Chenango Telegraph, Norwich, NY, July 29, 1863
Letter from the 114th NY Infantry Regiment
By William R. Gelderd, Delegate of U.S. Christian Commission
Camp before Port Hudson, July 3d, 1863
My Dear Telegraph: It has been my lot while in New Orleans to visit and carry reading to the gallant boys, sick and wounded as they were, of our own 114th N.Y.S.V. There were something over forty in the Marine Hospital. I found nine wounded in the St. Louis, and there are several sick and convalescent in the Barracks Hospital, some of whom ought to be instantly discharged or granted a lengthened furlough, or else they will never recover at all. But as I much wanted to see the boys in the field, and if needed as temporary nurse, be ready to act as one for them, Rev. Mr. Sutton procured me a pass and so I started up the river on the Sallie Robinson. She was heavily loaded with stores for the troops, and had on board, besides two regiments for the field, the 28th Main and the 15th N.H.
On the morning of July 1st we passed the ruins of Donaldsville. For, as you know, last Sunday morning the rebels had the impudence to attack the fort and they kept at it some three hours and were beaten off with heavy loss. A seedier looking lot of gallows birds never did disgrace sunlight than that lot of prisoners we took there. I saw them on Monday marched to the Provost Marshal office. On Monday evening Admiral Farrignt came up and ordered every house to be fired. If double the number that were actually burned had felt the flame, no injustice would have been done. There is a nunnery there, so far respected by both parties, but the rebels do it from interest, for it is well known that a number of the prominent citizens of the place, now in the rebel army, left their money and jewels for safe keeping with the good nuns, and our boys have not yet asked for a look at the same. Grim and sharp in it angularity looks the fort at the numerous brick chimney stacks, the mementoes that rebels once lived there, that burnt and black tell in every direction what has been at work. But pass that, pass the monotonous river scenery, pass Baton Rouge, and defer your visit to the hospitals for a time when you can have time unrestricted and you stop, look and disembark at "Springfield Landing," where all supplies for the boys round Port Hudson, and the work they are engaged in, are stored, and here beginneth my experience of yesterday.
I had found a corporal of the 114th on the Sallie Robinson, Porter H. Babcock by name, who had been down on business and was now going to the boys again, and you may be sure that the company of such a guide was a pleasant thing. The country round Springfield Landing is one immense thorny thicket. The timber grows small, and as if not possessed of thorns enough naturally, is very apt to take unto itself a mass of tangled drapery in the shape of creeping vines which mantle the original settler over clear unto the very top. We have there a large contraband camp, as well as quarters for some troops, the number I cannot state, and a heavy amount of stores of all sorts. Not seeing much prospect of getting a ride anyhow, Mr. Babcock and I started on foot about 4 A.M.
In a short time we had reached "Libby Station," the farmhouse of a protected colonist, where a brother delegate of the Christian Commission attends to the sick and wounded who pass, as all do, that way to New Orleans. We discussed our breakfast here with a very good will, but while engaged thereat, I noticed the reports of musketry down at the river and asked what it could be. One said it was the night guard discharging their guns, but another declared that to be never done or allowed at any time. So we went on our way along the dusty road, through the woods--it was just like treading in flour 10 inches deep--till a guard on the right hailed us with "Good news!" Last night our boys recaptured Gen. Dow and took about 100 rebs with him, and the d--d guerillas that have been prowling round Baton Rouge, they've got them hemmed in so they can't escape us now. We'll use them well up, no fear of that this time. An American Messenger made him right glad he had been a Sunday School teacher ere he came here to teach the rebels how to behave. Shortly after, we met a long empty wagon train for Springfield Landing, negro drivers, escorted by some sixty cavalry, all, white and black, in pretty good spirits. Even the wounded that followed in ambulances seemed to forget their pain as they rolled through those deep woods.
