Camp Pope: A Civil War Training Camp at Iowa City

28th Iowa Infantry, American Civil War, regimental flag with staff, tassel, and finial. State Historical Society of Iowa Accession Number 2001.071.138 https://iowa.minisisinc.com/SCRIPTS/MWIMAIN.DLL/i1k2MGNPGHN1MU8/2/52/69427?RECORD

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Twenty-Eighth Iowa Volunteer Infantry Regiment

The men in the Twenty-Eighth Iowa Volunteer Infantry Regiment began their rendezvous during the profusion of recruits that began after Linconln’s call for 300,000 volunteers in July 1862. Companies formed from July 24 to September 8, 1862 some of whom remained unassigned until The Iowa Adjutant General issued orders for the formation of the regiment on August 25. Samuel Kirkwood appointed William E. Miller to lead the regiment on August 10. Volunteers in the Twenty-Eighth Iowa came from a wide number of counties in the central and east central parts of the state, including Jasper, Poweshiek, Tama, Benton, Iowa, and Johnson counties. Miller was from Iowa City as were several of the officers and non-commissioned officers. The strength of the regiment at its largest was 963 men. Like the Twenty-Second Iowa, the companies were organized largely by county, with Benton County residents placed in Companies A and D, volunteers from Iowa County as Companies B, F, and I, and Poweshiek County men forming Companies C and H. Johnson, Tama and Jasper residents were assigned to Companies E, G, and K, respectively. ⁶⁶

Although the Twenty-Eighth Iowa had a far fewer number of veteran soldiers, a local newspaper communicated that the soldiers of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa were drilling with increased proficiency by early October. Local citizens decided at the time to plan an “old fashioned pic-nic” for the men. Only part of their government issued clothing had arrived but uniforms and weapons had not, a likely sign of the difficulty the federal government was having supplying the groundswell of new troops. In addition to delays in receiving equipment, their wages were also delayed. ⁶⁷

The Iowa City Weekly Republican reported that Captain Hendershott, US Army, mustered the Twenty-Eighth Iowa into “the service of Uncle Sam” on October 10 with 956 men. It also was stated that Colonel Miller had recovered after being very ill and that “The boys made merry by the receipt of their bounty, and premium money.” The weapons for the Twenty-Eighth Iowa had arrived in Davenport and were expected to be in Iowa City soon, no doubt shipped directly to the camp on the Mississippi & Missouri Railroad, a subsidiary of the Chicago, Rock Island, and Pacific Railroad that operated in eastern Iowa before 1866. The flank companies, elite soldiers placed along the sides of the main regimental body, would receive Enfield rifles, again almost certainly Pattern 1853 rifle-muskets, and the main body would receive smooth-bore Prussian muskets, very likely Potsdam, or Potzdam, model 1809/31, which were less effective overall especially at longer distances. The Iowa Adjutant General reported just 188 Enfield rifles were issued to the Twenty-Eighth. The other 708 men were issued Prussian Muskets, most of which were held over from the Mexican War. ⁶⁸

Although the Iowa City State Democratic Press reported on October 25 that the regiment was going to leave Camp Pope the following day, it was not until November 2 when the men of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa boarded a train and traveled to Camp Herron near Davenport. A member of the regiment, who signed his correspondence with the Iowa City Weekly Republican as “28th Iowa,” was frustrated with the preparations to move out. They were woken early and the camp was a hurried scramble. Finally at seven in the morning they marched out of camp, giving their farewells as they went. They boarded the train and left by nine. Some forty soldiers were sick and were placed in a separate car with the medical team. Most of the men were raw recruits and had only only two months to drill by this point but the Iowa Adjutant General commented in 1910 that the men were likely as well prepared as any regiment at the point they were ordered into the field. ⁶⁹

28th Iowa Infantry, American Civil War, national flag with staff, final, and tassel. State Historical Society of Iowa Accession Number 2001.071.136. Blue silk canton with painted gold stars, thirteen red and white stripes with painted battle honors on the second and third red stripe; unit designation painted on the fourth red stripe. https://iowa.minisisinc.com/SCRIPTS/MWIMAIN.DLL/q1k2MGNPGHN1MUh/11/6/69425?RECORD 

