Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and DescriptiveBurnett, Alfred
History
Incidents of the War: Humorous, Pathetic, and Descriptive
Burnett, Alfred
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Anecdotes
CHAPTER XXV.
A Trip into the Enemy's Country -- The Rebels twice driven
back by General Steadman -- Incidents of the Charge of the
1st Tennessee Cavalry, under Major Tracy -- The 35th and 9th
Ohio in the Fight -- Colonel Moody and the 74th Ohio --
Colonel Moody on the Battle-field.
A TRIP INTO THE ENEMY'S COUNTRY.
Triune, Tennessee, _March 8, 1863_.
After a four-days' trip, without tents, we are once more in camp. Last
Tuesday afternoon General Steadman ordered Colonel Bishop, of the 2d
Minnesota, to take his regiment, a section of the 4th Regular Battery,
under Lieutenant Stevenson, and six hundred of Johnson's 1st East
Tennessee Cavalry, and proceed forthwith to Harpeth River.
Anticipating a fight, I went with the detachment. As we passed through
Nolinsville and Triune the few butternut inhabitants gazed with
apparent envy at our well-clad soldiers. About nine o'clock at night
we reached the river. Here the infantry bivouacked for the night; the
artillery planted their pieces in eligible positions, while the
cavalry crossed the river and commenced to search for rebel gentry who
were supposed to be on short leave of absence at their homes. Quite a
number of _citizen_ soldiers were thus picked up. Major Tracy, of the
cavalry, then proceeded, with a dozen men, to the residence of
General Starnes, and surrounded it, hoping to find the General at
home. But the bird had flown the day previous. The Major, however,
being a _searching_ man, and full of inquiry, looked under the beds,
and in the closets, and asked who was up-stairs. "No one," was the
reply, "but my brother, and he has never been in the army." Major
Tracy took a candle, went up, saw the young man, and asked where the
man had gone who had been in bed with him. The young man protested no
one had been there, and Mrs. Starnes pledged her word, on the "_honor
of a Southern lady_," that there was no one else in the house. But
Tracy turned down the sheets, and, being a discerning man, discovered
the imprint of another person in the bed, and, from the distance they
had slept apart, he felt sure it was not a woman. So telling Mrs. S.
he hadn't much faith in the honor of a Southern woman, under such
circumstances, he thought he would take a peep through a dormer-window
that projected from the roof; there, sure enough, sat Major Starnes, a
son of the rebel general, in his shirt-tail, breeches and boots in
hand, afraid to stir. It was a bitter cold night, and the poor fellow
shook like an aspen leaf. He presented at once a pitiable yet
ludicrous aspect. After collecting some twenty or thirty horses, they
returned to their head-quarters, this side of the river. At night, not
relishing the thought of sleeping on a rail, I had the good fortune of
sharing a bed with Lieutenant Stevenson, who commanded the battery.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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