USA > Indiana > The soldier of Indiana in the war for the union, Vol. I > Part 18
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* General Sigel's report.
f Letter from a regular officer in " Rebellion Record."
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DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO PATRIA MORI.
mingling blood, brains and hair, a sight," one of Price's officers had the heart to write, "not devoid of satisfaction."*
The torn and bloody field also bore the too well-known marks of Indian warfare. The savage knife had severed the scalp from many a head, and lacerated many a face out of all likeness to humanity.
General Curtis remonstrated, by letter, with General Van Dorn for allowing such deeds. Van Dorn retorted by accusing the Germans, "Sigel's Dutch," of equal brutality.
The 7th of March, the first day of the battle, was the birth- day of Colonel Hendricks. His wife, in their home in Mad- ison, Indiana, celebrated it by inviting to dinner his best beloved friends. He was a man whose heart was full of the milk of human kindness, and he had many and loving friends. He was the subject of fond story and of fonder hopes at the very hour when he lay dying in the scrub-oak thicket, with no word to cheer and no hand to soothe. But death comes to all, and on the field, battling for the right, is the noblest place to meet him.
The battle of Pea Ridge was as decisive as any engage- ment of the whole war. It definitely determined the fate of the campaign in the southwest by effectually putting an end to the active resistance of the Rebels, who did not stay their retreat till they had reached the Arkansas River.
The Union army suffered greatly at this time from scarcity of food. Being at so great a distance from the depot at Rolla, whence the supplies were conveyed in wagons over almost impassable roads, the provision from this source was neces- sarily insufficient, and the deficiency could not long be sup- plied from the poor and thinly settled mountain regions. Whole regiments frequently subsisted for days on nothing but
*Letter to G. G. West, published in the Richmond (Va.) Whig.
tJames R. Smith, Lieutenant in company H, of the Eighth, was wounded in the leg during a change of position by the regiment, but he would not allow his comrades, who were deeply attached to him, to carry him from the field. "No, you must push forward with the command," was his settled reply to their entrcaties. The regiment had no sooner passed on than the Rebels occupied the ground on which Smith fell. His friends sought him at the earliest possible moment, but he was dead-his neck pierced through with a bayonet. His person was robbed of everything of value.
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parched corn, sometimes with the addition f blue beef, which, the soldiers said, was the remains of cattle so poor that they had to be supported to the place of execution. From the 24th of January to the 17th of March the army subsisted on fifteen days' rations. Stinted food could more easily have been borne with comfortable shelter and clothing. But even these were denied. The men slept without tents, and did duty in tatters, sometimes in bare feet. In consequence of these privations much sickness followed during the month the army lay in camp at Sugar Creek Bottom and at Cross Timbers. Cross Timbers was called from the trees felled by the Rebels across the road, which here runs through a deep and narrow valley.
On the 6th of April the "Army of the Southwest" left its dreary camping ground among the hills of northwestern Ar- kansas, and commenced another long march. Returning to Missouri, it proceeded eastwardly through Cassville, Bull's Mills, Forsyth and West Plains, whence, turning southward, it re-entercd Arkansas, and marching by way of Evening Shade, reached Sulphur Rock. While on the march Major Dailey was commissioned Lieutenant Colonel of the Twenty- Second, and Captain Gooding was appointed Major. About the same time Colonel Benton received his commission as Brigadier General.
General Curtis' army remained at Sulphur Rock and in its neighborhood till the last of June. Batesville and Jack- sonport were occupied, and expeditions were made across the river in the direction of Little Rock, proceeding as far as Little Red river, but returning without accomplishing any important result, except the severe chastisement of numerous bodies of guerrillas. Subsistence was obtained by foraging in the fer- tile White River Valley, which at first yielded a sufficiency within the limits of safety for foraging parties. But the immediate region becoming exhausted, and the remoter dis- tricts being infested with small roving bands of Rebel cavalry, which rendered it unsafe to proceed far from camp without a strong guard, the army, during the latter part of its stay, suffered much from scarcity of food. For daily allowance the
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PROMOTIONS.
commissaries issued to each man four ears of corn, which, with meat, constituted all the rations.
