemy. The
enemy had run off and given us no chance to show what we might have done, but
that was no fault of ours. But soon the pangs of hunger, which had been
forgotten for the time, came back, and as soon as the 150th took in the
situation, over the fences and into their deserted camp they went, and soon
everything eatable that their camp contained was transferred to ours, and soon
afterwards to our stomachs. And how much good it did them to see us eat! They
bought out the sutler and fed us until we could eat no more. And then we smoked
and talked and chatted until late into the night. Surely I have never seen so
much supreme satisfaction crammed into so small a space of time. But we finally
separated and have quieted down, and now that I have written up my diary I will
crawl in with my snoring comrades.
SOURCE:
Lawrence Van Alstyne, Diary of an Enlisted Man, p. 52-4
No comments:
Post a Comment