Part 2 (2/2)
I will digress here for a minute to speak of a little incident connected with this disastrous feature of the day that has always impressed me as a pathetic instance of the patriotism and unselfish devotion to the cause that was by no means uncommon among the rank and file of the Union armies.
There was in my company a middle-aged German named Charles Oberdieck. According to the company descriptive book, he was a native of the then kingdom of Hanover, now a province of Prussia.
He was a typical German, flaxen-haired, blue-eyed, quiet and taciturn, of limited and meager education, but a model soldier, who accepted without question and obeyed without a murmur the orders of his military superiors. Prior to the war he had made his living by chopping cord-wood in the high, timbered hills near the mouth of the Illinois river, or by working as a common laborer in the country on the farms at $14 a month. He was unmarried, his parents were dead, and he had no other immediate relatives surviving, either in his fatherland or in the country of his adoption. He and I enlisted from the same neighborhood. I had known him in civil life at home, and hence he was disposed to be more communicative with me than with the other boys of the company. A day or two after the battle he and I were sitting in the shade of a tree, in camp, talking over the incidents of the fight. ”Charley,” I said to him, ”How did you feel along about four o'clock Sunday afternoon when they broke our lines, we were falling back in disorder, and it looked like the whole business was gone up generally?” He knocked the ashes from his pipe and, turning his face quickly towards me, said: ”I yoost tells you how I feels. I no care anydings about Charley; he haf no wife nor children, fadder nor mudder, brudder nor sister; if Charley get killed, it makes no difference; dere vas n.o.body to cry for him, so I d.i.n.ks nudding about myselfs; but I tells you, I yoost den feels bad for de Cause!”
n.o.ble, simple-hearted old Charley! It was the imminent danger only to the Cause that made his heart sink in that seemingly fateful hour. When we heard in the malignant and triumphant roar of the Rebel cannon in our rear what might be the death-knell of the last great experiment of civilized men to establish among the nations of the world a united republic, freed from the curse of pampered kings and selfish, grasping aristocrats--it was in that moment, in his simple language, that the peril to the Cause was the supreme and only consideration.
It must have been when we were less than half a mile from the landing on our disorderly retreat before mentioned, that we saw standing in line of battle, at ordered arms, extending from both sides of the road until lost to sight in the woods, a long, well-ordered line of men in blue. What did that mean? and where had they come from? I was walking by the side of Enoch Wallace, the orderly sergeant of my company. He was a man of nerve and courage, and by word and deed had done more that day to hold us green and untried boys in ranks and firmly to our duty than any other man in the company. But even he, in the face of this seemingly appalling state of things, had evidently lost heart. I said to him: ”Enoch, what are those men there for?” He answered in a low tone: ”I guess they are put there to hold the Rebels in check till the army can get across the river.” And doubtless that was the thought of every intelligent soldier in our beaten column. And yet it goes to show how little the common soldier knew of the actual situation. We did not know then that this line was the last line of battle of the ”Fighting Fourth Division” under General Hurlbut; that on its right was the division of McClernand, the Fort Donelson boys; that on its right, at right angles to it, and, as it were, the refused wing of the army, was glorious old Sherman, hanging on with a bulldog grip to the road across Snake Creek from Crump's Landing by which Lew Wallace was coming with 5,000 men. In other words, we still had an unbroken line confronting the enemy, made up of men who were not yet ready, by any manner of means, to give up that they were whipped. Nor did we know then that our retreating ma.s.s consisted only of some regiments of Hurlbut's division, and some other isolated commands, who had not been duly notified of the recession of Hurlbut and of his falling back to form a new line, and thereby came very near sharing the fate of Prentiss' men and being marched to the rear as prisoners of war. Speaking for myself, it was twenty years after the battle before I found these things out, yet they are true, just as much so as the fact that the sun rose yesterday morning. Well, we filed through Hurlbut's line, halted, re-formed, and faced to the front once more. We were put in place a short distance in the rear of Hurlbut, as a support to some heavy guns.
It must have been about five o'clock now. Suddenly, on the extreme left, and just a little above the landing, came a deafening explosion that fairly shook the ground beneath our feet, followed by others in quick and regular succession. The look of wonder and inquiry that the soldiers' faces wore for a moment disappeared for one of joy and exultation as it flashed across our minds that the gunboats had at last joined hands in the dance, and were pitching big twenty-pound Parrott sh.e.l.ls up the ravine in front of Hurlbut, to the terror and discomfiture of our adversaries.
The last place my regiment a.s.sumed was close to the road coming up from the landing. As we were lying there I heard the strains of martial music and saw a body of men marching by the flank up the road. I slipped out of ranks and walked out to the side of the road to see what troops they were. Their band was playing ”Dixie's Land,” and playing it well. The men were marching at a quick step, carrying their guns, cartridge-boxes, haversacks, canteens, and blanket-rolls. I saw that they had not been in the fight, for there was no powder-smoke on their faces. ”What regiment is this?” I asked of a young sergeant marching on the flank. Back came the answer in a quick, cheery tone, ”The 36th Indiana, the advance guard of Buell's army.”
