Letter – Chester Ellis, 4 January 1864

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Letter written by Sergeant Chester C. Ellis of Company H, 80th IL Volunteer Infantry, to his uncle from Whitesides, TN. Ellis says that his regiment has left the 11th Corps, and are now attached to the 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, 4th Corps, under the command of Colonel Grose of the 36th IN. He writes disparagingly of the “Potomackers,” with whom they fought at Lookout Mountain. Ellis describes the battle as the “grandest” and “coolest” thing he ever saw, and writes how the Army of the Cumberland and the Army of the Potomac stood side by side with General Joseph Hooker and the Eastern Corps. Ellis goes into great detail about the fighting, which lasted a few days. The day after Hooker stormed Lookout Mountain, his regiment marched to support Sherman. They were marching to Knoxville when they heard that Ambrose Burnside had defeated James Longstreet. Ellis describes a difficult march back to camp, beleaguered by cold weather and a lack of provisions. Some men marched barefoot when they wore out their shoes.

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Whitesides Tenn

Jan 4 1864

Dear Unkle

I received your kind letter when we got back to camp after the fight and was glad to hear from you again And I was glad but somewhat surprised to hear that you had been to Ill I did not get [Pru?]’s letter that you spoke of for 2 weeks after I recd yours. I am in good health and we are all in fine spirits the health of our regiment is excellent. We have left the 11th Corps and are permanently attached to the 3rd Brigade 1st Division 4th Corps. The Brigade is commanded by Col Gross of the 36th Ind. that regiment is here and I saw Mr Turner (I believe his name is) the other day. He has left the hospital &

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is with his Reg; We are are all well pleased with our situation for we did not like the Potomackers a bit but they fought like dogs at Lookout Mountain

We were all through the fight at Chattanooga but it happened to be our luck not to be engaged as a Reg: Althought we lost 7 men on our skirmish line ie wounded one (Lieut)

To take the battle from beginning to end it was the grandest as well as the coolest thing I ever saw We left our camp at Lookout Valley about 9 AM of the 22″ and went over to Chattanooga got there after dark the next morning we got up and found the town full of troops: We all knew what was to be done and it was plain to be seen for down on the plain not a mile distant the rebel picket lines

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and back of them were their camp in full view although they had moved a great many the night before. Their lines and ours were from 150 to 200 yds apart

We lay here until noon: And if a stranger had been along and seen us laughing and talking he would have said that we did not know that we were agoing into a fight that day

About 12, the troops were all brought out on to an open field of some 80 or 100 acres & there was about enough to cover it the different divisions were assigned their places, that was prettiest sight I ever saw. There the glorious Old Army of the Cumberland stood with one Corp of the Army of the Potomac side by side while still further on the right was Hooker with the other Eastern Corp and we all well knew

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that Sherman had gone 8 miles up the river to cross with 2 as good corps as ever shouldered a rifle. such determination I dont believe was ever expressed on the countenances of men as were there shown. you could look over that vast army and see men from almost every state & territory from Maine to California. And judgeing from the flags which waved there they were men of the true blue style for some of their flags had been so cut up in former battles, that had every shred been fastened together there would not have made 1/4 yard of cloth. the staffs were in some places almost cut in two by balls – yet they dared to carry them into another perhaps fiercer contest than ever before. About 1 PM some 8 or 10 Regiments commenced filing off down the hill to form a skirmish line Each regiment followed by 8 or 10 men carrying stretchers to bring back the wounded on. They had not been gone long until the cannon from Ft. Wood opened and then the sharp rattle of musketry announced that the ball was opened. in 20 minutes from the time the firing commenced back came the stretchers loaded with wounded

The men went off down the hill as cool as if they were going

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down there to cut wood: every man had when he started, the flaps of his cartridge box raised and buttoned on his coat so that his pills would be handy after they had been fighting some time we started and double quicked it down to the once rebel picket lines 7 found that our skirmishers had driven them from the first line of rifle pits we formed a line of battle & after maneuvering there some time night came on and we lay down and slept sound

The next morning (24″) we were aroused at 2 and after standing around sometime we again lay down and slept until 5. It was today that they shot so many of our skirmishers Sergt Millburn of our Co: was on

