USA > Pennsylvania > History of the First regiment infantry, National guard of Pennsylvania (Grey Reserves) 1861-1911, pt 1 > Part 13
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On Tuesday morning, July 7, while General Smith was pre- paring to enter the Cumberland Valley and follow down the moun- tains toward Boonsboro, orders came from General Meade to march to Gettysburg. These orders were shortly afterward coun- termanded, and General Smith was permitted to do as he had at first proposed. The head of his column left Newman's Cut at eleven o'clock A. M., and the whole force arrived at Mount Alto Furnace, a distance of some fifteen miles, from five to seven in the afternoon. An officer was despatched to Chambersburg to en- deavor to procure supplies. His mission was but partially suc- cessful. The trains had failed to keep up with the column and but little remained to meet the craving demands of these hungry marchers.
Another day and another night made memorable by a steady downpour. "This was a night of nights," reads the diarist's story. "The rain came down in torrents harder than ever, and by three P. M. our camp was so wet that you had to walk through a foot of water to find an inch of dry ground. The whole eneamp- ment was a sheet of water. One big fellow, assistant quarter- master of the regiment, was lucky enough to have a shelter tent. About 4 A. M. I was on duty as officer of the guard. I went up near his quarters and found him looking very disconsolate, and asked him why he did not stay under his tent. Said he, " I have just floated out and do not think the current will let me go in again." The water was running through the tent at a mill-race pace."
This was in the valley; on the same night, the scene was
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paralleled on the mountain, as it appears, from the diary of the officer of the 119th Pennsylvania before quoted from, in the con- clusion of its entry of July 7, 1863: " Turned to the left up the Catoctin range, which mountains were crossed by a circuitous by-path after dark in a terrible rain storm." [Italics the author's. ]
On the following day, Wednesday, July S, the troops marched all day, passed through Quincy, and arrived at Waynesboro about six o'clock, where the whole force, Brisbane's brigade on the right and the New York troops on the left, went into camp in line of battle a mile and a half out from the town on the road to Hagers- town. There they remained all day over the ninth, awaiting rations and instructions from General Meade.
Here General Smith formed a junction with the infantry bri- gade of Gen. Thomas H. Neill of the Sixth Army Corps. Besides his own brigade, General Neill had with him a brigade of cavalry commanded by Col. John B. McIntosh and eight pieces of artillery. Awaiting his train and his supplies, General Smith sent an officer with a cavalry escort across the South Mountain to the west to communicate with General Meade.
On Friday the tenth, orders to be in readiness to move, orders countermanding these, other orders for a movement and their re call, followed each other through the day, resulting in no move ment at all, and the regiment's still remaining in its Waynesboro encampment until the following morning.
Meanwhile renewed activities elsewhere indicated the need for these various changes. After the publication of the order to be in readiness to move General Meade had directed that the commands of Generals Smith and Milroy should remain in the vicinity of Waynesboro, occupy the enemy to the best advantage, and join either the Army of the Potomac or General Couch, as the move- ments of the enemy might permit or require. General Meade in this same despatch indicated that on the evening of the tenth the right wing of his army would be on the Baltimore and Hagerstown turnpike between the Antietam and Beaver Creek, and his left at Bakersville. Bakersville is on the Potomac below Williamsport. His line would then face west to bear down upon the enemy, who was covering Williamsport, where he intended to recross the river. Smith's movements, continued when the enemy was out of his way, would bring him in touch with Meade's right wing. " An exam-
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HISTORY OF THE FIRST REGIMENT, N. G. P.
ination of the country from Franklin Cliff, Md., had in- formed us " [General Smith's Headquarters ] " that a force of the enemy was encamped on high ground two and a half miles from Hagerstown on the Waynesboro road, and another force to the southward of Ilagerstown of the road to Boonsboro. No earth- works could he discovered nor any earthworks seen on the range towards Williamsport. No movements were visible on the Williamsport road." 1
Upon the receipt of this order to occupy the enemy to the best advantage, and with this general knowledge of his position, General Smith at once ordered Colonel McIntosh with his cavalry brigade and four guns to feel the enemy along the Antietam below Leiters- burg. The Antietam, with its source above Waynesboro, flows southerly and empties into the Potomac near Sharpsburg. Leiters- burg is on the Antietam about two miles from the State line and some seven miles northeast of Hagerstown. Colonel McIntosh carried ont his instructions in a most skilful manner, driving the enemy's cavalry pickets across the creek upon their infantry and cavalry supports, where, confirming the result of the examination of the country from Franklin Mills, it was discovered that the enemy was eneamped in some force along the Boonsboro road to the south of Hagerstown. Colonel McIntosh was supported in this movement by two regiments of Pennsylvania militia under Colonel Frick and the Forty-third New York Volunteers from General Neill's brigade.
