War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

29th. Boys went out for forage, every man for himself, horses having stood hungry all night. Lay and slept considerably during the forenoon. Boys got some apples. Saw the boys play poker some. Am glad I have not the habit of playing. Col. sent for wagons to come up. Mail sent for. Bosworth went. Getting uneasy.

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Downing’s Civil War Diary.–Alexander G. Downing.

Diary of Alexander G. Downing; Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry

Thursday, 29th–It is quite pleasant today. The Mississippi river is slowly rising. Produce is very high here at Vicksburg and fruit and vegetables are scarce this fall because of the large armies in and around this section for more than a year. What little stuff has been grown by the farmers was confiscated by the soldiers before it was matured, so what we get is shipped down from the North, and we have to pay about four prices for it. Potatoes and onions are $4.00 a bushel, cheese (with worms) is fifty cents per pound, and butter—true, it’s only forty cents a pound, but you can tell the article in camp twenty rods away. Vicksburg being under military rule makes it difficult for the few citizens to get supplies, which they can obtain only from the small traders who continued in business after the surrender, or from the army sutlers. No farmers are allowed to come in through the lines without passes, and even then no farmer, unless he lives a long distance from Vicksburg, has anything to bring in.

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Through Some Eventful Years

Through Some Eventful Years by Susan Bradford Eppes
Susa Bradford Eppes

Note: though dated several weeks earlier, this entry follows that for October 27th in the book and, with its content consistent with a later entry, it is posted here in the same sequence..

October 6th, 1863.—Yesterday morning we got up with the sun and had a bath and some clean clothes, then came breakfast of corn hoe-cake and fried fish. Mother wanted to pack a basket of eatables for us but Father said we must eat camp fare, so the only thing we brought along in that line was a jar of preserves, for Cousin Joe, and some coffee. Breakfast was fine and when it was over we went fishing, still inside the cove. After dinner we went to Newport and had a bath in the sulphur spring. There we had some delicious October peaches, and we also saw many of our soldier friends in Colonel Scott’s battalion. I admire Colonel Scott most sincerely, he is a Pennsylvanian by birth but he came in early life to make his home in Tallahassee. His home was a little way out of town and his wife and babies were his world. When the war began he volunteered his services to the Confederacy; it had not been expected of him because of his Northern birth, but there is no better friend to the South. He says it is his country. He was in the mercantile business but he has developed unusual military ability and he seems never to tire. Last winter he took cold, being so constantly in the marshy coast region, and rheumatism followed the cold. He still suffers and at times he has to have assistance in mounting his horse, but he drills his men regularly and last night one of the boys told me of the burning of the bridge across the St. Mary’s river.

The enemy were advancing. The only hope of stopping them was to burn that bridge and Colonel Scott and his cavalry were miles away. Night was fast coming on, when the Colonel walked into camp and said, “Boys, I want volunteers to go with me to burn St. Mary’s bridge; we may get back or we may not, I am going.” Very nearly all wanted to go but Colonel Scott picked eight young men, almost boys, the most of them. He was so stiff from rheumatism that they had to put him on his horse, but “there is a spirit in man,” and he led them off in the darkness. [continue reading…]

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A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary

A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones
A likeness of Jones when he was editor and majority owner of the Daily Madisonian during President John Tyler’s administration.

OCTOBER 29th.—Gen. Lee writes (a few days since), from Brandy Station, that Meade seems determined to advance again; that troops are going up the Potomac to Washington, and that volunteers from New York have been ordered thither. He asks the Secretary to ascertain if there be really any Federal force in the York River; for if the report be correct of hostile troops being there, it may be the enemy’s intention to make another raid on the railroad. The general says we have troops enough in Southwestern Virginia; but they are not skillfully commanded.

After all, I fear we shall not get the iron from the Aquia Creek Railroad. In the summer the government was too slow, and now it is probably too slow again, as the enemy are said to be landing there. It might have been removed long ago, if we had had a faster Secretary.

