Showing posts with label Camp Dennison. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Camp Dennison. Show all posts

Sunday, August 13, 2017

Diary of Sergeant Major Luman Harris Tenney: July 14, 1863

Entered Harrison on state line at 2 A. M. Napped and breakfasted. Seemed good to be in Ohio again, and see faces of Ohio people. Passed through New Baltimore, New Springfield, Sharon, Montgomery, Miamiville, in sight of Camp Dennison and camped 5 miles. Morgan has today burned 48 cars, captured 300 militia, etc. People very hospitable.

SOURCE: Frances Andrews Tenney, War Diary Of Luman Harris Tenney, p. 79

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Lucy Webb Hayes to Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes, May 19, 1862

Our hospitals are all full of sick and wounded. A great difference can be seen between the sick and [the] wounded. The sick appear low-spirited — downcast, while the wounded are quite cheerful, hoping soon to be well. I felt right happy the other day, feeling that I had made some persons feel a little happier. Going down to Mrs. Herron's I passed four soldiers, two wounded and two sick. They were sitting on the pavement in front of the office where their papers are given to them. I passed them, and then thought, well, anyhow, I will go back and ask them where they are going. A gentleman who I saw then was with them, said he had just got in from Camp Dennison, and found they were too late to get their tickets for that evening. I asked, “Where will you take them?” He said he did not know, but must get them to the nearest place, as they were very weak. I said, “Doctor, (the wounded man had told me he was his family doctor and had come to take him home), if you will take them to my house I will gladly keep them and have them taken to the cars. There is the street-car which will take you near my house.” He was very thankful, and he put sick and wounded on, and I started them for Sixth Street, while I finished my errand, took the next car, and found my lame man hobbling slowly along. We fixed them in the back parlor. The doctor I asked to stay also, to attend to them. He said he could not thank me enough, that he was a stranger here and was almost bewildered as to what to do or where to take them. Mary was up early and we had a cup of coffee for them before five. I thought of you in a strange country, wounded and trying to get home. The cases were not exactly alike, but if anyone was kind to you, would I not feel thankful?

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 281

Saturday, November 8, 2014

Diary of Luman Harris Tenney: January 7, 1862

Paymaster telegraphed to, and preparations for leaving Camp Denison.

SOURCE: Frances Andrews Tenney, War Diary Of Luman Harris Tenney, p. 5

Thursday, October 30, 2014

Diary of Luman Harris Tenney: December 3, 1861

Reached Camp Denison where were encamped 8,000 troops.

SOURCE: Frances Andrews Tenney, War Diary Of Luman Harris Tenney, p. 4

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Diary of Luman Harris Tenney: December 2, 1861

Wrote and sent a package to Fannie. Bid the friends good-bye and left for Camp Denison. A noisy time — boys drunk —  slept in caboose.

SOURCE: Frances Andrews Tenney, War Diary Of Luman Harris Tenney, p. 4

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Major Rutherford B. Hayes to Lucy Webb Hayes, June 10, 1861

Columbus, Monday, 10 P. M., June 10, 1861.

Dearest Lu: — I have just sent Judge Matthews to bed in the room over the library, and I thought I'd write a few words to my dear wife before sleeping. We have been at the camp all the afternoon. Our quarters are not yet built; all things are new and disorganized; the location is not nearly so fine as Camp Dennison, but with all these disadvantages, we both came away feeling very happy. We visited our men; they behaved finely; they are ambitious and zealous, and met us in such a good spirit. We really were full of satisfaction with it. We are glad we are away from the crowds of visitors who interfere so with the drills at Camp Dennison.

When we reached town, Judge Matthews learned that Bosley was elected over the Grays; he was more than content with it.

I shall not need things in a hurry; take time, and don't worry yourself. I shall probably be down the last of the week; I shall only be prevented by the absence of Colonel Rosecrans and Judge Matthews. The colonel has accepted and will be here Wednesday.

There is a good band in camp; several well drilled companies. We shall have four thousand men by Saturday. Ours is the best regiment: two companies from Cleveland, one from Sandusky, one from Bellefontaine and one from Ashtabula, under a son of J. R. Giddings — a pleasant gentleman and a capital company.

