USA > Ohio > The Twelfth Ohio cavalry; a record of its organization, and services in the war of the rebellion, together with a complete roster of the regiment > Part 9
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" HEADQUARTERS U. S. CAVALRY CORPS.
" To Com'dg Officer at the Catawba :
"SIR : In order to prevent unnecessary shedding of blood. I demand the unconditional surrender of the forces under your command.
" GEO. STONEMAN, " Maj. Gen. Com'd'g U. S. Forces."
General Gillem (Captain Du Bois) represented the futility of attempting to hold the place, the rebel Lieutenant chimed in and stated what a tremendous force he had seen, what he had heard General Stoneman say, &c.
The rebel Major stormed and swore, but finally returned the following reply :
" To General Stoneman, &c .:
"" SIR : Owing to the cowardly surrender of my picket post, and in consequence of the vastly superior force of your command, I surrender this garrison, with its military stores.
Signed, MAJOR , Com'd'g, &c.
In less than ten minutes the garrison, consisting of seven 'officers and two hundred and twenty-three men, had grounded their arms, and the splendid railroad bridge was at the mercy of the raiders. Sending four of his companies out as pickets, Moderwell with the remaining two set about the work of de-
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struction. The muskets of the garrison were broken in pieces over the railroad iron; and the two pieces of artillery, owing to the lack of harness with which to haul them off, were damaged as much as possible and then thrown into the river. The bridge was fired at the north bank, and in less than thirty minutes had burned from end to end. It was a superb structure, eleven hundred feet in length, supported by ten stone piers which towered many feet above the water, and, once destroyed, was beyond the power of the Confederacy to replace. While the bridge was burning a brigade of rebel cavalry under General Ferguson, came up on the north side, and attempted to cross at the only ford near the bridge, but fifty men of Moderwell's detachment posted on the river bank, soon taught them that it would be a very expensive exploit to cross there.
Rest and feed for his horses being absolutely indespensable, Moderwell held the ford until dark and then took to the pine woods. Midnight found him thirty miles from the bridge, and men and horses being almost exhausted, they chose a strong po- sition and camped for the night. But fast as they had traveled some at least of Ferguson's men had followed, and at daylight, a rebel Lieutenant appeared at the picket with a flag of truce. All supposed it was a demand for surrender, and began to prepare for a flight or a fight. The flag of truce, however, brought a request from General Ferguson to General Stoneman to grant a cessation of hostilities. Knowing himself to be outnumbered five to one, Moderwell of course eagerly ac- cepted the offered truce, and in a few minutes the men were once more in saddle and on the way to Dallas, where they ar- rived that night and there rejoined the brigade. The results of this little exploit were, the destruction of the most important railroad bridge in the Confederacy, the capture of three hun- dred and twenty-five prisoners, (including stragglers picked up both going and returning) two hundred and fifty small arms, two pieces of artillery, and two hundred horses. Of this ad- mirably managed expedition, Mr. Lossing says truly in his "Civil War in America," " It was one of the most gallant little exploits of the war."
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While Palmer's Brigade lay at Lincolnton and Dallas, the first battalion of the Twelfth Ohio, under Major Herrick, was sent to hold Tuckaseige Ford, on the Catawba river. While here the cavalry division of Wheeler, from the army of the Po- tomac, came to the opposite bank, with the evident intention of crossing, but finding the Federals in secure possession, they withdrew without offering fight. It afterwards transpired that President Davis was with this party, making the best of his way across the country whose railroads Stoneman had de- stroyed, toward Mississippi. It was now the 22nd of April; the legions of Lee had gone down before Grant, and Sherman, and Johnson had declared a truce between their two armies.
