Chapter 16:
- Louisianians in the armies of the West -- Battles of Wilson's Creek, Belmont and Shiloh -- Beauregard in command -- succeeded by Bragg -- Battles of Iuka and Corinth -- March into Kentucky -- battle of Perryville.
On May 20, 1861, the Third Louisiana volunteers, Louis Hebert, colonel; S. M. Hyams, lieutenant. colonel, and W. F. Tunnard, major, left New Orleans for Little Rock, Ark., to join the forces then organizing to meet the aggressive operations of Lyon, the Federal commander in Missouri. Joining the army organized under Ben McCulloch, of Texas, they marched north into Missouri and united with the command of Sterling Price. While encamped at Wilson's creek, near Springfield, August 10th, the combined forces were suddenly attacked by Lyon and Sigel. The Federals gained without much opposition the commanding position they desired, but Hebert's Louisianians and McIntosh's Arkansans were speedily sent against the Federal left. Their opponents were a body of regular United States troops; but these fresh volunteers, in the face of a galling fire, surmounted a fence and drove the enemy back. Then, far on the right, it was observed that Sigel had opened fire with a battery that threatened havoc. Mc-Culloch took two companies of the Third to seek the rear of the battery, while Lieutenant-Colonel Hyams, with the Pelican rifles, Captain Vigilili; Iberville Grays, Lieutenant Verbois; Morehouse Guards, Captain Hinson; Pelican Rangers, Captain Blair; Winn Rifles, Captain Pierson; Morehouse Fencibles, Captain Harris; Shreveport Rangers, Captain Gilmore; Pelican Rangers, [162] Captain Beazeale, advanced to the front. At the brow of the hill, said Hyams, Lieutenant Lacy sprang on a log, waving his sword, and called, ‘Come on, Caddo!’ The whole command rushed forward, carried the guns and put the enemy to flight. The gallant Captain Hinson was killed, and his brother-in-law, Private Whetstone, fell dead at his side. Private Hicock, at the front among the guns, was shot through the breast. This was the first battle of the Third, and they had charged and taken five guns out of a battery of six. Again they were called on in the final charge which put the enemy to flight. Having routed Sigel they joined Price against Lyon, and as Lyon fell pushed the enemy before them into rout. Nine of the regiment were killed and 48 wounded. The regiment was in winter quarters, 1861-62, at Fort Smith, and on March 7, 1862, participated in the battle of Elkhorn Tavern, in McCulloch's division. The day was disastrous, McCulloch and McIntosh killed, and Hebert, in command of a brigade, captured; but the gallantry of the Third regiment was conspicuous. The enemy's attacks were repulsed repeatedly, Captain Harris, leading the right of the Louisiana regiment, being especially distinguished in this service. A month later the regiment was transferred to Mississippi.
With General Polk at Columbus, Ky., in the fall of 1861, were the Eleventh Louisiana volunteers, Col. S. F. Marks; the Twelfth, Col. T. M. Scott; LieutenantCol-onel Kennedy's Fifth battalion or Twenty-first regiment; Capt. R. A. Stewart's Point Coupee artillery; and the Watson battery, Capt. Daniel Beltzhoover. Grant gave most of these commands an opportunity for distinction by his attack on the Confederate camp at Belmont, November 7th. As soon as the landing of Grant was observed from the Kentucky shore, Stewart's battery was sent forward to the river, supported by Kennedy's battalion, and the artillery was soon engaged with the gunboats, driving them back up the river. Early in the [163] morning Beltzhoover's artillery had been sent across to Belmont, and there for some time his destructive fire prevented Grant from surrounding the Confederate line, He was finally compelled to withdraw for lack of ammunition, and the Confederates were soon crowded down to the river bank. It was a moment of peril, but the Eleventh Louisiana now arrived, with ‘the gallant old veteran, Colonel Marks, at the head of the column,’ Lieutenant-Colonel Barrow in immediate command of the regiment, and began the aggressive movement which resulted in driving Grant to his boats. The regiment lost 12 killed and 42 wounded, among them the gallant Major Butler and Lieutenant Alexander. Beltzhoover's loss was 2 killed and 8 wounded, 45 horses killed, 2 guns missing. His modest report was, ‘we stood doing our best until the whole line retreated to the river. At the river I formed battery again, though without ammunition, and so remained until carried down to the bank by force of the retreating troops.’ Polk telegraphed, ‘Watson's battery, under Beltzhoover, immortalized!’
