shrapnel shell

From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in January 1864:

A Rebel Shell.

Jas. Townsend, formerly of this village [Seneca Falls], and a member of the 1st New Jersey Battery, has left upon our table a rebel shrapnel shell, which he picked up on the battle-field of Antietam, soon after that fierce and bloody engagement. It is about five inches in length, three inches in diameter, and weighs about four pounds.

We suppose this to be one of the shells shipped to the rebels from New York, by the “loyal leaguers” of the Custom House, those patriotic souls of the Henry B. Stanton … [clipping cut off here]

The Democrat newspapers up in his neck of the woods didn’t like the Elizabeth Cady Stanton – Susan B. Anthony “loyal leaguers”; cady Stanton’s husband, Henry Brewster Stanton, was indeed a Deputy Collector of the Port of New York from 1861 until 1863. The U.S. Custom House in New York City was staffed by political appointees until the late 19th century. The pay was good – Chester A. Arthur made a lot more money as a Collector of Customs than he did as a lawyer.

British General Henry Shrapnel invented the shrapnel shell (see animation).

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the wolf/sheep party

If this war ever ends, I’m going to miss the rhetoric in the Richmond Dispatch. I’m certain … I’m pretty sure sometime in the last three years I’ve read an editorial that maintained Northern Democrats were bigger threats to the South than Black Republicans. The occasion for this editorial, however, was the approaching Democrat convention that would nominate a U.S. presidential candidate and a pronouncement from a Democrat relic, who comes across as a bit of a Rip Van Winkle who after four years woke up to the fact that South really was seceding. This editorial claimed that if Democrat officers and men didn’t volunteer for the Union army, the Northern war effort didn’t stand a chance; Peace Democrats were a bigger threat than Abolition Republicans because they thought that with sweet words everything could be restored to the status quo ante, while ignoring the mayhem the federal military caused throughout the South. The Confederacy would rather fight Abraham Lincoln, who is useful as a combination George III and Pharaoh, whose policies are so destructive that the South will never submit.

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 25, 1864:

The Northern Democracy again.

On the 4th of July, the anniversary of the Declaration of their Independence by the Rebels of ’76, the National Democratic Convention of the United States meets at Chicago, to nominate a candidate for the Presidency. A Congressional Democratic caucus, which lately assembled at Washington, has adopted resolutions disapproving of Lincoln’s emancipation proclamation, and also declaring in favor of such a policy to wards the people of the insurgent States, as is best calculated to bring the war to a close and restore said States to the Union, under the Constitution, with all their constitutional rights unimpaired. It is also announced that the greatest harmony prevails between Democrats and Conservatives.

Amos Kendall, half-length portrait, three-quarters to left (between 1844 and 1860; LOC: LC-USZ62-109899)

‘Methuselah’ thinks South might actually want to break free

This intelligence is not without interest in the Southern Confederacy. Amos Kendall, who lately presided over a conservative meeting in Philadelphia, gravely announced that a suspicion had recently sprung up in his mind that the Confederates really intended to dissolve the Union! We frankly confess that an idea of the same sort has more than once occurred to us since the first blood was shed at Bethel. We have not been able to dismiss the apprehension that permanent alienation of feeling might spring up from the constant bickering of Yankees and Confederates for the last three years. Perhaps it is owing to a despondent temperament, or a natural propensity to looking on the dark side; but, so it is, we have some times found that the constant recurrence of such unfraternal broils as those at Manassas, on the Peninsula, in Northern Virginia, it Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and every other Southern State, might lead ultimately to a separation and dispersion of the whole happy American family. We have at times fancied that we heard the rattle of musketry, the roar of cannon, the groans of the wounded, the sorrowful sighing of captives; that we have seen the pale faces of dead men, the tearful eyes of widows, and whole districts of country, once the garden spots of the earth, changed into a howling wilderness.–We have even dreamed of millions of men being in arms, of a despot at Washington filling dungeons with prisoners; of Southern soldiers tortured and hung; of great battle fields, where twenty or thirty thousand fallen warriors slept their last sleep on earth. All this must have been a dream, engendered by the excited state of the public mind for the last three years, and the crimination and recriminations which have passed between estranged and unnatural brethren. A like effect seems to have been produced upon the venerable Kendall, (now we should think about the age of Methuselah,) and the apparition has been so much like daylight life that he begins, like ourselves, to fear that he is awake, and that all this is not an oppressive nightmare, but a horrid reality.

