The Pennsylvania Reserves Remember Dranesville -- at Gettysburg!

As many readers may know, I spent last weekend in Gettysburg. I hadn't been to the battlefield in many years, and the visit left me with a lot of impressions and emotions. (More on that in a future post!) As part of my tour, I focused on sites associated with the Pennsylvania Reserves. Two brigades from the division participated in the fighting at Gettysburg. I am fascinated by the Reserves and have written many posts about their time in Northern Virginia. Imagine my surprise when I discovered "Dranesville" inscribed on the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves Monument along with the names of other battles in which the regiment participated. The same goes for the Bucktails (13th Pennsylvania Reserves) Monument. Although I didn't get to all of the monuments for the Pennsylvania Reserves this time around, I searched the Historical Marker Database and noticed that the other regiments who fought at Dranesville (the 6th, 9th, and 12th Pennsylvania Reserves) also listed this small-scale engagement on their monuments. I've written quite a bit about the battle, including an article for the Civil War Trust. Even after experiencing all the carnage at Gettysburg (not to mention other places like Antietam), the former members of these five regiments made sure to commemorate their clash in and around a small Virginia hamlet during the first year of the war. Dranesville rarely appears in most modern accounts of the Civil War, but the hardened veterans of the Pennsylvania Reserves could never forget the sacrifices they made in one of their early and limited battles against the Confederate infantry.

Here are a few pictures that I snapped of the monuments:

Soldier atop the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves Monument at Big Round Top. The 10th Pennsylvania Reserves belonged to the 3rd Brigade, 3rd Division (Pennsylvania Reserves), Fifth Corps, Army of the Potomac. The Maltese Cross on the monument represents the Fifth Corps.

A list of engagements of the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves, starting with Dranesville.

I couldn't help but take this close-up of Dranesville on the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves Monument.

The 13th Pennsylvania Reserves Monument near the Wheatfield. The 13th Pennsylvania Reserves were better known as the "Bucktails." The regiment belonged to the 1st Brigade, 3rd Division (Pennsylvania Reserves), Fifth Corps, Army of the Potomac. The soldier atop the monument is appropriately wearing a bucktail attached to his cap!

List of engagements in which the Bucktails participated, starting with Dranesville.

The Presentation of the Colors to the Victors of Dranesville

The month of January 1862 was cold, damp, and miserable for the Pennsylvania Reserves encamped at Langley.  The men huddled inside their crude huts as the snow and rain fell and the ground outside turned into mud.  The winter weather even interfered with the daily routine of army life.  As a soldier from the 7th Pennsylvania Reserves wrote to the Philadelphia Press, "owing to the unfavorable weather with which we have been visited, drill and other duties have been almost suspended."  Nothing, however, not even the elements, could get in the way of bestowing honors on the victors of Dranesville. 

The Pennsylvania Reserves had become the darling of  the political and military establishment ever since the battle.  At the end of the December, Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin visited the Reserves at Camp Pierpont and declared that the regiments involved at Dranesville would have the name of the battle inscribed on their standards.  (See here for a recent post on the governor's visit.)  The flags were soon sent to Washington to be painted with the battle honors. 

Flag of the 6th Pennsylvania Reserves with a barely visible "Dranesville" inscription (courtesy of Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee)

Flag of the 9th Pennsylvania Reserves with a faded "Dranesville" inscription (courtesy of Pennsylvania Capitol Preservation Committee)

A couple weeks later, on January 11, the entire division participated in the presentation of the colors to the men who had won the day at Dranesville.  All fifteen regiments, "in full uniform," formed and marched out to the parade ground, which was "in a wretched condition, occasioned by the rains of the previous day."  ("Letter from Camp Pierpont," Phila. Press, Jan. 20, 1862.)  A fifteen-gun salute was fired by the Reserves' artillery, and various regimental bands "returned the compliment."  ("Letter from Camp Pierpont," Phila. Press, Jan. 20, 1862.)  Speaker of the House Galusha Grow of Pennsylvania traveled to Langley for the occasion and met the Reserves on the parade ground.  As the soldier from the 7th Pennsylvania Reserves described the scene:

