st
Regiment of Missouri Volunteer Infantry into an artillery regiment.
I had organized eight batteries and used all the field-guns I could
get. There remained in the arsenal a battery of new rifled guns
which Fremont had purchased in Europe. I applied to him personally
for those guns, telling him I had a well-disciplined company of
officers and men ready to man them. He gave me the order without
hesitation, but when I went to the arsenal I found an order there
countermanding the order he had given me. I returned to headquarters,
and easily obtained a renewal of the order to issue the guns to
me. Determining to get ahead this time, I took the quickest
conveyance to the arsenal, but only to find that the telegraph had
got ahead of me--the order was again countermanded. The next day
I quietly inquired at headquarters about the secret of my repeated
disappointment, and learned that some foreign adventurer had obtained
permission to raise a company of artillery troops and wanted those
new rifled guns. It was true the company had not been raised, but
I thought that would probably make no difference, so I never
mentioned the matter to the general again. Instead I planned a
flank movement which proved far more successful than the direct
attack could possibly have been. I explained to General Fremont
the great need of field-guns and equipment for his army, and
suggested that if ordered East I might by personal efforts obtain
all he needed. He at once adopted my suggestion, bade me sit down
at a desk in his room and write the necessary order, and he signed
it without reading. I readily obtained twenty-four new rifled
Parrott guns, and soon had them in service in the Western Department,
in lieu of the six guns I had failed to get from the St. Louis
Arsenal.

When I had accomplished this duty and returned to St. Louis, where
I arrived in the early part of October, 1861, General Fremont had
taken the field in the central part of Missouri, with the main body
of his army, in which were eight batteries of my regiment. I was
instructed to remain in St. Louis and complete the organization
and equipment of the regiment upon the arrival of guns and equipments
procured in the East.

AFFAIR AT FREDERICKTOWN

It was while waiting for the expected guns that a demand for
artillery came from Colonel W. P. Carlin, commanding a brigade at
Pilot Knob and threatened with an attack