Levi Festerman awoke with a start as the laboring steam engine lurched around a bend. His fitful sleep was disturbed once again as he clung to the roof of the rattling car until his fingers tingled with numbness. Last night's excitement, when finally boarding the train for the battlefront, was now a distant, weary memory. The exhausted soldiers inside the train began to feel crushed and claustrophobic as the hot, muggy air seemed to press in on their crowded compartment. On top of the train, windblown soldiers held on for dear life as the rickety train hurtled through the darkness into the unknown. In the ensuing silence, as even the more boisterous fell silent, terror began to invade the thoughts of the citizen soldiers. They recalled tales they had heard about loyal unionists who had been known to put obstructions on the rails that could send the precariously perched soldiers to their deaths.
Sparks from the locomotive streaked brightly through the darkness, masking imagined bushwhackers around every bend. The night sounds were lost to the clicking of the rails and the roar of the engine. The crowded roof constantly shifted as the train bucked and lurched. Hot embers from the engine stung as they flew into Levi's face, burning little holes in his new uniform. The early morning wind was surprisingly cool.
The men had eagerly boarded the train about 7 p.m. on the 20th of July 1861, excited about the prospect of going to Manassas junction and being part of the big fight commencing there. After an exhausting forced march left them worn out and hungry, they had been waiting all day to board the cars. In her diary, Ida Powell Delaney recorded the scene at Piedmont Station:
"The many soldiers scattered about in groups, sleeping, cooking, eating and talking, waiting for the cars to take them to meet the enemy, seemed like sheep gathered for the slaughter, and my heart ached to look at them."
But the men, although tired and hungry, shared no such thoughts. They felt more like caged animals worried about their prospects of getting to Manassas before the battle was over and the South won the "war" without them.
For the Sixth North Carolina State Troops, a train derailment that afternoon was a blessing in disguise. The Colonel, Charles F. Fisher, was the president of the North Carolina railroad, and many of his men were former railroad workers he had recruited when he formed the regiment. He volunteered the know-how of these railroad men to set the train back on the track. It’s not known if he made their immediate passage a part of the bargain, but their hard labor was rewarded by jumping ahead of the other troops waiting and getting on the very cars they righted. Some of the tired men including Levi Festerman of company G, climbed on top of the cars while others pushed into the stuffy, crowded interior. An air of excitement and jubilation prevailed as the young men were finally off to war…and glory.
Early the next morning Levi focused his weary eyes on the eastern horizon. The light from the rising sun streaked across the gray dawn sky. Without even thinking about it, a lifetime of farming permitted him to read the weather and told him this would be another hot day.
Miles away, on the Northern side of the Bull Run, Federal troops, who had been awakened at 2:00 a.m., wearily marched into position as they approached the Confederate picket lines. They were store clerks and salesmen who had responded to Lincoln's call to suppress the rebellion. Their commander, General Irwin McDowell, was not yet confident of their abilities and only sent them toward the Confederates upon the urging of the President, Abraham Lincoln. When McDowell complained that his troops were inexperienced and needed more time for training, his superior, General Scott, responded by reminding him:
"You are green, it is true, but they are green also; you are all green alike."
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General Winfield Scott Circa 1862
(LOC LOT 14043-2, no. 914 [P&P]) |
McDowell’s plan was simple. Send a diversionary force to demonstrate near the Stone Bridge, the logical approach to Manassas from his stronghold at Centerville, while sending his main body far to the right around the Confederate flank, crossing the Bull Run upstream at the unprotected Sudley ford.
At 6:00 a.m. a monstrous thirty-pounder Parrot rifle of Federal General Tyler’s Brigade belched forth three missiles from a protected place half a mile away from the Stone Bridge, on the Warrenton turnpike, indicating the beginning of the battle. One of these shells, aimed at a signal station, knocked down the tent of young E. Porter Alexander. Perched high in the air on his makeshift tower, he trained his glass toward the Stone Bridge to observe the activity there. As they continued firing, the Federals were frustrated by the fact that the Confederates neither ran off in terror nor betrayed their position on the opposite bank of the Bull Run. Around 8:30 a.m., Alexander's well trained eyes noticed a momentary flash in the distance. It was the early morning sunlight flashing off a polished brass cannon barrel. Later recalling it as "indescribably quick", it drew his attention to Sudley ford, some eight miles distant from the signal station, where he noticed "the glitter of bayonets all along a road crossing the valley". He realized McDowell's plan and quickly signaled Colonel Evans, at the left end of the Confederate line to "look out for your left, you are flanked", spoiling the Federal's element of surprise. Evans moved a portion of his force to meet the Yankee threat on the flank and was soon engaged in a battle on Matthew's hill that would last all morning, drawing Confederate manpower away from General P. T. G. Beauregard's carefully placed defenses. Beauregard had spent the last month meticulously planning this battle and it was already off to a disastrous start.
