There was the deep Tennessee,
still swollen by spring rains, upon the left bank of which they lay,
with the stream protecting one flank. In the river were some of the
gunboats which had been of such value to Grant. All about them was
rough, hilly country, almost wholly covered with brushwood and tall
forest. There were three deep creeks, given significant names by the
pioneers. Lick Creek flowed to the south of them into the Tennessee,
and Owl Creek to the north sought the same destination. A third,
Snake Creek, was lined with deep and impassable swamps to its very
junction with the river.
Some roads of the usual frontier type ran through this region, and at
a point within the Northern lines stood a little primitive log church
that they called Shiloh. It was of the kind that the pioneers built
everywhere as they moved from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Shiloh
belonged to a little body of Methodists. Dick went into it more than
once. There was no pastor and no congregation now, but the little
church was not molested. He sat more than once on an uncompromising
wooden bench, and looked out through a window, from which the shutter
was gone, at the forest and the army.
Sitting here in this primitive house of worship, he would feel a certain
sadness. It seemed strange that a great army, whose purpose was to
destroy other armies, should be encamped around a building erected in
the cause of the Prince of Peace.
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