rocky mountain civil war round table

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www.rockymtncivilwarrt.com/
Vol. 22
No. 10
October 10, 2013
FEATURE
PRESENTATION
The 8th Kentucky at Chattanooga
Union Relief of
Chattanooga
by
Chuck Wheeler
T
his month Chuck will talk on one of the most pivotal battles of
the war. The Battle of Chattanooga. The outcome of this battle
would have a ripple effect throughout the rest of the war. Talk
discusses Union goals in the West, opposing generals, actions off
Pres. Lincoln and Davis, events near Chattanooga in 1863.
Upcoming Presentations
October 10 - Union Relief
of Chattanooga by
Chuck Wheeler
Gettysburg Part 2 by
Michael Lang
November 14 - Chattanooga
by Matt Spruill
March 13, 2014 - The
Wilderness by Dave
Townsend
December 12 - Mine Run
by Ethan Rafuse
April 10, 2014 - TBA by
Paul Jeffery
January 9, 2014 - General May 8, 2014 - TBA
Vaughan by Larry
June 12, 2014 - TBA
Peterson
July 12, 2014 - TBA
February 13, 2014 Myths, Monuments,
and Memories of
As I write this the study group
members are either getting ready to
leave or have already left Denver to
rendezvous in Vicksburg on Thursday
morning for our first day of touring.
We finalized plans and itinerary at
Dave Townsend’s house.
We will
have a day of touring the area north,
west and south of Vicksburg; then a
day south, east and north again; and
finally the Battlefield Park with the
city of Vicksburg on Saturday. Let’s
hope the government cooperates so
that the Battlefield Park will be open,
or that we can at least hop the fence
to tour it.
By the time you read
this we will be on our way back and
ready for our next meeting!
President’s
Message
September started a three month
sequence of presentations on the
battles in the vicinity of Chattanooga,
1863.
Larry Peterson started us
off with the army of Bragg being
maneuvered south by Rosecrans but
culminating in his defeat and retreat
at Chickamauga.
This month we’ll
continue with Chuck Wheeler talking
about all the Union efforts to relieve
and support Rosecrans in Chattanooga.
Next month Matt Spruill will finish
with the Union breakout from
Chattanooga and routing of Bragg’s
army.
Thank you and I look forward
to seeing you all at our next meeting!
-Ned Grauel
This month the pre-sale of books by
our two authors will continue. If you
weren’t able to attend in September
for whatever reason, UT Press has
agreed to extend this special offer
through our October meeting. Summer
Lightning, A Guide to the Second
Battle of Manassas, by Matt Spruill
and Confederate Combat Commander,
the Remarkable Life of Brigadier
General Alfred Jefferson Vaughan, Jr.,
CSA, by Larry Peterson.
I will again bring ‘ballots’ upon
which you can express an opinion on
summer meetings. If you didn’t get
to express an opinion last month, you
can still do so this month. You can of
course also express an opinion to me
via email -nedgrauelyahoo.com or to
our Round Table email -gettysburgrockymtcivilwarrt.com.
2
On the morning of April 9th , 1865,
General Robert E. Lee was waxing
morosely to his staff and was quoted
as saying “How easily I could be
rid of this, and be at rest. I have
only to ride along the line and all
will be over.” He paused, and in
the next breath, put those fleeting
thoughts of suicide aside and spoke
of the people of the south, their
bleak prospects and the need to
help in their recovery.
Civil War Curiosities
by Nick Muller
Nick, a long-time member of
RMCWRT, has volunteered to do a
monthly piece for the newsletter. We
are grateful for his contribution...
The Order of the Heroes of
America was a
Southern peace
society active in North Carolina,
southwest Virginia, and eastern
Tennessee. The group protected
deserters, aided spies, helped
escaped prisoners and supplied Union
forces with intelligence
about the Confederate
Army. Two of its’ most
famous members were
U.S. Grant and Abraham
Lincoln.
Adley Gladden
was a well
recognized
and
distinguished
soldier
before the Civil War
began. More than a
decade before southern
states began seceding,
he had proven himself
a brave and resouceful
commander during the
U.S. Grant bought a
Mexican
War. Promoted
mulatto slave, William
in
September
of 1861
Jones, in 1858. Grant
to
Brigadier
General,
gave him his freedom
he
caught
the
eye of
the
following
year.
