To the West Woods: The Correspondence of Henry Ropes, 20th Massachusetts, Entry 13

This is the thirteenth entry in the correspondence of Lieutenant Henry Ropes to his family between September 3 and October 5, 1862. Ropes was a Second Lieutenant in Company K of the 20th Massachusetts, Dana’s Brigade, Sedgwick’s Division, II Corps.

Headquarters  Bolivar Heights, Va.

October 1, 1862.

My dear Father.

I received yesterday your two letters of September 26^th and one from Mother of the 25^th. Thank you very much for again sending me so many comforts and luxuries.

I have not yet received the two boxes sent on with Lt. Abbott^⁠1, the parcel of fly netting you sent nor the box by Lt. Grafton^⁠2.

Bolivar Heights (detail): "The heights covered with
tents and troops." Library of Congress,
Prints and Photographs Division (click to enlarge)

The two first were sent last July or August and probably went to Harrison’s Landg. In a very few days the Express Company^⁠3 expect to open a depot here and then I shall probably receive all. When we were at Harrison’s Landing you wrote to me that you had sent through Mr. Alford,^⁠4 Agent of the American Tract Society $10.00 worth of “Goodies.” Perhaps they were for the sick, I am not not sure, but at any rate I never got them. Mr. Alford brought some tracts to the Regiment, and gave some Jams, Crackers &c. To the Hospital of the Regiment, but if I remember correctly your donation was after this.

You say you fear letters miscarry. Please tell me if you received lately a letter from me containing $4.00 in Mass. Banks to be changed for U.S. notes? I sent such a letter. I believe I am right about the boxes &c. I give the list as I expect to get them. Please tell me if it is right.

Boxes &c. sent to me.

1 box Ale &c.                                           by Adams Express

1 box Ginger (Mrs. Dr. Jeffries, &c)          “      “       “

1 parcel Netting                       “      “       “

1 supply Goodies                  American Tract Society

1 box Brandy &c.                  Lt. Grafton.

These I have received notice of an expect.

Please tell Mother that I long ago sent my thanks to Cousin Kitty for the sermons. I have written for some letter stamps. They are very scarce here now.

I think you underestimate our loss. Our Brigade lost most heavily of all. The day after the battle Col. Lee took command, and it then numbered 960 men, for 5 Regiments. He reported officially a loss in all of almost 900 men. Our Corps of about 13,000 or 14,000 men lost between 5000 and 6000. I think our entire loss must be 12,000 to 14,000.

We are all quiet here and no news.

Your affectionate son

Henry.

Source Note

The source for Henry Ropes’ correspondence is the three volume transcription of Ropes outbound correspondence to his father, mother, and his brother, John C. Ropes. The original transcription can be found at the Rare Books and Manuscripts Department, Boston Public Library.

Henry Ropes was killed at Gettysburg on July 3 and from that point on, John C. Ropes undertook a life-long pursuit to memorialize his brother’s life and the regiment’s history. The transcription volumes are the center piece of John C. Ropes work and his legacy. Each of the three transcribed volumes are organized chronologically: Volume 1 is Henry Ropes’ correspondence to his father and mother, and Volume 2 and 3 to his brother, John C. Ropes. For more on the Ropes correspondence, see Richard F. Miller’s excellent essay on historical bibliography at pages 495-499 in his superlative study on the 20th Massachusetts in Richard F. Miller, Harvard’s Civil War: A History of the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 2005). Any errors in transcribing and annotating the selected correspondence are mine.

Notes:

¹ Lt. Henry Livermore Abbott (1842-1864), Harvard College, 1860 would be killed at the Battle of the Wilderness.

² 1st Lt. James Ingersoll Grafton (1841-1865), Second Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry. He had left Harvard College at the outbreak of the war. He had been wounded in the head at Cedar Mountain and had returned to the regiment on October 1, 1862. Alonzo Hall Quint, Record of Second Massachusetts Infantry: 1861-1865 (Boston: James P. Walker, 1867), pp. 497-98.
³ Adams Express Company.

⁴ Probably John W. Alvord of the American Tract Society. For more on John W. Alford and his work with the American Tract Society, see http://tb.history.pcusa.org/resources/exhibits/civil_war/section_003_005.cfm; see also, James M. Schmidt, “A Balm from Gilead,” posted at the Civil War Medicine (and Writing) blog at http://civilwarmed.blogspot.com/2009/12/medical-department-32-religious-tracts.html.