But I must stop this. You know how I love you; how I love the family all; but Lucy, I am much happier in this business than I could be fretting away in the old office near the courthouse. It is living. My only regret is that you don't like our location. We shall probably spend the summer here, or a good part of it, unless we go into Virginia. No more tonight. Much love.

Sincerely,
R. B. Hayes.
Mrs. Hayes.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 23-4

Sunday, May 4, 2014

Col. Thomas Kilby Smith to Mrs. Eliza Walter Smith, July 28, 1862

CAMP NEAR MEMPHIS, July 28, 1862.
MY DEAR MOTHER:

I wonder sometimes that I do not lose myself in the frequent flittings I have made; as to the properties, the belongings, they are narrowed down to the smallest possible compass. My little leather travelling trunk is my bed, board, lodging, library, and secretary. Its key long disappeared; and as it is strapped up, I bid an affectionate adieu to all its contents, in the firm belief that I shall never see them again.

Soldiers are great thieves on principle; when they can't steal from the enemy, they circumvent each other to keep in practice, taking that which, “not enriching them,” causes, in its loss, their comrades to swear worse than “our army in Flanders.” One by one my shirts, drawers, socks, gloves, boots, handkerchiefs, books have disappeared. The last theft committed upon me was amusing from its boldness. We were encamped on the edge of an immense cotton field near a grove before “Holly Springs,” on our second march there, when we shelled the city. It was terribly hot; I was longing for something to read, when Stephen most opportunely produced from his bag a most excellent copy of Byron, that I had taken from Bragg's quarters at Corinth. I had entirely forgotten the book, which the boy had boned for his own use, and was overjoyed to get hold of anything to relieve ennui and the deadly tedium of waiting orders with the thermometer at an hundred and upwards, so I seized “My Lord,” and forthwith repaired to a log in the shade; but just as I was composing myself to read, a chattering above made me look up to see a fox squirrel and a jay bird fight. I drew my pistol, aimed at the squirrel, and in that brief moment the book was spirited away by some lurking vagabond who probably sold it for a glass of grog. For three long summer days I cursed that thief. Last night our regimental surgeon hung his trousers on the fence before his tent; they vanished just as he turned his back, and being his sole remaining pair, left him disconsolate. I can tell you many an amusing instance of just such purloinings as vexatious as they are ludicrous.

Still, barring attack sometimes talked of, it being a new base of operations, I think we shall hardly begin a fall campaign before the last of September or the first of October. I also acknowledged receipt of your most affectionate letter of the 4th inst., found here with quite a budget of mail. You say you look only for Halleck’s army. Events multiplying and succeed with lightning-like rapidity. Since the date of your letter Halleck has been given in charge of all the armies of the Union, et nous verrons.

The result of this struggle no human mind can foretell; the farther I penetrate the bowels of this Southern land, the more fully I am convinced that its inhabitants are a people not to be whipped. The unanimity of feeling among them is wonderful. The able-bodied men are all in the army. We find none en route but the old, the feeble, the sick, the women. These last dauntless to the last. Those the army have left behind have learned that there is nothing for them to fear from us. We shower gold and benefits which they accept with a greed and rapacity . . .

Children are reared to curse us. The most strange and absurd stories are told of us, and stranger still, they are believed. I have been gazed at as if I were a wild beast in a menagerie. The slaves thought we were black. We are scorned, though feared, hated, maligned. Seventeen hundred people have left Memphis within three days rather than take the oath of allegiance. Leaving, they have sacrificed estate, wealth, luxury, and the majority of them have gone into the Confederate army. There is scarce a lady in the city; the few who are left, our open and avowed enemies. We shall always whip them in the open field, we may cut them off in detail; we shall never by whipping them restore the Union. If some miraculous interposition of Divine Providence does not put an end to the unnatural strife, we shall fight as long as there is a Southerner left to draw a sword. Europe is powerless to intervene. England may take sides, but she can't grow cotton in the face of a Federal army. France, who is now equipping her navies, who by similarity of language and habit has close affiliations with Louisiana, who is eagerly stretching out her hand for colonies, and to whose arms the Southern Mississippi planters would eagerly look for protection — France must beware; Russia is no uninterested spectator. The first step towards intervention is the match to kindle the blaze of war all over Europe. The South would gladly colonize; it is her only hope for redemption. Congress has forced a new issue. Slavery is doomed. New levies must be forced. Three hundred thousand men from the North will not obey the President's call and volunteer. Drafting on the one side and conscription on the other. The result is plain — a military dictatorship, then consolidation. The days of the Republic are numbered. But a little while and the strong right arm is the only protection to property, the value of property existing only in name.

