Source: Goyne, Minetta Altgelt. Lone Star and Double Eagle; Texas Christian University Press; 1982, pp. 129-131.
Used by permission.
To order, call Texas Christian University Press at: 1-800-826-8911

Vicinity of Brownsville

No date [abt. Apr 1863], Letter to family

We have finally arrived at the end of our trip in good health. We are lying in camp six or seven miles from Brownsville on the San Patricio Road and are waiting for Benton, who rode ahead in order to look for a permanent campground for us. Carl was in town yesterday to ask about letters and got one from his wife. He told me things are going badly, that she is sick. It seems to me that the active life is having a good effect on Carl; he is generally in a good humor. Actually he was so at all times on the trip until yesterday when he returned depressed. Now though, it has let up quite a bit again… Our march was, for a military march, a rather hard one. We had to make long stretches per day in order to get to water, and that often turned out to be very salty, and the stupidity of our captain did not contribute to making the way much pleasanter. Now we are separated from our horses again. They are being herded by our men about thirty miles this side of San Patricio, because there is no more good grass or water nearer here. At the beginning I was not altogether content with this change; now though, I have come to see that it is best, because here there is no grass at all that a horse could eat. Between here and King's Ranch, where our horses are, there is a stretch of maybe forty miles of very deep sand. The only water that one finds is in wells and that has a strong taste of salt. At the beginning of this desert [Maj. Gen. John Bankhead] Magruder and his staff caught up with us and moved into a camp not far from ours. The same evening Capt. [Wm. L] Foster ["Forster"; of Co. D], who at the same time was commandant of three companies including ours, gave the order that two men from each company should ride ahead under the command of a lieutenant from Millett's company and look for a suitable campground on the Arroyo Colorado. From our company H.[ermann] Conring and I were ordered to go along. We rode away that same evening before sundown and got out of the sand at noon on the second day. Magruder's advance group caught up with us a couple of times and told us that Magruder had dismounted the regiment and that our men would have to make their way through the sand on foot. We rode as far as the Colorado, where we were able to convince ourselves that there was no grass to be found in the area, because it is horribly dry so that nothing can grow but mesquite, cactus, and salt grass, which the horses don't eat. Our horses ate hardly anything for thirty-six hours, and we had to ride quite hard, after all. So I longed to dismount and felt pity for those people who, as I thought, were having to walk through the sand. On the way back we met Magruder. Our Lieutenant asked him what had become of our men and he confirmed everything that his men had already told us earlier. He has fifteen baggage wagons in his entourage, not counting the wagon in which his staff is following. When our lieuteneant said that it surely was hard for the men to march through the sand, he said that was just a minor matter. He made a very bad impression on all the people I talked to. It sickens the men that a soldier should make such a fuss while we had to suffer such comparable want. In every wagon they have a big bottle of whiskey. He looks like a real drunken innkeeper or brewer, and his staff looks like an English riding party. I have never seen a company of such conceited and jaded faces together at one time. Riding with Magruder is a young woman, and while the lieutenant was talking with him, she was conversing in quite a common way with the teamster who drove the wagon behind theirs. Soon thereafter we met C.[hristoph] Pfeuffer, who brought us a letter from Col. Benton, in which he commanded us to ride back into camp before that day was over, since the horses were to be sent back the next day. He had taken the responsibility of not dismounting our men but rather letting them ride through the sand, and only then would he send back the horses. We had to ride over forty miles that day to get to the place he indicated. As if that were not enough, one of our horses gave out and we had to simply drag it for the last eight miles. Conring had the lariat on the saddle horn and another man and I pulled as hard as we could. We got to the designated place quite late at night. The companies didn't get there until the next day. We stayed there until the next day, then the horses were sent back and we went on toward Brownsville. Two companies left in the morning under the command of Col. Benton, and we stayed until evening in order to wait for wagons that were to take our things away. We made three more miles that day but didn't catch up with the others until we reached this camp. It is a stretch of about fifty miles, and we made that in three days. The walking wasn't hard for us. The road is good and firm, and whenever one of us got tired there was still room in the wagons so that he could ride for a stretch. Some rode all day long. The rations were good. We always had fresh meat, flour, sugar, bacon, and often had a chance to buy coffee for $2.00 or $2.50 a pound. The rations were get here seem to be very good. Today we drew bacon, rice, coffee, sugar, flour, and soap. I know only very little about the town so far. If I get there before the letter goes off I gan write a little about it. For today Adio.

Back to Confederate Forces Page