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

by Sam Watkins

  19. Sam's memory is faulty. At the time, the 1st Tennessee was part of General W. W. Loring's Army of the Northwest. For a time, Loring's army included a brigadier named Henry Jackson, who left to take command of state troops in Georgia. Lee was sent to advise Loring and two smaller commands to the southwest under Henry Wise and John B. Floyd, who were former Virginia governors.. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson was not part of the Cheat Mountain operation, although Loring (and Sam) would join Stonewall in December.

  20. The “long-roll” was a drummer's signal prompting all soldiers to grab their weapons in anticipation of imminent attack.

  21. There was little fighting at the battle of Cheat Mountain. A flanking Confederate force under General Albert Rust that was to trigger a general assault abandoned the effort, with the result that none of the other Confederate units attacked either. Federals from the fortress atop Cheat Mountain sent several units to probe the Rebels, and Sam's company must have run into one of them. General Lee's son, Rooney, also encountered a similar ambush but escaped.

  22. Lee and Stonewall Jackson were not simultaneously assigned to an army whose command included the 1st Tennessee Regiment. Lee left (present-day) West Virginia for Richmond in October 1861. Newly promoted Major General Stonewall Jackson arrived in Winchester, Virginia, to assume command of the Valley District on November 4, 1861. Thereafter, Loring's command, including the 1st Tennessee, was merged into Stonewall Jackson's army, which was not fully assembled until Christmas 1861.

  23. This comment is actually attributed to Union General Philip Sheridan. General Joseph “Fighting Joe” Hooker was not involved in the Shenandoah Valley campaigns.

  24. Sam Watkins died at sixty-two in 1901. While death at such an age was common among men at that time, it is possible his life span was cut short as a result of the hardships endured during the war.

  25. As a congressman from Massachusetts, Nathaniel Banks was a former speaker of the US House of Representatives who became a Union general commonly classified as a “political appointee.” When Watkins was at Romney, Banks was the federal commander on the Upper Potomac River. Union General George Meade was a West Point graduate who later commanded the federal army at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, which was the war's largest battle. At the time Watkins was included in Stonewall Jackson's unit, Meade commanded a brigade of Pennsylvanians who were also stationed in the area.

  26. Romney was a bitter experience for troops under Stonewall Jackson. Many straggled with frostbite and pneumonia. When Brigadier General Richard Garnett permitted his troops (the famous Stonewall Brigade commanded by Jackson himself at First Bull Run) to stop and cook rations, Jackson ordered Garnett court-martialed. Garnet would die at Gettysburg, conspicuously mounted during Pickett's charge, trying to restore his reputation.

  General Loring, whose Army of the Northwest was incorporated into Jackson's command the previous month and included Watkins's 1st Tennessee Regiment, complained directly to Richmond. He objected to Jackson's orders requiring him to spend the winter in remote and inhospitable Romney, while Jackson was camped in more agreeable Winchester. Consequently, Secretary of War Judah Benjamin instructed Jackson to also station Loring's troops in Winchester. The affair prompted Jackson to submit his resignation, which was not accepted. In short, Watkins's claim that the troops were nearly ready to revolt against Jackson was not an exaggeration.

  Jackson's reputation preceded his army, and the Union forces abandoned Romney. They retreated to the Maryland side of the Potomac River. Although Jackson wanted to pursue them, he was actually outnumbered, and the prospect was too dangerous. Nonetheless, Watkins is correct to comment that Jackson's own troops were also unwilling.

  27. The term “Dutchman” was a vernacular name for German immigrants. It was a corruption of the German word “Deutsche” (“German”).

  28. Sam's memory is wrong. The march to Bath preceded the march to Romney. Jackson wanted to clear the federal troops from his right flank at Bath before attacking Romney. The battle of Bath was not much of a fight. The federals quickly retreated across the Potomac to safety on the Maryland side. Nonetheless, the weather was harsh. It was January, and Bath (then in Virginia, now West Virginia) is only about five miles south of the Pennsylvania state line across the narrow western neck of Maryland.

