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[144] the course of the struggle, to do away with slavery, then, without question, away it must go. But the matter that touched his soul and fired his spirit was the outrage done to the country. Full of patriotic pride and devotion, he resented with the wrath of a personal indignity the wrong inflicted on the nationality of the United States. The regiment left Massachusetts July 8, 1861; and on the same day Lieutenant Mudge's commission as Captain was dated. On the field of war, among regiments from every quarter of the country, the Second Massachusetts Volunteers maintained a high character for drill and discipline, the result of the will and character of its officers. It was first engaged at Front Royal and Winchester, where it was ordered to protect our wagon-trains from the attack of General Ewell's forces. Captains Cary, Russell, and Mudge, with their companies, were detailed to support the batteries which were covering the movement of our troops and wagons on their road to Winchester. Finally they halted and undertook to hold the Rebels in check while the battery could also be withdrawn into the town. Night fell while they were still engaged in this duty. The Rebels, with wild shouts, made continual dashes upon them, and maintained an incessant fire of musketry. The only light was from the blazing wagons; and amid all this the Fifth New York Cavalry, mistaking these companies for a body of Rebels, dashed furiously through their lines, hewing with their sabres and firing their revolvers rapidly on every side, with very fatal results. The Second then fell back toward Winchester, into which our forces had been rapidly pouring since midnight. At a little distance outside the town they halted, but soon the fighting became general, and two Pennsylvania regiments broke and ran, leaving the Second exposed upon its flank and in much peril. By a skilful manoeuvre, executed at double-quick, they extricated themselves, and managed to enter the town, when they again made a stand, and again found themselves flanked by a force of Rebels who fired
Sever and Francis, 1866.
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