At a later date all of these Louisiana commands, except Beltzhoover's battery, were at Island No.10 and New Madrid, gallantly resisting the attacks of the Federal fleet.
During the early part of February, 1862, Fort Donelson fell, and Grant's forces pushed on down the Tennessee river to Pittsburg Landing, where, on March 1st, Colonel Mouton's Eighteenth Louisiana regiment had its first fight, with the gunboats for antagonists.
Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, falling back from Nashville, selected Corinth as his new base of campaign. He arrived at that town in advance of his troops on March 22, 1862, and found there an army of some 25,000 men. This force had been brought together through General Beauregard's feverish energy. In its composition it bore the features of a few States, one of the Confederate North and two of the Gulf. It had been drawn [164] from Louisiana, Alabama and Kentucky, General Lovell himself having brought a brigade of volunteers from New Orleans. The Louisiana commands assembled to fight at Shiloh were:1
First Louisiana regulars, infantry, Col. D. W. Adams; Fourth volunteer infantry, Col. H. W. Allen; Eleventh volunteer infantry, Col. S. F. Marks; Twelfth volunteer infantry, Col. S. M. Scott; Thirteenth volunteer infantry, Col. Randall L. Gibson; Sixteenth volunteer infantry, Col. Preston Pond; Seventeenth volunteer infantry, Lieut.-Col. Charles Jones; Eighteenth volunteer infantry, Col. Alfred Mouton; Nineteenth volunteer infantry, Col. B. L. Hodge; Twentieth volunteer infantry, Col. August Reichard; the Crescent regiment (N. O.), Col. Marshall J. Smith; Confederate Guards Response battalion, Maj. Franklin H. Clack; Thirteenth battalion (Orleans Guards), Maj. Leon Queyrouse; Fifth Company Washington artillery, Capt. W. Irving Hodgson.
Though called raw troops, the Louisiana levies proved to be splendid fighters, who in spite of some sharp crudeness here and there knew how, stepping straight from their drill-rooms in the city, to hold together at war's [165] word of command, shoulder to shoulder in one of the great combats of the war.
In coming to Corinth, Johnston had decided that the valley of the Mississippi was, in March, 1862, of far greater importance to the Confederacy than the occupation of Middle Tennessee. With his headquarters also at Corinth, Miss., General Beauregard was declared on March 29th by general orders, ‘second in command to the commander of the forces.’
General Johnston knew well that General Grant's army, massed at Pittsburg Landing about 22 miles from Corinth, was daily expecting Don Carlos Buell He fully understood the value that lay in striking a sudden blow before Buell could join Grant. He himself had hoped to move his army on April 1st, so as to make sure of attacking Grant on Saturday, April 5th, before the junction could take place. The army began its march on April 3d, two days after the date originally fixed. The next day rains, not heavy but persistent, flooded creeks, scattered bridges, bogged roads and stalled batteries. Every nerve was strained in rank and file to make progress on Thursday. The sun refused to shine out until Friday afternoon, at which hour the Confederates were a day's journey from the enemy's advance. The army bivouacked in his front Saturday about 5 p. m. The day was too far gone to open the attack that afternoon. A small fact; but small as it was, it changed the fate of the second day's fight. By this rain, the coming battle was thrown forward into daylight on Sunday (April 6). This was a day after the time originally selected by General Johnston's admirable plan of battle for opening the assault, a delay which, robbing us of time, gave it to the enemy. At 5 a. m. the Confederates began their forward movement. From that hour until evening their advance continued a victorious progress, full of dramatic surprises, and always marked by stubborn fighting on both sides. One fact may bear investigation here. America's best [166] fighting blood confronted one the other around Shiloh church. It was the men of the South brought face to face against the men of the West, both with heat of fire and nerves of steel.