To the West Woods: The Correspondence of Henry Ropes, 20th Massachusetts, Entry 7

This is the seventh entry in the correspondence of Lieutenant Henry Ropes to his family between September 3 and October 5, 1862. Ropes was a Second Lieutenant in Company K of the 20th Massachusetts, Dana’s Brigade, Sedgwick’s Division, II Corps.

Camp on Battlefield near Sharpsburg
Md. September 20, 1862.

My dear John.

I have written to Father giving an account of the late battle. I have received 2 letters from you of the 12th one from Mother of the 8th and one from Mary Ann, and one from Father of the 9th inst. Which I have not yet acknowledged.

Yesterday I went over the field, and it was really a most awful sight. The dead were really piled up and lay in rows. The slaughter was more awful than anything I ever read of, for it is not a small field on which the dead lay thickly scattered as if there was a separate fight at that one place, but a vast extent of country several times as large as the Commons⁠[1] where there is no place which you can stand and not see the field black with dead bodies as far [as] the eye can reach. Then the wounded gathered into barns &c. are an awful sight. The Rebels let them lay for 2 days without care, and would not allow our men to either take them off, or dress their wounds, as they lay, although their own men robbed them of everything and often stripped their clothes from their bodies. No description I ever

Location of the 20th Massachusetts in the West Woods.
Detail from Cope/Carman Map, 1904. Library of Congress.

read begins to give one an idea of the slaughter and the horrible sights of this battle-field. We drove them for about 1/2 miles, and they then repulsed us from the ravine into which we were too hastily advanced.⁠[2] The Artillery was by far the heaviest we have ever yet heard.

The 20th has lost about 150 about of about 400, and it never acted better or better supported its reputation for perfect steadiness. The advance of our Division was a splendid sight. I had 2 very narrow escapes. The spent ball made a hole in my coat and only scraped up the shirt a little and made me lame for a day. The Cannon ball I saw distinctly. It first hit the branch of a tree, glanced, passed between my legs slightly burning my knee and leaving a black mark on my pants. It struck the ground behind me and again glanced up and smashed the shoulder of Corporal Campion⁠[3] of my Company. A great many of our men were killed by the grape shot they piled into us from the top of the hill⁠[4] about as far off as from our house to Charles St.⁠[5] 

Well, it is over, and we may not see another such battle for many months.

Much obliged to you for your attention to my things. Your recruit has not yet come. James is doing better of late and [seems] capable of improvement. I should not take an enlisted man for a servant. Col. Lee⁠[6] is well and in command of the Brigade, Genl. Howard⁠[7] of the Division; Capt. Dreher⁠[8] of the Regiment. Herbert⁠[9] is all right and unhurt. So are all other friends except those I mentioned as wounded. We have beaten the enemy badly and they acknowledge it. I should not wonder if the war was now brought to a speedy end.

I have heard that our left was unprotected in consequence of Genl. French taking a wrong road. He should have been there.

I have received the pistol &c. And have determined to keep John Bradlee⁠[10] and send home the heavy one. Have not seen Lieut. Morse⁠[11] of the 2d. They were out near us for 2 days. Saw Caspar⁠[12] and Forbes⁠[13] of the Cavalry the other day. Murphy⁠[14] and Abbot⁠[15] were left sick at Frederick and were not in the battle.

Your affectionate brother,

Henry


Source NoteThe source for Henry Ropes’ correspondence is the three volume transcription of Ropes outbound correspondence to his father, mother, and his brother, John C. Ropes. The original transcription can be found at the Rare Books and Manuscripts Department, Boston Public Library.

Henry Ropes was killed at Gettysburg on July 3 and from that point on, John C. Ropes undertook a life-long pursuit to memorialize his brother’s life and the regiment’s history. The transcription volumes are the center piece of John C. Ropes work and his legacy. Each of the three transcribed volumes are organized chronologically: Volume 1 is Henry Ropes’ correspondence to his father and mother, and Volume 2 and 3 to his brother, John C. Ropes. For more on the Ropes correspondence, see Richard F. Miller’s excellent essay on historical bibliography at pages 495-499 in his superlative study on the 20th Massachusetts in Richard F. Miller, Harvard’s Civil War: A History of the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 2005). Any errors in transcribing and annotating the selected correspondence are mine.

