USA > Michigan > Genesee County > History of Genesee County, Michigan, Her People, Industries and Institutions, Volume I > Part 43
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was issued by the department and Colonel Stockton returned without delay to Detroit.
As soon as it became known that he had been authorized to raise a regiment, a number of applications were made to him by persons desiring authority to recruit companies for the new organization. Among the first of these was Capt. Stephen Martin, who in making his request, inquired what was to be the name of the regiment. In answer, the Colonel said that he (Martin) should have the privilege of giving a name to the organization as well as of raising a company for it. "Then," replied the Captain, "it shall be 'Stockton's Independent Regiment'." a designation which was at once adopted. Recruiting was immediately commenced at several points in the state and, though it proceeded under some discouragement, the progress made was so rapid that the regiment was ready for muster in less than five weeks from the issuance of the war department order authorizing the organization.
In nine of the companies of this regiment there were officers or enlisted men, or both, from Genesee county. There was one company, however. which (particularly during the raising and organizing of the regiment ) was generally known as "the Genesee company," because it was very largely composed of men from this county. This was the company raised by Capt. Thomas C. Carr, whose recruiting station was at the city of Flint. The recruiting-name of the company was the "Genesee Light Guard," though its nucleus was an organization which had been earlier known as the "Flushing Light Artillery." Captain Carr's company filled up rapidly and on the 7th of August, 1861, it left Flint under his command and proceeded to the regi- mental rendezvous which had been established at Detroit, the camp being named "Camp Backus" in honor of Lieut .- Col. E. Backus, U. S. A., by whom the regiment was mustered into the United States service, Septem- ber 7-13, 1861. The field and staff-officers of the regiment were: Colonel, Thomas B. W. Stockton; lieutenant-colonel, John V. Reuhle ; major, Norval E. Welch; adjutant, T. E. Morris; surgeon, Isaac Wixom; assistant surgeon, William H. Butler ; chaplain, Rev. W. H. Brockway; quartermaster, F. H. Elder.
The officers of the "Genesee Light Guard," designated in the organiza- tion as C Company, were: Captain, Thomas C. Carr; first lieutenant, Miner S. Newell; second lieutenant, Randolph W. Ransom.
On Saturday, September 14, orders were received from the war depart- ment directing Colonel Stockton to proceed with his regiment to Washington, D. C. Preparations were at once commenced and on the following Monday
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the command was ready to take its departure. At four o'clock in the after- noon of that day the companies marched out upon the parade-ground at Camp Backus and formed in a hollow square for the ceremony of the presen- tation of a flag, the gift of the ladies of Detroit-through Mrs. Charles H. Dunks-to Stockton's Independent Regiment. The flag was of heavy blue silk, six by six and one-half feet in dimensions, bearing on one side the arms of the state, with the words "Stockton's Regiment" underneath, and on the reverse the national emblems-the eagle and shield-and the words "Stand by the Union," upon a scroll. The presentation address was made by Judge Wilkins and was responded to by Colonel Stockton, both speeches being applauded most enthusiastically. The color was received from the hand of Mrs. Dunks by Colonel Stockton, and by him handed to Sergt. C. McDowell, of the "Genesee Light Guard," which was the color company.
At six o'clock the regiment, numbering seven hundred and sixty-one enlisted men, marched to the river, where Companies A, B and F embarked on the steamer "City of Cleveland," and the other companies, with the field and staff on the "May Queen," bound for Cleveland. They arrived at that city in the following morning and proceeded thence by rail via Pitts- burg, Harrisburg and Baltimore, to Washington, which they reached on Thursday, September 19. There the regiment remained in camp till the 28th, whon it crossed the Potomac into Virginia and moved to Fort Corcoran. After a three days' stay at that place it was moved to Hall's Hill, Virginia, where it was assigned to the Third ( Butterfield's) Brigade, in Gen. Fitz- John Porter's division. The infantry regiments, besides Colonel Stockton's, composing the Third Brigade were the Eighty-third Pennsylvania, Colonel McLane; the Seventeenth New York, Colonel Lansing, and the People's Ellsworth Regiment (Forty-fourth New York), Colonel Stephen Stryker.
