The Bay State Monthly. Volume 2, No. 6, March, 1885

2nd. Letter of Lieutenant Colonel Ross, A.D.C. to General Wallace, January 25, 1868.

3rd. Letter of General J.A. Strickland to General Wallace, January 24, 1868.

4th. Letter of General G.F. McGinnis to General Wallace, February 20, 1868.

5th. Letter of General Fred. Knefler to General Wallace, February 19, 1868.

6th. Letter of Captain Ad Ware, A.D.C., to General Wallace (without date).

7th. Letter of General John M. Thayer to General Wallace, March 4, 1868.

8th. Letter of General U.S. Grant to General Wallace, March 10, 1868, commenting upon the letters cited and suggesting their publication, in justice to General Wallace.

The map of the Compte de Paris has been utilized. 1, 2 and 3 give location of Wallace's Brigades in line, perpendicular to the river, with right at Adamsville (3), 2. Concentration of Division. 4. Crossing at Snake creek to take the right of General Sherman. 4-5. Countermarch to lower crossing after retirement of the right. 6. Lower crossing which had for several days previously been under water. Wallace's division, on the 7th, held the right of Sherman, as indicated for the 6th, when he moved to take part in the general action.

General Wallace to General Grant:

WASHINGTON CITY, Feb. 29, 1868.

GENERAL:

About a year after the battle of Pittsburg Landing, it came to my knowledge, that I was suffering, in your opinion, from erroneous information upon the subject of my conduct and movements as commander of the Third Division of your army during the first day of the battle named. To place myself right in your estimation and in that of the army generally, I asked a Court of Inquiry, by letter to the Secretary of War (Mr. Stanton) July 17, 1863. After several months, during which the application received no attention from the Secretary, I withdrew it, by advice of friends, General Sherman amongst others. The course I then resolved upon, that counselled by General Sherman, was to carry my explanation directly to you; and such continued my intention until the battle of Monocacy, after which your treatment of me became so uniformly kind and considerate that I was led to believe the disagreement, connected with Pittsburg Landing, forgotten; a result, to which I tacitly assented, notwithstanding the record of that battle as you had made it, in the form of an endorsement on my official report, was grievously against me.

A recent circumstance, however, has made it essential to my good name, which I cannot bring myself to believe you wish to see destroyed, to go back to my former purpose; in pursuance of which, the object of this letter is simply to introduce certain statements of gentlemen lately in the army, your friends as much as mine, in hopes that the explanations to be found therein will be sufficent to authorize you to give me a note of acquittal from blame, plainly enough, to allay the suspicions and charges to which I have been so painfully subjected. The statements are in the form of extracts pertinent to the subject from letters now in my possession, from General Fred Knefler, General George McGinnis, Colonel James R. Ross, General Daniel MacCaulay, Captain Ad Ware, General John A. Strickland, General John M. Thayer, now United States Senator from Nebraska—all, of my command, on the day in question, present with me, well known to you, and of unimpeachable honor. I could have obtained many others, of like import, but selected these because their authors had peculiar opportunities for information upon points considered of chief importance. It is possible that my explanations of the matter would be sufficient for the purpose in view. However that may be, it is my judgment now, that the charges against me have gone so far, and been put in such grave form, that public opinion may require an exoneration, though it come from your hand, to be based upon the testimony of others.

Permit me to say, further, that as to the order you started to me by Captain Baxter, I do not understand there is any question of veracity between us. You tell me, that from the battle-field you dispatched a verbal order by the officer named, to be delivered to me, at Crump's Landing, directing me to march my division to Pittsburg Landing by the road, parallel with the river; and, supposing, as you did, that the order would reach me by 11 o'clock, A.M., you reasonably concluded my command would be on the field by 1 o'clock, P.M.

