Chapter One: Glory Is Out of Date
The atmosphere of army dances during the winter of 1864 is well described in
A Woman's War Record,
1861-
1865,
by Septima
M.
Collis, pp. 34-36. The II Corps ball is depicted in
History of the 106th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers,
by Joseph R. C. Ward, p. 193, and in
The Diary of a Young Officer,
by Josiah
M.
Favill, pp. 277-80, and the corps" battle casualties are listed in Francis Walker's
History of the Second Army Corps,
p. 397. There are references to the ball and to the entertainment of the women guests, in
South After Gettysburg: Letters of Cornelia Hancock from the Army of the Potomac,
edited by Henrietta Stratton Jaquette, p. 53, and in
The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade,
by Captain George Meade, Vol. II, p. 167.
Meade's Headquarters, 1863-1865: Letters of Col Theodore Lyman from the Wilderness to Appomattox,
selected and edited by George R. Agassiz, p. 73.
Under the Old Flag,
by James Harrison Wilson, Vol. I, pp. 369-73;
Meade's Headquarters,
p. 75.
Civil War Echoes: Character Sketches and State Secrets,
by Hamilton Gay Howard, p. 214.
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 170-72;
Kilpatrick and Our Cavalry,
by James Moore, p. 143.
Correspondence regarding the Butler fiasco, culminating in a tart interchange between Sedgwick and Halleck during the post-mortem phase, is in the
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 338, 502, 506-7, 512, 514-15, 519, 530, 532, 552
f.
The business is summarized in William Swinton's
Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac,
pp. 398-99.
7
Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren,
by Rear Admiral John A. D.
Dahlgren, pp. 1-66, 92-116;
The Rebel Raider: a Life of John Hunt Morgan,
by Howard Swiggett, p. 208.
Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren,
pp. 159-62, 169, 185 204-11.
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
by H. P. Moyer, p. 233;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 170, 172-74.
Kilpatrick's report,
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 183;
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
p. 234.
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
p. 235.
Personal and Historical Sketches and Facial History of and by Members of the 7th Regiment Michigan Volunteer Cavalry,
compiled by William O. Lee, pp. 28, 198; report of Captain Joseph Gloskoski, 29th New York Infantry, a signal officer attached to Kilpatrick's column,
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 189;
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
pp. 235-36.
Personal and Historical Sketches . . . 7th Regiment Michigan Volunteer Cavalry,
p. 29;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 184-85, 192.
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
pp. 242-44;
Personal and Historical Sketches . . . 7th Regiment Michigan Volunteer Cavalry,
pp. 30-31;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 193.
The Rebel Raider,
p. 208.
Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac,
p. 400; Memoir
of Ulric Dahlgren,
p. 214;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 195.
The best account of this period of the expedition is perhaps that of Captain John F. B. Mitchell, 2nd New York Cavalry, in the
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 195-96.
Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren,
pp. 219-22; report of Lieutenant James Pollard, 9th Virginia Cavalry,
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 208;
The Rebellion Record,
edited by Frank Moore, Vol. VIII, Part 2, p. 589.
19. There is a thoughtful analysis of the treatment ac-
corded Dahlgren's body and effects in Swiggett's excellent
The Rebel Raider,
pp. 208-11. The photographic copies of the Dahlgren papers, forwarded by Lee to Meade, are now in the National Archives in
Union Battle Reports,
Series 729 of the Records of the Adjutant General's Office, Record Group 94. They are faded and are very nearly illegible, but it is fairly easy to see that the signature is misspelled—"Dalhgren" for "Dahlgren"—which would hardly be the case if it were genuine. The affair is discussed indignantly in
Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren,
pp. 225-35. The Bragg-Seddon-Lee correspondence is in the
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 217-18, 222-23.
The Rebellion Record,
Vol. VIII, Part 2, pp. 572, 574, 581, 591-92;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, pp. 178, 180.
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
p. 257.
turkey at a shooting match
Army Life in a Black Regiment,
by Thomas Wentworth Higginson, p. 310.
Reminiscences and Record of the 6th New York Veteran Volunteer Cavalry,
by Alonzo Foster, pp. 102-04.
An interesting account of the adventures of Custer's men, and of the behavior of the contrabands who followed them, appears in
Annals of the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry,
by the Rev. S. L. Gracey, pp. 228-29.
History of the 17th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry,
pp. 245-46.
Ibid.,
pp. 247, 251-52. The reference to the chalk line in the row of black faces is borrowed from this account.
Journal History of the 29th Ohio Veteran Volunteers,
by J. Hamp Se Cheverell, p. 21.
The Road to Richmond,
by Major Abner R. Small, p. 193. For an interesting depiction of a typical Army of the Potomac veteran early in 1864, see
Three Years in the Army: the Story of the 13th Massachusetts Volunteers,
by Charles E. Davis, Jr., p. 262.
An excellent analysis of the way the draft and bounty laws worked occurs in
Lincoln and the War Governors,
by William B. Hesseltine, pp. 290
ft.
This writer points out that the draft actually brought in few new men; its chief effect was to compel the state governors to raise troops. See also the report of James B. Fry, provost marshal general,
Official Records,
Series III, Vol. V, pp. 599
ff.
History of the 12th Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers,
by Captain A. W. Bartlett, pp. 152-53.
Official Records,
Series III, Vol. V, p. 831;
Three Years in the Army,
pp. 131, 264. The report of Thomas A. Mc-Parlin, medical director of the Army of the Potomac
(Official Records,
Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 213#.), gives a horrifying account of the defective human material which came to camp in the
winter of 1863-64.