Braxton
Bragg
who
When Grant married
had
him
transferred
to
Julia Dent she had three
his
Second
Corps
of
the
slaves. Before the war
Army of the Mississippi
he had them returned
for purposes of leading
to her family.
General US Grant
his First Brigade, Second
Division. A bright future
beckoned. But it was not
Blockade running was
to be.
very profitable and very risky. One
General Gladden was killed in
source estimates that there were
the morning on April 6th , 1862 at
over 1,650 vessels involved in this
Shiloh. That same day, General
endeavor, at one time or another,
Albert
Sidney Johnson, commander
during the war. The Union net
of
the
Army of The MIssissippi,
caught one of every ten blockade
was
killed,
overshadowing other
runners in 1861, one of eight in
losses.
Though
thousands turned
1862, one of four in 1863, and one
out
for
Gladdens’
funeral in New
of every two in 1865.
Orleans, history rarely mentions
him, even in regard to the battle
in which he died.
3
to tell the story of the many people
born into Captain Hemings’ family.
I believe anyone interested in
American history and a story rarely
told about a mixed race family
through the late 18th and early 19th
century should enjoy this book.
-Paul Jeffery
The Hemings of Monticello
A review by Paul Jeffery
Annette Gordon Reed, tell a great
story about a little known American
family. Ms. Reed studied for a
degree in history at Dartmouth
and has a legal degree from
Harvard. She writes more like an
attorney than a historian. She has
research legal documents, letters
and newspaper accounts of Captain
Hemings’ family. Captain Hemings
a sea captain, failed in his attempt
to purchase his daughter Elizabeth
whose mother was African from
the Epp’s family of Virginia.
Elizabeth grew up to have a
large family with John Wayles,
T. Jefferson’s father in law. The
Hemings family became Jefferson’s
property through his marriage to
Martha Jefferson Wayles legal
daughter.
The story becomes interesting as
Jefferson trains the Hemings family
to become French chiefs, carpenters,
musicians, and metal workers. He
also takes Sally Hemming to be his
partner and the mother of seven of
his children.
The book is well documented and
reads quickly. We are fortunate
that Mr. Jefferson kept detail books
on his property and expenses. As
lawyer and public figure Jefferson
used the legal system and public
venues that good historians can use
to uncover detail about a person’s
life. MS Reed, uses many avenues
4
Hall’s Valley CO
150 Years Ago This Month
August 1863
...
As you drive southwest on Highway
285 toward Fairplay, Colorado, and just
before you ascend Kenosha Pass, you
might notice a dirt road on the right
that follows Geneva Creek
to the north into Hall’s Valley, one of
the smallest of the mining districts of
Park County.
The valley is named after Jarius William Hall. Hall first came to Colorado in
about 1868 as a banker in Georgetown.
After a couple of successful years, he
and his brother Cassius “Cash’ relocated to the valley, purchasing the Whale
mine and establishing the Hall Valley
Silver Lead Mining and Smelting Company. Jarius Hall died in 1903 at the
age of 63 in England.
But as Paul Harvey would like to say
‘now the rest of the story’. It was early
evening on July 2, 1863 south of Gettysburg, when out of the west tree line,
came the regiments of Confederate General Kershaw’s infantry. The 4th Michigan Volunteer Infantry, along with the
other regiments of Sweitzer’s small brigade, V Corps, Army of the Potomac
were ordered into the Wheatfield to
stem the tide of the Confederate assault. Major Darius Hall was a member
of this regiment which was commanded
by Colonel Harrison Jeffords. As the
Confederates poured into the Wheatfield Sweitzer ordered a fighting withdrawal of his brigade. Quickly it became a brutal hand-to-hand brawl and
the flag of the 4th Michigan was in
danger of being captured. Jeffords, Hall
and other staff members went to the
rescue. Jeffords received a mortal bayonet wound as Hall shot the offending
Rebel and the flag of the 4th Michigan
was saved. The brigade lost 420 men in
the Wheatfield of the thousand Jeffords
had commanded.
