The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1881-09-06
[Corr. Philadelphia Times.l
Virginia Battle Fields.
A Ramble over Soil Sodden in the Penin-
sula Campaign.

Shortly after Sunrise Monday morning
was searching among some shell-shattered
fragments of wall at Gaines Mill when
man with an empty sleeve crawIed out Of
cart that had just come in from the New Cold
Harbor road He was hearty fellow of 40, or
thereabouts, and as he limped toward the
blacksmith shop saw that with his one arm
he was swinging handful of gun barrels as
though they had been SO many sticks of reed
"Hello, there!" he said gruffly to the man
at the forge, "want ye to make me some shoes
for my hoss.
"What out'n?" asked the busy blacksmith,
whose quick falling strokes upon a red-hot
rod gave out thud upon thud and shook the
shop in which he was beginning his toilsome
day.
yankee guns" said the new customer.
"HistI' whispered the blacksmith; "here's
Northern man lookin' at the battle groun'."
But Storekeeper Tucker, with quickness of
perception noticeable in both Federal and
Confederate veterans, felt that no Northerner
in his senses would care snap whether he
should be called Yankee" or Union man."
and, shaking hand, he cheerfully explained
luCiQOut VI tuO gums LhOJ hOO oOOA
picked up from various parts of the battle
field and brought to him at his New Cold Har-
Dor store, half mile to tho east. He had
long ago learned that the rusty barrel could be
turned by heat and hammering into what he
called "horse shoes of the best kind" and
time and again had he shed his fat roadster
with iron once used in the death grapple in the
Chickahominy hollows In his business
since the war he has dealt not only in old guns
but he has bought and sold lead, leather and
brass, gathered from the woods by little dark
les in search of dimes. l found him to be fnll
of war stories and though not exactly full to
the chin with war relics, he yet carried Min
ie ball in his pelvis, and piece OF she'll in his
foot. He was one of Pickett's men who beat
against the stone wall at Gettysburg, and in
the charge. almost at the same moment, his
arm was torn of by round shot, his body
pierced by ball and his heel ripped open by
missile. He dropped for dead upon the carpet
of clover, with most of his regiment around
him, but to his own astonishment he was re-
stored to robust health.
At daybreak on that day I had come out
from Richmond on the New Bridge road with
the idea of leaving behind the sands and
swamps of the Chickahominy before the sun
should become troublesome.
Bnt few turns of the wheels down a ravine
brought me to a bridge under which ran
thin stream. The bed of the stream was wide
and swampy. A score Of steps beyond the
further was a third, all alike narrow, sand-coy-
cred, and each arching a rivulet. Damp air
came from the grass below, but arrows OF sun
shine were darling among the tree-tops over
head. An old darkey was crossing the third
bridge and to him L addressed the query:
"How much further to the ChickahomiryY'
"How mt ch fudder ter de Cnikkyhomny?"
Bess yo' soul, honny, dis am de Chikkyhomny
'neef our berry feet Axed do chilun up dar,
did yo'? Oh, dey's my chillun, but dey take
arter dere mann an do'an kno' muffin. Dey
calls dis de Chick fur shot, and all de homny
dey kno' bout am de homny dey git from de
pot, sho' now" And the old fellow chuckled
while whipped up the sandy hill, logged
along the edge Of a field of peanuts and came
to Duane's branch, on the eastern bank OF
which nestes the hamlet of Gaines Mill.
The place is made up of a grist mill, black
smith and wheelwright shop and few houses.
It is at the foot of bluff that holds an oak
woods up towards the east and shelters the few
people there not only from the eastern storms,
but from the summers heat. The heavy
wooden waier-wheel turns all day long, cast
ing white spray into the air, and above its roar
comes the rasping sound OF the carpenters
saw and the ring of the blacksmith's hammer.
The one-armed rebel explained that thelruined
wall once enclosed the mill, and that 1t was
knocked to pieces during the canonadIng from
Robertsons position Just here there are no
other marks of battle, but when we crossed
several sandy, poor-looking fields and ap-
preached ridge on the northern bank OF the
Chickahominy, we-saw rotting trees, IN some
of which there were unexploded shells, and
we kicked over old canteens. Slight traces OF
Morrell's Notifications, on the Federal left may
be seen half mile south OF the mill. 1t was
against these Notifications, which are on
crest that jackson hurled Writings division.
