USA > Illinois > Ninety-Second Illinois Volunteers > Part 34
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Dick Lee tells the following also:
While camping for the night, near Wadesboro, N. C., a tame deer came running through the yard near the camp-fire of the Brigade Orderlies, with a jingling sheep bell attached to his neck. One of the boys proposed a venison steak for breakfast; it would not do to shoot the deer-but we soon had him corralled in a corner by a smoke house, and not many minutes after he was cut up into steaks and distributed. Then out of the house comes an old man, accompanied by a staff officer, passing close by us, and we heard the old gentleman say, " The deer is one I am raising, and I am afraid they will shoot him." The officer replied, " No, they dare not shoot in camp, and if he is like some dears I know of, he will be hard to catch." The old man replied, " If I could just hear the bell, I would drive him into the grove back of the house, and feel safe." " Elias," who stood by, cautiously picked up the bell, and we soon heard its tinkling jingle in the grove. " There," said the old man, "I know'd he was too smart for you'uns." And the satisfied old gentleman accompanied the staff officer back into the house.
A soldier writes: While passing through Raleigh, N. C., one of the gayest and most gallant officers on General Atkins's staff, when near what he supposed to be a " Female Seminary," asked permission of the General to take the Brigade Band and serenade the ladies. The General tipped a wink to the other members of his staff, and gave permission. Away went the officer with the Band, and music was soon floating out on the air ; but the ladies, talking to each other by making signs with their fingers, soon revealed to the officer that his music was unheeded by the deaf and dumb mutes he was serenading. The officer returned with the Band, and, until he was mustered out of service, he never heard the last of that gallant serenade.
It was expected that this chapter would contain some contri- bution, story, personally reminiscence of the march, battle, picket duty, scouting or foraging, by every member of the Ninety- Second. But the members of the Regiment have been slow to furnish such material, and the Committee on Publication can only say, that they have, in this chapter, made use of all the material furnished them.
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CHAPTER X.
THE REUNION AT POLO, SEPTEMBER FOURTH, IS67 -- GENERAL
ATKINS'S ADDRESS-A REUNION ASSOCIATION ORGANIZED -THE REUNION AT FREEPORT, SEPTEMBER FOURTH, IS70- GENERAL SHEETS'S ADDRESS-THE REUNION AT MOUNT CARROLL, SEPTEMBER FOURTH, IS73-MAJOR WOODCOCK'S ADDRESS.
The first Reunion of the Ninety-Second was held at Polo, Ogle County, Illinois, on September fourth, IS67. The following account of that Reunion is taken from the public press. The Chicago Republican said :
" At the depot the Polo band welcomed the visitors, and General Atkins found himself busy for a season, shaking hands with his boys. One mile away a beautiful grove was prepared for the occasion, and thither, in line of march, the throng pressed forward. The meeting was called to order by Major Albert Woodcock." There was music by the band, and prayer was offered by the old Chaplain of the Regiment, Rev. Barton H. Cartwright. Then followed the address, an hour and twenty minutes in length, by General Smith D. Atkins, of Freeport, the Colonel of the Ninety-Second. The following is a resolution adopted by the members of the Regiment present at the Reunion, immediately after the close of General Atkins's address, with his reply :
" Resolved, That we have listened with pleasure to the address of General Smith D. Atkins on this occasion, and respectfully request a copy for publication."
" POLO, Sept. 4, 1867.
" To the Soldiers of the Ninety-Second Illinois Volunteers;
" In compliance with your resolution, I herewith hand you a copy of my address at your first Reunion.
" Very Respectfully Your Obedient Servant,
"SMITH D. ATKINS."
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The following is the aldress delivered by General Atkins at Polo:
Soldiers of the Ninety-Second Illinois :
COMRADES-FRIENDS: I commence my remarks with con- flicting emotions of joy and sadness-joy that so many battle- surviving veterans are here to answer to roll-call to-day, and sorrow for the many who sleep quietly in their beds of glory on the battle-field's holy ground, who never more will answer roll- call until the bugle note of the resurrection reveille shall sound the assembly to the morning call of the grand Adjutant on high. Hail, survivors of a most glorious band! Citizen soldiers, and soldiers that are citizens! The crowded memories of the last five years come rushing, thronging, so thick and fast, like battalions closed in mass, that I find it difficult to detail those that must perform the duty of a single relief on this occasion.
