Arthur James Lyon Fremantle left Great Britain aboard a ship on March 2, 1863, headed for the northern border of Mexico. After a long voyage, the young British army officer finally arrived on April 1 “at the miserable village of Bagdad” on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. Despite considerable speculation at the time, Fremantle was in America only as a tourist and not as an official governmental observer of the United Kingdom—the widespread uncertainty of his status undoubtedly caused by Fremantle’s choice of daily attire, a full British military uniform resplendent with a corresponding bright red jacket.

Initially, Fremantle was inclined to side with the North in the Civil War, as were many of his fellow English citizens because of an inherent disapproval of slavery. He would soon switch his allegiance to the South, however, partly because he admired the Southern reputation of gallantry and determination, and also because “of the foolish bullying conduct of the Northerners.” As Fremantle would note: “I was unable to repress a strong wish to go to America and see something of this wonderful struggle.”

As he attempted to cross onto Texas soil, Fremantle was briefly detained and questioned by a half-dozen Confederate officers. Ever the keen observer, the British citizen noted that the troopers—all from Colonel James Duff’s “Partisan Rangers,” the 33rd Texas Cavalry—were similarly attired in “flannel shirts, very ancient trousers, jack-boots with enormous spurs and black felt hats ornamented with the lone star of Texas.” Despite their unkempt appearance, the Texans treated Fremantle with inestimable kindness.

While conversing with Fremantle, Duff’s troopers lamented that they were currently unable to visit some friends across the Rio Grande, alluding to a clandestine foray they had made about three weeks earlier that now put them in jeopardy. One particularly boastful Texan excitedly divulged that “he and some of his friends made a raid over there three weeks ago and carried away some ‘renegadoes,’ one of whom named [William W.] Montgomery, they had left on the road to Brownsville.”

Fremantle could tell by the smirks on the Texans’ faces that something disagreeable had clearly happened to this individual named Montgomery.

Meeting “Ham”

About noon, Fremantle left the officers and, along with a companion, headed toward Brownsville. The foreigner noted the country was mostly flat and contained an abundance of mesquite trees. Everyone they met, it appeared to Fremantle, carried a six-shooter, although he felt there seldom seemed a need for one. The duo had traveled about nine miles when they encountered an ambulance. They were informed that one of the passengers was Confederate Brig. Gen. Hamilton P. Bee, commander of Brownsville, to which Fremantle handed over his letter of introduction originally intended for Maj. Gen. John Magruder. Upon perusing the papers, Bee disembarked from the vehicle and formally presented himself to the British subject.

Bee had a famous brother, Barnard E. Bee Jr., who had been killed at the First Battle of Manassas and immortalized by giving then-Brig. Gen. Thomas J. Jackson the sobriquet “Stonewall.” The younger Bee, “Ham,” had accompanied his parents to the Lone Star republic decades before, and his father became part of the fledgling Texas government.

Seeing limited military service in the Mexican War, “Ham” used his political connections to secure the rank of brigadier in the Texas Militia and subsequently the Confederacy not long after the Civil War began. Bee plied the two travelers with “beef and beer in the open.” Fremantle recalled that they all talked politics for more than an hour while getting further details on the Montgomery affair. Bee elaborated that the episode was conducted without his authorization and that he was regretful it had happened.

Soon, Fremantle and his companion were on their way and, not quite 30 minutes later, came upon Montgomery’s final resting place. The victim, Fremantle wrote, “had been slightly buried, but his head and arms were above the ground, his arms tied together, the rope still around his neck, but part of it still dangling from quite a small mesquite tree. Dogs or wolves had probably scraped the earth from the body, and there was no flesh on the bones. I obtained this my first experience of Lynch law within three hours of landing in America.”     

A Cross-border Conflict

The origins of the raid across the river into Mexico began with feuding Texans. Montgomery, along with Texas transplant Edmund J. Davis, had fled south of the border to start a cavalry unit composed of Unionists from the Lone Star State. Located in a foreign country, they could safely recruit members under the protection of the Mexican authorities. The Unionists became emboldened that the Texans could do nothing without illegally crossing the border to apprehend them. The Yankee sympathizers, The Tyler Reporter noted, “had just stood over the river” and “begun a series of indignities which were very provoking” and eventually “their cowardly natures—prompted them to peer at and insult our brave boys.”

Davis’ exodus to Texas had come in 1848, after the Mexican War. Ironically, one of his earliest friends was Hamilton Bee. They both sold cattle to the U.S. Army, and the future Southern general was the best man at Davis’ wedding. Before the Civil War, Davis had been elected district attorney and then district judge. His popularity and organizational skills helped get him duty as a colonel and then brigadier general of cavalry in the Union Army, followed by a postwar stint as governor of Texas.

Montgomery’s background was more shady, and he had even been acquitted in a shocking murder trial—his lawyer none other than Andrew Jackson Hamilton, future military governor of Texas during the war. Montgomery had started out as a horse and sheep rancher before elevating his portfolio to capital crimes.

Meeting in Union-held New Orleans, Davis and Montgomery were assigned to send loyal men from Matamoros to the Crescent City as recruits for the proposed Federal cavalry unit.

In 1864, when Fremantle had his notes published in a book, he identified the leader of the murderous gang who had captured Montgomery and Davis and had killed the former. And though his publisher refused to print the name of the culprit in the text, Fremantle’s details about the perpetrator were included in the volume. A few days after his discovery of Montgomery’s remains, the Englishman jotted down: “We were afterwards presented to ________, rather a sinister-looking party with long yellow hair down to his shoulders. This is the man who is supposed to [have] hang[ed] Montgomery.”

Frustrated by the “despicable” behavior the Unionists had displayed, the Confederates vowed revenge. One of Duff’s men, a self-described Mexican-American Confederate named Santiago Tafolla, recalled, “about midnight, Col. [George William] Chilton came from Brownsville with a small group of men. They immediately woke us up and told us to go across the Rio Grande to capture certain men there who had been harassing us daily.” The Southerners secreted themselves across the river in three small boats after receiving specific instructions from Chilton that they were not to harm anyone, especially Mexican nationals. With Chilton in the lead, the small group stormed the customs house along the riverside and pulled out Davis and “a man named Montgomery who, according to what people said, was an evildoer.”

Another of Duff’s Partisan Rangers, an Englishman named R.H. Williams, remembered that on their way to Bagdad, Chilton explained to the group that their mission was to capture Davis and other leaders of the 1st Texas Cavalry (U.S.). Noted Williams: “Now these deserters and their boasting talk…had riled the boys very much, and they were ‘blue mouldy’ to get at them.”

A correspondent accompanying the insurgents wrote: “Surrounding the house in which Col[onel] Davis was said to be, [they]…ordered [him] to surrender, and I regret to say, he did so.” But Montgomery “fought like a wild cat and wounded two of the men badly with his bowie-knife before he was overpowered.”

The Yankee sympathizers being hunted had been alerted by the accidental discharge of a Confederate’s weapon. As Tafolla revealed:

“The day was dawning and at the sound of the shot, we saw men pop up from different directions. As it was now daylight and we were on Mexican soil, we were ordered back. To do that we had to pass through the village, which by this time had been totally alarmed. So as we approached the houses, we were greeted by a rain of bullets from the houses, from the windows and from the doors. But we had received orders not to fire. Before we could reach the Rio Grande, the local judge came out to ask us why we had crossed over to Mexico. We told him we were supposed to take certain Americans prisoner, but that we had strict orders not to violate any Mexican laws.”

At the time, Chilton was swiftly moving his force back across the Mexican border; the Kentucky native was serving as Bee’s brigade ordnance officer. He gave orders to transport the prisoners to Brownsville with Montgomery’s hands tied behind his back astride a horse, while Davis was allowed to mount his ride unrestrained. To his captors, Montgomery stated, “All I ask is that I be treated as a prisoner of war.” Chilton replied that he would be treated as he deserved, a foreshadowing of Montgomery’s deadly fate. Along the route back to Brownsville, the despised Montgomery was hanged, or as The San Antonio Herald documented, “immediately went up a tree.”

De-escalation

Davis’ wife had swiftly contacted the Mexican governor, Albino Lopez, who was in the area, and explained that her husband had been abducted. Lopez immediately called for the men’s return. Bee found himself amid a potentially major international incident and feigned ignorance of the incident. A month before, Bee and Lopez—together with Confederate agent Jose Quintero—had negotiated an extradition agreement. The particulars of the accord assured the extradition of persons accused of murder, embezzlement, theft, and robbery of cattle or horses without any previous notification of the authorities on the other side of the border. Furthermore, if a pursuit of a criminal began on one side of the border and continued on the other side, the posse had permission to continue to follow them.      Unfortunately, these kidnappings were not covered in the aforementioned document. The news of the situation provoked great rage in Matamoros. Groups of protesters paraded down its streets angrily shouting anti-Confederate slogans. When it was discovered that Montgomery had been killed, the Mexicans became even more upset. Lopez was so furious that he threatened to close the border and arrest all Confederate officers currently in Matamoros. Lopez followed up on his stance in a missive to Bee complaining not only about the Davis kidnapping but other less publicized incidents. He also requested a battalion of sharpshooters from the military and began organizing his own local militia in case of a martial confrontation with the Texans.

Finally, Bee relented and returned Davis to Mexico, which at least de-escalated the tensions. Quintero fired off a dispatch to the Confederate capital in Richmond, Va., informing his superiors of the peaceful resolution. He also notified Santiago Vidaurri, another governor in northern Mexico, of the incident crossing the border. Vidaurri had treasured his alliance with the Confederacy, as it greatly assisted his impoverished area.

“The bitter enemy of our cause,” Quintero reported, had been removed to Brownsville, where Montgomery would be “permanently located.” Vidaurri only seemed curious as to why it had taken the Confederates as long as it did to act on the situation.

Blame for the hanging of Montgomery continued to be debated on both sides of the river. Davis identified Sergeant H.B. Adams of Duff’s command as the person in charge of the lynching detail, and a Unionist in Mexico, Captain William H. Brewin of Yager’s Texas Cavalry Battalion, as a participant, though that accusation could not be confirmed by a corroborating witness. The Confederates tried to justify their actions in hanging Montgomery by claiming he led the forces that had killed a citizen named Isidro Vela, along with some cotton teamsters. This raid, carried out under a U.S. banner, happened in December, however, while Montgomery was busy recruiting in New Orleans.

Other Southerners accused Montgomery of murdering two men near Corpus Christi. They described Montgomery as being “of Kansas notoriety” and was considered a “noted jayhawker and murderer.” In all likelihood, Montgomery’s only true crimes were antagonizing the Confederates across the river and wounding two Confederates during his abduction.

Months later, the Federals controlled the area in which Montgomery’s remains were located. One member of the burial crew remembered: “I found the bones of Capt. Montgomery interred about one foot in the ground, except his right arm, which I found in the fork of a tree, some distance from the tree on which he was hanged.” At 3 p.m. December 19, 1863, Montgomery was given a proper military funeral in Brownsville. A soldier with the 19th Iowa Infantry witnessed the funeral procession and a stirring eulogy by Hamilton, Montgomery’s former attorney and now governor. He recalled a list of those condemned as having a part in Montgomery’s death, including Bee, Philip N. Luckett, Chilton, Brewin and Richard Taylor, who was field commander of Confederate forces in Louisiana.

Chilton was later publicly condemned for actually joining in Montgomery’s hanging, but his true crime was commanding the expedition, and in ordering the heinous execution that caused such a fiasco with the Mexicans. Both Fremantle and Tafolla positively identified Chilton as the ringleader of the hanging. Although Fremantle didn’t mention Chilton specifically by name, a glance at Chilton’s photograph would confirm he certainly matches the description the British soldier had made.

Fremantle returned to England after having achieved the adventure he sought by his travel through Texas and by witnessing the Battle of Gettysburg. His account of his trip was published the ensuing year. Seeing the writing on the wall with Vicksburg’s surrender, Tafolla deserted the Confederate Army in March 1864 and headed for the safety of Mexico. His memoirs were not published until 2010.

Richard H. Holloway, who writes from Alexandria, La., is a senior editor of America’s Civil War.

This article originally appeared in the Spring 2024 issue of America’s Civil War magazine.

When one hears the name of a Civil War general named Bee, the first reaction for most is the Confederate commander from South Carolina who shouted to his men at the First Battle of Manassas on July 21, 1861: “Look men, there stands Jackson like a stone wall. Rally behind the Virginians!” That Bee was Barnard Elliott Bee Jr., who would be mortally wounded on Henry Hill shortly after uttering that immortal cheer.

But Barnard Bee had a younger brother who also served in the Confederate Army during the war, Brig. Gen. Hamilton P. Bee.

“Ham” had moved with his parents as a teenager to Texas. He later leveraged his father’s political standing in the Texas government to get a spot as a brigadier general of Texas Militia in a 10-county area along the coast. In March 1862, he was elevated to the same rank in the Confederate Army.

In the early stages of the 1864 Red River Campaign, Bee and a large cavalry force were sent to fight in Louisiana. Generals Richard Taylor and Edmund Kirby Smith met at Bee’s campfire the night after the Confederate victory at Mansfield, La., on April 8. The next day, Bee was injured leading a charge at Pleasant Hill.

Although Bee was generally complimented for his personal bravery, he apparently lacked a capacity for military leadership. His ultimate failure came on April 23, 1864, when he pulled his men out of position at Monett’s Ferry, allowing the Federals to escape unchallenged to Alexandria, La.

Taylor soon dismissed him from service. According to one subordinate, Bee was “the poorest excuse for a Gen that I ever saw.”

As it is today, entertainment was an important part of life in the 19th century—and for soldiers stationed far from home, even the smallest distraction from homesickness was essential. Limited options were readily available, however. Antebellum audiences in some regions, for example, could enjoy a visit by the traveling Zouaves of Inkerman—French Zouaves who had teamed with their British allies during the Crimean War to defeat Imperial Russian forces at the November 1854 Battle of Inkerman. Those Gallic troops donned exotic uniforms patterned after ones worn by French Algerian soldiers, a style of dress that found immediate favor among military forces on both sides in the upcoming Civil War.

In early 1861, a newspaper in Memphis, Tenn., touted the arrival of the Zouaves of Inkerman in a newly built theater, enticing audiences with notice that the shows were to run for only two days and would be a “grand military spectacle in five and seven Acts Tableaux,” that the performance would “commence with the French Vaudeville of La Corde Sensible” and that “Zouave Frederick” would perform La Marseillaise. At the time, such live-action shows involving military drill, fancy costumes, and historical recitations by dramatic actors were cutting-edge entertainment.

Prior to the Civil War, technology known as “polyoramas” catapulted to fame as a feature at Niblo’s Garden in New York City. Founder William Niblo had emigrated from Ireland to New York in the early 19th century, and after a short stint working at a small tavern, he bought his own facility and dubbed it Bank Coffee House, eventually expanding his empire to include the Columbian Gardens, an all-weather entertainment facility. Both locales would host plays, concerts, and eventually polyoramas.

Polyoramas enjoyed increased exposure as the century progressed. Often called “Moving Panoramas,” they were 360-degree panoramic paintings to be shown in cylindrical buildings constructed specifically for that purpose. Special equipment would maneuver the painting in a circle before a seated audience.

What caused the medium’s popularity to grow was an owner’s ability to transport the apparatus to other cities across the nation, and innovations that eliminated the need to operate only in a round structure. Replacing the larger viewing area was a box-like window behind which the canvas would rotate. Long strips of painted canvas would be moved across the stage horizontally using a cranking mechanism, visible through the “window” opening. To not be distractions, the device and musicians were secreted away. 

Initially, polyoramas portrayed signature battles from across the ocean, such as Waterloo or the 1805 naval battle of Trafalgar. Wagons would transport the large paintings and corresponding hardware, along with a small crew, to each venue. Because of Niblo’s widespread name recognition, each traveling group would tout a partnership with him, whether real or not. Viewings in a particular city would usually last about a week.

A New View of War

Once the Civil War began, the subject matter of the polyoramas increased substantially. The variety of battles available for display with a war in their backyard allowed viewers more opportunity to learn what had really transpired at the event. As one such demonstration beginning May 11, 1863, in Cleveland, Ohio, was advertised:

“This is the Most Complete Exhibition Now Before the Public! Accurate, Authentic & Comprehensive, from the First Dread Signal at Sumter to the Battle of Fredericksburg, Profuse with Dioramic Effects, entirely new and on a scale magnificent and surprising The Thunder of Artillery and The Din of the Battle Field are realized with a vividness so nearly approaching Reality that the audience seem to realize the work of carnage as if the scene of life and death was Actually Before Them.”

The group would play “popular and appropriate music” that would accompany each painting, in addition to a “Patriotic Descriptive Lecture” delivered by “Mr. John Davies (late of the Boston Museum) whose delineations of these pictures have won for him the appreciation of many thousands in the cities of New York, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Cleveland and Chicago, where they have been exhibited with great success and pronounced unrivaled and unapproachable.” This particular polyorama company would occasionally be accompanied by Miss Viola, the “highly celebrated Patriotic Ballad Singer” and Mrs. Hattie Pomeroy, the “Popular Songstress.”

Traveling shows were a success across the nation and beyond during the war. In January 1864, for example, “Honolulu residents learned about the Civil War by viewing J.W. Wilder & Co.’s Polyorama depicting ‘The Terrible Rebellion.’ Narration and music accompanied a series of interlocking painted images drawn across the stage of the Royal Hawaiian Theater.”

Advertisements promised a survey of the war, east to west, land and sea, including the “Great Naval Combat between the Iron-Clad Monsters, The Monitor and The Merrimac!” Viewers would be informed of “key political figures, comic scenes in camp life, and sad and mournful events, all for just $.50.”

Some portrayals made a strong impression on the audience. One such individual was Lewis Josselyn, a shoemaker-turned-private in the 38th Massachusetts Infantry stationed in Baton Rouge, La., who wrote a letter to his mother after seeing a polyorama presentation in town. The 21-year-old Josselyn provided a wonderful blow-by-blow account of the legendary March 9, 1862, naval battle at Hampton Roads, Va:

“Last night Butt and I went to a show that is now here for a few nights. It was a Poly[o]rama (they call it) of the war from New York. It was paintings the same as a panorama or I could not see any difference in it. It was the best show of the kind that I ever saw. The paintings were as natural as life. One of the pieces was a fight between the Monitor and Merrimack. It first showed the Cumberland (the one that Hugh was in) and Congress in the Hampton Roads rocking in the water. The waves looked as if it was the sea itself. Then in steamed the Merrimack, going up to the Congress as if to run into and sink her, but the Congress then was aground and she dare not venture up to her, so she turns upon the Cumberland and runs into her, and then runs back and tries it again, this time making a hole in the Cumberland, and she sinks, with her colors still flying at the mast.

“The Monitor now comes in, and engages the Merrimack. She finally finds the Yankee cheese box too much for her and she has to retreat. As she does so, she fires a shell at the Congress and sets it on fire and is destroyed. This was done the best of anything of the kind I ever saw. I go to the theater every few nights. They now have it closed to us and our boys go as guard. I could go every night if I wanted to, but I don’t want to go every night unless they are going to play something pretty good – better than generally is for it is a poor theatre.”

Some shows became semi-permanent fixtures in large cities. Cutting’s Polyorama of the War was so popular in New Orleans that the manager of the St. Charles Theatre announced that Mr. Cutting would be giving presentations there “until further notice.”

Not all the viewers, however, were enamored with these shows, such as this mixed review in the Tunkhannock, Pa., newspaper in 1865:

“Hasty & Twombly spread what they called a Polyorama of the War, before a crowd of the curious, on Wednesday and Thursday evening last. It was evidently meant to represent a fight of some kind, but whether some of the great battles of our civil war, of the Crimean war or a Tunkhannock plug muss, we could not determine. Their closing scene, ‘Unnamed Heroes,’ was good, and worth the price of admission; the rest was a bore.”

While polyorama shows like the one Private Josselyn saw in Baton Rouge were captivating, others were duds for assorted reasons, or only partially interesting like the aforementioned Tunkhannock presentation. To offset potentially dull shows with poorly skilled narrators, uninspiring music, or ineffective paintings, additions were sometimes included to augment interest—though some demonstrations echoed a P.T. Barnum sideshow. For example, Morton & Co.’s “Polyorama of the Rebellion” offered viewing of “The Famous Little Zouave Twins”—an infant drummer and fifer “who led the decisive and immortal charge of the 19th Illinois at Murfreesboro, Tenn. They appear in full costume and go through the Zouave drill at the bugle call. Bayonet, small broad-sword exercise, and at one time play upon the instruments which compose a full band…” This presentation in Red Wing, Minn., was promoted heavily by the local press as “highly spoken of” and urged citizens to “Go and see it!” Viewings in a particular city would usually last about a week.

Rise of the Cycloramas

After the war, audience attendance waned as people grew tired of seeing reminders of the hardships of war. The lull did not last too long, however, with a resurgence in the 1880s. New and old companies rose to the occasion and started traveling the country again. Traditional round buildings also reappeared, but now audiences would stand at the center as the painting rotated before them.

The basic premise of the display slightly changed along with the name of polyorama being switched to cyclorama, although they were very similar in nature. A cyclorama did have the addition of dioramas of the contested battle areas to bolster the visual effects.

In 1885, the Philadelphia Panorama Company constructed a cyclorama of the Battle of Chattanooga in both Philadelphia and Kansas City, Mo. A few years later, a cyclorama was constructed and painted of the devastating 1876 Battle of Little Bighorn focusing on the loss of George Armstrong Custer and his command.

Over the next decade, hundreds of cycloramas were created, of which only about 30 survive today. The most realistic cyclorama was probably the re-creation of the classic story of Ben-Hur, written by former Union Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace. Real horses and chariots were used within the background of a cyclorama painting. This method exceeded all previous incarnations to the medium and allowed the pubic to experience the best example in lieu of actually being at the dramatic fictional event written in the book.

Two cycloramas depicting Civil War events still exist today and are open to the public: one representing the monumental July 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, the other the July 1864 Battle of Atlanta. The painting of the Gettysburg conflict was the work of French artist Paul Dominique Philippoteaux, who concentrated his efforts on the climactic Confederate attack famously known as Pickett’s Charge. Once the Frenchman finished his artwork, the painting stood 22 feet high and 279 feet in circumference.

Among veterans of the battle whom Philippoteaux interviewed to provide more realistic scenes were Union Generals Winfield S. Hancock, Abner Doubleday, O.O. Howard, and Alexander S. Webb. For further detail, Philippoteaux also took photographs of the terrain upon which the charge took place. Realism was considered essential, as the cyclorama included artifacts and sculptures, including stone walls, fences, and trees. Recently restored, it is currently on display at the Gettysburg National Military Park Museum and Visitors Center.

The Battle of Atlanta Cyclorama, 49 feet high and more than 100 yards long, was also recently restored. Augmented by modern technology, it is on display at the Atlanta History Center.

The American Panorama Company of Milwaukee hired 17 German artists with a penchant for beer to create the painting. It took the painters nearly five months and many cases of beer to complete the detailed painting. It debuted in Minneapolis in 1886. Due to its initial location in Minnesota and the efforts to attract Northern tourists, the focus of the events during the Battle of Atlanta concentrated on the Northern perspective, with highlighted Union military personnel and the Confederate side painted a bit more shadowy and vague. When the massive painting was relocated to Atlanta, it was billed locally as “the only Confederate victory ever painted” to appeal to audiences in its new Southern venue, although the original battle was certainly not victorious for the boys in gray. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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Richard H. Holloway is a frequent ACW contributor. Check out his article on George Custer at historynet.com/east-west-rivalry-civil-war.

William S. Love of the 1st Special Battalion of Louisiana Infantry had little time to revel in his army’s victory at the First Battle of Manassas. For nearly three weeks, the Confederate surgeon from New Orleans found himself “constantly employed” treating wounded from both sides at the Carter House, a Manassas hillside homestead now serving as a field hospital. Finally, on August 9, 1861, Love fired off a quick note to his father, apologizing that it had taken him so long to do so. “I have had charge of some thirty or forty wounded prisoners,” he professed. “I got rid of them two or three days ago and have now here only [Captain] George McCausland who had gotten into a conflict wounded in a duel [and] is not in a condition yet to be moved.”

The Civil War’s first major battle on July 21, 1861, had sent a shockwave across both sides of the fractured country. As the clash on the plains of Manassas, Va., teetered on the edge of an expected Union victory that many believed would quell the Southern states’ burgeoning rebellion, fate played its hand, allowing the combined armies of Confederate Generals P.G.T. Beauregard and Joseph E. Johnston to storm back and claim a victory.

Hand-picked to win it all, Union Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell attempted a bold advance that morning against the Southern forces assembled both on Matthews Hill and along the Warrenton Turnpike. Buckling under intense pressure on Matthews Hill, Love’s Louisiana Tigers—along with their beleaguered comrades from South Carolina and Virginia cobbled together in Colonel Nathan “Shanks” Evans’ 7th Brigade—withdrew in disarray toward Henry Hill, where the Southern commanders settled into a defensive posture.

Flush with grandiose visions of victory, McDowell ordered his troops to “press the Confederates.” At midday, astride his horse, he galloped along his lines shouting, “Victory! Victory! We have done it! We have done it!” The Union commander’s euphoric cries, however, produced ill-advised inaction among many of his troops—and soon a Herculean effort by their Confederate counterparts.

Patiently awaiting the Union advance behind a slope near Henry Hill were an unassuming former Virginia Military Institute professor named Thomas Jonathan Jackson and his contingent of Virginia infantry. The subsequent stand by the Old Dominion native would become immortal, of course, as was the Confederates’ remarkable rally on the field, which by evening had the Union troops and hordes of resident bystanders scampering back to Washington, D.C., as fast as the roads would allow.

The Southerners had indeed grasped victory from the hands of defeat. 

A Duel… and a Prince

The letters Love finally sent to his father, parts of which are published here for the first time, were heartfelt and in places detailed, particularly his descriptions of the incident involving Captain George McCausland and a visit to the battlefield by Prince Napoleon, the cousin of French Emperor Napoleon III.

Joining Wheat’s Tigers in Colonel Evans’ Brigade at Manassas were the 4th South Carolina; the 30th Virginia Cavalry, Troops A and I; and a section of the Lynchburg (Va.) Artillery. Poor McCausland, a volunteer aide-de-camp on Evans’ staff, had gotten into an altercation with Captain Alexander White, commander of the 1st Special Battalion’s Company B. Only 24, McCausland was a native Louisianan—considered “a strikingly handsome man,” but a little unwise perhaps. White was a notorious character, having once been convicted of murder during a poker game. When McCausland made insulting remarks about the Tigers in the wake of the victory, White was outraged. To satisfy his honor, he challenged the youngster to a duel.

McCausland accepted the challenge, and on July 24 the two squared off near their camp with Mississippi Rifles at “short-range.” White fired first, sending a .54-caliber bullet through both of McCausland’s hips. McCausland, who had fired but missed, languished with the wound in Love’s hospital for more than a month and ultimately perished “in great agony” of pneumonia on September 17. His body was returned to New Orleans for burial at his home in West Feliciana Parish.

