Circa1865

Perhaps the greatest accomplishment of the men who followed Lee and other Southern generals was their steadfast determination in the face of overwhelming odds. Rarely after mid-1863 were there even odds and most often Lee fought successfully against foes two or three times his own number.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.circa1865.org

The Grandest Soldiers That Ever Marched

“It is quite a mistaken idea that the Yankees were poor soldiers and easily whipped. Any Confederate soldier who met them often in battle will testify that they were hard and tenacious fighters, especially those from the Great North West.

The Confederates could claim very little credit for holding at bay such a mighty host armed with the most improved weapons and devices of warfare for four long, dreary years, and defeating them so often and disastrously, with odds often greatly against them, had the Northern army been merely a disorganized mob and rabble.

Yes, the Northern army was a fine one, well equipped and well officered, with all the resources at hand that could be desired for great and aggressive warfare; but it had to meet an army of Southern troops composed of the grandest soldiers that ever marched to martial music, or fought in defense of country!

Just to think, that the Southern army of six hundred thousand men, poorly armed and equipped, ridiculously clad and meagerly fed, without tents, without medicine, without pay, checkmating, baffling, repulsing and often humiliating and disastrously defeating the Northern army of 2,778,304 men armed with the most improved engines of warfare, well paid, well fed, abundantly clothed; backed by all the resources of a great nation, for four long, dreary years, staggers the credulity of man to contemplate.

In a letter to General [Jubal] Early shortly after the close of the war, General Robert E. Lee wrote: “It will be difficult to get the world to understand the odds against which we fought.” From the number drawing pensions from the United States government today, fifty years since the close of hostilities, there might have been a million more soldiers in the Union Army than given in the figures named above.”

(Sketch of the War Record of the Edisto Rifles, William V. Izlar, The State Company, 1914, pp. 98-100)

In his Life of Thomas H. Benton (Houghton-Mifflin, 1900), Theodore Roosevelt traced the important influences which formed Benton’s character to the militant spirit found in his native South, and further mentions that important influence on the Southern army and its commander.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.circa1865.org

Theodore Roosevelt’s Tribute to Lee

“No man who is not willing to bear arms and to fight for his rights can give a good reason why he should be entitled to the privilege of living in a free community. The decline of the militant spirit in the Northeast during the first half of this century was much to be regretted.

To it is due more than to any other cause the undoubted average individual inferiority of the Northern compared with the Southern troops – at any rate, at the beginning of the [War].

The Southerners, by their whole mode of living, their habits, and their love of outdoor sports, kept up their warlike spirit, while in the North the so-called upper classes developed along the lines of a wealthy and timid bourgeoisie type, measuring everything by a mercantile standard (a peculiarly debasing one, if taken purely by itself), and submitting to be ruled in local affairs by low, foreign mobs, and in national affairs by their arrogant Southern kinsmen. The militant spirit of these last certainly stood them in good stead in the civil war.

The world has never seen better soldiers than those who followed Lee, and their leader will undoubtedly rank, without any exception, as the very greatest of all the great captains that the English-speaking peoples have brought forth . . .”

(Roosevelt’s Tribute to Lee, Rev. J.H. McNeilly; Confederate Veteran, June 1900, page 257)

Comparable to the vastly outnumbered Texans’ at the Alamo, and similar to Col. William Lamb’s vastly outnumbered and outgunned North Carolinians at Fort Fisher the following month, Fort McAllister’s garrison was fighting an enemy seventeen times their own strength. As is common today, Southern defenders are often termed “Confederates” rather than identified as mostly local men defending their homes, farms, families and State.

At Fort McAllister were the First Regiment, Georgia Reserve’s Companies D and E under Captains George N. Hendry and Angus Morrison, respectively; the Emmet Rifles under Capt. George A. Nicoll; and Capt. Nicholas Clinch’s Light Battery of artillery.

Bernhard Thuersam, www.circa1865.org

Georgia’s Alamo

“The sporadic crackle of musketry echoed through the woods and marshes as Union patrols probed the defenses of Fort McAllister on Tuesday, December 13, 1864. Hunched in the fort were about 230 Confederates commanded by [Savannah native] Major George W. Anderson, Jr. All of them knew they faced a grim and hopeless task in repelling the expected attack.

Behind . . . skirmishers and shielded by forests . . . four thousand Federals were deploying, intent on overrunning the fort at any cost. McAllister had a number of large-caliber guns, but most were aimed at the sea.

Under the direction of engineer Capt. Thomas A. White, the Confederates had done everything possible to strengthen McAllister, especially the landward defenses . . . as [enemy] troops neared the sea.

Anderson realized it would be much more difficult to hold the fort against a land assault, but vowed a fight to the last. “I determined under the circumstances, and notwithstanding the great disparity of numbers, between the garrison and attacking forces, to defend the fort to the last extremity,” he later recalled. Numbering his effectives as 150 men, Anderson added that “with no possible hope of reinforcement, from any quarter, . . . holding the fort was simply a question of time. There was but one alternative – death or captivity.”

The attack was launched shortly after 4PM. Ragged musketry and cannon fire dropped some of the Yankees as they neared the breastworks. Other explosions ripped gaps in the blue line . . . “[and torpedo-mines] were exploded by the tread of the troops, blowing many men to atoms.” “The Federal skirmish line was very heavy and the fire so close and so rapid that it was at times impossible to work our guns,” Anderson said of the [enemy] assault. “My sharpshooters did all in their power, but were entirely too few to suppress this galling fire upon the artillerists.”

[Enemy troops swarmed] onto the embankments to engage the Rebels in hand to hand combat. “[The enemy commander wrote that] There was a pause, a cessation of fire. The smoke cleared away and the parapets were blue with our men, who fired their muskets in the air . . .”

The surviving Confederate troops scrambled into the bombproofs, where the close-quarter fighting continued. The combat swirled for several minutes before the last defenders were overwhelmed. The Southerners “only succumbed as each man was individually overpowered,” [an enemy commander] reported.

“The fort was never surrendered,” Anderson recalled, “It was captured by overwhelming numbers.” Captain Nicholas B. Clinch, Anderson’s artillery commander, personified the Rebels’ mettle. Refusing to surrender, he became engaged in a personal duel with [an enemy captain]. “The two fought for some minutes after the fighting had ceased,” a soldier recalled, “Both were good swordsmen and they were permitted to fight it out.” [The enemy captain] was “severely wounded about the head and shoulders” before other bluecoats intervened and subdued Clinch.

Bayoneted six times, sobered six times, and shot twice, Clinch was captured and survived the war. The fort was taken at 4:30PM, the assault lasting but fifteen minutes.”

(Civil War Savannah, Derek Smith, Frederic C. Beil, Publisher, 1997, pp. 173-178)