I did not, on hearing this, throw my cap into the air and yell.
That would have given those Indiana fellows a chance to chaff and guy me, and possibly make sarcastic remarks, which I did not care to provoke. I gave one big, gasping swallow and stood still, but the blood thumped in the veins of my throat and my heart fairly pounded against my little infantry jacket in the joyous rapture of this glorious intelligence. Soldiers need not be told of the thrill of unspeakable exultation they all have felt at the sight of armed friends in danger's darkest hour. Speaking for myself alone, I can only say, in the most heart-felt sincerity, that in all my obscure military career, never to me was the sight of reinforcing legions so precious and so welcome as on that Sunday evening when the rays of the descending sun were flashed back from the bayonets of Buell's advance column as it deployed on the bluffs of Pittsburg Landing.
My account of the battle is about done. So far as I saw or heard, very little fighting was done that evening after Buell's advance crossed the river. The sun must have been fully an hour high when anything like regular and continuous firing had entirely ceased.
What the result would have been if Beauregard had ma.s.sed his troops on our left and forced the fighting late Sunday evening would be a matter of opinion, and a common soldier's opinion would not be considered worth much.
My regiment was held in reserve the next day, and was not engaged.
I have, therefore, no personal experience of that day to relate.
After the battle of s.h.i.+loh, it fell to my lot to play my humble part in several other fierce conflicts of arms, but s.h.i.+loh was my maiden fight. It was there I first saw a gun fired in anger, heard the whistle of a bullet, or saw a man die a violent death, and my experiences, thoughts, impressions, and sensations on that b.l.o.o.d.y Sunday will abide with me as long as I live.
CHAPTER IV.
SOME INCIDENTS OF THE BATTLE OF s.h.i.+LOH.
There were many little incidents at s.h.i.+loh that came under my personal observation that I did not mention in the foregoing sketch. The matter of s.p.a.ce was important, so I pa.s.sed them over. But that consideration does not arise now, and as I am writing this for you, I will say something here about several things that I think may be of some interest.
I distinctly remember my first shot at s.h.i.+loh. It was fired when we were in our first position, as described in my account of the battle. I think that when the boys saw the enemy advancing they began firing of their own motion, without waiting for orders. At least, I don't remember hearing any. I was in the front rank, but didn't fire. I preferred to wait for a good opportunity, when I could take deliberate aim at some individual foe. But when the regiment fired, the Confederates halted and began firing also, and the fronts of both lines were at once shrouded in smoke. I had my gun at a ready, and was trying to peer under the smoke in order to get a sight of our enemies. Suddenly I heard some one in a highly excited tone calling to me from just in my rear,--”Stillwell!
shoot! shoot! Why don't you shoot?” I looked around and saw that this command was being given by Bob Wylder, our second lieutenant, who was in his place, just a few steps to the rear. He was a young man, about twenty-five years old, and was fairly wild with excitement, jumping up and down ”like a hen on a hot griddle.” ”Why, lieutenant,” said I, ”I can't see anything to shoot at.” ”Shoot, shoot, anyhow!” ”All right,” I responded, ”if you say shoot, shoot it is;” and bringing my gun to my shoulder, I aimed low in the direction of the enemy, and blazed away through the smoke. I have always doubted if this, my first shot, did any execution--but there's no telling. However, the lieutenant was clearly right. Our adversaries were in our front, in easy range, and it was our duty to aim low, fire in their general direction, and let fate do the rest. But at the time the idea to me was ridiculous that one should blindly shoot into a cloud of smoke without having a bead on the object to be shot at. I had shot squirrels and rabbits, and other small game, in the big woods adjacent to our backwoods home, from the time I was big enough to carry a gun. In fact, I began when I was too small to shoot ”off hand,” but had to fire from a ”rest,”--any convenient stump, log, or forked bush. The gun I used was a little old percussion lock rifle, with a long barrel, carrying a bullet which weighed about sixty to the pound. We boys had to furnish our own ammunition,--lead (which we moulded into bullets), gun-caps, and powder. Our princ.i.p.al source of revenue whereby we got money to buy ammunition was hazel-nuts, which we would gather, shuck, and sell at five cents a quart. And the work incident to the gathering and shucking of a quart of hazel nuts was a decidedly tedious job. But it made us economical in the use of our ordnance stores, so we would never throw away a shot carelessly or unnecessarily. And it was a standing rule never to shoot a squirrel anywhere except in the head, save as a last resort, when circ.u.mstances compelled one to fire at some other part of the body of the little animal. And so I thought, at the beginning of my military career, that I should use the same care and circ.u.mspection in firing an old musket when on the line of battle that I had exercised in hunting squirrels. But I learned better in about the first five minutes of the battle of s.h.i.+loh.
