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FROM THE SAME, MEMPHIS, June 18, 1864.
MESSRS. EDITORS: - The regiment has now been eight days at this
place, and is recruiting quite fairly, though under rather unfavorable
circumstances. Our camp is just in the suburbs of the city, is only partially
shaded, and is too small. The supply of shelter tents, or their substitute,
rubber blankets, is also insufficient. The shelter tents are made of fine cloth,
and of so small dimensions as to expose both - head and feet to every driving
rain. However, it is generally voted a fine place in comparison with Red river.
Orders to march, and to be prepared to march, have been frequent during the
week; but, to our great satisfaction, have been seasonably countermanded.
Forrest's operations are evidently watched from this point, and no one can
predict when we may be after him. The defeat of General Sturgis at Guntown and
Ripley is not as bad as at first reported; but it was a severe blow, not only in
the loss of men, but in artillery, stores, and transportation. The two regiments
of negro troops engaged are reported to have fought with great determination and
bravery. A detachment of the Fifty-ninth, numbering two hundred and forty men,
which had been reported as captured entire, came in on the night of the fourth
day of the fight, bearing their colors. It is reported that the rebels put to
death the colored soldiers captured. That course will hardly pay them; for the
colored troops and their officers are not to be scared out of the fight by this
added danger. On the contrary, they will go in and retaliate, to the full
satisfaction of rebels.
Several regiments of hundred days' men have arrived, and passed
down the river. The Forty-seventh Iowa were sent to Helena. While here the boys
were visited by their acquaintances in our regiment. Captain Herrick and his
company are doing well. The regiment seems to be made up too much of boys. It
seems to me poor policy, unless the men are all gone out of Iowa.
There have been several changes in the commissioned officers of
the Twenty-seventh. Lieutenant
Sill has been promoted to captain, and First Sergeant
Poor has been promoted to first lieutenant, in company C; Lieutenant
Wilcox, company H, promoted to captain commissary of subsistence on the
general staff; and Lieutenant
Harrington, adjutant, is promoted in regiment of colored troops. There are,
I think, about six hundred and twenty men and officers present with the
regiment, and nearly two hundred absent, sick, and on detached service.
H. C. H.. |