The C.S.S. Stonewall, the Last Ironclad of the Confederacy. And a ship that would sail under 6 flags

I ran across this little tidbit of History following another rabbit hole and compiled an article, the pics are compliments of "DuckDuckGo"

Patterned as she was on the revolutionary French Battleship Gloire, on paper she seemed formidable. She was 194 feet in length, 31.5 feet at the beam, drew 15.75 feet of water and displaced 1560 tons. Her hull was protected by 4.5 inches of armor amidships tapering to 3.5 inches at the bow and stern. Up to 24 inches of hardwood backed this iron carapace. A casemate forward sheathed in 5.5 inches of iron housed a pivot mounted, breech loading, 300 pounder Armstrong gun. A fixed turret aft covered in 4 inches of armor contained two 70 pounder breech loading Armstrong guns. In keeping with naval tactics at the time, she was also equipped with a ram. Steam powered with a top speed of 10.8 knots, twin screws coupled with twin rudders made her remarkably maneuverable for a ship of her size and displacement. Unfortunately, her bunkers held only 280 tons of coal limiting her ability to steam for prolonged distances. For longer voyages she was fitted with a bowsprit and two square rigged masts. Steam power, thick armor and modern guns made her a ship to be feared.

 In reality she was poorly constructed, leaked badly, drew too much water and wallowed dangerously in heavy seas. Several months of extensive repairs were required to make her truly sea worthy. Only then would she begin to live up to her reputation.

Her name was Sphynx; her sister ship was called Cheops. Ostensibly they were being constructed by Jean-Lucien Arman, one of France's most respected shipbuilders, for the Egyptian Navy, but that was a ruse. In 1863 the Confederate States of America were being slowly strangled by the Union blockade. The Confederacy had sufficient industry to cobble together a few ironclads that performed surprisingly well in riverine warfare and in coastal waters. These warships had an impact far greater than their numbers. Ocean going ironclads capable of breaking the blockade that was choking the Confederacy were beyond her capability however. Accordingly, Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory sent agents to Europe to procure ironclad warships that would splinter the mostly wooden hulled Union Navy. His agents, John Slidell and James Bulloch, had some success in England obtaining the famous or infamous, depending upon your point of view, CSS Alabama, among others. As the American Civil War drug on however, Britain became an increasingly difficult partner. Turning to France, Napoleon III agreed to provide warships but since this act was against French neutrality laws, only if their ultimate destination remained secret, hence the fiction of Sphynx and Cheops. A shipyard clerk scuttled that subterfuge by going to the United States Minister in Paris and informing him of their true destination. When the United States officially protested, the sale was cancelled. Albeit illegally, the devious shipbuilder, Arman, was able to sell the Cheops to Prussia and the Sphynx to Denmark, who were currently involved in the Second Schleswig War.

Renamed the Saerkodder (Strong Otter), she left Bordeaux on 21 June 1864, sailing with a Danish crew. The voyage to Copenhagen revealed numerous sea-keeping problems and construction flaws. A very disappointed Danish government demanded repairs and a steep reduction in price. Negotiations between the Danes and Arman became contentious, drawn out and finally broke down. By this time the war between Denmark and Prussia had ended and Danish interest in the Saerkodder ended with it.

