Harper's Round Table, June 4, 1895

Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers. All Rights Reserved.

n no war since the close of the great Napoleonic struggles has the fighting been so obstinate and bloody as in the civil war. Much has been said in song and story of the obstinate courage of the Guards at Inkerman, of the charge of the Light Brigade, and of the terrible fighting and loss of the German at Mars la Tour and Gravelotte. The praise bestowed upon the British and Germans for their valor, and for the loss that proved their valor, was well deserved. But there were over one hundred and twenty regiments, Union and Confederate, each of which in some one battle of the civil war suffered a greater loss than any English regiment at Inkerman or at any other battle in the Crimea; greater loss than was suffered by any German regiment at Gravelotte, or at any other battle of the Franco-Prussian war. No European regiment in any recent struggle has suffered such losses as at Gettysburg befell the 1st Minnesota, when 82 per cent. of the officers and men were killed and wounded; or the 141st Pennsylvania, which lost 76 per cent., or the 26th North Carolina, which lost 72 per cent.; such as at the second battle of Manassas befell the 101st New York, which lost 74 per cent.; and the 21st Georgia, which lost 76 per cent. At Cold Harbor the 25th Massachusetts lost 70 per cent., and the 10th Tennessee at Chickamauga 68 per cent.; while at Shiloh the 9th Illinois lost 63 per cent., and the 6th Mississippi 70 per cent.; and at Antietam the 1st Texas lost 82 per cent. The loss of the Light Brigade in killed and wounded in its famous charge at Balaklava was but 37 per cent.
These figures show the terrible punishment endured by these regiments—chosen at random from the head of the list—which shows the slaughter roll of the civil war. Yet the shattered remnant of each regiment preserved its organization, and many of the severest losses were suffered by regiments in the hour of triumph, and not of disaster. Thus, the 1st Minnesota at Gettysburg suffered its appalling loss while charging a greatly superior force, which it drove before it; and the little huddle of wounded and unwounded men who survived their victorious charge actually kept both the flag they had captured and the ground from which they had driven their foes.