USA > New York > The history of the Forty-eighth regiment New York state volunteers, in the war for the union. 1861-1865 > Part 5
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F ORT PULASKI is situated on Cockspur Island, a marshy island about a mile in length and half a mile wide, at the mouth of the Savannah River and at the head of Tybee Roads. It was a brick work of five faces, includ- ing the gorge, casemated on all sides with walls 73 feet thick and rising 25 feet above high-water. It mounted one tier of guns in embrasure and one en barbette. The gorge was covered by an earthenwork " demilune" of bold relief ; both the main work and the demilune were surrounded and divided by a moat, 48 feet in width around the main work, 32 around the demilune. Two drawbridges over the moats and a low sally-port formed the communication with the ex- terior. A full armament for the work was 140 guns." When we entered it June 1, 1862. everything was in great confusion : the breach made by Gillmore's guns yawned in its side, and the masonry was everywhere broken. For many
* See General Gilimore's Report.
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FORTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT, N. Y. S. VOLS.
a weary week the daily details for fatigue-duty worked away at repairing the fort. The brick walls rose again at the breach, the terre-plein was levelled to make a drill-ground ; the companies were quartered in the casemates, the men erecting bunks for themselves by the side of the cannon. The rebuilding of the fort was a long and tedious task, onerous and distasteful to soldiers; nevertheless it was at last completed, and Fort Pulaski was put in better shape than it had been for years. The guns were remounted, both in casemates and on the parapet ; one company of the Third Rhode Island Artillery under Captain Gould, a detachment of Serrell's Engineers, and the Forty-eighth Regiment com-
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FORT PULASKI.
prised the entire garrison. Our men were drilled at the guns, and became at last efficient as artillerists as well as in the drill of infantry. The officers' casemates of course were better than those of the enlisted men, but even there there was a great scarcity of furniture. A steam-condenser was procured, and the water for the garrison was condensed from the moat. The old boilers are there still ( 1884). rusted and useless, and the great moats are filled with mud and grown up with rushes. A signal station was erected on the para- pet, and we were in communication by signal with Brad- dock's Point : later a submarine telegraph-cable was laid to the fort. Two or three times a week a little steamer made the trip to Hilton Head, bringing mails and stores with regularity. No sutler was allowed in the fort, and many of the boys turned tradesmen. Who will not recall Jackson as
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A COMPANY (E) OF THE 48TH REGIMENT N. Y. S. VOLUNTEERS, FORT PULASKI, GA.
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FORT PULASKI.
he used to pass through the casemates calling out " Borden's condensed milk"? The regiment was drilled to the greatest efficiency. Guns were polished in those days, and scales must shine and gloves be worn on parade; and the writer does not remember to have seen even a crack regiment of militia or any other body of soldiers whose evolutions sur- passed those of the Forty-eighth when at drill in Fort Pu- laski. But our quarters on the island were circumscribed. The horses of the field-officers were of little use; occasionally they were exercised from the north to the south dock and around the little dikes on the island. We were a thou- sand men, living in narrow quarters. Under that confine- ment Colonel Perry pined ; more and more he ceased to take exercise, and sometimes for days would not even ap- pear upon parade.
On the 16th and 17th of June a terrible storm broke on the coast. In the height of it a sutler's schooner came ashore on Cockspur Island. She was laden with stores, and with many cases of liquors and barrels of wine and beer. The crew was rescued with difficulty by some of our boys : but when the liquor came ashore at the breaking-up of the wreck the opportunity for a great spree was more than the men could withstand, and many of " Perry's Saints" " fell from grace." Colonel Perry was greatly mortified at their behavior, and who will not recall the way in which he walked through our quarters in the casemates that day? He was held in such respect that there was no private sol- dier, however intoxicated, who was able to recognize him, who did not rise up to salute him, and all disorder ceased every- where around the casemates at his approach. Two days afterward, early in the afternoon of June 18, 1862, while in his quarters, he was stricken with apoplexy, and, without speaking a word, died. A great sadness fell upon the regiment, who mourned him as if he had been their father. He had taken great care of " his boys," and they had formed a great love for him. Often in the early morning he was found going around among the cooks, tasting the coffee.
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PERRY
MONUMENT TO COLONEL PERRY.
