feeling so miserable as to be
scarcely able to crawl about, yet was obliged to remain on duty; that
Lieutenant-Colonel Wilcox, now in command, and Major Shreve were in the
same condition. This was due to the nervous strain through which we had
passed, and to insufficient and unwholesome food. As stated before, we
had been obliged to eat whatever we could get, which for the past four
days had been mostly green field corn roasted as best we could. The
wonder is that we were not utterly prostrated. Nevertheless, I not only
performed all my duties, but went a mile down the Antietam creek, took a
bath, and washed my underclothing, my first experience in the laundry
business.

We had been now for two weeks and more steadily on the march, our
baggage in wagons somewhere en route, without the possibility of a
change of clothing or of having any washing done. Most of this time
marching in a cloud of dust so thick that one could almost cut it, and
perspiring freely, one can imagine our condition. Bathing as frequently
as opportunity offered, yet our condition was almost unendurable. For
with the accumulation of dirt upon our body, there was added the
ever-present scourge of the army, body lice. These vermin, called by the
boys "graybacks," were nearly the size of a grain of wheat, and derived
their name from their bluish-gray color. They seemed to infest the
ground wherever there had been a bivouac of the rebels, and following
them as we had, during all of this campaign, sleeping frequently on the
ground just vacated by them, no one was exempt from this plague. They
secreted themselves in the seams of the clothing and in the armpits
chiefly. A good bath, with a change of underclothing, would usually rid
one of them, but only to acquire a new crop in the first camp. The
clothing could be freed of them by boiling in salt water or by going
carefully over the seams and picking them off. The latter operation was
a frequent occupation with the men on any day which was warm enough to
permit them to disrobe for the purpose. One of the most laughable sights
I ever beheld was the whole brigade, halted for a couple of hours' rest
one hot day, with clothing off, "skirmishing," as the boys called it,
for "graybacks." This was one of the many unpoetical features of army
life which accentuated the sacrifices one made to serve his country.

How did we ordinarily get our laundrying done? The enlisted men as a
rule always did it themselves. Occa