"We Would Stand with Anyone, If Properly Taken In": The 79th Pa at Chickamauga, Part I

Battle of Chickamauga, Morning of Sept. 19, 1863 (Source)
The 79th Pa belonged to Baird's Division.

During the Battle of Chickamauga on September 19-20, 1863, the Lancaster County Regiment fought a battle in which it incurred significant casualties for the second time.  Although the 79th Pa's casualty total compared to that of Perryville, the regiment experienced battle in a dramatically different way at Chickamauaga.  While at Perryville the regiment stood its ground on an open hillside for an entire afternoon against repeated Confederate attacks, Chickamauga was defined by chaos, confusion, and dense woods.

The campaign that culminated in the Battle of Chickamauga began at the end of August as Gen. William S. Rosecrans' Army of the Cumberland -- spurred on by Washington -- crossed the Tennessee River and ventured towards Georgia.  Mountainous terrain presented significant logistical challenges, and it would be much more difficult to get supplies now that the army's supply pipeline from Nashville was restricted.  Just after noon on September 12, the regiment reached the summit of the Lookout Mountain range as it passed through Stevens Gap.  While the 79th Pa was enjoying majestic vistas, Gen. Rosecrans realized that his army was scattered, split by the mountain range, and vulnerable to a counterattack.  He set out to concentrate his army and withdraw northward through a valley to Chattanooga, Tennessee.

September 19, Late Morning

Brig. Gen. J. C. Starkweather
(Source)

The Battle of Chickamauga began in earnest on the morning of September 19 when Gen. George H. Thomas, commander of the Fourteenth Corps (which included the the 79th Pa) dispatched one of his divisions to attack a Confederate brigade rumored to be trapped on the west side of the Chickamauga Creek.  A fight escalated as combatants requested reinforcements and both sides committed more men to the fight. The second division that Gen. Thomas committed was Brig. Gen. Absalom Baird's, which included the 79th Pennsylvania (in a brigade commanded by Brig. Gen. John C. Starkweather).  Starkweather's brigade advanced behind two other of Baird's brigades.  Although listed as having an effective strength of 424 men and 21 officers, around 350 men were present with the regiment on September 19 to go into battle.  Starkweather's brigade moved in support of Baird's other brigades until Gen. Thomas ordered him to move to the left to relieve a brigade in another division.

While advancing through dense woods towards the fight that was supposed to be to the east, Confederates marching northward slammed into Starkweather's brigade just north of the intersection of Brotherton and Alexander's Bridge Roads.  Starkweather tried to wheel right and form a semicircle to confront the enemy.  As the front right regiment on the advance, the 79th Pennsylvania bore the brunt of the attack.  The recently promoted Capt. William S. McCaskey -- who led Companies A and B as skirmishers -- recounted, "We had not moved far, before we were completely flanked, and surprised.  I had charge of the skirmishers, but had not gotten them into position before they received a murderous fire from the enemy."  McCaskey tried to rally the skirmishers, but the rest of the line withered, unable to do anything about the Confederates firing on their right flank.  Starkweather's adjutant-general, Lieut. Charles Searles, was shot in the breast and fell from his horse.  The Union soldiers got off at most three or four shots and fled to the rear.  The Confederates did not advance far, though, as they were struck in their flank and rear by adjacent Union brigades.  

Capt. William S. McCaskey
(Richard Abel Collection)

In these brief disastrous moments, the regiment took most of its casualties during the battle (according to McCaskey).  Captain Louis Heidegger of Company F fell mortally wounded.  Captain Abraham Godshalk of Company H was wounded in the leg, which was soon amputated.  Lieuts. James Benson and Charles Madden were both wounded.  From a historian's perspective, it is sad to note that this action silenced the pen of the regiment's active and articulate soldier-correspondent, Corp. Elias H. Witmer.  Witmer was wounded in the thigh and left behind as the regiment hastily retreated, never to be heard from again.  Others left on the field would later be retrieved, including Cyrus Tool and Corp. Charles W. Wiley of Company B.

Eventually, the pace of the retreat slowed as the 79th Pennsylvania gained some distance from the spot of the their rout.  Lieut. John M. Johnston, in command of Company G (which served as the color company) recalled, "Our pace slackens.  I keep near the colors, and try to gather the stragglers around them; but my heart's in my mouth.  I feel more like crying than anything else."  Gen. Starkweather began to regain control of his brigade.  Johnston continued, "

But now Starkweather's stentorian voice is heard trying to rally the men.  He orders the colors to halt and face to the front.  I spring to the side of the boy who is carrying the striped flag and face him about, calling on Adjutant [Lyman] Bodie to stop the bearer of the blue flag who is still further to the rear.  But the blue flag still goes to the rear, till Starkweather dashes forward with an oath and drawn sword and orders the color bearer back into line.  And now a reorganization of the regiment rapidly commences. 

Note: See the Chickamauga section of the "Battle Files" page for sources.  Also, see the Civil War Preservation Trust's map of the morning fight for another visual resource. 

'Finally Arrived at Louisville'

Buell's Army Enters Louisville (HW 10/18/1862)

As the sun rose on September 26, 1862, the Lancaster County Regiment marched into the city that one year previous had welcomed the regiment to the war's western theater. Part race, part retreat, Gen. Buell's Army of the Ohio succeeded in beating the Confederate army to Louisville.  Although tired and hungry from the preceding weeks' forced marches and restricted rations, the Lancasterians felt relieved to finally be part of the main body of the Army of the Ohio, instead of detached duty like they had essentially been performing since March or April.

Hospital Steward John B. Chamberlain recounted the regiment's recent activity in a letter published in the October 1, 1862, Daily Inquirer (see full text here):

Since my last letter (link) the 79th has seen rough but active service.  Two weeks ago we received orders to move, and from that time to the present we have literally obeyed orders, and tramped over "the dark and bloody ground" after Secesh until we finally arrived at Louisville, and, as usual in our case, found that the enemy was not "thar."  When we started on the march the men were but poorly furnished with rations, the great bulk of the provisions being aboard the wagon train, and after one day's march the teams were so far in the rear that it was utterly impossible for them to catch up with the regiment, which was with the main body of the army.  The Quartermaster, however, did the best he could under existing circumstances; full rations of flour were issued to the regiment instead of crackers.  The entire ingenuity of the regiment was fully taxed to promptly improvise an article of food from flour and water; and many were the means resorted to, and odd contrivances employed, for baking.  Some wound the unleavened dough around sticks, others heated stones and some laid it upon boards--all aiming to make something eatable out of the most uneatable, unpalatable article ever compounded for human digestion.  