The National Democrats of the United States have not yet arrived at the sombre and intelligent apprehensions of the melancholy Kendall. They appear to indulge sanguine hopes of the probability of averting that dismal catastrophe, the dissolution of the Union, by such a policy towards the insurgent States as will bring them back in love and confidence to the dear old family hearthstone. They evidently look upon the visions which more or less have visited all men’s minds, of blood, slaughter, desolation, groans, and wailing, as mere phantasmagoria, illusions of the eye and ear — possibly, even forerunners of coming insanity, which may, however, be averted by a judicious course of treatment. They therefore propose a certain “policy,” a “policy”–lovely word, suggestive of everything honest, candid, and above-board — which will soothe and harmonize all conflicting elements and dismiss from the body politic forever those distempered dreams which are now haunting its imagination. They will open the eyes of the wretched sleepers, and enable them to wake up and thank God that all this has been a dream. The mothers, wives, and sisters whose faces are wet with bitter tears, will wake to find their loved ones once more in their warm embrace; the aged father will grasp once more to his heart the manly son who was his pride and hope, and whom in a dream of agony he had seen mangled and dead upon a furious battle field; the captain who had fancied himself in a dismal cell, pining away his life in a hopeless captivity, will wake to breathe once more upon his native sod the free air of heaven. The dry bones of the vision will stand up an exceeding great army, rising from their multitudinous graves as it the last trumpet had sounded, and bearing aloft the celestial banner of the Stars and Stripes. Davis and Lincoln will rush into each other’s loving arms, the inevitable negro will once more return to his appropriate sphere, and — the Democracy will divide the spoils.

Lincoln Statue at Lincoln Summer Home, Washington, D.C. (Carol M. Highsmith, 2008; LOC: LC-DIG-highsm-04089)

the devil the South knows

To dismiss these blissful visions, and come to sober, waking truth, we must say in all sincerity that we regard the Northern Democracy and their “policy” as the worst form of Northern hostility which has been manifested in the war. But for them we should not be where we now are. But for the military chieftains and soldiers of Northern Democracy, who once professed to be the bitter enemies of coercion in every shape and form, the war could not have lasted two months. The Black Republicans proper, unaided by the Democratic element, would have been struck with paralysis before Lincoln had been three months in his seat. At the same time, however, that this “politic” party has given the war its chief impetus in leaders and men, it has professed a policy of peace upon honorable terms, which was far more formidable in its arts than the combined arms of all parties at the North.–There was at one period of the war more danger from its seductive tongue than the brawling and bitter months of Lincoln and his Cabinet. Even now, we would much rather have Lincoln for the President of the United States than the candidate of the Conservative Democracy. Lincoln seems to have been raised up, as was George the Third, to render a restoration of Colonies to their tyrants impossible. If he had pursued the wise and conciliatory measures which the Northern Democracy profess to advocate, “the rebellion” would have been peacefully smothered in its cradle. But his heart has been hardened, like Pharaoh’s; he has gone from bad to worse; he has so trampled upon all law, disregarded all right, and outraged all humanity, that the whole Confederacy has become consolidated in the resolute determination to submit to every form of human suffering rather than return to the detestable embrace of a Government which he has rendered to their minds an embodiment of the Powers of Darkness. So long as he is President, so long as we see the Devil in his proper shape and form, we have nothing to fear; we have only to resist the fiend, and he will flee from us. It is only when the Prince of the infernal regions takes the shape of an angel of light that the faithful are in danger. We must be excused therefore, from wishing success to the Northern Democracy. Let the North stick to its representative man, and not change front in the hour of battle.

