Title: The Story of the Raising and Organization of a Regiment of Volunteers in 1862 - Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, Commandery of the District of Columbia, War Papers 46
Author: Spear, Ellis, 1834-1917
Language: English
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ORGANIZATION OF A REGIMENT OF VOLUNTEERS IN 1862***


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Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States.

Commandery of the District of Columbia.

War Papers.
46

THE STORY OF THE RAISING AND ORGANIZATION OF A
REGIMENT OF VOLUNTEERS IN 1862.


Brevet Brigadier General
ELLIS SPEAR,
U.S. Volunteers,

And Read at the Stated Meeting of March 4, 1903.



The Story of the Raising and Organization of a Regiment of Volunteers
in 1862.


Heretofore papers which have been read before this Commandery have
related to personal reminiscences of campaigns and battles, with all
the interest which accompanies the personal element in such affairs.
The preservation of these details is of great importance, not only for
the special interest which attaches to them, but because they
illustrate the larger actions and will be of value to future
generations, as showing the very body and features of the time. How
valuable these minor matters are, we perceive plainly by the use made
of them as they are found in autobiographies and diaries of former
generations. The knowledge of the manner in which people lived and
thought and acted in private life throws light upon public affairs and
public characters. It is interesting, and not unprofitable, to know
that the Father of his Country in some wrathful mood swore roundly; or
that the Philosopher of the Revolution, in his younger days, trudged
in the streets of Philadelphia with a loaf of bread under each arm;
or, when older, was very gay and festive in the gay and festive
capital of France.

I propose to continue in the same grave historical vein, but to treat
of less important affairs. I propose to avoid the beaten track of
campaigns, battles, marches and skirmishes, and the luxurious life of
Libbey or Andersonville prisons, and going back to the beginning of
things, endeavor to explain how a volunteer regiment was raised and
gotten into the field, and, incidentally, perhaps, to touch upon the
character of its officers and men.

The regiment of which I speak was the last to be organized in its
State under the call for three hundred thousand men, made by the
general Government in 1862. It was the last of that "three hundred
thousand more" responding to the call of "Father Abraham," according
to the popular ditty of the time. The recruiting was done by private
individuals, and at their own expense, under the authority of the
Governor of the State. These private individuals, as a matter of
course, expected, as a reward for their labor and expenditures, to be
commissioned in the companies which they might raise. That was the
understanding. Doubtless, in their efforts, they were inspired by
patriotism, but, as was said about the Pilgrim Fathers, that they
"sailed by Deuteronomy, modified by an eye to the main chance;" so
there was also, with the officers, some modification or further
stimulus of personal consideration, just as with the enlisted
men--their patriotic impulses were somewhat assisted by the bounty of
a hundred dollars.

This method of raising troops was an effective one and inexpensive to
the Government; but as it involved more or less of log-rolling amongst
his neighbors, and more or less persuasion and perhaps promises in the
obtaining of recruits on the part of the ambitious recruiting officer,
it was not so promising for future discipline. Nor was the process of
selecting line officers by their ability or success in persuading
their neighbors to enlist, a severe test of military fitness. However,
these considerations did not trouble the Governor nor the impromptu
recruiting officer, who did not foresee them. He had no experience
whatever in this line of business, and fortunately did not look so far
ahead. To say that as a rule he was utterly green in military matters,
is to do injustice to the words. However, he might be credited with
some enterprise and even audacity, for such certainly were required in
a young man given to serious reflection, who should proposed to
organize a military company, and to command it in the field, when he
scarcely knew a line of battle from a line of rail fence.

