Too Afraid to Cry: Maryland Civilians in the Antietam Campaign

649 Pages·1999·3.91 MB·English

by  Kathleen Ernst

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Page iii
Too Afraid to Cry
Maryland Civilians in the Antietam Campaign
Kathleen A. Ernst
Page iv
Copyright© 1999 by Stackpole Books
Published by
STACKPOLE BOOKS
5067 Ritter Road
Mechanicsburg PA 17055
http://www.stackpolebooks.com
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or
portions thereof in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information
storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the
publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to Stackpole Books, 5067
Ritter Road, Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania 17055.
Acknowledgment is made for permission to quote from the following
copyrighted works: Three Years with Company K, by Austin Stearns,
ed. Arthur A. Kent (Cranbury, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University
Press, 1976), used by permission of Associated University Presses; I
Rode with Stonewall, by Henry Kyd Douglas, ed. Fletcher M. Green
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1940), used by
permission of the publisher; The Diary of Jacob Engelbrecht, ed.
William R. Quynn (Frederick, Md.: The Historical Society of
Frederick County, Inc., 1976), used by permission of the publisher;
History of the Brethren in Maryland, by J. Maurice Henry (Elgin, Ill.:
Brethren Publishing House, 1936), used by permission of the
publisher; Medical Recollections of the Army of the Potomac; and
Memoir of Jonathan Letterman, M.D. by Jonathan Letterman, M.D.,
(reprint ed. Knoxville: Bohemian Brigade Publishers, 1994), used by
permission of the publisher.
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ernst, Kathleen, 1959
Too afraid to cry: Maryland civilians in the Antietam Campaign/
Kathleen A. Ernst: foreword by Ted Alexander.1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8117-1602-3
1. Maryland Campaign, 1862. 2. MarylandHistoryCivil War, 1861-
1865Socila
aspects. 3. United StatesHistoryCivil War, 1861-
1865Social aspects. 4. Sharps-
burg Region (Md.)History, Military-
Sharpsburg RegionHistory19th century. I.
Title.
E474.61.E76 1999
973.7'336dc21 99-36994
CIP
Page v
For my husband, partner, and companion, Scott.
Page vii
Contents
Foreword ix
by Ted Alexander
Preface xiii
Acknowledgments xv
Chapter 1: "This Conflict of Opinions and Sympathies" 1
Chapter 2: "In a Small Commotion" 28
Chapter 3: "What a Terrible Feeling This Is" 56
Chapter 4: "I'll Die First" 87
Chapter 5: "It Was an Awful Time" 111
Chapter 6: "Too Afraid to Cry" 130
Chapter 7: "A Smell of Death in the Air" 155
Chapter 8: "Broken Hearts Can't Be Photographed" 189
Chapter 9: "Deliver Us From This Terrible War" 203
Chapter 10: "When That Time Comes, All Hearts and 225
Hands Will Unite"
Notes 242
Selected Bibliography 272
Index 288

Page ix
Foreword
Western Maryland, particularly the counties of Washington and
Frederick, was a hotbed of turmoil during the Civil War. Indeed, along
with Pennsylvania's neighboring Cumberland Valley and Adams
County, of which Gettysburg is the county seat, this was an area that
from 1861 to 1865 saw more sustained military activity than any other
region north of the Potomac. Esteemed Civil War historian Dennis
Frye has likened life in Harpers Ferry at that time to living on the
Arab-Israeli border in the late twentieth century. He might just as well
have been talking about that thin strip of western Maryland bordered
by Pennsylvania on the north and Virginia and West Virginia on the
south. Through this corridor passed approximately three-quarters of a
million Union and Confederate soldiers.
Of this number, most were from the armies that traversed the region in
three major campaigns, the Maryland campaign of 1862, the
Gettysburg campaign of 1863, and Jubal Early's raid of 1864. In
addition, thousands of Union soldiers were garrisoned in the areaat
Frederick, at Hagerstown, and at lesser populated towns and villages
and in smaller detachments at key points along the Potomac and
Mason-Dixon line. To be sure, a less measurable portion of the troop
numbers can be attributed to the hundreds of small unit-mounted
incursions led by commanders such as Jeb Stuart and John
McCausland or partisan leaders such as John S. Mosby and Harry
Gilmor. While these latter movements may have been brief,
sometimes shorter than a day, their impact could be long lasting.
The battles of Antietam and Monocacy lasted one day. Gettysburg was
a three-day round of carnage. Yet for the civilians living in the wake
of these man-made disasters, the effects of these battles lasted for
weeks, months, and even years. A case in point is the community of
Sharpsburg, Maryland. Although much has been written about the
bloody day of fighting along
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Antietam Creek, most people do not realize that this was the first
organized community in the United States to suffer widespread
damage from both combat and the sheer presence of two opposing
armies. A wide body of anecdotal evidence from both soldiers and
civilians, via letters, diaries, and postwar reminiscences, leads us to
believe that nearly every house in the town of Sharpsburg was
damaged in some way by stray artillery rounds as well as small-arms
fire. Further, a number of buildings caught fire and were destroyed,
and some of the town's churches had to be rebuilt because of
structural damage.
Besides the immediate impact of combat, the residue of military
activity also left its mark during the period following the battle of
Antietam. The presence of more than 120,000 Rebels and Yankees
along with some 50,000 horses and mules generated tons of wastea
tremendous health hazard in and of itself. The threat of disease was
further exacerbated by thousands of dead men and animals rotting in
the warm September sun, and many more wounded left to care for in
field hospitals. Evidence shows that scores of citizens got sick, and
many of them died.
Combat and disease were not the only threats posed by a large battle.
Economic devastation loomed as an all-too-real possibility. At
Sharpsburg soldiers from both sides raided farms and homes, carrying
off valuables, destroying property, and confiscating livestock and
crops as provender of the armies. In some cases refugees who fled the
Sharpsburg area prior to the battle returned to find themselves in
economic ruina scenario that was repeated hundreds of times
throughout this corridor of war. This, then, is the story of Antietam
and beyond, looking through the prism of war as it affected the
civilian population.
Despite the compelling story of a citizenry's efforts to cope with the