by Jim Murphy
November 23
Capt. Clapp came this morning, and after a brief visit, Lt. Toms was as happy as he has been in a long time. I was glad to see this change in the Lt., but I knew it meant trouble for me and I was right. There is to be some sort of “surprise action” soon and Capt. Clapp wants G Company to be a part of his command. So I will not have a quiet — and safe — winter after all!!
Lt. Toms called the men together to tell us what he knew, which was not much other than we would leave in a few days and be close to the Mine Run River. “We have a chance to prove ourselves,” he told us. “Maybe our only chance. I want this Company to be the best in the 122nd.” He even asked about the Company journal, which he has not shown interest in for many days. He glanced through it and seemed pleased, but he did say, “Pease, why are you still going on about your bad luck? Didn’t your people teach you any better?” I was going to say, “I was brought up on the Bible, which is full of magic and miracles, and even a story about Jonah and his bad luck with the whale. So why is being cursed so strange?” But I didn’t because I didn’t want to sound like a blasphemer — and I didn’t want to miss supper again! “Well, just keep your head down and do what you have always done, and you will be fine, do you hear?” “Yes, sir,” I answered, but I can’t say that I was much reassured. His only other comment about the journal was that I should list the new men, but I don’t want to use up the space til we see who deserts.
The Lt. then sent Caesar to the sutler for some provisions and we are to have a special meal tonight! I was happy then that I had held my tongue. “A Thanksgiving meal,” Lt. Toms told us, “for our deliverance.”
November 24
Lt. Toms is quite happy today, but the rest of us are feeling stuffed and sluggish because of our meal — which consisted of real eggs, soft bread, butter that was not more than a week or two old, beef stew with real potatoes, dried peaches, and coffee and sugar. After dinner Lt. Toms brought out eight bottles of whiskey — which must have cost a great deal, since we have not seen this in over two months! — and Sgt. Donoghue gave each of us a share in our coffee. It was a fine feast and enjoyable, tho Shelp seems to have turned his mouth on me, repeating often that he did not want to stand near an unlucky Jonah Boy. We will see where this leads.
Asked Corp. Bell, Jehial Lamphier and the Wyatt boys about their pasts, but no one is in a mood to talk, which is just as well because I am in no mood to write.
November 26
Sgt. Donoghue woke us this morning before sunrise with “Happy Thanksgiving. Prepare to march in twenty minutes,” and we did, this time as part of Capt. Clapp’s unit.
4 o’clock
Crossed the Rapidan River just above the Mine Run River at ten and was immediately given a Reb salute of flying minié balls. Our Company got sent out, along with K Company, to shoo our Secesh friends away while the army marched on.
The woods and underbrush was something thick, so we did not move in any particular order. Crouching low, we went from tree to tree, trying to avoid the hot metal coming at us while working our way toward the sound and smoke of the firing.
I have to admit to being very nervous as we entered the woods. I even started to have trouble breathing and had to take in little gulps of air, but I kept moving forward by watching the man in front of me — who happened to be Johnny Henderson — and dashed ahead whenever he did. My breathing settled down some and was almost normal when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye.
I was sure I had a Reb located — maybe 400 feet away — and I pointed my musket at the tree near his position. I was holding steady, aiming, finger on the trigger, when I heard the loud crack of a shot out of the many that was crackling around me and then the whooshing sound of the ball coming at me.
I know this does not seem possible, but stranger things have happened in this strange war and I know what I heard, so I ducked — and just then the ball sent my forage cap sailing. I was so startled I just sat there on the ground, staring at my cap with its new ventilation hole thru the band and wondering what that ball would have done to my head if I hadn’t moved.
“You O.K.? You O.K.?” Johnny screamed in my ear all excited, and I nodded. “Let’s go, then! Come on!” he yelled, pulling me to my feet. “Lt. Toms has ordered a bayonet charge and we are lagging.”
