USA > Indiana > The soldier of Indiana in the war for the union, Vol. I > Part 6
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59
ABUNDANCE OF REBEL STORES.
families, happily unconscious that to the rude Hoosier the proud initials F. F. V. signified only fleet-footed Virginian. He also announced himself a descendant of Pocahontas, a fourth cousin of Mrs. General Scott, and an acquaintance of General McClellan. Not at all abashed by the mingled amusement and surprise in the faces of the gentlemen he addressed, he proceeded to accuse one of our surgeons of stealing a case of instruments, and threatened to report him to General McClellan. Later, he actually did report Federal officers to McClellan, and McClellan actually did arrest Federal officers on the word of this braggart.
According to General McClellan's report, the national loss on the two days, July 12th and 13th, was thirteen killed and about forty wounded. The loss of the Rebels was not far from two hundred killed and wounded, one thousand taken prisoners, all the baggage, and seven guns.
In the retreat the Rebel army was more fatigued and dis- pirited, but in every other respect had the advantage. The lowest number of the enemy engaged at Carrick's Ford was four thousand, while only eighteen hundred of the Union troops were up in time to take a part. Where Garnett was killed, but six hundred were engaged; they were members of the Seventh.
An article, in a heavy army-chest captured, excited some surprise. It was one of our bomb-shells. The prisoners said it fell, the day before the evacuation, about twenty feet from General Garnett's marquee, but failed to explode. The Gen- eral considered his escape so narrow, that he extracted the fuse and preserved the shell as a memento.
The camp-equipage of the Rebels showed long prepa- ration and lavish expenditure. The tents were the best Sib- ley ; the blankets, cots, litters, of which they had hundreds, bandages, and surgeons' stores, were all of the finest quality ; while the meagreness of the National tents, the coarseness of the blankets, the scanty supply of all kinds of utensils, the entire want of litters, and even of bandages, witnessed to the haste with which the National troops had been col- lected, and the unprepared state of the country. The con- trast was significant and painful.
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
At St. George, to which place he proceeded next day, General Morris received orders to return to Laurel Hill. General Hill, who was at Grafton with fresh troops, was di- rected by the Major-General to intercept the enemy. Though without a leader, and dispirited and fatigued to the last degree, the Rebels eluded Hill and effected their escape.
The march of Morris's troops back to Garnett's old quarters was followed by a stay long enough to insure the destruc- tion of the fortifications. The Eighth and Tenth, which had accompanied McClellan in his pursuit of Pegram to Bev- erly, assisted at the work. Then the veterans of the three months' campaign turned their faces homeward.
61
BUENA-VISTA.
CHAPTER VI.
THE ELEVENTH.
THE Eleventh was the first regiment ready to march. It was trained by Lewis Wallace in the style of Napoleon's Zouaves, and it adopted the name which those fierce Alge- rines and their French successors have rendered a synonym of victory. Perhaps three fourths of the men were from Indian- apolis and its vicinity. They were generally youths, high- spirited, generous, and intelligent, eager to win renown, and scornful of danger.
On the 8th of May they assembled in State House Square to receive two banners from the ladies of Terre Haute and Indianapolis. Tall, erect, in the bloom and vigor of young · manhood, and glowing with enthusiasm, their appearance would have been striking without the aid of the showy for- eign uniform. Colonel Wallace, who might be called the type of the regiment, received the banners, and turning to the soldiers, said, " Boys, will you ever desert these banners ?" " Never! never !" shouted every man. Wallace then spoke of the disgrace cast upon Indiana by the alleged cowardice of our troops at Buena-Vista. " Let us adopt for our motto," he continued, " Remember Buena - Vista !" " We'll adopt it !" responded the regiment. " Then get down on your knees and swear that you will remember Buena-Vista, and that you will never desert your regimental colors!" The regi- ment kneeled, and with uplifted hand swore to stand by their flag and to remember Buena-Vista.
By a coincidence worthy of note, the same watchword was recommended to the South, through " The Memphis Appeal," one of its leading journals, in the following words : " If the great body of McClellan's forces be Hoosiers and Buckeyes, as reported, the number of our men need give the depart- ment little concern. These fellows won't fight! We have
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
history for this. Remember Buena-Vista ! One to four, our boys will drive them into the lakes." *
The 1st of May, the Zouaves were ordered'to Evansville.
