6

A Big Review and a Little Fight

Although the regiment was lively enough and itching for combat, the Wildcats had become somewhat tamer. Captain Holland, Company A, wrote home that the men were "not as wild and ungovernable as last spring."

After the Dranesville reconnaissance the division settled down to camp drill and occasional patrols The Bucktails drew more of the latter than the other regiment. McClellan, soon to become general-in-chief, was determined to whip the Army into shape. Reviews of the various units by "Little Mac" were frequent during this period. On October 28 he reviewed McCall's Division.

At night hundreds of camp fires lit up the hills and the sound of music came from many of them. The banjo, fiddle,

and tucker sticks were the popular instruments, and almost every night these could be heard until tattoo told the men to turn in. It is a little difficult to imagine erstwhile lumber men from the Wildcat District dancing with each other on

those chilly evenings in the late fall of '61. Some wrote home that they did.[1]

The air was clear and cool and a pale moon was hanging near the horizon on a morning in mid-November. It was four o'clock, and all over Camp Pierpont was the roll of drums. It was to be a big day for the sleepy soldiers. Today McClellan was staging one of his grander reviews It was to

take place at Bailey's Cross Roads, near Munson's Hill six miles from Pierpont. McCall moved the division early, and the curious Bucktails had an opportunity to examine the place where the enemy had been only a short time before. The place was only eight miles from Washington. With all restrictions on crossing into Virginia temporarily lifted, the morning saw a general exodus from Washington to Bailey's Cross Roads. Before noon the troops were massed in a solid semicircle to await the arrival of the dignitaries. Lincoln's carriage drove up about twelve o'clock. The President was accompanied by Secretary of State Seward and Simon Cameron, still head of the War Department. Suddenly every soldier began to cheer and every feminine handkerchief fluttered in the breeze. There were the Army's commander, his staff, and a guard of eighteen hundred cavalry. No sooner had the jingling of McClellan's arrival subsided than the earth began to tremble with the booming of one hundred guns. Upwards of seventy thousand soldiers and many thousands of civilian spectators waited for the salute to end. Then came a shrill blast of a score of trumpets. This was the signal for "Little Mac" and staff to charge off at a clinking gallop. They were followed by the President and the entire entourage in a ride around all seven massed divisions This consumed most of an hour as the blue-uniformed lines reached several miles. The common soldier had time to catch his breath and contemplate in general the pageantry of the occasion.

When the ride was completed, each band in turn struck up a marching air, the regiments changed direction, and the grand review was on. In McCall's Division it was the First Rifes in the lead. With "bucktails proudly cocked in nearly every hat from the colonel down to the lowliest private," they marched. A year before not one of those lumbermen

and farm boys from the mountains of Pennsylvania would have dreamed that this day they would be reviewed by the general-in-chief and the President of the United States.

That night back in Camp Pierpont the boys talked over the events of the day. One private remarked that McClellan looked so "young and full of youthful hope, while Lincoln looked old and careworn." One wonders whether anyone noted the irony in the selection of a spot so close to Munson's Hill for such a grand review. It was at Munson's Hill where the "Rebs" had left the Quaker guns made of logs and pasteboard just a few weeks before .[2]

Shortly after the grand review Colonel Biddle resigned his commission to enter Congress. He had been elected to represent a Philadelphia district at a special election the previous July. After several months of thought on the matter Biddle had decided that he could not do justice to two jobs, and he chose the civilian post. There was some bitterness among the Bucktails over the decision of their colonel, but it was mostly genuine regret. One commissioned officer had this to say: "he made a regiment out of a group of awkard mountaineers." A private was even stronger in his praise: "A boy of ten might better lose his father and his mother and be thrown penniless upon the world than we to lose our little colonel." Biddle's departure made the Bucktails' Thanksgiving Day a sad one. They ate oysters which they considered a rare delicacy, and had a shooting match with prizes of a turkey, two barrels of apples and twelve pairs of sox.[3]

The last month of 1861 saw Joe Johnston's Confederate Army still centered around the Manassas-Centreville area. McClellan had his Army of the Potomac concentrated in front of Washington on the Virginia side of the river. There were units up the Potomac and as far away as lower Mary-

land. McCall's Division near Langley could be considered. the right wing.