Amongst those raising companies were young lawyers who had perhaps
learned to draw an indictment, but who would not then have been able
to draw anything in the military line, unless it were rations, or the
enemy's fire. There were schoolmasters whose only qualifications for
getting men to the front and keeping them there, were based on
experience in teaching young ideas how to shoot. There were farmers,
clerks, and fellows just out of college, some graduates and some
undergraduates, but with not a tried or known military qualification
in the whole squad. I mistake; there was one who recruited a company,
and who had been in the Mexican War, but he was afterward found to
have forgotten most that he had ever learned, and was soon found also
unable, in the matter of legs, to keep up with the procession. And
there was another who had had experience in an earlier regiment raised
in 1861, but he resigned after his first battle. However, with these
miscellaneous qualifications, unaided by experience, the embryo
officers worked energetically to enlist the men. The work was largely,
but not wholly, of the button-holing order. It was not unattended with
exciting incidents. Anxious mothers met the recruiting officers
sometimes in tears and sometimes in wrath. One such, I remember, drove
him from the premises with a pitchfork. It was the first charge he had
met and he retreated. The young man, however, got his recruit. The
method of recruiting at that time would not bear strict investigation.
It shared in the general and unavoidable slip-shodness and haste which
marked the whole work of raising great armies out of an undrilled and
unmilitary population, and on short notice. Troops in large numbers
were needed and that urgently. Political considerations forbade
drafting. They must be raised by volunteering. The inducements were
bounties to the men and commissions to the officers. He who could
raise a company in the least time was looked upon with the greatest
favor and, other things being equal, got the earliest letter in the
alphabet of the regiment. The recruiting officer did not know what
kind of a man, of what physical or moral fibre, the service required,
and had no opportunity to learn. His object was to get his hundred men
as quickly as possible; and provided the recruit had limbs, organs,
and dimensions, that was enough. The care of the Governor of the
State, and usually his knowledge, went also no further. He had the
State's quota to fill, and was most concerned to fill it as early and
as easily as possible. The average examining surgeon had no more
knowledge of the business than the recruiting officer, and was
inclined to take the patriotism of the volunteer as conclusive
evidence of bodily soundness. The mustering officer mustered in the
lump, what the recruiting officer had gathered and the surgeon had
passed.

So there was small effort at sifting. The results were sometimes even
ludicrous. One fellow, too short, was passed in high-heeled shoes, and
grew shorter as time and his shoes wore on; but he made an excellent
soldier. Another passed muster in a black beard, which soon after
disclosed an ever widening zone of grey, and he became a veteran
prematurely. More obscure bodily defects developed on the first hard
campaign, and speedily furnished ample material for the hospital and
pension roll. However, by hook or crook the ten companies were raised,
and from various quarters were transported at the Government's
expense, to the camp where they were to be organized into a regiment.
There was some grumbling on account of having to ride in a freight car
on the part of men who afterwards, many times, would have very gladly
availed themselves of that jolting method of transportation. At the
rendezvous the company first to arrive found neither quarters nor
rations, and therefore marched into the city, woke up the Mayor, and
then relied on his patriotic charity. But the later arrivals fared
better, and there was plenty of beef and bread.

The Governor, when he saw the enlistment rolls, and heard that the men
had been placed in camp at the rendezvous, said to himself and his
counsellors: "These fellows who have recruited so many men and have
actually landed them in camp must have military qualifications," and
straightway he commissioned them all. Strictly speaking, however, it
was not straightway, but as soon as the clerks could fill out the
commissions and the Governor found time to sign them.