Daily Evening Express correspondent Elias H. Witmer positively reviewed the regiments efforts, pronouncing, "The Lancaster county female cooks are knocked in the shade...The bread which these ovens turn out is christened 'Buell's slab-jacks' and 'bullet-proof doughnuts.'" [10/1/1862]

As satisfied as the Lancasterians felt with their own culinary abilities, they felt distressed about the state of the Army of the Ohio, to which they belonged.  Witmer and Chamberlain both lamented that the regiment had not the opportunity to fight on the banks of the Potomac.  Frustration began to build with Don Carlos Buell as much ground gained over the past year had been lost.  Comparing the situation in late September 1862 to that of earlier in the year, Chamberlain wrote

How different are the prospects now, from what they then appeared to us.  Then we were on the aggressive, and in a few short months Donelson, Henry and Shiloah shed lustre on our victorious arms.  Now we are on the defensive, and accumulated ruin and disaster has continually attended our every effort, since the inauguration of the "masterly inactivity policy" by the Commander-in-Chief of this department.  

 As September drew to a close, the situation deteriorated almost comically (and definitely tragically), as various factions within the army led to confrontations.  One general murdered another.  Washington relieved Buell of command and then rescinded the order.  Tens of thousands of green troops were absorbed into the army.  Yet, somehow, on October 1, Don Carlos Buell led an army out of Louisville to take the offensive and confront the Confederate army.   

A Fourth of July Barbacue with the 79th Pa and the People of Shelbyville, Tenn

Union Soldiers in Shelbyville, Tennessee
(Harper's Weekly October 18, 1862)

After their expedition to Chattanooga in early June 1862 and a couple weeks of rest afterwards, the next excitement in the annals of the 79th Pennsylvania was an Independence Day celebration hosted by the citizens of Shelbyville, Tennessee.  Hon. Edmund Cooper was the orator of the day, which also featured cannon salutes, a sword presentation to Capt. Michael Locher of Company H, and a feast thrown by the citizens for Union soldiers in the region.  Soldiers commented with a spirit of thanksgiving that there more ladies present than they had seen in a very long time.

Stuart A. Wylie
Editor, Inquirer
(Source: Ellis and Evans)

The food--corn bread, pork, and mutton alternately described as a "barbacue" and a "basket dinner"--was appreciated by the soldiers, even if it didn't quite live up to Lancaster County standards.  William T. Clark wrote in his diary, "There was plenty to eat but it was evident they did not understand getting up such dinner in the manner they do in Pennsylvania."  Elias Witmer unenthusiastically described the dinner in a Daily Evening Express letter "to show the Lancaster county people, who have every luxury at their command, how some of the rest of mankind live."

The day's events were recorded in a letter from Hospital Steward John B. Chamberlain published in a new outlet for news in Lancaster.  The Lancaster Inquirer under the editorial direction of Stuart A. Wylie began a daily version, the Daily Inquirer, in early July 1862, just in time to publish interesting news from the Seven Days Battles which must have been eagerly consumed by the people of Lancaster.  It would be Lancaster's second daily paper and would last for two years.  I believe most of the first year is accessible on microfilm, and it will be an invaluable source of information about the 79th Pennsylvania in late 1862 and early 1863. 

From the July 12, 1862, Daily Inquirer: (alternate link)

The Attack on Chattanooga, June 7, 1862

Map of Road from Jasper to Chattanooga (on the right edge of the map)
Detail of Map by N. Michler, 1862 (Library of Congress)

From Sweeden's Cove to Chattanooga

After a perfectly executed surprise attack on Confederate cavalrymen at Sweeden's Cove on June 4, 1862, the 79th Pennsylvania and other units in Gen. Negley's command continued east towards the critically important city of Chattanooga.  They arrived in the town of Jasper, Tennessee, on June 5 where the collected prisoners from the battle the day before and stared up at the mountains before them.

Almost every account from the 79th Pennsylvania mentions hordes of Unionist refugees living under pieces of canvas in the mountains and swamps.  In his diary entry for June 6, Sgt. William T. Clark (bio) remarked

We passed through some pretty good country, the people showering blessing upon us. One woman gave a Cavalry man a flag with the inscription the Union & Constitution & Remember Washington. In another place we saw a family who had been driven from home because their son would not enlist in the rebel service. They were in a swamp with nothing but a piece of canvas to protect them from the weather. She said she hoped that God might bless us & our Cause. We caught seventeen prisoners. This is the most loyal part of the country we have been in yet.

In a letter to his wife on June 14, Pvt. Lewis Jones (bio) echoed Clark

when we got over the Cumberland mountins in to Eastern Tennssee ther was the firs union men I saw the first Union men I saw for months when they hear that we wer a coming a long they com out of the mountins  I saw one old man com to me and asked a bout his sons that had wen of in the night to Kentucky to join the union armey and he had bin liven in th ewood for weeks a frad to go to his sons  I saw women and childer a living in the oods that had bin run out of town on acont of ther sones a beaing in the union armey

The First Battle of Chattanooga

Sketch of Chattanooga (Source)

On June 7, the 79th Pennsylvania left its lofty bivouac early in the morning and began to descend the mountains to Chattanooga--scenery that Clark called "beautiful in the extreme."  Colonel Hambright's makeshift brigade arrived at the Tennessee River shortly after noon, and ascended a hill that commanded Chattanooga from the opposite side of the river.

As Hambright sent skirmishers forward to the river bank, Confederate infantry and artillery entrenched about 400 yards away on the city-side of the river opened fire and prepared to dispute any crossing.  The two artillery sections (four guns total) attached to Hambright's command replied very effectively.  (Note: the alleged first shot has been preserved and is now in a private collection.)  The cannonading and sharpshooting continued five hours until the Confederate guns became silent, although actual losses are hard to ascertain from official reports. [Link: Hambright's Official Report]

One 79th Pennsylvania soldier on the firing line was Pvt. James Fields of Company A, whose letter to his father was printed in the July 5, 1862, Weekly Mariettian.

In the morning...we continued our march over the mountain chain, toward the great city of Chattanooga at the foot of the great Cumberland mountain, where the rebels were laying with the city well fortified and entrenched with rifle pits and in readiness for us--but all this was of no avail, for we knocked theam into a three-cocked hat when we came.  We planted six cannon pointing right into the rifle pits and then we got reinforcements of the Ohio 5th, of four cannons, making ten pieces, which enabled us to give them brisk work.  The Colonel then employed skirmishers to go down to the river's edge to shoot them from the rifle pits while the cannon would fire on their entrenchments.  I was one of the number to skirmish, and we fired at them all afternoon while the cannon blazed away at them until their guns were disabled.  We could see them all afternoon carrying out their dead, and at sundown they ceased firing and evacuated the place, which we soon took possession of.      

