Hello, I’m Pete “Hardcharger” Taylor author, Historian and storyteller. I’d like to share my thoughts about my various books with my readers. On my “Reflections” page I briefly discuss some of my writing, but in the blog, I can let you dig deeper into the stories that I tell.
What about my Unpublished works?
Why would anyone, especially an Author, talk about books that they’ve written but never attempted to publish? In some cases when the book is finished and you read it, the final product just isn’t worth the final effort. In my case that wasn’t the fact. It was just such an esoteric topic that no publisher would ever want to consider publishing the book. It would have an extremely limited readership. That was the case with my first two books.
My first effort began shortly after my graduation from the US Army War College. During my studies there I had spent a lot of time in the military library at Carlisle Barracks doing research on various historical topics. There I discovered that I really enjoyed researching topics and developing articles that I would write and share on some of the very early internet “Groups”.
I was one of the founders of the “Lee-Jackson Civil War Roundtable”, We met on-line in the chat room twice a week and we would share historical stories and get into some interesting debates about the Civil War. At the peak of the chat room group we had nearly 250 members. Of course, like most groups in those days we only had about 25 or 30 active members. But it led to some interesting discussions about the Civil War.
What was especially interesting was the fact that we had so many men and women who were extremely knowledgeable about the Civil War. The other thing that was notable was the fact that we had people who represented both the north and the South. Sometimes this heightened the discussions because we could see different sides of what had happened during that conflict.
We started talking about our Civil War relatives one evening and it dawned on me then I really didn’t know much about my Great-great grandfather and the part that he played in the Civil War. I had heard stories about the fact that he had died at Gettysburg in July of 1863.
One of the things that the group did occasionally was to make battlefield visits. One summer we all decided to meet at Gettysburg and study the battlefield. We were there for three days, and we had a wonderful time. It was interesting finally meeting in person some of the people that we had been online with at that point for two or three years. In some cases, it was a family affair with spouses and in one case children on the tour. We found a nice motel in the area and after our day of tromping across the battlefield we would meet for dinner and drinks afterwards continuing our discussions sometimes late into the evening. It was a wonderful time.
Back to my Great-great grandfather. According to family legend Calvin S Russell, my Great-great grandfather had been killed at Gettysburg allegedly he was in a unit called the Dakota battalion. I began talking to James Coco who was one of the senior historians at the battlefield museum. As we were talking, I asked him about where the Dakota Battalion had fought on the battlefield. He gave me a very funny look, and said he’d never heard of them. In fact, he thought that it was a unit of cavalry that had taken over defending the West when the union cavalry was called East to fight in the Civil War. But he said they had no involvement in the Battle of Gettysburg. So, my family tradition was wrong.
Well that really got my research-oriented mind wondering where to find information about this mystical regiment that my ancestor had allegedly been involved with. When I got home, I began doing some research. As Mr. Coco had indicated I did locate the Dakota Battalion. Further research indicated that the battalion had in fact taken over defending the Dakota territories from the Union cavalry when they were called East to fight in the Civil War.
Once I discovered the Dakota Battalion, I began my research there. That, too, was a dead-end. I managed to find a roster of the men who served in that battalion. And a description of their service. My Great-great Grandfather’s name was not mentioned there or found on any of the units’ rosters. However, I did locate the name of the officer in command. And that was helpful later on. He was from Vermillion, South Dakota and was an important person in town. He reportedly was a good friend of Calvin S. Russell.
The next year at Christmas time the family and I drove from West Virginia to South Dakota to visit my mother. She had been living there for a year, and we felt we needed to go and visit her. While I was there, she mentioned she thought that my Great-great grandfather was buried and Vermillion, South Dakota. So, I drove down from Sioux Falls and visited the local library. The local librarian set me up with the microfilm machine and a microfilm of the local newspaper for the years 1911 – 1914. I began scanning the obituaries and fortunately I was able to locate the obituary for my Great-great grandfather Calvin S. Russell.
