USA > Maine > The story of one regiment; the Eleventh Maine infantry volunteers in the war of the rebellion > Part 8
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" July 7th .- Detailed on fatigue. Went about half a mile from camp and cut trees."
"July 8th .- Did not return to camp until two o'clock in the morning. The regiment was under arms when we reached it."
"July 9th .- Was detailed to bury dead horses and mules killed in mnd sloughs during the retreat. I managed to be set as guard over the stacked guns and so avoided the stink."
"July 15th. - Inspected by Brigadier-General Emory."
"July 18th. - The regiment was ordered into the rifle pits soon after reveille. No enemy in sight. We ascertained that we were to do this same thing every morning -- probably for exercise. Dress parade at 6.30 p.v., as usual."
"July 20th .- Inspection at 9 A.M. Division drill in the after- noon."
" July 21st .-- Detailed on picket. Picketed a creek to watch for boats."
Went about three miles.
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"July 24th,-Detailed to help load teams at the Landing, some five miles below. Loaded seven teams with hard bread, pork, flour, sugar, beans, potatoes, and onions."
". July 25th .-- Regiment detailed in the afternoon as support for the picket line."
"July 28th .-- Brigade review in the forenoon by Generals Peck and Emory. Paid off in the afternoon."
"July 29th .- Company drill in the forenoon, battalion drill in afternoon. Dress parade."
"July 30th .- Division review in the forenoon."
"July 31st .- On picket. Rain. An attack was expected and the gunboats were drawn up in line of battle."
Newcomb's diary for July 13th : " The picket line was just across the creek, bur before the close of the following day it was advanced two and a half miles." Corporal Lary notes for July 20th : " Digging rifle pits," and for July 31st : " Changing rifle pits into breastworks." And Maxfield noted, for the first day of August : " We were turned out and were in line of battle at one o'clock in the morning. The rebels had planted a battery oppo- site the Landing and were shelling it. They were soon silenced by our gunboats. Regimental inspection at 6 P.M."
" August 2d .- Division drill in the forenoon in a large field in front of the fortifications."
Morton had now recovered sufficiently from the effect of his wound to return to the regiment. His diary runs handsomely with Maxfield's and Newcomb's, and as we have occasion we will cull from each.
Morton : " August 3d .- Heard a beautiful sermon by Key. George P. Van Wyck, chaplain of the Fifty-sixth New York."
Maxfield : " Heavy firing northwest of us. We had orders to pack knapsacks and be ready to march at a moment's notice."
At this time Major-General Halleck was General-in-Chief of the Armies of the United States, and Major-General Pope was in command of the armies before Washington. These were just consolidated into " The Army of Virginia."
On the 30th of July General Halleck telegraphed General Mcclellan : "A despatch just received from Pope says that deserters report that the enemy is moving south of the James River, and that the force in Richmond is very small. I suggest he be pressed in that direction so as to ascertain the facts of the
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case"; and telegraphed the 31st : " The enemy is reported to be evacuating Richmond and falling back to Danville and Lynch- burg." These telegrams brought about the reconnaissance in force of Hooker and Sedgwick.
General Hooker and his division, and Pleasanton's cavalry, were ordered to march on the night of August 2d and gain posses- sion of Malvern Hill, but Hooker failed of success on account of "incompetency of guides," it is said. In the night of the 4th Hooker and Sedgwick moved out with their divisions, and in the early morning succeeded in turning Malvern Hill, forcing the occupying enemy out of its defenses.
On the 4th of August General Mcclellan received an order from General Halleck to withdraw the Army of the Potomac to Acquia Creek. General MeClellan seems to have hoped that this order would be rescinded, for he says in his report : "On the 4th (of August) I had received General Halleck's order of the 3d, direct- ing me to withdraw the army to Acquia, and on the same day sent an carnest protest against it. A few hours before General Hooker had informed me that his cavalry pickets reported large bodies of the enemy advancing and driving them in, and that he would probably be attacked at daylight. Under the circumstances I had determined to support him ; but, as I could not get the whole army in position until the next afternoon, I concluded on the receipt of the telegram from the General-in-Chief to withdraw General Hooker." But MeClellan did not give the order until the 6th, and not until after receiving this despatch from Halleck: "It is reported that Jackson is marching north with a very large force."
