USA > Maine > Maine; a history, Volume II > Part 20
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One of Maine's best officers fell in the battle. In the morning of the second day, Major-General Berry was brought down by a Confederate sharpshooter, a victim to his courage and carefulness. He had insisted on doing a dangerous bit of work himself, instead of turning it over to a staff officer. Another Maine general met the greatest disaster of his career. Gen. Oliver O. Howard commanded the Eleventh Corps, which was taken in reverse and routed by Stonewall Jackson. How far he was responsible for the catastrophe is a much disputed question. Perhaps the fairest ver- dict would be that proper attention was not paid at Howard's headquar- ters to repeated warnings, that the enemy was threatening the flank, and that General Howard must bear part of the blame, but that the most important information arrived during his absence. A thorough discussion of the matter may be found in Hamlin's "The Battle of Chancellorsville" and Bigelow's "The Campaign of Chancellorsville."
While Lee and Jackson were defeating Hooker at Chancellorsville, Sedgwick with the Sixth Corps was fighting a second battle of Fredericks-
"Bigelow, "Campaign of Chancellorsville," 360, 370.
'Whitman and True, "Maine in the War," 412.
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burg. Marye's Heights, from which the Union forces had been repulsed with such fearful loss in the previous December, were now stormed. The flag of the Sixth Maine was the first to be planted on the redoubt at the top of the hill. Fox says: "The regiment was then in the famous Light Division of the Sixth Corps, and did not fire a shot during the charge, but carried the works with the bayonet; and mention is made of one man in the Sixth, who bayoneted two adversaries, and then brained a third with the butt of a musket. The loss of the regiment in that battle was 23 killed, 11I wounded, and 35 missing. Major Haycock and four captains were killed."5
The day after the capture of the heights, the Confederates were rein- forced. Fredericksburg was retaken and Sedgwick nearly surrounded, but he held out till night and then escaped across the river. In this battle the Fifth Maine did valuable service and lost a third of the men it took into the fight.
Hooker, instead of keeping his cavalry with him, had sent most of it off on an unwise and ill-executed raid. The fault, however, was with the commanders rather than the men. The First Maine Cavalry took part in this expedition and showed courage and resource. In the Gettysburg campaign which followed, the regiment greatly distinguished itself. When Lee began his march northward to invade Pennsylvania, the cavalry of the two armies were used by the respective commanders to cover their own movements and to find out those of the enemy. There were four battles, the First Maine was actively engaged in all, and in two may be said to have saved the day.
In the battle of Gettysburg, Maine took a greater part than in any other first-class battle of the war. She had on the field ten infantry regi- ments, a company of sharpshooters, one cavalry regiment and three bat- teries. It will be remembered Meade had not planned to fight at Gettys- burg, that only two of the Union corps were seriously engaged on the first day, and that they were finally driven back with great loss. The only Maine regiment in these corps was the Sixteenth. When the retreat was ordered, the division commander directed the regiment to hold a hill at any cost. The order was bravely obeyed, but prolonged resistance was impossible; the enemy pressed too closely to permit of escape, and the regiment was practically annihilated. Fox says: "Of the 248 officers and men engaged, . the casualties amounted to 9 killed, 59 wounded, and 164 captured. At the close of the fight, 2 officers and 15 men alone remained ;" Colonel Tilden was taken prisoner with his men. Many of the wounded died and nearly all the amputations proved fatal."
The Second Maine Battery, Captain Hall, also rendered good service.
"Fox, "Regimental Losses," 128.
"These figures are for the whole battle. It will be noted that, according to the losses as given by Fox, only 16, not 17, men should have been present for duty.
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In the second day's battle many Maine troops were engaged. The hill of Little Round Top, on the extreme left of the Union line, had been occupied only as a signal station. The Confederates moved to capture it, and had they done so the Union army would have been subjected to an enfilading fire which no troops could withstand. At the last moment Vin- cent's brigade occupied the hill." One of its regiments was the Twentieth Maine, Colonel Chamberlain. It protected the flank of the brigade and had a very sharp contest with two Alabama regiments. The lines swayed back and forth for some time, but the enemy finally gave way. In 1893 Con- gress voted General Chamberlain a medal of honor for the "daring heroism and great tenacity" displayed by him."