We walked on a mile or two, when a hasty sound made up look back and "the devil, the devil, the devil! up altogether, cut for the woods and keep out of our way," fairly screamed a cavalry man as he dashed on at a furious gallop with his horse's belly almost flat to the ground. Never before did I see a man ride at such a rate. Four or five more, one an officer, followed in hot haste, one telling us that two hundred guerillas were at work in the train we had just passed, and he had hardly gone ere another flyer informed us that seven hundred guerillas had attacked the landing, and were shooting down the contrabands first of everything, on every side. He disappeared at a rate similar to his predecessors, and his successor discovered unto us that it was sixteen hundred guerillas that had attacked the wagon train and that he could but just escape from a majority that it was useless to think of contending with. Then came several loaded wagons at a heavy speed, dangerous in common times I am sure, and some of the body sills had broken with the jostling just behind the hind axle, and "Uncle Sam's" dinner timbers were for descending earth wards the nearest way, but the drivers never stopped for all that, a lot of spilled boxes would make no matter to him. Then another lot of riders, one of whom I noticed particularly as keeping the lower part of his coat parallel with the ground he rode in, while his pantaloons were seriously imperiled in the rear by the holes which the saddle had made therein. But next unto him, maybe a quarter of an hour after, came a man of the N.Y. 160th, on a run, who took a more reasonable rate of procedure when we pointed out to him a lot of loaded wagons at a foot pace coming our way. I wish I could have all the artist in the Chenangoese Photography to take his picture as I saw him. His face plastered with dust, hat gone, (saw a cavalry man lose his as he fled past us) ditto cartridge box, trousers burst in the rear, while his shirt took the shape of a bird's tail as he ran. He estimated the guerillas at 1800. The guerillas had, by his account, been concealed in the woods till they dashed in, and went to killing the contrabands first. They must have captured every soldier and everything at the landing--bad luck to their impudence. Well, having passed one or two camps, all for breaking up in fear of these fellows, we came to the plains where our boys thrashed the rebels on May 24th It is a plain. I know not how large, perfectly open up to the woods, and close to the woods were some half done breastworks which [..unreadable..] the rest of them played the mischief with us out of the woods after their manner. Here I begun to see raw cotton thrown carelessly round in a way which would make a manufacturer shake his head in a manner indicating of anything but satisfaction. But let him come and take it if he wants it very bad. Just inside our lines is a barn, with one end open, with the loft chock full of cotton, while the staple blows about at will over the fields. Then your way leads through divers corn fields, minus the whole stalk save about a foot high, which has gone for forage to our horses &c. In a while the cotton seems to disappear, and you come to heavy woods with lots of tents at intervals, which give the idea, most unmistakably, to anyone whoever saw it, of a Methodist monster camp meeting. So many white tents, so many cooking conveniences, so many little squab beds of poles, bring up the thing very forcible, but the attendants are all brethren, no sisters visible, and the frequent oath, the stacked guns, the different variations of the blue uniform, and the occasional sight of a wounded man, tell what the gathering means, and that you are in the midst of war.
So we went for a mile and a half when the woods opened suddenly for a space and I got a little idea of general level of the land, but it is most curiously broken up with deep ravines which come when you least expect them and open on every hand. Over more than a mile of such broken country did our troops drive the rebels in the attack of May 27. And, as it is all a heavily wooded country, I am astonished at the pluck that could drive an enemy out of such defenses, as well as at the foolishness, to say nothing harsher of that enemy that could be induced to leave them. So our boys use these ravines, those in advance, as natural parallels in the siege, and the edges of the level land as spots to silence the rebel cannon with our sharpshooters' deadly fire. but more of this hereafter. So we went on through woods and camps. Here the timber is of a far different character from that round Springfield Landing, tall and straight, as well as heavy. the Magnolia being as big as any tree round. Those of your readers who have seen this as a comparatively small tree, may imagine its beauty as a tree 2 feet thick and 100 feet high, flashing white with it magnificent blossoms from top to bottom.
We were pretty tired when we reached the camp of the 114th, that is, where the cooking is done, and commissary stores are kept. I should, ere this, have noted that we found at the signal post on Port Hudson plain on one side, a man making signs to one in a tree on the other, I suppose about the rebel tricks at the landing, for in less than five minutes after our arrival, orders came for the boys to take two days ratios and start for the Bayou Sara road. They were to do to light marching order and only take one wagon with them. So there was bustle for a while, when the order was countermanded, as news had come that "our cavalry had surprised the guerillas at Springfield Landing, and cut them all to the d--l and taken all that they could not kill, quick enough.
There in the woods were the first Chenango boys I had seen able to do duty, and I was glad enough to see them. James Sherwood was among the first I saw, and then Hawley and Brookins of North Norwich. Aldrich, the drummer, also came and shook hands with me and Charles Hall of New Berlin. After dinner, James Sherwood took me to the front where most of the regiment are watching the rebels for evil and not for good, as the frequent presence of a stern man watching like a cat through a hole in a log at the breastwork shows very significantly. His rifle is poked through the hole and with his finger on the trigger, he sits minute after minute watching for a rebel ahead at a 500 yards distance or the protrusion of a rebel cannon through an embrasure. He is far from being alone in his merciless quest, and as either one shows itself a dozen balls remonstrate to their power at breach of U.S. rule in the case. While Sherwood and I were going to see the boys he showed me a spot in advance where the road went over a knoll, and charged me to hurry over that, as it was exposed to the fire of the rebel rifle pits. Safe enough as we walked there it was even so, for "zit, zit" told us that two rebels had personal objections to seeing us there. Those hills were far from being spent as the note plainly told. I saw many Norwich faces here and Norman Potter looking just as he used to, but Eugene Sherwood, who was wounded in the hand a while ago, has had the jaundice and looks far from well. There are several sick who if I could have my way should be occupying a bed, not in the woods here, but in the Barracks Hospital, New Orleans.
