By John Francis Maguire, 1868
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APPENDIX
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF MAJOR-GENERAL P. R. CLEBURNE....concluded
In a brief absence from Dalton, with one exception his only absence during his service, Cleburne formed an attachment as earnest and true as his own noble nature. The attachment was returned with the fervour and devotion of the daughters of the South. Much might be said of this episode--of its romantic beginning, and its tragic end; but the story of the loved and lost is too sacred to be unveiled to the public eye.
General Bragg had been relieved of the command of the Western army, at his own request, after the battle of Missionary Ridge; subsequently General J. E. Johnston was assigned to the command. To the Federal General Sherman was given the command of the armies assembled at Chattanooga for the invasion of Georgia. The campaign opened on the 7th of May. The history of its military operations, under the conduct of General Johnston, is the record of a struggle against largely superior forces, protracted through a period of seventy days, and extending over a hundred miles of territory. The campaign was characterised by brilliant partial engagements and continuous skirmishing, the aggregate results of which summed up into heavy battles. When the army reached Atalanta, notwithstanding the discouragements of constant fighting, frequent retreats, and loss of territory, it was with unimpaired organisation and morale.
In this campaign, Cleburne's division had two opportunities of winning special distinction. At New Hope Church, on the 27th of May. it formed the right of the army in two lines, the first entrenched. In the afternoon of that day the 4th corps of the Federal army advanced as if to pass its right. Cleburne promptly brought his two brigades of the second line into the first, extending it to face the Federal advance. This line received the enemy's attack, made in seven lines, on open ground, with no advantage on our side except a well-chosen position, and after an obstinate fight of an hour-and-a-half repulsed it. Cleburne's troops were not only greatly outnumbered, but were outnumbered by resolute soldiers. At the end of the combat about 700 Federal dead lay within thirty or forty feet of his line. During the action a Federal colour-bearer planted his colours within ten paces of Cleburne's line. He was instantly killed, a second who took his place shared his fate, so with the third and fourth; the fifth bore off the colours.
We read of little more effective fighting than that of Cheatham's and Cleburne's divisions in repelling an assault made upon them by Blair's corps of the Federal army, on the morning of the 27th of June, at Kennesaw. The conduct of the Federal troops on that occasion was as resolute as in the instance above. When they fell back, more than 300 dead bodies were counted within a few yards of Cleburne's entrenchment, some of them lying against it. His loss was two killed and nine wounded, certainly less than 1 to 100 of the enemy. On the 18th of July, Gen. Johnston was removed from the Western army, and Gen. Hood promoted to its command.
On the 21st, while the army was occupying a line encircling the northern front of Atalanta, Cleburne's division was detached to oppose an attempt of a corps of the enemy to turn the Confederate right, and penetrate to Atalanta at an undefended point. His troops, newly arrived at the point of apprehended attack, had no protection, other than the men provided themselves in the brief time allowed for preparation. They were attacked by large odds, in front and on both flanks. At one time Cleburne's line was so completely enfiladed, that a single shot of the enemy killed nineteen men in one company. The position was maintained, the enemy repulsed, and Atalanta preserved. Cleburne described this as the 'bitterest fight' of his life. On the 22nd of July, in carrying out a plan of general attack, my corps, consisting then of Cleburne's and three other divisions, assaulted and carried the entrenched left of the Federal army. The troops opposed to us were McPherson's army, of which Blair's corps formed a part. On the 27th of June, Cleburne had repelled an assault of these troops with a loss signally disproportionate. It bears strong testimony to the soldierly qualities of the Confederate troops, that on the 22nd of July, they, in positions exactly reversed, carried works equally strong manned by the same troops. The loss of twenty-seven of about thirty field officers in Cleburne's division in this action, attests the gallantry of the officers and the severity of the conflict.
