Death came many ways...

[K Bartsch]

In an account of the defense of Charleston published in 1890, author John Johnson shared a bizarre anecdote.

Background, July 11, 1863. First assault of Battery Wagner on Morris Island by Federals. Under leadership of BG G. C. Strong, the assault force composed of 6th Penn., 9th Maine, four companies of 7th Conn. with two NH regt's in reserve attacked at dawn and was repulsed with loss of 330. The 7th Conn lost 104 out of 196 engaged. Confederate losses totalled 12. (note: the "Glory" assault which included the 54th Mass would not occur until the second attack on 18 July.)

"THE WORK OF AN OLD SHOE HEEL - The author has been told by Mr Philip J. Langley, who was in the fight [on the 11th] that when he was detailed from his command, the Twelfth Georgia Battalion, to bury the enemy dead in front of the battery, a soldier, mortally wounded asked him the strange question: 'What have you been firing? Haven't you any powder and shot?' On being answered that there could be no doubt of that, the man held up an old shoe-heel, saying, 'This was fired at me with your canister, and this has killed me!' He had drawn it out from his wound and died soon after."

Cordially,
K. Bartsch

[SCSecesh]

Re: Death came many ways...

Was this Johnson, Captain John Johnson of Company D 25th SC?

[County Militia]

Re: Death came many ways...

If the discussion is about strange ways of dying, then I found a few examples of it in Sam Watkins' memoirs, Company Aytch.

One incident he writes of is as follows:

Ten Men Killed at the Mourners' Bench


At this place (Dalton) a revival of religion sprang up, and there was divine service every day and night. Soldiers became serious ont he subject of their souls' salvation. In sweeping the streets and cleaning up, and old tree had been set on fire, and had been smoking and burning for several days, and nobody seemed to notice it. That night there was service as usual, and the singing and sermon were excellent. The sermon was preached by Rev. J. G. Bolton, Chaplain of the Fiftieth Tennessee Regiment, assisted by Rev. C. D. Elliott, the services being held in the Fourth Tennessee Regiment. As it was the custom to "call up mourners," a long bench had been placed in proper position of them to kneel down at. Ten of them were kneeling at this mourners' bench, pouring out their souls in prayer to God, asking Him for the forgiveness of their sins, and for the salvation of their souls, for Jesus Christ their Redeemer's sake, when the burning tree, without any warning, fell with a crash right across the ten mourners, crushing and killing them instantly. God heard their prayers. Their souls had been carried to Heaven. Hereafter, henceforth, and forever more, there was no marching, battling etc. etc...

By order of the General, they were buried with great pomp and splendor, that is, for those times. Every one the was buried in a coffin. Brass bands followed, playing the "Dead March," and platoons fired over their graves. Etc. Etc....

Another incident is of Sam's buddy being killed in a tornado when bricks fell on top of him, crushing him. I'll try and find the passage soon.

[K Bartsch]

Re: Death came many ways...

David,

Neither,
He was John Johnson, Major of Engineers, CSA.

This history was actually commissioned by PGT Beauregard personally on 19 April 1864. The board of officers he appointed consisted of; Pierre Soule, one of Gus's aides (PRESIDENT); Maj WS Basinger, 18th Georgia Battalion (AKA Savannah Volunteer Guards); Capt John Johnson, Engineers; Lt John R. Key, Engineers (draughtsman.)

Of course, the war sort of got in the way with the project. Johnson, a Charleston resident after the war, finished it by himself and it was completed and published by Walker, Evans and Cogswell in Charleston in 1890 being entitled "The Defense of Charleston Harbor, including Ft Sumter and the Adjacent Islands 1863 - 1865." Two of the other original board members reviewed Johnson's text and Beauregard prepared a forward in which they all claim Johnson got it right.The copy I own is a reprint published in 1994 by Guild Bindery Press, Germantown TN.

Cordially,
K. Bartsch
"Save Morris Island!"

[styler]

Re: Death came many ways...

"... a soldier, mortally wounded asked him the strange question: 'What have you been firing? Haven't you any powder and shot?' On being answered that there could be no doubt of that, the man held up an old shoe-heel, saying, 'This was fired at me with your canister, and this has killed me!' He had drawn it out from his wound and died soon after."

I wonder if the heel was knocked off a comrade and struck the other dead.

"...it is all hell." -W.T. Sherman

[K Bartsch]

Re: Death came many ways...

I don't know Steve. Seems like a force sufficient to shoot off a guys shoe heel and imbed it into another guys gut would probably have taken off the foot too. Who knows? Speculation of course, but I tend to believe Wagner's defenders were firing canister fast and furious and some #2 cannoneer may well have tossed in junk lying around his embrasure for good measure.

Cordially,

[County Militia]

Re: Death came many ways...