View of Tennessee River
from Lookout Mountain
(Library of Congress)

The Union artillery reopened fire the next day but failed to solicit a response.  By afternoon, Negley declared his mission a success and started to make the return trip back over the mountains.  Remaining in Chattanooga would have meant vulnerability to attack and a very precarious supply chain (that would cause problems in October 1863 for the Union army) which Negley seemed to have no interest in testing.

Casualties on both sides are difficult to verify, but the 79th Pennsylvania did have one man wounded--the first battle casualty of the war for the regiment.  Pvt. Joshua Geiter of Company A was wounded in the arm, although he returned to the regiment, dying in the Battle of Chickamauga in September 1863.  Geiter also was the son in the only father-son combination that I know about in the regiment.  His father Henry, a printer by trade who wrote to the Lancaster Intelligencer later in the war, served the entire war in Company I.

Strategically, although Union forces did not end up taking possession of Chattanooga, they accomplished their goal of attracting Confederate attention and proving that a division-sized force could hop over the mountain range and strike quickly against the city.   The battle is credited with causing Confederate troop redeployment that allowed Union forces to capture the Cumberland Gap eleven days later.

The expedition with its heavy marching, tall mountains, cool streams, excited Unionists, and lopsided battles certainly made a positive impression on the men of the Lancaster County Regiment.  Elias Witmer (bio) counted marching three hundred miles over fifteen days (read his letter here), and claimed the title of the most active marchers in all the Union army during that time.  Pvt. Lewis Jones gave the best review, though, "I woul not mist the trip for fifty dollars."

(If anyone has assembled a more complete picture of the battle, please let me know.  Some of the details presented above regarding casualties, Confederate movements, other Union infantry, etc., are incomplete.)

The Battle of Sweeden's Cove, June 4, 1862

Map of Sweeden's Cove
Detail of Map by N. Michler, 1862 (Library of Congress)

The 79th Pennsylvania's very first engagement--on June 4, 1862, at Sweeden's Cove near Jasper, Tennessee--also happened to be perhaps its most tactically interesting and superbly executed mission of the entire war.  On May 28, the 79th Pennsylvania and other infantry, cavalry, and artillery under the command of General Negley left camp with twelve days' rations to march south again in the direction of Pulaski, Tennessee.  Instead of continuing south to Rogersville, as they had a couple weeks early, they veered east to march over mountainous roads to Fayetteville, Winchester, and ultimately the all-important city of Chattanooga approximately 90 miles east of Pulaski. Although I haven't seen it stated explicitly, I surmise the goal of this mission, which would have been planned by Negley and his superior General Mitchel, to feint towards Chattanooga to draw Confederate resources there and also encourage Unionist sentiment. 

The men of the Lancaster County Regiment enjoyed the first opportunity for real mountain marching, and soldier-correspondent Corp. Elias H. Witmer (bio) described the march on May 30 between Pulaski and Fayetteville:

The day is warm, the hills become steeper, the roads rougher, the poorly fed and worse cared for cavalry horses pant and fall to the ground, the artillery horses have become powerless, but the 79th is full of life--they laugh at their mounted fellow soldiers--the artillery call us the bull-dog regiment--the cavalry say we are the 1st Pennsylvania foot cavarly; we take it as a compliment, it gives us new life, and we push forward as fast as though the enemy, with 50,000 men, were on our heels.  We waded streams, crossed a small creek forty-one times, arrived at our place of bivouac, took a bathe, eat supper, made out bed, squatted, "good night," and were sound asleep. 

Confederate Col. John Adams
(Source)

Over the next few days, they continued marching east through a fertile valley and then through more mountains, reaching the peak of that section of the Cumberland Mountains on June 4.  Somewhere along the way, they discovered that Confederate cavalry, which Witmer plausibly estimates at 600-800, was encamped in the valley (Sweeden's Cove) that they were about to enter from the backdoor and descend.  The Confederate cavalry was a brigade under the command of Col. John Adams that had move out of Chattanooga and crossed the Tennessee River on May 29 and 30 under the orders of Gen. Beauregard. [OR Chap XXII, pp. 895-896]

After already having marched twenty miles that day, General Negley and acting brigade commander Col. Henry A. Hambright (bio) of the 79th Pennsylvania prepared to attack the rebels at the foot of the mountain.

Although it's not clear the specific roles of Hambright and Negley, they positioned two sections (four guns) of artillery just off the wood line and prepared their two regiments of cavalry out of sight.  Companies A, D, and F of the 79th Pennsylvania moved out of the woods and engaged the Confederates as skirmishers, soliciting the intended response of the cavalry being drawn up in a battle line. 

Satellite View of Sweeden's Cove near Jasper, Tennessee (Google Maps)
Union forces attacked from west to east (left to right on the map).

As soon as Adams' men were ready to charge, Hambright's artillery opened fire, initiating a panicked retreat by the Rebel horsemen.  One of the 79th Pennsylvania's skirmishers, Pvt. James Fields, wrote, "the moment [the Confederate cavalry] began the work [of attacking] we let drive and showered them in earnest from our cannon, which made them look two ways for Sunday." [7/5/1862 Weekly Mariettian]

It was then the Union cavalry's turn, and the 7th Pennsylvania Cavalry and 5th Kentucky Cavalry chased the routed Rebels for five miles.  Fields continued,

as the shot came thick and fast amongst them, they began to think about getting out of reach, and then our cavalry came rushing from the bushes and on them--and such getting away you never saw--they ran as if the devil was after them, dropping canteens, swords, sabres, guns, pistols, haversacks, overcoats... 

Sgt. William T. Clark (bio) recorded in his diary that the people in the nearby town of Jasper "told us the rebels didn't run, they flew."  The victory was decisive, and the pathway to continue the expedition to Chattanooga was now open.  

Besides captured ammunition and commissary wagons, the Confederates lost 20 killed, another 20 wounded, and 12 captured.  Clark mentioned on the next day that "Our cavalry found 20 bodies of the rebels that were killed yesterday," which must be those now buried in Bean-Roulston Cemetery in a mass grave.  Union losses were two killled and seven wounded, mostly among the 5th Kentucky, I believe.  The 79th Pennsylvania suffered no losses. 

