September 26, 1864,
City Point, Virginia.

Dysentery has taken me again – it has been an intermittent plague upon me for over a month now.  General Grant has “ordered” me to bed rest out of concern for my constitution, but I must get back on my feet to follow the troops today, who are scheduled to deploy by 11 am.  The camps are abuzz with activity now, small groups of men walking to the sinks and sutlers, carrying supplies by wagon and wheelbarrow, and filling canteens.  Officers’ call has commenced in our division headquarters, the smoke of cigars and pipes circling through the trees surrounding the command tent.  Reinforcements continue to arrive from Washington; a fresh brigade from Pennsylvania and a “paper box” artillery regiment from Rhode Island marched into camp this morning, fresh from the steamer flotilla.  It seems next to impossible to conceive of further Confederate resistance in the face of such mustering strength, but the distant smoke from campfires in the Rebel trenches, along with their defiant red banner which I can glimpse through my field glasses, bear witness to a prolonged struggle.

Mrs. U.S. Grant was here yesterday to visit the General and the troops, along with Mrs. Walker of the Sanitary Commission and her legion of volunteers.  Mrs. Walker was resplendent in a cream colored gown with black piping and Spanish leather gloves.  The Commission ladies handed out parcels of stationery and lemon cookies to the men, who had been assembled for that purpose.  Mrs. Walker informs me that a good portion of the Commission funds have been raised in faraway California, a State which has sought to assuage the challenges of the work here with financial support, given the difficulty of transporting large bodies of volunteers from such a distance.  California has not been an idle theatre of action, however, with Secessionist nests in certain of her counties and Rebel raiders prowling her coast.  I should very much like to visit San Francisco when all this is over.

General Grant is now riding past the hospital on Cincinnati, accompanied by a Capt. Chadwick and Sgt. McConnell of the 72nd New York, his latest engineering advisors at the front.  The General is a truly modern commander, seeking to employ science and mathematics to defeat the Rebels, and not merely courage and fortitude.  I have seen the face of warfare transform itself over these more than three years, from a contest between grand armies of duelists seeking to redeem their honor, to a race between rival machines, each striving to outdo the other in innovation and invention.  We have seen the advent of warfare in the air, in the trench, and under the sea, as well as with repeating firearms, telegraphed communication, and covert operations.  These developments, while vital to an early national victory, augur a sinister future for the nations of the earth, should the development of human reason and diplomacy lag behind technological progress.  Let us hope that clearer minds will prevail in the conflicts of the years ahead, so that warfare may one day be relegated to the barbarisms of years gone by. 

3 pm.  A renewed movement of Rebels on our right flank.  Artillery limbers move into place to the shouted commands of frantic officers.  The heat is particularly oppressive today.  Small clusters of infantrymen sit or collapse by the roadside, taken with heatstroke; the surgeons can do nothing for them, as the mobile field hospital moves forward with the main column.  A Pennsylvania battalion engages the enemy’s left flank and drives them back with substantial loss.  A company of North Carolina cavalry sweeps around our right, delivering their retreating infantry from complete disaster.  One of their troopers takes a bullet in his forehead from one of our horsemen’s revolver – the stricken man sits up straight in the saddle, then topples in a heap to the ground, wearing the exact expression in death that he wore a moment before in life.  An Irish regiment from New York charges forward with a shout, leaping over their own (and the enemy’s) dead and wounded with bayonets fixed.  The enemy is driven from the field in disarray, and the day is won.  Bodies of the slain lay intermingled with the crawling and prostrate wounded.  A busy day and night awaits the surgeons. 

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