Corporal Robert Gracey was among the captured Federals for whom Love also cared at his field hospital. As Gracey later conveyed to a New York newspaper, his two-week stay at the Carter House had been pleasant enough. He revealed that after being wounded he was taken to the hospital “in one of our own ambulances, captured at Bull Run,” and had been “placed…under [the] guard of Lt. Thomas Adrian and his command of Tiger Rifles, of Louisiana.”

The kindly Confederates, Gracey recalled, furnished him with “more condiments, luxuries and personal attentions than were bestowed upon their own sick. Lt. Adrian frequently and jocularly remarked, as an excuse for this, that his object was a selfish one. He wanted to take [him] to the South, and exhibit him, a la [Phineas T.] Barnum, as a fine specimen of the living Yankee who couldn’t be killed.”

As for Prince Napoleon, he did visit the Manassas area in the days following the battle and shared a carriage with Beauregard, escorted by more than 100 cavalrymen under that flamboyant Virginian, Colonel J.E.B. Stuart. According to one unidentified observer, Beauregard and his guest disembarked at the now-famous Stone Bridge and strolled about before returning to their carriage and arriving “on the bare plateau rising above the Bull Run, at the very center of the action, amidst corpses, dead horses and freshly-dug graves.”

The battlefield excursion would end at 11 a.m.

Winter in Virginia

Desperate for news from home to distract him from his exhaustive duties, Love implored his father to direct any letters to him “at Manassas, Wheat’s Battalion. The letters all go addressed to it into our box are taken out and sent as directed.”

“I hope to join the Battalion soon,” he divulged. “[I]t is encamped at Bull Run, where the Battle of the 18th alto [Blackburn’s Ford] was fought. I hear that we are to be kept to the sea, but I hope not.” Love also informed his father that he had sent him “by the Southern Express Company fifty dollars some days ago. I now enclose you the receipt for it lest you might have trouble getting it. I would have sent it long since….[but] the Post Office is at Manassas some eight miles from here and I could not get them to mail a letter….”

By the end of November, Love wrote his father again about the “very cold” weather where he was staying at Camp Florida, outside Centreville, Va. It was something to which the Louisiana native was certainly not accustomed. “I would have obtained a furlough ’ere this to have gone to Richmond probably to New Orleans,” he explained, “but that being in daily expectation of a grand battle with [George] McClellan’s whole Yankee army, I did not like to be absent from the company.”

By mid-December, Wheat’s Tigers were still recuperating their strength. Now camped east of Manassas Junction, they stored their flimsy canvas tents and built more substantial log cabins to weather the increasing winter temperatures. It had been less than a year since they had arrived in Virginia.

Although, as Love noted, offensive actions in the area had halted for the most part as winter approached, he elaborated: “Our scouts report the Yankees to be advancing in immense force. The battle is expected to take place in two days. Whole brigades of our army are sent out on picket duty and daily are capturing bodies of Yankee scouts and foraging parties. We are all sanguine and entertain no apprehensions as to the result. From all accounts it will be a bloody battle. But pray God will give us victory.”

The only “grand” battle of any consequence nearby would be known as the Bog Wallow Ambush, occurring December 4. Tired of Confederates capturing their men, the Yankees began probing enemy positions and finally launched a trap that produced a narrow victory, with five Confederate and four Federal casualties.

Eager for a Fight

The group that had first organized six months earlier at Camp Moore in southeast Louisiana proved a raucous assortment of men. Recruited from the alleyways and docks in the seedier side of New Orleans, they were at least experienced fighters, just not disciplined. While at Camp Moore, a young private from another company, John F. Charlton, wrote in his diary: “Our excitement in camp with the Tiger Rifles was our first experience being often aroused during the night by cries of ‘fall in fall in’ expecting to be attacked by the Tigers. They never liked us because we often accused them of Stealing.”

Initially they were all adorned with regular-issue Confederate uniforms, but they did wear distinctive wide-brimmed hats with slogans painted on the bands such as “Lincoln’s Life or a Tiger’s Death” and “Tiger in Search of Abe.” A rich benefactor, Alexander Keene Richards, admired them and purchased one company (the “Tiger Rifles”) wildly colored Zouave-style uniforms consisting of a red fez and shirt, a dark blue jacket trimmed in red, baggy blue-and-white-striped pants, and white gaiters to fit over most of their blue-and-white-striped socks. They were armed with .54-caliber Mississippi rifled muskets and had huge Bowie knives strapped to their waists. Stitched on their flag, ironically, were the words “As Gentle As” adjacent to a resting lamb in the center.

A Virginia native, Chatham Roberdeau Wheat was a veteran of many wars, and during the fighting in Mexico in 1846-48 received particular praise from General Zachary Taylor, who described him as “the best natural soldier he had ever seen.” He followed that up with military forays in Cuba, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Italy.

In addition to being a born leader, Wheat was a physically imposing figure, standing 6-feet-4 and weighing nearly 275 pounds. He demanded respect from the soldiers serving under him and was stout enough to earn it. At one point, Wheat was overheard screaming at his men, “If you don’t get to your places, and behave as soldiers should, I will cut your hands off with this sword!” It was widely acknowledged that his men feared him and that he was the only person able to control them.

Despite his rough exterior, Wheat interacted gentlemanly with the ladies of New Orleans. One Crescent City girl, 16-year-old Clara Solomon, was highly impressed with the major and was a family friend of one of his company commanders, Captain Obed P. Miller. Before the Tigers were scheduled to head off to war on June 15, 1861, Solomon traveled to Camp Moore in a desperate attempt to see “Maj. Wheat’s first special battalion.”

The giddy teen jotted in her journal:

“But hush! we are nearing Tangipahoa [where Camp Moore was situated]! The whistle is sounding! we are at the depot! ‘What hope, what joy our bosom’s swell!!’ Quickly my head is thrust out the window in search of one familiar, well beloved form [Battalion Adjutant Allen C. Dickinson]. The report! It is seen!! A moment more and we are with it. Our fears are ended. They have not gone! But one received the ‘kiss salute.’ How tantalizing!! He [Dickinson] was glad to see us! Sufficient! We slowly wind our way to the Hotel. We remain there a few moments and then proceed to the seat of action, ‘The Camp,’ accompanied by Capt. White and his wife.”

Unexpectedly, the unit’s departure to Virginia was delayed until the following Thursday. The soldiers were eager for a fight and seemed somewhat blue because of the delay. As Solomon would recall, “When we arrived at our quarters, the first object that attracted our attention was our ‘handsome Major [Wheat],’” who, she wrote, “greeted them very cordially.” Lamenting that Wheat was without a female companion, she offered to be his escort for the evening activities and later chided the major for not relaying his “proper” goodbyes to her at night’s end.

Once Wheat and his men finally departed on trains to Virginia, they found themselves packed tightly in the rail cars, much like sardines in a can. The companies comprising the battalion consisted of the Walker Guards (Robert A. Harris, commander); Tiger Rifles (Alexander White); Delta Rangers (Henry C. Gardner); Catahoula Guerrillas (Jonathan W. Buhoup); and Old Dominion Guards (Obed Miller). It was a plodding, uncomfortable ride, but it allowed for overnight stops. Local crowds cheered them on and often convinced the train to stop so they could pass out goodies to the Louisianans. One gift was a big cake made especially for Wheat.

The trip, though, was not entirely pleasant. During a stop at Opelika, Ala., Wheat’s men left the train and seized control of a hotel, including the bar inside. Unable to clear the troublesome men out of the building, the local authorities sought assistance from the major, who at the point was fast asleep on the train. Wakened, Wheat rushed to the scene, pistol drawn, and immediately ordered the belligerents to disperse and return to their railcars. But for a few men, all obeyed the order. Of those continuing to resist, two ruffians were clearly identified as the ringleaders. A witness, Colonel William C. Oates of future Gettysburg fame, later disclosed: “Wheat shot both of them dead. He told me the only way to control his men was to shoot down those who disobeyed or defied him, yet they loved him with the fidelity of dogs.”

Upon the battalion’s arrival in the Old Dominion, the men made an impression on the soldiers of the 18th Virginia Infantry, one of whom recalled witnessing “one freight car…pretty nearly full of Louisiana ‘Tigers’ under arrest for disorderly conduct, drunkenness, etc., most of which were bucked and gag[ged].”

At Lynchburg, former bookstore-clerk-​turned-Catahoula Guerrilla Lieutenant William D. Foley wrote: “Our destination is ‘Manassas Gap’. We will have the gratification to participate on the ‘Big Fight’ on Virginia’s soil, the first of Louisiana’s troops. The enemy outnumber us, but we are all prepared, and more than anxious for the Conflict. Troops from Richmond are being sent to the Gap. Tiz a place we must and will hold. The God of battles being with us.”

Before they could reach Manassas, however, the battalion clashed with Federal soldiers at Seneca Dam on the Potomac River.

“Our blood was on fire”

Many of the Tigers were immigrants—a large number from Ireland who had fled that country’s potato famine. As the New Orleans Daily Delta noted, “As for our Irish citizens—whew!—they are ‘spiling’ for a fight.”

It wouldn’t take long for them to get their wish. After McDowell’s forces were rebuffed attempting to cross Bull Run Creek at Blackburn’s Ford on July 18, the Union general was convinced it was too heavily defended and began looking for another point along the Confederate lines to assault. He moved his forces upstream and on the morning of July 21 put his renewed attack plan in place.

Just before daybreak, Southern pickets near the Stone Bridge heard a large movement of troops approaching their position. Colonel Evans deployed one of Wheat’s companies and some of his South Carolinians as skirmishers by the bridge, while the rest of his brigade took position on the nearby hills overlooking the bridge and the Warrenton Turnpike. The Union threat at the Stone Bridge, however, was merely a demonstration. The bulk of McDowell’s force was intending to cross 2½ miles north at Sudley Ford.

Soon, a Confederate signal station in Manassas—manned by future Confederate luminary Edward P. Alexander—alerted Evans that a large Union force was moving to turn his left flank. Evans and Wheat agreed they had to shift their lines to meet this new enemy front, hoping reinforcements would hastily arrive. With no desire to abandon such an important position entirely, the commanders left Lieutenant Adrian and a contingent of Tigers guarding the Stone Bridge.

Confusion among the Louisiana and South Carolina troops proved a problem, as the latter unwittingly fired on their Pelican State comrades while navigating a wooded area, and the Louisianans returned the fire. Wheat rushed to the scene to stop the shooting, but not before two of his men lay mortally wounded.

At about 9:45 a.m., Union Colonel Ambrose Burnside’s men advanced with bayonets fixed through a heavily wooded area into a clearing and found themselves flushing out the Catahoula Guerrillas, then hiding in the tall brush. Relayed Guerrilla Sergeant Robert Richie: “[T]he enemy opened on us, and we had the honor of opening the ball, receiving and returning the first volley that was fired on that day….After pouring a volley, we rushed upon the enemy and forced them back under cover.”

The Guerrillas’ advance at the double-quick forced Burnside’s startled men back into the cover of the forest. The Union colonel, however, had six cannons total, and some were lined up to repulse the Southerners. Guerrilla Drury Gibson remembered the deadly fire, writing, “The balls came as thick as hail [and] grape, bomb and canister would sweep our ranks every minute.”

Some of the Tiger Rifles and Catahoula Guerrillas dropped their Mississippi Rifles, which were bereft of lugs to hold bayonets, and unsheathed their Bowie knives before charging the Federals with ferocity. In later describing the conflict, one Alabama soldier called the Louisianans “the most desperate men on earth,” crowing that when they threw their knives at the enemy, they “scarcely ever [missed] their aim.” Worse for the Yankees, those large knives had strings attached, allowing them to be retrieved after they plunged into an enemy soldier’s body.

Vividly portraying the attack’s desperate moments, Ritchie crowed: “Our blood was on fire. Life was valueless. They boys fired one volley then rushed upon the foe with clubbed rifles beating down their guard; then they closed upon them with their knives. I had been in battles several times before, but such fighting was never done, I do not believe as was done for the next half hour[;] it did not seem as though men were fighting, it was devils mingling in the conflict, cursing, yelling, cutting, shrieking.”

One Tiger’s account of the battle found its way into a Richmond newspaper:

“As we were crossing a field in an exposed situation, we were fired upon (through mistake) by a body of South Carolinians, and at once the enemy let loose as if all hell had been left loose. Flat upon our faces we received their shower of balls; a moment’s pause, and we rose, closed in upon them with a fierce yell, clubbing our rifles and using our long knives. This hand-to-hand fight lasted until fresh reinforcements drove us back beyond our original position, we carrying our wounded with us. Major Wheat was here shot from his horse; Captain White’s horse was shot under him, our First Lieutenant [Thomas Adrian] was wounded in the thigh, Dick Hawkins shot through the breast and wrist, and any number of killed and wounded were strewn about.

“The New York Fire Zouaves, seeing our momentary confusion, gave three cheers and started for us, but it was the last shout that most of them ever gave. We covered the ground with their dead and dying, and had driven them beyond their first position, when just then we heard three cheers for the Tigers and Louisiana. The struggle was decided. The gallant Seventh [Louisiana Infantry] had ‘double quicked’ it for nine miles, and came rushing into the fight. They fired as they came within point blank range, and charged with fixed bayonets. The enemy broke and fled panic-stricken, with our men in full pursuit.

“When the fight and pursuit were over, we were drawn up in line and received the thanks of Gen. Johnston for what he termed our ‘extraordinary and desperate stand.’ Gen. Beauregard sent word to Major Wheat, ‘you, and your battalion, for this day’s work, shall never be forgotten, whether you live or die.’”

The Shreveport Daily News described the battalion as “a specimen of the toughest and most ferocious set of men on earth,” and an account that ran in the Wilmington [N.C.] Journal provided input by Tiger Lieutenant Allen C. Dickinson, who had been shot in the thigh by a Minié ball. “[O]ut of 400 which constituted that command, there were not more than 100 that escaped death and wounds. Maj. Wheat was shot through the body, and was surviving on Wednesday, although his case is exceedingly critical.” According to Dickinson, Captain Buhoup and his Guerrillas “fought with desperation.”

Dickinson, a Virginia native who had been living in New Orleans for several years, had been the one to draw Clara Solomon’s interest back at Camp Moore. When news of the battle reached New Orleans, she lamented, “No news about our Lieut. Dickinson.” Informed of Wheat’s fate, she wrote: “Just think the two persons, for whom we care most in the war, we should hear, in the very first battle, of one being seriously wounded, and nothing of the other.”

A contributor to the Richmond Dispatch, writing under the pseudonym “Louisiana,” tried to clear things up, including the status of the battalion’s leader. “The gallant Colonel Wheat is not dead,” he wrote. “I have just got[ten] a letter from Capt. Geo. McCausland, Aid[e] to Gen. Evans, written on behalf of Major Wheat, to a relative of Allen C. Dickinson, Adjutant of Wheat’s Battalion.”

The contributor went on to describe Dickinson’s injury in detail: “The wound is in his leg, and although not dangerous….His horse having been killed under him, he was on foot with sword in one hand and revolver in the other, about fifty yards from the enemy, when a Minie ball struck him. He fell and lay over an hour, when fortunately, Gen. Beauregard and staff, and Capt. McCausland, passed. The generous McCausland dismounted and placed Dickinson on his horse. Lieut. D. is doing well and is enjoying the kind care and hospitality of Mr. Waggoner and family, on Clay Street, in this city.”

The Shreveport Weekly News published the lyrics of a song written expressly about the battalion’s exploits. Borrowing its tune from the song, “Wait for the Wagons,” it had three stanzas praising the Louisianans at First Manassas—the song’s title aptly changed to “Abe’s Wagons.”

We met them at Manassas, all formed in bold array, 
And the battle was not ended when they all ran away. 
Some left their guns and knapsack, in their legs they did confide, 
We overhauled Scott’s carriage, and his epaulets besides. 
[Chorus]
Louisiana’s Tiger Rifles, they rushed in for their lines, 
And the way they slayed the Yankees, with their long Bowie knives. 
They laid there by the hundreds, as it next day did appear, 
With a countenance quite open, that gaped from ear to ear. 
[Chorus]
The battle being ended, and Patterson sent back, 
Because he did not fight us, for courage he did lack. 
Abe Lincoln he got so very mad, when his army took a slide, 
And we jumped into his wagons, and we all took a ride.

A British reporter recalled a peculiar tactic practiced by the Louisianans, writing, “[T]hey would maintain a death-like silence until the foe was not more than 50 paces off; then delivering a withering volley, they would dash forward with unearthly yells and [when] they drew their knives and rushed to close quarters, the Yankees screamed with horror.”

Lieutenant Adrian rejoined the battalion with his scant force, and after being wounded in the thigh fell to the ground. When he noticed some of the Tigers falling back, he propped himself up on one elbow and shouted at the top of his lungs, “Tigers, go in once more. Go in my sons, I’ll be great gloriously God damned if the sons of bitches can ever whip the Tigers!”

First-person reports were published in New Orleans’ Daily True Delta after the unnamed “vivandier of the Tiger Rifles” strode into their offices with letters from some Tigers to their friends back home. The newspaper cited:

“These letters give a detailed history of the Tigers’ sayings and doings since their departure hence, and especially their participation in the battles of…Manassas. The loss among them, we are pleased to say, is much less than has been reported. They have twenty-six of their seventy-six, wholly uninjured, and several more who are but slightly wounded. That they fought like real tigers everybody admits and Gen. Johnston, it is said, complimented them especially on the brave and desperate daring which they had exhibited.

“[Lieutenant] Ned Hewitt reported here as having been killed, did not receive the slightest wound. Moreover, none of the officers of the Company were killed. Two of the Tigers who had been missing for several days after the fight, made their way to Manassas on Thursday last, one being slightly and other pretty badly wounded. The kindness of the Virginia ladies to the wounded soldiers is said to be beyond all praise—like that of a mother to a child or a wife to a husband. Soldiers so nursed and attended can never be anything else than heroes and conquerors.”

Having defied death—and skeptical doctors—when gravely wounded at First Manassas, Wheat would not be so lucky when shot in the head 11 months later at the Battle of Gaines’ Mill, the third of the Seven Days’ Battles on June 27, 1862. His purported final words—“Bury me on the field, boys!”—were to open a poem in his honor. Wheat had been the only one to truly rein in the rambunctious battalion, which formally disbanded on August 15, 1862. Fortunately, their legend survives. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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A frequent contributor, Richard H. Holloway is a member of America’s Civil War’s editorial advisory board. He thanks Glen Cangelosi for his help in preparing this article.

As it is for so many of us today, coffee was an essential treat for soldiers during the Civil War. That was particularly true for members of the 1st Special Battalion of Louisiana Infantry — better known as Wheat’s Tigers. So attached to their New Orleans-brewed Joe with added chicory, the Tigers had a thousand pounds of beans transported by train to Richmond leading up to the First Battle of Manassas. Café du Monde was a Crescent City hot spot during the war, and it remains so today. Recently author Richard Holloway indulged himself at the historic café.

The detritus of war was evident along the banks of the Mississippi as the 7th Indiana Cavalry made its leisurely descent down the river from Memphis. On June 17, 1865—with Brig. Gen. Stand Watie’s final formal Confederate surrender less than a week away—the Hoosier State troopers had boarded four steamers headed for Alexandria, La.. It would be a pleasant enough cruise that included a pass of Milliken’s Bend, where Black troops had helped engineer a “bloody” Federal victory on June 6-7, 1863, during the Vicksburg Campaign. “The overflowings of the river were rapidly washing away the earthworks, which the negroes so gallantly defended,” noted 1st Lt. Thomas S. Cogley.

At Natchez, Miss., the convoy stopped for what was intended to be a short respite. Because the pilots were unfamiliar with the river and feared tempting an accident, however, they decided to dock there for the evening. That gave the cavalrymen unexpected free time to write letters back home.

On the move the next morning, they enjoyed some relief from the long journey’s monotony with numerous glimpses of alligators roaming along the water’s edge. One brazen soldier was surprised to see a bullet he fired from his carbine glance off one large reptile’s tough exterior. And though the act of shooting at alligators eventually grew tiresome, once an order was issued forbidding the routine, it led to an inordinate number of “accidental” weapon discharges.

Most of the men were unaware of their final destination. With the war all but over, they figured they were being sent to muster out of service before being allowed to head home. A collection of troops, most working together for the first time, were joining the 7th Indiana in Alexandria. Among these was the 5th Illinois Cavalry, better known as the “Prairie Boys.”

After departing the Mississippi River northwest of Baton Rouge, the boats steamed up the Red River toward Alexandria, located approximately 260 nautical miles from Memphis. Upon their arrival at the juncture of the two rivers, one of the Prairie Boys had noticed “[d]ull, brownish red, soil-laden water flowed into the Mississippi from the Red River.” During the spring, Red River water levels were normally low, making it hard to navigate, and by the summer of 1865 the river had remained drained and sluggish.

Near Marksville, La., the troopers passed the abandoned earthen works at Fort DeRussy. Then, about 50 miles from their destination, they began to notice that the ground was low, flat, and heavily wooded—but also enveloped by a considerable amount of water, essential for growing sugar and cotton. The heat, though, was oppressive at this time of year, and the heavy tree line cut off any potential breeze to cool the travelers down.

Custer Steams Toward Alexandria

The commander of the group of soldiers assembling in central Louisiana was none other than Maj. Gen. George Armstrong Custer. Accompanied by his young bride, Elizabeth Bacon “Libbie” Custer, the now-famous general had been dispatched to this vicinity by Maj. Gen. Phil Sheridan while stationed in Arlington, Va. Rumors were circulating that a Rebel force had pledged to perpetuate the Confederacy in Texas.

At the time the orders were issued, it was speculated that Confederate President Jefferson Davis was on the way to join Major George Kirby and a large force of Southerners in Texas. Some in the North feared the Confederates might even ally themselves with the French in Mexico and reignite the fighting.

Sheridan assigned Custer to pursue and subdue the enemy gathering in the Lone Star State, but he was initially to assemble at Alexandria and create an effective fighting force.

En route to central Louisiana, the Custers near the end of June had boarded a steamboat in New Orleans. Of their journey, Libbie recalled: “We grew to have an increasing respect for the skill of the [steamboat] pilot, as he steered us around sharp turns, across low water filled with branching upturned tree trunks, and skillfully took a narrow path between the shore and a snag that menacingly ran its black point out of the water.”

As had the troops Custer was about to command, the couple encountered alligators during their voyage, the massive beasts often sunning themselves on sandbars beside the water. Because of the tendency for fired bullets merely to bounce off the creatures’ skin, as the 7th Indiana troopers had already learned, Custer was determined to find a vulnerable spot at which to aim. After a few shots with a rifle borrowed from a steamboat guard, Custer finally succeeded in killing one.

According to Libbie’s attendant, Eliza, the general’s wife had several firsthand opportunities to view alligators at a distance. During the Custers’ boat ride, an unsuspecting African American lad was napping on a sandbar outside Alexandria as an alligator crept toward him. Using a loaned carbine, Custer dispatched the animal with a single shot.

On June 23, the 7th Indiana disembarked at a sugar plantation at the edge of Alexandria. The troopers immediately felt the effects of the harsh sun, the open fields offering no shade. Noted Cogley: “Awnings, both for the men and the horses were constructed of poles and brush brought from the woods, which measurably relieved the suffering…”

“The residents had partially rebuilt the town after [Maj. Gen.] A.J. Smith set [it] ablaze when the Federals withdrew in May 1864,” recalled one 5th Illinois trooper. “A few small, one-story cottages replaced the once thriving town….”

“Low, flat countryside bordered Alexandria, and the smell of rank, decomposing vegetation rose from the banks,” wrote another Prairie Boy. “The hot, tepid air and stagnant water of hundreds of boggy bayous created an oasis for mosquitoes. Clouds of bloodsuckers, including gallinippers [large flying insects with a painful bite] enveloped the men when they landed.”

Libbie Custer seemed even less impressed:

“The houses along the Red River were raised from the ground on piles, as the soil was too soft and porous for cellars. Before the fences were destroyed and the place fell into dilapidation, there might have been a lattice around the base of the building, but now it was gone. Though this open space under the house gave vent for what air was stirring, it also offered free circulation to pigs, that ran grunting and squealing back and forth, and even calves sought its grateful shelter from the sun and flies.”

Cogley was more sympathetic to the locals’ plight. “Alexandria, before the war was a small city of about five thousand inhabitants,” he noted. “It acquired some historic interest by being given over to the torch, and the greater and best portion of it destroyed by fire, by General [Nathaniel] Banks, when he left….At the time [our] regiment was there, it contained but about five hundred inhabitants. Old chimneys had not yet fallen, and ruined walls marked the site of former business blocks or palatial residences.”

Unpopular Order

Once the unaffiliated regiments arrived, they were separated into two brigades. The 7th Indiana, 5th Illinois, and 12th Illinois Cavalry comprised the 1st Brigade of Custer’s new division—to be headed by Brig. Gen. George A. Forsyth—and the 1st Iowa Cavalry and 2nd Wisconsin Cavalry formed the division’s 2nd Brigade, under Colonel William Thompson’s command.

Also supporting Custer were two Black regiments, the 76th and 80th USCI. While these units were not formally under the command of the cavalry division, they were under Custer’s direction. Each regiment in the mounted brigades were re-fitted with Spencer carbines and new mounts, except the 2nd Wisconsin, which had already been issued them before arriving after winning a shooting contest. Still, the men were lacking in adequate garrison equipment, and had poor clothing issues.

Libbie described the men of her husband’s command as “[t]ired out with the long service, weary with an uncomfortable journey by river from Memphis, sweltering under a Gulf-coast sun, under orders to go farther and farther from home when the war was over, the one desire was, to be mustered out and released from a service that became irksome and baleful when a prospect of crushing the enemy no longer existed.”

Before the troops could settle, Custer issued what turned out to be an extremely unpopular Special Orders No. 2:

Headquarters Cavalry
Alexandria, Louisiana. June 24th, 1865.
Special Orders No. 2.

Numerous complaints having reached these headquarters of depredations having been committed by persons belonging to this command; all officers and soldiers are hereby urged to use every exertion to prevent the committal of acts of lawlessness, which, if permitted to pass unpunished, will bring discredit upon the command. Now that the war is virtually ended, the rebellion put down, and peace about to be restored to our entire country, let not the lustre of the last four years be dimmed by a single act of misconduct toward the persons or property of those with whom we may be brought in contact. In future, and particularly on the march, the utmost care will be exercised to save the inhabitants of the country in which we may be located from any molestation whatever.

As supplies can be obtained from the supply train when needed, there will be no necessity for foraging upon the country.

No foraging parties will be sent out from this command without written permission from these headquarters and then only to obtain fresh beef and grain, for which payment will be made by the chiefs of the proper departments at these headquarters.

