OhioatPerryville

Seemingly a study on any unit being reported as having cowardly conduct could be an interesting topic. The 71st Ohio's story of flight has been fairly well proven to be an exaggeration, and seemingly there is some evidence that the 13th Ohio Battery suffered from an unfair account from Hurlbut as other reports I mention in the two blog posts allude to. I do not know enough of Hurlbut to surmise if he warrants a pass or fail grade.

After my first post about the 13th Ohio Battery, I came across a few more sources and hence have done a follow up post: More on the Unlucky 13th at Shiloh!

Thank you for sharing that letter. It is true that the good battery commander might have been stretching to fit a narrative, but it also helps to confirm for me that the 13th was more likely placed in a bad spot.

I am with you, Sean. A poorly suited position, taken under fire immediately, a direct hit on a caisson within moments of moving into position...all these seem to add up to a bad situation more than one of cowardice. Most likely Robertson exaggerated, as most were prone to do, but when you take his comments in context of other comments of the 13th, Hurlbut excepted, then the picture seems again to be one of circumstances.

Thanks, Ozzy, for the elaboration! It was Hurlbut's staff officer that insisted on the deployment location of the battery, so not certain if Hurlbut had input to that decision filtered through his staff officer or not. I have come across a few more articles for a Part II.

Now appearing on the Western Theater in the Civil War website/blog: https://www.westerntheatercivilwar.com/post/the-unlucky-13th-at-shiloh

Not sure if anyone knows, but as Shiloh is an NPS site, does the tour guide have to been "sanctioned" or approved by the park before leading paid tours there? I ask for my own personal interest, which means leading tours at other NPS sites, and having to jump through more hoops just to get approval to lead tours at Wild Cat Mountain (a Forestry Service site), I wonder if the hoops dance has to be performed at places like Shiloh.

We all wound up getting a tick or two, but the Deep Woods Off pretty much took care of most and we only had to flick a couple away.

A small blog post today about my first trip to Shiloh. Shamed of myself that I had never been to this iconic and bucolic location previously! Shiloh!

I am sure they do exist...most likely with LBL. I am working on another project at the moment, but after that has been completed I might dig into these old trails.

I got this from the Park Service about the old Fort Henry interpretive trail: About the discarded signage on the Fort Henry trails, this was a Land Between the Lakes, 1970 interpretive systems that had audio stations along the trail. Unfortunately, it too shared the fate of the fort proper, with annual floods. Any current interpretive signs were installed by the US Forest Service, however, they were donated from our park to celebrate the Civil War Sesquicentennial.

Thanks, all. I am definitely interested mostly in the US Regulars at Donelson, but any tidbit that helps fill in the story is helpful and much appreciated!

Does anyone have any info on the two U.S. Regular cavalry companies that were at Donelson? They only receive a mention in the order of battle in Tim Smith's book, no mention of them at all in Starr's cavalry trilogy, and Bradley's book on the U.S. Regulars in the west covers only infantry. Any info (commanders, unit strengths, after action reports, etc.) would be appreciated. I do not own the O.R. for the Henry-Donelson campaign, and I doubt if they receive any mention in the O.R. being that there were only two companies (according to the Blue & Gray 2011 issue).

It is a picture of one of the plastic replicas from the Upper Battery, and in this case is supposed to be a 32-pounder. I agree, must be more like a carronade than a gun, as the 32 pounders in the River Battery were much longer in barrel length, being guns.

If you ever come up with anything, I would love to know more. Appears to me a great chance for LBL to recreate the trail, which in turn would mean more visitation, which in turn would mean more dollars spent potentially within LBL and the surrounding area.