The first attack was—made upon Sherman's division, with Prentiss to the left. Although surprised, the two divisions fought resolutely, making our brilliant advance costly in killed and wounded. For hours, until the sun had scaled high the sky, the fight wavered on their front. About 2 p. m. Ruggles, whose division was mainly Louisianians, ordered his command to support Hodgson's Washington artillery (Fifth company).2 As they were passing Shiloh church, the Crescents saw Beauregard standing on a log by the side of the road. Seeing them, Beauregard, with ringing tone, cried out: ‘Louisianians, drive them into the Tennessee.’ Spurred by the war-like order, the regiment soon became engaged, a little way ahead, in a determined attack of the Confederate left on Wallace's division, which formed the enemy's right. In this movement, the Washington artillery did brilliant service in keeping a Federal battery from pouring too close a fire into Gibson's Louisiana brigade, then engaged in a rear part of the field. Gibson, unsupported by artillery, had been fighting desperately against masses posted on a ridge, under cover of a battery. This was a critical position, in which Mouton's Eighteenth Louisiana made a brilliant but ineffective charge up the hill. The [167] Eighteenth3 drove the battery off the crest when, reinforcements coming up, it was compelled to withdraw. It was in this general movement that General Wallace fell mortally wounded. His division, after Wallace's death, began a fierce struggle to retire to the river, a struggle which, for a time, seemed doubtful.
Towards 5:30 the Crescents, under Colonel Smith, made a gallant double-quick across a field, into another field, through a wood, crossing the Pittsburg Landing road, with a rush, to charge Prentiss' division. Prentiss, having been fighting hard since the dawn, was now posted in the camp nearest the Tennessee and its two gunboats. Just as the Crescents got to the road and were making ready to charge they noticed on the other side of the road a flutter of white handkerchiefs from the bayonets of several men standing in an open field. The capture of Prentiss' division, following immediately, formed a brilliant termination to Sunday's heavy fighting. Prentiss' division, 2,500 rank and file, surrendered to the Crescents, with a Tennessee command moving on parallel lines. General Prentiss was seen coolly seated on horseback, in the center of a mob of excited men. He yielded his sword, by right the prize of Col. Marshall Smith, to a young lieutenant of the regiment who asked for it.
After this capture, General Bragg's4 corps was deployed to the right of the ridge road. Elated with the victory, Ruggles' Louisianians were eagerly listening for the order to advance upon Pittsburg Landing. Dusk was melting into night. The word, so eagerly expected, had not yet come. Beauregard had charged them to drive the enemy into the Tennessee; Beauregard remained ominously silent. A shot shrieked its noisy way [168] across the wood which separated the Crescents from the landing, a mile away. Another shell came; then another; still another, all asking for Prentiss, who, known to the senders to be in peril, had not yet reported. Men in the gunboats had been told the range of the camp. Already these shells had killed or wounded some of our men. It was time to seek shelter. Not a man in Bragg's line but was disappointed at the failure on Sunday, April 6th, to receive the order to double-quick to Pittsburg Landing. It was an army filled with ardor to advance upon the enemy and to drive him, as Beauregard had said, ‘into the Tennessee;’ and on the way, to capture the whole force on its bank. Of that result, once at Pittsburg Landing, there was not a single doubter among the Louisianians at Shiloh. That night the army bivouacked in the Federal tents. It was already dark and raining. About 9 p. m. a courier came riding through the rain and halted by the side of a wood-road, where men grouped around him. He told the story of the death of the kingly Johnston at 2:30 p. m.
