This text is part of:
Table of Contents:
Chapter
8
: battles of
Chancellorsville
,
Thoroughfare Gap
and
Gettysburg
.--wounded at
Gettysburg
and ordered home.
Chapter
9
: regiment ordered home.--receptions.--my
first
call upon
Governor
Andrew
.--return to the front.
Chapter
10
: battles of the
Wilderness
,
Todd's Tavern
and
Laurel Hill
.--Engagement at the
Bloody Angle
.
[150]
An old colored woman kept her eyes on my feet, and began to untie her shoes; taking them off, she came to me and said, “Honey, take these shoes.”
“Oh, no,” I replied, “you will not get another pair, and a cold winter is coming.”
“No matter if I don't,” she said, “ain't you suffering all this for me, and hadn't I ought to go without shoes if they will help you get home?”
and she forced me to take them.
They were rudely made, the uppers being untanned and sewed with rawhide, while the bottoms were pegged on with homemade pegs, but they did me good service, and I wore them inside the Union lines three months later.
Another gave me a pair of socks, and, washing my bleeding feet, I was once more comfortable.
We could find no trace of Sherman's army, and remained with Isaac two days. We slept in the barn, and were well supplied with food; we also had plenty of peanuts, as they grew on this plantation, and were called “ground peas.”
At night the negroes held another meeting, and at their request I read the Bible to them.
My scripture lesson was the third chapter of John.
They asked me to pray, but I excused myself.
I never attended a meeting where all were so earnest.
The singing was grand.
They sang one song where all shake hands, and the words were, “My brother, ain't you mighty glad you're going to leave this sinful army,” etc. They kept time with their feet and hands, closed their eyes, and swayed from side to side as they sang.
The next day we decided that it was best to cross the river.
The rebels had cut holes in all the boats, and sunk them; but the negroes were sharp, and had taken them up, repaired them and sunk them again, so all they had to do was turn the water out and they were as good as new.
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