USA > Ohio > Washington County > Marietta > Address at the dedication of the Washington County Soldiers' Monument, at Marietta, Ohio, September 17, 1875 > Part 1
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Gc 973.7 Sm59a 1645495
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 00824 6370
ADDRESS
AT THE
DEDICATION
OF THE
ashington County $
Soldiers' f onument,
AT MARIETTA, O., SEPTEMBER 17, 1875.
BY GEN. T. C. H. SMITH.
CINCINNATI: ROBERT CLARKE & CO., PRINTERS, 1875.
٢٤
1645495
ADDRESS.
. 1.1
WE meet to-day, the people of the oldest county in the Northwest-the county which once included in its borders all of the Northwest then under civil jurisdiction-to dedi- cate a monument in memory of those of our citizens who fell as soldiers in a great struggle, which-devolved upon us by dissensions growing out of the colonial differences of the Atlantic States-the people of the Northwest, by their comparative nnity, enthusiasm, and devotion-aided by their controlling geographical position-were enabled, in the providence of God, mainly to decide.
We are assembled in the oldest city of distinctive Amer- ican origin on the continent, where first-after our political independence of Europe had been achieved-the waves of emigration from the various colonial States, passing the mountain barrier commingled in a common tide, and blending different traits and varied descents, began, in the great valley of the continent, the formation of a distinct- ively American nationality.
We are also upon the very scene where the scheme was forecast, and among us in numbers and part of us, are the immediate or near descendants of the very men, who planned, and by wise concert with others, engrafted such institutions upon the Northwest-notably township organ- ization and the common schools-as, when the crisis came, induced, in the people of our section, an intelligent, con- sistent, and unyielding adherence to the cause of liberty and the Union.
Assembled with us are distinguished officers, not of our community, but who have commanded Washington county troops, and are thus united with us in sentiment for our dead .* They have come great distances to testify by their
* General Pope, U. S. A., General Manning F. Force, and others were present.
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
presence their sympathy with us on this occasion. We thank them and we welcome them. No form of words or legal ceremony is necessary to confer on them an honorary co-citizenship with the people of this county. That bond was welded in the heat of war by military adoption, and since then we claim a part in them, and gladly yield them part in us.
To-day, for the first time, we come together as a county community to perform a duty concerning our soldiers. All previous offices, those connected with the raising of troops and their subsequent care, were so spontaneously and universally rendered by individuals, by families, by societies, by neighborhoods, by the vigorous home force of the townships, that although our county authorities were frequently called upon and always active, there came no necessity for an assembly of the people of the county in their collective capacity. It is well that this first meeting of the kind comes since the peace, for thus those who represented the county in the field are joined to those who, at home, stood by them and the cause; including always that sex which made the fame of American women honor- able by their enduring passive courage, and by their busy, thoughtful, and unflagging care for the health of the sol- diers, and for their families. If some whom we strongly wish were here have since been taken from us, yet it is a satisfaction to ns as a public that the generation which has in the interval been maturing, and on which we depend for the transmission of the principles for which we con- tended, thus comes to be largely represented, and can, in this instance, be witnesses and active participants of the spirit that animated and sustained the contest. That spirit is alive to-day. Let us rejoice then, sad as are the mem- ories that mingle with the time. that old Washington for once shows herself in force on an occasion wholly related to the war, and be glad that she thus warmly and unitedly remembers those who laid down their lives for the cause with which, by her origin, her history, and by all the higher aspirations of her people, she was so intimately and throroughly identified. " It is good for us to be here."
