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Iowa and the Rebellion
Lurton Denham Ingersoll Philadelphia, Lippincott, 1866 SECOND CAVALRY. RENDEZVOUS AT DAVENPORT—MOVE TO ST. LOUIS—BIRD'S POINT—NEW MADRID—ISLAND NO. TEN—SIEGE OF CORINTH—BATTLE OF FARMINGTON—RAIDS -BATTLE OF IUKA—BATTLE OF CORINTH—RAIDS AND COMBATS -THE GRIERSON RAID— VARIOUS MOVEMENTS—BATTLE OF MOSCOW—OPERATIONS DURING THE WINTER OF 1863 The various companies which formed the Second Iowa Cavalry were enrolled in different parts of the State, the counties which are bordered by the Mississippi, from Clayton to Lee, especially Muscatine, Scott and Jackson, contributing a generous share of its constituent parts, whilst Harrison on the Missouri, Cerro Gordo, Mitchell, Winnebago, and other counties of the north, Johnson, Polk, Hardin, Tama, Story, and several others of the center, were largely represented in the command. The rendezvous of the companies for regimental organization was at Davenport, whither they proceeded in the latter part of the summer of 1861, and where they were formally entered the service of the United States, between the 30th of August and the 28th of September. The aggregate strength of the regiment, when fully organized, was about one thousand and fifty. 9 The campaigns of the year 1863 were everywhere memorable, and were, in fact, decisive of the contest, in favor of the Union arms. The capture of Vicksburg, the defeat of Lee at Gettysburg, the great victory at Chattanooga, placed the military power of the insurgents in a waning condition, and made their defeat a mere question of time. These, the three great events of the year, were accompanied by innumerable lesser achievements, which, combined with the others, made patent the fact that the armies of Union Volunteers were the most accomplished troops, the most efficient soldiers, the world had ever seen. Perhaps the Vicksburg campaign was better illustrative of this than any other, and not only because of the bravery, endurance and all soldierly qualities of the troops directly engaged, but of those also who took part in the campaign, indirectly and at a distance; many of whom, indeed, took part therein so indirectly and at such a distance, that careless thinkers might not have thought of any connection at all between the auxiliaries and the principal command. 10 The troops whose cantonments were along our frontier lines in Tennessee and Mississippi, gained by the campaigns of 1862—Henry,, Donelson, Shiloh, Corinth, in May, and Corinth, in October—were General Grant's auxiliaries and many of these commands, though they never saw Vicksburg, had good right to inscribe that victory on their banners. Among the most active of these was the Second Iowa Cavalry, whose services, during the first part of the era under consideration especially, were not only brilliant, but of great value to the Union arms. Leaving winter quarters at La Grange, the 10th of March, 1863, Colonel Hatch, for about one month, was actively engaged in operations over a considerable portion of northern Mississippi—preventing the concentration of rebel forces, capturing and destroying property contraband of war, and in many ways inflicting damage on the insurgents—marching several hundred miles altogether, and performing several exploits of great skill and daring. These operations over, Colonel Hatch, commanding brigade, made preparations for that movement, which gained so much eclat at the time, which was of great value to the principal campaign under Grant, and which was called THE GRIERSON RAID The orders for this expedition were made known in camp on the afternoon of April 16th. The column, consisting of the Second Iowa, the Seventh Illinois, Lieutenant- Colonel R. Loomis, the Seventh Illinois, Colonel Edward Prince, with five pieces of light artillery, two-pounders, was to move early the next morning, with the object of cutting the railroad and telegraph communications with the rebel army at Vicksburg, in rear of that city, of inflicting damage generally Upon the enemy's resources in central Mississippi, having done which, it was to make way by the best route it could find into the Union lines in the Department of the Gulf. On the night of the 16th, Colonel B. H. Grierson, Sixth Illinois, arrived at La Grange and assumed command of the expedition, by virtue of seniority of rank. On the next morning the column started on this wild march, and bivouacked for the night near Ripley. Here Colonel Hatch separated from the principal command moving at some distance to the left thereof, skirmishing all day of the 18th with Smith's regiment of partisans. He rejoined the column a few miles south of Pontotoc, and led the advance thence, avoiding Houston, to Clear Spring, about thirteen miles southeast of Houston. Colonel Hatch now had under his command only about five hundred men, Major Love having returned to La Grange with a consider able detachment, including, I believe, troopers from all the regiments in the column. At Clear Spring, Colonel Hatch again left the column with his regiment, and took no further direct part in the raid. Colonel Grierson moved on, and, after destroying many miles of railway and telegraph, immense quantities of property, making a successful diversion in favor of General Grant, marching through sunshine and storm, surmounting almost insurmountable difficulties, reached Baton Rouge on the 2d of May. "This expedition, "says General Grant himself, "was skillfully conducted, and reflects great credit on Colonel Grierson and all of his command. It has been one of the most brilliant cavalry exploits of the war, and will be handed down in history as an example to be imitated." Colonel Grierson's name at once became the synonym for energy and pluck, and he was most justly promoted for his gallant achievement. But it is probably true that Colonel Hatch insured the success of the expedition, in like manner as Sherman, on a grander scale, insured the success of our arms on Missionary Ridge, himself bearing the heavy