Civil War times, 1861-1865

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Preface

In an address to the New England Society of New York, Oliver Wendell Holmes said : "The story of the Pilgrims may be told for a thousand anniversaries and the next year it will be fresh again." So it is with the story of the Civil War. Notwithstanding the passing years, it retains all its interest, especially for those who bore arms on either side. The surviving veterans never tire of telling the story or of hearing it told, and its fascination is such as to lend a charm to even the most unpretentious narrative of the conflict in which they took part.

Macaulay said that he intended to write a history of England that would make the lady in her drawingroom lay down the latest novel and take up his book, and he accomplished his purpose. The time has not yet come, nor has the historian appeared, for writing a history of the Civil War. No man now living can write it with the impartiality that should characterize the historian, and no historian could now write such a history without rekindling the embers of passion and prejudice still smoldering beneath the ashes of the conflict that once glowed with such fierce heat.

When the time comes for writing the history of the

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Civil War the historian will find a wealth of materials from which to construct a history far more fascinating than Macaulay's and infinitely more interesting" than the distorted history conveyed in diluted doses through the pages of so-called historical novels. It will be sufficient honor for the author of a volume like this if he has contributed even a little to the history that is to be written.

The general scope of this volume is indicated by the table of contents and a very full index. The statements in the text are supported by a liberal citation of authorities, a table of which precedes the general index. The military operations described are chiefly those of the Army of the Cumberland, and in describing them I have avoided, as far as possible, the use of technical military terms not generally understood by civilians. In the appendix will be found tables showing the organization of that army during the most important battles and campaigns in which it participated.

I claim no credit for discovering such facts relating to the Civil War as any one may find by an industrious examination of official records and histories open to all. Nor do I pretend to knowledge of facts, outside the official records, such as officers of high rank and those intimately associated with them may have acquired. The highest rank I attained was that of captain, and my associates in the army were chiefly among the line officers and enlisted men. My relations to these, however, were such as gave me greater familiarity than that generally possessed by officers of

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higher rank with the daily life and thoughts of a private soldier and with his views of military life and events. Moreover, the knowledge that I acquired of the battles and campaigns in which I participated, limited as were my means of knowing anything about them at the time beyond what I saw and heard, has given me clearer ideas of many matters in connection with them than I could have acquired by any amount of reading. I fully realize, however, that I am quite as liable as others to make mistakes in attempting to record personal observations of events that occurred so long ago, and I claim such indulgence on this account as I would freely accord to those whose recollection of the same events may not coincide with mine.

The political conditions and the military movements of the Civil War period were intimately connected, and the questions growing out of them have given rise to great diversity of opinion — some of them to acrimonious controversy. A colorless narrative of that period, ignoring these questions, would be of little value or interest. On the other hand, a mere partisan discussion of them would be equally unprofitable and uninteresting. Therefore, when expressing my opinion on any of these controverted questions, I have done so without reserve, endeavoring, however ; to write as fairly and impartially as is possible for one who took an active part in either war or politics during the Civil War times, and who has intelligence enough to ripen into a conviction.

We wish to forget the animosities of the Civil War

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period, but not the heroism of those who bore arms on either side of the bloody conflict. That is now the common inheritance of all Americans. The soldiers, Federal and Confederate, to whom I have inscribed this volume, first learned on the field of battle to respect their adversaries. No eulogy can do justice to those of either side which ignores the heroic achievements of those who fought against them. I trust that the soldiers of the South who may chance to see this book will read it with the same generous feelings that inspired a soldier of the North in writing it.

In the preparation of this volume I have been greatly aided by General Henry V Boynton, Colonel William F Fox, Colonel Thomas L. Livermore, and Mr. Jacob Piatt Dunn of the Indianapolis Sentinel, and especially by Mr. Charles R. Williams of the Indianapolis News, who has already placed me under great obligations by assisting me in preparing The Puritan Republic. All these well-known writers hold decided views that probably do not coincide throughout with mine, and, therefore, I deem it justice to exonerate them from any responsibility for my own conclusions. My daughter, Lucy Howe, has helped me very much in revising the manuscript for publication.

Daniel Wait Howe.

Indianapolis, Ind., October, 1902.

Chapter One The Three Months' Picnic

I come of a family always loyal to country One of my ancestors, Colonel Thomas Howe, of Marlborough, Mass., was prominent in King Philip's War; two others, Captain Eliakim Howe and his son Otis were in the New Hampshire militia in the Revolutionary War, and my grandfather, Captain Nathan Howe, served in a New York regiment in the War of 1812. When the Mexican War broke out my father was dead and I, his only child, was about five years old.

