The government supplied everything that was required, including sabres, carbines, uniforms, ammunition, and lumber for barracks. Steamboats from Evansville came up the river loaded with supplies; and as the water was high from unusual rains, they landed their cargoes at the boathouse pier, enlarged for the purpose. Each boat was provided with a guard, for they were occasionally fired upon from the shore. Another officer and several non-commissioned officers were sent to the camp.
Barracks and stables were built, and the drill was kept up very diligently. Riverlawn was no longer between two fires, for they were now all on one side. Before, the fight had been a sort of neighborhood quarrel; but now it had become a national affair. The outrages upon Union men ceased in that locality, though they still occurred in other parts of the State. At the end of a month two companies of cavalry had been enlisted, forming a squadron, if another could be raised.
About this time the Home Guard, under command of Captain Titus Lyon, marched to Bowling Green for the purpose of joining the Confederate army that was expected there. They went with such arms as they had used in the second battle of Riverlawn, and without uniforms. They had a hard time of it; for they had no supplies, and suffered from hunger and cold in the cool nights. Titus's two sons, Sandy and Orly, were enrolled in the company; but both of them deserted, though they had not been mustered in, and went back to their mother, where they could at least get enough to eat. The captain could not go home, for it required his presence and all his skill and energy to keep his recruits from abandoning the company.
Noah Lyon saw nothing more of his brother after his visit to Riverlawn when the lieutenant arrived. After he had gone to the South, his wife and daughters called at the mansion, and declared that they were left without money or means of support, except so far as they could obtain it from the little farm.
Deck and Artie Lyon, whose career as soldiers is to appear in these volumes, now appeared wearing the uniform of cavalrymen, with sabres clinking at their sides. They have been under fire, though not in a pitched battle. They are frequent visitors on Sundays at Lyndhall, and Kate Belthorpe has what her father called "a violent admiration for Captain Deck," as he still insists upon styling him, assured that, if he is not of that rank now, he will be in due time. The next volume will present the two boys and others engaged in actual warfare; and what they did will be found in "IN THE SADDLE."
