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 around. The soldiers have no camp equipage and are obliged to bivouac in the open air, which is not the pleasantest thing in the world, considering the fact that it has rained nearly the whole time for twenty-four hours; but the men, nothing disheartened, built wigwams of boughs, and those not actually on guard tumbled into these sieve-like dens and bore it as best they could. But thanks to fortune the glorious sun shines forth this morning, lighting up one of the finest landscape any where to be seen, bringing with it warm rays, joy and happiness to the soldiers as they sit around the camp fires, discussing bread, beef, coffee, and the state of the Union.
-This is most like a "soldier's life" of anything we have experienced since we left home; for there is something romantic and bewitching in this open field life, seeking food and sleep where accident or fortunte nay lead us. Our quarters are about half a mile from the relay House, which is a favorite watering place in summer; and within the lines of the camp is stationed a detachment of the Boston Light Artillery, 107 me, with six field pieces commanding the railroad; and nothing in the shape of stores is allowed to pass over the Baltimore and Ohio R. R. without being inspected by the troops, for which purpose three companies of the Sixth have been detailed for taht especial duty. Already they have seized large quantities of provisions and arms destined for Virginia. Gen. Butler has has quarters at the Relay House, which is in possession of Government troops, he has visited the quarters of our Regiment and told the men they were to have three meals a day. The intelligence as might be expected was received with rounds of applause. This is a very important post, and I understand it is the intention of the Government to hold it for a time at least.
+This is most like a "soldier's life" of anything we have experienced since we left home; for there is something romantic and bewitching in this open field life, seeking food and sleep where accident or fortune may lead us. Our quarters are about half a mile from the relay House, which is a favorite watering place in summer; and within the lines of the camp is stationed a detachment of the Boston Light Artillery, 107 men, with six field pieces commanding the railroad; and nothing in the shape of stores is allowed to pass over the Baltimore and Ohio R. R. without being inspected by the troops, for which purpose three companies of the Sixth have been detailed for that especial duty. Already they have seized large quantities of provisions and arms destined for Virginia. Gen. Butler has has quarters at the Relay House, which is in possession of Government troops, he has visited the quarters of our Regiment and told the men they were to have three meals a day. The intelligence as might be expected was received with rounds of applause. This is a very important post, and I understand it is the intention of the Government to hold it for a time at least.
 The eighth N. Y. Regiment is just back of us and a few rods distant; there are in all about two thousand troops at this place. One of the soldiers of the 8th N. Y. Regiment accidentally shot himself yesterday, and was buried at sunset last night. The funeral procession was a sad and solemn sight; as the funeral train passed slowly by our camp the soldiers formed in line and removing their hats stood silently viewing the melancholy spectacle. It was one of the most solemn sights I ever witnessed. Presently the notes of the muffled drum ceased, and we heard the farewell shot discharged over the grave where they had laid him. Almost a fatal accident happened in our camp yesterday. One of the men was a poisoned by eating some food sent from Baltimore containing strychnine; although it is possible he will recover, yet he had a narrow escape, which he probably owes to the fact that he took an over dose of the poison, besides having prompt medical assistance.
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 THE MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENTS AT THE RELAY HOUSE. The Sixth and Eighth Massachusetts Regiments are still at the Relay House, and if they have been ordered away it was probably for service in the immediate vicinity. We make the following extracts from a letter to the Boston Advertiser, dated—last Friday, respecting the Massachusetts regiments, written at the Relay House.
-Posted in this stronghold, with nothing to break the monotony more serious than an occasional night alarm, the troops are having an easy time. They find opportunity for drills and for dress-parades, such as officers in the Fourth Regiment sigh for in vain. The Eighth, especially, under Col. Hinks, has improved its opportunities, and is now one of the best regiments in the service, officers and men having had all the "bounce" of militia training knocked out of them, and having acquired the steady bearing and solid movement of regular troops. Besides having the advantage of an admirable camping-ground, the troops here have also learned valuable lessons as to the use of their rations. Officers and men declare that the supply under the army regulations is so abundant that, as one stout, hearty young private told me, "no man can eat his own ration." Under the supervision of Hon. Dexter F Parker, of the Sixth, now Acting Commissary of the post, economy in the use of rations has been made a system, and regular exchanges of the surplus, are made, so as to procure for the men an additional variety of articles such as the government does not supply. With constant labor and with some generous expenditures from his own private resources, Lieut. Parker hass reduced all these matters to order, and has enabled both regiments to get a considerable amount to their credit in the ration account with the Government. One item which I observed was 650 pounds of coffee, saved by the Eighth, if I remember rightly, within this month. The effect of all this upon the spirits as well as health of the men is at once obvious. They are for a most cheerful, contented, and eager for action.
