*535 [End of August, 1864] During this month of August there were two developments in the Twenty-seventh, one having reference to enlisted men, and the other having reference to commissioned officers, both of which awakened no little interest. The matter having reference to enlisted men was the date of their muster-in, particularly as bearing upon the date when their term of service rightfully expired. We have seen that one of our early experiences in Camp Morton was to be mustered into the service. It was the universal understanding at that time that we were then being mustered into the service for which we had enlisted, and that, as a matter of course, our term of three years began then and there. All of the circumstances attending the transaction, and those following after it, were certainly such as to give us that understanding, as they must have been especially designed for that purpose. The mustering officer was an officer in the United States army, his questions and investigations all had reference to our fitness for service in that army, the oath administered was the one administered to United States soldiers and the three-years-or-during-the-war clause was included in it. On the other hand, not a word was said or a suggestion made, from the beginning to the end, about any other service or form of obligation. The conclusion was, therefore, unavoidable that, after the transaction was concluded, we were regularly in the army, and that our term of service was in progress. So it was considered, not only by ourselves, but by others. It was definitely held over our heads that we were henceforth liable to all the pains and penalties of soldiers for any violation of orders or regulations, the penalty for absence without leave, or desertion, in particular. Later on. we were paid from that date and in descriptive lists and other papers, that date was always given as the date of our muster-in. But when the time drew near that, according to this general understanding, those first mustered at Camp Morton would be entitled to be mustered out, the fact developed from somewhere that the date of muster of all the original members of the regiment was registered on the books as having taken *536 place on September 12th, 1861, a full month after it had taken place, according to the foregoing view of it. Who had been instrumental in making such a record? Nobody knew. By whose knowledge or consent had it been made? Nobody pretended that it was by the knowledge or consent of those most concerned. What could be done about it? The officers of the regiment said they could do nothing, directly. All of them exercising any command over the men had succeeded to their positions long after the objectionable record had been made. What course were the men to pursue under the circumstances? The writer was very sick at this time and with him the question of when he could start home, was entirely obscured by the more serious one, would he ever be able to start home? In reality he was not able to travel until long after the date when the wrong entry concerning his muster-in would have permitted his muster-out. He feels free, therefore, to say that few things in the three years of unsparing, self-sacrificing service which these men gave, in such a laudable way, to their country, has impressed him as being so much to their credit as their conduct and spirit in this connection. No more convincing proof could be adduced of their stalwart good sense, as well as their stalwart patriotism, and their lofty ambition to maintain their own reputation, and that of the regiment to which they belonged, unsullied to the end. To be doomed to spend another month in the trenches, when they had been rightfully cherishing an expectation of an early departure for home, was, in itself, no trifling matter. Aside from any considerations of danger, it involved deprivations, annoyances and toils, manifold and sore. Persons disappointed, through the fault of others, in their reasonable expectation of reaching home at an appointed time do not commonly accept the situation with equanimity, though provided for in a good hotel, and not altogether destitute of other comforts. In comparison with instances such as these, however, the prospect before our Twenty-seventh men was simply overwhelming. With some being killed everyday—buried an hour or two afterwards in a shallow trench, in an inhospitable country, without coffin, shroud or ceremony—the problem assumed a seriousness many times multiplied. As a matter of fact, two of the men here referred to were killed after they had served the full time for which they had enlisted and were more than *537 entitled to a different form of muster-out. If it is hard to think of death coming to one earlier in his service, how doubly hard is it to think of his falling when his time has really expired, and dear ones are expecting his return? But the desperate feature of the case remains to be mentioned. That was the bald, hideous injustice of the transaction, and the stinging insult to the manhood and self-respect of those concerned. The hardest thing that an enlisted man ever has to do in the army—a thing that he can scarcely bring himself to do at all—is to submit in silence, and go forward and do his duty, when some palpable wrong is done him, or some unquestioned right is denied him, in sheer disregard and contempt of his human intelligence and sensibilities. To be treated in some matter vitally affecting himself as if he were nothing but a dumb animal, a mere thing, and not resent it in some way, is far more trying than any battle, campaign or bed of languishing. Such exasperating indignities are usually inflicted by ignorant, thick-skulled, low-down wretches that a man who has any real soldier in him cannot help but know is his inferior in every way, shape and manner on earth, except the purely accidental and temporary circumstance of rank. To pass them by, therefore, without a conflict, and leave the future to make it right—which is invariably the best way—is almost impossible, with a soldier of average courage and spirit. Soldiers of all ranks, even up to the highest, are not entirely exempt from such experiences, though none are so liable to have them, or quite so helpless in view of them, as a man in the ranks. Yet, silent submission and cheerful obedience constituted the course decided upon in this instance. A detail for duty on the skirmish line, from one of the companies, raised the question one morning, whether or not it was their duty to go. They did not refuse to go, they simply said to the officer in command, We have served out our time. This was reported, of course, to Colonel Fesler, and he came and conferred with the men at once. In the end, he gave them some good advice. He said, in substance, The record of your muster-in is undoubtedly erroneous, but none of us here had anything to do in making it, and neither have we any authority to change or disregard it. The matter will be referred at once to those who have power over such matters, and there is every reason to believe that they will act promptly and rightfully in the premises. In the meantime, it is for you *538 to say what your conduct shall be. You have been good soldiers so far; there could be none better. The army in which we are serving is at a critical stage in its operations. The campaign in which all of us have been so long engaged, while apparently about to be crowned with complete success, has