Drum Taps in Dixie: Memories of a Drummer Boy, 1861-1865
John Stuart Mill · en
Pete then laid a board on top of it and finding that many of the girls
dare not cross, he took a rope with him, and went over on the burning
building, threw one end back to his helpers and then compelled the girls
to walk over the bridge, using the rope as a hand rail. His bravery and
nerve saved the lives of very many who but for him would have been lost.
He was the last one to leave the roof of the building and was so badly
burned that he had to go to the hospital, and when I met him that day in
the park he was just getting around again.
Peter Boyle probably never attended a Sunday school in his life, but I am
glad that my faith is of the kind that helps me to believe that when the
Book of Life is opened there will be found a balance to his credit.
A COMRADE IN GRAY.
While attending a G. A. R. encampment at Washington not many years ago, a
party of us thought we would run over to the sleepy old town of Alexandria
one afternoon.
Grass was growing in the streets and the town had a deserted appearance,
all so very different from war times, when thousands of soldiers were in
and about the city. Among other places of interest we visited was the
little church where Washington used to worship. Sitting on the steps was a
dusty, grizzly, crippled man of 60, munching a dry crust of bread. He was
dressed in a threadbare suit of gray, and we knew he was a southerner, but
as we passed into the church he gave us a military salute.
When we came out he was still nibbling away, trying to find the soft side
of his bread, and one of our party ventured the remark that “dry bread
wasn’t much of a meal.”
“That’s so, but when rations are low and the commissary wagons are to the
rear, you’ve got to fill up on what you can get. I’ve camped longside of
dry bread and water more’n once.”
“Going anywhere?”
“Well, I reckon I be if my old legs don’t give out. Got a brother over on
the Eastern Sho’ of Maryland and I am marching that way.”
“Were you in the war?”
“I reckon I was, boys, but on ’tother side. Ah, but I can shet my eyes and
see jist how Gineral Pickett looked when he led us agin your 2d corps, (he
had noticed the red clover leaf pinned on our coats) over at Gettysburg on
that 3d of July. Say, Yanks, but ’twere bilin’ that afternoon. How one of
us got back alive is more’n I can tell.”
The survivor of the “Lost cause” had by this time forgotten all about his
rations. He was living again in the past. Like a tired old war horse at
the sound of a bugle, he had risen from the steps and the light of battle
flamed in his eye as he continued:
“Yes, boys, I was right there with Pickett--not coolin’ coffee back under
the wagons, or I wouldn’t hev got two of your bullets in me, nor been
jabbed with a bay’net trying to get over the stone wall near that clump of
trees. Lord, but I thought I was a goner sure.”
We acknowledged it was a hot place.