Personal Recollections of Sherman's Campaigns in Georgia and the Carolinas

by George W Pepper

  He was wounded by a Minnie ball through the left arm, just above the elbow, and, though faint from the loss of blood, until the body of the General was safely cared for, he never gave a moment's thought to himself: During all this the battle raged fearfully. The fierce Logan assumed command, and sounded the battle-cry: "McPherson and revenge." That night the enemy's dead summed up nearly four thousand, while ours was less than one-fifth of that number. Such was the revenge of McPherson's enraged soldiers. Reynolds, as soon as sufficiently strong to undergo the excitement, was presented, in the presence of his regiment, under arms, with the "Medal of Honor," instituted by McPherson for the heroes of the Seventeenth Corps. This act of devotion, which we have just narrated, not only secured to the country the remains of one of its best Generals, but has linked with the name of Major General McPherson the name of Private George Reynolds.

  CHAPTER XI.

  Rapid Movements of the Enemy — The Exertions of both Armies — Sherman Arranges his Army — The Enemy divine his intentions and give Battle — The Decisive Moment Approaches — The Rebels Attack Energetically — Progress of the Fight — Logan's Corps is Victorious — The Rebels Retreat — The Miseries of War — Hospital Scenes — What a Chaplain saw — The Battle-field Hospital

  The entire army had made a movement en echelon from left to right, by which the line was prolonged due South-east, facing East. General Howard, who had now succeeded the lamented McPherson in command of the Army of the Tennessee, defended the right, the Army of the Cumberland, General Thomas, holding the centre, and the Twenty-Third Corps was on the left. To protect Howard's column from any sudden dash of the enemy, Jefferson C. Davis' Division, of the Fourteenth Corps, was ordered to a position so as to aid Howard, if necessary. Davis' Division, by some mishap, not knowing the roads, probably, failed to report, and the Fifteenth Corps, unaided and alone, fought one of the most desperate and sanguinary battles of the war.

  The enemy, divining Sherman's intentions, massed his troops, on the 28th of July, and swung round on the Macon railroad.

  The 27th of July had been excessively hot. The march of the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps, from the extreme left to the extreme right, a distance of several miles, followed by one of the severest actions on record, had sorely tried the patience of our brave soldiers. Toward the evening of the 27th, however, a violent thunder storm mitigated the sultriness, but flooding the earth, converted the roads into mire.

  Gratefully, then, the troops hailed the hour which found them en bivouac in the fields around Ezra Chapel and near Atlanta. Poor fellows, they were not destined to enjoy uninterrupted and refreshing repose, for the rain fell in torrents during the night, and frequent thunder-claps startled them from their slumbers. There was little to cheer and inspire the troops, as day broke on the morning of the memorable 28th of July. The rain had literally poured down, and the field offered but scanty cover. The men could hardly keep their bivrouacs alight.

  Like sacrifices, they

  "Sat patiently, and only ruminated

  The morning's danger! and their gesture sad,

  Investing lank, lean cheeks, and war-worn coats,

  Presented them unto the gazing morn,

  So many horrid ghosts!"

  Gloom did not long pervade the ranks of Howard's troops. The trumpet, the drum, the bugle, sounded an early reveille, and immediately the whole camp of the Fifteenth Corps was in motion. Soldiers brightening up their guns, aids and staff officers galloping from headquarters, announcing to subordinate commanders the position to be assumed by the respective brigades. The field where the battle occurred was very irregular, and extended from three to four miles from left to right. Logan's Corps occupied a range of undulations; Howard was busily engaged in arranging his troops in

  "Battle's magnificently stern array,"

  And then rode along the ranks, escorted by a brilliant staff, in order to inspire his men for the contest. The bearing and skill of Howard, in this terribly contested battle, was worthy of the most glowing praise. He was everywhere throughout the action, and constantly under fire. He handled his troops splendidly.

