USA > Illinois > The story of the Fifty-fifth regiment Illinois volunteer infantry in the civil war, 1861-1865 > Part 31
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THE BATTLE OF ATLANTA.
The rifle-pits where properly reversed were sufficient, and the position was excellent, commanding a wide open area. But besides the grave mistake of thrusting the small force of artillery and infantry into an exposed position on the picket line, where they only invited capture or destruction, two seri- ous and utterly inexcusable blunders of omission were charge- able to some one high in authority. The rank and file attributed them, and no doubt correctly, to the carelessness of General Morgan L. Smith and the incompetency of the brig- adier who, by virtue of seniority, became division commander during the day, General Lightburn. The railway cut was neither barricaded nor guarded, and a large brick house directly in front of and near the line of Lightburn's brigade was allowed to stand. Colonel Jones, upon whom the com- mand of the brigade devolved about noon, is said to have asked authority to burn the house, but his request received no attention. This negligence cost us dear.
Not far from twelve o'clock heavy musketry firing at our left and rear, and over a long line, indicated that the Six- teenth and Seventeenth Corps were hotly engaged. It was evident that Hood was making a second furious attack, this time upon our left flank. For a time the issue was dubious, if not adverse to us, as we could easily judge from the vary- ing tumult of battle. Now we could tell that a charge had been repelled, and now the contest would seem to be renewed nearer to our rear. So far as could be seen the Seventeenth Corps, which joined the Fifteenth on the left, had not been driven from its position; but the occasional rattle of musketry directly in its rear was an ominous sound and one which we could not understand until, after the victory, we learned that our old brigade commander with his division had fought the enemy from both sides of his rifle-pits, the assaults upon him from front and rear being so obligingly timed that he could repel them alternately. Ambulances were bringing their groaning burdens up the roadway behind us, and staff officers were galloping furiously to and fro. About two o'clock our three reserve regiments, with the brave Colonel Martin at their head, were hurried away towards the smoke of the melee at the left. We now formed but a single thin
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FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
line, three of our largest companies being detached at the front. Before leaving to re-enforce the Sixteenth, Colonel Martin had requested General Smith to recall the two regi- ments upon the picket line; but this was not done. Although we did not then know of our misfortune, our beloved young general, McPherson, had fallen. General Logan was in com- mand of the Army of the Tennessee, General M. L. Smith had succeeded him as commander of the corps, and General Lightburn was temporarily placed over the division; Lieu- tenant-Colonel Mott of the Fifty-seventh Ohio was the senior officer in command of that part of the First brigade in line. No general, field or staff officer, however, troubled the Fifty- fifth with his presence or his orders. In the trials soon to come we conquered all difficulties, as we fought at Shiloh, without interference, assistance or direction from any outside party.
It was about three o'clock when, during a seeming lull in the conflict on the left, suddenly from our picket line and the supporting regiments there came to our cars the brisk pop- ping of the skirmishers' rifles, followed by musketry volleys and the rapid fire of the two field-pieces. Quickly after in came our three companies and the two regiments at headlong speed, while close behind them Hood's Corps, now led by General Cheatham, came surging forward, a grey torrent pouring over the fields towards us. In double line without skirmishers, the Confederates advanced in splendid order, the file closers forcing on any disposed to lag behind. Jf they had hoped to strike us before we were fully intrenched, they were much too late. For the first time in all its history the Fifty-fifth stood behind earth-works to meet a Confeder- ate charge. On came Hood's brigades with the usual car- piercing yell. Holding our fire until the piekets not captured were safely within our lines, our assailants were met when not over one hundred and fifty yards from the ditch by a volley of bullets sent with a cool, steady aim. Flags went down, the ground was strewn with dead and dying, and most of those left standing were soon fleeing pell-mell from the wrathful storm towards the city. Some of the bravest plunged forward into the ditch under shelter of the high
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THE BATTLE OF ATLANTA.
parapet, and some hid behind stumps and trees. The regi- ment, proudly exultant, was intoxicated with the wine of victory -- a victory gained with almost no loss -- and would have welcomed the sight of another such battle-line, however impetuous or persistent, coming in place of the one it had driven from its front.