* The statement already made, that Jeff. Davis is responsible for the un- fortunate reputation of the 2d Indiana, is based upon an assertion of Gen- eral Lewis Wallace. The following note, written by himself, gives his reasons for the assertion : -
" According to history, General Taylor is responsible for the charge against our troops at Buena-Vista. As usual, however, his report was based on the statements, official and other, of subordinate officers, to whose conduct, sup- pressed and generally forgotten, my charge against Jeff. Davis is traceable.
" About two weeks after the battle, I had occasion to go to Saltillo. The controversy about the 2d Regiment was very warm. Being Hoosier-born, it was natural for me to take interest in it; and the conclusion I came to is reli- able exactly in proportion to the reliability of the information it is founded upon.
" According to that information, the story of misconduct proceeded origi- nally from General Jo. Lane and Jeff. Davis. A Court of Inquiry satisfied the former that he was mistaken, not in the fact that a large portion of the regiment retreated in disorder, but in his belief that it had no authority for retreating. The testimony is said to have developed (and it is now my recol- lection that such was the finding of the Court) that Colonel Bowles had ordered it to retreat in violation of tactical rules. Satisfied of this, Lane amended his official report, and requested General Taylor to do the same thing. General Taylor refused, instigated, as was understood by well-informed Indianians at that time, by Jeff. Davis.
·
" The reasons for this belief may be summed up: Davis claimed the vic- tory for his regiment, the 1st Mississippi ; even went so far as to claim that his was the only regiment that did not run that day ; all his assumptions were vigorously disputed by officers from our State, who on their part asserted that the 1st Mississippi had turned its back along with the others, and that, in fact, the only regiment which had kept its front steadily to the enemy during the whole struggle, was the 3d Indiana, commanded by Colonel James H. Lane. Out of this dispute very naturally arose a red-hot quarrel.
" When the controversy among the officers from our State culminated in a Court of Inquiry, Davis sided, it was said, with Colonel Bowles. His regi- ment had formerly presented Colonel Bowles a Mississippi rifle, in token of appreciation of gallantry displayed, and the fact was urged as proof of his partiality. The particular accusation against the 2d Indiana, it must be borne in mind, was cowardice ; and when in the dispute it was established that its Colonel had ordered the retreat, no doubt was entertained by our officers that General Taylor would officially relieve it from the charge. That he did not do so was at once attributed to Jeff. Davis, whose malignity was well known, while his near relation to General Taylor gave him influence to accomplish the end."
63
THE ELEVENTH.
They left Indianapolis with delight at so soon getting into action. Their delight was premature, as the duties they were called upon to perform were no more active nor interesting than those of an ordinary police force. They examined ves- sels passing down the Ohio, to prevent the carrying of contra- band goods, and they guarded Evansville, which was neither attacked nor threatened. The monotony of the camp was unendurable to men burning with the desire to do or die. When the heart is strung to the performance of a great deed, or to the offering of a great sacrifice, it is inexpressibly weari- some to be forced to count the moments, and to fill them with the stiff trifles of military life. The departure of three regi- ments from Camp Morton to the East added fuel to the fire of impatience.
June 5th, the Eleventh was ordered to Cumberland, in the department of General Patterson. Little time was occupied in preparation. From one o'clock on the morning of the 7th, at which time the train arrived, until daylight, when it de- parted, crowds of friends in the Union Depot at Indianapolis were uttering last words and last cautions. Danger, death, and grief, all the scenes and emotions of war, have become so familiar to our minds through the terrible battles of Virginia, Alabama, and Tennessee, that it requires some effort of the imagination to appreciate the anxiety and sorrow of the friends of our first Volunteers. Then the form of war was as unfamiliar as it is awful. It blackened the very sky. Many a true-hearted woman, who bade her son or her brother go, shut down her windows and drew close her blinds, that she might not see banners and blue coats, - might not hear the drum and fife.