From the time it was known that Lincoln had been elected President, the nation was in a ferment of exT citement. The papers were full of rumors of the secession of the southern states and of the warlike preparations already begun. Among the citizens of Indiana were many whose ancestors had come from Kentucky, Virginia, and other southern states, and who were bitterly hostile to Lincoln. Nor was there entire unanimity among those who had supported him as to the proper course to be pursued in the event of the secession of the southern states, and many, influenced by the early opinions of Horace Greeley, were in favor of letting them go in peace. A great many others thought that the talk of war was but the vainglorious boasting of southern fire-eaters. Few suspected that such a bloody contest as that which followed was so near at hand.

In the early months of 1861 I was in Indianapolis attending a course of law lectures given to a small class by Judge Samuel E. Perkins, then one of the judges of the Indiana Supreme Court. It was during this time that Lincoln passed through that city on his way to Washington to be inaugurated. A great crowd assembled and listened to him as he spoke from the balcony of the Bates House. I remember, as if it were yesterday, his tall, lank form towering above those about him while he delivered his brief address. It was but little more than four years until the funeral train passed through the city bearing his body. back to his old home.

After the conclusion of the lecture course, I returned to my home in Franklin, the county seat of Johnson county, and I had been there only a few days when the whole country was startled, as if by the shock of an earthquake at midnight, by the news of the firing on Fort Sumter. This was followed at once by the proclamation of the President calling for 75,000 volunteers. Those who do not remember the situation can form some idea of it from the contemporaneous accounts in the newspapers. Lincoln had received a majority of

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the electoral, but not of the popular, vote, and would not have been elected at all but for the split between the Breckinridge and Douglas wings of the Democracy. If the bombardment of Fort Sumter "fired the southern heart," it fired the northern heart as well. There was at once a shifting of position and a new alignment of political parties. There were few left among the Republicans of the North who advocated letting the southern states go their way. Conspicuous among the great papers that helped to mold public opinion in the North was Harper's Weekly, which had not favored the election of Lincoln. Its issue of April 27, 1861, contained President Lincoln's proclamation and an editorial in which it said :

"War is declared. President Lincoln's proclamation, which we publish above, is an absolute proclamation of war against the Gulf states. The die is now cast, and men must take their sides, and hold to them. No one who knows anything of the southern people supposes for a moment that, having gone so far as to bombard a United States fort and capture it, they will now succumb without a fight. No one who has seen the recent manifestations of popular sentiment in the North can doubt that the northern blood is up, and that they will listen no more to talk of compromise, truce, or treaty, until they are fairly beaten.

"Let us then forbear puling, and look the situation in the face. There are some among us still who whine about the evils of civil war. These are they who, with a burglar in their house, his hand on the throat of their wife or daughter, would quote texts on the loveliness of Christian forbearance and charity Nobody

— outside of lunatic asylums — doubts that civil war an enormous calamity. On this point all are agreed. But as it has actually begun, and exists, what is use of deprecating it ? What should we think of a doctor who, summoned to visit a half-dying patient, should wring his hands hopelessly and bewail the malignancy of disease ?"

Its next issue of May 4, 1861, contained another editorial in which it said :

"It is not now a question of slavery or anti-slavery. It is not even a question of Union or disunion. The question simply is whether northern men will fight. Southerners have rebelled and dragged our flag in the dirt, in the belief that, because we won't fight duels or engage in street brawls, therefore we are cowards. The question now is whether or no they are right."

These utterances exactly sounded the keynote of northern sentiment. No paper was more loyal to the Federal government or more zealous for a vigorous prosecution of the war, and its able editorials and the striking illustrations of Thomas Nast exercised a powerful influence in shaping northern sentiment.

At the outbreak of the war the attitude of Kentucky was uncertain. The sympathies of the governor, Beriah Magoffin, were wholly with the seceding states, and to President Lincoln's call for troops he had answered that "Kentucky will furnish no troops for the wicked purpose of subduing her sister southern states." It was Magoffin's purpose to force Kentucky to secede,

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or, failing in that, to assume the position of "armed neutrality." The farce planned by Magoffin was not successful in the land of Henry Clay and soon ran its course, but, while it lasted, Indiana was practically a border state. It was fortunate for the state and for the Union cause that at this time there was in the office of governor a man of unquestioned loyalty, of tremendous energy, and of indomitable will. In the four years that followed, the name of Oliver P Morton became a household word throughout the United States. No governor in any northern state met with more bitter opposition ; none worked for the success of the Union cause with more untiring energy, or looked after the welfare of the soldiers of his own state with more watchful and careful solicitude.

