Diary of George Templeton Strong: Monday, February 6, 1860

Just from opera, Puritani, with Ellie and Mrs. Georgey Peters and Dr. Carroll. Little Patti, the new prima donna, made a brilliant success.³ Her voice is fresh, but wants volume and expression as yet; vocalization perfect. . . .

Columbia College meeting at two p.m. Resolved to appropriate the President’s house and Professor Joy’s to College purposes, turn them into lecture rooms, and so forth. A good move. It is contemplated to build a new house for the President on Forty-ninth Street, which I think questionable.

I brought up some matters connected with the Law School, which went to the appropriate committee, and instigated King to introduce the question of suppressing-these secret societies, which do immense mischief in all our colleges. John Weeks has just taken a young brother of his from Columbia College and sent him into the country, because he found that the youth belonged to some mystic association designated by two Greek letters which maintained a sort of club room over a Broadway grocery store, with billiard tables and a bar. Whether it be possible to suppress them is another question. Result was that King is instructed to correspond with the authorities of other colleges and see whether any suggestions can be got from them and whether anything can be done by concerted action. . .⁴

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³ Adelina Patti, now about to enter her eighteenth year, had made her operatic debut in New York in 1859.

⁴ Fraternities were well planted at Columbia. Alpha Delta Phi had been chartered there in 1836, and three other fraternity chapters had been organized in the 1840’s. Francis Henry Weeks took his degree at Williams College in 1864.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 6-7

Diary of George Templeton Strong: February 10, 1860

Opera tonight with Ellie and Mrs. Georgey Peters and her papa; Der Freischutz in an Italian version. The Germanism of that opera is so intense that any translation of its text is an injustice to Weber’s memory, but its noble music can afford to be heard under disadvantages. Max was Stigelli, and very good. Agatha (Colson) was respectable. She knew how her music ought to be sung and tried hard, but had not the vigor it demands. Caspar (Junca) was pretty bad.

Query: if there ever existed a Caspar who could sing “Hier in diesem Jammerthal” as it ought to be sung, or an Agatha who could do justice to the glorious allegro that follows her “leise, leise, fromme Weise”? I enjoyed the evening, also Wednesday evening, when we had Charley Strong and wife in “our box’’ and heard The Barber, delightfully rendered. Little Patti made a most brilliant Rosina and sang a couple of English songs in the “Music Lesson’’ scene, one of them (“Coming through the Rye’’) simply and with much archness and expression. This little debutante is like to have a great career and to create a furor in Paris and St. Petersburg within five years. . . .

Last night I attended W. Curtis Noyes’s first lecture before the Law School of Columbia College.⁵ It was carefully prepared, and (to my great relief) honored by an amply sufficient audience. The lecture room was densely filled, and Oscanyan told me sixty or seventy were turned away. We may have to resort to the Historical Society lecture room (in Second Avenue).

There is much less talking of politics now that a Speaker is elected.

I think a cohesive feeling of nationality and Unionism gains strength silently both North and South, and that the Republican party has lost and is daily losing many of the moderate men who were forced into it four years ago by the Kansas outrages and the assault on Sumner. If the South would spare us its brag and its bad rhetoric, it would paralyze any Northern free-soil party in three weeks. But while Toombs speechifies and Governor Wise writes letters, it’s hard for any Northern man to keep himself from Abolitionism and refrain from buying a photograph of John Brown.

Southern chivalry is a most curious and instructive instance of the perversion of a word from its original meaning; lucus a non lucendo seems a plausible derivation when one hears that word applied to usages and habits of thought and action so precisely contrary to all it expressed some five hundred years ago. Chivalry in Virginia and Georgia means violence to one man by a mob of fifty calling itself a Vigilance Committee, ordering a Yankee school mistress out of the state because she is heterodox about slavery, shooting a wounded prisoner, assailing a non-combatant like Sumner with a big bludgeon and beating him nearly to death. Froissart would have recognized the Flemish boor or the mechanic of Ghent in such doings. Sir Galahad and Sir Lancelot in the Morte d’Arthur would have called them base, felon, dishonorable, shameful, and foul.

