Diary of William Howard Russell: June 18, 1861

On looking out of my cabin window this morning I found the steamer fast along-side a small wharf, above which rose, to the height of 150 feet, at an angle of forty-five degrees, the rugged bluff already mentioned. The wharf was covered with commissariat stores and ammunition. Three heavy guns, which some men were endeavoring to sling to rude bullock-carts, in a manner defiant of all the laws of gravitation, seemed likely to go slap into the water at every moment; but of the many great strapping fellows who were lounging about, not one gave a hand to the working party. A dusty track wound up the hill to the brow, and there disappeared; and at the height of fifty feet or so above the level of the river two earthworks had been rudely erected in an ineffective position. The volunteers who were lounging about the edge of the stream were dressed in different ways, and had no uniform.

Already the heat of the sun compelled me to seek the shade; and a number of the soldiers, laboring under the same infatuation as that which induces little boys to disport themselves in the Thames at Waterloo Bridge, under the notion that they are washing themselves, were swimming about in a backwater of the great river, regardless of cat-fish, mud, and fever.

General Pillow proceeded on shore after breakfast, and we mounted the coarse cart-horse chargers which were in waiting at the jetty to receive us. It is scarcely worth while to transcribe from my diary a description of the works which I sent over at the time to England. Certainly, a more extraordinary maze could not be conceived, even in the dreams of a sick engineer — a number of mad beavers might possibly construct such dams. They were so ingeniously made as to prevent the troops engaged in their defence from resisting the enemy's attacks, or getting away from them when the assailants had got inside — most difficult and troublesome to defend, and still more difficult for the defenders to leave, the latter perhaps being their chief merit.

The General ordered some practice to be made with round shot down the river. An old forty-two pound carronade was loaded with some difficulty, and pointed at a tree about 1700 yards — which I was told, however, was not less than 2500 yards — distant. The General and his staff took their posts on the parapet to leeward, and I ventured to say, “I think, General, the smoke will prevent your seeing the shot.” To which the General replied, “No, sir,” in a tone which indicated, “I beg you to understand I have been wounded in Mexico, and know all about this kind of thing.” “Fire!” The string was pulled, and out of the touch-hole popped a piece of metal with a little chirrup. “Darn these friction tubes! I prefer the linstock and match,” quoth one of the staff, sotto voce, “but General Pillow will have us use friction tubes made at Memphis, that ar’n’t worth a cuss.” Tube No. 2, however, did explode, but where the ball went no one could say, as the smoke drifted right into our eyes.

The General then moved to the other side of the gun, which was fired a third time, the shot falling short in good line, but without any ricochet. Gun No. 3 was next fired. Off went the ball down the river, but off went the gun, too, and with a frantic leap it jumped, carriage and all, clean off the platform. Nor was it at all wonderful, for the poor old-fashioned chamber carronade had been loaded with a charge and a solid shot heavy enough to make it burst with indignation. Most of us felt relieved when the firing was over, and, for my own part, I would much rather have been close to the target than to the battery.

Slowly winding for some distance up the steep road in a blazing sun, we proceeded through the tents which are scattered in small groups, for health's sake, fifteen and twenty together, on the wooded plateau above the river. The tents are of the small ridge-pole pattern, six men to each, many of whom, from their exposure to the sun, whilst working in these trenches, and from the badness of the water, had already been laid up with illness. As a proof of General Pillow's energy, it is only fair to say he is constructing, on the very summit of the plateau, large cisterns, which will be filled with water from the river by steam power.

The volunteers were mostly engaged at drill in distinct companies, but by order of the General some 700 or 800 of them were formed into line for inspection. Many of these men were in their shirt sleeves, and the awkwardness with which they handled their arms showed that, however good they might be as shots, they were bad hands at manual platoon exercise; but such great strapping fellows, that, as I walked down the ranks there were few whose shoulders were not above the level of my head, excepting here and there a weedy old man or a growing lad: They were armed with old pattern percussion muskets, no two clad alike, many very badly shod, few with knapsacks, but all provided with a tin water-flask and a blanket. These men have been only five weeks enrolled, and were called out by the State of Tennessee, in anticipation of the vote of secession.

I could get no exact details as to the supply of food, but from the Quartermaster-General I heard that each man had from ¾ lb. to 1¼ lb. of meat, and a sufficiency of bread, sugar, coffee, and rice daily; however, these military Olivers “asked for more.” Neither whiskey nor tobacco was served out to them, which to such heavy consumers of both, must prove one source of dissatisfaction. The officers were plain, farmerly planters, merchants, lawyers, and the like — energetic, determined men, but utterly ignorant of the most rudimentary parts of military science. It is this want of knowledge on the part of the officer which renders it so difficult to arrive at a tolerable condition of discipline among volunteers, as the privates are quite well aware they know as much of soldiering as the great majority of their officers.

Having gone down the lines of these motley companies, the General addressed them in a harangue in which he expatiated on their patriotism, on their courage, and the atrocity of the enemy, in an odd farrago of military and political subjects. But the only matter which appeared to interest them much was the announcement that they would be released from work in another day or so, and that negroes would be sent to perform all that was required. This announcement was received with the words, “Bully for us!” and “That's good.” And when General Pillow wound up a florid peroration by assuring them, “When the hour of danger comes I will be with you,” the effect was by no means equal to his expectations. The men did not seem to care much whether General Pillow was with them or not at that eventful moment; and, indeed, all dusty as he was in his plain clothes he did not look very imposing, or give one an idea that he would contribute much to the means of resistance. However, one of the officers called out, “Boys, three cheers for General Pillow.”

What they may do in the North I know not, but certainly the Southern soldiers cannot cheer, and what passes muster for that jubilant sound is a shrill ringing scream with a touch of the Indian war-whoop in it. As these cries ended, a stentorian voice shouted out, “Who cares for General Pillow?” No one answered; whence I inferred the General would not be very popular until the niggers were actually at work in the trenches.

We returned to the steamer, headed up stream, and proceeded onwards for more than an hour, to another landing, protected by a battery, where we disembarked, the General being received by a guard dressed in uniform, who turned out with some appearance of soldierly smartness. On my remarking the difference to the General, he told me the corps encamped at this point was composed of gentlemen planters, and farmers. They had all clad themselves, and consisted of some of the best families in the State of Tennessee.

As we walked down the gangway to the shore, the band on the upper deck struck up, out of compliment to the English element in the party, the unaccustomed strains of “God save the Queen!” and I am not quite sure that the loyalty which induced me to stand in the sun, with uncovered head, till the musicians were good enough to desist, was appreciated. Certainly a gentleman, who asked me why I did so, looked very incredulous, and said “That he could understand it if it had been in a church; but that he would not broil his skull in the sun, not if General Washington was standing just before him.” The General gave orders to exercise the battery at this point, and a working party was told off to firing drill. ’Twas fully six minutes between the giving of the orders and the first gun being ready.

On the word “fire” being given, the gunner pulled the lanyard, but the tube did not explode; a second tube was inserted, but a strong jerk pulled it out without exploding; a third time one of the General's fuses was applied, which gave way to the pull, and was broken in two; a fourth time was more successful — the gun exploded, and the shot fell short and under the mark — in fact, nothing could be worse than the artillery practice which I saw here, and a fleet of vessels coming down the river might, in the present state of the garrisons, escape unhurt.

There are no disparts, tangents, or elevating screws to the gun, which are laid by eye and wooden chocks. I could see no shells in the battery, but was told there were some in the magazine.

