Excerpt from The Last Ten Days Service of the Old Third Corps ("as We Understand It") With the Army of the Potomac: Address Delivered After the Anniversary Dinner of the Third Corps Union, 5th May, 1887, at the Hotel Windsor, New York The night of the 1st-2d was the witches' sabbath of the artillery, the Walpurgis night of the big guns. Those who heard the crash and roar on that occasion are not likely to for get it. It was as if thousands of locomotives had gone insane and rivalled each other in making the darkness hideous with every species of howl and clamor of which steam or explosives and iron are capable. The next day broke beautifully; the weather was lovely. The spring sun seemed to laugh benignantly as its rays played among the developing foliage. Heaven and earth seemed to rejoice together over the Union success. It was a Sunday, and on it the Rebel armies prepared to evacuate their capital, which they had defended so obstinately for three years, and Peters burg, which had held Grant in check for over ten months. It was a sort Of poetical justice that the occupation of these two places fell in a great measure to the negro troops, and that those who had despised the black, and denied to him the rights of a man, should suffer this last and supreme humiliation. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.