USA > Massachusetts > Historical sketch of the old Sixth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers, during its three campaigns in 1861, 1862, 1863, and 1864 : containing the history of the several companies previous to 1861, and the name and military record of each man connected with the regiment during the war > Part 14
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THE LAST BLACKWATER MARCH.
Wednesday, May 13th, the regiment again heard the bugle call, and the drums beat, and the familiar order, " Fall in with three days' rations." We started just after noon, and marched somewhat deliberately to the old " Deserted House," where we bivouacked two hours. The expedition was commanded by Col. Foster ; and Foster's brigade was commanded by Col. Follansbee. The object of the expedition was to protect a party of
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workmen engaged in taking up the rails of the Seaboard and Roanoke Railway, so that the rebels could not use the roads, nor convey the rails away to repair their other roads, or manufacture batteries with them. The weather was oppressively hot, and the march a very hard one, continuing through the night ; and the column reached Carsville at daylight. Col. Follansbee commanded the advance, while the main body rested at Carsville. The ad- vance halted about three miles from the Blackwater, where the workmen were employed in tearing up the rails, and sending them back on the track by horse-power. While busily engaged in their work, they were suddenly scattered by the explosion of shells from a rebel battery that had dis- covered their movements. This discovery was caused by the conduct of the brave, but impetuous, Col. Spear, who determined to capture the rebel pickets known to be in front of an earthwork of theirs, at the junction of the railroad and the pike. The writer of these pages, anxious to see a cavalry charge, obtained the gallant colonel's leave to join his squadrons. Away we went. I could think of nothing but a whirlwind, a cloud of dust con- cealing us from each other ; and the horses, all used to the thing, seemed to enjoy it quite as much as the riders. We drove the rebel videttes into their fortifications, and then as swiftly countermarched. It seemed as if we flew ; and my own enthusiasm at one time was lost in the thought that my mare - educated in the cavalry - would carry me out ahead of all, as she passed one after another.
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But my feelings changed considerably, as the rebels in large force followed us back, and I saw I should not bring up the rear. Of all the excitements I ever experienced, commend me to a cavalry charge. We returned, having narrowly escaped, capturing several prisoners by the aid of two companies of the Indiana Thirteenth, deployed down an intersecting road.
Gallant as was this charge, it proved a damage to our enterprise, for the detachments that followed us discov- ered our working party ; and when about five hundred yards of the track had been removed, the workmen, par- ticularly the darkies, came skedaddling at a two-forty pace down the railroad, followed by the solid shot and shell of a couple cannon that were hurried after them to a place commanding them perfectly. The regiments pro- tecting them were very much exposed, and withdrew immediately. A Pennsylvania regiment set a very bad example.' I happened to be going up the track to dis- cover what progress the working party was making, when I saw the hospital attendants and surgeon, the latter in his shirt-sleeves, running away from the place where duty called them, accompanied by many of the soldiers. In justice to the regiment, however, let it be said that the officers did not flinch, and succeeded in rallying the bal- ance. Col. Foster was under positive instructions from Gen. Peck not to bring on an engagement, unless in de- fence of his enterprise ; and Col. Follansbee, who had command of the infantry, wisely withdrew to our main
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position, it being the opinion of both officers that the lives of men are of more value than railroad iron. In this attack, there were three killed and ten wounded. . -
During the engagement, our regiment, with others, was ordered to the front, where position was taken out of the range of the enemy's artillery, and the workmen continued their labors. We were kept in line of battle, just out of Carrsville, during the night of the 14th. It rained hard during the night, and the boys were thor- oughly saturated. Attacks were made on the pickets.
SHARP FIGHTING.
