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CIVIL WAR TIMES
JUNE 2022

3850 YEARS GONE

Union 2nd Corps veterans meet with
former Confederate soldiers on the
Gettysburg battlefield in 1913.

ON THE COVER: Emory Upton had a genius for war and revolutionized American military tactics.

2 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 Features
Spotsylvania
26 Shock Wave
By Jeffry D. Wert
“They are charging!” screamed a Confederate on May 10,
1864, as Colonel Emory Upton’s handpicked regiments
bore down on the Mule Shoe at Spotsylvania Court House.

Return to Gettysburg
38 By Richard Selcer
Food shortages, intolerable heat, and the occasional
fistfight plagued the 1913 Reunion of the Battle of
Gettysburg. But the photo ops made all seem well.
26
‘Pretty Rough Times’
46 By Jonathan A. Noyalas
The letters of a Union heavy artilleryman describe his
rapid change of lifestyle when he marched away from

60
D.C.’s clean forts to fight as an infantryman in the 1864
Overland and Petersburg campaigns.

Holding the East Pass

54 By Sheritta Bitikofer
Confederate General Braxton Bragg tried to gain control
of vital U.S. forts in Pensacola, Fla., with a quickly raised
local militia unit.

Departments
22 6 Return Fire Rufus Weaver’s Work
8 Miscellany A New Battlefield Is Born
14 Details In Good Company
16 Insight Another Civil War?
18 Rambling Antietam Storyteller
22 Interview Follow the Money
25 Editorial Gettysburg Exclusion
60 Armament A Brassy Rifle
64 Reviews Drafting Confederates
72 Sold ! Exceptional Corps Badge
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2); HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS; RTRO/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO;
COVER: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, EVERETT COLLECTION/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES/PHOTO ILLUSTRATION: BRIAN WALKER

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 3

 MICHAEL A. REINSTEIN CHAIRMAN & PUBLISHER

JUNE 2022 / VOL. 61, NO. 3

Dr. Chester Crist
with German POWs
at Gettysburg.
EDITORIAL
DANA B. SHOAF EDITOR / MANAGING EDITOR, PRINT
CHRIS K. HOWLAND SENIOR EDITOR
SARAH RICHARDSON SENIOR EDITOR
BRIAN WALKER GROUP ART DIRECTOR What is
Mary Chesnut’s
wartime MELISSA A. WINN DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY your favorite
reminiscences AUSTIN STAHL ART DIRECTOR primary
source?
CLAIRE BARRETT NEWS AND SOCIAL EDITOR
Antietam letters
collected by Ezra
Carman and John ADVISORY BOARD
M. Gould
Thomas G. Clemens, Catherine Clinton, Gabor Boritt, William C. Davis,
WWII AT GETTYSBURG Lesley Gordon, Gary W. Gallagher, D. Scott Hartwig, John Hennessy,
Period
Newspapers
Scrap drives, war rallies, and Harold Holzer, Robert K. Krick, James M. McPherson, Megan Kate Nelson,
German POWs took over America’s “Rags and Hope: Susannah J. Ural, Ethan S. Rafuse, Phil Spaugy “Inside the Army of
preeminent battlefield. The Memoirs of the Potomac: The
Historynet.com/WWIIGettysburg Val C. Giles”
CORPORATE Civil War Experience
of Captain Francis
KELLY FACER SVP REVENUE OPERATIONS Adams Donaldson”
‘THE COLONEL’S ORDERLY’ SHAWN BYERS VP AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT
A soldier’s diary preserves the only MATT GROSS VP DIGITAL INITIATIVES
known text of an Emory Upton speech. ROB WILKINS DIRECTOR OF PARTNERSHIP MARKETING
Historynet.com/UptonsOrderly JAMIE ELLIOTT PRODUCTION DIRECTOR

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4 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 Actual size
is 38.1 mm

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 RETURN FIRE

very well written. My parents

WEAVER’S GRIM WORK
Insightful and informative April
issue article on Dr. Rufus Weaver, a
figure of importance in the tangled
history of Civil War Reunion and
“Reunification” who has been
largely forgotten. I was especially
interested in his connection to Ada
Egerton of Baltimore; one of the
items in my collection is an enve-
lope addressed to Dr. Weaver at a
Baltimore address that’s always
been somewhat of a mystery to me.
Perhaps it was Ms. Egerton’s
boarding house? On the back of
the envelope are penciled notations,
no doubt in Weaver’s hand, of
some gravesites of Confederate
prisoners who died at Fort Dela-
ware, and were buried at Finn’s
Point, N.J., during the war. He
apparently did not confine his
efforts to identify and return Con-
federate remains solely to the Get-
tysburg battlefield.
Charles T. Joyce
Media, Pa.
April was another great issue. I
found the article “Collateral Costs”
most interesting, informative, and
owned a home just outside Gettys-
burg in the 1960s and ’70s, and my
wife and I live about 30 miles from
Gettysburg. I have always had a
strong interest in the battle and the
aftermath. After reading your
article on the burials, the exhum-
ing, and reburials, I’ve wondered
how many unmarked graves are
still unaccounted for, not only here,
but on any of the other battlefields.
Very sad to think there still may be
unaccounted-for bodies who were
never returned to their loved ones
and are still lying where they fell....
known only to God. Just my curi-
osity. Keep up the good work. I
love every issue!!
Randy Jenkins
Shrewsbury, Pa.

ANTIETAM IMAGE
Great February articles on Antietam, my favorite Civil War site.
I’m amazed how history seems to have neglected the actions of
CHARLES T. JOYCE COLLECTION; LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Irwin’s brigade (2nd Division, 6th Corps), especially the fruitless

attack on the Piper Farm by the 7th Maine. As for the burial photo,
it’s surprising William Frassanito overlooked this location in Antie-
tam: The Photographic Legacy of America’s Bloodiest Day, as he identi-
fied three other photos in the same approximate area. I guess even
the most knowledgeable historians can’t uncover all the mysteries.
Next mystery to solve is where was the limestone outcropping that
Colonel Turner Morehead posed on (left)—if it still exists!
Clayton Kite
Harrisonburg Va.

6 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 CULPEPER
STATE PARK
IN THE WORKS

A
Virginia state park focused on the battlefields troops born in Culpeper. Unlike White soldiers, USCT
of Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain, as well soldiers, if captured by Confederate troops, could be exe-
as the site of a ridgetop Union encampment cuted as escaped slaves under rules approved by the Con-
near Stevensburg is on the verge of creation. federate Congress. Three USCT soldiers are known to
First outlined in 2015, the proposal for Culpeper Battle- have been captured and executed at the side of the road on
field State Park has gained ground through local support May 5, 1864. A memorial marker near the site of their exe-
and advocacy. cution was installed in Lignum, Va., on November 9, 2021.
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin submitted an
amendment to the state budget regarding the proposed
park on January 21, and both chambers of the Virginia
legislatures approved budgets for establishing the park.
Although the exact details are still in the works, 1,700
acres already preserved by the American Battlefield Trust
will be donated to the park. Another 4,000 acres are now
held in conservation easements on private land, and more
land may be acquired. Advocates for the park note that it
PHOTO BY BUDDY SECOR; CLINT SCHEMMER/STAR EXPORT

preserves land between the Rappahannock and Rapidan

Rivers that was contested during the war and traversed
not only by Union and Confederate troops but also by
slaves escaping bondage as well as USCT regiments
fighting in the 1864 Overland Campaign.
These USCT soldiers—numbering close to 4,000— CAPTURED AND KILLED
were remembered with a marker erected at Brandy Road in In his diary, 9th Virginia Cavalry trooper Bird Willis
Brandy Station in Culpeper County on February 26, 2022. documented the execution of the USCT: “They were the
The marker was paid for by the Freedom Foundation, first [USCT] we had seen....They were taken out on the
which is devoted to preserving the memory of USCT road side and shot and their bodies left there.”

8 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 STEPPING DOWN
AFTER DEVOTING YEARS to the Ulysses S. Grant Asso-
ciation, John Marszalek and Chief Justice Frank Williams
retired from the organization in March. Marszalek, executive
director of the association since 2006, oversaw the transfer of
Grant’s papers to Mississippi State University (MSU) in
Starkville in 2009. Marszalek will serve as a contributing editor
for the association. Williams was president of the association for
more than 30 years. Anne Marshall, associate professor of his-
tory at MSU, is the new executive director of the Ulysses S.
Grant Association and Presidential Library. She is the author of CHANGING GRANT’S GUARD
the 2010 Creating a Confederate Kentucky: The Lost Cause and Left to right: James Bultema, incoming Grant Association
Civil War Memory in a Border State and is at work on a biogra- president; Frank Williams; John Marszalek; Anne
phy of Kentucky farmer, politician, and antislavery activist Cas- Marshall, incoming executive director of the association;
sius Marcellus Clay. Edna Green Medford, association board member.

WAR F RA M E
STRUCK BY HOW MANY miles were between his lover and
himself, this Civil War soldier not only took the effort to send
this 1/6th plate tintype of himself back home, he also tucked
inside the case several slips of paper with verses of poetry.
“Forget me not,” one poem implores. “When oceans us do sever,
and when once death the eye doth close…forget me not.” The
poet private also scribbled inside the case desperate pleas for
the recipient, possibly named Mary, to remember him, includ-
ing a popular sentiment of the time: “When this you see
remember me.” Some historians have mused that the tender
phrase coupled with a soldier’s portrait sent back home was
one way for these men, faced with the possibility of death in
the war, to establish some permanence. While the fate of this
unidentified soldier is unknown, his romantic musings and
longing for his lady remain to illustrate a very human side of
the conflict.
ULYSSES S. GRANT ASSOCIATION; MELISSA A. WINN COLLECTION (4)

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 9

 MISCELLANY

MONUMENTS LINCOLN PRIZE 2022

NEW AND OLD
A MONUMENT TO Maine sol-
diers was dedicated on the Third
Winchester battlefield on Septem-
ber 25, 2021. The monument proj-
ect was spearheaded by Nicholas
Picerno, Chairman Emeritus of the
Shenandoah Valley Battlefields
Foundation, and Pete and Cyndi THE GILDER LEHRMAN Lincoln Prize for
Dalton, Maine Civil War historians 2022 went to Caroline Janney, University of Vir-
and authors who recently moved to ginia Civil War professor, for her book Ends of
the Shenandoah Valley. War: The Unfinished Fight of Lee’s Army After
The rear of the monument con- Appomattox (University of North Carolina Press),
tains a quote from Major John which Civil War Times excerpted in the February
Mead Gould of the 29th Maine 2022 issue. The Lincoln Prize is awarded each
Infantry, which reads: “We are glad year by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of Ameri-
that we could suffer for our coun- can History and Gettysburg College. The judges
try’s good; we glory in our strength lauded how Janney expertly narrates the confu-
and in all that is creditable to a sol- sion and uncertainty that followed the surrender
dier, but war we hate; it shall never at Appomattox in an account that “seamlessly
exist again if we can prevent it.” blends military, social, and political history, tak-
In 1905, veterans of the 7th ing readers across the war-torn landscape as
Georgia Infantry placed seven mar- individuals and groups of soldiers decide what
ble markers at Manassas Battlefield Park to mark their positions during their next steps will be.”
the battles there. Six of the seven markers denoted positions occupied
by the regiment during the First Battle of Manassas, while the seventh
marker identified their position late on August 30, 1862, during the
Second Battle of Manassas. Only two of these markers have survived
on the battlefield, and on February 18, 2022, a fragment of another of
the First Manassas markers was returned to the battlefield after
decades. Jim Burgess, the park’s museum specialist, says he suspects this
stone may have been situated along the Warrenton Turnpike and likely

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: PHOTO BY NICHOLAS PICERNO; COURTESY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA;
disappeared before the park was estab-
lished in 1940. This fragment of
the marker was donated to
the park by the Country
Day School in COURTESY OF JOHN HEISER; COURTESY OF MANASSAS NATIONAL BATTLEFIELD PARK

Langley, Va.

LEAVE NO TRACE
LEAVING COINS on battlefield
monuments seems harmless, but as retired
Gettysburg National Military Park Historian
John Heiser notes, such coins can damage the
protective finish on the monuments. Leave
your pennies in your pockets!

10 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 REGISTER

Overland Campaign Parcels

The American Battlefield Trust is raising
$137,500 to buy two parcels of land totaling
239 acres contested during the Overland
Campaign of 1864. One 141-acre parcel is
the site of the Battle of Todd’s Tavern at the
crossroads of Brock and Carpathin Roads,
where Union troops had to force out Con-
federates to clear the Army of the Potomac’s
path to Spotsylvania Court House over May
5-8. The second parcel is 98 acres near
Petersburg where Union forces in the Battle Todd’s Tavern, 1865
of Globe Tavern on August 19 worked on
destroying Weldon Railroad and cutting off
Confederate supplies.

Union Flag Repaired in Frederick

An enormous Union flag sewn during the
Civil War by Matilda Kiefer Shawbaker, a
German immigrant in Frederick, Md., has
been restored and put on display on the
second floor of Frederick’s City Hall,
according to the Frederick News Post.
Shawbaker had been hired to create the
large flag for an agricultural fair, and one of
her descendants donated it to Frederick in
the 1980s. The flag needed attention to
conserve the flaking, hand-painted stars in
the canton and strengthen its fragile, fray-
ing fabric stripes. Staff of Washington,
D.C.-based Caring for Textiles worked on
the delicate project for eight months, com- 1862.The circa 1830 Shafer House had been STARS AND
pleting the $21,700 conservation last fall. damaged over time by nature and neglect. STITCHES
The barn was seriously damaged and par- A conservator
A Lending Hand tially collapsed on August 26, 2021, as a carefully works on
On February 26, 2022, members of the result of a violent windstorm. Volunteers an American flag
Antietam Institute Board of Directors pre- and workers have repaired significant por- created by a patriotic
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; FREDERICK NEWS POST

sented the Burkittsville Preservation Asso-
ciation a check for $2,500 to support the
restoration of the Hamilton Willard Shafer
Farm, the site of Maj. Gen. William Frank-
lin’s 6th Corps headquarters during the
Battle of Crampton’s Gap on September 14,
tions of the house and barn since then. Frederick, Md.,
Once restored, the Burkittsville Preserva- citizen during the
tion Association hopes to transform the Civil War.
farm into a center for the interpretation of
the history, culture, and architecture of
Burkittsville.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 11

 CLASS
PHOTO
IT TOOK TIME, effort, and patience to create this amazing image of a
Union infantry company, the basic building block of Civil War armies. On
paper, a company consisted of 100 men, and 10 companies made up a regiment
of 1,000 troops. But that was on paper. Illness and battle casualties, and men on
furlough or special details, meant companies operated with far fewer than 100
men. Fifty-five troops are in ranks in this image, including officers and musicians
but not the individuals at the far rear, so you are looking at how large a typical
company would have appeared as it marched into battle. The men and unit are
unidentified, but whoever originally owned the photograph obviously treasured
it. This is a 10.5 × 9 inch albumen image, meaning a sheet of thick paper was
coated with a mixture of salt and chicken egg albumen that was sensitive enough
to capture the picture. Such photographs were meant to be framed and hung on
a wall, and extra expense was paid to hand tint, or color, the buttons, flags, NCO
stripes, trousers, and vegetation. Those dashes of vivid color make the
photograph “pop.” Kudos as well to the unknown photographer for expertly
staging the men on a natural terrace that provides scale. And let’s give some
credit to these hardy ground pounders for holding still at their position of
“parade rest.” Not one man is blurry. Just an incredible image. —D.B.S.

1. The company is “broken” into two platoons, a maneuver frequently

done to “shrink” the front of a company and make it easier to march
down narrow roads or streets, among other reasons. When in platoons,
the company’s captain (1a) took command of first platoon, and the com-
pany’s first lieutenant (1b) led the second platoon.
2. A drummer and fifer stand to the right of first platoon. Unfortunately,
vegetation hides the front of the drum, which may have been painted
with the regimental designation. Just next to them, the company’s first
sergeant wears his red NCO sash.
2
3. The soldier is the only one visible carrying a musket with a long-range
site, meaning it is likely he carries a rifle musket. His bayonet also
appears a bit thinner than the others.
4. This officer is likely the colonel, lieutenant colonel, or major of the
regiment, as is indicated by his double-breasted coat. It appears his horse
moved its head during the exposure, and its face is drawn in. The U.S.
flag is mounted on a fixed pole, so it is likely the men are posed near a
large permanent camp. Perhaps they are standing on the exterior wall of
an earthwork fort.
5. This is most likely the regiment’s national flag. To the right, other
individuals can be seen, including two kids. They might be associated
with the company, or they might also simply be Civil War photobombers.

Civil War Times would like to thank collector Kevin Canberg for the use of this image.

