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THE CIVIL WAR
ARTILLERY PAGE |
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Effects of Artillery Fire
The following excerpts are not for the squeamish. I include them at
the Civil War Artillery site because I believe it is important to
remember that the artillery was not created as an abstraction for our
study, but as an instrument of war. War means fighting, and fighting
means killing. I am indebted to Alan Libby for suggesting this section
and providing me with the quotations.
For some horrific illustrations of the effects of artillery fire,
consult the Medical Staff
Press site, which includes images from the Photographic Atlas of
Civil War: Injuries and Orthopaedics Injuries of the Civil War;
Case Descriptions 3 and 6 are artillery wounds. My thanks
to Pamela Denius for suggesting this addition and the link.
Death Four Ranks Deep
As we returned a Yankee battery of eight guns had full play on us in the
field, and our line became a little confused; we halted, every man
instantly turned and faced the battery. As we did so, I heard a thud on
my right, as if one had been struck with a heavy fist. Looking around I
saw a man at my side standing erect, with his head off, a stream of
blood spurting a foot or more from his neck. As I turned farther around,
I saw three others lying on the ground, all killed by this cannon shot.
The man standing was a captain in the 42nd Va. Regt., and his brains and
blood bespattered the face and clothing of one of my company, who was
standing in the rear. This was the second time I saw four men killed by
one shot. The other occurred in the battle of Cedar Run, a few weeks
earlier. Each time the shot struck as it was descending - the first man
had his head taken off, the next was shot through the breast, the next
through the stomach, and the fourth had all his bowels torn out.
From the diary of Pvt. John H. Worsham, 21st Va.
A Cannonball in the Wilderness
"At one point," remembered Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., a young Sixth
Corps aide, "General Sedgwick's. . . headquarters were very accurately
shelled from the left - one struck within a yard of quite a number of
us who were siting on horseback & bounced under the horses." Another
staff aide, Thomas Hyde, was standing near the corps commander when a
stray cannonball decapitated a New Jersey private a few yards away.
The bloody head struck Hyde full in the face, momentarily blinding him
and filling his mouth with brains and gore. Friends moved to help the
shaken aide to his feet, finding to their astonishment that he was
otherwise untouched. " I was not much use as a staff officer for
fully fifteen minutes," Hyde later recalled with a shudder.
Noah Andre Trudeau, Bloody Roads South, page 66.
Col. Wise on the effect of Artillery
"We often hear the sneering criticism that at such and such a battle
but 1 or 2 per cent of the enemy's loss was due to the fire of
artillery. Any such test is entirely erroneous. Not only do the guns exert a
tremendous moral effect in support of their infantry, and adverse to
the enemy, but they do far more. They often actually preclude heavy
damage from the enemy by preventing him from essaying an assault against the
position the guns occupy. Then, again, by forcing the enemy to seek
cover, they eliminate their antagonists to that extent...Let us hear no more
of artillery efficiency as measured by the number of its victims."
Paddy Griffith, Battle Tactics of the Civil War, 1989, p.171
Jan. 5, 1863: The Aftermath of Murfreesboro
.....Nationals and Confederates, young, middle-aged, and old, are
scattered over the woods and fields for miles. Poor Wright, of my old company,
lay at the barricade in the woods which we stormed on the night of the
last day. Many others lay about him. Further on we find men with their
legs shot off; one with brains scooped out with a cannon ball; another
with half a face gone; another with entrails protruding; young Winnegard,
of the 3rd, has one foot off and both legs pierced by grape at the
thighs; another boy lies with his hands clasped above his head, indicating
that his last words were a prayer. Many Confederate sharpshooters lay behind
stumps, rails, and logs shot in the head. A young boy, dressed in the
Confederate uniform, lies with his face turned to the sky, and looks
as if he might be sleeping. Poor boy! what thoughts of home, mother, death,
and eternity, commingled in his brain as the life-blood ebbed away! Many
wounded horses are limping over the field. One mule, I heard of, had
a leg blown off on the first day's battle; next morning it was on the spot
where first wounded; at night it was still standing there, not having moved
an inch all day, patiently suffering, it knew not why nor for what.