Now in all candor, if you have been, as I am informed, of opinion that I received that order as it was given, and at the time stated (11 o'clock, A.M.), and that for any reason, such as personal feeling against you, or that I lost my way, or took the wrong road, or lingered on the march, making but five miles in seven hours, it must be admitted that you were justifiable in any, even the most extreme judgment against me; and I must confess that your moderation was greater than mine would likely have been, had our positions been reversed. I do not flinch from that conclusion, at all; but what I do say in my defence is that the opinion and the conclusion, which is its corollary, are both wrong, because the order admitted to have been dispatched was not delivered to me, in form or substance, as dispatched. On the contrary, the order I received from your messenger was in writing, unsigned, and contained substantially the following instructions:

"You will leave a force at Crump's Landing, sufficient to guard the public property there; then march the rest of your division, and effect a junction with the right of the army; after which you will form your line of battle at right angles with the river, and act as circumstances dictate."

This order was read by Colonel Ross, under circumstances well calculated to impress it upon his memory. It was also given to Colonel Knefler, then my Adjutant General, and by him read and unfortunately lost. Finally, its purport, as stated by me above, is vouched for by Captain Ware as the aide de camp. To refuse credit to my version of its contents will be very hard, indeed, corroborated as it is by so many gentlemen of unquestionable veracity, and such excellent opportunity for information on the point.

I think myself warranted now in asserting upon the credit of the three officers just named, as well as my own, that by the terms of the order, as it was delivered to me, the object of my march was not Pittsburg Landing, as you intended, but the right of the army, resting, when the battle opened in the morning, at a point quite three miles out from the landing, on the road to Purdy.

As a general principle it must be admitted that when you entrusted the order to a proper messenger for delivery to me, your responsibility ceased; but, I turn and ask you, appealing to your experience and justice, how am I held responsible for the execution of an order if it never reached me; or, if it reached me, conveying an idea radically different from that originally given? Of necessity, I was accountable for the execution of the order, only as it was received, and if it was not received in a form to convey your true design, but was promptly executed, neither of us are responsible for the result. It was not your mistake, nor was it mine.

Having established the purport, at least, of the order as it came to my hand, the next inquiry is: "Did I proceed to execute it, and how?"

On these heads all the letters on file are applicable. They show, as I think, that I took measures anticipatory to the order you gave me, personally, in your passage up the river to the battle-field, viz: to hold myself in readiness to march in any direction; that my brigades were ordered to concentrate at the place most proper and convenient for a prompt execution of the orders, whatever they might be, because it was at the junction of two roads, one leading to Pittsburg Landing, the other to the right of the army. To one of these points, it may be added, I was sure of being ultimately sent, if the exigencies of the battle required the presence of my command. They show, that after you parted from me, going up the river, I took measures to forward your messenger to me instantly upon his arrival (see Colonel Ross' letters), then rode to the place of concentration, and waited impatiently and anxiously the expected instructions; that they came to hand about 12 o'clock (my own remembrance is 11:30 A.M.), and that the officer who brought them, also brought the news that you were driving the enemy all along the line. (See letters of General Knefler and Colonel Ross.) Up to that time, therefore, I was certainly blameless.

But let me ask you to stop here, and consider the effect on my mind and subsequent movements, of the information, thus reliably obtained, that the battle was won. What inducement could I have had to march away from or linger on the road to a victory? Upon the hypothesis that the good news was true, how could I have imagined, (had there been so much as a doubt as to the intent of the order received,) a necessity for my command at Pittsburg Landing?

But, proceeding. The letters further establish, that, immediately upon receiving the order, I put my column en route, to execute it.