Johnny started dragging me along, and I stumbled, then righted myself and began to run on my own, fumbling to put on my bayonet as I did. I hardly had a chance to look where I was going before I plunged through a tangle of leaves and branches and followed the others, who was forty feet in front and plunging through leaves and branches, too. Suddenly I found myself very mad at what had almost happened to my head and I wanted to get the Reb who had fired at me, whoever he might be. Lt. Toms was way out in front, maybe 100 feet from me, his sword raised high in his right hand, and shouting “Come on, boys, come on! This way!” and I thought what a fool he was to be out there like that, all alone, and at the same time my legs began moving faster and I made up the ground between myself and the rest of the Company.
I was just a few steps behind one of the new men, with the rest of the Company spread out on either side. I didn’t notice anyone else, but I am sure Willie Dodd was near because Spirit, who hadn’t been tied up, was to my left and weaving this way and that way through holes in the underbrush and barking madly.
The Rebs was still firing on us and the hissing of lead was all around. Just then the new man went down in a heap ahead of me. That ball was meant for me, I thought, which made me madder still, and then I realized he had just gotten his bayonet snagged on some vines and tripped over his own clumsy feet. But that didn’t make me any less mad at the Rebs. I leaped over the new man and a second later I was right next to the Lt. and heading into the smoke of a recently fired Reb gun.
I saw a shadow move up ahead and thought about stopping to fire, when I remembered those shadows coming at us at Gettysburg and thought better of it. I did not want to cause the Lt. any more trouble. So I ran at it, musket lowered now and my bayonet aimed at its center — its stomach — and let out a howling scream that startled even me. Just then the woods in front of me began to crackle like popping corn tossed into a hot fire and the air around me vibrated and whizzed as the miniés flew over, around, and near me.
I had not one thought in my silly head as I ran at the enemy, except that I was going to get the one who shot at me. I did have this strange feeling at the same moment — just a feeling, not any words — that I needed to protect the Lt. — tho why he would need me to protect him I wouldn’t know.
The smoke from the volley rolled out to meet me and a thought did enter my head then. The thought was — on the other side of that smoke are a whole lot of Rebs with muskets and bayonets waiting for you. But by the time that thought was all strung together I was in the smoke and knew it was too late to do anything else, so I screamed again and lunged forward, bayonet extended.
Which is when Lt. Toms’s voice broke through clearly: “Pease, what the Hell are you doing? Get back here!” which was also when I came through the wall of smoke and discovered — well, nothing. The Rebs was gone and the only trace of them was their backs as they skedaddled through the trees.
I guess I should have fired on such easy butternut targets, but I was breathing so hard I probably wouldn’t have held my musket too steady. Besides I didn’t see the point. We had driven them away from the rest of the army, which is what our orders had been.
Lt. Toms and the other men came up then, and everyone started talking at once — the Lt. wanting to know why I’d charged so far ahead by myself and saying I could have been killed, the others patting me on the back and making all kinds of noise about how I’d driven off General Robert E. Lee’s army single-handed, that I was a regular hero and so forth. But the only thing I could say between gasps of breathing was “Where is my cap,” which Johnny dashed off to retrieve.
That’s when Sgt. Donoghue said, “Look at that,” and pointed to my stomach.
There was a ragged hole in my uniform. I unbuttoned my shirt and pulled out this journal, which I keep in there whenever we leave camp so I will not lose it and so no one else will steal it. The cover, which is of hard board, had a clean hole in it and the ball itself was lodged inside, having made a journey all the way to the entries about Gettysburg.
“Lord,” Johnny exclaimed when he came back and examined the hole in my cap and the ball in the journal, “you are one lucky soldier for sure.” But I didn’t see it that way. As far as I was concerned, the lead was getting closer and closer and it was only a matter of time before it hit its mark.
