Day Two at Shiloh brought about a reversal of the actions of Day One. Here are the monuments of the Army of the Ohio at Shiloh.

AMMEN’S BRIGADE

Jacob Ammen was a distinguished graduate of West Point in 1831 – he even helped teach at the Point for a couple of terms after he graduated.  He served in the active army until 1837 – Ammen served at Charleston Harbor during the Nullification Crisis – when he resigned to teach mathematics at colleges in Kentucky, Missouri and Indiana.  In 1855, Ammen took on a new career in civil engineering in Ripon, Ohio.  With the war, he joined the 12^th Ohio as a captain but soon became the colonel of the 24^th Ohio.  After action in West Virginia, the regiment became part of the Army of the Ohio with Ammen promoted to brigade command.  He would lead his brigade here and through the succeeding Corinth campaign before gaining promotion to division command.  Ill health would then sideline him for much of the rest of the war.

william grose

The man who would take over brigade command for Ammen was William Grose who led the 36^th Indiana at Shiloh.  Grose was a lawyer and a Republican politician before the war.  He recruited and trained the 36^th.  At Shiloh, he suffered a slight wound and had a horse shot out from under him.  Grose had a long career ahead of him as a brigade commander in the Army of the Ohio/Cumberland.

brigade in action

Ammen’s brigade was the vanguard of Don Carlos Buell’s Army of the Ohio.  Marching up the east bank of the Tennessee River from Savannah on 6 April, they crossed the river at Pittsburgh Landing at 5:30 pm.  Pushing their way through the many Federals whose units already disrupted during the long day’s fighting, Ammen’s men came forward supporting the left end of Grant’s ‘last line’ resting above the Dill Branch ravine.  Ammen had gotten the 36^th Indiana and parts of the 24^th Ohio into the line along with survivors of Stuart’s and Sweeny’s brigades among other skulkers who had regained their nerve – maybe slightly over 1,000 men online – just as the Rebels launched their last attack of the day at 6 pm with the brigades of Jackson and Chalmers easily repulsed.

The Confederates withdrew during the evening and Ammen’s men joined the general Federal advance during the morning of 7 April forming the left of Buell’s now mostly reunited army.  Ammen’s brigade marched through Cloud Field coming into line of battle between the Bloody Pond and into the woods to the east at around 11 am where McArthur and Stuart had used the ravines the day before to defend.  Confederate counterattacks stalemated the situation until about 2 pm when the general Rebel retreat began. 

monuments

Ammen’s men had support from the men of the 2^nd and 14^th Iowa of Tuttle’s brigade.  This brigade would go on to fight many more battles as part of the Army of the Ohio/Cumberland with another set of regimental monuments in the woods of Chickamauga.  Here, the brigade monuments are located in the woods east of the Bloody Pond where they fought in the late morning of 7 April:  6^th Ohio, 24^th Ohio and 36^th Indiana – west to east.

HAZEN’S BRIGADE

The men of Colonel William Hazen did not cross over the Tennessee River at Pittsburgh Landing until 9 pm on 6 April.  They formed on the right of Bruce’s brigade advancing early – 5:30 am –the next morning, engaging the Confederates in Wicker Field at about 8 am.  An advance into the Davis Wheat Field was – around 11 am – checked by a counterattack by the Crescent Regiment and 19^th Louisiana which pushed Hazen’s men back to the Sunken Road.  Each side would exchange attacks before the Confederates would finally begin to withdraw around 2 pm.

william hazen

Hazen had grown up in Hiram, Ohio where he was a close friend of James Garfield.  He graduated from West Point in 1855 and suffering a wound in a fight with Comanches in Texas in 1859.  With the onset of the Civil War, Hazen became the colonel of the 41^st Ohio and gaining elevation to brigade command shortly before Shiloh.  As a brigade commander, he would go on to more memorable battles – Perrydale, Stones River, Chickamauga. His brigade gained their best accolades for their stalwart defense of the Round Forest at Stones River.  Hazen would eventually reach divisional command and – very late in the war – corps command. 

