Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1895-12-20
CHRISTMAS IN CAMP.
Hon. Amos j. Cummings Re-
lates an Amusing Experience.

How He Added Pot of Soup, a Little
Sugar, Some MoIasses and a Canteen of
Yeast to the Christmas Mess-On Short
Rations.
My recollections Of Christmas expert
ences in tho army are mostly connected
with the matter of grub, and 1 suppose Gv-
cry other old soldier, If he is frank enough,
will admit the same thing. AS rule we
always looked for boxes from homo on
Christmas day, and those boxes were toler-
ably certain to have something in them
that made a delightful change from the
ordinary rations. When we got those
boxes, we celebrated Christmas When we
didn't, we didn't celebrate. Christmas
was pretty much the same as any other day
under those circumstances.
The particular Christmas that stands up
above all others In my memory was that of
1862. We had gone into camp after Fred
aricksburg, at u place called White Oak
church, about six miles from Falmouth,
Va, and lay there when Christmas came.
We looked for our boxes, of course for we
knew the people at home would not forget
us, but no boxes came. We learned after
ward that they were only three or four
miles away, but that didn't help us then,
and we didn't get them for several days.
1t was bitter cold. Only two days after
Christmas three or four men were frozen
to death on picket, and it was almost as
cold then, but even worse than the wealth
or was the notion of feeding on hard tack
and salt horse. which was about all we
had, while the people at home had turkey
and plum pudding. In the morning,
-, -. IL g. "a
and while we didn't grin we thought we
had to bear 1t.
At noon, however, there came little
alienation. One of the men-I remember
his name was Hageman-came in from
picket duty with the bones of sheep that
he had kicked up in the snow. Some guer-
rillas had been along there and had killed
and eaten the poor brute and left the
bones. They had mighty little meat on
them, but they were full of marrow, and
we boiled them up. There was Dutch
sergeant in the company who had potato,
and somebody managed to steal two onions
from the quartermaster; so we had some
soup.
1t was change, and so it was welcome.
don't remember to have enjoyed any
soup since then quite as much as 1 did
that, but somehow it didn't seem to fill
the bill of fare very we'll for Christmas,
and we were ready to take almost any kind
of n chance for something good.
My brother was in the same company
with me, and he was on guard at brigade
headquarters that day. We all knew that
there were some provisions in the store
house there, but the question was how to
get at them. 1t meant running the risk of
being shot by some sentinel, besides the
certainty of severe punishment in case we
should get caught trying to steal any
thing, yet there were some of us willing to
take the chance.
When my brother came in after being
relieved he came to my tent in great glee.
1--WE got It'll" he said after making sure
that nobody was looking or listening.
"What have you gotg" asked. "Sugar"
he exclaimed. "Where is itf" said I.
"Here," said he, showing me his musket.
He had managed to get into the storehouse
| long enough to pack the barrel of his gun
/ full of sugar, but didn't get anything else.
"Sugar is good, said 1, "but If there
is sugar in the storehouse there ought to
! be some whisky there too" And 1 made
up my mind to get some Of that whisky
that night If It was possible thing.
There was q corporal named Mason in
the company, who was always ready to
take chances il there was anything to be
| gained by 1t, and he wanted some of that
whisky as much as 1 did. 1t was cold
enough to make temperance orator long
for a nip. l hunted Mason up, and we
agreed to start together when 1t got dark
enough. Meantime we managed to steal
an auger from the quartermaster and that,
with two canteens, made all the outfit we
thought we needed.
Fortunately it was a dark night, and we
knew the lay Of the land all right, so we
had a comparatively easy time to dodge
the sentries. 1t wasn't really easy, but it
proved to be good deal easier than get
ting away from the place afterward. 1t
toC& us half an hour Of hiding and dodg-
ing to get through the line, but we man
aged it and found ourselves, somewhere
about 10 O'Clock, under the storehouse.
1t was a rough sort of shanty, built on
the side of a hill, and there was room
enough to move around under it all right,
but the trouble was, we had neither of us
been inside the building and we hadn't
any notion where the things were packed,
so we could only guess where the whisky
barrel was, and that was what we were
after.
We took turns boring holes in the floor
Rt random, and it wasn't long before we
found out that we had pretty dirty job
on hand, to say nothing of a good bit OF
hard work, but we persevered for some
thing like an hour before we could strike
anything that would leak through. We
struck all sorts of things that wouldn't
leak, but we had no means Of knowing
what they were and no way ot getting
them down if we had known.
At length, after an hour, we struck {
barrel out of which a slow thick stream
began to trickle. We couldn't think wha
it was till we tasted it, and then we knew
it was molasses. We used little Language
for a minute or two, but even molasse
was a treat, and we couldn't afford to de
spise it. So we filled one cantecn will
that and plugged the hole up as well rs w
could, so as not to waste the stuff unnec
essarily. 1 am afraid the plug wasn't
very good one, but we did the best w
could.
Then we went to work again. 1t was
little discouraging, but we didn't propos
to give up. We bored hole after hole. l
seems to me we must have bored 30 o
more before we got through, and it tool
some minutes for each one. Sometime
we would go through the floor and hi
nothing, and sometimes, as l said,
would be something solid.
At last we struck something that spout
ed like geyser, only it spoutod downward
1 was right under it and L was flooded in
minute scrambled out of the way a
quickly as possible, and we Investigated.
was yeast. Well, yeast didn't seem to b
as near what we wanted as the molasse
was, but we didn't propose to lose an
tricks, so we filled the other canteen wit
, that after Vve had had n GOOD drink aDieC(