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John Esten Cooke, Wearing of the Gray: Being Personal Portraits, Scenes, and Adventures of War., A dash at Aldie. (search)
rapidly advancing toward Warrenton, where the fatal fiat from Washington was to meet him, Off with his head! So much for Buckingham. But in these last days of October the wind had not yet wafted to him the decree of the civilians. He was pressing on in admirable order, and Lee had promptly broken up his camps upon the Opequonse precious quartermaster stores, blankets, oil-cloths, so scarce in the poverty-stricken Confederacy. The present writer was almost destitute on the last day of October--on the first day of November he was rich. His cavalier outfit had been reinforced by an excellent regulation blanket, heavy and double: and a superb india-rubbeStuart, with floating plume, drawn sword, and animated gesture. His horse was rearing; his sabre, as he whirled it around his head, flashed like lightning in the October sun. No officer was with him-he had distanced all. I never saw him more impatient. Go to the head of the column, and make it charge! was his order — an order
John Esten Cooke, Wearing of the Gray: Being Personal Portraits, Scenes, and Adventures of War., chapter 3.33 (search)
re to proceedit was admirable: and thus encouraged, the Third continued at their post until the enemy's batteries on Maryland Heights had gotten our range, and their rifle shell began to tear the ground near by. Concluding that the distance was too great to render a reply necessary, the Third came away soon after this-but the order to retire had been previously given, and the piece did not move off at a faster gait than a rapid trot-it might have been a gallop. This little affair was in October, and on our return to Leesburg the enemy were preparing to cross and attack us. General Evans put on the road to Edwards' Ferry all the guns, with the exception of the Third, which was sent with the Eighth Virginia regiment to repel an assault from General McCall, who was approaching Goose Creek, on our right, with a Division, and twelve pieces of artillery. The Third undertook this with alacrity, and remained in position at the Burnt bridge with ardour, hoping that the enemy would have th
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), The First iron-clad Monitor. (search)
paired and clothed with iron armor, when the contract for the Monitor was made. We, of course, felt great solicitude in regard to this proceeding of the rebels, not lessened by the fact that extraordinary pains were taken by them to keep secret from us their labors and purposes. Their efforts to withhold information, though rigid, were not wholly successful, for we contrived to get occasional vague intelligence of the work as it progressed. When the contract for the Monitor was made, in October, with a primary condition that she should be ready for sea in one hundred days, the Navy Department intended that the battery should, immediately after reaching Hampton Roads, proceed up Elizabeth river to the Navy Yard at Norfolk, place herself opposite the dry-dock, and with her heavy guns destroy both the dock and the Merrimac. This was our secret. The Monitor could easily have done what was required, for her appearance at Norfolk would have been a surprise. But the hundred days expir
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), The First attack on Fort Fisher (search)
f Wilmington would be an easy task. Circumstances prevented an attempt to execute General Graham's plan. Meanwhile, arrangements had been made by the government for an attack, by land and water, on the forts at the entrance to Mobile Bay, which were crowned with success. Similar arrangements were made to assail the forts at the entrance to the Cape Fear river. So early as August, 1864, armored and unarmored gunboats began to gather in Hampton Roads. Full fifty of these were there in October, under the command of Admiral David D. Porter, who had performed signal services on the Mississippi and other inland waters in the Southwest. Among them were several vessels of the Monitor class and the New Ironsides, a powerful vessel, built at Philadelphia, having a wooden hull covered with iron plates four inches in thickness, and at her bow an immense wrought iron beak, constituting her the most formidable ram in existence. She carried sixteen eleven-inch Dahlgren guns, two two hundr
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), The Dalton-Atlanta operations. (search)
a caused, but did not compel, the abandonment of Atlanta. For if the Southern troops had remained in the place, the enemy would, in a few days, have been forced to return to his railroad. And, besides, Atlanta could have been sufficiently supplied from Macon, through Augusta; but at Jonesboroa the Federal troops could not be fed. This mode of gaining Atlanta made the acquisition of no great value. For the campaign continued, and General Sherman was occupied by General Hood until late in October, when he commenced the disastrous expedition into Tennessee, which left the former without an antagonist. Bentonville-pages 303-4-5-6: Johnston attempted to unite the three little bodies of his troops near Bentonville, on the 18th of March, to attack the head of General Sherman's left column next morning, on the Goldsboroa road. Less than two-thirds had arrived at eight A. M. of the 19th, when the Federal column appeared and deployed, intrenching lightly at the same time. The fighting
