Category Archive

Robert Smalls (1839 - 1915) was born in Beaufort, South Carolina, on April 5th, 1839, in a slave cabin behind his mother’s master’s house on 511 Prince Street. In 1862 he escaped from Charleston harbor aboard a steamer called the Planter with his family and several friends too. The boat had to pass by five Confederate check-points and then surrender its contents to the northern Naval fleet out in the harbor where it was blockading the important southern port.

His escape succeeded and Robert would meet Abraham Lincoln personally a couple weeks later. Lincoln was quite impressed with a black man (slave) who had learned how to pilot and navigate the coastal waterways around Charleston. Lincoln rewarded Smalls handsomely with bounty-money and a commission into the Union Navy as a captain of a vessel - the Planter! He was the first black Captain of a U.S. Naval vessel.

Three months later Smalls would visit Abraham Lincoln in the Whitehouse to plead the opportunity for blacks to fight for the Union. Just days afterwards Lincoln approved the raising of the first black troops in the Blue uniform and Robert Smalls was instrumental in helping to start the 1st South Carolina Infantry of U.S. Colored Troops.

Smalls would go on to pilot the Planter for the Union cause and take pace in several important engagements around Charleston and the Sea Islands. After the Civil War he was elected among a few other blacks as they became the freshman class of blacks to serve as U.S. Congressmen.

Robert Smalls’s story is an amazing one of courage, determination, sacrifice, risk and reward - from slavery to Congressman!

This is the home on 511 Prince Street in Beaufort, South Carolina, that Robert was born behind in a slave cabin. He later bought this very same house, after the Civil War, and lived in it with his mother Lydia.

“What is to prevent a daily newspaper from being made the greatest organ of social life? Books have had their day - the theaters have had their day - the temple of religion has had its day. A newspaper can be made to take the lead of all these in the great movements of human thought and of human civilization. A newspaper can send more souls to Heaven, and save more souls from Hell, than all the churches or chapels in New York - besides making money at the same time.”

James Gordon Bennett, editor, The New York Herald
Written in 1835

Samuel Bowles, editor-publisher of the Springfield Republican, wrote these words in 1851

The brilliant mission of the newspaper is . . . . to be, the high priest of history, the vitalizer of society, the world’s great informer, the earth’s high censor, the medium of public thought and opinion, and the circulating life blood of the whole human mind. It is the great enemy of tyrants and the right arm of liberty, and is destined, more than any other agency, to melt and mold the jarring and contending nations of the world into . . . one great brotherhood . . . .

Source: quoted in Blue & Gray in Black & White, p. 3, 4

March 8/9 - Confederate iron-clad C.S.S. Virginia (formerly U.S.S. Merrimack) sinks two wooden Federal ships and runs others aground near Hampton Roads, Virginia. March 9th the C.S.S. Virginia duels with the U.S.S. Monitor to a draw. Dueling iron-clads will change naval history forever.

The Civil War Gazette Civil War Timeline is a linear, chronological look at the important events related to the American Civil War, fought between April 1861 and April 1865. The timeline includes major battles and skirmishes, significant political events impacting the war, deaths of major military figures, as well as details of important battles including casualty numbers.

“Defeat was the best thing that could have happened to us; for it humbled us and made us make better preparations which led in time to a final victory.”

Col. Oliver O. Howard, Union Brigade Commander

Links to some online articles related to Mississippi Civil War action:

• Battle of Corinth
  The strategic railroad town of Corinth was a key target for Confederate armies hoping to march north in support of General Braxton Bragg’s invasion of Kentucky. By Robert Collins Suhr

 

“The first thing in the morning is drill, then drill, then drill again. Then drill, drill, a little more drill. Then drill, and lastly drill. Between drills, we drill and sometimes stop to eat a little and have roll call.”

- A Northern soldier
Cited in Soldiers Blue and Gray, Robertson: p. 48.

“DEATH CLAIMS A GOOD WOMAN”

February 22, 2008, Marks the 103^rd Anniversary of Carrie McGavock’s Death

Franklin, TN … February 22^nd, 2008 marks the 103^rd anniversary of Carrie McGavock’s death.  Known best for her “unwavering loyalty to the Confederate cause, both in war and in peace,” and also for her caring heart and devotion to the Presbyterian Church, Carrie’s death was a loss for her county and her country.

            The funeral was held February 23, 1905 at Historic Carnton Plantation.  She passed away without suffering with family surrounding her.  She was 76.  Many family members and friends gathered to honor the woman who during the bloody Battle of Franklin had her home converted to a Confederate field hospital.

            The battle which left thousands of soldiers wounded, dead, and missing changed this Carrie to an advocate for the dead.  She inspired the movement of roughly 1,500 buried bodies to the private cemetery on her property.  Today, it is the largest privately owned Confederate cemetery in the nation.

            McGavock kept a small journal containing the names of those buried at Carnton.  It has served as a research tool for those looking for fallen soldiers for generations.  Still today, visitors come to the cemetery to visit the grave of fallen relatives from long ago generations.
            “Carrie McGavock was an ordinary woman thrown into extraordinary times, one who stepped up to the plate with extraordinary valor.  She is the centerpiece of Robert Hicks’ international bestseller, Widow of the South,” said Angela Calhoun, executive director of Carnton Plantation.

           Calhoun said Carnton will hold no special ceremonies or services on the anniversary of her death though the mirrors in the “Best Parlor” will be draped with black fabric to signify the loss of her life.

              “We do expect increased visitors that day, however.  Williamson County residents and visitors from across the nation will likely come here to honor the memory of this brave woman, the mistress of a home and the chief operating officer of the hospital it became,” Calhoun said.

         Historic Carnton Plantation is a private, non-profit historic site located in Franklin, Tennessee.  Today the site consists of 48 of the original 1,400 acres and includes the restored antebellum home, a recreated one-acre 1847 garden, slave quarters, smokehouse, springhouse, and the adjacent Confederate and family cemetery.

We invite the public to come and honor Carrie McGavock on the anniversary of her death.

For More Information contact: Joanna Stephens (Joanna@carnton.org) or Eric Jacobson (Eric@carnton.org) or (615) 794.0903

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Source: Official Carnton Plantation news release

Here is a small surgeon’s kit that belonged to and was used by John H. Lyon’s, a surgeon with the 6th Texas Infantry (CS). There were at least seven surgeons that served with the 6th Texas.

The 6th Texas fought, among other places, at Chickamauga, the Atlanta Campaign, and the Battles of Franklin and Nashville.

At Chickamauga, the 6th TX fought with the 10th and 15th TX Infantries. “Our whole loss was 20 killed, 95 wounded, and 28 missing.”

The following men were wounded at Franklin (11/30/64) and may have been tended to by Lyon’s:

• J.F. McGilton, severely wounded in right leg, amputated
• Steven E. Rice, was captured five times during the war; was a Captain
• John Stevenson, severe wound in right elbow

In July 1863, the 6^th Texas was assigned to Major General Pat Cleburne’s Division of the Army of Tennessee, Granbury’s Brigade.

Here are some pictures of the kit. It is part of the Kraig McNutt Civil War Collection.

I’m almost finished reading Wiley Sword’s new book - Courage Under Fire: Profiles in Bravery from the Battlefields of the Civil War. I have really enjoyed it. He focuses on the subject of courage (or lack thereof) during the Civil War on the part of the common soldier, and even some officers and Generals. He equally gives treatment to northern and southern stories. His personal collection of Civil War letters is the main resource he draws from for many of the letters he profiles, which only makes me salivate, wishing I owned a tenth of the quality of letters he does.

