Morris Island is but a strip of white sand on the Atlantic Ocean, at the mouth of Charleston Harbor. It runs north and south nearly, and is about four miles long. Its broad southerly end lying well out of the range of the enemy's fire, served as a camp-ground for troops not actively engaged in the siege and for headquarter and depot purposes. Narrowing as it approaches Sumter, till Fort Wagner completely barred all further progress at fairly high water, the island ends in a hooked projection known as Cummings' Point. It was on this point that Beauregard built Battery Gregg as long ago as when Sumter was forlornly garrisoned by Major Anderson.
From Cummings' Point it is but 1300 yards to Sumter, due northwest, and but four miles to Charleston City, looking about directly west across the bay, and is but about a mile and a half across to the batteries on Sullivan's Island, where Moultrie and its batteries lay beyond Sumter and to its east Sullivan's Island running about east for a short distance and then bearing rapidly towards the northeast, the north end of Morris pointing to about the western end of Sullivan's. To the west of the upper part of Morris Island, across a marshy tideway, through which flows Vincent Creek, James Island points a blunt end to Morris, the length of James forming the southern boundary line of Charleston Harbor. Outside of James, on the Atlantic, and separated from James by the Stono River, lies Folly Island, with Black Island wedged in between Folly, James and Morris.
When we reached Morris Island the tragedy of the siege was over, the whole of the island was in Union possession, and Wagner and Gregg were being rebuilt from the wreck occasioned by the terrible bombardment they had undergone, were being turned and armed to operate on the enemy's batteries on James and Sullivan's Islands, Sumter standing no longer as the chief, though still as an important factor in the problem of getting into Charleston, it having been battered from its aggressive symmetry into a silent, crumbling ruin. But from something like sentimental reasons it was still considered the central point of offense and defense, the rebel flag still flying defiantly over its ruined bastions, the garrison burrowing in bomb proofs that every shrieking shell of ours but added to the strength of, crumbling and tumbling the broken stone work in yet deeper depths above them. From these burrows they watched for night sallies from shore and fleet, and by the aid of the enfilading fire of the guns of James and Sullivan's Islands, succeeded in beating all off that were made upon them.
As the fatigue parties worked with shovel and spade in the sand of Fort Wagner and of Battery Gregg, the lookouts on the parapets would see a round cloud of white smoke fly into the air, from James Island perhaps. Then, with a cry of "James Island," they would leap from the parapets to cover, while the busy shovelers would scatter for shelter, instinctively taking cover under the sand walls next James Island till the projectile, shot or shell, from gun or mortar, had exploded and the fragments had buried themselves deep in the sand. Or, the cry might be "Sullivan," then the cover was sought for under the sand walls next that island. As soon as the danger was over, all rushed back to their work again. But sometimes this enfilading fire would become so vigorous a one as to force the men to quit work for a time and take shelter in the great bomb proofs and magazines, built of squared logs, banked and heaped with such depths of sand that even the fifteen-inch shells of the ironclads has failed to make any impression on them during their bombardment. All this time our own batteries on Morris Island were keeping up a steady fire upon Sumter and the other rebel fortifications, the fleet taking advantage of good weather to leave their stations outside the rebel line of fire to steam in and join in the roaring chorus.
Our regiment was encamped in the shelter of some sand hills about halfway down the island. From this camp details of men for fatigue duty were sent to the upper part of the island to take part in the fortification building going on there, D men with the rest. But in a short time a number of D were detailed to serve as artillerymen in Battery Chatfield, a work on Cummings' Point, and so many of D were in this detail that it may be said that the Company was on artillery service in the mortar battery of Chatfield, where, under Lieutenant Sellmer's practical tuition, they soon became able heavy artillerymen. The men of C, E, G and K, who had served with Lieutenant Sellmer in the Swamp Angel Battery, were in this detail also.
Our battery work was mainly directed against ruined Sumter. Day after day we trained the mortars on that crumbling fortress, sending their ten-inch shells high in the air to drop into Sumter and burst there. After a shot was fired it was watched by Lieutenant Sellmer through glasses, and its effect noted, whether it fell into the fort or outside of it, whether it burst in the air or after striking its objective point, the men at work in the magazine filling the flannel bags each charge of powder weighed out was enclosed in, receiving orders to put in more or less powder as the Lieutenant noted the effects of the shots, and those cutting the fuses receiving their orders to cut them shorter or longer from the same observations. As Lieutenant Sellmer observed the effects of the shots, Lieutenant Charles H. Foster of Company K, detailed to assist Lieutenant Sellmer, as he had in the Swamp Angel Battery, would note on a prepared form the results given him by Lieutenant Sellmer, so keeping a tabulated statement of each day's work during its progress, the number of shots fired and their individual results.
Sometimes these results were plain to all of us. A shot would fall into the fort and a whirl of flying fragments of stone or a leaping barbette caisson would tell us just where it had struck, and just what its effect was, and a few times we succeeded in our unceasing endeavor to bowl the rebel flag down. But to the credit of the garrison of Sumter, it must be said, that no sooner was it down than some brave fellow would mount to the parapet and set it flying again.
There is rarely any great loss of life through artillery firing. While the singing of minie balls has an ominous sound in the ears of the most hardened veteran, the roar of a battery, except at close quarters, when throwing grape and canister, is not very alarming to him. Why, at the great artillery duel of White Oak Swamp, in June, 1862, our loss, except in artillerymen, was slight, and the artillerymen killed and wounded were mostly picked off by the rebel sharpshooters, while General "Dick" Taylor, who commanded the Confederate troops immediately across the bridge, says that severe as was our fire, their loss from shells was but a small one. So, in all the wild uproar at the siege of Charleston, our loss from flying shells was ridiculously small, viewed from the standpoint of infantry engagements, the careful watch the outlooks kept from the parapets, the facility for shelter, and the promptness of the men in getting into safe places, saving many lives and limbs. But there were several narrow escapes, and some curious ones too. How shall we account for that of Lieutenant Foster, who after remaining comfortably seated for hours upon an empty ammunition box on the parapet of Chatfield, entirely ignoring the fast coming shots of the enemy, suddenly rose and stepped off the parapet, and just as he stepped off it, the box he had been seated on went into the air, struck by a piece of shell! And that of Private Darling, who, working at a mortar, suddenly stepped backwards just in time to save himself from being cut in two by the whistling copper bottom of a Brooks' rifle shell that went flying right across the spot he had just stood on. But it was not all so bloodless. One day, the 8th of December, a mortar shell struck the magazine of Chatfield in its weakest spot, and went crashing into it. For a moment we outside the magazine were panic stricken, expecting the immediate bursting of the shell and the blowing up of the magazine, in which we had many barrels of powder stored. But fortunately the shell was so surrounded with the tons of sand that poured into the magazine with it, that its bursting flame was completely smothered and did not touch a grain of our powder. We hastened to dig our buried men out, and found Corporal Albee, of C, killed by a piece of the shell, Private Kimball, of E, mortally wounded, and Sergeant Howard, of K, Corporal Bearce and Privates Maddox and Bragdon, of D, more or less severely injured.
