History of the 27th regiment N.Y. Vols. , Part 19

Author: Fairchild, Charles Bryant, 1842- comp
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Binghamton, N.Y., Carl & Matthews, printers
Number of Pages: 654


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Our prison is surrounded by a grove of fine trees. The guard line is in the shade of these trees, and our Richmond experience of being fired at through the windows, was re- peated here. I have seen the commanding officer, Lieut. Bradford, son of the Union Governor of Maryland, take a musket and go creeping around among the trees, trying to get a shot at some unsuspecting Yankee who might venture too near the window.


One night, after the men were all asleep, the guard at the door of the third floor, without any warning, opened the door and fired his piece into the room. The charge (three buckshot and a ball), seriously wounded three men.


Our drinking water is all supplied from a single well, near the door. We never get enough to wash or bathe in.


Our time is passed in playing games, chess, cards, etc., or in reading our old letters, and telling stories that we have told more than a hundred times before, but always find at- tentive listeners. We have a dramatic association, which gives very creditable entertainments. Sometimes the offi- cers furnish lights and come in to witness the play. A stage was erected near the front door, and curtains were made of calico, which the rebel officers brought in. At one of these entertainments, an actor was costumed as a woman. How the dress was smuggled in, none of us ever knew. The make-up of the actor was so perfect that the officers were completely deceived, and when they saw the supposed woman come on the stage, they stopped the play, drew their swords, and demanded to know how that woman came there. This was soon explained, and the play was allowed to go on. But when the curtain fell, a lot of the boys rushed on to the stage and hugged the poor fel- low most to death-so rare to them was the sight of a woman.


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March 5th .- We learn to-day from the papers that no more prisoners are to be exchanged at present, so we shall have to stay here for awhile yet. It is a great disappoint- ment to us, for we had hoped to be released soon. It has been represented to us that it is the fault of our govern- ment that there is no exchange, but we do not believe it ; yet we cannot see why we are not released. We are will- ing to wait, however, if any good can come from it. The long confinement is beginning to tell upon the men ; nearly all have a bad cough, and look pale and weak. We are afraid, if we remain here much longer, we shall contract diseases from which we can never recover.


There has been a slight change in our food for a few days : Bread, and coffee made from burnt meal, for break- fast ; pork and bean soup for dinner. Some of the men were allowed to go out in the yard to-day.


March Ioth .- Quite a number of the men have made their escape lately ; they are usually gone two or three days before the officers find it out. Although they come in and have roll-call every day, we manage to fool them and keep our full number, even when three or four escape at a time. It is done by transferring men from one floor to another through trap doors which we have cut through the floors just over the top bunk of some tier. Through these we also visit our comrades on the other floors, and the guards are none the wiser for it. Almost all who make their escape are caught and brought back, sometimes after being out a month or more; and such a pitiable sight as they present when they return ! Usually their clothes are nearly all torn off, and their hands and faces cut and scratched by the briars and thorns, for they have had to travel through the woods and swamps and avoid the houses of white people. The negroes are always kind to escaped prisoners, but hunger would sometimes drive them to ask food of the whites, and this would usually lead to their capture and return.


Besides the prisoners of war in Salisbury there are many Union men, residents of West Virginia, Western North


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UNION SOUTHERN MEN IN PRISON.


Carolina and East Tennessee, who have been arrested on account of their loyalty, torn from their families, thrown into prison, and are treated more shabbily than the soldier prisoners. One night the hospital steward sent for me to come to the hospital and watch with one of these citizen prisoners. I found him in an attic of one of the numerous little brick houses which surround the prison, and were formerly the homes of the operatives in the cotton factory. I watched with him till 2 o'clock, when he died. He had been entirely neglected, and was in a horrible condition.


Perhaps we can forgive our late enemies for their ill- treatment of our prisoners, regarding it as one of the results of the war, but the blood of these Union men will eternally cry to heaven for vengeance.


I found on this visit to the hospital that no provision had been made for washing the clothing of the sick men. So I went to the commanding officers and asked permission to set up a laundry. This was granted, and a number of men were detailed to assist me. This work kept us out in the open air. We followed it for nine weeks. Then I went into the hospital as nurse again, and remained until the time for our release drew on.


