Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 16.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

Incidents of the skirmish at Totopotomoy Creek, Hanover county, Virginia, May 30, 1864.

By T. C. Morton, late Captain Company F, Twenty-sixth Virginia Battalion of Infantry.

It was about dark, on the 30th of May, 1864, that the Twenty-sixth Virginia battalion, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel George M. Edgar, to which my company (F) belonged, was drawn up in line on a hill in a cultivated cornfield, above a small creek called Totopotomoy, and not far from Atlee's station on the railroad between Hanover Junction and Richmond, Virginia. Our command was attached to Breckenridge's division, and we had a battery in line on our right, commanded by Major (now Judge) William Mc-Laughlin. Soon after getting in position, orders came for us to throw up breastworks in our front. There were few, if any, spades or shovels, but the men realizing the necessity for the order, as a heavy force was immediately in our front, split their canteens, making scoops of them, and, together with their bayonets and their hands, for the soil was light and sandy, soon had a very respectable earthwork thrown up, and, lying down behind it, it was not long before we were all sleeping soundly.

The next day we remained in that position, but the morning after I received orders to take my company to the foot of the hill and [48] occupy the picket line near the creek. Captain Pratt, from Derrick's battalion, was on my left, and Captain Swann, from ours (Edgar's), was on my right. The men concealed themselves behind trees, stumps and logs, or constructed hasty rifle-pits, and the enemy's picket line being on the opposite side of the creek, only partially concealed among the scrubby pines and broom sedge, the opposing lines soon commenced a desultory fire upon each other, and it was not long before the artillery of the two forces engaged in the fight.

This cannonading soon grew heavy, and other batteries joining in from the opposite side, we found ourselves the centre of the most furious cannonading we had ever before experienced. There was no advance made by the infantry of either force during this heavy artillery duel, but it seemed as if all the gun and mortar batteries in Grant's army had been let loose on Breckenridge's devoted division. His few batteries responded with spirit, and returned the fire until they were badly crippled, while the infantry—not being brought into action and having nothing to do—cowered for protection from the death-dealing shot and shell in the piece of woods on our left, and behind every available defense. Many were killed and maimed, but the troops were not dislodged from their position.

We ascertained afterwards that General Breckenridge, having taken his position after dark, had by some mistake gotten nearly a mile beyond the alignment of Lee's line of battle and was drawn up within long rifle range of the enemy, who at that point consisted of Hancock's corps. So it was, that when daylight disclosed our position to the enemy he concentrated the fire of his heavy guns on Breckenridge, who found himself the centre of a long line of artillery practice, while the other batteries of Lee were not near enough to render their support of much assistance.

I do not know what our loss was in this artillery fight, only recollect that two men in my own company were killed. One of them while lying down was struck on the back by a large piece of descending shell and cut in two, poor fellow. The other had gone to the rear a mile with a detail to cook and was on his way back to the line with a camp-kettle full of corn-bread and beef on his arm when the cannonading commenced. He ran towards the breastworks for protection, while the hungry men in the trenches watched his race through the ploughing shot and shell, almost as solicitous for the safety of their breakfast, perhaps, as for that of their comrade. Just before the poor fellow reached us, however, a shell exploded directly in front of him, and when the smoke cleared away the bloody fragments [49] of the man and the scattered contents of the camp-kettle lay mingled together on the ground before our eyes. It is said that from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaketh, but on this occasion speech came from the emptiness of one poor soldier's stomach, when looking upon the ghastly wreck before us, he exclaimed: ‘Lora, boys, just look, Joe Flint is all mixed up with our breakfast, and it aint fit for nothing!’ Such want of sentiment, or feeling if you like, sounds strange and heartless to us now, but in those times of courage and every-day suffering, the hungry soldier's remark, finding an echo in the empty stomachs of his fellows, did not seem so much out of place.

Another incident I recollect as very characteristic of those times. There was in Company F a man by the name of Ford, who was so disfigured by a hump that his position in the company line always interfered with its proper dressing, and I generally left him in quarters when I wished the company to appear at its best.

