F. W. Chesson File: GLORY.HTM
144 Fiske Street Rev: March, 1996
Waterbury CT 06710 Rev: 5-26-2000
COLONEL CHATFIELD'S COURAGE
or
A Share of "Glory"
by
Frederick W. Chesson
It was said by the unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots at her execution in
1587 for conspiring to overthrow Elizabeth: "In my ending is my beginning."
Therefore, to start with a chronicle of Colonel Chatfield, it is appropriate
here to commence with the climatic event of his military career and life....
The motion picture "Glory" chronicled the difficult origins and even
more traumatic maturity of the 54th Colored Massachusetts Regiment in 1863.
Their Armageddon was on a low sand spit off of Charleston, South Carolina,
the very birthplace of Secession, where a defensive structure, known both
as Battery or Fort Wagner, stood in the path of their main objective, Fort
Sumter.
The 54th was not alone in this attack. The large Union force, commanded
by Major General Quincy Adams Gillmore of the Tenth Corps, included the 6th
and 7th Connecticut regiments, along with troops from Maine, New Hampshire,
New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio.
Fort Sumter had both important military and political values. Its Federal
garrison was the target, early on April 12, 1861, for fifty Confederate guns.
The commander, Major Robert Anderson Federal, bravely held out for two days,
then evacuated the place under a Flag of Truce. His only fatality resulted
from a powder accident while a salute to the National Colors was being fired.
General Anderson would re-hoist the same Stars and Stripes, almost exactly
four years later, but in between would come four years of fratricidal Civil
War.
Charleston increasingly became a focal point for both Federal attack
and Confederate resistance, as daring blockade runners slipped past
patrolling Union warships to carry out cotton and return with such diverse
goods as guns, medicines and the latest in Paris fashions.
Sumter had been considerably reinforced by Confederate engineers, most of
whom were former West Pointers, well-trained in harbor defenses. To augment
Sumter's approaches, two fortifications were erected on nearby Morris Island.
One of these was Fort Gregg, named for General Maxey Gregg, killed at the
Battle of Fredericksburg in December, 1862. The other, Battery Wagner, honored
Colonel Thomas M. Wagner, killed by a burst cannon at Fort Moultrie in July of
1862.
Early in 1863, General Beauregard ordered additional improvements to
Wagner, so that the original battery was now more of a true fort, and
presented a formidable obstacle to any attacking force moving up the narrow
land neck.
On April 7th, a Union Naval unit of eight monitors and the massive "New
Ironsides" under Admiral DuPont attempted to force Charleston Harbor, but was
unable to silence Fort Sumter and its supporting batteries. A land assault,
via Morris Island now became the only alternative.
By early July, 1863, Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg raised
hopes for quick end to the war. Capture of Charleston would kill the last
chance of any foreign recognition of the faltering Confederacy, and would be
a morale-booster in the North, to say nothing of the political benefits for
the Lincoln Administration and Republicans in general.
Accordingly, the Tenth Corps was put in motion. Among its Second Division
was General Charles C. Strong's Brigade which included the Sixth and Seventh
Connecticut Regiments, plus the Glory-fated 54th Massachusetts. The Sixth
Connecticut had a unique Waterbury connection, not only in enlisted ranks,
but also in the person of its commander, Colonel John Chatfield....
John Lyman Chatfield was born in Oxford, Connecticut, on September 13th,
1826, the eldest son of Pulaski and Amanda Chatfield. His father had evidently
been named for the Polish patriot who assisted the colonists in their own war
for independence. Ironically, the son would one day attack a fort so honoring
this foreign hero.
Before removing to Waterbury in 1851, this twenty-five year-old had
already commenced his military training with the Derby Blues. By 1854 he
had raised his own unit, the Waterbury City Guard, and elected its captain.
When Fort Sumter fell, President Lincoln issued a call for Three Months
Volunteers, cautiously hopeful for a speedy suppression of the Rebellion.
The City Guard at once volunteered and soon found itself training in New
Haven as Company D of the First Connecticut Volunteer Infantry.
(The story of this regiment, as seen through the letters home of Color
Sergeant Andrew McClintock, appeared in six installments of the Waterbury
Sunday Republican Magazine, commencing with the January 29, 1989 edition.)