  29. Confederate General William Hardee was earlier commandant of cadets at West Point and author of a book on tactics. The reference to Scott presumably is to General Winfield Scott, who was general-in-chief of the Union army early in the war.

  30. Later the 3rd Arkansas would become part of General John Bell Hood's famous Texas Brigade of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. That army had representatives from every Southern state. The 3rd Arkansas was the only regiment within it from the state. Arkansas was the second least populous state of the Confederacy, trailed only by Florida.

  31. This was a serious matter because the guards (pickets) were relied on to prevent sleeping bivouacked soldiers from being attacked by surprise.

  32. This seems like a tall tale. Admittedly, there's plenty of evidence that the winter was cold, and the elevation in the area is around twelve hundred feet. Moreover, it is factual that the 3rd Arkansas and 14th Georgia were among the regiments in the region. But the editor can find no corroborating evidence of the incident Watkins describes.

  33. The regiment was ordered to return to Tennessee on February 14, 1862.

  TWO

  SHILOH

  THIS WAS THE FIRST BIG BATTLE in which our regiment had ever been engaged. I do not pretend to tell of what command distinguished itself; of heroes; of blood and wounds; of shrieks and groans; of brilliant charges; of cannon captured, etc. I was but a private soldier, and if I happened to look to see if I could find out anything, “Eyes right, guide center,” was the order. “Close up, guide right, halt, forward, right oblique, left oblique, halt, forward, guide center, eyes right, dress up promptly in the rear, steady, double quick, charge bayonets, fire at will,” is about all that a private soldier ever knows of a battle.1

  He can see the smoke rise and the flash of the enemy's guns, and he can hear the whistle of the minnie and cannon balls, but he has got to load and shoot as hard as he can tear and ram cartridge, or he will soon find out, like the Irishman who had been shooting blank cartridges, when a ball happened to strike him, and he halloed out, “Faith, Pat, and be jabbers, them fellows are shooting bullets.” But I nevertheless remember many things that came under my observation in this battle. I remember a man by the name of Smith stepping deliberately out of the ranks and shooting his finger off to keep out of the fight; of another poor fellow who was accidentally shot and killed by the discharge of another person's gun, and of others suddenly taken sick with colic.

  Our regiment was the advance guard on Saturday evening, and did a little skirmishing; but General Gladden's brigade passed us and assumed a position in our immediate front. About daylight on Sunday morning, Chalmers' brigade relieved Gladden's. As Gladden rode by us, a courier rode up and told him something. I do not know what it was, but I heard Gladden say, “Tell General Bragg that I have as keen a scent for Yankees as General Chalmers has.”

  On Sunday morning, a clear, beautiful, and still day, the order was given for the whole army to advance, and to attack immediately. We were supporting an Alabama brigade. The fire opened—bang, bang, bang, a rattle de bang, bang, bang, a boom, de bang, bang, bang, boom, bang, boom, bang, boom, bang, boom, bang, boom, whirr-siz-siz-siz—a ripping, roaring boom, bang! The air was full of balls and deadly missiles. The litter corps was carrying off the dying and wounded. We could hear the shout of the charge and the incessant roar of the guns, the rattle of the musketry, and knew that the contending forces were engaged in a breast to breast struggle. But cheering news continued to come back.

  Every one who passed would be hailed with, “Well, what news from the front?” “Well, boys, we are driving ’em. We have captured all their encampments, everything that they had, and all their provisions and army s
tores, and everything.”2

  As we were advancing to the attack and to support the Alabama brigade in our front, and which had given way and were stricken with fear, some of the boys of our regiment would laugh at them, and ask what they were running for, and would commence to say “Flicker! Flicker! Flicker!” like the bird called the yellowhammer, “Flicker! Flicker! Flicker!” As we advanced, on the edge of the battlefield, we saw a big fat colonel of the 23rd Tennessee regiment badly wounded, whose name, if I remember correctly, was Matt. Martin. He said to us, “Give ‘em goss, boys. That's right, my brave First Tennessee. Give ‘em Hail Columbia!” We halted but a moment, and said I, “Colonel, where are you wounded?” He answered in a deep bass voice, “My son, I am wounded in the arm, in the leg, in the head, in the body, and in another place which I have a delicacy in mentioning.” That is what the gallant old Colonel said.

