USA > Indiana > Reunion of the 9th regiment Indiana vet. vol. infantry association, 1892-1904 > Part 40
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
Very truly yours, J. W. CHENEY, Librarian.
The President said there being no further routine work of the association set down for this afternoon, and it being too early to adjourn. we will employ the time in listening to short speeches and the reading of a letter of historical value written by our old comrade Lieut. Bierce of Company C, relative to our West Virginia campaigning. For our Campfire to-night we have se- cured Gen. James R. Carnahan. Col. E. P. Hammond and Gen. R. H. Pratt to make us speeches. Gen. Pratt will be with us to-night, and Col. Hammond, who is attending the reunion of his own regiment, the 87th Ind .. will. I am quite sure, be with us to-night before our Campfire closes. I am happy to state Gen. Carnahan is already with us in this hall, and I have noticed quite a number have already shaken his hand. The Ninth never had a more loyal friend than Gen. Carnahan. Personally, I can testify to his material assistance to us as Secretary
9
of the Indiana Chickamauga Commission to locate the monuments of Indiana soldiers on the battlefield of Chickamauga, in securing a just recognition of the claims of the Ninth Indiana in placing its monument and mark- ers on that historical battleground. Some of our com- rades have said to me this afternoon that they deem it but just to the General, in recognition of his love for, and loyalty to, the old Ninth, that he be made an honor- ary member of our Regimental Association. I beg to assure the General, on the part of my comrades present, that we are pleased to have him with us in this reunion, and that we will in all ways try to make him feel that with the old Ninth he is an honored and welcome guest. ( Hearty applause. ) By the way, I see my comrade Madden is on his feet, and I will recognize the Captain.
CAPT. MADDEN said : Judge McConnell, I move you, sir, that as a token of our appreciation of his good service in helping the Ninth Indiana to obtain a just recognition from the National Chickamauga Park Commission for the part the regiment took in the two day's of terrible but heroic fighting in that great battle of the war that we make Gen. James R. Carnahan an honorary member of this Veteran Association of the Ninth Indiana. As an old friend of my boyhood days, and old school mate, I. can testify that the General is not only a soldier of the Eleventh and Eighty-sixth regiments with an honorable record, but is also a first-class, genial gentleman.
The motion was seconded and unanimously carried.
The CHAIRMAN said: Comrades of the Ninth, I have gone over into the camp of the Eighty-sixth Indiana and captured one of its well-known officers, and now present him to you as the latest recruit to the Ninth Indiana.
GEN. CARNAHAN said: Comrades of the old Ninth, I very cheerfully accept service in your ranks as a recruit
IO
for this afternoon and to-night, and thanking you for the honor you do me, I may as well say that I feel quite at home in the Ninth. In the ranks of your regiment served one of my most esteemed friends, and when I have two such stanch old comrades as Captains Madden and McConnell stand up and vouch for me I feel as if I had satisfactory backing. Gentlemen, as an Indianian, I am proud of the old Ninth Regiment, and of every other good regiment of our state and nation. It is but natural with each of us comrades that while we have love for all who wore the blue, with honor to themselves and their Uncle Sam, we somehow feel just a little kind- lier to the men of our own command who fought side by side with us. With the men of the same regiment there exists a tie akin to the family tie. You comrades know that no man worked harder than Capt. McConnell for a recognition of the brave and faithful service of the Ninth at Chickamauga. and likewise for all Indiana troops. As Capt. Madden says, he and I were school- mates, and we were taught loyalty to our state as a part of the great Federal Union by a schoolmaster who proved his unquestioned love and loyalty to the nation as a captain in the Twelfth Indiana.
Comrades, these reunions are always very pleasant to me, and I am particularly well pleased to meet and mingle with you men of the old Ninth. I thank you again for your kindness in complimenting me with an honorary membership in your association.
CAPT. MCCONNELL said: These reunions are said to be places where old soldiers meet to brag over what they done as soldiers of their command. The Ninth don't claim it was better or braver than any other regiment, but it does claim with pride that circumstances so placed the Ninth that it was enabled to make a splendid record in doing its duty to the country, a record creditable alike to the regiment, its state, and the nation, when oppor- tunity came to the Ninth. Comrades, I hope to have with us in our reunion and campfire another good friend and ever-ready defender of the fair fame of the Ninth. Capt. Cockrum of the Forty-second Indiana, who was
II
shot through the body and lay on the battlefield all night. He can not be with us, but writes us the letter which I will now ask our Secretary to read. Letter reads as fol- lows :
OAKLAND CITY, Ind., Oct. 6, 1904. Hon. D. B. McConnell, Logansport, Ind.
