Our blisters had scarcely well hardened to callosities when orders reached Weitzel's brigade to break camp, overtake Dwight, who was five miles ahead, and push the enemy as rapidly as possible to Alexandria. I was at this time on a court-martial at Opelousas, and we might, I suspect, have remained on that duty, and so have escaped the three days of misery which followed; but, anticipating a battle, we enthusiastically deemed it our duty to adjourn to the General's headquarters and beg leave to join the column.
Starting at five in the afternoon, we reached a broken bridge about seven, made it passable, after several hours of labor, and then pushed on until three in the morning. Next to the stupidity and fruitless worry of night fighting, comes the stupidity and fruitless worry of night marching. Except under extraordinary circumstances, the results which it achieves do not half compensate for the mischief which it works on the discipline of an army, and the morale and physique of the individual soldier. The officer cannot see his men, and they straggle in spite of him. There is constant falling, stumbling, and unrewarded waste of strength, accompanied by irritation, quarrelling, and disorderliness. Every molehill seems a mountain; every unusual darkness in the path shows like an abyss; the line is continually opening, and must be closed up by laborious double-quicking. The men stagger against each other, and slumber marching. At every halt to rest, some fall asleep, and are left behind in the darkness. When we bivouacked at three in the morning, ten hours from our starting point, we had made only sixteen miles, and were as exhausted as if we had gone thirty. My company was immediately sent out on picket, and this duty kept me moving and watching until sunrise. After a breakfast of hard-tack and coffee, I dozed a few minutes while the fall-in call was beating, and then set off on a day's march of twenty-seven miles, coming in after nightfall well blistered.
The next day, bivouacked on rolling turf by the side of a lovely stream, we bathed and rested. Before dawn on the third morning, having as yet had less than ten hours' sleep since leaving Opelousas, I commenced the hardest day's work of my life. Starting lame, and improving from hour to hour, like foundered horses, we accomplished twenty-four miles by three in the afternoon. As usual, we had halted ten minutes in every hour, closing up, coming to a front, dressing the line, stacking arms, and dropping down by the side of the road to rest. The men had kept well together; such few as had fallen out had come up during the long pause which took place at three; and we were, so far, proud of our march, and rather pleased at having done so much. But this sentiment was based on the expectation that we would presently go into bivouac. When, therefore, General Banks joined the column, and some one heard him say that we must reach Alexandria that night, and the horrible tale passed down along the line of stacks, our hearts were suddenly full of despair and growling.
For the next ten miles it was a fight against nature. Every effort was made to cheer the men onward and beguile them from a sense of their miseries. The staggering drummers were forced to beat the march for the staggering regiments. Some of the field officers dismounted, and walked at the head of their commands. At one halt, Lieutenant-Colonel Van Patten ran foot-races in his big boots with a private, to make the soldiers laugh at the unusual buffoonery. Staff officers rode up and down the line, giving orders to yell, and setting the example of uproar. The company officers carried the rifles of tottering men, and hastened from straggler to straggler, cheering, ordering, and threatening, but, I think, never striking; for no one could find it in his heart to maltreat poor fellows who were
