fourteen miles to Fairfax Court House, where we slept for the first time under shelter tents. The ridge pole was so near the ground that the occupants could neither sit nor stand upright; each man had two pieces of twilled cotton cloth, four feet wide and six feet long, and when two tented together they used two pieces for roofing and the other two for closing the ends of the tent. The enemy had evacuated Manassas; it was too muddy to drill and we waited for orders with commendable patience. On the evening of Friday, March 14th, we were ordered to retrace our steps, and marched all night, arriving in Camp Franklin on Saturday morning. Here we remained until April 4th, when we marched to Alexandria, and took the cars for Manassas Junction, where we pitched our tents south of the battle-field of Bull Run, close to the camps which the Confederates had recently abandoned. It was evident that the enemy had passed the winter in comfortable quarters and had been abundantly supplied with the creature comforts usually found in military camps,especially with "wet goods," for in the débris were many bottles "in which there was no sin." On April 8th, we marched along the railroad track, to Catlett's Station, eleven miles, arriving in the middle of the afternoon in a severe storm of snow and rain. I do not recall a more unseasonable snow storm than this one; four or five inches of snow fell and remained on the ground for three days; the grass and wheat were several inches high, the peach and apple blossoms had come and fallen. It was a dreary place where the regiment was halted to encamp. Lieutenant-Colonel Marsh came to call the attention of the captains to a strict order which had been issued against the burning of fence-rails. When he communicated it to me I said that we were greatly in need of fuel, that there was an abundance of "split timber" near, and asked if we could burn anything of that description. He replied, "certainly," and hastened to notify the other companies. When he returned to headquarters and reported that he had delivered the orders as directed, he was asked by Colonel Howland, “What material is being used to make the fires which I see starting up along the regimental line?" Further inquiry disclosed the fact that the first fire had been started in my company, and that it was made of rails. I was directed to report to headquarters; on arriving there I was asked by the colonel if I was burning rails. I replied, "No sir, my company is burning 'split timber,' as authorized by Lieutenant-Colonel Marsh." The lieutenant-colonel was asked to explain and frankly stated that he had replied affirmatively to the question of Captain Curtis, in regard to permission to burn split timber; he did not at the moment suspect that this included rails. I escaped the intended arrest, and the lieutenant-colonel received a reprimand for his thoughtless reply to my request. Colonel Howland said that the spirit of the order had been violated, but, in view of the permission given by the lieutenant-colonel, no further action would be taken. I quote from two letters of Captain Parker to his wife: "CAMP NEAR MANASSAS JUNCTION, "The morning we left Camp Franklin, I wrote you. We arrived here that evening by cars. The ride was delightful, through hills and fine groves. Occasionally we saw a farmer ploughing, but it was always done in a poor way. As far as I have seen, nearly all the houses in Virginia were cast in the same mould, chimney on the outside at each end. The soil here is a red freestone loam, mixed with clay, naturally a very quick productive soil, but, of course, very much worn out by the universal mode of Virginia farming. We passed within sight of Centreville Heights. It looked perfectly natural. We passed many Secesh camps after crossing Bull Run. The quarters were made |