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GEO. ALFRED TOWNSEND.
GEO. ALFRED TOWNSEND.
NEW YORK: BLELOCK & COMPANY, 19 Beekman Street , 1866. Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1866, by GEORGE ALFRED TOWNSEND, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. Scrymgeour, Whitcomb & Co. , Stereotypers, 15 Water Street, Boston . Inconsistency in hyphenation in this etext is as in the original book....
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"Miles O'Reilly,"
"Miles O'Reilly,"
Who saw the war as vividly as he sang it; and whose aims for the peace that has ensued, are even nobler than the noble influence he exerted during the struggle, these chapters of travel are inscribed by his friend and colleague....
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PREFACE.
PREFACE.
In the early part of 1863, while I was resident in London,—the first of the War Correspondents to go abroad,—I wrote, at the request of Mr. George Smith, publisher of the Cornhill Magazine, a series of chapters upon the Rebellion, thus introduced:— "Few wars have been so well chronicled, as that now desolating America. Its official narratives have been copious; the great newspapers of the land have been represented in all its campaigns; private enterprise has classified and illustrated its sever
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CHAPTER 1.
CHAPTER 1.
"Here is a piece of James Franklin's printing press, Mr. Townsend," said Mr. Pratt to me, at Newport the other day,—"Ben. Franklin wrote for the paper, and set type upon it. The press was imported from England in 1730, or thereabouts." He produced a piece of wood, a foot in length, and then laid it away in its drawer very sacredly. "I should like to write to that press, Mr. Pratt," I said,—"there would be no necessity in such a case of getting off six columns for to-night's mail." "Well!" said M
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
Looking back over the four years of the war, and noting how indurated I have at last become, both in body and in emotion, I recall with a sigh that first morning of my correspondentship when I set out so light-hearted and yet so anxious. It was in 1861. I was accompanied to the War department by an attaché of the United States Senate. The new Secretary, Mr. Edwin M. Stanton, referred me to a Mr. Sanford, "Military Supervisor of Army Intelligence," and after a brief delay I was requested to sign
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
When I awoke at Colonel Taggert's tent the morning afterward, I had verified the common experience of camps by "catching several colds at once," and felt a general sensation of being cut off at the knees. Poor S., who joined me at the fire, states that he believed himself to be tied in knots, and that he should return afoot to Washington. Our horses looked no worse, for that would have been manifestly impossible. We were made the butts of much jesting at breakfast; and S. said, in a spirit of at
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
There was a newsboy named "Charley," who slept at Captain Kingwalt's every second night, and who returned my beast to his owner in Washington. The aphorism that a Yankee can do anything, was exemplified by this lad; for he worked my snail into a gallop. He was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts, and appeared to have taken to speculation at the age when most children are learning A B C. He was now in his fourteenth year, owned two horses, and employed another boy to sell papers for him likewise. His
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
I found at breakfast, that Miss Bessie had been placed beside me, and I so far forgot myself as to forget all other persons at the table. Miss Priscilla asked to be helped to the corn-bread, and I deposited a quantity of the same upon Miss Bessie's plate. Miss Bell asked if I did not love dear old Virginia, and I replied to Miss Bessie that it had lately become very attractive, and that, in fact, I was decidedly rebellious in my sympathy with the distressed Virginians. I did except, however, the
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
Disappointed in the unlucky termination of my adventures afield, I now looked ambitiously toward New York. As London stands to the provinces, so stands the empire city to America. Its journals circulate by hundreds of thousands; its means are only rivalled by its enterprise; it is the end of every young American's aspiration, and the New Bohemia for the restless, the brilliant, and the industrious. It seemed a great way off when I first beheld it, but I did not therefore despair. Small matters o
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
Yorktown lies twenty-one miles northwestward from Old Point, and thither I turned my face at noon, resolving to delay my journey to "White House," till next day morning. Crossing an estuary of the bay upon a narrow causeway, I passed Hampton,—half burned, half desolate,—and at three o'clock came to "Big Bethel," the scene of the battle of June 11, 1861. A small earthwork marks the site of Magruder's field-pieces, and hard by the slain were buried. The spot was noteworthy to me, since Lieutenant
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
At White House, I met some of the mixed Indians and negroes from Indiantown Island, which lies among the osiers in the stream. One of these ferried me over, and the people received me obsequiously, touching their straw hats, and saying, "Sar, at your service!" They were all anxious to hear something of the war, and asked, solicitously, if they were to be protected. Some of them had been to Richmond the previous day, and gave me some unimportant items happening in the city. I found that they had
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
While daylight remained, I had little reason to repent my wayward resolve. The Pamunkey lay to my left, and the residences between it and the road were of a better order than others that I had seen. This part of the country had not been overrun, and the wheat and young corn were waving in the river-breeze. I saw few negroes, but the porches were frequently occupied by women and white men, who looked wonderingly toward me. There were some hoof-marks in the clay, and traces of a broad tire that I
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
The two ramrods were still pacing to and fro, when I aroused in the gray of the morning; but they looked very misty and moist, as if they were impalpables that were shortly to evaporate. The Major poked his head between the flaps at eight o'clock, and said that breakfast was ready; but the ramrod nearest me kept vigilantly alongside, and I thought he had been invited also. The other ramrod guarded the empty tent, and I think that he believed me a doppel-ganger likewise. I wondered what was to be
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CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
Some days ago, as I was sitting in Central Park, under a tree no bigger than Jonah's gourd, broiling nicely brown, and seasoning the process by reading what the lesser weeklies said about me, I saw at the Park gate a great phantasm, like a distended sausage, swaying to and fro as if striving to burst, and directly the horrible thing blew upwards, spilling all the stuffing from the case. I saw in a moment that the apparition was a balloon, and that the aeronaut was only emptying ballast. Straight
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CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
Returning from White House on Saturday, May 29, I heard the cannon of "Seven Pines." The roar of artillery came faintly upon the ear in the dells and woods, but in the open stretches of country, or from cleared hill-tops, I could hear also the volleys of musketry. It was the battle sound that assured me of bloody work; for the musket, as I had learned by experience, was the only certain signification of battle. It is seldom brought into requisition but at close quarters, when results are intende
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CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIII.
