Autumn was drawing to a close, the leaves had fallen from the trees, the grass was no longer green, and prairie and timber seemed alike bare and cold. Still no exchange had come. We knew of the thirty-seven thousand prisoners taken at Vicksburg, and the six thousand taken at Port Hudson, and therefore we listened hopefully to rumors of exchange, and coined a few of our own, and remained prisoners of war. Within the prison-camp, affairs had not grown brighter. There was increased sickness with despondency and (for so small a party) many deaths. Two Massachusetts officers had died early. Then the consumptive lieutenant’s light had flickered, and with fitful changes grown more and more dim, until it softly expired. A week later, as some of us were awaiting impatiently the breakfast-whistle of our cook, an officer ran hurriedly past to the guard-line, and calling to the surgeon, said, “Come quickly, Doctor, Lieutenant Hayes is dead!” The merry-hearted Irishman lay in his hammock in the composure of an easy sleep. His light had gone out in a single instant. Later, our friend, Mr. 133Parce, grew weaker. An order came to send the “citizen prisoners” to Mexico; it did not revive him. His strength waned, but his placid cheerfulness was still undisturbed. “It is a bad sign,” said one of his friends, “if he were only cross and fretful, we might hope.” The sign did not pass away; and with the prospect of home and liberty held before him he died. We knew that at this rate, another year would leave very few survivors to be carried from the camp.
One gloomy evening, as we sat pondering and talking over our affairs, rumor came in and told us a new tale. It said that the prisoners were to be paroled and sent forthwith to the Federal lines. The rumor was confirmed within a day or two by Major Barnes; but when the paroling officer came, it appeared that it was not altogether true; the seamen and privates were to be paroled; the officers were to be sent to Camp Ford.
It behooved us now to find ways and means for carrying our remaining effects to their new abode. By the aid of Major Barnes we succeeded in chartering two wagons for fifteen hundred dollars. We also secured an old hack to carry Mrs. Stratford and four sick officers at fifty dollars apiece. Some of us strove hard to purchase a poor horse or cheap pony that would carry us at any gait. In this race honor compels me to confess that the effrontery of the navy completely distanced the army. Early one morning the camp rang with cries of “Here’s yer mule.” Through the admiring throng appeared an animal of that description towed in by Captain Dillingham. 134It was a peculiar animal—small, old, ugly, vicious, and one-eyed. The Captain had bought him on our joint account, and had paid for him one hundred and fifty dollars in the currency of the Confederate States of North America. This alarmingly low price was due to the recent loss of his left optic, causing a dangerous sore, which, the vendor thought, would not prove fatal before we reached Camp Ford. The example was speedily followed by Captain Crocker of the “Clifton,” who bought another mule, and by Captain Johnson of the “Sachem,” who bought a third, and by Surgeon Sherfy of the “Morning Light,” who bought an old “calico” horse that the sailors immediately named “Quinine.” The army, either from excess of modesty or excess of poverty, did not succeed, I regret to say, in buying anything.
“Can we ride there on a mule bare-back?” was the question. “Decidedly not,” was the answer.
Yet a good saddle in Texas would cost as much as a good horse. In this state of doubt we were relieved by purchasing of a contraband an old wooden “tree” with a strap or two and a piece of raw-hide hanging to it. It bore about the same relation to a saddle that a pair of old wheels do to a cart. But we went to work. And here again the army was eclipsed by the navy. I had been a cavalry officer, and thought I knew a thing or two about broken saddles, and accounted myself fertile in such expedients, but the Captain borrowed a sailor’s needle and palm-thimble; brought out an old marlin-spike and some rope, and stitched and spliced with a 135neatness and rapidity that threw me in the shade. Trunk straps were speedily transferred and changed into girths, some rope was spliced and lashed around a wooden shoe till it became a stirrup, and pieces of raw-hide were bound to the “tree” till it fairly grew to be a saddle.
As the time of departure approached another subject engrossed our attention. Eating continued to be the chief thought and passion of our lives. Whatever could be bought to eat we bought. Our stoves ran literally night and day in baking hard-tack; and we, duly instructed by a professional cracker-baker, pounded dough till our arms ached.
There was still another subject of interest to many. A large part of the officers belonged either to the navy or to new regiments. They were entirely innocent of having slept out a night in their lives, and knew nothing of marches and bivouacs. The fuss which they made about this expected movement was in the highest degree amusing to those who, by virtue of a year or two’s service, dubbed themselves veterans. They looked on with smiles as they saw the others making good blankets into poor shelter-tents, and winked to each other when they heard the new men confidently assure one another that they could stand it now, even if there should be a wet night upon the march.
After some delay there came in five or six impressed wagons and a squadron of stalwart men mounted on large, well-fed horses. They were chiefly stock breeders from the prairies, and boasted of being the best mounted 136troop in Texas. All of these men owned the horses they rode, and many brought with them a led horse and servant. They were supposed to be men of unquestionable secession sentiments, and were employed chiefly in hunting down conscripts and guarding prisoners.
On the ninth of December our seamen and privates left us, and we were notified to be ready on the eleventh. Our two wagons came down—a quantity of yapon was gathered and dried—a last baking of biscuit was made, and our stoves were duly incased in open boxes with beckets so as to be readily loaded and unloaded.