The Sphynx / Saerkodder kept returning to Arman. The scheming shipbuilder approached Bulloch regarding Confederate interest. By this point in the war only a few southern ports were still open, most had been captured or were closed by blockading Union warships. Desperate times called for desperate (and expensive) measures. The CSS Virginia had sown panic in the north during her all too brief career. An even more powerful ironclad might do the same. It was slim hope, but it was hope. Accordingly, Arman was able to broker a deal through his agent, Arnous de la Rivière, to resell the Saerkodder to the Confederate States for 450,000 francs. Thus, on 07 January 1865 the Confederate States Navy acquired its first and only European built oceangoing ironclad. Now called Olinda to maintain the fiction of legality, she sailed from Copenhagen toward the English Channel with a makeshift crew, under a Danish captain, and with Captain Thomas Jefferson Page, CSN, onboard. The plan was to rendezvous with the blockade runner City of Richmond at sea to take on supplies and her permanent crew, primarily sailors from the CSS Florida which had been seized 04 October 1864. A severe gale forced Olinda to take shelter in Kristiansand, Norway and drove the City of Richmond into Cherbourg, France. The two ships finally met on 24 January 1865 near the island of Houat off the coast of Brittany. The crews transferred and in a brief ceremony at sea the Danish flag was hauled down and the Confederate ensign raised. Thus, the Olinda became the CSS Stonewall, in honor of General Stonewall Jackson, mortally wounded at Chancellorsville. Before she could cross the Atlantic however, additional supplies, full bunkers of coal and repairs to damage caused by the gale were necessary. Stonewall first took refuge in Á Coruña, Spain and then on 12 February 1865 moved to El Ferrol which had better repair facilities. The United States government argued that Stonewall should be considered a pirate vessel and offered no assistance. Spain ignored those diplomatic protests and ship and crew were offered every courtesy in accordance with neutrality law.

Steaming from El Ferrol on 24 March 1865 Stonewall was confronted by the steam screw frigate USS Niagara and the steam screw sloop of war USS Sacramento. These ships were under the overall command of a naval officer with the unfortunate name of Commodore Thomas T. Craven. In spite of an untried ship and an untested crew Captain Page eagerly sought battle. Although Niagara was larger than Stonewall and both of his ships were faster, threw a greater weight of shell [1] and were manned by veteran crews, Commodore Craven, based solely on Stonewall's reputation, took council of his fears and declined to engage the Confederate ironclad. For his inaction Commodore Craven was later tried by Courts Martial.

The non-battle off Ferrol was a great disappointment to her citizens who were hoping to witness something like the epic duel between the USS Kearsage and the CSS Alabama. Instead the Union ships used their greater speed to remain out of range. Unable to engage their reluctant enemies, Stonewall made way for Lisbon, Portugal, arriving on 28 March 1865 to take on supplies and coal. Before crossing the Atlantic she made one last stop at Tenerife (01 April 1865) to take on coal and resupply. Departing Tenerife she sailed for Nassau in the Bahamas arriving on 06 May 1865. There her crew learned of the surrender at Appomattox. Resolved to capitulate on his own terms, Captain Page steamed to Havana, Cuba. On 19 May 1865 [2] Captain Page sold the Stonewall to the Spanish Captain General of Cuba for sixteen thousand dollars in order to pay off his crew. In July 1865 Spain transferred the Stonewall to the United States for the same amount. Moved to the Naval Shipyard in Washington, DC Stonewall was decommissioned and sat in lay up for nearly three years until the Japanese expressed an interest in her.

Preparing for war with the Imperial Japanese government during the Meji Restoration [3] the Tokugawa Shogunate offered the United States $30,000 down and $10,000 upon delivery of the vessel. The offer came at an opportune time for in 1868 the United States was rapidly demobilizing its army and navy which, during the Civil War, had become the largest in the world. The victorious Union had a surplus of vessels, among them the vessel described above, the former ironclad ram CSS Stonewall, which were being decommissioned and hurriedly laid up as their crews were discharged. The United States also had huge war debts to pay off. The offer was accepted and manned by a Japanese crew with a small American training crew onboard the Stonewall became the Kotetsu (Ironclad) and set sail for Japan.

During the time it took to sail from the Washington D.C. Navy Yard where she was berthed to the port of Shinagawa in Tokyo Bay the Boshin War between the Tokugawa Shogunate and the Imperial Japanese (Meiji) government erupted. In keeping with International Neutrality Laws the American Resident Minister, Robert B. Van Valkenburg, voided the sale and ordered the vessel placed under United States flag. Fatefully in February 1869 that decision was reversed and the transfer completed but to the Meiji government rather than the Tokugawa Shogunate who had purchased her.