The space across which that division charged
with yellS that were caught by PorterS ear Is
now grown up in pines, at the roots of which
are many bones.
We passed an hour in search of marks
of Summers upper bridge across the
Chickahominy, and at last were able to locate
it by marks in the oaks near by, and by some
debris that was aoated during a flood into the
forks of huge oak. A by-road took me thence
out of the Chickahominy lowland to Summers
road, between the lower bridge and Savage's
Station. This battlefield, where Sumner held
the enemy in check until the rest of the army
of 120, 900 men had slipped through White Oak
swamp on the bloody march to Malvern, now
shows more positively than any other peninsu-
lar point yet visited, the hand of the progress
sive landowner What was then the hotly
contested Whitsides farm is now in high
state of cultivation, and the Allen brothers
have grated their enterprise upon the grow
ing community. Considerable business is done
at the station on the Richmond and York rail-
roads, and things appear to be brisk enough
roundabouts. The outlines Of psrapet with
embrasures clearly marked may be seen among
some cedars back of the Allen House, and sew
eral rifle pits containing the bodies OF Confed-
kept down on the road through White Oak
swamp to Frazier's farm. The narrow defle
through the swamp is bordered by oaks, pines,
gum trees and chickapin bushes, frequently
canopied by grape vines and the climbing
creepers of wet woods. Being here, it is no
longer hard to understand why with all his
dash and vim, jackson could not get at Nc
Clellan's rear, and it is easy also to fancy how
the man of the valley chafed inwardly until
mis- heartstrings were sore.
And MOI xvhilA .IQckgOnH feet
tangled in the swamp, there came from the
high lands beyond such sounds OF strife, that
Lee, now in command himself, fretted at the
delay. Over beyond the tops Of the white oaks
McCall's Pennsylvanians, were gun to gun with
Longstreets Alabama troops, and bsyonets
were locked fiercely in the struggle. 81 saw
skulls crushed by the heavy blow OF the butt
of the musket," said Mccall, and there is no
doubt that in this pine thicket through which
have just passed, are bones dear to mothers
on the Susquehanna and Delaware. ms
Jhicket and the surrounding fields OF corn
make up the battle ground OF Frazlers tarm,
or Glendale, or New Market road, but there
is little except memory to busy the mind with,
and push on toward the James, now wind
ing between its bluffs in sight, to the south.
The afternoon sun is scorching hot, and,
therefore, Malvern Hill, always inviting, now
looks doubly so as it lifts its forest crown in
the distance. What welcome thing it was
to the marching thousands, whose backs were
toward a foe eager to smite, the veterans OF
that hard campaign no doubt recall.
The road leading up to the plateau to Mrs.
Alexander's house, which may be seen when
one is ten miles away, is grayelly and hard to
climb. The farming land on the plateau
stretches for a mile and a half along the
James, commanding that river, but is poorly
cultivated. Many places that were cleared at
the time of the battle are now scrub pine,
which is particularly thick on the slope up
which ID. II. Hill hurled his lines and where
leaden missiles flew so fast that he left 5000
men dead and dying in his path. The ravines
running from the plateau to thick woods to-
wards the north and east sometimes, after
heavy rains, give up skeletons and the woods
below contain many evidences of the desperate
assault. A year or SO ago some oak timber was
cut from this Malvern slope and hauled TO
sawmill on Turkey Island creek. One day the
saw struck she'll, and there wasn't any more
need of the keen toothed saw for that log.
Saw, sawyer, log and mill roof went off in va
rious directions, much in the same way as the
things about the Brandywine powder mill are
in the habit of doing. While Frederick Betz
was hunting in the thick timber last fall, he
came upon three guns resting against
large oak tree. The stocks were
rotten, and the bark of the tree had
grown around the barrels, but there they stood,
silent sentries of Malvern-McC Clellan's refuge
and the grand srmy's steadfast rock.