on to the
Presidency of Mr. Lincoln. I could not but think the action of the
seceding States unwise and dangerous to their future prosperity. On
the other hand, this action had already been taken, and without any
prospect of its revocation. Indeed, in the present frame of mind of
the North, any steps toward recession seemed likely to precipitate
the very evils which the secession of the states had been designed
to anticipate. I believed slavery a disadvantage to the South, but
no sin, and, in any event, an institution for which the Southerners
of the present day were not responsible. An inheritance from their
fore-fathers, properly administered, it was by no means an unmitigated
evil, and it was one, moreover, in which the North but a few years
before had shared. All my interests, present and future, apparently
lay in the South and with Southerners, and if the seceding States, in
one of which I resided, chose deliberately to try the experiment of
self-government, I felt quite willing to give them such aid as lay
in my feeble power. When I add to this that I was 24 years of age,
and naturally affected largely by the ideas, the enthusiasm and
the excitement of my surroundings, it is easy to understand to what
conclusions I was led."

So on June 17, 1861, he volunteered in the Stafford Guards under Capt.
(afterward Brigadier General) L.A. Stafford. The Guards became company
B of the 9th Regiment of Louisiana Volunteers, Confederate States of
America, Colonel (later Brigadier General) "Dick" Taylor (son of
"Old Zach," the President of the U.S.), in command. During the year
that followed until the close of the war, Handerson experienced the
adventures and trials of a soldier's life. He knew picket, scouting,
and skirmishing duty, the bivouac, the attack and defense in battle
formation, the charge, the retreat, hunger and thirst, the wearisome
march in heat and dust, in cold, in rain, through swamps and stony
wildernesses. He was shot through the hat and clothing and once
through the muscles of the shoulder and neck within half inch of the
carotid artery, lay in a hospital, and had secondary hemorrhage. At
another time he survived weeks of typhoid fever.

He was successively private soldier and accountant for his company,
quarter-master, 2nd Lieutenant of the line, Captain of the line, and
finally Adjutant General of the 2nd Louisiana Brigade, A. N. Va.,
under Lee and Jackson, with rank of Major. On May 4, 1864, Adjutant
G