For those interested in or from the middle Tennessee area (i.e., Nashville, Franklin, Spring Hill, etc.,) one will find many examples from this book to read about.

The CWG gives this a hearty 4.5 stars (out of five) for Courage Under Fire.

From the book description:

Through diaries and letter written on the battlefield, in camps, and on the deathbeds of soldiers from north and south, Wiley Sword, writes about more than the Civil War. He writes of the complex working of a soldier’s mind coming to grips with life and death in a time when his country was at war with itself. On Aug. 3, 1864, Illinois Lieutenant Frank Curtiss was ordered by his commander to take the 127th Illinois Infantry into a charge of the fortified Rebel lines. He knew certain death was in store for him and his men. He also knew little tactical superiority would be gained for lives lost and refused to do it. Confederate Brigadier General Patrick Cleburne, one of the South’s greatest military tacticians, left diaries showing he was striving to refine his methods to save lives while winning battles. And then there is the Rhode Island Regiment’s Major Sullivan Ballou who, in 1861 on the eve of the battle of Bull Run who wrote of courage and dedication to his cause. Wiley Sword constructs a picture of the military mind that still resonates in today’s wars.

The south had 480,000 men and the north had 861,000 fighting men in early 1864.*

By early 1864 the southern-rebel war machine was grinding to a slow drip in terms of availability of eligible fighting men. Thus, the losses of the Army of Tennessee during the summer of 1864 and then Hood’s Tennessee campaign (fall/winter 1864) were irrecoverable and irreplaceable to Jefferson Davis and the Confederate States.

*Source: Thomas L. Livermore, Numbers and Losses in the Civil War in America (1900); repr., Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1957), 45, 47, 48.

The wagon trains were devoted entirely to the transportation of ammunition and commissary and quartermaster’s stores, which had not been issued. Rations which had become company property, and the baggage of the men, when they had any, was carried by the men themselves. If, as was sometimes the case, three days rations were issued at one time and the troops ordered to cook them and be prepared to march, they did cook them, and eat them if possible, so as to avoid the labor of carrying them. It was not such an undertaking either, to eat three days rations in one, as frequently none had been issued for more than a day, and when issued were cut down one half.

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. II. Richmond, Virginia, September, 1876. No. 3.
Detailed Minutiae Of Soldier Life In The Army Of Northern Virginia.

Harper’s Weekly, February 6, 1864, The Wagon Train

“When rations got short and were getting shorter, it became necessary to dismiss the darkey servants. Some, however, became company servants, instead of private institutions, and held out faithfully to the end, cooking the rations away in the rear, and at the risk of life carrying them to the line of battle to be devoured with voracity by their “young mahsters.”

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. II. Richmond, Virginia, September, 1876. No. 3.
Detailed Minutiae Of Soldier Life In The Army Of Northern Virginia.

Let us consider the effect of camp life upon a pure and noble boy; and to make the picture complete, let us go to his home and witness the parting.

The boy is clothed as a soldier. His pockets and his haversack are stored with little conveniences made by the loving hands of mother, sister and sweetheart, and the sad yet proud hour has arrived. Sisters, smiling through their tears, filled with commingled pride and sorrow, kiss and embrace their great hero.

The mother, with calm heroism suppressing her tender maternal grief, impresses upon his lips a fervent, never to be forgotten kiss, presses him to her heart, and resigns him to God, his country and his honor.

The father, last to part, presses his hand, gazes with ineffable love into his bright eyes, and fearing to trust his feelings for a more lengthy farewell, says, ‘Good bye, my boy; God bless you, be a man’ Let those scoff who will; but let them know that such a parting is itself a new and wonderful power, a soul enlarging, purifying and elevating power, worth the danger, toil and suffering of the soldier. The sister’s tears, the father’s words, the mother’s kiss, planted in the memory of that boy will surely bring forth fruit beautiful as a mother’s love.

As he journeys to the camp, how dear do all at home become ! Oh ! what holy tears he sheds! His heart, how tender! Then, as he nears the line, and sees for the first time the realities of war, the passing sick and weary, and the wounded and bloody dead, his soldier spirit is born; he smiles, his chest expands, his eyes brighten, his heart swells with pride; he hurries on, and soon stands in the magic circle around the glowing fire, the admired and loved pet of a dozen true hearts. Is he happy? Aye!

Never before has he felt such glorious, swelling, panting joy. He’s a soldier now! He is put on guard. No longer the object of care and solicitude, he stands in the solitude of the night, himself a guardian of those who sleep.

Courage is his now. He feels he is trusted as a man, and is ready at once nobly to perish in the defence of his comrades.

He marches. Dare he murmur or complain? No; the eyes of all are upon him, and endurance grows silently, till pain and weariness are familiar, and cheerfully borne.

At home he would be pitied and petted; but now he must endure, or have the contempt of the strong spirits around him.

He is hungry. So are others; and he must not only bear the privation, but he must divide his pitiful meal when he gets it with his comrades; and so generosity strikes down selfishness. In a thousand ways he is tried, and that by sharp critics. His smallest faults are necessarily apparent, for, in the varying conditions of the soldier, every quality is put to the test. If he shows the least cowardice he is undone. His courage must never fail. He must be manly and independent, or he will be told he’s a baby, ridiculed, teased and despised. When war assumes her serious dress, he sees the helplessness of women and children, he hears their piteous appeals, and chivalry burns him till he does his utmost of sacrifice and effort to protect and comfort and cheer them.

It is a mistake to suppose that the older men in the army encouraged vulgarity and obscenity in the young recruit; for even those who themselves indulged in these would frown on the first show of them in a boy, and without hesitation put him down mercilessly. No parent could watch a boy as closely as his messmates did and could, because they saw him at all hours of the day and night, dependent on himself alone: and were merciless critics, who demanded more of their protoge than they were willing to submit to themselves.

The young soldier’s piety had to perish ignominiously, or else assume a boldness and strength which nothing else could so se well impart as the temptations, sneers and dangers of the army. Religion had to be bold, practical and courageous, or die.

In the army the young man learned to value men for what they were, and not on account of education, wealth or station and so his attachments when formed were sincere and durable, and he learned what constitutes a man, and a desirable and reliable friend. The stern demands upon the boy, and the unrelenting criticisms of the mess, soon bring to mind the gentle forbearance, and kind remonstrance, and loving counsels of parents and homefolks, and while he thinks, he weeps, and loves, and reverences, and yearns after the things against which he once strove and under which he chafed and complained.

Home, father, mother, sister — oh! how dear. Himself how contemptible! ever to have felt cold and indifferent to such love. Then, how vividly he recalls the warm pressure of his mother’s lips on the forehead of her boy. How he loves his mother! See him as he fills his pipe from the silk embroidered bag. There is his name embroidered carefully, beautifully by his sisters hand. Does he forget her? Does he not now love her more sincerely and truly and tenderly than ever? Could he love her quite as much had he never parted, never longed to see her and could not; never been uncertain if she was safe, never felt she might be homeless, helpless, insulted, a refugee from home? Can he ever now look on a little girl and not treat her kindly, gently and lovingly — remembering his sister? A boy having ordinary natural goodness, and the home supports described, and the constant watching of men, ready to criticise, could but improve. The least exhibition of selfishness, cowardice, vulgarity, dishonesty, or meanness of any kind, brought down the dislike of every man upon him, and persistence in any one disreputable practice, or habitual laziness and worthlessness, resulted in complete ostracism loneliness and misery; while on the other hand he might, by good behavior and genuine generosity and courage, secure unbounded love and sincere respect from all. Visits home, after prolonged absence and danger, open to the young soldier new treasures — new, because, though possessed always, never before felt and realized.

The affection once seen only in every day attention, as he reaches home, breaks out in unrestrained vehemence. The warm embrace of the hitherto dignified father, the ecstatic pleasure beaming in the mother’s eye, the proud welcome of the sister, and the wild enthusiasm even of the old black mammy, crowd on him the knowledge of their love and make him braver, and stronger, and nobler. He’s a hero from that hour! Death for these how easy!! The dangers of the battle field, and the demands upon his energy, strength and courage, not only strengthen, but almost create new faculties of mind and heart. The death, sudden and terrible, of those dear to him, and the imperative necessity of standing to his duty while the wounded cry and groan, and while his heart yearns after them to help them, and the terrible thirst, and hunger, and heat, and weariness — all these teach a boy self denial, attachment to duty, and the value of peace and safety; and instead of hardening him, as some suppose they do, make him to pity and love even the enemy of his country who bleeds and dies for his country.

The acquirement of subordination certainly is a useful one, and that the soldier perforce has. And that not in an abject, cringing way, but as realizing the necessity of it, and seeing the result of it in the good order and consequent effectiveness and success of the army as a whole, but more particularly of his own company and detachment.

And if the soldier rises to office, the responsibility of command, attention to detail and minutiae, the critical eyes of his subordinates, and the demands of his superiors, all withdraw him from the enticements of vice, and mould him into a solid, substantial character, both capable and willing to meet and overcome difficulties.

The effect of outdoor life on the physical constitution is undoubtedly good, and as the physical improves, the mental is improved; and as the mind is enlightened, the spirit is enabled to grasp the purifying truths of the gospel, and thus the whole man is benefited.

Who can calculate the benefit derived from the contemplation of the beautiful in nature, as the soldier sees? Mountains and valleys, dreary wastes and verdant fields, rivers, sequestered homes, stirred by the sounds of war; quiet, sleepy villages, as they lay in the morning light, doomed to the flames at evening: this enlarges the mind, and stores it with a panorama whose pictures he may pass before his mental vision with quiet pleasure year after year for a lifetime.

War is horrible, but still it is in a sense a privilege to have lived in time of war. The emotions are never so stirred as then. Imagination takes her highest flights, poetry blazes, song stirs the soul, and every noble attribute is brought into full play.

It does seem that the production of one Lee and one Jackson is worth much blood and treasure, and the building of a noble character all the toil and sacrifice of war. The camp fires of the Army of Northern Virginia were not places of revelry and debauchery. They often exhibited gentle scenes of love and humanity, and the purest sentiments and gentlest feelings of man were there admired and loved, while vice and debauch, in any, from highest to lowest, were condemned and punished more severely than they are among those who stay at home and shirk the dangers and toils of the soldier’s life. Indeed, the demoralizing effects of the late war were far more visible ‘at home’ among the skulks, and bombproofs, and suddenly diseased, than in the army.

And the demoralized men of today are not those who served in the army.

The defaulters, the renegades, the bummers and cheats, are the boys who enjoyed fat places and salaries and easy comfort while the solid, respected and reliable men of the community are those who did their duty as soldiers, and having learned to suffer in war have preferred to labor and suffer and earn rather than steal in peace.

And, strange to say, it is not those who suffered most and lost most, who fought and bled — who saw friend after friend fall, who wept the dead and buried their hopes — it is not these who now are bitter and dissatisfied, and quarrelsome and fretful, and growling and complaining — no, they are the peaceful, submissive, law abiding and order loving of the country, ready to join hands with all good men in every good work, and prove themselves as brave and good in peace as they were stubborn and unconquerable in war.

Many a weak, puny boy was returned to his parents a robust, healthy, manly man. Many a timid, helpless boy went home a brave, independent man. Many a wild, reckless boy, went home sobered, serious and trustworthy, and many whose career at home was wicked and blasphemous, went home changed in heart, with principles fixed, to comfort and sustain the old ages of those who gave them to their country, expecting not to receive them again. Men learned that life was passable and enjoyable without a roof or even a tent, to shelter from the storm — that cheerfulness was compatible with cold and hunger, and that a man without money, food or shelter, need not feel utterly hopeless, but might, by employing his wits, find something to eat where he never found it before; and feel that, like a terrapin, he might make himself at home wherever he might be. Men did actually become as independent of the imaginary ‘necessities’ as the very wild beasts. And can a man learn all this and not know better than another how to economize what he has and how to appreciate the numberless superfluities of life? Is he not made, by the knowledge he has of how little he really needs, more independent and less liable to dishonest exertions to procure a competency?

If there were any true men in the South, any brave, any noble, they were in the army. If there are good and true men in the South now, they would go into the army for similar cause. And to prove that the army demoralized, you must prove that the men who came out of it are the worst in the country today. Who will try it?

Strange as it may seem, religion flourished in the army. So great was the work of the chaplains, that whole volumes have been written to describe the religious history of the four years of war. Officers who were ungodly men found themselves restrained alike by the grandeur of the piety of the great chiefs and the earnestness of the humble privates around them.

Thousands embraced the Gospel, and died triumphing over death! Instead of the degradation so dreaded, was the strange ennobling and purifying which made men despise all the things for which they ordinarily strive, and glory in the sternest hardships, the most bitter self denials and cruel suffering and death. Love for home, kindred and friends intensified, was denied the gratification of its yearnings, and made the motive for more complete surrender to the stern demands of duty. Discipline, the cold master of our enemies, never caught up with the gallant devotion of our Christian soldiers, and the science of war quailed before the majesty of an army singing hymns.

Hypocrisy went home to dwell with the able bodied skulkers, being too closely watched in the army and too thoroughly known to thrive. And so the camp fire often lighted the pages of the best Book, while the soldier read the orders of the Captain of his salvation.

And often did the songs of Zion ring loud and clear on the cold night air, while the muskets rattled and the guns boomed in the distance, each intensifying the significance of the other, testing the sincerity of the Christian while trying the courage of the soldier.

Stripped of all sensual allurements, and offering only self denial, patience and endurance, the Gospel took hold of the deepest and purest motives of the soldiers, won them thoroughly, and made the army as famous for its forbearance, temperance, respect for women and children, sobriety, honesty and morality, as it was for endurance and invincible courage.

Never was there an army where feeble old age received such sympathy, consideration and protection; and women, deprived of their natural protectors, fled from the advancing hosts of the enemy and found safe retreat and chivalrous protection and shelter in the lines of the Army of Northern Virginia; while children played in the camps, delighted to nestle in the arms of the roughly clad but tender hearted soldiers. Such was the behavior of the troops on the campaign in Pennsylvania, that the citizens of Gettysburg have in my presence expressed wonder and surprise at their perfect immunity from insult, violence, or even intrusion when their city was occupied by and in complete possession of the Boys in Gray.

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. I. Richmond, Virginia., February, 1876. No. 2
Camp Fires Of The Boys In Gray.

