The 21st Illinois Infantry and Its Famous Colonel

Ulysses S. Grant’s Civil War career began in the trans-Mississippi, where he campaigned in Missouri for a few months. His first command was the 21^st Illinois Infantry, a high spirited group nicknamed "Governor Yates's Hellions," because they "had mutinied over bad bread and had burned the guardhouse....the men robbed hen roosts for miles around and stayed out all night in the saloons of Mattoon" (p. 417), according to Bruce Catton in Captain Sam Grant. I wonder…did any of these soldiers detect any signs of greatness in their colonel? After serving in Missouri, Grant’s former regiment went on to compile a fine fighting record in Tennessee and Georgia. The short history below is from the “Three Hundred Fighting Regiments” chapter of William F. Fox’s Regimental Losses In The American Civil War, 1861-1865 (1898).

For more information about the regiment, see the following:

Illinois GenWeb: a roster and short histories of the unit are on this website

Civil War Flags of Illinois: three battle flags of the 21^st are shown

“Cruft's Brigade — Stanley's Division--Fourth Corps.

（1) Col. Ulysses S. Grant. W. P., R. A.; General, U. S. A.	（3) Col. James E. Calloway.
（2) Col. John W. Alexander (Killed).	（4) Col. William H. Jamison.

Companies.		killed and died of wounds.			died of disease, accidents, in Prison, &c.			Total Enrollment.
		Officers.	Men.	Total.	Officers.	Men.	Total.
Field and Staff		1	1	2	1		1	18
Company	A	1	14	15		10	10	146
	B		11	11	1	14	15	146
	C	1	8	9		8	8	132
	D	1	11	12		24	24	142
	E		11	11		10	10	139
	F		15	15		17	17	146
	G	1	10	11		18	18	140
	H		16	16		20	20	157
	I		18	18		7	7	138
	K	1	9	10		12	12	148
Totals		6	124	130	2	140	142	1,452

Original enrollment, 923; killed, 113; percentage, 12.2

Total of killed and wounded, 374; died in Confederate prisons (previously included), 53.

Battles.	K. & M. W.	Battles.	K. & M. W.
Stone’s River, Tenn.	78	Kenesaw, Ga.	1
Chickamauga, Ga.	45	Atlanta, Ga.	1
Gay's Gap, Tenn.	1	Franklin, Tenn.	1
Iuka, Miss., August 21, 1862	1	Nashville, Tenn.	1
Chattahoochie, Ga.	1

Present, also, at Fredericktown; Siege of Corinth; Chaplin Hills; Knob Gap; Liberty Gap; peach Tree Creek; Jonesboro; Lovejoy's Station.

Notes.--A peculiar interest attaches itself to the Twenty-first, because it was Grant’s old regiment. The men in that command little thought that the stranger assigned to them as their colonel was destined to become the grandest figure in the war. The recruits rendezvoused at Mattoon, where they were mustered into the State service, May 15, 1861, by “Captain” Grant, and on the 24th of June, the regiment was mustered into the United States service by Captain Pitcher, U. S. A., with U. S. Grant as colonel. Grant continued in command of his regiment until the 7th of August, when he was promoted, and entered on the career which was to culminate in grandeur at Appomattox. The regiment served in Missouri until May, 1862, and then it joined Buell's Army. It was engaged at the battle of Perryville, Ky., but with only a slight loss in wounded. At Stone’s River, it participated in the hardest of the fighting, losing in that battle, and in the preliminary skirmish at Knob Gab, 57 killed, 187 wounded and 59 missing; total 303. The regiment was then in Carlin's (2d) Brigade, Davis's (1st) Division, McCook's Corps, and sustained the heaviest loss of any regiment on that field. Four color-bearers were shot down, but the colors were carried safely through the fight. At Chickamauga it lost 22 killed, 70 wounded, and 146 captured or missing; Colonel Alexander, an officer of rare merit, was killed there. After this battle the Twenty-first was assigned to Cruft's (1st) Brigade, Stanley's (1st) Division, Fourth Corps. The regiment reenlisted in March, 1864, upon which it returned to Illinois on a veteran furlough. It rejoined the Army while at the front, near Kenesaw Mountain, the men who did not reenlist having been attached during the meanwhile to the One Hundred and First Ohio. After participating in the Atlanta and Nashville campaigns of 1864, it accompanied its corps to Texas, where it was mustered out in December, 1865” (Fox, 358).

The Agony of Marching

Captain John William De Forest could certainly turn a phrase, and he skillfully used his writing talent to document the activities of his regiment, the 12^th Connecticut Infantry, in Louisiana and later in Virginia. In 1946, James H. Croushore edited De Forest’s journal and some of his postwar articles in A Volunteer’s Adventures: A Union Captain’s Record Of The Civil War. The following sample is taken from an article about the Louisiana Teche campaign that was first published in 1868:

“Oh, the horrors of marching on blistered feet! It is an incessant bastinado applied by one’s own self, from morning to night. I do not mean a single blister, as big as a pea, but a series of blisters, each as large as a dollar, or, to judge by one’s sensations, as large as a cartwheel. I have had them one under the other, on the heel, behind the heel, on the ball of the foot, on every toe, a network, a labyrinth, an archipelago of agony. Heat, hunger, thirst, and fatigue are nothing compared with this torment. When you stand, you seem to be on red-hot iron plates; when you walk, you make grimaces at every step. In the morning the whole regiment starts limping, and by noon the best soldiers become nearly mutinous with suffering. They snarl and swear at each other; they curse the general for ordering such marching; they curse the enemy for running away instead of fighting; they fling themselves down in the dust, refusing to move a step further. Fevered with fatigue and pain, they are actually not themselves. Meantime, the company officers, as sore-footed as anyone, must run about from straggler to straggler, coaxing, arguing, ordering, and, perhaps, using the flat of the sabre. Instead of marching in front of my company, I followed immediately in the rear, so that I could see and at once pounce upon everyone who fell out.