On the 15th, the enemy troubled our pickets ; and companies A and F were ordered forward from the main body, as skirmishers. The enemy was found to be ad- vancing in large force ; and the rest of the regiment, with cavalry, and Lieut. Farrar's section of the Seventh Mas- sachusetts Battery, were sent up to support them. The artillery was posted in the road, just in front of " Holland's House," near " Hebron Church ;" and the Sixth was in support of the battery, the right and left wings on each side of the road, respectively. Companies D and B were then sent forward to reinforce our skirmishers ; the enemy and our skirmishers being concealed in the woods, while our three lines of battle stretched across an open field, our regiment, a part of the New York One Hundred and Twelfth, and Farrar's (section of the Seventh) Battery constituting the first line. The enemy advanced in force,
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and our skirmishers fell back to the line of battle. The enemy then appeared in the edge of the woods, and opened on us vigorously with musketry. Our artillery and first line of battle replied, and for nearly an hour the firing resembled the continuous roll of drums. The engagement closed, and strange to say, though the air was thick with flying bullets, and though the trees near the house, the gun-carriages, and caissons, and fence- rails were perforated with balls, not a man was scratched. A tree near which the colonel stood was tattooed as though a woodpecker were rapping it, during the action.
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At the end of an hour, or thereabouts, companies H and G, with some of the Tenth New Jersey, were thrown forward into the woods as skirmishers ; and they drove the rebel skirmishers back to their lines, when they were re- called, and C and I were sent out. They were imme- diately charged by the rebels in superior force, when they fell back. One horse was killed and nine wounded in the Seventh Battery by sharpshooters. A part re- mained in the woods, and laid between and under the two fires, which, as before, broke out with great fury, and was general along both lines, the enemy employing only infantry to our infantry and artillery. The firing, as be- fore, subsided by the falling back of our forces a short distance, to draw the enemy on, and then we advanced again, to resume our former position.
While we were returning, the fire became fast and furious on the part of the rebels, and the hottest part
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of the engagement then came on. The battery got out of ammunition, so that the fight was one of infantry alone. To protect our guns, as well as to secure a better position, we fell back to the opposite edge of the field in which we were, and picketed that position for the night. In the last engagement, the Sixth was not on the front, it having given place to others that had not borne the great heat and exposure of the day.
All of the losses experienced by our regiment were during the second round : -
KILLED - Ira Bowles; Geo. H. Grey.
WOUNDED - Company C, J. E. Wilson, slight ; G. I. Fox, leg, mortal ; Anson G. Thurston, leg, mortal ; John Keith, lungs, serious ; Lewis A. Pierce, leg ; David H. Goodhue, mortal. Com- pany B, C. A. Luce, arm, severe ; G. F. Lillis, arm, slight; G. A. Farnsworth, slight. Company H, Hiram E. Hartford; Chas. F. Clark, wrist, severe ; Augustus P. Frazer, head, slight. Company K, Thos. Lincs, slight ; Albert L. Burgess, slight. Company F, Thomas Drinan, slight.
MISSING - Joseph Stevens, of Company I, a drummer, taken prisoner, unhurt. Fox and Thurston were wounded, and taken prisoners ; and J. M. Thurston, father of A. G., and W. H. Drinker, of Company D, went in search of Thurston and Fox ; and J. Sweat, D. H. Godhue, Norman I. Austin, and B. F. Evans went in with a stretcher, and all but Evans were captured. As these brave fellows approached on their humane errand, the rebels began to fire. An officer among them shouted to his men to desist firing, as the boys were aiding the wounded. This was done to catch them; for, as soon as they were within their reach, they were seized.
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Fox, Thurston, and Goodhue afterwards died of their wounds, in rebel hospitals. They were gallant fellows. Indeed, it was a common remark that it would be difficult for the enemy to destroy so much moral excellence in the same number of men, among the survivors.
Grey was placed in a gig, after having been stripped of clothing, and in the night was run near our pickets, where he was found in the morning, the brutes who had killed him having thus insulted his lifeless remains.
Thurston died of the wound in his leg. His father was with him, and was afterwards exchanged. He was a young man of much promise, having left Harvard Uni- versity, where he had been two years, at his country's call.
During the night of the 15th, the enemy tried a scheme to entrap prisoners. They would call, so that our pickets could hear them, " Col. Spear! Col. Spear ! Come and get me ; I am badly wounded; I can go no further; I belong to the Sixth Massachusetts ; come and get me ! " But they tried in vain.
