Only Thirty Men Left

Col Peter A S McGlashan

On July 31^st 1863 the 50^th Georgia Infantry changed Colonels from Confederate Colonel William R Manning to Colonel Peter Alexander Selkirk McGlashan.

The 50^th Georgia Infantry was organized at Savannah, Georgia March 4^th 1862.  It was made up mostly of men from the southern part of the state.  They began drill at Camp Davis near Guyton, Georgia under the command of Confederate Colonel William R Manning.  On July 17^th 1862 the 50^th was sent to Richmond, Virginia to become a part of the First Corps of the Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E Lee.

The men of the 50^th saw action in over 45 engagements, including the Battles of South Mountain, Sharpsburg; where they were part of the brigade which held the bridge over Antietam Creek, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg.  After the Battle of Gettysburg their Colonel William R Manning resigned his command due to health issues and was replaced on July 31^st 1863 by Colonel Peter Alexander Selkirk McGlashan.  When Confederate General James Longstreet moved his Corps in the autumn of 1863 the 50^th became engaged in the Siege of Knoxville.  They would return to the Army of Northern Virginia and continue on through war with fighting at Petersburg and the Battles of Cedar Creek and Sayler’s Creek, where their commander Colonel McGlashan was captured.  The men of 50^th were still the Army of Northern Virginia when Robert E Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House on April 9^th 1865.  When the 50^th surrendered it counted only 30 men on the line.

If you’re interested in reading more about this regiment, check out 50th Georgia Volunteer Infantry Confederate States of America (CSA)

Tetanus Took Him

Union Brigadier General George Crockett Strong died from complication of a wounding on July 30^th 1863.

George Crockett Strong was born October 16^th 1832 in Stockbridge, Windsor, Vermont the son of David Ellsworth and Harriet (Fay) Strong. He was raised by an uncle in Easthampton, Massachusetts. He attended the Williston Seminary in Easthampton, Massachusetts, and Union College in Schenectady, New York, before settling in and graduating from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1857.  He was ranked 5^th out of a class of 38.  He served in several military arsenals, becoming the assistant superintendent of the Watervliet Arsenal in Watervliet, Albany, New York.

At the beginning of the Civil War, Strong was serving as an ordnance officer on the staff of Union General Irvin McDowell with the rank of First Lieutenant, and was with him at the First Battle of Bull Run.  He commanded an expedition against Biloxi, Mississippi in April 1862, and received a commission to Brigadier General in November 1862.  While leading and assault on Fort Wagner at Morris Island, South Carolina on July 18^th 1863 he was wounded in the thigh.  While on his way to New York City to recuperate, Strong developed tetanus because of the wound and died June 30^th 1863.  He is buried in the Green Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.

Covering The River Crossing

The Battle of Cool Spring was fought July 17^th and 18^th 1864 in Clarke County, Virginia as a part of the 1864 Valley Campaigns.

As Confederate Lieutenant General Jubal Anderson Early’s withdrew from Washington, DC following the Battle of Fort Stevens, they were pursued by Union troops commanded by Major General Horatio G Wright.  On July 15^th 1864 as the two armies moved up the Valley, the Union troops were reinforced by parts of Brigadier General George Crook’s force.  There were a couple of skirmishes on July 16^th 1864, before Early crossed the mountain at Snickers Gap.

Early left a part of his force covering the rear of the army, at the main Shenandoah River crossing at Castleman’s Ferry.  On July 17^th 1864 Union cavalry moved through Snicker’s Gap but were held up by the Confederate force there.

The next day July 18^th 1864 Union Generals Crook and Wright arrived at Snicker’s Gap and decided to attack what they thought was Confederate skirmish line.  Wright wanted a small force to cross the river a short ways downstream and flank the Confederates at Castleman’s Ferry; he assigned Colonel Joseph Thoburn the job.  The Confederates were alert to the movement and this allowed Confederate Major General John B Gordon to move troops unseen to the Ford.  Confederate General John C Breckinridge backed him with more troops deployed on the left flank.  Around 6pm the Confederates attacked along the exposed Union left flank, and the cavalry fighting un-mounted collapsed.  The Confederates then ran up against a Union reserve line which was able to push them back to the river.  After some spirited skirmishing along the river, Thoburn withdrew his troops from the river.

300,000 More

The poem “We Are Coming, Father Abraham, Three Hundred Thousand More” is published July 16^th 1862 in the New York Evening Post.

James Sloan Gibbons was a Hicksite Quaker living in New York City.  At 20 he became active in the abolitionist movement.  Gibbons was best known for writing about finances and banking, and had been the financial editor for the New York Evening Post.  When President Abraham Lincoln called for an additional 300,000 men to join the Union Army, it inspired Gibbons to write the song “We Are Coming, Father Abraham, Three Hundred Thousand More”.   The song was published July 16^th 1862 in the New York Evening Post.  The song was used to help recruit Union soldiers and became very popular.

“We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more,

From Mississippi's winding stream, and from New England's shore;

We leave our ploughs and workshops, our wives and children dear,

With hearts too full for utterance, with but a silent tear;

We dare not look behind us, but steadfastly before:

We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more!

 

If you look across the hill tops that meet the Northern sky,

Long moving lines of rising dust your vision may descry;

And now the wind, an instant, tears the cloudy vail aside,

And floats aloft our spangled flag, in glory and in pride,

And bayonets in the sunlight gleam, and bands brave music pour:

We are coming Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more!

 

If you look all up your valleys, where the growing harvests shine,

You may see our sturdy farmer boys, fast forming into line;

And children from their mothers' knees, are pulling at the weeds,

And learning how to reap and sow against their country's needs;

And a farewell group stands weeping at every cottage door:

We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more!