Now comes the questions. Did I take the right road to effect the junction with the right of the army, or one leading to Purdy, away from the battle? Pertinent to these inquiries, General Knefler says, that the road chosen for the movement had been patrolled and picketted by my cavalry. By their report, if by nothing else, I must have been posted as to its terminus. In corroboration of this assertion please notice that General Macaulay, General Strickland, General Thayer and General Knefler, all allude to the fact that the head of the column was approaching, not going away from the firing, when the countermarch took place. Consider, further, that the most imperative necessities of my situation, isolated as I had been from the main army, were, to know all the communications with that army, and to keep them clear, and in order for rapid movement. Not only did I know the road, but every step my division took from the initial point of the march up to the moment of the change of direction, was, as is well known to every soldier in the column, a step nearer to the firing and therefore a step nearer to the battle. While on this inquiry, let me add that the report of my being set right after marching upon the wrong road has in it this much truth, and no more. When about a mile from the position which had been occupied by the right of the army (General Sherman's division), Captain Rowley overtook me and told me that you had sent him to hurry me up, and that our lines had been carried by the enemy and the army driven back almost to the river, a very different story from the one brought me by Captain Baxter. Captain Rowley set me right as to the conditions of the battle, not as to the road I was following. Colonel McPherson and Major Rawlins, the other members of your staff, mentioned as having been sent to me, met me after the countermarch, when my command was on the river road moving to Pittsburg Landing.

Concerning the countermarch, I would remark that the condition of the battle, as reported by Captain Rowley, made it prudent, if not necessary. My column was only five thousand men, of all arms. Reflecting upon it now, I am still of the opinion that it did better service the next day in your new line of battle, than it could have done, operating alone and unsupported in the rear of the whole rebel army, where I was certainly taking it, when "set right" by the captain.

Instead of making the change of direction, when it was resolved on, by a countermarch, the result proved that it should have been effected by a general right about. The former manoeuvre was chosen, however, because I was confident of finding a cross road to the river road long before the head of the column doubled upon its foot. [See Colonel Ross' statement of the effort made to accomplish that idea.]

One of the results I confidently anticipated from a reading of the letter submitted, is, that you will be satisfied of the wrong done me (unintentional, I believe), by Colonel Badeau, when, in his book, he describes me as consuming seven hours in marching five miles in the direction of the battle. The march actually performed in that time was not less than fifteen miles, over an execrable dirt road.

Your opinion, as advanced in your letter to the War Office, July, 13, 1863, that General Morgan L. Smith, had he been put in command, could have had the division in the battle by 1 o'clock P.M., is in direct terms, based upon the condition that General Smith received your orders as you supposed them communicated to me. But, suppose he had not received the order as originally given; suppose, on the contrary, the order actually received by him had the effect to send him in another direction from Pittsburg Landing; and suppose that, on approaching his objective, he had found himself in the rear of the whole rebel army, and in his judgment compelled, by that circumstance, together with the bad fortune of our own army, to a further movement of quite ten miles—all of which were terrible realities in my case—I am sure you are too just a man to have held him accountable for the hours, however precious, thus necessarily lost.

With these remarks I place the letters of the officers named in your hands. They will satisfy you, I think, that the exoneration I seek will be a simple act of justice. The many misconceptions which have been attached to my movements on that bloody Sunday, have, it must be confessed, made me extremely sensitive upon the subject. You can imagine, therefore, with what anxiety your reply will be waited.

    Very respectfully your friend,
    LEW WALLACE.
    To GENERAL U.S. GRANT, WASHINGTON CITY.

Colonel Ross to General Wallace:

CHICAGO, January, 25, 1868.

General: Having read the extract from "Badeau's Life of General Grant," as published in the Chicago Tribune, of the twenty-fifth of December, 1867, wherein he refers particularly to the battle of Shiloh, and seeing the gross injustice done you, and the false light in which you are placed before the country and the world, I deem it my duty to make a brief statement of what I know to be the facts in reference to your failure to reach the field of battle in time to take part in the action of Sunday, April 6, 1862.