Every violation of this order will receive prompt and severe punishment. Owing to the delays of court martials, and their impracticability when the command is unsettled, it is hereby ordered that any enlisted man violating the above order, or committing depredations upon the persons or property of citizens, will have his head shaved, and in addition will receive twenty-five lashes upon his back, well laid on. This punishment will, in all cases, be administered under the supervision of the Provost Marshal of the command, who is charged with the execution of this order so far as it in his power.

Any officer failing to adopt proper steps to restrain his men from violating this order, or fails to report to these headquarters the names of those violating it, will be at once arrested and his name forwarded to the proper authority for prompt and dishonorable dismissal from the army. The commanding General is well aware that the number of those upon whom the enforcement of this order will be necessary will be small, and he trusts that in no case will be necessary.

He is also confident that those who entered the service from proper motives will see the necessity for a strict compliance with the requirements of this order.

Citizens of the surrounding country are earnestly invited to furnish these headquarters any information they may acquire which will lead to the discovery of any parties violating the forgoing order.

Regimental commanders will publish this order to every man in their commands.

By the command of Major General Custer.

The reaction among the command was swift. One of the displeased was 1st Iowa surgeon Charles H. Lothrop, who wrote: 

“On the promulgation of this order no little indignation was manifested by all the troops, which would be natural among all honorable and high-minded men, who from purely patriotic motives responded to the first call for volunteers to defend and maintain the laws of the country, and endured the privations and vicissitudes incidental to four years’ active warfare, to be thus subjected to eternal disgraces without a shadow of law or precedent; and real citizens, entertaining the most malignant bitterness towards federal soldiers.”

Nevertheless, considering the situation facing his men, Custer’s decision had been correct. Indeed, many former Confederate soldiers occupied the surrounding countryside and likely would need only a small provocation to band together and launch attacks on the isolated command. Alexandria’s mayor had surrendered the town only on June 3, mere weeks before Custer’s arrival. Its citizens undoubtedly harbored ill will toward the men in blue, as barely a year had passed since Federal troops had burned their town maliciously on May 13, 1864.

A subsequent wave of desertions was clearly proof Custer had trouble discerning the difference between volunteer soldiers and Regular Army cavalry. In the wake of the order, members of the 5th Illinois began leaving in droves. Although most of these deserters had recently transferred from the 11th Illinois Cavalry, the loss of eight—Joseph Hakin, William H. Barcus, Jesse Cannon, Thomas Ross, John Brown, Thomas W. Wiley, William H. Warren, and Archibald C. Tigner—was somewhat shocking as they had enlisted at the war’s start in 1861.

Another trooper attempting to flee, William A. Wilson, was caught and court-martialed. Other units also reported serious departures from their command. “On several occasions,” Lieutenant Cogley recalled, “nearly the whole command was called out at night, to prevent the threatened desertions of companies and of a regiment.”

While in Alexandria, 15 members of the Prairie Boys alone deserted, and by the time of their October mustering-out, they would be short 75 troopers. Some dangerous incidents even sprang up during this period. “The soldiers did not confine their maledictions to the regular officers of command; they openly refused to obey their own officers,” Libbie reported. “One of the colonels (I am glad I have forgotten his name) made a social call at our house. He was in great perturbation of mind, and evidently terrified, as in the preceding night his dissatisfied soldiers had riddled his tent with bullets, and, but for his ‘Lying low,’ he would have been perforated like a sieve.”

Unfortunately, Custer ended up further exacerbating the friction with his men by directing them to perform menial tasks for his family. In a response to Custer’s report of the strife he was experiencing, Sheridan instructed, “Use such summary measures as you deem proper to overcome the mutinous disposition of the individuals.”

Having become a strict disciplinarian, Custer became enraged when hearing of the trouble in his command. “The conduct of these troops while at Alexandria was infamous, and rendered them a terror to the inhabitants of that locality, and a disgrace to this and any other service,” he would write. “Highway robbery was of frequent occurrence each day. Farmers bringing cotton or other produce to town were permitted to sell it and then robbed in open daylight upon the streets of their town.”

Custer’s command had dissolved into an unruly rabble determined to wreak revenge on the Southern population.

Well after the war, Union 1st Lt. Michael Griffin attempted to explain the problems Custer was having by writing, “[We] had come directly from the Army of the Potomac.” The inner conflict between Custer and his Western troops was part of a rivalry of who was tougher or better than the other: the hard Western trooper or the apparent dandies from the East. As the war played out, the Army of the Potomac veterans were actually just as tough as their counterparts to the West, having had to fight Lee, Jackson, and Stuart for so long. Dutifully, though, the remaining soldiers who decided to stay endeavored to drill together and become a cohesive unit for the upcoming campaign in Texas.

When it came up in conversation, Custer adopted a soothing demeanor to calm Libbie’s concerns about the openly hostile activities around them. Despite the controversies, Custer and his wife endeavored to make their stay in central Louisiana pleasant. Eliza convinced Libbie to get out and visit the elderly former slaves encamped behind Dr. John Casson’s house in Alexandria where the Custers were staying and where General Banks had lodged in 1864. Eventually, Custer joined in these interactions and provided food for the seniors. They also attended church services there.

“It was at Alexandria that I first visited a negro prayer-meeting,” Libbie recalled. “As we sat on the gallery one evening, we heard the shouting and singing, and quietly crept around to the cabin where the exhorting and groaning were going on. Though they were so poor and helpless, and seemingly without anything to inspire gratitude, evidently there were reasons in their mind for the heart-felt thanks [for the nourishment provided by the Custers] as there was no mistaking the genuineness of feeling when they sang [grateful hymns]. They swayed back and forth as they set about the dimly lighted cabin, clapped their hands spasmodically, and raised their eyes to heaven in moments of absorption.”

“a land of enchantment”

The Custers did experience some lighter moments with some of the soldiers not quite as disgruntled as the rest. The 7th Indiana troopers in particular tried to alleviate tensions with their commanding general. After spending long hours in the hot sun drilling, they would often relax by fishing and catching alligators. “Occasionally, a baby alligator from a foot and a half to two feet in length, got on dry land and was taken prisoner by the men,” Cogley wrote.

Aware of Libbie’s fear of the beastly reptiles, Custer proposed to put her at ease by exposing her to one of the smaller ones the Indiana troopers had captured. As Libbie recalled: “[T]he General, thinking to quiet my terror of them by letting me see the reptile ‘close to’ as the children say, took me down to camp, where the delighted soldier told me how he had caught it, holding on to the tail, which is its weapon. The animal was all head and tail; there seemed to be no intermediate anatomy. He flung the latter member at a hat in so vicious and violent a way, that I believed instantly the story, which I had first received with doubt, of his rapping over a puppy and swallowing him before a rescue could come. This pet was in a long tank of water the owner had built, and it gave the soldiers much amusement.” Many times the baby alligators’ parents would come on shore hunting for them, sending the ladies scurrying for safety and the soldiers for their weapons.

Libbie also documented the excursions into the countryside that she and her husband would make to relieve tensions. The heat was still stifling during daylight so the couple went for evening rides around the area. Libbie’s state of mind eased considerably upon touring the area. “It seemed to me a land of enchantment,” she allowed. “We had never known such luxuriance of vegetation. The valley of the river extended several miles inland, the foliage was varied and abundant, and the sunsets had a deeper, richer colors than any in the North. We sometimes rode for miles along the country roads, between hedges of osage–orange on one side, and a double white rose on the other, growing fifteen feet high. The dew enchanted the fragrance, and a lavish profusion was displayed by nature in that valley, which was a constant delight to us.”

The couple’s explorations brought them to the Louisiana State Seminary and Military Academy, a facility that Libbie noted was still called the “Sherman Institute.”

“General Sherman had been head of this military school before the war, but it was subsequently converted into a hospital,” she elaborated. “It was in a lonely and deserted district, and the great empty stone building, with its turreted corners and modern architecture, seemed utterly incongruous in the wild pine forest that surrounded it.

“We returned to the river, and visited two forts [Forts Randolph and Buhlow] on the bank opposite Alexandria. The General took in at once the admirable situation selected, which commanded the river for many miles. He thoroughly appreciated, and endeavored carefully to explain to me, how cleverly the few materials at the disposal of the impoverished South had been used. The moat about the forts was the deepest our officers had ever seen. Closely my husband studied the plan and formation, he said it would have added greatly to his appreciation, had he known then that the Confederate engineer who planned this admirable fortification was one of his classmates at West Point.”

The general also climbed with his wife atop the walls of Fort Randolph to get a glimpse of Colonel Joseph Bailey’s dam in the river that had saved a Union fleet from destruction the previous year. Additional excursions of the area’s buildings continued, and the Custers also took time to observe the notorious ironclad CSS Missouri, no longer in service and resting idly in the Red River between the two forts.

Across the river in Pineville, Custer stationed the two Black regiments. Tasked to keep the order among citizens, desertions among these troops were fairly low, as morale was better. First Lieutenant Biddle Boggs of the 80th USCI, who also was the acting regimental post quartermaster and ordnance officer, actually bragged to his sister, Sarah Wheldon: “We [Boggs and his wife, Maria] can live much cheaper here than New Orleans. We can buy chickens for 25 cents each, eggs 25 to 30 cents per dozen and butter 50 to 75 cents per pound but rather white and soft.”

The men occupied the cabins at the forts, which had been built the year before by the Confederate garrison. Confederate Colonel Winchester Hall of the 26th Louisiana Infantry mentioned, “The men hastily constructed small cabins with pine boards.”

Although the cabins were dilapidated by the time the USCI soldiers arrived, they were still preferable to the constant burning rays of the sun. Rain, however, provided its own misery for the men who now occupied them. They “leaked badly and flooded frequently,” asserted a former occupant, surgeon Augustus V. Ball of McMahan’s Texas Battery.

Tensions remained high, and national news did not help the situation. Word reached Alexandria on July 11 that four conspirators in President Abraham Lincoln’s assassination had been hanged on July 7. Upon hearing the news, Boggs quickly jotted down a short letter to his sister to express his thoughts: “Hurrah for [U.S. President] Andy Johnson for hanging Mrs. Surratt and all other assassins. It saves trouble and sends witches where they belong—to Old Nick [Satan]. Who would want to be in Heaven with assassins[?]”

A Disturbing Court-Martial

By far, the most disturbing issue that occurred while stationed in Alexandria was a court-martial of two men. Lincoln’s assassination had been the root of that, as members of the 2nd Wisconsin were livid to be still under the command of Lt. Col. Nicholas H. Dale. In April, Dale had made several inflammatory statements after learning of Lincoln’s death. Told of the tragedy, Dale reportedly replied: “That is all right. The country suffers nothing by such a loss. Abe Lincoln is an imbecile. Abe Lincoln is an old fool.”

The men in the ranks believed their commander had disgraced the Army with his insult. Given the audience of men who had overwhelmingly supported Lincoln’s reelection the previous November, the colonel’s words were ill-advised. Dale would be brought up on charges for his contemptuous and disrespectful language.

“[The] strenuous efforts and endeavors were required of the 2nd Wisconsin troopers to suppress riot and insubordination,” according to one report. On April 18, two days before Lincoln’s funeral, Dale’s court-martial lasted mere hours. Though found guilty, he suffered only a reprimand, leaving the Badger State boys infuriated. Now in Alexandria, they continued to seethe at the trial’s result.

When 2nd Wisconsin Lieutenant Leonard L. Lancaster arrived in Alexandria on July 6, it only exacerbated the situation. Lancaster and his company had been on assignment since early in the year, guarding the railroads in Grenada, Miss., and had not seen their comrades in some time. The Confederate threat in Texas was subsiding, but a possible altercation in Mexico remained possible.

The men of the 2nd Wisconsin roundly welcomed Lancaster’s return, according to 1st Lt. Michael Griffin. They quickly made the lieutenant aware of a petition they were circulating to have Dale removed. “Here is Len; he will go with us,” Griffin remembered the men declaring. Agreeing that Dale’s words about Lincoln were an embarrassment to the unit, Lancaster signed the petition and said, “Yes, where do you want to go? To see Col. Dale? Alright fall in.”

This somewhat lighthearted account by one of Lancaster’s supporters should, of course, be taken with a grain of salt. For one thing, most of the men were highly inebriated at the time, which was never accounted for in any of these unofficial post-action reports.

Lancaster soon had several hundred men following him to Dale’s tent, the mob intent on securing their commander’s resignation. Standing in the way initially was Captain Zelotes P. Coggswell, commanding the guard. Coggswell managed to turn a few away from the direction of Dale’s quarters, spurring Lancaster to call out belligerently, “What in hell is the use of my going unless you follow me?”

Reaching Dale’s tent, Lancaster and the group would be halted by Captain George W. Nobles, officer of the day. When Nobles asked them to disperse, Lancaster tersely commented: “I am responsible for this thing. Colonel Dale shall not command this regiment. We are going to put him and his baggage on the steamer Hillman and send him home.”

At that moment, Dale burst out of the tent and confronted the angry men. Lancaster repeated his demand for the lieutenant colonel’s resignation and harshly stated, “….if Dale refused, Custer would share the same fate.”

After successfully convincing the drunken soldiers to go back to their camp, Dale had Lancaster brought up on charges. Lancaster’s court-martial was convened July 18. He sat silently through the testimony against him, simply stating when it was his time to speak: “[A]t the time of the riot, [I] was intoxicated and did not know what he said.”

Despite a heretofore spotless service record, Lancaster was quickly found guilty and Custer signed the order for his execution, alongside Private Wilson of the 5th Illinois, who was found guilty of desertion and likewise sentenced to death. Both men languished in a small local jail that was already full of fellow comrades sentenced for lesser offenses.

The inmates would take turns standing in front of the 14-inch square hole above ground level, the only air available in the stifling heat. Lancaster and Wilson were incarcerated until July 28, when they were both to be executed. On the final day, the two men had their wrists bound together and were led to the designated area for their sentences to be carried out. A hollow square of 5,000 of their fellow soldiers surrounded them, and coffins were placed at their sides.

The prisoners had their faces covered with hoods, but as the firing squad was about to carry out the execution, Custer gave a quick nod to the provost marshal, who pulled Lancaster from the danger zone just before the men fired. Young Wilson was not so lucky, as he was killed instantly.

Custer read an order from President Johnson commuting Lancaster’s death penalty, giving him instead a dishonorable discharge and ordering him to be sentenced to three years hard labor. Custer had received the pardon that morning, but upset with Lancaster’s drunken and treasonous behavior, he let the charade of the junior officer’s execution play out to the last seconds. “General Custer told Colonel Dale that he wanted to shoot Lancaster,” said Private Emmet C. West of the 2nd Wisconsin, “If General Custer had any humane feelings in his soul he would have issued an order immediately [stopping Lancaster’s death sentence].”

The next week, Custer received orders to bring his command to Hempstead, Texas. Frustration among the troopers continued, as Custer issued strict marching orders, again not garnering any feelings of loyalty among them. The cavalrymen were mustered out of service in October 1865, most having a life-long dislike of the perceived dandy from the Eastern Theater. Later in life and into the Dakotas, Custer would carry a mockingbird in a small cage as a memento of the summer of 1865. 

Richard H. Holloway serves on America’s Civil War’s editorial advisory board. He recently completed writing about the rejuvenation of the Confederate Army of Tennessee at Dalton, Ga., slated for publication in 2023.

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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America’s Civil War author Richard H. Holloway explores six Civil War-era sites in Alexandria and Pineville, La. George Armstrong Custer and his wife, Libbie, briefly made the area their home as the war came to a close in June 1865.

Red River, Alexandria, Louisiana

Fort Randolph, Pineville, Louisiana

St. Francis Xavier Cathedral, Alexandria, Louisiana

Kisatchie National Forest, Louisiana

Mount Olivet Cemetery, Pineville, Louisiana

Kent Plantation House, Alexandria, Louisiana

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An underlying factor in the Confederacy’s eventual loss of the Civil War was President Jefferson Davis’ often-shaky ties with his generals. Nowhere was that more evident than Davis’ rocky partnership with Joseph E. Johnston. At the onset of the war, Johnston was in the middle of a tug of war between his native Virginia and the new Confederate government. When Davis began doling out promotions for some of his top officers, however, once-cordial relations turned sour for Johnston and his new commander in chief. Unfortunately, that animosity continued throughout the war. To his credit, Davis kept the proud Virginian in the command mix until the end. From the war’s first major engagement at Manassas, Va., to his surrender of the remnants of the Army of Tennessee in late April 1865, Johnston remained at the forefront of the war effort.

For his latest book, The Civil Wars of Joseph E. Johnston, Confederate States Army: Volume 1: Virginia and Mississippi, 1861-1863 (Savas Beatie, $34.95), esteemed historian Richard M. McMurry scoured resources in archives across the country for rare material. The result is an insightful look at one of the war’s more intriguing characters.

Joe Johnston has been the subject of a great deal of literature already. What new material were you able to find?

Well, I found some diaries and letters that had not been used before, as well as many newspapers. The most important collection of letters that I found were those of Lieutenant Richard Manning, who served on Johnston’s staff from 1861 to 1863. He had many interesting insights into Johnston’s interactions and feelings, especially toward Generals Leonidas Polk and John Pemberton. He was not a big fan of either, but especially not partial to Pemberton.

Another source I stumbled across was that of Sue Harper Mims. She was married to Livingston Mims, who was on Johnston’s staff during the war and subsequently his business partner afterward. I also had a young man at the Mississippi Department of Archives who led me to the journal of Thomas B. Mackall. He was an aide and cousin of General William W. Mackall, who served on Johnston’s staff. That journal contained many gems about Johnston.

Who had a bigger hand in having Johnston join the Confederate Army: Davis or Johnston himself?

Before the official start of the war, prior to Virginia seceding and the formation of the Confederate States of America, the state of Virginia sought out both Johnston and Robert E. Lee, natives of the commonwealth, to join their militia forces. When Governor John Letcher and later Jefferson Davis tried to sway the high-ranking officers, both were still enlisted in the United States Army. Both entities did their very best to recruit them to their cause, with Davis winning out in the end.

How quickly did the relationship between Johnston and Jefferson Davis unravel?

The animosity between Johnston and Davis began the moment Johnston joined the Confederate Army. The date was September 1861, and it began over Johnston feeling devalued at the rank Davis bestowed upon him. Many of his fellow officers were given a higher rank [he was fourth in seniority behind Samuel Cooper, Albert Sidney Johnston, and Robert E. Lee]. Johnston had already begun arguing with the Confederate government officials upon his assignment to command at Harpers Ferry, Va., back in May of 1861. At that point, many of those government officials drew Johnston’s ire, but Johnston did not yet have any friction with Davis.

What is your opinion of Johnston’s performance against Union General Robert Patterson in the buildup to the First Battle of Manassas?

I do not go into great detail of that aspect of Johnston’s career. The main focus of this first volume is Johnston’s quarrels with Davis contrasting Lee and others. Johnston was generally ambiguous toward Lee. He respected Lee, but he was also jealous of him—very resentful of the praise Lee received. It never occurred to Johnston to ask why Davis didn’t like him.

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How did Johnston contribute to the victory at First Manassas?

He did his complete job at Bull Run and acquitted himself as a professional soldier, which he had been trained to do. His aides were relaying orders all over the field on his behalf.

How was Johnston’s defense of Richmond during the 1862 Peninsula Campaign?

I do not cover in-depth of what Johnston had planned to do in defense of the Confederate capital. There are many factors in examining that, including his alienation of government officials as well as President Davis. His wounding at Seven Pines on May 31 quickly caused plans to change after Robert E. Lee was inserted into Johnston’s position.

You discovered new information about Johnston’s wounding at Seven Pines. Explain.

Johnston was wounded twice at Seven Pines. He was shot both in the chest and in the shoulder, both painful and serious wounds. All of mid-1862, Johnston was unable to perform any military duties, either on the field or at a desk. When it seemed Johnston had finally recovered from his wounds in November 1862, he was injured yet again. This little-known account occurred on a train ride between Atlanta and Montgomery, Ala. His rail car ran off the tracks, rolled over and slammed against a tree. Johnston was slung across the car and landed on top both Lt. Manning and a member of Patrick Cleburne’s staff. This definitely reaggravated his healing wounds from Seven Pines. Johnston also became very sick in the spring of 1863, about when he was sent to Mississippi. That was partially due to his wounds; the rest was the result of the normal diseases rampant at that time.

What was the reasoning behind Davis’ decision to hand Johnston such a lofty command in the West in 1863?

Davis appointed Johnston to command in the Western Theater command to provide direction to both Pemberton and Braxton Bragg. Remember, Johnston disliked Pemberton, and it only grew worse when he came into close contact with the Vicksburg garrison commander. Johnston actually liked Bragg at this juncture, from 1862 to 1863. He had reason not to. Johnston’s resentfulness of Bragg came only after he replaced him as commander of the Army of Tennessee. At this point, Bragg was appointed to Davis’ administration, which was sufficient enough to draw Johnston’s scorn. Bragg also eventually came to resent Johnston taking his place in command of the Western forces. Johnston had friction, too, with William Hardee, Bragg’s interim replacement. He felt Hardee was fine as a division or corps commander, but nothing higher.

Tell us more Johnston’s time in charge of the Army of Relief in the West.

Johnston absolutely hated serving in the Western Theater. He preferred to serve in the Army of Northern Virginia again. However, Johnston kept asking Davis for a command. With Davis needing someone to monitor such a large area, he relented and sent Johnston. Upon his arrival in Mississippi, Johnston became sick again and Dr. Yandell was constantly at his side taking care of him. To top it off, when well, Johnston twice had to abandon Jackson, Miss.

How do you feel Johnston handled matters in the eventual loss of Vicksburg? Where did things stand for him as 1863 ended?

Vicksburg could not have been saved and Pemberton was wary of abandoning it. Vicksburg was so messed up, nothing could have been done to save it or its garrison. Johnston should have just specifically ordered Pemberton to leave the city entirely. Pemberton’s brief departure from Vicksburg was not in full force and he was quickly defeated at Champion Hill and removed his forces to the trenches again. Nothing could have been done to wrest the city from Federal forces by the time Johnston arrived on the scene.

As for his besieged troops in Jackson, Johnston was totally unprepared to stay there. He had no supplies for a siege and would have starved and had to surrender the city like Pemberton eventually had to do at Vicksburg.

Johnston ended 1863 at the Huff House, his headquarters at Dalton, Ga. He would go on to jump start the Army of Tennessee into an effective fighting force again as the calendar turned to 1864. Volume 1 of my book mainly covers Johnston’s feud with Davis and his administration and his time in the West.

The Civil Wars of Joseph E. Johnston, Confederate States Army

Volume 1: Virginia and Mississippi, 1861-1863
By Richard M. McMurry, Savas Beatie, 2023

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On December 11, 1861, Jacob Gall enlisted in the 19th Louisiana Infantry at Camp Moore, La., home of the Confederate Army’s largest training facility in the Pelican State. The 28-year-old Jewish immigrant from Meschisko, Poland, had ventured to Louisiana’s Claiborne Parish with his wife, Menia, in the late 1850s, opening a mercantile store in the town of Minden. Now, with the Civil War in its seventh month, he was ready to do his part as a soldier in furthering his adopted homeland’s cause. Along with a number of his neighbors from Minden, he joined Company D of the 19th Louisiana—known as the “Claiborne Grays.”

In early 1862, Gall and his unit were sent north by train to Corinth, Miss., near the Tennessee border. On April 6, the 19th joined General Albert S. Johnston’s early-morning surprise attack on Ulysses Grant’s army at Pittsburg Landing, Tenn., starting the Battle of Shiloh.

The regiment saw action primarily in the Hornet’s Nest, earning the nickname the “Bloody 19th” because of its heavy casualty count. Not long after the Confederate loss at Shiloh, the 19th was assigned as the “Army of Observation” in Pollard, Ala.—a more relaxing designation, of course, that would last nearly a year. It was responsible for keeping an eye on Yankee forces in nearby Florida.

In the spring of 1863, dapper Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee, a corps commander in the Army of Tennessee, began a search for a personal tailor. Word of that reached Pollard, and on May 6, Gall was officially detached from the 19th Louisiana to fill the position for Hardee. Gall’s sewing skills are evident in photos from this period of the fashion-conscious general in uniform.

Gall surely felt fortunate with the assignment, knowing he could stop worrying about dodging bullets in battle. And when Hardee desired to have new flags issued for his corps in September 1863, he turned to his trusted new assistant, Gall.

Gall eventually sewed 34 unit flags with distinctive designs indicating they belonged to Hardee’s Corps. Each featured a white circle centered on a blue field, and bordered in white—with the particular unit’s identification and battle honors painted on the obverse.

Gall would be paid a princely sum of $80.92 and given authority to purchase 38 yards of Merino material, 30 yards of domestic cotton cloth, and eight spools of thread—at a whopping $951. He was also reimbursed $6 a day for travel expenses and assigned a personal guard.

While Gall crafted the banners for Hardee, the Army of Tennessee had begun a siege of Federal forces trapped in Chattanooga, Tenn. On November 25, 1863, Hardee’s Corps was positioned on Missionary Ridge, suffering the brunt of the Federal attack there one day after Joe Hooker’s victory at nearby Lookout Mountain. Some of the standards Gall had created were captured during the Confederate retreat toward Georgia.

Gall was furloughed and served in another command for the rest of the war before returning to Minden and his mercantile store. He remained heavily involved in Shreveport’s United Confederate Veterans organization until his death on February 3, 1901. He was 67 years old.

Some of the flags Gall created during the war remain in pristine condition—testament to his skill and hard work.

Our thanks to Greg Biggs for his assistance with this article.

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The Union Army’s 17th Missouri Infantry arrived at Bridgeport, Ala., on the Tennessee River in late November 1863. Known as the Western Turner Rifles, they fought in Maj. Gen. Peter Osterhaus’ 1st Division in the Army of the Tennessee’s 15th Corps, part of Ulysses S. Grant’s command reinforcing besieged Chattanooga, Tenn. “We have had hard times since I left you,” wrote Private William Heldman of the 17th. “First we had to fight every day and now we have marched about 200 miles without one day’s rest and not enough to eat. They are making a railroad bridge here across the river today. I don’t think we will stay here long. We have got the right wing of the army.”

Grant’s arrival in Chattanooga on October 23 had effectively opened a key Union supply chain into the city known as the “Cracker Line”—welcome relief not only for the starving Federal soldiers inside the city but also the army’s animals. “The men had been on half rations of hard bread for a considerable time,” Grant would note. “The besieged Union troops were happy to get the food supplies but they were without sufficient shoes or other clothing suitable for the advancing [winter] season.”

That’s not to say their counterparts in gray weren’t suffering, too. The torrential rains had muddied the roads to the Confederate positions, significantly preventing the routine flow of supplies. As President Jefferson Davis noted of the Army of Tennessee during an October 10 visit: “[T]hey had given still higher evidence of courage, patriotism, and resolute determination to live freemen, or die freemen, by their patient endurance and buoyant, cheerful spirits, amid privations and suffering from half-rations, thin blankets, ragged clothes, and shoeless feet, than given by baring their breasts to the enemy.”