Soon after the arrival at Sulphur Rock, Colonel Pattison was placed in command of the post of Batesville, and the Eighteenth Indinna was detached from its brigade, and re- moved to that post for duty.
Encamped in a beautiful cedar grove in the suburbs of town, the regiment now had its first wholesome rest since it entered the field, for, with such surroundings, they regarded the frequent details for guard duty as nothing compared with their previous long marches, or short sojourns in dreary and unhealthy camps.
At this place Colonel Pattison resigned his commission. He was succeeded in the command of the post by Lieutenant- Colonel Washburn, who was now promoted to the vacant Colonelcy. Major Thomas was commissioned Lieutenant- Colonel, and Captain Jesse L. Holman Major.
Colonel Pattison early gained and always retained the love and respect of his command. When he was about to leave, the regiment marched to his quarters in a body to bid him good-bye. Lieutenant Black, of company H, addressed him in behalf of the regiment, and the Colonel, overcoming his emotion with visible difficulty, responded to the farewell of men he had so ably led at Pea Ridge.
Adjutant George S. Marshall here received the appointment of Captain and Assistant Adjutant General on the staff of Brigadier General Benton. He was a young man of great promise, and a thorough soldier. The failure of his health afterwards compelled him to quit the army, but he left behind him hosts of friends and admirers. He died shortly after near Panama, on a voyage to California for the recovery of his lost health.
May 10th Colonel Davis received orders to proceed with several regiments, one of which was the Twenty-Second In- diana, with all possible speed, to Cape Girardeau, and thence to General Halleck's army before Corinthi. The troops se- lected to go with him threw away everything that might impede their movements, burned their tents, and started on the march. Moving rapidly two hundred and fifty miles
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through a rough, sparsely settled district, they reached Cape Girardeau in ten days, but in an almost exhausted condition. Without delay they embarked on steamboats, which were waiting for them, and went down the Mississippi.
On the march from Sulphur Rock, Colonel Davis received, by a courier, his commission as Brigadier General, dating from the day of the Blackwater fight.
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SOLDIER, WILL YOU WORK?
CHAPTER XIX.
THE TWENTY-SIXTH REGIMENT.
" They also serve who only stand and wait."-Milton.
THE Twenty-Sixth Indiana, the Sixth Missouri and Fry- barger's battery saw one after another of the regiments and batteries, with which they had been connected in the fall and winter, sent up to St. Louis or down towards Arkansas until all were gone, and they were left alone to guard and finish the fortifications. A letter from a soldier in the Twenty- Sixth, published in the Indianapolis Journal, in the latter part of February, shows the dissatisfaction with which the troops submitted to their lot:
"Our letters are still headed La Mine Cantonment; our address is still Otterville; Missouri mud still sticks to our feet and settles in our stomachs; butternut breeches still are the prevailing costume of our visitors, and the aguish faces which appear in our encampment denote that we are still in the land of blue mass and quinine. We had settled in our minds that long ere this we should be with our gallant Hoosier boys in Kentucky, who have been gaining for themselves bright laurels on the battle-field; but the powers that be have over- ruled all the nice plans we had laid down for our future ; and instead of sending us down South, have given us a contract to throw up a great many square yards of dirt to constitute Camp Pope a safeguard for commissary stores and home- guards.
" Why we were assigned to this delectable duty deponent saith not; perhaps we were considered better mud-diggers than the other regiments, and, maybe, because we were of no account for anything else; be that as it may, here we are, with the dim hope of being able to get away when we have thrown up breastworks so high that the blood-thirsty home-
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guards of this State will be willing to trust their precious car- cases behind them.
" When it is considered that an embankment from seven to fourteen feet high, and half a mile long, is to be thrown up, a stockade of heavy timber some two hundred yards long to be put in, besides the gates and magazines to be built, it will be seen that quite a large amount of labor will be necessary to fill the contract. The question, 'Soldier, will you work?' which is supposed to be always answered in the negative, is now, much to the dissatisfaction of the boys, answered in the affirmative, and we are compelled to work all the time.
" We have faithfully clung to our old muskets, through evil as well as good report-we have scoured them, cleaned them and carried them for six long months, and, save in some rare instances, when they have protected the boys from the violent attacks of secesh pigs and chickens, they have been articles of ornament, not utility.
