USA > Iowa > Delaware County > Manchester > Reunion of the 12th Iowa V.[eteran] V.[olunteer] infantry 1st-8th, 1880-1903 > Part 5
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There is a calm precedes the wildest storm, Before the lightning's flash or thunder rattle ; Just like the calm when strong battalions form, Sure harbinger of on impending battle.
A single gun within the rebel lines, And all his fierce battalions were in motion ; Sons of the Southern palm, and Northern pines, Now mel to test their courage and devotion.
The rebel masses press their devions way, Through talling timber. difficult obstruction. While on their ranks converging batteries play, With marked mifeet and tenible destruction.
Unmindful of the cannister and shell. And heedless of the thundering cannonade ; The rebel column staggered. stopped, and fell, Before the volley of your old Brigade.
That glorious flag so often fell and rose. Its very tissue singed by rebel fire ; But to the last it waset b fore tistas, Upheld by the Twelfth, till all its foes retire.
For two brief hours the battle fiercely raged, Repulsed and bleeding their recall was sounded ; The Twelfth lost riRry from Bienry men engaged, And every commissioned officer was wounded.
The enemy lost five thousand on the field, 11 is rout was nost disastrous und complete ; In lengthened struggles Southrons have to yield, And Inten as usual beat a swift retreat.
The chosen seed of Israel's ancient race, Who ouce of old on heavenly nimma fed ; At Corinth were found, not weeping o'er the place, But robbing the gallant and unconscious dead.
General Gra it took special notice of the crime, But not to punish with prison house or fines ; In general orders secured at the time, The Jews were banished from the Union lines.
By order the Union Brigade was discontinued. The fragments ordered to their several States : Their love of country turm and unsubdued. Rejoiced to meet their liberated mates.
The Twelfth's surviving prisoners were exchanged, ifter long months of wretched prison life ; With hated treason they were enstranged, ind doubly anxious to renew the strif ..
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39
TWELFTH IOWA Y. V. INPANTRY.
At St. Louis the Twelfth again were re-united, Re-organized again for active war ; Again your regimental faith was plighted, For victory and your Nation's rising star.
The Regiment soon was ready for the front, And anxious to respond to duty's call : To Vicksburg you were sent to share the brunt, And walk on foot through General Grant's canal.
The boat on which you sailed down to Vicksburg, Was loaded with collins for prospective dead ; l'or want of space, you used them for a table, At night you used them for your bunk or bed.
Yon disembarked at Duckport, Louisiana, The land of cypress swamps and alligators ; Stagnant bayous fringed with mock banana, 'The home and hot-bed of rebellious traitors.
Vicksburg, majestic in its strength was seen. The very embodiment of slumbering war ; The Mississippi only rolled between. So very near it seemed, and yet so far.
Even in repose the silent water batteries, Seemed conscious, active, living, sentient things ; And branching works, like human arteries, Connecting all its fort encircled rings.
Here you beheld that wonderful display, The Vicksburg batteries blazing like retorts ; ( Hoomy midnight changed to glorious day, When Union transports passed the rebel forts.
Vicksburg was impregnable from the front, its capture by the Yazoo far too dear ; Captured it must be, and as was your wont. You marched by the dank to take it from the rear.
Your progress marked war's desolating path, Through burning ruins of sugar house and gin ; A soldier's vengeance, or a planter's wrath, Fit sequence of secession, war and sin.
Lone chimneys stand where lordly mansions stood, Like monumental tomb stones over the place ; Where prayers to heaven ascended from the good, To CURE the oppressors of the Negro race.
You found amusement on the weary march, In shooting buzzards, snakes and alligators ; The sacred birds and reptiles of the south, With characteristics like their kindred traitors.
The road to Hard Times Landing was so long, The transports bore you to the Eastern shore ; Gaily you sung that stanza from the song, May Hard Times Landing come again no more.
Grand Gulf was left dismantled by the fleet, You with Sherman was ordered to explore ; The exterior line of Pemberton's retreat, And capture Jackson with the Fifteenth Corps.
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FIRST REUNION OF THE
This for the Twelfth was not unpleasant duty, As you had called at Jackson once before ; When insults greeted you from lips of be uity, And you had promised them to call once more.
Your second call was rather unexpected. By rapid marching through a summer storm ; You found the Johnnies busy cooking breakfast, And helped yourselves without the usual form.
Some were engaged in conning o'er their books, Some playing cards, or polishing their gaiters ; The Twelfth found them very admirable cooks, But very negligent and careless waiters.
