Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Thursday January 1, 1863

Went to La Vergne and pitched into their wagon train, captured and burned a good many wagons, 200 prisoners.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 5

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Friday January 2, 1863

Transferred to the right wing. Saw the fight this eve. Breckinridge had to fall back. Raining all the time.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 5

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Saturday January 3, 1863

Raining all day; sent out on a scout last night beyond Stone River to Mr. Black's. All quiet.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 5

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Tuesday December 30, 1862

Rained to-day; all quiet till evening; fight then opened between the infantry and continued until dark.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 5

Diary of Private Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Wednesday December 31, 1862

The great day of battle commenced at daylight and raged heavily all along the line until 3 o'clock. Yanks drove back four miles. Our Boys took in prisoners by the hundreds. Captured twelve cannon and during the day about 2000 prisoners, 160 odd beeves, some wagons, etc.

SOURCE: Ephraim Shelby Dodd, Diary of Ephraim Shelby Dodd: Member of Company D Terry's Texas Rangers, p. 5

Diary of Private W. J. Davidson, January 11, 1863

To-day we have another beautiful Sabbath. The boys are engaged in cleaning up guns for inspection, and as we are not in the immediate vicinity of the enemy, and have no hope of marching orders, we may expect a day of comparative idleness, which is more to be dreaded than any hardship that could be imposed, as it disposes the men to immoral practices to kill time. In two hours at least half of us will be playing cards, while a few, true to the principles of religion instilled into their hearts in times past, will be reading their Bibles, or engaged in other devotional exercises. The news of the defeat of our army in Tennessee [Murfreesboro] has created quite an excitement in our camp, as nearly all of the soldiers here are from that State. We are impatient for orders to go to the defense of our own homes, and some of the men say they will go whether they get orders or not. As yet, however, good order and discipline have prevailed, and I believe will to the end.

SOURCE: Edwin L. Drake, Editor, The Annals of the Army of Tennessee and Early Western History, Vol. 1, p. 19

Official Reports of the Campaign in North Alabama and Middle Tennessee, November 14, 1864-January 23, 1865: No. 208 — Reports of Maj. Gen. Lovell H. Rousseau, U. S. Army, commanding District of Tennessee, of operations December 4-12, 1864.

No. 208

Reports of Maj. Gen. Lovell H. Rousseau, U. S. Army, commanding District of Tennessee,

of operations December 4-12, 1864.

MURFREESBOROUGH, TENN., December 8, 1864—12 m.

GENERAL: I beg leave to report that everything is in first-rate condition here. The railroad south of this is believed to be uninjured, as well as the railroad between this and Overall's Creek, five miles north. From a point half a mile beyond that creek the railroad is believed to be destroyed north beyond La Vergne. The block-houses Nos. 5 and 6 were abandoned, and the garrisons arrived safely here. These garrisons received orders from Captain Hake, at La Vergne (who said he acted under the orders of General Thomas),to abandon the block-houses. They did so, with the enemy all around them, and, much to my surprise and their own, reached here without loss, coming though the country. On Sunday [4th] last the block-house at Overall's Creek was attacked by General Bate's division with a battery of artillery, and seventy-four shots fired at it, doing it no damage. In the afternoon a force of three regiments of infantry, four companies of the Thirteenth Indiana Cavalry, Colonel Johnson, with a section of artillery, went out from here, under General Milroy. The force of the enemy was unknown to me. This force attacked and routed the enemy, showing great spirit and courage. Our loss in the affair was 4 killed and 49 wounded. The loss of the enemy was unknown, for although we took possession of the field night closed in at the end of the fight, and I ordered our forces to return at once to the fortress, which they did. Colonel Johnson, Thirteenth Indiana Cavalry, with four companies of his regiment, being cut off from Nashville by the enemy, joined me here and has rendered very efficient service. On Monday [5th] the enemy were re-enforced by two brigades of infantry and 2,500 of Forrest's cavalry, under Forrest in person. On Monday evening and during Tuesday and Wednesday [7th] the enemy demonstrated against the fortress at all points as well as against the town. They were very impudent and skirmished heavily with us, especially on the Nashville pike, coming up to within a mile of the fortress. On Wednesday the enemy's infantry had moved around on the Wilkinson pike, about one mile and a quarter northwest of the fortress. The major-general commanding will not have forgotten the very spot, being near where Negley's command was formed at the battle of Stone's River, a little farther south. Not knowing where the main body of the enemy was, I sent General Milroy, with seven regiments and a battery, on the Salem pike, with directions to swing around to right, returning parallel to the works along the line of the woods west and northwest of the fortifications. The enemy was encountered on the Wilkinson pike behind breast-works made of logs and rails, and infantry and cavalry utterly routed and driven off in great confusion, Forrest's cavalry making the finest time, to the right, across and down the Nashville road, I have seen in many a day.