Major S. Hart, San Antonio, Texas, writes that the 10,000 (the number altered again) superior rifles captured by the French off the Rio Grande last summer, were about to fall into the hands of United States cruisers; and he has sent for them, hoping the French will turn them over to us.

Gen. Winder writes the Secretary that the Commissary-General will let him have no meat for the 13,000 prisoners; and he will not be answerable for their safe keeping without it. The Quartermaster-General writes that the duty of providing for them is in dispute between the two bureaus, and he wants the Secretary to decide between them. If the Secretary should be very slow, the prisoners will suffer.

Yesterday a set (six) of cups and saucers, white, and not china, sold at auction for $50.

Mr. Henry, Senator from Tennessee, writes the Secretary that if Ewell were sent into East Tennessee with a corps, and Gen. Johnston were to penetrate into Middle Tennessee, forming a junction north of Chattanooga, it would end the war in three months.

 

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War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

28th. At 2:30 relieved and ordered to Jonesboro, 11 miles. Cold ride. Reached there at sunrise, reported to Shackleford. Sent on G. road half a mile, dismounted and fed. Whole army retreating. Went mile east of town where Regt. in line. Stayed and waited for Capt. Case to come from the river. Got chestnuts. Sent for provisions. Fed below Leesburg, then marched to old camp at Henderson Station.

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Downing’s Civil War Diary.–Alexander G. Downing.

Diary of Alexander G. Downing; Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry

Wednesday, 28th–The weather is getting quite cool, particularly the nights, and a little fire in our tents in the evening makes it quite comfortable and homelike. It is different on picket, where no fires are allowed, except on the reserves’ posts. Troops are leaving Vicksburg nearly every day, going to northern Mississippi and western Tennessee to occupy garrisons made vacant by General Sherman’s men going to the relief of the army cooped up in Chattanooga.

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Diary of a Southern Refugee, Judith White McGuire.

Diary of a Southern Refugee During the War by Judith White McGuire

28th.—Our niece, M. P., came for me to go with her on a shopping expedition. It makes me sad to find our money depreciating so much, except that I know it was worse during the old Revolution. A merino dress cost $150, long cloth $5.50 per yard, fine cotton stockings $6 per pair; handkerchiefs, for which we gave fifty cents before the war, are now $5. There seems no scarcity of dry-goods of the ordinary kinds; bombazines, silks, etc., are scarce and very high; carpets are not to be found—they are too large to run the blockade from Baltimore, from which city many of our goods come.

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A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary

A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones
A likeness of Jones when he was editor and majority owner of the Daily Madisonian during President John Tyler’s administration.

OCTOBER. 28th.—No news from the army. We have some 13,000 prisoners here, hungry; for there is not sufficient meat for them.

Mr. Memminger, Secretary of the Treasury, is said to be transporting his private fortune (very large) to Europe.

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War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

27th. In the morning, read some late newspapers–month old. Took Davenport over to be mustered. Found no difficulty in examination. Co. detailed for picket, also myself. Took 50 men to Vaul’s Ford on Blountville and J. road. Awkward place for picket, 7 miles from camp. Long ride posting pickets. Two letters from home. Good. No alarm.

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Downing’s Civil War Diary.–Alexander G. Downing.

Diary of Alexander G. Downing; Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry

Tuesday, 27th–The Eleventh received their pay today, and then went out on picket. Picket exchanges are directed by the aid-de-camp of our brigade, who rides out every morning with the picket relief, and after posting them, brings the retiring picket into camp and disbands them.

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Diary of a Southern Refugee, Judith White McGuire.

Diary of a Southern Refugee During the War by Judith White McGuire

27th.—I was surprised this morning by a precious visit from S. S. She went to Petersburg this evening, to join her husband, who is stationed there. She seems to think , that she can never return to her Winchester home, so completely is every thing ruined. It is strange how we go on from month to month, living in the present, without any certain prospect for the future. We had some sweet, sad talk of our dear William. She says he was prepared, and God took him. At his funeral, his pastor took out his last letter from him, but became so overwhelmed with tears that he could not read it. It is right, and we must submit; but it is a bitter trial to give up one we loved so dearly.