Before this shelling of our position commenced, John Ford had been placed on the advanced picket line and his position happened to be in a sandy bottom near the creek, where he had sheltered himself behind an uprooted tree. He could be plainly seen by many of the men, crouching low in the sand. In the midst of the cannonading a large mortar shell without exploding, fell in the sand a few feet from him, the fuse still smoking and spitting and an explosion momentarily imminent. John took in the situation at a glance, and doubtless arguing that if he jumped up to run, the shell might explode before he got out of reach and tear him to pieces, and that the safest thing for him to do was to get down into the ground, commenced at once to work down into the sand with hands, legs and head. My attention was attracted by the men hollering ‘scratch John! scratch! she's a going off!’ and looking in the direction where I had last seen him, I witnessed an amusing spectacle. Never was a man more dead in earnest. The sand all around him was in commotion, and in the few seconds that the fizzing fuse gave him, he burrowed like a great gopher till nothing but the top of his hump could be seen as the loose sand settled around it. I held my breath expecting the next second to see the poor fellow blown to atoms. Then the explosion came with a tremendous jar that shook the ground and sent a hundred pieces of iron singing through the air. We all kept our eyes fixed upon the spot as the smoke and dust slowly lifted, when the first sight that came to view was the head of Ford, happily, still on his shoulders, and as he realized that he was [50] all right, he looked back at us and sang out ‘Who-eeh’ as cheerily as if he had treed a coon instead of been face to face with death a second before. An answering cheer and a laugh went up from the boys on the line, and the incident was the next minute forgotten.

Just before the shelling commenced, I was sitting on the ground among some low bushes with pencil and paper, writing upon my knee what I thought might be my last letter to my wife. The pickets had been for some time keeping up a dropping and uninteresting fire as they would catch a glimpse of each other. Presently, one after another, two or three minies dropped in the bushes near, and as each one seemed to cut a little closer, I thought a sharpshooter with a telescopic rifle, which we understood the ‘Yankees’ were using, had perhaps been attracted by my white paper and it would be safest to move. I did so, and getting up leaned against an oak tree, something larger than my body, which stood near, but the next minute I thought the earth had opened and that I and the tree were falling into it. As soon as I could shake myself together and rub some burnt powder out of my eyes, I realised that a shell had burst against the tree right behind me, the pieces striking the ground all around, throwing sand and leaves all over me. The concussion was so great, that I had to pass a hand over each limb and feel myself all over before I could be sure that I was not wounded, during which investigation Lieutenant Cowley ran up and congratulated me on being alive, saying that as he knew where I had been sitting a minute before and hearing the shell explode at the spot, he had come expecting ‘to pick up what was left of me.’

After that fierce artillery duel was over, there was no further passage at arms between the opposing forces on this part of the line, except the continuous but irregular firing between the pickets, which lasted until it got too dark to see.

And now we on the picket line—tired out with the constant activity of the day and the cramped position which most of the time we were forced to keep in the narrow, single rifle-pits—looked anxiously for the appearance of the ‘relief.’ Independently of the physical strain that the picket has to endure, the sense of responsibility, as he feels himself to be the eyes and ears of the army, is an intense mental tax, that no one but he who has experienced it can realize.

