Day 19. March 19, 1862.
19
and look at his image in it as he ran….
March Wensday 19 1862
Quite cool this morning and somewhat cloudy. I found myself a soldier still* this morning and in the 110th Regt Penn. Volunteers and in the 3rd Brigade our Brig. Gen Tyler and under Gen Shields. We took up the line of march from where we was last night at 8oclock this morning. Our Brigade in advance we crossed over Cedar Creek on a foot bridge that was built last night where the burnt bridge was only below near the water. The teams crossing below. We went on to within 1 mile from Strausburg then we was halted and skirmishers throwen out to see where the enemy was while we was resting the 24 pieces of cannon came past on the double quick. It looked like going to have a battle. The 6 cannon wagons passing the cavalry while we had haulted a while. We heard a report and they fired a shell it bursting in the air we cut off to the right through fields and the other Brigades went around to the left. We was haulted by Gen Tyler and loaded our guns and left the blankets overcoats and haversacks and the Gen Tyler said we was to support the artillary on the right and he wanted to know if we was going to do it. The response was that we would. Took up the line of march for about ¾ of a mile up towards the the hills the artillary having placed their pieces and got the range and loaded our 3 Brigade to the right the artillary made a grand volley. Their troops soon got off they only made some 4 or 6 shots. It was a grand position for a battle our infantry in the rear of the cannon. There was some three of our cavalry horses killed by our shell as they advance beyond the place that they were to go to so our shell bursted and killed the three horses. There was none hurt accept one had his hand hurt slightly by a piece of shell. There was none of our men hurt. We went down to the Pike Bridge and went up the Pike with artillary and infantry and cavalry. We then came back to where our blankets were and over coats and haversacks and went up through a field and camped near the Turn Pike and made some coffee and making preparation for the night out in the open field without tents and it began to rain some and we got some orders to march again. The 3 Brigade took up the line of march down through Strausburg then to the left until they came to the Rail Road then down the Rail Road about one mile. They were doing some picket duty. They got into some sheds and shelter. Lieut [illeg. possibly Kay or Ray] and I was in the ambulance and we stoped in town and hunted. We got into a house on the corner of Main Street on the left hand side. We had nothing but my shaul over us. I was on the sick list but we had to do the best we could for the night. It is hard to soldier when a person is not well. Our Gen Shields thought that we would have a hard fight out at Strausburg and they would not stand and our forces was too strong. There was a retreat of them. We came back. There was some talk that Jackson was reinforced and that he would make a stand and there was no stand but we must be subject to the laws of our Government and sustain them there and have a Constitution or we perish and may the stars and stripes wave
Note: General James Shields (1806–1879), who once challenged Lincoln to a duel. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017894337/
*”I found myself a soldier still this morning….” “….he wanted to know if we was going to do it. The response was that we would” reads like there was some deliberation involved. Also, the men’s permission was solicited prior to the action.“we must be subject to the laws of our Government and sustain them there and have a Constitution or we perish.” Ephraim is clear about the fate of America should the Union lose the war.
Note: See March 29 (“My Hands and Heart Full” by Peter Stanley) where an Isaac Kay of the 110th is quoted. He may have been the same soldier Ephraim refers to above.
“The Constitution must be the supreme law of the land; otherwise it would be in the power of any one state to counteract the other states, and withdraw itself from the Union.” Governor Samuel Johnston, North Carolina State Ratifying Convention, July 19, 1788
Note: 192 nations currently go by a Constitution. The U.S. Constitution is the sole 18th century one still in use today. Can & should have evolved with the centuries to reflect the current century it’s in.
A Virginia Yankee in the Civil War The Diaries of David Hunter Strother David Hunter Strother P. 17
Note: The Union batteries are advancing toward the Rebels, all the while Strother can’t help admiring Shields & Ashby. He also notes the high columns of smoke & burning bridges that Ephraim writes of:
“MARCH 19, WEDNESDAY.—Crossing Cedar Creek the General expressed his annoyance that he should have been stopped by such a trifling obstacle, it being fordable everywhere, even for the infantry. On reaching Strausburg we again heard Ashby’s cannon but he had opened at such a distance that his shells fell short a mile at least. Some very tardy maneuvers on our part were executed to place twenty pieces in position within range of the enemy. By the time the artillery and supporting infantry found their places, the enemy was retiring. A splendid volley covered the country before us with bursting shells, but I cannot flatter myself that they did any damage to the rebels. A regiment of the Michigan cavalry, pushed forward to harass the enemy’s rear, got the benefit of our fire and thereby lost four horses. They retired precipitately or they would have been destroyed by our own artillery. Fortunately no men were lost.