Morton was then in the prime of vigorous manhood — a man of far-seeing sagacity, of great endurance, of dauntless courage ; a man who could have taken Cromwell's place in England, and who needed all of Cromwell's force of character to fill the place of governor of Indiana. Clearly foreseeing from the beginning the magnitude of the Rebellion and the tremendous efforts that must be made to suppress it, he often chafed under what he thought to be the puny and tardy measures of the Federal government. When the Federal authorities were too slow in supplying arms for the Indiana troops, he bought them on his own responsibility. When the government became short of ammunition, he established at Indianapolis an arsenal for its manufacture, soon having 600 men employed, and ammunition enough for the Indiana troops and some to spare to the government. When the legislature in 1863 adjourned, after refusing to make any appropriation to carry on the state government, he borrowed money sufficient for two years without closing a single state institution and without stopping the organization of a single regiment.

The President's proclamation calling for 75,000 volunteers was issued April 15 and six three-months' regiments with 4,683 men were required of the state of Indiana. Within a week 12,000 men had responded — twice as many as could then be armed. The four three-year regiments required under the President's call of May 3 were raised at once, and ten more besides in advance of the call in July, and before January 1, 1862, Indiana had 60,000 troops in the field.

The Morgan raid found Indiana almost destitute of armed soldiers, but within twenty-four hours after Morgan had touched her borders 15,000 men were hastening to Indianapolis; and before two days had passed Morton had 30,000 assembled to repel the invaders.

No orator ever lived in Indiana whose speeches had such weight as those of Morton. He never attempted to be funny; he never indulged in the "spread-eagle" style of oratory; he never resorted to the tricks practised by the modern professional "spell-binder." But under his sledge-hammer logic all opposition went down as the gates of Torquilstone went down under the blows of Richard the Lion-hearted. Probably no

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one speech ever delivered in America left such a deep impress upon the public mind as Morton's Masonic Hall speech in 1866. I once heard a prominent Democrat say that this one speech determined the election in the state for that year. No Republican could add strength to it ; no Democrat could answer it.

Morton's care for the Indiana troops in the field was proverbial throughout all the armies. Surgeons and nurses were sent by him to every battle-field. Often he went himself to give his personal attention to the care of the wounded. His strong hand was the chief support of the Indiana Sanitary Commission, whose special business it was to care for the sick and wounded soldiers in the hospitals. No regiment passed through Indianapolis, either going to or returning from the front, that did not enjoy the fruits of his provident hospitality. His kind and sympathetic feeling for his suffering fellow men was not limited to soldiers of the Union armies. It extended to the Confederate prisoners confined at Indianapolis, and nowhere in the North were they more humanely treated.

His vigilance was marvelous. Nothing escaped his keen watchfulness. Not a plot against the government was concocted in Indiana that he did not ferret out ; hardly a meeting of the Knights of the Golden Circle or Sons of Liberty was held of whose proceedings he did not know. On one occasion a prominent citizen of Indianapolis called on him to assure him that the reports of an alleged treasonable meeting held the night before were exaggerated, and that he, the visitor, would certainly have heard of the proceedings if they were such as had been reported ; whereupon Morton almost paralyzed him by at once pulling out of a pigeon-hole a stenographic account of the proceedings, including a full report of the visitor's own treasonable speech.

He was omnipresent ; now buried in the details of the work of carrying on the state government, or preparing troops for the field, now going about the state making speeches and infusing into the people some of his own enthusiasm , now visiting battle-fields and camps at the front — wherever he was most needed during the war he was always to be found. It was chiefly to his untiring efforts that Indiana enjoys the distinction of having furnished to the Federal armies over seventy-four per cent, of the entire fighting population of the state. No obstacles stopped him; his tremendous energy overcame them all ; no disasters dismayed him — they only strengthened his courage and inspired him with renewed determination. He will live in history as the greatest war governor of his time.

Morton's response to the President's proclamation was instantaneous, and the call to arms was heard in every town and village in Indiana. At once old party affiliations were broken and the question no longer was whether a man were a Republican or a Democrat, but whether he stood for or against the Union. A great meeting was called at Franklin, patriotic addresses were made, and preparations were at once begun to enlist a company of volunteers. I was then

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living at home with my mother and my stepfather, Samuel P Oyler. There were only three of us. It was felt that either my stepfather or I should enlist; my mother would not decide between us, so we both enlisted.

