John Davis Billings
Hardtack and coffee : $b or, the unwritten story of Army life, including chapters on enlisting, life in tents and log huts, jonahs and beats, offences and punishments, raw recruits, foraging, corps and corps badges, the wagon trains, the Army mule, the Engineer Corps, the Signal Corps, etc.
"Hardtack and coffee : or, the unwritten story of Army life" by John D. Billings is a memoir published in 1887. A veteran of the 10th Massachusetts Volunteer Light Artillery Battery, Billings offers an intimate look at everyday Union soldier life during the American Civil War—not the battles, but the camps, marches, rations, and routines. Enhanced by Charles W. Reed's pen and ink drawings, the book combines humor with vivid detail, revealing what it truly meant to be a common soldier in America's defining conflict.