many of whom had imbibed aristocratic prejudices, and more fully than did our Government, for even after the rebellion, the aristocratic spirit of the Border slaveholding States exerted a most disastrous influence over the councils at Washington. It is not too much to say, and the popular voice will sustain the declaration, that all through the conflict, the masses of the community in the free North were in advance, decidedly in advance, of both the Government and the army officers, in their advocacy of the true principle of republicanism-equal rights for all men.

It was the universal sentiment of the community, that President Lincoln was right in heart, and there were some members of the Cabinet, and a majority in Congress, who were the advocates of that brotherhood of man, which Christianity enjoins, and which our Constitution recognizes; and there were officers in the regular army who were the glorious expounders and exemplars of a pure republicanism. Prominent among these stood Gen. Fremont, of South Carolina, and Gen. Hunter, of South Carolina, and Gen. Phelps, of Vermont. Many were offended when one of our officers made the common-sense declaration,

"I am frank to say, that if I am to go to South Carolina, or to Louisiana, or any where else South, I want all the help I can get from the colored man. I want him to dig the trenches, to do all the drudgery, to save my men as much as possible from disease, and to fight, if he will fight. For this we must give him his freedom. We are forced to do it. And, for one, I will not allow my old notions on the subject of slavery to stand in the way of success."

The moral grandeur which this foul rebellion created and developed, among the lovers of freedom at the North, may almost reconcile one to its fiend-like crime. Volumes might be written, crowded with incidents of heroism never surpassed. Mothers girded their sons for the contest. Wives sent the fathers of their babes to all the perils of the battle; and maidens hurried or postponed their bridals, that their lovers might hasten to the field, where shot and shell tear limb from limb, and cover the ground with the dead.

As the Union force entered Western Virginia, the rebels retreated through Grafton, an important town on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, to Philippi, a small town on the Monongahela. Here they made a stand, about 2,000 in number. The Union troops, marching upon them in a very dark night, when a storm was raging, took them by surprise at 4 o'clock in the morning. The enemy, alarmed by the fire of their pickets, had just time to form in line of battle, when three small regiments of Indiana, Ohio, and Virginia volunteers came rushing upon them. Firing but one volley, the assailants at full run charged with the bayonet. The rebels, discharging their pieces so wildly, that but two of their assailants were killed, and about twenty wounded, broke and fled. Col. Kelly, in command of the First Virginia Regiment, fell, severely, but not mortally, wounded by a pistol ball in the breast. In this short conflict, the Union troops conducted themselves with the bravery of veterans. The routed rebels fled to Leedsville, ten miles farther south, losing all their camp equipage, and about 800 stand of arms.

The Southern leaders now began to call earnestly for slaves to be sent

forward to aid their soldiers in throwing up entrenchments. Gen. Beauregard, who was in command of the rebels at Manassas, that he might still more intensely rouse the South, issued a proclamation containing the fol lowing sentiments:

"A reckless and unprincipled tyrant has invaded your soil. Abraham Lincoln, regardless of all moral, legal, and constitutional restraints, has thrown his abolition hosts among you, who are murdering and imprisoning your citizens, confiscating and destroying your property, and committing other acts of violence and outrage, too shocking and revolting to humanity, to be enumerated. All rules of civilized warfare are to be abandoned, and they proclaim by their acts, if not on their banners, that their war-cry is, 'Beauty and Booty. All that is dear to man-your honor and that of your wives and daughters-your fortunes and your lives, are involved in this momentous contest."

Early in June, Gen. Butler, at Fortress Monroe, learned that the rebels were fortifying themselves at a point called Little Bethel, about twelvę miles from the fortress on the road to Yorktown, and that five miles further on at a point called Big Bethel, where there was a church, they were establishing themselves still more firmly. From these positions they were continually issuing in marauding parties, harassing the Union men, and impressing their negroes into their service. Gen. Butler prepared a secret expedition to break up these encampments. To accomplish this, it was necessary to ferry his troops across the river at Hampton, where the rebels had burned the bridge. Ten flat-boats were prepared, each capable of conveying 130 men, besides 27 rowers. Men, from the Naval Brigade, were thoroughly drilled in the management of these boats, and on the night of the 9th the boats were sent into Hampton River, with carefully muffled oars, and anchored on the hither side of the stream, where it was about 100 yards wide, to be ready to ferry the troops across.

