A Narrative of Service with the Third Wisconsin Infantry

by Julian Wisner Hinkley

Slocum was a very different type of man from Hooker. The latter was brilliant and dashing, and in the excitement of battle his ardor and personal courage carried him where the fire was hottest. Slocum, on the contrary, reminded one of the descriptions of Marlborough. Cool and unimpassioned he directed a battle as he would a review. Without particularly avoiding danger, he would not rush recklessly into it. Hooker was an inveterate boaster. Slocum usually said nothing. I think most men would have considered Hooker the better leader, and Slocum the better man.

Late on the night of September 1, while I was on picket duty, I heard in the direction of Atlanta what I at first thought was artillery. The rumbling kept increasing in intensity until it seemed like the heaviest firing I had ever heard. Finally, a number of terrific explosions lit up the air. At six miles distance they seemed like bright flashes of lightning. I knew then that the enemy were blowing up their powder magazines. I supposed, however, that Sherman was fighting his way into Atlanta from the south.

At daylight a reconnoitering party was sent out toward the city. They found it evacuated, except for a small rear guard of cavalry which was soon driven out. The remainder of the Corps moved up in the afternoon, our Regiment reaching the city at about dark. Sherman's flanking movement had been completely successful. He had met Hood on the Macon Railroad, near Jonesboro, and had beaten him terribly. The Confederate commander had been obliged to evacuate Atlanta at once, blowing up eighty cars of ammunition which had been cut off by the capture of the railroad at Jonesboro. He had been compelled to destroy, also, the large rolling mill of the city, which was said to have been the only mill in the South where plating for gunboats could be manufactured.

We found more Union sentiment in Atlanta than anywhere else in the South. As our Brigade entered the city, at about nine o'clock at night, many of the women brought out buckets of water for us to drink. They were very bitter against Hood's army, which they said had robbed them of everything that could be carried off, with the excuse that the Yankees would steal it anyway. They were agreeably disappointed to find that the Yankees did not rob them of a thing.

Immense quantities of tobacco were abandoned by the Secessionist citizens who left town. This fact ruined the sutlers' trade in that article. On the day before Atlanta fell, tobacco sold in our camps at a dollar a plug, and fifteen cents for cigars. On the day after, plug tobacco passed about for five cents, and cigars were twenty-five cents a hundred. Our men found tobacco in every conceivable place. One lot of twenty boxes was dug out from under a big ash-heap. It was, however, the only plunder obtained, for the most stringent orders were issued against pillaging occupied houses.

The effects of the Union bombardment could everywhere be seen in the city. Almost every house had the marks on it of shot and shell. One man showed me a dozen shells that had struck in his garden. The families remaining in the city had all built in their yards bombproofs, to which they had fled for safety whenever the shelling was in progress.

On September 6 Sherman's army came back from Jonesboro, and went into camp in the vicinity of town. For a time we enjoyed the luxury of complete rest, after our four months of continuous campaigning. On September 23 our Regiment received from Wisconsin 200 fresh recruits, who had just been secured under the draft. Every one was a substitute, and a splendid lot of men they were physically, representing almost every nation in Europe—English, Irish, Scotch, Welsh, Germans, French, Norwegians, and I don't know how many others. Some of them could not speak a word of English. Over a dozen were full-blooded Chippewa Indians, who until they put on the uniforms of the United States Army, had never worn the clothing of civilized people. They were all excellent raw material, and in the course of time made good soldiers. I recall only two of the entire 200 who deserted.

About the first of October, Hood set out on his trip to the North, in the attempt to starve us out of Atlanta. On October 3 Sherman started after him with all of the army except our Corps, which was left to hold the town. Our camps were now changed around so as to defend the city on a shorter line. Our Brigade was moved from the south to the northwest side, and set to work to build new breastworks, or rather to rebuild the old ones of the Confederates.

The enemy succeeded in getting upon our railroad to the North, and for about twenty days we were completely cut off without news or provisions. However, they had left us the whole of the country southward to forage in; and this, together with the rice we had captured in the city, and the "beef dried on the hoof," as the men called the cattle that were driven in, kept us a long way from starving. Every week our forage trains would run out into the country to the south, and gather in from 500 to 700 wagon-loads of corn, besides living, while they were out, on the best that the land afforded. Moreover, we had our provisions all to ourselves; for on September 10 Sherman had ordered all the citizens of the town to leave either to the North or to the South.

On October 11 our Regiment went out for the first time on a foraging expedition. There were 2,500 men in the detachment, and a train of about 500 wagons. About fifteen miles south of Atlanta we found plenty of corn for the animals; and for the men, abundance of sweet potatoes and other dainties not laid down in the army menu. In two days we had our wagons laden with all that could be hauled away. About a fortnight later we went out again and brought in over 800 wagons of corn.