Private Sam Watkins of the 1st Tennessee recalled that as Davis and his staff galloped by the Tennessee troops, the soldiers mixed cheers with chants of “Send us something to eat, Massa Jeff! I’m hungry!” Those supplications were answered by the end of October; Davis had made sure his men were much better fed and clothed. The 19th Louisiana Infantry, in Colonel Randall Gibson’s Brigade occupying Missionary Ridge, were among those to draw jackets, pants, caps, shirts, drawers, shoes, and blankets. Private George A. Bruton, however, lamented the lack of a key item in winter time, writing to his sister: “As for clothes, I now have plenty of evry thing but socks. Socks can not be had for love or money.”

Douglas John Cater, the regiment’s drum major, described the unbalanced food situation: “Our cooks were with the wagons in the rear and brought rations to us between Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. For the first eight days these rations consisted of cornbread and bran coffee, but on the eighth day, Ram[e]y Lafitte, our company cook, got in possession of a yearling calf and made jerked beef of it. This was in addition to our bill of fare and we ate it with good relish.”

Despite the supply relief, the Louisianans were disappointed to see some of their own moving on to another brigade. In General Braxton Bragg’s reorganization of his forces, the 5th Company, Washington (La.) Artillery was separated from Gibson’s Brigade, resulting in “quite a commotion.” Gibson’s infantryman shouted to the artillerists, “Boys, you will lose your guns to-day; we will not be there to stand by you.”

A petition was drawn up requesting that the Louisianans be left to fight together, circulated by the 19th’s commander, Colonel Wesley Parker Winans. To no avail. Recalled one gunner: “[I]t was the first time the battery had been separated from Louisiana infantry units.”

The Confederates began bracing for “a big fight every day.” Wrote Lafitte: “[W]e are station[ed] on a high Ridge from where we can see Yankee tents. They are just as thick as bees…” Bruton’s patriotic ferver was particularly apparent. “Old Jeff Davis is determined to keep us here until my heads are as white as coton or I die with old age,” he wrote. “A great many men are geting out of servis by diserting but I will stay here for ever before I disert as many have done.”

Nevertheless, as often happened with two armies in such close proximity for an extended period, enemy soldiers began trading goods with each other. Private William Hamner of the 19th Louisiana told his family that he had done so several times, and drum major Cater wrote that he saw his men “giving tobacco [to the Yankees] in exchange for coffee. In this way we found out that they too were sometimes almost without provisions.”

Lookout Mountain

On November 4, Braxton Bragg directed Lt. Gen. James Longstreet and his two divisions, reassigned from the Army of Northern Virginia, to advance toward Knoxville to deal with the threat posed by Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside’s Army of the Ohio. Burnside had occupied the important city, only a few days’ march north of Chattanooga. It was up to Longstreet not only to keep Burnside’s army away from Bragg’s, but also to break the Union occupation of Knoxville.

Grant responded quickly when he learned of Longstreet’s departure. On November 23, he sent troops forward to capture a lightly occupied Confederate observation post on Orchard Knob, a small hill midway between Chattanooga and Missionary Ridge. Bragg responded to the loss of Orchard Knob by repositioning sections of his army. The 19th Louisiana’s longtime division commander, Maj. Gen. John C. Breckinridge, was given command of the left side of the forces on Missionary Ridge, while Lt. Gen. William Hardee assumed command on the right. “The night we got to the Ridge, though late, thousands of camp fires were sparkling in the valley beneath,” wrote John Jackman of the 9th Kentucky Infantry. “A belt of fires encircled Chattanooga, showing the lines of the enemy and all around the base of the Ridge, our fires were glowing.”

The next Union target was Lookout Mountain, which a 10,000-man force commanded by Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker captured on November 24. Unable to provide assistance, the men in the Washington Artillery were left to observe the battle as it unfolded. The famed gunners also took time “to partake of some delicacies received from far off Louisiana”—joined by Breckinridge, his staff, and other dignitaries.

Lieutenant James E. Carraway of the 19th Louisiana had a prime view of Hooker’s attack:

“We were on picket duty in the valley just below and to the right of the battlefield. We could see the charges made by the opposing lines as they wavered to and fro. The mountaintop was made dense with smoke and the air hideous with the cries and groans of the wounded. It was a grand yet solemn sight to behold. And at a late hour of the night, ere the battle ceased, the moon which was shining brightly was suddenly enveloped in darkness as if to show the powers of heaven upon the cruelties of war, and the painting of the earth below red with the blood of human lives. The battle at last hushed. Adjutant Ben Broughton of our regiment visited the picket line, having brought and almost whisperingly delivered orders to fall back. We took up the line of march east, and at the break of day we were ascending the west side of Missionary Ridge, which with its projecting rocks was difficult to do, and not without our lines becoming frequently disordered. Yet by sunup we had reached its summit….”

The Union occupation of Lookout Mountain severely exposed Bragg’s left flank on Missionary Ridge, which required another troop shift.

“After midnight having repulsed every attack of the Rebels, our Div. had a few hours rest with only an occasional picket shot along our line in our front, which ceased entirely towards dawn of the 25th of Nov.–” recalled Captain John G. Langguth of the 17th Missouri. “Soon daylight revealed the fact that the Johnnies had left Lookout Mt. and the Union troops were in full possession. With the rising of the Sun on that beautiful clear Nov morning, a mighty shout arose from the troops on the Lookout upon their seeing the Stars & Stripes again floating proudly to the breeze on the White House [today’s Cravens House, which the home’s owner called “Alta Vista” at the time]….”

Fierce Fighting on the Ridge

As Colonel Winans had predicted upon his arrival on Missionary Ridge, pieces had begun to fall in place. “Another great fight is imminent at Chattanooga,” he wrote to this sister, Mary Winans Wall. “…I expect in the course of a month to test my luck or fate in the Waterloo of this revolution. Both sides are reinforcing—.”

The 19th Louisiana stacked arms near Breckinridge’s headquarters and hurriedly cooked up the five days’ rations that they had been issued, all the while allowing themselves ample time in the frigid temperatures to enjoy the heat of the fires. “[Bragg] ordered the line in single file which gave it the appearance of an army twice its real size,” remembered Carraway. “Then came an order for each company to build breastworks equal to its front, and all this was done while the dense fog hung between us and the enemy. But the greatest difficulty confronting us just at this moment was procuring of picks, spades, and other implements to enable us to build the breastworks which we had been ordered to do. Nothing of the kind could be commanded, and if ever such things were possessed by our army they were far away with the wagon trains.”

Recalled Langguth: “In due time after coffee, hardtack and replenishing ammunition in our cartridge boxes, the Union troops, our Division in the lead began their march down the mountain winding their way like a large blue snake in the warm rays of the morning Sun. It was a beautiful morning and a grand Panorama—the distant thunder of Sherman’s artillery on the left of the line, the camps around and in Chattanooga alive with massing troops, 1,000’s of glistening guns, all moving in one direction, towards Bragg’s host’s [sic] on Missionary Ridge.”

For Carraway, the 19th Louisiana’s new position elicited strong memories. “The face of the mountaintop…was covered with rocks of almost every conceivable shape and size,” he wrote. “We could no longer hold them [the Federals] in check, and for a while at different places along the line the Rebs and the Yanks were engaged in hand to hand combat, guns were clubed, bayonets used and the artillery swabs instead of their being used in driving home the charge the empty guns were hurled in the face of the enemy until the line was enveloped in smoke.”

As the regiment valiantly tried to rally, its ammunition began to dwindle. To stem the approaching tide of blue, some men resorted to throwing rocks.

Already facing an attack from the base of the ridge, the Louisianans were shocked to watch the disintegration of the brigade to their left. Because of the extremely loud gunfire, Winans had split his command into two wings, with Captains Winfrey B. Scott and Michael G. Pearson operating each flank and Winans astride his horse, Delia, maintaining control of the center of the regiment. This allowed him to relay commands easier amid the sounds of battle.

The enemy “advanced and crossed Chickamauga Creek,” Cater recalled. “Our men in rifle pits on the ridge were about one man every ten or fifteen feet, and we were attacked in front. We could not check the advance of the enemy because they were three lines deep and our men were in single file. We did some good shooting but there were not enough of us. When the Federals which were on the left of us in the ridge were coming from that direction, making an enfilading fire on us, it was either leave the trenches or be killed, so we left them. We didn’t leave soon enough because we lost many of our best men before we got out of range of their guns. Our loved Col. Winans was killed on this ridge.”

Scott praised his men in his after-action report. “[T]he enemy made a gallant assault but were soon scattered and driven back….,” he wrote. “Never did I witness men who appeared more cool, deliberate, and confident of being able to repel any force that could be brought against them than did our men on this occasion. No one seemed to dream of being driven from our position….It was about this time the enemy began to fall back on the first charge that Colonel Winans received his wound and was carried to the rear.”

“A part of the regiment was rallied and gave the enemy fight again,” Scott would recall, “but we could not get the regiment reformed until we got near the bridge….”

Of the ensuing Union sweep up Missionary Ridge, Langguth wrote:

“Our column—Hooker’s were out of sight[—]reached the Valley without molestations, moving across Chattanooga Creek and thus forming the extreme Right of Genl. Grant’s Army; while thus marching through the woods, the Rebels send a shell occasionally our way. Our movements now brought us to the rear of the Rebel left (Breckinridge’s Corps), some of the Johnnies showed their heads but were quickly induced to skedaddle or surrender, the terrible firing to our left indicated the charge of [Maj. Gen. George] Thomas’ troops, which soon became evident by a whole brigade of Confederates running our way & were captured, bag & baggage, with many stands of colors. Our Division then halted and we witnessed one of the greatest sights a soldier can ever witness: A Conquering Army. Regiment after regiment swept over the brow of Missionary Ridge amid hurrahs and excitement, following up the enemy, every man in his place in company front, stepping brisk & fresh with the stars & stripes carried proudly aloft, the many days or weeks of hardship were forgotten and only ‘Forward!’ ‘Forward!’ was their cry until late in the night.”

In addition to describing Winans’ fall, Carraway divulged his own near-fatal wounding that afternoon: 

“[Winans] who was in command of our regiment was killed (hit by a minieball in the neck which failed to stagger him yet he was in ten minutes, even walked away from the line of battle a few steps to the rear) and the remains of the gallant [Winans] was all that was left to us. At this command of the regiment fell into the willing and gallant hands of Capt. Pierson [sic] who was the senior Captain of the regiment. [The] regiment…had retreated more than one hundred yards from in the rear of the position from which we had been fighting, [soon] to rally. It was here, halting in obedience to the command of Captain Pierson I was shot down on the rocky mountain.

“As I lay there in this almost half conscious condition, four of my men threw a folding litter on the ground beside me and placed my helpless body on it. Shot was raining around us, raining a perfect whirlwind of dust and dirt. These true friends had not borne me far ere Andrew Davis, one of the bearers, fell with his back broken. He never uttered a word. This dropped me by the side of my dying companion, and my shoulder was resting on his left arm. By this time I had located my wound. It was a crease in the back of my neck. So by an effort I arose to my feet. I knew the direction my command had gone, and also the one I wanted to go, but at first my legs were tottery and refused to lead me in that direction.

“The last rebel out of sight, not a soul in view except those who were seeking my life. I had not gone more than two hundred yards when in crossing a ravine I saw standing not far from me, in a sort of hillside ravine the horse [Delia] of our dead [colonel], who seemed to be waiting patiently for the coming of [her] master. I walked up to and climbed on…and made my way eastward.”

The Search for Winans

Langguth was of course ecstatic in victory, crowing, “[T]hat great battle of the Civil War, which will ever stand as one of the greatest achievements of the American soldier—it was a picture no painter or artist can ever portray.” As the defeated Confederates moved south, they mounted a strong defense at nearby Taylor’s Ridge. Then, with harsher weather approaching, Bragg’s army settled into winter quarters at Dalton, Ga.

Back in Louisiana, grief for lost loved ones was rampant. Mary Wall, Winans’ sister, was no exception. So distraught from not knowing what had happened to her brother’s remains, she wrote Hardee asking his assistance. The heart-wrenching missive said in part: “I had only one brother. Oh, how I loved him! He was handsome, popular, useful, necessary to many. On November 25, 1863, he was shot. He walked to the bottom of the hill, by the assistance of a friend. The surgeon told him that his wound was ‘mortal.’ He said, ‘My regiment acted gallantly today.’ The Federals now passing our folks, and they were obliged to fall back. My brother was left in charge of a young man of his regiment while ‘they all passed by and left their Colonel alone to die.’ This man reports he took off the Colonel’s pistol, and belt, leaned him against a tree and left him ‘not yet dead.’”

Mary implored Hardee to find out if anyone in his command was by Winans when he passed. “Did any kind soul give him water or hold his dying head? Did my brother say anything? Was he dead when the Federals found him and was he buried in the common graves? If he had a separate grave, can anyone identify it? My brother was the only ‘field officer’ who fell that day. He was about 5′8″ tall, had light hair, I think he had a mustache, his eyes were black, and his feet and hands were very small. I suppose some of his apparel was marked ‘W P W’ or ‘Winans.’ He had on gold or heavily gilded spurs, these had his name on them and the name of the giver, C[amp]. Flournoy. He wore his wife’s double cased gold watch. The stars on his coat were gold. I mention these particulars that you may be able to identify what person I inquire after. Though I mourn him as dead and it nearly kills me at the bottom of my heart. [C]an I suppose if you can recover those spurs and the watch, the person from whom you get them will want them as mementoes. I promise to pay for them.”

Hardee inquired if the commanders and men in the Louisiana brigade or other nearby troops knew anything about Winans, without success. Having known Hooker while at West Point, Hardee decided to query the Union commander, who had graduated the year before him. Surely, someone in the Northern forces would remember a Confederate field grade officer wounded on the left side of the ridge where Hooker and his men under Generals Cruft, Geary, and Osterhaus had charged upon and overrun the Louisianans’ position atop the ridge. Hooker agreed to assist his old fellow cadet in Mary’s quest to determine her brother’s final hours. He asked his three division commanders to question those in their command on what might have happened to Winans. Unfortunately, no one in the 17th Missouri or any other unit in Osterhaus’ command recalled seeing the mortally wounded Winans.

Geary was a bit more informative after collecting the reports of men under his command. He replied, “Two of my surgeons…think his name was Winans. They were called by some privates of my lines which they saw was that of a rebel colonel. They did not examine it. The casualty was about a quarter mile to our right from the final resting place of Gen. Hooker’s command for the night. A rebel officer said to be a colonel was brought to a house by them as he was reported mortally wounded.”

At nearby Ringgold, Ga., Winans was reportedly cared for by a Mrs. W. Donald, but little else was known. Agreeing with Geary’s findings, Maj. Gen. O.O. Howard forwarded the results to Hooker, who in turn sent the new information to Hardee via a flag of truce. Cruft remained an important part of the final key to obtaining further details on what had happened to Winans.

“I…made the assault on the extreme left of the enemy’s line,” Cruft wrote in his report. “As our lines moved northward along the ridge, I spied a Confederate officer who appeared to be mortally wounded & in great agony. He was reclining on the ground & leaning back against a tree. He spoke to me and asked to be cared for. I promised to send him a surgeon as soon as possible. The lines were now pressed forward at a charging pace and the interview with the officer was but momentary. A party of Confederate prisoners happening to be nearby, I ordered one of them to care for the officer & stay with him & if possible assist him to the rear or down the hill. One of the prisoners stepped out and said, ‘[I] would stay with him as he belonged to his regiment.’ I thought at the time that the wounded person was a field officer but do not know this to be so. He was well dressed and was an intelligent & gentlemanly man. He did not state his name or regiment or rank.”

The general was attempting to provide as many details as possible to Mary to bring her some peace. In addition, Cruft noted in his response, “A surgeon was sent back, according to my hurried promise to look to him but no report as to his condition or fate. Some of my staff think they can remember a resemblance to the description given in the letter of Colonel Winans’ sister. The whole thing was momentary. If this officer was Colonel Winans he probably died where he was seen by my staff, myself, or a very short way down the hill & was buried with the other dead. The wounded of the Confederates lying on the ground fought on by my division were all collected & sent, in the division ambulances, to Chattanooga during the night & the dead were buried soon after daylight the following morning by a burial detail. I saw two other Confederate officers lying on the field severely wounded whom I supposed to be at the time line officers.”

These men likely both belonged to the 19th Louisiana, as Captain Andrew J. Handly was mortally wounded and Lieutenant Barney H. Sears suffered a bad wound to the head, from which it took him several months to recuperate.

Cruft had no further information for Mary, but he did mention in his missive to Hooker, “[N]or was any portion of the personal effects described reported or heard of by me.” The query for information among the Federal commanders did have one last reply. Wanting a thorough inquiry, each division leader sent out a request to each regiment, who in turn sent the information to their company captains. Captain John B. Mattison of the 19th U.S. Infantry, who also served as the unit’s provost marshal, sent a message up the line that provided more details of Winans’ mortal wounding. He wrote, “[Here is the] information from the officers of this command relative to Colonel Winans, 19th Louisiana (Rebel) Vols….In reply, I have to state he was the only field officer of the enemy killed in front of this command. He was shot by a non-commissioned officer of the 18th Infantry. The officer in question was wounded at the left of the hilltop, along the southern end of the ridge. He was seen to fall from his horse. He had been injured in the left side of the abdomen passing through the body. The brigade inspector, in posting the pickets that evening had [Winans] removed to a log cabin near the picket line.”

Exact locations of the Confederate burials are unknown. When General Thomas was asked if he wanted the bodies buried by state, he replied, “No, no, mix them up. I’m tired of States’ Rights.” Although Mary Winans Wall never found her beloved brother’s final resting place, she knew Hardee and Hooker had done their best to bring her some peaceful closure. Amid the horror of war, humanity won out.

Richard H. Holloway, an ACW advisory board member, thanks Rodney Huffman, Beth Horner, and Robert Sears for their help with this article.

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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Today, people are familiar with Black Fridays, the day after Thanksgiving sales across the United States. But a far more notable Black Thursday happened on Oct. 24, 1929. That was the ominous day that the stock market crashed and launched America into a full-scale depression. By 1933, almost 15 million citizens were unemployed and nearly have of the financial institutions across the country had gone broke. Industrial production was halved and scores of people became homeless. 

Though the Depression was one of the darkest times in American history, Americans toughed it out with their usual creativity and pluck, and we have those lean days to thank for some of the most popular foods we enjoy today — as well as more than a few that we’ve gladly forgotten. 

Hard Times, New Foods 

A bright spot during the Great Depression? Americans started bread lines and soup kitchens to keep everyone fed. This elevated the spirits of the downtrodden populace and introduced new foods to the general public, many of which are still consumed today. 

The most interesting food type to become popular across the country from that era was ox-tail soup. It was a way to use the entire animal with nothing going to waste, from the nose to the tail. The dish harkens back to the 17th century England, but the French, Flemish, Korean and Chinese also have a stake in its origin. In this country, ox-tail soup’s popularity began before the American Revolution and was oftentimes eaten by slaves in the South, who had to make do with the food scraps their masters turned their noses up at. 

Ox-tail soup during the Depression was a simple fare with basic components — you simply chop up the tail of an ox or cow, leaving the bone attached. In Korean recipes, the meat is barbecued or fried or even parboiled and put in the mix with a daikon radish and an onion.  

Down in Louisiana, there is a Creole version of the dish. Tomatoes are a popular vegetable in the Bayou State, so it’s one of the major ingredients of the ox-tail soup. A must-have is Creole seasoning and the “holy trinity” of onions, bell pepper and celery stalks. Add some dried chiles, an abundance of herbs and spices along with the basic salt and pepper to achieve the desired tangy soup. 

Campbell’s, Ritz and Kraft Take Off 

Some food brands became critical to people’s lives during the Depression. 

Simple to heat and eat, a simple can of Campbell’s soup went a long way for many, and by the end of the Depression, Campbell had five different flavors for consumers: tomato, chicken, oxtail, vegetable and consommé. The company launched massive advertising campaigns in magazines, newspapers, radio during the height of the Depression, and their signs popped up everywhere — even on streetcars. Their soups proved so popular that they expanded to Europe and Canada while the hard times still went on. 

Campbell’s Soup wasn’t the only brand of food to make huge advances during the hard times of the Depression. Kraft’s macaroni and cheese jumped onto the scene in 1937. A salesman for the Tenderoni Macaroni Company started a side business of selling noodles with packets of grated Kraft cheese to locals. It was a hit, and Kraft started churning out boxes of the mixture for 19 cents per container, each making four meals. (The meal itself was not a new idea: Thomas Jefferson served it at his home after trying a version of it in France.) 

Ritz Crackers also launched a major campaign during the Depression that resulted in it being a substitute for apples in pies. It doesn’t sound as patriotic as the real thing. but for the poor, mock apple pie was a hit. The addition of lemon juice and the texture of the crackers made the simulated apple slices seem real enough. Like many culinary ideas, this one can be traced back to the 1880s, when there was an apple shortage nationwide and people were desperate for ideas to satisfy their taste buds — crackers making a cheap substitute. 

Mulligan Stew 

Alongside the railroad tracks existed many a hobo camp during the 1920s, and a staple there was Mulligan stew. While they could generally scrounge up a few vegetables (carrots, potatoes and cabbage or lettuce were popular) and sometimes meat scraps, one of the most important ingredients of the stew was tobacco. You would use the loose-leaf brand or squeeze it out of the ends of cigarettes to gather enough pieces to flavor the dish. One desperate item used to bulk up the Mulligan stew was lint. Yes, lint from clothing. (Times were indeed rough.) If you could gather some bread and make an easy gravy, you could create SOS, an acronym for “s— on a shingle.”  

For those families still living in a home, savory beef gelatin could be created with a mold by mixing gelatin and beef broth. Old gravy from the ice box stretched out a meager supply of meat.   

Bacon Spaghetti and Involuntary Vegetarians 

One of the most popular dishes today, spaghetti, had a variant to reflect the hard times. Instead of meatballs, mothers would use dried bacon to add a meat flavor, as ground beef prices were high.  

Salads became a healthy alternative during the Depression for many people who did not have much food. Soup kitchens served them with the soup, which is still common today. To mimic the nose-to-tail option of cows. Lots of leafy items were used: Radish leaves became popular addition, as did dandelion greens, which were another palatable ingredient for salads.  Dandelions were also good for making tea, a recipe that dated back to antebellum times. 

Eleanor Roosevelt’s Prune Pudding 

Eleanor Roosevelt consulted with Cornell University to create myriad foods that were both inexpensive and easy to make. Topping the list was prune pudding. Not the most attractive food to eat, it was still tasty and filling. Some of the more unusual dishes made during the Depression were milkorno (or with wheat or oats). With the assistance of some of the Cornell scientists, they developed this meal from powdered skim milk, cornmeal and salt.  

Dinners served at the White House during this time were known for their simplicity: Deviled eggs drenched in tomato sauce were popular, as well as beans in tomato stew. Eleanor Roosevelt’s own contribution was her own version of spaghetti. She boiled the noodles until mushy and added equally steamed carrots. She topped off the dish with a white sauce, a basic bechamel created from milk, flour, salt and butter.  

Peanut Butter-Stuffed Onions (Not a Typo) 

One of the most amazingly curious recipes was devised by the Bureau of Home Economics was peanut butter-stuffed onions. This awkward dish was heavily promoted in advertisements across the land.  

The United States managed to crawl out of the Great Depression after a decade of very hard times. And though some of these Depression-era foods have started appearing again in recent times, sometimes with fancier ingredients in high-end restaurants, we hopefully won’t see a comeback for peanut butter onions and edible lint. 

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My favorite three-letter word in the English language? P-I-E. But though it’s one of the first words you learn as a child — and one of the simplest and shortest words in English — the pie has been around since before the existence of either the United States of America or the country of England. Pies are even older than the English language.

The origins of pie date back to the early Egyptian culture. Their pie had a honey filling encased in a crusty cake made from barley, oats, rye or wheat. One Egyptian tablet created before 2000 B.C. provided a recipe for chicken pie. Both sound pretty delicious, and it shows the nation liked both sweet and savory pies. The ancient Greeks got in on the pie business around the fifth century B.C. The pie pastry is mentioned in the plays of Aristophanes, and heeven suggests there was a vocation of pastry chef, totally separate from a baker.  

ROMAN PIES 

It was the Roman Empire that expanded on the covering of pies. They made a pastry of flour, oil and water to cover up their meat of choice, but it initially was not meant to be consumed with the savory inside — it was strictly added to preserve the juices. “Apicius,” a Roman cookbook though to have been written anywhere from the first century A.D. to the fifth century A.D., has many recipes that include a pie casing. The clever Romans even developed a cheesecake called “placenta,” which had a pastry base. Because of their development of roadways, Roman concoctions traveled across Europe with a vibrant trade system. So the world of pies expanded across the continent.  

THE ENGLISH PERFECT PIE 

However, it was Great Britain that vaulted pies to a higher level. Definitions of pie from the 1300s clearly stated it was either meat or fish covered in a pastry. Like the Romans, these coverings were meant to contain the savory food inside instead of being eaten with it. The pastry topping also served to preserve the meat or fish inside on long voyages abroad and as a space saver for ships with limited storage. This eliminated the need to bring along a cook and the live animals it would take to create the pies.  

The only knock on British pies was the terminology associated with them. The word pie was spelled “pye,” which wasn’t so bad, but the pastry covering was called a “coffyn,” more frequently spelled today as “coffin.” Many pie coverings were actually a rectangular shape, thus justifying the moniker. Still, this was definitely a term you did not want to associate with such a delicious treat, but more on that later. One bad habit when serving fowl in a pastry was to leave the bird’s legs hanging outside of the covering to make it easier to pick up. This method was certainly a crude presentation not suitable for modern sensibilities.  

During the era of knights in armor and damsels in England, pies became a focus at opulent banquets. It became vogue to remove the covering to showcase the inner delicacies. (Except for cases like Arya Stark’s revenge pie in “Game of Thrones”). The elaborate pies included in this period were sometimes outlandish. Imagine a huge pie that contained musicians or jesters. There were few limits to the lengths these medieval people would explore. But if you think about it, today’s stunts involve sometimes putting a person inside a large cake for birthdays and other events — even British nursery rhymes mentioned “Four and 20 blackbirds baked in a pie.” Some thought this just a tall tale, but royalty and aristocracy really would attempt to impress their guests by creating pies with live animals inside.  

Geoffrey Chaucer branched out to pastries with fruit contained within. He published a recipe for apple pie long before it became synonymous with moms showcasing the wholesomeness of traditional American values. In addition to the apples, ingredients included figs, pears and raisins but did not contain any sugar. (Sounds like a healthy version of pie today, using the natural sweeteners within the fruits.)  

A letter exists from a baker to Jane Seymour, third wife of Henry VIII stating, “… hope this pasty reaches you in better condition to the last one …” showing royalty continued to indulge in the delicacies.  

