Master Lieut. Bradley of Company I sailing over the broad meadows on horseback, endeavoring to capture the splendid horses grazing on the luxuriant pastures there. Some of the horses were too fleet to be captured, and maintained their freedom.

(45) The boys fared well on this raid, getting milk, honey, apples, etc., in abundance. The apples were buried in holes, as is frequently done with potatoes. And it was a laughable sight to see the boys fairly tumbling over each other, and almost standing on their heads, as they dived into the apple holes, trying to not get left in their attempts at getting a fair share of the apples.

(46) Sergeant Orr has the floor once more for the narration of an incident said to have occurred here, for the truth of which, however, he does not vouch. He tells it thus:

(47) "Two men of the expedition went into a house to get something to eat. It happened that the male folks were all away from home, as was generally the case in that section when the Yanks were about, leaving only two single ladies of uncertain age in charge of the premises. When our two Yanks made their appearance, the two ladies became frantic with terror; and holding up their hands exclaimed, 'Take our money, take everything we have, but do not harm us personally'! 'You personally be damned,' said the Yanks, 'have you any corn-bread?' That soothed them."

(48) On this raid of the three companies we captured 60 head of horses and mules, 300 head of cattle, 41 prisoners and a wagon load of fine butter on its way to Staunton, Va. The owner of the butter was sent to Camp Chase. Where the bulk of the butter went is not known, but the boys made use of some of it.

(49) We arrived at Monterey on the night of the 9th, rejoining here the other seven companies, as before stated, which had accompanied an expedition under command of Gen. R. H. Milroy, to this point. The regiment remained here but one day, when we started on our return, by way of Crab Bottom, resting one day there in the old Rebel winter quarters. We resumed our march on the morning of the 13th, by way of Franklin, the county seat of Pendleton County; thence by way of Circleville and Hunting Ground Mountain, back to Tygart's Valley River, five miles below Beverly, our starting point.

(50) A sad accident occurred while crossing the mountain. A member of the Eighty-seventh Pennsylvania, who was along with the expedition, was accidentally shot by a comrade. His comrades attempted to carry him, but they could not do so, and they were compelled to bury him on the lonely mountain, using their bayonets to dig his grave.

(51) Leaving our camp below Beverly, we marched to Webster, on the Parkersburg branch of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, where we arrived on the 18th, marching a distance of 238 miles in fourteen days during the most inclement season of the year, fording mountain streams, swollen by melting snow and rain, many of the men barefooted, and the roads half knee-deep with mud. It is not to be wondered at that many of the men succumbed to this severe ordeal, and were candidates for the hospital on our arrival at Webster.

(52) One more incident of this raid will perhaps bear relating. Some of the boys took the measles on the route. On the return to Beverly a sergeant was sent in charge of an ambulance containing four sick boys, something in advance of the regiment, and over a different route, it is believed, from that taken by it. One evening, the second out, perhaps, after ascending and descending Cheat Mountain, the driver halted the ambulance just at its base on the west side, where there was a hotel.

(53) Now it happened that Gen. Milroy and his Adjutant General, Capt. McDonald, if his name is not mistaken, were going to put up at that hotel. The boys being quite sick, the Sergeant spoke to the landlord to procure beds for them. He seemed reluctant to comply with the request, and perhaps, to baffle the Sergeant, he told him to see Capt. McDonald about the matter, saying it would be just as the Captain said.

(54) It often is the case that a man holding an inferior rank or position assumes an air of more importance, and more of "the insolence of office," than do his superiors. This Captain was no exception to this rule. In fact, he was a specimen of the type of fellows represented by the fellow who was "a bigger [sic] man than old Grant." So when the Sergeant spoke to him regarding the getting of the beds, he put on a forbidding and repellant air and said sarcastically that "he was not quarter-master." The Sergeant replied with somewhat of offended dignity that he would not have come to him at all, only that the landlord had referred him, the Sergeant, to him, the Captain.

(55) Here Gen. Milroy spoke up in a courteous and considerate manner, quite in contrast with that of the Captain, saying "We do not assume to have the disposition of the landlord's beds; they are entirely at his own disposal. As for myself, I can sleep on the floor." The Sergeant, being thus left to his own resources, secured those beds for the sick boys.

(56) The regiment left Webster on the 19th, going over the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad to New Creek, in Hampshire County, West Virginia, distance 89 miles, arriving there the same day. There were other troops besides the Twelfth. One of the regiments of these was the Twenty-third Illinois Infantry, Col. Mulligan's regiment. This command was made up almost if not entirely of men of Irish birth, Mulligan himself being of that nationality. He was a fine, tall, erect man, with a military air, and a general mien and bearing that would attract attention anywhere. For this reason, and because of his national reputation, no doubt, and, it may be, the circumstance that he wore a green shirt, he attracted considerable attention from our boys.

(57) As the weather was now pretty cold, and severe winter was approaching; and as we had established a camp here with regularly-laid-out streets, it looked as though we might winter here. But we staid here only three weeks. On the 11th of December our regiment marched by way of Burlington and Petersburg to Moorefield, the county seat of Hardy County.

(58) On the march to this place Lieut. Col. Northcott, stopping at a house on the way between Petersburg and Moorefield and getting thus behind the command, was taken prisoner by a Rebel scout. One of our scouts, however, followed the Rebel and his prisoner, and recaptured the Colonel, after, it was said, a severe hand-to-hand fight, in which each scout surrendered alternately, the Union scout coming out final victor.

  CHAPTER III.

(59) At Moorefield the Twelfth was assigned to Gen. Cluseret's brigade of Milroy's division, and on the 17th Gen. Cluseret started on an expedition to Strasburg, Va., the Twelfth being part of his command. We marched 26 miles the first day, camping on Lost River, four miles from Wordensville. That night was cold and stormy. The wind blew so that it made the soldiers' blankets flap as they lay under them trying to get a little sleep, and it was so cold that in some cases they had to get up in the night to go to the large fires they had made to get warm. That night it froze so hard that the creek was frozen so as to bear up a horse, but not quite the artillery. There was some difficulty in getting it over the creek. It was to this bleak and inhospitable place that the eccentric genius, "Barney" Wiles of Company D, alluded when he spoke of "the place where fire froze and turkeys chewed tobacco."

(60) The second day the command marched through Wordensville to Capon Springs, 18 miles, encamping there for the night in the Mountain House, a magnificent building of 410 well finished rooms, situated right in the midst of rather a dense forest. Owing to the torturous mountain roads we were close to this building before observing it. Making a sharp turn in the road, its grand proportions flashed upon us suddenly, as if by magic. The water in these springs is quite warm, and much steam was arising from it that cold