 

You have called us, and we're coming, by Richmond's bloody tide

To lay us down, for freedom's sake, our brother's bones beside;

Or from foul treason's savage group to wrench the murderous blade,

And in the face of foreign foes its fragments to parade;

Six hundred thousand loyal men and true have gone before:

We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand more!

More Officers Fell

Francis V Randall

The 17^th Vermont Infantry a part of the Union IX Corps mustered out of service July 14^th 1865.

The 17^th Vermont Infantry was recruited by order issued August 3^rd 1863 by Vermont Governor Frederick Holbrook.  It was thought that this regiment would be filled by men recently mustered out of the Nine Month regiments, this didn’t work out however.  The bounties offered to join the 17^th were gradually increased, but still the first company wasn’t filled until January 5^th 1864.  From then until September 1864 companies of the regiment were mustered into service for a three year term.

The Colonel of the 17^th was Francis V Randall who had served as a Captain in the Vermont 2^nd and then as a Colonel in the 13^th Vermont having led them at the Battle of Gettysburg.  The 17^th left Vermont April 18^th 1864 with only seven companies under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Charles Cummings.  They arrived in Alexandria, Virginia four days later with very little drill or training, placed in Union General Ambrose Burnside’s IX Corps just in time for the Battle of the Wilderness.  Here under fire for the first time, the 17^th went into battle with 313 and lost 80 men killed and wounded.  They continued in this command throughout the 1864 spring campaigns and the siege of Petersburg.  When the Union army exploded the mine in front of the Confederate line at Petersburg, the 17^th went into battle with 8 commissioned officers and 120 men, they out with only 1 officer and about 60 men left standing.  The 17^th was part of the final pursuit of Robert E Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, and was at Burkesville when the surrender came.

The men of the 17^th participated in the Grand Review May 23^rd 1865 in Washington, DC.  They were mustered out of service July 14^th 1865.  The 17^th had 14 officers killed or mortally wounded, more than any other Vermont regiment.  The regiment’s totals numbered 1,106, of which 226 men were killed, died of wounds or in Confederate prisons.  They also had 386 men wounded or captured.

Attacking The Draft

July 13^th 1863 was the first day of weeklong New York City draft riots.

As the Civil War continued in 1863, and the need for more troops grew, the United States Congress passed a law to establish the draft.  As a part of this draft, new immigrants were expected to register for the draft, black were excluded from the draft and if you could afford it a man could pay for a substitute.

In New York City the first drawing on July 11^th 1863 had occurred smoothly, even though there had been reports of riots in other cities.  But on Monday July 13^th 1863 when the second drawing started a crowd of about 500 led by one the fire companies attacked the assistant Ninth District Provost Marshal’s Office on the corner of Third Avenue and 47^th Street, where the draft was being held.  This mob threw paving stones through the windows, pushed down the doors, and finally set the building on fire.  The riot moved on with its destruction, smashing vehicles and killing horses that pulling streetcars.  To keep other parts of the city from coming the aid, the rioters cut telegraph lines.

When the Confederates invaded Pennsylvania, the New York State Militia had been sent to the Union assistance.  The only force in the city to put down the riot was the New York Police Department.  When the Police Superintendent John A Kennedy arrived, he was recognized by some the rioters.  They attacked him, beating him to an unconscious bloody pulp.  Other police in the area armed with clubs and guns charged the crowd, but they were outnumbered and unable to put down the riot.  As the mob moved on they burned the Bull’s Head Hotel on 44^th Street because they refused to serve alcohol.  Then the mob moved onto the mayor’s home, and the eighth and fifth districts police stations, setting them on fire as well.  When the rioters reached the New York Times building they were turned back by a Gatling gun fired by the “Times” founder Henry Jarvis Raymond.  As the rioters continued their path of destruction, they turned their attention to the blacks of the city.  Viewed as competition for jobs, the fear of more blacks coming to the city following emancipation and the view that the slaves were the cause of the war, thereby the need for the draft, the mob beat and killed a number of black people.  Reaching the Colored Orphan Asylum on Fifth Avenue and 44^th Street around 4pm, a mob made up mostly of women and children looted the building before sitting it on fire.  Police were able to help the 233 black children living at Asylum escape just ahead of the fire.

The rioting on July 13^th 1863 finally came to an end when a hard rain started and drove the people out of the streets.  The rain helped put out the fires.  It was only a short break as the mobs return the next day.  It would take the presence of hardened Union fighting troops to put the riots down and calm the city.  There isn’t a certain known number of deaths, but it’s thought that about 120 civilians were killed in the New York Draft Riots, and around 2,000 injured.  There were fifty buildings burnt down including the Orphan Asylum and two churches.

To read more look at The New York City Draft Riots of 1863

For Gallantry In Action

The United States Congress authorized the Medal of Honor July 12^th 1862 for gallantry of Army noncommissioned officers and privates.

After the Civil War started in December 1861 the United States Congress authorized a medal of honor for Marines and Navy.  Two months later Massachusetts Senator Henry Wilson introduced a bill on the floor to authorize "the President to distribute medals to privates in the Army of the United States who shall distinguish themselves in battle."

President Abraham Lincoln signed the bill into law on July 12^th 1862, as “Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the President of the United States be, and he is hereby, authorized to cause two thousand "medals of honor" to be prepared with suitable emblematic devices, and to direct that the same be presented, in the name of the Congress, to such noncommissioned officers and privates as shall most distinguish themselves by their gallantry in action, and other soldier-like qualities, during the present insurrection.”

The first Medals of Honor were presented March 25^th 1863 by Union Secretary of War Edwin M Stanton to the surviving members of Andrew’s Raiders.  The first action for which a Medal of Honor would be awarded occurred at Apache Pass, Arizona on February 13^th 1861 when Union Assistant Surgeon Bernard J D Irwin rescued 60 soldiers.