not as yet been so crowned. Anything like insubordination or mutiny never has a right look, more especially in good soldiers, and it would certainly look worse now, and be more liable to be misunderstood, than at almost any other time. If— But before the Colonel could go on some one raised the yell, as the saying was; that is, cheered; and that terminated the interview, and ended the matter finally. The detail went into the trenches with alacrity. So did all subsequent details. What was disappointment, wounds or death, compared with a charge of unfaithfulness or dishonor? It was not long until an order came to muster out-the regiment on September 1st. Following shortly after the above development, affecting the enlisted men of the Twenty-seventh, was another, affecting the commissioned officers, in almost exactly the same way. This was a ruling that each successive muster would be regarded as a re-enlistment. Therefore, any officer who had accepted promotion subsequent to his original muster-in was not to be mustered out with the regiment. This affected every officer in the Twenty-seventh except two, and it was only because they had been shamefully treated before that, that it did not affect them. As in the other case, this created no small stir. It is still a source of quiet amusement in certain quarters that certain officers who, when the enlisted men were in trouble, had pooh-poohed and said, with lofty indifference, such things were to be expected in the army; nevermind them! now raved and swore terrifically. The writer has come upon such bad words as tyrannical, outrageous, forced impressment, conscripted, etc., etc., that were written down in this connection. It seems also quite certain that the very thing that was strongly advised against in the former case was now done. That is, a deputation, armed with sundry Whereases and Wherefores, We respectfully request, We urgently demand, and so on and so forth, was dispatched to those whom, it was believed, could have the hateful ruling rescinded. It makes all the difference sometimes whose ox is gored. Still, to say, or intimate, that anything really improper *539 or compromising was done by our officers would be misrepresenting the facts. They, too, decided to remain at the post of duty, until relieved in a regular way. The course pursued by both officers and men in this connection was in striking contrast with that of many others during the war, sometimes those occupying the highest stations. We have seen that, at this very time, our own corps commander, because he felt himself slighted over the promotion of another officer, was taken with the sulks, threw up his command, and went to the rear. At least one other corps commander did the same thing, in connection with the same incident. Both of them were appealed to in the same form, and in almost the same words, that was the case with our enlisted men, though ineffectually. [Cited Shermans Memoirs, Vol. II, page 100.] Both continued to draw their salary, but neither did anything further toward putting down the rebellion. The public at large is surely too much attracted by the glamour of noted personages, and history is sometimes too partial to a few favorites. It was not unusual in the Civil War, as it has not been unusual in all wars for the benefit of humanity, to make appeals to men who had already sacrificed almost everything except life itself. The men appealed to had already served long and diligently in positions of almost unnoticed and unrequited toil and exposure. For some special reasons they were asked to do still more, and they seldom refused. They were urged to consider the peculiar demands of some crisis and to subordinate self and self-interest still further for the common good, and, God bless them! they were ready to do it. But, at the very same time, and under the same or similar circumstances, other men, occupying conspicuous positions, men who had really never known what it was to sacrifice anything for anybody, when appealed to do something unusual, or that was a little distasteful or humiliating, refused utterly. Vital interests might be pending, past records might be involved, and great opportunities might be beckoning—it was all in vain. Is it right that men like these should be remembered, that their names should be blazoned on the pages of history and their forms be embodied in bronze and marble, while the others are passed by and forgotten? *540 Thus the time passed until the evening of August 31st. That evening our brigade band came to our camp and favored us with one of their incomparable serenades. Matchless as we had always considered their music to be, it seemed sweeter, especially more pathetic, now than ever before. The inevitable commissary was also in evidence, and some became merry in that way. Not so with most of the boys. The serenade impressed us more deeply with what was about to take place than we had realized before. Those emotions which are peculiar to a long parting between true and tried friends were deeply stirred within us. There was a tremendous tugging at our heart-strings. The brave men of other regiments—how faithfully and unflinchingly they had stood by us through all of the eventful, over-taxing period of our association, and how we honored and trusted them! As individuals, we knew comparatively few among them. Not many of them were known to us personally by sight, and especially not by name. But as members of this or that regiment we knew them all, and seemed to have a personal regard for each one. The veterans and recruits of our own regiment were likewise to be left behind. A thousand acts of kindness and incidents of courage and heroism bound them and us as with hooks of steel. Our discharge also meant a final separation from those who were going home with us. We began to see, as we had not seen so clearly before, that there was to be an entire, ruthless breaking up and casting off of those ties and associations which had been forming and maturing for so long. Alas, alack! We did not then begin to comprehend half the truth! How could we? Was it to be expected that any of us could so penetrate the future as to comprehend the full meaning of that parting? Men shook hands and separated there, on the bank of that far-away Southern river, who, through the entire three years of that desperate, bloody war, were more than brothers to each other. When not separated by sickness or wounds, occupying the same narrow bunk, sheltered, when sheltered at all, by the same little tent, covered, when covered at all, by the same blanket, often hovering close together to make up for each other what the blanket lacked in warmth; as between themselves absolutely counting nothing their own, dividing the last cracker, drinking from the same canteen, the only rivalry or contention ever *541 known between them being as to which should be the most unselfish and thoughtful towards the other, and surrender the most for the others good. Yet, though a third of a century has passed away since that Summer day, and children then unborn are telling their children, themselves well grown, how Grandpa was a soldier for his country, away back in the sixties, those men have never again clasped hands or looked into each others faces. Nor will they ever again, except in a land where war shall be no more.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Sep 2014 16:49:19 +0000
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