The Day Dixie Died: The Battle of Atlanta

by Gary Ecelbarger

  5 Jeffrey C. Weaver, 54th Virginia Infantry (Lynchburg, Va.: H. E. Howard, 1993), p. 121; Jeffrey C. Weaver, 63rd Virginia Infantry (Lynchburg, Va.: 1991), p. 62; Reynolds’s strength estimated from one regiment from a late-June calculation. See Weaver, 54th Virginia, p. 117.

  6 OR 38 (3), pp. 970–71.

  7 OR 38 (3), pp. 280, 342, 355; T. W. Connelly, History of the Seventieth Ohio Regiment from Its Organization to Its Mustering Out (Cincinnati, Ohio: Peak Bros., 1902), p. 95. Cumming’s involvement in the contest is derived entirely from casualties specific to July 22. See “Regiment Casualty Analysis” (34th, 36th, 39th, 56th Georgia Infantry) in American Civil War Research Database, http://www.civilwardata.com. A diary from a member of the 39th Georgia provides evidence that they saw no action that day. See Brenda Phillips, ed., Personal Reminiscences of a Confederate Soldier Boy (Milledgeville, Ga.: Boyd Publishing Co., 1993), p. 53.

  8 OR 38 (3), pp. 285, 342.

  9 Tri-monthly returns for Stevenson’s division show an “effective” strength that diminished by only thirty-six men from July 20 and July 31, 1864. (See Peter W. Alexander Papers, Rare Books and Manuscript Department, Columbia University; provided to the author by Keith S. Bohannon.) Note: the effective totals—4,069 and 4,033—underrepresent some battle losses that are compensated by soldiers who returned from absences. The “effectives” do not count officers and therefore also underrepresent present-for-duty strength by at least 500. See OR 38 (3), pp. 679–80.

  10 David S. Heidler and Jeanne T. Heidler, eds., Encyclopedia of the American Civil War: A Political, Social, and Military History (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2000), p. 294; Manigault quote reproduced in Castel, Decision in the West, p. 338; Augustus C. Buell, History of Andrew Jackson Vol. 2 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1904), p. 381.

  11 OR 38 (3), pp. 778–79; R. Lockwood Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War: The Civil War Narrative of Arthur Middleton Manigault, Brigadier General, C.S.A. (Columbia, S.C.: Published for the Charleston Library Society by the University of South Carolina Press, 1983), p. 226.

  12 OR 38 (3), pp. 223, 235, 250; Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, p. 226; C. I. Walker, Rolls and Historical Sketch of Tenth Regiment, So. Ca. Volunteers in the Army of the Confederate States (Charleston, S. C.: Walker, Evans & Cogswell, 1881), p. 113.

  13 Allen Daniel Candler and Clement Anselm Evans, eds., Georgia: Comprising Sketches of Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form Vol. 2 (of 3) (Atlanta, Ga.: State Historical Association, 1906), p. 326; Wilbur G. Kurtz, “At the Troup Hurt House,” Atlanta Constitution Magazine, January 25, 1931, p. 4.

  14 OR 38 (3), pp. 139, 147.

  15 OR 38 (3), p. 195; “Report of Major Thomas Davies Maurice,” SOR 7, pp. 48–49.

  16 Lewis F. Lake, “My War Service as a Member of ‘Taylor’s Battery’ ” (1888), Lewis F. Lake Papers, ALPL; “From Chicago Battery A (A Private Letter),” Chicago Tribune, August 4, 1864; OR 38 (3), p. 262; “The Late Battles in Georgia,” Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1864.

  17 Wilbur G. Kurtz, “At the Troup Hurt House,” pp. 4–5.

  18 Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, pp. 226–27; OR 38 (3), p. 787; Walker, Tenth Regiment, p. 114.

  19 George W. Bailey, A Private Chapter of the War (1861–5) (St. Louis, Mo.: G. I. Jones and Co., 1880), p. 4.

  20 De Gress to Major Thomas Maurice, July 22, 1864, in “Report of the Battle of Atlanta,” Blue & Gray Magazine 11 (April, 1994), p. 29; OR 38 (3), p. 188.

  21 Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, p. 227; OR 38 (3), p. 787; Gill to his wife, July 23, 1864, in Wiley, “A Story of 3 Southern Officers,” Civil War Times Illustrated (April, 1964), p. 33.

