USA > Ohio > The story of the Sherman brigade. The camp, the march, the bivouac, the battle; and how "the boys" lived and died during four years of active field service > Part 30
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Captain Horatio N. Whitbeck to major. October 7th.
John M. Todd, commissioned surgeon, October 20th.
William A. McCulley, commissioned assistant surgeon, August 21st.
Wilson S. Patterson, commissioned assistant surgeon, October 7th. First Lieutenant Samuel L. Bowlby to captain, April 14th.
First Lieutenant Lucien B. Eaton to captain, May 26th.
First Lieutenant Thomas Powell to captain, August 8th.
First Lieutenant Francis H. Graham to captain, August 16th.
First Lieutenant Joseph M. Randall to captain, October 7th.
First Lieutenant Nahum L. Williams to captain, November 4th.
Second Lieutenant Charles O. Tannehill to first lieutenant, Au- gust 12th ; to captain, December 31st.
Second Lieutenant George N. Huckins to first lieutenant, Febru- ary 26th.
Second Lieutenant Johnston Armstrong to first lieutenant, April 14th.
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THE BATTERY AND SQUADRON.
[Jauuary,
Second Lieutenant John C. Matthias to first lieutenant, May 11th,
Sergeant Asa M. Trimble to second lieutenant, February 26th ; to first lieutenant, May 26th.
First sergeant Wilbur F. Hinman to first lieutenant, June 16th.
Sergeant-major William H. Massey (transferred from Sixty-fourth Ohio) to second lieutenant, June 3rd ; to first lieutenant, July ist.
Second Lieutenant Frank B. Hunt to first lieutenant, August 8th.
Second Lieutenant Andrew Howenstine to first lieutenant, August 16th.
First Sergeant Asa A. Gardner to second lieutenant, February 8th; to first lieutenant, October 7th.
First Sergeant Peter Markel to second lieutenant, August 8th; to first lieutenant, November 4th.
First Sergeant Oscar D. Welker to second lieutenant, April Ist; to first lieutenant, November 13th.
Sergeant Joel P. Brown to second lieutenant, August 16th; to first lieutenant, December 31st.
Corporal Francis H. Klain to second lieutenant, March 30th.
Sergeant Robeson S. Rook to second lieutenant, April 14th.
Sergeant John R. Parish to second lieutenant, June Ist.
Sergeant Joseph F. Sonnanstine to second lieutenant, June 16th.
First Sergeant Dolsen Vankirk to second lieutenant, August 12th.
First Sergeant Samuel H. Young to second lieutenant, Novem- ber 4th.
First Sergeant Franklin Pealer to second lieutenant, November 14th.
First Sergeant Nelson Smith to second lieutenant, December 3!st.
First Sergeant Charles Schroder to second lieutenant, December 31st.
First Sergeant Otho M. Shipley to second lieutenant, December 31st.
Sixth Battery.
RESIGNATION :
Second Lieutenant Edwin S. Ferguson, November 7th.
PROMOTION :
First Sergeant George W. Smetts to second lieutenant, Novem- ber 7th.
McLaughlin's Squadron.
DIED OF DISEASE :
Major William McLaughlin, on the Big Sandy river, Kentucky, July 19th.
RESIGNATIONS :
Captain Samuel R. Buckmaster, May 26th.
Second Lieutenant Herman Alleuran, September 15th.
First Lieutenant Enoch Smith, September 20th.
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WE CAMP AT MURFREESBORO.
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PROMOTIONS :
Captain Gaylord McFall to major, July 19th. Sergeant Richard Rice to captain, May 27th. Second Lieutenant Samuel H. Fisher to captain, July 19th.
First Sergeant John L. Skeggs to second lieutenant, July 19th ; to first lieutenant, September 20th.
Bugler Erastus P. Coates to second lieutenant, September 20th.
CHAPTER XXXV.
SPADES ARE TRUMPS.
WE DO SOME HEAVY DIGGING AND GRUMBLING-FOUR MONTHS WITH PICK AND SHOVEL -THE FORTIFICATIONS AROUND MURFREESBORO -SOME WILD GOOSE CHASING-OUR COMFORTABLE CAMPS-CAR - ING FOR OUR DEAD-MAILS AND CORRESPONDENCE-THE "UN- KNOWN" FAIR ONES-CHANGES IN OUR FIELD OFFICERS-"APRIL FOOL" IN CAMP-A CALAMITOUS JOKE ON THE SUTLERS.