Only three wounded in our Company — Corp. J. Bell was shot in the leg and the doctor says the bone is broken; W. Zellers was hit in the shoulder, tho the injury is not bad; and W. Bateman had his left eye nearly poked out by a branch he ran into, but he says he aims with the other so he will be okay. Assorted other bruises and sprains and cuts, all minor.
November 27
After our skirmish yesterday, we marched double time til we caught up with the rest of the 122nd. Lt. Toms received a personal “Well done” from Capt. Clapp and some other officers after K Company’s capt. related what took place in the woods. This cheered all of us who want to see our Lt. Toms restored in rank someday. There was nice words for me, too, but by this time I had found my tongue and said I was just following Lt. Toms’s orders and had gotten confused in the smoke, which is true, I think. The boys have been studying the recovered ball very carefully and say it is a lucky charm and that I should keep it in my pocket. I said I did not want anything to do with it because metal attracts more metal, so now the boys are going to pass it around among themselves, each one getting to hold it for a day.
November 28
Woke to heavy rain and grumbling thunder. The 122nd was ordered to join up with Gen. Warren’s Second Corps, so we and thousands of other soldiers spent the day clomping thru mud. Everyone fears another “mud march” such as we had last January, but that would not bother me. Mud is a lot safer than fighting. Besides, every time I think about what a fool thing I did in those woods and what could have happened, I become very excited and then, afterwards, I get sleepy and want to find a warm blanket. So I am marching with my eyes half open.
November 30
Yesterday we worked like beavers throwing up protective breastworks and preparing to charge the Rebs. The enemy had a strong position, with swamps and gullies behind and to the sides, so any run at them would have been straight on across a wide-open field 1000 yards long. For some reason I continued to be exhausted and fell asleep often, but at least this prevented me from worrying. Even the occasional shots exchanged did not disturb my rest.
Sgt. Donoghue said I might sleep the war away if I wasn’t careful and so I did this self-portrait.
At nightfall the order to charge was revoked and we withdrew. Lt. Toms said it was smart to call off the charge since not enough of us would have been left alive to bury the dead. Henry Wyatt called out, “I would have,” because he was the holder that day of Lucky Minié, as the ball is now called. “Just stay clear of Jonah Boy,” Shelp said. “He is marked, no doubt about it, and so is anyone around him.” Sgt. Donoghue went to say something to Shelp, but I said not to and that he didn’t bother me, which wasn’t true, but I did not need Shelp to be even angrier at me than he already seems to be.
We are at the Rapidan River today and will cross tomorrow. Lt. Toms thinks our fighting is finished for the year — finally! — and I, for one, will be happy to be back at Brandy Station and in our safe, warm home.
December 2
Arrived in camp to find our tent filled with six loafers! They left very quickly — at our request and Sgt. Donoghue’s urging — but it took my tent-mates and me quite a while to clean the mess they left. These loafers was so lazy as to chop up our bench, barrel table, and stools for firewood! They was from a Maine regiment and we somehow would have expected better of them than we got!
I was so tired, I thought I would fall asleep the minute I pulled the covers over me, but I stayed awake a very long time instead, thinking of this and that, but mostly seeing myself running at the enemy and screaming and seeing muskets flashing in my direction. And the dead Reb boy. He had come back, too. I have been in fighting before, but this is the first time a memory has followed me so long after. Is this another part of my bad luck — to remember?
December 3
We built ourselves a bench and more stools, but barrels are scarce, so we have no table yet. Drilled, helped unload wagons, and cleared a section of brush behind the sutler.