" Otterville and the vicinity are quite attractive in scenery and society, there being a lovely bottom on one side and a magnificent forest of oak-grubs on the other. The view is not so pleasant now as it was when we first encamped herc, as the bottom is overflowed, and the forest has been mostly cut down for fire-wood. The society is good-there being two families which keep open house for the defenders of their country. One of these bakes pies at twenty-five cents each, and the other does what little washing the soldiers require.
"To-day the news of the surrender of Fort Donelson was received, and caused much rejoicing. Thirteen guns were fired in honor thereof, and the fatigue parties saluted by throwing their picks as far as possible.
"All that the Union-loving inhabitants here want is the as- surance that there is no possible danger of their being injured in person or property, and good pay besides, and they will rally in large numbers round the flag of our country. B."
One or two passages from private letters end, for the pres- ent, the picture of Indiana life in Missouri :
"Last Friday a train of fifteen teams, with about fifty men to guard it, was sent on a foraging expedition some fifteen miles distant. We passed through the prettiest portion of Missouri
Susht
Eng
MAI GEM. HOVERI CI MILKOV.
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FORAGING.
that I have yet seen-wide-spreading, rolling prairies, skirted by dense woods of a species of oak, with here and there a stately monarch of the forest standing proudly out in the prairie. Splendid farms and buildings, some with and some without orchards, were hurriedly past, until we came to one which seemed to be of a different cast from the others. It was the plantation of a Mr. Cockrell, who is in 'Uncle Sam's' college in St. Louis, where I hope he is well attended to. We drove into his meadow and up to his corn-crib, and helped ourselves without waiting for an invitation-indeed there was none there to invite us. When the loading was finished, we drove back to the house, where we put up unconditionally for the night.
"Some of the slaves, in talking with us, gave us a little intimation of the delights of slavery in this style. One of the unfortunate wretches had, in some way, given offense, for which his master chained him to the joist of an old house, so high that the victim could just stand on tip-toe, then applied the lash to his naked back until it was completely lacerated. When the chain was removed he sank to the floor and ex- pired. Our informant showed us the very lock and part of the chain which were used in this worse than inhuman act ..
" The poor Africans seemed almost overjoyed to see us, and said they wished we could remain with them. The 'Missus' directed us to sleep in an out-house. The slaves said had we been secessionists the parlor would have been appropriated to our use.
" The paymaster has been coming 'to-morrow' for weeks, but 'to-morrow never rose to man, nor set,' and the paymas- ter has not yet been seen.
" I do believe, were it to rain or pour, it always pours here, forty days and forty nights, the dry land would appear by noon on the forty-first day.
" This morning before sunrise two slaves came into camp. They ran away from their master, traveled all night, stopped with us, told their tale of sorrow, and, after eating a hearty Federal breakfast, and filling their spacious coat pockets with meat and sheet-iron crackers, they pressed on with blistered feet, bound for Jefferson City. Rest would have been accept- 15
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able, but they feared their masters were after them, and were eager to be going. Such occurrences are not rare."
" We have a good many secesh prisoners in Sedalia, taken principally at Warrensburg lately. One of them is a Colonel Parker. He was lying in a ditch acting 'possum,' but one of our boys thought he would proceed according to scripture and prove whether or not little secesh was dead, so he tickled the Colonel in the short ribs with his toe, and Reb. went 'ugh!' Of course the Union man declared the accused 'guilty,' and brought him to his footing.
"The weather is fine, warm days and cold night, with frost. Those verses you sent, 'No letters to-day,' are appropriate to my case nearly every day. The boys unanimously agreed one night that if I received more letters than anybody else when the train came in, I should have the tent all to myself one whole hour. I went to work and wrote a lot of letters which I addressed to myself. I determined that I would get some, if I had to do the writing as well as the reading. I put all the boys out of the tent in double-quick time.
" You think the war will soon be over; well I don't. I look upon our men as more than fools for feeding the Rebel pris- oners so well, while they let the Union soldiers suffer for food. I think Morton, kind as he is, has one bad eye.