Altogether, though Randolph's Point and Fort Pillow afford strong positions, in the present state of the service, and equipment of guns and works, gunboats could run past them without serious loss, and, as the river falls, the fire of the batteries will be even less effective.

On returning to the boats the band struck up “The Marseillaise” and “Dixie's Land.” There are two explanations of the word Dixie — one is that it is the general term for the Slave States, which are, of course, south of Mason and Dixon's line; another, that a planter named Dixie, died long ago, to the intense grief of his animated property. Whether they were ill-treated after he died, and thus had reason to regret his loss, or that they had merely a longing in the abstract after Heaven, no fact known to me can determine; but certain it is that they long much after Dixie, in the land to which his spirit was supposed by them to have departed, and console themselves in their sorrow by clamorous wishes to follow their master, where probably the revered spirit would be much surprised to find himself in their company. The song is the work of the negro melodists of New York.

In the afternoon we returned to Memphis. Here I was obliged to cut short my Southern tour, though I would willingly have stayed, to have seen the most remarkable social and political changes the world has probably ever witnessed. The necessity of my position obliged me to return northwards — unless I could write, there was no use in my being on the spot at all. By this time the Federal fleets have succeeded in closing the ports, if not effectually, so far as to render the carriage of letters precarious, and the route must be at best devious and uncertain.

Mr. Jefferson Davis was, I was assured, prepared to give me every facility at Richmond to enable me to know and to see all that was most interesting in the military and political action of the New Confederacy; but of what use could this knowledge be if I could not communicate it to the journal I served?

I had left the North when it was suffering from a political paralysis, and was in a state of coma in which it appeared conscious of the coming convulsion but unable to avert it. The sole sign of life in the body corporate was some feeble twitching of the limbs at Washington, when the district militia were called out, whilst Mr. Seward descanted on the merits of the Inaugural, and believed that the anger of the South was a short madness, which would be cured by a mild application of philosophical essays.

The politicians, who were urging in the most forcible manner the complete vindication of the rights of the Union, were engaged, when I left them arguing, that the Union had no rights at all as opposed to those of the States. Men who had heard with nods of approval of the ordinance of secession passed by State after State were now shrieking out, “Slay the traitors!”

The printed rags which had been deriding the President as the great “rail-splitter,” and his Cabinet as a collection of ignoble fanatics, were now heading the popular rush, and calling out to the country to support Mr. Lincoln and his Ministry, and were menacing with .war the foreign States which dared to stand neutral in the quarrel. The declaration of Lord John Russell that the Southern Confederacy should have limited belligerent rights had at first created a thrill of exultation in the South, because the politicians believed that in this concession was contained the principle of recognition; while it had stung to fury the people of the North, to whom it seemed the first warning of the coming disunion.

Much, therefore, as I desired to go to Richmond, where I was urged to repair by many considerations, and by the earnest appeals of those around me, I felt it would be impossible, notwithstanding the interest attached to the proceedings there, to perform my duties in a place cut off from all communication with the outer world; and so I decided to proceed to Chicago, and thence to Washington, where the Federals had assembled a large army, with the purpose of marching upon Richmond, in obedience to the cry of nearly every journal of influence in the Northern cities.

My resolution was mainly formed in consequence of the intelligence which was communicated to me at Memphis, and I told General Pillow that I would continue my journey to Cairo, in order to get within the Federal lines. As the river was blockaded, the only means of doing so was to proceed by rail to Columbus, and thence to take a steamer to the Federal position; and so, whilst the General was continuing his inspection, I rode to the telegraph office, in one of the camps, to order my luggage to be prepared for departure as soon as I arrived, and thence went on board the steamer, where I sat down in the cabin to write my last despatch from Dixie.

So far I had certainly no reason to agree with Mr. Seward in thinking this rebellion was the result of a localized energetic action on the part of a fierce minority in the seceding States, and that there was in each a large, if inert, mass opposed to secession, which would rally round the Stars and Stripes the instant they were displayed in their sight. On the contrary, I met everywhere with but one feeling, with exceptions which proved its unanimity and its force. To a man the people went with their States, and had but one battle cry, “States’ rights, and death to those who make war against them!”

Day after day I had seen this feeling intensified by the accounts which came from the North of a fixed determination to maintain the war; and day after day I am bound to add, fine impression on my mind was strengthened that “States’ rights” meant protection to slavery, extension of slave territory, and free-trade in slave produce with the outer world; nor was it any argument against the conclusion that the popular passion gave vent to the most vehement outcries against Yankees, abolitionists, German mercenaries, and modern invasion. I was fully satisfied in my mind also that the population of the South, who had taken up arms, were so convinced of the righteousness of their cause, and so competent to vindicate it, that they would fight with the utmost energy and valor in its defence and successful establishment.

The saloon in which I was sitting afforded abundant evidence of the vigor with which the South are entering upon the contest. Men of every variety and condition of life had taken up arms against the cursed Yankee and the Black Republican — there was not a man there who would not have given his life for the rare pleasure of striking Mr. Lincoln's head off his shoulders, and yet to a cold European the scene was almost ludicrous.

Along the covered deck lay tall Tennesseans, asleep, whose plumed felt hats were generally the only indications of their martial calling, for few indeed had any other signs of uniform, except the rare volunteers, who wore stripes of red and yellow cloth on their trousers, or leaden buttons, and discolored worsted braid and facings on their jackets. The afterpart of the saloon deck was appropriated to General Pillow, his staff, and officers. The approach to it was guarded by a sentry, a tall, good-looking young fellow in a gray flannel shirt, gray trousers, fastened with a belt and a brass buckle, inscribed U. S., which came from some plundered Federal arsenal, and a black wide-awake hat, decorated with a green plume. His Enfield rifle lay beside him on the deck, and, with great interest expressed on his face, he leant forward in his rocking-chair to watch the varying features of a party squatted on the floor, who were employed in the national game of “Euchre.” As he raised his eyes to examine the condition of the cigar he was smoking, he caught sight of me, and by the simple expedient of holding his leg across my chest, and calling out, "Hallo! where are you going to?" brought me to a standstill — whilst his captain who was one of the happy euchreists, exclaimed, “Now, Sam, you let nobody go in there.”

I was obliged to explain who I was, whereupon the sentry started to his feet, and said, “Oh! indeed, you are Russell that's been in that war with the Rooshians. Well, I'm very much pleased to know you. I shall be off sentry in a few minutes; I'll just ask you to tell me something about that fighting.” He held out his hand, and shook mine warmly as he spoke. There was not the smallest intention to offend in his manner; but, sitting down again, he nodded to the captain, and said, “It's all right; it's Pillow's friend — that's Russell of the London ‘Times.’” The game of euchre was continued — and indeed it had been perhaps all night — for my last recollection on looking out of my cabin was of a number of people playing cards on the floor and on the tables all down the saloon, and of shouts of “Eu-kerr!” “Ten dollars, you don't!” “I'll lay twenty on this!” and so on; and with breakfast the sport seemed to be fully revived.

There would have been much more animation in the game, no doubt, had the bar on board the Ingomar been opened; but the intelligent gentleman who presided inside had been restricted by General Pillow in his avocations; and when numerous thirsty souls from the camps came on board, with dry tongues and husky voices, and asked for “mint-juleps,” “brandy smashes,” or “whiskey cocktails,” he seemed to take a saturnine pleasure by saying, “The General won't allow no spirit on board, but I can give you a nice drink of Pillow's own iced Mississippi water,” an announcement which generally caused infinite disgust and some unhandsome wishes respecting the General's future happiness.

