Private Dick Ransom, Chicago Mercantile Independent Battery Light Artillery, Exceptional Civil War Archive, incl. References

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• Lot Description

  Lot of 46, including 11 war-date letters written by Private Dick Ransom to his friends and family accompanied by modern photocopies of additional correspondence, 22 war-date letters from Ransom's mother, father, and sister, as well as photographs and other personal items.

  "War is cruelty. There's no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over,” said General William Tecumseh Sherman. In many ways, Sherman was a proponent of total war. He and the troops under his command were responsible for the “March to the Sea,” which destroyed cities and towns in a 40 to 60-mile-wide war path through Georgia. Yet, it was not the first time his men set fire to cities. Two years earlier, on Sherman’s Yazoo Expedition from December 20, 1862, to January 2, 1863, one of the thousands of soldiers under Sherman’s command, Dick Ransom, witnessed and participated in the looting and burning of Southern towns and cities. While traveling down river, Ransom wrote extraordinarily detailed letters home about the movements and the actions of Sherman’s unruly bunch, revealing their cavalier attitudes towards ceasing Southerners’ property and how some Union soldiers viewed African Americans as “creatures” and treated them like slaves.

  Five days into the expedition on board steamer Des Arc, Ransom wrote home:

  The Commander of the Division we are now in is Gen. A.J. Smith, a West Pointer. and the men do not like him at all He is no such man as Morgan L. Smith of our Division we are the right of the right division now before we were the left of the left Division There are four Divisions here under Gen. W.T. Sherman The two Smiths-Gen. Stiel’s and Gen. Morgan’s Ours is most all Ohio troops. We were selected. (our two guns and ten men) to go on this boat as Gen. Smith’s artillery escort and there are two companies of Infantry and ten men of Cavalry So we are not crowded as other boats are (about 25 miles above Vicksburg, December 25, 1862).

  Similar to the behaviors of soldiers during the “March to the Sea” several men broke rank and burned a town. Ransom wrote:

  On Monday morning some of the soldiers set a house on fire in the town and soon enough more were going to burn the most of the place…Tuesday night we went as far as Gaine’s Landing Ark and tied up for the night the place begun to be burnt before dark and kept up all night and in the morning but one or two houses were left. Gen. Smith ordered that the men that set the fires to be tied hand and foot and thrown into them or if the fire was burnt out when they were caught he would throw them tied into the river and if one was caught before two in the morning he should be hung and one was caught and brought in and he told him he should be shot at two o’clock the next day but before the time came he told him he might go that Gen. Sherman had pardoned him and gave him agood talking to and let him go (about 25 miles above Vicksburg, December 25, 1862).

  On a lighter note, mischief (or insubordination, depending on one's perspective) happened aboard the ships. Ransom wrote:

  Since we have boarded on this boat we have drawn our own fodder from barrels boxes and etc. around the boat such as flour, bacon, coffee, sugar, rice, molasses, vinegar, candles, soap-hard tack and sow belly and some of the boys have been down in the hold and tapped sundry barrels of pure government “jiggers” which is said to be the “real stuff” direct from the inspectors without reducing (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 5, 1862).

  A few soldiers took advantage of their liberties and stole a large amount of goods from below. Ransom wrote:

  Last night about nine o’clock [the Colonel] had a guard of infantry placed all over this boat to protect the “hard tack” …but the boys say that there was more stolen last night than altogether since we have been on the boat so that it must be the infantry that did it all but some of the infantry guards lost their ramrods some of their bayonets some of their cartridge boxes &c. which they say were stolen but it seems impossible (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 5, 1862).

  Obviously, the soldiers sold the goods on the ships and their own equipment to an eager buyer. Union men not only profited from the goods on the ship but also by looting homes. Ransom explained to his family:

  In ransacking a secesh house today at Pecan Grove one of the boys made from two hundred and forty dollars of the “Bank of Tennessee” which is worth a premium above “green backs” in Memphis, which makes me think if we were in Memphis before Gold was sold for 45 per ct premium in green backs and the whole of the “change” in the “Bank of Tenn” 5-10-25 and 50 cent shinplasters such as I sent you specimens if only some-worse worn (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 5, 1862).