We worked at our batteries during the day only, as a rule, returning to the regimental camp each night, leaving the batteries to be defended from any attempt of the enemy to occupy them by the heavy and light guns of direct fire, and by the infantry force that was marched up the island each night and ensconced in the bomb proofs of Wagner and Gregg. But such an attack never came, the Confederates contenting themselves with long range demonstrations, though frequently indulging in a heavy night shelling of our works, as if to cover a landing.
At these times the air would be full of artillery pyrotechnics, the flaring of bursting shells, and the sparkling arcs of mortar shells with their flaming fuses, described by an old writer as appearing in the night to be "fiery meteors with flaming tails, most beautifully brilliant." A fine exhibition for those out of range.
In December, reenlistments began from among the original men of the regiment, though they had a year yet to serve, proving to us that the government had settled down into the conviction that the war was far from being near its end. Many of D put their names on the reenlistment roll.
Later on, the 23d of January, 1864, D, with B, entered Fort Wagner as part of its garrison. It was really a sort of going into winter quarters—without the winter—for you could lie out of doors, under one blanket, in the nights of December and January, and sleep as comfortably as a soldier need to.
The siege of Charleston was really abandoned by now, and the troops that had been engaged in it were only held in hand until the time should come for them to go to Virginia to engage in graver operations.
Though regularly trained to use the thirty-two and the one-hundred pound Parrot guns Wagner was mainly armed with, we did not fire them often now except for range practice, or to send a shell now and then shrieking into Charleston. We usually aimed at the tall white steeple of St. Michael's Church, the most prominent object in the foreground of the city, and a most useful one to the Confederates, for a bright light kept burning at night from this steeple served as a guide to blockade runners. Getting the light within a certain range of one on Sumter and they could keep the channel and glide safely into the harbor. Not always, though. Early one foggy morning, that of February 2d, just after daybreak, a sentry called the attention of the sergeant of the guard to a patch of harder color in the soft atmospheric gray of the fog bank that lay between us and Sullivan's Island. A hasty inspection and a sudden lift of the fog showed us that there was a blockade runner fast ashore under Moultrie.
The alarm was quickly given, and in a few minutes a hundred-pound shell was whirling through the fog at the grounded blockade runner, the powerful impact of the shell serving to lift the fog enough to show us the lead colored vessel, with hundreds of men swarming in and out of it, engaged in a desperate attempt to unload freight before the Yankees should discover her presence. There was a wild scattering at the sound of the coming shell, the runner was left to serve us as a target, and we sent shell after shell into her until she was but a wreck.
Our Confederate friends would still favor us with a serenade of shot and shell in spite of our peaceful demeanor. And once or twice they did this so vigorously as to cause the commanding general to think they were really on the point of attacking us with infantry. Beauregard says that he made one of these night bombardments to give our commander just that idea to cover his own withdrawal of troops to Florida to General Finegan, about the time the battle of Olustee was fought in that state. Regiments of our troops would then come to Wagner to stand at the parapets all night, while we artillerymen worked the guns to keep down the enemy's fire. It was in one of these bombardments, that of Christmas night, that Private Laffin, of D, was so badly wounded, a piece of shell striking the bayonets of some stacked rifles, one of the pieces of shattered steel penetrating a leg.
This night our gunners paid particular attention to Charleston, I remember, throwing shells into that city until a large fire broke out in it, and then throwing shells at the glare of the fire. The men fighting the fire in the city, largely colored non-combatants probably, would succeed in getting the flames somewhat under control. We could see them lower and lessen, then they would suddenly flare up bright and red again, telling us that the screech of one of our going shells had driven the fire fighters to cover.
A "cruel war" it was, especially to non-combatants that circumstances of situation or greed placed in dangerous positions. Just think of the terror the enterprising sutler must have been in who had pitched a big tent outside of Fort Wagner that none of our boys having money need go without such delicacies as pickled pig's feet, canned condensed milk, ginger cakes, strong butter and slabby skim milk cheese, just think of the terror he must have been in when he would leave all these precious goods to destruction for the sake of his unexpectedly endangered person.
For a few days after his arrival he did a thriving business, then came one of the nights of heavy bombardment from James and Sullivan islands. In the morning the tent was still on the beach, but with certain suggestive looking holes in it. An investigation showed a medley of goods shattered and piled into a chaotic mass by invading shells, but the sutler was not to be found. He did not appear to us again, but it was said that he evacuated his bed and fled to the lower extremity of the island, as the first shell broke unceremoniously in upon his private apartment. That afternoon men came with an army wagon and carried away what Lieutenant Nel Norris would call the "debris" of boxes and barrels with what little remained of the stock of goods. That there was little besides shattered boxes and barrels to cart away, may be somewhat due to the fact that the men of D and B had been busily engaged during the forenoon in buying goods in the absence of their frightened owner.
At last the time came for leaving Morris Island. The reenlisted men had gone away on their veteran furlough, and finally D and B rejoined the regiment, which had been camping on Black Island since early in February. The Eleventh proceeded to Hilton Head, from where it sailed away with other troops the 21st day of April for a point on the York River, Virginia, from where our fleet had sailed a little more than a year before for the purpose of capturing Charleston. That the attempt had been a failure is to be attributed largely perhaps to the route of approach chosen. Beauregard says that there were three routes of attack from the sea, and that Morris Island was the worst of the three. He says that had we effected a lodgment on James Island instead, and have overcome the garrison there, as we did that of Morris Island, we had but to erect batteries within such easy distance of Charleston as to make it untenable, and as we would also be in the rear of their outer line of defense, they would have been obliged to evacuate Sumter, Moultrie and Wagner, and give up the city. That a similarly successful descent upon Sullivan's Island would have given the control of the inner harbor to the fire of our ironclads, with a similar result. But that when we had Morris Island, our occupation of it neither involved the evacuation of Sumter and the other forts, the destruction of the city by a direct fire, nor the control of Confederate movements in the inner harbor by the ironclad fleet. Be this as it may, beyond the destruction of Sumter, and the taking of Wagner, little had been accomplished, and we left Charleston and its defenses much as we had found them, the fleet riding outside the bar, the rebel flags still flying over Sumter, Sullivan's and James, Charleston still in the distance, now as exultantly defiant as it had been sullenly so in the height of the siege.
The regiment arrived at Yorktown, Va., April 24th, and landing at Gloucester Point, on the opposite bank of the York River, went into camp. Here the reenlisted men rejoined the regiment from "veteran" furlough, bringing with them 176 stalwart recruits. These new recruits were distributed through the companies, and though almost without drill or preliminary discipline, they marched, fought, bled and died in the rough campaign of '64 as manfully as did the seasoned veterans they strove in their pride to emulate, both in bravery and endurance.
Yorktown was a very familiar spot to most of us. It stood just across the York River from our camp, on a high bluff-like shore, and still surrounded by the earthworks captured from Magruder, turned and strengthened by ourselves; grass-grown in the months that had passed since we sailed away from them.
The plains below the town, where the camps of our brigade had been, were now white with the tents of a part of the troops of the newly organized army of the James. This new military organization was composed of the Tenth Corps, drawn from the troops in South Carolina, consisting of three divisions, commanded by Generals Terry, Turner and Ames; the Eighteenth Corps of three divisions too, commanded by Generals Brooks, Weitzel and Hinks; and of a cavalry division commanded by General Kautz. These corps were commanded respectively by Major-Generals Q. A. Gillmore and W. F. "Baldy" Smith, the whole army by Major-General Benjamin F. Butler.