The people now forgot to jeer and mock, The Yankee soldiers at their just carouse ; When rebel stores aseend to heaven in smoke, Accompanied by the old Confederate house.
Railroads out. and rebel stores consumed. The troops with Jackson settled all their bills ; The march on Vicksburg was again res med, To the mmsie of our guns on Champion Ihills.
Pemberton defe ated on the Champion Hills, Before the Thirteenth Corps falls slowly back ; Disheartened al all those multiplying ills, le ded to Vicksburg, when you crossed the Black.
Your army corps from Black River led the van, Your Regiment in advance when brought to bay ; The Vicksburg Forts with gloomy thoughts you sean, At nine o'clock, the eighteenth day of May.
Within their works all silent and sedate, The rebels from theh battlements beholds ; Deploying squadrons seal them to then fate, Like anaconda in its lengthened folds.
Provisions now were very high and scarce, For all you had from the commissariat store. When you began the battle, march and chase, Was three days rations twenty days before.
The value of HARD Tek now you comprehend, Satiety and loathing are forgot : And like the memory of an absent friend, Yon prize it highest when you have it not.
Grant flushed with victory in the open field, I'ropelled his army like a pond'rous sledge ; Full on the forts, expecting them to yield, Without the labors of a regular siege.
Vainly the columns charge with bated breath, Entire Brigades became the forlorn hope : Repulsed before those giddy heights of death, You plant your flags along the outer slope.
But not content with courage and devotion, More vietims still, for war's avenging thunder ; Fresh Brigades were doomed and put in motion, A noble sacrifice to MeClernand's blunder.
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TWELFTH IOWA V. V. INFANTRY.
The ernel charge was barren of results, The bleeding soldiers uttered no reproaches ; Vicksburg could not be taken by assault, But regular siege and gradual approaches.
For forty days you work at sap and mine, Alternate nights is given to sleep and rest ; Alternate nights you guard the picket line, And every duty is performed with zest.
Magnolia blossoms strew the trembling earth, Sweet perfine by the sunnner breeze was spread ; Now from the field a pestilential breath, Is wafted from our still unburied dead.
A flag of truce from every fortress tell, The thundering batteries now are lished and still ; Our galiant dead were buried where they fell, Along the rest of Vicksburg's bloody hill.
Two hours armistice, both the armies meet, On nentral ground their courtesies begin ; No boast of victory, glory of defeat, Death and the grave make enemies akin.
The time is up, the BLUE and GRAY retire, The signal gun is heard from near and far ; Five hundred guns resme their deadly fire, With all the horrors of tundtnous war.
The answering batteries, through the summer nights, Made music like a chime of perling bells ; The arch of heaven was glorious with the lights, Of burning fuse and bright exploding shells.
On July fourth the works were all complete, The knell of Vicksburg was already tofled ; The garrison capitulate to escape defeat, And Thirty thousand prisoners were paroled.
The backbone of the rebel cause you br ,ke, The Mississippi valley now was free, And free indeed, for not a slavish yoke Was borne from Lake Itasca to the sea.
Joliston's army came like gallant liege, Yon marched at once and met him at the Black ; He came too late to raise the Yankee siege. Yon crossed the stream and promptly drove him back.
Ile sought at once the shelter of his guns, At Jackson. where he fortitied the place ; A useless labor lost, because he runs. And leaves the once proud city in disgrace.
Your Regiment and Brigade was sent in chase, \ duty pertormed with spirit and abandon ; You changed his slow retreat, into a race, And closed the campaign with the fight at Brandon.
Two rebel armies captured or destroyed, For want of work your Generals thought it best ; The summer months in camp should be employed, To build SHEBANGS, recuperate, and rest.
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FIRST REUNION OF THE
How tedions were those weary days in camp. So trying to the active soldier's patience ; low deleterious to the general health, Was HARD TACK fried in grease, the usual ration.
The CLASSIC NAME of one important RATION. I dare not speak, for fear of punishment, It is that part of the MATERNAL HOG, Where juvenile swine derive their nourishment.
The summer gone with all its fading beauty, The time for active service is at hand ; Y'on march on Brownsville, bent on warlike duty, Where all the reb's SKEDADDLE, or disband.
The Mississippi campaign now is o'er. The country of armed rebels wholly free ; Transferred from Sherman to the Sixteenth corps, Y'on join your division at Memphis, Tennessee.
Detailed for duty never done before, Rebuilding railroads now your thoughts employ ; You led the van as a construction corps, As promptly as you labored to destroy.
This duty done you garrison Chewalla, Colonel Stibb's commandant no one interferes ; There you passed a very pleasant winter, And re-enlisted as Veteran Volunteers.