Burke announced sixty years ago that "the age of chivalry” was gone, and "that of calculators and economists had succeeded it.” Their period has likewise passed away now, south of the Potomac, and has been followed by a truculent mob despotism that sustains itself by a system of the meanest eavesdropping and espionage and of utter disregard of the rights of those who have not the physical power to defend themselves against overwhelming odds, that shoots or hangs its enemy or rides him on a rail when it is one hundred men against one and lets him alone when evenly matched, and is utterly without mercy for the weak or generosity for the vanquished. This course of practice must be expected of any mere mob when rampant and frightened, but the absurdity is that they call it “chivalry.” There was something truly chivalric in old John Brown’s march with his handful of followers into the enemy’s country to redeem and save those he held to be unjustly enslaved at peril of his own life. For that enterprise he was hanged, justly and lawfully, but there was in it an element of chivalry, genuine though mistaken, and criminal because mistaken, that is nat to be found in the performances of these valiant vigilance committeemen.

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⁵ William Curtis Noyes (1805—1864), one of the foremost New York lawyers, and owner of a magnificent law library, had distinguished himself in numerous cases; notably in the prosecution of the Wall Street forger Huntington, and in protecting the New Haven Railroad stockholders from the consequences of Schuyler’s embezzlement.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 7-9

Diary of George Templeton Strong: February 29, 1860

Went alone to Philharmonic rehearsal at Academy of Music. Watched Hazeltine and pretty Helen Lane billing and cooing just in front of me to the very appropriate accompaniment of Beethoven’s lovely D Symphony. A sentimental gent would say that the handsome young couple and the glowing joyous music of that brightest of all Beethoven’s greater works were each a sort of commentary on the other. Then I went to 24 Union Square and saw Mr. Buggies, who left Lockport Monday, spent a day at Albany, and reached New York this morning. I paid him another visit this evening. He has convalesced rapidly and looks better than I expected to see him. I feared this perilous illness might have left him with energies impaired and faculties blunted, but he is quite himself, full of life and vigorous thought. He is not without his hobby, namely: there is, or seems to be, a political reaction against sectionalism, John Brownism, Higher Lawism, and the like. This is, therefore, a good opportunity to assert the claims of the church as a conservative law-loving institution against Calvinism and the ultra Protestant notions it has produced; to tell Union men throughout the country that they belong in the church; to define the limits of authority and private judgment in political ethics. A clear statement of all this might effect a great deal just at this time and would come with a certain authority from the committee appointed by the last general convention of which Mr. Ruggles is chairman.

Monday, Jem and George Anthon dined here, and we heard Martha, which is a very pretty opera. Last night I attended Noyes’s second lecture before the Law School; crowded, like the first. That people should go away from a law lecture in New York for want of seats is without precedent. This school is the only one of our seeds of post-graduate instruction that survives and grows, our only university nucleus. If Betts and Ogden were less hopelessly inert, it might be developed into usefulness on a large scale.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 11-12

Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, Friday, February 7, 1862

News rc^d today of the capture of Fort Henry on the Tennessee River by Comodore Foot and his Gun Boat Squadron. The news created quite a Sensation in the City as it is considered an important point. Weather damp & chilly and the Roads & crossings awful. When the roads dry up or are at least passable I intend to go over the River and visit the Camps with my family. It will be a new thing for the Boys to visit the Forts. Spent the evening at a Party at Doct Everitts. Julia was with me. Music, dancing & a late supper, did not get home till 1 o'clock a.m.

SOURCE: Horatio Nelson Taft, The Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, 1861-1865. Volume 1, January 1,1861-April 11, 1862, Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Washington D. C.

