Chickamauga Monuments (Sept 20)

Continuing with yesterday's theme of Chickamauga monuments, here are some for the second day of combat.

The 22nd Michigan monument. I've always been drawn to the monuments with these panels. I guess I like the artwork, how the regiment decided to remember their engagement. Usually the text of monuments is plain enough to not offend another regiment, simply stating where they were at what times and how many men they lost. There is good information there but it often is only a small piece of the puzzle. For a good chuckle read how many monuments at Shiloh say that the regiment retired to the landing. That makes it sound like an organized affair when in some cases it was a matter of the regiment disintegrating rapidly and running everywhere. So these panels in some way shed a bit more light on the action. Of course they are going to be a sanitized version of the regiment's exploits but they are still more interesting than the simple recap of where, when and losses.

The 68th Indiana monument. This one also tells a story, not with a panel but with an engraving. I've never seen a copy of the Indiana at Chickamauga book so I could find out why they choose this moment to present. Its just a solitary soldier looking at his leg. There is no visible wound but that would seem the most logical explanation.

Chickamauga Monuments - part 4

Today's final installment. Loomis' Battery, 1st Michigan Battery A. Time has been kind to this panel. The detail presented is amazing. Also the story of the action here is pretty interesting. The battery held to the very last, firing tons of canister, but eventually being overrun and losing 5 of 6 guns. But the battery was the center of much fighting afterwards and 3 of those guns were recaptured.

Showing the death of the battery's commander, Lieutenant George Van Pelt.
Showing the Confederates advancing on the battery.

Chickamauga Monuments - part 3

The 4th Michigan cavalry monument. Time has not been kind to the panel. They were among the regiments resisting the Confederate advance on the 18th.

The 13th Michigan monument. This is on the south end of the battlefield, near the Heg monument from the previous post. I like the monument plus I was able to get some interesting shots. I particularly like the final one.

Chickamauga Monuments - part 2

A few more monuments I like.

Since my family is from Wisconsin I try to see all the Wisconsin monuments. I actually have pictures of every monument at Chickamauga but Wisconsin monuments still hold a special place in my heart.

This is for the 3rd Wisconsin Artillery. I like how it kinda blends in as just another gun in the line, three feet higher than the others but still in line.
This is for the 15th Wisconsin. The monument itself isn't too exciting, I do like the star at the top, but the main reason I included it was because this was Colonel Hans Heg's regiment before he got promoted to brigade command. On the afternoon of the 19th Heg was mortally wounded near this monument. In fact his mortuary monument is directly across the road about 50 yards away.
Heg's mortuary monument.

Chickamauga Monuments

I decided to commemorate the 144th anniversary of Chickamauga I'd share a few of my favorite Chickamauga monuments. These are all for actions on September 19.

I like the 77th Pennsylvania's monument because of its design and the relief on front. Plus in this particular image I like the fall leaves in the background. The 77th Pennsylvania lost their flag during this fighting, it was captured by the 13th Tennessee, which provides another connection for me. The commander of the 13th Tennessee, Alfred Vaughan, is the great (however many) grandfather of one of my friends.

I like this marker too. Its very simple, just stating that this is where the 84th Indiana was posted on the 19th. I like it though because it is well off the beaten path. It is way off the park boundary, they were guarding a bridge well north of the battlefield near the state line. Last fall when I was at Chickamauga this marker was about 100 yards from my campsite.

Colonel Frederick A. Bartleson

The other day someone left a comment asking for more info about Colonel Frederick A. Bartleson of the 100th Illinois. The only info I have is what I’ve found online. He was born November 10, 1833 and was an Illinois state attorney. In the spring of 1858 he was the prosecutor in an odd case in Joliet. A man was accused of killing a young woman (who he might have been romantically linked to). During the trial the young woman was presented as a witness for the defense, which effectively won the case. It seems that the dead body had no clear identifying marks so the young lady’s mother decided to blackmail the defendant claiming the body was her daughter. The truth was that some local doctors wanted to learn their trade on a fresh corpse. They hired someone to dig up a freshly buried woman, when they were done the man had second thoughts about reburying the woman and instead dumped her in a secluded area.

Bartleson is credited with being the first man from Joliet to volunteer for the Union. At a rally after the fall of Fort Sumter he enrolled and said, "I will ask no man to do that, which I would not be willing to do myself." He entered the service as captain of Company B in the 20th Illinois. The regiment fought at Fort Donelson and Shiloh. Bartleson lost an arm at Shiloh. When he was healed he was given command of the 100th Illinois in August 1862.

The 100th Illinois fought at Stones River and then at Chickamauga, where Bartleson was wounded and captured. He was sent to Libby Prison in Richmond and was paroled in time to led his regiment in the Atlanta Campaign. On June 23, 1864 he was killed in the fighting at Kennesaw Mountain. He was buried in Joliet. I found no mention of any children but his spouse was Catherine Murray.

His obituary in The Joliet Signal Newspaper on Tuesday, July 12, 1864 says of his death: “An advance was ordered and the Colonel had command of the front skirmish line, and while leading his column in plain view of the enemy, was pierced through the body by a rebel bullet and fell from his horse and was taken up and carried from the field’s lifeless corpse.” Oddly the obituary says that his body arrived in Joliet on July 1st but that he was buried on June 31st.

