our
Sixth corps were sent to hospitals in Hagerstown. At dark, we set out,
and making a night march of a few miles, reached Williamsport, where we
bivouacked and remained two days, and thence went to Boonsboro.

The march from Williamsport to Boonsboro led us through a magnificent
country. On either side of the road, the long lines of corn shocks and
the vine-clad houses, formed a picture of wealth and comfort. We halted
at Boonsboro in sight of the field of Antietam, and passed our
bi-monthly muster. At daybreak in the morning we were again on the road.
The first part of our way led through a beautiful open country, but we
were soon winding among the hills that form the slopes of "Pleasant
Valley."

The forests on the hillsides, glowing with the brilliant colors of
autumn, the fine old residences, appearing here and there among the
trees, and the plethoric stacks of hay and grain, combined, indeed, to
make it a "pleasant valley," and, as the lines of troops filed along the
roads, the spectacle was beautifully picturesque. We passed South
Mountain, where the rebels had met with such a bloody reception from our
forces, and not long after we were on the ground of the battle of
Burkettsville, where our Sixth corps had charged up the hill and had
driven the enemy in confusion. Every tree bore lasting marks of a
terrible fight. For more than a mile, the forest was completely scarred
by bullets and shells; not a tree had escaped, and many of them were
pierced like the cover of a pepper-box. We halted near Berlin, in a
charming valley, where we staid over Sunday. Monday morning, we crossed
the Potomac to Virginia, on pontoon bridges, passed through the little
towns of Lovettsville and Purcellville, Union Town and Upperville, then
crossing the valley almost from west to east, from the Blue Ridge to the
Kittoctan mountains, at length, on Thursday, reached White Plains, a
station on the Front Royal and Manassas railroad, not far from
Thoroughfare Gap. Here we were overtaken by a cold storm of rain, sleet
and snow, gloomy enough, but not so gloomy as was the news that here
reached us of the elections in New York. Whatever the attitude of the
political parties may have been before or since that time in reference
to the war, in our army the result of the New York elections was
regarded, at that time, as a repudiation of the war.

We reached New Baltimore on the 9th, and the next morning we were
notified that, by order of the Pres