USA > Illinois > Iroquois County > History of Iroquois County, together with Historic notes on the Northwest, gleaned from early authors, old maps and manuscripts, private and official correspondence, and other authentic, though, for the most part, out-of-the-way sources > Part 30
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109 | Part 110 | Part 111 | Part 112 | Part 113 | Part 114 | Part 115 | Part 116 | Part 117 | Part 118 | Part 119
18
274
HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.
after the fall of Richmond, until December 16, 1865, when it was mustered out.
Iroquois county was represented in the "Yates Phalanx " by one non-commissioned officer and five privates. One of the latter laid down his life in battle.
THE FORTY-SECOND REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
Col. William A. Webb organized the Forty-second regiment July 22, 1861, at Chicago, Illinois, where it remained in camp until it joined Gen. Fremont's army at St. Louis, Missouri, September 21, 1861, and was by him sent to Gen. Hunter at Tipton, Missouri, arriving October 18, 1861. The regiment here became a part of Gen. John M. Palmer's brigade. The first week in November the Forty-second marched to Springfield, Missouri, thence to Smithton, in the same state, where it went into winter quarters early in December. The regiment was ordered to Fort Holt, Kentucky, and reached its destination February 20, 1862, and proceeded from there to Columbus and Island No. 10, taking an active part in the siege and capture of the island. Previous to the capture of Island No. 10 the Forty-second performed a couple of brilliant exploits that are worthy of perpetuation in its history. The first was a bold daslı made into Union City by the Forty-second regiment, supported by 400 men of the Fifteenth Wisconsin regiment, two companies of the Second Illinois Cavalry, and a battery, all under the command of Col. Buford, seconded by Col. Roberts of the Forty- second. A large force of secessionists, under the command of the notorious Clay King, were completely surprised, and utterly routed by the union force. The union loss in this dash was one man killed, and the rebel loss twenty killed and 100 captured. A lot of 200 horses, and other very valuable captures fell into the hands of the charging column. Col. Roberts, at the head of about forty picked men from the Forty-second, one dark night in the midst of a terrific storm, put off from the gun-boat Benton in a boat with muffled oars, and landed in the face of a scorching picket fire, and scaled the enemy's parapets in less than three minutes after landing ; and before the dis- mayed rebels could get aroused to what was going on, the daring band had effectually spiked six of their cannon, the Lady Davis among the number, which daring act enabled our gun-boats to run past tlie battery, and complete the evacuation of the Island. The regiment was engaged in the siege of Corinth, and the battle of Farmington, losing at the latter place seventeen nien.
At Columbia, Tennessee, September 9, 1862, the Forty-second lost
275
IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.
one man killed, and the enemy eighteen killed and forty-five wounded. The regiment was cooped up in Nashville during the siege late in tlie fall of 1862. December 10 it moved out of the city on the Nolansville pike, and entered upon the Murfreesboro campaign. At Stone River, the regiment was on an exposed part of the field, and did hard fighting, losing twenty-two killed, 116 wounded and eighty-five prisoners. At Chickamauga the regiment did gallant service, and displayed great cool- ness under the most disheartening surroundings. Its loss on the two days, September 19 and 20, was twenty-eight killed, 128 wounded and twenty-eight taken prisoners by the rebels. In the assault upon Mission Ridge the Forty-second acted as skirmishers, and sustained a loss of five killed and forty wounded.
The regiment reënlisted January 1, 1864, and six weeks later was furloughed, and did not return to the front until the April following, when it returned to Chattanooga, and entered upon the Atlanta cam- paign, participating during the summer of 1864, in the following en- gagements, viz: Rocky Face Ridge, Resaca, Adairsville, New Hope Church, Pine Mountain, Kenesaw Mountain, Peach Tree Creek, Atlanta, Jonesboro and Lovejoy Station, going into camp at Atlanta, September 8, 1864, with a loss during the campaign of 116 men.
The Forty-second, during the Atlanta campaign, forming a part of the lamented Gen. Harker's (Third) brigade of the second division, Fourth Army Corps, with the other troops of the Fourth corps, the Forty-second took up position at Pulaski, Tennessee, to check the northward march of Gen. Hood's army. The regiment took a prominent part in the battles of Spring Hill, Franklin and Nashville, behaving with its accustomed coolness and courage, suffering a severe loss at Franklin, losing twenty-four men killed, and over one hundred wounded and cap- tured. In the battles at Nashville the regimental loss in killed and wounded was thirteen men. The regiment participated in the chase after Hood's defeated army as far as Lexington, Alabama. Afterward, during the winter or spring of 1865, the Forty-second formed a part of the expedition to Bull's Gap, Tennessee. And June 15, 1865, the regiment broke camp near Nashville and moved to Johnsonville, thence to New Orleans, and from there to Port Lavaca, Texas, at which place it was mustered out December 16, 1865, and returned to Camp Butler, Illinois, arriving January 3, 1866, receiving pay and final discharge January 10, 1866.