The work on the fortifications near the La Mine was some- times varied by expeditions in search of bands of guerrillas who committed depredations on the Union farmers. As the robbers scattered when threatened by the approach of Fed- eral soldiers, the pursuit was generally but a hasty march, with no other result than the capture of a few prisoners, often citizens who were in secret alliance with the enemy, and the establishment for a time of some degree of quiet and safety among the country people.
Colonel Wheatley endeavored to preserve the morality of his regiment by enforcing rules, early introduced into the camp, forbidding drinking and gaming. The regulations were generally approved, nevertheless there existed some dis- satisfaction with the Colonel, the inevitable result of a mo- notonous camp-life.
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AN OFFICER'S TRIALS.
Few regiments, in the first three months of their career, regarded their commanding officers with affection. Unused to restraint, accustomed to yield obediance only to the invisi- ble and commonly inflexible and infallible power of law, men's feelings revolted against the orders of an officer, who was but a man like themselves, often no older, no wiser and no better, and who was daily in their presence. They first learned obedience on the battle-field, and having then from necessity heartily accepted their leader, they afterwards acknowledged his authority as just, and even agreeable. But if months of quiet camp-life continued, the Colonel had little opportunity of gaining the willing and affectionate submission of his command.
April, May and June were spent in Sedalia. With the spring health improved, and the camp became more cheerful. Inaction, however, continued to be distasteful.
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
CHAPTER XX.
KENTUCKY.
The civil war had just begun, And caused much consternation, While O. P. Morton governed one Great State of this great Nation. So it dia
"Magoffin governed old Kentuck, And Dennison Ohio; And no three humans had more pluck Than this puissant trio.
So they hadn'«
"No matter what they found to do, 'Twas done with all their power; What other men would do in two, They did in just one hour. So they did. -The Meeting on the Border.
THERE was once, a very long time ago, though not so many generations back that the traces of their Franco-Germanic cruelties are faded out of their race, a parcel of undutiful princes who tied their mother to two wild horses, and then with shout and lash, drove the creatures violently apart.
The old lady had lived more than eighty years, and had queened it right royally. But her sons were bold, young blades. They fretted and chafed in her traces, they struggled under her resistless rule; their high wills rose in rebellion; their youthful hearts burned with the love of liberty, and at last they sought the aid of death to gain their deliverance. But they doubted if even death had power to touch that iron frame while it held together. Therefore it was that they tore her to pieces.
The disloyal children of Kentucky behaved in the very same way. They taunted their mother's old-fashioned love for
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SONS OF KENTUCKY.
the Union; they jeered her cowardly dependence on it; they essayed to drag her from its protection; they bound her openly to Neutrality and secretly to Secession. They stretched and bruised and tore her tough old sinews, they racked her bones, and lacerated her flesh, and grieved her heart; they trailed her gray discrowned head in the dust. But Kentucky was loyal to herself. She held her own.
Her sons, bad and good, (she was happier than the ancient queen in that she had good as well as bad sons,) ran off. They formed the largest portion of Fremont's Body-Guard. They mingled with the Sixth and other Indiana regiments. They enlisted under Kentucky officers on Ohio, Indiana and Illinois soil, but especially they joined the Confederates of Missouri, Virginia and Tennessee.
The Louisville Journal said of this last class: "Hundreds of those exceedingly sensitive Kentuckians, who so eloquently proclaimed that they could never take up arms against the Southern States, inasmuch as those States were Kentucky's sisters, have now taken up arms for the conquest of Kentucky herself. Isn't that enough to make the devil laugh?"
By this state of affairs the commerce of Kentucky was in a great measure cut off, except by the Louisville and Nasli- ville railroad. This last line of communication was shortly rendered unavailable by the authorities of Tennessee, who, fancying that the small quantities of rice, cotton, turpentine and tobacco which went to the North, were of more impor- tance than the vast amount of provisions and clothing which came to the South, forbade exports from Tennessee. In homely phrasc, Tennessee "cut off her nose to spite her face."
The act was of advantage to the Federal Government, which had long been embarrassed by the manifest fact that the blockade of the South could not become complete until the passage of supplies through Kentucky was stopped; and by the inability to stop this passage without violating the neutrality of Kentucky. The blockade could now be enforced at Louisville.