Five years! so long to look forward-so short to look back ! It seems only yesterday that our prairies were all alive with patriotic ardor, and little parties were traveling over the country with fife and drum, holding meetings in every school-house, drumming up recruits; where the laborers from the harvest fields thronged late at night, and glee clubs were singing, " We are coming, Father Abraham, six hundred thousand more," and "We will rescue our country, we'll save her or die!" Who can torget those meetings, or would forget them if he could? It was in those meetings that the hearts of the American people were touched with the sacred fires of liberty, and melted into a patriot- ism from which was moulded as heroic deeds as embelish the history of any age. How many a husband who went to those meetings with no thought of enlistment, returned to his wife with tearful eyes to tell her he had enlisted-he couldn't stand it any longer-the dear old flag of his fathers had been insulted, aye, liberty was in danger-traitors had dared to raise their bloody hands against the country Washington had saved, and by the memories of Bunker Hill and Lexington, and his gray-haired revolutionary sires who had bared their breasts to the storms of war, he must go! And then a sleepless night, in which all the little plans for his absence were discussed and the good-bye kiss. Ah, boys, you will not soon forget your partings! Happy, happy wives that have your husbands back again. Happy maidens whose lovers are here. Happy mothers, happy fathers, that are here with your soldier boys to-day. But, Oh! God pity the wives
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who are waiting yet-the maidens whose lovers come not back- the fathers, the mothers, whose darling boys shall never come home.
In this Reunion you will rapidly live over again-you already have done so-all those bloody years; you already have recounted to one another the incidents of every camping ground, every march, bivouac, skirmish, and battle.
You have not forgotten Rockford, where you took your first lessons in camp-life. You thought the rough board barracks, and the rations prepared by loving hands at home, and brought you in baskets, hardly good enough. You thought the company, squad, and battalion drills hard work; but you learned by and by what a terribly in earnest thing it was to leave a citizen's for a soldier's life. Don't you sometimes quietly smile when you think of the dirk-knives you bought, the pistols with which you loaded down your belts, and the curiosity shops you so carefully stowed , away in your knapsacks to the tune of a hundred pounds? When will you forget your first march down through the streets of Rockford, that bright October morning, nine hundred and fifty strong, with colors streaming in the wind and martial music filling the air? How many tearful eyes were there-how many delicate hands waved adieu, as the train slowly rolled off bearing you away !
And you have not forgotten your camp in the old field south of Covington, Kentucky, where you heard the first hostile shot, and the last one fired by Kirby Smith in his raid on Cincinnati. Do you remember your field drilling there-" Foward into line. By companies, left half wheel. Double quick. March!"-and away you went tumbling down into the dark ravines, or climbing the sides so steep you had to cling to the grass. It was there you drew your bell tents, and a six mule team to each company to " tote" your " traps." It was there, at four o'clock one afternoon, you started on your second march, thirteen miles on a good pike road, and I never saw a Regiment march so before or since. A quarter horse was nowhere. I couldn't keep you back! But the next morning, when you tied your boots together and hung them over your shoulders, because you couldn't get them on your swollen feet, you could march quite comfortably slow. Do you remember how the sullen roar of artillery sounded off to the front that evening, when Aids came riding back to tell us somebody was fighting? But you got used to artillery after that!
You remember, too, your experience in Kentucky, marching
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along by the plantations of the rich old Rebel planters of the blue grass region, guarding the property of the enemies of the country, while you drank out of their cattle ponds! And our first entrance into Lexington, the home of Henry Clay, all the Regiment singing,
" We will rally around the flag, boys, rally once again, Shouting the battle-cry of Freedom !"
And on the road to Mt. Sterling. Have the boys of Company "A" forgotten the nice, fresh mutton they furnished the hospital one day? How the darkies flocked into our camp. Have you forgotten Mt. Sterling? I wonder if those " secesh" planters have got their slaves back yet? Do you recollect Winchester? It seems to me I can now hear the " tramp, tramp, tramp," of the old Regiment on the broad pike road of Winchester town, with guns loaded and bayonets fixed, while the crowds of the cadaver- ous looking Kentuckians, who had come there with the avowed purpose of suppressing the Ninety-Second Regiment, slunk away. And the moonlight evening in camp, where the Major sang, " Dinah am a handsome gal," and your Colonel got down from his dignity, and showed you how to " cut a pigeon wing!" And on to Lexington again-I don't imagine the State of Ken- tucky is many millions better off for the black boys they compelled you to return to them. And at Danville, where our Band was organized, and our glee club sang at our dress parades,
" So let the cannon boom as they will. We'll be gay and happy still, Gay and happy, gay and happy, We'll be gay and happy still."
