Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Tuesday, September 30, 1862

Nothing of importance. We received orders to drill.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 72

Yorktown

The news of the capture of Yorktown, yesterday morning, spread a general feeling of satisfaction among our citizens, and even some who were never known to smile over a Union victory before, or who usually endeavor to belittle everything of the kind, were loud in their praises of McClellan and exultation over his victory.  That brave officer has achieved a comparatively bloodless victory, one which, if rightly followed up, will hasten the end of the rebellion.  So may it be.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

Dr. Hughes

From a letter written by J. L. Hughes of Co. H., 81st reg. O. V. U. S. A., from the Pittsburg battle-field, to his brother Mr. Harvey J. Hughes, of this city, we learn that Dr. Charles Hughes, of this city, who in the early excitement of the rebellion was suspicioned of entertaining secession feelings, participated in that battle and escaped unscathed.  We are glad to hear this and to place him right on the record.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

Rev. J. S. Whittlesey

It is with sorry we learn, from a member of Mr. Whittlesey’s family, that that gentleman, chaplain of the 11th Iowa regiment, is now lying sick at his home in Durant, Cedar county, of typhoid fever and pneumonia, worn out by the care of so many wounded men.  We hope his recovery may be speedy.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Monday, September 29, 1862

We were relieved from picket this morning, and for the first time in several days we rested in camp all day. The weather is hot and sultry, with quite cool nights. The rebel cavalry seem to be all around us, but for fear of getting hurt they keep their distance.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 72

Four Or Forty-One

The telegraph yesterday morning told us that our troops entered Yorktown ’41 hours’ after the rear of the enemy had left, and so we announced in our Extra.  Later dispatches put the time four hours, which is probably correct, and much more satisfactory.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

The Ladies’ Soldiers’ Aid Society will . . .

. . . meet this (Tuesday) afternoon at 2 o’clock, at Odd Fellows’ Hall.  Members who have not paid their monthly dues, are requested to do so this afternoon, as the Society is much in need of funds.

SEC. SOL. AID SOCIETY.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

Keokuk Hospital

W. Patton, Co. C, 11th Iowa, and B. Bense, Co. K, 7th Iowa, died at the Keokuk Hospital on the 1st inst.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, May 6, 1862, p. 1

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Sunday, September 28, 1862

It rained all day. I went out on picket. David Huff, Leroy Douglas, Wm. Esher and I were together at one post. We had strict orders to keep a sharp lookout for the rebel cavalry. We are expecting to be attacked.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 72

The War News

A Sensation Canard from Washington.

Tatnall Resigns in Disgust.

Baton Rouge, La., Captured.

CORINTH EVACUATED.

SAVANNAH TO BE SURRENDERED.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 1

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Saturday, September 27, 1862

Company E went out today with the teams to forage for corn and fodder. We were out northeast about seven miles and found plenty of corn, but not much fodder. The boys also took some chickens and two fine hogs. The farmers in this section are not rich, their farms being on the bluffs of the Tennessee river, but they seem to have plenty and some to spare. When the quartermaster sends teams out to forage, he calls for a company or perhaps a whole regiment, and they go and take what they want without asking for it, but the officer in charge always gives the owner of the property the quartermaster's receipt.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 71-2

The Government of God

Society is of God, as well as nature and religion.  Man has received his life from the Creator, and no one has the right to take it from him, unless he is a violator of the most precious rights and privileges he has conferred upon him. – Even the Guilty and the wicked should not suffer the extremity of the law, but for crimes involving the life and peace of society.  No one has the right to shed the blood of his fellow, unless for reasons the highest and most sacred, derived from the word of God and the original constitution of our nature.  Government holds a sword, and that sword is the gift of God.  Without it, society would be exposed to the lawlessness of the unprincipled and base, and would be like a human body without arms.  God has the power to take away human life, as he does by sickness, famine, and death; and he has put the sword into the hands of human governments, to be used when the necessity of the case demands it.

He is called the Lord of hosts, or armies, and the reason is, that among the heathen the nation most successful in arms was supposed to have the most powerful God!  Jehovah entered the lists against the Lords many and Gods many of the idolatrous nations, and was always successful, when his chosen people, the Jews, cast themselves upon his arm, and thereby proved the eternal sovereignty.