These thoughts are gloomy, but I must confess there is but little to encourage one who perils his life for his country's honor.

You flatter me when you say my letters are interesting to you. Save to you, or to wife, I am inclined to think there would be found in these letters little worth perusal. They have almost invariably been written while upon the march, in bivouac, often behind intrenchments, right in front of the enemy, and only to reassure you of my continued safety. I continually regret that the pen of the ready writer has not been given me, with industry commensurate. I might then have made pencillings by the wayside, through the wilderness and the camp, worth more than passing notice. For four long months my life has been rife in incident; the circumstance that would have made an era to date from in times that are past, being so rapidly followed by one of more startling nature, as to drive it from the memory, and so the drama of life has gone on, the thrill of excitement a daily sensation.

I had become somewhat familiarized with camp life and its surroundings before I undertook to recruit my own regiment at Camp Dennison. The fall and winter passed away quietly enough in barracks, though it was no light task with me, to recruit, organize, and drill a regiment of new levies.

Suddenly and before spring was opened, marching orders came and we found ourselves hurried into the field, without arms or adequate camp equipage. The first issue of arms I had condemned as unreliable and returned to the State arsenal. Within a week of our arrival at Paducah a detachment from my regiment with borrowed arms had taken possession of Columbus. There our colors waved for the first time over an enemy's fortification, and I may say, par parenthese, this of these colors, that their history is rather peculiar. The regiment never had its regimental colors; the flag we carry was presented by a Masonic lodge of Cleveland to a company I recruited in that city. It floats over me as I write, and I thank God is unstained by dishonor. It waved at Columbus, at Chickasaw Bluff; at Shiloh its guard of four men were all killed, its bearer crushed and killed by the falling of a tree-top, cut off by solid shot. The staff was broken and the flag tangled in the branches; there I dismounted for the first and only time during that day to rescue the old flag, which I took under a sheet of flame. I rode upon it the rest of that day, slept upon it at night, and on Monday flaunted it in the face of the Crescent City Guards. The old flag floated at Russell's house. We were in reserve in that battle, but under fire. It was foremost in all the advances upon Corinth, and the first planted inside the intrenchments. Since the evacuation of Corinth, on detached service, it has been unfurled at all the important points; at Lagrange, at Holly Springs, at Moscow, at Ammon's Bridge, at Lafayette, at Germantown, at White's Station, and now at Memphis. But, to return, we received our arms at Paducah, and were terribly exposed while encamped there. From thence we were transported on steamboats to Chickasaw Bluffs on the celebrated Tennessee expedition. For nine days we were crowded close on small steamboats, and the first day we disembarked were compelled to wade streams breast high, the weather terribly cold. We were driven back by high water. We again embarked and landed at Pittsburg Landing. There my men began to feel the effects of the terrible exposure to which they had been subjected. But no time was allowed to recuperate, constant