14 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 5
4

1b

3
1a

COURTESY KEVIN CANBERG JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 15

 by Gary W. Gallagher

WORDS HURT. SO DO CLUBS

South Carolinian Preston Brooks bears down
on Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner.
During Sumner’s years-long recovery, the Bay
State left his desk vacant in silent protest.

of the past decade pales in comparison

DIVISIONS
to that of the period that included sys-
temic political failure climaxing in
secession, a cataclysmic military con-

THEN AND NOW

flict, and wrenching postwar aftershocks
that lingered for more than a decade.
A few examples will illustrate the
profound difference between the Civil
War era and the recent past. Prominent
DOES THE TURMOIL OF THE 1860s PRESENT A FAIR actors increasingly use awards ceremo-
COMPARISON WITH CURRENT EVENTS? nies as a platform to express unhappi-
ness with political leaders. On April 14,
1865, a member of the most celebrated
IT HAS BECOME commonplace that current political and cultural fissures family of thespians in the United States
rival those at any other point in U.S. history. The Civil War is frequently offered as expressed his unhappiness with Abra-
UNIVERSAL HISTORY ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES

a comparative example to highlight contemporary disagreements. A New York Times ham Lincoln by shooting him in the
piece from December 2021, titled “We’re Edging Closer to Civil War,” reflected this back of the head. Similarly, Americans
phenomenon in sketching an ominous national mood. Whether stemming from regularly hear and watch members of
genuine ignorance about American history or from a cynical attempt to abet parti- Congress direct rhetorical barbs at one
san political agendas, such claims and comparisons distort both mid-19th-century another during hearings and in other
and 21st-century disruptions and, by extension, threats to the stability of the nation. venues. On May 22, 1856, Congress-
In fact, as the United States enters the third decade of the 21st century, it is not man Preston Brooks of South Carolina
witnessing an almost unprecedented breakdown of national civility. Public acrimony caned Senator Charles Sumner of Mas-

16 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 sachusetts into bloody insensibility on
the floor of the Senate chamber because
Sumner had criticized Senator Andrew
Butler, one of Brooks’ kinsmen, for
embracing “the harlot, Slavery” as his
“mistress.”
Recent presidential elections have
provoked a good deal of posturing about
how Texas or California might break
away from the rest of the nation. The
election of a Republican president in
1860 prompted seven slaveholding
states actually to secede between
December 20 and February 1, 1861.
Four of the remaining eight slavehold-
ing states followed suit between April
and June 1861, and Americans grappled
with the reality that the political system
established by the founding generation
had failed to manage internal tensions
during an election no one claimed had
been tainted by fraud.
Events on January 6, 2021, at the
Capitol in Washington, D.C., provide a
final example. Often described by poli-
ticians and pundits, and even by some
historians, as the gravest threat to the
republic since the Civil War, the cha-
otic occupation of parts of the Capitol
Building yielded deeply troubling
images. But the incident lasted only a
few hours before order was restored.
The heated presidential canvass of
1860, in contrast, positioned the United
States and the newly proclaimed Con-
federacy to engage in open warfare that
stretched across four agonizing years of
escalating bloodshed. More than
3,000,000 men eventually took up arms
(that would be equivalent to more than
30,000,000 today). Between 618,000
and 750,000 perished (imagine
between 6.2 and 7.5 million dead
today). Hundreds of thousands of Afri-
can American and White civilians
became refugees (the number would be
millions today). Four million enslaved
people emerged from what Frederick
Douglass called the “hell-black system
of human bondage.” And the country
soon entered a decade of virulent, and
often violent, disagreement about how
best to order a biracial society in the
GETTY IMAGES
absence of slavery.
The key to mid-19th century politi-
cal and cultural turmoil, and eventually
to slaughter on battlefields, lay in the
existence of the institution of slavery.
Slavery’s toxic presence provoked
debates about the gag rule in the House
of Representatives, halted the untram-
meled dissemination of printed materi-
als to parts of the nation, affected
diplomatic decisions relating to Mexico
and Cuba, split mainstream Protestant
NO POLITICAL
ISSUE IN 2022
APPROACHES
SLAVERY
IN TERMS OF
POTENTIAL
EXPLOSIVENESS
denominations, hastened the break-
down of the second party system, and,
in the late 1850s, triggered a low-level
guerrilla war in “Bleeding Kansas” and
John Brown’s quixotic raid on Harpers
Ferry. The key issue centered on
whether slavery would be allowed to
expand into federal territories, creating
a series of crises between 1820 and 1860
that ultimately proved intractable.
No political issue in 2022 approaches
slavery in terms of potential explosive-
ness, which bodes well for the long-term
stability of the republic. More broadly,
to compare anything that has transpired
in the past few years to the political,
military, and social upheavals of the
mid-19th century represents a spectacu-
lar lack of understanding about Ameri-
can history that is potentially destructive
to current political discourse.
Public ignorance about U.S. history,
or its willful manipulation for political
ends, often gets in the way of fruitful
debate about issues of surpassing
importance that have ties to American
past. The discussion of immigration, for
example, too often betrays little appreci-
ation of comparable public debates
throughout U.S. history—or of the vit-
riol characteristic of some of those
debates that makes the current ones
seem almost tame.
Once again, the Civil War era pro-
vides useful context. The Know Noth-
ings of the mid-1850s (formally the
American Party), with a strong focus on
nativist issues, won control of the Mas-
sachusetts Legislature, polled 40 per-
cent of the votes in Pennsylvania in
1854, and significantly affected politics
in numerous other states. Moreover,
mid-19th century statistics attest to the
fact that percentages of foreign-born
residents currently are not at unprece-
dented levels. In 1861, as the Lincoln
administration prepared to go to war to
restore the Union, almost one-third of
the military-age White males in the
loyal states had been born outside the
United States, and the proportion of
foreign-born residents in 1860 and in
2020 was almost the same (the 1860
percentage rose in the censuses of 1870,
1890, and 1910).
A careful examination of U.S. history
leads to an inescapable conclusion: A
more certain sense of their national past
would allow Americans, as a people, to
know that almost no issue or debate is
new, that earlier generations overcame
far greater problems than the present
generation faces, and that the nation
almost certainly will emerge from cur-
rent controversies intact. 2
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 17
 RAMBLING
with John Banks

mode…and I love it.

“John, I remember coming out here relic
hunting, and when the sunlight hit the
IN HIS BLOOD field just right, you could see the glass glis-
Richard Clem tening from the broken medicine bottles
holds half of a rare from that hospital.”
Confederate belt “Mr. Smith’s barn stood in the hollow
buckle he unearthed out there. This hospital site was a mystery
at Antietam. for many years.”
“Right over here on this hill I found that
ID disc of that VER-mont soldier.”
A decade ago, I connected with
Clem—a retired wood worker and life-
long Washington County, Md., resi-
dent—for a story about a Connecticut
soldier who was killed by friendly fire at
William Roulette’s farm at Antietam
on September 17, 1862. We became fast
friends, and no visit to Sharpsburg,
Md., is complete for me now without
exploring area historic sites with him or
listening to Clem’s battlefield stories on
his back porch.
I won’t forget the afternoon we exam-
ined the ruins of prewar kilns along the
bank of the Potomac River at Shepherd-
stown, W.Va. (formerly Virginia), where
friendly artillery fire killed 118th Penn-
sylvania soldiers on September 20, 1862.
“You’re an old man,” his delightful
wife Gloria kidded him before our trek
that day. “Watch yourself out there.” But
Clem navigated the hills with the enthu-
siasm of a 22-year-old history geek.
I also won’t forget the day we visited
the grave of Nancy Campbell, once

SAGE OF
enslaved by Roulette—the man who

THE farmed one of Antietam’s most infa-

mous killing fields. Or the day we spent

ANTIETAM
in the “Corner of Death” on David R.
Miller’s farm, when five battlefield
trampers marveled as Clem told them
stories.
Or after a lunch at Captain Bender’s
A “BABE RUTH OF STORYTELLERS” HOLDS Tavern in Sharpsburg, when the
ever-generous Clem handed me a gift
HISTORY IN HIS HEAD… AND HIS POCKETS of four bullets and a Union coat button
that he had eyeballed on the surface of
the ground in the Bloody Cornfield in
ON A BABY-BLUE SKY fall afternoon, Richard Clem and I stand the late 1960s and early 1970s.
among the remains of cornstalks in a field on the old Otho J. Smith Farm near the Shortly after my return home from
PHOTO BY JOHN BANKS

Antietam battleground. The South Mountain range stretches across the horizon to that visit, an all-caps e-mail from Clem
the east; roughly 350 yards away stand large, modern farm buildings. A hint of cow arrived in my in-box. Our visit, he
manure wafts through the air. wrote, was “A TIME I’LL LONG
Clem, a wiry octogenarian with a soft, deep voice, quickly shifts into storytelling REMEMBER.”

18 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 In the late 1940s, Richard Clem’s
grandmother Betty—then in her 60s—
fueled his interest in the Civil War. On
Sunday afternoons, his father pumped
50 cents’ worth of gas into an ancient
Ford for excursions with the family from
Hagerstown to the Antietam battlefield.
Grandma packed a container with sar-
dines, crackers, cheese, and water for the
trips. Mom sat up front while Grandma
sat in the back with Richard, whom she
fondly called “Dickie.”
While Dad drove over gravel battle-
field roads and across Burnside Bridge,
then open to vehicles, Grandma fed
Clem a steady diet of local history—the
lifelong western Maryland resident
knew people who had lived through the
battle. She even recalled Civil War vet-
erans visiting Sharpsburg.
“Dickie,” Grandma said during a bat-
tlefield trip, “that’s the old Iney Swain
home there, and she told me back when
she was still alive that there were
wounded soldiers in her barn from the
state of Massachusetts.”
At Bloody Lane, where the family ate
lunch, Grandma recounted what locals
had told her about the battle. “Even
months after the battle, people would
slip here on pools of dried blood,” she’d
tell Dickie. Sometimes the truth may
have been stretched a bit.
On the return trip to Hagerstown on
the Sharpsburg Pike, the Clems passed
the site of Dunker Church, the iconic
battlefield landmark that had collapsed
in a windstorm in April 1921. Only a
pile of bricks from the original church
remained. Clem remembers when it was
the site of a gas station and a conve-
nience store that sold ice cream, beer,
and sandwiches. In the early 1960s, the
church was rebuilt on the site with
many of the original bricks.
“Grandmother didn’t understand
exactly what happened during the Civil
DEEP ROOTS
Clem enjoys Miller’s Cornfield on a
PHOTO BY JOHN BANKS
fall day at Antietam. The days when
he could pick relics off the ground are
long gone, and his frequent hikes have
become more quiet and contemplative.
War,” Clem says, “but she knew and
spoke almost like it was reverent to her.
Sometimes she’d even tear up.”
Years later, Clem and his brother Don
discovered the joys of hunting for bat-
tlefield relics. Most of the battlefield
was in private hands then. So, on after-
noons after work, Clem rode in his
brother’s four-wheel drive jeep to
Antietam, where they would eyeball rel-
ics in the fields—with a farmer’s per-
mission, of course.
On the surface, just south of Bloody
Lane, Clem found his first bullet—a
fired, Union three-ringer. He still has it.
“If you found four or five bullets, that
was a good afternoon,” Clem recalls
about those early hunts. After a hard
rain in the 1960s, he eyeballed 18
bullets behind Dunker Church.
Later, the Clem brothers discovered
the joys of hunting for artifacts with
metal detectors. Their hobby turned
into an obsession. On leisurely walks
with Gloria, Clem often stared at the
ground, fixated on what Civil War-era
metal might lie beneath the surface.
Over the years, the brothers
unearthed roughly 30,000 bullets and
other artifacts in Maryland, Virginia,
West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Years
later, they sold more than 12,000 of
those bullets to artifact dealers for a
buck apiece. Clem gave many away.
But these hunts were never business
for Clem, who hung up his metal detec-
tor for good several years ago. In a note-
book, he documented many of the
artifacts recovered, noting their location
and other details. For Cracker Barrel and
Gettysburg magazines and The Washing-
ton Times, Clem wrote deeply researched
stories about his most remarkable finds.
And he continues to share his vast local
historical knowledge with others.
Most of Clem’s relic hunts were a
short distance from his Hagerstown
home in Washington County, where
brigades of soldiers in both armies
fought and camped from 1861-65.
Thousands of bullets and other artifacts
turned up in U.S. Army 6th Corps
camp sites in a farm field across the road
from his house. In his backyard, Clem
unearthed his first U.S. box plate and
50-60 bullets.
At the Otho Smith Farm, Clem and I
walk steps from where Alexander Gard-
ner set up his camera in September
1862 for a series of remarkable photo-
graphs. Here, at the division hospital for
U.S. Army Maj. Gen. William French,
doctors, volunteers, and others cared for
hundreds of Antietam wounded from
both sides.
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 19

Two images Gardner shot on the
farm intrigue me most. In a cropped
enlargement of one, an unidentified
man—undoubtedly a wounded sol-
dier—rests in a makeshift, hay-covered
tent. Another shows 14th Indiana regi-
mental surgeon Anson Hurd standing
among wounded.
Clem and I often wonder about the
heart-rending scenes that played out
here.
“Almost every hour I witnessed the
going out of some young life,” recalled
nurse Elizabeth Harris about her ser-
vice on the farm.
On the brink of death, a blue-eyed
soldier—a “mere youth” with a “full,
round face”—captured Harris’ heart.
“Hold my hand till I die,” he told her. “I
am trying to think of my Saviour; but
think of my mother and father; their
hearts will break.”
On a beautiful, fall day on the Smith
Farm in 1991, Clem unearthed a brass
identification disc—roughly the size of
a quarter—under five inches of earth on
a cedar-covered ridge. The rare find
turned into an obsession for Clem, who
has recovered three other soldier ID
discs while relic hunting—a feat equiv-
alent to Babe Ruth hitting four grand
slams in a game.
Dog tags weren’t issued to Civil War
soldiers; instead, they purchased their
20 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
RAMBLING
with John Banks
UNFORTUNATE DISTINCTION
During a relic hunt at the site of the
Otho Smith Farm, the location of a
Union post-battle hospital run by Dr.
Anson Hurd, left, Clem excavated an
ID disc, right. It had been carried by
Corporal William Secor, the only man
of the 2nd Vermont to die at Antietam.
own “tags” in which they had their
names and units stamped. No soldier
wanted to be forgotten if he fell in bat-
tle or from disease. Letters, diaries, pho-
tographs, and ID discs often aided
burial crews in the identification of sol-
dier remains.
Clem’s dogged research brought the
owner of the Smith Farm disc back to
life. It belonged to 2nd Vermont color-
bearer William Secor, a corporal, and
the only soldier in his regiment to die
at Antietam. Perhaps he was one of
Harris’ patients.
Using a small hammer and lettered
dies, a sutler probably hammered Sec-
or’s name and regiment into the gold-
plated disc. It may have cost the soldier
25 cents for a pair—one for him,
another to send home.
Secor stood 5-foot-6¼, with blue eyes
and brown hair. From Halfmoon, N.Y.,
he enlisted in neighboring Vermont. He
was 21 and unmarried. On September
17, 1862, Secor was mortally wounded
at Bloody Lane—an old sunken, coun-
try road during the battle and where the
Clems picnicked decades later.
A condolence letter Clem discovered
from Secor’s commanding officer to his
stepfather shed further light on his last
day on Earth.
“I saw the Chaplain that was with
him in his last hours, and he said that it
might be of consolation to his friends to
know that he lived with a hope in
Christ and was resigned to his fate,”
Lieutenant Eugene O. Cole wrote. “As a
soldier, there was none better.”
Clem believes U.S. Army comrades
transported Secor to the Smith Farm
along with countless other casualties.
He likely was buried on the ridge with
others. Perhaps their remains still rest
there. Secor’s ID disc may have fallen
out when his remains were disinterred
for reburial in New York.
Before our visit to the farm ends,
Clem pulls from his pocket the small
disc. And so an Antietam story comes
full circle. I am half-tempted to send
Clem my own all-caps e-mail:
WE’RE GRATEFUL, RICHARD,
THAT YOU KEEP HISTORY
ALIVE. 2
PHOTO BY JOHN BANKS
John Banks, who lives in Nashville, is
author of a popular Civil War blog
(john-banks.blogspot.com).
TODAY IN
HISTORY
JANUARY 16, 2001
THEODORE ROOSEVELT BECAME THE
ONLY U.S. PRESIDENT EVER TO RECEIVE
THE MEDAL OF HONOR. PRESIDENT
BILL CLINTON AWARDED THE MEDAL
TO ROOSEVELT POSTHUMOUSLY
FOR HIS SAN JUAN HILL BATTLE
HEROICS. THEODORE ROOSEVELT JR.
ALSO RECEIVED THE MEDAL OF HONOR
AS THE OLDEST MAN AND ONLY
GENERAL TO BE AMONG THE FIRST
WAVE OF TROOPS THAT STORMED
NORMANDY’S UTAH BEACH.

For more, visit

WWW.HISTORYNET.COM/
TODAY-IN-HISTORY
 with Roger Lowenstein

MONEY MAKERS
Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of the
Treasury Salmon P. Chase confer
about the 1863 National Bank Act
in this N.C. Wyeth painting. Chase’s
financial policies raised millions.

chew. He’s got a nice little commodity

cartel with energy, and it seems he
thought that would cow NATO—a
similar dynamic to the South thinking
the world would bow to cotton. “Cot-
ton is King”; no one will dare make war
on us. The other reason they weren’t
prepared is because there just wasn’t
any financial architecture for such a
massive governmental undertaking.

CWT: What about the banks?

RL: Previous wars had been financed
basically by going to banks. We think
of banks now as big institutions with
thousands of employees and millions of
shareholders. Back then, banks were
small and entrepreneurial. They were
lending out from the founders and a
few partners. Secretary of the Treasury
Salmon Chase went to the banks and
said, “Lend me your gold.” They lent
him $50 million. And then the U.S.
government spent 60 times more than
that sum. There was no national bank,

COST
there was no national currency, no taxes
to speak of then. No financial organi-
zation for this undertaking.

CWT: How did things stand in the

WAR
Confederacy?

OF RL: The same situation stood for the

South, but it had no willingness to tax.
In addition, the South had this massive
delusion that kept them unprepared.
One person in Jefferson Davis’ Cabinet,
ROGER LOWENSTEIN, author of many histories of 20th-century Judah Benjamin, suggested they ship a
American finance, became interested in the 19th-century banking system that pre- lot of cotton to Europe to finance the
dated the Federal Reserve and its origins in the Civil War. In his latest book, Ways war. At that time, the sea lanes were
and Means: Lincoln and His Cabinet and the Financing of the Civil War (Penguin still open; they could have done it.
Press), Lowenstein narrates how the challenges of funding the United States effort Davis and other members of the Cabi-
produced innovations that included a new banking system and a new role for gov- net instead came up with this bizarre
RTRO/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO

ernment in shaping the nation’s future. strategy to hold back cotton so that
England and France would feel the
CWT: What were U.S. finances like at the start of the war? need to come in and intervene and stop
RL: Everyone thought it would be a short war, so no one was prepared. There is a the war. By the time they realized that
modern-day resonance with Vladimir Putin, who has bitten off more than he can wasn’t happening, the Union Navy

22 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 began to constrict the sea lanes. The
South was in trouble.
CWT: There was some Union trade
for the South’s cotton?
RL: The United States also wanted the
cotton. They wanted American trading
partners Britain and France to get the
cotton, and Lincoln wanted the North’s
own cotton mills to have raw materials.
People began to ask the U.S. govern-
ment for permission to go into occu-
pied territories and take cotton and
ship it North. It was impossible, how-
ever, to buy cotton in the unoccupied or
occupied South without the revenue
going into Jefferson Davis’ coffers. I’m
sure this trading delayed the war’s end.
It’s bizarre—we never would have gone
into Berlin in 1942 and started trading
with the Germans.
CWT: How did the Union fund the
war’s enormous cost?
RL: Every government has three ways
of raising funds, war or no war. You can
tax, meaning transfer, some wealth of
the country to the government; you can
borrow; or you can print pieces of
paper. The interesting thing is the
extent to which you use each of these
affects the viability of the other two. To
the extent that you tax and have real
wealth behind the government, people
will be more willing to lend because
your credit will be better. In the North,
they made two decisions. One was to
print paper; they’re called demand
notes. They weren’t compulsory. They
used these to pay for the war because
they just didn’t have enough gold. Peo-
ple were very suspicious and many
times refused them. The U.S. Congress
came to a very difficult decision, which
was to print pieces of paper and call
them money. They called them green-
backs, legal tender.
CWT: Explain greenbacks.
RL: So these were legally money; you
had to take them. The greenback was a
PHOTO BY JUDY SLOVIN
great success. To Jefferson Davis’ dis-
may, they were even circulated deep in
the South. The greenback worked
because the Union was very careful to
set a limit on its volume. Ultimately the
amount of greenbacks printed was
about one-sixth of the overall war debt,
and as a proportion, that’s not
overwhelming.
CWT: What else paid for the war?
RL: Really extensive taxation. What for
the time was revolutionary taxation—
an income tax that was higher for
higher incomes, and they taxed all sorts
of industries individually. Secretary
Chase was very aware of Americans’
traditional and cultural antipathy to
taxation, which is true today, but
Roger
Lowenstein
Northerners did accept it. That was
greatly instrumental in the Union’s
ability to borrow money. Jay Cooke,
who became the agent selling Union
bonds across the country, would adver-
tise that Union bonds are backed by the
productive power of every state, all the
businesses, all the individuals. When
you lent to the Union, there was some-
thing there.
CWT: What happened in the South?
RL: They were unwilling to tax. Their
wealth was in land and slaves, so they
didn’t really have a lot of liquid wealth.
Nor a lot of industry. For ideological
reasons they were reluctant to choose to
tax land and slaves until the very end.
Therefore they couldn’t really borrow.
They tried one issue of borrowing by
creating bonds backed by cotton. But
they could only borrow in Europe, so
the logistical problems are immense
and they made a complete hash of it.
All that was left to them was the print-
ing press. That caused impossible infla-
tion. A barrel of flour cost about $5.50
at the beginning of the war. By 1863,
when Richmond women rioted to
break open the repositories of flour
because they were hungry, flour was up
to $38 a barrel. By the end of the war, it
was $1,000. The North had inflation of
80 percent, high but not like the 9,000
percent it was in the Confederacy.
CWT: Was Salmon Chase prepared to
manage all this?
RL: He learned on the fly. He had a
deep suspicion of financiers. He had a
suspicion of paper money. But there
was something persuasive about him.
He said to the bankers, you lend me the
money or I will drive the price of
breakfast to $1,000, meaning he would
inflate their notes to that degree. He
was very reluctant to go ahead with
legal tender, but he had no choice. He
revolutionized the banking system in
quite a clever and enduring way. The
system that he formed of national
banks lasted until 1913, a half century.
It’s amazing to realize that President
Lincoln and Secretary Chase spent
more money than all previous U.S.
governments combined.
CWT: The war opened a window of
opportunity.
RL: These ideas were very important to
people like Lincoln, and in the July 4,
1861, address—his first to Congress as
president—he called Congress in spe-
cial session to raise troops and money,
and he took time out to remind them
of what he called the leading object of
government, which was to elevate the
condition of man. There was a reason
he wanted to preserve the Union. He
thought American democracy could
really be a beacon to the world, to ele-
vate the condition of men, or men and
women as we would say now. 2
Interview conducted by Sarah Richardson.
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 23
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A large contingent of
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down an Easton, Pa.,
street in 1912.