It was curious to note how cheerful everyone became if cannon in front told of the proximity of the enemy. We were ready to fight the bloodiest of combats rather than march a mile further. We filed into line of battle delighted, and then resumed our pursuit heartsick” (pp. 92-93).

"I was once tender hearted..."

This photograph shows the position of Good’s Texas Battery on March 8, 1862. Although a peaceful scene today, it would have been a very hot spot indeed during the battle of Pea Ridge.

In an earlier posting, I documented the hard fight that an Iowa artillery battery endured during the battle. This time, I focus on the plight of Captain John J. Good’s Texas battery during the last day of the fight. Made up of men from Dallas as well as Smith County, John J. Good, an attorney from Dallas, commanded the battery during the unit’s baptism of fire. These battery boys first saw action near Leetown on March 7^th, but would serve the next day near Elkhorn Tavern. Captain Good wrote about this latter action to his wife:

“…All were ordered around to Van Dorn. We reached the command in the evening. We had nothing to eat for two days before. We slept this night upon the ground with empty stomachs. Early next morning Van Dorn ordered my Battery to support his centre. We were no sooner in position than three batteries opened a perfect storm of round and

shrapnell shot and shell. We fought all for ¾ of an hour. Our shell and shrapnell having been expended and 25 men killed, wounded and missing, I ordered the Battery to retire. Hart’s Battery was ordered into my position and did not stay 10 minutes before they were litterally cut to pieces and retired. Just at this time to the astonishment of all the enemy made a bold dash at our centre, pierced it and Genl Van Dorn ordered a retreat….

The battle ground is strown with the dead, some killed by cannon balls, some with shell, some with rifle balls and some with bayonet thrusts. God forbid I shall ever again see such a sight….

I was once tender hearted, Sue, and expect to be so again when peace sheds her genial influence over the land, but on the field I had no more feeling for the dead Dutch than so many hogs. [I] did not budge from my course to avoid running over them. Confound them. I wish they were all dead and hope to have the pleasure of assisting soon in executions again….” From Fitzhugh, Lester Newton, ed. Cannon Smoke: the Letters of Captain John J. Good, Good-Douglas Texas Battery, CSA (Hillsboro, TX: Hill Junior College, 1971), pp. 165-166.

Private Sam Thompson wrote:

“…About 9 o’clock a.m. the Texas Battery and Churchill Clark’s Battery were ordered forward, and placed half mile to the front and southwest of Elkhorn Tavern, supported by a small battalion of Missouri infantry, about 100 strong. To the west across an open field were Curtis and Sigel. We opened fire with 6 guns and Capt. Clark opened 300 yards or more to our right. Very soon the Federal batteries replied from the edge of the woods beyond the field. A most terrific artillery duel followed. Capt. Clark was soon struck from his horse by a solid shot and after a short time the Missouri Battery made only a feeble response to the enemy’s guns, and all the Federal batteries turned their attention to the Texans, which was being splendidly served, every man being at his post giving the enemy the full capacity of our guns.

Here Charle Erwin fell dead at his gun. Billy Wilson had a leg swept off by a ball, and a number were wounded, besides a number of horses were killed or disabled….” From Lucia Rutherford Douglas, comp. and ed. Douglas’s Texas Battery, CSA (Tyler, TX: Smith County Historical Society, 1966), pp. 185-186.

Oklahoma and the Sesquicentennial

Oklahoma may not be the first state that you think of when you hear or read the phrase “Civil War Sesquicentennial,” but there was a lot of activity in the Indian Territory during the conflict. Oklahoma’s Sesquicentennial website has several digitized collections including the letter collections of David Breese, George Fine, Cyrus Byington, and Dallas Bowman. A Fort Blunt Ledger has also been digitized, and there are over twenty maps to peruse. Check it out!

Cabin Creek Preservation?

The site of the First and Second Battles of Cabin Creek is currently commemorated in a tiny park near Pensacola, Oklahoma, consisting of about ten acres. There is no visitor center and essentially no attempt at interpreting the battle actions that occurred there; a few granite markers line the roadway but they serve little purpose other than to inform the visitor of the units that participated in the actions. Since the park itself contains just a small percentage of the actual battlefields, I've long thought of it as a prime candidate for further preservation.

As a member of the Oklahoma Historical Society, I receive the organization’s official journal, The Chronicles of Oklahoma. Every issue includes the minutes of the Society’s quarterly meeting. Reading minutes is one of my odd pleasures, and I found the following part in the most recent issue to be quite informative:

“Consideration of projects for the Civil War Sesquicentennial. Bob Blackburn reported the Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission will hold its next meeting on April 30 at Honey Springs. He asked for at least four top priority projects, supported by the board, to submit to the commission at the meeting on Saturday and suggested the following: (1) finishing the visitor’s center at Honey Springs, (2) acquiring two parcels of land at the Cabin Creek Battlefield, (3) hosting an academic conference at the History Center in 2013 on the War in the West, and (4) changing reenactment schedules, having the Honey Springs reenactment in 2011, 2013, and 2015 in September…The president of the Civil War Trust and his chief fundraising officer were at the History Center last week and reported that the Civil War Trust has an option to buy the two parcels of land at Cabin Creek for $360,000. The Civil War Trust is applying for a grant from the American Battlefield Protection Plan for half the purchase price, leaving $180,000 to be raised” (The Chronicles of Oklahoma, Fall 2011, p. 380).