All these assembled recruits and expectant officers presented when in
camp the general appearance of a town meeting. But one uniform was to
be seen; that was of the gentleman who had seen service in the
regiment of 1861; the uniform of the Mexican veteran evidently had
been worn out long since. However, soon the Major came who had seen
some service as a captain in an earlier regiment, and who had
succeeded in getting himself transferred with an increased rank; leave
of absence and promotion at the same stroke. He wore a uniform, but
looked lonesome. However, he had seen a camp and had been in a
regiment, and had some ideas of what ought to be done. He organized a
guard whose only weapons at first were those given by nature or
borrowed from the wood pile. His first officer of the day, in a brown
cutaway, striped trowsers, and a silk hat, bore as insignia of his
office a part of a military weapon, now discarded, but at that early
date in use, and known as a ramrod. If there were a sword in camp,
excepting those of the major commanding and the veteran of '61, its
owner must have concealed it, perhaps for fear of applications to
borrow. Imagine the guard mounting! the difficulties of getting into
line; no two hats alike; no uniforms and no two suits alike, and the
officer of the day in costume approximating that of a Quaker, and with
a ramrod for a sword! The orders were of a nature of explanation and
conference, and were the result of an agreement between the officers
and men. To the credit of all concerned it must be said that these
agreements were faithfully carried out, and if any fellow presumed to
disobey the officer of the guard after due remonstrance, he was liable
to be knocked down and perhaps kicked, according to the gravity of the
offence. But there were no accidents from fire-arms. Shot-guns had
been left at home and Springfield muskets had not arrived. Clothing
arrived in boxes in advance of the quartermaster, but lack of
quartermaster was a small matter. One of the captains (since a
distinguished lawyer), was detailed to attend to the business of
distributing the clothing, and the invoices and vouchers were long
afterwards, I believe, made up by counting noses and multiplying that
factor by the number of articles properly allowed each man. By good
luck or the favor of Providence rations soon became plenty. There was
no canned roast beef nor those other luxuries much advertised long
afterwards, as we all know, but there was salt beef in abundance and
bread and potatoes and coffee. The country boys sorely missed their
daily pie, but there was no grumbling; the beef and potatoes were
cooked in the company's kitchen, and such were the innate good manners
of the cooks that the officers were served first out of the rations of
the men.

But I anticipate. Prior to the issue of the clothing, and while the
affairs of the camp were conducted in this go-as-you please manner,
more civil than military, one evening the Colonel arrived, a West
Pointer, and recently from service in the regular army in the field.
At once there seemed to be a general impression throughout the camp,
which cannot perhaps be expressed better than by the use of a phrase
common on that ship-building coast, "that there was the devil to pay
and no pitch hot."

The Colonel, a thoroughly trained soldier, saw things, to him new and
strange, and perhaps with a prejudiced eye. It was his first
experience with volunteers, and he found them in their most immature
condition. The respectable citizen who seemed to be half loafing,
half on guard at the Headquarters' tent did not salute, and, in fact,
had nothing military to salute with, but cheerfully remarked "How do
you do, Colonel." Him the Colonel regarded as a villain of the deepest
dye and perhaps as a fool into the bargain. But this was all of a
piece with the general appearance of the camp, so far as the Colonel
saw it. Once in the tent he sent an orderly disguised as an honest
citizen of the State, and who did not know, in fact, that he was an
orderly, for the officer of the day. When that friend appeared, the
Colonel propounded questions to him which he had never heard before,
and never dreamed of. If the Colonel had inquired about hexameter
verse or the volume of the cycloid, he might have obtained perhaps
prompt and correct answers. But concerning the details of guard
mounting and the duties of his office, the embryo Captain and Officer
of the Guard was as ignorant as a spring chicken; and after some
fruitless pursuit of information the Colonel expressed the opinion
that it was "A hell of a regiment," and terminated the interview. The
officer of the day went out with the impression that he had smelled
something sulphurous, and that the Colonel was correct in his location
of the regiment.

However, the men were speedily put into uniform, company books
were distributed, and there was a scramble, under pressure from
Headquarters, for information as to tactics and army regulations.
Commissions for the officers came from the Governor, and uniforms from
the tailor; the mustering officer appeared, and these miscellaneous
gentlemen of various previous occupations and training, suddenly
became officers and men, in the army of the United States, tailor-made
and Governor-made.

Probably the parchments and the textile fabrics had been selected with
quite as much care and discrimination as the raw material which they
covered and designated. Certainly the commissions and uniforms were
made by rule and in accordance with the army regulations. The
officers, so far, had simply happened.