I will first state the position of your command on that morning. The First Brigade, Colonel M.L. Smith commanding, at Crump's Landing; Second Brigade, Colonel John M. Thayer commanding, two and one-half miles out on the Adamsville road; Third Brigade, Colonel Charles R. Wood commanding, at Adamsville, five miles out from the river. The first intimation you or any of your staff had of the battle was between five and six o'clock, A.M., when my attention was called by one of the men on the boat on which were your headquarters, to the heavy and continued firing in the direction of the camp at Pittsburg Landing. You were at once notified of this, and being satisfied that there was a battle going on, directed me to go at once and order this division to get ready to move at a moment's warning, and to instruct Colonel Wood to move his baggage and camp equipage to the river with the least possible delay, and march his command to the camp of the Second Brigade, midway between his (then) camp and that of the First Brigade, at the river.

After executing your order, as above, I returned to the Landing. Soon after, you, together with your staff, went out to the camp of the second Brigade, when the division had been ordered to concentrate in order to be in position to take either one of two roads, intersecting the Adamsville road from Crump's Landing to Pittsburg Landing; one leading to Pittsburg Landing, the other to the Purdy road from Pittsburg Landing, intersecting it at a point not far from the right of our army under General Sherman, as it was encamped when the battle began.

Before starting for Colonel Thayer's camp, orders were given by you to Captain Lyman, A.Q.M., on your staff, for a horse to be saddled and kept in readiness, in case a messenger should come down the river with orders from General Grant to you.

Now for the order. Badeau says that a staff officer was dispatched to General Wallace with verbal orders for him to march by the nearest road parallel with the river. The order may have been given verbally by General Grant to his staff officer, but was not so delivered to you, nor did it direct you to march by the nearest road parallel with the river. At about 11 o'clock, A.M., while at the camp of Colonel Thayer, I was directed by you to go to Colonel M.L. Smith. I met Captain Baxter, A.Q.M., who stopped me and handed me a paper saying, "I wish you would take this to General Wallace." I took the paper, read it and returned it to him, saying, I could not do so, as I was on my way under orders from General Wallace. At the same time I turned in my saddle, and pointed out a group of horsemen, telling the Captain that you were among them. I went to Colonel Smith, delivered my orders, and returning, met the Captain again. I very distinctly remember that this order directed you to move forward and join General Sherman's right on the Purdy road and form your line of battle at right angles with the river; and then act as circumstances would dictate. Now the shortest possible route by which you could reach the point designated in the order was the one taken, viz: that one leading from Colonel Thayer's camp (on the Adamsville road from Crump's Landing), to the Purdy road (from Pittsburg Landing), a distance of about five miles; whereas the distance to the point to which you was to march as designated in the order, via Pittsburg Landing, would have been at least twelve miles. Perhaps I should here state that this order was not signed by any one, but coming as it did through one of the Staff Officers of the Commanding General, could not be questioned. I would also state in this connection, that when I met Captain Baxter first, I asked him how things were going. He replied that Grant was driving the enemy at all points. Had this been the case, the order as delivered by Captain Baxter would have been all right, as we could then have joined General Sherman as directed therein. Within ten minutes after the receipt of the order, the troops were on the road.

When we were about one mile from where we expected to join General Sherman, we were overtaken by a messenger from General Grant, Captain (since Colonel) Rowley, I believe, who informed you that our troops had been defeated all along the line, and driven back, till the right was within half a mile of the river, and that the road we were on, would, if followed up, lead us into the rear of the enemy. This being the case, it became necessary to find some other way to form a junction with the army. In order to do so, every mounted man attached to your Head-Quarters was dispatched to find, if possible, some way to get round the enemys' left without going back to the starting point, or to find some resident to guide us by the nearest possible route. Finally a man was found who was compelled to act as guide. Nevertheless the march was continued as rapidly as possible, until we joined the right of the army, just after dark, in the position in which it lay when the battle closed for the day. Badeau also says: "General Wallace was set right by Captain (afterwards Colonel) Rowley, and Colonel (afterwards Major General) McPherson, both at the time upon General Grant's staff; that they set him right at 1 o'clock, and it took him till seven to march five miles." It was near 1 o'clock when we were overtaken by Rowley, but instead of having but five miles to march, the distance could not have been less than eleven or twelve miles. The first seen of General McPherson was when we were met by him and General Rawlins, just as the head of the column had reached the river road (from Crump's Landing to Pittsburg Landing) who had come out to urge you to greater haste. We had to march over the worst road I ever remember to have seen. In many places it was almost impossible to get artillery through. In my judgment the entire distance marched by your command could not have been less than sixteen or seventeen miles.