But there was no rest for us that night. Instead of the ‘relief’ came an orderly with a squad heavily loaded with ammunition, and these were the orders he brought: Said he, ‘Colonel Edgar says you are to keep your company on the picket line all night, [51] keep a close watch on the enemy, and in the morning annoy him all you can, and try to keep up the impression that our command is in the breastworks, still on the top of the hill above you, but we will not be there. General Breckinridge has discovered that his division is out of line nearly a mile too far to the front, and he is going to retire it at once, and in order that we may have time to fortify our new position he directs that you carry out your part of the ruse he is going to play on the enemy, by fighting as though the main body were directly in your rear, and that you hold your position until the enemy forces you out of it.’ ‘And what then?’ said I. ‘Well, he says when you can't stay here any longer, you must get back to the command the best way you can, and I have brought you sixty rounds of extra ammunition to do your extra fighting with.’ ‘Are we to have any reinforcements, sergeant?’ ‘No, sir. I reckon General Lee thinks he can't afford to lose any more men than he has out here on this picket line now.’ And so we were in for it, and after making things as snug as circumstances would admit of, I sat down in my rifle-pit and began to think of home, and wife and children, whom I never expected to see again. For what chance could two hundred or so of men have in retreating a mile across open fields with Hancock's whole corps right after them and on them? for we had to stay in our rifle-pits until they drove us out. As I sat there thinking, as I had never thought before, for never had death seemed so near, I heard a familiar voice in the dark calling my name in a low tone, for the enemy's line was within ear-shot. Answering in the same tone, Captain John Swann, whose company was on my right, came up and asked me ‘What orders I had?’ I told him. ‘I have the same d——n orders,’ said he. ‘We'll all be in hell or Boston before to-morrow night. What matter is that? We won't be missed down here,’ he went on to say. ‘General Lee will report to-morrow night that in the morning he had had a skirmish in his front, his pickets engaging the enemy on Taylor's farm, and only lost about two hundred killed and missing.’ That's all of us, you know, but we aren't hardly worth counting down here among all these men.

After talking over the situation and trying to arrange for some plan of concerted action with Captain Pratt, of Derrick's battalion, whose company was also in line on my left, we parted, and soon after, squatting in my rifle-pit, I was fast asleep, nor did I awake till the noise of an exploding shell near aroused me to find the sun [52] shining brightly in my face as my head rested on the edge of the pit where I sat, while a Yankee gunner seemed to be practicing on different points along our line.

Having no artillery with which to reply, we made no answer to that challenge, but after a while some of the enemy's infantry began to show themselves incautiously, and we let them have it with our long range rifles, and a brisk fire opened from the rifle-pits on both sides, which lasted, with some intermission, for several hours.

Finally, the enemy concluded he would try the tactics of the day before, and commenced shelling with great fury our empty breastworks on the top of the hill behind us. Getting no response from the empty fortifications, after a good deal of waste of ammunition, the fire slackened and there was a lull all along both lines.

Just then occurred one of those episodes in the conflict peculiar, I believe, to that civil war of ours, and showing that the men who fought it were akin, despite all the blood that was shed. Looking far down the line to my right, I saw a Confederate walking boldly down the hill towards the creek carrying a white rag aloft on a stick. Startled, I called to a lieutenant and asked what that meant. Said he, ‘I don't understand it; he is not one of our company.’ In another moment, however, it was all plain. A ‘Yank’ was seen advancing to meet the ‘Johnny,’ as they called our boys, also carrying a white flag, and they were ‘on a trade.’ I understood afterwards, that during the lull in the firing one of the enemy's pickets had called across to his vis-a-vis. ‘Hello, Johnny! Got any good tobacco?’ ‘Yes; good as you ever chawed!’ ‘How'll you swap for some first-class Rio?’ ‘All right.’ ‘Well, meet meat the creek, and don't you fellows shoot till I get back, and we won't either.’ So the swap was made, whether with the consent of any officer, I never knew, but I dreaded the consequences of letting the Federal soldier get that near to our line, lest he should spy out its thinness. The whole thing may have been concocted on that side with that very end in view, for soon after the men had returned to their posts, there was an unusual stir among them over in the pines. Loud commands could be heard, and we could catch glimpses of moving lines of men in blue, which seemed to thicken near the edge of the ‘piney woods.’

