It’s 5:30 in the morning, I can barely see a thing, and I’m huddling round a tiny fire wishing I’d taken my greatcoat with me. I can’t say that I slept well: I’m not accustomed to sleeping in just my blanket and uniform. Nobody is really saying much, but we can see gloomy outlines moving in the other companies’ streets. The silence is eventually broken by our sergeant’s whisper:
‘First call, boys’
I follow others into our Sibley and fumble for my accoutrements. I can just make out the belt buckle and am relived to notice that when I put it on it is the correct way up. Picking up my Enfield I go outside and find my position in the line. Whether we were ordered to remain quiet, or just all chose to be, I don’t remember. After forming company, the front rank leads off and passes the commissary, where we are issued two pieces of hardtack and an apple. The rear rank follows us, and we form up as a battalion. After a short discussion between the officers we start marching. It is a beautiful cloudless night for such a stroll, but this isn’t a sightseeing exercise. Not at this hour, at any rate. I don’t know how far we were taken, but the landscape is rolling and we climb and descend several ridges. Or, indeed, the same ridge several times.
As the exercise wakes us up, scatterings of conversation are heard. We halt.
‘Where’d you get that English accent?’ I’m asked.
‘England’, I reply. I then vaguely introduce myself, but we’re soon moving again.
By the time we see the first rays of dawn, we’re in a sloping field, surrounded by trees. A team of oxen are pulling an artillery piece. Facing a line of trees, we go to ‘in place rest’, and just wait. Another company have formed a skirmish line, whilst up on the ridge we occasionally see figures appearing and disappearing. The conversation is flowing more easily now: we’ve certainly all woken up. Some of us kneel down. My bayonet pokes someone behind me:
‘I know you Europeans are more liberal, but…’
There are repeated sightings of cavalry on the ridge. The ridge hides the sun, but I’ve been enjoying watching the sky lighten, and turn from pink to orange to yellow. It should be a lovely day, but I’m starting to feel anxious. We’ve been held in this position for a long time now, and all we are facing is a line of trees. It feels vulnerable, and the waiting just adds to this sensation of unease. They’re out there, somewhere, but we aren’t getting any closer to making contact, nor is our current position amenable to an efficient execution of the ghastly business.
We see movement, and hear the crack of the skirmishers’ muskets. We march over into the next field. We can see the Rebels now, in the distance. We start firing. They reply in kind. This continues for a bit, and we marched at some point to a different part of the field to get a better shot. Eventually, we realise that more cavalry and infantry are approaching us from the field we had been in at dawn. We are surrounded, and the officers decide to surrender us. We march back, defeated.