This delay over the ninth, besides the disclosure it revealed of the enemy's position, was otherwise advantageous to the troops that had remained in canip. It had seemed apparently impossi- ble, notwithstanding the urgency, to bring along the supplies " with sufficient celerity." The efforts, too, to supply the troops with rations from the " country people met with but little success, the rebels having cleaned out the region." This intervening day of no movement permitted the trains to overtake the column.
Saturday the eleventh was a day of events. The regiment moved at seven o'clock, the day was very hot, a fifteen-mile march followed, interrupted by a reconnaissance and diverted by a raid. At the eighth mile the column erossed the State line into Maryland. " A recommoj-auce in force," it was called, a forward movement in
1 Itinerary. War Records. vol. xxvii, part ii, p. 226. et seq.
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line of battle through a cornfield, overhauled a detachment of rebel cavalry on a foraging expedition. Two of the party fell into the custody of Companies K and G, and were turned over as prisoners of war.
Then it having been reported to Division Headquarters that a miller on Marsh Run, within the enemy's line of the day before, had been ordered by the rebels to run his mill all night to grind wheat for them, General Brisbane, with two regiments of his brigade. the Thirty-second and Twenty-eighth Pennsylvania, was ordered, if possible, to intercept the wagons and destroy the grain if he could not bring it off. He destroyed twenty-four barrels of flour which had been ground for the rebels and all the grain in the mill-one hundred bushels. From the two prisoners captured at the mill it was learned that the enemy had fallen back from Hagerstown. In this affair Brisbane was supported by the Sixty-first Pennsyl- vania Volunteers of General Neill's brigade. That night the two regiments detached with General Brisbane returned to the camp in the vicinity of Waynesboro. Except .the troops of Bris- bane the whole Division moved to Leitersburg, where it encamped for the night.
Sunday the twelfth was a quiet day. Religious services were held in the camp of the Thirty-third Regiment Blue Reserves, and as the diarist remarked : " Our efficient chaplain will go rusty again for another weck." The chaplain of the Thirty-second was a help- ful addition to the staff. He could preach when opportunity offered. was always ready with a kindly greeting; ever willing to be of ser- vice, he found frequent occasions to put the ministrations of his calling to a good and useful purpose. He was a famous provider, and what " his country " sometimes failed to supply, he would secure in far more generous measure from " the country " around about.
He had the full, true, sincere and trustful convictions of a sound orthodox belief; wholly different from another chaplain in a nearby Army of the Potomac regiment, who, though proficient. efficient in every other way, and much beloved by the men, be- lieved in nothing at all, and was the veriest skeptic. This after a time came to the knowledge of the colonel, himself a sound churchman. He summoned the chaplain, who, upon inquiry, freely conceded his non-believing delinquencies. The colonel. recognizing how good he had been to the men, was reluctant to
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HISTORY OF THE FIRST REGIMENT, N. G. P.
ISC3
part with him, yet, as he said, indifferent as they might be to any presching at all, they necessarily demanded that he who was required to preach should at least be as fairly well disciplined in his calling as they were required to be in theirs, so he demanded his resignation. There was little delay in its acceptance. A demonstration for some time in preparation awaited his departure .- The dress parade of the evening of his last day in camp was made the occasion of a farewell tribute; the colonel in a few well-chosen remarks wished him God-speed, and then the ten first sergeants marched out to the front and centre. A wooden sword, specially made for the occasion, twelve feet long and of propor- tionate width, with the words in big red letters, " Thou shalt not kill," painted on it, borne by two husky fellows, was produced and formally presented to the retiring chaplain. Lifted into the head- quarter ambulance by the two burden-bearers, the chaplain fol- lowed it. He was driven to the railway station, boarded the train, and both his ex-reverence and the sword disappeared forever from everything else save the memory of those familiar with the inci- dent, who no doubt will still recall it.
