Page:Nurse and spy in the Union Army.djvu/143

Rh diers were digging trenches in which to bury the mangled bodies of the slain. I passed along the entire line and uncovered every face, in search of one who had given me a small package the day before when going into battle, telling me that if he should be killed to send it home; and, said he, "here is a ring on my finger which I want you to send to ——. It has never been off my finger since she placed it there the morning I started for Washington. If I am killed please take it off and send it to her." I was now in search of him, but could find nothing of the missing one. At last I saw a group of men nearly half a mile distant, who also seemed to be engaged in burying the dead. I made my way toward them as fast as I could, but when I reached them the bodies had all been lowered into the trench, and they were already filling it up.

I begged them to let me go down and see if my friend was among the dead, to which the kind hearted boys consented. His body lay there partially covered with earth; I uncovered his face; he was so changed I should not have recognized him, but the ring told me that it was he. I tried with all my might to remove the ring, but could not. The fingers were so swollen that it was impossible to get it off. In life it was a pledge of faithfulness from one he loved, " and in death they were not divided."

The dead having been buried and the wounded