Late in November the battalion organization was completed by the appointment of the Field and Staff, Francis J. Parker, Major; Charles K. Cobb, Adjutant; and George W. Pearson, Quartermaster; and the Major assumed command December 2d, 1861.
The Post-Commander, Colonel Justin E. Dimmock, was also Colonel of the First United States Artillery, and the headquarters of the regiment was with him; but with the exception of the excellent band of the regiment, there were none other of its officers or men at the post.
Fort Warren at this time was occupied as a depot for Confederate war and state prisoners--the former consisted mainly of some 800 men, captured in North Carolina, and included also a number of Confederate officers, among whom were Commodore Barron and Colonel Pegram; and among the latter were the Confederate ambassadors, Mason and Slidell, Mayor Brown, Chief of Police Kane of Baltimore, and others.
The first duty to be taught and learned under such circumstances was guard duty, and that was no holiday work. The daily detail consisted of about seventy-five men, and was divided into the interior and exterior guard. During the daytime a line of sentinels enclosed a space in front of the prisoners’ quarters, within which they were permitted to exercise, and these sentinels at retreat were drawn in to the casemate entrances. Guards were also placed at the sally-port and postern, and near the staircases leading up to the ramparts. Outside, a picket line entirely surrounded the fortifications; watch being kept not only to prevent escape from within, but also to forbid the approach of boats from the sea or the shore.
Such duty on a bleak island, exposed to the terrible cold and storms of a New England winter, was no pastime. Occasionally some of the outposts would be untenable by reason of the dash of waves, and often inspection and relief of the posts was effected with great difficulty because of the icy condition of the ground. In the most severe storms the guard was replaced by patrols, each of two men, who walked the line, one patrol being despatched every fifteen or twenty minutes.
One dark howling night the sentinel, on post near what was called the grave-yard, reported to the officer that a white form had twice passed between him and the fort, and upon close questioning the soldier admitted that he had not challenged, because he feared it was a ghost. There was considerable stir, in and outside the fort, until an inspection had shown that no prisoner had escaped and no intruder could be found.