Sherman's March was just as destructive. Since he is dead Southerners will curse Pope instead for generations.
Wrapped in Flames: The Great American War and Beyond
- Thread starter EnglishCanuck
- Start date
It seems that Lee is bound to lose, unless he gets a lot of reinforcements very soon or someone gets a force behind the Army of the Potomac. Rosecrans might not be a strategic or tactical genius, but he is an able organizer. With the Union army simply being larger, better trained and more completely supplied, any local victory will cost Lee's force a lot, as the battle of Strasburg did. Meaning that Lee's only options are knocking the Union armies back a bit with phyrric victories, taking losses he can't afford with strategic withdrawals or gambling everything on a single battle he cannot afford to lose, or even only take a minor victory on.
What's worse is since the Union is actively seeking to disengage from the contest in Canada, hence the withdrawal of Hancock's II Corps, they still have a pool of reinforcements to draw upon should Lee inflict a devastating loss on the Army of the Potomac. Lee has to hope he can, somewhere, inflict casualties on the scale of the Overland Campaign to take advantage of Union discontent at home.
Though I should note the Battle of Starsburg was so bloody simply because of the ideological and racial issues. White men were not going to admit defeat easily, and the black soldiers were not going to go down without one hell of a fight. So any fight between those kinds of units will be disproportionately bloody.
I had many complex reactions to this chapter so here's a play list that basically describes how I feel
I very much appreciate a soundtrack to the madness. Hopefully the next vignette I'm cooking up provokes similar experiences!
Chapter 88: Part 2
Chapter 88: Part 2
June 4th, 1864
Winchester, Virginia,
The day was hellishly hot, the humidity clung to a man like a cloying woman. Swarms of flies and other terrors bracketed the soldiers, attracted by the dead and the filth of the battlefield beyond the entrenchments. The secesh had come in force the day before, and all indications said they planned on one more attack today. Captain Francis Choate, Battery B of the 2nd Regiment, United States Colored Light Artillery had seen their like before, and he dared say so had many of his men. Though less from the battlefield and more from the slave quarters of Old Virginia.
Battery B was organized from men recruited directly from the contraband camps that had fled the advance of the slavers the year prior, running like hell before the Confederates could catch them and ship them back to slavery. Choate had gone around with the recruiters seeing how many would like to give a little back to their old masters. They’d found hundreds of enthusiastic volunteers, and almost overnight they’d formed a new battery. The whole of the regiment consisted of black men, namely former slaves and some freedmen, who had been accepted into the ranks in independent batteries in 1863 and 1864, and a shocking number were slaves from Kentucky who had conveniently been recruited elsewhere. Good officers didn’t ask questions about that, and many clever officers had sent their men East to avoid scrutiny.
Choate was glad for it, but he was less glad about the quality of his battery.
His boys had trained on Napoleon guns, but found those unexpectedly taken away when the fighting had begun in earnest, and replacements had been needed for the much abused men of XII Corps. Choate couldn’t be too mad at the Dutchmen, they’d given Bobby Lee a sound thrashing at Whiskey Hill after all, but he could be damned mad they’d taken his guns and given him something that the War Department clearly didn’t know what the hell to do with.
His new guns resembled no cannon he’d ever seen. Only a pitifully thin barrel with a rifle front and a funnel and a damn crank his men ran spitting out - the guns' armorer had assured him - thousands of rounds per minute. Certainly in the pell mell process to train his men on these contraptions had seen an impressive quantity of ammunition discarded downwind at unfortunate targets, but so far not at a single slaver.
Choate had sent plenty of lead at Confederates, serving with Battery E of the First Pennsylvania Light Artillery and joining the fight against secession in 1861, seeing action at Dranesville in 1861, Centreville, and along the Rappahannock in 1862, and been savaged by the counterattack that year. He’d missed Chantilly while in garrison at Washington, and then in 1863 barely avoided capture by Jackson’s encroaching legions. He’d seen vile things done by the oncoming Confederates, and heard all the stories of their depredations against colored folk. So when the request for experienced gun captains had gone out for Colored Regiments, he’d offered himself up immediately.