The old Chickahominy bridges were soon repaired, and the whole of Franklin's corps crossed to the south side. McClellan moved his head-quarters to Dr. Trent's farm, a half-mile from Michie's, and the latter gentleman's fields and lawn were made white with tents. Among others, the Chief of Cavalry, Stoneman, pitched his canopy under the young oaks, and the whole reserve artillery was parked in the woods, close to the house. The engineer brigade encamped in the adjacent peach-orchard and corn-fiel
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CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XIV.
A subtle enemy had of late joined the Confederate cause against the invaders. He was known as Pestilence, and his footsteps were so soft that neither scout nor picket could bar his entrance. His paths were subterranean,—through the tepid swamp water, the shallow graves of the dead; and aerial,—through the stench of rotting animals, the nightly miasms of bog and fen. His victims were not pierced, or crushed, or mangled, but their deaths were not less terrible, because more lingering. They seemed
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CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XV.
The Confederates had been waiting two months for McClellan's advance. Emboldened by his delay they had gathered the whole of their available strength from remote Tennessee, from the Mississippi, and from the coast, until, confident and powerful, they crossed Meadow Bridge on the 26th of June, 1862, and drove in our right wing at Mechanicsville. The reserves of Gen. McCall were stationed here; they made a wavering resistance,—wherein four companies of Bucktails were captured bodily,—and fell back
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CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVI.
The scene presented in Michie's lawn and oak grove, on Saturday morning, was terribly picturesque, and characteristic of the calamity of war. The well was beset by crowds of wounded men, perishing of thirst, who made frantic efforts to reach the bucket, but were borne back by the stronger desperadoes. The kitchen was swarming with hungry soldiers who begged corn-bread and half-cooked dough from the negroes. The shady side-yard was dotted with pale, bruised, and bleeding people, who slept out the
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CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVII.
In the dim of the morning of our Lord's Sabbath, the twenty-ninth of June, 1862, I sat in my saddle at Savage's. The gloom was very cheerless. A feeling of hopeless vagabondism oppressed me. I remembered the Disinherited Knight, the Wandering Jew, Robinson Crusoe, and other poor errants in the wide world, and wondered if any of them ever looked so ruefully as I, when the last wagon of the Grand Army disappeared through the shadow. The tent had been taken down at midnight. I had been dozing in th
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CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A crash and a stunning shock, as of a falling sphere, aroused me at nine o'clock. A shell had burst in front of our tent, and the enemy's artillery was thundering from Casey's old hill, beyond the swamp. As I hastily drew on my boots,—for I had not otherwise undressed,—I had opportunity to remark one of those unaccountable panics which develop among civilian soldiers. The camps were plunged into disorder. As the shells dropped here and there, among the tents and teams, the wildest and most fearf
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CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XIX.
An earnest desire now took possession of me, to be the first of the correspondents to reach New York. The scenes just transpired had been unparalleled in the war, and if, through me, the —— should be the first to make them public, it would greatly redound to my credit. Perhaps no profession imparts an enthusiasm in any measure kindred to that of the American Newsgatherer. I was careless of the lost lives and imperilled interests, the suffering, the defeat: no emotions either of the patriot or th
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CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XX.
Counter winds and tides had so delayed the Adelaide , on which I departed for New York with my despatches, that it became a doubtful question as to whether we could make connection with the early train for New York. The captain shook his head distrustfully when he had looked at his watch, and told me that he frequently failed to land his passengers in time. The bitterness of the doubt so troubled me, that I paced the decks, looking at the approaching city, and thinking that all my labor was to b
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CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXI.
The court-house village of Fauquier County contained a population of twelve or fifteen hundred at the commencement of the war. Its people embraced the revolutionary cause at the outstart, and furnished some companies of foot to the Confederate service, as well as a mounted company known as the "Black Horse Cavalry." The guns of Bull Run were heard here on the day of battle, and hundreds of the wounded came into town at nightfall. Thenceforward Warrenton became prominently identified with the str
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CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXII.
