Hey Buckeye!
Isaac,
My mistake. It was northeastern Ohio!
It appears that the fine people of Pittsburgh had been entertaining the boys of the battery rather merrily, and even went so far as to assemble a bunch of the local men to unload the artillery off of one train and transfer it onto flatcars of the Fort Wayne road. The loss of the caisson was detailed only as follows:
"The train left Pittsburg at 10 P.M. and was in motion nearly all night. A long stop was made at Loudonville, Ohio, to fasten the artillery which was loaded on open cars, for it had been discovered that one of the caissons had gone overboard. After leaving Crestline, one of the men fell from the moving train, and was supposed to have been killed, but he afterward turned up with a bruised head and neck."
And almost a month later we find . . . "Lieutenant Loeser returned to camp the next day and reported that Captain Durell was at Lexington (KY) with the lost caisson. It was found at Cincinnati in bad shape. It was broken in many places, the boxes were all in a bad condition, the powder bags were broken open, and a number of projectiles were found to be worthless. The boys' knapsacks that had been attached to it were all gone, and they were obliged to pay for the new clothes they drew in place of the lost garments."
Orderly Sergeant Andrews goes into greater detail about what was lost and the circumstances that caused it in his diary, but I don't have that handy at the moment. :(
You may be wondering why so many things were falling from the train on their trip. Here's a description of the quality of the road: "The track was rough, and the freight cars did not ride very easy. It seemed, at times, as if the wheels were off the track and running over the ties." Now that's a bumpy ride!
Originally posted by ohiofed
Isaac,
My mistake. It was northeastern Ohio!
It appears that the fine people of Pittsburgh had been entertaining the boys of the battery rather merrily, and even went so far as to assemble a bunch of the local men to unload the artillery off of one train and transfer it onto flatcars of the Fort Wayne road. The loss of the caisson was detailed only as follows:
"The train left Pittsburg at 10 P.M. and was in motion nearly all night. A long stop was made at Loudonville, Ohio, to fasten the artillery which was loaded on open cars, for it had been discovered that one of the caissons had gone overboard. After leaving Crestline, one of the men fell from the moving train, and was supposed to have been killed, but he afterward turned up with a bruised head and neck."
And almost a month later we find . . . "Lieutenant Loeser returned to camp the next day and reported that Captain Durell was at Lexington (KY) with the lost caisson. It was found at Cincinnati in bad shape. It was broken in many places, the boxes were all in a bad condition, the powder bags were broken open, and a number of projectiles were found to be worthless. The boys' knapsacks that had been attached to it were all gone, and they were obliged to pay for the new clothes they drew in place of the lost garments."
Orderly Sergeant Andrews goes into greater detail about what was lost and the circumstances that caused it in his diary, but I don't have that handy at the moment. :(
You may be wondering why so many things were falling from the train on their trip. Here's a description of the quality of the road: "The track was rough, and the freight cars did not ride very easy. It seemed, at times, as if the wheels were off the track and running over the ties." Now that's a bumpy ride!
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