October 6- On this day in 1863, Confederate
guerilla leader William Clarke Quantrill
continues his bloody rampage through Kansas
when he attacks Baxter Springs. Although he
failed to capture the Union stronghold, his men
massacred a Federal detachment that happened
to be traveling nearby.
Some of the bloodiest chapters of the Civil
War were written in Kansas and Missouri,
where irregular combatants fought. In August
1863, Quantrill and 450 Confederate partisans
sacked the abolitionist town of Lawrence,
Kansas. They murdered 150 men and set the
town on fire before escaping the pursuing
Union cavalry. After destroying Lawrence,
Quantrill and his men noticed that the area
around northwestern Missouri and northeastern
Kansas was becoming more crowded with
Yankee troops. Quantrill started to drift
south, intent on wintering within the friendly
confines of Confederate Texas.
On October 6, Quantrill and his men happened
upon a Federal post at Baxter Springs, near
the Missouri and Indiana Territory borders.
Defending the post were parts of the 3rd
Wisconsin Cavalry and the 2nd Kansas
Colored Infantry. Quantrill attacked suddenly,
surprising the Yankees, who suffered heavy
casualties before barricading themselves
inside the earth-and-timber fortress. While
Quantrill’s men debated the merits of another
attack on the post, a Union force appeared
from the north. It was General James G. Blunt,
commander of the forces in Kansas, who was
in the process of moving his headquarters from
Fort Scott, Kansas, to Fort Smith, Arkansas.
Blunt spotted Quantrill’s men but mistook them
for Union troops because many were dressed in
captured Yankee uniforms. A large portion of
Blunt’s 100 men were clerks and office staffers.
Quantrill attacked, and the scene turned into a
massacre. The Yankees quickly scattered, and
Quantrill’s partisans hunted them down.
Ian Duncanson
5
group of Redditors from
looking to change the past.
On the Colorized History
Subreddit, Redditors use
photo manipulation to add
color to historical black
and white images.
The
Knapsack
Amazing American
Civil War Photos
Turned Into Glorious
Color
Color
photography
may
not have been invented
until the 1930s but that
hasn’t stopped an active
Two of the most prolific
users, Mads Dahl Madsen
and
Jordan
J.
Lloyd
(who has since started
Dynachrome,
a
digital
image restoration agency,
have done United States
Archival Newsletters
2005
2009
2006
2010
2007
2011
About the Round Table
2008
2012
2013
he Rocky Mountain Civil War Round Table (RMCWRT)
T
is a Colorado-based group of Civil War enthusiasts
that met for the first time in 1991. Our membership
represents a variety of backgrounds including
published Civil War authors, scholars, battlefield
tour guides, librarians, lawyers, doctors, active
participants in Civil War Trust, and casual hobbyists.
New members and guests of all interests are welcome.
Annual dues of $20 confer full membership privileges
including the monthly newsletter.
Monthly Meetings
embers and guests begin gathering at 6:00 PM the
M
second Thursday of each month at 6375 South Platte
Canyon Road in Littleton (Columbine United Church) for
Christensen Ln.
Columbine United Church
6375 S. Platte Canyon Rd.
President,
Treasurer,
S. Santa Fe Dr.
S. Lowell Blvd.
W. Bowles Ave.
Points of Contact
Ned Grauel
Renee Powers
Newsletter
Mike Lang
Dave Armagast
Ian Duncanson
S. Platte Canyon Rd.
Wadsworth Blvd.
dinner (B.Y.O.) and discussion about the “War Between
the States.” Buy plenty of tickets as Ian is sure to have
some great books for this month’s meeting. Everyone
present will receive one free ticket with additional
tickets available at 5 for $1.00. The drawing follows
the new business portion of the meeting which begins
promptly at 7:00 PM. All are welcome!
N
history a favor by taking
a large amount of the Civil
War photographs available
at the Library of Congress
and turning them into
realistic
and
beautiful
looking color.
6
303-694-6369
303-585-1948
Email/Website/Photography
gettysburg@ rockymtncivilwarrt.com
www.RockyMtnCivilWarRT.com
http://www.flickr.com/groups/rmcwrt/