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the line at noon I got his dinner and took it down to him. I got up to within 60 yds of him he says “be careful Ellis theyll shoot you sure” he was standing behind a large tree, he came back and while he was eating his dinner I took his post And poked my head around the tree to see if they’d shoot. I was soon satisfied that they would by seeing the smoke of a gun & drawing my head back the ball came whistling past me And concluding that turn about was fair play I levelled my piece and took a pull at them and we had it turn about there for some time. It was playing Ante over on a pretty rough scale but there was some fun in it. While I was there they shot at the man on my right now “says he “you tried me a pull

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poke your skull a little further around the tree and I’ll try you a shot”. They would stand there & tell each other where they shot whether too high too low of too far to the right or left. If it had been me I would have left it to their own judgement & perhaps they would not have hit so often

About 3 oclock Hooker commenced storming Lookout. I thought I had head cannonading before but this surpassed anything I had ever before heard & they kept it up until 12 that night

The next day we marched 8 or 9 miles to the left to support Sherman who was giving them fits up there, we built rifle pits and lay there until next day when after the fog blew away rebs were gone. but for three days we

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here firing from different quarters as they were retreating towards Atlanta. We then struck out for Knoxville and got to within 15 miles of there when we found that Burnside had whipped Longstreet and the latter was retreating. We then turned back & got to our old camp on the 17″ Dec after the hardest marching we ever done. some of our boys marched 3 days barefooted their shoes being worn out & almost every morning the ground would be froze until 10 oclock yet you scarcely ever here a murmur from them. We marched 250 miles in 15 days counting every day that we marched and some we did not go over 8 miles. We had to forage nearly all our provision and when it comes to foraging for 3 army corps you can guess that it makes food scarce If we had went to Knoxville which I was in hopes we would I would have found Hubbard had he been there

Well Uncle I have strung this out about long enough and will quit by asking you to write soon

your Nephiew

Chet C. Ellis

Chester C. Ellis, from Rome, IL, enlisted on August 12, 1862 as a sergeant in Company H, 80^th IL Infantry. After losing heavily at Perryville, KY, the regiment was mounted as infantry in April 1863. Ellis was captured with his regiment at Blount’s Farm, AL on May 3, 1863 by Nathan Bedford Forrest’s command, but was soon paroled. The regiment was exchanged that fall, and Ellis and the 80^th IL participated in the Chattanooga Campaign as part of the 11^th Corps. In 1864, having been assigned to the 4^th Corps, they fought throughout the Atlanta Campaign, but on September 2, 1864 Sergeant Ellis was killed in action at Lovejoy Station, GA.

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 10 February 1864

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Letter written by Private Cecil Fogg of Company B, 36th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, to his father from Chattanooga, TN. Fogg writes that he sent his father his pocket diary from 1863, which he carried while in Tennessee. The arrival of the paymasters leads him to believe they will be paid soon. Fogg has heard that his regiment received marching orders for Knoxville, though they have yet to move. He has continued working on the bridge, along with the 21st Michigan Regiment. Fogg writes that a depot containing overcoats and other clothing recently burned down, having caught fire from a nearby dwelling house that was supposedly set ablaze by a Confederate sympathizer. Fogg concludes by writing that they will take up the dead at Chickamauga and bury them in the Soldiers’ Cemetery near town.

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Chattanooga, Tenn. Feb, 10^th

Father

I rec’d the Tribune Almanac which you sent to me, and the two letters containing money and stamps. I mailed a pocket diary for 1863, which I suppose you will get before this reaches you. It may contain some of the items of interest which I have not written to you. It is too small to write much in. I carried it in my blowse [blouse] pocket the most of the time since we came to Tennessee. The paymasters are here again. We signed the payroll yesterday, and I suppose we will be paid off again shortly. We only get paid for two months this time, and I don’t know as I shall have any [money] to send home this time. Most everything is plenty now, but prices are very