By and by, a number of sick men were brought down on litters, and placed here and there along the deck. As there was a considerable misunderstanding between the civilian and military doctors, it appeared to be understood that the best way of arranging it was not to attend to the sick at all, and unfortunate men suffering from fever and dysentery were left to roll and groan, and lie on their stretchers, without a soul to help them. I had a medicine chest on board, and I ventured to use the lessons of my experience in such matters, administered my quinine, James's Powder, calomel, and opium, secundum meam artem, and nothing could be more grateful than the poor fellows were for the smallest mark of attention. “Stranger, remember, if I die,” gasped one great fellow, attenuated to a skeleton by dysentery, “That I am Robert Tallon, of Tishimingo county, and that I died for States' rights; see, now, they put that in the papers, won't you? Robert Tallon died for States’ rights,” and so he turned round on his blanket.

Presently the General came on board, and the Ingomar proceeded on her way back to Memphis. General Clarke, to whom I mentioned the great neglect from which the soldiers were suffering, told me he was afraid the men had no medical attendance in camp. All the doctors, in fact, wanted to fight, and as they were educated men, and generally connected with respectable families, or had political influence in the State, they aspired to be colonels at the very least, and to wield the sword instead of the scalpel.

Next to the medical department, the commissariat and transport were most deficient; but by constant courts-martial, stoppages of .pay, and severe sentences, he hoped these evils would be eventually somewhat mitigated. As one who had received a regular military education, General Clarke was probably shocked by volunteer irregularities; and in such matters as guard-mounting, reliefs, patrols, and picket duties, he declared they were enough to break one's heart; but I was astonished to hear from him that the Germans were by far the worst of the five thousand troops under his command, of whom they formed more than a fifth.

Whilst we were conversing, the captain of the steamer invited us to come up into his cabin on the upper deck; and as railway conductors, steamboat captains, bar-keepers, hotel clerks, and telegraph officers are among the natural aristocracy of the land, we could not disobey the invitation, which led to the consumption of some of the captain’s private stores, and many warm professions of political faith.

The captain told me it was rough work aboard sometimes, with “sports” and chaps of that kind; but “God bless you!” said he, “the river now is not what it used to be a few years ago, when we'd have three or four difficulties of an afternoon, and maybe now and then a regular free fight all up and down the decks, that would last a couple of hours, so that when we came to a town we would have to send for all the doctors twenty miles round, and maybe some of them would die in spite of that. It was the rowdies used to get these fights up; but we've put them pretty well down. The citizens have hunted thom out, and they's gone away west” “Well, then, captain, one's life was not very safe on board sometimes.” “Safe! Lord bless you!” said the captain; “if you did not meddle, just as safe as you are now, if the boiler don't collapse. You must, in course, know how to handle your weepins, and be pretty spry in taking your own part.” “Ho, you Bill!” to his colored servant, “open that clothes-press.” “Now, here,” he continued, “is how I travel; so that I am always easy in my mind in case of trouble on board.” Putting his hand under the pillow of the bed close beside him, he pulled out a formidable looking double-barrelled pistol at half-cock, with the caps upon it. “That's as purty a pistol as Derringer ever made. I've got the brace of them — here's the other;” and with that he whipped out pistol No. 2, in an equal state of forwardness, from a little shelf over his bed; and then going over to the clothes-press, he said, “Here's a real old Kentuck, one of the old sort, as light on the trigger as gossamer, and sure as deeth. Why, law bless me, a child would cut a turkey's head off with it at a hundred yards.” This was a huge lump of iron, about five feet long with a small hole bored down the centre, fitted in a coarse German-fashioned stock. “But,” continued he, “this is my main dependence; here is a regular beauty, a first-rate, with ball or buckshot, or whatever you like — made in London. I gave two hundred dollars for it; and it is so short and handy, and straight shooting, I'd just as soon part with my life as let it go to anybody;” and, with a glow of pride in his face, the captain handed round again a very short double-barrelled gun, of some eleven or twelve bore, with back-action locks, and an audacious “Joseph Manton, London,” stamped on the plate. The manner of the man was perfectly simple and bonâ fide; very much as if Inspector Podger were revealing to a simpleton the mode by which the London police managed refractory characters in the station-house.

From such matters as these I was diverted by the more serious subject of the attitude taken by England in this quarrel. The concession of belligerent rights was, I found, misunderstood, and was considered as an admission that the Southern States had established their independence before they had done more than declare their intention to fight for it.

It is not within my power to determine whether the North is as unfair to Great Britain as the South; but I fear the history of the people, and the tendency of their institutions, are adverse to any hope of fair-play and justice to the old country. And yet it is the only power in Europe for the good opinion of which they really seem to care. Let any French, Austrian, or Russian journal write what it pleases of the United States, it is received with indifferent criticism or callous head-shaking. But let a London paper speak, and the whole American press is delighted or furious.

The political sentiment quite overrides all other feelings; and it is the only symptom statesmen should care about, as it guides the policy of the country. If a man can put faith in the influence for peace of common interests, of common origin, common intentions, with the spectacle of this incipient war before his eyes, he must be incapable of appreciating the consequences which follow from man being an animal. A war between England and the United States would be unnatural; but it would not be nearly so unnatural now as it was when it was actually waged in 1776 between people who were barely separated from each other by a single generation; or in 1812-14, when the foreign immigration had done comparatively little to dilute the Anglo-Saxon blood. The Norman of Hampshire and Sussex did not care much for the ties of consanguinity and race when he followed his lord in fee to ravage Guienne or Brittany.

The general result of my intercourse with Americans is to produce the notion that they consider Great Britain in a state of corruption and decay, and eagerly seek to exalt France at her expense. Their language is the sole link between England and the United States, and it only binds the England of 1770 to the American of 1860.

There is scarcely an American on either side of Mason, and Dixon's line who does not religiously believe that the colonies, alone and single-handed, encountered the whole undivided force of Great Britain in the Revolution, and defeated it. I mean, of course, the vast mass of the people; and I do not think there is an orator or a writer who would venture to tell them the truth on the subject. Again, they firmly believe that their petty frigate engagements established as complete a naval ascendency over Great Britain as the latter obtained by her great encounters with the fleets of France and Spain. Their reverses, defeats and headlong routs in the first war, their reverses in the second, are covered over by a huge Buncombe plaster, made up of Bunker's Hill, Plattsburg, Baltimore, and New Orleans.

Their delusions are increased and solidified by the extraordinary text-books of so-called history, and by the feasts and festivals and celebrations of their every-day political life, in all of which we pass through imaginary Caudine Forks; and they entertain towards the old country at best very much the feeling which a high-spirited young man would feel towards the guardian who, when he had come of age, and was free from all control, sought to restrain the passions of his early life.

Now I could not refuse to believe that in New Orleans, Montgomery, Mobile, Jackson, and Memphis there is a reckless and violent condition of society, unfavorable to civilization, and but little hopeful for the future. The most absolute and despotic rule, under which a man's life and property are safe, is better than the largest measure of democratic freedom, which deprives the freeman of any security for either. The state of legal protection for the most serious interests of man, considered as a civilized and social creature, which prevails in America, could not be tolerated for an instant, and would generate a revolution in the worst governed country in Europe. I would much sooner, as the accidental victim of a generally disorganized police, be plundered by a chance diligence robber in Mexico, or have a fair fight with a Greek Klepht, suffer from Italian banditti, or be garrotted by a London ticket-of-leave man, than be bowie-knived or revolvered in consequence of a political or personal difference with a man, who is certain not in the least degree to suffer from an accidental success in his argument.