Staying on in the army after the war, he would serve on the Western Frontier.  In the postwar years, Hazen developed a reputation as “disputatious” taking on powerful men including Philip Sheridan, Robert Todd Lincoln and William Belknap – Grant’s Secretary of War – among others.  In 1880, Hazen saw promotion to brigadier general in the regular army and was made the Chief Signal Officer until his death in 1887 – his widow would remarry Admiral George Dewey in 1899.

Brigade notes – 41st Ohio

The 41^st Ohio suffered an almost 50% casualty rate here at Shiloh during their first engagement of the war.  This was Hazen’s initial command and as a regular army officer, his volunteers thought of him as harsh and dictatorial – a common feeling of volunteers serving under former regulars.  Stones River and Chickamauga lie ahead in the regiment’s future. Their commander here was Lieutenant Colonel George Starr Mygatt who resigned in November 1862 probably from illness since he died in 1866 at only the age of 34.

9th indiana

One of the famous writers to come out of the Civil War was Ambrose Bierce.  He spent three years with the 9^th Indiana and his article “What I Saw of Shiloh” describes his battle experiences here with the 9^th.  Bierce described Hazen as “the best hated man I ever knew.”  The commander of the 9^th Indiana, Colonel Gideon Moody, an Indianan lawyer before the war, would move on to the Dakota Territories after his resignation from the army in 1864.  Moody served in the Territorial House of Representatives and on the Territorial Supreme Court he served as an associate justice before an election to the U.S. Senate when South Dakota became a State.

walter whitaker

Walter Whitaker, colonel of the 6^th Kentucky, had served in the Mexican War and was a lawyer in Kentucky before the war.  The fighting in the Wheat Field got to hand-to-hand at one point and Whitaker knifed a Southerner to death here. 

Wounded after Shiloh in the Round Forest at Stones River, Whitaker went on to brigade command after recovering.  His brigade played a major role in the late stages of the Battle of Chickamauga where his men helped in the defense of Horseshoe Ridge. Here, he suffered another wound. Some have mistaken him for drunkenness here, though the evidence suggests otherwise. 

Eventually he would serve as a division commander – both at Franklin and Nashville late in 1864.  After the war, he resumed a law practice in Louisville.  While he may not served drunk at Chickamauga, he did have a drinking problem and ending up in an asylum for a period in his post war life.

monuments

Regimental monuments of the 9^th Indiana and 41^st Ohio lie in the south end of Wicker Field where they fought hard on 7 April.  The 6^th Kentucky is remembered on the Kentucky State Monument on the east edge of Cloud Field.  Both the 41^st Ohio and the 9^th Indiana have monuments erected at Chickamauga, as well.

BRUCE’S BRIGADE

The men of Colonel Sanders D. Bruce were all from Kentucky – 1^st, 2^nd and 20^th Kentucky.  There are no separate regimental monuments.  All are placed together on the Kentucky State Monument found just to the east of Cloud Field.

Bruce’s men reached Pittsburgh Landing at around 6 pm on 6 April just as the last Confederate attack was ebbing away.  The brigade formed up on the right of Ammen’s brigade and the left of Hazen’s during the early morning of 7 April, holding the center of William “Bull” Nelson’s division together.  They first engaged in Wicker Field and then fought a see-saw battle in Sarah Bell’s Cotton Field and the Peach Orchard before drawing back to the Sunken Road.  They joined with the rest of the division pushing forward around 2 pm as the general Confederate retreat began.

Sanders Bruce had been a captain in the State militia before the war becoming the colonel of the 20^th Kentucky early in 1862.  A month later, he gained command of a brigade in Nelson’s division. That proved a rocky road with Nelson placing Bruce in and out of arrest.  Two months after Shiloh, Bruce suffered a stroke forcing him to resign from the army.  He would, however, live on until 1902 moving to New York becoming a publishing expert on horse breeding.