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A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary

A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones
A likeness of Jones when he was editor and majority owner of the Daily Madisonian during President John Tyler’s administration.

OCTOBER 27th.—Nothing from the North or West to-day. But Beauregard telegraphs that the enemy’s batteries and monitors opened this morning heavily on his forts and batteries, but, as yet, there were no casualties.

The Commissary-General to-day, in a communication to the department, relating to the necessity of impressment to subsist our armies, says “the armies in Virginia muster 150,000 men.” If this be so, then let Meade come! It may be possible that instead of exaggerating, a policy may have been adopted calculated to conceal the actual strength of armies.

Nevertheless, it is understood that one of the cabinet is offering his estates, lands, and negroes for sale. Will he convert the money into European funds? If so, he should not let it be known, else it will engender the terrible idea that our affairs are in a desperate condition. The operations of the next thirty days may be decisive of our fate. Hundreds of thousands of Southern men have yet to die before subjugation can be effected; and quite that number of invaders must fall to accomplish it!

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Through Some Eventful Years

Through Some Eventful Years by Susan Bradford Eppes
Susa Bradford Eppes

October 27th, 1863.—We went to the salt works today and, though I am tired and dirty and have no good place to write, I am going to try to tell you about it.

A year ago salt began to get scarce but the people only had to economize in its use, but soon there was no salt and then Father got Cousin Joe Bradford to come down from Georgia and take charge of some salt works he was having installed on the coast. He had plenty of hands from the plantation but they had to have an intelligent head and then, too, it is a rather dangerous place to work, for the Yankee gunboats can get very near the coast and they may try shelling the works.

Though they have been in operation quite awhile this is my first visit. Father brought us with him and we will stay three days, so he can see just how they are getting on. We are to sleep in a tent, on a ticking filled with pine straw. It will be a novel experience.

I am so interested in seeing the salt made from the water. The great big sugar kettles are filled full of water and fires made beneath the kettles. They are a long time heating up and then they boil merrily. Ben and Tup and Sam keep the fires going, for they must not cool down the least little bit. A white foam comes at first and then the dirtiest scum you ever saw bubbles and dances over the surface, as the water boils away it seems to get thicker and thicker, at last only a wet mass of what looks like sand remains. This they spread on smooth oaken planks to dry. In bright weather the sun does the rest of the work of evaporation, but if the weather is bad fires are made just outside of a long, low shelter, where the planks are placed on blocks of wood. The shelter keeps off the rain and the fires give out heat enough to carry on the evaporation. The salt finished in fair weather is much whiter and nicer in every way than that dried in bad weather, but this dark salt is used to salt meat or to pickle pork. I think it is fine of Father to do all this. It is very troublesome and it takes nine men to do the work, besides Cousin Joe’s time; and Father does not get any pay whatever for the salt he makes.

We expected to have a grand time swimming and fishing. We are both good swimmers, but Father and Cousin Joe will not allow us to go outside of this little cove. Yankee gun-boats have been sighted once lately and there is no knowing when the salt works may be attacked.


Susan Bradford is 17 years old when this entry was made.

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A Diary From Dixie.

A Diary From Dixie by Mary Boykin Miller Chesnut.

October 27th.–Young Wade Hampton has been here for a few days, a guest of our nearest neighbor and cousin, Phil Stockton. Wade, without being the beauty or the athlete that his brother Preston is, is such a nice boy. We lent him horses, and ended by giving him a small party. What was lacking in company was made up for by the excellence of old Colonel Chesnut’s ancient Madeira and champagne. If everything in the Confederacy were only as truly good as the old Colonel’s wine-cellars! Then we had a salad and a jelly cake.

General Joe Johnston is so careful of his aides that Wade has never yet seen a battle. Says he has always happened to be sent afar off when the fighting came. He does not seem too grateful for this, and means to be transferred to his father’s command. He says, “No man exposes himself more recklessly to danger than General Johnston, and no one strives harder to keep others out of it.” But the business of this war is to save the country, and a commander must risk his men’s lives to do it. There is a French saying that you can’t make an omelet unless you are willing to break eggs.

