Born into the Union Again: A Buckeye View of the Occupation of Nashville

Nashville was the first of the Confederate state capitals to fall during the Civil War when the forces of the Army of the Ohio under Major General Don Carlos Buell entered the city in February 1862. Federal occupation became a fact of life in wartime Nashville and while the Federal hold on the city was threatened on a few occasions, the Confederacy never again controlled the city. 

 The following account written by Corporal John Cox of the 24th Ohio Infantry gives a first hand account of the first days of Federal occupation of the city. It is interesting to note that Cox believed that Nashville residents became "Union to the hub" shortly after General William Nelson issued his directive to the troops prohibiting plundering of either private or public property. "They have been taught to believe that the Yankees were such desperate creatures and that our mission was to plunder, steal, destroy property, outrage females, etc., and this scared them out of their wits," he wrote. 


A period map showing Nashville as a transportation hub with the Cumberland River flowing west to east, and four railroads radiating from the city: the Kentucky Railroad and Louisville and Nashville roads going north, the Alabama and Nashville & Chattanooga road going to the south. 



Nashville, Tennessee,
February 26, 1862

Dear Kate:
          We are in camp again having just pitched our tents in the suburbs of the Southern metropolis. I am at leisure and embrace the earliest opportunity to indite a few lines though I do not know that it will reach you with mail facilities being so poor and we have no post office or postmaster.
         
          This place was just born into the Union yesterday morning. Nelson’s division landed yesterday morning at 8 o’clock and took peaceable possession of the city of Nashville and planted the stars and stripes on the capital. Our two brigades (the 10th and 19th) with one gunboat ran up the river and landed without any resistance, the Rebels having evacuated the city a week ago. We found all the stores and business houses closed up and very few citizens were to be seen. A few manifested courage enough to come to the landing and wave their handkerchiefs, but the majority were so frightened that they did not show themselves for some time.
 
Bust of Major General William "Bull" Nelson of Kentucky. The outspoken general would be murdered by General Jefferson C. Davis September 29, 1862 at the Galt House Hotel in Louisville, Kentucky. 

They have been taught to believe that the Yankees were such desperate creatures and that our mission was to plunder, steal, destroy property, outrage females, etc., and this scared them out of their wits. As soon as we landed, General Nelson issued an order forbidding soldiers entering any private house or mutilating private or public property, which was received with cheers by those present. In a short time the streets were covered with thousands of curious and anxious spectators- men, women, children, and Negroes (the latter forming no small part of the crowd) crowded around and welcomed us. The women especially received our flag with exclamations of joy. One old lady was so carried away that she came up and kissed the flag. A wonderful change has been wrought in the sentiment of Nashville in the last 24 hours and today it is Union to the hub.

I will give you a description of our trip here. We started from Hart County, Kentucky a week ago last Friday and marched to the river, to West Point, arriving there Sunday evening. Monday the 17th, we got aboard steamboats and started down the river. Tuesday evening arrived at Evansville and laid there till Wednesday. Thursday we ran back up to Kenelton and were ordered to Paducah, Kentucky and reached Paducah Friday at 9 o’clock and lay there till Sunday morning at sunrise, when we started for Nashville. We came back to the mouth of the Cumberland River (12 miles) and ran up the Cumberland to this place, passing Fort Donelson Sunday night but could not see much of it and arrived here at 8 o’clock yesterday.

The Rebels left here the day after Fort Donelson was surrendered in a perfect panic. They have taken a start for Murfreesboro some 30 miles back of this city. Soldiers are pouring in here by the thousands; one brigade landed yesterday evening and some half dozen brigades have landed here today and still they are coming. Governor Isham Harris and the members of the legislature left here for Memphis.

A wartime view of the Capitol Building in Nashville, Tennessee taken by George Barnard. 

Nashville is a fine city, has a beautiful situation, and some splendid buildings. The capitol stands on an eminence and commands a view of the river and country for miles. It is a stone building and quite a fine one. Money seems to be very scarce except for Southern script and every boy has his pocket full of that legal tender, but it is now considerably below par. It was current until yesterday morning when it depreciated so much that one man told me he couldn’t pay for his breakfast with a $100 bill. We captured a large amount of commissary stores here and are now living on it.