and severe marches by night and by day kept the army on the qui vive. I can assure you there was no surprise at Shiloh. I made a tremendous night march only the Thursday before, of which I have heretofore given you some account; was ordered upon a march that very Sunday morning, and was setting picket guard till twelve o'clock of Saturday night. Well, then came the great battle and the burying of the dead, and here I will refer you to an autograph order of General Sherman which I enclose; he will doubtless be a great man in time to come, and it will be worth while to preserve as a memorial of the times. . . . After the burial of the dead and a brief breathing spell in a charnel-house, we were ordered forward; then came more skirmishing, then the advance upon Corinth by regular parallels, the felling of enormous trees, to form abattis, the ditch, the rampart, often thrown up by candle-light. Scouting, picketing, advancing in force, winning ground inch by inch, bringing up the heavy siege guns; at last the evacuation, the flight, the pursuit, then the occupation of the country. Now my labors were not lessened, though my responsibilities increased. I was often upon detached service, far away from the main army, as at Ammon's Bridge, where I lay for ten days, and where I had frequent skirmishes, taking many prisoners. There I made acquaintance with the planters, and finally, when I left, destroyed the structure, by chopping it away and by burning, bringing upon my head, doubtless, the anathemas of all the country-side. There is a portion of Tennessee and Mississippi where they know me, and where I think my memory will be green for some time to come. And now I am at Memphis or rather in the suburbs, that I assure you are beautiful. The shrubbery is splendidly luxurious, the most exquisite flowers, magnificent houses and grounds and a splendid country about it. I do not wonder its people have made boast of their sunny South; no more beautiful land is spread out to the sun, but now devastation and ruin stares it in the face. I have met but few of the people, those I have seen are sufficiently polite; but it is easy to see we are not welcome guests, that the Union sentiment expressed, is expressed pro hac vice. If I stay here long I will write you more about them. Thus you have a brief synopsis of the history of my regiment in the field; unfortunately, it has no historian in its ranks; all connected with it have been satisfied with doing their duty, without recording their acts. Thus while we see in every paper, officers and regiments lauded and praised, the most insignificant performances magnified into glowing acts of heroism, the most paltry skirmishes into great battles, we find ourselves unknown. I do not regard courage in battle as a very extraordinary quality, but fortitude on the march and in the trenches, in the endurance of the thousand vicissitudes that attach to such a campaign as we have gone through, is above all praise. My men, now sadly reduced in numbers — for dysentery, diarrhoea, camp fever, exposure, to say nothing of wounds, have done their work — have shown this fortitude in a superior degree. They have been a forlorn hope, have always led the van, have never missed a march, a battle, or a skirmish, but their history will never be written, the most of them will go to their graves unhonored and unsung. But I am wearying you with too long a letter, written not under the most favorable auspices. I enclose you a report from Sherman partly mutilated before I received it.

