It may seem strange that the outbreak of hostilities between warring factions in the Middle East would bring to mind the peaceful, idyllic fields of south-central Pennsylvania, but it is difficult to watch the news coming out of Israel and Palestine these days without recalling the important role that Gettysburg played in 1978 to bring an unlikely peace to that region.

Seldom is there something happening in the world that does not in some way connect to or a least remind one of Gettysburg. I don’t just mean the battle by that name, but the famous address that Lincoln gave there, the decades of struggle over the memory of the place, the evolution of the park into a national park, and much more that falls under the general subject heading of Gettysburg.

In the last century and a half, numerous U.S. presidents have made use of Gettysburg symbolism to further some larger political goal with varying degrees of success. Woodrow Wilson used a speech at the 50th anniversary of the battle to promote his hope for peace. Months later, the world erupted into the War to End All Wars. At the 75th anniversary, President Franklin Roosevelt spoke to an estimated 200,000 people at the dedication of the Eternal Light Peace Memorial, while another 100,000 clogged the roads unable to reach the field. Months later, the world exploded into World War II.

In 1979, however, quite unexpectedly, Gettysburg and a president played a key role in bringing about the end of millennia of hostilities between two long-warring peoples.

carter’s peaceful plan

Jimmy Carter had long been a Civil War buff, and its greatest battle was seldom far from his thoughts. One of his ancestors had fought at Gettysburg, and in 1976, while he watched the results of the Democratic primary in Pennsylvania come in, candidate Carter noticed that he had won the vote in the electoral district that included the battlefield. To his delight, he remarked, “We ought to tell the Georgians that we finally won in Gettysburg.”

Two years later, while sitting at the presidential retreat at Camp David just a few miles southwest of the famous battlefield, his thoughts drifted there again. He was in the fourth day of intense negotiations designed to bring peace between Egypt and Israel — a conflict that predated Moses.

The leaders of both nations were there with him (Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Menachem Begin of Israel), but their views could scarcely have been farther apart. On one key negotiating point, Begin had declared, “My right eye will fall out, my right hand will fall off before I ever agree.”

In Carter’s view the two leaders were thinking in the wrong direction. “I tried for three days to get them to talk about the future,” Carter said. “But all they would talk about was the past.” Faced with the standoff and searching for some way to bring the parties to a different level of thought, Carter first kept them apart for a while, then proposed an excursion. “We went to the Civil War battlefield at Gettysburg one day,” he later recalled, “and I made them both agree not to talk about the Middle East or about anything that happened since 1865.”

Thanks to the meaning and mythology attached to the Gettysburg story since 1863 (much of it carved in stone in more than a thousand monuments and markers), Carter’s choice of destination was a fertile place for symbolic demonstration and persuasion. Two powers of the same region, grown from the same land but with differing cultural histories, once differed so greatly from each other that they engaged in the bloodiest war the continent had ever known. The worst of the fighting happened on the ground they were touring.

When the war was over, the two powers became one again, healed their wounds, set aside many of their differences, and went on to form the most powerful nation on earth. If North and South could accomplish this, then Egypt and Israel had a chance as well. As he admitted later in his memoirs, Carter wanted to demonstrate the high cost of war and persuade the two leaders to sign the first-ever peace agreement between Israel and an Arab nation.

The Egyptian took to the field right away. As a military student, Egypt’s Sadat had studied Gettysburg in detail and recognized it as the turning point in the Civil War. Israel’s Begin, however, was slower to the mark as he knew nothing about the battle. When the group passed the monument commemorating Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, however, Begin recited it from memory in a thick Yiddish accent, probably adding an Israeli emphasis to the line “that this nation…shall not perish from the earth.”

It took many more hours of negotiating, but less than a week later the three leaders took part in a historic signing ceremony for an agreement that brought peace between the two long-warring nations. Menachem Begin even gave in on his sticking point without losing an eye or his right hand.

lessons from gettysburg

To be sure, many factors helped bring about the Egyptian–Israeli peace in 1978, most of them having nothing to do with Gettysburg. But years after they signed the accords, the participants expressed a belief that the trip to America’s hallowed ground had meant a great deal. Carter said as much in a speech long afterward.

Sadat made one interesting observation. Since our visit to Gettysburg, he had been thinking that Carter, as a Southerner, could understand what it meant to be involved in a terrible war, and also knew how difficult it was to rebuild both the material things and the spirit of the people after a recognized defeat.

For Carter, Gettysburg was a reminder of the high cost of war and an example of reconciliation among adversaries. Sadat, lured by the military aspect of the field, felt the hope and healing in the post–Vietnam era ideas it elicited. Begin was taken with the ideas embodied in Lincoln’s immortal address.

Though perhaps not in the way he intended, Carter’s idea had worked. Both negotiating parties found meaning in the Gettysburg story that, though different from the other, helped inspire their thoughts and actions toward peace.

With war in the Middle East again the lead news story, one wonders if there might not be some magic left in the meaning of Gettysburg and whether a trip to the battlefield might someday encourage opposing leaders to find common ground, even if that ground lies in south-central Pennsylvania.

This essay was adapted from Thomas A. Desjardin’s book These Honored Dead: How the Story of Gettysburg Shaped American Memory (DaCapo, 2003).

Thanks to a resounding wave of recent public support, the Texas Civil War Museum’s board of directors has decided to keep the museum in Fort Worth, Texas, open, reversing a decision made earlier this year to permanently close the facility to the public on December 30, 2023. Museum artifacts currently in possession of The Horse Soldier Antiques in Gettysburg, Pa., and Heritage Auctions in Dallas, will continue to be sold and auctioned off to endow the museum.

The museum’s current hours of operation will remain the same: Thursday through Saturday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Marcus Richey, son of retired museum president Ray Richey, will continue in his present role as museum director. 

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It was a fear Milton Smith Littlefield Jr. simply couldn’t shake whenever speaking before an audience. Though well-respected, the Presbyterian minister and editor of hymn books agonized about being recognized as the son of Civil War General Milton Smith Littlefield. The younger Littlefield did what he could to squash this controversial legacy, even tearing out, upon his father’s death, the pages of the general’s scrapbook to conceal his crimes from curious readers.

Was General Littlefield really worthy of such shame, however? He had been a rising star in the U.S. Army—a friend of Abraham Lincoln and, during the war, a distinguished commander of African American troops.

The elder Littlefield befriended Lincoln while working as a lawyer and newspaper reporter, and enthusiastically lent his support during the 1860 presidential election. His brother, John H. Littlefield, worked as a clerk in Lincoln’s Springfield, Ill., law office and was later appointed a U.S. Treasury Department clerk.

Elected a captain in the 14th Illinois Infantry, Milton Littlefield Sr. led a company at Shiloh, drawing praise from one of his sergeants for standing “erect in front of his men, during the whole engagement” and escaping “injury, except having about three inches torn from the left shoulder of his coat, by an [enemy] ball.”

In November 1862, Littlefield was aboard the steamer Eugene when it struck a sunken ship and sank in the Mississippi River, about 12 miles above Fort Pillow. While trying to keep passengers calm, the future general was knocked overboard and drifted downriver until rescued by Union soldiers at the fort.

Four months later, Littlefield was sent to South Carolina to organize and lead African American troops. As colonel of the 21st U.S. Colored Infantry, he was attached to Brig. Gen. Quincy A. Gillmore’s staff and, during the famed assault on Fort Wagner in July, was among those noted for “doing all in their power to sustain the courage of the troops and urge on reinforcements” while under “constant” fire. Littlefield assumed command of the 54th Massachusetts, replacing slain Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, and in November 1864 was brevetted a brigadier general.

Erasmus W. Jones, 21st USCI chaplain, would write that Littlefield’s “unflinching perseverance, united with that perfect moral integrity that have so far elevated him, will soon raise him to higher dignities and honors.” The general’s postwar endeavors erased any chance of that, however.

In 1867, he and George W. Swepson, president of the Western North Carolina Railroad, were involved in a multi-million-dollar embezzlement scheme. Having fled to Florida, he evaded prosecution despite multiple attempts to extradite him.

After relocating to New York in his later years, he was arrested for other offenses, including grand larceny and misappropriation of a mortgage bond. He died in Vadhalla, N.Y., on March 6, 1899—his burial service lightly attended, no surprise.

Perhaps Milton Littlefield Jr. had his father in mind with this entry in his Hymns of the Christian Life: “Those who never knew Thee, Those who’ve wandered far, Guide them by the brightness Of Thy guiding star….To that heavenly home, Where no sin nor sorrow Evermore shall come.” 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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No larger collection of artillery had ever been brought to a war’s battlefields in the Western Hemisphere before the Civil War. More than 200,000 men, trained and educated like no other subset of soldiers in this war of amateurs, handled and operated these big guns.

The story continues that the Civil War changed the standards, rules, and results of artillery use, advancing technological, tactical, and other norms forward from the Napoleonic wars, with their smoothbore guns and inaccurate round shot, toward a present and future determined by rifled guns that could be expected to hit their targets with regularity. Artillery would dominate from here on, and the side that figured out how to use it best would surely be victorious.

Not so fast, says Earl J. Hess. The professor emeritus of history at Lincoln Memorial University and author of 30 books on the Civil War argues in his 2022 study Civil War Field Artillery: Promise and Performance on the Battlefield that these advances were overrated in determining the war’s outcome as well as the proper place of its artillery on the timeline of military history.

Let’s get right to the heart of it: The Civil War is often considered the “first modern war.” You argue that it was mostly a traditional one. Please explain. 

Anyone who views the Civil War as the first modern war has a very hard case to prove. In my view it overwhelmingly was closer to warfare during the Napoleonic era 50 years before than to World War I 50 years later. A Napoleonic soldier would have been quite comfortable on a Civil War battlefield, while a Civil War soldier would have been stunned by the battlefield created by the Great War of 1914–18. 

In light of that, what were the differences between the artillery forces of previous wars and those of the Civil War? 

Civil War artillery saw only relatively slight improvement over that used in the Napoleonic era. The biggest difference was rifling, which applied to only about half the pieces used during the Civil War. Yet, because mostly of problems with igniting long-range ordnance and problems with seeing targets at great distances, there is no proof that rifled artillery produced any noticeable results on Civil War battlefields other than the odd long-range shot that hit its target because the gun crew happened to be particularly good. 

What were the main improvements over the past? 

Another difference between Civil War artillery and that of previous decades was adding heavier ordnance to the mix. Six-pounders were phased out during the first half of the Civil War in favor of 10-pounders and 12-pounders. Also, the trend was toward eliminating all decorations and handles on the artillery tube because they caused weak points that could not resist the stress of firing as well. Sleek-looking designs, heavier ordnance, and lighter pieces for easier moving around were the trends evident by the 1850s and 1860s. All this amounts to an improvement on the age-old system of artillery, but not a revolutionary break from it. 

What were the greatest disappointments of Civil War artillery? 

Probably the greatest disappointment was the failure of rifled pieces to prove their worth on the battlefield. Their limitations became apparent to many. That is why about half the pieces used by both sides during the war still were smoothbore. Many gunners were convinced they were at least as good as the new rifles, or better. 

How much did the improvements and disappointments have to do with winning and losing the war? 

Civil War artillery failed to achieve more than a supporting role to infantry. It did not come to dominate the battlefield as would happen along the Western Front during World War I. Even in static campaigns like that at Petersburg, and despite the heavy concentration of artillery pieces along the 35-mile-long trench system at Petersburg and Richmond, the guns failed to provide a campaign-winning edge for either side. That does not mean they were unimportant, by any means. They could and did on occasion elevate their role on the battlefield to something like a decisive edge under the right circumstances. One could argue that Union guns did so on January 2, 1863, at Stones River, and Confederate guns did so at the Hornet’s Nest at Shiloh, for example. But far more common was their accomplishment in helping infantry hold a position, a much less prominent, though important, role. 

One of the issues you cover in your book is the conflict over control of the artillery between the artillery itself and the infantry. How important was that, and how did it resolve? 

Artillery was a supporting arm of the infantry, and to a lesser extent of the cavalry. It did not have the ability to operate independently, always needing support from foot or mounted troops. That is one of the reasons army culture considered it best to vest infantry commanders with the authority to command artillery. Batteries were assigned to infantry brigades and were under the infantry brigade commander’s orders and relied on his infantry brigade staff for their supplies as well. 

Some artillery officers complained of this arrangement for several reasons. The most prominent one was that it inhibited the concentration of artillery on the battlefield and thus robbed it of its potential to play a decisive role in combat. But more importantly, they complained that infantry brigade staff simply did not know how to supply batteries very well. Another important reason for their complaint was that dispersing the batteries to infantry units greatly limited advancement for artillery officers, most of whom could look forward to holding nothing higher than a captaincy of a battery. 

While historians have widely accepted the opinion of artillery officers without question, I argue that their complaint has only limited validity. The complaint about the inability to concentrate the guns to play a prominent role on the battlefield does not hold water. The most visible concentrations of guns, at Shiloh and Stones River, took place in armies that practiced dispersion of batteries to infantry brigades. The system was flexible. If infantry officers wanted to, they had no difficulty concentrating batteries for a specific job on the battlefield.

There must have been something to their complaints…

Their complaints were quite valid when it came to administrative control, rather than battlefield control. They needed their own staff to supply the batteries and to constantly train the men. 

By the midpoint of the Civil War, the major field armies of both sides began to group field artillery into units of their own, called artillery brigades in some armies and artillery battalions in others. Between battles, these units were under the control of an artillery officer appointed to his position, and he was responsible for supply and training. But during a battle, control of those units reverted to infantry commanders at the division or corps levels. This was not everything the artillery officers wanted, but it was more than they ever had before in American military history. Moreover, it essentially was the system used during the 20th century wars as well.

In the Civil War this arrangement improved the administration and upkeep of the artillery force, but it did not noticeably improve its battlefield performance, which was as good early in the war as it was later in the conflict. Even though some infantry officers foolishly ordered the guns about even though they knew nothing about how to use them, an equal number were keen students of artillery practice and could use the guns well on the battlefield.

There was a third group of infantry officers who knew little if anything about how to use artillery but were wise enough to allow their battery commanders a completely free hand in operating under fire. In other words, there is not such a clear-cut difference between the dispersion policy of 1861–62 and the concentration policy of 1863–65.

How should we think of the Civil War as it occupies the space between Napoleonic warfare and World War I? 

I do not see the Civil War as a transitional conflict between the Napoleonic wars and World War I so much as a minor variation on the Napoleonic model. The things that made the Great War the first truly modern conflict were largely or wholly absent in the Civil War. If that is transition, then one could say there was a huge leap across a big chasm between 1865 and 1914, but an easy step back from 1861 to 1815.

this article first appeared in civil war times magazine

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Finding enthusiastic volunteers to serve was not a problem for the 1st Alabama Infantry at the outset of the Civil War. Young soldiers flocked to fill the regiment’s ranks, with 90 percent of the privates who signed up no older than 25, and its officers averaging 30 years of age.

Organized at Pensacola, Fla., in February 1861, the 1st Alabama consisted of 10 companies, all raised and transported to Pensacola independently. Henry D. Clayton served as the regiment’s first colonel.

During the first few months of the war, the regiment enjoyed relatively easy service. The men occupied the Barrancas Barracks and had their slaves do most of the menial work, including cooking, cleaning, and washing of clothes. They received a daily ration of one pound of fresh bread and another pound of beef, which they supplemented with boxes of provisions sent to them by their friends and families.

Because the men would be paid in gold and silver, the camp was transformed into a gambling den every payday. And, as happened in so many units during the war, disease wracked the regiment not long after it formed, meaning the regiment’s first casualties and deaths were the result of measles, malaria, or typhoid fever.

Although organized as an infantry unit, the 1st found itself initially under the watchful eye of Brig. Gen. Braxton Bragg, who had won acclaim during the Mexican War as an artillery officer, particularly at the Battle of Buena Vista on February 22-23, 1847—famously ordered by General Zachary Taylor to fire “a little more grape, Captain Bragg.” Throughout the war, the 1st Alabama received praise for its ability to seamlessly transition from infantry to artillery and back again whenever needed.

On November 22-23, 1861, the 1st participated in the bombardment of Fort Pickens, Fla. Not only did the Alabamians suffer no casualties, Bragg called the regiment “a well-instructed body of artillery”—high praise from the typically gruff general, who also authorized the 1st to list the date of engagement on its battle flag to recognize the exemplary marksmanship and discipline they had shown.

On March 5, 1862, the 1st was ordered to Missouri. In his official report, Maj. Gen. Leonidas Polk referred to the Alabamians as “Bragg’s best artillerists.” They eventually helped at Island No. 10 on the Mississippi River. After weeks of intense bombardment, Union forces surrounded the Rebel bastion with superior numbers of men, gunboats, and heavy artillery. With its lines of retreat cut and its ammunition nearly exhausted, the 1st surrendered with the rest of the island’s garrison on April 8, 1862. 

Roughly 400 members of the regiment died from either the fighting or disease during its 27-day defense of Island No. 10.

Victorious Federals sent the regiment’s officers to the prison camp at Johnson’s Island on Lake Erie and the enlisted men to prison camps in Wisconsin and Illinois. In Wisconsin alone, 105 members of the regiment died, and most of them remain buried there today. Survivors of the 1st Alabama still in prison camps were exchanged starting on September 7, 1862. According to one account, young girls pelted the Alabamians with apples along the road, although it is not clear if the girls intended this an attack on their hated enemies or as an act of kindness to hungry men in desperate need of fresh produce.

On October 4, 1862, the 1st reported for duty at Port Hudson, La., on the Mississippi River. The depleted regiment entered Port Hudson with only 700 combat troops and a brass band. Less than half of those men were fit for active duty, the rest being too sick to participate in the fighting. The regiment served in Port Hudson as infantry and as heavy artillery during the siege. A small detachment from the regiment served as the Port Hudson “coast guard” operating small boats in the Mississippi River where they kept a lookout for Union forces. When not busy on lookout, the Alabamians used their small boats to go fishing, occasionally with the aid of artillery shells which became improvised depth charges that provided huge catches of tasty—possibly mangled—fish.

On March 14, 1863, as Union ships ran past the Port Hudson batteries, the regiment played a leading role in battering those vessels. According to one 1st Alabama veteran, Edward McMorries, “the scene became one of indescribable grandeur” as “the river and our line of fortifications looked like a solid sheet of electric glare and flame.” Unable to hear their officers over the horrific racket of artillery, the 1st’s gunners fell back on their training, loading and firing their cannons as quickly as possible without even trying to speak. Every man knew his duty and every man did his part. The Union fleet suffered dreadfully in sailing within range of the 1st Alabama’s expert gunners, and the Yellowhammer State boys congratulated themselves on a job well done.

Union forces returned to Port Hudson several weeks later and launched major assaults on May 27 and June 14, along with countless smaller attacks and constant artillery barrages. Members of the 1st Alabama took great pride in their work at Port Hudson, and one member of the regiment bragged that he and his comrades “repulsed with slaughter” every Union attack on their position. Major General Franklin Gardner, Port Hudson’s Confederate commander, praised the 1st Alabama for its “gallant conduct,” saying it was “deserving of highest praise.”

Despite the 1st’s courage and skill, the Federals slowly ground down the garrison. With Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton’s surrender of Vicksburg, Miss., on July 4, 1863, Port Hudson became the last major Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River.

Alone, surrounded, and nearly out of supplies, further resistance seemed futile. On July 9, 1863, Gardner surrendered Port Hudson and the 1st’s officers became prisoners of war once again, but this time the enlisted men were paroled and allowed to return home until they were exchanged.

On November 10, 1863, the 1st Alabama’s officers were again exchanged and assigned to service with the Department of the Gulf. The Alabamians helped defend Mobile Bay, patrolling the coast, manning the heavy artillery of Fort Gaines, and feasting on seafood that they supplemented with produce from a personal 10-acre vegetable garden. They saw little action, their most noteworthy moment coming when they executed a man they suspected was a Union spy. Confederate forces in Georgia needed reinforcements and the 1st Alabama received orders to stiffen the line. The regiment marched north but left its cannons behind. The men once known as “Bragg’s best artillerists” would serve as infantry for the remainder of the war.

On May 18, 1864, the 1st joined the Army of Tennessee near New Hope, Ga. Sherman’s blue-clad attackers gave the regiment little time to acclimate to its new home, launching a series of attacks on its positions on May 25–27. The 1st played an important role in the Atlanta Campaign, particularly at the Battle of Peachtree Creek on July 20, 1864. Nevertheless, Atlanta eventually fell to Union forces on September 2, 1864.

With Atlanta in Union hands, the 1st remained with the Army of Tennessee during its desperate offensive across Georgia, Alabama, and into Tennessee. The regiment crossed the Tennessee River near Florence, Ala., on November 20, 1864. As the Alabamians shuffled their bare feet across the snow-dusted ground, several ladies stood along the roadside, waving their handkerchiefs and crying. Decades later, a member of the regiment recalled that “their tears revealed that we were without any hope of success.”

At the Battle of Franklin on November 30, the 1st Alabama formed on the Confederate right. The regiment had come within about a hundred yards of the Union position when the Federals unleashed a volley. The veteran Alabamians responded with “rebel yells” and charged forward without waiting for orders or bothering to fire. When they got to the Union breastworks, the Alabamians reached over the works and fired their rifles at the Federals at point-blank range. Without time to reload, the sons of Alabama resorted to grappling hand-to-hand with Federals from Indiana and Illinois.

According to one veteran of the regiment, the Federals vastly outnumbered their attackers, but “men have never been made so brave as to be wholly unmoved by such audacity as the Confederates exhibited.” For a short time, the battle’s outcome hung in the balance at the bottom of a muddy ditch. Quantity, however, proved to have a quality all its own, as the Federals used their numerical advantages to force the Alabamians to retreat with heavy losses. The Union army evacuated Franklin that night , falling back toward Union-occupied Nashville, followed closely by the Army of Tennessee’s shattered remnants.

At the Battle of Nashville on December 15-16, 1864, the 1st again faced heavy fighting, serving near the center of the Confederate line on the battle’s opening day and withdrawing only when ordered to retreat. On the second day, the Alabamians once more found themselves near the center of the fighting. They successfully repelled repeated Union attacks until realizing in horror that the Confederate left flank was disintegrating, forcing members of the regiment to flee to avoid capture. On December 24, after a long and difficult retreat, survivors joined the remnants of the Army of Tennessee just south of the Tennessee River.

In 1865, the 1st Alabama received orders to join Confederate forces assembling in North Carolina for a last stand. Of the more than 3,800 men who had once served in the regiment, only about 100 were left—but those 100 or so answered the call. In what would be the Army of Tennessee’s final battle and the war’s last major clash, the 1st fought at Bentonville, N.C., on March 19-21, 1865.

