with General
Grover.

At 7 P.M. I was detailed to go on picket. Rather rough on a fellow to
be two days and nights on duty. But a soldier's first duty is to obey
without grumbling and so I went, but I could hardly keep from going to
sleep. It was a beautiful moonlight night and I stood and watched the
bombs from the mortar boats curling around in the sky and bursting in a
fiery show, making a splendid sight. The night passed quietly, save for
a couple of false alarms. At about 5 o'clock A.M., Jared Wells, my old
tent mate, and I went out blackberrying. In a little while we had
enough for a good meal for ourselves and some for the boys in camp.
This was the 24th of May, under the guns of Port Hudson. We got back
into camp about 9 o'clock and commenced making preparations for a
Sunday advance on the fortifications. The Second Brigade was in advance
and the Twenty-fourth Connecticut lost a few men; at about noon the
first earthworks were taken and we deployed into the woods on our
right. We lay here for two long hours while shells burst all around us,
but we were mercifully preserved, though in great danger.

Soon after 4 P.M., our regiment was ordered out as picket-skirmishers
and we were stationed behind trees all through the woods to keep the
enemy back. On our right was the Thirteenth Connecticut and on the left
was the One Hundred and Fifty-ninth New York. This was the third night
that we had been on duty and we were pretty well tired out but it seems
they hadn't got through with the Twenty-fifth yet.

May 25th. At about 9 A.M. we were relieved and called in. As we were
being relieved by the Twelfth Maine we had to pass over a place
commanded by the sharpshooters of the enemy. The bullets whizzed most
unpleasantly near, killing one man of the Thirteenth Connecticut. We
thought that after being relieved we should get some rest. But about as
soon as we got into camp we were ordered to fall in again. We marched
out of the woods, over the hill and the entrenchments taken the day
before, immediately coming under a sharp fire from the Rebel
sharpshooters. We were immediately ordered to fire upon them and drive
them out. After a sharp skirmish of half an hour we drove them clear
out of the woods and into their rifle-pits. We then occupied the woods,
and we kept up such a sharp fire upon them that not one of the rascally
Rebs dared lift his head above the works. We were just in time to save
the Twelfth Maine from being fl