Notes

1 The Boston Commons.

2 The location of the 20th Massachusetts in the West Woods placed them in a broad depression between two limestone ridges. See, illustration.

3 This was Irish-born Corporal Edward J. Campion. He and his brother, Sgt. Patrick J. Campion, served in Company K, 20th Massachusetts. The medical history of Corporal Campion follows: “Campion, Edward J., Corporal, Co. K, 20th Massachusetts, aged 31 years. Antietam, September 17th 1862. Shell fracture of right temporal bone. Baltimore hospitals. Removal of spicular of bone. Discharged March 10, 1863. Examiner David Choate, M.D., reports, November 27th, 1863, that the patient is subject to vertigo, palpitation, and morbid wakefulness. He was admitted to the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers at Togus, Maine on September 20, 1887 where he lived until his death on December 26, 1910. The Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1870), p. 238; 62d Congress, 2d Session (December 4, 1911-August 26, 1912) House Documents, Vol. 121 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1912), p. 287; National Archives, Record Group 94, (M544, Roll 0006). Alphabetical card index to the compiled service records of volunteer Union soldiers belonging to units from the State of Massachusetts.

4 This would be Hauser’s Ridge.

5 The 9:00 to 9:30 location of the 20th Massachusetts is marked on the Antietam Battlefield Board Atlas a little less than 600 yards from Brockenbrough’s and D’Aquin batteries located on Hauser Ridge. The distance from the family residence on 92 Beacon Street and Charles Street is 500 feet. Cope/Carman Map 1904; Boston Directory… for the Year Commencing, July 1, 1862 (Boston: Adams, Sampson, & Co., 1862); Mitchell’s New General Atlas, Plan of Boston (Philadelphia: S. Augustus Mitchell, 1866).

6 Colonel William Raymond Lee (1807-1891), attended West Point but dropped out in 1829. John C. Ropes, “William Raymond Lee,” Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. 28 (May, 1892-May, 1893), pp. 346-348.

7 General Oliver O. Howard (1830-1909), took command of the division vice the wounded John Sedgwick. Cullum’s Register.

8 Captain Ferdinand Dreher (1822-1863) commissioned as Major on September 5, 1862 will be wounded at Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862 and die in Boston on April 30, 1863. Annual Report of the Adjutant General of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts with reports from the Quartermaster-General, Surgeon-General, and Master of Ordnance for the Year Ending December 31, 1862 (Boston: Wright & Potter, 1863), pp. 676-77; NARA, RG 15, Case Files of Approved Pension Applications of Widows and Other Veterans of the Army and Navy Who Served Mainly in the Civil War and the War With Spain, compiled 1861 - 1934, Application Number WC8673.

9 Lt. Herbert Cowpland Mason (1840-1884), Harvard College, 1862, will be severely wounded in the West Woods.

10 Unknown reference.

11 Lt. Charles Fessenden Morse (1839-1926), Harvard (1858) served as Captain of Company B, 2nd Massachusetts.

12 Caspar Crowinshield (1837-1897), Harvard (1860), originally with the 20th Massachusetts, was a captain in the First Regiment of Massachusetts Cavalry. The regiment, deployed across the Middle Bridge and finding some refuge in the hollows and banks adjacent to Antietam Creek as the “air was full of shot and shell.” Ezra A. Carman, The Maryland Campaign of September 1862, Vol. II: Antietam. Thomas G. Clemens, ed. (California: Savas Beatie, 2012), p. 363.

13 William Hathaway Forbes (1840-1897), Harvard (1861), served in the First Regiment of Massachusetts Cavalry. Obituary, The Harvard Crimson, October 31, 1897.

14 Lt. James Murphy would resign his commission on August 28, 1863 due to wounds received at Chancellorsville. He will serve as one of Henry Ropes’ pallbearers.

15 Lt. Henry Livermore Abbott (1842-1864), Harvard College, 1860 will be killed at the Battle of the Wilderness.

To the West Woods: The Correspondence of Henry Ropes, 20th Massachusetts, Entry 5

This is the fifth entry in the correspondence of Lieutenant Henry Ropes to his family between September 3 and October 5, 1862. Ropes was a Second Lieutenant in Company K of the 20th Massachusetts, Dana’s Brigade, Sedgwick’s Division, II Corps. 

