USA > Maine > The story of one regiment; the Eleventh Maine infantry volunteers in the war of the rebellion > Part 24
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That this was one of the most stubborn assaults of the war is shown by its lasting for twenty minutes, during which time General Walker of the Second Corps notes, in his history of that corps, that the fire of musketry was tremendous.
It must be said for the One Hundredth New York that when our artillery opened fire, intending to drop shells along our front. many of the shells fell among the men of that regiment, throwing
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it into confusion, and that many of that regiment, officers and men, stood fast throughout the assault. Adjutant Camp, of the Tenth Connecticut, wrote at the time of this stampede : "There was already some unsteadiness among those who were firing, when our artillery opened from a position some distance in the rear, intending to fire over our heads, but dropping about every shell with horrible precision directly among us. Henry [Chaplain Trumbull] was standing a few yards from me, when one of these exploded in his very face, seemingly but a few inches above and before him, knocking him down, blinded and almost stunned. It was a spherical case. At the same moment another cx- . ploded among the men in front of our regiment. It was more than they could stand. A dozen started for the rear, a hundred followed, then the whole line broke, turned backwards, and surged away from the works, through our line and into the woods. Our boys sprang forward to fill the vacancy as well as the thin line enabled them to, and with cool determination hold the enemy at bay. As they broke, our officers rushed among the fugi- tives, shouted encouragement, entreated, threatened, seized them and flung them back to the front --- all did what they could to turn the tide. We were in some degree successful. A dozen looked on hesitatingly while our major flogged an officer, a six-foot skulker, back to the works with the flat of his sword, and con- cluded to stand there themselves. Indeed, I ought to say that many of this regiment stood fast from the first."
At cight o'clock, General Hancock received an order to send Mott's division back to Petersburg to take the place of the Ninth Corps in the intrenchments, in order that the latter corps, Dow under General Parke, might support Warren in a contemplated movement against the Weldon road. Mott's withdrawal made a. contraction of Hancock's line necessary. Word was passed that we were to retire and that we must do so. very quietly, without noise or gun-rattling ; even the fin cups and plates of the men must be so placed in their haversacks as not to give out the monot- onous clinking that usually tells that a line of troops is on the march. Then, a little later, we stole through the dark woods, moving towards the left, leaving Colonel Plaisted with a thousand men of various commands to cover our movement.
The 19th and 20th of August, we lay in position on the con- tracted line, but were unmolested. An assault was contemplated
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for the 19th, as General Grant thought the enemy had returned one division to Petersburg, and so advised General Hancock to attack if an opportunity offered. But a personal reconnoissance by General Hancock gave so little hope of success that, on report- ing to General Grant by telegraph, word was returned not to attack unless with a chance of surprise, or the prospect of some marked advantage. There was considerable picket firing during the 19th. During the day the following general order was issued to the corps by General Birney :
HEADQUARTERS, TENTH ARMY CORPS, FUSSELL'S MILL, VA., Aug. 19, 1864.
General Order.
The Major-General commanding congratulates the Tenth Corps upon its success. It has on each occasion, when ordered, broken the enemy's strong lines. It has captured, during the short campaign, four siege guns protected by the most formi- dable works, six colors, and many prisoners. It has proved itself worthy of its old Wagner and Sumter renown. Much fatigue, patience, and heroism may yet be demanded of it, but the Major- General commanding is confident of the response.
MAJOR-GENERAL D. B. BIRNEY.
(Signed, ) EDWARD W. SMITH, Lt .- Col. and A. A. G.
On the 20th Hancock was instructed to retire from the north side of the James. . Immediately after dark the two divisions of the Second Corps, with the cavalry and the artillery, began this movement, which was covered by the troops of our corps. It rained all through the night, as it had almost continually since the night of the 18th. During the night of the 20th we followed the retiring Second Corps, and, reaching the redan on Strawberry Plains, our brigade went into bivouac, after throwing out a strong picket line. At daylight of the 21st we were in line again, and, crossing the ponton bridge to the south side of the river, recrossed the river by the upper bridge, marching into our camp ground at Deep Bottom at five o'clock, just the hour of the morning at which, exactly one week before, we opened fire on the Deep Bottom front, initiating a week of hard campaigning.
