July 25th. Nearly all the men are back again to-night, and military duty is to be resumed to-morrow, but our three months have expired, and we are ordered back to New York to be mustered out of service. The President has called for three hundred thousand men to serve for three years, or the war. The country is just beginning to realize the magnitude of the undertaking, and the first thing it is going to do is to organize a regular army, which will last at least for three years. Our views of war are somewhat modified by the past three months’ experience, but I am determined to return, and under more favorable conditions, try to find that exaltation and glory that I have always associated with arms.
We shall go home and refit for a long period, organize and discipline an army, and when officers and men have learned to adjust themselves to their new positions, and know each other and their duties thoroughly, then commence afresh, and go on to victory, or sustain defeat with dignity. The cause is just as great to-day as it was the day we left New York, and, while we have been temporarily overthrown, there is no cause for despondency. We shall as certainly win in the end, as though we had never seen, or heard, of the disastrous battle of Bull Run.
For myself, I have served in the ranks for the last time; and shall go home and apply at once for a commission in some of the regiments now forming to serve for three years or the war, which will be more to my taste than serving in the ranks.