Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Harvard Memorial Biographies

The commission Temple was striving to obtain, and to which he refers in his letter, was that of a second lieutenancy in the Regular Army. He was not at first successful; but each day he seemed so near gaining his object, that he never thought it best to enlist as a private soldier. Three or four long months he labored for this commission, entirely giving up the plan of returning to Cambridge. Much of this time he spent in Washington. In August the appointment came; and so favorable an impression had he made at the War Department when in Washington, that a captaincy was given him. He was appointed to the Seventeenth Infantry, and directed to report at Fort Preble, Maine. He reported at once, and was ordered to Biddeford, Maine, on the recruiting service, whither he repaired full of hope that he might soon raise a company, and be sent to the army, then before Washington. But early in the war scarcely any recruits could be obtained for the Regular Army; and then, recruiting for the Seventeenth was confined to Maine and New Hampshire. Besides, this regiment, was a three-battalion regiment, and there were a great many officers for only a few men. Temple was disappointed. The youngest captain in the army was as far from seeing active service as when studying at Stockbridge. He got no men at Biddeford, and naturally formed rather a low opinion of the patriotism of that town. When, some time after, the Adjutant-General of the Army wrote him that he had put government to great expense for very little gain, he was quite bitter in his reply, intimating that he might as well try to recruit a company in a village of Georgia as in Biddeford, and that troops were needed in Maine as well as in Virginia. This shows the impatience with which he looked upon those whose patriotism was lukewarm during the great struggle.

In December, Temple was ordered to a recruiting station in Albany. He was there until the summer months approached. He had many acquaintances in the city, and