USA > New York > History of the One hundred and twenty-fourth regiment, N. Y. S. V. > Part 37
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We kept up a rapid fire in return and the roar and racket soon became so terrific that General de Trobriand, fearing the enemy would sally forth and overpower my command, hurried out the 73d N. Y. and 110th Penn. to our assistance. The engage- ment continued some fifteen minutes after the arrival of our support, when an aide rode out and recalled us. The most seri- ous obstacle encountered was the swamp, for their shells and nearly all of their bullets passed harmlessly over our heads.
However, some of the latter were aimed only too well, for on returning we carried back with a number of. seriously wounded, the dead body of as brave a soldier as ever fell in battle upon Virginia's bloody soil, Captain Edward J. Carmick, of Com- pany F. . At early dawn we buried him by the roadside and, with eyes moistened with tears and hearts filled with sorrow, carefully marked his grave. Eleven months afterward, I received from his mother this letter.
" RONKONKOMA, LAKESIDE LAKELAND, LONG ISLAND, MARCH 2, 1866."
COLONEL WEYGANT,
" Dear Sir :- As you were the Colonel of the 124th N. Y. State Vols. at the time of the death of my beloved son Captain Edward J. Carmick, an officer under your command, who was killed in front of Petersburg on the night of April 1st 1865, I take the liberty of addressing you. . . . He was a most kind, dutiful and affectionate son, and his death will be to me a life-long sorrow ; for it has deprived me of my greatest happiness in life, as he was dearer to me than life itself ; and had you, sir, known all of his noble qualities you would not, as you may now, think a mother's love causes her to eulogize her lost son more than he deserved. There was great sympathy and perfect confidence between us, and he never deceived me in his life. While in the army, which was nearly four years, he kept
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HISTORY OF THE 124THI NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
up a frequent correspondence with me, and you sir do not seem a stranger to me, as he often spoke so kindly of yon. He thought you a brave officer and appreciated everything you may have done for his benefit. On the 27th of November last, I visited his grave at the junction of the Boydton and Quaker roads, eight miles ont from Petersburg. Va. I found his grave as it had been described to me. General Gibbon, who was in command there, kindly furnished me two teams and men sufficient to disinter him, and I had his remains put in a metallic coffin that I had carried out from New York for the purpose. On opening the grave I found his body in an excellent state of preservation and could easily recognize him. A head board with his name cut on it with a knife was firmly nailed to a tree under which he reposed. Oh, what a satisfaction it was to me to find my dar- ling boy had been buried by kind friends, and as you probably gave orders for his burial so carefully, a mother's heart is filled with gratitude to you for it, and for all and every kindness you may have shown him in life, and for kindly caring for his remains in having them deposited where I could recover them. I could not rest satisfied until I visited his grave myself. I brought home his remains and had them buried with funeral services on the 10th of Dec. last near his home. I regret, sir, that I was unable to see you when I visited your regiment at Hart's Island when it was there waiting to be discharged-you being absent at the time. Yourself and the officers of your regiment will always seem near to me as the brothers in arms of my beloved son. Had he lived I believe he would always have felt a warm friendship for you and them.
" I am very respectfully, " EVELINA L. CARMICK."
A few hours after our return to the main line from the appa- rently useless and fruitless midnight advance in which Captain Carmick was killed, I learned that the object aimed at was not only most important but that it had been fully accomplished. Grant, it appears, had directed Generals Ord, Wright and Parke, who commanded the troops now occupying our intrenched lines to the south and east of Petersburg, to assault and if possible carry the formidable works in their front at break of day. Gen. Lee, supposing Grant's chosen point of attack was the now most vulner- able Confederate right flank, stripped his works near Petersburg of the bulk of their garrison, which early in the evening he hur- ried off to a chosen position in front of the Second Corps. But shortly after these troops had taken position in front of us, Lee
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FALL OF PETERSBURG AND RICHMOND.
became aware of his mistake, and ordered them back to the works from which they had been withdrawn.