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high. Green apples are bought for $10 per barrel, and retailed out at 10 and 12 cent a piece. Cheese sells at 50 K, 60 cts. and butter 75 cts. to $1.00 per lb. Paper is the cheapest thing I know of now at this place; it can be had for 15 cts. a quire. Two months ago it was selling at 50 cts. It has been reported in camp that we have been under marching orders for Knoxville twice within the last two weeks, but we are still here. One division of our corps is said to have started for Knoxville this morning. They started very early this morning for some place. I have been at work on the bridge for 3 days. It is a large job. We have been at work on it for about a month, and have not got the abutments and piers half done yet. The 21^st Michigan Regt. is working at it too. The soldiers

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do the heavy work and the government pays $2.50 and $3.00 per day to citizens for doing the light work, which we could do just as well as they. There are men here working at the bridge from nearly all the New England states, New York and Pennsylvania, who get $3.00 a day and their board, and don’t work half as hard as we do at 50 cts. a day. There was a fire here on the morning of the 6^th. A depot burned down, and it was said to contain 50,000 overcoats, besides a great quantity of other clothing. It caught fire from a dwelling house nearby, and it is supposed by a good many that it was set on fire by some Rebel sympathizer. I must close now, for we have just rec’d orders to be ready to march at 4 in the morning, and it is after roll call now. We are going out to take up our dead at Chickamauga and bury them at the Soldiers’ Cemetery near town.

Cecil Fogg

Cecil Fogg enlisted in Company B of the 36^th OH Volunteer Infantry on August 12, 1861 at Marietta, OH at the age of 20. He served through his three year term of service and re-enlisted for the war, but was mustered out July 27, 1865 based upon a surgeon’s certificate of disability. The 36th served in West Virginia in 1861, and participated in the battles of South Mountain and Antietam as a part of the 9^th Corps before being transferred west in January 1863. As a part of the Army of the Cumberland’s 14^th Army Corps (George H. Thomas), the regiment fought at Chickamauga and later in the Atlanta and Savannah, GA (March to the Sea) Campaigns.

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 31 January 1864

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Letter of Private Cecil Fogg of Company B, 36th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, to his father from Chattanooga, TN. Fogg writes that sutlers have come to camp, and retracts his previous request for money. He describes a scouting trip to McLenmore Cove where they rescued families of Union Home Guards who had been taken prisoner. Fogg writes that a cavalry expedition to Dalton found no Confederate troops, and that his regiment is still working on a bridge. The 92nd Ohio is working on burying deceased soldiers in the nearby National Cemetery, while other squads are fencing in the depot and repairing the railroad track to Knoxville. Fogg mentions family friends who have re-enlisted in the 40th Ohio, and were at Shell Mound since the fight at Lookout Mountain but are now guarding the railroad. Veterans from the 36th Ohio have begun to return home. Several deserters have been sentenced in a court martial. Fogg discusses the benefits of instating a draft and concludes by mentioning the recent arrival of sanitary stores.

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Chattanooga, Tenn. Jan. 31/64

Father

I have rec’d 3 or 4 letters from you within the last 10 days; 2 of them containing thread. There was enough in the first one to do me, as the sutlers have now come up. I wrote to you on the 17^th for some money. If you have not sent any, you need not now, for I can get along without it till we are paid again. I believe I have not wrote to you since the scout. We were out on a 3 days’ scout to McLenmore Cove. We started out on the 18^th and went up to where we came down the mountain in Sept. We camped there at the foot of the mountain on the night of the 18^th, and the next day we went a few miles farther and loaded up about 16 or 18 wagons

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with some Union families and their household goods, and came back to the place where we camped the night before. We camped there that night and returned to our camp at Chattanooga the next day. The families which we moved in are families of Union Home Guards, who have been taken prisoners by the Rebs. The Home Guards met to organize and elect officers, and the Rebs slipped in on them in our uniform, and took all but 5 or 6 of them. They shot some of them in the own door yard, stripped some of all their clothing, and made them double quick towards Dalton in their bare feet over the frozen ground. It rained the morning we started out there, and the road was very bad that day. But it froze up that night, and snowed a little.

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It thawed a little the next day, and froze up again at night, so we had pretty good walking back to camp. I understand that our cavalry have been out to Dalton and found no enemy there. Our regt. is still at work on the bridge. The 92^nd [Ohio] is engaged at the work of re-interring the bodies of soldiers who have been killed or died, and been buried near this place.

