In the three previous posts, I examined the fighting at
Rappahannock Station, a bloody engagement that occurred on November 7, 1863.
That fight cost the bluecoats 419 casualties. It is important to remember that
this was not the Army of the Potomac’s only engagement on that fateful day. Farther
southeast, another Union column made its way south, advancing on Kelly’s Ford. After
a short fight, the Union troops took possession of the river crossing, and both
columns united at Brandy Station.
Not many accounts describe the battle action at Kelly’s
Ford, but one incident is worth mentioning. It involves a Confederate prisoner
taken into custody by the 3rd Corps. According to the men who captured
him, he was really dumb and really ugly.
Okay, you may be wondering why we should care about a dumb,
ugly Confederate. Believe me, there is a point here. But first thing’s first. Here’s
what happened.
At noon, November 7, the vanguard of the 3rd Corps—Col.
Regis de Trobriand’s brigade with three additional regiments attached to it—arrived
at the north bank of the Rappahannock River. Two North Carolina regiments
belonging to Brig. Gen. Stephen D. Ramseur’s brigade—the 2nd and 30th—sat
sprawled on the low ground on the south bank. Eager to get his men across the
river, Col. de Trobriand ordered his men to secure the crossing point. He
deployed one regiment, the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters, as skirmishers
atop the river bank’s high bluff. Arriving quietly, the Union riflemen ducked
behind trees and cautiously observed their enemy. Looking down, they beheld an unobstructed
view of the North Carolinians’ position. Sergeant James M. Matthews jotted what
he saw in his diary, “Johnnys were scattered around permiscuously on the
opposite side and horses and cattle [were] grazing as if no Yanks were
near. . . . The enemy were seen playing cards and employing their leisure time
in diverse ways along the line.”
Although the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters deployed in a
timely manner, the other regiments from de Trobriand’s brigade did not. Eventually,
after an hour’s delay, the Confederate pickets became alerted to the
Sharpshooters’ presence. They scurried to their rifle pits and opened fire. For
the next hour, the North Carolinians and the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters
blazed away. Finally, at 3 P.M., de Trobriand sent in his assault troops. The 1st
U.S. Sharpshooters led the way, plunging into the river, followed by the 40th
New York, the 20th Indiana, the 3rd and 5th
Michigan, and the 110th Pennsylvania. Taken in the flank, the two
North Carolinian regiments gave way and fled.
However, a larger number of North Carolinians simply threw down their
weapons and surrendered. Altogether, de Trobriand’s men captured about 290 Confederates.
Although he had seen most of his brigade ensnared, one dumb-struck
North Carolinian refused to surrender. He was a skirmisher who had spent the
first phase of the battle firing at the 2nd U.S. Sharpshooters. Instead
of fleeing for his life or throwing up his hands to surrender, this unnamed fellow
ducked behind a small stump. Unfortunately, the stump did not provide him much
cover. He crouched behind it, somewhat like a frightened ostrich, buttocks in
the air, hoping the Union soldiers would not notice him.
From their lofty position, the Sharpshooters could see the
cowering Confederate and believed that they could kill him
in an instant. However, none of them wanted to spill more blood, so the U.S.
Sharpshooters called to the North Carolinian, inviting him to surrender. They
shouted to him many, many times, but each time, he refused to answer. One of
the U.S. Sharpshooters, Private Wyman White, wrote, “We peppered the stump,
trying to make the fellow understand that we could wing him, but he gave no
sign that he saw the danger he was in. He would just move a little at times
when our bullets hit the stump.” Eventually, the U.S. Sharpshooters reasoned
that the man “had no brains,” which explained his unwillingness to comprehend
his dire predicament.
Finally, one intrepid officer ended the charade. Adjutant
Charles H. Foote stripped off all of his clothing and accoutrements—with the
exception of his hat and pistol—and swam the river. Naked, Foote
approached the cringing North Carolinian and convinced him to surrender. Exactly
what Foote said is unknown, but whatever it was, he persuaded the frightened
North Carolina soldier to throw in the towel. They swam back across the
Rappahannock and the U.S. Sharpshooters gathered around, intent on
interrogating their captive. Private White was not terribly impressed with what
he saw, and he found some of the prisoner’s words disturbing. He wrote:
The boys collected around the prisoner and fired questions at
him. He said he was from North Carolina and that he was drafted for the second
time, having served in one campaign before. Then he was sent home for awhile to
raise corn. But a few weeks previous they came for him again. The man was
deformed in his lower limbs and one of his hands was badly out of shape. All
that was not enough to keep him from serving Jeff Davis. The poor fellow’s legs
below his knees were about four inches over the proper length. He was very tall
and almost a skeleton, being one of the lankiest of southern lanks. With a grip
on the skin on his neck, one might run around him once or twice without letting
go. The fellow was about the color of a bacon rind and his hair was down to his
shoulders. He was considerably frightened
but came out of his fright when he was served with coffee and hardtack
by the boys. He was taken to the rear and probably sent north as an object
lesson to the loyal people of that section, an inkling of the strength of the
Southern Confederacy at the time.
White’s description of the dumb, ugly Confederate captured
at Kelly’s Ford is interesting, and not merely because of its humorous (and
somewhat mean-spirited) portrayal of the southern captive. I find it
illuminating that the U.S. Sharpshooters crowded around the prisoner to learn
his life story. The Union soldiers did not dismiss the North Carolinian as a waste of
conversation. Indeed, Private White even found the man’s tale so interesting that he filled the pages of his diary with the lurid material quoted above. Further,
White did not attribute the prisoner’s unpleasant appearance to substandard
grooming or to poor eating habits. Instead, he blamed the Confederacy for taking the man him from his peaceful pursuits and then overusing and underfeeding him. To White, the
prisoner’s ill-looks and apparent ignorance did not impose a censure upon the
people of North Carolina, but it revealed “an object lesson” in the tyranny and desperation
of the Confederate cause. In the end, White found it satisfying to blame the Confederate government for the prisoner’s stupidity and ugliness.
This is no surprise. It is often easier to blame the enemy
government than to blame the individuals who fight for it. For soldiers,
such an outlook makes war palatable.
"The lankiest of southern lanks." |
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