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General Joseph E. Johnston
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The Sixth North Carolina was still many miles distant as the battle commenced. Between the violent lurching of the train and the frequent stops for fuel, water and maintenance it seemed like they would never arrive. As they drew near the junction at Manassas they could hear the booming rumble of artillery and the muffled, far off crackling of musketry fire. On the horizon, great clouds of smoke and dust boiled over the treetops marking the fierce battle being fought below.
Their journey really began several weeks before when they left the training grounds in Richmond, where President Davis himself had come out to review them. They boarded cars north to Manassas Junction and then Piedmont station, marching the final 18 miles to Winchester. They were joining General Joseph E. Johnston's army of the Shenandoah and were brigaded under General Bernard Bee. Lt. Willie P. Mangum of company B recalled:
"We all suffered much from fatigue and want of food and the bad weather. But soldiers must become accustomed to privations."
This would be the beginning of four years of privations for many of the men. Others would not live beyond this battle.
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| General Pierre Gustave Toutant-Beauregard |
On the evening of July 18th General Joseph E. Johnston had personally spoken to the regiment, telling them they were going to Manassas to help General Beauregard, who was under attack by the Yankees. The enthusiastic and untested young men responded with a loud and lusty cheer. They were soon on the march, retracing their steps of a few days before, back to Piedmont station. Amanda Virginia Edwards watched the dusty columns passing by Belle Grove near Paris, Virginia.
"Our dear, worn, fatigued soldiers. O! What is it that we wouldn't do for them. Regiment after Regiment pass by... "Dixie" is the national and favorite air. Many are singing, laughing and chatting in perfectly good spirits, just ready and willing for a fight. You never suppose that an idea of getting killed ever entered their heads. Poor creatures-- how many will march to their graves. Some are dear little boys between fifteen and sixteen years old and others are grey headed."
Now that they had finally arrived, their help was desperately needed. It was about sunrise when they finally got off the trains. They marched four miles, toward the Lewis house and the sounds of the battle already under way. Captain York wrote to the North Carolina Standard after the battle that the terrible cannonading "nerved every arm, brightened every eye and quickened every step." The regiment had been without food and had little sleep for over thirty hours. When a spring was reached the companies were filed left and allowed to fill their canteens. Twenty three year old Levi and many of his tired comrades sunk down in the cool shadows of the surrounding grove and promptly fell asleep while their pards replenished their canteens. One account indicates that they were halted and "drilled in the manual" for an hour, before continuing their march to the battlefield. Most accounts place their time of arrival on the battlefield at about 2:00 P.M. Colonel Fisher pushed on ahead going to the Lewis house to meet General Johnston and receive his orders. The tired men of the Sixth were ordered to "load" and then fell out under cover of a hill behind the line of Confederate guns near the Lewis house, "Portici", being used by Johnston as his headquarters. Many of them promptly fell asleep on their loaded arms, even with the sound of the battle exploding all around them. Missiles whizzed through the trees above their heads, sending limbs and leaves fluttering into their midst. Deprived of sleep for three days, the men barely moved.
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| The Lewis House Portici (LOC LC-DIG-ppmsca-20479.jpg) |
Suddenly a "slug" from a rifled cannon came tumbling into the ranks parting Captain Craig's G company. Another struck Colonel Fisher's Horse, slightly injuring it. Wounded Confederates began appearing from the battlefield, staggering toward the rear. The eager young lads of the Sixth regiment were seeing the bloody result of the fighting, their first glimpse of war, real war. This was no longer a fanciful, storybook daydream. They were no longer chivalrous knights in long plumbed hats. Men were dying this day. Lieutenant (later Captain) Ray, from Company D, recalled seeing wounded men coming through the ranks and wrote
"some of our men were so unsoldierly as to envy those who had escaped with only such slight wounds as would give them a furlough"
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| Colonel Fisher |
Colonel Fisher ordered the gawking boys into line, knowing he might lose control of his frightened green troops if he didn't act quickly. What happened next, while not precisely clear, was reported on by dozens of eyewitnesses in letters, newspapers and memoirs.
Lieutenant (later Captain) B. F. White, of company F, recalled
"Lieutenant-Colonel Lightfoot requested Major R. F. Webb to ask, for him, the privilege of putting the regiment in line of battle, as Colonel Fisher had not drilled the regiment and was incompetent to do it, and further that Colonel Fisher and himself were not on good terms"
Colonel Fisher refused this request and ordered the regiment forward, hurrying toward the threatened left of the Confederate line.
