Saturday, November 1, 2014
Major Rutherford B. Hayes to Lucy Webb Hayes, Monday, August 26, 1861 – 8:30 p.m.
Monday, March 31, 2014
3rd Ohio Infantry – 3 Months
3rd Ohio Infantry – 3 Years
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Operations in Northern Alabama
Gen. Mitchell has finished his campaign, by the complete victory which he gained over the forces of Gen. E. Kirby Smith, at this place yesterday afternoon, and which you have doubtless had by telegraph. I left the force of Gen. Turchin evacuating Decatur, and came to Stevenson, knowing that important movements were in contemplation in these quarters.
I found that Col. Sill had on Sunday managed to cross Widow Creek, and was marching on Bridgeport on Monday. On the latter day his brigade was joined by the 3d Ohio, Col. Beatty, and it was understood that Col. Lyttle’s brigade was in the rear, acting as a reserve. On Tuesday, the march began, under command of Gen. Mitchell, who had come up, and we pushed eastward along the line of the railroad, dragging two pieces of artillery by hand for a distance of 20 miles, at the least.
It was about 4 o’clock in the afternoon of yesterday – Sunday – that we came upon the enemy’s pickets, three miles from Bridgeport. They were stationed on the side of a small stream, the bridge across it having been burned, and we soon found they were supported by an infantry and two cavalry regiments, the former of which came up and engaged our advance, the 33d Ohio. This regiment was the only one which appeared to the sight of the rebels, and after half an hour’s work they fell back unpursued, as no means were had by the rebels for crossing the stream.
General Mitchell in the meantime made a detour to the left with his whole force, and after marching a mile came upon a road which led to Bridgeport. He immediately started for this point, and after an hour’s weary march approached the rebel fortifications on the bank of the Tennessee. This march was one of incredible difficulty and danger. Gen. Mitchell was placing himself with five regiments of infantry, two companies of cavalry and two pieces of artillery, between two divisions of an enemy much stronger combined than himself. Had he been defeated he could not have managed to retreat – it would have been an utter impossibility.
We halted at 6 o’clock at the foot of a hill, and the column deployed right and left and formed into line of battle where they stood hidden from the enemy by the hill. The artillery stood in the centre, the 33d and 2nd Ohio on the right, with the 10th Wisconsin and 21st Ohio on the left. As soon as formed in line, the whole column advanced, and reaching the crest of the hill, looked down upon the enemy. Again they came to a halt. Peering above the top of the hill, I saw the whole of the rebel force below the hill, in their entrenchments. The setting sun glistened on thousands of stacked guns, and two pieces of brass cannon. The men had evidently been drawn up in line of battle at the first alarm, but when it had ceased they stacked arms and were now engaged in eating supper. Captain Loomis, when the force halted, stepped forward, saw the enemy, calculated the distance and stepped back undiscovered. In a moment he had given his orders, the cannon were charged with canister and moved to a position in which they were brought to bear on the main body. This evidently consisted of four full or parts of regiments of infantry. The first warning which the rebels had of their danger, or of our near approach, was the discharge of our artillery and the launching of the terrible death-dealing missiles in their very midst. They spring instantly to their guns, hundreds, however, flying in every direction. The main body evidently intended standing, but a second discharge added to the panic, and the whole force fled as our columns in line marched to the top and began the descend of the hill on a charge bayonets. – They frightened, without a single general discharge, broke for the river and quickly crossed the bridge. When we reached the works of the rebels they were deserted, a few dead and wounded alone remaining. The rebels fired with precipitancy, their speed increasing as they went, followed by the shells of Capt. Loomis. – They managed to fire the bridge and a good portion of it was destroyed, but the half west of the island was saved by Gen. Mitchell’s personal exertions. Having reached the other shore the rebels abandoned their camp and stores on that side, and by the whistling of a locomotive, I imagine went off at railroad speed. Capt. Loomis continued to throw shells after them for several rounds, when by order of Gen. Mitchell he ran his two pieces down the hill and placed them in position to receive the body on the railroad, whom it was anticipated would come to the aid of their friends now already and completely defeated. A second line of battle was formed in the works of the rebels, and we awaited for the rest of the rebels to attack us.