Three Years in the Army,
p. 270.
History of the 12th Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers,
p. 155.
History of the 2nd Connecticut Volunteer Heavy Artillery,
by Theodore F. Vaill, p. 45.
Three Years in the Army,
p. 302. The gambling and fighting are described by Stephen F. Blanding in
In the Defenses of Washington; or, the Sunshine in a Soldiers Life,
pp. 8-10.
The History of the 39th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Veteran Infantry,
by Charles
M.
Clark, M.D., pp. 240-42.
There is a detailed and rather dreadful account of life on this island camp in
Henry Wilsons Regiment: History of the 22nd Massachusetts Infantry,
by John L. Parker and Robert G. Carter, pp. 359-60, 362-70.
A
Little Fifers War Diary,
by C. W. Bardeen, pp. 261-62;
History of Durrell’
s Battery in the Civil War,
by Lieutenant Charles A. Cuffel, p. 167;
History of the 12th Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers,
pp. 156-57.
The reader who wants an extended account of one of these sea voyages is referred to Frank Wilkeson's
Recollections of a Private Soldier in the Army of the Potomac,
pp. 14—19—one of the most graphic and least romanticized of all
the Civil War reminiscences, with a tone of bitter disillusionment which sounds almost as if it had come out of World War II.
Ibid.,
pp. 1-14, 20. For the way the bounty men vanished on the way to camp, see
The Story of the 15th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry,
by Andrew E. Ford, p. 290.
Four Years Campaigning in the Army of the Potomac,
by D. G. Crotty, p. 141.
Musket and Sword,
by Edwin C. Bennett, p. 200;
The Irish Brigade and Its Campaigns,
by Captain D. P. Conyng-ham, pp. 425-38. The writer of
History of Durrell’
s Battery in the Civil War
remarks (p. 168) that the 79th New York was the only IX Corps regiment which failed to re-enlist that winter. All regiments which re-enlisted were re-enforced by drafts of new recruits. See also the pamphlet,
Report of Committee to Recruit the Ninth Army Corps,
printed in New York in 1866.
Official Records,
Series III, Vol. V, pp. 600, 669. In the summer of 1864 U. S. Grant wrote to Secretary of State Seward that not one in eight of the high-bounty men ever performed good service at the front.
(Official Records,
Series II, Vol. VII, p. 614.)
History of the 7th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry,
compiled by Stephen Walkley, p. 150.
Recollections of a Private Soldier,
pp. 32-34.
Four Years Campaigning in the Army of the Potomac,
pp. 117-18;
My Diary of Rambles with the 25th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry,
by D. L. Day, p. 110;
Three Years in the Army,
pp. 302-3.
History of the 5th Regiment Maine Volunteers,
by the Rev. George W. Bicknell, p. 296. The manuscript letters of Edwin Wentworth of the 37th Massachusetts, made available through the kindness of Miss Edith Adams of Auburn, Maine, show how the high-bounty system could affect a veterans decision. Early in the winter, Private Wentworth was writing to his wife that he would not re-enlist: "There are plenty of men at home, better able to bear arms than I am, and I am willing they should take their chance on the battlefield and have their share of glory and honor." Later, however, he reflected that with the bounty he could buy a home and some land—'it will enable me to provide you a good home and a chance to live comfortably." In the end, Private Wentworth re-enlisted, and was killed at Spotsylvania Court House.
A Brief History of the 100th Regiment,
by Samuel P. Bates, p. 21;
Service with the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers,
by Rufus R. Dawes, p. 235;
Official Records,
Vol. XXXIII, p. 776.
Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment,
by Captain John G. B. Adams, pp. 79, 89.
Music on the March, 1862-65,
by Frank Rauscher, pp. 122, 141, 145, 151;
History of the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry,
compiled by the Regimental History Association, pp. 409-11.
Campaigning with Grant,
by General Horace Porter, pp. 15, 22, 28.
3.
Ibid.,
p. 30.
For various glimpses of Grant, see
Captain Sam Grant,
by Lloyd Lewis, pp. 99-100;
Campaigning with Grant,
pp.
45,
56;
Army Life: a Private's Reminiscences of the Civil War,
by the Rev. Theodore Gerrish, p. 324;
A War Diary of Events in the War of the Great Rebellion,
by Brigadier General George H. Gordon, p. 351;
Three Years in the Army,
p. 315;
Following the Greek Cross; or, Memories of the Sixth Army Corps,
by Brigadier General Thomas W. Hyde, p. 181.
Meade's Headquarters,
p. 81;
Correspondence of John Sedgwick, Major General,
Vol. II, pp. 177-78.
For soldiers' comments on Grant, see
Down in Dixie: Life in a Cavalry Regiment in the War Days,
by Stanton P. Allen, pp. 187-88;
Four Years in the Army of the Potomac: a Soldiers Recollections,
by Major Evan Rowland Jones, pp. 128-29;
The Road to Richmond,
p. 130.
Campaigning with Grant,
pp. 46-47; an incident described to General Porter after the war by Longstreet himself.
8.
Congressional doubts in regard to Grant's drinking, and
the reliance placed on Rawlins, are touched on by General James H. Wilson, who was fairly intimate with both Grant and Rawlins, in
Under the Old Flag,
Vol. I, pp. 345-46. Dana's comment is cited in
Abraham Lincoln: the War Years,
by Carl Sandburg, Vol. II, p. 542. The whole question of the extent to which alcohol was a problem to Grant is carefully examined in Lewis's fine book,
Captain Sam Grant.
(His conclusion: that it wasn't nearly as big a problem as some people have assumed.)