Battle of Cameron's Depot

Today I circled back on a pet project I started a number of years ago that's sparking my interest once more.  While I was a student at Shepherd University I had the good fortune to meet a local Jefferson County land owner who has been a great friend of mine for the past five years or so.  He owns 200+ acres of some very scenic farmland, and although you'd never know it passing through, battlefield land as well.

The Battle of Cameron's Depot, or Summit Point as it's often called, was one of the opening engagements of the 1864 Valley Campaign.  It was the first sizeable confrontation of Jubal Early's Confederate Army of the Valley and Phil Sheridan's Union Army of the Shenandoah.  The bulk of both armies were within a few miles of one another, and if either commander wanted to really pitch in, it could have gotten very messy.  Early and Sheridan both held back, however, and the day saw a brief but sharp Confederate assault mid-morning, following by a day of brisk skirmishing all up and down the front.

A pretty generic representation of the Battle of Cameron's Depot/Summit Point.

The reason I came across this little known engagement again is I was asked to help out someone looking to interpret the battle for a symposium this summer.  It made me realize I have a lot of unfinished work when it comes to forming a complete picture of the battle, which has hardly anything published about it.  That said, I have a hankering to dive back in.

So, it's to the OR's for me!  It's been too long since I rolled up my sleeves and did some real research.

150 Years Ago Today at Massaponax Church

150 years ago today a fairly well known photograph was taken by Timothy O'Sullivan near Massaponax Church, Virginia.   It captures General in Chief Ulysses Grant, Army of the Potomac commander George Gordon Meade, Assistant Secretary of War Charles Dana, and gobs of their staff officers.  This is one of the more remarkable photos taken during the war.  It amazingly captures the buzzing of activity around federal headquarters, and shows the two most important commanders of the eastern theater of the war at this time planning their next move.  Near the center of the image you'll see Grant leaning over Meade's shoulder, as they review a map of the area:

Now, if this photo was a dead horse, by now it would have been beaten into something resembling patties found on the sandwiches of several large U.S. fast food chains.  It's probably been featured in every notable documentary on the Civil War, and certainly the blogosphere is feasting upon this image today for its 150th anniversary.  Rightfully so, I might add, considering what it captures.  But, while it may be a bit redundant to cover this image here on my modest blog, I have a computer, a brain, and an hour of free time, so why not?

So with that, here we go.

As with most images like this, I tend to be less interested in the well known figures shown, and instead get captivated by the details.  One thing that instantly caught my eye was a wagon towards the background.

On it the maltese cross of the V Corps can clearly be seen.  That's pretty cool to be able to ID a piece of equipment to a particular unit, but can we dive a little deeper into the details here?  There's writing below the cross that says "[something] DIV 5th CORPS."  Sadly this background stuff wasn't quite in focus. But dammit I want to figure out which division this wagon belonged to.  I'm weird, I know.

So, how can we figure this out?  Well, I think we can possibly eliminate two of the four divisions that belonged to the V Corps because of a photo we analyzed last week.

In this photo of the AotP's crossing of the Rapidan earlier in May, we saw the probable insignia of either the 2nd of 4th Divisions of the V Corps.  Those two were mostly made up of troops from the discontinued I Corps, hence the circle inside the maltese cross.  If we assume that the wagons of these two divisions had the combined insignia, which I'm not saying we really should, then you could make an argument that the wagon in the Massaponax image was probably from the 1st or 3rd Divisions of the V Corps.  Unfortunately the writing in that image is blurred so we'll never know.

But wait!  Look at the dude standing beside the wagon:

He's wearing a fez!  That means he's zouave!  As far as I know only the 1st Division of the V Corps had zouaves...but no, I don't think that logic will take us anywhere.  You see, one of the regiments of the headquarters guard at this time was the 114th Pennsylvania, a.k.a. Collis' Zouaves that almost certainly would have been nearby at this time.  Here's a photo of them later on in 1864:

Looking elsewhere in the photo, it seems this image wasn't exactly candid:

Many of the staff officers are definitely aware there's a photographer here, and it seems can't help but pose.  My favorite personality, however, doesn't seem to care if he was being made famous:

And for good reason.  Look at the guy towards the top of this zoom.  He was observing, and probably hearing, what Grant and Meade were discussing, oblivious to his surroundings.  I hope this guy ended up having grandkids, because the story of witnessing these two men plan the second half of the Overland Campaign is a tale I sure would have been proud to pass on.

