Civil War Drummer Boy Johnny Clem Takes Arms

In a previous post we learned of the circumastances under which young Johnnie clem left home in order to enlist and fight for the cause. What follows here is an account of the manner in which the young Clem showed his mettle at the Battle of Chickamauga. The account is provided by Benjamin F. Taylor, military correspondent for the Chicago Evening Journal. Taylor writes:

You remember the story of little Johnny Clem, the atom of a drummer-boy, "aged ten," who strayed away from Newark, Ohio, and the first we know of him, though small enough to live in a drum, was beating the long roll for the 22d Michigan. At Chickamauga, he filled the office of a "marker," carrying the guidon whereby they form the lines, a duty having its counterpart in the surveyor's more peaceful calling in the flagman who flutters the red signal along the metes and bounds. On the Sunday of the battle, the little fellow's occupation gone, he picked up a gun that had slipped from some dying hand, provided himself with ammunition, and began putting in the periods quite on his own account, blazing away close to the ground, like a fire-fly in the grass. Late in the waning day, the waif left almost alone in the whirl of the battle, one of Longstreet's Colonels dashed up, and, looking down at him, ordered him to surrender: "Surrender!" he shouted, "you little d--d son of a -----!" The words were hardly out of the officer's mouth, when Johnny brought his piece to " order arms," and as his hand slipped down to the hammer he pressed it back, swung up the gun to the position of " charge bayonet," and as the officer raised his sabre to strike the piece aside, the glancing barrel lifted into range, and the proud Colonel tumbled dead from his horse, his lips fresh stained with the syllable of reproach he had hurled at the child.

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A few swift moments ticked off by musket shots, and the tiny gunner was swept up at a swoop and borne away a prisoner. Soldiers, bigger but not better, were taken with him, only to be washed back again by a surge of Federal troopers, and the prisoner of thirty minutes was again John Clem "of ours," and General Rosecrans made him a Sergeant, and the stripes of rank covered him all over like a mouse in a harness, and the daughter of Mr. Secretary Chase presented him a silver medal appropriately inscribed, which he worthily wears, a royal order of honor, upon his left breast, and all men conspire to spoil him, but, since few ladies can get at him here, perhaps he may be saved. Think of a sixty-three pound Sergeant, fancy a handful of a hero, and then read the "Arabian Nights" and believe them.

Battle of Gettysburg: behavior of the townspeople

Part 1 in a series of posts on the behavior of the townspeople at the Battle of Gettysburg.

In the July 7, 1863 edition of the New York Times, war correspondent L.L. Crounse wrote a scathing piece regarding the conduct of the people of Gettysburg. Some echoed Crounse's assessment while others disagreed vehemently. Both sides will be represented here in this forum in forthcoming posts. But first, we offer the July 7, 1863 piece by L.L. Crounse. He writes:

....But there is one thing the country cannot have too much of -- sympathy for the fallen -- or cannot give too much -- aid for the wounded, and unstinted praise for the valorous ones, whose steady and unflinching courage have turned the tide of successive disaster into a sweeping and surging victory -- let a nation be truly thankful.

And apropos to this, let me make it a matter of undeniable history that the conduct of the majority of the male citizens of Gettysburg, and the surrounding County of Adams, is such as to stamp them with dishonor and craven-hearted meanness. I do not speak hastily. I write but the unanimous sentiments of the whole army -- an army which now feels that the doors from which they drove a host of robbers, thieves, and cut-throats, were not worthy of being defended. The actions of the people of Gettysburg are so sordidly mean and unpatriotic, as to engender the belief that they were indifferent as to which party was whipped. I will give a few instances.

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In the first place the male citizens mostly ran away, and left the women and children to the mercy of their enemies. On their return, instead of lending a helping hand to our wounded, and opening their houses to our famished officers and soldiers, they have only manifested indecent haste to present their bills to the military authorities for payment of losses inflicted by both armies. One man yesterday presented a Captain with a full bill for eighteen rails which his men had burned in cooking their coffee! On the streets the burden of their talk is their losses -- and speculations as to whether the Government can be compelled to pay for this or that. Almost entirely they are uncourteous -- but this is plainly form lack of intelligence and refinement. Their charges, too, were exorbitant -- hotels, $2.50 per day; milk, 10 and 15 cents per quart; bread, $1 and even $1.50 per loaf; twenty cents for a bandage for a wounded soldier! And these are only a few specimens of the sordid meanness and unpatriotic spirit manifested by these people, from whose doors our noble army had driven a hated enemy. I wish it to be understood that the facts I have stated can be fully substantiated by many officers high in rank, as well as by what I personally saw and experienced. This is Adams County -- a neighbor to Copperhead York, which is still nearer to the stupid and stingy Berks.