Amos Kendall (1789-1869) was an influential journalist and Democrat. After Andrew Jackson was elected in 1828:

In 1829, Kendall was appointed fourth auditor of the United States Department of the Treasury. The following year, Jackson supporters won control of the Washington Globe newspaper in Washington, D.C. The newspaper became the house organ of the Jackson administration, and Kendall brought Jackson’s nephew, Francis Preston Blair, to Washington to be the paper’s editor-in-chief. Along with Duff Green, Isaac Hill, and William Berkeley Lewis, Kendall was a member of Jackson’s Kitchen Cabinet. Over time, Kendall came to dominate the Kitchen Cabinet. He had more influence over Jackson than any other Cabinet official or Kitchen Cabinet member. Kendall took many of Jackson’s ideas about government and national policy and refashioned them into highly polished, erudite official government statements and newspaper articles. These were then published in the Globe and other newspapers, enhancing Jackson’s reputation as an intellectual. Kendall also drafted most of Jackson’s five annual messages to Congress, and his statement vetoing the renewal of the charter of the Second Bank of the United States in 1836. [well footnoted at Wikipedia]

Mr. Kendall served at 8th U.S. Postmaster General from 1835-1840. Depending on your definition of friend, he showed himself a friend of the South: “Despite having no legal basis for his action, he also allowed postal officials in the Deep South to refuse to deliver abolitionist literature.”

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staunch

Confederate artillery near Charleston, S.C. in 1861 [i.e. 1863] (by George Smith Cook, photographed 1863, printed between 1880 and 1889; LOC: LC-DIG-ppmsca-35428)

Confederate artillery near Charleston in 1863

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 25, 1864:

Siege of Charleston.

–This is the two hundredth day of the siege of Charleston. The Courier, of Thursday last, says:

The enemy continues the bombardment of the city with slight intermissions. The shells thrown are still the Wiard rifle and 100 pounder Parrotts, fired at intervals of about one every ten minutes. One hundred and thirty-four shots were fired at the city from half-past 5 o’clock Tuesday afternoon to half-past 5 o’clock Wednesday evening. We learn that a private of the Gist Guard, Capt. Chichester’s company, First S. C. Artillery, was instantly killed last evening by the explosion of a Wiard rifle shell. This is the first instance of a white person having been killed outright by a shell since the bombardment of the city. The name of the man was not ascertained at the time of writing our report. A negro was also reported severely wounded on Tuesday.

Here’s a homemade remedy from the same issue:

A Styptic which will stop the Bleeding of the Largest wound.

–Scrape fine two drachms of Castile soap and dissolve in two ounces of brandy or common spirits. Mix well with it one drachm of potash, and keep it in a close phial. When applied, warm it and dip in pledgets of lint. The blood will suddenly coagulate some distance within the vessel. For deep wounds and amputated limbs, repeated applications may be necessary.

And there sure were a lot of amputated limbs 150 years ago.

Washington, District of Columbia. Wiard gun at U.S. Arsenal (1862; LOC: LC-DIG-cwpb-01443)

Wiard gun in D.C. arsenal 1862

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skating … or not

Here a Northern newspaper acknowledged the huge contrast between the suffering soldiers and the still luxurious life at home. For all the people in New York could tell, the fighting might just as well have been in China. The least homebodies should do is contribute some money to the Sanitary Commission

From The New-York Times January 24, 1864:

A Contrast Patriotism at Home and in the Field.