On the 26th of August, the Federal commander, Gen. Sherman, commenced to turn the Confederate position at Atalanta. A Federal force made a detour, and occupied a position at Jonesboro, about twenty-five miles south of Atalanta. On the night of the 30th, Gen. Hood, remaining in Atalanta with one corps of his army, sent the remaining two, Lee's and my own, under my command, to dislodge this force. It was found to consist of three corps, strongly entrenched. The attack upon it was unsuccessful. Cleburne commanded my corps in this action, and achieved the only success of the day, the capture of some guns and a portion of the enemy's works. On the night of the 31st, Gen. Hood withdrew Lee's corps towards Atalanta, and the Federal commander was reinforced by three additional corps, so that on the morning of the 1st of September, my corps, in which Cleburne had renewed his place as division-commander, was confronted by six Federal corps. Gen. Sherman had, meantime, arrived on the field, and taken command in person. The enemy at once took the offensive. It was of the last necessity, to secure the safe withdrawal of the remainder of the army from Atalanta, that this Confederate corps should hold its position through the day. The odds were fearful, and the contest that followed was a very trying one; but the position was held against the attacks made upon it through the day, and the remainder of the army retired in safety from Atalanta. Cleburne's services were highly valuable in the operations of this day.
In the fall and winter of 1864, Gen. Hood marched into Tennessee. In this campaign, at the battle of Franklin, November 30th, Cleburne fell at the head of his division. He was one of thirteen general officers killed or disabled in the combat. He had impressed upon his officers the necessity of carrying the position he had been ordered to attack, a very strong one, at all cost. The troops knew from fearful experience of their own, and their enemies, what it was to assault such works. To encourage them, Cleburne led them in person to the ditch of the opposing line. There rider and horse, each pierced by a score of bullets, fell dead against the reverse of the enemy's works.
The death of Cleburne cast a deep gloom over the army and the country. Eight millions of people, whose hearts had learned to thrill at his name, now mourned his loss, and felt there was none to take his place. The division with which his fame was identified merits more particular mention. It was worthy of him, and he had made it so. Its numbers were made up, and its honours were shared, by citizens of five communities--Arkansas, Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee. In it was also one regiment of Irishmen, who, on every field, illustrated the characteristics of the race that furnishes the world with soldiers. No one of its regiments but bore upon its colours the significant device of the 'crossed cannon inverted,' and the name of each battle in which it had been engaged. Prior to the battle of Shiloh, a blue battle flag had been adopted by me for this division; and when the Confederate battle flag became the national colours, Cleburne's division, at its urgent request, was allowed to retain its own bullet-riddled battle flags. This was the only division in the Confederate service allowed to carry into action other than the national colours; and friends and foes soon learned to watch the course of the blue flag that marked where Cleburne was in the battle. Where this division defended, no odds broke its lines; where it attacked, no numbers resisted its onslaught, save only once;--and there is the grave of Cleburne and his heroic division. In this sketch of Cleburne there has been no intention of disparaging, by omission or otherwise, the merits and services of other officers and troops, some of which are eminently worthy of commemoration; but the limits of a sketch, personal in its character, and giving a bare outline of the military operations with which the subject of it was connected, necessarily preclude an account of the services, however great of others, even when rendered in the same action.
Cleburne at the time of his death was about 37 years of age. He was above the medium height, about 5 feet 11 inches, and though without striking personal advantages, would have arrested attention from a close observer as a man of mark. His hair, originally black, became grey under the cares and fatigues of campaigning. His eyes, a clear steel-grey in colour, were cold and abstracted usually, but beamed genially in seasons of social intercourse, and blazed fiercely in moments of excitement. A good-sized and well-shaped head, prominent features, slightly aquiline nose, thin, greyish whiskers worn on the lip and chin, and an expression of countenance when in repose rather indicative of a man of thought than action, completes the picture. His manners were distant and reserved to strangers, but frank and winning among friends. His mind was of a highly logical cast. Before expressing an opinion upon a subject, or coming to a decision in any conjuncture of circumstances, he wore an expression as if solving a mathematical proposition. The conclusion when reached, was always stamped with mathematical correctness. He was modest as a woman, but not wanting in that fine ambition which ennobles men. Simple in his tastes and habits, and utterly regardless of personal comfort, he was always mindful of the comfort and welfare of his troops. An incident which occurred at Atalanta illustrates his habitual humanity to prisoners. A captured Federal officer was deprived of his hat and blankets by a needy soldier of Cleburne's command, and Cleburne, failing to detect the offender or to recover the property, sent the officer a hat of his own, and his only pair of blankets.