Companies " I" and "G" prepared and in platoon, Marched to a party, through the somber woods; The boys struck up their old familiar tu e, And ALL TO A MAN LEFT, the rebel dance who could.
Chewalla to Vicksburg you were ordered back, On garrison duty, where one month yon staid ; Protecting all the crossings of the BLACK, Till Sherman returned from his meridian raid.
To Towa now you went on veterans' furlough. And reach your pleasant homes by various ways. The brightest page your checkered lives can show, Was that bright holiday of thirty days.
Short thirty days, a drop in human life, Friends grasp your hand with many doubts and fears ; The blushing MAIDEN, PARENT, FRIEND, OF WIFE, Sob their good bye with eyes suffused in tears.
Still more endeared to country, home and friend, While silent prayers like holy incense rise ; You take the field, those treasures to defend. The soldier's love of country never dies.
The veterans meet at Davenport on time, And soon rejoined their comrades at the front ; Where General Smith and MR. Banks combine -- Along the Red River on a rebel hunt.
Your late position is again restored, The first division of the Sixteenth corps, No more with musty camps will you be bored, But marching or fighting till the war be o'er.
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TWELFTH IOWA V. V. INPANTRY.
A. J. Smith, your dashing corps commander, An active Vesuvius, always in eruption ; In battle he was a perfect Salamander, Ilis corps the very war cloud of destruction.
Your march was often fleeter than the wind, Your path seemed blackened by the siMooN's breath, Your tents and baggage always left behind ; Your war cry followed by the stroke of death.
Your line of march though never trod before, Left few indneements for a march again ; The rebels supplied your basket and your store, And real war was never felt till then.
The natives reap the fruits of disobedience, And the States once traversed by the Sixteenth corps ; Were ready to resume their old allegiance, And satisfied with war forevermore.
Forrest flushed with victory over General Sturges, And treating armed Contrabands like brutes ; It is acts applanded by the rebel Burghers, Who gloried in his fiendish attributes.
War at best is cruel and severe, But nonRik when MALer guides the hands. Historie justice DAMNs the dark career, Of Forrest murdering captured Contrabands.
Yon marched at onee to stay the cruel disaster, Filled with contempt for such a treacherous chief ; At Tupelo you applied your usual plaster, And punished for onee this Negro killing thief.
The post of honor assigned to your Brigade, You plainly see his motley gathering host ; In three lines deep the columns were arrayed, Yon even hear their proud exultant boast.
Forrest promised his troops a very easy battle, Another Guntown massacre he said ; Stampede the Yankees like a herd of cattle, And feed the buzzards with their butchered dead.
With all the eloquenee of an auctioneer, Hle sold his Yankee wares so very cheap ; And those same Yankees cost the butcher dear, You piled his dead in one promiscuous heap.
Forrest reforms his shattered line anew, Grown desperate in view of probable defeat ; You meet his onset with a counter charge, When all his lines are broken and retreat.
You taught him lessons in the art of war, Kindly removed and dressed his wounded braves; Foul murder leaves a more enduring sear, Casts deeper shadows o'er the gloom of graves.
The confederate stores at Tupelo consumed, T he railroads eut and Forrest's troops defeated ; Your march on Memphis was again resumed, With that affair at Old Town Creek completed.
FIRST REUNION OF THE
At Tupelo your losses were severe, Sixty-four in wounded, killed and missing, Their noble deeds we honor and revere. Their glorious death receives a nation's blessing.
Companies " A" and " E" detatched for special duty, Guarding the whites from raiding Mamalukes; One rosy dawn so fresh with summer beauty, Repulsed a Brigade of General Marmaduke's.
The rebel forces full six hundred men, Who summoned your forty veterans to yield ; Your ringing answer shook the southern glen, They fled, and left you, masters of the field.
They also left their fallen comrades there, Sure evidence of their disastrous flight; Twenty dead and wounded to your eare, Human trophy's of a desperate fight.
In Mississippi other raids you made, More foes to conquer. other fields to win ; But Forrest now avoids your dextrons blade. And rebel provender, getting searce and thin.
Across the Mississippi now you go, Where rebel cavalry resistless race ; The Union horsemen being found too slow, Smith's infantry were started in the chase.
Embarked on transports ready to explore. The white river country, gloomy, wild and rough ; Through treacherous Bandits on its murky shore, You disembark at rugged Duvall's Bluff.
