Wild rumors of heavy bodies of Confederate troops, crossing the Chicahominy at points lower down prepared to fall upon the exposed flank and rear of the federals were prevalent, and the dreaded form of Stonewall Jackson seemed to start from every bush.
During the night, which was intensely dark, the horses attached to a battery got loose by some means and, dashing through a portion of the ground occupied by other troops, seemed, with their rattling harness, to be a host of rebel cavalry. A bugle at some distance sounded the assembly, drums beat the long roll, and in the confusion of that night alarm it seemed as though a general panic had seized upon all. The sharp shooters, like all others, were thrown into confusion and momentarily lost their sense of discipline and disappeared. When the commanding officer, perhaps the last to awake, came to look for his commandthey were not to be found; with the exception of Calvin Morse, bugler of Co. F, he was alone. The panic among the sharp shooters, however, was only momentary; the first blast of the well known bugle recalled them to a sense of duty, and, a rallying point being established, the whole command at once returned to the line reassured and prepared for any emergency.
At daylight the march was resumed and continued as far as Charles City cross roads, or Glendale, the junction of two important roads leading from Richmond southeasterly towards Malvern Hill; the lower, or Newmarket road, being the only one by which a rebel force moving from the city could hope to interpose between the retreating federals and the James.
The sharp shooters were thrown out on this road some two miles with instructions to delay as long as possible the advance of any body of the enemy who might approach by that route. This was the fourth day for Co. F of continuous marching and fighting; they had started with almost empty haversacks, and it had not been possible to supply them. The country was bare of provisions, except now and then a hog that had so far escaped the foragers. A few of these fell victims to the hunger of the half-starved men; but, with no bread or salt, it hardly served a better purpose than merely to sustain life. To add to their discomforts the only water procurable was that from a well near by which was said to have been poisoned by the flying owner of the plantation; his absence, with that ofevery living thing upon the place, made it impossible to apply the usual and proper test, that of compelling the suspected parties to, themselves, drink heartily of the water. A guard was therefore placed over the well, and the thirsty soldiers were compelled to endure their tortures as best they could. The day passed in comparative quiet; only a few small bodies of rebel cavalry appeared to contest the possession of the road, and they being easily repulsed. Late in the afternoon the sharp shooters were recalled to the junction of the roads, where they rested for a short time to allow the passage of another column. At this point a single box of hard bread was procured from the cook in charge of a wagon conveying the mess kit of the officers of a battery; this was the only issue of rations made to the regiment from the morning of the 25th of June until they arrived at Harrison's landing on the 2d of July, and, inadequate as it was, it was a welcome addition to their meager fare.
At dark the regiment marched southwardly on a country road narrow and difficult, often appearing no more than a path through the dense swamp; the night, intensely dark, was made more so by the gloom of the forest, and all night the weary unfed men toiled along. At midnight the column was halted for some cause, and while thus halted another of those unaccountable panics took place—in fact, in the excited condition of the men, enfeebled by long continued labors without food, a small matter was sufficient to throw them off their balance; and yet these very men a few hours later, with anenemy in front whom they could see and at whom they could deal blows as well as receive them, fought and won the great battle of Malvern Hill. During the night Co. F. with one or two other companies were detailed to accompany Gen. Porter and others on a reconnoissance of the country to the left of the road on which the column was halted. With a small force in advance as skirmishers, they passed over some two miles of difficult country, doubly so in the darkness of the night, striking and drawing the fire of the rebel pickets. This being apparently the object of the movement, the skirmishers were withdrawn and the command rejoined the main column. So worn and weary were they that whenever halted even for a moment, many men would fall instantly into a sleep from which it would require the most vigorous efforts to arouse them. Shortly before daylight they were halted and allowed to sleep for an hour or two, when, with tired and aching bodies, they continued their march. At noon they passed over the crest of Malvern Hill and before them lay, quiet and beautiful in the sunlight, the valley of the James; and, at the distance of some three miles, the river itself with Union gun boats at anchor on its bosom.
It was a welcome sight to those who had been for six long days marching by night and fighting by day. It meant, as they fondly believed, food and rest, and they greeted the lovely view with cheers of exultation. But there were further labors and greater dangers in store for them before the longed for rest could be obtained. Passingover the level plateau known as Malvern Hill, they descended to the valley and went into bivouac. Here was at least water, and some food was obtained from the negroes who remained about the place.
No sooner were ranks broken and knapsacks unslung than the tired and dirty soldiers flocked to the banks of the beautiful river, and the water was soon filled with the bathers, who enjoyed this unusual luxury with keen relish.