Our loss was about 30 killed and 175 wounded. The loss of the enemy unknown, though it largely exceeded ours. Immediately after the fight I ordered our forces to return to the fortress. In this fight we captured 207 prisoners, including 18 commissioned officers. We captured also 2 guns of the enemy (12-pounder Napoleons), and have them now in position on the fortress.

Just before General Milroy fell upon the enemy Buford's division of cavalry attacked Murfreesborough and entered the town, shelling it fiercely, knocking the houses to pieces. With a regiment of infantry and a section of artillery I drove the enemy out of the town, and I have not heard any more of them in any direction since. All is perfectly quiet here to-day, which doubtless results from the fact that the enemy was badly whipped. In these fights the troops have behaved with exceeding courage and I am glad to say that the new troops have not been at all behind the old in the exhibition of steadiness and courage.

I heard from General Granger on Monday last by telegram and he was all right at Stevenson, having had great difficulty from high water in reaching there, going but eight miles a day for three days. The wires in that direction were cut at 4 p.m. on that day, and I have not heard from him since.

Perhaps you have not heard of the enemy's loss of generals at the battle of Franklin; I have it definitely from prisoners; it is this: Killed, Major-General Cleburne, Brigadier-General Gist, Brigadier-General Strahl, Brigadier-General Adams, Brigadier-General Carter, Brigadier-General Granbury, and three others wounded. It is reported by citizens here that Bate was killed on yesterday, and I think the report very probably true.

I shall ask leave to make a more detailed report, calling attention, amongst other matters, to the deportment of individual officers and men.

I am, general, very respectfully, &c.,

LOVELL H. ROUSSEAU,        

Major-General.

Brig. Gen. W. D. WHIPPLE,
        Chief of Staff.

_______________

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE,        

Murfreesborough, December 12, 1864.

Dispatches from General Thomas of the 5th and 8th instant received last night. Railroad train to Stevenson for supplies will take this dispatch to be forwarded. Wires down between this and Stevenson. On the 8th instant I dispatched by courier by way of Gallatin reporting operations here on the 4th instant. The enemy attacked the block-house at Overall's Creek, fired seventy-four shots, doing no damage. I sent three regiments, under General Milroy, to its relief. The enemy (Bate's division) were routed and driven off. We took some prisoners, near thirty, but no guns. Loss of the enemy unknown, as night closed in before the fight was over. Our troops, new and old, behaved admirably. We withdrew at night. The next evening Bate returned, skirmished with amid drove in our pickets, and threatened the fortress; pretty heavy skirmishing till the 7th, when the enemy moved around on the Wilkinson pike, northwest of the fortress. He was re-enforced by Forrest with 2,500 cavalry and two divisions of infantry. On the evening of the 6th he made a breast-work of logs and rails on Wilkinson's pike, from which he was driven on the 7th by General Milroy with seven regiments of the garrison here; a pretty severe engagement, lasting perhaps three-quarters of an hour. The rout was complete, infantry and cavalry running in every direction. The fight was well conducted by Major-General Milroy, and the troops behaved most gallantly. We took 207 prisoners, including 18 commissioned officers, 2 pieces (12-pounder Napoleons) of artillery, which were at once placed in position in the fortifications, and 1 stand of colors belonging to the First and Third Florida. Our loss in the fight at Overall's Creek was 5 killed and 49 wounded, and on Wilkinson's pike about 175 killed and wounded, 1 missing. I reported these facts a little more fully in my dispatch of the 8th, which may not have reached you. I am subsisting off the country, which I think I can do. Before the fight on the Wilkinson pike, Buford's division of cavalry took possession of about one-half of the town of Murfreesborough, shelling it vigorously and destroying many of the houses. With a section of artillery and a small force of infantry, I drove them, wounding and killing 30 and taking 25 prisoners. A captain of artillery left his boots, letters, sponges, staff buckets, on the ground. We lost one man wounded. The enemy's cavalry all around, but I think in small bodies. We forage without molestation. No enemy near here that! know of. Cheatham reported coming this way through Triune. All right here, and will endeavor to keep it so.

