USA > Maine > The story of one regiment; the Eleventh Maine infantry volunteers in the war of the rebellion > Part 16
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47
The weather steadily improved, without much rain, until April 4th, when there was a high tide and a strong sea. Maxfield notes, from Black Island : " Tide very high ; I passed over the regimental parade ground in a boat at high tide." Of this same flood New- comb notes in Fort Wagner : " A very high wind and heavy rain. A part of the stockade is washed away. A terrible sight outside the fort. More remains have been disinterred than by any pre- 11
T
162
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
vious storm." He writes, April 7th : "The effect of the great storm is made disagreeably evident by the odor that arises from the uncovered bodies."
A large number of men had been killed and buried around Wagner. The high tides and the storms that came in with winter had washed many bodies from their graves in the shifting sand before this. Newcomb noted, December 12th : " In going to the front in the morning we had to wait at several places for the water to retire, and then rush across before the next wave came booming in. Morris Island from the Beacon House to Gregg was but a series of small islands. The stockade in front of Wagner is washed away, together with the exterior slope of the parapet. Many bodies were washed out of their graves. I saw two skulls rolling in the surf, and while returning to camp saw three or four bodies lying between Wagner and Chatfield."
One of the difficulties of getting water in Wagner and Chatfield was the trouble we had in sinking our wells (a barrel thrust its length into the sand) without piercing a grave. And it can be imagined that the water was none of the best, what with its brackishness-it was but sea-water filtered through sand-and the contiguity of the decomposing bodies.
The companies garrisoning Wagner were engaged in desultory battery work, in firing into Charleston, and in making counter demonstrations to those of the enemy, who were inclined to show a bold front with limited numbers, especially while depleting their small force to strengthen that of General Finegan in Florida, when General Seymour made his ill-starred expedition into the interior of that State, an expedition that came to a disastrous end at Olustee on the 20th of February, where he was routed by the force of General Finegan, with a loss of 193 killed. 1,175 wounded, and 460 missing, losing five guns. The total Con- federate loss reported by General Finegan was 93 killed and 841 wounded.
During the period of time occupied by the operations in Florida, General Beauregard visited us with fierce night bombardments. One of these, the one mentioned in Maxfield's diary, and the most notable one of the winter, is graphically described by New- comb in his diary : "February 12th .- Last night I sat in the mess tent writing until a late hour. I had been asleep but a short time when I was awakened by a heavy cannonading in the direc-
163
A WINTER ON THE SOUTH CAROLINA COAST.
tion of Secessionville. I had scarcely got out of the tent when the rebels opened from Moultrie, Simpkins, and Johnson. The guards were all turned out, and the gun detachments sent to their posts. Several shells burst near the fort, two bursting over it, a few pieces falling inside. Five companies of the Ninth Maine came from the old Eleventh Maine camp ground, where the Ninth now is, and were stationed along the banquette. One shell from Simpkins came near pitching into the tent in which Captain Baldwin lay confined with rheumatism. The bombard- ment lasted for three or four hours. A comical incident of it was that the sutler, whose shop is outside the fort, got so frightened that he ran away down the beach until stopped by the guards at the Beacon House. His hat fell off in his flight, but he was too scared to stop and pick it up, so when he came back to the fort at daylight he had his handkerchief tied on his head, presenting a most ridiculous appearance."
The object of this particular bombardment was to force the withdrawal of the Union troops that had recently landed on John's Island, as if intending to take advantage of the known necessity of the Confederates to send all possible reenforcements to Florida. So serious did this Federal movement appear to General Beauregard, who knew the weakness of his line better than did anybody else, that he held back most of Colquitt's bri- gade, already en route for Florida. The following paragraph from Beauregard's report to the Confederate War Department, made in March, 1864, tells the story : " On the night of the 11th ultimo [ February, 1864] I ordered all the batteries bearing on Morris Island to open a heavy simultaneous fire on that position as if a cover for an assault, and with the hope of forcing the enemy to withdraw from John's Island to the protection of his own works. This stratagem seems to have produced the desired effect. or assisted to make him abandon the movement on John's Island and withdraw hastily before daybreak, thus releasing and enabling Colquitt's command to reach General Finegan in time to meet and defeat the enemy at Ocean Pond [Olustee]."