While our attention was fixed in the direction of Atlanta, where the rebel officers were striving to rally their men for a second charge, bullets began to whistle among us from the right, and an order to fire to the right oblique was passed down the line because of some rebel troops seen charging along the railroad towards the battery. It was too late. As we turned we could see the rifle-pits across the railway, where Lightburn's brigade had been, swarming with Confederate soldiers, the battery captured, and hundreds of the enemy coming up in serried ranks from out the railroad cut behind our right companies. The Fifty-seventh Ohio whirled back, and was gone into the woodland. There was but one thing to do, and every intelligent soldier knew without orders that liberty depended upon a rapid movement to the left rear. Captain Shaw had no time to give orders for a regimental change of front, and nothing but confusion would probably have resulted from such an order; for a dense thicket cov- ered the slope, coming quite near to our line; and even if gifted with the lungs of a Stentor, his voice could hardly have been heard by all in the din of the fight. He gave the best possible order under the circumstances: to fall back by companies, By command of its officers, cach company from right to left of the regiment swung back, no two leaving the works at the same time, but each going at double-quick obliquely to the left rear of the position. The cool and val- iant Lieutenant Ebersold-now chief of police in the city of Chicago-was that day commanding Company A upon the right, and when his fellow-officers towards the left saw him consenting to a retrograde movement, even though they heard no general order, they knew that the withdrawal was not illconsidered, nor blamable for unnecessary caution.
Plunging, within a few paces, into the forest through which ran a small water-course thick set with tangled underbrush,
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FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
protection was at once gained, saving us from an enfilading fire which must otherwise have inflicted fearful loss; but there could be no preservation of line. It was, however, no senseless panic. Every man clung to his gun, and when safe from the enveloping sweep of the Confederate flank assault, each faced about; comrade joined comrade, squad was added to squad, and within half an hour the rallied and re-formed regiment, by its commander's orders, began skirmishing its way forward.
A few did not aid directly in the first charge of the main body for the recovery of the position, having become sepa- rated from it by taking a different course in retreat, but all were soon heading in the same direction. The chaplain had fought in the ranks of Company B, then commanded by Lieutenant Eichelbarger, on the extreme left of the battalion; and from that position the Confederate column sweeping un- opposed up towards our rear from the railway could not be seen. The lieutenant, a fine officer and recklessly brave, hearing no order and seeing no adequate reason for the aban- donment of the works, seems to have been stung almost to madness by what he supposed a disgraceful rout, and with tears streaming down his cheeks begged his men to stand firm. When finally forced to retreat, as soon as he could gather a squad about him he insisted upon returning, and the chaplain, thinking from the sound of musketry that the reg- iment was rallying at the works again, consented. Forming the little company, that had become somehow detached from the regiment, into a short skirmish line, they rapidly ad- vanced, only to suddenly find themselves in the immediate presence of the enemy in force, and in terrible danger of death or captivity. A rebel soldier raising his gun ordered the chaplain, with an insulting oath, to surrender. The chap- lain's musket was luckily loaded and cocked, his challenger was not twenty steps away, and without waiting to aim he fired and fled. The man in grey had surrendered -his life. Lieutenant Eichelbarger was found after the battle, near this spot, shot through the head.
The Fourth division, under General Harrow, joining us on the left, two brigades of which had also been obliged to
3.4 1
THE BATTLE OF ATLANTA.
change front to avoid the enfilading fire, charged back and after a brisk fight drove the rebels over the rifle-pits, at the same time that the Fifty-fifth put its whole vigor into a second charge and recaptured its portion of the works, the Fifty-seventh Ohio keeping equal pace with it on the right. Just as the regiment when at the rear was moving forward to this counter charge, a well-known form came galloping furiously up the Decatur road on a coal-black charger streaked with foam, hatless, his long black hair flying, his eyes flashing with wrath - a human hurricane on horseback. It was "Black Jack," as the Illinois men were fond of calling Logan, and rousing cheers went up as the soldiers recognized him whose presence alone was a host. Behind him, coming on the run, were our reserve regiments so unfortunately absent at the critical moment. Under such inspiriting leadership, re-enforcing the rallied lines of Lightburn's bri- gade on the right of the railroad, an impetuous charge was made, the First division sweeping down from the right at the same time, and the rebels were pushed back over the intrenchments. Two or three batteries on the left of the Twenty-third Corps were now able to pour in upon the Con- federate flank a rapid fire of spherical case and canister, and the rout was complete. All the guns save the two upon the picket line were again ours. Captain DeGress, who had been almost heart-broken at the loss of his battery, was soon hurl- ing shell from the recaptured twenty-pounders into the mob of fugitives.