Iroquois county furnished twenty-eight men to the Forty-second, distributed as follows : Company C, two men ; D, one man; F, one man ; G, twelve men ; and H, twelve men, of whom six died in line of duty.
276
HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.
THE FORTY-THIRD REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
Iroquois county furnished seventeen enlisted men to the Forty- third regiment as members of Company K, a one-year organization mustered in during the early spring of 1865.
The Forty-third regiment in the outset was very largely composed of Germans, and under the command of Col, Julius Raith, it distin- guished itself by the devotion it showed to the "flag of the free " upon many a bloody field and in many weary, harassing marches through the wilds of Arkansas and Tennessee, often meeting and vanquishing the guerrilla bands that so sorely ravaged portions of the state of Arkansas and the western portion of Tennessee. At Shiloh the chivalric Col. Raith and a number of his officers and men laid down their lives that the Union might live, and to secure peace and strength to their adopted government. Near Jackson, Tennessee, the Forty- third and Sixty-first Illinois regiments, aggregating a force of four hundred and twenty-five mnen, defeated the notorious rebel raider, Gen. Forrest, at the head of eighteen hundred rebels. The regiment formed a part of Gen. Steele's Arkansas expedition, and subsequently of his expedition toward Red river, Texas, and suffered heavily from the toil- some marches and attacks of the enemy upon the column. At Prairie D'Anne, Arkansas, April 10, 1864, the Forty-third regiment behaved with great bravery, and was the first to occupy the evacuated works of the confederates. The Forty-third did some hard fighting at Jen- kin's Ferry, Arkansas, losing quite heavily itself, and at the same time inflicting serious loss upon the rebel command under Gen. Kirby Smith.
The regiment toward the latter end of the rebellion was stationed at Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas, where it remained, doing guard duty, from May 3, 1864, up to December 14, 1865, when it was mus- tered out of the service at Little Rock, and returned home soon after.
THE FIFTY-FIRST REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
Nine companies of the Fifty-first regiment of Infantry were organized at Camp Douglas December 24, 1861, and led to the field by Colonel Gilbert W. Cummings. During February and the early part of March, 1862, the Fifty-first was engaged in campaigning in Missouri. It formed a part of the force that captured New Madrid, Missouri, and after resting a few days at New Madrid the regiment started on the expedition for the capture of Island No. 10, and was quite effective in securing the capture of the 4,000 troops under Gen. Mackall, that sought to save
277
IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.
themselves by flight after the surrender of the fortifications on Island No. 10.
From Island No. 10 the regiment mnoved down the river to Osceola, Arkansas, and thence to Hamburg Landing, arriving April 22, 1862. During the later part of April the regiment was made a part of Gen. John M. Palmer's brigade, of Gen. Paine's division, and participated in the battle of Farmington, winning good opinions from its com- manders by its veteran-like behavior while under fire. During the operations against and the advance upon Corinth, Paine's division, to which the Fifty-first belonged, with that of Gen. Stanley, constituted the "right wing," as designated by Gen. Halleck.
In the early part of the month of June, 1862, while the regiment was in the field near Baldwin, Col. F. A. Harrington assumed com- mand of the brigade to which the Fifty-first belonged, and continued in command until killed at its head during the bloody battle of Stone River. About the middle of June the regiment returned to Corinth and remained there until July 20, when it marched to Tuscumbia, Alabama, and during the greater part of August the Fifty-first was en- gaged in guarding the railroad from Hillsboro to Decatur, until the first week in September, when it crossed the Tennessee river and inoved to Athens, and thence to Nashville, forming a part of the garrison during the siege of the city by Breckenridge, Morgan and Forrest, being cut off from Buell in Kentucky from September 11 to November 6, 1862, during which time the garrison suffered from a scarcity of rations and supplies. Meantime Col. Cummings resigned while the regiment lay at. Nashville, and Lieut .- Colonel L. P. Bradley, an excellent officer and gallant soldier, succeeded him in command of the regiment. In December, before the movement against Bragg at Murfreesboro, the Fifty-first was transferred to Gen. Phil. Sheridan's division, forming a part of the Third Brigade, Third Division of the Fourteenth Army Corps. The regiment went into the battle of Stone River under Col. Bradley, but Col. Harrington, acting-brigadier, being mortally wounded and captured, Col. Bradley, December 31, took command of the brigade, and Capt. Westcott took command of the regiment. The Fifty-first was in the thickest of the fight, and sustained a loss of nearly sixty killed, wounded and missing. In the following March the regiment went on a " wild goose chase " after Van Dorn, pursuing him as far as Duck river. In the forward movement to Tullahoma, Tennessee, and Bridgeport, Alabama, after Bragg, the division to which the Fifty-first belonged formed a part of the Twentieth Corps under Gen. McCook and did its full share of the hard marches through Alabama and Georgia and into the Lookout valley near Chattanooga,
278
HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.