+Posted in this stronghold, with nothing to break the monotony more serious than an occasional night alarm, the troops are having an easy time. They find opportunity for drills and for dress-parades, such as officers in the Fourth Regiment sigh for in vain. The Eighth, especially, under Col. Hinks, has improved its opportunities, and is now one of the best regiments in the service, officers and men having had all the "bounce" of militia training knocked out of them, and having acquired the steady bearing and solid movement of regular troops. Besides having the advantage of an admirable camping-ground, the troops here have also learned valuable lessons as to the use of their rations. Officers and men declare that the supply under the army regulations is so abundant that, as one stout, hearty young private told me, "no man can eat his own ration." Under the supervision of Hon. Dexter F Parker, of the Sixth, now Acting Commissary of the post, economy in the use of rations has been made a system, and regular exchanges of the surplus, are made, so as to procure for the men an additional variety of articles such as the government does not supply. With constant labor and with some generous expenditures from his own private resources, Lieut. Parker has reduced all these matters to order, and has enabled both regiments to get a considerable amount to their credit in the ration account with the Government. One item which I observed was 650 pounds of coffee, saved by the Eighth, if I remember rightly, within this month. The effect of all this upon the spirits as well as health of the men is at once obvious. They are for a most cheerful, contented, and eager for action.
 The chief complaint which I heard, of any hardship at the hands of the government, was caused by the doubt as to whether they can be taken on their present cones into the three year's service. The Eighth regiment is eager to be recruited up to the full standard and mustered in for long term, and the Sixth might easily be made the basis for another valuable corps. The great point on which they insist is that they shall not lose their present regimental numbers; they are jealous of having any new regiment confounded with the Sixth that forced its way through Baltimore, or the Eighth that opened the road to Washington, and they have a right to have their honest pride respected. It is not possible that this opportunity to obtain two regiments which have had their training in actual service, and have become accustomed to army fare and inured to the climate, will be neglected by the government, I am glad to add that these regiments are also recommended by their approved good conduct, the inhabitants in the neighborhood of the camp, including the gentlemen whose grounds are occupied by some of the troops, having petitioned to the War Department to the Massachusetts men retained at this post. On the other hand it is said that the neighborhood was somewhat relieved at the departure of the Maryland regiment, which was at one time encamped close by the Relay House.
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 {{:6th_mass_inf:lowellcourier_1861_06_24.jpg?linkonly|}}
+----
+//Boston Traveler//, June 26, 1861
+THE EIGHTH (MASS.) IN CAMP.
+Camp Life - A Stroll to a Maryland Town - Poverty and Desolation - The Inhabitants - Presentation of Colors to the Regiment by the Ladies of New York - Other Presentations - Return Home of the Three Months Men - Negroes and Flies.
+From our Correspondent.
+CAMP NEAR RELAY HOUSE, MD., \\
+June 22, 1861.
+Camp life drags along somewhat monotonously with us at the relay camp. To be a soldier and know that we are entitled by right to be in old Virginia where the fighting is going on, and yet be forced to remain quietly here with another regiment for something, the possible good of which you cannot see, is most certainly a grievous bore. Well-appointed regiments destined to Virginia via Washington, are carried by our encampment by the railroad every day. We greet them with patriotic enthusiasm, but at the same time we cannot help envying them the good fortune of being permitted to pay their respects to the poor fools down South who are growing very angry at being let alone.
+The weather continues dry and hot, but as our drills are now early in the morning and late in the evening, exclusively, we manage with but little difficulty to keep tolerably comfortable, and the long rest at mid-day gives us plenty of chance to bathe, or to walk about the country, for which passes are issued in liberal numbers. The most of my recent walks have been through the neighboring woods; but a day or two since I passed through the streets of the adjoining village of Elkridge Landing, where some years since there was in operation Iron works which gave employment to a large number of men; but the furnace has ceased operation and closed up some time ago and every inch of the premises is the very picture of desolation. Nearly all the dwellings of the village are in keeping with the furnace property. The brick store, after fourteen failures in one year, shut up shop, and
+closed its shutters for the last time; the houses, for the most part, are miserable specimens of architecture, sadly out of repair, and somewhat after the supposed style of Noah's ark; the inhabitants, if one may judge by appearances are not rich enough to be troubled with investments, and too lazy to warrant any fears of their ever adding, by labor, much more to their wordly goods; in short, the whole concern is about as much of a one horse with a broken harness settlement as I every saw.
+And yet this settlement, as poor as it is, is quite a convenience to us. From its inhabitants we procure, at reasonable rates, milk, eggs, butter, fruit, &c.: but we are of still more advantage to them, for aside from what they gain from us by peddling, washing, and doing trifling errands, they obtain our swill for their hogs, our cast-off clothing for their growing children, and our surplus rations for themselves. It is a singular community hereabout - a mixture of Union and secession sentiment. I met a man yesterday, who told me that he had two brothers who had been pressed into the Virginia service, and that one of them was totally blind in one of his eyes, yet he expressed strong Union sentiments, and would, if necessary, enter the Federal forces and trust of Heaven to care for his wife and children. Then, on the other hand, there is a professed secessionist residing near our camp, who is reputed wealthy, and who has a son holding a commission in the Confederate Army; he sent one of his men into camp, a day or two since, with a load of cherries to sell, and the darkey told me, confidentially, that the old man had never sold his cherries before, but times were had and money scarce, and he wanted to raise enough to pay his daughter's music tutor the next day, and so keep up his reputation for prompt payment.