A move is always interesting; after months of dreary idleness it is exciting. Happy did we seem, and happy did we feel as on the cold, foggy morning we marched down the “wood road,” crossed the little brook, and left Camp Groce at last behind us. The new Captain—a tall, powerful Texan, with a determined eye and stern, compressed lips—evidently understood his business. He kept us well together, managed his own men with few words and great judgment, and watched the column with close vigilance. The one-eyed mule behaved with gravity and decorum, never showing any unnecessary signs of life or unseemly gayety, except once when he slipped his bridle and ran away like a deer.
Before three o’clock we went into camp on a little brook called “Kane’s Creek.” Thanks to the autumn rains, there was some water in the “creek,” and thanks to the December frosts, it was clear and cold. The proceedings of our naval friends were a new chapter in my 137experience of bivouacs. Notwithstanding the clear sky and roaring camp-fires, edifices called shelter-tents were erected, with an immense amount of consultation and anxiety. Heavy mattresses were unpacked from the wagons and lugged to the tents. Stoves were unloaded and put up under trees, where they soon smoked and steamed as did the excited cooks who hovered around them. So elaborate, indeed, was the dinner of our mess, that the short winter day closed ere Lieutenant Dane doffed his apron, and summoned us to our seats around the camp-fire. By its light I saw a sirloin of roast beef, a large piece of corned, sweet potatoes, corn bread and butter, flap-jacks and sauce, tea, coffee and cake.
“What are you doing?” asked somebody, as I drew out my pencil and note-book. “I thought you never took notes; it was only an hour ago you were telling me that a note-book spoils a good traveller.”
“I am noting down this bill of fare. After my rough experience in our army of the West, this dinner seems too ridiculous to be believed.”
“I suppose you will publish it in the newspapers when you get out?”
“Yes, I rather think I shall.”
“Well, it’s the last of the pepper,” said the caterer, “so mind and put it down.”
“Yes, by all means.”
“And they say we can buy no sugar at Tyler,” said another; “so mind and put it down.”
“Certainly; anything else?”
138“There’s some salt, and there’s a hard-tack. Perhaps you think they are luxuries. And here’s a candle, moulded in the neck of a bottle—hadn’t you better mention it?”
“I think I had—the mould was so ingenious. You remember I invented it myself.”
“You haven’t exposed the fact that it’s our last pound of coffee, treasured up for this journey?”
“Certainly not.”
“Nor that the tea grew in Texas?”
“No.”
“Don’t—a few such secrets exposed will destroy the whole effect of the bill. And now, if the dinner isn’t too much for you, let us box up the stove, while those delicate young gentlemen wash the dishes.”
So we boxed up the stove, and washed the dishes, and lit our pipes, and sat looking in the glowing camp-fire. And then our three naval Captains crawled into a tight little shelter-tent, where they suffocated and perspired, and caught cold. The army part of the mess spread their blankets and lay down, with their feet against a smoking log, their heads resting on their knapsacks, and their eyes watching the stars, which twinkled them asleep.
The bugle called us long before daylight to prepare our breakfast and re-load the wagons. I cannot pay Captain Davis a better compliment, than by saying that for five successive mornings we moved off at precisely 6–45, and then for six successive mornings at precisely seven. This day the road ran over some fine rolling 139country, occasionally clean and park-like, with stately trees sprinkled here and there, and entirely free from young wood and underbrush. The weather was delightful, but we went into camp before two o’clock, after a march of only fourteen miles.
The next morning as we started, a cold gust of north wind struck us. It was not a “norther,” but a sudden change of weather from warm to cold. All the morning we breasted it, and it blew keener and keener as the day advanced. Early in the afternoon we encamped in an open wood, which gave but poor shelter from the piercing gale. The little stream that formed our watering place was coated with ice, and the ice grew thicker with each hour. We set ourselves at the work of unloading the wagons and the heavier work of chopping wood for the large camp-fire that must burn all night. The stove went up and puffed and steamed as usual, and all endeavored to impress upon the mind of our amateur chef that this extreme cold was only an additional reason that we should eat.
“While we were fresh from a sharp walk, with the blood stirred by the active labors of the camp, we were comfortable enough. When we first threw ourselves down before the fire all aglow, saying we were thankful that the work was done, we still felt indifferent to the cold north wind. But presently it crept in, and sent a shivering chill over the frame. Then the nervous energy relaxed, and one felt great need of a warm room where he could hide himself from the blast, and fall 140asleep if only for an hour. The dinner and the hot tea that accompanied it braced us up somewhat, and fitted us for bed. Our three naval friends again crawled into their shelter-tent, where (inasmuch as it was at a prudent distance from the fire) they nearly froze to death. The remainder of the mess used the shelter-tent, a large tree and the stove box as a wind-break, and put their feet almost in the fire. For some hours we all slept soundly, as men must who have marched and worked since long before day. But although the blankets were drawn over our heads and the wind-break seemed to afford ample protection, the cutting air pushed its way in. It crawled through the hair and curled itself round the neck, and sent the same shivery chills over the body. I rose and warmed myself by rolling a couple of large logs on the fire, and prizing them into their places. The scene around me was wild in the extreme, for every mess had built a large fire, and the flames of these leaped and roared in the blast, and sent large sparks flying through the tree-tops; while in the fiery light, picturesque figures could be seen crouching over the embers or throwing fresh wood into the flames.”
The bugle again called us up, while the stars were yet shining, to find the dodger we had baked over night, and the cold beef we had put by for breakfast, frozen harder than paving stones. Close seated by the fire, we ate a moody breakfast, each one declaring that he had not slept one hour during the night, and that he wanted to turn in again. Instead of doing so, we took the road, 141now solid as a rock. The horses had to stamp through the ice to drink, and the “Sunny South” se............