The garrison in Wagner was commanded by Captain Strahan, of Company I, Third Rhode Island Heavy Artillery. His com- pany made part of the garrison. We camped in tents pitched in as sheltered positions of the esplanade as we could find. But we had some unpleasant experiences, as may be imagined by these
1
164
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
bits from Newcomb's diary : " About four o'clock in the after- noon, as Captain Baldwin and myself were sitting in our tent taking turns in reading Dickens's ' Old Curiosity Shop' aloud, we were interrupted by the screech of a 200-pound shell from Battery Beauregard. It buried itself in the counterscarp and exploded, a piece passing through one of our teuts." And another day : " About half-past three in the afternoon a mortar shell from Moultrie went over the fort. Four others came afterwards, the pieces from two falling into the fort."
We had many such experiences, and several narrow escapes. We did not care so much for the rebel guns of direct fire, for their shrick and the explosion of the percussion shell came so near together as to make but a few moments of intense excitement. But the mortar shells ! Their deliberation, and their coming down from on high, making nearly all cover, except that of a bomb-proof, a mockery, made them dreaded visitors, and the more you saw of them the less you liked them. You are never likely to forget the moments spent in company with a hissing mortar shell. One comes whistling down with blazing fuse and crashes into the ground within a few feet of you, compelling you to throw yourself flat on your face and wait for its explosion. Strange speculations run through your mind during the awful moment of suspense, while the hissing fuze warns you that the shell is "alive "-is really going to explode. Then comes the roar and crash of the explosion, the moment of thankfulness that you are yet unstruck except by a shower of saud. This is followed by a few moments of breathless waiting until you can be sure that the flying pieces have buried themselves in the ground around you. Then you leap to your feet and laugh with a real joy, and try to make yourself believe that you were not anything like as horribly seared as you know in your heart you really were.
We must not forget one of the most exciting incidents of our sojourn in Wagner, that of the destruction of the blockade-runner that went ashore under the guns of Moultrie, the night of Febru- ary 2d. The blockade-runners stolo through the blockading fleet on dark night, and, steaming into the channel, would take their course from a bright light kept burning in the steeple of St. Michael's Church, a most prominent object in the foreground of Charleston, and which, by the way, we made our target when firing into the city. Getting this light within range of one
1
165
A WINTER ON THE SOUTH CAROLINA COAST.
burning on Sumter, they could usually keep the channel and glide safely into the harbor. But this night was a very foggy one, and this runner could not make the lights, so went fast aground. Just after daybreak a sentry called the attention of the sergeant of the guard to a patch of harder color in the soft atmospheric gray of the fog bank that lay between us and Sulli- van's Island. A hasty inspection convinced us that a blockade- runner was fast ashore under Moultrie. The alarm was quickly given, and in a few minutes a 100-pound shell was whirling through the fog at the grounded steamer, the powerful impact of the shell boring a gigantic tunnel through the fog bank, through which we could see the lead-colored vessel, with hundreds of men swarming in and out of it, engaged in a desperate attempt to unload freight before the Yankees should discover her presence. There was a wild scattering at the sound of the coming shell, the runner was left to serve us as a target, and, assisted by an emula- tive monitor or two, we threw shell after shell until the boat was a wreck.
The diaries tell nothing now of life on Black Island and in Wagner during the remaining weeks of the companies' stay in the Department of the South. For some time rumors that the vet- eran troops of the Department were to be sent to Virginia bad been prevalent, and on the 13th of April orders were received to be ready to march at an hour's notice.
