ALL THAT'S LEFT OF ME

By Jo Anzalone

Chapter 3:

The 13th arrived back down at Jackson, Tennessee on the Missouri and Ohio RR at 9 AM,

having left Union City at dusk the previous evening. Jonathon stood in line waiting to unload

the baggage cars.

"You know what's up, Johnnie?" Jimmie asked, coming up beside him.

"All I hear is that we're to take our stuff to the fair grounds now. 'Bout a mile yonder, or so

I'm told.  Might be goin' into some sort of more permanent camp there. I was hopin' we'd

be headin' somewhere else, you know, somewhere closer to where the Yanks are."

The two young men walked the mile side by side but had no sooner arrived at the fair grounds

when orders were received to move immediately to Virginia.  Jonathon and Jimmie joined in

the wild cheering that resulted from the news then turned around and marched back to the

depot.

As they boarded the train again, Jimmie pounded Jonathon's back. "We're goin', Johnnie!

Sure shootin', we're goin' at last! Them Yanks won't know what hit 'em."

They left Jackson at noon, arriving in Corinth, Mississippi by 6 in the evening, where they

spent the night and were ordered to cook eight days provisions. 

"Eight days," Johnnie sighed when they were aboard the Memphis and Charleston Railroad

by early afternoon.  "Guess we'll be ridin' trains for a long ways, Jimmie." He looked out

the window at the passing land, the talking level of the other soldiers subsiding with the lulling motion of the cars. "Virginia," he added. "You ever think you'd get that far from home?"

"Not me, Johnnie. I ain't never left Winston County 'fore goin' to trainin' camp."

"It's just that Virginia, you know, it always sounded so far away."

"Heck, Johnnie, it IS a far piece. We ain't cooked eight days provisions 'cause it's right 'round

the corner."

By 3 PM the train was at Iuka, Mississippi, almost at the Alabama border, when Jonathon

heard some sort of yelling from outside the car and leaned close to look.  "Look, Jimmie! It's

Calvin. What the heck is he tryin' to do?"

"'Pears like he's tryin' to get to that there other car. Guess he sees some friends there he wants

to visit or somethin'."

Jonathon's lips were pressed tightly together, his brow knitted in a frown, as he watched the

tall, dark-haired young farmer he'd known most of his life running alongside the moving train.

He hadn't noticed when Cal had jumped off their car, hadn't been aware of anything concerning it at all until he heard the encouraging shouts coming from a car two up from theirs.

The train wasn't moving all that fast. Maybe he could make it. Then with a sudden lurch, the

thing picked up speed. "Don't, Cal, don't try...."  His voice was a breathless whisper as he watched his friend, but Calvin gave a mighty leap, disappearing between two of the cars.

"Did...did he make it?" Jimmie asked, his mouth hanging open.

"I don't see him. I don't...."

Just then someone up at the front of the cars uncoupled them from the engine and as the engine

kept on a ways, the cars settled to a stop. 

"What's going on?" Jimmie yelled, but Jonathon was already out the door at the front end of

their car, running along the tracks.

A lot of young men were off the train now, all heading along the tracks, all...looking.  John

Gideon grabbed Jonathon's shoulders. "Don't look, Johnnie," he croaked. "You don't wanna

look."

But Jonathon did. He needed to see for himself.  Cal had fallen between two cars. He was

simply cut to pieces.  Bile rose up Jonathon's throat but he closed his lips on it, blinking

rapidly as he looked at what was left of Calvin Warner's twenty-one year old body.  Some

men he didn't know were beginning to move him off the tracks.

"Let me through," Jonathon said, his voice hollow, shaky. "Come on, Jimmie, John. Friends should do this for him." 

As best they could, the three, along with another young farmer from their area, lifted Cal,

carrying him to a near-by house.  While the engine slowly backed up to couple again to the

cars, they buried him at the edge of a patch of woods.

When it was done, Jonathon looked at Cal's blood on his hands, mingled now with dirt from

digging the grave.  He squeezed his eyes closed, keeping them that way a long moment, then

looked at the sky, piercingly, intently, as though he might be able to see through it to something

beyond.  Wiping his hands a bit then on a tall tuft of grass, he pulled out his mother's small

Bible and read the 23rd Psalm.  His face grim, he walked away, back toward the train, pausing

only long enough by a pump to wash his hands and forearms.

He didn't say a word the rest of the day, just sat silently, his left temple leaning against the

window, staring at nothing.  Cal's jump toward the train kept repeating over and over in his

mind. He couldn't stop seeing it, stop seeing what came after, no matter if his eyes were open

or closed.  He'd expected he'd see some bad things, bloody things, as part of what he'd signed

on to do. But not this. Not Cal's strong body like it was after the wheels of the train rolled

over it. Not that. And now he was buried, buried without ever making it to war, without ever

seeing a Yank or firing a shot in battle. He needed to write his parents and tell them, maybe

enclose something for the Warner family, too.  But not now. Not yet.