THE FIRST CHERRY PIE 

In the middle of the 1500s, England created a new type of pie especially for Queen Elizabeth I. The very first documented cherry pie was made specifically for the queen. No mention of her reaction to the taste is recorded, but pastries continued to be a staple in England. When pie prices became too inflated for most commoners, King Richard II issued an ordinance limiting the ceiling on the cost within London’s city limits.   

Over the years, Great Britain continued to develop many types of pies. In Scotland, they have a Scotch pie (or mutton pie). As with pies with steak or kidney fillings, mutton pie is often seasoned with copious amounts of pepper. Sometimes the inside of the pie will also include potatoes, eggs, baked beans or gravy to complement the meat.  

Even the British miners developed their own version of pies that catered to their surroundings underground called Cornish pasties. These were filled with beef or venison, potatoes and rutabagas or sometimes just fruit. Like in earlier days, these pasties would last a whole week, being rolled up in a paste made of flour and lard. Once baked, the hardened crust created a seal for the food inside. They were also easily tucked into a miner’s pocket until needed. 

PIES IN THE US 

So when did pie first travel to what would become the original 13 colonies? It may sound cliché but the first pies arrived on the Mayflower with the Pilgrims at Cape Cod in 1620. (Remember the pies made for long ship voyages?) Unfortunately, the first Thanksgiving did not mention any pie being consumed.  

Tastier pies were on the horizon, as colonial America contained such sweeteners as maple syrup, cane syrup, molasses and honey collected from imported English bees. The very first American cookbook, dated 1796, contained a recipe for “Pompkin Pudding,” which was baked in a crust. Varieties of the principal ingredients included pumpkins, blueberries, pear, apple and quince. The popularity of pies along the East Coast grew, and as the country expanded west, pies went along for the ride. The fillings of the pies grew, as well, on the westward trek with cream, custard, lemons, coconuts, blackberries, strawberries and many more.  

PIES AS WEAPONS IN THE CIVIL WAR 

When the American Civil War erupted in 1861, pies were consumed across both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line. And some citizens used people’s universal love of pie to wage the war.  

On Sept. 12, 1861, a “free colored woman” named Mrs. Welton was arrested for selling poisoned pies to Union soldiers on the streets of St. Louis, Missouri. Pittsburgh was a hotbed of poison pie incidents, as well. A resident, Mrs. Nevins, managed to dispatch her husband, a retuning soldier, via a poisoned pie. She joined another Pittsburgh woman named Grinder in garnering a sentence of death.  

Arsenic and strychnine were the principle culprits put into deadly pies. However, women in the South branched out with such death-dealing pie ingredients as ground glass and diamond dust gathered from a jeweler’s floor.  

Members of the 52^nd Massachusetts Infantry stationed in Louisiana were particular targets of female Southerners. After the reoccupation of Baton Rouge in late December 1862, this Yankee unit accidentally burned down the state capitol building. That, combined with the haughty attitudes of the Northerners, compelled the local ladies to gain a bit of revenge on the invaders. One Bay State soldier had earlier been writing home about how much he missed his mother’s custard pie. By February, 1863, he wrote home that his “captain had forbidden them to buy any pies from these Rebel women.” A comrade had “bought one yesterday but was dead today.”  

Even the elderly got in on the pie action. A grandmother in Plaquemine, Louisiana, across the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge, had come home to find her 12-year-old grandson murdered by the occupying Federals for making rifle cartridges at home. She set about to fight back the only way she knew how, which was to include some ground glass into pies she sold to soldiers on the streets in Baton Rouge. 

Not all deadly pies were intentional: Accidents caused some of the people to pass away from eating pies. On Dec. 1, 1864, a Minnesota newspaper lamented the poisoning of seven enlisted men from eating a cracker pie. Fortunately, no one died, and it was discovered “arsenic had been used by mistake for tartaric acid.” Saleratus, the precursor to baking powder, contained some dangerous properties and when not mixed right was fatal. 

THE BOSTON CREAM PIE QUESTION 

A less stomach-churning controversy over pies arose back in Boston in the mid-1800s. Today, there are not many people in the United States who have not heard of the famous Boston cream pie. But each time someone thinks they have proof of its true origin, another record is found to refute the actual year the popular pie was first made.  

Local legend has the pie being created in 1856. Claims have it being served for the grand opening of Boston’s Parker House. However, many cannot or will not explain the existence of the Dedham Cream Pie. Published recipes of the tasty Dedham, Massachusetts, pie come out around the same time, and one recipe for it was published in the city of Boston. The person documenting the Dedham dessert was a female physician and nurse.         

EMPANADAS AND CALZONES 

Eventually, the pie made its way to the Americas via different European cultures. For instance, the Spanish brought over their version of the pie, the empanada. The name literally translates into “enbreaded” or “wrapped in bread.” These treats were variously filled with meat, cheese, tomatoes or corn, among other foods. Once they crossed the sea to North and South America, many empanadas were baked but subject to being fried as well.  

Like a pastry, the dough is simply folded over the ingredients inside. The contents and shapes may vary dependent on where they are located, but the principle is the same. One city in Louisiana embraced these savory treats, dubbing them “Natchitoches meat pies.” They are served in restaurants or even at convenience stores right off the I-49 exit and come mild or spicy beef or filled with crawfish. Don’t despair if you live far away, as they are even frozen and sent across the United States boxed up.  

The Italians followed suit with a wonderful rendition of a savory pie called a calzone. It is almost like a pizza folded over, and is popular across the U.S. 

THE WAR AGAINST PIES 

In the early 1900s, pies went from being used in warfare to being the focus of a war against them. As the country embarked on a nationwide health movement, pie became the focus of a smear campaign. Ladies Home Journal published two articles condemning the popular dessert, with the author, Sarah Tyson Rorer, stating: “The inside of a pie is injurious [and] pies and cakes ae indigestible.”  

Since the 1950s, though, pie has returned to being the phenomenon it deserves to be treated as. The range of fillings has only increased over the years, including Key lime, potato chips and Oreos. So the next time you dig into a pie of any flavor, think about the long journey it took over centuries, oceans and continents to get to you.

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Gravy’s so easy to make — just mix meat drippings and a pinch of flour to thicken it and you are done. But the pan-scraping sauce, particularly creamy white gravy, has had a surprising sojourn throughout history. Along with its cousins gruel and chocolate gravy, it makes up part of a family of simple, filling foods that anyone can make and nearly everyone enjoys.

And though its legacy is wide, white gravy’s chief contribution to American military cuisine may be one that soldiers, sailors, Marines and airmen loudly profess to loathe — but that they actually seem to love.

But before we get to that, a brief history of white gravy and how it led to the military staple known as “SOS.”

WHITE GRAVY AND CHOCOLATE GRAVY

White gravy, the broadly Southern staple found blanketing chicken fried steak and biscuits, is a version of a fancier sauce. Actually François de la Varenne, chef de cuisine for Louis XIV’s diplomat Nicolas Chalon du Blé, gets credit for first concocting it. La Varenne authored the world’s first commercial cookbook, “Le Cuisinier François” (“The French Cook”), and the recipe for béchamel sauce accompanied early French explorers to Louisiana, where meatier variants soon followed.

One cousin of white gravy is the lesser-known chocolate option. In the early 1500s, one of the most prized spoils from the Spanish conquest of the Americas was the secret of the cacao tree, the seed of which forms the basis for chocolate. This discovery led to the eventual transport of the precious commodity of chocolate to the Spanish-held territories of Louisiana and Texas in later years.

At some point, very possibly along the frontier between Spanish Louisiana and the first-British, then-American-held Tennessee Valley, the chocolate was mixed with other ingredients to formulate a sweetened version of the gravy with the same purpose, poured over pancakes, biscuits, and the like, gradually spreading throughout the Upland South. Folks in the Ozark Mountains use this version of gravy nowadays more often than they do along the coastline.

GRUEL, WHITE GRAVY’S UNLOVED COUSIN

On the other hand, white gravy’s distant relative gruel suffers from a stigma. Gruel is typically associated with both the sick and downtrodden; the fact it rhymes with “cruel” does not help its standing. However, Ursuline nun Marie-Madeleine Hachard excitedly wrote her father in 1727 about the wonderful food in Louisiana. She seemed almost giddy, expounding, “We are getting remarkably used to the wild food of this country … rice cooked in milk [gruel] is very common and we eat it often ….”

In the mid-1700s, Native American tribes in Louisiana offered a resident Frenchman, Lt. Dumont, a similar type of mixture that he described as gruel made from husked maize, water and oil from bear fat. Dumont, receiving this repast in return for some gifts and trinkets, noted, “The French eat it on salads and also … for making soups.”

(White gravy on a salad is quite a concept!)

GRUEL AS MIRACLE CURE

A century later, gruel was reintroduced across the United States via an 1860 marketing surge driven by its supposed medicinal value. Newspapers were saturated with advertisements lauding its “invigorating” qualities. One particular brand of gruel claimed to be helpful to children as well as “highly useful and beneficent to Women in the state of Pregnancy.”

During the Civil War, Ransler Wilcox of the 49th Massachusetts Infantry was stationed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and jotted this in his diary: “I do not feel well … have been to the doctor and got some medicine … gruel for dinner … tea and gruel for supper.”

Samuel Haskell of the 30th Maine Infantry on duty at Morganza, Louisiana wrote, “I have been sick [and] I dare not eat the rations we draw … [we can get] every thing but flour …. I have bought some to make some grewall.”

Modern postnatal care research papers have lauded its benefits in artificial infant feeding. Maybe there is something to this aspect of gruel being a cure for your ailments after all.

In the aftermath of the Battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in July 1863, women from the surrounding area flocked to the battlefield to assist with the large number of wounded soldiers. Supplies being minimal, the makeshift hospitals resorted to whatever was at hand to ease the pain and hunger of the injured men.

Farina is mentioned in lots of reminiscences from nurses and ladies of the Sanitary Commission. The caretakers would add water or milk to the farina and heated it to a palatable gruel mixture. This allowed the comforting, warm food that would stretch to larger groups of troops. The concoction was also very nourishing and easy to eat and digest.

One Union soldier marching through the south recalled: “Many a soldier will remember how, when he fell out of the ranks during one of those severe marches, and the planter nearby scowled and glowered so that he could not enter the rich man’s door,” some sympathetic slave woman “helped him to her own cabin . made him tea and gruel, and nursed him as tenderly as his sister would have done.”

GRAVY ON THE GO

During the 1864 Red River Campaign, Lt. George G. Smith of the 1^st Louisiana (U.S.) Infantry put the two staples of rations together out of necessity. All he had available to eat was “a piece of boiled salt pork, a few pieces of hard tack and some coffee. Salt pork I could not, and hard tack I would not eat.”

Finally, Smith decided, “I will soak my hard tack in some hot water and soften it up a little, and fry some of the salt pork in my tin plate and then fry the soaked hard tack in the gravy. Very good!”

After creating the makeshift white gravy, Smith noticed comrades were watching the process. Within a week, instead of garnering the credit for the mixture, he noticed the entire camp was relishing the new dish made from items everyone had in their haversacks.  

Whether a remedy for sickness or not, anyone who has ever read the book or watched one of the numerous movie versions of Charles Dickens’ classic “Oliver Twist” surely recalls the protagonist uttering the plaintive line about gruel: “Please, sir, I want some more.” One can assume this is the juncture where being orphaned, poor and homeless became associated with the term “gruel.” The derogatory meaning associated with the word has even found its way into mainstream media thanks to a statewide sports column. Headlines of a postseason loss for Louisiana State University football a few years back opined, “LSU’s holiday bowl gruel typified a mushy season.”

S*** ON A SHINGLE

White gravy has ingratiated itself with the United States military; for example, add sausage and you have sawmill gravy. Chipped beef even found its way into the white gravy mixture with the future doughboys right before World War I.

Soldiers and sailors eventually dubbed it “SOS” (“Save Our Souls” or “Same Old Slop” being the PG-rated translations) when served on a piece of toast. The very first documented proof of the military making SOS was the 1910 “Manual of Army Cooks.” Field conditions caused some ingredients to change due to availability but for the most part the stuff used to make the concoction for the troops included … well, see for yourself.

Recipe #251. Beef, chipped: 15 pounds of chipped beef; 1 pound fat, butter preferred; 1½ pounds flour, browned in fat; 2 12-ounce cans of evaporated milk; bunch parsley; ¼ ounce of Pepper; 6 quarts of beef stock

Before you start cooking this up, please realize you have to invite 59 friends over to consume this massive portion with you, as it was measured out to feed 60 hungry soldiers.

One of the stories of the famous “Band of Brothers,” Easy Company of the 506^th Parachute Regiment of the 101^st Airborne Division, happened stateside, before they crossed the ocean to fight the Germans in World War II. They boarded a train bound for Sturgis, Kentucky. At the railroad depot, women from the Red Cross gave them doughnuts and coffee. The soldiers camped outside of the town and were treated to what seemed to be the Army’s meal of choice to offer troops in the field, creamed chipped beef on toast.

Gerry Stearns of the 89^th Infantry Division recalled his experiences with SOS in World War II.

“Sometimes the GI’s names for staples could have been off-putting,” he wrote. “The Mess Sergeant’s menu listed ‘cream chipped beef on toast.’ What we called it was ‘Something on a Shingle,’ or usually ‘S.O.S.’ I was uneasy about trying that until about three or four o’clock one morning I was checking the buildings of the reception center where I was a limited service MP. There was an interesting smell of frying meat as I approached the mess hall. I am pretty sure my General Orders required me to investigate. What I found were mounds of hamburger being cooked in big pans, a milk and flour sauce being prepared and hundreds of bread slices being toasted. I became an instant fan and a regular participant in this and many subsequent S. O. S. Breakfasts.” 

SOS TAKES OFF

SOS grew in popularity during both world wars and in Korea and Vietnam. Near the end of World War II, the Army published the recipe in “TM 10-412” in August 1944 but made a few changes in the previously standard ingredients. The parsley and beef stock had been removed in an effort to make a creamier chipped beef serving. It was a success, but cooks still had to be reminded to soak the chipped beef beforehand to remove the preservative salt. The U. S. Air Force joined in serving SOS in World War II and through the next few wars.

Dennis Peterson of the 309^th Tactical Fighter Squadron fondly recalled many SOS meals during the Vietnam War.

“Good eating,” Peterson wrote. “It [SOS] was always available on the food tray. Eggs and bacon were my preference, but SOS was delicious, too.”

Becoming a professional truck driver after the war, Peterson would often sample similar food on his travels across the Southern United States roadways.

The U. S. Navy had their own varied ingredients, which included tomatoes, fresh ground beef and nutmeg. One sailor commented that his ship got upset when they were given the SOS with chipped beef Army variant instead of the minced beef style they had been served for so long. They eventually convinced the cooks to restrict the chipped beef version to once a year.

Interestingly enough, if you look through any Navy cookbook from 1927 until 1952, you will find that there is no recipe for making creamed beef. Hands down, they preferred minced beef, something unique to their branch of service. The only other group to eat it were U. S. Marines being transported on Navy vessels. A Navy cook was taught to thicken the tomato sauce for the minced beef with cornstarch. Their nautical SOS was served for an entire week and then alternated the next week with corned beef hash and hard-boiled eggs and so on throughout the year.

“Probably because space is such a premium aboard ship, we did not have chipped beef, just good old hamburger meat, minced with plenty of black pepper and salt, “ said U. S. Navy Cook Striker (apprentice) Jon Lord, aboard the U.S.S. California from 1974 to 1975. “It was more of what today we would call sausage gravy. We fed 450 men, three times a day at sea. Breakfast was the favorite meal. As I recall, there would be one or two meats on the line every morning: bacon, sausage, ham, or SOS. SOS was always a crew favorite.” 

SOS TODAY

More recently, some branches of service have decided to go with a healthier SOS, using very lean ground beef (less than 10% fat) or implementing ground turkey to provide the meat in the meal. Regardless of the mixture, the popularity of this dish has persevered in the military over the years.

In the aftermath of the disastrous Hurricane Katrina along the Gulf coast in 2005, the makeshift kitchens at Camp Beauregard in Pineville, Louisiana, were full of continuous large containers of the white gold, this version mixed with ground beef. This was used to fill the many hungry stomachs of the various units from across the United States sent down on rescue missions throughout the state and nostalgically housed in the old World War II-era barracks on post. Considering the disaster areas they were confronting on a daily basis and the shortage of generators on post, the warm, tasty SOS made a lasting culinary experience akin to the earlier days of the military camp.

In garrison situations, the Army SOS would be served over toast. In field-based scenarios, the SOS would be put atop baking powder biscuits.

“Since the cooks started to cook breakfast before sunrise, they had to work under blackout conditions,” one cook said later. “The walls of the mess tent were drawn, and the cooks had to work with flashlights. This was important because you could see a cigarette for miles.”

But whether you can see it or not as you eat, SOS or chipped beef, or whatever you prefer to call it, has seemingly made itself a permanent home in America’s military mess halls.  

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The weary soldiers of the 1st Louisiana Infantry disembarked from their train in San Benito, Texas, early in the summer of 1916. Disoriented after the long trip from Camp Stafford in Pineville, Louisiana, the foot soldiers quickly got their bearings when they were ordered to set up their pup tents in a dusty field along the edge of town.

The Louisianans completed their task quickly as the heat of the day bore down upon them. On one side of the newcomers stood the camp of the 1st Oklahoma Infantry while the other side contained the troops of the 4th South Dakota Infantry. At the end of all three unit’s campsites stood the worn buildings of the city, its citizens soon growing accustomed to their new residents.

The culinary staff of Col. Francis P. Stubbs’ Louisiana regiment unloaded their field equipment in order to begin a meal for their comrades in arms. Initially, their cooking facilities had already been set up for them inside of one of the converted boxcars set up as a makeshift dining hall.

SETTING UP THE KITCHEN

First off the train was their collection of brand new U.S. Army field ranges, one for each of the 10 companies. The version the Louisianans used, Model No. 1, was a 264-pound monstrosity, complete with utensils. The stoves were also augmented with “Alamo” attachments, which allowed them to prepare enough meals to feed up to 150 troopers. Holes were dug to partially embed the stoves into the ground, the base lying in a 2-foot-deep bed of cobblestones.

Then the soldiers removed the tools of the trade stored inside the oven, each appliance containing pans, knives, cleavers and other utensils, even a fire-iron set. The cooks were also encouraged by the army’s directives to use wood in this latest stove instead of coal, a requirement quickly remedied by hungry soldiers with axes.

Time was of the essence, as the men in the ranks would be hungry after their assigned tasks, so each company cook was ordered to prepare a simple but hearty fare. The menu that day was to be fried bacon with both German boiled and French baked potatoes, which were standard preparations made straight out of the brand-new “Manual for Army Cooks.” Each recipe was based on an average of 60 men and carefully measured out.

LOUISIANA’S TALENTED MILITARY COOKS

When everything finished cooking, the infantrymen lined up with the plates and silverware and ate the filling meal. While their neighbors to each side consumed similar Army-style food prepared the exact same way, the Louisiana troops would not long stand such a bland repast. In fact, it was a standard practice for each company to switch cooks on a regular basis to provide the men in the ranks with varied culinary styles, so for Louisiana troops that meant Cajun style one day, Creole the next, followed by Spanish-influenced dishes.

Though the cooks may have been officially called that name in the military, they were in fact employed as professional chefs working in restaurants located across the Bayou State. So, while they adhered to rules and regulations for guardsmen, these culinary masters managed to smuggle their own favorite ingredients along with them on the trip. Cook George Graham was a stalwart chef at the Mirror Room Restaurant in the Hotel Bentley in Alexandria, while Cook J. B. David had been a chef at the Costello Hotel in Morgan City. Cook William Fink was a chef in the heart of the French Quarter of New Orleans at the Royal Restaurant. Many chefs had not ever left the state before now, so they were not aware of what might be available in the way of groceries in the sleepy Texas town.

BORDER PATROL OR BOREDOM PATROL?

The soldiers in the San Benito area were all a part of a campaign dubbed the Punitive Expedition, orchestrated by the United States government in response to recent raids into American soil. These raids were carried out by a small army led by Pancho Villa. These self-styled “Villistas,” or at least 485 of them, raided the town of Columbus, New Mexico, on March 9, 1916, leaving in their wake a total of 18 dead and nine wounded Americans, both soldiers and civilians.

Tabbed to lead the American forces in response to these heinous criminal excursions was Brig. Gen. John J. “Blackjack” Pershing. Not satisfied with the nearly 6,700 Army regulars available for such a vast area to patrol, National Guard units from each state and the District of Columbia, totaling 110,000 men, were ordered by President Woodrow Wilson to assist Pershing. This maneuver had been authorized by Congress with their passing of the National Defense Act of June 3, 1916. As the individual National Guard organizations initially deployed to different positions along the Mexican border, Villa’s bandits made three additional sorties into Texas.

Although the regular troops managed to get into actions chronicled by many of the country’s newspapers, the men in the National Guard units fought a more serious enemy called boredom. These militia groups were prevented from crossing the border into Mexico, so they had plenty of time on their hands.

Commanders of the regiments stationed in San Benito realized idle hands were not good for morale. Collectively, the three state units there were under the command of a brigade commander, Col. R. L. Bullard, who offered several key suggestions to keep everyone busy. The three regiments started a weekly newspaper called The Oklasodak, derived from the abbreviations of the states the men came from. The men were also given assignments to construct entrenchments next to important local installations. Troops also made regular trips into town to familiarize themselves with the local businesses and purchase postcards and stationery to send missives home. Being away from home, many men tried to befriend members of the local community and support its businesses, forming fast relationships.

THE SECRET INGREDIENT

When they had the opportunity, each unit would bolster the spirits of their soldiers stationed so far away from home with such fun events like flapjack eating contests. While their comrades from Oklahoma and South Dakota created standard pancakes with syrup for a topping, the Louisiana chefs used special recipes to delight the palate. The actual pancakes were made close to how the others made theirs, including using the morning’s bacon grease to keep them from sticking to the pan.

What set the Louisianans apart from the rest was the topping they used, a centuries-old creation.

In the early 1500s, one of the most prized spoils from the Spanish conquest of the Americas was the secret of the cacao tree, the seed from which forms the basis for chocolate. This discovery led to the eventual transport of the precious commodity to Spanish-held Louisiana in later years. Eventually, residents mixed it with some other ingredients to make a dish hailed as white chocolate gravy. This delicious recipe would replace regular syrup being served on flapjacks and biscuits in many Louisiana homes for decades to come.

While chocolate was not an item that made the trip from Louisiana due to the summer heat conditions, much to the delight of the chefs there were chocolate vendors on nearly every local street corner in San Benito to satisfy the Louisianans’ needs to make their tasty delicacies.

WAR BABIES, FRESH FISH AND MILK FOR THE COFFEE

As the soldiers of the 1st Louisiana settled into a regular routine, good news arrived, as one of their officers from Bogalusa, Louisiana, was greeted with the first “war baby” in Bullard’s brigade. The proud father, 1st Lt. R. L. McLean exclaimed he “feels like he could whip the whole Mexican army right now,” further emboldening the charges under his command and within the regiment.

The men continued to find enjoyable distractions to occupy their time. The craving to read elevated in popularity, causing a strain on the local availability of books. Even flying a kite became popular as it lent itself to the frequent strong winds.

Fishing also became a favored pastime among all of the groups. The “finny tribe,” as they were nicknamed, contributed heavily as an alternative to the normal rations of red meat. Even live shrimp managed to wash into the river, which provided an even more familiar ingredient to the Louisiana kitchen staff.

The fish were prepared Delmonico style, while the shrimp were made in many different Louisiana variants, among them Cajun shrimp with a garlic-Parmesan cream sauce or the simpler fare of fried shrimp. Both recipes required fresh milk, which was not available in camp. The chefs simply sent one of their kitchen staff to get some milk from either the local San Benito Dairy or J. E. Smith’s Dairy. These assignments to forage for milk were a regular occurrence considering the number of Louisiana recipes requiring the precious white liquid.

Also in need of milk was Creole coffee that often filled the canteens of the Louisiana men. While café noir was served black, café au lait needed a touch of milk to make it right. In true Creole style, they always dripped their coffee, as boiling would remove the delicious flavor.

MILITARY FOOD TO WRITE HOME ABOUT

Both the Oklahoma and South Dakota troops quickly became enamored with eating in the Louisiana camp. A Tulsa newspaper reported on the attraction of Cajun cuisine when they wrote, “The Louisiana cooks are spreading the gospel of good living too. Every invitation to take mess with a Louisiana company is accepted. For Louisiana has been famous all over the world for its cookery ….”

Even a far distant South Carolina tabloid noted, “The Creoles of Louisiana, famous for their cookery, are reported to use the young buds of the sassafras as a substitute for okra in thickening soups.”

However, observing the cooking process was best not done with a weak stomach. One South Dakota private was sickened to see dozens of turtles hanging from a clothesline with the blood draining from their bodies, an important process in making Creole Caouane [pronounced “cow-ann”], or turtle soup, using a dark brown Cajun roux and various vegetables and spices.

NEVER CUT IN LINE IN THE MILITARY

By far, the most shocking episode during the deployment of the Louisianans happened in a train car. At the end of July, the 1st Louisiana was recalled home as soon as possible at the request of their governor. The Louisiana soldiers started repacking their gear and began receiving their meals in the rail cars, cooked using their smaller permanent stoves. The enlisted men began getting their meals inside the small boxcar and eating outside.

Capt. Ralph B. Lister, depot quartermaster for the brigade at San Benito, stopped by to inspect the boxcar and its equipment. The captain was a rising star in the U.S. Army, having recently served with the 1st U.S. Infantry at Schofield Barracks in Hawaii before being promoted to assistant department quartermaster and simultaneously taking charge of all military transportation on the island. A native of New Jersey, Lister had been a captain with the 1st Colorado Infantry before receiving a commission in the regular army due to his notable service in the Philippines.

Lister had just entered the car when he found his path blocked by a crowd of enlisted men as they awaited their lunch. 1st Louisiana Sgt. William E. Kelly stepped up and tried to assist the officer in making his way through the crowd when they ran afoul of the cook for the day, George Graham. Heavily inebriated, Graham apparently mistook Lister and Kelly as skipping in line and lashed out with the meat cleaver he currently held in his hand. Lister was struck on the left side of the jaw and neck.

The gash was about 4 inches long and so deep it managed to sever the facial artery, causing a massive loss of blood, so much so it was initially feared to have nicked the jugular vein. The captain’s wound proved not serious, but he would carry the scar for the rest of his life. Kelly also incurred a head wound with the cleaver trying to shield Lister. Bystanders immediately restrained the maddened chef, who was soon imprisoned and court-martialed.

GOODBYE, RIO GRANDE

Within days, the men of the 1st Louisiana boarded the Pullman cars for their return to Pineville. On the day of their departure they presented Col. Bullard with a booklet containing an original play titled “To the Border and Back”:

“Of the girl left behind; the Mexicans; the rain and the brand-new kitchens were left behind causing one Louisiana soldier to query one of their officers upon their return to Camp Stafford, ‘I wonder who’s loving ’em now?’”

