for by a kind and loving mother,
I never felt more like singing, "Home, Sweet Home."

In closing this sketch of the gallant Twenty-fifth Regiment, I would
say that war, as far as my experience goes, is not the thing it's
cracked up to be. Though anyone can get used to all kinds of horrid
sights, in a measure, I could tell some things that I don't think one
would care to hear. But I will omit all description as it is best
learned by experience. I think scant justice has been done to the
Nineteenth Army Corps and General Banks, inasmuch as the field of
action while in Louisiana was far away and until the fall of Port
Hudson, was cut off from the North except by the sea. The public
attention was taken up in the States along the border and even our
great victory at Port Hudson was eclipsed and looked upon as a
consequence of the fall at Vicksburg. But they did a great deal of hard
fighting and made hundreds of miles of hard marchings in a climate to
which the men were not accustomed.

An Interesting Incident.

It was in the Spring of 1863, and General Banks had inaugurated the
campaign which ended in the capture of the last stronghold. We had
marched to the very outworks of Port Hudson, and engaged the
Confederate forces, on that historic night, when lashed to the maintop,
high above the boiling surges, stout-hearted, Farragut, drove his
vessels through the storm of shot and shell, that was hurled upon him
from the heights above, and cut the Rebel communications between Port
Hudson and Vicksburg. These two fortified places were the only ones
left on the Mississippi River, not in our hands. Grant, was already
hammering at Vicksburg, but before Port Hudson could be invested, it
was necessary to dispose of Confederate General Taylor and his forces,
who from their position in the South, could fall upon our unprotected
rear or make a dash for New Orleans. Returning then, to our camp at
Baton Rouge, after a few days' rest, we were suddenly divided into two
forces, one marching down through the country, to engage the enemy at
New Iberia, and the rest of us sent around by water and up through the
Atchafalaya to intercept and cut them to pieces. It was only a partial
success. Driven from their position in Fort Bisland, they fell upon us
before we were fairly in position, and held us in check while the whole
army slipped by. Then commenced a long pursuit, enlivened by daily
skirmish and fighting which lasted from the shores of