The Thirty-Ninth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, 1862-1865

by Alfred S. Roe

I will now state all that I remember of what occurred within my own experience on the morning of May 5th, 1864. I suppose these things occurred during Griffin's assault through the gully, and while the Thirty-ninth was being held in reserve in Griffin's rear.

We were standing in line of battle in a grove of oaks, the largest of which were perhaps eight inches in diameter. I was in the front rank near the right of Company B. First Lieutenant Spear was in his usual place in the rear of the Company and a little to my left. Lieutenant Spear turned on his heel and momentarily vacated his place. Almost instantly a piece of a shell buried itself where he had stood. Occasional bullets passed over our heads and among the oaks. Captain W. W. Graham of Company B was at rest in front of the Company, leaning against an oak but not behind it. A raw recruit in the rear rank who had joined the Company at Mitchell's Station and who had not yet learned to await the word of command aimed his rifle at a venture and planted a bullet in Captain Graham's oak, close to his head. Orderly Sergeant Allison shook the recruit by the collar and threatened terrible things if he should fire again without orders.

I can not recall that I knew anything of Griffin's assault while it was in progress, or of the rout which followed it. I have since learned from General Robinson's report that at the close of Griffin's sanguinary assault, Griffin's Division was relieved by Robinson's First and Second Brigades, ours, the First, taking the line of battle.

I remember that the Regiment moved to a new position and that later in the day we were lying, faces down, on the grass covered slope of a ridge. Small pines branching from near the ground broke its surface. Erect, and close behind us, Lieutenant Colonel Peirson walked back and forth like a sentinel upon his beat, but with his eyes never off of his ready but prostrate men. Absolutely alert, in quiet and calm tones, he said to each restless one who sought a dangerous relief from his unbearable immobility, "That man in —— Company, lie down," or whatever would cause the man to safeguard himself. The minie balls continually showered the green pine needles and pitchy twigs upon us. No one was in such danger as the Lieutenant Colonel, but he ever walked back and forth, back and forth, speaking his words of friendly caution. Still later it was desired that we should lie nearer the top of the ridge. He said to Colonel Davis, "If you will stand here" (at the right of the line to be formed) "I will align the men on you." When we again stretched ourselves upon the slope our heads were close to its top. Later in the afternoon we were standing in line of battle on the top of the ridge. The line of battle of a Regiment on our left made an angle of less than 180 with our own. For a moment I had a clear, distinct view of its front brilliantly lighted by the rays of the declining sun. I saw Colonel "Dick" Coulter on his prancing horse in front of them. The vision though momentary was changeful, unsteady, as if the men were staggering, falling. Our Brigade charged down the western slope. A Battery was in the gully at the foot of the slope, and neither the Federals nor the Confederates could touch it. The Brigade did not reach the Battery but returned to the ridge. The cries of the wounded on the slope were heart breaking. They called for help, for water. I was told, "General Grant says, 'Let no well man risk himself for his companion. He will need the help of all well men to-morrow.'" There was a call for volunteers to act as skirmishers on the slope toward the battery. I volunteered without any personal request that I should do so. I was located some distance down the slope and walked back and forth upon a "beat," like a camp guard. Then I had a genuine surprise. While I walked and watched with fear in my heart, the sun not having yet gone down, Lieutenant Colonel Peirson came sauntering along the skirmish line as if he was enjoying a pleasurable stroll. He made some casual remark and, handing me his May 6, '64 field glass, asked if I would enjoy seeking the battery through it. He left me after I had had abundant time to look, but all of the fear had gone and did not return. When I next saw the glass it had been ruined, smashed by a shell which had nearly taken the life of the Lieutenant Colonel at Spottsylvania. All night I walked back and forth on the slope.

When we took our position upon the Brock Road, volunteer skirmishers were again called for and I responded as before. I was placed perhaps three hundred feet in front of the Regiment in a typical Wilderness forest tangle. Here were hardwood trees several inches in diameter, and in an almost impenetrable mass between them were quickly grown hardwood saplings of the diameter of one's finger and perhaps twenty feet in height. These were in the beautiful, tender green, full foliage of May and often woven all through between their interlacing branches were strong, green, horse-briar vines in so high and dense a hedge that had a line of battle been in your front not twenty feet away you probably could not have seen it. My part was to watch the thicket in front of my post and to give warning of the first appearance of the enemy. My fear of the day before did not return. I had excellent opportunity to hear the rapidly detonating musketry on my left and front, varied by the deep bass of occasional artillery. As the firing quickened I could no longer distinguish intervals between the sounds. I heard only one clear, loud, inspiring, uplifting, musical sound punctuated by artillery.