Tennessee, and also took a hand in the disastrous battle of Chickamauga, losing nearly 45 per cent of the men engaged.
After the battle of Chickamauga the Twentieth and Twenty-first Corps were consolidated, and designated as the Fourth Corps,- Gen. Sheridan commanding the Second Division, and Col. G. C. Harker the Third Brigade of the Division ; the Fifty-first forming a part of the Third Brigade. In the assault upon Mission Ridge. Maj. Davis was severely wounded, Capt. Bellows was killed, and the regiment lost thirty men out of the 150 that went into the charge. Capt. Tilton took Maj. Davis' place after the latter was wounded, as regimental commander. The last of November, 1863, the regiment, brigade, division and corps, moved toward Knoxville to release Gen. Burnside. It encamped at Blain's Cross Roads, and remained till Jannary 15, when the regiment returned to Chattanooga and there reënlisted, and started home two days later on a veteran furlough. The regiment returned to Cleveland, Tennessee, the last of March, 1864, and soon after entered upon the great Atlanta campaign, and during the many engagements the regiment was in it behaved courageously, losing dur- ing the campaign three officers killed, four wounded, and 105 men killed and wounded. The regiment sustained its severest loss at Kene- saw, where its gallant adjutant and one lieutenant were killed, and fifty-four men killed and wounded. Capt. Tilton, of Company C,-the Iroquois county company,-was severely wounded at Dallas, Georgia. The regiment marchied into Atlanta September 8, 1864, and a proud day it was to the conquerors of that stronghold.
The last of September the regiment moved to Bridgeport, and after a couple of weeks encamped at Chattanooga, where the venerable chap- lain, Rev. L. Raymond, well known as a popular evangelist in the Baptist churchi, resigned and went home. At this point 192 recruits (drafted men) joined the regiment, many of whom did good service at Franklin and Nashville a few weeks later. The regiment moved with its corps to Pulaski, Tennessee, to checkmate Hood in liis bold advance upon Nashville. The Third Brigade, under Bradley, held the strong columns of Hood in check, November 29, at Spring Hill, enabling the First and Third Divisions of the Fourtli, and the whole of the Twenty- third Corps, and their trains, to pass on to Franklin, where, in conjunc- tion with the Second Brigade of its Division, it also repaired, halting on Carter's Hill 300 yards in advance of the union works, on the right and left of the Columbia pike. Here the two brigades disposed on each side of the pike, hastily threw up barricades, and in obedience to the somewhat reckless orders of Gen. Wagner, it made ready to fight the whole of Hood's ariny. When Hood, with his two army corps
279
IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.
massed in column on the pike, and on either side of it, with the Third Corps behind the others, in reserve, the two gallant skeleton brigades, true to Wagner's order, hield their position in the face of an army of nearly 50,000 men, advancing in grand array upon the army of Scho- field, and poured a deadly fire into the massed ranks of the enemy, but were, as a matter of course, forced to fall back to the main line, which they did in some disorder,-but for the most part the Fifty-first fell back in good order, though at a rapid pace, and once behind the works they faced about and poured a deadly fire into the enemy's ranks ; but in falling back, Wagner's men had, in some places, been so closely pur- sued, that in letting them through that part of the union lines held by the brigades of the Twenty-third Corps, posted on the right and left of the Columbia pike, the rebels also forced their way through tlie lines and captured a battery, turned it upon the union line crouching behind their works, and then began a terrible hand-to-hand figlit, in which the. Fifty-first-or so much of it as had not been killed or cap- tured before reaching the works-took a hand. Here Captain Tilton and Lieut. Iven Bailey (late county treasurer), then a sergeant, fell terribly wounded ;- the latter, like many of liis brave comrades, though shot down kept on firing at the enemy until their guns were wrenched from their hands in the desperate conflict. At last the gallant First Brigade, of the Second Division, having come to their relief, the enemy was driven back beyond the works, after terrible fighting, and kept there until after midnight, when the whole union army fell back across the Harpeth river, and retired to Nashville. At Franklin, beside the loss of four of its officers, the Fifty-first lost fifty-two men killed and wounded, and ninety-eight missing,-most of the latter were taken prisoners before they could get behind the works, after they had been driven from the outpost on Carter's Hill.