The Adjutant-General of the Army of Northern Virginia states the situation from a Confederate point of view, and the determina- tion of Lee to change the locality of the struggle.
" Its proximity [ Mcclellan's army] to the Confederate capital, and its unassailable position, the facility with which it could be transferred across the James River for operations on the south side, rendered the situation one of peculiar solicitude, and pre- sented to the Confederate commander the alternative of remaining a passive spectator of his adversary's movements, or of devising a campaign which would compel the withdrawal of the hostile army from its position of constant menace.
" With a just conception of the inordinate fear which possessed the mind of the Federal civil authorities for the safety of their
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capital, he [ Lee] concluded that to threaten that city, either by strategetical maneuvers or by a decisive blow struck at the army in its front, would be the surest way of effecting the removal of McClellan's army from its position on the James River. With this view he sent Jackson in advance with his two divisions, fol- lowed by A. P. Hill, to engage General Pope, intending, as soon as his anticipations of the effect of this movement were realized, to follow promptly with the bulk of his army. In vindication of his sagacity, information was soon received of the. transfer of troops from MeClellan's army on the James to Washington."
August 4th, General Mcclellan telegraphed General Halleck : " This army is now in excellent discipline and condition. . We hold a debouch on both banks of the James River, so that we are free to act in any direction. All points of secondary importance elsewhere should be abandoned and every available man brought here. A decided victory here, and the military strength of the rebellion is crushed. It matters not what partial reverses we may meet with elsewhere, here is the true defense of Washington."
General Halleck answered : "I was advised by high officers. in whose judgment I had great confidence, to make the order (of removal) immediately on my arrival here. The old Army of the Potomac is split in two parts, with the entire force of the enemy between them; they cannot be united by land without being exposed to destruction, and yet they must be united. To send Pope's force by water to the Peninsula is, under present condi- tions, a military impossibility. The only alternative is to remove the force on the Peninsula to some point by water, say Fredericks- burg, where the two armies can be united. If General Pope's army be directed to reinforce you, Washington, Maryland, and Pennsylvania would be exposed."
This brief summing up of the historian of " The Army under Pope " is probably a true story of the situation : " The Govern- ment had lost confidence in General Mcclellan, and the removal of the Army of the Potomac from the Peninsula provided them with a convenient mode of disposing of their superfluous general."
All this is of little consequence to our story, I know, but it seems well to set down a brief statement of the arguments used to justify an abandonment of what time proved to be the true road to Richmond.
A look at the situation seems to show that, had the order for
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withdrawing from the Peninsula been issued a day later than it was, there would have been a second Battle of Malvern Hill ; as there was, a few weeks later, a second one of Manassas, when Pope and his Army of Virginia were snuffed out. And had a second Battle of Malvern Hill been fought, and had the Army of the Potomac been as victorious as it was in the battle of July 1st, it is more than probable that there would not have been a withdrawal from the Peninsula, and that the road of 1864-65 to Richmond would have been followed in 1862. But the order had been issued, and Mcclellan began to prepare to evacuate the Peninsula, too good a soldier to disobey, and risk his fate in a final engagement in which victory would have regained him the confidence of the people of the North, if not the cordial support of the Adminis- tration.
The corps of the army, other than Heintzelman's, moved down the Peninsula by its river roads, crossing the Chickahominy at Barrett's Ferry, near the mouth of the Chickahominy. Heintze)- man's corps swung to the north, crossing the Chickahominy at Jones's Bridge, not far below Long Bridge ; this movement cover- ing the flank of the march of the other corps, while the cavalry commands of Stoneman, Pleasanton, and Averill guarded their rear, and scouted along all the roads by which attacking forces must march. But Lee did not care to barry us. He was well satisfied with Halleck's disposition of our army ; so well satisfied that, assured by his scouting parties on the south bank of the James that the reported evacuation was actually taking place (it only needed a man in a tree with a field glass through which to sean the departing transports to tell that), he marched Longstreet's corps to the Rapidan on the 13th of August, three days before our regiment started from Harrison's Landing, with purpose to unite Longstreet's divisions with those of Jackson and A. P. Hill, both at Gordonsville, and try to defeat Pope before Mcclellan's divi- sions could reenforce the newly organized " Army of Virginia."
The diaries of our friends show that the movement, both in preparation and execution, was a leisurely one, and that it was compassed without adventures. The following extracts from the diaries between August 6th, the day Mcclellan began to act on the order to evacuate, until the 20th, when we reached Yorktown. give what I think will be considered a most interesting view of the movement.