  At about twelve o'clock, the signal for the fight was given. Hardee's, Stewart's and Lee's Corps made a sudden and vigorous assault on Logan's Corps. Heavy and murderous volleys were hurled into our lines, but the boys in blue waver not. The rebels had massed in a dense piece of woods, and dashed in great force upon Logan. On, on came the rebels, in splendid style, their artillery tearing up the ridges, but the gallant Fifteenth remain rooted in its position. Now they move out in majestic order, under the personal guidance of Logan. They are within a hundred yards of the enemy's line, pouring into their ranks an iron hail storm. The danger is imminent. Showers of balls saluted the rebels as they energetically pushed forward to the attack. The enemy seemed to grow, like Hydra's heads, for, ever as they were repulsed, they returned reinforced, to sweep our braves from the field. But Logan's gallant veterans held their position. They yielded not an inch of ground. After a breathing spell, the combatants renewed the fiery contest. A frightful cannonade opposed the advance of the daring and impetuous chivalry of the Army of the Tennessee. They bravely faced the hedge of bayonets, bristling from the guns of the proud and haughty foe.

  For four dreadful hours the Fifteenth Corps nobly held the enemy at bay, and notwithstanding the frightful shower of shot and shell that plunged about them in every direction, the boldness and intrepidity of Logan's soldiery, and the firmness and dashing heroism of the gifted leader, deterred the rebels from advancing. The quick perception of Howard dictated a tremendous attack upon the whole of the rebel line. This attack is extended to the Fifteenth Corps, the victors of Vicksburg, the reapers of military honors on a score of battle-fields. Logan forms his Corps into two columns, hastily arranging the gallant fragments of the divisions which had survived the murderous combat of the 22d of July. The boys moved steadily forward, in the face of a surging fire of artillery and musketry. The rebel line reels and wavers. The first rebel column is defeated—the second advanced to the rescue. Logan's heroes, who had shown their metal at Resaca, pour upon the stubborn rebels with determined force. "Remember McPherson and revenge!" exclaimed the exalted chief,— "let the whole line advance," The command is obeyed with enthusiastic shouts.

  The gallant Osterhaus headed his splendid division, and fought where the battle raged the hottest. The other general officers, with the members of their staff, minded with the soldiers on foot, and cheered them on in the bloody carnage. It is said a thousand rebels were hurried into eternity, by this single charge. The rebels fought with their accustomed gallantry, but human beings could not longer withstand the fierce and overpowering onslaught of our men, and finally their lines gave way at all points, and the whole force were in full retreat. In vain the daring Cleburne, who had led the rebel advance, urges it to rally and resist— in vain Hardee and Stewart launch their shattered, troops upon our impregnable and conquering Fifteenth Corps. Humbled by the fierce impetuosity of our gallant men, not a single rebel remained on the field. They had lost the clay. Hardee was quick to see that his cause, was hopeless. The flower of his troops are panic-stricken — they abandon their arms and hasten to our ranks, begging for mercy.

  Logan and Howard had several narrow escapes; the soldiers saluted them at the close of the battle with enthusiastic rejoicing.

  Our loss was about six hundred, and the rebel's five thousand. The sad scenes of the wounded and dying make impressions on the mind that will never be forgotten. Here is a poor rebel with both legs off below, the knee, waving a small sprig to drive off the flies. Here is one with his nose and face shot off, moaning dreadfully. Here is a poor fellow, minus an arm. Among our wounded soldiers there are no angry words, not a word of complaint escaped their lips. They were resigned to their fate, bearing with sublime composure, their terrible wounds. One poor fellow snatched from, his bosom a picture, exclaiming: "This is a glorious cause, and would be a glorious death, were it not for the thought of w
ife and children.” If women can bear severe wounds, sickness and anguish, more patiently than did these victims of that battle, they must largely "be compounded of angel and divinity. Worthy of a Nation's gratitude and tears, were the services of the brave men of the Army of the Tennessee, who fell and made no sign, on the 28th of July; their names and deeds ought to be perpetuated in shafts of spotless marble, with the inscription, "To the unrecorded and unrecognized brave."

