USA > Illinois > The story of the Fifty-fifth regiment Illinois volunteer infantry in the civil war, 1861-1865 > Part 6
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
62
FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
and Sergeant John B. Johnson of Company A made its second-lieutenant. To Company H, Corporal Nicholas Aagesen of Company C was transferred for its second- lieutenant. In Company I Orderly-Sergeant Lucien B. Crooker and First-duty Sergeant Charles A. Andress were made first and second-lieutenants respectively. The best information at hand would indicate that Second-Lieutenant A. J. Gillett of Company K, was promoted to be its first-lieutenant, and Sergeant John H. Fillmore to be its second-lieutenant. As before intimated the Adjutant-Gene- ral's report for the state of Illinois is utterly unreliable in this connection.
By an order dated March 10th, Major W. D. Sanger was placed upon the staff of General Sherman and the regiment thereby forever deprived of his services. He was a bright, genial and efficient officer, who in his somewhat uninfluential position had been subjected to frequent humiliation at the hands of the lieutenant-colonel. He had studied three years at West Point, and had added to that experience by serving both upon government surveys and upon the ocean. During the period of his staff duty, the reports of his commanding general abound with accounts of his good conduct.
All will remember Charles A. Andress, who subsequently commanded the regiment, and who at this time was made second-lieutenant. No one will for a moment question but that he was entitled to his promotion according to grade; yet the tenure by which men there held their rights was so slight that he came near missing it. Just as Company I was marching to the upper deck to receive its baptism of decla- mation before described, the colonel suggested to Captain Slattery that his brother, Edward Slattery, second sergeant, be promoted to second-lieutenant over the head of Andress. To the eternal credit of that stalwart soldier and good citi- zen, Captain Tim Slattery, be it said that he utterly refused to permit his brother to profit by such methods. The writer is indebted to the sense of justice and firmness of the same person for his own promotion according to rank, and what- ever of egotism appears from the statement herein may be
63
UP THE TENNESSEE.
credited to the grateful recognition of an obligation long existing.
Toward evening the grand movement began to assume practical shape. From the levee, from the river banks, above and below, from out behind islands, here and there, one steamer followed another- more than three score in all- and like a gigantic blue serpent the long line glided into the Tennessee. At five o'clock in the afternoon the Fifty-fifth was moving towards the heart of the Confederacy. Behind were happy homes and the hopes and fears of the loyal North. Before was the unconquered and defiant rebellion. In God's own time these same heroes met the hosts of this rebellion upon their chosen ground and struggled mightily and prevailed.
As morning dawned the beautiful Kentucky scenery on either hand was visible. The progress of the fleet up the swolen river was a sight not to be seen twice in a lifetime, and never to be forgotten. The river itself was beautiful, barely six hundred yards in width, with high, well-wooded banks, but adorned with few marks of advanced civilization. The black smoke from more than a hundred tall pipes rolled away in clouds over the forest, verily a "cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night," to mark the progress of liberty. The journey up the river was fraught with no great interest aside from its novelty and the magnificent spectacle of the expedi- tion itself. Fort Henry was soon passed, and its water-soaked ruins viewed with some curiosity. Stopping occasionally for wood, or in the language of the commissary sergeant, to "cramp stave bolts for fuel," the Hannibal arrived at Savan- nah about five o'clock in the afternoon of March 1Ith. This was the shire town of the county in which the then obscure Pittsburgh Landing was embraced. It was a pleasant country village, the prominent feature from the river front being then as now the fine residence subsequently used by General Grant as headquarters, where he sat at breakfast when the vibra- tions from the first shots at Shiloh fell upon his ear. This mansion belonged to a Mr. Cherry, a name worthy of preser- vation because he was the leading Union man of that vicinity. As night approached patrols were sent out through the town
64
FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
from the Fifty-fifth, consisting of parts of Companies A and I, and perhaps others. The next day battalion drill with knapsacks took place, while the steamboats were purified, Captain Bird of Company C acting as major. Wagons were dispatched into the country a short distance, in charge of Commissary Sergeant Fisher, for forage. Considerable Union sentiment was discovered, and numerous persons who had been in hiding from oppression came in and enlisted in some of the Ohio regiments. It is gratifying to know that this county is now a Republican stronghold with officers of that ยท ilk, and that a prosperous Grand Army post exists at Svan- nah.