A little to the right of Round Top, the Third Maine, Colonel Lakeman, highly distinguished itself. General Sickles had placed his corps forward of the Union line. It was necessary to discover the position of the Con- federates. Sickles sent a hundred sharpshooters and the Third Maine, only two hundred and ten strong, to reconnoiter. This was done most brilliantly. Colonel Fox says: "The regiment made an advance outside the lines which developed the enemy's position and elicited timely warning of the attack on Sickles' corps. The tenacity with which the Third Maine held that skirmish line at Gettysburg is worthy of note." General Sickles is reported to have declared that "the little Third Maine saved the army today." Messrs. Whitman and True state in their history that the com- mander of the brigade said to Colonel Lakeman: "Colonel, I had to send three times to you before I could get your regiment to retire. I believe you intended to stop there all day ; they did nobly, sir, and your officers and men are deserving of unbounded praise." Whitman and True say: "Had it not been for the masterly manner in which the officers executed Colonel Lakeman's commands in that trying position, as well as the random firing of the enemy, the regiment would have been annihilated." As it was, it lost over a fifth of its men. On its withdrawal to the main body the Third was stationed in the famous Peach Orchard and won its full share of glory in the courageous though unsuccessful defense of that position. The total loss of the regiment at Gettysburg, incurred almost entirely during the first two days, was 30 killed, 47 wounded, 45 missing, or about 58 per cent. of the number engaged.
The Fourth Maine also did excellent work and suffered heavy loss. The lieutenant-colonel was absent, Colonel Walker and Major Whitman were both wounded, the latter fatally. The Seventeenth was likewise desperately engaged, losing more than one-third of its number killed and wounded. Of the Nineteenth, Colonel Fox says: "Under command of Colonel Heath the regiment was conspicuously engaged at Gettysburg, where it suffered a feu d'enfer, that cost it 29 killed, 166 wounded, and 4
'It was later reinforced by Weed's brigade.
'Norton, "Attack and Defense of Little Round Top."
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missing ; a total of 199 out of 440 present, all told." Unlike the regiments just mentioned, the Nineteenth was not engaged until late in the afternoon, when it interposed between Humphries' division and the enemy, and led a gallant charge which prevented the Confederates from piercing the Union line and perhaps from reaching the Taneytown road.
A little earlier a Maine officer and a Maine battery had helped render a like service. After the breaking of the Third Corps, a fatal gap had been left in the Union line. This was perceived by Lieutenant-Colonel Mc- Gilvery, the titular commander of the Maine "regiment" of light artillery. The batteries, however, did not fight as a regiment, and the field officers were assigned to other positions. Colonel McGilvery was then command- ing the first brigade of the artillery reserve. Perceiving the danger, he sacrificed the Ninth Massachusetts battery to check the Confederates, while with extraordinary effort he got together a line of guns to hold the gap. Among the forces thus summoned was the Sixth Maine Battery, Dow's. When the fight was ended by the arrival at the last moment of infantry supports, every battery or part of a battery in the line had withdrawn or been captured except the Sixth Maine and two guns of the Fifth Massa- chusetts.
The Maine troops took little part in the battle of the third day, but when a portion of Pickett's division broke into the line at Cemetery Hill, the Nineteenth Maine was one of the regiments rushed up to meet them. General Gibbon was wounded in its ranks while leading the regiment and the Twentieth Massachusetts to the rescue.
The Nineteenth Maine hastened to the right and joined the troops in front of Pickett's men. The historian of the Nineteenth says:
"Several regiments from our own brigade and that of Colonel Hall hurried to Webb's assistance, and without much organization, were massed, many deep, around the hapless Confederates who had penetrated our lines. For ten or fifteen minutes the contending forces, in some places within rifle length of each other and in other places hopelessly mingled, fought with desperation. Those in front used the butt ends of their rifles, and those in the rear of the crowd of Union soldiers fired over the heads of those in front, and some of them hurled stones at the heads of the Confederates. The ground was covered with men dead, and men wounded and bleeding. In swift succession the Confederate flags went down and the men who had crossed the wall, despairing of success, threw up their hands in token of surrender.""
Some regiments which were held in reserve, and so took no part in the battle, did splendid marching to reach the field. The Fifth Maine is said to have marched thirty-six miles in seventeen hours, without even stopping to make coffee.