Patriotism in the City of New-York, or in any of our home communities, is a comparatively cheap and easy virtue. We go about our business as usual, eat our dinners, entertain our friends, enjoy amusements, and make money very much as we always have done. It is true, we subscribe to the Sanitary Commission, or invest in Governments, or make an occasional eloquent speech on our “glorious Union;” but on the whole, so far as our comfort and ease are concerned, the great American civil war might as well be in China.

snowing (Harper's Weekly January 30, 1864)

SNOWY MORNING—ON PICKET.

And yet, now and then, something comes to remind us of the immense contrast between our inglorious lives and the heroic actions being performed all around us. We hear, for instance, from East Tennessee from corps who have distinguished themselves on many a field; of gentlemen, whom we all know, sleeping on the ground, half barefooted in the snow, living in certain stations on a bit of hard-tack and small rations of pork, and the hardships which have been endured in that remote region by the brave men of our army will probably never be known. Supplies have been forwarded with great difficulty, much confusion has occurred in regard to the trains for particular corps, and the outlying detachments have especially suffered for the want of common necessaries. But even with ample food and luxurious clothing, let the polite reader fancy what picket duty must be on a bleak mountain side, with snow blowing in a gale, and the thermometer near zero, or camping in leaky tents, where no fire can be kept up, and the breath freezes on the beard of the sleeper; or marching through unbroken snow, against icy winds, for days together! But such is the kind of life which thousands of our once luxurious young men are now leading. Their fate is salt beef and hard tack, while we sit at tables loaded with luxuries ; their bed is a blanket, and pine boughs or straw, with rain dripping in or snow sprinkling them, while we are tucked up on our comfortable mattresses.

They have hardship, we, comfort; they hold their lives in their hands every hour of the day, and we expect to reach an undisturbed old age. They have chosen exposure, cold, fatigue, hard fare, the risk of wounds, sickness and death, for the sake of country. We have either chosen ease, luxury, and the making of money, or we have been compelled to continue our former courses of life.

central-park (Harper's Weekly January 30, 1864)

far, far away from East Tennessee

The contrast can never be forgotten. History will not forget it; and a people, above all, sensitive and grateful to heroic and patriotic services, will never suffer it to go out of mind. Whatever rewards the republic has to bestow, will, for the next generation at least, be given to those who have served her in the field.

This contrast, which, though so often repeated, must even now make the cheeks of thousands of our young men tingle with shame, should arouse every one who is enjoying the blessings of home to new efforts for the army.

Certainly, the least we can do is to contribute clothing and medicines and hospital stores to our brethren in the field, the camp and the hospital. To lighten the pangs of the wounded, to soften the pains of the sick, and smooth the pillow of the dying, is but the simplest duty for the great multitude for whose homes and children these brave men have suffered and bled. No individual — man, woman or child — in all classes of society that have a single luxury, should suffer this Winter to pass without contributing something to the great agency for supplying the wants of the army — the Sanitary Commission. There cannot be extravagant contributions to such a, charity, and nothing but absolute penury can excuse from aiding it.

The images above were published in the January 30, 1864 issue of Harper’s Weekly at Son of the South.

[Civil War envelope showing eagle with American flag above star design with message "Not a star must fall (between 1861 and 1862; LOC:  LC-DIG-ppmsca-34622)

envelope’s in the right place

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Pope Pius for Peace

I heard President Obama is going to visit Pope Francis in March. 150 years ago today citizens in Richmond could have read some correspondence between their president and the Roman pontiff. Both leaders seem to agree that war is cruel and peace should be restored.

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 23, 1864:

Correspondence between his Excellency, President Davis, and his Holiness Pope Pius IX.

We publish the following correspondence between the President of the Confederate States and His Holiness Pope Plus the Ninth, elicited by the published letter of the latter, dated in October, 1862,to the Catholic Archbishops at New York and New Orleans, enjoining t[h]em to employ their prayers and influence for the restoration of peace:
President Davis to his Holiness Pope Pius the Ninth.

Executive Office, Richmond, Sept, 21, 1863.