Our regiment was in the Third Brigade of Terry's Division. The other regiments of the brigade were the 24th Massachusetts, 10th Connecticut, and the 100th New York.
On the night of the 4th of May the transports the army had embarked on set sail for Fortress Monroe, and on the 5th moved up the James River, reaching Bermuda Hundred the afternoon of the 5th, and by morning of the 6th had disembarked. Bermuda Hundred is a peninsula, made by a sweep of the James River to the east and by its tributary, the Appomattox. It is at the mouth of the latter river, on its north bank, City Point lying opposite it on the south bank. Petersburgh is twelve miles up the Appomattox on its south bank, and Richmond twenty-three miles north of Petersburgh, directly connected by a railroad and turnpike.
On the morning of the 6th of May our disembarked forces advanced to the neck of the peninsula, about six miles from the landing. This neck is here about three miles across from river to river, two miles and a half beyond our halting point the railroad runs, the pike running between. The ground we took up was superficially intrenched at first, the plan not looking to a protracted stay there, but to an advance on the railroad and pike, the taking of Petersburgh and a march on Richmond and its southern communications. The force ready to oppose us was a small one, no larger than our brigade, and our army numbered some 30,000 men. But before vigorous steps were taken to capture Petersburgh, it had been reinforced by troops hurried forward from North Carolina by General Beauregard, our old opponent of the Department of the South, now in command of the Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia. It was the head of this reinforcing column that successfully held Port Walthall Junction the 7th of May against a portion of our army. On the 9th we moved out to the front and destroyed the railroad between Swift Creek and Chester Station, a length of about six miles. On the 10th, the Confederate General, Ransom attacked this outlying force, but was repulsed. On the 12th we moved towards Richmond, Smith's corps on the right and ours on the left. We did not meet with any serious resistance this day. At night our line camped on Proctor's Creek. On the 14th we meet with more resistance. Smith found the works in his front too strong to be assaulted, but our corps moving to turn the enemy's right, resting on Wooldridge Hill, succeeding in forcing them to abandon their position there, and by night of the 15th we had driven them out of their whole outer line and into their interior one, and we were in position before Drury Bluff. But while we had been moving so slowly, Beauregard had been acting with such rapidity that he was now in the Drury's Bluff intrenchments with an army gathered from North Carolina and Richmond, and felt so strong that on the morning of the 16th he assumed the offensive, attacking Smith's right flank in the early morning, and capturing General Heckman and some hundreds of his brigade. Beauregard's plan miscarried somewhat, or he might have ended the career of the army of the James before it had fairly begun. He intended to get around our flank, while General Whiting should move out from Petersburgh with 5,000 men and attack our rear. His attack against Heckman was successful, but the other attacks on Smith's line failed, though the rebels captured four pieces of artillery, but his attacks on the line of our corps were all repulsed. Still we were pressed back, partly by the numerical force thrown against us and partly from our anxiety to cover our trains and keep our connections with Bermuda Hundred, where we had left but a small force. By night our army had given back until the rebels occupied their whole outer line again, but Whiting's force failing to advance, Beauregard could not press his advantage as he wished to, and before morning our whole force was safely behind the Bermuda Hundred intrenchments. The truth is that General Whiting was not a prohibitionist by any means, and this day of all days in his military career, he chose to exemplify that fact by getting drunk. Colonel Logan, of General Beauregard's staff, who took General Whiting written orders to move out the morning of the 16th, delivered them to him the night of the 15th, and was with General Whiting when on the morning of the 16th, beginning at daylight, he made his advance. Striking the Union picket line, his force was placed in line of battle, but made no advance during the day, in spite of Colonel Logan's expostulations and those of General D. H. Hill, "spending the day in arranging and rearranging his line," according to Colonel Logan, who does not doubt but had General Whiting followed his instructions the result would have been the capture of the entire force of General Butler.
Company D had not yet been actively engaged. It had been under fire a number of times though, quite enough to show the good stuff its new men were made of. It had taken an active part in tearing up the railroad, and had done a little long range skirmishing in which its only casualty was Private Annis, wounded on the 14th; but I think that the members of it who had been in the most serious danger were those on the picket line the night of the 13th.
The picket line of this night was in charge of Captain Mudgett. In running it he placed some of us before the open grounds in which stood the house before which Lieutenant Brannen, of Company I, was killed, and then by some devious piloting placed another line between us and our line of battle, a bit of duplication that was decidedly unpleasant to us of the outer picket line, for the Confederates were terribly uneasy that night, firing heavily all along their apparently very strong picket line, we replying, of course, but—zip, zip, in front of us was all very well, but where did the bullets that flew around us from the rear come from? The unpleasant fact speedily dawned on us that a picket line lay behind us firing too at the Confederate rifle flashes, as they supposed, but really at our own, so that we poor fellows were between two fires. To attempt to go back to expostulate with the pickets behind us was impossible, for the inevitable crashing through the underbrush between us and them would concentrate sure death upon the messenger. So all we could do then was to stay where we were, cease firing, and lay low. This last we did literally, lying flat on the ground while the bullets zipped viciously back and forth over us, one every now and then striking this or that side of a tree with a suggestive spat.
But Private Day would fire, to lie still and be shot at was contrary to his nature. Every once in a while his gun would bang from his position on the left of the line, giving the enemy in front and the line behind us a range by which to pelt us most dangerously. Again and again I had to go down the line and expostulate with John, but it was of no use, and at last I was forced to take my position with him and by sheer ill-temper keep him repressed, while he foamed with wrath at the idea of being compelled to lie still and silent to be shot at.
The night of the 15th our regiment took a position on the extreme left, where we threw up a sort of intrenchment in anticipation of an attack. But in the morning the heavy firing and the shouting told us that the other flank was the one attacked. We remained in our position a short time in the thick fog, hastily getting coffee boiling and the inner man strengthened for what seemed to be a coming day's work. Soon an order came for us to move to a position in support of the assailed line. As we moved rapidly along the line, we passed General Terry's headquarters, a small house, out of which the General rushed in his shirt-sleeves to admonish us to double quick "for God's sake." Then, striking a panting gait, we soon took position under a heavy fire.
Here we lay watching the give-and-take going on in front of us, expecting each minute to be obliged to fill a gap, but instead we were suddenly ordered to march rapidly to the rear and push down the pike toward Petersburgh till we should meet the supposed to be approaching Whiting.
And we did march rapidly. The fog was long gone, and the sun was beating down hot and strong. Men fell right and left, not bullet struck, but sun-struck. Caps were filled with green leaves, handkerchiefs were soaked in water and tied around swelling temples, but still it was "Forward," "Forward." The desperate pace seemed endless, but at last we were halted, formed in a strong skirmish line, and moved through woods till we reached a creek where we awaited the Confederate advance.
We could hear them talking and moving beyond the creek, but for reasons now known to you, they did not cross it. We remained in this position until night, then by a circuitous route, down one ravine and up another, under the piloting of Lieutenant Newcomb and Sergeant Payne we stole away, and soon found ourselves behind the outworks of Bermuda Hundred.