All that night, Don Carlos Buell's hardy army of the Ohio was coming down the Tennessee. At daylight on Monday, the enemy in his turn, relying upon his new masses, began the attack. The ‘offensive’ on Sunday was, on Monday, the ‘defensive.’ Bragg's corps was soon on the road. Ruggles' division marched through the woods until some of the command encountered Nelson's advancing line. The Crescents had, in ascending a slope, reached a hill, once a ploughed field, with large trees left loosely standing. In front of that hill, thus denuded, was a narrow valley which on the other side sloped up to another hill, as high as that on which the Crescents stood. This hill was heavily timbered to the brink, from which it looked across to the Crescents. On the extreme right of the Crescents waited Hodgson's Washington artillery. The battery had, on its right, a steep and jagged dip of a sloped hill, rendering passage [169] down it impossible to horses. For awhile the men of the regiment and of the battery peered through the rain and mist to the other side, which looked dark and dangerous. Suddenly, through the light rain but heavier mist, four flags floated for an instant. The woods being too dense to see the commands, no one knew that within that darkness a murderous battle line had already silently formed. Without warning a heavy crash of musketry poured from a long line, unseen, upon the Confederate hill The fire did some execution, killing and wounding nine or ten men among the Crescents.5 Among the latter was Color-Sergeant Schilling. The flag, falling from his hand, was quickly taken up by Lieut. William Bullitt. Evidently the Washington artillery had been seen, and the aim was to kill the horses and so secure the battery. Two of the guns remained on the hill, with dead horses keeping guard. Hodgson feared that his other horses might be disabled, and, none too sure that his horseless guns would be safe from capture, turned to the left to save what remained of his battery. The horses, already frightened, became unmanageable, and in their terror they bore the guns and caissons straight through Company C of the Crescents, scattering them here and there, and throwing the regiment into some disorder. Colonel Smith immediately ordered the Crescents to fall back to the slope of the hill to the rear, in order to reform. Seeing the hill empty, the enemy promptly exposed their line, swept down the slope and, crossing the valley, charged the guns lying defenseless. They were making hurried preparations to carry them off with the aid of other horses when a solid line of gray-coats came firmly up the rear slope at double-quick, Colonel Smith on horseback gallantly carrying the colors. In another [170] minute the enemy, seeing the Crescents, left the guns and hurried to their first position. When Hodgson came up he found his two guns unharmed. Later on Ruggles' division again faced the Federals, this time the Federal right under Sherman. The fire of the Confederates was at first light; but on coming well into range the enemy were met with so terrible a storm of musketry and artillery that they reeled, and rushing to the rear were followed nearly a mile. Sherman himself vouched for the fact that the firing here ‘was the severest I had ever heard.’
The First Louisiana brigade, under command of Col. R. L. Gibson, of the Thirteenth Louisiana, was conspicuous for its share in the events of both days. From an early hour on the 6th to the hour of retreat on the 7th, Gibson was everywhere in the front, with a loss in officers and men exceeding that of nearly every brigade at Shiloh. Col. H. W. Allen, of the Fourth Louisiana, was wounded in one of the fierce charges of the 6th. Later, at Baton Rouge, in August, he was to receive a wound which long disabled him. The Fourth lost two officers killed, Capts. C. E. Tooraen and J. T. Hilliard, with 22 men; wounded, 12 officers and 157 men. Among the deaths most deeply regretted was that of Brig.-Gen. Adley H. Gladden. General Gladden, a gallant veteran of the Mexican war, had gone out as colonel of the First Louisiana regulars. Promoted to brigadier-general on September 30, 1861, much was hoped for from his recognized skill and courage.
The fighting continued, sharp, resolute, stubborn, throughout the early part of the 7th. Exhausted in body, reduced in numbers, but in heart undaunted, the Confederate army found itself forced to face ever augmenting odds. It was compelled—through Beauregard's resolve to check as long as possible his own proposed withdrawal of his forces—to show an invariably formidable front along the whole line, wherever assailed. This, [171] though a wise precaution, called for a severe strain upon the Confederates. Fall back fighting! was Beauregard's order on that Monday, April 7th; and his army fought with such ardor as to create little suspicion that it was also falling back. At about 3:30 p. m. the army's retrograde movement was begun. It was carried out with a cheerful steadiness never exceeded by a force in retreat. The men knew that they had fought well, and that it was only a missing order on Sunday afternoon which had brought them, overpowered by numbers but not crushed, to the unequal field of Monday. Such are the oscillations of the battle pendulum—those oscillations which so often change the final results of battles.
