an order came from brigade headquarters, for me to enter upon the responsibilities of acting Assistant Adjutant General of Kershaw’s Brigade.  When General Connor was disabled soon after, and the Senior Colonel of the brigade, present for duty, the gallant William D. Rutherford, received his death-wound, General Kershaw, commanding division, sent the Assistant Adjutant General of the division, (a staff officer), Major James M. Goggans, to command the brigade.  About the 17th of October there came a delegation to brigade headquarters, to learn, if possible, whether there could be obtained a leave of absence for a soldier, whose wife was dead, leaving a family of children to be provided for.

I was a sympathetic man, and appreciated the sad condition of the poor soldier, who had left his all to serve his country, and now had at home, a house full of motherless children.  I said “wait till I see the brigade commander,” and went to Major Goggans, relating the circumstances, and was assured of his approval of the application for leave of absence in question.  This news, the spokesman of the delegation, gladly carried back to the anxiously awaiting group.  Soon papers were brought to headquarters, signed by all the officers below.  When the papers were carried by me to the brigade commander for his approval, it raised a storm, so to speak, in the breast of the newly appointed, but temporary Chieftain.  “Why do you bring me this paper to sign this time of day?” it being in the afternoon.  “Do you not know that all papers are considered at nine o’clock A.M.?” In future, and as long as I am in command of the Brigade, I want it understood that under no considerations and circumstances, I wish papers to be signed, brought to me before or after nine o’clock A.M.  The faces of the officers composing the delegation, when the news was brought to them, plainly expressed their disgust; they felt, at the idea, that no grief, however great, would be considered by the self-exalted Chief; except as the clock struck nine in the morning.

Circumstances and occurrences of this kind were so rare and exceptional, that I record the facts given by Judge Pope, to expose an exception to the general rule of gentlemanly deportment of one officer to another, so universal throughout the army.  The kindness, sympathy and respect that superiors showed to subalterns and privates became almost a proverb.  While in a reminiscent mood, I will give a story of two young officers as given by the writer of the above.  He claims to have been an eye witness and fully competent to give a true recital.  It is needless to say that the writer of these memoirs was one of the participants, and as to the story itself, he has only a faint recollection, but the sequel which he will give is vivid enough, even after the lapse of a third of a century.  Judge Pope writes, “It is needless to say that the Third South Carolina Regiment had a half-score or more young officers, whose conduct in battle had