W E LAY at Murfreesboro nearly six months-the long- est stay we made at one place during our four years of service. Such events of special interest as oc- curred there may be grouped in two chapters.
The designations of the grand divisions of the Army of the Cumberland were changed to the Fourteenth corps (Thomas), Twentieth (McCook), and Twenty-first ( Crittenden ). We be- came the Third brigade, First division, Twenty-first corps.
For a few days after the battle we were engaged in getting ourselves into shape for whatever might ensue. Details were sent to assist in burying the Confederate dead-generally where they fell-and disposing of the carcasses of hundreds of horses and
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A WRETCHED FOUR DAYS' JOURNEY.
[January,
mules that strewed the field. These latter, if left, would poison the air with their foul exhalations. Much of the ground was so stony that it was impossible to dig pits deep enough for their bur- ial, and most of them were destroyed by burning. They were kept covered with blazing rails and logs, sometimes for two days, until thoroughly cremated. From the field of conflict was col- lected a vast quantity of the debris that always lay thickly upon the ground after a great battle-muskets, accouterments, blankets, overcoats, broken wagons and artillery carriages and caissons. Relics, by tens of thousands; were picked up by the soldiers and sent to friends at home as mementoes of the struggle.
The baggage train arrived from Nashville a week after the battle. Our first camp was about a mile from Murfreesboro, on the Lebanon pike. The ground was low. It rained with exas- perating frequency and copiousness, and more than once our camp was literally overflowed-a sea of water and mud. In about a month. we moved to a vastly more pleasant and healthy location, on the north side of the river, near the Nashville railroad, and within the line of intrenchments then being constructed. Some weeks later we once more changed our habitation, but by this time the vernal breath of spring had dried the ground and it made little difference where our tents were pitched, so that we were convenient to water.
During the uncomfortable months of January and February we made several expeditions into the surrounding country, forag- ing, guarding wagon-trains from Nashville, and one or two trips, the purpose of which was never unfolded. One of the latter, a reconnoisance, or something of that sort, to Eagleville, was es- pecially trying to the temper and physical endurance of the men. We started on the 13th of January and were absent four days. The weather was cold, with almost constant rain, and we had a dismal time. Wet, shivering, without shelter except such as we could improvise, the nights were altogether wretched, and the days scarcely less so. We did not lack for something to eat, for we raided chicken-coops and smoke-houses, securing as much as we could carry. One day the brigade struck a large smoke-house, filled with the hams and sides of from fifty to seventy-five hogs, which were being cured for the rebel army. The men immediate-
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369
WE RESUME FORAGING TRIPS.
ly proceeded to take the hans and bacon from the smoke-house, and resumed their march. They carried the meat upon their bayonets, with their guns at a "right shoulder shift." It was a laughable sight to look down the line and see the hams and bacon bobbing up and down with every movement of the men. We returned to our camp bedraggled, muddy and miserable. Prob- ably nobody ever found out what we went for, or what we acconi- plished by going.
At different times the regiments, and sometimes the entire brigade, went on foraging expeditions. Upon one of these the Sixty-fifth was absent three days. The wagons returned with full cargoes of forage, and the men were loaded down with poul- try and vegetables, the result of their efforts "on their own hook." Company E brought in five pigs, about two months old, which were tender, juicy and succulent. Once, our brigade was ordered out in hot haste to recapture a wagon train which the rebels had snatched from its guards. We went out seven or eight miles at a tearing gait, but of course the train was then far out of reach. Some general had the crazy notion .. in his head that we could overtake the galloping mules, when they had miles the start of us! We returned to camp thoroughly exhausted and wind-broken.
Sergeant George W. Smetts, of the battery, received a well- earned commission as second lieutenant, to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Lieutenant Ferguson. He had served faithfully as orderly sergeant of the battery from its organization. Early in February, Captain Bradley was appointed chief of artil- lery of the division, on the staff of General Wood. He continued in this position during the remainder of his term of service. While his duties during the campaigns that followed, required hin to be absent from the battery more or less, yet he made it his headquarters, and was always in command, except at such times as duty called him away, when the battery was commanded by the senior officer present.
Our most vivid recollection of our stay at Murfreesboro is the fact that "spades" were turned up for "trumps." It was deter- mined that the place should be fortified in the strongest possible manner, so that if the rebels ever got possession of it again they would have to fight for it, and fight hard. The army engineers
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WE STRIKE A LONG JOB OF DIGGING.
[February,
"spread themselves" in laying out a cordon of forts and other earthworks completely surrounding the town. In the execution of this plan many thousands of men were employed for weeks and months. One day the cars brought from Nashville seven hundred carts to be used in the work, and a portable steam saw- mill for sawing timber.