  Advancing a little further on, we saw General Albert Sidney Johnston surrounded by his staff and Governor Harris, of Tennessee. We saw some little commotion among those who surrounded him, but we did not know at the time that he was dead. The fact was kept from the troops.3

  About noon a courier dashed up and ordered us to go forward and support General Bragg's center. We had to pass over the ground where troops had been fighting all day.

  I had heard and read of battlefields, seen pictures of battlefields, of horses and men, of cannon and wagons, all jumbled together, while the ground was strewn with dead and dying and wounded, but I must confess that I never realized the “pomp and circumstance” of the thing called glorious war until I saw this. Men were lying in every conceivable position; the dead lying with their eyes wide open, the wounded begging piteously for help, and some waving their hats and shouting to us to go forward. It all seemed to me a dream; I seemed to be in a sort of haze, when siz, siz, siz, the minnie balls from the Yankee line began to whistle around our ears, and I thought of the Irishman when he said, “Sure enough, those fellows are shooting bullets!”

  Down would drop first one fellow and then another, either killed or wounded, when we were ordered to charge bayonets. I had been feeling mean all the morning as if I had stolen a sheep, but when the order to charge was given, I got happy. I felt happier than a fellow does when he professes religion at a big Methodist camp-meeting. I shouted. It was fun then. Everybody looked happy. We were crowding them. One more charge, then their lines waver and break. They retreat in wild confusion. We were jubilant; we were triumphant. Officers could not curb the men to keep in line. Discharge after discharge was poured into the retreating line. The Federal dead and wounded covered the ground.4

  When in the very midst of our victory, here comes an order to halt. What! Halt after today's victory? Sidney Johnston killed, General Gladden killed, and a host of generals and other brave men killed, and the whole Yankee army in full retreat.

  These four letters, h-a-l-t, O, how harsh they did break upon our ears. The victory was complete, but the word “halt” turned victory into defeat.5

  The soldiers had passed through the Yankee camps and saw all the good things that they had to eat in their sutlers' stores and officers' marquees, and it was but a short time before every soldier was rummaging to see what he could find.

  The harvest was great and the laborers were not few.

  The Negro boys, who were with their young masters as servants, got rich. Greenbacks were plentiful, good clothes were plentiful, rations were not in demand. The boys were in clover.

  This was Sunday.

  On Monday the tide was reversed.

  Now, those Yankees were whipped, fairly whipped, and according to all the rules of war they ought to have retreated. But they didn't. Flushed with their victories at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson and the capture of Nashville, and the whole State of Tennessee having fallen into their hands, victory was again to perch upon their banners, for Buell's army, by forced marches, had come to Grant's assistance at the eleventh hour.

  Gunboats and transports were busily crossing Buell's army all of Sunday night. We could hear their boats ringing their bells, and hear the puff of smoke and steam from their boilers. Our regiment was the advance outpost, and we saw the skirmish line of the Federals advancing and then their main line and then their artillery. We made a good fight on Monday morning, and I was taken by surprise when the order came for us to retreat instead of advance. But as I said before, reader, a private soldier is but an automaton, and knows nothing of what is going on among the generals, and I am only giving the chronicles of little things and events that came under my own observation as I saw them then and remember them now. Should you desire to find out more about the battle, I refer you to history.

  One incident I recollect very well. A Yankee colonel, riding a fine gray mare, was sitting on his horse looking at our advance as if we were on review. W. H. rushed forward and grabbed his horse by the bridle, telling him at the same time to surrender. The Yankee seized the reins, set himself back in the saddle, put the muzzle of his pistol in W. H.’s face and fired. About the time he pulled trigger, a stray ball from some direction struck him in the side and he fell off dead, and his horse becoming frightened, galloped off, dragging him through the Confederate lines. His pistol had missed its aim.