We will not weary the reader with further details of life in Salisbury Prison, only to say that as the spring came on the men chafed more and more under the confinement, and very many of those who had borne up so manfully in New Orleans became discouraged, lost heart, lay down and died. By this time there were many thousand prisoners in Salis- bury. We found some whom we parted with in Richmond, and among them the comrades who were with my friend Trowbridge when he died. They gave me his diary and the trinkets that were found in his pockets. These I brought home and gave to his friends. After the first of May the guard-line was enlarged, and the men were allowed to take exercise in the yard, where various outdoor sports were in- dulged in, and the health of the men rapidly improved.


May 23d, 1862 .- The glad day has at last come! Two hundred of us are to start for home to-day. Before we left


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we were required to subscribe to the following oath or parole of honor :


" We, the undersigned prisoners of war to the Confeder- ate States, swear that if released we will not take up arms during the existing war against the Confederate States, until we be regularly exchanged, and that we will not com- municate in any manner anything that may injure the cause of the Confederate States, which may have come to our knowledge, or which we may have heard since our cap- ture. Signed at Salisbury, N. C., May 22, 1862."


Notwithstanding the above parole, and an order that every man should be searched, I determined to save my diary and that of my comrade Trowbridge. When we left New Orleans, I obtained a double canteen. In this I hid my own diary. After removing one spout, I ripped up the cloth covering on one side ; cut through the tin with a knife; placed the papers inside; turned down the tin, and sewed the cloth on as before. The canteen looked as good as new, and was filled with water on the sound side.


There was not room in the canteen for the other diary ; so I took a loaf of bread that I obtained at the hospital, and cut a piece out of one end ; removed all the soft part, to the crust ; rolled up the book, and put it in the loaf. The piece was then wet and put back, and the loaf placed in my haversack. Twice we were searched, and many of the men lost all their records, but mine came through safely. We left Salisbury by rail, and went to Tarboro, N. C., on the Tar River, where we were put on board an open scow, and towed down the river by a little stern wheel steamer, flying the Confederate flag and a flag of truce, to Little Washington, N. C., where we were received by a vessel from the blockade squadron.


The ride down the river was very tedious, but the men will never forget how good the "Old Flag" looked when we came out into the open bay, and saw the colors waving from the masthead of the U. S. gunboat. We were soon discovered, and a boat, flying a beautiful new flag, and manned by officers and men in brilliant uniforms, put out


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RETURN TO GOD'S COUNTRY.


from the ship to hail us. We had arranged to give three cheers as soon as they should board our steamer. But when the word was given, not a cheer was heard-the. men were too happy to cheer. Such ecstasy comes only once in the life of any man.


What a joyful moment! Yet it seemed too good to be true. We who had been so used to being deceived, were incredulous to the last moment. But we were soon on board a transport, and sailed away for New York,-again under the dear old flag! How our tear-dimmed eyes gazed on its folds, and the men, with solemn, sobbing voices, said, " Thank God! thank God!" The link that bound us to the terrible past is broken.


After three days we landed on Governor's Island, New York Harbor, and after a few days were allowed to return to our homes.


Here we remained till July 12th, when by General Order No. 54, Adjutant-General's office, State of New York, all paroled prisoners were ordered to report to the Camp of Instruction, near Annapolis, Md.


Here we remained till the 25th of September, when we were notified that we had been exchanged, and ordered to report to our regiments. We were furnished transportation to Washington, and from there marched in search of our regiment, which was in camp near Bakersville, Md., where we arrived October 4th, 1862, having been absent from the command one year and nearly three months.


Hard as our lot was, we now realize that it did not com- pare with the inhuman treatment our prisoners received later on in the war, at Belle Isle, Andersonville, and Salis- bury. The policy of our government in regard to an ex- change of prisoners has never been fully explained and is not now generally understood. It was doubtless thought to be a wise policy at the time ; but the twenty-nine thou- sand victims who went down to death from those vile, south- ern prisons, after months of suffering that baffles the pen to describe, was an awful sacrifice, that the survivors to this day cannot believe was necessary. And it seems to us that


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God's everlasting curse must surely rest upon the men of the South who thus knowingly allowed the thousands of young lives to be blotted out of existence by cruelties un- heard of before in the annals of civilized warfare. Those who abetted so great a crime against civilization and hu- manity, against Christianity and even decency, must in the future stand condemned by the public opinion of the world, until they shall have done " works meet for repent- ance."