+There are in this vicinity numerous well-to-do farmers with fine estates, well improved, and to a number of them our men are under great obligation for favors rendered; their strawberry beds and cherry trees have been thrown open to us with great liberality, and consequently we have had fruit in profusion. One of my mess tells of climbing into a cherry tree a day or two since, where he eat so many cherries that the stones which he dropped upon the ground almost reached a lower limb of the tree! I am inclined to doubt his statement, but I am positive that he and two companions were disturbed last night in their slumbers by cramps, supposed to be caused by too much fruit.
+Our regiment is not likely to want for regimental colors. We had a third banner presented to us last Friday. It is the present of several ladies of New York, and was forwarded to us through Maj. Gen. Butler with the following neat letter:
+"To Gen. Butler: We take pleasure in presenting this flag to the Sixth Mass. Regiment as a token of our admiration and respect for the noble and courageous men, who were among the first to obey their country's call to arms, and the first to shed their blood in defence of the laws and property of the United States."
+The donors are Mesdames Lydig, Kernochan and Colden, and Misses Berriam, Lydig, Gerry, Fish, Lorillard, Clift, Wolfe, Russell, Prime, Campbell, Wilkes, Minton, Field, Tompkins, Griffin and Whitsey. Gen. Butler says in forwarding the flag - "It gives me pleasure to be the medium of transmission between the ladies of New York and your Regiment of this token of good will. I know that in the hands of my old friends and neighbors it will be borne forward in such manner, as never to call a blush to the cheek of the fair donors, but they will hear of it carried in advance of you, with sparkling eyes of pleasure and triumph."
+Col. Watson forwarded to the ladies the following letter of acknowledgment:
+HEAD QUARTERS 6th Regiment M. V. M.\\
+Camp near Relay House, June 21.
+To Miss Berriam and other ladies of New York City
+In behalf of my command, the 6th Regiment of Mass. V. M., I take great pride in acknowledging the gift from you of the beautiful Regimental Colors transmitted by Major Gen. Butler. Such a gift - wrought by fair hands - prompted by pure and patriotic hearts, and presented to us by a gallant officer whose name every citizen of our old Commonwealth pronounces with pride, and to whom the eyes of an expectant country are turned, calls out from every heart in our land the terms of gratitude, and nerves every arm uplifted in the pledge of devotion to the flag. To us it symbolizes the pure patriotism of the Fathers - their noble blood shed and the band of free States united. It reminds us of the successful labors of those great and good men who followed in their footsteps, and following, nourishes the growth of Freedom's Empire. In its folds we read the call to duty in a cause which seeks only to maintain and not to conquer. In behalf of every officer and soldier in the 6th Regiment, I feel authorized to return sincere thanks to the fair donors and to pledge a rally around that flag whenever floes or traitors danger it, and that we will never dishonor it.\\
+B. F. WATSON\\
+Lieut. Col. Commanding.
+While on the subject of flags I may as well say that we are expecting to be presented with another one from the Union merchants of Baltimore. The Eighth Regiment have also had a splendid affair in that line presented to them by the ladies of the New York Seventh.
+Our men are now engrossed with the subject of returning home, and rumors are rife that we shall return before the expiration of our time, but rumor is liable to be false; most of our men will probably reenlist for the war, but I think that ll of them will desire to return and arrange their business and see their friends; besides, some of our boys desire to try a different arm of service. As our present term of service draws to a close we are receiving smarter drills, and the reins of government are being drawn a trifle tauter by the officials. Besides the "Shirks' Battalion," we have almost daily court martials, and they sentence men to carry knapsacks upon their backs containing from 25 to 40 lbs. of stone for several hours. The regiment remains very healthy, and although we have at present a very fine hospital, for which purposes we have taken possession of a find house a short distance from the camp; yet the boys do not seem inclined to patronize it to the extent that was anticipated, but those who are sick receive the very best of care. The wife and daughter of Col. Jones - who still remain in camp - as well as the colonel himself, are very attentive to them.
+Negroes and flies are very thick here, the latter, perhaps, a trifle the thickest, but the former the greatest annoyance by all odds. Nearly all our commissioned officers sport a darkey body servant, which which the camp is over-run, and they all answer with great pleasure to the name of Ephraim. There is a big nigger wench, a frequent visitor to the camp, formerly a slave, who had a hand cut off by a mowing machine some years since, who, with many other of the blacks hereabouts seem to think that our mission is to free all the slaves. She answers readily to the above general name, and swears worse than any man in our Regiment.
+If the friends of any of our men wonder why then do not hear from them they must bear in mind that the most of us are out of money, without postage stamps, and that the franking privilege is cut off.\\
+Co. K.
+{{ :8th_mass_inf:boston_traveler_1861-06-26_2.png?linkonly|}}
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Howard County, MD in the Civil War

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