The Maine bugle ... campaign; 1-5 Jan. 1894-Oct. 1898 - Maine.gov

118 THE MAINE BUGLE.
my labor and inconvenience of carrying that cumbersome bun-
dle so many miles when I saw those soft, clean stockings encas-
ing worn and bleeding feet till every pair was gone. Could the
donors have witnessed that scene, the sight would have been
compensation enough for them. On Thursday, April 6th, we
met the enemy near Rice's Station and our regiment was hotly
engaged. Several were severely wounded, but I think that
none from our regiment were killed. One, who was danger-
ously wounded, leaned upon my shoulder while the surgeon removed
the ball, and there told me he was glad he enlisted
though he might have to give up his life. Nineteen years later
he called to see me and showed me that ball. The greatest
loss was to the cavalry and among them Gen. Read of Ohio.
Near High Bridge the next morning I met a Farmville lawyer
who told me that having received his collegiate education at
Amherst College, Mass., and spent four years at the North he
had a peculiar regard for northern people, that personally he
was opposed to secession ;
but when Virginia voted itself out of
the Union he felt compelled to go with his State. He told me
he had volunteered to superintend the burial of the dead who
fell the day before, both Union and Confederate, without dis-
tinction ; that he placed boards at their heads marked with
name, regiment and company, speaking with peculiar satisfac-
tion of the care he had taken in the interment of Gen. Read's
body. An hour or two later I saw that body disinterred under
the direction of the medical directors, and there was not more
than six or eight inches of earth over it and its only clothing
was a flannel under shirt. It showed the haste in which the
labor had been performed and the demoralizing effect of the
need of clothing in the rebel army. I realized we were in an
enemy's country who had little love for northern people, living
or dead. Soon after meeting the lawyer I met a man who
awakened both my curiosity and my pity. A tall, erect figure,
dark complexion, black e\'es, and hair sprinkled with white,
features of a decidedly intellectual cast, face haggard and pale
and thin, the picture of despair, and might have been a model