During the week we had lost 5 officers and 141 men, of whom 2 officers and 46 men had been killed or mortally wounded ; 92 others had been wounded, a large percentage of whom too severely to
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rejoin the regiment. Six had been taken prisoners; of these, 2 only survived their imprisonment.
Small wonder that there was gloom in our camp as we thought of the comrades aud tent-matos that had fallen-our best and bravest, as it seemed to us. And for the few days we yet occupied the Deep Bottom camp-ground the survivors could only, with Sergeant-Major Morton, " wander around the camp, looking for faces never to be seen again."
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CHAPTER XXV.
PETERSBURG.
A Sad March and a Glad Countermarch-A Night March to Petersburg -- We Take Position near Fort Hell-Disappointed Artillerymen -- Under a Continual Fire -- The Death of Bassett-A Brave Soldier-1 Day in a Picket Hole -- Pleasant Fatigue Duty --- Scurvy-Swindling the Surgeon's Cook-Roaring Shotted Salutes and an Incident of One-Major Camp's Description of a Midnight Shotted Salute-Col- onel Plaisted's Narrow Escape-Relieved and Fall Back out of the Line of Fire-Casualties.
THE regiment went on picket at eight o'clock in the evening of August 21st. In the night it was called in, as light-marching orders had been received, and at about one o'clock in the morning the Eleventh, the Tenth Connecticut, and the Twenty-fourth Massachusetts recrossed the ponton bridge and took the road leading towards the Bermuda Hundred front. We had passed over half the distance, when an aid met us with countermanding orders, and we retraced our steps to Deep Bottom, arriving there at daylight.
General Birney had planned to assault the Howlett House Bat- tery position in the early morning, and as a compliment to the valor our brigade had shown in assaulting and carrying works during the preceding weck, it was to be given the head of the assaulting column. Luckily for us, wiser counsel prevailed, and the proposed attack was abandoned, else it is very probable that the history of the Eleventh Maine would end here ; for it is hardly to be supposed that many of its members would have escaped the terrible fire with which the rebels could have met our advance. This every man of us knew, yet there was no disposition shown to draw back ; and had we assaulted the enemy's line, I am not sure but some of us would have succeeded in at least mounting their works. 'Of course, the boys cursed loudly, but Colonel Plaisted, who headed the regiment, was too shrewd to notice the objurgations concerning all in authority. He patiently sought to encourage the men by describing the ground they must charge
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over, ground he had become well acquainted with in reconnoiter- ing the Howlett House front while commanding along it. He felt quite sure that he could lead the column of attack by shel- tered ways, so that it would not be directly under fire until he could get it where a short rush would bring us into the enemy's works. All of which was comforting after a poor fashion ; still, we turned our faces towards Deep Bottom with very much lighter hearts than we bore while marching the other way.
On the 24th of August, Colonel Plaisted turned the command of the regiment over to Captain Merrill, and resumed that of the brigade, General Foster taking command of a division elsewhere. Colonel Plaisted retained command of the brigade until in Novem- ber, when he took home the three years' men who had not reen- listed, and whose three years then expired. He returned from Maine to resume command of the brigade, and, having received his star, held command until he left the service in March, 1865.
On the same day that Captain Merrill assumed command, Au- gust 24th, we received marching orders. We were to make ready to march at a moment's notice.