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“When I got in this morning found orders to be ready to move at 12 this p.m.”–Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, Charles Wright Wills.

Army Life of an Illinois Soldier, Charles Wright Wills, (8th Illinois Infantry)

Iuka, Miss., October 26, 1863.

Let your pocket ‘kerchief float out on the breeze, halloo a little and throw up your bonnet. It’s only a “march at 12 o’clock to-night” but that’s good enough. We’ve been here a week now, drawing clothing and making all kinds of preparations for a “forward,” and the blessed word has come at last. I don’t believe anybody enjoys anything better than I do marching. I feel as coltish all the time on a move as I used to, when after a long week of those short winter days at school, with just time enough between the school hours and dark to cut the next day’s wood (how I did work), Job Walker and I would plunge into those dear old Big Creek woods with our guns or skates, and make such a day of it that I would almost wish all time was cut up into Saturdays. I was on picket last night; full moon, splendid post, right on the old Iuka battle ground, where the fight was the hottest; the old clothes, straps, cartridge boxes and litter always found in such places, the scarred trees, and the mounds a little further up the road, marking the pits where lay the glorious dead, then a half dozen neatly marked single graves, showing the care of some company commander, all tempted me to commit some more poetry. You know I can. But I nobly resisted the temptation. There were no coons or owls. I wished for them. My picketing the last year has almost all been in swamps, and I have learned to love the concerts those innocent animals improvise. When I got in this morning found orders to be ready to move at 12 this p.m. We cross the Tennessee river, I suppose, near Eastport. This beats me all hollow. Can’t see the point, unless we’re moving to check some of Bragg’s flanking motions. Anything for a move. I put the profile of a fort here the other day under the direction of Sherman’s engineer, and the chief told me if I would like it he would have me detailed to assist him. Have had enough of staff duty and excused myself. The men are rapidly becoming more healthy. I have but one person sick now. Dorrance arrived here a few days since, and brought a splendid long letter from you. Have to go to work on some ordnance reports now.

Am half inclined to think that our big march is played out. Rather think now that we will stop at Eastport on the Tennessee river. Isn’t that heavy? Eight miles only and then go to guarding navigation on a river that’s a twin sister of Big Creek. Can’t tell though, one rumor says that we will go 128 miles beyond the river. These generals are positively getting so sharp that a man can’t tell one month ahead what they are going to do.

One of my men who was captured down near Panola, Miss., last April returned to the company for duty yesterday. Some Confederate soldiers captured him and some citizens offered them $10 to each captor for the privilege of hanging the d___d Yanks. They couldn’t make a bargain. Transferred five men to the invalid corps yesterday. Jacob J. Nicholson among them.

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War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

26th. Got out desk and Co. property to work. Trains reloaded and sent to the rear. Fear of an attack. Proposed to the boys the order for re-enlistment. Read some in “B. House.” Boys got some good apples and apple butter. Cloudy and quite cold. Contradictory news from the Army of the Potomac. Election news.

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Downing’s Civil War Diary.–Alexander G. Downing.

Diary of Alexander G. Downing; Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry

Monday, 26th–Everything is quiet. A thousand men are at work every day on the fortifications. The fortifications are being built on a small scale, but are built all around the edge of town so that a small force can hold the place. The cannon are arranged so that they can be turned in any direction.

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A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary

A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones
A likeness of Jones when he was editor and majority owner of the Daily Madisonian during President John Tyler’s administration.

OCTOBER 26th.—No news from our armies. The President was in Mobile two days ago.

Gen. Rosecrans has been removed from his command, and Grant put in his place. Meade, it is said in Northern papers, will also be decapitated, for letting Lee get back without loss. Also Dalgren, at Charleston, has been relieved. And yet the Northern papers announce that Richmond will soon and suddenly be taken, and an unexpected joy be spread throughout the North, and a corresponding despondency throughout the South.