With a view like this, O'Sullivan was sure to take multiple shots of the scene.  Here's one he took in stereoview:

In this version Grant is sitting down on one of the benches, looking like he is quietly thinking while puffing a cigar.  

So, could this second image help us with our wagon mystery from earlier?  Maybe O'Sullivan changed his focus enough to let us read the writing in this one.

Sadly, no.  The wagon train was in motion during this shot, and therefore blurred in the background.  Oh, well.

One last note on this scene is a seemingly random and nondescript soldier caught in the photo.

Amazingly enough, through some detective work much more thorough than mine, in 2011 the authors of Mysteries and Conundrums posted about the identity of this fellow.  It's a pretty neat post, and I highly recommend it.  This man, named Leander Herron, would actually go on to receive a Medal of Honor for actions that occurred in Kansas in 1868, where Herron was posted as a soldier in the 3rd United States Infantry following his Civil War service.

Crossing the Rapidan - Part II

Today I'll look at two more images of the Army of the Potomac's crossing of the Rapidan River in May of 1864.  These two will be scans direct from the original plates, unlike Part I's photo which was a scan of a reprint of the original image.  The images show the AotP's movement south to engage Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in a series of brutal battles collectively known as the Overland Campaign.  The day after these photos were taken, the campaign kicked off with the Battle of the Wilderness on May 5, 1864.

Let's start out with a look at some federal artillery in motion:

Photos of artillery batteries all limbered up and ready to go are usually my favorites to look at.  When guiding at Gettysburg, one aspect of the battle that usually blows peoples' minds is the logistics of moving the huge amount of cannon that supported the armies.  Folks unfamiliar with mid-19th Century military logistics (a.k.a. normal people) take for granted that the guns on the battlefield were positioned where they were, without giving much thought as to how they got to or left those positions.  Even in reenacting, you almost always see guns go into action being pulled by Suburbans, not six horses.  So, images like the one above convey the scale and limitations of artillery deployment during the Civil War like nothing else today can.  The only thing that might compare is a reenacting group wealthy enough to afford the equipment, guns, horses, and insurance required to accurately portray a full battery going into action.

Anyway, this photo, taken on May 4, 1864, shows a battery that possibly belonged to the VI Corps crossing the pontoon bridge at Germanna Ford on the Rapidan.

A close inspection in the zoom above shows a gun being pulled on its limber by six horses, followed by a caisson also pulled by six horses.  The background of the photo also shows various battery wagons and other vehicles required for the movement and operation of the guns in battle.  The ground would have shaken when one of these guns rolled by, and you wouldn't want to get in its way.

So, what about the infantry?  In these posts so far we've looked at the quartermaster and artillery branches, but no foot soldiers.  Lucky for us, photographers on site in 1864 took the time to try and capture a federal infantry column on the move:

This amazing image shows federal infantry, probably from the VI Corps, crossing the same bridge pictured above.  It is just simply amazing that we're able to look back 150 years ago with such detail.

This image show what makes me think these troops belong to the VI Corps.  The corps insignia on the wagons is the Greek cross, which was the symbol assigned to the VI Corps early in 1863.

This is one of my favorite images from the war.  You just simply don't see this all that often.  The precision to which we know when and where this photo was taken means that many of the men pictured here would not make it through the next day, or indeed the next several weeks as the Overland Campaign ground on.  I love the motion that these wet plate images convey.  Sure the figures are blurred because of the long exposure time, but you can infer many details from nuances like that. For instance, you'll see that the men on the right side of the zoom are more blurred than on the right side.  That means the column was probably halted when the photographer began this exposure.  Mid-way through the command "Forward, March!" came down the line and the front of the column began to move.  But, by the time the photographer covered back up his lens, the rear of the column to the left hadn't been able to move forward yet, hence their relative clarity.