While he’d been proud of his reliable old Napoleons, he’d gotten used to the rattle of these Ager Guns. Dreadful name, and one his lieutenants had quipped at the time ‘Looks more like a coffee mill than an artillery piece’ and so his brave and ever joyful former slaves had named them ‘Coffee Guns’ and referred delightedly to their battery as ‘The Coffee Battery’ to anyone who asked. While he’d initially tried to put a stop to it, the name had stuck and come with some wonderful admirers from Philadelphia and Boston society who’d visited the guns over the winter and early April. The one good thing about that was that those fine abolitionist families had reached into their larders and, in the spirit of Christian fellowship, sent bags of fresh coffee to he and his men. Considering the beans were worth their weight in gold thanks to the intolerable British blockade, Choate let the name stick.
Now, his coffee guns were pointed towards the enemy from their little point on the redoubts at Winchester. His one regret was that he’d been unable to put his guns into action as Strasburg, but being caught up in the army’s baggage train had given them the advantage of siting their guns first when Jackson’s slaver hordes had thrown the boys back, and he’d chosen a spot that couldn’t help put wipe out any secesh who came at them.
Choate slapped another encroaching insect, his hand came away bloody. “By God I hate Virginia,” he muttered.
“Reckon them Virginians hate you too, sir,” his sergeant, Josiah said laconically. The man may have been uneducated, but he had a keen grasp and wit that had rapidly advanced him to sergeant. Even back in training the former slave had shown an uncanny ability to inspire men to action and discipline those who made trouble.
“Don’t be too free with your words Sergeant Washington. I’d hate to court martial you,” Choate chided, but with a smile.
“Better than a whipping, sir,” he answered back with simple laconic spirit.
Trying not to laugh, Choate looked over the field south of Winchester, where the enemy would be coming from. It was rolling, given to little dips and rises like much of the Valley, but was on a remarkably flat piece of terrain. It gave his guns clear fields of fire, and meant that their limited range would be more than made up for by how much they could hit. Fortunately, much like a good old Napoleon gun, it was all a straight shot, but you never really could be sure if the bullets were flying right.
“Be a good field for these pieces,” Josiah patted the nearest gun fondly, like a man patting a favorite horse on the flank.
“I’m hoping Jackson’s willing to test our aim.”
“You think that old devil will come?” The sergeant almost whispered. Jackson had a reputation amongst the contrabands, deservedly so, as a devil who had hunted them. Men under his command showed no mercy, and had been fierce in the hunting of contrabands until an order from Bobby Lee himself had put a stop to the practice.
“We should sincerely hope so, I would hate for these guns to miss their baptism by fire.”
As if summoned like the devil from a story, the sudden far off BOOM of secesh guns echoed from the forest. It looked as though Jackson planned to try the defences at Winchester one more time after all.
“Stand to!” Choate barked. Men hurried in from where they had been lounging or doing duty in the works nearby, running to man the gun. Josiah harangued men who seemed to be moving too slow, and soon crates of the peculiar ammunition were being readied, and the gun crew were taking their positions.
The six Agar guns which made up Battery B were arranged in a slight zigzag pattern in the works on their sector of the line. One at both the height of an earthen line and another inside so that there was no place on this portion where an attack would not face the fury of their fire.
Leaving Josiah and the lieutenants in charge of individual guns to their work, Choate paced his guns and made damn sure each of them was ready. He needn’t have worried. Despite the bleating of some that ‘blacks would not fight’ Choate had always found his men to be hard workers, dedicated to their tasks. They manned their pieces with an alacrity which in Choate’s opinion would put dedicated white men to shame. Other than a few critiques and encouragements, his men were ready when the keening rebel wail came from the trees.
Soon, ranks of gray clad devils were streaming across the ground. Under flapping flags and banners, they advanced. Choate smiled at that, and hoped they’d get closer. His guns might not look like much, but of course, looks could be deceiving.
“Come on you bastards,” he snarled under his breath. “Got a barrel full of coffee right here.”
On the slavers came. It might have been admirable had they not been traitors and the sellers of flesh. Choate could abide neither, and so he only looked on them as he looked at targets, mere points to be made when training his men. Finally, they reached the range just as he stepped back on up to Josiah.
“My mother told me to always give guests a warm welcome,” Joisah remarked.
