Granger had been in the Southwest when the secession movement began, had seen the formation of military companies everywhere, and the incessant drilling which had been going on all winter, whilst we, in a strange condition of political paralysis, had been doing nothing. His information was eagerly sought by us all, and he lost no opportunity of impressing upon us the fact that the South was nearly six months ahead of us in organization and preparation. He did not conceal his belief that we were likely to find the war a much longer and more serious piece of business than was commonly expected, and that unless we pushed hard our drilling and instruction we should find ourselves at a disadvantage in our earlier encounters. What he said had a good effect in making officers and men take more willingly to the laborious routine of the parade ground and the regimental school; for such opinions as his soon ran through the camp, and they were commented upon by the enlisted men quite as earnestly as among the officers. Still, hope kept the upper hand, and if the question had been put to vote, I believe that three-fourths of us still cherished the belief that a single campaign would end the war.

In the organization of my own brigade I had the assistance of Captain McElroy, a young man who had nearly completed the course at West Point, and who was subsequently made major of the Twentieth Ohio. He was sent to the camp by the governor as a drill officer, and I assigned him to staff duty. For commissary, I detailed Lieutenant Gibbs, who accompanied one of the regiments from Cincinnati, and who had seen a good deal of service as clerk in one of the staff departments of the regular army. I had also for a time the services of one of the picturesque adventurers who turn up in such crises. In the Seventh Ohio was a company recruited in Cleveland, of which the nucleus was an organization of Zouaves, existing for some time before the war. It was made up of young men who had been stimulated by the popularity of Ellsworth's Zouaves in Chicago to form a similar body. They had had as their drill master a Frenchman named De Villiers. His profession was that of a teacher of fencing; but he had been an officer in Ellsworth's company, and was familiar with fancy manoeuvres for street parade, and with a special skirmish drill and bayonet exercise. Small, swarthy, with angular features, and a brusque, military manner, in a showy uniform and jaunty kepi of scarlet cloth, covered with gold lace, he created quite a sensation among us. His assumption of knowledge and experience was accepted as true. He claimed to have been a surgeon in the French army in Algiers, though we afterward learned to doubt if his rank had been higher than that of a barber-surgeon of a cavalry troop. From the testimonials he brought with him, I thought I was doing a good thing in making him my brigade-major, as the officer was then called whom we afterward knew as inspector-general. He certainly was a most indefatigable fellow, and went at his work with an enthusiasm that made him very useful for a time. It was worth something to see a man who worked with a kind of dash,—with a prompt, staccato movement that infused spirit and energy into all around him. He would drill all day, and then spend half the night trying to catch sentinels and officers of the guard at fault in their duty. My first impression was that I had got hold of a most valuable man, and others were so much of the same mind that in the reorganization of regiments he was successively elected major of the Eighth, and then colonel of the Eleventh. We shall see more of him as we go on; but it turned out that his sharp discipline was not steady or just; his knowledge was only skin-deep, and he had neither the education nor the character for so responsible a situation as he was placed in. He nearly plagued the life out of the officers of his regiment before they got rid of him, and was a most brilliant example of the way we were imposed upon by military charlatans at the beginning. He was, however, good proof also of the speed with which real service weeds out the undesirable material which seemed so splendid in the days of common inexperience and at a distance from danger. We had visits from clerical adventurers, too, for the "pay and emoluments of a captain of cavalry" which the law gave to a chaplain induced some to seek the office who were not the best representatives of their profession. One young man who had spent a morning soliciting the appointment in one of the regiments, came to me in a shamefaced sort of way before leaving camp and said, "General, before I decide this matter, I wish you would tell me just what are the pay and emoluments of a Captain of Calvary!" Though most of our men were native Ohioans, General Bates's brigade had in it two regiments made up of quite contrasted nationalities. The Ninth Ohio was recruited from the Germans of Cincinnati, and was commanded by Colonel "Bob" McCook. In camp, the drilling of the regiment fell almost completely into the hands of the adjutant, Lieutenant Willich (afterward a general of division), and McCook, who humorously exaggerated his own lack of military knowledge, used to say that he was only "clerk for a thousand Dutchmen," so completely did the care of equipping and providing for his regiment engross his time and labor. The Tenth was an Irish regiment, and its men used to be proud of calling themselves the "Bloody Tinth." The brilliant Lytle was its commander, and his control over them, even in the beginning of their service and near the city of their home, showed that they had fallen into competent hands. It happened, of course, that the guard-house pretty frequently contained representatives of the Tenth who, on the short furloughs that were allowed them, took a parting glass too much with their friends in the city, and came to camp boisterously drunk. But the men of the regiment got it into their heads that the Thirteenth, which lay just opposite them across the railroad, took a malicious pleasure in filling the guard-house with the Irishmen. Some threats had been made that they would go over and "clean out" the Thirteenth, and one fine evening these came to a head. I suddenly got orders from General Bates to form my brigade, and march them at once between the Tenth and Thirteenth to prevent a collision which seemed imminent. My brigade was selected because it was the one to which neither of the angry regiments belonged, the others being ordered into their quarters. My little Frenchman, De Villiers, covered himself with glory. His horse flew, under the spur, to the regimental headquarters, the long roll was beaten as if the drummers realized the full importance of the first opportunity to sound that warlike signal, and the brigade-major's somewhat theatrical energy was so contagious that many of the companies were assembled and ready to file out of the company streets before the order reached them. We marched by the moonlight into the space between the belligerent regiments; but Lytle had already got his own men under control, and the less mercurial Thirteenth were not disposed to be aggressive, so that we were soon dismissed with a compliment for our promptness. I ordered the colonels to march the regiments back to the camps separately, and with my staff rode through that of the Thirteenth, to see how matters were there. All was quiet, the men being in their quarters; so, turning, I passed along near the railway, in rear of the quartermaster's sheds. In the shadow of the buildings I had nearly ridden over some one on foot, when he addressed me, and I recognized an officer of high rank in that brigade. He was in great agitation, and exclaimed, "Oh, General, what a horrible thing that brothers should be killing each other!" I assured him the danger of that was all over, and rode on, wondering a little at his presence in that place under the circumstances.

The six weeks of our stay in Camp Dennison seem like months in the retrospect, so full were they crowded with new experiences. The change came in an unexpected way. The initiative taken by the Confederates in West Virginia had to be met by prompt action, and McClellan was forced to drop his own plans to meet the emergency. The organization and equipment of the regiments for the three years' service were still incomplete, and the brigades were broken up, to take across the Ohio the regiments best prepared to go. One by one my regiments were ordered away, till finally, when on the 3d of July I received orders to proceed to the Kanawha valley, I had but one of the four regiments to which I had been trying to give something of unity and brigade feeling, and that regiment (the Eleventh Ohio) was still incomplete. General Bates fared even worse; for he saw all his regiments ordered away, whilst he was left to organize new ones from freshly recruited companies that were sent to the camp. This was discouraging to a brigade commander, for even with veteran troops mutual acquaintance between the officer and his command is a necessary condition of confidence and a most important element of strength. My own assignment to the Great Kanawha district was one I had every reason to be content with, except that for several months I felt the disadvantage I suffered from assuming command of troops which I had never seen till we met in the field.

The period of organization, brief as it was, had been valuable to the regiments, and it had been of the utmost importance to secure the re-enlistment of those which had received some instruction. It had been, in the condition of the statute law, from necessity and not from choice that the Administration had called out the state militia for ninety days. The new term of enrolment was for "three years or the war," and the forces were now designated as United States Volunteers. It would have been well if the period of apprenticeship could have been prolonged; but events would not wait. All recognized the necessity, and thankful as we should have been for a longer preparation and more thorough instruction, we were eager to be ordered away.

McClellan had been made a major-general in the regular army, and a department had been placed under his command which included the States of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, to which was added a little later West Virginia north of the Great Kanawha. [Footnote: McClellan's Report and Campaigns (New York, 1864), p. 8. McClellan's Own Story, p. 44. Official Records, vol. ii. p. 633.] Rosecrans was also appointed a brigadier-general in the regulars, and there was much debate at the time whether the Administration had intended this. Many insisted that he was nominated for the volunteer service, and that the regular appointment was a clerical mistake in the bureaus at Washington. There was no solid foundation for this gossip. A considerable increase of the regular army was authorized by law, and corresponding appointments were made, from major-general downward. It was at this time that Sherman was made colonel of one of the new regiments of regulars. It would perhaps have been wiser to treat the regular commissions as prizes to be won only by conspicuous and successful service in the field, as was done later; but this policy was not then adopted, and the newly created offices were filled in all grades. They were, of course, given to men from whom great services could reasonably be expected; but when none had been tested in the great operations of war, every appointment was at the risk that the officer might not show the special talent for command which makes a general. It was something of a lottery, at best; but the system would have been improved if a method of retiring inefficient officers had been adopted at once. The ostensible reason for the different organization of volunteers and regulars was that the former, as a temporary force to meet an exigency, might be wholly disbanded when the war should end, without affecting the permanent army, which was measured in size by the needs of the country in its normal condition.