At Newport News, about eight miles from Fortress Monroe, at the mouth of James River, there was an encampment of Union troops, a few thousand in number. Brig. Gen. Pierce, who was in command there, was ordered to take two regiments, and coöperate in the expedition. Col. Duryea, in command of the troops from Fortress Monroe, crossed the river at Hampton safely, about one o'clock in the morning, and marched silently on toward Little Bethel. The expedition was well-planned. It was mainly the work of Major Winthrop, and approved by Gen. Butler, and but for an untoward accident, not strange with troops who had never before been upon a battle-field, would have been eminently successful. The march was to be so timed that the concentrated troops should make an attack upon Little Bethel, just at the break of day. The result of this could not be doubtful. They were then impetuously to follow upon the heels of the routed rebels to Big Bethel, protected by the crowd of fugitives flying before them, from the fire of its batteries.

To guard against any mishap in the darkness, no regiment was to make an attack without shouting first the watchword, and the troops were also to wear a white badge upon the arm, that in daylight they might casily recognize each other. For a time all these arrangements were car

ried out vigorously and very prosperously. At a certain point, a short distance from Little Bethel, the regiment of Col. Bendix was stationed with two field-pieces to guard and hold, at every hazard, a cross of the road. The great body advanced silently upon Little Bethel. The day was now beginning to dawn. The New York Third Regiment just then came cautiously moving along in the dim twilight and fog of the morning, on the road from Hampton. Gen. Pierce and Col. Townsend, and their several staffs, rode in a body in advance of the troops.

These officers, by an optical illusion not very unusual, presented the aspect of a large body of cavalry. It was known that there was no cavalry with the Union forces. Col. Bendix consequently thought that it was a body of the enemy preparing to assail them in the rear, and immediately opened upon them, with his guns, at the distance of a quarter of a mile. Fortunately, the road was a little below the level of the land on each side, and was bordered by fences. Ten men were, however, wounded, and two killed by the discharge. The regiment, thus unexpectedly assailed, fell back, and Gen. Pierce immediately sent to Fortress Monroe for reënforcements. Col. Duryea also, who was advancing a mile or two in front of the cross in the roads where he had stationed Col. Bendix, alarmed by the firing in his rear, retraced his steps. Daylight soon revealed all. But the rebels at Little Bethel heard the firing, took the alarm, and fled with the tidings to the strong batteries at Big Bethel.

The Union columns now pressed vigorously forward, and speedily destroyed the camp at Little Bethel, which they found vacated. They then hurried rapidly on five miles farther to Big Bethel. Here they found the enemy prepared to receive them, entrenched behind formidable batteries, at a point of their own choosing, and in full force. It probably was not wise, under the circumstances, to order an assault. The Federal troops were depressed by the untoward accident-they had failed entirely in effecting a surprise; it was ten o'clock in the morning; the troops had been up all night; had marched about twelve miles, half the distance in a broiling sun. Still it was judged best to make the attempt, as it would have been mortifying indeed to return without firing a gun, and success was by no means hopeless.

For two hours the Union troops fought with bravery which would have done honor to veterans. Facing a storm of shot, from rifled cannon and masked batteries, they drove the enemy from their first intrenchments, when other masked batteries opened upon them, and it was deemed necessary to retire. This they did in good order. The Zouaves manifested great courage and skill, in creeping up almost to the edge of the ramparts, loading and firing while flat upon their faces, and picking off many men from the enemy's guns. The officers are all represented as having conducted themselves with the greatest coolness and intrepidity. It is supposed that the enemy had about two thousand men, with from fifteen to twenty guns in battery. The Union loss was about 40 killed and wounded. The troops retired in perfect order to Hampton, where Gen. Butler met them, and they were transported in flat-boats to Fortress Monroe. The failure of the expedition was a great disappointment, and

its conduct was consequently far more severely censured than it merited. The foe was so alarmed by the attack, and so apprehensive of its renewal, that they abandoned their works, and retired the next day to Yorktown.

Gen. Butler had given orders that no private property should be destroyed, but ordered, in accordance with the invariable laws of war, that any house on the way should be burned, from which the rebels should fire upon the troops. Just as one of the regiments was drawing near Little Bethel, a man came out of a large and handsome house, took deliberate aim with his rifle at a body of Union troops, not far off, and fired. The ball, with its shrill whistle, passed by one man's cheek, through the pants of another, and into the leg of a third. Some slaves, who just then came up, said, that the house belonged to their master, Adjutant Whiting, who was in the rebel army, and who had fired the treacherous shot.