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August 6th -Morton : " On picket ; mosquitoes awful." New- comb : " Reported here that Richmond is evacuated." Maxfield : " A report was circulated at night that the rebels had evacuated Richmond."
August 7th -- Morton : "Saw a quite intelligent old negro. Says the Southerners' rations per week consist of one and a half pecks of corn meal and one and one-half pounds of meat." Newcomb : " Division drill; very hot. Two men of other regiments died immediately after the regiments got into camp, and several others are very sick." He adds, a few days afterwards : " We have heard that no less than nine deaths were caused by that Saturday's drill." Maxfield : " A lieutenant, sergeant, corporal, and twenty men are detailed from our regiment for picket every day."
August Sth-Maxfield : " The whole regiment on picket re- serve."
August 9th -- Morton : " Hot. The flies are so thick that the boys shoot them with cartridges." Maxfield : "Division drill in forenoon."
August 10th -- Morton : " Heard of the affair of Malvern Hill. One brigadier-general drunk. In consequence, lost a chance to bag the whole rebel army." Maxfield : " Divine services at S P.M. At about six o'clock had orders to pack our knapsacks, and to put everything in them except blankets and tents. The knapsacks were placed on teams and taken away."
August 11th-Morton : "Got orders last night to pack knap- sacks to go on transports." Maxfield : " Ascertained that our knapsacks were on board a transport at the Landing. Officers' tents struck in the forenoon."
August 12th-Morton : " Baggage all gone, but we remain." Maxfield : " About noon a body of cavalry was discovered on the opposite bank, and our gunboats opened fire on them, shelling the woods for two or three miles. Their fire was not re- turned. The canal boat our knapsacks were placed on sank, and the knapsacks are now on a schooner in a rather wet condi- tion."
August 13th-Morton : "Great rage for bone jewelry. Dan here from the Landing. Says making preparations there for re- moval."
August 15th-Morton : "Started out of camp this afternoon to go, and then returned." Maxfield : "Started and marched
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half a mile, when we were ordered back to camp ground. Stacked arms and lay down on tent floor, with equipments and luggage within reach."
August 16th-Morton : "Started this morning at three o'clock. It is now noon, and have come sevon or eight miles. Later -- Suppose we have marched about twelve miles to-day." Maxfield : " On the march. Halted quite often. Passed Charles City Court Honse before noon. Halted for the night in a cornfield. The roads are good, but somewhat dusty. The orders are not to leave the ranks for water even, but we took the liberty to forage, and are feasting on green corn and apples. I was so lucky as to get my haversack half full of tomatoes." Newcomb : " The weather cool. Water is scarce."
Angast 17th-Morton : "A long, painful march of about thirty-five miles." Maxfield : " We were turned out at 3 A.M. and started on our march just after daybreak. We marched quite rapidly during the day, and halted for the night at about six o'clock. The road was good, but exceedingly dusty. For much of the way we could not see over two rods ahead of us. We crossed the Chickahominy on a ponton bridge early in the afternoon. The bridge was two thousand feet long, and was laid on ninety- eight ponton boats. Our division camped for the night about five miles from the Chickahominy. Six companies of our regiment, mine [C] included, were detailed for picket. We went about three miles and were posted on roads in the woods." Newcomb : " Company C stationed for the night on a road leading from Long Bridge, which is four miles above our encampment."
August 18th-Morton : " The Colonel told us when we started not to fall out till dead. Came through Williamsburg. When we halted for the day, went in for green corn, apples, etc. Took one man's pig out of the pen ; took his corned beef and chickens, and set his cider mill to making cider of his apples." Maxfiehl : " The pickets were called in just before daybreak, and when we arrived at where our division was encamped the night before, we found it had left. We halted and ate breakfast, and then started and marched with the rear guard. We passed through Williams- burg between nine and ten o'clock in the forenoon, and, passing Fort Magruder, encamped with the regiment. We lay about three-quarters of a mile from where we camped the night of the 4th of May. Marched sixteen miles this day." Newcomb : " The
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people did not seem so much depressed as they did when we passed through in May."
August 19th-Morton : " Wagon train fifteen miles long. Troops passing all day. It is near sunset and we have not left our camp ground yet."