Intelligence of the armistice reached Palmer by couriers sent through from Sherman, then in the vicinity of Raleigh, , and it was believed that the war was over, and the fighting done, On the 23d the Twelfth broke up Camp at Dallas, and joining the Brigade of Col. Palmer, marched towards Knoxville It was at Hendersonville while on this march, that word came that the armistice was suspended. The same courier brought an order from Stoneman, who by this time had reached Ten- nessee, directing Palmer to turn southward and instantly join in the pursuit of Davis, who was then hastening with all possible secrecy and speed through South Carolina toward Georgia. The same order reached Brown at Asheville, N. C., a consider- able town not far from the western line of the State. Brown had just passed through the place under influence of the armis- tice, leaving several hundred fugitive rebels in peaceful posses- sion. Hearing that the truce was ended and the President assassinated, Brown instantly faced about and wreaked his ven- geance on Asheville and the rebels in the place. Private pro- perty and the lives of all citizens were respected, but govern- ment stores and enemies in uniform fared badly. Then turning ,southward, Brown left Miller's brigade to convoy the prisoners and captured cannon to Knoxville, and joined Palmer in a wild, headlong chase after Davis. It was while at Hendersonville, N. C., that Palmer received the despatch confirming the
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assassination of President Lincoln, announcing the termination of the armistice, and directing him to throw his entire energy into the pursuit of the Confederate President. Nothing that could ensure the capture of the fugitive was to be neglected. Neither men nor horses were to be spared. The thin shell of the rebellion had been broken. If the cavalry of Stoneman could overtake the flying arch-rebel its work would be trium- phantly closed. But not even the stimulus of a prize like Davis ' was necessary to nerve Stoneman's Uhlans up to their highest effort. The story of that dark deed in the Washington Thea- . tre, the consciousness that the God given President of the Republic had been stricken down by the hand of a bravo just as the work of four terrible years was almost complete, was of itself the most desperate, electric poison ever instilled into the hearts of an army. Well was it for the armies of the South that they had yielded before the terrible earnestness, born of that cowardly murder, had been infused into their foes. For a moment the feeling among the Union soldiers was one of regret that this great wrong could not be avenged upon the battle field. Such at least was the sentiment that nerved the officers and men of Palmer's Cavalry Brigade, as it left Hen- derson C. H., just at dawn on the 27th of April, in pursuit of Davis. The eminent fugitive had made the best of his time while Palmer lay at Dallas, Lincolntor and Rutherford, and had already gained an important lead. Though encumbered with baggage, he traveled over excellent roads, with relays of horses and a full cavalry escort at his disposal, and, having crossed the Catawba on the 23d or 24th, was already far on his way into South Carolina. Palmer moved rapidly past King's Mountain, crossed the mountains that divide the Carolinas at Hickory Gap, and pushed on at a swinging trot for many weary hours, crossing the revolutionary battle-field of Cowpens on the 29th, ,and on the same night"arrived at Smith's Ford on the Pacolet river. Here Davis had crossed only forty-eight hours previous. and again the Brigade galloped forward, marching all night, and reaching Spartansburg on the first of May. Driving on
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southwestwardly, Palmer passed between the two important towns, Greenville and Anderson, the former of which was occu- pied at the time by a full Brigade of Wheeler's Cavalry which had abandoned Davis and was seeking to escape through Georgia and Tennessee toward their homes. Wheeler himself with a few platoons of Texas rangers remained with the flying. President, but that party had by this time abandoned all idea of fighting, and only sought to escape through the State into Georgia as secretly and rapidly as possible .. Palmer marched all day and until after midnight of the first, and encamped just before morning of the second, on the Saluda river, at this point near the dividing line between South Carolina and Georgia.
Just at this point, occured a little incident, which the Twelfth Ohio found very enjoyable at the time. Shortly after sunrise on the 2d there came riding into camp, on a gaunt white · mule, Captain Mason of Squadron "L" whose capture by the guerrilla Everett, on the 10th of the previous October has been already described. After a winter of suffering in Libby Prison this officer had been exchanged at Annapolis, sent home to Ohio, and had thence come by rail via Nashville and Chatta- nooga to Knoxville. Finding his regiment absent on the raid, he at once set out for Greenville with the intention of joining it' in North Carolina. At Greenville he met four men of his Squadron, who had come through from Palmer with a dis- patch to Gen. Gillem, at that time in temporary command of the Department of East Tennessee. Having occasion to send an immediate reply, Gillem withdrew his refusal to allow Capt. Mason to make the journey, and the Captain, with the dis- * patches in his boot, set out with his four men to join the brig- ade. Crossing from Greenville to Asheville N. C., thence south through Greenville into South Carolina, the little squad finally on . the sixth day, having ridden 254 miles, reached Anderson S. C., at that time occupied by the brigade of Brown. During "this time, the party had encountered many straggling detach- ments of rebel cavalry, and at Greenville ran directly into the entire Brigade of Wheeler, but by charging into the small
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squads and eluding the large ones, finally came through in safety, and came riding into camp that bright May morning as unex- pected and surprisingly as though dropped down from the sky. From their arrival the Twelfth learned what had transpired in the North since the middle of March, and heard for the first time of the profound impression created throughout the country by the death of President Lincoln.