SOURCE: Walter George Smith, Life and letters of Thomas Kilby Smith, p. 225-30

Monday, March 3, 2014

Colonel Thomas Kilby Smith to Elizabeth Budd Smith, February 21, 1862

HEADQUARTERS 54TH REGT. O. V. U. S. A.,
CAMP NEAR PADUCAH, KY., February 21, 1862.

I arrived safely with my regiment yesterday morning, and am now encamped at a point about a mile and a half west of Paducah. Our voyage down the river was made safely and without accident. I think it a little doubtful whether you received my hurried letter written during the voyage, and therefore am disposed to recapitulate, even at the risk of giving you stale news, the circumstances of our departure from Camp Dennison. As I told you in one of our conversations I have considered marching orders as being near at hand for some weeks, and so endeavored to arrange my regimental matters that I should not be taken unawares, but I hardly expected them to come as they did, by telegraph, and on Sunday. I was very strongly tempted to pass that Sunday with you. Camp had become intensely disagreeable, the weather was cold, inclement, and the ground in a horrible condition, and I thought how very comfortable it would be to take a good Sunday dinner with you and have a nap afterwards on the lounge upstairs, enveloped in my new dressing gown, you were so good as to toil over for me, but again I thought if any accident were to occur to the regiment if I were away, that I would never forgive myself or be forgiven by my superior officers, and that at the present time I owed my whole time, at whatever sacrifice, to my country; therefore I resisted all the temptations and blandishments of home, and well it was that I did so. Oh! how bitterly have some of my officers and even privates regretted that they absented themselves, and at what terrible cost will they be to get to their regiment. I had gone through the duties of the day, which for Sunday in camp, or rather garrison, consists of an inspection of the barracks and soldiers with their arms and accoutrements, and was finishing my tour of the hospital when up rode an adjutant, his horse in a foam, and hurriedly handing me a paper, asked me when I could be ready to march. I looked at my watch, coolly took his paper, which was a telegraphic despatch or order, and replied: "In fifteen minutes." He looked at me incredulously and was about to ride off. I called to him, ''Stop, Sir, I will show you my troops in marching order within fifteen minutes, and leave it to you to report the fact." Within ten minutes from that time my soldiers were in line with blankets rolled and knapsacks packed, ready to march a thousand miles. The Adjutant, an old English soldier, by the bye, who was in the Crimean war and has been to India with troops, looked on in astonishment. But cars could not be put upon the railroad before nine o'clock the next morning, and all night I kept the men up cooking rations for three days. I sat up all night myself, and, of course, was about bright and early in the morning. My boys were all eager for the start. I had but one craven hound who deserted me, and he, I am sorry to say, was from . . . His name was . . . and he must be published to the world as a coward and a perjured liar. At nine o'clock as I sat on horseback at the head of the column with my staff about me, an orderly rode over to say that the cars would be ready by the time that I had marched to the depot. The cavalry regiment had sent their band and an escort, and with my own band we made fine music, and I flatter myself a gallant appearance. At the depot we were met by Colonel Burnett of the artillery with his band, and every officer of distinction at camp was there to bid me farewell. They gave me a good send-off. Few troops have left Camp Dennison under pleasanter auspices, and sooth to say I was loath to leave the old camp after all, for there I have spent some pleasant days "under the greenwood tree, and in winter and rough weather." I was so careful to get the troops on board and to see the last man on, that I got left myself and was somewhat thrown out of my calculations. However it ended well enough, for my farewell to you and the dear children would have been heartbreaking all round, and perhaps wholly unnerved me. As usual in moments of great excitement with me, I had lost my appetite, and did not want a great deal to set me back at a time when I required all my faculties at hand. It is just as bad to march troops from home the first time they leave their homes as to march them in battle to the charge. One of my companies was from Cincinnati, and it was almost heartbreaking to see the leavetakings between mother and son, husband and wife, sister and brother. All classes were represented, and I was compelled to put a stop to the terrible scenes mingled with considerable drunkenness (for the soldiers had so many friends that their canteens were well filled and continually replenished with whiskey) by ordering the captain of the boat of which I took charge in person to run her over to the Kentucky shore. My whole time was taken up as a matter of course, and I tried in vain for an opportunity to come to you. We sailed down the river without adventure worth relating, save that our soldiers fought terribly among each other, at least those who were drunk, and we lost one man by drowning, and another whose skull was fractured accidentally by a shovel. I arrived at Paducah at about six o'clock on the evening of Wednesday the 19th inst. As soon as the boat landed and before my report was written, I was waited upon by General Sherman, who is the commandant of this post, and by him shown on board a steamer lying a little farther down stream from our boat, which was thoroughly stowed, rammed, packed, and crowded with prisoners from the enemy, captured at Fort Donaldson, together with five thousand stand of arms. The prisoners were of high and low degree. I was introduced to one or two colonels and several other officers. The men, in my judgment, do not well compare with ours. I think we can always whip them about three to five. They fought magnificently, however, at Fort Donaldson, and lost probably on their side about three thousand killed and wounded. On our side there were thirteen hundred wounded and five hundred killed. We took thirteen thousand three hundred and thirty-six prisoners — these figures are reliable. The hospitals here are perfect charnel houses. . . .