SMITH’S BRIGADE

William Sooy Smith graduated sixth in his class at West Point in 1853.  Resigning his commission the next year to take a job with the Illinois Central Railroad, he went on to start his own engineering company.  With the war, he joined the 13^th Ohio and becoming the colonel shortly afterwards.  Just before Shiloh, he became a brigade commander and would go on to eventually commanding a division during the Vicksburg campaign.  Following that, he would become a cavalry commander in 1864 before resigning his place in the army due to arthritis.  Life after the war saw Smith back in civil engineering before retiring to Medford, Oregon.

brigade in action

The brigade formed on the right of Nelson’s division with the 13^th Ohio on the left and the 26^th Kentucky on the right and the 14^th Wisconsin temporarily assigned to the brigade further to the right.  The 11^th Kentucky stayed back in reserve.  Fighting in woods around the Sunken Road, Smith’s men went back and forth in the heavy brush that had helped federal defenders the day before.  Eventually, by 2 pm, they helped to push the Rebels out of the Davis Wheat Field and the general Confederate retreat began.

Two of Smith’s regiments, being Kentuckian are remembered together on the Kentucky State Monument east of Cloud Field.   The monument of the 13^th Ohio lies hidden in the woods between Duncan and Wicker Field. 

The 14^th Wisconsin placed a unique monument along the Eastern Corinth Road where J.D. Putnam fell in the afternoon fighting.  His comrades buried him beneath a tree inscribing his name on the base of the trunk.  When the time came in the post-war years to remember where the different units had fought on the battlefield, the tree was found.  The tree chopped down, but the stump still stood with the inscription still legible.  The men of the 14^th Wisconsin then placed this more permanent reminder.  The 13^th Ohio also erected a monument at Chickamauga where they had very rough fight.

BOYLE’S BRIGADE

Brigadier General Jeremiah T. Boyle led the other Army of the Ohio brigade of Thomas Crittenden’s division forming up behind Smith’s brigade on the morning of 7 April around 8 am here at Shiloh.  They became engaged in the east Duncan Field along with Captain Joseph Bartlett’s Battery G – a Cleveland unit – in support.  Here they fought elements of Trabue’s Kentucky brigade soon flanked by Rousseau’s oncoming brigade coming out of the north Duncan Field.  Boyle’s men pushed on down to the Hamburg-Purdy Road at about 1 pm – the 19^th Ohio lent to Nelson’s division to fight over in the Peach Orchard earlier around noon.

Boyle had been a slave-owning Whig lawyer from Kentucky before the war.  Son of a U.S. Chief Justice – John Boyle – and brother-in-law to a former congressman, Boyle was in favor of a gradual emancipation of slavery.  With the war, he raised a brigade of infantry for Federal service and became a brigadier general.  After Shiloh, Boyle gained appointment as military governor of Kentucky by Lincoln.  He left the army after the death of his son, William – the youngest colonel in the Union army who died in battle at Marion, Tennessee.  After the war, Boyle oversaw the creation of Louisville’s first street rail system and became involved in the rail industry until his death in 1871.

Brigade notes

Colonel Samuel Beatty of the 19^th Ohio would go on to brigade command seeing heavy action at Stones River, Chickamauga and Nashville.

The regimental monuments of the 19^th Ohio and the 59^th Ohio are found off the Eastern Corinth Road about 100 yards south of its intersection with the Corinth Road – about halfway to the Sunken Road.  This is where the brigade first came into action.  The battery monument of Bartlett’s Battery is just opposite that of the 59^th along the Eastern Corinth Road.  The two Kentucky regiments – 9^th and 13^th Kentucky – remembered on the Kentucky State Monument just east of Cloud Field.  The 19^th Ohio and the 59^th Ohio also have separate monuments erected at Chickamauga where they fought in different brigades.

ROUSSEAU’S BRIGADE

Brigadier General Lovell H. Rousseau was an important political figure in the antebellum era in Kentucky and Indiana.  The family had originally owned slaves, but hard financial times had forced their sale.  Rousseau was a self-made man after the death of his father when he was only 15 years of age.   He became a lawyer in Louisville but setting up practice in Indiana with his brother and another partner – both Lovell and his brother married daughters of their partner – in 1841. 