On Monday the thirteenth, at eight o'clock, the regiment, as did the entire brigade, again resumed the march, this time to Hagerstown, some twelve miles distant, whence the enemy had withdrawn on the day before. It reached its destination about six. Now in close touch with the right wing of the Army of the Potomac and the cavalry force of General Kilpatrick, the brigade, with the cavalry, proceeded to uncover the enemy, who still main- tained his lines not far distant. The Thirty-third Regiment, Blue Reserves, became briskly engaged in quite an active skirmish, acquitted itself most commendably and suffered a loss of nine men wounded, and as accounted for in the division official itinerary, but not returned in the regimental losses, one man killed.
On the fourteenth the regiment was ordered into line of battle in the early morning, where it remained until later in the day, where. upon the announcement that Lee's entire army had re- crossed the Potomac at Williamsport, it returned to camp. On this night a rain-storm of some pretentions, while it received due recognition in the diary of the 119th's officer, in the phrase " rained terribly during the night," seemed to have escaped the observation of those who were preserving the records of the Thirty-second.
The Sixty-first Pennsylvania Volunteers was through with its
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DRAFT RIOTS
1863
duty with Brisbane, and that same night, Saturday the eleventh, General Neill's brigade was ordered at once to rejoin the Army of the Potomac. As no specific instructions had been given General Smith for the disposition of his troops, exclusive of Brisbane's brigade, he distributed his forces to the eastward and southward, Cavetown, Benevola, where Beaver Creek crosses the turnpike, and Boonsboro, covering a radius of some eight to twelve miles, and himself reported to General Meade for instructions, at the same time recommending that, in view of the pending engagement then believed to be imminent, his forces be divided among the " old divisions " of the Army of the Potomac-a plan which General Meade did not seem to favor. Its further consideration was avoided, with the disappearance of the likelihood of battle, by the withdrawal of the enemy to his own side of the Potomac.
On Wednesday the fifteenth, their immediate presence in the city of New York demanded for the suppression of the memo- rable draft riots of the summer of 1863, the regiments of the New York State National Guard were hastened with all despatch to Frederick, Maryland, and thence to their destination.
The absence of so many of his troops at a time so critical is thus commented on by Maj .- Gen. Charles W. Sandford, command- ing the First Division New York State National Guard, in his official report of December 30, 1863 : 1
During the absence of all these regiments2 of my Division on the 13th of July last a riot of the most serious character occurred (in consequence of the commencement of the United States draft) which for three or four days was more disgraceful in its character and more serious in its conse- quence than any before known in our City and which could not have lasted twelve hours if one third of our regiments had been home at its commence- ment.
Upon the first alarm upon the requisition of his honor the mayor the whole of the division remaining in the City was ordered on duty, but the absence of over 8000 men at the seat of war had left me with so small a force that my means were entirely inadequate to the magnitude of the occa- sion.
With the departure of the New York troops and the concentra- tion of the Pennsylvania militia at Hagerstown under General
1 War Records, vol. xxvii, part ii, p. 228.
' Seventh, S00; fifth, 900; eighth. 350: eleventh, 850; twelfth, 700; twenty-second. 600: thirty-seventh. 600: sixth. 650; sixty-ninth, 700; fourth, 500; seventy-first, 650; fifty-fifth, 350; eighty-fourth, 400; idem, p. 227.
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HISTORY OF THE FIRST REGIMENT, N. G. P.
Brisbane, who had been designated as its military governor, the connection of Brig .- Gen. William Farrar Smith, U. S. V., with the Emergency Service of 1863 practically ceased. Of high repute in his chosen profession of arms, not only for hi- soldierly courage and capacity, but for his scholarly attainments and ability, his favorable comment on the conduct of the troops under him during that service is of especial value. In his official report 1 there is this significant paragraph :
Before closing I must call to the remembrance of the general command- ing the force that I moved without a quartermaster or commissary, without supply trains, some regiments even without having haversacks, and with no adequate transportation of the cooking utensils of the men and must pay the proper tribute to the general behavior of the troops during long marehe. in rainy weather and without sufficient food. The rugged mountain roads left many of them barefooted, but the greater portion of the command seemed animated by a desire to do all that was required in the service of their country.
