USA > Indiana > The Eighty-sixth regiment, Indiana volunteer infantry : a narrative of its services in the civil war of 1861-1865 > Part 9
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COLONEL: The company of cavalry I sent to look after the brigade at Rural Hill have returned, and report that the cannonading of which I sent you notice in my note of this date, at 8:45 a. m., was at Rural Hill;
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TIIE EIGHTY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
that the brigade there was attacked by Morgan's cavalry, who dis- mounted after their first charge and fought as infantry, with artillery; that the fight lasted about two and one-half hours, but with very slight result. We had no men killed or wounded, but four of the Thirteenth Ohio were taken prisoners. The enemy had four killed that were left dead on the field, and the men buried while the cavalry were there ; the number wounded unknown.
No more fighting occurred at this place, although great care was exercised not to be caught napping by the wily enemy. This was the regiment's introduction to General John Morgan, who afterwards became so noted as a cavalry commander and a warrior on the side of the Confederacy. While he had been kept at bay, and Hawkins' brigade had not been shaken in the least, its position was considered rather more hazardous than it should be without a better prospect of gaining by it some signal advantage over the enemy, therefore on the 19th of November the brigade was ordered back from its advanced and exposed position. It was while at Rural Hill on the 17th that Lieutenant Colonel George FF. Dick joined the regiment. He had been Major in the Twentieth and had already been through twelve battles, and his coolness under fire had created a most favorable im- pression, and inspired the men with great confidence.
The morning of the 19th was rainy, which rendered marching disagreeable. Bivouacked at night near the Nashville and Murfreesboro pike some four or five miles out from the former place. On the 20th tents were put up and the regiment remained at camp. On the 21st it had marching orders, and moved out about 2 o'clock, but did not go far until it was ordered back and pitched tents on the same ground which it occupied on the previous night. On the 23d the regiment was inspected. On the 24th a heavy detail was sent out with the teams to collect forage. The detail was busily employed and collected forage for the men as well as the horses and mules. On the 26th the regiment marched to within one and a half miles of Nashville and camped. The weather was now quite cool. On the 28th the regiment moved out toward Murfreesboro and camped in one of the worst briar patches in the State of Tennessee not
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INDIANA VOLUNTEERS.
very far from the Asylum for the Insane. Lieutenant Thomas, of Company H, who had been absent without leave, returned to the company on this day. On the 1st of Decem- ber the regiment was out for picket, started and were ordered back for review. After being reviewed the whole regiment went on picket and was not relieved until about 8 o'clock on the evening of the 2nd. On the 3d the day was spent in company drill in the forenoon, general inspection at 2 o'clock and dress parade at 4:30. On the 4th in the evening the reg- iment went on picket again. It was now quite cold and win- try. It snowed a little in the evening. The next forenoon quite a snow fell and the next day it froze quite hard, but the regiment was sent out with the teams to collect forage. On the 7th it received marching orders. On the 8th the whole brigade was sent out on picket. On the 9th returned to camp and received orders to get ready to march. The 10th the command moved back about three miles toward Nashville. In the afternoon of the 11th the regiment being out on battalion drill an alarm was given. Those in camp were formed and marched out until the drill ground was reached, when the whole regiment went about four miles and finding no enemy or disturbance requiring its attention, re- turned to camp. On the 14th the regiment was sent out with a forage train. On the 15th it was again on picket during a great rain storm.
On the 17th a detachment of twenty men from the Eighty-sixth left the regiment to become a part of the pio- neer corps. They formed a part of Company I, Third Bat- talion Pioneer Corps, and never again served with the regi- ment. There should have been twenty, but owing to sick- ness some few of the detachment never reported. The detail included a commissioned officer-a Lieutenant who should have a good knowledge of civil engineering. Second Lieu- tenant James T. Doster, of Company I, a civil engineer of much experience, was the officer selected. Lieutenant Doster was a gallant, courteous, and accomplished gentleman, and as events subsequently proved and at that time were mani- fest, he should have been Captain of his company. He first
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THE EIGHTY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
enlisted in the Tenth Indiana and was with his regiment in the battle of Mills Springs, where he was severely wounded in the foot and from which disability he was discharged. Recovering from this disability, as he supposed, he enlisted in the Eighty-sixth and was made Second Lieutenant of Com- pany I. Lieutenant Doster died from the effects of his Mills Springs wound December 19. 1863.