August 20th-Maxfield : "Started at six in the morning and marched six miles. We then halted awhile near the spot where Cornwallis gave up his sword, October 19, 1781. We then marched three miles more, marching in the direction of Shipping Point, then halted for the night." Newcomb: "Breakfast at daylight. Mine consisted of strong coffee made in a tin cup, a slice of bacon frizzled on a sharp stick, two apples, an ear of roasted corn, and two cakes of hard bread."
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CHAPTER IX.
YORKTOWN.
How we Became Severed from the Army of the Potomac .- Shoveling Virginia Soil -- Disposition of Troops-Catching Crabs-Country Produce-Contrabands -- A Guerrilla Scare -- Our New Recruits-From the New York Evening Post-The Veterans and the Recruits-A Grievance -- An Ungrateful Pickaninny-General Emory -- The Raid into Matthews County -- The Raid to Gloucester Court House.
THE corps of the army, except the Fourth, now went on board transports ; some divisions at Fortress Monroe, others at Newport News, and others at Yorktown. All sailed for Acquia Creck. Couch's division of our (Fourth) corps soon followed.
It may not be uninteresting to know how our division came to be dissevered from the Army of the Potomac. General Halleck telegraphed General Mcclellan on the 21st of August : "Leave such garrison in Fortress Monroe, Yorktown, etc., as you may deem proper. They will be replaced by new troops as rapidly as possible." General Mcclellan states in his report : " Immediately on reaching Fortress Monroe, I gave directions for strengthening the defenses of Yorktown to resist any attack from the direction of Richmond, and left General Keyes, with his corps, to perform the . work and temporarily garrison the place." Mcclellan's idea of the military importance of the position at Yorktown --- a position that we thought one of exile-is shown by his despatch of August. 27th to Halleck : " Two good ordnance sergeants are needed at Yorktown and Gloucester. The new defenses are arranged and commenced. I recommend that five thousand new troops be sent immediately to garrison Yorktown and Gloucester. They should be commanded by an experienced general officer, who can disci- pline and instruct them. About nine hundred should be artillery. I recommend that a new regiment, whose colonel is an artillery officer, or graduate, be designated as heavy artillery, and sent there."
Couch's division does not seem to have been ordered from the Peninsula until the 24th of August, when Mcclellan telegraphed
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Halleck from Alesandria : "I have sont for Couch's division to come at once." Halleck then telegraphed Mcclellan that General Casey would furnish him with five thousand of his new troops to send to Yorktown to relieve our division, but General McClellan deemed it best, in view of the dangerous condition of the front before Washington, to order Casey to hold the men designed for Yorktown in readiness to move, but not to send them off until he received further orders. It appears then that the defeat of Pope, and the necessity of putting every man at hand instantly into the line of defense, prevented the relief of our division, and severed its connection with the Army of the Potomac.
The diaries for the month of August and September are a con- tinued record of work done on the fortifications, in leveling works McClellon's and Magruder's engineers had built in the spring, and in strengthening the fortifications of Yorktown and Gloucester Point. They run along in this vein from day to day, and show the disgust of the diarists at the toilsome work they were now set to perform. Maxfield's is especially violent, his poetic vein crop- ping out again :
" Here we labor, here we toil, Shoveling Virginia's soil."
Horrible in rhythm, but kindly consider the provocation-fatigue duty for seven days in the week ; for we had been some time at Yorktown before Maxfield sets down for a Sunday : " To-day we rest, like Christian people."
The headquarters of the depleted corps was at Yorktown, although the immediate command of this post and that of Gloucester seems to have been vosted in our brigade commanders ; in General Emory for a while, then in General Naglee -- General Keyes assuming but a nominal control. The other brigades of our division were with General Peck, whose headquarters were at Suffolk. His troops were stationed at points down the Peninsula. Couch's division never rejoined us, but entered the Sixth Corps after a time.
Our brigade was materially strengthened here. To the five regiments it was made up of until now were added the Eighty- first and Ninety-eighth New York, and the New York Independ- ent Battalion (French Zouaves-". Les Enfants Perdus "), known to us as " The Lost Children." The One Hundred and Fourth
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Pennsylvania and the One Hundredth New York garrisoned Gloucester Point, with Colonel Dandy of the One Hundredth in command of the post until Colonel Davis of the One Hundred and Fourth recovered sufficiently from the wound received at Fair Oaks to return to duty.