Here was regularly laid out a camp which became the winter-quarters of the regiment and the home of its officers and men for a period of nearly six months. The time was devoted mainly to the attainment of military discipline, proficiency in drill and to the transformation of a body of brave and patriotic citizens into an efficient regiment of soldiers. In effecting this the military education and experience of Colonel Stockton was invaluable; his success was complete and was universally acknowledged. Especially were the benefits of his oversight and experience discernable in the superior sani- tary condition of the regiment during its stay at Hall's Hill and in the campaign which followed.
Before the earliest streakings of daylight in the morning of March 10, 1862, the Third Brigade struck camp and marched from its winter-quarters
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to Fairfax Court House, where the Forty-fourth New York was tempo- rarily detached and in company with Averill's Eighth Pennsylvania Cavalry advanced on Centerville, the troops fully believing at that time that a direct movement was to be made on Richmond. But the enemy's works at Center- ville and Manassas were found deserted; the detachment returned and the entire brigade marched through drenching rain over most wretched roads and in a state of gloom and disappointment to Alexandria, where it embarked on steamers on the 21st of March and on the following day proceeded down the Potomac and the Chesapeake bay to Fortress Monroe, arriving there on the 24th, it marched thence on the 25th, to a camp in the vicinity of Hampton. This was a Virginia village which had then recently been destroyed by fire by order of the Confederate General Magruder-a place which nature had made beautiful, which its inhabitants had embellished and embowered with roses and woodbine, but now only a waste of bare chimneys and blackened walls. The camp of the regiment was located about two miles from the village and was named "Camp Wide Awake." Here the command remained until the 27th, when, with the brigade, it took part in a reconnoissance in force, moving as far up the Peninsula as Big Bethel; but encountering no serious opposition, it returned to the camp near Hampton.
On the morning of the 4th of April the Army of the Potomac, more than one hundred thousand strong, moved up the Peninsula by the differ- ent roads, and in the afternoon of the 5th, Stockton's regiment, with the Third Brigade, stood before the enemy's intrenchments at Yorktown. Here General Butterfield called the officers of his brigade together and gave orders for each regiment to leave all knapsacks under charge of one man and to be ready in two minutes to charge the rebel works. It was rumored, and was probably true, that the general had asked permission to make the assault with his brigade. Had he done so, with such support as might easily have been furnished, there is little doubt that the fading daylight of that Saturday afternoon would have seen the Stars and Stripes floating over the hostile ramparts; but the desired permission was not given, and that night the great army lighted its camp-fires in front of the fortified line and sat down to a four weeks' siege of Yorktown.
While at this place the regiment was engaged in the usual routine duty and drill, interspersed with labor upon the earthworks and parallels which were constructed in pursuance of the plan of the commanding general to cap- ture the place by regular approach. During this time the strength of the regiment had been augmented to one thousand men by enlistment and by the addition of two new companies from Detroit. The health of the command
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also remained good, in consequence of the strict sanitary rules of Colonel Stockton, and in marked contrast to that of many other regiments; notable among these was its companion in the brigade, the Forty-fourth New York, whose men suffered so severely from sickness that when the advance was made they were left as a garrison at Yorktown.
Early in the morning of Sunday, May 4, it became known that the hostile fortifications were evacuated and soon the troops were in motion in pursuit of the retiring enemy. Colonel Stockton's command remained within the captured works until the 8th of May when it embarked and pro- ceeded thence up the York river to West Point, Virginia, reaching there on the following day. While at this place the regiment received its designating number, which the colonel, though on some accounts unwilling to do so, was induced to accept in view of possible future advantages which might accrue to his officers and men. From this time it was no longer known as "Stockton's Independent Regiment," but as the Sixteenth Michigan Infantry, in the Third Brigade, First Division ( Morrell's) of the Fifth Provisional Army Corps, which was formed at that time ( May roth) and placed under command of Gen. Fitz-John Porter.