From the June twenty-something (my notes were corrupted), 1862, Daily Evening Express, we have Corp. Elias Witmer's letter describing the engagement which contains Col. Hambright's report: (alternate link)

'E.H.W.' Reviews the 'Wild Goose Hunt' to Alabama

Echoing J. R. Sypher's description of Negley's Alabama expedition is a letter by the 79th Pennsylvania's regular correspondent, Corp. Elias H. Witmer (bio). He has a stinging review of the Alabama town of Rogersville, which displays full Lancaster County snobbery on the two matters of which a 19th-century Lancasterian would be most proud: public education and farm management:

Rogersville is a small post village, and one of the smallest kind, in Limstone county. It is one of those towns which we find at almost every cross road in the northern states, containing a smith shop, dwelling, and school house; but the town, however, is minus the latter. It is black as "Tow Hill" [in Columbia, PA]; occupied almost entirely by the same race of people; was built by the first settlers, who, from appearance, had great antipathy to white-wash, paint, and elbow grease. The country is as barren as Patagonia; their cattle &c., as poor as Job's famous turkey, and the citizens very ready to take the oath of allegiance,and then--cut your throat. Land sells from a dime to five dollars an acre, and produces excellent crops of mullin and thistles. Their plows are self-sharpening land pike, and their swine such as require knots tied in their tails to prevent them from getting into the potato patch. Each family supports a score of cats, and a dozen dogs, which receive more care and attention than their children, and their continual barking makes the nights hideous. The people, in general, live and die in ignorance. Other people think for them, and thus they become and remain the dupes of another's will.

Witmer had kinder words about Florence, which gave him an opportunity to talk about the prevalence of Pennsylvania families who had immigrated to the region. It seems to have been a common theme for the regiment at this time, as a couple soldiers mention these types of connections. For example, back at Columbia, Tennessee, William Clark recorded in his diary that "This morning I took a walk through the cemetary in the northern part of the town and saw the graves of several from Pennsylvania & New Jersey." [5/25/1862]

Statue of Tennessee's Military
Governor Andrew Johnson
(Source)

Witmer connected Southern Unionists' experiences to anti-war Northerners, writing:

Wherever we find Pennsylvanians, there we find a love for the whole country; and it is a remarkable and deplorable fact, that while they in the south have remained true to the country, when persecutions were hurled at them thick and fast, and stood like martyrs when threats of the stake, the gallows and the knife were daily occurrences, that there are sympathisers in the north with their hellish deeds. Sympathy in the north for men who are in league with hell! We can scarcely believe it, yet in comes to us in glowing language upon the wings of the press every day. Oh, ye northern rebels, make peace with your God, the hour of retribution is fast approaching.

He also makes an interesting prediction that the war will end in guerrilla warfare based on what he was seeing happening to Unionist citizens, and endorsed Military Governor Andrew Johnson's efforts to protect Unionists and punish those who harmed them.    

From the June 2, 1862, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)

'E.H.W.' Meets a Tennessee Unionist, Later Hanged as a Spy

While traveling through Pulaski, Giles County, Tennessee, and the northern part of Alabama, Lancaster's soldier-correspondent Corp. Elias H. Witmer spent some time with a Unionist and former resident of Lancaster.  The man, Samuel W. Kenney, had according to Witmer worked in Lancaster from 1840 to 1841.  He described the conversation and what he learned about Kenney's sufferings as a Unionist in a letter that was extracted in the May 26, 1862, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link) 


Upon searching for more information about Kenney, I was surprised to not only verify him as a resident of Giles County, Tennessee, but learn that he would be hanged as a spy a year later under the orders of Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg.  Fifteen years after the incident, his wife Miriam V. Kenney received a $12/month special pension by act of Congress, with a corroborating letter from General Negley testifying that Kenney indeed was a spy.  According to an Ancestry.com forum, the family did not know what happened to Kenney, and it was only in the 1890s that his body was returned to Illinois. 

I'm not sure how to interpret Kenney's status, whether he was actually acting as a spy, or whether he simply aided the Union army when it was in his neck of the woods.  It would be interesting to see the Negley letter, as Negley's pattern of loyalty and helping people around him makes it seem like he would have gladly written to help Kenney's widow based on casual encounters with Kenney.  I'll have to watch for more information about Kenney and the circumstances that led to his execution.   

The Capture of Capt. Kendrick's Detail

Capt. William G. Kendrick (WGK)

On May 2, 1862, Capt. William G. Kendrick (bio), the regiment's senior line officer, and his detached detail serving with the the telegraph corps near Pulaski, Tennessee, were interrupted by Confederate cavalry under the notorious John Hunt Morgan (bio).  The rebel horsemen approached unrecognized to within twenty yards of the detail before leveling their rifles at Capt. Kendrick, who was in no position to resist.  Kendrick recounted

The first thing I knew twenty rifles were leveled at me by a desperate gang of Guerillas swearing they wold kill me if I moved.  One snapped his piece.  Had it gone off I might not be now writing this letter.  Such is the fortune of war.  I took supper with Capt. Morgan.  He and all his officers treated me as a gentleman.  I had not one unkind word spoken to me after I got in the town by the Rebel soldiers.  The ladies were very jubilant over our Capture.  I had my album and the little boys ambrotypes with me.  An old lady asked if I had children.  I showed the little boys.  She shed tears over them saying poor, dear little fellows, their father a prisoner and so far from them.  There was quite a rush of ladies to see them, nearly all pronouncing them the handsomest of children they ever saw.  I soon had a number of friends amongst the women, who pitied me for the sake of my dear little boys.  [WGK 5/3/1862]

John Hunt Morgan (Source)

Word of the capture of Capt. Kendrick and ten or fifteen others from the Lancaster County Regiment quickly got back to Negley's brigade camp thirty miles north in Columbia and caused much excitement.  Around midnight, four companies--Companies C, E, I, and G--of the 79th Pennsylvania with some cavalry and artillery set out in the darkness to find out what was going on.  As a corporal in Company E, correspondent Elias H. Witmer made the forced overnight march of thirty-one miles.  When the expeditionary force came within five miles of Pulaski, they ran Kendrick and the others, who had been lumped in with 200 prisoners from Gen. Mitchell's division and paroled.  

The incident clearly elicited the fighting spirit of the men in the 79th Pennsylvania.  Witmer, the Mountville storekeeper, concluded his letter by creatively asserting, "A dead codfish could as easily climb a greased sapling, tail foremost, with a loaf of bread in his mouth, as a band of these marauders to whip the Lancaster Co. Regiment."  His entire letter describing the expedition, published in the May 14, 1862, Daily Evening Express, is here: (alternate link)


As paroled prisoners, Capt. Kendrick and the other men returned from the front lines. I'm not sure how the exchange process worked, but Kendrick sat out the rest of 1862 and would rejoin the army as a key staff officer for Gen. Negley.

Lancaster NOT at Shiloh: Letters from 'E.H.W.'

General Buell's army crossing the Duck River near Columbia, Tennessee, where the 79th Pennsylvania was left on detached duty during the Battle of Shiloh (HW 5/3/1862)

Checking in with the 79th Pennsylvania's regular soldier-correspondent, Corp. Elias H. Witmer, we find that missing the Battle of Shiloh due to being on detached duty outside of Nashville caused much angst among the soldiers of the Lancaster County Regiment.  It's hard to separate hyperbolic indignation from fact, but Witmer certainly took umbrage at silly insinuations of cowardice by "ye shallow-pated demagogues of Lancaster" that the 79th Pennsylvania had been intentionally excluded from battle. 

