History of Ingham and Eaton counties, Michigan, Part 45

Author: Durant, Samuel W. cn
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia : D.W. Ensign & Co.
Number of Pages: 772

USA > Michigan > Eaton County > History of Ingham and Eaton counties, Michigan > Part 45
USA > Michigan > Ingham County > History of Ingham and Eaton counties, Michigan > Part 45

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).

The good State of Michigan has received the best of compliments for the excellence of its soldiers in the great war for the Union from that grand old patriot, Gen. George H. Thomas. We once beard a dying Massachusetts officer say that she " was equally good in infantry, cavalry, artillery, and the corps of engineers." But high as the compliment was, it does not give her the full meed of praise that she deserves. The green sash had its honors as well as the red ; the yellow flag its mission as well as the Stars and Stripes : there were times when the knife of the surgeon was as indispensable and required as much fortitude in

its proper use as the sword. The writer of this sketch well remembers a day, after the greatest of all our battles, as the wounded lay in thousands and the surgeons were few, when he would willingly have given up all other kinds of knowledge save one,-to know how to make a proper use of a box of surgical instruments. With the modesty of true science the results of their labor have been recorded, but too often we are without record as to the danger and cost at which those results were achieved. Only, then, has biography found its true use when it possesses the power of transfusing character into the reader, and where it widens into history, causing our homage to the nation to transeend our homage to the man. We honor the physi- eian who has bravely maintained his post during a pesti- lenee, if he lives, as a hero ; if he dies, we lament him as a martyr, and ereet an enduring monument to his fame. Why not similar honor be given to the hero-surgeons of the war? aud among others, to our modest friend and worthy fellow-citizen, Surgeon Ranney, of the Michigan Second Cavalry ?

In modern sketches of biography we notice that inereas- ing attention is given to the question of ancestry. As in animals, so in man, there is a general law of heredity that asserts itself too plainly to be denied. The time was when Coleridge remarked that "the history of a man for the nine months preceding his birth would probably be far more interesting and contain events of greater moment than all the threescore and ten years that follow it." It was ridiculed as a speculation far more curious than useful. But it is so no longer. The received opinion now is "that character is the result of innumerable influences from with- out and from within, which aet unceasingly through life. Who shall estimate the effect of these latent forces enfolded in the spirit of a new-born child,-forces that may date back eenturies, and find their origin in the life and thought and deeds of remote ancestors,-forees the germs of which, enveloped in the awful mystery of life, have been trans- mitted silently from generation to generation and never perish ? All-cherishing Nature, provident and unforget- ting, gathers up all these fragments that nothing may be lost, but that all may ultimately re-appear in new combina- tions. Each new life is thus the heir of all the ages, the possessor of qualities which only the events of life can un- fold."* Especially in the life of a physician, to give some- particulars eoneerning his parentage is not so much a matter of laudable pride as of scientific information. Many things that will hereafter appear in this sketeh are thus readily accounted for that would not be understood otherwise.

GEORGE E. RANNEY was born June 13, 1839, in Ba- tavia, N. Y., the county-town of Genesee, and almost equi- distant from Buffalo and Rochester. His father, grandfather, and great-grandfather were born in Ashfield, Mass. His father's name was Joel Ranney ; that of the old patriarch, who came to New England from Scotland in 1620, Thomas Ranney. Many of his descendants have been men of in- fluence and position, and not a few of the family are still found in their original county of Franklin. It is something

* Gen. Garfield's Oration on tho Life and Character of Gen. George II. Thomas, p. 5.

(@Kannal MIO.

183

CITY OF LANSING.

to come from a stock that has staying qualities and docs not run out; it is something more to inherit the perfer- vidum ingenium Scotorum; and in this respect, as in so many others, a good man leaveth an inheritance to his chil- dren and his children's children to the remotest generation.

The mother of Dr. Ranney was Elizabeth P. Champlain, the daughter of Francis Champlain, who died at the early age of thirty-two, from injuries received in the war of 1812. He was the direct lineal descendant of Samuel Champlain, the celebrated French naval officer, who, in 1609, discov- ered the lake that still bears his name, founded Quebec in 1608, and to whose courage and enterprise France was indebted for the establishment of her colony of Canada. Mrs. Ranney still lives with her son in a happy and peace- ful old age, and with a keen relish and recollection of events public and private in the " long, long ago." As often hap- pens, the son " favors" his mother, and to a practiced eye the French lineaments in his countenance are obvious. In the early days of our history the Scotch and French frequently united in marriage, each having a common Celtic origin.

