A little after nightfall, I was sent by General Lee upon an errand to AP Hill, and returning

sometime later with information of matters on our right, I found General Jackson retired

to rest, and General Lee's sleeping at the foot of a tree covered with his army cloak.

As I aroused the sleeper, he slowly sat up on the ground and said, Ah, Captain, you

have returned, have you? Come here and tell me what you have learned on our right.

Laying his hand on me, he drew me down by his side, and passing his arm around my shoulder,

drew me near to him, and a fatherly way that told of his warm and kindly heart.

When I had related such information as I had secured for him, he thanked me for accomplishing

his commission, and then said he regretted that the young men about General Jackson had

not relieved him of annoyance by finding a battery of the enemy which had harassed our

advance. Adding that young men of that day were not equal to what they had been when

he was a young man, and as he laughed heartily through the stillness of the night, I went

off to make a bed of my saddle blanket, with my head and my saddle, near my horse's

feet, and was soon wrapped in the heavy slumber of a weary soldier.

Sometime after midnight, I was awakened by the chill of the early morning hours, and

turning over, caught a glimpse of a little flame on the slope above me, and sitting up to

see what it meant, I saw, bending over a scant fire of twigs, two men seated on old

cracker boxes, and warming their hands over the little fire. I had to rub my eyes and collect

my wits to recognize the figures of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.

Janet James P. Smith, staff, Lieutenant General Thomas J. Jackson.

Hey y'all, it's New Year's Eve Eve, and perhaps like us, you've also had a lot going

on during the holidays. But despite all that's going on, we wanted to be sure to get an episode

...