Ten years in the ranks, U.S. Army

31 May – 12 June 1864

Battle of Cold Harbor

PART X.

After a hasty breakfast without coffee, we stood to arms and waited. Some troops were marching on the road to the rear and we learned that General McCall's division was being quietly withdrawn from their defenses. Only some rambling shots could be heard. After a while we marched out into the road and in the direction of Cold Harbor, which was simply a traven at the intersection of two roads. On our way we passed our old camp and the mill and noticed that all our wagons had departed during the night and that quantities of provisions which they could not carry had been set on fire and were still burning.

PART XIII.

After dark on the same day the Army of the Potomac was withdrawn from the trenches at Cold Harbor, where they had such a deplorable experience that General Grant himself in his Memoirs says: "I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made; no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained."

PART XIII.

When Generals Grant and Meade, whom I encountered a few times, appeared among the troops there was but feeble applause, and the hearty cheers received by some of our former commanders were no longer heard. At this period of the war the only bright spot was the masterly strategy and successful campaign of General Sherman against the Confederate General Joseph E. Johnson in the West from Chattanooga to Atlanta. In the Histories of the Wilderness,--Cold Harbor campaign, written after the conclusion of the Civil War by officers still in the service or on the retired list--histories most carefully written--there is an absence of criticism of the military strategy in this campaign. When all participants have passed away, some future historian will write an unbiased story of the war and its strategy.

PART XIII.

One day, after loading my wagons, I went to one of the sutler's booths to buy some crackers and cheese for a lunch before my ride back to camp. As I stood among a crowd of soldiers, waiting to be served, I heard one of them demanding something in a voice that sounded familiar to me. I soon discovered that he was a former drummer of my regiment, in fact one of the two boys who had accompanied me from Governor's Island to Carlisle. He was now a bugler in Captain Haxamer's New Jersey Battery. I was glad to see him again. We conversed a while and then rode together towards the front, his battery being stationed about a mile to the right of the main road to Petersburg. He told me he had a fine flute which he had found in a knapsack on the field of Cold Harbor, which he desired to present to me, having no use for it himself. At the parting of our ways he requested me to wait, while he rode to his camp to get it. He soon returned and handed me a package which I found, when opened, contained the first two joints of a flute and a music book. The third joint, usually made in two sections, was missing. He thought he must have dropped it out of the carelessly wrapped package, when he mounted his horse in camp to return to me. He promised to make diligent search for it, and did find the upper section of the third joint, where he thought he had lost it, and brought it to me. More than a month later, I met him again. He had recovered the last section of the third joint and the flute was finally complete. It appeared that a soldier of his battery had found this part in camp and kept it for weeks in his haversack as a curiosity, until one day my friend recovered it. I have treasured this flute which came to me so curiously in installments; the key on the last joint shows plainly the imprint of a horse's hoof.