Showing posts with label 49th IN INF. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 49th IN INF. Show all posts

Saturday, September 14, 2019

Official Reports of the Campaign in North Alabama and Middle Tennessee, November 14, 1864 — January 23, 1865: No. 172. Report of Lieut. Col. Zalmon S. Main, Fifty-second Indiana Infantry, of operations December 15-16, 1864.

HDQRS. FIFTY-SECOND REGIMENT INDIANA VETERAN VOLS.,                       
In the Field, Tenn., December 23, 1864.

LIEUTENANT: I have the honor to make the following report of the part taken by the Fifty-second Regiment Indiana Veteran Volunteers in the battle fought between Generals Thomas' and Hood's forces on the 15th and 16th instant, near Nashville, Tenn.:

On the morning of the 15th instant I was ordered to move my regiment in front of the fortifications near the Hardin pike, and formed on the left of the Forty-ninth Illinois Volunteer Infantry. Soon after this formation was completed a general advance was made in line of battle, obliquing to the left until we had gained a distance of about a mile, arriving at a point near the Hillsborough pike, where we found the enemy in force behind strong works. Here the colonel commanding the brigade ordered a halt. Two sections of the Ninth Indiana Battery at once took position some 200 yards in rear of the Fifty-second Indiana Volunteers, and opened fire on a rebel battery in our front behind strong works near the Hillsborough pike, which was the cause of the regiment receiving a terrible shelling from the rebel battery in its return fire, nearly all of their shells dropping short of our battery and falling in our ranks, killing 1 and severely wounding 6 others. This was a loss to the regiment that it would not have sustained had it not been for our battery. At about 2 p.m. the whole line was again advanced toward the rebel works, my regiment advancing within 200 yards of them, where we received a galling fire of canister and musketry, having one officer and several men wounded. The Forty-ninth Illinois Volunteers, on my right, having obliqued to the right, under cover of the woods, leaving my regiment without support, compelled me to order a halt, which I did in a ravine near the rebel works, where I soon received orders to move by the left flank to a point of more safety near the Hillsborough pike, where the brigade was formed and a charge made in concert with the Fourth Army Corps, capturing a battery. This about closed the operations of the first day's fight. The regiment soon after went into camp for the night. During the day's fight the regiment sustained a loss of 1 man killed and 1 officer and 10 men wounded.

On the morning of the 16th instant a general advance in line of battle was again ordered, the Fifty-second Regiment Indiana Volunteers taking the center, the Forty-ninth Illinois Volunteers on the right, and the One hundred and seventeenth Illinois Volunteers on the left. In this order the whole line moved forward across the Granny White pike, a distance of about a mile, where we found the rebels posted in a strong position. After some maneuvering the command was halted, where we remained but little exposed to their fire until 3 o'clock, when a charge on the enemy's work was ordered, the regiment occupying the same position in the line that it had in the earlier part of the day. The regiment moved forward in line under a severe fire from a rebel battery in our immediate front and musketry from their works. Yet the whole line pressed forward with a determination that it was plain to be seen that neither rebel batteries nor musketry could withstand the bravery and determination of our officers and men, who had now reached the enemy's works, where prisoners were picked up in squads of six to ten in each, which I ordered to be taken to the rear and turned over to any officer that might be found in charge of the same, without counting them, therefore I am unable to give the number captured by my regiment. The command, without halting at the rebel works, continued to move forward, capturing prisoners, until we reached near the crest of the hill in rear of their works, when the command was halted and went into camp for the night.

The following is a list of the casualties.*

Very respectfully,, your obedient servant,
Z. S. MAIN,              
Lieut. Col., Comdg. Fifty-second Regt. Indiana Vet. Vol. Infty.
Lieut. J. D. COBINE,
Acting Assistant Adjutant-General, Third Brigade.
_______________

*Embodied in Table, p. 101.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 45, Part 1 (Serial No. 93), p. 495-6

Monday, December 1, 2014

49th Indiana Infantry

Organized at Jeffersonville, Ind., and mustered in November 21, 1861. Moved to Bardstown, Ky., December 11-13, and duty there till January 12, 1862. Attached to 12th Brigade, Army of the Ohio, December, 1861. 12th Brigade, 1st Division, Army of the Ohio, to March, 1862. 24th Brigade, 7th Division, Army of the Ohio, to October, 1862. 3rd Brigade, Cumberland Division, District of West Virginia, Dept. of the Ohio, to November, 1862. 2nd Brigade, 9th Division, Right Wing 13th Army Corps (Old), Dept. of the Tennessee, to December, 1862. 2nd Brigade, Sherman's Yazoo Expedition, to January, 1863. 2nd Brigade, 9th Division, 13th Army Corps, Army of the Tennessee, to February, 1863. 1st Brigade, 9th Division, 13th Army Corps, to July, 1863. 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, 13th Army Corps, Dept. of the Tennessee, to August, 1863, and Dept. of the Gulf to March, 1864. 2nd Brigade, 1st Division, 13th Army Corps, to July, 1864. 4th Brigade, 1st Division, District of Kentucky, to February, 1865. Dept. of Kentucky to September, 1865.