The 17th of May was passed by the men in necessary recuperation, and by the commanding officers in a rearrangement of lines, now looking to defense. That night the pickets at Warebottom Church reported a movement down the pike. The sound of trampling horses and the rattling of heavy wagons came clearly to their ears. It was conjectured that a wagon train was moving down the pike from Richmond to Petersburgh, and it was determined to attack it. Troops were hurried from the inner lines to the front, and the Eleventh was formed in line of battle and moved through the woods toward the pike. As it was a bright moonlight night, and the woods were fairly clear of underbrush, this movement was rapidly made, but suddenly, click, click, all along in front came the sound of cocking guns, and as our men threw themselves upon the ground, a crash of musketry came from a line of battle the Eleventh had almost run into. For an hour fierce firing was kept up by both sides, a battery of artillery on ours, placed near the church, adding not a little to the uproar by throwing shells over our heads. At last, when our ammunition had become exhausted, and while the men, their blood up, where clamoring for a fresh supply, orders came to fall back.
The wagon train proved to be Beauregard's trains and batteries moving down from Richmond, and well sheltered from us by a strong line of battle.
Of D, Private Carver received a severe flesh wound in this affair and Private George L. Butler was mortally wounded, the loss of the regiment numbering 26 men.
The 20th of May the enemy made a most determined but entirely unsuccessful attack on our outer line. We were not engaged, however. It was this day that the rebel General Walker was wounded and captured.
Only heavy skirmishing took place for some days after this, the night firing between pickets being especially continuous. During this comparative lull, and accounting for it partly, the enemy was building the Howlett House line, extending from the Howlett House Hill on the James to the Appomattox, by this line of intrenchments effecting the famous "bottling up process," and most effectually protecting their lines of communication between Richmond and Petersburgh.
As soon as General Grant learned of the futile result of Butler's movement, from which he had hoped so much, the destruction of Confederate communication with North Carolina, the investment of Richmond, and the consequent withdrawal of a large body of Lee's army from his own front, he directed that all the troops not actually needed to hold Bermuda Hundred be sent to him under command of General Smith. In consequence of this order, 16,000 of our army with 16 guns embarked the night of the 28th, and the 29th sailed for White House Landing on the York River, leaving a force of about 15,000 infantry and cavalry in the Bermuda Hundred intrenchments.
At about the same time General Lee ordered Beauregard to send him all the men he, too, could spare, which he did, retaining about 12,000 infantry and cavalry. There seems to have been a desire on the part of General Lee that still more of Beauregard's force be sent to him; even that Beauregard himself should go to him with all his available troops and take command of the right wing of Lee's army, leaving Petersburgh with a small force to take care of itself. But Beauregard was tenacious in his determination to hold his position on the south side of the James, and to keep his lines of intrenchments strongly manned. He argued that Butler's force was still large enough to endanger Petersburgh, even against the force he had retained, and it was to test this theory that he made the reconnoissance in force on the 2d of June which proved so disastrous to Company D.
The regiment went on picket duty the evening of June 1st, D taking position at Warebottom Church. The pickets had by this time settled into a state of armed neutrality, the more venturesome of them even trading in coffee and tobacco. Private Bridges, of D, was especially active in this sort of barter. He frequently went across the strip of ground that lay between the picket lines to drive lively trades with the enemy for tobacco, which was scarce with us, bartering coffee therefor, which was scarce with them.
Private Bridges, "Old Turk" as he was called, was a character. A half surly look in his eyes, something like that in those of a half tamed steer, caused him to receive the bucolic nick-name. He had ideas of his own about guns; the Springfield rifles we were armed with he despised. He wanted a gun that would carry a bullet to the spot he aimed at. Somewhere, at Gloucester Point I think, he got hold of a sporting rifle, a heavy, thick barreled, strongly grooved piece, and then the bother was to get suitable ammunition for it, our cartridges being much too large for its bore. After a deal of wandering through camps, he secured, through a good-natured cavalryman, a suitable cartridge for his gun, a carbine cartridge that fitted it perfectly. With a stock of these in his cartridge box he was ready for the enemy. Of course the carrying of this gun had to be winked at by his officers, and when he went on inspection, parade or guard duty he had to borrow a despised Springfield rifle from some one off duty to appear with, giving rise to a lately heard of story of his carrying two guns.
This evening of the 1st of June, Corporal Weymouth made himself the medium of exchange between the pickets.
He went towards the rebel picket line in the early evening and was met by one of their number whom he arranged to meet at the same spot in the early morning for the exchange of goods agreed upon.
The night was a moonless one, I remember, for, as we were not allowed fires, or to light matches on the outposts, when we wanted to learn the time of night we had to catch a fire-fly and make him crawl across the face of a watch, that when he flashed we might catch the positions of the hands. In the early part of the night the rebel batteries opened on our lines, firing most vigorously for a time, but as we did not reply they ceased firing after about one hour. It is probable that it was Beauregard's purpose to aggravate our batteries into replying that he might gather an idea of their positions and the number of their guns.
Morning came at last and the daylight broke. As soon as the light was strong enough to see clearly, Lieutenant Maxfield made a tour along the line of D, from right to left. He found Corporal Weymouth wide awake and in readiness to go out to meet his rebel friend when he should appear coming over the rebel works.
"There he is, Corporal," said some one as a form darted over the rebel line. "But he has a gun in his hand," Weymouth answered, and sure enough Lieutenant Maxfield saw that the man they were looking at had a gun in his hand, and that he was accompanied by a long line of other gray clad men, reaching out from his right and left, all with guns in their hands, too, and all moving swiftly toward our works.
In a moment the Lieutenant had shouted the alarm to his men, and as the sharp word of command rang out, every man, were he asleep or awake, sprang to his feet, every gun was to a cheek, and a rapid and effective fire was opened upon the now swiftly approaching enemy. So sure and cool were our men, far from being surprised, that in less than a minute the long line of the enemy in front of D was gone, those of them not fallen back to cover, lying on the ground dead or dying, the not too desperately wounded slowly crawling for spots sheltered from our fire.
The new rifle of Private Bridges was especially effective that morning every shot from it seeming to tell. His usually half closed eyes were wide open now and sparkling with joy. As he fired he would peer after his flying shot, and "I have hit him," he would triumphantly shout, and then proceed to reload his rifle with cool care. We were jubilant, for we had beaten the enemy off, but we speedily found that the pickets on our left had not been so fortunate. We could see them falling hastily back, and then over the open space before us that we had just cleared of one rebel skirmish line, a heavier one came rushing.
We fell back to a reserve pit on the run, entering it pell mell. Here we found Captain Lawrence and his company, H, and at his command a smart fire was opened on the pursuing enemy, driving them to cover. But unfortunately there was an unoccupied reserve pit to our rear and left that the enemy entered, and from which they poured a galling fire on our rear. Captain Lawrence, as commander of our little force, was ably assisted by Lieutenant Thompson of his own company, and by Lieutenant Maxfield, of D. These officers exposed themselves recklessly while urging the men to keep up their fire on the enemy in their front, not forgetting those in the reserve pit behind us.
