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was then disbanded, except one company That company, under command of Sergeant Trowbridge, then acting as Captain, but not commissioned, was kept in service, and was sent (August 5, 1862) to garrison St. Simon's Island, on the coast of Georgia.
On this island (made famous by Mrs. Kemble's description) there were then five hundred colored people, and not a single white man.
The black soldiers were sent down on the Ben De Ford, Captain Hallett.
On arriving, Trowbridge was at once informed by Commodore Goldsborough, naval commander at that station, that there was a party of rebel guerillas on the island, and was asked whether he would trust his soldiers in pursuit of them.
Trowbridge gladly assented; and the Commodore added, “If you should capture them, it will be a great thing for you.”
They accordingly went on shore, and found that the colored men of the island had already undertaken the enterprise.
Twenty-five of them had armed themselves, under the command of one of their own number, whose name was John Brown.
The second in command was Edward Gould, who was afterwards a corporal in my own regiment.
The rebel party retreated before these men, and drew them into a swamp.
There was but one path, and the negroes entered single file.
The rebels lay behind a great log,. and fired upon them.
John Brown, the leader, fell dead within six feet of the log,--probably the first black man who fell under arms in the war,--several others were wounded, and the band of raw recruits retreated; as did also the rebels, in the opposite direction.
This was the first armed encounter, so far as I know, between the rebels and their former slaves; and it is worth noticing that the attempt was a spontaneous thing, and not accompanied by any white man. The men were not soldiers, nor in uniform, though some of them afterwards enlisted in Trowbridge's company.
The father of this John Brown was afterwards a soldier in my regiment; and, after his discharge for old age, was, for a
Boston: Fields, Osgood and Co. University Press: Welch, Bigelow, & Co., Cambridge. 1870.
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