After that excitement calmed, we have a second letter from the Mountville storekeeper written a week later on April 21.  Its main topic was fugitive slaves--a naturally complicated situation that would demand policy attention by Union forces in that part of Tennessee.  Acknowledged the polarized nature of discussions about slavery, Witmer--who apparently went to war with a negative opinion of slavery--declined to judge what he saw saying, "If I would write favorable about the slaves, my friends would say, he has changed his opinion on slavery, and if I would write unfavorable some would say he is prejudiced." 

He continued to complain about the restraint Union forces showed to hostile civilians and express little hope of reconciliation within a generation.  Of Southern women, he wrote:

The women are evidently the worst enemies to the government; they display a prejudice and hatred unequaled by the men in arms; they believe that our mission is the emancipation of slaves, which would doom them to labor.  They despise the sunburnt brow of honest industry; they look in scorn upon the dignity of labor, and consider the subjects of that great lever of our national greatness as the rubbage of society.

Witmer concludes with comments about pay problems in the 79th Pennsylvania and the allotment roles designed to transfer money to soldiers' families.  I have other information about this, including a letter from the wife of a soldier, which warrants its own post (time permitting).  

From the April 19, 1862, Daily Evening Express (alternate link):


From the April 30, 1862, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)

Elias Witmer's 'Interesting, Instructive, and Amusing" Incidents in Nashville

Tennessee State House in Nashville (National Archives #528850)

After a hiatus of over two months, the 79th Pennsylvania's "regular correspondent," Corp. Elias H. Witmer, resumed his journalistic responsibilities with a letter penned on March 27, 1862, that was worth the wait.  Recall that Witmer was a shopkeeper in the Lancaster County village of Mountville before the war, and see <this post> for a brief biography.

The first half of the letter describes the state of affairs in Nashville.  Skip to Page 3, though, for Witmer's account of a nice spring day spent touring the city in company of a few friends.  The highlight was a productive mock legislative session held in the Tennessee State Capitol worthy of Lancaster County's Congressman, Thaddeus Stevens.  Witmer recounted the incident:

While on a visit to this place, in company with several of my friends of the "bloody 79th;" we forgot that we were soldiers, and imagined ourselves legislators and acted accordingly.  After electing a speaker by acclamation, we proceeded to business, during which able speeches were made, and animation burned upon the brow of every senator.  The following was the result of the session: Adopted the erring sister, Tennessee, as a member of the United States family, provided she hangs her traitors, re-builds her destroyed properties, swears allegiance to her former faith, clothes herself in sackcloth and sits in ashes, and prays for forgiveness until the last rebel shall have given up the ghost; sold South Carolina to Africa, with a promise that we will not interfere if England desires to extend her conquest to her shores; defied the allied powers to "break" our blockade; sympathized with Mexico in her present difficulties; sent Mason and Slidell exiles to the dreary shores of Botany Bay; sentenced Jefferson Davis and his Cabinet to be hung on John Brown's gallows, and the rest of the traitors in the City of Washington, and the English Parliament witness and House of Commons, be invited to the spectacle; voted that the "C.S.A." exists only in worthless bonds, scrip, shinplasters, and fresh-made graves, after which we adjourned to meet again on or before October next, in Lancaster, Penna., when the 79th shall be mustered out of service.

Having finished our National business, we paid our compliments to Gov. Johnson, who by the way, is a noble-hearted and brave man, worthy the position assigned him.  

Witmer continues to describe visiting the graves of President Polk and Confederate General Zollicoffer.  He ends by noting that Gen. Negley's brigade was detached from the division of Alexander McCook, who apparently had fallen out of favor with the men in the ranks of the Lancaster County Regiment.  While the rest of the division was marching toward their first engagement, the Battle of Shiloh, the 79th Pennsylvania spent late March and early April encamped among flowering trees by a beautiful spring south of Nashville on the turnpike to Franklin, Tennessee. 

From the April 3, 1862, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)

'God save the American people from a government such as they would establish.'

Unidentified Lancaster Soldier
Supposedly in 79th PA
Photo by Wm. Gill
(Richard Abel Collection)

Over the past couple days, a couple Civil War blogs (e.g., Civil War Memory) have lit up with discussions about the typically incendiary questions about motivations and causes of the Civil War.  Exchanges of ideas--some more illuminating than others--have, for instance, focused on Florida's reasons for secession and highlight the need to really to do good historical research if we want to have a basic grasp of people's incentives, motivations, and worldviews.  Although the question of why the North fought the Civil War does not get as much attention as why the South seceded, it's still a very difficult question to answer in a single soundbite, and I find myself still learning more and more as I dig into the primary sources.

So, coincidentally, 150 years ago this week, our 79th Pennsylvania soldier-correspondent, Corp. Elias H. Witmer (biography) of Company E, penned a lengthy letter to Lancaster's Daily Evening Express that exhibited some significant thoughts about the war, slavery, and the American political system.  It's colored by Witmer's background as a staunch Republican, a merchant who left a dry goods store in Mountville when he went to war, and a someone of old Mennonite heritage whose family over the generations had migrated to a more modern denomination.  Although Witmer was uniquely articulate in his views, I suspect his views represent a large number of enterprising and upwardly mobile Lancaster County farmers and merchants.

Looking at Paragraphs 7-10 as I've numbered them, we can infer a couple specific hopes and fears that can be connected to historians' more general assessments of the Civil War North.  In particular, it's fascinating how he views the Confederacy and its leaders as committed to forming an aristocracy that would destroy both the political freedoms and the economic opportunities of the upper-middle class with which Witmer personally identified.  His fears were heightened as the middle class seemed to be losing political and economic power across Europe, and he saw the Confederacy as part of a global trend against American values of capitalism, free labor, and social mobility and which sought to replace democracy with oligarchy.  Throw in some interest in the sufferings of Union sympathizers in the South and some apparently original poetry, and we get a much better sense of why Witmer left his Mountville dry goods store to join the Lancaster County Regiment. (Also, reference Gary Gallagher's The Union War for a generalization to the broader North, with some similar comments about Europe on pages 72-73.)

There's a lot more to this issue and others in the letter, such as views on alcohol and temperance, but that's enough for me tonight.  Enjoy another excellent 'E.H.W.' letter. 

From the January 11, 1862, Daily Evening Express (paragraph numbers are my addition):

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FROM OUR REGULAR CORRESPONDENCE.
CAMP WOOD, Ky., Jan. 7, 1862.