  In another instance, a battery boy stole a mule from a distracted Southerner...he never saw Mr. Mule but some three boys had some “long eared money” to divide after selling muley to some speculative hack driver or livery and sale stable keeper, wrote Ransom (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 5, 1862).

  Ransom confiscated some goods of his own and benefited from his friends’ acquisitions. He explained, This morning we went out of our tents and into the mud-hunted around and found three secesh houses deserted and took possession of them and moved into two of them and the officers take the other for headquarters...  I took dinner with DeGraff and Allen who have confiscated a couple of good rooms over a store on Front Row and got a cooking stove and a couple of contrabands to do the work for them they draw their rations etc. and live high-drawing extra pay and “live in town” (Memphis, TN, December 14, 1862).

  However, the voyage on the river was not entirely smooth. Stuck on the muddy shallow banks, part of the duty of the men was to move the boats off shore. Ransom explained:

  Again we are landed or not landed either but tied up for the purpose of “wooding up” with fence rails. The Colonel who is on the boat “Meteor” towing us tries to make our boys bring rails (The way they get them is to bring two or three on their backs from the fence about twenty rods from the river bank) and the boys make him send one of his infantry guards with the musket and one rail at a time and that is sure to be a rotten one or one that is small enough to be so light as to be almost worthless for wooding a steamboat…I suppose it to be a very easy matter for a good rebel battery and a couple of regiments to make us “lay to” and surrender just now. Then we might get a “free pass” to Vicksburg or be paroled and sent to Camp Douglass or some place east may be to be kept till exchanged (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 6, 1862).

  Disease and dysentery also spread rapidly through the steamers stuffed with soldiers, which abruptly changed the light-hearted nature of the journey sour. Ransom wrote:

  I believe that there never was such a change in the minds of the same number of men as there has been here since we started “down river.” So many of the boys are sick and the Yazoo water and swamps, and bayous gave most all the diarhoea and then such a disgust of the commanding officers all round and of the general management of the expedition and then being obliged to retreat and that too probably all the way back to Memphis and the verdict of the whole this is “defeated and beaten” it is enough to sicken three quarters of the men, of war and demoralized (if such a thing is yet possible) the whole of the army (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 6, 1862).

  Other than dysentery and being stuck in the mud, Ransom’s descriptions sound more like a leisure cruise than a military expedition, but he was still part of a mission.

  On pursuit of Rebel troops, Ransom’s officers sent scouts to scan the areas for the enemy. Sometimes, information would come to them from more unlikely sources—runaway slaves. Ransom encountered such a group and wrote, some “reliable contrabands” …have just come in bundles and all and want to go with us “up norf” and the information these “intelligent” creatures bring is that there is a rebel force of about 5,00 men and one battery of artillery about 15 miles ahead of us up the river (Pecan Grove, Louisiana Corral Co., January 6, 1862).

  While resting on a river bank in the middle of the night, news came of approaching rebel forces and a Union retreat. The men furiously tore down their camp in order to board the ships. Unaware of the news, Ransom had a startling wakeup call when his tent began to be packed away while he was still inside. He wrote:

  The tent was jerked down on to me and all there was in it news had come in that our forces were retreating and the n*****s must pack up our baggage and stuff and move it down to the water ready to put on a boat I put my clothes, overcoat and a blanket and found the man the captain’s n***** Hostter that brought the news soon Serg’t Cone came and I found out that the whole army was going to be drawn back and put on the boats before morning…two of the pickets who came in reported that the rebels were building bridges across that bayou we had been fighting over and probably intended to cross and attack us in the morning There was nothing come in behind our two guns but one reg’t Infantry, and they reported that rebel scouts followed right behind us clear in to the edge of the woods…Our guns are on the “Louisiana” but we could not put the horses or ourselves on for she has a cabin full of wounded soldiers, many with legs and arms amputated and shot in all sorts of places I don’t know how many there are such but I believe several boatloads there are between two and three hundred on her (January 1, 1863).

  A few weeks before, Ransom described another anticipated attack:

  The alarm was given that a large rebel force was driving our men in and all hands were ordered to unload and get into position on the bank for a fight.