The ordinary rations were now well seasoned with supplies of oysters and crabs from the York River. And no one who knows what a York River oyster fresh from its bed is-large, fat, quiver- ing with what passes for life in an oyster -- but will think that we were not unhappily situated, with acres of these luscious bivalves at our tent-openings almost. Nor were the crabs to be despised. It was a comical sight to see our men fishing for them --- bare- footed, knee and more deep in water-each poking with a long stick till a snaptious crustacean took a rarely yielded grip, when the lucky fisherman would scamper for the shore with his prize. Sometimes, though, an unwary fisherman would step too near one of the lively creatures, and then the scampering to shore was a noisy one, the hold of the crab on the victim's toe making him shout in vociferous if not in triumphant tonos.
Then, in their season, green corn, apples, melons, and other fruit and vegetables were brought in by the country negroes, those who had not yet taken to contrabanding as a profession, which meant hanging to the skirts of the quartermaster's depart- ment for a precarious living. We had a large camp of these con- trabands to the north of Yorktown, a thieving, licentious lot of negroes. They made the night air ring, now with wonderfully sung pious melodies, then with fiendish screeching and caterwaul- ing, as the bucks would fight like wild beasts for the possession of some bit of disputed property-a bit of food perhaps, a rag of clothes maybe, but more often for the favors of some not over- scrupulous Dinah.
A few extracts from the diaries will help us to catch the salient points of our sojourn in Yorktown.
August 21st-Masfield : " Marched in the afternoon to a place just above Yorktown, where we encamiped."
August 24th-Maxfield : "Detailed on guard at Yorktown. Guarding contrabands to prevent their being insulted by white men, and from having riots among themselves. We were called on twice to quell riots." Morton : " Part of our knapsacks came. They were nearly ruined."
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August 28th -- Morton : "Living on the fat of the land- peaches, melons, crabs, and oysters." Newcomb: " The nights are very cold, and the men have not yet received blankets or overcoats for those lost at Harrison's Landing."
August 30th-Morton : "Boys bought a lot of melons from a negro for sesesh money."
September 1st-Maxfield : "The Ninety-eighth New York stacked arms in the morning, and refused to take them again, as they had not been paid for six months. General Keyes made them a speech, after which be put all the officers of the regiment under arrest, and left the sergeants in command. Moved our camp in the afternoon to a spot west of Yorktown and near the fortifications."
September 2d-Maxfield : " The old round Ellis tents the regiment received in Augusta came into camp from Fortress Monroe."
September 9th-Maxfield : " About eleven o'clock in the fore- noon were ordered into the fort and took positions. A guerrilla party made an attack on Williamsburg, driving in our cavalry, and are expected to attack Yorktown. Later, had orders to go back to camp, one company at a time, and get a day's rations and blankets. Found there one hundred and sixty recruits that had arrived, three second lieutenants, and any number expecting to be non-commissioned officers, basking in their long-tailed bles. We were ordered from the fort on fatigue after a while. Too! shovels and axes. The axemen felled trees across the roads, and the shovelmen leveled forts." Morton : " Saw General Dix. A hundred and seventy recruits came to the regiment. They are mostly non-commissioned officers."
During the earlier months spent here the health of the regi- ment seems to have been fairly good, but during the later months there was much sickness and many deaths. The rainy season had set in, and the malarial qualities of the swamps near Yorktown began to affect the men. Our diarists are all frequently sick, Maxfield acknowledging " severe chills," Morton ill and senten- tious. Lary jots down these suggestive words, " Quinine and Iron." Lieutenant Newcomb's diary tells us that nearly all the officers of the regiment were sick, leaving but himself, Nickels. Brann, Williams, Butler, and Mudgett to attend to guard and camp duties. Indeed, had it not been for the recruits that
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reached us here, and a new company, " Now B," Captain Bald- win's company (the remaining members of original B were transferred to Company G), the lugubrious and greatly exagger- ated paragraph that appeared in the New York Evening Post concerning the regiment would have seemed quite justified to observers of our steadily shrinking line of battle. We copy it, only remarking that, like assaulted and battered Patrick, after listening to his lawyer's speech, we had not realized until now how badly off we were. "Shure," cried Patrick, as his lawyer closed his depiction of his client's wrongs, "it's murther I want the shcoundrel tried for. Assault and battery don't do me joostice.".
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