Next day, affairs were mostly quiet until toward noon, when picket firing and skirmishing commenced, which at length were stilled by cannonading from Davis's and How- ard's batteries. The enemy almost surprised the unso- phisticated pickets we had thrown out (from the Pennsyl- vania One Hundred and Seventy-Sixth). Their uniforms are so nearly the color of the dirt, that they can scarcely be distinguished from it. Taking advantage of this fact,
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a large number of them had wriggled their way along till almost up to our front, when they rose, and with a yell charged. For a moment our pickets fell back ; but Howard's and Davis's guns opened on the enemy, and they rapidly retreated to their position. In the skirmish, we had one man mortally and five otherwise wounded. The enemy's loss must have been consider- able. Next night all was quiet. The enemy's force was about 8,000, mainly infantry.
INCIDENTS.
It was a sight of thrilling beauty and interest to see the boys of the Sixth (while those who were with them from other regiments, unused to the skirmish drill, fal- tered) go forward in perfect line, rise and fall like one man, and conduct throughout as coolly as though in a sham-fight. Making off myself with a wounded man on my horse, who was hit at my side at one time, and at an- other lying so close to the ground that an emmet could scarcely crawl under me, I could not help seeing how admirably our boys were distinguishing themselves during the last days of their service.
It is curious to think how men's thoughts will assume a ludicrous phase, even under circumstances of great personal danger. After the first round of fighting was over, I had just been into the house (" Hollands"), and, supposing the engagement was ended for the present, and that our men would lie on their arms for a while, I
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was moving a few rods to the rear, where our hospital was located, to endeavor to sleep a little in the church, as doubtless " many a friend and brother had done before me," when the second volley suddenly burst upon us. I fell prostrate on my face, some three rods behind our line of battle, and finding that the bullets sang their death- song rather nearer than was pleasant, I began to devise some way of bettering my prospects, for I lay on my face. It seemed to me that I had chosen an unfortunate posi- tion ; for the most prominent part of my body, in that position, was one on which I could not describe the wounds in a mixed company. I turned on my back, and then I remembered that a wound in the bowels is more likely to prove fatal than elsewhere, and, besides, my head was toward the enemy, and thus there were two vital presen- tations ; so I placed my body parallel with the rebel line of battle, when I suddenly was reminded that I was as much worse off than before, as five feet nine exceed two feet. Place myself as I would, I wished I. was otherwise and otherwheres, and with a laugh I could not control, I rose, the bullets ploughing the dirt and sounding their zmmm all around me. I made for the road, and lay under the slight protection of the bank, till the firing subsided.
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Another incident : While the fight was going on briskly, our men lying down and the officers standing, the inen instinctively hugged the ground, when one officer, who never failed to do his duty, standing where
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his command could not see him, but where " a chiel among them taking notes " could, was heard to say, " Boys [ducking his head], don't dodge! [Another duck.] It's of no use to dodge when you hear the sound of a bullet. [Duck again.] The ball passes long before you hear the sound. [Duck.] I am more ex- posed here than you are [duck], and you need not dodge more than I do!" [Duck again.]
A VERACIOUS CORRESPONDENT.
I ascertained, at this time, the manner in which some very glowing newspaper reports of battles have been written. The reporter of a New York sensation sheet came to me, as I was standing with my regiment, and remarked that he had found an admirable spot from which to view the approaching fight, pointing to an open place in the field, hard by. He had scarcely spoken when the tattoo of the enemy's musketry began ; and, as some of the balls hummed uncomfortably near, he tum- bled off his horse, and crouching to the ground, and dragging the bit almost out of his horse's mouth, in his haste to get to the rear, he disappeared from view, amid the derision of all who observed his cowardly conduct. Next day I met him in Carsville, some three miles to the rear. He came forward with much more coolness, I thought, than he exhibited the day before, saying, “ I found a better spot from which to see that fight. I made up my mind that I could see it with less prejudice
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from Carsville !" When the paper came, containing his account of the affair, it began in these words, with im- mense capitals and an excess of exclamation points : " Great fight at Carsville !!! Our correspondent in the fight, and wounded !!! " And then followed a long ac- count, describing what was accomplished by Corcoran's Brigade, which was not under fire at all, and omitting all mention of the Massachusetts Sixth, and New York One Hundred and Twelfth, the only regiments that fired at the enemy. So much for surveying matters at such a distance.
