The National tribune., 1886-06-17
GEN. A. ]. SMITH.
A COmrade Tells How He Took Midnight Tramp
With the General.

COmrade Tells How He Took Midnight Tramp
With the General.
To THE EDITOR: read an article in THE
NATIONAL TRIBUNE, written by III. G. NOse,
Captain Co. B. Ilth III. Cav. wondering if he
werothe only survivor of his regiment. he says
he never sees anything concerning any of them
in The NATIONAL TRIBUNE. | am, Captain,
one OF the survivors. l have often wondered,
too, why it was that we never saw any Of the
names of cur regiment mentioned, and bad just
spoken about it to my wife the week before
reading your article. / enjoyed the sight of
it, and hope the little incident I'm about to re-
late will do somebody else as much good as that
did me. 1t is only little episode concerning
Gen. \. J. Smith and myself His headquar-
teTs were at Memphis, Tenn. Now for my story
One night as / was on guard duty in front Of
the Generals residence, heard footsteps on
the stairway leading from the attic of the build
ing 10 the hallway below. / waited to see
who il was. It proved to be the General. On
approaching me | saluted him. He returned
the salute. He then asked me where the relief
was. / told him they were in the barracks. He
wanted to know if l had more than one gun
with me. told him ] hadn't. He requested
me to go and get one, also q box of cartridges
did as he ordered me. Returning with them
/ handed them 10 him. WhereupOn he said ::
For the past week / have been so annoyed
been able to get hardly q moments sleep. Now
| intend to investigate the cause of all this
night shooting and put stop to 1T imme-
diately. So come and go with me-"
We took our guns and started. We hadn't
gone very far, however, when we met six col
Ored soldiers. The General requested them to
halt, and wanted to know of them what they
were doing out at that time of the night. At the
sound Ofthe deep, commanding voice Of the Cen
eral they were frightened nearly out of their
senses. Their eyeballs rolled hitherand thither
in their sockets, while their thick lips kept up
a perpetual motion, so excited were they, that
they could hardly speak After twisting and
jerking and eyeing the General, they said ::
We'll, Massa, we's only jis' bin down heah to
dc ball TO little reecomatiOn, sab. / guess
dah's no harm in dat, am dah Gineral."
"NO, no; there is no harm in any one having
good time; but who gave you permission to
go" said the General.
DE Capten, sab, dc Capten."
The General then wanted TO know if they
had any weapons about them. " No, sab No,
sah :" came from first one and then another.
Doubling the veracity of their statement, he
ordered me TO search them. i did so, finding
but an old jack-knife in the pocket of one. He
ordered them back to camp, and told them that
they had better never let him catch them out
again at that time of the night, emphasizing
his words WITH If do, I'll punish you severely
for it. Do you hear" "Jes' so, Massal Jes' so
Yes, sab, we heahs.D And off they flew as fast
as legs could carry them. The expression OF
fear depicted upon each face while the General
was talking TO them, was certainly very conf
cal and laughable to witness. knew it amused
the General from the twinkle of his eye.
Well, when he had disposed of the darkies, we
resumed our journey to the suburbs 10 investi-
gate the cause of the shooting. We hadn'tg gone a
half mile when we heard the report of guns in
different directions. This so aroused all the fire
and enthusiasm in the Generals nature that
he used few gentle oaths as a stimulant IN
helping him in his deadly determination to
have this shooting stopped. All of sudden
we stumbled upon another eolored soldier. So
dark was the night that we did not see him
until we got right upon him. The General
was so mad that he gave plunge for him, and
with an oath seized him by the eoat-collar and
shook him like dog shaking a rat. The
darkey looked so comieal, it was all the Gen
eral could do to keep from laughing outright
mad as he was. However, he gave him an
extra jerk, kicking him with the toe OF his
boot in the handiest place. WhereupOn the
niger yelled as only niger can, saying
Fo' the Lawd sakes, massa, hole on heah
What has been gone and done now?" "Done
Enough" cried the General. / want to know
what you are doing out at this time of the
night, and where you belong. rs doing
nothing, sab, and / belong to the hospital
" Get there, then, and stay there" said the Gen
eral, and you bet he got. Just about this time
we left the sidewalk behind US, and resumed
our journey through mud and slush nearly VI
to our hoot-tops. We ploughed on through it
occasionally hearing the report of gun. At
such time, and taking the mud into consider
alton, too, the General would rip out an oath
declaring final extinction TO every man h'
caught firing gun; and 1t was provoking, too
We would no sooner start out in the direction
of the shooting than we would hear a report il
some other direction, and so on. Finally, th'
General decided that it would be Of no use t,
search for the individual perpetrators. He a
last concluded it would be best to go to- tht
headquarters of the camp there, and have til,
matter attended 10. We went. The Genera
saw the officers, and wanted to know of then
what they meant by allowing so much shooting
at nights, and asked what they were shooting
for? They said they guessed the boys wer
just shooting for the fun Of it," Il can't SCI
any fun in it, when the noise keeps persoI
awake nearly all night" said the General. III
issued his orders to have it stopped, and tina
Immediately. His orders were evidentl.
obeyed, for that was the last Of the shooting
that ever heard of.-MILTON RINGLASD, Co
A, 11th III. Cav, Kansas City, Mo.