The next step on the part of the Tennessee authorities was to stop altogether the running of cars on the road. The road was entirely closed in consequence, commerce destroyed,
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
trade almost extinguished, and industrial pursuits of every kind injured, if not ruined. Union men of Kentucky were only stimulated by the arbitrary temper of their southern neighbor to an active support of the Government. Seces- sionist, however, were stimulated by the same influence to the opposite line of action.
There existed in Kentucky before the commencement of the war the nucleus of a military organization, called the State Guards, which was formed chiefly of very pro-slavery young gentlemen. Simon B. Buckner was the commander and instructer of this organization, and being a fine Kentucky gentleman, which means that he shook hands with everybody, had a smooth tongue, a ready smile and a pleasant bow, he was a man of almost unbounded influence. Under his auspices the State Guards now filled up rapidly. He labored assiduously to impart military instruction, and lost no oppor- tunity to instil the insidious and treasonable doctrine of se- cession. His pupils were apt, and after they were armed and supplied with all needed aecouterments, they stole in squads out of the State.
General Buckner's movements in the beginning were covert, yet they were soon well understood. The Governor and Lieutenant-Governor were violent secessionists, and the Na- tional Government not only made no attempt at interference, but even allowed Buckner to visit Washington, and examine the fortifications lately erected for the defence of the city. "Hurra for Jeff. Davis!" was shouted with impunity in the streets of Louisville.
Encouraged by the leniency of the Government, the Con- federate Congress passed an act authorizing enlistments in Kentucky; some Tennessee forces entered the State and took away with them six cannon and one thousand stand of arms; and Senator Johnson, from the northwest corner of the State, addressed to Mr. Lincoln a solemn and emphatic pro- test against the planting of cannon at Cairo, declaring that they pointed towards the sacred soil of Kentucky.
Of the protest the President disposed by replying that if he had known earlier that Cairo, Illinois, was in Johnson's
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RAGAMUFFINS.
Kentucky Senatorial District he would not have established either the guns or troops there.
No notice was yet taken of the other acts, except by loyal Kentuckians, some of whom made an attempt to form Union camps within the State. Lieutenant Nelson, of the United States Navy, requested permission to use his influence for the Government in his native State, and, obtaining it, formed in Garrard county a small Federal encampment, afterwards noted as Camp Dick Robinson.
Governor Magoffin addressed a letter of remonstrance on the subject to the President, but the latter replied that, after taking all the means within his reach to form a judgment, he did not believe it to be the popular wish of Kentucky that this force should be removed beyond her limits, and with this impression he declined to remove it.
Lovell Rousseau, a Kentuckian, although Indiana lays some claim to him, as he began his career as a lawyer in In- diana, and laid during the eight or ten years of his residence in this State the foundation of his reputation, drew out from the State Guard a number of young men, who, not having originally been Rebels, were not yet converted to Secession, and used his influence to have them organized into Home Guards. He saw that every young man seduced, into the ranks of treason, took with him the sympathies of his friends, and he was convinced that it would be the part of wisdom to recruit for the Union within the State, in order, by enlisting men on the side of the Nation, to give a loyal direction to the sympathies of the people. He therefore endeavored to obtain permission from the President to raise troops in Kentucky for the service of the United States. With difficulty he obtained a sort of half permission, on condition that his recruits should not be encamped within the State. So cautious was the President not to offend or wound the sensitive Kedtuckians. Rousseau set to work, established a camp, which he called "Joe Holt," in the edge of Indiana, opposite Louisville, and soon had two regiments and a battery. Secessionists called his men ragamuffins, in reference to the poverty of their origin. Many of them were from the mountains, and clothed in home-spun, simple, true-hearted men, but not fit subjects
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
for scoffs, as the enemies of their country learned in the course of time.
Federal and Confederate forces gathered along the borders of Kentucky. Pillow, Polk and Thompson on the Missis- sippi; Zollicoffer on the Tennessee line; Prentiss and Grant at Cairo. The Governors of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois held themselves in readiness to send ten thousand men to Ken- tucky when they should be needed. The heaving and seeth- ing, the waiting and working and watching could not long continue without an encounter of the hostile forces.
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