This text is part of:
[260]
The long march of 700 miles had been very tiresome.
The clothing and equipments of the Army demanded renewal, the many sick of heat and fatigue demanded restoring rest, the shattered commands needed reinforcements before they could again face the army of Lee, already reinforced with a sufficient number to nearly make good his losses.
The men remained in camp near Morrisville through the month of August and the work of re-organization and repair went on.
The middle of September found the Army of the Potomac stronger in numbers than at Gettysburg and nearly as well equipped.
The apparent strength of the reinforcements needed, however, a large deduction from the fact that a great proportion of them were the product of the draft or were substitutes.
The Nineteenth Massachusetts received 216 substitutes of this class on August 16th.
At that time its ranks had been swelled by the returns from the hospital and other sources to 80 veterans.
This lot of recruits that arrived in August contained many good and patriotic men, who deserved and won the confidence and love of their veteran comrades.
While the regiment lay in camp at Morrisville, Col. Devereux being still on detached service, it was under the command of Capt. J. F. Plympton.
This gallant, but aged officer, had, from the outbreak of the war to this time, kept up with the youngest and most vigorous officer in the discharge of every active and laborious duty.
His health was now fast breaking down, however, under the hardships and labor so unsuitable to his years and he was soon compelled, from this cause, and with great reluctance, to retire from the service.
Here also Lieut. Charles L. Merrill was driven, from the effects of his wound (received while saving from capture the colors of the regiment at Fredericksburg) to retire from active service with the regiment and accept a commission in the Veteran Reserve Corps, in which he remained until the close of the war.
Lieut. William Stone also retired to accept a commission in the Veteran Reserve Corps and Lieut. Col. Ansel D. Wass
Salem Press. Co., Salem, Ma., 1906.
Tufts University. provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.