On the morning of December 12 at about 1 o'clock the regiment was ordered out and marched perhaps five miles east of its encampment. There it was met at the picket station by about 1,500 paroled prisoners who had been cap- tured by the rebel General Morgan at Hartsville on the 7th. It was a most disgraceful surrender on the part of Colonel A. B. Moore, of the One Hundred and Fourth Illinois, who had command at that post. These men had been taken to Mur- freesboro, stripped of their blankets and overcoats, and then marched up to the Union lines to be paroled. The Eighty- sixth escorted these men to Nashville, arriving there about daylight. It then returned to camp, reaching there at 11 o'clock, having made a march of probably twenty miles.
In the above villainous manner was the Eighty-sixth "cat-hauled" from place to place in good or bad weather, with or without cause, moving frequently to satisfy the whim of some red tape upstart, who simply wished to show his authority. However the regiment remained in this im- mediate neighborhood in various camps and performing the several duties of foraging, scouting, picket and drill, until the army moved forward to attack Bragg's army at Murfreesboro on the 26th of the month. The weather had now become quite cool, and the men who were not warmly clad, and few were, suffered from the inclement weather. It would rain and snow alternately, and then perhaps be warm a day, rendering it still more disagreeable when it again turned cold. On the 6th of December the regiment received its first supply of ponchos, or rubber blankets, after which time the men were somewhat better protected from wind and rain when doing guard and picket duty, or milking the farmers' cows as they came up and around the picket station. Rubber
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INDIANA VOLUNTEERS.
blankets like beans, bacon, and coffee came to be a prime necessity for the private soldier doing duty at the front.
CHAPTER XI.
THE BATTLE OF STONE'S RIVER.
The Army of the Cumberland-Its Organization-The Eighty-sixth's Assignment -Moving Out From Nashville-Its Position-Plan of the Battle-Colonel Hamilton Relieved-The Movement on the Left Suspended-The Regiment Ordered to the Right-In the Vortex of Death-List of the Regiment's Killed and Mortally Wounded-The Second Day's Fight-Bragg Lost and Rosecrans Won.
On the 26th of December, 1862, the Army of the Cumber- land, General W. S. Rosecrans in command, moved from its camp near Nashville against General Braxton Bragg, the commander of the Confederate forces, who had taken up a strong position on Stone's River, near Murfreesboro, a point thirty miles southeast. General Rosecrans had been placed in command of this army, then known and designated as the Fourteenth Army Corps, Department of the Cumberland, on the 24th of October. For the sake of convenience but with- out authority from the War Department, as has been stated in a previous chapter, General Buell, whom General Rose- crans succeeded, had divided the Army of the Ohio into three corps and designated them as the First, Second and Third. The divisions and brigades were numbered consecu- tively without reference to the corps to which they were as- signed. The First corps was placed in command of General A. McD. McCook, with the Second, Third and Tenth divis- ions; the Second corps under General Thomas L. Crittenden, with the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth divisions; and the Third corps under General C. C. Gilbert with the First, Ninth and Eleventh divisions. It was by this rearrangement of the army that the Eighty-sixth regiment received its first organ- ization assignment. It was placed in the Second corps under
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THE EIGHTY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
General Crittenden, in the Fifth division, with General Hora- tio P. VanCleve in command, and in the Fourteenth brigade commanded by Colonel Pierce B. Hawkins, of the Eleventh Kentucky regiment. The Fourteenth brigade was composed of the Thirteenth Ohio, the Eleventh and Twenty-sixth Ken- tucky, and the Forty-fourth and Eighty-sixth Indiana, and the Seventh Indiana battery. November 5 the three grand divisions of the army, hitherto known as the First, Second and Third corps, were by orders designated as the "Right Wing, " the "Center " and the "Left Wing." On November 13 the Fifty-ninth Ohio which was in the Eleventh brigade, Fifth division, exchanged places with the Eleventh Ken- tucky, and Colonel James P. Fyffe, of the Fifty-ninth, suc- ceeded Colonel Hawkins in command of the Fourteenth brigade. November 22 the Twenty-sixth Kentucky was sent to Bowling Green, leaving the Fourteenth brigade with but four regiments. General George H. Thomas, who up to November 5 had been second in command of the entire army, was assigned to command the "Center," General A. McD. McCook the "Right Wing," and General Thomas L. Crit- tenden the "Left Wing." December 19 a change was made in numbering the divisions and brigades. The consecutive numbering was discontinued. Divisions were numbered, be- ginning with the First in each corps or grand division, and brigades in the same manner, beginning with the First in each division, and numbered from right to left. Flags of various designs were used to designate the different head- quarters.