Col. Brisbane deserves special mention for the manner in which he man- aged and led his command, and I earnestly recommend him to notice.
[The records at Harrisburg do not disclose that General Brisbane -- "Colonel," as he is always styled by General Smith-held either rank in the militia of Pennsylvania during the campaign of 1863, nor does he appear to have had any other rank in the United States Army after his honorable discharge as Lieutenant-Colonel of the Forty-ninth Pennsylvania Volunteers in October, 1862. It is fortunate that this well-deserved recognition of a meritorious officer help, in a measure to rescue his record from its other- wise official oblivion .- THE AUTHOR.]
As the narrative of this Valley campaign nears its close an interesting happening must not be allowed to pass unnoticed. Chambersburg had her sore trials. Lee's invasion was a heavy stroin. His order to avoid the appropriation of private property did not meet with a cordial acquiescence. His officers did not seem at all times to encourage its observance nor lend their best efforts to its enforcement. A notable incident illustrative of these con- ditions is said to have been the manner in which the provost mar- shal of Chambersburg had sought to make himself as inaccessible as possible to those in search of protection from soldiers disposed to freely help themselves. Though his headquarters were at the court-house, he had stowed himself away in an interior apartment. not easily aeco -- ible.
1 War Records, idem. p. 223.
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VALLEY CAMPAIGN NARRATIVE
1863
A large wholesale grocery establishment had fallen under the ban of the soldiers' spleen. Its failure to yield to persuasion had been met by violence and its stock of goods was rapidly disappear- ing. Every effort of the proprietors to communicate with this official had been foiled, when a bright young fellow in their employ, with a better knowledge of how he might be reached, climbed a - water-spout on the outside of the court-house wall, gained an entrance through a window, secured an interview with him, made the plight of his employers known, when a guard was promptly dispatched to cject the intruders and stop the plunder. But the men who had thus been foiled of their opportunities had kept a keen eye on the boy who had acomplished their discomfiture, with a view to revenge and retribution, and it was not far away. Soon the troops began to withdraw, one by one the guards were gradually relieved. It was then that these disappointed soldiers with enough stragglers gathered to assure their purpose, scized the lad, placed him at a spigot on his haunches in front of a hogshead of molasses, and there he sat, carefully watched, compelled to fill the canteen of each soldier with the slowly running viscous fluid until his persecutors saw he could no longer endure the task, when, laying him flat on his back, they tied his trousers at the ankles and his coat-sleeves at the wrist, placed his neck under the spigot, turned it on full head until the molasses had filled his clothing almost to bursting. stood him on his feet. and sent him away, con- tent in their conclusion that the full measure of their vengeance had been satisfactorily attained. It appeared more like a Yankee trick than southern invention. Unique beyond precedent, the vic- tim preserved its memories, rather for a humorous reminiscence than as a lingering resentment. He does say, however, that he permitted more than half a generation to pass before he allowed molasses, even under its more pursuasive designation of syrup, to pass his lips again.
There were little flurries looking to the return of the enemy rather in detachments for a raid than in force for operation. So General Brisbane had been instructed to watch the fords at Williamsport and Falling Waters. But he never attempted an- other invasion ; this was his last, and, as was said subsequently, " It was on Pennsylvania's soil that rebellion reached its flood, and as it slowly ebbed the other way, reared a marathon on Round
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1863
HISTORY OF THE FIRST REGIMENT, N. G. P.
Top and made great Gettysburg immortal as the ages." The days for ontpost, pieket, and line of battle were over, camp, march, drill, guard mount, followed for a few more, and then the cam- paign of this summer of 1863 was afterward a patriotic memory.
The sixteenth of July was fairly eventful. The general orders from Governor Curtin declaring that, the emergency over, the troops would be returned to their home rendezvous as soon as transportation was available, was published at the evening parade. General Brisbane after its publication made a felicitous speech, profuse in congratulations, abundant in sentiment, grateful in acknowledgments. General Brisbane was an excellent officer. He knew as well how to be appreciative of service as he did how to forcefully exact it.
