Bridgeport, Tuesday, Dec. 8. A cold- rainy day, very disagreeable in camp; naturally thought much of home and its comforts. But we looked forward to the happy time coming when we will be permitted to join the circle on the old hearth stone and know war no more. May the day soon come. I am not impatient but anxious.
Sunday, December 8, 2013
8th. Awoke considerably rested. Surprising how a tired man can sleep. Drew one day’s ration of meal and two of H. Bread. Moved around Clinch Mountain to Blains Cross Roads. Boys killed a flock of sheep. Passed a division of the 9th Army Corps in camp. Stopped with boys at a house near road leading to Walker’s Gap. Got coffee and then slept in good bed—secesh.
Mud Creek Cove, Jackson County, Ala. December 8, 1863.
I was at Stevenson yesterday and put a letter in the office for you, but with my accustomed shrewdness failed to either stamp or frank it. It graphically described the gallant exploits of the detachment I have the honer to command during the past three weeks, and its loss will be deplored in common with the other heavy losses of this “cruel war.” I can now but give you the topics it discussed or elaborated, and leave to your imagination the finishing and stringing together the skeleton. First and foremost, stealing horses; second, defying bravely the tears and entreaties of helpless women, and taking their last measure of meal and rasher of bacon; third, the splendid conduct of our regiment and brigade at the late Mission Ridge fight; fourth, reflections. Do you remember, how, after the evacuation of Corinth one and one-half years ago, Halleck thought the rebellion virtually ended? And how many of the soldiers wrote home that they expected to be mustered out within three months? Then Halleck sent Buell with half of the army toward Chattanooga, Sherman and Hurlburt to Memphis, McClernand and Logan to Jackson, Tennessee; kept some four divisions at Corinth, and with three others opened and guarded 95 miles of railroad east to Decatur. That was what he called letting the army enjoy the rest they had earned by their glorious victory. The whole of the splendid army that had forced the Rebels to leave Corinth, was divided, subdivided and the subdivisions divided until, except Buell’s, there was hardly a detachment left strong enough to hold its own against any overgrown band of guerrillas. The result you know. Buell’s retreat with his heavy losses of detachments at Munfordsville, etc., our evacuation of the M. & C. R. R. between Memphis and Corinth, the driving in of our guards from Decatur to Corinth, and the fight there in October which we gained only because our side weighed only one ounce the most; and finally they shut us up in Memphis, Bolivar, Corinth and Nashville so closely thai foraging parties hardly dared venture ten miles from the siege guns, and there our army stayed until relieved by “500,000 more.” I don’t like to slander so great and noble a man as Grant, by insinuating that he has any notion similar to Halleck’s, but what I have seen with my naked eye, and heard from good authority with my uncovered ears, makes me think he has in his opinion at the Lookout, Mission Ridge, Ringgold fight, bursted the rebellion to flinders. I know that Sherman with six divisions has gone to Knoxville. John E. Smith’s and Osterhaus’ divisions are at Bridgeport on their way to Huntsville or Decatur. Some 12 companies of artillery, (nearly enough for a corps) went to Nashville yesterday, and Hooker with the11th and 12th Corps, are going back to the Potomac. Does that sound anything like active forward movements? And don’t it sound exactly like Halleck’s disposition of the army after he got Corinth? I predict that no good will come from scattering the army in this way, and much harm. Bragg has fallen back to Dalton, only 25 or 30 miles from Chattanooga, and 15 less than Beauregard ran from Corinth. The Rebel cavalry are already driving in our foragers at Chattanooga. That’s all I have to say about the matter. Our regiment, brigade and division have gone with Sherman to Burnside’s relief. They are probably at Knoxville now. All accounts agree that the regiment behaved splendidly; and Fulton county ought to either disown her soldiers or quit disgracing them by her d—sh copperheadism. You didn’t have any fears for my safety when you heard of the fight, did you? Of course you knew I wouldn’t be there. I heard three days before the fight that it would probably open Sunday or Monday. Tuesday I was out in the Cumberland mountains, near Paint Rock, some 50 miles from