We pushed on for about five miles beyond Strasburg on the Woodstock road, columns of smoke rising as we advanced, from the bridges fired by the retreating Rebels. Near Bush Creek bridge Ashby’s guns opened again, but as usual at a ridiculous distance. At this point we wheeled about and returned to Strasburg, the men growling at what appeared to be a retrograde step. The reconnoissance had been pushed as far as was intended, and General Shields fell back to get up his supplies and await further orders. He certainly is a man of pluck and enterprise and suits me better than anyone I have yet seen in the field. I must say, too, that Ashby had played his part handsomely in disputing our advance, displaying a great deal of personal boldness and military tact in checking so large a column as ours with his small force.”
We Are In For It! The First Battle of Kernstown Gary L. Ecelbarger P. 60-62
“By 8:00 A.M. Shields’s division plodded forward, crossed their makeshift bridge, and filed into Strasburg. The general was vocally annoyed at the delayed creek crossing, particularly when he believed it could have been forded without a bridge. At the southern side of town, Shields and his staff rode to the summit of Quarry Hill where they could see Ashby astride his white horse near the top of Fisher’s Hill over a mile away. Ashby ordered his gunners to fire rounds at the Federals, but the shells fell well short of their mark. Shields ordered all his brigade commanders forward – Colonel Nathan Kimball commanding his First Brigade, Colonel Jeremiah C. Sullivan leading his Second Brigade, and Colonel Erastus B. Tyler heading his Third Brigade– and added Colonel Mason to the council. According to Mason (the only one who recorded the event), Shields “stated that he was under the impression that Jackson’s whole force was in front of us, and he should make his dispositions for battle immediately.”
With that, Shields ordered all his available artillery forward and placed a battery on the height. Lieutenant Colonel Philip Daum, the division’s chief of artillery, spent two hours maneuvering the guns in an attempt to place them on flanking hills undetected. Confederate cavalry and artillerymen watched the entire event unfold; eight rifled cannons were positioned at an elevation equal to the Confederates one mile to the northeast. The Union infantry brigades supported the rear. Mason’s force from the previous day was sent on a flanking path along the turnpike which skirted the Southerners to their right. Before morning had closed, twenty Union cannons were firing away at Ashby while Mason’s detachment, led by the 1st Michigan Cavalry, fast approached Ashby’s flank. “It looked like we were going to be picked up in short order,” wrote a member of Company I, 2nd Virginia, who believed they held on to the height too long. At what seemed to be the last possible second, Ashby ordered his guns to limber and withdraw a mile to the rear.
Lieutenant Colonel Daum stood on the flanking hill with eight rifled cannons belonging to Captain Joseph Clark’s 4th U.S. Artillery, Battery E. Watching the head of the Michigan column emerging from the distant glen, Daum mistook them for Ashby’s men and ordered Captain Clark to fire his guns at them. Clark protested, knowing they were Union horsemen, but eventually conceded to the stubborn Daum’s instructions. Within seconds friendly fire took out four Federal horses– including one poor animal that was torn in two behind the saddle) the rider was uninjured by the shell, which passed through his coattails). Daum’s faux pas did not cost any human lives. The Michigan cavalry was quick to forgive the cannoneers after receiving indirect praise from the gunners by learning that they were mistaken as Ashby’s men because of their swift advance. According to one horseman, his company “congratulated [the artillerists] on their promptitude and good marksmanship, and let the matter drop.” Shields organized his force and moved forward once again.
Ashby’s newest position rested on an elevation one mile south of Fisher’s Hill. Watching the Union batteries rolling toward them, the Southerners opened upon them with the two rifled pieces of Chew’s battery only to have the fire returned in triplicate. The 8th Ohio spearheaded the Federal assault. Colonel Carroll commanded the left (southern) wing and Lieutenant Colonel Franklin Sawyer proceeded with the right-hand companies. Confederate shot and shell plowed into the ground directly in front of the officers on horseback. The Southern aim was so precise that Carroll was forced to dismount; he claimed the shots would have cut him in two otherwise. As the regiment began to scale the height, Ashby disappeared like a flash and took up a new position southward. The procedure repeated itself, again with the same results. The day-long repetitious sparring desensitized members of the 8th Ohio to the artillery rounds thrown by Chew’s guns. By late afternoon the foot soldiers were seen turning their rifles around and swatting at the incoming shot as though they were playing ball. By 5:00 P.M. Ashby held his force a few miles north of them. With darkness approaching, Shields decided that the reconnaissance had been advanced as far as could be expected; therefore, after leaving a strong picket in their most advanced position, he withdrew his division seven miles northward on the Valley Pike to Strasburg. There they camped for the night.