However, in every action I was in, when the opportunity was afforded, I took careful and deliberate aim, but many a time the surroundings were such that the only thing to do was to hold low, and fire through the smoke in the direction of the enemy. I will say here that the extent of wild shooting done in battle, especially by raw troops, is astonis.h.i.+ng, and rather hard to understand. When we fell back to our second line at s.h.i.+loh, I heard an incessant humming sound away up above our heads, like the flight of a swarm of bees. In my ignorance, I at first hardly knew what that meant, but it presently dawned on me that the noise was caused by bullets singing through the air from twenty to a hundred feet over our heads. And after the battle I noticed that the big trees in our camp, just in the rear of our second line, were thickly pock-marked by musket b.a.l.l.s at a distance of fully a hundred feet from the ground. And yet we were separated from the Confederates only by a little, narrow field, and the intervening ground was perfectly level. But the fact is, those boys were fully as green as we were, and doubtless as much excited. The Confederate army at s.h.i.+loh was composed of soldiers the great majority of whom went under fire there for the first time, and I reckon they were as nervous and badly scared as we were.
I never shall forget how awfully I felt on seeing for the first time a man killed in battle. This occurred on our second position, above mentioned. Our line of battle here was somewhat irregular, and the men had become mixed up. The trees and stumps were thick, and we availed ourselves of their protection whenever possible. I had a tree, it was embarra.s.singly small, but better than none. I took to a log later. But there was a man just on my right behind a tree of generous proportions, and I somewhat envied him. He was actively engaged in loading and firing, and was standing up to the work well when I last saw him alive.
But, all at once, there he was lying on his back, at the foot of his tree, with one leg doubled under him, motionless,--and stone dead! He probably had been hit square in the head while aiming, or peeking around the tree. I stared at his body, perfectly horrified! Only a few seconds ago that man was alive and well, and now he was lying on the ground, done for, forever! The event came nearer completely upsetting me than anything else that occurred during the entire battle--but I got used to such incidents in the course of the day.
After rallying at our third position, we were moved a short distance to the rear, and formed in line at right angles to the road from our camp to the landing. While standing there I casually noticed a large wall tent at the side of the road, a few steps to my rear. It was closed up, and n.o.body stirring around it. Suddenly I heard, right over our heads, a frightful ”s-s-wis-sh,”--and followed by a loud crash in this tent.
Looking around, I saw a big, gaping hole in the wall of the tent, and on the other side got a glimpse of the cause of the disturbance--a big cannon ball ricochetting down the ridge, and hunting further mischief.
And at the same moment of time the front flaps of the tent were frantically thrown open, and out popped a fellow in citizen's clothes.
He had a Hebrew visage, his face was as white as a dead man's, and his eyes were sticking out like a crawfish's. He started down the road toward the landing at probably the fastest gait he had ever made in his life, his coat tails streaming behind him, and the boys yelling at him.
We proceeded to investigate the interior of that tent at once, and found that it was a sutler's establishment, and crammed with sutler goods. The panic-struck individual who had just vacated it was of course the proprietor. He had adopted ostrich tactics, had b.u.t.toned himself up in the tent, and was in there keeping as still as a mouse, thinking, perhaps, that as he could see n.o.body, n.o.body could see him. That cannon ball must have been a rude surprise. In order to have plenty of ”han'
roomance,” we tore down the tent at once, and then proceeded to appropriate the contents. There were barrels of apples, bologna sausages, cheeses, canned oysters and sardines, and lots of other truck.
I was filling my haversack with bologna when Col. Fry rode up to me and said: ”My son, will you please give me a link of that sausage?” Under the circ.u.mstances, I reckon I must have been feeling somewhat impudent and reckless, so I answered rather saucily, ”Certainly, Colonel, we are closing out this morning below cost;” and I thrust into his hands two or three big links of bologna. There was a faint trace of a grin on the old man's face as he took the provender, and he began gnawing at once on one of the hunks, while the others he stowed away in his equipments. I suspected from this incident that the Colonel had had no breakfast that morning, which perhaps may have been the case. Soon after this I made another deal. There were some cavalry in line close by us, and one of them called out to me, ”Pardner, give me some of them apples.” ”You bet;” said I, and quickly filling my cap with the fruit, handed it to him. He emptied the apples in his haversack, took a silver dime from his pocket, and proffered it to me, saying, ”Here.” ”Keep your money--don't want it;” was my response, but he threw the coin at my feet, and I picked it up and put it in my pocket. It came agreeably handy later.
Jack Medford of my company came up to me with a most complacent look on his face, and patting his haversack, said, ”Lee, I just now got a whole lot of paper and envelopes, and am all fixed for writing home about this battle.” ”Seems to me, Jack,” I suggested, ”you'd better unload that stuff, and get something to eat. Don't worry about writing home about the battle till it's done fought.” Jack's countenance changed, he muttered, ”Reckon you're right, Lee;” and when next I saw him, his haversack was bulging with bologna and cheese. All this time the battle was raging furiously on our right, and occasionally a cannon ball, flying high, went screaming over our heads. Walter Scott, in ”The Lady of the Lake,” in describing an incident of the battle of Beal' an Duine, speaks of the unearthly screaming and yelling that occurred, sounding--
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