The campaign following Gettysburg was one rather of manœuvering than battle, but some minor engagements were hard fought. In one of
'Smith, "History of the Nineteenth Maine Regiment," 82-83.
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these, that of Rappahannock Station, Maine troops greatly distinguished themselves. General Lee had fallen back behind the Rappahannock, but had left a detachment protected by strong fieldworks on the north side of the river at Rappahannock Station. It was determined to capture the place, and by a clever ruse Gen. A. D. Russell brought the Sixth Maine and Fifth Wisconsin near to the enemy's works without their being discovered. He then gave the order to storm, which was most gallantly carried out. Fox says :
"There was no more brilliant action in the war than the affair at Rappahannock Station. The Sixth Maine was the most prominent in that successful fight, although gallantly assisted by the other regiments of the brigade." The enemy, about 2,000 strong, occupied an entrenched position ; the Sixth Maine, with uncapped muskets, supported by the Fifth Wiscon- sin, stormed their works, and, springing over them, were engaged in a des- perate strugle, some of the fighting being hand to hand; bayonets were freely used; and in one case an officer thrust his saber through an antag- onist. Good fighting was also done at other points of the line, the total result being a brilliant victory, with large captures of men and material. But the brunt of the fight fell on the Sixth. It lost 38 killed and IOI wounded, out of the 321 present in action; and of 21 officers engaged, 16 were killed or wounded."
In a note to his sketch of the Sixth Corps, Fox says: "At Rappahan- nock Station, Captain Furlong of the Sixth Maine leaped over the enemy's works, and after employing his revolver, fought with a clubbed musket, swinging it round his head until he fell dead. After the battle his body was found among a pile of dead, several of whom had been killed by the blows of a musket stock."
While many Maine regiments and batteries were fighting in the armies of the Potomac and the Shenandoah, others were engaged on the Southern coast and the lower Mississippi. The Eighth Regiment did excellent work in the siege of Fort Pulaski at the mouth of the river, and was honored by having its flag chosen as the first to be hoisted over the fort after it had surrendered. The Ninth Regiment served with distinction on Morris Island and took part in both the assaults on Fort Wagner. Its losses dur- ing these attacks and in the siege operations were severe. A detachment from the Eleventh assisted in serving the siege cannon and mortars and manned the famous "Swamp Angel" which bombarded the city of Charles- ton itself.
Eleven infantry regiments, five of which were enlisted for nine months only, served in Louisiana. The Fourteenth took a very prominent part in the battle of Baton Rouge, and suffered the greatest loss of any regiment except one. Seven regiments and one battery accompanied Banks in his Port Hudson expedition, and shared in one or both of the bloody and ill-
10The Fifth Maine also took a prominent part in the affair.
ME .- 31
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advised assaults on that place. Near the close of the siege, volunteers were called for for a storming column or forlorn hope. The force was divided into two battalions, one of which was commanded by Colonel Bicknell, of the Fourteenth Maine, but while the men were being given a special train- ing as stormers, Vicksburg fell, and Port Hudson at once surrendered.
During the siege the Confederate general, Dick Taylor, made a well- managed attack on the Union posts in Louisiana. On June 27 two bri- gades and a battery appeared before Donaldson, a town on the Mississippi between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. There was a square redoubt between a bayou and the river. "The parapet was high and thick, like the levees, and was surrounded by a deep ditch, the flanks on the bayou and the river being further protected by stout stockades extending from the levees to the water, at ordinary stages. The work was held by a mixed force of 180 men, comprising two small companies of the Twenty-eighth Maine-F, Captain Edward B. Neal, and G, Captain Augustine Thompson- besides a number of convalescents of various regiments. Major Joseph D. Bullen of the Twenty-eighth was in command. The garrison numbered 180 men, the attacking force some 1,300 to 1,500. The fort, however, was sup- ported by a powerful gunboat. In the early morning of the 28th the Con- federates charged. The water was low, and the enemy on one side at least was able to pass around the stockade. "The assault was made in the most determined manner. Shannon, with the Fifth Texas, passed some of his men around the end of the river stockade, others climbed and helped one another over, some tried to cut it down with axes, many fired through the loopholes, Phillips made a circuit of the fort and tried the bayou stockade, while Herbert, Seventh Texas, attempted to cross the ditch on the land side. The fight at the stockade was desperate in the extreme; those who succeeded in surmounting or turning this barrier found an impassable obstacle in the ditch, whose existence, strange to say, they had not even suspected. Here the combatants fought hand to hand; even the sick who had barely strength to walk from the rampart took part in the defense. The Texans assailed the defenders with brickbats; these the Maine men threw back on the heads of the Texans ; on both sides numbers were thus injured."
