CHAPTER V.
ANOTHER NIGHT MARCH - FAYETTEVILLE OCCUPIED – DISAPPOINTMENT - "JAYHAWKING" A NECESSITY – PILLAGING - INEXPLICABLE CONDUCT OF OUR COMMANDERS - SUDDEN EVACUATION OF THE PLACE - OUR SICK ABANDONED, WHO FALL INTO THE HANDS OF THE REBELS - RETURN TO MISSOURI - KEITHSVILLE BURNED - MARCH TO MARIONSVILLE.
A deep anxiety prevailed in regard to the movements of Generals BLUNT and HERRON who were still in the neighborhood of Fayetteville. Rumors were current that the former had met with a slight reverse and had been compelled to fall back from Bentonville. Consequently when we received orders at 8 o'clock P. M., October 27th, to march immediately, no surprise was felt and we at once concluded that we were to hasten to his assistance to take part in another combination of "strategical movements" by which, as usual, we were destined to perform the labor while the other divisions would reap the honor. We accordingly, after a hasty preparation, set out in a southwest direction.
The fall season was well advanced and the nights were cold and chilling; but the 37th Illinois being in the advance we were well supplied with fires, as that regiment were proverbial for frequent rests and a vague idea as to the utility of leaving fences or other combustible matter
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in their rear. The country over which we passed during the night was much broken, but at the approach of day we intersected the direct road from Springfield to Fayetteville, which was bordered by fine farms, the land less rugged but still presenting some of the desolating effects of war in the smouldering ruins of mills, dwellings, and deserted farms. At daybreak our march was quickened, the battery was hurried to the front, regiments began closing up, and we were convinced a crisis was at hand. Continuing our march without hearing the report of artillery we began to hope that the 2nd division had out-maneuvered or out-marched the 1st and 3rd, and if fighting was to be done, we would have the glory of participating in it. But, alas, our hopes were again doomed to disappointment. When within two miles of Fayetteville, we heard the heavy booming of those twelve pounders, which so animated us at Newtonia, but which told us plainly enough we were again too late. Halting when we had arrived nearly in the suburbs of the town, weary and disappointed, we flung ourselves down by the roadside, listening to the sounds of battle as it gradually died away in the distance towards Boston Mountain.
Remaining here till 2 o'clock P. M., we were marched through the village, bivouacking in a ravine on the west side. The first objects of interest that here caught our attention on halting, were a number of swine, which had failed to imitate their owners in running away, and as we had been disappointed in smelling rebel gunpowder, were amply compensated in feasting on rebel pork, and
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the rich abundance of vegetables from gardens in the vicinity. Calling upon the inhabitants generally for contributions of milk, butter, corn-bread, preserves, jellies, &c., they were promptly furnished, as a refusal to comply would probably have been followed by greater loss. The dainties thus provided through the fears of our secesh friends, notwithstanding they were the productions of rebel soil, and gathered from rebel cellars and cupboards, were found well adapted to loyal palates after a weary march and long fast. The sumptuous repast thus furnished us by the intensely disloyal citizens of this town, will ever be held in grateful remembrance by the 20th regiment.
By our frequent long and hasty marches, our commissary department had become nearly exhausted, and as sufficient rations could not be regularly drawn from that quarter, "jayhawking" had become a part of every man's duty for his own preservation for the time being. Each man, therefore, provided his own commissariat. By this course we were relieved from the necessity of making "provision returns," and the services of an issuing clerk were entirely dispensed with. We drew from the inhabitants by their fears - from hen-roosts by the tail - and thus made amends for the quartermaster's neglect in not giving us beef.
While some of the soldiers of the brigade were thus engaged in providing for the culinary department, there were many others busily employed in examining into the affairs of merchants and dealers who had carelessly
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abandoned their places of business without locking the doors. This, some of our men thought, indicated an unwarrantable recklessness on the part of dry goods and grocery merchants and they at once proceeded to act as executors de son tort, and I will do them the justice to say that their work was thoroughly done. In some of the stores bolts of muslin, silks, ribbons and fancy goods were lying indiscriminately about the floor, among shovels, pitchforks, nails, and crockery-ware, over which large numbers of soldiers were constantly passing and re-passing in search of articles more useful for camp purposes. In the postoffice, which had been hastily abandoned on our approach, many "relic-hunters" were assembled, eagerly examining the letters which had been left - and when an epistle from some gushing "moonstruck" secesh lover to his sympathetic female friend was found and read aloud to the crowd of eager listeners, shouts of applause followed, and as the articles were being disposed of by auction, the letter was bought by the highest bidder, who paid for it with "Fayetteville scrip," a local currency which was found in abundance in all the stores.