Among his attachments was a very strong one for his adjutant, General Captain Irving A. Buck, a boy in years, but a man in all soldierly qualities, who for nearly two years of the war, shared Cleburne's labours during the day and his blankets at night.
He was also much attached to his youngest brother, who was killed in one of Morgan's fights in South-Western Virginia. This brother inherited the brave qualities that belonged to the name, and after being promoted from the ranks for 'distinguished gallantry,' fell in a charge at the head of his regiment.
Cleburne had enough accent to betray his Irish birth. This accent perceptible in ordinary conversation, grew in times of excitement into a strongly marked brogue. He was accustomed to refer to Ireland as the 'old country,' and always in the tone of a son speaking of an absent mother. He possessed considerable powers of wit and oratory, the national heritage of the Irish people; but his wit, perhaps characterised by the stern influences that had surrounded his life, was rather grim than humorous. He had a marked literary turn, and was singularly well-versed in the British poets. Indeed, he had at one period of his life wooed the muse himself, and with no inconsiderable success, as was evidenced by some fragments of his poetical labours which he had preserved.
It was known that he had a brother in the Federal army, but he seldom mentioned his name, and never without classifying him with the mass of the Irish who had espoused the Federal cause, of whom he always spoke in terms of strong indignation. His high integrity revolted at the want of consistency and morality shown in the course of that class of Irish who, invoking the sympathies of the world in behalf of 'oppressed Ireland,' gave the powerful aid of their arms to enslave another people.
Cleburne's remains were buried after the battle of Franklin, and yet rest in the Polk Cemetery, near Columbia, Tennessee, the most beautiful of the many beautiful spots in the valley of the Tennessee. Generals Granberry and Strahl, brave comrades who fell in the same action, were buried at his side. On the march to Franklin, a few days before his death, Cleburne halted at this point, and in one of the gentle moods of the man that sometimes softened the mien of the soldier, gazed a moment in silence upon the scene, and turning to some members of his staff said, 'It is almost worth dying to rest in so sweet a spot.'
It was in remembrance of these words that their suggestion was carried out in the choice of his burial-place. In this cemetery is set apart a division called the 'Bishops' Corner.' Here were buried the remains of the late Right Rev. Bishop Otey of Tennessee--here are to be placed the ashes of the heroic bishop, General Leonidas Polk, and here it is purposed that the tombs of the future bishops of Tennessee shall be ranged beside these illustrious names. In this spot, where nature has lavished her wealth of grace and beauty, in ground consecrated by the dust of illustrious patriots, churchmen, and warriors--in the bosom of the State he did so much to defend, within whose borders he first guided his charging lines to victory, and on whose soil he finally yielded to the cause the last and all a patriot soldier can give--rests what was mortal of Patrick Cleburne, and will rest until his adopted State shall claim his ashes, and raise above them monumental honours to the virtues of her truest citizen, her noblest champion, her greatest soldier.
Cleburne had often expressed the hope that he might not survive the independence of the South. Heaven heard the prayer, and spared him this pang. He fell before the banner he had so often guided to victory was furled--before the people he fought for were crushed--before the cause he loved was lost.
Two continents now claim his name; eight millions of people revere his memory; two great communities raise monuments to his virtues--and history will take up his fame, and hand it down to time for exampling, wherever a courage without stain, a manhood without blemish, an integrity that knew no compromise, and a patriotism that withheld no sacrifice, are honoured of mankind.
SELMA, ALABAMA: May 1, 1867.