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and ascertaining for himself the quality of the rations that were to be distributed to the men. His death was a calam- ity to his regiment as it was an affliction to his friends and a loss to his country. High hopes had been entertained of him ; he possessed such fine qualities of mind, that many who were partial to him anticipated a great career for him in the army. His majestic bearing, his noble face, who can ever forget ? But he never had "a fair field" in the war. It was his misfortune, Ist, to lack that political acquaintance and influence which was necessary to gain position at the outbreak of the rebellion ; 2d, to be assigned to a depart- ment where nothing of moment was done ; and, 3d, to have engendered the envy of his immediate military superiors. He was a man of nobler bearing and finer attainments than any of them. His clerical profession also was against him for it was reckoned, however untruthfully, that " parsons" were not the men to fight. We buried him outside the fort, the regiment firing a salute above his grave. But his re- mains were afterwards removed to Cypress Hills Cemetery, Brooklyn, L. I., where a noble monument of granite has now been erected to his memory by the comrades of the James H. Perry Post, G. A. R., the survivors of his regi- ment, and a generous donation from the Hanson Place Methodist Episcopal Church of Brooklyn. Lieutenant- Colonel William B. Barton succeeded to the Colonelcy ; Major Beard was promoted to be Lieutenant-Colonel, and Captain James M Green, of Company F to Major. Captain Knowles of Company D, to whom we are indebted for the account of the work on Jones' Island, broken in health by exposure, resigned his commission in July, Lieutenant Pax- son became Captain of the " Die-no-mores." On August 29th Captain Travis of Company C resigned. Other changes occurred among the officers of the regiment at this time, which can be ascertained by referring to the rolls of the companies in this volume. So the long hot summer passed ; yet it was often cool in the casemates, especially at night. But the mosquitoes and sand-flies were the greatest
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FORTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT, N. Y. S. VOLS.
nuisance. Life in the garrison was a monotonous routine, the events of one day being repeated the next day and every day, and the diaries which we have examined contain little of interest except in what was personal to the writers.
We made two expeditions that summer and fall to Bluff- ton, " on the main," a summer resort of the planters, from the sea-coast islands, destroying the salt-works in the neighborhood, and " confiscating" a piano and such furni- ture as could be brought away for the officers' quarters in the fort. The second expedition burned about two thirds of the town by command of General Hunter, in retalia-
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HEADQUARTERS OF GENERALS HUNTER AND MITCHEL.
tion for certain unwarlike depredations by the enemy. The spoliation of Bluffton formed the ground of an indignant protest by General Beauregard to General Gillmore a year later, and certain of us lived to be threatened with punish- ment for that deed. when we were in Beauregard's power as prisoners of war .*
On October 18, 1862, on returning from an expedition up May River, we lost four wounded from the enemy's firing into us, and one of the wounded men, Corporal George Durand of Company B, died the following day. He was the first man of the regiment to fall at the hands of the
* See "Military Operations of General Beauregard," vol. ii. p. 453.
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FORT PULASKI.
enemy. On September 16, 1862, Major-General O. M. Mitchel arrived at Hilton Head, and assumed command of the Department of the South, relieving Major-General David Hunter. General Mitchel had been famed in civil life as an astronomer, and in military life in the West for "doing things." We now anticipated more active service under his command. He visited us at Fort Pulaski, and highly complimented our drill. He made us a brief address on the terre-plein, a report of which (found in The New South of September 20, 1862) is appended :
"SOLDIERS OF THE FORTY-EIGHTH. It gives me great pleasure to meet you here inside of this fortress : a fortress recovered by your own prowess from the enemy ; a fortress you now hold ; a fortress planned by the Government of the United States and built by it, but which had been seized by the rebels. Those rebels you have dispossessed ; those rebels you have compelled to lower their flag before you, and those rebels you have been instrumental in defeating and capturing. I need not say to you-understanding the nature of this war and all its ob- jects -- what you are expected to do. You are too intelligent ; you think too much ; you are volunteers, and as volunteers you understand your duty and the responsibilities devolved upon you. I am here a stranger to you ; but I trust not entirely a stranger in name, although this probably is the first time you have had the opportunity of looking upon my face and form. I am here to say that we have an immense work to perform. I am just from the North, where, having conversed and associated with the thinking men of the country, I am satisfied that the work before us is the most stupendous, the most arduous, that has ever been attempted ; and it is a work in which we never can be successful unless we enter upon it with a firm determination never to succumb. I believe that we are fighting the battle of Human Lib- erty, not for this country alone, but for the whole world. I believe that the despotisms of the Old World would say. if this Great Repub- lic were rent in twain, that it was an absolute fallacy to believe that man can govern himself. and that the interests of the governing class and of the people were so radically diverse as to render all attempts at Republican government failures. If we permit the iron heel of the Southern aristocracy to crush us. I undertake to say before you all. that the last hope of Humanity will die out forever. All lovers of humanity are looking upon us with anxiety. Responsibilities are de- voiving upon us, greater than have ever before devolved upon any people on the earth. The responsibilities of the French Revolution
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FORTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT, N. Y. S. VOLS.