Chatfield was soon promoted to major and then to colonel, and on May
9th, he and his regiment marched through a flag-bedecked city to board
the steamer "Bienville." On the 13th, they arrived at a tense and almost
encircled National Capital, the troops eager to storm the Virginia side of
the Potomac, where rebel banners flew in sight of the White House.
"Thank God," gruff old Commanding General Winfield Scott was said to
exclaim, "at last we have one regiment ready to take the field!"
Training continued in earnest, as the Second and Third Connecticut
arrived, joining a host of volunteers. One June first, the troops crossed
the Potomac, and trod the "Sacred Soil of Virginia." Here, Chatfield was
transferred to command of the Third Connecticut, whose colonel had proved
less than competent in the face of impending combat.
After weeks of skirmishing, McDowell's vast and still-green host began
a cautious advance towards the important rail center of Manassas Junction.
Here was fought on July 21st the famed Battle of Bull Run, or First Manassas,
according to Southern terminology, climaxing in a Union rout.
Amid scenes of disorder and outright panic, the three Connecticut
regiments fought well and even returned with a few prisoners. Col. Chatfield
was commended for his battlefield conduct and on August 1st was honorably
mustered out with his men, many of whom were to become future officers.
The sobering defeat brought the realities of Civil War home to all, and
new enlistments for Three Years Service were now called for. Chatfield helped
raise such a regiment and was appointed colonel of the new Sixth Connecticut.
He applied himself so strenuously to its development that his health suffered
and required a convalescence at Annapolis, while his men went on to South
Carolina for the Hilton Head and Port Royal Campaigns.
Rejoining the Sixth in January, 1862, he led it in the attacks on Fort
Pulaski and other fortifications guarding the vital port of Savannah. The
fort capitulated on April 11th, and Chatfield no doubt must have wondered
what his father would have thought about his name-sake's new notoriety.
In October, Chatfield was placed in charge of a brigade, having turned
down the rank of brigadier general, so that he might remain with his beloved
Sixth, and set off on a campaign to destroy railroad communications between
Savannah and Charleston. Supporting General Terry's Second Brigade against
Pocotaligo, he was wounded by canister shot, unhorsed and forced to crawl
through snake-infested underbrush before reaching safety.
By April, 1863, Colonel Chatfield was able to rejoin the Sixth and
commence training for the ultimate move against Fort Sumter and Charleston.
On July 10th, some 3,000 of Gillmore's 12,000 troops, supported by guns
on Folly Island and the fire of four monitors, attacked the southern end of
Morris Island. They were led by Brig. Gen. Truman Seymour, who had once been
a company commander at Fort Sumter. Now the guns of Sumter helped cover the
Confederate retreat to Fort Wagner.
After leading his men, Chatfield, was presented with a captured regimental
banner, stained with the blood of its late bearer, which bore the inscription
"Pocotaligo, Oct. 22, 1862", the very battle in which he had been wounded.
The initial success had been so swift that Gillmore was unprepared for a
quick follow-up assault on Wagner. His 24 hour delay for regrouping instead
spelled disaster.
Early on the 11th, the Seventh Connecticut, led by Daniel Rodman, fought
their way into the outer works of the fort, but were forced out when their
supporting Maine and Pennsylvania regiments were cut down. In the retreat,
Colonel Rodman was killed, adding his name to the roll of over one hundred
casualties out of the 195 engaged.
Gillmore had not yet given up hope of taking Wagner by direct assault,
but realized the importance of a thorough pre-attack bombardment. At noon
of the 18th, 60 guns from land and sea poured tons of projectiles into the
fort. At twilight, the fire slackened and the "Glory Assault" got under
way, spearheaded by Strong's brigade, consisting of the 48th New York, 76th
Pennsylvania, Ninth Maine, Third New Hampshire, 54th Massachusetts, and the
Sixth Connecticut.
The troops charged through a holocaust of fire from both Wagner, Cummings
Point and Fort Sumter without flinching, finally reaching the fort's moat.
It was the duty of the Sixth Connecticut to go in close behind the 54th.
But the brave Shaw fell early in the assault, leaving the regiment confused.