On our return to the hotel I dined with the General and his staff at the public table, where there was a large assemblage of military men, Southern ladies, their families, and contractors. This latter race has risen up as if by magic, to meet the wants of the new Confederacy; and it is significant to measure the amount of the dependence on Northern manufacturers by the advertisements in the Southern journals, indicating the creation of new branches of workmanship, mechanical science, and manufacturing skill.

Hitherto they have been dependent on the North for the very necessaries of their industrial life. These States were so intent on gathering in money for their produce, expending it luxuriously, and paying it out for Northern labor, that they found themselves suddenly in the condition of a child brought up by hand, whose nurse and mother have left it on the steps of the poor-house. But they have certainly essayed to remedy the evil and are endeavoring to make steam-engines, gunpowder, lamps, clothes, boots, railway carriages, steel springs, glass, and all the smaller articles for which even Southern households find a necessity.

The peculiar character of this contest develops itself in a manner almost incomprehensible to a stranger who has been accustomed to regard the United States as a nation. Here is General Pillow, for example, in the State of Tennessee, commanding the forces of the State, which, in effect, belongs to the Southern Confederacy; but he tells me that he cannot venture to move across a certain geographical line, dividing Tennessee from Kentucky, because the State of Kentucky, in the exercise of its sovereign powers and rights, which the Southern States are bound specially to respect, in virtue of their championship of States' rights, has, like the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, declared it will be neutral in the struggle; and Beriah Magoffin, Governor of the aforesaid State, has warned off Federal and Confederate troops from his territory.

General Pillow is particularly indignant with the cowardice of the well-known Secessionists of Kentucky; but I think he is rather more annoyed by the accumulation of Federal troops at Cairo, and their recent expedition to Columbus on the Kentucky shore, a little below them, where they seized a Confederate flag.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 309-21

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Wednesday, June 25, 1862

Ditto, Ditto. — Dined with General Cox. He has a plan of operations for the Government forces which I like: To hold the railroad from Memphis through Huntsville, Chattanooga, Knoxville [and] southwest Virginia to Richmond; not attempt movements south of this except by water until after the hot and sickly season. This line is distant from the enemy's base of supplies; can therefore by activity be defended, and gives us a good base.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 293

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Monday, June 9, 1862

Flat Top Mountain. — Still cold weather. . . . Heard of the taking of Memphis after a battle of gunboats lasting an hour and twenty minutes. As reported it was a brilliant victory.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 288

Diary of 2nd Lieutenant John S. Morgan: Wednesday, February 15, 1865

Start at 2 A. M. Rowena passed us in the night. touched at St Charles at 8. A. M. negro Regt. there & fortifications landed at mouth of White river at 1. P. M. & camped ½ mile from river at 2 P. M. carried all our water from the river 126th Ill & detachment of 1st Ind Cav garrison this Post under comd of Genl ——. Liu Wm Wallace arrives from Pine Bluffs with F. L & K cos of 1st Iowa Cav enroute for Memphis. Some 6 or 8 boats here Weather Pleasant.

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, 33rd Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 13, No. 8, April 1923, p. 574

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Thursday, June 5, 1862

Flat Top Mountain. — Rained most of the day. Want of exercise these rainy days begets indigestion, indigestion begets headache, blue devils, ill nature, sinister views, and general disgust. Brightened up a little by news that General Pope has taken ten thousand men and fifteen thousand stand of arms from Beauregard's retreating army. It looks as if Beauregard's army was breaking up. Later. News of the taking of Memphis and Fort Pillow.

General Cox read me a letter from General Garfield in which he speaks of the want of sympathy among army officers with the cause of the war; that they say Seward, Chase, and Sumner are more to blame than Davis and Toombs! General Sherman said he was “ashamed to acknowledge that he had a brother (Senator John Sherman) who was one of these damned Black Republicans”!

These semi-traitors must be watched. — Let us be careful who become army leaders in the reorganized army at the end of the Rebellion. The man who thinks that the perpetuity of slavery is essential to the existence of the Union, is unfit to be trusted. The deadliest enemy the Union has is slavery — in fact, its only enemy.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 286

Diary of 2nd Lieutenant John S. Morgan: Thursday, February 9, 1865

Cool & raw today. a. m. spent running about. Called to see Charlie who is mending rapidly. Cory pretty sick H. Bowman back to the Co. Genl. Car relieved from the command of the Detached Brigade & Genl Veach late comdg at Memphis assigned to comd the Brigade The 29th Iowa left at 6.30 A. M. on the cars. P. M. drew & issued clothing. Boxing up surplus clothing to ship to Keokuck Subject to the order of Co commanders. Evening cool

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, 33rd Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 13, No. 8, April 1923, p. 573

Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, January 10, 1863

The President sent for Stanton and myself; wished us to consult and do what we could for the employment of the contrabands, and as the Rebels threatened to kill all caught with arms in their hands, to employ them where they would not be liable to be captured. On the ships he thought they were well cared for, and suggested to Stanton that they could perform garrison duty at Memphis, Columbus, and other places and let the soldiers go on more active service.

Covode called at my house this evening and wanted the President's card. Said he was likely to get into difficulty and wished his name not to be used in the matter of removing the Navy Agent which he had urged. Would himself see Chambers and advise him what to do. He expects, he says, to be candidate for Governor of Pennsylvania. Covode is shrewd but illiterate, a match and more than a match for men of higher culture, reputation, and acquirements; but I hardly think his gubernatorial expectations will be realized, though they sometimes take strange material for Governor in Pennsylvania.

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The great problem which is being solved in these days seems to be scarcely realized by our public, and really great, men. It is sad to witness in this period of calamity, when the nation is struggling for existence, and the cause of good government and civil liberty is at stake, the spirit of party overpowering patriotism. The Governors in several of the States have presented their messages during the week. Tod of Ohio exhibits a manly, wholesome, and vigorous tone, others also do well, but the jesuitical and heartless insincerity of Seymour of New York is devoid of true patriotism, weak in statesmanship, and a discredit to the position he occupies. Unhallowed partisan and personal aspirations are moving springs with him. That such a man, at such a time, should have been elected to such a place does no credit to popular intelligence or to public virtue. When Seward, himself, I think, rightly disposed, acquiesced in the debased partisanship of his friend Weed, who in spite wanted Wadsworth, the gallant and patriotic citizen, defeated, he committed a fatal error.

In the insurgent States patriotism seems extinguished, the flag and country are hated. There is great suffering on the part of the people from all the direful calamities which war can bring, yet there is no evidence of returning sense or affection for that union which conferred upon them happiness and prosperity. Greater calamities, greater suffering, must be endured.

Some things have taken place which will undoubtedly for a time exasperate the Southern mind, for they will affect Southern society, habits, labor, and pursuits. For a period emancipation will aggravate existing differences, and a full generation will be necessary to effect and complete the change which has been commenced.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 218-20

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: December 27, 1862

The successes in the West have been confirmed. Morgan captured 2000 and Van Dorn 1500 prisoners at Holly Springs. They likewise destroyed a large amount of stores.

We have intelligence of a great armament, under Gen. Sherman, sailing from Memphis against Vicksburg. At the last accounts the President was at Vicksburg; and he may be witness of this decisive struggle for the possession of the Mississippi River, the result of which involves immense interests. We await with much anxiety the issue of the naval operations during the ensuing month. We are content with the land achievements of this year; and if we should be equally successful in resisting the enemy's fleets, we shall deem ourselves fortunate indeed.