When General Sherman had got through his business with me and had offered the hospitalities of his headquarters, I returned to the boats. The Fannie McBumie, the one in which I sailed, arrived first, and while I was inspecting the prisoners and arms, the Ben Franklin, the boat that had my other detachments, arrived. I was engaged during the night in preparing for disembarkation and at seven o'clock the next morning had my troops, horses, tents, supplies all off; at eight o'clock marched to General Sherman's headquarters, one of the finest regiments, as he told Colonel Stuart in my hearing, he had ever seen. The morning was fine and the boys looked splendidly. We are now, as I told you, encamped at a point about a mile and a half west of the city of Paducah, containing some ten thousand inhabitants. My troops are well bestowed in tents, and I have taken to myself a house of some twelve or fifteen rooms for my headquarters. It was occupied, I believe, by a secessionist, and has fine grounds, stables, etc., about it. I am very much more comfortable than at Camp Dennison. My regiment has the post of honor, and with a battery of artillery guard the encampment. There are a great many troops here. I cannot say nearly how many, for I have not information. I should think twelve or fifteen thousand. General Halleck, under whose command my regiment is placed, is concentrating vast forces here. He anticipates a forward movement. We are ordered to hold ourselves in readiness to march at a moment's notice.

SOURCE: Walter George Smith, Life and letters of Thomas Kilby Smith, p. 181-5

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Kilby Smith to Elizabeth Budd Smith, October 6, 1861

HEADQUARTERS 54TH REGT., O. V. U. S A.,
CAMP DENNISON, OHIO, October 6, 1861.

I do not know, and can scarcely form a conjecture, as to what service my command will be in or as to where I shall be ordered when the regiment is ready for the field. I am now waiting for an equipment and arms. Shall very soon have men enough and am anxious for marching orders to any point away from Camp Dennison. I have been made commandant of the post and have now under my command, not only my own regiment but four others, with artillerists, besides the control of the post hospital, and no small care in itself, as you will imagine when I tell you we had two deaths last night, and have buried twenty-five men since I have been here. If I only had subordinate officers upon whom I could rely these responsibilities would only stimulate me to a pleasant excitement. Indeed I feel always a pleasurable thrill when real earnest work is before me — work that is befitting a man. I have reason to believe that I am popular with the command, that for the most part my men all like me; which is a great point gained in the army. Yet I have been pressed with many and grave obstacles, wholly unforeseen and unprovided for, that perhaps hereafter I shall have an opportunity to explain to you. You may be surprised not to see my name or my regiment mentioned in what is called the Military Column of the newspapers. I have sedulously from the first endeavored to keep away from stupid newspaper puffery or notice. Time, and my own merits, if I have any, will show whether I have judgment and military skill enough to organize, prepare, and drill a regiment for the field and make it serviceable after I get the men into active service, and meanwhile it is worse than absurd to attempt by monied influences or otherwise the manufacture of a fictitious fame.

SOURCE: Walter George Smith, Life and letters of Thomas Kilby Smith, p. 175+6

Saturday, February 22, 2014

Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Kilby Smith to Elizabeth Budd Smith, September 12, 1861

HEADQUARTERS CAMP DENNISON,
Sept. 12, 1861.

As you will have seen in the papers “I have gone and done it.” Now keep a stiff upper lip and sustain and cheer me all you can, and by being cheerful yourself keep me in good spirits. I have an arduous and responsible duty to perform, but by God's help hope to get through with honor to myself. Have been full of business and should have written to you yesterday, my first day in camp, which was wet and muddy enough, I assure you. We shall be here for some weeks. It will take at least four weeks I think to organize my regiment.
. . . . . . . . . .

Direct Lieut.-Col. Thos. Kilby Smith, Commanding 54th Regt., Camp Dennison. The weather to-day is very fine, the camp drying up very fast.

SOURCE: Walter George Smith, Life and letters of Thomas Kilby Smith, p. 174

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Deaths at Camp Dennison

Chris Angeno [sic], Co. F, 13th Iowa, gunshot wound in leg, admitted April 18th, died May 2.

D. A. Willard, Co. A, 8th Iowa, typhoid fever, admitted May 2d, died May 5th.

J. W. Robinson, Co. F, 2d Iowa, typhoid fever, admitted May 2d, died May 5th.

Stowell G. Dean, Co. C, 13th Iowa, typhoid fever, admitted April 18th, died May 6th.

Orland M. Nichols, Co. G, 3d Iowa, typhoid fever, admitted April 18th, died April 18th.

Enos Walker, Co. E, 13th Iowa, intermittent fever, admitted April 17th, died April 26th.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 17, 1862, p. 2