The quota of the company was filled almost as fast as the men could write their names. We did not wait for uniforms, but were all rigged out in red shirts. The loyal ladies of the town presented us with a beautiful silk banner and we were ready to march. My stepfather was elected captain and I was elected private, a rank which I retained throughout the three-months' service. Another little fellow and I, being the two smallest men in the company, were assigned to the position of rear guard — which I think we filled with due regard to the responsibility and the honor attached to it. The fashion was then to dignify each local company with some distinctive appellation indicating the warlike character of its members, and I have an indistinct recollection that we were known as "The Franklin Tigers."

When the day arrived for us to take the train to Indianapolis, our company was marshaled in the public square, and, preceded by fife and drum, we marched through the streets to the railroad station. It was a great day for the staid old town. All the people were out, and thousands gathered from the country roundabout. In the crowds that thronged the sidewalks along the line of march were some tender-hearted women who wept, but most of the spectators and the

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volunteers wore smiling faces. It was generally thought that the flurry would soon blow over. Seward, in whose sagacity we had unbounded confidence, predicted that the war would end in sixty days.

Arriving at Indianapolis we went into camp, and the Franklin company became Co. H of the 7th Ind. Vols., of which Ebenezer Dumont was commissioned colonel and Captain Oyler, major. We remained in Indianapolis only long enough to receive arms and uniforms, diligently employing the interval before our departure in drilling; and then the regiment was sent to what is now West Virginia, crossing the Ohio at Bellaire and going into camp near Webster. From there we marched in a few days to Philippi, which was captured with a great flourish. The "Battle of Philippi" was described in bombastic style by the northern press, and Lander's ride down the hill was supposed to rank next to the mad plunge of General Israel Putnam in Revolutionary times. The truth is that, to quote from the old nursery rhyme, describing the fierce assault of the youthful soldiers upon a flock of geese, "we routed them, we scouted them, nor lost a single man." Not a man was killed on either side. Colonel Kelly of the Federal forces was wounded ; one unfortunate Confederate had his leg taken off by a stray cannon-ball; two or three others were slightly wounded and all the rest precipitately fled — in army phrase they "skedaddled" — and probably lived to fight another day.

There were many incidents of the three-months'

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campaign that, at the time, made a deep impression upon my mind, but most of them have been obliterated by the more significant events of the three-years' service. My first experience on picket was at Webster. I was stationed in a dense wood, and it poured down rain all night. It was so dark that I could scarcely see my hand before me. About midnight a vivid flash of lightning suddenly revealed a man approaching within ten feet of me. This was a trying ordeal for a boy who had not been in service a month, and who had not been in the enemy's country more than a week, and I am not ashamed to say now that I was nearly frightened out of my wits. But I had enough courage left to call out "Halt! who goes there?" and I do not recall anything in my life that was such a relief to me as the quick response, "A friend with the countersign." It was at Philippi that I first heard the "long roll," a peculiar rolling beat of the drum betokening imminent danger, and calling instantly to arms every soldier that hears it. Its effect upon an army is more startling than the cry of "fire" at midnight. In this instance it turned out to be a false alarm.

While at Philippi another incident occurred which I have never forgotten. Co. H had been totally stripped one night of all its cooking utensils by marauders from another company. There was not a skillet nor a frying-pan nor a coffee-pot left in the whole company. The next day the captain's son and I obtained a pass permitting us to visit Philippi. There was not much to be seen — the most prominent public buildings being the court-house and the county jail which had been used by the Confederates as a guard-house while they occupied the town. Nearly all the inhabitants, most of whom were known to be violent "secesh," had fled. Passing a deserted house it occurred to us that here was a good chance to repair the losses of Co. H ; so we entered the house and filled an empty sack with cooking utensils. But we had no sooner passed through the gate than we were seized by a provost guard, stripped of our booty and hurried off to jail where we were kept in durance vile until night, and then dismissed with a severe reprimand and an admonition that if ever detected committing a similar offense we were liable to be instantly shot. This was during the period when McClellan and other Union generals seemed to be far more solicitous to protect the property of Confederates than they were to protect the property of those loyal to the government. It is but justice to them to add that this policy seemed for a time to meet the approval of the authorities at Washington, who still clung to the hope that some compromise could be patched up by which their erring southern brethren might be coaxed back into the Union.