Choate grinned. “She taught you well,” then in his command voice: “Sergeant, roll out the hot beverages. Battery Coffee! Fire!”
It wasn’t a great booming roll like anyone was used to. Instead, it was a series of loud rattles and cracks that sounded more like a hail storm than artillery, it was not dissimilar from a very badly done volley of rifles. However, as his men cranked, the guns still fired their deadly shot.
Out in the enemy ranks, men were hit and fell, some blasted apart, the shot going through them and into the man behind them. Choate watched with military efficiency as the guns did their terrible work. Spurts of red were soon obscured by gun smoke as the rebels fired back at their tormentors. The first volley washed over the guns, and though he heard a man scream, he didn’t seen anyone in his vicinity go down and stood tall.
“Pour it on boys! Pour it on! Traitors like it hot!”
There were occasional silences as men cleared the none too infrequent jams, but his six guns fired as the rebels came on. Suddenly a man howled like a scalded cat, and Choate turned to see one of the gunners clutching his hand, he’d touched the barrel and it was red hot. Choate scowled, he didn’t think they’d fired nearly that much ammunition. The other five guns made up for his piece’s sudden silence, but still the rebels came. Hate them as he might, Choate knew they could advance into the worst artillery had to offer.
“Sergeant Washington!” Choate snapped. “Get that gun back in action!”
After a few moments fiddling with the ammunition, all he heard were some nasty clicking sounds.
Josiah shook his head. “It’s no good sir, guns too hot. It’s jamming up, and we have to pull the rounds out!”
Goddamit, Choate thought but kept the blasphemy to himself. The rebels were barely twenty yards off now. They’d be upon the battery soon. For every man who’d fallen on their advance, another had taken his place. He saw the fresh gleam of hatred in those men’s eyes as they advanced over their dead and wounded comrades. Another gun fell silent, clearly jammed or too hot. Soon the rebels were making for the gaps where the guns had stopped.
“Men, prepare to receive the enemy!” He raised his sword high, and the soldiers nearby picked up pistols or carbines, whatever came to hand, including ramrods and in one case an empty crate.
With a howl the rebels came, and Choate raised his sword with a snarl of defiance. But before he could do anything he was pushed aside and a blast of fire washed ahead, burying the rebels in smoke. Dozens of black men in blue uniforms were pushing past him, hollering. “Lincoln! Fort Lincoln!” Choate vaguely remembered that was where the Colored Brigade had seen off the rebel attack at Washington the year prior.
As suddenly as they had come, the rebels were turning back, and they were chased by fire from the black men around him.
“Damn fool,” a voice said from beside him. “Where the hell were your supports before now?”
Turning to vent his anger, he stopped as he saw the colonel's oak leaves on the man's uniform, and he saluted.
“Colonel, sir! We didn’t think the rebels would make it past our guns!”
The colonel regarded the guns skeptically. “They make a lot of racket Captain, I’ll give you that. Don’t think they’re as good as a regular cannon though. But I grant, they served their purpose. Perhaps you can see the rebels on their way?”
Rattling thunder was picked up again and Choate proudly knew his men were doing just that.
“Thank you for your timely intervention Colonel, to whom do I owe the honor?”
“To those brave Africans who saved your sorry behind, Captain. More specifically, the 52nd Massachusetts.” The man grinned ruefully. “We were supposed to be resting after the hard fighting the other day, but as you can see we have been sent to assist.”
“Colonel Shaw,” Choate said a bit in awe, the famous scion of the abolitionist family had earned a just fame in commanding his men. Wouldn’t this be a story for society back home? “I thank you for your timely assistance sir.”
“Don’t thank me just yet. We both know Jackson is stubborn as the devil tempting a man to sin, he’ll be back. See to your guns captain, we’ll support you.”
By the end of the afternoon, the rebels had retreated. Winchester remained firmly in Union hands, and Jackson’s men had once again suffered a painful reversal. The Colored Corps lived to vex the rebellion another day.
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Grind up confederates as well as they look like they'd grind coffee huh? Cool beans. But they've clearly got heating issues, time to look into water jackets?
Grind up the enemy quite well indeed! They weren't as effective as later machine guns, or truthfully as grapeshot in the same era. These proto-machine guns were ahead of their time by quite a lot. Would take a lot of refinement to make them reliable.