The cause of the temporary disaster was casy to sec. Massing behind the house-which should have been de- stroyed in the morning,-and in the railway cut -- which should have been protected by a barricade and two field pieces-General Manigault's brigade and the bravest of the Confederates driven from our front, broke through and out- flanked the weak line of the Second brigade, killed the battery horses, captured the guns and opened an enfilading musketry fire right and left. At the same time a large force from the railway cut swept round upon Battery A and began to envelope the fragment of the First brigade. If in the needful hurry of the movement this little force of two de-
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FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
pleted regiments did not change front in excellent order and according to tactical rule, the exigency and the location excused such fault, and the promptitude it showed in re- forming and driving the intruders back, more than atoned for it.
When the regiment again stood aligned at the works, and not until then, was the absence of the color-bearer with the ragged remnant of the colors generally noticed. After the four companies on the right had moved to the rear, Lieuten- ant Oliver, the self-possessed officer commanding the color company, gave orders for it to fall back, and all seem to have heard and obeyed save the color-sergeant. In the exciting whirl of events no one appears to have noticed that he was remaining behind. Not a man of that company but escaped and canie back in the counter charge. After the return of the sergeant from captivity, it was ascertained that he did not hear the order to leave the position nor understand the reason for the abandonment of the works, and therefore clung to them almost alone. One's hearing in the hubbub of a great battle is certainly not so faithful a guide, often, as sight, and the fact that company by company the regiment rolled back to the left and rear was proof enough in the Fifty-fifth not only of an order but of intelligent purpose. The grave misfortune was sorely felt throughout the regi- ment, and the more because so entirely unnecessary and undeserved. No one doubted for an instant the personal courage of the flag bearer, for that had been fully tested, and on more sanguinary fields; but most felt that he had momentarily forgotten that there is a "better part" of valor called discretion, as well as that his appointed place was in the regimental line whichever way it moved, and not behind it, even in retreat.
The effective force of the Fifty-fifth before this fight was two hundred and thirty-ninc. The casualties reported were : four killed, thirteen wounded and sixteen missing. One of the missing, John Smith, was doubtless mortally wounded, taken to Atlanta, and there died. The other fifteen fell into the hands of the enemy and were soon experiencing the pri- vations of Andersonville.
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343
BATTLE CASUALTIES.
CASUALTIES OF FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS VET. VOLS. AT ATLANTA, JULY 22, 1864.
KILLED. COMPANY. REMARKS.
HARVEY BOLANDER.
A. Shot through the head.
GEO. W. EICHELBARGER, Ist-lieut. B. Shot through the head.
JAMES A. BAINES. G. Died during amputation of leg.
FRANKIN L. KIMBERK, corporal. I.
WOUNDED.
AARON LINGENFELTER.
A. Finger shot away.
JOHN P. WHEELER, sergeant.
A. In left foot.
JOHN H. FISHER. corporal.
B. Severely, in left thigh.
EARL P. GOODWIN.
C. In hand.
SAMUEL KNIGHT.
D. In neck.
DAVID MARTIN CRUMBAUGH, sergt. F. Mortally, in right thigh.
SAMUEL FAS.
F. In face.
BENNETT SWEARINGEN.
F. In head.
FRANCIS M. NIKIRK.
H. Slightly.
FRANCIS M. DENMAN, corporal.
I. In left leg.
HEMAN F. HARRIS.
I. In right leg.
GEORGE C. Cov, corporal.
K. In left leg.
WILLIAM MOUNT.
K. Slightly, in hand.
CAPTURED.
ROBERT R. ELLIOTT, sergeant. B.
DENNIS SULLIVAN, corporal. B.
PETER HIGGINS.
D). Captured on picket line.
D. do. do.
FRELINGHUYSEN PARVIN.
D.
JOHN SHENEMAN.
D. do. do.
JOHN LUNDBERG.
E. do. do.
FREDERICK VEITH.
E.
do. dc.
JAMES W. GAY. color-sergeant.
G.
JOHN SMITH.
H. Probably mortally wounded. I.
STEPHEN R. MALCOLM.