were nothing compared to those under which we labor. That was a contest against oppression, an uprising of the people against tyranny. But this is a contest for human freedom-a contest for the absolute supremacy of the people ; it is a contest in which is arrayed absolute liberty on the one hand, and on the other the most hateful and abom -. inable aristocracy. And now the grand question is this : Are we to meet with success or not? We cannot meet with success unless the soldier enjoys the confidence of his officers, and the officers that of the soldier. Now, I am an old soldier-so old, that thirty years ago I was stationed in the regular army at St. Augustine ; and though at that time I had not the slightest idea of reaching the official rank I
GENERAL MITCHEL.
now hold, yet I am now the commanding officer of this Department I have been in the field, and I understand it perfectly. I have fought the enemy through four hundred miles of territory, and never knew what it was to be checked or turned back. | Loud cheers and cries of 'Good,' ' That's the talk,' etc.] I will tell you of another trait of my character. I am very restless. I don't know how to be still. If you were to confine me within a fortress, or upon one of these islands. I should feel as though I were in a penitentiary. I don't know what the object of the Government was in sending me here; but it is the duty of a good soldier to obey orders, without waiting for words of explanation, and as a good soldier I obeyed. I was told that I would receive instructions here -- instructions which had been given my pre- decessor -- and would answer for my guidance. I find that those in- structions permit me to do pretty much as I please ; and I shall en-
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deavor to do the best I can. I assure you of this : that I will omit no opportunity of giving you active employment. You shall have no time for sighing and lamenting over your inactivity if we can find any- thing to do. Be assured that if I can use you, no opportunity will escape for active duty if you are ready for the field. [Prolonged ap- plause, with cries of ' We're ready.' etc.]
"Now a perfect confidence between the officers and their command- ing- officer-between the soldiers and their commanding-general-is necessary for success. I am delighted with the appearance of this regiment. I don't want any better-looking regiment. You all look like good soldiers-and a good soldier I love. I could get off my horse and take him to my arms. But a mean soldier I contemn and despise. Now, a good soldier knows his duty, and loves his duty, and performs his duty because it is his duty. He obeys an order because it is given him. He treats his military superior with deference because it is his duty. He knows that as a good soldier he must show that military deference to every officer. If this military deference can be mingled with personal respect for your superiors, so much the better ; but the two are not to be confounded, nor is one to be mistaken for the other. . A good soldier, when he lies down at night, conscious of having performed his duty perfectly, don't care whether he gets up alive or dead. [Cachinnations along the line.] I want you to understand that you have made a free-will offering of yourselves to your country and to the great cause of human liberty. Your lives are not your own. My life is not my own. A good soldier should be ever striving to better himself. A private should struggle for a place among the non-commissioned officers. Having attained this, he should never be satisfied till he is a lieutenant ; and a lieu- tenant is good for nothing unless he strives to be a captain. Once made a captain, he should aim to command a regiment, and by faith- ful, earnest service to fit himself for the position of a brigadier. Then let him press steadily forward, until the whole country shall take him up, and say, ' Make that man a major-general, and give him an army corps.' But let him stop there. We don't need a commander-in-chief.
" We want many armies. A grand, magnificent army is a glorious sight-the most glorious that the sun ever shone upon. Anybody can become a drilled soldier, and every officer can make drilled soldiers ; but then the next thing is to inspire them with a proper determination to die, if need be, in the performance of their duty. When this is done, an army corps is a soldier himself, instinct with life, and vigor, and determination. Then the commanding officer must have the wisdom, the discretion, and the force to compel victory to perch upon his banner. Your fortunes are to a certain extent in my keeping.