There's one other detail of this photo that has been the source of wild speculation on my part:

There's this group of riders just above the bridges.  Who could these guys be, cavalry?  I think not.  To me this looks like a general and his staff.  I count thirteen riders in this group, though.  That might seem like a lot of staff for one general to have...but wait a tick:

Here's a photo of Major General John Sedgwick and his staff, taken at the AotP's winter camp near Brandy Station a few months before the Overland Campaign.  I count thirteen officers here, which kinda matches up with the group of mounted men in the Germanna Ford photo.  Also, Sedgwick commanded the VI Corps, whose troops are likely the ones in the photo.  There's no way to prove it, and I'm probably wrong, but I'd like to think that one of those riders is Sedgwick, who would become a martyr to the Union cause just five days after his men crossed at Germanna Ford.

Crossing the Rapidan - Part I

The 150th seems to be flying by as we now find ourselves in the middle of the commemorations of the 1864 Overland Campaign.  With my work in Gettysburg I'm sadly missing out on the many living histories and reenactments going on around Fredericksburg.  But, giving tours on the Gettysburg Battlefield is still a great way to spend my weekends, so I shouldn't really be complaining.  This doesn't mean I can't vicariously experience the Overland Campaign 150th, though, and my favorite way to do that is through period photos from the Library of Congress' digital collections.

Three photos that have caught my eye recently are of the Army of the Potomac's crossing of the Rapidan River in early May of 1864 on the eve of the Battle of the Wilderness.  The three I'll focus on today each offer amazing views of what the AotP would have looked like on the move, and provide exquisite detail thanks to the high resolution copies made available by the LoC.

So, let's have a look at our first image:

This shot shows wagons of the V Corps crossing a river.  There are contradicting captions for this image on the LoC website, but I think it shows the V Corps' crossing of the Rapidan in early May of 1864.  I feel confident of the date because of the corps insignia painted on the covers of the wagons.

You'll see that there is a I Corps circle nested into the V Corps Maltese cross insignia.  During the AotP's reorganization in early 1864, the I Corps was discontinued and consolidated into two divisions under John C. Robinson and James S. Wadsworth.  Not wanting to let go of their old insignia, the men of the former I Corps were allowed to wear their old badges, and I reckon to distinguish their wagons from the other V Corps Divisions they utilized the combined symbol.  I haven't found documentation to back up this claim, but would be interested to know how this might have come about.  This to me shows that the spring of 1864 is the earliest date this photo could have been taken.

There are other markings seen on these wagons that are harder to decipher.

On the leftmost wagon in this shot, there's a "3 4" visible.  My first thought was this might belong to a regiment with the numeral 34.  Unfortunately it's not that simple, because the only unit in the AotP at this time numbered 34 was the 34th New York Light Artillery Battery, which was a part of the IX Corps.

All the men pictured seem rather nonchalant.  If I was in the middle of a swift river standing on a temporary pontoon bridge weighted down by several tons of wagons, ammunition, supplies, men, and horse muscle that could break loose any moment, I'd be a little uneasy.  On the bright side, the traffic jam up the road that caused these wagons to pause enabled these men to be photographed, preserving their memory for the use on blogs 150 years later.

In the background we see that there's plenty more wagons coming around the bend and maneuvering down the steep bank to the bridge.  This photo really provides an amazing view into what the seemingly endless trains of men, guns and wagons looked like when an army of 100,000 men was on the move.

Finally, there's one figure in this photo who I'd be very curious to know about.  That's the man sitting next to the dog tent and what looks like a little shack to the right of the bridge on the far bank.  What's this guy's purpose here?  Is the shack his office?  Is he tasked in some way with managing the crossing, maybe keeping track of whose going over and what they have?  I'm not sure, but I can't help imagining his job being something like this:

While he may not of asked each person who crossed five three questions, the name "Bridge of Death" would probably be a good name for the crossing he overlooked in the photo.  While mostly veterans, I think its safe to say the men of the AotP who crossed at Germanna Ford in early May of 1864 could not have imagined the grueling campaign that lay before them.  Inside of two months from when this photo was taken between 50 and 60,000 federal soldiers would be killed, wounded, or captured.

This is just the first installment of photo analysis from the AotP's crossings.  In the next few day's I'll take a look at two more images struck at about the same time, so stay tuned.