Yet the men of the Sixth managed to penetrate to the fort's interior, where
they engaged the defenders in hand-to-hand combat within its smoke-filled
casements and bomb-proofs.
The 54th finally secured a lodgement in a parapet to the left of the
Sixth and cries of Victory went up. But, with the charismatic Shaw dead,
his troops lacked their initial keen impulse. Outside, the supporting
regiments also lost cohesion, denying those inside the manpower necessary
to tip the balance for the Union cause.
For three bloody hours, the Connecticut troops held out, improvising
their defenses among the enemy dugouts. Color-Sergeant Gustave de Bouge of
Waterbury fell, shot through the head, his blood staining the blue State
Banner, and was soon followed by Private William Miller of Company F and
five more comrades. Finally, Captain Frederick B. Osborne of K Company
snatched the colors from the grasp of a Rebel and bore them tattered but
safe from the field.
Colonel Chatfield rallied his men to meet growing enemy counter-attacks,
until he too fell, his left leg shattered by a blast of grape-shot. Seeing
that relief was impossible, he ordered a man-by-man withdrawal, then
commenced his own tortuous evacuation. He had almost succeeded when a shot
nearly severed his right hand, shattering the fine sword presented to him
by the old City Guard in 1859.
Amid the carnage, humane instincts rose above personal safety, as
Private Bernard Haffey of G Company lay down beside Chatfield to shield
him from further injury. Nearby, Corporal Cummings, also of G Company,
removed the tourniquet from his own shattered leg to apply it to a more
seriously wounded comrade. At length, Chatfield was removed to relative
safety by a Private Grogan of Bridgeport, aided by Sergeant Chace of the
Seventh New Hampshire, himself wounded.
Others were not so fortunate. The fort's moat was so clogged with the
dead and dying that the retreating survivors had to claw their way through
blood-soaked bodies, many still writhing and screaming in excruciating pain.
When efforts were made to recover Shaw's body, the Flag of Truce party
was met with defiant shouts of "We have buried him with his Niggers!"
Eventually, the dead hero was returned home to Boston amid great ceremony
and national honors.
Chatfield was evacuated on the steamer "Arago." On the way to New York,
Chaplain Woodruff comforted him with the news that the Colors had been saved.
"Thank God!" he managed to reply. "Keep them, as long as there's a thread
left."
Today, the shredded banner reposes among other tattered treasures in
the Capitol's Hall of Flags, along with the heroic emblems of other battles
from yet other wars.
The mortally wounded Strong was also evacuated north, but never reached
his home state of Vermont, expiring in New York City on July 30th.
Chatfield arrived home in Waterbury on July 31st, his spirits raised but
his wounds worsening. Spurning a risky amputation of his festering leg, he
bade his weeping family a cheerful farewell on Sunday evening, August 9th,
1863.
His funeral was held on Thursday, with all city business suspended,
black crepe on the public buildings and flags drooping at Half-Staff.
Military and civic delegations assembled from across the state for services
at St. John's Church on the Green. Among the dignitaries were Governor
Buckingham and General Anderson, Fort Sumter's defender. Chaplain Woodruff
preached the funeral sermon and then accompanied his friend on the last
slow journey to Riverside Cemetery, while bells tolled and minute-guns boomed
a final salute to City's fallen hero.
Back on Morris Island, Gillmore turned to his engineering training, and
now instituted classic siege operations against the stubborn fort. Attacker
and defender suffered alike in the heat and humidity, with sunstroke and
disease soon claiming more victims than the preceding battle. Wagner's
bomb-proofs became furnaces, as land and naval shelling went on incessantly.
After dark, calcium lamps (the lime-lights of theatrical fame) garishly
illuminated the siege scene.
Finally, on the night of September 6th, Beauregard ordered evacuation
of both Wagner and Gregg. Gillmore's victory was largely empty, as Sumter
continued to hold out tenaciously, though battered into barely recognizable
lump of shattered masonry by repeated land and sea bombardments. It remained
a defiant monument to Confederate determination until virtually the end of
the war, finally being evacuated on February 17th, 1865.
Honors for heros, living and fallen came in the following General Orders.
GENERAL ORDERS No. 94.
DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH, HEADQUARTERS IN THE FIELD, Folly Island, S. C.,
October 28, 1863.
I. Medals of honor for gallant and meritorious conduct during the
operations before Charleston will be awarded by the commanding general to a
number of the enlisted men of this command, not exceeding 3 per cent. of the
present aggregate strength of those regiments, companies, and detachments
that have been in action or on duty in the batteries or trenches...
II. In honor of some of the brave men who have fallen on Morris Island
during the present campaign, the following names are adopted for the works
herein below designated, viz: The work at Cummings Point will be known as Fort
Putnam; that next to it, on Morris Island, as Battery Chatfield; Fort Wagoner
as Fort Strong; the new work near the south end of Morris Island as Fort Shaw;
that on Oyster Point as Battery Purviance, and that on the north end of Folly
Island as Fort Green.
By command of Maj. Gen. Q. A. Gillmore:
W. L. M. BURGER,
Asst Adj-General.
As for the battered Sixth Connecticut, it was first sent off to Hilton
Head to recuperate. What with the loss of half its original complement and
the death of its beloved colonel, it was never again the once-unique band of
Fighting Brothers-in-Arms.
Nevertheless, under the command of another Waterburian, Redfield Duryee,
the survivors went loyally into new bloodbaths on the Road to Richmond. In
early 1865 they participated in the capture of another Confederate bastion,
Fort Fisher, which guarded Wilmington, North Carolina, the South's last
major port. The city fell on February 22nd, shortly after Charleston's
evacuation on the 18th.
On April 14th, now-retired Major General Robert Anderson was present
for the raising of Old Glory over the ruins of Sumter, four years to the
day that the very same flag was lowered by him.
On that same night, Abraham Lincoln went to see "Our American Cousin"
at Ford's Theatre in Washington, there to meet the "Glory of Martyrdom"
at the hands of John Wilkes Booth.
On August 21st, 1865, the Sixth Connecticut was mustered out in New
Haven, having suffered over two hundred casualties in its service to the
Union. In 1865, the State Militia was reorganized into the Connecticut
National Guard, with Waterbury's Company A of the 102nd Regiment officially
designated as the Chatfield Guard.
Following the erection of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument on the
Green in 1884, the designer, George E. Bissell, was approached by fellow
friends of Chatfield with the plan for a memorial to the late Colonel.
Bissell carried out the execution in his Paris studio and the life-sized
bronze was cast there at Gruet's Foundry in 1887.
On September 13th of that year the monument was unveiled by Colonel
Chatfield's grand-daughter amid appropriate parading and ceremony. It also
marked the appearance of the Chatfield Guard's Veteran Association, an event
which would initiate a yearly memorial event for years to come.
About three years before Colonel Chatfield's monument was cast, plans
had been formulated in Boston for a heroic monument to Colonel Shaw. The
Dublin-born sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens, whose bronze of Admiral Farragut
had already brought him renown, was commissioned.
The Artist proceeded with painstaking care and produced a life-sized,
high-relief bronze sculpture. Shaw is depicted as mounted, with drawn sword,
leading his troops. Overhead hovers a robed female figure, bearing laurel and
poppies, symbolic of glory and victory, even in death. The work was dedicated
in 1897, facing the Old State House, and is still considered a masterpiece of
public monumental art.
But in Waterbury, time has rolled on and, as it is painfully clear, the
sanctity of our cemeteries and their monuments are of small concern to
vandals and metal looters. Colonel Chatfield stands alone, still erect upon
his granite pedestal, as if facing the ramparts of Fort Wagner. Both his
sword blade and scabbard have been literally "ripped-off" by prowling
scavengers. And now, unlike Colonel Shaw, his fellow-martyr of July 18th,
he faces the vandalism of Time's obscurity, as well.
Perhaps, however, he is sustained in his lonely hours by the closing
words of General Kellogg, at the dedication ceremony, over one hundred years
ago.
"...heroic, Patriotic Soul! The autumn leaves may fall about thy grave
for ages yet to come and the moss and rust of years gather on this monument.
But thy name and virtues shall remain imperishable in the hearts and history
of this thy people forever...."
* * *
RETURN TO INDEX