At the hour of noon on March 14th a fleet, consisting of nineteen steamboats and one gunboat, carrying twelve regi- ments of infantry, six companies of cavalry and one battery, started up the Tennessee River from Savannah. It was Sher- man's division of the army of invasion, and with it of course was the Fifty-fifth. The expedition had for its immediate object the destruction of the Memphis and Charleston Rail- road at any attainable point within reach of the river, between Corinth and luka. A few miles, and Pittsburgh Landing was passed, but two days' carnage had not yet happened in its vicinity to make it an object of notoriety. The head of the floating column reached Tyler's Landing at seven in the after- noon, and at eleven o'clock at night the cavalry, and with it Major Sanger of the general's staff, started to reach Burns- ville, nineteen miles inland. During the night it began to rain as though the windows of heaven had opened. At four o'clock in the morning Stuart's brigade disembarked in the driving rainstorm. The river was rising rapidly, and a bayou, the head of which was immediately above the landing, was already flowing with the inrushing water. Just as daylight appeared the troops went plunging through this midleg deep, but in no wise deficient in enthusiasm. After wallowing and wading across the muddy bottom, the bluffs were reached about a half mile away. Three miles out messengers were met, who reported that the creeks in the interior were impas- sable and rapidly rising. Upon such news being confirmed by Major Sanger in person, obedience was grudgingly yielded
65
A FRUITLESS EXPEDITION.
to the elements, and the column countermarched. Arriving at the point overlooking the river bottom a lake intervened between the bluff and the boats. The battery first essayed to cross, but was obliged to cut the traces to save the horses, and the guns were left in the water, from which they were finally recovered by the use of long ropes. It was utterly impossible for infantry to march through the intervening mass of raging waters. During the day yawl-boats were brought from the steamers, and with the aid of gang-planks a precarious bridge was constructed, over which the troops passed to the landing. Had not the unexampled flood inter- fered with the expedition it is almost certain that the rebel troops from Burnsville and Iuka would have been met. In that case Chalmers and his Mississippians would have grap- pled with the stout men of the Fifty-fifth, as they did a few weeks later at Shiloh. The river rose fifteen feet in twenty- three hours, and the whole country from the mouth of Yellow Creek to Pittsburgh Landing was under water. Gen- eral Hurlbut , although exercising no authority, was upon the boat occupied by the Fifty-fifth. "Where two or three are gathered together," like Stuart and Hurlbut , the spirit always descended, thus fulfilling a promise evidently not intended for their benefit.
General Sherman having personally ascended the river as high as Eastport, and finding the railway unapproachable, the whole fleet dropped down, on the night of March 15th, to a point nineteen miles below Tyler's Landing. The place of halting was the now historical Pittsburgh Landing.
5
CHAPTER II.
THE BATTLE OF SHILOH.
A T Pittsburgh Landing the high bluffs came to the river bank, affording a good foot-hold for debarkation. This natural conformation of worthless ridges of land is accounta- ble for the pregnant fact that it became a point of occupation, and that the Federal army was placed within the reach of the dashing strategy of Johnston and Beauregard. From the river at this place various roads ran into the country, and as poor as they were they made such places as Corinth, Purdy, Bethel, Hamburgh and Crump's Landing accessible, and all had an important bearing upon thrilling events close at hand. The roads, ridges and ravines which marked and furrowed the interior became land-marks in a great battle, a description of which, so far as they affected the Fifty-fifth, is postponed until we meet that regiment in the sulphurous flames of Shiloh.
Pittsburgh Landing, now so famous, then excited nothing but disgust and ridicule, and indeed it deserved no better tribute. A small, dilapidated storehouse was the only build- ing there, having reference to business. Up the bluff through a ravine ran the miserable road from the river, its course marked by the unfathomable yellow mud of that region. Just at the right, where the road ascended the hill, a small field was located, sloping toward the water, and in it was a double log house of uncouth construction. There had been a slight skirmish here a few weeks before between a Federal gunboat with a small force, and a rebel regiment. In the
67
AT LOCUST CREEK.
field before mentioned, exposed by the action of the recent rains, could be seen the ghastly remains of two or three Con- federate victims of that conflict. This same field has now resting in its bosom the remains of 3590 brave, loyal soldiers. They are sleeping in a state over which rules a governor who lost a limb in the same battle where they lost their lives. He is living and is honored among men because he was a rebel. They lie dead, and mostly in unnamed graves, because they were patriots.