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
And as this is the first such assemblage, so is it, it need hardly be added, the last. And this gives it its greatest in- terest and most solemn significance. When a man dies, the care for him by those who were attached to him, and which followed him through life, ends with that closing act which places the headstone to tell that though he be dead his memory is to be kept alive. And this community, in dedicating this monument, completes its course of duty performed for those who represented it in arms. The long series of mutual relations and sympathetic offices, which, from enlistment onward, marked and illustrated the con- nection of the soldiers with their fellow-citizens, ends here. It began when the reverberations from Sumter sounded over the land and told us we must fight; when the cry that the Union was in danger stormed all hearts. Then came the fearful separation which patriotism unhesitat- ingly demanded, when wives gave up husbands, children fathers, parents sons, sisters brothers, the betrothed her lover, and all-their friends, and along our ridges and down our valleys flowed the tide of men who came to take up arms. And this was but the beginning. Again and again, through the long struggle, the recruiting drum beat its summons in your midst, and never in vain. At first, after battles deputations went to see that our wounded should not want. Soon the perfect working of the Sanitary Commission supplied all such needs, and supplies for these Commissions became the rule. Loving and patriotic hands-for love and patriotism were so blended, that even in thought they could not be separated - prepared these supplies, and, what was more, sent direct those hundreds on hundreds of tokens, and thousands on thou- sands of letters, that here, as all over the land, aided so much to keep open the way, for a re-absorption of the vast military forces into home citizenship and peaceful work again. At the polls, whenever the war was put in issue, the thunders of your votes cleared and purified the politi- cal sky, and strengthened the hearts of soldiers with the knowledge that they were still in a majority at home. Finally came the raising and fitting out of the hundred-
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
day men-the young reserves that, posted on every com- municating line, enabled the veterans to concentrate and deliver with confidence their last blows. Soon then all was wonl. The history of what occurred at home, to which we thus briefly refer, should be written and preserved. It con- stitutes as grateful a recollection for all as that of the deeds in the field is a proud one. To-day, in its last link, is com- pleted the chain that kept the soldier a citizen, and bound the citizen to the soldier. Nothing more can be added ; and the record may be said to be made up, by which in our common responsibility we are to be judged at the bar of history. Upon it we are not afraid to stand.
Thus much for those considerations which touch the larger relations, or again the warm homeside of the events which the deaths of those whom we are here to remember and honor signalize. When we turn to the field record itself, all else passes at once out of sight, and intenser, sharper memories take the place. It is no longer of the cause, even, but of the men we have lost that we have to think. It is of Melvin Clark, falling in the sweep- ing assault of his regiment at Antietam. Upon his body, worn next to his heart, they find the miniature of his little girl. It is of Franklin Buell, in the great artillery contest on the Rappahannock. Thrown insensible and crushed- soon to die, the first wave of consciousness that returns, brings back to him only the thought of duty. He sees that the men of his battery have gathered around him, and his first words, calmly uttered, are, " Go back to your guns, men; there are enough others to take care of me." It is of Beale Whittlesey, in the grand assault at Mission Ridge, In the midst of the struggling steep ascent, he springs for- ward to incite his command to new efforts, and is shot dead as he takes the lead. It is of Turner, crowning the height in advance of all, and cheering them on, his sword on high, as he falls. It is of Condit, in the desperate cavalry com- bat on the right at Stone River, fighting to the death. It is of these, and such as these, we think. For why name instances ? Only as instances. The deeds that speak loud- est spoke but for all. The most fiery feats-impetuous out-
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
bursts-of bravery, were but brilliant scintillations, brighter rays, thrown out from that latent, all-pervading, and power- ful heat-that staying quality of valor-which inhered in the mass of our army and held it up through battle, sickness, privation, and toil, on to the determined end. And, not less brave, not less devoted, always more touching, were the deaths of those who, stricken by disease, many of them before even the opportunity for the glorious seal of wounds upon them, in the seclusion and silence of the hospital, withdrawn alike from the sustaining excitements of the field and the comforting sympathies of home, passed away.
We furnished, in this county, for the national canse, something over four thousand men, including recruitments. The majority of the Seventy-seventh, over a third of the Thirty-sixth and Ninety-second, and two companies each in the Thirty-ninth and Sixty-third Infantry ; one company each in the First, Seventh and Ninth Cavalry ; aud Hunt- ington and DeBeck's Batteries, were from Washington. A large number crossed the Ohio, and, joining with loyal Virginians, formed the Second Virginia Cavalry and Buell's Battery. Squads from our county enlisted in adjoining dis- tricts, and we were thus represented in the Fifty-third, Seventy-eighth, and One Hundred and Fourteenth regi- ments, and in the United States Colored Troops. Of the National Guards, or hundred-day men, we furnished seven companies of the One Hundred and Forty-eighth regi- ment. Many citizens of our county, temporarily away in other States, enlisted where they happened to be, including the distinguished instance of that gallant soldier who, en- tering the service but a youth, rose to the command of the famous " Iron Brigade"-General Rufos R. Dawes.