The Fifty-first regiment was engaged in the two-days battle at Nashville, and followed Hood's defeated army to the Tennessee river, and afterward went into winter quarters at Huntsville, Alabama. In the spring it moved first to Greenville, East Tennessee, and from there to Nashville, where Company I, ninety strong, joined the regiment from Camp Butler, Illinois. Lieut. James Skidmore and his company (F) was mustered out, and returned lionie June 15, 1865. Lieut. Skid- more himself was from this county. The regiment during the month of July went to Texas, and was mustered out there September 25, 1865.
Company C of the Fifty-first was, with the exception of some twenty men from Knoxville and Knox county and a few other points, recruited by Lieut. Albert Eads, from Iroquois county. Capt. N. B. Petts, assisted by A. M. Tilton and Adamn S. Hetfield, afterward first
280
HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.
lieutenant and first sergeant of the company respectively, did most of the recruiting for the company during the early fall of 1861. Lieut. Tilton, on the resignation of Capt. Petts, was made captain of the com- pany, and he was succeeded at the expiration of his term of service by Lieut. Francis M. Bryant, formerly of Middleport. Sergt. A. S. Het- field was promoted lieutenant, then quartermaster, and afterward cap- tain of company E. Corp. Benjamin F. James, before the close of the war, was promoted to the first lieutenancy of company B. A number of the members of the Fifty-first are well-to-do farmers and prominent citizens of this county. Among them we name A. M. Eastburn, of Sheldon, and J. J. Edwards, of Crescent, as being both veterans and sergeants of Company C, and many other of our solid citizens did noble duty as soldiers of the old Fifty-first regiment.
THE FIFTY-SEVENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
The Fifty-seventh, Col. Silas D. Baldwin commanding, was inus- tered into the United States service at Camp Douglas, December 26, 1861, and the second week in February following it moved to Cairo ; thence to Forts Henry and Donelson, being.assigned to Gen. Lew Wal- lace's division at Donelson, and taking part in the battle. At Shiloh, in the two-days battle, the regiment lost over 180 men and officers. Afterward the regiment formed a part of the army besieging Corinth, and after its capture formed a part of the garrison, and stubbornly held the place when Van Dorn assaulted it, losing forty-two men. During the summer of 1863 the regiment was engaged in chasing the bold raider, Forrest, from one place to another, and finally settled back in its old quarters as the garrison of Corinth, and remained there till November 4, when it moved to Louisville, where it reënlisted, and the veterans returned home on a thirty-day furlough, the regiment mean- time being strengthened by 250 new recruits while at Chicago on fur- lough, and with this new levy the regiment returned to the front in March, 1864.
The regiment did duty at Athens, Alabama, until May 1, 1864, when it joined Sherman's grand army en route for Atlanta, and formed a part of the army of the Tennessee, under command of the lamented Gen. McPherson, and did good service in that historic campaign ; and also after the fall of Atlanta, the regiment did good service scouting through North Georgia. After a severe brush with the rear of Hood's army, then marching northward on October 13, in which the Fifty- seventh lost seven men and threw a large force of the enemy into confu- sion, the regiment, with the rest of the brigade, took up the line of
281
IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.
march from Rome to Atlanta, and thence to the sea, forming a part of the Fifteenthi Army Corps; and the fortunes of the Fifty-seventh after leaving Atlanta, Georgia, on the famous tramp to Savannah, are iden- tical with those of the Fifteenth Corps, to which, as above stated, it belonged. It made the tour of the Carolinas, and was present at the surrender of Joe Johnston's army, and continued its tramping after the surrender, until it finally brought up with the rest of Sherman's army in the grand review at the national capital. The Fifty-seventh was mustered out July 10, 1865, at Chicago. There were thirteen men from Onarga, in this county, in the Fifty-seventh, four of which number lost their lives.
