In our scouting expeditions we found little farms in secluded nooks
among the mountains, where grown men assured us that they had never
before seen the American flag, and whole families had never been
further from home than a church and country store a few miles away.
From these mountain people several regiments of Union troops were
recruited in West Virginia, two of them being organized in rear of
my own lines, and becoming part of the garrison of the district in
the following season.
I had been joined before reaching Gauley Bridge by Chaplain Brown of
the Seventh Ohio, who had obtained permission to make an adventurous
journey across the country from Sutton to bring me information as to
the position and character of the outposts that were stretching from
the railway southward toward our line of operations. Disguised as a
mountaineer in homespun clothing, his fine features shaded by a
slouched felt hat, he reported himself to me in anything but a
clerical garb. Full of enterprise as a partisan leader of scouts
could be, he was yet a man of high attainments in his profession, of
noble character and real learning. When he reached me, I had as my
guest another chaplain who had accepted a commission at my
suggestion, the Rev.
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