I am a man who cannot carry a tune in a bucket. But I can whistle and whistle loud, over the years I have even learned to whistle a few tunes but I do not have an ear for music and few would care to listen to my music. Thankfully there were plenty in my company and Regiment who had a taste and a talent for music.
The regiment had a band and it wasn’t an unskilled group of men. Many a tune I liked was shared among the soldiers. Minstrel Boy may well have been my favorite but there were others sung and played around the campfires at night. Whenever we stopped it seemed small instruments appeared from nowhere to add their accompaniment to our sad attempt at music. On the march, in the camp a song was always being passed about. Music soothed our souls and made the time pass more quickly.
Pictured above is one of my mess, Emmanuel. Emmanuel and his constant companion Nate were friends and good soldiers. Emmanuel planned to make a business building musical instruments after the war, he had built quite a few cigar box fiddles and a few larger instruments. He carried a violin through the war, I cannot recall it ever leaving his pack except to grace his shoulder.
Young Nate was killed at Allatoona Pass. All that is good that can be said of his death is that it was quick. A bullet took him in the head killing him outright; at least the boy did not suffer. Emmanuel went a little mad over the death of his young friend becoming one of my “killers.” After Allatoona Pass he never once passed on the opportunity to form up in the skirmish line or take part in a patrol. He actively hunted the rebels and spared no effort trying to kill them. Emmanuel had been well liked prior to Allatoona Pass, but afterwards his cold demeanor and dead eyes changed him. The change dulled his popularity with the other men of the company and regiment. He took up a friendship with the Dakota boy Little Foot and the two worked well together.
Emmanuel like so many other young men, Union and Confederate, was forever changed by the war. I watched hatred nearly consume him, it became his boon companion. He still played but it was not the same; he had lost his passion for the music and it was not the same. If it had not been for the actions of my Mina and that precious little baby I expect Emmanuel would have attempted suicide by rebel. He was not alone in having the war change him; all too many were forever changed and scarred by the war. Too many of us looked into hell and found it staring back at us. Some learned to live with it, others let it consume them.
I lost track of Emmanuel after the war; like so many others he disappeared into the vast west never to be seen or heard from again. I cannot hear the strains of music from a fiddle or violin without thinking of Emmanuel. He was a good soldier and a good man. I hope that if he has indeed died he has found peace.