. . . the color companies attached to the different regiments in [E.O.C.] Ord's brigade took an advanced position, when the flags on which were neatly inscribed the word "DRANESVILLE," in honor of the late victory, were presented by [Grow] -- the ceremony winding up with a few complimentary remarks from that gentleman.  The cavalry and artillery that accompanied the brigade were also on the ground, and were presented with new flags similarly inscribed.*

Rep. Galusha Grow,  Speaker of the House, 1861-63 (courtesy of Wikipedia)

The regiments then filed past Grow and the other notables gathered on the parade ground.  Overall, the soldier from the 7th considered that "the affair passed off admirably" despite the muck and mire.  Perhaps the review lifted more than a few spirits in the middle of the harsh winter.  The glow of Dranesville, however, would grow dimmer as the new year progressed and the war's toll grew to unimaginable proportions.

Note
*Ord's brigade was comprised of the 6th, 9th, 10th, and 12th Pennsylvania Reserves.  All of these regiments were engaged at Dranesville. The 1st Pennsylvania Rifles ("the Bucktails"), although not part of Ord's brigade, also participated in the battle, and it is likely that they also received the inscribed flag during the ceremony.

Sources
"Letter from Camp Pierpont," dated Jan. 14, 1862, Philadelphia Press, Jan. 20, 1862;  O.R. Howard Thomson & William H. Rauch, History of the "Bucktails" (1906).

Christmas at Camp Pierpont, December 1861

Readers by now are quite familiar with Camp Pierpont, the quarters of the Pennsylvania Reserves in Langley, Virginia during the winter of 1861-62.  The Pennsylvania boys, many away from their families for the first time, marked the Christmas holiday that December in a variety of ways.  Some soldiers received packages from home and shared the bounty with their comrades-in-arms. According to Private Adam Bright of Co. C, 9th Pennsylvania Reserves:

I had a very nice dinner on Christmas day. One of my friends had a box sent to him by express containing 4 large Shanghi [sic] roosters stuffed, a number of pound cakes, and pies, pickles and apples. You may be sure I did them all justice.

Soldiers also received clothing like "socks and comforters," as well as "a little Old Rye." (Letter from Newsboy, Philadelphia Sunday Transcript, Dec. 24, 1861.)  The whiskey sometimes led to mischief.  The History of Company H, 4th Pennsylvania Reserves recalls:

Christmas being at hand, the boys solicited boxes from home to somewhat alleviate the rugged realities of camp life. In many of these bottles of whiskey figured cheerfully amidst other luxuries for their holiday festivities. The provost-Marshal, learning of this new feature of Northern liberality, by order of the General, opened the boxes on their arrival, confiscated all contraband goods and removed them to headquarters, to be "used by the mess," so the soldier lads said. They becoming enraged by this unwarrantable intrusion upon their rights, confiscated a quantity of poultry received by General [George A.] McCall from a friend by way of retaliation for their wrongs.

Soldiers also had other distractions during the holiday season.  The 11th Pennsylvania Reserves, for instance, took part in an amusing "friendly fire" episode:

Some of the boys . . . had Santa Claus, with a full-rigged suit of Secesh [sic]Clothes, stuck up in a tree. One of the guards, being put on post, and not knowing of the aforesaid gentleman being in the neighborhood, while walking his lonely beat, cast his eye that way, and, seeing Mr. Man, came to the conclusion that it was one of the men of J. Davis & Co. . . . .  He determined to make a hero of himself and fired, putting a ball through our Christmas friend, when the rest of the boys jumped up, exclaiming "Guard house, Guard House." (Letter from Newsboy, Philadelphia Sunday Transcript, Dec. 24, 1861.)

"Christmas Boxes in Camp, Christmas, 1861," Harper's Weekly, Jan. 4, 1862  (courtesy of sonofthesouth.net)

All lightheartedness aside, the Pennsylvanians showed that the spirit of Christmas was alive and well at Camp Pierpont.  Private William H. Jayne of  Co. C, 6th Pennsylvania Reserves was wounded at the Battle of Dranesville on December 20 and spent the holiday recovering at a field hospital.  In a December 26, 1861 letter to the Honesdale Democrat he expressed his appreciation for the generosity of his fellow soldiers:

Our boys received some luxuries from Wayne county for Christmas, which they sent to the Hospital for the wounded and we had as merry a Christmas as ever such a lot of cripples enjoyed.

