“Waid a minute, of you blease,” said the colonel. “Dake von more drink, and dell me, of you please, vot de hell you vos drying to get at. Capt. Hemrech, gif der shendleman a glass of beer.”
A second glass of beer was given me, and I drank it. There was evidently a suspicion on the part of the New Jersey officers that the importance of my visit had been over-rated by them, and they seemed anxious to have me come to the point.
“On the march today,” said I, wiping the foam off my moustache on my shirt-sleeve, “one of your thieving soldiers stole my boots from our negro cook, who was conveying them for me. A cavalry soldier without boots, is no good. I came after my boots, and I will have them or blood. Return my boots, or by the eternal, the Wisconsin cavalry regiment will come over here and everlastingly gallop over your fellows. The constitution of the United States and the Declaration of Independence, are on my side. In civil life a man’s house is his castle. In the army a man’s boots is his castle. Give me my boots, sir, or the blood of the slain will rest on your heads.”
The colonel was half mad and half pleased. He tapped his forehead with his fore-finger, and looked at his officers in a manner that showed he believed my head was wrong, but he said kindly:
“My man, you go oud and sit under a tree, in the shade, and I vill hafe your poots found if they are in my rechiment,” and I went out. I heard the colonel say to one of his officers, “It vas too pad dot two good glasses of beer should be spoiled, giving them to dot grazy solcher. Ve must be more careful mit de beer.”
Pretty soon an officer came out and asked me how the boots were taken, and I gave him all the information I had, and he sent men all around the regiment, and in an hour or so the boots were brought to me, the man who stole them was arrested, the officers apologized to me, and I went back to my regiment in triumph, with my boots under my arms. The incident got noised around among the other regiments, and for months after that, when the colonel of the New Jersey cavalry rode by another regiment, the boys would yell out, “Boots, boots,” or when a company or squad of the New Jersey fellows would pass along, it was “Look out for your boots! The shoemakers are coming.” For stealing that one pair of boots, by one man, a whole regiment got a reputation for stealing that hung to it a long time. Ten years afterward I was connected with a New York daily paper, and one evening I was detailed to go to a New Jersey city to report the commencement exercises of a college. In the programme of exercises I noticed that a man of the same name of that of the New Jersey colonel, was one of the college professors, and I wondered if he was the same man. During the evening he put in an appearance on the stage, and I could see that he was the colonel who had given me the beer, and caused my boots to be returned to me. After the exercises of the evening, the New York newspaper men were invited to partake of a collation in the apartments of the college officials, and the professors were introduced to the newspaper men. When my turn came to be introduced, and the old colonel stood before me, I said:
“General, you were in the army, were you not?”
“Yezzer!” said the old man. “I am broud to say dot I fought for my adopted country. But vy do you ask?”
“We have met before. I, too, was a soldier. I was at your headquarters once, on a very important mission. I was entertained, sir, in your tent, permitted, to partake of the good, things you had, and sent away happy.
“Vell, you dond’t say so,” said the old man, as he pressed my hand warmly. “Vere vas dis dat you were my guest, and vot vas de important message?” and he smiled all over his face at the prospect of hearing something about old times.
“It was in Mississippi, between Montgomery, Ala., and Vicksburg. Do you remember the hottest and dustiest day that ever was, when we camped on a little stream?” said I.
“O, yah!” said the colonel; “very well. It vas an awful time.”
“I went to your headquarters with information of vital importance. One of your soldiers had stolen my boots.”
“Gott in himmel!” said the old colonel, now a college professor, as he looked at me to see if there was any resemblance between the New York reporter and the dusty, bare-footed soldier of ten years before. “Vill I never hear de last of dem dam boots? And you are de same veller, eh. I have often thought, since dat day, vot an awful gall you had. But it is all ofer now. You vatch your poots vile you are in New Chersey, for plenty of dose cavalry-men are all around here. But do me a favor now, and don’t ever again say poots to me, dot’s a good fellow,” and then we all sat down to lunch, and the old colonel told the newspaper boys from New York about how I called at his tent on the march, looking for a pair of boots that had eloped with one of his New Chersey dutchmen.