The Twenty-Eighth participated in the same major campaigns and battles as the Twenty-Second Iowa, namely the Vicksburg Campaign and the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, but participated in actions elsewhere before Vicksburg and the intervening months before they were transferred to Sheridan’s Army of the Shenandoah. While camped at Helena, Arkansas before Vicksburg, about 300 men were detached and participated in rapid marches in Northwest Mississippi and Southeast Arkansas. They rarely encountered resistance, but the men, animals and equipment were worn down by the rapid pace through difficult terrain. The Iowa Adjutant General’s office reported in 1910 that those in camp fared nearly as bad with sickness common. The report blamed the illness in part on swampy ground that surrounded the meandering channel of the Mississippi River but stopped short of saying it was due to bad air and noted that illness prevailed on higher ground as well. ⁷⁰

The Twenty-Eighth next participated in Ulysses S. Grant’s preliminary strategic actions leading up to the Siege of Vicksburg that were paradoxically intended to not make great tactical gains on the field. Instead Grant secretly hoped the strategy of intentionally random maneuvers would serve several purposes that were helpful to him and his command. These included confusing the Confederate generals as to their intent and position by busying them with tracking the many erratic troop movements. In the meantime, Grant’s main force moved toward Vicksburg. Another purpose was to keep the Union troops from having to camp for additional long weeks in the swamps of the Mississippi Valley and risk further illness and bad morale. Persistent rain over the winter had flooded the entire valley to above its usual wetland condition. Grant hoped frequent movements would improve conditions for the men in reserve. A third reason was to increase Northern support for the war through correspondents sending reports of their busy movements around the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta region to Northern newspapers. Northern Democrats, who continued to support chattel slavery even if they were against the war, had made large gains in the 1862 midterm elections and Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation of January 1863 was not well-received by them. Many considered abolition unconstitutional even when conditioned to only be a war measure. Further, volunteer enlistments had all but ceased. Grant hoped to improve the impressions of the progress of the war among Northern voters and politicians and to encourage the general public’s support for its efforts, including support for a federal conscription act. Lincoln resorted to a draft that was enacted in early March 1863 as the Enrollment Act. Ultimately, Grant needed time to assemble a large force near Vicksburg and he wanted to keep the Confederate officers distracted and northern voters free from protesting. Approaching Vicksburg was extremely difficult. The river city was situated along a bluff that rose between 80 and more than 200 feet above the river. The city was built on an upland that descended rapidly in three directions and facing the river on top of bluffs on the fourth. Vicksburg had become a citadel protected by the swampland in the Mississippi Valley as well as several gun batteries facing the river and additional batteries connected by riffle pits built along the steeply descending slopes. Grant was determined to have a strategically decisive end to this battle that would be regarded far and wide as a decisive victory.⁷¹

The Muscatine Weekly Journal reported that William Miller had resigned his commission in command of the Twenty-Eighth in early April, 1863. During the events leading up to the Battle of Vicksburg, the regiment, now commanded by John Connell, saw heavy fighting under artillery and small arms fire guarding the left flank of the Union battle formation in the Battle of Port Gibson. Earlier three companies had joined Thirty-Fourth Indiana in taking a Confederate battery. The Twenty-Eighth suffered heavy losses during the Battle of Champion’s Hill where they again guarded the left flank and took another Confederate battery, this time with the Twenty-fourth Iowa in support. Theodore Schaeffer of the Twenty-Eighth carried orders for James R. Slack of the Forty-Seventh Indiana who was the brigade commander. The Twenty-Eighth Iowa lost 100 men. Alvin Peterson Hovey, the general in command of the 12th Division in the XIII Corps, heaped praise on the Twenty-eight Iowa, including in his official report the statement of Joseph G. Strong, the adjutant of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa, saying “The Twenty-eighth has added new laurels to the noble young State of Iowa.” The Twenty-eighth Iowa lost 10 men, with three killed and seven wounded during the Siege of Vicksburg but just one in the siege of Jackson. ⁷²

