Annals of our ancestors; one hundred and fifty years of history in the ...

THE lAVE OF OUR SISTER 279
"We were loaded on board the boats at Memphis, December
19, 1862. Our regiment was packed upon a little boat by
the name of Citizen. There were about nine hundred of us, and
we literally swarmed all over the boat like flies. My company.
Company D, with another company as well, occupied the
hurricane deck of the boat. It was midwinter; we had no way
of warming ourselves or of cooking our food. The weather
was cold and rainy; we had no shelter whatever. The draught
of wind on the river, partly from the moving boat, was cruel,
and pierced us to the bone; our situation was pitiable in the
extreme.
"We had large iron camp kettles in which to cook our food.
We found that by getting ashes from the fire under the boilers
of the boat and putting them in the bottom of a kettle, we
could build a fire in it and boil cofl^ee and fry salt pork. We were
camped thus on the hurricane deck of this boat for thirty-three
days, except when we landed to fight the enemy, which occupied
about eight days of the time, and which I will describe later.
To add to our discomfort, either because hard bread was not
available or because they expected to land the army before
they did, when it would be possible to bake bread,— whatever
the reason, the result was that for the last two weeks on the
boats they issued us flour which we had no means of baking,
and which we could only eat, to keep from starving, by mixing
it into dough and placing it on the boilers of the boat until it
dried to a crust. We picked the crust off and ate it, and then
dried the dough again.
"We had nothing but Mississippi water to drink, which
was full of sediment. The result was that many soldiers died
from sickness induced by our manner of food and living, and
when we made a permanent landing at Young's Point, opposite
Vicksburg, there was scarcely a well man in the army. I
mention this incident to show that fighting was not the most
painful feature of army life in those days. But to return to
the battles: As I said, we left Memphis on December 19th for
Vicksburg. Christmas Day our brigade was landed at Milliken's
Bend and ordered to march back into the country twenty
miles and destroy a portion of the Texas and Shreveport