LOVELL H. ROUSSEAU,        

Major-General.

Brig. Gen. W. D. WHIPPLE,
        Chief of Staff.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 45, Part 1 (Serial No. 93), p. 612-5

Diary of Private Daniel L. Ambrose: Wednesday, January 14, 1863

A cold drizzly rain has been falling all day. The sentry will have a dreary time to-night for the howling winds are piercing. It is now dark and the ground is all saturated with water (shivering winds, and chill whistlings.) Hollow coughs and long sighs are heard as the sentinels pace their lonely beats. Quiet tramping is now heard, and amid the dense darkness two comrades meet. We see where they stand by the falling of the sparks from their pipes. They are talking now about the news from Stone River, and the Rappahannock, and of the flow of blood that has made red their brewing waters. They stop—they are silent—but again the stillness is broken; says one, “John, I received by the last mail a letter from home, and they tell me that they trail the flag up there—that they shoot down the furloughed soldiers, and insult our wounded comrades, that our father's lives have been threatened because they have hearts that go out and take in the army and navy, because they have sons who wear the blue, fighting for the flag and union.” As these sentries turned on their way, we imagine that on that dreary path along where the winter winds kept sighing mournfully, tears fell, and their hearts were sad, because they knew that in the north, around their father's homes, where once they looked in the innocence of childhood, could be found so many who would smile to see the old flag go down and Liberty's cradle rock no more.

SOURCE: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 130-1

Brigadier-General James Edward Raines

Brigadier-General James Edward Rains, one of the many civilians who rose to high military command during the great war between the States, was born in Nashville, Tenn., in April, 1833. He was graduated at Yale in 1854, and then studied law. He became city attorney at Nashville in 1858, and attorney-general for his judicial district in 1860. In politics he was a Whig, and was for some time editor of the Daily Republican Banner. When the summons to war came, he enlisted in the Confederate army as a private, but was elected colonel of the Eleventh Tennessee infantry and commissioned May 10, 1861. The greater part of his service was in east Tennessee. During the winter of 1861-62 he commanded the garrison at Cumberland Gap. This position he held as long as it was possible to do so, repulsing several attempts of the enemy upon his lines. It was not until the 18th of June, 1862, that the Federals turned his position and rendered it untenable. Had this occurred earlier, east Tennessee would have been completely lost to the Confederates in 1862. But the forces which Kirby Smith was now gathering about Knoxville, in addition to those in the neighborhood of Cumberland Gap, made the Union occupation of that post almost a barren victory. When, in August, Smith advanced into Kentucky, he left Gen. Carter L. Stevenson with a strong division to operate against the Union general, Morgan, who was holding the gap with about 9,000 men. Colonel Rains commanded a brigade in Stevenson's division, and so efficient was his work that his name frequently appeared in both the Confederate and Union reports. Kirby Smith's success in Kentucky, and the steady pressure brought to bear upon Morgan by the Confederates, at last forced the Union commander to abandon Cumberland Gap and retreat through eastern Kentucky to the Ohio river. The efficient service rendered by Colonel Rains in all these movements was rewarded by a brigadier-general's commission, November 4, 1862. When Bragg was concentrating his army at Murfreesboro (November, 1862), after the return from the Kentucky campaign, the brigade of General Rains, composed of Stovall's and J. T. Smith's Georgia battalions, R. B. Vance's North Carolina regiment and the Eleventh Tennessee under Colonel Gordon, was ordered to that point and assigned to the division of General McCown, serving in Hardee's corps. In the brilliant charges made by this corps in the battle of December 31, 1862, by which the whole Federal right was routed and tent back upon the center, with immense loss in killed, wounded, prisoners and guns, McCown's division bore an illustrious part. But, as in all great battles is to be expected, the division lost many brave men and gallant officers. Among the killed was Brigadier-General Rains, who fell shot through the heart as he was advancing with His men against a Federal battery. He left to his family, to his native State and to the South the precious legacy of a noble name.