CHAPTER III

MCCLELLAN IN WEST VIRGINIA.

Political attitude of West Virginia—Rebels take the initiative—McClellan ordered to act—Ohio militia cross the river—The Philippi affair—Significant dates—The vote on secession—Virginia in the Confederacy—Lee in command—Topography—The mountain passes—Garnett's army—Rich mountain position—McClellan in the field—His forces—Advances against Garnett—Rosecrans's proposal—His fight on the mountain—McClellan's inaction—Garnett's retreat—Affair at Carrick's Ford—Garnett killed—Hill's efforts to intercept—Pegram in the wilderness—He surrenders—Indirect results important—McClellan's military and personal traits.

The reasons which made it important to occupy West Virginia were twofold, political and military. The people were strongly attached to the Union, and had generally voted against the Ordinance of Secession which by the action of the Richmond Convention had been submitted to a popular vote on May 23d. Comparatively few slaves were owned by them, and their interests bound them more to Ohio and Pennsylvania than to eastern Virginia. Under the influence of Mr. Lincoln's administration, strongly backed and chiefly represented by Governor Dennison of Ohio, a movement was on foot to organize a loyal Virginia government, repudiating that of Governor Letcher and the state convention as self-destroyed by the act of secession. Governor Dennison, in close correspondence with the leading loyalists, had been urging McClellan to cross the Ohio to protect and encourage the loyal men, when on the 26th of May news came that the Secessionists had taken the initiative, and that some bridges had been burned on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad a little west of Grafton, the crossing of the Monongahela River where the two western branches of the road unite as they come from Wheeling and Parkersburg. The great line of communication between Washington and the West had thus been cut, and action on our part was necessary. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 44.]



Governor Dennison had anticipated the need of more troops than the thirteen regiments which had been organized as Ohio's quota under the President's first call, and had enrolled nine other regiments, numbering them consecutively with the others. These last he had put in camps near the Ohio River, where at a moment's notice they could occupy Wheeling, Parkersburg, and the mouth of the Great Kanawha. [Footnote: Id., pp. 46, 47.] Two Union regiments were also organizing in West Virginia itself, of which the first was commanded by Colonel B. F. Kelley of Wheeling. The left bank of the Ohio was in McClellan's department, and on the 24th General Scott, having heard that two Virginia companies had occupied Grafton, telegraphed the fact to McClellan, directing him to act promptly in counteracting the effect of this movement. [Footnote: Id., p. 648.]

On the 27th Colonel Kelley was sent by rail from Wheeling to drive off the enemy, who withdrew at his approach, and the bridges were quickly rebuilt. [Footnote: Id., pp. 46, 49, 655.] Several of the Ohio regiments were ordered across the river at the same time, and an Indiana brigade under General Thomas A. Morris of that State was hurried forward from Indianapolis. As the Ohio troops at Camp Dennison which had been mustered into national service were in process of reorganizing for the three years' term, McClellan preferred not to move them till this was completed. He also adhered to his plan of making his own principal movement in the Great Kanawha valley, and desired to use there the Ohio division at our camp. [Footnote: Id., pp. 50, 656, 674.] The Ohio regiments first sent into West Virginia were not mustered in, and were known as State troops. General Morris reached Grafton on the 1st of June, and was intrusted with the command of all the troops in West Virginia. He found that Colonel Kelley had already planned an expedition against the enemy, who had retired southward to Philippi, about fifteen miles in a straight line, but some twenty-five by the crooked country roads. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 66.] Morris approved the plan, but enlarged it by sending another column, under Colonel E. Dumont of the Seventh Indiana, to co-operate with Kelley. Both columns were directed to make a night march, starting from points on the railroad about twelve miles apart and converging on Philippi, which they were to attack at daybreak on June 3d. Each column consisted of about fifteen hundred men, and Dumont had also two smooth six-pounder cannon. The Confederate force was commanded by Colonel G. A. Porterfield, and was something less than a thousand strong, one-fourth cavalry. [Footnote: Id., pp. 70, 72.]

The night was dark and stormy, and Porterfield's raw troops had not learned picket duty. The concerted movement against them was more successful than such marches commonly are, and Porterfield's first notice of danger was the opening of the artillery upon his sleeping troops. It had been expected that the two columns would enclose the enemy's camp and capture the whole; but, though in disorderly rout, Porterfield succeeded, by personal coolness and courage, in getting them off with but few casualties and the loss of a few arms. The camp equipage and supplies were, of course, captured. Colonel Kelley was wounded in the breast by a pistol-shot which was at first supposed to be fatal, though it did not turn out so, and this was the only casualty reported on the National side. [Footnote: Colonel Kelley was a man already of middle age, and a leading citizen of northwestern Virginia. His whole military career was in that region, where his services were very valuable throughout the war. He was promoted to brigadier-general among the first, and was brevet-major-general when mustered out in 1865.] No prisoners were taken, nor did any dead or wounded fall into our hands. Porterfield retreated to Beverly, some thirty miles further to the southeast, and the National forces occupied Philippi. The telegraphic reports had put the Confederate force at 2000, and their loss at 15 killed. This implied a considerable list of wounded and prisoners, and the newspapers gave it the air of a considerable victory. The campaign thus opened with apparent eclat for McClellan (who was personally at Cincinnati), and the "Philippi races," as they were locally called, greatly encouraged the Union men of West Virginia and correspondingly depressed the Secessionists. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 64-74.]

Nearly a month elapsed, when, having received reports that large forces of the enemy were gathered at Beverly, McClellan determined to proceed in person to that region with his best prepared troops, postponing his Kanawha campaign till northwestern Virginia should be cleared of the enemy.

Military affairs in West Virginia had been complicated by the political situation, and it is necessary to recollect the dates of the swift following steps in Virginia's progress into the Confederacy. Sumter surrendered on Saturday, the 13th of April, and on Monday the 15th President Lincoln issued his first call for troops. On Wednesday the 17th the Virginia Convention passed the Ordinance of Secession in secret session. On Friday the 19th it was known in Washington, and on Saturday Lee and Johnston resigned their commissions in the United States Army, sorrowfully "going with their State." [Footnote: Johnston's Narrative, p. 10. Townsend's Anecdotes of the Civil War, p. 31. Long's Memoirs of Lee, pp. 94, 96.] On the following Tuesday (23d) the chairman of the Virginia Convention presented to Lee his commission as Major-General and Commander of the Virginia Forces. On the same day Governor Dennison handed to McClellan his commission to command the Ohio forces in the service of the Union. Although the Confederate Congress at Montgomery admitted Virginia to the Confederacy early in May, this was not formally accepted in Virginia till after the popular vote on secession (May 23d) and the canvassing of the returns of that election. Governor Letcher issued on June 8th his proclamation announcing the result, and transferring the command of the Virginia troops to the Confederate Government. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 911.] During the whole of May, therefore, Virginia's position was unsettled. Her governor, by the authority of the convention, regarded her as independent of the United States, but by an inchoate act of secession which would not become final till ratified by the popular vote. The Virginia troops were arrayed near the Potomac to resist the advance of national forces; but Confederate troops had been welcomed in eastern Virginia as early as the 10th of May, and President Davis had authorized Lee, as Commander of the Virginia forces, to assume control of them. [Footnote: Id., p. 827.]

It was well known that the prevailing sentiment in West Virginia was loyal to the Union, and each party avoided conflict there for fear of prejudicing its cause in the election. Hence it was that as soon as the vote was cast, the aggressive was taken by the Virginia government in the burning of the bridges near Grafton. The fire of war was thus lighted. The crossing of the Ohio was with a full understanding with Colonel Kelley, who recognized McClellan at once as his military commander. [Footnote: I treated the relations of Lee and Virginia to the Confederacy in a paper in "The Nation," Dec. 23, 1897, entitled "Lee, Johnston, and Davis."] The affair at Philippi was, in form, the last appearance of Virginia in the role of an independent nation, for in a very few days Lee announced by a published order that the absorption of the Virginia troops into the Confederate Army was complete. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 912.] It will be well to understand the topography of the Virginia mountains and their western slope, if we would reach the reasons which determined the lines of advance chosen by the Confederates and the counter moves of McClellan. The Alleghany range passing out of Pennsylvania and running southwest through the whole length of Virginia, consists of several parallel lines of mountains enclosing narrow valleys. The Potomac River breaks through at the common boundary of Virginia and Maryland, and along its valley runs the National Road as well as the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad also follows this natural highway, which is thus indicated as the most important line of communication between Washington and the Ohio valley, though a high mountain summit must be passed, even by this route, before the tributaries of the Ohio can be reached. Half-way across the State to the southward, is a high watershed connecting the mountain ridges and separating the streams tributary to the Potomac on the north from those falling into the James and New rivers on the south. The Staunton and Parkersburg turnpike follows the line of this high "divide" looking down from among the clouds into the long and nearly straight defiles on either hand, which separate the Alleghany Mountains proper from the Blue Ridge on the east and from Cheat Mountain and other ranges on the west. Still further to the southwest the James River and the New River interlace their headwaters among the mountains, and break out on east and west, making the third natural pass through which the James River and Kanawha turnpike and canal find their way. These three routes across the mountains were the only ones on which military operations were at all feasible. The northern one was usually in the hands of the National forces, and the other two were those by which the Confederates attempted the invasion of West Virginia. Beverly, a hundred miles from Staunton, was near the gate through which the Staunton road passes on its way northwestward to Parkersburg and Wheeling, whilst Gauley Bridge was the key-point of the Kanawha route on the westerly slope of the mountains.

