The National tribune., 1909-09-16
sLACK's BRIGADE.
"A fishtins Lot of Hawkeyes. Hoosicrs
and Buckeyes

2Sth and 24th Iowa and our old regf-
ment. the 47th Ind. that comprised
| Col. James K. Slack's Brigade of Ger.
I Alvin z. Horey's Third Division. Thir-
teenth Corps. in the Vicksburg cam
paign. After the battle of Champion
| Hills the S7th Ill. was added to our bri-
gadc: and. boys, do you recollect how
the Johnnies would laugh and kid" the
S7th when they would go into the rife
pits at Nicksburg with their old Bel
| sian muskets. that shot round ball
and three buckshot? When we first
invested their works the s7th could not
reach the Johnnies with their blunder-
| buses, and it created some merriment
for the joking rebels. and gave them an
advantage over the S7th- We relieved
the S7th in the works, and 1t took us
about two hours to cool the Johnnies in
| front of us down with our rifles. The
| S7th Ill. was good regiment. none bet
! ter. They were not armed properly for
sharpshooting. When We went into the
rifle pits the Johnnies would soon know
us, and they would call out: Hey, you
| Hoosiers. over there? What are you
| lighting us for? We don't want to fight
you feIlers.'
"All right, Johnnies."
And both sides would get on top of
! their respective works and kid each
other. Presently the Johnnies would
yell out. Get in your holes, Yanks.
| Officer coming" and sometimes vice
versa. We were honorable with each
other: no advantage was taken by eth
er side. | respect the old Johnnies yet.
for the majority of them were honor
! able and brave men and thought they
were right, and would have been if
| they had won. Might makes right: but
all may not agree with me in my views.
| went into the rife pits one morning.
and L was on the left of the company
L. being boy and small. stopped at the
first port hole | came to. There was a
| cartridge box over the hole full of dirt.
to protect a fellows head from the
enemy's. fire. | rammed my Enfield
rifle thru the hole in the wall, and took
a survey of the enemy's works. Soon
observed the smoke of a Johnny's gun.
| let drive with my Enfield at the
behind the smoke. Z, L unconcernedly
stepped back against the dirt wall of
the works to reload my Enfield, and
while doing so a mimic ball came thru
the four-inch port hole that / had just
been using and struck in the dirt wall
just over my right shoulder. If l had
had my gun in the hole sighting, the
mimic would have taken me between
the eyes 1 murmured to myself: Good
day old Johnny. You have too good a
range of that hole to suit me- And
went in search of a safer location; some
Johnny had seen the smoke of my gun.
At one time L was in the works there
was half-witted fellow at the next
port hole to the one I was at Gen
Grant came walking thru with field
glasses in his hand, and stopped be-
tween us and began to climb up on top
of the works. This half-witted fellow
said: General. don't go up there. You
will get shot" Gen. Grant answered
Il hope not" and went up and stood
IL
the minies flying thick and fast. Just
at that time there was a heavy artillery
duel on. l made up my mind then and
there that Gen. Grant was no coward
after observing his GOODNESS under fire.
/ have ever since been great admirer
of Gen. Grant. He was a brave man
and competent General. Seeing is
believing.
After the surrender of the Confeder-
ates on the morning of July 4, ] went
across to the Confederate lines in front
of our works. Some Confederates in a
ditch called to me to come and talk to
them They told me that it was certain
death for them to shoot at u.s. "a dozen
OF you Yanks would be laying for the
smoke of our guns" They told me
that one day their Colonel came into
their pit, and they We're all lying fiat on
the bottom. The Colonel said: Men,
what are you all lying there for and
ietuns them - Yankees do all of the
shooting?' He snatched a gun out of
one of their hands and showed it in
port hole and fired. The gun had hard
ly gone off than a Yankee bullet took
him between the eyes. Some Yank was
watching for the smoke of a gun. The
Colonel rolled over amongst his men
dead. They said that some one of them
made the remark after the Colonel was
shot: Il guess he has found out the
CHI
Yanks.''
After l left those Johnnies I went into
Nicksburg- L saw Gems. Grant, Sher-
man, Mcpherson and Logan riding into
the city. Grant was on the left, Sher-
man next on his right. Grant and Sher-
man were very busy in conversation.
Grant wore slouch hat. pantaIoons in
his boots and no shoulder straps Sher-
man was in about the same condition,
but believe he had on shoulder straps
number of Confederate officers
stopped me and asked me which one of
those Generals was Grant 1 pointed
him out to them, and they seemed sur
prised No doubt they expected to see
our beloved Grant adorned in gold lace
epaulets. but Gen. Grant was not much
for style. He was for planning and
executing his plans. He could do that
with his pantaloons in his boots and
without shoulder straps He was not
ou uTeSS parade that memorable 4th of
July. when 33, 900 men and 33 general
officers, with their arms and artillery.
surrendered to him, along with the
Southern Gibraltar, and the Mississippi
River was clear of Instructions from its
headwaters to the Gulf of Mexico. No
troops did more than Slack's Brigade to
open up the Mississippi from Island No.
10 to the Gulf. Col Slack and his bri-
gade We're the first to march thru the
city of Memphis, and Col. Slack was the
first Federal commander of Memphis. I
should like to hear from some of the
old boys of Slack's Brigade thru The
National Tribune. His brigade was
composed of good material from IIli-
no1s. Indiana, Ohio and Iowa. The
Johnnies always ran against a snag
when they came up against Stacks
Second Brigade. Third Division, Thir-
teenth Corps. They made an abrupt
stop. and generally turned and took the
back track One time while we We're
under fire there was a turnip patch near
by, and Slack's men were paying no
attention to the Johnnies' fire. but 60
ing after the turnips. Gen. Slack yelled
out in stentorian tones: Fall in here.
You fellows would go into a turnip
patch II - was not a mile off."-Wm.
w. Aspinwall. National Military Home,
Tenn.