Rousseau gained election to the Indiana House of Representatives as a Whig in 1844.  With the Mexican War, he raised a company of volunteers serving as a captain.  Returning to Indianan, he won a seat in the Indiana Senate before moving back to Louisville.  He served in the Kentucky Senate for a year before resigning in 1861 to raise volunteers to help keep Kentucky in the Union.  Initially, he served as the colonel of the 5^th Kentucky though he quickly gained promotion to brigadier general and led his brigade here as a part of Alexander M. McCook’s division.

Rosseau’s men enter the fray

This Army of the Ohio brigade formed to the right here at Shiloh of Crittenden’s division – Boyle’s brigade, in particular – at about 8 am on the morning of 7 April:  6^th Indiana, 1^st Ohio, 1^st Battalions of the 19^th, 15^th and 16^th US Regulars, left to right with the 5^th Kentucky in reserve and the 15^th Michigan temporarily attached.  The brigade of Trabue was already engaged with Boyle’s men when Rousseau came in through the northern part of Duncan Field overlapping Trabue’s left flank. This caused a quick retreat on the Confederate’s part, which was the beginning of the end for the Confederate line this day. 

With Trabue gone, Rousseau advanced all the way – crushing the small brigade of Russell on the way – to Woolf Field where he ran into desperate Confederate resistance around the Water Oaks Pond that had also been holding up Sherman and McClernand’s men.  Rousseau’s men took a short break to replenish their ammunition – Kirk’s men replaced them – before resuming their place in pushing the Rebels back further.  The 1^st Ohio was one of the few Federal units to go forward to pursue the retreating Rebel army, but they soon gave up the chase as Beauregard took his wounded army back to Corinth.

rousseau after shiloh

Rousseau became a major general and a divisional commander in the Army of the Cumberland until November 1863 when he left the field to command the District of Nashville. 

After the war, he gained elected as a Unionist from Kentucky to the U.S. House of Representatives.  In 1866, he and Iowa congressman Josiah Grinnell – a former abolitionist – ran afoul of each other and insults led Rousseau to using his cane on Grinnell – similar to the antebellum incident between South Carolina congressman Preston Brooks and Massachusetts senator Charles Sumner.  This time, instead of ignoring the action, Rousseau suffered a reprimand and resigned his seat. 

The people of Kentucky voted him back, however and he served the remainder of his term.  Leaving Congress, Rousseau returned to the army as a brigadier general.  Assigned to duty in Alaska, he was very helpful in the transfer of Alaska from Russia to the U.S. in 1867.  He was transferred to Louisiana to replace Philip Sheridan in July 1868 and died six months later.

Brigade notes

Colonel Harvey Buckley led the 5^th Kentucky here at Shiloh as part of the Army of the Ohio.  He gained appointment as lieutenant colonel behind Rousseau when the regiment became solvent in October 1861.  With Rousseau’s promotion, Buckley would lead the regiment at Shiloh, Perryville, and Stones River resigning at the end of January 1863.  A year later, he helped raise the 54^th Kentucky Mounted Infantry and would lead that unit for the rest of the war.

1st ohio

The 1^st Ohio served initially as a three-month volunteer unit, participating as a part of Schenck’s brigade at the First Battle of Bull Run/Manassas where they played a peripheral reserve role on the east side of the Stone Bridge.  Many of the men re-enlisted when the regiment became a three-year unit. They served under Colonel Alexander McCook, their divisional commander here.  There would be many battles ahead for the regiment with maybe its brightest day coming at Missionary Ridge when the 1^st Ohio planted their colors first atop the ridge – a regimental monument proudly exists there.  The regiment mustered out in the fall of 1864 with those re-enlisting becoming part of the 18^th Ohio.

