The Twenty-sixth Ohio came into the Kanawha valley on the 8th through a mistake in their orders, and their arrival supplied for a few days the loss of the Twenty-first, which had gone home to be mustered out and reorganized. Some companies of the newly forming Fourth Virginia were those who protected the village of Point Pleasant at the mouth of the river, and part of the Twelfth and Twenty-sixth Ohio were in detachments from Charleston toward Gauley Bridge, furnishing guards for the steamboats and a.s.sisting in the landing and forwarding of supplies. The Eleventh Ohio, under Lieutenant-Colonel Frizell, which still had only eight companies, had the task of covering and reconnoitring our immediate front, and was the advance-guard already mentioned. Part of the Twelfth under Major Hines did similar work on the road to Summersville, where Rosecrans had an advanced post, consisting of the Seventh Ohio (Colonel E. B. Tyler), the Thirteenth (Colonel Wm. Sooy Smith), and the Twenty-third (Lieutenant-Colonel Stanley Matthews). On the 13th of August the Seventh Ohio, by orders from Rosecrans, marched to Cross Lanes, the intersection of the read from Summersville to Gauley Bridge, with one from Carnifex Ferry, which is on the Gauley near the mouth of Meadow River. A road called the Sunday Road is in the Meadow River valley, and joins the Lewisburg turnpike about fifteen miles in front of Gauley Bridge. [Footnote: See Official Atlas, Plate IX. 3, and map, p. 106, _post_] To give warning against any movement of the enemy to turn my position by this route or to intervene between me and Rosecrans"s posts at Summersville and beyond, was Tyler"s task. He was ordered to picket all crossings of the river near his position, and to join my command if he were driven away. I was authorized to call him to me in an emergency.
On the 15th Tyler was joined at Cross Lanes by the Thirteenth and Twenty-third Ohio, in consequence of rumors that the enemy was advancing upon Summersville in force from Lewisburg. I would have been glad of such an addition to my forces, but knowing that Rosecrans had stationed them as his own outpost covering the Sutton and Weston road, I ordered Tyler to maintain his own position, and urged the others to return at once to Summersville. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. pp. 449, 453, 454.] The road by which they had expected the enemy was the Wilderness road, which crossed the Gauley at Hughes" Ferry, six miles above Carnifex. If attacked from that direction, they should retire northward toward Rosecrans, if possible.
Rosecrans gave orders to the same effect as soon as he heard of the movement, saying that his intention had been to station Smith and Matthews at Sutton, where their retreat toward him in case of necessity would be a.s.sured. [Footnote: Dispatch of August 16.] His orders for Tyler were that he should scout far toward the enemy, "striking him wherever he can," and "hold his position at the ferries as long as he can safely do it, and then fall back, as directed," toward Gauley Bridge. [Footnote: Dispatch of August 17.]
The incident throws important light upon the situation a week later, when Tyler was attacked by Floyd.
Floyd and Wise were now really in motion, though General Lee remained at Valley Mountain near Huntersville, whence he directed their movements. On the 17th they had pa.s.sed Sewell Mountain, but made slow progress in the face of the opposition of the Eleventh Ohio, which kept up a constant skirmish with them. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. pp. 792, 799; _Id_., vol. li. pt. i. pp.
450-453.] On the 19th Floyd"s advance-guard pa.s.sed the mouth of the Sunday Road on the turnpike, and on the 20th made so determined a push at my advance-guard that I believed it a serious effort of the whole Confederate column. I strengthened my own advance-guard by part of the Twelfth Ohio, which was at hand, and placed them at Pig Creek, a mile beyond the Tompkins place, where the turnpike crossed a gorge making a strongly defensible position. The advance-guard was able to withstand the enemy alone, and drove back those who a.s.saulted them with considerable loss. It has since appeared that this movement of the enemy was by Wise"s command making a direct attack upon my position, whilst Floyd was moving by the diagonal road to Dogwood Gap on the Sunday Road where it crosses the old State Road. There he encamped for the night, and next day continued his march to the mouth of Meadow River near Carnifex Ferry.