Other soldiers could not help but notice that the war left little reason to celebrate.  William R. Brown of Easton's Battery, which has seen action at Dranesville, wrote to the Raftsman's Journal on Christmas Day, lamenting that "there are none of those scenes of frivolity and good cheer with which Pennsylvanians are wont to regard this annual holiday to divert the mind from the daily routine of camp life."

Brigadier General George G. Meade, commander of the Second Brigade of the Pennsylvania Reserves, offered a glimmer of hope amidst the conflict that had torn the country apart.  In a December 25, 1861 letter to his wife, he expressed the sentiments likely shared by many that holiday season:

I write a few lines on this day of rejoicing and festivity, to let you know I am well, and though absent from you in the body, that I am with you and my dear children in spirit and thought. As this day is the anniversary commemorating the great promise held out to all mankind, let us hope it may promise speedy peace and happiness to us in this world as well as the one to come. God grant it may be so!

As I drive down Georgetown Pike and through Langley from the comfort of my own heated car, I can't help but think about the homesick men in blue who tried to celebrate Christmas as best as they could under the hardships of winter camp.

On a personal note, I would like to wish you and your family a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! 

Note on Sources:

I am eternally indebted to the Pennsylvanian Reserve Volunteer Corps Historical Society, whose website makes available a multitude of soldiers' letters, including those cited above. 

Meade's entire letter can be found in The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Volume I, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1913, p. 239 (available on Google Books).

Friendly Fire Episodes at Dranesville

As students of the Civil War know, friendly fire-related incidents sometimes occurred during the heat and confusion of battle, often with tragic consequences.  One of the more infamous episodes involved the shooting of "Stonewall" Jackson by his own men during the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863.  But battle histories are replete with other, lesser-known examples.  While researching the Battle of Dranesville, I recently came across a few tales related to friendly fire.

Battle flag of the 1st Kentucky (courtesy of Sand Hill Flag Co.)

As J.E.B. Stuart prepared to attack the Union force under General E.O.C. Ord which had entered Dranesville on December 20, 1861, he sent forward the 1st Kentucky and the 6th South Carolina to the left of the Centreville Road.  According to Stuart in his official report of the battle:

The thicket where the Sixth South Carolina and First Kentucky operated was so dense that it was impossible to see either [their] exact position or their progress in the fight, and I regret to say that the First Kentucky and the Sixth South Carolina mistook each other for the enemy, and a few casualties occurred in consequence. . . .

Colonel Conrad F. Jackson, commander of the 9th Pennsylvania Reserves (courtesy of the Pennsylvania Reserve Volunteer Corps Historical Society)

(Stuart's report does not mention the exact number of dead and wounded as a result of this friendly fire incident, but according to The Glories of War by Charles P. Poland, Jr., the 1st Kentucky killed five men of the 6th South Carolina.)  The 1st Kentucky, recovering from this unfortunate encounter, pressed forward into the fight.  Meanwhile, Ord had dispatched the 9th Pennsylvania Reserves south of the Leesburg and Alexandria Turnpike on the Union right.  Before long, Colonel Conrad F. Jackson heard movement in the underbrush and ordered the 9th Pennsylvania into position.  According to a letter to the Pittsburgh Gazette from an unknown soldier of Company A (Pittsburgh Rifles), 9th Pennsylvania Reserves, some men called out "Who are You?," to which the Confederate troops responded, "The 1st Kentucky Regiment."  Other Pennsylvanians heard something else.  As Colonel Jackson recounted:

One of the enemy called out, "Don't fire on us." One of my men imprudently asked, "Are you the Bucktails?" The answer was, "Yes, we are the Bucktails; don't fire."

