Spencer Talley, Part 2

Fishing Creek

We were called a late hour of the night to rush up to camp "Myers" a distance of about three or four miles where Colonel Sidney Stanton was forming a regiment. The report said that a force of the enemies cavalry was approaching and that we would be needed in their defense. Much excitement and great haste was made in getting in line of march, all were anxious to get into the fight and it was about good daylight on the morning of the 19th of January that we came to the enemy camps. The night was very cold and it had been raining, sleeting or snowing all night and many were the fences we had to burn on the roadside to keep from freezing. Our old flintlock muskets were wet and water soaked, our regiment spent about ten minutes in trying to dry out and be ready for the fray. Battle's regiment, the 20th Tennessee, and the 15th Mississippi Rgt. brought on the attack. General Zollicoffer, in the mix-up owing to the smoke and fog, dashed into the enemy's ranks and was killed before the battle had begun. Leaving his brigade without a commander these two regiments were badly used up and gave way in great confusion.

Our regiment was on the extreme left while the fighting was all on the right and when they were repulsed, our wing was about to be cut off and captured. We were formed through a dense thicket of undergrowth and grape vines, when our colonel gave order to retreat in haste or we would be cut off. There was a rush made to get out of this thicket and in leaving my foot was caught in a vine. I fell in the pathway leading out of the thicket. I made many efforts to rise up but before I could rise some boys would step on me and I am sure that not less than twenty men ran over me before I could get on my feet, and when I had succeeded I found that I had been kicked along and that my hat and gun were twenty feet behind me. I knew it would not do to lose my gun and hat, and when I had gone back for them, I found I was way behind and the "minnie balls" flying thick and fast about me. After leaving the thicket we had to cross an open field, the ground was soft and wet and covered with grass which made the mud stick fast to our feet. Before I reached the woodland on the opposite side of the field my feet felt as if there was twenty pounds to each foot and I was broken down and still behind my comrades and felt sure I would be captured. I had gone but a short distance in the woodland before a piece of fleeing artillery came by me with ten horses hitched to it. A man to each pair of horses was driving under whip and lash, as the cannon was passing I jumped astride of it and locked my arms around it and my gun to keep from falling off. I rode this cannon for half a mile I suppose right through a woods when there was no road and frequently had jolts. When the wheels would strike a tree, that almost knocked the life out of me, and I have often thought of this as the most uneasy as well as the roughest ride of my life.

This was our first scrap with the Yanks and I am sure we had a few days of as much suffering and want as we experienced during the civil strife. We reached the Cumberland river near our camp about sunset. The Yanks kept in close pursuit all the way. Our few Cavalry men, who covered our retreat held them back until we were in a somewhat fortified position where we held them in check till late in the night, when we crossed over to the south side of the river. When (we were)through crossing the little steamboat "Ella", which we used in crossing, was burned to prevent it's use by our enemy in it's pursuit.

Retreat and Hardship

Now we privates had no idea that the retreat would be continued. We thought we were back at home in our old camp and would probably spend the remainder of the winter there. But early the next morning we were ordered in line of march. We had no orders to take our rations or anything save our guns and were expecting an engagement with the Yanks that were crossing over, but instead we took the Livingston road and never halted till night. We hadn't a thing to eat or cooking vessels of any kind, and our minds naturally reverted to the good coffee, bacon, flour, lard, etc. We had a bountiful supply of provisions that we could easily carried along had we known that we were on a long retreat. Our army officers were lacking in the first principles of army life. They had little if any conception of the vital points to be guarded in case of retreat. The news of this disaster, having gone to our people at home, they quickly slaughtered a number of hogs and several wagons from Wilson county loaded with fresh killed pork and flour and meal met us a few miles above Gainsboro. My father and Uncle E.D. Johnson were with the party and had each a load of the things we were wanting. It is useless to say there was great rejoicing when these old men met us with such a substantial relief, for we had been on starvation basis for several days and many of our boys had become sick and worn out and would have fallen into the hands of the Yankees had not been for the courage and heroism of comrades who packed them for miles on their backs rather than leave them in the hands of the enemy. Dr. J.N. McFarland, who died a few months ago, often expressed his love and gratitude to me for having borne him along for miles to save him from the enemy. We were much together and devoted friends before the war and of course I would do anything in my power for his good and welfare.