Lost [?] Venerable Chief of the Holy See and Sovereign

Pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church.

frontis ( The Real Jefferson Davis  Author: Landon Knight)

we want the wicked war to cease – but those … darned Yankees keep invading

The letters which your Holiness addressed to the Venerable Chiefs of the Catholic clergy in New Orleans and New York, have been brought to my attention, and I have read with emotion the terms in which you are pleased to express the deep sorrow with which you regard the slaughter, ruin and devastation consequent on the war now waged by the U. S. Government against the States and people over which I have been chosen to preside, and in which you direct them, and the clergy under their authority, to exhort the people and the rulers to the exercise of mutual charity and the love of peace. I am deeply sensible of the Christian charity and sympathy with which your Holiness has twice appeared to the venerable clergy of your Church, urging them to use and apply all study and exertion for the restoration of peace and tranquility.

I therefore deem it my duty to offer to your Holiness, in my own name and in that of the people of the Confederate States, the expression of our sincere and cordial appreciation of the Christian charity and love by which your Holiness is actuated, and to assure you that this people, at whose hearthstones the enemy is now pressing with threats of dire oppression and merciless carnage, are now and ever have been earnestly desirous that this wicked war shall cease; that we have offered at the footstool of our Father who is in Heaven prayers inspired by the same feelings which animate your Holiness; that we desire no evil to our enemies, nor do we covet any of their possessions; but are only struggling to the end that they shall cease to devastate our land and inflict useless and cruel slaughter upon our people, and that we be permitted to live at peace with all mankind, under our own laws and institutions, which protect every man in the enjoyment not only of his temporal rights, but of the freedom of worshipping God according to his own faith.

1, therefore, pray your Holiness to accept from me and from the people of these Confederate States, the assurance of our sincere thanks for your effort to aid the cause of peace, and of our earnest wishes that your life may be prolonged and that God may have you in His holy keeping.
(Signed)

Jefferson Davis.

President of the Confederate

States of America.

[Translation from the Latin.]

To the Illustrious and Honorable Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America,Richmond.
Pius. P. P. IX.

Pope Pius IX (Printed by J.F. Smart & Kahlmann,c1872; LOC:  LC-DIG-pga-03307)

praying for union – of perfect charity

Illustrious and Honorable Sir., greeting. We have lately received with all kindness, as was meet, the gentlemen seat by your Excellency to present to us your letter dated on the 23d of last September. We have received certainly no small pleasure in learning both from these gentlemen and from your letter the feelings of gratification, and of very warm appreciation with which you, Illustrious and Honorable Sir. were moved when you first had knowledge of our letters written in October of the preceding year to the Venerable Brethren, John. Archbishop of New York, and John, Archbishop of New Orleans, in which we again and again urged and exhorted those Venerable Brethren that be cause of their exemplary piety and episcopal zeal they should employ their most earnest efforts, in our name, also, in order that the fatal civil war which had arisen in the States should end, and that the people of America might again enjoy mutual peace and concord, and love each other with mutual charity. And it has been very gratifying to us to recognize, illustrations and Honorable Sir., that you and your people are animated by the same desire for peace and tranquility which we had so earnestly inculcated in our aforesaid letters to the Venerable Brethren above named. On, that the other people also of the states and their rulers, considering seriously how cruel and how deplorable is this intestine [internecine?] war, would receive and embrace the counsels of peace and tranquility. We, indeed, shall not cease with most fervent prayer to beseech God, the Best and Highest, and to implore Him to pour out the spirit of Christian love and peace upon all the people of America, and to rescue them from the great calamities with which they are afflicted. And we also pray the same most merciful Lord that he will illumine. Your Excellency with the light of His divine grace and unite you with ourselves in perfect charity.

Given at Rome, at St. Peter’s, on the 3d December, 1863, in the eighteenth year of our Pontificate.

P[i]us P. P. IX.

