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the purpose of handling supplies for the Federal army at Greens- boro' and Danville, and other purposes. We were told to take our own men to man the trains and engines, and none of the men who worked for Major Wright in the operations of those roads for the succeeding ninety days will ever forget the uniform kindness of him- self and his assistants. When the corps was ordered to the frontiers of Texas, in anticipation of trouble with the French in Mexico, the writer and many of his assistants were urged to go with them. We wanted rest, many of us had families in the South that we had not seen for months, and in the latter part of July we disbanded, as it were, and to-day we are like the survivors in gray scattered.
Two of the engineers who did faithful service to the Confederacy, and one or more of the conductors who served with me in those try- ing days, are now trusted employees of the Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway. We are two small a body to think of re- unions. We sometimes meet, not as "ships that pass in the night," but on the car or around the engine of to-day, and discuss those old days of the past the days that the average railroad man of to-day knows so little about or can comprehend how armies were moved and provisioned by the Southern roads, and how trains were run.
We are, like the survivors, fast passing away, and will soon be
known no more.
COLONEL J. H. AVERILL.
[From the Richmond (Va.) Dispatch, Sept. 18, 1897.]
SUSSEX LIGHT DRAGOONS.
A ROLL OF THIS GALLANT ORGANIZATION.
Something of Its History.
The following is the original roll of the Sussex Light Dragoons: Captain, Benjamin W. Belshes; First Lieutenant, George H. Dil- lard; Second Lieutenant, William W. Blow; Junior Second Lieuten- ant, P. S. Parker; First Sergeant. H. Q. Moyler; Second Sergeant, Thomas A. Dillard; Third Sergeant, E. T. Thornton; Fourth Ser- geant, William L. Adkins; Corporals, T. L. Johnson, F. L. Vellines, James E. Barker, Joseph H. Chappel; Privates, A. P. Adkins, J. D. Adkins, B. R. Birdsong, A. S. Birdsong, Henry Birdsong, Jr., J.
18