We had not long to wait. In a short time we saw the infantry on a double-quick, coming through the woods, along the line of the railroad, and the cavalry right and left. They came into the open fields and forward in splendid line of battle. The cavalry looked Magnificent and came dashing along in splendid style. They got within 300 years of us before they discovered their mistake, and then the artillery told them of it. The canister was poured into them and away they went in every imaginable direction – infantry and cavalry mixed in one conglomerated mass of frightened and flying humanity. The cavalry was sent in pursuit when they had got out of artillery range, and the prisoners were being sent in every hour until I laid down to try to sleep.
This morning I find we have killed and wounded 72 and taken 350 prisoners and two pieces of artillery.
General Mitchell has entire possession of the railroads from Bridgeport, ten miles east of Stevenson, west to Huntsville, thence south to Decatur, north to Athens, and in a month will have the railroad lines running to Nashville via Columbia from Decatur and via Murfreesboro from Stevenson.
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 10, 1862, p. 2
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Victory At Pittsburg, Tenn.
With the news of the surrender of Island Number Ten, came the news also of a brilliant victory by Gen. Grant, at Pittsburgh, Tenn.
The meagre account given in the dispatches of this battle gives us to understand that it was a hard fought one, but none the less glorious in its results. The rebels were defeated, and dispersed in all directions. Gen. Grant was pursuing them in hot haste. The battle lasted nearly a whole day.
LATER. – Since writing the above we have received dispatches which state that the battle began on Saturday and continued during the day. Our forces were that day repulsed with a loss of 3000 killed and several hundred taken prisoners! Gen. Buell came to Gen. Grant’s assistance the next morning, Sunday. This day the rebels were repulsed with terrible loss on both sides. Ours stated to be from 18,000 to 20,000 the rebels from 35,000 to 40,000!! This must be fearfully exaggerated. We will await details with great interest. There is a possibility of Gen. Mitchell’s Division being in the battle. Several hundred men from Athens county were in this Division. The 18th and 3rd Regiments are in it.
– Published in The Athens Messenger, Athens, Ohio, Thursday, April 10, 1862
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
BATTLE AT PITTSBURG
PITTSBURG, ON BOARD THE WHITE CLOUD,
MONDAY EVENING, April 7, 1862
Let me now give you a chapter from my own experiences. And I am aware that I shall fail to give you anything like an adequate idea either of the sights I witnessed, or the impressions they produced. Language could convey no conception of the ghastly horrors of a great battle-field, much less of its sickening effect upon one unused to such spectacles. The descriptions of scenes like these, most of your readers will be happy enough never to realize.
It is a fact which I can hardily account for on principles of acoustics, that when we were forty miles from our destination, confused and vague reports came to us of the cannonading heard all day Sunday. These stories although frequently repeated, served only to amuse me at first. As we came within ten miles of Savannah, and twenty miles from Pittsburg, the dull boom of cannon became distinctly audible, and grew sharper and louder as we advanced. The effect of the sound, now repeated at slow intervals, now increasing almost into volleys, when combined with our knowledge of the vast forces probably engaged, brought to mind the tones of Waterloo, heard in the halls of Brussels. It was half the pean of victory, and half the knell of untold dead.
When we reached Savannah the most incoherent and conflicting stories were hurled at us from deck and shore. The cry was, “Hurry on with your batteries immediately; they want them.” How slowly the craft seemed to toil against the stream. Perhaps our little six pound howitzer might change the fortunes of the day. At last Pittsburg landing, with its line of smoke stacks and steep bluffs came into sight. Its sides for a mile were swarming with blue coats, artillery horses struggling up the bank, cavalry, infantry, army stores, litters bearing the wounded and dying, mingled in chaotic confusion. What could this mean? Could it be another Bull Run? When the boat landed we learned that we had been repulsed on Sunday, but hat retrieved our fortunes the next day; that the enemy were retreating, and that the battle was pretty much ended. I rushed ashore, hoping to find some place to deposit my baggage in safety, but for a half hour the attempt seemed hopeless. Meantime the quivering report of monster guns behind the bluff told plainly enough that the contest was not ended. At last I found an hospital steward who relieved me of my burden, and I got fairly under way, floundering along through the mud among the snake train of ambulances and artillery wagons. For half a mile I pressed on through the forest, which covered the entire surrounding country without finding any evidences of an engagement, except here and there the scar of an occasional shot high up on the trees. I was told that the hard fighting was a mile beyond. At last broken muskets, cartridge boxes, haversacks, a horse here and there stretched out in his blood began to appear. Before long I found a poor fellow mangled and rotting, who had doubtless fallen the day before. I picked up a letter lying upon him, but reflected that it might identify the body and replaced it. These were the first drops in the tempest of human blood. At some little distance beyond, through the encampment of the Third Ohio, the scene baffled description. Muskets by the hundreds had been thrown away and abandoned. Bodies were lying at intervals of a rod in all directions. Mangled trunks of horses were scattered about. The fighting here must have been well contested and desperate. To detail all of the hideous aspects of the dead in this field of carnage, if it were possible, would be simply revolting. I was drawn by a sort of fascination to one corpse after another. The expressions of mortal agony in the faces of many was fresh as Parhasius could have wished to paint. Some were distorted and defiant. Others were boyish, and wore almost the repose of sleep. One smooth-faced lad seemed to smile. I fancied that in the dying moment he saw his mother. God pity such mothers! Most of the hands were clenched; the glazed eye still glaring as it glared upon the enemy in the moment of death.