We rested for a day or so at and around Gainesboro and then began our march for a concentration of our armies. Fort Donelson on the Tennessee river both fell into the hands of the Federals soon after our defeat at Fishing Creek, thus forcing our retreat to the southern boundary of Tennessee.

Shiloh

The entire army in the middle or Western division of Confederate forces was now under command of General Albert Sidney Johnston. The Federal or Union forces were under command of General U.S. Grant who was concentrating his army at Pittsburgh Landing on the Tennessee river. General Johnston had all his forces from Kentucky and West Tennessee, as well as our army on the Cumberland to concentrate at Corinth, Mississippi. It was a sad time with all the older people in this country when we were leaving them in the hands of the Yankees, old men and old women were heartbroken to see us leaving. However this was natural and could not have been otherwise for no people on earth ever loved their homes and the sunny South more than did the people of Tennessee. We can never make you feel and realize how sad and sorrowful a time it was when our southern forces met with these several reverses in we might say the beginning of the war, for all of this occurred in January and February of 1862.

On our retreat from Fishing Creek we camped a while at Murfreesboro leaving there sometime in February on our journey to Corinth, Mississippi crossing the Tennessee River at Decatur, Alabama. It was here that we took our first ride on a railroad and were very soon a part and parcel of a great army at Corinth. When all of our scattered forces from West Tennessee and Kentucky had come together at this point I suppose we had an army of something like fifty thousand men. General Grant, commanding the federal forces at Pittsburgh landing on the Tennessee River, had a few thousand more men than Johnston and had much our advantage in that they had the best of rifles and superior artillery. It was on Sunday morning April 6th that the great Battle of Shilo was begun.

The Yankees all call it the Battle of Pittsburgh Landing but we Southerners have always called it Shilo because of the church house standing near where the most desperate efforts of the day were made. The exciting scenes of that Sunday morning will always be fresh in my memory, the shrill bugle notes calling every man to readiness of action. The rushing of couriers bearing messages, the swiftly riding officers up and down our lines, halting at some places to speak words of cheer and to urge men to deeds of daring and desperation. These scenes together with the gushing thunders of the cannon had an awakening effect so that we began this awful struggle, with a most determined and stubborn spirit while the Yanks put up a strong fight, having the advantage of better arms and equipment. They could not stand before the demonic yell and charge of our determined forces. We drove them from every position they took through the day. We captured money, a thousand prisoners, among which were several of their generals. We took their camping grounds and army supplies of every kind even their money which was in their paymasters tents and in great sheets not cut apart. I was not one who got some of this money, but saw some of the bills which I think was the first sight I ever had of greenback money.

After an all day fight and having driven them back for miles even to the banks of the river we were commanded to halt and all firing having ceased we began fixing to camp, for night was now upon us, and we were tired and hungry. It was while recounting the work of the day that the sad news of the death of our chief was announced to us. The loss of this great man was a severe shock. We felt that the thousands we had killed and captured was in no way compensation for so good and great a man as Albert Sidney Johnston. Many of us could not sleep that night for talking over the happenings and incidents of the day, a goodly number of our friends had been killed or wounded and we were busy till a late hour, looking up and hunting for our missing comrades and friends who had fallen. Many sad rehearsals of where this and that one had fallen. When we laid down on the ground to sleep that night our eyes were hard to close in slumber as our minds were intensely fixed on the courage and bloodshed of the day. We had certainly done all that we desired or expected, and yet the thought of our losses in killed and wounded was so depressing, we could not sleep well.

Before the light of another day Buell's army of more than twenty thousand men had by a forced march come to Grant's relief. We were thus confronted on Monday morning by an army of double our strength. Beauregard was now our chief, being next in rank after the death of Johnston. Had Johnston not been killed no doubt he would have pressed on and made his victory complete on the first day, while he had them beaten and driven to the shelter of their gun boats on the river. It was (due to) Beauregard's lack of generalship that we lost the benefits of the great victory we had won on the first day. We gave them battle on Monday but their lines were so much longer and flank movements so great and frequent that Beauregard was forced to retire, not in a routed way, but in the most perfect and orderly way. They did not pursue or endeavor to bring on another trial of our valor, but were no doubt glad to have us leave them alone.

On to Part 3