The midnight advance of the 124th and several similar demon- strations by regiments of other divisions, on our left, were made to delay the return of these troops, and with such success that they did not get fairly under way until three A. M., so that when the critical moment arrived they were neither in their strong works at Petersburg where their services were so sorely needed, nor con- fronting the Union turning column on their right, but caught on the march half way between the two points, and fully three miles distant from either. Our brave Captain Carmick's life was therefore not lost in vain, for the affair in which he fell contributed in no small degree to the mighty Union success which followed, bringing about a result which undoubtedly saved the lives of hundreds if not thousands of brave Union soldiers.
The grand assault was opened promptly at the appointed time. Parke, on the Union right, carried the enemy's outer lines, capturing several guns and a few prisoners, but found their inner lines so strong that he despaired of being able to carry them and desisted ; Wright with his own corps (the 6th) supported by two divisions of Ord's made an impetuous and determined advance, losing heavily but carrying everything in his front, and capturing a large number of guns and several thousand prisoners. Ord's remaining division forced the enemy's line at Hatcher's Run and with the main body under Wright swung around and pressed for- ward from the west toward Petersburg. At length, about nine A. M. Humphrey advanced with the divisions of Mott, and Hays, carried a redoubt, scaled the enemy's works in his front, and elos- ing in on the left of Ord's men pushed on with the victorious lines toward the fated city.
In this glorious advance a portion of de Trobriand's brigade led by the 124th moved at a double-quick over one of the main roads leading into Petersburg. Ahead of us was a demoral- ized fleeing body of Confederates, whose pace we occasionally quickened by hurling into them a few bullets. Several times a squad of the hindermost, wheeled and returned our fire, but in
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HISTORY OF THE 124TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
so wild a manner that none of us were injured by it. With wild huzzas, we pushed rapidly on and did not halt until the enemy had been driven behind his inner line of works immediately surround- ing the city. Sheridan who held position on the extreme Union left, and had with him in addition to his cavalry, the bulk of the Fifth Corps and Miles' division from our corps, was equally suc- cessful; and when in the afternoon Miles rejoined us he brought with him several captured guns and six hundred prisoners.
The enemy yet held the city, and Lee was permitted to spend the remainder of the day, making new dispositions of the troops of his shattered army, for " Butcher Grant " could not be made to see the necessity of wasting ten thousand lives in assaulting the formidable works on the outskirts of the city, which he declared could at the end of a few hours be carried by a corporal's guard. Early in the afternoon Mott's division was assigned a position in the most advanced Union line, while the remaining troops of our corps moved to the left, to complete our investing half circle ; both flanks of which that evening rested on the Appomattox River.
About four p. M. a strong skirmishing force was advanced on our right to feel the enemy's lines, and soon became hotly en- gaged, but pushed resolutely forward until General Grant, who had established temporary headquarters in a frame house just behind where our brigade was lying, sent a messenger with orders for them to desist.
Lee's judicious redisposition of his troops which was carried on in plain view of the Union outlooks during the afternoon, was not for the purpose of attempting to hold fast to Petersburg, for that he knew was now an impossibility, but merely to gain a few hours for another purpose. At eleven A. M. he had sent a dis- patch to the Confederate War Department at Richmond advising that preparations be immediately made for the evacuation of that city. And that night while the elated troops of the investing army lay sleeping by the side of their loaded weapons around "Petersburg, there was being enacted in the Confederate Capital. only thirteen miles distant, one of the wildest scenes ever wit- nessed on this continent. Pollard, the author of The Lost Cause,
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FALL OF PETERSBURG AND RICHMOND.
was in the city at the time, and as the fall of Richmond was the direct result of the successes at Petersburg, in which the 124th bore an honorable part, I will insert here a few passages from his weird story of the reign of terror which preceded its evacuation.
" A small slip of paper, sent up from the War Department to President Davis, as he was seated in his pew in St. Paul's church, contained the news of the most momentous event of the war. It is a most remarkable circumstance that the people of Richmond had remained in profound ignorance of the fighting which had been taking place for three days on Gen. Lee's lines. There was not a rumor of it in the air. Not a newspaper office in the city had any inkling of what was going on. Indeed for the past few days there had been visible reassurance in the Confederate Capi- tal; there were rumors that Johnston was moving to Lee's lines and a general idea that the combined force would take the offen- sive against the enemy. But a day before Grant had commenced his heavy movement a curious excitement had taken place in Richmond. The morning train had brought from Petersburg the wonderful rumor that Gen. Lee had made a night attack, in which he had crushed the enemy along his whole line. . . . How was it possible to imagine that in the next twenty-four hours, war. with its train of horrors. was to enter the scene; that this peace- ful city, a secure possession for four years, was at last to succumb ; that it was to be a prey to a great conflagration, and that all the hopes of the Southern Confederacy were to be consumed in one day, as a scroll in the fire ?
