CHAPTER XII.

The Connecticut Chaplains'-aid Commission. - Chapel Tents and Regimental Libraries furnished. Medical Examining Board. - Spring Election of 1862. — The War Spirit predominant. - Governor's Message. - Legislative Action. Special December Session. Party Spirit rising. Cornelius S. Bushnell builds the Monitor.

HE literary and religious privileges of some were sadly missed by our reading and thinking volunteers in their early camps, and the people of the State supplied their wants as best they could. As soon as the Fourth was fairly in the field, its energetic chaplain, Rev. Edward A. Walker, expressed a desire to have a large tent under his own control for meetings of every sort. Mr. Alfred Walker, his father, immediately solicited contributions. Money came in from day to day in sums of one to five dollars, with one or two large donations.

The tent, strong, neat, and commodious, was purchased for two hundred and twenty-five dollars, exhibited a day or two on the New-Haven Green, and forwarded to the regiment. Officers and men united to set up and prepare the canvas meeting-house; and the chaplain shortly after wrote,—

"The Temple of Nature, sufficient in summer, is too chilly in December; and of late it has been too leaky over head, and too wet under foot, to be very inviting; and the number of worshipers has been sadly out of proportion to the accommodation. Now we have a church and divine service, and something more like a sabbath. We have our prayer-meetings and Bible-class, our lectures, temperance-meetings, and musical society. We have also a melodeon; for, when the men heard that the tent was com ing, they started at once a subscription, declaring that they would now have service in style."

Almost every night, the tent was in use for social or religious purposes.

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About the first of January, 1862, the Rev. Dr. L. W. Bacon undertook the task of organizing an association to supply all Connecticut regiments with chapel-tents, circulating libraries, and regular newspapers, and to co-operate with the chaplains in the mental and moral welfare of the men. In response to his circulars, prominent citizens from all parts of the State assembled, and formed the Chaplains'-aid Commission, with the following officers and members, representing all denominations, and authorized to add to their num bers: -

President, Gov. William A. Buckingham; Vice-President, Lieut.-Gov. Benjamin Douglass; Corresponding Secretaries, Rev. L. W. Bacon, Rev. A. R. Thompson; Recording Secretary, Francis Wayland; Treasurer, Stephen D. Pardee; Members, Pres. Theodore D. Woolsey, Right Rev. John Williams, Rev. Robert Turnbull, Rev. Leonard Bacon, Rev. G. W. Woodruff, Rev. P. S. Evans, H. M. Welch, H. B. Harrison, William H. Russell, William B. Johnson, Edward W. Hatch, Richard D. Hubbard, Henry T. Blake, F. J. Kingsbury.

Mr. Bacon was soon called away; and the burden of labor fell upon Mr. Wayland, who cheerfully and heartily entered into the philanthropic work. His office became the headquarters of the Commission.

Finding the duties more than he could alone perform, Mr. Wayland secured the aid of John M. Morris, who also gladly labored without compensation.

Mr. Morris presented the subject to the people of Waterbury, Stonington, Hartford, Norwich, Meriden, Bridgeport, New Britain, and Greenwich. Chaplain H. L. Hall, of the Tenth Connecticut Volunteers, also spoke for the Commission at Meriden, Norwich, Stonington, and Greenwich; and Chaplain J. J. Woolley of the Eighth (who had just resigned), in Meriden, Waterbury, Farmington, Danbury, Norwalk, South Norwalk, Madison, and New Milford. The people responded with liberality, with funds sufficient for the need. They also sent in hundreds of excellent books, thousands of magazines, and of illustrated papers uncounted numbers. Chapel-tents were now purchased for the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Tenth, Eleventh, Twelfth, and Thirteenth Regi

ments. Each of the ten regiments then in the field was furnished with a library of from seventy-five to a hundred and twenty-five bound volumes. For these libraries, Mr. Wayland devised a strong portable case, with shelves, lock, and handles, so that the library was packed by simply locking it, and prepared for use by setting it up and unlocking it. Mr. Samuel Nichols, carpenter, made these cases for the cost of the materials. With each library was sent a written catalogue, with numbers, and in each book the proper regimental label.

By July, twelve hundred and eighty-four bound volumes had been forwarded, and fifty-four hundred and forty-eight magazines, with a very large number of illustrated and religious papers. The books sent were not worn out or cast off, but of high character and great variety. In order to be sure of the newest and freshest, Mr. Wayland purchased two hundred and fifty volumes of the best recent publications.