It so happened, too, that for the day the camps of the 118th and 119th were not far away, at least as the soldier had come to know how to compute distance. In other words, it did not make much difference to him, how far away the object or the purpose was, if he had to or wanted to reach it. Throughout the day the men of the Thirty-second had opportunity to extend a good cheer and a hearty hospitable welcome to their many visitors. It was a bright spot in the campaign. Those who went were replete with story upon their return of what they had seen and where they had seen it. What they had been told, and how generous had been their treatment. With the men of the Thirty-second the visit seems never to have been forgotten and its survivors still recall the incident, whenever it is pertinent to the occasion.
This is one of the stories of the day that still finds a place in memory.
A well-remembered non-commissioned officer of the 119th, who afterward rose to prominent rank in the regiment, one of the visiting party, had dallied a little too long, and inopportunely fell upon and into the custody of the army headquarters provost guard. Everything was on the move, the guards were few and the prisoners many ; the teamsters, too, had been disposed to be sport- ive, their places on a number of mules without drivers were sup- plied from those in custody. This lot fell to our delinquent non- commissioned officer. Remembering that no list had been taken of those in arrest, he set himself about to conjecture how soon and how he could avoid his predicament. The trains had started on
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DAILY RECORD
1863
the turnpike for Baltimore; the pike led directly there, and that was where our dallying soldier did not propose to go if he could help it. The army could have but one destination, the nearest available crossing of the Potomac, and that lay off to the right and not all the way down the pike. The night was bright moonlight, the guards' watchfulness relaxed, escape was not impossible. The route by the pike clearly indicated to the trained eye that a heavy column of marching men had recently passed over it. Pretty soon this heavy trail bore off on a road that turned abruptly to the right toward the Potomac; the train kept straight on. Our non- commissioned officer caught the scent keenly. At the first con- venient shadow he slipped off his mule, dodged into the timber for cover, made good his escape, quickly picked up the trail, and by daylight was in the camp of his regiment near the river, his absence over his time not yet discovered. It was too good a story to keep, and soon became a tasty morsel of regimental gossip.
A single day had scarcely gone, with rainy and disagreeable weather, to be sure, when there goes forth in the diarist's entry of the seventeenth a wail of the monotony of camp life, relieved somewhat by the arrival of boxes and packages from considerate friends at home. On other days the end was not yet, but now the tension was off, the enemy had gone. What they had come for, the " emergency," was over, and the only end for the other days was " awaiting transportation."
On Saturday the twenty-eighth the weather continued warm- very warm. Captain Loudenslager and his Company E, and Captain Allen and his Company C, marched into Hagerstown, reported at headquarters at six o'clock for provost duty, when, their orders countermanded, they returned to camp.
The usual Sunday morning inspection was the feature of the morning of the nineteenth, followed for Company C by its attend- ance at divine service in the Episcopal church in Hagerstown. In the evening the chaplain of the regiment conducted a service, largely attended, in the camp.
On Monday, the twentieth, with no interruption of the usual routine of eamp duty, affairs in the evening took on something of a social turn. The several companies of the regiment supplied their detachments, a serenading party was made up, and compli- mentary serenades tendered to General Brisbane at his headquar-
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1863
ters, and at their several residences to a number of the specially pronounced Unionista of Hagerstown. The usual functional cour- tesies and hospitalities ineident to such occasions followed and the whole party returned to camp about ten o'clock, bearing the freely expressed appreciation of those for whom the little remembrance had been arranged. It was the last night in the vicinity, and hence so selected.
The regiment left its Hagerstown encampment at eight o'clock on the morning of the twenty-first, and after a tiresome but not a tedious march reached Greencastle at about half-past four in the afternoon, where it encamped on the same spot the regiment had occupied in the previous September. The well-remembered spring of fine cool water was still there, and not a landmark had been disturbed.
Without any definite explanation of how it came about, it is recorded that on Wednesday the twenty-second, Company _1 brought into camp several rebel prisoners whom they had in their charge, a portion of whom had been engaged in the attack on Carlisle on the first of July.
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