Reading Bruce Catton's "This hallowed ground", the last few pages documented a simple, unorganized last "huzzah" for the men of the 5th Corps, of which the 4th regiment was a part.
"There was a quiet, cloudless May evening in Washington, with no touch of breeze stirring. In the camp of the V corps of the Army of the Potomac men lounged in front of their tents, feeling the familiar monotony of camp life for the last time. Here and there impromptu male quartets were singing. On some impulse a few soldiers got out candles, stuck them in the muzzles of their muskets, lighted them, and began to march down a company street. In the windless twilight the moving flames hardly so much as flickered.
Other soldiers saw, liked the looks of it, got out their own candles, and joined in the parade, until the presently the whole camp as astir. Privates were appointed temporary lieutenants, captains, and colonels, whole regiments began to form, spur of the moment brigadiers were commissioned, bands turned out to make music-and by the time full darkness had come the whole army corps was on the parade ground, swinging in and out, nothing visible but thousands upon thousands of candle flames.
Watching from a distance, a reporter for the New York HARALD thought the sight beautiful beyond description. No torchlight procession Broadway ever saw, he said, could compare with it. Here there seemed to be infinite room; this army corps had the night itself for its drill field, and as the little lights moved and out it was 'as though the gaslights of a great city had suddenly become animated and had taken to dancing.' The parade went on and on; the dancing flames narrowed into endless moving columns, broke out into broad wheeling lines, swung back into columns again, fanned out across the darkness with music floating down the still air.
As they paraded the men began to cheer. They had marched many weary miles in the last four years, into battle and out of battle, through forests and across rivers, uphill and downhill and over the fields, moving always because they had to go where they were told to go. Now they were marching just for the fun of it. It was the last march of all and, when the candles burned out, the night would swallow soldiers and music and the great army itself, but while the candles still burned, the men cheered.
The night would swallow everything-the war and its echoes, the graves that had been dug and the tears that had been shed because of them, the hatreds that had been raised, the wrongs that had been endured and the inexpressible hopes that had been kindled-and in the end the last little flame would flicker out, leaving no more than a wisp of gray smoke to curl away unseen. The night would take all of this, as it had toaken so many men and so many ideals-Lincoln and McPherson, old Stonewall and Pat Cleburne, the chance for a peace made in friendship and understanding, the hour of vision that saw fair dealing for men just released from bondage. But for the moments the lights still twinkled, infinitely fragile, flames that bent to the weight of their own advance, as insubstantial as the dream of a better world in the hearts of men, and they moved to the far off sound of music and laughter. The final end would not be darkness. Somewhere, far beyond the night, there would be a brighter and a stronger light."
I honestly have no words to add to this... its beautiful. :)
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