The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1885-06-17
The Adventure Of Two Officers.

Last February, while in Virginia,
met with a gentleman who was in the
artillery service during almost the whole
of the war, being at first in field service
and then shut up in mortar batteries at
different places. When Petersburgh was
invested he, sergeant, and his brother,
a lieutenant, were in mortar battery
situated near the old Blandford ceme-
terry, his brother beingin charge. Their
principal duty was to fire at the federal
batteries and draw their fire.
When the confederates made dem
onstration they had bomb-proofs to run
into, of course; but one can't stay in a
bomb-proof and fire the mortar at the
same time, and, as might be supposed,
they became more familiar with pyro-
technic displays than they cared for.
There was one Union battery in partic-
ular that always gave them trouble
whenever they fired at it. 1t was known
as the " railroad iron battery, and was
very heavily armed. Moreover, the
gunners therein had the exact range of
the Blandford battery, which was twice
too large, and it rarely required more
than ten minutes to run the cOnfeder-
ates into their bomb-proof. 1t was in
this Blandford battery that one of the
most curious, and at the time most mys-
FERROUS, events of the war occurred.
One night" says Sergeant Eggles-
ton, " we were working there in the
battery firing away in different direc-
tons but taking care to keep our hands
off the railroad-iron battery, and watch
ing the shells as they flew around, oc-
casionally jumping into the bomb-proof
when one would light in our place,
when two fine-looking men, whom we
all took for general officers, suddenly
walked into the works. We could not
tell their exact rank, because they wore
white waistcoats and coats, but they
looked as though they were rank officers.
They walked up to George, addressed
him as lieutenant, as though they knew
him, and said that they had come
out to see some mortar-fring, and
hoped that he would accommodate
them if it was not inconvenient. George
replied that he would be happy to show
them anything in that line, and turning
to me said, Touch up the railroad-iron
battery, joe
" Well, / wished that those chaps
had stayed in their tents; but thought
that it would not be very long before
they would be glad to get into the boom
proof, and that the rest of us could 90
in then also. So / commenced to touch
up that railroad-iron place. In less
than three minutes we had walked up
that hornets nest, and they were rain
ing shells into us at a terrible rate.
"ThOse fellows over there seemed
to know that the occasion was an unusual
one, and they were determined to give
us all that we could ask for. The shells
were dropped into our battery like
hailstones, bursting all around us, and
rolling around like footballs; but there
stood those two officers and George
leaning up against a piece of timber
and talking as coolly as if they were
leaning on fence a thousand miles
away from a piece of artillery. A
shell came along and cut that piece of
timber in two, and scattered splinters
all over the place; but all that they did
was to lean against fresh place and
60 on talking. l don't believe that
either one of the three even winked.
came to the conclusion that they liked
that thing better than / did, and told
one of the gunners to shift his CUR
around and play on something else
pretty soon / shifted another, and the
fire gradually died down. | knew thai
George would stand there and be shot
at till the crack of doom before he
would suggest anything about bomb
proofs, and the other chaps didn't wan
to say anything unless he did. Well
they talked on for ten or fifteen min
utes after the fire had died down, anC
then said that they would like to 60 OF
to the skirmish line, and see what wa
going ON there, if he would show then
the way. He told them to 90 out o
the battery on certain side and follow
the path; they could not miss the Skin
mish line. They left, after expressing
their thanks for our kindness; but the,
did not say what their names were, ant
George was too polite to ask them.
" Now the funny part of it comes in
The next day George tried to find GU
who they were, but none of our officer
,. had been out there. The fact is,
don't believe that any of our officer
. had any white clothes to wear, and
George had only thought minute h
might have known that none of then
would be roaming around at night t
see mortar-firing; they could stay i
camp and get enough of that. But h
could not find out who those men were
though every effort was made as tn
thing began to get mysterious.
"About two years ago, or longer
1 George was on an Ohio river steambos
a talking to man in the saloon, when
5 gentleman came up and said: Ar
e you not the lieutenant who was in con
y mand of a mortar battery near Blanc
S ford cemetery at Petersburgh?' yes
e he answered. And don't you remen
E Der two officers coming to your batter
< one night and saying that they ha
: come out to see some mOrtar-fring'
S Yes, and have been looking for thei
o ever since
o well, | am one of them, and m
! companion was General --, also {
t the Union army l am very glad {
/ meet YOU said Lieutenant Egglestor
:. but if / had known who you were
e that time you would not be talking
me now So l knew then,' was til
s reply. We did start out to see morta
i firing, just as told you; and we al,
g intended to 60 on to the skirmish lint
d but we got into the wrong batter
/ You remember that our skirmish liz
e ran up to what W as marsh when v
e first rot to Petersburoh and that