The summer was spent chiefly in camp on a hill overlooking Philippi. The weather was hot, and when not drilling we sought the friendly shade of the great chestnut trees that were so abundant in that locality. The regiment was engaged in a few insignificant skirmishes, then dignified by the press in grandiloquent

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descriptions as "battles" ; but the only real battle of any consequence in which it was engaged was that at Carrick's Ford. That was my first battle. Before reaching the ford we had repeatedly crossed Cheat river, a mountain stream with a very swift current and about waist deep, the bottom of which was covered with slimy boulders. I had twice slipped and fallen, and I had gone clean under and rolled over on the bottom, gun and all. On getting to shore I had tried in vain, by putting dry powder in the tube, to make my musket go off. I also tried to pull the load, but the attempt was equally vain. Probably it made little difference, for my gun was an old Harper's Ferry musket that nearly dislocated my shoulder every time I fired it. and was almost as dangerous to the man behind as to the man in front of it. But I remained in the ranks and went through the battle, feeling as proud as anybody when it was over. General Garnett, the Confederate commander, was killed there. I passed by the place where he lay dead and thought he was one of the finest looking officers I had ever seen.

Our term of enlistment expired the latter part of July and we started home. On our return we stopped for a night at Bellaire, Ohio, and there I first heard the dismal tidings of the disaster that had overtaken the Union army at the first battle of Bull Run. Young and inexperienced as I was, I understood its significance. It meant that going to war was no longer like going to a picnic, as we thought when we volunteered, but that a mighty effort must be made by the

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North or the Union would be shattered and broken forever. I had not yet learned, nor had the nation yet learned, the truth of the saying of General Sherman, that "War is hell."

The three-months' service, though somewhat of a picnic when compared with the three-years' service, nevertheless produced very important results not at once apparent. One of the most important was that the three-months' men gained a fair knowledge of the manual of arms and of company and regimental evolutions, and learned some of the rudiments of a soldier's education. A great many again enlisted for three years ; many who did so became officers, and the military experience, limited as it was, acquired in the three-months' service, was of great value in enabling them to drill and discipline the troops over whom they were placed in command.

Chapter Two Further Development Of The Great Conflict

The disaster of Bull Run occurred on July 21, 1861. Its effect was to throw the North into a panic. The venerable General Scott, then seventy-five years of age, was general-in -chief. The next day General George B. McClellan was called to Washington to take charge of the defense of the city and he arrived there July 26. The Confederates, as much elated as the people of the North were depressed, at once moved up to the Potomac, stopped navigation, and virtually blockaded the national capital.

At Washington the authorities, civil and military, were in constant dread of an attack that might result in the capture of the capital and an invasion of the country north of it. Still the mass of people of the North did not yet fully appreciate the magnitude of the preparations necessary to suppress the Rebellion. Even the Secretary of War, as late as October, 1861, had no conception of the stupendous proportions into which the conflict, then scarce six months old, was destined to expand.

"About this time," says Mr. Foulke,1 "Secretary

1 Life of Morton, vol. 1, p. 147.

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Cameron stopped at Indianapolis, on his way from St. Louis to Washington, and in company with Senator Chandler, took supper with Morton at the governor's mansion. He was quite talkative and laughed heartily at Sherman's idea that it would take two hundred thousand men to recover the Mississippi states. He made no secret of his belief that Sherman was crazy, and unfit for any military command. He derided Sherman's notions of the need of cavalry and artillery as old-fashioned and silly, and was boyish in his fun over the 'Minie rifle,' and over improved arms generally. The old smooth-bore musket, in the hands of well-disciplined infantry, he regarded as the best kind of arms. Morton listened to this talk in silence."

We can well understand why Morton listened in silence, and no doubt in amazement, to such twaddle at such a time from the Secretary of War.

Moreover the slavery question continued to be a disturbing element, and military operations were interfered with by political considerations and by the jealousies of generals. The senseless clamor expressed in the cry of "On to Richmond," which led to the disastrous defeat at Bull Run, again urged an advance of the Union armies and led to another defeat on October 21st at Ball's Bluff, and soon after, on November 1, 1 86 1, General Scott was succeeded as general-in-chief by General McClellan.

The disasters at Bull Run and Ball's Bluff only deepened the conviction, long before entertained by Morton and others of far-seeing sagacity, that the Rebellion would not blow over in sixty days as Seward

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