OSHKOSH COURIER

November 15, 1861

Camp Life on the Potomac

Letter from a Private in Captain Bouck’s Company

We are permitted to publish the following extracts from a letter written by a young man in Capt. Bouck’s Company to a relative in this city:

November 1, 1861

Oh, dear! We do nothing now-a-days but drill or go on inspection. We average about three reviews a week, and they are so tiresome that we get excused from other duty. – Day before yesterday there was a grand review of a regiment of cavalry and our brigade by Gen. McDowell. We had to appear with everything we would carry on a march. Our Captain called us into the ranks at twelve, and we did not rest again until seven. ‘Twas decidedly the most tedious affair I was ever engaged in. The next morn-ing we had to turn out at five to get ready for another review and muster which commenced at nine and did not end until about two. Gen. King inspected every company very closely. In passing through ours he took my gun in his hand, examined it inside and out, and then turned to Capt. Bouck and told him that it was the cleanest gun he had seen, that it was clean enough. I have had a good many tell me ‘twas the best looking gun in the regiment. Our regiment gets a good many compliments now-a-days from military men.

There is no doubt that we have at last won an enviable reputation. It has taken us a long time to do it, but we never had any officers who were good for any thing until our last. We think everything of our present field officers, and our boys would do anything for them. We have as good men in our regiment as any from the State, and as good in our company as any in the regiment. There is no denying the fact that our company is the best in our regiment. We owe our superiority in a great degree to Capt. Bouck’s strict discipline. He is kind to all his men, yet he makes every man do his duty.

I suppose that if Cap. wished to leave us he could get a much higher position at any time. He is regarded now by all as the Captain of the regiment. He swears and curses some, but we have learned not to notice it. The rain has just commenced to patter upon the roof of our little home. Only think of the change in my life in the past six months. – Then I was at home with you all, living snugly and pleasantly with my parents; now my life is very different.

Our little family is made up of six. Bryant, Thompson, Lester, Ole Oleson, Corporal Wait, with myself. Our home, a canvas tent pitched wherever Gen. McClellan commands. Now, though the rain has increased and is pouring in torrents on the roof, still our little tent turns it all from us, and we sit around our table, myself writing, the rest reading the papers received from home; the letters have been read long ago.

We have made some improvements in our little home lately. We used to sleep on the hard ground; but the cold nights stopped that. We got some boards, made a box around our tent on the inside, and then banked up with earth outside of that. Our tent is fastened down tight so that no wind gets to us at night. On the side opposite our heads I fixed a "deacon seat", and near that a long table, and in one corner a closet; and now live first rate. We have good cedar boughs for a bed, and plenty of blankets to cover us. If it does not rain tomorrow we are going to build a fireplace, and then we shall be ready for "Jack Frost".

You would be surprised if you should step into our tent some evening to see how much we enjoy ourselves, and how little apparent thought there is concerning the war, or the dangers of it, before us. Indeed ‘twas a subject of conversation in our tent this evening, how little we volunteers realized the anxiety felt for us by our friends at home.

But ‘tis a necessity of the life. A soldier must try and forget the dangers of battle and be joyful in camp. Still the bravest man is he who will find out his dangers and then prepare himself to meet them. Had our volunteers known the truth in this respect we should have had less cowards in our army. – Our men now seem to grow restive under this inactive life, though we do not wish to leave this camp till we go forward to fight. Deliver me from frontier guard duty this time of the year.

In a letter from Jim Osborn, I find the old opinion of my poor health is still held by you at home. Now ‘tis time you stopped worrying about that. I never was so healthy in my life before. When I left Oshkosh I weighed in overcoat and boots, one hundred twenty eight. Yesterday I weighed, without over-coat, one hundred thirty-nine; more than I ever weighed before in my life. I am gaining all the time, and before spring, if nothing ill happens, will bring up one hundred and fifty. ED.