Here, at Shiloh, the 1st Ohio fought under the lead of Colonel Benjamin F. Smith. A graduate of the class of 1853 at West Point, Smith was a captain in the 6th U.S. Infantry before the war. In August 1861 he became colonel of the 1st Ohio, newly organized as a three-year unit. Smith received a regular army brevet to major for gallant and meritorious service at the battle. Later in the spring, Smith returned to the 6th U.S. Infantry, seeing action in the Peninsula Campaign and at Second Manassas before taking command of a new regiment that fall, the 126th Ohio.

the regulars

The Regular army battalions of the Army of the Ohio here at Shiloh were under the command of Major John H. King.  He had served in the army since 1838 and seen action in the Mexican War.  Stationed in Texas at the start of the war, he brought nine companies north.  He led the regulars through the Battle of Stone River where he went down wounded.  Appointed a brigadier general of volunteers, he led a brigade of regular troops at Chickamauga and eventually would command a division during the Atlanta campaign.  King gained a brevet to a major general in the Regular army towards the end of the war before reverting to the rank of colonel in the post war army.  He served in that role commanding the 9^th U.S. Infantry on the Western Frontier until his retirement in 1882.

It is important to remember that even though units may have been part of the Regular army, the men serving were as green as those in the State volunteer regiments.  Lincoln vastly increased the size of the antebellum army and most serving were new soldiers and quite possibly recent emigrants, as well.

6th indiana

The other regiment of Rousseau’s brigade – the 6^th Indiana – was led by Thomas L. Crittenden, a nephew of Kentucky senator John Crittenden. His cousins included both Confederate general George B. Crittenden and Federal general Thomas L. Crittenden.  Thomas had grown up in Texas but was practicing law in Missouri at the outset of the Mexican War.  Serving as a lieutenant, he returned and relocated to Indiana.  With the Civil War, he became the regimental colonel for the 6^th Indiana, leading them into frays in West Virginia.  Reorganizing the regiment as a three-year unit, he led them here at Shiloh, becoming a brigadier general later in April. 

During the Perryville campaign, he gained command of the Federal garrison at Murfreesboro, Tennessee where he and his entire command suffered capture by Nathan Bedford Forrest 13 July 1862.   Exchanged in October 1862, he eventually became named to replace William Woodruff as a brigade commander in the Army of the Cumberland – Woodruff had hurt himself at Stones River falling from his horse. But Crittenden would resign in May 1863, his career over as a result of no confidence from those who served under him.  The brigade command next fell to his successor at the 6^th Indiana, Philemon Baldwin, who fell on the first day at Chickamauga 19 September 1863.

monuments

The monuments of the brigade lay arrayed along a north-south line running from the woods just north of Duncan Field – here is the monument to the Regulars – and then coming to the monuments to the 1^st Ohio – north edge of the field – and the 6^th Indiana – on the north edge of the Corinth Road opposite the monument of the 2^nd Iowa.  The 5^th Kentucky is remembered on the Kentucky State monument east of Cloud Field.  Both the 1^st Ohio and the 6^th Indiana have erected monuments at Chickamauga.

KIRK’S BRIGADE

Edward Kirk was a successful lawyer and businessman from Illinois before the war.  He raised the 34^th Illinois at the onset of the war and would eventually rise to brigade command within the Army of the Ohio before Shiloh.  At Shiloh, Kirk suffered a wound in the shoulder forcing him home for an extended period of recovery.  He returned to brigade command in time to suffer another severe wound leading to his capture at Stones River.  Exchanged shortly after, he would return to Illinois for a final time dying midsummer 1863 from his wounds. 

77th pennsylvania

Brigade command this day would next fall to Colonel Frederick Stumbaugh of the 77^th Pennsylvania who would lead the brigade until he became ill.  Forced to return home, he would recover well enough to join the staff of General Darius Couch and serve at Gettysburg before his health forced him to resign in October 1863.  Stumbaugh gained election to the Pennsylvania legislature after the war before moving to Kansas where he became a member of that State’s legislature, as well in 1877.

woolf field

Here, the Army of the Ohio brigade formed up behind Rousseau’s on 7 April at Shiloh.  They relieved the forward command in action near the Water Oaks Pond in Woolf Field.  The battle line formed had the regiments aligned with the 34^th Illinois on the left, 30^th Indiana in the center and the 29^th Indiana on the right.  The 77^th Pennsylvania was detached to the left to help Gibson’s brigade fighting in the west side of Review Field.  On its first advance, the 34^th Illinois marched straight through the pond where they ran head on into a last counterattack by the brigade of S.A.M. Woods.  The 34^th was pushed back into the woods east of Woolf Field, but Gibson’s fresh oncoming brigade got thrown in. With help from Sherman’s men firing from the north side of Woolf Field, the Rebel attack suffered a repulse.

