USA > Indiana > The soldier of Indiana in the war for the union, Vol. II > Part 35
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
"The work of the Sixth was more difficult. Where the road turned to the left a level plain extended to the left fronted by a hill, being a continuation of the hill on which their right had to operate. They acted splendidly, now going up with a rush, now crawling through open ground, very much exposed and meeting with considerable loss, consider- ing the ground and length of time engaged, which was only an hour. They took ten prisoners, killed and wounded many. It was a beautiful performance. I never saw better skir- mishing in my life.
"This fight gave me more insight into the proper way of attack and defense of hilly positions, and in fact, of handling troops generally, than I had before had.
" Miller was wounded on the twenty-sixth. He had his quarters in an old church, and when I moved my brigade into reserve there, he gave me quarters with him, and treated me very kindly because of my relationship to you. He talked so kindly of you that he quite won my heart. We received orders at the same time and moved up at the same time, and it was but a few moments before I saw them carrying him off. He was shot when he was riding along at the turn of the road, where I fought two days without being fired on from the top of the hill at the opening of the pass, five to six hundred yards off. We left there on the night of the twenty- sixth, marching nearly all night, returning to the Manches- ter pike, thence to Manchester, and thence to this place, reaching here to-day at two o'clock in the morning.
"It has rained constantly night and day. The roads are indescribable. I never saw such roads, nor such marching as we had to do; but the men stood it without grumbling, and my health improved rapidly. I was quite unwell before I started, and I am confident that I would have been really ill if we had not moved. I have never gone through such exposure, some people would have called it hardship, as on this march,-working all day and all night, snatching a few moments sleep on the wet ground, and not having even a blanket with mc."
While McCook was forcing his way through Liberty Gap, Thomas advanced toward Hoover's Gap, Wilder's mounted
407
HOOVER'S GAP.
brigade scouring the country along the Manchester turnpike. The Seventy-Second, being the foremost regiment, came. upon the enemy's skirmishers, and pushing them impetu- ously, drove them rapidly. The brigade following closely, entered and pressed half way through Hoover's Gap, a defile three miles long. Wilder then halted and considered the ex- pediency of waiting for the rest of Reynolds' division, which he knew was coming up as fast as infantry could come. But as even a short delay would enable the enemy to increase the force at the further extremity of the pass, and as his dash had thus far been crowned with an unexpected degree of success, he concluded to spur forward. He was shortly brought to a stand by evidence of the enemy's readiness to fight. He placed the guns of Lilly's battery on a command- ing point, a small howitzer on lower ground, and formed his four regiments,-the One Hundred and Twenty-Third and the Ninety-Eighth Illinois, the Seventeenth and Seventy-Sec- ond Indiana,-in line. The artillery opened fiercely on both sides, and the musketry was not slow to begin. The strug- gle was stout and long, lasting five hours, but it was very une- qual, the Rebels having fifteen regiments engaged, and would doubtless have ended in Wilder's defeat, had not Hall's brig- ade opportunely arrived. By night the pass was cleared. All the troops behaved with distinguished gallantry. Gen- eral Thomas eommended especially the Seventy-Second. The chaplain of this regiment, John N. Eddy, of Lafayette, was among the killed. According to Henry Campbell, of the Eighteenth battery, the Seventeenth regiment lost more than any other at Hoover's Gap. After stating the propor- tion, he adds:
"It is very strange to me that the loss in our battery was not greater. We were exposed to the fire of a Rebel battery and a company of sharpshooters during the entire engage- ment, and were in plain sight of both, while they were con- cealed from us. The hill that they occupied being higher ground than that which we were on, made it difficult to get their range; but the flash of their guns informed us, and we compelled them to change position more than once. The boys were all as cool as if they were firing blank cartridges.
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
The gun corporals made splendid shots. During the engage- ment we dismounted two Rebel guns. A shell exploded under one of them, tearing the gun from the carriage and scattering the pieces in every direction. Every time that we would sce the Rebel guns flash, some one would cry out, 'Down!' The men at the guns would all lie flat on the ground, and the drivers, who were dismounted and held their horses on foot, would lie down too. Our horses stood very well. I dismounted and made myself useful when I was needed, sometimes carrying orders, but mostly on the top of a high hill on the right of the battery, telling the effect of the shots. I was taking an order over to the section of the Nine- teenth battery that was posted on the hill across the road be- hind, when a six pound ball whizzed over the back of my horse within a foot of me."