On the evening of December 19, a courier rode to McCall's headquarters and reported that a strong enemy forag-

ing party and wagon train would be at Dranesville the next day. The general considered that part of Virginia his own

special preserve for foraging. He lost no time in issuing an order to General Edward O. C. Ord, in command of the

Third Brigade. Ord would advance toward Dranesville at six o'clock the next morning. He would drive back the

enemy's pickets and he would also forage. The brigadier would e assigned the battery of Captain Hezekiah Easton

(Battery A, First Pennsylvania Reserves, Artillery and two squadrons of cavalry. The Bucktails would go along as

skirmishers.

The air was cold and a thin frost covered the ground as the First Rifles, preceded by the cavalry, started along the Dranesville Road. This road was now becoming somewhat familiar to the Bucktails. They had been this way several times including the day of Ball's Bluff. As the column left Difficult Creek, Company A was advanced as skirmishers and Companies G and E were to the right and left as flankers. In this cautious manner the last four of the twelve miles to Dranesville were covered without incident.[4]

Dranesville was on the Alexandria-Leesburg Turnpike about fifteen miles east of Leesburg. Just east of the town, the road on which Ord's force had advanced, running southwesterly, converged with the turnpike at about a forty-five degree angle. Just east of this convergence the road from Centreville, running somewhat northeasterly, hit the turnpike at about the same angle. When Ord reached Dranesville, his brigade was vulnerable to attack by any enemy advancing up the Centreville Road. Ord realized this, sus-

pected an attack from that direction, and took steps to guard against it. He posted the cavalry, the battery, the Ninth Regiment, and two companies of Bucktails in a position to guard the Centreville approaches. Ord, soon due for promotion, was getting ready for a fight. The brigadier looked at the soldiers from the northern Pennsylvania hills and said: "Come down on them, boys, like the wildcat in the mountain." Kane, who again was in command of the regiment by reason of-his rank, was ordered to occupy the turnpike with the rest of the Bucktails. In this position Ord waited for the rest of his forces to come up. South of the turnpike on either side of the Centreville Road were open fields and back of them was higher woodland.[5]

Coming up the Centreville Road on this same morning were four regiments of Confederate infantry, a battery, and two squadrons of cavalry, in all about 1,750 men. They were under the command of Brigadier General J. E B. Stuart, whose mission was to cover a wagon train, sent up from Centreville to collect forage. Unwarned by the Confederate pic- kets, who fell back from Dranesville at Ord's approach, Stuart, a short distance south of Dranesville sent his wagons off to the west of the town. The Cavalier, who had not bothered to examine the area, had intended to cover his wagons from Dranesville. But Dranesville was full of Ord's Yankees, who already knew about Stuart's foragers west of the town. Sending his cavalry to round up the wagons, it appeared to Stuart that he had better attack to protect the train.[6]

Ord's messenger with the order to form on the turnpike found Kane and the rest of his Rifles hastily returning from higher ground toward the Potomac. The Bucktail commander had previously been ordered to scout this area and had discovered the enemy coming up the Centreville Road. By the time the Wildcats, on the double-quick, had gained

the turnpike, Company E, which had been advanced as skirmishers, was being driven in, an A. S. Cutt's Georgia

Battery of six guns had opened with shell and grape. The Confederate artillery was in the Centreville Road five hu -

dred yards away and the infantry, concealed by the woods, was advancing on both sides. Kane led the Bucktails to the

open field southeast of the road intersection and formed his line. A brick house, standing well back from the turnpike

close to the woods, was occupied. This put the Bucktails on the Union left, with the Sixth Reserves in the center, and the

Ninth on the right-both regiments west of the Centreville Road. When Stuart ordered his artillery to open, shooting

up the Centreville Road, he hoped to enfilade the turnpike and prevent the return of the regiments that had crossed the

intersection. The Rebel shot and shell, although inaccurate, caused considerable commotion in the Union ranks, most of

whom were under fire for the first time. Easton's Battery consisted of two 24-pound howitzers and two 12-pounders. Ord

ordered Easton to place these guns just north of the turnpike at the intersection. The eager young artillery captain rushed

his pieces down the turnpike right past the selected position capsizing one of the howitzers. He got three of the guns into

position and opened fire about fifteen minutes after the Rebel artillery had opened.[7]

Things were getting quite warm for the Bucktails whose line had now been extended west of the Centreville Road.

