Andersonville, vol 2 | Page 4

NEW LOT OF PRISONERS--THE BATTLE OF
OOLUSTEE--MEN SACRIFICED TO A GENERAL'S
INCOMPETENCY--A HOODLUM REINFORCEMENT--A QUEER
CROWD-- MISTREATMENT OF AN OFFICER OF A COLORED
REGIMENT--KILLING THE SERGEANT OF A NEGRO SQUAD.
So far only old prisoners--those taken at Gettysburg, Chicamauga and
Mine Run--had been brought in. The armies had been very quiet during

the Winter, preparing for the death grapple in the Spring. There had
been nothing done, save a few cavalry raids, such as our own, and
Averill's attempt to gain and break up the Rebel salt works at
Wytheville, and Saltville. Consequently none but a few cavalry
prisoners were added to the number already in the hands of the Rebels.
The first lot of new ones came in about the middle of March. There
were about seven hundred of them, who had been captured at the battle
of Oolustee, Fla., on the 20th of February. About five hundred of them
were white, and belonged to the Seventh Connecticut, the Seventh New
Hampshire, Forty Seventh, Forty-Eighth and One Hundred and
Fifteenth New York, and Sherman's regular battery. The rest were
colored, and belonged to the Eighth United States, and Fifty-Fourth
Massachusetts. The story they told of the battle was one which had
many shameful reiterations during the war. It was the story told
whenever Banks, Sturgis, Butler, or one of a host of similar smaller
failures were trusted with commands. It was a senseless waste of the
lives of private soldiers, and the property of the United States by
pretentious blunderers, who, in some inscrutable manner, had attained
to responsible commands. In this instance, a bungling Brigadier named
Seymore had marched his forces across the State of Florida, to do he
hardly knew what, and in the neighborhood of an enemy of whose
numbers, disposition, location, and intentions he was profoundly
ignorant. The Rebels, under General Finnegan, waited till he had strung
his command along through swamps and cane brakes, scores of miles
from his supports, and then fell unexpectedly upon his advance. The
regiment was overpowered, and another regiment that hurried up to its
support, suffered the same fate. The balance of the regiments were sent
in in the same manner--each arriving on the field just after its
predecessor had been thoroughly whipped by the concentrated force of
the Rebels. The men fought gallantly, but the stupidity of a
Commanding General is a thing that the gods themselves strive against
in vain. We suffered a humiliating defeat, with a loss of two thousand
men and a fine rifled battery, which was brought to Andersonville and
placed in position to command the prison.
The majority of the Seventh New Hampshire were an unwelcome

addition to our numbers. They were N'Yaarkers--old time colleagues of
those already in with us--veteran bounty jumpers, that had been drawn
to New Hampshire by the size of the bounty offered there, and had
been assigned to fill up the wasted ranks of the veteran Seventh
regiment. They had tried to desert as soon as they received their bounty,
but the Government clung to them literally with hooks of steel, sending
many of them to the regiment in irons. Thus foiled, they deserted to the
Rebels during the retreat from the battlefield. They were quite an
accession to the force of our N'Yaarkers, and helped much to establish
the hoodlum reign which was shortly inaugurated over the whole
prison.
The Forty-Eighth New Yorkers who came in were a set of chaps so odd
in every way as to be a source of never-failing interest. The name of
their regiment was 'L'Enfants Perdu' (the Lost Children), which we
anglicized into "The Lost Ducks." It was believed that every nation in
Europe was represented in their ranks, and it used to be said jocularly,
that no two of them spoke the same language. As near as I could find
out they were all or nearly all South Europeans, Italians, Spaniards;
Portuguese, Levantines, with a predominance of the French element.
They wore a little cap with an upturned brim, and a strap resting on the
chin, a coat with funny little tales about two inches long, and a brass
chain across the breast; and for pantaloons they had a sort of a petticoat
reaching to the knees, and sewed together down the middle. They were
just as singular otherwise as in their looks, speech and uniform. On one
occasion the whole mob of us went over in a mass to their squad to see
them cook and eat a large water snake, which two of them had
succeeded in capturing in the swamps, and carried off to their mess,
jabbering in high glee over their treasure trove. Any of us were ready to
eat a piece of dog, cat, horse or mule, if we could get it, but, it was
generally agreed,