Dan Masters' Civil War Chronicles

H aving missed most of the action at Fredericksburg, one Alabama soldier recalled the extraordinary meeting of the two armies during the flag of truce two days after the battle. “As soon as they saw the flag, one of them came a little forward and proposed a friendly meeting halfway,” he wrote a few days later. “We accepted, and a dozen or so of us went out and met them, shook hands, passed compliments, traded a little, and had a gay time. In a few minutes, the truce being refused, we all quickly took our places ready to change our friendly meeting into a bloody conflict. We agreed not to fire on each other that day unless the fight commenced.” Later that afternoon, a second flag of truce was agreed upon and again the men met to exchange the bodies of their dead comrades. “A large body of Yankees then came forward with litters to pick up our dead which they brought halfway and laid them down; about the same number of our men commenced picking up the Yankee dead and carrying them to

R iding over the Shiloh battlefield on April 8, 1862, Generals Alexander McCook and William "Bull" Nelson came across an old acquaintance lying upon the battlefield: George W. Johnson, the provisional Confederate governor of Kentucky. The 49-year-old, serving as a volunteer aide on the staff of General John C. Breckinridge, had a horse shot out from under him on April 6 th , then took his place as a private in the ranks of Co. E of the 4 th Kentucky on the 7 th . In the course of the fighting, Johnson suffered a mortal wound in the right thigh and abdomen.           I saw lying upon the ground a tall man dressed in gray jeans. I dismounted, approached him, and recognized him as a Kentucky Johnson and told him so,” McCook wrote years later. “He replied, ‘Yes, I am George W. Johnson, Confederate governor of Kentucky.’ He asked me to come nearer. I knelt beside him, better to hear what he had to say. He asked me if I was a Mason, I convinced him I was. He then told me he had

S ergeant Randolph Smedley of the 15 th Alabama recalled the electric effect seeing General Robert E. Lee had upon his regiment as they moved into action into the Wilderness on May 5, 1864.           “It seemed that every man went in determined to whip or die,” he informed his father. “As we were going in, we passed by General Lee. He raised his hat and said, “Go it, my brave Alabamians!” There is no telling how much good a kind word from such a general as Lee will do. When he spoke, although the balls were flying thick, every face brightened, each one took a quicker step, and when the order forward was given, a yell was raised and each one seemed to try to be the first to get a shot at the enemy.”           Sergeant Smedley felt sure that the bitter losses suffered by the Army of the Potomac in the ensuing battles would send Grant to the rear in disgrace, as had happened so many times before with other Federal commanders who had tangled with Lee and his army. “The Yankees, poor f

W riting in his diary, Private Manius Buchanan of the 29 th Indiana recalled the eagerness with which his regiment marched towards Savannah, Tennessee with the sounds of the battle of Shiloh ringing in their ears.           “The forced march was kept up until 2 p.m. when we were halted until 4 p.m,” he noted. “The rest was really needed, but the continual question is ‘Why are we stopped here?’ The sound of battle increased in volume and anxiety to be up and doing grows more intense. As I am weak from a late sickness, I am urged to fall to the rear; but no, in common with all, I want to see a battle and fear this will be my only chance.” The regiment would go into action the following afternoon, and of the four neighborhood boys who had enlisted together in Co. B, only Buchanan escaped unscathed. One afternoon's exposure to the horrors of battle was all it took to satisfy this Hoosier's desire to see the elephant. “I wanted to see a battle. I am satisfied. I don’t want to s

T he 1939 film The Wizard of Oz has delighted viewers for 85 years and ranks as a personal favorite, especially during the Halloween season. While watching it with the family the other night, I wondered if there were any connections between the film and the Civil War. Not surprisingly, the answer is yes and those connections touch both the blue and the gray.           Interestingly both “witches” in the film not only had Civil War ancestors but had connections with Civil War soldiers from Ohio. Margaret Hamilton, the “Wicked Witch of the West,” was born in Cleveland, Ohio on December 9, 1902, to attorney Walter Jones Hamilton and his wife Mary Jane Adams; Margaret’s grandfather was Judge Edwin Timothy Hamilton. Judge Hamilton had served as a private in Co. D of the 84 th Ohio Infantry during the summer of 1862. The 84 th Ohio, a three months’ regiment, served nearly the whole of its service attached to the Railroad District in western Maryland, performing provost duty at Cumberlan

F or one soldier in the 5 th Alabama, the hardest fighting at Chancellorsville didn’t occur during Jackson’s celebrated flank attack on the evening of May 2 nd . It occurred when the regiment erroneously charged against General John Geary’s entrenched Federal division on the morning of May 3 rd which resulted in not only heavy casualties but the loss of the regiment’s colors.           The men had recently advanced and were firing upon a Federal battery when they found themselves under a crossfire. “In a few moments, the crossfire slackened and supposing that they were being driven back on the left, we were ordered to charge,” the soldier stated. “We did so in dashing style, or least a portion of the regiment (the rest not hearing the order) and carried the redoubts of Chancellorsville Heights. Just as we were ordered to charge, our color sergeant was wounded and George Nutting, seizing the colors, waved them in proud triumph and cried, “Come on, boys!” That portion of the regiment