On the morning of the 19th of April, between twelve and one o'clock, the companies on Black Island were relieved by com- panies of the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts, and the same night the companies of the regiment in Waguer were relieved by companies of the Fifty-second Pennsylvania. By daylight the companies ou Black Island had been transferred in boats to Folly Island. Dur- ing the day, Companies Band D from Wagner, and squads that had been on detached service here and there, rejoined the regi- ment. Later in the afternoon the reunited regiment marched to Pawnee Landing, and went on board the steamer Cosmopolitan with the Ninth Maine. We were soon at sea, arriving at Hilton Head the next morning. The regiment went ashore and camped in a newly built storage warehouse, remaining there until the evening of the 21st, when it reembarked on board the Cosmopoli- tun, again with the Ninth Maine.
In the evening of April 23d, after a pleasant passage of forty-
166
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
eight hours, the Cosmopolitan steamed into Hampton Roads. It proceeded to Yorktown that night, and, anchoring off the bar until daylight, when it went into the river, touched at Yorktown, then crossed to Gloucester Point, where the regiments were landed, the Eleventh going into camp about a mile from the landing, and within sight of the camp ground it marched from to take ship for the Department of the South, fifteen months before.
CHAPTER XVIII.
YORKTOWN AND GLOUCESTER POINT.
Recollection and a Comparison -- The Army of the James -- The "Iron " Brigade-The "Veterans " Return with One Hundred and Seventy- six Recruits-The Plan of Campaign-Preparations Completed -- We Embark and Sail for Bermuda Hundred-Organization of the Regi- ment at This Time.
Ir is my recollection that Yorktown had not improved since we last saw it. It certainly bad not in Newcomb's opinion, for his diary tells us this : " Yorktown has not improved much. The only improvement I can see is that half its buildings have been burned down. The same hay bales, apparently, are piled on the wharves ; the same bags of cats, yes, and there, just where we left them, are the same old canal boats that sank at Harrison's Land- ing, to the spoiling of our knapsacks. And the earthworks are in a state of neglect ; they do not look like the trim ones we left on Morris Island."
The plains below the town, where the camps of the old Naglee brigade had been, as were the plains at Gloucester Point, were now white with the tents of the newly organized Army of the James, an army consisting, officers and men, of 31,872 infantry, 2,126 artillery with eighty-two guns, and of 2, 181 cavalry, attached to which was a six-gun battery. There was also a colored cavalry " brigade " of some 1,800 officers and men. Major-General Benja- min F. Butler commanded this army, which was divided into two corps : the Tenth. composed of troops drawn from South Caro- lina, and commanded by Major-General Quincy A. Gillmore, and the Eighteenth, commanded by Major-General William F. (Baldy) Smith. This was the same General Smith that commanded a division of the old Fourth Corps in the opening of the Peninsula campaign.
The Tenth Corps was divided into three divisions, commanded respectively by Generals Terry, Turner, and Ames; the Eigh- teenth, of three divisions, commanded respectively by Generals Brooks, Weitzel, and Hinks. Hinks's division was made up of
168
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
colored troops: Our regiment was in the Third Brigade of Terry's division, with Colonel Plaisted as brigade commander. The other regiments of the brigade were the Twenty-fourth Mas- sachusetts, the Tenth Connecticut, and the One Hundredth New York.
Chaplain Henry Clay Trumbull, of the Tenth Connecticut, writes of this brigade formation in " The Knightly Soldier," a memorial of gallant Major Camp, of the Tenth, killed in an assault on the rebel works near the Darbytown Road, October 13, 1864. The Chaplain says : " The Twenty-fourth Massachusetts and the Tenth Connecticut had been friends in all their campaign- ing. The One Hundredth New York had been brigaded with both in South Carolina. The Eleventh Maine, although more recently with them, soon became a general favorite, and that and the Tenth were almost as oue regiment."
