One battle only did I witness from the vantage ground of a non-combatant, the first Fredericksburg fight, and I found it vastly more interesting and conducive to personal ease and safety, if less glorious. But this is not what I started out to tell the readers of this Magazine. I am to relate my experience during that memorable episode referred to in my opening paragraph. I must say at the outset that it was an exceedingly checkered episode, so far as my memory serves me, for within the time outlined I ran the gamut of a soldier’s emotions—anxiety, uncertainty, fear, hope, the thrill of victory succeeded all too quickly by the blackest despair; for success was followed by repulse, and from an elated victor I became almost in a twinkling, a captive in the hands of as ragged and as dirty a lot of Johnny Rebs as ever fought with a courage worthy of a better cause,—a part of Wilcox’s Alabama brigade, McLaw’s division. But I must not anticipate. During the winter of 1862–63, our brigade lay encamped near White Oak church, a locality about equi-distant, if my memory serves me, between Falmouth on the Rappahannock and Belle Plain on the Potomac. It had had ample time to recuperate from the fatigue of the “mud march,” as Burnside’s second futile attempt to dislodge Lee from his entrenchments about Fredericksburg, was facetiously termed, and as spring opened the routine of life in cantonment was relieved by parades, reviews, inspections, drills, and, occasionally, target practice. Meantime Hooker had superceded Burnside in chief command, and a new and more vigorous life had been infused into all branches of the service. This was particularly true of the cavalry, which had fallen into general disfavor. Under Hooker’s discipline it became very effective. The high-sounding grand divisions had been broken up, and the over-cautious, phlegmatic Franklin, relieved. With other changes, came Sedgwick to the command of our corps—a great improvement in some respects on Franklin. The cool and sagacious Slocum, so long at the head of the red-cross division, had been promoted to the command of a corps, and Gen. Brooks, as brave, perhaps, but a far less skilful soldier, had succeeded him, having been promoted from the Vermont brigade. Gen. Joe Bartlett of New York, commanded our brigade—a fine officer, and a lion in battle. A brave man, too, was our Colonel, but deficient in tactical skill. He might not “set a squadron in the field,” but he could face the enemy’s line of battle without flinching. In action he was the embodiment of pluck, and at such times he looked as if he might be the very “——Colonel Who galloped through the white infernal powder cloud.”