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To read first-hand accounts of what life was like for the Civil War soldier read:

The Soldier’s Pen: Firsthand Impressions of the Civil War by Robert Bonner.

The courage and devotion of the men rose equal to every hardship and privation, and the very intensity of their sufferings became a source of merriment. Instead of growling and deserting, they laughed at their own bare feet, ragged clothes and pinched faces, and weak, hungry, cold, wet, worried with vermin and itch, dirty, with no hope of reward or rest, but each fighting on his own personal account, needing not the voice of any to urge them on, marched cheerfully to meet the well fed and warmly clad hosts of the enemy.

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. II. Richmond, Virginia, September, 1876. No. 3.
Detailed Minutiae Of Soldier Life In The Army Of Northern Virginia.

The Scribe was a wonderful fellow and very useful. He could write a two hours pass, sign the captain’s name better than the captain himself, and endorse it ‘respectfully forwarded approved,’ sign the colonel’s name after ‘respectfully forwarded approved’ and then on up to the commanding officer. And do it so well! Nobody wanted anything better. The boys had a great veneration for the scribe, and used him constantly.

Southern Historical Society Papers.
Vol. I. Richmond, Virginia., February, 1876. No. 2
Camp Fires Of The Boys In Gray.

The 8th Arkansas fought for Govan’s Brigade, Cleburne’’s Division at Franklin.  Four known-dead are buried at McGavock Cemetery. The Captain of the 8th Arkansas, Samuel L. McAllester was captured at Franklin. The colors of the 8th, below, were presented to the 8th by the women of Jacksonport, Arkansas in the summer of 1862.

There is a golden embroidered inscription in the center of the flag that reads, “March on! March on! All hearts are resolved on victory or death!”

The boys of the 8th Arkansas marched this flag into the Federal line just west of the Cotton Gin as they took fire from the 104th Ohio and the 6th Ohio Battery.

Picture credit: Arms and Equipment of The Confederacy (p. 25

The 29th AL faced the Union left flank of Casement’s Brigade on the Federal line at Franklin. The 29th was part of Cantley’s Brigade, Walthall’s Division, on the eastern Union flank.

Here is Crew’s kepi he wore in the war, including at Franklin.

Picture credit: Arms and Equipment of the Confederacy (p. 163)

At least six of Crew’s comrades are known to be buried at McGavock Cemetery. One can only wonder how may young men from Alabama were buried after the Battle of Franklin with kepis on their head just like this one.

The 8th Arkansas fought for Govan’s Brigade, Cleburne’’s Division at Franklin.  Four known-dead are buried at McGavock Cemetery. The Captain of the 8th Arkansas, Samuel L. McAllester was captured at Franklin. The colors of the 8th, below, were presented to the 8th by the women of Jacksonport, Arkansas in the summer of 1862.

There is a golden embroidered inscription in the center of the flag that reads, “March on! March on! All hearts are resolved on victory or death!”

The boys of the 8th Arkansas marched this flag into the Federal line just west of the Cotton Gin as they took fire from the 104th Ohio and the 6th Ohio Battery.

Picture credit: Arms and Equipment of The Confederacy (p. 25

Military records show that seven young men with the last name Fincher served with the 43rd GA, all in Company I.

Eyewitness to the Civil War (p. 91)  shows the picture below and the caption reads Fincher brothers.

Some of these Fincher boys made it o Franklin and survived the battle, we’re just not sure if these pictured were ones or not.

We’ve added this picture to show an example of the Georgia 43rd uniforms they wore.

It was Carrie Winder McGavock, wife of John, who spearheaded the Good Samaritan operation of mercy that last evening of November 1864. She personally supervised the logistics of the effort and sacrificed much food, clothing and supplies to care for the wounded and dying. When she arose to make breakfast in the morning witnesses say her dress was soaked at the bottom with bloodstains. At least 150 Confederate soldiers died the first night at Carnton.

The smell of blood, wounds, infection and death was horrible. The visual scenes must have been indescribable as well. Carries two surviving children, Hattie (age nine) and Winder (age seven) served as medical aides throughout the evening as well.

Source: excerpted from the Wikipedia article (authored by Tellinghistory, the owner of this blog site)

The 14th MS fought with Adams’s Brigade, Loring’s Division. The 14th faced heavy casualties near the Cotton Gin. As the 14th MS assaulted the Union line at the Gin, the colors displayed a picture of Lady Liberty holding a picture of Jefferson Davis.

The 14th also fought with: 6th, 15th, 20th, 23dand 43d Mississippi regiments. Many boys from the 14th MS are buried at McGavock. One wonder show many young men and boys saw this flag emblem in the final moments of their lives as the died on the Franklin battlefield.

There are at least ten young men from the 14th MS buried at McGavock Cemetery.

There’s a fascinating story behind this particular emblem/patch see below. Color Bearer Andrew S. Payne of the 14th Mississippi cut this emblem away from the rest of the flag when the 14th surrendered at Ft. Donelson and sewed the patch into the interior lining of his coat to keep it from falling into Federal hands. When Payne and his fellow comrades were paroled in October 1862 he returned the shield to his regiment.

Picture credit: An Illustrated History of the Civil War, (p. 136).

A People at War: Civilians and Soldiers in America’s Civil War
Scott Reynolds Nelson and Carol Sheriff
Oxford University Press, 2007

Publisher’s description:
Claiming more than 600,000 lives, the American Civil War had a devastating impact on countless numbers of common soldiers and civilians, even as it brought freedom to millions. This book shows how average Americans coped with despair as well as hope during this vast upheaval.

A People at War brings to life the full humanity of the war’s participants, from women behind their plows to their husbands in army camps; from refugees from slavery to their former masters; from Mayflower descendants to freshly recruited Irish sailors. We discover how people confronted their own feelings about the war itself, and how they coped with emotional challenges (uncertainty, exhaustion, fear, guilt, betrayal, grief) as well as physical ones (displacement, poverty, illness, disfigurement). The book explores the violence beyond the battlefield, illuminating the sharp-edged conflicts of neighbor against neighbor, whether in guerilla warfare or urban riots. The authors travel as far west as China and as far east as Europe, taking us inside soldiers’ tents, prisoner-of-war camps, plantations, tenements, churches, Indian reservations, and even the cargo holds of ships. They stress the war years, but also cast an eye at the tumultuous decades that preceded and followed the battlefield confrontations.

An engrossing account of ordinary people caught up in life-shattering circumstances, A People at War captures how the Civil War rocked the lives of rich and poor, black and white, parents and children–and how all these Americans pushed generals and presidents to make the conflict a people’s war.

Table of Contents
Introduction: A People at War
FROM COMPROMISE TO CHAOS: 1854-1861
1. The Road to Bleeding Kansas
2. From Wigwam to War
THE CHANGING FACES OF WAR: 1861-1863
3. Friends and Foes: Early Recruits and Freedom’s Cause, 1861-1862
4. Union Occupation and Guerilla Warfare
5. Facing Death
POLITICAL, MILITARY, AND DILPOMATIC REMEDIES: 1862-1865
6. Two Governments Go to War: Southern Democracy and Northern Republicanism
7. Redefining the Rules of War: The Lieber Code
8. Diplomacy in the Shadows: Cannons, Sailors, and Spies
THE WAR HITS HOME: 1861-1865
9. We Need Men: Union Struggles over Manpower and Emancipation
10. The Male World of the Camp: Domesticity and Discipline
11. “Cair, Anxiety, & Tryals”: Life in the Wartime Union
12. War’s Miseries: The Confederate Home Front
REBUILDING THE NATION: 1865-1877
13. A Region Reconstructed and Unreconstructed: The Postwar South
14. A Nation Stitched Together: Westward Expansion and the Peace Treaty of 1877
Acknowledgements
Political Chronology
Military Chronology
Suggestions for Further Reading
Index

The Battle of Franklin (November 30, 1864) brought a huge problem to the little town of Franklin, TN, with its population in 1860 of just over 900 residents. Almost 2,500 soldiers, North and South, were lying dead on the fields of farmers like Fountain Branch Carter and James McNutt. When the Franklin residents awoke on the morning of December 1st, the sleepy Southern town’s first concern was what to do with the nearly 1,750 Confederate boys who were killed.

Source: excerpted from the Wikipedia article (authored by Tellinghistory, the owner of this blog site)

Mathew Brady photograph, Antietam Confederate dead laid out in rows before burial. The dead at Franklin probably looked very similar to this picture.

Letter from an unidentified Union soldier of the 9th Indiana Infantry, Company K.

Undated letter reads in part

“I received orders early in the morning to cook three days rations and prepare for marching. There is considerable sickness in the army here. But no more or hardly as much as would naturally be expected. I am sitting under a little bower that McNeal, Himman and I have fixed up for our special comfort and can see the burying ground that is used by several Regiments, and I can see the boys now digging two graves, and I guess there average one burial a day. It is a solemn right to witness, a burial in the army. The burying ground is only a few rods from our camp and we can see or hear every one. The first that we hear is slow and plaintive tones of the martial bands then the slow and measured tread of a long line of soldiers and next we can see them winding their way through the woods. (it is all woody here) bearing the brave and honored child of Liberty and lover of his Country to his endless home, with the good Old Flag wrapped about him and then after he is laid to rest, the prayer has been made, the guard fired their farewell shot, we return to our duties and leave him with the honored dead.”

The 9th Indiana Infantry was engaged at Camp Alleghany, Shiloh, Corinth, Perryville, Stone’s River, Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain, Franklin and Nashville.

Source: Nate Sanders, July 2007

John Neil Mcleod
Chaplain of the 84th New York Infantry

Camp Paulding, Baltimore
9 July 1863,

Excerpt

“The mustering officer of the N.S. came here today to muster the men in, the process was solemn. First they took their names and ages, then the whole mass were ordered to take off their hats, hold up their right hands, and take the oath to bear true allegiance to the U.S. etc. The mustering officer was Capt. William Sterling, (Son of Henry Sterling of Philadelphia). He looks very well and is greatly altered for the better. Old Peter stood muster and is now a U.S. soldier. A high private of the 84th. If I detested all forms of Toryism before I detest them more now. It is easy to stay at home and grumble in a corner. But not so easy to suffer wounds, privation and death to serve a great country and cause.  Yesterday 250 of the Regt. were sent to escort 900 rebel prisoners. Alexander had command and it was a very arduous service. They were marched to Fort McHenry, and came near getting up mob in the rebellious streets of Baltimore. Ladies came out in crowds to sympathize with them, and threw all marks of indignity to the Union troops. It was night before they returned to camp.”

Source: Nate Sanders auction, July 2007

Letter from KIA Sergeant Clifford Woods of the 62nd New York Infantry, Company E, or Anderson Zouaves

Harpers Ferry Va

Jan 23rd, 1864

A few months before Woods was killed in action at the Wilderness. 

Since I wrote the enemy have moved down in front of us some eleven thousand strong and are composed of Cavalry and mounted Infantry with some Artillery. Our Artillery was playing upon them (to use a military phrase) all day yesterday. We have been having some very cold weather here…still I never enjoyed better health in my life. I feel very grateful to you and Uncle for your kindness in offering to give me the charge of the farm this coming Summer and yet I hardly know how to answer you for I do want to study as much as I can after my term of service expires which will be on the 30th of June However, I can study through the winter and should be very much pleased to do the best I can for you on the farm until that time. Aunt Melissa, this is the holy Sabbath and how I wish I were with you away from these scenes of profanity, vulgarity, and bloodshed. ‘Our Heavenly Father give me grace and strength to resist temptations and do my whole duty in a right manner is my daily prayer‘ but oh, it is hard to do this and resist evils.

Late in 1863, the 62nd New York Infantry fought in the Mine Run campaign before heading into winter quarters. During Woods’ three years’ service, the regiment also engaged at Yorktown, Williamsburg, Fair Oaks, the Seven Days Battles and Gettysburg. Woods mustered into service on 3 July 1861. He was killed at the Wilderness on 6 May 1864.

Source: eBay, June 2007

Soldier’s identity:

Residence was not listed; 18 years old.

Enlisted on 5/1/1861 at New York City, NY as a Private.

On 7/3/1861 he mustered into “C” Co. NY 62nd Infantry
He was Killed on 5/6/1864 at Wilderness, VA

Promotions:
* Corpl 12/1/1861
* Sergt 1/8/1864

Intra Regimental Company Transfers:
* 8/15/1861 from company C to company E (Estimated Day)

When Quarles’ Brigade reached the Federal line on November 30th, it would not break. Many of the Confederates fell back and as they did several regiments lost their colors. Capt. George V. Kelley captured the colors of the 1st Alabama during the action. The Confederates would lose at least 20 colors at Franklin at the hands of the 23 Corps.

Section 72 Alabama has six identified 1st AL soldiers buried here (plots #61-64, 66 and 73). Section 73 Alabama has seven identified buried (plots #81-88).
There are also 1st AL soldiers buried in Sections 75, 76. In total, there are 19 known 1st AL soldiers buried at McGavock. No doubt some of these men lost their lives as the colors were captured by the 104th Ohio and Captain Kelley.

Picture credit: Portraits of Conflict: A Photographic History of Tennessee in the Civil War, McCaslin, 2007: p. 241.

Resources on the 1st Alabama

• McMorries, Edward Young. History of the First Regiment, Alabama Volunteer Infantry, C.S.A. (Montgomery : Brown Printing Co., 1904 [reprinted, Freeport, NY : Books for Libraries Press, 1970])
• Partin, Robert. “Report of a Corporal of the Alabama First Infantry on Talk and Fighting Along Mississippi, 1862-63,” in Alabama Historical Quarterly, XX, no. 4 (Winter, 1958), 583-594
• “The pioneer banner : a Confederate camp newspaper,” in Alabama Historical Quarterly, XXIII, no. 3-4 (Fall-Winter, 1961), 211-219 [includes Co. "A" muster roll]
• Rogers, William Warren, “The Escape of Melvin Thornton from Camp Butler, Illinois,” in Alabama Historical Quarterly, XXIII, no. 3-4 (Fall-Winter, 1961), 220-230
• Rumph, Catherine Elizabeth (Hixon), “Reminiscence of Perote in Bullock,” in Alabama Historical Quarterly, XX, no. 3 (Fall, 1959), 479-522 [includes, "The History of the Perote Gurds Flag," pp. 504-508]
• Rumph, Langdon Leslie, “Letters of a teenage Confederate,” in Florida Historical Quarterly Review, XXXVIII (April 1960), 339-346
• Smith, Daniel P. Company K, First Alabama Regiment, or, three years in the Confederate service (Philadelphia : Burke & McFetridge, 1885 [reprinted, Gaithersburg, MD : Butternut Press, 1984; contains regimental muster roll])
• Thornton, Harry Innes, “Recollection of the war by a Confederate officer from California,” in Southern California Quarterly, XLV (Sept 1963), 195-218
• Thornton, Melvin, “The Escape of Melvin Thornton from Camp Butler, Illinois” in Alabama Historical Quarterly, XXIII, no. 3-4 (Fall-Winter, 1961), 220-230

Manuscript Resources

• Dent, Stouten Hubert [1st Lt., Co. "B"]. Papers, in Auburn University, Archives and Special Collections Dept., RG 86
• Parker, John M. [Co. "G"] Civil War Letters, 1861-1862 in Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, VA, Accession #13240
• Partin, Robert. Papers [includes collected research materials], in Auburn University, Archives and Special Collections Dept., RG 448

The sun goes down early in late November in Williamson County, Tennessee. The Battle of Franklin (Nov 30, 1864) was fought mostly from 4:00 to 9:00 pm. It was a beautiful Indian Summer day - around 50 degrees that day - but the sun started setting around 4:30 in the late afternoon. By 5:30 it was dark.

The most intense fighting on the Union line and breastworks would have taken place in the evening, from 6 til 9pm. There was close hand-to-hand fighting at Franklin, especially around the Fountain Branch Carter home and his cotton gin. One can only imagine the incredible scene of desperate carnage that could be seen only as musket fire flared, temporarily giving a brief flash of fire.

Frank Leslie’s Illustrated has a picture of night fighting during a “night attack on the Federal forces under Major Bowen, Occupying Salem, Mo., by the Confederate forces under Colonel Freeman, December 11th, 1861.”

What this Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War
By Chandra Manning
Knopf, 2007

Publishers description:

A vivid, unprecedented account of why Union and Confederate soldiers identified slavery as the root of the war, how the conflict changed troops’ ideas about slavery, and what those changing ideas meant for the war and the nation.

Using soldiers’ letters, diaries, and regimental newspapers, Chandra Manning allows us to accompany soldiers—black and white, northern and southern—into camps and hospitals and on marches and battlefields to better understand their thoughts about what they were doing and why. Manning’s work reveals that Union soldiers, though evincing little sympathy for abolitionism before the war, were calling for emancipation by the second half of 1861, ahead of civilians, political leaders, and officers, and a full year before the Emancipation Proclamation. She recognizes Confederate soldiers’ primary focus on their own families, and explores how their beliefs about abolition—that it would endanger their loved ones, erase the privileges of white manhood, and destroy the very fabric of southern society—motivated even non-slaveholding Confederates to fight and compelled them to persevere through military catastrophes like Gettysburg and Atlanta, long after they grew to despise the Confederate government and disdain the southern citizenry. She makes clear that while white Union troops viewed preservation of the Union as essential to the legacy of the Revolution, over the course of the war many also came to think that in order to gain God’s favor, they and other white northerners must confront the racial prejudices that made them complicit in the sin of slavery. We see how the eventual consideration of the enlistment of black soldiers by the Confederacy eliminated any reason for many Confederate soldiers to fight; how, by 1865, black Union soldiers believed the forward racial strides made during the war would continue; and how white Union troops’ commitment to racial change, fluctuating with the progress of the war, created undreamt-of potential for change but failed to fulfill it.

About the Author

Chandra Manning, a graduate of Mount Holyoke College, received an M.Phil from the National University of Ireland, Galway, and took her Ph.D. at Harvard in 2002. She has lectured in history at Harvard and taught at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington. Currently, she is assistant professor of history at Georgetown University and lives in Alexandria, Virginia, with her husband and son. This is her first book.

George W. Williams was born in 1840 at [Leonard] Williams’ Ferry, Nacogdoches County, The Republic of Texas.

George W. Williams enlisted as a Private in the Waco Guards, Waco, Texas, on 01 October 1861. The Waco Guards and eight other companies were recruited by John Gregg to form the 7th Texas Infantry. The 7th Texas Infantry was mustered into Confederate service on 02 October 1861 in Marshall, Texas, and almost immediately removed to Hopkinsville, Kentucky. The Waco Guards were assigned as Company A of the 7th Texas Infantry Regiment on 10 November 1861 at Hopkinsville, Kentucky.

George W. Williams served more than 36 months in the 7th Texas Infantry Regiment; 10 November 1861 to 30 November 1864. He was killed in action at the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee, on 30 Nov 1864.

George W. Williams was listed as:

• age 21 when the Waco Guards was assigned as Company A of the 7th Texas Infantry
• captured at the Battle of Ft. Donelson, Tennessee, 16 Feb 1862
• imprisoned at Camp Douglas [Chicago], Illinois, circa Feb - Sept 1862
• exchanged at Vicksburg, Mississippi, on 16 September 1862
• missing on 12 May 63 in Raymond, Mississippi; apparently returned to the company shortly after
• killed in action at the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee, 30 Nov 1864.

George W. Williams is buried in Grave 31, Section 3, McGavock Confederate Cemetery on Carnton Plantation, Franklin, Williamson County, Tennessee.

While he was in service, the 7th Texas Infantry regiment participated in the following battles which had a direct impact on the course of the war and / or a decisive influence on a campaign

• Fort Donelson, Tennessee, 12 - 16 February 1862
• Raymond, Mississippi, 12 May 1863
• Jackson, Mississippi, 14 May 1863
• Chickamauga, Georgia, 19 - 20 September 1863
• Missionary Ridge [Tunnell Hill], Tennessee, 25 November 1863
  part of Battle of Chattanooga, Tennessee, 23 - 25 Nov 1863
• Ringgold Gap [Taylor's Ridge], Georgia, 27 November 1863
• Gilgal Church, Georgia, 15 June 1864
  part of Battle of Marietta, Georgia, 09 June - 03 July 1864
• Atlanta, Georgia, 21- 22 July 1864
• Jonesboro, Georgia, 31 August - 1 September 1864
• Spring Hill, Tennessee, 29 November 1864
• Franklin, Tennessee, 30 November 1864 [KIA]

Source: posting on a web site by a relative of Williams

He is buried in South Carolina section #86, plot #50 at McGavock Confederate Cemetery.

“Arthur Manigault’s Brigade endured a night of horrors. Barely after reaching the front line the unit met a ravine too deep to cross and it was forced to move around to the right. After the men swung back to the left and were finally ordered forward again, word came that Gen. Manigault had fallen dangerously wounded. Command of the Brigade fell upon Col. Newton N. Davis of the 24th Alabama, but soon he was wounded. Col. Thomas Thomas P. Shaw of the 19th Carolina was the next to be shot down. The troops, almost leaderless and stumbling around in the dark, were under fire from front and flank. “
[For Cause and For Country, Jacobson: p. 404]

Hattie was just nine years old as she flagged her mother, Carrie, the evening of November 30, 1864, as Carrie - the Good Samaritan of Franklin - tended the wounded and dying Confederate soldiers at Carnton. Carrie’s story is now immortalized in the blockbuster-selling novel by Robert Hicks, The Widow of the South.

Hattie is buried in Mt. Hope Cemetery.  She married George Cowan in 1884 when she was 29.