The other incident:

"Poor" Berry Morgan


...Our regiment had been out to the front, on duty, and was returning to camp. It was nearly dark, and we saw a black wind cloud rising. The lightning's flash and the deep muttering thunders warned us to seek shelter as speedily as possible. Some of us ran in under the old depot shed, and soon the storm struck us. It was a tornado that made a track through the woods beyond Shelbyville, and right through the town, and we could follow it's course for miles where it had blown the timber, twisting and piling it in every shape. Berry Morgan and I had ever been close friends, and we threw down our blankets and were lying side by side, when I saw roofs of houses, sign boards, and brickbats flying in every direction. Nearly half the town was blown away in the storm. While looking at the storm without, I felt the old shed suddenly jar and tremble, and suddenly became unroofed, and it seemed to me that ten thousand brickbats had fallen around us. I could hear nothing for the roaring of the storm, and could see nothing for the blinding rain and flying dirt and bricks and other rubbush. The stown lasted but a few minutes, but those minutes seemed ages. When it had passed, I turned to look at "poor Berry." Poor fellow! His head was crushed in by a brickbat, his breast crushed in by another, and I think his arm broken, and he otherwise mutilated. Many others of our regiment were wounded.

etc...

[K Bartsch]

Re: Death came many ways...

This from my self-effacing comrade Bruce Rollin, who either was too busy, or simply didn't think our A-C friends would find it as fascinating as us Palm-eating artillery types:

Regarding shoe-heels and other such junk being used as ordnance as reported by Johnson:

"...from the site where several CS munitions trains were blown up to prevent their capture. Strikes me this was a tad west of Cheraw & east of Columbia. The locale was well known, albeit on some sorta hunt club, and off limits. A coupla folks managed to get permission & get in, circa '70s/'80s. They got all sorts of quick hits on their metal detectors, started diggin' & then they spent a LOT of time throwing away all sorts of scap iron bits n'bobs, nails, screws, chunks of metal, whatever. That is until they unearthed the rusting remains of a canister, 12 pdr as I recall, with just this sorta shop floor sweepings junk INSIDE IT!!!!!! Thus scrap becomes munitions.

While its not proof positive that Johnson was told the truth, I'm a believer. And it makes a LOT more sense than No 2 just grabbin' hunks of metal, in his copious free time, & stuffing it down the bore AFTER he inserts the round. What gunner worth his salt or No 1 for that matter, would stand for that behaviour anyhow??

These cars had originated in Charleston, sent north & west when the city was evacuated, then kept on the move as Sherman swung into the State. As I recall lack of motive power & either damaged or destroyed bridges prevented the trains' further escape. When detonated, the explosions were heard in both Columbia AND Charleston!! Their contents would have been of either Charleston manufacture, materials shipped to the Charleston Depot from in-state (Think State Military Works in Greenville or foundries around Cola) or blockade run items, most likely the former. It seems logical, likely & prudent for the Confederacy to make use of scrap metal in such an efficient fashion. Granted the ballistic coefficient of irregular metal chunks won't produce the pattern, or range, of iron balls, but under 200 yards who cares?? I have no doubt that the munitions expended at Battery Wagner were produced in state. I'll go back & do some more checking, but the trains were there [and their freight destroyed,] we know what the relic hunters found, and it all ties to Johnson's anecdote!! "


Throwing everything but the kitchen sink at 'em,

Cordially,

[County Militia]

Re: Death came many ways...

This reminds me of Pirates of the Caribbean a tad bit. The pirates threw all heavier things overboard in an effort to escape the pursuer. So, they threw all the solid shot into the sea. They weren't able to escape the pursuer, and they were forced to fight. Without any solid shot, they loaded their cannons with nails, forks, knives, spoons and junk of that sort. In a scene, they fire one of the cannons and a fork comes hurtling out and hits an enemy pirate in his glass eye. He moves his eye around, and the fork, because it is stuck in the eye, moves with it.

Sorry, but it just emmensely reminds of that scene.



But on the War munitions topic -- If it can kill a person if lobbed out from a cannon, so be it, I say! A shoe heel can kill an attacker just as well as a bullet can.

[SCSecesh]

Everything but the kitchen sink . . .

"Uncle R."s house has been broken into and robbed . . . All the lead pipe that was exposed, the copper boiler from the kitchen, the lead from the bathing tubs and pantry, all have been torn away . . . In Mr. B's house they have ripped up the floors for the pipe & taken the lead from the roof."
Gus Smythe - Charleston 1863

"I remember that the window-weights and loose lead about homes yielded 200,000 pounds in Charleston alone."
Col.Josiah Gorgas, Chief of Confederate Ordance Bureau

[DukeRPSC]

Re: Not on the agenda, I'm sure

I'll have to look this up to confirm the source. It may be I'm recalling Elisha Hunt Rhodes' "All for the Union." Anyway, there was an account of an officers' meeting in one of the officers' tents. Someone's revolver accidentally discharge killing one of the other officers there.

I guess that'll teach 'em to use a revolver as a gavel to call the meeting to order.