The history of the struggles of the Revolution shows the special care of Providence over our great leader, Washington.  He rode in the thickest of the fight, and was never injured.  Four bullets made as many holes in his coat, and two horses fell dead under him in a single battle, yet he escaped without a wound.  He, himself, regarded it as a special interposition of the hand of God.

The following incident is reported of him:  In the battle of Monongahela – the defeat of Braddock – a distinguished warrior swore it was impossible to bring Washington down by a bullet.  His reason was, that he had taken steady aim at Washington seventeen times, but could not once hit him, and he gave up believing he was invulnerable.  Washington’s work was not then completed.  An unseen hand defended him; and every soldier is under the special care of Him, who recognizes His authority.  Let every one who goes out to defend the sacred rights of his country, look to God for aid and counsel.  He is a present help – a refuge in distress.  If he fall in battle, he falls in a good cause; and even the more wicked and desperate are cut off from the evil to come, and are saved from additional years of crime and guilt.  God does not permit war to be an undeserved and lasting injury to any one.

War should lead us to look to god as the Supreme Arbiter and Judge of nations, and make us feel our dependence upon Him, at home and in the field of battle.  Each father and mother, who has sent a son into battle, should pray as Moses did for Judah:  “Hear, Lord, the voice of Judah, and bring him unto his people.  Let his hand be sufficient for him; and be thou an help to him from his enemies.”  Let every warrior, like Judah, call upon the Lord; and let every parent and friend remember Judah on the field of battle.

God uses war as a purifier of the world.  It is often the scourge of a nation’s wickedness and impiety.  It makes the proudest heart to quail, and humble itself under his mighty hand.  It shows how vain is the help of man.  The neglect of a single officer may turn the tide of war against us, and after a successful campaign, bring us into unexpected disasters.  God is now reminding us of His authority, and teaching the nation that not in statesmen, nor in captains or great generals, but in Him alone there is ever-lasting strength.

The following incident is recorded in a private letter from Ft. Donelson by a soldier in the fifteenth Illinois regiment:

I visited the battle-field on the day of the surrender; here indeed can one truly see the “horrors of war.”  I would not sicken you by detailing the horrible sights I witnessed, but I cannot refrain from mentioning one incident.  In passing among the wounded and dead of the enemy, I came to the body of a young man, lying partly on his side; he belonged to the Second Kentucky Regiment, and was an exceedingly handsome man.  It was the expression of his face, so different from the rest, which first attracted my attention.  One of his hands rested upon his breast just beneath his coat; slightly removing this, I discovered the cause of that expression: tightly grasped in his hand was a Bible.  My curiosity was so great that I could not resist the temptation of learning his name, but it was with no little difficulty that I succeeded in obtaining it, so tightly had his fingers stiffened in their grasp.  I opened the book, and on the fly leaf was written: “Presented to Robert Reeves by his affectionate mother,” and then immediately beneath these words were “My dear son, when troubles and temptations assail you, here alone can you find comfort and consolation.”  What a consolation would it be to her poor heart if, when she hears of the death of her dear son, could she but know that ’midst the din and roar of battle, and with death slowly but surely creeping over him, he had sought and found that comfort and consolation in the teachings of a redeeming Savior.  * *

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 2

The Governor’s Veto

The Iowa City Republican takes us to task because we chose to allude to a measure wherein we thought Gov. Kirkwood had erred.  It takes the ground that the bill passed at the late session of the Legislature reducing the salaries of some of the State officers is unconstitutional, and that had Gov. Kirkwood signed the bill in the face of his oath to support the Constitution he would have been “a perjured villain.”  The Republican, in its sophistry, makes a majority of our State Legislature “perjured villains,” for they as well as the Governor are bound by an oath to support the Constitution, and in voting for the bill, according to this logic, have clearly violated their oaths.

The scarcity of money, the general depression of business and the enormous taxes to which we are to be subjected, we should think would be an incentive enough to any officer, who has the good of his constituents at heart, to aid any, and all measures looking towards economy.

The Republican classes us with the Dubuque Herald and other secession sheets.  Be this as it may, we are proud to say that we are no man’s tool, but shall ever speak out our honest sentiments when we think the good of the people is at stake.

The above article we clip from the Muscatine Journal of Thursday.  The Journal evades an answer to the position of the Republican, by suggesting that the members of the Legislature who voted for the bill had violated their oaths.  We desire to remind the Journal that it censured the Governor for vetoing the act in question, and the simple question at issue is, whether the Governor was right or wrong in vetoing the bill.