The Confederate army under Johnston had gone into the battle with 39,630 men of all arms, and lost 1,728 killed, 8,012 wounded, 950 missing; total 10,680. With Buell's army, the total Federal force was about 72,000. The losses numbered 12,190. Of all martial names, in our civil war, devoted to slaughter, Shiloh was in date the first.
Johnston had fallen in the arms of victory. Had he lived until sundown the army would not only have fought enthusiastically under his ably-conceived plan, but would have victoriously carried it to the end contemplated by him. That order to advance, looked for, but not received, would have been caught up by men flushed with victory, standing expectantly around Prentiss' camp. Grant's men, lying listless by the river where they had fallen in their fatigue,6 would have been captured on the southern bank of the Tennessee. With the capture of his army, General Grant would have been in danger of suffering military eclipse. He would have found his name, assailed through the Northern press, linked to a great disaster rather than to a victory snatched by reinforcements from defeat. He would not have sat before Vicksburg or offered, as victor, an ultimatum; [172] nor, indeed, would his have been the dogging of glorious Robert Lee in the Wilderness; nor to sit, the Union's host, in the White House at Washington.
Misapprehension had done its utmost to defame greatness. It had, with its strongly-feeble hands, dragged Johnston from the exalted place gained by his great qualities, to make him pass as a marked man through the valley of humiliation. Praise is due to those uncorrupted instincts of men, however, which lead them with clarified vision nobly to weigh maligned reputation on juster weights than those for the mass. It is these instincts which, lifting up that lofty fame and tenderly preserving it from wrong, have placed it, restored to grandeur, upon a pedestal far overtopping that from which Detraction, with its thousand mouths of clamor, had for a space pulled it down.
For a time, Beauregard planned to hold Corinth for strategic purposes, it being of great natural strength. The troops were at first kept busy fortifying. While Beauregard was doing this, Halleck was advancing, with tantalizing deliberation, at the head of 105,000 men from Pittsburg Landing. General Grant was second in command. Pope, always ambitious to be prompt, showed himself over-hasty. He had moved on the 18th, eager to anticipate Halleck's slowness. At the village of Farmington he drove off an insignificant Confederate force and occupied it. Here he was, for all practical purposes, separated from Halleck and Buell. This furnished Beauregard with a plan. He quickly resolved, by an attack in force, to cut Pope off from his base. Van Dorn was to move by his right flank, and to keep on moving until his center should be opposite Pope's left. Van Dorn understood the plan, but through inefficient guides failed to get into position at the hour fixed for the flanking. In spite of this, the engagement soon became spirited. Van Dorn, once in line, opened his work with his usual vigor. In this movement he was aided by the simultaneous advance [173] of Ruggles' Louisiana division, which by its fiery onset nearly captured two brigades forming the rear of Pope's command. The enemy's loss was considerable in killed and wounded; the Southern casualties, some 200. In the Farmington affair, though without satisfactory results, owing to the blunder of Van Dorn's guides, our troops behaved with great spirit.