(1) The rainy weather which we have at present gives us leisure time, and I shall take advantage of the opportunity and write you a letter. Christmas is over and new year day has gone by; and we yet find ourselves in the State of Kentucky. Many in this army had expected to celebrate Christmas in Tennessee, but this expectation has not been realized. While our friends at home have enjoyed gay holidays, surrounded with luxuries incident to the occasion, there were over half a million of soldiers surrounding the camp fires, or some marching over frozen ground to the “gory field,” and some standing sentinel in some dreary spot, with a pilot biscuit to call to mind the days one year ago. But this was not the case with the “Lancaster County Regiment,” as almost every member was kindly remembered by his generous friends at home. The boxes sent as Christmas gifts to the volunteers in the army, were among the most welcome things in camp.

(2) An order has been issued by Gen. Buell to prohibit the sale of intoxicating liquors to all soldiers, which is among the most important orders of the army. Liquor had been sold in some regiments by the sutlers as freely as it is dealt out over the bar of a Lancaster groggery or lager from the swill tub of a Dutch brewery. No character is so disgusting as a drunken soldier, and while no army has ever gone to battle as the American army of 1861—characterized by so much morality, it would be injustice to them to allow a set of unprincipled sutlers to morally ruin the noble men who have sacrificed the comforts of home to fight the great battle of constitutional liberty. This great evil had, however, been confined to certain regiments, and bloated faces, greasy clothing, rusty muskets and a large sick list, were its fruits. Sutlers in general, rob the soldiers by exorbitant prices—which is bad enough, without robbing them of their manhood and ruining them forever. It is, however, a pleasant task to say that this is not the case with the “Lancaster County Regiment,” as the sound judgment of our commanding officer would, with his determined nature, drive the devils from his camp.

(3) The stupendous iron railroad bridge which spans Green river, and which had been partially destroyed through Buckner’s vandalism, is now under reconstruction and will be completed in about a week. A pontoon has been built for the crossing of the troops, which will do away with all fears of fording the stream.

(4) It is amusing to read the different reports published relative to the movements and position of Buell’s army, and charge him with inefficiency because he has not taken Bowling Green before this. Let such learn the vast labor to be performed before a battle at that point can be fought and a victory there won. The destruction of the bridge was the great and the only cause of our encampment at this point. This is now nearly finished, and when completed we are inclined to believe that we will advance. But we cannot sling our knapsacks and go at Bowling Green, as the railroad five miles in advance is torn up, the sills burnt, and rails destroyed, and every obstruction placed in our way which possibly could be done. The tunnel, three hundred feet in length, on the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, about twenty miles south of this, is also blown up. Can any person expect that this division of the American army can be expected to march in advance of the railroad communication? The army must be fed and everything must be transported in the army wagons, and the present supplies of teams would fail to transport sufficient to keep it from starvation.

(5) Sudden marches upon Bowling Green are all a myth, and time is required before we can reach it. No army is more eager for an engagement whenever prudence shall dictate, but their friends shall not mourn their defeat through reckless bravery. I doubt whether you could find another division in the grand American army that is managed with so much judgment and forethought as this under Gen. Buell.

(6) Rebel scouts come within three miles of our picket line, in troops of two and three hundred. Their nearest encampment is ten miles south, near Cave City, under command of General Hindman, whose army numbers six or eight thousand and are called the advance of the rebels; but they might be more properly called the rear guard of their retreating forces. A Lieutenant who had been a prisoner at Bowling Green for several months, has been released and arrived at camp a few days ago, who reports their forces at 30,000 and they in a very unhealthy condition. Twenty-five hundred have died and five thousand have been sent to the Nashville Hospitals. Rebel deserters arrive daily, while scores of slaves arrive at camp with requests from their masters to give them protection. They are accepted and employed as private citizens, but no encouragement is given them by General McCook. On last week fifteen were stolen from the immediate neighborhood, and it is alleged by their masters that they are taken to Bowling Green, and there put into the rebel army, or sold for its benefit.

(7) It is a useless task to attempt to portray the treatment which the Union men received from the hands of the rebel army, as such an attempt would fail to chronicle the vile and atrocious conduct of men who seek to destroy the principles which governed their manhood, before the misguided leaders precipitated them in an unholy rebellion. A glance over the face of this community is the best description of their depraved, nature; houses are ransacked and deserted, lands uncultivated, business houses closed, and enterprise of every class stagnated.

(8) It is equally true of the rebel forces in Kentucky, as on the Potomac that they have sunk in morality to an extent unprecedented in American Society. Bowling Green is a heinous stage of corruption. Drunken brawls, brutal prize fights, assassinations, and riotous destruction—reigns supreme; vice has become honorable, rascality a virtue, and the men themselves very devils incarnate. Every rebel deserter brings the disgusting details of their depravity, loaded with crime, dyed in a brother’s blood, and their midnight hours, “when honest men repose,” are spent in orgies more frantic than Bachanalian revelry. Drunken with the fumes of plunder and the excitement of the gambling table, the boasted chivalry spend their days in serving their country. While their leader boasts that he has not come to destroy and make war upon the government, but only to protect the soil of Kentucky from the hordes of Northern invaders, he is piling up with one hand and puling down with the other. He speaks words of friendship, but practices deeds which a respectable demon would blush to own. A leopard cannot hide his spots, or a camel his hump, neither can Buckner his misguided career. The destruction of the bridge and railroad cannot be covered up by pretended innocence, but must be accounted for by a suspension in the air. Zollicoffer too, who has outraged the people and endeavored to subjugate Kentucky into the Southern Confederacy, in his late proclamation says that, “he does not come to wage war, but to protect the people.” He protects the people with his proclamation, but with fire-brand in the one hand and the dagger in the other, draws the life blood from the Union loving men, and scatters devastation wherever he goes.

(9) It becomes more apparent every day, that the leaders of this rebellion are striving to establish a government upon aristocratic principles.  Mason, Cobb, Davis, Floyd and Yancey would like to have an aristocracy. Would you? oh thoughtless millionaires who like to extract each day a few additional sweat drops from the brows of your industrious mechanics and ill paid laborers, whose daily bread is too often purchased with the very life-drops of anguish. They would dye the annals of their country with paupers’ tears, and blot out her glory with the blood stain of famished merchants. They boast loud of the workings of the government they aim to establish. “Oh ye traitors, turn to the tax ridden masses of England, whose hard earned mites are at most but half enough to satisfy the wants of nature. Oh! Ye howling herd of aristocratic wolves and noble vultures, extracting half of the poor man’s loaf, and for aught you care leave his family starve. Their aristocratic avarice must be satisfied, through human hearts bleed and immortal, souls are wrong to satiate their lust. God save the American people from a government such as they would establish.

