Part 21

It was early in the morning of the 17th when the march was resumed, and at 9 a. m. we halted in the rear of breastworks, our entire route having been enlivened by the sound of firing, more or less vigorous, indicating a resumption of the days at Spottsylvania and Cold Harbor. Moreover, Massachusetts men do not forget that it is the 17th of June, and noise they had grown to think a regular accompaniment of that illustrious date. We are at the Union left and massed in the rear of the Ninth Corps, under Burnside, and the duty of our Corps is to act as a support of the Ninth if needed. We are about two miles from Petersburg and from many points the city is plainly seen. The cupola of Dinwiddie County Court House will be a target for Union artillery during many coming months. Lying in the breastworks through the day and night, we were exposed to the missiles of the enemy; Lieut Wyman of "H" and Captain Willard Kinsley of "K" as well as others were wounded. Unless he could sleep in the direst confusion there was no closing of the eyelids during this first night in front of Petersburg. In this memorable siege, the 18th of June is a notable date, for then there was concerted action along the entire line, though not in such uniform time and order as General Meade desired. It was a bloody day in which a vigorous effort was made to force the rebel lines before the arrival of help from the Northward. This might have been done earlier in the day, but, before the advance could be made, re-inforcements had arrived to nearly, if not quite, equal the number of the Union soldiers, and General Meade's orders were to hold what had been gained and to fortify immediately. The casualties of the four days, 15th-18th, footed up nearly two thousand killed and more than eight thousand wounded, the charges of this 18th day ending assaults on intrenched positions. The work of the Fifth Corps is thus described by a war correspondent:

[Sidenote: JUNE 18, '64]

"On the left of the Ninth was the Fifth Corps, in the following order of divisions: from right to left--Crawford (3), Griffin (1), Cutler (4), Ayers (2). At early morning the advance was made and the enemy's withdrawal discovered. The Corps then prepared for a new advance, meanwhile keeping up a fierce fire of infantry and artillery. At noon, simultaneously with the attack of the Second Corps, a determined and vigorous advance was made. The ground to be crossed was generally open and cultivated, slightly rolling, and here and there artificially prepared with abatis, as well as naturally defended by undergrowth. The advance was against the south side of the Norfolk Railroad, and was partially, but not fully successful. In the evening again, at the time of Mott's attack in the centre (when the First Maine Heavy Artillery was so badly cut up) Griffin's and Cutler's divisions once more assaulted with great vigor. But here as before the labor was lost. The enemy foiled all our desperate endeavors."

The advance of the First Brigade, Third Division, is made at daybreak and we find the enemy missing. We are passing over surface which was fighting ground yesterday and last night; encountering the dead in both blue and gray, a most gruesome sight, at the same time driving back the rebel skirmishers until we come in sight of the Confederate earthworks, when we halt and throw up works for our own protection. Even danger and death can not wipe out human or, at least, boyish nature. Near the brief halting place are mulberry trees, fairly black with luscious, well ripened fruit, and not even rebel riflemen can keep Yankee berry-pickers out of those tempting branches. We soon advance, however, across a field and towards a railroad-cut some distance ahead of us, and to reach it we have to run the risk of the foe's rifles and cannon, snugly entrenched beyond the cut. We make a rush for this cut and the tumbles that some of the men take in entering it are funny even in battle's din. Colonel Davis's well known avoirdupois gained such momentum in the rapid rush that halting on the brink was quite impossible, and he rolled rapidly down the declivity. There is skirmishing all day and an artillery duel in the afternoon. Just at dark, a rapid movement is made across a ravine and orders are quietly passed that when the Colonel's hat is raised on the point of his sword, we are to rush forward to the edge of a bank, so near and yet so far below the rebel works that they cannot depress their cannon sufficiently to hit us. Officers are summoned later to brigade headquarters where they are informed that there will be a night attack, but, for some reason, changes come in the programme and in a new position we again throw up breastworks. In an exposed condition, we lie in them through the night and are saluted in the morning of Sunday, the 19th, by the enemy's fire at closer range.

[Sidenote: JUNE 19, '64]

The 19th falls on Sunday, though the particular day of the week gives these soldiers very little concern, since each successive twenty-four-hours is only one day more of "smoke and roar and powder-stench" and of this particular interval, General Warren has only the words, "Remained in position. Loss about three hundred." If remaining in position brought such a record as this, what would it have been had there been another effort to advance? The night before had seen very vigorous work in the trenches and men tried to strengthen them against possible attack, and so close were the workman to each other and so emphatic their strokes, George A. Farrar of "E" was wounded in the knee by a pickaxe and was obliged to go to the hospital. Nothing in the world finds more ready and willing workers than the throwing up of breastworks that may be used for defense and, under the spur of hostile missiles, the laziest become most industrious. At such times there are no suggestions that the other fellow ought to do it, but everyone is doing something, if it is no more than loosening earth with a bayonet or case-knife and throwing up the results with a cup or tin-plate, hoping thus to stop a vagrant bullet. Continuous rattle of musketry recalls the noise of the Wilderness and, with the evident skill of the sharpshooters, it behooves everyone to lie low. Writes one poor fellow, somewhat discouraged, "When shall we get through this terrible campaign?" Another says, "The Thirty-ninth is about five hundred yards (others put the distance as low as eighty yards) from the Confederate works and our skirmishers are on a hillside, across a ravine. At nightfall, we begin on the works again." This, doubtless, is the point referred to by Captain Porter, years afterward, when at a reunion of the Regiment, he said, "our skirmishers were among the first to establish the line at what was afterward the Crater, blown up on the 30th of July, 1864, and that line was pushed nearest to the rebel line, not excepting that of Fort Stedman and Fort McGilvery, by twenty yards."

Of the 20th, an officer records, "We worked till two o'clock last night, and turned out at four this morning. The rebel sharpshooters are on the lookout for a man careless enough to show himself. I am twenty-four years old to-day." Another scribe in the same company enters these words, "Wish I were at home to-day for it is our boy's birthday," so closely does the absent soldier keep in heart and mind to the loved ones at the hearthstone. While there is a trend towards the west, General Griffin's Division (First) reaching the Jerusalem plank-road and the Second Corps crossing it, our portion of the Fifth Corps, except as a part of the Brigade moves off to the left to help fill the gap made by the withdrawal of Griffin, remains as before. The 21st varies little from yesterday, men keeping pretty closely to their places, the least exposure bringing attention from the enemy, and men are wounded in spite of all care to the contrary. One of Burnside's colored regiments is digging a traverse out to the picket line. Extreme vigilance continues into the night, through fear of an assault by the enemy, and at about 9 p. m., the most of the Regiment goes on picket. Picket duty on the 22nd requires vigilance, "Yank" and "Reb" exchange compliments whenever opportunity offers and Jonas P. Barden, Company A, is killed. Quite late in the evening, the Regiment is relieved and retires to its former location, the same being not remote from the spot which in a few weeks would be known as the "Crater," and somewhat further to the Union left, opposite prominencies will be called Forts Sedgwick and Mahone, or in army parlance, Forts "Hell and Damnation." It is on this day that the Second Corps suffers one of the severest set backs in its entire history, the enemy succeeding in getting at its left flank, in a manner unprecedented, and in carrying off four cannon and more than two thousand prisoners.

[Sidenote: JUNE 24, '64]

Everyone is learning caution, but there are mortalities still, as with S. B. Harris of "H" who is hit in the head and killed on the 23rd. It is fair to suppose that Union sharpshooters are just as vigilant as their opponents, and that Death visits, with no show of partiality, both blue and gray. As the stay in these advanced trenches has not savored at all of rest, any change seems desirable, hence orders to move early in the morning of the 24th are heard with pleasure and, before daylight, we are off to the left to take the places of Second Corps men who had gone still further to the left, while the Ninth Corps moves into our vacated places. One very careful observer states that we lost our way and had to back and fill, as it were, at one time coming near running into the enemy, who kept up an almost constant shelling during the change. There seems to be less activity among the sharpshooters, for which the soldiers are duly grateful. To-day the original members of the Twelfth Massachusetts, the Fletcher Webster Regiment, long in the Second Brigade of our Division, draw out of line and start for home. The recruits, re-enlisted and drafted men of the Twelfth are to become a part of the Thirty-ninth. The coming into our ranks of one hundred and twenty-five men from the returning Twelfth, is the crowning incident of the 25th. One hundred and six more men are nominally transferred, but they are absent on sick leave, in rebel prisons or elsewhere, and those received to-day, represent about all the real additions to come from our friends who, after three years of arduous labor, are homeward bound. The new position of the Regiment is across the Petersburg & Norfolk Railroad and the depleted condition of the 39th, following the campaign, is evident from the fact that eighteen of the men from the Twelfth Regiment, added to those left in Company C of the Thirty-ninth, called for just forty three rations in the entire company.

It was not lack of excitement which prompted a certain Company A man to a prank which afforded him and his comrades a deal of pleasure, rather was it a desire for something out of the ordinary that, in the midst of this, the severest campaign in the progress of the war, suggested to him a variation. Taking pencil and paper, he wrote, "I should be happy to correspond with any young lady so disposed; address G. W. Cheney, Company A, 39th Regt., M. V. M., Second Brigade, Third Division, Fifth Army Corps, Army of the Potomac." Thinking the idea too good to be kept secret, he read it to the boys around the campfire who were delighted with the plan and he had to write another, couched thus, "I would be pleased to correspond with young ladies, 18 to 22, with view to matrimony." Both of the ads were sent to the Boston Herald and the writer thinks they were the first of the kind ever inserted there. Two weeks later, or after the ads had had time to circulate, the mail brought one hundred and six answers, representing every state then in the Union; long letters, short and pithy ones, some perfumed and embossed; no end of good advice, love, kisses, merry, sporting fun and blessings; it was understood that the Colonel's good wife was quite horrified at seeing the ad and there must have been some uxorious advice to Colonel Davis since, though the next mail had over two hundred letters for the advertisers, they were all destroyed on the pretext that there were no such persons in the Regiment as those addressed. This however did not prevent the enterprising young men doing extensive corresponding over their own names.

The 26th is a quiet day; the 27th has its alarms with prompt response but no attack. Long desired rain fell along towards night, but not enough to satisfy the overheated men and the thirsty earth; so near are pickets of the opposing armies, they could readily converse without raising their voices, but they have not, as yet, reached that degree of familiarity. The 28th, Tuesday, marks a change in the situation in that we move to the front and right and proceed to throw up a line of earthworks, stronger than those already in use with the expectation of thereby affording shelter for suddenly attacked pickets and to better resist any assault of the enemy. The month of June ends with the Corps stretched along the Petersburg line, with the Ninth and Eighteenth at the right and the Second and the Sixth at its left. By seeming common consent, pickets cease firing, though the heavy guns thunder away; evidently both Johnnie and Yankee would like a rest; after extremely hard work, the regimental rolls are got into shape for muster which is had on the 30th; another sign of semi-permanency is the coming up of some of the sutlers who are anxious to resume operations, especially in view of the possible coming of the paymaster. It is in these days that the 1st Massachusetts Heavy Artillery, Second Corps, which received so severe a handling at Harris's Farm, May 19th, yet most manfully held its place, is once more encountered and the ravages of war were never more apparent than in the fact that only three hundred are reported present for duty out of eighteen hundred men who left the defenses in the month of May.