Diary of Corporal John Worrell Northrop: Wednesday, May 25, 1864

The air is purified by rain during the night. At first dawn we go to the stream for a bath. Knowing the difficulty to keep clear of lice and dirt, we take the first precaution. Found plenty of the same opinion. Breakfast from our scanty lump of bread and lump of bacon. Roll call at 8 o'clock whereat Rebel sergeants attend. The purpose is to see if all are present. In the event of any being absent, the detachment is deprived of rations for the day whether the missing man appears or not. The bread is of course unsifted meal, mixed without leaven or seasoning, baked in creased cards two feet square. The cry of "raiders" awoke us last night. We were told by old prisoners yesterday, about gangs of thieves composed of brutal men who steal everything that they can use or sell to Rebels; and in some cases they brutally beat and kill. These organizations have grown rapidly since arrival of new prisoners, and act in concert in their nefarious practice. They boldly take blankets from over men's heads, pieces of clothing, anything that can be carried away, standing over men with clubs threatening to kill if they move. They are led by desperate characters said to have been bounty jumpers. They bear the name of raiders. Going among men of our company I found they had not realized their danger; some had lost boots, knapsack with contents, blankets, provisions and other things. In some parts, we hear of pocket picking, assaults with clubs, steel knuckles and knives. This happens every night; in some places at day, especially after new arrivals.

The rumor circulated last night that there was a plot to break out of prison on an extensive plan, has some weight and is the topic of the day. Near the gate an address is posted signed by Henri Wirz, captain commanding prison, saying the plot is discovered; he is fully apprised; warns all to abandon the design; that if any unusual movement is made, the camp will be immediately swept with grape and cannister from the artilery; that all must know what the effect will be on a field so thickly covered with men. Evidently the strictest vigilance is kept over us day and night as shown by the movements of the military posts from the outside.

Inquiring in reference to the matter, I learned that a large number of western men had formed a plan to undermine a section of the stockade from which point the artillery and other arms were most available, and had tunneled along the wall underground, having approached it from a tunnel from the interior with a view, at a given signal, when the wall is sufficiently weakened, to rush upon it with as much force as could be concentrated, push it down and sieze the guns while the Rebels are sleeping. It was a daring plot, easily discovered and defeated.

Thompson and I go in search of "Paradise Lost" to quaff from the Parnassian springs of Milton. After a long search, for we became bewildered in the crowds, we found our friend who welcomed us. After exchanging addresses and a glance with the mind's eye over his field of philosophy, we bore away the prize. Could that great author, Milton, have thought of a title more appropriate to the place into which the work of his genius has fallen? Foe without, foe within, robbery, murder, sickness, starvation, death, rottenness, brutality and degradation everywhere! Fumes of corruption greet our nostrils; the air is impregnated with morbific effluvium. It seems impossible that fearful epidemic can be stayed. A few weeks hence but few may be left to tell the tale of misery. The sacred realm of nature and its virgin purity have been invaded by the crushing power of tyranny and ravished by the cruel hand of false ambition. Where but lately the songs of happy birds rang from lofty pines through heavenly air, today we hear the groans of men in unrestrained agony. On the foul atmosphere is wafted the expiring breath of men wasted and wasting in their prime. Daily they sink as if their feet were planted on a thinly crusted marsh,

and, as they sink, there is nothing to which their hands can cling; no power can reach that would save, while around hisses the foe who madly thrust us into this worse than den of lions.

W. H. Harriman, Zanesville, Ohio, 15th U. S. Infantry, our new acquaintance, is a finely organized man, possessing a calm, genial nature, of sterling intelligence. He has patience, faith, hope, and enjoys their blessed fruits. He has a fine sense of things, takes a comprehensive view of the crisis, how results one way or another, will affect the interests of mankind. The right is clear to him; he has faith it will triumph; regrets that any doubt. His knowledge of things common to schools and men of thought, proves him of a reflective mind; his candor, brotherly conduct, render him a noble companion.

We are camped in the midst of Ohio boys belonging to the 7th cavalry. Thirteen were taken, only seven alive. One has a malignant sore on his arm caused by vaccination. It has eaten to the bone, nearly around the arm; gangrene is spreading. He is very poor; soon must die. (Note—June 13th, he died. He had a wife and comfortable possesions in Ohio.)