On the 13th of May, the Sixteenth marched with its brigade from West Point to Cumberland on the Pamunkey river. Thence it moved by way of White House and Tunstall's Station to Gaines' Mill where it arrived on the 26th, having advanced forty miles from Yorktown in eighteen days! Before daybreak on the 27th of May the division of General Morrell moved from Gaines' and marched rapidly through rain and mud towards Hanover Court House for the purpose of destroying the railroad at that point; in this vicinity there was known to be a considerable force of the enemy, which proved to be Branch's division consisting of seven regiments, with artillery. A part of Morell's division-the Second Maine and the Twenty-fifth and Forty-fourth New York-under command of General Martindale, was left by the way to hold an important position, while the remainder of the divi- sion went forward to capture the station at Hanover and destroyed the railway track. This service was successfully accomplished, while Martin- dale bravely held his ground against the determined attack of Branch. If Martindale could have been forced from his position, the advanced troops of Morrell would have been left in a most perilous situation; but in this attempt the rebels failed and, after a hot engagement of more than an hour's duration, were compelled to retire with a heavy loss in killed, wounded and prisoners. On the Union side the loss, in the Forty-fourth New York alone, was twenty-seven killed and fifty-seven wounded. "General Butter-
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field, hearing firing in the rear, moved his command at once to the point of attack. Few of the Sixteenth who were present will ever forget that march in line of battle across wheat-fields, through swamps and ravines, cheering as they advanced, impetuous to strike their first great blow for freedom. The enemy, seeing that to remain was to be captured or killed, fled in dismay, leaving their dead, wounded and many prisoners on our hands. The day's work was a complete triumph and that night we bivouacked for the first time on the field we had won. * * * Here for the first time the regiment had a taste of living on the enemy. Through some strange freak, the commanding officers winked at it. Beef, pork, dried fruits and preserves-in fact, everything that an epicure could crave-were procured in abundance and indulged in with apparent emotions of pleasure. That day was never forgotten by the Sixteenth during its entire service thereafter; its members ever after repeated the operation whenever the country afforded the material." The division, having successfully accomplished its mission, returned to its camp on the north side of the Chickahominy, near Gaines' Mill, on the 29th of May. At about one p. m. on the 3Ist, the crash of artillery and the incessant roar of musketry were heard coming from the woods and thickets on the opposite side of the river; the infernal uproar con- tinued during most of the afternoon. It was the battle of Fair Oaks. The men of the Sixteenth stood with their brigade in line ready to cross the stream to the assistance of their comrades, but they were not ordered in on this or the following day, when the fight was renewed.
With but one change of camp, the Sixteenth remained near Gaines' Mill until the first day of the Seven Days' battles-Thursday, June 26- when it was moved in haste towards Mechanicsville to support the right of the Union line against the assault of the redoubtable Stonewall Jackson, but it was not engaged in the fierce battle that ensued. Before daylight on the following morning it retired with other regiments, though not unmolested by the enemy, from the position held during the night's to Gaines' Mill, where a line of battle was formed with Butterfield's brigade on the extrame left, Sykes' division of regulars on the right, and McCall's Pennsylvania Reserves division in the second line. Approaching them were the rebel commands of Gens. A. P. Hill, Longstreet, H. D. Hill and the dreaded Jackson, in all more than fifty thousand men, against half that number on the Union side. The battle was opened by a furious attack on Porter's right. Here the enemy was at first repulsed but renewed the assault and turned the Union right; this retreated in disorder, and caused the whole line to give way, which
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resulted in Colonel Stockton being made prisoner by the enemy. Sick and unfit for duty, he had insisted on entering the field at the head of his regi- ment, though against the expostulations and earnest protest of his surgeon; and now, dismounted and weak from illness, he became separated from his command in the turmoil and disorder of the retreat and was afterwards captured and taken to Richmond. The hardships which he was compelled to endure during his subsequent captivity wrought injury to his health from which he never recovered.
The retreating line was finally rallied and the Sixteenth, now under com- mand of Major Welch, with other troops, charged on the defiant foe, but only to be decimated and hurled back in utter rout, leaving their dead and wounded on the crimson field. This closed the disasters of the day for the Sixteenth, and a bloody day it had been for this regiment. Its losses had been forty-nine killed, one hundred and sixteen wounded and fifty-five miss- ing. Of the killed, three were officers, and among these was Capt. Thomas C. Carr, of the Genesee company, the first member of the regiment to die on the battlefield.