General Granger, who had the extreme right, skirmished all the way from Triune to Guy's Gap, with Stanley's cav- alry clearing the gap, and with Minty's pursuing the Rebels seven miles, driving them into and then out of their rifle pits near Shelbyville. Klein's battalion charged a troop of Reb- els twice its own number, and drove them into the river. Company G did most of the fighting, Lieutenant Callahan leading the charge.
Granger carried the intrenchments without difficulty, took more than five hundred prisoners, and rested the night of the twenty-seventh in Shelbyville.
The danger of the march was in the front, where balls and bullets were flying, but the body of the army had double toil and trouble, as every regiment made the mud deeper and stickier. A member of the Eighty-Seventh Indiana thus describes the march of that regiment:
" In order to avoid obstructing the passage of the wagons we pursued our way principally across the fields, where the soil was anything but firm beneath the tramp of so many feet. Beyond Christiana we halted, built fires, procured water, and pitched our tents, using guns for the last, as wood was scarce. The soldiers crowded together, each one intent on having his bed on a row rather than in a furrow. Rain fell all night. Wind blew down our tents, and water filled
409
THE ENEMY RETREATS.
our boots and shoes. The men who rolled into furrows in their sleep looked in the morning like drowned rats. About ten the march was resumed, over roads and through fields, which were now become lakes of mud. It is not pleasant to be in camp during inclement weather, as the frail shelter-tent is but a poor protection against the driving storm; but the most unpleasant thing a soldier has to do is to march through mud from one to two feet deep, carrying his tent when it is thoroughly soaked with water, and his blanket, its weight increased by dampness, not to speak of knapsack, haversack, canteen, gun and cartridge-box. All day long the sound of cannon could be heard. At dark we halted to prepare a hasty meal. In fifteen or twenty minutes groups of men were seated on stumps or stones, with coffee-pots, oyster-cans or tin-cups by their sides, and a huge hard tack and a hunk of raw pork in their hands. We continued the march far into the night."
Thomas' corps was not wholly up until the twenty-sixth. On the afternoon of this day Wilder's brigade cleared the way by seizing Matt's Hollow, a gorge two miles long, with scarce room anywhere for wagons to pass each other. Press- ing on beyond the hollow, and skirmishing heavily, the brig- ade and division reached Manchester, where General Rose- crans arrived next day, and where, within a few days, the whole army concentrated.
Colonel Wilder proceeded round and below Tullahoma to tear up the railroad bridge, and to destroy Elk river bridge, and large reconnoitring parties sedulously endeavored to dis- . cover and disclose the enemy's positions and intentions. But Bragg was wide awake and convinced that discretion was the better part of valor, at least with an army that was out- flanked, and in danger of being cut off from its base. Ac- cordingly, while he held Elk river bridge with a force that was invincible to Wilder's brigade, and strongly guarded all the roads north, east and west, he rapidly retreated.
On the first of July Brannan's, Negley's and Sheridan's divisions took possession of Tullahoma. The Seventy-Fifth Indiana was the first regiment to enter the Rebel works. A heavy pursuit was instituted, but as the Rebels destroyed the
410 .
THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
bridges on which they crossed the streams, and the waters were swollen, it effected little. Bragg was driven out of Middle Tennessee, leaving behind him sixteen hundred and thirty men and three guns, captured. Rosecrans lost five hundred and sixty men. The campaign was thus eminently successful. It was only of nine days' duration, but the rain had been constant, and the roads so bad that Crittenden's corps, which moved by the most difficult, because the most mountainous route, required four days of incessant labor to advance twenty-one miles, even though large quantities of the officers' baggage were thrown out and burned to lighten the wagons.
With each step the army found increased difficulty in mov- ing, having to make and repair roads and bridges, to bring up supplies, and to guard, with a heavy force, every mile of road. Its lines were now over three hundred miles of an enemy's country. As it was impossible to bring up a suffi- cient number of trains, it was widely scattered. While sev- eral brigades were thrown forward to the Tennessee river, the main part went into camp in the barrens at the foot of the mountains, and one or two divisions were sent back to positions they occupied previous to the movement.