The Hundredth New York was with us in the old Naglee brigade, joining us at Carver Barracks, to part from us at St. Helena Island ; now reuniting to remain with us until it was mustered ont in the fall of 1865. The Twenty-fourth Massachu- setts we soon learned to respect as a brave, reliable, and effective regiment. The Tenth Connecticut chance threw us into comrade- ship with, now having it for our reserve, now supporting it, and it is to the credit of both regiments that a feeling of confidence sprang up in cach regiment for the other, so that cach felt safer when on the front line in knowing that the other was supporting it, for then the exposed regiment well knew that in its support it had a bulwark to fall behind in case of need. The Tenth Cou- necticut never failed us. None of us engaged that day will ever forget the 18th of August, 1864, when, but for the prompt action of the Tenth in rushing forward from a position on reserve and closing the gap between our right and the left of the Twenty- fourth Massachusetts, made by the rapid retreat of a panic-stricken regiment of our brigade, the rebel wave, already at our abatis, would have poured through the gap, and the career of the " Iron Brigade " would have ended in a bloody rout. And here on the threshold of the bloodiest campaign of the war-in which cam- paign this brigade lost two-thirds of its number in killed, wounded, and prisoners-we will quote the truest words that were ever written of it. They are from the last letter written by " The Knightly Soldier," the letter that barely reached his home before
169
YORKTOWN AND GLOUCESTER POINT.
the telegraph brought the story of his heroic death : "The three New England regiments of our brigade are of as good mnen as ever fought."
On the 27th of April the veterans returned to the regiment, bringing one hundred and seventy-six recruits with them. These recruits made excellent soldiers, throwing themselves into the struggle with a fierce determination, apparently to measure up to the standard of their friends the veterans, who in the weeks they had been camping together on Arlington Heights, while awaiting the coming North of the regiment, had not Jost an opportunity to win the admiration of the new men by telling them the story of their own prowess on the Peninsula and at the siege of Charleston. And so successful were the scholars in emulating their teachers that within a very few weeks the word " recruits" in our regi- ment was only used as a descriptive one ; all " veterans," "sixty- two men," and recruits speedily recognizing the feeling of comradeship that binds brave men together when fighting shoulder to shoulder under the folds of a common flag.
The concentration of troops at Yorktown and Gloucester Point was intended, as it did, to give the Confederate authorities the idea that a second movement by way of the Peninsula was to be made, while really the plan of campaign was, briefly, that, while General Grant and the Army of the Potomac should assail Lee before Richmond, Butler and the Army of the James should invest Richmond on the south side, cut off its communication with North Carolina, and force Lee to divide his army to defend both his front and rear. In short, the two armies were to cooper- ate, and if the one of the Potomac failed in its attempt to break through Lee's lines of defense, and that of the James secured a lodgment on the James River, close to the city, then the two would unite there, and besiege Richmond, with the gunboat- guarded river for a base of supplies.
The organization of the regiment at this time was as follows :
FIELD AND STAFF.
Harris M. Plaisted, Colonel.
Winslow P. Spofford,
Lieutenant-Colonel.
Henry O. Fox. Adjutant.
Wm. II. II. Andrews, Quartermaster.
Nathan F. Blunt, Surgeon.
170
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
Richard L. Cook,
Assistant Surgeon.
Woodman W. Royal,
Assistant Surgeon.
James Wells,
Chaplain.
Albert Maxfield,
Sergeant-Major.
John Williams,
Quartermaster Sergeant
Ellery D. Perkins,
Commissary Sergeant.
George B. Noyes,
Hospital Steward.
Joseph Webb,
Fife Major.
Abner Brooks,
Drum Major.
COMPANY A.
Lewis HI. Holt, First Lieutenant. Charles E. Poor, Second Lieutenant.
Sergeants. William H. H. Frye, First Sergeant ;
James R. Stone, Elias P. Morton, James Andrews.
Robert Doyle,
Corporals.
George A. Bakeman, Sylvester Stone,
William G. Lee, Willard Barker,
Joseph L. Mitchell, John W. Tibbetts,
Charles L. Jordan.
COMPANY B.
Charles P. Baldwin, Captain. Corydon A. Alvord, Jr., First Lieutenant. Frederick T. Mason, Scrond Lieutenant.
Sergeants. Lewis W. Campbell, First Sergeant ;
Charles A. Rolfe, John W. Hayward, Rufus M. Davis.
Samuel Cushing,
Corporals.
Philip HI. Andrews, Nathan Averill.
Nehemiah R. Maker. James L. Potter, Jerome B. Ireland,
Joseph H. Crosby,
William Rushtou.