With steady march you sweep across the State Of Arkansas, where lawless robbers rove ; O'er barren hills, composed of rock and slate, Through DisMAL swamp, and NASEOUS papa grove
Across the Ozark range with rapid strides, Where primative races sung their fetich hymns ; With seareely space along its rocky sides, To pitch your camp or streach your weary limbs.
Down from the hills yon sweep, a compact force, Your daily march, at night bring pleasing dreams ; Rapidly gaining on the rebel horse, You ford or swim the rushing mountain streams.
A strange phenomenon never seen before, Unknown in warefare's pre-existing rules ; The rapid marching of the Sixteenth corps, From sheer exhaustion killed the patient mules.
This fact alone, retarded operations, And frequent halts the hurried march beguile ; The dying brutes call forth your obligations, The average loss was three mules to the mile.
By Cape Girardeau sound to Jefferson city, You sailed, to give the weary mules a rest. Price saw the point, and more from fear than pity, Turned his plundering columns to the West.
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TWELFTH IOWA V. V. INPANTRY.
Yon disembark without an hours delay, And once again renew the novel chase ; Where mounted rebels try to run away ; And infantry still gaining in the race.
The enemy burn the bridges in his rear, And to all destructive usages conform ; Which does not even check your swift career. You swim the ice-cold Osage in a storm.
Right in the midst of war and its alarms, The soldier being a common resident ; A halt is called, the Regiment stack their arms, And dripping wet you vote for PRESIDENT.
You exercised the freeman's sacred right, Without a thought of folly. frand or vice ; With batlot and bullet both you fairly light, This Presidential campaign after Price.
You make a spurt and march both day and night, While agne chills and burning fevers parch ; Before or since no record of the sight Of Infantry sleeping while upon the march.
Across three States you chased the rebel host, Captured all his baggage, guns and cattle: His army scattered, broken up and lost, Ilis retreat was more disastrous than a battle.
Without a moment's time for needed rest, The Sixteenth Corps was sent to Tennessee, Where Hood on General Thouris closely prest, When Sherman's army started for the sea.
Along the course of three Majestic streams, Past marts of trade and silent sombre wood, Up the Cumberland your transport streams, Where you eontrout the rash, impetuous Hood.
Your landing from the boats was made in time, Your corps its noble destiny fulfills; Ont on the centre of the Union lines You stem the rebel torrent from the Hills.
The gallant Hood you never met before; Yon only knew his fighting reputation; Ilis introduction to the Sixteenth corps Broke the last link that bound his federation.
'The opposing squadrons scarce their lines conform, When from the north the wintry tempests blow - The wrath of heaven seemed riding on the storm, And both the armies are engulfed in snow.
The heavenly wrath subdued the wrath of men; War for a time the shivering hosts forego; No shelter save the hills or wooded glen, One hundred thousand soldiers 'neath the snow.
Scarce had the melting show from mountain sides Poured down its torrents to the swelling flood, When battling armies help to swell the tide With precions streams of gallant soldiers' blood.
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FIRST REUNION OF THE
A council of war by all the corps' comrinders; General Thomas granted A. J. Smith's request,- The Sixteenth corps, those fiery salamanders, Should strike the besieging rebel army first.
. December fifteenth. ore the break of day,
The movement was begun with silent tread; Dense clouds of vapor over the landscape lay, The drowsy rebels thought you still in bed.
Like opening dram you the mimic stage The foggy enrtaja lifted to the sun, Revealing all the Sixteenth corps engaged, And the last great battle of the war begun.
The charge was sharp, decisive and severe; No hesitation marked the prompt advance; No doubtful laggards lingered in the rear, And all on . flag's went o'er their works at once.
Hood's veteran soldiers, brave, misguided men, Well back before you in disastrous tout; While breathless you renew the charge again, Capturing their cannon in their last redoubt.
You gathered up the captured spoils of will, Advanced your lines till you confront your foes, Eat your seant rations, and beneath the stars Sank on the field of battle for repose.
flood, staggered by the almost crushing blow. Strong disappointment now his bosom fills, Not one step northward now his legions go, Besieged himself along the Brentwood Hills.
When morning broke cahn and serenely bright, Your veteran ranks were moving o'er the plain; Full in the front and center of the fight, You take the post of honor once again.
Wood's fourth corps was to storm the Overton's Hill, Il is success of defeat, Smith's only sign; To hurt his corps against the Brentwood Hill, And break in pieces Dood's extended line.
By ten o'clock, with stubborn resistance, Y'on gain position near your watchful foe, And wait for hours within good striking distance For Woods to move and strike the signal blow.
You hear at last the tumult of his charge, In quiet suspense yon wait with anyions breath; When from the hill the enemy discharge Full on his ranks the leaden streams of death.
