The Lone Star Defenders 7

The Lone Star Defenders 7

I will not attempt to give the number of troops engaged, as the

official reports of the battle written by the officers in command fail

to settle that question. General Price reported that he had 5221

effective men with 15 pieces of artillery. General McCulloch’s brigade

has been estimated at 4000 men, with no artillery, and this officer’s

conclusion was that the enemy had 9000 to 10,000 men, and that the

forces of the two armies were about equal. The Federal officers in

their reports greatly exaggerated our strength, and, I think, greatly

underestimated theirs, especially so since, General Lyon being killed,

it devolved upon the subordinates to make the reports. Major S. D.

Sturgis, who commanded one of Lyon’s brigades, says their 3700 men

attacked an army of 23,000 rebels under Price and McCulloch, that their

loss in killed, wounded, and missing was 1235, and he supposed the

rebel loss was 3000. Major J. M. Schofield, General Lyon’s adjutant,

says their 5000 men attacked the rebel army of 20,000. General Frémont,

afterwards, in congratulating the army on their splendid conduct in

this battle, says their 4300 men met the rebel army of 20,000. They

give the organization of their army without giving the numbers. General

Lyon had four brigades, consisting, as they report, of six regiments,

three battalions, seven companies, 200 Missouri home guards and three

batteries of artillery, many of their troops being regulars. Their army

came against us in two columns.

 

[Illustration: LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JILES S. BOGGESS

 

Third Texas Cavalry]

 

General Lyon, with three brigades and two batteries, Totten’s six

pieces, and Dubois, with four, came down the Springfield road and

attacked our main army in front. Colonel Franz Sigel, with one brigade

and one light battery, marched down to the left, or east of the road

and into our rear, and attacked the cavalry camp with his artillery, as

has already been stated. Poor Sigel! it would be sufficient to describe

his disastrous defeat to merely repeat their official reports. But I

would only say that his battery was lost and his command scattered

and driven from the field in utter confusion and demoralization in

the early part of the day and that it was followed some five miles by

our cavalry and badly cut up, he himself escaping capture narrowly by

abandoning his carriage and colors and taking to a cornfield. It was

said by the Federals that he reached Springfield with one man before

the battle was ended. But the forces led by the brave and gallant Lyon

fought bravely. The losses are given officially as follows: Federals:

killed, 223; wounded, 721; missing, 291. Total, 1235. Confederates:

killed, 265; wounded, 800; missing, 30. Total, 1095.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER IV

 

THE WAR IN MISSOURI

 

Personal Characteristics—Two Braggarts—Joe Welch—William

Hood—We Enter Springfield—Bitter Feeling in Missouri—Company

Elections—Measles and Typhoid—Carthage, and My Illness

There—We Leave Carthage—Death of Captain Taylor—Winter

Quarters—Furloughed—Home Again.

 

 

A BATTLE—or danger—will often develop some characteristics that

nothing else will bring out.

 

One Gum was a shabby little man, mounted on a shabby little mustang

pony; in fact his horse was so shabby that he would tie him, while

we were at Dallas, away off in the brush in a ravine and carry his

forage half a mile to feed him rather than have him laughed at. Gum

was a Missourian, and got into the company somehow, with his fiddle,

and aside from his fiddling he was of little use in camps. During the

time we were kept slowly moving along in the rear of our infantry,

engaged mainly in the unprofitable business of dodging balls and

shells that were constantly whizzing near our heads, Captain Taylor

was very anxious that his company should act well under fire and

would frequently glance back, saying: “Keep your places, men.” Gum,

however, was out of place so often he finally became personal, “Keep

in your place, Gum.” At this Gum broke ranks and came trotting up on

his little pony, looking like a monkey with a red cap on, for, having

lost his hat, he had tied a red cotton handkerchief around his head.

When opposite the captain he reined up, and with a trembling frame

and in a quivering voice, almost crying, he said: “Captain, I _can’t_

keep my place. I am a coward, and I can’t help it.” Captain Taylor

said, sympathetically: “Very well, Gum; go where you please.” It so

happened that a few days later we passed his father’s house, near

Mount Vernon, and the captain allowed him to stop and remain with his

father. And thus he was discharged. At this stage of the war we had

no army regulations, no “red tape” in our business. If a captain saw

fit to discharge one of his men he told him to go, and he went without

reference to army headquarters or the War Department. I met Gum in

November, fleeing from the wrath of the home guards, as a man who had

been in the Confederate Army could not live in safety in Missouri.

