The Union Army was supplied with food and new uniforms while in Wayne County, coming up from Wilmington and Beaufort by train. The old uniforms were discarded and their buttons found for years afterwards.
There is a story about a slave named Uncle Counce Wooten, who, the day after the Yankees left went to their commissary and picked out an officer's coat with gold braids and epaulets and wore it home.
On the way back, he was stopped by a Confederate soldier who thought he had enlisted in the Union Army. Counce explained, but the Confederate used his sword to cut off the gold braids and let him go.
Oldtimers in Mount Olive remembered piles of Union uniforms in the woods where they had encamped.
While in Mount Olive, the federal troops complained much about the uncessant rain and mud. They broke camp April 10, 1865, and moved toward Smithfield.
Small Town, Big War. --Old Secesh
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