[2]
This is the way in which I came to the command of this regiment.
One day in November, 1862, I was sitting at dinner with my lieutenants, John Goodell and Luther Bigelow, in the barracks of the Fifty-First Massachusetts, Colonel Sprague, when the following letter was put into my hands :--
Had an invitation reached me to take command of a regiment of Kalmuck Tartars, it could hardly have been more unexpected.
I had always looked for the arming of the blacks, and had always felt a wish to be associated with them; had read the scanty accounts of General Hunter's abortive regiment, and had heard rumors of General Saxton's renewed efforts.
But the prevalent tone of public sentiment was still opposed to any such attempts; the government kept very shy of the experiment, and it did not seem possible that the time had come when it could be fairly tried.
For myself, I was at the head of a fine company of my own raising, and in a regiment to which I was already much attached.
It did not seem desirable to
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Boston: Fields, Osgood and Co. University Press: Welch, Bigelow, & Co., Cambridge. 1870.
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