Thus on the 26th of December the Eighty-sixth was in the Second brigade, Colonel J. P. Fyffe, command- ing, the Third division, General H. P. VanCleve in com- mand, and the "Left Wing " of the Fourteenth Army Corps, Department of the Cumberland, with General T. L. Critten- den in command. The officers in command of the regiments composing the brigade were Colonel W. C. Williams, of the Forty-fourth Indiana, Colonel O. S. Hamilton, of the Eighty- sixth Indiana, Colonel J. G. Hawkins, of the Thirteenth Ohio,
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Lieutenant Colonel William Howard, of the Fifty-ninth Ohio, and Captain G. R. Swallow, of the Seventh Indiana Battery.
On December 24, General Crittenden with Generals Thomas and McCook received a circular from General Rose- crans directing that ample provisions be made for prompt and rapid communication between theirs and his headquar- ters. Staff officers were to provide themselves with paper and writing materials, and orderlies and couriers should be at close distance, not more than a half a mile apart, and within sight of each other. This the General considered of vital importance to a combined movement. On the same day a general order was issued that the army should move at daylight on the 25th-Christmas- but this was countermanded on account of the lack of forage on the "Left Wing." The order was renewed on the 25th for a general movement on the 26th. The quiet of Christmas was therefore disturbed by the bustle and con- fusion incident to such an important move as all felt this one to be. Three days' rations were to be drawn and placed in haversacks, while two days' more were to be carried in the wagons. Twenty wagons were assigned to each grand di- vision loaded with forage and provisions. All ammunition wagons, ambulances and hospital stores were to accompany the army. The sick were to be sent to the hospitals, and the Sibley tents, and all camp equipage and unnecessary baggage to be packed and sent back under the guard of of- ficers and men unable to march to the front and parked in- side the fortifications at Nashville. The boys were all busy, in addition to their other duties, in writing letters to friends at home. That was a heavy mail that started North the next day.
A pleasant little incident occurred in the Fifty-ninth Ohio on Christmas evening which the Eighty-sixth was in- vited to witness. The citizens of Clermont, Ohio, had sent that regiment new colors, On their folds were inscribed "Shiloh," "Corinth," "Ivy Creek," "Perryville " and "Crab Orchard," the battles in which the Fifty-ninth had participated. The presentation speech was delivered by
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THE EIGHTY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
Colonel Fyffe. Remarks of a patriotic character were made by Colonel O. S. Hamilton, Captain C. F. Sheaff, and Cap- tain W. C. Lambert. Music was furnished by the Second brigade band and patriotic songs were sung by the men.
The morning of the 26th, so big with fate, dawned gloomily. The clouds hung like a pall over the wintry land- scape. Great drifts of slowly moving mist lay along the val- leys, while the rain came down in torrents, that gathered in pools in the roads, or ran in streams along the gullies. The reveille, as it rolled from camp to camp from the drums and bugles of more than a hundred regiments that covered the fields and hillsides, had a muffled sound in the murky atmos- phere. Every officer and man was busy. At the appointed hour the "assembly" was heard. The Eighty-sixth was quickly formed. The bugles sounded "forward," and the brigades, and divisions, and corps, with swinging step filed out upon the roads. McCook led the right, Thomas the cen- ter and Crittenden the left. Although the Second brigade started at 8 o'clock, yet it was one of those jerky, exasper- ating marches, so that it did not get fairly started until 2 o'clock. The rain continned to pour, and the men huddled down under their ponchos like drenched chickens. The enemy was encountered at once and the occasional cannon shot or a sputtering dropping of musketry by the skirm- ishers of the First and Second divisions, which were in front, were evidences that the rebel nests were being stirred. All day long the steady columns toiled over the broken country and at night bivouacked in the wet fields. Such conveni- ences as shelter tents had not then been introduced, and the men were placed on their own resources to improvise pro- tection from the storm during the night. The Eighty-sixth camped in some woods where there was much cedar. Their evergreen branches were brought into use both for shelter and beds and the night was passed in comparative comfort.