Of course we could not stay where we were unless we proposed to go to Richmond before its evacuation. A hasty council of war was held by the officers, and it was agreed that the plan should be to fight desperately until a lull in the attack should give an opportunity to gain the woods behind us, then that we should break for it with a sudden and combined rush that would carry us right through the enemy of the reserve pit should they sally out as we ran by them, which we must, and within a few feet of them. The rebels in our front made several vain rushes at us. Once a sergeant of theirs led his men almost to the muzzles of the guns on the left, at a moment too, when the most of the guns there were uncharged. Corporal Weymouth was on the extreme left, "shoot that sergeant, Weymouth," was shrieked at him, and like lightning Weymouth's gun was pointing straight at the gallant rebel, and Weymouth's sharp eye was looking down the barrel as if to give the death stroke. Even rebel human nature probably fighting for a commission could not stand it, and the sergeant turned and fled, his men flying with him, not knowing that Weymouth's gun was as empty as a last year's bird's nest.
A movement of the rebels in our front that checked the fire of their men in the reserve pit indicated a sudden onslaught. The moment for retiring had come, "now, all together," said Lieutenant Maxfield, as he ran along to the left, "pour it into them when Captain Lawrence shouts 'fire, ' and then run for the woods." "Fire," the order came, a crash of rifles answered it, and then we ran like deer for the sheltering timber.
The enemy in the reserve pit was nonplussed for a moment, for it looked as if we were charging straight upon them, but catching the idea in a moment they arose and poured a sharp fire into us as we ran by. Within a minute those of us not killed, made prisoners, or too badly wounded to be carried off the field, had rejoined the Eleventh, which we found in line of battle not many rods in rear of the scene of our desperate defence.
Of D, Private Bridges was killed in the reserve pit, Sergeant Brady, Corporal Bailey, Privates Conforth, Moses E. Sherman, Smith, Dawe, Dyer and Bragdon were wounded, Captain Mudgett, Sergeant Blake, Privates Bryant, Kelley and Bolton were prisoners, Private Bolton having been too badly wounded to be taken from the field. Of these prisoners all were eventually exchanged and discharged, except Private Kelly, who died in Andersonville Prison.
We find it reported that of Company H, Privates Cumner and Rogers were killed, and that Lieutenant Thompson and Private Green were wounded. The loss of the Regiment for the day was 41 in killed, wounded and prisoners. Lieutenant-Colonel Spofford, who was in command of the Regiment, was mortally wounded before the line was broken and the command then devolved on Captain Hill, of K, shortly Major and then Lieutenant-Colonel, and from this day on the most conspicuous commanding officer the Regiment ever had.
The picket skirmishing that had died out to a large extent during the last week in May, became continuous again from this attack of June 2d. Our own Regiment when not on the picket line engaged in this desultory sort of warfare, was lying in line of battle behind the heavy inner works of Bermuda Hundred, consisting of strong redans, or batteries, connected by infantry parapets, all with stout abatis in front, and with slashings wherever possible, and from Beauregard's report, his men lay behind their somewhat similar works as anxiously as we did behind ours, both we and they in continual expectation of an assault. The truth is that both Butler and Beauregard were afraid that their long and thinly manned lines might be assaulted and carried at any moment, each knowing his own weakness full well, and magnifying the strength of his opponent.
Beauregard had the best ground for his fears. As the strongest numerically and occupying the inner and therefore the shorter lines of the opposing works, and with a strong fleet of gunboats in the river to fall back to the shelter of in case of disaster, the initiative belonged to us. And indeed a force did move out from our line the 9th of June to attack Petersburgh. General Gillmore with 3,000 infantry, accompanied by General Kautz with 1,500 cavalry, crossed the Appomattox on the ponton bridge at Port Walthall in the early morning. Gillmore moved out on the City Point Road, and Kautz moved to the left four or five miles to reach the Jerusalem Plank Road. Gillmore finding the works before him strong ones, and apparently well manned, did not attempt to assault them, returning to Bermuda Hundred that afternoon. Kautz attacked on the plank road with indifferent success at first, but finally flanked the enemy's line, forcing them out of their ranks, then marched on the city, but reinforcements coming to the enemy and Gillmore not supporting him, Kautz was forced to withdraw. But more formidable opposing forces than were those of Butler and Beauregard, forces commanded perhaps by greater chieftains than they, too, were now moving to the position of which Petersburgh was the central figure, now to become the most important position of the war.
Before the battle of Cold Harbor was fought by the Army of the Potomac and the portion of the Army of the James sent to Grant under General Smith, Grant had about given up all hope of breaking through Lee's defence on the north side of the James, and had planned, if this last effort failed, to move across the James to a position before Petersburgh, hoping to be able to move so unexpectedly to Lee as to effect the capture of Petersburgh, the turning of Beauregard's Bermuda Hundred line, and to cut off Confederate communication with North Carolina before Lee should realize Grant's object sufficiently to checkmate it by throwing the Army of Northern Virginia across the James and into the Confederate intrenchments at Bermuda Hundred and Petersburgh in time to save them. The part of the Army of the James under General Smith marched to White House, reembarked and sailed for Bermuda Hundred, arriving in the afternoon of June 14th. Smith's force crossed the Appomattox by the ponton bridge at Broadway Landing, two miles from Port Walthall and eight from Petersburgh. Assaulting the works they found in their front, they succeeded in carrying a long line of them. Divisions of the Army of the Potomac began to reach Smith's position that afternoon, crossing the James on a ponton bridge laid down from Wilcox Landing on the north side and Windmill Point on the south, just below City Point, but owing to the exhaustion of troops, missent orders, and various other causes, the success of the forenoon was not followed up, and the 16th and 17th were spent by our forces there in making assaults on the strong and, though mainly defended by artillery, still well defended rebel works. The results were varying during these two days, but without our gaining a position of sufficient strength to enable our columns to overcome the defence of the 18th, when Beauregard's small, almost exhausted and somewhat provisional army was heavily reenforced by Lee's veteran troops.
During this time we were holding the lines of Bermuda Hundred, in hourly expectation on the 16th and 17th of the Army of Northern Virginia assaulting us, it having to pass so near us in moving down the pike and the Richmond and Petersburgh to Beauregard's assistance, that it might easily hurl an assaulting column on our lines and breaking through the inadequate force with which we held them, assail Grant on the flank.
While Beauregard, thoroughly alive to Grant's real purposes through the stories of scouts and spies, and the sifted admissions of the prisoners he captured on the 15th, was showering telegrams on Lee and sending his aides with personal messages to Richmond, Lee was still on the north side of the James throwing out reconnoissances in every direction in search of Grant's real course. This delay of Lee forced Beauregard to hold his lines with a very small force against a constantly augmenting one. But these lines were formidable ones. A born engineer as well as an educated one, Beauregard had from sheer restlessness already entrenched every practicable position around Petersburgh, planting enfilading batteries on all commanding points, and generally had already planned and arranged the lines of works that, with little modification of position, held Petersburgh so long against our armies.
Knowing that the force in his front was steadily growing as divisions of the Army of the Potomac came on the ground and went into position, and that the 16th would be a day of trial to him, Beauregard the night of the 15th determined to abandon the Bermuda Hundred line, trusting to the coming of Lee's troops to regain them.
That night he withdrew the force that held the Bermuda Hundred lines, leaving only a mask of pickets, virtually abandoning his whole line from the Howlett House to the Appomattox. He says he had the guns and caissons of the Howlett House Battery removed and buried, the ground above them rearranged with sticks and leaves as not to arouse any suspicion, and that this prize remained safely hidden until the Confederates had regained their line.