1 Before I get any further on this history of the war, it is necessary to explain. The facts proved to be that my regiment had got lost in the woods, and the scouting party, under the corporal, who had been sent out to find a road, had come upon the three-quarter stretch of an old private race track on a deserted southern plantation, instead of a main road, and I had been placed on picket near the last turn before striking the quarter stretch. A small party of Confederates, who had been out on a scout, and got lost, had come on the track further down, near the judges’ stand, and they had put a man, on picket up near where I was, supposing they had struck the road, and intending to wait until morning so as to find out where they were. My horse was an old race horse, and as soon as he saw the other horse, he was in for a race and the other horse was willing. This will show the situation as well as though I had a race track engraved, showing the positions of the two armies. The Confederates, except the man on picket, were asleep beside the track near the quarter stretch, and our fellows, except myself, were asleep over by the three-quarter pole.
2 I neglected to say, in my account of the battle at the race-track, that when firing with my revolver, at my friend the rebel, I put one bullet-hole through the right ear of my horse. I was so excited at the time that I did not know it, and only discovered it a week later when currying off my horse, which I made a practice of doing once a week, with a piece of barrel-stave, when I noticed the horse’s ear was swelled up about as big as a canvas ham. I took him to the horse doctor, who reduced the swelling so we could find the hole through the horse’s ear, and the horse doctor tied a blue ribbon in the hole. He said the blue ribbon would help heal the sore, but later I found that he had put the ribbon in the ear to call attention to my poor marksmanship, and the boys got so they made comments and laughed at me every time I appeared with the horse.
3 A few weeks ago I met a member of my old regiment, who is traveling through the South as agent for a beer bottling establishment in the North. He was with me when we built the corduroy bridge twenty-two years ago. As we were talking over old-times he asked me if I remembered that bridge we built one day in Alabama, in the wrong place, and moved it during the night. I told him I wished I had as many dollars as I remembered that bridge. “Well,” said my comrade, “on my last trip through Alabama I crossed that bridge, and paid two bits for the privilege of crossing. A man has established a toll-gate at the bridge, and they say he has made a fortune. I asked him how much his bridge cost him, and he said it didn’t cost him a cent, as the Yankees built it during the war. He said they cut the timber on his land, and when he got out of the Confederate army he was busted, and he claimed the bridge, and got a charter to keep a toll-gate.” My comrade added that the bridge was as sound as it was when it was built. He said he asked the toll-gate keeper if he knew the bridge was first built a mile away, and he said he knew the timber was cut up there, and he wondered what the confounded Yankees went away off there to cut the timber for, when they could get it right on the bank. Then my comrade told the toll-gate keeper that he helped build the bridge, the rebel thanked him, and wanted to pay back the two bits. Some day I am going down to Alabama and cross on that bridge again, the bridge that almost caused me to commit suicide, and if that old rebel-for he must be an old rebel now—charges me two bits toll, I shall very l
ikely pull off my coat and let him whip me, and then as likely as not there will be another war.
4 Eighteen months after the lady rode away from me, “leaving” her quinine, I was in New Orleans, to be mustered in as Second Lieutenant, having received a commsssion. I had bought me a fine uniform, and thought I was about as cunning a looking officer as ever was. I was walking on Canal street, looking in the windows, and finally went into a store to buy some collars. A gentleman came in with a gray uniform on, and one sleeve empty. He was evidently a Confederate officer. He asked me if I did not belong to a certain cavalry regiment, and if my name was not so and so. I told him he was correct. He told me there was a lady in an adjoining store that wanted to see me. I did not know a soul, that is, a female soul, in New Orleans, but I went with him. Any lady that wanted to see me, in my new uniform, could see me. As we entered the store a lady left two little girls and rushed up to me, threw her arms around my neck and —(say, does a fellow have to tell everything, when he writes a war history?) Well, she was awfully tickled to see me, and she was my smuggler, the Confederate was her husband, and the children were hers. The officer was as tickled as she was, and they compelled me to go to their house to dinner, and I enjoyed it very much. We talked over the arrest of the “female smuggler,” and she said to her husband, “Pa, it was an awfully embarrassing situation for me and this Yankee, but he treated me like a lady, and the only thing I have to find fault about, is that he forgot to help me hook up my dress, and I rode clear to town with it unhooked.” The Confederate had been discharged at the surrender, and I was on my way to Texas, to serve another year, hunting Indians. I left them very happy, and as I went out of their door she wrapped his empty sleeve around her waist, drew the children up to her, and said, “Mr. Yankee, may you always be very happy.”
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