The unknown soldier recalled that the Kentuckians also shouted "For God's sake don't fire we are your friends."  This deception strengthened the impression for some soldiers that the men in front of them were fellow Pennsylvanians from the Bucktail regiment.  Jackson soon heard from another officer that "the troops opposite were the Bucktails."  Concern over accidentally opening fire on Union soldiers overcame Jackson.  He wrote:

Determined to avoid falling into the fatal error of killing our own men, I at once used all my energy to prevent firing, nor did we fire until after we had received a volley from the enemy, as they proved to be. We received their first fire as Captain Galway was in the act of reporting that he had obtained a view of them, and assured me in the most emphatic manner they were rebels. The order to fire was then given and promptly obeyed, but I found there still existed a doubt on the part of the men as to the true character of the troops we were engaged with, which caused considerable confusion in the ranks, which was overcome to a great extent with some difficulty.

The anonymous soldier had a somewhat different recollection.  He wrote to the Pittsburgh Gazette that Colonel Jackson "rode in the rear of the line begging the men not to fire into the Buck Tails, though the shot was flying thick as hail and our boys were falling on our right and our left."  This soldier's account raises questions about whether in fact the 9th was under an intense attack before Jackson learned that the regiment opposite his men was the 1st Kentucky.  The unknown soldier also indicated that some soldiers may not have waited for the order to fire:

Yet, regardless of all orders, there was firing all along the line, and finally the Colonel could no longer be heard and all loaded and fired as fast as we could for half an hour.  

Jackson and his unknown soldier were in agreement about one thing.  As Jackson wrote in his report of the battle:

I feel perfectly convinced, had the men been assured at the onset that the troops before us were rebels, we might have driven them from their position before they could have fired on us, as we could hear them distinctly load their pieces.

The soldier from the Pittsburgh Rifles likewise believed that "Had we been commanded to fire immediately, we might have done terrible execution."  Regardless, even with the confusion at the outset of the encounter, the 9th Pennsylvania held its ground and drove back the 1st Kentucky.  But this story goes a long way to showing just how soldiers and commanding officers could be gripped by anxiety over friendly fire.  As the earlier encounter between the 1st Kentucky and the 6th Carolina shows, the 9th Pennsylvania had every reason to fear such a costly mistake.

The Action at Dranesville

Of all the skirmishes and minor battles around the Washington area during the Civil War, Dranesville has attracted its fair share of attention.  A quick search on Google reveals plenty of material about this engagement on December 20, 1861.  The Friday after Thanksgiving, my Dad and I set out to explore the area around Dranesville.  The battlefield is now marred by the suburban D.C. development, but a few historical markers recall the encounter, and Fairfax County has preserved an old tavern there.  

The hamlet of Dranesville sat just west of the crossroads of the Leesburg & Alexandria Turnpike (today's VA Route 7/Leesburg Pike) and the Leesburg & Georgetown Turnpike (VA Route 193/Georgetown Pike).  In December 1861, Dranesville occupied "debatable ground" between the Union and Confederate lines in Northern Virginia, characterized by heightened tensions among local inhabitants.  The Union Army learned that enemy cavalry was operating in the region and threatening Union sympathizers.  Brigadier General George A. McCall, commander of the Pennsylvania Reserves, instructed Brigadier General E.O.C. Ord on the evening of December 19 to set out the next morning with his brigade to drive back Confederate pickets and collect forage from secessionist farmers.  Another brigade commander, Brigadier General John F. Reynolds, was instructed to move to Difficult Run, where he was to wait and provide support to Ord if necessary.  Early on the morning of the 20th, Ord left Camp Pierpont in Langley with his brigade of the 6th, 9th, 10th, and 12th Pennsylvania Reserves, along with the "Bucktail" regiment (13th Pennsylvania Reserves), four guns under Captain Hezekiah Easton of Battery A, 1st Pennsylvania Artillery, and two squadrons of the 1st Pennsylvania Cavalry.  All told, the force comprised about 5,000 men.

Brigadier General E.O.C. Ord (courtesy of Georgetown University Library)

The Confederates, meanwhile, were planning a similar foraging expedition in the area.  Brigadier General J.E.B. Stuart was assigned to guard the wagons with around 1,600 infantry of the 1st Kentucky, 6th South Carolina, 10th Alabama, and 11th Virginia, as well as four guns of the Sumter Flying Artillery and 150 cavalry.  When Stuart learned of the approaching Federal brigade, he sent the wagons back towards the Confederate camps in Centreville and prepared to defend what he perceived as a threat to his recently collected supplies.

