Evening star., 1896-10-16
THE GAPLAND ARCH
Continued From Page rhlrteen.)

gage, having very few blankets even.
Everybody was. in extreme sense. in light
respondents, who provided for themselves,
| and at that time had nothing to provide.
Not one of them, as I remember, had q
horse. and most Of them were foodless and
| blanketless.
To add to our discomfort the afternoon
| OF our arrival was bright with sunshine
and warm In Tennessee for the season, but
during the night sudden. sharp change
| to wintry cold occurred, accompanied by a
snow storm. We had no regular shelter
| and nothing to eat for the three days and
| two nights we were with the Union forces
| except what little we could buy, corn bread
! and bacon, at the miserable farm houses in
| the vicinity. We suffered SO greatly from
| cold and semi-starvation that we were
well-nigh exhausted when the fort sur
rendered.
Myself and another New York corre-
spondent. Richard T. Colburn, tried to sleep
| in a forlorn clubhouse without fire. Get
ting up to move about in order to get warm
we fell down heavily again and again, our
| legs. stin from exposure. having lost the
power to support our half famlshed bodies.
We frequently followed army wagons
over the rough, snowy roads till they jolted
out fragments of hardtack, which we
picked up and eagerly devoured.
AZ Fort Henry a large wooden tox of
cartridges having accidentally exploded
near where I was standing one Of the
fragments struck my eye, causing severe
Inflammation. with which the other eye
s!mpathized, and was rendered partially
blind. Wandering over the Held, the snow
reflected the glare on my disabled eyes,
producing constant pain that was.often tor
turesome.
In this condition I. with the other torre-
spondents, left Donelson the evening of the
day OF the surrender on a government
transport. carrying dispatches for Cairo.
AS wrote until sunrise my account of
light Of oil lamps hanging high in the
cabin, my pitiable plight on reaching port
may be readily conceived After posting
my account went by rail directly to st.
Louis. where 1 healed my diseased eyes by
prescription of my own, and after a few
days was again enabled to use them
Such instances Of hardship were not un-
common among the correspondents. who
uriously in the field. This is specimen of
our luxury.
Courage Acquired.
A man entirely inexperienced in war is
apt to believe at his first participation in
battle that every time a gun is fired some
body Is hit. After sharing in a number Of
engagements. and seeing how much powder
is wasted, he is ready to believe the mill
tary proverb that it requires as much lead
to kill man as would equal his weight.
Only a tried soldier learns to discriminate
between real and apparent danger; and to
such discrimination 1T is altogether prob
able that much of his courage is to be
ascrlbed.
All men, speaking generally, are what is
loosely called brave. They become so by
accustomedness. The raw soldier who
might run away. and is often tempted to. in
his first battle, will, after getting well
seasoned. charge battery without a
tremor.
Is courage little else than getting used to
being scared?
The difficulty Of hitting a man was re-
peatedly exemplied by our going up the
Yazoo in one of the rams in the summer of
1862 on short trips Of observation in the
enemy's country. The river, which empties
Into the Mississippi a few miles above
Vfcksburg, is narrow and deep. having le-
wees on each side to prevent the adjacent
country, lower than the bed of the stream
from overflow Behind the levees the guer-
rilla Mississippians would shelter them
selves. and. taking deliberate aim, though
invisible from the ram, with old rifles mus
kets, shotguns, such nondescript arms as
homes, would fire at dozen or more north
erners standing fully exposed on the fore
part OF the upper deck.
One would say that at so short a dis
lance, and screened from all peril, their
sectional foes never suspecting their con-
tiguity, they could not fail to kill or wound
some Of them. But again and again have
oeen thus exposed, when. suddenly and un-
expectedly, the balls and buckshot would
rain around us without striking anybody
NO wonder that some Of those superstitfous
southerners were of the opinion that them
ID Yanks' bore charmed lives Hav-
ing been In no regular engagements thew
mad not learned how much lead is neces-
sartly wasted in well-intentioned homicides
Near Greeneville, on the lower Mississippi.
the guerrillas were in the habit of planting
six and twelve Founders behind the ievae
during the last half of 1862 and the first
half Of 1863. Thence they would fire on
Union transports in the vain hope of OBJ
structing its navigation to the enemy.
In August of 1862 was going I'D to Mem
phis on the ram Queen of the West, which
had been very badly damaged in encounters
with hostile vessels on the river We had
to run very near the right bank to follow,
the channel and as we were quietly and
slowly steaming against the swift current
the unseen guerrillas began firing at us with
small arms. We replied with some old
worn-out Mississippi rifles we had captured
simply to show fight conscious we could do
the enemy no harm. Then they suddenly
opened with invisible cannon, whose rapid
firing we were obliged to endure in silence
Tor nearly half an hour. They struck the
ram everywhere, protected in most parts
solely by thick oak boards, no better de-
tense than tissue paper, adding materially
to her already shattered condition. Never
theless. they killed but one man, and slight
ly wounded another-myself I was hurt
with splinters, made by a round shot tina I
cut the other poor fellow, standing by my
side. completely in two-a ghastly spectacle
Taken Prisoner.
The career of myself and another Tribune
correspondent in the field ALBERT D. Richard
son, came to an abrupt end when we, with
third correspondent Of the New York
World. attempted to run the batteries of
Vicks5urg, on the night Of May 3, 1863 1t
was fortunately the last expedition, as it
was the most ill-fated. If it had been the
first. others might have been deferred from
following an example that had had SO un-
lucky an outcome.
Several expeditions had got through in
comparative safety. When ours had been
prepared, the river had fallen; the moon
was at the full; the confederates had got
the range; everything was against US. Ex-
perienced Mississippi pilots warned us
against taking the great risk, predicting
that we should probably ground on bar
and be shot to pieces. Our reply was that
we were not bound to go; that we wanted
the experience, and that the more danger
Gus the venture, the greater the experience
would prove.
Our expedition, composed Of steam tug.
the Sturges, and two barges. lashed to 1t,
and loaded with barrels Of provisions and
bales of hay, had on board about thir-
ty-fve persons, including the correspond
ents, and some twenty privates with a
captain of an Ohio regiment. Every one CT
| them had volunteered. Regarded by the
military authorities as exceptionally haz-
| srdous, they did not wish to order any one
l IN