Coshocton County, Ohio - Chapter 17: Military Affairs, 1876

Chapter 17: Military Affairs

Military spirit has in all its history been largely manifested in Coshocton county. " Fighting blood " abounded among the early settlers. ]S[early every neighborhood had its champion wrestler or fighter. Personal combats were frequent - often accounted a fitting close for every public day, ranking along with horse-racing and rifle-shooting. Pages could be written showing the strength and prowess of some of the old-time heroes, especially as detailed by some of their boon companions. At a term of court held in 1813, twelve indictments were found " for fighting at fisticuffs by agreement," including one against the sheriif of the county. In these appear the even yet well known names, Yan Kirk, Markley, Hill, Cantwell, Williams, Cain, Roderick, JSTewcum, and Clark.

A citizen, coming in some fifteen years later, details how he frequently heard little companies of men quietly talking together and discussing the question as to who was "the best man." And upon the facts coming out it would always appear that this phrase did not denote the man of mind, and heart, and good character, but the man of muscle - the brawniest, bulliest fellow !

The " musters " were the big occasions, brightening the eyes of citizens generally, and affording a fine field for ambition, and producing a large crop of Majors, Colonels, and Generals. Thus came Generals Johnston, Burns, Meredith, Workman, etc.; Colonels Swigert, Ferguson, Ravenscraft, etc.; and Majors Frew, Robinson, etc. Much might be written presenting the tamer or the more ludicrous aspects of the "corn-stalk" musters, and trainings, and drillings of the " citizen soldiery." But these things were in nowise peculiar to Coshocton county, and all the old chroniclers tell of them.

" "We all in fancy now see the gentleman in that most dangerous and glorious event in the life of a militia general on the peace establishment - a parade day ! The day for which all other days of his life seem to have been made. We can see the troops in motion - umbrellas, hoe and axehandles, and other like deadly implements of war overshadowing all the field - when, lo ! the leader of the host approaches ; ' far oft' his coming shines.' His plume white, after the fashion of the great Bourbon, is of ample length, and reads its doleful history in the bereaved necks and bosoms of forty neighboring hen-roosts ! Like the great Suwaroft*, he seems somewhat careless in forms and points of dress ; hence his epaulettes may be on his shoulders, back, or sides, but still gleaming, gloriously gleaming in the sun. Mounted he is, too, let it not be forgotten. Need I describe to the colonels and generals of this honorable house the steed which heroes bestride on such occasions ? No, I see the memory of other days is with you. You see before you the gentleman from Michigan, mounted on his crop-eared, bushy-tailed mare, the singular obliquities of . whose hinder limbs are described in that most expressive phrase, 'sickle hams;' her height just fourteen hands, '- all told.' Yes, sir ; there you see his ' steed that laughs at the shaking of the spear;' that is, his 'war-horse whose neck is clothed with thunder.' Mr. Speaker, we have glowing descriptions in history of Alexander the Great and his war-horse, Bucephalus, at the head of the invincible Macedonian phalanx ; but, sir, such are the improvements of modern times, that every one must see that our militia general, with his crop-eared mare with bushy tail and sickle ham, would literally frighten off" a battlefield a hundred Alexanders. But, sir, to the history of the parade day. The general, thus mounted and equipped, is in the field

*In a speech in the House of Representatives, February 14, 1840, in answer to lion. Isaac E. Crary, of Michigan. Corwin several times spoke at Coshocton - the last time in 1860.

and ready for action. On the eve of some desperate enterprise, such as giving order to shoulder arms, it may be, there occurs a crisis - one of the accidents of war which no sagacity could foresee or prevent. A cloud arises and passes over the sun ! Here an occasion occurs for the display of that greatest of all traits in the character of a commander - that tact which enables him to seize upon and turn to good account events unlooked for as they arise, l^ow for the caution wherewith the Roman Fabius foiled the skill and courage of Hannibal. A retreat is ordered, and troops and general, in a twinkling, are found safely bivouacked in a neighboring grocery ! But even here the general still has room for the exhibition of heroic deeds." Hot from the tield, and chafed with the untoward events of the day, your general unsheathes his trenchant blade, eighteen inches in length, as you will well remember, and with an energy and remorseless fury he slices the watermelons that lie in heaps around him, and shares them with his surviving friends. Other of the sinews of war are not wanting here. Whisky, Mr. Speaker, that great leveler of modern times, is here also ; and the shells of the watermelons are tilled to the brim. Here, again, Mr. Speaker, is shown how the extremes of barbarism and civilization meet. As the Scandanavian heroes of old, after the fatigues of war, drank wine from the skulls of their slaughtered enemies, in Odin's halls, so now our militia general and his forces, from the skulls of melons thus vanquished, in copious draughts of whisky assuage the heroic tire of their souls, after the bloody scenes of a parade day. But alas for this short-lived race of ours, all things will have an end ; and so even it is with the glorious achievements of our general. Time is on the wing, and will not stay his flight. The sun, as if frightened at the mighty events of the day, rides down the sky ; and at the close of the day, when ' the hamlet is still,' the curtain of night drops upon the scene -