Turner Ashby took his force of 700 southward three miles beyond Woodstock and camped for the night at Narrow Passage. Throughout the day, Ashby slowed the momentum of a 10,000-man enemy division, limited their advance to approximately nine miles, and kept Shields more than fifteen miles from General Jackson’s infantry camp. Additionally, a detachment of the 7th Virginia Cavalry burned three railroad bridges to further impair the Manassas Gap line.
P. 64
Realizing the survival of the Confederacy depended on keeping Union troops dispersed, Lee also believed that McClellan’s campaign could be delayed if President Lincoln felt threatened. “Can you by a rapid forward movement threaten Washington and thus recall the enemy?” Lee queried Johnston.”
Eyewitness to History Edited by John Carey (1987) P. 370-371
The Great March: General Sherman’s ‘Bummers’, March 1865
Elias Smith
“In rear of each Division followed the foragers, or ‘bummers’, as they are called by the soldiers, constituting a motley group which strongly recalls the memory of Falstaff’s ragged army, though they are by no means men in buckram. The men having worn out all their clothing and shoes during the march, were obliged to provide themselves the best way they could as they went along.
Here came men strutting in mimic dignity in an old swallow-tailed coat, with plug hats, the tops knocked in; there a group in seedy coats and pants of Rebel grey, with arms and legs protruding beyond all semblance of fit or fashion; short jackets, long-tailed surtouts, and coats of every cast with broad tails, narrow tails, and no tails at all—all of the most antiquated styles. Some wore women’s bonnets, or young ladies’ hats, with streamers of faded ribbons floating fantastically in the wind.
The procession of vehicles and animals was of the most grotesque description. There were donkeys large and small, almost smothered, under burdens of turkeys, geese and other kinds of poultry, ox carts, skinny horses pulling in the fills of some parish doctors, old sulkies, farm wagons and buggies, hacks, chaises, rockaways, aristocratic and family carriages, all filled with plunder and provisions.
There was bacon, hams, potatoes, pork, flour, sorghum, and freshly slaughtered pigs, sheep, and poultry dangling from saddle tree and wagon, enough, one would suppose, to feed the army for a fortnight.”
Bloody Engagements: John R. Kelso’s Civil War John R. Kelso Edited by Christopher Grasso P. 76-80
“Next day, we made another forced march, skirmishing a little with the enemy, occasionally, throughout the day. Over half our infantry men straggled from the ranks. Seeing a great crowd of men surrounding an apple cellar, I, for the first time, left the ranks to get some apples for Captain Barris, who was ill. By reason of the great crowd around the cellar, I was a long time reaching the door, and when I did reach it, I did not venture to enter. The air inside was stifling. The apples seemed to be under the floor. A layer of men had got down upon their bellies to reach these apples though a trap door. Another layer of men had thrown themselves down upon their bellies, on top of the first layer, and were trying to reach down after apples, past the shoulders of the first layer. Sometimes, even a third layer threw themselves, in like manner, upon the backs of the second layer. As fast as the members of the upper layers departed, other fresh arrivals took their places, thus giving the members of the lower layer no chance to get up at all. These poor fellows were nearly suffocated and were pleading pitifully to be allowed to get up and depart. Not caring to be caught in this trap, I slowly worked my way out of the crowd.
When I again reached the road, the army had all passed except the stragglers who, in marching, observed no order at all. With these, the road was literally packed. Nearly every man, notwithstanding he had ostensibly quit the ranks because he was exhausted, was carrying some kind of plunder;– generally something to eat. One had his bayonet run through two large middlings of bacon, and, with his gun thus loaded upon his shoulders, was marching vigorously along as if he had never known any such thing as weariness. Another marched thus with two geese, tied together by the necks, slung across his gun. Another with two turkeys. Another with half a dozen chickens. One carried upon his shoulder a sack of flour, another a sack of meal, another a sack of dried fruit. Hundreds were thus loaded. A few carried plunder not in the usual line. Of these, one had a large earthen jar full of some kind of preserves. From the mouth of this jar, which he carried under his left arm, he constantly kept taking handfuls of preserves and cramming them into his mouth. Another carried a large wooden churn full of butter-milk. This he carried by locking both arms around it and hugging it to his bosom. Another, a kind of Oscar Wilde, nearly seven feet in height, who cared more for the beautiful than for the useful, wore upon the lower part of his body, the immense hooped skirt of some gigantic female; upon his shoulders, a large striped shawl; upon his head, a huge, funnel-shaped, Leghorn bonnet of the style fifty years ago. Thus attired, this remarkable aesthete marched proudly on, contemplating his various charms in a large looking-glass which he carried in both hands directly in front of him.