The bivouac of the regiment was in the midst of a field of oats but recently cut and bound, and the men proceeded to arrange for themselves couches which for comfort and luxury they had not seen the like of since they left the feather beds of their New England homes. Their repose, even here, was, however, destined to be of short duration; for hardly had they settled themselves for their rest when the bugles sounded the general, and the head of the column, strangely enough, turned northward. Up the steep hill, back over the very road down which they had just marched, they toiled, but without murmur or discontent, forthismovement wastowardsthe rebels, and not away from them. Inspiring rumors began to be heard; where they came from, or how, no one knew, but it was said that McCall and Sumner had fought a great battle on the previous day, that the rebel army was routed, that Lee was a prisoner, that McClellan was in Richmond, and the long and short of it was that the Union army had nothing more to do but to march back, make a triumphal entry into thecaptured stronghold, assist at that often anticipated ceremony which was to consign "Jeff. Davis to a sour apple tree," be mustered out, get their pay and go home. When they arrived on the plateau, however, a scene met their eyes that effectually drove such anticipations from their minds. A mile away, just emerging from the cover of the forest, appeared the forms of a number of men; were they friends or enemies? Glasses were unslung and they were at once discovered to be federals. Momentarily their numbers increased, and soon the whole plain was covered with blue coated troops, but they were without order or organization, many without arms, and their faces bearing not the light of successful battle, but dull with the chagrin of defeat. The story was soon told. Sumner and McCall had fought a battle at Charles City cross roads, but had been forced to abandon the field with heavy loss in men and guns. Instead of a triumphant march to Richmond, the Fifth Corps was again to interpose between the flushed and confident rebels and the retreating federals—but not, as at Gaines Hill, alone. This was late in the afternoon of June 30. That night the sharp shooters spent in bivouac near the ground on which they were to fight the next day. At dawn on the 1st of July the men were aroused, and proceeding to the front were ordered into line as skirmishers, their line covering the extreme left of the Union army directly in front of the main approach to the position. Malvern Hill, so called, is a hill only as it is viewed from the southern orwestern side; to the north and east the ground is only slightly descending from the highest elevation. On the western side, flowing in a southerly direction, is a small stream called Turkey run, the bed of the stream being some one hundred feet lower than the plateau. On the south, toward the James, the descent is more precipitous. The approaches were, as has been stated, from the north where the ground was comparatively level and sufficiently open to admit of rapid and regular maneuvers. The position taken by the Union army was not one of extraordinary strength, except that its flanks were well protected by natural features: its front was but little higher than the ground over which the enemy must pass to the attack, and was unprotected by natural or artificial obstacles. No earth works or other defenses were constructed; although the "lofty hill, crowned by formidable works," has often figured in descriptions of this battle. The simple truth is it was an open field fight, hotly contested and gallantly won.
The Union artillery, some three hundred guns, was posted in advantageous positions, some of the batteries occupying slight elevations from which they could fire over the heads of troops in their front, the most of them, however, being formed on the level ground in the intervals between regiments and brigades. The gun boats were stationed in the river some two miles distant, so as to cover and support the left flank, and it was expected that great assistance would be afforded by the fire of their immense guns.
Porter's corps held the extreme left, with its left flank on Turkey run, Morell's division forming the front line with headquarters at Crew's house. Sykes' division, composed mostly of regulars, was in the second line. McCall's division was held in reserve in rear of the left flank. On the right of Morell's line thus formed, came Couch's division; further to the right the line was refused, and the extreme right flank rested on the James; but with this portion of the line we have little to do. The main attack fell on the Fifth Corps, involving to some extent Couch's troops next on the right. In this order the army awaited the onset. In front of Morell's division stretched away a field about half a mile in length, bounded at its opposite extremity by heavy woods.
Nearly level in its general features, there extended across it at a distance of about one-third of a mile from the federal front, and parallel with it, a deep ravine, its western end debouching into the valley formed by Turkey run. This open field was covered at this time with wheat just ready for the harvest.
Along the north side of this ravine, covered from view by the waving wheat, the sharp shooters were deployed at an early hour and patiently awaited the attack of the enemy. A few scattered trees afforded a scanty supply of half grown apples which were eagerly seized upon by the famished men, who boiled them in their tin cups and thus made them fairly palatable; by such poor means assuaging as best they could the pangs of hunger.
At about twelve o'clock heavy clouds of dust arising in the north announced the approach of the Confederate columns, and soon after scouts and skirmishers began to make their presence known by shots from the edge of the woods, some two hundred yards distant, directed at every exposed head. A puff of smoke from that direction, however, was certain to be answered by a dozen well aimed rifles from the sharp shooters, and the rebel scouts soon tired of that amusement. In the meantime the artillery firing had become very heavy on both sides, our own depressing their muzzles so as to sweep the woods in front; the effect of this was to bring the line of fire unpleasantly near the heads of the advanced sharp shooters. The gun boats also joined in the cannonade, and as their shells often burst short, over and even behind the line of skirmishers, the position soon became one of grave danger from both sides.