[Footnote: _Id_., vol. v. p.800.] It was an affair of advance-guards in which Wise was satisfied as soon as he found serious resistance, and he retired during the night. On the first evidence of the enemy"s presence in force, I called Tyler from Cross Lanes to Twenty-mile Creek, about six miles from Gauley Bridge, where it was important to guard a road pa.s.sing to my rear, and to meet any attempt to turn my flank if the attack should be determinedly made by the whole force of the enemy. [Footnote: Dispatch of August 20.]
As soon as the attack was repulsed, Tyler was ordered to return to Cross Lanes and resume his watch of the roads and river crossings there. [Footnote: _Id_., vol. li. pt. i. p. 454.] He was delayed by the issue of shoes and clothing to his men, and when he approached his former position on the 24th, he found that Floyd was reported to have crossed the Gauley at Carnifex Ferry. Without waiting to reconnoitre the enemy at all, Tyler retreated to Peters Creek, several miles. Floyd had in fact succeeded in raising two small flatboats which Tyler had sunk but had not entirely destroyed. With these for a ferry, he had crossed and was intrenching himself where he was afterward attacked by Rosecrans.
In the hope that only a small force had made the crossing, I ordered Tyler to "make a dash at them, taking care to keep your force well in hand so as to keep your retreat safe." [Footnote: Dispatch of August 24.] I added: "It is important to give them such a check as to stop their crossing." Meanwhile my advance-guard up New River was ordered to demonstrate actively in front and upon the Sunday Road, so as to disquiet any force which had gone towards Tyler, and I also sent forward half a regiment to Peters Creek (six miles from Cross Lanes) to hold the pa.s.s there and secure his retreat in case of need. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 457.]
But Tyler was new to responsibility, and seemed paralyzed into complete inefficiency. He took nearly the whole of the 25th to move slowly to Cross Lanes, though he met no opposition. He did nothing that evening or night, and his disposal of his troops was so improper and outpost duty so completely neglected that on the morning of the 26th, whilst his regiment was at breakfast, it was attacked by Floyd on both flanks at once, and was routed before it could be formed for action. Some companies managed to make a show of fighting, but it was wholly in vain, and they broke in confusion.
[Footnote: _Id_., pp. 458, 459, 461.] About 15 were killed and 50 wounded, the latter with some 30 others falling into the enemy"s hands. Tyler, with his lieutenant-colonel, Creighton, came into Gauley Bridge with a few stragglers from the regiment. Others followed until about 200 were present. His train had reached the detachment I had sent to Peters Creek, and this covered its retreat to camp, so that all his wagons came in safely. He reported all his command cut to pieces and captured except the few that were with him, and wrote an official report of the engagement, giving that result.
On the 28th, however, we heard that Major Cas.e.m.e.nt had carried 400 of the regiment safely into Charleston. He had rallied them on the hills immediately after the rout, and finding the direct road to Gauley Bridge intercepted, had led them by mountain paths over the ridges to the valley of Elk River, and had then followed that stream down to Charleston without being pursued. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 462.] This put a new face on the business, and Tyler in much confusion asked the return of his report that he might re-write it. I looked upon his situation as the not unnatural result of inexperience, and contented myself with informing General Rosecrans of the truth as to the affair. Tyler was allowed to subst.i.tute a new report, and his unfortunate affair was treated as a lesson from which it was expected he would profit.
[Footnote: Rosecrans"s dispatch, _Id_., p. 460.] It made trouble in the regiment, however, where the line officers did not conceal their opinion that he had failed in his duty as a commander, and he was never afterward quite comfortable among them.
The lieutenant-colonel, Creighton, was for a time in the abyss of self-reproach. The very day they reached Gauley Bridge in their unceremonious retreat, he came to me, crying with shame, and said, "General, I have behaved like a miserable coward, I ought to be cashiered," and repeated many such expressions of remorse. I comforted him by saying that the intensity of his own feeling was the best proof that he had only yielded to a surprise and that it was clear he was no coward. He died afterward at the head of his regiment in the desperate charge up the hills at Ringgold, Georgia, in the campaign following that of Chickamauga in the autumn of 1863, having had the command for two years after Tyler became a brigadier.
During those two years the Seventh had been in numberless engagements, and its list of casualties in battle, made good by recruiting, was said to have reached a thousand. Better soldiers there were none, and Creighton proved himself a lion in every fight.