It would, of course, be vain to try to give, in the limits of an address, even the barest sketch of what those whose fame to-day we commemorate, endured and achieved. And, on the other hand, it would, in view of the occasion, be an ungrateful omission to pass over their services with- out some mention of events. We can refer, theu, to the more important operations of the war in which they bore a part,
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
and recall some instances, striking because of the quality of the fighting or the amount of sacrifice required. These, by association, may serve to call up in our minds their career, and renew its remembrance this day.
Our regiments, by which I mean those in which we were more especially represented, first came under fire in the spring of 1862-the Thirty-ninth and Sixty-third in March, at the siege of New Madrid; the Seventy-seventh in April, at Shiloh ; and the Thirty-sixth in May, at Lewisburg.
Our successes that spring, which broke the first power of the rebe lion and defeated its principal policy, have been so shadowed by greater battles and more far-reaching marches since, that we hardly consider their relative importance.
It is well enough to briefly recount them and point out their bearing, not only because this is necessary to under- stand what Shiloh was, but because-if the judgment and plans of the Southern leaders are to count as of value in forming an opinion-the danger of what alone could prevent our ultimate triumph was, by those successes, dis- posed of-viz. European intervention.
The Secession forces had, that winter, in violation of their professed doctrines, invaded the State of Kentucky, and taken up a line which, with its right resting on Mill Springs, extended westward through Glasgow and Bowling Green, closed the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers by Forts Donelson and Henry, and the Mississippi with the fortifications at Island No. 10 and New Madrid, and occu- pied at large Southern and Western Missouri. Their ob- ject in assuming this line, as is shown in an official letter of General Albert Sidney Johnston, accounting for the disasters upon it, was to entirely cover the cotton region, and thus distress us, and compel European intervention, by a dearth of that staple.
Pope, in Missouri, by an advance on Price's flank and rear, captured some fourteen hundred prisoners, and in- duced the withdrawal of the rebel forces to the Arkansas line. Thomas, by the battle of Mill Springs, disposed of their right. Grant, by his success at Henry, and his tremendous blow at Donelson, capturing nearly fifteen
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
thousand prisoners and sixty-five guns, sent all of the rebel forces that he did not capture out of Kentucky and Middle Tennessee. The capture of Island No. 10, of which the seige of New Madrid had been the preliminary operation. followed. Here were captured nearly seven thousand pris- oners and one hundred and twenty-three guns. Pope ef- fected this with such care and skill that the casualties on our side were but a handful, and not a man was killed in the Thirty-ninth or Sixty-third, though they were much in the trenches and under fire. To complete the disastrous results of the attempt, to control cotton, on the same day on which the garrison of Island No. 10 surrendered, the battle of Shiloh was decided in our favor.
By far the most decisive of these successes was that at Donelson; but all aided, and the general result was, that enough of the cotton region was gained to reasonably sup- ply the world, with what was on hand, for another year. By that time England had become sufficiently interested in cotton culture in India to so far separate her in purpose from France, and our formal adoption of the emancipation policy had raised such an issue, and developed such an opin- ion in our favor abroad, as strengthened indefinitely there the sentiment of neutrality.
It is only in the light of these disasters, most of which preceded it, that the full significance of the battle of Shiloh can be estimated. Two things the Southern leaders had mainly relied upon-two principal articles of faith were held by those who attempted to form the planters' confed- eration. One was that cotton was king, and foreign powers would allow us but a limited time to stop supplies of that article in an attempt to subjugate the region which supplied it to the world. The other was that the people of the North, if they fought at all, would not, from the circum- stance that they were so wholly an industrial people, have sufficient military skill and prowess to cope with the South in arms. But not only had the cotton region been opened and large supplies obtained, but at Mill Springs, in the open field, and at Donelson, in a fortification, they had been defeated by inferior forces. Thus the general feeling of the
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
rebels in the Southwest was, that if they did not at once restore their military prestige they were gone, and Shiloh became, as Sherman well phrased it, a fight for manhood. It was fought by the South with desperation, and as a battle that was to decide all.