At about half-past two the artillery fire from the rebel line slackened perceptibly, and soon appeared, bursting from the edge of the forest, a heavy line of skirmishers who advanced at a run, apparently unaware of any considerable force in their front. Bugler Morse of Co. F, who accompanied the commanding officer as chief bugler on that day, was at once ordered to sound commence firing, and the sharp shooters sent across the field and into the lines of the oncoming rebels, such a storm of lead from their breach loading rifles as soon checked their advance and sent them back to the cover of the woods in great confusion and with serious loss.The repulse was but momentary, however, for soon another line appeared so heavily re-enforced that it was more like a line of battle than a skirmish line. Still, however, the sharp shooters clung to their ground, firing rapidly and with precision, as the thinned ranks of the Confederates, as they pressed on, attested. They would not, however, be denied, but still came on at the run, firing as they came. At this moment the sharp shooters became aware of a force of rebel skirmishers on their right flank, who commenced firing steadily, and at almost point blank range, from the shelter of a roadway bordered by hedges. The bugle now sounded retreat, and the sharp shooters fell back far enough to escape the effect of the flank fire when they were halted and once more turned their faces to the enemy. The tables were now turned; the rebels had gained the shelter of the ravine, and were firing with great deliberation at our men who were fully exposed in the open field in front of the Crew house. Still the sharp shooters held their ground, and, by the greater accuracy of their fire, combined with the advantage of greater rapidity given by breach loaders over muzzle loaders, kept the rebels well under cover. Having thus cleared the way, as they supposed, for their artillery, the rebels sought to plant a battery in the open ground on the hither side of the woods which had screened their advance. The noise of chopping had been plainly heard for some time as their pioneers labored in the woods opening a passage for the guns. Suddenly there burst out of thedense foliage four magnificent stray horses, and behind them, whirled along like a child's toy, the gun. Another and another followed, sweeping out into the plain. As the head of the column turned to the right to go into battery, every rifle within range was brought to bear, and horses and men began to fall rapidly. Still they pressed on, and when there were no longer horses to haul the guns, the gunners sought to put their pieces into battery by hand; nothing, however, could stand before that terrible storm of lead, and after ten minutes of gallant effort the few survivors, leaving their guns in the open field, took shelter in the friendly woods. Not a gun was placed in position or fired from that quarter during the day. This battery was known as the Richmond Howitzers and was composed of the very flower of the young men of that city; it was their first fight, and to many their last. A member of the battery, in describing it to an officer of the sharp shooters soon after the close of the war, said pithily: "We went in a battery and came out a wreck. We staid ten minutes by the watch and came out with one gun, ten men and two horses, and without firing a shot."
The advanced position held by the sharp shooters being no longer tenable, as they were exposed to the fire, not only of the rebels in front but to that of their friends in the rear as well, they were withdrawn and formed in line of battle in the rear of the fourth Michigan volunteers, where they remained for a short time. The rebel fire fromthe brink of the ravine from which the sharp shooters had been dislodged, as before described, now became exceedingly galling and troublesome to the artillery in our front line, and several horses and men were hit in Weeden's R.I. battery, an officer of which requested that an effort be made to silence the fire. Col. Ripley directed Lieut. J. Smith Brown of Co. A, acting Adjutant, to take twenty volunteers far out to the left and front to a point designated, which it was hoped would command the ravine. The duty was one of danger, but volunteers were quickly at hand, among whom were several from Co. F. The gallant little band soon gained the coveted position, and thereafter the fire of the rebel riflemen from that point was of little moment. Lieut. Brown's command maintained this position during the entire battle, and being squarely on the flank of Magruder's charging columns, and being, from the very smallness of their numbers, hardly noticeable among the thousands of struggling men on that fatal field, they inflicted great damage and loss in the Confederate hosts. It was now late in the afternoon, no large bodies of the rebel infantry had as yet shown themselves, though the clouds of dust arising beyond the woods told plainly of their presence and motions. A partial attack had been made on the extreme right of Morell's line, involving to some extent the left of Couch's division, but was easily repulsed; the fire of Co. E of the sharp shooters, which had been sent to that point, contributing largely to that result. The artillery fire had been heavy andincessant for some hours, and shells were bursting in quick succession over every portion of the field. Suddenly there burst out of the ravine a heavy line of battle, followed by another and another, while out of the woods beyond poured masses of men in support. The battle now commenced in earnest.
The Union infantry, heretofore concealed and sheltered behind such little inequalities of ground as the field afforded, sprang to their feet and opened a tremendous fire, additional batteries were brought up, and from every direction shot and shell, canister and grape, were hurled against the advancing enemy, while the gun boats, at anchor in the river two miles away, joined their efforts with those of their brethren of the army. It was a gallant attempt, but nothing human could stand against the storm—great gaps began to be perceptible in the lines, but the fiery energy of Magruder was behind them and they still kept on, until it seemed that nothing short of the bayonet would stop them. Gradually, however, the rush was abated; here and there could be seen signs of wavering and hesitation; this was the signal for redoubled efforts on the part of the Union troops, and the discomfited rebels broke in confusion and fled to the shelter of the woods and ravines.