The weather is cloudy and cold. The papers announce that all clerks appointed since October 11th, 1862, by order of the Secretary of War, are liable to conscription. This cannot be true; for I know a Secretary who has just appointed two of his cousins to the best clerkships in the department—both of conscript age. But Secretaries know how to evade the law, and “whip the devil round the stump.”

How long will it be after peace before the sectional hatred intensified by this war can abate? A lady near by, the other night, while surveying her dilapidated shoes, and the tattered sleeping-gowns of her children, burst forth as follows: “I pray that I may live to see the United States involved in a war with some foreign power, which will make refugees of her people, and lay her cities in ashes! I want the people ruined who would ruin the South. It will be a just retribution!”

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War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

25th. Morning work over, set out for regt. Stopped in town and saw wounded boys. Glad to see the boys so long absent. Reached Watauga about noon. Found most of Co. C absent on a scout. Came in about dark. Grand jubilee. Proposed to re-enlist as regiment. All would like to go home this winter but some don’t want to be bound again till time’s out.

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Downing’s Civil War Diary.–Alexander G. Downing.

Diary of Alexander G. Downing; Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry

Sunday, 25th–I went out on picket today. We keep a strong picket guard along the entire line. The rebels’ cavalry are not as bold as they were two or three weeks ago, for they know that we are becoming more thoroughly entrenched every day; besides this, they have been pretty well driven out of this section.

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Diary of a Southern Refugee, Judith White McGuire.

Diary of a Southern Refugee During the War by Judith White McGuire

25th.—To-day we heard the Rev. Mr. Peterkin, from the text: “Be not weary in well-doing.” It was a delightful sermon, persuasive and encouraging. Mr. –– spends Sunday morning always in the hospital. He has Hospital No. 1, in addition to the Officers’ Hospital, under his care. They occupy a great deal of his time, in the most interesting way.

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Louise Wigfall Wright — A Southern Girl in ’61

(excerpt)

Charlottesville, October 25, 1863

“I hope you will be able to pay us a visit at Xmas in Richmond. We are looking forward with much pleasure to the winter, in spite of the prospect of having nothing to eat nor wear! We hear to-day that Genl. Hood is doing exceedingly well and would be in Richmond this winter. He is going first to pay Gen. Hampton a visit in Columbia. Mr. B. has been with him since his wound and wrote to your father that he was in fine spirits and bore it admirably. Genl. Hampton is expected on very soon.”

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A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary

A Rebel War Clerk’s Diary at the Confederate States Capital, By John Beauchamp Jones
A likeness of Jones when he was editor and majority owner of the Daily Madisonian during President John Tyler’s administration.

OCTOBER 25th.—We have nothing new this morning ; but letters to the department from North and South Carolina indicate that while the troops in Virginia are almost perishing for food, the farmers are anxious to deliver the tithes, but the quartermaster and commissary agents are negligent or designedly remiss in their duty. The consequence will be the loss of the greater portion of these supplies, and the enhancement of the price of the remainder in the hands of the monopolists and speculators.

The Southern Express Co. has monopolized the railroads, delivering cotton for speculators, who send it to the United States, while the Confederate States cannot place enough money in Europe to pay for the supplies needed for the army.

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Louise Wigfall Wright — A Southern Girl in ’61

In a letter written by my father… he says: “Davis is still in the West and is not expected back for a week or ten days. He seems determined to sustain Bragg and Pemberton, cost what it may to the Country. John A. Wharton of Texas has been lately made a Major General of Cavalry. He told me when here that the dissatisfaction with Bragg was universal in the Western Army and a general desire to be commanded by Johnston. I got a letter from Seddon a few days ago saying that the President was determined to keep Bragg in command, not that he thought him a great General, but that he was better than any with whom he could replace him. That is, than Johnston or Longstreet.”

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War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney.

24th. Another unpleasant day. Boys drew some boots. Brought in big pile of butter, bacon, potatoes and oats. Receipted to Union man and Confed. money to Reb. Seems good to have the boys back again. In the evening wrote home and to Ella Clark. Feel ashamed of my carelessness. Ordered up with train. After forage remained over night. All glad.

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