General Lee determined to send columns upon both these lines. General Henry A. Wise (formerly Governor of Virginia) took the Kanawha route, and General Robert S. Garnett (lately Lee's own adjutant-general) marched to Beverly. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 908, 915.] Upon Porterfield's retreat to Beverly, Garnett, who had also been an officer in the United States Army, was ordered to assume command there and to stimulate the recruiting and organization of regiments from the secession element of the population. Some Virginia regiments raised on the eastern slope of the mountains were sent with him, and to these was soon added the First Georgia. On the 1st of July he reported his force as 4500 men, but declared that his efforts to recruit had proven a complete failure, only 23 having joined. The West Virginians, he says, "are thoroughly imbued with an ignorant and bigoted Union sentiment." [Footnote: Id., p. 239.] Other reinforcements were promised Garnett, but none reached him except the Forty-fourth Virginia Regiment, which arrived at Beverly the very day of his engagement with McClellan's troops, but did not take part in the fighting. [Footnote: Id., pp. 240, 274.]

Tygart's valley, in which Beverly lies, is between Cheat Mountain on the east, and Rich Mountain on the west. The river, of the same name as the valley, flows northward about fifteen miles, then turns westward, breaking through the ridge, and by junction with the Buckhannon River forms the Monongahela, which passes by Philippi and afterward crosses the railroad at Grafton. The Staunton and Parkersburg turnpike divides at Beverly, the Parkersburg route passing over a saddle in Rich Mountain, and the Wheeling route following the river to Philippi. The ridge north of the river at the gap is known as Laurel Mountain, and the road passes over a spur of it. Garnett regarded the two positions at Rich Mountain and Laurel Mountain as the gates to all the region beyond and to the West. A rough mountain road, barely passable, connected the Laurel Mountain position with Cheat River on the east, and it was possible to go by this way northward through St. George to the Northwestern turnpike, turning the mountain ranges.



Garnett thought the pass over Rich Mountain much the stronger and more easily held, and he therefore intrenched there about 1300 of his men and four cannon, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Pegram. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 268.] The position chosen was on a spur of the mountain near its western base, and it was rudely fortified with breastworks of logs covered with an abatis of slashed timber along its front. The remainder of his force he placed in a similar fortified position on the road at Laurel Mountain, where he also had four guns, of which one was rifled. Here he commanded in person. His depot of supplies was at Beverly, which was sixteen miles from the Laurel Mountain position and five from that at Rich Mountain. He was pretty accurately informed of McClellan's forces and movements, and his preparations had barely been completed by the 9th of July, when the Union general appeared in his front. [Footnote: Id., pp. 241, 248.]

McClellan entered West Virginia in person on the 21st of June, and on the 23d issued from Grafton a proclamation to the inhabitants. [Footnote: Id., pp. 194, 196.] He had gradually collected his forces along the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and these, at the time of the affair at Rich Mountain, consisted of sixteen Ohio regiments, nine from Indiana, and two from West Virginia; in all, twenty-seven regiments with four batteries of artillery of six guns each, two troops of cavalry, and an independent company of riflemen. Of his batteries, one was of the regular army, and another, a company of regulars (Company I, Fourth U. S. Artillery), was with him awaiting mountain howitzers, which arrived a little later. [Footnote: As part of the troops were State troops not mustered into the United States service, no report of them is found in the War Department; but the following are the numbers of the regiments found named as present in the correspondence and reports,—viz., 3d, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th, and 22d Ohio; 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 13th, 14th, 15th Indiana, and 1st and 2nd Virginia; also Howe's United States Battery, Barnett's Ohio Battery, Loomis's Michigan Battery, and Daum's Virginia Battery; the cavalry were Burdsal's Ohio Dragoons and Barker's Illinois Cavalry. VOL. I.—4] The regiments varied somewhat in strength, but all were recently organized, and must have averaged at least 700 men each, making the whole force about 20,000. Of these, about 5000 were guarding the railroad and its bridges for some two hundred miles, under the command of Brigadier-General C. W. Hill, of the Ohio Militia; a strong brigade under Brigadier-General Morris of Indiana, was at Philippi, and the rest were in three brigades forming the immediate command of McClellan, the brigadiers being General W. S. Rosecrans, U. S. A., General Newton Schleich of Ohio, and Colonel Robert L. McCook of Ohio. On the date of his proclamation McClellan intended, as he informed General Scott, to move his principal column to Buckhannon on June 25th, and thence at once upon Beverly; [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 195.] but delays occurred, and it was not till July 2nd that he reached Buckhannon, which is twenty-four miles west of Beverly, on the Parkersburg branch of the turnpike. Before leaving Grafton the rumors he heard had made him estimate Garnett's force at 6000 or 7000 men, of which the larger part were at Laurel Mountain in front of General Morris. [Footnote: Id., p. 205.] On the 7th of July he moved McCook with two regiments to Middle Fork bridge, about half-way to Beverly, and on the same day ordered Morris to march with his brigade from Philippi to a position one and a half miles in front of Garnett's principal camp, which was promptly done. [Footnote: Id., p. 200.] Three days later, McClellan concentrated the three brigades of his own column at Roaring Creek, about two miles from Colonel Pegram's position at the base of Rich Mountain. The advance on both lines had been made with only a skirmishing resistance, the Confederates being aware of McClellan's great superiority in numbers, and choosing to await his attack in their fortified positions. The National commander was now convinced that his opponent was 10,000 strong, of which about 2000 were before him at Rich Mountain. [Footnote: Id., pp. 203, 204.] A reconnoissance made on the 10th showed that Pegram's position would be difficult to assail in front, but preparations were made to attack the next day, while Morris was directed to hold firmly his position before Garnett, watching for the effect of the attack at Rich Mountain. In the evening Rosecrans took to McClellan a young man named Hart, whose father lived on the top of the mountain two miles in rear of Pegram, and who thought he could guide a column of infantry to his father's farm by a circuit around Pegram's left flank south of the turnpike. The paths were so difficult that cannon could not go by them, but Rosecrans offered to lead a column of infantry and seize the road at the Hart farm. After some discussion McClellan adopted the suggestion, and it was arranged that Rosecrans should march at daybreak of the 11th with about 2000 men, including a troop of horse, and that upon the sound of his engagement in the rear of Pegram McClellan would attack in force in front. By a blunder in one of the regimental camps, the reveille and assembly were sounded at midnight, and Pegram was put on the qui vive. He, however, believed that the attempt to turn his position would be by a path or country road passing round his right, between him and Garnett (of which the latter had warned him), and his attention was diverted from Rosecrans's actual route, which he thought impracticable. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 215, 256, 260. Conduct of the War, vol. vi. (Rosecrans), pp. 2,3.] The alert which had occurred at midnight made Rosecrans think it best to make a longer circuit than he at first intended, and it took ten hours of severe marching and mountain climbing to reach the Hart farm. The turning movement was made, but he found an enemy opposing him. Pegram had detached about 350 men from the 1300 which he had, and had ordered them to guard the road at the mountain summit. He sent with them a single cannon from the four which constituted his only battery, and they threw together a breastwork of logs. The turnpike at Hart's runs in a depression of the summit, and as Rosecrans, early in the afternoon, came out upon the road, he was warmly received by both musketry and cannon. The ground was rough, the men were for the first time under fire, and the skirmishing combat varied through two or three hours, when a charge by part of Rosecrans's line, aided by a few heavy volleys from another portion of his forces which had secured a good position, broke the enemy's line. Reinforcements from Pegram were nearly at hand, with another cannon; but they did not come into action, and the runaway team of the caisson on the hill-top, dashing into the gun that was coming up, capsized it down the mountain-side where the descending road was scarped diagonally along it. Both guns fell into Rosecrans's hands, and he was in possession of the field. The march and the assault had been made in rain and storm. Nothing was heard from McClellan; and the enemy, rallying on their reinforcements, made such show of resistance on the crest a little further on, that Rosecrans directed his men to rest upon their arms till next morning. When day broke on the 12th, the enemy had disappeared from the mountain-top, and Rosecrans, feeling his way down to the rear of Pegram's position, found it also abandoned, the two remaining cannon being spiked, and a few sick and wounded being left in charge of a surgeon. Still nothing was seen of McClellan, and Rosecrans sent word to him, in his camp beyond Roaring Creek, that he was in possession of the enemy's position. Rosecrans's loss had been 12 killed and 49 wounded. The Confederates left 20 wounded on the field, and 63 were surrendered at the lower camp, including the sick. No trustworthy report of their dead was made. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii pp. 215, 260, 265. C. W., vol. vi. (Rosecrans) pp. 3-5.]