We had scarcely settled down after the battle when one morning the entire brigade was ordered out for fatigue duty. We had no idea of its nature, but soon found out, to our sorrow. WVe had struck a job that was to keep us out of mischief for more than a hundred and thirty slowly dragging days. There was very much more "fatigue" about that duty than we relished. We marched to the spot assigned us, and found there several wagons loaded with picks, shovels and axes. We were told to go to digging at once, guided by numerous stakes which marked the projected line of fortifications. The boys did the digging and the officers did the heavy standing around. After a full day of work the men returned to camp, in a thoroughly disgusted frame of mind. The disgust increased as the days wore on and we con- tinued to dig. When it came to protracted labor of this sort the constitutional laziness of the average soldier always asserted itself. He was willing to endure hard marching and exposure to all the rigors of heat and cold and storm, for that was legitimate soldiering, but he drew the line at grubbing with pick and shovel for forty cents a day.
Our men resorted to every "playing off" scheme that ingenu- ity could devise to evade the obnoxious duty. Even the monoto- nous round of three or four drills each day would have been pref- erable, for that came within the proper sphere of a soldier's activity. But week after week we toiled on, digging deep and wide ditches, piling up huge embankments, and making fascines and gabions out of boughs and wire, for the embrasures and in- ner walls. If we had believed that we would sweep down legions of rebels from the shelter of those fortifications, it would in some measure have assuaged the burden of our grief, but we had not the most remote idea that we would ever have a chance to do that -and we didn't. The rebels tried two or three times, before the war was over, to retake Murfreesboro, but other fellows who
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371
OUR COMFORTABLE CAMPS.
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wore the blue did all the fighting behind those mighty breast- works, that we toiled and perspired so long to build After the work was well advanced, the generals eased up on us a little, and we labored by reliefs, each man being allowed to "knock off" half the day. We were devoutly thankful when our part of the job was finished, and we returned to the old daily routine of camp duty.
One day some of the Sixty-fifth diggers came upon the re- mains of two Confederates, killed in the battle. They placed them at the bottom of the embankment and covered them with a mountain of earth. Sergeant Dave Miller, of Company I, was led to remark :
"Them fellers '11 have to scratch gravel to git out o' there when Gabriel blows his horn !"
Lieutenant Joseph H. Willsey, promoted January Ist, 1863, from sergeant, Company E, Sixty-fifth, was soon afterward de- tailed as topographical engineer on the staff of Colonel Harker, a position for which, by ability and education, he was well fitted. He continued to serve on the brigade staff until the close of the war, with conspicuous fidelity and usefulness.
Our camps at Murfreesboro were fixed up in luxuriant style. Most of the tents were raised two or three feet upon frameworks of logs, making them much more comfortable for dwellings. They had fire-places, with chimneys of brick or sticks and clay, and many had floors, and sleeping bunks raised from the ground. These habitations were furnished with improvised chairs of all sorts, and here and there a rude table. The camp was kept thor- oughly policed, and good health and spirits generally prevailed- barring, of course, the prodigious amount of growling that was in- dulged in while we were so long at work upon the fortifications. The boys put in a good deal of their leisure time in playing ball, pitching quoits and other innocent diversions. Every now and then there was a scare, and we would get the old "peep o' day" orders, to turn out at an absurdly early hour and stand at arms till daylight. The many hours we spent in that way during our four years afforded excellent and abundant opportunity for silent medi- tation and communion with one's self. All the hundreds of times we stood at arms never amounted to anything. It was with us as it was with the young woman who dressed for a ball, although she
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372
THE GRAVES OF OUR DEAD.
[March,
had not been invited. She said she might get an invitation, and she would rather be ready and not be invited than be invited and not be ready.
On Sunday, March 22nd, we spent the day in an appropriate manner. In the morning each regiment of our brigade marched to the scene of its fighting on December 31st. Arms were stacked and the men were directed to put in order, as neatly as possible, the graves of our dead. This they did, with sad hearts but will- ing hands. The surface was carefully cleaned, the mounds smoothed, and the names upon the little headboards were carved with knives, so that their identity might not be lost. In the necessary haste of burial this had been done only with pencils, and the names were fast becoming obliterated. The sacred spot was then inclosed by a fence. When the work was finished, the men were called together and a touching address was delivered by Captain Thomas Powell, of the Sixty-fifth, after which an im- promptu glee-club sang a number of patriotic songs. Upon our return to camp our route lay through "the cedars," where the battle had raged most fiercely during the hours of that fateful morn- ing. On every hand the trees gave evidence of the terrible con- flict-scarred by bullets and torn by shot and shell.
