Ohio History Journal

GENERAL JOSHUA WOODROW SILL

 

BY ALBERT DOUGLAS

 

FOREWORD

With some sixty years intervening since the Civil

War; and with the generation of men and women to

whom it was a fearful reality almost all gone from

earth; it cannot be hoped that many who knew him per-

sonally will read this slight memoir of one of Ohio's

great and best soldiers of that war.

But to these few, and especially to those who have

urged me to use the letters and memoranda in my hands

for the preparation of some memoir, as well as to all to

whom this story of youthful devotion and valor may

appeal, I dedicate this sketch.

In stature General Sill was rather below than above

medium height.  His figure was well knit and erect,

his carriage and movements vigorous and somewhat

nervous, his whole appearance indicative of health. His

hair and beard were brown, and his handsome, gentle

eyes were of the same color.

As I recall him during his visits in 1861, he was

thoughtful and affectionate to those of his kin-folk with

whom I saw him, fond of long walks and talks with his

sisters and playful with his nephews and niece. Indeed

as I look back to my earliest recollections of men and

events, he seems to me "scarce other than my own ideal

knight."

Washington, D. C.

ALBERT DOUGLAS.

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      107

 

 

JOSHUA WOODROW SILL

General Joshua Woodrow Sill, who was killed on the

morning of December 31, 1862, on the battlefield of

Stone's River, Tennessee, was born in Chillicothe on

December 6, 1831.

He was the son of Joseph Sill, of a family identified

through several generations with the town of Lyme,

Connecticut; though Rev. Richard Sill having been

called to Granville, New York, his son Joseph was born

there. He graduated at Middlebury College, Vermont,

studied law, was admitted to the bar in Philadelphia;

and the same year, 1814, came to Chillicothe, where he

successfully practiced his profession for many years.

General Sill's mother was Elizabeth Woodrow, of

Hillsboro, Ohio, daughter of a sturdy Quaker, Joshua

Woodrow, for whom her son was named, and whose

father, also named Joshua, came to Highland County,

Ohio, from Culpepper, Virginia, in 1808.

His mother having died before he was three years

old, the boy Joshua Sill spent much of his youth in Hills-

boro with his grandparents and relatives, among whom

he was a favorite. His father was a scholar, a man of

much reading, and gave his personal attention and care

to the education of his son, especially in mathematics,

as well as in Latin and general history. To his efforts

and teaching the boy gave cordial response, as he was

an apt pupil, of good mind and then and always a dili-

gent student. As a youth he was not given to the more

boisterous sports of his fellows, though a favorite

among them; but was disposed to be quiet and serious

even as a boy. Though quiet in manner, he was fond

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of fun, had a quick wit and much enjoyed the society and

fellowship of boys and girls of his own age. He early

became an earnest Christian, and his sincere faith domi-

nated his habits, conduct and speech till the day of his

death.  At West Point he organized a large class for

Bible study and gave much of his spare time to its suc-

cessful work.

On July 1, 1849, in his eighteenth year, he entered,

by the appointment of his father's warm friend, Con-

gressman John L. Taylor, the United States Military

Academy as a cadet in the class of 1853.  It does not

appear likely that he went to the Military Academy from

any predilection for the military profession as a voca-

tion. It is probable that like many other boys he ac-

cepted the appointment to West Point because it offered

an inexpensive way to a good education, especially along

the lines of his taste for mathematics; and this would

seem to be confirmed by his choice upon graduation of

the ordnance arm of the service.  His father's careful

teaching and his own studious habits and clever mind,

along with a first rate physical rating, resulted in his

entrance to the Academy without difficulty or condi-

tions; and he at once took and maintained high rank in

his class.

The roll of the class of 1853 contains the names

of some of the most distinguished generals of the

Civil War, including James B. McPherson and Philip

Sheridan, both from Ohio, and Schofield, victor in one

of the last great battles in the West. When on July 1,

1853, the class was graduated, McPherson, the hero and

victim at Atlanta, stood first; William P. Craighill, of

Virginia, afterwards a general in the Northern army,

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      109

was second and Sill was third on the roll of "honor

men."   It is another interesting commentary on the

often mooted question of class standing as related to

professional success that the name of Phil. Sheridan,

after five years at the Academy, stood thirty-fourth in

the list of fifty-two names.