After a mid-day lull in the battle, McDowell had ordered Rickett's battery to the top of Henry hill where they quickly became engaged in an "exceedingly hot" dual with the Washington Artillery and other Confederate batteries, firmly planted on the opposite crest. General Thomas J. Jackson, about to earn his nickname, "Stonewall", was calmly moving fresh troops of infantry into position behind the booming artillery.
On the left of the Federal line, Griffin's Battery limbered up its two howitzers and galloped furiously behind Rickett's guns to "a less exposed" position. Reaching the Sudley road he turned left , went down the road a short distance and then abruptly turned left again, reentering the field looking down the flank of the Confederate Guns.
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| Griffin's Battery at Manassas Battlefield (Photo by Frederick Walton) |
Nearby, the 33rd Virginia watched in amazement as the Federal gunners unlimbered and boldly set about their deadly business, seemingly unconcerned that the blue clad Confederates were massing nearby. Mistaking the Virginians for their artillery support, the gunners allowed them to advance to within 40 yards before the battery fell victim to a devastating volley.
The 14th Brooklyn, known as the red-legged devils because of the baggy red Zouave pants they wore, rushed forward through the retreating artillerymen and unleashed a volley into the 33rd Virginia, crumbling their line and retaking Griffin's Battery. Supported by Minnesota troops, the Zouaves continued their advance pouring volleys into the crippled flank of the Confederate left. This put the Confederate line in a precarious position.
The Sixth North Carolina was close by, still moving toward the left. They had gone down a hill, passing through some woods, before emerging into an old sedge field. They crossed a small stream, halting for a short time. Heading toward a point to the rear of where Colonel Bartow fell earlier. A mounted Confederate warned Fisher not to go in that direction to avoid being cut up by Yankee Cavalry. Fisher turned the Regiment abruptly left, crossed an old worm fence and passed through a thick Pine wood in the rear of the fourth Alabama, 2nd Mississippi & 2 companies of the 11th Miss. An old farm road could be seen disappearing into the woods. Fisher turned right, again heading toward the left of the Confederate line. Following the road, keeping a thick copse of wood to his left, they emerged from the pines beyond the Mississippi troops.
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| Remains of the Old farm Road at Manassas Battlefield Park (Photo by Frederick Walton) |
When the right of the 6th North Carolina State Troops got opposite the left of the Mississippi Regiment , Captain White recalled
"I heard distinctly one of our field officers call to Colonel Fisher, "Colonel, turn the head of your regiment this way" To this Colonel Fisher paid no attention whatever, but passed on into an angle formed by the Yankees in the Sudley road and the New York Zouaves marching to turn our left flank."
When the left of the third company, company F, commanded by 1st Lt. Robert N. Carter came opposite of the Mississippi Regiment, one of the field officers yelled halt. Carter repeated the commanded and added "Right Face". Colonel Fisher was a short distance away and "called out sharply, "Who in the hell gave that command? I am the Colonel of this Regiment; follow me."" Carter corrected the command by saying "left face, Forward, March". Since no other company had halted, Co. F followed the two lead companies. "Lightfoot Remarked, "did any body ever see the like."
With a sickening thud an unsuspecting soldier was thrown violently backward into his filemates before falling to the ground, shot in the head. The sound of a volley from an angle to their left echoed away, passing mostly harmlessly over the heads of the surprised men. Before they could react a second and third volley came in lower and found their marks. Captain York reported many of his injured men as being shot in the thigh. Lt. Colonel Lightfoot was slightly wounded and according to Captain White,
"headed toward the rear calling out "Boys, take care of yourselves"".
Nearby, Captain Issac E. Avery's Company E had been halted directly in front of what they all believed to be Sherman's battery, only sixty yards away. Staring down the twin dark throats of shiny brass howitzers, Captain Avery had no time to wait for orders. Taking control of his company, he ordered his men to fire. His anxious men and others near them fired suddenly into the battery. A Thunderous volley killed most of the cannoneers as well as their horses.
A Federal officer, thinking they were a Federal battery support, galloped up, waving his hat and calling "For Gods sake stop; you are firing on your friends". Discovering his almost fatal mistake too late, he attempted to ride off but reeled and fell as he passed the left of the adjacent Mississippi Regiment and was captured. He was Colonel Orlando B. Willcox, 1st Michigan who afterwards became a Major-General. General Clingman from North Carolina recalled that Colonel Liddell of the 11th Miss. got his horse "and rode him for many a day".