About the landing many boats were grouped containing the elements of Hurlbut's and other divisions, but no en- campments had as yet been established. It appears from some of the orders issued that it was at first intended to keep Sherman's division on board steamboats to act as a movable column in seeking a place along the river where the railroads might be vulnerable, but the unprecedented high water de- feated any farther attempt, as it had already one, to that end. Sunday evening of March 16th the Fifty-fifth, with the rest of the brigade to which it belonged, filed up the hill into the woods west of the landing. The weather had become clear and frosty, and in the thick woods about three-quarters of a mile away, the regiment passed its first night without shelter. On the following morning, with three days' rations and forty rounds of cartridges, the march was slowly resumed over what afterwards became the battle-field. It was found to be an uninteresting tract of country, cut up by rough ravines and ridges, and for the most part covered with oak timber. Here and there an irregular field and rude cabin indicated a puny effort at agriculture. The course taken by Stuart's brigade carried it along what was then as now known as the Hamburgh road, which turned to the left from the main Corinth road about one mile from the river. From the point of divergence this road circles around the heads of the rugged gullies, and so far as possible following the high ground, makes its way to Hamburgh, an insignificant landing place four miles above Pittsburgh. About three miles out a small branch of Lick Creek crosses the road. Upon this branch, called thereabouts Locust Creek, the Fifty-fifth slept the night of March 17th, and at a point about eighty rods
68
FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
east of the little peach orchard, which was its encampment at the opening of the battle.
On the next day the brigade went to the boats, and with its teams and complete outfit returned to the former bivouac, and without shelter endured a heavy rainstorm all night. The Tennessee woods were fast putting on the garb of spring, and the peach trees thus early showing their pink flowers. This was a sort of tropical revelation to these lusty Northern soldiers, who were stretching their thews and sinews in the bracing air of the next morning. It was a striking contrast to those who had been accustomed to the blustering, cold winds of March, as they rush to and fro over the prairies of Illinois.
In selecting and preparing camping-grounds, a beautiful little peach orchard fell to the lot of the Fifty-fifth. Next to the right and in the oak thickets, was the Fifty-fourtli Ohio, and beyond it and just at the junction of the Ham- burgh and Purdy roads, encamped the swift-footed Seventy- first Ohio. All were south of the Hamburgh road, there trending a little southeast on its course to the river. Imme- diately south of all the camps of the brigade, and within easy distance-say a hundred yards from the color line- rippled Locust Creek, running due east, and soon absorbed in the greater volume of Lick Creek. Upon the opposite side of Locust Creek, and near the camps, uprose a rugged line of bluffs, dominating all the country in the vicinity. At the left of the Fifty-fifth there was a group of three or four log cabins, aforetime squalid domiciles of certain human beings held as chattels by a tenure fully recognized in the morals, religion and statutes of the South. Across the road, at a point about midway between the camps of the Fifty-fifth and Fifty-fourth, Colonel Stuart located the brigade headquarters in a white, frame dwelling-house of some pretension for that region. Pittsburgh Landing was about one mile and three- quarters away, in a direct line north. The road to that place, however, formed a semi-circle for the purpose of finding an easier route around the terrific ravines running to the river, so that about three miles' travel was necessary when going to the steamboats. All the ground which the brigade occupied
69
SHILOH CHURCH.
belonged at that time to one Noah Cantrill, and has now de- scended to his heirs, who live upon it. To the right of the Fifty-fifth was a pretty little ravine running into Locust Creek at right angles with it, along which were located the cooking devices and ovens of the soldiers. Due east was about one- quarter of a mile of field, bluff and ravine, and beyond it another quarter of muddy bottom, which reached to the river, All the camps were beautiful, convenient and healthy, with wood, water and parade ground close at hand. The scenery abounded in deep ravines, sparkling waters, rugged bluffs and beautiful foliage. In short, as a soldier's abiding place it was admirable. In a military sense, as to its defensibility when attacked, and in its relation to other troops, the location was simply atrocious.