Vainly the soldiers strive, both white and black. To reach the erest of Overton's fiery Hill ; Repulsed and bleeding they are driven back ; The firing cease and all the lines are still.
The cahn was but the prelude to the storm; The Sixteenth corps from their concealment rose, Without a halt their broken lines to form; You heedless rush on panie-stricken foes.
TWELFTH IOWA T. V. INPANTRY.
The rebel works became a wall of lire, In sharp response to your resounding cry: When veteran soldiers of a hundred battles Break their ranks, throw down their arms and fly.
You take their batteries, arms and battle flags, And capture prisoners, now a seething mass, All struggling to escape beyond the hills, Or through the defile of the Brentwood pass.
Your work in Tennessee was now completed; You had no other contracts, jobs or leases; You left the rebels broken and defeated, With Genend Thomas gathering np the pieces.
You made a hall at Eastport, Mississippi, Ostensibly to build your winter quarters; . But marching orders came and set you free, And off again like roving Cahmuck Tartars.
At Eastport you were short of food supplies; The country round depleted and forlorn; The baggage taules, your steady constant friend, Divide with you his fodder and his corn.
You embark al Eastport through a storm of sleet, And down the Tennessee in steamers glide, l'ast former scenes of victory of defeat, And comrades graves that dot the river's side.
And down the Mississippi's swollen tide, The grandest trop hy of the waning war, With not a fort or city on its banks, But floats on high the glorious stripes and stars.
Down through the richly laden orange groves, 'Through flowering shrubs and beautiful exotics, Down where your regiment and the Sixteenth corps Were formed by balmy breezes from the tropics.
You disembarked below the Crescent City, Where sugar cane and orange groves abound, Close by the buried dead of former wars Y'on camp on Jackson's famous battle ground.
Ilere you beheld the CREOLE population, In holy frenzy o'er their saered law; Where masked absurdities of every nation Were represented in their MARDI GRAS,
With orders to report at Mobile Bay, You marched to the lake along the Newshell road; Green fields and flowers all over the landscape lay; The smoothest pathway armies ever trod .
Lake Ponebartrain you crossed in stormy weather, lligh winds and chopping waves from ocean free; Your regiment nearly foundered altogether: Your craft was frail for such a stormy sea .
Y'on landed on the shores of Dauphin Island, And down to the gulf in joyous troops yon go, . Where drifted sand along the sea-washed shore Was white and spotless as the mountain show.
FIRST REUNION OF THE
Here you had oysters fresh from Mobile Bay, And hunted shells amongst the ocean caves; Like happy school boys on vacation day, Yon bask in the sun, or plunge beneath the waves.
War with its hardships call you once again ; To General Canby next you bring relief, That gallant soldier who has since been slain, The noble vieth of the Modoc chief.
You cross the bay. and up the Fish river swamp, In rear of Spanish fort to make a landing; The rebels fall back before you and decamp, And all arranged by previous understanding.
You land amidst the gloomy pitch pine thickets, And march through resinous camps of pitch and tar, Driving before you all the rebel piekets, Who lure you on to more infernal war.
Your camps are pitched beneath the forest shade; Your pine knot fires illuminate the scenes; Fresh gathered branches for your fragrant bed, You seek repose and court the land of dreams.
You emerge from the woods in front of Spanish Fort, Begrimmed with smoke and clothing glazed with pitch, Rebellion had reached this court of last resort, Besieged in Spanish Fort, THEIt LAST GRAND DITCH.
The place was worthy of its reputation; Planted Toursbois, nicely matched with gravel; Four years of skillful murderous preparation, Made Spanish Fort a hard old road to travel.
Instinctively you step with cautions tread. EARTH, Att and WATER, all combine and meet, In hurhing death at your devoted head, While fiery billows roll beneath your feet.
Ten days of active work with pick and spade, And wooden morters on your picket line; Ten days of raining shell and cannonade, Your zig-zag works the rebel fort entwine.
The rebels, seeing that their cause was lost, The evaenation of the fort began; Yon entered the works at midnight April ninth; The war was over, ALL YOUR BATTLES WON.
Now, when from war and tumult you were free, And rebel armies cease their stern commotion, The courageous Reed and gallant Major Kuce Received their just and merited PROMOTION.
With other promotions all along the line, Fresh from the ranks, d void of pomp or style, The noblest heroes of the civil war Were the glorious veterans of the rank and file.
For one year, after all strife was over, You served as magistrates and courts of law, Recovering cotton and other goods in trover, A civil bureau under martial law.
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