The Thirty-Ninth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, 1862-1865

by Alfred S. Roe

On the 10th much attention was attracted by the funeral procession of General A. W. Whipple, one of the victims of Chancellorsville, having been shot on the 4th, though he survived till the 7th. A native of Greenwich, Massachusetts, he was graduated at West Point, 1841, and his fellow Massachusetts soldiers felt almost a personal interest in the tokens of respect as the procession passed, including, among many other distinguished public officers, President Lincoln; the pall-bearers were eight first sergeants from the Thirty-ninth Regiment. For many years, thereafter, one of the great forts on the Virginia side of the Potomac was to bear his name. Those of the Regiment, not on other duty on the 11th and 12th, had the benefit of one of the periodical scares liable to any locality near the seat of war. Just before dress parade on the earlier date, at a quarter of six, orders came to have the Regiment ready to march to the Chain Bridge, the most northerly of the three great connections between the District and Virginia. After supper, with rubber blankets and overcoats properly slung, the men were in line, prepared for the order to advance to repel any possible rebel raid. The bridge is about five miles from the barracks and the troops reached that point soon after 10 p. m. No sign of any enemy appearing, they stacked arms by the roadside and proceeded to get what rest they could from the materials in their possession, every one taking the trip as a mild kind of lark. At an early hour of the 12th the return march was made by the men, tired and dusty, though they were quite prepared for the eight o'clock breakfast which the cooks had in readiness.

It was not all work in Washington; there were pranks by the score, and now and then one was written down in the book of someone's recollection,—witness the following: "a corporal of Company A with a guard was detailed to look after certain condemned goods some two miles out; with stripes and chevrons he was as slick and dapper a youth as ever wore a uniform. Without a cent in his pocket, and his entire party of twelve men equally lacking, he took them all to the theatre to see Maggie Mitchell play 'Little Barefoot'; he had said to the men, 'Be ready at seven o'clock, sharp, with shoes blacked and with brass scales on shoulders, the U. S. on the belts, well polished.' They obeyed and were marched off the grounds and along Pennsylvania Ave., the Corporal saluting any patrol they chanced to meet, right up to the theatre, itself; past the ticket-office, and when tickets for the company were demanded, the natty corporal threatened to arrest any one venturing to halt or impede his men, so in they went to the very best seats in the building, two dollar ones, and there he seated his squad. Never was play better enjoyed and when, at 9 o'clock or later, a lieutenant of cavalry looked the house over in search of parties without proper credentials, the corporal rose and, like a veritable Crichton, saluted; how could any officer disturb such serenity and immaculateness? He asked no questions; not a boy in the party understood the circumstances under which they were having the time of their lives, and the return was quite as successful as the going; the whole affair, a triumph of unqualified bluff and cheek."

Very likely many good veterans never knew that the Northern soldiers in Washington maintained an active Division of the Sons of Temperance, having their meetings in Odd Fellows Hall, corner of Nineteenth Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, and that, on public occasions, no branch of the order turned out more men. Several officers and men of the Thirty-ninth were deeply interested in the society, and one of them records with some evident satisfaction the fact that he had closed a rum hole and arrested the keeper, making one less source of temptation. On the May 24, '63 24th the boys from New England, with eyes alert for anything savoring of home, discover the passing of the Eleventh Massachusetts Battery, the Commonwealth's only Nine Months' Artillery organization, on its way homeward. Naturally the exchange of greetings was most hearty. On meeting Major S. E. Chamberlain of the First Massachusetts Cavalry, only recently severely wounded, yet out and ready to return, an admirer writes, "If the service were made up of officers like him, more would be done towards putting down the Rebellion."

Pay-day came on the 28th, and the promptness of the Government won no end of praise from the always impecunious soldiers, a feeling that they were disposed at a later time to considerably moderate.

The crowning event of the end of the month was the joint drill of the Regiment along with the Fourteenth New Hampshire some three miles away, in the rear of Mt. Pleasant Hospital on Fourteenth Street. It was hot and dusty, there having been no rain for three weeks, but the men were put through their evolutions by Brig. General Martindale, in a manner that evidently met his approval, whatever those exercised may have thought of it. White gloves and shiny scales suffered from the heat and dust laden air, but the men bore ample testimony to the quality of the drill on the old Poolesville grounds. However, the principal honors came when the return was made, for though the route step was allowed until the heart of the city was reached, then came the display moment and, in column of companies, the Regiment wheeled into Pennsylvania Avenue with the precision of a machine, winning the applause of the crowd of officers who were occupying the piazzas of Willard's Hotel; and without music, but with the regular tramp, tramp, that drill alone can impart, the men marched to their quarters with an added notch in their appreciation of what the Thirty-ninth could do.