The noise of the engagement had been heard in McClellan's camp, and he formed his troops for attack, but the long continuance of the cannonade and some signs of exultation in Pegram's camp seem to have made him think Rosecrans had been repulsed. The failure to attack in accordance with the plan has never been explained. [Footnote: C. W., vol. vi. p. 6. McClellan seems to have expected Rosecrans to reach the rear of Pegram's advanced work before his own attack should be made; but the reconnoissance of Lieutenant Poe, his engineer, shows that this work could be turned by a much shorter route than the long and difficult one by which Rosecrans went to the mountain ridge. See Poe's Report, Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 14.] Rosecrans's messengers had failed to reach McClellan during the 11th, but the sound of the battle was sufficient notice that he had gained the summit and was engaged; and he was, in fact, left to win his own battle or to get out of his embarrassment as he could. Toward evening McClellan began to cut a road for artillery to a neighboring height, from which he hoped his twelve guns would make Pegram's position untenable; but his lines were withdrawn again beyond Roaring Creek at nightfall, and all further action postponed to the next day.

About half of Pegram's men had succeeded in passing around Rosecrans's right flank during the night and had gained Beverly. These, with the newly arrived Confederate regiment, fled southward on the Staunton road. Garnett had learned in the evening, by messenger from Beverly, that Rich Mountain summit was carried, and evacuated his camp in front of Morris about midnight. He first marched toward Beverly, and was within five miles of that place when he received information (false at the time) that the National forces already occupied it. He then retraced his steps nearly to his camp, and, leaving the turnpike at Leadsville, he turned off upon a country road over Cheat Mountain into Cheat River valley, following the stream northward toward St. George and West Union, in the forlorn hope of turning the mountains at the north end of the ridges, and regaining his communications by a very long detour. He might have continued southward through Beverly almost at leisure, for McClellan did not enter the town till past noon on the 12th.

Morris learned of Garnett's retreat at dawn, and started in pursuit as soon as rations could be issued. He marched first to Leadsville, where he halted to communicate with McClellan at Beverly and get further orders. These reached him in the night, and at daybreak of the 13th he resumed the pursuit. His advance-guard of three regiments, accompanied by Captain H. W. Benham of the Engineers, overtook the rear of the Confederate column about noon and continued a skirmishing pursuit for some two hours. Garnett himself handled his rear-guard with skill, and at Carrick's Ford a lively encounter was had. A mile or two further, at another ford and when the skirmishing was very slight, he was killed while withdrawing his skirmishers from behind a pile of driftwood which he had used as a barricade. One of his cannon had become stalled in the ford, and with about forty wagons fell into Morris's hands. The direct pursuit was here discontinued, but McClellan had sent a dispatch to General Hill at Grafton, to collect the garrisons along the railroad and block the way of the Confederates where they must pass around the northern spurs of the mountains. [Footnote: Reports of Morris and Benham, Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 220, 222.]

His military telegraph terminated at the Roaring Creek camp, and the dispatch written in the evening of the 12th was not forwarded to Hill till near noon of the 13th. This officer immediately ordered the collection of the greater part of his detachments at Oakland, and called upon the railway officials for special trains to hurry them to the rendezvous. About 1000 men under Colonel James Irvine of the Sixteenth Ohio were at West Union, where the St. George road reaches the Northwestern Turnpike, and Hill's information was that a detachment of these held Red House, a crossing several miles in advance, by which the retreating enemy might go. Irvine was directed to hold his positions at all hazards till he could be reinforced. Hill himself hastened with the first train from Grafton to Oakland with about 500 men and three cannon, reached his destination at nightfall, and hurried his detachment forward by a night march to Irvine, ten or twelve miles over rough roads. It turned out that Irvine did not occupy Red House, and the prevalent belief that the enemy was about 8000 in number, with the uncertainty of the road he would take, made it proper to keep the little force concentrated till reinforcements should come. The first of these reached Irvine about six o'clock on the morning of the 14th, raising his command to 1500; but a few moments after their arrival he learned that the enemy had passed Red House soon after daylight. He gave chase, but did not overtake them.

Meanwhile General Hill had spent the night in trying to hasten forward the railway trains, but none were able to reach Oakland till morning, and Garnett's forces had now more than twenty miles the start, and were on fairly good roads, moving southward on the eastern side of the mountains. McClellan still telegraphed that Hill had the one opportunity of a lifetime to capture the fleeing army, and that officer hastened in pursuit, though unprovided with wagons or extra rations. When however the Union commander learned that the enemy had fairly turned the mountains, he ordered the pursuit stopped. Hill had used both intelligence and energy in his attempt to concentrate his troops, but it proved simply impossible for the railroad to carry them to Oakland before the enemy had passed the turning-point, twenty miles to the southward. [Footnote: Report of Hill, Official Records, vol. ii. p. 224.]

During the 12th Pegram's situation and movements were unknown. He had intended, when he evacuated his camp, to follow the line of retreat taken by the detachment already near the mountain-top, but, in the darkness of the night and in the tangled woods and thickets of the mountain-side, his column got divided, and, with the rear portion of it, he wandered all day of the 12th, seeking to make his way to Garnett. He halted at evening at the Tygart Valley River, six miles north of Beverly, and learned from some country people of Garnett's retreat. It was still possible to reach the mountains east of the valley, but beyond lay a hundred miles of wilderness and half a dozen mountain ridges on which little, if any, food could be found for his men. He called a council of war, and, by advice of his officers, sent to McClellan, at Beverly, an offer of surrender. This was received on the 13th, and Pegram brought in 30 officers and 525 men. [Footnote: Report of Pegram, Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 265, 266.] McClellan then moved southward himself, following the Staunton road, by which the remnant of Pegram's little force had escaped, and on the 14th occupied Huttonsville. Two regiments of Confederate troops were hastening from Staunton to reinforce Garnett. These were halted at Monterey, east of the principal ridge of the Alleghanies, and upon them the retreating forces rallied. Brigadier-General H. R. Jackson was assigned to command in Garnett's place, and both Governor Letcher and General Lee made strenuous efforts to increase this army to a force sufficient to resume aggressive operations. [Footnote: Id., pp. 247, 254.] On McClellan's part nothing further was attempted till on the 22d he was summoned to Washington to assume command of the army which had retreated to the capital after the panic of the first Bull Run battle.

The affair at Rich Mountain and the subsequent movements were among the minor events of a great war, and would not warrant a detailed description, were it not for the momentous effect they had upon the conduct of the war, by being the occasion of McClellan's promotion to the command of the Potomac army. The narrative which has been given contains the "unvarnished tale," as nearly as official records of both sides can give it, and it is a curious task to compare it with the picture of the campaign and its results which was then given to the world in the series of proclamations and dispatches of the young general, beginning with his first occupation of the country and ending with his congratulations to his troops, in which he announced that they had "annihilated two armies, commanded by educated and experienced soldiers, intrenched in mountain fastnesses fortified at their leisure." The country was eager for good news, and took it as literally true. McClellan was the hero of the moment, and when, but a week later, his success was followed by the disaster to McDowell at Bull Run, he seemed pointed out by Providence as the ideal chieftain who could repair the misfortune and lead our armies to certain victory. His personal intercourse with those about him was so kindly, and his bearing so modest, that his dispatches, proclamations, and correspondence are a psychological study, more puzzling to those who knew him well than to strangers. Their turgid rhetoric and exaggerated pretence did not seem natural to him. In them he seemed to be composing for stage effect something to be spoken in character by a quite different person from the sensible and genial man we knew in daily life and conversation. The career of the great Napoleon had been the study and the absorbing admiration of young American soldiers, and it was perhaps not strange that when real war came they should copy his bulletins and even his personal bearing. It was, for the moment, the bent of the people to be pleased with McClellan's rendering of the role; they dubbed him the young Napoleon, and the photographers got him to stand with folded arms, in the historic pose. For two or three weeks his dispatches and letters were all on fire with enthusiastic energy. He appeared to be in a morbid condition of mental exaltation. When he came out of it, he was as genial as ever. The assumed dash and energy of his first campaign made the disappointment and the reaction more painful when the excessive caution of his conduct in command of the Army of the Potomac was seen. But the Rich Mountain affair, when analyzed, shows the same characteristics which became well known later. There was the same over-estimate of the enemy, the same tendency to interpret unfavorably the sights and sounds in front, the same hesitancy to throw in his whole force when he knew that his subordinate was engaged. If Garnett had been as strong as McClellan believed him, he had abundant time and means to overwhelm Morris, who lay four days in easy striking distance, while the National commander delayed attacking Pegram; and had Morris been beaten, Garnett would have been as near Clarksburg as his opponent, and there would have been a race for the railroad. But, happily, Garnett was less strong and less enterprising than he was credited with being. Pegram was dislodged, and the Confederates made a precipitate retreat.