" As the day wore on, clatter and bustle in the streets denoted the progress of the evacuation, and convinced those who had been incredulous of its reality. The disorder increased each honr. The streets were thronged with fugitives making their way to the railroad depot ; pale women and little shoeless children strug- gled in the crowd ; oaths and blasphemons shouts smote the car. Wagons were being hastily loaded at the departments with boxes. trunks, etc .. and driven to the Danville depot. In the afternoon a special train carried from Richmond President Davis and some
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HISTORY OF THE 124TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
of his cabinet. At the departments all was confusion ; there was no system ; there was no answer to inquiries ; important officers were invisible, and every one felt like taking care of himself. Outside the mass of hurrying fugitives, there were collected here and there mean-visaged crowds, generally around the commissary depots ; they had already scented prey ; they were of that brutal and riotous element that revenges itself on all communities in a time of great public misfortune.
" When it was finally announced by the Mayor that those who had hoped for a dispatch from Gen. Lee contrary to what he had telegraphed in the morning, had ceased to indulge such an expec- tation, and that the evacuation of Richmond was a foregone con- clusion, it was proposed to maintain order in the city by two regiments of militia ; to destroy every drop of liquor in the ware- houses and stores ; and to establish a patrol through the night. But the militia ran through the fingers of their officers; the patrols could not be found after a certain hour; and in a short while the whole city was plunged into mad confusion and inde- scribable horrors.
" It was an extraordinary night; disorder, pillage. shouts, mad revelry of confusion. In the now dimly lighted city could be seen black masses of people, crowded around some object of excitement, besieging the commissary stores, destroying liquor. intent perhaps upon pillage, and swaying to and fro in whatever momentary passion possessed them. The gutters ran with a liquor freshet, and the fumes filled the air. Some of the strag- gling soldiers passing through the city, easily managed to get hold of quantities of the liquor. Confusion became worse con- founded : the sidewalks were encumbered with broken glass ; stores were entered at pleasure and stripped from top to bottom ; yells of drunken men, shouts of roving pillagers, wild cries of dis- tress filled the air, and made night hideous.
" But a new horror was to appear upon the scene and take possession of the community, To the rear-guard of the Confeder- ate force on the north side of the James River, under General Ewell, had been left the duty of blowing up the iron clad vessels
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FALL OF PETERSBURG AND RICHMOND.
in the James and destroying the bridges across that river. The Richmond, Virginia, and an iron.ram, were blown to the winds ; the little shipping at the wharfs was fired ; and the three bridges that spanned the river were wrapped in flames, as soon as the last troops had traversed them. The work of destruction might well have ended here. But Gen. Ewell, obeying the letter of his instructions, had issued orders to fire the four principal tobacco warehouses of the city.
" The warehouses were fired, the flames seized on the neigh- boring buildings and soon involved a wide and widening area; the conflagration passed rapidly beyond control; and in this mad fire, this wild unnecessary destruction of their property the citi- zens of Richmond had a fitting souvenir of the imprudence and recklessness of the departing Administration.
" Morning broke on a scene never to be forgotten. . . . The great warehouse on the basin was wrapped in flames; the fire was reaching whole blocks of buildings ; . . . Its roar sounded in the ears, it leaped from street to street; pillagers were busy at their vocation, and in the hot breath of the fire were figures as of demons contending for prey.