Mr. Joel Ranney received an excellent education, and for some years turned it to good account as an intelligent farmer and dealer in stock. Then came the crash of 1837, a debased currency, stagnation in business, and bankruptcy all over the land. The long-continued " hard times" had at least one good effect,-it compelled multitudes to " go West ;" and but for this enforced hegira from the East, Michigan would not have been the mighty commonwealth she now is.

Mr. Ranney, with his wife and four children, removed to Kent Co., Mich., and after their full share of malarial illness and other inevitable hardships of pioneer life, he se- cured a good home and eighty acres of land about three miles southwest of Grand Rapids. Then came calamity indeed. Long before the farm had been cleared or ren- dered productive, the good husband and father died, and George, now a lad of twelve, had to form the brave pur- pose of fighting the battle of life alone. The offer of work for wages on a farm, with the privilege of attending win- ter school, was at onee accepted, and from that time for- ward he went through the young American's regular cur- riculum of farming, driving team, clerking, and railroading. At the carly age of seventeen he found himself at Stafford, N. Y., as freight- and ticket-agent of the Buffalo, Corning and New York Railroad. In his endeavor to keep order at his station there were some who despised his youth, and occasionally got the worst of it. One of them, the son of a director, complained to his father, and the di- rector insisted that George should be dismissed. Nothing daunted, however, he appealed to the superintendent and asked him to inquire of the citizens as to the merits of the case. The result of this inquiry was that George was indeed removed from his position, but only to another and a better one in the superintendent's own office. Such an incident is as ereditable to the young defender of his rights as it is mean and contemptible on the part of the cowardly aggressors. The victory was something, but the good opinion of the superintendent, that " George was capable of occupying a much better position," was a good deal more. It gave him a new impulse in his attention to duty, and

very soon he was promoted to Wayland,-excepting two, the most important station on the road. His determined cool- ness and pluck, and his ability to overcome opposition and to avail himself of opportunities of advancement, were marked characteristics of our young railroad-agent, of which we shall see numerous illustrations in his further carcer. In an ebbing tide let us cast anchor and hold on ; the tide will soon turn again. Only a dead fish floats with the stream.

Meanwhile, underlying all other things in young Ran- ney's mind was an intense desire for knowledge. Hence his sacrifices to attend " winter school ;" hence his exemplary diligence at Stafford Academy, under " Parson Radley ;" at Rushford Academy, under Professor Saylles ; at Cary Col- legiate Seminary, under Dr. Eastman. Hence his enthu- siastic attachment to some of his fellow-students, especially to Thaddeus C. Pound, afterwards of Wisconsin, whose subsequent success in political life fully justified the ad- miration of his friend. This attachment was one of the kind that those only understand who have had the privi- lege of enjoying it. "The union of two minds," says the greatest reflective thinker of all time, " from that sympathy which is the result of unity of aim in the acquisition of truth, is the highest to which they can aspire." Like that of comrades in war, the attachment of classmates is prover- bial. This is the true Platonic love : what so often goes under the name is but a base and unworthy counterfeit.

In addition to the desire for knowledge, young Ranney had also a very definite ideal before his mind of the kind of man he would like to be. Of all the men with whom he had come into more immediate contact, none had more deeply enlisted his youthful admiration than a certain " be- loved physician," in whom the " code of ethics" was most happily exemplified. Would his coming ever be watched for with so much anxiety ?- the door be opened with as much reverence for his opinion in matters of life and death ? Would he ever have it in his power to confer similar bene- fits on the sick and suffering ? The way did not seem to be easy, but there was a way, and he found it. The grim lions that so often seem to be in the path of sloth and cowardice are found by the brave and industrious to be chained on cither side. They are not in the path itself.

Our biography now widens into history. In 1858 young Ranney came to Charlotte, Mich., and, after spend- ing some time in a drug-store, began the study of medicine under Dr. Joseph P. Hall. In 1860-61 he attended his first term of medical lectures in the University of Michi- gan. But those were times in which men were studying the condition of their country more than anything else.

" Oh, sad and slow the weeks went by! Each held his anxious breath,

Like one who waits, in helpless fear, some sorrow great as death ! Oh, scarcely was there faith in God, nor any trust in man, While fast along the Southern sky the hlighting shadow ran ! It veiled the stars one after one, it hushed the patriot's song, And stole from man the sacred sense that parteth right and wrong !

" Then a red flash,-the lightning across the darkness broke, And with a voice that shook the land the guns of Sumter spoke ! Wake! sons of heroes, wake! the age of heroes dawns again ! Truth takes in her hand her ancient sword, and calls her loyal men ! Lo! brightly o'er the hreaking day shines Freedom's holy star ! Peace cannot cure the sickly time,-all hail the healer, WAR !"

1S+

HISTORY OF INGIIAM COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

" War a healer" seems strange doctrine to many who do not distinguish between war and mere bloodshed, but not to such philosophers as De Quincey, or to such poets as Words- worth. There are times when the body politic requires the sword, just as the body physical requires the knife. War in a good cause is not the greatest evil which a nation can suffer. If slavery will not give way to freedom, nor freedom to slavery, the sword is the only umpire that can settle the controversy.

In September, 1861, young Ranney enlisted as a private under Capt. II. A. Shaw, and assisted him in recruiting a company for the Second Michigan Cavalry. Ilis knowl- edge of medicine soon made him its third hospital steward. The radical change of habits in a thousand men recruited from their homes imposed arduous duties upon the sur- geens, and in the summer of 1862 the hospital steward was temporarily assigned the duties of an assistant surgeon at New Madrid, Mo. By overwork and exposure he was there taken ill, and the disease being severe and long pro- tracted, he was mustered out of the service. During his convalescence he attended another term at the Michigan University, and graduated in March, 1863. But it was not his lot to lose time in waiting for patients. Letters from his regiment to Governor Blair, recommending Dr. Ranney as their unanimous choice for second assistant sur- geon, at once secured him the appointment, and on the 13th of June he joined his old regiment at Triune, Tenn.

Those who know what cavalry service is, as compared with that of infantry, how desperate are the raids, and how frequent the skirmishing, can well believe that Surgeon Ranney's position required no little fortitude and self-pos- session. Take a few examples : On the first day's advance from Triune there was a fight at Rover, in which a soldier belonging to another brigade was severely wounded in the arm. His own surgeon confessing his utter inability to operate on account of his trembling nerves, the medical director himself was obliged to operate, and took Dr. Ran- ney to assist him. The trembling surgeon was not alarmed without cause. The scene was exciting in the extreme. Bullets whizzing thick and fast; squadrons dashing here and there ; everything uncertain as to the result of the conflict; the wounded man just on the ground where he fell, and no time to take him anywhere else,-these, it must be confessed, were not very desirable conditions for a capital operation. But the two surgeons, solely intent on their work, made the amputation as required. From that day on, through the entire campaign, Surgeon Ranney found a true friend and a kindred spirit in Medical Director Greer. Knowing that the post of honor was the post of danger, the director took the full measure of his calin and resolute assistant, and thenceforward lost no opportunity to give him better position.

Take another example: In the Atlanta campaign, during the hundred consecutive days in which the Federal forces were under fire, the First Missouri Cavalry, under Col. Le Grange, suffered very severe loss, and the colonel himself was taken prisoner. A soldier of the brigade having lost his leg, it was, of course, the duty of his own surgeon to operate, but when everything was ready he confessed that he could not operate under fire. At his request Dr. Ran-

ney made the amputation, and being seen by many of the combatants, it thus gained him a reputation for nerve and self-possession that he never afterwards forfeited. Soldiers love and admire courage, not only in other officers, but in chaplains and surgeons.

Take a third example: A Wisconsin brigade suffered severely in killed, wounded, and prisoners, one of the pris- oners being the colonel himself. Their own ambulances not being accessible, those of Dr. Ranney's brigade were ordered up. Alarmed by the near approach of the enemy, the brigade-major and his assistants fled to the rear, reporting their own hairbreadth escape and the certain capture of Surgeon Ranney and his assistant. Greatly to their cha- grin, however, there came an order from Dr. Ranney for more ambulances. They arrived promptly, and with them an order from Director Greer for Dr. Ranney to assume the duties of brigade surgeon. The promotion was a rapid one, but it was well deserved, and the doctor held the position with increasing honor during the remainder of the very active and trying campaign that culminated in the capture of Atlanta.