A sergeant of the same company is afflicted with scurvy in the feet. They are terribly swollen, nearly black, give almost unendurable pain; still he is kind, cheerfully sings for our diversion in the inimitable tone the western country boys have in their songs, "The Battle of Mill Spring," "Putting on Airs," etc., accompanied by his brother whose limb is contracted from the same disease. (Note—He became helpless, was carried to the hospital in a hopeless condition in June.)

I speak of this as a few incidents among hundreds all over the camp, illustrative of patient suffering of as noble young men as grace family households, under circumstances that have no parallel in affliction.

At 8 o'clock this evening a sentinel fired. Going to the vicinity I learned a man who came in today, knowing nothing of the dead lines, lay down near it, was shot in the side and borne away by friends.

SOURCE: John Worrell Northrop, Chronicles from the Diary of a War Prisoner in Andersonville and Other Military Prisons of the South in 1864, p. 60-2

Diary of Private Lewis C. Paxson: Thursday, October 16, 1862

I copied music in the evening for Private Norton. Slept in office. Indian summer.

SOURCE: Lewis C. Paxson, Diary of Lewis C. Paxson: Stockton, N.J., 1862-1865, p. 7

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Friday, February 13, 1863

Came up to L. I went with Aaron Burleson to the fortune teller's; had our future destiny read to us; then to Mr. Lane's and listened to Miss Jennie paw ivory awhile. Miss Mattie Long present.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 7

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, November 27, 1862

Thanksgiving was a great day in the barracks and a fine day outside, except for those who are on guard. We will recollect them all day, having great pity, but unable to relieve them.

To-day has been talked about and worked up for a week. Turkeys and the fixings have been at a premium, but they say our dinner is safe. The day opened splendidly; just cold enough to induce the boys to play at foot and base ball; some of the officers taking hold and seemingly enjoying the sport.

We had dinner at one P.M. The table, extended nearly the length of the barracks, was covered with our rubber blankets, white side uppermost, looking quite home-like. Our plates and dippers were scoured till we could see our faces in them, and how we hated to rub them up! for, according to tradition, the blacker the dipper and the more dents it had, the longer and harder the service. But it had to be, and was done, and we had to acknowledge "How well it looks!" When we were seated, about a man to every ten was detailed as carver; and a few of us who had engineered to get near the platters were caught and had to cut up and serve. We tried in vain to save a nice little piece or two for ourselves; each time we did it some one would reach for it. At last we cut the birds into quarters and passed them indiscriminately. After the meats we had genuine plum-pudding, also nuts, raisins, &c. After the nuts and raisins were on a few made remarks, but the climax was capped by our Lieut. Cumston, who, after telling us not to eat and drink too much, said, "There is a man in camp from Boston, getting statistics; among others, wishes to find out how many of 'E' smoke." The lieutenant said it would be easier counting to ask the question, "How many did not smoke." Several jumped up proud to be counted; among them a few who did occasionally take a whiff. The joke was soon sprung on them, for when they were well on their feet, Lieut. Cumston remarked that he had a few cigars, not quite a box, and hoped they would go round, but those who did not smoke were not to take any. We had the cigars and the laugh on those who wished to figure in the statistics. It was a big dinner, and we did it justice, and gave the cooks credit for it.

In the evening Company D and ourselves gave a musical and literary entertainment. Our barrack was full, and the audience often applauded the amateurs. The programme was as follows:—

PART I.
Song	“Happy are we to-night boys”
Declamation	“England’s interference”	F. S. Wheeler (Co. D)
Song	“Oft in the Stilly Night”
Declamation	“The Dying Alchemist”	S. G. Rawson (Co. E)
Readings	“Selections”	J. W. Cartwright (Co. E)
Song	“Viva L’America”
Declamation	“Spartacus to the Gladiators”	J. Waterman (Co. D)
Declamation	“The Beauties of the Law”	H. T. Reed (Co. E)
“Contrabands Visit”		Myers and Bryant (Co. E)
Song	“Gideon’s Band”
INTERMISSION
	PART II.
Song	“Rock me to sleep, mother”
Declamation	“Garabaldi’s Entree to Naples”	G. H. Vanvorhis (Co. E)
Song	“There’s music in the air”
Imitation of Celebrated Actors		H. T. Reed (Co. E)
Declamation	“Rienza’s Address to the Romans”	N. R. Twitchell (Co. E)
Old Folks Concert		Father Kemp
Ending with “Home Sweet Home,” by the audience