The diverse effect of all these new clothes was remarkable. Of course
there was no such blaze of glory as that which now appears upon the
Avenue on occasions of official display; but compared with the sober
drabs of civil life, the blue cloth with the gold buttons and the new
shoulder-straps were comparatively gorgeous. Some whose youth was more
easily affected by the unusual display assumed airs of importance;
others wore their honors with meekness, and some went about with a
settled determination expressed upon their faces to attend to business
and to ignore as far as possible these honors and glories thus
suddenly thrust upon them. The camp put on a military appearance, and
the regiment, if not a lion, was at least clothed in the skin of that
formidable beast. Arms and equipments were procured for two companies,
and there were feeble attempts to drill. Company K, blessed with an
officer of some experience, went forward with a bound, and the blind
leaders of the blind in other companies groped on. A drum corps was
organized, if that could be said to be organized in which every member
drummed or fifed independently of all others.

The Adjutant and Sergeant-Major were made out of the same raw
material, and in a few days the regiment reached that astounding
perfection of drill which permitted it to get into line and go from
line into column and the reverse. The sound of men counting off, "1,
2," "1, 2," "1, 2," was heard throughout the camp, and that wonderful
complication in which No. 2 was perpetually stepping to the right of
No. 1, was a daily occurrence, and finally came to be understood. Of
course the line was not at first the shortest distance between two
fixed points, and the process of going from line into column resembled
a convulsion.

In this advanced stage of the drill, the Colonel determined to hold a
dress parade. With much running to and fro and much discord under the
theory of drumming and fifing, from the drum corps on flank, much
exhortation on the part of the line officers, much right-dressing and
left-dressing, the regiment was gotten approximately into line. The
Colonel was in his place in front, with his war visage on, and filled
with energy and disgust, when suddenly and prematurely the drum corps
broke loose and began to ramble down the line uttering discords
galore. It was very far from "sonorous metal blowing martial sounds."
Then came the first order of the Colonel which, as faithful history
must record, was the beginning of the military history of the regiment
as a battalion. The order was: "Captain Bangs, stop that damned
drumming." The order was directed to Captain Bangs from local
considerations, he being the Captain nearest to the point where the
confusion had broken out. It is needless to say that neither Captain
Bangs nor the drum corps heard the order. They would not have heard it
had it been uttered through a megaphone, and megaphones had not then
been invented. The Colonel, the noise continuing, and the drum corps
continuing, grew more and more wrathy, and finally charged upon that
musical body sword in hand. It was an unfair advantage, justifiable
only on the ground of military necessity. The Colonel was armed and
the drum corps had only drums and fifes, formidable for offence but
not for defence. Instantly they were routed and fled, and disappearing
around the nearest flank, took refuge in the rear. It was the first
victory in the regiment. It could not be said that this charge reduced
things to order; it only tended to suppress disorder.

What became of the drum corps on that day I do not now remember. I
have the impression that they retired to the guard-house for
recuperation. Certainly they appeared no more upon the scene that day,
and the dress parade proceeded as a school of instruction, which the
Colonel administered partly to the regiment as a whole, and partly to
individuals, with distressing particularity. Of the instruction given
in general terms it is sufficient to say that it was of the most
elementary character, and was such wholesome counsel as an experienced
and trained officer would give to a green regiment; only the terms
were unusually emphatic, and the amount too great for one occasion. Of
the individual exhortations a sample should be preserved to posterity
as illustrating the conditions of these times. If any be inclined to
judge harshly, from the character of these exhortations, as to the
patience and forbearance and longsuffering spirit inculcated at West
Point, he may consider the trying nature of the job suddenly placed
upon the graduate of that venerable institution (only one year out of
the school, and of a temper naturally not mild), called upon to direct
and drill, in one lump, a thousand greenhorns, and charged with the
duty of making soldiers out of them. Unfortunately, in the center of
the line, in front and in plain view, was a newly uniformed and
commissioned Lieutenant, whose _nomme de guerre_ was Simps. On this
occasion he was standing much like a tall, full meal bag, bulging
under its own pressure. The eagle eye of the Colonel soon detected him
and the wrath accumulated, and unsoothed by the strains of the drum
corps, broke out afresh. Referring in terms of emphatic condemnation
to Simps as an individual, and assigning his spiritual being to a
warmer climate, he ordered him to "draw up his bowels." The
embarrassed Simps, thus singled out and complimented, already feeling
himself in too conspicuous a position, and quite too new to the
business, and also alarmed at the suddenness and warmth of the
personal address in front of so large and critical a company, made
some convulsive movement as if struck by lightning; but either because
he had no control over his abdominal muscles, or because he was
paralyzed by fear, he did not "draw up" perceptibly. However, Simps
was not the only awkward figure in the line, though perhaps the most
conspicuous; and the exhortations of the Colonel proceeded, and soon
no fellow felt sure that some particular exhortation, uncomplimentary
and perhaps not fully understood, would fall upon him. The attention
of the Colonel, however, recurred to Simps, no less bulging, but
rather worse than before: "Mr. Simps, for God's sake draw up your
bowels." The miserable Simps could not; his bowels were not built that
way, and further exhortations followed in the same vein, and with
increasing emphasis. He was advised to employ the worst drilled man in
the regiment to teach him, and finally was driven into the rear of the
regiment, where he disappeared to fame, and from whence he soon after
retired to private life. His military career was short but
conspicuous. He had one notice from his commanding officer in front of
his regiment. He was probably, too, the only man in military history,
certainly the only one whom I have found in a somewhat extensive
reading, who was disabled as to the military service and lost to the
defence of his country because he could not "draw up his bowels."
Other heroes, notably in the recent Spanish war, have failed to confer
luster on the American arms and to secure immortal fame for themselves
simply from lack of opportunity. It was reserved to Simps alone to
miss the shining mark by reason of stomachic distortion.