I wouldn't say the Union is on the verge of adopting them wholesale.
That's a goof on my part really. They should be oak leaves. Only junior ranks had stripes to identify them.
So like today, from a certain point upwards in rank, the collar insignia is the only difference in Uniform between a certain rank and a general...
It's actually still pretty close to how rank insignia looks today. Below the rank of Lt. Colonel everyone has stripes to a certain extent, while a Lt. Colonel has oak leaves, full Colonels have an eagle, and Generals have stars. I'm not an expert on rank insignia, but I think the biggest difference between the ranks today and the Union ranks of the 1860s is that there wasn't a stripe for privates.
Most Trent War ATL's reduce Britain or the United States to "bit characters with zero will of their own", while allowing the side the author worships to ignore friction, logistics, and sometimes even the laws of physics. It's the hivemind versus the potted plant. Canada tends to get ignored as no sections of the hivemind have thoughts of their own or no sections of the potted plant have any thoughts at all. Just the fact you are considering the Canadian POV puts this above virtually all ATL's, including published ones.
Your divergence points are credible. Prince Albert could have died earlier and Wilkes could have made even more of a disaster of the French incident than he did. Too many ATLs have divergence points that are as likely as swimming up Niagara Falls.
The Lone Ronin
Banned
@EnglishCanuck Seeing as you're Canadian, it's no surprise that Canada plays a big role in the Great American War which makes perfect sense since it was a colony of Britain and it's proximity to the United States gives the British a firm place to invade and attack aside from somewhat supporting the Confederate States.
At first this seemed like too much, too fast, but in ATL Admiral Milne was re-enforced to 33 ships. and it's nice to see acknowledgement that Britain had worldwide interests that needed protecting. They can't just send everything immediately and they will need to bring vessels back into service.
You have probably already seen it, but here's a Naval list for the Royal Navy in 1861.
Thank you! I am glad that after so long people can still go back and read what I've written and people enjoy the points of divergence. I've enjoyed looking at not only the history of the US and Britain in the period, but also the lives of the Canadians whose homes would turn to battlegrounds. Getting to more intimately know their ground and their lives in the 1860s has been entertaining for me too.
It's been a fun project, and my side work in expanding it into published story format has allowed me to both tighten the focus and simultaneously fix some errors I've discovered over the most recent periods of research.
Thank you! While it seems fast, I was also somewhat surprised to see how deep the British resources were in this period, with their navy probably at a height it wouldn't reach again until the later 19th century as everyone had begun standardizing ironclad warships. Milne was, so far as I can gather, a very canny soldier who was perhaps better at strategy and logistics than line fighting, but that's what you need when you're implementing a blockade. I tried to make sure the British didn't get everything their own way, but I am quite confident in my assessment of the first six months of the conflict at least.
I have seen this link thank you, but it's always good to have another link to it!
Unfortunately for Canada, they were bound to be a battleground in any Anglo-American conflict. Since this was the formative decade for what became the Dominion of Canada, I had figured getting a good in depth look at their politics and struggles would be important.
I intend to explore their development post-war just as deeply. so be prepared for a lot of Canadian content in the future!
If it helps here is the Navy List for 1862.
(It lists 28 Ironclads in various conditions. Saying that the Union Navy is outclassed by an order of magnitude is no exaggeration)
(It lists 28 Ironclads in various conditions. Saying that the Union Navy is outclassed by an order of magnitude is no exaggeration)
I was personally surprised by the number of ironclads the RN had on hand, as it were, in 1861/62. It reminded me of the sheer scale of the Royal Navy in comparison to most of its contemporaries.
The USN was no slouch either, and once it got going its ironclad dominance on the inland rivers was simply staggering, and the latent ability to construct more on the inland rivers really shouldn't be underestimated either. On the seas though... well, I think that despite a valiant fight, it's a rather done deal over the way things turn out.
I jus read the tl an so far is really good , a shame that the csa seems to be losing , i think tls where they survive are pretty fun .
I hope that the british and the csa beat the us and we see an expanded canada and csa compete for north american dominance ( a humbled us is also always fun ).
I hope that the british and the csa beat the us and we see an expanded canada and csa compete for north american dominance ( a humbled us is also always fun ).