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 21-2

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, December 15, 1862

After turning in last night it was impossible to sleep, the cause being the music of a band farther down the railroad track. It was a serenade to the general, probably, but we took it all in. Our batteries had been practising all the evening on the hill occupied by the rebels, altogether making it lively, but conducive to sleep.

At half-past four this morning we were aroused by the usual drum-beat, ate breakfast, and started once more; and as we had more resting than fighting yesterday, we were in a comparatively good condition, marching out of Kinston in good spirits. We crossed the river by the same bridge where the fight occurred, and, after burning it, took the road towards Goldsboro. Nothing worthy of note turned up to-day but our toes and heels alternately, which did not interest us much. After a steady march of sixteen miles, we encamped in a cornfield on the right of the road. (About all the fields we ever did camp in were cornfields.) We would have liked a potatoe-patch or dry cranberry meadow for a change, but probably Col. Lee or the exigencies of the case demanded a cornfield. If the colonel had been obliged to have slept once across the rows of these or between them, filled as they oftentimes were with water, he would have picked out other quarters without doubt. This camp is about five miles from a place called Whitehall, where they say we are to "catch it."

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 26

Diary of Private Lewis C. Paxson: Saturday, October 11, 1862

I worked in Second Lieutenant Christ Berker's room by his permission. I commenced a letter to Howard Bell. We sang hymns in the evening.

SOURCE: Lewis C. Paxson, Diary of Lewis C. Paxson: Stockton, N.J., 1862-1865, p. 6

Diary of Private John J. Wyeth, November 3, 1862

At four o'clock this morning "all was wrong." We were aroused from the most miserable attempt at sleep our boys ever dreamed of trying. It was a mercy to awaken us; only we were so stiff, sore, cold, and hungry, that it was most impossible to get up at all. We were covered with dirt and frost. Our guns were in fearful condition, and we were ordered to clean them and be ready for the road in half an hour. That was good; no chance to eat anything or clean up ourselves; but such is the luck of war. At six A.M. we started on our second day's tramp. Had you asked any of the company, they would have said, "We have been tramping a week." Our colonel gave us a good word this morning, in passing, saying we had done well. We are satisfied; for although "Rawle's Mill" was not an extensive affair, but very few men being engaged, it was an ugly encounter for raw material, fired upon, as we were, while up to our waists in water; the unknown force of the enemy, apparently on top of the hill, under cover, and having a perfect knowledge of the "lay of the land.”

After a steady march of about twelve miles, we entered Williamston, where we halted, broke ranks, and had a picked-up dinner, and made ourselves comfortable for two hours or so. Williamston is a pretty little town on the Roanoke. We foraged considerably; most every man having something. The gunboats here effected a junction with us, bringing extra rations, &c.

We visited the wounded, calling on Charley Roberts, who was hit last night. He looks pretty white, but is doing well, and will probably be sent to New Berne on one of the boats. A few of us found a piano in one of the houses, and after moving it to the piazza, Ned Ramsay played, and we sang home tunes for a while, having a large audience on the lawn. Soon after the officers broke up our fun, by Fall in E," and as that was what we came for, we "fell in," and recommenced our walk at three P.M., marching about five miles, when we pitched camp for the night. Parsons has been made sergeant for his coolness and bravery in taking prisoners.