The agents of the Commissary and Quartermaster-General make grievous complaints against Lieut.-Gen. Pemberton, at Grenada, Mississippi; they say he interferes with their arrangements to procure supplies — for cotton; and it is intimated that he has some little arrangements of his own of that nature. This illicit trade is very demoralizing in its nature.

Oh, that peace would return! But with Independence!

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 225

Diary of William Howard Russell: June 17, 1861

If it was any consolation to me that the very noisy and very turbulent warriors of last night were exceedingly sick, dejected, and crestfallen this morning, I had it to the full. Their cries for water were incessant to allay the internal fires caused by “forty-rod” and “sixty-rod,” as whiskey is called, which is supposed to kill people at those distances. Their officers had no control over them — and the only authority they seemed to respect was that of the " gentlemanly" conductor, whom they were accustomed to fear individually, as he is a great man in America and has much authority and power to make himself disagreeable if he likes.

The victory at Big or Little Bethel has greatly elated these men, and they think they can walk all over the Northern States. It was a relief to get out of the train for a few minutes at a station called Holly Springs, where the passengers breakfasted at a dirty table on most execrable coffee, corn bread, rancid butter, and very dubious meats, and the wild soldiers outside made the most of their time, as they had recovered from their temporary depression by this time, and got out on the tops of the carriages, over which they performed tumultuous dances to the music of their band, and the great admiration of the surrounding negrodom. Their demeanor is very unlike that of the unexcitable staid people of the North.

There were in the train some Texans who were going to Richmond to offer their services to Mr. Davis. They denounced Sam Houston as a traitor, but admitted there were some Unionists, or, as they termed them, Lincolnite skunks, in the State. The real object of their journey was, in my mind, to get assistance from the Southern Confederacy, to put down their enemies in Texas.

In order to conceal from the minds of the people that the government at Washington claims to be that of the United States, the press politicians and speakers divert their attention to the names of Lincoln, Seward, and other black republicans, and class the whole of the North together as the Abolitionists. They call the Federal levies “Lincoln's mercenaries” and “abolition hordes,” though their own troops are paid at the same rate as those of the United States, This is a common mode of procedure in revolutions and rebellions, and is not unfrequent in wars.

The enthusiasm for the Southern cause among all the people is most remarkable, — the sight of the flag waving from the carriage windows drew all the population of the hamlets and the workers in the field, black and white, to the side of the carriages to cheer for Jeff Davis and the Southern Confederacy, and to wave whatever they could lay hold of in the air. The country seems very poorly cultivated, the fields full of stumps of trees, and the plantation houses very indifferent. At every station more “soldiers,” as they are called, got in, till the smell and heat were suffocating.

These men were as fanciful in their names and dress as could be. In the train which preceded us there was a band of volunteers armed with rifled pistols and enormous bowie-knifes, who called themselves “The Toothpick Company.” They carried along with them a coffin, with a plate inscribed, “Abe Lincoln, died ——,” and declared they were “bound” to bring his body back in it, and that they did not intend to use muskets or rifles, but just go in with knife and six-shooter, and whip the Yankees straight away. How astonished they will be when the first round shot flies into them, or a cap-full of grape rattles about their bowie-knives.

At the station of Grand Junction, north of Holly Springs, which latter is 210 miles north of Jackson, several hundreds of our warrior friends were turned out in order to take the train north-westward for Richmond, Virginia. The 1st Company, seventy rank and file, consisted of Irishmen, armed with sporting rifles without bayonets. Five sixths of the 2d Company, who were armed with muskets, were of the same nationality. The 3d Company were all Americans. The 4th Company were almost all Irish. Some were in green, others were in gray, — the Americans who were in blue had not yet received their arms. When the word fix bayonets was given by the officer, a smart keen-looking man, there was an astonishishing hurry and tumult in the ranks.

“Now then, Sweeny, whar are yes dhriven me too? Is it out of the redjmint amongst the officers yer shovin' me?”

“Sullivan, don't ye hear we're to fix beenits?”

“Sarjent, jewel, wud yes ayse the shtrap of me baynit?”

“If ye prod me wid that agin, I'll let dayloite into ye.”

The officer, reading, “No. 23. James Phelan.”

No reply.

Officer again, “No. 23. James Phelan.”

Voice from the rank, “Shure, captain, and faix Phelan's gone; he wint at the last depôt.”

“No. 40. Miles Corrigan.”

Voice further on, “He's the worse for dhrink in the cars, yer honor, and says he'll shoot us if we touch him;” and so on.

But these fellows were, nevertheless, the material for fighting and for marching after proper drill and with good officers, even though there was too large a proportion of old men and young lads in the ranks. To judge from their dress these recruits came from the laboring and poorest classes of whites. The officers affected a French cut and bearing with indifferent success, and in the luggage vans there were three foolish young women with slop-dress imitation clothes of the Vivandière type, who, with dishevelled hair, dirty faces, and dusty hats and jackets, looked sad, sorry, and absurd. Their notions of propriety did not justify them in adopting straps, boots, and trousers, and the rest of the tawdry ill-made costume looked very bad indeed.

The train which still bore a large number of soldiers for the camp of Corinth, proceeded through dreary swamps, stunted forests, and clearings of the rudest kind at very long intervals. We had got out of the cotton district and were entering poorer soil, or land which, when cleared, was devoted to wheat and corn, and I was told that the crops ran from forty to sixty bushels to the acre. A more uninteresting country than this portion of the State of Mississippi I have never witnessed. There was some variety of scenery about Holly Springs where undulating ground covered with wood, diversified the aspect of the flat, but since that we have been travelling through mile after mile of insignificantly grown timber and swamps.

On approaching Memphis the line ascends towards the bluff of the Mississippi, and farms of a better appearance come in sight on the side of the rail; but after all I do not envy the fate of the man who, surrounded by slaves and shut out from the world, has to pass his life in this dismal region, be the crops never so good.

At a station where a stone pillar marks the limit between the sovereign State of Mississippi and that of Tennessee, there was a house two stories high, from the windows of which a number of negro girls and young men were staring on the passengers. Some of them smiled, laughed, and chatted, but the majority of them looked gloomy and sad enough. They were packed as close as they could, and I observed that at the door a very ruffianly looking fellow in a straw hat, long straight hair, flannel shirt, and slippers, was standing with his legs across and a heavy whip in his hand. One of the passengers walked over and chatted to him. They looked in and up at the negroes and laughed, and when the man came near the carriage in which I sat, a friend called out, “Whose are they, Sam?” “He's a dealer at Jackson, Mr. Smith. They're a prime lot of fine Virginny niggers as I've seen this long time, and he wants to realize, for the news looks so bad.”   

It was 1:40 P. M. when the train arrived at Memphis. I was speedily on my way to the Gayoso House, so called after an old Spanish ruler of the district, which is situated in the street on the bluff, which runs parallel with the course of the Mississippi. This resuscitated Egyptian city is a place of importance, and extends for several miles along the high bank of the river, though it does not run very far back. The streets are at right angles to the principal thoroughfares, which are parallel to the stream; and I by no means expected to see the lofty stores, warehouses, rows of shops, and handsome buildings on the broad esplanade along the river, and the extent and size of the edifices public and private in this city, which is one of the developments of trade and commerce created by the Mississippi. Memphis contains nearly 30,000 inhabitants, but many of them are foreigners, and there is a nomad draft into and out of the place, which abounds in haunts for Bohemians, drinking and dancing-saloons, and gaming-rooms. And this strange kaleidoscope of negroes and whites of the extremes of civilization in its American development, and of the semi-savage degraded by his contact with the white; of enormous steamers on the river, which bears equally the dug-out or canoe of the black fisherman; the rail, penetrating the inmost recesses of swamps, which on either side of it remain no doubt in the same state as they were centuries ago; the roll of heavily-laden wagons through the streets; the rattle of omnibuses and all the phenomena of active commercial life before our eyes, included in the same scope of vision which takes in at the other side of the Mississippi lands scarcely yet settled, though the march of empire has gone thousands of miles beyond them, amuses but perplexes the traveller in this new land.