CHAPTER IV

THE KANAWHA VALLEY

Orders for the Kanawha expedition—The troops and their quality—Lack of artillery and cavalry—Assembling at Gallipolis—District of the Kanawha—Numbers of the opposing forces—Method of advance—Use of steamboats—Advance guards on river banks—Camp at Thirteen-mile Creek—Night alarm—The river chutes—Sunken obstructions—Pocotaligo—Affair at Barboursville—Affair at Scary Creek—Wise's position at Tyler Mountain—His precipitate retreat—Occupation of Charleston—Rosecrans succeeds McClellan—Advance toward Gauley Bridge—Insubordination—The Newspaper Correspondent—Occupation of Gauley Bridge.

When McClellan reached Buckhannon, on the 2d of July, the rumors he heard of Garnett's strength, and the news of the presence of General Wise with a considerable force in the Great Kanawha valley, made him conclude to order a brigade to that region for the purpose of holding the lower part of the valley defensively till he might try to cut off Wise's army after Garnett should be disposed of. This duty was assigned to me. On the 22d of June I had received my appointment as Brigadier-General, U. S. Volunteers, superseding my state commission. I had seen the regiments of my brigade going one by one, as fast as they were reorganized for the three years' service, and I had hoped to be ordered to follow them to McClellan's own column. The only one left in camp was the Eleventh Ohio, of which only five companies were present, though two more companies were soon added.

McClellan's letter directed me to assume command of the First and Second Kentucky regiments with the Twelfth Ohio, and to call upon the governor for a troop of cavalry and a six-gun battery: to expedite the equipment of the whole and move them to Gallipolis via Hampden and Portland, stations on the Marietta Railroad, from which a march of twenty-five miles by country roads would take us to our destination. At Gallipolis was the Twenty-first Ohio, which I should add to my command and proceed at once with two regiments to Point Pleasant at the mouth of the Kanawha, five miles above. When all were assembled, one regiment was to be left at Point Pleasant, two were to be advanced up the valley to Ten-mile Creek, and the other placed at an intermediate position. "Until further orders," the letter continued, "remain on the defensive and endeavor to induce the rebels to remain at Charleston until I can cut off their retreat by a movement from Beverly." Captain W. J. Kountz, an experienced steamboat captain, was in charge of water-transportation, and would furnish light-draught steamboats for my use. [Footnote: What purports to be McClellan's letter to me is found in the Records (Official Records, vol. ii. pt. i. p. 197), but it seems to be only an abstract of it, made to accompany his dispatch to Washington (Id., p. 198), and by a clerical error given the form of the complete letter. It does not contain the quotation given above, which was reiterated before the letter was closed, in these words: "Remember that my present plan is to cut them off by a rapid march from Beverly after driving those in front of me across the mountains, and do all you can to favor that by avoiding offensive movements."

After the printing of the earlier volumes of the Records, covering the years 1861-1862, I learned that the books and papers of the Department of the Ohio had not been sent to Washington at the close of the war, but were still in Cincinnati. I brought this fact to the attention of the Adjutant-General, and at the request of that officer obtained and forwarded them to the Archives office. With them were my letter books and the original files of my correspondence with McClellan and Rosecrans in 1861 and 1862. Colonel Robert N. Scott, who was then in charge of the publication, informed me that the whole would be prepared for printing and would appear in the supplemental volumes, after the completion of the rest of the First Series. Owing to changes in the Board of Publication in the course of twenty years, there were errors in the arrangement of the matter for the printer, and a considerable part of the correspondence between the generals named and myself was accidentally omitted from the supplemental volume (Official Records, vol. li. pt. i.) in which it should have appeared. The originals are no doubt in the files of the Archives office, and for the benefit of investigators I give in Appendix A a list of the numbers missing from the printed volume, as shown by comparison with my retained copies.]

Governor Dennison seconded our wishes with his usual earnestness, and ordered the battery of artillery and company of cavalry to meet me at Gallipolis; but the guns for the battery were not to be had, and a section of two bronze guns (six-pounder smooth-bores rifled) was the only artillery, whilst the cavalry was less than half a troop of raw recruits, useful only as messengers. I succeeded in getting the Eleventh Ohio sent with me, the lacking companies to be recruited and sent later. The Twelfth Ohio was an excellent regiment which had been somewhat delayed in its reorganization and had not gone with the rest of its brigade to McClellan. The Twenty-first was one of the regiments enlisted for the State in excess of the first quota, and was now brought into the national service under the President's second call. The two Kentucky regiments had been organized in Cincinnati, and were made up chiefly of steamboat crews and "longshoremen" thrown out of employment by the stoppage of commerce on the river. There were in them some companies of other material, but these gave the distinctive character to the regiments. The colonels and part of the field officers were Kentuckians, but the organizations were Ohio regiments in nearly everything but the name. The men were mostly of a rough and reckless class, and gave a good deal of trouble by insubordination; but they did not lack courage, and after they had been under discipline for a while, became good fighting regiments. The difficulty of getting transportation from the railway company delayed our departure. It was not till the 6th of July that a regiment could be sent, and another followed in two or three days. The two Kentucky regiments were not yet armed and equipped, but after a day or two were ready and were ordered up the river by steamboats. I myself left Camp Dennison on the evening of Sunday the 7th with the Eleventh Ohio (seven companies) and reached Gallipolis in the evening of the 9th. The three Ohio regiments were united on the 10th and carried by steamers to Point Pleasant, and we entered the theatre of war. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 416: my report to McClellan.]

My movement had been made upon a telegram from General McClellan, and I found at Gallipolis his letter of instructions of the 2d, and another of the 6th which enlarged the scope of my command. A territorial district was assigned to me, including the southwestern part of Virginia below Parkersburg on the Ohio, and north of the Great Kanawha, reaching back into the country as I should occupy it. [Footnote: The territorial boundary of McClellan's Department had been placed at the Great Kanawha and the Ohio rivers, probably with some political idea of avoiding the appearance of aggression upon regions of doubtful loyalty.] The directions to restrict myself to a defensive occupation of the Lower Kanawha valley were changed to instructions to march on Charleston and Gauley Bridge, and, with a view to his resumption of the plan to make this his main line of advance, to "obtain all possible information in regard to the roads leading toward Wytheville and the adjacent region." I was also ordered to place a regiment at Ripley, on the road from Parkersburg to Charleston, and advised "to beat up Barbonsville, Guyandotte, etc, so that the entire course of the Ohio may be secured to us." Communication with Ripley was by Letart's Falls on the Ohio, some thirty miles above Gallipolis, or by Ravenswood, twenty miles further. Guyandotte was a longer distance below Gallipolis, and Barboursville was inland some miles up the Gurandotte River. As to General Wise, McClellan wrote: "Drive Wise out and catch him if you can. If you do catch him, send him to Colombus penitentiary." A regiment at Parkersburg and another at Roane Court House on the northern border of my district were ordered to report to me, but I was not authorized to move them from the stations assigned them, and they were soon united to McClellan's own column.

At Gallipolis I heard that a steamboat on the Ohio had been boarded by a rebel party near Guyandotte, and the news giving point to McClellan's suggestion to "beat up" that region, I dispatched a small steamboat down the river to meet the Kentucky regiments with orders for the leading one to land at Guyandotte and suppress any insurgents in that neighborhood. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. Ii. pt. i. p. 417.] It was hazardous to divide my little army into three columns on a base of a hundred miles, but it was thought wise to show some Union troops at various points on the border, and I purposed to unite my detachments by early convergent movements forward to the Kanawha valley as soon as I should reach Red House, thirty-two miles up the river, with my principal column.

Before I reached Charleston I added to my artillery one iron and one brass cannon, smooth six-pounders, borrowed from the civil authorities at Gallipolis; but they were without caissons or any proper equipment, and were manned by volunteers from the infantry. [Footnote: Ibid.] My total force, when assembled, would be a little over 3000 men, the regiments having the same average strength as those with McClellan. The opposing force under General Wise was 4000 by the time the campaign was fully opened, though somewhat less at the beginning. [Footnote: Wise reported his force on the 17th of July as 3500 "effective" men and ten cannon, and says he received "perhaps 300" in reinforcements on the 18th. When he abandoned the valley ten days later, he reported his force 4000 in round numbers. Official Records, vol. ii. pp. 290, 292; 1011.]

