The men of Wisconsin who had fought and conquered the hard conditions of
frontier life, developing a raw wilderness into a wealthy and
progressive commonwealth, were of the sort to make the best of soldiers
when called upon to take up arms in behalf of the nation.
From the earliest days of the War of Secession until its close,
Wisconsin troops were ever upon the firing line, and participated in
some of the noblest victories of the long and painful struggle. General
Sherman, in his "Memoirs," paid them this rare tribute: "We estimated a
Wisconsin regiment equal to an ordinary brigade." It is impracticable in
one brief chapter to do more than mention a few of the most brilliant
achievements of the Badger troops.
In April, 1862, the Fourteenth, Sixteenth, and Eighteenth Wisconsin
infantry regiments, although new in the service, won imperishable
laurels upon the bloody field of Shiloh. The men of the Fourteenth were
especially prominent in the fray. Arriving on the ground at midnight of
the first day, they passed the rest of the night in a pelting rain,
standing ankle-deep in mud; and throughout all the next day fought as
though they were hardened veterans.
A Kentucky regiment was ordered to charge a Confederate battery, but
fell back in confusion; whereupon General Grant asked if the Fourteenth
Wisconsin could do the work. Its colonel cried, "We will try!" and then
followed one of the most gallant charges of the entire war. Thrice
driven back, the Wisconsin men finally captured the battery; confusion
ensued in the Confederate ranks, and very soon the battle of Shiloh was
a Union victory.
In the Peninsular campaign of the same year, the Fifth Regiment made a
bayonet charge which routed and scattered the Confederates, and turned
the scales in favor of the North. In an address to the regiment two days
later, General McClellan declared: "Through you we won the day, and
Williamsburg shall be inscribed on your banner. Your country owes you
its grateful thanks." His report to the War Department describes this
charge as "brilliant in the extreme."
Some of the highest honors of the war were awarded to the gallant Iron
Brigade, composed of the Second, Sixth, and Seventh Wisconsin, the
Nineteenth Indiana, and the Twenty-fourth Michigan. At Gainesville, in
the Shenandoah Valley campaign, also in 1862, this brigade practically
won the fight, the brunt of the Confederate assault being met by the
Second Wisconsin, which that day lost sixty per cent of its rank and
file; the brigade itself suffered a loss of nine hundred men.
The Third opened the battle at Cedar Mountain, and very soon after that
was at Antietam, where it lost two-thirds of the men it took into
action. The Fifth also was prominent near by, and the Iron Brigade,
behind a rail fence, conducted a fight which was one of the chief events
of the engagement.
At the battle of Corinth, several Wisconsin regiments and four of her
batteries won some of the brightest honors. In the various official
reports of the action, such comments as the following are frequent:
"This regiment (the Fourteenth) was the one to rely upon in every
emergency;" a fearless dash by the Seventeenth regiment, one general
described as "the most glorious charge of the campaign"; there was an
allusion to the Eighteenth's "most effectual service"; in referring to
the Sixth battery, mention is made in the reports, of "its noble work."
At Chaplin Hills, in Kentucky, a few days later, the First Wisconsin
drove back the enemy several times, and captured a stand of Confederate
colors. The Tenth was seven hours under fire, and lost fifty-four per
cent of its number. General Rousseau highly praised both regiments,
saying, "These brave men are entitled to the gratitude of the country."
The Fifteenth captured heavy stores of ammunition and many prisoners;
the Twenty-fifth repulsed, with withering fire, a superior force of the
enemy, who had suddenly assaulted them while lying in a cornfield; and
the Fifth battery three times turned back a Confederate charge, "saving
the division," as General McCook reported, "from a disgraceful defeat."
At Prairie Grove, in Arkansas, at Fredericksburg, and at Stone River,
still later in the campaign of 1862, Wisconsin soldiers exhibited what
General Sherman described as "splendid conduct, bravery, and
efficiency."
Men of Wisconsin were also prominent in the Army of the Potomac, during
the famous "mud campaign" of the early months of 1863. At the crossing
of the Rappahannock, theirs was the dangerous duty to protect the makers
of the pontoon bridges. In the course of this service, the Iron Brigade
made a splendid dash across the river, charged up the opposite heights,
and at the point of the bayonet routed the Confederates who were
intrenched in rifle pits.