[Sidenote: JULY, '64]

The first third of July, as far as the Thirty-ninth is concerned, is quite uneventful. The comparative quiet that the men are experiencing has become a necessity. The persistent bending of the bow, beginning at the Wilderness, is bringing expected results. The fire of conscious strength, so evident in the earlier encounters of the campaign, is nearly burned out and recent trials of courage and endurance have shown and, future struggles will exhibit, a lacking of that enthusiasm which characterized the early days of May. Human bodies cannot endure everything, their limitations are sooner or later determined and such is the case with these survivors of the terrible exactions so continuously made. General F. A. Walker says, "Men died of flesh wounds which, at another time, would merely have afforded a welcome excuse for a thirty days' sickness leave. The limit of human endurance had been reached." General Grant, in his Memoirs, writes of the situation after the assault on the 18th of June, "I now ordered the troops to be put under cover, and allowed some of the rest which they had so long needed." It is a protraction of this rest that our men are getting in earlier July. From the 1st to the 10th of the month, the diary of General Warren has no entry of greater importance than reference to the building of a redoubt or the development of some plan on paper and, though constant vigilance is evident, there are none of the exposure and tests characteristic of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania.

To supplement the somewhat stilted rations furnished by the commissary department, the sanitary commission is sending in a variety of vegetables, fresh and dried, as well as fruits that are most gratefully received by the men and they are working a great improvement in general health. In our Regiment, appearances begin to resemble those of winter quarters since roll calls, three times a day, are in order, falling-in with guns and equipments. Ground is cleared for inspection and those formal ordeals are had as of old, and guns have to be cleaned up accordingly; prayer-meetings also are resumed. The 4th, usually so noisy at home, is just the reverse in our particular locality, though away off to the right, Butler and Smith fire salutes. In the Fifth Corps, the impression apparently is that we have had noise enough of late. In the evening, the pickets on both sides celebrate a bit with cheers, perhaps in behalf of ancestors who, both North and South, fought for a common cause. The weather continues very hot and mutual forbearance permits the men to stretch their tents as awnings back of the earthworks into which they are ready to tumble instantly, should occasion arise. Heavy details are made of men for labor on a new fort in process of erection to the southwest of our position, to be called, at first, Fort Warren, but later to take the name of our Colonel who, all unconscious of the fact, is rapidly approaching the day of his departure. On the 7th of July the Third Division of the Sixth Corps is detached and, by way of the James and Chesapeake Bay, is sent to Baltimore to head off near Frederick, Maryland, the movement of General Early and his men on Washington. This Confederate officer had been ordered to leave the vicinity of Cold Harbor on the 13th of June, and to proceed towards the Shenandoah Valley for the purpose of making trouble for General David Hunter, who had been operating in that section, Lee evidently thinking that his lessened battle front could afford the withdrawal. A considerable battle followed on the 9th, at Monocacy Junction, where Lew Wallace with a force made up of local militia and certain Ohio one hundred days' men and the Third Division of the Sixth Corps, was able to hold the Confederates long enough to permit the arrival in Washington of the remaining two divisions of the Sixth, the same leaving City Point the night of the 9th, and to successfully repel the rebel assault upon Fort Stevens on the 12th. Considerable effort was necessary to persuade General Grant that any portion of the Confederate army was missing from his front, luckily he was convinced in time to send a sufficient force to Washington to destroy all of Early's expectations.

[Sidenote: JULY 11, '64]

The comparative calm of the first third of July was rudely broken on the 11th. The day had begun much as usual and, from five o'clock in the morning till five-thirty in the afternoon, there was the regular round of camp and other duties when, for some unexplained reason, the enemy began a fierce fire of artillery on our rations-train. As hitherto, nearly all of the shells exploded way back of our lines but one, and a man states distinctly in his diary, "the only one," struck close beside Colonel Davis and, exploding, wounded him so severely that he died very soon afterward, 7 p. m. Private Mentzer of "A," long years later, recalls the sad happening thus: "Streets, tents, stockades, properly aligned; camps, graded and drained; constant discipline, inspections, dress parades, deportment, all better than those of any other regiment I ever saw, tell me that Colonel Davis did his work thoroughly and well. He sat on a rustic seat or bench, talking with a friend (Asst. Surgeon of the Thirteenth), none other near, save a detail of pickets, of whom I was one, just reported at headquarters, when a shell burst and tore his body dreadfully, still he was the commander to the end."