At Shiloh, the Seventy-seventh was posted at the Church, from which the field received its name, the key-point of Sherman's position and in front of his headquarters. It was there, indeed, that during the fight Sherman received his wound. The brigade included also the Fitty-third and Fifty-seventh. It was the most advanced of the division and the first to receive the shock of the enemy. It was commanded by Colonel Hildebrand of the Seventy-seventh, and of our county, of whom Sherman said in his official report that a braver man he never saw. Two companies of the regiment, constituting the picket for the brigade, under Captain McCormick, were attacked at daylight, and . after having been reinforced, were, before sunrise, driven in. Immediately the line of battle of the enemy, Har- dee's Corps, came rushing on at a double-quick, and the regiments of the brigade had hardly more than formed before they were attacked at their camps. The Fifty-third, on the left, which by Sherman's designation should have been in line with the others, stood at a considerable angle, its left fully in air, and thrust squarely into the enemy's line. It was at once hopelessly rolled up. The Fifty-sev- enth and Seventy-seventh, more fortunate, rallied quickly from a first disorder, clung to the ridge, and, with the aid of Taylor's Chicago battery on the right of the brigade, held the enemy in check-the Seventy-seventh under the command of that able soldier, Major (since General) Fearing, of our county. The Fifty-third soon rallied on their left. Gradually the enemy flanked the troops on the left of the brigade, and after a while they gave way, Waterhouse's battery there losing three guns. Next the Fifty-third and Fifty-seventh were flanked and over- powered. The Seventy seventh still held on, maintaining its possession of the ridge at that point till about 10 o'clock, when, under orders from Sherman, it retired slowly,
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
still fighting, to the new line in the rear, which, meantime, he had assumed for his division. When this order was re- ceived, Fearing had just sent word that they could still hold the position if needed. By this obstinate resistance, Sherman was mainly enabled to gather his reduced forces upon his second position, and if we consider how much, under the circumstances which attended the opening of this battle, depended on gaining time for better dispositions, we shall be impelled to the conclusion that probably no single regiment on that famous field rendered such impor- tant service at the opening of the battle as the Seventy- seventh. Its loss was heavy.
This opinion as to the value of the stand made on the ridge is not confined to our community. Lieutenant Col- onel Compton, of Michigan, in command of the United States Sharp-shooters in that part of the field, in his official report to General Grant declares that he is forced to the conclusion that the stand made by Hildebrand saved the right wing of the army (Sherman's division), and thereby the army.
Sherman's division was composed of troops all raw. The very arms they fought with had only been issued to them at Paducah, when about to ascend the river, a few weeks before. The troops were so debilitated and reduced by sickness from the use of water flowing from the swamps, that three hundred per regiment was about the average on the sick list the day before the battle. (The Seventy- seventh, for instance, three hundred; the Fifty-third, three hundred and twenty.) These were ordered back at the opening of the fight, and a very large proportion of the con- gregated mass in the rear were men of this class, instead of being runaways from the fighting.
Next in order comes the first engagement of the Thirty- sixth. Most fortunate of our regiments, it had been thor- oughly drilled by the famous soldier who commanded it, Colonel (since General) George Crooke.
In renewal of operations in Western Virginia in the spring of 1862, Crooke, with his brigade, penetrated the mountain region to Greenbrier, the wealthiest slaveholding
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
county in that quarter, and most allied socially with the ruling class east of the mountains, and occupied Lewisburg, the county-seat. To drive Crooke out, General Heth was sent with an infantry force double that of Crooke, and a battery. "Great confidence," said a Richmond paper, " is felt in this young and talented officer." The two opposing commanders had been classmates at West Point. In the gray twilight, one fine May morning, Captain Palmer, with Company A, sent out to reconnoiter, because of infor- mation received, found the enemy's forces forming on a ridge facing Lewisburg. As Palmer began skirmishing, they began shelling our camps, and the Thirty-sixth and Forty-fourth regiments formed under this fire and ad- vanced to the attack. In twenty minutes after the mus- ketry opened, the affair was decided, and Heth was de- feated, with the loss of about two hundred and fifty killed and wounded, three hundred prisoners, and all his guns. The most resistance offered was on Heth's right, by the crack regiment of Western Virginia, the Twenty-second, veterans of Scarey, Cross Lanes, and Carnifex, who had never been beaten. These were opposed to the Thirty- sixth, but the latter, compacted by its long winter's drill, never broke its ranks, and pressed its opponents steadily for half a mile, when they gave way altogether.