(10) Turn to the laboring classes of Europe, bowed down by the shackles of an imbecile nobility, and read its fruits in the sunken eye, the haggard look, the emaciated frame and the half-clad form. Ask the “hewers of wood and drawers of water” of Britain, Russia, France and Austria. Ask the oppressed sentiments of the freedom loving men of the South, whether such a government is preferable to the domain over which the ensign of American liberty floats? Their hopes of establishing such a government is preferable to the domain over which the ensign of the American liberty floats? Their hopes of establishing such a government must eventually prove a dream of empty speculation. Truth and justice must ultimately triumph over error and wrong. Tyranny will be crushed and rebellion suppressed. Though our domestic strifes are not limited to wordy wars and our social leg is terribly fractured, our national neck never has been nor ever will be broken.

(11) The same patriotic impulses which beat around the camp-fires in the dark days of our national birth, and the sacred blood which stained many a battle-field in the “times which tried men’s souls,” will not be dishonored by the noble posterity who have gone forth in the present campaign. The South may foam, and England may bark, yet the United States will vindicate their honor in every emergence. Fear not, ye faltering sages who look out into the broad future and contemplate the result of the present issues-the cannons of peace will again boom in all the States freighted with the grand burthen of liberty, and the flash of exultant camp-fires will make the new world lurid—

Stand by the sacred flag of stars
Amid the cannon’s loudest rattle,
And pluck the hero’s honored name
Out of the smoke and flame of battle.

Fear never clouds the soldier’s brow
When whistling bullets sing of glory,
When clashing swords and waving plumes
Tell of the deeds that live in story.

Strike, fellow-soldiers, for the right,
Strike for the insulted land that bore you,
And falter not, while high in air,
The glorious stars and stripes wave o’er you.

March, brave men, march and never falter
Till traitors bow the willing knee,
Upon your country’s sacred altar
Rest every hope of liberty.

The “Constitution and the Union,”
Let this be made our battle-cry—
With rebel hosts hold no communion
Till, conquered, they for “quarter” cry.

Friends watch your actions, watch and love you,
Their prayers at night to God ascend,
That He’ll protect the flag above you,
And strength and wisdom to you lend.

Minstrels shall praise the glowing deeds,
In songs of grand heroics’ reason,
That vindicated God and Right
And crushed the myrmidons of treason.

Draw swords and bayonets in bravery
And march with hope and valor on,
Till treason’s perfidy and knavery,
Are with the evils past and gone.

E. H. W.

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A Sabbath Day Letter from Camp Wood

Bridge over the Green River, Munfordville, Kentucky (HW 2/25/1860)

On December 22, 1861, Corp. Elias H. Witmer—the normal correspondent of the Lancaster Daily Evening Express in the 79th Pennsylvania—wrote his second (and final) letter to the Church Advocate, a religious newspaper affiliated with the Church of God that was published in Lancaster. Earlier this month, I excerpted part of this letter in a post on the first death in the 79th Pennsylvania’s ranks, that of Pvt. Samuel Clair of Company E. Now that I’m back in Lancaster for two weeks, family and other obligations prevent me from having the time to go into further detail about the letter, but I think it stands pretty well on its own. Topics include religion in army life, the town of Munfordville where the regiment camped, the death of Samuel Clair, and the Battle of Rowlett’s Station.

From the January 9, 1862, Church Advocate: (alternate link)

'There Sleeps a Pennsylvania Volunteer': Death Visits the 79th Pa

The Soldier's Grave (HW 11/5/1861)

Although the Lancaster County Regiment was a model of health for its first month in Kentucky at Camp Nevin, the regiment changed camp at exactly the wrong time.  As soon as they left Camp Nevin for Camp Negley, the weather soured.  As November turned to December, a week of snow and rain turned everything to mud, and health began to deteriorate for a handful of soldiers.  On December 5, 1861, the 79th Pennsylvania suffered the first death of one of its members, drummer-turned-private Samuel H. Clair of Company E.  Clair had been sick for a little over a week after going out on picket duty, and died in the camp hospital of "typhoid pneumonia."  The regiment's officers decided not to send the body back to Lancaster, and Clair's remains were buried in a quiet corner of the camp.  (I haven't done any research to ascertain if they were subsequently moved.)

PA Card File record for Samuel H. Clair

His captain, Morris D. Wickersham, sent the following note back to Lancaster, which reveals an attempt to rationalize health and disease and reassure readers in Lancaster who might be worried about a friend or relative in the regiment.  It was published in the December 13, 1861, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)


Two weeks later, Elias H. Witmer followed up with more complete eulogy as part of a December 22 letter to the Church Advocate, which appeared in the January 9, 1862, edition of the newspaper:

There has been but one death in our regiment, which speaks encouragingly for the health of the "Lancaster County Boys."  Samuel H. Clair, of Company E--a young man loved by all--was the first, and, as yet, the only victim.  He possessed those noble traits of character which endeared himself to all, who held intercourse with him.  But while we had to mourn his early loss, we have the glorious consolation that he died as he lived--an honest man, kind and affectionate friend, and, above all, a pious and devoted Christian.  We buried him in a secluded corner, and inscribed upon his tomb, to tell the passer-by, there sleeps a Pennsylvania Volunteer.  We enclosed his grave with a fence, so that nothing could disturb his resting-place; we shed another tear over his grave, sung the hymn, "A charge to keep I have," with the chorus, "There will be no more parting there," and cast another look upon the little mound of earth, after which we turned our steps toward the camp, with the hope that if we could never visit the spot again, that we may meet "Where the wicked cease from troubling, And the weary are at rest."

Direct Deposit for 79th PA Soldiers and Families

Union soldiers outside a sutler's store (Mathew Brady via National Archives)

On December 2, 1861, the 79th Pennsylvania assembled on parade to hear an address by commissioners sent by Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin to promote something known as the "Allotment Roll."  It looks like company commanders made arrangements with private bankers in Lancaster to offer the option of allowing soldiers' families to receive money directly in Lancaster.  The financial plight of soldiers' families had attracted much attention locally, and I'll try to address interesting aspects of Lancaster's implementation of the state-mandated "Relief Fund" in a future post.  It was hoped, though, that the U.S. Paymaster was finally fully operational in late 1861 and that the flow of money home from soldiers would alleviate the suffering of their families and the burden on local government coffers.  The allotment roll was meant to improve upon the decentralized process in the 79th Pennsylvania's first pay day in mid-November when each Captain made his own arrangements for sending its share of the estimated $14,000 in cash that soldiers of the 79th Pennsylvania sent back to Lancaster. [LEH]. 