After a four hour's rest at this place, Palmer's brigade remounted, crossed the Saluda on a long covered bridge, and made that day and night an extraordinary march of eighty miles, reaching Athens, Georgia, shortly after dawn on the 5th. This large, wealthy town was at that time the home of many eminent Confederate officers, and had been, up to that date, wholly free from federal invasion. The place contained, besides a considerable depot of supplies, a large arsenal, at which the 'manufacture of small arms and cartridges was still vigorously going on. At the arsenal a company of Home Guards attempted to make a defence, but a squadron of the Twelfth immediately attacked and dispersed them, capturing the build- ings, and, a few moments after, the astonished town. Here Col. Palmer's brigade remained one entire day, during which time the men of the Twelfth Ohio took possession of a newspaper establishment, and issued the first and only number of a small extra entitled " The Yankee Raider," which was read but hardly enjoyed by the people of the place. The arsenal and depot contained much that had been valuable to the Confederacy, but the war was over and the cavalrymen of Stoneman were weary of the work of destruction. It seemed wantonness to destroy anything further, and the arsenal, with its valuable machinery, imported from Europe, was left standing, the pro- perty of the United States. Resting a day at Athens, Colonel Palmer gained some vague information of the course of ex- President Davis, and on the morning of the 6th set out on another rapid march, crossed the Oconee and pushed on to Monroe. ' Here it became apparent we were on the immediate. track of the fugitive, and the brigade was dispersed over the
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country, so as to sweep every lane and road for a breadth of fifty or sixty miles. In most cases the largest force that could · be spared for any one road was a single squadron, and it thus happened that the Twelfth Ohio was spread over the entire country from Monroe to the Savannah railroad. In this way the command swept down through Georgia, constantly captur- ing large parties of fugitives from the armies of Lee and Johnson, and on several occasions coming within a few hours of Davis, who had now forsaken the main roads, and by travel- ing at night on woodland paths and farm roads, eluded the keenest pursuit. In this way Davis was driven by Palmer directly into the arms of Wilson who, coming up from his raid toward Mobile, spread his cavalry division out over a breadth of fifty or sixty miles, and by advancing toward Palmer, caught the unhappy traitor in a trap from which there was no escape. The capture of Davis of course ended the pursuit, and the work of the cavalry was done.
At the moment of Davis' capture the main body of the Twelfth Ohio was under Lieut. Col. Bentley, at Monroe. A Battalion under Captain Hunter was at Lawrenceville, and Squadron "L" under Captain Mason, was on the extreme left of the line, holding the Atlanta and Charleston railroad at Madison, eighty miles southeast of Atlanta. General Palmer with the Fifteenth Pennsylvania was deployed still farther toward the left and rear, passing through Penfield, Greensboro and Eatontown. As soon as the capture of his victim was · secure, Palmer sent word along his line directing his men to face toward the rear and, while resting from the severe work of the past fortnight, to pay their respects to the rabble of Confeder- ates then swarming from the disorganized armies of Lee and Johnson toward their homes in the Gulf States. It was known that very many of these men, stung by the final collapse of the Confederacy, had disregarded the terms by which they had been surrendered, and had set out for home without having signed or accepted the parole specified in the capitulation. They were determined to fight their way homeward, and, as
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was then apprehended, might be ready at any propitious time in the future, to again take up arms in the cause which, though defeated, they had not yet relinquished. It was important, therefore, to capture as many of these fugitives as possible, and for a few days the tired horsemen of Palmer devoted them- selves to the work of capturing, disarming and paroling such squads and stragglers as passed that way. Among the inci- dents worthy of note which occurred at this period, was the capture of the rebel cavalry leader, Wheeler, with his staff and escort, by a detachment of Squadron "L." This squadron as already indicated, occupied the important railway station of Madison, a point likewise on the main road leading from Athens to the southern portion of the State. The number of fugitives pass- ing along this road was large and the squadron was kept con- stantly busy. A strict watch was kept in the town, and small detachments sent out north and south to intercept as many as possible of those skulking across the country by farm roads and lanes. One of these detachments under Lieut. J. J. Defigh having been sent two or