About eighteen per cent. of the men captured died in prison : and a larger per cent. of prisoners were killed and wounded by the rebel guards than would have been killed had the men remained with their respective regiments and engaged in every battle that was fought during their term of imprisonment. Our own government has never yet fully recognized the heroic sacrifice that even the survivors made in support of one of the most vital points of our war policy : " Refusing an even exchange of prisoners, lest, by so doing, they recognize the enemy as a belligerent power," and which was claimed to be necessary in order to prevent foreign nations from accepting the claims of the Confeder- ate States to a place in the galaxy of nations.


Still another view of the matter is outlined in the follow- ing letter from Gen. Grant to Gen. Butler, in 1864 :


" It is hard on our men held in Southern prisons not to exchange them, but it is humanity to those left in the ranks to fight our battles. Every man released, on parole or otherwise, becomes an active soldier against us at once. either directly or indirectly. If we commence a system of ex- change which liberates all prisoners taken. we will have to fight on until the whole South is exterminated. If we hold those caught, they amount to no more than dead men. At this particular time, to release all rebel prisoners North would insure Sherman's defeat, and would compromise our safety here."


The following letter from Gen. Butler to Commissioner Ould, in reply to the proposition to resume exchange. is of interest as bearing on the same point :


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WHO WILL DO IT ?


"One cannot help thinking, even at the risk of being deemed unchar- itable, that the benevolent sympathies of the Confederate authorities have been lately stirred by the depleted condition of their armies, and a desire to get into the field, to affect the present campaign, the hale, hearty, and well-fed prisoners held by the United States,. in exchange for the half- starved, sick, emaciated and miserable soldiers of the United States, now languishing in your prisons."


The above outline helps to explain the policy of our government, and is recorded with the hope that it may reach the eyes of some one in authority, who will be able to stir up our people to a sense of their obligation to this class of our soldiers ; and that justice, though tardy, may yet be done to the men who patiently endured the ten-fold hardships of a soldier's life.


"The National wealth that lies in the treasures of mines, or under the white wings of ships, or in the yellow tassels of wheat fields, is well ; but the richest land is one rich in patriots' graves."


Their memory is a holy legacy. . May the next genera- tion grow up with this sentiment wrought into every fibre of their characters -- that there is no nobler fate than to die for one's country. And if another time of trial and trouble and woe should shadow the land, may they be ready to step forward and die, if need be, that the nation may live.


"For gold the merchant ploughs the main, The farmer ploughs the manor, But glory is the soldier's prize, The soldier's wealth is honor.


The brave, poor soldier ne'er despise, Nor count him as a stranger ; Remember, he's his country's stay, In day and hour of danger."


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The following interesting statement from D. W. Bosley, hospital steward of the 27th, will remind many of the every-day scene about the hospital tent, after the bugler had sounded surgeons' call :


"The hospital department of a marching regiment, or rather the dispensary part, over which I had the honor to preside in the 27th regiment, is probably one of the most " onerous" in the service, and compels the hospital stew- ard to perform almost herculean duties. When the tents were pitched for the night and the soldiers retired to rest, his hardest task would just commence. The unpack- ing of medicine chests, filling prescriptions, extracting teeth, compounding medicines, attending sick, etc., etc., would give him but little time to rest.


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I am pleased to say that I have always held the boys of the 27th in the highest esteem for their bravery and pluck, and endurance of sickness and wounds. Their cheerfulness while suffering was something wonderful.


The kindness of the soldiers to the officers of the med- ical department, was an exhibition of their gratitude to us, for we were never allowed to go hungry, nor to be in need of help."


RETURNED PRISONERS.


From a lot of toz received at a Baltimore Hospital, in May, 1864: Showing the effects of ill treatment while in the hands of the enemy.)


42


BIOGRAPHIES.


GENERAL HENRY WARNER SLOCUM


Was born in Delphi, Onondaga county, N. Y., Sept. 24th, 1827. His ancestors, for three generations, resided at New- port, R. I., where his father was born, and from whence he moved to Albany, N. Y., about the year 1812 ; and thence to Delphi, where he was engaged in mercantile pursuits un- til his death, in 1853. Gen. Slocum received his early edu- cation at the Cazenovia Seminary.