Chattanooga, when suddenly we heard the sound of cannonading. I thought of our regiment being in the fight and my company away, and cursed my luck to the best of my ability. I never expect to be in a battle. Being shot by a guerrilla is as good as I will probably get. It is strange that there was only the one vicinity in which we could hear the firing that day, and 25 miles nearer the scene of action they were unable to hear it. We are meeting with good success hunting horses. We only lack about 200 of having enough to mount the brigade and will have them by the time they get back from Knoxville. My men were never as healthy as now. My old convalescent “stand-bys” now walk into their double rations of fresh meat and corn pone tremendously, and do their share of duty splendidly. For four weeks we have had nothing to eat but corn bread and fresh pork. I am beginning to like it. It positively does taste better every day, and I destroy immense quantities. When reading about the elephant browsing upon the tree tops, did you ever imagine what an awful crashing he would make? That’s about like the smash I make among the spareribs and hoecake. I thought that when they set me up as horse thief, that my measure was filled, that earth had nothing left too bitter for me to quaff or “chaw.” But last night a draught was put to my lips of which I drank, and lo, I am undone. Can’t look an honest man in the face. Fortunately there are no honest men in this command, so I am spared the mortification of turning my eyes. I was sent out to steal sheep. Can’t call taking aught from these poor miserable citizen devils here anything but stealing. I made a pretty good haul. They go to the front to-day; I expect for hospital use. Of course we have to take them, but these citizens are on the verge of bankruptcy as far as eating is concerned. Saw Bill and Davis Trites at Bridgeport two days since. All right. Had just got back with their division from Chattanooga. Were both well. Captain Walsh, who was killed, was one of the finest officers in our regiment. I had formed a strong attachment for him, and mourn his loss as a dear friend and splendid fellow. His company, in camp, joins mine on the left and we were more intimate than I was with any other officer in this command.
Tuesday, 8th—Everything is marching along fine. The finishing touches are being put upon the outside forts and the heavy guns are mounted and ready for action. The floors of the forts and rifle pits are all laid with the lumber torn from the houses which were removed to make room for the forts, so when it rains while the men are occupying the forts, they will not need to tramp through the mud. News came that General Bragg was retreating with Grant after him. General Grant is the man for us yet. All are loud in their praise of Grant, and declare that he is the coming man of the time, that we will have him at the head of all of the United States armies before the war is ended.
December 8.—A very gloomy, wet, cold day. I have not been able to go to see any of the patients on account of the weather.
We get along very nicely now. Mrs. W. has taken charge of the linen department, and keeps two girls busy sewing all the time. We have numbers of pads to make for the wounded. The fact is, there is always plenty to do in the way of sewing.
We have all the whisky now in charge. Miss W. makes eggnog and toddies, and gives out the whisky as the surgeons prescribe it. Besides that, we have all of the delicacies, such as coffee, tea, sugar, butter, eggs, etc. Miss W. has not much idle time.
A very nice woman has charge of the distributing-room, and attends to preparing little extras for the sick. She has a kitchen in which is a stove, and all I have to do is to send her word what I want prepared for the patients.
We have a large kitchen in which are three stoves, where the diet is prepared for those who are on the diet-list. Many a time there are two hundred patients fed from it.
The kitchen itself does very well in good weather, but when it rains the cooks, stoves, and every thing else in it get a shower-bath.
It has no chimneys, and the stove pipes are put through the roof, without an elbow or any covering. Many a time the cooks are up all night, trying to keep the water out of the stoves. But no matter what happens, the breakfast is always ready at the right time.
There is a kitchen for the convalescents, which has a brick furnace with boilers and an oven in it. We have also a very fine bakery. All has been put up since we have been here, at government expense.