The interest of the warm-hearted people of Ohio, and the ardor of the West Virginians, had not cooled; and the jour- ney to Grafton was different in no particular from that of the regiments which had gone before. From Grafton to Cum- berland the railroad passes through some of the most magnif- icent scenery in the United States. In winding down the slope of Laurel Hill, it springs over chasms of fearful breadth and depth, and at the base leaps boldly across the Cheat, a stream now dark with the sap of the laurel and spruce and
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
pine forests in which it has its rise, soon, like many another American river, to be stained with brothers' blood. Almost lost in a savage pass, through which Snowy Creek alone sends a gleam, the rails again appear hanging on the rugged mountain-side, as if at the mercy of a gust of wind; then gliding down from mountain and pass, they cut a straight line through level and beautiful meadows.
Cumberland lies in a noble amphitheatre, with the laughing Potomac at its foot, and sunny slopes rising afar to forest- crowned peaks, all around. The fine old town has a history. Here the British, more than two hundred years ago, wrested an important fort from the French. Here the terror-stricken forces of Braddock found shelter after their disastrous defeat near Fort du Quesne. Here were Washington's head-quar- ters at one time, when he was in command of the Colonial troops. The stump of the pine, to which, according to tradi- tion, he with his own hands nailed the Stars and Stripes, still stands. Our soldiers were not sufficiently familiar with the history of our flag to observe the anachronism ; and they cut many a splinter from the venerable relic, and sent it home as a memento of the past and a token of the present.
The Eleventh was scarcely encamped, before Colonel Wal- lace had an expedition planned. Romney, a town among the mountains, on the west branch of the Potomac, in Vir- ginia, formed the head-quarters of several hundred Rebel troops. These he determined to disperse. On the morning of June 12th, he went by railway, with about five hundred men, twenty miles, to New Creek Station. From this point it was necessary to proceed on foot over a rugged mountain- road, which afforded rare facilities to an enemy. About four miles from Romney the scouts captured a well-known Seces- sion officer. To men who had been walking twelve hours, the sight of an important prisoner was agreeable. A little more than a mile from Romney they were fired upon by the enemy's advance guard, which then galloped forward and in- formed the camp. The approach of danger fired the spirits of the Zouaves, and they increased their speed.
The enemy was drawn up on the bluff, on which the town is situated, with two guns planted to sweep the road. Col-
65
SCOUTING AND SKIRMISHING.
onel Wallace called the attention of his men to a large house, about seventy-five yards from the farther end of the bridge, between them and the town; then gave the order to advance. They dashed over the bridge, leaped down an embankment at the farther end, and, as had been expected, received some scattering shot from the house. They rushed to the house and surrounded it, but not in time to prevent the escape of the pickets through windows and doors and up the hill be- hind. They now rapidly, but in a scattering manner, avoid- ing the road, pushed up the bluff to the right, with the double purpose of escaping the guns and cutting off the retreat. But " the legs of the enemy, their only trusty weapon of defence," did not fail them now. When the hill was gained, the road beyond was darkened with fugitives, - soldiers and citizens, women and children.
The Zouaves seized a quantity of arms and ammunition, some horses and provisions, then turned and walked back over a road which to footsore and wearied men was doubly dangerous. This expedition occupied but forty-two hours, although forty-six of the eighty-seven miles comprised were performed on foot; the road was rough, and not without dan- ger in the night. Two dead and one wounded Rebel were left on the field. There was no Union loss.
A few days later, the Rebels burned a bridge, six miles from camp, and established themselves in force at Piedmont, twenty-eight miles west, on the railroad. Colonel Wallace's small force was now in a dangerous situation. The only reinforcements he could expect on short notice were two or three hundred Pennsylvania miners, who signified their willingness in case of necessity. Colonel Wallace daily sent mounted pickets, thirteen in all, to different posts along the several approaches to Cumberland. June 26th, the whole thirteen - D. B. Hay, E. Baker, E. Burkett, J. Hollenback, T. Grover, J. Hollowell, T. Brazier, G. Mulbarger, L. Farley, F. Harrison, H. Dunlap, R. M. Dunlap, and E. P. Thomas - were directed to proceed to Frankfort, a town midway be- tween Romney and Cumberland.
In the evening of the same day, as the regiment was drill- ing on the hill-side, Harry Dunlap, his horse foaming and
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
panting, was seen hastening toward Colonel Wallace. The word flashed along the line, surmise taken as fact : " All our scouts are prisoners or killed !" Anxiety was not allayed when Colonel Wallace, after rapidly giving some orders to an officer who stood near, called to Dunlap, as he turned : " Get off that horse. There is a horse," - pointing to a fine animal a citizen was riding up the hill, -" take him."