Alba W. Shorey, Wagoner.
الدماء ٥٣٢
1
--
YORKTOWN AND GLOUCESTER POINT.
COMPANY C.
Edgar A. Nickels, Captain. Lemuel E. Newcomb, First Lieutenant.
Sergeants.
Charles W. Bridgham, First Sergeant ; Edwin J. Miller, James Gross, Asa W. Googing.
Allen M. Cole,
Corporals.
Melville Cole,
William Libby, Adolphus L. Cole, John A. Hammond,
Edward Noyes, Lovell L. Gardiner,
Charles A. Davis, James E. McGinnis.
Benjamin J. Smith, Wagoner.
COMPANY D.
Albert G. Mudgett, Captain. Charles Sellmer, First Lieutenant.
Sergeants.
Abner F. Bassett, First Sergeant ; Judson L. Young, Gardiner E. Blake, Robert Brady, Jr.
Ephraim Francis,
Corporals.
Josiah F. Keene, James E. Bailey, John Dyer, Horace Whittier, Stephen R. Bearce,
Shepard Whittier,
Amaziah Hunter.
William H. Hardison, Wagoner.
COMPANY E.
Francis W. Wiswell, Captain. Stephen B. Foster, Second Lieutenant.
Sergeants.
Adoniram J. Fisher, First Sergeant ; John N. Weymouth, Charles F. Wheeler, George W. Chick, Peter Bunker.
171
172
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
Corporals.
Simon Batchelder, Jr., Elias II. Frost,
Solomon S. Cole, Ira Weymouth,
Franklin W. Rowe, Andrew R. Patten,
Lacassard Lassell, Kenney C. Lowell.
John B. Reed, Wagoner.
COMPANY F.
Samuel G. Sewall, Captain. Archibald Clark, First Lieutenant.
Sergeants. Charles H. Scott, First Sergeant ; L
Grafton Norris, Daniel S. Smith,
James W. Bailey, Clarence C. Frost.
Corporals.
Rufus N. Burgess,
James W. Little,
George S. Buker, Ambrose F. Walsh,
Joseph H. Estes. Ira M. Rollins, Musician. Wendell F. Joy, Wagoner.
COMPANY G.
Francis W. Sabine. Captain. Henry C. Adams, First Lieutenant.
Sergeants. Thomas Clark, First Sergeant :
George Payne, Henry B. Rogers, William Wiley.
Daniel Burgess,
Corporals.
Albert Flye, Thomas T. Tabor,
Josiah L. Bennett, Horace S. Mills,
Thaddeus S. Wing, Horace A. Manley,
Amos W. Briggs. Thomas J. Holmes.
Ambrose P. Phillips, Wagoner.
1
173
YORKTOWN AND GLOUCESTER POINT.
COMPANY H.
Luther Lawrence, Captain. Benjamin F. Dunbar, First Lieutenant. James M. Thompson, Second Lieutenant. Sergeants. Nathan J. Gould, First Sergeant ;
Seth A. Ramsdell, Joseph Harris, William H. Girrell.
Albert L. Rankin,
Corporals.
James Ellis, Augustus T. Thompson,
John Lary, Jr.,
George E. Morrell, John S. Fogg, Charles Bouge, Charles H. Cummings. John E. McKenney, Musician. John E. Gould, Wagoner.
COMPANY I.
Simeon H. Merrill, Captain. William Branden, First Lieutenant.
George B. Weymouth, Second Lieutenant. Sergeants. Charles O. Lamson, First Sergeant ; Joseph S. Butler, Arthur V. Vandine, Charles W. Trott.
David B. Snow,
Corporals.
Weston Brannen, George Gove,
Marshal B. Stone, John A. Monk,
Albion W. Pendexter, Lewis M. Libby,
James W. Moody, Charles G. Warren.
COMPANY K.
Jonathan A. Hill, Captain. Melville M. Folsom, First Lieutenant. Charles II. Foster, Second Lieutenant.
