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whose order it was finally forwarded through, by flag of truce, to the father of Col. Ely, while the soldier who had borne it gallantly was yet a prisoner.

Besides the thirty who got away with Major Peale, Company D of the Eighteenth, detailed as provost-guard, escaped intact. About half of the seven thousand of the division ultimately escaped; stragglers coming into the border-towns of Maryland and Pennsylvania for a week, most of them unarmed and nearly famished.

Within thirty minutes after Ely's surrender, Early's entire corps marched across the battle-field in swift pursuit of the fugitives. Many were captured.

Among the killed in this battle was Capt. Edward L. Porter, only son of Dr. Isaac G. Porter of New London. He was a graduate of Yale of the class of '57; a young man of excellent literary taste, and had adopted the practice of law with fine promise. Surgeon Holbrook recently wrote of him, “I remember Capt. Porter as one of the noblest of our company of martyrs, who, on that memorable morning, offered up their lives on the altar of constitutional liberty. At my suggestion, he went to the hospital three days. before; being sick with what I feared might prove typhoid fever. I visited him on the day before the evacuation, and found him very weak, and was surprised, on the following morning, to find him at the head of his company. An officer informed me that he seemed possessed of superhuman energy in the battle, and gallantly led his men in the charge, when he was struck by a bullet in the forehead, and died almost immediately. He has left a bright record of honorable manliness. Dignified and gentlemanly, always prompt in the conscientious discharge of duty, he attested by his death the sincerity of his patriotism, and sealed with his blood his love of liberty." His watch was returned to his father; and on the inside he had written, rap epyeta vož: "For the night cometh." The words characterized his general thoughtfulness.

The handsome regimental colors presented by the ladies of Norwich were not captured with the regiment. When they were inquired for, the men would not or could not give

any information as to their whereabouts; but in two days, after many hairbreadth scapes," they crossed the Pennsylvania border wound about the body of Color-sergeant George Torrey of Woodstock, who had taken to the woods during the confusion. He was subsequently commissioned captain in the United-States colored troops.

About two hundred made good their retreat, and gradually gathered again at Maryland Heights, under Major Peale. H. H. Starkweather immediately went to the rendezvous, carrying food and other comforts from home, and sending back to the anxious relatives news from the regiment. Capt. Thomas K. Bates, a brave officer, severely wounded and a prisoner, was recaptured shortly after in a rebel hospital.

The prisoners suffered from the first day of their captivity. They were not allowed to bury the dead of the regiment, as that would deprive the rebels of the Thenardierian privilege of robbing the corpses of the slain. The prisoners were hurried back to the fort, and next day were started for Richmond on foot. They made ninety-two miles in four days, arriving at Staunton on Monday the 22d, and thence took the cars for Richmond. They reached the Confederate capital early next morning, and, without making any triumphal entrée, marched straight to Libby Prison.

The food on the journey consisted of a pint of flour and a very small piece of pork to each man. The officers and enlisted men were in separate squads, and were not permit ted to communicate.

On the second day, the privates were transferred from Libby to Belle Isle in the James River, now so infamous in the annals of the war. Here they staid a few weeks, on scanty rations; when they were taken back to Libby, paroled July 2, taken to City Point, released, and transported to Annapolis; having been under the stars and bars seventeen days. They remained at Camp Parole until the 1st of October, when they were duly exchanged, and returned the nucleus of the regiment, now in camp at Martinsburg, rth of Winchester.

The officers were not so fortunate. They were detained

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at Libby through many weary months; hoping, fearing, expecting, and sometimes almost despairing. They had scarcely food enough to sustain life; but the miserable rations were supplemented with heavy boxes of succulent and nourishing food, prepared with loving hands in Eastern Connecticut. Officers of other regiments brought away letters concealed in their buttons, from Col. Ely, Capt. Davis, Lieut. Higgins, and others. Capt. Davis said, "On the prison-walls of the Conciergerie, in the days of the French Revolution, was written, ' He who retains his patriotism can never be wholly miserable;' so here in these days, a parallel with that time in fraternal bloodshed, this sentiment sustains many a prisoner. Deprived of liberty, and subsisting on a scanty diet, we are not of all men the most miserable when we remember for what we are here."

About this time, Corporal Samuel D. Worden of Canterbury died of wounds received at Winchester, and disease engendered on Belle Isle. He was liberally educated, a graduate of the Unitarian Theological Seminary at Meadville, and had occasionally occupied the pulpit of that denomination. He was an exemplary Christian soldier, and fought as he had lived, in compliance with his conscientious convictions. When the second call for troops came, he had charge of a school at Greenville; but he joined Capt. Davis's company, and laid all the hopes and aspirations of his cultivated mind on the altar of American nationality. He finally died at home, where Rev. Mr. Stone of Brooklyn delivered a touching address; and the remains of the fallen hero were borne to the grave by his companions in arms. Such were many of the men who fought in the ranks of our great army.

CHAPTER XXIII.

Battle of Chancellorsville. — Advance upon the Flank. — The Fifth, Fourteenth, Seventeenth, Twentieth, and Twenty-seventh Connecticut Regiments engaged. — The 11th Corps overwhelmed by Stonewall Jackson. - Terrible Battle of May 3.- Heavy Losses of the Twentieth Connecticut Volunteers. The Twenty-seventh Regiment captured. - A New Line of Battle.— Withdrawal of the Army and Failure of the Movement. Losses of the Connecticut Regiments. - Prisoners of War.

PRING came. It was 1863. Two years of the war had passed with little gain for the Union arms in Virginia. Hooker was in command of the splendidly-disciplined and plucky Army of the Potomac, which he declared to be" the finest army on the planet." His eight corps were eager to be led again towards Richmond, - this time by the soldier who had borne the brunt of battle at Antietam. Five Connecticut regiments were with him, the Fifth and Twentieth in the 12th Corps, the Fourteenth and Twenty-seventh in the 2d Corps, and the Seventeenth in the 11th Corps.

In the march to Chancellorsville, the 11th and 12th Corps were in company; while the 2d proceeded by the nearer route, via United-States Ford.

On April 27, the réveille was sounded at three o'clock in the morning. Breakfast was dispatched; tents struck and knapsacks slung; officers' baggage sent to the regimental wagons; and at six o'clock the men were in line. They were supplied with eight days' rations of hard-tack, sugar, coffee, and salt. Mules bore a blanket and a shelter-tent for each man. Fresh beef was driven along in the train; one ration to be issued every three days. The men were in good spirits: the day was beautiful. At ten o'clock, the 11th and 12th Corps were in motion; the march of the day lying