Saturday, May 26, 2012

1862 May 27 about 5 miles from Hanover Junction, Va.


[from the diary of John Tyler of Letcher's Artillery]

May 27th.  Awoke this morning still rain-
-ing and we saturated through & through.
Started off in about half an hour after
rising.  Passed a house on the road where
the men got at whiskey.  Halted a short
distance from it on the road to feed
the horses.  Two or three of us went back
and took breakfast there which con-
-sisted of coffee, biscuits & fat bacon,
for which the moderate sum of .88 cts each
was charged. – After the battery had
moved on from this point, the road
became so bad that we halted and the
Capt. went down a new road that turned
off on our right to see if we could not
cut off the bad roads by going around –
while the Capt was gone the whiskey com-
-menced to take effect, and a general fight
ensued, in which about one half the Comp-
-any was engaged swords were drawn &

pistols.  The command devolving on us
I had at first a good deal of difficulty
in getting the men to listen to me;  but
in a short time, after taking a pistol
from one of them & depriving others of their
swords, & ordering the men to their
posts, the riot was stopped without
my drawing my pistols, although two
or three times I started to unfasten my
holsters.  I was very glad the Capt. was
not there for he would certainly have
shot some of them.  He came up a few
moments after and was just about
reviving it by calling out in an ex-
-cited tone “what is the matter here”
etc when I told him not to say any thing
at all as it was all over, and the best
thing we could do was to start on.  So
we took the road that branched off
towards Ashland, leaving the rest of
the train to pursue their way over the

bad road we left.  We reached Ashland
in a short time, as it was only a mile
off.  There we stopped long enough to get
some corn for our horses.  During which
time I went down to see Mr. Macmurdo’s
family with Mr. Pemberton whom I met
at the Depot.  Took a wash there & res-
-ted a short time, when Mrs. Mac [letter lined through] gave
me a bundle of biscuits & ham for my
haversack, most acceptable I can as-
-sure you.  Left Ashland on a good road
to join our train at a little beyond Kilbys
Mill station.  When we reached the railroad
we found Genl. Anderson & staff, who
told us that orders had been issued for our
return to Hanover Junction, & we started
back on our return, immediately after
drawing some crackers for the men they
nor me having had any thing to eat since
early in the morning.  We Camped about
5 miles from Hanover junction at 6 o’c [The time of “6” is not perfectly clear.]

[transcription by Mary Roy Dawson Edwards]

MSS 6150

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