The stranger, seeming to comprehend the necessity for the singular order, quietly dismounted. Dunlap instantly sprang on the fresh horse, and away he flew. Fifty men, under Major Robinson, followed. Soon a covered express-wagon, surrounded by a large crowd of citizens, approached. Cor- poral Hay, the leader of the scouts, pale and bloody, lay within. The wagon stopped before the hospital-tent. The wounded man refused assistance, although he moved with difficulty. He had one sword- and three bullet-wounds, and had come ten or twelve miles since receiving them. Never- theless he was able to give a spirited history of a great part of the day's adventures to Colonel Wallace.
The scouts went within a quarter of a mile of Frankfort, to a point from which they obtained a view of the village. To their surprise, they saw large numbers of both infantry and cavalry in the streets. A short reconnoissance was suffi- cient. They turned their horses' heads in the direction of Cumberland, and having come over the broad and direct road, they now, the better to scour the district, took a different route, which happened to be narrow, winding, and hilly. At a cabin-door they asked a woman, who stood watching them, with an interested and alarmed countenance, if any of the enemy were near. " Yes," she answered, " I counted forty- one, not five minutes ago, trotting along this very road." " Boys, shall we fight, or turn back ?" asked the corporal, fight gleaming in his own eyes. "Fight!" responded all, and on they plunged. A man at the side of the road stopped them. " Rebels just ahead !" he said. "How far ?" " Not fifty yards ; around that bend."
The hour had come for which they had volunteered; the hour of revenge for Buena-Vista, and of glory. They reached the bend. Before them, trotting along leisurely, was a small
67
PATTERSON'S CREEK.
body of cavalry. Clatter, clatter on the hill-side! The Rebels turned. Deceived by the bend, or by the furious onset of the approaching party, they fancied a hundred men in pursuit. One glance sufficed. " Neck or nought !" The horses caught the fear or the spirit, and neither whip nor spur they needed as they dashed on. The Zouaves did not even rein up to fire, but fired as they galloped. Suddenly the flying party came upon a deep gully. Several of their horses fell. There was no escape. The pursuers were at their heels. A des- perate hand-to-hand fight ensued. Farley and a noted Texan ranger, a man of immense size, rolled down the bank, locked in each other's arms. The Texan cried for mercy. Farley loosed his hold, and sprang up. The Texan caught him by the legs and pulled him down again. Again there was a deadly struggle. Now one, and now the other, had his gripe on the throat of his foe. Both could never rise. Farley's hand failed. His limbs relaxed. One more blow, and the ranger would shake the dead man's hold from his massive body. Just then a bullet. The ranger released his clutch, and Farley staggered to his feet. Harrison had beaten off an assailant, when his eye fell on the struggling form of Farley, and he sent the ball which saved his comrade's life. Eight Rebels fell at this point. The remainder of the party fled on up the mountain. The scouts turned back into the road, and were engaged in binding up the wounds of Hay, when they saw the enemy returning, and in a force not less than seventy-five. One of the Dunlaps had gone for a wagon for Hay, and the scouts were now but eleven. Hay was placed on a horse and had sufficient strength to keep his seat, and to escape to the woods.
The corporal could tell no more. What had become of his comrades, he could not say. They came in, however, during the night, except two, Thomas and Hollenback, and finished the tale.
While Hay was making his escape into the woods, the remaining scouts abandoned their horses and waded to an island in the mouth of Patterson's Creek, which here flows into the Potomac. They could not have found a better position, but the odds were fearful. Eleven men on the low,
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
defenceless island, more than seventy on the shore. Not a bullet must fail. Not a bullet did fail. With steady eye and steady hand, the scouts aimed at every man who entered the water ; and Patterson's Creek was certain death to him who was so bold as to leave the shore. But the contest was too unequal to be kept up long. The water was crossed, the island gained, and yet not won. Foot by foot, inch by inch, it was disputed in blood. It is a fearful sight, men fighting for their lives! Now teeth were set, and fists were clenched. There was firing, and stabbing, and wrestling, and swearing, and praying. There was even pity in the wild fury of this combat. " I hate to kill you, but I must," muttered a Rebel, leaning over a Zouave, with bowie-knife upraised to give the fatal blow. A ball entered the divided heart, and the lifted hand sank powerless.