Cas.e.m.e.nt, who rallied and led the most of the regiment from Cross Lanes over the mountains to Charleston, became afterward colonel of the One Hundred and Third Ohio. He came again under my command in East Tennessee in the winter of 1863, and continued one of my brigade commanders to the close of the war. He was a railway builder by profession, had a natural apt.i.tude for controlling bodies of men, was rough of speech but generous of heart, running over with fun which no dolefulness of circ.u.mstance could repress, as jolly a comrade and as loyal a subordinate as the army could show.
After the Cross Lanes affair I fully expected that the Confederate forces would follow the route which Cas.e.m.e.nt had taken to Charleston. Floyd"s inactivity puzzled me, for he did no more than make an intrenched camp at Carnifex Ferry, with outposts at Peters Mountain and toward Summersville. The publication of the Confederate Archives has partly solved the mystery. Floyd called on Wise to reinforce him; but the latter demurred, insistent that the duty a.s.signed him of attacking my position in front needed all the men he had. Both appealed to Lee, and Lee decided that Floyd was the senior and ent.i.tled to command the joint forces. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. pp. 155-165, 800, 802-813.] The letters of Wise show a capacity for keeping a command in hot water which was unique.
If he had been half as troublesome to me as he was to Floyd, I should indeed have had a hot time of it. But he did me royal service by preventing anything approaching to co-operation between the two Confederate columns. I kept my advance-guards constantly feeling of both, and got through the period till Rosecrans joined me with nothing more serious than some sharp affairs of detachments.
I was not without anxiety, however, and was constantly kept on the alert. Rosecrans withdrew the Twelfth Ohio from my command, excepting two companies under Major Hines, on the 19th of August, [Footnote: My dispatch to Rosecrans of August 19; also Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p. 454.] and the imperative need of detachments to protect the river below me was such that from this time till the middle of September my garrison at Gauley Bridge, including advance-guards and outposts, was never more than two and a half regiments or 1800 men. My artillerists were also ordered back to Ohio to reorganize, leaving the guns in the hands of such infantry details as I could improvise. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 462.] I was lucky enough, however, to get a very good troop of horse under command of Captain Pfau in place of the irregular squad I had before. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 464.]
On the 25th my advance-guard under Lieutenant-Colonel Frizell very cleverly succeeded in drawing into an ambuscade a body of Floyd"s cavalry under Colonel A. G. Jenkins. The princ.i.p.al body of our men lined a defile near the Hawk"s Nest, and the skirmishers, retreating before the enemy, led them into the trap. Our men began firing before the enemy was quite surrounded, and putting their horses upon the run, they dashed back, running the gantlet of the fire. Wise reported that he met men with their subordinate officers flying at four miles" distance from the place of the action, and so panic-stricken that they could not be rallied or led back.
[Footnote: _Id_., vol. v. p. 816; _Id_., vol. li. pt. i. p. 457.]
Jenkins was hurt by the fall of his horse, but he succeeded in getting away; for, as we had no hors.e.m.e.n to pursue with, even the wounded, except one, could not be overtaken. Hats, clothing, arms, and saddles were left scattered along the road in as complete a breakneck race for life as was ever seen. The result, if not great in the list of casualties, which were only reported at 10 or 15 by the enemy, was so demoralizing in its influence upon the hostile cavalry that they never again showed any enterprise in hara.s.sing our outposts, whilst our men gained proportionally in confidence.
About the 30th of August we heard of an encampment of Confederate militia at Boone C. H. which was so situated, southwest of the Kanawha River, as to menace our communications with the Ohio. I sent Lieutenant-Colonel Enyart with half of the First Kentucky Regiment to beat up this encampment, and he did so on the 2d of September, completely routing the enemy, who left 25 dead upon the field.
Enyart"s march and attack had been rapid and vigorous, and the terror of the blow kept that part of the district quiet for some time afterward. [Footnote: C. R., vol. li. pt. i. pp. 465, 468, 472.]
We had heard for some days the news of the a.s.sembling of a considerable force of Confederate militia at Fayette C. H. under General Chapman and Colonel Beckley. They were reported at 2500, which was a fair estimate of the numbers which answered to the call.