Our hospital, with the exception of the tents, which are by themselves, occupies a square of store buildings, and the courthouse. Many of the buildings are in a dilapidated condition, but they are all nicely whitewashed, and kept in perfect order.
Miss W. received a letter from a cousin, a surgeon in the army, entreating her to leave the hospital, saying that it is no place for a refined, modest young lady. I have perhaps made a mistake as regards the meaning of the word modesty. As far as my judgment goes, a lady who feels that her modesty would be compromised by going into a hospital, and ministering to the wants of her suffering countrymen, who have braved all in her defense, could not rightly lay claim to a very large share of that excellent virtue—modesty—which the wise tell us is ever the companion of sense.
“Good sense, which is the gift of heaven,
And, though no science, fairly worth the seven.”
I am thoroughly disgusted with this kind of talk. When will our people cease to look on the surface of things? At this rate, never! If the scenes we are daily witnessing will not serve to cure this miserable weakness, nothing will.
There is scarcely a day passes that I do not hear some derogatory remarks about the ladies who are in the hospitals, until I think, if there is any credit due them at all, it is for the moral courage they have in braving public opinion.
A very nice lady, a member of the Methodist Church, told me that she would go into the hospital if she had in it a brother, a surgeon. I wonder if the Sisters of Charity have brothers, surgeons, in the hospitals where they go? It seems strange that they can do with honor what is wrong for other Christian women to do.
Well, I can not but pity those people who have such false notions of propriety.
After getting tired of hearing what is said, I told a lady friend that she would oblige me by telling the good people of Newnan, that when I first went into the hospitals I was not aware of there being such a place in the world as Newnan, and they must excuse me for not asking their advice on the subject; and since without it I had taken the step I had, I could not say I had any thing to regret in the matter; far from that, I can truly say, that there is no position in the world that a woman can occupy, no matter how high or exalted it may be, for which I would exchange the one I have. And no happiness which any thing earthly could give, could compare with the pleasure I have experienced in receiving the blessings of the suffering and dying.
As for no “refined or modest” lady staying in them, from my own experience, and that of every surgeon whom I have heard speak on the subject, I have come to the conclusion that, in truth, none but the “refined and modest” have any business in hospitals. Our post surgeon called on me the other day, and told me he had determined to permit none but such to enter any of his hospitals; and he earnestly warned me to be careful whom I took to stay with me.
But I feel confident we shall always have the approval of the truly good. I have not asked Miss W. to remain; her own sense of right has determined her to do so.
Mrs. B. and I took a walk to the graveyard last Sunday. We saw two of our men buried; one was named S. Brazelton, a member of the Fiftieth Alabama Regiment; the name of the other I did not learn; he came from some of the other hospitals. All the men of our hospital are now buried by the chaplain, Mr. Moore.
The graves have head-boards, on which is the occupant’s name and regiment.
We had a man by the name of Vaughn die very suddenly on the 3d.
Canandaigua, December 8. — Home again. I had military attendance as far as Paterson, N. J., and came the rest of the way with strangers. Not caring to talk I liked it just as well. When I said good bye I could not help wondering whether it was for years, or forever. This cruel war is terrible and precious lives are being sacrificed and hearts broken every day. What is to be the result? We can only trust and wait.
Knoxville, December 8th, 1863.
Thanks to Almighty God—and General Grant— the crisis is passed. General Sherman arrived on the 5th inst but Longstreet had fled, and he returned immediately to Chattanooga. Nobody seems to know the exact date of Longstreet’s withdrawal. Our forces were sent out in pursuit yesterday, the 7th inst., but no enemy could be found. We have passed through a terrible ordeal. Twenty days and nights under fire. Twenty days with death or surrender staring us m the face—and surrender meant Andersonville, a fate worse than death. On our retreat from Lenoir we were compelled to leave most of our wounded. We have recovered our own and about three hundred wounded Rebels.