War Of 1812

It was proposed originally that this work, as giving special prominence, though far from exclusive attention, to the days of " the fathers," should contain a list of all the soldiers of the war of 1812. But success has not crowned efforts in this direction. The recollection of the few survivors is unreliable and incomplete; the statements made by those supposing themselves informed contradictory. Repeated applications to the War Department were declined, with information that, while answers will be given in relation to individuals, when company, etc., are given, lists will not be furnished or allowed.

There are reports that, at the outset of the war, a considerable number of citizens, chiefly from the south and west parts of the county, joined a company that was being raised by Lewis Cass. This detachment was surrendered by Hull, and sent home on parole.

Under a requisition from the governor. Judge Isaac Evans responded with a full company, marching to Franklinton (across the Scioto from Columbus), where they were mustered into service, and furnished with uniforms and United States muskets. They were in the forces of General Harrison. Their period of service was six mouths.

Captain Tanner is reported to have taken a company from the southern part of the county, and mention is also made of Captain Beard's company.

Detailed for the protection of " the Mansfleld frontier," under command of Colonel Charles Williams, by order of Return J. Meigs, Governor of Ohio :

Abraham Miller, ensign; Thomas Foster, first sergeant; John M. Miller, second sergeant ; Frederick Markley, third sergeant ; Robert Culbertson, fonrth sergeant ; John H. Miller, first corporal; Zebedee Baker, second corporal; John M. Bantham, third corporal ; John D. Moore, fourth corporal.

It will be observed that this force was a volunteer rifle company. The men, as they went out, wore new yellow hunting-shirts, trimmed with white fringe, and each carried his own trusty rifle and tomahawk and scalping-knife. The company was summoned to the field under the impulse given by the account of the massacre of the Copeland family, near Mansfield, by some Indians. It was mustered into service August 25, 1812, and mustered out September 25th of the same year.

Colonel Charles Williams went along with the force in the capacity of scout and general adviser, and in expectation of taking charge of a regiment, if occasion might oiFer or necessity require.

One of the sentinels of the company shot a cow, mistaking it in the dark for an Indian. An Indian, supposed to be a scout, was discovered behind a tree and killed and scalped, the scalp being an adornment of one of the riflemen for years afterward.

In addition to those whose names appear in the foregoing list the following are reported as having rendered service in the war of 1812 : Peter Moore, Charles Miller, John G. Pigman, Thomas Johnson, Richard Johnson, Andrew Mc- Clain, Samuel Elson, Francis Smith, W. R. Clark, James

Some of the saltpeter used for making powder for the war of ]812 was collected a few miles south of Roscoe. The " caves " formed by projecting rocks had in the decomposed stone on their floors a great deal of nitrate of lime, which, being leached with wood-ashes and exposed to the air and sun, gave nitrate of potash, a high-priced material in those war times, wherewith to make powder.

Mexican War

On the first call for troops for the Mexican war, more than a hundred citizens of Coshocton county sprang to arms, although the whole State of Ohio was asked to furnish only some 2,400.

On the 5th of June these embarked on a canal-boat at Roscoe, destined for the " Halls of the Montezumas." Upon reaching Camp Washington, near Cincinnati, a full company was mustered into the service, and became part of the Third Ohio regiment.

A considerable number of the Coshocton boys went into what was commonly spoken of as the Union company, made up of soldiers from Muskingum, Morgan, and Coshocton counties.

The full Coshocton company was officered as follows : Captain, Jesse H. Meredith ; First Lieutenant, J. M. Love ; Second Lieutenant, S. B. Crowley ; Third Lieutenant, Jos. D. Workman. Seven of this company were lost by the casualties of war. This force was under General Taylor, but was not in any considerable battle.

There was also a considerable number of Coshocton county boys in Captain Hart's (afterward Captain Irvine's) company, which became part of the Fourth Ohio regiment. This was raised under the call for troops in 1847. The term of service of the first forces was one year, and they

It is reported that there are now in the connty only seven Mexican war survivors, the rest having died or removed. Joseph Sawyer sports the medal of the Veteran Association, a handsome bronze shield, made out of cannon captured in the war.