The Great Kanawha River was navigable for small steamboats about seventy miles, to a point ten or twelve miles above Charleston, the only important town of the region, which was at the confluence of the Kanawha and Elk rivers. Steamboats were plenty, owing to the interruption of trade, and wagons were wholly lacking; so that my column was accompanied and partly carried by a fleet of stern-wheel steamers.

On Thursday the 11th of July the movement from Point Pleasant began. An advance-guard was sent out on each side of the river, marching upon the roads which were near its banks. The few horsemen were divided and sent with them to carry messages, and the boats followed, steaming slowly along in rear of the marching men. Most of two regiments were carried on the steamers, to save fatigue to the men, who were as yet unused to their work, and many of whom were footsore from their first long march of twenty-five miles to Gallipolis from Hampden station, where they had been obliged to leave the railway. The arrangement was also a good one in a military point of view, for if an enemy were met on either bank of the stream, the boats could land in a moment and the troops disembark without delay.

Our first day's sail was thirteen miles up the river, and it was the very romance of campaigning. I took my station on top of the pilot-house of the leading boat, so that I might see over the banks of the stream and across the bottom lands to the high hills which bounded the valley. The afternoon was a lovely one. Summer clouds lazily drifted across the sky, the boats were dressed in their colors and swarmed with the men like bees. The bands played national tunes, and as we passed the houses of Union citizens, the inmates would wave their handkerchiefs to us, and were answered by cheers from the troops. The scenery was picturesque, the gently winding river making beautiful reaches that opened new scenes upon us at every turn. On either side the advance-guard could be seen in the distance, the main body in the road, with skirmishers exploring the way in front, and flankers on the sides. Now and then a horseman would bring some message to the bank from the front, and a small boat would be sent to receive it, giving us the rumors with which the country was rife, and which gave just enough of excitement and of the spice of possible danger to make this our first day in an enemy's country key everybody to just such a pitch as apparently to double the vividness of every sensation. The landscape seemed more beautiful, the sunshine more bright, and the exhilaration of out-door life more joyous than any we had ever known.

The halt for the night had been assigned at a little village on the right (northern) bank of the stream, which was nestled beneath a ridge which ran down from the hills toward the river, making an excellent position for defence against any force which might come against it from the upper valley. The sun was getting low behind us in the west, as we approached it, and the advance-guard had already halted. Captain Cotter's two bronze guns gleamed bright on the top of the ridge beyond the pretty little town, and before the sun went down, the new white tents had been carried up to the slope and pitched there. The steamers were moored to the shore, and the low slanting rays of the sunset fell upon as charming a picture as was ever painted. An outpost with pickets was set on the southern side of the river, both grand and camp guards were put out also on the side we occupied, and the men soon had their supper and went to rest. Late in the evening a panic-stricken countryman came in with the news that General Wise was moving down upon us with 4000 men. The man was evidently in earnest, and was a loyal one. He believed every word he said, but he had in fact seen only a few of the enemy's horsemen who were scouting toward us, and believed their statement that an army was at their back. It was our initiation into an experience of rumors that was to continue as long as the war. We were to get them daily and almost hourly; sometimes with a little foundation of fact, sometimes with none; rarely purposely deceptive, but always grossly exaggerated, making chimeras with which a commanding officer had to wage a more incessant warfare than with the substantial enemy in his front. I reasoned that Wise's troops were, like my own, too raw to venture a night attack with, and contented myself with sending a strong reconnoitring party out beyond my pickets, putting in command of it Major Hines of the Twelfth Ohio, an officer who subsequently became noted for his enterprise and activity in charge of scouting parties. The camp rested quietly, and toward morning Hines returned, reporting that a troop of the enemy's horse had come within a couple of miles of our position in search of information about us and our movement. They had indulged in loud bragging as to what Wise and his army would do with us, but this and nothing more was the basis of our honest friend's fright. The morning dawned bright and peaceful, the steamers were sent back for a regiment which was still at Point Pleasant, and the day was used in concentrating the little army and preparing for another advance.

On July 13th we moved again, making about ten miles, and finding the navigation becoming difficult by reason of the low water. At several shoals in the stream rough wing-dams had been built from the sides to concentrate the water in the channel, and at Knob Shoals, in one of these "chutes" as they were called, a coal barge had sometime before been sunk. In trying to pass it our leading boat grounded, and, the current being swift, it was for a time doubtful if we should get her off. We finally succeeded, however, and the procession of boats slowly steamed up the rapids. We had hardly got beyond them when we heard a distant cannon-shot from our advance-guard which had opened a long distance between them and us during our delay. We steamed rapidly ahead. Soon we saw a man pulling off from the south bank in a skiff. Nearing the steamer, he stood up and excitedly shouted that a general engagement had begun. We laughingly told him it couldn't be very general till we got in, and we moved on, keeping a sharp outlook for our parties on either bank. When we came up to them, we learned that a party of horsemen had appeared on the southern side of the river and had opened a skirmishing fire, but had scampered off as if the Old Nick were after them when a shell from the rifled gun was sent over their heads. The shell, like a good many that were made in those days, did not explode, and the simple people of the vicinity who had heard its long-continued scream told our men some days after that they thought it was "going yet."

From this time some show of resistance was made by the enemy, and the skirmishing somewhat retarded the movement. Still, about ten miles was made each day till the evening of the 16th, when we encamped at the mouth of the Pocotaligo, a large creek which enters the Kanawha from the north. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 418.] The evening before, we had had one of those incidents, not unusual with new troops, which prove that nothing but habit can make men cool and confident in their duties. We had, as usual, moored our boats to the northern bank and made our camp there, placing an outpost on the left bank opposite us supporting a chain of sentinels, to prevent a surprise from that direction. A report of some force of the enemy in their front made me order another detachment to their support after nightfall. The detachment had been told off and ferried across in small boats. They were dimly seen marching in the starlight up the river after landing, when suddenly a shot was heard, and then an irregular volley was both seen and heard as the muskets flashed out in the darkness. A supporting force was quickly sent over, and, no further disturbance occurring, a search was made for an enemy, but none was found. A gun had accidentally gone off in the squad, and the rest of the men, surprised and bewildered, had fired, they neither knew why nor at what. Two men were killed, and several others were hurt. This and the chaffing the men got from their comrades was a lesson to the whole command. The soldiers were brave enough, and were thoroughly ashamed of themselves, but they were raw; that was all that could be said of it. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 421.]

We were here overtaken by the Second Kentucky, which had stopped at Guyandotte on its way up the river, and had marched across the country to join us after our progress had sufficiently covered that lower region. From Guyandotte a portion of the regiment, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Neff, had gone to Barboursville and had attacked and dispersed an encampment of Confederates which was organizing there. It was a very creditable little action, in which officers and men conducted themselves well, and which made them for the time the envy of the rest of the command.

The situation at "Poca," as it was called in the neighborhood, was one which made the further advance of the army require some consideration. Information which came to us from loyal men showed that some force of the enemy was in position above the mouth of Scary Creek on the south side of the Kanawha, and about three miles from us. We had for two days had constant light skirmishing with the advance-guard of Wise's forces on the north bank of the river, and supposed that the principal part of his command was on our side, and not far in front of us. It turned out in fact that this was so, and that Wise had placed his principal camp at Tyler Mountain, a bold spur which reaches the river on the northern side (on which is also the turnpike road), about twelve miles above my position, while he occupied the south side with a detachment. The Pocotaligo, which entered the river from the north at our camp, covered us against an attack on that side; but we could not take our steam-boats further unless both banks of the river were cleared. We had scarcely any wagons, for those which had been promised us could not yet be forwarded, and we must either continue to keep the steamboats with us, or organize wagon transportation and cut loose from the boats. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 420; dispatch of 17th also.] My urgent dispatches were hurrying the wagons toward us, but meanwhile I hoped the opposition on the south bank of the river would prove trifling, for artillery in position at any point on the narrow river would at once stop navigation of our light and unarmed transports. On the morning of the 17th a reconnoitering party sent forward on the south side of the river under command of Lieutenant-Colonel White of the Twelfth Ohio, reported the enemy about five hundred strong intrenched on the further side of Scary Creek, which was not fordable at its mouth, but could be crossed a little way up the stream. Colonel Lowe of the Twelfth requested the privilege of driving off this party with his regiment accompanied by our two cannon. He was ordered to do so, whilst the enemy's skirmishers should be pushed back from the front of the main column, and it should be held ready to advance rapidly up the north bank of the river as soon as the hostile force at Scary Creek should be dislodged.

The Twelfth and two companies of the Twenty-first Ohio were ferried over and moved out soon after noon. The first reports from them were encouraging and full of confidence, the enemy were retreating and they had dismounted one of his guns; but just before evening they returned, bringing the account of their repulse in the effort to cross at the mouth of the creek, and their failure to find the ford a little higher up. Their ammunition had run short, some casualties had occurred, and they had become discouraged and given it up. Their loss was 10 men killed and 35 wounded. If they had held on and asked for assistance, it would have been well enough; but, as was common with new troops, they passed from confidence to discouragement as soon as they were checked, and they retreated.