The evening was so exceedingly warm that I was glad to remain within the walls of my darkened bedroom. All the six hundred and odd guests whom the Gayoso House is said to accommodate were apparently in the passage at one time. At present it is the head-quarters of General Gideon J. Pillow, who is charged with the defences of the Tennessee side of the river, and commands a considerable body of troops around the city and in the works above. The house is consequently filled with men in uniform, belonging to the General's staff or the various regiments of Tennessee troops.

The Governors and the Legislatures of the States view with dislike every action on the part of Mr. Davis which tends to form the State troops into a national army. At first, indeed, the doctrine prevailed that troops could not be sent beyond the limits of the State in which they were raised — then it was argued that they ought not to be called upon to move outside their borders; and I have heard people in the South inveighing against the sloth and want of spirit of the Virginians, who allowed their State to be invaded without resisting the enemy. Such complaints were met by the remark that all the Northern States had combined to pour their troops into Virginia, and that her sister States ought in honor to protect her. Finally, the martial enthusiasm of the Southern regiments impelled them to press forward to the frontier, and by delicate management, and the perfect knowledge of his countrymen which Mr. Jefferson Davis possesses, he is now enabled to amalgamate in some sort the diverse individualities of his regiments into something like a national army.

On hearing of my arrival, General Pillow sent his aide-decamp to inform me that he was about starting in a steamer up the river, to make an inspection of the works and garrison at Fort Randolph and at other points where batteries had been erected to command the stream, supported by large levies of Tennesseans. The aide-de-camp conducted me to the General, whom I found in his bedroom, fitted up as an office, littered with plans and papers. Before the Mexican War General Pillow was a flourishing solicitor, connected in business with President Polk, and commanding so much influence that when the expedition was formed he received the nomination of brigadier-general of volunteers. He served with distinction and was severely wounded at the battle of Chapultepec and at the conclusion of the campaign he retired into civil life, and was engaged directing the work of his plantation till this great rebellion summoned him once more to the field.

Of course there is, and must be, always an inclination to deride these volunteer officers on the part of regular soldiers; and I was informed by one of the officers in attendance on the General that he had made himself ludicrously celebrated in Mexico for having undertaken to throw up a battery which, when completed, was found to face the wrong way, so that the guns were exposed to the enemy. General Pillow is a small, compact, clear-complexioned man, with short gray whiskers, cut in the English fashion, a quick eye, and a pompous manner of speech; and I had not been long in his company before I heard of Chapultepec and his wound, which causes him to limp a little in his walk, and gives him inconvenience in the saddle. He wore a round black hat, plain blue frock-coat, dark trousers, and brass spurs on his boots; but no sign of military rank. The General ordered carriages to the door, and we went to see the batteries on the bluff or front of the esplanade, which are intended to check any ship attempting to pass down the river from Cairo, where the Federals under General Prentiss have entrenched themselves, and are understood to meditate an expedition against the city. A parapet of cotton bales, covered with tarpaulin, has been erected close to the edge of the bank of earth, which rises to heights varying from 60 to 150 feet almost perpendicularly from the waters of the Mississippi, with zigzag roads running down through it to the landing-places. This parapet could offer no cover against vertical fire, and is so placed that well-directed shell into the bank below it would tumble it all into the water. The zigzag roads are barricaded with weak planks, which would be shivered to pieces by boat-guns; and the assaulting parties could easily mount through these covered ways to the rear of the parapet, and up to the very centre of the esplanade.

The blockade of the river at this point is complete; not a boat is permitted to pass either up or down. At the extremity of the esplanade, on an angle of the bank, an earthen battery, mounted with six heavy guns, has been thrown up, which has a fine command of the river; and the General informed me he intends to mount sixteen guns in addition, on a prolongation of the face of the same work.

The inspection over, we drove down a steep road to the water beneath, where the Ingomar, a large river steamer, now chartered for the service of the State of Tennessee, was lying to receive us. The vessel was crowded with troops — all volunteers, of course — about to join those in camp. Great as were their numbers, the proportion of the officers was inordinately large, and the rank of the greater number preposterously high. It seemed to me as if I was introduced to a battalion of colonels, and that I was not permitted to pierce to any lower strata of military rank. I counted seventeen colonels, and believe the number was not then exhausted.

General Clarke, of Mississippi, who had come over from the camp at Corinth, was on board, and I had the pleasure of making his acquaintance. He spoke with sense and firmness of the present troubles, and dealt with the political difficulties in a tone of moderation which bespoke a gentleman and a man of education and thought. He also had served in the Mexican war, and had the air and manner of a soldier. With all his quietness of tone, there was not the smallest disposition to be traced in his words to retire from the present contest, or to consent to a reunion with the United States under any circumstances whatever. Another general, of a very different type, was among our passengers, — a .dirty-faced, frightened-looking young man, of some twenty-three or twenty-four years of age, redolent of tobacco, his chin and shirt slavered by its foul juices, dressed in a green cutaway coat, white jean trousers, strapped under a pair of prunella slippers, in which he promenaded the deck in an Agag-like manner, which gave rise to a suspicion of bunions or corns. This strange figure was topped by a tremendous black felt sombrero, looped up at one side by a gilt eagle, in which was stuck a plume of ostrich feathers, and from the other side dangled a heavy gold tassel. This decrepit young warrior's name was Ruggles or Struggles, who came from Arkansas, where he passed, I was informed, for “quite a leading citizen.”

Our voyage as we steamed up the river afforded no novelty, nor any physical difference worthy of remark, to contrast it with the lower portions of the stream, except that upon our right-hand side, which is, in effect, the left bank, there are ranges of exceedingly high bluffs, some parallel with and others at right angles to the course of the stream. The river is of the same pea-soup color with the same masses of leaves, decaying vegetation, stumps of trees, forming small floating islands, or giant cotton-tree, pines, and balks of timber whirling down the current. Our progress was slow; nor did I regret the captain's caution, as there must have been fully nine hundred persons on board; and although there is but little danger of being snagged in the present condition of the river, we encountered now and then a trunk of a tree, which struck against the bows with force enough to make the vessel quiver from stem to stern. I was furnished with a small berth, to which I retired at midnight, just as the Ingomar was brought to at the Chickasaw Bluffs, above which lies Camp Randolph.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 302-8

Diary of William Howard Russell: June 16, 1861

I was compelled to send my excuses to Governor Pettus, and remained quietly within the house of my host, entreating him to protect me from visitors and especially my own confreres, that I might secure a few hours even in that ardent heat to write letters to home. Now, there is some self-denial required, if one be at all solicitous of the popularis aura, to offend the susceptibilities of the irritable genus in America. It may make all the difference between millions of people hearing and believing you are a high-toned, whole souled gentleman or a wretched, ignorant and prejudiced John Bull; but, nevertheless, the solid pudding of self-content and the satisfaction of doing one's work are preferable to the praise even of a New York newspaper editor.

