Connecticut western news., 1882-10-04
Washington Letter.

Connecticut Volunteers, afterwards the Second Conn. Heavy Artillery.
 This morning we took the ferry from Washington to Alexandria, with the in tention of visiting some of the old en- campments of the regiment. On arriv- ing at Alexandria, was surprised by the naturalness of the place. Twenty years has changed Washington into one of the finest of cities I ever visited, but it has not done this for Alexandria, for it re- mains the same unwholesome city that it was in '62 I could have told where I was with my eyes shut, for it has the same peculiar odor about it, that it had 20 years ago land there was not mem Der of the regiment that could not tell it by the smelD It had no sewers then; it has not taken step forward since the war. They tried street cars, but they didn't pay, so they took up the track. Those same old water pumps which re- semble a log set into the ground, with a crowbar drove into the side, are still in use. I walked up King street till came to the Provost Marshals office, and standing before it upon the old brick pavement imagined myself returning from furlough. The building is used as Q savings bank. The Marshall House, in which the gallant Ellsworth fell, is now boot and shoe store.
 Passing out of the city, we came to our first encampment, from which I used to head my letters Camp near Alexandria, Va" This remains much as we left it.; not building has been erected between the city and the hill upon which the convalescent camp was situated. The immediate ground which our regiment occupied, has been culti- vated, but above this no blow has dis turbed since the war. You can still see where tents have been placed. called upon John B. Catts who lives just to the south, upon the pike, having in- herited the estate from his father, who owned the property during the rebel lion. MT. Catts, the present occupant, well remembers the regiment and some of the circumstances connected with it., I was out to Fort Ellsworth, calling upon man who lives in the brick house near by, whose name is James A. Har- rison, an ex-soldier in Gen. Longstreet's corps. He was very courteous and obliging, and when I left him at Fort Williams, thanking him for his kind ness, said, ''I am glad that two sol diers from two conflicting armies can stand here to-day as friends. His reply was: "Yes; we are friends, why should we not be?" Fort Ellsworth presents lilapidated appearance. The hand of time seems to be the only one that has been working upon it during these years. The ditches remain, and in some places the parapet is regular and unchanged, but the bomb-proof and magazine house have fallen in, while brushes and woods are growing all over the interior. The little stone building in the northeast corner of the fort, which I think was our cook house, is used as stable A little boy told us hec.heard they used to put soldiers in it to keep them from be- ing ugly. The fort was built on Shoot ers' Hill, the ground now being owned by Harry Delaney, young man living in Alexandria, whose income is $1O0,O0O
 The general appearance about Fort Williams is not greatly changed. The house occupied by Captain Jones and other officers looks no older-and cer- tainly no newer than it did, for no re- pairs nor paint has molested it. It is owned by maiden lady, Virginia Ma son, daughter of the Mason taken with Slidell, and is occupied by tenant named Charles Shaffer. The fort could be easily repaired. The two large gate posts at the entrance are standing. The magazine, over the door of which plain ly reads ''entrance to magazine, " is used as cellar. I said to MT. Harrison, ''I don't see Fort Worth.'' Pointing over the river, he replied, ''Do you see that large house on the hill :? That stands in the fort, and is built over the magazine, and is the residence of Arthur Herbert of the banking firm of Burt X Herbert, Alexandria. He was Colonel in the Confederate army. I asked the man in charge if there would be any objection to my looking over the grounds, and he replied, s'I reckon the Colonel won't care." So I looked; but I was not at home A large dwelling house in our old field Think of it. What would Kellogg have said? He would have or dered the man into the guard house who put it there The north and west portions of the fort remain but the south and east have been leveled off for the lawn in front of the house. The parade ground is meadow Jour boys in the guard house first dug out the stumps). On the eastern slope is an orchard, and near by I noticed melon patch (indi eating the absence of the '2nd Heavies), the valley between Worth and Williams being in state of cultivation.
 Such are some of the changes and some of the resemblances. As I stood in the old earth works which had once been our home for year and half, the memory of many events and expe- riences frightened till the past seemed but yesterday; unwittingly I looked lbout for my comrades of the regiment. |, l r a1. 1oo,. bo