At five o'clock in the afternoon of the 25th of August we struck tents, and, a heavy shower coming up, we got well soaked for our prematureness. On the 20th, negro troops of Paine's brigade arrived and relieved us, and at half-past four o'clock in the after- noon our brigade started to make a night march to the Peters- burg front, where the Tenth Corps was to relieve the Eighteenth Corps. The night was a dark and rainy one, and the way lay through thick pine woods for some miles. The road was muddy, and patched with puddles of water, lying in the ruts the heavy wagons had worn. The line of march was a broken one, every man straying along as best he could, now stumbling through a pool of water, now running against a tree-trunk. The grumbling and swearing can be imagined. We reached the Appomattox at Point of Rocks about eleven o'clock. By this time tho rain was coming down in torrents. A wagon train was crossing the bridge, so we had to lie down and wait its passage, during which, wet as we were, our tired men lay down on the muddy ground, and napped as best they could. It was one o'clock before we started again. We crossed the bridge in the dark, guided across it by the flashes of lightning that now lit up the scene. The bridge was a long one, the Appomattox here running to wide swampy shores, across
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which the bridge was built from the high ground on each side of the river. After marching a few miles farther, the storm grew to such violence and the roads were in such a terrible condition, that the order came to halt, and shelter ourselves as we best could. All we could do in the open ground we were now in was to crouch down in the mud, and doze it out. The storm rolled away dur- ing the early morning hours, so that the sun rose clear and warm. After making coffee, we were in line and resumed our march. We now marched through a rolling country of cleared plantations, with their abandoned houses and negro quarters. Petersburg was plainly in sight during a portion of the march ; we could see its encircling lines of earthworks, Confederate and Union. In- deed, cverywhere we could see there were earthworks, and frown- ing guns, and camps of soldiers.
After having marched about fifteen miles from Deep Bottom, we reached the outer line of works at a point not far from the Jerusalem Plank road. Here we halted, and then moved up to the works in line of battle, the troops we were relieving marching ont. As we looked over the works, we could see the Confederate works and batteries, not a tree or stump intervening -- just a smooth stretch of cleared grass land. As we were scanning the lines a group of Union artillerymen strolled down, and, seeing that we were new to the position, thought to have a little fun with us. Said one : " This is the most dangerous spot in the whole line of works ; men are killed here by shells every day." " Yes," chimed in a comrade, "the rebel artillery have the dead drop on this place, and can put a shot in here just where they want to." Just then a cloud of smoke rolled out of the rebel battery opposite, and a shell came shrieking across the works, to burst a few rods in our rear. " Jim Island !" sang out one of our Morris Island ex-artil- lerymen ; then, as another shell came bounding over us, " Sulli- van !" yelled another, and then came a shout of laughter as the roguish artillerymen turned to hurry off, one of them saying : " Why, these are some of those damned Charleston fellers." You see, we " Charleston fellers" could not be intimidated by a few shells. We had long since learned that a brigade of artillery, manning guns of the largest caliber, hadn't the killing power possessed by a thin skirmish line, with its deadly rifles.
We made our camp near the Avery House, not far from the point on the front where the mine was exploded in July. Along
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the front of this camp, which was pitched with one wing of the regiment arrayed behind the other-along the front of each wing we built a high breastwork of logs banked with carth, under the lee of which "splinter proofs " our shelter tents were pitched. The officers' quarters, and the cook-houses in the rear of the camp -indeed, all places that were to be occupied by men or animals --- had these high breastworks built before them.
Our routine of duty at Petersburg ran thus : One day of twenty- four hours we would be on the picket line in our front, placed along a run that intersected an exposed field, the enemy's picket line lying on the other side of the run. Here, in the head-high holes some of our predecessors had dug, we shivered through the night and broiled through the day, not daring to lift our heads above our rude earthworks until dark. Firing and observing was done through the rude embrasures the banks of carth before our picket holes were pierced with. When relieved, always at night, and just after dark, we would only fall back into the front line of works (batteries connected by infantry parapets), to remain there forty-eight hours. Then, relieved by in-coming pickets, we would fall back to our camp and remain until morning, the next day being spent on fatigue duty. Then after another twenty-four hours spent in camp we went on picket again, going over the weary round.
All this time, in camp and out of it, we were under fire, the bullets of the enemy ever singing around our cars, whether we were on the picket line, the main one, the reserve one, or in camp. And often in camp, in the night, a sudden commotion would tell that some poor fellow had been severely wounded or perhaps killed, while curling up to his tent-mate under their blankets. We would often be turned out by a furious mortar-shelling to lie in line of battle under a storm of falling iron. But we dreaded the picket line the most, especially the day hours of it, not on account of its danger, for it was a comparatively safe one, all knowing the danger of exposure and conforming to the necessity of keeping closely covered ; but to lic for so many hours under a hot sun in a hole in the ground, with only "hard tack " and greasy boiled pork to cat, and the warm water of our (the night before filled) canteens to drink was very disagreeable. Then the certainty that a rush of the enemy nwant death or imprisonment for all pickets on the line of attack was not a quieting one.