The War Of 1861-5

The people of Coshocton county, as those of all other localities, were watching with intensest interest the occurrences of the winter of 1860-61. Whatever the personal sympathies, political attachments, or peaceful proclivities, none were indifferent. When Lincoln, in the latter part of February, passed through the town of Coshocton on his way to the national capital, he was greeted b}'' an immense throng of anxious citizens. The news of the fall of Sumter caused hereabouts as elsewhere a thrill that passed and repassed along the nerves of the people. Many of the settlers had come from south of Mason and Dixon's line, and had tender recollections of their old homes and the people therein. But the war spirit was not wanting, even among these, and as promptly as in any county the masses of the people were up in arms. Under the first call of the president, two companies of men were enlisted for three months' service. One of them was commanded by Captain James Irvine,f and the other by Captain R. W. McLain. They were mustered into the Sixteenth Ohio Regiment, of which Irvine became colonel, John D. Nicholas taking command

* Charles McCloskey, of Coshocton (now of Steubenville), at the time of the Mexican war, was a soldier in the regular army, and one of the storming party or "forlorn hope" at the capture of the City of Mexico, when he was terribly wounded, and for a long time near to death. Upon his return to Coshocton, after his recovery, a salute was fired by some of his old comrades, and, by the premature discharge of the cannon, Joseph Sawyer and John Richards lost each an arm, car. ried away by the rammer.

f R. M. Voorhees, Esq., lays claim to having been the first man to put his name on paper in the recruiting of this company. It is said that N. R. Tidball claims the same distinction.

of the company. The regiment, as will be remembered, was sent to Western Virginia, and smelled a little powder at Philipi. These forces were sworn in for three months' service, and rendered it. Before this time was up, however, it became manifest that the suppression of the rebellion was to be no ninety days' job. Promptly, Josiah Given, Esq., who had seen service in the Mexican War, set about raising another company for three years' service, under the second call of the president, and in a little time another hundred of the youth and strength of Coshocton county were mustered in, and became part of the Twentyfourth Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry. There soon followed another hundred, entering the Thirty-second Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry, with Captain Stanley, First Lieutenant C. C. Nichols, and Second Lieutenant Geo. Jack. Then, indeed, were the piping times of war. At every cross-road was a recruiting station. Within a few months, nearly a thousand men were recruited. The most of these were mustered into the Fifty-first and Eightieth Regiments Ohio Volunteer Infantry, which rendezvoused at Camp Meigs, near Canal Dover. In the Fifty-first were Companies D, F, II, and I, commanded respectively by Captains John G. Patton, D. W. Marshall, John D. Nicholas, and James Crooks, and about one-half of Company C, commanded by Captain Hesket, was also made up of Coshocton boys. Of this regiment R. W. McLain was made lieutenant-colonel, and D.W. Marshall, adjutant, both of Coshocton county. In the Eightieth Regiment there were three companies and a considerable part of a fourth. The commissioned ofiicers of the three companies were as follows : Company F, Captain Pren Metham ; First Lieutenant James Carnes ; Second Lieutenant F. H. Farmer : Company G, Captain Wm. Marshall ; First Lieutenant Peter Hack ; Second Lieutenant John Kors : Company H, Captain G. W. Pepper ; First Lieutenant John Kinney ; Second Lieutenant J. W. Doyle. The major of this regiment was Richard Lanning.*

While the Fifty-first and Eightieth were being collected, J. V. Heslip raised a considerable squad in this county, for the Sixty-ninth Eegimeut Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and R. W. Burt, formerly a resident of the county, came up from E'ewark and enlisted a few Coshocton boys for a regiment being raised in Licking county. In the summer and fall of

1862, four companies were raised for the Ninety-seventh and One Hundred and Twenty-second Regiments Ohio Volunteer Infantry. Of one of those in the Ninety-seventh, E. Shafl:er was captain, Martin Weiser first lieutenant, and G. W. Smailes second lieutenant. Of the other, C. C. Nichols Avas captain; N. McLain first lieutenant, and C. H. Matthews second lieutenant.

Of those in the One Hundred and Twenty-second, B. F. Sells and Dr. 0. C. Farquhar were captains, Joseph Work and G. H. Barger first lieutenants, and James M. Sells and companies were being raised. Colonel James Irvine, commissioned to raise a regiment of cavalry, secured some fifty men in Coshocton county, who were mustered in the Ninth Ohio Volunteer Cavalry. In the summer of 1868, a draft was ordered. The enrollment reporte'el, in August of that year, three thousand and nine persons in the county subject to military duty. Of these some eight hundred were of the second class (between thirty-five and forty-five years of age, and not subject to duty until the first class, from twentyfive to thirty-five, was exhausted). On the day fixed for examination of claims for exemption, there was a pretty good mass-meeting iu the public square in Coshocton. Many claims were justly made and allowed. The horrors of the draft were largely diminished as the whole process was better understood. The results of it in securing soldiers iu Coshocton county are not readily accessible ; but it is believed that they were not widely different from those in the country at large, as follows : On the 19th of October, farmer in earlier years ; afterward studied law, and was prosecuting attorney of the county when commissioned. He was about fifty years of age. His body was sent home, and lies in the Coshocton Cemetery.