Another section of the Sixth had focused their fire on the unseen riflemen to their left that were firing into their flank. Witnesses latter speculated that this may have been the 4th Alabama. As the smoke of the unordered volley drifted over the carnage around the battery, seven of Fisher's companies ran forward firing at will. Three other companies who were not clear of the woods didn't get into the fight, although their ranks were raked with small arms fire. Witnessing this desperate charge, General Clingman later recalled that
"The men ran down upon them and finished the survivors with their muskets and bowie knifes."
The wide battle line became a confused mob as the flank companies focused on the battery in the center and began a pursuit of the retreating Yankees. The momentum of the charge carried the line beyond the disabled battery toward the Sudley Road , Where it was subjected to a heavy fire from Yankees stationed in the road and New York Zouaves, in bright red trousers, on the left.
In the confusing melee, the Sixth was taking fire from all directions, Officers were desperately shouting for the men to stop "firing on your friends". Men fell dead and wounded across the crest of the hill. Exposed to a raking crossfire Fisher had no other choice but to order his men to retreat, which Captain York recalled was done "with some disorder".
On the far right of the line, in a grove of trees, Lt. Mangum was leading his men forward when he fell stunned. A bullet had hit the bible in his breast pocket that his sister had presented him when he departed. Saving him from instant death, the bullet glanced off "inflicting a severe, but not dangerous flesh wound". Poor medical treatment caused complications and several weeks later he died as the result of his wounds.
(Today a marker commemorates where he fell).
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| Lt. William Preston Mangum, 6th North Carolina State Troops |
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| Marker on Manassas Battlefield (Photo By Frederick Walton) |
Captain Avery recalled seeing Colonel Fisher fall as he was rallying his men according to a report by General Clingman:
"Captain Issac Avery stated to me that while he was sitting for a moment on one of the captured pieces, he saw Colonel Fisher, who had moved forward to reconnoitre seemingly, but was waving his rifle above his head triumphantly. "
"having passed over the battery, [Fisher] received a ball in the brain and fell dead about thirty yards in the rear of the battery they had taken."
A witness reported his last words to be "fire on the battery". He fell, shot through the head by a single bullet. After the battle there was much controversy over where the projectile originated. In the confusion of the charge, some believe it may have come from Confederates. Avery believed it came from a Massachusetts regiment wearing gray that was posted near the Sudley road. Fishers death was lamented throughout the south as that of a brave and noble patriot. The young Rowan county farm boy, Levi Festerman, wrote to his family:
"We had a hard time here last Sunday... Our Colonel was too brave and rushed in too strong. The Colonel hollowed hurrah Rowan boys and kept rallying them up. It is a wonder we wasn't all killed the way we was led into it. The Colonel must have been excited the way he went on, but the poor fellow lost his life by the operation."
Making their way to the relatively safe fringe of pine, where they launched their original attack, the surviving officers of the 6th North Carolina State Troops attempted to restore order to the tangled and confused knot of soldiers. As a fragile line formed, Captain Avery looked across the hillside scattered with dead and wounded comrades and noticed old glory still floating over the disabled battery. Determined to claim the battery, he ordered another charge and his men went forward into the whirlwind of bullets surrounding the guns. Moving quickly, his men drove off the remaining defenders and once again took the disputed battery. Perhaps not realizing the success of this charge, and hidden by the smoke of the battlefield, an eyewitness reported the Sixth North Carolina being fired on by Mississippi and South Carolina Brigades as well as the Federals in their front.
Pressured to once again leave this murderous position, The gallant Sixth was compelled to abandon the hard won guns. Guns that could have devastated the fragile Confederate line. Guns that were never fired again that day as a result of the North Carolinian's charge.
It can not be disputed that this charge was a turning point in the battle. Had Griffin's battery gotten established in this position, it would have enfiladed the Confederate line, forcing them off Henry hill as they had been pushed off of Mathews hill during the morning battle.
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| "Stonewall" Jackson may have never earner his moniker if the 6th North Carolina State Troops had not stopped Griffin's Battery from Flanking him and his Virginians. |
Captain Ricketts, who was captured, told Colonel Waightsill Avery (Captain I. E. Avery's brother) That "the position of Fisher's Regiment was such that he supposed them to be a support for his battery". He recalled that all his men were killed or wounded by the Sixth and had he a minutes time longer he might have swept the whole head of the column down.
As Fishers men blunted the effects of Griffin's Battery, the entire Confederate line began moving forward, pushing the remaining Federals off of Henry hill and turning what might have been a disaster for the young Confederate cause into a rout. Fishers men had done their duty well, but as they reorganized their lines in the shadows of the pines, other southern troops had moved forward, and again "captured" the disabled battery, littered with the bodies of Yankee cannoneers, North Carolinians of the Sixth regiment and dead horses still in their harnesses, holding the caissons fast to that position.