On the 3d of September a pretty well combined attack was made by Wise and this force; Wise pushing in sharply upon the turnpike, whilst Chapman, a.s.sisted by part of Wise"s cavalry, drove back our small outpost on the Fayette road. Wise was met at Pig Creek as in his former attack, the eight companies of the Eleventh Ohio being strengthened by half of the Twenty-sixth Ohio, which was brought from below for this purpose. The effort was somewhat more persistent than before, and Wise indulged in considerable noisy cannonading; but the pickets retreated to the creek without loss, and the whole advance-guard, keeping under good cover there, repelled the attack with less than half a dozen casualties on our side, none being fatal. Wise retreated again beyond Hawk"s Nest. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. pp. 468, 470. Wise"s Report, _Id_., vol. v.
p. 124.] The irregular troops on the Fayette road were more boldly led, and as there was no defensible position near the river for our outposts, these fell slowly back after a very warm skirmish, inflicting a loss, as reported by prisoners, of 6 killed among the enemy. I expected Floyd to move at the same time, and was obliged to continue upon the defensive by reason of his threatening position up the Gauley River; I, however, sent Major Hines with his two companies in that direction, and Floyd appeared to be impressed with the idea that my whole force was moving to attack him and attempted nothing aggressive. As at this time Wise, in his letters to General Lee, puts Floyd"s force at 5600, and his own at 2200, [Footnote: _Id_., vol. v. p. 840.] I had good reason, therefore, to feel satisfied with being able to keep them all at bay.
In the midst of the alarms from every side, my camp itself was greatly excited by an incident which would have been occasion for regret at any time, but which at such a juncture threatened for a moment quite serious consequences. The work of intrenching the position was going on under the direction of Lieutenant Wagner as rapidly as the small working parties available could perform it. All were overworked, but it was the rule that men should not be detailed for fatigue duty who had been on picket the preceding night. On August 28th, a detail had been called for from the Second Kentucky, which lay above the hedge behind my headquarters, and they had reported without arms under a sergeant named Joyce. A supply of intrenching tools was stacked by the gate leading into the yard where my staff tents were pitched, and my aide, Lieutenant Conine, directed the sergeant to have his men take the tools and report to Mr. Wagner, the engineer, on the line. The men began to demur in a half-mutinous way, saying they had been on picket the night before.
Conine, who was a soldierly man, informed them that that should be immediately looked into, and if so, they would be soon relieved, but that they could not argue the matter there, as their company commander was responsible for the detail. He therefore repeated his order. The sergeant then became excited and said his men should not obey. Lieutenant Gibbs, the district commissary, was standing by, and drawing his pistol, said to Joyce, "That"s mutiny; order your men to take the tools or I"ll shoot you." The man retorted with a curse, "Shoot!" Gibbs fired, and Joyce fell dead. When the sergeant first refused to obey, Conine coolly called out, "Corporal of the guard, turn out the guard!" intending very properly to put the man in arrest, but the shot followed too quick for the guard to arrive.
I was sitting within the house at my camp desk, busy, when the first thing which attracted my attention was the call for the guard and the shot. I ran out, not stopping for arms, and saw some of the men running off shouting, "Go for your guns, kill him, kill him!" I stopped part of the men, ordered them to take the sergeant quickly to the hospital, thinking he might not be dead. I then ordered Gibbs in arrest till an investigation should be made, and ran at speed to a gap in the hedge which opened into the regimental camp. It was not a moment too soon. The men with their muskets were already cl.u.s.tering in the path, threatening vengeance on Mr. Gibbs. I ordered them to halt and return to their quarters. Carried away by excitement, they levelled their muskets at me and bade me get out of their way or they would shoot me. I managed to keep cool, said the affair would be investigated, that Gibbs was already under arrest, but they must go back to their quarters. The parley lasted long enough to bring some of their officers near. I ordered them to come to my side, and then to take command of the men and march them away.
The real danger was over as soon as the first impulse was checked.
[Footnote: Dispatch to Rosecrans, August 29.] The men then began to feel some of their natural respect for their commander, and yielded probably the more readily because they noticed that I was unarmed. I thought it wise to be content with quelling the disturbance, and did not seek out for punishment the men who had met me at the gap. Their excitement had been natural under the circ.u.mstances, which were reported with exaggeration as a wilful murder. If I had been in command of a larger force, it would have been easy to turn out another regiment to enforce order and arrest any mutineers; but the Second Kentucky was itself the only regiment on the spot. The First Kentucky was a mile below, and the Eleventh Ohio was the advance-guard up New River. Surrounded as we were by so superior a force of the enemy with which we were constantly skirmishing, I could not do otherwise than meet the difficulty instantly without regard to personal risk.