With the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, and the collapse of the Confederate government, the war was all but over. On April 26, 1865, the 1st Alabama surrendered along with the rest of the Army of Tennessee. After more than four years of war, the regiment’s handful of survivors returned home to rebuild their lives and their communities.

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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For the Union Army of the Potomac and its commander, Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside, the early winter of 1862-63 proved extremely taxing. First, they suffered through the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg, fought on Dec. 13. After the army retired back across the Rappahannock River, regimental musters revealed a staggering loss of 12,653 casualties. Nothing had been gained. It had all been for naught. Army morale plummeted, and desertions soared, eventually reaching 200 per day. Tens of thousands of men were listed as “not present”: thousands of others were sick due to inadequate food and the army’s abysmally filthy camps.

Then came Burnside’s infamous “Mud March.” In an attempt to flank the opposing Army of Northern Virginia out of its positions behind the Rappahannock, Burnside ordered an upriver movement via Banks’ Ford. It began on Jan. 20, but that night, the heavens opened up. In the following two-day deluge, small streams became raging torrents. Roads turned into muck-filled quagmires choked with stalled wagons, pontoons, artillery pieces, and hundreds of buried horses and mules. Drenched, freezing, exhausted—feeling as if the very fates were against them—the rank and file dragged themselves back to their encampments at Falmouth. Everyone realized the army was dispirited; many believed it was “all played out.” For the Army of the Potomac, the early winter of 1862-63 was indeed the Valley Forge of the Civil War.

Enter the army’s next head, Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker. Most often remembered as the bombastic commander who lost the subsequent Battle of Chancellorsville (May 1-4), despite outnumbering his opponent two to one, Hooker, nonetheless, possessed admirable administrative and organizational skills. And what’s little remembered is that—in the three months leading up to Chancellorsville—he did a fantastic job restoring the army’s morale and preparing it for the upcoming campaign. Maj. Gen. George Brinton McClellan built the Army of the Potomac, but Maj. Gen. Hooker rehabilitated it.

“The Handsome Captain”

Born in Hadley, Massachusetts, in 1814—the grandson of a Continental Army captain—Hooker graduated from West Point in 1837. Commissioned 2nd Lt. in the 1st U.S. Artillery, he first served brief stints in Florida, on the frontier, and as adjutant at his alma mater. During the Mexican-American War (1846-48), Hooker proved an able and courageous staff officer, winning three brevet promotions. It was in Mexico, too, that the well-proportioned six-foot-tall officer first became known as a ladies’ man: the señoritas there nicknamed him the “handsome captain.” 

In California after the war, Hooker served briefly as assistant adjutant general of the Army’s Pacific Division, then, following a leave of absence, resigned his commission to work the land. Unsuccessful as a farmer, he moved to Oregon, where he held the position of superintendent of the territory’s military roads for two years. The last years of the 1850s found Hooker serving as a colonel in the California State Militia. When the Civil War exploded onto center stage in 1861, he raised a regiment of Union volunteers to bring east but was extremely disappointed to learn that California units weren’t eligible for such service. He was determined to travel east and renew his affiliation with the Army, but high living had reduced him to poverty. Thankfully, his friends—among them a San Francisco tavernkeeper—staked him $1,000 and sent him off by steamboat.

In Washington, Hooker presented his credentials to President Abraham Lincoln and 75-year-old Winfield Scott, the Army’s commanding general. But there was a snag. At the termination of the war with Mexico, Hooker had testified in defense of an officer Scott had charged with disloyalty. This had angered Scott, and unfortunately, Scott still remembered. Forced to cool his heels in the War Department anterooms, Hooker nonetheless witnessed the First Battle of Bull Run as a civilian.

Soon thereafter, in an audience with Lincoln, Hooker first complained that, evidently, the Army didn’t want him back. Then he boldly asserted: “I was at Bull Run, the other day, Mr. President, and it is no vanity or boasting in me to say that I am a damned sight better General than you, Sir, had on that field!”

Made a brigadier general on Aug. 3, 1861, his commission backdated to May 17; he was first posted to the fortifications northeast of Washington City, where he drilled his regiments rigorously. In October, Brig. Gen. Hooker was put in charge of a 10,000-man division and charged with defending the lower Potomac River. This exceedingly dull duty involved primarily the interdiction of illicit mail and trade. 

The following year, in mid-March, Hooker’s division was assigned to the III Corps of Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac. Landing on the Virginia Peninsula in April, Hooker’s men dug in opposite the Confederate position at Yorktown.

During the subsequent Peninsula Campaign, Hooker, now a major general, frequently displayed his aggressive and boastful nature—rashly attacking the superior forces of the enemy rearguard at the Battle of Williamsburg on May 5, for example, and later confidently messaging McClellan that he could hold his position in front of Richmond “against 100,000 men.”

Fighting Joe

It was during the Peninsula Campaign that Hooker received his enduring nickname. The standard tale was that a New York newspaper’s compositor accidentally set a telegraphed headline reading “Fighting—Joe Hooker” (meaning it was a continuation of a previous piece) as “Fighting Joe Hooker.” That story now appears apocryphal—several historians have searched archives in vain for said headline. “A reasonable conclusion,” wrote biographer Walter H. Hebert, “is that in some spontaneous manner it was applied to Hooker after Williamsburg.” Perhaps surprisingly, Joseph Hooker was mortified by the name, saying that people would think him “a highwayman or bandit.” (And, to debunk another nickname associated with Hooker: There’s no truth to the story that ladies of the night became known as “hookers” because so many swarmed around Fighting Joe’s encampments. The first known use of “hooker” for prostitute dates to 1845, 16 years before he became a public figure.)

Hooker fought at the Second Battle of Bull Run (August 29-30), and when the Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia crossed the Potomac River into Maryland—Lee’s first invasion of the North—Lincoln and a few of his Cabinet officers considered appointing him to command the Army of the Potomac. Postmaster General Montgomery Blair ended the discussion, however, with the blunt condemnation that Hooker was “too great a friend of John Barleycorn.”

At the beginning of the Maryland Campaign, Hooker was put in charge of the army’s V Corps, a sizeable 15,000-man force. Soon redesignated as the I Corps of Gen. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac, Hooker’s command fought at Turner’s Gap (on Sept.14) and the Battle of Antietam three days later. There, during the desperate fighting in the Miller cornfield, Fighting Joe’s divisions were shattered, the general himself receiving an incapacitating wound to the foot. While convalescing, he was visited by numerous government officials, including President Abraham Lincoln. Hearing rumors that he was again being considered for army command, Hooker—never shy about self-promotion—pressed his case by attacking McClellan’s generalship.

Lincoln’s Choice

Instead, of course, Lincoln replaced McClellan with Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside, an 1847 West Point graduate with a somewhat checkered battlefield résumé. Taking over in November 1862, Burnside reorganized the Army of the Potomac into four massive “grand divisions,” each comprising two army corps as well as attached artillery and cavalry. Hooker’s Center Grand Division, totaling about 40,000 men, contained Maj. Gen. George Stoneman’s III Corps and the V Corps under Maj. Gen. Daniel Butterfield.

During the catastrophic Battle of Fredericksburg, Fighting Joe’s Center Grand Division was at first held in reserve, then sent in piecemeal. One of his divisions suffered twenty-five percent casualties in a useless assault against Marye’s Heights (quite possibly the Civil War’s strongest defensive position). On Dec. 13, the Confederates at Marye’s Heights—infantry sheltered behind a stonewall along the base of the rise, dug-in artillery on top—easily annihilated fourteen separate Federal attacks. Seven thousand Union casualties were needlessly lost on this part of the battlefield.

Angered over Burnside’s mishandling of the army, Hooker attacked him unsparingly, telling the Joint Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War, for example, that the strength of the Confederate position had been well-known beforehand. There had been no excuse for the bloodletting at Marye’s Heights. Burnside, exasperated by Hooker’s numerous machinations—his denunciations, his flagrant self-promotion, and his call for a dictatorship to save the republic—drafted for Lincoln’s signature an extraordinary document, General Order No. 8.18. It stated in part: “General Joseph Hooker… having been guilty of unjust and unnecessary criticisms of the actions of his superior officers… and having… endeavored to create distrust in the minds of officers who have associated with him, and having… made reports and statements which were calculated to create false impressions… is hereby dismissed from the service of the United States as a man unfit to hold an important commission. …” Additionally, two major generals and five brigadiers, accused of similar military indiscretions, were also to be relieved from duty.

In Washington, Burnside presented General Order No. 8, along with his resignation, to the much-beleaguered Abraham Lincoln, asking him to either approve the order or accept his stepping down. Lincoln replied that he needed time to consult with his advisers. During those deliberations, several officers were considered for the Army of the Potomac’s top slot (although all agreed that Burnside was out). In the end—and despite the strenuous objections of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and General in Chief Henry Halleck—Lincoln chose Fighting Joe.  

On Jan. 25, 1863, news of Hooker’s appointment reached the Army of the Potomac, where it was fairly well received by the rank and file. They saw him as a fighting general. And, thanks to their fondness for Fighting Joe, they were more than willing to overlook his infighting, intemperance, and reportedly low moral character. Many in the army’s highest ranks, however, were not so sanguine. Two of the army’s grand division commanders—major generals Edwin V. Sumner and William B. Franklin—refused to serve under Hooker and were summarily banished from the Army of the Potomac. Burnside was given a leave of absence.

Fresh Veggies

Soon thereafter, Hooker received the famous Jan. 26 letter from President Lincoln. It opened with a listing of the general’s positive qualities—his bravery, his confidence, his ambition. Then the president admonished Hooker for thwarting Burnside at every turn. Next followed an incredible passage: “I have heard, in such way as to believe it,” Honest Abe had written, “of your recently saying that both the Army and the Government needed a Dictator. Of course, it was not for this but in spite of it that I have given you the command. Only those Generals who gain successes, can set up Dictators. What I now ask of you is military success, and I will risk the dictatorship.” The president then promised the government’s utmost support.

On Jan. 28, after a face-to-face with Lincoln in the White House, Hooker returned to his army’s headquarters at Falmouth, just across the Rappahannock from Fredericksburg, to take command. But, as noted above, the Army of the Potomac was in a deplorable state, both physically and mentally. In letters to their families and hometown newspapers, the soldiers grumbled, detailing their woes. One feared they were “fast approaching a mob.” Another, advocating the army’s breakup, wrote that they “may as well abandon this part of Virginia’s bloody soil.”

Despite the task’s enormity, the 48-year-old Joseph Hooker dove into his new responsibilities with a passion. First, he needed a right-hand man, a chief of staff. In General Order No. 2, dated Jan. 29, Hooker appointed Maj. Gen. Daniel Butterfield. (His first choice for the position, Brig. Gen. Charles P. Stone, was still under suspicion thanks to his bungling of the Battle of Ball’s Bluff in October 1861.)

Although not a West Pointer, New Yorker Butterfield—best known as the supposed composer of “Taps”—had risen quickly through the ranks and was part of Hooker’s inner circle, having led the V Corps in Hooker’s Center Grand Division. He possessed solid organizational skills. Retained as chief of artillery was Brig. Gen. Henry J. Hunt (although he was unfortunately limited to administrative responsibilities). The other staff appointments were adjutants and aides-de-camp from Hooker’s earlier commands.

Early on, Hooker tackled the problem most dear to the men in the ranks—food. Rations for an encamped army were supposed to include fresh vegetables, “desiccated” (or dried) vegetables—derisively called “desecrated” by the soldiers—hardtack, salt pork, and coffee. But much of this good food was being sold for cash by the regimental commissaries to people outside the army. The hungry foot soldiers—even some officers—simply went without. To counteract this profiteering, Hooker ordered that henceforth the men would receive fresh vegetables twice and dried legumes once per week.

Additionally, the new commander ordered the erection of camp bakeries, mandating that his soldiers be issued soft bread, or flour, at least four times a week. Commissary officers who failed to comply were required to file a written explanation. Thanks to this new system of accountability, the men quickly noticed an improvement in both the quality and quantity of their rations. “Whatever they thought of Hooker’s other qualities,” wrote historian Bell Wiley, “soldiers highly approved his competency as a provider.”

Teaching the Men To Bathe?

Orders were also issued to improve the vast camps around Falmouth. When first laid out in early winter, little thought had been given to proper sanitation. The foul odors that emanated from the countless log-and-canvas huts are best left undescribed. Now headquarters required the men to bury their garbage every day and dig drainage ditches around every cabin. Latrines were relocated farther from the company streets. Blankets and bedding were to be aired daily, and the canvas roofs removed often so that the sun, and fresh air, might enter. Unimprovable campsites were abandoned. Attention was also paid to the men’s personal hygiene: They were ordered to cut their hair short, bathe twice a week, and change their underclothing at least once every seven days.

Cleaning up brought about quick and noticeable changes. The army’s medical director, Maj. Jonathan Lettermen, reported that in February, cases of potentially fatal diarrhea dropped 32 percent. Cases of typhoid fever—which had run rampant through the filthy encampments—were down twenty-eight percent. By April, scurvy was almost eliminated. Under Letterman’s direction, army hospitals were aired out and renovated. New hospitals were built. Drunken surgeons were discharged. The ill and the slightly wounded were quickly patched up and returned to the ranks.

As the men’s health improved, Fighting Joe took steps to keep them occupied. A hectic daily regime of drills and inspections was reinstituted. Company, regimental, and brigade officers studied the manuals by candlelight and put their men through the complicated battlefield evolutions the following day. Of course, the men at first complained—one called the drilling “constant and severe”—but they quickly began to take pride in their improved capabilities. The Falmouth drill fields now witnessed large-scale reviews like those once staged by McClellan.

During these special ceremonies, Fighting Joe Hooker would smile approvingly as the infantrymen marched past him in columns of companies—the men in clean uniforms, their rifled muskets bright. “I believe that the army was never in better condition … than it is now,” noted one Bay Stater, “very different from what it was a month ago.”

Hooker went after the horrendous desertion problem with a carrot-and-stick approach. More than anything else, the soldiers wanted to visit their families back home. Now came a new system—the carrot—under which each company was allowed one ten-day furlough at a time. Additionally, President Lincoln issued an order granting amnesty to absentees who returned to the Army of the Potomac by April. Then there was the stick—programs designed to make desertion difficult and more dangerous. Up to this time, homefolks frequently assisted desertion by simply shipping civilian duds to their soldier boys. Now army-bound packages were under the purview of the provost marshals, and none was allowed past without certification from the shipping agent that it was clothing-free.  

Under orders from Hooker, the Army of the Potomac now began stringently enforcing army regulations. Groups of soldiers claiming to be telegraph-repair details needed passes, as did wagons headed north to Washington. Each military unit was ordered to name and physically describe every member who was absent without leave. The outlying picket lines were greatly reinforced—the pickets themselves now ordered to shoot individuals refusing to halt when challenged. Men caught deserting were executed in front of their comrades.

Cheerful Spirits in Camp

Formerly called a “mob,” the Army of the Potomac—thanks to Fighting Joe’s improvements—once again resembled an army. “[C]heerfulness, good order, and military discipline,” wrote one soldier, “at once took the place of grumbling, depression, and want of confidence.” One new development that didn’t sit well with the rank and file, however, was the banishing of liquor from the camps. (And naturally, the officers were excluded from this regulation.) Now the regimental sutlers witnessed booming sales of such items as canned “brandied peaches.” At Washington, bridge guards started seizing five hundred dollars’ worth of alcoholic beverages each and every day.

The most significant structural change to the Army of the Potomac under Hooker was the breaking up of Burnside’s “grand division” formations (of two infantry corps each). As noted above, two of the four grand division heads, major generals Sumner and Franklin, had already departed. (Hooker himself had been another.) The fourth, Maj. Gen. Franz Sigel, took leave of the army at this time due to poor health (and dissatisfaction). Now, army headquarters would issue orders directly to seven infantry corps commanders. (The eighth infantry corps, Burnside’s old IX Corps, still fiercely loyal to “Old Burn,” was ordered away under the command of Maj. Gen. William F. “Baldy” Smith, whom Hooker considered a bad influence.)

While historians have called this reordering detrimental to the army’s success—after all, in 1864, the Army of the Potomac would be reorganized into fewer, larger formations—Hooker’s reasoning at the time appears sound. Based on his Fredericksburg experience, Fighting Joe called the grand divisions cumbersome, predicting that the upcoming campaign would prove “adverse to the movement and operations of heavy columns.” Grand divisions also added another layer to the army’s military hierarchy—meaning orders took longer to filter down to the frontlines.

Four of the army’s infantry corps were given new leaders: Maj. Gen. Daniel E. Sickles—another Hooker crony—assumed command of the III Corps; the V Corps head became Maj. Gen. George G. Meade; Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick was transferred from the exiting IX Corps to lead the VI Corps; and Maj. Gen. O. O. Howard eventually took command of the XI Corps. Four new division heads and nineteen new brigade commanders were appointed. Several of these new leaders were controversial, but nobody could deny that Hooker was breathing new life into the Army of the Potomac.

A huge improvement was now made to the cavalry arm. Under previous commanders, the much-maligned Federal horsemen had been frittered away in inappreciable detachments. Outpost duty, dispatch delivery, and the escorting of general officers had been their lot. Consolidated, they now became a powerful Cavalry Corps under the command of Maj. Gen. George Stoneman. Comprising three divisions of two brigades each, supported by a brigade-sized reserve, this force of over 11,000 proved more than equal to the much-vaunted Confederate cavalrymen at the Battle of Brandy Station on June 9. “From the day of its reorganization under Hooker,” noted an appreciative dragoon, “the cavalry of the Army of the Potomac commenced a new life.”

Expanding on an idea first concocted by Maj. Gen. Philip Kearny (who’d had his soldiers wear squares of red cloth), Chief of Staff Butterfield devised a corps badge system that proved immensely popular. Each corps was assigned a unique emblem—a circle, trefoil, diamond, Maltese cross, St. Andrew’s cross, crescent, or star—that the men attached to their caps. Following the colors of the Stars and Stripes, a corps’ first division wore badges in red, the second division white, and the third blue. The system fostered corps pride and was later invaluable for identifying units in combat.

Joseph Hooker’s leadership transformed the Army of the Potomac. Greatly appreciative, the enlisted personnel began cheering him whenever he rode by on his white charger. As one soldier remembered years later: “Ah! the furloughs and vegetables he gave! How he did understand the road to the soldier’s heart! How he made out of defeated, discouraged, and demoralized men a cheerful, plucky, and defiant army, ready to follow him everywhere!”

President Lincoln’s letter of Jan. 26, 1863 had concluded with a brief warning: “Beware of rashness,” Old Abe had written, “but with energy, and sleepless vigilance, go forward, and give us victories.” To Lincoln’s great dismay, however, Fighting Joe went forward and gave the nation the Battle of Chancellorsville, the worst defeat ever suffered by the Army of the Potomac. “My God! My God!” moaned the chief executive, his ashen face filled with sorrow and dread. “What will the country say?”

Under Arrest!

The country had plenty to say—especially when the losses, over 17,000, began to sink in. The New York Herald, for example, worrying about the battle’s “fearful consequences,” blasted Lincoln and his advisers for their “ruinous policy of underrating the enemy. …” And Washington was abuzz with wild rumors: Lee had destroyed Hooker’s army and was advancing on the capital; Fighting Joe was under arrest; McClellan would return to command. 

Abraham Lincoln, however, decided to keep Hooker in charge. But when General Lee launched his second invasion of the North and Hooker got into a squabble with the War Department over the status of the Union garrison at Harpers Ferry, Lincoln replaced him with Maj. Gen. George Meade on June 28 (only three days before the commencement of the Battle of Gettysburg).

Despite the career black mark that was Chancellorsville, Hooker was sent west to Chattanooga, Tennessee, in command of the Army of the Potomac’s XI and XII Corps. There he performed admirably at Lookout Mountain on Nov. 24, 1863. The two eastern corps were combined in April 1864 as the XX Corps, Army of the Cumberland, and subsequently, under Hooker’s leadership, participated in the Atlanta Campaign. Passed over for promotion, Hooker submitted his resignation to army head Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman on August 27. “I will not object,” was Sherman’s reaction. “He is not indispensable to our success.”

Hooker sat out the rest of the war in Cincinnati, Ohio, in charge of the army’s Northern Department (which comprised the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan). The boredom of this duty—securing the Ohio River and the northern frontier—Fighting Joe alleviated by making speeches and wooing Olivia Groesbeck of Cincinnati, whom he married once the fighting was over. Hooker led Lincoln’s funeral procession in Springfield, Illinois, on May 4, 1865, and was greatly heartened that same year when the report of the Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War exonerated him for the devastating defeat at Chancellorsville.

After the war, he oversaw two of the Army’s large administrative districts: the Department of the East and the Department of the Lakes. Retiring on Oct. 15, 1868, he spent his last decade traveling, attending reunions, and threatening to publish his memoirs. Joseph Hooker—the pompous, hard-drinking officer whose leadership, in only three months, completely revitalized the Army of the Potomac—died suddenly on Oct. 31, 1879. He was buried in Cincinnati’s Spring Grove Cemetery.

this article first appeared in military history quarterly

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About one-fifth of military-age White men in the South perished during the war—a chilling statistic that reinforces the argument that steadfast devotion to the Confederate cause compelled these soldiers to continue fighting despite the relentless carnage. But before soldiers faced the clang of the battlefield, how did they decide to mobilize, and what part did Confederate law and culture play in promoting military service?

Initially, the cause of secession attracted fervent volunteers. Young men who had forged their convictions during the sectional crisis rushed with friends and neighbors to assert their martial fidelity, chanting songs about defense of home, political power, and slavery. But as 1861 drew to a close without a decisive repelling of Union forces, Confederate leaders looked ahead with uncertainty, as many thousands of volunteer enlistments were to expire by late spring. In December, the Confederate Congress enticed soldiers with a promise of furloughs and cash upon re-enlistment, but with only limited success.

Alongside formal legislative efforts to promote volunteer service, Confederate nationalists did their best to inculcate a spirit of sacrifice and duty in the public consciousness. That would include contributions on the literary front, as artists joined the push to convince the population the war was a defensive revolution and not a slaveholders’ rebellion.

At the forefront of this push was William Gilmore Simms, a novelist, editor, and planter from Charleston, S.C. Despite early opposition to the nullification movement, Simms had become increasingly sectional after 1833, even theorizing that slavery was a traditional and munificent institution. Aware the South had a reputation for lagging behind the North’s literary accomplishments, Simms sought to bolster the intellectual credibility of his section while defending its distinctions, including the sunny agricultural landscape and chivalric culture.

In late 1861, as the Confederate government debated the furlough and bounty system, Simms produced a poem in the Romantic style that exemplified the proper manner for a man of the South. The ballad’s protagonist, however, was no Lowcountry gentleman or plantation prince. Instead, Simms cast his vision of a noble soldier as a backwoods warrior, “The Mountain Partisan.”