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Members of the 6th North Carolina State Troops reenactors at
the 140th anniversary of the battle of 1st Manassas in 2001 |
The Surviving members of the Sixth North Carolina State Troops moved forward in the wake of the attacking Confederate line, driving the demoralized Yankees before them, down the sloops of Henry hill, through the fields bordering the Bull Run and finally across the stone bridge toward Centerville. As the shadows grew longer, the exhausted men gave up the chase and spent the night sleeping on the vast battlefield. Hopelessly mixed up with other Confederate troops that only hours before may have been inadvertently firing on them as they surrounded the captured battery.
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| Captain B. F. White |
Captain White recalled that when the Sixth finally halted for the night and roll call was taken only 125 men were present. The fast moving battle had scattered the rest. They drifted back to camp from advanced positions on the battlefield removing the concern that the regiment had been wiped out. In the end 25 men from the Sixth were killed and double that number were wounded. Private Festerman survived the battle only to be slightly wounded a week later when a gun accidentally discharged in camp. (Levi would fight with the Sixth for two more years before being wounded at Gettysburg and captured on South Mountain.)
Colonel Charles Frederick Fisher, a gallant leader with a promising future, was cut down by a single minie ball. Many of the field officers, including Avery and Lightfoot were also wounded. The Sixth North Carolina had fought valiantly in their first battle.
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Colonel Fisher Fell about where the Flag pole stands at the Manassas Battlefield Visitor Center
(photo by Frederick Walton) |
The following week as newspapers across the south celebrated the great victory, a dispute arose about "who captured Sherman's battery" the accomplished and feared 'regular army' cannoneers. Various regiments claimed the honor as their own. Much newsprint was dedicated to the debate. General Clingman implored General Johnston to set the record straight, but Johnston slyly avoided the controversy by claiming he could only share what was submitted to him by his subordinates. At this time he was more concerned with his own place in history as he struggled to publicize his leadership role which both General Beauregard and President Davis were anxious to claim as well.
Regrettably Colonel Fisher did not live to write the account of the glorious charge and claim for the Sixth North Carolina the credit they deserved. Lt. Colonel Lightfoot, for reasons not recorded for historians, refused to submit a report. General Clingman, trying to defend North Carolina's honor many years later wrote:
"Lt. Colonel Lightfoot "with the two rear companies, was by some means separated from the balance of the regiment ." The officers stated that while under his immediate command, as the regiment was marching forward into battle, they were separated from the other eight companies. Lightfoot, in their presence, for it was a general conversation, complained very much of Colonel Fisher because he carried the regiment into action by the flank" He refused to submit a report, not having been in the battle himself."
Lightfoot was an unpopular officer and was not appointed to colonel of the Sixth Regiment after Fisher's death.
Quartermaster, Lieutenant Nathaniel E. Scales, recalled in his memoirs :
"The lieutenant colonel, Charles E. Lightfoot, would naturally have been made colonel, but although a most excellent drill officer, very popular, after the battle made many unkind remarks about Colonel Fisher, laying all the blame upon him for the loss of his own life and the men on the right.
We officers resented this and some 12 or 15 of us met one evening in my tent to talk it over. We wrote to the governor of North Carolina [Governor Henry Toole Clark], who made the appointments in the state troop regiments, and asked him to give us a North Carolina man for colonel."
Colonel Pender, A North Carolinian and Already the Colonel of the 13th North Carolina Regiment was appointed as the New Colonel Of the Sixth North Carolina State Troops. Lightfoot was a strict disciplinarian and in the days after the battle, the men of the Sixth struggled with a new enemy- sickness and disease, shortages of food and clothing, poor living conditions and low moral. Lightfoot ignored the hardships being faced instead renewing his military school notions on the men who were increasingly losing their respect for the drill master.
Colonel Pender despaired over the sickness and low moral writing:
"I never saw such long faces as when I came here. Together with sickness and misdirected discipline one never heard a good laugh of an attempt at song"
Realizing the hatred Lightfoot was breeding, Colonel Pender reprimanded him for his pompous attitude, further alienating his second in command.
Less than a year later Lieutenant Colonel Lightfoot transferred to the 22nd North Carolina Infantry Regiment Volunteers to become its colonel.
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| Captain Robert F. Webb |
On July 22,1861 Captain Robert F. Webb, commanding the Flat River Guards, company B wrote to Hon. W. P. Magnum, Lt. Magnum's father, informing him of his sons wounding. his closing lines clarified what the his son and the 6th regiment had accomplished:
