The Hocking sentinel. [volume] (Logan, Ohio) 1871-1906, 1902-06-19
THE BOOMING CANNON
RECITALS OF CAMP AND BAT.
TILE INCIDENTS.
Of the Rebellion Relate
Many AmusinG and Startling Incl
dents of Marches, Camp Life, FOrag-
ing Experiences and Battle Scenes.

Not far from his old homestead-but 4
Union soldier WAS he:
One of the loyal many who hid in the
mountains there.
Driven from home and friends when trea-
son tainted the air.
Twas after the Donelson fight. when
our ranks were broken and thin.
Jim strayed into camp one morning and
begged TO be mustered in:
A STRIPPING Of seventeen, tattered and
sorry and slim.
With great. deep eyes that troubled our
hearts as we looked on him
Eyes Of most piteous pleading. yet touch
ed with an ominous glow.
That told of a namcless wrong that
gnawed at his heart below.
Patient and sad and silent = seemed,
as one who had known
Already the pains OF existence. and car
ried his burden alone.
Yet holding some resolute nim-sOme pur-
pose that gave to his life
A courage that mastered his years, and
strengthened his arm for the strife.
In battle as brave as n Bayard, he never
faltered nor shrank.
When the showering shot Of the enemy
poured on the charging rank:
And even at times it seemed to the men
as they watched him there.
That he somehow courted death in the
depth OF his mute despair.
There was that in the strange boys ma
ture that held him aloof and apart,
Not even his messmatc sharing the secret
that saddened his heart:
Only one time. when the lad fell i'll, and
the fever ran high.
He muttered some words abcut "Mollie''
for her being ready to die"
And then we all knew that love-that
love in some pitiful guise.
Was feeding the poor boys passion, and
paling the light Of his eyes;
And Dixie" the company's poet, be
lighted his pipe and swore
That '.Mollie's" old dad was rebel "A
rebel-no less and no more
And the whole OF the secret was plain
Us plain as the nose on each face,
That Jim had been driven away from the
home of the girl in disgrace
That she. in her first wild passion Of low
ing, had clung to him still,
In spite of the fortunes Of war. as women
frequently will.
At least. so Dixie" the poet, had argued
the evening before
With Jerry McFadden, the drummer, in
front of the orderly's door.
And here the true story begins: Jim was
on picket that night.
Just under the hill, and a few hundred
yards to the regiments right.
The woods hung heavy around him, while
off in the valley below,
He saw the moon on the waters, and
heard the Tennessee flow;
And his thoughts strayed off in q dream
in a dream OF happier hours.
When Mollie and he together had strolled
down there in the flowers,
Ere ever the blast Of battle had dark
ened the pleasant vale,
Or ever the orphans cry was heard, or
the widows wall.
And then as the shadows shifted, he
thought Of his father away
On the trackless mountains-an exile
hiding by night and by day:
0f his mother weeping alone, in her cabin
across the wood.
And then the remembrance Of Mollie
again took fire in his blood.
As he walked to and fro on his heat.
through glimmering patches Of
light,
That reached to the river below, and
back to the lonesome height,
The crickets had fallen asleep, and the
last lone whippoorwill
Had fitted away into silence, and all Of
the camp was still;
When suddenly down by the river, scarce
thirty PAGES from him,
The hurrying sound Of a horses feet at
tracted Jim;
As swift as the meteor fell, just then,
from the starry vault.
His musket few to his shoulder. and he
shouted sharply, "Halt-'
But the rider lunged ahead t'ward the
spot where the sentry stood.
Right in the face of death, as q reckless
trooper would:
A breathless silence followed-and then
the rifles roar
Went up to the sleeping army, and down
by the rivers shore;
The mad horse reared and fell, and the
rider tumbled prone
On the turf of the Tennessee, where the
awful moonlight shone.
Then, clubbing his gun, Jim sprang over
rock and ravine to the place
Where the man went down-and. pausing
an instant, peered in the face
Of slender. quivering youth, whose
mass OF shimmering hair
Clustered over brow that was strange
ly smooth and fair;
And 10! as he stopped Mt the side Of his
bleeding and helpless foe,
A sudden horror seized him-his blood
refused to flow.
And he faltered "Mollie! Molliew As the
truth flashed over him,
And the dying girl responded with a
family whispered Jim"
He clutched her close to his breast, in
agony awful to see,
And smiling up in his face. she died with
her head on his knee.
Such was the end of the story-a sorrow-
full one-and yet,
Tis only a fragment Of war-a thing to
deplore and regret.
We carried her back into camp, but none
of us ever knew
The inside truth Of the matter-never
the slightest clew-
Never a reason was given-never a how
or a why
Whether she came as a lover-whether a
friend or spy
But letter was found In her bosom,
simply directed ''To Jim,"
And the secret of that nights tragedy
afterwards died with him,
When he fell at the storming Of Vicks-
burg, bravely leading the rest,
With grape-shot mangled shoulder and
n rifle ball in his breast.
But Dixie" the poet, still claimed in
verses long afterward penned,
That Mollie was true and loyal-the fed
eral soldiers friend.
No matter! Jim and the girl will never
forgotten be
By the boys who camped that night on
the bluffs of the Tennessee.
james Newton Matthews, in Indianap-
oils Journal.
Closing Days of the War.
"A good many Of the boys" said a
veteran recently, "made mistakes In the