By the time I had fully taken in all these things, the thunders of heavy cannonading began to reverberate among the hills. By one common impulse, the whole vast mass of stragglers started forward on a run. The swinging of middlings of bacon upon bayonets, the flopping of geese, chickens, and turkeys hung upon guns, the bobbing up and down of sacks of flour, of meal, &c. upon men’s shoulders, made a novel and ludicrous sight. The man with the jar of preserves ran as fast as he could, taking out of handful of preserves every few jumps, cramming them into his mouth and daubing them upon his face. He meant to go into battle with a full stomach. The man with the churn of butter-milk ran well, but labored under a good deal of disadvantage. He had to lean back as he ran, so as to keep the center of gravity within his base, and this made his running resemble that of Parson Bullin, when the lizards under his clothes made him disrobe himself in church and flee into the woods. The butter-milk splashed up through the dasher hole, and around the edges of the lid, and came down in quite a shower upon the face and bosom of our hero, leaving many little lumps of butter entangled in his beard. He did not propose to fight for fame alone. Our seven foot aesthete took longer strides than had ever before been taken in that monstrous hooped skirt. Running so fast against the wind made the front part of the skirt come down against his legs, while the stiffness of the hoops and their great size made the back part rise up and stick far out behind. This hero carried no gun. He would run a few rods holding his looking-glass in one hand by his side. Then he would throw it up in front of him, seize the other edge with his other hand, and look at his image in it as he ran. He wanted to regale his vision upon his own beauty before it was spoiled forever, as he very well knew it soon might be, by some stray bullet carelessly fired in his direction by those naughty rebels.
About 300 yards from our battle line, we met all the regimental Adjutants, calling aloud the position of their several regiments. This enabled every straggler to find his own proper place in the battle line. I heard the Adjutant of my own regiment calling: “Twenty Fourth Missouri, extreme right!” Bearing off toward the right, I and the other stragglers of our regiment were soon in a squad to ourselves, all the balance having found their proper places in the line as we passed along behind it. When I perceived myself to be in the company of several comrades that I knew, I suggested to them that we go a little beyond what seemed to be the extreme right of the line and get behind a number of little trees that we saw growing there. They liked the suggestion, and away we went to the trees. Upon our arrival, however, we found to our great disgust that every tree and every bush had already had a man or officer behind it, who did not propose to give up his place for our benefit. The result was that, much against our wishes, we had to stand out in open spaces and be shot at by an enemy that was pretty well sheltered. As the storm of bullets whistled about our ears, it was amusing to see some of the men and officers, behind saplings not larger than a man’s three fingers, trying to draw themselves in from both sides and to make themselves as slim, respectively, as were their protecting saplings.
This was by far the most important skirmish that we had yet had. It was the only one in which the infantry, generally, had taken part. For a time it seemed that the enemy were going to give us a pitched battle. They soon retired, however, leaving us masters of the field. They left their dead, their wounded, and several prisoners in our hands. We also lost a few in killed and wounded. For a hospital, we took possession of a large farm house in the vicinity. This ended our chase. We fell back a little from the battle ground and went into camp. Why we did not pursue the enemy any further, I never knew. As we turned back, every turkey, goose, chicken, churn, and other article of plunder, thrown down by the stragglers in the rear of the battle line, was picked up by the first man that came upon it. Then was heard a great deal of first-class cursing. One, forgetful of how [he] himself had obtained the plunder, was loudly proclaiming: “Some d—d thief has stolen my two turkeys!” Another, equally forgetful, was proclaiming: “Some d—d thief has stolen my butter-milk!” And so on for a thousand other things. One half the army seemed to be accursing the other half with being d—d thieves. Those who now had the plunder did not seem to hear the invidious remarks of their less fortunate comrades. They were extremely quiet, and their countenances were a charming expression of innocence and contentment. Most of those who had no plundered provisions, got nothing to eat at all that night. I was so fortunate as to steal an ear of corn for my supper from a poor half-starved mule. As the mule saw me robbing him of his own scant fare, he seemed to reproach me with his eyes, but he did not say anything out of the way to me.”
Note: Just a cotton-picking minute, this don’t look like the Coachella Valley to me. Bugs Bunny, 1953
Note: They called it Yankee ingenuity for a reason.
Note: 1862: Following more than $10,000 in renovations, Ford’s Theater reopens for business (Ford’s Athenaeum was the name at the time). (Blue and Gray Trail website)
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it is hard to soldier when a person is not well….
A hand to the sky, that’s all he has.
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