Battle of the Crater; and Experiences of Prison Life

Experiences of Prison Life.

BY SUMNER U. SHEARMAN, [Late Captain, Fourth Rhode Island Volunteers.]

PROVIDENCE: PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY. 1898.

[Edition limited to two hundred and fifty copies.]

Battle of the Crater; and Experiences of Prison Life.

I have been asked by the Society under whose auspices we are gathered to-night to tell you something of my personal experiences in the Battle of the Mine, or of the Crater, as it is sometimes called, and to supplement those experiences with some account of my life in a Southern prison.

At the time of the battle I was captain of Company A, Fourth Rhode Island Volunteers Infantry. The regiment to which I belonged was a portion of the Ninth Army Corps, under the command of General Burnside. The battle was fought on the 30th of July, 1864. But some months previous, as far back as January, 1863, the regiment, as also the corps, had been detached from the Army of the Potomac. Burnside, as you know, succeeded McClellan after the battle of Antietam in command of the Army of the Potomac; but he himself was removed from that command in January, 1863, and taken away from the Army of the Potomac. But the regiment to which I belonged ultimately became separated from the corps, and was on detached duty in the city of Norfolk, Virginia, and afterwards at Point Lookout, Maryland, where we were when the order came for us to rejoin the Ninth Corps, which had been brought back to the Army of the Potomac.

We arrived in front of Petersburg, at a point on the line where the Ninth Army Corps was stationed, on the Fourth of July, 1864. The two lines, our line and the enemy's, were at this point very near each other, from one hundred and fifty to three hundred yards apart, the distance varying according to the line of the works. We were ordered to encamp in some woods in the rear of our line of rifle-pits, and not far from them.

Shots from the enemy were continually coming into our camp, being fired at the men in the breastworks in front. We had to erect a barricade in the camp to protect ourselves, behind which we lived. Men of course strayed more or less away from the barricade, and every now and then some one would be wounded. Every three or four days it became our turn to take our places in the rifle-pits, where we had to stay forty-eight hours, and sometimes longer. We never went into the rifle-pits without some one being killed or wounded.

While we were encamped in this way, we heard of the plan of Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Pleasants, of the Forty-eighth Pennsylvania Infantry, who was a practical miner, and his men were largely men who had worked in the coal mines of Pennsylvania. He conceived the idea of building a mine under a certain portion of the enemy's works, with the purpose of blowing them up. At a certain point in the enemy's line, opposite the point where we were located, was a very strong earthwork, mounting several guns of large calibre, which did very much damage to our fortifications and troops. It was but one hundred and fifty yards from our line to that point. Back of it, on higher ground, was a hill called Cemetery Hill, regarded as a strategic point. If we could capture that hill, it was believed that much would be done to force General Lee out of Richmond. This fort stood in the way. Colonel Pleasants believed that he could remove it by his plan of blowing it up. The idea was that, if the fort could be removed by the explosion, the enemy being taken by surprise, opportunity would be afforded for our troops, already in position, to charge in through the open space thus made, and, taking advantage of the surprise on the part of the enemy, to push on to the crest of Cemetery Hill.

Colonel Pleasants met with no encouragement on the part of General Meade, in command of the Army of the Potomac; nevertheless, as General Burnside, his corps commander, approved of it, he was allowed to undertake it. No assistance whatever was afforded him by the Engineer Corps of the Army. He had to devise such methods as he could to accomplish his purpose, working at a great disadvantage all the time, but he finally accomplished the task. He began the work inside of our lines, under cover of a hill, at a point where the enemy could not perceive what was being done, and carried his tunnel through the earth the whole distance of one hundred and fifty yards, until he reached the fort. It was twenty feet beneath the surface of the ground at the point he reached. From thence he made a branch at right angles on either side, making it in the form of a letter T, as it were, at that point. In these branches he placed large wooden tanks in which powder was to be put. Four tons of powder were placed in these wooden boxes, and connected by a fuse at the entrance of the mine.

The 30th of July, 1864, was fixed upon as the time for the explosion to take place. It was intended to have it take place somewhere about three o'clock in the morning. Troops were gotten into position the night before under cover of the darkness, ready to charge as soon as the mine should be exploded.

I had been engaged for some days previous at the headquarters of the Third Division of the Ninth Army Corps, General Potter commanding, as judge advocate in connection with a court-martial. On the evening before the battle, the evening of the 29th, an order came to me to report to my regiment. I did so, and found that it was about to take its place in line of battle, ready to join in the charge on the morning of the next day. I had my supper in camp as usual, and we started to take up our position, carrying with us no food, nor anything in the way of clothing, except the clothes we had on.

