Co. Aytch, or a Side Show of the Big Show

by Sam Watkins

  20. This incident was similar to the killing of Leonidas Polk, and it happened the following day, June 15, 1864. It was the fourth time Lucius was wounded. He never saw further action. Without realizing it, the Confederate command put the troops at Gilgal Church in a vulnerable position, subjecting them to artillery crossfire from two federal corps. It was one such artillery shot that wounded Lucius Polk. After the barrage, the Rebels retreated to a less vulnerable position.

  21. Joachim Murat was a daring French cavalry officer who was also the brother-in-law of his commander, Napoleon.

  22. At Chickamauga, one of Lucius Polk's attacks occurred just as the final Union defense was starting to collapse. Accordingly, he overran the federal breastworks and captured over one hundred prisoners. The nephew sent a message back to his uncle, corps commander and Episcopal Bishop Leonidas Polk. The message implied that if other units joined the attack, a major victory was at hand. Bishop Polk turned to nearby commanders and ordered them to attack all across the line. Division General Cheatham responded by telling his soldiers to “Give'em hell.” By way of amplification, Bishop Polk shouted, “Do as General Cheatham says, boys, do as he says.”

  23. From the “Union Attack on Kennesaw Mountain” map it may be observed that Maney's brigade was at the apex for one of the federal attack objective points. Watkins was truly at the center of action in the fight at “Dead Angle.”

  24. The Union brigades of Generals John Mitchell, Charles Harker, and Daniel McCook charged Dead Angle at 9:00 a.m. Harker and McCook were killed. Prior to the charge, Harker commented, “I shall not come out of this charge today alive.” Similarly, McCook quoted a poem, “To every man upon this Earth/Death come soon or late.”

  25. Maney's brigade was in the most vulnerable spot at Dead Angle. Unlike the rest of the line, it was not protected by abatis, but merely by a flimsy pile of cut saplings owing to a shortage of large trees in the area. The Yankee bullets were so thick that one officer said he could “catch a handful” merely by extending his hand. Sam and his comrades realized they would be trapped and slaughtered if the Union troops got over the parapet. Consequently, they fired as fast as they could, sometimes not ever bothering to take aim. The Stars and Stripes that Sam mentions were probably carried by the color bearer of the 52nd Ohio.

  26. This is an exaggeration. Sherman reported a total of three thousand casualties along the entire line. If Sam's regiment had three hundred soldiers, and each shot a minimum of twenty Yankees, the total federal casualties inflicted by Sam's regiment alone would have totaled six thousand.

  27. Although Sam was at times prone to exaggeration, his feelings about the merits of his regiment at Dead Angle are valid.

  28. Lieutenant Colonel John L. House replaced Feild as the regimental commander.

  29. J. M. Mayes was presumably the father of Jennie Mayes, whom Sam married after the war. Mayes owned a general store where Sam evidently worked as a clerk before the war. He also worked there afterward for a time.

  30. This is a biblical reference to Matthew 10:42.

  31. This is a reference to the final deathbed words of Stonewall Jackson, “Let us cross over the river and rest under the shade of the trees,” who died in May 1863.

  32. Sam's chronology is mixed up. The battle of New Hope Church was actually about a month before the battle of Kennesaw Mountain. Moreover, Maney's brigade was not engaged. This is consistent with Sam's description of bullets flying over their heads. Owing to peculiar topography, many of the Union and Confederate soldiers on the front lines at New Hope Church were shooting high. Consequently, there were a number of casualties in the rear positions, which is presumably where Sam was located.

  33. This battle immediately follows the battle of New Hope Church and is also weeks before Kennesaw Mountain.

  34. Sam's memory partly fails him. Breckinridge left the Army of Tennessee early in 1864. John Breckinridge was well known because he was vice president under President James Buchanan just before the Civil War. He was a US senator from Kentucky until near the end of 1861, when he resigned to become a Confederate general. During the period of fighting at Dallas, Georgia, Breckinridge was in Virginia. Less than two weeks prior to the battle of Dallas, he won a victory at New Market in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. However, his first cousin, Colonel William C. Breckinridge, was a member of the 9th Kentucky Regiment. It was a component of the Kentucky Brigade, which did make an assault at the battle of Dallas resulting in casualties of about fifty percent. William Breckinridge later served ten years as a congressman.

  35. General Johnston ordered the attack to determine the strength of Sherman's army at Dallas. If it was strong, he did not want to press the attack, but if it was weak he wanted to capture the defensive works. The attack Watkins witnessed showed that Dallas was strongly held. That is why there was no follow-up attack involving Sam's regiment.

  36. This is probably a skirmish at Vining's Station, which was a station on the Western & Atlantic Railroad slightly north of the Chattahoochee River. The Western & Atlantic connected Atlanta with Chattanooga. It was the main supply line for both armies as they maneuvered between the two cities. Initially, Sherman planned a vigorous assault, but upon more carefully inspecting the Confederate lines, he called off the attack.

  37. General Vaughan lost his foot during the skirmish at Vining's Station, on July 4, 1864. As noted, the station was north of the Chattahoochee. In contrast, Mount Zion Church was south of the river and was on the left end of the Confederate attack at Peachtree Creek on July 20, 1864. Thus, Sam's dates and locations are apparently confused. Since most of this section concerns events on July 4, it is presumed the applicable incident is the skirmish at Vining's Station. Furthermore, Maney's troops were about three-fourths of a mile east of Mount Zion Church during the battle of Peachtree Creek.

  38. Sam is implying that after 110 days of steadily yielding ground, General Johnston was not going to retreat anymore. He must have realized that Johnston was under criticism for constantly retreating and vulnerable to replacement for his reluctance to fight.

  39. Sam's chronology is again faulty. The battle of Cassville was on May 19, 1864. That was earlier than Dallas, Kennesaw Mountain (Dead Angle), Vining's Station, and Peachtree Creek.

  40. Sam again indulges anti-Hood rhetoric. Both Hood and Polk were exposed to enfilading artillery fire, which Johnston's chief-of-artillery, Francis Shoup, earlier warned would be the case based on likely federal artillery placements. Johnston announced he disagreed with Shoup's analysis, but Joe was wrong.

  41. Hardee had not yet resigned, but he would be transferred to another army after Hood's costly attacks around Atlanta in the ensuing two months. Similarly, Kirby-Smith had not resigned. Instead he had been put in charge of all Confederate forces west of the Mississippi River for more than a year. He held the position until the end of the war. Finally, John C. Breckinridge was in Virginia until the end of the war, and Colonel William Breckinridge did not leave the Confederate army.

  42. After twenty years, Watkins began to see the viewpoint shared by modern historians and President Davis.

  43. It is not permitted to blunder twice in war.

  44. As noted, Watkins incorrectly repeats that Kirby-Smith and Hardee resigned.

  THIRTEEN

  ATLANTA

  HOOD STRIKES

  General John B. Hood had the reputation of being a fighting man, and wishing to show Jeff Davis what a “bully” fighter he was, lights in on the Yankees on Peachtree creek. But that was an “I give a dare” affair. General William B. Bate's division gained their works, but did not long hold them.1

  Our division, now commanded by General John C. Brown, was supporting Bate's division; our regiment supporting the Hundred and Fifty-fourth Tennessee, which was pretty badly cut to pieces, and I remember how mad they seemed to be, because they had to fall back.2

  Hood thought he would strike while the iron was hot, and while it could be hammered into shape, and make the Yankees believe that i
t was the powerful arm of old Joe that was wielding the sledge.

  But he was like the fellow who took a piece of iron to the shop, intending to make him an ax. After working for some time and failing, he concluded he would make him a wedge, and, failing in this, said, “I'll make a skeow.” So he heats the iron red-hot and drops it into the slack-tub, and it went s-k-e-o-w, bubble, bubble, s-k-e-o-w, bust.

  KILLING A YANKEE SCOUT

  On the night of the 20th, the Yankees were on Peachtree creek, advancing toward Atlanta.

  I was a videt that night, on the outpost of the army. I could plainly hear the moving of their army, even the talking and laughing of the Federal soldiers. I was standing in an old sedge field. About midnight everything quieted down. I was alone in the darkness, left to watch while the army slept. The pale moon was on the wane, a little yellow arc, emitting but a dim light, and the clouds were lazily passing over it, while the stars seemed trying to wink and sparkle and make night beautiful. I thought of God, of heaven, of home, and I thought of Jennie—her whom I had ever loved, and who had given me her troth in all of her maiden purity, to be my darling bride so soon as the war was over. I thought of the scenes of my childhood, my school-boy days. I thought of the time when I left peace and home, for war and privations. I had Jennie's picture in my pocket Bible, alongside of a braid of her beautiful hair. And I thought of how good, how pure, and how beautiful was the woman, who, if I lived, would share my hopes and struggles, my happiness as well as troubles, and who would be my darling bride, and happiness would ever be mine.

