1        Bucks County Intelligencer, From the Ringgold Regiment.  December 17, 1861  Page 2  Col. 5

 

LETTERS FROM OUR VOLUNTEERS.

From the Ringgold Regiment.

Correspondence of the Bucks County Intelligencer.

CAMP DAVIS, KALORAMA,

December 13th, 1861.

Messrs. Prizer and Darlington :—We are having de-

lightful weather.  December thus far is almost as warm

and pleasant as June in Bucks county.  It could not be

more favorable for such as live in tents.  If we had

rough, cold weather, the kind we generally receive at

this season of the year, the trials of the soldier would be

greatly increased.

The health of the regiment, I am glad to say, is fast im-

proving.  The small-pox that made its appearance ten

days since, and which threatened to prove a very serious

matter, has almost entirely left us.  Much praise is due

to our Surgeon, Dr. Peck, for the energy and skill dis-

played.  He spared no labor to arrest the progress of the

disease, and all who have been sick speak highly of the

good accommodations, and the kind treatment they re-

ceived while in the hospital, under the doctor’s care.—

Our friend, Dr. Robinson has been quite sick for more

than a week.  He left camp on Tuesday, in company

with his brother for home.  The Hospital Orderly is Peter

Nice, from New Hope, a member of company C.  He has

the entire control of the Hospital and is admirably fitted

for the work.  Mr. Nice has had a large experience in at-

tending the sick, as a nurse ; he made himself very use-

ful, during the yellow fever and cholera times.  He was also

three years in the Florida wars—employed in the Hos-

pitals.  He has two sons in the ranks of the Ringgold

Regiment.  I think that our friends at home need give

themselves no anxiety about us.  The few that are sick in

the Hospital are doing well—they will all soon be out-

again fit for duty.  The disease has been with us in a

mild form.  We have had no new cases for nearly a week. 

In a few days we will be in comfortable quarters, with

something more healthy to sleep upon than the wet

ground.  It is not unlikely that as soon as we get nicely

fixed in our new home, with a great many little contriv-

ances arranged for our comfort, we will have orders to

pack up and leave.  A soldier’s life is a very queer one.

You have all heard of the Paymaster’s visit.  We were

all very glad to see him.  There was no time to take the

small pox that day—all our attention was given to the

Paymaster and his money.  We received pay up to the

1st of November—making one month and nineteen days. 

The amount for each private was $21.23.  On the first of

January, we will receive pay for November and Decem-

ber.  An arrangement was made so that all can send mo-

ney home with no danger of loss.  The plan is a good one

—it came from the Colonel.  Company C sent to Bucks

county, $642.50.  I will give the names of those who

placed money in my hands, and the amount of each sum. 

I hope that on the next pay day the list will be much

longer.

R. W. Perry $20, Mahlon Moss $15, Samuel Taylor $11,

Wm. Robbins $15, Wm. Caffey $15, Stephen Gano $20,

Wm. H. Stiner $10, Isaac Hamilton $15, Abraham Silvey

$16, Peter S. Weisman $10, John B. Erwin $12, George T.

Magill $15; Julius B. Tyson $15, Chas. Michener $17,

Jordan Cooper $10, Jas. Dungan $10, Wm. S. Jones $10,

Joseph Roberts $10, James Fagney $10, W. H. Brown $10,

Stephen Clark $15, Edward Bright $20, Henry V. Ross

$20, Harrison Hibbs $20; Jas. M. Carver, $155, Joseph

Mullin $10, George Hinds $12?, Harvey Sines $15, Jacob

Obendeffer $12, Nathan Carver $10.  This money is now

in the Doylestown Bank, and only awaits the proper ones

to receive it.  Each person at home entitled to draw, has

received a check of her amount.  When it is presented to

the Bank, gold will be paid for it.  I received a letter

from Mr. Brock acknowledging the receipt of the draft. 

He stated that it would give him some trouble, but that

he would willingly do the work to accommodate so many

people.

The Intelligencer arrived this evening (Thursday.)  It

was getting to be quite a stranger.  It is becoming very

independent—comes when it pleases, sometimes it don’t

please to come at all.  Last week I don’t think there was

a single copy in camp.  The fault is not with you, for I

know that you mail a large number for us every week.—

The trouble, I suppose, is the pressure of business in the

Post Office department—papers are crowded out to give

room for the letters.