  The miseries of a battle-field are those which cannot be exaggerated The lives of thousands, rich in all that makes life precious to the brave, who, if they perish, perish not alone, but in their fate, break the far-spreading tendrils that they had formed, and leave them nurture less. Shoddy contractors and those belligerents who are invincible in peace, but invisible in war, are unable to form anything like a just notion of the horrors of war. And if, as a counter-poise to all these miseries, we are asked to look at the bright side of the picture, and to contemplate the splendor of military glory, and the joy of victory — to listen to the shouts of triumph, and the acclamations with which a grateful people welcome the returning conquerors to their homes — I would refer to the tears of widows and orphans, the groans of dying warriors, the murmurs of ruined citizens. That was a sweet and solemn truth uttered by Wellington, that "next to a defeat, the most dreadful of all calamities was a great victory."

  What an awful scene is a battle-field? Thousands of men are engaged in the deadly strife of arms, and are hurrying each other, in murderous conflict, into the other world. Here there is no time for preparation; the bed of death is not smoothed by the tender assiduities of affection, and the sublime consolations of religion. There is no wife or sisters to minister, to relieve, to console. I forbear from describing the suffering of the wounded; in many cases noble fellows, they are spared from immediate death only for a prolonged period of pain and misery— their limbs shattered, their frames debilitated, their power of active usefulness destroyed. Then the shrieks of the dying.

  No wife at hand to bind up the bleeding wound; no friend to close the dying eye; no mourner to perform the last duties to the departed; no parent to gather up the remains of the little ones. For the moment, victory has lost its charms — the wife is a widow — the children are orphans— parents are childless. Yet such must be.

  HOSPITAL SCENES AT VINING's.

  The hospital and yard about it presented a spectacle which — how can I describe it? Stretchers, dripping with blood, stand in the pathway. Here comes four men, bringing on a blanket, a pale, bleeding form; in the grass lies a Lieutenant, with a great wound in his thigh, from a grape-shot, from which his life is ebbing; close by him, a man with a rifle ball in his back, and nearby, another with a ball through his shoulders; the grass plots are covered with just such scenes, and off in the corner of the yard is a blanket spread out, revealing the outline of a human form; we need not lift the covering, for we know instinctively that it hides a corpse.

  On the grass are those whose wounds either do not need or do not encourage an immediate operation. Within doors are the surgeons. The floor and the tables are covered with blood. In a corner lies an arm; on the floor two surgeons are amputating the arm of a corporal, who is mercifully insensible from chloroform. In the next room is a man of stalwart form and noble stature. His right hand is shot through by a rifle ball, and the bones are protruding. His coat is drenched with blood. His right shoulder is torn to pieces by a grape-shot. By an almost superhuman effort he rises to his feet, with the help of others, and leaning on a fellow soldier, staggers toward the ambulance. In the out buildings are other just such scenes. I have heard of the horrors of the battle field; but they are nothing to the horrors of the hospital. The glare and excitement are absent, the wickedness of war is revealed.

  I have said above that we were camped on the battle field. I have seen all there is to be seen about it.

  Sometimes I think I have seen too intensely. Sleeping or waking, its pools of blood, its ghastly forms, its staring eyes, its heaps of dead, are before my mind. Its groans and horrid cries, and howling shells, smite ever on my ears.