The sequel of the affair was not reached till some weeks later when General Rosecrans a.s.sembled a court-martial at my request.
Lieutenant Gibbs was tried and acquitted on the plain evidence that the man killed was in the act of mutiny at the time. The court was a notable one, as its judge advocate was Major R. B. Hayes of the Twenty-third Ohio, afterwards President of the United States, and one of its members was Lieutenant-Colonel Stanley Matthews of the same regiment, afterwards one of the Justices of the Supreme Court.
[Footnote: Some twenty years later a bill pa.s.sed the House of Representatives pensioning the mother of the man killed, under the law giving pensions to dependent relatives of those who died in the line of duty! It could only have been smuggled through by concealment and falsification of facts, and was stopped in the Senate.]
The constant skirmishing with the enemy on all sides continued till the 10th of September, when General Rosecrans with his column reached Cross Lanes and had the action at Carnifex Ferry which I shall describe in the next chapter. I had sent forward half a regiment from my little command to open communication with him as soon as possible. On September 9th a party from this detachment had reached Cross Lanes and learned that Floyd was keeping close within his lines on the cliffs of Gauley above Carnifex Ferry. They, however, heard nothing of Rosecrans, and the princ.i.p.al body of their troops heard no sound of the engagement on the 10th, though within a very few miles. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. li. pt. i. p.
478.] On the 12th communication was opened, and I learned of Floyd"s retreat across the Gauley. I immediately moved forward the Eleventh and Twenty-sixth Ohio to attack Wise, who retreated from Hawk"s Nest to the mouth of the Sunday Road, and upon my closer approach retired to Sewell Mountain. [Footnote: _Id_., pp. 479, 481.] At the Sunday Road I was stopped by orders from Rosecrans, who thought it unwise to advance further till he had made a ferry at the Gauley and succeeded in getting his command over; for Floyd had again sunk the flatboats within reach, and these had to be a second time raised and repaired. At his request I visited the General at Carnifex Ferry, and then got permission to move my column forward a few miles to Alderson"s, or Camp Lookout as we dubbed it, where a commanding position controlled the country to the base of Sewell Mountain.
[Footnote: _Id_., p. 482.] I was now able to concentrate the Seventh Ohio at Gauley Bridge, and ordered forward the Second Kentucky to join me in the new camp.
The period of my separate responsibility and of struggle against great odds was not to close without a private grief which was the more poignant because the condition of the campaign forbade my leaving the post of duty. On the day I visited General Rosecrans at Carnifex Ferry I got news of the critical illness of my youngest child, a babe of eight months old, whom I had seen but a single day after his birth, for I had been ordered into camp from the legislature without time to make another visit to my family. The warning dispatch was quickly followed by another announcing the end, and I had to swallow my sorrows as well as I could and face the public enemy before us, leaving my wife uncomforted in her bereavement and all the more burdened with care because she knew we were resuming active operations in the field.
CHAPTER VI
CARNIFEX FERRY--TO SEWELL MOUNTAIN AND BACK
Rosecrans"s march to join me--Reaches Cross Lanes--Advance against Floyd--Engagement at Carnifex Ferry--My advance to Sunday Road--Conference with Rosecrans--McCook"s brigade joins me--Advance to Camp Lookout--Brigade commanders--Rosecrans"s personal characteristics--Hartsuff--Floyd and Wise again--"Battle of Bontecou"--Sewell Mountain--The equinoctial--General Schenck arrives--Rough lodgings--Withdrawal from the mountain--Rear-guard duties--Major Slemmer of Fort Pickens fame--New positions covering Gauley Bridge--Floyd at Cotton Mountain--Rosecrans"s methods with private soldiers--Progress in discipline.
General Rosecrans had succeeded McClellan as ranking officer in West Virginia, but it was not until the latter part of September that the region was made a department and he was regularly a.s.signed to command. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. pp. 604, 616, 647.]