That the bill was manifestly unconstitutional, seems to us too clear to admit of a doubt.  Section 9 of the Constitution provides, that the salary of each Judge of the Supreme Court shall be $2,000 per annum until 1860, after which time they shall severally receive such compensation as the General Assembly may, by law prescribe; which compensation shall not be increased or diminished during the term for which they shall have been elected.

On the 22d of January, 1857, the Legislature passed an act fixing the annual salaries of the Supreme Judges at $2,000.  No act has ever been passed repealing that act.  The Constitution went into effect, we believe, on the 1st of Sept., 1857, and did not repeal this act, for it exactly accords with its provisions.  In March, 1858, the Legislature passed an act providing “that all acts which were in force at the time of the taking effect of the New Constitution, and which have not been repealed thereby, or by the acts of the General Assembly now (then 1858) in session, be and they are hereby re-enacted and revised.”  There was no act passed at that session repealing the act fixing the salaries at $2,000, and none has ever been passed since.  On the contrary, at every subsequent session of the Legislature, acts have been passed to appropriate money to pay the salaries of the Supreme Judges at $2,000 per annum.

Thus it will be seen that the act of 1857 has never been repealed, but on the contrary, was re-enacted in March, ’58, and is now the law.  That the Legislature had no power to reduce the salaries of the Supreme Judges during their present term of office, as was attempted by the bill vetoed by the Governor, is so clear “that a wayfaring man, though a fool, need not err therein.”  The simple question, with these facts before him, which the Governor had to decide was shall I obey the mandatory and solemn duty imposed on me by the Constitution, and veto this bill, or shall I sign it and willfully violate the Constitution and my own oath in a case so clear and unequivocal?  It is a shabby morality which would advocate the violation of the Constitution in so plan a case, for the paltry sum which would have been saved to the State if the bill had become law.

The House income tax bill, which would have taxed the State officers on their salaries about $150 each, and which would have brought into the State treasury a revenue of forty or fifty thousand dollars, was defeated in the Senate.  This was a just measure, and would have materially aided the finances of the Sate in this emergency, by compelling not only the State officers but also United States officers within this State, members of Congress and all others having incomes over $500, to contribute to the support of our financial burdens – a class, too, who now do not pay a single dollar on their incomes, and who can best afford to pay taxes.  No, friend Mahin, the responsibility, if any, for not aiding our tax payers, devolves upon those members of the Legislature who voted against the income tax bill of the House, and substituted for it this unconstitutional law.  We believe the Governor was right in vetoing the bill reducing the salaries of the Judges and that every right thinking man will approve the veto message.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 2

Local Matters

FOR cheap straw hats go to R. Krause’s, No. 36 West Second street.  *

IF YOU want wall papers of the newest patterns, go to Plummer’s, No. 50 Brady st.  *tf

GRENADINE VEILS, black, brown, blue and green with plain and colored borders, just received at Wadsworth’s. *

RE-OPENING OF THE POST OFFICE EXCHANGE. – Haskins will open his Room, Monday morning, at 10 o’clock, with his usual nice lunch.  *

LANDLORDS, paper your houses with some of the beautiful paper hangings which can be found only at Plummer’s.  Then on rent day, instead of being met at the door with a broomstick, you will be greeted with pleasant smiles.  *tf

ERSKINE has a fine stock of Melton’s French Coatings, and English, French and American Cassimeres, which he will make to order in the best style.  He is selling very low for cash.  *

DANGEROUS. – As a lady of this city, the other day, was opening a box of the preparation known as concentrated lye, a lump of it dropped on the floor, where it was found by her infant child, who at once at it, and soon became alarmingly sick.  Proper medicines were promptly resorted to, which succeeded in neutralizing the effects of the poison.  There cannot be too much care experienced in handling such articles, especially when there are children around.

THE WASPIE. – This romantic stream has been, as usual every spring, on a roaring rampage, and no team has crossed it on the Dubuque road since the beginning of March.  The state on this side stops at the Fifteen Mile House, and the passengers partially cross the stream, which is two miles wide, in a skiff, for which the moderate sum of half a dollar is asked, while the bassenger foots it or wades nearly half the way.  The ferry boat will probably be in place to-day, so that teams can cross again, as the water has fallen considerably.

