Part 2 (1/2)
About the first of July we were ordered to Fort Pillow, which is by land fourteen miles above, on the same side of the river. When we reached that place, they were daily expecting an attack from the gunboats, of which we had heard so much, but had not yet seen or feared. Here the commanders wanted to exact the same amount of toil as at Fort Wright; but the men drew up pet.i.tions, requesting that the planters, who were at home doing nothing, should send their slaves to work on the fortifications. General Pillow approved of this plan, and published a call for laborers. In less than a month, 7000 able-bodied negro men were at work, and there would have been twice as many, if needed. The planters were, and are yet, in b.l.o.o.d.y earnest in this rebellion; and my impression, since coming North, is, that the ma.s.s of Union-loving people here are asleep, because they do not fully understand the resources and earnestness of the South. There is no such universal and intense earnestness here, as prevails all over the Rebel States. Refined and Christian women, feeling that the Northern armies are invading their homes, cutting off their husbands and brothers, and sweeping away their property, are compelled to take a deeper interest in the struggle than the ma.s.ses of the North are able to do, removed as they are from the horrors of the battle-scenes, and scarcely yet feeling the first hards.h.i.+p from the war. Indeed, I do not doubt that regiments of women could be raised, if there was any thing they could do in the cause of the South. That they are all wrong, and deeply blinded in warring against rightful authority, makes them none the less, perhaps the more, violent.
The employment of slaves to do the hard work was of great advantage in several respects. It allowed the men to drill and take care of their health, as the planters sent overseers who superintended the negroes. It kept the men in better spirits, and made them more cheerful to endure whatever legitimately belongs to a soldier's life, when they had slaves to do the toilsome work. These slaves were not armed, or relied upon to do any fighting. I have no means of judging how they would have fought, as I never saw them tried.
The natural situation of Fort Pillow is the best I saw on the Mississippi river. It is built on what is called the First Chickasaw Bluff. Fort Wright is on the second, and Memphis on the third bluff of the same name. The river makes a long horseshoe bend here, and the fort is built opposite the lower end of this bend, so that boats are in range for several miles.
The first battery built here was just above high-water mark, and nearly half a mile long. Bomb-proof magazines were placed in the side of the hill; and more than twenty guns of heavy calibre, 32 and 64-pounders, were mounted on double casemate carriages; and it was intended to mount many more. A formidable defence was this expected to be against the gunboats.
We also made a fine military road, thirty feet wide, cut out of the side of the bluff, and ascending gradually to the summit. It served the double purpose of a road, and also a protection for riflemen; as a bank was thrown up on the outer edge of it breast high. Where the road reached the summit of the bluff, was placed a six-inch mortar, mounted on a pivot carriage; and a little further on was a battery, mounting three eight-inch mortars, which were cast in 1804, and looked as if they had seen much service. A great extent of ground was cleared on the summit, and extensive land defences laid out; but while these were in progress we were ordered away.
The river was blockaded a short distance below Fort Pillow in a novel, but not very efficient manner. Flat-boats were anch.o.r.ed in the river about one hundred yards apart, and heavy chain-cables stretched across them. This was intended to stop the boats which should attempt to run past the fort, until the land batteries could sink them. This all did very well, until a rise in the river, when the boats lifted the anchors, broke the chains, floated away down the river, and stuck on a bar several miles below. This blockade was facetiously called by the men, ”Pillow's trot-line.”
Here again the independent character of the men composing our regiment showed itself more strongly than at Fort Wright. The regiment had now been without pay or bounty for nearly four months, and the men determined to find out why it was not forthcoming. One morning, at drill-call, the men in my own company marched out and stacked their arms, refusing to drill. I then proceeded to call the roll, but no one answered. I then reported to the captain that no one had answered to roll-call, but that all the ”_absentees were present_” in camp. He ordered me to take a guard and arrest every one who refused to fall into ranks. But the question now arose, where was the guard to come from--no one would answer to the guard detail?
The captain went to the colonel, and reported his company in a state of mutiny. Colonel Walker immediately mounted his horse, and galloping to our quarters, ordered the men to take their arms and proceed to the drill-ground. Not a man moved to obey this order, although a few would have done so had they not feared the vengeance of their comrades. The colonel stormed and swore, and a.s.sured them that he would have them all shot next morning, if they did not return to duty; but finally, cooling down a little, he demanded of them the reason for refusing to do duty. Some of them answered that they wanted their money. He scornfully asked them, if they came out to fight for the paltry sum of eleven dollars a month; upbraiding them with their lack of patriotism. One of the men remarked, that the officers could afford to be very patriotic, as they drew their pay regularly every month. The colonel then got wrathful again, and ordered out the rest of the regiment to quell the mutiny; but in the mean time they had come to the same resolution, and refused to move.