Commanders of both the 34^th Illinois – Major Charles N. Levanway who was substituting this day for Colonel Amos Bosworth who had developed a severe cold after falling into water while supervising a bridging operation; and the 30^th Indiana – Colonel Sion Bass – died during the fighting.  Bosworth was lying in bed that day in Savannah and doctors had a hard time keeping him bed with the sounds of battle clearly audible.  His condition worsened after the battle, and he died a couple of weeks afterwards.  Levanway had his head shot off by a cannonball while Bass was hit in the upper thigh by a musket ball dying a week later.

 

joseph dodge

The subsequent commander of the 30^th Indiana, Colonel Joseph Dodge – a schoolteacher before the war – would take over brigade command when Kirk went down again at Stones River.  He would lead the brigade at Chickamauga until the reorganization of the Army of the Cumberland after that battle left him out of a job.  He served as a president of the court-martial for Tennessee for most of the next year before mustering out of the army in August 1864.

29th indiana

The 29^th Indiana of the Army of the Ohio was led by Lieutenant Colonel David M. Dunn at Shiloh according to the regimental monument, but the same Indiana commission responsible for drafting the information on the monument also note in the same report that Colonel John F. Miller, the original colonel of the regiment was present at the battle, too.  Miller would go on to brigade command early in 1864, succeeded by Dunn.  The regiment was involved at both Stones River and at Chickamauga.

Miller was considered one of the young bright stars of the Federal army.  He would suffer a wound leading another brigade on 2 January 1863 across Stones River repulsing Breckinridge’s late attack.  In the ensuing Tullahoma campaign, he lost his left eye, taking him out of the field for a year before he saw his last serious action at the Battle of Nashville. He would eventually go on to become a U.S. senator from the State of California.  Dunn was captured at Stones River, gaining an exchange five months later. He returned once more to lead the 29^th Indiana.

monmuments

The monuments of the brigade sit aligned northwest to southeast from the 29^th Indiana and the 30^th Indiana located along the side road coming off Sherman Road on the north side of Woolf Field to the west – a Confederate burial trench is opposite the 29^th monument; the 34^th Illinois lays next just north of Water Oaks Pond in Woolf Field; the 77^th Pennsylvania lies along the north side of the Hamburg-Purdy Road near the western edge of Review Field.  All three regiments have erected monuments at Chickamauga, as well.

GIBSON’S BRIGADE

The brigade of Colonel William H. Gibson from the Army of the Ohio didn’t reach the Shiloh battlefield until noon on 7 April. They quickly gained insertion into the fight by divisional command Alexander McCook.  They came in on the left of Kirk’s brigade, driving the Rebel line across the Hamburg-Purdy Road.  The last Confederate counterattack led by Preston Pond’s men – with other disorganized detachments added on – briefly threatened Gibson’s left flank, but Grant called in Veatch’s men who had been in reserve and they, in turn, caught the Rebels on their right flank.  With Veatch, Kirk, Gibson and Rousseau’s men – now resupplied with ammunition – plus, Colonel George D. Wagner’s fresh brigade coming into line, as well, Beauregard ordered a general retreat around 2 pm.