Recounting such incidents as these of ourselves and each other serves to make many an otherwise tedious hour of camp life pass away pleasantly and cheerfully, and the memory of them will remain with us life-long souvenirs.
ALMOST IN RICHMOND.
On Saturday night, the writer of these pages came near taking one of those involuntary journeys to Rich- mond that so many of our men have accomplished. Just before dark, I had an interview with Dr. Hand, medical director, who had come out from Suffolk to obtain facts concerning the casualties, and to look after the duties of his office, and gave him the items concerning the wound- ed, which, in the exercise of my duties as a correspond- ent, I had gathered ; and just after dark it occurred to me that I might convey to the readers of the " Tribune " and the " Journal " the earliest news of our fight, and
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also bring out the mails that had arrived for the mem- bers of the regiment, and thus kill two birds with one stone. Accordingly I started. At Kinsale Swamp, our last regiment, the New York Ninety-Ninth, was posted. Col. Wardrop informed me that Dr. Hand and two others had just gone in toward Suffolk, and at first I resolved to hurry after him and overtake him ; but, on reflection, concluded to save my horse's wind, in case it were wanted. I soon overtook an ambulance train ; but, find- ing its progress too slow, I left it, and struck out on my own responsibility. The way was dark and lonely enough. I heard a gun ahead of me, after leaving Kinsale Swamp, but pushed on, keeping a leisure lope or walk in the open, but giving my horse her rein in the dense woods. Thus I rode about eight or nine miles, till I came to our pickets, three or four miles out of Suffolk. No one had gone in, and I thought that perhaps the doctor had taken another road.
Next morning, I went to head-quarters, and found he had not made his appearance. It turned out that he had ridden but two or three miles when he was suddenly ordered to halt. He declined the invitation at first, and gave his horse the spur ; but a more pressing invitation, in the shape of a bullet through his horse's neck, " pre- vailed on him to stop," and his horse tumbled headlong. The next feature on the programme, as the doctor jumped up to run, was a blow with the butt of a rifle on the head; and he came to himself, a while after,
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riding on a strange horse, through the woods, a prisoner in the hands of a squad consisting of a sergeant and six- teen men, that had flanked us, and that lay in ambush to pick up small parties. The refusal of the doctor to halt compelled them to fire, - as they had not intend- ed, - and then they feared that the shot would bring a party down on them ; so they left for the Blackwater, at Zuni. A few minutes after, I cantered by, and found no obstruction, - thanks to the gun that was fired at Dr. Hand. But, had the doctor intimated to me his intention of going into Suffolk that night, or had I overtaken him, I should have been of his party, and might have got a worse fate than befell him ; for I don't think I would have halted unless my horse or self had received more than a word. He was exchanged in a few days, as I, a noncombatant, ordinarily would have been ; but the cor- respondence for the New York " Tribune " in my pocket might have given me a bitter dose of Southern hospitality. That is as far as I ever went on the road to Richmond.
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CLOSING SCENES.
At about the same time, Capt. Jepson went into Suffolk, sick, with a couple of ambulances, when, as they were moving slowly along the road, four shots were fired at them, one of which took off the arm of one of the two cavalrymen riding with them. There were not more than three armed men with our train ; but the cowards in the woods only dared fire from a distance. I have
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been in eight fights ; and it will illustrate the manner in which, for at least two years of the war, the fighting was done. I never knew our army to be posted in the woods, nor the rebels to fight in an open field. Indeed, I never saw a rebel, when fighting was going on, unless he was brought in as a prisoner. They always kept in the woods, and our troops always occupied the open.
Having finished our task, our forces fell back in the night of the 18th, toward Deserted House, when a mel- ancholy blunder and fatal mistake occurred, between Deserted House and Carrsville. Our forces were mov- ing, by two highways and the Seaboard Railroad, in three parallel lines, from Carrsville to Deserted House, having started a little after midnight. They had been about an hour on the march, when the columns on the other two roads were startled at hearing the sound of a volley of musketry from the northern route. In a short time several men from the New York (Corcoran's) Legion, hatless and without arms, which they had dis- gracefully thrown away, came running across from the road on which the firing was heard, through the woods, to the railroad, and reported to Col. Foster that the rebels had fired upon them and charged them. One of them declared that a whole regiment charged his com- pany, and that he and one or two others alone were left to tell the tale !