MISSING
VOICES
IT REMAINS UNCLEAR IF USCT ATTENDED
GETTYSBURG’S 50TH REUNION
THE 1913 GETTYSBURG REUNION is one of those events I would love to visit if time trav-
el were possible (P. 38). The chance to hear veterans talk over their experiences would have been
incredible. Listening to old soldiers fight battles over and over, for example, was a primary inspi-
ration for Bruce Catton’s interest in the Civil War. But there was one group of old soldiers whose
voices don’t seem to have been present at the 50th reunion, those who served in the USCT. No
Black troops fought at Gettysburg, but there were numerous White vets at the reunion who had
also served elsewhere in July 1863. The presence of any Black vets at all—and if they even were
SPECIAL COLLECTIONS AND ARCHIVES, GETTYSBURG COLLEGE

invited—has been debated by scholars. New Jersey veteran Walter Blake wrote an account of his
time at the reunion called Hand Grips, and his book is an oft-cited source for those arguing Black
men were there. Blake’s descriptions, however, were vague, and he wrote that “negroes for the Union
side” were in attendance. Were those men soldiers? Teamsters? It’s hard to say. Reunion images
don’t show many African Americans, unless they were working there, such as the Black porter in
the background of the photo on P. 40. Also, the speeches and tenor of the Gettysburg reunion made
little mention of slavery or emancipation. The focus was on White reconciliation and a reunited
nation—a whitewashed interpretation of the Civil War that held sway for decades. In recent years,
new books, monuments, and tablets about the USCT experience (P. 8) have helped fill out the war’s
complex story. We can no longer talk to USCT vets, but their voices are finally being heard. 2

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 25

 SPOTSYLVANIA
SHOCK WAVE
DYNAMIC UNION TACTICS
MET SOUTHERN GRIT
ON MAY 10, 1864

BY J E F F RY D. W E RT

After the Battle of the Wilderness on May 5-7, 1864, the Army of the Potomac tried to slip by General Robert E. Lee’s
Army of Northern Virginia. Lee, however, was just able to block the Federals’ flank move, and both armies faced each
other from trench lines in the vicinity of Spotsylvania Court House. An eager, bright young Union officer came up with
a plan to break the impasse.

W
arfare suited Colonel Emory Upton. He embraced it with an evangelist’s fervency
and a scientist’s objectivity. A native New Yorker, Upton was 24 years old in the
spring of 1864 and three years out of the U.S. Military Academy. He had drilled
recruits, had been appointed colonel of the 121st New York Infantry after the Battle
of Antietam, and now served as a brigade commander in the 6th Corps. A fellow
officer wrote that Upton had “an ardent love for the profession of arms.”
Upton also possessed, in the estimation of Brig. Gen. James H. Wilson, “a patriotic sleepless ambi-
tion” and “the resolve to acquire military fame.” Under his tutelage, the 121st New York became so
proficient in drill and discipline that it acquired the nickname “Upton’s Regulars.” An unbending

OPPOSITE PAGE: ©BRANDYWINE RIVER MUSEUM OF ART/GIFT OF CHARLES S. CROMPTON, JR.,

abolitionist and “despiser” of “all treason,” he could be, however, arrogant and self-important. There
could be no denying what Wilson stated about Upton: “His courage was both physical and moral, and
therefore of the highest type. In the hour of battle he was as intrepid a man as ever drew a saber.” IN MEMORY OF HIS WIFE, MILBREY DEAN CROMPTON, 2014/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES

It was this intense, enterprising colonel who had approached his division commander, Brig. Gen.
David A. Russell, with a plan of attack on the afternoon of May 9. Upton had been at the forefront of
a swift assault on an enemy bridgehead at Rappahannock Station, Va., on November 7, 1863. Upton’s
troops had overrun the Confederate works, using only their bayonets, not stopping during the advance
to fire, which was standard tactical practice. His units had charged on a narrow front as they had at
Fredericksburg the previous May during the Chancellorsville Campaign.
When he met with Russell, Upton proposed a similar tactical formation, with the regiments stacked
in four lines, advancing rapidly without firing shots until they reached the enemy’s works. Once they
breached the entrenchments, the troops in the first line would fan out left and right, widening the
breakthrough. The second line would deepen the penetration, while the third and fourth lines came
up in support. Russell took Upton to Sixth Corps headquarters, where he presented the plan to Brig.
Gen. Horatio G. Wright, who had succeeded the mortally wounded John Sedgwick.

26 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 OVER THE WORKS
An evocative N.C. Wyeth painting
conveys the feral violence that
reigned when Colonel Emory Upton’s
assault poured over the Confederate
earthworks on May 10, 1864. Before the
attack, a Union soldier noted it felt like
rain, and the atmosphere was “hazy”
due to the “racket and smoke made by
skirmishers and batteries....”
 Wright endorsed Upton’s scheme and later discussed it with Lt. Gen.
Ulysses S. Grant and Maj. Gen. George G. Meade. Both commanders
approved, but neither general possessed adequate intelligence on the nature
and strength of the enemy’s defenses and the disposition of Confederate
units. Although the tactical formation differed from linear alignments, it
remained a blind, frontal assault. Nevertheless, they authorized Wright to
select a dozen regiments for the attack force and to assign a division to be
ready to exploit a breakthrough. In turn, Wright assigned Russell to overall
command of the operation. The attack force would advance from the Union
center toward the opposing Rebel earthworks or a section of the salient.
Wright met with Upton on the morning of May 10, informing the colo-
nel that 12 regiments from the 6th Corps had been assigned to his com-
mand. Earlier, Grant had shifted Brig. Gen. Gershom
Mott’s 2nd Corps division to the left flank of the
6th Corps and placed it under Wright’s direc-
tion. Mott’s two brigades, Wright said, would
support Upton’s attack. Captain Ranald S.
Mackenzie of the engineers “will show
you the point of attack,” concluded the
FRONT-LINE LEADER
Emory Upton was wounded at the
First Battle of Bull Run, and at the
September 19, 1864, Third Battle of
Winchester a shell fragment tore
open his leg and exposed the femoral
artery. He nearly bled to death.
corps commander. Wright’s instruc-
tions had been verbal.
In a postwar letter, Upton stated, “My
interpretation of these orders was that the
object of my assault was to break the ene-
my’s line; that Mott would then move
through the opening; and, forming at right
angles to the works, would charge, continuing to
roll up the enemy’s flank.”
Upton did not confer with Mott about what was expected of each offi-
cer’s role in the offensive strike. Martin McMahon, the 6th Corps’ chief of
staff, showed Upton a list of the 12 regiments the aide had chosen for the
attack, inquiring, “Upton, what do you think of that for a command?”
Upton looked at the assigned units and replied: “Mack that is a splendid
command. They are the best men in the army.”
The staff officer continued, explaining his duty, “Upton, you are to lead
those men upon the enemy’s works this afternoon, and if you do not carry
them, you are not expected to come back, but if you carry them I am autho-
rized to say that you will get your stars.”
“Mack, I will carry these works,” declared Upton. “If I don’t, I will not
come back.” The ambitious warrior mounted and, turning in his saddle,
exclaimed: “Mack, I’ll carry those works. They cannot repulse these
regiments.”
The officers and men in the dozen regiments numbered upward of 4,500.
Seven regiments served in Russell’s division, including three from Upton’s
brigade, and the remaining five came from Thomas H. Neill’s command.
The men hailed from Maine, Vermont, New York, Pennsylvania, and Wis-
consin—veteran soldiers with fine combat records. The previous autumn
Upton had observed to his brother, “No soldier in the world can equal the
American, if properly commanded.”
Captain Mackenzie conducted Russell and Upton to the edge of woods
28 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
opposite the western face of the salient, where a
slight bulge or “curve” protruded out from the
main earthworks. Three regiments of Georgia
troops, perhaps 1,350 officers and men, under
the command of Brig. Gen. George Doles
manned this smaller salient—later called Doles’
Salient. Behind the Georgians, four cannon of
the 3rd Richmond Howitzers provided support
for the infantry. From the woodline, the Yankees
needed to cross roughly 150 yards of open
ground, break through abatis, and cross over the
line of works into the trenches.
Upton gathered the regimental commanders
together and explained in detail the plan, assign-
ing a role to each regiment. Three regiments in
each line, 20 paces between the lines, Upton
told them. Each soldier should load his
rifle, but only the troops in the first
line—Upton’s own units, the 5th
Maine, 96th Pennsylvania, and 121st
New York—would have their weap-
ons loaded and capped, ready to fire.
The command would rendezvous at
a house owned by William D. Scott,
rented at the time by a man named
Shelton, located behind woods
slightly more than a quarter of a
mile from the Rebel works.
Headquarters scheduled the
charge for 5 p.m. in conjunction with
the renewal of assaults on Laurel Hill.
When they were delayed, Upton’s attack
was rescheduled for an hour later. The reg-
iments rendezvoused at the Shelton House,
and Upton led them on a woods road or path
to the edge of the tree line across from Doles’
Georgians. Here the Federals “formed for the
charge,” in Upton’s words. The time approached
6:30 p.m. “I looked about in the faces of the boys
around me,” recounted a New Yorker, “and they
told the tale of expected death. Pulling my cap
down over my eyes, I stepped out.”
T
he Mainers, Pennsylvanians, and New
Yorkers emerged from the trees. Across
the open ground, a Rebel shouted to his
comrades, “Make ready, boys—they are
charging.” The Yankees began to run, cheering
as they went. The Georgians triggered a volley
and then a second one. The Federals reached the
abatis, clawed their way through the stakes and
entwined branches, and jumped on to the earth-
works. Then, the Federals “left them have it.”
Upton had accompanied the first line and
HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS
reported later that the enemy “absolutely refused
to yield the ground.”
For a few minutes, the struggle in the trenches
became a frenzy of killing and wounding. Yankee
and Rebel alike wielded their bayoneted rifles,
 DESPERATION, FRENZY, GORE
Corporal Clinton Beckwith of the 121st
New York remembered Confederates firing
revolvers and that the defenders of the
Mule Shoe were “lunging at our men with
bayonets and a few had their guns clubbed.”
stabbing with them, swinging them as clubs, and
even hurling them as spears. Upton’s second line
scrambled over the works and joined in the
fighting. The Georgians fled rearward while
Upton’s first line filed left and right down the
trenches, widening the breach. The Federals
“poured through,” exclaimed a Georgian, overran
the four cannon of the 3rd Richmond Howit-
zers, and captured many Rebels, including
George Doles, who lay down on the ground.
Penetrating deeper into the main salient, the
attackers struck the right front of Junius Daniel’s
North Carolina brigade, shattering its ranks. At
SEM STUDIO/UIG/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES
the left end of the breakthrough, the Federals
raked the flank and rear of the 2nd and 33rd
Virginia of the Stonewall Brigade, sending them
fleeing “in great confusion.” “It was a crisis of
dreadful suspense,” exclaimed a Confederate
staff officer, “and for a brief interval the worst
fears prevailed.”
Major General Richard S. Ewell had been at the Harrison House when
Upton’s regiments charged. He rode to the scene, meeting eddies of fleeing
soldiers. He halted by Daniel’s North Carolinians and tried to rally them,
shouting: “Don’t run, boys. I will have enough men here in five minutes to
eat up every damned one of them.” Even as he spoke, Confederate rein-
forcements were racing toward the breach—from the south, Stephen Dod-
son Ramseur’s North Carolinians and Cullen Battle’s Alabamians; from the
east Robert Johnston’s North Carolinians and Clement Evans’ Georgians.
As Captain J. W. Williams of the 5th Alabama recorded, the Rebels “went
in at a run.” Behind them, a pair of Confederate batteries turned their guns
on the blue-coated foes.
A REBEL SHOUTED
TO HIS COMRADES,
“MAKE READY, BOYS—
THEY ARE CHARGING”
Johnston rode ahead of his troops and met Ewell, Lee, and their staffs.
Ewell was, wrote Johnston, “very much excited and entreating me to hurry
up the Brigade.” Lee had been with Ewell at the Harrison House when the
enemy attacked. The army commander had spurred Traveller ahead, joining
Ewell at the front and helping to rally their officers and men. “The Gen-
eral,” noted Johnston of Lee, “was looking very calm and quiet and pointed
out to me the line of works occupied by the enemy.”
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 29
 MISSED CHANCE Lee, Ewell, and their aides were less than 200 up double-quick, halted, and strung out a line of
Upton’s success yards from the fighting and under Union artil- battle. When they saw Lee, who was “greatly
depended not only lery fire from the guns supporting Upton’s attack. exposed,” the officers and men refused to advance
on his own men, but One shell struck within 15 feet of the army com- until the army commander withdrew to the rear.
also on the efforts of mander, plowed along the ground, and barely The incident rivaled the Texas Brigade’s encoun-
supporting columns. missed Traveller. “I look for him [Lee] to fall ter with Lee on Orange Plank Road on May 6.
Maj. Gen. Gersham every minute,” asserted a courier in a letter to his Lee turned rearward, and the North Carolinians
Mott’s tepid effort, in aunt the next day. Walter Taylor’s horse was charged. Behind them came George H. Steuart’s
particular, helped the wounded twice, while Charles Marshall had a brigade of Virginians and North Carolinians.
Confederates mount hole shot through his pants and a button clipped Loading and firing, pressing forward, veteran
a counterattack. off his coat. Johnston’s North Carolinians came fighters from eight Confederate brigades closed

30 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 in on the attackers. “The excitement of the advance…was beyond anything
I have ever felt,” Major Campbell Brown, Ewell’s stepson and chief of staff,
exclaimed in a letter to his mother. “I shouted till I was hoarse.” In the
Union ranks, all twelve of the regiments had entered the enemy works but
had become entangled in a mass. “There was not a single unit under my
control,” Upton admitted later.
The Federals fought stubbornly, clinging to the breach in the enemy
line. The struggle was “the bravest fighting I ever saw,” attested Captain
Williams. “Not a Yankee bent his body that I could see, and I know our
VETERAN FIGHTERS FROM
EIGHT CONFEDERATE BRIGADES
CLOSED IN ON
THE ATTACKERS
men stood perfectly erect, loaded and fired.” A North Carolinian wrote in
his diary, “It was an awful time for about thirty minutes.” Upton ordered
his men to retire outside of the works and “to hold the ground.” The
Union colonel expected reinforcements from Gershom Mott’s 2nd Corps
brigades.
Mott’s troops had advanced before Upton attacked, angling toward the
apex of the salient. When they cleared some woods into open ground, Con-
federate batteries in the salient raked them with shellfire and canister. The
Yankees reeled under the blasts and then broke in confusion to the rear. No
one informed Upton of Mott’s bloody repulse.
“Night had arrived,” Upton stated in his report. “Our position was
three-quarters of a mile in advance of the army, and, without prospect of
support, was untenable.” He rode back to their starting point in the woods
and met Russell, who ordered a withdrawal. Upton returned to the action,
penned a retreat order, and had it sent along the line. Members of the three
Vermont regiments refused until instructed to do so repeatedly by corps
commander Wright. “This I assure you was galling to the pride of brave
men,” declared one of their officers, adding that he and many men cried
while others voiced “unnumbered salvos of profanity.”
Upton estimated his losses at about 1,000 killed, wounded, and missing.
The Mainers, Pennsylvanians, and New Yorkers of his brigade in the first
line suffered 464 casualties, while the 49th Pennsylvania in the second
incurred losses of 246, or a casualty rate of 52 percent. The Yankees cap-
tured 950 Confederate officers and men, and “several stands of colors.”
Upton reported, “Many rebel prisoners were shot by their own men in pass-
ing to the rear over the open field.”
Upton regarded the assault as a “complete success” but attributed the
outcome to “the difficulty of combining the operations of two corps.” Oth-
ers were more pointed in their criticisms.
Theodore Lyman groused that Mott’s
troops “behaved abominably.” A fellow
staff officer, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.,
declared, “Nobody did anything to speak
of except 6th Corps.”
Tuesday, May 10, had been a difficult day
for Union leadership and its rank and file.
The assaults on Laurel Hill had been
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS;
ill-conceived and wretchedly executed and
had ended in costly failures. Veteran units
either had refused to advance far or had Gen. Doles
gone to ground. Frontal attacks eroded
BATTLEFIELD PROMOTION
Major General Horatio Wright had the
challenging task of replacing the popular Maj.
Gen. John Sedgwick, who was killed on May 9,
in command of the 6th Corps. Wright served
competently in his demanding new role.
morale, causing demoralization among the sol-
diers. The day had been the costliest since the
Wilderness, with approximately 4,100 killed and
wounded.
Across the bloodstained ground behind the
Confederate earthworks, Lee’s officers and men
had demonstrated their fighting prowess once
again. They had punished the Yankees along the
Po River, tore gaps in their foes’ ranks in front of
Laurel Hill, and undertook fierce counterattacks
that recaptured Doles’ Salient. Lee informed Sec-
retary of War James Seddon, “Thanks to a mer-
ciful Providence our casualties have been small.”
The losses surely exceeded 2,000, if not 3,000.
Doles’ Georgians had begun the campaign, for
instance, with roughly 1,560 officers and men but
counted only 550 after Upton’s attack.
A Rebel courier who had witnessed the coun-
terattacks against Upton’s Federals claimed in a
letter, “but it had not been that Gen. Lee was so
close and rallied our men, the day would have
been lost.” The army commander and his aides
had been fortunate that no one among the group
had been killed or seriously wounded. The con-
cern for Lee’s safety and his irreplaceable bond
with the army had been exemplified first by the
Texans and then by the North Carolinians
within five days.
Before Lee returned to the army headquarters,
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 31