At about four the attack lost most of its vigor, and a half an hour later the fighting ceased. The Confederate loss had been very heavy. The defenders reported 8 killed and 13 wounded. A little later the garrison suffered a severe loss, though not at the enemy's hands. Irwin says in his "History of the Nineteenth Corps"": "On the 5th of July Bullen, the hero of this heroic defence, whose name deserves to live in the memory of all that love a sturdy man, a stout heart, a steady mind, or a brave deed, was murdered by a tipsy mutineer of the relieving force."
In the autumn the Thirteenth and Fifteenth Maine did good service in an expedition to Texas. Four Maine regiments were in the unfortunate
"Irwin, "Nineteenth Corps," 242-247.
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Red River expedition. The army encountered the Confederates when it was strung out on a narrow road, with considerable distance between its divisions, and the Thirteenth Corps was driven back in great confusion, but reinforcements were hurried forward and the enemy repulsed. The Maine regiments took part in the rescue, the work of the Twenty-ninth and the Thirteenth being especially important and honorable. Although the enemy had been stopped, a council of war decided that evening to retreat, and the Twenty-ninth Maine was chosen to act as a rear guard, an honor that the regiment (which had been looked down on by those of longer service) greatly appreciated. Next day the Maine regiments took part in the battle of Pleasant Hill, the Thirtieth suffering heavily. After the bat- tle, though a victory, the retreat was continued. At Alexandria the Maine regiments, which contained many lumbermen, did good work in obtaining timber for Colonel Bailey's famous dam which increased the depth of the Red river and so enabled the gunboats to escape. Shortly after the close of the expedition, several Maine regiments were transferred to Virginia. They nobly did their duty in the desperate, bloody and unsuccessful attacks which marked the progress of the Union army from Washington to Peters- burg and in the battles of the "siege" of Petersburg, when Grant was attempting to extend his lines and cut the enemy's communications. These conflicts much resembled each other. A description of them would be like a tale many times repeated, and is not necessary in a general history of the State. But some account should be given of four particularly courageous attacks by Maine troops.
On May 19, Grant was preparing to flank Lee out of his position at Spottsylvania, when Ewell seized the Fredericksburg road, the main line of communication with the army's base. A division of foot artillerists con- sisting of the First Maine and the Seventh New York had been posted nearby, under General Tyler. Swinton says: "Tyler promptly met this attack and succeeded in driving the enemy from the road and into the woods beyond. The foot artillerists had not before been in battle, but it was found that once under fire, they displayed an audacity surpassing even the old troops. In these murderous wood-fights, the veterans had learned to employ all the Indian devices that afford shelter to the person; but these green battalions, unused to this kind of craft, pushed boldly on, firing furi- ously. Their loss was heavy, but the honor of the enemy's repulse belongs to them." The loss was indeed heavy, the First Maine had 82 killed and 394 wounded.
Two specially heroic charges were made at Spottsylvania. The first was under the direction of Emery Upton, who had so distinguished himself at Rappahannock Station. The ground to be traversed was carefully examined by the division commander, General Russell, by Upton, and by the colonels of the twelve regiments who had been selected for the storm- ing party. Among those chosen were the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Maine.
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The formation of the ground permitted the attacking party to be massed out of sight of the enemy. At the signal for attack the troops rushed forth with a cheer, crossed the intervening space and mounted the parapet. But the Confederates did not flinch. Colonel Upton said in his report :
"The enemy, sitting in their pits, with pieces upright, loaded and with bayonets fixed, ready to impale the first who should leap over, absolutely refused to yield the ground. The first of our men who tried to surmount the works, fell, pierced through the head with musket balls; others, seeing the fate of their comrades, held their pieces at arm's length and fired down- ward, while others, poising their pieces vertically, hurled them down upon their enemies, pinning them to the ground. The struggle lasted but a few seconds. Numbers prevailed, and, like a resistless wave, the column poured over the works, quickly putting hors de combat those who resisted and sending to the rear those who surrendered."""
