k place while encamped near Rodgersville, an incident
that will ever remain fresh in the memory of all of the old First
Division who witnessed it. It is with feelings of sorrow at this
distant day to even recall it to mind, and it is with pain that I
record it. But as I have undertaken to give a faithful and true story
of the army life of the First Brigade, this harrowing scene becomes a
part of its history. It was near the middle of the month. The sun had
long since dropped out of sight behind the blue peaks of the distant
Cumberland. All is still in camp; the soldiers, after their many
hardships and fatiguing marches, rest, and soon all in sound slumber.
Even the very voices of nature seemed hushed and frozen in the gloomy
silence of the night. All is quiet, save in one lonely tent, apart
some distance from the rest, before which walks a silent sentinel,
as if he, too, feels the chilling effects of the sombre stillness.
Murmurings soft and low in the one lighted tent are all that break
the oppressive death-like silence. In the back ground the great forest
trees of the mountain stand mute and motionless, not even a nod of
their stately heads to a passing breeze, while far away to the south
could be seen an occasional picket fire, making the surrounding
objects appear like moving, grotesque phantoms. The heavens above were
all bedecked with shimmering stars, pouring down upon the sleeping
Valley of the Holston a cold and trembling light.

In the lonely tent sits a soldier, who is spending his last night on
earth; by his side sits his little son, who has come far away over
the mountains to spend the last moments with his father and see him
die--not to die like a soldier wishes for death, but as a felon and
outcast, the ignominious death at the stake. An occasional sob escapes
the lips of the lad, but no sigh or tears of grief from the condemned.
He is holding converse with his Maker, for to His throne alone must
he now appeal for pardon. Hope on earth had gone. He had no friend at
court, no one to plead his cause before those who had power to order
a reprieve. He must die. The doomed man was an ignorant mountaineer,
belonging to one of the regiments from North Georgia or Tennessee, and
in an ill-fated moment he allowed his longings for home to overcome
his sense of duty, and deserted his colors--fled to his mountain home
and sought to shelter himself near his wife and little ones in the
dark recesses and gorges thereabou