Meanwhile the three months" enlistments were expiring, many regiments were sent home, new ones were received, and a complete reorganization of his forces took place. Besides holding the railroad, he fortified the Cheat Mountain pa.s.s looking toward Staunton, and the pa.s.s at Elkwater on the mountain summit between Huttonsville and Huntersville. My own fortifications at Gauley Bridge were part of the system of defensive works he had ordered. By the middle of August he had established a chain of posts, with a regiment or two at each, on a line upon which he afterwards marched, from Weston by way of Bulltown, Sutton, and Summersville to Gauley Bridge.
[Ill.u.s.tration Map--Affair At Carnifex Ferry]
As soon as he received the news of Floyd"s attack upon Tyler at Cross Lanes, he hastened his preparations and began his march southward from Clarksburg with three brigades, having left the Upper Potomac line in command of General Kelley, and the Cheat Mountain region in command of General J. J. Reynolds. His route (already indicated) was a rough one, and the portion of it between Sutton and Summersville, over Birch Mountain, was very wild and difficult. He crossed the mountain on the 9th, and left his bivouac on the morning of the 10th of September, before daybreak. Marching through Summersville, he reached Cross Lanes about two o"clock in the afternoon. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. p. 129.] Floyd"s position was now about two miles distant, and, waiting only for his column to close up, he again pressed forward. General Benham"s brigade was in front, and soon met the enemy"s pickets. Getting the impression that Floyd was in retreat, Benham pressed forward rather rashly, deploying to the left and coming under a sharp fire from the right of the enemy"s works. Floyd had intrenched a line across a bend of the Gauley River, where the road from Cross Lanes to Lewisburg finds its way down the cliffs to Carnifex Ferry. His flanks rested upon precipices rising abruptly from the water"s edge, and he also intrenched some rising ground in front of his princ.i.p.al line. Benham"s line advanced through dense and tangled woods, ignorant of the enemy"s position till it was checked by the fire from his breastworks. It was too late for a proper reconnoissance, and Rosecrans could only hasten the advance and deployment of the other brigades under Colonels McCook and Scammon. [Footnote: For organization of Rosecrans"s forces, see Id., vol. li. pt. i. p.
471.] Benham had sent a howitzer battery and two rifled cannon with his head of column at the left, and these soon got a position from which, in fact, they enfiladed part of Floyd"s line, though it was impossible to see much of the situation. Charges were made by portions of Benham"s and McCook"s brigades as they came up, but they lacked unity, and Rosecrans was dissatisfied that his head of column should be engaged before he had time to plan an attack. Colonel Lowe of the Twelfth Ohio had been killed at the head of his regiment, and Colonel Lytle of the Tenth had been wounded; darkness was rapidly coming on, and Rosecrans ordered the troops withdrawn from fire till positions could be rectified, and the attack renewed in the morning.
Seventeen had been killed, and 141 had been wounded in the sharp but irregular combat. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. p. 146.]
Floyd, however, had learned that his position could be subjected to destructive cannonade; he was himself slightly wounded, and his officers and men were discouraged. He therefore retreated across the Gauley in the night, having great difficulty in carrying his artillery down the cliffs by a wretched road in the darkness. He had built a slight foot-bridge for infantry in the bit of smooth water known as the Ferry, though both above and below the stream is an impa.s.sable mountain torrent. The artillery crossed in the flatboats.
Once over, the bridge was broken up and the ferry-boats were sunk.
He reported but twenty casualties, and threw much of the responsibility upon Wise, who had not obeyed orders to reinforce him. His hospital, containing the wounded prisoners taken from Tyler, fell into Rosecrans"s hands. [Footnote: A very graphic description of this engagement and of Floyd"s retreat fell into my hands soon afterward. It was a journal of the campaign written by Major Isaac Smith of the Twenty-second Virginia Regiment, which he tried to send through our lines to his family in Charleston, W. Va., but which was intercepted. A copy is on file in the War Archives.
See also Floyd"s report, _Id._, vol. v. pp. 146-148.]
