The Triune Slobberknocker

On the evening of December 27, 1862, the Federal camps near Triune, Tennessee buzzed with talk of a hand-to-hand fight the men of the Anderson Troop witnessed that morning. In modern wrestling parlance, the two men engaged in what is called a slobberknocker, a particularly violent physical confrontation. The epic fight between Major Adolph Rosengarten of the Anderson Troop and Corporal Joel T. McBride of the 45th Mississippi meets that definition in spades. 

    The Federal army was pushing south from Nashville and after taking Knob Gap in a sharp fight the day before, the forces of General Alexander McCook's Right Wing, led by the Anderson Troop (also known as the 15th Pennsylvania) engaged in a running fight with the troopers of John Wharton's cavalry brigade and skirmishers from General S.A.M. Wood's brigade, among them the 45th Mississippi. It was two ridges north of Wilson Branch in Triune along was is now Tennessee Highway 41A where Rosengarten and McBride grappled. 

      

One of the two combatants in the Triune Slobberknocker was Major Adolph Rosengarten of the Anderson Troop. He was killed in action two days later in the fight near Wilkinson's Crossroads, pierced by seven balls when he charged a line held by Co. A of the 10th South Carolina. His death cast a gloom over the troop as Rosengarten was beloved by his men. 

          Adjutant Josiah Reiff of the Anderson Troop provided this detailed description of the Rosengarten-McBride fight:

The special incident of the day was an extremely exciting and well-nigh mortal combat engaged in by a six-foot Rebel and Major Rosengarten. I had been riding with the Major, but had I become separated from him.

When I found him, I was astonished to see him pale, exhausted, and bleeding. After leaving me he hurried into the woods to reconnoiter, meeting a single Rebel, who fired at him but missed at twenty yards, to which fire the Major replied with his pistol, and ordered him to surrender. This the rebel, who was dismounted, promised to do, and the Major rode up to receive his arms.

When in the act of surrendering the Rebel suddenly struck the Major a tremendous blow over the left shoulder with his gun. The man was six feet high and strongly built. The Major was also a very muscular man and a scientific boxer. He sprang from his horse, at the same time aiming another shot at the fellow, but the pistol snapped. He then clutched and struck out with his fist. They grappled, and in the tussle the Rebel, being the heavier, got on top, the Major, however, still retaining a good grip on the fellow's throat.

Both were becoming somewhat weakened, when the Rebel put his knee on the Major's breast, and seizing his saber aimed for his throat. The blow was turned aside by the Major, who at the same time dealt the Rebel a couple of good blows on the temple with the butt of his pistol, crying out as lustily as possible for “Anderson! Anderson! Help! help!”

Washington Airey, our Sergeant Major, hearing the cry thought Lieutenant Anderson was being called, therefore he paid no attention to the noise. Airey had been on the hill and was going toward the left near the turnpike, when looking through the woods, he saw a man on the ground and another apparently helping him. Thinking that a Rebel had been wounded and another was getting him off the field, he hurried forward to capture both, when to his surprise he recognized the Major on the ground. He seized the fellow, who was not inclined to lose his hold, by the back of the neck and pulled him off. He was then about to fight both, but on Airey's threatening to shoot, he surrendered.

The Rebel said, “I have had hold of some good men, but that one (the Major) is a little bit the best man I have ever had hold of.” I neglected to say what caused the flow of blood. When this chap found things were growing tight, he undertook to bite the Major's finger off, and he well-nigh accomplished it; so, the Major turned to help himself to a steak from the enemy's cheek, consequently it was a “stand-off.”

 

No known photos exist of Corporal Joel McBride of the 45th Mississippi, but this image of an unidentified soldier in the 27th Mississippi gives some idea of how he might have been dressed during the fight. The pugnacious and combative McBride later became the color bearer of the 45th Mississippi and was killed carrying the colors at Franklin nearly two years later. 

Sergeant L.G. Williams of Co. A of the 45th Mississippi provided his own memories of the slobberknocker: 

 Our company was deployed as skirmishers to meet an advance of cavalry of General McCook’s corps. When the crack of carbines and rifles got to be pretty lively, our colonel gave the command ‘Skirmishers retreat!’ The entire company heard and obeyed except Captain Connor and Corporal McBride who were too far away to hear and too busy at the time to heed.

To the rear of our skirmish line some 75-80 yards was a ten-rail worm fence which would have to be climbed in the retreat. McBride had his eye on some ten or twelve cavalrymen led by an officer who were advancing at a gallop and at the same time realized that his company had fallen back. He determined to make their leader, who was some distance in front of his men, a target, fire, then join his command which by this time had almost passed out of view.

Waiting until the officer got within 20-30 feet, he took deliberate aim, pulled trigger, but his gun snapped. The major dashed forward, almost standing in his stirrups, his saber raised to cleave his enemy’s chest, confident of victory, when McBride clubbed his gun and before the major could strike, knocked him from his horse badly stunned.

 This was McBride’s chance to retreat as the men had not reached them as they had stopped to capture Captain Connor and talk to him. So, McBride made for the rear in double quick time. Arriving at the fence, he attempted to get over but being rather clumsy and the day damp and drizzly, on grasping the top rail to aid him in getting over, it would slip or be drawn toward him causing him to let go and fall flat on his back. Three times he made the effort to go over the fence but each time it was a slip and a fall. Raising a fourth time, the major, having recovered from the blow and still on foot, was upon him savagely cutting and thrusting at him with his saber making his mark in good shape across the front of McBride’s body.

 This infuriated the corporal who sprang at the Major like a bulldog, caught him around the body, threw him down, straddled him, and nearly pounded the life out of him with his fists. At this moment, the major’s troops, a sergeant and eight or ten men, came up excitedly shouting ‘Shoot the Rebel! Shoot him! Kill him! No, don’t shoot boys, you’ll kill the major! Take him off! Jerk him off!’ and other phrases more profane than polite. At last, they got him off the major but McBride had his dander up and struck and kicked at the sergeant and the men ferociously who threatened to kill him if he didn’t give in at once. His own captain finally commanded him “Surrender, Joe, surrender you fool!” which caused him to submit, but even then, reluctantly.

 

Major Rosengarten, pummeled but still alive, was helped from the ground by his men only to meet his end two days later at Wilkinson’s Crossroads. As for Corporal McBride, he remained a prisoner of war for a good while afterwards and witnessed the Battle of Stones River as a prisoner. Pugnacious as ever, McBride yelled at the fleeing Yankees of the Right Wing as they passed by. “What yer running fer? Why don’t you stand and fight like men?” Captain Connor pulled him aside and said, “For God’s sake Joe, don’t try to rally the Yankees!”

McBride spent months at Camp Douglas in Chicago as a prisoner of war but was exchanged in time to take part in the Tullahoma campaign. He later served as the regimental color bearer through the Atlanta campaign but was among the slain at the Battle of Franklin, a battle which took just a few miles from where he fought “The Triune Slobberknocker.”

 

Sources:

Kirk, Charles H. History of the 15th Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry which was recruited and known as the Anderson Cavalry in the Rebellion of 1861-1865. Philadelphia: Historical Committee, 1906, pgs. 80-81

“Hand to Hand Fight in the Army,” Sergeant L.G. Williams, Co. A, 45th Mississippi, Confederate Veteran, August 1894, pg. 228

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