But among the first music our Band learned was the solemn funeral dirge, and we followed to their burial many of our boys at Dan- ville. And what a march we had from there after Jolin Morgan. Perhaps the regular army officers thought we could catch that bold rider with columns of infantry, but no volunteer officer thought so. How the rails disappeared that dark and rainy night when our boys went into camp, and how long your faces were the next evening, when you camped again in Danville on the very ground you had occupied before, and were without the board floors to your tents which you had inade bonfires of when you began your march. And the march to Louisville. I wonder if the fellow who got his skull cracked with the butt of a musket in Louisville
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has been hunting fugitive slaves lately? And down the Ohio and up the Cumberland, where we reached Fort Donelson in time to see the dead Rebels that Colonel Harding, of the S3d Illinois, had mustered out, but not in time to take active part in the glory of that repulse. And on to Nashville and Franklin. We didn't do much fighting at Franklin, but we cut down lots of timber, built the largest kind of breastworks, had some fine Brigade drills, and turned out in line of battle regularly every morning two hours before daylight! It was at Franklin that our new old Chaplain came to us, and it was marching from Franklin to Triune one hot morning that you threw away your blankets, which the Chaplain kindly gathered up and piled in front of him on his horse and returned to you again on going into camp, when some graceless soldier even took the Chaplain's blanket, to pay him for his pains! And at Triune you heard Rebel shell go fluttering over your camp for the first time. And from Triune you marched through rain and mud to join the right flank of Rosecrans's army in his movement against Tullahoma and Shelbyville. Do you recollect your march from Guy's Gap, with the "Johnnies" captured at Shelbyville, and the plantation kettles full of coffee Captain Espy had prepared for them? Would to God the kind treatment we always gave the Rebel prisoners had induced them to treat kindly our poor boys at Andersonville and Libby. And from Shelby- ville to Wartrace, through the hardest rain-storm that ever fell. And the building of the bridge over Duck River, where, while you were working, details were made to gather for you black- berries by the tub full. And then you were "paddle-ducks" no longer, for Wilder came along and "gobbled " you up for his " Spencer Brigade." How glad your faces were with the thought that you would have no more hard marches, loaded down with heavy knapsacks. And what a gala day was that about Columbia and Shelbyville, gathering up horses and darkies-the horses to mount yourselves upon, and the darkies to muster into the ranks of the Army of the Cumberland, bearing the bright banners of liberty, and " keeping step to the music of the Union." What a funny cavalcade you were, mounted on Tennessee plow nags, with citizen saddles of every pattern, infantry clothing and long Enfield Rifles, but a happier, more determined, braver set of men never drew rein. General John E. Smith used to call you " Mame- lukes," and as I remembered the campaign of Napoleon in the shadow of the Pyramids of Egypt, and the annoyance the fiery Mamelukes gave him, hanging on his flanks or falling like an
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avalanche on his detached parties, I was disposed to accept as a compliment what he intended as a jeer. And then from Decherd over the mountains into the Tennessee Valley, at Harrison's Land- ing, where one of the Polo boys got a shot in the arm, sent from Dixie's land across the Tennessee River, the first soldier in the Ninety-Second wounded by Rebel lead. There you learned that the " Spencers" would carry farther than the Enfields, and taught the swaggering "Johnnies" on the other side of the river to " hunt their holes" behind their breastworks. And here it was that our good old Chaplain was so exercised about the Tennessee lady that was coloring her cotton clothing "butternut." How his voice rang through the camp as he went hallooing, "Doctor Winston! Doctor Winston! There's a woman 'dying' over there!" and Doctor Winston, good-natured fellow, couldn't see where the "laugh came in." And back again over Walden's Ridge, down through the Sequatchie Valley, and over the Tennessee, to report to General Rosecrans for special duty, the only mounted force at his immediate command, for all the cavalry was with McCook on the right, or with Wilder and Minty on the left. Colonel Van Buskirk, and the detail with him, were the first blue-coated sol- diers to drink in the air on the top of Lookout Mountain, and brought back the first authentic intelligence to General Rose- crans that Bragg had evacuated Chattanooga. And the next morning it was your honor to lead the advance over Lookout Mountain, driving the Rebel pickets before you and into the town of Chattanooga, planting your colors first in that Rebel strong- hold, while columns of dust from the fleeing cavalry of the enemy were yet rising, and the rattle of advance firing sounded on the air, and made it possible for General Wagner, who laid idly on the north side of the Tennessee, to cross over in a skiff and telegraph over the country that he was the first into Chattanooga! And on through the town, after Forrest and his Rebel horde, to Frier's Island, where Wilder was attempting to ford the Tennessee. Do you remember your camp that night on the old grape plantation? And then to Ringgold. Can't you hear the bullets, boys, "tszip," " tszip," as they sounded that bright morning, our first prospect of a fair stand-up fight? If General Van Cleve had pushed into Ringgold, instead of stopping for an artillery duel, we would have " bottled up" Forrest and two of his brigades. And away toward Rossville, saving on the road Crittenden's wagon train, the Ninety-Second coming up just in time to repulse the Rebel charge. And down the top of Lookout Mountain that dark night-" artil-