I asked Henry Clements about his life and it was as if the Heavens had opened up and a great rain had begun to fall. He talked and talked and talked — a deluge of words — and told me how his great-great-great-great- grandparents had settled in New England and raised seven children. Then he told me what happened to each of these children, and their children and theirs! It was like all the begats in the Bible — how Cain begat Enoch, who begat Irad, who begat Me-hu’ja-el and on and on — til my head was spinning. If I have this correct, Henry (ours) was born to Henry (the fourth or fifth Henry Clements to appear) and to Henrietta Clark (who was a second cousin of this Henry and who bore a strong resemblance to some other Henry’s mother, which created “talk” in the family, it appears). Any-way, Henry (our Henry’s father) ran a dry-goods store and livery service and Henrietta gave piano lessons and played the organ in church. They was fairly well off and well connected and had even tried to keep Henry (ours) from having to go into the war by buying a substitute for him, but Henry (ours) did not think it an honorable thing to do, so he enlisted. Henry said he was given a very good education, and even went away to Harvard College, which is a good thing, I think, just to keep all of his relatives straight in his head. I think I will not add another history to this journal for some time.
Johnny is writing home for some herbs to put in a concoction that will, in his words, “let you sleep like a baby even under the barrels of the big guns.” I am almost afraid to say it — since I worry that some of my bad luck might rub off on him — but he is as close to a friend as I have ever had.
December 4
Two from our Company deserted last night, and another would have, but a sentry spotted him and brought him in. One of those who got away was our tent-mate Charles Buell. I guess helping a few Negroes get to Canada is a lot different than getting shot at for them! Several men have the bloody flux and are in the hospital, which was a barn before we got here.
Later
The man caught deserting was sentenced to stand on a platform in the middle of camp for twenty-four hours without coat or hat. After this, he will clean out the horse and mule corrals by himself til Lt. Toms says other-wise. Most of us think this a fine enough punishment because he did not run off during a battle. But others — especially his fellow greenhorns — think he deserves something more severe. It is true that in some brigades he could be tried by court-martial, and sentenced to be shot, but Col. Titus has a more lenient attitude with his men.
Of course, a discussion developed over this — soldiers are always scouting for something to yap about — and this discussion boiled up into a little argument when talk got around to the best reason to fight in this war. Sgt. Donoghue said he was part of the regular military before the war and would be after, and following orders, especially to fight, is how you advance in rank and pay. John Farmer said he was a good Christian and that “the bondage of slavery had to be broken once and for all time.” George Chittenden said he was also a good Christian but did not care one bit about the Negroes and that they could all go back to Africa as far as he was concerned. He joined because the rebellious states had committed treason and had to be taught a powerful lesson. Lyman Swim came because two of his friends did and he did not want to be seen as a coward or a Copperhead.
I was asked why I had put my neck at risk, and when I said, “Because I needed a pair of boots and dinner,” everybody laughed. But that
is the truth. And when the Sgt. asked why I didn’t leave after I had got my feet covered and belly full, I got an even bigger laugh when I answered, “Because the boots fit perfect and the dinner tasted good.” Which is also the truth. At the time I signed my papers I had been on my own for three months, and while happy to have freed Uncle and Aunt of my bad luck, I have to admit there was too many quiet, hungry nights.
December 5
Drilled in the morning, chopped wood in the afternoon. Lt. Toms was beaming — that is how the Little Profeser described his smile — as he read the part of the official report saying: “Special note is made of the distinguished actions of Cos. K, Lieut. Wooster, and G, Lieut. Toms, who engaged a superior number of enemy skirmishers threatening our line of march and subsequently drove them off.” The Lt. was not made a capt., but this recognition pleased us any-way. Of course, Shelp had to say, “Hey, Jonah Boy, they didn’t mention you or your hero’s charge,” and this bothered me more than it should have because I really did not want to be mentioned. Or did not think I did.
Four more men have come down with the bloody flux, so seven are in the hospital now. We also have two cases of the ague — tho I am not one if you do not count waking in the middle of the night with the cold sweats and troubled thoughts.
December 6
Drilled, chopped, ate, looked at the newspaper, and avoided Shelp. That was my day. And wrote this.
December 7
Same as yesterday, tho we did not drill or chop today. Lt. Toms said I might want to add the names of the six new men still here, so I will:
