Crab Orchard, Ky. We
arrived at 10 a. m., making ten miles from Lancaster this morning. Crab Orchard
is a lovely town of about one thousand inhabitants. We are encamped about one
mile south of the village, in a lovely spot, shut in on all sides by high hills
and forests. To the south, far in the distance, the Cumberland Mountains raise
their blue peaks as landmarks to guide us on our course when next we move.
From what I see and
hear of the surrounding country, the boys will have to depend on their rations
for food.
Soldiers are strange
beings. No sooner were our knapsacks unslung than every man of us went to work
as though his very life depended on present exertions. We staked out streets,
gathered stakes and poles with which to erect our tents, and now, at 3 p. m., behold!
a city has arisen, like a mushroom, from the ground. Everything is done as
though it were to be permanent, when no man knows how long we may remain or how
soon we may move on.
Part of our route
from Camp Parks lay through a country made historic by the chivalric deeds of
Daniel Boone. We passed his old log fort, and the high bluff from which he
hurled an Indian and dashed him in pieces on the rocks below. At the foot of
the bluff is the cave in which he secreted himself when hard pressed by savages.
His name is chiseled in the rock above the entrance. The place is now being
strongly fortified.
We had a lively
skirmish in Company G this morning. About a week ago the Brigade Surgeon
ordered quinine and whiskey to be issued to every man in the brigade, twice
daily. During our march the quinine had been omitted, but whiskey was dealt out
freely.
Solon Crandall—the
boy who picked the peaches while under fire at South Mountain—is naturally
pugnacious, and whiskey makes him more so. This morning, while under the
influence of his "ration," he undertook the difficult task of
"running" Company G.
Captain Tyler,
hearing the "racket," emerged from his tent and inquired the cause.
At this Solon, being a firm believer in "non-intervention," waxed
wroth. In reply he told the Captain, "It's none of your business. Understand, I am running this
company, and if you don't go back to your tent and mind your own business, I'll
have you arrested and sent to the bull pen. At this the Captain
"closed" with his rival in a rough-and-tumble fight, in which the
Captain, supported by a Sergeant, gained the day.
I have the most
comfortable quarters now I have ever had. Our tent is composed of five pieces
of canvas, each piece the size of our small tents—two for the top, or roof, the
eaves three feet from the ground. The sides and ends are made to open one at a
time or all at once, according to the weather. Three of us tent together, and
we have plenty of room. We have bunks made of boards, raised two feet from the
ground. This, with plenty of straw, makes a voluptuous bed. I received a letter
from home last evening, dated August 13th. Oh, these vexatious postal delays;
they are the bane of my life. I wonder if postmasters are human beings, with
live hearts inside their jackets, beating in sympathetic unison with other
hearts. I wonder did they ever watch and wait, day after day, until hope was
well-nigh dead, conscious that love had sped its message and was anxiously
awaiting a return. A letter from home! What thrilling emotions of pleasure;
what unfathomable depths of joy it brings the recipient. It is not altogether
the words, be they many or few, but the remembrances they call forth; the
recognition of the well-known handwriting; old associations and past scenes are
brought forth from the storehouse of the memory and held up to view. The joy of
meeting—the agony of parting—all are lived over again.
We are having
brigade inspection today, which is suggestive of a move, but our artillery has
not turned up yet, and we will not take the field without it.
The health of our
men has improved wonderfully since we reached Kentucky. A more rugged, hearty
set of men I never saw than the few who are left. But, as I look around upon
the noble fellows, now drawn up in line for inspection, a feeling of sadness
steals over me. One short year ago nine hundred ninety-eight as brave, true men
as ever shouldered gun marched forth to battle in their country's cause. Of all
that noble band, only two hundred in line today. Where are the absent ones?
Some, it is true, are home on furlough, but not all. They have left a bloody
track from South Mountain's gory height through Antietam, Fredericksburg and
Vicksburg to Jackson, Mississippi.
Oh, how I miss
familiar faces!
SOURCE: David Lane,
A Soldier's Diary: The Story of a Volunteer, 1862-1865, pp. 86-89