Lieut. J. H. Dusseault, "H," describes the sad event thus:

"The first shot fired, which we were wont to call the five o'clock express, hit a tree about fifty feet in front of our lines, cutting it off some forty feet from the ground; the rebels were really shelling our baggage train, some distance in the rear. Hitting the tree deflected the shell so that it passed downward through the canopy of leaves, arranged for shade above the officers' quarters, and burst under the Colonel, who was sitting cross-legged on a rustic seat with Assistant Surgeon L. W. Hixon of the Thirteenth Massachusetts. Both men were thrown down and the lower part of Colonel Davis' body seemed completely torn to pieces. My own quarters being not more than ten feet away, I was able to see the missile as it passed downward, after striking the tree. I helped pull the Colonel into his pit. His mind was clear and I heard him converse with Lieut. Colonel Peirson to the purport that he would be colonel now. To this Colonel Peirson replied, 'Oh no! You are going to get out of this.' The wounded officer, however, insisted that it was all over with him and he gave certain directions to the Lieut. Colonel saying that he would like to have him recommend Capt. F. R. Kinsley to be Lieut. Colonel and, his passion for details being strong even in death, he named a member of the drum-corps, who had overstayed his leave of absence and wanted him attended to when he returned. He requested also that a letter he had just written to his wife should be mailed and that the circumstances of his death should be added. Dr. Hixon, proclaiming himself also wounded, said he was unable to attend to the dying officer and it is possible that the surgeon of the First Massachusetts Heavy Artillery was called in to help dress the wound. After this he was placed on a stretcher and William S. Sumner of "H" was one of the men who carried him to the rear. As the enemy was shelling the road, they felt obliged to carry him through the woods and the way being very rough, the officer suffering terribly said to the bearers, 'Men, I wish you would take the road, I hate to ask you to do so, but this is terrible.' He died about the time the hospital was reached. A veteran of the Thirteenth Regiment claims to have a piece of the shell which killed Colonel Davis."

At this very time Colonel Davis was president of a court martial at the headquarters of the Third Division and had been there earlier in the day but, as the business in hand was not in proper shape, the court did not convene and its president returned to his Regiment. Had it been in progress, the chances are that our colonel would not have passed out of life as he did. John S. Beck, "C," detailed as a clerk at the court martial, writes thus: "I did not think it was the last time I should ever see him.... I felt very badly about it, for he seemed like a father to me. The boys felt blue enough. I think it will be hard to fill his place. I turned in feeling very sad and downcast."[N]

[Sidenote: JULY 11, '64]

As with Tennyson's Brook, "Men may come and men may go," but the war "goes on." The gallant officer, into whose care the dying colonel committed the Regiment, was fully equal to the task. A member of the famous Fourth Battalion, which served its period of volunteer duty in Fort Warren at the breaking out of the war entirely without compensation, he had been one of the first to volunteer in the Twentieth Massachusetts where he was first lieutenant and adjutant and, captured at Ball's Bluff, had experienced Richmond inhospitality. Then as a staff officer, he had seen the fierce Peninsula campaign along with Generals Dana and Sedgwick. An early selection of Governor Andrew, he was made second to Colonel Davis in the raising of the Thirty-ninth and we have grown pretty well acquainted with him during the preceding months. As close to the enemy at Laurel Hill as he well could be, he was severely wounded and he now takes his promotion with the good will and thorough loyalty of every officer and man under his command. Major Henry M. Tremlett who was still absent on detached service in Boston becomes lieutenant colonel, and Captain F. R. Kinsley of the Somerville Company, "E," succeeds Tremlett as major.