 

One of our men, in the morning when I was forming the company, was so

agitated that it was a difficult matter to get him to call his number.

During the day a ball cut a gash about skin deep and two inches in

length across the back of his neck, just at the edge of his hair. As a

result of this we were two years in getting this man under fire again,

though he would not make an honest confession like Gum, but would

manage in some mysterious way to keep out of danger. When at last we

succeeded in getting him in battle at Thompson’s Station in 1863, he

ran his iron ramrod through the palm of his right hand and went to the

rear. Rather than risk himself in another engagement he deserted, in

the fall of that year, and went into the Federal breastworks in front

of Vicksburg and surrendered. This man was named Wiley Roberts.

 

Captain Hale, of Company D, was rather rough-hewn, but a brave,

patriotic old man, having not the least patience with a thief, a

coward, or a braggart. While he had some of the bravest men in his

company that any army could boast of, he had one or two, at least, that

were not among these, as the two stalwart bullies who were exceedingly

boastful of their prowess, of the ease with which Southern men could

whip Northerners, five to one being about as little odds as they cared

to meet. This type of braggart was no novelty, for every soldier had

heard that kind of talk at the beginning of the war. While we were

moving out in the morning when Sigel’s battery was firing and Captain

Hale was coolly riding along at the head of his company, these two

men came riding rapidly up, one hand holding their reins while the

other was pressed across the stomach, as if they were in great misery,

saying, when they sighted their commander: “Captain Hale, where must we

go? we are sick.” Captain Hale looked around without uttering a word

for a moment, his countenance speaking more indignation than language

could express. At last he said, in his characteristic, emphatic manner:

“Go to h——l, you d——d cowards! You were the only two fighting men

I had until now we are in a battle, and you’re both sick. I don’t care

when you go.” Other incidents could be given where men in the regiment

were tried and found wanting, but the great majority were brave and

gallant men who never shirked duty or flinched from danger.

 

An instance of the opposite character may be told of Joe Welch. Joe

was a blacksmith, almost a giant in stature. Roughly guessing, I would

say he was six feet two inches in height, weighing about 240 pounds,

broad-shouldered, raw-boned, with muscles that would laugh at a sledge.

Joe had incurred the contempt of the company by acting in a very

cowardly manner, as they thought, in one or two little personal affairs

before we reached Missouri. But when we went into battle Joe was there,

as unconcerned and cool, apparently, as if he was only going into his

shop to do a day’s work; and when we made our charge down that rough

hillside when the enemy’s bullets were coming as thick as hailstones,

one of Joe’s pistols jolted out of its holster and fell to the ground.

Joe reined in his horse, deliberately dismounted, recovered the pistol,

remounted, and rapidly moved up to his place in the ranks. Those who

witnessed the coolness and apparent disregard of danger with which he

performed this little feat felt their contempt suddenly converted into

admiration.

 

Another one of our men was found wanting, but through no fault of his

own, as he was faithful as far as able. This was William Hood. Hood was

an Englishman, quite small, considerably advanced in years, destitute

of physical endurance and totally unfit for the hardships of a

soldier’s life. He was an old-womanish kind of a man, good for cooking,

washing dishes, scouring tin plates, and keeping everything nice

around the mess headquarters, but was unsuited for any other part of a

soldier’s duty. Hood strayed off from us somehow during the day, and

for some part of the day was a prisoner, losing his horse, but managed

to get back to camp afoot at night, very much depressed in spirits. The

next morning he was very proud to discover his horse grazing out in the

field two or three hundred yards from the camp. He almost flew to him,

but found he was wounded. He came back to Captain Taylor with a very

sad countenance, and said: “Captain Taylor, me little ’orse is wounded

right were the ’air girth goes on ’im.” The wound was only slight and

as soon as the little ’orse was in proper traveling condition little

Hood was discharged and allowed to return home.

 

As already stated, we returned late in the evening to the camp we

had left in the morning to rest and sleep for the night, for after

the excitement of the day was over bodily fatigue was very much in

evidence. Our train came up about nightfall, but as I was very tired,

and our only chance for lights was in building up little brush fires,

the opening of my letters was postponed until the bright Sunday

morning, August 11, especially as my mail packet was quite bulky.

One large envelope from Huntsville, Ala., contained a letter and an

exquisite little Confederate flag some ten or twelve inches long.

This was from a valued young lady friend who, in the letter, gave me