John Cox enlisted as a 30-year old Private in Company K, 24th Ohio Volunteer Infantry on June 13, 1861, mustering into service the same day. He was promoted successively to Corporal November 18, 1861, to Sergeant November 1, 1862, and to Commissary Sergeant July 14, 1863. His method of discharge is unknown, but he later served in Co. B of the 9th U.S. Veteran Infantry Regiment. After the war, he moved to Indiana and died January 28, 1896 in Lagrange Co., Indiana. He is buried at Greenwood Cemetery in Lagrange, Indiana. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Most Popular Posts

Arming the Buckeyes: Longarms of the Ohio Infantry Regiments

Image
     A common question that comes up in conversation about Civil War Buckeye regiments is "What were they armed with?" We are fortunate in that the state of Ohio kept good records of how the regiments were armed when they went into service, this being especially true for those regiments which went into service in 1861 and 1862. The state adjutant general's reports for 1861 and 1862 have been heavily drawn upon to construct this article, as well as consultation with Phil Spaugy who has done extensive research on how Ohio's troops were armed during the war.      Buckeyes carried a fairly wide variety of weapons into the field, and the below article breaks this down into weapons of both domestic manufacture and imported arms. The early days of the war found the state of Ohio practically bereft of longarms; as an example, when the 1st and 2nd Ohio Volunteer Militia left the state in late April 1861, they left unarmed, being armed at Lancaster, Pennsylvania on their way to
Read more

Bullets for the Union: Manufacturing Small Arms Ammunition During the Civil War

Image
       Civil War bullets are perhaps the most common item collected from the era; the two armies expended bullets by the millions during the four years’ conflict and spent or deformed bullets of all shapes and sizes have made fascinating and affordable collectibles since the guns went silent in 1865.       I recently acquired a display piece featuring 35 different types of small arms ammunition used during the Civil War, including everything from a small .28 caliber ball up to a .69 caliber three-ring Minie and it triggered some questions: how did the Federal army obtain its small arms ammunition during the war? Where did the lead come from to make the bullets, and where and how was the ammunition manufactured? This post seeks to answer those questions. A typical .58 caliber 3-ring Minie bullet   “Whenever the blasts of war blow in the ears of men who trade in the implements of destruction, they are apt to experience more joy than the true warrior, for then comes the harvest of gain.
Read more

Dressing the Rebels: How to Dye Butternut Jeans Cloth

Image
     In the early days of the Civil War,  the Southern states found themselves with an abundance of cotton but a shortage of cloth with which to make army uniforms. The trade in cloth prior to the war had largely been to send raw cotton or wool north to New England (or Great Britain) where it was converted into usable cloth; but now that trade was broken and the Southern states were thrown upon their own resources in their efforts to properly clothe the Confederate army.  This collection of Confederate enlisted men's frock coats and shell jackets gives some indication of the variety of shades of butternut worn during the war. All of them are shades of yellow brown, some heavier on the yellow and some heavier on the brown. The blue used around the collar or as rank insignia indicates that the soldier was in the infantry. Surviving Confederate uniforms are considered rather rare and command quite a healthy price in the collecting market. For an in-depth study of how Confederate jacke
Read more

The Wizard of Oz and the Civil War

Image
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
Read more

The Vaunted Enfield Rifle Musket

Image
     The English-made Model 1853 .577 caliber Enfield Rifle Musket was widely regarded as the best infantry arm in the world at the outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861. Favorable international press describing its efficiency in the Crimean War and in suppressing the Indian rebellion led to the widespread desire of American infantrymen (both Federal and Confederate) to be armed with these accurate and well-made arms. The lock plate of this well-worn P1853 Enfield rifle musket produced in 1862 shows the typical markings of a British-made weapon that made it through the Federal blockade.  ( Army of Tennessee Relics ) Enfield-pattern weapons were imported into the states by the tens and hundreds of thousands during the war years; one estimate stated that the Federal government purchased 500,000 while the Confederates purchased another 400,000. The Confederate government dispatched Captain Caleb Huse to Europe in April 1861 to purchase weapons and Huse focused on securing all the Enfi
Read more