SOURCE: James D. Porter, Confederate Military History, Volume VIII. Tennessee, p. 329-31

Brigadier-General James Edward Raines

JAMES EDWARD Rains, [Class of 1854,] son of John Rains, was born in Wilson Co., Tenn., April 10, 1833, and entered college Sophomore year, a resident of Nashville, Tenn.

After teaching for a short time, he studied law and entered on the practice of his profession in Nashville.

In the Confederate army he held the rank of Colonel, and subsequently of Brigadier General, and fell, shot through the heart, at Murfreesboro', Dec. 31, 1862.

He married Miss Yeatman, a step-daughter of John Bell, formerly U. S. Senator from Tennessee.

SOURCE: Obituary Record of Graduates of Yale College Deceased from July, 1859, to July 1870, p. 140-1

Arthur MacArthur

MacARTHUR, Arthur, soldier, was born in Springfield, Mass., June 1, 1845; son of Judge Arthur MacArthur (q.v.). In 1849 he went with his father to Milwaukee, Wis., and there attended school until Aug. 4, 1862, when he was appointed by Governor Salomon 1st lieutenant and adjutant of the 24th Wisconsin volunteers. His first battle was Perryville, Ky., Oct. 8, 1862, in the 37th brigade, 11th division, 3d army corps. At Stone's river, Tenn., Dec. 3031, 1862, his regiment was part of the 1st brigade, Sheridan's 3d division, McCook's right wing, Army of the Cumberland. He was second in command during the engagement, the regiment being commanded by Major Hibbard, and he was commended for bravery in the official report of the commander of the brigade. At Chickamauga he was again second in command, and at Chattanooga he gained a medal of honor for conspicuous bravery in action Nov. 25, 1863, while serving as 1st lieutenant and adjutant of the 24th Wisconsin infantry. He was promoted major Jan. 25, 1864, and commanded the regiment at Kenesaw Mountain, June 27, 1864. At the battle of Franklin, Tenn., Nov. 30, 1864, he commanded his regiment in Opdyke's brigade, Stanley's division, and General Stanley gave the 24th Wisconsin credit for doing “a large part” in saving the day. He was severely wounded and could not take part in the battle of Nashville. He was promoted lieutenant-colonel May 18,1865, and was mustered out June 10, 1865. He was brevetted lieutenant-colonel of volunteers for Perryville, Stone's river, Missionary Ridge and Dandridge, Tenn., and colonel of volunteers for services at the battle of Franklin, Tenn., and in the Atlanta campaign, March 13, 1865. On Feb. 23,1866, he was commissioned 2d lieutenant in the 17th infantry and the same day was promoted 1st lieutenant. He accepted the commission April 30, 1866, was promoted captain of the 36th infantry July 28, 1866; major and assistant adjutant-general July 1, 1889; lieutenant-colonel May 26, 1896; brigadier-general Jan. 2, 1900, and major-general Feb. 5,1901. He re-entered the volunteer army as brigadier-general May 27, 1898, and was promoted major-general of volunteers Aug. 13, 1898. He succeeded Gen. Elwell S. Otis in command of the Division of the Philippines, Feb. 5. 1901, and on June 15.1901, issued a proclamation of amnesty to the natives. He assumed command of the Department of the Lakes, March 25, 1902.