He then placed all the commissioned officers of the regiment under arrest, for not quelling the mutiny. As there was but one other regiment at Fort Pillow at that time, they could not put it down by force. In two days we were paid, and all returned peaceably to duty. Colonel Walker was then put under arrest by General Pillow, and tried by a court-martial, for allowing his regiment to be off duty for two days, but he was acquitted.
General Pillow, from whom this fort received its name, is a short, stoutly built man, about fifty years of age; has a mild, pleasant expression when not excited; firm, large mouth; gray eyes; hair and whiskers sprinkled with gray. He is fond of the good opinion of his men, and does every thing consistent with military rigor to gain their good-will; nevertheless, he is a strict disciplinarian, and has punished several men with death for desertion and disobedience of orders.
About the middle of August, General Pillow's division, including my regiment, was ordered to Columbus. On our way we pa.s.sed Island No.
10, which was then being fortified, and did not stop again until we landed at Columbus, Kentucky. This town is situated on the east bank of the Mississippi river, 140 miles above Fort Pillow, and 20 miles below Cairo; while, directly across the river, lie two or three houses which are designated by the name of Belmont.
The hards.h.i.+ps of Fort Wright were here renewed; that is, hard work and harder drill. At one time we worked twelve hours out of every thirty-six, so that every other work-turn came at night. Generals Polk, Pillow, Cheatham, and McGown were present day and night, encouraging the men with words of cheer. General Pillow at one time dismounted and worked in the trenches himself, to quiet some dissatisfaction which had arisen. The night was dark and stormy, the men were worn out, and many gave utterance to their dissatisfaction at having to work on such a night. General Pillow was sitting on his horse near by, and occasionally urging on the men the necessity of pressing on with the work; when an old Mexican war veteran, named W.H. Thomas, who was allowed some little lat.i.tude by his general called out, ”Old Gid, if you think there is so much hurry for this work, suppose you get down and help us a while.” The general, seeing that he had an opportunity to gain popularity with the men, dismounted, and laying aside his sword and cloak, worked for several hours. This was a feather in his cap, in the eyes of the poor fellows, for many a day.
An immense amount of work was performed here, and Columbus was often called the ”Gibraltar of the Mississippi river,” and the Confederate generals fancied that it could not be taken. The town itself is built on a level plain scarcely above high-water mark, as it has been submerged by some of the great floods of former years. A range of hills running parallel to the river, rises directly north of the town. On these hills most of the batteries were erected, and extensive breastworks were also thrown up, since this was the terminus of the Mobile and Ohio railroad, which it was important to keep un.o.bstructed, as the only land communication to Memphis and the interior, should the river navigation be interrupted below Columbus.
On the river side were the heaviest batteries. A sand-bag battery mounting six heavy guns, was constructed at the upper end of the town, just in front of General Pillow's head-quarters. This battery was constructed by filling corn-sacks with sand, and piling them up in tiers, leaving embrasures for the guns. These tiers were carried several feet above the heads of the men employed in working the guns, so that they were comparatively safe; for if a ball struck the battery, it was merely buried in the sand and no damage done. These guns were thirty-two and sixty-four pounders, brought up from New Orleans. About a mile north of the town, where the bluff juts out flush with the river, a shelf had been formed by a landslide about half way between the level of the river and the summit of the bluff.
This shelf was enlarged and leveled, and a battery constructed upon it which completely commanded the river in the direction of Cairo.
This battery was large enough to mount ten or twelve heavy guns. On the summit of the bluff was placed a large Whitworth rifled gun, carrying a round shot weighing one hundred and twenty-eight pounds.
Minie shot of much heavier weight were also used in this gun. This was one of four which ran the blockade in the Bermuda into Charleston, South Carolina, in the early autumn.
All these works were constructed under the direction of competent engineers, the chief of whom was Captain E.D. Pickett, since adjutant-general to Major-general Hardee.