In a ravine further on, the corpses of the enemy lay thickest. Here there had been a cannonade of grape-shot and balls. Trees a foot in diameter had been cut in two. Nothing seemed to be unscathed. Two rebels lay disemboweled and brained by a large ball, which had apparently slain a horse beyond. Here lay a poor wretch, in the clamminess and pallor of apparent decomposition. I supposed he had died Sunday; but conceive of my horror when I saw that his chest heaved, “as in his breast the wave of life kept heaving to and fro.” A cannon shot had brained him, but life still worked in a spasm upon his features. Behind me came a strange agonizing cry; it was that of a wounded man bore by on a litter. – A Kentucky captain was exceedingly anxious that I should superintend the burial of an old friend, and recent enemy – a white-headed gentleman of the manner born, and I made him some vain pledges. He said that it would break his wife’s heart if she knew that he was rotting there. How many hearts will be broken – how many homes made desolate by the last few hours! One soldier told me that he was trying to find the body of his brother who might be dead on the field.
Such is war. I would have lingered much longer, but the night was coming on, and the landing was three miles distant and he had fearful evidence that the enemy could not be far distant. Surfeited with horrors I fell in with the returning soldiers and ambulances, “the weary to sleep and the wounded to die.”
Reports, which seem to be confirmed, are afloat that Gen. Prentiss is dying, (he is known to have been captured;) that A. S. Johnson [sic] is killed, (which lacks confirmation,) and that Gen. Beauregard has lost an arm.
LATER.
Tuesday Morning. – On the bluff to the south of the Landing I stumbled upon forty –seven bodies of the wounded who had since died. Among them was a Lieutenant Colonel and Major. Gen. Grant is known to have said that our loss will about to 10,000 wounded, and that of the enemy very much heavier. Gen. Bragg is reported killed, but this is not reliable.
LATER. To day (Tuesday) a strong reconnaissance was made, and the enemy found to be distant at least fifteen miles. An advance will doubtless be made to-morrow. The impression is general that the enemy is completely broken.
ONE DAY LATER.
Tuesday Evening. – I have spent a good portion of the day in traveling over the field of the engagement, but have seen only a small portion of the field. The hardest fighting has been upon the extreme left under Gen. Nelson. The enemy’s batteries fronting them were taken and lost, and after a desperate fighting a charge was made upon the rebels, which drive them finally from the field.
The fighting took place in the effort to drive the enemy from behind a rail fence. Here was a struggle almost hand to hand, and carried on upon both sides with the greatest obstinacy. – The loss was very severe. Bodies lay in some places almost in heaps; many of them were burned almost to cinder by the shell. To the south of our extreme left also, the carnage was very great, particularly through an open orchard. As far as I went the dead were to be seen in all directions. Most of them were secessionists, and many Tennesseans, who had been pressed into the service. Log cabins had been turned into hospitals, wherever found, and were filled with the wounded. The dead were being buried as fast as possible, but under the influence of a hot sun, the air is already impregnated with foul odors. The indications are that to-morrow a general forward movement will be made, and the enemy compelled to fight or fall back upon Corinth.
– Published in the Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, April 19, 1862