When my work was over I walked out and sat in the shade with a gentleman whose talk turned upon the practices of the Mississippi duello. Without the smallest animus, and in the most natural way in the world, he told us tale after tale of blood, and recounted terrible tragedies enacted outside bars of hotels and in the public streets close beside us. The very air seemed to become purple as he spoke, the land around a veritable “Aceldama.” There may, indeed, be security for property, but there is none for the life of its owner in difficulties, who may be shot by a stray bullet from a pistol as he walks up the street.

I learned many valuable facts. I was warned, for example, against the impolicy of trusting to small-bored pistols or to pocket six-shooters in case of a close fight, because suppose you hit your man mortally he may still run in upon you and rip you up with a bowie-knife before he falls dead; whereas if you drive a good heavy bullet into him, or make a hole in him with a “Derringer” ball, he gets faintish and drops at once.

Many illustrations, too, were given of the value of practical lessons of this sort. One particularly struck me. If a gentleman with whom you are engaged in altercation moves his hand towards his breeches pocket, or behind his back, you must smash him or shoot him at once, for he is either going to draw his six-shooter, to pull out a bowie-knife, or to shoot you through the lining of his pocket. The latter practice is considered rather ungentlemanly, but it has somewhat been more honored lately in the observance than in the breach. In fact, the savage practice of walking about with pistols, knives, and poniards, in bar-rooms and gambling-saloons, with passions ungoverned, because there is no law to punish the deeds to which they lead, affords facilities for crime which an uncivilized condition of society leaves too often without punishment, but which must be put down or the country in which it is tolerated will become as barbarous as a jungle inhabited by wild beasts.

Our host gave me an early dinner, at which I met some of the citizens of Jackson, and at six o'clock I proceeded by the train for Memphis. The carriages were, of course, full of soldiers or volunteers, bound for a large camp at a place called Corinth, who made night hideous by their song and cries, stimulated by enormous draughts of whiskey and a proportionate consumption of tobacco, by teeth and by fire. The heat in the carriages added to the discomforts arising from these causes, and from great quantities of biting insects in the sleeping places. The people have all the air and manners of settlers. Altogether the impression produced on my mind was by no means agreeable, and I felt as if I was indeed in the land of Lynch-law and bowie-knives, where the passions of men have not yet been subordinated to the influence of the tribunals of justice. Much of this feeling has no doubt been produced by the tales to which I have been listening around me — most of which have a smack of manslaughter about them.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 300-1

Diary of 4th Sergeant John S. Morgan: Thursday, October 1, 1863

Return to the co. Detail from our regt to guard prisonors to Memphis—

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, 33rd Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 13, No. 7, January 1923, p. 498

Major Wilder Dwight, May 6, 1862

in Bivouac Massanatan Pass, Opposite New Market,

May 6, 1862.

A word with you in the rough confusion of our mountain bivouac.

Sunday last I should have written, but being a little out of sorts, put it off. In the afternoon we had an alarm, the long roll beaten, and marched toward the front. The regiment spent the night by the roadside. At three, A. M., started for New Market, in retreat. Marched all day in oppressive heat and dust, delayed by baggage-trains and batteries. Got into camp at eight, P. M. 1 was busy posting grand guards and outposts till eleven. At twelve, another alarm, and we marched again, foot-sore, hungry, weary, in the dark, over the mountain pass. You should have seen the sunrise from the head of the pass. To-day we rest. We found the alarm a false one, owing to the stupidity of General of Shields's division. Our work has been awful and useless utterly. My soul is aweary — so, indeed, is my body.

I could prose you a long story of our experiences; but to what good?

I am well now. We bivouac again to-night. The scenery is glorious, the weather fine. I have two letters from you since I wrote.

As to ——'s secession friend, let him alone. Colonels Corcoran and Wilcox are still in captivity; so is Botts and the Governor of North Carolina. Smooth no pillows for traitors.

Love to all. I am glad to hear such good news of Charley. I hope William is now lucky. Memphis will fall before you get this. Hurrah!

SOURCE: Elizabeth Amelia Dwight, Editor, Life and Letters of Wilder Dwight: Lieut.-Col. Second Mass. Inf. Vols., p. 243-4

Diary of 4th Sergeant John S. Morgan: Monday, July 6, 1863

Very tired. Jake died 1.30 A M. 117 Ill. 5th Kansas cav. out on scout brought in 100 prisonors. afternoon 117 Ill. go to Memphis.

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, 33rd Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 13, No. 7, January 1923, p. 492

Diary of 4th Sergeant John S. Morgan: Friday May 15, 1863

No news from below or from the Eastern div. Some talk of us going up the river to Memphis

SOURCE: “Diary of John S. Morgan, Company G, 33rd Iowa Infantry,” Annals of Iowa, 3rd Series, Vol. 13, No. 7, January 1923, p. 489

Diary of Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Friday, April 11, 1862

Clear and cold. Bet with Avery that five men could not put a great log across Piney. Rode out to see the work. The pine log was water-soaked, long, large, and very heavy. Five men from Company C worked resolutely at it two or three hours, when Avery gave it up. — Threatening again.

Further news shows that on Sunday our men near Pittsburg [Landing] were surprised by the Rebel army in great force from Corinth, Mississippi. They were driven from their camps with heavy loss, took shelter near the river under protection of the gunboats. Early next day Buell came up and attacked the enemy, routing him. Sidney Johnston reported killed and Beauregard wounded— lost an arm. We barely escaped an awful defeat, if these first accounts are true.

Island [Number] 10 was a great capture. Cannon, stores, etc., etc., in prodigious quantities were taken. These victories if followed up give us Memphis and New Orleans. — Nothing said about our moving the last three or four days.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 227

Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, April 8, 1862

Camp Hayes, Raleigh, Virginia, April 8, 1862.

Dear Uncle: — We are getting ready to move south. Our first halt, unless the enemy stops us, will be at Princeton, forty-two miles from here, the county-seat of Mercer County. We shall stop there for supplies, etc., etc., and to suppress Rebel recruiting and guerrilla bands probably a fortnight, then on to the railroad at Wytheville, Dublin, or some other point. The enemy will try to stop us. They will do their best, as the railroad is of the utmost importance to their grand army in eastern Virginia.

Colonel Scammon has a brigade consisting of [the] Twenty-third, Thirtieth, and Thirty-seventh Ohio Regiments, a fine battery of eight pieces, and a small force of cavalry. I command the Twenty-third which has the advance. General Cox commands the division consisting of three brigades. At present only one brigade (ours) moves up this side of New River.

We should move tomorrow, but heavy rains yesterday and today have filled the streams so that they can't be forded. I have got two companies cut off by the freshet, and have been taxing the Yankee ingenuity of a company from Ashtabula in getting grub to them. I think it has succeeded.

It is much pleasanter carrying on the war now than last campaign. Now the people, harried to death by the Rebel impressment of provisions and also of men, welcome our approach, receive us gladly, send us messages to hurry us forward, and a few turn out to fight. Guides are plenty, information furnished constantly, etc. All which is very different from carrying on an invasion of a hostile people.

I can't think that the new armies of the South will fight as well as the old ones. Besides being raw, large numbers are unwilling. Our troops have improved beyond all expectation. Our regiment is now a beautiful sight. The Thirtieth too has become, under the drilling of the last two months, a capital body in appearance. The Thirty-seventh is a German regiment — has companies from Toledo, Sandusky, and Cleveland. I have not yet seen it.

I prefer Lucy should let the house remain empty this summer, or rented to some [family] to take care of it with my name on the door, etc., and in the fall we will see as to permanent arrangements.