  22 OR 38 (3), p. 779. Strength estimated obtained by comparing returns of July 10 and 31. See OR 38 (3), pp. 679–80.

  23 OR 38 (3), p. 779; J. G. B. to the ed., July 23, 1864, Canton Weekly Register, August, 8, 1864; Committee of the Regiment, The Story of the Fifty-fifth Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War (W. J. Coulter; 1887), pp. 338–39; Dunbar Rowland, ed., Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society, Centenary Series, Vol. 1 (Jackson, Miss.: Mississippi Historical Society, 1916), pp. 574–76.

  24 Committee of the Regiment, The Story of the Fifty-fifth Regiment, p. 339; OR 38 (3), pp. 285, 778–79.

  25 Atlanta Constitution, July 20, 1898; Albert Castel, Tom Taylor’s Civil War (Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 2000), pp. 246–47; Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, pp. 226–27.

  26 Lewis F. Lake, “My War Service as a Member of ‘Taylor’s Battery’ ” (1888), Lewis F. Lake Papers, ALPL; “From Chicago Battery A (A Private Letter),” Chicago Tribune, August 4, 1864; OR 38 (3), p. 262; “The Late Battles in Georgia,” Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1864.

  27 Gary Ecelbarger, Black Jack Logan: An Extraordinary Life in Peace and War (Guilford, Conn.: Lyons Press, 2005), p. 130; Hotaling quote reproduced in “A Great War Picture,” Freeport County (Minn.) Standard, July 21, 1886.

  28 Lewis F. Lake, “My War Service as a Member of ‘Taylor’s Battery’ ” (1888), Lewis F. Lake Papers, ALPL; “From Chicago Battery A (A Private Letter),” Chicago Tribune, August 4, 1864; OR 38 (3), p. 262; “The Late Battles in Georgia,” Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1864.

  29 Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, p. 230.

  30 “A Great War Picture,” Freeport County (Minn.) Standard, July 21, 1886; Ecelbarger, Black Jack Logan, p. 129.

  31 OR 38 (3), p. 246; William Bakhaus, “The Battle of Atlanta,” The Ohio Soldier, April 27, 1889; Castel, Tom Taylor’s Civil War, pp. 247–48.

  32 OR 38 (3), pp. 210, 224, 787; Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, pp. 227–29; A. B. Crummel, “De Grasse’s [sic] Battery,” NT, September 10, 1885; De Gress to Maurice, July 22, 1864, “Report of the Battle of Atlanta,” p. 29.

  33 Committee of the Regiment, The Story of the Fifty-fifth Regiment, p. 339; OR 38 (3), p. 29.

  34 Reuben Williams, “Memories of War Times,” Warsaw (Ind.) Daily Times, December 12, 1903.

  35 Ibid.; James B. Swan, Chicago’s Irish Legion: The 90th Illinois Volunteers in the Civil War (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University Press, 2009), p. 150.

  36 Walker, Tenth Regiment, p. 115; OR 38 (3), pp. 280–81, 779.

  37 Leggett, “Battle of Atlanta,” p. 18.

  38 OR 38 (3), p. 872; William Titze diary, July 22, 1864, ALPL.

  CHAPTER 9—A HUMAN HURRICANE ON HORSEBACK

  1 “From Georgia,” Burlington Weekly Hawkeye, July 23, 1864.

  2 J. W. Long, “Flanking Johnston: The Army of the Tennessee on the Move,” NT, September 13, 1888.

  3 Letter excerpted in Gary L. Scheel, Rain, Mud & Swamps: The Story of the 31st Missouri Volunteer Infantry (Pacific, Missouri: Plus Communications, 1998), pp. 358–59.

  4 Leggett quote in “Resolutions on General Logan,” Society of the Army of the Tennessee, Report of the Proceedings of the Society of the Army of the Tennessee, at the Twentieth Meeting, Held at Detroit, Mich., September 14th and 15th, 1887 (Cincinnati, Ohio: Published by the Society, 1893), p. 541.

  5 Jacob D. Cox, Atlanta (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1882), p. 171; OR 38 (2), pp. 516–17; OR 38 (3), p. 26; OR 38 (5), pp. 230–31, 317; Dodge, The Battle of Atlanta, p. 60.

  6 OR 38 (3), p. 26, 195.

  7 OR 38 (3), pp. 195, 203–205, 451, 679–80, 819–20.

  8 Bailey, A Private Chapter of the War, pp. 8–9.

  9 Gill to his wife, July 23, 1864, in Wiley, “A Story of 3 Southern Officers,” p. 33; John R. Windham, “A Johnny Reb Speaks,” NT, March 4, 1897. Gill misspelled his sergeant’s surname as “Nabors.”