three miles north of the town, sud- denly one evening came upon a full squadron of rebel cavalry, which instantly showed fight. Shots were exchanged, Defigh charged, and the enemy, not knowing but he had encountered a regiment, sought safety in a headlong flight along a plantation . road leading toward the west. Sending word of his encounter to his captain at Madison, Defigh continued the pursuit, and toward midnight had another moonlight skirmish, in which A. C. Wall, a sergeant of Wheeler's Texan Rangers, was killed. This was the last Confederate killed in battle by the Twelfth Ohio. The story of Defigh's encounter having reached his Captain, every available man in camp was instantly mounted and sent to his support. By hard riding and good fortune, this reenforcement sometime after midnight overtook Lieut. Defigh, and the pursuit was kept up till dawn, when it was discovered that the trail had been lost. The enemy had left the path and for the time eluded pursuit. Following their own trail back- ward three or four miles, the Ohio men found where the rebels
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had broken down the bushes in entering a thicket beside the path. Charging along this trail through the woods, the detach- ment came suddenly upon its prey, encamped in a corner of a. grove. The party numbered between 80 and 100, most of whom were asleep, the remainder being busy preparing breakfast. All sprang to their feet, weapons in hand, and a fight seemed inevitable. The irruption of the assailants was so sudden that before the drowsy rebels could understand the situation their . pursuers were among them with levelled carbines, ready to punish any further infraction of the truce. Seeing this, the commanding rebel threw up his hands in token of surrender, called to his men to throw down their arms, and yielded as gracefully as circumstances would permit. The Texans were set at liberty, but their commander, who seemed to have a staff of several officers, was retained on account of the suspicious appearance of their paroles, which were written in blue ink, and not upon the blank forms used by General Fry in paroling the armies of Lee and Johnson. The prisoners were taken to Covington and then turned over to Major Moderwell. They proved to be Major General Wheeler and staff, all of whose paroles were shown to be forgeries. The party was afterwards turned over to Colonel Palmer, who released the staff officers but put Wheeler under guard and sent him via Charleston to Fort Warren. General Bragg meantime had fallen into the clutches of Major Moderwell, and among the large number of Confederates thus captured and paroled by the regiment at this time, were six or eight General officers. It was also the felicity of the Twelfth Ohio about this time to capture, parole and send to his home, the urbane vice-President of the Confed- eracy, Alexander H. Stephens. This ended the fighting, and : it now only remained for Palmer to bring his brigade back to Tennessee. From where he then lay the distance to Chatta- , nooga was perhaps two hundred miles. The distance was insignificant, but the route lay through the desert left by the devastating columns of Sherman the year before, From Atlanta to Tennessee the country for fifty miles on either side
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of the railroad was swept as clear of forage or food as though ravaged by a wide-spreading fire. How to cross this desert was the problem. How the remainder of Palmer's brigade reached Tennessee we never knew. The Twelfth Ohio was left under command of Colonel Bentley, with directions to cross into Alabama and make the best of his way to the Tennessee River. Orders were sent to the various detachments, directing them to concentrate at Warsaw, on the north bank of the Chattahoocheeorty miles northeast of Atlanta. Here a quan- tity of corn and fresh meat was found and the regiment enjoyed what proved to be its last full meal for many a hungry day. Leaving the Chattahoocheen the morning of the 13th of May, the Twelfth Ohio pushed rapidly westward, passed the battle- scared Kennesaw and Lost Mountains, crossed the railway at Tullahoma, and, still pressing forward, encamped, some two hours after midnight, at a deserted mill on the headwaters of the Tallapoosa. This day's march of seventy miles had brought us nearly across the track of Sherman, and thence- forward we hoped for better foraging. Passing through Cedartown, the regiment crossed the line into Alabama and encamped on the night of the fifteenth at Cross Plains. Thence its route lay northward through Jacksonville to Gadsden, where it swam the Coosa and entered the mountain district of Northern Alabama. Having crossed the main range, the regi- ment on the 18th, reached the Tennessee river at Kirby's ford, at which point it had been hoped we might be able to cross into the cultivated region of Huntsville. But the river was high and swift, and as the ferries were all destroyed, crossing was impossible. While encamped here on the river bank a U. S. gunboat came along, and seeing the strangely dressed party on shore cleared its decks and ran out its guns for a fight. Just as the order to fire was about to be given, one of the troopers waved a guidon within range of the commander's telescope, and the naval men were with difficulty persuaded that the brown, ragged, promiscuously clad regiment belonged to the Union army. So long had the Twelfth Ohio been on