At the critical moment of this charge the sharp shooters had been thrown into line on the right of the fourth Michigan regiment and bore an honorable part in the repulse; indeed, so closely crowded were the Union lines at this point that many men of the sharp shooters found themselves in the lineof the Michigan regiment and fought shoulder to shoulder with their western brothers. The battle was, however, by no means over; again and again did Magruder hurl his devoted troops against the Union line, only to meet a like repulse; the rebels fought like men who realized that their efforts of the past week, measurably successful though they had been, would have failed of their full result should they now fail to destroy the Army of the Potomac; while the Union troops held their lines with the tenacity of soldiers who knew that the fate of a nation depended upon the result of that day. At the close of the second assault the sharp shooters found themselves with empty cartridge boxes and were withdrawn from the front. The special ammunition required for their breech loaders not being obtainable, they were not again engaged during the day. In this fight the regiment lost many officers and men, among whom were Col. Ripley, Capt. Austin and Lieut. Jones of Co. E, wounded. In Co. F, Lieut. C. W. Seaton, Jacob S. Bailey and Brigham Buswell were wounded. Buswell's wound resulted in his discharge. Bailey rejoined the company, only to lose an arm at Chancellorsville.
The final rebel attack having been repulsed and their defeat being complete and final, the Union army was withdrawn during the night to Harrison's landing, some eight miles distant, which point had been selected by Gen. McClellan's engineers some days before as the base for future operations against Richmond by the line ofthe James river; operations which, as the event proved, were not to be undertaken until after two years of unsuccessful fighting in other fields, the Army of the Potomac found itself once more on the familiar fields of its earliest experience.
The campaign of the Peninsula was over; that mighty army that had sailed down the beautiful Potomac so full of hope and pride less than four months before; that had through toil and suffering fought its way to within sight of its goal; found itself beaten back at the very moment of its anticipated triumph, and instead of the elation of victory, it was tasting the bitterness of defeat; for, although many of its battles, as that of Hanover Court House, Williamsburgh, Yorktown, Mechanicsville and Malvern Hill, had been tactical victories, it felt that the full measure of success had not been gained, and that its mission had not been accomplished. While the army lay at Harrison's landing the following changes in the rolls of Co. F. took place: Sergent Amos H. Bunker, Azial N. Blanchard, Wm. Cooley, Geo. W. Manchester and Chas. G. Odell were discharged on surgeon's certificate of disability, and Brigham Buswell was discharged on account of disability resulting from the wound received at Malvern Hill. Benajah W. Jordan and James A. Read died of wounds received at Gaines Hill and W. S. Tarbell of disease. E. F. Stevens and L. D. Grover were promoted sergeants, and W. H. Leach and Edward Trask were made corporals. At this camp also Capt. Weston resigned and Lieut. C. W. Seaton wasappointed captain, Second Lieut. M. V. B. Bronson was promoted first lieutenant and Ezbon W. Hindes second lieutenant. Major Trepp was promoted lieutenant-colonel, vice Wm. Y. W. Ripley, and Capt. Hastings of Co. H. was made major.
The regiment remained at Harrison's landing until the army left the Peninsula. The weather was intensely hot and the army suffered terrible losses by disease, cooped up as they were on the low and unhealthy bottom lands bordering the James. The enemy made one or two demonstrations, and on one occasion the camp of the sharp shooters became the target for the rebel batteries posted on the high lands on the further side of the river, and for a long time the men of Co. F were exposed to a severe fire to which they could not reply, but luckily without serious loss.
About the middle of August, the government having determined upon the evacuation of the Peninsula, the army abandoned its position at Harrison's landing. Water transportation not being at hand in sufficient quantity, a large portion of the army marched southward towards Fortress Monroe, passing, by the way, the fields ofWilliamsburgh. Lee's Mills and Yorktown, upon which they had so recently stood victorious over the very enemy upon whom they were now turning their backs. Co. F. was with the division which thus passed down by land. Upon arriving at Hampton the Fifth Corps, to which the sharp shooters were attached, embarked on steamboats and were quickly and comfortably conveyed to Acquia Creek, at which place they took the cars for Falmouth, on the Rappahannock opposite Fredericksburgh.
No sooner did McClellan turn his back on Richmond in the execution of this change of base, than Lee, no longer held to the defense of the rebel capitol, moved with his entire force rapidly northward, hoping to crush Pope's scattered columns in detail before the Army of the Potomac could appear to its support. Indeed, before McClellan's movement commenced, the Confederate General Jackson—he whose foray in the valley in May had so completely neutralized McDowell's powerful corps that its services were practically lost to the Union commander during the entire period of the Peninsular campaign—had again appeared on Pope's right and rear, and it was this apparition that struck such dread to the soul of Halleck, then General-in-Chief at Washington. Now commenced that campaign of maneuvers in which Pope was so signally foiled by his keen and wary antagonist.