  10 SOR 7, pp. 118, 127.

  11 Wilber G. Kurtz, “The Broken Line and the DeGress [sic] Battery,” Atlanta Constitution Magazine, February 8, 1931.

  12 SOR 7, pp. 127–29; Wilmer Kurtz, “Civil War Days in Georgia,” The Atlanta Constitution Magazine, January 25, 1931. Charles W. Wills diary, July 25, 1864, in Mary E. Kellogg, co
mp., Army Life of an Illinois Soldier (Carbondale, Ill.: Southern Illinois University Press, 1996), p. 285. Abda Johnson vehemently denied the spade incident to Wilmer Kurtz, even though he reported it officially right after the battle, naming McGinnis in his summary.

  13 SOR 7, pp. 119–124; Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, p. 228. It should be noted that Colonel Jones placed his brigade strength at “678 muskets, the remainder being on the picket line” (see SOR 7, p. 119). This is a common mode for Confederate reports that enumerates privates and not officers of companies (up to 3 men), and regiments (up to 3 men). The 900 estimate is for rank and file for the brigade and the picket line, adding in an estimate of 2 commissioned officers per company and one per regiment for each of the four regiments to make an equal comparison with Union strength reports.

  14 OR 38 (1), p. 74; OR 38 (2), pp. 516–17, 572, 617; OR 38 (5), p. 319.

  15 OR 38 (3), p. 174; Williams, “Memories of War Times,” Warsaw (Ind.) Daily Times, December 12, 1903.

  16 Tower, ed., A Carolinian Goes to War, p. 228; SOR, pp. 119, 122–23.

  17 “Several Reminiscences. Stories Told of Incidents in Gen. Logan’s Career,” Chicago Tribune, December 27, 1886; William Bakhaus, “The Battle of Atlanta,” The Ohio Soldier, April 27, 1889; John S. Bosworth, “July 22, 1864: Gallantry of Logan, Giles A. Smith and Others on That Terrible Day,” NT, August 7, 1884.

  18 Leggett, “Battle of Atlanta,” pp. 18–19; OR 38 (3), p. 319.

  19 D. Q. M., “Letter From Atlanta,” (Princeton, Ill.) Bureau County Republican, September 1, 1864; “A Veteran,” “Who Recaptured the De Gres [sic] Battery in the Battle Before Atlanta?” NT, June 28, 1883; G. L. Childress, “Degrasse’s [sic] Battery,” NT, September 9, 1885; Adams, “The Battle and Capture of Atlanta,” pp. 156–57.

  20 Thomas J. Shelley, “Atlanta,” NT, September 15, 1887.

  21 OR 38 (3), pp. 305, 342–43, 348, 355–56, 778–80.

  22 OR 38 (3), pp. 217–18.

  23 Committee of the Regiment, The Story of the Fifty-fifth Regiment, p. 341.

  24 SOR (38), pp. 122–23, 127; Gill to his wife, July 23, 1864, in Wiley, “A Story of 3 Southern Officers,” p. 33.

  25 Thomas J. Shelley, “Atlanta,” NT, September 15, 1887; “81st Ohio” [William E. McReary], “DeGress’s [sic] Battery,” NT, July 5, 1888; De Gress to Maurice, July 22, 1864, “Report of the Battle of Atlanta,” Blue & Gray Magazine, pp. 29–30.

  26 Ibid.; “Capture of the DeGress [sic] Battery—The Question Settled,” NT, July 19, 1883.

  27 “A Great War Picture,” Freeport County Standard, July 21, 1886; Lake, “My War Experience,” Lewis F. Lake Papers, ALPL, pp. 9–10; “A Handsome Record of a Chicago Boy,” Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1864.

  28 Gill to his wife, July 23, 1864, in Wiley, “A Story of 3 Southern Officers,” p. 33.

  29 Sixteenth Annual Reunion of the Association of the Graduates of the United States Military Academy (East Saginaw, Mich.: Evening News, 1885), p. 88; Thomas McCunniff, “De Gress’s Battery,” NT, February 2, 1888; Oliver Otis Howard, “The Battles About Atlanta,” Atlantic Monthly Magazine (October–November, 1876), p. 395.