MY DEAR MR. MCCONNELL : Your very kind invi- tation to attend the reunion of the Ninth Indiana Regi- ment is to hand, and I am very sorry to be so situated that I cannot come. I am in the midst of my fruit gath- ering, which will last yet for ten days.
The history of the Ninth Indiana is one full of hard service, but few, if any, Indiana regiments saw more real service on the firing line than yours. The portion of its history that I have become the most acquainted with was its noble work on the famous battlefield of Chickamauga. In that furious struggle, where one hundred and fifty thousand men fought for three days for the possession of that picturesque region, full of wikl and beautiful scenery on every hand, which was the point to the open- ing wedge that split the Confederacy in twain. Yes, the Ninth, from the time it went into Brock field. where it with its brigade held its position and put the Rebels to flight, until its final wind-up on top of Snodgrass Hill at 8 o'clock on that beautiful yet bloody Sunday evening, its history was full of heroic and brave deeds. I think it is considered by the Rebel as well as the Union com- manders on that part of the field that had it not been for the determined stand made by your gallant regiment at the Brotherton House, where your monument stands, that our army would have been cut in two on Saturday evening instead of Sunday noon.
Comrades, whilst you are holding your reunion numer- ous of your brave commands are making music in Para- dise, and you and I will soon have crossed the River Styx too, but when we do we will leave the honorable record that we helped save the greatest country under the sun. full of the happiest and most prosperous people of any in the world. As time goes on and the scroll of history is unrolled great deeds and noble action of heroic
12
men of a mighty nation will be recorded, but nothing will ever come that will add so much to the greatness of our country as the noble sacrifice made by the volunteer sol- dier from 1861 to '65.
Yours sincerely, WM. COCKRUM.
The Secretary then read the following letter from Lieut. Ambrose Bierce of Company C:
WASHINGTON, D. C., Oct. 1, 1904.
DEAR MR. WHITEHALL : I ought to have sent you the enclosed paper before, and should have done so had I not been absent in the Catskill Mountains for three months without my notes. I hope, however, it is in time for the reunion, which I regret my inability to attend. May you all have a good time, God bless you!
Sincerely, your comrade,
AMBROSE BIERCE.
WASHINGTON, D. C., Sept. 30, 194. Alex. L. Whitehall, Esq., Corresponding Secretary Ninth Regiment Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry Association.
DEAR SIR: I passed the greater part of the summer before the last at the little village of Aurora, West Vir- ginia, just west of the Maryland line, and overlooking the Cheat River valley in the Allegheny Mountains. Through Aurora a part of the Confederate force re- treated after the engagement at Carrick's Ford, a few miles to the southwest, and the older inhabitants still tell many tales of that to them memorable event. From some of the peaks near Aurora I could see down into several of the blue and purple valleys, where, with some of the comrades who, I hope, will be with you when this paper is read, I campaigned in those distant days of '61 and '62.
That region had ever since been to me, as I suppose it has to them, a kind of dreamland. I was reluctant to descend into it for fear of dispelling the illusion, but finally I did so, and passed a few of the most interesting
13
weeks of my life, following the track of the Ninth, visit- ing its camps, the forts that it helped to build, those that it assisted to take, or try to take, the graves of its fallen and those of the misguided gentlemen whom it sent to their long rest, and who, doubtless, sleep not less soundly than the others.
At Grafton is a beautiful National Cemetery, where lie some twelve hundred of the Federal dead, removed to that place from their scattered graves in that part of the state. About one-half of them are marked "unknown." Many of the Ninth, however, were identified, and I for- ward herewith some notes concerning them which I cop- ied from the records of the cemetery.
Some of the entries doubtless are incorrect, or at least inaccurate. The very first on the books stood thus :
"Abbott, E. J. (Ind. ). Removed July 17, 1867, from Geo. Burns' farm, Travelers' Repose, Pocahontas Co. Head southeast, 150 yards from road."
This entry I took to refer to James A. Abbott of my company (C), who fell at the battle of Greenbrier River -Travelers' Repose being a wayside inn and postoffice on the field of engagement. Afterward I was shown the grave from which the body had been removed. On re- turning to Washington I went to the War Department and had the record corrected in accordance with my be- lief, although I was not present at the engagement.
Of the other dead members of Company C the Grafton Cemetery has no record, though doubtless some of them are there among the "unknown."