My rifle, pouch, and knife!
My steed! And then we part!
One loving kiss, dear wife,
One press of heart to heart!
Cling to me yet awhile,
But stay the sob, the tear!
Smile—only try to smile—
And I go without a fear.

Our little cradled boy,
He sleeps—and in his sleep,
Smiles, with an angel joy,
Which tells thee not to weep, 
I’ll kneel beside, and kiss—
He will not wake the while, 
Thus dreaming of the bliss
That bids thee, too, to smile.

Think not, dear wife, I go,
With a light thought at my heart
’Tis a pang akin to woe,
That fills me as we part;
But when the wolf was heard
To howl around our lot,
Thou know’st, dear mother-bird,
I slew him on the spot!

Aye, panther, wolf, and bear,
Have perish’d ’neath my knife;
Why tremble, then, with fear,
When now I go, my wife?
Shall I not keep the peace,
That made our cottage dear;
And ’till these wolf-curs cease
Shall I be housing here?

One loving kiss, dear wife,
One press of heart to heart;
Then for the deadliest strife,
For freedom I depart!
I were of little worth,
Were these Yankee wolves left free
To ravage ’round our hearth,
And bring one grief to thee!

God’s blessing on thee, wife,
God’s blessing on the young:
Pray for me through the strife,
And teach our infant’s tongue.
Whatever haps in fight,
I shall be true to thee—
To the home of our delight—
To my people of the free!

Although we tend to associate “partisan” with political parties today, the term meant “irregular soldier” or “guerrilla” in the 19th century. Simms, who had begun building his literary bona fides with an 1835 novel The Partisan, hoped to connect Rebel soldiers with their Revolutionary War forebears, including South Carolina partisan heroes Francis Marion, Thomas Sumter, and Henry Lee III.

His 1861 poem joined a wider Confederate effort to make secession seem congruent with the American Revolution and not destructive of the union that struggle had created. Likewise, Simms rendered his volunteer as an idealistic pioneer, an equestrian rifleman on the edge of settlement—one who had slain wild animals to “keep the peace” and was ready, too, to slay Lincoln’s “wolf-curs.” In his absence, the partisan’s wife was to remain sturdy, all while tutoring his heir, maintaining the homestead, and offering protective prayers. Simms wanted to make the compelling national narrative of wilderness conquest and republican motherhood “Confederate,” not American.

When the poem appeared in Southern Literary Messenger in March 1862, it had a new title, “The Border Ranger,” part of a push by Simms to present irregular warfare in a wider national scope—beyond merely South Carolina.

To address the Army’s tumbling manpower levels, Congress passed a conscription law in early 1862 mandating service for most White men ages 18–35, and that April issued the Partisan Ranger Act, pulling independent guerrillas into the Confederate command structure in an effort to maximize the benefits of “partisan” warfare while tempering any of its infamous excesses through supervision by the formal military.

Yet what seemed rational for Simms’ archetypical “Border Ranger” would be harrowing for thousands of men and women on this new borderland of whirling violence. Indeed, the poem’s new title reads not only as an invocation of the frontier spirit, but as a plea for faithfulness from those on the Confederacy’s geographical margins. Partisan warfare on the border produced provocative heroes for the South (William Quantrill, John Singleton Mosby, etc.), but it also blurred into bushwhacking and spurred Union sympathizers to take up arms themselves. Southern Unionists, such as the bridge-burning Tennessee mountain men under David Fry, inflicted their share of partisan terror to preserve the United States.

The effort to inculcate a national feeling for the South by Simms, who died in 1870, did not alter the war’s outcome, but the literary story had just begun. As former Confederates endeavored to explain their subjugation, new myths of untainted chivalry in the coming decades would help to solidify the memory of an honorable cause and an honorable defeat.

Literary works present a challenge for those who love history. Parsing an author’s intentions, the context of the time, the allusions and hidden references, and the representation of the truth can seem daunting. But such literary endeavors also offer an opportunity to scrutinize how contemporaries painted their beliefs and assumptions. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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The Confederate Congress met in 11 sessions from February 1861 to March 1865. The last seven volumes of the Southern Historical Society Papers, published intermittently from 1923 to 1959, reprinted proceedings of the body’s sessions from February 1862 through March 1865. This book thus fills the void, reprinting proceedings of the first five sessions: February 1861–February 1862.

Following the U.S. precedent, the Confederate Constitution prescribed two senators per state. In the House, population-based representation gave Virginia 16 seats, Georgia and Alabama 12 each, and so forth.

On February 5, 1861, the second day of the Confederate Provisional Congress convened in Montgomery, Ala., Vice President Stephens declared, “This is a Congress of States.” He was being more than metaphorical. First it was a unicameral house (it split into House and Senate in February 1862). Moreover, in floor votes each state delegation got just one to cast.

One of Congress’ first tasks was to devise a plan for a national government, that the people’s “rights and social institutions may be forever maintained,” in the words of Georgia’s Francis Bartow. Congressional members in the first year were essentially delegates to the states’ secession conventions; elections were held in November 1861.

From the start, Congress allowed stenographers and reporters to attend and record sessions. This allows Dr. Carlson to draw not just from the congressional journal (scanty in detail), but also from Confederate newspapers, which frequently carried actions on the floor word for word. Accordingly, in compiling this book the editor has drawn on daily press reports in the Richmond papers as well as The Charleston Mercury, Montgomery Weekly Advertiser, and a few others.

Congress of States concludes with Howell Cobb’s address to the Congress, predicting the viability of the Confederate government, “relying on the harmony of our people; upon the justice of our cause; upon our own strong arms, and the smile of a kind and protecting Providence.”

Congress of States

Proceedings of the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States of America

Edited by R. David Carlson, University of Alabama Press, 2023

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Hiram Dryer is not a name that readily comes to mind when we ponder leaders who stood out during the Battle of Antietam. He remains largely unknown to all but the battle’s most ardent students, yet the impact Captain Dryer had on the fighting September 17, 1862, should not be underestimated.

A New York native, Dryer was 53 years old at Antietam. Relatively little is known about his early years, but on October 1, 1846, during the Mexican War, he enlisted in the Regular Army. Assigned to the newly organized Regiment of Mounted Riflemen, he rose rapidly in rank to first sergeant, and then earned a commission on July 31, 1848, as a second lieutenant in the 4th U.S. Infantry for gallantry at the battles of Chapultepec and Garita de Belan. He served for a time with future Civil War luminaries Ulysses S. Grant, Phil Sheridan, and George Crook. In 1852, the 4th U.S. was transferred to the West Coast, which required the regiment first to cross the Isthmus of Panama and then journey by ship to the Pacific Northwest. Passage across Panama’s isthmus was a nightmare, as a cholera breakout killed 104 enlisted men and one officer. In November 1853, while stationed at Fort Vancouver in Oregon, Dryer displayed trademark courage in volunteering to lead a supply expedition to a group of settlers trapped by a blizzard in the Cascade Mountains.

Dryer returned with his regiment to the East in the fall of 1861 and was assigned to the Army of the Potomac. The early war period was a time of great change for the Regular Army, its leadership decimated both by officers assuming commissions of higher rank in the U.S. Volunteer service and Southern-born officers who resigned to fight for the Confederacy. Individuals pulled from civilian life frequently filled the resulting vacancies.

The enlisted ranks were also in flux due to the expansion of the Regular Army, featuring nine new regiments of infantry and one each of cavalry and artillery. Some of the noncommissioned officers serving under Dryer were no doubt grizzled veterans, but many of his soldiers had enlisted in 1861. Rigorous training and discipline was what set Regulars apart from most volunteer regiments, and the heightened attention they received in skirmishing and marksmanship would prove particularly crucial.

Dryer, who saw service during the 1862 Peninsula and Second Bull Run campaigns, was his regiment’s senior officer when fighting broke out at Antietam. At about 10 a.m. September 17, Maj. Gen. George McClellan ordered his cavalry commander, Maj. Gen. Alfred Pleasonton, to cross Antietam Creek at the Middle Bridge with his troopers and horse artillery in order to provide a diversion and support to the current Union attack on the Confederate position along the Sunken Lane.

A diversion was a sound idea; using cavalry was not. Most Union troopers lacked carbines or training in fighting dismounted, so Pleasonton’s men were forced mainly to hide from enemy artillery either behind Joshua Newcomer’s large barn or on the Antietam Creek bank. This left the horse artillery exposed to long-range fire from skirmishers and sharpshooters. Disgusted that his guns and the others had been sent into harm’s way without proper support, one horse battery commander, John C. Tidball, sought infantry help.

Pleasonton managed to get two companies of the 1st Battalion/12th U.S. Infantry (1/12th) to support his batteries, and then for Brig. Gen. George Sykes, commanding the 5th Corps’ 2nd Division (which included all of the army’s Regular regiments) to send in the entire 2nd/10th U.S. Infantry, commanded by Lieutenant John Poland.

Fierce artillery duels and skirmishing continued well into the afternoon. Worried the Confederates had large reserves concealed behind Cemetery Hill and Cemetery Ridge, Sykes was reluctant to send more infantry across the creek but acquiesced on Poland and the 2nd/14th U.S., and then, at 2 p.m., ordered Dryer to cross the creek with the 4th U.S. and the 1st/14th U.S. and to assume command of all Regular forces there.

Described by a peer “as one of the coolest and bravest officers in our service,” Dryer proceeded to justify such high praise. He first reinforced the Regulars’ skirmish line west of Newcomer Ridge—high ground several hundred yards west of the Newcomer farmhouse. Then, he ordered skirmishers forward on both sides of the Boonsboro Pike, toward Cemetery Hill south of the pike, and Cemetery Ridge, north of it. Unlike commanders who liked to test enemy strength and position by an all-out attack with massed infantry, resulting in extensive casualties—Maj. Gen. William H. French, for instance—Dryer used the superior training, leadership, and marksmanship of the Regulars to probe and press the enemy defenses, his men deployed in dispersed order, offering no inviting targets for Confederate artillery or riflemen.

Backed by plentiful artillery deployed along Newcomer Ridge, the Regulars worked their way forward, advancing on the left as far as the Sherrick Farm lane and on the right, north of the pike, using four companies (at most 130 men) to dislodge Confederate defenders on Cemetery Hill. While forcing the artillery there to withdraw, they advanced within 450 yards of the Lutheran Church on Cemetery Hill’s western slope. But that would be their high-water mark, not because of Rebel resistance, but because of General Sykes. What Sykes saw in Dryer’s advance was an unnecessary risk rather than an opportunity. He found it highly unlikely the Confederate center was simply a hollow shell, only that his Regular infantry faced potential destruction with Dryer exceeding his orders.

Sykes’ orders directing him to immediately withdraw his forces to Newcomer Ridge left Dryer incredulous. Asking if there was any discretion, he was told the “order was imperative.” Gathering up their dead and wounded, Dryer and his Regulars fell back.

At a cost of 11 killed and 75 wounded, they had cleared Cemetery Ridge of Confederates and threatened to capture Cemetery Hill. It would be an exemplary yet virtually unknown achievement. When one considers that the 1st Delaware lost 230 men alone in French’s failed frontal assault upon the Sunken Lane, Dryer’s proficiency in tactics and managing his troops is remarkable.

Dryer went on to receive brevet promotions for courage at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville but, surprisingly, not for Antietam. He apparently lacked political clout, or had no interest in taking a volunteer commission, for there is no evidence he sought or was considered for promotion to higher rank in the volunteer service.

Thrown from a horse in June 1863, Dryer would miss the Gettysburg Campaign. The injury apparently affected his ability to return to the field, for he spent the rest of the war in staff duties. He was remembered by a fellow officer as “always kind and friendly.” We might add that he was also a man of remarkable, daring skill and competence who deserves to be remembered.

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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Thanks to modern media, Joshua L. Chamberlain is remembered today for his bravery on Little Round Top at the Battle of Gettysburg. He was much more than a Civil War hero, however. A new biopic by award-winning historian Ronald C. White examines the full breadth of the man who went from mild-mannered college professor to Medal of Honor recipient and one of the Union Army’s most respected generals. On Great Fields: The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (Penguin Random House, 2023) offers a deep dive into Maine’s native son, who spoke nine languages, served as a four-term governor of Maine, was president of his alma mater Bowdoin College, and, yes, had a remarkable mustache. Chamberlain was the real deal: honorable, dutiful, religious, intellectual, compassionate and committed to the ideals of the Republic. America’s Civil War recently spoke with White about his new book and what he learned about the “Lion of Round Top.”

After writing about Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant, what drew you to Chamberlain?

I was speaking about Grant at the Jonathan Club in downtown Los Angeles and someone said, “What is your next book? And I said, “I’m not exactly sure. Do you have any ideas?” And suddenly this fellow literally leapt up in the back of the room and shouted out, “Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain!” Well, I didn’t really know that much about him, so I took it to my editor and publisher. We looked at the things that were already out there and realized there was a need for a full-scale biography—not simply Chamberlain at Little Round Top, which is very important, but an in-depth book. So that’s how it all started. 

What surprised you the most about him?

To me, it was the whole religious story. His father wants him to go to West Point, his mother wants him to be a minister or missionary, so he goes to Bangor Theological Seminary after Bowdoin College. At the end of those three years, Chamberlain receives three calls to Congregational churches in Maine and New Hampshire, but he offers an address at Bowdoin’s commencement. It is so successful they offer him a teaching position. In all other biographies, those three years at Bangor are literally erased. I mean, they were important for him. All the records of the seminary, which was founded in 1814, are at the Maine Historical Society. I realized that if I was going to devote two chapters to Chamberlain’s four years at Bowdoin College, I needed to devote at least one chapter to his three years at the Bangor Theological Seminary. I was able to find things that no one else had ever looked at before. This is part of his formation, part of his shaping, part of the values that he will carry forward. 

Chamberlain has a strong sense of duty and honor. Where does that come from?

As a professor at Bowdoin during the first year of the Civil War, he saw how many of his students volunteered, how many of them were captured, how many of them were killed. He watched as these 17-, 18-, 19-year-olds go off to war. Finally he comes to the conclusion that this war cannot simply be fought by boys. It has to be fought by men of his distinction and substance. He was 33 years of age with a wife and two young children, so no one would criticize him for not serving. Yet he decides he must do this. His sense of duty compels him to do it. 

When Chamberlain volunteers for the Army, he turns down his first commission. Why?

I love that. The governor of Maine said, “I’ll make you colonel.” He responds, “No, I don’t deserve that title. Make me lieutenant colonel. I’m not a military man, but I can learn.” That was terrific. It shows the humbleness of the man. 

What impact did his religious and educational background have on his service in the military?

People went off to the Civil War in those days with patriotic values and Christian values, both of which would be severely tested. They were not at all prepared for what they would encounter in the Civil War in terms of the suffering and death. His strong faith helped him get through a horrible war and gave him the strength to survive a wound that would impact his life for 50 years. 

How important was Chamberlain’s role at Little Round Top? 

It was a very important moment at the Battle of Gettysburg. Chamberlain never demeaned—he actually lifted up—the role of Union Colonel Strong Vincent. He gives him incredible credit. Vincent is the one who, before the battle begins, says, “You will hold this line.” The same with General Gouverneur Warren, who was the first to see that Little Round Top was in danger because it wasn’t defended. Years later, Chamberlain will become an important witness for Warren, who was trying to restore his rank after he had been relieved of command by General Phil Sheridan. There’s not just one person who needs to be remembered at Little Round Top. In 1889, Chamberlain is at a reunion of the 20th Maine. He acknowledges that many things had been claimed about that engagement. He said, “We’re all right. We’re all correct.” I thought that was really a statesman-like comment. Years later, there’s no point trying to argue who did or didn’t do that. “We are all right.” That, to me, is Chamberlain. 

When things were dire at Little Round Top, Chamberlain gives a one-word order.

He later said he didn’t have time to give some embroidered command. It was simply, “Bayonet.” That was understood by the men under his command. They were running low on ammunition and knew what they had to do. 

Little Round Top was Chamberlain’s first serious introduction to combat.

This is what surprised many people and why I use “Unlikely Hero” in the title of my book. You wouldn’t think of a mild-mannered college professor being willing and able to act with courage and be so daring in battle. When I was at West Point a few years ago, several members of the faculty told me they believe Chamberlain is an embodiment of what military leadership should be all about. My friend David Petraeus [retired U.S. Army general and former CIA director], who thinks Grant is the greatest general of all time, also thinks Chamberlain is a great, great military leader. So it’s not just me, someone writing a biography, but it’s military people themselves who are validating Chamberlain’s leadership. 

Chamberlain is given the nickname “Lion of Round Top.” Does he deserve it?

I think it is well deserved. He earned it. Chamberlain led by example. When the 20th Maine rushes down the hill with bayonets, Chamberlain is out front with them. He confronts an officer with a sword and a pistol [Lieutenant Robert H. Wicker, 15th Alabama] and he convinces him to surrender. That’s an amazing story. He was not afraid to face death. 

What happens to Chamberlain at Petersburg in June 1864?

He almost died at Petersburg. Chamberlain was shot through the hip and it caused severe internal damage. It was a horrible injury that would plague him for the rest of his life. He had several surgeries and suffered terrible pain and infections until the day he died. He never, never complained and never really talked about it. He earns the nickname Bloody Chamberlain that day. He suffered a terrible pelvic wound that probably would have killed another man, then he’s leading his troops again less than a year later. His mother says to him, “Have you not given enough of yourself? You’ve done more than enough. Let other people do it.” He answers, “No, I have yet to finish this job.” The record is not clear, but Chamberlain may have used a catheter for the rest of his life. With the Civil War, we often focus on amputations as a big thing. What I learned from several scholarly articles was that it was really these invisible wounds hidden from sight that were the most prevalent and the most terrible. They went on for the rest of your life. You never got rid of them. Chamberlain finally dies, ultimately from the infections from his wounds, in 1914. He is considered the last Civil War veteran to die from his injuries. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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His wound likely caused incontinence, constant pain and maybe sexual dysfunction. How does he endure this?

Again, he never talks about it, but you have to imagine what this meant for his entire life, for 50 years after the Civil War. That’s a long, long time. I think his faith enables him to accept it. I was surprised to learn that several people would see him in pain and ask why he never talked about it. He was not the kind of man who would do that. Not at all. 

Chamberlain, a strong Unionist, did not believe in the Confederate cause. Yet he does something unusual during the surrender at Appomattox.

This, to me, was so much the essence of who Chamberlain is. He never accepted their cause, but he always applauded their courage by ordering his troops to salute the surrendering soldiers. This can be difficult for contemporary audiences who are revisiting Confederate monuments and wondering if Robert E. Lee was a traitor. I want to emphasize he never, ever accepted the cause of slavery or the cause of disuniting the Union, but he never gave up his compassion for the courage of these men. He could hold both of those views at the same time.I don’t think the salute was a planned thing. I would argue that like his actions at Little Round Top, this all ultimately grows out of his whole set of values. It’s understandable because this is who he was. His whole idea of wanting reconciliation with the South as just a part of his faith, his values, the formation of his life. 

Some historians claim Chamberlain embellished his Civil War record, but you don’t think so. Why?

I found confirmation for several of his claims. For example, John Brown Gordon, the Confederate general who surrendered at Appomattox. He and Chamberlain were really on the same page about what happened. That discovery was quite fascinating. Chamberlain was also accused of changing his speeches. After the war, he was reading all these regimental histories. When he got new information, he put that into his addresses. It says a lot about who he is. I think it is a great quality that he wanted to set the record straight. 

What do you want readers to take away from your book? How do you want them to remember Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain?

As a rediscovered hero of America who has the kind of values that we need to have in our society today. And what is the source of those values? It’s both his classical education and his Christian education. And I think he is a great example of what a person can do, even facing immense difficulty with his wounds for 50 years. He perseveres and becomes not simply the Civil War hero, but the governor of Maine, president of Bowdoin College, and one of the great speakers about the values of the American democracy in those decades after the Civil War. No one spoke more eloquently than Chamberlain about what it meant to be an American in the last part of the 19th century and early part of the 20th century. I wish we had people like him around today. Chamberlain had integrity and duty and loyalty. Those were the bedrock values in his life.

On Great Fields

The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
By Ronald C. White, Penguin Random House, 2023

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It has been more than 20 years since the appearance of the last truly major study of the 1862 Maryland Campaign, Joseph L. Harsh’s magnificent 1999 study Taken at the Flood. To be sure, it can hardly be said that the campaign that produced the greatest surrender of American troops until 1942 and what is still the bloodiest day in American military history has been neglected since then. After all, a number of fine works on the Maryland Campaign have appeared in the past two decades—the most important being the three-volume edition of Ezra Carman’s study that Thomas G. Clemens superbly brought to print in 2010-2017. Still, the absence of a major scholarly study since Harsh’s work is notable given the importance of the Maryland Campaign, and the fact that significant studies of Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and other great Civil War campaigns have appeared since 1999. Consequently, the appearance of the second in D. Scott Hartwig’s massive and grandly executed two-volume study of the campaign is a decidedly welcome event.

Hartwig takes his title from Iron Brigade stalwart Rufus Dawes’ comment as he contemplated the possibility of the Army of Northern Virginia’s crossing of the Potomac River in 1863 bringing the Army of the Potomac back to the environs of Sharpsburg—and it is fitting. Among the many things that set Hartwig’s study apart from previous studies of the Maryland Campaign is just how effectively and powerfully he communicates and keeps central to the story of Antietam the raw brutality and violence of the battle and the frightful damage the two armies inflicted and suffered. After a preface summarizing the events that brought the armies to Sharpsburg on September 17, 1862, (the 231st anniversary, interestingly, of the momentous clash between Gustavus Adolphus’ and Count Tilly’s armies at Breitenfeld), Hartwig opens his narrative of the battle with Dawes and his comrades as they prepare for the advance toward the Dunker Church that set off the day-long fight that produced horrific carnage. From there, the book follows the battle as it moves from the North Woods to the Miller Cornfield to the West Woods to the Sunken Road to the fields south of Sharpsburg where the timely arrival of A.P. Hill’s Division brought the 9th Corps to grief.

Of course, the general course of Antietam is well-known to students of the Civil War. What Hartwig provides in his chronicle of the battle, as well as the September 19 clash at Shepherdstown, is a level of detail rivaled only by Carman’s work and one informed by access to sources Carman did not have available. Indeed, readers who have done battle with publishers over word and page counts will applaud (and envy) the amount of space Johns Hopkins University Press gave Hartwig. All readers will be impressed with the skill with which he tells the story of Antietam. Any future author who hopes to produce a work that challenges Hartwig’s deeply researched and splendidly written study as the standard work on the Maryland Campaign will have a formidable challenge indeed. 

‘I Dread the Thought of the Place’

The Battle of Antietam and the End of the Maryland Campaign

By D. Scott Hartwig, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023

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Read our recent interview with author D. Scott Hartwig about the Battle of Antietam and the writing of I Dread the Thought of the Place.

