George T. Ulmer

“ Scattered about were old wagon boxes, odd wheels, old toothless harrows, plows, a wheelbarrow upside down with the wheel gone, part of an old harness lying across it; bits of harness were hanging on pegs in the barn. Geese, turkeys and chickens were numerous and clucked about as if they were really pleased to see us, and in fact, I discounted or anticipated the looks of the house from the careless dilapidated appearance of every thing around and about the old man’s farm. ”

“ I saw several with fingers cut off in order to obtain a ring quickly, and many other sickening sights which tended to make me a hardened soldier. I was having lots of experience, even before I had really reached my regiment, and I tell you, the heroic ardor of my boyish dream was beginning to ooze out of me quite fast. I began to think I was not cut for a soldier.
Well, my first battle was over, my first experience before an enemy. The first sound of musketry had died away, and we were again steaming towards City Point to join our regiments. ”

“ They finally reached the foot of the stairs, which led to the wharf. The young officer espied me and standing up in the boat shading his eyes with his hand seemed carefully contemplating me. I wondered if it could be possible that he had defined my wish and would have me arrested when he landed; perhaps it was the cigar that attracted his attention. It was against orders to smoke on the wharf, and such a big cigar in a boy’s mouth looked very much out of place, but I wasn’t going to give it up, and puffed more vigorously than ever. ”

“ I tried to find shelter behind a tree, away from the bullets, but as soon as I found shelter on one side it seemed as though the bullets and shells came from all sides, and I lay down in utter despair [Pg 39] and fright. I don’t know how long I was there, but when I awoke I thought the war was over, it was so still. I thought every one had been killed on both sides, excepting myself. I was just thinking I would try and find a live horse, ride back to Washington and tell them that the war was over, everybody was killed, when my brother tapped me on the shoulder and asked me where I had been. ”

“ Picture to yourself, dear reader, four boys taken from the busy life of a great city, place them in the wilderness of Maine, where they had to make a winrow of the forest to secure a garden spot for the house, pry out the stumps and blast the ledges to sow the seed, then ask yourself what should the harvest be? ”

“ A home is all right
With father and brother,
But darker than night
Without sister and mother.
The war grew more and more serious. Newspapers were eagerly sought; and every word about the struggle was read over and over again. A new call for troops was made, another and still another, and I was all the time fretting and chafing in the corn or potato field, because I was so young and small. I could not work; the fire of patriotism was burning me up. My eldest brother had arrived at the age and required size to fit him for the service; he enlisted and went to the front. ”

“ He had driven right up to the front, unhitched his horse and began selling hot mince pies. He had some kind of a stove and outfit in an old covered wagon where he made the pies quickly and sold them hot for one dollar apiece; the pies were about the size of a saucer. When I reached the wagon there was quite a crowd around him; some were buying and eating them as if they were good, while others stood looking on wistfully watching their comrades who were fortunate enough to have the price. ”

“ That evening we passed by Fortress Monroe, up the James river. There was not much transpired to relieve the monotony or appease our hunger or thirst; in fact, it began to look dubious as to reaching City Point. The monotony, however, was somewhat relieved in the morning. About daylight a commotion was caused by the sound of distant cannonading. Every one crowded to the front of the boat; everybody was asking questions of everybody. Each one had some idea to offer as to the cause. Some ventured to say it was a gunboat up the river practising. ”

“ I kept on with them until it seemed to rain bullets, but on, on they went unmindful of the awful storm of leaden messengers of death—on, on and into one of the fiercest charges of the entire war. I saw men fall so thick and fast that there didn’t seem as if there was any of my regiment left, and I made up my mind it was too hot for me, so started on the dead run to the rear for a place of safety, and I didn’t stop until I was pretty sure I was out of harm’s way. ”

“ The Yankee yearning for fight had possession of me, and I could neither eat, sleep [Pg 18] nor work. I was bound to be a soldier. I prayed for it, and I sometimes thought, my prayers were answered; that the war should last ’till I was big enough to be one—for it did.
I had enlisted four times in different towns, and each time I went before a mustering officer, I was rejected. “Too small” I was every time pronounced, but I was not discouraged or dismayed—the indomitable pluck and energy of those downeast boys pervaded my system. ”

“ I could picture nothing but a soldier’s life; I could almost hear the sounds of the drums, and almost see the long rows of blue-coated soldiers marching in glorious array with steady step to the music of the band. “Thirty! thirty!” I would repeat to myself, but finally concluded thirty wouldn’t buy much of a horse, but my heart was set upon it, and nothing remained for me to do but cut more “poles.” One day when [Pg 11] I arrived at the road with a bundle of them, a farmer happened to be passing, driving a yoke of oxen as I tumbled my hoop-poles over the fence on to the pile. ”

“ I never will forget the shame and mortification I felt at the sight I must have presented when the boat that conveyed us to Portsmouth arrived.
An old negro came to my bunk and took me on his back, and with a boot in each hand dangling over his shoulder he carried me pickaback through the streets to the hospital, a large, fine building, formerly the “Balfour Hotel,” and converted into a hospital after Portsmouth was captured. They took me up stairs into what was formerly the dining-room but now filled with over two hundred little iron beds, and each bed occupied by a wounded soldier. ”