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Rest assured that day and night I shall think of you ; day and night I shall care for you, and your interests shall be in my thoughts. Rest assured that I shall endeavor to see that you get from the Government all that it has promised you, punctually and systematically. In return, I shall expect from you the most complete and perfect service, the most absolute devotion. When I order you to move, I shall expect you to go forward with spirit and alacrity. When I ask you to attack yonder battery, I shall expect you to march over it, and to plant your bayonets beyond it, halting when the word is given-not before. Now, boys, we understand each other."
The report adds that-
" The General concluded his address amid the most enthusiastic cheers, after which the regiment was dismissed. Subsequently the casemates were visited. and an inspection was made of the quarters and of the well-ordered hospital under the charge of Dr. Mulford, With all that he saw the General expressed his gratification, and in private conversation complimented the Forty-eighth even more warm- ly than in his public speech. A dinner at the quarters of Colonel Barton, attended by sweet music from the regimental band. and a personal introduction to the officers of the regiment, were the final features of the visit of General Mitchel to Pulaski."
Our new commander at once planned an advance, having as its final object the capture of Charleston, but initiated by an expedition to destroy the Charleston and Savannah Railroad in the vicinity of Pocotaligo and Coosawhatchie. Before the expedition was ready to start, however, General Mitchel was taken down with yellow-fever. He was re- moved from Hilton Head to the more healthful locality of Beaufort ; and there, in the parlors of a fine mansion in that deserted town, on the 30th of October, he died. While he was ill a request came to Fort Pulaski that Chaplain Strick- land of the Forty-eighth should visit him. To visit a man sick with yellow-fever was not a coveted duty in those days, and a consultation was held in the fort as to whether the chaplain ought to go. The noble man cut it short by say- ing, " If I knew I would get my death, I would go;" and he did go, and took with him to the bedside of the dying
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soldier such comforts as a faithful Christian minister can render. Happily he escaped the disease ; perhaps God cares for His workmen when they are at His work. Chaplain Strickland was not destined to die till twenty-two years afterward,-in July, 1884,-at Ocean Grove, N. J., when it was the writer's privilege to speak at his funeral.
General Brannan, who was next in command to General Mitchel, perfected the arrangements for the expedition during the commanding-general's sickness. He gathered an effective force of between four and five thousand men, on transports, and, accompanied by gunboats, moved up
THE PLANTER.
the Broad River and Bee's Creek, and, landing his forces at Mackey's Point, pushed on some miles in the direction of Pocotaligo. A detachment of three hundred men of the Forty-eighth Regiment and fifty of the Third Rhode Island Artillery had embarked at Fort Pulaski on the steamer Planter, on the 21st, under Colonel Barton, and accompanied the expedition. We did not land, however, with the main body of troops at Mackey's Point, but proceeded farther up the river for the purpose of cutting the railroad some miles south of Pocotaligo, and hindering the arrival of reinforce- ments from Savannah.
. We were accompanied up the Coosawhatchie River by the gunboats Patroon and Uncas [or Marblehead ], until
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they got aground, and then we went on alone. The Planter (the famous boat which had been run out of Charleston Harbor by its colored pilot, Robert Small) carried an arma- ment of four guns, and they would be some protection. We also got aground at Dawson's Plantation, and Colonel Barton ordered us ashore and marched us straight towards the railroad. We advanced up the narrow road through a dense forest for some two miles toward the village of Coosawhatchie. Just as we reached an open space near the village we heard the whistle of an engine. The men were quickly deployed along the bank of the railroad- Company H, who were in advance as skirmishers, on the left-and were hidden by the underbrush. The train came thundering by,-a long train, mostly of platform-cars,- heavily loaded with Confederate soldiers on their way to rein- force General W. S. Walker at Pocotaligo. We were certainly not more than ten yards from the track when the train came by. At a given order we rose and fired. Some of the boys had brought along a little howitzer, which they aimed at the boiler of the engine. It was a terrible and unex- pected volley which we fired into them. Their commander, Major Harrison, was killed, and some seventy of them were killed and wounded. The rest jumped from the platform- cars to the ground on the other side of the track with the greatest agility. We captured some prisoners, and one of their flags and some small-arms. The flag belonged to the "Whippy Swamp Guards."