The next day, Saturday, the 27th, dawned like the one before. The heavy clouds hung low and the rain continued to pour all day long. The brigade marched perhaps two hundred yards when it came to a halt, started again, and
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again halted, and marched and halted alternately. At night- fall the command was but a short distance from where it started in the morning. Slowly the columns felt their way on, pre- ceded by heavy lines of skirmishers, driving the sullen and stubborn enemy before them. The Second brigade of the Second division, and the First and Second brigades of Van- Cleve's division, were diverged from the main column of the corps and sent down the Jefferson pike, a road running directly east from the Murfreesboro pike beyond LaVergne. Late at night the advance reached Stewart's Creek and charged the rear guard of the enemy, thus saving the bridge, performing the work it was sent to do. The Eighty-sixth was kept on the move until 2 o'clock in the morning, although but six miles had been made, when it bivouacked for the re- mainder of the night, utililizing corn blades for beds which the boys found in a barn near by. How these blades had escaped the eagle eye of the cavalrymen of both armies is to this day an unsolved mystery.
Sunday, the 28th, the troops generally rested. The Second brigade moved from its camp to the south about a half a mile, and formed in line of battle near to and west of Smyrna church, where it remained all day. In the evening the regiment with the brigade returned to their camping ground of the night previous, but the corn blades had turned up missing.
No movement was made by the regiment on Monday, the 29th, until 1 o'clock, when the three brigades crossed the bridge which they had saved, turned south, and rejoined the main body of their command on the Murfreesboro pike. General Crittenden with his three divisions advanced that evening to within three miles of Murfreesboro, and bivou- acked in order of battle not more than 700 yards from the enemy's entrenchments. The camp of the Eighty-sixth was between the railroad and the pike in a cotton field, and on ground now used as a National cemetery where more than six thousand Union soldiers have "spread their silent tents." General Palmer, who commanded the Second division, and was in the advance, reported that he was within sight of
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THE EIGHITY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
Murfreesboro, and that the enemy was in full flight. Gen- eral Rosecrans immediately sent an order to General Critten- den to move a division into the town. Colonel Harker's brigade of Palmer's division, was accordingly sent across Stone's River-the stream being almost everywhere fordable -and drove a rebel regiment back upon the main body in some confusion. Some prisoners were captured who re- ported that Breckinridge's entire division was there present. General Crittenden wisely took the responsibility of sus- pending the order until General Rosecrans could be further communicated with. The commanding general was con- vinced that a mistake had been made and Harker was with- drawn without serious loss.
That night it rained heavily, drenching the soldiers to their skins. The following day, the 30th, was dark, gloomy and depressing, and was spent in anxious suspense as the men stood shivering in their lines. All day the Eighty-sixth waited, the boys securing as best they could their guns from the occasional showers that fell, and many can recall the spectacle of their muskets as they stood, butts up, with fixed bayonets forced into the soft soil-an ominous crop sprang in a single night from fallow-fields, awaiting the quick-coming harvest of Death. The orders were to be ready at a moment's notice. The lines were forming. Bat- teries were being placed in position. Dark columns stood noiseless in the rain. Hospitals were established in the rear, and the musicians and other non-combatants were de- tailed to bear the stretchers and attend the ambulances. Medical stores were unpacked and countless rolls of band- ages placed at hand for use. Provision trains were brought up and rations issued. Bodies of horse galloped over the heavy fields. Staff officer and orderlies from General Rose- crans' headquarters, near where the Eighty-sixth stood in line, dashed away in different directions. The scattering fire of musketry which came up from the cedar woods far to the right, now swelling into full volleys, the heavy boom of cannon in front, the bearing back of wounded officers and men on stretchers, and the certainty of a great battle at
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hand, combined to make all serious and thoughtful. The Eighty-sixth remained in its designated position, calmly awaiting the storm which was to burst on the following day.
The army now stood with its left resting on Stone's River, and its right stretching off into the country as far as the Franklin pike, making a line three miles long. The country is undulating, much of it cleared but broken by rocky ridges overgrown with close cedar thickets. Besides, there were forests of oak and other deciduous trees. Per- allel to the Union lines, and distant half a mile, lay Bragg's army, its right resting on the east side of the river, while the main body was on the west side. The night of the 30th set in with a keen, north wind, with heavy, threatening clouds. After dark an ammunition wagon was brought up and each man was supplied with sixty rounds of cartridges, after which such sleep and rest as were possible under the circumstances, were taken. The men slept on their arms. Each had his musket beside him ready to leap out at the slightest alarm. It was a weary night for the Eighty-sixth.