"I am ordered by General Butler," said Col. Duryea to Adjutant Ste"to burn every house whose occupant or owner fires upon our troops. Burn it."

vens,

The sequel we give in the words of Adjutant Stevens, of the First Vermont Regiment. "Col. Duryea leaped from his horse, and I upon the steps, and by that time three Zouaves were with me. I ordered them to try the door with the butts of their guns-down went the door, and in went we. A well-packed traveling bag lay upon a mahogany table. I tore it open with the hopes of finding a revolver, but did not. The first thing I took out was a white linen coat: I laid it on the table, and Col. Duryea put a lighted match to it. Other clothing was added to the pile, and soon we had a rousing fire. Before leaving, I went into the large parlor in the right wing of the house-it was perfectly splendid. A large room with a tapestry carpet, a nice piano, a fine library of miscellaneous books, rich sofas, elegant chairs, with superior needle-work wrought bottoms, what-nots in the corners, loaded with articles of luxury, taste, and refinement, and upon a mahogany center-table lay a Bible and a lady's portrait. The last two articles I took, and have them now in my possession. I also took a decanter of most excellent old brandy from the side-board, and left the burning house. By this time the Zouave regiment had come up. I joined them, and in a short time came up with our rear guard, and saw a sight, the like of which I wish never to see again-viz.: nine of Col. Townsend's Albany regiment stretched on the floor of a house, where they had just been carried, and eight of them mortally wounded, by our own men. Oh! the sight was dreadful. I cried like a boy, and so did many others. I immediately thought of my decanter of brandy, took a tin cup from a soldier, and poured into it my brandy, and filled it (the cup) with water from a canteen, and from one poor boy to another I passed and poured into their pale and quivering lips the invigorating fluid, and with my hand wiped the sweat-drops of death from their foreheads. Oh! how grateful the poor fellows looked at me as they saw, by my uniform, that the usually stern officer and commander had become to them the kind and tender-hearted woman, by doing for them woman's holy duty."

Major Theodore Winthrop fell upon this field much lamented. He

was leading his men in a charge upon a redoubt. He leaped upon a log shouting, "Come on, boys, one charge, and the day is ours." A North Carolina drummer boy, seeing so fair a mark, borrowed a gun, took deliberate aim, and buried a bullet in his bosom. He fell dead, "nearer to the enemy's works than any other man."

Lieut. Greble also signalized himself in this battle, and sealed his devotion to his country with his life. Unlimbering his gun, he advanced towards the foe, slowly firing, until he arrived within two hundred yards of a masked battery. He had eleven men to work his gun. With them he was left alone in the open road, the deadly fire from the rifled cannon of the foe having scattered the rest. For two hours he thus bore the brunt of battle. He was repeatedly urged to retire to a less exposed position, but refused. His gun was so efficiently worked that he silenced all in the battery except one. The enemy made a sortie. "Now, Charley," said Lieut. Greble to Capt. Bartlett, "I have something to fire at. Just see how I will make them scamper." He poured in one or two charges of grape, and the enemy fled back in confusion behind their intrenchments."

He was now left with but five men at his gun. Turning to Corporal Peoples, he said, "All I can now do will be useless. Limber up the gun, and take it away." At this moment a ball struck him upon the head, and his body fell headless. The same ball passed through the body of another man, and took off the leg of a third. Gen. Butler, in his official report of this adventure, says, "I think, in the unfortunate combination of circumstances, and the result which we have experienced, we have gained more than we have lost. Our troops have learned to have confidence in themselves under fire, the enemy have shown that they will not meet us in the open field, and our officers have learned wherein their organization and drill are inefficient."

The following extract from the letter of a young citizen soldier to his friends, gives a graphic view of the battle, and gives as clear an idea as words can convey, of the feelings with which such a brave boy enters upon scenes so dreadful.

On we

"Before midnight, the regimental line was formed, and we filed silently into the road, and took up our march under the light of the stars. went in silence, nothing heard but the tramp, tramp of our feet. It was a beautiful night, clear as crystal-just the night for a march. As we neared the enemy's line, we were saluted by a cannon ball, which came flying over the road, and landed at our feet. Thus the battle opened. Our field pieces were placed on the road, on a line with the enemy s battery. It was discovered that it was too strong to be taken by infantry that the only way to reduce it was by heavy cannon, which we had not. The battle lasted between two and three hours. It was a novel thing to hear the cannon balls crashing through the trees, and whizzing past, and the missing of the rifle balls as they flew by.

"I don't know whether it was bravery or not, but I was never more cool in my life. I hardly thought where I was; in fact, I don't think I had a realizing sense of the danger. The fire was very hot and rapid. Every instant the balls were crashing and whistling around us. Yet all