The affair was accompanied by another humiliating incident which gave me no little chagrin. During the progress of the engagement Colonel Woodruff and Lieutenant-Colonel Neff of the Second Kentucky, with Colonel De Villiers of the Eleventh Ohio, rode out in front, on the north bank of the river, till they came opposite the enemy's position, the hostile party on our side of the stream having fallen back beyond this point. They were told by a negro that the rebels were in retreat, and they got the black man to ferry them over in a skiff, that they might be the first to congratulate their friends. To their amazement they were welcomed as prisoners by the Confederates, who greatly enjoyed their discomfiture. The negro had told the truth in saying that the enemy had been in retreat; for the fact was that both sides retreated, but the Confederates, being first informed of this, resumed their position and claimed a victory. The officers who were captured had gone out without permission, and, led on by the hare-brained De Villiers, had done what they knew was foolish and unmilitary, resulting for them in a severe experience in Libby Prison at Richmond, and for us in the momentary appearance of lack of discipline and order which could not fairly be charged upon the command. I reported the facts without disguise or apology, trusting to the future to remove the bad impression the affair must naturally make upon McClellan.

The report of the strength of the position attacked and our knowledge of the increasing difficulty of the ground before us, led me to conclude that the wisest course would be to await the arrival of the wagons, now daily expected, and then, with supplies for several days in hand, move independent of the steamers, which became only an embarrassment when it was advisable to leave the river road for the purpose of turning a fortified position like that we had found before us. We therefore rested quietly in our strong camp for several days, holding both banks of the river and preparing to move the main column by a country road leading away from the stream on the north side, and returning to it at Tyler Mountain, where Wise's camp was reported to be. I ordered up the First Kentucky from Ravenswood and Ripley, but its colonel found obstacles in his way, and did not join us till we reached Charleston the following week.

On the 23d of July I had succeeded in getting wagons and teams enough to supply the most necessary uses, and renewed the advance. We marched rapidly on the 24th by the circuitous route I have mentioned, leaving a regiment to protect the steamboats. The country was very broken and the roads very rough, but the enemy had no knowledge of our movement, and toward evening we again approached the river immediately in rear of their camp at Tyler Mountain. When we drove in their pickets, the force was panic-stricken and ran off, leaving their camp in confusion, and their supper which they were cooking but did not stop to eat. A little below the point where we reached the river, and on the other side, was the steamboat "Maffet" with a party of soldiers gathering the wheat which had been cut in the neighboring fields and was in the sheaf. I was for a moment doubtful whether it might not be one of our own boats which had ventured up the river under protection of the regiment left behind, and directed our skirmishers who were deployed along the edge of the water to hail the other side. "Who are you?" was shouted from both banks simultaneously. "United States troops," our men answered. "Hurrah for Jeff Davis!" shouted the others, and a rattling fire opened on both sides. A shell was sent from our cannon into the steamer, and the party upon her were immediately seen jumping ashore, having first set fire to her to prevent her falling into our hands. The enemy then moved away on that side, under cover of the trees which lined the river bank. Night was now falling, and, sending forward an advance-guard to follow up the force whose camp we had surprised, we bivouacked on the mountain side.

In the morning, as we were moving out at an early hour, we were met by the mayor and two or three prominent citizens of Charleston who came to surrender the town to us, Wise having hurriedly retreated during the night. He had done a very unnecessary piece of mischief before leaving, in partly cutting off the cables of a fine suspension bridge which spans the Elk River at Charleston. As this stream enters the Kanawha from the north and below the city, it may have seemed to him that it would delay our progress; but as a large number of empty coal barges were lying at the town, it took our company of mechanics, under Captain Lane of the Eleventh Ohio, but a little while to improvise a good floating bridge, and part of the command passed through the town and camped beyond it. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 425.] One day was now given to the establishment of a depot of supplies at Charleston and to the organization of regular communication by water with Gallipolis, and by wagons with such positions as we might occupy further up the river. Deputations of the townspeople were informed that it was not our policy to meddle with private persons who remained quietly at home, nor would we make any inquisition as to the personal opinions of those who attended strictly to their own business; but they were warned that any communication with the enemy would be remorselessly punished.

We were now able to get more accurate information about Wise's forces than we could obtain before, and this accorded pretty well with the strength which he reported officially. [Footnote: Ante, p. 63 note.] His infantry was therefore more than equal to the column under my command in the valley, whilst in artillery and in cavalry he was greatly superior. Our continued advance in the face of such opposition is sufficient evidence that the Confederate force was not well handled, for as the valley contracted and the hills crowded in closer to the river, nearly every mile offered positions in which small numbers could hold at bay an army. Our success in reaching Charleston was therefore good ground for being content with our progress, though I had to blame myself for errors in the management of my part of the campaign at Pocataligo. I ought not to have assumed as confidently as I did that the enemy was only five hundred strong at Scary Creek and that a detachment could dispose of that obstacle whilst the rest of the column prepared to advance on our principal line. Wise's force at that point was in fact double the number supposed. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. p. 1011.] It is true it was very inconvenient to ferry any considerable body of troops back and forth across the river; but I should nevertheless have taken the bulk of my command to the left bank, and by occupying the enemy's attention at the mouth of Scary Creek, covered the movement of a sufficient force upon his flank by means of the fords farther up that stream. This would have resulted in the complete routing of the detachment, and it is nearly certain that I could have pushed on to Charleston at once, and could have waited there for the organization of my wagon train with the prestige of victory, instead of doing so at 'Poca' with the appearance of a check.

McClellan recognized the fact that he was asking me to face the enemy with no odds in my favor, and as soon as he heard that Wise was disposed to make a stand he directed me not to risk attacking him in front, but rather to await the result of his own movement toward the Upper Kanawha. [Footnote: Dispatches of July 16 and 20.] Rosecrans did the same when he assumed command; but I knew the hope had been that I would reach Gauley Bridge, and I was vexed that my movement should have the appearance of failing when I was conscious that we had not fairly measured our strength with my opponent. As soon, therefore, as the needful preparations could be made, I decided upon the turning movement which I have already described, and our resolute advance seems to have thrown Wise into a panic from which he did not recover till he got far beyond Gauley Bridge.

At Charleston I learned of the Bull Run disaster, and that McClellan had been ordered to Washington, leaving Rosecrans in command of our department. The latter sent me orders which implied that to reach Charleston was the most he could expect of me, and directing me to remain on the defensive if I should succeed in getting so far, whilst he should take up anew McClellan's plan of reaching the rear of Wise's army. [Footnote: Dispatches of July 26 and 29.] His dispatches, fortunately, did not reach me till I was close to Gauley Bridge and was sure of my ability to take possession of that defile, some forty miles above Charleston. An additional reason for my prompt advance was that the Twenty-first Ohio was not yet re-enlisted for the war, was only a "three months" regiment whose time was about to expire, and Governor Dennison had telegraphed me to send it back to Ohio. I left this regiment as a post-garrison at Charleston till it could be relieved by another, or till my success in reaching Gauley Bridge should enable me to send back a detachment for that post, and, on the 26th July, pushed forward with the rest of my column, which, now that the First Kentucky had joined me, consisted of four regiments. Our first night's encampment was about eleven miles above Charleston in a lovely nook between spurs of the hills. Here I was treated to a little surprise on the part of three of my subordinates which was an unexpected enlargement of my military experience. The camp had got nicely arranged for the night and supper was over, when these gentlemen waited upon me at my tent. The one who had shown the least capacity as commander of a regiment was spokesman, and informed me that after consultation they had concluded that it was foolhardy to follow the Confederates into the gorge we were travelling, and that unless I could show them satisfactory reasons for changing their opinion they would not lead their commands further into it. I dryly asked if he was quite sure he understood the nature of his communication. There was something probably in the tone of my question which was not altogether expected, and his companions began to look a little uneasy. He then protested that none of them meant any disrespect, but that as their military experience was about as extensive as my own, they thought I ought to make no movements but on consultation with them and by their consent. The others seemed to be better pleased with this way of putting it, and signified assent. My answer was that their conduct very plainly showed their own lack both of military experience and elementary military knowledge, and that this ignorance was the only thing which could palliate their action. Whether they meant it or not, their action was mutinous. The responsibility for the movement of the army was with me, and whilst I should be inclined to confer very freely with my principal subordinates and explain my purposes, I should call no councils of war, and submit nothing to vote till I felt incompetent to decide for myself. If they apologized for their conduct and showed earnestness in military obedience to orders, what they had now said would be overlooked, but on any recurrence of cause for complaint I should enforce my power by the arrest of the offender at once. I dismissed them with this, and immediately sent out the formal orders through my adjutant-general to march early next morning. Before they slept one of the three had come to me with earnest apology for his part in the matter, and a short time made them all as subordinate as I could wish. The incident could not have occurred in the brigade which had been under my command at Camp Dennison, and was a not unnatural result of the sudden assembling of inexperienced men under a brigade commander of whom they knew nothing except that at the beginning of the war he was a civilian like themselves. These very men afterward became devoted followers, and some of them life-long friends. It was part of their military education as well as mine. If I had been noisy and blustering in my intercourse with them at the beginning, and had done what seemed to be regarded as the "regulation" amount of cursing and swearing, they would probably have given me credit for military aptitude at least; but a systematic adherence to a quiet and undemonstrative manner evidently told against me, at first, in their opinion. Through my army life I met more or less of the same conduct when assigned to a new command; but when men learned that discipline would be inevitably enforced, and that it was as necessary to obey a quiet order as one emphasized by expletives, and especially when they had been a little under fire, there was no more trouble. Indeed, I was impressed with the fact that after this acquaintance was once made, my chief embarrassment in discipline was that an intimation of dissatisfaction on my part would cause deeper chagrin and more evident pain than I intended or wished.