  An owl had lit on an old tree near me and began to “hoo, hoo, hoo are you,” and his mate would answer back from the lugubrious depths of the Chattahoochee swamps. A shivering owl also sat on the limb of a tree and kept up its dismal wailings. And every now and then I could hear the tingle, tingle, tingle of a cow bell in the distance, and the shrill cry of the whip-poor-will. The shivering owl and whip-poor-will seemed to be in a sort of talk, and the jack-o'-lanterns seemed to be playing spirits—when, hush! What is that? listen!

  It might have been two o'clock, and I saw, or thought I saw, the dim outlines of a Yankee soldier, lying on the ground not more than ten steps from where I stood. I tried to imagine it was a stump or hallucination of the imagination. I looked at it again. The more I looked the more it assumed the outlines of a man. Something glistens in his eyes. Am I mistaken? Tut, tut, it's nothing but a stump; you are getting demoralized. What! it seems to be getting closer. There are two tiny specks that shine like the eyes of a cat in the dark. Look here, thought I, you are getting nervous. Well, I can stand this doubt and agony no longer; I am going to fire at that object anyhow, let come what will. I raised my gun, placed it to my shoulder, took deliberate aim, and fired, and waugh-weouw, the most unearthly scream I ever heard, greeted my ears.

  I broke and run to a tree nearby, and had just squatted behind it, when zip, zip, two balls from our picket post struck the tree in two inches of my head. I hallooed to our picket not to fire that it was “me,” the videt. I went back, and says I, “Who fired those two shots?” Two fellows spoke up and said that they did it. No sooner was it spoken, than I was on them like a duck on a june-bug, pugnis et calcibus.3 We “fout and fit, and gouged and bit,” right there in that picket post. I have the marks on my face and forehead where one of them struck me with a Yankee zinc canteen, filled with water. I do not know which whipped. My friends told me that I whipped both of them, and I suppose their friends told them that they had whipped me. All I know is, they both run, and I was bloody from head to foot, from where I had been cut in the forehead and face by the canteens.

  This all happened one dark night in the month of July 1864, in the rifle pit in front of Atlanta. When day broke the next morning, I went forward to where I had shot at the “boogaboo” of the night before, and right there I found a dead Yankee soldier, fully accoutered for any emergency, his eyes wide open. I looked at him, and I said, “Old fellow, I am sorry for you; didn't know it was you, or I would have been worse scared than I was. You are dressed mighty fine, old fellow, but I don't want anything you have got, but your haversack.” It was a nice haversack, made of chamois skin. I kept it until the end of the war, and when we surrendered at Greensboro, N.C., I had it on. But the other soldiers who were with me, went through him and found twelve dollars in greenback, a piece of tobacco, a gun-wiper and gun-stopper and wrench, a looking-glass and pocket-comb, and various and sundry other articles. I came across that dead Yankee two days afterwards, and he was as naked as the day he came into the world, and was as black as a Negro, and was as big as a skinned horse. He had mortified. I recollect of saying, “Ugh, ugh,” and of my hat being lifted off my head, by my hair, which stood up like the quills of the fretful porcupine. He scared me worse when dead than when living.

  AN OLD CITIZEN

  But after the little unpleasant episode in the rifle pit, I went back and took my stand. When nearly day, I saw the bright and beautiful star in the east rise above the tree tops, and the gray fog from off the river begun to rise, and every now and then could hear a far off chicken crow.

  While I was looking toward the Yankee line, I saw a man riding leisurely along on horseback, and singing a sort of humdrum tune. I took him to be some old citizen. He rode on down the road toward me, and when he had approached, “Who goes there?” He immediately answered, “A friend.” I thought that I recognized the voice in the darkness—and said I, “Who are you?” He spoke up, and gave me his name. Then, said I, “Advance, friend, but you are my prisoner.” He rode on toward me, and I soon saw that it was Mr. Mumford Smith, the old sheriff of Maury county. I was very glad to see him, and as soon as the relief guard came, I went back to camp with him. I do not remember of ever in my life being more glad to see any person.