A few private dwellings were also entered by men of other regiments, and acts of a disgraceful character perpetrated. The citizens who remained after our entry into the place, all claimed to be "good Union men," but in our journeyings through the south we never encountered one who did not disclaim all sympathy with the rebellion, but whom his neighbors, in their zeal to prove their own loyalty, would assure us was a "persecutor of
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Union men." We soon came to the conclusion that all southern men who were not in our own or the rebel army were true to neither, but changed their professions in accordance with circumstances. This indiscriminate plundering, therefore, although against the strict orders of our commanding general, and deprecated by all the order-loving men of our own regiment, we never felt any inclination to check, unless on duty for that purpose.
After enjoying the hospitalities of our kind friends at Fayetteville until 8 o'clock on the morning of the 30th, we were suddenly ordered to prepare for marching immediately. Accordingly within an hour from the reception of the order, after placing several of our men who were sick in hospital, we hastily departed, and after a rapid march of eight hours arrived at the camp we occupied before going to Fayetteville.
Why we moved back in such haste, leaving our sick to fall into the hands of the rebels, who entered the town on the south-west while we were leaving it on the southeast, is still a mystery to me. At the time some of us supposed it to be a brilliant "strategical" move! but as no corresponding brilliant results were developed from it, I now believe that it may be classed with other of somebody's pleasantries - or blunders - which kept us continually on meaningless hard service.
The position of the other two divisions of our army at the time of our departure was a matter of some speculation. We learned, however, that in his engagement on the morning of our arrival at Fayetteville, Gen, BLUNT
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had killed thirteen rebels, and captured a number of prisoners, with a loss on his part of one horse only.
The 2nd and 3rd divisions of the "Army of the Frontier," was now placed in position extending on a line from Huntsville to Cross-Hollows, and the 1st temporarily at Prairie Creek, some distance west of Bentonville - where we awaited future movements of the enemy.
We remained in camp at Osage Springs until November 2nd. Nothing occurred during our stay worthy of note, except that the monotonous routine of camp duties was sometimes relieved by startling rumors of bold exploits by BLUNT'S command, and great activity on the part of our indefatigable wide-awake "jayhawkers," to whose perseverance our tables bore unmistakable evidence.
In the latter part of October orders were received from Gen. CURTIS at St. Louis, by which the 2nd and 3rd divisions were recalled from Arkansas. Accordingly on the morning of November 2nd, our regiment broke camp at Osage Springs at 10 o'clock A. M., and set out in the direction of Keithsville. We had an easy march of thirteen miles, and bivouacked at the junction of the Fayetteville and Huntsville roads, in an old cotton field at 4 o'clock in the afternoon - our place of encampment being called "Ford's Farm."
We remained in camp here until 1 o'clock P. M, on the following day, when our march was resumed on the road leading to Keithsville. After a rapid march of seventeen miles, over a dusty road we arrived at that
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place at 8 o'clock the same evening, where we bivouacked for the night.
Keithsville, since our previous visit, had been the scene of much commotion, and was now a mass of ruins. By information received from one of the residents, still remaining in the locality, we learned that a party of guerrillas had attacked a mail carrier while passing through the town a few days previous to our arrival, on his way from our army to Cassville, severely wounding him. The carrier, however, succeeded in escaping to Cassville, pursued almost to the picket line at that place by the guerrillas, where he reported the outrage to Maj. MONTGOMERY, commanding the post. The Major at once despatched a squad of the 6th Missouri Cavalry to punish the offenders, who, not finding the guerrillas, retaliated on the citizens, by reducing the town to ashes.
Resuming our march from Keithsville at 7 o'clock on the following morning we found many of the fine farm houses which we had passed on our previous march from Cassville, now in ashes. The hand of desolating war had by this time began to press heavily on this region of country, and its effects were now becoming visible. We passed Cassville without halting, but did not fail to observe, however, that the Court House, whose walls had so often reverberated with the voice of eloquence and the decrees of justice, and where each oppressive wrong received its just retribution, had now been converted to the double use of a stable and military prison - being occupied jointly by Confederate prisoners and mules. A
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distinction had been made in favor of the mules, who occupied the ground floor, while a few guerrillas and desperadoes were closely guarded in the upper rooms. Strange association, but perhaps not inappropriate. Leaving this village, we followed the direct road to Springfield - wading Silver Creek, which we found "navigable for boots," seven times in a march of four miles - and at 3 o'clock in the afternoon bivouacked at Camp "Three Widows." This camp is twelve miles north of Cassville, and derived its name from its being located on part of three farms occupied by three widows of rebel officers. Our men were much fatigued on this twenty miles march, as the day was warm and few halts made to rest, yet the cheering anticipations of soon reaching Springfield - the hope of meeting the "paymaster" - and the bright visions of greenbacks, crinoline and civilization, measurably overcame our fatigue. But the following morning, shortly after resuming the march, our course was suddenly changed to the northwest, and all these bright visions of rest, civilization and money vanished into thin air.
We marched on the 5th about twenty miles over a good road, with many well improved farms on either side, and water more abundant encamping at Marionsville at half past four o'clock P. M.