  Several thousand infantry and some big guns were immediately put out and Capt. Cooley began to unload his four guns which lay nearby us and it was discovered that only a very few of our men coming in with ten prisoners and 210 head of cattle and mules The prisoners were dressed in all kinds of garb and mounded and armed with all kinds of guns one had a rifle worth $150. They are from Texas. (On Louisiana Shore, December 25, 1862).

  The Rebel and Union armies finally met one another on the battlefield. Ransom describes his march into battle while suffering from the measles:

  About 3 o’clock the cannonading was commenced and kept up pretty hot. Apparently ten miles from us. About day light we marched out of camp in the direction of the firing passing troops and batteries all the way almost for about 7 or 8 miles. The nearer we came to the fighting-the hotter and plainer it grew- the cannonading at this time was more terrific than at any other time. The boys may have some of them worn long faces but the most of “Squad 6”- I noticed- grew more and more reckless as they neared the enemy- We were not allowed to ride but all had to walk in our places beside the gun ready for the action in one moment the same as on drill. Before we started out the Captain talked to the boys for a few minutes giving advice &c and he never spoke to them when they approved him so much though anyone could see that the most of them thought that they might be safe under some other man but still they pitied him because what he said showed that he wanted to do right and he wanted to and meant to try to take care of the boys…. We finally stopped in the woods I should think about eight miles from the boats and nearly north of Vicksburg. The city being in sight from a short distance from us and we could “hear the bells.” Where our guns were planted down on the “River Bottoms” in the woods. the water marks on the trees for high water was eighteen feet above the ground and was so far the whole distance back to the Yazoo. Where we lay there we were only about a mile West of the Mississippi. and the fighting was between some of our big guns on the west of us and some batteries across a bayou, on the hills, which we must take to get into Vicksburg- I believe that our artillery beat them on Sunday morning and the infantry and all were driven into Vicksburg and we had the hill- here Morgan L. Smith was wounded leading a charge across the bayou where the men hesitated to go-he got a bullet through his belt in front and it lodged between two bones in his back and he has had to give up command of the 2^nd Div. Then our A.J. Smith took his place and Brig. Gen. Burnbridge took this- the 1^st Div.

  Before noon we heard a good deal of heavy firing of infantry volleys and single shots and finally it all ceased and not much more was heard till the next morning though an occasional big gun would start us a little for we lay where they could shell us all to pieces from Vicksburg.

  Sunday night the horses were kept standing hitched up all night and the boys had to curl up and lie down where they could raise up and be in the shot to do his part at the gun…in the morning I was so very weak I could hardly walk and about 10 o’clock Serg’t Cone came to me and told me I had the measles and must go back to camp…I could hardly bear to go back and we expected to have our first fight every minute…[at camp] Only two white men stayed in the tent with me Carry and Tripp but 3 or 4 n*****s slept over on the other side. Tripp got me some ginger tea and I got one of the n****** by giving him some whiskey to promise to wait on me till I get well. and I kept him nearly busy trotting for me making grull and making composition fesser, lobelia, &c and I did not go out of my tent for anything…I believe it was the first time I wished I was home and then I believe I dreamt it. But I would have given anything on Tuesday to have seen a good nice white woman coming into the tent there as I lay-just to see me (January 3, 1863).

  In addition to the correspondence, the archive includes: 6 CDVs of Ransom, 5 taken in civilian clothing during the war, one of which is backmarked by McGill and Almond, Louisville, KY; gem-sized tintype he references in a letter offered in the lot; American Express Company receipt dated April 13, 1863; clipping from The Longmont Ledger and Longmont Press, dated July 16 and 17, 1885, celebrating the Golden Anniversary of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Ransom; 2 CDVs of Mrs. Ransom taken by J.H. Tatman, Connersville, IN and Swaine & Mote, Richmond, IN; a gem-sized tintype of Louie Perham included in a letter to Dick Ransom on August 19, 1866, credited to J.W. and F.R. Tinsley, Chicago; 4 cards, one for his affiliation with Freemasons and 3 introduction cards printed for Ransom to give to employers in need of a practical accountant in Colorado, which reads “I want a job!"; and modern copies of supplementary research on Ransom.  

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