Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 10.djvu/271

 The No7'thern Volunteers.

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��attack of McLaw's division, and again at Petersl)urg, where, in the assault of June 15, 1864, a line of formida- ble works was carried by the skirmish line of Gen. W. F. Smith's corps.

The picket line at night in the dark recesses of the Southern forests was a great trial of the morale of the sol- dier. Then silence itself had its alarms. A private soldier of 1861 wrote these lines, which, whatever their poetic merit may be, well ex- press what many a soldier has felt on his solitary post :

"Alas! the weary hours pass slow;

The night is very dark and still. And in the marshes far below

I hear the bearded whip-poor-will. I scarce can sec a yard ahead ;

My ears are strained to catch each sound ; I hear the leaves about me shed,

And the springs bubbling through the ground.

"Along the beaten patli I pace

Where white scraps mark my sentry's track; In formless shrubs I seem to trace

The foeman's form with bending back. I think I see him crouching low;

I stop and list — I stoop and peer — Until the neighboring hillocks grow

To groups of soldiers, far and near.

" With ready piece I A'ait and watch

Until my eyes, familiar grown, Detect each harmless earthen notch.

And turn guerillas into stone. And then, amid the lonely gloom,

Beneath the tall old chestnut-trees , My silent marches I resume,

And think of other times than these."

In front of Richmond, in 1862, the army, then new to this phase of war, maintained its picket line for a month in the woods and thickets, within rifle shot, and in places within pistol shot, of the enemy's pickets. The crack of rifle was heard day and night, and the scattering shots often swelled into a rolling fusilade, to be followed by the roar of shells whirling over the crouching pickets. The time was full of alarms. Unused to reading

��the signs of war, for a long time every soldier on picket was tense with the feeling that each outburst of arms might be the signal for an attack by the enemy. The keenest vigilance possessed every man. Without the element of strong and self-reliant character in the soldier, the picket line at this time would have been the source of constant alarm to the arm}'. But, in fact, the conduct of the troops on picket was so admirable that a sense of security possessed the army behind the earthworks that was not to be disturbed by anything short of seeing the pickets coming in in re- treat, which was a rare occurrence.

Concerning the conduct of the vol- unteers in battle, the Comte de Paris, a very friendlv writer, sa^'s, that while they showed much personal bravery and skill in firing, these qual- ities alone cannot give to a body of troops "• that collective courage which inspires every man with the same spirit, and enables it to undertake with unanimity of purpose " what is impossible for the individual, and that "■this distinctive trait of well trained armies which constitutes their superiority is the result of long hab- its of discipline and the influence of old and experienced regimental or- ganizations."

He also says that it took our sol- diers " a long time to learn that upon ground where fighting had to be done at short distances, it is almost less dangerous to rush upon the enemy than to be decimated by his fire while standing still." But he says " they went under fire more resolutely the second time than the first."

Gen. de Chanal writes as follows : "It is difficult to compare the Amer-

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