Philippi, where we had our first affair with the enemy, is now a considerable town. It was easy to identify the road by which we entered, in the belief that we had the' enemy's camp surrounded. The high hill from which a battery of ours pitched shells into the startled Confed- erate camp (and I believe flung a few at us by mistake) is still there, as is the way of hills, and looked quite fa- miliar. We afterward camped on it, among the trees in a field. It is still a field, but the trees are mostly gone. By the way, that battery of ours did nothing worse than take off a young Confederate's leg. He was living near there a year ago, a prosperous and respectable
1.4
gentleman, but still minus the leg; no new one had grown on.
The "three months' men" will remember Belington well enough. I think it was little but a blacksmith's shop at a cross-roads. It is now a pleasant little village. Two or three miles out is where we fought the battle of Laurel Hill. It was not much of a battle-none of them was-but it gave us something to think about during the few days that it kept us pegging away at Garnett's men, with or without orders. None of the enemy's earthworks remain except an emplacement for guns on the summit of a hill; the rifle pits cannot now be traced. They were lower down the hill in the woods. With the exception of a strip of trees at the very bottom, held by our skir- mishers, the forest is gone. In this strip of trees oc- curred, just before nightfall one day, the only really sharp little fight that we had. It has been represented as a victory for us, but it was not. A few dozens of us, who had been all day swapping shots with the ene- my's skirmishers, grew tired of the resultless quarrel, and by a common impulse, and I think without orders or offi- cers, ran forward into the woods and attacked the Confederate works. We did well enough, considering the hopeless folly of the movement, but we came out of the woods faster than we went in, a good deal. This was the affair in which Corporal Dyson Boothroyd of Company A fell with a mortal wound. I found the very rock against which he lay.
Our camp is now a race track.
On the reorganization of the regiment for the three years' service it returned to this region and lay for weeks at Huttonsville, near the foot of Cheat Mountain, where many of the men died of disease. Their bodies are at Grafton. Then, after the Greenbriar affair, we went to the summit of the mountain. It will be remembered that we built a row of big log houses, one for each company, all connected for mutual protection and loopholed for rifle firing. These military defenses commanded the road-almost straddled it. I fancy we feared that if the enemy got a chance he would sneak by us at arm's length and conquer all the country in our rear. Certainly there
15
was many a prediction of disaster when we went into an earthwork a considerable distance from the road.
The stone foundations of the houses are still there, as are all the stone and earth elements of the fort. Every- thing wooden has disappeared. The parapet of the fort is in so good condition that an hour's work by a regiment would make it serviceable. The old cemetery on the hill- side opposite (I think none of our regiment was buried there) shows twenty-five or thirty graves from which all the bodies have been removed. One headstone remains, propped against a rock and rudely carved: "W. Wilker- son. Died Aug. 9, 1861."
For many square miles the forests on the slopes of the mountains have been thinned by the lumbermen, with their sawmills. But the old wooden covered bridge across Cheat River looks hardly a day older, and is still elaborately decorated with the soldiers' names carven with jack-knives. I think the summit used to be a farm, with a farm house. There is now neither field nor dwell- ing-just a desolate area of rock and scanty grass, where nothing dwells but memories and ghosts.
At Greenbrier River the Confederate earthworks are almost as good as new. If they were all there at the time of the engagement the wisdom of not assaulting them cannot be doubted. The best thing to do was to call it a "reconnoisance in force," and let it go at that. I found a number of opened graves besides that of Ab- bott, and a few undisturbed ones which had apparently been overlooked. Back of the fortifications is the burial ground of the Confederates. It is nearly obliterated. The graves are in rows that can hardly be traced in the dense undergrowth. Persons living within a mile did not know of its existence. I made out between eighty and a hundred graves-depressions which had been mounds. Fallen into them were eight or ten rude headstones with inscriptions that I copied. It did not seem quite fair that these poor fellows should lie there under the forest leaves, their graves forgotten even by their own people, while our dead were so well housed under the big flag at Graf- ton, with monuments and flowers, music and Memorial days.
16
The last place that I visited was the old Confederate fort at the summit of Buffalo Mountain. Officially, in the postoffice department, the name is "Top of Alle- ghany," and it is the top of the main ridge. Here the regiment had its hardest fight in Western Virginia, and was most gloriously thrashed. When I saw the place (with better opportunities for observation than we had then) I knew why. The works are skilfully constructed and nearly a half mile in length, with emplacements for several batteries. They are built on a narrow ridge and are hardly more than one hundred and fifty yards wide at any point. At the rear, where our attack was made (after the garrison, having defeated our co-operating force in front, had got "good and ready" for us to "sur- prise" them) there was but one approach, and that was by a narrow road, through acres of slashed timber, im- penetrable to a cat. The trunks of the trees are still there, all pointing away from the fort, all decaying and none of them having even their largest branches. A big head-log across the embrasure commanding the road is so rotten that one can pick it to pieces with the fingers. I fancy the Yankee bullets have all been picked out of it; I found none.