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), Lee and Grant in the Wilderness. (search)
e greatest numbers are engaged, and most brilliant victories won, are not always followed by the best results to the fortunate side. When General Grant was assigned to duty as above stated, the Army of the Potomac, commanded by General Meade, lay in Culpepper county, Virginia, and, confronting it, across the Rapidan, was the Army of Northern Virginia. These armies had, with two exceptions, held the above positions since early in August following the battle of Gettysburg. The first was in October, when General Lee, although much reduced by detaching Longstreet South, crossed the Rapidan and advanced on Meade. The latter retired rapidly, not halting until he had crossed Bull Run. During this retreat of Meade a collision occurred at Bristoe Station between three of Hill's Brigades and the Fifth Corps, in which the former were worsted. General Lee returned to the Rapidan, and Meade to his old camp in Culpepper. The latter part of November (the second exception), Meade crossed the R
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), Confederate negro enlistments. (search)
r forty thousand slaves drafted into the army as cooks, teamsters, trainsmen and the like, and the soldiers found that they not only got along very well with Cuffee, but that he saved them no end of work and trouble, was handy, amiable, liked the service well enough, and was not without a spirit of adventure. Some of the negro teamsters did a little amateur fighting now and then, and they showed themselves very skilful in plundering a battle-field. Slavery, too, was on its last legs as October rolled by. The enemy had possession of more than half the Confederate territory, and wherever they marched they set the negroes free. Slaves had lost their market value even in Richmond, where, when sugar was selling at from eight dollars and a half to eleven dollars and eighty-seven cents per pound, coffee at twelve dollars, tea at forty-two dollars, bicarbonate of soda at five dollars and thirty-seven cents, flour at three hundred and fifty dollars, and a china dinner and tea set brought
The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), The famous fight at Cedar creek. (search)
e had combined, in spite of not a few unheroic personal traits, to give his army unbounded faith in his leadership and enthusiasm for the man. But Sheridan was twenty miles away, at Winchester, where he had arrived the day before from Washington. Meantime, the battle and the day wore on together. The sulphurous cloud that overhung the field, and the dense volumes of dust that rose behind the wheeling batteries and the charging troops, contrasted grimly with the sweet light of that perfect October day, as it could be seen beyond the limits of the battle-field. At noon, and for some time previously, the enemy was opposed only by Merritt's and Custer's cavalry and Getty's Division of infantry, with their accompanying batteries, while the main portion of the Sixth Corps was more than two miles to the right and rear of Getty, engaged in reorganizing, and the Nineteenth Corps was, in turn, to the right and rear of the Sixth. At this juncture, those of us who were stationed near the W
Robert Lewis Dabney, Life and Commands of Lieutenand- General Thomas J. Jackson, Chapter 7: Manassas. (search)
always conspicuous for the promptitude with which it appeared at the threatened point, and for its martial bearing. This season of comparative quiet was largely employed by General Jackson in religious labors for the good of his command. His correspondence showed the same humility and preference for the quiet enjoyments of home which characterized him before he became famous. August 22d, he wrote to his wife :--Don't put any faith in (the assertion) there will be no more fighting till October. It may not be till then; and God grant that, if consistent with His glory, it may never be. Sure, I desire no more, if our country's independence can be secured without it. As I said before leaving you, so say I now, that if I fight for my country it is from a sense of duty, a hope that, through the blessing of Providence, I may be enabled to serve her, and not merely because I prefer the strife of battle to the peaceful enjoyments of home. September 24th, he says:--This is a beautiful
Thomas C. DeLeon, Four years in Rebel capitals: an inside view of life in the southern confederacy, from birth to death., Chapter 25: the war in the West. (search)
rial and endurance-already almost past bearing. But there was no weak yielding in Government, or in people. Men looked at each other through the gloom, and even as they asked --Brother, what of the night? --struck hands in a clasp that meant renewed faith in the cause and renewed determination to prove its right. Early in the New Year, news reached Richmond of Magruder's amphibious victory, the recapture of Galveston; which town had fallen a prey to the enemy's naval power early in October. On the last night of 1862-while the wearied troops of Bragg were sleeping on the bloody field of Murfreesboro-General Magruder, with a mixed command of three regiments of raw infantry, some nineteen pieces of field artillery, and a boarding fleet of four unarmed boats, came down silently to Galveston. The Federal fleet-consisting of the Harriet Lane, the Clifton, the Westfield and the Ossawa — were lying just off the town; covering it with their broadsides and supported by a force of in
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