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Chapter 20: autumn of 1863.
The close of summer and the opening of autumn were marked by great religious power in all the armies of the
Confederacy.
Rev. Dr. John C. Granbery, whose labors among the soldiers will ever be remembered by the surviving veterans of the war, in September wrote of his work to the
Richmond Christian Advocate:
I have been employed one month in my new position as a missionary to the army.
Bro. Evans having been compelled by ill health to resign his appointment, Bishop Early transferred me, at my request, from Ewell's to Longstreet's corps.
I naturally felt a preference to remain with those troops among whom I had labored as a chaplain from almost the commencement of the war. The last four weeks I have been preaching daily, and sometimes twice a day, in the brigades of Pickett's division.
I have never before witnessed such a wide-spread and powerful religious interest among the soldiers.
They crowd eagerly to hear the gospel, and listen with profound attention.
Many hearts have been opened to receive the word of the Lord in every brigade.
It would delight your heart to mark the seriousness, order, and deep feeling, which characterize all our meetings.
In Armistead's brigade, where I have been most constantly working in co-operation with Bro. Cridlin, a Baptist, and chaplain of the 38th Virginia, and with other ministers, there have been some seventy professions of conversion, and the altar is filled morning and night with penitents.
The change is manifest in the whole camp.
Men have