Their next significant engagement was the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads during the doomed Red River Campaign of Nathaniel P. Banks. John Connell was still in command of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa. The battle was an attempt to capture the Louisiana capital and failed miserably with more than 2,000 total federal casualties and 1,000 horses and mules killed or captured. The Iowa Adjutant General reported that the Twenty-Eighth Iowa “bore a most conspicuous part and sustained the greatest loss, in killed and wounded, of any regiment in its brigade or division. John Connell was severely wounded and captured. Thomas Dillin replaced him and in his official report of the battle he noted, “that space will not permit me to speak of all the officers standing up bravely and facing the rain of death, and of the non-commissioned officers and privates, many of whom fell in the conflict, yielding up their lives upon their country’s altar.” They lost 75 men, with eight killed, 41 wounded and 26 captured. ⁷³

The Iowa Adjutant General’s office, writing about the Red River campaign around 1910, placed blame solidly on Banks as the general commanding the Army of the Gulf for its strategic failure. Banks was described by others as a politically appointed general with a lack of significant military experience. Banks was an abolitionist politician from the mill towns of Massachusetts. His military career was marked by a series of significant losses. While he appears to have been at least partly at fault, the Red River Campaign was not his idea. He and Grant had preferred a different military goal instead of the Red River Campaign but were overruled by the Lincoln administration due to powerful political and business interests. During the campaign Banks was called to pursue two opposing goals. Since Autumn 1861, Lincoln had wanted to capture Texas to liberate the West Texas German communities from Confederate rule. Free-thinker and Protestant Germans across the Upper Midwest had voted in large percentages for the Republican candidates in the 1860 elections and Lincoln wanted to maintain their support for his administration. A second and no less important goal was pushed onto Lincoln by the mill owners and business interests, including those in Banks’ Massachusetts, that benefited from a steady supply of low-cost cotton for their textile mills. Proponents of the Red River Campaign sought to take control of Texas to achieve both special interests. This was done without regard to the general public’s desire in the North for a quick end of the war. By this point the war was moving slowly and deaths and injuries were mounting. The public were not only likely to lose their loved husbands, brothers, and fathers, but could also lose their source of labor and therefore their main income. Advisors at the Cabinet level as well as Massachusetts politicians appealed directly to President Lincoln of the strategic interests of a military occupation of Texas and it was their goals that Lincoln pursued. ⁷⁴

After a series of lost battles, Banks ordered a retreat. As the men retreated back from the Texas and Oklahoma border they remained under frequent harassing fire. When they arrived at Pointe Coupee Parish, on the Mississippi in east-central Louisiana, Banks was relieved of command. His successor attempted to counter the pursuing Confederate units, but they repeatedly withdrew when engaged. After several attempts to track down elusive Confederate units during the final weeks of the Red River campaign, the battle plan was given up and the Twenty-Eighth Iowa went into camp at New Orleans. They stayed there from the end of May until July 22 when they and several other regiments boarded a steamship bound for Virginia. John Connell had rejoined the unit, his left arm missing and its sleeve pinned to his chest. The crowded and hot steamer landed at Alexandria 11 days later and from there they marched north and went into camp at Washington, D.C. to wait for Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley Campaign. ⁷⁵

Bartholomew W. Wilson was in command of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa during the Battle of Opequon or Third Winchester where the Regiment was ordered to protect the left flank as they advanced through exploding shells, solid shot, and canister shot. When they ran out of ammunition, they fell back, restocked, and then participated in the counter-charge and pursuit of the Confederate forces up the valley. There were 92 casualties, including 12 killed, 58 wounded, and 22 missing in action. ⁷⁶

