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Oliver Boardman correspondence and journals, 1861-1863

03_1862-04-24 Page 03

experience in the battle we had here the other sunday and monday although I have seen and heard so much about it that I am tired of thinking about it  but it may interest you alittle and it may be some time before I write again so I will tell you what I can in this letter I saw the most of the battle monday though I was in rather the tightest place sunday our Regt is in general Sherman's division and on the extreme right  we were the farthest from the river and came very near being cut off from the main body. ther was several rebel Regts in our Camp before we were out of sight  we didnt have very far to go to get out of sight either they fired in to us, that is their sharp shooters or skirmishers did, the flanking or out side Company of each Regt generaly goes ahead especialy in thick timber. to feel their way or to keep the Regt from running into atrap then there is whole Regts of sharpshooters occasionaly that works on the same princible only on a larger scale they scatter out and go on their own hook considerable  pick off the gunners while they are working the batteries  find out the position of the enemy &c I suppose it was their sharp shooters that fired into us before we were fairly out of our Camp but they didnt kill many of our men we didnt return the fire although they kept it up whenever they could see any one of us to shoot at  it wouldnt have done to get into an engagement there there was only three Regts of us together and completely surroun but the timber was very thick and by watching close we got out of it. we didnt get into a regular fight until we had got two or three miles from our Camp our skirmishers had been firing into them more or less from the start  Company [J?] was the skirmishers in our Regt they had one Lieutenant badly wounded and two or three privates slightly we had only two or three men in our Regt killed so far which was about twelve oclock but there was several wounded too in our Company. you must not think

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experience in the battle we had here the other sunday and monday although I have seen and heard so much about it that I am tired of thinking about it but it may interest you alittle and it may be some time before I write again so I will tell you what I can in this letter I saw the most of the battle monday though I was in rather the tightest place sunday our Regt is in general Sherman's division and on the extreme right we were the farthest from the river and came very near being cut off from the main body. ther was several rebel Regts in our Camp before we were out of sight we didnt have very far to go to get out of sight either they fired in to us, that is their sharp shooters or skirmishers did, the flanking or out side Company of each Regt generaly goes ahead especialy in thick timber. to feel their way or to keep the Regt from running into atrap then there is whole Regts of sharpshooters occasionaly that works on the same princible only on a larger scale they scatter out and go on their own hook considerable pick off the gunners while they are working the batteries find out the position of the enemy &c I suppose it was their sharp shooters that fired into us before we were fairly out of our Camp but they didnt kill many of our men we didnt return the fire although they kept it up whenever they could see any one of us to shoot at it wouldnt have done to get into an engagement there there was only three Regts of us together and completely surroun but the timber was very thick and by watching close we got out of it. we didnt get into a regular fight until we had got two or three miles from our Camp our skirmishers had been firing into them more or less from the start Company [J?] was the skirmishers in our Regt they had one Lieutenant badly wounded and two or three privates slightly we had only two or three men in our Regt killed so far which was about twelve oclock but there was several wounded too in our Company. you must not think