General Rosecrans found the country so difficult a one that he was in no little doubt as to the plan of campaign it was now best to follow. It was out of the question to supply his column by wagon trains over the mountainous roads from Clarksburg, and the Kanawha River must therefore be made the line of communication with his base, which had to be transferred to Gallipolis. In antic.i.p.ation of this, I had acc.u.mulated supplies and ordnance stores at Gauley Bridge as much as possible with my small wagon trains, and had arranged for a larger depot at the head of steamboat navigation. I was ready therefore to turn over the control of my supply lines to Rosecrans"s officers of the quartermaster and commissary departments as soon as his wagon trains could be transferred. It was to consult in regard to these matters, as was as in regard to the future conduct of the campaign, that the general directed me to visit his headquarters at Carnifex Ferry. I rode over from my camp at the Sunday Road junction on the morning of the 15th, found that one of the little flatboats had been again raised and repaired at Carnifex, and pa.s.sing through the field of the recent combat, reached the general"s headquarters near Cross Lanes. I was able from personal observation to a.s.sure him that it was easy for his command to follow the line of the march on which Floyd had retreated, if better means of crossing the Gauley were provided; but when they should join me on the Lewisburg turnpike, that highway would be the proper line of supply, making Gauley Bridge his depot. He hesitated to commit himself to either line for decisive operations until the Gauley should be bridged, but on my description of the commodious ferry I had made at Gauley Bridge by means of a very large flatboat running along a hawser stretched from bank to bank, he determined to advance, and to have a bridge of boats made in place of my ferry.
McCook"s brigade was ordered to report to me as soon as it could be put over the river, and I was authorized to advance some six miles toward the enemy, to Alberson"s or Spy Rock, already mentioned beyond which Big Sewell Mountain is fourteen miles further to the southwest. [Footnote: Official Records vol. v. p. 602.]
At Cross Lanes I met the commanders of the other brigades who were called in by General Rosecrans of an informal consultation based upon my knowledge of the country and the enemy. I naturally scanned them with some interest, and tried to make the most of the opportunity to become acquainted with them. General Benham I knew already, from his visit to me at Gauley Bridge in his capacity of engineer officer. I had met Colonel Robert McCook at Camp Dennison, and now that it was intimated that he would be for some days under my command, I recalled a scene I had witnessed there which left many doubts in my mind whether he would prove an agreeable subordinate. I had gone, one morning, to General Bates"s office, and as I entered found McCook expressing himself with more vigor than elegance in regard to some order which had been issued respecting his regiment.
My presence did not seem to interfere with the fluency of his remarks or the force of his expletives, but after a moment or two he seemed to notice a look of surprise in my face, and his own broadened humorously as his manner changed from vehemence to geniality. General Bates and he were familiar acquaintances at the bar in Cincinnati, and McCook had evidently presumed upon this as a warrant for speaking his mind as he pleased. When he reported to me at this later period, I found a hearty and loyal character under his bluff exterior and rough speech, with real courage, a quick eye for topography, and no lack of earnest subordination when work was to be done. Although our service together was short, I learned to have real respect for him, and sincerely mourned his loss when, later in the war, he met his tragic death. The other brigade commander was _Colonel E. P. Scammon_ of the Twenty-third Ohio. He had graduated from West Point in 1837, and had served in the Topographical Engineers of the regular army and as instructor in the Military Academy. In the Mexican War he had been aide-de-camp to General Scott. He had been out of the army for some years before the rebellion, and was acting as professor of mathematics in St.
Xavier"s College, Cincinnati, when he was appointed to the colonelcy of the Twenty-third Ohio upon Rosecrans"s promotion. Like Rosecrans, he was a Roman Catholic, though himself of Puritan descent. It seems that at the time of the Puseyite movement in England and in this country there had been a good many conversions to Romanism among the students and teachers at West Point, under the influence of the chaplain of the post, and Scammon, among a number of young men who subsequently became distinguished officers, was in this number. It need hardly be said that Scammon was well instructed in his profession. He was perhaps too much wedded to the routine of the service, and was looked upon by his subordinates as a martinet who had not patience enough with the inexperience of volunteer soldiers.
He was one of the older men of our army, somewhat under the average height and weight, with a precise politeness of manner which reminded one of a Frenchman, and the resemblance was increased by his free use of his snuff-box. His nervous irritability was the cause of considerable chafing in his command, but this left him under fire, and those who had been with him in action learned to admire his courage and conduct. He was with me subsequently at South Mountain and Antietam, and still later had the misfortune to be one of those prisoners in the Confederates" hands who were exposed to the fire of our batteries in front of Charleston, S. C.