The remaining three brigades of the Fifth division, in their route from the landing followed the Corinth road, and stopped contiguous to "Shiloh church," a little log building in the woods, where the people of the vicinage were wont to meet on the Sabbath and listen to sermons about the beauties of African slavery, and to pray for the success of the Southern Confederacy. Stuart's brigade was just about two miles away from the nearest troops of its own division. The purpose of this distribution of Sherman's forces was to guard the whole front between Owl and Lick Creeks, leaving space enough in the rear for the cantonments of subsequent arrivals. The location of the forces at Pittsburgh Landing was ordered by General Charles F. Smith. The establishment of the line and its tactical arrangement was the work of General Sher- man, and that the subsequent battle was fought under its accompanying disadvantages, and with so little notice of the approach of the enemy, is equally due to the same great general.
Near Stuart's headquarters, and assigned to the brigade, was Stone's battery, which was removed, however, before its services were needed. General Sherman's order of March 19th stated, in regard to Stuart's troops, as follows: "The Second brigade will camp on the Hamburgh road where the Purdy road comes in near Colonel Stuart's headquarters." At the close of the order above referred to, the following is
1
70
FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
directed to the whole division: "Each brigade must encamp looking west, so that when the regiments are on their regi- mental parades the brigade will be in line of battle. The intervals between regiments must not exceed twenty-two paces." In point of fact, Stuart's brigade camped so as to face exactly south, and an interval of one hundred paces ex- isted between its different regiments, and the encampments of its three battalions occupied, from one extreme to the other, over one-half mile of sacred soil. If on the morning of Shiloh these troops had been attacked as suddenly and with as little opportunity for preparation as was Prentiss, neither of Stuart's regiments would have been in its proper place in the brigade, nor its flanks connected with any other organized body. A curious and thoroughly characteristic illustration of the unsoldierly carelessness of the time may be found in the statement that, by General Sherman's order of March 9th, the Fifty-fifth was assigned to the right of the brigade, while its camp was on the extreme left of it, and in the battle which soon followed, the regiment was in the centre.
The elaboration of these details may seem tedious to some, but they were then important and are now historical. On this very ground and within a few days' time the Fifty- fifth Illinois and Fifty-fourth Ohio stood, a stalwart obstruc- tion across the pathway of the grand left wheel by which Albert Sidney Johnston sought to sweep away the army of the Union. Exactly upon this part of the field the issue of a great battle impinged upon these two regiments; and there alone, without experience, without generals and without artillery, they fought mightily for the saving of a nation. Then the ground which was under the feet of these men, the trees which waved over them, and the rills which rippled by them are worthy of an abler pen than will be likely to touch the themc.
In the agreeable labor of preparing quarters in this sylvan retreat, and at moderate drill, the next four days were spent. The details for guard duty were light. The most distant pickets on the front were located not over one hundred yards away, and were under the bluff on the opposite side of Locust
71
RECONNOISSANCE TO MONTEREY.
Creek. They could have seen no approaching foc until di- rectly over their heads and within gunshot of the camps.
On March 24th, in pursuance of orders from the division commander, the brigade, under Colonel Stuart, marched directly toward Corinth to Monterey, an interior hamlet -- a sort of half-way point to the rebel stronghold. It was a reconnoissance, and a tramp of ten miles over the rough ridges and across the muddy creeks which intervene between the starting place and Pea Ridge. The weather was delight- . ful, but the twenty miles of travel was sufficiently tiresome to the troops, unaccustomed as they were to marching. The rank and file of course had no knowledge of the object of the expedition, and clamored lustily to be led to Corinth. General Sherman, upon hearing these pugnacious expressions as he passed by, remarked that there were sixty-thousand rebels there. In this he was greatly mistaken, but there were enough to have overwhelmed Stuart's brigade, notwithstand- ing its conceit.