His obituary was interesting. He had become sort of a local legend in Vermillion because on the 4th of July he would dress up like Uncle Sam and march in the parades and give candy out to the children. He had also been honored by the men of the Grand Army of the Republic as one of the last surviving Civil War veterans in town. Further in the obituary I found out that he had actually fought with the Second Wisconsin cavalry regiment. Further in the obituary it indicated that he was actually from a small town called Ellenboro in southwestern Wisconsin. I now had a good starting point to begin my research on his Civil War exploits.
The following summer we were visiting some friends in Wisconsin. When I was in the army I had been stationed at Fort McCoy, Wisconsin for a number of years and we had a lot of friends in the area. So, I drove down to Madison WI and visited the Wisconsin Veterans Museum to find out what they had available on the regiment. What I found was a small folder in their possession that had a very small officers journal and a couple of letters from men who had been in the regiment. That was all they had. That’s what I began to work with.
Later in the fall of that year I drove over to Washington DC and spent a week with my son who lived out in Alexandria. Each day I would catch the bus and ride to the metro station and from there take the metro into Washington DC to the US Archives. The archivist was extremely helpful in locating information about the Second Wisconsin cavalry. They did not have a lot, but what they did have was extremely helpful. In their stacks they had a copy of the Regimental Orders Book. I found this to be extremely valuable. Each day the regimental adjutant would write down the orders for that day and post them in the orders book. Each of the companies and the regiment would send their adjutants to the regimental adjutant’s tent and they would transcribe the orders of the day into their company book. A third copy was sent to the War Department and eventually ended up in the Archives.
With this newfound information I was able to get a very detailed idea of everything that had happened in this regiment from its founding until its eventual mustering out of the US army in 1866.
While I was at the archives, I also found the data file for my relative. On a microfilm set I found his pay records for each two-month period that he was in the Union Army. These records didn’t show very much, but it did trace his location each time that he was paid. But there was some interesting information there that I found that he had been reduced in rank in the Vicksburg area. There was no indication of why just the fact that his pay had been suspended for one month. In the records I also found out that he had lost some equipment, and the army deducted the cost of that equipment from his pay. I also found out from those records that he was one of the men who received the first Spencer repeating rifles it was issued to his regiment. Interesting facts about him.
With this information I was really excited, and I began to try to find other sources that would tell the story of this regiment. In my research I found that I could get microfilm of Wisconsin newspapers during the Civil War era. I found a couple of books that had been written by men in the regiment that were over 100 years old. Through my local library I was able to have those books sent to be in Clarksburg WV and from there I was able to begin developing additional information about the Second Wisconsin cavalry.
The Second Wisconsin cavalry was one of those nondescript Civil War regiments. It was never engaged in any large battles; they were used as couriers and scouts and escorts. They served at Vicksburg during the siege of Vicksburg, but they weren’t involved in any of the battles. Their job was to guard the Black River crossings to make sure that the Confederates weren’t able to trap General Grant while he was attacking Vicksburg. Once Vicksburg fell the regiment spent time on guard duty along the river. They were involved in a lot of scouting expeditions, but in most cases all they did was chased Confederates and burn railroads. While it was grueling work it was not work that historians were going to write any detailed histories.
There were some very interesting stories that developed from that book. Men of the regiment were involved in one of the mutinies against General Custer. At the very end of the war Custer was given command of a division of cavalry and sent to Texas in order to make sure that the Mexican government didn’t try to retake Texas from a weakened United States. The problem for the regiment was the fact that the war was over, and the men wanted to go home.
Unfortunately, this was a Veteran Volunteer Regiment. They had all reenlisted in 1863 for an additional three years of service. In 1865 they still had two years to go on their enlistment. They were a cavalry regiment and Custer needed horsemen for his division.
Another big problem for the regiment was the fact that the army in April and May of 1865 started selling off all of their equipment and horses to the highest bidder to get rid of them so they weren’t feeding the horses or maintaining the wagons. So, when the regiment was ready to March almost 200 men were without animals to ride. This did not sit well with cavalrymen.