The night of the 15th Lieutenant-Colonel Greely of the 10th Connecticut, which regiment was on picket at the Warebottom Church position, hearing movements on the rebel line, crept out and made up his mind from what he heard and saw that the rebels were moving away. Reporting his belief and his reasons for it to General Terry, that officer ordered a movement in the early morning of the 16th that resulted in the capture of the whole rebel line with their pickets and such troops as they had left there.
A force of one hundred day's men from Ohio had reported to General Butler, good material enough, but in the nature of things quite undisciplined, mere raw recruits, and without the veteran organization of officers and men that enabled our own new men to do such good work. These new troops were placed in the captured lines, while we held our own outer line just across the slashing dividing the two lines of intrenchments. They now held their position beautifully so long as they were not troubled by the Confederates, but along in the afternoon a commotion was visible among them, then a few came hurrying over the works they were in, then more and more, a confused firing was heard, then the "rebel yell" rose clear and shrill and the whole force of Ohio men came flocking over the works and across the slashing, a strong skirmish line of gray clothed soldiers moving after them—the van of Lee's army. The hundred day's men came tearing towards us at the top of their speed without order or orders so far as could be seen. We opened ranks to let them through, the scared white faced flock of sheep, one of them, I remember, holding up a hand from which the blood was trickling from a scratch probably made by a limb of a fallen tree of the slashing, lamentably crying "I'm wounded," "I'm wounded," while our men roared with laughter. What would have become of them—whether they would have stopped short of Ohio—I do not know, had not the 10th Connecticut, on reserve, deployed with fixed bayonets and fenced the mob back.
But we had no time for enjoyment of this part of the comedy. Closing up as the Ohio men passed through us, we turned so heavy a fire on the advancing lines of the enemy that they stopped, staggered, fell back and finally retired to their recaptured works.
At day-break of June 17th, General Osborn says that the Confederates assaulted the Union line in our front and were repulsed, but when they assaulted in the afternoon they broke through a portion of the line, driving it back.
Captain Maxfield's diary states that in the evening of the 17th, the Eleventh charged to support the left of the 24th Massachusetts, where some one-hundred day men had given way, our Ohio runaways again. It was in this charge that Corporal Bearce was wounded. And for the 18th this diary states that we had fallen back to the old line of rebel rifle pits, back of the church, and that either intentionally or by accident the rebels set fire to the recaptured church, and it was burnt to the ground.
The night of June 18th, after the corps of the Army of the Potomac had made a series of desperate and bloody assaults on the Confederate works at Petersburgh, works that military authorities agree should have been taken the 15th, could have been the 16th, might have been on the 17th, but that were impregnable for the time now that the lines of the Army of Northern Virginia were stretched behind them, General Grant, recognizing the futility of further direct efforts against Petersburgh, gave orders that all assaults should cease, and that the positions gained by the several corps close against the enemy's lines should be intrenched, and as General Humphreys says of the intrenchments threw up that night by this order, "the two opposing lines of works before Petersburgh remained substantially the same in position to the close of the war."
In the afternoon of the 20th of June, the Regiments of our brigade broke camp and marched to the James River, crossing it by ponton boats after dark, landing at Deep Bottom, on the north bank of Bailey's Creek, emptying into the James. The position so quietly taken was three miles east of the Howlett House Battery, and though four miles north of it by terra firma measurement, it was fifteen miles below it in the flow of the river, so crooked is the James at this point of its course. Deep Bottom was a well wooded bluff when we seized it, but 'twas bare enough before many days, so vigorously were axes plied by the men of our regiment, and while they were renewing their youth as axemen, fatigue parties from regiments more used to the spade were throwing up a strong line of works, batteries connected by infantry parapets and with outlying rifle pits, forming when completed and with gunboats anchored on the flanks, a practically impregnable "bridge head" for the ponton bridge now laid across from the south bank of the James to Deep Bottom.
We remained at Deep Bottom for several weeks, within easy reach of strong outlying works of the rebels, partly thrown up and strengthened after our arrival. Their main outer line on this side of the river, the Chapin's Bluff one, was about four miles northeast of Deep Bottom. The opposing lines at Deep Bottom were some distance apart, from half a mile to a mile, but portions of the picket lines were very near together, particularly in the extensive fields to the north of Deep Bottom. In the immediate front, looking east, there was a wide stretch of woods, a tongue of the woods that ran along both sides of Bailey's Creek from its wide mouth, a mouth of such uncommon depth as to give the position we held on its north shore the name of Deep Bottom. But without the animus of a momentarily expected attack, the picket of both sides were amicably disposed, meeting in a big corn patch in the open field to gather green corn and to barter. There used to be a story that some of them occasionally visited a secluded spot to indulge in friendly games of cards together, with coffee and tobacco for stakes.
An occurrence that will interest fatalists took place at Deep Bottom. A member of the 24th Massachusetts had deserted from that regiment to the enemy while the regiment was in North Carolina. It was undoubtedly his plan to take an early opportunity to desert from his new service to our lines again and get sent North out of the way of any possible casualty, for he took an early opportunity to get taken prisoner at Deep Bottom during one of our reconnoissances there, the Confederate regiment he had joined having been sent to Virginia and located before Deep Bottom. But, strange to say, the double deserter passed directly back into the arms of his old company of the 24th Massachusetts. A dramatic situation it must have been both to him and his old comrades. Recognized in a moment, he was imprisoned, tried and sentenced to be shot, and the sentence was carried out in the fields between our works and those of the Confederates.
Little of memorable moment took place for a time. Captain Maxfield's diary has these entries for the month following our arrival at Deep Bottom. For June 22d, that men of the 10th Connecticut had found a pot of gold. He does not record whether they did so at the end of a rainbow or not. For July 1st, that Brigadier General R. S. Foster took command of our brigade, and that Colonel Plaisted, who had been Brigade commander so far on the campaign, returned to the command of the Eleventh. For the 3d, that Captains Hill and Baldwin were mustered as Lieutenant-Colonel and Major respectively, and that Company A was sent across Bailey's Creek "to hold it." This entry argues a large liquid capacity for that company.
It was about this time that General Hill, then our Lieutenant-Colonel, had an adventure that would have been a misadventure but for his characteristic readiness. General Foster requested him to go out through the big corn field already told of, and learn what he could of the force of the rebels in our front, and to do it in his own way, having learned that as a daring, long-headed scout, General Hill was without a peer in our brigade. Taking a couple of orderlies with him, General Hill rode into the interior until he judged he was a mile from the river, not seeing any rebels yet, then he bore to the left to strike the river away above us, intending to ride down along the river bank to Deep Bottom. After riding for about a half mile towards the river, he suddenly rode into the rear of an undeployed rebel picket force of about twenty-five men. Clustering around him, their officer laughingly asked the General "where he was going." Personally the General felt very sure that he was going to Richmond, however much against his will, but putting on a bold face, he answered, "that he had rode out to get the news by exchanging papers with them." "This is pretty cool," said the rebel officer, "let me see your papers." Luckily the General had a copy of the New York Tribune, and one of the Philadelphia Inquirer in his pocket, and luckily too, a rebel sergeant here said "this is the same officer that sent us a paper the other day." This was so, the General, a week before, when officer of the day, having effected an exchange of papers with this sergeant through the medium of one of our men, when the sergeant must have taken a sharp look at the officer who moved so cooly along a dangerous picket line. "Well," said the good-natured rebel lieutenant, "I guess I will let you go, you look as though you were telling the truth. But I must say you took a good deal of pains to come so far, and to come in our rear, too." Our General with the guileless face answered "that he got lost in riding out, and was trying to find his way into camp when he rode up to them." Drifting into a general conversation with the officers and his men, each party covertly tried to learn a little something concerning the other's force on that side of the river, until the General, having learned all he wished to, embraced a good opportunity to make his adieus. As he rode away with his eager orderlies riding on his heels, the Confederate officer, on whom the real purpose of the General's mission had dawned, but who was too honorable to take back his given word, called out, "Remember this, you can't play at exchanging papers with me again." With this friendly warning from the "good fellow," as the General rightly calls him, ringing in their ears, the little Union party spurred its horses into a magnificent burst of speed that quickly took it out of all possible danger of having to obey a recall.