The Fifth Corps left Falmouth on the 24th of August, marching to Rappahannock Station, thence along the line of the Orange & AlexandriaR. R. to Warrenton Junction where they remained for a few hours, it being the longest rest they had had since leaving Falmouth, sixty miles away. On the 28th of August the sharp shooters arrived, with the rest of the corps, at Bristoe's Station where Porter had been ordered to take position at daylight to assist in the entertainment which Pope had advertised for that day, and which was to consist of "bagging the whole crowd" of rebels.
The wily Jackson, however, was no party to that plan, and while Pope was vainly seeking him about Manassas Junction, he was quietly awaiting the arrival of Lee's main columns near Groveton. The corps remained at Bristoe's, or between that place and Manassas Junction, inactive during the rest of the twenty-eighth and the whole of the twenty-ninth, and the sharp shooters thus failed of any considerable share in the battle of Groveton on that day. During the night preceding the 30th of August, Porter's corps was moved by the Sudley Springs road from their position near Bristoe's to the scene of the previous day's battle to the north and east of Groveton, where its line of battle was formed in a direction nearly northeast and southwest, with the left on the Warrenton turnpike. Morell's division, to which the sharp shooters were attached, formed the front line with the sharp shooters, as usual, far in the advance as skirmishers. With a grand rush the riflemen drove the rebels through the outlying woods, and following close upon the heels of the flying enemy, suddenly passed from the comparative shelter of the woodsinto an open field directly in the face of Jackson's corps strongly posted behind the embankment of an unfinished railroad leading from Sudley Springs southwestwardly towards Groveton.
It was a grand fortification ready formed for the enemy's occupation, and stoutly defended by the Stonewall brigade. Straight up to the embankment pushed the gallant sharp shooters, and handsomely were they supported by the splendid troops of Barnes and Butterfield's brigades. The attack was made with the utmost impetuosity and tenaciously sustained; but Jackson's veterans could not be dislodged from their strong position behind their works. The sharp shooters gained the shelter of a partially sunken road parallel to the enemy's line and hardly thirty yards distant; but not even the splendid courage of the men who had held the lines of Gaines Hill and Malvern against this same enemy, could avail to drive them from their shelter.
To add to the peril of the charging column, Longstreet, on Jackson's right, organized an attack on Porter's exposed left flank. The corps thus placed, with an enemy in their front whom they could not dislodge and another on their unprotected flank, were forced to abandon their attack. The sharp shooters were the last to leave their advanced positions, and then only when, nearly out of ammunition, Longstreet's fresh troops fairly crowded them out by sheer numerical superiority. Of Co. F the following men were wounded in this battle: Corporals H. J. Peck and Ai Brownand Private W. H. Blake. Corporal Peck was honorably discharged on the 26th of October following for disability resulting from his wound. The sharp shooters were not again seriously engaged with the enemy during Pope's campaign. On the night after the battle they retired with the shattered remains of the gallant Fifth Corps, and on the 1st of September went into camp near Fort Corcoran. So far the campaigns of the sharp shooters had, although full of thrilling incident and gallant achievement, been barren of result. Great victories had been won on many fields, but the end seemed as far off as when they left Washington more than five months before.
Disease and losses in battle had sadly thinned their ranks, but the remnant were soldiers tried and tempered in the fire of many battles. They were not of the stuff that wilts and shrivels under an adverse fortune, and putting the past resolutely behind them, they set their faces sternly towards the future, prepared for whatever of good, or of ill, it should have in store for them.
THE ANTIETAM CAMPAIGN.
On the 12th of September, the main portion of the army having preceded them, the Fifth Corps crossed to the north bank of the Potomac, and by forced marches came up with the more advanced columns on the sixteenth and took part in the maneuvers which brought the contending armies again face to face on the banks of the Antietam.
The rebels, flushed with the very substantialadvantages they had gained during the past summer, were confident and full of enthusiasm. Posted in an exceptionally strong position, their flanks resting on the Potomac while their front was covered by the deep and rapid Antietam, they calmly awaited the Union attack, confident that the army which they had so signally discomfitted under Pope would again recoil before their fire. But the Union situation was not the same that it had been a month before; McClellan had resumed the command, not only of the old Army of the Potomac—the darling child of his own creation, and which in turn loved and honored him with a devotion difficult for the carping critic of these modern times to understand—but of the remains of the army of Northern Virginia as well.
These incongruous elements he had welded together, reorganized and re-equipped while still on the march, until, when they stood again before Lee's hosts on the banks of Antietam creek on the 17th of September, they were as compact in organization and as confident as at any previous time in their history. Then, too, they were to fight on soil which, if not entirely loyal, was at least not the soil of the so called Confederate States; and the feeling that they were called upon for a great effort in behalf of an endangered North, gave an additional stimulus to their spirits and nerved their arms with greater power. But with the history of this great battle we have little to do. The Fifth Corps was held in reserve during the entire day. It was the first time in the history of the companythat its members had been lookers on while rebel and Unionist fought together; here, however, they could, from their position, overlook most of the actual field of battle as mere spectators of a scene, the like of which they had so often been actors in.
