19th.–I confess to myself to-night, that deeply as I am I interested in the cause for which we fight–the question of government against anarchy–what I have witnessed today has cooled much of the enthusiasm with which I entered the service of this government, which I find so tardy in doing justice to those who are fighting for its preservation: This is a stormy day in mid-winter. Whilst going my rounds of camp to see what was needed for the health and comfort of the men, I passed the guard house of the regiment, and stepped in to see the condition of things. I there found soldiers–formerly my neighbors–sons of my friends, imprisoned in a pen where pigs could not have lived a fortnight without scalding the hair off them, (this is not figurative language) and in which these men had been kept for three months, awaiting the decision of a court martial which had tried them for some trivial offence, the extremest penalty of which would have amounted to some three to six days’ confinement! at all events, under the extremest limit of the law, its punishment could not have exceeded in severity a sentence of three days’ imprisonment in this vile hole of filth and water! Yes, they had been tried, and for three months had been kept, not only in this vile hole, but under indignity and disgrace, awaiting the convenience of gentlemanly officers, to send them word whether they were honorably acquitted, or that they must be imprisoned for two or three days. When these men, who, perhaps, have never been guilty of offence besides being suspected of it, are released from this disgraceful punishment, will they not feel indignant at hearing the justice of their government questioned, and be ready to rush to arms again to defend it? If scenes like this are necessary to the preservation of a government for my protection, then in God’s name let me be untrammelled by conventional forms, and left dependent on my own powers for my protection. I assumed a prerogative; I pronounced most of these men sick, and ordered them sent to my hospital. They will hardly be pronounced well before the gentlemanly members of the court get ready to inform them of their sentence.
From this last scene I passed on to look up a party of our Regiment, who had been detailed to guard the General’s Headquarters. I found them; and, my God! what a sight!– Around the house occupied by the General was a large ditch, some five feet deep, and some ten or twelve feet wide, dug as the commencement of a fort. In this ditch, over which a few evergreen boughs had been thrown as a covering, stood a well dressed Lieutenant, (from my own county) with a squad of soldiers guarding the General’s house–the Lieutenant trying to infuse into the men a little warmth of patriotic feeling, whilst the winter torrents poured through the evergreen branches, and their whole frames shook with cold in this sentry house, charitably built for them by orders of the General, who at that moment was being joyful over his wine, and with his friends!! And is this the REPUBLIC, the government of equality for which I am fighting? If we were men, this would be pitiable, but we are only soldiers, volunteer soldiers at that; and what right have we to be cold, when our services are wanted for the comfort of a General? But these are only thoughts; should I write or speak them, it would amount to shameful insubordination, and I should be disgracefully dismissed from the service of the country which tolerates it. I am too honorable a man to permit myself to be disgraced, even for the privilege of uttering a truth. I therefore decline to say, or even to write, what I have seen.
This afternoon I received an order to be ready to move at a moment’s notice, and to give no more certificates for furloughs, as the applications would not be entertained. I have lost faith in the idea that the authorities have the slightest intention to move. They have seen our impatience to do something, and this order is a mere dumb-watch thrown us children to amuse us with the old promised hope that “when it gets a little older it will keep time.”