Kotetsu became the flagship of the Imperial fleet and commanded by Captain Shiro Nakajimo immediately sailed with a squadron of seven warships to the island of Hokkaido. Kotetsu was instrumental in the 25 March 1869 victory over Shogunate forces at the naval battle of Miyako Bay. The Imperial fleet, including Kotetsu, supported the invasion of Hokkaido which led to the conclusive attack on the Shogunate stronghold of Hakodate. Thanks in no small part to the efforts of Kotetsu, the most modern and most powerful warship in the Imperial fleet, the remaining forces of the Tokugawa Shogunate surrendered to Meiji forces on 25 May 1869. Japan became an empire and America became a kingmaker.

Renamed Azuma (East) on 07 December 1872, ironically, Azuma played a major role in the suppression of the Saga rebellion, the Satsuma uprising and the expedition to Formosa (Taiwan) in 1874. Azuma was decommissioned on 28 January 1888 but continued to serve as a training and barracks ship for another ten years. After serving under French, Danish, Confederate, Spanish, American and Japanese flags she was broken up and scrapped in 1908.

Had the Stonewall and the other warships [4] ordered by the Confederacy been completed and delivered in a timely fashion they might have been a factor in the outcome of the American Civil War. As it was the Stonewall never fired a shot in anger as a Confederate States Ship. As the Kotetsu however she played a prominent role in the outcome of the Boshin War, thus ending the 268-year reign of the Tokugawa Shogunate, launching Meiji rule, setting Japan on the course to Empire and eventual conflict with the nation that provided her.

Civil War Sniper Jack Hinson, The Need for Revenge

 

I ran across this story and it resonated with the revenge part of my nature, the part of my nature that believes that that   there comes a time where a person may have to hoist the black flag of revenge and start cutting throats and enacting retribution for massive wrongs.   Right now we leave this to the state to handle the justice part of the equation of society, but of this "social Justice" nonsense gets carried away and if people get away with murder and mayhem, you will see a a return back to the old ways and that will not be a pretty sight. 

An old proverb dictates that, “revenge is a dish best served cold,” but to Southerner Jack Hinson, revenge tasted best when he was consumed with the heat of anger and it smelled of blood. Hinson tried to live as a peaceful man, no mean trick when surrounded by America’s Civil War, as he was.

But in spite of the battles raging all around him, Hinson started no fights with his neighbors, nor arguments around the dinner table with his family. He simply would not choose a side in that most dreadful American conflict, even though he lived smack in its midst, in Tennessee.

In the early 1860s, Jack Hinson lived with his wife and 10 kids on a plantation called “Bubbling Springs”. He was content to stay out of local squabbles about the war, and though he owned slaves, he quietly told his family that secession would be bad for their farming business. Still, he kept those views private, and just got on with life and taking care of his family.

Enslaved Africans on a plantation.

Hinson even managed to stay apolitical when he hosted Union Brigadier General Ulysses S. Grant, who was so enamored with the plantation that he commandeered it for his local headquarters. After Grant won the pivotal takeover of Fort Donelson, Union soldiers were a common sight along the Kentucky-Tennessee border. And yet Hinson still took no sides.

Then, events conspired to change Jack Hinson from a fence sitting farmer to a rage-filled Killer. One son signed up with the Confederacy, another with a local militia. Unfortunately for these young men, Union soldiers found them in the wilds of the region while they were deer hunting one day, and mistook them for bushwhackers.

Ulysses S. Grant

“Bushwhackers” were men who lived in the wild, men who inflicted terrible damage on the Union troops, then melted back into the forest.  They were decreed enemies of the Union, and if caught, were not given a trial, they were simply dealt with in the harshest manner possible.

Because the local structures of civility and law and justice had deteriorated so badly after the fall of Fort Donelson, some bushwhackers no longer confined themselves to killing Union soldiers. Some pillaged entire homesteads and wreaked havoc on whole communities. Consequently, they were badly mistreated before being killed by their captors.