" The sun was an hour or more above the horizon, when sud- denly there ran up the whole length of main street the cry of ' Yankees, Yankees !' The upper part of this street was choked with crowds of pillagers-men provided with drays, others roll- ing barrels up the streets, or bending under heavy burdens, and intermixed with them women and children with smaller lots of plunder in bags, baskets, tubs, buckets, and tin-pans. As the cry of ' Yankees' was raised, this motley crowd tore up the street, cursing, screaming, trampling upon each other, alarmed by an enemy not yet in sight, and madly seeking to extricate themselves from imaginary dangers. Presently, beyond this crowd following up the tangled mass of plunderers, but not press- ing or interfering with them, was seen a small body of Federal cavalry riding steadily along. Forty Massachusetts troopers dispatched by Gen. Weitzel to investigate the condition of affairs, had ridden without let or hindrance into Richmond."
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HISTORY OF THE 124TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
Meantime everything in and about Petersburg remained un- usually orderly and quiet. During the night Gen. Lee and his army stole away over the muffled bridges so silently that it was said they had taken off their shoes that we might not be dis- turbed by the echo of their departing footsteps. On the morn- ing of the 3d Gen. Grant sent a governor and provost-guard into the city, and forthwith set his army in motion after Lee's fleeing veterans.
CASUALTIES NEAR HATCHER'S RUN, MARCH 31, 1865.
LIEUTENANT AND ACTING ADJUTANT JOHN S. KING
Wounded.
Private James L. Johnson Co. A. Killed.
Charles Pullman H. Wounded.
CASUALTIES NEAR BOYDTON ROAD APRIL 1-2, 1865.
CAPTAIN EDWARD J. CARMICK, Co. F. Killed.
SERGEANT Albert I. Bunce
C. Wounded.
CORPORAL Samuel Yoemans 16.
Private William A Retalic
John J. Messenger
66 Luke Petitt 66 C.
" Andrew W. Conklin Co. K
A.
A.
B.
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THE PURSUIT.
CHAPTER XXII.
THE PURSUIT .- OUR LAST ENGAGEMENT .- LEE SURRENDERS.
ITIIE Confederate forces, after their hasty flight from the Petersburg and Richmond lines under cover of the friendly darkness, on the night of April 2d, concentrated at Chesterfield C. II., a small village situated several miles to the west and about eight miles distant from each of the above named cities. From that point the Veteran army of Northern Virginia, yet forty thousand strong, moved rapidly westward along the northern shore of the Rappahannock river some thirty miles to Amelia C. H.
Simultaneously with telegraphing to the Confederate War Department on Sunday morning the necessity of immediate pre- paration for the evacuation of their capital, General Lee had sent a dispatch to Danville ordering a supply of commissary and Quar- termaster's stores forwarded to Amelia C. IJ. This dispatch was duly received, and early that afternoon three long trains heavily laden with the stores called for arrived in safety at the Amelia C. H. station; but the officer in charge of them, there found awaiting his arrival a dispatch from one of the blundering Con- federate War Department officials, directing him to hasten for- ward to Richmond with the trains in his charge. What the Richmond officials really meant to call for were the empty cars ; but this well trained officer obeyed the second order without asking for the why or wherefore just as promptly as he had the first one ; and among the property consumed by the conflagration which that night swept over the business portion of Richmond, were these trains laden with the food with which Lee expected to replenish the haversacks of his weary and hungry army ou it- arrival at Amelia C. Il. And it is said that when the Confeder-
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HISTORY OF THE 124TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
ate chief, on reaching that point, learned of the calamity, his heart sank within him.
The pursuit was begun on the morning of the 3d. Before the sun was up Sheridan, with his cavalry and the Fifth Corps, was moving up the south bank of the Rappahannock toward Jet- tersville, a depot on the Danville railroad about seven miles south-east of Amelia C. H. Meade, with the Second and Sixth Corps, followed close after Sheridan, starting at eight A. M. and pushing rapidly forward with scarce a ten minute halt until ten p. M.
During the day our brigade, which had the advance of the Second Corps column and marched full twenty miles, gathered in about two hundred dismounted Confederate cavalrymen and cap- tured one brass field-piece.
On the morning of the 4th we were awakened from our slum- bers at three A. M., and an hour later resumed our onward march. Many of the Orange Blossoms had eaten their last hard tack before lying down to rest the night before, and consequently started that morning breakfastless ; but all were in the best of spirits, and not one of the number suggested such a thing as wait- ing for rations to come up, or asked to be sent to the ambulances or allowed to lag behind because of sickness or blistered feet.