It was dusk when the train passed through Tuscumbia, Alabama, and 11 when it crossed the

Tennessee River at Decatur.  At 3 in the early morning, Jonathon still stared out the window,

unable to sleep, Huntsville passing unnoticed.  Finally he dozed, but not long before the train

arrived at Stevenson, Alabama where the Memphis and Charleston RR had a junction with

the Chattanooga RR.  Here they remained between trains for three hours, from nine till noon,

and Jonathon found an old bench in a corner, finally sleeping soundly, having asked Jimmie

to wake him in time to get a bite of something to eat before the train pulled out.

Rested a bit, his mind settled somewhat, he found himself paying more attention to the country

they were traveling through. They crossed the Tennessee River again at Bridgeport, Alabama,

heading northeast for Chattanooga.  It was hard not to notice the scenery.  The line the track

followed had been excavated from the very side of a mountain that rose hundreds of feet up

above them. On the side Jonathon was sitting, he could look almost straight down at the river.

He hadn't ever seen anything quite so spectacular.  It was simply beautiful and the sight of it

calmed something deep inside him that had been aching profoundly.

After a while, Jimmie leaned over him, pointing in the distance. "That there peak, that's gotta

be Lookout Mountain.  My gran'pa told me 'bout it, 'bout how far you can see from the top o'

the thing."

"Doesn't look like a good place to have a battle," Jonathon commented with a wry smile. "I

surely hope we don't ever have to fight one in these parts."

"I doubt it'll come to that, Johnnie. We'll lick 'em in Virginia and they'll all hightail it back

where they belong."

"I guess so, Jimmie. You're probably right about that."  But more than the deaths from sickness

that had taken place at Union City, more than the coffins unloaded at stops along the train's

route or the sick men left behind in those places, Cal's bloody death, his grave miles from his

home with no family around to see him off, had taken the edge off the sense of pure adventure

with which he'd marched out of Louisville.  Just traveling toward war had been filled with

disease and death, with Cal's mangled form. Maybe war wasn't going to be so grand after all?

It was cloudy and rainy when they left Chattanooga in the evening of Tuesday, July 16th on

the East Tennessee and Georgia RR.  The train stopped for two hours at Cleveland, Tennessee,

on its steady northeast course toward Knoxville. More sick had been left at Chattanooga and

he began to wonder just how many of them would be left when they finally reached northern

Virginia.  As night began to fall again, he pulled his hat low, too tired not to fall asleep, unaware

when they crossed the Tennessee River at Loudon for the third time on the trip.  It was 4 AM

on Wednesday the 17th when they arrived in Knoxville, which seemed to him a rather pretty

city. During their four hours there, he and Jimmie watched the steamboats in the dawn light,

the rising sun making pink reflections on the water.

They passed through Greeneville on yet another long day's travel, arriving at Bristol well

after dark.  One of the soldiers who'd been there before explained how the main street of

Bristol is on the state line between Tennessee and Virginia. Just the thought of finally passing

into Virginia was a relief to them. Almost none of them, though, realized just how very much

of Virginia lay ahead of them to cross.  They traveled all night toward Lynchburg, changing

cars there for the Orange and Alexander RR.  Charlottesville came at 9 AM on Saturday the

20th.  Jonathon, who had taken some classes at Louisville Academy, knew Thomas Jefferson's

Monticello was just off out of town a bit.  What a sight that would be to see, but they had

another very long day of travel before them and this was definitely not a sight-seeing excursion

they were on.  They stopped at Gordonsville and were allowed off the train to stretch their

legs and get a bite to eat.

"This here trip ever goin' to end?" Jimmie complained, bouncing from heel to toe several

times to ease his leg muscles.

"I hear we should be gettin' in to Manassas Junction 'round 10 or 11 tonight," Jonathon

said.  "That should do it for a spell, I reckon."

"God be praised!" Jimmie said, his voice loud and fervent.  "I expect my tailbone's 'bout to

poke a hole clean through my backside.  I thought we was infantry and we was supposed to

be foot soldiers 'n all that, but I've plum wore off ever' bit of meat attached to my sittin'

down parts."

"You'll be gettin' plenty of foot time. There ain't much doubt of that. This is just the gettin'

the infantry to the place where they walk part of the deal."

"I need me a place to lie down to sleep, too. I ain't had a full body stretch out in so long my

bones've done forgot how to do it."

He was right. Sleeping on the crowded train had not been an easy thing and eating had been

hit and miss at best. As darkness fell and the train steamed toward Manassas, it was a worn

and weary group of soldiers who filled its cars.  They arrived at their destination around 10,

and by the time they unloaded the cars and got their gear, it was 11.  Word was they'd be

fighting Yanks come morning. There was no time or energy for putting up tents in the camp

of 3000 troops where they found themselves, just off a bit from 20,000 more Confederates

nearer the scene of battle.  Jonathon and Jimmie exchanged tired looks, unrolled their blankets

on the ground, and lay down.

"Ahhh!" Jimmie sighed, straightening his legs. "This is better."

But Jonathon was asleep as his cheek touched the thin nap of his blanket.

ON TO CHAPTER 4

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