On the day after the battle they received a welcome addition to their terribly reduced ranks by the arrival of some fifty recruits under Lieut. Bronson, who had been detached on recruiting service while the army yet lay along the Chicahominy during the previous month of June. On the 19th of September the pursuit of Lee's retreating army was taken up, the Fifth Corps in the advance, and the sharp shooters leading the column. The rear guard of the enemy was overtaken at Blackford's ford, at which place Lee had recrossed the Potomac.
The rebel skirmishers having been driven across the river, preparations for forcing the pursuit into Virginia were made, and the sharp shooters were ordered to cross and drive the rebel riflemen from their sheltered positions along the Virginia shore. The water was waist deep but, holding their cartridge boxes above their heads, they advanced in skirmish line totally unable to reply to the galling fire that met them as they entered the stream. Stumbling and floundering along, they at last gained the farther shore and quickly succeeded in compelling the rebels to retire.
Advancing southward to a suitable position, Co. F was ordered to establish an advanced picket line in the execution of which order a party underCorporal Cassius Peck discovered the presence of a small body of the enemy with two guns, who had been left behind for some reason by the retreating rebels. This force was soon put to flight and both guns captured and one man taken prisoner. The captured guns were removed to a point near the river bank, from which they were subsequently removed to the Maryland shore. Remaining in this position until after dark the sharp shooters were ordered back to the north bank of the river, to which they retired. Morning found them posted in the bed of the canal which connects Washington with Harper's Ferry, and which runs close along the Maryland shore of the Potomac at this point. The water being out of the canal, its bed afforded capital shelter, and its banks a fine position from which to fire upon the rebels, now again in full possession of the opposite shore from which they had been driven by the sharp shooters the previous afternoon, but which had been deliberately abandoned to them again by the recall of the regiment to the northern shore on the preceding night.
It now became necessary to repossess that position, and a Pennsylvania regiment composed of new troops were ordered to make the attempt. Covered by the close and rapid fire of the sharp shooters, the Pennsylvanians succeeded in crossing the river, but every attempt to advance from the bank met with repulse. Wearied and demoralized by repeated failures, the regiment took shelter under the banks of the river where they were measurably protected from the fire of the enemy,and covered also by the rifles of the sharp shooters posted in the canal. Ordered to recross the river, they could not be induced by their officers to expose themselves in the open stream to the fire of the exulting rebels.
Every effort was made by the sharp shooters to encourage them to recross, but without avail. Calvin Morse, a bugler of Co. F, and thus a non-combatant (except that Co. F had no non-combatants), crossed the stream, covered by the fire of his comrades, to demonstrate to the panic stricken men that it could be done; but they could not be persuaded, and most of them were finally made prisoners. In these operations Co. F was exceptionally fortunate, and had no casualties to report.
The regiment remained at or near Sharpsburgh, Maryland, until the 30th of October following. The members of Co. F, except the recruits, were but poorly supplied with clothing; much had been abandoned and destroyed when they left their camp at Gaines Hill on the 27th of June, and much, also, had been thrown away to lighten the loads of the tired owners during the terrible marches and battles they had passed through since that time, and the little they had left was so worn and tattered as to be fit for little more than to conceal their nakedness. The rations, too, were bad; the hard bread particularly so, being wormy and mouldy, and this at a place and time when it seemed to the soldiers that there could be no good reason why such a state of things should exist at all. But time cures all ills, even in the army, andon the 30th of October the regiment, completely refitted, rested and in fine spirits, crossed the Potomac at Harper's Ferry and were once more on the sacred soil of Virginia. Moving southwardly towards Warrenton they arrived, on the evening of November 2d, at Snicker's Gap and were at once pushed out to occupy the summit. The night was intensely dark, and the ground difficult; but a proper picket line was finally established and occupied without event through the night. The next morning's sunlight displayed a wonderful sight to the eyes of the delighted sharp shooters. They were on the very summit of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and below them, like an open map, lay spread out the beautiful valley of Virginia.
Scathed and torn as it was, to a close observer, by the conflicts and marches of the past summer, from the distant point of view occupied by the watchers, all was beautiful and serene. No sign of war, or its desolating touch, was visible; except that here and there could be seen bodies of marching men, and long trains of wagons, which told of the presence of the enemy. Now, however, the head of every column was turned southward, and the rebel army, which had swept so triumphantly northward over that very country only two months before, was retiring, beaten and baffled, before the army of the Union. The scene was beautiful to the eye, while the reflections engendered by it were of the most hopeful nature, and the sharp shooters descended the southern slope of the mountainwith high hopes and glowing anticipations of speedy and decisive action.
