Weekly View » Civil War Indianapolis

The Civil War — 150th Anniversary: August 1863

Steven R. Barnett — Thu, 22 Aug 2013 05:09:33 +0000

Saturday morning, August 1, Indianapolis residents read a letter from a member of the 3rd Indiana Cavalry, published in the Journal, giving an account of the chase of the “notorious John H. Morgan” and his capture in Columbiana County, Ohio thus ending “one of the most memorable raids and pursuits on record.” Three hundred prisoners arrived on the Jeffersonville Railroad from Port Hudson and were marched from the depot under escort to Camp Morton. A few days later, 1,200 more prisoners arrived from Jackson, Mississippi. By mid-month, 300 additional rebel prisoners came from St. Louis. The military authorities at Camp Morton were besieged daily by fifteen to twenty persons from the “first families” of Kentucky wanting to give the prisoners something, but Col. Biddle refused them entrance. A detachment of the 63rd Regiment met “fierce resistance” while arresting deserters near Edinburgh in Johnson County. Four or five members of the “band of lawless traitors” lost their lives in the fight. Gov. Morton promptly replied to Gov. Curtin of Pennsylvania that Indiana would “contribute the expense of removing her dead” to the cemetery intended for a portion of the battlefield at Gettysburg. By the end of the month, preliminary arrangements for a National Cemetery “embracing the highest point on the Cemetery Hill” were completed.
President Lincoln proclaimed Thursday, August 6, as a day of thanksgiving for the recent victories. A great majority of businesses closed and the streets were mostly deserted. Church congregations were large and collections were taken up for the Christian Commission whose agents “are on every battlefield” and are found “in every hospital where there is a sick soldier.” The city regiment of the Indiana Legion had their usual weekly parade on University Square in the evening, followed by Rev George O. Betts, pastor of North Street Methodist Episcopal Church, stepping from the ranks of his company, where he serves as a private, to offer a prayer of praise and thanksgiving. The entire regiment then sang the Doxology “with great vigor and feeling.”
Long delayed official reports to Gov. Morton of the casualties sustained by Indiana regiments at Gettysburg began to appear in newspapers, and Hoosiers read the horrific accounts looking for the “loss of some relative or friend, or the happy termination of fears for their safety.” The 19th Indiana Regiment began the fight on July 1st with 261 men and 27 officers. After having its colors shot down five times and “being shelled almost constantly,” 69 men and 9 officers answered evening roll call at the end of the first day of fighting — “No regiment in the world has seen more deadly perils or met them more bravely.” The regiment’s wounded and those of other regiments of the Iron Brigade, many who had lost their knapsacks and nearly all with “clothing torn off, being covered with blood,” were brought to a neighboring house and barn at White Church, three miles from Gettysburg. Indiana’s Military Agent, Isaac W. Monfort, and his assistants brought shirts, drawers, bandages, socks, shoes, towels, vegetables, fruit, bread, butter, and Hoosier wine; “the soldiers were rejoiced to receive these supplies. ‘Bully for Indiana!’” Lists of killed and wounded were also compiled. The Indiana Sanitary Commission steamer Sunny Side left Evansville for Vicksburg and Natchez to pick up sick and wounded Hoosier soldiers. It carried a full contingent of surgeons and nurses and 1,000 packages of “well-assorted supplies.” Rev. W. R. Revels sent Gov. Morton a letter signed by himself and 90 other “colored inhabitants” of Indianapolis tendering their services as Home Guards. The governor declined the offer “in view of the superabundant force already organized in the Legion, and the fact that the constitution and laws of the State give him no authority to accept colored troops.” Levi Coffin, general agent of the Western Freedman’s Aid Commission was in the city soliciting donations to “aid in clothing, civilizing and Christianizing those slaves of the South who have been freed by the fortunes of war.”
The State Quartermaster General published a notice that severely rebuked unnamed parties for the “outrageous thoughtlessness” of using the door of the powder magazine west of Camp Sullivan for target practice. Messrs. White and Hill broke “the long dearth of entertainments” in Indianapolis with their performances of “Conscriptor Substitute” and “The Secret.” At College Hall, a capacity crowd gave a “perfect storm of applause” to Prof. Robert Kidd’s recitations “Negro Regiment” and “The Copperheads.” The State Convention of the War Democrats assembled at the State House grove Thursday morning August 20 with an opening salute from the 23rd Artillery Battery and “excellent music” provided by the 71st Regimental Band. A crowd of 15,000 cheered speeches, unanimously adopted resolutions, and in “thunder tones” gave emphatic affirmatives to calls for the Union and the Constitution and the “prosecution of the war until no last vestige of rebellion is left.”
Over 460 rebel prisoners at Camp Morton enlisted into the service of the United States and were assigned to the 71st and 73rd Indiana Regiments and the 12th Michigan Artillery Battery.