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The arrival of Colonel Benjamin Grierson and his saddle-sore troopers in Union-occupied Baton Rouge, La., on May 2, 1863, simultaneously caused both relief and excitement throughout the region. Grierson’s cavalry had barely slipped through the grasp of the pursuing Confederates on several occasions, managing to reach safe haven after a long and treacherous expedition originating in LaGrange, Tenn. Brigadier General Halbert E. Paine of Wisconsin, 3rd Division commander in the Army of the Gulf, later described the incoming horse soldiers as “rough and ready Illinois cavalrymen embrowned by their raid through the Confederacy unkempt and frowsy.” The weary men set up what they called “Camp Magnolia Grove” and finally had a chance to rest uninterrupted.

Stationed outside New Orleans when he heard the news, Corporal George W. Southwick of the 1st Vermont Light Artillery on May 6 elatedly wrote—albeit with a few misspellings—“900 cavalry made a good sweep down through from Tennessee to Baton Rouge. They made a good sweep tareing up railroads burning bridges cuting telegraph wires and raising the divil in general. It is the greatest thing that has ever transpired since this war broke out.”

For the Northern public, this was not mere hyperbole. Cavalry raids in late 1862 and early 1863 by Confederate Generals Earl Van Dorn and Nathan Bedford Forrest had disrupted Union Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s supply lines in Mississippi and Tennessee, greatly frustrating Grant’s advance on the important Mississippi River port city of Vicksburg. A Union response of some scale was needed, leading to Grierson’s daring raid behind enemy lines.

In the wake of the raid, Captain Henry Clinton Forbes, who commanded Company B of the 7th Illinois Cavalry, took time to write his wife a detailed account of the role he and his men had played in the venture, planting himself on a hill in front of the Louisiana State House to do so. Although Forbes—labeled “a dashing sagacious captain of 30” by one relative—later compiled an official report, these initial thoughts, still fresh in his mind, provided valuable insight. Portions of the letter to his wife, now in a private collection, are published here for the first time.

The brainchild of this “expedition southward into Mississippi” on horseback was Union Maj. Gen. Stephen A. Hurlbut, commander of the 16th Corps, headquartered in Memphis, Tenn. Obtaining quick approval from Grant, Hurlbut called Grierson to his headquarters for a detailed description of his idea. Grant had planned a series of diversions to throw the Southern forces off balance. Northern Mississippi was to be rife with Federal advances, certainly drawing enough attention away from Grant’s river operations and Grierson’s maneuvers.

Forbes’ own description of the raid’s start was rather matter of fact: “Well, I was in my blankets, on my particular five feet nine of mother earth at ten o’clock P.M. 16th-April at LaGrange where we had been so long and so quietly doing duty at Headquarters of the 1st Div., 16th Army Corps, when an orderly brought me a dispatch from the general commanding, ordering me to report to the Commanding Officer of my regiment, for ‘duty on this expedition.’ Reporting immediately, I learned that three regiments comprising our brigade [6th Illinois, 7th Illinois, and 2nd Iowa] were ordered to march at daylight the next morning with five days rations.”

“By special favor,” Forbes recalled, “I learnt that we were to make a deep cut into ‘Dixie’ and at the dawn we were in our saddles.” Of their departure, Forbes noted, “42 men and both my lieutenants McCausland and O’Kane, provided each man with a [Cosmopolitan] carbine and fifty rounds of ammunition, a saber and a gay heart. We were within the enemy’s lines; ahead, a wilderness of secession and enmity…”

The troopers had an inkling it was to be a long raid, but, as Grierson elaborated, “No person other than myself and Lieutenant S.L. Woodward, a.a.a. [acting assistant adjutant] general of the brigade knew the probable extent of the expedition on which we had started.”

Wanting his wife to know the exact route they took, Forbes recommended: “Now take the best map of the State of Miss. you can get and you shall march with us. You observe Tippah County next to the N.W. of Ripley its county seat, having marched 35 miles. There we found plenty of Com. [Commissary] Fodder and meat, which we appropriated with a liberal understanding of our own wants. The soonest of objections only enlisted the sweetest of smiles, but the inexorable ‘can’t help it’ of the pleasant ‘Feds’ only left the grief of the impoverished secesh the deadlier and the deeper.”

Forbes would also boast: “Through the northern edge of Pontotoc Co. you will observe the Tallahatchie river running in a southwestern course. This stream the Rebs had vaunted no Yank should ever pass alive again. Accordingly, we passed it, the central Column a couple of miles above New Albany. One battalion at Kingsford [King’s] Bridge, below, and the 2nd Iowa above. About twenty secesh men found by the advance guard endeavoring to fire [King’s] Bridge, but were readily dispersed and the crossing effected.” These, Forbes noted, were part of a cavalry force dispatched by Major A.H. Chalmers, but when word that a larger force of Yankees was headed their way, “they had suddenly left in the night, going west.” The clash, though, had served to warn Grierson of a possible attack from the rear.

The next morning, Forbes’ Company B took the lead and had “several lively chases after little squads of the enemy”—a singular “rebel scout…shot on the edge of town” being the only notable interaction. Commissary stores were destroyed, including “a number of barrels of salt [which were] poured in the street, not that it had lost its savor, but that it might be trodden under foot by our horses.”

The malicious act sent the civilians scrambling for the valuable commodity. As Forbes wrote, “You should have seen the unsalted poor jubilant with their pails to scratch the precious condiment out of the dirt! One poor woman I remember with peculiar zest, who, as she came in sight of the long white line of salt spilled across the street turned to our column then in full motion and with her bonnet hastily snatched from her head in one hand and her pail in another powerless to express her joy in Language jumped up and down in her place and actually screamed in delight.”

Forbes’ baleful tendencies were further exposed when he recalled: “Another amusing incident occurred near the rear of the column where my company was stationed….I heard a dire knocking behind some fine premises against whose fence our horses were turned, and passed through to see what was doing when I found our boys in the act of very generously distributing some five or six hundred weight tobacco which they had discovered. The man of the house having run away, his lady very affectingly besought me to set a guard for his property, which I very magnanimously proceeded to do. Some delays, accountable to the uninitiated, having been experienced, when I finally went to set my guard, behold the tobacco, the boys and the duty, which, as a gallant Knight owed to a fair one in distress, I was not at all sorry to find had all vanished together!”

On April 20, Grierson’s command was “roused by the shrill reveille bugles at 2 o’clock in the morning.” By then, Grierson had already “sent back all the sick and disabled men”—an ensemble to be dubbed the “Quinine Brigade”—through Pontotoc in an effort to further confuse the Confederates of his true intentions. Forbes and his men “drew a deeper breath and set out again for Dixie, which like ‘away down east’ you may discover is difficult to reach.”

“We marched south east by byroads and encamped at Clear Spring,” Forbes wrote. “No event occurred worthy of note, save that being below the advance of our troops upon any former occasion, we began to perceive the most ludicrous panic in possession of the minds of the people. No language can give an adequate idea of the prepossession of the popular mind in Central Mississippi, against the Yankee soldiery, all chimerical, all whimsical, the work of false witnesses in the only journals which come to their hand, a part of the great system of atrocious fabrication upon which the rebellion was based at the first, and by which it is diligently sought to be perpetrated.”

Grierson continued his efforts at subterfuge on April 21, when he detached Colonel Hatch and the 2nd Iowa Cavalry. They were, Forbes noted, “striking eastward with his command for the Mobile and Ohio R.R. to work it whatever mischief lay in his power and diverting the attention of the enemy from our progress midway between the two roads to return at his convenience to our lines.” Grierson’s main command crossed a local creek and, according to Forbes, “[Upon entering] Starkville, a neat and pleasant village, we found almost entirely deserted of its inhabitants, they newly fled in terror of the Yankee invasion. The place was tenderly treated, not a house being broken, not a person molested, though afterwards the secesh papers published that we burned the town and hung one of the physicians.”

“We camped 8 miles beyond [Starkville],” Forbes continued, “having marched 45 miles thru interminable swamps, and captured a number of prisoners, among which was a quartermaster from Port Hudson.” About two miles out after dawn, Colonel Prince asked Forbes if he was willing to take his command of 39 men to Macon and if possible destroy the [rail]road at that place. They were instructed to then rejoin the main column by forced marches.

Forbes readily accepted the assignment and started out toward Macon “as rapidly as the slippery roads would permit.” One soldier, however, quickly suggested: “The detachment to be thrown against this [railroad] was used as a forlorn hope and was expected to be thrown away.”

Forbes’ men noticed the roads were tracked with hooves of livestock “driven in to the swamps to be hidden by negroes” to avoid capture. Several women, Forbes noted, “burst into tears as we passed without biting their noses off.” The group also encountered wagons loaded with food and valuable goods hub-deep in mud. Forbes directed a couple of his men to dress in captured “secesh” clothes and scout ahead of their unit. The detail would arrest a few locals, while one man attempted to make a break for it before getting “a saber stroke for his temerity.” Company B finally halted and bivouacked in the yard of a local plantation. “Just as I was finishing my piece of pone and cup of buttermilk,” Forbes wrote, “…picket posts came in with a prisoner captured.” Forbes learned that a Southern infantry regiment had arrived in Macon by rail, bolstered by two artillery pieces and local militia.

Forbes was not pleased to learn that the bridge he was suppose to cross “had been prepared for instantaneous destruction.” They all slept restlessly that night with “23 men out of 39 sustaining various parts of guard duty for that night.” Realizing that at least 30 miles separated Company B from Grierson’s main body, Forbes impressed a guide to lead them to Baugh’s Ford, which they “found impassable owing to a[n] exceedingly heavy current.” They ended up crossing a bayou, finally making their way to the Marshallville road. They turned and went through a menagerie of “swamps, plantations, wildernesses, dens, logs, pens, lakes, pits and caves of death.” They swam two more streams and eventually struck the road running southwest from Macon to Philadelphia about four miles from the former, “pushing with all speed.”

As Forbes would later document: “We passed thru Summerville, called Gholson on Colton’s maps, just before sundown. It is a beautiful little hamlet, the seat of two popular schools finely situated in large buildings, one for either sex. We were mistaken for secesh cavalry by the boys of the first school, and amid the most exaggerated demonstrations of pleasure we made in enjoying the glory of being their brave defenders. The girls rushed to their balcony to wave us all hail, the matrons to their larders to procure us a lunch and invitations to the officers to sup here.” The men of Company B passed up those opportunities but finally stopped at Mr. Nunn’s plantation. Recalled Forbes: “We entered into negotiations for feed and supper all in the pure Secesh vernacular. Out came the fodder, out came the corn; the smokehouse disgorged, the ovens glowed, the churn gave up her all (of buttermilk), even the knives and spoons found their way on to the table cloth.”

Forbes had a confidential confab with his host, where the latter expressed his dire contempt of the Yanks. Nunn began to entertain “misgivings in his mind and neuralgia in his stomach” when he heard the bugles sound and came outside to discover “one of the boys whose horse had become way worn had traded him incontinently for an available nag that he found neighing patriotically for U.S. Service in the poor patriarch’s stables. The last I heard of our host was an inquiry for the Captain, and upon being told that he was in advance, he lifted up his voice, and called me just as I was engaged in shouting forward! March! Which of course, shut off forever the noise of his complaints and divided the Yankees and fair Summerville for a season. Poor Nunn! May he repent and believe. Though he is old in transgression, and hardened in false doctrines.”

Forbes’ men were making great time, resting for four hours at Pleasant Spring after traversing 60 miles. On the 24th, the company passed through “a poor and barren company.” The side trip became dangerous when the two scouts Forbes had dispatched ahead encountered bushwhackers, with one scout killed and the other wounded. The Confederates “had done their bloody work and disappeared before we could canter on to the ground.” They gathered up the dead man and “laid him on a neighboring porch and spread a blanket decently over him and left him for the enemy to bury. Our haste would brook no delay. Poor Bill Buffington! God gave him good sleep under the green trees of this far land!” Forbes had his revenge, however, revealing, “I enjoyed the pleasure of burning to the ground the home of one of the bushwhackers.”

Upon reaching Newton Station, the troopers found the train depot smoldering. Expecting to cross the bridge Grierson had used, they discovered it had been destroyed by their own forces and headed instead toward Enterprise. There, Forbes came upon a “suspicious looking enclosure of high plank fence around a school house…[that] I speedily discovered was full of soldiers and a sentry to be standing at the gate.”

In the middle of his next sentence, however, the narrative ends. Forbes had spilled coffee on this 14th page and neither finished his thoughts nor the missive itself. He had also spilled ink on the first page.

Forbes later boasted to his sister about going “48 hours without food,” despite revealing quite the opposite to his wife. He also claimed to have lost 22 pounds, despite his earlier descriptions of eating sumptuous meals from the hands of Southern civilians or their storehouses.

Forbes became a farmer after the war and published a large volume of his own poetry. He would pass away on January 5, 1903, in Champaign, Ill. 

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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George Vernon Moody, a 26-year-old native of Maine, graduated from the prestigious Harvard Law School in 1842. Degree in hand, he promptly headed to Port Gibson, Miss., to join his younger brother, a successful druggist in the Mississippi River town. The elder Moody secured office space across from the Claiborne County Courthouse and in the almost two decades that followed accrued a reputation as a forceful presence in the courtroom—fiery behavior that at one point provoked six locals enough to attempt to assassinate him. Chased through town, Moody somehow managed to evade their shotgun blasts by racing through several local businesses and churches that lined Port Gibson’s picturesque roadways.

When Mississippi and neighboring Louisiana seceded from the Union in January 1861, the 45-year-old Moody decided to try his hand as a soldier, organizing an infantry company from Port Gibson and parishes across the river in Louisiana. Many of the men who signed up were Irish immigrants who were provided both a bonus for enlisting and a monthly source of income.

Once assembled, the company embarked on a long, winding train ride to Lynchburg, Va., where it was officially mustered into Confederate service. On August 23, Moody’s unit was transferred to the artillery and, in recognition of the men’s Irish roots, took the name Madison (La.) Light Tipperarys Battery. Transferred to the state fairgrounds in Richmond to complete their organization, the “Light Tips,” as they became better known, began training with two 12-pounder howitzers, two 3-inch rifles, and two 6-pounder smoothbores.

Not far away in Hanover and surrounding Virginia counties, another temperamental personality began raising a company of infantry in May 1861: Captain Pichegru Woolfolk Jr., a 6-foot-tall, dark-haired 30-year-old, already regarded as an expert drillmaster. Woolfolk was generally known as “jolly, careless, hospitable, sociable, and always fond of a laugh,” though other characteristics clearly offset his youthful vigor. While “fearless in the face of danger,” he was also “high-strung.“ The captain was also apparently selective with whom he added to his ranks. As one man would write, “I tride to enlist[,] but they told me I was too small and too young.”

Lacking the required number of men for his unit—named the Ashland Light Artillery in July—Woolfolk continued his recruiting efforts until the end of the year. In addition to providing a bounty, he would take each man to a tailor to be fitted for his uniform. The battery achieved sufficient manpower by September but remained underequipped—lacking small arms and harnesses—and in need of more overall training. 

Training with the weapons lasted six weeks. In February 1862, Woolfolk’s unit was sent to Manassas Junction, a 75-mile venture that took 10 days because of mud-caked roadways. “[W]ell at that time in Virginia,” a gunner recalled, “it rains a great deal and we [saw] mud worse than any Nebraska mud you ever saw. It was almost impossible to get feed for the men and horses (Sometimes we had to cut down trees about 6 inch through and put them across the mud places so as to get through with the Cannon). We staid at Manassas 2 or three weeks.”

On January 13, 1862, Moody embarked on a 30-day venture to Louisiana and Mississippi to recruit more men for the Light Tips, who had been encamped at Manassas since October 1861. As it was still early in the conflict, Moody’s mission would prove fairly easy, with offers of a $50 bounty particularly enticing to potential recruits. In mid-February, Moody returned to Virginia with 99 officers and men, signed up for the length of the war.

With winter approaching, the soldiers in northern Virginia began constructing small log cabins, complete with fireplaces. It was especially hard for the Louisianans to adjust to the colder temperatures, and each battery’s contingent of horses likewise suffered braving the elements outdoors. Local farmers would occasionally come to the camps to sell goods to the soldiers, which gave the men opportunity to pull shenanigans. “One day there was a man came with a wagon load of dressed Turkeys and chicken,” recalled one Ashland cannoneer, “and when he was selling them at the front end of the wagon the soldiers were stealing them out of the hind end and stole about half his load.”

By April, as the weather got warmer, both the Ashland Light Artillery and Moody’s Battery were assigned to the defenses of Yorktown, Va., as part of Major John J. Garnett’s Artillery Battalion in Maj. Gen. John Bankhead Magruder’s command. This was likely the two captains’ first time serving in close proximity of one another. In the summer of 1862, both units saw their first heavy action during the Seven Days Battles. As one Ashland gunner remembered, “Some times we would get up onto the Breast works and the enemy would fire at us we could see the smoke of there guns before the balls and shells would reach us and Jump down behind the works. [S]ometime the balls would strike the works and cover us all up in dirt. [T]here was the first time I saw a balloon go up in the army it was sent up to see what we were doing we went to work and dug a hole in the ground and let the hind end of the Cannon down got the right elivation and began to fire at them and they soon pulled it down they had a rope to it so that it wouldn’t get away.”

Major Garnett complimented the batteries, both attached to Brig. Gen. Robert Toombs’ Brigade during the Seven Days. “Captain Woolfolk,” Garnett reported, “was relieved from duty with General Toombs’ brigade on Monday, July 30, and was engaged only on Friday, [the] 27th, when he behaved very handsomely and his battery did excellent service.” At Garnett’s Farm on June 27, Moody’s Battery served in support of Captain James J. Brown’s Wise (Va.) Artillery. When they opened fire, the Light Tips found themselves fired on by an enfilading Federal battery on the right in addition to the two in front of them. The engagement endured for two hours, but Moody, in such a precarious position, finally retired, incurring only minor losses.

Colonel Stephen D. Lee, the army’s acting chief of artillery, had high praise for Moody’s service. “On June 27, Moody’s and Brown’s batteries engaged the enemy’s works,” he recalled. “I mention the above batteries specifically, as they were each of them under very heavy artillery fire. None of the captains except Brown had their entire batteries; they went into action with their rifle[d guns] section generally. Officers and men behaved well.”

In an after-action report for July 11, Lieutenant James Woolfolk, Pichegru’s brother, noted that his battery had served somewhat uneventfully on picket duty at “Mrs. Price’s property.” In less kind words, Lee complained, “I should like another battery or Woolfolk’s replaced by heavier guns, so I could consider that battery as one of my reserve batteries. Shelling from four enemy batteries opposite on the north s[i]de of the Chickahominy River was ineffective and cause no injury.”

On the 28th, the two rifled pieces of Woolfolk’s unit were detached and accompanied other cannon down the New Bridge Road to shell enemy positions at long range. That gave the Ashland gunners welcome credit “as the enemy broke and ran in every direction.”

In early October, the Hanover (Va.) Artillery, under Captain William Nelson, was disbanded by Special Orders No. 209 and some of its equipment and 40 men transferred to Woolfolk’s command, as were 20 men from the Middlesex (Va.) Artillery—known better as Fleet’s Battery. Many men chose to desert, however, rather than serve in a new command. Others remained absent because of sickness or took unauthorized furloughs. One private even took matters into his own hands and reported to the Amherst Artillery. Woolfolk’s demeanor quite possibly was a reason why so many men avoided serving under his direction.

Although both Moody’s and Woolfolk’s batteries were not engaged at the Second Battle of Manassas in late August, they did see action at Sharpsburg on September 17. On September 14, with Woolfolk’s Battery encamped at Funkstown, Md., two gunners encountered Robert E. Lee while they were out looking for fruit. When the general indicated that their unit would be moving soon, the men scampered back to their command with haversacks full of peaches.

The next day, Woolfolk’s command was ordered to cross the Potomac River at Williamsburg, Md., to guard the fords. Men without shoes were given the option of crossing the river or remaining behind in Virginia to guard the wagons. The bulk of the artillery battalion then crossed Antietam Creek about 8 a.m. Woolfolk’s Battery, equipped with at least one 12-pounder howitzer, and another battery formed part of the Confederate line facing a cornfield from atop a slight rise. On the night of September 16, the entire battalion, except Moody’s unit, was shifted left, bivouacking on the Hagerstown Pike about 400 yards in front of the Dunker Church.

Moody’s men would be integral in the upcoming fray. Equipped with two 3-inch rifles and two 24-pounder howitzers, they had seen action on the 15th. Then early on the morning of September 17, the battery took up a position near the Dunker Church. Colonel Lee ordered Moody to advance 300 yards with two of his guns into a plowed field, where he did “good service” for 15 minutes while “exposed to a most galling infantry fire.”

About 10 a.m., Moody was sent to a nearby ridge, where he quickly refitted his guns and replenished his ammunition before moving adjacent to the famed Washington Artillery of New Orleans in front of the village of Sharpsburg. Moody posted his battery on the right and again “did good service” alongside their fellow Louisiana artillerists, and “repelled some six or eight attempts” by Federal infantry to take “our position.” Colonel Lee later credited Moody “particularly” for “distinguished gallantry.”

Moody drew praise from Brig. Gen. Richard B. Garnett for his aid with his “200 men and two rifled pieces during the Miller Cornfield fighting.” Garnett noted that his infantry held its precarious position “partly due to the brave and energetic manner in which [Moody’s Battery] was handled.” A South Carolina brigade commander also offer commendations for Moody’s “skill, daring and endurance.”

By midday, Moody unlimbered near Brooks’ (S.C.) Artillery, commanded by William Elliott, a fellow Harvard graduate. Moody and the Light Tips played a decisive role in keeping the blue columns pinned down. After Sharpsburg, Colonel Lee rewarded the Light Tips by regularly placing them at the head of his line of march.

When Lee was promoted to brigadier general in November and sent west to command infantry, Moody was among those lobbying for Lt. Col. Edward Porter Alexander, the Army of Northern Virginia’s chief of ordnance, as his replacement. Alexander recalled Moody as “a magnificent specimen of physical manhood, over six feet in height & weighing about 200 pounds, a large strong face, blue eyes and no colored hair. He always dressed well & I think rather prided himself in a carriage & general appearance not unlike Gen. [Robert E.] Lee’s.”

Moody, Alexander noted, was “a good soldier & disciplinarian, & needed to be as his company was rather a rough one, having many ex-stevedores & boat hands from the Mississippi River,” astutely adding: “He & I were always most excellent friends, but he was not an easy man to get along with generally, & was often in more or less hot water with his brother captains.”

Alexander’s observation was certainly on point. Moody’s and Woolfolk’s batteries performed admirably at both Fredericksburg in December 1862 and Chancellorsville in May 1863, but tensions between the two commanders continued to grow. As Alexander recalled, during the march into Pennsylvania in June 1863, “Various little things between Moody and Capt. Woolfolk had kindled feeling.” A few days before the Battle of Gettysburg, Alexander surmised, “some question, of precedence in the march led to a challenge from Moody to Woolfolk” on July 1 at Fairfield outside Gettysburg. Woolfolk accepted the terms for the following day, electing to duel Moody with rifles at 10 paces. That evening, however, orders came to head to Gettysburg. The planned altercation would have to be postponed until after the battle.

Both batteries again exhibited exemplary service during the battle, but fate intervened to permanently postpone the personal dispute. Woolfolk was badly wounded on July 2 and Moody was captured at a later date to prevent a resumption of their affair of honor.

On July 2, during the heavy fighting around the Peach Orchard, the Light Tips adopted the tactic previously used against enemy balloons during the Seven Days. By lowering their guns’ trails into holes in the ground to elevate the barrels, their shots arched when fired. Raining fragments from their exploding shells added to the devastation of the Union soldiers below.

During the night of July 3, 1863, thunderstorms hampered the Confederate retreat from Gettysburg. In the confusion, Moody’s Battery accidentally left behind its flag (shown above). As the 2nd U.S. Cavalry scoured the area, Private Newton McCan recovered the abandoned guidon. On July 4, 1885, the flag was presented to the State of Illinois, where it remained until returned to Louisiana in 2009.

Moody returned to Port Gibson after the war, only to get killed in 1866 when a personal enemy seeking satisfaction fired 16 buckshot into Moody’s back as he sat at his office desk. Four years later, Woolfolk would also lose his life tragically. While attending a trial on the top floor of the Virginia Capitol, he was among several killed when the floor collapsed. 

Richard H. Holloway is president of the Civil War Round Table of Central Louisiana.

The defeated Confederate president’s dramatic capture—in fact and fiction

After a long trip from New Orleans in mid-July 1865, former Confederate Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor walked into a jail cell at Fort Monroe, Va., where its occupant, Jefferson Davis, welcomed him with a silent handshake. Taylor had earlier been in Washington, D.C., where he met with President Andrew Johnson, as well as numerous congressmen and generals, to obtain permission to make contact with Davis, the imprisoned former president of the dissolved Confederate States of America and also Taylor’s brother-in-law. At the time of the meeting with Johnson, a standing order prohibited ex-Confederates from entering the nation’s capital—a restriction spurred by rumors circulating throughout the city that another presidential assassination plot was in the works. But Taylor, son of former President Zachary Taylor, knew how to finesse politicians and soon managed to persuade his way into seeing Davis.

Until Taylor arranged to speak with Davis, the latter was forbidden to have any visitors, including family members. President Johnson had been very hands-on early during Davis’ incarceration, permitting only guards inside his cell, so Taylor’s unannounced appearance was quite welcome. “This is kind,” exclaimed the “pallid, worn, gray, bent, [and] feeble” Davis, “but no more than I expected of you.” The two men began discussing the condition of the war-torn South, with Davis asking whether he was being blamed for the Confederate defeat. Taylor confirmed Davis’ conjecture but surmised that the assaults on Davis’ character were coming from people now eager to curry favor with the federal government.

Although Davis and Taylor spent the entire day catching up, neither left a record or mention about the plethora of drawings and articles currently circulating among the Northern press perpetuating the claim that the former president had been captured in Irwinville, Ga., on May 10, 1865, wearing women’s clothing. The opportunity to depict the former Confederate president in stories and engravings as having been captured in women’s clothing—humiliation based on hearsay and unverified accounts—proved irresistible to much of the print media. President Abraham Lincoln had received similarly rough treatment throughout the war, regularly lampooned in particular by Confederate-sympathetic media in Britain such as Southern Punch and the Southern Illustrated News.

From the time the Confederate capital had fallen and Davis fled south from Richmond with his entourage on April 2, he had naturally been the target of ridicule for countless Northern newspapers, quick to publish any nugget of news about the Confederate president’s desperate attempt to escape capture and, in doing so, likely racing ahead of established fact to please their readers.

