Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/174

160 In the summer of 1864 Wright's Georgia brigade was stationed at a point where the opposing lines were some distance apart, and the preacher used to stand on a plat of grass in front of the trenches while the men would gather close around him or sit on the parapet. One night, with a full moon shedding its light upon the scene, there was an unusually large congregation and a service of more than ordinary power. A large number came forward for prayer, there were a number of professions of faith in Christ, and at the close of the service I received nine for baptism, and had just announced that I would administer the ordinance the next morning, when the "long roll" beat, the brigade formed at once, and in a few minutes began the march to one of the bloody battles of that summer. Several days later the brigade returned to its quarters, and I went back to resume my meetings, and look up my candidates for baptism. I found, alas ! that out of the nine received three had been killed, two were wounded and one was a prisoner, so that there were only three left for me to baptize.

The alacrity with which the men went to work to build chapels may be cited as an illustration of their eagerness to hear the Gospel. When we went into winter quarters along the Manassas line in the winter of 1861-62, a few of the commands had well-constructed chapels. I think the first one was built in the Seventeenth Virginia regiment, of which Rev. John L. Johnson (long the distinguished professor of English in the university of Mississippi) was chaplain. There was one also in the Tenth Virginia infantry, of which Rev. S. S. Lambeth, of the Virginia Methodist Conference, was chaplain. In the Thirteenth Virginia infantry we had a chapel and "parsonage" under the same roof, and a well-selected circulating library, which proved a great comfort and blessing to the men. Down on the Rappahannock the next winter there was a still larger number of chapels, and a large and very comfortable one was built in the "Stone-