Gibson had been a Whig abolitionist lawyer before the war.  He became an early organizer of the Republican Party in Ohio and gained election to State Treasurer in 1856.  Gibson saw himself forced to resign when coming into office he found the treasury short several hundred thousand dollars.  He tried to give his predecessor – a relative by marriage – a chance to make up the money but the public became aware of the problem, and Gibson was accused of covering up the affair.

gibson at shiloh and after

With the war, he helped raise the 49^th Ohio becoming the regimental colonel.  At Shiloh, he substituted for a sick brigade commander, Richard W. Johnson.  After the battle, he went back to the 49^th and would lead that regiment throughout the war.  He temporarily was back at brigade command when August Willich – commanding the 32^nd Indiana at Shiloh – suffered capture at Stone River.  At Shiloh, three horses were unlucky enough to be shot out from underneath Gibson and he received a bayonet wound.  He would return to the law after the war and become a sought-out speaker.

august willich and the 32nd indiana

One regiment that did not have a good day at Shiloh 7 April was the 32^nd Indiana.  The regiment was mostly German under the command of Colonel August Willich, a former Prussian officer who had become a far-left wing leader of a Free Corps unit in the failed German revolution of 1848-1849.  He came to the U.S. afterwards and had been working as an editor of a German newspaper in Cincinnati before the war.  Originally associated with the 9^th Ohio – Die Neuner – Willich became commissioned as the colonel of the 32^nd Indiana – the First German – during the winter of 1861-1862.

Here at Shiloh, he had the regiment come onto the field in column formation instead of line.  What might have worked for Napoleon did not work here as his men were hit by enfilading fire routing the regiment.  The regiment was lost to the brigade and ended up bivouacking after the battle by itself.

Willich went on to command the brigade.  Captured at Stones River, he spent four months at Libby Prison in Richmond.  Exchanged in May 1863, he returned to brigade command through Chickamauga and further until suffering a severe wound at Resaca which forced him to leave the field.  Postwar, he returned to Cincinnati though he did offer his services to Prussia during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870.  The last thing Prussia needed was an old Communist and they declined.

gibson’s other regiments

Albert M. Blackman led the 49^th Ohio at Shiloh.  He would later be the colonel of the 27^th U.S. Colored Troops and became involved with the fall of Fort Fisher outside of Wilmington, North Carolina.

Thomas Jefferson Harrison led the 39^th Indiana of the Army of the Ohio at Shiloh as he would until after Chickamauga – with the exception of Stones River – when the regiment became the 8^th Indiana Cavalry.

monuments

The regimental monuments of Gibson’s brigade stand organized along a line northwest-southeast parallel to that of Kirk’s brigade:  32^nd Indiana on the north side of Corinth Road just south of the Water Oaks Pond; the 15^th Ohio some forty yards southeast followed by the 39^th Indiana and the 49^th Ohio which are on the north side of the Hamburg-Purdy Road just to the west of the Review Field.  Each regiment also has a monument at Chickamauga. 

In addition, a soldier of the 32^nd Indiana erected a monument in 1862 in memory of the regiment’s first action at Munfordville, Kentucky.  This monument – the first Civil War monument in existence – was moved to the Cave Hill National Cemetery in Louisville after the war but now is in the lobby of the Frazier History Museum also in Louisville.

WAGNER’S BRIGADE

George D. Wagner was a prosperous farmer in Indiana before the war.  As a Republican he gained election to the Indiana House of Representatives in 1856, moving to the State Senate two years later.  With the war, Wagner helped raise the 15^th Indiana which saw its initial action in West Virginia.  By the time of Shiloh, Wagner was commanding a brigade within the Army of the Ohio – a position at which he would continue until after the Atlanta command when he would lead a division.  After a controversial performance at the Battle of Franklin, he would leave the army and die at the young age of 39 in 1869.

wagner’s regiments

Here at Shiloh, Wagner’s brigade was the first of Thomas J. Wood’s division to reach the field around 2 pm.  They filed onto the south edge of the Review Field just as the Confederate line was in full retreat.  A few volleys were fired, and the men captured some 40 prisoners suffering only four casualties before the fighting was over.  The one Kentucky regiment – the 24^th Kentucky – is remembered on the Kentucky State Monument east of Cloud Field. 