The position, condition and spirit of the army is shown in the soldiers' letters:
"ARMY OF THE CUMBERLAND, July 17.
"Our army has been crowned with victorious laurel, and we rest in security, conscious of having done our duty, and ready for the severer struggle that our judgment assures us is pending at no distant period. We see here the workings of the great machinery of war. By day the whistle of the locomotive and the rumble of long supply and transportation trains sound right merrily in the ears of the soldiers of the advanced army. The first is like music from the 'horn of plenty,' and both give aid and comfort.
"By night the signal flags are supplanted by lights whose complex movements change the position of armies as fate the fortunes of men.
' " We have one of the most beautiful camps we have yet had. It is in the lawn of a beautiful mansion, owned by a
411
THE MOUNTAINS FULL OF DESERTERS.
niece of James K. Polk. Two or three large Rebel houses have been torn down within a day or two past, they being in the way of our siege guns, and have furnished ample material for the comfort of the boys. We have houses in camp made of nothing but window-sash and blinds, neatly arranged 'under canvass,' and supplied with every variety of household furniture,-cots made in the frames of mirrors, and floors of pannelled doors. Such is war's devastation.
" WILLIAM HURBERT."
FYFFE'S BRIGADE, MCMINNVILLE, July 21.
" This is a splendid place to camp. Our brigade is on a high hill at the edge of town, and has plenty of water, black- berries, huckleberries, potatoes, &c. We have good pies. The advantages we have gained over the enemy since the first of this month are very encouraging. Many who were despondent, and thought much of home, are now jubilant, and say they must remain in the army and see the thing through. You may depend that Bragg's army is demoralized. These mountains are full of deserters. About eight thousand have deserted, and will not leave their State again. Soldiers and citizens are coming into our lines every hour, many of them joining the army and taking the oath.
" I was sorry to learn of the great casualties in the Twen- tieth Indiana in the battle of Gettysburg. A regiment scarcely ever suffers such loss in battle. It is hard for men, after serving and suffering as long as they have, to be killed, and never reach home to enjoy the blessings of peace that they have worked so hard to obtain. I feel very sorry for the death of Theodore Day. He was a good boy, and Colonel Dick says he was a very good soldier. I trust that the coun- try will ever remember the honored dead who have fallen in defence of such a cause as ours.
" DARWIN THOMAS."
" WILDER'S BRIGADE, DECHERD, August 1.
"The mountains here are only about eight hundred or a thousand feet high, but that is very well up in the air. From the top, a good view of the surrounding country for several
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
miles can be had. For the width of about twenty-five miles, all along the foot of the mountains, is a level plain with a soft sandy soil, very thickly covered with small jack- oaks. No one lives on it, and there are no roads. Every- body makes his own road. When we crossed it, the mud was almost impassable. We cut roads through the timber, and filled them up with trees and brush. Sometimes it took ten horses to pull a gun through! Tullahoma is situated in the midst of this waste, where there is nothing whatever in the formation of the country which would encourage the building of a town. It is very small, like all Southern towns. I havn't seen one, with the exception of Nashville, as large as Crawfordsville-by half. We often pass through a town without knowing it, as they give the name to every black- smith shop. Decherd consists of a dwelling house, a burnt depot, and a water tank.
"Everything is quiet. No movements are being made, except that the second and third brigades of our division have been sent on top of the mountains.
" HENRY CAMPBELL."
" HEADQUARTERS THIRD BRIGADE, FOURTHI DIVISION, FOURTEENTH CORPS, UNIVERSITY, TENNESSEE.
"The brigade moved up to this place on the mountain, over a rough road, with about two miles of the way up hill, on Saturday. I could not possibly have been assigned to a more disagreeable position. General Crook had just been relieved from this command, and had carried away with him all his staff officers, including Commissary and Quarter- master and their clerks. General Turchin brought with him only his Adjutant General. He was a total stranger to his command and to his staff. The brigade was far removed from the world and the necessary supplies. What little Commissary and Quartermaster supplies were on hand, had to be left under guard at the old camp, because of the diffi- culty of pulling them up the mountain. You will have some idea of the road when I tell you that the teams were from one morning until eight o'clock the next coming twelve
413
ON THE HEIGHTS.