“The three large guns shown in this picture commanded the only point in the harbor that was out of reach from Fort Moultrie on one side, and Fort Johnson on the other. The Yankees were entirely unaware of the existence of these three guns, and when the United States ship ‘Keokuk’ attempted to pass through that part of the channel which could not be reached by the guns from the forts above mentioned, she was sunk by the shots from these three guns.” – Conrad Wise Chapman, 1898
by John Beauchamp Jones
DECEMBER 8TH.—The President’s message was sent to Congress to-day. I was not present, but my son Custis, who heard it read, says the President dwells largely on the conduct of foreign powers. To diminish the currency, he recommends compulsory funding and large taxation, and some process of diminishing the volume of Treasury notes. In other words, a suspension of such clauses of the Constitution as stand in the way of a successful prosecution of the war. He suggests the repeal of the Substitute law, and a modification of the Exemption act, etc. To-morrow I shall read it myself.
December 8. — A brisk cannonade between Fort Moultrie and Battery Gregg, in Charleston harbor, was carried on this day. The firing on Fort Sumter was moderated.—In a speech before the rebel Congress, this day, Mr. Foote expressed great indignation at the course pursued by President Davis. “When Pemberton dishonorably surrendered Vicksburgh to the enemy, the President made him his companion, and carried him to General Bragg’s army, when, as he rode along, soldiers were heard to say: ‘There goes the traitor who delivered us over at Vicksburgh.’ The President never visited the army without doing it injury; never yet that it was not followed by disaster. He was instrumental in the Gettysburgh affair. He instructed Bragg at Murfreesboro. He has opened Georgia to one hundred thousand of the enemy’s troops, and laid South-Carolina liable to destruction. I charge him with having almost ruined the country, and will meet his champion anywhere to discuss it. Would to God he would never visit the army again!” . . .
Mr. Foote also referred to abuses in the commissory department. A certain commissary-general, who was a curse to our country, is invested with authority to control the matter of subsistence. This monster, Northrop, has stealthily placed our government in the attitude charged by the enemy, and has attempted to starve the prisoners in our hands!
Meats were furnished the prisoners very irregularly, and in a meagre manner. For twelve days the supply was inadequate, and for eight days they had none at all!
“The commissary-general,” says Mr. Foote, “was a pepper-doctor down in Charleston, and looked like a vegetarian, and actually made an elaborate report to the Secretary of War, showing that for the subsistence of a human Yankee carcass vegetable diet was the most proper! For the honor of the country, this Northrop should be ejected at once.”
—President Lincoln, in his Message to Congress, appended his Proclamation of Amnesty.— (Doc. 32.)
—The following is an account of an affair that took place to-day, near Great Western Furnace, Stuart County, Tenn., about twelve miles from Canton, Ky.: “The guerrilla, Colonel Martin, who lately robbed the citizens in that section of nearly all they possessed, passed through Golden Pond, Tenn., with his gang, taking horses, and plundering indiscriminately. The citizens of the neighborhood organized a squad of fifteen men, composed principally of the late Eighth Kentucky cavalry, headed by John Martin and F. M. Oakley, and started in pursuit of the guerrillas. They came upon them about midnight, in camp, eating a supper furnished them by one Dawsy Griffin. The citizens demanded a surrender, which was refused by the rebel leader, and the order was given by Martin to charge upon them, which was done in a handsome manner, resulting in a complete rout, and the capture of all their arms, horses, clothing, camp equipage, and two contrabands. Three of the rebels were killed on the spot”—The National House of Representatives unanimously passed a vote of thanks to General U. S. Grant and his army, and ordered that a medal be struck in his honor, in the name of the people of the United States.
—President Lincoln sent the subjoined congratulatory despatch to Major-General Grant: “Understanding that your lodgment at Chattanooga and Knoxville is now secure, I wish to tender you, and all under your command, my more than thanks—my profoundest gratitude for the skill, courage, and perseverance with which you and they, over so great difficulties, have effected that important object. God bless you all!” This was immediately published to the armies under the command of General Grant.