It also said of Bartleson, “Well may the citizens of Joliet mourn the loss of one so noble and brave as Col. Bartleson proved himself to be Courteous and honorable, he won the respect and confidence of all who knew him. Gentle as a lamb and as brave as a lion, he captivated the feelings and inspired his soldiers with more than human courage. Truly, his death, at this critical juncture of affairs, is a national calamity.”

If you’re still wanting info on Bartleson I suggest you see if you can get a copy of
Colonel Frederick Bartleson by Kathy Johnson through interlibrary loan. Its only a small pamphlet produced by the Will County [Illinois] Historical Society, but it might have some extra info.

Bahamas

I've known about the trip for awhile but recently it was confirmed that I will be going to the Bahamas in February. I'm excited, this will be my first vacation with my girlfriend. It will also be my first vacation that is not family or Civil War orientated. But there is a small Civil War element to the trip. The Bahamas were part of the blockade running trade routes. I've been doing a bit of reading this past week on blockade running (something I've never really examined before) and have been amazed at just how much material was making it through the blockade. And Nassau was a pretty big link in the trade routes. I have not yet found a blockade running museum, nor do I expect to find one, but there is a pirate museum there and I bet they'll have a panel on their role as a fueling/trade center during the era of sailing ships.

There is also some Revolutionary War history there. In March 1776 John Paul Jones captured Fort Montagu in Nassau. And the fort still exists, along with two others. I definitely see a day of touring forts in my future. My girlfriend might be bored silly but maybe that day she can sit on the beach and drink something fruity with rum. I'll be getting in a battlefield fix in the most unlikely of places.

My reading also turned up that the CSS Florida was turned from a normal ship into a battle ship in the waters of the Bahamas. After it was built in England (its sister ship, which was not yet complete, was the CSS Alabama) it set sail for the Bahamas where it rendezvoused with its military equipment. In Nassau the US consul had figured out that something fishy was happening and the local admiralty court researched the situation. Despite contrary evidence the court allowed the ship to leave the harbor and it made its transformation near some smaller island in the area. Remarkably this transformation, which included moving several heavy guns, was accomplished with just 22 sailors. The court situation had made recruiting difficult so the ship started with far less than its normal 130 man crew. Then yellow fever gripped the crew. After picking up a doctor in Cuba they ran into Mobile Bay, apparently the day they ran the blockade into Mobile there was only 4 healthy sailors manning the ship. So now I've been doing some reading on the Florida. I doubt I'll find any more interesting connections with the Bahamas but it I'm sure it will still be interesting.

Shiloh and the Western Campaign by Cunningham

Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862 by O. Edward Cunningham. Edited by Gary D. Joiner and Timothy B. Smith.

Cunningham wrote this book as a PhD dissertation in 1966. Until this past year it has remained unpublished. I had earlier gained a copy through interlibrary loan and a ton of xeroxing. I've never sat down and read it cover to cover before though because my copy was so ungainly to hold and read. The dissertation has a wonderful reputation among serious students of Shiloh as one of the best examinations of the battle.

This new edition has been edited by Gary D. Joiner and Timothy B. Smith. I'm familiar with Smith's previous works but not Joiner's, and a better choice for editing a Shiloh book could not be made in Smith. They did a great job of adding their own footnotes and comments into Cunningham's work without it being distracting. Besides using the footnotes to clarify points or discuss new sources, they also used them to compare and contrast Cunningham's conclusions with Larry Daniel, Wiley Sword and James Lee McDonough (the three other modern examinations of the battle). I enjoyed this as I didn't have to remember exactly what those three authors had said. Plus page citations were given so that I could check exactly what they wrote in each instance.

My only problem with the footnotes was there were times that the editors would say that Cunningham's original text had said something that is pretty clearly incorrect and that they changed the text so that it read better. Perhaps this "error" was because Cunningham's work hadn't gone through the extensive review process that books go through now (and you could assume that if he was alive now to publish his dissertation the peer review process would have fixed those things). Or maybe its not really an error and further research might show Cunningham was right. I'm still not sure where I sit on this issue. In some respects I wish the new book was a faithful reproduction of the dissertation, warts and all. In other respects I think its good that obvious mistakes were edited out. In other sections the editors did mention that Cunningham's interpretation differs, the text was left alone, just a foot note added to indicate the interpretive differences. And that is a great thing. I'm still have not decided if I like the minor corrections or not.

The one problem I had with the dissertation is a complete lack of maps. Thankfully that has been fixed in this new edition. But the maps seem a little busy at times with too many of the trails shown. Also the maps typically show brigade sized units (some do show regiments) and I'd prefer if they had all shown regiments. But that's only a minor point and does not detract from the worth of the book. Just a personal preference, I'm sure there are other readers who would prefer only brigades shown.