miles. The prospect of getting supplies and feeding the brigade was anything but pleasant, I assure you. But it was doubtless a good thing to break me in. I have been working early and late. My clerk takes to his work admira- bly. We built a shelter for our stores with our paulins, and were busy all day selling to officers. I am keeping, for the first time in my life, a retail grocery. I got here Sunday afternoon in a heavy rain, found everything in confusion, no commissary stores, and nothing to eat. (General Turchin having his wife continually with him in the field, does not mess with his staff.) I had my tent put up on the wet grass, and went to bed hungry. I have a first-rate cook, but he could not make a meal out of nothing. Captain Leech, the division commander, is to-day hauling up supplies suffi- cient for the two brigades here and the Fifteenth. He stores them at the University site, about a mile and a quarter from here, on a good mountain top road. There is a railroad from Cowan, up the mountain, running quite near us and on to Tracy City, to the coal mines. It will soon be put in operation and our supplies steamed up.
" The top of this mountain was the site for a grand South- ern college, to be established at a cost of three million dol- lars. It was to be a stock concern with shares of fifty dol- lars each. The corner stone was laid, and one hundred and fifty thousand dollars expended, when the scheme failed. Some of our soldiers tore up the corner stone, and found a hymn-book, bible, and some gold coin. The hymn-book is said to have been one carried by General Scott all through the Mexican war. The place is twenty-seven hundred feet above the Tennessee river, is ten miles from Decherd and seven from Cowan. The road leading from the University to Decherd runs on the top some four miles before it begins to descend.
"This is a delightful place to camp. Beautiful ground, cool breezes, and the finest and clearest spring-water I ever saw, and plenty of it. No one could ask a pleasanter sum- mer residence. General Reynolds' headquarters and Colonel Wilder's brigade are still near Decherd, and will not come up until the railroad is working.
414
THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
" Heard yesterday that Major Parrott and the Sergeant Major of the One Hundredth had been killed by the falling of a tree. I don't know when any news has shocked me so much.
"EDWARD WILLIAMS."
"STEVENSON, ALABAMA, August 5.
" We are back on the old ground, just where we were last year. I arrived day before yesterday, with forty-seven horses, after a long and tedious trip from Nashville.
" All along the road, I met friends and acquaintances. I have fully concluded it is a good thing to have friends, es- pecially when traveling without a blanket, as I was, having expected to bring horses by the cars. The battery (Suter- meister's) had already arrived. It is probable it will join our brigade at Bridgeport, in a few days. General Sheridan came to-day, he having been commanding the corps, with headquarters at Winchester, during M'Cook's absence.
"HENRY M. WILLIAMS."
It was thought that General Rosecrans delayed unneces- sarily after the battle of Stone River; that half a year for rest and preparation was a most extravagant and lavish ex- penditure of time, when the country seemed languishing at the point of death. However that may be, having once again set his army afoot, he remained unwillingly halting in the hill country, and made immense exertions to proceed. But an army moves, so Frederick the Great, or some other renowned warrior asserts, and all commissaries testify to the truth of the assertion, as the serpent in Paradise was con- demned to go-by means the farthest from wings. Conse- quently, though troops were gradually thrown over the mountains, it was long weeks before the line of the river was gained.
415
ON THE BANKS OF THE TENNESSEE.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHICKAMAUGA.
"We dared not speak to each other at table of Malplaquet, so frightful were the gaps left in our army by the cannon of that bloody action. 'Twas heart-rending for an officer who had a heart, to look down his line on pa- rade day, afterward, and miss hundreds of faces of comrades-humble, or of high rank-that had gathered but yesterday full of courage and cheerful- ness round the torn and blackened flags. Where were our friends? The men had no heart to cheer. Not one of them but was thinking, 'Where's my comrade ?- Where's my brother that fought by me, or my dear Captain that led me yesterday ?'"-IIenry Esmond.