A rare gem of a Civil War memorial can be found in the small coastal town of Eastport, Maine. Patriotic and corps badge murals adorn the walls of a Grand Army of Republic meeting hall there, uncovered when modern construction was stripped away. Although thousands of G.A.R. buildings sprang up around the country after the war—and there were many far grander—Eastport can take pride in that its hall is one of the few that still exists. Countless others, in fact, have been modernized or repurposed beyond recognition, if not razed all together. Also fortunate is that Eastport’s G.A.R. Hall was recently donated to the Tides Institute & Museum of Art, a local powerhouse of preservation already involved in expert conservation of the facility.

It is no exaggeration to call Eastport “downeast,” for you can go no farther in that direction without leaving the United States and entering Canada. Despite its distance from the centers of the first European settlements on the continent, covetous eyes were eventually cast upon the region’s lush forests, fertile soils, and rich fishing grounds. In 1745, during the struggle between Britain and France for control of what is now Canada, members of a British expedition preparing to lay siege to France’s Fortress Louisbourg took note as they sailed past and later returned to claim the region, wresting it from its original inhabitants, the Passamaquoddy Indians.

The New Englanders, however, were not the only ones who recognized its value. When the British took a worrisome interest in the area in the early 19th century, the fledgling United States built Fort Sullivan on a hill above Eastport’s deep water harbor in 1808. Lest that defensiveness seem unwarranted, during the War of 1812 a British flotilla led by Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy of HMS Victory fame took possession of the town. It was held in what Britain was calling New Ireland until 1818, when it was returned to the United States.

When the Civil War tore the country apart roughly a half-century later, it roused men and boys of this far corner of the Union from their homes. Maine, of course, made a remarkable contribution to the Civil War. Despite a relatively small population—just more than 600,000—it sent 31 regiments of infantry, two regiments of cavalry, one regiment of heavy artillery, and seven sharpshooter companies into action, and raised coast guard infantry and artillery units to watch over the state’s line of ports.

Remarkably, 72,945 men between the ages of 18 and 45 (60 percent of the state’s population) would serve, purportedly the largest proportion of any state in the Union. That also meant a high proportion of fatalities: 9,398 (3,184 killed or mortally wounded in battle, twice that number from disease). Although the 1860 population of Eastport was a mere 3,850, the little town sent 614 men to serve in the Army and Navy, leaving scarcely a Maine regiment without an Eastport man in its ranks.

Those lucky enough to return home after the war soon came to accept that those with whom they served best understood the terrific impact their wartime experiences had had on their lives. Many served with men from their hometowns, where what kept a man going was the desire to not let down his brother, his cousin, or his best friend. But there were also relationships forged in moments as disparate as those of mortal danger, or those hours of paralyzing boredom, loneliness, and homesickness.

For many veterans, the answer was the Grand Army of the Republic, and though Maine’s population was small, by 1868 the state saw more than 167 G.A.R. posts in towns across the state, with more to follow. The posts served many of the veterans’ needs including ones beyond camaraderie. There were bereaved families, and those whose loved ones had returned disabled, who needed financial assistance and support.

It was also important that those who never returned would be remembered and honored. Eastport’s Post #40 hoped to memorialize Captain Thomas Roach of the 6th Maine Infantry, who had been mortally wounded during Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick’s Second Fredericksburg assault on May 3, 1863, during the Battle of Chancellorsville. Roach had his wounded leg amputated below the knee and would die several weeks later after gangrene set in.

The Eastport veterans initially committed to naming their post in Roach’s honor, but it eventually became known as the Meade Post in honor of Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade, who in 1869 had been instrumental in stymieing plans to use Eastport as a staging area for a possible attack by the Fenian Brotherhood on British interests in the Canadian province of New Brunswick. The Fenians hoped that in posing an armed threat against New Brunswick, British naval vessels would be forced to remain engaged in nearby waters and would be unable to recross the Atlantic Ocean to defend against an armed insurrection in Ireland.

After a ship loaded with weapons and ammunition for the Fenians arrived in Eastport’s harbor in April 1869, Meade, on behalf of the U.S. government, quickly seized the ship’s cargo and effectively put an end to the threat.

Not all memories were grim for Eastport veterans, as Maine soldiers acquired a reputation for valuable skills other than their tenacity in battle. The number of lumberjacks in the 6th Maine, for instance, made them a handy addition to any army. Their proud commander decreed to one visiting general, astonished as a work party hewed trees in the Eastern Theater, that the 6th Maine was “axing” its way to Richmond.

The Maine boys were also known for their adept foraging skills. When asked how far Union troops had advanced toward the enemy, their division commander at the time, Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock, responded: “That’s uncertain; but if you want to know, go out and pass the picket line and go as much farther to the front as you think it safe to do; then climb the tallest tree you can find, and off in the distance you will still see men from the Sixth Maine in the corn field stealing corn.”

Since many an Eastporter made his living on the sea, plenty chose to serve in the U.S. Navy during the war. They served on more than 200 ships, most enduring the tedium aboard vessels assigned to blockade duty, but a number volunteered for the naval shore parties that assisted in the capture of North Carolina’s Fort Fisher in January 1865. Two Eastport men, Edward Bowman and Clement Dees, received Medals of Honor for their Fort Fisher contributions.

Dees, unfortunately, forfeited his medal by going AWOL after the war, but the Navy saw to it that another participant in the Fort Fisher assault, Joseph Cony, was not forgotten—naming the destroyer USS Cony, built in August 1942 at Maine’s Bath Iron Works, in his honor.

Yet another Eastport sailor whose Civil War service was anything but routine was Eastport’s Captain John Crosby, acting commander of USS Housatonic—the first ship sunk by a submarine in warfare. In a night attack by the Confederate vessel H.L. Hunley, Crosby first believed the long, thin shadow in the water was a log, but as it continued to approach his ship ordered the crew to quarters, the ship’s chains slipped, and its engine backed, although it would be too late. Hunley’s spar torpedo struck Housatonic amidships near its magazine, and the resulting explosion sealed its fate. Hunley’s eight-man crew, however, paid for their heroics with their lives.

The restoration of the Meade Post #40 G.A.R. Hall is an outstanding memorial to the Eastport veteran soldiers and sailors, always lionized by the town’s residents, but particularly so in their later years—usually finding a prominent place in the annual July 4 parade. Two of Eastport’s last surviving Civil War veterans were Peter Kane, who rode and fought in the 1st Maine Cavalry, and Fred Call, who served in the 7th Maine Infantry as a teenager. All five Call family boys—William, John, Stephen, Levi, and Fred—served in the Union Army, with all, by great fortune, surviving.

Fred and Peter made the trek to Gettysburg for the milestone 50th anniversary, and on their return, the hometown newspaper reported, “The Gettysburg veterans are home again, coming back with weary feet and tired body but filled to the brim with delightful memories, not only of scenes of half a century ago renewed, but with the realization of the unitedness of this great nation….”

That a historic structure such as Eastport’s G.A.R. hall has survived, and its importance recognized, is gratifying for many.

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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Diane Smith, an author of several military histories (dianemonroesmith.com), writes from Holden, Me. She thanks Tides Institute’s Hugh French and her husband, Ned, for their help.

William S. Love of the 1st Special Battalion of Louisiana Infantry had little time to revel in his army’s victory at the First Battle of Manassas. For nearly three weeks, the Confederate surgeon from New Orleans found himself “constantly employed” treating wounded from both sides at the Carter House, a Manassas hillside homestead now serving as a field hospital. Finally, on August 9, 1861, Love fired off a quick note to his father, apologizing that it had taken him so long to do so. “I have had charge of some thirty or forty wounded prisoners,” he professed. “I got rid of them two or three days ago and have now here only [Captain] George McCausland who had gotten into a conflict wounded in a duel [and] is not in a condition yet to be moved.”

The Civil War’s first major battle on July 21, 1861, had sent a shockwave across both sides of the fractured country. As the clash on the plains of Manassas, Va., teetered on the edge of an expected Union victory that many believed would quell the Southern states’ burgeoning rebellion, fate played its hand, allowing the combined armies of Confederate Generals P.G.T. Beauregard and Joseph E. Johnston to storm back and claim a victory.

Hand-picked to win it all, Union Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell attempted a bold advance that morning against the Southern forces assembled both on Matthews Hill and along the Warrenton Turnpike. Buckling under intense pressure on Matthews Hill, Love’s Louisiana Tigers—along with their beleaguered comrades from South Carolina and Virginia cobbled together in Colonel Nathan “Shanks” Evans’ 7th Brigade—withdrew in disarray toward Henry Hill, where the Southern commanders settled into a defensive posture.

Flush with grandiose visions of victory, McDowell ordered his troops to “press the Confederates.” At midday, astride his horse, he galloped along his lines shouting, “Victory! Victory! We have done it! We have done it!” The Union commander’s euphoric cries, however, produced ill-advised inaction among many of his troops—and soon a Herculean effort by their Confederate counterparts.

Patiently awaiting the Union advance behind a slope near Henry Hill were an unassuming former Virginia Military Institute professor named Thomas Jonathan Jackson and his contingent of Virginia infantry. The subsequent stand by the Old Dominion native would become immortal, of course, as was the Confederates’ remarkable rally on the field, which by evening had the Union troops and hordes of resident bystanders scampering back to Washington, D.C., as fast as the roads would allow.

The Southerners had indeed grasped victory from the hands of defeat. 

A Duel… and a Prince

The letters Love finally sent to his father, parts of which are published here for the first time, were heartfelt and in places detailed, particularly his descriptions of the incident involving Captain George McCausland and a visit to the battlefield by Prince Napoleon, the cousin of French Emperor Napoleon III.

Joining Wheat’s Tigers in Colonel Evans’ Brigade at Manassas were the 4th South Carolina; the 30th Virginia Cavalry, Troops A and I; and a section of the Lynchburg (Va.) Artillery. Poor McCausland, a volunteer aide-de-camp on Evans’ staff, had gotten into an altercation with Captain Alexander White, commander of the 1st Special Battalion’s Company B. Only 24, McCausland was a native Louisianan—considered “a strikingly handsome man,” but a little unwise perhaps. White was a notorious character, having once been convicted of murder during a poker game. When McCausland made insulting remarks about the Tigers in the wake of the victory, White was outraged. To satisfy his honor, he challenged the youngster to a duel.

McCausland accepted the challenge, and on July 24 the two squared off near their camp with Mississippi Rifles at “short-range.” White fired first, sending a .54-caliber bullet through both of McCausland’s hips. McCausland, who had fired but missed, languished with the wound in Love’s hospital for more than a month and ultimately perished “in great agony” of pneumonia on September 17. His body was returned to New Orleans for burial at his home in West Feliciana Parish.

Corporal Robert Gracey was among the captured Federals for whom Love also cared at his field hospital. As Gracey later conveyed to a New York newspaper, his two-week stay at the Carter House had been pleasant enough. He revealed that after being wounded he was taken to the hospital “in one of our own ambulances, captured at Bull Run,” and had been “placed…under [the] guard of Lt. Thomas Adrian and his command of Tiger Rifles, of Louisiana.”

The kindly Confederates, Gracey recalled, furnished him with “more condiments, luxuries and personal attentions than were bestowed upon their own sick. Lt. Adrian frequently and jocularly remarked, as an excuse for this, that his object was a selfish one. He wanted to take [him] to the South, and exhibit him, a la [Phineas T.] Barnum, as a fine specimen of the living Yankee who couldn’t be killed.”

As for Prince Napoleon, he did visit the Manassas area in the days following the battle and shared a carriage with Beauregard, escorted by more than 100 cavalrymen under that flamboyant Virginian, Colonel J.E.B. Stuart. According to one unidentified observer, Beauregard and his guest disembarked at the now-famous Stone Bridge and strolled about before returning to their carriage and arriving “on the bare plateau rising above the Bull Run, at the very center of the action, amidst corpses, dead horses and freshly-dug graves.”

The battlefield excursion would end at 11 a.m.

Winter in Virginia

Desperate for news from home to distract him from his exhaustive duties, Love implored his father to direct any letters to him “at Manassas, Wheat’s Battalion. The letters all go addressed to it into our box are taken out and sent as directed.”

“I hope to join the Battalion soon,” he divulged. “[I]t is encamped at Bull Run, where the Battle of the 18th alto [Blackburn’s Ford] was fought. I hear that we are to be kept to the sea, but I hope not.” Love also informed his father that he had sent him “by the Southern Express Company fifty dollars some days ago. I now enclose you the receipt for it lest you might have trouble getting it. I would have sent it long since….[but] the Post Office is at Manassas some eight miles from here and I could not get them to mail a letter….”

By the end of November, Love wrote his father again about the “very cold” weather where he was staying at Camp Florida, outside Centreville, Va. It was something to which the Louisiana native was certainly not accustomed. “I would have obtained a furlough ’ere this to have gone to Richmond probably to New Orleans,” he explained, “but that being in daily expectation of a grand battle with [George] McClellan’s whole Yankee army, I did not like to be absent from the company.”

By mid-December, Wheat’s Tigers were still recuperating their strength. Now camped east of Manassas Junction, they stored their flimsy canvas tents and built more substantial log cabins to weather the increasing winter temperatures. It had been less than a year since they had arrived in Virginia.

Although, as Love noted, offensive actions in the area had halted for the most part as winter approached, he elaborated: “Our scouts report the Yankees to be advancing in immense force. The battle is expected to take place in two days. Whole brigades of our army are sent out on picket duty and daily are capturing bodies of Yankee scouts and foraging parties. We are all sanguine and entertain no apprehensions as to the result. From all accounts it will be a bloody battle. But pray God will give us victory.”

The only “grand” battle of any consequence nearby would be known as the Bog Wallow Ambush, occurring December 4. Tired of Confederates capturing their men, the Yankees began probing enemy positions and finally launched a trap that produced a narrow victory, with five Confederate and four Federal casualties.

Eager for a Fight

The group that had first organized six months earlier at Camp Moore in southeast Louisiana proved a raucous assortment of men. Recruited from the alleyways and docks in the seedier side of New Orleans, they were at least experienced fighters, just not disciplined. While at Camp Moore, a young private from another company, John F. Charlton, wrote in his diary: “Our excitement in camp with the Tiger Rifles was our first experience being often aroused during the night by cries of ‘fall in fall in’ expecting to be attacked by the Tigers. They never liked us because we often accused them of Stealing.”

Initially they were all adorned with regular-issue Confederate uniforms, but they did wear distinctive wide-brimmed hats with slogans painted on the bands such as “Lincoln’s Life or a Tiger’s Death” and “Tiger in Search of Abe.” A rich benefactor, Alexander Keene Richards, admired them and purchased one company (the “Tiger Rifles”) wildly colored Zouave-style uniforms consisting of a red fez and shirt, a dark blue jacket trimmed in red, baggy blue-and-white-striped pants, and white gaiters to fit over most of their blue-and-white-striped socks. They were armed with .54-caliber Mississippi rifled muskets and had huge Bowie knives strapped to their waists. Stitched on their flag, ironically, were the words “As Gentle As” adjacent to a resting lamb in the center.

A Virginia native, Chatham Roberdeau Wheat was a veteran of many wars, and during the fighting in Mexico in 1846-48 received particular praise from General Zachary Taylor, who described him as “the best natural soldier he had ever seen.” He followed that up with military forays in Cuba, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Italy.

In addition to being a born leader, Wheat was a physically imposing figure, standing 6-feet-4 and weighing nearly 275 pounds. He demanded respect from the soldiers serving under him and was stout enough to earn it. At one point, Wheat was overheard screaming at his men, “If you don’t get to your places, and behave as soldiers should, I will cut your hands off with this sword!” It was widely acknowledged that his men feared him and that he was the only person able to control them.

Despite his rough exterior, Wheat interacted gentlemanly with the ladies of New Orleans. One Crescent City girl, 16-year-old Clara Solomon, was highly impressed with the major and was a family friend of one of his company commanders, Captain Obed P. Miller. Before the Tigers were scheduled to head off to war on June 15, 1861, Solomon traveled to Camp Moore in a desperate attempt to see “Maj. Wheat’s first special battalion.”

The giddy teen jotted in her journal:

“But hush! we are nearing Tangipahoa [where Camp Moore was situated]! The whistle is sounding! we are at the depot! ‘What hope, what joy our bosom’s swell!!’ Quickly my head is thrust out the window in search of one familiar, well beloved form [Battalion Adjutant Allen C. Dickinson]. The report! It is seen!! A moment more and we are with it. Our fears are ended. They have not gone! But one received the ‘kiss salute.’ How tantalizing!! He [Dickinson] was glad to see us! Sufficient! We slowly wind our way to the Hotel. We remain there a few moments and then proceed to the seat of action, ‘The Camp,’ accompanied by Capt. White and his wife.”

Unexpectedly, the unit’s departure to Virginia was delayed until the following Thursday. The soldiers were eager for a fight and seemed somewhat blue because of the delay. As Solomon would recall, “When we arrived at our quarters, the first object that attracted our attention was our ‘handsome Major [Wheat],’” who, she wrote, “greeted them very cordially.” Lamenting that Wheat was without a female companion, she offered to be his escort for the evening activities and later chided the major for not relaying his “proper” goodbyes to her at night’s end.

Once Wheat and his men finally departed on trains to Virginia, they found themselves packed tightly in the rail cars, much like sardines in a can. The companies comprising the battalion consisted of the Walker Guards (Robert A. Harris, commander); Tiger Rifles (Alexander White); Delta Rangers (Henry C. Gardner); Catahoula Guerrillas (Jonathan W. Buhoup); and Old Dominion Guards (Obed Miller). It was a plodding, uncomfortable ride, but it allowed for overnight stops. Local crowds cheered them on and often convinced the train to stop so they could pass out goodies to the Louisianans. One gift was a big cake made especially for Wheat.

The trip, though, was not entirely pleasant. During a stop at Opelika, Ala., Wheat’s men left the train and seized control of a hotel, including the bar inside. Unable to clear the troublesome men out of the building, the local authorities sought assistance from the major, who at the point was fast asleep on the train. Wakened, Wheat rushed to the scene, pistol drawn, and immediately ordered the belligerents to disperse and return to their railcars. But for a few men, all obeyed the order. Of those continuing to resist, two ruffians were clearly identified as the ringleaders. A witness, Colonel William C. Oates of future Gettysburg fame, later disclosed: “Wheat shot both of them dead. He told me the only way to control his men was to shoot down those who disobeyed or defied him, yet they loved him with the fidelity of dogs.”

Upon the battalion’s arrival in the Old Dominion, the men made an impression on the soldiers of the 18th Virginia Infantry, one of whom recalled witnessing “one freight car…pretty nearly full of Louisiana ‘Tigers’ under arrest for disorderly conduct, drunkenness, etc., most of which were bucked and gag[ged].”

At Lynchburg, former bookstore-clerk-​turned-Catahoula Guerrilla Lieutenant William D. Foley wrote: “Our destination is ‘Manassas Gap’. We will have the gratification to participate on the ‘Big Fight’ on Virginia’s soil, the first of Louisiana’s troops. The enemy outnumber us, but we are all prepared, and more than anxious for the Conflict. Troops from Richmond are being sent to the Gap. Tiz a place we must and will hold. The God of battles being with us.”

Before they could reach Manassas, however, the battalion clashed with Federal soldiers at Seneca Dam on the Potomac River.

“Our blood was on fire”

Many of the Tigers were immigrants—a large number from Ireland who had fled that country’s potato famine. As the New Orleans Daily Delta noted, “As for our Irish citizens—whew!—they are ‘spiling’ for a fight.”

It wouldn’t take long for them to get their wish. After McDowell’s forces were rebuffed attempting to cross Bull Run Creek at Blackburn’s Ford on July 18, the Union general was convinced it was too heavily defended and began looking for another point along the Confederate lines to assault. He moved his forces upstream and on the morning of July 21 put his renewed attack plan in place.

Just before daybreak, Southern pickets near the Stone Bridge heard a large movement of troops approaching their position. Colonel Evans deployed one of Wheat’s companies and some of his South Carolinians as skirmishers by the bridge, while the rest of his brigade took position on the nearby hills overlooking the bridge and the Warrenton Turnpike. The Union threat at the Stone Bridge, however, was merely a demonstration. The bulk of McDowell’s force was intending to cross 2½ miles north at Sudley Ford.

Soon, a Confederate signal station in Manassas—manned by future Confederate luminary Edward P. Alexander—alerted Evans that a large Union force was moving to turn his left flank. Evans and Wheat agreed they had to shift their lines to meet this new enemy front, hoping reinforcements would hastily arrive. With no desire to abandon such an important position entirely, the commanders left Lieutenant Adrian and a contingent of Tigers guarding the Stone Bridge.

Confusion among the Louisiana and South Carolina troops proved a problem, as the latter unwittingly fired on their Pelican State comrades while navigating a wooded area, and the Louisianans returned the fire. Wheat rushed to the scene to stop the shooting, but not before two of his men lay mortally wounded.

At about 9:45 a.m., Union Colonel Ambrose Burnside’s men advanced with bayonets fixed through a heavily wooded area into a clearing and found themselves flushing out the Catahoula Guerrillas, then hiding in the tall brush. Relayed Guerrilla Sergeant Robert Richie: “[T]he enemy opened on us, and we had the honor of opening the ball, receiving and returning the first volley that was fired on that day….After pouring a volley, we rushed upon the enemy and forced them back under cover.”

The Guerrillas’ advance at the double-quick forced Burnside’s startled men back into the cover of the forest. The Union colonel, however, had six cannons total, and some were lined up to repulse the Southerners. Guerrilla Drury Gibson remembered the deadly fire, writing, “The balls came as thick as hail [and] grape, bomb and canister would sweep our ranks every minute.”

Some of the Tiger Rifles and Catahoula Guerrillas dropped their Mississippi Rifles, which were bereft of lugs to hold bayonets, and unsheathed their Bowie knives before charging the Federals with ferocity. In later describing the conflict, one Alabama soldier called the Louisianans “the most desperate men on earth,” crowing that when they threw their knives at the enemy, they “scarcely ever [missed] their aim.” Worse for the Yankees, those large knives had strings attached, allowing them to be retrieved after they plunged into an enemy soldier’s body.

Vividly portraying the attack’s desperate moments, Ritchie crowed: “Our blood was on fire. Life was valueless. They boys fired one volley then rushed upon the foe with clubbed rifles beating down their guard; then they closed upon them with their knives. I had been in battles several times before, but such fighting was never done, I do not believe as was done for the next half hour[;] it did not seem as though men were fighting, it was devils mingling in the conflict, cursing, yelling, cutting, shrieking.”