The day of Gaines' Mill had closed in blood and defeat. During the succeeding night the Union forces, including the remnant of the Sixteenth Michigan, succeeded in crossing the swollen Chickahominy and destroying the bridges behind them, though two bridges farther down the stream (Bot- tom's and Long Bridges) still remained; it was not long after sunrise on Saturday morning when the rebel force under the indomitable Jackson was massed at the upper one of these and making preparations to cross to the south side. Other hostile forces were also advancing from Richmond direct on McClellan's left wing, and in view of this rather alarming situation of affairs the General had, as early as Friday evening, decided on a retreat by the whole army to the James river where a base of supplies could be held and communication on the river kept open by the co-operation of the Union gunboats. The troops were informed of the proposed change by an appar- ently triumphant announcement, intended merely to encourage the soldiers and lighten in some degree the gloom of the great disaster, that a new and mysterious flank movement was about to be executed which would surely and swiftly result in the capture of Richmond. No such assurance how- ever could conceal from the intelligent men who formed the Army of the Potomac that their backs and not their faces were now turned toward the rebel capital and that the much vaunted change of base was made from necessity rather than choice.
During the four days succeeding the battle of Gaines' Mill the men of
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the Sixteenth took part in the daily fight, skirmish and march which brought them on Tuesday, July I, to the heights of Malvern. On that field the regiment lost thirty-nine killed and wounded and three missing, but it held the position assigned it, repulsing the repeated attacks of the enemy with unsurpassed bravery and strewing the ground thickly with his dead and wounded. The battle was opened at this point at about four o'clock p. m., and from that time until darkness closed the roar of musketry was uninter- mitting. Finally the carnage ceased, and the men of the North laid them- selves down, victors, they believed, to rest on the blood-soaked field; but at about one o'clock in the morning of July 2d orders were given to fall in for a march, and the regiment moved silently down the hill and away on the road to Berkeley, or Harrison's Landing, leaving their dead and wounded behind.
No one who was not present can ever realize the bitterness of humilia- tion and despair that pervaded the rank and file of the army as they turned their backs upon a victorious field and marched away in the gloom of the night, and through the mud and pouring rain of the succeeding morning, to seek the protection of the gunboats in the river against a beaten foe who was at the same time retreating in an opposite direction. But the wearied and dispirited men struggled on, some in sullen silence, some cursing, and some actually weeping in the agony of their shame, until at last they rested on the banks of the James under the friendly guns of the Union fleet.
Four days after the arrival of the army at Harrison's Landing, the commander of the Fifth Corps (General Porter) issued a general order congratulating the officers and men of his command "on the perils through which they have so honorably passed, and the successes they have added by their valor to the glory of our arms," and mentioning especially their gallantry at Yorktown, April 5; New Bridge, May 24; Hanover Court- House, May 27; Mechanicsville, June 26; Gaines' Mill, June 27; New Mar- ket, June 30, and Malvern Hill, July I. A complimentary order was issued by the commander of the Third Brigade, in which was the Sixteenth Mich- igan, as follows:
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HEADQUARTERS BUTTERFIELD'S BRIGADE, MORRELL'S DIVISION. Circular.
BRAVE SOLDIERS OF THE THIRD BRIGADE :
It is with no ordinary pride that your general promulgates to you general orders No. 4, from the headquarters of the army corps. Your bravery and gallantry have won my love, and you are as dear to me as brothers. Let the esprit and the pride which have always distinguished you be renewed and redoubled. Your children's children will be proud of your noble acts, and your country will love you. Let every
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one, officers and men, make renewed exertions, and let the next call to arms find the brigade, as it always has been heretofore, unflinching, unfaltering, devoted to the coun- try and the honor of its flag. Let the proud recollections of the glorious names your banner will bear redouble your strength and zeal, so that, as heretofore, you will equal twice your numbers of the enemy. By command of BRIG .- GEN. BUTTERFIELD. (Signed) THOS. J. HOYT, Asst. Adjt-Gen.