SOURCE: Rossiter Johnson & John Howard Brown, Editors, The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Volume 8, p. 1739

Elizabeth Adams Lusk to Captain William Thompson Lusk, January 4, 1863

24 West 31st Street,

Sunday, Jan. 4th, 1863.

My own dear Son:

I went to hear Mr. Prentiss this morning, and was deeply affected and impressed by his New Year's sermon. Thomas and Lilly having gone to church this afternoon, I take advantage of this quiet hour to write a few words to you. We are anxiously awaiting the final result of the battle in Tennessee. It has involved another fearful loss of life; another “army of martyrs” have shed their blood, we trust Oh, God! not in vain. The Emancipation Proclamation too has been issued, and now we wait for the events which crowd so heavily, we trust to a final end. The Monitor has foundered off Cape Hatteras, another calamity to mourn over. We take victories as a matter of course without much elation, but defeats or humiliation in any form we cannot bear. I hoped to have received a letter from you yesterday but did not. Your last letter to me was written on the 23d. Elliott told me he heard that Col. Farnsworth had resigned. Is it true? I hope you approve of the Proclamation. It seems to me it strikes at the root of the evil. Dr. Grant says, although it beggars his family at the South, he thinks it wise and just. Mr. Riley who was born in a slave country (S. A.), says he thinks it is the first blow which has given much alarm to the rebels. There is an idea that it is an obnoxious measure to the soldiers, and those hostile to the Administration foster the notion and strive to spread it. Many prayers for Abraham Lincoln have been offered up to-day, that he may be guided aright, and having acted in the fear of God, that all other fears may be quieted, and he may be strengthened for his great responsibilities. I heard a young man say, at our table to-day, that democratic clubs were forming about the city to prevent drafting. I heard another say that Gen. Dix had been appointed Military Governor of the State of New-York. The times are indeed turbulent and stormy, and none can prophecy as to the future, and yet a stranger in New-York would scarcely believe that we were a nation struggling through appalling trials. The streets are as gay as ever, public amusements as much frequented, and our gayest shops are filled with ladies spending money profusely. The hospitals however tell a tale different indeed.

SOURCE: William Chittenden Lusk, Editor, War Letters of William Thompson Lusk, p. 264-5

Major-General William S. Rosecrans to Edwin M. Stanton, January 5, 1863 – 4:30 a.m.

MURFREESBOROUGH,     

January 5, 1863 — 4.30 a.m.

God has crowned our arms with victory. The enemy are badly beaten, and in full retreat. We shall press them as rapidly as our means of traveling and subsistence will permit. Will you please ask the President to have Captain Morton, engineer, made brigadier-general? He has distinguished himself in the fortification and defense of Nashville, after our army left for Kentucky. He has organized a Pioneer Corps of 1,700 picked men, which he now commands, with the rank of captain, and behaved like a hero during the whole battle of Stone's River. He not only deserves the promotion, but it is absolutely necessary to the interest of the service that he should have the rank to command his brigade.

W. S. ROSECRANS,

Major-General.

Hon. E. M. STANTON,

Secretary of War.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 20, Part 1 (Serial No. 29), p. 185-6

Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, January 12, 1863

Camp Reynolds, Near Gauley Bridge, January 12, 1863.

Dear Uncle: — Yours of the 6th came duly to hand. The death of Magee is indeed a public calamity. No community has such men to spare. There is, I judge, no doubt of the death of Leander Stem. More of my acquaintances and friends have suffered in that than in any battle of the war except those in which my own regiment took part. It was Rosecrans' personal qualities that saved the day. He is not superior intellectually or by education to many of our officers, but in headlong daring, energy, and determination, I put him first of all the major-generals. He has many of the Jackson elements in him. Another general, almost any other, would, after McCook's misfortune, have accepted a repulse and turned all his efforts to getting off safely with his shattered army.

Sherman has been repulsed, it seems. No doubt he will get aid from below and from Grant. If so, he will yet succeed.