One Tiger’s account of the battle found its way into a Richmond newspaper:

“As we were crossing a field in an exposed situation, we were fired upon (through mistake) by a body of South Carolinians, and at once the enemy let loose as if all hell had been left loose. Flat upon our faces we received their shower of balls; a moment’s pause, and we rose, closed in upon them with a fierce yell, clubbing our rifles and using our long knives. This hand-to-hand fight lasted until fresh reinforcements drove us back beyond our original position, we carrying our wounded with us. Major Wheat was here shot from his horse; Captain White’s horse was shot under him, our First Lieutenant [Thomas Adrian] was wounded in the thigh, Dick Hawkins shot through the breast and wrist, and any number of killed and wounded were strewn about.

“The New York Fire Zouaves, seeing our momentary confusion, gave three cheers and started for us, but it was the last shout that most of them ever gave. We covered the ground with their dead and dying, and had driven them beyond their first position, when just then we heard three cheers for the Tigers and Louisiana. The struggle was decided. The gallant Seventh [Louisiana Infantry] had ‘double quicked’ it for nine miles, and came rushing into the fight. They fired as they came within point blank range, and charged with fixed bayonets. The enemy broke and fled panic-stricken, with our men in full pursuit.

“When the fight and pursuit were over, we were drawn up in line and received the thanks of Gen. Johnston for what he termed our ‘extraordinary and desperate stand.’ Gen. Beauregard sent word to Major Wheat, ‘you, and your battalion, for this day’s work, shall never be forgotten, whether you live or die.’”

The Shreveport Daily News described the battalion as “a specimen of the toughest and most ferocious set of men on earth,” and an account that ran in the Wilmington [N.C.] Journal provided input by Tiger Lieutenant Allen C. Dickinson, who had been shot in the thigh by a Minié ball. “[O]ut of 400 which constituted that command, there were not more than 100 that escaped death and wounds. Maj. Wheat was shot through the body, and was surviving on Wednesday, although his case is exceedingly critical.” According to Dickinson, Captain Buhoup and his Guerrillas “fought with desperation.”

Dickinson, a Virginia native who had been living in New Orleans for several years, had been the one to draw Clara Solomon’s interest back at Camp Moore. When news of the battle reached New Orleans, she lamented, “No news about our Lieut. Dickinson.” Informed of Wheat’s fate, she wrote: “Just think the two persons, for whom we care most in the war, we should hear, in the very first battle, of one being seriously wounded, and nothing of the other.”

A contributor to the Richmond Dispatch, writing under the pseudonym “Louisiana,” tried to clear things up, including the status of the battalion’s leader. “The gallant Colonel Wheat is not dead,” he wrote. “I have just got[ten] a letter from Capt. Geo. McCausland, Aid[e] to Gen. Evans, written on behalf of Major Wheat, to a relative of Allen C. Dickinson, Adjutant of Wheat’s Battalion.”

The contributor went on to describe Dickinson’s injury in detail: “The wound is in his leg, and although not dangerous….His horse having been killed under him, he was on foot with sword in one hand and revolver in the other, about fifty yards from the enemy, when a Minie ball struck him. He fell and lay over an hour, when fortunately, Gen. Beauregard and staff, and Capt. McCausland, passed. The generous McCausland dismounted and placed Dickinson on his horse. Lieut. D. is doing well and is enjoying the kind care and hospitality of Mr. Waggoner and family, on Clay Street, in this city.”

The Shreveport Weekly News published the lyrics of a song written expressly about the battalion’s exploits. Borrowing its tune from the song, “Wait for the Wagons,” it had three stanzas praising the Louisianans at First Manassas—the song’s title aptly changed to “Abe’s Wagons.”

We met them at Manassas, all formed in bold array, 
And the battle was not ended when they all ran away. 
Some left their guns and knapsack, in their legs they did confide, 
We overhauled Scott’s carriage, and his epaulets besides. 
[Chorus]
Louisiana’s Tiger Rifles, they rushed in for their lines, 
And the way they slayed the Yankees, with their long Bowie knives. 
They laid there by the hundreds, as it next day did appear, 
With a countenance quite open, that gaped from ear to ear. 
[Chorus]
The battle being ended, and Patterson sent back, 
Because he did not fight us, for courage he did lack. 
Abe Lincoln he got so very mad, when his army took a slide, 
And we jumped into his wagons, and we all took a ride.

A British reporter recalled a peculiar tactic practiced by the Louisianans, writing, “[T]hey would maintain a death-like silence until the foe was not more than 50 paces off; then delivering a withering volley, they would dash forward with unearthly yells and [when] they drew their knives and rushed to close quarters, the Yankees screamed with horror.”

Lieutenant Adrian rejoined the battalion with his scant force, and after being wounded in the thigh fell to the ground. When he noticed some of the Tigers falling back, he propped himself up on one elbow and shouted at the top of his lungs, “Tigers, go in once more. Go in my sons, I’ll be great gloriously God damned if the sons of bitches can ever whip the Tigers!”

First-person reports were published in New Orleans’ Daily True Delta after the unnamed “vivandier of the Tiger Rifles” strode into their offices with letters from some Tigers to their friends back home. The newspaper cited:

“These letters give a detailed history of the Tigers’ sayings and doings since their departure hence, and especially their participation in the battles of…Manassas. The loss among them, we are pleased to say, is much less than has been reported. They have twenty-six of their seventy-six, wholly uninjured, and several more who are but slightly wounded. That they fought like real tigers everybody admits and Gen. Johnston, it is said, complimented them especially on the brave and desperate daring which they had exhibited.

“[Lieutenant] Ned Hewitt reported here as having been killed, did not receive the slightest wound. Moreover, none of the officers of the Company were killed. Two of the Tigers who had been missing for several days after the fight, made their way to Manassas on Thursday last, one being slightly and other pretty badly wounded. The kindness of the Virginia ladies to the wounded soldiers is said to be beyond all praise—like that of a mother to a child or a wife to a husband. Soldiers so nursed and attended can never be anything else than heroes and conquerors.”

Having defied death—and skeptical doctors—when gravely wounded at First Manassas, Wheat would not be so lucky when shot in the head 11 months later at the Battle of Gaines’ Mill, the third of the Seven Days’ Battles on June 27, 1862. His purported final words—“Bury me on the field, boys!”—were to open a poem in his honor. Wheat had been the only one to truly rein in the rambunctious battalion, which formally disbanded on August 15, 1862. Fortunately, their legend survives. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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A frequent contributor, Richard H. Holloway is a member of America’s Civil War’s editorial advisory board. He thanks Glen Cangelosi for his help in preparing this article.

On September 14, 1862, fighting broke out on South Mountain, Md., as portions of the Army of the Potomac clashed with Army of Northern Virginia troops holding passes over the mountain. On the 15th, the day after particularly heavy fighting at Fox’s Gap, Ohio troops were assigned to a burial detail on that contested cleft. As it was a task they did not particularly like, they sought a shortcut by dumping a number of Confederate bodies down a well in front of a cabin.

The cabin and well belonged to an old farmer named Daniel Wise. Realizing his well was ruined and being a shrewd codger, Wise made the most of a bad situation by contracting with 9th Corps commander Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside to continue the process for $1 a body. After depositing several more bodies, Wise sealed the well, earning himself a tidy sum.

Or so goes the legend.

Some versions of the tale claim that no damage was done because the well was dry or abandoned. Others claim farmer Wise was caught and made to put things right by removing the dead Confederates and giving them a decent burial. All accounts agree, at least, that Wise was paid for his troubles.

Most modern authors of books on the battle use the same source when relating the tale: History of the Twenty-First Massachusetts Volunteers. It was authored 20 years after the Battle of South Mountain by Charles F. Walcott, a member of the 21st. Since Captain Walcott was at Fox’s Gap on September 14 and 15, some historians presume that he witnessed the event. It is from the following account that most authors have based their narratives concerning Wise: 

“The burial of a portion of the rebel dead was peculiar enough to call for special mention. Some Ohio troops had been detailed to bury them, but not relishing the task, and finding the ground hard to dig, soon removed the covering of a deep well connected with Wise’s house on the summit, and lightened their toil by throwing a few bodies into the well. Mr. Wise soon discovered what they were about, and had it stopped: and then the Ohioans went away, leaving their work unfinished. Poor Mr. Wise, anxious to get rid of the bodies, finally made an agreement with General Burnside to bury them for a dollar apiece. As long as his well had been already spoiled, he concluded to realize on the rest of its capacity, and put in fifty-eight more rebel bodies, which filled it to the surface of the ground.”

So now, let’s establish some facts.

The Fight at Fox’s Gap

Daniel Wise was a real person. He was born in Brunswick, Md., in 1802. On June 24, 1824, he married Mary Milly and together the couple had at least three children, a son named John, and two daughters named Matilda and Christiana. The census records for 1860 lists Daniel, Matilda, and John as residents of a modest, 1½-story whitewashed log cabin that stood at the intersection of the Old Sharpsburg Road (modern Reno Monument Road) and two mountain roads that more or less followed the mountain crest in a north-south direction.

Daniel’s wife seems to have perished (she was not listed in the 1850 census) and Christiana married and moved to start a family of her own. Among Christiana’s children was one of Daniel’s grandchildren, 5-year-old Anne Cecilia. Christiana often returned to visit and brought her children with her. At the time of the battle, Daniel Wise was 60 years old.

It seems that neither Wise nor his children were especially well off. In addition to farming, both Daniel and John eked out a living as day laborers and for a time as potters. Daniel Wise also earned a living as a “root doctor,” a local expert in folk medicine. According to the family’s oral history, on the morning of the battle the Wise family fled their cabin to seek safety elsewhere.

The fight at Fox’s Gap resulted in horrendous slaughter. The section of the Old Sharpsburg Road that passed over the ridge crest near Wise’s cabin would come to be known to the veterans as the Sunken Road. Regarding Confederate casualties, square foot per square foot, the Sunken Road at Fox’s Gap is proportionately every bit as bloody as its famous counterpart at Antietam.

One of the battle’s Confederate combatants, 1st Lt. Peter McGlashen of the 50th Georgia Infantry, later wrote: “When ordered to retreat I could scarce extricate myself from the dead and wounded around me. A Man could have walked from the head of our line to the foot on their bodies.”

This is borne out by a New York veteran of the battle. Remembered William Todd, the regimental historian of the 79th New York Infantry:

“Morning of the 15th dawned at last, and on such a sight as none of us ever wish to look upon again. Behind and in front of us, but especially in the angles of the stone walls, the dead bodies of the enemy lay thick; near the gaps in the fences they were piled on top of each other like cord-wood dumped from a cart. The living had retreated during the night and none but the dead and severely wounded remained….About noon we moved off the field, and on our way saw many more evidences of the battle. At one angle of the stone walls fourteen bodies of the enemy were counted lying in a heap, just as they had fallen, apparently. We referred to that spot as ‘Dead Man’s Corner.’”

The Wood Road, which ran southerly from Turner’s Gap to Fox’s Gap, was bordered on the east by a “stone and rider” fence near the intersection with the Old Sharpsburg Road. This type of fence consisted of a combination of stone wall with split rail fence over the top. William Todd may have referenced the intersection as “Dead Man’s Corner” as he was one of many who noticed a dead Confederate soldier hung up on the fence. “A curious sight presented itself in the body of a rebel straddling a stone wall,” wrote Todd, “he must have been killed while in the act of climbing over, for with a leg on either side, the body was thrown slightly forward stiff in death.”

Captain James Wren of the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry had some time to view the battlefield on September 15 before his regiment headed for Sharpsburg. He not only noticed the dead Confederate on the fence, but another truly horrific sight. The following is from his personal diary:

“Just to the right of my skirmish line of yesterday were two Cross roads…and on our front there was a stone fence & behind that fence & in this cross road the enemy lay very thick. One rebel, in crossing the fence was Killed in the act & his Clothing Caught & he was hanging on the fence….At this place being the top of South Mountain, the Hospital was an awful sight, being a little house, by its self, & in the yard there was 3 or 4 Large tables in it & as the soldiers was put on it (that was wounded), the surgical Core Came along & the head of the Core had in his hand a piece of white Chalk & he marked the place where the Limb was to be Cut off & right behind him was the line of surgeons with their instruments & they proceeded to amputate & in Looking around in the yard, I saw a Beautiful, plump arm Laying, which drew my attention & in looking a Little at it, and seeing another of the same Kind, I picked them up & Laid them together & found that they are right & one a Left Arm, which Convinced me that they war off the one man & you Could see many legs Laying in the yard with the shoes & stocking on.”

Burial details began their gruesome work. Because Burnside’s 9th Corps occupied Fox’s Gap, the Union dead were buried first. By the end of the 15th, most of Burnside’s troops were off the mountain. Very few dead Confederates, if any at all, were buried on that day and, consequently, the bulk of the dead Southerners still lay above ground.

Burying the Dead

Many of the survivors of the fight at Fox’s Gap took the opportunity to tour the field, and many of the local citizenry came by to watch and collect curios. The Wise family’s well was located between Wise’s cabin and the Old Sharpsburg Road in plain sight of everyone using the road.

It is not unreasonable, then, to presume that had a 60-year-old man been occupied dumping dead Confederates down his family’s well, there would have been someone around to take notice. The truth is, no bodies were thrown down the well on September 15, 1862. That would instead happen on September 16, and farmer Daniel Wise had nothing to do with it.

It seems there was a witness to the event, Private Samuel Compton of the 12th Ohio Infantry, who wrote: 

“On the morning of the 16th I strolled out to see them bury the Confederate dead. I saw but I never want to another sight. The squad I saw were armed with a pick & a canteen full of whiskey. The whiskey the most necessary of the two. The bodies had become so offensive that men could only endure it by being staggering drunk. To see men stagger up to corpses and strike four or five times before they could get a hold, a right hold being one above the belt. Then staggering, as the very drunk will, they dragged the corpses to a 60 foot well and tumbling them in. What a sepulcher and what a burial! You don’t wonder I had no appetite for supper.”

Obviously, conditions at Fox’s Gap on September 16 were much different from what they had been the day before. The area was definitely less crowded. One of the soldiers on burial detail was Private Michael Deady of the 23rd Ohio Infantry, who recalled that there were 75 men on burial detail at Fox’s Gap, a mixture of soldiers from several different regiments. It certainly seems that the Ohio men had a hand in dumping the bodies down the well.

If Private Deady’s veracity is trustworthy, the numbers of Confederates requiring burial was tremendous. After helping to bury 33 Union troops on September 15, Deady noted on the next day, “Buried 200 rebs, they lay pretty thick.” On September 17, he was till at the grim work, “bury 250 today.” Remarkably, the burial details at Fox’s Gap were still at it as late as September 18. As Deady noted: “Same old work awful smell to work by. To day finish and glad of it.” On the same day, Private John McNutty Clugston of the 23rd Ohio noted, “Finished the burying of the dead at 4 P.M. and proceeded to Boonsboro and camped in a barn.”

The burial details at Fox’s Gap spent three days, apparently on their own with little supervision, burying more than 450 dead Confederates. Many of the soldiers were using alcohol to numb their senses. These unfortunate Union soldiers rejoined their regiments at Antietam just as the burial details of that momentous battle began the grisly task of burying the dead in the fields around Sharpsburg.

58 Bodies

As far as the well is concerned, the intoxicated men may have simply viewed the well as a convenient receptacle. Or, it may have started by someone dumping amputated limbs into the well on September 15, and then naturally continuing with whole bodies the next day. For the burial details it would have seemed that the well was already ruined and therefore it was only natural to continue. This brings up another aspect of the legend, that the well was not ruined because it was abandoned and dry. Once again there is evidence in the family history that indeed the well was dry, not because it was abandoned, but because as Anne Cecilia (Daniel’s granddaughter) remembered, it was under construction at the time.

Whatever the spark of origin, or condition of the well at the time, at least 58 dead bodies ended up in Wise’s Well on September 16. Samuel Compton’s account was verified in both a remarkable and roundabout manner by someone else associated with the 12th Ohio Infantry. Eliza Otis, the wife of 2nd Lt. Harrison G. Otis. Eliza noted the incident in her journal. It was occasioned by the visit in June 1863 of some fellow officers that served with her husband. In the course of the evening’s conversation, some incidents and “personal observations” of previous battles were discussed: 

“In one place, near South Mountain, I think, they said it was, sixty dead bodies were thrown into a deep old well– that was their only sepulcher– they were those of the rebel soldiers, and were placed there by our men who were three days in burying the dead, and time and their various duties gave them no opportunity to afford the fallen foe a better mausoleum.”

It is appropriate at this juncture to clarify that Captain Charles F. Walcott, whose account of the incident became the basis in popular Civil War history, was not there when the incident happened, because he marched off the mountain with his regiment on September 15. Walcott received his information second-hand, and footnoted his account by saying that the story as he described it was told originally to a member of the Sanitary Commission by Daniel Wise: 

“This account of the burial of the rebels was given by Mr. Wise himself, a few weeks after the act. to a gentleman connected with the Sanitary Commission, who noticed that the well had been filled up, and asked him how a man’s hand came to be projecting through the sunken earth, with which it had been covered.”

The Sanitary Commission was a civilian organization whose basic object was to better the living conditions of the Union Army. Walcott did not name the source, only that it was a “gentleman” connected with the commission, but his anonymous second-hand account in his 1882 regimental history has been accepted over others written by those who observed first-hand what actually transpired at Wise’s farm.

It must have been a very frustrating couple of days for the Wise family. Not only were they unable to immediately get back into their home because it was being used as a field hospital, but they most likely had to wait several more days until the burial details had finished their work. According to the Wise family history, “there were bodies in the well when they came back.”

Bowie’s List

Sometime around 1869, Moses Poffenberger and Aaron Good were employed by the state of Maryland to inventory Confederate burial places and visited Fox’s Gap. Although most of the Union soldiers who perished in Maryland had already been re-interred at the Antietam National Cemetery by then, the Confederates mostly remained buried on the battlefields. Both Poffenberger and Good visited, identified, and cataloged every trench and grave they could find. Under the auspices of Governor Oden Bowie, their list was published with the title: A Descriptive List of the Burial Places of the Remains of Confederate Soldiers, Who Fell in the Battles of Antietam, South Mountain, Monocacy, and other Points in Washington and Frederick Counties in the State of Maryland. Today it is simply known as “Bowie’s List.”

Poffenberger and Good listed 47 unknown “In Wise’s lot on east side of house and lot on top of South Mountain.” They also listed 23 unknown “In Wise’s lot on west side of house and stable on top of South Mountain.” On page 51 of Bowie’s List is the succinct entry, “58 unknown, In Wise’s Well on South Mountain.” 

In 1874, 12 years after the Battle of South Mountain, the Confederate dead were finally removed and re-interred at the Washington Confederate Cemetery in Hagerstown, Md. Incredibly, for 12 years the Wise family lived with the graves of 128 unknown Confederate soldiers in the immediate vicinity of their home. The work of removing the Confederate dead was contracted to Mr. Henry C. Mumma of Sharpsburg. He was paid $1.65 “per head.” As noted in the local Hagerstown Mail, June 26, 1874:

“Mumma has been most successful in his work and is at this time continuing its prosecution with vigor…Some of these bodies we have heretofore noticed as having been taken from the historical well on South Mountain battle-field, where they were thrown by Gen. Reno’s command.” 

General Burnside’s 9th Corps was commanded by Maj. Gen. Jesse Lee Reno, who was mortally wounded at the close of battle and perished within hours. What is germane to debunking the accepted narrative of the well is to note that the Hagerstown newspaper attributed the act to “Reno’s command,” not Daniel Wise.

In 1876, six years before the publication of Walcott’s regimental history, Daniel Wise died. He never knew of the legend that grew from Walcott’s storytelling, published in 1882. John Wise sold the property in 1878, two years after his father’s death, and moved to West Virginia. When Walcott’s book was published, the Wise family had left Fox’s Gap.

Excavation and Discovery

In the early 2000s, the National Park Service purchased the site of Wise’s well for incorporation into the Appalachian Trail. During the summer of 2002, a collaboration of archaeologists, historians, and trail volunteers explored the site and accomplished some meaningful archeology for the first time. They discovered a rectangular brick and mortar shaft feature in the vicinity of the suspected cabin site. A visual examination of the interior revealed a half dome-shaped concrete vault structure under the shaft. It was interpreted to be the top of a concrete cistern, that is, an underground tank for holding water. This was consistent with conversations of former residents who insisted there was no well, but a cistern instead, perhaps constructed by later residents as an alternate water source.

That theory, however, was debunked. Upon further excavation the bell-shaped concrete vault was found to be sitting on at least four courses of dry laid stone that undoubtedly surrounded an open shaft that was consistent with a hand-dug stone-lined 19th-century well or cistern. The feature was filled with debris, most of which looked to be from the mid- to late-20th century. No other stone-line underground structure that could have been used as a well or cistern was found near the cabin site that summer. Although not entirely conclusive, it does appear that the archaeologists found Wise’s famous historical well. It also appears that it was later used for a time as a functioning cistern.

Setting the historical record straight is often condemned as “revisionism.” The story of Daniel Wise’s well has become cemented as fact in the history of the Maryland Campaign and, unfortunately, much of it is legend. The campaign has more than ample drama and human interest that is well documented and so its history should not include incidents that have no basis in the historical record.

To “revise,” by definition, implies correction and improvement. I have attempted to correct the Wise’s well story; not demolish it. The intent has always been to exonerate Daniel Wise from blame for an onerous act he never committed. Without doubt the well became a mass grave for at least 58 dead Confederate soldiers. What I have done is merely correct the narrative behind how they got there and, in the process, expose some of the true horror of warfare.

The 58 unfortunate Southerners were not put in the well on September 15, but rather the next day, September 16. Daniel Wise did not put them there, a drunken Union burial detail did; and there is no evidence that Wise, or any member of his family, got $1 per body, or any compensation for damages done.

this article first appeared in civil war times magazine

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Steven R. Stotelmyer writes from Hagerstown, Md., and is the author of The Bivouacs of the Dead: The Story of Those Who Died at Antietam and South Mountain and Too Useful To Sacrifice, Reconsidering George B. McClellan’s Generalship in the Maryland Campaign. He is a National Park Service Volunteer as well as a Certified Antietam Battlefield and South Mountain Tour Guide.

In her day, Elizabeth Oakes Smith was a national figure. Born in Maine in 1806, she and her family moved to New York City in the late 1830s, where she joined literary circles and emerged as a prominent feminist essayist, lecturer, and poet. By the 1850s, she was living with her family on Long Island. The forces of the Civil War, however, led to her downfall. In 1861, her favorite son, Appleton Oaksmith, was arrested for outfitting old whaling ships for the slave trade. After spending several weeks imprisoned at Fort Lafayette in New York and Fort Warren in Boston, Oaksmith was transferred over to civil authorities and convicted in the federal court in Boston in the summer of 1862. Before he could be sentenced, though, he escaped from jail and exiled himself in Havana, Cuba, where he became a Confederate blockade-runner.