The Civil War — 150th Anniversary April 1863

Steven R. Barnett — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 05:09:03 +0000

General Henry B. Carrington and his staff had barely completed the move of the offices of the General Military Headquarters into Andrew Wallace’s new building at the corner of Maryland and Delaware Streets when an immense crowd of deserters and straggling soldiers descended on the headquarters. Meeting the President’s deadline of leniency, the men awaited transportation orders. In response to “a great need of bandages and rags” at the military hospitals, a plea was made to the “ladies of the city” to bring old sheets, shirts, and other suitable articles for the dressing of wounds and sores to the Meridian St. Congregational Church. The 529 rebel prisoners at Camp Morton were ordered to be exchanged and after marching to the Depot; they left the city on the Central Railway.
The federal grand jury called to investigate recent acts of resistance to the military draft and the concealment of deserters in Indiana received its charge from Judge Caleb B. Smith who wrote, “Opposition to the Government can assume no form more dangerous than that of secret organizations formed to obstruct the execution of the laws.” Reports of over 200 Copperheads assembling for military drill in Tippecanoe County and a riot between a company of Knights of the Golden Circle and law-abiding citizens in Danville which prompted Gen. Carrington to dispatch 50 cavalrymen and 100 infantry soldiers to prevent any further civil disturbance, added to anxiety among Unionists. However, temperate thought led to a pardon for Private John O. Brown, 3rd Indiana Cavalry, who was under sentence of death for being a member of the Knights of the Golden Circle and inducing soldiers to desert. Gen. Carrington and Gov. Morton, believing the young soldier to have been duped into his actions, asked for a suspension of the sentence.
On the eastern edge of Marion County, Dr. James N. Ray of Cumberland was attacked by five men as he walked to his home from the town’s train depot. He “hallooed ‘murder’” which brought a couple of men from neighboring houses to his rescue. It is believed the assault was aimed at driving Dr. Ray away from Cumberland because of his strong Union views. An excellent school teacher had been driven out a while before “because he and his lady sung Union songs and played American airs in the school exercises.”
On the first Monday of the month, township elections were held. The loyal white men of Marion County were encouraged to vote early and “stay at the polls and watch them.” The Journal warned that the Knights of the Golden Circle “bear watching” and the Copperhead faction of the Democratic Party is “desperately bent on carrying the township election . . . by any means.” There was “positive proof” of forty men coming into Indianapolis from Terre Haute to illegally vote. The Union ticket won handily, although there were numerous quarrels and fights around the Court House sparked by uncalled for epithets and insulting remarks coming from Butternuts and directed at soldiers and others standing about the yard.
At Metropolitan Hall “an immense audience” attended the performance of Love Chase and said farewell to those renowned actors Frederick B. Conway and his wife, Sarah Crocker Conway. At the Masonic Hall the Continental Old Folks Concert was well attended. The costuming of the singers and the performance of the music that was in vogue in earlier times was pleasing and harmonious. The State Librarian David Stevenson planted 250 trees, mostly silver maple and elm, on the State House Square
All compositors and pressmen at the city’s four main printers quit work on Saturday, April 11th in a dispute over wages. The Typographical Union had sought an increase in wages because of the rise in the cost of living. In response, the Journal advertised for “permanent places at good wages” claiming that “any competent workman can easily make from $15 (2012 $275.78) to $18 (2012 $330.93) a week.” The Union called off the strike after a few days. Any member could “go to work at the old prices if he wanted to, or if the proprietors would take him.” On Monday, April 20th, the railroads announced the change of time on their arrival and departure schedules
The war’s shadow continued to cross Hoosier homes with almost daily reports of deaths at military hospitals. The report of the killed, wounded, and missing of the 33rd Indiana at the Battle of Spring Hill, Tennessee was painfully felt in cities and towns and villages and farms across the state. On the last day of the month, business was suspended as Hoosiers joined their fellow Americans in observing President Lincoln’s call for “a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer.”