General Daniel E. Sickles loses a leg at the Battle of Gettysburg

Colorful, enigmatic, and controversial Union General Daniel E. Sickles suffered the misfortune of being struck by a cannonball at the Battle of Gettysburg. As a result of this injury, his right leg was amputated, thus ending his combat career. In typical Sickles fashion, he faced his handicap with extraordinary bravery and calm. Whitelaw Ried describes this calm in his Cincinnati Gazette column of July 4. Reid writes:

On a stretcher, borne by a couple of stout privates lay General Sickles -- but yesterday leading his corps with all the enthusiasm and dash for which he has been distinguished -- to-day [sic] with his right leg amputated, More...and lying there, grim and stoical, with his cap pulled over his eyes, his hands calmly folded across his breast, and a cigar in his mouth! For a man who had just lost a leg, and whose life was yet in imminent jeopardy, it was cool indeed. He was being taken to the nearest railroad line<, to be carried to some city where he could get most careful attendance...

Newspaper coverage: Charles Carleton Coffin "predicts" the Battle of Gettysburg

As described in an earlier post, war correspondents often played an important military role by providing timely information to battlefield commanders. A fine example of the insightful observations of the war correspondents can be found in the writings of Charles Carleton Coffin, correspondent for the Boston Journal. In his June 29 column (five days before the battle), Carleton writes:

If Lee advances with nearly all his forces into Pennsylvania, there must be a collision of the two armies not many miles west of Gettysburg, probably among the rolling hills near the State line, on the head waters of the Monocacy... I believe that Washington Baltimore will not be harmed. I expect to see Adams, Franklin, Cumberland, and York counties run over somewhat by the rebels, and i also expect to see Lee utterly defeated in his plans. His army may not be annihilated. Hooker may not achieve a great, decisive victory. But I fully believe that Lee will gain nothing by this move.

Newspaper coverage of the Civial War: journalists report on the Battle of Gettysburgh

During the American Civil War, Whitelaw Reid was a war correspondent for the Cincinnati Gazette. In his coverage of the Battle of Gettysburg, he relates the following story wherein he encounters fellow journalist L.L. Crounse while enroute to Taneytown, Maryland to meet the newly installed commander of the Army of the Potomac, General George Meade. Reid writes:

In a plain little wall-tent, just like the rest, pen in hand, seated on a camp-stool and bending over a map, is the new " General Commanding" for the army of the Potomac. More... Tall, slender, not ungainly, but certainly not handsome or graceful, thin-faced, with grizzled beard and moustache, a broad and high but retreating forehead, from each corner of which the slightly- ciirling hair recedes, as if giving premonition of baldness — apparently between forty-five and fifty years of age — altogether a man who impresses you rather as a thoughtful student than as a dashing soldier — so General Meade looks in his tent.

"I tell you, I think a great deal of that fine fellow Meade," I chanced to hear the President say, a few days after Chancellorsville. Here was the result of that good opinion. There is every reason to hope that the events of the next few days will justify it.

A horseman gallops up and hastily dismounts. It is a familiar face — L. L. Crounse, the well- known chief correspondent of the New York Times, with the army of the Potomac. As we exchange hurried salutations, he tells us that he has just returned from a little post-village in Southern Pennsylvania, ten or fifteen miles away ; that a fight, of what magnitude he cannot say, is now going on near Gettysburg, between the First corps and some unknown force of the enemy ; that Major-General Reynolds is already killed, and that there are rumors of more bad news.

The Battle of Gettysburg: we could have whipped you

Lorenzo L. Crounse, chief correspondent for the New York Times during part of the Civil War, was present at the Battle of Gettysburg. His July 8 column, "Further Details of the Great Battles of Friday", contains the following interesting conversation between a captured Confederate colonel and a Federal captain:

A peculiar fact concerning our position is contained in the expression of surprise which the rebel officers uttered when they crossed our lines as prisoners of war. One of the Colonels said, as he looked at our thin line, "Where are the men who fought us"? "Here", said a Captain. "My God!" exclaimed the Colonel, "if only we had another line we could have whipped you;" and then, still gazing about him in astonishment, he continued, with great emphasis, "By God, we could have whipped you as it was!" This is a positive fact, and illustrates how the noble Army of the Potomac can yet fight after all the imputations of demoralization and inefficiency which have been heaped upon it.