. From the notes of C. C. Davis of Company G, who was postmaster of the regiment, it is learned that Chicago daily papers cost at the landing fifteen cents each. From the same source it is ascertained that Orderly Roberts, who had been left at Paducah sick, returned to the regiment on April 2d, and so by a narrow margin of time his company gained the presence of that fine soldier for the approaching battle. On Tuesday, March 25th, Captain Clay was officer of the day, and succeeded in making his only capture for the war in the person of Sergeant Henry Augustine of Company A, who incurred his suspicion of being noisy after taps. The matter was laboriously adjudicated by a court-martial, com- posed of Captains Chandler, Wright, Thurston, and Lieuten- ant Lawrence, and Captain Clay censured by the verdict, while the sergeant went scot free. Company and battalion drill were practiced with considerable industry, Lieutenant- Colonel Malmborg being in command of the regiment. Captain Bird acted as major, and had more than the average knowledge of drill found among line officers at that time. Few combined movements occurred to afford any test of the
72
FIFTY-FIFTH ILLINOIS INFANTRY.
capacity of the brigade commander, although he looked right gallant when mounted and surrounded by his staff.
General Prentiss was given command of an embryo divis- ion on March 26th, and, as new regiments arrived, he began the organization of it to the right and front of Stuart's loca- tion, and nearly one mile away. The remaining divisions occupied, irregularly and without much system, the ground to the right and rear. Directly to the rear of Stuart's brigade was a space of rough country stretching inland from the Tennessee somewhat more than half a mile, and entirely un- occupied by troops all the way to Pittsburgh Landing. In other words, had this brigade been removed, or had it run away upon the approach of danger, a broad way was opened to flank the entire army and capture the base of supplies. If this had happened, the battle order of the Confederate commander would literally have been complied with. It is deliberately recorded, and with a full knowledge of its his- torical significance, that the Fifty-fifth Illinois and the Fifty- fourth Ohio were the only armed obstruction in the way of the execution of that order, so far as it related to the extreme left flank of the Union army, during the first of the two days' battle of Shiloh. The order spoken of, or rather the portion of it referred to, is as follows:
HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE MISSISSIPPI, { CORINTH, April 3, 1862. 5
In the approaching battle every effort should be made to turn the left flank of the enemy so as to cut off his line of retreat to the Tennessee River, and throw him back on Owl Creek, where he will be obliged to surrender.
By command of Gen. A. S. Johnston.
THOMAS JORDAN, Adjutant-General.
Had it not been for the manful resistance of two of Stuart's regiments, Chalmers' and Jackson's brigades of the rebel army could have been at Pittsburgh Landing before noon of April 6th, if they had pursued the direct route. The details of the struggle which prevented this dire calamity belong to the events of a battle soon to be related.
A grand review and inspection of the army occurred on Wednesday, April 2d, in which Stuart's brigade filled a space
-
73
THE FIRST ALARM.
along the Hamburgh Purdy road about two miles west of its camps. On Friday, April 4th, forty men, partly from the Fifty-fifth and all under the direction of the first-lieutenant of Company I of that regiment, worked through the day repairing a road across Locust Creek. The talk then was that Buell's troops were going to land at Hamburgh, and that the road was for their benefit. The first use it was put to was to smooth the way for Clanton's cavalry to reconnoitre the Federal left on the morning of April 6th. On the evening of April 4th, just after the dress-parade, firing was heard to the right and in the direction of Shiloh church. The customary drum signal of danger "rolled " along the front of the army and the men quickly got under arms. It was a slight affair of one of Buckland's regiments accident- ally colliding with the advance of the Rebel army, and should have been accepted as notice of peril by the generals at the front. It served no such purpose, however, though Stuart's brigade, too far away to be lulled into security by the soothing assurances of superiors, sent out strong re- enforcements to its pickets. A terrific rain followed during the greater portion of that night and demonstrated to the officers on duty the wonderful adaptability of the little Zouave caps then worn, for pouring an uninterrupted stream of rain-water down the spinal column. It was this storm more than anything else which delayed the concentration and deployment of the Confederate army in time to bring on the battle Saturday, as was intended.
On the next day, Stone's battery, hitherto located upon the extreme left, took its departure in accordance with orders emanating from the Army Commander. No other was sent to replace it and that flank was therefore left to such protection as the infantry could afford. All through the pleasant Saturday the routine of drill and camp was pursued without alarm or suspicion. The sound of the drums which called the Federal troops to the parade ground fell with almost equal distinctness upon the ears of a mighty opposing host crouching in the woods beyond. Along the disintegrated Union line, from McDowell's brigade on the right to Stuart's brigade on the left, not one act took
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.