  He had brought a letter from home, from my father, and some Confederate old issue bonds, which I was mighty glad to get, and also a letter from “the gal I left behind me,” enclosing a rosebud and two apple blossoms, resting on an arbor vita leaf, and this on a little piece of white paper, and on this was written a motto (which I will have to tell for the young folks), “Receive me, such as I am; would that I were of more use for your sake. Jennie.” Now, that was the bouquet part. I would not like to tell you what was in that letter, but I read that letter over five hundred times, and remember it today. I think I can repeat the poetry verbatim et literatim, and will do so, gentle reader, if you don't laugh at me. I'm married now, and only write from memory, and never in my life have I read it in book or paper, and only in that letter—

  “I love you, O, how dearly,

  Words too faintly but express;

  This heart beats too sincerely,

  E'er in life to love you less;

  No, my fancy never ranges,

  Hopes like mine, can never soar;

  If the love I cherish, changes,

  Twill only be to love you more.”

  Now, fair and gentle reader, this was the poetry, and you see for yourself that there was no “shenanigan” in that letter; and if a fellow “went back” on that sort of a letter, he would strike his “mammy.” And then the letter wound up with “May God shield and protect you, and prepare you for whatever is in store for you, is the sincere prayer of Jennie.” You may be sure that I felt good and happy, indeed.

  MY FRIENDS

  Reader mine, in writing these rapid and imperfect recollections, I find that should I attempt to write up all the details that I would not only weary you, but that these memoirs would soon become monotonous and uninteresting. I have written only of what I saw. Many little acts of kindness shown me by ladies and old citizens, I have omitted.

  I remember going to an old citizen's house, and he and the old lady were making clay pipes. I recollect how they would mold the pipes and put them in a red-hot stove to burn hard. Their kindness to me will never be forgotten. The first time that I went there they seemed very glad to see me, and told me that I looked exactly like their son who was in the arm
y. I asked them what regiment he belonged to. After a moment's silence the old lady, her voice trembling as she spoke, said the Fourteenth Georgia, and then she began to cry. Then the old man said, “Yes, we have a son in the army. He went to Virginia the first year of the war, and we have never heard of him since. These wars are terrible, sir. The last time that we heard of him, he went with Stonewall Jackson away up in the mountains of West Virginia, toward Romney, and I did hear that while standing picket at a little place called Hampshire Crossing, on a little stream called St. John's Run, he and eleven others froze to death. We have never heard of him since.”4

  He got up and began walking up and down the room, his hands crossed behind his back. I buckled on my knapsack to go back to camp, and I shook hands with the two good old people, and they told me good-bye, and both said, “God bless you, God bless you.” I said the same to them, and said, “I pray God to reward you, and bring your son safe home again.” When I got back to camp I found cannon and caissons moving, and I knew and felt that General Hood was going to strike the enemy again. Preparations were going on, but everything seemed to be out of order and system. Men were cursing, and seemed to be dissatisfied and unhappy, but the army was moving.

  A BODY WITHOUT LIMBS—AN ARMY WITHOUT CAVALRY5

  The most terrible and disastrous blow that the South ever received was when Hon. Jefferson Davis placed General Hood in command of the Army of Tennessee. I saw, I will say, thousands of men cry like babies—regular, old-fashioned boohoo, boohoo, boohoo.

  Now, Hood sent off all his cavalry right in the face of a powerful army, by order and at the suggestion of Jeff Davis, and was using his cannon as “feelers.” O, God! Ye gods! I get sick at heart even at this late day when I think of it.6

  I remember the morning that General Wheeler's cavalry filed by our brigade, and of their telling us, “Good-bye, boys, good-bye, boys.” The First Tennessee Cavalry and Ninth Battalion were both made up in Maury county. I saw John J. Stephenson, my friend and step-brother, and David F. Watkins my own dear brother, and Arch Lipscomb, Joe Fussell, Captain Kinzer, Jack Gordon, George Martin, Major Dobbins, Colonel Lewis, Captain Galloway, Aaron and Sims Latta, Major J. H. Akin, S. H. Armstrong, Albert Dobbins, Alex Dobbins, Jim Cochran, Rafe Grisham, Captain Jim Polk, and many others with whom I was acquainted. They all said, “Good-bye, Sam, good-bye, Sam.” I cried.