Another practical reason to learn Latin – to be able to translate correspondence from the Vatican

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kill ’em with kindness

[Unidentified soldier in Confederate uniform with bouquet of flowers] (between 1861 and 1865; LOC: LC-DIG-ppmsca-33309)

Families at home trying to survive during a seemingly unending war in which important supplies for the army are questionable – there are reasons for a Confederate soldier to consider deserting, even if they are treated well by their commanders. The following editorial noted a report that some officers in the Army of Northern Virginia might be treating their men rather haughtily: the officers are urged to respect their rank and file as gentlemen, and privates are encouraged to stay devoted to the cause whether or not they are treated by their officers almost like Yankees.

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 22, 1864:

The rank and file.

A correspondent in the Army of Northern Virginia, and an esteemed personal friend, is pleased to express his approbation of a recent editorial in this paper advocating the claims of the private soldiers to the gratitude of their country and the consideration of their officers. He is greatly mistaken, however, in the impression that this is the first time attention has been called in these columns to the subject. The memory of our regular readers and the files of this journal will bear witness that, from the beginning of the war to the present hour, if any one topic connected with the army has received more editorial attention than any other, it has been the rank and file, whose prodigious sacrifices for the common cause, and whose purely disinterested devotion present altogether the brightest and most immortal chapter in the history of this country.

[Private Richard F. Bernard of Co. A, 13th Virginia Infantry Regiment, in uniform] (between 1861 and 1864; LOC:  LC-DIG-ppmsca-34336)

not an officer but probably a gentleman

We are sorry to hear from our correspondent, (himself an officer and therefore a dispassionate witness,) that there are some officers in the Confederate service who treat the noble soldiers whom they have the honor to command as inferior beings, mere machines, like the mercenaries of a standing army, and never manifest towards them the sympathy and kindly attentions which are so dear to the soldier’s heart. We hope the number of such military popinjays is small, for straggling and desertion in the army will never be put a stop to, where their influence extends. It is easy enough to talk of enforcing military discipline, and unless it is enforced, we might as well not have an army, but the strongest discipline in camp or court, in earth or heaven, is that which flows from Love. The fear of hell itself has never melted the human heart like the influence of Divine Benevolence. There are few men in the world so thoroughly depraved that they cannot be more easily drawn by affection than driven by fear. Such exceptional reprobates there may be in the army as well as in other vocations, and upon them the severe penalties should be dealt without mercy. But the great mass of our rank and file are as much gentlemen as the officers who command, and deserve a great deal more credit, as we have often said, than the officers, because they have no earthly motive, except love of country, to prompt their heroic exertions. As gentlemen they ought to and must be treated, if the army is to retain its efficiency, and the peculiar spirit of the Southern soldier to be developed. –Whilst discipline is strictly enforced, the soldier should be elevated, instead of depressed, in his own esteem by the treatment of the officer; he should never be permitted to lose the self-respect and conscious dignity of the gentleman which he brought with him to the army; he should never be permitted to forget that he has as much interest in the contest as the officers by whom he is led. We believe that most of our officers, like our intelligent correspondent, have the good feeling and the good sense to take this view of the subject, but there are some miserable exceptions, and they have done more harm to the service than their bedizened little carcases, buttons, gold lace, and all are worth.

At the same time, we hold it to be the solemn duty of the private soldier, who may happen to have over his head a cold-hearted and tyrannical officer — his duty to himself not less than to his country — to obey in all things, and to stick to his colors to the last, not for the sake of his officer, but of his cause, and of his own character — a character too high at home, and too long maintained in the fiery furnace of this war’s tribulations to be sacrificed at this time of day on account of any kind of sufferings. If there are some Southern officers who treat their men almost as harshly as Yankee officers, let there be no privates in our ranks who can be driven, like Yankee privates, to faithlessness and desertion by the misconduct of hard-hearted officials. Let them live and endure all for the sake of their country, and their constancy and virtue, equal to and worthy of their he clam, will ultimately receive a deserved reward.