RICHARD NEEDHAM.
I.
CHARLES D. RAY.
I.
JOSEPH P. COOMBS.
K.
JOHN W. EDWARDS.
K.
WILLIAM E. MONEYMAKER. K.
James A. Baines was an Englishman of somewhat eccen- tric disposition, but a kind-hearted comrade and an excellent soldier. After the breaking of his thigh by a bullet, using his gun as a crutch, he pluckily made his way to the hospital unaided. His leg was amputated, and he never awoke after
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GEORGE A. LEMBKE.
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FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
the operation. Bolander and Kimberk were patriots, true- hearted and brave.
For the four days succeeding the battle we remained in our position held at such cost, burying the rebel dead and rectifying the two lines of works. The pickets were skir- mishing continuously and artillery duels were kept up with the usual insignificant results. The stench from the bodies unburied before the outposts became almost intolerable ; indicating that the picket companies and their support of artillery and infantry had poured a very effective fire into the charging column before they were outflanked and hurled back in confusion. In the front of our regimental line alone seventy-five dead Confederates were buried. We undoubt- edly had put out of the combat more rebels than our whole number present in the battle.
At the first hour in the morning of July 27th, the Army of the Tennessee was aroused and began moving to the right rear. It was past three o'clock before the turn of the Fifty- fifth came to take up the route step. Through a drizzling rain we marched around behind the troops facing Atlanta from the north, passing corps after corps --- first the Twenty- third, then in succession the Fourth, Twentieth, and Fourteenth; and finally our more intimate associates of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth who, preceding us, were coming into battle line. We found the familiar locomotives already busily puffing and whistling about close to the rear of the Army of the Cumberland, Colonel Wright having rebuilt the great Chattahoochee bridge in a single week. To us, who were near the rear of the whole column, the tiresomely slow tramp, tramp, hour after hour, seemed as though it never would end. Occasionally the shells from Atlanta burst over us, always harmlessly. Night came down, but on we marched, wet, hungry, tired out. At every little halt caused by some obstruction to a gun or caisson in the van, men would drop by the wayside and instantly fall so soundly asleep that their comrades awakened them with difficulty when the move began again. Thus the column dragged on and on until, when nearly eleven o'clock, we were halted and
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THE BATTLE OF EZRA CHURCH.
allowed to sleep upon our arms, having been twenty hours on the road.
At three the next morning we were in motion again. The Seventeenth Corps gradually swung into line, facing Atlanta from the west, directly opposite the position occupied by it on the twenty-sixth of the month, and about the same dis- tance of two miles from the centre of the city and the Macon railway. The right of the corps approached the cross-roads near Mount Ezra Church. From that point the Fifteenth Corps began to form, on an almost east and west line, at about right angles with that of the Seventeenth, and parallel with the Lick-skillet road. About half-past ten artillery opened upon our front and left. We had barely got disen- tangled at noon from a labyrinth of swampy, densely-wooded ravines, and gained a favorable position upon a slight ridge in a narrow belt of trees, when musketry fire began to be heard, and we could see the grey legions in double line of battle bearing rapidly down upon us. They had nearly caught us in air, and there was no time to use spade or axc for protection. Even the men of the advance division had barely opportunity to pile a few fence rails in their front. The Fifty-fifth, conforming to the nature of the site and keeping within the edge of the timbered belt, chanced to be refused at a considerable angle from the east and west line of battle, the ground sloping towards the right of the regiment where Company A extended across a little brook. In the ravine by this run the assistant surgeon and his little corps of helpers stationed themselves. Beyond to the right were two regi- ments, the One-hundred-sixteenth Illinois and the Thirtieth Ohio, with a section of artillery between them, continuing the east and west alignment for a short distance in the border of the forest. The ground in front was open for several hun- dred yards, a part of it being thickly set with stumps, and a little stream and a rail fence crossing it.
The two charging lines came steadily on, at first without firing, the sergeants behind with fixed bayonets keeping every man up to his work. Exposed to our fire at long range, scores were dropping under the cool aim of marksmen who had not lost the skill acquired by their practice at Vicksburg.