"The Battle of Dranesville -- Sketched by an Officer Who Was Present," Harper's Weekly, Jan.11, 1862 (courtesy of sonofthesouth.net).  This print depicts a view from the position of Easton's battery.  Ridge Road is to the left of the artillery.  The Thornton House, occupied by the Bucktails, is immediately to the front of the artillery, on the right.

As Ord arrived in the vicinity of Dranesville, Rebel pickets fled before his men.  Ord's soldiers moved west of the intersection of the two pikes.  Ord soon discovered that the Confederate force was advancing in his rear, and dispatched his artillery to high ground east of the intersection.  He then wheeled his regiments around and aligned them facing south, towards the Confederates, who were advancing on either side of Ridge Road (or Centreville Road, more or less today's Reston Avenue).  A hot fight ensued between the two armies, lasting around two hours.  The Union artillery, occupying a dominant position, proved particularly effective and wrecked havoc on the Confederate battery.  The Bucktails engaged the 6th South Carolina and 10th Alabama from an advantageous location in and around the Thornton House in the Union center. Off to the Union right, the 9th Pennsylvania battled the 1st Kentucky.  Finally, Stuart, who feared the arrival of Union reinforcements, withdrew from the field and fell back to Frying Pan Church, about half a dozen miles distant.  Lucky that Stuart left, as Reynolds, and another brigade of Pennsylvania Reserves under Brigadier General George G. Meade, were on the way  after learning of the battle that had erupted at Dranesville.  The Union had lost about 68 killed and wounded, and the Confederates suffered 194 casualties.  McCall, worried that the Rebels might cut off Ord's men from Union lines during the night, ordered Ord to march his brigade back to Camp Pierpont.  Stuart returned the next day to collect the wounded and bury the dead.

Modern view of the intersection of Leesburg Pike and the Georgetown Pike at Dranesville.  Ord aligned his forces along the Leesburg Pike, facing south.  The 9th and 12th Pennsylvania were positioned just beyond the intersection, where the ground slopes down.  Easton's artillery was placed to the right of the intersection on elevated land (not visible here).



State historical marker on the "Action at Dranesville," along Leesburg Pike heading west towards the Dranesville intersection of VA Routes 7 & 193. More information can be found on the Historical Marker Database.  



Dranesville Tavern (c. 1824), located west of the Dranesville intersection.  This historic site is owned by Fairfax County, which restored the tavern to its 1850 appearance.  The tavern was moved about 125 feet southwest of its original location.  During the time of the Civil War, the tavern was considered "one of the best roadside inns in America," according to the Virginia Gazette.  The tavern's role in the Battle of Dranesville is not known.  However, a Civil War Trails marker in front of the tavern commemorates the action at Dranesville.

Dranesville was hailed in Northern papers as a major victory.  After the ignominious defeats at First Bull Run and Ball's Bluff, the North was hungry for a win over the Confederates.  Dranesville gave Northerners the opportunity to celebrate.  Secretary of War Simon Cameron, himself a Pennsylvanian, wrote to General McCall that "[i]t is one of the bright spots that give assurance of the success of coming events, and its effect must be to inspire confidence in the belief that hereafter as heretofore, the cause of our country will triumph."  Confederate papers largely portrayed the engagement as a loss.  The Richmond Examiner, for instance, observed that "[t]he impression is, that we have suffered no inconsiderable disaster."  Larger-scale, more brutal battles would follow, and for all the attention Dranesville got in the winter of 1861, it would soon become, as historian Charles Poland has said, "a virtually forgotten sideshow of the war."

A Note on Sources:

I found several sources useful in learning more about the Battle of Dranesville.

The Glories of War: Small Battles and Early Heroes of 1861, by local historian Charles P. Poland, Jr. has a detailed chapter on the battle.

The Official Records, Series I, Volume V contains official reports of the battle by Union commanders and Confederate General Stuart.

"The Battle of Dranesville, Va." by William S. Hammond in the Southern Historical Society Papers, Vol. XXXV, Richmond, Jan.-Dec. 1907 (available here) provides a concise account of the engagement.

Craig Swain, over at To the Sound of the Guns, does a great job of describing troop positions in relation to the current lay of the land in Dranesville.