WAR FLAG
Emory Upton’s 2nd Brigade in the
6th Corps’ 1st Division carried
this pennant at the Battles of the
Wilderness and Spotsylvania Court
House in May 1864.
your whole line to-night.” He conjectured that
Grant might undertake a night attack “as it was
a favorite amusement of his at Vicksburg.” Lee
and Ewell evidently had discussed holding the
salient, for the army commander wrote, “I feel no
apprehension on your part if the men do their
duty.” He urged Ewell to keep pickets alert
during the night and to send out scouts toward
the enemy’s lines to the west.
Earlier, shortly after the repulse of Upton’s
charge, a Confederate band played “Nearer, My
God, to Thee.” In the distance, a Union band
followed with the “Dead March.” A Rebel sol-
dier wrote that he and his comrades remained “in
fine spirits, and eager for the enemy to come.”
A sense of things, a dark reality, seemingly
hung over some in the Federal ranks on Wednes-
day, May 11. One of Winfield Hancock’s aides,
Lt. Col. Francis A. Walker, complained that
since the Wilderness “everything had gone
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS

wrong with the Union army.” In a letter on this

he sat with Ewell and various Second Corps generals on the porch of the
McCoull House. At one point, Lee turned to Robert Rodes and remarked,
“General, what shall we do with General Doles for allowing those people
to break over his lines?” “We shall have to let Doles off this time,” responded
Rodes, “as he has suffered quite severely for it already.” Doles had escaped a
Union prison by feigning death until his men and their comrades had
driven the Yankees from the salient.
Later Lee instructed Ewell, “It will be necessary for you to re-establish
day, a Second Corps brigade commander, Colo-
nel Robert McAllister, confided to his wife:
“This campaign beats all the rest in desperation
and determination. God only knows the result.”
Six days of unrelenting combat, of random
death brought by unseen sharpshooters, of futile
assaults, and of woods and fields awash in car-
nage had marked the passage from the fords of
the Rapidan River to the earthworks of Spotsyl-

32 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022


MOVE IT!
A mounted U.S. officer with a bandaged
head and his bayonet-wielding soldiers
drive Confederates to the rear during
Upton’s attack on May 10. The Shelton
House is in the background.
vania Court House. It could have appeared that both armies had descended
into a foreboding nightmare of staggering cost and without an end. It could
also have appeared that the descent would only deepen.
Ulysses S. Grant, however, assessed the situation as promising on the
morning of May 11. While eating breakfast, Grant was joined by Elihu B.
Washburne, a friend and congressman who had been with the gener-
al-in-chief since the campaign’s outset. Washburne was returning to the
capital and suggested that Grant might want to write a note to the presi-
dent. Grant demurred, explaining: “We are certainly making fair progress,
and all the fighting has been in our favor. But the campaign promises to be
a long one, and I am particularly anxious not to say anything just now that
might hold out false hopes to the people.”
Later, in a dispatch sent at 8:30 a.m. to Henry W. Halleck, Grant wrote,
expecting the chief of staff to share the message with Abraham Lincoln:
“We have now ended the sixth day of very heavy fighting. The result to this
time is much in our favor. But our losses have been heavy, as well as those
of the enemy.” Grant estimated his casualties at twenty thousand men,
believing that the Rebels’ “must be greater.” Reinforcements, he hoped, “will
be sent as fast as possible, and in as great numbers.”
“I am satisfied the enemy are very shaky,” Grant continued, “and we are
only kept up to the mark by the greatest exertions on the part of their offi-
cers, and by keeping them intrenched in every position they take.” He reit-
erated his commitment to the ongoing campaign: “I am now sending back
to Belle Plain [on the Potomac River] all my wagons for a fresh supply of
provisions and ammunition, and propose to fight it out on this line if it
takes all summer.”
The soldiers had come to call Grant the “silent man.” An artilleryman
said of him about this time, “I have seen Genl Grant a few times he is plain
quiet looking man smokes no show.” Writing to a hometown newspaper, a
5th Wisconsin soldier, who had charged with Emory Upton, maintained,
“The army is well satisfied with Gen. Grant’s
plans and movements thus far, and is giving him
its most entire confidence.”
Upton’s breakthrough had convinced the gen-
eral-in-chief that another assault on a massive
scale with timely support could succeed in possi-
bly ending the stalemate around the crossroads
village. The army’s senior leadership, however,
knew little of the nature, shape, or extent of the
Confederate lines on the enemy’s right front and
flank. Grant concluded that the farm of John and
Elizabeth Brown, where Gershom Mott’s troops
had started from on the previous night, could
serve as the staging area.
Grant dispatched Lt. Col. Cyrus B. Comstock
of his staff on a reconnaissance of the ground
between Mott’s division and Ambrose Burnside’s
9th Corps units posted east of Fredericksburg
Road and south of the Ny River. Comstock’s
efforts yielded scant solid information on the
enemy’s dispositions and fieldworks. Mott
offered limited knowledge of the terrain but
advanced troops to the Willis Landrum House,
which lay south of the Brown homestead and
closer to the Confederate position. Rebel skir-
mishers contested the movement, and Mott
withdrew. Comstock agreed with Grant that the
Federals should use the Brown Farm.
“The result of the day’s work on our front,”
wrote Lieutenant Colonel Horace Porter in his
memoir, “was to discover more definitely the
character of the salient in Lee’s defenses on the
right of his center.” In his memoirs, Grant stated:
“A salient was discovered at the right center. I
determined that an assault should be made at
that point.” Both accounts, however, were written
from hindsight, not reflecting accurately the
writers’ knowledge of the contours of Lee’s lines
at that time.
Nevertheless, by three o’clock in the afternoon,
Grant had “matured his plans,” according to Por-
ter, and sent instructions to George Meade:
“Move three divisions of the Second Corps by
the rear of the Fifth and Sixth Corps under
cover of night so as to join the Ninth Corps in a
vigorous assault on the enemy at 4 a.m. tomor-
row.” Warren and Wright should “take advantage
of any diversion caused by this attack.” Grant
had “little doubt in my mind” that Upton’s attack
would have succeeded had it gone forward an
hour earlier and “had been heartily entered into”
by Mott and the Ninth Corps. Left unstated was
that Grant expected the undertaking to be dif-
ferent on May 12.
When Meade received Grant’s orders, he
summoned Hancock, Warren, and Wright to
army headquarters. Details of the discussion
went unrecorded, but no one at the meeting or at
headquarters possessed firm knowledge of either
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 33

A COUPLE OF BAD DAYS
Brig. Gen. Gersham Mott failed to support
Union efforts on May 10 and 12. A subordinate
officer wrote that Mott routinely kept his
headquarters “well to the rear, and he don’t
seem to be anxious to get to the front....”
the location of or the approaches to the Confed-
erate position. In turn, Meade directed Hancock
to march the divisions of Francis Barlow, David
Birney, and John Gibbon after dark to a point
between the left flank of the 6th Corps and the
right flank of the 9th Corps, joining Mott’s 2nd
Corps brigades. Warren and Wright were
ordered to make preparations for either a diver-
sion or an attack in support of Hancock. Meade
likely impressed upon the three generals the
importance of this large-scale offensive to the
general-in-chief.
While Meade finalized matters, Grant issued
orders to Burnside at 4 p.m. The instructions
reflected Grant’s mounting concern for the cau-
tiousness, even the outright failures, of the for-
mer commander of the Army of the Potomac
during the campaign. At times, Burnside had
been immovable and seemingly incapable of
directing even a corps. “You will move against
the enemy with your entire force promptly and
with all possible vigor at precisely 4 o’clock
to-morrow morning,” commanded the gener-
al-in-chief. Preparations should be completed
“with the utmost secrecy, and veiled entirely
from the enemy.” In his earlier orders to Meade,
Grant stated, “I will send one or two officers
over to-night to stay with Burnside and impress
him with the importance of a prompt and vigor-
ous attack.”
34 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
Grant assigned Comstock and Lieutenant Colonel Orville E. Babcock to
the duty. The Union commander also wanted them to conduct a thorough
examination of the terrain toward the enemy works. Colonel Charles H.
Morgan, Hancock’s chief of staff, and two aides accompanied Comstock and
Babcock. It had been raining most of the day, more heavily in the late after-
noon. The five horsemen rode for hours, with Comstock “missing the way”
and finally halting at Burnside’s headquarters. Hancock’s staff officers turned
back, searching for the proposed staging area, which they located finally
about dark.
According to one of them, Major William G. Mitchell, they “made as
careful a survey as possible before night.” The three officers had crept for-
ward until they encountered an enemy picket line. Staff member Francis
Walker argued subsequently, however, that the “party had to select the posi-
tions for the column of attack, without learning much definitely regarding
the extent and direction of the works to be assaulted.” The staff officers
reported their findings to Hancock as the rain kept falling.
P
rivate Asbury Jackson of the 44th Georgia wrote to his mother on
May 11. A member of George Doles’ Brigade, Jackson had sur-
vived the attack by Yankees on the previous evening. The Georgian
finished his letter home by probably repeating a camp rumor: “I
forgot to say the prisoners captured last night were drunk, this is said to be
the case throughout the lines. They wont fight when sober.”
Perhaps so, but inebriated or not, the enemy had broken through the
Rebels’ earthworks, overrun a battery, and fought their foes for an hour
before being ordered back. Although the Confederates had sealed the
breach with counterattacks by reserve units, the Union assault demon-
strated the exposed nature of the salient. In the fighting’s aftermath, Rob-
ert E. Lee had instructed Richard Ewell to “rectify his line and improve
its defenses.”
Improvements in the salient’s defenses had been ongoing since their
original construction. On May 11, the Confederates strengthened the
earthworks and added more traverses, cleared more ground in front by cut-
ting down trees, and fashioned more abatis with “limbs and branches inter-
woven into one another.” Colonel Bryan
Grimes of the 4th North Carolina boasted on
this day, “We now have good breastworks and
will slay them worse than ever.” Stonewall Bri-
gade commander James Walker thought the
fieldworks were “apparently impregnable.”
The rain and occasional shots from Union
sharpshooters hampered the labors. Some men
recalled being soaked by afternoon thunder-
storms. Danger from sharpshooters proved to
be a constant throughout the day. At one point,
Walker ordered Colonel William Terry of the
This article is excerpted 4th Virginia to select two hundred men and “to
from The Heart of feel” for the Yankees beyond their skirmish line.
Hell: The Soldiers’ Before Terry acted, the order was revoked.
Struggle for Morale among the salient’s defenders remained
Spotsylvania’s Bloody high. “Our boys are in fine spirits,” Captain
Angle by Jeffry D. Wert. John G. Webb of the 9th Georgia informed his
Copyright © 2022 by father in a letter on this day.
Jeffry D. Wert. Published Late in the afternoon, General Lee came to
by the University of the Edgar Harrison home, which Ewell used
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
North Carolina Press. as his headquarters. With Ewell were Robert
Used by permission of Rodes, the Second Corps’ chief of artillery,
the publisher. Brig. Gen. Armistead L. Long, and their staffs.
www.uncpress.org Reports from scouts, skirmishers, and signal
 officers in the upper story of a brick church near
the village courthouse indicated a movement by
the enemy. While Lee was there, a 4:30 p.m. dis-
patch arrived from his son, cavalry Major Gen-
eral William H.F. “Rooney” Lee. Referring to
the units of Burnside’s 9th Corps, the message
read: “There is evidently a general move going
on. Their trains are moving down the Freder-
icksburg road, and their columns are in motion.”
If Grant were withdrawing and marching The Army of the Potomac regiments that took part in Upton’s
south, Lee wanted to pursue, either interdicting attack were chosen for their mettle and strength under fire.
the movement or barring its route. Was the
intelligence accurate, or were the Federals just
redeploying units within their lines? During the
previous night, while sitting on the porch of the
McCoull House, Lee “playfully remarked” to
the assembled subordinates, “I do not know
which one of you may be called to the com-
mand of the army when I am gone. Until then
you could not know the difficulties which beset
the commander of an army, the greatest of
which is to distinguish the true from the false
reports which come from scouts.”
Brig. Gen. Russell Brig. Gen. Neill Colonel Bidwell
His son’s dispatch evidently settled the matter.
“Genl Lee had information which he considered
reliable that Grant was moving his army some-
UNIT COMMANDER
where else,” wrote the army’s chief of artillery,
William N. Pendleton, two days later. Four days 6th Corps MG John Sedgwick 1
earlier, the Union commander had abandoned 1st Division MG Horatio Wright 2
the Wilderness, moving south, so Lee had rea- 2nd Brigade Col. Emory Upton
son to conclude that his opponent was undertak- 5th Maine Col. Clark S. Edwards
ing a similar movement. Lee ordered Ewell to 121st New York Col. Emory Upton
evacuate the salient, withdrawing the Second 95th Pennsylvania Lt. Col. Edward Carroll
Corps infantry divisions to the crossroads village. [Killed at Wilderness]
Ewell expressed concern for the men’s welfare in 96th Pennsylvania Lt. Col. William H. Lessig
the heavy rain, asking if they could remain under 3rd Brigade BG David Russell 3
their shelters and leave in the morning. Lee
6th Maine BG Hiram Burnham
acceded to the request.
The army needed to be prepared to march, so 49th Pennsylvania Col. Thomas M. Hulings
[KIA at Spotsylvania CH]
Lee directed Long to pull out the Second Corps
batteries from the salient. “This involved the 119th Pennsylvania Lt. Col. Gideon Clark
removal before dark of such artillery as might 2nd Division BG Thomas H. Neill
embarrass or retard a withdrawal from the lines 2nd Brigade Col. Lewis A. Grant
at night,” Long explained in his memoirs. The 2nd Vermont Col. Amasa Tracy 4
gun crews “had to pass through a dense wood by 5th Vermont Col. John R. Lewis
a narrow and difficult road” to reach Spotsylva- 6th Vermont Col. Elisha L. Barney
nia Court House. The batteries limbered up and [MW at Wilderness; died May 10] 5
began rolling before dark. 3rd Brigade Col. Daniel D. Bidwell
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS; USAHEC

When Lee examined the salient and described 43rd New York Col. John Wilson
it as “a wretched line” on May 9, the arguments [Killed at the Wilderness]
for maintaining the position had been predicated 77th New York Col. Winsor B. French
on artillery batteries being posted behind the
infantry. The guns began unlimbering that day
1 Killed May 9
and, by the morning of May 11, three battalions 2 Replaced Sedgwick as 6th Corps commander
of Second Corps artillery manned the salient. 3 Replaced Wright as 1st Division commander
Major Richard C.M. Page’s four-battery battal- 4 In command May 12 after John S. Tyler mortally wounded at the Wilderness
5 Lt. Sumner H. Lincoln was wounded at the Wilderness and not in action at
ion and Lt. Col. William Nelson’s three-battery Spotsylvania Court House, but later assumed command of the regiment.
battalion were posted to cover the apex and
approaches to the left and right front of the

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 35

 BOY GENIUS
1889 copy, below, of Upton’s
salient, 29 cannon in all. Lieutenant Colonel
Robert A. Hardaway’s five batteries of 20 guns
were arrayed behind Rodes’ infantrymen and
swept the ground in front of the salient’s western
face. It had been one of Hardaway’s batteries that
Emory Upton’s attackers had seized temporarily.
In compliance with Lee’s orders, Long with-
drew Page’s and Nelson’s battalions, stripping the
main sections of the salient of critical artillery
support. Two batteries from Major Wildred E.
Cutshaw’s battalion moved forward from their
reserve position, with eight cannon replacing 29.
Major James M. Carrington’s Virginia battery
unlimbered near the Stonewall Brigade, with a
pair of guns posted to fire to the left and “really
36 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
FOR WAR
Emory Upton was a military mastermind. Born in 1839 in New York, Upton
graduated eighth in his class of 45 cadets at West Point in May 1861 and
immediately entered the Civil War’s fury. Even before he left the academy he
presaged the upcoming conflict by engaging in a saber duel with fellow cadet
Wade Hampton Gibbes, after the future South Carolina gunner accused
Upton of having improper relations with African American women. The
duel left Upton with a slashed cheek, but intact honor.
His first major command was as the colonel of the 121st New York. If you
visit the regiment’s monument on Little
LEGACIES Round Top at Gettysburg, you’ll see that
Upton’s profile is featured the veterans thought highly enough of him
on the 121st New York’s to place his bas relief on the obelisk.
Gettysburg monument. An It’s surprising to realize that Upton was
still a colonel when he led the attack at
postwar tactics manual. Spotsylvania. On May 12, 1864, the day Maj.
In 1867, Secretary of War Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock’s 2nd Corps
Edwin Stanton prohibited attacked the Mule Shoe using Upton’s plan,
the teaching of any other he was finally promoted to brigadier gen-
manual for the U.S. Army. eral. By the time the conflict ended, he was
a brevet major general.
Upton’s postwar war years were productive. A fervent believer that Amer-
ican troops were the best in the world but suffered from poor leadership
and outdated tactics, he authored a number of books that influenced unit
tactics. His book The Military Policy of the United States from 1775 had a
profound impact on the development of the modern American military
system. Union General James Wilson called Upton “incontestably the best
tactician of either army…whether tested by battle or by the evolutions of the
drill field and parade…he had a real genius for war.”
For years, Upton suffered from debilitating headaches, which may have
been caused by a brain tumor. On March 14, 1881, with his headaches wors-
ening and his behavior becoming more erratic, Upton sat down at his desk
at the Presidio in San Francisco, penned a letter to his sister, wrote a note
resigning his commission, picked up his Colt .45 and shot himself in the
head. He was 41 years old.
“Up to the time when he was disabled by the disease which caused his
death,” Wilson said, “he was, all things considered, the most accomplished
soldier in our service.” —M.A.W.
straight down the fortifications,” while the other pair unlimbered roughly
twenty yards to the right to fire “straight down their front.” Captain W.A.
Tanner’s Virginia gun crews deployed their four cannon to the southwest of
and at a right angle to Carrington’s crews.
Carrington’s artillerists shouldered their cannon into traverses, which one
PHOTO BY MELISSA A. WINN; DANA B. SHOAF COLLECTION
of them described as “oblong pens of logs, filled with earth, with openings
left for the guns.” They strengthened the works, but one of them stated
later, “I remember that the men complained of the position and said that
something was wrong as we were exposed to a cross fire on account of the
federal line of battle.”
Colonel Thomas Carter had been assigned to “special direction” of Cut-
shaw’s battalion. He had never believed that the salient was defensible, “so
miserable was the shape.” He had voiced opposition to staying there “all the
day” on May 10, to Lee and Ewell. But, according to Carter, Rodes and
Johnson, “having made their breastworks, insisted they could hold it.” Car-
 ter decided to remain with Cutshaw’s batter-
ies in the salient and to spend the night with
artillery chief Long.
Like Carter, battalion commander
Hardaway raised objections to the with-
drawal of his batteries. “I told Gen. Rodes &
Ramseur,” Hardaway asserted in a postwar
letter, “that if they would sustain me in a
court martial, I would disobey orders and
retain my artillery in position though I had
orders to move at dark and Gen Lee had left
the McCoull house and I could not commu-
nicate with him.”
Hardaway encountered Armistead Long
and perhaps pleaded his case. Long told him
that “he did not intend for the guns to be
brought out until the troops left.” Hardaway
informed his battery commanders to remain
in position until the withdrawal of Rodes’
infantry, which had been planned for the next
morning. Long’s retention of Hardaway’s and
Cutshaw’s batteries was perhaps based on the
judgment that if the Yankees attacked again,
it would be on Rodes’ front.
“The withdrawal of these guns was the one
fatal Confederate blunder of this whole cam-
paign,” observed Porter Alexander, who kept
his First Corps batteries with the infantry in
the works on Laurel Hill. The reports of a
Union retreat “proved erroneous,” but Lee
accepted their accuracy. Believing the reports
to be true, he might have seen an opportunity
to regain the initiative in the campaign and
to strike the enemy while on the march. The removal of the artillery would HE GOT THE LATTER
have saved some time at the outset of the pursuit but, if he was mistaken Corporal Silas Shirley of the 16th Mississippi
about Grant’s intentions, withdrawing the artillery incurred serious risk. Infantry survived the May 10 onslaught. Two
Perhaps historian Gordon Rhea had it right, “Never had Lee made a more days later on May 12, however, Shirley died
egregious miscalculation.” when Maj. Gen. Winfield Hancock’s attack,
When Lee rode away from the salient, he stopped at Henry Heth’s head- following Upton’s tactics, careened into the
quarters in a church in the village. A sick A.P. Hill and other officers were Mule Shoe, initiating a full day of battle.
with Heth when Lee arrived. They criticized Grant for attacking the Con-
federate earthworks and having his men “slaughtered.” Lee countered,
“Gentlemen, I think that General Grant had managed his affairs remark- pieces. But once again, the supporting Union assaults
ably well up to the present.” Then, turning to Heth, the army commander failed to help exploit the breakthrough, and when the
asserted: “My opinion is the enemy are preparing to retreat tonight to Fred- fighting died down, Lee’s men held a patched-up line
ericksburg. I wish you to have everything in readiness to pull out at a one mile to the rear from their original position that
moment’s notice, but do not disturb your artillery, until you commence defied the Army of the Potomac. Grant and Meade’s
moving. We must attack these people if they retreat.” men would probe the Spotsylvania Line until May
Hill interjected, stating, “General Lee, let them continue to attack our 21, when the Federal troops shifted around Lee’s left
breastworks, we can stand that very well.” Lee answered, “This army cannot flank once more, heading for the North Anna River.
stand a siege; we must end this business on the battlefield, not in a fortified
place.” With this done, Lee walked out of the church, mounted Traveller,
and rode away in the darkness.
Jeffry D. Wert is a retired Pennsylvania high school
HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS

Inspired by Upton’s success, At 5 o’clock a.m. on May 12, Grant launched the 2nd
Corps, some 20,000 troops, at the Mule Shoe. The Federal troops smashed through
the Confederate earthworks, helped initially by the fact the Southern artillery
was still being withdrawn. Twenty-two hours of horrific fighting resulted. The
U.S. troops captured 3,000 Confederates, including two generals, and 20 field-
history teacher and a Civil War historian. His
books include biographies of Generals James
Longstreet, J.E.B. Stuart, and George Armstrong
Custer and works on the Army of Northern
Virginia and the Army of the Potomac.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 37

 RETURN TO
GETTYSBURG
AGING VETS FACED A
NUMBER OF CHALLENGES
AT THE
1913 REUNION

BY RICHARD SELCER

RALLY ONCE AGAIN

A column of veterans trudges down a
dirt lane on a hot Pennsylvania day in
July, heading for their tents at the 50th
reunion of the Battle of Gettysburg. In
1863, heat and dust also plagued them,
along with deadly bullets and shellfire.

38 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

T
he common story of the 1913 reunion of the Blue and Gray
at Gettysburg emphasizes camaraderie between former
foes and the shared reminiscences of past glories. More
than 50,000 elderly veterans showed up, creating the big-
gest tent encampment on American soil since the Civil
War. The national press covered the four-day event in exhaustive detail, and
President Woodrow Wilson gave his own “Gettysburg Address” that, while
not quite on a par with Lincoln’s, was still widely praised.
There was another side to the reunion that has been lost amid all the
nostalgia and patriotism attached to the event, however. One of heat, chow
shortages, and short tempers. Some of those reports have come to light only
recently thanks to the online digitization of newspaper archives. Reporters
did not have recording devices or readily available databases for fact-check-
ing. They were reliant on memory and notes to write their stories. That is
why names were spelled differently in various reports and some men could
get away with telling whoppers about their age and wartime service.
Veterans came from 46 of the 48 states (minus only Nevada and Wyo-
ming). Those who came from the Far West
spent four days or more on trains to get to Get-
tysburg, a town served by just one rail line. Some
of the aging men had argued for a Gettysburg
reunion ever since the last one 25 years earlier in
1888. While there were still enough of them
around to hold a reunion, they lobbied for
another grand get-together. Not all, however,
were in favor. Seventy-seven-year-old R.M.
Holbert of Fort Worth, Texas, who had fought
under the Stars and Bars remained an unrecon-
structed Rebel. “I gave those Yankees all that was
a-comin’ to ’em in the sixties,” he said, “and it is
certain I’m not goin’ to fool ’round ’em now.”
Besides, he added, “Gettysburg is too far north
of the Mason-Dixon line.” On the other extreme
was an 85-year-old veteran who lived with his
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 39

NEW ARRIVALS
A few of the 55,000 veterans who attended the reunion disembark from
their train and head for the largest veteran gathering in Gettysburg
history. They are remarkably overdressed for the summer compared with
current standards. Note the “OHIO” on the lead veteran’s hatband.
son. The son told the old man he could not go “under any circumstances,”
so the vet crawled out a window and went anyway. Who could be neutral
about something so important to their lives?
Newspapers in countless little towns across the country followed the
preparations of the veterans who planned to go. Some of the men whom
nobody had paid attention to for years were suddenly celebrities and
interviewed by every reporter who could get them to sit down. The result-
ing stories were sometimes long on derring-do and short on facts, reflect-
ing the passage of the years and the desire to please. Judge Charles C.
Cummings of Fort Worth, who considered himself something of a histo-
rian, recounted how as a member of the 7th Mississippi Infantry he had
been wounded on the first day of the battle. But as he went on, he came
off better than Maj. Gen. George Pickett, who in his version lost a leg in
the charge bearing his name and “died as a result of his injury” soon there-
40 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
after. Pickett actually died in 1875—with two
good legs.
T
he reunion was hosted by the U.S.
Army, the Gettysburg Battlefield Com-
mission, and the town of Gettysburg
itself. Except for those who might have friends in
the town or managed to secure a room in the
Gettysburg Hotel, everybody got the same
accommodations: U.S. Army tents, courtesy of
the Philadelphia Supply Depot. Their occupants
included officers and privates alike. The tents
were laid out in street after street covering sev-
eral hundred acres. Some of the old vets got lost
at night trying to find their street. The Army also
set up mess tents, rest stations, hospitals, and
telephone lines for an expected crowd of 40 to 50
thousand. All their planning and preparation,
however, were overwhelmed by the 55,000 veter-
ans and 10,000 visitors who showed up. The
Battlefield Commission put together the pro-
gram and raised money, and the town threw
open its doors symbolically speaking.
But the town’s hospitality extended only so far.
They prohibited the sale of alcohol, so the elderly
gents had to make do with what they had
brought with them or send out to other nearby
towns, a little foraging reminiscent of the old
days. The spirit of camaraderie included former
rivals sharing a bottle in get-togethers at night,
resulting in “many cases” of “overindulgence in
alcohol” being treated in the local hospital.
The Blue and Gray did not just meet at Get-
tysburg. Many former enemies traveled together,
sometimes for several days. They were already
acquainted with each other back in their home-
towns and had worked together before. For
instance, on Decoration Day (Memorial Day)
every year, United Confederate Veteran (UCV)
BUNKMATES
Charles McConnell, who served
as a sergeant in the 24th
Michigan, brought this tent. The
Iron Brigade veterans shared the
canvas with their former First
Day foes from North Carolina.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2)
 camps and Grand Army of the Republic
(G.A.R.) posts in the former Confederate states
held joint ceremonies while decorating the veter-
ans’ graves in the local cemeteries, albeit with dif-
ferent flags. Now they collaborated in raising the
money to attend the reunion.
Many of the elderly gents, living on piddling
pensions and the charity of family members,
could not afford such a trip on their own.
Together Blue and Gray launched fund-raising
drives. In Fort Worth, for instance, the members
of the R.E. Lee Camp of the UCV and the Wil-
liam S. Parmley Post of the G.A.R. formed a joint
FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG; REPORT OF THE PENNSYLVANIA COMMISSION
committee they called the “Blue and Gray Com-
mittee” to raise money and plan the trip. They
arranged with the St. Louis and Southwestern
Railway (aka the “Cotton Belt”) for their very
own car to take them at the bargain rate of $39.40
per person round-trip, reservations required.
At one point 80 veterans were said to be mak-
ing the trip from Fort Worth, but when the day
arrived only five had actually purchased tickets.
Their numbers swelled to 20 as they were joined
DECEMBER 31, 1913; HERITAGE AUCTIONS,DALLAS
by men from as far away as Houston. Their most
distinguished traveling companion was former
Confederate General Felix H. Robertson, the
Texas representative on the Gettysburg Battle-
field Commission who had already spent time on
site preparing for the big event. Now he was back
in Texas to lead the Texas contingent.
The intrepid travelers set out on their journey
on June 26 at 8:50 p.m. They picked up addi-
STATE SEGREGATED
The encampment was situated
between the Emmitsburg Road and
West Confederate Avenue. The Great
Tent is at far left, and a railroad
serviced the camp. It’s interesting
that the souvenir pennant at right
pits Grant, not Meade, against Lee.
tional veterans as they crossed Texas,
Arkansas, and Missouri, and on the way
shared liquid refreshment they had
brought on board to ease their aching
bones and pass the time more pleasantly.
Thanks to the Cotton Belt’s arrangements
they did not have to change cars even once
all the way across five states.
They arrived hale and hearty at Gettys-
burg’s little train depot on the night of June 30
only to discover there was a shortage of tents.
They had to sleep on the ground under the stars
that night but took the foul-up in good nature,
recalling similar sleeping arrangements 50 years
before. At least they did not have to eat hardtack,
and no one would be shooting at them the next
day. Some of the men preferred to sleep outside,
at least until a deluge hit on July 2. There were
separate encampments for Blue and Gray, but
many veterans spent their time visiting the other
side’s tents.
To accommodate the additional thousands,
the Army had to scramble, even borrowing cir-
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 41
cus tents and packing in the assigned occupants. Still, there were not
enough tents on hand, and shipping in more from St. Louis would have
taken too long. So hundreds slept on the ground, willingly or otherwise.
The chief complaint about the Army-served chow was not the quality of
the food but the meager amounts they got at every meal. Most of them had
not gone hungry since the end of the war, and now they were reliving
another unpleasant aspect of soldiering that they thought they had put
behind them.
There were gestures of kindness over and above the common courtesies.
Colonel Charles McConnell, a 24th Michigan color bearer at Gettysburg,
brought from Chicago a large tent to serve as the headquarters for his old
regiment. Once it was set up, however, he invited the survivors of James Pet-
tigrew’s North Carolina brigade to join them. The two regiments had fought
each other on July 1, 1863; now they would gather under the same tent as
DONE IN BY THE SUN
United States troops place an overheated veteran into an ambulance.
A soldier holds his campaign hat over the face of the prostrate victim.
Thousands of the aging warriors left early due to the heat.
42 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
brothers in arms. It was also the only tent on the
whole field not furnished by the U.S. Army.
A
side from accommodations and food,
the biggest problem was the brutal July
heat. The temperature reached 90˚ F.
outside on the second day, reaching 103˚ indoors
with no such thing as air conditioning. The fore-
cast was that it would go higher before it was
time to leave. Those temperatures were similar to
what they had been in 1863, but these were no
longer young men hardened by campaigning.
Hundreds would suffer heat prostration and
wind up in the hospital tents over the course of
the four days. On July 2, General Hunter Leg-
gett, the U.S. Army officer in charge, told a
reporter that 6,000 men had already departed,
and he estimated another 1,000 leaving that
night. He tried to put the best face on it by
explaining that the old fellows had gotten what
they came for: a chance to see the old battlefield
one more time, shake hands with long-ago foes,
and reconnect with comrades. Having done all
that, they were ready to return home and sleep in
their own beds and eat home cooking. On July 2,
a storm blew through that replaced sweltering
temperatures with soaked clothing.
Getting around the battlefield, which had not
changed much since 1863, was a challenge for
the aged veterans. While some made pilgrimages
to Devil’s Den or Culp’s Hill, most were not so
energetic. They stayed in the shade and hydrated
with one form of liquid refreshment or another.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (3)
Most of the socializing that went on was at night
after the sun went down and the day’s heat had
dissipated. Some Union vets organized an
impromptu fife and drum corps and went calling
on their Confederate comrades.
 The old fellows were not much interested in been a Union drummer boy in 1863, but his PANORAMAS
the first day’s fighting. Instead, they wanted to story, too, was subsequently questioned. The top view was
visit the sites and recount the stories of the sec- Distinguished attendees included the gover- taken from the
ond and third days. That was true of both sides. nors of six states (Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Vir- perspective of the
Judging by the reports, a remarkable number of ginia, Kentucky, North Dakota, and Iowa). Texas Emmitsburg Road.
the Confederates in attendance took part in Governor Oscar Colquitt considered coming, The Great Tent is at
Pickett’s Charge, or at least that was the way and as late as June 25, newspapers reported he left, and the plinth
they remembered it. Fifty-year-old memories was going. But at the last minute he decided not of the unfinished
could get blurred. Two veterans, one Union and to go, instead naming General Robertson, the Virginia Monument
the other Confederate, met at Devil’s Den. The state’s only native-born Civil War general to rep- can be seen in the
Confederate found the spot where he had been resent Texas. For those with long memories, distant treeline. The
wounded on the second day and recalled that a Robertson was the same officer who had been bottom image looks to
Yank had saved his life by giving him water. The disgraced by the actions of his troops in the Salt- the east. The town of
Union veteran cried out that he was that Yank. ville Massacre (October 2, 1864) to the point Gettysburg is at far
The problem with the touching story is that that General Lee called for his court martial. left, and the Round
the Johnny Reb had been a member of Garnett’s But all was forgiven now. Robertson was in Tops are at far right.
Brigade, and they didn’t fight at Devil’s Den.
Reporters wrote down the stories they heard
without attempting to verify their authenticity,
sometimes acknowledging that some stories may
JUST HOW OLD?
Micyah Weiss served in the
have been the result of “fifty years of embellish- 144th Pennsylvania. He
ment.” According to veterans of both sides, there claimed he was somewhere
had been hard hand-to-hand fighting on all three north of 100 years old, and
days, at places with memorable names: Barlow’s was proclaimed the oldest
Knoll, Culp’s Hill, Devil’s Den, the Peach veteran at the 50th reunion.
Orchard, Little Round Top, the Bloody Angle.
The oldest veteran at the reunion was Micyah
Weiss, a Union vet who said he was either 110 or
112 years old (the story changed) and who also
happened to be a veteran of the Mexican War
(1846-48). If true he was a freak of nature. He
said he had enlisted with the 144th Pennsylvania
at the advanced age of 55, meaning he was older
than most of the senior officers in his second war.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

No one at Gettysburg in 1913 asked for a birth

certificate, and his stories of service in two wars
entertained his fellows for four days. The young-
est was 61-year-old John Clem who said he had

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 43


Sallie
Pickett
“MY HUSBAND
IS DEAD, MY
SON IS DEAD”
One person who did not attend the reunion
was Sallie Pickett, aka LaSalle Corbell Pickett.
Major General George E. Pickett’s widow, 70
years old, was still mourning the death of her
son, George Jr., two years earlier. As she wrote
a friend: “Oh, I would like so much to be there,
but do not feel that I would be able to bear up
under the flood of emotions memory would
arouse. My husband is dead, my son is dead,
and it would be best for me not to attend.”
Her health was also not up to the trip from
her home in Washington, D.C. So, she sent her
two grandsons, George III and Christiancy
Pickett, to represent the family. They were the
center of attention for all the Virginia veterans
who had hoped “Mother Pickett” would attend
the reunion as she had in 1888.
The Pickett boys, 19 and 17 respectively,
brought their grandmother’s warm wishes and
posed for pictures. Veterans presented them
with a special gift for Sallie. It was a gold
pocket watch engraved to “Mrs. Genl. George
E. Pickett.” The message on the back said
everything about their high regard for the
general and his lady. Engraved in tiny print
letters, all caps, to her was this inscription:
“...by Pickett’s men in memory not only of
our beloved general but her own loyalty to
us his soldiers. July 3rd 1913.”
Sallie cherished the reunion watch until her
death in 1931, as well as a watch engraved with
George’s battles, which she had given him as
an anniversary gift. She considered herself
George’s spokesman to his men. They in turn
revered her. —R.S.
44 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
Gettysburg on May 21 when Gettysburg officially welcomed the Bat-
tlefield Commission. He delivered the opening speech, receiving a “tre-
mendous ovation” from the assembled townspeople and making him
the first Southerner ever to speak as the Pennsylvania town’s represen-
tative at a public event. Now he was back and leading the Texas contin-
gent of veterans.
The Gettysburg experience was a dream come true for Robertson. In
the spirit of forgive and forget his checkered past was not brought up. He
was feted by Yanks and Johnny Rebs alike. For four days he strutted
about the town in his general’s uniform, which was spotless and fit sur-
prisingly well for something that had been in the closet for 50 years. One
of the warm, fuzzy anecdotes to come out of the reunion involved Rob-
ertson on the last night. As related by him later, he chanced to meet a
former West Point classmate who fought on the other side, General Bar-
low (presumably Francis Barlow, the one Union general by that name).
Both in his telling were members of the class of 1857, and now they
were seeing each other for the first time since 1861. The Texan recog-
nized Barlow first and introduced himself, and they spent several hours
in Barlow’s tent reminiscing about West Point and their wartime expe-
riences. Nobody back in Texas questioned the story, but it had a few
problems, beginning with the fact that Francis Barlow died in 1896. He
also never attended West Point. Robertson entered West Point in 1857,
but he would have been a member of the Class of 1861, not 1857, had
he graduated, but he left in January 1861 to join the Confederacy. A lot
of stories also of dubious authenticity were perpetrated at Gettysburg
during those four days of 1913. Reputations were burnished after the
fact, careers rewritten, and memories created out of whole cloth. Among
Texans, however, Felix Robertson, last surviving general officer of the
Confederacy (he died in 1928), would always be a hero.
Neither the old warhorse Felix Robertson nor the attending gover-
nors were the biggest celebrities at the reunion. That honor went to the
descendants of beloved general officers, a select group that included a
son and two grandsons of Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, A.P. Hill’s daugh-
KEEP THOSE MEMORIES FRESH
Plenty of knickknacks were produced to market to veterans
and visitors at the reunion. This pot-metal plaque featuring
Lee’s and Meade’s headquarters was set off with cheap gilding.
HISTORIC COLLECTION/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; MELISSA A. WINN COLLECTION
 ter, two grandsons of General George Pickett,
and three granddaughters of General George
Gordon Meade.