FROTHY, OF A TRUTH. – We believe, that it was Sir Wm. Drummond who said, that “he who will not reason is a bigot, he who cannot reason is a fool, and he who dares not reason is a slave.”  The following is the editor of the Democrat’s reply to our article of Friday, and it is a parity of reason with all he writes:

            FROTHY. – Brother Sanders feels stirred up.  He is evidently afraid that he will yet be called upon to furnish room in his family for a few samples of the “institution.”  Don’t the idea make him mad though!  Don’t he doubt the integrity of any man who will thus open up to his affrighted gaze the naked results of his pet hobby!  What a wail of agony, because we are allowed by a forbearing public thus to torment him.  Can’t somebody take his part?  O, Sanders! You are a persecuted individual.

THE Democrat, with its accustomed perspicacity, pitches into Marshal Hoxie for arresting Hill and taking him to Fort Lafayette. – Hoxie but obeyed the orders of his superior, as every good officer should.  We know our neighbor feels aggrieved that his friend Hill should have been  imprisoned for writing treason.  He thinks that is coming rather too close home to be agreeable.

CHILD LOST. – A boy about five years old, son of Mr. Henry Hansen, of Princeton, wandered away from home last Tuesday, and had not been heard from at last accounts.  Any one knowing anything of the whereabouts of the little fellow, will do an act of kindness by letting his father know where he may be found.

DECORATE your dwellings with some of those recherché patterns of wall paper, which can be seen only at Plummer’s, No. 50 Brady street.  *tf

RELIGIOUS NOTICES.

The Rev. Mr. Brooks of Rock Island, will preach this (Sabbath) morning, at 10½ o’clock, in the M. E. Church, in this city.

Rev. G. W. Barnes, of Omaha, Nebraska, will preach in the Main street Baptist Church to-day (Sunday) at 10½ o’clock a. m.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 1

The Cincinnati Commercial deigns to give the Dubuque Herald a notice, and this it does it:

The Dubuque Herald, complains of a want of conservative papers in the West.  If by conservatism it means such papers as the Dubuque Herald, Indianapolis Sentinel, Dayton Empire, and Cincinnati Enquirer, it is mistaken.  They are sufficient to satisfy the demands of the small squads of politicians, with traitorous instincts, to be found scattered about the country, and who are looking to what they call a reorganization of the Democratic party, with the special purpose of adapting it to the purposes of their old masters down South, when the rebellion shall be crushed and the States restored to their allegiance.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Monday Morning, May 5, 1862, p. 2

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Friday, September 26, 1862

I was on fatigue duty down in town today, helping to dismount the guns and load them with the ammunition upon the cars to be shipped to Corinth. We are preparing to leave Iuka as soon as possible, but it is slow work, as the railroad is in bad shape, and there is only one train a day.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 71

Senator John H. Gear to the Commissioner of Pensions, October 19, 1896

United States Senate

Burlington, Ia, Wasington D. C., Oct. 19, 1896

Hon. Commissioner, of Pensions,

            Washington, D. C.

Sir;

James Bankhead of Lockridge, Iowa, wishes to obtain P. O. address of four of his comrades.  Cannot the Department furnish these, as he is unable to find out where they live.

Yours truly,

Jn H. Gear

James Bankhead }	Fathers. - #599,946. – G – 30 – Ia.
G. A. Bankhead }

SOURCE:  Item offered for auction on Ebay, July 18, 2013

EDITOR’S NOTE:  George A. Bankhead enlisted August 9, 1862 as a Private in Company G, 30th Iowa Infantry and died of disease at Black River Bridge, Mississippi on September 14, 1863. - Roster And Record Of Iowa Soldiers In The War Of The Rebellion, Volume 3, p. 1497

George A. Bankhead, Private, Co. G, 30th Iowa Infantry: Pension Indes Card

SOURCE: Civil War and Later Veterans Pension Index at Fold3.com

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Thursday, September 25, 1862

Our knapsacks and tents arrived today by train from Corinth, and it will be more like living now. We have excellent water here, and there are large hotels for invalids, this having been a health resort for Southern people. There are quite a number of mineral springs here, some of sulphur and others of iron.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 71

Edward Francis Winslow

BRAVE SOLDIER AND SUCCESSFUL RAILROAD PRESIDENT

Almost alone among the Iowa soldiers who bore distinguished honors and responsibilities during the War for the Union, General Winslow lived on until the 22d of October, 1914, when his death occurred, at Canandaigua, N. Y., aged seventy-seven years.