brunt of battle and appearing to be defeated, whilst other corps and other generals pressed on to the glorious victory which his immolation was placing within their power. On the morning of the 21st, Colonel Grierson pushed on directly southward from Clear Spring, leaving orders with Colonel Hatch to proceed to the railroad at West Point, destroy the railroad bridge over the Oka Tibbyhah south of that place, thence move rapidly southward to Macon, and, having there destroyed the railroad and government stores, return northward to La Grange by such route as might be found practicable. Inasmuch, however, as Colonel Hatch was in the first place to attract the attention of the enemy to himself, and to conceal by a stratagem the march of Grierson—which he did so successfully as to give the principal column nearly two days' start of the forces which had concentrated against it—it was very soon discovered that Hatch would have all that it was within the power of man to do to accomplish a retreat for his own command. Spending some time in obliterating Colonel Grierson's trial, Hatch marched in the direction of West Point, but had proceeded only about ten miles, when, at the village of Palo Alto, he was attacked in rear and on both flanks by a force consisting of Smith s regiment of partisan rangers, Bartoe's regiment, and Inge's battalion, all under General Gholson, whilst between him and West Point was an Alabama regiment with several pieces of artillery. Willing to continue the deceit upon the enemy who supposed they were attacking Grierson's main column, Hatch made a most gallant fight, using his little two-pounder, his revolving rifles and his carbines to the best advantage, driving the enemy some three miles, capturing arms and horses, and retaking a company which had been cut off on the first attack. Yet he kept his men so well concealed behind hedges and fences that he suffered no loss, whilst the rebels acknowledged that twenty-five of their number had been killed and wounded. Correctly judging that the time consumed in the skirmish at Palo Alto had given the rebels opportunity to guard the railroad at and below West Point, Hatch moved on northward. He was in the face of an enemy who largely outnumbered him, who was entirely familiar with the country, and who had a friend in every citizen. Nevertheless, Hatch continued his retreat to La Grange, where he arrived in safety, and without mentionable loss, on the 26th. He had attacked Okolona, driving before him the enemy's cavalry and State militia, burning barracks for five thousand men, and destroying stores and ammunition; he had repulsed Chalmers with loss, near Birmingham and Molino; he had marched by by-ways, and bridlepaths, and through swamps and fields where there v. ere no roads at all; he had crossed one stream in the entirely unique manner of throwing the horses bodily over the bank into the river, driving them in the right direction with long poles, and catching them as they emerged on the other side, the men themselves crossing on a "foot-log," and carrying their saddles on their backs; he had, besides the damage inflicted on the enemy already noted, captured fifty rebels, and killed and wounded not less than twice as many more, and taken nearly two hundred and fifty horses and mules, so that when he marched into camp at La Grange his troops were, upon the whole, better mounted than when they had left there, ten days before. 11 Immediately after his return to La Grange, Colonel Hatch took command of a brigade just formed, consisting of his own regiment, the Sixth Iowa Infantry, mounted, a regiment of West Tennessee cavalry, and four pieces of artillery. The command soon moved on a raid southward, going as far as Okolona, and returning the 5th of May, with three hundred captured horses and mules, more than a score of prisoners, and a number of negroes. In a few days it marched in a southwesterly direction to Senatahoba, some eighty miles from La Grange, and having captured many horses and mules, returned after an absence of five or six days. On the countermarch, Hatch was attacked at Wall Hill by Chalmers, but our gallant riders and the little guns soon sent him scampering to the right about. It is stated that, in consideration of his warlike genius. the fair ladies of Senatahoba presented him a crinoline petticoat and a corn-cob pipe. The encampment of the regiment remained at La Grange till near the last of August, where the labors and taste of the men made comfortable and agreeable quarters, so that the summer in this healthful and pleasant locality passed happily by. But not without much activity and adventure away from the encampment The principal events of the summer were: 1. A raid to Panola, nearly an hundred miles southwest of La Grange, which resulted in the capture of much property, and the laying waste of a wide extent of country in retaliation for guerrilla attacks on steamboats navigating the Mississippi. 2. The march against Forrest, who had entered Tennessee, and the skirmish of Jackson, on the 13th of July, in which the rebels were driven from the town and severely punished, the Second Iowa losing Lieutenants John K. Humphreys and Frank L. Stoddard, wounded, and two men missing. In this engagement the Onion loss was fourteen, that of the rebels more than one hundred and seventy-five. 3. The raid on Grenada. On this expedition Major Coon commanded detachments from the Second Iowa, Third Michigan, and Eleventh Illinois, numbering five hundred well mounted men. The raid was most successful, Major Coon, after reaching Grenada through great difficulties from the enemy and from storms, destroying two depots, sixty locomotives, five hundred cars of all kinds, machine shops, two large flouring mills, and a large number of army wagons and returning in safety on the 23d of August, after an absence of eleven days, and an achievement worthy of all admiration. A few days afterwards the regiment moved to Memphis, and remained there in quiet till the first of November. |