The three Indiana regiments all erected monuments on the south side of the Hamburg-Purdy Road – south edge of Review Field – where the brigade helped the Confederate army on its way back to Corinth.  Unlike most of the other regiments of the Army of the Ohio, Wagner’s regiments do not have monuments at Chickamauga since General Rosecrans had kept Wagner’s men back in Chattanooga as a garrison while the rest of the army was chasing after Braxton Bragg.  As part of the Army of the Cumberland (which succeeded the Army of the Ohio) did play a key role in the ensuing victory on Missionary Ridge, but the regiments only have monuments here at Shiloh.

GARFIELD’S BRIGADE

The next brigade of Thomas J. Wood’s division to reach Pittsburgh Landing was the green brigade commanded by Brigadier General James A. Garfield.  They arrived just as the battle was over led by Wood, himself, to the sound of the guns, as per Grant’s orders.  The brigade did undergo some artillery fire but saw no action.  They did go forward on 8 April to verify that the Rebels had indeed gone; recovering some of the remnants left behind by Beauregard’s wounded army. 

James Garfield’s history is a storied one.  He was Horatio Alger’s “Self-Made Man”.  When parents tell their children that they, too, might grow up to be President one day, it is Garfield of whom such thoughts start.  For more on Garfield, see my tips in Ohio including his home in Mentor, grave in Cleveland and the college that shaped him in Hiram.  Suffice it to say; that Garfield, a newly promoted brigadier general, was a bit frustrated getting to the battle late.  It would not be long before malaria would force him to give up command of his brigade and return to Ohio to recover. 

Once home, he found he was the Republican candidate for Congress from his district – an election he handily won.  Before he could actually take his seat in Congress, he served on a court-martial that found General Fitz-John Porter guilty of failing to support Pope at Second Manassas.  Garfield was then ordered to Murfreesboro, Tennessee where he became the chief of staff for William Rosecrans.  His actions at Chickamauga would propel him to the Presidency.

garfield’s regiments

the monuments

The regimental monuments of the 64^th and 65^th Ohio stand near Pittsburgh Landing on the north side of the Pittsburgh Landing Road.  The 13^th Michigan is remembered on the Michigan State Monument on the northwest corner of Cloud field.  All of the regiments have more monuments erected at Chickamauga:  the 64^th and 65^th Ohio as a part of Harker’s brigade and the 13^th Michigan as a part of Buell’s brigade.

One of Garfield’s Ohio regiments reaching the Shiloh battlefield even later was the 51^st Indiana commanded by Colonel Abel Streight – a book publisher before the war.  This is their only Civil War regimental monument.  With Garfield as chief of staff of the Army of the Cumberland (earlier Ohio) in early 1863, Streight had his old brigade chief get the ok from the army commander Rosecrans to allow his regiment to form the core of a Federal deep strike similar to what Morgan and Forrest were doing on the Confederate side.  Mounted on mules – not enough horses to go around – Streight’s men reached deep in to Rebel territory but eventually found themselves surrounded by the more mobile and cavalry-savvy Forrest and forced to surrender.  There was no 51^st Indiana at Chickamauga.

HASCALL’S BRIGADE

The Army of the Ohio brigade of Colonel Milo S. Hascall did not reach the battlefield of Shiloh until 8 April.  Hascall was a West pointer – class of 1852 – but was practicing law in Indiana before the war.  He was the original colonel of the 17^th Indiana and originally saw action in West Virginia under George B. McClellan.

Both Indiana regiments have erected monuments here – the 17^th Indiana commanded by Colonel John. T. Wilder, about whom much more would be heard from at Chickamauga; and the 58^th Indiana led by Colonel Henry Carr – Carr would resign in June 1862 being replaced by the cousin of Don Carlos Buell, George P. Buell who would go on to brigade command at Stones River, Chickamauga and beyond.  Both the 17^th Indiana and the 58^th Indiana also have monuments at Chickamauga.

The 58th was led by Colonel Henry M. Carr at the time of Shiloh. He would resign not long after for allowing sutlers to use army wagons to haul their goods. Carr resurrected his career first as a captain and then major with the 71st and 72nd Indiana. He eventually resigned once again in the June 1864 due to illness.