one hundred and fifty men drafted, thirty never reported, being thoroughly disinclined to the service or confident of their legal right to exemption. Of the one hundred and twenty reporting, seventy- two were excused. Of the fortyeight held for service, twenty-four paid the commutation, sixteen furnished substitutes, and the balance, being eight, went to the field. In an efibrt to arrest drafted men in Crawford township, three men were shot. A few of the citizens of Coshocton county, excited by stories of personal outrage and ofiicial mismanagement, gathered their old shot-guns, and repaired to Napoleon, Holmes county, whence fearful accounts of resistance to the draft were soon sent out ; but no Coshocton comity blood was there spilled.

An incident of the Napoleon excitement was the march of a detachment of bronzed soldiers, in charge of a small gun, which had been sent by the governor to Napoleon, down the Walhonding valley to Coshocton, where they took the cars for Camp Chase.

During the Morgan raid excitement Coshocton became the depositor}^ of the treasures of the banks of Cadiz, which were brought hither and put in the vault of Joseph K. Johnson & Co.'s bank. Morgan, on his way to Columbus, after his capture, spent a few minutes in Coshocton.

The men drafted or going as substitutes were allowed the privilege of going into companies and regiments in which their friends and associates were, and the ranks of some of these were thus increased. The generous provision made by the township for the relief of the families of those in the service, and the bounties ottered, bore their fruits in the enlistment of many scores of men in the summer and fall of 1863 ; and, while no new organizations were formed, several hundred men went during that season out of Coshocton county into the military service.

In the fall of 1863, some seven volunteer military companies were, by state authority, organized and drilled under the name of Ohio National Guards. On the 25th of April, 1864, these were ordered by the governor to take the field. They rendezvoused at the fair-ground in Coshocton, and after a few days proceeded to Columbus. After inspection, some five 'hundred men were selected out of the nearly seven hundred men, and two companies were placed in the One Hundred and Forty-second Regiment, and three in the One Hundred and Forty-third Regiment. The companies in the One Hundred and Forty-second Regiment had the following commissioned officers : Captains L. B. Wolf and Caleb Wheeler ; First Lieutenants John Weatherwax and D. L. Lawson ; Second Lieutenants B. F. Leighninger and

Fritchey, quartermaster. Of the One Hundred and Fortythird Regiment, John D. Nicholas was lieutenant-colonel. The commissioned officers of the companies were as follows : Captains IST. R. Tidball, Jno. L. Dougherty, and Jas. Ririe ; First Lieutenants D. F. Denman, A. J. Stover, and James Crawford ; Second Lieutenants John Willis, D. Rose, and !N"at. Elliott, They were mustered into the United States service, May 13, 1864, and mustered out September 13th, of the same year,

A few men were secured in Coshocton for the gun -boat service. Dr. S. H. Lee and Dr. A. G. Brown, of Coshocton, and Dr. Edwards, of West Carlisle, represented Coshocton in the medical department, and Rev. G. W. Pepper, of the Methodist Episcopal church at Keene, was chaplain, as well as captain of a company. And there was no arm of the service that did not find some of its strength in the warm hearts and brawny arms of Coshocton county boys.*

It is not in the plan of this work to trace the career of those entering the military service after leaving the county. They were absorbed in the larger bodies of which they became part, and the record of these is in the general history of the war. They were given by the county to this service, and most of them proved worthy representatives of it. It is estimated that in all there entered the service

* Major-General William Burns, of the regular United States array, and Lieutenant Poe, of the United States navy, were horn and hred in Coshocton county.

nearly twenty-five hundred men, and of these between three and four hundred fell by the casualties of war. There is not a graveyard in Coshocton county but holds the ashes of some of them, and scores of them rest in " the south-land."*

To promote enlistments and serve as counselors in relation to all military matters, the following persons acted, by appointment of the governor, as a military committee for Coshocton county : A. L. Cass, Houston Hay, Seth Mc- Lain, J. D. Nicholas, and D. Rodahaver. Soldiers' aid societies were formed in almost every school district, gathering up comforts and delicacies for the camps and hospitals in which were the " boys." Rev. A. McCartney, of Keene township, and Joseph Elliott and Rev. C. "W. Wallace, of Coshocton, visited the " Army of the Cumberland " as delegates of the United States Christian Commission.

* In the Coshocton Cemetery is buried a young Confederate soldier, who died in the cars when near Coshocton while being transported as a prisoner of war.