Three Bushwhackers circa 1864

To be mistaken for bushwhackers sealed the Hinson boys’ fate. They were murdered by a Union lieutenant, their bodies mutilated, heads severed and jammed onto the posts outside the gates of the Hinson estate. Their decapitated bodies were left rotting in the sun in the town’s central square. One was 22, the other only 17. It was only Jack’s connection to General Grant that spared him, and the rest of his family, a similar fate.

But Jack Hinson went almost mad with grief for his boys. He swore revenge, and he got it in spades. But first, he sent the remaining members of his family elsewhere so that he could exact his revenge untethered by familial responsibilities or, perhaps, his conscience.

An unidentified sharpshooter for the Army of the Potomac on picket duty during the American Civil War.

First, he needed a weapon, so he purchased a rifle made to his exact specifications, accurate to half a mile. Hinson then found a cave in which to live, taking only the bare necessities to help him survive. His first order of business was to kill the two men who were responsible for his sons’ deaths; the man who gave the order, and the one who carried it out. He killed both.

The British Whitworth sharpshooting rifle which served as the basis for Jack’s own

Hinson then went after Union supply boats, their captains, crews, and whatever officers he could find. He had started the war as a neutral man, he did not finish it as one. Though throughout his later life he maintained that he was on no one’s side, Union records estimate Hinson killed more than 130 officers, an extraordinary feat for a man in his late 50s when the war started.

United States Navy ironclads off Cairo, Illinois, during the American Civil War.

Hinson finally went back to his plantation after the war. He died there, in 1874, a much diminished man, as he had lost so much of his family to war and disease. It is impossible to estimate the toll all those murders took on his soul.

A New age of Warfare and advent of the Ships of Iron.

Iron Ships of War

It was March 8, 1862, a Saturday. On the waters of Hampton Roads off Newport News, Virginia – where the Chesapeake Bay empties into the Atlantic Ocean – the Federal warships Cumberland and Congress bobbed easily on a light chop.

The sky was blue, the day warming, the morning uneventful. Drying wash flapped on a light breeze, harmonicas offered-up pleasant tunes, as sailors went about their usual duties. Then, abruptly, around 12:30 in the afternoon, all that changed.

Across the Bay, far to the south, emerging from the Elizabeth River at Norfolk, something odd, something never seen before, had just been spotted. Heads turned, fingers pointed, as binoculars and telescopic glasses were quickly yanked from their cases. A trail of black smoke could be seen rising from a smokestack, below that what appeared to be an enormous hull moving very slowly, bearing WNW.

“I wish you would take the glass and have a look over there, sir,” said the quartermaster of the watch. “I believe that thing is a-comin’ down at last.”

CSS Virginia (ex-USS Merrimack)

General Quarters was sounded. Drums beat the rhythm as men scurried cross decks, pulling down laundry, racing to the guns, preparing for battle. Truthfully, there was no rush. It would take almost an hour before the hulking mass would be near enough to spot the gun tubes that lined its casemate, or the iron that covered its hull.

At that point there was no doubt, however, it was the rechristened USS Merrimack, clearly identifiable now by the Confederate, seven-star, blue naval jack flying from her stern. The Confederates had renamed her Virginia, but everyone – friend and foe alike – still called her Merrimack.

She had been joined by several vessels of the Confederacy’s James River Squadron – Raleigh, Beaufort, Jamestown, Patrick Henry, along with the tug, Teaser – all of them smaller, and far less formidable than the Merrimack.

USS Monitor

The Merrimack had been a frigate under construction at the Federal Navy’s yard in Norfolk at the beginning of the war. That yard was then put to the torch when the Navy decided to abandon Norfolk to the Confederacy, but much of the Merrimack survived the flames. Salvaged and retooled as an ironclad, the vessel, now a lumbering, iron monster with sloping sides, and a formidable collection of guns, looked far more like some leviathan risen from the deep, than any recognizable vessel of the day.