The claim made often about Cunningham's book is that his interpretations were well ahead of their time. I'm not sure about that. There was nothing I read that was a real surprise to me, but I'm not exactly new to studying Shiloh. I think it is an important book that can now be read by everyone and sit proudly on the shelves with Sword, Daniel and McDonough. I highly recommend it to all. If I only was going to have one of those four Shiloh books I think it would be Daniel's (then again I have 3 copies of Sword's book so I'm not the best judge of only having one book) but Cunningham's would be my second choice and only because I think Daniel did a better job of showing Shiloh's place in the war. Cunningham is a strong second place though.

A rant from recent reading

I am a horrible speller and my grammar is not much better but there is one little grammar rule that really irks me, and I've seen a lot of it recently. I noticed it used a lot while reading Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862 by O. Edward Cunningham (edited by Gary D. Joiner and Timothy B. Smith). I've noticed it in of other books recently too, Cunningham's is just the first example that springs to mind because it was the book I most recently finished reading.

It's the use of "try and." As in "Bragg needed to try and take the Sunken Road position." It really should be "Bragg needed to try to take the Sunken Road position." The first sentence indicates that Bragg was going to try to do something and that he was going to do the same thing. If that's the case just say that you are going to do the something. This is probably the only grammar lesson that has stuck with me over the years.

I hear it everyday in conversations and it doesn't bother me but I find it annoying to read. When I see it I can be pretty sure that the copy editor used was not first rate. If the publisher skimped here, did they also skimp in the peer review process?

I find it so annoying to read that I have actually stopped reading some books that use it a lot. One in particular was a Revolutionary War overview that seemed to have a good amount of information. But "try and" was used all the time and it got so annoying that I put the book away. I'll probably never finish the book and since then I've been leery of that publisher (I've seen it in other books from that publisher too which makes me wonder what sort of copy editing process they use.)

Sorry for the rant. It was just bothering me. I'll try to not let it get to me as much in the future.

Winchester National Cemetery part 4

The final installment of monument pics from the Winchester National Cemetery is a few from New England.

The 13th Connecticut's. It is rather simple as the other side only lists the regiment's various engagements.
The 12th Connecticut's. It also only lists the regiment's various engagements and leaves no mention of what it did in the campaign.
The 18th Connecticut's. Yet another one that only lists the regiment's various engagements.
Vermont. This is for a particular regiment but it worn down such that the number cannot be read. It appears to be a single digit, maybe the 5th, 6th or 8th. It does list the names of some men who were casualties so with further research it would be possible to figure it out.

8th Vermont's monument.
Detail of the 8th Vermont's monument. It reads: "Honor the Brave. Erected to commemorate the bayonet charge of the Eighth Vermont Vol's led by Genl Stephen Thomas Sept 19, 1864. Committed to the care of those once a brave foe now our generous friend. Gift of comrade Herbert F. Hill Boston, Mass. Dedicated Sept 19, 1885."

Winchester National Cemetery part 3

A few Massachusetts monuments:
The state monument.
The 34th Massachusetts monument with a bust of Wells on top.
The 3rd Massachusetts cavalry monument. It says that the regiment lost 207 killed and wounded but doesn't say out of how many. But for an 1864 engagement 207 had to be a pretty large percentage.
The 38th Massachusetts monument. It list the names of the men who lie in unknown graves. I thought that was a nice touch. Obviously the regiment knew these men died in this vicinity but when the cemetery was built not every one of them had a gravestone with their name. So a very nice touch by the survivors to remember the men that otherwise might have disappeared into the shadows of history.

Winchester National Cemetery part 2

New Hampshire's monument. Hard to read but the names of the killed are listed on the sides of the monument.
Monument to the 114th New York. Back side says the regiment lost 188 of 315 men at 3rd Winchester (September 19, 1864) holding an advance defensive line. Then at Cedar Creek a month later it lost another 127 men, out of 250 engaged.

Detail of the 114th New York's monument.
Pennsylvania state monument, which reminds me very much of the Wisconsin state monument at Shiloh.
Close up of the top of the Pennsylvania monument.
123rd Ohio's monument.

Winchester National Cemetery

Across the street from the Confederate cemetery is the National Cemetery. This land was part of the battlefield for the 3rd battle of Winchester, as this sign indicates.
A general shot of the cemetery.
Monument for the 6th Corps. Its pretty rare to find a monument for a corps, in fact no others currently come to mind.
Detail of the 6th Corps monument showing colored tiles to denote divisions just like corps badges did during the war.

Winchester Confederate Cemetery part 5

Here are a few more scenes from the Winchester cemetery that I found interesting.

A marker for the 3rd battle of Winchester. This site was a cemetery during the war (though much smaller) and was part of the fighting during the third battle to be called Winchester.
A modern marker for the women of Winchester. A very neat colorful marker.
Turner Ashby's grave. I don't know too much about this cavalry leader since he died so early in the conflict. Maybe if he had lived a few more years his reputation would be more well known.
Grave of General Robert Johnston. Fought with Lee and Jackson. It says he was wounded 7 times, pretty remarkable.
Grave of General Archibald Godwin. He was killed in the 3rd battle of Winchester. Somewhere I read that he was killed near this very spot but that seems hard to believe.
A few other personal graves on the edges of the Confederate section.

Finally a panoramic, moving right to left, showing about a third of the cemetery.