SERVICE. – March to Cumberland Ford January 12-February 15, 1862. Flat Lick Ford, Cumberland River, February 14. Skirmishes at Big Creek Gap and Jacksborough March 14 (Detachment). Reconnoissance toward Cumberland Gap and skirmishes March 21-23. Duty at Cumberland Ford till June. Cumberland Gap Campaign March 28 to June 18. Occupation of Cumberland Gap June 18 to September 16. Tazewell July 22 (Detachment). Evacuation of Cumberland Gap and retreat to the Ohio River September 17-October 3. Expedition to Charleston, W. Va., October 21-November 10. Moved to Memphis, Tenn., November 10, and duty there till December 20. Sherman's Yazoo Expedition December 20, 1862, to January 3, 1863. Chickasaw Bayou December 26-28. Chickasaw Bluff December 29. Expedition to Arkansas Post, Ark., January 3-10, 1863. Assault and capture of Fort Hindman, Arkansas Post, January 10-11. Moved to Young's Point, La., January 15; thence to Milliken's Bend March 8. Operations from Milliken's Bend to New Carthage March 31-April 17. James' Plantation, near New Carthage, April 6 and 8. Dunbar's Plantation, Bayou Vidal, April 15. Expedition from Perkins' Plantation to Hard Times Landing April 25-29. Phelps' and Clark's Bayous April 26. Choctaw Bayou on Lake Bruin April 28. Battle of Thompson's Hill, Port Gibson, May 1, Battle of Champion's Hill May 16. Big Black River Bridge May 17. Siege of Vicksburg, Miss., May 18-July 4. Assaults on Vicksburg May 19 and 22. Advance on Jackson, Miss., July 4-10. Near Clinton July 8. Siege of Jackson July 10-17. Ordered to New Orleans, La., August 13. Duty at Carrollton, Brashear City and Berwick till October. Western Louisiana "Teche" Campaign October 3-November 30. Moved to New Orleans, thence to DeCrow's Point, Tex., December 10-14. Duty at Matagorda Island and Indianola till April, 1864. Ordered to New Orleans April 19, thence to Alexandria April 23. Red River Campaign April 26-May 22. Action at Graham's Plantation May 5. Retreat to Morganza May 13-20. Expedition to the Atchafalaya May 30-June 6. Duty at Morganza till July. Moved to New Orleans, thence home on Veteran furlough July and August. Ordered to Lexington, Ky., and garrison duty there till September 7, 1865. Moved to Louisville, Ky., September 7, and there mustered out September 13, 1865.

Regiment lost during service 1 Officer and 40 Enlisted men killed and mortally wounded and 3 Officers and 192 Enlisted men by disease. Total 236.

SOURCE: Frederick H. Dyer, A Compendium of the War of the 3, p. Rebellion, Part 1138

Monday, February 25, 2013

From Kentucky

Col. Decouroy, of the Sixteenth Ohio, is encamped four miles above Somerset, on the Stanford road, and as near London as he would be at the former place.  Col. Ray, 49th Indiana, in at Hall’s Gap.  It is probable he will march on the Mount Vernon road.  Col. Garrard, 7th Kentucky is at Crab Orchard.  Col.  Mundy’s battalion of Cavalry is to form part of Gen. Carter’s force.  Wetmore’s Battery is to encamp at Somerset.  Gen. Schoepff’s Brigade is encamped on the road from Somerset to Waitsburg, on the Cumberland.  He will move into Tennessee, on the Monticello road, as soon as he receives supplies of provisions and means of crossing the river.  Gen. Thomas’ headquarters are at Somerset.  He, too, is waiting for rations and will, in a short time, go down the Cumberland on Nashville, and turn Bowling Green.

The roads are drying very fast.  Mr. Garber rode to the Ferry at Waitsburg on the 26th ult., and found the road in good order, dry and hard, excepting a large sized mud hole in every mile.  The regiments have been working on the road between Somerset and Hall’s Gap since the battle and judging from the long trains of wagons that came on the 25th and next night, he thinks the clear weather and the labors of the soldiers have improved the road wonderfully.  The captured animals and property have been sent to Lebanon.

Mr. Garber was told by a Secession officer, now a prisoner, that in sixty days Gen. Thomas and all the force he would take into Tennessee, would be captured – that Beauregard was quietly withdrawing his army from Manassas, and would soon be in Tennessee.  This may be true but Garber feels willing to trust Gen. McClellan to keep the French rebel in check.  It seems to him, however, that some move similar to that one mentioned must be made by the rebels to save their railroad communication.  If Gen. Thomas is permitted to reach Nashville, Buckner’s force will be cut off, and will be sandwiched between the divisions of Gen. Thomas and Gen. Buell.  Carter and Schoepff, at Knoxville would break up the communication by the Tennessee and Virginia railroad, and be equally disastrous to the rebels.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 8, 1862, p. 2

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Rebel Atrocities In East Tennessee

The horrors of rebel supremacy in East Tennessee have not yet been told.  A member of the Forty-ninth Indiana regiment now at Cumberland Ford, says that three hundred refugee East Tennesseeans have enlisted within a week from whom he gathers the following almost incredible stores of the barbarities inflicted on Union men by their rebel tyrants:

One man sixty-five years old, attacked by a large force, refused to surrender, and after being mortally wounded, having first slain four of his assailants, was propped up on the road side and sixty balls fired into his body. – Another was hanged without trial, and his son compelled to sit beneath the gallows and witness the agonies of his dying father.  Two other unobtrusive, quiet citizens, were called at midnight from their beds, and in the presence of their wives and children brutally shot down, and not content with this villainy, their homes were stripped of everything.  Even the wearing apparel was taken from their wives and little ones, and they turned naked into the street.  Many equally brutal instances are related by honest, candid men, whose testimony none would doubt.  Such are the sufferings of a people whose only crime is a refusal to become traitors.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 8, 1862, p. 1