In the chaos following the battle our mails were stopped and more than a week passed before communication was restored. For many days our friends at home were in suspense, not knowing whether their loved ones were dead or alive. Just by way of il- lustration, I will cite an incident personal to myself. In general appearance there was a resemblance between Lieutenant Vankirk, of Company G, Sixty-fifth, who was killed, and myself. One of the wounded men of Company E saw his body and mistook it for mine. Within two or three days he reached Nashville and wrote home that I was . killed. I was mourned by mother, sisters and brother for a week, until a letter written by my own hand reached them. As soon as the mails resumed business they were burdened with letters from the front, giving detailed accounts of the battle.
While we lay at Murfreesboro, a large number of the brigade engaged in the diversion of advertising in northern newspapers for young lady correspondents. The seed thus sown produced an immediate and bountiful crop. Scores of frisky young officers
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and men found themselves up to their ears in correspondence. Lieutenant "Polly" Rook, as the boys called him, of Company B, led the procession in the Sixty-fifth. He used to get sometimes twenty-five or thirty letters in a single mail. I, myself, plead guilty to receiving thirty-seven in one day-so says my diary-but that was when our epistolary rations had been cut off for a week, resulting in this large accumulation. This "unknown" cor- respondence was generally innocent and harmless, without the smallest tinge of impropri- ety. The soldiers formed the acquaintance, at long range, of many exceedingly bright young ladies, and clever writers, whose only purpose in engaging in the correspondence was to di- vert the soldiers and help to relieve the tedium of camp life. As for the boys, they found in this pastime much profit and amusement. They might otherwise have occupied themselves in prac- tices much more reprehen- sible than writing letters to young ladies they had never seen, and were likely never to see. Of the great mass ROBESON S. ROOK, FIRST LIEUTENANT, SIXTY-FIFTH. of these letters, both ways, it may be said that there was not a word in them which might not have been published to the world. It is true that now and then Cupid interested himself in this correspondence, and some matches were thus made which reached full fruition "when the cruel war was over." At Chick- amauga a bullet through my right elbow disabled me from writing a letter for two months. Then I opened up again all along the line. A young lady in Boston wrote me : "You ought to have been spry and dodged the bullets," which was certainly very good advice.
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"UNKNOWN" CORRESPONDENCE.
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MAILS, STAMPS AND STATIONERY.
[March,
During all our army life, whether in camp or on the march, nothing was looked forward to with a keener interest than the ar- rival of the mail. Sometimes we could get none for weeks at a time and then it would come by the wagon-load. Each division, brigade and regiment had its postmaster. At brigade head- quarters the mail was sorted for the various regiments. In each of the latter the cry "Orderlies for your mail" always provoked a yell and a scramble for letters. The value of the best possible mail service for the army, to keep the soldiers in good spirits, was fully realized by the government, and no pains were spared to maintain the slender thread of communication between the men in the field and their friends at home. Breaks were frequent, owing to our movements or the predatory raids of the rebel caval- ry, but these were unavoidable. The wonder is that the irregu- larity was not much greater. Now and then we would hear that a mail had been captured by the "Johnnies" and destroyed. Then the boys would vow to take dire vengeance by putting extra bullets into their muskets the first time they had a chance.
Postage stamps were often scarce and sometimes wholly un- obtainable. In the second year of the war, Congress thoughtfully provided for this by the passage of an act permitting letters from the army to be indorsed "soldier's letter" and sent without pre- payment of postage, the bill to be settled at the other end of the line. Millions of letters were thus forwarded without stamps. There was also a frequent and long-continued famine of writing materials. Often the soldiers wrote on the brown wrappers of cartridge packages, odds and ends of all sorts, and even on pieces of newspaper. Envelopes enclosing letters received were "turned" and used again. During such campaigns as that from Chatta- nooga to Atlanta, pens and ink were rarely available except at headquarters, and four-fifths of the letters were written with pen- cils. As for writing-desks, a piece of an ammunition or hardtack box, a drum-head, any stray bit of board, or a gum blanket across the knee, answered the purpose. The soldiers wrote under all conceivable conditions-during a halt in the march, on the guard reserve, on the picket-post and in the trenches, when a man would often lay down his pencil to seize his musket. it was writing under difficulties, but the soldiers were handy in
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CONCERNING DIARIES.