From Snicker's Gap the army advanced by easy marches to Warrenton, where, on the 7th of November, Gen. McClellan was relieved from the command and Gen. Burnside appointed to that position. The army accepted the change like soldiers, but with a deep sense of regret. The vast mass of the rank and file honored and trusted Gen. McClellan as few generals in history have been trusted by their followers. He was personally popular among the men, but below and behind this feeling was the belief that in many respects Gen. McClellan had not been quite fairly treated by some of those who ought to have been his warm and ardent supporters. They felt that political influences, which had but little hold upon the soldiers in the field, had been at work to the personal disadvantage of their loved commander, and to the disadvantage of the army and the cause of the Union as well.
Whether they were right or wrong, they regretted the change most deeply, and in this general feeling the sharp shooters stood with the great mass of the army.
While they were always ready with a prompt obedience and hearty support of their later commanders, the regiment never cheered a general officer after McClellan left the head of the Army of the Potomac.
After a few days of rest at Warrenton to allow Gen. Burnside to get the reins well in hand, thearmy was put in motion towards Fredericksburgh where they arrived on or about the 23d of November. While at Warrenton Gen. Burnside effected a complete reorganization of the army, on a plan which he had been pressing upon the notice of his superiors for some time. The entire army was divided into three Grand Divisions, the right under Sumner, the center under Hooker, and the left under Franklin. The Fifth Corps formed part of the Center Grand Division under Gen. Hooker, and at about the same time Gen. F. J. Porter, who had been its commander since its organization while the army lay before Yorktown during the preceding April, was relieved from his command and was succeeded by Gen. Dan'l Butterfield.
Gen. Burnside, having been disappointed in finding his ponton trains, on which he depended for a rapid passage to the south bank of the Rappahannock, ready on his arrival at Falmouth, was constrained to attempt to force a passage in the face of Lee's now concentrated army. The position was one well calculated to dampen the ardor of the troops now so accustomed to warfare as to be able to weigh the chances of success or failure as accurately as their commanders, and to judge quickly of the value to their cause of that for which they were asked to offer up their lives, but they undertook the task as cheerfully and as willingly as though it had been far less uncertain and perilous. The Rappahannock at this point is bordered by opposing ranges of hills; that on the left bank, occupied by the troops of the Union and calledStafford heights, rising quite abruptly from the river bank; while on the southern shore the line of hills, called Marye's heights, recedes from the river from six hundred to two thousand yards, the intervening ground being generally open and, although somewhat broken, affording very little shelter from the fire of the Confederate batteries posted on Marye's heights. On the plain and near the river stands the village of Fredericksburgh.
During the night of the 10th of December Gen. Burnside placed in position on Stafford heights a powerful array of guns, under cover of whose fire he determined to attempt the passage of the river at that point, while to the Left Grand Division under Franklin was assigned the task of forcing a passage at a point some two miles lower down. On the night of the 11th attempts were made to lay the ponton bridges at a point opposite the town. The enemy, however, well warned, posted a strong force of riflemen in the houses and behind the stone walls bordering the river, whose sharp fire so seriously impeded the efforts of the engineers that they were forced to retire. The guns on Stafford heights were opened on the town, and for nearly two hours one hundred and fifty guns poured their shot and shell upon the devoted town. Each gun was estimated to have fired fifty rounds; but at the close of the bombardment the annoying riflemen were still there. Three regiments were now thrown across the river in ponton boats, and after a severe fight in the streets of the town, and after heavy loss of men, succeeded in dislodgingthe enemy, and the bridges were completed. Of course a surprise, upon which Burnside seems to have counted, was now out of the question; but urged on by the voice of the North, whose sole idea at that time seemed to be that their generals should only fight—anywhere, under all circumstances and at all times—he threw Sumner's Grand Division over the river and determined to try the issue of a general battle.
The Center Grand Division, under Hooker, were held on the left bank of the river and were thus unengaged in the earlier portion of that terrible day; but from their position on Stafford heights, the sharp shooters were eye witnesses to the terrible struggle in which their comrades were engaged on the plain below—where Hancock's gallant division, in their desperate charge upon the stone wall at the foot of Marye's height, lost two thousand men out of the five thousand engaged in less than fifteen immortal minutes, and where a total of twelve thousand, three hundred and twenty-nine Union soldiers fell in the different assaults; assaults that every man engaged knew were utterly hopeless and vain; but to the everlasting honor of the Army of the Potomac be it said that, although they well knew the task an impossible one, they responded again and again to the call to advance, until Burnside himself, at last convinced of the hopelessness of the undertaking, suspended further effort.
During the day Griffin and Humphrey's divisions of the Fifth Corps, and Whipple's of the Third, all belonging to the Center Grand Division,were ordered over the river to renew the attack which had been so disastrous to the men of the Second and Ninth Corps. Hooker in person accompanied this relieving column, and after a careful personal inspection of the field, convinced of the uselessness of further effort in that direction, sought to persuade the commanding general to abandon the attack.