He entered the U. S. Military Academy at West Point, in 1848, and took a high stand in his class. Upon gradu- ating, in 1852, he was assigned to duty in the regular army, as a Lieutenant in the First Artillery.


He served two years in the interior of Florida, and three years at Fort Moultrie, S. C. While at the latter post, he read law in the office of Hon. B. C. Presley, afterwards Jus- tice of the Supreme Court of South Carolina. He resigned his commission in the army in 1857, and commenced the practice of law, at Syracuse, N. Y. In 1858 he was elected to the Legislature from that city. Upon the breaking out of the war he re-entered the military service, and was made Colonel of the 27th Regiment, N. Y. Vols.


His regiment suffered severely at the first battle of Bull Run, and he received a wound which confined him to the hospital nearly two months, during which time he was pro- moted to the rank of Brigadier-General, and, as soon as he


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was able to do duty, he was assigned to the command of a brigade under Gen. McClellan. During the campaign on the Peninsula he was assigned to the command of a Divis- ion in the Sixth Corps, under Gen. Franklin, and after the seven days' battle in front of Richmond, upon the recom- mendations of Generals McClellan and Franklin, he was made Major-General.


In the Maryland campaign under Gen. McClellan, he took part in the battles of South Mountain and Antietam, and at the close of the latter battle he was assigned to the command of the Twelfth Army Corps; Gen. Mansfield, the former commander, having been killed during the battle. He was at Chancellorsville under Gen. Hooker, and at Get- tysburg, under Meade. During the great struggle at Get- tysburg, he commanded the right of Meade's army, and was heavily engaged during the second and third days of the battle. The defeat of Rosencranz, at Chickamauga, late in the fall, necessitated sending immediate reinforce- ments to him; and the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps, commanded by Howard and Slocum, were rapidly trans- ferred thither by railroad.


In the following spring, when Sherman reorganized his army for the Atlanta campaign, he consolidated the Elev- enth and Twelfth Corps, and the new corps (designated the Twentieth) was placed under the command of Gen. Hooker-Slocum being assigned to the command of the De- partment of the Mississippi, with headquarters at Vicksburg.


He was ordered to make frequent excursions into the country and keep the enemy actively engaged, with a view of preventing reinforcements from that quarter to the army in front of Sherman. When Hooker was relieved from the Twentieth Corps, Slocum was ordered by telegraph to sur- render his command at Vicksburg to the officer next in rank, and join Gen. Sherman. He was at once placed in command of the Twentieth Corps.


When Sherman made his bold movement around Atlanta to the Macon road, he left Slocum on the bank of the Chattahoochee guard the communication and take ad-


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BIOGRAPHY OF GENERAL, SLOCUM:


vantage of any opportunity which might be presented. Sherman forced the enemy to leave the entrenchments around Atlanta, to meet him in the field, and the Twen- tieth Corps marched into the city. Within an hour the telegraph line was established, and the first message over it was a dispatch from Gen. Slocum, carrying the glad tidings to the North, "Atlanta has fallen." When Sherman planned his great campaign " from Atlanta to the sea," he gave Slocum command of the left wing of his army, com- posed of the Fourteenth and Twentieth Corps. The his- tory of Sherman's grand campaign from Atlanta to the sea, and from the sea through the swamps of the Carolinas to Raleigh, the capital of North Carolina, is well known to the world. On this campaign, at the urgent request of Gen. Sherman, President Lincoln constituted the Fourteenth and Twentieth Corps an army, to be designated as the " Army of Georgia," and assigned Gen. Slocum as its commander. He continued in this command to the close of the war, when he was again sent to command the Department of the Mississippi. !


In the fall of 1865 he resigned his commission, and in the spring of 1866 he took up his residence in Brooklyn, N. Y., where he now resides. He has twice been elected to Congress from a district in that city, and afterwards a rep- resentative at large for the state.


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RECORD OF 27TH REGIMENT N. Y. VOLS.


BREVET MAJOR-GEN. JOSEPH J. BARTLETT.


Joseph J. Bartlett was born in Binghamton, N. Y., on the 4th of November, 1834. His education was obtained in the public schools of Binghamton, and he afterwards began the study of law in the office of the Hon. Eaton J. Rich- ardson, of Utica, N. Y. He was admitted to the bar in 1860, and began the practice of his profession at Syracuse, N. Y., and next year returned to Binghamton.


