356 NortH Carouina Troops, 1861-’65.

protest against this breach of faith, but found our men had
been before us, whose pleading was so effective that eventu-
ally the order was rescinded. When Stonewall Jackson,
coming down from the Valley, struck the enemy on the flank,
the Captain and Lieutenant Horne were ordered to report,
with part of the company, at Crenshaw’s battery, on Charles
City road and by a rapid march of twenty miles reached it
about sunset. The next morning we marched with that bat-
tery in rear of the attacking column towards Malvern Hill,
though not in the fight, and the next day were in pursuit of
the enemy to Harrison’s Landing, where McClellan took
refuge under the guns of ‘his fleet.

In the Spring of 1861, when Governor Ellis took posses-
sion, by means of the Cumberland militia, of the Fayette-
ville arsenal, he found there a complete field battery of 12-
pound howitzers. These were given to Company A, Tenth
North Carolina Regiment (First Artillery), commanded by
Captain Stephen D. Ramseur, and on his promotion by Cap-
tain Basil C. Manly. After the “Seven Days” battles that
company having received one of the many batteries captured,
their old guns which had been turned in to the Ordnance de-
partment were given to us and we were at last equipped on
20 September and furnished with horses. We were soon
after transferred to the Twentieth Virginia Battalion of
Heavy Artillery and an order was later procured changing us
into infantry to be attached to a regiment being raised for an
aspiring young Virginian who wished to be made Colonel. An
energetic protest by Captain Webb caused him to be placed
in arrest, and the other officers of the company were forbid-
den to communicate any complaints to the War Department,
but a note sent by a negro servant to Hon. Thomas S. Ashe,
member of Congress from our district, brought that gentle-
man and some of his colleagues to our camp to investigate
with the result that Captain Webb was promptly released
from arrest and the battery ordered to report to Lieutenant-
Colonel Chas. E. Lightfoot, commanding Field Artillery at
Seven Pines, below Richmond.

Major Boggs returned and assumed command of our com-

pany and one other and early in November we were ordered

 

THIRTEENTH BaTTALIon. 357

to report to General Pettigrew near Petersburg, later the
company went to Ivor Station, on the Blackwater, with the
Forty-second North Carolina, thence to South Quay, re-
porting to Colonel P. F. Faison, of the Fifty-sixth North
Carolina. Here we remained six months on outpost duty,
guarding the several crossings of the river against raiding
and foraging parties which were frequently sent out from

_ Suffolk and accompanying expeditions from our side sent out

by General Roger A. Pryor, who commanded that line, for
purposes of reconnoitering and procuring supplies. In one
of these a section of the battery under Lieutenant Horne was
engaged for several hours at Kelly’s Farm. We were with
General Longstreet in his siege of Suffolk.

In June, 1863, we were ordered back to Petersburg and
saw arduous service under General D. H. Hill, commanding
defences of Richmond during the Gettysburg campaign,
marching back and forth to Hanover Junction, and the Chick-
ahominy and up and down the Pamunkey, York and James
rivers, being continually on the move to meet threatened at-
tacks of the enemy. On 3 October at Fort Clifton, near the
mouth of Appomattox river our horses were taken from us
and turned over to the artillery of General Longstreet, who
was on the move to Chattanooga.

Soon after we were supplied with horses that had endured
much service, but which we grazed and restored. The North
Carolinians in the other company in the battalion procured
in November, 1863 a transfer to our battery, 39 men from the
Albemarle country thus coming to us, among them Lieuten-
ant Thomas G. Skinner, who resigned his commission and
came to us as a private that he might stay with his men.
Soon after the Thirteenth North Carolina Battalion was or-
ganized, of which this battery was made Company A.

On 1 January, 1864, we were ordered to Weldon and
thence in a few days to Fort Fisher, and were assigned to Bat-
teries Gatling and Anderson 6 or 8 miles from the fort. Here
we remained on coast guard duty and protecting blockade
runners till 12 May, when we were sent to Masonboro, where
the enemy was threatening a second destruction of the State
salt works. On 15 May having taken our position before