Sergeants. George W. Small, First Sergeant ; Henry HI. Davis, John Howard, Andrew B. Erskine, Charles Knowles.
.
174
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
Corporals.
John J. Hill,
Cyrus E. Bussey,
Josiah Furbish,
Robert H. Scott,
John F. Buzzell, Amos R. Pushaw,
Jotham S. Garnett, Augustus D. Locke.
Joseph G. Ricker, Wagoner.
The preparations for the advance of the Army of the James were pushed rapidly forward. The unarmed men were equipped, the large tents were exchanged for shelter tents, the officers sent their extra baggage north, and the dress coats of the men were packed up to be stored at Norfolk.
On the 3d day of May orders were received to be ready to move the next morning, with two days' cooked rations in the haversacks. We broke camp at sunrise of May 4th, and by noon were em- barked on the steamer Webster. We left for Fortress Monroe about midnight. The regiment numbered, present for duty at this time, 630 officers and men.
On the morning of the 5th of May we moved into the James River and steamed up it in a fleet of transports and gunboats. We left detachments of colored troops at landing points along the river, and arrived before City Point at five o'clock in the afternoon.
It was now just two years since we had started from before Yorktown to follow the retreating Confederate army up the Peninsula.
CHAPTER XIX.
OPERATIONS BEFORE BERMUDA HUNDRED.
The Landing at Bermuda Hundred-Clothing the Roadsides-Foraging- Marching and Countermarching - The Affair at Chester Station - An Expected Attack-The Advance on Drury's Bluff-The Death of Lieutenant Brannen-Heavy Skirmishing-The Battle of Drurs's Bluff-The Retreat-The Eleventh the Last Regiment to Reenter the Bermuda Hundred Works-List of Casualties.
ANCHORING above the mouth of the Appomattox, off Bermuda Hundred, we lay there until towards morning. Bermuda Hundred is a peninsula made by a sweep of the James River to the east, and by its tributary, the Appomattox. It is situated at the mouth of the latter river, on its north bank, City Point lying opposite it on the south bank. Petersburg is twelve miles up the Appomattox, on its south bank, and Richmond twenty miles north of Peters- burg, directly connected by railroad and turnpike.
Towards morning we were roused from sleep, and our companies prepared to land in small boats. Companies K and E were landed, when the Eliza Hancos came alongside, with General Terry on board, who hurried up the disembarkment. The eight remaining companies went on board the Hancoe, and about daylight were landed at a wharf of barges. The regiment marched about half a mile back from the landing, and, halting in a large, clear field, pro- ceeded to prepare breakfast. According to Newcomb's diary, this meal consisted of a piece of pork roasted on a stick, coffee, and hard broad. He was strongly reminded of Peninsula days. About ten o'clock we fell in, and marched about eight miles, then balted to make coffee.
The quantity of clothing thrown away by the men on this march was enormous. They were loaded too heavily. Just think ; the orders given out at Gloucester Point were that, in addition to gun and equipments, canteen, haversack, forty rounds of cartridges in each box and twenty in each knapsack, there should be carried by each man a piece of shelter tent, an overcoat, two pairs of drawers, one pair of trousers, two pairs of shoes, one rubber blanket, one
-
176
THE STORY OF ONE REGIMENT.
woolen blanket, one cap, one blouse, two shirts, three pairs of stockings ; with one clothes brush, one shoe brush, and two boxes of blacking to every four men. Now multiply the extra shoes, drawers, shirts, and stockings, not forgetting the brushes and the boxes of blacking, and not forgetting either that nearly every man had brought from the Department of the South, where there was little marching, at least two blankets-not to mention a thousand little odds and ends-multiply all this by something like 15,000, and you have but a faint idea of the appearance of the roadsides on the line of march of our single corps. As the historian of the Forty-eighth New York says : "Fifty pounds on one's back gets heavy after a few miles of marching, and whenever we halted for rest the men would examine their knapsacks and throw away whatever they could spare, until knapsacks that were full at the start wero well nigh empty." Really, there was enough thrown away that day to well nigh clothe a second corps of the same size as the Tenth.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.