But being a subordinate, I was most interested in the characteristics of our commander. Our Camp Dennison acquaintance had been a pleasant one, and he greeted me with a cordiality that was rea.s.suring. His general appearance was attractive. He was tall but not heavy, with the rather long head and countenance that is sometimes called Norman. His aquiline nose and bright eyes gave him an incisive expression, increased by rapid utterance in his speech, which was apt to grow hurried, almost to stammering, when he was excited. His impulsiveness was plain to all who approached him; his irritation quickly flashed out in words when he was crossed, and his social geniality would show itself in smiles and in almost caressing gestures when he was pleased. In discussing military questions he made free use of his theoretic knowledge, often quoted authorities and cited maxims of war, and compared the problem before him to a.n.a.logous cases in military history. This did not go far enough to be pedantic, and was full of a lively intelligence; yet it did not impress me as that highest form of military insight and knowledge which solves the question before it upon its own merits and without conscious comparison with historical examples, through a power of judgment and perception ripened and broadened by the mastery of principles which have ruled the great campaigns of the world. He was fond of conviviality, loved to banter good-humoredly his staff officers and intimates, and was altogether an attractive and companionable man, with intellectual activity enough to make his society stimulating and full of lively discussion. I could easily understand Garfield"s saying, in his letter to Secretary Chase which afterward became the subject of much debate, that he "loved every bone in his body." [Footnote: An anecdote told at my table in 1890 by the Rev. Dr. Morris, long Professor in Lane Theological Seminary, Cincinnati, is so characteristic of Rosecrans that it is worth repeating. After the battle of Stone"s River (January, 1863) Dr.
Morris, who was then minister of a Presbyterian church in Columbus, was made by Governor Tod a member of a commission sent to look after the wounded soldiers. He called on General Rosecrans at his headquarters in Murfreesboro, and among others met there Father Tracy, the general"s chaplain, a Roman Catholic priest. During the visit Rosecrans was called aside (but in the same room) by a staff officer to receive information about a spy who had been caught within the lines. The general got quite excited over the information, talked loudly and hurriedly in giving directions concerning the matter, using some profane language. It seemed suddenly to occur to him that the clergymen were present, and from the opposite side of the room he turned toward them, exclaiming apologetically, "Gentlemen, I sometimes _swear_, but I never _blaspheme!_"]
Rosecrans"s adjutant-general was Captain George L. Hartsuff, an officer of the regular army, who was well qualified to supplement in many ways the abilities and deficiencies of his chief. [Footnote: Hartsuff was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers in the next year and was severely wounded at Antietam, after which he was made major-general and commanded the Twenty-third Army Corps in Burnside"s campaign of East Tennessee.] He was a large man, of heavy frame; his face was broad, and his bald head, tapering high, gave a peculiar pyramidal appearance to his figure. He was systematic and accurate in administrative work, patient and insistent in bringing the young volunteer officers in his department into habits of order and good military form. His coolness tempered the impulsiveness of his chief, and as they were of similar age and had about the same standing in the army before the war, the familiarity between them was that of comrades and equals more than of commander and subordinate.
My intercourse with these officers on the occasion of my visit to Cross Lanes was only the beginning of the acquaintance on which I based the estimate of them which I have given; but it was a good beginning, for the cordial freedom of thought and speech in the conference was such as to bring out the characteristics of the men.
I rode back to my camp in the evening, feeling a sense of relief at the transfer of responsibility to other shoulders. The command of my brigade under the orders of Rosecrans seemed an easy task compared with the anxieties and the difficulties of the preceding three months. And so it was. The difference between chief responsibility in military movements and the leadership even of the largest subordinate organizations of an army is heaven-wide; and I believe that no one who has tried both will hesitate to say that the subordinate knows little or nothing of the strain upon the will and the moral faculties which the chief has to bear.
McCook"s brigade joined me on the 16th, and we immediately marched to Alderson"s, where we made a camp afterward known as Camp Lookout.
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. ii. pt. i. p. 481.] I was able to bring up the Second Kentucky Regiment from Gauley Bridge, giving me in hand three regiments of my own brigade. I sent forward Major Hines with five companies as an advance-guard, and with these he scouted the country as far as the top of Big Sewell Mountain, and was able to give us definite information that Floyd had retreated as far as Meadow Bluff, where the Wilderness road joins the turnpike.
Wise halted at Big Sewell Mountain and persisted in keeping his command separate from Floyd, who ordered him to join the rest of the column at Meadow Bluff. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. v. pp.