The slashed timber, which prevented us from attack- ing in line, saved our lives-most of them-when we attacked in column. We took cover in it and pot-shotted the fellows behind the parapet all day, as I recollect it, and then withdrew and began our long retreat in a frame of mind that would have done credit to an imp of Satan.
The road that penetrated the slashed timber is easily traced: I recognized the spot where Capt. Madden fell. at the extreme head of the column. Lord! how close to the work it was-I had thought it farther away.
This fortification is distant from our camp at the sum- mit of Cheat Mountain some twenty miles, with nothing intervening but valleys and low hills. In those winter days of '61 we used to watch the blue smoke of the Con- federate camp with intense interest, but that was all that we could see of our enemies. But from their position they could see all that we did, if they had glasses of moderate power. They could see our houses, our fort,
17
our parade ground, all our movements; for our position was a little over on their side of the summit. Both camps guarded the old Staunton and Parkersburg turnpike, a fine and famous road in its day, but now fallen into dis- use and no longer a "main traveled road." But the whole region is wild and grand, and if any one of the men who in his golden youth soldiered through its sleepy valleys and over its gracious mountains will revisit it in the hazy season when it is all aflame with the autumn foliage I promise him sentiments that he will willingly entertain and emotions that he will care to feel. Among them, I fear, will be a haunting envy of those of his comrades whose fall and burial in that enchanted land he once bewailed.
October 1, 1904. AMBROSE BIERCE.
ยท
18
SOME DEAD SOLDIERS OF THE NINTH INDIANA,
REMOVED FROM WHERE THEY LAY AND REBURIED IN THE NATIONAL CEMETERY AT GRAFTON, WEST VIRGINIA.
(Transcribed from the Cemetery Records in 1904.)
ABBOTT, E. J. (Ind.). Removed July 17, 1867, from George Burns' farm, Travelers' Repose, Pocahontas County. Head southeast, 150 yards from road. [Rec- ord corrected-see accompanying paper. ]
BUNNELL, NATHANIEL. Musician. Died Nov. 3, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from A. Hutton's farm, Randolph County. 300 yards from road. Head west.
BOYD, ROBERT F. Corporal Co. I. Died Nov. 6, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from H. Hutton's farm, Randolph County. Three hundred yards from road. Head west.
BALDWIN, WILLIAM. Private Co. G. Died Nov. 5, 1863. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from farm of heirs of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Moun- tain, Randolph County, opposite oat field, 150 yards from road. Head east.
BLOOMER, JOHN M. Private Co. G. Died Dec. 7, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from farm of heirs of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Randolph County. Opposite oat field, 150 yards from road. Head east.
CLARK, THOMAS M. Private Co. D. Died Jan. 29, 1862. Reinterred July 25, 1867. Removed from hill north of Grafton, Taylor County.
COTTON, WILLIAM S. Private Co. E. Died Jan. 30, 1862. Reinterred Aug. 12, 1867. Removed from graveyard on Jeff. Keenan's farm near Fetterman.
19
CUSHMAN, JAMES Private Co. D. Died Nov. 5, 1861. Reinterred July 17, 1867. Removed from farm of heirs of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Randolph County." Opposite oat field, one hundred and fifty yards from road. Head east.
EARLE, GEORGE. Private Co. B. Died Oct 31, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from A. Hutton's farm, Randolph County, 300 yards from road. Head west.
EARLE, WILLIAM H. Private Co. G. Died Dec. 1, 1861. Reinterred July 30, 1867. Removed from farm of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Ran- dolph County, 150 yards from road. Head east.
GUSTAVUS, GEORGE. Private Co. E. Died Nov. 16, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from the farm of Alf. Hutton, one-fourth mile north of Hut- tonsville, Randolph County, 300 yards from road.
GILMAN, FRANCIS M. Private Co. I. Died Dec. 10, 1861. Reinterred July 17, 1867. Removed from farm of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Ran- dolph County, 150 yards from road.
JOHN, HENRY S. Private Co. D. Died Jan. 28, 1862. Reinterred July 25, 1867. Removed from north side Catholic cemetery north of Grafton, Taylor County.
LESCOHIER, FREDERICK. Private Co. I. Died Oct. 25, 1861. Reinterred July 9, 1867. Removed from A. Hutton's farm, Randolph County, 300 yards from road. Head west.
PREW, ALEXANDER. Private Co. F. Died Nov. 7, 1861. Reinterred July 17, 1867. Removed from farm of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Ran- dolph County, opposite oat field. 159 yards from road. Head east.