The same march enabled me to make the acquaintance of another army "institution,"—the newspaper correspondent. We were joined at Charleston by two men representing influential Eastern journals, who wished to know on what terms they could accompany the column. The answer was that the quartermaster would furnish them with a tent and transportation, and that their letters should be submitted to one of the staff, to protect us from the publication of facts which might aid the enemy. This seemed unsatisfactory, and they intimated that they expected to be taken into my mess and to be announced as volunteer aides with military rank. They were told that military position or rank could only be given by authority much higher than mine, and that they could be more honestly independent if free from personal obligation and from temptation to repay favors with flattery. My only purpose was to put the matter upon the foundation of public right and of mutual self-respect. The day before we reached Gauley Bridge they opened the subject again to Captain McElroy, my adjutant-general, but were informed that I had decided it upon a principle by which I meant to abide. Their reply was, "Very well; General Cox thinks he can get along without us, and we will show him. We will write him down."

They left the camp the same evening, and wrote letters to their papers describing the army as demoralized, drunken, and without discipline, in a state of insubordination, and the commander as totally incompetent. As to the troops, more baseless slander was never uttered. Their march had been orderly. No wilful injury had been done to private property, and no case of personal violence to any non-combatant, man or woman, had been even charged. Yet the printing of such communications in widely read journals was likely to be as damaging as if it all were true. My nomination as Brigadier-General of U. S. Volunteers was then before the Senate for confirmation, and "the pen" would probably have proved "mightier than the sword" but for McClellan's knowledge of the nature of the task we had accomplished, as he was then in the flood-tide of power at Washington, and expressed his satisfaction at the performance of our part of the campaign which he had planned. By good fortune also, the injurious letters were printed at the same time with the telegraphic news of our occupation of Gauley Bridge and the retreat of the enemy out of the valley. [Footnote: As one of these correspondents became a writer of history, it is made proper to say that he was Mr. William Swinton, of whom General Grant has occasion to speak in his "Personal Memoirs" (vol. ii. p. 144), and whose facility in changing his point of view in historical writing was shown in his "McClellan's Military Career Reviewed and Exposed," which was published in 1864 by the Union Congressional Committee (first appearing in the "New York Times" of February, March, and April of that year), when compared with his "History of the Army of the Potomac" which appeared two years later. Burnside accused him of repeated instances of malicious libel of his command in June, 1864. Official Records, vol. xxxvi. pt. iii. p. 751.] I was, however, deeply convinced that my position was the right one, and never changed my rule of conduct in the matter. The relations of newspaper correspondents to general officers of the army became one of the crying scandals and notorious causes of intrigue and demoralization. It was a subject almost impossible to settle satisfactorily; but whoever gained or lost by cultivating this means of reputation, it is a satisfaction to have adhered throughout the war to the rule I first adopted and announced.

Wise made no resolute effort to oppose my march after I left Charleston, and contented himself with delaying us by his rear-guard, which obstructed the road by felling trees into it and by skirmishing with my head of column. We however advanced at the rate of twelve or fifteen miles a day, reaching Gauley Bridge on the morning of the 29th of July. Here we captured some fifteen hundred stands of arms and a considerable store of munitions which the Confederate general had not been able to carry away or destroy. It is safe to say that in the wild defile which we had threaded for the last twenty miles there were as many positions as there were miles in which he could easily have delayed my advance a day or two, forcing me to turn his flank by the most difficult mountain climbing, and where indeed, with forces so nearly equal, my progress should have been permanently barred. At Gauley Bridge he burned the structure which gave name to the place, and which had been a series of substantial wooden trusses resting upon heavy stone piers. My orders definitively limited me to the point we had now reached in my advance, and I therefore sent forward only a detachment to follow the enemy and keep up his precipitate retreat. Wise did not stop till he reached Greenbrier and the White Sulphur Springs, and there was abundant evidence that he regarded his movement as a final abandonment of this part of West Virginia. [Footnote: Floyd's Dispatches, Official Records, vol. li. pt. ii. pp. 208, 213.] A few weeks later General Lee came in person with reinforcements over the mountains and began a new campaign; but until the 20th of August we were undisturbed except by a petty guerilla warfare.

McClellan telegraphed from Washington his congratulations, [Footnote: Dispatch of August 1.] and Rosecrans expressed his satisfaction also in terms which assured me that we had done more than had been expected of us. [Footnote: Dispatch of July 31.] The good effect upon the command was also very apparent; for our success not only justified the policy of a determined advance, but the officers who had been timid as to results were now glad to get their share of the credit, and to make amends for their insubordination by a hearty change in bearing and conduct. My term of service as a brigadier of the Ohio forces in the three months' enrolment had now ended, and until the Senate should confirm my appointment as a United States officer there was some doubt as to my right to continue in command. My embarrassment in this regard was very pleasantly removed by a dispatch from General Rosecrans in which he conveyed the request of Lieutenant-General Scott and of himself that I should remain in charge of the Kanawha column. It was only a week, however, before notice of the confirmation was received, and dropping all thoughts of returning home, I prepared my mind for continuous active duty till the war should end.



CHAPTER V

GAULEY BRIDGE

The gate of the Kanawha valley—The wilderness beyond—West Virginia defences—A romantic post—Chaplain Brown—An adventurous mission—Chaplain Dubois—"The River Path"—Gauley Mount—Colonel Tompkins's home—Bowie-knives—Truculent resolutions—The Engineers—Whittlesey, Benham, Wagner—Fortifications—Distant reconnoissances—Comparison of forces—Dangers to steamboat communications—Allotment of duties—The Summersville post—Seventh Ohio at Cross Lanes—Scares and rumors—Robert E. Lee at Valley Mountain—Floyd and Wise advance—Rosecrans's orders—The Cross Lanes affair—Major Casement's creditable retreat—Colonel Tyler's reports—Lieutenant-Colonel Creighton—Quarrels of Wise and Floyd—Ambushing rebel cavalry—Affair at Boone Court House—New attack at Gauley Bridge—An incipient mutiny—Sad result—A notable court-martial—Rosecrans marching toward us—Communications renewed—Advance toward Lewisburg—Camp Lookout—A private sorrow.

The position at Gauley Bridge was an important one from a military point of view. It was where the James River and Kanawha turnpike, after following the highlands along the course of New River as it comes from the east, drops into a defile with cliffs on one side and a swift and unfordable torrent upon the other, and then crosses the Gauley River, which is a stream of very similar character. The two rivers, meeting at a right angle, there unite to form the Great Kanawha, which plunges over a ledge of rocks a mile below and winds its way among the hills, some thirty miles, before it becomes a navigable stream even for the lightest class of steamboats. From Gauley Bridge a road runs up the Gauley River to Cross Lanes and Carnifex Ferry, something over twenty miles, and continuing northward reaches Summersville, Sutton, and Weston, making almost the only line of communication between the posts then occupied by our troops in northwestern Virginia and the head of the Kanawha valley. Southwestward the country was extremely wild and broken, with few and small settlements and no roads worthy the name. The crossing of the Gauley was therefore the gate through which all important movements from eastern into southwestern Virginia must necessarily come, and it formed an important link in any chain of posts designed to cover the Ohio valley from invasion. It was also the most advanced single post which could protect the Kanawha valley. Further to the southeast, on Flat-top Mountain, was another very strong position, where the principal road on the left bank of New River crosses a high and broad ridge; but a post could not be safely maintained there without still holding Gauley Bridge in considerable force, or establishing another post on the right bank of New River twenty miles further up. All these streams flow in rocky beds seamed and fissured to so great a degree that they had no practicable fords. You might go forty miles up New River and at least twenty up the Gauley before you could find a place where either could be passed by infantry or wagons. The little ferries which had been made in a few eddies of the rivers were destroyed in the first campaign, and the post at the Gauley became nearly impregnable in front, and could only be turned by long and difficult detours.