As Cumberland and Congress cleared decks for action, the other wooden ships of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron – St. Lawrence, Roanoke, and Minnesota attempted to get underway and escape as quickly as possible. Cumberland, a powerful sloop-of-war, was the flagship of the Home Fleet, a wood-and-sail vessel of the Raritan-class. She had been recently streamlined and refitted with twenty-two 9” Dahlgren smoothbore cannon, one 10” Dahlgren, and a 70 lb. naval rifle – a daunting array of weaponry.

But the Virginia – now armed with three 9” Dahlgren guns on each broadside, a Brooke rifle fore and aft, and an additional Brooke rifle on each broadside – appeared unimpressed. The ironclad churned-on slowly but steadily, straight at Congress, a wood and sail frigate bearing 48 32 pounder guns, and four 8” smoothbore cannon.

Map of events of the Battle of Hampton Roads

The crews of both Federal warships looked-on in amazement as the Virginia closed to within two hundred yards. “The Congress then fired a full broadside point-blank. Nine hundred pounds of hurtling metal smashed fully home. In horror the gunners saw the balls ricochet into the air likes pebbles off a roof.”

The Virginia was not only unscathed by the broadside, but unfazed. Hardly a metal plate had been rattled loose. The ironclad then came about and unleashed a four-gun broadside, tearing Congress to pieces. Below decks, smoke billowed, men screamed, and blood pooled like water. The era of the wooden warship – an era that had reigned for at least five thousand years – had just been brought to an abrupt and frightful end. The age of the iron warship had dawned.

As Congress took on water, Virginia came about, then headed straight for the Cumberland. Attached to her prow was an iron ram – a weapon not used widely since the days of Greece and Rome – with which she intended to dispatch the Federal sloop-of-war. The ironclad fired one shot with its forward gun which exploded below decks, then rammed Cumberland dead on the bow.

Sinking of Cumberland by the ironclad Virginia

Mayhem reigned onboard the Federal sloop as the ironclad backed away full astern, turned slightly, and found a comfortable position just off Cumberland’s shattered bow where she raked the Federal warship with impunity. The Cumberland soon went-up in smoke and flames. That accomplished, the ironclad returned to the wounded Congress, which was trying to limp away to safety.

But Virginia caught her easily and turned broadside. Raking the frigate from stem-to-stern, the ironclad simply tore her to shreds, and the Congress eventually blew to pieces when her magazines took fire

By day’s end the Federal squadron had been virtually annihilated. Both Congress and Cumberland were on the bottom, while the other three Federal vessels had run aground in their haste to escape. For those looking on, it appeared the Confederacy had developed a superweapon.

Photo of crew members aboard the USS Monitor

Thus, as the Virginia returned to its berth that evening –intent on returning the following morning to finish-off the stranded Federal squadron – it appeared the Confederacy had engineered a new weapon that would, not only break the Federal naval blockade, but revolutionize naval warfare entirely.

As the Virginia slipped away on the evening tide, however – and unknown to everyone present – another ironclad was then steaming-up Bay. As if Neptune, with an eye for high drama, had written the script himself, this ironclad finally cut its engines, dropped anchor, and took-up a position in defense of the stranded Minnesota. It was, of course, the USS Monitor.

The brainchild of Swedish engineer John Ericsson, his design was so radical that initially the navy board hardly knew what to make of it. The Monitor was only 172’ in length, 41’ abeam. On the deck sat a small pilot house, a revolving turret sporting 2 11” Dahlgren naval rifles, and nothing more. Constructed on New York’s East River in just over 100 days, having received reports of the Virginia's imminent completion, Monitor had shoved-off for Virginia in early March.

Ironclads engaged in terrific combat by Currier and Ives

Meanwhile, in Washington, President Lincoln, along with his cabinet, having received telegraphed reports of the prior day’s calamity, sat in benumbed silence. No one had the slightest idea what to do. Lincoln was reportedly so overwrought he could barely speak.