In front of Atlanta with the 68th Ohio

Image
  The arrow corps badge of the 17th Army Corps was worn by many members of the 68th Ohio in the latter days of the war.       Private Edward A. Bigelow of Co. F of the 68th Ohio Volunteer Infantry wrote this brief account of the Battle of Atlanta just two days afterwards to his father back home in Henry County, Ohio. The regiment formed a part of Colonel Robert K. Scott's three regiment all-Ohio brigade consisting of the 20th, 68th, and 78th regiments, being designated the Second Brigade of the Third Division of Frank Blair's 17th Army Corps. Bigelow's letter originally appeared in the Napoleon Press newspaper and was copied in the Toledo Daily Commercial which was providential as no known copies exist today of the wartime Napoleon Press.  
Read more

Charging Battery Robinett: An Alabama Soldier Recalls the Vicious Fighting at Corinth

Image
W riting 30 years after the Battle of Corinth, James A. McKinstry of the 42 nd Alabama recalled his experiences storming Battery Robinett with Colonel William P. Rogers of the 2 nd Texas and expressed guilt that it was perhaps his action that brought about the colonel’s demise. “On seeing a line of Federals approaching, and before giving the situation a thought, I immediately raised my gun and fired full into the breast of a Federal sergeant, who was in front of the column, and only a short distance from us.  'Twas then that Captain George Foster shouted, "Cease firing, men! cease firing!" and waved his handkerchief, then I realized the true situation. 'Twas too late! That fatal volley had been turned on our little band from the muzzles of 1,500 muskets. I was still standing just as I was when I fired my last shot, and within a few feet of Colonel Rogers, when a Minie ball went crashing through my left hip and turned me half round; another went tearing through my
Read more

Federal Arms in the Stones River Campaign

Image
  T he following list, constructed after many years of research, lists unit by unit which type of weapons were carried by the Army of the Cumberland during the Stones River campaign. A number of sources were consulted including state ordnance reports, Federal quarterly ordnance reports (thank you Research Arsenal ), Ken Baumann’s Arming the Suckers, regimental histories and memoirs, captured ordnance reports, and consultation with knowledgeable experts in the field of firearms. Some of this information has been shared on the blog before in “ Rosy’s Heavy Metal: Artillery of the Army of the Cumberland ” or “ Shoulder Arms: How Sheridan’s and Davis’s Divisions Were Armed at Stones River ” but this is the first time the army as a whole has been presented. The overall conclusion I drew from looking at this data is that the Army of the Cumberland in December 1862 was an organization in the midst of transformation as far as arms. Many of the regiments still retained their original issue
Read more

Cook & Brother of New Orleans

Image
    The lockplate of a New Orleans-made Cook & Brother Enfield rifle produced in 1862 shows the fine craftsmanship that became the hallmark of the maker throughout the Civil War. Note the stars and bars flag at left, an emblem used on C&B's production throughout the war and the Cook & Brother, N.O. 1862 markings. Earlier production weapons at New Orleans had the flag located just above the maker's name while later weapons produced in Athens, Georgia would have a modified flag and Athens on the plate followed by the serial number.        In the spring of 1861, two English-born businessmen, Ferdinand and Francis Cook of New Orleans, perceived the need for the South to have its own domestic production of firearms and  set out to prove "that rifles could made here as well as in Yankee land or in Europe." The brothers  elected to produce copies of the British Model 1853 .577 caliber Enfield rifle as this was considered the benchmark longarm at the outset of the
Read more

Revisiting Snodgrass Hill: Memories of a 21st Ohio Officer

Image
Captain Isaac Cusac, Co. G, 21st Ohio Volunteer Infantry proudly displaying his rank as captain in an image likely dating from early 1863. One of his shoulder straps was shot off in the final stages of the 21st Ohio's fight atop Snodgrass Hill on September 20, 1863. Cusac brought it back to Chickamauga 50 years later.  I n September 1913, 83-year-old Isaac Cusac, a retired Presbyterian minister from the little town of McComb, Ohio, returned to Chattanooga to attend the national G.A.R. encampment. The former captain of the 21 st Ohio returned to Snodgrass Hill on the old Chickamauga battlefield on the 50 th anniversary of the battle carrying with him a precious relic of his wartime experiences. “He carried with him there an epaulet that was shot from his shoulder at the battle,” it was reported. “The bullet clipped off the epaulet and then struck him on the left hand, injuring two fingers.”           The flood of memories as he walked the grounds must have been overwhelming. The f
Read more