Camp 20th Regiment near 

Middletown, Md.  Monday September 15th 1862

6 A.M.

My dear Father.

We came here late last night, having marched very far to the North during the day. We marched from Rockville to Frederick City via Clarksburg and Middlebrook^⁠1, and camped day before yesterday close to Frederick. The people show every sign of joy at our arrival. There was a severe battle^⁠2 here yesterday before we came up, about which I have not yet heard much, but we drove the Rebels at last. All quiet as yet this morning, so I suppose they have retreated in the night. I hear the 35th Mass.^⁠3 was

Major General Jesse Reno (1823-1862)
Tenleytown Historical Society, Washington, D.C.

engaged. Genl. Reno^⁠4 is killed_ his body was carried by us. The houses were filled with wounded when we passed up. We are about 2 miles from the position the Rebels occupied last night. My foot is well. All the Regiment safe and well, except Lieutenants Abbott^⁠5, Murphy^⁠6 and Beckwith^⁠7 who are ill and left at Frederick. I do not think Abbott is much ill, but it would have hurt him to march and we persuaded him to stay behind for a day or two. 

Received letter from mother of the 8th. No other letters. Please do not send on the pistol if there is no fixed Ammunition to fill it. Love to Mother and all. Shall try to write soon. Our force here is very large and we are in reserve and in all probability shall not be engaged in case another battle takes place in a few days.

In great haste

Your affectionate Son
Henry.

Source.

The source for Henry Ropes’ correspondence is the three volume transcription of Ropes outbound correspondence to his father, mother, and his brother, John C. Ropes. The original transcription can be found at the Rare Books and Manuscripts Department, Boston Public Library. 

Henry Ropes was killed at Gettysburg on July 3 and from that point on, John C. Ropes undertook a life-long pursuit to memorialize his brother’s life and the regiment’s history. The transcription volumes are the center piece of John C. Ropes work and his legacy. Each of the three transcribed volumes are organized chronologically: Volume 1 is Henry Ropes’ correspondence to his father and mother, and Volume 2 and 3 to his brother, John C. Ropes. 

For more on the Ropes correspondence, see Richard F. Miller’s excellent essay on historical bibliography at pages 495-499 in his superlative study on the 20th Massachusetts in Richard F. Miller, Harvard’s Civil War: A History of the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 2005). Any errors in transcribing and annotating the selected correspondence are mine.

Notes.
¹ Middlebrook Post Office was located along the Frederick Road just west of Great Seneca Creek. 
² The Battle of South Mountain, September 14, 1862.
³ The 35th Massachusetts was organized at Worcester, Massachusetts on August 1, 1862. They joined the 2nd Brigade (Ferrero), 2nd Division (Sturgis), of the IX Corps for the advance into Maryland. They participated at the Battle of South Mountain on September 14th. Ropes’ interest in the regiment probably is his family relationship with Major Sidney Willard (1831-1863) who served as a Major in the 35th Massachusetts. See previous post, December 29, 2014. Bartol, A Nation’s Hour: A Tribute to Major Sidney Willard (Boston: Walker, Wise, and Company, 1862), pp. 14, 30-31; The Civil War in the East website; Union Order of Battle, Official Records.
⁴ Major General Jesse Reno (1823-1862), a Virginian by birth, headed the Union IX Corps. He was mortally wounded at Fox Gap, South Mountain while directing troop positions toward the end of the battle. See further, John Hoptak, The Battle of South Mountain, (Charleston, SC: History Press, 2011), pp. 82-85.
⁵ Lt. Henry Livermore Abbott (1842-1864), Harvard College, (1860), will be killed at the Battle of the Wilderness.
⁶ Lt. James Murphy will resign his commission on August 28, 1863 due to wounds received at Chancellorsville, Murphy will serve as one of Henry Ropes’ pallbearers.
⁷ Sgt. Robert Beckwith (1840-1862) a Scottish-born ironworker will be commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant following Antietam. He will be killed on the assault on Mayre’s Heights, Fredericksburg on December 13th.  Richard F. Miller, Harvard’s Civil War: A History of the Twentieth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry (Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 2005), pp. 183, 212.