375
everything, and when the spirit moved one to write a letter he always found a way to do it. Nor, it may well be imagined, were these letters any the less welcome at home because they were not models of epistolary beauty and excellence.
Probably half the members of the Sherman Brigade started out with a brave purpose to keep a diary, for their own satisfac- tion and for the benefit of posterity. To keep up a daily record, with any measure of fullness, often under circumstances difficult and discouraging to the last degree, required about all the perse- verance and stick-to-it-iveness that a man could muster. A large part of the diaries perished early, coming to an untimely end be fore we had been three months in service. I doubt if more than two dozen of the persistent scribblers held out faithful to the end, and even these were more or less spasmodic. There were times when for days it was impossible to write a word. Then it was such a job to bring up the arrears, that a man would generally start in afresh, leaving a gap which he never filled. Diaries were often lost by the accidents of the service, and such a dishearten- ing mishap was very likely to prove fatal. I stuck to it fairly well, my jottings covering more than three-fourths of our entire service; otherwise I fear this volume never would have been written-or somebody else would have done it. On the march I always carried my diary in my pocket, and when a book was filled I sent it home, having the good fortune never to lose one of them. One night at Chattanooga, some worker of iniquity stole my valise from my tent, slashed it open, appropriated all the clothing and valuables, and pitched what he didn't want, includ- ing books, letters and papers, into a pond of water. There they soaked till morning, when I found them. Among the wreckage floating calmly on that pond was one of my diary volumes, just filled. I was so glad to recover this, notwithstanding its damaged condition, that I almost forgave the miscreant for his nocturnal foray. In the Sixty-fifth, Captain Edwin E. Scranton, of Con- pany B, Sergeant Arthur G. Mckeown, of Company H, and Cor- poral "Fet" Spellman, of Company E, were the successful "diary fiends" whom I now recall.
While we were at Murfreesboro many ofour boys received from their friends in Ohio, boxes filled with sundry articles of clothing,
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MORE OFFICIAL CHANGES.
[March,
stationery, notions and "goodies" to tickle the sense of taste and relieve the monotony of army rations. Butter, preserves, canned fruits, maple sugar, pickles, etc., were to us like manna to the children of Israel in the wilderness. These things did not always get through in the best condition, for they would usually be two or three weeks on the journey. A number of boxes and pack- ages sent before we left Nashville did not reach us until five or six weeks after their shipment, and their contents were badly wrecked. Whenever a man who had been at home on furlough returned to his regiment, he brought for "the boys" all the stuff he could manage. After we left Murfreesboro we saw no more boxes from home for two years.
Not long after the battle of Stone River, the main body of the recruiting party, sent to Ohio from Stevenson and Bridgeport, returned, bringing with them a few recruits-not enough to fill a tenth of the vacant places in our ranks.
In March, Lieutenant-colonel Alexander McIlvaine, of the Sixty-fourth was promoted to colonel vice Ferguson ; Captain Robert C. Brown, of Company C, to lieutenant-colonel; Captain Samuel L. Coulter, of Company E, to major. About the same time Lieutenant-colonel Alexander Cassil, of the Sixty-fifth, re- signed on account of ill health and death in his family. He took leave of the regiment at dress-parade, on March 24th, with a few touching remarks expressing his regret at parting from his comrades, with whom he had served so long. Resolutions convey- ing a reciprocal feeling on the part of the regiment, were offered by Surgeon John M. Todd and unanimously adopted. Colonel Cassil left the next day for his home, his departure being sincerely regretted. Major Horatio N. Whitbeck was promoted to lieuten- ant-colonel and Captain Samuel C. Brown, of Company H, to major.
In April the Sixty-fifth received from the state of Ohio a new stand of national colors. That which we had followed so long, faded and tattered, was sent to Columbus for preservation. While we lay at Murfreesboro, a few furloughs were granted to enlisted men, but the number was at no time permitted to exceed one from each of our small companies.
On the first day of April-All Fools' Day-the boys had a
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ALL FOOLS' DAY IN CAMP.
great frolic. Ingenuity was taxed by pretty nearly everybody to "fool" some other body. Few in the camp, from colonels down, escaped being made the victims of harmless tricks and pranks. A soldier of the Sixty-fifth, who was below the average in his rev- erence for "shoulder-straps," soaked a cloth in red ink, wrapped it around his foot, hobbled up to the quarters of Doctor Todd, and told him he had cut his foot while chopping wood. The surgeon carefully unwrapped the cloth, expecting to find a gaping wound.
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