Upon his graduation Sill was breveted second lieu-

tenant of ordnance and assigned to the government

arsenal at Watervliet, New York.  He stayed there

about a year; was made a second lieutenant May 11,

1854, and a first lieutenant July 1, 1856. From Septem-

ber, 1854, to August, 1857, he was assistant professor

of history at West Point. During the next four years

he was stationed at various posts, including the com-

mand of the ordnance depot at Vancouver, Washington

Territory, and of the ordnance depot at Leavenworth,

Kansas. It was from the latter post that he took leave

of absence; and on January 28, 1861, he resigned from

the army to accept the professorship of Mathematics

and Civil Engineering in the Collegiate and Polytechnic

Institute of Brooklyn, New York, then and now one of

the leading institutions of learning in its own field in

the United States.

When Sumter was fired upon and the call came, Sill

at once resigned his Brooklyn professorship and ten-

dered his services to the Governor of Ohio. It is evi-

dent from the official records of the Board of Trustees

of the Brooklyn Institute, the action of the faculty and

otherwise that the young officer had won the sincere

esteem of all at the Institute. Only a leave of absence

was given him, other members of the faculty generously

offering to do his work; resolutions were passed of the

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most complimentary and cordial sort; and a handsome

sword was presented to him.  Now, as for more than

fifty years, his class room in the Brooklyn Polytechnic

has upon its wall a beautiful memorial tablet to this

professor of but three months' service.

From April to July, 1861, Sill served as Assistant

Adjutant General of Ohio. During July and August he

served on General McClellan's staff in western Virginia.

On August 27th he was commissioned a colonel in the

volunteer service of the United States, and helped to

raise the Thirty-third Regiment of Ohio Volunteer In-

fantry, of which he took command.

Briefly stated, Sill's military record was as follows:

the Thirty-third Regiment was organized at Camp Mor-

row, Portsmouth, Ohio, and joined Nelson's army in

eastern Kentucky early in October, 1861, where Colonel

Sill won distinction at Ivy Mountain. Late in Novem-

ber he was ordered to Louisville with dispatches from

General Nelson to General Buell, then in command of

the Army of the Ohio. By General Buell he was given

command of a brigade in the Division of General O. M.

Mitchell. He worked hard during the winter of 1861-

1862, helping to make an army of the recent recruits

under Buell. Their reports abundantly show that he

won the esteem of both Buell and Mitchell. From Feb-

ruary to July, 1862, he served with Mitchell in Kentucky,

Tennessee and northern Alabama, winning distinction,

in April, by his prompt and efficient execution of General

Mitchell's order for the seizure of the railroad from

Stevenson west toward Decatur, Alabama.

On July 16th, Sill was commissioned a brigadier

general. In September, after Buell's retreat to Louis-

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      111

ville and just before the battle of Perryville, he was

placed by Buell in command of two divisions and

ordered toward Frankfort, Kentucky, to hold in check

the Confederate forces under General Kirby Smith;

which he did, repulsing an attack made by Smith, pre-

venting him from joining Bragg. Sill joined Buell at

Perryville and in the pursuit of Bragg toward the south.

On September 29th, Brigadier General Sill was

placed by Buell in command of the Second Division of

the First Army Corps, the Army of the Ohio.

On October 30, 1862, General Buell was superseded

in his command by General Rosecrans, and the Army of

the Ohio became the so-called "right wing" of the new

Fourteenth Army Corps, better known as the Army of

the Cumberland; and on November 13th General Sill

came into command of the Second Division of this right

wing; which was commanded by Major General Anson

McD. McCook. General Sill's division consisted of the

Fourth, Fifth and Sixth brigades, three batteries of

artillery and part of a regiment of cavalry; and was in

camp between Nashville and Murfreesboro, Tennessee,

until shortly before the fatal battle of Stone's River.