T
he grand reunion of Blue and Gray
wrapped up on July 4 with a series of
speeches climaxed by President Wood-
row Wilson’s speech. Then it was home for the
old fellows. The “after-action” report on the event
said there were only nine fatalities during the
four days, eight Union men and one Confeder-
ate. One newspaper reported that one of those
deaths was the result of being struck by a car.
It is impossible to know exactly how many
attended. The count of Lewis Beitler who com-
piled the Report of the Pennsylvania Commis-
sion was 53,407, but that number blurs the fact
that thousands departed before it was over. Vari-
ous newspaper reporters on the scene also offered
different counts. How to count them? No one
could know for sure how many were there.
The theme of “unity of North and South,”
was endlessly repeated afterwards. It was sym-
bolized by the meeting of the survivors of Pick-
ett’s Charge, Billy Yank and Johnny Reb, at the
stone wall on July 3, exactly 50 years after they
clashed there in a death struggle. Now the one-
time foes shook hands across the wall. (The lat-
ter may have been true, but the former was open
to question.)
Contrary to later reports, all was not peace and
love between the old gents. A mixed group got
into it in the dining room of the Gettysburg
Hotel on July 2 when a Union vet defended
Abraham Lincoln against the jibes of Southern-
ers. Seven men were stabbed, all of them Yanks. SHOWING THEIR COLORS
The victims were all lightly injured, and their Members of the Union 2nd Corps, top, near the famous Angle on Cemetery
assailant was released. Ridge with a banner bearing their corps insignia. Above, a Virginia
Fort Worth Judge Charles C. Cummings was veteran with the Richmond Clothing Bureau coat he wore during the war.
not shy about partisan feelings in his speech on
the last day of the reunion. Said he proudly, “The from as far away as New York, Massachusetts, and Wisconsin. Some of the
South has risen again,” not as some sort of “New veterans of both sides who had been under their tender ministrations came
South” but as “the same Old South!” Buried in by to see them. Even reporters dropped by to see why all the attention on
the middle of his speech, this statement drew no these gray-haired ladies and hopefully get a fresh human-interest angle on
response from the crowd. the reunion. So, no, those women were hardly forgotten.
Among all the half-truths and tall tales to come The warm afterglow of the Grand Reunion stayed with attendees long
out of the reunion was one myth that has taken after they bid farewell to Gettysburg. Judge Cummings pronounced it, “the
on added significance in recent years, namely that grandest occasion of the century,” adding, “The spectacle of 50,000 men
the Gettysburg event did nothing to honor the who formerly fought each other fraternizing will never be seen again.” Per-
nurses who attended the thousands of wounded haps the most remarkable thing to come out of it was the proposal that
in 1863. But they were certainly honored in 1913. Confederate and Union veterans’ organizations merge into one known as
Mrs. Salome M. Stewart, a resident of the town, the United American Veterans. But nothing came of it. An occasional
turned her house “on a quiet little street” into a reunion with their opposite numbers was okay, but subsuming their unique
headquarters for the nurses of both sides. During identities into some integrated organization was too much.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2)

the battle it had been an emergency hospital for

the wounded of both sides run by Mrs. Stewart
and six like-minded women of the town.
With word of the reunion spread across the Dr. Richard Selcer is a professor of history and author based in Fort Worth,
country, the nurses came back to Gettysburg Texas. He has authored 13 books and dozens of articles on American history.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 45

 1EBT>ƹƮQEBFOTLOAP

‘Pretty Rough Times’

HEAVY ARTILLERYMAN LEWIS FOSTER
LEFT COMFORTABLE BARRACKS
FOR THE FURY OF BATTLE
B Y J O N A T H A N A . N O YA L A S

46 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 GUARDING THE CAPITAL
Members of the 9th New York Heavy Artillery
pose with an impressive array of firepower at a
Washington, D.C., fort. The battery’s pup enjoys the
view from the limber at far left.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 47

 WHITE-GLOVE DUTY
A heavy artilleryman stands
guard at Fort Foote near D.C.
In spring 1864, many “Heavies”
turned in their white dress
gloves and went into the fight.
A
mong the 28 regiments raised in New York as a result of
President Abraham Lincoln’s call for 300,000 volunteers on
July 1, 1862, was Colonel Joseph Welling’s 138th New York
Volunteer Infantry, a regiment that was re-designated the
9th New York Heavy Artillery on December 9, 1862.
Among those who answered Lincoln’s appeal and joined
Welling’s regiment was Lewis Foster.
Foster stated his age as 18 at the time of his enlistment in Com-
pany C on September 1, 1862, but in actuality he had turned 16 just
four days before. Promoted to corporal on November 14, 1864, the
resident of Wayne County, N.Y., served for the war’s duration with
the 9th New York.
On September 12, 1862, following a brief period of training, Foster
and his comrades departed for Washington, D.C. Five days later they
arrived in the nation’s capital. From that moment until May 18, 1864,
the regiment served in Washington’s defenses. After that, however,
they were one of the “Heavy” regiments pulled into the gory whirl-
pool of the 1864 Overland Campaign. The 9th never returned to its
comfortable D.C. barracks, and spent the rest of its enlistment endur-
ing rugged marches and bloody fights.
In the spring of 2020, Alexander MacLeod, a descendant of a vet-
eran of the regiment, donated 22 letters written by Lewis Foster,
along with approximately 40 other missives penned by 10 other mem-
bers of the unit and scores of other documents related to the 9th
NYHA’s service, to the care of Shenandoah University’s McCormick
Civil War Institute. All of these letters appear in “A Good Cause”: Let-
ters from the Ninth New York Heavy Artillery. The letters excerpted
here from Foster and an unidentified member of the regiment, offer
insight into the regiment’s tenure in the capital’s defenses, service
with Army of the Potomac in the spring of 1864, and in the conflict’s
final months.
48 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
FORT GAINES
May 28, 1863
Dear Mother,
I don’t see where the folks up north get the
foundations for their rumors. I have not heard
anything about this regiment being turned into
infantry. Again the reason for the change of
coats is that they want all the artillery to wear
the same kind of coats. I don’t think we will
leave here very soon… We are at work from 7
o’clock till ten. From 2 till 4 those that are not
detailed on the fort have to drill on the big guns.
I am detailed to work on the fort today… I am
PREVIOUS SPREAD: LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; BOSTON ATHANEUM/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES
tired of working on roads and forts… I would
like to go and garrison a Fort on the Sea Coast.
Give my love to all
Lewis
FORT FOOTE
January 25, 1864
Dear Aunt,
I have not been very well for about three weeks.
It is three weeks ago today since I have done
any duty. I am some better today… We expect
our regiment will soon be filled up… It is so
warm that the boys sit out by the side of the
barracks in their shirt sleeves… We had some
 cold weather about a month ago. The river froze over so that the boys or
some of them went across the river to Alexandria on the ice, but the ice is
all out of the river now. [First Lieutenant Seth F.] Swift is getting to be
pretty careless of his reputation, he drinks a considerable [amount]. He
was on a spree one night with a lot of the officers and the next morning
he was on guard and he was so drunk he could hardly stand up, he
dropped his gun once, but the rest of the Officers was on and it all passed
off. If the rest of the officers had not been on a spree with him and he
come out to guard mounting drunk as he
was then he would have been reduced to the HEAVY DRINKER
ranks in no time. Cap[tain Harvey Follett] Bearded First Lieutenant
don’t drink much now, his wife is here and Seth F. Swift is seated
he carries himself pretty straight. at right along with two
Your affectionate nephew. other officers in the 22nd
Lewis New York, his first unit.

A
Problems with alcohol
lthough the work the regiment per- may have caused Swift to
formed during its first 20 months of resign his 9th New York
service—building roads, strengthening commission in 1864.
existing defenses, constructing new
fortifications, and garrison work—proved important, some of the regi-
ment’s members noted that they were “not particularly proud of its reputa-
tion” as construction laborers. They wanted to fight. That opportunity came
in the late spring of 1864 when the regiment was ordered to join Maj. Gen.
James Ricketts’ division of Maj. Gen. Horatio Wright’s 6th Corps. On May
18, 1864, the 1,900 men who comprised the 9th NYHA boarded three When the 9th joined the 6th Corps near the
steamers—John Brooks, John W.D. Prouty, and State of Connecticut—and end of the month the men seemed “particularly
headed “to the front.” The scenes the regiment witnessed at Belle Plain pleased” to be part of it. However, the corps’ vet-
Landing and in Fredericksburg, wounded from the battlefields of the Wil- erans wondered how this regiment, now com-
derness and Spotsylvania, proved jarring. manded by Secretary of State William Seward’s
son, Colonel William Seward, Jr., would per-
form in combat. While some of the 6th’s veter-
ans derisively referred to the 9th as the
“White-gloved Soldiers,” those labels no longer
seemed fitting after the regiment’s baptism of
fire at the Battle of Cold Harbor on June 1,
1864—an engagement in which the 9th suffered
148 casualties.

FORT WARD, VA

May 17, 1864

FROM TOP: THE 9TH NEW YORK HEAVY ARTILLERY; HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS; ©DON TROIANI.

Dear Mother,
Our Co[mpany] was sent to Fort Ward….We
expect soon to go to the front. Our bed ticks
have been turned in to the Quartermaster. We
have turned in our shoulder scales and have to
turn in our dress coats and draw blouses. A
blouse is a loose kind of a sack coat, it is cool
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 2022/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES

and comfortable. The barracks that we are in

GETTING IN FIGHTING FASHION
As Lewis Foster noted on May 17, 1864, the men in his company
traded in their dress coats, like the one at left, piped in artillery
red, for looser fitting four-button fatigue (“sack”) coats, right.
now are good comfortable ones. They are well
ventilated with lots of doors and windows and
on the roof is three little cupolas. The sides are
made of slats so the barracks are well ventilated,
our beds are easily described. We have got
bunks and good soft boards to lay on with our
knapsack for a pillow. We have orders to be
ready to march at any time that we are called

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 49

upon. We have got a lot of hard tack here ready so when we do march we
can bid good bye to soft bread… There is lots of wounded soldiers com-
ing into the city every day… According to reports Grant is whipping Lee
all to pieces….Grant is bound to crush Lee before he can get to Rich-
mond and I think he will.
My love to you mother,
Lewis
FREDERICKSBURG
May 21, 1864
Dear Mother,
On the 18th our regiment embarked on board a transport and steamed
down the river about 70 miles to Belle Plain Landing at the mouth of the
Potomac Creek. It took three transports to carry our regiment… What
sights of government property did we see there. There was train after train
there of wounded soldiers and rebel prisoners….There is lots of guerrillas
in this neighborhood. They quite often attack our trains. Every train has
to be guarded from one station to another….There is lots of soldiers here
and more coming every day. The rebel prisoners that are here are sulked
and will not answer any questions. I don’t blame them for that….There is
a train of ambulances at the dock that just came in from Grant’s army
with wounded. Some are wounded in the arms, hands, some in the leg or
feet, some in the head and face, some in the body…we may see some wild
rebels before long.
Your loving son,
Lewis
SIGNS OF WAR’S COST
Injured soldiers at a hospital in Fredericksburg in May 1864. Scenes
such as this one greeted members of the 9th New York when they
arrived in the city and were a slight taste of what lay ahead.
50 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
“THE REBEL
SOLDIERS ARE
ALMOST ALL TIRED
OF FIGHTING”
COLD HARBOR
June 8, 1864
Dear Aunt,
We have had one hard fight [Cold Harbor],
probably you have heard….I went through the
battle without a scratch except a slight mark on
my nose. We had to fight in the woods. I stood
behind a tree loading my gun when a ball struck
the tree and glanced off a piece of bark hitting
me on the nose starting the blood a little…
Four companies of our regiment were support-
ing a battery….Our regiment was left back
from the division to guard a wagon train but
about one o’clock on the morning of the 1st of
this month we was ordered to join our brigade.
We marched about 10 miles and overtook our
brigade then we marched about 7 miles and
stopped and built a rifle pit and about three
o’clock we was ordered to fall in line and attack
the enemy. Our brigade formed in line of battle
and charged on the enemy… We charged across
an open field into the woods where the rebels
were, we drove them through the woods….
Some of our boys got rebel haversacks with
cornbread and bacon. I got some of their
bacon….We have laid in reach of bullets every
day this month….Some of the rebel prisoners
say that if we drive them from this position
Richmond is gone up. I hope it is so….Our
men sent in a flag of truce last night for a cessa-
tion of hostilities to bury the dead. Our men
and the Rebels met each other half way and
exchanged papers. Our men are building rifle
pits and batteries. They calculate to shell the
rebels when they get everything ready. Lewis
O
n July 5, 1864, Ricketts’ division, due to the
threat Confederate General Jubal Early
posed to the nation’s capital once his com-
mand of approximately 14,000 troops
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
pushed beyond Harpers Ferry, received orders
to “take transports for Baltimore.” After arriv-
ing in Baltimore on July 8, the regiment
boarded train cars that carried them west to
 THIS IS NOT A DRILL Frederick, Md. The following day, the 9th and cabbages… Our men captured one Johnnie
The 9th New York fought NYHA fought in what would be one of its and the prisoners that our men captured today
at Cold Harbor in Colonel costliest engagements—the Battle of says that the Rebel soldiers are almost all tired
Benjamin Smith’s Monocacy. The 9th suffered 207 casualties, of fighting and that there is lots of them that
brigade. Its position is Colonel Seward among them. In addition would desert and come into our lines but they
circled. The 9th served to receiving “a slight wound in the arm,” cannot. They are kept well guarded. He also
with the 6th Maryland; Seward broke his ankle after his horse “was says that there is lots of them skulking around
the 110th, 122nd, and shot” and fell on him.
126th Ohio; and the 67th Nine days after Monocacy, the regiment,
and 138th Pennsylvania. although not engaged, “came under fire”
The regiments charged along the banks of the Shenandoah River at
the prominent woodline. the Battle of Cool Spring. Over the next
three months, the 9th NYHA experienced
incessant marching and intense combat in the Shenandoah Valley as part
of Union Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan’s Army of the Valley.
©VIRGINIA HISTORICAL SOCIETY/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES; THE 9TH NEW YORK HEAVY ARTILLERY

CAMP NEAR KERNSTOWN, VA

November 26, 1864

We had a sort of Thanksgiving dinner yesterday, but it was a small fry. I
tell you there was turkey and fowls of every [sort] sent by the folks at
home, but they had to pass through so many officer’s hands before they
got to us that there was not much left… It is reported in Camp today that
the rebels are evacuating Petersburg, but I don’t believe it. It is only a
rumor… You would laugh to see the huts we have got up here. They look
almost half like beaver huts or something of that kind and [you] would MONOCACY CASUALTY
smile to see the tools we have borrow[ed] from farmers here….We came Colonel William H. Seward Jr. took command of
across a wagon shop with lots of wagon spokes in it, all carved good….It the regiment on May 22, 1864. At the Battle of
was an old Rebel that owned the shop and I think he was a guerrilla as Monocacy, Seward’s shot horse fell on him and
there was a lot of blue clothes found between the ceiling and the clap- broke his right leg. The injury left a scar on his
boards of the house….We took all the hay [he] had and a lot of potatoes leg that was noted in a 1908 examination.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 51

 SLOWING DOWN JUBAL EARLY
Union 6th Corps soldiers fire on advancing
Confederates at the July 12, 1864, Battle of
Monocacy. The 9th New York suffered more
than 200 casualties and helped repulse a
number of attacks during the engagement.

in the mountains that would come into our FORT WADSWORTH, VA

lines but they are afraid that the Yankees will
treat them as they do guerrillas and that is to
hang them. Some of the folks hide their things
in the woods and bury them, but the boys man-
age to find the most of it. Today the boys found
a lot of honey, butter, potatoes, cabbages, and
other edibles hid in the woods.
Your affectionate son,
December 27, 1864
Dear Mother,
It is pretty rough times here now for some reason or another. We don’t get
more than half enough rations now… One of the boys that tents with
me… bought bread and flour and so we have got along better than some
of the boys… We have more duty to do than we did in the summer. We

©KEITH ROCCO. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 2022/COURTESY NATIONAL PARK SERVICE/BRIDGEMAN IMAGES
Lewis have to do picket duty, guard duty, drill, and 25 men have to stay to the

D
fort half of the night and keep awake and we have to all get up at five in
uring the first week of December, Lt. Gen. the morning and stay to the fort until daylight then we have to carry our
Ulysses S. Grant ordered the 6th Corps to wood nearly a mile.
move from the Shenandoah Valley back to
Petersburg. Shortly before noon on Decem-

“THE PICKETS KEEP

ber 3, 1864, the 9th NYHA broke camp, marched
to the train depot north of Winchester, and
boarded cars that carried them to Harpers Ferry.
Two days later the regiment reached Petersburg.
Although the New Yorkers returned to a familiar
place the regiment’s veterans reflected upon how
different the unit looked compared to when it
departed Petersburg the previous summer. The
fighting from Monocacy to Cedar Creek had
taken its toll. “Scarcely more than half as many
men return to Petersburg as left it in the preced-
ing July. The months had sadly ravaged our
ranks,” one of the 9th’s veterans recalled.
FIRING ALL THE TIME”
Since we got the news of the capture of Savannah there has [been] 180
rebs come into our lines. They said that a whole brigade started but some
of their own batteries were turned on them. Some … say that there is
thousands of them that will come to us as soon as they get paid again so
their families can have the money to keep them from starving.
Your loving son,
Lewis

