Sunday, 15th—The rebels fell back last night and our men pushed forward this morning. We moved six miles and again went into camp. One regiment and the Thirteenth Iowa was left at Pocotaligo for picket duty and to act as train guard for the trains passing to and fro from Beaufort, hauling provisions out to the front for the army.
January 2015
January 15th.—Clear and frosty. Guns heard down the river.
Dispatches came last night for ammunition—to Wilmington, I believe. We have nothing yet decisive from Fort Fisher, but I fear it will fall.
Mr. Hunter was in the Secretary’s office this morning before the Secretary came. I could give him no news from Wilmington. He is much distressed; but if the enemy prevails, I have no doubt he will stipulate saving terms for Virginia. He cannot contemplate the ruin of his fortune; political ruin is quite as much as he can bear. Always at the elbow of the Secretary, he will have timely notice of any fatal disaster. He is too fat to run, too heavy to swim, and therefore must provide some other means of escape.
Last night and early this morning the Jews and others were busy, with hand-carts and wheelbarrows, removing barrels of flour from the center to the outskirts of the city, fearful of impressment. They need not fear.
I have enough flour, meal, and beans (black) to subsist my family two weeks. After that, I look to the kind Providence which has hitherto always fed us.
It is now rumored that Mr. Blair came to negotiate terms for the capitulation of Richmond, and that none were listened to. Better that, if it must fall, than be given up to pillage and the flames. If burning our cities had been the order in 1862, it might have been well; it is too late now!
Colonel Lyon’s Letters.
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The Fight with Lyon at Scottsboro—Bravery of the Colored Troops.
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(Letter from Colonel Lyon to the Nashville Union.)
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Huntsville, Ala., Jan. 14, 1865. “A fight took place at Scottsboro, twenty miles west of Stevenson, on the evening of the 8th inst., between the forces of the rebel General Lyon and the garrison at that place, consisting of detachments from Company E, 101st U. S. C. T., and from Company E, 110th U. S. C. T., the former commanded by Lieutenant John H. Hull, and the latter by Lieutenant David Smart, the whole under command of Lieutenant Hull. This affair deserves more publicity than it will get through the ordinary medium of an official report, as it helps settle the oft repeated question, ‘Will the negro fight?’
Lieutenant Hull’s command numbered fifty-three muskets in all, but eleven of his men were on outpost duty at the water tanks over one mile west of the depot, in which the balance of the command, forty-two strong, was stationed. Here the little garrison was attacked by the whole force of the rebel General, reinforced by several guerrilla companies that infest that region, and numbering from 800 to 1,000 men, with two twelve-pounder howitzers.
After skirmishing with the enemy and holding him in check for some time, the garrison was driven into the depot, upon which three determined charges were made, each one of which was repulsed with severe loss to the enemy. The rebels then withdrew beyond musket range and opened upon the depot with their artillery; but the garrison remained in it until it had been struck with four shells, three of which exploded in the building. Lieutenant Hull then withdrew his command to a mountain four hundred and fifty yards distant, cutting his way through the ranks of the rebels, who attempted to intercept his progress, in a hand-to-hand fight. One rebel seized the Lieutenant by the collar, but was instantly killed by him. The pursuit was short. The rebels had been too severely handled to approach within reach of the muskets of these dusky warriors; and, after firing a few random shots with their artillery into the mountain, they left for the Tennessee river. Their loss was one Colonel and seventeen men killed, and forty or fifty wounded. Ours was six wounded.
The men on duty at the water tank were captured, but before reaching the river they stampeded, at great personal peril, and all of them escaped and are now with their commands.
There were some interesting incidents that took place during the engagement, worthy to be mentioned.
After the men had been driven into the depot, Lieutenant Hull went out upon the platform to reconnoitre. The enemy’s bullets were flying thickly around him when he discovered his orderly sergeant, a colored man, approaching him. The Lieutenant ordered him back into the building. ‘I wish to speak to you,’ said the sergeant. ‘Very well,’ replied the Lieutenant, ‘speak quickly’. ‘The men don’t want to surrender,’ continued the sergeant. The response from the Lieutenant was, ‘Go back and tell them that while a man of us lives there will be no surrender’.