SOURCE: John Jasper Wyeth, Leaves from a Diary Written While Serving in Co. E, 44 Mass. Dep’t of North Carolina from September 1862 to June 1863, p. 19

Diary of Captain Joseph Stockton, December 5, 1862

Left camp at 6 o'clock. Roads in a terrible condition, mud knee deep, marching almost impossible; artillery stuck in the road, wagons in every conceivable condition. Crossed the Tallahatchie on a pontoon bridge of a very primitive build, being composed of trees cut down fastened together with ropes and tied to the shore with the ropes, small trees were laid crosswise and on this we crossed. The rebels had quite a strong fort here which would have given us a great deal of trouble, but Sherman's march on our flank forced Price to abandon it. The roads on the south side were much better and after a wearisome march of sixteen miles reached Oxford, Mississippi, at 8 o'clock p. m. I never was so tired and never saw the men so worn out and fatigued as they were on this day's march. We were kept over an hour before our camp was located and it seemed as if all dropped to sleep at once. I could not but think of those at home who are all the time condemning our generals and armies for not moving with greater rapidity, for not making forced marches and following up the enemy, when they know nothing about it. We made quite a parade going through Oxford as it is a place of considerable importance. Flags were unfurled, bands struck up, bugles sounded, and men for the time being forgot their fatigue and marched in good order. Nothing like music to cheer up the men.

SOURCE: Joseph Stockton, War Diary (1862-5) of Brevet Brigadier General Joseph Stockton, p. 5-6

Diary of Corporal Lawrence Van Alstyne, September 18, 1862

Mr. Parker came last night, and is to be our chaplain. He is the one who preached for us at Hudson Camp Ground, and the one we asked to have for chaplain of the 128th. He can sing like a lark, and we are glad he is here. There are many good singers in the regiment. There is talk of organizing a choir or club, and no doubt the dominie will join it. We have more good news from the front. McClellan seems to fit the place he is in. It is reported that George Flint and Elihu Bryan have been taken prisoners. I know them well, but don't remember the regiment they went out in.

SOURCE:  Lawrence Van Alstyne, Diary of an Enlisted Man, p. 31

Diary of Corporal Lawrence Van Alstyne, Saturday, September 27, 1862

We are looking for the Dutchess County regiment as if their coming was an assured fact, yet it is only a rumor, and even that cannot be traced very far. Aside from our daily drill, which is not much fun, we manage to get some amusement out of everything that comes along. We visit each other and play all sorts of games. Fiddling and dancing take the lead just now. The company streets, now that the ground has been smoothed off, make a good ballroom. A partner has just been swung clear off the floor into a tent, onto a man who was writing a letter, and from the sound is going to end up in a fight. "Taps" are sounded at 9 P. M., which is a signal for lights out and quiet in the camp.

SOURCE:  Lawrence Van Alstyne, Diary of an Enlisted Man, p. 39

Diary of Malvina S. Waring, February 18, 1865

The people of Charlotte received us with unbounded kindness, and are treating us with royal hospitality. They met us in their carriages and, although utter strangers, conducted us, as honored guests, to their beautiful homes. How is that for Confederate Treasury girls? Bet has gone to General Young's, but the others of us have fallen to the lot of Mr. Davidson, and a very enviable lot it is for us, in a home so well ordered and abounding in plenty. I do not know how long we shall be here. Mr. Duncan, who has charge of our division, says until transportation can be secured. Tonight some troops were passing through the city, and I could hear in the far, faint distance, a band playing "Dixie" and "Old Folks at Home." It made me cry, the sound was so sweet, so mournful, so heart-breaking. How fare my old folks at home? Are there any old folks left at my home? Maybe not! Alas! we can hear nothing definite!

SOURCE: South Carolina State Committee United Daughters of the Confederacy, South Carolina Women in the Confederacy, Vol. 1, “A Confederate Girl's Diary,” p. 276

Diary of 1st Lieutenant Joseph Stockton, September 30, 1862

For the past ten days there was nothing of particular interest. Quite a number of men are sick. I was in the hospital today seeing my men and while there one of Co. C men was dying. He was delirious and wanted his gun that he might take his place in the ranks of his company. Poor fellow, before tomorrow's sun he will be marching with that country's host that have already gone before. Some six or eight others have already died but none as yet from my company. We came near having a large fire the other day, but owing to the exertion of the guard under the command of my 1st Lieutenant Randall, it was put out. He was complimented on dress parade for his courage. Some days we are required to go to church which is held by the men being drawn up in a square and our Chaplain Barnes discourses in the center. As we have a number of good singers the music goes off very well, but there is a great deal of opposition to church on the part of the men, some being Catholics and one a Jew. In my company are two Germans who are atheists so there is quite a mixture. On Sunday last, sixty of the men marched down to the church in the city and took communion. Our camp life promises to be tedious in some respects but we are kept busy in batallion and company drills. Colonel Starring is very proficient in the formations.