For July the 10th Captain Maxfield's diary states, that (among others) First Sergeant Bassett, of D, reported for duty from recruiting service in Maine, where he had been for some months. For the 12th, that an expedition from the 10th Connecticut went up the river and captured a lieutenant and fourteen men, besides burning a mill. For the 13th, that two prisoners were taken by a scouting party under Major Baldwin and Captain Nickels, and that some of D were in this party. Possibly it was this expedition that Private William Sherman, of D, shot the rebel "stone dead," as he declared, but while he was reloading his gun the supposed to be dead man jumped up and ran away regardless of Sherman's hilarious expostulations.
For the 14th, the diary states, that the rebels opened fire with a battery they had stationed in a ravine and that their shells killed "a horse and six men" on the gunboat Mendota. It would appear from this that there were veritable "horse marines" in our navy.
For the 21st, the diary states that our regiment moved across to Strawberry Plains, on the south bank of Bailey's Creek, and that we captured eleven prisoners, but that the enemy appeared in force and caused us to fall back into our intrenchments. For the 22d, that the regiment went to the Plains again, "we taking all we wished to," as the Captain modestly phrases it. For the 23d, that the regiment went to Strawberry Plains again, and met a strong force of the enemy, we losing two killed and four wounded, and that we remained that night on the ground we had taken during the day. For the 24th, that we were relieved by two regiments of the Nineteenth Corps, that Corps having just arrived from the Red River, and, by the way, its commander was our old brigade commander, General Emory. For the 25th, the diary tells us that the pickets of the Nineteenth Corps on the Plains were driven in, and that we were ordered out to retake the position they had lost. For the 26th, that we were still skirmishing on Strawberry Plains in an effort to retake the lost position, and that by night, when we had recovered it, we had lost one man killed and twenty-one wounded, and that we were relieved by the Tenth Connecticut that night. For the 27th, that the Second Corps crossed to the Plains early in the morning.
These operations of our regiment on Strawberry Plains in the last days of July were in connection with a movement planned against the enemy's left flank, resting on our side of the James, and directly in our front.
After the assaults of the 18th of June, the immediate attempts of Grant to overcome Lee were confined to flanking movements from the right and left, north and south of the James. The plan of the movement we were initiating was that Hancock should move to Deep Bottom with the Second Corps and two divisions of cavalry under Sheridan, and that the Second Corps should try and break through the rebel line near Chapin's Bluff, at about the spot we operated in the following October; then if the infantry succeeded in breaking the rebel line, the cavalry was to make a dash on Richmond, while Hancock should operate to prevent rebel reenforcements crossing from the south bank of the James by the ponton bridge they had laid down between Chapin's and Drury's Bluffs. And that if the dash on Richmond could not be made, then the railroad communications of the rebels on the north side should be destroyed as far as practicable. It was thought, too, that this movement, if unsuccessful in itself, might force the rebels to reinforce the north side so heavily as to cause such a reduction of their force holding the Petersburgh lines as to give a fair promise of success in the assault to be made when the mine in front of Burnside's Ninth Corps was sprung.
As a necessary preliminary to these movements, and to give the idea perhaps that the contemplated attack, which they could not help learning of the preparations for, through spies, prisoners and deserters, was a flanking one, by the way of Bailey's Creek, as, in fact, it finally became, the Eleventh crossed to Strawberry Plains, just on the other side of Bailey's Creek, having to cross the James twice to get there, once to the south side by the ponton bridge we held the head of, and then to the north side again by another ponton bridge laid down with its north side head debouching on the great cleared flat known as Strawberry Plains. Across the head of these Plains runs the River road, a connecting link of the system of roads leading into Richmond. Working our way up through the woods bordering Bailey's Creek, by night we had driven the enemy into his works guarding the road and outer lines, his main one lying on the Deep Bottom side of Bailey's Creek and running along that side of the Creek to Fussell's Mill at the head of the Creek, from which point his line was refused, as the military phrase is, that is it turned sharply back.
It was the position we had gained before this outer line that we turned over to the Nineteenth Corps and that they lost the 25th of July. The next day we pressed the enemy steadily back until we were lying close to their outer line, the gunboats firing sharply this day, throwing their heavy shells over our heads at the enemy's lines, the enemy replying as best they could with a battery of artillery they had brought down and stationed in the road. During the day a shell from a gunboat fell so unfortunately short as to fall just behind our right rifle pit, lightly scooped out pits, unconnected, each sheltering a half dozen men. It fell at just the most dangerous distance from our men, burst, and threw its fragments right among them, killing and wounding several.
During this night Hancock and Sheridan arrived with their troops. Halting their men on the other side of the river, they rode over to Deep Bottom and had a consultation with General Foster, who described to them what he had learned of the enemy's works in our front. Hancock then telegraphed to General Meade, his immediate superior, stating what had been told him, and doubting the advisability of assaulting so strong an intrenched line with the force at his command, and suggesting a flank movement by way of Strawberry Plains instead. General Meade coinciding with him in his opinion, Hancock moved his troops over the river to Strawberry Plains, and attacked soon after daylight on the 27th of July, the cavalry on his right.
General Miles moved to the front across the open field with a brigade in open order, charged and captured the enemy's battery, four 20-pound parrot guns, in a handsome manner. Then swinging to the right on its pivot, the position held by the Eleventh on the creek, the whole line moved out across the enemy's roads until it had invested his whole line, extending from our position on the creek to Fussell's Mill. The part of the infantry in the plan was now completed. The cavalry then proceeded to carry out the flanking operation it was charged with, but the rebels had been reinforced, four divisions of infantry and two of cavalry having come across the James and taken position in the works we were threatening, so that when Sheridan's cavalry moved out beyond Fussell's Mill they found the road barred by a heavy force of cavalry supported by infantry.
General Grant came across the river to the Plains that afternoon and made a personal observation of the rebel position, and deciding that not much could be done there, returned to his headquarters, from which he telegraphed General Meade that he did not wish Hancock to assault, but for him to hold his position for another day. For, though foiled in his attempt to make a dash on Richmond, Grant had learned that the reinforcements the rebels had hurried across the James had left their Petersburgh lines guarded by three infantry divisions only, while but one cavalry division remained on that side of the river, and now hoped by threatening demonstrations to keep the rebel force on the north side, out of the way of the column he was already forming to assault the Petersburgh lines. In obedience to Grant's wishes, Hancock and Sheridan spent another day in holding the heavy rebel force far from the scene of Grant's new hopes, hurrying back to Petersburgh with their troops the night of the 29th, to take part in the assault that was to follow the mine explosion set for the morning of July 30th. The explosion took place as planned, but for various reasons the results were as disastrous to the Union as to the Confederate army. Returning to our camp at Deep Bottom, we spent a few days in comparative quietude, while a new movement in which we were to take part was in process of evolution.