But it was at the memorable battle of Chickamauga where Dr. Ranney was in the greatest peril. One day in Sep- tember, 1863, a telegram came to the War Office at Wash- ington,-" The army is in total rout !" By noon came another telegram,-" Gen. Thomas still helds the centre !" Never were President Lincoln and Secretary Stanton in more complete bewilderment. Unfortunately for Dr. Ranney, his place on this trying day was not the centre with Gen. Thomas. The right wing, struck heavily in the flank, was sent flying in disorder towards Chattanooga. The cavalry covered the retreat, first massing at Crawfish Springs, and then retreating about half a mile and massing again. While still near the springs the enemy were threat- ening and firing at long range. A detachment under Gen. Rucker dashed up to get the position and strength of the Federals, fired at them, and retreated. Dr. Ranney thus far during the retreat had been in the immediate rear of his regiment, but meeting a wounded man making his way towards the hospital and quite exhausted from loss of blood, he dismounted and applied dressings to stop the bleeding. In the mean time the cavalry had started, leaving Dr. Ranney a short distance in the rear ; he hastened to over- take them. Just at that moment, however, Gen. Rucker's command charged the Federal cavalry from the flank and rear, and the rebel cavalry having got in between the sur- geon and his brigade, he found himself in a very difficult position. Making his way to a road about three miles distant, and which ran parallel with the road to Chatta- nooga, he reached it in advance of the Confederates, but in the rear of Gen. Sheridan, who was covering the retreat on the same road near the base of the ridge.

Riding rapidly along, joyous and confident of his escape, he came to a diagonal road crossing the two others. But the elatter of horses' feet, the rebel yell, and the command to halt from a company of Texas rangers charging down upon him not twenty rods off, showed him at once that his hopes were disappointed. Quickly turning his horse, he tried to reach an undergrowth of oak, which might par- tially obstruct the rangers' view. Those at the head of

185

CITY OF LANSING.

the column having fired three shots at him, to avoid any more he jumped from his horse without checking his speed, hoping the animal would continue its course on the road. Much to his surprise and alarm, the horse stopped and en- deavored to follow him into the bushes. Three of the rangers halted to take him and his horse, but not daring to stop long enough they got the horse only.

The firing of the rangers at Dr. Ranney having been no- ticed by some rebel cavalry in the rear, they formed a line across an open field in the immediate vicinity of the woods, where the doctor was hugging the ground as closely as pos- sible behind a friendly " rail cut," about half the size of his body. Skirmishers came across the field and into the woods, and one came over within ten rods of his hiding- place. Watching for him to raise his gun and take aim before he cried for quarter, the doctor concluded to wait until the very last moment. Fortunately the skirmisher was looking higher and beyond him, and not finding any one to shoot at, returned to his horse. From behind his slender protection the doctor watched the horse's legs until he was glad to see those at the end of the column.

It was now evening, and the sun was just going out of sight. One thing was certain, the rebels had fairly cut him off from his own army. He had had a hard day of it. Hearing the firing at the front, just as he had sat down to breakfast, he snatched a hard-taek, and after the whole weary day of work this was all he had to eat. Tired and hungry and cold, he at last found a dead man's blanket soaked with blood, and wrapping himself up in it laid down in a fence-corner and slept until morning. What could he do ? Between him and his own army was that of the rebels. On his right were some twenty miles of barren and inhospitable mountains. He did the only thing possible in the circumstances, and reported himself to Surgeon Hawley (now of Peoria, Ill.), who was then in charge of the well- filled hospital at Crawfish Spring, and where he was imme- diately assigned to duty.

Soon Gen. Bragg's adjutant-general, and others belonging to his staff, including Dr. Fluellin, his medical director, visited the place to parole the wounded soldiers and some surgeons who had been taken prisoners. The surgeons were asked to sign the same parole as the soldiers. Some did so without hesitation. When Dr. Ranney's turn came to sign, he said that according to the eartel existing between the Federal and Confederate governments the surgeons, as non-combatants, could not legally be made prisoners of war. He also said that if the Federal government were holding Confederate surgeons who were captured in the legitimate discharge of their duties he was willing to be held as a hostage until the wrong was redressed, but he would not sign the parole. The controversy grew hotter and hotter, until the adjutant-general told the doctor he must either sign the parole or be put under guard.

" Put me under guard, then," said the plucky surgeon. " I will look to my own government to see that justice is done in the case."