It is a most common sight to see the nests our boys have constructed for themselves in the side hills, where they are now living. They have scooped out holes almost big enough for woodchucks to lie in and the contrast of the dark dead brush, with the light yellow clay of the side hill is very striking, and so into what we might call checkerboards of colors they have mapped out the hill. But even here our gallant boys are not safe. A spent ball killed Erastus Gregory about a week ago as he sat reading his Bible on a log and Morell Sturges and William Sipples lay in their nest day before yesterday, when a rifled cannon ball from one of our own batteries, the gun being elevated too high, went clear over the rebel battery it was aimed at and came and took both legs off for one, and broke one leg for the other in two places, it was amputated, but he died yesterday. I am going to take a sketch of where the boys are now, and maybe wives and mothers will be glad to see it. I think of taking one of where our boys charged on the fatal 14th. Fatal indeed, if it be true as I heard today, that our loss that day and since amounts to one hundred and fifteen. It was that day when the boys in the St. Louis Hospital were hurt, D.H. Bentley in the thigh, Leroy B Woods in the knee, who died last Friday the 26th June, and many others. Bolivar Aldrich, Co. C, with Henry L. Isbel were stretcher bearers for the wounded. Poor Isbel was shot through the thigh as he and Aldrich were carrying off a wounded man of the 151st N.Y. and the same ball struck off the fur on the sleeve of Aldrich's coat. Isbel is in the St. Louis Hospital. I have seen him several times, and though he is low, I hope he may recover, but there is in that word sadly too little light admitted.
Last night on our left the rebels made a nice little whip for themselves. They had rolled up a great pile of 6-pounder shells for our benefit, and because they dare not show their dirty faces, even by moonlight, they calculated to throw them lighted over their breastwork inside ours. But their arms were not quite strong enough, and the first one rolled back among their own infernal tools, and ignited the heap, and such a set of explosions followed by groans and screams--"I'm dying!" "Lord have mercy on me." &c. Have not been heard this last two or three nights previous.
I went with three or four boys this morning to where the battle was fought on the 14th. It was then rough as the ground was, full of logs, brush and fallen trees. Our boys have since cleared it away pretty much, and on the edge of a rise of ground we have a lot of frowning breastworks, behind which our boys are practicing at rebel game 450 yards off all day, said game being pretty careful how it shows itself.
We have masked battery of seven guns only a little way from where Col. Smith fell that day. The trees show strangely many marks of the shot and shell that day. Many rebel shell are now lying in the woods unburnt, for the rebs filled them with sand for the want of powder. I have multitudes of rumors, which as they are but for the day, I will not repeat. But our pickets when near the enemy's works are on pretty cordial terms, and have signals when they want to talk. I heard a conversation this morning when the rebs told our boys they would not fight or were they not compelled to. They do [unreadable] bad as they do New England ones. Antislavery men know very well the glorious reason. But they did ask for some hard tack, and the boys aggravated them sorely by asking them to come out and take some soft bread and butter. They replied however with asking in turn that we would come for some Louisiana rum. I think our boys got the run. but whether the rebs did the hard tack this deponent saith not. In a little time they got into very friendly talk. and when at last the time for closing came "Down Yank," "Down Reb" crack, crack, and for the rest of the day, half an inch of hair or hat will draw a shot from either one of them. All day and night at intervals the mortars are at work. The many explosions reverberating through the woods, while those from the boats in the river answer in turn. An eleven ounce charge of powder will send a ten inch shell about 500 yards. The rebel artillery threw all manner of evil stuff on the 14th; old iron, gun barrels filled with nails, in one instance a case of dentist's tools came flying, horse shoes and pieces of railroad iron. The curious configuration of the country gives the rebs advantages of which I marvel that they make no better use. If New Yorkers should abandon some of their mountain sides as comparatively easily as rebels have done the pokerish ravines, they would deserve all they got.
I slept in camp last night. My bed was of poles covered with loose cotton, spread over with James Sherwood's blanket. We have many sugar hogsheads filled with cotton to make our breastworks. I saw more than a dozen bales of cotton lying round loose today in a heap. A great deal has been drawn into camp for that very purpose. There is one huge bridge over a gulley which is spread over thick with cotton to muzzle the sound of heavy guns in their passage.
So now, having no more at present to say, a mortar explosion having just reached my ear in the distance, of which many of the rebs have a hearty benefit, asking full and plenary pardon of your compositors, Mr. Editor for writing on both sides of my sheet, and wishing a "thank you for nothing" to the rebel sharpshooters who this morning twice sent a "zit," "zit," "spat" not a yard from us as we were visiting the 18th N.Y Battery.
Believe me, yours sincerely in a good cause, Wm. R. Gelderd, Delegate of U.S. Christian Commission.
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