The sergeant delivered this message, and a wild shout of joy went up from the beleaguered garrison—a shout that assured their gallant commander that there would be no faltering on the part of his men in the deadly conflict which was rapidly thickening around them.
Another incident. A colored sergeant named Anderson had his leg torn off by the explosion of one of the shells—and afterwards loaded and fired his musket three times! This brave soldier has since died of his wounds.
It is worthy of mention that these soldiers were mostly new recruits, and had never before been in action, and a majority of them had not even been mustered.
The whole affair lasted some three hours, and to give an idea of the desperate character of the fighting I will mention that in one at least of the assaults the rebels came so close to the building that they seized the guns of our men as they were projected through the loopholes in the brick walls of the depot and attempted to wrench them from the grasp of those inside.
Lieutenant Hull, a resident of Ripley County, Indiana, was formerly an enlisted man of the 83d Indiana, and is a brother, I am informed, of the gallant Colonel Hull, of the 37th Indiana, whose name is so familiar in the Army of the Cumberland.
I am not acquainted with the history of Lieutenant Smart, but it is just to add that Lieutenant Hull speaks in terms of the highest praise of his courage and efficiency in the contest.
Respectfully yours,
Wm. P. Lyon,
“Col. 13th Wis. V. I., Comd’g.”
Nashville, Saturday, Jan. 14. Sickness has prevented me from writing the last three days. Wednesday morning while on post from 3 to 5 A. M. I was taken with violent chills and ague, continuing nearly the two hours I was on. Every muscle and sinew in me was wracked, while I stood in a driving wind and freezing rain. Never did I suffer so much from “shaking” but I did not call for relief till my time was up. It was with difficulty that I staggered to my bunk where a furious fever set in and raged very high. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday part of the time delirious, but I was the object of all the care that could be bestowed on me under the circumstances, Cousin Griffith filling as nearly as he could the place of mother and sister. Last evening the fever left me. Bathed and felt somewhat refreshed. Spent a very restless night, my whole muscular system seemed charged with pain, but this morning it eased off, and I find myself thickly covered with feverish looking pimples. They say it is “fever rash.” Doctor came 9 A. M.; looked dubious about something, but left with the injunction to “go slow”. About 10 A. M. I dressed and wrote a short letter home. I feel very weak, but the pain has all left me.
14th. Saturday. Drew clothing. Beat Col. at chess.
Saturday, 14th—Our army commenced to move at 7 this morning and by 10 o’clock the last detachment had crossed Broad river. We moved on about ten miles, driving the rebels and skirmishing with them all the way. The Iowa Brigade lost one man killed, a lieutenant of Company A, Fifteenth Iowa. The expedition consists of the Seventeenth Army Corps with General Foster’s command on our left.
January 14th.—Cloudy and cool. The news that Goldsborough, N. C., had been taken is not confirmed. Nor have we intelligence of the renewal of the assault on Fort Fisher—but no one doubts it.
The government sent pork, butchered and salted a few weeks ago, to the army. An order has been issued to borrow, buy, or impress flour, wherever found; but our political functionaries will see that it be not executed. The rich hoarders may control votes hereafter, when they may be candidates, etc. If domiciliary visits were made, many thousands of barrels of flour would be found. The speculators have not only escaped hitherto, but they have been exempted besides.
The Assembly of Virginia passed a resolution yesterday, calling upon the President to have revoked any orders placing restrictions upon the transportation of provisions to Richmond and Petersburg. The President sends this to the Secretary, asking a copy of any orders preventing carts from coming to market.
Flour is $1000 per barrel to-day!