I do not expect a great deal from the [Emancipation] Proclamation, but am glad it was issued.

Notice Governor Seymour's message. It shows what I anticipated when I was with you — that the logic of the situation will make a good enough war party of the Democracy in power. If you want to see eyes opened on the slavery question, let the Democracy have the power in the nation. They would be the bitterest abolitionists in the land in six months. I am perfectly willing to trust them.

I received a letter from Dr. Joe saying he would bring Lucy and Birch and Webb back with him. They will enjoy it, I do not doubt.

I am now in command of [the] First Brigade of [the] Second Kanawha Division. General Ewing has gone South with six regiments from this quarter. This leaves us none too strong, but probably strong enough. I shall probably have command of the extreme outposts. I am not yet in command at Gauley Bridge. I say this because I think it very insufficiently garrisoned, and if not strengthened a surprise would not be remarkable. If I am put in command, as seems likely, I shall see it fixed up very promptly.

Sincerely,

R. B. Hayes.

S. BlRCHARD.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 387-8

Captain Charles Wright Wills: January 16, 1863

Camp 103d Illinois Infantry, Jackson, Tenn.,

January 16, 1862.

It commenced raining early the morning of the 14th and did not cease until about 2 a. m. the 15th, since when it has snowed steadily until within two hours. The snow is some eight inches deep, underneath which is mud immeasurable. The rain the last six or eight hours came through our tent as through a sieve, the snow came in at the top, through the door, and blew under the curtains. Everybody's wearing apparel, blankets, and self absorbed all the damp possible, and besides carried all that would hold on outside. Our stove was in this extremity our comfort and our joy. We kept two loyal Ethiopians busy during the two days, getting wood, and feeding said comforter. Great was the tribulation, and much audible cursing resulted, while the secret history of oaths unuttered, would I'm afraid, fill many volumes, and in all human probability cause, if made public, the appointment of many army chaplains. This is the first winter weather that we have had, and I'll be willing if it proves the last, although there is a half melancholy pleasure in spludging around in this slop and taking the weather as it comes, without its first being made to feel the refining influence of house walls and good warm fires. Our men have become quite soldier-like, and endure without much murmuring the little ills as they come. It shows some of the principles of manhood, you must believe, when men stand this weather in these worthless little wedge tents, without fires and without grumbling. I got four of my men discharged to-day, and want to discharge some six or eight more. When I get my deadheads off my hands will have some 70 good men left. Rather think now, that we are stationary here for the winter, but we may possibly be sent to Vicksburg, than which nothing will suit us better There are some eight or nine regiments here, two or three of them cavalry. The enemy is pretty well cleared out of this strip of country, and if Rosecrans gets down into North Alabama, opinion seems to be that some of us can be spared from here for Vicksburg and Port Hudson. Several houses have been burned here lately. This town will share the fate of Holly Springs, sure, if the Rebels trouble us here any more. 'Tis fearfully secesh, and a little fire will, I think, help to purify it. Isn't it wonderful how with so much fighting everywhere I have escaped so long? The whole of the 10th Illinois Infantry were with me in luck until the last fight at Murfreesboro, and am not certain they participated in that. There are two regiments here that have endured all of this storm without tents. I suppose the Lord takes care of them fellows, if it’s a fact that he looks after sheared sheep and birds. From my heart I pity them, though that strikes me as something like the little boy who, when his mother put him to bed and covered him with an old door, told her how much he pitied folks who had no doors to cover themselves with while they slept. That's a story mother and aunt used to tell me in my trundle-bed days. Wonder if aunty has forgotten the story that used to make Tip and me rave. All about how that “great big prairie wolf bit a wee boy's head off.” I almost forgot that I am out of woollen socks. Have only the pair of socks that are on my feet. Put them on this morning, and there were so many holes that I could hardly tell where to put my feet in. Wish you'd send me three or four pair. Will make cotton ones do until then. I can send you a nigger baby if it would be acceptable. They are more "antic" than either a squirrel or monkey. I have two he niggers, two she's and three babies, mess property. Think I will either have to drown the babies, or sell them and the women, whom I endure because their husbands are such good hands. Will you take one?