In early May, Davis and his supporters crossed into Georgia, where he was reunited with his wife, Varina, who had fled Richmond separately. Varina’s guard was led by Captain George Moody, former commander of the Madison Light Artillery (Madison “Tips” or Tipperarys), who was on his way home to Louisiana. Moody, Varina recalled, was a “very gentlemanly escort” who had volunteered to accompany her “as a friend and protector” and was a neighbor of the Davis family.

The joint Davis wagon train was not aware that parts of two veteran Yankee regiments, the 1st Wisconsin Cavalry and the 4th Michigan Cavalry, were zeroing in on their position after being dispatched by Union Maj. Gen. James H. Wilson. While both units were able to gather similar intelligence, inexplicably Wilson did not direct the commanders to work in conjunction with each other.

The initial intelligence reports, which stated that Davis was accompanied by 600–700 men, prompted Brevet Colonel Henry Harnden, leading the 1st Wisconsin, to inquire of his commander if his allotment of 150 men would be sufficient for the task. Via a subordinate, Wilson explained it was his opinion that Davis’ escort was “greatly demoralized” and “that they would be poorly armed.” The commander of the Michigan troopers, Lt. Col. Benjamin D. Pritchard, led a larger force of 459 cavalrymen, effectively evening the odds against the suspected number of the soldiers in the escort.

Meanwhile, Davis and his traveling companions were bogged down by heavy storms. The path for wagons in their caravan was constantly blocked by mud and downed trees lying across the road. Eventually, people and animals alike grew so weary that they had to halt. After midnight on May 10, everyone was fast asleep. The officers in command of the escape party failed to send out pickets to guard themselves. Davis had already reduced the size of his military retinue to lessen their chances of being caught.

An hour later, Pritchard and his Michiganders rode into nearby Irwinville. Residents disclosed the location of the Confederate encampment just outside town. The horsemen stealthily made their way to within a few hundred yards of the exhausted presidential party to await dawn. A mile northward, and unbeknown to Pritchard, Harnden’s Wisconsin men had obtained virtually the same information about Davis and had ridden north, likewise bivouacking nearby to rest until daylight. Because Wilson failed to have his men work in conjunction with one another, neither group was aware of the other’s presence. According to Harnden, his commander’s instructions were “that if there was a fight and Jefferson Davis should get hurt, General Wilson will not feel very bad over it”—setting up a potentially deadly encounter.

As dawn was breaking, the inhabitants of the Davis camp were still fast asleep. Both sets of Union cavalry mounted their steeds about the same time and began moving toward the camp, accidentally encountering each other first. In the morning haze, the two commands saw shadowy mounted figures headed for them and opened fire. Once the smoke cleared and the fog dissipated, two men from the 4th Michigan lay dead and another was wounded. Three men of the 1st Wisconsin were severely injured in the brief fray. Pritchard determined that all of the weapons firing were Spencer repeating carbines, a weapon he presumed only Northern troops would possess, so he loudly called for a ceasefire. He “hallooed” to the troops across from him in the smoke-filled woods and received a response of “First Wisconsin,” causing great relief.

The friendly fire altercation abruptly awoke the Davises. The president stepped outside his tent, thinking the combatants were part of a group of renegade Southerners believed to have been stalking them for more than a day. Davis believed the party would be sympathetic to him, as president, and hoped he could calm them down. He quickly realized his error, recognizing in the growing daylight that the horsemen were Federals. Davis’ initial instinct was to defend his family, but that quickly dissipated as an option as his wife begged him to make his escape.

Recalled Varina: “When [her husband] saw them [Federal cavalrymen] deploying a few yards off, he started down to the little stream hoping to meet his servant with his horse and pistols, but knowing he would be recognized, I pleaded with him to let me throw over him a large waterproof raglan [very similar to what Lincoln wore to Ford’s Theatre the night of his assassination the previous month] which had often served him in sickness during the summer season as a dressing gown and which I hoped might so cover his person that in the gray of the morning he would not be recognized. As he strode off, I threw over his head a little black shawl which was around my own shoulders, seeing that he could not find his hat. After he started I sent my colored woman after him with a bucket for water, hoping that he would pass unobserved. He attempted no disguise, consented to no subterfuge.” Davis’ own account of the events was essentially the same as his wife’s. Davis remembered that he reached for what he thought was his dark raglan to cover his light gray clothing but picked up Varina’s raglan instead.

Several members of their party were nearby when he attempted to escape. (Closest was Moody, a one-time political rival of Davis who, later, in a letter to his wife did not contradict either of the Davises’ accounts.) Willing perhaps to fashion any scenario to help her husband get away, Varina did her best to distract a lone approaching Yankee corporal by claiming that only women were in the family tents. As she did so, another member of the group attempted to lead the Federal away.

The corporal, however, noticed two figures moving away from his position and realized one was wearing boots. “Who is that?” he demanded while pointing at the retreating booted figure. Still intent on doing what she could to help her husband escape, Varina replied, “That is my mother.” The corporal leveled his pistol as he called for the unidentified individual to halt. Varina began to scream, prompting her husband to stop and throw off his cloak and shawl. Seeing that the soldier still had his gun pointed at Davis, she ran and flung her arms around her husband, frantically yelling for the Union men not to shoot. Her bravery likely saved Davis’ life. One of the president’s party slipped his own cover over his commander’s shoulders after noticing him shivering.

In short order, all in the Davis party surrendered and then watched as their captors rifled through their personal belongings. Of particular note was the confiscation of Varina’s spare hoop skirt and later the discarded shawl and raglan, which were taken, it seemed, for far more nefarious reasons than the simple acquisition of a souvenir. As the two groups made their way toward Wilson’s headquarters in Macon, Ga., the Davis clan was subjected to Yankee cavalrymen gaily singing, “We’ll Hang Jeff Davis from a Sour Apple Tree,” a tune that likely upset the Davises’ young offspring.

Davis had to endure a mounted horseman waving a broadside in his face that turned out to be a wanted poster announcing a $100,000 reward for his capture. The broadside falsely accused Davis of being complicit in Lincoln’s April 14 assassination.

Before the prisoners arrived at his headquarters, Wilson fired off a dispatch to Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton announcing Davis’ capture. In the text of the report was a statement that Davis had “hastily put on one of Mrs. Davis’ dresses” in his aborted escape attempt. It also inaccurately claimed that Davis brandished a Bowie knife at the corporal on the scene. Subsequent information was shared with the public by Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck who stated, “If Jeff Davis was captured in his wife’s clothes, I respectfully suggest that he be sent north in the same habiliments.”

It was Stanton who passed along the dubious attire story to The New York Times, which on May 14 would print a large headline, “Davis Taken.” Erroneous subheads followed: “His Wife, Sister and Brother Secured” [Davis’ sister and brother were not with him]; “Cowardly Behavior of the Head of Southern Chivalry”; “He Put on His Wife’s Petticoats and Tries to Sneak Into the Woods”; and “Not Having Changed His Boots, the Brogans Betray Him.”

A follow-up report by Wilson made no mention of Davis being in women’s clothing, or even in disguise. Even Harnden, who was on the scene, admitted: “As to the story which became widely prevalent at the time, that Davis had on a hoop-skirt, and was disguised as a woman, I know but very little of it; but think it grew out of the remark of the soldier, that, when he stopped him, he had his wife’s shawl on him.”

The architect of the fabrication that Davis was wearing women’s clothing was apparently Lieutenant Julian Dickinson, adjutant of the 4th Michigan. In 1899, Dickinson was speaking to a group of historians when he elaborated, “Davis had on for disguise a black shawl drawn closely around his head and shoulders, through the folds of which I could see his gray hairs. He wore on his person a woman’s long black dress, which completely concealed his figure, excepting his spurred boot heels. The dress was undoubtedly Mrs. Davis’ traveling dress, which she afterward wore on her return march to Macon.” This account differs from the corporal claiming to be the sole captor of Davis.

It seems highly unlikely Davis would have had time to don one of his wife’s dresses in the scramble to escape the Yankees. If the horsemen arriving out of the fog were Confederates as Davis first believed, the possibility he would have greeted them in women’s attire strains credulity. The list of dubious scenarios combined with Harnden’s and Wilson’s reluctance to support them certainly leaves many suspect conclusions. In addition, 4th Michigan trooper Joseph Odren was a direct witness to Davis’ capture yet neglected ever to mention anything about the president being in feminine clothing, despite ample opportunity to do so.

Stanton surely wasn’t disappointed to find the story of Davis being captured while wearing his wife’s garments end up being reported in numerous newspapers across the country. In addition, hundreds of demeaning drawings and lithographs portraying Davis in female clothing would continue to circulate, further spreading the fabrication. Although it took a few years, all of the captors were finally able to split the ample reward for Davis’ apprehension. The victor of any confrontation almost always gets the last word, and in this instance it is certainly no different. Unfortunately for Davis, it was a fictional account. 

Richard H. Holloway works for the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism and is president of the Civil War Round Table of Central Louisiana.

The joint American-British Independence Day 1942 air raid was a costly start to the Eighth Air Force’s European bombing campaign…but it was a start

It was a beautiful sunny day in England on July 11, 1942, as the crew of the Douglas Boston mark III light bomber stood stiffly at attention in their best theater dress uniforms. U.S. Brig. Gen. Ira C. Eaker watched as Maj. Gen. Carl A. “Tooey” Spaatz made his way down the line, pinning medals on all of them. The bomber’s commander, Captain Charles C. “Keg” Kegelman, was the first recipient of the Distinguished Service Cross in the Eighth Air Force, while his crew, Lieutenant Randall Dorton and Sergeants Bennie Cunningham and Robert Golay, were all awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for their July 4 mission. Kegelman was also promoted to the rank of major, effective immediately.

Major General Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of all U.S. troops in Europe, had read Kegelman’s after-action report upon the latter’s miraculous return and then wrote in pencil across the page, “This Officer is hereby awarded the Distinguished Service Cross.” Shaking his head, the astonished Eisenhower looked up at his aide and asked, “Are all of the reports going to be like this one?” 

Kegelman’s unit, the 15th Bomb Squadron (Light), had docked in Wales on May 13 and been swiftly transported by train to Grafton Underwood, a cleverly hidden Royal Air Force base near Kettering, England. The airfield was entirely covered in ankle-high grass with swaths cut through it to resemble cultivated farmland. The illusion was further enhanced by full-scale replicas of black-and-white Holstein cows randomly scattered across the area.

Several pilots were dispatched on June 4 to RAF Swanton Morley to gain operational experience before conducting their own forays. Early on, Lieutenant Howard Cook tried to tell airmen of the resident No. 226 Squadron how to fly low. This advice did not go over very well and the men of the 15th were sent back to their base two days later. Not all of the British had their feathers ruffled by the bold Americans. Harry Castledine of 226 Squadron noted: “The Americans were a really wild lot, but great fun. I was told they played cowboys and Indians in the woods around Bylaugh Hall with live ammo! At the All-Ranks dances you might think that they would win a jitterbug contest, but a lot depended on the partner and the WAAFs [members of the RAF Women’s Auxiliary Air Force] were not so experienced.” 

On June 6 the RAF loaned the Americans A-20 Havocs (called Bostons by the British), twin-engine airplanes on which they had already trained. Almost immediately tragedy struck, however, as the 15th suffered its first casualties. One of their bombers hit a high-tension wire mid-flight, killing two crewmen. Nine four-man flight crews and 36 ground personnel were eventually sent back to Swanton Morley for extensive instruction. One of the hardest parts of training was learning the intricate system for identifying friendly planes in England’s crowded skies, especially in silhouette. The airmen were trained in low-level bombing using sunken ships along the shore as well as vacant fields as targets, simultaneously honing their gunnery skills. 

Along with Kegelman, Captains Bill Odell and Martin Crabtree had been com­missioned officers for two years and had each logged more than 1,000 hours of flight time. In his diary, Odell wrote, “Our junior pilots, like [Leo] Hawel, [Fred A. “Jack”] Loehrl and [Stan] Lynn had completed flying school in December, 1941.” Not mincing words, Odell explained that the British wing commander, J.H. Lynn, surely recognized “we knew and flew the Boston aircraft better than his own [squadron].” He further noted, “Wing Commander Lynn advised his superiors that aside of providing the initial baptism of fire, his ability to further the Americans’ pre-battle education was limited. They [the Americans] could be turned loose anytime and be perfectly confident of finding their way around in the dark.”

 The Bostons’ Wright R-2600-A5B Twin Cyclone engines propelled the bombers to a little over 300 mph in a pinch and their large fuel tanks enabled them to fly long-range missions. These agile aircraft could not destroy an entire industrial plant, but they were very effective in damaging airfields and dispersing troop concentrations. The 97th Bomb Squadron’s Lieutenant James Wash recalled the Bostons’ advantage of “sur­prising ground defenses and presenting difficult targets to enemy fighters.”

Back in Washington, D.C., political leaders clamored for some type of demonstration to be made against the Germans on the European front. “After seven months of war, they were eager for evidence of American air power,” Wash noted. “The blitz-wearied British and the folks back home in the United States badly needed a shot of good news.”

President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that Independence Day would be honored “not in fireworks of make-believe, but in death-dealing reality of tanks and planes and guns and ships.” What more fitting way to commemorate the United States’ separation from Great Britain than to bring both sides together in a joint operation? Roosevelt further observed how important it was to “not waste one hour, not to stop one shot, not to hold back one blow—that is the way to mark our great national holiday in this year of 1942.” With his subordinates kept in the dark, U.S. Army Air Forces Commanding General Henry H. “Hap” Arnold had written to Prime Minister Winston Churchill promising that American and British airmen would be fighting together by July 4.

Orders came through on June 28 to Eaker and Spaatz for them to begin combat operations on Independence Day. The two generals were both aghast and protested against the directive, to no avail. Despite the military’s advice, some sort of dramatic event, much like Jimmy Doolittle’s Tokyo raid back in April, was going to happen to satisfy the politicians, who knew it would likely have a positive effect on American voters. Eaker’s aide, James Parton, recalled his boss “argued that a quickie out of England would accomplish no real damage, risk heavy losses and hurt the morale of his tiny command.” 

As neither the Eighth nor the RAF had any planes available for the 97th Squadron, it was an easy choice to use the 15th since it had both the local training and the loaned bombers on hand. The British roundels on the six borrowed Bostons were quickly painted over with the USAAF’s white star to boost American morale. 

The British had already scheduled a raid with 12 Bostons of 226 Squadron on June 29, and substituted Kegelman and his crew for one of theirs. This would be the first time that members of the AAF took part in European bombing operations. The mission’s targets were the marshalling yards and other military facilities at Hazebrouck, France. All of the Bostons managed to get through the mission unscathed, though their escorts lost three planes. Bombing between 12,500 and 13,000 feet, the formation recorded several hits on the rail lines and adjoining buildings. In the process Kegelman and his crew accrued some valuable combat experience for their upcoming mission. 

Given the short time available for organization, Eisenhower, Eaker and Spaatz all visited the 15th at Swanton Morley in late June. They gave directions in person for the bombing runs and took time to shake hands with the airmen. As they would only be using six American crews paired with the equivalent number of British ones, Hawel recalled: “On July 1st, Captain Kegelman put all nine pilots’ names in a hat. Six were marked with a ‘yes’ and three marked ‘no.’ I drew a ‘yes’ and later discovered I was one of six American pilots who would fly the famous 4th of July raid over Holland. The six pilots drawn were Captains Kegelman, Crabtree and Odell and Lieutenants Lynn, Loehrl and myself.” The next day, Eaker and Spaatz returned and spoke at length with Kegelman. On July 3 the intelligence officer for VIII Bomber Command, Harris Hull, came by the airfield to give the men their first combat briefing.

“Just shows you how much our brass hats know or how they value the cost of men’s lives,” wrote Odell in his diary.

The men of the 15th thought it peculiar that they were garnering such attention for a raid that the British had conducted many times before. Odell mirrored the other airmen’s feelings when he wrote, “It seemed a little ironic that they [the RAF] had been pressed into taking part in an Ameri­­can Independence Day celebration commemorating the severance of ties between our two countries.” But as AAF airman Francis Chartier noted, “Our national holiday was just another day to our allies in England.”

Four airfields in German-occupied Holland were selected as targets and the attacking force was separated into four three-plane formations. The first objective along the shore of Holland was De Kooy, which was to be bombed by 226 Squadron Leader Shaw Kennedy, followed by Americans Kegelman and Loehrl. The second target was Ber­gen Alkmaar, with an assaulting force of 226 Flight Lt. Ronald A. “Yogi” Yates-Earl and Pilot Officer Charles M. “Hank” Henning along with the 15th’s Lieutenant Lynn. The third site to be attacked was Valkenburg with the lone British crew of Squadron Leader John Castle in addition to the 15th’s Crabtree and Hawel. The final flight was directed at Haamstede, led by 226 Flight Lt. A.B. “Digger” Wheeler and Pilot Officer A. “Elkie” Eltringham, with Odell bringing up the rear.

At 5:15 on the morning of July 4, the pilots and crews were awakened and served coffee in the airfield’s mess hall before heading to the operations room. “We turned in our papers and got packed for the combat flight (concentrated food, water purifier, compass and French, Dutch, German money),” Odell later documented. “More dope on the trip and then out to the airplane. Had no trouble but was a bit anxious on take off.” Eisenhower returned to the field to send off the 15th, recalling, “To mark our entry into the European fighting I took time to visit the crews immediately before the take-off and talked with the survivors after their return.” He understood the public ramifications of the raid while participants such as Odell tried to downplay the historic date and concentrate solely on the mission at hand. 

The first Boston lifted off at 7:09 a.m., with the rest of the formation taking off five minutes later. “Take off time was to be early in the hope of catching the German defences off guard,” wrote RAF Swanton Morley historian and airman Stephen W. Pope. The raiders would fly across the North Sea at low level to avoid detection. Once they reached the Dutch coast they would split up and attack their assigned airfields.

In Kegelman’s plane, Dorton remembered how graceful they looked trundling across the grass field against the dawn. “As we flew over the English countryside [toward] the coast, farmers already at work in their fields waved to us as our ships roared over their heads at less than 100 feet,” he wrote in his journal. 

“After getting in the air we settled down and flew right on the trees to the coast,” recalled Odell. “Felt a little uneasy, because there was a cloudless sky but no fighters appeared.” As they approached the Dutch coast, Dorton noticed “yellow-sailed fishing boats a mile to their left. That was unlucky as the Germans kept observers on off-shore boats.”

Wheeler’s section reached Haamstede just before 8 a.m. Close behind him flew Eltringham and Odell. The Bostons raced across the airfield at 20 to 100 feet above ground, dropping 500-pound general purpose bombs with time-delay fuzes and incendiaries. Hits were made on administration buildings, a hangar and dispersal points. Odell unleashed his inner daredevil during the bomb run, maneuvering his plane sideways while flying between two hangars and strafing smaller targets near the runway. Wheeler used his nose guns to good effect, shooting up 160 German airmen in their flying kits gathered in a crowd for roll call. Additionally, the rear gunners of all three planes managed to score some casualties on their way out of the area. As the formation left the target area, smoke was seen rising over the southeastern section of Haamstede.

The Bergen Alkmaar contingent led by Yates-Earl arrived at their destination at 8:02. They had difficulties in identifying the proper objective, causing the formation to attack at 100 feet in line astern, starting fires in hangars located on the north side of the field. Lynn’s plane was hit by flak right after bombing and crashed on the airfield, killing all on board in a fiery eruption. Henning safely left the area after his bombing run, only to be shot down 15 miles off the Dutch shore by a Focke-Wulf Fw-190 flown by Sergeant Johannes Rathenow of Jagdgeschwader 1.

The Valkenburg attacking force found themselves too far south after hitting the coast. Castle’s bomb bay doors jammed and he was unable to drop his bombload. Americans Crabtree and Hawel waited in vain for Castle to open his doors. “We were so low I saw two young ladies eating breakfast right out of my side window,” Hawel said. Finally, the two Americans used their machine guns to strafe the airfield and disperse three Messerschmitt Me-109s, setting one on fire. All three Bostons returned with their full complement of bombs. 

“I noticed numerous lines of splashes walking out to meet us,” Dorton reported on their approach to De Kooy, “and it was hard to realize they were bullets striking the water. The closer we got, the more splashes there were and suddenly Kennedy veered sharply to the left. Now our engines were wide open and we shot across the land at close to 300 mph. We were jinking about violently, so close to the ground that a gun trying to fire at us hit a German soldier on a bicycle. He flew straight up into the air and the cycle rolled on down the road.” The gunfire was getting heavier and tensions rose as Dorton recalled: “We twisted over violently and I heard Sergeant Cunningham scream, ‘Loehrl hit the ground…he’s breaking all to pieces!’ At the same moment our plane gave a tremendous lurch and we hit the ground. We skidded along for a sickening moment and then the captain [Kegel­man] pulled her nose up and we were pointed straight at an old structure that looked like a windmill without sails. There were guns mounted in it and they were firing.”

As Kegelman’s Boston skidded on the ground, Sergeant Golay yelled, “Give ’em hell, Cap!” Golay saw a propeller fly by “and I thought Ben­nie had got a Messerschmitt. Then I saw smoke and looked out and saw it was our propeller and I didn’t feel so happy anymore.”

The bomber’s starboard engine had been hit by flak, causing the prop to shear off. “I was wondering what to do when I heard Golay shout,” Kegelman reported. “I thought we were goners but somehow Golay’s shout made me try to pull us out.” The captain managed to keep the Boston aloft by jettisoning its bombload.

“Then our nose section jumped and shook as Kegelman fired our forward guns into the flak tower,” remembered Dorton. “I thought we would ram it but Keg lifted a wing over [it] and then dove between the banks of a canal heading for the North Sea.

“I looked to the right and saw that the shell that had knocked us to the ground had sheared off the forward section of the right engine, prop and all. Gas was pouring out of the fuel line and burning as it hit the hot cylinders. Luckily, our airspeed with one engine was enough to blow out the flames.”

“It was a long 140 miles home, but they made it,” said Wash. “When the plane finally parked and the bomb bay doors were opened, Netherlands soil fell out on the tarmac.” Kegelman’s bomber was the last to touch down and despite only having one engine made a safe landing and taxied to the control tower. Inspection of his aircraft revealed scratch marks on the Boston’s belly where he had obviously touched the ground.

this article first appeared in AVIATION HISTORY magazine

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“All the brass were on the field with us, anxiously awaiting the captain’s return,” recalled AAF airman Eben W. “Wright” Holloway. “A great cheer arose when Keg’s plane finally came hobbling in.” Eaker was present when Kegelman landed, congratulating him and the other crewman. Hull handled the debriefings for the flight crews. Eaker called Eisenhower, who was relieved to hear of the bombers’ return but concerned about the losses. 

The positive press generated by the attack soothed the politicians in Washington. The Wash­ington Post gave front-page billing to the raid with the headline “Yanks Raid Nazis In Holland” and The New York Times opined, “The attack was no holiday stunt.” Despite the loss of three planes—two American and one British—and most of their crews (the bombardier on Loehrl’s Boston, Lieutenant Marshall Draper, miraculously survived and became the first Eighth Air Force POW), the mission was deemed a success. On the British side of the Pond, RAF officials applauded their allies. They described the 15th’s joint mission with them as a “daring event which, occurring on July 4, symbolized American ability once more to strike for freedom!”  

Richard H. Holloway is the 15th Bombardment Squadron’s historian and the son of one of its members, Eben Wainwright “Wright” Holloway. Suggested reading: We Were Eagles, Volume 1: The Eighth Air Force at War, July 1942 to November 1943, by Martin W. Bowman; and The Mighty Eighth: A History of the Units, Men and Machines of the U.S. 8th Air Force, by Roger A. Freeman.

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This feature originally appeared in the July 2021 issue of Aviation History. Subscribe today!

Louisiana units played a key role during the Vicksburg campaign

The area surrounding Pollard, Ala., located east of Mobile, in the early months of 1863 was overrun with deserters and stragglers from both armies who had flocked to this sparsely populated and isolated locale. Fortunately for the local populace, which included a large number of civilian refugees from Pensacola, Fla., several Confederate units were stationed nearby to protect them if required.

The command consisted mainly of Alabama and Florida units and the 19th Louisiana Infantry. Private George Asbury Bruton of the 19th Louisiana wrote to his sister and described Pollard: “This is the poorest country I ever saw in my life or ever expect to see. Tell Ma I am sorry that I can’t say any thing in favor of her old native state but we are camped in the out-edge close to no where. I never saw a goffer [gopher] before I come to this country & I imagin that is all this country is fit for is to rais goffers.”

Despite Bruton’s low opinion of his surroundings, these forces served another vital purpose in their assignment to keep an eye on the Yankees at Pensacola; thus, the assembled Confederates units were officially deemed an “army of observation.”

The Louisianans were added to this garrison in part to recoup their strength after appalling losses at the Battle of Shiloh, where they earned the sobriquet “Bloody 19th.” In addition to their daily drudge of drill and outpost duties, music was incorporated into the 19th with both practical and spiritual results. The 19th’s commander, Colonel Wesley Parker Winans, was a “lover of music” and formed a regimental band. Douglas John Cater, a transfer from the 3rd Texas Cavalry, was tabbed as drum major who oversaw four other drummers.

Cater also implemented a string band that further raised the spirits of the soldiers. The regiment took up money that was used to purchase musical instruments from Mobile. “We secured,” Cater later recalled, “a good violin [for Cater’s brother, Rufus], a guitar [for John W. Bonham who also sang lead for the melodious quartet], a base violin [for Lieutenant Frank Smith] and a piccolo [for himself].” Cater’s orchestra was soon serenading young ladies throughout the countryside.

Preparation for resumption of duty at the front lines soon marred the serenity of the concerts. Orders came to pack up and get ready to move by train starting April 8 and ending May 31 at Jackson, Miss. During the same time, the 5th Company of Washington (Louisiana) Artillery was passing through Mobile from Wartrace, Tenn. The last time the 19th Louisiana and the Washington Artillery served side by side was at Shiloh, where both units were part of a makeshift brigade with the Crescent Infantry, 24th Louisiana, during the battle’s second day. The two units, along with the Crescents, bonded from the fighting they endured.

The brigade the 19th and Washington Artillery joined consisted of the 32nd Alabama Infantry, 13th and 20th Louisiana Consolidated Infantry, 14th Louisiana Sharpshooter Battalion, and 16th and 25th Louisiana Consolidated Infantry, all under the command of Brig. Gen. Daniel W. Adams. The soldiers learned they were ordered there by General Joseph Eggleston Johnston, who was assembling an army for the relief of the Vicksburg garrison, besieged by Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. Johnston arrived in Jackson a couple of weeks before the Louisianans and immediately began to formulate a plan to free up the forces inside of beleaguered Vicksburg.