Suddenly, upon my left and behind me all was commotion. The Sixteenth Maine on our left fired volley after volley toward the front. My regiment, the Thirty-ninth Massachusetts, followed their lead. I threw myself upon my face until the fusilade had ceased. Then I lost no time in reaching the Regiment. I saw no wounded in our immediate front, but a number in butternut clothing crawled toward the Sixteenth Maine or lay prostrate in their front. One in particular, I remember, he was crawling upon his hands and knees toward the Sixteenth, while a large, red stream flowed from his throat as I had seen blood flow from the throat of a slaughtered pig.

I now saw that a wonderful change had occurred in front of the Thirty-ninth. A wide belt of the forest had disappeared. Three parallel lines of breastworks, with an abatis in their front, were undergoing construction along the Brock Road. Men without axes had felled large trees with hatchets, and saplings with knives. Bayonets instead of pickaxes had loosened the sun-baked Virginia clay and tin plates instead of shovels had transferred the soil. The trees, the saplings and the clay, under the direction of skilled mechanics and by the herculean efforts of determined and rapid workmen, had taken and were taking effective defensive shape. The moment the firing ceased the constructive, defensive work again began. I saw upon the Brock Road a mounted officer, riding and swinging his sword. I heard him say, "General Grant says, 'If you hold this place until night, the enemy must evacuate Petersburg and Richmond, is ours.'" I began to use my bayonet and tin plate with the rest in constructing breastworks, but the call for skirmishers soon came again and I went back to watch through the night and the following day for the first signs of another frontal attack, which happily did not come. Before we left this place I listened to the account of my messmate, George V. Shedd, who, as one of a squad, had passed on duty through a part of the woods where men wounded, dying and dead had been blistered, blackened and burned by ruthless forest fires.

I have learned since that on the morning of May 6th a Confederate engineer officer reported to General Longstreet that the extreme left of the Infantry of the Army and of the Second Corps was in the woods in front of the Brock Road and exposed. A flank attack by four Brigades was immediately made, following first the unfinished railroad bed where their march was practically unimpeded and then advancing north through the woods. Our men, who were cooking coffee, were completely surprised and routed, and this explains the confusion which prevailed along the Brock Road when we arrived a little later. The Brock Road was now almost in the grasp of Longstreet, who hoped to seize it and to "put the enemy back across the Rapidan before night." "Longstreet, followed by fresh Brigades at double-quick," began to follow up the victory when he and his staff were mistaken for Federal troops and fired upon by the Sixty-first Virginia of Mahone's Confederate Brigade. Longstreet was severely wounded. General Longstreet says, "I immediately made arrangements to follow up the successes gained and ordered an advance of all my troops for that purpose."

(Here the hand of our comrade ceased, for fatal illness came upon him ere his task was ended.—A. S. R.)

One of the saddest features of the Wilderness struggle was the fire kindled by exploding shells and which raged unchecked over much of the fighting area, enveloping in its destroying embrace with equal fury the blue and the May 7, '64 gray, whether living or dead, and we can never know how many among the missing were thus ushered into eternity. In Northern burial grounds, no unusual sight is that of a cenotaph or memorial to the memory of a departed soldier whose body was cremated or burned beyond recognition in the Wilderness. Save for the industry displayed in the building of rifle-pits, and the fruitless rebel assault on the Sixth Corps at our right, the night connecting the 6th and 7th of May was a quiet one; both sides were weary to the pitch of exhaustion, and both had learned that breastworks had wonderfully preserving qualities and, while Sheridan makes something of a stir at our left, as far away as Todd's Tavern, the day is relatively a peaceful one. Very likely the respective heads of the two great armies are taking inventories of their losses and gain, if any of the latter were observable. Both leaders had suffered sufficiently in the Wilderness, yet each one is perfectly willing that the other should attack, and when Grant's tentative skirmish line fails to draw the men in gray from their intrenchments, the Union commander knows that the time for him to continue his march towards Richmond has come. There appears to be a general agreement among those keeping diaries that the Thirty-ninth, with the other regiments of the brigade remained in or near the intrenchments till well along in the afternoon, when it was withdrawn, and in the rear had the privilege of preparing something to eat. Davis, in his story of the Thirteenth Massachusetts, says fresh meat rations were drawn and cooked and coffee was boiled, a most grateful relief, if only a brief one.