After nearly being trampled by Gen. Hatch's stampeding cavalry on the night before the battle of Winchester, Lt. Harry Russell wrote his sister, "It's a funny feeling to have a squadron of cavalry pass over you."
While falling back with his company so they could collect their knapsacks, Capt. Edward Abbott took a member of the 23rd Virginia prisoner. "He tried to escape afterwards but one of my men blew his brains out."
"Stonewall" Jackson violated his own principles against fighting on a Sunday on the 25th of May.
While the regiment was halted in the streets of Winchester, Lt. Robert Gould Shaw was struck by a minie ball which passed through his clothing and smashed into his watch, shattering the works to pieces but leaving him no more than a bruise. "I felt a violent blow and a burning sensation in my side, and at the same moment a man by my side cried out, 'O, my arm!' I had just time to wonder why I wasn't lying on the ground when the order came, 'Right face, double-quick, march,' and we moved on."
The stories of civilians shooting at the Union soldiers from windows is well documented. Col. Gordon condemned the "hellish spirit of murder" which prevailed among Southerners. The incident was seen as proof of the slaveholder's inbred brutality.
At least one soldier in the 2nd Massachusetts--Pvt. Charles H. Emerson of Company B--is listed as having been "killed by a civilian" at Winchester.
As he ran through bullet and flame to escape from the town, Capt. Samuel Quincy had to make a decision: should he throw away his cumbersome heavy overcoat? He didn't really wish to part with it, but as he saw the National colors growing smaller in the distance, "I had settled the matter definitely that being shot in a fiery furnace was worse than to die of cold for want of a coat--so off it came & I hoe it was scorched to tinder before any rebel rascal pounced upon it."
Although shot through the left breast, Sgt. Nathan Dane Appleton Sawyer of Company A walked 13 miles before finally getting into an ambulance. He returned to duty in September a 2nd Lt. During the war he was wounded twice more--at Gettysburg and at Peach Tree Creek. After the war be became a Captain in the U.S. Infantry.
Lt. Charles Morse described some of the close calls in his company. One soldier was struck in the forehead by a ball which "cut a groove right across it, doing no harm and making an honorable scar." Another man was glanced on his cap by a sabre, was passed over for dead by the enemy cavalry, "then quietly got up and escaped through a side street and across to Harper's Ferry." And a corporal was raising the rammer of his piece "when a ball came between the fingers holding the rammer cutting into each."
Edward Abbott had not even gotten clear of the town when his wind gave out and he was obliged to walk. In spite of his entreaties that they keep up with their companies, several men pulled up to stay with him. "They said they would not leave me, and so I had to be contented, though I would rather they had gone on ahead, for I knew that they could not do me any good against 3 or 4 thousand men." Finally deciding he prefered not to be taken prisoner, Abbott took to his heels again, but soon had to give it up again. He ended up with the 5th CT INF, with whom he stayed as far as Bunker Hill, where he caught up with the 2ND MA.
While a prisoner at Winchester, Maj. Wilder Dwight attempted to use Gordon's former association with "Stonewall" Jackson as a means of securing the comfort of the Union wounded, but found that the general lived up to his nickname. When he identified himself as the major of the regiment of George H. Gordon, "who, I believe, an old friend of yours," Jackson replied coldly, "Friend of mine, sir? He was, sir, once a friend." Dwight, a lawyer by trade did manage to get himself paroled on the spot rather than endure a trip to Libby.
Capt. Richard Cary, who had spent the past months disparaging the fortitude of his new 2nd Lieutenant, Francis Crowininshield, was now compelled to write the wounded hero's family, "It affords me the greatest satisfaction to tell you that his conduct throughout was perfect even so much so that I was obliged to once or twice command him to seek shelter when he was needlessly, though most bravely, exposing himself."
Among the first to cross the Potomac after the escape from Winchester was Peggy, the runaway slave who had become Gordon's cook. Gordon arranged passage for her and her son to Massachuetts where she would work (for wages this time) for Gordon's cousin (and future wife), Lizzie Scott. But he was first obliged to pledge a $1,000 bond to absolve the Philadelphia, Wilmington & Baltimore RR from any "lawful claims that might be hereafter brought against it by the owner of this colored property."
One misconception about the Rebels acknowledged by Maj. Dwight to be a falsehood was the frightful rumors of their barbarity towards the wounded and captured. All had been treated with kindness and respect.
Among the dead in Lt. Morse's company was 18-year old Alexander Stephens, whom he described as a "brave little fellow." Morse could not help but feel sorry for the boy's older brother, John, who had joined up with him and had always looked out for him. "It is a severe shock, but he bears it bravely, and says he feels happy that his brother never showed himself a coward." John Stephens was later wounded in the shoulder at Cedar Mountain and died in September, 1862.
The 2nd Massachusetts returned to Winchester in June without incident. Although Chaplain Quint expressed regret the "infamous town" never got its just desserts he took comfort in the belief that "Satan will get his own some day." And when he observed one brave soul handing a bouquet to a surpsried Lt. Col. Andrews, it demonstrated to the Chaplain that "there was one decent woman in that town."
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