This particular lesson, however, was not lost upon the regiment, and
the enforcement of it was subsequently made easier when in the field,
by reason of material change in the rations. For some days, however,
instruction mixed with similar emphatic exhortations continued, and
the regiment continued to learn military drill and a new vocabulary at
the same time.

The regiment had been in camp about a week when, on the 29th day of
August, it was mustered into the service of the United States, and
soon thereafter was ordered to the front, greatly to the relief of
all, and especially of those slowest to learn.

After these trials by fire, so to speak, the Government in its wisdom
proceeded to give a further seasoning by water, and this regiment with
another (2,000 men in all) were shipped, packed like so many sardines,
in one vessel, from Boston to Alexandria. This process was perhaps a
process of artificial aging as of liquor, and served well to assist in
the process of drawing up the bowels to the regimental standard.

While the men, packed in the hold of the ship, on this voyage, were
taking care of themselves as best they could, the company officers,
under the tutoring of the Colonel, were cramming themselves with
Casey's Tactics.

In due time they passed Alexandria, and, as a cheerful introduction to
the service, saw on the decks of the river steamboats the crowds of
wounded from the field of the Second Bull Run and heard of the
disastrous result of that battle. Landed at the Arsenal the regiment
passed the first night in an adjacent open lot, on a downy bed of dead
cats, bricks and broken bottles; the next day they were supplied with
arms and equipments, and on the hot September evening of that day
marched without a halt, seven miles, and joined the brigade to which
the regiment had been assigned.

It is a striking illustration of the pressure of the emergency, and of
the wasteful unpreparedness of the Government, that within three weeks
from the day this regiment was mustered into service, and before it
had ever had what could properly be called a battalion drill, it was
in the battle of Antietam. But subsequently officers and men were
instructed and drilled in the field, in time snatched from battle,
marching, picketing, and camp duties. They learned the duties of a
soldier by performing them, and in performing them; at first
laboriously, with difficulty and awkwardly. But they learned them
well. Of the original officers, two served with great distinction and
rose to the rank of Major-General. And the men so raw and undrilled at
first, under the severe but wise discipline and thorough instruction,
became soldiers as good as any that ever carried muskets. At
Gettysburg, ten months after muster in, they stood till 40 per cent.
of their number had been killed or wounded, and then charged. That
line, so awkward, raw, and unprepared at first, in all the subsequent
campaigns, from Antietam to Appomattox Court House, in fights as
stiff, and under fire as searching and deadly as any, was never
broken. Never!





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