Torpedoes and other obstructions were placed in the river; but all this kind of work was done secretly by the engineer corps, and the soldiers knew but little of their number and location. Some of these torpedoes were made of cast iron at Memphis and Nashville, and would hold from one to two hundred pounds of powder as a charge. Others were made of boiler iron, of different shapes and sizes. They were to be suspended near the surface of the water by chains and buoys, and discharged by wires stretched near the surface, which a boat would strike in pa.s.sing over them. I never learned that these infernal machines did any damage, except that one of them nearly destroyed one of their own transport boats, which had incautiously ventured too near its resting-place.
After spending nearly two months in the monotonous camp life of drill and fatigue duty, on the morning of the 7th of November I experienced a new sensation, more startling than agreeable. I had as yet been in no battle, and certainly had no desire to join in a fight against my country and against my kindred, some of whom I had no doubt were in the opposing army, as it was recruited where many of them lived; and I knew they would be loyal to the old flag, and ready to defend it with their lives. But the alarm came so suddenly that I had no time to feign sickness, or invent an excuse for being off duty.
Tappan's Arkansas, and Russell's Tennessee regiments, with a battalion of Mississippi cavalry, about fifteen hundred men in all, who were stationed at Belmont, across the river, were attacked, about seven o'clock, A.M., by General McClernand, with a little over seven thousand men, according to Union authorities. It was a complete surprise to us. At first we thought it was a picket skirmish with the cavalry; but soon Frank Cheatham, our brigadier, came galloping through the camp, bare-headed, in s.h.i.+rt and pantaloons, ordering us to ”fall in,” saying that the ”enemy were murdering the sick men in their tents across the river.” The report thus started soon took this form: ”The Yankees have bayoneted the sick men in Russell's regiment.” This regiment was composed mostly of Irishmen, as was ours. Instantly the rage of our men was such they could scarcely be restrained, and many of them swore they would swim the river if necessary, to reach the enemy, and would give no quarter.
I called the roll of the company, as was my duty, and found seventy-nine men out of one hundred and three present,--there was a good deal of sickness then in the army. Soon four of the company came in from the hospital, declaring they would have a share in the fight; and fourteen who were on guard were added, making the company nearly full.
Two steamboats soon had steam up, and by nine A.M., General Pillow, with his brigade of three thousand five hundred men, was across the river and in the fight.
Up to this time, the Federal force had driven the Confederates back from their camps, and threatened their annihilation, but Pillow's arrival stayed the retreat. By ten A.M., Cheatham's brigade of 2500 men, in which was my regiment, were also coming into the engagement.
By eleven A.M., both armies were fully employed. In the mean time some of the guns on the fortifications at Columbus were trying their range upon the Federal gunboats, which lay about three miles distant, and replied fiercely to their challenges. But little execution on either side was done by this firing. The carelessness of the officers in our brigade nearly lost the day, early in the contest. The men had but ten rounds of ammunition, which was soon expended, and we were compelled to retire beneath the bank of the river until more was supplied.
This incident developed a strange, and to me a very sad, trait of human nature,--other ill.u.s.trations of which I have observed repeatedly since,--an unusual disposition to witticisms in the most solemn circ.u.mstances, when it might be supposed that even the most hardened would reflect upon the fearful fate sure to seize upon some of them. One of the captains of our regiment, J.L. Saffarrens, ran into the river waist-deep, in his desire for safety, when one of his men called out, ”Captain, dear, are ye off for Memphis? If ye are, tell the ould woman the last ye saw ov me I was fighting, while ye were runnin' away.”
The gallant captain received a ball in the face, while stuck in the mud into which he had sunk, and was taken to Memphis with the wounded next day; but I never learned that he delivered the message to the ”_ould woman_.” A curious little Irishman in our company, nick-named ”Dublin Tricks,” who was extremely awkward, and scarcely knew one end of his gun from the other, furnished the occasion of another outburst of laughter, just when the bullets were flying like hail around us. In his haste or ignorance, he did what is often done in the excitement of rapid firing by older soldiers: he rammed down his first cartridge without biting off the end, hence the gun did not go off. He went through the motions, putting in another load and snapping his lock, with the same result, and so on for several minutes. Finally, he thought of a remedy, and sitting down, he patiently picked some priming into the tube. This time the gun and Dublin both went off. He picked himself up slowly, and called out in a serio-comic tone of voice, committing the old Irish bull, ”Hould, asy with your laffin', boys; there is sivin more loads in her yit.”