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David W. Stafford
A true war story. A pen picture of scenes and incidents during the great rebellion.--Thrilling experiences during escape from southern prisons, etc
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There is one thing that I recall to memory very distinctly. It is the incident of our camping on the battle field of Bull Run, on our retreat from Mine Run, near the Rapidan River. Near this run the rebels had very strong fortifications thrown up. Now on the battle field of Bull Run our dead had just been covered—a great many by the enemy—on top of the ground, and so shallow that the bones of thousands of the dead, skulls and all others, lay on top of the ground. Oh, how sad it did seem to wake in the morning to find the country strewn with human bones for miles around, and it is one thing that I can’t forget very soon.
I had gone over the ground in the direction of Bull Run, and very close to the run, studded with trees, sat the skeleton of one of our Indiana men against a large elm tree, just as he had died one year before. I called the attention of the officers to this spectacle. The skeleton was in a sitting posture, the flesh having entirely disappeared, and on the ground lay his blue clothes. On the arms of the clothes were the emblems showing the sergeant’s stripes and the number of his company and regiment. One of the officers just touched his sabre under the chin of this skeleton and it fell all to pieces. I thought this a wonderful sight.
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