rn. I remember well the beautiful day when
the flags were presented at Readville, and you told the regiment
that your reputation was to be identified with its fame. It was a
day of festivity and cheer. I walk now in these hospitals and see
mutilated forms with every variety of wound, and it seems all a
dream. But well has the regiment sustained the hope which you
indulged, and justified the identity of fame which you trusted to
it.

"I ought to add in relation to the fight on James Island, on July
sixteenth, in which the regiment lost fifty men, driving back the
rebels, and saving, as it is stated, three companies of the Tenth
Connecticut, that General Terry, who was in command on that
Island, said to Adjutant James:

"'Tell your Colonel that I am exceedingly pleased with the
conduct of your regiment. They have done all they could do.'

"Yours truly,
"EDWARD L. PIERCE."[103]

The Negro in the Mississippi Valley, and in the Department of the
South had won an excellent reputation as a soldier. In the spring of
1864 Colored Troops made their _debut_ in the army of the Potomac. In
the battles at Wilson's Wharf, Petersburg, Deep Bottom, Chapin's Farm,
Fair Oaks, Hatcher's Run, Farmville, and many other battles, these
soldiers won for themselves lasting glory and golden opinions from the
officers and men of the white organizations. On the 24th of May, 1864,
Gen. Fitz-Hugh Lee called at Wilson's Wharf to pay his respects to two
Negro regiments under the command of Gen. Wild. But the chivalry of
the South were compelled to retire before the destructive fire of
Negro soldiers. A "Tribune" correspondent who witnessed the engagement
gave the following account the next day:

"At first the fight raged fiercely on the left. The woods were
riddled with bullets; the dead and wounded of the rebels were
taken away from this part of the field, but I am informed by one
accustomed to judge, and who went over the field to-day, that
from the pools of blood and other evidences the loss must have
been severe. Finding that the left could not be broken, Fitz-Hugh
Lee hurled his chivalry--dismounted of course--upon the right.
Steadily they came on, through obstructions, through slashing,
past abattis without wavering. Here _one_ of the advantages of
co