Author and historian Eric A. Jacobson (For Cause and Country) recently made this comment:

The attack by Edward Johnson’s Division is often overlooked or forgotten, or mentioned almost as a footnote, in studies of Franklin. Sadly through the years even the division’s formation as it attacked had been mangled. By studying what information is available (unfortunately Johnson nor any of his brigade or regimental commanders ever filed reports) the proper formation of Johnson’s Division is now known with near certainty. Like Brown’s Division, Johnson’s Division had four brigades and moved forward with a two brigade front and two in reserve. On the right front was Zachariah Deas; on the left was Jacob Sharp. In reserve was William Brantley on the left; Arthur Maniagult on the right.

As the division advanced Brantley was moved to the left front, giving Johnson a three brigade front. A similar effort was made to move Manigault to the left front, but everything fell apart before that happened. As a result Brantley was horribly exposed on his left flank (it was effectively up in the air) and his men suffered grievous casualties. His brigade alone absorbed forty percent of the division’s total casualties.

Manigault’s Brigade suffered the fewest casualties in the division, but may have had the most difficult time maneuvering. Manigault’s men were being shifted under fire and well placed bullets took out the brigade’s three ranking commanders. In the darkness and confusion, and with the rest of the division being pounded, there was little Manigault’s men could so.

Interesting to note that Henry Clayton, whose division was formed up and ready to attack following Johnson, but was subsequently ordered not to, said “night mercifully interposed to save us from the terrible scourge which our brave companions had suffered.”

The McGavock Confederate Cemetery: A Revised and Updated Compilation
Eric A. Jacobson, 2007

Book description:

A book detailing the complex story of the McGavock Confederate Cemetery is long overdue. The manner in which the cemetery was organized and maintained by private means has a much broader scope than ever before realized. The facts presented are remarkable, allowing the reader to witness firsthand how the cemetery became such an integral part of Civil War history. Life is breathed into the shadows of the cemetery’s past. Additionally, the names of the Confederate soldiers buried there are known to only a very few and this book allows the reader to learn just who those men were. Never before has such an accurate compilation been published. Historians and genealogists will find this book a much-needed addition to Civil War literature. Modern-day descendants of those buried in the cemetery will find the book invaluable. Essential to anyone studying the Battle of Franklin.

Author’s web site

William Martin fought for the 65th Georgia Infantry, Company G, in the Gist Brigade. Martin is buried in the Georgia Section #80 at McGavock Confederate Cemetery, plot #53.

Writing about the 65th Georgia at Franklin, Jacobson says:

“Captain William G. Foster of the 65th Georgia managed to get his regiment’s flag on top of the enemy’s works, but the staff was shot in two and the banner fell to the earth.. Foster determinedly picked it up and battled on. A participant said it was the most desperate fighting imaginable… Lt. Col. Isaac Sherwood of the 11th Ohio faced the storm and remembered vividly how the line to his left was broken and the troops there were forced back in confusion [For Cause and For Country; p. 332].

Some Confederates managed to survive the bloodbath at Franklin being captured.  The two soldiers on the left prisoners of war casualties at Franklin.

L/R are Charles H. Bailey (49th TN), Edmond R. Read (49th TN), and Charles D. Shanklin (23rd TN, did not fight at Franklin).

The 49th TN had 129 effective fighting men at Franklin. 20 were killed, 36 wounded and 36 were missing (either killed or captured).  At least eight identified 49th boys rest in McGavock.  The 49th TN was part of Quarles’ Brigade.

Picture credit: Portraits of Conflict: A Photographic History of Tennessee in the Civil War, McCaslin, 2007: p. 242.

New York

Aug 27th, 1862

Excerpted

Mr. Varker thinks that there will no drafting done but his thoughts about it did not keep me from coming. It was because it looked too much like a coward and rather than to be called a coward, I would remain even if there was danger of being drafted. It is but for nine months at any rate it is no weak cause, no disgraceful one. I am willing to give myself to my Country, that Country for which my fathers bled and if necessary let my blood be shed. It is for no disgraceful cause but it would be an honorable death to die.

There seems to be but a short distance to the Christian between the battlefield and heaven. Why then should we so dread to go? But it is a solemn subject. It is a serious matter. Many are gone unprepared and many must fall the same. Let us weigh the matter well and be not hasty. I will not lengthen on this subject. I am willing to go, willing to remain and risk the draft but if my parents are opposed I will not go and if it is their wish I will return home. If you wish me to come and if you want anything from the City, some of you had better come and I will return with you.

from William Augustus

I was looking for a marker in McGavock Cemetery this morning when a family came up to me to ask a question.

This was their first time at McGavock. They proudly introduced me to grand-dad, “who was 90 years old today,” Dad, Mom, and their teenage grandson who is planning on becoming a history teacher.

The mother was directly descended from Abraham Lincoln they proudly explained to me.

But what was most interesting was seeing three generations standing before me. What a treasure it must have been for that young teenage boy to walk through McGavock for the very first time with his grandfather, who was born in 1917!! Thousands of Civil War veterans were still alive when his grandfather was a teenager.

Think about that. This old man, who looked like he was in his 70s, is a living connection between Civil War veterans and a generation of young people who will probably be alive to witness the 200th anniversary of the start of the American Civil War in 2061.

If you know someone alive that is eighty years or older how about talking to them about sitting on grandpa’s lap as a young boy or girl. There’s a good chance” grandpa fought in the Civil War.”

I recently engaged a man in conversation probably in his 50s while he was visiting the McGavock Confederate Cemetery. He was by himself and told me he was from Chicago.

He was balding on top and seemed a bit perturbed.

I discovered this was his first time in Williamson County and at McGavock. Then he blurted out, “Stupid war!”

“All these boys died for nothing.”

I wanted to engage him in a discussion further but I could tell he was not in a great mood.

How sad though.

The American Civil War was not a stupid war. To generally ascribe the reason men and boys fought - on both sides - as stupid is just plain . . . well, stupid!

Try telling that to the almost 1,500 Confederate soldiers buried in McGavock Cemetery that they fought in vain. That their sacrifice didn’t matter? It mattered to William Stone of the 19th South Carolina, and William Martin of the 65th Georgia.

On the contrary. The men who fought and died during the Civil War (1861-1865) fought for many reasons; everything from States’ rights to abolish slavery, and everything in between. To simply dismiss the Civil War as “stupid” minimizes the sacrifice and honor the boys fought for on either side - Confederate or Union.

Mark Twain once said something to this effect, “It ain’t that we know so much. It’s that we know so much that isn’t true.” Case in point . . .

I was sitting inside the Carnton giftshop talking to author and historian Eric A. Jacobson today (6/30/07). We were “talking shop” about the Confederate dead buried in the McGavock Cemetery.

In walked a woman who proceeded to buy her ticket to tour the Carnton home. She overheard our conversation and then remarked to the effect that, “It’s a shame all those boys were buried in mass graves.” Her point was no one knew who the real names of the boys are in the cemetery because she knew for a fact - she read it in a book and on the Internet - that all the soldiers were buried in mass graves.

“Not here!” replied Eric in a kind but firm resolve, trying to penetrate through the dark cloud of ignorance permeating her grey matter. “They weren’t here at Franklin,” referring to the nearly 800 identified young men and boys buried in the McGavock Confederate Cemetery just a 100 yards away from the Carnton gift shop.

The funny thing is that she was insistent and was totally unaware that she was lecturing all of us, including most notably, Eric Jacobson (right), who recently wrote the definitive book on the McGavock Cemetery. It was evem more comical in that Eric’s book - The McGavock Confederate Cemetery (2007) - was prominently displayed right in front of this woman. All she had to do was open up the book and read the names for herself.