During the night of the 31st of July the enemy on the south side of the river suddenly opened fire from more than fifty pieces of artillery on the Union army lying on the north side, the camp of Butterfield's brigade being fairly within their range. The scene was a grand and exciting one and the wildest commotion ensued, the great guns of the fleet in the river adding their thunders to the roar of the cannonade. Very little injury was inflicted however on either side. On the following day the Third Brigade crossed the river, burned the plantation buildings near which the hostile batteries had been placed and then made a reconnoissance towards Petersburg, but finding no enemy it returned to the river and bivouacked on the Ruffin plantation where it remained five days foraging on the country and at the end of that time recrossed the river to its former position. After this, few, if any, note- worthy events occurred in the experience of the Sixteenth during the remainder of its stay at Harrison's Landing.
In the night of the 14th of August the regiment struck camp and with its corps took the advance in the march of the army down the Peninsula, reaching Hampton after three days' and one night's march. There was a striking contrast between the appearance of the haggard and tattered rem- nant of the Sixteenth Michigan who now returned to their old camping- place, and that of Stockton's Independent Regiment of well-fed and healthy men as they had marched away from the same place a little more than four months before; but their hope and courage were still high and none were doubtful of ultimate triumph. On the 19th they took transports for Acquia Creek, and arrived there the following morning, proceeding thence by rail- road to Fredericksburg. Remaining there until the evening of the 23d, the line of march was then taken northwestwardly along the left bank of the Rappahannock and, after an eventless march and some countermarching reached Kelley's Ford on the 26th. During the night, orders were received to burn such regimental and company property as could not be carried and be ready to march at daybreak for the line of the Orange & Alexandria rail- road. On arriving at Bealton Station, it was reported that the enemy had destroyed a portion of the railroad between that place and Alexandria and had captured and burned a large amount of property. Rations had become
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very low and a forced march was necessary to make a junction with the Army of Virginia, under General Pope, which was effected by the corps at Groveton August 29. While at this place the troops were formed in line of battle, but no engagement occurred. For his failure to engage the enemy General Porter was severely censured by General Pope.
The command then moved towards Manassas and on the 30th a new position was taken near Bull Run. The brigade lay for hours under a heavy artillery fire until about the middle of the afternoon when the regiments were formed in column by division and ordered to advance. The infantry of the enemy lay well protected in a deep railroad excavation and a large number of artillery pieces were posted in the rear of the infantry and on higher ground. When the Third Brigade had reached an open field, the enemy poured into its ranks an infernal fire of artillery and musketry. The brigade advanced most gallantly to within a few yards of the enemy's infantry, and on that spot the bones of its brave men who fell on that day were found when the survivors again marched over the field months afterwards. While the brigade was engaged at this point a force of the enemy attacked in flank and they were thus forced back in disorder and with severe loss. No troops ever better deserved victory than did the Union forces on that day and that they did not obtain it was no fault of theirs. It was because "some one had blundered." The loss of the regiment in this battle was seventy- nine killed and wounded, among whom were three color-bearers, and seven- teen missing. Capt. Randolph W. Ransom, of Flint, was also among the killed.
After this crowning disaster the command fell back, by way of Centre- ville and Hall's Hill, their winter camp of 1861-62, to Arlington where a rest of ten days was had, during which Colonel Stockton returned from his captivity in Richmond and the regiment received considerable accessions to its numbers from hospitals and other sources. On the 12th of September the brigade, under command of Colonel Stockton, moved with the Fift' Corps on the Maryland campaign which culminated in the bloody battle of Antietam, September 17th. On that day the Fifth Corps was not engaged, though towards evening the Third Brigade was ordered first to the right and then back to the left, but sustained no loss.
On the 20th the Fifth Corps-the Sixteenth Michigan in advance- started in pursuit of the retreating columns of Lee, and engaged his rear guard at Shepherdstown Ford; after this the regiment and brigade returned and camped near Sharpsburg on Antietam creek, where the Twentieth Maine Regiment was added to the brigade.
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