In the meantime Beauregard, in view of the heavy odds against the Confederates, had decided to evacuate Corinth. He had no desire that the enemy should see into his mind. Without the knowledge of either Halleck or Grant, therefore, he quietly withdrew his army on the night of April 29th, with a loss of neither men nor stores. Beauregard's retreat was masterly in every respect. It became known only at sunrise, and may stand for a model as the march from the front of a prudent commander. His army reached Tupelo, Miss., on the 9th of June. Beauregard had already begun to feel the effects of ill health at Corinth, and on the 14th of June he left Tupelo for Claiborne Springs in search of temporary recuperation. He had, before leaving, turned the command of Department No. 2 over to General Bragg. As early as May 7th Maj.-Gen. Braxton Bragg had assumed command of the Confederate army of the Mississippi. Braxton Bragg had been a resident of Louisiana for several years before the war. In 1861, the general assembly provided for organizing the Louisiana State forces, and under that law General Bragg was appointed brigadier-general, March 7th. It seemed, at the opening of the Tennessee campaign, of good augury that the Louisiana troops should have been placed under the command of so distinguished a soldier, who was also a representative of their own State.
Before leaving Tupelo, Bragg had practically reorganized his army. Among the Louisianians whom he left with Price were Mouton's brigade, consisting of the Eighteenth Louisiana regiment, and the consolidated Crescent [174] regiment.7 These, together with Semmes' and Ralston's batteries, afterward reported to Gen. Richard Taylor, in the Trans-Mississippi department.
Halleck, able tactician in the closet, was uncertain in the field. His deliberate movements had no effect upon General Bragg, who had already sent his troops on the railroad via Mobile to Chattanooga. Bragg, by reason of this surprise, was enabled to control events until Grant, cutting free from Vicksburg, could drive him off. Here Bragg remained concentrating an army, gathering troops around him, tried in the war, long in the field, seasoned in old fights, and eager for new.
After Bragg left Price with his army of the West, and Van Dorn with his army of West Tennessee, in Mississippi, the two moved northward, but separately, menacing Grant and Rosecrans. Price, caught alone near Iuka by two largely superior columns which Grant designed should close upon him, made a brilliant fight September 19th. The Third Louisiana, LieutenantCol-onel Gilmore, was there, in the brigade of Gen. Louis Hubert, and Price declared that the brunt of the battle fell upon Hebert's command, and nobly did it sustain it. Coupling the Third Texas in his praise, he dubbed the Third Louisiana as ‘ever-glorious.’ He had observed them at Oak Hills and Elkhorn, and ‘no men had ever fought more bravely or more victoriously.’
On October 3 and 4, 1862, Corinth again became for [175] two days a ‘seat of war.’ Again did it hear in its streets the martial drumbeats; again see the two armies drawn up, facing each other as stoutly as they had done at Shiloh, near by. Price had hoped that an attack upon Corinth would thrust Grant back from the public eye, neutralizing his victory so recently gained. Eager in his movements, Van Dorn upon this hope had acted on the spot. Rosecrans, with Grant as his adviser, was at Corinth with 23,000 men. Van Dorn, for the attack, had about the same number. Coming in on the northwest of the town he cut Rosecrans from Grant, who was not far off. Van Dorn had a plan to feint upon Rosecrans' left, thereby drawing troops from his right. Upon the wing so depleted Price was to fall and crush it. This was done on the 3d. A gap was soon made in Rosecrans' line, into which Van Dorn hastened to pour and drive back his enemy's left and center; his right, however, still remaining intact to threaten Van Dorn's flank. Night fell, and with it the combat closed.