Burnside, however, clung to the hope that repeated attacks must at last result in a disruption of the enemy's line at some point, and the brave men of the old Fifth were in their turn hurled against that position which had been found impossible to carry by those who had preceded them. Griffin and Humphrey's divisions fought their way to a point farther advanced than had been reached in former attempts, some of the men falling within twenty-five yards of the enemy's line, but they were unable to reach it and were compelled to retire. It was clearly impossible to carry the position. Hooker's educated eye had seen this from the first, hence his unavailing suggestion before the useless slaughter. His report contains the following grim lines: "Finding that I had lost as many men as my orders required me to lose, * * * I suspended the attack." With his repulse the battle of Fredericksburgh substantially closed. The sharp shooters were not ordered to cross the river on the thirteenth, and thus had no share in that day's fighting and no casualties to report. On the early morning of the fourteenth, however, the remainder of the Center Grand Division crossed tothe south bank, remaining in the streets of the town until the night of the fifteenth, when the sharp shooters relieved the advanced pickets in front of the heights, where considerable firing occurred during the night, the opposing lines being very near each other. The ground was thickly covered with the bodies of the gallant men who had fallen in the several assaults, lying in every conceivable position on the field, gory and distorted. How many of the readers of this book will make it real to themselves what gore is? A familiar and easily spoken word, but a dreadful thing in reality, that mass of clotted, gelatinous purple oozing from mortal wounds.
Such things are rarely noted in the actual heat of the battle, but to occupy such a field after the fury of the strife is over is enough to unman the stoutest heart, and many a brave man, who can coolly face the actual danger, turns deathly sick as he looks upon the result as shown in the mangled and blood stained forms of those who were so lately his comrades and friends. During the night the army was withdrawn to the north bank, and just before daylight the sharp shooters were called in. So close were the lines that great caution was necessary to keep the movement from the sharp eyes of the peering rebel pickets. To aid in deceiving the enemy the bodies of the dead were propped up so as to represent the presence of the picket line when daylight should appear. The ruse was successful, and the sharp shooters were safely withdrawn to the town. They were the last troops onthis portion of the field, and on arriving at the head of the bridge found that the planking had been so far removed as to render the bridge impassable. They had, therefore, to remain until the engineers could relay sufficient of the planks to enable them to cross. In their retreat through the town they picked up and brought away about one hundred and fifty stragglers and slightly wounded men who had been left behind by other commands. The Army of the Potomac was again on the north bank of the Rappahannock. They had fought bravely in an assault which they had known was hopeless; they had left behind them twelve thousand of their comrades and gained absolutely nothing. The loss which they had inflicted bore no proportion to that which they had suffered; what wonder, then, if for a time officers and men alike almost despaired of the cause of the Union? This feeling of depression and discouragement was, however, of short duration. The men who composed the Army of the Potomac were in the field for a certain well defined purpose, and until that purpose was fully accomplished they intended to remain. No reverse could long chill their ardor or dampen their splendid courage. Defeated to-day, to-morrow would find them as ready to do and dare again as though no reverse had overtaken them.
Thus it was that after a few days of rest the army was ready for whatever task its commander might set for it. The sharp shooters remained quietly in their camp until the 30th of December,when they accompanied a detachment of cavalry on a reconnoissance northwardly along the line of the Rappahannock to Richard's Ford, some ten miles above Falmouth. The cavalry crossed the river at this point, covered by the fire of the sharp shooters; a few prisoners were taken, and on the 1st of January, 1863, the command returned to their comfortable camp near Falmouth, where they were agreeably surprised to find the Second Regiment of Sharp Shooters, and among them, two other companies from Vermont. The little band of Green Mountain boys composing Co. F had sometimes felt a little lonesome for the want of congenial society, and hailed the advent of their fellow Vermonters gladly.
At about this time Col. Berdan became an appendage to the general staff, with the title of Chief of Sharp Shooters. The two regiments were distributed at various points along the line, and the detachments reported directly to Col. Berdan. The right wing, under Lieut. Col. Trepp, was assigned to the Right Grand Division under Gen. Sumner, but Company F remained near army headquarters.
On the 19th of January the Grand Divisions of Franklin and Hooker moved up the river to essay its passage at Banks' ford, some six miles above Falmouth, but in this affair, known as the Mud Campaign, the company had no share, not even leaving their camp. Of this campaign it is enough to say that it had for its object a turning operation similar to that undertaken by Hooker somemonths later; but a furious rain storm converted the country into one vast quagmire, in which horses, wagons, guns and men were alike unable to move. It was entirely abortive, and, after two days of exhausting labor, the disgusted troops floundered and staggered and cursed their way back to their camps, actually having to build corduroy roads on which to return. In consideration of their dry and comfortable condition in camp, the sharp shooters freely conceded all the glories of this campaign to others, preferring for themselves an inglorious ease to the chance of being smothered in the mud. Some of the difficulties of the march can be understood by recalling the requisition of the young engineer officer who reported to his superior that it was impossible for him to construct a road at a certain point which he had been directed to make passable for artillery. "Impossible," said the commander, "nothing is impossible; make a requisition for whatever is necessary and build the road." Whereupon the officer made the following requisition in the usual form: