ain, and after a fatiguing march reached
Yorktown; our Second division encamping in the works erected by Porter's
division during our famous thirty days' siege of that place.

Many of the men had by this time become exhausted; and a long train of
ambulances was filled with these and sent ahead on the morning of the
20th. The well ones soon followed toward Fortress Monroe, halting on the
field of Big Bethel. This was the first visit of our corps to this
disastrous field, and the men rambled about manifesting great interest
in the spot rendered sacred by the blood of Winthrop and Greble.

Plums, peaches and sweet potatoes constituted novel additions to the
diet of the men, and although the two former were unripe, their good
effects were manifested in arresting multitudes of those troublesome
cases of diarrhea which had resisted all treatment so long as the men
were deprived of acid fruits. Another hard march on the 21st brought the
corps again, after five months' absence, to the vicinity of the
desolated village of Hampton, and the end of our march for the present.
The whole army was crowded along the shores, waiting to embark for
Aquia. Transports of every size and description were riding upon the bay
or lashed to the wharves, and infantry, cavalry and artillery were
crowding toward the beach ready to take their turn to embark. The scene
was one of unusual activity, resembling only the one we had witnessed on
embarking for the Peninsula months ago.

At length all were on board, and the transports swung out upon the bay
and steamed up the Potomac. One of the transports on which a portion of
the Second division was embarked, the "Vanderbilt," had been, in other
days, an old friend, as she ploughed up and down the Hudson; now her
magnificent saloons, which had been of dazzling beauty, were dismantled
and disfigured. No gorgeous drapery or gilded mirrors adorned them, but
desolation and filth prevailed.

The weather was charming, and, except for the crowded condition of the
transports, the trip would have been a delightful one. What a contrast
was there in the appearance of those same men now, and when they came
down the river in April! Then our ranks were full; the men were healthy
and in fresh vigor; their uniforms were new and clean, and their muskets
and equipments were polished and glistening. Now, we looked about with
sadness when we remembered how many of our former companions were
absent, and how few present. We c