Camp South Of Strasburg, March 28, 1862.
You must be expecting, by this time, to hear some account of
what we have been up to for these last ten days. I will give you a journal of
things as they have happened.
Last Friday afternoon, our brigade received orders for a
four days' march to Centreville, fifty-five miles across the Shenandoah and
over the mountains; the Second brigade had gone the day before; the First was
to follow us. Our brigade formed line and started at ten Saturday morning, and
made a good march of fifteen miles to Snicker's Ferry on the Shenandoah,
passing through Berryville; we camped there. Reveille the next morning was
beaten at five o'clock; at seven, things were moving; our regiment that day
being put in the rear of everything. The Third Wisconsin, Twenty-ninth
Pennsylvania, and Twenty-seventh Indiana, had crossed the bridge and half the
supply train was over, when a refractory team of mules succeeded in making a
bad break, two mules were drowned, and of course our chance of crossing was
small until the bridge was repaired.
It was near night before it was ready, and we were ordered
to camp again where we were. Reveille Monday morning at five o'clock. Mounted
orderlies coming at the gallop brought us news of a fight at Winchester. Our
march was countermanded and we were ordered back with a section of artillery
and some cavalry to Berryville. Here we stayed, guarding the approaches till
noon, when the rest of the brigade came up. Starting at about one, we marched
back to Winchester, arriving there just before dark. Our regiment was quartered
in some empty warehouses. We officers had the ticket office of the railroad for
our quarters. I will give you now an account of the skirmish and fight of
Saturday and Sunday, as I have heard it from eye-witnesses and from soldiers
engaged. A few hours after the First and Third brigades had marched away from
Winchester, Colonel Ashby, with a few hundred cavalry and a battery of
artillery, drove in the pickets of General Shields' division, and came with his
force almost into town; our side pitched in and took a good many prisoners; no
great harm was done except that General Shields had his arm fractured by a
shell grazing it.
That night, every precaution was taken to guard against
surprise. The next morning, the enemy again appeared in small numbers, and
there was cannonading on both sides throughout the day till three o'clock, when
their infantry appeared. Our line was formed and the fight began. We had six
regiments engaged; their force must have been between seven and eight thousand.
The fighting was of the fiercest description for two hours, when the rebels
gave way and retreated, leaving in our hands two hundred and forty-two
prisoners, and between two and three hundred dead on the field and several
hundred wounded. Our loss was about a hundred killed and four or five hundred
wounded. The rebels fought as well as they ever can fight. They were close to
their homes, numbers of them living in Winchester, and we whipped them by sheer
hard fighting at short range. Persons who were near by told me that for two
hours there was not an interval of a second between the firing of the musketry.
Captain Carey, of our regiment, whose company is on provost marshal duty in
Winchester, had a pretty hard duty that night; he had to provide quarters for
the wounded of both sides as they were brought into town. All night long they
were brought in by the wagon load, every empty house and room in town was
filled with them; the poor fellows had to be laid right down on the floor,
nothing, of course, being provided for them. Monday they were gradually made
more comfortable, yet as late as Monday night, when we arrived in town, there
were numbers of wounded who had not seen a surgeon.
Tuesday morning, I went into the Court House, which had been
turned into a hospital. In the yard, there were two cannon which we had
captured; one of them was taken from us at Bull Run and belongs to a battery in
our division. Just in the entrance were about twenty of our men that had died,
laid out in their uniform for burial, their faces covered by the cape of their
overcoat. The sight inside was of the most painful description; there were
sixty or seventy of the wounded in the room, mostly of the enemy, and the most
of them very severely wounded. Generally they did not seem to suffer much, but
there were some in dreadful agony. I saw one nice-looking young fellow that I
pitied very much. He could not have been more than sixteen or seventeen years
old, and was mortally wounded, shot through the body. He was sitting up resting
against the wall; his eyes were closed and there was almost a smile on his
face. You could see, though, by the deathly color of his face, that he had only
a few minutes to live. It seemed hard that he should have to die there with no
one near that knew him. There was one rebel captain who was shot across the
forehead, blinded and mortally wounded, who, when our surgeon attempted to help
him, slapped him in the face and said he wouldn't let any “damned Yankee” touch
him; he relented, however, in the afternoon and had his wounds dressed. I will
say this for our two surgeons, they worked nobly for nearly twenty-four hours
without rest.
During the day, the ladies of the town brought a great many
comforts to the wounded of their side, but everything was refused for
particular individuals, and they became more charitable and gave a great deal
of aid to the surgeons.
One of the rebel wounded was George Washington, of the
present Sophomore class at Cambridge; as he was brought in, he recognized
Lieutenant Crowninshield, who was his classmate, and spoke to him. G. W. is of
the old Washington family and, of course, one of the “F. F. Vs.” He was serving
as a private; he has been made a great hero of in Winchester; he is said to be
mortally wounded.
About ten o'clock, after visiting the hospital, Captains
Savage and Russell and myself walked out to the battle-field, four or five
miles from town. On the road as we approached it, were the marks of shells,
dead horses and cows lying about where they were struck. At the side of the
road where our artillery turned off, we found one of our men, the top and back
of whose head had been entirely knocked off by a shell. The hardest fighting
was along a ridge which the enemy attempted to hold. Along it for nearly a
mile, the bodies of our soldiers and those of the enemy were scattered thick,
although most of them were the enemy. In one little piece of thick woods, there
were at least thirty of the enemy lying just as they fell; they were sheltered
by a ledge of rocks, and most of them were shot through the head and had fallen
directly backwards, lying flat on their backs with their arms stretched out in
an easy, natural manner over their heads. Some were terrible to look at, but
others looked as peaceful as if they were asleep. Men killed by a shot scarce
ever have an expression of pain on their faces. It is astonishing how much less
repulsive the bodies were that were lying about in this manner, than those that
were regularly laid out in rows for burial.
The countrymen about here had, when we visited the ground,
taken every button and other article of value off the bodies. I saw one who had
had a daguerreotype cut out from a case that was hanging around his neck;
almost all had had their boots taken off their feet. A number of people were
out from Winchester, trying to recognize their townsmen. The bushes and trees
here were completely riddled with bullets; there was not a twig the size of
your finger that was not cut off, and trees the size of a man's body had every
one at least three or four bullets in it. Our men shot remarkably well, as
these things go to show. Several soldiers of Captain Carey's company got passes
and went out to the fight and joined the Seventh Ohio; they fought well and
took two prisoners and two rifles.
One of Captain Quincy's company, who was taken prisoner at
Maryland Heights last year, and was released about a month ago, arrived at
Winchester, on his way to join the regiment, the day of the fight; he went out
to the battle and took a prisoner and a gun. At six o'clock that night
(Tuesday), we got marching orders; at seven, we were on the way to Strasburg; we
marched thirteen miles to just the other side of Middleton, arriving there
between one and two A. M. We built fires here and lay down till daylight, then
proceeded on to Strasburg, where we marched into a wood to bivouac. There was a
good deal of sleeping done that night although we lay on the ground with
nothing over our heads. Thursday morning, as we were quietly sitting around our
fires, we heard the long roll beaten at the guard tent. An attack had been made
on our outposts, and all disposable forces were marched in that direction.
After going four miles, the firing stopped. Our brigade was halted in a fine
wood where we are now camping.
SOURCE: Charles Fessenden Morse, Letters Written
During the Civil War, 1861-1865, p. 43-8