POND, WESLEY O. Private Co. G. Died Dec. 22, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from farm of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, oppo- site oat field, 150 yards from road. Head east.
20
PRATT, HENRY. Private Co. E. Died Feb. 1, 1862. Reinterred July 25, 1867. Removed from north side Catholic cemetery north of Grafton.
RHEAR, JOHN. Private Co. F. Died Nov. 21, 1861. Reinterred July 12, 1867. Removed from farm of Richard W. Barton, foot of Cheat Mountain, Ran- dolph County, opposite oat field, 150 yards from road. Head east.
ROBEY, J. E. Private Co. F. Died June 21, 1861. Re- interred Aug. 12, 1867. Removed from graveyard on Jeff. Keenan's farm near Fetterman.
SNURE, JOHN D. Private Co. E. Died Feb. 8, 1862. Reinterred July 25, 1867. Removed from north side Catholic cemetery north of Grafton.
WAARHOB, HENRY D. Private Co. F. Died Jan. 18,, 1862. Reinterred Aug. 12, 1867. Removed from graveyard on Jeff. Keenan's farm near Fetterman.
WATERMAN, JOSIAII. Private Co. F. Died Jan. 24, 1862. Reinterred Aug. 12, 1867. Removed from graveyard on Jeff. Keenan's farm near Fetterman.
WILLIAMS, JOHN. Private Co. B. Died Jan. 2, 1862. Reinterred July 25, 1867. Removed from north side of Catholic cemetery north of Grafton.
[Doubtless there are many errors of original record and of transcription in this list, some of which may be corrected by reference to the rosters. ]
AMBROSE BIERCE.
Lieut. John Banta of the local committee stated to the comrades that immediately on adjournment of this ses- sion he wanted all comrades not already supplied with meal and lodging tickets at Dunn's Hotel to call upon him for such.
Recess taken till 7:30 P. M., to reassemble at the Rink tor Campfire.
21
CAMPFIRE.
At the appointed time the Campfire was opened by Capt. McConnell, introducing the G. A. R. Quartette, composed of Comrades Cushman, Crain, Watkins and Giffe, who sang with old-time spirit "Oh, Banner of Beauty."
HON. GEORGE MCKEE, Mayor of Logansport, was introduced by Chairman McConnell. The Mayor, in well chosen words, tendered to the survivors of the Ninth Indiana a very cordial welcome on behalf of the citizens of Logansport, assuring the comrades present that the people of Logansport held the regiment in high esteem 'for its soldierly conduct in the field, and was proud of the fact that his city and county were represented in the Ninth by two companies in the three months, and one company in the three-year service. He recalled how, as even a small boy, he was fortunate in witnessing the en- rollment of the two companies of volunteers in April, 1861, that became Companies D and K of the Ninth Indiana, under the President's first call.
COMRADE ALEX. L. WHITEHALL, responding for the regiment, said on behalf of his comrades present, and as well of all the surviving comrades who by reason of age, infiirmity or wounds or other good cause could not take the touch of elbows with their comrades on this enjoy- able occasion, sincere and heartfelt thanks for this gra- cious and cordial welcome back to Logansport, and on behalf of all soldiers of the Ninth Indiana, living and dead, he felt warranted in thanking Mayor McKee for his warm words of commendation of the regiment.
Miss Martha Philena Powell sang very touchingly "I Was a Soldier," prefacing her excellent rendition of the
22
solo, with the statement, "the words are by Rev. D. R. Lucas, late Chaplain of the goth Indiana Infantry, of which regiment my father was a member."
GEN. R. H. PRATT of the Regular Army ( retired) was next called upon, and his remarks were alike inter- esting to the regiment and the citizens of Logansport. We can only reproduce a small part of his speech. He said, among other things: Though my service with the Ninth Indiana was only during the three months' cam- paign in West Virginia, when I received the invitation to this reunion to be held in the home of my boyhood. I said, I will go to Logansport and meet my old boy- hood friends, and some of the splendid old soldiers of the Ninth with whom I soldiered under President Lincoln's first call for volunteers. I am so glad I came. Meeting these old comrades of the war has been an inspiration to me, and I almost feel impelled to make a speech, but I feel I must not take up the time of others who are ex- pected to address you. After the three months' service the rest of my service to the end of the war was in an- other regiment from this state, though my brother was with Company K throughout the war. The General told several anecdotes of Gen. Milroy, and paid him a fine compliment as a fearless fighter and an honest, earnest man, and said in closing, "I remember with pride my service in the Ninth under Col. Milroy."
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.