John Beatty, The Citizen Soldier or, Memoirs of a Volunteer,
1879, p.211
"We bury our dead"
At five p.m., Bate led the six hundred men of the 37th GA,
20th TN, and the 4th GA Battalion of Sharpshooters into the Poe field. For an
instant, perhaps, the Confederates could see in the fading daylight
the black outline of cannon barrels trained on them from across the field.
Then came the brilliant orange flashes, followed by the report of
twenty guns simultaneously, and the field was blanketed in smoke and blood.
Bate's horse was torn to pieces by canister. The Tennessean mounted
another and kept on. It too was cut down. Both regimental commanders
were struck and Maj. T.D. Caswell fell at the head of his sharpshooters,
nearly half of whom were killed or wounded. For three, maybe four minutes,
the Confederates withstood the pounding. Men fell at the rate of nearly one
every second. Finally, after 180 had been hit, Bate led the rest back into
the woods.
Ambrose Bierce watched the slaughter from behind the batteries:
"Nothing could be heard but the infernal din of their discharge, and
nothing seen through the smoke but a great ascension of dust from the
smitten soil. When all was over and the dust cloud had lifted, the
spectacle was too dreadful to describe. The Confederates were still
there -- all of them, it seemed -- some almost under the muzzles of the
guns. But not a man of all those brave fellows was on his feet, and so
thickly were all covered with dust that they looked as if they had been
reclothed in yellow. `We bury our dead,' said a gunner grimly."
Peter Cozzens, This Terrible Sound: The Battle of
Chickamauga, 1992, pp.256-257.
[Canister is packed in sawdust; the resulting smoke is bright
yellow and even thicker than the clouds of smoke from the black powder
charges.]
Civilian Death
Now it was Minty who was in trouble, and he had to act fast. "My
only means of crossing the creek was Reed's Bridge, a narrow, frail
structure, was planked with loose boards and fence rails, and a bad ford
about three hundred yards farther up," he recalled. By the time Minty's
first squadron trotted across, the head of the rebel column was only five
hundred yards away, "carrying their arms at right shoulder shift, and moving
at the double quick as steadily as if at drill." Mrs. Reed stood on her
porch and jeered the troopers as they rode past her house. "You Yanks are
running! Our army is coming! Our friends will not hurt me!" Just then
Bledsoe's Missouri battery (Confederate) swept the
house with canister, throwing
her mangled body against the door.
Peter Cozzens, This Terrible Sound: The Battle of
Chickamauga, 1992, p. 105.
The following excerpts were taken from Edward A. Moore of the
Rockbridge Artillery, ANV, The Story of a Cannoneer Under Stonewall
Jackson, 1907.
Just after we got to the top of the hill, and within fifty or
one hundred yards of the position we were to take, a shell struck the
off-wheel horse of my gun and burst. The horse was torn to pieces, and the
pieces thrown in every direction. The saddle-horse was also horribly
mangled, the driver's leg was cut off, as was also the foot of a man who was
walking alongside. both men died that night. A white horse working in the
lead looked more like a bay after the catastrophe. To one who had been in
the army but five days, and but five minutes under fire, this seemed an
awful introduction. p.31
As we drove into the road again, I saw several infantrymen
lying horribly torn by shells, and the clothes of one of them on
fire. p.35
[Moore counts 27 holes in walls of a house which had been struck by
three artillery shells.] Being an artilleryman, and therefore
to be exposed to missiles of that kind, I concluded that my chances
for surviving the war were extremely slim. p.49
Still photographed on my memory is the appearance of the body of
one of the Second Virginia Regiment being hauled on our rear caisson.
His head had been shot off, and over the headless trunk was fastened a
white handkerchief, which served as a sort of guide in the
darkness. p. 78
....One of the drivers, Fuller, was lying on the ground, his head
toward the enemy. A shell entered the crown of his head and exploded in his
body! p. 162
So great was the loss of horses, there being over a hundred in
this battery killed in battle, that during the last year of the war they
were unhitched from the guns after going into action and taken to the rear
for safety. p. 315
Mother whose heart hung humble as a button
On the bright splendid shroud of your son -
Do not weep.
War is kind.
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