Elizabeth Oakes Smith spent the war years seeking a presidential pardon for her son. She wrote to Abraham Lincoln and met with Secretary of State William H. Seward, but nothing ever came of her efforts. As the war continued, she became increasingly embittered toward the Union and believed that Appleton was the victim of a malevolent administration in Washington, D.C. Although she had shown sympathy for African Americans and abolitionism before the war, her Democratic politics became increasingly evident in her diary by the midpoint of the war. She grew to especially hate Seward.

In the summer of 1863, Oakes Smith experienced one of the greatest terrors of her life—the New York City Draft Riots. For several days in mid-July, working-class men, women, and children—mostly Irish Democrats—lashed out against Lincoln’s conscription and emancipation policies. At least 105 people died during the five days of rioting, many of whom were African Americans who were viciously targeted by the mob. During this ordeal, Oakes Smith saw a dense crowd standing around a lamppost, upon which hung the body of Colonel Henry O’Brien, the Irish commander of the 11th New York Volunteers, who had ordered his troops to fire above the crowd the previous day in order to disperse them.

Sadly, O’Brien’s men had killed a mother and her 2-year-old child in the process. Now the rioters would exact their revenge. She also encountered Jeremiah G. Hamilton, a 56-year-old African American millionaire on Wall Street. Her diary, which is held with her papers at the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia, is one of the most remarkable accounts of this period. The following excerpts trace her reaction to the Gettysburg Campaign and then the horrific events that transpired in New York City shortly afterward.

June 17
The whole country is in a ferment because of the movement of General Lee north—Harrisburg is threatened—the Govenor [sic] of New York has been called upon for troops by the Govenor of Pennsylvania. The people have responded generously to the State call, but desired guarantees of the Govenor that they shall go only on short service—to defend the north—not fight the South—they will not trust the authorities at Washington.

June 18th
The excitement still continues. The people call for Gen. McLellon [McClellan] to head the army of the Potomac. We are now reaping the bitter fruits of the imbecility, and treachery of this Administration. I sometimes wonder how the historian will deal with this period. The Abolitionists have anticipated time by publishing their own version of events, called a History of the Rebellion by [John S.C.] Abbott, which suppresses facts and misrepresents them.

I am startled and distressed at events, and find how little I have understood the world—how far off the ideal seems now—that once was so near: but to one thing I still cling, the intrinsic worthiness of our humanity—the wholesomeness, and upwardness of its attributes—and then comes the question whence comes all this distortion?….

June 19
….Noon. The papers have come—and the panic is subsiding—it seems that Lee is on the retreat. I do not think all this demonstration is for nothing—I believe he designs to attack Washington, and dictate a peace from the Capital….

June 24th
A day of heavy work—found myself worn in body and spirit—cross and miserable.

The country is in a state of ferment, and yet it is suppressed—no faith in our rulers—I see the Govenor of New Jersey has directed the Malitia which was collected for the defense of Pennsylvania, to be disbanded, judging that there will be no occasion for their service. They refused to serve under the Administration….

Lee’s army within 18 miles of Pittsburg. 10 o’clock P.M. Going to bed—dissatisfied with myself—oppressed with a terrible sense of weariness and despondency. I am indeed cast from my moorings, drifting—drifting—whither?

June 25
The Confederates in large force in Pennsylvania—the papers contain some terrible records of savage cruelty and atrocious crime perpetrated by the Black soldiers. The negro in our cities and villages also has started upon a career of crime unparrallelled in our history. We are threatened with a war of races, in which the poor Negro must and will be the great sufferer….

June 27 
[Discussion of Lee’s invasion and Confederate privateers omitted.]

I believe this treacherous Administration designs to allow the Confederates to take Washington—having no capacity to manage our national affairs—finding themselves hopelessly involved, they design to let matters take very much their own way, and then under plea of necessity, acknowledge the Southern Confederacy:—then will come the contest for northern supremacy, when the wily Seward hopes to ride into the Presidency of the North….

June 30th 
….The Confederates are within four miles of Harrisburg. Gen. Meade has been called to the command of the army of the Potomac—Gen. Hooker relieved probably because of his interference. This is bad, people say, in the face of the enemy—but the Administration will not care to give battle—they wish for a general disruption in public affairs. They have inaugurated the reign of falsehood.

July 1st 
….The Confederates are within ten miles of Washington—they do not seem inclined to battle—with a grim wit they say they have come North to hold Peace meetings. So disgusted have the people become with the present Administration that they seem rather disposed to receive, than repel the invaders. Many say openly that the prospect of restoring the Constitution would be better under Jefferson Davis, than under Abraham Lincoln. Immense Peace Meetings prevail through the country, and resistance to the enrollment is the common sentiment….

July 3d
Great anxiety about the expected battle—I am by no means sure that our arms are successful against Vicksburg. The repulse of our troops at Port Hudson was a shocking, and bloody disaster….

July 6th
A terrible battle has been fought at Gettysburg. The Union army is said to be triumphant, with a loss of twenty thousand men—Good God! what horrible carnage—I am sick at the record—my whole soul revolts at this sanguinary conflict. Such a victory is as ruinous as defeat. There must be a compromise—for neither party will yield, and each seems an equal to the other in point of courage and persistency….

July 20th
The past week has been one replete with anxiety and not without incident. On Monday 13th inst. I took the early train for the City, where the most appalling scenes awaited me. Our fool-hardy, despotic rulers in spite of the warning of observant men, and the indication of the masses, that revolt would come, have persisted in enforcing the Conscription Act. On Saturday the action of Draft created no disturbance, although much jeering and derision followed. The City was greatly excited through Sunday—On Monday I went to the City, and what I now describe, I saw myself. I had occasion to visit the offices of several lawyers upon business—as I passed along the streets large bodies of people thronged the corners—a great crowd was about the Tribune Office, and the white faces of the workmen within, with their little paper caps upon their heads now and then appeared at the windows—but retreated at a sort of growl from the crowd which beset them.

I was obliged to call upon places in this vicinity, and was not unwilling to learn by my own observation the exact spirit of the crowd. I saw a respectable working-woman threading her way through the living mass, as I was doing myself, and found it convenient to use her and her basket as an entering wedge. Sometimes it would cross my mind, that if paving stones should take wing my position would be a dangerous one—but I had little anxiety for myself—indeed! let me confess it: own to the truth.

I was intoxicated—drunk with excitement. I said of myself—“Oh thou drunk, but not with wine.” I had seen the people submit to so many arbitrary measures—seen them go like sheep to the slaughter in this stupidly managed war—seen them die without a word for measures repugnant to them—seen the encroachments upon our liberties made daily by this corrupt Administration, and yet the people were silent—bitter—cursing deep, not loud, and I began to lose all hope—I wished I could do…something to rouse them—but nothing seemed able to do this—the people tamely cowered under oppression—the radical Editors lied and deceived them as did the rulers at Washington, and I despaired for American freedom. I knew the draft was repugnant to the genius of the country—I knew that the…burden of the war fell upon our working men, and the clause of exempting those who were able to pay the $300 threw all the burden upon the poor men, still it seemed as if the people would submit—

But now there was a recoil—five thousand men were up in arms—there was a perfect howl of rage and indignation from the masses. I said to my pioneer of the basket—“what is the matter? what are the people about?”

She gave me a fierce look—“They wont be carried off to the war—that’s what is the matter.”

“Well, would you have your husband carried off in this way?”

“If they do, they ve got to fight me first,” was the prompt reply. She went on with a hard sneering laugh—“Eh! you ladies can pay the $300 and keep your men to home.”

I said no more—passing into Broadway the shops were nearly all closed—the stages had been stopped or converted into conveyances for the insurgents—I walked up to the University building where I found Dr. Elliott, and Edward, on my way I passed several police men, haggard, dusty—exhausted—I said to myself—the mischief works—these insolent ruffians, who have lately fairly trod upon the people—knocking them down, firing upon them in mere wantonness, will now find a check—I grew ruthless in my indignation—for their insolence and cruelty had become a public cry.

About three o clock P.M. Capt Ellott invited us to a dinner at Delmonico in 5th Avenue: scarcely were we seated when the waiters rushed in barring the doors and closing the windows, and there came that great sound as of the sea—the tumult of the people. The rioters had burned down the colored orphan asylum and several other buildings—they paused and for a brief space it was doubtful whether they would not force the building. Soon there was a cry—“there goes a nigger,” and the cruel, remorseless multitude, three thousand strong were in pursuit of the unhappy fugitive. He was without doubt torn in pieces. As we made our way up to 36th street, all was dire confusion—mad uproar—police men, Military, citizens and rioters, in one vast conclave. I was shocked and ashamed to hear these well to do and luxurious people—the denizens of that vicinity urge the fire of the military—there was no expression of pity—no sympathy for the poor laborer, who in his mad vengeance sought a sort of justice—a wild revenge one most true.

Early on tuesday morning I was obliged to go to Wall Street. Before noon the outbreak had assumed such proportions that all business was suspended—stages and cars could not run, and the frequent discharges of the military told that hot work was in progress. I tried to make my way up town—I could not get across the City to take the train for home—nearly exhausted I was struggling onward when a carriage stopped in front of me, and J.G. Hamilton Esqr asked me to ride home with him—I did so and remained long enough to rest, and obtained information that struck me to the heart, and which I inwardly resolved to impart to the people.

While resting in the Hamilton parlors, which opened upon 29th st. down which masses of people were constantly passing with the debris of the insurgents, I observed a demonstration which was quite touching. I ought to say that Mr Hamilton is I think an eastern Indian—his complexion is darker than that of a mulatto, but his features are Caucassian [sic]—and he is a highly cultivated man—his children also are dark, but with fine black eyes, and long hair in ringlets—not at all [illegible word]. Two of these stepped out upon the balcony as they probably have always been in a habit of doing to watch the passers by in the street. Mr H. sprang from his chair—took them in and closed the window—He understood the hazard growing out of their dark complexions. I shall never forget the expression of anguish upon his face.

Soon after I took my leave, and my Host advised me to get at once into Lexington Avenue as a safer retreat from the crowd. I followed his advice—but made a circuit which brought me into the midst of the insurgents. Oh! my soul—what a sight presented itself! Masses of infuriated women, tossing their arms wildly—weeping women and children, and pale desperate men—pools of blood—broken furniture burning ruins. In a low calm voice I began to talk with the people—I told them what I had just heard that five thousand men would reach the City in the five o’clock train, and they had orders to march at once to this Avenue [2nd] and rake the whole length of it with grape shot—no warning given—the first round would be this iron hail. I went from group to group and told this and urged them to go to their houses. A poor, lank boy of thirteen kept close to me—at length I said to him, “My poor boy—go home—keep out of these dreadful scenes.”

The child burst into a perfect paroxysm of tears and sobbed out—“I have’nt got any home”—a woman explained that his Mother had been for some time dead—the father had been killed in the army—and the child lived upon the kindness of others. Observing a pale desperate looking man leaning against a wall I assayed a word with him—“Madam, (he said in good accent) it may be easy to tell us what to do—but I will not obey this draft. I may as well be shot here as anywhere. Look here—(pointing to blood upon the walk)—the soldiers fired upon us—not a word—no warning—and I took a child up—shot through the head—covered with blood—I looked at him—it was my own child—I will have revenge.”

At length a great burly fellow eyed me with a savage frown—and muttered between his teeth—“I know what you are—you are one of them aristocrats from the fifth Avenue—you’re a Spy”—looking round upon his followers—“she’s a Spy—sent here from the Black Republicans!” I saw I was in some danger—but I did not flinch—I do not think I turned pale—I repelled the charge in a calm, firm voice, and went on—he following and muttering—but I did not fear—a superhuman strength seemed mine. I knew better than to leave them—so I kept on talking in [a] low calm manner, advising them as seemed best. I had now reached 33d street, the disorder rather increasing. A short distance from me was a dense mass surrounding a lamp post, upon which the infuriated multitude had suspended the body of Col O Brine, an Irish officer, who had commanded his troops to fire into the crowd. It was a sickening sight—for four hours they tortured the unhappy man—prolonging his sufferings with a fiendish fury. I expressed compassion for him—but they justified their conduct on the ground that he was a traitor to his countrymen—

The deep shadows began to overspre[a]d the neighborhood—and waving my hand I turned up fourth street, quite a group following me and thanking me for what I had done.

The people everywhere repelled the imputation that their object was plunder. It was only opposition to the Draft, they said, and disgust at that clause in the act by which the rich man could exempt himself by paying $300 while the poor man was compelled to go.

It is not generally known what gave the first impetus to the Riot against the draft. I was told several times by the people with whom I talked, the Rioters—and they all told the same story.

It seems that somewhere in the vicinity was a widow woman—Irish, who had six sons. Of course the six were enrolled for the Draft, and by a singular fatality—the whole six were drafted—the young men were aghast—a crowd followed them to the Mother’s door; when the announcement was made to the Mother—she uttered a wild cry—“a yell,” the people called it, and rushed shrieking into the street, tearing her hair and tossing her arms above her head. The effect was electrical—and the fierce passions of the people broke out at once, sweeping all before them.

I returned home on wednesday morning. In the cars I found Mr Hamilton—looking haggard and internally excited, but outwardly calm, and determined. I said at once go home with me. He remained nearly a week….Oh how anxiously we waited returns from the great City.

The Radicals have done their utmost to exasperate all classes—in order to have martial law proclaimed in the City. God save us from such calamity—the streets of New York would run blood—and the prisons be filled with men and women suffered to be obnoxious to the powers that be.

this article first appeared in civil war times magazine

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Jonathan W. White is professor of American Studies at Christopher Newport University. In August 2023 he published a biography of Appleton Oaksmith titled Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, Blockade-Running, and the Slave Trade with Rowman and Littlefield.

Reconstruction is a tough story to tell. The promise was so great and the ending so disappointing. It’s hardly a surprise that it took a century and a half to open a national historical park portraying what happened. In January 2017, a site was established as a national monument and rededicated as Reconstruction Era National Historical Park in 2019. The location is in South Carolina’s Sea Islands, where Reconstruction can be said to have begun and for a long while succeeded. Rich Condon arrived as park ranger a year later, around the start of the COVID-19 lockdown. The temporary closure of the National Park Service site gave him time to acclimate to his new situation and to the touchy subject matter with which he would be dealing.

The attempt to reconstruct the South after the Civil War and the freeing of the slaves didn’t go according to plan. But what was that plan? What were the goals at the start?

Here in the South Carolina Sea Islands, U.S. troops arrived in November 1861. They drive out a large portion of Confederate troops and White plantation owners. What’s left are about 10,000 African Americans. They make up 85–90 percent of the population.

A lot of questions start to surface. The U.S. troops are being asked: Am I free? Can I go to school? Can I carry a rifle? There are goals of providing education, building schools. There’s the goal of eventually arming newly freed African American men. You have the start of the 1st South Carolina Volunteer Infantry, the first Black regiment to don the U.S. Army uniform. Things like land ownership and labor reform. All that’s part of Reconstruction.

What’s special about this site is that all that stuff happens here starting in 1862 through the rest of the war, when it isn’t really happening in many other places throughout the South. This becomes what historians have called a rehearsal for Reconstruction. All those goals are outlined here, and they attempt to execute them during the postwar period in many other places across the South. The success rate varies. Here, it’s a massive success. It takes hold and lasts probably the longest of anywhere.

How did the grand designs for Reconstruction go wrong?

For a long time, Reconstruction was portrayed as a failure. It wasn’t a failure. It was defeated. It was dismantled and defeated in large part by groups like the Ku Klux Klan, the Red Shirts, the White League—groups of White supremacists who did not want to see African Americans in U.S. Army uniforms. Seeing them in a position of authority didn’t sit well for people who used to call a lot of these men “property.”

Reconstruction takes root and is doing well for a while. In most places it’s lasting 12-plus years. If you look at most definitions of Reconstruction, people look at it beginning with the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the passing of the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery and ending about 1877, when Rutherford B. Hayes is elected president and pulls U.S. troops from the South.

Here we have a much broader definition. We start in 1861 with the arrival of U.S. troops and we extend it to about 1900, because even in the 1880s and 1890s, there are Black public officials being elected to office. Where it goes wrong is some of these more isolated areas like the South Carolina Upcountry, where you have the Klan presence—White supremacist violence and voter intimidation. In many parts of the North, White Northerners were losing interest in Reconstruction. All these are contributing factors to the process going into a steady decline.

In the end, what were the most significant changes, good and bad?

We see the legacy of Reconstruction in a lot of different places, even into the 20th and 21st century. Some of the good changes: African American land ownership. African American citizenship. “Citizenship” was defined largely by Black U.S. military veterans from the Civil War before 1868. Before the passing of the 14th Amendment in 1868, “citizenship” was not clearly defined.

The bad side is that at the end of Reconstruction, you have the start of the Jim Crow era, which lasts well into the 1960s. Here in South Carolina, the 1868 state constitution was a restructuring of society. It allowed African American men to vote. It extended public education to everybody, regardless of sex or race. Almost 30 years later, in 1895, a new constitution is passed in which segregation is codified, in which African Americans are seen as less than citizens and are largely disenfranchised. This was happening across the South at the end of the 19th century and in the early 20th century, and the ripple effects of that last much longer than people like to remember.

This is one of the newest national historical parks. Can you talk about how it came to be?

There was plenty of interest in the local community of having a park here addressing Reconstruction. Broad and diverse support ranged from community leadership to churches to average citizens. They have a vested interest in this story being told.

This site was established initially as a national monument through an executive order in January 2017, and it becomes a national historical park in March 2019. And really what that did was allow for the expansion of this story. It allowed for the establishment of the Reconstruction Era National Historic Network, which is operated by the park. We have national parks across the country that are part of this network. We also have sites that are not managed by the federal government that have a Reconstruction story to tell. It allows this story to become more familiar to people across the nation.

this article first appeared in American history magazine

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How do you manage to maintain a balance in your portrayal of controversial subject matter like this?

We talk about the hopes and successes of Reconstruction, but we also talk about the dismantling, and that includes things like racial violence, attacks on African Americans and their allies in the South. We talk about the reactions to things like African American progress, to moving from the state of enslavement to freedom to working toward equality. I think we give it a fair treatment, which in other places it had not been given in a long time.

I’ll note that we didn’t have a lot of violent push back on the Sea Islands during Reconstruction. That’s because the population remains about 90 percent African American, so you don’t have groups like the Klan or the Red Shirts operating. You also didn’t have bridges that connect these islands to the mainland until the 1920s.

Can you describe briefly what’s most important about each of the distinct sites that make up the park?

We have three, you could say three or four, sites. We have our main visitor center in downtown Beaufort. There is a plethora of things we can cover here, one of them being African American financial autonomy. The Freedman’s Bank, one of the first in the nation, is still standing. We can talk about land ownership and labor reform. The majority of the homes and lots in this area are African American–owned by 1864–1865.

Out on Saint Helena Island, a 15-minute drive from here, we have the Penn Center Historic Landmark District. We operate a site there called Darrah Hall, and we also have an easement agreement with Brick Baptist Church right across the road. At Darrah Hall, education is the big story. The people who attended classes there at Penn School, who were enslaved just a couple of months earlier, were prevented by law from learning to read and write. This is their first opportunity to change that. Knowledge is power. That’s the last thing a plantation owner wants the people he calls “property” to have.

The last one is Camp Saxton, down in Port Royal, about 4 miles south of here. This is the site where the 1st South Carolina was recruited and trained for service, the first Black men to wear the U.S. Army uniform.

You learn, in a larger sense, how military service, especially for African Americans, is kind of this direct pathway toward citizenship. During Reconstruction, when the nation’s trying to figure out who deserves citizenship, 200,000-plus African American veterans raised their hands: we fought for this country and prevented it from falling apart.

Here is also the site where about 5,000 African Americans gathered on January 1, 1863, for an impartation of the Emancipation Proclamation. They’re hearing the words that declare their freedom for the first time.

This story appeared in the 2023 Autumn issue of American History magazine.

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What can we learn from an old photograph, a moment in time captured on a glass plate negative? In the case of the image above—taken by Alexander Gardner and Timothy O’Sullivan on September 19, 1862, two days after the Battle of Antietam—the answer is quite a bit. It appears to be a burial detail, but we will discuss this more later. The granite outcropping and boulders piled on it make the identification of this site straightforward. It is marked today by the unique 90th Pennsylvania Infantry monument of three stacked rifles supporting a water or coffee bucket with the inscription: “Here fought the 90th Penna (Philadelphia) Sept 17, 1862 A Hot Place.”

The last three words of the inscription are an apt description of this spot on September 17. Few locations on the Antietam battlefield saw more sustained combat than what swirled around this point. It is located about 50 yards south of David Miller’s famed Cornfield. The camera is facing slightly southwest with the Cornfield directly behind the viewer. The woods visible behind the group of four living soldiers on the right are the West Woods. Midway between the outcropping and the West Woods the line of occasional brush marks a fence line that ran east-west from the Hagerstown Pike to the southern tip of the East Woods and was used as cover by Colonel Marcellus Douglass’ Georgia brigade in its fierce engagement with the Union brigades of Brig. Gens. Abram Duryée, John Gibbon, and George Hartsuff.

The first troops heavily engaged near this point were the 97th, 104th, and 105th New York of Duryée’s 1st Brigade in Maj. Gen. James Ricketts’ 2nd Division, 1st Corps. They would be relieved by the 12th Massachusetts, part of Hartsuff’s brigade, also in Ricketts’ division. Around this outcropping, they engaged the 13th and 60th Georgia, and Brig. Gen. Harry Hays’ Louisiana brigade, which launched a counterattack that was repulsed with significant losses. “Never did I see more rebs to fire at than that moment presented themselves,” recalled Corporal George Kimball of the 12th Massachusetts—hit hard, too, with 49 killed, 165 wounded, and 10 missing.

Typically, struck soldiers drop their weapons and/or equipment (belts, canteens, cartridge boxes, haversacks, etc.), lose their hats, tear off pieces of clothing to locate their wounds, or grab for blankets to help carry wounded to the rear. Walking this ground on September 21, physician and poet Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. found it “strewed with fragments of clothing, haversacks, canteens, cap-boxes, bullets, cartridge-boxes, cartridges, scraps of paper, portions of bread and meat.” We can see in the foreground what Holmes is referring to. The ground is literally covered with discarded clothing and gear.

There are seven dead bodies and, on the far right, what looks like a dead horse. All appear to be Confederates, but who? Numerous Rebel units passed this point or fought in its immediate vicinity: the 2nd and 11th Mississippi of Evander Law’s Brigade; the 1st and 3rd North Carolina of Roswell Ripley’s Brigade; and the 28th and 23rd Georgia of Alfred Colquitt’s Brigade. All had high casualty counts—the 3rd North Carolina suffered an appalling 116 killed or mortally wounded and the 1st 50 in this area alone. Illustrating just how lethal the fighting was, the 3rd North Carolina at one point had to change front to the northeast to counter an advance by the 128th Pennsylvania, a maneuver in which seven of the regiment’s 10 companies had every officer killed or wounded.

