nto consideration about the only thing for
General Gardner to do was to surrender. Should the expected charge have
been made by the "stormers" it would have been a waste of life for they
could not expect to hold their position.

The 8th was spent in arranging terms for the surrender of the fortress
and on the 9th, the storming column led the advance as the victorious
army marched into Port Hudson to put the Stars and Stripes in the place
of the stars and bars.

President Lincoln's long-desired hope was realized and he could now
say: "The Father of Waters again goes unmolested to the sea." The time
of the nine-months' men was soon to expire and the Twenty-fifth
Connecticut left very soon for New Orleans, but was detained at
Donaldsonville for a few days.

[Illustration: SAMUEL KIMBALL ELLIS
This picture was taken at time of enlistment Sept. 12,
1863, at the age of 22. He enlisted as a private in
Company G, 25th Regiment, Connecticut Volunteers.]

About fifty years ago the people in the North were probably in a frenzy
of excitement. We soldiers in the South had learned to take things
cool. Vicksburg, the stumbling block, had fallen; Port Hudson had caved
in; Lee and his army had gone to one eternal smash; Port Hudson had
scarcely surrendered when we were called upon again to take the field.
Those confounded Rebels didn't know how to stay whipped, and General
Taylor, reinforced by General Magruder's Texicans, had again taken the
field. They attacked us at Donaldsonville with a much larger force in
proportion to ours but got soundly thrashed; we being strongly
reinforced, came out to meet them and got whipped, and so the matter
rested. The commanding officer of the brigade was flanked through
carelessness and they had to fall back with a loss of two cannon. Our
brigade was on the reserve. We fell in and rushed to the rescue but too
late, for they were in full retreat. A new line was formed, the
Twenty-fifth deployed as skirmishers and sent forward. After advancing
quite a distance through the corn we were ordered back and our whole
force fell back about half a mile, where we were still holding a strong
position. The Rebels meanwhile had left and fortified at Labordieville,
some twenty miles distant. The Twenty-fifth Connecticut regiment, after
one of the most trying campaigns of the war, was about to take another
sea voyage.

Here are a few verses which I have writt