Stuart had ordered three regiments out of the woods on the Confederate right in an attempt to turn the Union left. The Tenth Alabama came charging down the hill with a yell, a little later, the Sixth South Carolina. They were met with a

shower of bullets from every available opening in the two story brick house which had been taken over by the Buck-

tails. Dr. S. D. Freeman, regimental surgeon, had decided that the house would make a good field hospital if one were needed after the fight. Making a tour of inspection at the height of the engagement, he passed the open door of one of the second-floor rooms. Looking in, he saw one lone Bucktail. While his comrades were doing their best to fight off the Rebels, Private E. W. Seamans had been examining the contents of a dresser in the room. The astonished doctor saw the cool, but vain lumberman, bent double in front of a little mirror, calmly oiling his hair.[8]

The Wildcats were at last getting the action they had been waiting for so long They were well-supported by the Sixth. The Ninth fighting in the woods on the right was also doing well. The pressure there was not as great as on the Buc tail flank, but the Ninth had gotten off to a bad start. The woods were thick, and, supposing the enemy to be Bucktails, the Ninth had permitted the Rebels to get in the first fire. The initial confusion finally cleared.

Captain Easton (who would be killed within the next few months, after messing things up in getting into position.

made amends and more. Guessing as to the location of his target from the smoke of the enemy guns, the captain sent his

shells into the woods. Stuart himself said that every shot "was dealing destruction on either man, limber or horse." The artillerist's third shell hit an enemy caisson setting off a terrible explosion which decapitated three of Cutt's cannoneers. After it had been righted, Ord sent Easton's capsized gun to a point on the extreme Union left. From here Easton could beautifully enfilade the Centreville Road. This helped to break the Confederate line and may have produced the impression that the Federals had been reinforced .[9]

The action had started about 2:30 P.m. and between three

and four o'clock the Union brigade commander ordered a general advance. The Bucktails had repulsed the threat to the left, and the yeoman service of Easton's battery made the time ripe. The Bucktails and the Ninth "required no urging." Ord devoted his efforts to bringing up the reserve regiments. With Kane at the head the First Rifles charge , and with them, the Ninth. Over the open ground and into the woods they drove the gray coats. The Rebels gave ground slowly at first and put up a good fire. Kane caught a ball in the jaw, but he stopped only momentarily while a crude bandage was rigged. Then on he went at the head of his Wildcats. The Rebel retirement became faster, and soon the ground where the disabled battery had been was reached. General McCall was on the field by this time. He let the regiments continue past the original Confederate line for about a half-mile and then stopped them. The enemy had left The fight was over.

Ord had had nearly four thousand men under his command. The fighting, however, had been done by the three regiments and a battery. Considering this, the Federal numerical superiority in the actual fight was not great. The First Rifles lost three killed and twenty-six wounded The Ninths casualties were slightly less. The Sixth's were about half those of the other two regiments.

It was dark when the brigade started back to Camp Pierpont. For lack of enough ambulances, some of the wounded had to be carried all the way by stretcher. The Confederate wounded of necessity were left at Dranesville. Loaded forage wagons also slowed down the march.[10] Plodding back in the darkness, the men were too tired to indulge in contemplation. Had they not been so tired, some of them might have thought of the day, just two months before, when they had

trod this same road. That day they had missed a battle that had turned out to be a Union disaster. Today they had not missed. Although the record books could only list Dranesville as an "engagement," it was a Union victory, and they had helped to gain it.