Just before that battle Brigadier General Richard W.

Johnson, who had been a prisoner of war and recently

exchanged, rejoined McCook's command. Sill was the

junior brigadier general of the right wing, and John-

son's commission antedated his by nearly a year, so that,

when Johnson's request for command of the Second

Division was endorsed by McCook, Sill was obliged to

give way; which he did cheerfully and without a mur-

mur.   At his and at Sheridan's request, General Sill

was given command of the First Brigade in the divi-

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sion of his classmate, Sheridan, with whom he had

later been associated on the Pacific coast.

As one reads of the alert care with which Sill, on the

night between the 30th and 31st of December, prepared

his command for the anticipated attack of the morning,

as compared to what Cist, the historian of the Army of

the Cumberland, calls "the criminal carelessness" and

"neglect of duty" of Johnson on McCook's exposed right

flank, it is impossible not to conjecture as to what "might

have been" had Sill been left in charge of that division,

every officer of which was devoted to him and regretted

his loss. In reviewing his account of the battle Cist

says: "It is safe to say that had the line of Johnson's

division been properly formed, with officers in their

places, these troops would have given a very different

account of themselves when the blow struck the right."

And Johnson, who knew well his danger and responsi-

bility, was at his headquarters, a mile and a half away,

when this blow did fall upon his illy formed and un-

officered legions. We shall see how Sill spent that fate-

ful night and morning.

Few, if any, more interesting battles from a military

point of view occurred during the Civil Warthan this

along the banks of the rather insignificant stream,

Stone's River - Murfreesboro, as the battle is called

in the Confederate annals.  The plans of Rosecrans

and of Bragg exactly overlapped. Each was to feint on

the right and attack in force on the left.  Bragg got

started first and hardest.  Rosecrans, McCook and

Johnson had failed to make adequate preparation and

the right wing of the Union army was crumpled up and

driven back to the Nashville pike.  Here Rosecrans

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill     113

rallied his forces, and here the army was saved from

rout and utter disaster by that unconquered soldier who

later on was again to save Rosecrans and the Army of

the Cumberland-Thomas, "the Rock of Chickamauga."

That 31st day of December, 1862, marks the highest

tide, the very peak, of the successes of the Confederate

arms. And had their success of the morning continued

to the evening of that day, no man can now declare what

the ultimate result might have been. One of the pro-

found students of the war, Wilson J. Vance, in his in-

troduction to his book entitled Stone's River, the Turn-

ing Point of the Civil War, says:  "Gettysburg, in-

deed, may have been the wound mortal to the Confed-

eracy, but it was at Stone's River that the South, at the

pinnacle of confidence and warlike power, was halted

and beaten back, never again to exhibit such strength

and menace."

At the North it was a time of deep depression. The

fall elections had been most discouraging; - enlistments

had nearly ceased. Buell had proved a great disappoint-

ment and had been superseded. McClellan had also dis-

appointed the nation and had been superseded by Burn-

side, who, but two weeks before, had been repulsed with

frightful slaughter at Fredericksburg.  Only a week

before, Grant, near Vicksburg, had lost his immense

depot of supplies at Holly Springs. Only two days be-

fore, Sherman had been hurled back from Chickasaw

Bluffs. That December, too, at sea the famous Monitor

had gone down and the Alabama and Florida had been

let loose to prey upon northern commerce.  Gold had

reached an enormous premium and the National credit

had touched its lowest ebb. Gladstone had just created

Vol. XXXI-8.

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114      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

a profound sensation by declaring, "We may anticipate

with certainty the success of the Southern States."

Thus will be seen the force of what the above quoted

historical critic says of Stone's River:

"It is in the light of what it might have been rather than

what it was that Stone's River must be judged. Had Bragg been

able to drive his infantry across the Nashville pike on the last day

of 1862, the capture or destruction - whole or partial - of his

enemy would have been one of the least of these consequences.

The way to the Ohio would have been open and opulent northern

cities at the mercy of Confederate arms. Overwhelming forces

could have been turned against Grant to crush him. Europe's

recognition could have been no longer logically denied to the

Richmond Government."

This is not the occasion to discuss the details of this

memorable battle, but it was and is some comfort to

those to whom the death of young Sill was the supreme

sacrifice of that war to realize that he died at a supreme

crisis of that war; and that his careful preparation dur-

ing the anxious hours of his last night upon earth, and

his heroic and repeated repulse of the expected attacks

of the enemy, just before he met death, were in some

part the means of saving his country in that fateful

hour.

As has already been suggested, it is altogether prob-

able that young Sill sought or accepted an appointment

to West Point for the opportunity it gave him to acquire

an education rather than from any inclination to the

profession of arms; that upon graduation he chose the

department of ordnance rather than the more active

and essentially military service with cavalry or infantry;

and that after eight years' service when the opportunity

came to him to enter upon the congenial work of a

professor in a well established institution of learning, he

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      115

resigned from the army.  It is patent that he much

enjoyed this work and won the sincere regard of those

with whom he was associated. Though he returned to

the army at once when the war came, this was from a

just sense of his duty and from motives of patriotism.

From this time to the end his letters make it clear that

it was only this sense of duty and loyalty to his country

that kept him in the army, and that he longed for service

in some other than the tented field and the field of battle.

That he was a successful soldier and rose rapidly in his

profession may seem inconsistent with the fact, which

becomes obvious from his letters to relatives at home,

that he found his surroundings distasteful and that he

doubted his own qualification for the rank and for the

important commands which, unsought by. him, were

from time to time conferred upon him.  His manly

courage is beyond question; but in character he was

essentially a man of peace, a sincere Christian, a man of

quiet manners, pure speech, of refined habits and of

gentle disposition; so much so that the charge made by

Confederate General Bragg, that on a certain march he

was guilty of cruelty and barbarity towards civilians

must inevitably have been based upon mis-information,

at least so far as regards any complicity or even knowl-

edge on the part of Sill. From his first campaign with

Nelson in eastern Kentucy to the end his letters to his

father, sister and others demonstrated his strong dis-

taste for the inherent barbarity of war, and constant,

earnest endeavor to prevent all looting and disorder

among his fellow officers, and won his men, in regiment,

brigade and division, to an unusual degree of discipline

is capable of ready proof.

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His men obeyed him the more readily because they

respected and esteemed him. One of his officers wrote:

"The men of the Second Division fairly worshiped him,

for he treated them like men," and then proceeded to

illustrate his meaning. Another wrote: "No man in

this entire army, as I believe, was so much admired,

respected and beloved by inferiors and superiors in rank

as was General Sill." Such quotations could be multi-

plied. The officers under whom he served -Nelson,

Buell, Mitchell and McCook - all testify to his worth,

modesty and efficiency. One says, "He was the most

unassuming man I ever knew." In a letter to a sister,

with whom he was upon terms of special intimacy, writ-

ten soon after his promotion had been announced, he

says:  "Do not call me General. Without any false

modesty I can truly say that my present responsibilities

give me sufficient anxiety and perplexity; and a chieftain

who rules the fate of hundreds or thousands ought to

possess a frame of mind very different from my quiet

and homely aspirations." And again to the same cor-

respondent he expresses his disregard for "the honor

of the thing," and the earnest desire that he might "per-

form my duty in a less conspicuous but equally service-

able situation." Indeed such self-depreciation appears

as constantly in his letters as commendation of his serv-

ices, care and success appears in the letters of others.

A few further quotations from letters of his brother

officers will throw light upon his character. Says one

who knew Sill very intimately: "He was a firm believer

in the Christian religion, and all who came in contact

with him were impressed by his example." Another

writes: "A nobler, purer minded man never lived. In

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      117

thirteen months that I was on his personal staff I never

heard him utter a profane word."  Another officer of

his staff wrote: "It has never been my lot among men

to be so pleasantly situated as when associated with him.