In April, 1861, he enlisted as a private soldier, in Bing- hamton, N. Y., where he had just commenced the practice of law. Upon the organization of the company he was elected Captain. Upon the organization of the Twenty- seventh Regiment of Volunteers, at Elmira, he was elected Major of the Regiment.


At the first battle of Bull Run, after Colonel Slocum was wounded, he was placed in command of the regiment, by the Colonel's order. A few weeks after the battle, Colonel Slocum was promoted to Brigadier-General, and Major Bartlett to Colonel of the Twenty-seventh. Immediately upon arriving at West Point. on the Peninsula, the provis- ional Sixth Army Corps was organized, Gen. Franklin com- manding. This gave Gen. Slocum command of Franklin's Division, and Colonel Bartlett the command of Slocum's Brigade. A reconnoissance made by Col. Bartlett at Mechanicsville was so successful that Gen. McClellan con- tinued him in command of his brigade, although general officers were sent from Washington to report to General McClellan for assignment to duty.


At the battle of Gaines' Mill. Col. Bartlett's Brigade re- ported to Gen. Sykes for duty, and, with the regular troops, held the right of Gen. Porter's line successfully until the close of the battle, losing 504 men killed and wounded, including all but three of the field officers.


For this battle he received the warm praise of Gens. Franklin. Slocum, Sykes. Porter and Mcclellan, in their re- ports. He also received the same for services rendered during all the seven days' fighting.


At the second battle of Bull Run, he covered the re-


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BIOGRAPHY OF GENERAL BARTLETT.


treat of the army to Centreville. At the battle of South Mountain his brigade led the column of attack of the First Division, Sixth Corps, at " Crampton's Gap," breaking the enemy's line at the foot of the mountain, driving him be- yond the crest, and securing the road for the passage of our troops.


At Antietam he engaged with the balance of the Corps. For his services up to this date, he was recommended by Gen. McClellan for promotion to Brigadier-General, which title he received about ten days after.


From this period to the close of the war he also engaged in every battle of the Army of the Potomac. At the bat- tle of Marye's Heights, Second Fredericksburg, and Chan- cellorsville, hewas with Sedgwick's. Sixth Army Corps.


At Gettysburg he was given by General Sedgwick the command of the Third Division of the Sixth Army Corps. retaining its command until the " Mine Run " campaign, when Gen. Sykes applied for him to command the First Di- vision of the Fifth Corps, which he retained until Gen. Grant took command and consolidated the six corps of the army into three. This legislated him out of a command, but the Corps Commander made up for him the equivalent of a division, by giving him nine regiments of veteran troops. With this command he served through the Wil derness campaign and in front of Petersburg. For dis- tinguished services in that campaign he was made Brevet Major-General. At the battle of "Five Forks" he was once more assigned to the command of the First Division of the Fifth Corps, which marched from there to Appo- mattox Court House with the cavalry. Being in advance of the corps the morning Sheridan struck Appomattox, he formed his division in two lines of battle with a cloud of skirmishers in front, and forced the enemy to retire behind the town, and received the surrender of a rebel brigade be- fore the general surrender took place.


The next day he was appointed to receive the surrender of the infantry arms of Gen. Lee's army. Gen. Bartlett was struck six times, but never for a day gave up the cont-


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mand of his troops. After the close of the war he was appointed by President Johnson " Minister Resident " to Stockholm, where he remained three years.


: This record shows continuous service in the field from the first Bull Run until after the surrender at Appomattox Court House.


He is now Deputy Commissioner of Pensions, having been appointed to that position by President Cleveland.


COLONEL ALEXANDER DUNCAN ADAMS,


The fourth son of Gen. William H. Adams, was born at Lyons, N. Y., on the 25th of December, 1832. He en- tered Hobart College, at Geneva, in 1852. After leaving college, he was engaged as Civil Engineer on the Erie Canal enlargement, for a few years, when he accepted an appointment as teacher in the Lyon's Union School. He responded to the first call for volunteers, and raised the first company in Wayne county. He was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel after the first battle of Bull Run, and to Colonel after the battle of Antietam. At the close of his term of service he returned to Lyons, and became Principal of the Union School, which position he held for five years. Declining health prevented active employment after this. He died of consumption on the 28th of October, 1872, leaving a widow and one daughter.




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