About ten A. M. a general halt of Humphrey's Corps was ordered, and presently General de Trobriand directed me to advance with my regiment into the country to the right of our line of march for a mile or two and see if I could not forage a meal for the brigade. The 124th had never before been sent out on a regular foraging expedition, and as many of the boys were very hungry, this order was received with a hearty cheer.
Hastily forming column and moving from the main road through a piece of woods and over the cleared fields about a mile, we came to a deep and thickly wooded ravine, through which ran a stream of water. Following the course of the ravine a short distance we reached and turned into a road that led down to an old fashioned mill. Near this mill there stood a dilapidated frame house in which dwelt the miller, who, hearing our approach
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THE PURSUIT.
came out to see who we were and what we wanted. His honest face wore a surprised look when he saw our clothes were blue instead of grey ; and on learning our errand he stontly declared that a body of Confederate cavalry had been there the day before and carried off every bushel of grain from the mill .and nearly every particle of food from his house, besides driving off all his live stock.
My hungry boys refused to credit the old man's story, and clamored so hard for the privilege of testing its truth by examin- ing the mill for themselves, that I allowed about twenty of them to enter it. The first floor contained nothing worth their notice, but on the upper floor they found a small blind bin. filled with corn, whereupon the frightened miller was pressed into service 'and'ordered to start the mill and grind it for us. He histantly set about the forced task, but his movements were so slow that several of the men I had detailed to superintend the job volun- teered to assist him.
In a trice the raceway gate was hoisted. to its utmost limit. and as the water rushed through and fell on the old rickety water-wheel it started with a creak and a groan, but was soon rushing around with such speed that the old mill trembled and shook as if it had the ague. The noise of the grinding grew louder and yet louder ; the boys shouted at each other as with boxes, pails and measures they hastened from the bin above to the hopper below ; and the old man grew frantic, and stormed about, unheeded by all, while his wife thrust her head from an upper window of the house and stared at the shaking mill with an expression of countenance indicating most plainly that she was sure the old man instead of his corn was in the hopper.
Presently several young slave women crawled out from their hiding place in the upper part of a log cabin, wearing on their black features a frightened grin as if they were uncertain whether the day of doom or of jubilee had arrived ; then three half grown pigs, aroused by the noise of the mill, broke from a pen under or near the house, and started up the side of the ravine toward the plain above, but the foremost one was soon brought down by a
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HISTORY OF THE 124TH NEW YORK VOLUNTEERS.
shot fired from a rifle in the hands of Lieutenant Law-on. and the remaining two, foolishly halting to take a farewell smell of their defunct brother, soon shared his ignoble fate-death at the hands of a hungry Yankee.
In the brush near where the pigs fell, several loaded muskets were found, and one of the slaves secretly informed some of my men of the whereabouts of several sides of bacon. Meantime the grinding continued, but just as the last measure of corn was cast into the hopper the stones became clogged, a crash was heard, and a man rushed out and shut down the gate ; the upper grind- ing stone had been thrown from the spindle and gone crashing through the side of the mill.
Leaving Captain Quick with Company G. in charge of the corn, bacon and fresh pork already collected at the mill. I divided the balance of the regiment into three parts and sent each off in a different direction, with orders not to enter any dwelling, but to borrow all the cattle, pigs, sheep and poultry they could find within a mile of the mill, and to return there at the end of an hour. I moved with one of these columns, which did not return empty handed, but that under Captain Travis was the most successful. It was the last to return, and came in drawing a platform wagon which the captain had personally fitted up by placing a door on an old set of running gears. This wagon was loaded with car- cases of sheep, pigs, and calves, and was drawn in true fireman ยท fashion by a long rope. Behind it was a motley procession, headed by a long horned sheep of the male gender, tied to the wagon, and several very black contrabands, driving two or three wonderfully lean cows. Nearly every man in the regiment had captured a chicken, goose or duck, and had his haversack filled to its utmost limit with corn meal and bacon. But all this plun- der when divided among three thousand men made but a scanty meal. After partaking of a late dinner we advanced about three miles and halted for the night.
At half past three A. M. on the 5th we resumed our onward march, and not a few again started breakfastless ; but at about eight A. M. we were overtaken by a supply train, and received
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THE PURSUIT.
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