There was a paragraph in your paper of this week

stating that the Chaplain requires every soldier to salute,

when they meet him.  This I was sorry to see, for it is

not true.              Yours, truly,                  W. W. M.

CAMP DAVIS, Washington, D.C.,

December 7th, 1861.

Dear Intelligencer :—’I’ promised you in my last to

write to you soon again, to keep you and your readers

fully informed of the health and doings of the Ringgold

boys.

We are still encamped on the Heights, where we are

dry when the weather is dry, but the slightest rain gives

up more than our allowance of mud.  Camp Lacey was a

sticky place in rainy times, but Kalorama can beat it.—

We will all be glad when we receive marching orders and

take up the march for “ Davisville,” where we will be

quartered, for the winter.  The buildings are fast being com-

pleted, and when done, we will have a handsome village. 

Your townsman, Lieut. Carver, is Master Builder.  He has

four hundred mechanics under his command.  There will

be over sixty buildings in all—each company having one

with five apartments in it each mess furnished with a

stove and plenty of wood.  In a few days we will have

not only the necessaries, but the luxuries of life, and

will be fully prepared to receive and entertain our friends

from home.  We can even permit them to share our haver-

sacks ; and you, my friends, if you continue to behave

yourselves, will be allowed, with our Chaplain, &c, ? per-

misson, to even enter the officers’ quarters.

Our chaplain took occasion in his letter to the demo-

crat to say some plain things of your “voracious” cor-

respondent.  I am much surprised at the tone of his re-

marks; and styling that as a base falsehood which he

knows to be only the truth, with the refined epithets—

“ blackguard,” “ black sheep,” &c.—reminded me very

forcibly of the character of the sermon in question.  I will

insert here what I said in my last letter, if it offends the

Chaplain.  If he does not like to see in print the language

that he used in his sermon, he must still remember that

truth is mighty.

“ The morals of our regiment are decidedly better than any

of the neighboring regiments, and I doubt whether there are

any in the service in which there is so little profanity as in the

Ringgold—notwithstanding our Chaplain informed us, in his

remarks, on last Sabbath, that we were the most profane, and

vulgar regiment in the service; that he had visited ?

and prisons for the past seven years, and in depravity the 104th

Regiment surpassed them all.”

Now the above is the very language the preacher . 

Will not the 200 to 400 letters that each day passed from

camp, through the extraordinary exertions of our “ Chap-

lain,” &c., sustain me in the report that I made?  There

is not one officer or soldier in the entire Regiment, but

will, if interrogated, answer— " Potomac told the truth,

nothing but the truth.”

“ Chaplain,” &c., do you know anything of the ?

that the discourse produced in the minds of the hearers? 

Do you know how the men—not just the “ black-

guards” that you speak of that are in the Regiment—

but nearly every man—resolved that he would never go

to hear you again unless forced to do so ?

Do you know that on the Sabbath following that dis-

course, if every soldier had been left to his own free choice,

not more than 25 men would have gone to hear you?  So

great was the labor to induce the men to attend service

that force had to be resorted to.  Now, these are hard say-

ings, but they are plain truth.

You tell us that you labor night and day for the welfare

of the Regiment.  This will do very well to write home. 

It reads well.  But people away from camp have learned,

I hope, by this time not to place too much confidence in

newspaper correspondence.  For my own part, I don’t

doubt your interest in the success of the Regiment—you

have a very fine situation.

The Chaplain complains that I am one of the “ ?

black sheep” who are laboring to destroy his character

and render him unpopular with the Regiment.  I have

but this to say answer; If telling the truth will injure

a good man, let him fall.  But the efforts of a “ few black

sheep” are not needed to make our Chaplain unpopular

with the Regiment ; he has done this work most effectu-

ally for himself.

I have not time to pursue this subject further this week,

but all that I have said, either in this or in my former

letter, I can substantiate, not with none witness only, but

with the testimony of an entire Regiment.

In my former letter I gave this subject only a passing

notice, with no intention to misrepresent or do injustice

to any one.  I have been compelled to refer to the sub-

ject again; not from choice; but to present things in their

true light.

As I have no official signature, to attach to unofficial

newspaper correspondence, I simply sign myself.

Yours, truly,                            POTOMAC.