The war will certainly last another campaign — I mean through this summer and until next fall. Even with victories on the Potomac and at Corinth and Memphis, it will take months, if not a year or two, to crush out the Rebellion in all quarters.

Sincerely,

R. B. Hayes.

S. BlRCHARD.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 225-6

Major Wilder Dwight: February 9, 1862

Cantonment Hicks, February 9, 1862, near Frederick.

If I could take the wings of this brisk, sunny morning, I would certainly fold them on our front-door steps in Brookline. Nor would I then proceed to hide my head under the wings, but, having flapped them cheerfully, I would thereupon crow!

But, as the wings and a furlough are both wanting, I must content myself with a web-footed, amphibious existence in the mud of Maryland.

There is a secession song which enjoys a surreptitious parlor popularity here. It is called, “Maryland, — my Maryland!” and rehearses, among other things, that “the despot's heel is on thy breast!” If that be so, all I have got to say is, that, just now, the heel has the worst of it. Yet there is a just satisfaction in this morning's inspection of men, tents, and kitchens, — to see how, by discipline, method, and fidelity, there is a successful contest maintained with all the elements. The neatness and order of our camp, in spite of mud, is a “volunteer miracle.”

You will be glad to know that the regiment is now in fine health. We already begin to count the days till spring. Of course, it is unsafe to predict the climate. I remember very well, however, that last February was quite dry, and that early in March dust, and not mud, was the enemy I found in Washington. It may well be, therefore, that there is a good time coming.

Indeed, has it not, in one sense, already come? Can you blind yourself to the omens and the tendencies? What shall we say of those statesmen of a budding empire, a new State, which is to give the law to the commerce and industry of the world through a single monopoly? What shall we say of the statesmen (Cobb, Toombs, etc.) who counsel their happy and chivalrous people to a general bonfire of house, home, and product? There's a new industry for a new State. King Cotton is a rare potentate. He proposes to be, himself, his own circulating medium, among other eccentricities.

Then, too, what admirable inferiority of fortification they succeed in erecting! Will our fleet of gunboats have as easy victories over all their river defences? and, if so, how far are we from Memphis? and where is Porter going with his “Mortar Fleet.” Among the ablest of our naval commanders, he is not bent on a fool's errand. When Jeff Davis sleeps o’ nights, does he dream of power?

But I've given you too many questions. In the midst of all this jubilant interrogatory, when will our time come? Just as soon as the mud dries, without a doubt.

Our life jogs on here without variety. For the most part, we spend our time in reading military books and talking military talk.

I am just now a good deal disturbed by the prospect of disbanding the bands. A greater mistake could not be made. The man with so little music in his soul as to vote for it is fit for — a Secessionist. Marshal Saxe, in introducing the cadenced step in the French infantry, says, “Music exerts a great and secret power over us. It disposes ‘nos organes aux exercises du corps, les soulagent dans ces exercises. On danse toute une nuit au son des instruments mais personne ne resterait à danser pendant un quart d’heure, seulement, sans musique.’” I have seen many a practical verification of this in the gathering freshness and quickness with which jaded men went on their march when the music called and cheered them.

Besides, we want the Star Spangled Banner, and its melody, as allies against the Rebel seductions.

SOURCE: Elizabeth Amelia Dwight, Editor, Life and Letters of Wilder Dwight: Lieut.-Col. Second Mass. Inf. Vols., p. 194-6

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: August 23, 1864

All in a muddle, and yet the news, confused as it is, seems good from all quarters. There is a row in New Orleans. Memphis¹ has been retaken; 2,000 prisoners have been captured at Petersburg, and a Yankee raid on Macon has come to grief.

At Mrs. Izard's met a clever Mrs. Calhoun. Mrs. Calhoun is a violent partizan of Dick Taylor; says Taylor does the work and Kirby Smith gets the credit for it. Mrs. Calhoun described the behavior of some acquaintance of theirs at Shreveport, one of that kind whose faith removes mountains. Her love for and confidence in the Confederate army were supreme. Why not? She knew so many of the men who composed that dauntless band. When her husband told her New Orleans had surrendered to a foe whom she despised, she did not believe a word of it. He told her to “pack up his traps, as it was time for him to leave Shreveport.” She then determined to run down to the levee and see for herself, only to find the Yankee gunboats having it all their own way. She made a painful exhibition of herself. First, she fell on her knees and prayed; then she got up and danced with rage; then she raved and dashed herself on the ground in a fit. There was patriotism run mad for you! As I did not know the poor soul, Mrs. Calhoun's fine acting was somewhat lost on me, but the others enjoyed it.

Old Edward Johnston has been sent to Atlanta against his will, and Archer has been made major-general and, contrary to his earnest request, ordered not to his beloved Texans but to the Army of the Potomac.

Mr. C. F. Hampton deplores the untimely end of McPherson.² He was so kind to Mr. Hampton at Vicksburg last winter, and drank General Hampton's health then and there. Mr. Hampton has asked Brewster, if the report of his death prove a mistake, and General McPherson is a prisoner, that every kindness and attention be shown to him. General McPherson said at his own table at Vicksburg that General Hampton was the ablest general on our side.

Grant can hold his own as well as Sherman. Lee has a heavy handful in the new Suwarrow. He has worse odds than any one else, for when Grant has ten thousand slain, he has only to order another ten thousand, and they are there, ready to step out to the front. They are like the leaves of Vallambrosa.

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¹ General Forrest made his raid on Memphis in August of this year.

² General McPherson was killed before Atlanta during the sortie made by Hood on July 22d. He was a native of Ohio, a graduate of West Point, and under Sherman commanded the Army of the Tennessee.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 323-4

Diary of Corporal Alexander G. Downing: Tuesday, October 25, 1864

Still lying in camp. The supply train of the Fifteenth Army Corps returned with rations late this evening, but the supply train of the Seventeenth Corps has not yet come in. It is reported that the army of the Tennessee is going on a march of four hundred miles. The route is supposed to be down through the States of Alabama and Mississippi and then up through to Memphis, Tennessee.¹ We are to take rations for thirty days and clothing for sixty days. The armies of the Ohio and of the Cumberland, it is said, are to garrison Atlanta² and also to hold the railroad between Atlanta and Nashville. The Twenty-third Army Corps moved out today to Cedar Bluffs.

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¹ This was the first hint at “marching through Georgia,” but the camp rumor had it Alabama and Mississippi. — Ed.

² We learned later that it was Chattanooga instead of Atlanta, and that the two armies were to be united under the command of General Thomas. — A. G. D.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 224

Major Wilder Dwight to 1st Lieutenant Howard Dwight, September 6, 1861

pleasant Hill, Camp Near Darnestown,

September 6, 1861.

Dear Howard, — Advice is cheap. When lost it goes to the moon, according to the old superstition, and does no harm. Hear mine. General Fremont is on his way to Memphis. As sure as sunrise he will go there. Go with him. Now is the opportunity for adventure, for success. Energy and aptitude are in demand. This autumn they will bear fruit. The wheel is entitled to every man's shoulder; offer yours. In other words, pack your trunk, take a few letters of introduction and authentication from the Governor and others, go to Fremont, tell him you wish to serve in his army You will do yourself credit, and be in the midst of some of the most brilliant achievements of the war. I have said my say, after reflection, and from a near view of the field.

Yours affectionately,

Wilder Dwight.

To Lieutenant Howard Dwight.

SOURCE: Elizabeth Amelia Dwight, Editor, Life and Letters of Wilder Dwight: Lieut.-Col. Second Mass. Inf. Vols., p. 95-6