At last a lieutenant near me cried, ‘There they come! get ready for them, boys!’ I called out, ‘And don't fire until you see their eyes!’ Soon a long, close battle-line, several ranks deep, moved out of the cover and marched rapidly down the hill toward the creek. [53] When they got nearly to the brush, which lined the creek's banks, a well-directed fire blazed all along our line of rifle-pits. Every man had taken dead aim, and almost the whole front rank of the enemy went down. The confusion among them was great. They struggled forward a few paces, only to receive another rattling volley, and then broke and ran back to the shelter of the pines, followed by the yells and cheers of our brave fellows. Again there was a lull in the firing, and we could distinctly hear the officers berating their men in the pines for giving away before a picket line. Oaths, and even sabre blows, could be plainly distinguished as the lines were reformed, and we knew we were to have it again very soon, and prepared for the tug of war which it was plain was now upon us.

Forward! Forward! March!

were the orders we heard repeated from many voices along their concealed line, and then out of the thicket they burst. ‘Double-quick!’ and down the hill they swept in a long trot, many, many times our numbers. When they reached the ‘dead line’ we again poured a well directed fire into their ranks. Scores fell in their tracks, but they answered with another volley, a huzzah that went to our hearts, and plunged into the brush and through the creek; no stop now, and on our side they came, and now it was plain that the time when we ‘could not stand any longer and must retreat’ had come. ‘Retreat! Retreat!’ rang out along our long, thin line. The boys hustled out of their pits and away they scampered up the hill, pursued by the yelling enemy and volleys of ball. Many fell, but the others pressed on to the top of the hill, paused in our old breastworks to turn round and give them a parting volley and then pushed on again across the wide level towards the distant wood where our division lay—by this time well entrenched. But now, as ill-luck would have it, danger appeared from a new direction. The enemy, under the cover of the piece of wood on our left, had sent a force around with a battery and flanked us, and had we been a few minutes later abandoning our position they would have been in our rear and bagged the whole force. As it was, they poured a galling fire into our flank, while the batteries from the hills in our late front, now our rear, opened on us to add to our discomfiture. Thus, admidst the whistle of minies, the bursting of shells and the whir of grape, we made our perilous way over the open fields. Our only chance was to make a show of resistance, by loading as we ran, facing about and firing back at our pursuing foe, while the thinness and irregularity of our line was in our favor, for it took a good shot to bring down one of our men, and we had a comparatively close [54] line to fire into. Nevertheless, what between the fire of the enemy and the fatigue of the retreat, we lost at every step, and when at last we dragged ourselves up to the welcome breastwork (I thought it was the dearest pile of logs and dirt I had ever beheld), it was a fearfully thinned line that climbed over and flung itself down bleeding and panting behind that grateful shelter. But General Lee's object had been accomplished. Breckenridge's command was aligned with the rest of the army, and his front was strongly fortified and well manned from right to left, and though, as Captain Swann had predicted the night before, many of our men had fought their last fight and others were on their way to Boston, Grant was again checkmated and had to attack us in our fortified position or move his whole army again to the left, which he did. And so it was that there was only some heavy skirmishing in our front that day, from which Companies A and F were excused on account of the hot morning's work, but which resulted in the capture of the enemy's picket line, which, when they ran us in, had advanced too close to our line and taken position in some rifle-pits. We sat upon the breastwork to the right of the point where the scrimmage took place, and with indescribable satisfaction and restfulness watched our boys charge our late antagonists in their pits and gather them in.

That night we slept on our arms, and the next day moved again to our right to prevent Grant's flanking, and helping him to carry out his threat and ‘fight it out on that line if it did take all summer.’

It was probably two days after this, during which we were constantly moving and halting, forming line of battle, sleeping on our arms, breaking the line and moving again, when we brought up in front of Cold Harbor one afternoon, the 2d of June. From all the signs which a soldier soon learns, it was evident that we were upon the eve of a great battle. The massing of troops, the placing of batteries, the hurrying of staff-officers, the galloping to and fro of couriers and orderlies, and the something indescribable in the faces of the general officers, meant business as plainly as if it had been spoken.

