all day, to be up all night cooking
three meals each for thirty or forty men, having to gather their own
fuel, and often going half mile for water. A whole day's ration is
always cooked at one time on marches, as night is the only time
for cooking. The decrees of an order for a detail are inexorable. A
soldier must take it as it comes, for none ever know but what the next
duties may be even worse than the present. As a general rule, soldiers
rarely ever grumble at any detail on the eve of an engagement, for
sometimes it excuses them from a battle, and the old experienced
veteran never refuses that.

At daylight a battery some two hundred yards in our front opened a
furious fire upon us, the shells coming uncomfortably near our heads.
If there were any infantry between the battery and our troops, they
must have laid low to escape the shots over their heads. But after a
few rounds they limbered up and scampered away. We moved slowly along
with heavy skirmishing in our front all the morning of the second.
When near the Chancellor's House, we formed line of battle in a kind
of semi-circle, our right resting on the river and extending over the
plank road, Kershaw being some distance to the left of this road,
the Fifteenth Regiment occupying the right. Here we remained for
the remainder of the day. We heard the word coming up the line, "No
cheering, no cheering." In a few moments General Lee came riding along
the lines, going to the left. He had with him quite a number of his
staff and one or two couriers. He looked straight to the front and
thoughtful, noticing none of the soldiers who rushed to the line to
see him pass. He no doubt was then forming the masterful move, and
one, too, in opposition to all rules or order of military science
or strategy, "the division of his army in the face of the enemy,"
a movement that has caused many armies, before, destruction and the
downfall of its commander. But nothing succeeds like success. The
great disparity in numbers was so great that Lee could only watch
and hope for some mistake or blunder of his adversary, or by some
extraordinary strategic manoeuver on his own part, gain the advantage
by which his opponent would be ruined. Hooker had one hundred and
thirty thousand men, while Lee had only sixty thousand. With
this number it seemed an easy task for Hooker to threaten Lee
at Fredericksburg, then fall upon him with his entire force at
Chancellorsville and crush him before Lee cou