The writer has always felt that our firing into that train was a cruel ambuscade. But such are the practices of war. The conductor of the train on that railroad (by which we visited Coosawhatchie again in the spring of 'S4) told us that that engine, bearing still the bullet-marks of that day, was yet in use upon the road. Coosawhatchie is now a quiet, sleepy little village, and there is nothing but the ruins of a fortification at the railroad crossing to indicate that that was in any sense an historic spot.
We were followed back to our boat, to which we retreated
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through the woods, by a few cavalry, Their parting volley severely wounded Lieutenant Blanding of the Third Rhode Island Artillery, who had accompanied us. Our forces at Pocotaligo were repulsed with great loss. We had succeed- ed, however, in destroying the railroad and the telegraph lines, and the three hundred men of the Forty-eighth under Colonel Barton had won the only success of our arms on that day, and had possibly saved the forces of General Brannan from destruction. Chaplain Strickland was greatly indignant at the order to retreat. He insisted that we should have marched straight on upon the " Confederacy," his zeal being greater than his discretion. As a matter of fact, only a quick retreat to our boat, before the enemy could rally from their discomfiture, and come in behind us on a cross-road, saved us all from being captured. We returned to Fort Pulaski feeling that we had won a very "little" victory. I append entire Colonel Barton's report of the affair :
" HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES, ON THE SAVANNAH RIVER, 1
FORT PULASKI, GA., October 23, 1862. )
"CAPTAIN: I have the honor to report my share in the recent operations against the Charleston and Savannah Railroad. In accord- ance with orders from General Mitchel, received on the evening of the 20th inst., I left this Post at eight o'clock A.M. on the 21st inst., with three hundred men of the Forty-eighth New York Volunteers and fifty men of Third Rhode Island Artillery (the latter under command of Captain John H. Gould), with three days' cooked and seven days uncooked rations, on board the armed transport Planter.
"On arriving at Hilton Head I received instructions as to my num- ber in the line of the fleet, and also directions to report to Brigadier- General Brannan.who commanded the expedition on reaching Mackey's Point, for further orders. Soon after daylight on the morning of the 22d, I reported to General Brannan on board the Ben Deford, and was directed by him to proceed with my command up the Coosawhatchie River-as near to the town of that name as I might deem practicable ; and disembarking under cover of the gun-boats, which were to accom- pany me, to move toward the town and, if possible, reach the Charles- ton and Savannah Railroad, and destroy it at that point, and the bridge on it over the Coosawhatchie River.
:
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" I was fully instructed, however, not to hazard too much in order to accomplish the above ; but, if opposed by a force at all superior, to fall back under cover of the fleet. There was some delay in starting, arising from the gun-boats being well to the rear, which I improved in borrowing from Commander Steedman, on board the flag-ship Paul Fones, a twelve-pound dahlgren boat-howitzer and fifty-two rounds of ammunition, which proved of great service to me, and for which I desire to return my thanks. I was also furnished, by General Bran- nan's order, with fifty men from the New York Volunteer Engineers, under command of Captain Eaton, provided with the necessary im- plements for cutting the railroad, etc.
" We were soon under way, and had proceeded some three miles up the river when the gun-boats turned around and went back, in com- pliance, as I was informed, with an order from the flag-ship. I how- ever continued on my course in the Planter, meanwhile signalling to the flag-officer for at least one gun-boat, in reply to which he kindly sent two, viz., the Patroon and the Marblehead, which followed after the lapse of a few minutes. The river at this point was very narrow and winding, but the water in most places was over twelve feet in depth at low-tide. I found no difficulty, therefore, in reaching a point two miles distant from Coosawhatchie ; but, it now being almost dead low-tide, further progress by water was rendered impossible by the Planter running aground. Throwing a few shells in the woods, I disembarked with my infantry and engineers as expeditiously as pos- sible, taking with me the boat-howitzer (referred to above), in charge of Captain Gould. Third Rhode Island Artillery, and a detachment of twelve of his men. The swampy nature of the ground rendered land- ing difficult ; but, losing no time, I advanced towards the main road, sending a request to the officer in command of the Patroon -- the gun- boat nearest me, and about one mile and a half astern-to cover the road in my rear as I advanced. I should state here that both the gun-boats were unfortunately aground, and were thus prevented from taking a position nearer to the Planter.
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