The time arrived when the explosion was expected to take place, but no explosion occurred. It was learned that the fuse had gone out. An officer of the Forty-eighth Pennsylvania volunteered to go in and relight the fuse; and, as I remember, it went out a second time, and was relighted. Shortly before five o'clock, just as the sun was rising, a sound as of thunder was distinctly heard, and in a moment the earth at the point where the mine had been constructed was thrown upward, slowly mounting into the air to a height of some two hundred feet, and then, spreading out like a fan, fell back again into the excavation made by the explosion. The soil was of a clayey character, and enormous boulders of clay were thrown up and fell back around the opening, resembling in some respects the crater of a volcano; hence the battle has sometimes been called the Battle of the Crater. The men who were in this fort, and the artillery, and everything pertaining to the fortifications, huge timbers, ammunition, tents, and everything that would be naturally located there, were all thrown heavenward. The men, of course, were either killed or wounded, with hardly an exception. A large number of men were in the fort. It has been estimated by some that there were a thousand.

As soon as the explosion took place, the artillery all along the line on our side, some one hundred and twenty pieces or more, began firing at that point. The firing lasted some moments, and then the troops were directed to charge. It had been the plan of General Burnside to have his division of colored troops lead the advance. There was in the Ninth Corps at that time a division of colored troops. They had been drilled with the idea of taking the advance, but General Meade overruled Burnside's plan, and thought it best that the colored troops should not be put in that position. So General Burnside called together his division commanders, and told them of the change of plan on the very night before the battle, and allowed them to draw lots to see which one should take the lead. The lot fell to General Ledlie, the least efficient of the division commanders in the Ninth Corps.

When the Third Division, to which my regiment belonged, charged over our breastworks and across the space between our line and the enemy's line, they came upon the enemy's works to the right of the crater; but by that time the enemy had recovered from his surprise, and was concentrating a terrible fire upon all that region. The men instinctively sought shelter in the excavation made by the explosion, but when we arrived at that point we found the crater filled with troops of General Ledlie's division. There seemed to be complete chaos reigning there. The lieutenant-colonel of our regiment, who was in command, Colonel Buffum, tried to rally the men, as did officers of other regiments, and to push on to Cemetery Hill; but General Ledlie, who should have been with his command, remained behind in a bomb-proof. I remember seeing him, as we passed the front, secure in a bomb-proof. His troops had fallen into confusion in the way I have explained, and he was not there to remedy the situation. It seemed impossible for the officers to accomplish anything in the midst of the reigning confusion.

The Fourth Rhode Island, the few of us that were together at that time, followed the colonel and the color bearer out beyond the enemy's works towards Cemetery Hill, but we encountered such a hurricane of shot and shell that it was impossible to face it, and we were driven back again into the shelter of the enemy's works, where we remained. The attempt to capture Cemetery Hill had proved a failure. Many of the men and officers tried to get back to our own line, but the enemy by that time had a raking fire over the space between their line and our own, and it was almost sure death for any person to undertake to cross it. Very few of those who did, escaped being killed or wounded. The space between was so covered with the dead and the wounded that it was possible for a person to go from one line to the other without stepping on the earth. I have learned since that an order was issued for the troops in the crater to return to our own lines, but I myself did not hear of such an order, neither did Lieutenant-Colonel Buffum. We remained in the crater. It was on the 30th of July, as I have said, and one of the hottest days of the summer. The enemy had gotten range upon the crater, and were dropping mortar shell into our midst, but we held them at bay until our ammunition gave out. Finally they made a charge, and succeeded in reaching the crater, and were firing directly down upon us. General Bartlett, the highest officer in rank in the crater, a general from Massachusetts, gave the order for us to surrender. An officer of my regiment, a lieutenant of the Fourth Rhode Island, Lieutenant Kibby, tied a white handkerchief on his sword, and held it up in token of surrender. The enemy ceased firing.

I may mention that General Bartlett in a previous battle had lost a leg, and it had been replaced by a wooden one. A shot struck him and his leg was broken, but it proved to be the wooden leg.

During all this time we had no water to drink, and we were parched with thirst. I had the feeling at the time that if I had a thousand dollars I would give it cheerfully for a drink of water. The sun beating down upon us as it did, exposed as we were, and having neither water to drink nor food to eat, I became very much prostrated. I have always believed that I came very near having sunstroke, from the after effects upon me.