  I have heard hundreds of old soldiers tell of the amount of greenback money6 they saw and picked up on the battlefield of Shiloh, but they thought it valueless and did not trouble themselves with bringing it off with them.

  One fellow, a courier, who had had his horse killed, got on a mule he had captured, and in the last charge, before the final and fatal halt was made, just charged right ahead by his lone self, and the soldiers said, “Just look at that brave man, charging right in the jaws of death.” He began to seesaw the mule and grit his teeth, and finally yelled out, “It arn't me, boys, it's this blarsted old mule. Whoa! Whoa!”

  On Monday morning I too captured me a mule. He was not a fast mule, and I soon found out that he thought he knew as much as I did. He was wise in his own conceit. He had a propensity to take every hog path he came to. All the bombasting that I could give him would not make him accelerate his speed. If blood makes speed, I do not suppose he had a drop of any kind in him. If I wanted him to go on one side of the road he was sure to be possessed of an equal desire to go on the other side. Finally I and my mule fell out. I got a big hickory and would frail him over the head, and he would only shake his head and flop his ears, and seem to say, “Well, now, you think you are smart, don't you?”

  He was a resolute mule, slow to anger, and would have made an excellent merchant to refuse bad pay, or I will pay your credit, for his whole composition seemed to be made up the one word—“no.” I frequently thought it would be pleasant to split the difference with that mule, and I would gladly have done so if I could have gotten one-half of his “no.” Me and mule worried along until we came to a creek. Mule did not desire to cross, while I was trying to persuade him with a big stick, a rock in his ear, and a twister on his nose. The caisson of a battery was about to cross. The driver said, “I'll take your mule over for you.” So he got a large two-inch rope, tied one end around the mule's neck and the other to the caisson, and ordered the driver to whip up.

  The mule was loath to take to the water. He was no Baptist, and did not believe in immersion, and had his views about crossing streams, but the rope began to tighten, the mule to squeal out his protestations against such villainous proceedings. The rope, however, was stronger than the mule's “no,” and he was finally prevailed upon by the strength of the rope to cross the creek. On my taking the rope off he shook himself and seemed to say, “You think that you are mighty smart folks, but you are a leetle too smart.” I gave it up that that mule's “no” was a little stronger than my determination. He seemed to be in deep meditation. I got on him again, when all of a sudden he lifted his head, pricked up his ears, began to champ his bit, gave a little squeal, got a little faster, and finally into a gallop and then a run. He seemed all at once to have remembered or to have f
orgotten something, and was now making up for lost time. With all my pulling and seesawing and strength I could not stop him until he brought up with me at Corinth, Mississippi.

  * * *

  1. Shiloh was the first massive battle of the war. Casualties were over five times greater than in any previous battle. It was fought on Sunday and Monday, April 6 and 7,1862. The battle was prompted by the collapse of Confederate defenses in Kentucky and northern Tennessee, culminating in the capture of the Confederate garrison at Fort Donelson by Grant on February 16.

  The surrender of Donelson left Tennessee's state capital of Nashville indefensible. Union gunboats could freely steam up the Cumberland River and take the city under fire with impunity. As a result, the Confederate theater commander, General Albert Sidney Johnston, decided to concentrate Confederate forces in northern Mississippi where he could launch an attack against the Donelson victors.

  Grant's army was about twenty-five miles north, unwisely bivouacked about on the western bank of the Tennessee River. He was awaiting reinforcements from the Union Army of Ohio that had occupied Nashville after the Confederates abandoned the city. However, the Army of Ohio, under General Don Carlos Buell, would need to first cross from the east bank of the Tennessee River to the west side. Thus, the Confederates decided to attack Grant before Buell arrived.

  Since it was early in the war, both armies had little experience. Nonetheless, despite a clumsy advance, the Confederate attack took Grant by surprise. Fortunately for the federals, General Buell was able to arrive with reinforcements toward the end of the first day. He maintained a steady stream of reinforcements throughout the ensuing night.