SOURCE: Charles Wright Wills, Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, p. 147-8

Diary of Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Sunday, January 11, 1863

Moved into my new quarters last night. Ratherish damp; roof and gables of “shakes,” a little open; no ceiling or flooring above; altogether cool but not unpleasant. A letter from Dr. Joe. Lucy and Birch and Webb to come up and give me a visit. Right jolly! A letter from Uncle also.

Rosecrans by his fiery and energetic courage at Murfreesboro or Stone River saved the day. Not intellectually an extraordinary man, but his courage and energy make him emphatically the fighting general of this war.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 387

Diary of Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Wednesday, January 7, 1863

Appointed to command First Brigade, Second Kanawha Division. Rather a small affair — Twenty-third Regiment and Eighty-ninth Regiment, Captain Harrison's Cavalry, Captain Gilmore's ditto.

Reports, after several days' desperate fighting, General Rosecrans has taken Murfreesboro and defeated Bragg.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 387

Diary of Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes: Tuesday, January 6, 1863

Very fine weather for a week past, and I am busy digging ditches, building walks, roads, bridges, and quarters. A pleasant occupation. Great fighting at Murfreesboro; heavy losses on our side, but the general result not yet known. Rainy today. I must build a skiff to get over to the brick house to headquarters easily.

During past year we have received sixty-eight recruits; discharged sixty-six; killed in action forty-seven; died of wounds twenty; died of disease fifteen. [Total] deaths eighty-two. Total loss aggregates one hundred and forty-eight. Net loss eighty.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 386

Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, January 4, 1863

Camp Reynolds, Near Gauley, Virginia, January 4, 1863.

Dear Uncle: — First of all, my arm gives me no trouble at all ordinarily. Getting on or off from a horse, and some efforts remind me once in a while that it is not quite as good as it was. Perhaps it never will be, but it is good enough, and gives me very little inconvenience.

I am learning some of your experience as to the necessity of overseeing all work. I find I must be out, or my ditches are out of shape, too narrow or wide, or some way wrong, and so of roads, houses, etc., etc. We are making a livable place of it. I put off my own house to the last. Fires are now burning in it, and I shall occupy it in a day or two. It is a double log cabin, two rooms, eighteen by twenty each, and the open space under the same roof sixteen by eighteen; stone fireplaces and chimneys. I have one great advantage in turning a mudhole into a decent camp. I can have a hundred or two men with picks, shovels, and scraper, if I want them, or more, so a day's work changes the looks of things mightily. It is bad enough at any rate, but a great improvement.

We have rumors of heavy fighting in Tennessee and at Vicksburg, but not enough to tell what is the result. I hope it will be all right. I tell Dr. Joe to bring out Lucy if he thinks best, and I will go home with her.

Sincerely,

R. B. Hayes.

S. BlBCHARD.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 385-6

Henry Clayton Ewin

HENRY CLAYTON EWIN, son of John Hill Ewin, was born at Nashville, Tenn., November 13,1839, and fitted for college in that city. He left the Class in December, 1860.

For about a year he was engaged in farming, and on December 1, 1861, entered the Confederate Army as a private in the 58th Tennessee Regiment. At the battle of Shiloh he distinguished himself for his valor and efficiency in rallying his men, and, upon a reorganization of the regiment, in April, 1862, was appointed its major. He participated in the battle of Perryville, Ky., where he made himself conspicuous for his gallantry, being in command of his regiment. At the battle of Murfreesboro, Tenn., in an attack upon a Federal battery, he was shot through both thighs, and was carried to his residence in Triune, Tenn., where, after a day or two of suffering, he died in the latter part of December, 1862.

He was married at Triune, Tenn., in February, 1861, to Alice, daughter of James H. and Eliza May, of Nashville, Tenn.

He had one daughter:

Henrietta, born February, 1862.

SOURCE: A History of the Class of 1863 Yale University, p. 146