Five officers, friends in Edgar's battalion, Captain Read, Captain Swann, Adjutant Craig, Lieutenant Patton and myself, had met under the shade of a small tree, and lying around on the grass discussed the situation. Finally, I remarked, ‘Well fellows, we are in for a big fight, no doubt of it, and I would give my left leg now if I could have my life guaranteed.’ ‘So would I,’ said Captain Read. ‘I would give my left arm,’ said Lieutenant Patton. ‘They might [55] have the tip of my ear, darn 'em,’ said Captain Swann. ‘Well,’ remarked the Adjutant, ‘I'll take my chances, fellows, I wouldn't give the ‘Yanks’ the tip of my finger-nail to let me off from anything.’

Well, as all the world knows, the next day, the 3d of June, 1864, was fought the great battle of second Cold Harbor, one of the bloodiest of the war, and in the summing up it turned out that every one of these five officers had been shot—Read in the leg, Morton in the head, Patton in the body, Swann on the side of the head, sure enough losing the tip of his ear, while poor Craig was the only one killed. Strange, wasn't it?

The afternoon before the battle, our command was ordered to take position in line. A force of dismounted cavalry occupied the field, and were lying behind a low ridge of earth they had hastily thrown up to protect themselves from the enemy's sharpshooters. We were ordered to relieve them, which we did, under a galling fire from concealed riflemen. Again was our position unfortunately chosen, being too far back from the brow of the slight eminence where we were posted, and an angle or salient about the centre of the line occupied by Edgar's battalion was thrown too far forward and exposed our part of the line to a concentrated fire from the enemy. But we now had to make the most of it and stand or fall where we were.

No sooner had we settled ourselves in our position than our men, who were handy with dirt—being most of them farmers and laboring men—set themselves to strengthening our breastworks, and it was not long before they presented a pretty fair protection against the constant fire from the enemy's pickets and sharp shooters, who were strongly posted in a piece of wood land immediately in our front. So galling did this fire become, that Colonel Edgar determined to dislodge the force of pickets if possible, and ordered out a skirmish line consisting of two companies, Company B, Captain E. J. Read's, being one. I do not recollect the other. But they met such a well-directed fire from the protected enemy, that they could not proceed far, and had to throw themselves flat upon the ground and behind logs and stumps to escape annihilation. One by one they made their way back to the breastworks, many of them wounded and several left dead in the timber; among the wounded were Captain Read and Lieutenant Patton.

The day wore on, the sun was getting down in the west, and the enemy were evidently massing in our front, while his sharpshooters [56] were so vigilant and expert at their business that a head could hardly show itself above our earthwork without getting a ball through it. A hat put on a ramrod and raised a little would be perforated in a jiffy. It was evident that the enemy was thus endeavoring to prevent his movements from being seen, and I felt sure that he was massing troops under the hill in the woods, with the design of charging our exposed position, and determined to risk a peep at them. I ordered the men to keep low while I cautiously raised my head, and at one quick glance saw a heavy column of men in blue flanking towards our left, though partially concealed by the timber. At the same time I saw a puff of smoke issue from behind a big pine, perhaps four hundred yards in my front. I instantly ducked my head; the next second a minie-ball cut the dirt just behind me. Satisfied that the fellow was far enough away for me to dodge his ball by the flash of his gun, I again raised my head, took a good, long look, and saw more troops moving to the left, but another puff of smoke warned me to duck again, and again a ball cut the earth where my head had been.

I then dispatched a runner to my commanding officer to tell him what I had seen, and that our line was too weak to withstand the anticipated charge, and subsequently heard that Finnegan with his Floridanians were ordered up within supporting distance in our rear. Then calling the best riflemen in my company to me, I pointed out the place where my enemy stood behind the tree and told him to watch. Soon the man's head moved cautiously around the tree, and my man fired. He disappeared instantly, and thinking he had been settled, I raised and looked in another direction, when instantly I felt a shock, like a red-hot iron had pierced my brain. I experienced a great jar, saw a thousand stars, and then all was blank, and I saw no more of that fight.