The Union troops pressed on, carried the second line and had made an opening for the division that was to come to their support, but they failed to arrive, and it was necessary to abandon the captured works.
Two days later, the Fifth Maine, with the rest of Upton's brigade, took part in the fight at the salient commonly known as the Bloody Angle. Captain Lamont of this regiment, the only one of seven captains who escaped in the assault of the Ioth, was among the killed. He was the vic- tim of treachery. A white flag had been displayed on the enemy's breast- works and the Fifth and other troops, advancing to take possession, were met by a terrible fire and obliged to retreat in all haste.
In June, Grant attempted to hold Lee in his front while a portion of the army surprised Petersburg, which was almost ungarrisoned. But there was a fatal delay, the responsibility of which has been much debated. Petersburg was reinforced and its defenses strengthened. A storm was now almost if not quite impossible, but General Meade, undiscouraged by several repulses, determined on another effort and sent peremptory orders "to attack at all hazards." The attempt was made and was everywhere repulsed. In this attack the First Maine Heavy Artillery made a famous charge. Its division commander, General Mott, "determined," says General Walker, "to try what virtue there might be in the enthusiasm of a new, fresh, strong regiment, not yet discouraged by failures," selected the First Maine to lead the attack. There was a brief desperate rush, shorter and more bloody than that at Balaklava, and all was over in fifteen minutes at most. Nine hundred and fifty men left the Union lines. Two hundred and eighteen came back. One hundred and fifteen had been killed, 489 wounded, there were 28 missing, most if not all of whom were dead or wounded. The loss exceeded that of any Union regiment in any battle, but it is fair to state that there are nine regiments with a higher percentage of loss.
Mention should also be made of the activity and courage shown by
"Michie, "Upton," 98.
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the First Maine Cavalry during the same campaign. Fox says: "At St. Mary's Church, Virginia, the First Maine made a desperate fight against great odds, losing 10 officers and 56 men, killed, wounded, and missing, out of 260 who were engaged."
Several Maine organizations served in the Valley of the Shenandoah during the fall of 1864. The First Maine Battery and the Twenty-ninth Maine Infantry particularly distinguished themselves at Cedar Creek.
A new regiment had been formed of the soldiers of the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Maine that remained in service, and was called the First Maine Veteran Infantry. When Wright's corps stormed the Petersburg entrenchments, the brigade which formed the tip of the wedge that pierced the enemy's line was commanded by Colonel Thomas W. Hyde, and among the regiments forming it was his own, the First Maine Veteran. Hyde says in his little book of reminiscences: "When we reached Hatcher's Run, Captain Merrill, of the Ist Maine, with 14 men, crossed it on fallen trees, and captured and brought back 79 men, the sharpshooters of Heth's division. This shows how a night attack had demoralized our gallant foe." A little later the whole division was annoyed and then repulsed by a battery directed by an elderly officer on a gray horse. The division was formed for another charge, and meanwhile Hyde sent Lieutenant Nichols of the First Maine with fifty men to get round the hill and shoot the battery horses. The next charge was successful and the battery was taken. General Hyde says :
"I asked a mortally wounded artillery officer, who was propped up against a limber, what battery it was. 'Captain Williams, of Pogue's North Carolina battalion,' said he. 'And who was the officer on the gray horse?' I continued. 'Gen. Robert E. Lee, sir, and he was the last man to leave these guns,' replied he, almost exhausted by the effort. What a prize we had missed !- this gallant old man, struggling like a Titan against defeat. He had ordered his battery commander to die there, and had done all one brave man could do to save his fortunes from the wreck. They told us the house had been his headquarters during the siege of Petersburg. In a Confederate 'Life of General Lee' I have seen this incident mentioned, but the account says he saved the battery."
The Eighth, Eleventh and Thirty-first Maine also did excellent work in the storming of Petersburg, and the Eighth and Eleventh rendered good service and suffered considerable loss in the pursuit of Lee, as did the First Maine Heavy Artillery. The Nineteenth saved an all-important bridge which the Confederates had almost succeeded in burning.
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