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PETERSBURG.
It was on this picket line that First Sergeant Bassett, of D Com- pany, was killed the night of the 15th of September. It was a bright moonlight night. We relieved the First Maryland. Our men crept forward, cach squad well informed of its assigned posi- tion, and all suddenly hurried for their positions, getting under cover as speedily as possible, the relieved pickets stealing away for the main line. But some of the relieved pickets moved up the hill somewhat carelessly, their plates and cups clanking noisily and themselves visible in the bright moonlight, so drawing a sharp fire from the enemy's pickets, by which several of the careless fellows were wounded. Sergeant Bassett was to enter the extreme left picket hole to be occupied by our regiment. Lieutenant Maxfield, commanding D, was assisting in placing the line, and was in the picket hole, with Sergeant Bassett running towards it, when the enemy opened fire on the careless Maryland men. Reaching the pit, Sergeant Bassett thoughtlessly stood erect on its edge while saying, "Well, boys, I'm here," then fell forward into the Lieutenant's arms, a bullet having pierced his throat.
Lieutenant Maxfield sent word down the line to the writer of this to make his way to the left and take Sergeant Bassett's place in the pit, and, if possible, have the body removed to the main works. With this object in mind, the Lieutenant moved down the line to his position near the right of the company, and called for a volunteer to go for a stretcher. Private Prince Edward Dunifer, of D, promptly responded, and succeeded in making his way into the main works. But the night was so bright that it was impossible for us to take the body in. Had it been a dark night, or a dasky one, we could easily have sent his body over the works without much risk ; but so light, and with the enemy's pickets in the firing mood they were-for all night long they sent bullets flying at every moving shadow-it would have been suicide to attempt it. We could only lay the body on a rude bed that some one had spaded out of the side of the hole we were cooped in, and wait for morning.
In the early morning, just after daybreak, I consulted with Lieutenant Thomas Clark, whom Lieutenant Maxfield had left in this pit to command the left of our line in case of an attack. He agreed with me that it was most desirable to remove the body, in view of the promise of a terribly hot day, and I determined to make the venture. I asked the men with us if one would make
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the venture with me, preferring a volunteer to a detailed com- panion. All promptly offered to share my chance. I. then selected Private Benjamin F. Dumphey, of Company H, whom I knew to be a cool, steady-nerved man, and told him to remove his belts, while I did the same. I then leaped out of the pit, and stood for a half-minute facing the enemy, numbers of whom arose from behind their works and took a look at me. Seeing me unarmed and unequipped, they refrained from taking a shot at the fair mark I offered. Feeling quite sure now that those in front would not shoot me without giving fair warning, and accepting the chance of some diagonally situated sharpshooter potting me, I called to Dumphey to pass along a rubber blanket, which I laid rubber side down on the dew-wet grass ; our friends had not yet succeeded in reaching us with a stretcher. Then Dumphey joined me, and the men in the pit passed the body to us, and we laid it on the blanket, of which each of us immedi- ately took hold of an upper corner, and quickly slid it over the hill to the works, from which a hundred hands were extended to take the body from us. We hurried back to the pit and, with a hasty salute to the watching enemy, leaped into it, each of us drawing our first long breath sinco placing ourselves at the mercy of the enemy.