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help the maimed

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 21, 1863:

Association for the relief of maimed soldiers.

–A meeting was held in the Hall of the House of Delegates on Tuesday night last, having for its object the organization of an Association for the purpose of supplying artificial limbs for those soldiers who have been maimed in our service, and otherwise providing for their wants. After the adoption of a series of resolutions, and the delivery of several appropriate addresses, adjourned to meet again on Tuesday evening next, at the same place.–The following are the resolutions adopted at the meeting, which were offered by the Rev. Dr. Marshall:

Whereas, The citizens of the Confederate States feel themselves to be under lasting obligations of respect and gratitude for the memorable services rendered in the terrible conflict of many battles, and desirous, at the present time, to give some taken of our regard for those who have lost their limbs, as well as to discharge a high duty devolving on us: Therefore,

Resolved, That we will organize an Association, the object of which shall be to supply artificial limbs to those gallant men who have been maimed in the defence of their country, and to furnish such other means of relief as will contribute to the general object proposed.

Resolved, the Association shall be called and known as–(the name not being agreed on, was left to be supplied at an adjourned meeting.)

The Association for the Relief of Maimed Soldiers is discussed in Artificial Parts, Practical Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics(edited by Katherine Ott, David Serlin, Stephen Mihm, starting on page 124 in an article by Jennifer Davis McDaid). Robert E. Lee donated $500 to the organization, well over the $10 membership fee. The association estimated that by the time it was organized more than 10,000 Southern soldiers had lost limbs. According to Ms. McDaid’s article, we can add artificial legs and arms to the list of southern shortages.

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still heading south

The North needed men to continue a “vigorous prosecution” of the war. 150 years ago this month large numbers were waiting at the Elmira, New York railroad depot for their trip South.

From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in January 1864:

SOLDIERS AT ELMIRA. – There are now over 6,000 soldiers at the Elmira depot, and the number is being increased dail[y,] faster than the Southern Railroad can take them away. The facilities of the Williamsport road are quite limited.

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honoring his mother …

and honoring her son

From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in January 1864:

PRESENTATION OF A BATTLE-FLAG. – The members of the 11th Regiment, Illinois Infantry, have recently presented their old battle-flag to Mrs. Rachel Nevius, of Lodi, in this county, mother of the late Colonel Nevius, formerly commanding that Regiment. The flag has been gallantly borne through many hard fought battles, and is the same one under which Col. Nevius fell, on the 22d of last May, while leading his men in a desperate assault against the rebel works at Vicksburg.

You can read a good account of Garrett Nevius’ life at the Interlaken Historical Society. As a young man of 21 years, he moved to Rockford, Illinois in 1859. Nevius helped form a Rockford Zouave unit after having met and been inspired by Elmer Ellsworth. In 1860 he formed and led the Rockford Wide-Awakes to campaign for the election of Abraham Lincoln. After the war started he took his Zouave unit to Springfield and joined the 11th Regiment. Nevius changed his name to Nevins because he thought it would be less Dutch-sounding. He was wounded in the hand at Shiloh but kept fighting. He was at some point promoted to Colonel. As part of General McPherson’s corps at Vicksburg he led his men on May 22nd. Nevins was killed during the assault on the 3rd Louisiana redan.

He was buried in Lake View Cemetery, Interlaken, New York. You can see his grave column here. A good map of the May 22nd fight at the National Park Service shows Ransom (probably the 11th’s Brigade commander) near the 3rd Louisiana redan.

The 11th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment was originally a three-month unit that ended up serving for the war’s duration. Wikipedia says Garrett Nevins was killed on April 23, 1863.

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“childish despondency”

Late in 1863 the Confederate Congress abolished substitution – those conscripted could no longer hire replacements to serve in the CSA army. The Congress went further (third paragraph) in January 1864 by requiring “that men who had hired substitutes report for duty as either volunteers or inductees.” It didn’t take long for a citizen to challenge the January law in court.

