#71 – Col. E. B. C. Cash

Report of Col. E. B. C. Cash, Eighth South Carolina Infantry, of Operations July 18 and 19

O.R.– SERIES I–VOLUME 2 [S# 2] — CHAPTER IX, p. 457

HDQRS. EIGHTH REGIMENT SOUTH CAROLINA VOLS.,

Camp Victory, July 31, 1861

In obedience to orders from the general commanding the First Brigade, Army of the Potomac, I beg leave to submit the following report of the operations of the Eighth Regiment South Carolina Volunteers during the 18th, 19th, and 20th July instant:

Having sufficiently recovered from a serious attack of sickness I assumed command of my regiment on the morning of the 18th, and found it posted on the south side of Bull Run, on the extreme left, my right resting on the left of Colonel Williams’ Third Regiment South Carolina Volunteers. On the 18th there was heavy cannonading to the right of my position, and occasionally balls and shells were thrown very near my lines. On the 19th and 20th my position was strongly fortified by voluntary labor from my regiment. On the 19th Colonel Kershaw’s regiment was posted upon my left, and with it Captain Kemper’s battery of light artillery. I have the honor to be, general, your obedient servant,

E. B. C. CASH,

Colonel Eighth Regiment South Carolina Volunteers

Brig. Gen. M. L. BONHAM

I Never Expected This

I’ve been keeping you up to date with the continuing saga of my copy of Michael Burlingame’s Abraham Lincoln: A Life.  I got a really good price on the two volume set, $83 from Amazon with free shipping, and I used a $50 gift certificate from my credit card points against that.  The book took a month and a half to arrive, and when it did, the spine cover of volume II had separated from the text block spine, so the book just falls open.  As Drew pointed out to me, that’s to be expected for a 1,000 page book, eventually, but for a new book it’s inexcusable.  Confused by Amazon’s statement on its site that exchange was not an option (the instructions say to return the book and reorder it, which would have lost me the significant discount I got on the price when I ordered it), I checked into getting the book repaired.  I was told by the nice folks at Mechling Bookbindery that it would cost about $40 for repair, which was more than the lost discount.  So I followed Amazon’s return instructions and found in the process that indeed, I could exchange the book for a new copy.  The new books would arrive within days, and I had 30 days to return my original order.

The new volumes arrived within a few (very few) days.  But guess what?  The same volume of the set had the same defect.  Drew tells me that this is a pretty consistent problem with this set.  So I fired off a note to Amazon, telling them how much it was going to cost me to get the book repaired.  Guess what?  They told me that I could return the book for full credit, or I could accept a $40 credit to the payment method I used to buy the book from them.  Whoda thunk?