66 COLLINS' NEGRO BOY, FRACTION-THE SAD STORY OF OMRADES, listen, while I tell you about a muledriver of the Twenty-sixth Illinois," spoke up one of the boys. 6 Frequently private soldiers became widely known in the army for some peculiar characteristic, but perhaps few were more so than the one I am about to describe. He was about six and a half feet high, long, lank and angular, with an ungainly, swaggering kind of gait, though when astride a mule he was at home. He was generally known as Stackpole,' the mule driver of the 26th Illinois. He always had a good team, and if he lost a mule he could soon pick up another, since he did not concern himself as to where the mules belonged, if he wanted them. In the fall of 1864 he took a span from General Schofield's headquarters team, and shaved, cropped and painted them, till the driver passed them on the road a few hours afterward, hunting his stolen mules, but never dreaming they were before him. "This same driver had an undying thirst for good commissary whiskey, and when the roads were in the most fearful condition, and teams balked and floundered in the mud till it almost seemed nothing would ever again induce the mules to pull a pound, if only the quartermaster would send for Stackpole' and promise him a pint of good whiskey, the balkiest team would soon be pulling for dear life. He would vault into the saddle, straighten up the leaders, touch up every mule in the team, and when all were alert and ready, it really seemed he could make his whip play round like a streak of lightning, hitting all at once; then he would halloo till you could hear him for miles, not omitting of course the traditionary cuss words,' and things would go, however deep the mud might be. "Starting loads recalls the 'March to the Sea' with Sherman, and through the Carolinas in the winter of 1865, which developed many expert foragers, and the enormous loads that some soldiers could carry into camp would astonish people in civil life. But the improvised carts and conveyances would also make them open their eyes. It was a common thing to see mules and horses led in loaded down with provender, but to see a nice family carriage driven in, with the elegantly cushioned and costly upholstered seats piled full of bacon or pickled side meat, was not at all unusual. "At Lynch's Creek in South Carolina, owing to high water, crossing was delayed several days, and the sparsely settled country was soon stripped of almost everything eatable, until finally nothing remained to live upon but a scant supply of ear corn, which was rendered palatable by being parched. Officers had to watch their horses while they were eating, to prevent the famishing men from stealing all their corn. After crossing, the foragers struck out to collect food, and when they returned about 2 o'clock in the morning, the men got up, cooked, ate, and sat round the camp-fires, singing and making merry, apparently as happy and contented as if in the midst of plenty." James Houghton, of Plymouth, Indiana, a member of the 29th Indiana, then took the floor. "At Stone River, on the afternoon of December 30, 1862, the regiment was ordered to move up and take a position for the fight on the morrow. "Major Collins, of that regiment, had a negro servant whom the boys, for some unaccountable reason, had nicknamed 'Fraction.' While being placed in position, Fraction espied a mulatto boy passing to the rear with an old fashioned 'horse pistol' in his possession. A sudden idea seemed to strike the servant, and he yelled, 'Wha' yer gwine wid dat shootin' iron?' The boy answered, Gwine to de reah, to take car' the Cunnel's hoss.' Fraction' then said, 'Jess han' dat shootin' iron ober to me,' and the boy, like a true soldier, quickly obeyed the order of his superior'(?). Fraction' then followed along till the regiment was placed in position, borrowing ammunition from several of the soldiers. When the fight commenced the following morning, he disappeared very suddenly, and not turning up at nightfall, nor the next day, the regiment came to the conclusion that he had been killed or taken prisoner. "On the third day, while a bevy of regimental and company officers were seated under a tree, cracking and eating nuts that had been shaken off during the previous day's engagement, one of the officers descried Fraction' coming toward them. He was immediately assailed by a volley of questions as to his late whereabouts, and after much taunting and more coaxing, seated himself, and assuming a very important manner, gave the following account with the utmost gravity: "Well, gemmen, when dat fightin' commenced, and de boys 'gan to drap like dey was hurt, an' de rebs 'gin runnin tow'd us purty fas', I jess 'cluded dat I could run faster dan dem. I jess got dat hoss pistol all ready, and away 1 went. Purty soon I he'rd somebody ridin' arter me, and when I looked 'roun', I tell you dat my legs trimbled, for I seed one ob dem rebel hoss offica' hs comin' like de berry debil. I didn't stop to take aim, but jess histed dat gun over my left shouldah, and pinted it in the d'rection of dat man, and pulled de' triggah, an' I'll bet a possum' dat I killed dat fellah, but I didn't stop, no sah! I jess kep' on runnin', and when de bullets 'gan to go whiz-z-z-z, and de big shot sing whir-r-r-r, I jess dodged to one side, an' lay down in de fiel' wha' I bin eber since! You don' catch dis chile foolin' wid dem rebs any mo',—no sah,-de bullets cum too clus, an' 'sturb my appytite!"" "As a contrast to the anecdote just given, I offer a tribute to the memory of a brave Michigan boy who gave his life to his country," said Isaac N. Phillips, corporal of Company A, 47th Illinois Infantry, 16th Army Corps: "We had been for ten or twelve days lying in the trenches in front of the frowning batteries of old Spanish Fort, one of the defences of the city of Mobile. About the fort proper were breastworks inclosing a large extent of land, with several smaller forts having mounted batteries. The 13th Army Corps lay upon the left of the 16th to which I belonged. I, with a large number from our brigade, was doing detail duty as a sharp-shooter up in the saps near the rebel works. The main line of the corps lay several hundred yards in our rear. The fighting had been done principally with artillery, and, day by day, as the siege progressed, and the tremendous siege-guns were put in place back on the main line, the cannonade upon the Union side grew more terrible and deadly. The leaden rain poured into the port-holes of the forts by the vigilant sharp-shooters (whose well-directed bullets made it almost impossible to man the rebel guns), with the still more terrible fire from the batteries, and the ponderous shells from the mortars far back of the main line in the woods, made the situation of the 'Johnnies' precarious in the extreme. "Those great mortar shells! Who that has ever heard the sound of their journey through the sky can ever forget it! When night settled down, and the cannonade would cease, |