  Here in these woods where Logan's Corps was first engaged, there is not a rock or tree, or log, or leaf, but shows the desperate strife. One section of woods is literally cut off, torn down, scattered. Acres of this forest is topped by canister and grape-shot and shell almost as completely as our farmers top their cornfields with a sickle. At the corner of the cornfield where the Corps was engaged, there is a piece of oak rail fence, and part of a stone wall. In one-length of that fence behind which the rebels were concealed, I count one hundred bullet holes. And along that field, and within the distance of eighty rods, we count sixteen hundred dead rebels, most of them lying on their backs, eyes open, faces black, hands folded on their breasts. Here lies one upon his side, eyes closed, feet slightly drawn up, his head resting easily upon his knapsack. He looks a weary soldier, sound asleep. I speak to him, he stirs not; put my hand upon him, he will not wake. Dead. Here is a soldier, a rebel Captain, sitting against this tree. His limbs were crossed, and his cap hangs naturally upon his knee. Onehand, in the breast of his coat, the other hangs by his side. Dead. Here, leaning against this wall, is a rebel soldier with his leg broken below the knee, and a Union surgeon lying dead across his feet. They are both dead. The surgeon was evidently dressing his wound when he received his death shot, for there is the bandage wound twice around the limb, the other end of which is still in the dead surgeon's hand. The rebel soldier evidently bled to death.

  Here is the great burying-ground. Buried in the long trenches, patriots by themselves, rebels by themselves. At the head of every trench a rough slab, or stick, or stone is erected, on which is written the number in the trench, and the army to which they belong.

  Most of the Union dead are buried decently. The trench is dug six feet broad, and most of them four feet deep. Our dead are then brought to the edge of the trench, and placed in, one by one, shoulder to shoulder. The earth is thrown upon them, and the work is done. Sometimes the slab at the head of the trench gives many of the names of the dead. Dear mourning parents, stricken, heart-broken wives, I would not have these words encourage you to think that by coming to this, or any battle-field, you can find your dead. For of all the many hundred who have, for this purpose, visited this graveyard, but few have found their dear ones. Most have returned disappointed, with a new sorrow added to their limitless woe.

  I have walked long weary hours with an aged mother, searching for her boy. We very probably stood at sometime, above his moldering dust. No voice was heard from the grave. No dust, responsive to a mother's presence, settled at our approach. Even a mother's boundless love did not declare his resting place. Poor, sorrowing mother! God pity thee, and teach thee how to wait. Without murmuring, trust Heaven, and the glory of the coming revelation shall be sufficient.

  The manner in which the rebels bury their dead, proclaims the barbarism of their character. They are but half buried—buried in heaps—unburied. In that trench I count —four days after the battle—ten feet, four arms, and six heads, already above the earth in full sight. In some cases the whole body lies exposed. Beasts and buzzards are preying on them, and noisome worms creep and crawl about them. We wrote them down soulless, and without natural respect for their dead, or too lazy to throw a handful of earth upon their remains. Either, a barbarism.

  Finally, in this connection, the things I see are not to be compared with the things which are not seen. The day of retribution, the angel of the resurrection, the great congregation, the throne, and Him that sits upon it, the open book, the final judgment, the sea of fire, sounding lashes and dragging chains; those who inaugurated this rebellion on the left, those who put it down, on the right.

  HOW I FEEL AND WHAT I THINK ABOUT IT.

  Any man who for a long year has been an inhabitant, an eye-witness of this war, finds himself possessed of feelings that no language can portray — new and strange class of emotions, never defined in the books. How I fe
el! I feel every way, anyway, a thousand ways in as many hours. Most of the time I feel as you might imagine one to feel if the sun were blotted out of Heaven—the whole earth transformed into one dark iron mountain, and he, the one, lone, solitary man, standing on the top, wearily looking off into the sunless, moonless, starless blackness, hopeless, faithless, despairing. These sensations come upon me when I see man in the conduct of this war, and man only. Man planning these battles, man fighting them. Commanding as if he were power; acting as if place, honor, glory, gold, were all; and right and wrong, life, death, freedom or slavery, nothing! Then am I hopeless, faithless, despairing. Again, I feel as if from some, high point of vision, I see a world of holiness, shining. In glory; a world smiling beneath the love of Heaven, stamped with the intensity of peace. Then I see God, in the conduct of this war. God planning, God fighting these battles, worldly honor, glory, gold, are dross; freedom and slavery, life and death, right and wrong, all. Then I am neither hopeless, faithless, nor despairing.