Fortunately, at this critical juncture Dr. Fluellin sub- mitted a paper, which is still in Dr. Ranney's possession, and reads as follows :

" We, surgeons and assistant surgeons of the United 24

States Government, captured at the battle of Chickamauga, on Sept. 20, 1863, do solemnly swear that we will not bear arms against, or give any information detrimental to, the Confederate States Government, nor in any way or manner assist the United States Government until we leave, or are exchanged for such Confederate surgeons as have been cap- tured in the legitimate discharge of their duties and held by the United States Government. And as we are only paroled to attend the Federal wounded, we will report to the commandant of the post at Atlanta, Ga., as soon as our services can be dispensed with."

When a man's head is in the lion's mouth it requires some grit to object to the terms on which the king of beasts may see fit to let the head out again ; but this is just what John Knox did when a slave on board the galley, and what Dr. Ranney did when a prisoner at Crawfish Springs. In the end, all were satisfied with the paper except the adjutant-general, who had to pocket the affront from the sturdy " Yank" as best he could. The subsequent experi- ence of the doctor for forty-four days in the Libby prison is, unfortunately, too familiar to need detail. One thing, however, at Libby was quite characteristic. Haviog picked up a work on medical jurisprudence, he read it with more interest than one would expect in such unfavorable circum- stanees.

Early in July, 1864, the portion of the Second Regiment then in the field was ordered to return to Franklin, near Nashville, and there join the other part of the regiment, which had been absent on veteran leave. Arrived at Frank- lin, the post hospital was put in charge of Dr. Ranney, and shortly after he received veteran leave of absence for thirty days.

Returning to his old friends at Charlotte, he employed his last eleven days in recruiting men to fill the quota for the towns of Eaton and Carmel. The first two days he enlisted twenty seven, and before the expiration of bis fur- lough the whole quota of fifty-one. These recruits, equally to the surprise and delight of his old regiment, now reduced to a minimum, he marched into their camp, thus securing for some twenty officers the rank to which their commis- sions entitled them. The Second Regiment soon had an opportunity of showing their newly-acquired strength by repelling a raid of the rebel cavalry under Gen. Wheeler, and driving him beyond the Tennessee. Almost immedi- ately the raid was repeated under Gen. Forrest, and in the engagement at Pulaski, lasting a whole day, the Federals suffered the heaviest loss, but the Confederates abandoned the field.

While at Pulaski, Dr. Ranney was called from the field to operate for the First Brigade. The church used as a hospital being full to overflowing, he was ordered to estab- lish another hospital, and furnished with assistants for that purpose. Being the only medical officer with his regiment, he was relieved from the hospital and allowed to accompany his command when it moved from Pulaski. Forrest was driven across the Tennessee, but only to be succeeded by Hood and his entire army, now reinforced by the army of Diek Taylor. After some severe skirmishes with the Second Cavalry and other regiments who were acting as pickets to prevent Hood crossing the river, bis overwhelm-

186

HISTORY OF INGHAM COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

ing numbers soon enabled him to accomplish his design with much loss to the Federals.

A more intensely interesting moment than this was scarcely known during the war,-Sherman cutting loose from his base and starting southward from Atlanta on his great march to the sea ; the sagacious Thomas keeping his own counsels and organizing a new army out of everything on which he could lay his hand ; Gen. Grant leaving Richmond for Washington on his way westward to find what it all meant ; and Hood with characteristic audacity determined " to carry the war into Africa." In vain the Union cavalry contested the grouud ineh"by inch, felling trees, and fighting behind barricades on every hill that would give them advantage; the columns of the enemy were too heavy. Schofield fell back from Pulaski to Co- lumbia, and after fighting all day and marehing twenty-five miles at night got into position early October 30th, at Franklin. Never were the rebels in better spirits. Hood had delayed his attaek until all his forces could be brought up, some 55,000 men. Opposed to him, under Sehofield, were only 20,000. " Break those lines," shouted the im- petuous Hood, " and there is nothing more to withstand you this side of the Ohio River. On to Nashville, and you will have nothing to do this winter but eat and drink and sit by the fire and swap jaek-knives."

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.

History of Ingham and Eaton counties, Michigan, Part 45

Author: Durant, Samuel W. cn Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Philadelphia : D.W. Ensign & Co. Number of Pages: 772

Author: Durant, Samuel W. cn
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia : D.W. Ensign & Co.
Number of Pages: 772