THE FIFTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
Col. William F. Lynch, a dashing young Irishman, of Elgin, Illi- nois, organized the Fifty-eighth at Camp Douglas December 25, 1861, and led it to the field the second week of February, 1862, taking a part in the siege and capture of Fort Donelson, and later, a part in the dark drama enacted on Shiloh's field, where the greater portion of the Fifty-eighth was surrounded and captured after a prolonged and des- perate resistance, in which the regiment was severely handled by an overpowering foe. Four hundred and fifty were either killed, wounded or captured, and as 218 was the number taken prisoners, it will be seen that the loss in killed was very great. Those taken prisoners were sent to the rebel prison pens at different points in the South, and as a large number of the prisoners were suffering from wounds, and were treated with the inhumanity and devilish brutality which distinguished the boasted "chivalry " (?) of the Confederacy, after seven months' suffering in the horrid dens devised by rebel monsters, 130 men of the 218 were exchanged, the rest having died under their tortures. The remnant of the regiment, after the battle of Shiloh, together with remnants of other regiments that had suffered in the same manner a loss of the major part of their inen, were consolidated into an organization known as the " Union Brigade," and rendered efficient service at the siege of Corinth, also in its defense still later in the year, and also at Iuka, Mississippi.
In the early winter of 1862-3 the regiment was reunited at Camp Butler, the prisoners now exchanged and able for duty reported, and the regiment was held at Springfield guarding rebel prisoners until June 28, 1863, meantime it liad received a number of recruits and was once more a strong, disciplined and effective force. The regiment spent the rest of the summer of 1863 and the fall of that year in doing
282
HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.
garrison duty at Cairo, Mound City, Union City, Paducah and Colum- bus, Kentucky, np to January 1, 1864, when it veteranized. January 21, 1864, the Fifty-eighth embarked for Vicksburg, Mississippi; arrived there February 3, and moved across the Big Black, fighting the enemy at Queen's Hill; participated in the Meridian raid and suffered severely on the raid, by reason of the scarcity of rations, subsisting seventy hours on one day's rations and marching forty-seven miles in the meantime. The Fifty-eighth was the first infantry to enter Meri- dian. On its return to Vicksburg the regiment accompanied Gen. A. J. Smith in his Red River expedition, and took a part in the siege and capture of Fort De Russey, the Fifty-eighth's colors being the first planted on the captured works.
In the disaster at Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, the Fifty-eighth bore a conspicuous part and a heroic one, in checking the flushed rebel army that was pressing triumphantly back upon Grand Ecore in disorderly retreat, the demoralized army of Gen. Banks. Hoping to check the exnltant foe and save the panic-stricken army of Banks, Gen. A. J. Smith threw out his lines in good order, but a brigade of eastern troops on the right of the Fifty-eighth (the latter holding the extreme left), filled with forebodings of defeat from the tales of excited and demor- alized stragglers from Banks' column, fell back early in the engage- ment, leaving the Fifty-eighth alone and cut off, but the dauntless regiment fearlessly charged the pursuing enemy on the flank and rear, and poured in such a deadly enfilading fire as to completely stag- ger and throw into confusion and retreat the column of rebels that, in tlie flush of victory, were fast on the heels of the flying brigade of eastern troops. And here the daring Fifty-eighth got in its best work, taking upward of 500 prisoners, many of whom turned out to be the same men they had, the winter before, guarded as prisoners at Camp Butler, in Illinois. The rebels thus confronted and driven back by this gallant regiment, began a retreat. And yet the union forces also con- tinued to retreat, and the boys of the Fifty-eightli, with a re-captured battery and their prisoners, fell back sullenly with and in the rear of the main column to Grand Ecore. The regiment afterward partici- pated in the following engagements with credit: Marksville Prairie, Clouterville and Yellow Bayou, losing heavily at the last-mentioned fight. Nine color-bearers were shot down in rapid succession, and their young and dashing commander, Col. Lynch, here received a severe wound.
The regiment spent the rest of the summer of 1864 in steeple- chases after guerrilla bands in north Mississippi, west Tennessee, Arkansas and Missouri, and in the fall marched throngh Missouri
283
IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.
to Kansas, being poorly fed on the route. December 1, 1864, the regi- ment reached Nashville, Tennessee, and took a part in the two-days battle and the pursuit of Hood, following him to Eastport, Mississippi, where the non-veterans were mustered out, leaving 390 men, that were consolidated into four companies as the Fifty-eighth battalion, and sent to Gen. Canby, at Mobile, Alabama ; and while there the battalion of four companies was joined by six new companies of recruits, and was fore- most in the charge upon Fort Blakeley. From Mobile the Fifty-eighth went to Montgomery, Alabama, where it was further recruited by the assignment of recruits from the Eighty-first and One Hundred and Fourteenth Illinois. And it remained at this point, doing garrison duty until April 1, 1866, when it was mustered out. In the old three- years organization Iroquois county furnished nineteen men to Company C, and Hon. George C. Wilson was at first corporal, and afterward second lieutenant of this company.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.