The battle of Corinth, on the 4th of October, the same year, was the great and terrible day for the Sixty-third- when it performed its greatest feat of arms, and suffered its greatest loss. It was posted at the right of Battery Robinett, which was on the right of Corinth, facing north- west, and commanding the Chevalla road. By this road, Maury's division debouched and delivered its determined and even desperate assaults. There were three of these as- saults, each prolonged. All of them had to be met by the Sixty-third, without being relieved, because its supporting regiment, the Thirty-ninth, which extended-being a much larger regiment-a considerable distance to the right rear also, was under imperative orders to hold the plank-road on its right at all hazards. The rebel columns, though torn in fragments by the fearful fire to which they were
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
subjected over three hundred yards of open ground, re- peatedly penetrated in storming groups to the work, and the ditch was filled with their dead. Each time the left of the Sixty-third, at the appeal of the artillery-men, charged round in the front of the works and beat them back. In several instances, the thing came to the bayonet. Officers, for the only time during the war, used their pistols. By the time of the third assault, the Sixty-third had to hold its line in squads, as there were but half enough men to fill the space. It was thereupon relieved on the left by the Eleventh Missouri. The loss of the Sixty-third was forty- eight per cent. killed and wounded, and but one line officer was left standing in the left wing at the close of the fight. Lieutenant Browning, of our county, commanding company G, was wounded three times before he would leave the line. In front of the work were found, among the dead, General Rogers of Texas, one or two colonels, and also a rebel chaplain, who had died, bravely leading a company up to that point. For years afterward, instances were known of rebel soldiers who, when taken prisoners, inquired what regimeut it was at Corinth which fought so, armed with white-stocked rifles.
Let us now pass to the great operations and deadly fight- ing which marked the prolonged struggle for the strategic heart of the South-Chattanooga. The Thirty-sixth and Ninety-second, serving together in Turchin's brigade. par- ticipated in the famous charge, that which Thomas, in his official report, calls that "splendid advance"-the last stroke delivered by him in his battle on the left of the army, and the closing scene in the two days contest at Chickamauga. Under orders to withdraw to Rossville, Thomas, on the 20th, at 5.30 P. M., having completed his arrangements, notified General Reynolds to commence the movement with his division. Of this division, Turchin's brigade was a part. On attempting the movement, it was found that the enemy had completely turned the left flank, and were in heavy force in the rear and on the Rossville road, and already moving up to attack. The first notifica- tion of the fact had in Turchin's brigade was grape-shot
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ADDRESS OF GENERAL SMITH.
and shells from batteries behind them. Thomas asked if that brigade could break through those lines, pointing to the heavy forces of the enemy. The answer was in the af- firmative. "Then, do it!" said Thomas. Immediately, the brigade was faced to the rear. This brought the Thirty-sixth and Ninety-second in the first line. Turchin gave the preliminary directions : "Now, when I order you to charge, you must charge, and you must keep charging !" Bayonets were fixed, and at the word, the brigade, raising its peculiar yell, rushed at the enemy. But one volley was received from them, when, before they could reload, the front line, the Thirty-sixth and Ninety-second, was upon them, and had broken them. Thomas, who saw it, is our witness, in his official words, that the rebel force was routed and driven in utter confusion beyond the left of his division next beyond the interposed rebel force. For a mile and a half, indeed, the charge continued with unabated fury-the rebel batteries, from three different points on the right, pouring grape-shot and shell into the column, in the endeavor to arrest its progress. A battery was taken and abandoned. Six hundred prisoners were taken, including a colonel and a number of other officers. About three hundred escaped in the clouds of dust and smoke that enveloped all. At length, having successfully charged and captured the Tenth Wisconsin battery, which had opened upon them as they approached the reserves, it was thus ascertained that their work was accomplished. Making a movement in force immediately into the path thus opened, Thomas was soon enabled to continue, and complete his retirement in safety. 1
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