  30 OR 38 (1), p. 74; OR 38 (3), pp. 139, 147.

  31 OR 38 (3), pp. 139–41.

  32 Walker, Tenth Regiment, pp. 115–16; OR 38 (3), p. 118. Manigault placed the casualties for Brown’s division over 1,000. Clayton’s losses are tallied for his three most active brigades (see SOR 38, pp. 120, 126, 129).

  CHAPTER 10—DESPERATION

  1 Davis, Perry, and Kirkley, Official Military Atlas of the Civil War, Plate LVI (No. 6), Plate LXII (No. 3).

  2 OR 38 (3), pp. 547, 565, 573, 583; W. S. Ayres, “The 78th Ohio at Bald Hill,” NT, January 17, 1884.

  3 Higbee, “Personal Recollections of a Line Officer,” p. 322; Munson, “Battle of Atlanta,” pp. 224–28.

  4 Edmund E. Nutt, “Twentieth Ohio at Atlanta,” The Ohio Soldier, July 28, 1894; E. E. Nutt, “Fight at Atlanta,” NT, January 3, 1884; W. L. Wade, “Bald Knob,” NT, July 3, 1884; N. D. Brown, “Who Held Bald Hill?” NT, August 28, 1884.

  5 OR 38 (5), p. 219. This revealing dispatch, published in the Official Records, has been neglected partly because it was misdated by Blair as “July 21.” Although it was corrected to July 22 upon its transcription, it was compiled chronologically with the previous day’s correspondences in the official publication.

  6 “General M. P. Lowrey. An Autobiography,” SHSP XVI (1888), p. 372; Joslyn, ed., Charlotte’s Boys, p. 271; OR 38 (3), pp. 732, 754, 759.

  7 “General M. P. Lowrey. An Autobiography,” SHSP XVI (1888), p. 372; Brown, ed., One of Cleburne’s Command, p. 114; SOR 7 (1), p. 103; OR 38 (3), pp. 732–39.

  8 OR 38 (3), pp. 739, 754; Will Thomas Hale and Dixon Lanier Merritt, A History of Tennessee and Tennesseans Vol. 7 (Chicago and New York: Lewis Publishing Co., 1913), p. 2100; Sam R. Watkins, Co. Aytch, Maury Grays, First Tennessee Regiment (Nashville, Tenn.: Cumberland Presbyterian Publishing House, 1882), p. 151.

  9 OR 38 (3), p. 759.

  10 Walker, Hell’s Broke Loose in Georgia, p. 167; Watkins, Co. Aytch, p. 153; James R. Fleming, The Confederate Ninth Tennessee Infantry (Gretna, La.: Pelican Publishing Co., 2006), pp. 117–18.

  11 OR 38 (3), p. 166.

  12 OR 38 (3), pp. 600, 739–41, 749; F. P. Cander, “Before Atlanta, and the Part That the Eleventh Iowa Played There,” NT, November 8, 1883.

  13 OR 38 (3), p. 741; Dixon diary, Duke University, July 22, 1864. Captain Bourne’s enlistment and regimental information available at: http://www.tngennet.org/civilwar/csainf/csa15.html; http://www.couchgenweb.com/civilwar/3rdinf_regt.html.

  14 Ibid.; Byers, Iowa in War Times, p. 319; OR 38 (3), pp. 599–600; W. L. Wade, “Bald Knob,” NT, July 3, 1884. Wade, the Iowan (Company G), learned Bourne’s name, rank, and unit during a burial detail the next day, but inadvertently altered his name twenty years later as “Capt. F. A. Bohn, Co. B, 3d battalion, CSA.”

  15 OR 38 (3), pp. 740–41.

  16 OR 38 (3), pp. 739–40; Fleming, The Confederate Ninth Tennessee Infantry, p. 119.

  17 Chapman Brothers, Portrait and Biographical Album of Oakland County, Michigan, p. 820.

  18 Munson, “Battle of Atlanta,” p. 228; Fleming, The Confederate Ninth Tennessee Infantry, pp. 119–20; Oldham diary, July 24, 1862.

  19 Munson, “Battle of Atlanta,” p. 228.

  20 Joslyn, Charlotte’s Boys, p. 271; “The Story of the 54th Georgia’s Flag,” in Richmond Whig, August 24, 1864.

  21 OR 38 (3), pp. 754, 756.

  22 Christopher Losson, Tennessee’s Forgotten Warriors: Frank Cheatham and His Confederate Division (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 1989), p. 183; E. E. Nutt, “Fight at Atlanta,” NT, January 3, 1884.