The next day, at dawn, Van Dorn advanced into the town and for an hour could not be put out. He soon found, however, that he could not move one step forward. Here was a quandary. With Rosecrans stoutly holding his position, Van Dorn, now in some doubt for himself, decided to retreat. Under cover of a new attack, he fell back skillfully, the enemy not following. The battle of Corinth was a strong attack and defense, a cut and thrust movement, leading to no results save the taking of Corinth as an active factor from the arena of war. Its year for ‘war's dread alarum's,’ with formidable muster of both armies, was emphatically 1862.8
The Confederates in two columns, meanwhile, had marched into the friendly State of Kentucky. E. Kirby Smith, commanding an army at Knoxville, took one line of the advance and defeated the enemy in a spirited [176] action at Richmond, Ky. Smith's cavalry brigade, of which a large part was the First Louisiana, under Lieut.-Col. James O. Nixon, was commanded by Col. J. S. Scott. He drove the enemy from London, making heavy captures of prisoners and stores; fought a considerable engagement successfully at Big Hill, the enemy leaving 120 killed and wounded and over 105 prisoners; and on the occasion of the battle at Richmond attacked the enemy in the rear, capturing 3,500 prisoners, including General Manson, the Federal commander, and 8 pieces of artillery. Scott reported that in the campaign he captured nearly 4,000 prisoners, 375 wagons, mostly loaded, 1,500 mules and many horses. From the 896 men of his command he lost 7 killed and 21 wounded. A somewhat dramatic fact may be cited here. Profiting by his New Orleans lesson of a transfer of flags, Scott, riding into Frankfort, hoisted the battleflag of the First Louisiana (no Confederate flag being at hand) on the capitol of the State. The dramatic touch was emphasized by the presence of a pacific rear guard of the enemy, 8,000 strong, watching the scene with mild interest from the opposite bank. Acute war legalizes offenses even against ‘Old Glory,’ and that Confederate ceremony of September 3d having been completed, Scott dashed on hotly with 450 horses to harass the friendly rear.
The second line was followed by Bragg himself. The movement was not overwise, but the issue of it was the severely fought battle of Perryville, on October 8, 1862. Buell, after having been summarily relieved from command, had just been reinstated at the solicitation of Thomas, prince of Federal soldiers, whose Virginia lineage is so clearly traced in his steady character. Buell's whole army was not with him when he came upon Hardee with only 15,000 men. Had that army been behind him, Buell might have defeated Hardee where he met him. Half of his force was distant from the field. This lack of concentration called for payment somehow, at [177] usurer's interest. Bragg was too shrewd to err in the same way. He had already, on October 8th, succored Hardee, who, on finding himself attacked, fell stoutly on McCook, holding Buell's left, and bore him back helplessly. Tug as he might, Hardee could not break Buell's center. After a fierce fight, stubbornly maintained, Bragg suddenly withdrew from the field. Decidedly, a tactical check had been suffered by Bragg. Loss, about 5,000 men on either side.
With Bragg in the wearisome march and the tug of battle was the Louisiana brigade of the army of Tennes-see, organized under the command of Daniel W. Adams, promoted to brigadier-general. It included the Thir-teenth regiment, Col. R. L. Gibson; Sixteenth, Col. D. C. Gober; Twentieth, Col. August Reichard, Lieut.-Col. Leon von Zinken; Twenty-fifth, Col. S. W. Fisk; Fourteenth battalion sharpshooters, Maj. J. E. Austin; and Fifth company, Washington artillery, Capt. C. H. Slocomb. Adams was put in line on the extreme left, and while a fierce attack was being made on the angle of the Federal line the Louisianians advanced with Buckner's left All along the line the enemy was driven back, throwing away arms and equipment, and Adams' bri-gade, with the others, followed for about a mile. The Washington artillery, whose guns had opened the ball, followed and again opened fire. Later the whole of Adams' command was stationed on the hill from which they had driven the enemy. While they were far in front, ammunition exhausted and no effective supports in sight, some mishaps occurred. Lieut. Philip Seyne, with his ammunition train, and Lieut. Thomas Blair, with fourteen men, going after ammunition, were capt-ured. The same fate was supposed to have befallen Aide-de-camp E. M. Scott. The regimental and battal-ion commanders,, and Maj. Charles Guillet, Capt. H. Brummerstadt, Adjt. E. P. Guillet, Lieutenant Schaedel, Capt. M. O. Tracy, Lieutenant McCall, Maj. R. G. [178] Higgins and Lieutenants Eichholz and Stewart (both wounded) were mentioned with honorable distinction: and of the Washington artillery Adams said: ‘It did most essential and valuable service and deserves particu-lar notice of praise, and I would especially recommend that they be allowed to have Perryville inscribed on their banner.’ The brigade loss was 152, of whom 6 were known to have been killed, 78 wounded and 68 missing [179]