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the march, so thoroughly had the original blue of its uniforms been embrowned by dust and storm, or exchanged for gar- ments picked up by the way, and so seedy and unshaven were both officers and men, that it was no wonder the dainty warriors of the gunboat service failed at first to recognize them as friends Finding it impossible to cross the river, Col. Bentley turned toward the northeast, ascended the mountains, and for three days and nights traveled incessantly, almost wholly without forage, over one of the roughest roads it had ever been our bad fortune to encounter. Finally, however, just at sunset of the 23d of May, the weary, travel stained column, wound down the mountain path into the valley of the Tennessee, and in another , hour the advance was pouring across the long viaduct at Bridgeport, the crossing of the Nashville and Chattanooga rail- road. Here at last were rations that did not require to be stolen, and clothing that would restore its wearer to the guise of a Federal soldier. For a week the Regiment gave itself up to the enjoyment of the new situation. It had been so long upon the march that the experience of resting quietly in camp, with abundant food for men and horses, had all the charm of novelty. For sixty-nine days it had not drawn a government . ration nor seen the national flag. During that period it had swept round a circle that lay through six States, and measured with all its eccentric meanderings, fully a thousand miles. It had shared the last and longest cavalry raid of the war, and now, returning to a point from which Northern news could be gained, found the war over, the great armie's of Grant and Sher- man marching homeward, and the whole country happy in the returning sunshine of peace. Isolated as it was, and over- shadowed by the greater events which took place just as it was sweeping through Virginia and the Carolinas, the Division of Stoneman had been almost forgotten, The newspapers and people saw Lee stopped in his flight by some unknown obsta- cle, they knew that Davis had been driven into the clutches of Wilson, and captured, but they had never heard of Stoneman's stealthy departure from Knoxville, and in the joyousness of the
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general result, they were indifferent to the methods by which it had been achieved. So it has happened that the two last cavalry expeditions of Stoneman have never found their just rank among the later events of the war. The raid of Decem- ber, 1864, destroyed Saltville, defeated Breckenridge and ruined his department, but it was overshadowed by the commanding victory of Thomas at Nashville, and by the daring swoop of Sherman from Atlanta to the sea. The last of his great raids gave the final thrust to the dying Confederacy, but it was out- shone by the grander events at Raleigh and on the Appomattox. The soldiers of the various armies knew the value of Stone- man's operations, and in his oration before the great army re- union at Chicago, in December, 1868, Gen. J. D. Cox referred to these two final expeditions in the following words :
"During our operations at Nashville, the cavalry corps of the Army of the Ohio was not idle. Under the command and leadership of General Stoneman, an expedition was made into southwestern Virginia, which for rapidity of movement, and completeness of execution, considering the inclemency of the weather, was not surpassed by any expedition during the war. With two small divisions Gen. Stoneman penetrated the en- emy's country to Saltville, destroyed the important salt works there together with much material of war; captured twenty- two pieces of artillery and so routed and destroyed the ene- my's forces under Breckenridge, that East Tennessee was never again troubled by a hostile presence."
" Again in March 1865 while we of the main body of the Army of Ohio, were engaged in operations to which I shall presently allude, Gen. Stoneman made another important ex- pedition out of East Tennessee, into southwestern Virginia and the Carolinas, destroying the railroads by which escape from Richmond was possible for Lee's army, and performed services which but for the fact that it occured during the general crash of the Rebellion, would have attracted universal attention. A little later the same dashing horsemen had almost succeeded in capturing the person of Jefferson Davis, whose escort surren- dered, but who himself by changing his direction of flight to- ward the Atlantic coast, escaped for the moment, but only to fall quickly into the hands of Gen. Wilson and his gallant troopers."
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