The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-09-20

the patients. 1t will comfort the soldiers
friends at home to learn that every posi-
pie provision is now being made for the
care or the sick men and they are nearly
as We'll on here as they could be at home"
Chaplain Christensen, in a letter to the
Sentinel, published June 20, 1898.
do not let your readers believe any yell
low journal fake stories about hard condi-
OF difficulty at first and food and water were
both scant and poor, but / have heard no
word of complaint from any reasonable man
for the last fortnight. The kickers' are
invariably the men who are faring better
to-day than they would at home-men who
nave never been able to command a living
Such as Uncle Sam now furnishes them. The
service would be better off without them
but there are always a few such in every
army Srnly, ana l suppose we Shall nave to en-
cure them as philosophically as we cam
Chaplain Christensen in a letter to the SEN
tnel, published June %, 1898.
Rev. Gustav A. Christensen was chaplain
of the observation-disclosures fty-eighth Regi-
ment of Indiana Volunteers. He was also
the correspondent of the Indianapolis Sem
tinel while at Camp Thomas, where the
regiment was stationed many weeks His
letters to the Sentinel were sometimes
signed with his full name. Again they were
simply sigred with the initials-"G. A. c.
Everybody knew who &c. A. c." was. For
a long time he contributed matter to the
Sunday Sentinel above those initials in a
column known as the Parsons Points,
On last Sunday the Sentinel answered the
Journals statement that Chaplain Carsten-
sen was Sentinel correspondent with this
remark:
Yes, he was the war correspondent of
the Sentinel, and 1t is safe to say that his
letters were the most interesting and more
eagerly sought for than those of any of the
correspondents of the Indianapolis papers"
Tn lie Cd Tod onsk
spondent of the Sentinel" the chaplain wrote
many letters on various topics while he was
stationed at Camp Thomas, Chickamauga
Park Sometimes he told about the hot
weather and the dust; again the army can
teen came in for good deal of discussion;
sometimes it was the army mule that
seemed to him an interesting topic for the
folks at home. Occasionally he spoke of
the hospitals, the rations, water and the
amdsements of the boys of the regiment
Once he took occasion to ridicule certain
other chaplains who undertook to organize
a 'chaplains' association" and establish an
"army church." On that occasion he wrote
the Sentinel, under date of July %: I'VE
have few chaplains at Camp Thomas who
are among the silliest of the Lords silly
people," This appeared in the paper July
%. Sometimes he told about the antics of
Murphy" the regimental bull-pup mas
cot" and again he discoursed of the
Crackers" sellers of ''moonshine whisky
and other subjects that were more or less
interesting. His letters were always of a
critical tone, not to speak of them as NOR
bidly pessimistic. But, almost in spite Of
himself, it would seem, he found many
things to commend. In one letter there
would be complaints of conditions that had
improved and were satisfactorily adjusted
by the time his next letter was written. 1t
was not until he reached Indianapolis, after
four months service, and had seen some of
his partisan friends, that he forgot the good
he had previously recorded and spoke of
Camp Thomas and all the conditions there
as he was quoted in the Sentinel last Thurs
day: bah! 1t makes me sick to think of
Camp Thomas" Not one of his letters
from the middle of May down to August in
dictated that his heart and soul were filled
with such feelings of revulsion.
THE PARSONS POINTS.
The Sentinel files are to be seen at the
Public Library. The chaplain's letters fill
up well on toward sixty columns of matter
that generally brings about S. a column. 1t
took a reporter two days to go through
them in order to ascertain whether what the
chaplain wrote home over his own sigma
ture accorded with the interview attributed
to him. The letters do not bear out the in
terview. They are in the main as contra
dictory of the interview as the extracts
from two of them quoted at the top of this
column. Chaplain Christensen seems to be
in about the same predicament DR.. Semi
Not long since DR.. Sem was quoted as Civ
ing a sensational interview in which he
cried down the War Department for Sc
lecting Camp Thomas, saying virtually: Il
told them it was unfit Tor camp before
they sent the troops there" Afterward
somebody discovered a letter which DIR.
Sem had written to a Southern paper early
in the summer, in which he had declared
in substance that a better location could
not be found. The Christensen interviews
and letters. placed in parallel columns.
would not reflect much glory upon the chap
lain. Any one so inclined may find it inter-
esting to take copy of the interview and
compare it with the reverend correspond
ent's letters in the files of the Sentinel at
the Public Library for the months of May,
June, July and august.
Take few illustrations from the many
that the reporter found. Concerning the
division hospital, the chaplain said in the
interview: II went to the division hospital
every day, and the sights and sounds and
smells that one came in contact with there
made it resemble perfect lazaretto. Bah!
1t makes me sick to think of Camp
Thomas. Compare that with the state
ent in his letter published in the Sentinel
June 20, in which, as appears above. he
said: Il went through the division hospital
last night 1t is about two hundred yards
in the rear of General PCland'S headQuar-
tiers, away from the dust and noise, and
comforts for the patients. Going further,
he added that it would comfort the SOL
diers friends at home to learn that every
possible provision is now being made for
the care of the sick men, and they are
nearly as we'll off here they could be at
in "a perfect lazaretto' as if they were at
home? In the same interview, speaking of
men in the ''lazaretto," he said that he had
seen flies fill the mouths of men at the
point of death, because there was no one
to brush them away" Were those men
at homer When he read that statement
the editor of the Terre Haute Express, in
the issue of last Friday morning, ex-
claimed: In the name of God and chris
tianity. in the name of humanity and COM
mon decency where was the chaplain's
good right hand while his eyes toasted upon
a spectacle so reVolung.
Those who compare the description of the
division hospital IN the letter as a place
where men were nearly as we'll OFF as they
could be at home" will wonder what be-
comes OF the 'lazarreto'' and fly stories
in the interview. Also, compare the de-
scription of the hospital. as being provided