F. P. Blair, Sr., has been here several days, the guest of Mr. Ould, agent of exchange. He left this morning for Grant’s lines below the city. I saw him in an open carriage with Mr. Ould, going down Main Street. He looks no older than he did twenty years ago. Many consider Ould a fortunate man, though he is represented as a loser in the war. Blair seemed struck by the great number of able-bodied men in the streets.
Major Maynard, Quartermaster, says he will be able next week to bring 120 cords of wood to the city daily.
If Richmond be relinquished, it ought to be by convention and capitulation, getting the best possible terms for the citizens; and not by evacuation, leaving them at the mercy of the invaders. Will our authorities think of this? Doubtful.
One of the President’s pages told me to-day that Mr. Blair had several interviews with the President at the latter’s residence. Nothing relating to propositions has transpired.
The clerks are again sending out agents to purchase supplies. The President has decided that such agents have no right to expend any money but that contributed. This hits the Assistant Secretary of War, and Mr. Kean, Chief of Bureau, and our agent, Mr. Peck, for whom so many barrels of flour were purchased by the latter as agent, leaving the greater part of the contribution unexpended; nay, more, the money has not yet been refunded, although contributed five months ago!
Some 700 barrels of flour were realized yesterday for the army.
January 14th.—Yesterday I broke down—gave way to abject terror under the news of Sherman’s advance with no news of my husband. To-day, while wrapped up on the sofa, too dismal even for moaning, there was a loud knock. Shawls on and all, just as I was, I rushed to the door to find a telegram from my husband: “All well; be at home Tuesday.” It was dated from Adam’s Run. I felt as lighthearted as if the war were over. Then I looked at the date and the place—Adam’s Run. It ends as it began—in a run —Bull’s Run, from which their first sprightly running astounded the world, and now Adam’s Run. But if we must run, who are left to run? From Bull Run they ran full-handed. But we have fought until maimed soldiers, women, and children are all that remain to run.
To-day Kershaw’s brigade, or what is left of it, passed through. What shouts greeted it and what bold shouts of thanks it returned! It was all a very encouraging noise, absolutely comforting. Some true men are left, after all.
January 13 — This far in the new year the weather has been very disagreeable, windy, and cold. Last night about nine o’clock a man died, frozen to death or starved in bed, in the next tent to mine. The orderly sergeant of our company called for four volunteers to bear the corpse to the dead house; I volunteered for one. The night was bitter cold, with a full moon in a clear, wintry sky which rendered the night almost as bright as day. As we bore the body of our comrade through the silent street the pale silvery moonbeams with kindly light played softly over the cold thin white face of the dead. The moonlit wavelets of the Bay, as they kissed the pebbly strand, whispered a soft vesper hymn, a fitting requiem, as we moved away with our silent burden toward the house of the dead. When we arrived at the dead house, which is a large Sibley tent, the Great Reaper had already harvested seven sheaves garnered in silent waiting for the morrow’s interment. The burial hour here is daily at four o’clock in the afternoon, and the man that we carried to the dead house made the eighth one that died from four o’clock until nine. Death with its fatal shears clips a brittle thread of life here, and with insatiable greed calls for “next” every hour of the day and night and gathers on an average twenty-five passengers for the daily train to the Silent City. The man that we carried to the dead house was a Virginian from Floyd County. He attended roll-call yesterday evening; I saw him standing in ranks, but he looked wan and frail.
Beaufort, S. C., January 13, 1865.
Retired about 11 p.m. and woke up here this morning. A very handsome, small town, about the size of Canton, but more fine dwellings. All have been confiscated and sold to the negroes and white Union men. Find the 17th A. C. here, but about ready to move out to drive the Rebels away from the ferry, where we will lay our pontoons to the main land. The 14th and 20th will move by land and join us on the main land somewhere. I can hardly imagine what our next move will be, but mostly think we will tear up the railroads through the Carolinas and take Charleston and Wilmington during the spring campaign. The health of the command is perfect, and all are in most soldierly spirits. Thinking nothing impossible if Sherman goes with us, and go he will.