What seems odd is that no dead are visible beyond the outcropping, but they may already have been picked up for burial, or buried, by the time the photographers arrived. That no Union dead appear in the image is evidence that burial details had already been at work here.

We can presume that the five living soldiers looking upon the dead are a burial party, but unlike another set of soldiers Gardner and O’Sullivan photographed near the Miller Farm, these men have no tools. Jeff Dugdale, who produced a fascinating book about Confederate uniforms during the Maryland Campaign, believes the two men sitting and crouching in front of the two men on top of the outcropping are prisoners, based on their clothing. If they are Confederates, which might explain the one Union soldier behind them holding his musket, they may have been stragglers, captured when the Army of Northern Virginia retreated the night of September 18 and put to work gathering the dead for burial. Perhaps the four bodies in front of them had been moved, laid out in a rough line. The other three bodies seem to have remained where they fell or where they were dragged by comrades during the fighting.

It is remarkable that members of the burial detail—if that is what this is—seem grim but otherwise unaffected by the carnage before them. September 19 was warm—75 degrees—and the rapidly decomposing bodies were emitting an offensive odor. A Massachusetts soldier in a West Woods burial party described the work that day as “very unpleasant,” that he “tasted the odor for several days.” And according to civilians from Lancaster, Pa., who visited immediately after the battle, “the stench…from the decomposing bodies was almost unendurable.” The soldiers here have made no effort to ward off that odor by covering their mouths or noses with a handkerchief or bandanna. Perhaps they believed it would make no difference, as the smell penetrated everything.

Because the photographers made no known effort to identify either the living or the dead in this image, we are left to speculate, which perhaps makes it easier for a viewer to remain emotionally detached from the scene. It is horrifying, but we do not know who the dead are. One conceivably is Anson W. Deal, a 25-year-old private in Company B, 3rd North Carolina, who in the summer of 1862 had been conscripted from his family farm in Duplin County, N.C. Deal was initially listed as missing and presumed captured, and his family surely held out hope that he had survived. Months later, though, the remarks on his fate were changed to “supposed to have been killed in battle at Sharpsburg” and then to “killed at Sharpsburg.” He was almost certainly buried as an unknown soldier in a mass grave with other Confederates. His name, and the family that grieved his death, are a reminder that every anonymous body we peer at in photographs from that fateful day had a story to tell and deserves to be remembered as a person and not a prop. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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Major General John Pope’s actions with the Army of Virginia resonated far beyond the battlefields of August 1862. Often dismissed as a blustering incompetent who supposedly announced his headquarters would be “in the saddle,” he experienced ignominious defeat at the Second Battle of Bull Run and then exile to the backwater of Minnesota. Few army commanders on either side inspired more scorn from contemporaries and subsequent historians. Yet Pope’s record in Virginia deserves serious attention as crucial to the shift from a restrained to a more all-encompassing style of war in the Eastern Theater. This shift, in turn, lessened the likelihood of a brokered peace that would restore the nation to anything resembling the prewar status quo.

Pope entered the Virginia theater at a pivotal moment. Orders creating his Army of Virginia on June 26, 1862, consolidated the commands of Maj. Gens. John C. Frémont, Nathaniel P. Banks, and Irvin McDowell, which had faced Maj. Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley. Charged with defending Washington, Pope also was “in the speediest manner [to] attack and overcome the rebel forces under Jackson and [Richard S.] Ewell, and render the most effective aid to relieve General [George B.] McClellan and capture Richmond.” Less than a week after issuance of these orders, McClellan’s unforced retreat following the Seven Days’ Battles changed everything, persuading Abraham Lincoln and the U.S. Congress that the war would continue much longer and require more drastic measures to crush the Confederate military resistance. Pope soon found himself a leading actor amid a tectonic shift in the nation’s war aims and policies.

McClellan’s failure escalated debates about emancipation, the limits of “civilized” warfare, and the relationship between armies and civilians and their property. Such controversial topics had arisen earlier in Missouri, where Frémont had tried to confiscate slaves owned by pro-Confederates, and anti-Union depredations by irregular forces had prompted discussions between Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck and the German-born scholar Francis Lieber. Prompted by his exchanges with Halleck, Lieber later in the war codified the rules of war in a document signed by President Lincoln and issued as General Orders No. 100 in April 1863. Controversy in Missouri, a secondary military arena, was one thing—controversy in Virginia, where the most famous armies campaigned in proximity to the rival capitals, proved more explosive.

Within three weeks of McClellan’s withdrawal from Richmond to Harrison’s Landing on the James River, both Congress and Abraham Lincoln acted regarding emancipation. The Second Confiscation Act of July 17, 1862, freed slaves held by Rebel owners, authorized seizure of property from several categories of individuals, and empowered the president “to employ as many persons of African descent as he may deem necessary and proper for the suppression of this rebellion.” Senator Charles Sumner, a Radical Republican from Massachusetts, observed that “the Bill of Confiscation & Liberation, which was at last passed, under pressure from our reverses at Richmond, is a practical Act of Emancipation.”

Four days earlier, according to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, the president discussed “the subject of emancipating the slaves by Proclamation in case the rebels did not cease to persist in their war on the govt’ and the Union, which he saw no evidence.” Lincoln believed “the reverses before Richmond, and the formidable power and dimensions of the insurrection which extended through all the Slave States…impelled the administration to adopt extraordinary measures to preserve the National existence.” At Cabinet meetings on July 21-22, 1862, Lincoln discussed emancipation and his intention to issue a proclamation.

These policies contrasted starkly with McClellan’s ideas. Shortly after the Battle of Malvern Hill, “Little Mac” offered the president a gratuitous tutorial about how to conduct the war. The United States should adhere to the “highest principles known to Christian Civilization,” insisted McClellan in what came to be called the “Harrison’s Landing letter.” The conflict “should not be, at all, a War upon population; but against armed forces and political organizations. Neither confiscation of property, political executions of persons, territorial organization of states or forcible abolition of slavery should be contemplated for a moment.”

On August 1, while still ensconced at Harrison’s Landing, McClellan wrote to General-in-Chief Halleck. “I believe that together we can save this unhappy country and bring this war to a comparatively early termination,” he stated, “the doubt in my mind is whether the selfish politicians will allow us to do so. I fear the results of the civil policy inaugurated by recent Acts of Congress and practically enunciated by General Pope in his series of orders to the Army of Virginia.”

New Orders

Pope issued three general orders between July 14 and 23 that drew on his prior experience in Missouri and signaled a sharp departure from McClellan’s conciliatory approach. The first, General Orders No. 5, instructed Union troops to “subsist upon the country in which their operations are carried on” without reimbursement to pro-Confederate owners. Next, General Orders No. 7 held people “throughout the area where the Army of Virginia campaigns” responsible for any damage to railroads, roads, and telegraph lines at the hands of “lawless bands of individuals not forming part of the organized forces of the enemy nor wearing the garb of soldiers.” Anyone connected to “such outrages, either during the act or at any time afterward, shall be shot, without awaiting civil processes.”

Finally, General Orders No. 11 instructed Union officers “immediately to arrest all disloyal male citizens within their lines or within their reach in rear of their respective stations.” Those who refused to take the oath of allegiance would be sent south beyond the pickets of the army and if subsequently found “within our lines or at any point in rear they will be considered spies, and subjected to the extreme rigor of military law.” Anyone who took the oath and later violated it “shall be shot, and his property seized and applied to the public use.”

Pope’s thinking aligned with political leaders seeking harsher treatment of Confederates and their property. Lieutenant Colonel David W. Strother, who served on Pope’s staff, and Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase recorded impressions of the general in July. Although not an abolitionist, Pope told Strother “the war had necessarily given the death blow to slavery. Wherever the Union armies move, the old system of master and slave falls.” Describing Pope’s ideas as “clear and strong,” Strother added that his chief believed enslaved people “ought to be taken and used remorselessly whenever needed….They will not make soldiers but as laborers they might be extensively used.” Chase summarized Pope’s thinking about employing Black laborers in almost identical terms, while also observing that the new commander “expressed himself freely and decidedly in favor of the most vigorous measures in the prosecution of the war.”

Divided Opinion

Pope made no effort to disguise his low opinion of McClellan. “[H]e regarded it as necessary for the safety and success of his operations that there should be a change in the command of the Army of the Potomac,” noted Chase, because “Genl. McClellan’s incompetency and indisposition to active movements were so great….” Pope’s widely quoted message to the Army of Virginia on July 14, 1862, can best be read as a critique of McClellan’s type of warfare. “I have come to you from the West,” he began bluntly, “where we have always seen the backs of our enemies; from an army whose business it has been to seek the adversary and to beat him when he was found; whose policy has been attack and not defense.” In a direct slap at McClellan, Pope inveighed against a preoccupation with “‘taking strong positions and holding them,’ of ‘lines of retreat,’ and of ‘bases of supplies.’” Discard such ideas, he counseled, and instead “study the probable lines of retreat of our opponents, and leave our own to take care of themselves. Let us look before us, and not behind. Success and glory are in the advance, disaster and shame lurk in the rear.”

Many people in the loyal states responded favorably to Pope’s orders and attitude. William Swinton, a correspondent for The New York Times, believed Pope’s actions were popular in the loyal states. “[T]here is no doubt,” he wrote shortly after the war, “that the declaration of a more vigorous war-policy quite met the views of the mass of the people.” Representative quotations from newspapers in the summer of 1862 buttress Swinton’s view. In this vein, the Republican Chicago Tribune printed and endorsed the orders on July 22: “We like Gen. Pope and the way he falls to work in the Shenandoah . . . . [H]is orders have the right tone, and are based on the right principles of conducting the war. It has been severe enough upon loyal men; it is now proposed to render it unpleasing to the rebels.” 

Two New York papers took similar stances. The largely Democratic New York Herald claimed the “commonest complaint from our soldiers…has been, that while standing guard over rebel property they have been liable to be shot down by rebel bushwhackers.” The measures Pope learned in fighting guerrillas in Missouri “appear to be working very well among the same customers in Virginia.” The New-York Daily Tribune, a Republican sheet, made the same point with greater emphasis from a special correspondent near Warrenton. “I cannot describe too strongly the intensity of the feeling among the soldiers of this Virginia army,” he wrote, “—how clearly they see, and how strongly they feel that they are fighting in an enemy country. They needed to be convinced that their commanders and the Government also appreciated their situation, and they find in these orders the assurance they have sought.”

Michigan’s Lansing State Republican will have the final word here. Under the heading “New Life in the Army,” its editor cheered: “There is no longer to be that extreme carefulness of the rights, and tenderness at the feelings of rebels, but they are hereafter to be treated as rebels….General Pope intends to make clean work as he goes. This policy will give new life and vigor to the army, and to the people of the loyal States. This looks like putting down the rebellion. Hurrah for General Pope!”

Many Union soldiers echoed such opinions. A New Yorker deployed near Warrenton, Va., who complained that nothing “is more galling to a patriot and Union loving man than to be compelled to guard the property of his enemies,” celebrated Pope’s orders as “a very important step toward ending the war. Until the rebels are made to feel the severity of the war, but little permanent success will be won by our arms.” Lieutenant John Meade Gould of the 10th Maine Infantry praised Pope’s policies as overdue. “It is positively proven that an easy policy is a poor one,” he insisted from near Chester Gap, Va., “the natives laugh at us, jibe us, and when we are gone, pick up our stragglers and sick….WAR is a great and terrible game….Let the terror be with our enemies and not among ourselves.”

Disgust and Anger

McClellan’s loyalists, in contrast, lambasted Pope. They often opposed emancipation and tougher policies regarding Confederate civilians, while also bridling at what they deemed sneering allusions to the Army of the Potomac’s passivity. None vented more fulsomely than Brig. Gen. Marsena R. Patrick, who served as military governor of Fredericksburg in May–June 1862 and later led a brigade in the field. Pope’s orders “demoralized the Army,” the New Yorker noted in his diary on July 18, “& Satan has been let loose” among soldiers who pillaged at will. 

About a month later, Patrick pronounced himself “so utterly disgusted that I feel like resigning & letting the whole thing go—I am afraid of God’s Justice, for our Rulers & Commanders deserve his wrath & curse—” Lieutenant Charles Francis Adams Jr., whose family boasted two presidents and the current U.S. representative to Great Britain, spoke in Washington with members of McClellan’s and Halleck’s staffs and concluded “that Pope is a humbug and known to be so by those who put him in his present place.” “I still believe in McClellan,” affirmed Adams, “but I know that the nearest advisers of the President…distrust his earnestness in this war.”

Criticism emanated from within the Army of Virginia as well. Brig. Gen. Alpheus S. Williams castigated Pope after Second Bull Run: “It can with truth be said of him that he had not a friend in his command from the smallest drummer boy to the highest general officer. All hated him.” Reaching a hyperbolic crescendo, Williams spewed “that more insolence, superciliousness, ignorance, and pretentiousness were never combined in one man.” Lieutenant Robert Gould Shaw of the 2nd Massachusetts Infantry, who like Williams served in Banks’ 2nd Corps, also took a scolding position. “Pope criticizes and abuses McClellan with a will,” he observed on August 3, “showing in a man in his position no better taste than appeared in his proclamation and some of his orders….He looks just what we have always understood he was,—a great blow-hard, with no lack of confidence in his own powers.”

George B. McClellan refused even to wish for Pope to succeed against the Rebels. “I have a strong idea that Pope will be thrashed during the coming week—& very badly whipped he will be & ought to be,” McClellan wrote on August 10 in language that flirted with disloyalty, “—such a villain as he is ought to bring defeat upon any cause that employs him.” Two days earlier, he had denounced Pope and the war’s new direction. “I will issue tomorrow an order giving my comments on Mr. Jno Pope,” he told his wife, “—I will strike square in the teeth of all his infamous orders & give directly the reverse instructions to my army—forbid all pillaging & stealing & take the highest Christian ground for the conduct of the war—let the Govt gainsay it if they dare.”

Confederate reactions underscored the powerful ramifications of Pope’s short tenure with the Army of Virginia. On July 22, the United States and the Confederacy agreed to a cartel stipulating “that all prisoners of war hereafter taken shall be discharged on parole till exchanged.” Nine days later, an indignant Jefferson Davis wrote to Lee regarding the “general order issued by Major General Pope on the 23rd of July.” Because of that directive, the Confederate government recognized “General Pope and his commissioned officers to be in the position…of robbers and murderers, and not that of public enemies entitled if captured to be considered as prisoners of war.” For the present, the Confederacy would forego retaliation against Pope’s enlisted soldiers and treat them as prisoners of war. Should the United States continue its “savage practices,” however, “we shall reluctantly be forced to the last resort of accepting war on the terms chosen by our foes, until the outraged voice of a common humanity forces respect for the recognized rules of war.”

On August 1, Davis instructed Robert E. Lee to seek details from the Union general-in-chief about “alleged murders committed on our citizens by officers of the U.S. Army”—including one in Missouri supposedly ordered by Pope. Lee was instructed to allow Halleck 15 days from receipt of the query to reply; failure to do so would set in motion “retributive or retaliatory measures which we shall adopt to put an end to the merciless atrocities which now characterize the war waged against us.”

The Confederate War Department issued General Orders No. 54 that same day. It quoted part of Pope’s General Orders No. 11 and another authored by Brig. Gen. Adolph von Steinwehr on July 13 to show that the United States had “determined to violate all the rules and usages of war and to convert the hostilities hitherto waged against armed forces into a campaign of robbery and murder against unarmed citizens and peaceful tillers of the soil….” If captured, Pope, von Steinwehr, and their subalterns would not be treated as the recent cartel mandated but held in “close confinement so long as the orders aforesaid shall continue in force and unrepealed by the competent military authorities of the United States….” Should the Federals murder any unarmed Confederate civilians under Pope’s orders, whether with or without trial, an equal number of U.S. officers held in custody would be hanged.

On August 18, Davis sent a message to the Confederate Congress accusing the United States of “Rapine and wanton destruction of private property, war upon noncombatants, murder of captives, bloody threats to avenge the death of an invading soldiery by the slaughter of unarmed citizens, [and] orders of banishment against peaceful farmers.”

That Pope did not enforce his orders on a grand scale made little difference. Perception rather than reality held sway, as is almost always the case, and Confederates reacted with a spasm of anger to the threats inherent in the orders and to specific instances of Federal arrests and confiscation. Meanwhile, the increased movement of enslaved refugees toward Pope’s lines inflamed fears of the consequences of emancipation. Confederates coalesced with an outraged sense of purpose, determined to resist a foe who threatened every aspect of their social and economic structures.

Newspapers across the Confederacy engaged in a carnival of outrage that instigated popular fury directed at Pope. Two examples illustrate this phenomenon. On July 24, the Richmond Daily Dispatch printed Pope’s three orders under the heading “GEN. POPE’S ARMY / VIRGINIA TO BE LAID WASTE.” In early August, this paper expressed a hope “to see this execrable villain and his lieutenant[s] expiate their crimes on the gallows.” In North Carolina, Winston’s Western Sentinel deprecated Pope and his “execrable order which exposes all sexes and ages to the severest cruelties of ruffian Yankee troops.” The editor further observed that “North Carolina has hitherto been exempt from the operations of these brutal military decrees . . . only because the minions of Lincoln in this State have not had the force at command to enforce their execution.”

Robert E. Lee joined countless Confederates who read the texts of Pope’s orders in newspapers. He related that his son Rob was “off with Jackson & I hope will catch Pope & his cousin Louis Marshall. I could forgive the latter for fighting against us, if he had not have joined such a miscreant as Pope.” Lee’s use of the word “miscreant” bears close attention. Its mid-19th century meanings, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, included “Misbelieving, heretical; unbelieving, infidel” and “A vile wretch; a villain, rascal.”

Others selected comparably harsh epithets for Pope and his troops. A Catholic priest with the 14th Louisiana Infantry deplored “Pope’s abolition robbers,” while a British-born soldier stated that “our men heartily hated him for his ruthless cruelty to the inhabitants of the country, and his extraordinary amount of vanity and bombast.” Colonel Josiah Gorgas, the Confederate chief of ordnance, called Pope the “morally worthless” author of “infamous orders holding citizens responsible for the shooting of his men by guerrillas, or rangers.”

Women left ample testimony about the impact of Pope’s orders, much of which alluded to what newspapers decried as the “uncivilized” and “savage” conduct of Union soldiers. For Lucy Buck, living near Front Royal, the reality of General Orders No. 11 exceeded her worst imaginings. “This is what I have all the time been dreading,” she wrote on July 26, “and now it had come in a more hideous shape than I had ever anticipated.” Neighbors agreed: “We met Mr. Hope and Mr. Hainie and the former had been weeping and seemed to be utterly bewildered by the shock. Oh how intensely I did hate the whole race of Yankees.”

A diarist from outside Virginia reflected the national interest in Pope and his orders. Kate Edmondston clipped the texts of General Orders No. 5 and No. 7 from a newspaper and pasted them in her journal. “Gen. Pope has issued an order…monstrous in its cruelty and contrary to the practices of all civilized warfare,” she commented with obvious anger, “but this is not civilized warfare, nor do our enemies show either the genius of Christianity or the spirit of Civilization.”

Anyone interested John Pope’s impact in Virginia must look beyond the battlefield. His inept tactical performance and defeat at Second Bull Run, however embarrassing, shaped Union military fortunes in only a transitory way. Campaigning in Maryland almost immediately seized the spotlight, relegating operations in July and August to a secondary position they hold to this day. The ratcheting up of animosities during those two months proved far more consequential.

Pope’s orders and conduct played a crucial role in this process, evident in the Eastern Theater and on the respective home fronts, which heralded a kind of war that could engulf untold noncombatants. Lincoln’s preliminary and final proclamations of emancipation, the sack of Fredericksburg by Union soldiers during the Fredericksburg campaign, and other episodes left little doubt that George B. McClellan’s sort of war had ended. The stakes had been raised, hatreds stoked, and the stage set for elemental social, cultural, and ideological disruptions.

this article first appeared in civil war times magazine

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As Brig. Gen. Benjamin Alvord sat in his office at Fort Vancouver contemplating the operational season that had just concluded, he had every reason to feel satisfied about his first full year as District of Oregon commander. Almost everything he had asked of his forces, especially the 1st Oregon Cavalry, had been achieved. The only thing his mounted command had not done was largely out of its control: “chastise” the Snake Indians, more specifically the Northern Paiute. To accomplish that, as regimental commander Colonel Reuben Maury could point out after two years, one needed to find them first.

During the winter of 1863–64, Alvord mulled over how to make certain the Oregon Cavalry found the Snakes. On February 10, 1864, he mapped out his plans for the coming campaign in a letter to Oregon Governor Addison Gibbs, telling Gibbs: “I shall recommend to the general commanding the department [Department of the Pacific] that troops be sent to traverse thoroughly the whole region” from Canyon City to the California border, and as far east as Fort Boise.

While the Oregon Cavalry had spent the past two summers and falls in the field, Alvord planned to deploy them differently in 1864. “I hope to put two expeditions in the field the whole season for that purpose against the Snake Indians…,” he detailed. “I shall also recommend a movement from Fort Klamath easterly; but as that post is not in my district I cannot speak so definitely in reference to it.”

The plan was textbook military strategy: Alvord’s concept was to constrict the open spaces as the various Oregon Cavalry companies moved toward each other. If all worked well, one or more of those contingents would finally have the clash they sought with Chief Paulina’s band of Northern Paiutes. This differed in two ways from what the Oregon Cavalry had done the previous two years. First, the operations area would be shifted; instead of spending most of their time from Fort Boise eastward, along the immigrant trails, they would operate in eastern Oregon and western Idaho Territory, south of Canyonville, Ore. Next, this would entail multiple expeditions taking place at the same time.

With the three-year enlistments of most of the Oregon cavalrymen set to expire between December and March, this was likely the troopers’ last chance to prove their loyalty to the Union. Alvord was empathetic, knowing the “ardent desire of many of them would be to join in the war in the East.” Since that had never been possible, a well-coordinated military campaign to stamp out any Indian raiders along the immigrant trails was their only chance to prove their patriotism for the larger Union cause.

Raising a Loyal Regiment

It had been more than two years since federal officials finally decided to raise a regiment of Oregon volunteers to replace the departing Regular Army units in the District of Oregon. From its origins, the 1st Oregon Cavalry was different than the Union’s other volunteer commands. Not only would its service be different, the manner in which it was formed also differed from other volunteer commands. While governors in other states played prominent roles in raising regiments by appointing officers to lead them, that was not the case in Oregon.

