The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1896-03-25
BILL ARp'S LETTER.
Lees Army Crossing the Shenandoah
by Torchlight.
atlanta Constitution.


atlanta Constitution
One pleasant morning we were talk
ing about war-war with England, wal
with Spain-and as is usual with old
soldiers, our conversation drifted back
to our late civil war. We call it late,
I reckon, because it is the last war we
had, but it is not so very late. Al
most everybody down South who was
engaged in it is dead. A generation
dies out in thirty years and it has been
thirty-fve years since that war begun.
But there are a few of us left and we
were talking about the war like we
used to talk around the camp fires,
and I was asked what scene or battle
or event had left its most vivid i'm
preston upon my mind and memory.
I knew very we'll, but 1 can 60 back to
scenes and events that have lasted
longer and been more personal. / re-
member when I had a fight at camp
meeting on Sunday and got whipped
by a country boy and my Sunday
clothes were all torn and muddied and
my father whipped me that night aud
the teacher got ready to whip me next
morning and I showed him the red
whelps on my legs and he let me of
with q Calvinistic lecture on the sin
Of breaking the Sabbath day. Well,
the way Of it was, / had got up on the
hub Of q watermelon wagon to look at
the tempting fruit and the country
boy pulled myfoot off so as to get my
place and I bounced him, but he was
bigger and stronger and had country
boys to sick him on and they dident
like my ruf1ed town shirt and he got
me down and nobody wouldent part
us and I got the worst of it aud my
Sunday clothes we're all soiled and my
face scratched and I had no friends
and it grieved me for q month that /
had been imposed on and whipped be-
sides. I watched for that boy to
come to town and at last he did come.
I spied him on the other side Of the
square and I got George Lester to
back me and / everlastingly licked
him and my father eve knew any
thing about it, but | told my mother
that / had licked Tom Fountain and
she Rugged me and kissed me and told
me that it was wrong to fight, but
somehow or other I knew she was glad
that I whipped him. l remember yet
how the big tears came in my mothers
eyes when she pulled up my pants
and saw the marks on my legs that
my father had made aud I laid my
head in her lap and cried.
Well, you see that was war big
ger war than I ever found afterwards
and has left q deeper impression:
But about the late war / said that
the most vivid and lasting impression
on my mind was the midnight scene
of our army crossing the Shenandoah
by torchlight, when we were going
from Winchester to tight the first bat
tie Of Manassas. / stood on the bank
and saw 1900 men ford that river.
The water was about breast deep to
most Of the soldiers and they held
their guns and cartridges up high and
it strained the little fellows like Nc
Osker and Jim Smith and Zach Har-
grove powerfully to keep their footing
and the water out of their mouths and
not wet their ammunition. It was
the 18th day Of July, 1861, and next
morning the boys all laid down on the
hillside near Paris and went to sleep
in their wet clothes and by noon re-
sumed the march to Manassas. They
had had q good wetting, if not a good
washing. The army left Winchester
just at twilight. Not a drum was
heard-not a camp FIRE put out-not
an alarm of any sort. "They folded
their tents like the Arabs and silently
stole away" The enemy was left at
Martinsburg preparing for to.morrow's
battle and they never knew where We
were until after the battle Of Manassas
had been fought and won. It was old
Joe Johnston's first military strategy.
But the crossing of that river was the
most historic and graphic scene that
T had witnessed and brought wildly
before me a picture I had seen when a
boy Of Bonaparte crossing the Rhine.
It was q wild, weird sight and | had
never seen 80 many men at once in all
my life. It seemed to me there were
enough to whip all creation and they
were eager to do it.
Another one Of our party said,
"Weil, I was in that same battle and
saw the killed and wounded all around
me, but it was not till next day that [
came to myself and had to command a
squad that was detailed to dig the
trenches and bury the dead. | shall
never forget the field where the New
York Zouaves lay dead, nor. how thick
they were upon the ground. They
were dressed like Turks and had on
turbans and wide, loose pants and
CATERS. They were large men to start
on, and during the night had swollen
up and their faces turned almost black,
and it took about four Of US to roll
one into the ditch. Their faces were
distorted, their clothing bloody, and |
never realized the horrors of war until
then. We dident give them a full
length apiece, but put the head of q
between the feet of another and cover
ed them about eighteen inches Deep
'sThe most horried sight / ever saw
said another comrade, 0was the battle
field of Malvern Hill. Mimic balls
don't mangle up the boys like shell
and canister. Our boys were awfully
torn up on the last days fight by the
shot and shell from the gun-boats.
The next morning after the fight [
walked over the field, and there was
hardly a complete man to be found
among the dead. Legs and arms and
hands and feet were seen scattered in
all kinds of mutilated shapes and
fragments. saw one headless soldier
sitting upright, his back against a tree,
his rife clutched in rigid fingers, the
muzzle on the ground, and not a sign
of a head on his shoulders. A shell
had torn it away and left a. clean cut,