From the Richmond Daily Dispatch January 16, 1864:

The substitute question.

–The case of Josiah Blackburn, who applies for a discharge from military service under a writ of habeas corpus, will be argued to day.

This is the first case in which the validity of the late law of Congress placing in the service those who have furnished substitutes, has been questioned, and its decision will be looked to with great interest by a large number of persons similarly situated.

An editorial claimed that the biggest problem facing the South was the bad attitudes of those who now had to serve in the army.

From the same issue:

The situation of the Confederacy.

We feel perfectly confident in the belief that the despondency which to a certain extent has lately spread over the country is due, in a great degree, to the murmuring of those who have been subjected to the operation of the conscription by the repeal of the substitute laws. Those gentlemen who, in the prime of life, with all their limbs sound and intact, with their bodily condition in a state of perfect health, strong, and active, who thought themselves secured from accident by shot and shell under cover of their substitutes, have found themselves mistaken, and there is no end to their lamentations. Of course, the country must be gone to the dogs since they are called upon to fight for it. What more terrible calamity can befall it than that they should be disturbed in their patriotic occupations of fleecing the public and hoarding up money, to bear arms, like common people, in defence of their lives, their homes, their families, and their firesides? As long as the question was left to be decided by others, everything was going on well enough. No reverse could daunt their courage, since it did not fall on them; no defeat could abate their hopes, since it did not endanger their money-bags. Now, however, the scene is completely reversed. These patriots see ruin in everything — even in our very successes. The idea of having to shoulder their muskets and face the enemy in person tinges all their contemplations, and causes them to see everything through a veil as murky as the very pit of perdition. They live in an atmosphere rendered gloomy by their own personal apprehensions, and they fancy that it is the only atmosphere in the world. Because everything looks black and gloomy to them, they believe that everything is black and gloomy in very truth. “Pat,” said a gentleman sleeping at an inn to his Irish servant, “Pat, open the door and see what sort of night it is.” “Please your honor,” answered Pat, opening the door of a press and popping his nose upon a huge cheese, “Please your honor, it’s dark and smells like cheese.”

The discontent, the murmurs, the gloomy views of this class of malcontents have, we verily believe, done more to dispirit this people than all the disasters we have sustained from the beginning of the war to this moment. …

That the Yankees are making desperate efforts to bring the war to a speedy termination cannot be doubted, and we, at least, are not at all disposed to deny it. But the very prices which they offer for the re-enlistment of their veterans, proves that this effort will be their last. The very fact that they are enlisting our negroes to do their fighting for them, proves a scarcity of men who have any stomach for the war. Nevertheless, they will make this effort, and it will be gigantic. And how do we propose to meet it? Not, we presume, by a tame surrender; not by giving up our houses to be taken possession of by negroes; not by turning over all our goods and chattels to be confiscated for the benefit of the Yankees; not by sitting with our arms folded, or wringing our hands and blubbering over our misfortunes. These are the inevitable consequences of submission, and we do not suppose even the most gloomy of the substitute purchasers contemplate such a surrender as that. If they do not, there is but one alternative. It is to obey the laws of Congress cheerfully and with alacrity — to fight the enemy, since better may not be done. While our Congressmen are talking, they are preparing for their formidable onset. We must be prepared to meet them, and we can be prepared if the proper steps be taken. We must meet them, and we must beat them. What is more, we can meet them, and we can beat them. What is most of all, we will meet them, and we will beat them. Away, then, with all this childish despondency. There is no occasion for it, and if there were, this is not the time to indulge in it. The Confederacy has not yet put forth one-half its strength. It has risen always with the occasion, and thus it will continue to rise, as fast as fresh occasions present themselves. For our own part, we never have doubted of the issue, even when McClellan was around this city, and that, we take it, was the darkest hour of the Confederacy.

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