In the way of dust and heat, June was to be a trying month for the men who had to keep themselves in the very primmest form possible, since to be neat and speckless was deemed the highest attainment of a soldier in town. In those days there was voting by the citizens on local matters and the drift of the ballots cast on the first day of the month gave indications of a large secession spirit in the city. On the second day, the Thirty-fourth Massachusetts appeared in Washington for the performance of duties, similar to those already falling to the lot of the Thirty-ninth. Though from Worcester County and Berkshire there was the common bond of statehood, and the Thirty-fourth also prided itself no little on its discipline and well drilled ranks. One of the members of the Thirty-ninth comments on the hardness of appearance of some of the prisoners whom he had to watch over and remarks that, at the window by his beat is a girl, about eighteen years old, who is a rebel spy, and that for five months she was a corporal in the Union ranks. Of this same person, Colonel Lincoln in his story of the Thirty-fourth relates that, to curb her and keep her within bounds, one of his officers was obliged to handcuff her.

So far as the amenities of Washington life for the regiment were concerned, nothing contributed more than the evenings spent in connection with the Sons of Temperance organization, of which something might be said in addition to former items. Formed in the Poolesville camp during the preceding winter, it had been chartered by the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts and was known as Army Lodge, Number 39, and after reaching the Capital, its membership increased to about two hundred. No better indication of the moral quality of the regiment could be found. Similar organizations among the residents of the city were especially hospitable, and invitations to all sorts of entertainment were of frequent occurrence. A festival on the 12th, where not only the delicacies of the season were served, but where literary and elocutionary ability were displayed, was long memorable in regimental circles. Also long remembered was Monday, the 15th, when large details June 15, '63 assisted in bearing to the several hospitals the grievously wounded from Chancellorsville, many of whom had been lying on the field for almost two weeks with scant attention, some having suffered the amputation of limbs at the hands of Confederate surgeons. Carried upon stretchers as gently as possible, some of them fully two miles, through the intense heat, some died on the way, many more soon after arriving. While people along the route did all that they could do to alleviate their suffering, the condition of these unfortunate men was a startling lesson to all of the awful possibilities of war.

It would be very strange if the guarding of the White House grounds did not occasion some meetings with the President. Of William S. Sumner, Company H, a second cousin of Senator Charles Sumner, the following is related: He had been stationed at a path, leading across a recently seeded lawn, the path having formed a short cut to one of the departments. Several officers had been turned back, when Sumner saw the president approaching to take the cut-off himself. He was promptly halted when the President exclaimed, "What's up, Sentry?" To this, the sentinel replied, "The grass is up, Mr. Lincoln." Looking down at his feet, the president said, "Some of it would be down, if I crossed over the lawn. I gave the order to place a sentinel here and I am just ready to be an offender." He commended the soldier for obeying his orders so strictly, even to halting the President, and Sumner was also commended by his own officers. Later when a comrade of his company had obtained a sick furlough and could not secure transportation, Sumner went with him to the White House, to present the case to Mr. Lincoln, who, remembering the incident of the hold-up at the lawn, readily wrote a line to the quartermaster which speedily brought the desired means of going home.

The campaign which was to reach its culmination at Gettysburg was well under way. Lee was headed northward and Union Governors were speeding troops towards the South to assist in driving him back. Naturally, expectation was at fever heat and every rumor simply added to the excitement. Some of the men who visited Baltimore to escort thither certain prisoners found the city with barricades in the streets and negroes working on fortifications, all under the apprehension of the coming of the rebel army. Friday, the 26th, under the tidings that the enemy was near Fort Massachusetts, north of Georgetown, the regiment was ordered to be in readiness to move at a moment's notice. Ammunition was given out and, in light marching order, the men were excitedly expectant when the order came to turn in and "snooze." As the sequel showed, had the Thirty-ninth and other regiments marched out beyond Tenallytown, a great wagon-train might have been saved, but those in command had not the power of reading the future.

How near the men came to meeting Stuart's Cavalry appeared a little later. Rumors were afloat as to some sort of disaster on the Maryland side of the Potomac and not so very far away from the District. The result was that late at night, orders were received to start at once for the scene of depredation and after a rapid march of several miles beyond the Chain Bridge, line of battle was formed at about two o'clock in the morning of the 29th. If all concerned could have known that the terrible Stuart and his men were many miles away at the time, with no thought whatever of molesting Washington or its defenders, very likely the impromptu bivouac or "In place, rest" might have been more comfortable than it really was. The event, in which any act on the part of the regiment was altogether lacking, was one more of those audacious deeds for which the Confederate Kleber was famous. Crossing the Potomac at Rowser's Ford somewhat south of Poolesville, under the most difficult circumstances, early in the morning of the 28th, he rode east to Rockville, whence a detachment, a very small one, dashing towards the District, encountered a wagon-train of one hundred and twenty-five vehicles, June 28, '63 heavily loaded, on their way to supply the Union Army, then marching towards the north. Though Stuart was able to retain the train and to take it with him into Pennsylvania, the delays occasioned by it rendered him and his men much less efficient in the great encounter at Gettysburg than they might have been otherwise.