Secretary of War Edwin Stanton finally broke the silence, railing: “The Merrimack would sink every vessel in the navy, capture Fort Monroe, cut off Burnside in the Carolina sounds, retake Port Royal, and lay New York and Boston under ‘contribution.’” Then he threw-open a window, half-expecting to see the Merrimac steaming-up the Potomac River, presumably to open fire on the White House. According to Gideon Welles, then Secretary of the Navy, it was “the worst day of the war.”

The heart of battle, from an 1871 wood engraving published by A.S. Barnes & Co.

The morning following the Virginia's frightening debut, March 9, the Confederate ram again journeyed across the Bay with the intention of destroying the stranded Minnesota, only to discover the tiny Monitor bobbing in the water like “a cheese on a raft,” gamely prepared to give battle. Much like a heavyweight fight, crowds jammed and jostled along the shoreline to watch as the spectacle unfolded.

The Virginia opened the engagement with a broadside that flew high, and the Monitor returned fire, striking Virginia, but doing little damage. Then, for hours-on-end, the combatants circled at close quarters, repeatedly scoring hits, but neither able to strike a decisive blow. Virginia attempted to ram, but the more maneuverable Monitor dodged away, unharmed.

Destruction of the rebel monster Merrimac off Craney Island, May 11, 1862, by Currier and Ives

Damage was done to both vessels, but nothing disabling. In fact, at one point during the confrontation, the Virginia's guns fell oddly silent. Catesby Jones, the ironclad’s commander, inquired as to the pause. From the gundeck Lieutenant Eggleston responded wryly, “I find that I can do her as much damage by snapping my thumb at her every two minutes and a half.”

A shot finally struck the Monitor’s pilot house, momentary blinding the captain, and the vessel withdrew momentarily to make a change in command. It soon returned to combat, however, only to discover the Virginia's – thinking its foe had given-up the fight – departed. Both sides subsequently claimed victory, but there is little question the first clash of iron warships had ended in a draw.

Stereograph of Monitor after the battle, July 1862

Regardless of wins and losses, however, every wooden warship then in existence had been instantly rendered obsolete, naval blueprints altered forever. And while Virginia's had made a fine showing, it would be the gritty little Monitor with its low silhouette and revolving gun turret, that would inspire naval concepts of the future.

Indeed, it would not be overstatement to suggest that every battleship of the 20^th Century – from Dreadnaught to Bismarck to Missouri – had direct bloodlines back to John Ericsson’s innovative design, and that on March 9, 1862 a page in the book of naval warfare had been emphatically turned.

The Most lethal unit of the American Civil War.

I have heard of the term "SharpShooter' and here is where it had paid off, and with few exceptions the South had better marksmen than the North did.  After the war between the States as we southerners called it, the NRA was formed in 1871 by Union officers who were appalled by the  lack of marksman that was apparent to the American Public, especially the Northern states and they formed the organization to teach marksman to the American public in the belief that everyone needs to know how to shoot.  When I was in school and also when I was playing AD&D and other things I always wondered "Why didn't they dress and equip a unit for actual service in the field rather than look good in the parade ground, I know the Americans did a bit better at it than the British did during the American Revolution because we had to deal with the indians and nobody fought like the indians so we had to adapt to the indians and that is where Rogers Rangers came from and the Francis "The Swamp Fox" Marion, we adapted to the Terrain, we used camouflage to make it harder to be spotted.

Very loosely strung, these 204 veterans represented the only Federal opposition between Law’s brigade and Little Roundtop.

