 |
| Wheat's Louisiana Tigers helped rout the Federal forces at Front Royal, Virginia on May 23, 1862 150-years-ago. Seen here is reenactor Luke Jones portraying one of Wheat's Tigers. (Photo by Mike Jones) |
The attack began
soon after Belle Boyd’s dramatic appearance, about 1:45 p.m., with the
Marylanders and Louisianans swooping down the hill and scooping up the advance
pickets. Jackson, Ewell, and their staffs were close behind. Campbell Brown, aide-de-camp on Ewell’s staff,
gave this impression of Wheat’s Battalion: “I shall never forget the style in
which Wheat’s Battalion passed us, as we stood on the road. He was riding full
gallop, yelling at the top of his voice – his big sergeant major running at top
speed just after him, calling to the men to come on -- & they strung out
according to their speed or ‘stomach for the fight,’ following after – all
running – all yelling – all looking like fight. Their peculiar Zouave dress,
light striped, baggy pants, bronzed and desperate faces wild excitement made up
a glorious picture. Wheat himself looked as handsome in a fight as any man I
ever saw. . . . That day, the enemy having hurried across the bridge tried to
fire it. Wheat’s position, on the right of Johnson, brought him nearer their
line of retreat & consequently he was the first man at the bridge. He put
spurs to his horse, galloped through the already kindled flame in the face of
enemy fire, & saved the bridge – so I was told by him and others at the
time and afterwards & never heard it denied.”
When the Confederates got into the town, the battle
developed into a rare urban battle with fighting house to house. The civilians
in town also recorded their impressions. Lucy Buck wrote in her diary, “There was heard the
quick, sharp report of a rifle, and another and another in rapid succession.
Going to the door we saw Yankees scampering over the meadow below our house and
were at a loss how to account for such evident excitement on their part until
presently Miss B. White rushed in with purple face and disheveled hair crying –
‘Oh my God! The Southern Army is upon them – the hill above is black with our
boys.’ ”[1]
Col. Johnson halted his Marylanders on the
edge of town so they could catch their breath. They then began the process of
taking a building that was being used as a hospital. “. . . Major Wheat shot by
like a rocket, his red hat gleaming, revolver in hand, and in first, throwing
his shots right and left. The hospital was taken,” Johnson wrote. The Federals
fired from the hospital windows and wounded six Marylanders. As they pushed
through the town, Johnson could see the enemy had a line of battle on the side
of a hill on the road to Winchester. The bluecoat skirmishers came rapidly down
the hill and into a wheat field. The Confederates met them with the Marylanders
on the right side of the road and Wheat’s Tigers on the left. “The enemy opened
on us sharply with shell from two pieces, and though shooting remarkably well,
did no execution. During the rest of the afternoon, after a short struggle,
their skirmishers were driven back, and Captain Nicholas was ordered to take a
white house to the left of the road, which would give us flank fire on their
line. . . . Nicholas got nearly to his position, but was obliged to give ground
on account of Wheat’s battalion falling back and exposing his flank,” Johnson
wrote. [2]
Johnson was referring to the Federals who had
reformed in a strong line on Richardson’s Hill,
and with two rifled artillery pieces prevented the Confederates from
directly charging their infantry position. Due to the strung out condition of
the Confederate army, the attackers were unable to bring up their own rifled
pieces in time to provide effective counter-battery fire. Taylor sent the 8th
Louisiana Infantry across the North Fork bridge, which the
Federals had tried to burn, and the 6th Louisiana to the left to outflank the desperate
northerners. Realizing he had been outflanked, Colonel Kenly withdrew to save
his command. Johnson and Wheat then led their men in a run on the abandoned
position and a Maryland private captured the enemy’s colors. The Confederate
cavalry, Lt. Col. Flournoy’s 6th Virginia, caught up with
the Federals at Cedarville and the Virginians badly cut them up with their
sabers before the bluecoats surrendered. Kenly was wounded and captured. In his official report, Taylor wrote of the
Tigers at the opening of the engagement, “Here Major Wheat’s battalion, of five
companies, was immediately ordered forward into the town, to assist the
Maryland regiment in dislodging the enemy, the Sixth Louisiana Regiment
following as a reserve.” After the town was cleared, “Major Wheat performed his
part in gallant style, charging through the town, and drawing up his command on
the bank of the Shenandoah in a position sheltered from enemy’s shells . . . .”
Wheat’s Battalion lost one man killed and six wounded in the Battle of Front
Royal. Another sidebar to the story of Wheat’s Tigers at Front Royal is their
capture of a train chugging in to the town with tons of supplies for the
Federal army, during the afternoon lull in the battle. Since communications had been cut off before
the battle, the train engineer had no idea he was entering a combat zone.
Wheat, seeing the slow moving train, and always quick to seize an opportunity,
swarmed the engine, hopped on, began tooting the horns and taking control of
more loot for themselves and the Confederate army. [3]
Lucy
Buck also
wrote in her diary of an amusing joke the “N.O. Tigers” played on the “Yankees.”
She wrote, ‘The Tigers doffed their uniforms and donned the Yankee blue. Then
they got on the cars and steamed off to Markham where the news of the fall of
Front Royal had not arrived and the Federal troops of course took them to be
some of their own men and coming out of quarters at the invitation of the
Tigers a number of them concluded to ‘take a ride a little way.’ The hospitable
Rebels not only extended the ride to Front Royal but also gave them lodging and
board there.” The next morning Lucy noted that she had some of the Tigers and
other Louisiana troops over for breakfast at the Buck home, which was called
Bel Air.
[1] William Buck, Sad
Earth, Sweet Heaven, The Diary of Lucy Rebecca Buck, (Buck Publishing Co.,
Front Royal, Va. 1995) 78.
[3] Driver, First
and Second Maryland Infantry, 70-75. Ecelebarger, Three Days in the Shenandoah, 88, 89. Official Records, Reports of
Brig. Gen. Richard Taylor, Vol. 12, Series 1, 800. Robert G. Tanner, Stonewall in the Valley: Thomas J.
“Stonewall” Jackson’s Shenandoah Valley Campaign, Spring 1862, (Doubleday
& Company, Inc., Garden City, N.Y. 1855) 213.
No comments:
Post a Comment