To make matters worse General Custer was a strict disciplinarian and he used rather nasty methods of enforcing discipline. Flogging had been outlawed by the US Army, except that Custer still believed in it. The regiment was stationed at Alexandria LA prior to marching into Texas. While they were there, one evening, men of the Second Wisconsin got their hands on a large amount of liquor and the drunken men signed a petition against their commanding officer. They wanted the regimental commander removed. They even threatened to kill him if Custer would not remove him.
The next morning General Custer was ready to dissolve the entire regiment. By that time the men had sobered up and they realized that they could be classified as a mutineer and thrown into prison or worse. So, they revoked their letter to Custer and said that they really didn’t mean it.
However, one man, a Lieutenant by the name of Lancaster, refused to sign the letter saying that he was sorry. Lieutenant Lancaster was arrested and ultimately sentenced to die, as an example to others, of what happened to mutineers. Lieutenant Lancaster was given a number of opportunities to escape, but he refused to do so. He indicated it would be better to shot as a mutineer for standing up for what he believed in rather than being classified as a deserter.
The regimental chaplain went to Libby Custer and pleaded with her to have the young lieutenants sentence commuted. The chaplain explained that he was a young family man that he had children at home and that as a result of this dishonorable discharge his family would lose all benefits. Mrs. Custer allegedly went to her husband and tried to get him to commute his sentence. But it appeared that he refused.
The day of execution came. He and a young private, a young man who had been convicted of desertion, were sent out into a field to dig their own graves early in the morning. That afternoon after they both met with chaplains they were placed in a wagon; both were seated on their coffin and driven out to the field next to the grave that they had dug in the morning. The entire regiment was formed up in a semicircle surrounding the spot of execution to observe the final sentence.
Arriving at the grave site the men were required to take their coffin out of the wagon and set it next to the grave. They then stood with their backs to the grave so that when they were shot the body would fall into the coffin and make it easier for the soldiers to bury them.
The two men were positioned next to their coffins with blindfolds on and the order of execution was read by the regimental adjutant. The Provost Marshall then positioned himself to order the execution. Just as the order to fire was being given, he pushed Lancaster into the open grave. When the order to fire was given only the young private was killed.
A dazed Lieutenant Lancaster was then sent off to a prison called the Dry Tortugas. He languished there until the general pardon was given by President Johnson. He managed to get home from there without any government assistance or help.
When I did some research on Lieutenant Lancaster once he was home, he became a important man in his town. When he died his obituary indicated that General Custer had tried to kill him in 1865 but that he had outlived Custer by 20 years because Custer had been killed at the Battle of Little Bighorn.
The rest of the regiment marched from Alexandria LA into Texas with General Custer. It was a difficult march under very harsh conditions. The soldiers were all very upset because Custer took his family with him and the family lived quite well while the soldier suffered. In 1866 they were mustered out of the Union army. They marched from Austin TX to Galveston and from there they caught a transport up the Mississippi River back to Wisconsin where they were mustered out of the army.
So, as you can see there were some interesting events with this regiment but nothing that a historian or novelist would write about. When I tried to get the book published, I first went to the University of Wisconsin Press to see if they would publish the book for its historical value for the state of Wisconsin as a scholarly work. There was no interest. I asked the Veterans Museum, at that time under the direction of author and historian Stephen Ambrose if they were interested in taking on the project of publishing the book. At the time they were heavily involved in working on World War II projects and there was no interest in the book.
As a result, I donated the book as well as my entire research material library which filled the box about 3 feet long and 24 inches wide. They now had a very complete record of the Second Wisconsin cavalry in their library files. Hopefully at some point in time some researcher will get hold of my information and perhaps find a way of publishing the book that I wrote.
As you can see sometimes the work of an author just doesn’t get published. However, did teach me how to improve my writing style and how to research. So even though the book that I wrote sits on a shelf, probably collecting dust, it was a good learning process. It helped me immeasurably in my next endeavors.
So those of you out there who are writing don’t be discouraged. Even if you do have an issue with what you are writing the discipline that develops will help you in the future. I hope you enjoyed this brief expose on the beginnings of a new author trying to break into the field.
Regards
Pete “Hardcharger” Taylor
Peter A. Taylor's Home Page 