At approximately 4:00 PM, July 2, 1863 the great Confederate turning movement at Gettysburg, meant to roll-up the Federal line from left-to-right, finally stepped-off, General Evander Law’s Alabama brigade leading the way.
Longstreet’s entire division was to deliver the blow, the assault performed in left echelon, one brigade going-in after the other. Law’s objective was Little Roundtop, a rocky hill, then unoccupied, that dominated the Federal line.
If the Confederates could secure that hill, the remainder of the Federal line could be enfiladed from the heights and rendered indefensible – game over.
As the Confederate skirmishers initially moved forward there appeared to be no force between them and their objective, but this was misleading.
Unseen to the Rebels, a thin skirmish line of Federals was posted from the base of Big Roundtop (approximately ¼ mile south of Little Roundtop) running west about 900 yards.
Very loosely strung, these 204 veterans represented the only Federal opposition between Law’s brigade and Little Roundtop. Fortunately for the Federal cause that day, this unit was the 2^nd United States Sharpshooters, one-half of the most lethal detachment of the American Civil War.

The Battle of Gettysburg by Thure de Thulstrup

Waiting behind a stone fence, Wyman White, one of the U.S. sharpshooters later recalled: “They came yelling and firing and struggling over fences and through the timber. Just in front of where I was, the land was open and, as they were mostly dressed in butternut colored clothes they had the appearance of a plowed field being closed in mass formation.”
Although outnumbered more than 10 to 1, the Sharpshooters calmly took aim, and began firing. “As we took the matter very coolly,” said White, “many a brave Southron threw up his arms and fell. But on they came, shouting and yelling their peculiar yell.”
The Sharpshooters had no hope of stopping Law’s advance, of course, only slowing it, and they went about this with deadly professionalism. Moving in groups of four, two laying down suppression fire while the other two withdrew to cover, the Sharpshooters began taking a heavy toll on the lead elements of Law’s advance.

General Evander McIvor Law, Confederate States Army, 1860s photo

The Sharpshooters had been built for just such an occasion. Uniformed in green hats, coats, and pants, these with leather gaiters (with no brass anywhere that might reflect sunlight), the Sharpshooters were deliberately camouflaged for guerilla-style warfare, a style with which they had become expertly familiar.

They wielded the Sharps, 1859 breech-loading target rifle, a weapon they could load and shoot from any position (prone, standing, or in a tree) with a rate of fire three-times that of any standard rifle. The Sharps was frighteningly accurate up to 600 yards, still deadly beyond.

Battle of Little Round Top, initial assault. Map by Hal Jespersen

More importantly, the Sharpshooters were a truly elite unit. To qualify each candidate had to pass a difficult shooting-test by forming a “string” of ten consecutive shots in a ten-inch-wide target from the distance of 200 yards.

Undoubtedly patterned after the British Green Jackets of Napoleonic War fame, the Sharpshooters were the brainchild of Colonel Hiram Berdan, and they had performed superbly throughout the war.
Professionally selected, trained, and outfitted, fighting in a fire-and-maneuver tactical scheme, the 1^st and 2^nd Regiments of Sharpshooters were essentially a 20^th Century battle unit, fighting a 19^th Century war.

Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain ordered the bayonet charge on Little Round Top.

It should come as no surprise, therefore, that the men of the 2^nd Regiment managed to significantly slow the momentum of Law’s advance, taking a heavy toll on the Confederates with their rapid-fire, breech-loading weapons.
Many Rebels fell, this sewing much confusion in the ranks. One Rebel officer noted, “the slaughter commenced in earnest for we were in good range of their sharp-shooters, but we could get no crack at them.” The rock-strewn woods west of the Roundtops proved ideal terrain for the Sharpshooters, but a nightmare for infantry advancing in ranks. Major Stoughton, in command of the 2^nd, later wrote:
“While they were advancing, the Second Regiment did splendid execution, killing and wounding a great many. One regiment broke three times and rallied, before it would advance.”
Firing as they gave ground, the Sharpshooters fell-back across a small swamp, then over the western face of Big Roundtop before reaching the summit of Little Roundtop.


There they came upon the 83^rd Pennsylvania, falling-in with them amongst the trees, rocks, and heavy boulders. The Sharpshooter’s pin-point shooting and stubborn withdrawal, had forced the Confederates to take an hour to traverse a mere quarter mile, providing critical time for Federal reinforcements to rush forward.