52 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 FORT WADSWORTH
February 4, 1865
Dear Mother,
The pickets keep firing all the time. Once in a few minutes
our reserve pickets fire a volley that stops the rebs for a while
but they soon commenced popping again. There is all kinds of
rumors in camp about peace. Some says they heard that peace
was soon going to be declared and some says that [Francis]
Blair’s mission to Richmond was an entire failure. Then rumor
says the peace commissioners have gone to Washington from
Richmond to see what terms can be agreed upon, but I don’t
credit much of it, but I hope it is true… I wish the war would
close and that we could go home….I have seen men enough
killed to satisfy my war fever entirely. A swallowtail pennant used by the 9th. Such flags
From your loving soldier boy, helped mark an artillery battery’s flanks. After the unit
Lewis converted to infantry, it would have been used to set
the right and left flanks of the regimental formation.
FORT FISHER [PETERSBURG, VA.]
February 18, 1865
Dear Mother,
We have left Fort Wadsworth and are quartered at Fort Fisher about
three miles from our other camp….The Rebel lines are but a short dis-
tance from our own and we can see them very plainly when they are at
work on their forts and breastworks. There is no firing on the picket line
except [when] the Johnnies try to desert….The picket lines are close to
them and their men desert very fast. Some nights if it is pretty dark some
few to twenty will come in one night. Sometimes a squad of the Johnnie’s
pickets will come half way and some of our boys go out to meet them and
talk with each other. We have got some strong works here, and if the
Johnnies pitch into us here we will give them a warm reception….I can
hear the pickets yelling at each other. From your loving son,
Lewis
F
ollowing the Army of Northern Virginia’s surrender on April 9, 1865,
the 9th NYHA protected the Richmond and Danville Railroad. The
9th performed this duty until May 22, when it was ordered to proceed
north to Washington, D.C. On June 8 the regiment, along with the
entire 6th Corps, participated in the Grand Review of the corps. While the
review, as one of the regiment’s veterans recalled, presented an opportunity
for “all those who had fought to save the Capital might, in triumph, march
through its streets,” as the following excerpted letter, penned by an uniden-
tified member of the regiment, notes it was a miserable experience.
NEW YORK STATE MILITARY MUSEUM & VETERANS RESEARCH CENTER
CAMP 9th NYHA
Near Washington, D.C.
June 9, 1865
Dear Parents,
We had that great Review yesterday. I thought I would write a few lines to
let you know that I was one of the number to live through it, but I had a
pretty rough time of it. The day was scorching hot there was not the least
bit of air in the city. There was a great many men sun stroke & some died,
some dropped dead in the ranks. Officers fell from their horses….It must
[be] a great pleasure for them head officers…there is no use of these
YANKEE PENNANT
reviews….I shall not go on another review, if we
have to go on another I shall fall out the first
thing… All that lacks of our coming home is
making out our discharges & our transporta-
tion….I don’t think I would give much for a
soldier’s labor when we get home for they are
like a lot of broken down horses. It will take
food, clothing, rest, & washed about 3 times a
week in warm water with some good bay rum in
it to get his hide cleaned, a glorious old physic
& the thorough cleansing of the blood & stom-
ach to make anything of the worst of us.
F
oster mustered out of the regiment on July
18, 1865, he returned to New York, but did
not remain long in the Empire State. In
1867 Foster and his new bride, Albina (the
couple married on September 15, 1867), headed
west to Nebraska. According to Foster’s pension
file the Foster family, which eventually included
three children, lived and labored in Beaver Creek
and Lincoln as a farmer for 25 years. For reasons
unclear, the Fosters moved to Powhatan County,
Va., by 1896. On September 28, 1912, battling
various ailments including chronic rheumatism,
arteriosclerosis, and “mental insufficiency,” Foster
was admitted to the National Home for Dis-
abled Volunteer Soldiers in Hampton, Va. He
died at the home on November 2, 1912, and was
buried in the Hampton National Cemetery.
Jonathan A. Noyalas is director of Shenandoah
University’s McCormick Civil War Institute and
the author or editor of numerous books,. including
“A Good Cause”: Letters From the Ninth New
York Heavy Artillery.
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 53
 HOLDING THE
EAST PASS

54 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

A local militia unit served as
Braxton Bragg’s spearpoint
to control Pensacola’s U.S. forts
BY S H E R I T TA B I T I KO F E R

GARRISON DUTY
The 6th New York Infantry—“Wilson’s
Zouaves”—occupied the pentagonal Fort
Pickens in 1861 and defended it against
repeated Confederate threats. It was one
of only four Southern forts to remain in
Union hands throughout the war.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 55

I
n January 1861, the firing upon Fort
Sumter and the Civil War’s outbreak
were still months away, but the war had
already arrived in Pensacola, Fla. The
strategic naval port had three forts
(Barrancas, McRae, and Pickens) and a navy
yard—the largest in the soon-to-be Confederate
States. Control of the Federal installations
around the bay were crucial to both sides looking
to maintain a foothold in the state. Senator
David L. Yulee strongly recommended that the
secessionists in Florida should “lose no time” in
trying to capture them, and they did not.
On January 8, secessionists had already taken
control of the neighboring U.S. arsenal at Chat-
tahoochee and Fort Marion in St. Augustine,
when Federal soldiers guarding Pensacola’s Fort
Barrancas fired warning shots at unknown pass-
ersby. With shots fired, Southern-sympathizing
Florida Governor Madison Starke Perry quickly
decided to seize all the United States property he
DEPARTMENT HEAD
In March 1861, Jefferson Davis assigned
Mexican War hero Braxton Bragg to command
the region around Pensacola and to train the
area’s new recruits to the Confederate Army.
56 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
could in Pensacola. Troops converged in the city from Florida, Alabama,
Mississippi, Louisiana, and Georgia.
Florida formally seceded from the United States on January 10, and two
days later the navy yard surrendered to Southern troops. Forts Barrancas
and McRae followed suit and were soon under secessionist control, but U.S.
troops held strong onto Fort Pickens at the western tip of Santa Rosa
Island. Its location and size made it the ideal position from which to block-
ade and control the entire harbor, and its control by the Federals gave the
U.S. Army the upper hand in the area.
Brigadier General Braxton Bragg, who assumed command of the Con-
federate forces in Pensacola on March 11, 1861, believed that even if Fort
BRAGG WAS DETERMINED
TO DEFEND THE EAST PASS,
ANDTHAT JOB WOULD FALL TO THE
NEWLY FORMED WALTON GUARDS
Pickens could be captured, it could not be maintained for long. By the end
of April, Federal reinforcements had arrived at the fort and blockading
efforts of key port cities had begun along the Gulf Coast. Bragg understood
that he couldn’t contend with these forces, but he could try to hold them at
bay. He was determined to defend the East Pass, and that job, he decided,
would fall to the newly formed Walton Guards.
O
n March 1, 1861, east of Pensacola in Eucheeanna, the county seat
of Walton County, the town’s women organized and marched
through the streets, chanting, “Go boys, to your country’s call! I’d
rather be a brave man’s widow than a coward’s wife.” Inspired by the patri-
otic sentiment of their kin and community, 60 of the local men agreed to
fight for the Confederate cause, and formed the Walton Guards.
In early April, they elected as their captain William McPherson, a prom-
inent 27-year-old local lawyer and graduate of Cumberland University Law
School in Lebanon, Tenn. The unit embarked on the schooner Lady of the
Lake at Alaqua Creek, destined for Garnier Bayou and then the “Narrows”
to guard the East Pass.
This corridor at the mouth of Choctawhatchee Bay, also called Santa
Rosa Sound, allowed passage between the mainland and Santa Rosa Island.
Most important, the East Pass and Nar-
PREVIOUS SPREAD: HARPER’S WEEKLY; HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS, FLORIDA MEMORY
rows were the gateways to the “back door”
of Fort Pickens, just 40 miles to the west.
Confederates could use it as an avenue of
assault, the Federals as a safe bypass to
reinforce or resupply the fort. The only
Confederate force protecting the East Pass
was the Walton Guards, who set up their
encampment, dubbed Camp Walton,
around a collection of tall Mississippian Lt. Reddick
mounds near the shoreline.
Life at Camp Walton was fairly com-
fortable for the Guards. Their proximity to
home and an ample source of fresh fish,
timber, and entertainment along the beach
made service in the Confederacy seem easy. Lieutenant Henry W. Reddick
remembered, “We soon had the camp ground and drill grounds cleared up
 BATTLE STATIONS
U.S. forts built to protect Florida’s mainland became battlegrounds
for Federal and state troops after Florida’s secession. The Walton
Guards camped east of Pensacola to defend the East Pass (inset)
against Union troops reinforcing Fort Pickens.

and set to work building our houses, and in about a week we were all
fixed and had a jolly good time.” The existing earthen mounds also
provided natural protection from the direction of the Narrows, mak-
ing the grounds of Camp Walton ideal for their mission.
The Federal gunboats Water Witch, Wyandotte, and Maria A. Wood
were tasked with blockading the East Pass from any Confederate
breaches. Small skirmishes with the Walton Guards on July 12,
1861, and again on February 1, 1862, resulted in no casualties, but both Closson was to carry out the investigation
sides became more wary of the other after a failed attempt by Bragg to with Company L of the 1st Artillery and Com-
capture Fort Pickens on the night of October 9, 1861. pany K of the 6th New York Infantry, known as
Hostilities around East Pass came to a head in late March 1862, when it Wilson’s Zouaves. Closson set out on March 27,
was reported that “200 armed rebels” had “killed 2 sailors and wounded 2 traveling along Santa Rosa Island, and was 20
others belonging to the blockading schooner stationed there.” Brigadier miles from Fort Pickens on March 28 when he
General Lewis G. Arnold, who had been assigned to command the Depart- was intercepted by Lieutenant Richard H. Jack-
FLORIDA MEMORY (2)

ment of Florida on February 22, 1862, ordered Captain Henry W. Closson son, acting assistant adjutant-general of the
of the 1st U.S. Artillery for a reconnaissance in force to ascertain “the char- department, and Company D of the 6th New
acter of the upper end of the island and to punish and take prisoners any York, along with a Rebel refugee acting as a
rebels he might meet.” guide. The refugee, a Mr. Woods, was a former

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 57


ZONE DEFENSE
On January 10, 1861, after the surrender of the
Pensacola Navy Yard, 2nd Lt. Adam Slemmer
concentrated his Pensacola force at Fort
Pickens to defend it against Confederate threat
of attack and demands for its surrender.
sawmill manager who had been pressed into ser-
vitude at Bragg’s headquarters but had escaped
to Santa Rosa Island, where he provided vital
information to Jackson and Closson for the
expedition.
Jackson’s initial plan was to split Closson’s
forces into three parts: one that would shell the
camp from the island, one to cross the Narrows to
the mainland, and the third to enter the pass and
move down the sound with boats provided by
Maria A. Wood on blockade duty. The latter ele-
ment of the plan was abandoned due to the dis-
tance from the intended place of bombardment.
“The island varied in width,” Closson would
later detail, “so far as I had an opportunity to
notice, from half a mile to 500 yards; to cut up by
sand ridges, so as to make the passage of teams
across very difficult and generally impossible;
furnishes good water in pools or by digging in
the depressions; but very little grass indeed, and
that very coarse.”
As Closson noted: “In many places, the island
is perfectly open, in others screened from the
main-land by ridges of sand hills and fringes of
forest. The sound is in width from 3 miles to 300
yards, I should judge. The narrowest point is
about 40 miles from the fort. Here the rebel
camp was located. It is nowhere fordable; naviga-
ble for its whole extent for vessels of 7 feet
draught, the channel running generally close
along the main-land.”
58 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
A
t noon on March 31, Closson arrived within four miles of his
target, but plans soon went awry. He set out at sunset with 170
men and traveled two miles up the beach. Two surf boats were
dispatched for his use, which he hauled over the sandy hills of the island to
the launching point, where they waited for the third boat. By then, it was
reported that the Confederates suspected their intentions, via a report from
Lieutenant Theodore K. Gibbs that two Rebel spies had been spotted on
the mainland but were not detained. Closson now abandoned the crossing
of the Narrows and settled for an artillery bombardment of Camp Walton.
With only Company D of the 6th New York, Closson set up a single rifled
gun about 250 yards across from the camp and waited until dawn before
firing the first shot.
The Guards were lined up for roll call when they heard the roar of the
gun across the sound and the “shot whistling over their heads.” Lieutenant
Reddick had been sleeping after a night of picket duty and was awakened
by one of his messmates at the onset of the attack. “I thought that he was
teasing me and while we were talking the second shot came, the ball going
through our house near the top and just over my head,” Reddick relayed.
“There was no more talking. I jumped up and began looking for my pants
and shoes, which I had a hard time finding.”
Once fully clothed, the lieutenant was ordered by Captain McPherson to
assist in calming the panic among the men.
The Walton Guards tried to re-form multiple times during the hysteria,
but Union artillery continually dispersed them with startling accuracy. Not
even McPherson could rally his men to make a stand. On the island, Clos-
son later reported that, “Loud cries and yells were heard, and the rebels
could be barely seen through the brush in their shirt-tails making rapidly
into the back country. A scattering volley was fired from what I supposed
to be their guard, who then disappeared also.”
The earthen mounds became a refuge for some of the surprised Confed-
erates while many of the troops fled to the sheltering woods north of camp.
In a letter written after the attack, Confederate Lieutenant John L.
McKinnon noted he “staid where I could see them all the time I was
behind a very large tree & feared no danger.” In an April 2 letter to the Rev.
John Newton, he said, “After all went out of camp I sent back after a sick
man that was behind & I hollered to the Yankees on the island to come
ALPHA STOCK/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; HISTORICAL/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
WILSON’S ZOUAVES
The 6th New York Infantry, organized in May 1861, was composed
mostly of gang members, ex-cons, and criminals. Rumor had it that a
man had to prove he’d served time in jail before he was allowed to join.
 ROUGH BUT READY
Confederate troops straight from civilian life pose next to
their cook fire at a Pensacola camp. Aside from their rifles
and accoutrements, little distinguishes them as soldiers.
The Walton Guards likely had a similar appearance.
over to this side & we would fight them. They said for us to carry over
some boats that was on the beach at our Camp & they would. You know
we did not comply with this request.”
The Walton Guards proceeded inland and encamped at Garnier Bayou
under a heavy guard until the danger passed. Rumors came that the shelling
was part of a plan to land troops, as it was suspected that 160 cavalry had
landed on Santa Rosa Island in the vicinity of Camp Walton. This was not
the case, as Closson’s rations were dwindling, and his mules broken down
by the arduous journey from Fort Pickens. He thought it prudent to return
without pursuing the Confederates on the mainland.
For the Walton Guards, many of whom hadn’t experienced combat thus
far in the war, the assault on Camp Walton was a harrowing experience.
Orders were given for the company to return to their post and “hold that
place at all hazards.” They were sent two 30-pounder naval cannons to
assist, seeing as they were only armed with muskets up to this time. Once
they returned to the Narrows, one gun was mounted near the water’s edge,
but they never had the opportunity to mount the second.
A
pril 1862 proved to be a disastrous month for the Confederacy.
The defeat at Shiloh and the capture of New Orleans sent a
panic through the high command. It became clear that Pensacola
could not be held efficiently without the possession of Fort Pickens. Bragg
had left the area in late February, leaving Brig. Gen. Samuel Jones in charge
of the troops in Pensacola. On February 27, he gave the orders to “make all
dispositions at the earliest moment, working day and night, to abandon
Pensacola.” The evacuation wouldn’t be fully carried out until May 9, and
the Federals took advantage of the abandoned forts almost instantly.
With Pensacola irrevocably in Union hands, it was no longer necessary
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
to protect the East Pass. The 64 members of the Walton Guards were con-
solidated into the 1st Florida Regiment, Company D. By 1863, the 1st,
3rd, 4th, 6th, and 7th Florida Infantry regiments were combined into the
Florida Brigade. McPherson, Reddick, and the rest of the men would see
action at Perryville, Stones River, Chickamauga,
and during the Atlanta Campaign.
One Walton Guard who survived the war,
John Thomas Brooks, returned to the site of
Camp Walton in 1868. Brooks and his wife pur-
chased 111 acres of land along the water where
his company had encamped for a year. Camp
Walton grew in popularity as a beach destination
and attracted tourists and settlers from across the
country. It would later be renamed Fort Walton
Beach to imply a greater sense of prominence
and attract vacationers.
In the early 1900s, a resident of the area, W.C.
Pryor, was digging fence posts near the Santa
Rosa Sound, when his shovel hit something hard
and immovable. When the site was excavated,
they pulled from the ground, one of the
30-pounder cannons the Walton Guards had
buried prior to their abandonment of the camp.
The second is still buried in an unknown loca-
tion, likely under busy Highway 98. The
unearthed cannon was put on display on the side-
walk in the downtown area in front of the only
surviving earthen mound used by the Walton
Guards. Here, it can be seen by many travelers
driving through Fort Walton Beach to this day.
Sheritta Bitikofer, a member of Emerging Civil
War, writes historical fiction and manages
www.belleonthebattlefield.wordpress.com.
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 59
 ARMAMENT

FROM THE FRONT LINES

A group of campaign-weathered Union soldiers,
some with their bedrolls, pose with their Model 1841
“Mississippi” Rifles. Their socket bayonets suggest the
guns had been altered like the example on the next page.

ONE MISSISSIPPI,
TWO MISSISSIPPI
THE BEAUTIFUL BRASS-MOUNTED MODEL 1841 RIFLE
SAW DECADES OF SERVICE
HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS (3)

GOOD LOOKING KILLER

The Model 1841 Rifle is a handsome muzzleloader. The example at top was made
at the Harpers Ferry Arsenal, and remains as produced with no bayonet lug. The
bottom 1841 was altered with the addition of a long-range rear sight, a shorter
nose band, and a brazed lug on the barrel to hold a Model 1855 Saber Bayonet.

60 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 THE MODEL 1841 RIFLE crackled into American military
legend when the U.S. Army regiment made up of men from
Mississippi led by Colonel Jefferson Davis—yes, that Jefferson
Davis—used the rifles and .54-caliber patched round balls with devastating
effect in the Mexican War. Their marksmanship forever applied the nickname
“Mississippi Rifle” to the firearm. Between the federal armory at Harpers
Ferry and five other contracting firms, nearly 93,000 M-1841s were made
between 1844 and 1855. Davis continued to have an impact on the weapon
when, as secretary of war in 1853-57, he ordered upgrades for older U.S. mil-
itary firearms and the production of the new Model 1855 series.
Before the war, but mostly after the war began, Model 1841s received a
number of alterations. Some were fitted to accept bayonets for the first time,
received long-range sights, and some were bored out and re-rifled to fire .58-
caliber ammunition. Both Union and Confederate troops carried M-1841
rifles during the first two years of the war, and one regiment, the 45th New
York, went into the Battle of Gettysburg wielding their Mississippis. —D.B.S.

NOSE JOB
Henry Leman of Lancaster, Pa., altered Model 1841s by turning
the end of the barrels down, as seen here, to accept a socket
bayonet. Many were also stripped of the browned finish and
polished bright, re-bored to .58 caliber and given ramrods made
to fit over the end of the standard conical (“Minié”) ball.
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS (3); NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN HISTORY

SHORT BUT FEISTY

The Model 1841 was about 49
inches long, and two bands
secured the barrel to the stock.
The Model 1861 Rifle Musket,
IMITATION IS FLATTERY left, used three bands to secure
the barrel and was 7 inches
Between 1852 and 1853, the Wm.
longer. The brass patch on the
Glaze & Co. in Columbia, S.C., made
Mississippi was used to hold gun
1,000 “Palmetto” Rifles that were
tools and greased patches for the
nearly exact copies of the Model
rifle’s round ball ammunition.
1841. These guns saw service by
troops of that state during the war.

JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 61

 ARMAMENT

MR. MISSISSIPPI
Jefferson Davis played
an outsized role in the
Model 1841’s history.
The prowess of his
Mississippi Volunteers
in Mexico gave the
guns their beloved
nickname. Later, as
Secretary of War, his
orders set in motion
alterations that
updated thousands of
rifles and extended
their military
usefulness.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS; HERITAGE AUCTIONS, DALLAS; CONFEDERATE MEMORIAL LITERARY SOCIETY

THAT’S A LOAD
The Model 1855 Saber
Bayonet used on some Model
1841s was a beast that
required its own unique
belt, which was wider than
the standard infantry belt
and used a heavier buckle
to hold the cleaver. Leather
straps from a knapsack
hooked to the brass slides
THIS MISSISSIPPI STAYED SOUTH on the belt to help the
A Confederate soldier clutches his Model 1841 Rifle. Regiments soldier literally keep his belt
from Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Virginia are known up. Imagine that big blade
to have carried the guns. Some Confederate cavalry regiments, smacking your thigh as you
unable to obtain small, nimble breechloading carbines, instead marched down a dusty road.
toted the relatively short brass-mounted rifles.