Twilight came, and under its friendly cover the scouts crept through the bushes, waded the stream, and hid in the woods ; all but Hollenback. He lay helpless and bleeding on the island.
The next day Hollenback's lifeless body, shockingly pierced and mutilated, was found. His appearance excited suspi- cion ; and the woman at whose house he was found asserted that he had been murdered. He was buried with the honors of war in the old cemetery of Cumberland, on the shore of that river whose melancholy fame was just beginning.
Hollenback was dead, murdered ; and no man knew what had befallen Thomas. He had been seen to fall, but the island, the road, and the woods around had been searched in vain. Perhaps he lay in some dark gorge, perhaps in the river. Perhaps the Rebels had dragged him, wounded, into imprisonment. A heavy gloom rested on the camp.
As the evening sun was sinking behind the mountains, a cry ran from lip to lip, and swelled into a glad shout of " Thomas! Thomas!" On the brow of the hill the figure of a man was thrown in strong relief against the sky. It was the lost soldier. The regiment rushed towards him, and " every man felt as if his own brother had risen from the dead!" Thomas had been knocked down by a grazing shot over the eye. Scarcely had he fallen, when a hand was on his throat.
.
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KELLEY'S ISLAND .- MARTINSBURG .- MANASSAS.
A shot from Grover delivered him from this second danger. He crept into a thicket and remained quiet until he could, unobserved, get to the hills.
The number of the enemy killed in this encounter was surprising. The woman at whose house Hollenback was found, said twenty-three were laid out on her porch. Neigh- bors confirmed her statement.
Certainly it was a most remarkable skirmish, whether we consider the number of the enemy slain, or the physical strength and skill, the steadiness of hand and eye, the readi- ness of thought, the coolness and resolution of the Zouaves, the fiery bravery with which they made the onset, and the patient bravery with which they withstood the assault. Kel- ley's Island is the least among battle-fields, yet its glory is not small. Here fell the first Indiana soldier.
The Eleventh received many attentions from the good people of Cumberland, but none which they appreciated more highly than a present of a garrison-flag, - with compli- ments to the bravery, kindness, and courtesy of Colonel Wallace's Zouaves- and a Fourth of July dinner. In honor of the Fourth, the camp was decorated with evergreens and flowers; and the exchange of positions, which imagination sometimes attempts in society, was proposed and effected with no confusion and much amusement. Officers carried guns and walked the rounds, while privates entertained company.
July 7th, the Eleventh received orders to join General Patterson at Martinsburg, and the same evening took up the line of march. The distance, ninety-seven miles, was accomplished in four days and a half. Forty thousand United States troops were now at Martinsburg; and the larger number, deceived by the easy conquest of West Vir- ginia, anticipated a rapid march to Richmond. The supe- rior officers, however, who knew the difficulty of obtaining supplies, and the danger of a sudden decrease of numbers arising from the expiration of the term of enlistment, looked forward to a battle with anxiety, if not with dread. Gen- eral Patterson was ordered to prevent the arrival of General Johnston with reinforcements at Manassas. He visited the
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
different brigades in person, represented that a battle was imminent, and urged them to stay a few days longer. Four of the nineteen regiments whose time was expiring, among them the Eleventh Indiana, came forward and announced their determination to remain, but fifteen could not be moved from their stubborn purpose to return to their homes. The fact that many men had left families unprovided for, and that their own clothing was worn out and could not be renewed, forms some slight alleviation to the disgrace of men who could march from the battle-field to the firing of the enemy's cannon.
With such a force as he could retain, and it was not small, Patterson approached Winchester, where Johnston was for- tified,- approached, and stopped, and lay on his arms, while all night long the puffing of locomotives announced the departure of Rebel troops toward Manassas. He went to Charlestown, then back to Bunker Hill, and farther back to Harper's Ferry. He was not idle. In one or two warm skir- mishes his advance was successful; and if marching and countermarching could have saved the battle of Manassas, then would Patterson have done his duty and won great renown. He was too far off to engage in the disastrous conflict which opened and closed on the 21st of July. Thus it happened that Indiana, in her grief for the national defeat, was spared the additional pang of recognizing her own sons among the sufferers in that strange panic which, for the hour, unmanned the noble and the brave.
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