One of Lancaster's private bankers, George K. Reed (bio), who administered parts of the regiment's allotment roll even visited the regiment's camp on December 4, 1861, presumably to get business in order [JHD].  The median response for the soldiers, who were paid $13 a month, seems to have been to allocate $10 to be picked up in Lancaster via the allotment roll.  That's what Lewis Jones, a working class husband and father of three or four young children tenuously living on South Queen St., decided to allot to his wife.  As a side effect, this process also necessitated the use of house numbers, as Lewis Jones' next letter contained an inquiry as to the number of the family's rented dwelling. [LHJ, 12/9/1861]

Here are some additional thoughts on the allotment roll and soldiers' finances from Corp. Elias H. Witmer of Company E, 79th Pennsylvania, published in the December 11, 1861, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)

E.H.W.'s Epistle to the Lancasterians

Header of the Church Advocate newspaper

In today's letter, Corp. Elias H. Witmer (bio) of Company E, 79th Pennsylvania, who had already written seven letters to the Lancaster Express, took a sharp religious turn in his writing by sending a letter to the Church Advocate.  Witmer's letter fits right into the distinctly American brand of evangelical Christianity that developed from the early 1700s to the late 1800s, with a special emphasis on the Second Great Awakening (early 1800s) and its intense fervor, conversions, revivals, and attempts to return to Christianity's primitive apostolic roots.  The Church Advocate was published in Lancaster as the organ of the Church of God (Winebrenner), a Baptist-like denomination active in southcentral Pennsylvania that split acrimoniously from the German Reformed Church a generation before the Civil War as part of this Awakening.

I don't know of any pre-war connections between the Church of God and Witmer, a merchant from Mountville who looks to have a good number of Lancaster County Mennonites in his family tree going all the way back to Hans Herr.  He might have belonged to one of Lancaster County's Church of God congregations, or he might have just written back to a newspaper whose message he supported regardless of denomination.  Anyway, it's interesting that he adopts such a heavy religious tone in this letter compared to his Express letters, as it shows a relatively modern division between appropriate styles of discourse when writing to the general public (the Express) versus writing for a religious forum (Church Advocate). 

A couple recent studies of religion among Civil War soldiers have just come to my attention while researching this post, and hopefully after more data gathering from the 79th Pennsylvania I can say something about how the regiment's story fits in with the broader story.  One enduring controversy is that Confederate soldiers were more pious than their Union counterparts, as some people can take this idea and run with it to make a variety of grand moral judgments.  However, some historians have lately argued evidence shows greater piety per capita in the ranks of Union armies, although the whole framing of the historical question is somewhat silly.  I'll be more interested in seeing what the mid-nineteenth century "marketplace" of religious ideas in Lancaster looked like, and how different soldiers 'and civilians' faith affected how they experienced the war and how they experienced the war affected their faith.

From the December 12, 1861, Church Advocate: (alternate link)

'Turn our footsteps towards the Sunny South': Another Camp Nevin Letter

Artilleryman in Independent Battery B, 1st Pennsylvania Light Artillery (Library of Congress)
The battery was attached to Negley's Brigade at Camp Nevin.

Today's letter again comes from Camp Nevin, but show some signs of itching to move on to the target of Bowling Green, Kentucky, and Confederate forces under Gen. Simon B. Buckner.  Although the letter is missing a signature, its tone and content convince me it's from the pen of the Daily Evening Express's normal correspondent, Corp. Elias H. Witmer.

Regarding a few of the topics mentioned in the letter:

• On November 9, 1861, Gen. Don Carlos Buell took over command of the Army of the Ohio from William T. Sherman.  The brigade of Pennsylvanians that included the 77th, 78th, and 79th Pennsylvania under Gen. James Negley was assigned to the division of Gen. Alexander McCook.  Attached to Negley's Brigade was Independent Battery B, Pennsylvania Light Artillery (aka Muehler's Battery, 26th Pennsylvania Artillery), in which Thaddeus Stevens' nephew and ward Alanson J. Stevens was an officer.  It was recruited in Franklin and Erie Counties, and I don't know if I can verify Witmer's assertion that it was "manned entirely by Germans."
• Witmer's description of praise for Col. Hambright's regiment is among the first of a long parade of compliments the regiment would receive for its appearance and proficiency.
• The lightning strike of a tent in the 77th Pennsylvania's camp was described in a letter from last week.
• The fatal accident in the 78th Pennsylvania, commanded by Col. Sirwell, is described in more detail in the regiment's history. (p. 29)
• The company under Capt. Pyfer was the extra company intended for Col. Hambright's regiment but that later became Co. K, 77th Pennsylvania.  (see this post for the first letter from the company)
• Witmer offers pretty strong support for Gen. John C. Fremont and his preliminary emancipation proclamation in Missouri, which drew the ire of Washington.  In the complex and evolving opinions soldiers in the 79th Pennsylvania felt about race, slavery, black soldiers, etc., Witmer's comments are an important data point. 

From the November 21, 1861, Express: (alternate link)

A 'Sore Time' on Picket Duty: 'E.H.W.' Letter

"The Picket Guard" (HW 11/2/1861)

Today's letter by Corp. Elias H. Witmer (bio) of the "Normal Rifles"--Company E, 79th Pennsylvania--continues the string of letters from the regiment's first camp, Camp Nevin, fifty miles south of Louisville, Kentucky.  Almost two weeks into the regiment's stay, not much exciting happened with the exception of picket duty and an occasional false alarm.  The ten companies of the 79th Pennsylvania rotated the duty during their time at Camp Nevin.  With the coming winter and a few days of torrential rain in early November 1861, descriptions of picket duty as a glorified picnic disappeared.   

Recruiting efforts continued in Lancaster, and although advertised as for a new company in the 79th Pennsylvania the new recruits seemed to end up in one of the neighboring Pennsylvania regiments as Company K, 77th Pennsylvania.  The controversy that Witmer mentions would continue between various parts of Lancaster County, normally through accusations that farmers (which seems to always imply a prosperous class of citizens) lagged behind in contributing men to the army.  Such criticism reached its height and began to matter practically when drafts were instituted in fall of 1862 and summer of 1863.  

From the November 13, 1861, Lancaster Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)

'Here in an Isolated Place': 'E.H.W.' from Camp Nevin

Camp Nevin (HW 12/7/1861)

It's now three days and three letters published from the 79th Pennsylvania's new camp, Camp Nevin, Hardin County, Kentucky.  This letter, by Corp. Elias H. Witmer, touches on many of the same topics as the previous letters by O.C.M. Caines and W. Wilberforce Nevin, so I won't add much too it.  The only thing to notice is the issue of how the citizens of Kentucky and Tennessee--loyal and "secesh"--respond to the presence of Union armies there. Interactions with the civilian population of Kentucky and Tennessee town will play an important role in the regiment's history over the first two years of the war, especially because the 79th Pennsylvania spent much of its first two years of the war running around those two states on detached duty attempting to protect towns and railroads.

From the November 2, 1861, Daily Evening Express: (alternate link)