The final major engagement they fought was at the Battle of Cedar Creek, which was also marked by many casualties for the men of the Twenty-Eighth Iowa. Lieutenant Colonel Wilson was injured and carried away by ambulance, after which the regiment was commanded by its Major. The Twenty-Eighth were ordered to hold the left flank after the Confederate forces ambushed the Union fortifications overlooking the creek hours before dawn and under cover of fog. The Twenty-eighth was the last to retreat and was under heavy fire for a third of a mile and then hastened to retreat with the rest of the army when the left flank was turned, falling back about two miles. At this point Philip Sheridan appeared and rallied the troops. The armies reengaged the Confederate forces and pushed them back up the valley eventually routing them and securing the valley for the remainder of the war. The Iowa Twenty-Eight suffered 95 casualties, including 9 Killed, 77 wounded, and 9 missing. ⁷⁷

The Twenty-Eighth Regiment was mustered out on July 31, 1865 and returned to Baltimore by steamship and then by rail to Davenport, disembarking the government train on August 8. The total number to have been in the regiment through the war was 1,195 of which 89 were killed or died of wounds, 262 wounded, 206 discharged during the war. Another 109 died of disease and 99 were captured. ⁷⁸

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notes to page 8

66. N. B. Baker, “State of Iowa, Adjutant General’s Office, General Orders, No. 89,” State Democratic Press, (Iowa City), August 30th, 1862, page 2; Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment Iowa Volunteer Infantry,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, page 1229, 1242 https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008885770; “Affairs at Camp Pope,” Iowa City Weekly Republican, September 17th, 1862, page 3; Iowa City Weekly Republican, October 1st, 1862, page 3 (Return ↩)

67. Iowa City Republican, October 1st, 1862, page 3; Iowa City Republican, Wednesday, October 8th, 1862, page 3 (Return ↩)

68. Iowa City Weekly Republican, October 10, 1862; page 3, Iowa Adjutant General, “Report to Samuel J. Kirkwood, Governor of Iowa, January 11, 1863,” Report of the Adjutant General and Acting Quartermaster General of the State of Iowa, January 1, 1863, Des Moines: F. W. Palmer, 1863, page xvi (Return ↩)

69. State Democratic Press (Iowa City), October 25th, 1862; [Clarence] Ray Aurner, Leading Events in Johnson County, Iowa History, volume 1, 1912, pages 534–535; Iowa Adjutant General’s Office, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, page 1229
 (Return ↩)

70. Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, page 1230 (Return ↩)

71. Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1229–1230; Ulysses S. Grant, Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant, Selected Letters 1839–1865, New York: Library of America, volume 1, 1990, pages 295–297, https://archive.org/details/memoirsselectedl00gran_0; Iowa City Weekly Republican, August 13, 1862, page 2. (Return ↩)

72. Muscatine Weekly Journal, April 10, 1863 page 1, Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1230–1233
(Return ↩)

73. Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1234–1235 (Return ↩)

74. Ludwell H. Johnson, Red River Campaign : Politics And Cotton In The Civil War, Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1993, pages 4–5, 9, 36 https://archive.org/details/redrivercampaign0000john; Regarding the German Vote in 1860, see Frederick C. Luebke, “Introduction,” Ethnic Voters and The Election of Lincoln, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1973, pages xi–xxxii https://archive.org/details/ethnicvoterselec0000lueb_q7k1 and Thomas W. Kremm, “Cleveland and the First Lincoln Election: The Ethnic Response to Nativism,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History, volume 8, number 1, 1977, pages 84–86 https://www.jstor.org/stable/202596 (Return ↩)

75. Iowa Adjutant General’s Office, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1236–1237pages 1236–1237 (Return ↩)

76. The number given here reflects both sources provided and what appears to be needed corrections of the numbers given in 1910. Iowa Adjutant General’s Office, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, page 1238; Iowa Adjutant General, “Twenty-Eighth Infantry, Engagement Near Winchester, V.A.,” Report of The Adjutant General and Acting Quartermaster General of The State of Iowa, January 11, 1864 to January 1, 1865, volume 2, Des Moines: F.W. Palmer, 1865, pages 1182–1183, [image number 356] https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008885770 (Return ↩)

77. Iowa Adjutant General’s Office, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1238–1239; Daily Democrat and News (Davenport) November 18, 1862 Page 1 (Return ↩)

78. Iowa Adjutant General’s Office, “Twenty-Eighth Regiment,” Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers, volume 3, 1910, pages 1240 (Return ↩)