The tents and libraries were received with grateful delight by the officers and men. Every chaplain testified to their value. Chaplain Hall of the Tenth wrote, —

"It is the most convenient thing imaginable. I have constructed a long writing-desk, on which I place all the papers which you so kindly furnish me at the end of the desk is my library of books. You will always find from ten to fifty men in the tent, reading and writing. The library is just the thing needed. The books are well assorted, and enter. taining."

Of the books and pamphlets sent to the Eighth Connecticut Volunteers, Chaplain Morris wrote, "The nicelyselected stock was gone in two hours after I had opened the box. Since that time, the delivery and return of books has occupied several hours a day. Dickens has a great run. The tales by Miss Edgeworth and T. S. Arthur are very popu lar. The Army and Navy Melodies are hailed with delight, and 'the boys' are singing right merrily almost every night. Day before yesterday, I received a box of pamphlets from the Commission. There were half a dozen men ready to open the box, and twenty more at hand to superintend the process and share the contents. The demand for reading is four times the supply." Mr. Morris having become chaplain

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of the Eighth Connecticut Volunteers, Mr. H. O. Ladd, afterwards of the Congregational church in Cromwell, rendered efficient assistance to Mr. Wayland.

After the first set of libraries had been forwarded, circulars were sent to chaplains, inquiring what else they needed, and how the Commission could aid them.

The Ninth Regiment was supplied with Catholic books and papers. A large number of local and religious journals were subscribed for, and regularly sent to each regiment. Hundreds of singing-books were provided.

No more chapel-tents were furnished, however. It was found that they could not be transported on long marches, and were liable to seizure in emergency for hospital-purposes. In this way, nearly every one disappeared within a year. Those of the Fifth, Eighth, and Eleventh, were of substantial service in sheltering the wounded upon the sanguinary field of Antietam; but they were seen by the wistful chaplains no more.

Books, magazines, and papers were repeatedly forwarded by Mr. Wayland throughout the war. By July, 1862, the tract societies were able to distribute all the religious reading that was needed, and local soldiers'-aid societies sent on magazines and papers with other supplies: so the Chaplains'aid Commission was not kept up as an organization. But Chaplain Hall doubtless said truly, "Connecticut leads every other State, even the old Bay State, in the aid she is furnishing her chaplains."

Early in the war, Gov. Buckingham, in order to secure efficient medical officers, appointed Drs. G. W. Russell of Hartford, P. A. Jewett of New Haven, and Ashbel Woodward of Franklin, an examining board. These gentlemen, at great personal inconvenience and sacrifice, met throughout the war, and considered with thoroughness the qualifications of candidates for those responsible posts. The traditions and rules of the army forbade the board to pass any applicants, except practitioners of the old school; but this duty was performed with faithful discrimination, and it is safe to say that no man was commissioned as surgeon in any Connecticut regiment who was incompetent for the position.

vation of others the strength which was necessary to his own." The men of the Eighth Regiment built a handsome monument to his memory in Windham.

At this time, Rev. Henry Clay Truiabull joined the Tenth as chaplain, most fortunately for the regiment. The NewHaven Journal said, "He is not an austere religionist, but a cheerful, social Christian, a man to be loved and trusted." So it proved.

As soon as the country about Newberne was firmly occupied, attention was turned to Fort Macon, that still flaunted a rebel flag, and defended blockade-runners; and, within two days, Gen. Parke had faced his little brigade that way. On March 19, the Eighth left camp, proceeded down the Neuse on transports, landed again at Slocum's Creek, and marched across the country towards the coast. The men made good time to "Carolina City," thinking of theaters, restaurants, and other city facilities; and were somewhat chagrined, on arriving, to find that the entire municipality was contained in a dozen one-story houses and a few sheds.

The force consisted of the Eighth Connecticut and the 4th and 5th Rhode-Island. The trains were much delayed: there was little food, and no tents or cooking utensils. The weather became stormy, and the men dug holes in the ground, and sheltered them with boards; and here for a dreary week they lived, catching a few fish and oysters when they could. Here Col. Harland was prostrated with typhoid-fever. Two companies of the Eighth were sent over to occupy Beaufort, and others to Morehead City. Opposite was Fort Macon, on the extreme upper point of Bogue Banks, a low, sandy island, or spit, half a mile wide, stretching twenty miles south-west along the coast. Inside this island was Bogue Sound, three miles wide, with shallow water, only three or four feet deep.

The Eighth Connecticut Volunteers at once knocked together some rafts, got some flat-boats, and floated over to the Banks a detail of men; carrying across the island upon their shoulders some boats they had seized at Beaufort, and communicating with the fleet outside waiting to co-operate. Here they were immediately joined by the 4th and a battalion of the 5th Rhode-Island.