The National tribune., 1889-11-21
STORY OF A CANNONEER
Continued from 1st page.)

|
end of the Sunken Road found lower jaw
bone half buried in the dirt, and as picked
it up | noticed that il had tooth in il with
gold filling. The action of the frost during
| the Winter had loosened the filing so that
piece of it fell into my hand as | turned it
over. / said, Here is q nugget, Elb; Twill
| keep 1t as a souvenir!p
Don't" said he. "Put it back in the
tooth and leave it there. 1t will 'hoodoo
you if you keep it,"
1t was little piece of gold tooth h-filling
about the size and shape of q grain ofrye.
carried it along with me, Notwithstanding
| Packard's objections. / kept il in my
cap-box long time, but it finally got lost
somehow. / have since had all kinds of
luck" bad and good, but it never occurred
to me that that wee morsel of rebel tooth
filling ever had any effect on my fortunes.
noticed that the sights of that old battle
field seemed to have depressing effect on my
comrade He was reflective sort of q follow,
| full of sentiment, and,
THOUGH BRAVE As A LION
| in the presence of danger, exceedingly tender
hearted and aflectonate in his temperament.
| After we had been over tho field at Antietam,
Packard told me he had presentiment that he
would fall somewhere in the war. / scofied at
presentiments; said that "the only apprehension
ever had was that tho - Commissary train
would get stuck in the mud and leave us
! hungry; that tho ore to make iron or lead to
| kill me was still q thousand feet under ground,
and that the tree to make charcoal for the
powder to throw my bullet had not yet
| sproutedl" !"
! remember adding that maybe l might be
| born to be hanged, but not to be drowned or
! killed in battle"
"You may feel that way" said Packard
gravely. Il presume you do. Perhaps you
will pull through. l hope So But have no
| expectation of being alive this time next year.
j shall fall in battle. l have no doubt of It,"
| ] do not know whether there is anything in
| what they call presentiments." / never felt
! one. But this conversation occurred in July,
| 1863 On the 2ith of May, 1864, considerably
! less than year afterward, poor Packard was
mortaly wounded Mt Jericho Ford. His pre-
sentiment turned out TO be true. But he
always faced his fate like a man going to q
| frolcl
After leaving the field of Antietam we
marched over to the bank Of the Potomac and
camped there just below WillamspOrt. The
army was tired. hungry, footsore, ragged, pow
| eTty stricken aud savage. Between Gettysburg
and the Potomac. while we were following up
| victory, there had beer 10 times moro strag-
| Cling. desertion and "coffee- boiling" than ever
| had been known in retreating from defeat.
| This was because tho people up North were
spending their time firing hundred-gun salutes
and holding thanksgiving prayer meetings over
Gettysburg. while the troops who had won it
were swetering under July sun, in rags and
on half rations chasing the rebels back into
virginia. And as If TO add insult TO injury,
every chump of stay at homo editor from
Maine to Minnesota was bowling in his news
paper because we had
"LEr LEE GET AwAY!"
Let Lee got away, forsoothl We were all
devilish glad 10 see the last of his internal
infantry disappear behind the Harper's Ferry
hills. And We were quite content to get into
decent camp on the north bank Of the Poto-
| mac. out OF rie.range of the enemy. where we
could get n chance to wash our clothes and
take a swimming bath, and get three days of
consecutive rest for the first time since Chan
cellorsvillel
Speaking OF going over old battlehelds, onr
veterans had 10 have their fun, and sometimes
IL was pretty grim When We were moving up
from Fredericksburg to 20 TO Gettysburg we
camped about June II or - near tho old fold
OF GTogeton. Some of the boys who had fought
there went over 20 look at the ground They
wanted me 10 10 but ! was tired aud preferred
to take nap. They found an old skull on the
field, and when they got back-as / was still
asleep. on the ground, under tree-they care
fully arranged the skull close TO me- so that
the first thing / should sec when / woke up
would be its grinning fSee. Then they got q
rush or twiR and ticklea my ear till woke up.
The thing startled me a little but not so much
as they expected, because | " caught on pretty
quick, and, not TO be outdone, In sang frod /
raised up on my elbow, surveyed tho skull
moment, and remarked quietly, "0h, thought
et first that we had got n new detached man
from the 18th fnd.!" As tho authors Of this
Joke were 18th Ind men, 10 was agreed that
bad turned the laugh on them. The old fell
lows were up 70 all sorts Of CHASTITY jokes on
the recruits.
After we had been In camp here two or thr rec
days orders came 10 make out a general mus
ter roll, tho troops not having been paid since
April. ! was detailed 90 assist the Orderly in
the clerical work Of making out this roll and
as it involved accounting for all the men that
bad been with tho battery from the date of tho
last general muster, 1t Afforded me opportunity
to learn
THE HISTORY or ITS PERSONNEL
The period covered by this roll. with It's accom-
panying statements, was about a year-from
July. 1862, 20 July, 1863. During that time
the battery had been In action Mt Manassas.
South Mountain. Antistam. Fredericksburg,
Chanceiorsvlle. and Gettysburg The roll,
taken by monthly statements. showed that out
OF some $50 or is5 men on tho entire rolls for
the year, the average "presont for duty had
been two officers aud about 81 or IS enlisted
men. Aud the casualty returns" for the
whole time showed that 10 men had been kill
cd outright on the field of BATTLE aud two ofIi-
GERS and II men wounded of whom 10 or l2
died of their wounds. In other words, 81 men
killed or fnortaly woanded and 67 severely
wounded In six battles, or a total loss of 81 oiii-
GERS and men, ali told out of an average effective
strength of 81 or s5. To put it in another way:
our poor old battery had lost in 10 montbs'
fighting, from Aug 20, 1862. to July 3, 1863. 10
men more than it had had present for duty in
the average during that year!
Ii anybody thinks that this is AN impossible
statement, l am confident that tho War Rec
ords, when published, will verify what say.
Our old boys had fashion of returning to
duty after severe wounds, which probably bo-
speaks the stun that was in them more elo-
queBtly than enlogy could do. When | Joined,
the battery had lost as / remember, i've wound
cd at Manassas, 30 at AntIetam. eight at Fred.
ericksburg aud four at Ghanceilorsville-52 In
all aud yet quite number of these were on
hand at Gettysburg! And some of them were
hit thore again and went to hospital, and still
returned TO duty third timei
do not pretend TO know the record of any
other command in this respect, but until see
official data to the contrary shall maintain
that ours was the only command in the ARMY
OF the Potomac or any other army,
UNION on REBEL,
which In any year of the war sustained actual
losses by gunshot in battle considerably greater
than its force present for duty on au average
during that year, or that had more than half of
its wounded men return to duty as ours didl
or course these appalling losses required an