You may be sure that we thought we had done pretty well, but within a minute our feat was eclipsed. One of our men (I am very sorry I have forgotten his name and company), piqued at not having been selected by me to help take the body to the works, now deliberately volunteered to go for water. We needed water badly, and the day was bound to induce thirst. So, receiving per- mission from Lieutenant Clark to try it, the man gathered our nearly empty canteens, and removing his equipments stepped out of the pit, and, walking with the utmost deliberation and without a glance at the enemy, made his way to the works and climbed over them. In a short time he reappeared, recrossed the works, and made his way to us with the same cool deliberation, and with as careless a demeanor as if he was not risking his life. But the moment he had reentered the pit a bullet came whistling across it to warn us that the truee was up, and from that moment not a finger could be raised above our pit but a bullet came whis- tling at it. And once, just as Private Stephen Mudgett, of D. stepped back from the little porthole we kept up a return fire
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through, a bullet came whizzing through it, just skimming by his ear, to bury itself with angry force in the bank behind him. A half-second sooner, and we would have had a second tragedy in our little pit. We kept up a steady fire, trying to do just that thing-to put a bullet through the porthole of the rebel pit before us. Towards night a commotion among its occupants made us feel sure that we had managed to injure some one of them, at which idea we jubilated to a savage extent that it hardly seems possible such mild-mannered men as we survivors now appear to be could ever have been guilty of.
A sad feature of Bassett's death was the fact that from the date of his enlistment, September 7th, he had served his full · term of three years, and he firmly believed that he ought not to be asked to serve beyond three years from the date he signed the roll. He presented the case to headquarters, but the ruling was that the service was for three years from the date of his muster into the United States service, which was October 19th. In view of the fact that he had spent months in Confederate prisons, and was a brave, active, and intelligent soldier, who perhaps ought to have been considered when commissions were being recommended, he was told that he need not serve at the front for the remainder of his term of service. But he was too proud a man to take advantage of this offer, and insisted on sharing the labors and risks of his comrades.
There were others of the regiment who had enlisted early in the fall, and who by their reckoning were entitled to their dis- charge. These now called themselves "conscripts," but they fought and marched like the veterans they were, their resent- ment in no way cooling their ardor for victory when the onset sounded.
The details for fatigue duty were large, ranging from one hun- dred to two hundred and fifty men, the last number covering about the effective strength of the regiment. The details were under the orders of the Adjutant-General of the division, each brigade furnishing a force for the day from the regiment in camp, so that quite a little army was mustered daily for fatigue pur- poses from our division of three brigades.
The fatigue duty consisted in repairing the destruction to the works made by the enemy's artillery fire, and in cutting logs and hewing them into planks for artillery platforms. The first work
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was very disagreeable, having to be done under the enemy's fire largely ; the last the boys called a "picnic," as it was done in woods some distance in rear of our works, and only to be reached from the rebel works by very long-range guns, so that when on this duty we could walk around freely without fear of " running against a bullet," as the phrase was. So deft were our Eleventh Maine boys with the axe that we could finish the stint set for a squad of a hundred men in two-thirds of the time the same num- ber of men from the other regiments could. But we were too shrewd to let this be known at division headquarters, as Adjutant- General Adrian H. Terry was not remarkable for his sense of justice, and might be inclined to raise our stint. No, we pre- ferred that it should be graded by the lesser axe-handling abili- tios of the other regiments, so that, with the work done, we could lie down under the trees and enjoy ourselves until we could return to camp without question. Once or twice in my experi- ence the rebels shelled the woods we were at work in ; but, on the whole, " cutting timber" was very pleasant fatigue duty.
The health of the regiment had been very good all summer, but now a scarcity of vegetables and fresh meat and a lack of muscle- hardening service brought on dysentery and scurvy. In this con- nection, Doctor Cook tells a story of a shrewd trick men of our regiment played on his cook. As soon as symptoms of the scurvy became manifested the doctor bestirred himself, and by personal solicitation secured from the Sanitary Commission people an allowance of cornstarch. This his cook would make into a sort of soft pudding, to be dealt out to such patients as the doctor should designate. When the sick call sounded and the sick went to the surgeon's tent, and he would want one of them to benefit by the sanitary diet, he would direct Hospital Steward Noyes to give the man a check-a square bit of pasteboard of a peculiar color-and would tell the recipient to call on the cook, who would accept it in return for a stout ration of the cornstarch mixture. It was a good mixture, much appreciated, and the cook soon found that he could hardly supply the demand, although he cooked zealously ; for the good soul was appalled at the constantly growing number of scurvy patients, and was patriotically alive to the necessity of eradicating the terrible disease, until he made his fears known to the Hospital Steward, who assured him that, instead of the number afflicted with scurvy increasing. it was
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