The above, General, are the facts relative to the movements of your command on the day referred to, which fell under my personal observation. I am, General, very respectively, your obedient servant,

    JAMES R. ROSS,
    Late Brev. Lieut. Col. Major. A.D.C.
    To MAJOR GENERAL LEW WALLACE
    CRAWFORDSVILLE, Indiana.

General Strickland to General Wallace:

HEADQUARTERS FIFTIETH REGIMENT, O.V.I. }

BIG RUN TRESTLE, Ky., June 24, 1863. }

CAPTAIN J.R. Ross, for MAJOR GENERAL LEW WALLACE:

DEAR SIR: In answer to your question as to my recollection of the circumstances and time of the moving of Major General Lew Wallace's command to the battle of Shiloh on the sixth of April, 1862, I will submit the following statement:

I was Acting Adjutant General for Colonel John M. Thayer (now Brigadier General Thayer), he (Colonel Thayer) being in command of the Second Brigade, General Lew Wallace's Division. On the morning of the sixth of April (Sunday), 1862, the Brigade commanded by Colonel Thayer, stationed at "Stony Lonesome," was in readiness to march at daylight, or before. We were waiting for orders to move, when Major General Lew Wallace and staff rode to the headquarters of the brigade, I think between the hours of 8 and 9 o'clock; it may have been earlier. General Wallace ordered everything in readiness to move at a moment's notice. I received the orders directly from General Wallace. I assured him that the brigade, upon previous orders from himself and Colonel Thayer, was ready to move, but went again, in person, by order of Colonel Thayer, and notified Commanders of Regiments, Batteries, etc., to be ready at the call from Colonel Thayer's headquarters, to move. I heard General Wallace addressing himself to Lieutenant Colonel McCord, commanding the First Nebraska Regiment, to say, that he had received no orders to move and that he was waiting for orders frown General Grant's headquarters to move. I heard General Wallace request one of his staff to watch the road to Crump's Landing for a messenger with orders.

At half past 11 A.M. (it might have been fifteen minutes to 12) a person rode up to General Wallace with orders to move. I was standing by General Wallace at the time. The Brigade commanded by Colonel Thayer was in motion in just ten minutes after the order was received. I am particular about this, because Colonel Sanbourn, of the Twenty-first Indiana Regiment, and other officers of the Brigade, talked over the matter in the morning. After the order was received we moved off rapidly.

After we had marched some distance, and were getting nearer to the sound of musketry continually, we were met, I think, by Major Rawlins, Assistant Adjutant General of General Grant, and our direction changed. From my knowledge of the country, after the battle of Monday, I am satisfied that, if we had not changed our direction when we did, we would have gone in behind the left of the rebel army. After the direction of the column was changed, I was ordered by Colonel Thayer to go to the foot of the column, for what purpose I cannot now recollect. I think it was at the instance of General Wallace, to change direction on a shorter route of Wood's brigade, and when going from the foot of the column to the head, to report to my commanding officer, Colonel Thayer. I remember noticing all three of the Brigades in close column, marching rapidly forward. Just at dusk we arrived at the valley of a small stream, where the mud was very deep. We met an orderly, there, from the battle-field, who said we could reach General Grant's forces by making great haste, as Berdan's Sharp-shooters were holding the road by which we were to enter. The column was hurried forward as fast as it was possible for it to move. We arrived a little after dark, on the right of General Grant's forces, but a few yards in front of the enemy.