At Chancellorsville, the Third Wisconsin, detailed to act as a barrier
to the advance of the Confederates under Stonewall Jackson, was the last
to leave the illfated field.
At Fredericksburg, not far away, the Fifth Wisconsin and the Sixth Maine
led a desperate charge up Marye's Hill, where, in a sunken roadway, lay
a large force of the enemy; this force, a few months before, had killed
six thousand Union men who were vainly attempting to rout them. This
second and final charge overcame all difficulties, and succeeded. As the
Confederate commander handed to the colonel of the Wisconsin regiment
his sword and silver spurs, he told the victor that he had supposed
there were not enough troops in the Army of the Potomac to carry the
position; it was, he declared, the most daring assault he had ever seen.
Such, too, was the judgment of Greeley, who declared that "Braver men
never smiled on death than those who climbed Marye's Hill on that fatal
day." The correspondent of the _London Times_ also wrote, "Never at
Fontenoy, Albuera, nor at Waterloo was more undaunted courage
displayed."
In the campaign which resulted in the fall of Vicksburg, in 1863,
numerous Wisconsin regiments participated, many of them with conspicuous
gallantry. It was an officer of the Twenty-third who received, at the
base of the works, the offer of the Confederates to surrender.
The part taken by Wisconsin troops at Gettysburg, was conspicuous. The
Iron Brigade and a Wisconsin company of sharpshooters were, day by day,
in the thickest of the fight, and gained a splendid record. At
Chickamauga, several of our regiments fought under General Thomas, and
lost heavily. They afterward participated in the struggle at Mission
Ridge, which resulted in the Confederate army under Bragg being turned
back into Central Georgia.
The Iron Brigade was in Grant's campaign against Richmond, serving
gallantly in the battles of the Wilderness, in the "bloody angle" at
Spottsylvania, at Fair Oaks, and in the numerous attacks before
Petersburg.
Wisconsin contributed heavily to the army of Sherman, in his "march to
the sea," and in the preliminary contests won distinction on many a
bitterly contested field. Several of our regiments were in the assault
on Mobile, the day when Lee was surrendering to Grant, in far-off
Virginia. Others of the Badger troops, infantry and cavalry, served in
Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas, fighting the Confederate guerillas,
while our artillerymen were distributed throughout the several Union
armies, and served gallantly until the last days of the war.
Wisconsin soldiers languished in most of the great Southern military
prisons. A thrilling escape of Union men from Libby Prison, at Richmond,
was made in February, 1864, by means of a secret tunnel. This was
ingeniously excavated under the superintendence of a party of which
Colonel H. C. Hobart of the Twenty-first Wisconsin was a leader.
Another notable event of the war, of which a Wisconsin man was the hero,
occurred during the night of the 27th of October, 1864. The Confederate
armored ram _Albemarle_, after having sunk several Union vessels, was
anchored off Plymouth, North Carolina, a town which was being attacked
by Federal troops and ships. Lieutenant W. B. Cushing of Delafield,
Waukesha county, proceeded to the _Albemarle_ in a small launch, under
cover of the dark; and, in the midst of a sharp fire from the crew of
the ram, placed a torpedo under her bow and blew her up. The daring
young officer escaped to his ship, amid appalling difficulties, having
won worldwide renown by his splendid feat.
The saving of the Union fleet in the Red River was an incident which
attracted national attention to still another Wisconsin man. The
expedition up the river, into the heart of the enemy's country, was a
failure, and immediate retreat inevitable. But the water had lowered,
and the fleet of gunboats found it impossible to descend the rapids at
Alexandria. The enemy were swarming upon the banks, and the situation
was so hazardous that it seemed as if the army would find it necessary
to desert the vessels. Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Bailey of the Fourth
Wisconsin infantry, serving as chief engineer on General Franklin's
staff, proposed to dam the river, then suddenly make an opening, and
allow the boats to emerge with the outrush of imprisoned water. The plan
is a familiar one to Wisconsin lumbermen, in getting logs over shoals;
but it was new to the other officers, and Bailey was laughed at as a
visionary. However, the situation was so desperate that he was allowed
to try his experiment. It succeeded admirably; the fleet, worth nearly
two millions of dollars, was saved, and the expedition emerged from the
trap in good order. Bailey was made a brigadier general, and the
grateful naval officers presented him with a valuable sword and vase.