I love him, but indeed no one knew him well but to love

him."

When upon the battlefield the news of Sill's death

was brought to Sheridan, who lost that morning every

one of his brigade commanders, an officer who was quite

near to him writes that Sheridan exclaimed: "What?

Sill? My God! So good and pure a man!"

The night before the battle Sill slept but little. The

letters of his aides-de-camp, the reports of General Sher-

idan and of Major Hibbard, of the Thirty-fourth Wis-

consin, one of Sill's regiments, disclose all the details.

He got up and left his tent a little past midnight;

and after listening a while to the movements of the

enemy on the other side of the valley, he called an or-

derly and asked for his horse. One of his aides there-

upon came out of the tent, intending to ride with him;

but Sill told him to go back and lie down, that he was

only going over to General Sheridan's tent.

Sheridan in his official report says: "At two o'clock

of the morning of the 31st General Sill, who had com-

mand of my right brigade, reported great activity on the

part of the enemy immediately in his front." Sill stayed

some time talking with Sheridan, and it was agreed that

before morning Sill should have two regiments from

another brigade to strengthen his line. Sill then seems

to have visited his lines, to look after and encourage

his officers and men.  Major Hibbard in his report

says that at about three in the morning General Sill

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came down to his regiment, talked with the officers and

among other things told them that they would be sup-

ported by two extra regiments.  About daybreak he

sent aid to tell General Sheridan that these reserves

had not arrived; but the orderly writes that he "met the

two regiments from General Schaeffer's brigade on their

way to the front." Had the same anxious care been

exercised elsewhere the story of the morning might have

been far other than it was.

As has been said, the battle opened upon the extreme

right; but, Sheridan reports, "About 7 A. M. the enemy

advanced to the attack across an open cotton field on

Sill's front." In this field, on rising ground beyond the

Hardman house, which quickly became a field hospital,

General Sill had posted his artillery. The fire of artil-

lery and infantry drove back the Confederates, under

McCown and Hardee, with heavy loss. The latter in his

report says:  "The battle here was bloody."  The en-

emy then reformed his lines, strengthened them with his

reserves and once more pressed forward. Such is Cist's

account, and he continues:  "Again these heavy lines

struck Carlin and Sill and were again handsomely re-

pulsed; Sill gallantly charging the rebels and driving

them into their line of entrenchments."  But, as Sill,

among the guns of Bush's battery rallied and cheered

on his troops, (so we read in the report of the Confed-

erate General, McCown:) "Private Clark Jenkins of

Co. D, First Arkansas Rifles, seeing a Federal officer

rallying his command, detached himself from his Com-

pany, and, taking deliberate aim, shot him from his

horse." The young rifleman's aim was but too true.

His ball entered near his victim's left eye and killed him

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General Joshua Woodrow Sill      119

instantly.  Captain Stearns writes: "He never spoke

after he was struck. I was within twenty feet of him,

ran to him and raising his head, spoke to him, but he did

not reply." His men bore his body back some distance;

but a third and successful charge of the enemy upon

troops temporarily without a leader, compelled them to

leave it near the Hardman house. It was recognized

and taken to Murfreesboro by the Confederates. After

their retreat it was interred by Captain Stearns, and a

month later reached Chillicothe in charge of a commit-

tee of citizens who had gone South to recover it. On a

dark, rainy day in early February, with banners and

with music, it was buried on the brow of the beautiful

hill which overlooks the valley and city where he was

born, thirty-one years before.

Over his grave a bereaved sister erected a monu-

ment, a fluted column, broken below its capital, draped

with the flag of his country.

Three of the men of the West Point class of 1853,

who rose to great distinction, are honored by equestrian

statues in Washington; and as we think of Sill, so young,

so modest and winning in his personality, so painstaking

and efficient, so able and so gallant, we cannot but con-

jecture what his career might have been had the aim of

the Arkansas rifleman been less sure.

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