h announced that our
train was at last on hand. After the usual preparatory bustle, we were
safely loaded up, and were presently whizzing off at a good speed
toward Chambersburg. The dim light of the lanterns tied to the rods
at the top of the cars, threw a gloomy air over the sleeping freight
which they contained. At one o'clock a halt of an hour was made at
Chambersburg, and by daylight Shippensburg was reached.

_Wednesday, September 24._ At Carlisle another stop of half an hour.
The morning was clear and bright, and the men in the most cheerful
spirits. We arrived at Harrisburg at eleven o'clock, and were marched
at once to the Capitol grounds, where we turned over our arms and
accoutrements at the Arsenal. In company with K., I went to the United
States Hotel, where we got a good dinner. I am inclined to think the
landlord did not clear much on the meal which we laid in on that
occasion. At 1.45 P.M. the company took the regular afternoon
passenger train for Reading, our Pottsville friends being again with
us. Reached home at 4.15, and found a concourse of citizens assembled
at the depot with a band of music to receive us. After a short street
parade, by way of exhibition, I presume, of the State's gallant
defenders, we filed into our old mustering place, at Fifth and
Washington Streets, where, with loud and hearty cheers for everybody
concerned, we were dismissed, and thus our brief but memorable militia
campaign of eleven days peacefully ended.

The company of Captain Bickley, which had been the first to leave
Reading, was also the first to reach home. On the day it arrived, a
proclamation was issued by Governor Curtin, discharging the militia,
with his grateful acknowledgments in the name of the State, and
commending their bravery in passing the borders, although not required
to do so by the terms of the call, holding Hagerstown against an
advancing foe, and resisting the threatened movement of the rebels
upon Williamsport until the United States troops arrived and relieved
them. This timely and heroic action, the Governor said, saved the
State from the tread of the invading enemy. He recommended that the
militia organizations be preserved and perfected--a suggestion which
was not generally followed.

The only sad feature of the campaign was the dreadful accident which
befel the company of Captain Boas, from Reading, of the 20th Regiment,
on the Cumberland Valley Railroad, near Harrisburg, at an early hour