Edward Francis Winslow was born in Augusta, Me., September 28, 1837. In 1856, at the age of nineteen, he entered upon a business career in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa. When the war called the young men of Iowa, he gave quick response, recruiting a company for the Fourth Iowa Cavalry. In January, 1863, he was made major, and, ten months later, was commissioned colonel of his regiment. He commanded a brigade under Sherman, Grant, Sturgis and Wilson respectively, and wherever he was ordered, whether to victory or, as under Sturgis, to inevitable defeat, he served with equal fidelity and courage. In December 1864, after having earned his star over and over again, he was brevetted a brigadier-general. He was mustered out at Atlanta, August 10, 1865.

Reference has been made to Sturgis’s ill-starred campaign against Forrest. It is a matter of history that but for the defense put up by Winslow’s brigade, without orders other than those originating with himself, the retreating army of Sturgis would never have reached Memphis. Other witnesses of the retreat corrected certain misrepresentations of Sturgis, and Winslow received the high praise he had so bravely won but which his chief had withheld. The chagrin of this retreat was in part obliterated by the after-victory at Tupelo in which Winslow was led by A. J. Smith.

To tell with any detail the story of General Winslow's activities during the war — from the winter of 1861-62, with Curtis in Missouri, until the victory at Columbus in 1865, to which he contributed both the plan and a brigade of splendid veterans — would be to write many chapters of war history. It must suffice here to quote the deliberate judgment of Iowa’s war-historian, Maj. S. H. M. Byers, who says: “He was loved by his soldiers, and shared with them the hard march, the fierce encounter, or the last cracker. His brigade, was a fighting brigade and was as well known among the cavalry of the West as was Crocker's Iowa Brigade among the infantry.” He “came out of the war a brevet brigadier-general, with the reputation of a good patriot, a brave soldier and a splendid cavalry commander.”

The veteran general was only twenty-eight when he was mustered out. Gen. James H Wilson, in his interesting work, “Under the Old Flag,” refers to General Winslow's achievement at Columbus as “one of the most remarkable not only of the war but of modern times.”

After the war, General Winslow was offered a captain’s, and later a major’s, and still later a colonel’s commission in the regular army, but he had seen enough of war.

In the siege of Vicksburg he received a wound which caused him no end of pain and inconvenience. Before setting out on his long marches, his wounded leg was wrapped in stiff bandages, and much of the time his suffering was acute. Again, one day, while leading his brigade in the fall of 1863, in the vicinity of Vicksburg, a shell burst near him as he sat on his horse, and the concussion ruptured an ear-drum, causing total deafness in one ear.

The purpose of the war attained, the general gladly turned his attention to business. His executive ability led him to engage in railroad building and managing. For years he resided in Cedar Rapids, serving as manager of the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Northern Railway, years afterward absorbed by the Rock Island system.

In 1879, as vice president and general manager of the Manhattan Elevated Railway, he unified the system of control and management of its lines. In 1880 he was elected president of the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway Company, and vice president of the Atlantic & Pacific Railway Company. He was also for several years president of the New York, Ontario & Western Railway Company, and formed an association for the purpose of building the West Shore Railway, which he completed in about three years. His last active work was in the organization of the “Frisco” system.

For several years after his retirement, General and Mrs. Winslow resided in Paris and spent much time in travel. A few years ago the general visited his old comrade, General Bussey, in Des Moines, and a reception given the two worthies by ex-Mayor and Mrs. Isaac L. Hillis, was a notable assemblage of prominent Iowa soldiers and civilians. The general was in full possession of his faculties, including that most elusive of all the faculties, the memory.

During the last three years of his life, General Winslow had busied himself writing a book of reminiscences of his part in the Civil War. The book had been completed and waited only the final revision when, on the 22d of October, 1914, illness closed it forever to the author. The manuscript left in possession of his widow cannot fail to be a valuable addition to Iowa history, as it is a transcript from the memory of one of Iowa’s best-known and most highly esteemed soldiers.

SOURCE: Johnson Brigham, Iowa: Its History and Its Foremost Citizens, Volume 1, 397-9