  23 Dwight, “How We Fight at Atlanta,” p. 666; W. S. Ayres, “The 78th Ohio at Bald Hill,” NT, January 17, 1884; E. E. Nutt, “Fight at Atlanta,” NT, January 3, 1884.

  24 J. P. Ross, “July 22, 1864,” NT, April 14, 1892.

  25 Leggett, “The Flag of the Seventy-eighth,” http://www.ohiocivilwar.com/stori/78flag.html; Dwight, “How We Fight at Atlanta,” p. 666; Leggett, “Battle of Atlanta,” p. 27.

  26 Eli Detwiler letter published in Aledo Weekly Record, August 24, 1864; “The Battle Flag of the Thirtieth Illinois…,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society Vol. 4 (April, 1911–January, 1912), pp. 493–96; McDonald, History of the 30th Illinois, Sparta News, 1916, transcribed on http://home.comcast.net/~30il/mcdonald.html.

  27 Captain Elliott quote in Chapman Brothers, Portrait and Biographical Album of Oakland County, Michigan, p. 820.

  28 Edmund E. Nutt, “Twentieth Ohio at Atlanta,” The Ohio Soldier, July 28, 1894; E. E. Nutt, “Fight at Atlanta,” NT, January 3, 1884; W. L. Wade, “Bald Knob,” NT, July 3, 1884; OR 38 (3), pp. 594–95, 600.

  29 OR 38 (3), pp. 747, 750.

  30 Cander, “Before Atlanta,” NT, November 8, 1883; Edmund E. Nutt, “Twentieth Ohio at Atlanta,” The Oh
io Soldier, July 28, 1894; George Mercer diary, July 22, 1864, in Walker, Hell’s Broke Loose in Georgia, p. 168; OR 38 (3), pp. 740, 754.

  31 William J. Worsham, Old Nineteenth Tennessee Regiment, C.S.A. (Knoxville, Tenn.: Paragon Printing Co., 1902), p. 129; Castel, Decision in the West, p. 409; OR 38 (3), pp. 741, 756. Worsham states a brigade loss of 140 (p. 129). This figure appears suspiciously low based on the ferocity of their fight on the knoll, particularly when the killed and wounded (not including captured) of Maney’s division exceeded 600 and Walker’s brigade was more imperiled than the other three brigades of the division. (See “Grand Summary of Casualties in Cheatham’s Division,” Cheatham Papers, TSLA.)

  32 OR 38 (3), pp. 550, 600; Wesley Craig to the editor, July 25, 1864, Warren (Ohio) Chronicle, August 10, 1864; Detwiler letter, Aledo Weekly Record, August 24, 1864; George E. Welles, “List of Casualties in 68th O.V.I,” Daily Toledo Blade, August 2, 1864; John P. Ross to the editor, July 23, 1864, (Cambridge, Ohio) Guernsey Times, August 4, 1864; Ayres, “The 78th Ohio at Bald Hill,” NT, January 17, 1884.

  33 OR 38 (5), p. 232.

  34 OR 38 (5), p. 900; New York Herald, July 29, 1864.

  35 William F. Neubert to Guido Marx, July 25, 1864, Daily Toledo Blade, August 2, 1864.

  CHAPTER 11—IMPACT

  1 R. C. Carden, “The Old Confederate’s Story,” Boone (Iowa) Independent, May 31, 1912, http://bellsouthpwp.net/C/a/CanCofHist/coffee/carden.htm; William P. Howell, “History of the 25th Alabama Infantry Regiment,” Alabama Department of Archives and History, Montgomery, Alabama, http://home.earthlink.net/~sdriskell/25th/25th.htm; Fuller, “A Terrible Day,” NT, April 16, 1885; Henry O. Dwight Sketch Album, Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio.

  2 Foster reminiscences, July 23, 1864, in Brown, ed., One of Cleburne’s Command, p. 115.

  3 F. G. De F., “From the Army of Tennessee,” Columbus Daily Sun, July 29, 1864; Black to his wife, July 26, 1864, in Frano, ed., Letters of Captain Hugh Black, p. 68.

  4 Yeary, Reminiscences of the Boys in Gray, p. 809; Key diary, July 23, 1864, in Cate, ed., Two Soldiers, p. 99; Fleming, The Confederate Ninth Tennessee Infantry, p. 122; William Jennings diary, July 23, 1864, http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~ialcgs/mifflinj.htm.