General Grant had received information that General Lee was strongly reenforcing Early, now operating in the Valley, and believed the reenforcements were so largely taken from the troops on the north side of the James as to give a chance for a more successful operation on that side of the river than our late one had been. The troops to be engaged in this second attempt were largely those engaged in the first, the Second Corps, part of the Tenth, and a cavalry force under General Gregg, all to be under Hancock's command. But instead of marching directly across the river as before, Hancock's corps was to embark on transports at City Point and move down the river in the afternoon, to give the Confederate spies the idea that it was going to the Valley, but under the cover of the night the transports were to run back to Deep Bottom, the troops were to disembark at Strawberry Plains, move rapidly in the morning, turn the enemy's line on Bailey's Creek, and push for Richmond. But through lack of proper landing places the second corps was not disembarked until eight o'clock instead of at daybreak.
The part of the Tenth Corps men in the programme was that we were to assault in our front, which we did promptly at daybreak, the Second Corps' historian stating that we opened fire at five o'clock.
The Eleventh held the part of the picket lines running through the woods in front of Deep Bottom the night before the 14th of August. Though so far from the river we pickets had a suspicion that something was on foot. The ponton bridge crossing to Strawberry Plains was muffled, yet we could distinctly hear the rumble of the artillery and the tramping of the horses of Gregg's cavalry division as they crossed it, and the screeching of steamboat whistles was too continuous for secrecy too, though necessary from the darkness of the night and the crowding of so many boats in the narrow channel. If we heard it, and our suspicions were aroused by it, then our contiguous friends, the enemy, whose pickets could hear it all as well as we could, must have been forewarned of what was coming in the morning.
But we of the Eleventh had no idea that we were to take the sharp initiative that we did. In the early morning of the 14th Colonel Plaisted rode up to the reserve of D and directed Lieutenant Norris to deploy the reserve, move out to the picket line and advance with it until he met the enemy, then to press forward and capture his exterior lines. (Lieutenant Grafton Norris, of Company F, was in detailed command of D, Lieutenant Maxfield having gone North on an overdue leave of absence). The movement directed by the Colonel was immediately proceeded with, and in less time than it takes to tell it we had moved out, and our skirmish line was moving rapidly through the woods and was on the enemy's pickets. We forced them back on their reserve, stationed behind a strong line of rifle pits, with partly open ground before them immediately in front of D's skirmishers. This line ran along the top of the reverse side of a dip of the ground, covering a wood road that ran directly down this dip before crossing their line. As the men of D reached this road in hot pursuit of the enemy, its inviting smoothness led them to converge on it, and, frantic now with anticipation, to charge the enemy's works without orders. Lieutenant Norris and Sergeant Young saw the danger and tried hard to prevent this movement, rushing among the men to drive them out of the road, but before they had an appreciable time to enforce their commands in a withering rifle fire of the enemy swept the road, killing and wounding several of our men. In spite of this severe check the officers held their men close up to the enemy's works, on which we opened an eager fire. For a time our line was kept back by the enemy, but suddenly the exertions of our men were rewarded, the rebel line beyond our company's left giving way just as the enemy in our front had ceased firing; and D took so quick an advantage of the opening that before the startled and momentarily confused enemy fairly knew what was happening we had mounted their works and were in possession of them.
We found that their slackened fire meant that they had not had their breakfasts any more than had we, and that they had relinquished firing in fancied security until they should have strengthened the inner man. Their untouched rations of freshly cooked bread, cooked in Dutch ovens after the peculiar Southern style, with the side of fat bacon left behind them, satisfied the sharp monitions of several Yankee appetites.
The enemy had retreated to the main line, from which they opened a sharp artillery fire on us. This line across a wide field was so very formidable in appearance that an assault was not ordered.
Of D, Privates Hall, Shepard and Stanley had been killed, Corporals Keene, Weymouth and Privates Samuel A. Bragdon, Collins, Wm. Sherman, Adelbert Stratton and Alfred C. Butler had been wounded; Weymouth mortally so. It is notable that Butler, an impetuous youth, fell close to the enemy's works, wounded in three places, and that his friend Bragdon received his mortal wound in a brave attempt to rescue him from his perilous position.
During the rest of the 14th we lay on the ground we had won, General Birney, our new Corps commander, having been ordered to suspend his operations on account of the delay attending the movements of the second corps. It was a terribly hot day in open ground, General Mott reporting that of two small regiments of his Second Corps division exposed to it 105 men were prostrated by the heat.
This intense heat may have had something to do with the slowness and weakness of the Second Corps assault, for it was not delivered until four o'clock, and then with but one brigade, others intended for the attacking column having become too demoralized to make it wise to push them forward. The only effect of this movement was to draw enough of the enemy from our front to enable part of our corps to capture a battery of four eight-inch howitzers.
The record states the night of the 14th the greater part of our Corps was marched to the vicinity of Fussell's Mills at the head of Bailey's Creek, and that the order for the 15th was that our Corps should find the enemy's left and attack Gregg's Cavalry covering our flank, but that General Birney took so wide a circuit that it was night before he found the enemy's left and took position.
As for the Eleventh, we seem to have been placed on the left for the 15th, near the pivot, for we moved but little. The recollection is that we lay along a road most of the day, sheltering ourselves from falling rain in the bordering woods as best we could. At night we went into bivouac in a handsome grove of trees, and our wagons coming up to deal out company rations, D had a company supper, First Sergeant Bassett having arrived with the cooks and the men who, for one reason or another other than sickness, had been left in camp when we went on picket.
The morning of the 16th broke clear and cloudless, too cloudless, for it was soon evident that the 16th was to be a day like the 14th, when the men of the Second Corps suffered so terribly in men and morale. The regiment was on the move very early in the day. In moving for position we were soon under an aggravating fire, marching and counter-marching with men dropping out wounded or killed, until we took position in a dense wood where we were somewhat sheltered by a bend of ground. Here a column for attack was formed, the 1st Maryland Cavalry dismounted, serving as infantry and temporarily attached to our brigade, on our right.
Anticipating the coming assault, the enemy had thrown a heavy skirmish line into a line of rifle pits running along enfilading points, to sweep the woods with a galling fire. It is very unpleasant to lie in action under such a fire and see comrades to your right and left struck by unseen foes. If a man has nerves they are soon in a quiver, and if he has not known he had any before, he learns that he is not made quite of iron after all. We found it so in the half hour we lay in this position and it was really a relief when scudding aids dismounted and darting through the woods from tree to tree brought the order to charge. Quickly we arose to our feet, and rushed forward with the wild cry which seems as necessary to a charging force as the breath with which they give it. Almost immediately we were subjected to the most severe fire we were ever under. No mere skirmish line this, but an outlying line of battle. The woods fairly rang with the screeching of the bullets; still we pushed on, when suddenly the 1st Maryland fell back, not directly back, but obliquing into our own now swaying line, and in another second in spite of the shouts of their maddened officers, the men of the two regiments were falling back in confused mass.