Col. Foster ordered two of Col. Follansbee's regiments and two pieces of artillery to hurry to the scene of con-
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flict, and despatched orders for one of the regiments sta- tioned at Deserted House to move to the same place, when word came from Col. Murphy that his column had arrived at Deserted House. Col. - , of the -, was lighting his pipe or cigar with a match, when his horse jumped suddenly, and caused a man's musket to go off, when it was supposed to be an attack on the regi- ment, and a most disgraceful panic ensued. . Men threw away their arms and accoutrements, and in their igno- minious haste to escape supposed danger, rendered them- selves helpless and powerless by their own folly, while others, wildly and at random, fired into each other, and killed three, and wounded four men. In the confusion that followed, for a short time, we had a miniature Bull Run.
THE MARCH TOWARD HOME.
We bivouacked, on the night of the 19th, on ground for which we fought on the 30th of January, and Gen. Corcoran came out and assumed command of the forces, in consequence of the sudden illness of Col. Foster. During the day, we lay at the Deserted House, expecting orders to return to camp, when we were directed to sup- ply ourselves with three days' rations ; and toward night we moved for Windsor, a station on the Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad. Here we remained, in support of Howard's Battery, while the track of this road was being torn up, expecting a brush at any moment, until Satur- day, May 23d, when orders came from Gen. Peck, re-
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lieving us from duty ; and we left on the easiest march we ever accomplished, - the road toward home. We reached camp at about nine at night, as happy a crowd of boys in blue as ever was seen. We were very much reduced in strength. Camp life had agreed so well with us, that many of us weighed twenty-five pounds each more than at home, when we left on this expedition ; but the great heat, and hard marching, and watchfulness, and hard fare, had reduced us so that we scarcely looked like the same regiment. We were as happy to reach camp as we ever could be to see home. We received orders to leave Suffolk on the 26th. Before leaving, a dress parade was formed, when the following orders were read : -
COMPLIMENTARY ORDERS.
From our brigade commander : -
HEAD-QUARTERS FOSTER'S BRIGADE, } SUFFOLK, Va., May 25, '63. 5
TO THE OFFICERS AND SOLDIERS OF THE SIXTH MASS. VOLS.
The time has arrived when the period of service for which you enlisted has expired, and you are to return to your homes and the avocations of business which a few months since you so sacrifieing- ly left, to aid in quelling the rebellion, which, in its attempt to overthrow the best government in the world, needed the strong arms and steady hearts of its supporters to subdue.
In the separation from my commaud, which has been of long standing, and of an exceedingly pleasant character, permit me to. return my sincere and appreciative thanks for the manner in which you have discharged your duties. It is needless to refer back, and recall those obligations performed ; there are living evidences all
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over this command that bear witness to your gigantic efforts, and the patience, energy, and willingness by which they were accom- plished.
Let me suffer the hope, that, after a return to your homes, you will again enroll yourselves under the flag of our country, again to lend your efforts to remove all 'stains that a wicked people are striving to place upon its gorgeous folds, and to plant that glorious ensign so that it will cover our whole country from gulf to gulf, and from the one ocean to the other. You are now veterans. You are acquainted with the realities and inured to the hardships of war, and your country still needs your services. Let me suffer the hope that the " Old Sixth " will soon again appear upon the stage of action, and be instrumental in securing and riveting the bonds of this glorious country in the slumbers of a perpetual peace.
With many well wishes to the living, and the warmest feelings of condolence to the friends of the dead,
I am, very respectfully, R. S. FOSTER, Col. Com'g Brigade.
From our division commander : -
HEAD-QUARTERS UNITED STATES FORCES, 1 SUFFOLK, Va., May 25, 1863.
GENERAL ORDERS, NO. 34.
1. The term of service of the Sixth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers being about to expire, the Commanding General is unwilling to let the occasion pass without expressing his reluctance at parting with it, and his appreciation of the service it has ren- dered.
Among the earliest, if not the first, to take the field, it served its original term with credit and distinction. With unremitting patriotism, since the necessity of the country still called for brave hearts and strong arms, it again offered itself. Its second term has been served almost exclusively with this command. Its record is
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