Ignorance is not only bliss, it’s also fodder for a blog post.

It was all for a humorous exchange.

Did Eric tell her who he was? No.

But I did ask her what book she got it out of. “Oh”, she said, “that book!” Pointing to a copy of Robert Hicks’ Widow of the South on the table.

Nuff said.

Picture source: Eric spoke at the 2007 Franklin’s Charge at the Cool Springs Marriott.

230 Tennessee Confederate soldiers are recognized as buried at McGavock cemetery. They are contained in sections 51-66.

Quarles’ Brigade had 37 killed: 42nd, 46th, 49th, 53rd and 55th TN.

Gordon’s Brigade had 51 killed; 11th, 12th, 13th, 29th, 47th, 51st, 52nd and the 154th TN.

Strahl’s Brigade had 29 killed; 4th, 5th, 19th, 24th, 31st, 33rd, 38th and 41st.

Carter’s Brigade had 42 killed; 1st, 4th, (prov), 6th, 8th, 9th, 16th, 27th, 28th and 50th TN.

Smith’s Brigade had 3 killed; 2nd, 10th, 15th, 20th, 30th, and 37th TN.

The Tennesse section and marker is at the far left end of the cemetery, just to the left of the entrance to the McGavock family cemetery, and across from the Texas section.

This marker is inscribed with the simple phrase, “gone but not forgotten”. When the almost 1,500 Confederate soldiers were originally interred in McGavock cemetery after the Battle of Franklin (December 1864), almost all of them were identified by temporary markers. Since then we only know the identity of 780 soldiers. Some 558 men are now officially unknown.

This blog is dedicated to all the Confederate soldiers who fell at Franklin in 1864. We are not interested in resurrecting the ‘Lost Cause’ and we don’t approach the Civil War as Neo-Confederates. Rather, by honoring and respecting the lives of the Confederate dead at McGavock, we are saying that our nation continues to heal from the breach that severed North and South almost 150 years ago.

We particularly want to do all we can to remember those soldiers who are identified and buried at McGavock. “Gone but not forgotten.”

James A. Hampton was a member of the 8th TN Infantry (USA), which fought at Franklin.

The 8th Tennessee Infantry fought in the 3rd division, 1st Brigade, led by Brig Gen James A Reilly, at Franklin (Nov 30, 1864).

The 1st Brigade was made up of the 12th and 16th KY, the 100th, 104th and 175th Ohio, and the 8th TN.

The other two brigades fighting with Reilly’s were Casement’s and Stiles.

See a larger map of the 8th’s position at Franklin

Reilly’s brigade was quite active at Franklin capturing eight color flags of the enemy.

“At the main line, Alvah and his Union comrades watched in horror as the men of Wagner’s 2nd & 3rd Brigades were overrun by the advancing Rebel onslaught. It wasn’t too long before Wagner’s men began pouring down the Columbia Pike and up and over the breastworks into the protection of the main Federal line. Strickland and Reilly’s Brigades of the 23rd Army Corps were soon overwhelmed with their comrades and Rebels coming through at almost the exact same time. The tidal wave of fleeing Federals and screaming Rebels caused the front Union regiments in the line to break apart in the confusion. Retreating commanders of Wagner’s brigades yell for their troops to “rally in the rear.” The men of Strickland and Reilly’s Brigades hear this and believe the order is for them too, and fall back also. The Confederates have now penetrated deep into the Union center and have begun to surround the Carter House. Disaster seems loom for the Federal troops.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Report of Maj. Gen. John M. Schofield, U.S. Army,
commanding Army of the Ohio. (on the battle of Franklin)

Brigadier-General Reilly, commanding (temporarily) the Third Division, Twenty-third Corps, maintained his lines with perfect firmness, and captured twenty battle-flags along his parapet.

The Third Division saw 48 killed, 185 wounded, 97 missing at Franklin. Those were the highest casualty numbers for any division in the 23rd Army Corp at Franklin.

According to Jacobsen, For Cause and Country (Ch.8):

“As Opdycke’s men stopped the confederate push west of Columbia Pike, the 12th Kentucky, 16th Kentucky, 175th Ohio, and 8th Tennessee regiments of Reilly’s reserve tried to do the same to the east. After the 1st Kentucky Battery and the front line had been overrun, the men of these four regiments moved forward, the Kentuckians in the lead. Several of Opdycke’s Illinois regiments also helped Reilly’s reserves. Some of the Kentucky companies had Colt Revolving Rifles, and the Confederates were exhausted from their long sprint to the Federal lines. To make matters worse, the Confederates had become disorganized and could not present a coherent line to face this new threat. These reserves managed to drive the Confederates out of the Federal main works east of the Columbia Pike. The Confederate breakthrough was growing smaller.”

Wiley Sword (from pages 223-224):

“About forty yards from Reilly’s works, and nearly in front of the salient at the cotton gin, an ounce of lead, little more than a half inch in diameter and traveling about 1,000 feet per second, found its mark. It was the work of but an instant; a great chasm in Southern history frozen in microseconds. In one shocking moment Pat Cleburne collapsed to the ground, carrying with him perhaps the best hopes of a dying Confederacy’s western army. A lone minie ball had struck just below and to the left of his heart, shredding veins and arteries like tissue paper as it ripped through his body. In a few moments he breathed his last. Pat Cleburne lay dead, his battle saber still grasped firmly in his hand, and his lifeblood soaking the white linen shirt and gray uniform vest with a slowly expanding blotch of crimson. After all the glory and the anguish, it had come to this. Perhaps the South’s most brilliant major general, the “Stonewall Jackson of the West,” his ideas scorned by his president and his competence punished by his commanding general, had been required to lead a suicidal frontal attack like some captain of infantry. Was it God’s decreed fate, or simply man’s stupidity?

More Confederate soldiers from Mississippi lie at McGavock than any other State represented. These boys assume sections 22-50. The number of Mississippi boys reflect the brutal cost paid by Featherston’s and Scott’s brigades as they absorbed Union artillery shelling on the far left Union flank.

The 31st MS regiment has the highest known number of men buried at McGavock, twenty-one. The 31st MS was part of Featherston’s Brigade, BG Winfield S. Featherston, fighting also with the 3rd, 22nd, 31st, 33rd, 40th Miss., 1st Miss., Battalion.

Click here to see a large map of the Battle of Franklin, with an enlarged map of the Eastern flank.

Regarding the action the Mississippi boys saw . . .

Stiles’ and Casement’s men found a thick hedge of osage about fifteen yards south of their position, an almost perfect natural abatis. They went to work cutting some of it down and using the refuse to extend its reach farther west until most of their front was covered by the prickly limbs. Along the line the boys topped the earthen walls with head logs for added protection. . . . Only a fool would attack such a position of strength.

- Patrick Brennan, The Battle of Franklin, North & South magazine, January 2005, Vol. 8., No.1: page 32.

Near the Harpeth River, Major General William Loring’s troops could begin to see the looming Federal line protecting Reilly’s division. Buford’s dismounted troopers and Brigadier General Winfield Featherston’s Mississippians advanced between the river and the Lewisburg Pike, their line bisected by the Central Alabama Railroad. To their left, the Alabamians of Brigadier General Thomas Scott’s brigade had fallen behind as they guide