“ It was Butler’s command, and our regiment, the Eighth Maine, must be there. The Eighth Maine, Company H, was the regiment and company to which my brother belonged, and in which I was enlisted. I [Pg 33] started out across the fields in the direction of the light—on, on I tramped, into ditches, through mires, over fences. The farther I went the faster I went. I was so impatient I could not hold myself to a walk; it was a dog-trot all the time. I was heedless of every obstacle, till I began to near the front. I realized the danger by the whizzing of shell, and the zip, zip of bullets. ”

“ Our regiment lay here in the advance line of breastworks for thirteen days. The sappers and miners were constantly working our breastworks towards the enemy, and every time I wanted to reach my company I found it in a new place and more difficult to reach. The rebel sharpshooters, with their deadly aim, were waiting for such chaps as me. However, under cover of night, I always managed to find and reach the company with some palatable relish.
I will never forget one night; four men were detailed to go to the rear for rations. ”

“ The next morning I was given a broom and put to sweeping around camp with about twenty tough-looking customers. The broom did not look well with my uniform, and as soon as an officer noticed me, I was summoned before the colonel in command. He asked, what I was? I told him I didn’t know yet—would not know ’till I reached my regiment. He had a hearty laugh at my appearance; said I ought to be sent to some fair instead of the front. ”

“ This fort was located on a mound or hill with a ravine in front of it. Our brigade was drawn up in line of battle in a wheat-field on the right. A colored brigade was ordered to charge the fort from the hill opposite, and across this ravine; then I beheld one of the grandest and most awful sights I ever saw; those colored troops started on a double quick, and as they descended the hill, the fort poured volley after volley into them. The men seemed to fall like blades of grass before a machine, but it did not stop them; they rallied and moved on ”

“ The regiment finally brought up in the first or advance line of breastwork, and I was still skirmishing in the rear for anything that I could find that was good.
I had tramped back to the rear about three miles, my mind bent on securing anything that would please the heart and eye, or tickle the palates of the brave [Pg 50] fellows who had gone to face the enemy and do the real work of our country. About a quarter of a mile to the left of me I espied a covered wagon moving toward the front. ”

“ I ran this way and that, trying to find my brother and regiment. Every turn I made it seemed I encountered more bullets and shells. Soldiers were shouting and running in every direction, artillery was galloping here and there, on every side it seemed they were fighting for dear life. On one side of me I saw horses and men fall and pile up on top of each other. ”

“ He said the fort was a very important position, and must be held at all hazards; that there were only two hundred colored troops there, and they could not hold it. Now, he proposed, as we had no arms, to go in with a rush and a yell, and make those rebels think that re-enforcements had arrived. All this time the musketry firing was increasing. The whizz of bullets through the air and about our heads were becoming too frequent. I was in the front rank, center of the line, and I tell you I think I had a little of that frightened smell about me at this time. ”

“ But when I made my appearance tears changed to laughter, for the sight of me I think was enough to give them hope. They didn’t believe our government would have such a little, ill-dressed soldier. And father said, after looking me all over: “Well, if they have mustered you in, after they see you in that uniform it will be muster out, my boy.”
In about ten days I received orders to report in Augusta. Then the family realized there was more in it than they at first thought, but consoled [Pg 22] themselves with the belief that when I reached headquarters, I would be found useless, and sent home. ”

“ With a yell they were up and into that fort, and in less time than it takes to tell it, the guns were turned on the fleeing rebels. Here was the greatest mistake of our greatest commander. All of our army was brought to a standstill by some one’s foolish order. Not another move was made. We lay there waiting, and all night long we could hear the trains rumbling along on the other side of the [Pg 46] Appomattox river. Lee had been outwitted. We had stolen a march on him. We had arrived in front of defenseless Petersburg, and could have gone right in and on to Richmond without a struggle. ”

“ I held this position some time, until one day there was going to be a squad of recruits, and returned furloughed men sent on a steam-barge to the front at City Point, where Butler was bottled up. I asked to be one of them. The colonel told me I was foolish, and better stay with him, but I insisted; and he allowed me to go. The barge was a kind of an open double-deck boat without cabin or shelter, and they crowded us on to her as thick as we could stand; we were like sardines. ”

“ I would fill my other haversack from the bags in the wagon; that’s what the boys expected I would do, and I did from the first bag I could get into. Each company had its own bag.
When we arrived at the breastworks my company crowded around me for plunder. I divided it up, and was looked upon as quite a hero, but when the rations were issued it was found our company’s bag was short about thirty rations of sugar, but no one said a word. It was surmised that it got spilled. Day after day our regiment lay there and our army did not seem to gain anything. ”

“ This was joyous news, the anticipation of a new mother, [Pg 7] and above all a step-sister, inspired us with new ambition. The fences and barn received a coat of whitewash, the stones were picked out of the road in front of the house, the wood-pile was repiled and everything put into apple-pie order. We did not know what day they would arrive. So each day about the time the stage coach from Belfast should pass the corners, we would perch ourselves on the fence in front of the house to watch for it, and when it did come in sight, wonder if the folks were in it ”

“ My First Day in Front of Petersburg.
[Pg 44] One night the Johnnies made a charge on us. That was the only time I ever fired a gun in the whole war, and I honestly believe I killed a dozen men, for immediately after they stopped firing. It was only a few moments, however; on they came, only to be repulsed. They kept that up nearly all night, and I served my country by standing down in the trench, loading a gun and passing it up to my brother to fire. I did this all night, but I didn’t see any less rebels in the morning. Our next order was to fall back, under cover of darkness. ”