June, 1861.
June, 22
Arrived at Bellaire at 3 P. M. There is trouble in the neighborhood of Grafton. Have been ordered to that place.The Third is now on the Virginia side, and will in a few minutes take the cars.
June, 23
Reached Grafton at 1 P. M. All avowed secessionists have run away; but there are, doubtless, many persons here still who sympathize with the enemy, and who secretly inform him of all our movements.
June, 24
Colonel Marrow and I dined with Colonel Smith, member of the Virginia Legislature. He professes to be a Union man, but his sympathies are evidently with the South. He feels that the South is wrong, but does not relish the idea of Ohio troops [10] coming upon Virginia soil to fight Virginians. The Union sentiment here is said to be strengthening daily.
June, 26
Arrived at Clarksburg about midnight, and remained on the cars until morning. We are now encamped on a hillside, and for the first time my bed is made in my own tent.Clarksburg has apparently stood still for fifty years. Most of the houses are old style, built by the fathers and grandfathers of the present occupants. Here, for the first time, we find slaves, each of the wealthier, or, rather, each of the well-to-do, families owning a few.
There are probably thirty-five hundred troops in this vicinity — the Third, Fourth, Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and part of the Twenty-second Ohio, one company of cavalry, and one of artillery. Rumors of skirmishes and small fights a few miles off; but as yet the only gunpowder we have smelled is our own.
June, 28
At twelve o'clock to-day our battalion left Clarksburg, followed a stream called Elk creek for eight miles, and then encamped for the night. This is the first march on foot we have made. The country through which we passed is extremely hilly and broken, but apparently fertile. If the people of Western Virginia were united against us, it would be almost impossible for our army to advance. In many places the creek on one side, and the perpendicular banks on the other, leave a strip barely wide enough for a wagon road. [11]Buckhannon, twenty miles in advance of us, is said to be in the hands of the secession troops. To-morrow, or the day after, if they do not leave, a battle will take place. Our men appear eager for the fray, and I pray they may be as successful in the fight as they are anxious for one.
June, 29
It is half-past 8 o'clock, and we are still but eight miles from Clarksburg. We were informed this morning that the secession troops had left Buckhannon, and fallen back to their fortifications at Laurel Hill and Rich mountain. It is said General McClellan will be here to-morrow, and take command of the forces in person.In enumerating the troops in this vicinity, I omitted to mention Colonel Robert McCook's Dutch regiment, which is in camp two miles from us. The Seventh Ohio Infantry is now at Clarksburg, and will, I think, move in this direction to-morrow.
Provisions outside of camp are very scarce. I took breakfast with a farmer this morning, and can say truly that I have eaten much better meals in my life. We had coffee without sugar, short-cake without butter, and a little salt pork, exceedingly fat. I asked him what the charge was, and he said “Ninepence,” which means one shilling. I rejoiced his old soul by giving him two shillings.
The country people here have been grossly deceived by their political leaders. They have been made to believe that Lincoln was elected for the sole purpose of liberating the negro; that our army is marching into Virginia to free their slaves, destroy [12] their property, and murder their families; that we, not they, have set the Constitution and laws at defiance, and that in resisting us they are simply defending their homes and fighting for their constitutional rights.
