Crab Orchard, Ky. Again has the note of preparation sounded in
our camp, and all hands are busy getting ready for another campaign. In all
probability we will soon be on our winding way among the Cumberland Mountains,
en route for East Tennessee to assist in driving treason from that unhappy
State. Orders have not been issued, but our artillery and ambulances have come,
clothing has been issued, knapsacks, haversacks, canteens and tents have been
distributed, and, more ominous still, forty rounds of cartridges have been
dealt out to every man—in fact, we are ready to take the field at a minute's
notice, and only await the order.
"Be ready to
march tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock," is the order that greets me as I
write. It is one hundred forty miles to Knoxville, our objective point, and
will take us fourteen days if unopposed.
SOURCE: David Lane, A Soldier's Diary: The Story of
a Volunteer, 1862-1865, p. 90