SOURCE: Joseph Stockton, War Diary (1862-5) of Brevet Brigadier General Joseph Stockton, p. 2-3

Brigadier-General Rutherford B. Hayes to Sophia Birchard Hayes, February 15, 1865

CUMBERLAND, MARYLAND, February 15, 1865.

DEAR MOTHER: – We are jogging along in the usual style of a winter camp. The thing about us which you would think most interesting is the doings of our chaplain. We have a good one. He is an eccentric, singular man — a good musician — very fond of amusement and as busy as a bee. He is a son of a well-known Presbyterian minister of Granville, Mr. Little. Since I left he has had built a large log chapel, covered with tent cloth. In this he has schools, in which he teaches the three R's, and music, and has also preaching and prayer-meetings and Sunday-school. The attendance is large. The number of young men and boys from the mountains of West Virginia, where schools are scarce, in my command makes this a useful thing. He has also got up a revival which is interesting a good many.

Since my return itinerant preachers of the Christian Commission have held two or three meetings in our chapel.

Affectionately, your son,

R.

MRS. SOPHIA HAYES.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 558-9

Diary of Private Daniel L. Ambrose: Thursday, May 14, 1863

This morning we take the train for Bethel, and in about one hour we arrive at this outpost and are conducted to the barracks lately vacated by the Forty-third Ohio. We find the Seventh Iowa stationed here, who very cordially welcome the Seventh Illinois as their “Brother Crampers.” The two Sevenths soon come to a mutual conclusion that they can run this part of the line and impart general satisfaction to all concerned. It is said that smiles are not wanting for the “vandals” in these parts. In the afternoon the regiment is paraded to receive Adjutant General Thomas, who is expected to arrive on the afternoon train. After his arrival and reception by the troops, he addresses us for a short time upon the issues growing out of the emancipation proclamation, and then proceeds on his way towards Corinth.

We remain at Bethel from the fourteenth of May until June 7th, 1863. The Seventh will long remember Bethel and Henderson, Tennessee. How they stood picket; how they patroled the railroad; how they drilled; how they run the lines and sallied forth into the country; how they mingled with the chivalry and partook of their hospitality; how they sat down and talked with the beautiful, and how they listened to their music, “Bonnie Blue Flag” and “Belmont;" how the citizens flocked to our lines; how the boys traded “Scotch snuff” to the gentle ones for chickens, butter and eggs. Yes, Bethel and Henderson will long live on memory's page.

SOURCE: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 170-1

Diary of Private Daniel L. Ambrose: Tuesday, April 21, 1863

Reinforcements still continue to come, and we still remain quiet. Why we do not move we cannot tell. Perhaps the General is waiting for all expected reinforcements to arrive. Captain Smith with Company E is sent on a foraging expedition to Dickenson's plantation, coming back in the evening well supplied. This evening the Seventh seem in a gleeful mood. Around every camp fire they are now singing “Bonnie blue flag,” — “Rally round the flag, boys,” making the mountain gorges re-echo with patriotic songs. No discord here; no discontent manifest-all seem united in the great work of saving the Union.

SOURCE: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 149-50

Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Lucy Webb Hayes, December 6, 1864

CAMP RUSSELL, December 6, 1864.

MY DARLING: – We are very comfortable and very jolly. No army could be more so. We have had no orders to build winter quarters, but we have got ready for rough weather, and can now worry through it.

We have horse-races, music, church (sic!), and all the attractions. No fighting, which makes me hope I shall get off the last of this month to see my darling and the dear ones.

Affectionately,

R.

MRS. HAYES.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 543