Daylight of the 31st found the men standing to arms. There was no blast of bugle or clatter of drum for reveille. A hasty breakfast of coffee, hardtack and bacon was pre- pared and quickly eaten. Their morning service consisted in listening to the Adjutant read General Rosecrans' "Grace of God " battle order. From out the raw mists that for a time hung over the field came resonant cheers as the stirring words were read to regiment, detachment and battery. The General came riding by and in encouraging words said: "Boys, stand like men. Fire low, and make every shot count. "
Just here an unpleasant incident occurred, and as it is a leaf in the history of the regiment it is proper that it should be mentioned. Colonel O. S. Hamilton, who had command of the regiment, a courageous but inexperienced officer, was ordered by General VanCleve, * the division commander, to
*It is the recollection of some of the men that this order was given by Colonel Fyffe, the brigade commander; others that it was General VanCleve.
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THE EIGHTY-SIXTH REGIMENT,
perform certain evolutions. After several attempts Colonel Hamilton signally failed, whereupon he was relieved of his sword and his command. The command of the regiment was at once turned over to Lieutenat Colonel George F. Dick, a skillful, experienced and well trained officer who had served both as Captain and as Major in the Twentieth Indiana regiment, and came to the Eighty-sixth with his com- mission on the 17th of November. The action of Gen- eral VanCleve was wholly a surprise to both Hamilton and Dick, but a step that met the approval of the subordinate officers and the men of the regiment. In justice to Colonel Hamilton and to his memory it should be stated that this unfortunate episode was entirely due to his inexperience, and was no reflection on his courage or bravery. As an officer he was heroic, intrepid and fear- less, but was entirely without military knowledge either nat- ural or acquired. He was bold to recklessness as he exhib- ited by his subsequent actions. Mortifying as this must have been to a man of his proud spirit he nevertheless asked, and was granted, permission to accompany the regiment into the approaching engagement in a subordinate capacity. Most valiantly did he carry himself throughout. Colonel Fyffe, in his report of the battle, generously makes special mention of him, and says Colonel Hamilton, although unac- quainted with military matters, was present throughout as- sisting all in his powers. This affair, however, greatly hum- iliated and chagrined him and he soon relinquished command of the regiment. He returned to his home at Lebanon where he died a few years ago a disappointed and broken-hearted man.
It was this ground that General Bragg had deliberately chosen whereon to stand and fight. General Rosecrans had planned that General MeCook, who commanded the "Right Wing" should occupy the most advantageous position possi- ble, and fight to hold it. General Thomas was to open with skirmishing, and engage the enemy's center. General Crit- tenden, of the "Left Wing" was to cross General Van- Cleve's division over the river at a place known as the lower
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INDIANA VOLUNTEERS.
ford, covered and supported by the sappers and miners, and to advance on Breckinridge who commanded the enemy's left. the only rebel division on that side of the river. Gen- eral Wood's division was to follow General VanCleve by brigade, and cross at the upper ford. Wood was to take posi- tion on VanCleve's right, and the two divisions, supported by Palmer, were to fall with overwhelming force in front and flank, crush Breckinridge, sweep through Murfreesboro, and gain the rear of the enemy's center and left, push him off his natural line of retreat, and thus destroy his entire army. The plan was a skillful one, but Bragg, however, had already decided to fight his own battle and not the one Rosecrans had planned. He had a similar one of his own, by which he hoped to double up his adversary's right by a secret concen- tration of a heavy force against it. To this end he had massed heavily on his left where Hardee was in command, with orders to attack McCook at daylight. Bragg struck he first blow.
According to the plans of General Rosecrans, McCook, however strongly assailed, was to hold his position for three hours, and to recede-if attacked in overwhelming force-very slowly, and to fight desperately, which he had undertaken to do. Bragg's order was, that at day-break the whole line, beginning at the extreme left, with Hardee's corps, and followed by Polk's, should move forward on Mc- Cook's extreme right, and bear it back, crumbling it in the retreat, till Rosecrans' army should stand with its rear to the river. In double lines, the rebel hosts came on, swift and terri- ble as in-rolling billows. General Johnson who commanded a division in McCook's corps on the extreme right, and who was wholly unprepared for the sudden onset, was crushed with a single blow, the enemy sweeping over his batteries with wild hurrahs. Jeff C. Davis's division was next hurled back over the field. Like a swift succeeding wave the last division of the "Right Wing, " Sheridan's, was struck with the same desperation. Sheridan fought with equal persist- ence and determination. The slaughter was horrible. Three times did the determined enemy advance, and as often was
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