Confederate Secretary of War James Alexander Seddon had dispatched Johnston to Mississippi on May 9 with orders to take “chief command of the forces, giving to those in the field, as far as practicable, the encouragement and benefit of your personal direction.” Grant’s men, however, were already positioned between Johnston and Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton’s forces just east of Vicksburg. Some of Pemberton’s soldiers attempted to join Johnston, but they were soundly defeated at the Battle of Champion Hill on May 16, and retreated back to their breastworks. Thwarted at rescuing Pemberton, Johnston resolved to attack the Federal rearguard and trap them between the two Southern forces, and he waited for reinforcements to arrive at Jackson.

When the 19th arrived, much of Jackson was in shambles. In mid-May, in an attempt to destroy facilities housing Confederate war materials, Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s troops started fires to burn every building in the city capable of producing war material. Both public and private residences went up in flames despite one of the “most drenching rain storms” the night prior to the city’s brief occupation by Federal units. The residents later dubbed their city “Chimneyville” because chimneys were the only thing left of many of the burned buildings. Private Rufus Eddins of the 19th observed upon his entrance to the city, “The Yanks nearly ruined Jackson…they burned up $15,000,000 worth of property.”

Shortly after pitching their tents in a valley about 200 yards from the Mississippi capitol building, Cater recalled the 19th Louisiana was ordered to go on provost duty three miles from town. Eddins complained he was “standing guard ev[e]ry other day.” 

Aside from guard duty, members of the Washington Artillery spent time ensuring the unit was well equipped. Captain Cuthbert H. Slocomb managed to secure new issues of clothing, refurbished wagons, “camp equipage, artificers tools, etc.,” and his battery was better equipped than it had been in over a year’s time. 

Rumors about Vicksburg began trickling in. As the middle of June approached, Eddins wrote, “[T]here is talk ev[e]ry day of Johonsons [Johnston’s] mooving on the Yanks. [T]hey have Vicksburg in a clost [closed] place. [T]hey are within rifel shot of our works and as well fortied [fortified] as we are in some places. The Pontoon Bridges from here this morning. I expect there will be a forward move shortly. I expect our Regt will be left here to guard Jackson.” Despite the rest and refitting, Eddins was experiencing the doldrums when he explained, “I don’t feel like writing humor this morning.” Soon, others in the 19th Louisiana would have a cure for his sagging spirits.

Because of his appreciation of music, Winans ordered the 19th Louisiana’s string band instruments safely stored among the baggage of the regiment on their winding travels from Pollard to Jackson. Cater and the other members of the musical group excitedly hauled them out and put them to use. One night, the group somehow secured the use of an ambulance to transport them, along with Adjutant A. Ben Broughton, Captain Jack Hodges, and Sergeant Thomas J. Prude, a few miles outside of town with the purpose of serenading some young ladies.

It was a beautiful moonlit night; the men brought out their pieces and took note of their surroundings, bedecked with a plethora of decorative flowers and shrubs. “[T]he folding doors were thrown open by an affable old gentleman, who welcomed us and invited us” inside, so impressed was he with the band’s selection of tunes. In the dining room, the bandsmen were delighted to discover a “sumptuous repast” awaiting them. Cater later remembered his brother Rufus saying the dessert cake “was too pretty to cut.” Wines, salads, and much more awaited the talented musicians, all surrounding a notable vase inscribed, “Vicksburg, Vicksburg, Vicksburg.” Discreetly tucked inside the flower arrangements encircling the vase were dainty notes thanking the soldiers “for the serenade and conveying happy wishes.”

While the men under his command were involved in frivolous activities to pass the time, Johnston realized he was not getting any more additions to his small “Army of Relief.” He even debated with Confederate President Jefferson Davis concerning the actual number of men he had on hand. The general speculated he had in the neighborhood of 23,000 soldiers fit for duty while the president countered with an amount totaling 34,000 troops. Other governmental officials in Richmond chimed in and confirmed the president’s mathematics, but Johnston insisted those numbers were blown out of proportion. Finally, Johnston was told by Confederate Secretary of War Seddon in no uncertain terms, “You must rely upon what you have and the irregular forces in Mississippi.” Aware of Johnston’s probable approach, Grant instructed his command to build another set of entrenchments that would protect the Federals from an offensive emanating from Jackson.

During most of late June, soldiers in Jackson could hear cannonading originating from the direction of Vicksburg. On the first day of July, Johnston finally headed toward Vicksburg with his army. Cater noted he and his comrades marched all day and reached the outskirts of Clinton more than a dozen miles away. A Kentuckian remembered it was, “The hotest march we have ever made. Many soldiers tumbled down the road from sun-stroke.”

To combat the extreme heat, the officers elected to take up the next day’s march before daylight. An Alabamian remarked, “Orders issued to allow no music from bands, beating of drums nor any noise above ordinary tone of conversation,” a hardship for the musically inclined Louisiana troops. Private Eddins remembered that “A grate many fell, some stretch on the side of the road.” Late in the afternoon, Johnston’s exhausted soldiers halted and stretched out to sleep alongside the road.

The Army of Relief stayed in a holding pattern for most of July 3 and 4. One disgruntled Alabama soldier complained, “Our idea of generalship was that if our expedition was intended for a relief of Vicksburg, it should be a bold and quick movement. It was irritating to be dallying along at the rate we were going, but we had implicit confidence in General Johnston and hoped all would turn out well.” 

Meanwhile, after negotiations on July 3, Grant prepared to accept the surrender of Vicksburg’s garrison, thus ending the long siege. Soon thereafter Grant instructed Sherman: “I want Johnston broken up as effectually as possible, and the [rail]roads destroyed.” Sherman responded, “[T]elegraph me the moment you have Vicksburg in possession, and I will secure all the crossings of [Big] Black River, and move on Jackson or Canton, as you may advise.” As an Illinois foot soldier put it on July 5, “We were called out and started on the march toward [Big] Black River at an early hour. We were marched at a very rapid pace as Gen Sherman was trying to steal a march on Gen Johnston before he learned of the fall of Vicksburg.”

On the afternoon of July 5, Johnston’s command assembled and advanced about six miles toward Vicksburg. One Louisiana soldier commented, “The weather is very dry and the roads a foot deep in dust.” An enlisted man serving in the Breckinridge’s Division proclaimed it “the hardest marching ever” and noted when his unit halted for the evening, they “bivouacked in line of battle on the battle field of ‘Champion’s Hill.’” 

The next day was ominous for the Confederates as word began to spread throughout Johnston’s forces of Vicksburg’s fall. Cater recalled, “Gloom is on every countenance, with Pemberton’s army prisoners in the hands of Gen. Grant and the war prolonged.” Johnston’s army reversed their course towards Vicksburg and headed back to Jackson. Continuous forced marching caused elements of Johnston’s men to arrive back in Jackson toward the late evening amid a “heavy rain & storm.” Eddins wrote, “We got back the night of the sixth. [T]he last day we marched nearly all day and a good portion of the night.” During the trip, the Washington Artillery stopped on a regular basis to deploy into battery to confront any perceived rearguard attacks. Eddins wrote, “[W]e arrived in Jackson [and then] we were ordered to the ditches.” 

The units settled into the trenches in an arc configuration with both flanks resting on the Pearl River per Johnston’s orders. The Louisiana brigade manned the extreme right side of the Confederate line’s left flank, straddling the New Orleans Railroad. In line from the left were the 16th and 25th Consolidated Louisiana; 32nd Alabama; 5th Company, Washington Artillery; 19th Louisiana; and 13th and 20th Consolidated Louisiana. The 14th Louisiana Battalion was stationed nearby with its dependable sharpshooters. Incredulously, the members of the Washington decried the use of a barricade for protection as they were used to fighting out in the open. First Lieutenant J. Adolphe Chalaron explained, most “had never handled anything heavier than a pen,” and this experience became “their first initiation handling picks and shovels.”

Slocomb’s gunners were not the only soldiers in the area unfamiliar with digging implements. Men of Breckinridge’s Division scoured the city in search of “negroes to work on the fortifications.” One group managed to corral quite a crowd, “among them a few dandy barbers, who did not fancy wielding the pick and shoving the spade much.” One of the Kentucky natives remembered, “We layed around & took it easy while the negroes used the picks, spades & axes.” The Army of Relief’s commander personally inspected the earthworks and found them “miserably located and not half completed.”

Johnston ordered 4,000 bales of cotton to help augment his defenses. Of Johnston’s directions, a Georgian surmised, “I think he is going to make a stand here. He is going to fight the Yanks as old Jackson did the English at New Orleans, behind the cotton bags.” Slocomb “erected a strong traverse of cotton bales” around the battery and proclaimed, “Thus we formed quite a comfortable redoubt for ourselves.” This area of fortifications was referred to as Fort Breckinridge in honor of their division commander. Second Sergeant James Elijah Carraway of the 19th Louisiana wrote, “[A]ll of the timber and underbrush had been cut down for one quarter of a mile in front of our works.”

“A very fine but abandoned brick residence stood out in front of our works” that belonged to William A. Cooper’s family, recalled Carraway. One of Slocomb’s gun crew confirmed his statement by remarking, “[It was indeed a] splendid mansion…which had been deserted by the family, leaving most of the household effects behind.” On the 10th, Cater volunteered to join a party of five from Adams’s brigade and sharpshoot from near the home. “I volunteered to go and a musket and cartridges were furnished me,” Cater later speculated, “There was a large cistern under a dwelling in the yard. The water was cool and it seemed the Federals knew that the cistern of good water was there and they wanted it.” Of the Yankees, he noted, “Their guns were better than ours and they were doing good execution while our guns could not reach them, only raise the dust twenty or thirty feet in front of them.” Not long after the Southerners settled in, one of them was hit by an enemy bullet. Two men were required to drag him to safety, leaving Cater and another man to scramble behind a tree until they could retreat under the cover of darkness. Cater resolved to not volunteer for sharpshooting again “if I could not get a longer ranging gun.”

This detachment was firing into the distant ranks of Union Maj. Gen. Edward O.C. Ord’s 13th Corps. Their attention toward the Cooper house caused Johnston to direct it to be burned immediately. A small group comprised of Louisianans was tasked with the job. Cater grabbed a “little piece of broken mirror and about a yard of Brussells carpet for use in camp.” Carraway pocketed a piece of one of the “large and costly mirrors” so he could “afterwards behold his own half-starved features and ragged clothes,” and he also cut himself a blanket-sized section of the carpet. All the men appropriated a suitable volume from the splendid library.

The squad came across a magnificent piano and a “swarthy Creole” from the Washington Artillery “proposed that it be turned over to his battery as most of them were musicians, all of them French.” It was agreed upon, and the men picked up the heavy piano and carried it back to their breastworks in the dead of night. The large musical instrument was safely placed among the large cotton bales. After they were gone, the remaining men, much to their chagrin, began to “apply the torch” to the magnificent home.

Bolstered by the reinforcements from the timely arrival of Maj. Gen. Francis P. Blair Jr.’s division of the 15th Corps, Ord’s men made a heavy reconnaissance toward the cistern at the Cooper residence the next day but were met with the deadly fire of one of Slocomb’s rifled cannons sent out 500 yards in advance of Fort Breckinridge to hamper the Federal advance. After being bloodied heavily, the Northern troops retired to a safe distance. With the onset of evening, the Union troops were treated to a concert of melodies played by the Southerners on the piano and accompanied by hundreds of Louisiana soldiers singing such patriotic songs as Dixie.

An hour before noon on July 12, elements of the 13th Corps began to attack the well-defended Confederates, despite orders not to bring on a general engagement by their superiors. As the Union advance developed, Lawrence Pugh of the Washington Artillery made his way to the piano and began playing it enthusiastically. Fellow cannoneer Andy Swain soon pushed him aside, grabbed an ammunition box, flipped it over, and took a turn at the ivory keys. Other men packed around the piano and sang along with the songs.

The force moving on Fort Breckinridge consisted of two divisions from Ord’s 13th Corps. He instructed them to “make a reconnaissance, and, if it is necessary to form a line and attack to drive the force in front, do so, so as to keep your connection with the main corps.” The Federals dispatched the 5th Ohio Independent Battery to shell the Confederates in the vicinity of Slocomb’s battery and Winans’ infantry. The Washington Artillery coolly responded to the attack but with only two of their cannon, thus not revealing their remaining arsenal. One of the Yankee brigade commanders hesitated upon receiving the Louisianans’ return fire. Ordered to continue forward, Union Colonel Isaac Pugh complied and moved to a cornfield in front of the fort. The other division halted forward progress and dug in while Pugh’s men advanced amid a hail of cannon and small arms fire from Slocomb’s and Winans’ men. Felled trees blocked their progress as a Kentucky artillery unit and the 32nd Alabama managed to get an angle on them to multiply the murderous firing.

As Pugh’s men trudged forward, some of the 19th Louisiana “had told the battery ‘boys’ to send for me,” described Cater, “and that I would give them some good music on that piano.” Cater responded to Slocomb’s call, along with his brother Rufus. As the Southerners enjoyed Cater’s playing while the shells and bullets whizzed by, Slocomb caught sound of a Federal movement and “saw them coming at a charge.” The Cater brothers quickly scurried back to their post. Winans’ regiment held their fire until Slocomb’s cannon belched forth a volley in unison. Cater reported the deadly rounds took a toll of 260 men dead in their front, 150 prisoners, and 160 wounded. One of the Washington Artillery recounted years later, “’Tis over; with a rush the piano is sought again. Not twenty minutes has sped since its last notes have died away.” When Pugh’s regiments streamed to the rear, Winans’ soldiers emerged from behind the breastworks to collect their spoils of war.

The July 12 attack was the only major assault on Jackson, and by the 17th Johnston’s forces abandoned the city. One of Breckinridge’s Kentuckians recalled, “About midnight…we folded our tents like the Arabs and quietly stole away.” The Confederates burned the bridge they retreated across and moved to Morton, a short distance away. Looting and destruction by the Federal soldiers entering Jackson was rampant until Blair’s division arrived to restore order.

Into the next century, Carraway would sit at a local store and relate the story of the piano in the trenches to anyone who would listen. Used as a horse trough by the Yankees after they retook the city, the piano found its way to New Orleans after the war where it remains on display today at the Confederate Memorial Hall Museum. It is a fitting honor for the musical instrument that unintentionally played the swan song of Johnston’s Army of Relief.

Richard H. Holloway works for the Louisiana Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism and is president of the Civil War Round Table of Central Louisiana. His biographies of Hamilton Bee, William Boggs, and Richard Taylor appeared in Confederate Generals of the Trans-Mississippi, Vol. 3 (University of Tennessee Press, 2019). This article is adapted from his essay in Vicksburg Besieged (SIU Press, 2020), edited by Steven E. Woodworth and Charles D. Grear.

On the afternoon of February 3, 1864, while taking a leisurely horseback ride about five miles outside Alexandria, La., Confederate Major David French Boyd was stopped and forced into custody by a small band of so-called “Jayhawkers.” These brigands, better known to history perhaps as “Louisiana Scouts,” were draft dodgers, deserters, and Unionists who, after robbing people and places for their own benefit, would hide out in the swamps to evade both military and civilian authorities.

Boyd was chief engineer on the staff of Maj. Gen. Richard Taylor, commander of the District of West Louisiana, and Taylor wasn’t about to disregard this transgression. He instructed his cavalry to hunt down the criminals and ordered that any armed man of draft age who could not account for himself was to be shot on the spot. To a subordinate stationed at Fort DeRussy, Taylor directed: “No officer should be permitted to travel north of the [Red] river from here [Alexandria] to Marksville until we root out this band. At present they number 15, but the whole population sympathize[s] with them.”

Public opinion be damned, however—Taylor planned to do all he could to stop these hoodlums from assaulting and kidnapping his men.

Nearly a week after Boyd’s abduction, his captors decided to sell him to Federal forces occupying Natchez, Miss. But en route to Natchez, as the group crossed the Black River, the small skiff they were using overturned, plunging Boyd and the outlaws into the icy river. A veteran swimmer, Boyd saved the lives of two of his captors who would have otherwise drowned. During his struggles in the water, Boyd also managed to rid himself of $5,000 he had stashed in his boot, money intended as payroll for the Confederates’ garrison at Fort DeRussy. Better that the money be lost than end up in the hands of the Jayhawkers or Federal guards.

Despite his heroism, Boyd was sold for $100 to the Yankee authorities in Natchez on February 7. To his good fortune, he soon learned that an old friend in high places happened to be just up the road at Vicksburg: Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman. When “Cump” received Boyd’s letter, he was visiting the city he had helped conquer under Ulysses S. Grant’s command in July 1863.

Boyd had been one of Sherman’s professors during the latter’s tenure as president of the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy in Pineville—today’s Louisiana State University. He informed Sherman of his incarceration at Natchez, saying he wished to be transferred to Federal custody in New Orleans, where a formal system of exchange was already in place for prisoners of war in the Trans-Mississippi Theater. Sherman acquiesced and Boyd was soon on his way to the Big Easy. Sherman even allowed Boyd to ride aboard his ship on the journey south, later writing in a letter to his wife that until they parted, “He [Boyd] clung to me till I came away.”

Prison life did not suit Boyd. A request for a mattress, blankets, and a pillow from his captors was immediately granted, but his pleas to be allowed to roam the city on parole were denied. Boyd also complained about the noise and his lack of privacy within the facility to no avail. By late March, the prison became even more crowded with officers taken prisoner after engagements at Fort DeRussy (March 14) and Henderson Hill (March 21). Among the latter number was yet another member of Taylor’s staff, Captain Charles LeDoux Elgee. Though young, Elgee was sickly in nature and Taylor wished to secure his release before the onset of yellow fever season (mosquito season, as Louisianans are well aware, can sometimes run for 9–10 months).

Surprisingly, even during the Red River Campaign, commanders from both sides agreed to a formal prisoner exchange to take place at Grand Ecore on the Red River, north of Natchitoches. Early the morning of April 5, Boyd and 56 other Confederate officers, along with 60 noncommissioned officers and more than 300 enlisted men from another prison, were lined up on the docks to board the transport vessel Polar Star. (Confederate Lieutenant John C. Sibley of the 2nd Louisiana Cavalry, one of Boyd’s fellow prisoners, was undoubtedly one of the best-dressed of the lot, as the night before he had thrown a rope out of his window and pulled in a new linen shirt and $32 in greenbacks courtesy of two local ladies. As the Confederates lined up to ascend the gangplanks, Sibley recalled, “Hundreds of ladies crowded the levee to see us leave. There were several gentlemen but they dare not make any sign of Pleasure or they are arrested.”)

In addition to the large ironclad gunboat fleet the Union had amassed to complement Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks’ forces marching overland toward Shreveport, the Navy enlisted the assistance of dozens of independently owned transports. They were all under Federal contract with the Department of the Gulf’s quartermaster corps to move men and material.

One of those ships was Polar Star, which had first operated as a service vessel for people traversing the Missouri River. Constructed in 1858, Polar Star had a crew of 35, which included cooks and waiters, as well as a chambermaid and a pantry man to feed the crew and passengers. Once all were aboard, Polar Star’s captain—Horace Holton, a Missourian—steered the boat up the Mississippi River “with 450 Secesh prisoners to exchange.”

On April 6, Polar Star passed Baton Rouge and Port Hudson. A day after entering the Red River, the boat reached recently captured Alexandria, where its prisoners got a chance to converse with Yankee soldiers stationed on shore. “The Polar Star came up with 500 prisoners on the way to the front to be exchanged,” recalled a member of the 128th New York Infantry. “They were delighted at the prospect of a chance to fight us again.”

A few of the soldiers in the 38th Massachusetts Infantry vented to the prisoners aboard the ship concerning a recent guerrilla attack. “The rebels shouted back the taunts defiantly and pointed up the river,” recalled one Yankee.

On the same day, reports of the disposition of the Union’s Mississippi River Squadron, and other pertinent information about waterborne troop movements reached Taylor’s hands. Cryptically, the general wrote, “The progress of these vessels up the river was closely watched by an officer of my staff, who was also in communication with [Brig.] General [St. John R.] Liddel[l] on the north side [of the Red River].” The reports came from spies keeping a tally of Union ships and soldier strengths—an officer in addition to Major Boyd.

“[On April 7] we came above Grantecore [Grand Ecore], noted Private John C. Porter of Texas, one of Boyd’s fellow prisoners aboard Polar Star. “This was just prior to the Mansfield and Pleasant Hill battles.” Wrote Captain Edward T. King, a Confederate artillerist injured and captured at Fort DeRussy, “Owing to the retreat of General Taylor and the Confederate Army, no exchange was made and they took us on with them until their defeat and retreat.” Holton, meanwhile, bitterly complained: “Went up 400 miles [and] through some strange mismanagement, got 80 miles beyond our lines. Had our retreat cut off & but for the [fact] of bearing a flag of truce, would inevitably been captured, were stopped twice by Rebels who boarded us[,] examined papers & passed us on our way.”

During the trip, Boyd had secretly made detailed notes in the margins of a newspaper he carried. He jotted down the locations and numbers of the Federal gunboats, troops, and guns he had heard about or seen while aboard Polar Star. According to Private Porter, during the first Confederate detainment of the vessel on April 7, “[O]ur boat was halted by Confederate Cavalry, and the officer in command went ashore and had an interview. We could have easily taken boat, crew and guard, but we were upon parole [i.e., had given their word of honor not to attempt an escape], and did not suspect them [the ship’s crew] of acting treacherously.”

A Confederate surgeon was allowed to board the vessel during the stop to examine sick prisoners. Boyd secreted the newspaper into the doctor’s possession under the promise he would get it into General Taylor’s hands as soon as possible. Apparently, Holton and his sailors were already becoming more cautious after that first stop by the Confederates. On April 9, Sibley remembered, “[J]ust before dark, there came an order to…blow no whistles, and look out for sharpshooters. Something is wrong above [their position].”

As it turned out, the surgeon Boyd contacted did not understand the need for urgency and delayed in delivering the message to Taylor until April 19. Even at that late date, the information still proved valuable to the Confederate commander.

On April 10, Sibley noted, “We passed several Confeds today who hailed our boat to know what our flag of truce was for, among others was Lieut. Fontleroy [T.K. Fauntleroy] of [Captain Oliver] Semmes’ Battery [dispatched by Taylor to harass enemy ships]. We left him on shore ready to pitch into the fleet as it comes down.” Captain King similarly lamented, “We had not gone very far…when we were ordered to stop and land under [the] guns of a Confederate battery. Of course, we were greatly rejoiced, but to our surprise, Lieutenant Fontleroy [Fauntleroy] under whose guns we had been brought to land, after coming aboard and having a conference with the officers in charge and with Colonel Bosworth, Colonel Bird [Byrd] and some other Confederate officers [allowed the vessel to proceed]. We were greatly discouraged to see them allow the Federal officers to continue with their boat and prisoners.”

King later speculated, “There was never a greater mistake made, for we were fairly recaptured and if given our liberty could have not only saved the large quantities of provisions she had in her [Polar Star’s] hull, [some of] which I saw her discharge [previously] at Natchitoches but we could also have sunk her on some shallow places in the river and prevented the escape of the immense fleet above. The Federal army was badly discouraged by their defeat and could have been captured if properly pressed.”

Two days later, Polar Star’s captives witnessed the April 12-13, 1864, Battle of Blair’s Landing. Ironically, one of the observers was Lt. Col. James D. Blair of the 2nd Louisiana Cavalry, who owned the landing being fought over. Confederate Brig. Gen. Tom Green of Texas led a bold attack with his cavalry against the Yankee gunboats in the river. Headway was being made as the horsemen waded into the river and almost disabled the lead boat, but a cannon shot killed Green and the attack quickly dissipated. Of the affair, Holton wrote, “You may expect to hear of an awful fight and I tremble for the result. Our Gun Boats are anchored there and I hope a good deal from them.”

Due to the pandemonium of the Red River Campaign, the order exchanging the troops was temporarily rescinded. Late on April 14, Sibley noticed they were “[d]ownward bound, [the] exchange played out. We are again on our way to prison.” Porter recalled, “When they [the boat officers] had decoyed us to Alexandria, within their lines, they became bold, and told us they were taking us back to New Orleans. This was about dark, and some of the men began to make preparations to jump off, which four succeeded in doing; the last of whom leaped from the top of the banister, which made a tremendous splash when he struck the water, and the guard upon the hurricane deck, shot at him, with what effect none of us ever knew. But he had given away the plan, and the officers doubled the guard. Before the light of another day, we were again upon the bosom of the Father of Waters [Mississippi River], where it required but little restraint to keep us aboard.”

On the 15th, Polar Star passed Baton Rouge, where the captain and crew learned more details about the battles at Mansfield and Pleasant Hill, both Confederate victories. The ship anchored off New Orleans the following day, waiting until another exchange could be arranged. Holton did not want to be “able to be made a target of [again],” reporting in frustration: “Both of my Boats are now seized by Gov. to go up Red River. I have abandoned [Polar Star] to [the] Government and they can put their own men in Charge & I will go back home in a day or two.” Holton acknowledged, “I have just returned from a very dangerous trip up Red river.”

True to his word, Holton quit the shipping business and opened his own military clothing depot.

In late July, Boyd and the rest of his fellow captives finally were exchanged for Federals captured during the Red River Campaign. Elgee died four months later, but Blair, Boyd, Sibley, King, and Porter returned to active duty. Years later, when Richard Taylor was writing his postwar reminiscences, he reached out to Boyd about his voyage on Polar Star. Boyd responded, elated that Taylor had been able to use his intelligence and harass Banks’ forces until they escaped to safety across the Atchafalaya River in late May 1864. Amazingly, Taylor still had the newspaper Boyd had given him.

Boyd, meanwhile, continued to regale his friends with the story of rescuing the two “long-bearded sinners” from drowning on the way to Natchez. As for Polar Star, the vessel returned to passenger transport work after the war, until 1883, when its boilers suddenly exploded on a routine trip up the Missouri River, sending it to an inglorious end at the bottom of the muddy water.

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Swamp Men

The outlaw bands running rampant through central Louisiana in 1864 called themselves Jayhawkers, a label we typically associate with antislavery guerrillas in Kansas. At first, these Jayhawkers were organized into smaller bands, but when Union Maj. Gen. Nathaniel Banks arrived to begin the Red River Campaign, he offered them a place in his army. The Yankees dubbed them “Louisiana Scouts.” Described as “more like ragamuffins than men,” they nevertheless inflicted heavy damage in the region. But when the defeated Yankees retreated, Rebel cavalry hunted down and killed or dispersed the Jayhawkers. The most infamous of the lot was probably Ozeme Carriere (shown). As a local once groused: “Carriere, with his band of jay-hawkers…has been very actively engaged in robbing the citizens of all the fine horses, guns…thus showing a disposition to carry on their thieving business publicly.” –R.H.H.

Richard H. Holloway is a Louisiana Park Ranger, based at Forts Randolph and Buhlow in Pineville. He has worked with the Louisiana National Guard; Louisiana State University (Baton Rouge and Alexandria); and George Washington University. His biographies of Richard Taylor, Hamilton Bee, and William Boggs can be found in Confederate Generals of the Trans-Mississippi, Vol. 3.

This story appeared in the May 2020 issue of America’s Civil War.