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FIFTY-FIFTHI ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
But the gaps were quickly closed, and the rapid step quick- ened. Alone and on foot, an almost exultant expression lighting up his dark face, General Logan passed along behind the line with words of cheer on his lips: "Hold them! steady, boys, we've got them now." Yet that desperate wave, though gradually growing thin and weak, is getting too near; it is scarce eighty yards from the regiments on our right. En- couraged by their general's presence these regiments increase the rapidity of their fire. The Fifty-fifth, because of its re- fused situation, has been necessarily firing obliquely to the left, but now its guns completely enfilade the charging ranks, and we pour in deadly volleys at short range. The ragged, dust-colored lines become a mob, falter, turn, are gone. They will come again, driven by desperate commanders; but a few moments are granted us, and hurriedly fence-rails, old logs, stumps-anything which can help stop a bullet, are brought and piled along the front, making a slight cover for men lying at full length. Two regiments from the Seventeenth Corps, armed with repeating rifles, are hastened past our rear to extend the right flank, around which some of the enemy's skirmishers have already advanced, and others are pushing in alarming numbers.
Again the well-known yell; the pop-popping of the pre- liminary shots; the magnificent on-coming of proud lines from behind the opposite ridge, with flag-bearers seeming to dance out defiantly in their front; the crash of the volleyed musketry; the hopeless struggle, growing confusion, slaugh- ter, and helpless rout. The second charge visibly lacked the verve and tenacity of the first, but it was followed by a third, a fourth, and a fifth, led finally by the general officers them- selves; but each was a more dismal failure than the one pre- ceding it. One of the most desperate was even made in column. About four o'clock the discouraged remnants of the assailing divisions withdrew. We had again met the same corps, now under General S. D. Lec, which, led by Gen- cral Cheatham, had assailed us on the twenty-second, and we were content with our second revenge for the temporary dis- comfiture of that day. In the later charges General Stewart's corps had also taken active part, only to share in the carnage.
347
GENERAL . HOWARD INTRODUCES HIMSELF.
The Fifteenth Corps alone had been attacked, and had fought its own fight; in fact two divisions only had been seriously engaged.
The second charge had hardly been fully repulsed, occa- sional shots still coming from the distant woodland before us, when we heard cheering on our left, which regiment after regiment in succession took up; and soon, walking down the front of the line, came a neatly dressed officer of kindly face and martial bearing, whose rank was shown by the two stars upon either shoulder. The empty sleeve pinned up on his right breast told us it was General O. O. Howard, that day made chief of the Army of the Tennessee. He was intro- ducing himself to his new command on the eve of their first victory under him. At the hearty cheer with which he was welcomed he said: "Well, boys, I thought I had seen fighting before; but I never saw anything like this." A little further down the line, pointing to a dying Confederate sergeant who had crept close up to the rails, he turned to the men near with: "What! you didn't let them get as near as this, did you?" Having been gone to the right a few minutes, he re- turned by the same route, and as he reached us again he looked towards the fence which ran across a portion of the field, along which the grey-coats lay thick, and said: "Boys, there's a line of battle in your front." Some of those near, thinking he meant that the enemy were again coming, sprang up with guns poised, when he added: "O, you needn't mind it; it scoms to be a very harmless line now." The favorable first impression had been happily made, and the Army of the Tennessee never had reason to blame Sherman's selection of the man to succeed the lamented McPherson. What our general thought of us he told in his endorsement of General Logan's report of the battle, and in his own congratulatory order at the close of the campaign. From the last is the following :
My first intimate acquaintance with you dates from the twenty-eighth of July. I never beheld fiercer assaults than the enemy then made, and I never saw troops more steady and self-possessed in action than your divisions which were then engaged.
I have learned that for cheerfulness, obedience, rapidity of movement
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FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
and confidence in battle the Army of the Tennessee is not to be surpassed, and it shall be iny study that your fair record shall continue, and my pur- pose to assist you to move steadily forward and plant the old flag in every proud city of the rebellion.
Of course when the history of this battle came to be written, it was announced that the generals had fully antici- pated it, and planned for it. Of course a special colunin --- on this occasion General Davis's division -- had been sent by another road to the right, instructed to come up providentially . at the crisis of the action, and by a fierce flank attack com- bine with us to utterly demolish the foc. Of course, as is always the fact in battle strategy, the cooperating force got lost in the woods and failed to arrive until the crisis had long passed. The heroism of the assailed line was such as to put out of account chance lack of genius or disappointment of official plans.
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