Until the middle of August, General Rosecrans was forced to retain the main part of his army on the northern slopes of the Cumberland Mountains. On the sixteenth of that month he started out again with a front extending from Athens, in : Alabama, to the head of the Sequatehie valley, in Tennessee, over one hundred and fifty miles. Stanley's cavalry guarded McCook's corps, which moved on the right. Thomas fol- lowed the general line of the railroad toward Stevenson and Bridgeport. Crittenden climbed the heights and steeps of Se- quatchie valley. The weather was hot and dry, and the men, so often drenched with rain on their marches, now dripped with sweat, and panted with heat. In the almost incredibly short period of five days, the wide-spread host surmounted the rugged wall of rocks and appeared on the banks of the Tennessee. On the twenty-second, Lilly's battery threw shells across the river into Chattanooga, the stronghold to which Bragg had retreated and where he awaited reinforce- ments,-Buckner from East Tennessee, Longstreet's veteran corps from Virginia, and a division from Johnston in Missis- sippi.
Henry Campbell narrates the movements and action of Lilly's battery, which announced to General Bragg the ap- proach of his antagonist.
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THE SOLDIER OF INDIANA.
"August 18. Marched in a general north-east direction through thick woods, over bad roads and rocky hills. Passed Wagner's brigade about three o'clock. In the morning, went through a very large pine forest. Camped on the banks of a very small stream in the woods. Forage scarce and rattle- snakes plenty. Marched about sixteen miles.
"Nineteenth. Left camp this morning at six. We have been traveling on the top of a mountain, high table land ever since we left University Springs. Very little of the land is fit for cultivation. About eleven, commenced de- scending the mountain by a very bad road. We are now in Sequatchie valley. After traveling through Jack Oak woods three days, it is a relief to see open ground and farm houses, and especially orchards filled with ripe fruit. The valley is about four miles wide and very fertile. The Sequatehie river runs through its entire length. We marched up to Dunlap and encamped about four o'clock. At dark, Cruft's brigade, of Palmer's division, came down into the valley by a differ- ent road, and camped near us.
"Twentieth. At six this morning left all our wagons, tents, knapsacks and everything but just what we could carry on our horses, and with five days rations in our haversacks, passed Cruft's camp, forded Sequatchie river, and started up the mountain. Were about three hours getting up. Passed Hazen's brigade at the top. Marched across the top and down into a valley, where we camped for the night. Seven- teen miles to-day.
" Twenty-first. Left camp at six. Expect to fight at Chat- tanooga before we get to another camp. The road down the valley is good. The corn crops the best I have seen in Tennessee. Apples and peaches are abundant. All you have to do to raise peach trees down here is to scatter a handful of peach seeds in a corn field, and in a year or two you have a good orchard. The people that live in this val- ley are all for the Union. Many came to see us as we marched along the road. About nine, as we were ascending the hill from which you can see Chattanooga, we were or- dered to form into column. At the same moment the Reb- els commenced firing on a company of our scouts who had
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CANNONADING CHATTANOOGA.
gone down to the bank of the river, and there had captured a lot of Rebels that were grazing their horses on this side of the river at a distance of one thousand yards, and placed two guns on a hill about five hundred yards to the right of the road, and opposite a heavy fort on the other bank. Com- manding the hills which we occupy, are seven forts and bat- teries. If they had the right number of guns to fill all the embrasures, they could bring about twenty-seven to bear upon us. Chattanooga is not as large as Crawfordsville. The two principal streets commence at the river and extend back about a mile. The business part of the town is on these two streets. The private houses are in a grove. Sev- eral large warehouses are down by the bank. Two steam- boats lie in the river, and a pontoon bridge is ready to swing across. With this rough sketch you can form some idea of Chattanooga.
"The first gun from our side was fired at ten o'clock, at one of the steamboats. The shot struck it, and made the men who were at work on it scatter up the bank in a hurry. We kept on firing until we sunk the lower boat, and had shot the upper one through and through. The Rebels replied from eighteen different guns, but all their shot and shell fell short, striking the ground and bursting about half way up the hill, without doing any harm.
"After we had disabled the boats, we turned our guns on the Rebel forts. Four other guns which were now in posi- tion opened fire on a battery near the warehouse, on a fort over the cliff, and two other forts. The firing for a few mo- ments was quite brisk on both sides; but the Rebels finding that they were only wasting ammunition, ceased, except an occasional gun from the high hill fort. We fired away slowly, and although we were at a distance of a mile and a quarter, we threw several shells into the embrasures where their guns were, and dismounted a gun. One of our shell ; exploded within five yards of a woman who was walking slowly across the street. We all thought she would be killed, but, when the smoke blew away, she was still walk- ing, though more slowly than before. We afterward learned
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