Major General Gouverneur Kemble Warren. From the Liljenquist Family Collection of Civil War Photographs, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

From their strong position the Sharpshooters helped repulse desperate charge after desperate charge of Rebel infantry, principally by the 15^th and 47^th Alabama, cutting Law’s men down as they swarmed toward the hill. White describes the fighting: “First the fire was by volleys which soon turned to a continuous fusillade of rifle fire. T
he bullets hummed and spatted the rocks and trees, glancing off with a hideous screech and hum.” The Confederates came-on time and again, only to be turned away, time and again. “Again the ranks withered,” White tells us, “but they showed the same desperate courage as they had before.
Our line was invincible so it proved, and again these brave men, broken, torn and exhausted, turned their faces down the mountainside.”

Battle of Little Round Top: final assault. Map by Hal Jespersen.

At long last Federal reinforcements arrived, and Little Roundtop was soon turned into a Union bastion, not to be tested again. Of the Union success that day, White wrote: “I think the breech loaders of the Sharpshooters was quite an item in the balance.”
White was hardly alone in his analysis. Years after the war, Colonel William C. Oates, who had led the 15^th Alabama into action that fateful day, praised the U. S. Sharpshooters, claiming that, had they not been where they were, and fought as they had, he most certainly would have taken Little Roundtop. “They ought to erect the tallest monument on the field to Stoughton and his Sharpshooters,” said Oates.

LTC William C. Oates, commander of the 15th Alabama Infantry from Spring of 1863 to July 1864

Not only did the 2^nd Regiment play a significant role that day, but the 1^st Regiment also did their part earlier that afternoon in Pitzer’s Woods, northwest of the Roundtops.
Sent out to scout along Seminary Ridge with the 3^rd Maine, the Sharpshooters stumbled upon the 10^th and 11^th Alabama Regiments of Wilcox’s Brigade, ordered into Pitzer’s Woods to refuse the right flank of the Confederate line.
Unaware of the Sharpshooters presence, the 11^th was greeted by a torrent of well-aimed gunfire from the green-clad Federals. The 11^th fled, while the 10^th came-up and gave battle.
Outnumbered, the Sharpshooters once again gave ground, fighting tree-to-tree, in a stiff action that went on for almost a half-hour. Wilcox then threw-in the 8^th Alabama with orders to flank the Yankees.
Only when the 8^th appeared to overlap his position, did Berdan break-off the engagement; a spirited fight that exposed the true length of the Confederate position to the Federal high command, observing from a distance.

Little Round Top today, seen from the Devil’s Den. The 15th Alabama’s assault was made on the portion of the hill lying to the far right in this photo.

The Confederates also had excellent sharpshooting units, of course, but none rose to the level of the U.S. Sharpshooters.
The exceptional service rendered by the U.S. Sharpshooters throughout the course of the war was readily acknowledged by officers in the know, nevertheless – like most Civil War detachments – they were fought to death, then simply disbanded.
How good had they been? In his Regimental Losses in the Civil War, Lt. Col. William F. Fox wrote of the Sharpshooters: “They undoubtedly killed more men than any other regiment in the army. In skirmishing they were unequaled,” a firm testament to their multidimensionality and sheer lethality.

Monument of General Warren overlooking the battlefield from Little Round Top

Unfortunately, no one at the time seemed to grasp what the Sharpshooters truly represented – the face of combat’s future.
The Industrial Revolution had stimulated a rapid evolution in military hardware, a progression in lethality that had already rendered massed infantry assaults – the very backbone of warfare since its inception – obsolete.
Unfortunately, no one seemed to take notice. Even the generals who led troops into WW I did so initially as if refighting the Civil War, thus marching millions into a maelstrom of virtually unavoidable death.
As a result, all the lessons of warfare the Sharpshooters represented had to be relearned in the 20^th Century as the world careened into two catastrophic World Wars.
Only then did it become clear that Berdan’s small group of elite Sharpshooters were, not only the most lethal fighting force in the Civil War, but a proven template for infantry of the future.