Some of General McDowell's aides had invited me to pass a night with them at Warrenton Springs. Fully equipped, I joined Captain Ball, of Cincinnati, and we rode southward, over a hard, picturesque turnpike, under a clear moonlight. The distance was seven miles, and a part of this route was enlivened by the fires, halloos, and the music of camps. Volunteers are fond of serenading their officers; and this particular evening was the occasion of much merry-making, since a majority of the brass band
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CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
While General Pope's army was concentrating between the Rappahannock and Rapidan rivers, the army of General Stonewall Jackson was lying upon the south bank of the Rapidan, and that renowned commander's head-quarters were at Gordonsville, about thirty miles from Culpepper. It was generally presumed that Jackson had fortified Gordonsville, intending to lie in wait there, or possibly to oppose the crossing of Pope upon the banks of the river. It was not believed that Jackson's force was very great
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CHAPTER XXIV
CHAPTER XXIV
There being nothing to eat in the vicinity of the ambulances, I mounted anew at five o'clock and rode back toward Culpepper. No portion of the troops of Crawford were visible now, and only some gray smoke moved up the side of the mountain. A few stragglers were bathing their faces in Cedar Creek, and some miles in the rear lay several of McDowell's brigades under arms. Their muskets were stacked along the sides of the road, the men lay sleepily upon the ground,—company by company, each in its pr
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CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXV.
When I rose, at ten o'clock on the morning of Sunday, August 10, the porch was covered with wounded people. Some fierce sunbeams were gliding under the roof, shining in the poor fellows' eyes, and they were stirring wearily, though asleep. Picking my way among the prostrate figures, I resorted to the pump in the rear of the tavern for the purpose of bathing my face. A soldier stood there on guard, and he refused to give me so much as a draught of water. The wounded needed every drop, and there w
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CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVI.
The boy's vague dream of foreign adventure had passed away; my purpose was of a tamer and more practical cast; it was resolved to this problem: "How could I travel abroad and pay my expenses?" Evidently no money could be made by home correspondence. The new order of journals had no charity for fine moral descriptions of church steeples, ruined castles, and picture galleries; I knew too little of foreign politics to give the Republic its semi-weekly "sensation;" and exchange was too high at the d
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CHAPTER XXVII.
CHAPTER XXVII.
Florence, city of my delight! how do I thrill at the recollection of the asylum afforded me by thee in the Via Parione. The room was tiled, and cool, and high, and its single window looked out upon a real palace, where the family of Corsini, presided over by a porter in cocked hat and an exuberance of gold lace, gave me frequent glimpses of gauze dresses and glorious eyes, whose owners sometimes came to the casement to watch the poor little foreigner, writing so industriously. Every young travel
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CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Again on the way to Washington! I have made the trip more than sixty times. I saw the Gunpowder Bridge in flames when Baltimore was in arms and the Capital cut off from the North. I saw from Perryville the State flag of Maryland waving at Havre de Grace across the Susquehanna. I saw at the Washington Navy Yard the blackened body of Ellsworth, manipulated by the surgeons. I moved through the city with McClellan's onward army toward the transports which were to carry it to the Peninsula. The awful
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CHAPTER XXIX.
CHAPTER XXIX.
I commence my account on the battle-field, but must soon make the long and lonely ride to Humphrey's Station, where I shall continue it. I am sitting by Sheridan's camp-fire, on the spot he has just signalized by the most individual and complete victory of the war. All his veterans are around him, stooping by knots over the bright fagots, to talk together, or stretched upon the leaves of the forest, asleep, with the stains of powder yet upon their faces. There are dark masses of horses blackened
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CHAPTER XXX.
CHAPTER XXX.
The scenes of entering the doomed stronghold, when Grant had burst its gates, ought to be made vivid as the spectacle of death. With my good and talented associate, Mr. Jerome B. Stillson, I hold the Spotswood Hotel, and from this caravansary of the late capital as thoroughly identified with Rebellion as the inn at Bethlehem with the gospel, we date our joint paragraphs upon the condition of the city. A week cannot have exhausted the curiosity of the North to learn the exact appearance of a city
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CHAPTER XXXI.
CHAPTER XXXI.
When Richmond was a plain city, a county seat, and the residence of a governor and commonwealth legislature, its enterprise was as gradual as its hospitality and private probity were steadfast. It was always a fierce political arena, and its two great journals, the Whig and Enquirer , were not more violently partisan than its hustings. In the latter its debaters were wide-famed. No such "stump" has ever existed in America, commencing with Patrick Henry, whose eloquence was as intense and telling
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CHAPTER XXXII.
CHAPTER XXXII.
To have looked upon seventeen beings of human organism, ambition, sense of pain and of disgrace, brought forward with all the solemnities of a living funeral, and launched from absolute cognition to direct death, should put one in the category of Calcraft, Ketch, and Isaacs. Yet, I do not think it would be right to so classify me. I know an excellent clergyman, who has seen and assisted in fifty odd executions. He says, as I say, that each new one is an augmented terror. But he is upon the spot
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