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lery closed up!" to Thomas's head-quarters, establishing courier posts. And with Turchin's brigade at Dug Gap, where the Rebel army was held in check from morning until sundown, waiting for McCook. And the burial of Giles at night with light- wood torches 'neath the fat pines. And then the bloody field by Chicamauga's dark river! Words fail me to tell that story. When General Reynolds said to you his front line was hotly pressed, and the Ninety-Second was the only reserve he had, you hitched your horses to the trees, and, forming as infantry, you started to reinforce the line, and found the regular battery already captured, and the entire brigade cut to pieces and fleeing before a tumultu- ous sea of Rebels, and you, halting in the open field, while the enemy's bullets rattled around you, and the fleeing troops of the broken brigade crowded past and through your line, it was yours to steadily receive the shock of the enemy's victorious charge, to halt it in your front by your heavy volleys of musketry, and hold the ground until your artillery had left you, and the gray-coats were surging past your flanks! Then you sprang to your horses, and while the flood of artillery and infantry went streaming to the rear, you faced to the front again, and passing around the Rebel column that had broken and penetrated our lines, you re- joined Wilder's Brigade and formed on his left flank, filling a part of the very gap made by the assault on our lines! Were you not glad when General Nagle's column marched in on our left? How terribly sounded the continuous roll of musketry, as he pushed out on the enemy in the gleaming of the twilight! Will you not hear, ringing in your ears in your old age even, the agonizing cries of the wounded between our line of battle and the enemy, crying for " water! water !! " God grant that in all our fair land such cries may never again be heard except in memory.
And the next morning, when we scattered out in a thin skir- mish line to hold the entire front of Wilder's Brigade, while Rosecrans's lines were retired to the hills, and sent word again and again to McCook of the heavy columns of the enemy moving past our left, and when the shock of the stormn of which we had repeatedly warned him burst on McCook, it scattered his thin lines like chaff, and left us nearly surrounded, and we only got out in time to see all McCook's corps, like a cloud of dust, floating away from the field. But you did not join the cloud! With Wilder you gathered up the wounded, the ambulances, and deserted artillery left upon the field, and, holding the Rebel cavalry in check, sullenly retired. How your hearts ached to be with old
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" Pap" Thomas on the left, where the Union cannon still thun- dered defiance to Bragg's minions and Longstreet's legions! Companies "K" and "C" were there to witness the bull-dog tenacity of the hero of Chicamauga, and have a part in the glory achieved by the troops under Thomas. And away again to Har- rison's Landing, picketing the Tennessee, and back again over Walden's Ridge to Caperton's Ferry, to Huntsville, to Trianna, where Colonel Sheets "didn't catch a fish," but where we had plenty of forage for our jaded animals, and where Skinner and his scouts had plenty of riding, and played many a trick on the confiding "Johnnies" on the south side of the Tennessee. And then back again to Ringgold, where we went into Kilpatrick's Division, and had a camp in the open field so finely policed and shaded with artificially planted evergreens, that General Elliott pronounced it the handsomest camp in the Army of the Cumber- land, and the only camp in the cavalry. I can see the camp now, with Taylor's Ridge sweeping away to the south; and oh! what sad memories come back to me as I remember the bloody mas- sacre of our poor boys captured at Nickojack Trace! I had solemnly protested against picketing eight miles away, and expected disaster at that post; but I did not expect that soldiers captured bravely fighting would be brutally murdered atter they had laid down their arms! No civilized people could be thus guilty! It required a barbarism that had enslaved four millions of men, lifted its bloody hands against the temple of liberty WASHINGTON had raised, contrived and executed the horrible tortures of Andersonville, Millen, Salisbury and Bell Isle, and culminated in the assassination of the great and good LINCOLN, to produce the libel on a soldier or a man that could coolly murder a captured enemy, as our poor boys at Nickojack were murdered. Whenever I think of the brave men so cruelly butchered, I will curse the cowardly guilty criminals who did it, and curse the treason that was the father of the crime. But a day or two after Nickojack, when we pushed the enemy down to Tunnel Hill, many a gray-coated Rebel bit the dust, when you went into battle shouting, " Boys, remember Nickojack !" And then with Kil- patrick in the lead on Rockyface, and through Snake Creek Gap to Reseca, where our little General was wounded, and on to Lay's Ferry, and Adairsville, and Kingston, and while Sherman was thundering against Atlanta, scattered along the line of rail- road keeping open communications, or under Major Woodcock on the wild ride around at Atlanta, and at Jonesboro, Flint River
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and Lovejoy's. And at all these places the music of your " Spencers" was heard whenever a gray-coated "Johnny" was seen, heard first, and heard latest-when we heard their sharp rattle, we knew the enemy was near, and when we no longer heard it, we knew the enemy had gone.