No account of Wisconsin's part in the War of Secession should, however
brief, omit reference to a conspicuous participant, "Old Abe," the war
eagle of the Eighth Regiment. He was captured by an Indian, on the
Flambeau River, a branch of the Chippewa, and until the close of the
long struggle was carried on a perch by his owners, the men of Company
C. He was an eyewitness of thirty-six battles and skirmishes, and
accompanied his regiment upon some of the longest marches of the war.
Frequently he was hit by the enemy's bullets, but never was daunted, his
habit in times of action being to pose upon his perch or a cannon,
screaming lustily, and frequently holding in his bill the corner of a
flag. No general in the great struggle achieved a wider celebrity than
"Old Abe." Until his death, in 1881, he was exhibited in all parts of
the country, at State and national soldiers' reunions, and at fairs held
for their benefit. At the great Sanitary Fair in Chicago, in 1865, it is
said that the sales of his photographs brought $16,000 to the soldiers'
relief fund.
Upon the opening of the Spanish-American War, in April, 1898,
Wisconsin's militia system was one of the best in the country, and its
quota of 5390 volunteers was made up from these companies.
The First Regiment was sent to Camp Cuba Libre, at Jacksonville,
Florida; the Second and Third to Camp Thomas, at Chickamauga; and the
Fourth, at first to the State military camp at Camp Douglas, and later
to Camp Shipp, Alabama. The First was the earliest raised, and the best
equipped, but its colonel's commission was not so old as those held by
the other regimental commanders from this State; therefore, when two
Wisconsin regiments were to be sent in July to Puerto Rico, the Second
and Third were selected, leaving the First reluctantly to spend its
entire time in camp. After the war, it had been intended to detail the
Fourth, not mustered in until late in the struggle, to join the
American army of occupation in the West Indies; but, owing to the fact
that a large percentage of the men were suffering from camp diseases,
they were finally mustered out without leaving the country.
The Second and Third had an interesting experience in Puerto Rico.
Arriving at the port of Guamico upon the 25th of July, they took a
prominent part in the bloodless capture of the neighboring city of
Ponce. This task completed, they were detailed, with the Sixteenth
Pennsylvania, to form the advance guard of the army, which prepared at
once to sweep the island from south to north. Our men were almost daily
under fire, particularly in road clearing skirmishes under General Roy
Stone.
Two days after the landing at Guamico, Lieutenant Perry Cochrane, of Eau
Claire, an officer of the Third, was sent forward with seventeen other
Eau Claire men, to open up the railway line leading to the little
village of Yauco, lying about twenty miles westward of Ponce, and to
capture that place. The track and the bridges had been wrecked by the
fleeing enemy, so that Cochrane's party endured much peril and fatigue
before they reached their destination; and Yauco was not disposed to
succumb to this handful of men. Cochrane successfully held his own,
however, until the following day, when reenforcements arrived.
A few days after the fall of Ponce, the Sheboygan company was acting as
guard to a detachment repairing the San Juan road, several miles out of
town. Hearing that a party of Spanish soldiers had taken a stand at
Lares, eighteen miles away, a detail was sent with a flag of truce, to
treat with them. The squad consisted of Lieutenant Bodemer, four
privates, and a bugler. The Spaniards were not in a pleasant frame of
mind, and but for their officers would have made short shrift of the
visitors, despite the peaceful flag which they bore. Finally, the
Spaniards agreed to receive a deputation of native Puerto Ricans, and
talk the matter over with them. Our men withdrew, and sent natives in
their stead; but the latter were treacherously assaulted, and only one
of them escaped to tell the story.
Upon the 9th of August, there was a sharp fight at Coamo. Both of our
regiments were actively employed in this encounter, and were of the
troops which finally raised the American flag over the town walls.
The final engagement was fought two days later, at the mountain pass of
Asomanta, near Aibonito, where 2500 Spanish troops were centered. The
Second Wisconsin was the last American regiment in this fight, and lost
two killed and three wounded. These were Wisconsin's only field losses
during the war, although her deaths from camp diseases were about
seventy.