62 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 The N-SSA is America¶s oldest and largest Civil War shooting sports
organization. Competitors shoot original or approved
reproduction muskets, carbines and revolvers at

FIRST
breakable targets in a timed match. Some units even
compete with cannons and mortars. Each team
represents a Civil War regiment or unit and wears the
uniform they wore over 150 years ago. Dedicated to

MONDAYS
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the camaraderie of team sports with friends and family,
the N-SSA may be just right for you.
)RUPRUHLQIRUPDWLRQYLVLWXVRQOLQHDWZZZQVVDRUJ
AN ORIGINAL VIDEO SERIES
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REVIEWED BY RICK BEARD
I
n April 1862, the Confederate Congress passed the first conscrip-
tion bill in American history. White men between the ages of 18
and 35 could now be drafted into the Confederate Army for three
years, or less if the war ended sooner. As an alternative, they could
pay a substitute. At the same time, those who had volunteered to
fight for a year in 1861 saw their term of service extended to three years.
For the duration of the conflict, the Confederate government would sev-
eral times revise policies designed to fill its armies’ ranks and offset the
Union’s overwhelming demographic advantage. In Confederate Conscription
and the Struggle for Southern Soldiers, John Sacher offers a detailed narrative
of the Confederacy’s efforts to solve its manpower problem and judges
conscription a success that enabled the South to
prosecute the war as long as it did.
Historians who argue that conscription weak-
ened the Confederacy, the author believes, fail to
consider how the policy evolved in response to
the critiques of Confederate stakeholders and
too readily conflate anger and criticism over a
particular policy as opposition to the Confeder-
acy at large.
The “Twenty Negro Law” of October 1862
offers Sacher an opportunity to illustrate his
point. Many historians single out the law, which
exempted overseers on plantations with 20 slaves Confederate
from military duty, as undercutting Confederate Conscription and the
conscription efforts. But fewer than 10 percent of Struggle for Southern
Soldiers
the South’s 43,000 plantations received such an
exemption, the author argues, and the Rebel gov- By John M. Sacher
ernment tightened conditions for such an exemp- LSU Press, 2021, $45
tion several times during the war.
64 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
HEEL DRAGGERS
Bayonets and ropes
are used to force
reluctant Southern
dandies to honor
their conscription
in the Confederate
Army in this
satirical cartoon.
Sacher details how, over the four years of the
war, critics of conscription challenged it as a
threat to states’ rights and sought to exert state
control over a process that Confederate leaders
insisted was national; took issue with the evolving
list of occupations exempting men from military
service; and questioned the recruitment process’
effectiveness as opposed to the military’s often
aggressive efforts. But, he concludes, most South-
erners recognized conscription as necessary. By
1863, even its critics accepted it and instead
worked to make it more equitable.
Sacher concludes that “conscription tried to
solve an unsolvable problem—finding enough
men to both fight and farm without allowing
special privilege—or even the perception of spe-
cial privilege.” He suggests Confederate leaders
had to reckon with three questions: How to rec-
oncile national power with states’ rights? How to
achieve an equilibrium between the needs of the
military and the home front? And how could the
anticipated sacrifices be spread equally across
families and communities?
How well Confederate leaders answered these
questions is open to interpretation. On one hand,
since the Confederacy was defeated, conscription
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
was in the end a failure. On the other hand, an
11-state confederation with a White male popu-
lation only a quarter that of its opponent kept
Union forces at bay for four long years.
 Eye Eye FOR
REVIEWED BY GORDON BERG
W
hen Frederick Douglass met with Abraham Lincoln in August
1863, he asked the president to “retaliate in kind and degree
without delay upon Confederate prisoners in his hands” if
Confederate authorities carried out their threat to kill or
enslave Black Union soldiers captured on the battlefield. Lincoln
demurred; he didn’t feel it just to punish so severely otherwise
innocent soldiers for crimes perpetrated by others.
Lincoln’s actions conformed to a highly ritualized process of war-
fare whereby, according to Lorien Foote, “the combatants staked
broad claims about what civilized warfare should look like in practice
and negotiated details about how to interpret the laws of war and
conduct campaigns.” These laws, traditionally followed by civilized
belligerent counties, were meant to mitigate the severity of battle,
preserve national honor in the eyes of their own citizens and other
nations, and justify their actions in the eyes of history. General
Orders No. 100, known as the Lieber Code, spelled out how Union
soldiers should conduct themselves in wartime. Foote’s in-depth
examination of rarely studied and little understood rites of retalia-
tion in the Civil War broadens our understanding of why politicians,
military commanders, ordinary soldiers, and civilians saw the war as
a crisis of civilization and attempted to keep it from descending into
savage barbarity.
Foote focuses her investigation on the Department of the South
because it was there, in Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas, that the
presence of Black troops—particularly the famed 54th Massachusetts
Infantry and the 1st South Carolina Infantry—inflamed Southern
soldiers and pressured the Confederate government into threatening
to treat captured Black Union soldiers as runaway slaves liable to be
hanged for armed insurrection and their White officers imprisoned
as common criminals. “Retaliation incidents in the Department of
the South,” Foote writes, “were regular, prolonged, and usually well
documented.”
Rather than follow a strict chronological narrative, Foote organizes
her investigation around thematic constructs such as how rites of
retaliation were used regarding the treatment of prisoners, the fears
of a servile insurrection, massacres of wounded or surrendering
troops, threats to use captured soldiers as human shields, and dealings
with pillagers and reprisal assassinations. Foote carefully documents
both the successful and failed retaliation rituals spawned by the
Rites of Retaliation:
Civilization, Soldiers,
and Campaigns in the
American Civil War
By Lorien Foote
UNC Press, 2021, $22.95
Union campaign against Charleston,
including the attack on Battery Wagner,
operations on James and Morris Island,
and the Union bombardment of the city
itself. She describes how various Union
officers followed or deviated from accepted
retaliation rituals and how Confederate
commanders on the ground and civilian
officials in Charleston and Richmond
responded to each phase of the campaign.
But the raids carried out by Black
troops on Jacksonville and Darien, Fla.,
and the killing of wounded Black troops
after the Battle of Olustee in February
1863—coupled with the massacre of sur-
rendering Black soldiers at Fort Pillow in
Tennessee the following April—threat-
ened to dramatically change the character
of Civil War warfare.
Foote argues that the study of Civil War
retaliation rituals is important because
they “were foundational for establishing
the norms that Western nations codified
in the 20th century and that shaped the
rules that the United States uses in its
conflicts today.” Rituals for tomorrow’s
conflicts may be another matter entirely.
JUNE 2022 CIVIL WAR TIMES 65
 FINAL
EXAM
REVIEWED BY MELISSA A. WINN

A
ERIC W. BUCKLAND
s the 1876 presidential election loomed, Ulysses S. Grant sur- RETIRED ARMY LIEUTENANT COLONEL,
prised everyone when he declined to seek a third term. Grant PRESIDENT OF THE STUART-MOSBY
had ardently used his time in office to advance the principles HISTORICAL SOCIETY, GRANDFATHER
he felt the Union Army had fought for (and won) under his
generalship in the Civil War. Plagued by a string of scandals near the
end of his second term, however, Grant was now desperate to be out What Are You
of the spotlight and leave the nation building to others who, he hoped,
would carry out a similar vision, particularly the work of integrating
Blacks into society and protecting their
Reading?
new freedoms, especially in the South.
“Was the nation ready to move for-
I am re-reading James Williamson’s
ward, or was it hopelessly trapped in the
“Mosby’s Rangers.” Even though it is a
division that led to the war in the first
frequent research tool for me, the
place?” Bret Baier asks in his new book,
To Rescue the Republic: Ulysses S. Grant, enjoyment of reading it in its entirety
The Fragile Union, and the Crisis of 1876. always results in an even better
The answer, the 1876 election would understanding of the unit’s history. It
prove, was the latter. never fails to provide another “golden
The contest between Republican nugget” about an individual Ranger, a
Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat specific location, or some small fight. The
Samuel Tilden was one of the most con- second edition, published in 1909, offers a
tentious in American history. With alle- revised and enlarged version of the first
To Rescue The Republic: gations of electoral fraud, violence, and edition published in 1896 and continues
Ulysses S. Grant, The the suppression of Republican black to be the most comprehensive book about
Fragile Union, And The
votes, Hayes was declared the winner the 43rd Battalion Virginia Cavalry—
Crisis of 1876
only after a series of negotiations that Mosby’s Rangers. Anyone seeking to
By Bret Baier, with
Catherine Whitney included the withdrawal of federal troops learn about that famous collection of
from Southern states and essentially the cavaliers and daredevils should begin
Custom House, $28.99
end of Reconstruction. their quest with Williamson’s book.
To Rescue the Republic is Baier’s follow-
up to his “Three Days” trilogy of presi-
dential biographies, and attempts to act as one for Grant, too, cover-
ing everything from his upbringing in Ohio, to his days at West Mosby’s Rangers
Point, the Civil War, and ultimately his presidency and legacy. It’s a By James J.
quick read that summarizes the major points, events, and people in Williamson
Grant’s life without much examination. The book’s strength lies in Sturgis & Walton
Baier’s analysis of Grant’s presidency and the political impact and Company, 1909
implications of the 1876 election, not surprising since Baier has had
a notable career as a political journalist and White House correspon-
dent, including now as Fox News’ chief political anchor. His contem-
plations of this less-covered aspect of Grant’s final days leading a
country to which he devoted his life, are worth understanding.

66 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022

 THE CALL OF McCALL
BY GREGORY J. LALIRE
THIS HISTORICAL NOVEL follows
From Gregory J. Lalire,
the editor of Confederate veteran Zach “the bastard” McCall,
his African American bear-wrestling pal Jasper
Washington and half-brother Jack “Crooked
Nose” McCall from the Daniel’s Den (a bordello
M AGA ZI N E in Boonesborough, Kentucky) to Springfield,
Missouri, to connect with Wild Bill Hickok. The
trio watches Wild Bill win a shootout with cardsharp Dave Tutt and
then follows the famous lawman-gambler to the Kansas cow towns of
Hays City and Abilene. In the end, they all arrive in Deadwood, Dakota
Territory, where one of the Wild West’s most famous murders takes
place—during a poker game at the No. 10 Saloon.
PRICE $25.95/447 PAGES
HARDCOVER (5.5 X 8.5)/ISBN13:9781432892722
TIFFANYSCHOFELD@CEGAGE.COM
FACEBOOK & TWITTER: @FIVESTARCENGAGE
PRESIDENT
. ON TRIAL .
REVIEWED BY GORDON BERG
M
ost chroniclers have portrayed the Andrew Johnson impeach-
ment drama as a contest of political wills between Johnson and
his supporters and the Radical Republicans in Congress. Robert
Levine has broadened the scope of this clash to include a third player: the
African American community led by its most influential leader, Frederick
Douglass. In so doing, Levine has provided a fresh and nuanced account of
how Reconstruction failed to achieve its full potential of creating a new
nation that recognized Black citizenship and accepted racial equality.
Levine’s stated objective is to “chart the course of Reconstruction, from
the optimism of the spring of 1865, to the increasing pessimism of the late
1860s and 1870s from the perspective of a man who was not a senator or
congressman, and was not directly involved with the political conflict
between the president and Congress.” Levine demonstrates that immedi-
ately following Lincoln’s assassination, both Congress and African Ameri-
cans had reasons to believe that Johnson would carry on in the spirit of the
martyred president. But that era of good feeling was fleeting. Johnson’s
Amnesty Proclamation of May 29, 1865, gave the first hint of an impend-
ing schism. Levine contends that “[w]ith his veto of the Freedmen’s Bureau
Bill and the Civil Rights Bill, Johnson had essentially lost the support of his
own party in Congress.”
Levine is a literary scholar, not a historian. As such, he is acutely aware
of the power of rhetoric and the importance of language in understanding
Douglass’ growing disillusionment with Johnson. Along with other leaders
of the African American community—men such as George T. Downing,
Frances Harper, and Philip A. Bell—they sought to articulate an alterna-
tive vision of Reconstruction; one at odds with not only Johnson’s, but also
with that of Congressional Republicans. Douglass, Levine adroitly shows,
“posed challenges to both Johnson and Congress in the many speeches he
delivered to Black, White, and mixed-race audiences.” By 1867, Douglass
had gone so far as to “focus more specifically on the flaws of the American
Constitution that he believed paved the way for Johnson’s actions.”
Although Frederick Douglass may not have cared for President Johnson, he worked closely and
cordially with Johnson’s successor, Ulysses S. Grant. After Grant’s death in 1885, Douglass
eulogized him, saying, he was “a man too broad for prejudice, too humane to despise the humblest, too great to be small at any point. In
him the Negro found a protector, the Indian a friend, a vanquished foe a brother, an imperiled nation a savior.”
68 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
The Failed Promise:
Reconstruction, Frederick
Douglass, and the Impeachment
of Andrew Johnson
By Robert S. Levine
W.W. Norton, 2021, $26.95
Levine offers the impeachment trial of John-
son as the culminating event that revealed the
limits of congressional support for African
American efforts to use Reconstruction as a
springboard for achieving their rights as equal
citizens under the law. The impeachment trial
focused on a strictly political issue, the Tenure of
Office Act. By failing to convict Johnson on any
grounds, Douglass concluded in his famous “The
Work Before Us” essay of 1868, it further encour-
aged racist outrages that were then roiling
throughout the South. Levine’s analysis of
Douglass’ essay concludes, “His point was that
the Senate had implicitly exculpated Johnson for
policies that led to such violence.” Douglas
believed that until America honestly confronted
the history and legacy of slavery, “the connection
of the present with the past” could neither “be
ignored nor forgotten.” Douglass’ words, Levine
sadly contends, “confirms Douglass’ status as one
of the nation’s prophets.”
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 Teacher, Preacher,
Soldier, Spy: The Civil
Wars of John R. Kelso
By Christopher Grasso
Oxford University
Press, 2021, $34.95
HE WORE
MANY HATS
REVIEWED BY STEPHEN DAVIS
W
hen the war broke out, Missourian
John Kelso was an outspoken
Unionist. He was elected major of a
local Home Guard unit; then he volunteered as
a private in the 24th Missouri Infantry. In the
spring of 1862, Kelso transferred to a regiment
of Missouri militia cavalry, earning a lieutenant’s
commission. That summer and fall, Kelso’s reg-
iment hunted down bushwhackers in the state’s
bloody guerrilla warfare. He morphed into
something of a spy for Brig. Gen. Samuel Cur-
tis, commander of the Federal Army of the
Southwest operating in Missouri. After his
pro-Southern neighbors burned his house,
Kelso swore revenge. Toward the end of the war,
he was elected to Congress, proud to have killed
60 Rebels.
Working from Kelso’s bombastic autobiogra-
phy, Grasso keeps his focus consistently on his
subject. Teacher, Preacher, Soldier, Spy in fact reads
like a one-man war story rather than a study of
the conflict in Missouri.
The author is a professor at William & Mary.
He found Kelso’s 800-page memoir at the Hun-
tington Library in San Marino, and published its
12 wartime chapters as Bloody Engagement: John
R. Kelso’s Civil War (2017). Subsequently descen-
dants came forth with more of Kelso’s writings,
making possible this quite thorough biography.
John Kelso was a Methodist preacher who
turned into a spiritualist, then an atheist; a school
teacher who became a spy, often disguised as a
Rebel; and a congressman who developed into an
anarchist. Covering Kelso’s “rich and multifac-
eted life,” Christopher Grasso has indeed much
to write about.
70 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022
ALSO ON THE SHELF
Brigades of Antietam: The Union and Confederate
Brigades at the Battle of Antietam, Bradley M.
Gottfried, editor, 2021, Antietam Institute Press,
$37.64
Fifteen experts on the Battle of Antietam contribute
to this volume chronicling the activities of 112 Infan-
try and cavalry brigades in the Maryland Campaign.
Each entry lists the brigade’s units, strength, and
casualties, and then provides concise descriptions of the brigade’s role
at South Mountain, Antietam, and Shepherdstown. Plenty of quotes
enliven the text. Antietam still feels like an understudied battle. This
volume will help change that equation.
Gettysburg’s Lost Love Story: The Ill-fated Romance
of General John Reynolds and Kate Hewitt, by Jeffrey
J. Harding, 2022, The History Press, $21.99
Some of the story is familiar. General John Reynolds
and Kate Hewitt are secretly engaged, and after he is
killed at Gettysburg, she honors their pact and enters a
seminary. But there is so much more to be learned, the
California roots of their romance and her real life after
his death. Through diligent research, author Harding uncovers the true
story that brings depth to the tragedy that befell the star-crossed lovers.
The Summer of ’63: Gettysburg: Favorite Stories and
Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging
Civil War, Edited by Chris Mackowski and Dan
Welch, 2021, Savas Beatie, $29.95
It’s impossible to study the Battle of Gettysburg or visit
the battlefield and not be struck by the stories—of
heroism, daring, terror, and awe. And, let’s face it,
everybody has a favorite story or two, or four. This
new volume from Emerging Civil War features some of the favorites
from historians studying and interpreting the battle today. It also
includes some poignant essays about broad and individual strategies
and efforts that affected the battle or its outcome and offer a new
understanding of the war’s most devastating battle.
U.S. Civil War: Battle by Battle, by Iain
MacGregor, Osprey, 2022, $12 [U.S.]
This new offering from Osprey, first printed in
Great Britain, will be advantageous mostly for
younger audiences and general readers, but that
doesn’t mean it is without merit for aficionados.
Particularly nice is the original artwork that accompanies the 30
capsule looks at battles fought in all three of the war’s major theaters,
as well as the famed Virginia-Monitor clash at Hampton Roads.
Getting a surprise but welcome look is the February 1864 Battle of
Okolona, Miss.
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 WORK OF

ART
$11,875

CHARLES KOCHERSPERGER surely beamed with pride when his men

presented him with this elaborate 2nd Corps badge, engraved on the back, “Lt. Col.
Charles Kochersperger by the members of Co. F May 1864.” In 1861, Kochersperger was
the captain of Company F of the 1st California, one of several Pennsylvania regiments
designated as being from California in a brigade commanded by Oregon Senator Edward
Baker, done so the West Coast could participate in the “short war.” But Baker died at Ball’s
Bluff in November 1861, and the 1st was renamed the 71st Pennsylvania. Kochersperger
had become a lieutenant colonel by the time his regiment helped repulse Pickett’s Charge
at Gettysburg. On the badge, sold by Hindman’s Auctions, a spread-winged eagle grasps the
company letter “F” in its beak, while a gold wreath surrounds “1 Cal.” Each leaf contains
the name of his brigade commanders: Edward Baker, Wallace Burns, and Alexander Webb.
HINDMAN’S AUCTIONS

Not long after he received the treasure, Kochersperger was badly wounded at the Battle
of the Wilderness, a trauma that led to his death in 1867. —D.B.S.

72 CIVIL WAR TIMES JUNE 2022