And when Sherman captured Atlanta and gave his army rest, you lay in camp on half rations, while your Division Commissary was running bakeries, and selling you bread at a shilling a loaf ! And when Hood started around Sherman on his campaign against Nashville, it was yours to lead Sherman's columns against him, and gallantly achieve new laurels at Powder Springs and Van Wert. Do you remember how you drove the enemy from Powder River and pushed up to the village of Powder Springs, under the command of Captain Preston, until you de- veloped the long line of the enemy, and drew the fire of his light and heavy artillery, and then retired bearing your wounded and your dead? Do you remember your charge at Van Wert and the music of the dozen Rebel bands, that solemn evening when the news came that the enemy had surrounded us on every side? And back again to Marietta, where our Division was reorganized for the grand campaign from the mountains to the sea. Do you recollect your review by General Sherman, the smoking ruins of Marietta, and the destroying of the railroad, and the commence- ment of our march, leading Sherman's columns south ward, while Hood was marching north? Do you remember the brilliant charge of the first brigade, at the old Rebel earthworks at Love- joy's, when that brigade took back again the two pieces of artillery the Rebels had taken from Stoneman? And at Bear Creek Station, where we sent Wheeler flying toward Macon, and the night marching across the Ocmulgee on the pontoons, and into a country where horses and turkeys and sweet potatoes were plenty. And from Clinton to Macon, where Captain Becker, with a battalion so handsomely repulsed the charge of Crews's brigade ; and do you recollect how that Rebel brigade scattered in utter confusion in every direction through the woods and fields, leaving us an open road up to the Rebel earthworks east of Macon? Can you not now even hear the cannon thunder, and the bursting shells from the nine pieces of artillery with which the enemy opened on us-and can't you see the long line of burning railroad ties, with the iron rails heating for bending? The cutting of that railroad put Wheeler in our rear, and cut off the Rebel General Cobb with his Georgia " Melish," and gave
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Sherman uninterrupted roads as he wheeled his grand army to the left and held his course for Savannah. And then that rainy night when we retired on the Clinton Road, and buried our dead, and amputated the limbs of the wounded. And the next morning when you boys, under that cool, intrepid officer, Colonel Van Buskirk, who honored the silver leaves he wore, and had doubly earned the eagles he would have honored, so handsomely repulsed the four heavy columns charging against you, and achieved as brilliant a little victory as the history of the war can furnish. I give the credit to the skill of your commander, and your cool bravery; but you, I know, will give the credit to your trusty " Spencers" that served you so well and faithfully on many a trying occasion. And then away through Milledgeville to the left flank of the army, feinting on Augusta, and turning short off for Millen. Do you remember the day when Wheeler came up in our rear, joined by Wade Hampton and his Potomac cavalry, and you so steadily and ably held the rear guard while Kilpatrick's column, uninterrupted, continued its march all day long? I seldom have seen the cool bravery and courage of the Ninety- Second put to a severer test, or more evenly and squarely vindi- cated. After they had charged one or two of the "rail barricades" and found them full of " Spencers," they became very shy of charging, and the remark I made to Kilpatrick was true, that there was no danger to his Division as long as the Ninety-Second was between it and the enemy. Kilpatrick thought the next day that he would superintend the rear guard in person, and came very near getting his precious little person into a Rebel prison, and he himself confessed if it had not been for one of the regi- ments of my Brigade, the 9th Michigan Cavalry, with their " Spencer" Rifles, he would have been captured. Do you recol- lect Buckhead Creek Church, when an Orderly came to tell us that General Kilpatrick was captured, and we waited for the first brigade to pass through ours? and the fight on the Chevish planta- tion, a little farther on, where we all sat down in the road and gave Wheeler and Hampton, with their combined force far out- numbering ours, an opportunity to run over us if they could, and how they couldn't! The only mistake of that engagement was that Kilpatrick did not have a couple of regiments ready to charge the confused ranks of the enemy, after we had given them so handsome a repulse! But that was lacking a great many times. If always, when the Ninety-Second had charged the enemy on foot, broken their ranks and sent them flying, a well-
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