They are burying them in the National Cemetery near this place. There are also squads at work fencing in the depot, and repairing the track between here and Knoxville. And I think the [rail]cars will be running through to that point in a short time. This is a very lively place at present; nearly everybody appears to be doing something. I saw John Williams’ boys a few

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days ago. They are in the 40^th Ohio. Their division passed up the river. They have been at Shell Mound since the fight at Lookout Mt. They have all three re-enlisted, and expect to go home in a short time. They are going up to guard R[ail] Road between here and Knoxville for the present. The veterans of the 36^th (about 54 in number) started home a few days ago. Harrison Adney is one of them. None of the Salem boys in this regt. have re-enlisted yet. I believe Henry Pedin started home a few days ago on furlough. We have had about 2 weeks of the finest weather I ever saw at this time of the year. It realizes my former ideas of the “Sunny South,” but which all were put to flight by that cold snap in the fore part of the month.

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The deserters are catching it pretty hard at the court martial now in session. Three deserters in Co. B were tried a few days ago. They don’t know their sentence yet. Bill McKey is sentenced to one month’s hard labor, and lose 10 month’s wages. His sentence is light. Some have to work 6 months, lose a year’s pay, and after they have worked out their sentence, return to the regt. and make up for all the time they have lost. All your arguments in favor of big bounties for volunteers look to me as though they might be used as arguments on the other side. If the novelty of the thing has worn off and volunteering is a drag, why not draft at once save time and money, and bring out some of the Copperheads into the ranks who never will be there unless they are drafted, or get more than their services

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are worth in the shape of a bounty. If the draft had come off 6 months ago, there would not have been so many loafing soldiers at home pretending to recruit for months at a time when their services are needed in the field. I think the veterans ought to have twice the bounty that a raw recruit gets, for a veteran is worth more to the gov’t than 2 new recruits. Almost every regt. in the service lost more than half their no. before they ever done any service to the government. A regt. will lose one half its no. in getting seasoned to the service.

Some sanitary stores have reached this place, and the sick and wounded in the hospitals in town have had the benefit of some of them. And the hospital attendants and officers are living in closer. They can afford to be generous when they have more than they can use themselves.

Cecil Fogg

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 17 January 1864

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Letter written by Private Cecil Fogg of Company B, 36th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, to his father from Chattanooga, TN. Fogg begins by saying that he is out of money, and requests that his father send him some. He was previously spending a lot of money on food, but expects to spend less now that they get full rations. He mentions that the soldiers at Knoxville have had harder times with less to eat, and are re-enlisting just so they get an opportunity to go home for a few days. Fogg mentions that the 36th Ohio is building a bridge across the Tennessee River.

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Chattanooga, Tenn. Jan. 17^th 1864

Father,

I am out of money again, and expect I will need some before we are paid off again. I wish you would send me about five dollars. Perhaps it would be best to send a dollar or two at a time. I will not need it all at once, and if you send it part at a time, I will be pretty sure to get part if not all of it. If you send it all together it may get lost.

Keep an account of what you have sent me, and what you send me hereafter, and take it out of what I send to you. I have spent a good deal of money here for something to eat, but we get full rations now, and I think things will be cheaper now, for the [rail]cars came in on the 14^th and they are bringing rations in fast now. The soldiers up at Knoxville have had harder times than we have [had] here, I think, and less to eat. They are nearly all re-enlisting up there to get to go home where they can get something to eat. Three regiments arrived her a few days ago from Knoxville on their way home, and a great many are going to start from here in a few days. The 36^th [Ohio] has got into a job of building a bridge across the Tennessee [River] at Chattanooga. Half the regt. works 3 days at it, and then the other half works 3 days. They have put up a portable saw mill, and are at work on the abutments and getting out timber at present. I have not got my coat yet. It is comfortable weather now without an overcoat. If it don’t come, I will get paid for it by the Express Co.

Cecil Fogg

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Letter – Chester Ellis, 4 January 1864

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 10 February 1864

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 31 January 1864

Letter – Cecil Fogg, 17 January 1864