NOTES OF A CONFEDERATE STAFF-OFFICER.

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P ass ' n f? the river and walking leisurely upe hill, the idle Federal soldiers, seeing a Confed-e rate officer on their side and feeling curious^oout it, ran down in numbers toward the road,ihe first time I was frightened by this result, a y act, as I feared that our generals on the

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'ills with their strong glasses, seeing the commo-g Might inquire into it. As soon as I approachedj rils ide, who met ine with the greatest cordiality,^expressed to him this fear. He at once sent out^uriers to order the soldiers back to camp, andhen sat down on an old log, and being providedh crackers, cheese, sardines, and a bottle of(all luxuries to a Confederate), we discusseds j! s lunch as well as the situation. General Burn-hi s . eeiae <l terribly mortified and distressed atold a '^ Ure , sa 'l | l Ihul l le wanted me to tell hisarmy friends on the other side that he was notthe^° nS ^ e ^ 0r ^ ie attack on Fredericksburg in^auner in which it was made, as he was him-g Under orders, and was not much more than a^e-head, or words to that effect.

e talked pleasantly for an hour about oldfor 6S ’ ® urns l ( ie asking me many questions aboutllie^f r ^ r ' en< l s and comrades, now on our side oft-tricidal struggle. When I expressed myt 0 . h° return, he wrapped up a bottle of brandyme a ^ Parting, and sent me under escort toand nV6r ' having recrossed, I mounted my liorseas tK r ° de hack to Marye’s Heights, but, enjoyableaho I s . esea Pade had been, I said nothing, of course,Th ^ army friends till long afterward.

i n „ a * day I witnessed with pain the burial ofat t/ thousands of Federal dead that had fallen1 ^ re< ! e ricksburg. The night before, the tlier-oy 6 ^ er must have fallen to zero, and the bodiesW a „ f s lain had frozen to the ground. The groundto n ro ^ ei1 nearly a foot deep, and it was necessaryHeld 6 ac k~ a xes. Trenches were dug on the battle-hfiri f aild c l ea< i collected and laid in line forSofq- ' H was a sad sight to see these bravehl aa l f rs thrown into the trenches, without even athro 6 * ° r a w ord of prayer, and the heavy clodsof 11 u P°n them; but the most sickening sightfive i, Was w hen they threw the dead, some four orho Us u udred in number, into Wallace’s empty ice-®tong’ W ^f re they were found — ahecatombof skel-after the war. In 1865-66 some shrewd

Yankee contractors obtained government sanctionto disinter all the Federal dead on the battle-fieldsof Fredericksburg , Chancellorsville, the Wilder-ness, and Spotsylvania Court House. They were tobe paid per capita. When I went out to see theskeletons taken from the ice-house, I found the con-tractor provided with unpaiuted boxes of commonpine about six feet long and twelve inches wide;but I soon saw that this scoundrel was dividing theremains so as to make as much by his contract aspossible. I at once reported what I had seen toColonel E. Y. Sumner, Jr., then in command of theSub-district of the Rappahannock. He was utterlyshocked at this vandalism. I afterward heard thatthe contract was taken away from the fellow andgiven to more reliable parties.

One morning about this time I was at breakfast,when the servant, terribly frightened, announceda sergeant and file of soldiers in my porch askingfor me. The ladies immediately imagined thatthis squad had been sent to arrest me, as they hadheard more than once that charges would be pre-ferred against me by the United States Govern-ment for extreme partisanship. Going to the door,I was told by the sergeant that Colonel Sumnerhad sent him to me to inquire as to the burialplaces of the Federal soldiers whom I had founddead upon my lot and in my house after the battleof Fredericksburg . I told him that I had foundone Federal soldier stretched on one of my beds.In my parlor, lying on the floor, was another whoseentire form left its imprint ill blood on the floor,—as may be seen to this day. In my own cham-ber, sitting up in an old-fashioned easy-chair, Ihad found a Federal lieutenant-colonel. When Ientered, I supposed him to be alive, as the backof his head was toward me. Much startled, Iapproached him, to find that he had been shotthrough the neck, and, probably, placed in thatupright position that he might better breathe. Hewas quite dead. I had all these bodies, and fiveor six others found in my yard, buried in one graveon the wharf. They had been killed, no doubt, byBarksdale’s Mississippi brigade, in their retreatfrom my lot. I made my report at Sumner’s head-quarters, after which I took the burial squad tothe grave, and then returned home to quiet theapprehensions of my family.