From the start of the war, federal officials had concerns about the loyalty of Oregon’s governor, John Whiteaker, who had supported John Breckinridge’s presidential candidacy in 1860. Since the start of the secession crisis, Whiteaker had made a number of public statements supporting the South’s right to leave the Union. Those comments culminated with a set of lengthy remarks that were widely circulated in the Oregon newspapers in June 1861. Not only did the South have the right to secede, but, according to the governor, the Confederates had the right “if need be, to use every just means within their power to defend themselves, their property and institutions, against the unjust encroachments of the North.”

As the Army authorized the raising of a regiment of Oregon volunteers, the only question was whether Whiteaker was a Confederate sympathizer or just a local Copperhead. One regional newspaper editor felt Whiteaker was the former, calling him “as rank a traitor as Jolane [Joe Lane],” the former Oregon senator who ran as the vice presidential candidate on John Breckinridge’s ticket. Federal military and political officials in Washington, D.C., agreed and decided they would not work through the governor, opting to maneuver around him. Doing so was not an easy matter, even as his popularity eroded considerably throughout the summer.

The political and military leaders in the U.S. capital had not circumvented a governor before and did not have a clear alternative in place. They knew they needed to ensure that any Oregon Volunteers were led by men loyal to the Union cause, but they were not sure how to go about it. So, on September 24, the adjutant general of the Union armies informed Thomas Cornelius, Reuben Maury, and Benjamin F. Harding they had been selected, “upon the strong recommendation” of Oregon Senator Edward Baker—President Lincoln’s dear old friend—who “relies confidently upon the prudence, patriotism, and economy with which you will execute” the raising “for the service of the United States one regiment of mounted troops.” The three men were informed they would “be governed by any directions sent to you by Col. E.D. Baker, and will under all circumstances report your conduct to the premises of the War Department.”

Senator Baker’s role ended abruptly on October 21, 1861, when he was killed at the Battle of Ball’s Bluff, Va. Upon his death, the challenging task of recruiting what became the 1st Oregon Cavalry fell solely to the trio in Oregon. The difficulties were exacerbated by the onset of the worst winter in a generation. Desperate to put a large mounted force in the field, the U.S. Army decided it could not wait to recruit a full complement of men, if it were even possible. In March 1862, the regiment formed with just six companies. A seventh company was added the following year.

For two years, the seven companies traversed thousands of miles in some of the country’s most inhospitable regions, from north central Oregon to southeastern Idaho Territory. At times, individual companies went into the field; at others, several served together for as long as seven straight months. They rode through mountain passes in the midst of snowstorms as late as June and as early as September, and across scorching high plains deserts. During those first two years, they had provided security for whites streaming into the Northwest, but they had not forced a large engagement on the various tribes they simply called Snakes. Despite their frustration, they were achieving part of the objective their leaders set for them—just not the one most of the troopers had sought. Alvord’s plan for 1864 just might give them the opportunity to finally prove, in the only way they could, “to the world, by acts rather than by words, our love and veneration for this blessed heritage bequeathed us by our [fore]fathers.”

Engaging the Paiutes

Four weeks into the 1864 campaign, Captain John M. Drake had nothing to show for his efforts except growing frustration over the numerous delays. As a result, the column had reached a point only about 125 miles southeast of his base at Fort Dalles. While he and some of his men took note of the vegetation and nature of the terrain they had ridden over, most of that land had been explored before. The fact his column had ridden on existing, though rough, roads most of the way, made it clear they had yet to explore any true frontier regions. Worse, given Alvord’s objectives, the only Indians the Oregon Cavalry had encountered during the campaign thus far were their own Warm Springs scouts. As his force continued southeast, he sent small patrols and some of his Indian allies fanning out on his forward flanks to find Paiute encampments or at least some indication they had been in the area. On May 17, that discovery occurred two miles below Drake’s camp, at the junction of the North Fork Crooked River and the main river channel. A Warm Springs scouting party that Drake subsequently sent out revealed a Paiute “camp about 12 or 15 miles [northeast] distant, numbering 9 lodges, and a large band of horses, 100 or more.”

Eager to engage the Paiutes, either in a confrontation of arms or to verbally impress upon them the cost of attacking Whites, Drake moved quickly. He ordered Lieutenant John M. McCall to make a night march to the site of the Paiute camp with a force including 26 of his own men from Company D; Lieutenant Stephen Watson and 10 men from Company B; and 21 Warm Springs scouts led by Stock Whitley. The objective was for McCall to surprise the camp in the pre-dawn hours, despite having no evidence they had done any raiding. Drake would follow with the rest of the command in the early morning.

At 9:30 p.m., McCall left Drake’s camp on the Crooked River and headed in a northeasterly “direction over an extremely rockey [sic] country for some 12 miles,” before coming to “the vicinity of the camp, where we found our [Warm Springs] scouts.” Traveling guardedly in the dark, McCall’s force did not reach his scouts’ location until about 2 a.m. He sent four Warm Springs scouts ahead to find the best way to close the mile gap between his men and the Paiute camp. The scouts reported they could close to within 500 or 600 yards without being discovered. McCall quietly moved his force as near as possible, noticing the camp was on flat ground, under juniper trees, with the Paiute horses herded together in two groups above and below the camp.

On his scouts’ advice, McCall decided to approach from the west, dividing his force into three groups. Watson would be in the center, as Whitley and his 21 Warm Springs scouts moved to the left and McCall advanced with Company D on Watson’s right.

The crucial coordination between the three columns—made more challenging in the dark—quickly unraveled after the advance started about 4 a.m. The eager Watson, who had the easiest path, quickly outpaced the other two wings. McCall’s men literally bogged down while crossing treacherous ground and then having to traverse “a quagmire” with some difficulty.

By this point the Paiutes, discovering they were being attacked by a force of undetermined size, sent a man out to gather their horses. McCall’s men drove the man off and “immediately secured these, and put them in charge of a corporal and two men.” The struggle through the quagmire and disorganization caused by capturing the horses left McCall well behind Watson’s group, although the Warm Springs scouts were making steady progress on the far left.

After detailing the three men to take charge of the horse herd, McCall moved the rest of his wing toward the Paiute encampment. According to McCall, upon hearing firing to their left, they turned to find “we were going directly under the fire of Lieutenant Watson’s men.” Shifting to the right to get out of the line of fire as they moved forward, McCall’s men “found Lt. Watson’s party all cut to pieces.” As Watson’s men emerged into the open, the Paiutes had fallen back to a defensible position among some rocks on the hill, where they fired both guns and bows. “Lieutenant Watson was the first to arrive in front of the Indians,” one of his men observed, “and on the first fire fell mortally wounded from his horse—two of his men were killed at the same time.”

Others were hit during the ensuing firefight, including five more troopers. A civilian named Richard Barker was shot in the thigh, breaking the bone, and one of the Warm Springs scouts was also hit. Their leader, Whitley, was struck at least four times. One of the bullets “entered just under his ear and came out of his mouth carrying away two teeth, another fracturing his collar bone.”

After emerging on the right, and out of the line of friendly fire, McCall “found on examination that the Indians were completely fortified in a cliff of rocks.” With both Watson’s troopers and the Warm Springs Indians receiving heavy fire and his own group of troopers starting to come under fire, McCall decided that if he was going “to save my wounded men and the horses, my only recourse was to retire to a safe place, and send for reinforcements.” At 6 a.m., McCall’s situation was precarious; he believed reinforcements were nearly 30 round-trip miles away. About 8 a.m., a worried McCall “reached what I considered a safe place” near a spring.

Fortunately for McCall’s force, Drake had led a patrol out of camp at the usual time, heading generally in McCall’s direction. Thus, Drake was already an hour out of his camp when he saw two riders “approaching at full speed.” Learning from the messengers—a trooper and one of the Warm Springs Indians—that Watson had been killed and McCall was in danger, Drake “and a detachment of 40 men” from Captain Henry Small’s Company G “proceeded with all possible speed to the scene of the conflict.” 

Having ridden “at a plunging trot,” Drake arrived at McCall’s defensive position three long hours after the call for reinforcements had gone out. While his surgeon attended to the wounded, Drake rode the extra mile to the scene of the firefight. As near as Drake could tell the Paiutes had left in considerable haste about an hour before his arrival, leaving a large quantity of provisions and some equipment. They fled on foot because the Warm Springs scouts managed to capture the horse herd after the three cavalrymen fell back with the rest of McCall’s command, abandoning their prizes. Drake’s men also recovered the bodies of their dead comrades, who had been stripped and mutilated. The Warm Springs scout had been disemboweled and scalped.

After burning the Paiute encampment with “an immense amount of provisions, robes, saddles and plunder,” Drake’s men gathered the remains of their dead comrades and headed back to McCall’s position. From there, the wounded who were able to ride mounted horses while the two most severely wounded were carried on impromptu stretchers; they slowly returned to the campsite selected by Lieutenant William Hand, finally reaching it at 11 p.m.—in Drake’s words, “weary, tired and gloomy.”

May 19 “was consumed in the necessary preparations for the burial of our fallen comrades,” Drake recorded in his journal. “Their graves were dug side by side on a small knoll south of camp in the edge of the timber and the three bodies were buried with appropriate [military] honors.” The surviving Warm Springs scouts gathered their wounded and dead and returned to their reservation. Drake acknowledged “a sad feeling pervades the command on account of Watson,” who, according to one trooper, “was about the most popular officer in the regiment.”

Once their dead comrades were buried and the initial shock wore off, the camp was rife with talk about Lieutenant McCall’s conduct during the firefight. Most blamed him for the disaster. Drake, however, did not. While he repeatedly criticized his fellow officers when he felt they were not performing their duty effectively, he was pragmatic and restrained in his assessment of McCall’s actions. Drake told Lieutenant John Apperson: “I am not disposed to censure McCall in this matter at all. He obeyed his orders. I did not send him out there to get a lot of men butchered for the mere glory of the thing.”

Drake dismissed camp talk that McCall had not moved fast enough to relieve Watson’s force, noting that the Paiutes’ position was strong and they had already shown their ability to crush a frontal attack. Even criticism that he could have used his remaining force to pin the Paiutes in their position did not impress Drake, who noted McCall had no way of knowing how long it would take for help to arrive. In the meantime, “the wounded were groaning and writhing in their agony, and a man whose heart is not very hard, could not be blamed much for trying to alleviate their sufferings as much as possible.”

Drake’s command spent the next 17 days building a defensible supply depot before resuming the march deeper into southeastern Oregon. Once the depot was fully constructed, most of the troopers continued their march to meet up with Captain Currey’s eastern prong of the operation. While the meeting eventually occurred, neither Drake’s nor Currey’s columns (nor Lt. Col. Charles Drew’s third column) ever caught up with a large body of raiders. In October, after an arduous seven months, the Oregon Cavalry companies returned to their bases of operation—Forts Dalles, Walla Walla, and Klamath—with most mustering out when their enlistments expired during the winter.

“[T]he results achieved,” Captain Drake candidly admitted, “are not all that I hoped for at the beginning” of the 1864 campaign. In truth, it was the Paiutes who had defeated the Oregon Cavalry twice—one of those, near the Crooked River, was the bloodiest day of the Oregonians’ cavalry service. Though disappointed at missing their last chance, to “chastise” the Paiutes, the Oregon cavalrymen had, to a large degree, succeeded in their three years of service. Indian raids in the District of Oregon did not end during the war years, but the cavalry’s roving presence did at least provide considerable protection, especially for inbound immigrant trains. Had they failed, there would have been no choice but to redirect forces recruited for the main fronts of the war, as had happened during the fighting against the Sioux in Minnesota and the Dakota Territory in 1862.

There would be no national coverage of romanticized raids as there would be for Confederates such as J.E.B. Stuart or Union leaders like Benjamin Grierson. After gathering reports from several Oregon Cavalry officers in 1866, Cyrus A. Reed, the state’s adjutant general, concluded that even though serving in the Pacific Northwest was different than service elsewhere during the Civil War, the Oregon troopers were “ready and willing…to imperil lives in their country’s cause.”

Noted Reed: “[O]ur troops have not been idle; that a large scope of our country has been explored, which is now being settled under their protection, metals brought into circulation, and, I can say without fear of contradiction, that for long, and tedious marches, excessive privation and hardship, that our troops can produce as fair a record as any; still they have encountered a sufficient number of hostile Indians in every conceivable phase of attack to demonstrate how ready and willing they were to imperil lives in their country’s cause.”

Not long after the Oregon Cavalry’s defeat near the Crooked River, one of Drake’s men wrote to a Portland newspaper, observing bitterly that “though public opinion did not so vote, it was just as deserving of praise to die here in the discharge of one’s duty as it would have been to fall at Chickamauga or Gettysburg.” This was their war. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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James Robbins Jewell, a frequent America’s Civil War contributor, writes from Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. This article is adapted from his latest book Agents of Empire: The First Oregon Cavalry and the Opening of the Interior Pacific Northwest During the Civil War (University of Nebraska Press, 2023).

In 2002, I ventured to Culpeper, Va., to satisfy a particular quest of mine: to explore the route that Brig. Gen. Evander Law’s Alabama Brigade, in Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood’s Division, undertook from Raccoon Ford to Gettysburg in June 1863. Hood’s command was present at the massive cavalry reviews that Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart, the Army of Northern Virginia Cavalry Corps’ commander, conducted in the vicinity of Brandy Station on June 5 and 8.

Leaving the crass commercial sprawl of the I-95 corridor and Spotsylvania County, I traveled west on Virginia State Route 3 to the vast open space of Culpeper County. Since first visiting Culpeper in the early 1990s, I could not help but feel the county seat was a somewhat odd place, suffering perhaps from an identity crisis or cultural amnesia. It appeared to be a town lost in time, not knowing how to, or not interested in, capitalizing on heritage tourism. Although Culpeper was not unique, the song remained the same in many historic towns in Virginia and beyond. But Culpeper had been so significant in the war.

The town and surrounding area held a wealth of history that had not been tastefully capitalized on. Perhaps it was lofty idealism on my part, sprinkled with unreasonable economic considerations.

The architecture of Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill’s hometown was impressive and hopefully a future anchor for downtown redevelopment. One could see the potential of investing in history, especially in the wake of Ken Burns’ pop-culture phenomenon, The Civil War.

Just north and east of Culpeper is the battlefield of Brandy Station—known as the largest cavalry battle in the war (though folks heavily interested in the 1864 cavalry battle at Trevilian Station, Va., might argue otherwise). Of course, as many know, Brandy Station has the often-common layers of Civil War history—from Maj. Gen. John Pope’s 1862 Federal occupation to the massive 1863 battles, to the grand encampment of the Army of the Potomac, to nearby Kelly’s Ford, Rappahannock Station, Cedar Mountain, and so on. It is indeed a target-rich environment, as all these sites are within a few miles of each other.

Many modern preservation battles have been fought here as well. In the past 40 years, the county has been on the front-line of the see-saw preservation saga. Because Culpeper is located on the U.S. Route 29 highway—which provides a corridor for quicker ingress and egress, thus accommodating the growing Washington, D.C., regional commuting population movement in that direction—developers have long salivated over exploiting the area. Traditionally, many members of the Culpeper Board of Supervisors have not exactly gone out of their way to care for their historic pearl, as their voting records will attest.

Despite the constant development hurdles, much property has been protected through the yeoman service of long-term Culpeper–Brandy Station advocate Clark “Bud” Hall. The founder of the Brandy Station Foundation has fought much for the battlefield land around Culpeper —from thwarting a proposed Formula 1 racetrack in the mid-1990s to efforts by Southern California land developers looking to exploit and radically change the area.

Until 1987, not a single acre of Brandy Station had been saved. Since then, the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites (APCWS), which became the Civil War Trust (now the American Battlefield Trust), and others have saved 1,872 acres of the Brandy Station battlefield, including Fleetwood Hill, the site of J.E.B. Stuart’s headquarters and the epicenter of the battle. Because the battle was so massive, and substantially a cavalry fight, it covers a lot of ground—more than 10,000 acres.

The Brandy Station preservation issue begs reoccurring questions: How much land needs to be saved? Why should it be saved? How does one quantify preservation? Who benefits from it? Time is dwindling to save this vast historic and natural area from the advancing Washington, D.C., commuter traffic and population. The area is indeed fragile.

On my 2002 trip to Culpeper, many of the historic sites were threatened, and I was concerned I perhaps would never get to see them. Yet my schedule dictated a fast pace, negating extensive exploration—always a big draw when traveling into history in the Old Dominion. My focus this time was on Law’s Yellowhammer Brigade in June 1863 at Brandy Station.

A Massive Mounted Force

Law’s Brigade camped with John Bell Hood’s Division southeast of Culpeper, near Pony Mountain and paralleling the Fredericksburg Pike (modern-day Virginia Route 3), from June 5 through June 15.

A soldier in Hood’s Division wrote of the town: “Once more we stand with shattered walls of Culpeper, and again our line of operations points onward to the Potomac….Shaken by the shock of twenty battles, mutilated by four barbaric invasions, her sanctuaries defiled, devastated by pestilence and famine and the citizens driven from their hearths depending on God alone for food….”

In early June 1863, J.E.B. Stuart had assembled a force of 10,000 troopers around Culpeper. The size of a mounted force that large made me wonder about the forage and logistics of the horse and mule element of Lee’s army; it was a part of military strategy of which I often feel ignorant.

Peter Wellington Alexander, the popular partisan reporter from The Savannah Republican newspaper, would write about forage and logistics of equestrian sustenance while at Culpeper: 

“The number of horses [and mules] in this army, including the cavalry, artillery, quartermaster’s department, and field and staff, is not far from 35,000….To supply these horses with the usual rations of corn and hay, would require 7,500 bushels or 420,000 pounds of the former and 490,000 pounds of the latter, per day. The labor and expense of supplying so large a quantity of forage are necessarily very heavy.

“Fortunately for us, as well as for the horses, neither army has occupied this part of the State since last fall, and consequently the supply of grass, clover and timothy is abundant, otherwise it would be impossible to subsist so many animals with our limited wagon and railroad transportation, and at a time of so much scarcity as the present. You will be surprised to hear, therefore, that the horses receive no hay at all, and very seldom and fodder, and only one third the usual ration of corn. And yet I have never seen them in better condition.

“It is reported that the grazing in the counties between the Rappahannock and the Upper Potomac is equally as good as it is in this vicinity. Many of the farms have been abandoned, and much of the fencing destroyed, but it is believed that the supply of grass, though not as abundant as in times of peace, is ample for our wants, should the army advance. The farmers are allowed ten cents per day for the grazing of each horse, which would make the total cost of grazing 35,000 horses, $3,500 per day.”

That account underlines the logic of necessity for Lee to move his army to another region to survive. I have often overshadowed the Confederate desire for supplies as a major reason for their movement north in 1863; however, the mathematical logic illustrated by Alexander’s account partially illuminates the hard realities of supply and logistics.

On June 5, and three days later, Stuart conducted massive cavalry reviews near Culpeper. Hood’s Division attended both events; General Robert E. Lee attended the latter.

A Southern soldier-reporter in Hood’s Division said of the June 5 equestrian spectacle: “It was an imposing sight. One hundred and forty-four companies passed in review in the most splendid order. I counted twenty-six stands of colors, exclusive of those belonging to Stuart’s horse-artillery. After the review there was a sham fight, in which the artillery fired over one hundred and sixty rounds, and the cavalry made several brilliant charges. The horses were generally good, and everything indicated a good degree of discipline. Many ladies, blooming in health and beauty, were present. Gen. Hood marched his whole division out to witness the review.”

Such accounts always spur my imagination and whet my appetite to travel back in time. It is hard to fathom what 10,000 cavalrymen would look like thundering ahead. To what can we truly compare the sound of 40,000 charging hooves?

“On the 8th of June General Lee ordered a review of the whole of General Stuart’s Corps,” recalled Robert T. Cole, the 4th Alabama’s adjutant. “The 4th…was present and witnessed the grandest and most spectacular display of the largest body of cavalry they had ever seen massed on one field. General Stuart was in all his glory. Mr. Davis, his cabinet, and a large number of ladies from Richmond and the surrounding country were among the spectators.”

Wrote one of Hood’s infantrymen: “Yesterday we had a great review. Thousands of cavalry and infantry were upon the ground. The infantry rested on their arms and the cavalry pranced and maneuvered over the field to the delight of about 500 young and thoughtless beauties. The cavalry looked fine with the Prince of showy men at their head, dressed with gold and yellow trappings glistening on the plain grey surface like fire-flies on a darkening night. They were essentially a collection of pretty men, dressed in their best, while the poor, tattered, worn and tired infantry received not one smile from the light-hearted beauties who were out on that day….The cavalry parade was a beautiful sight, but I have no patience for such tomfooleries.”

I could relate somewhat to that soldier’s words; in my reenacting days, the grimy, hardcore, authentic types rarely got the attention of the fairer sex—but the cavalry did, especially if they wore “glittery” things.

“A Sham Battle”

Alexander, usually writing under the acronym “PWA”, was a notorious Stuart critic. On June 8 he penned an article that would appear in the June 15 Savannah Republican, declaring: “Gen. Stuart has assembled a heavy cavalry force here….Some of the ladies adorned him and his horse with flowers, and in this condition he presented himself to General Lee, who, it is reported, having surveyed him from head to foot, quietly remarked: ‘Do you know General, that Burnside left Washington in like trim for the first battle of Manassas. I hope your fate may not be like his.’ Unfortunately, Stuart was too much occupied with his flowers to take the hint.”

That evening, observed Cole, “General Stuart entertained his visitors with a sham battle. To several members of the 4th Alabama there was only one thing to mar the occasion—the absence of the dashing Alabama artillerist of Stuart’s Horse Artillery, John Pelham, who was killed leading a cavalry charge [at Kelly’s Ford] only a few miles from where we then were, on the 17th of March 1863.”

Continued Cole: “That night the little village of Culpeper was filled to overflowing with beautiful women and brave men, where a dance…inaugurated by the cavalry continued until long after we infantry had retired…”

Early the next morning, true fighting broke out at Brandy Station, although Hood’s Division was held back in a concealed support position near Pony Mountain. Although the Federal horsemen were repelled after a hard-fought clash, Lee’s troop concentration at Culpeper had been revealed. Wrote Alexander: “Lee’s flank movement, like a coal of fire on the terrapin’s back, has had the effect to put [Hooker’s Army of the Potomac] in motion….”

The Gettysburg Campaign had begun.

Visiting Culpeper last October, I was struck by the new sense of community building with a historic bent. As I drove by the nearby fields of Brandy Station, it felt good to know much is now protected and that a new state park incorporating neighboring Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain is being developed. It’s the kind of development I love to see. I thought of Bud Hall, whose incredible efforts over the years have helped bring this park to fruition. Without him, so much would have been lost, denying me and others the opportunity to easily imagine the historic events that had transpired there, such as those glamorous Confederate cavalry reviews of June 5 and 8. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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