The Civil War: 150th Anniversary, Feb. 1863

Steven R. Barnett — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 06:03:53 +0000

Note: 2013 continues the 150th anniversary of the greatest conflict in which Americans were ever engaged – the Civil War. This is the twenty-sixth in a series of articles providing a month by month synopsis from the pages of The Indianapolis Daily Journal of Hoosier reactions to national events.

February 1863

As the month began, reports reached Indianapolis of soldiers being fired upon near the Morgan County community of Waverly, Indiana as an attempt to arrest deserters was taking place. When cavalry reinforcements arrived on the scene additional shots were fired from ambush by about forty armed horsemen. However, the cavalry quickly dispersed the assailants, apprehending three deserters and nine citizens who were brought into court to stand trial for their crime. Thankfully, no blood was shed in “the Morgan County War.” A strict regulation of passes was ordered for the officers and soldiers because of citizen complaints “as to depredations” and the large number of soldiers on the streets of the city without passes. Gov. Morton issued an appeal for 3,000 barrels of potatoes, 500 barrels of onions, 50 barrels of cornmeal, and 50 barrels of dried fruits for use by the sick and wounded Indiana soldiers in the various hospitals.
Real estate agent Frank Smith was offering “the cheapest and most desirable lots” in McGuire’s Subdivision, west of Blackford St. and “cornering the Old Fair Ground.” The gas lights along New York St. offered nighttime security, too. Miss Charlotte Thompson returned to the Metropolitan Hall playing the double character of Edith & Zeldia “unusually well” before a well attended house. Later in the month, Miss Alice Placide appeared in Madelaine and Murder at the Farm, and the 18th Regimental band played a benefit for hospitalized soldiers at Masonic Hall. The crowd was gratified to hear “Annie Laurie,” “Dixie,” “Red, White and Blue,” and “John Brown” among the tunes played.
The post office was besieged throughout Valentine’s Day by “an army of valentine seekers” most of whom were minors, the youngest seemingly to be “the most anxious to receive a share of those illustrated love tokens” to the great delight of young ladies. Washington’s Birthday was commemorated on Monday, February 23, 1863 with a “military display exceeding the most imposing military demonstration of the present year.” The city’s bakers are increasing the size of a loaf of bread from one pound to one and a quarter pounds, and increasing the price from four cents to five cents. The scarcity of pennies has necessitated the change.
Memorials and resolutions began arriving from Indiana regiments to the State Legislature opposing “anything like an armistice or cessation of hostilities” and affirming “prosecuting this war boldly and vigorously to the crushing out of the rebellion and the restoration of the union” amid reports of secret societies — the Knights of the Golden Circle — “working now in our midst” and “secret combinations” seeking to separate states, including Indiana, into a North Western Confederacy. In response to these “secret cliques,” a federal grand jury met in Indianapolis to “inquire into any and all conspiracies to resist and obstruct the laws of the United States.” Union meetings continued to be held around the state culminating in the “GRAND RALLY of the loyal Union citizens of Indiana” on Thursday, February 26, 1863 at Indianapolis. Crowds began arriving the previous day, and by evening there was not an accommodation to be had in the city. The next morning, despite the rain, trains arrived with lengths of cars loaded with people. Flags flew from many buildings, and by late morning the sun broke through the clouds and the crowds swelled faster as the warm rays filled the sky with long processions snaking through the gate to the State House yard quickly filling the grounds out to the streets. Among the featured guest speakers to address the multitude of more than 25,000 Unionists was Gov. Andrew Johnson of Tennessee whose remarks were greeted with cheers and applause.
The ladies of Christ Church held a festival at Masonic Hall that was well attended. The funds made at the festival will be used to complete the finishing of the church sanctuary. Chaplain Locke visited churches in the city seeking clothing and other necessities for about 5,000 Negro “contrabands” that have sought refuge within the lines of Gen. Grant’s army.