The Battle of Perryville and my Great Grandfather John Huber, with photos of the Perryville reinactments Plus Artiles on other battles

John Huber At Perryville

Nothing could Have Prepared This Civil War Private For Scenes Of Death At Kentucky’s Most Famous Battlefield

By James Joseph Huber – 2001
Revised 2005 and Reprinted from Kentucky Explorer Magazine

I have always been intrigued with the part that my great grandpa John Huber, played in the Battle of Perryville, as a member of Stones’ Artillery unit.  Having served with the 138 Field Artillery myself, which traces its lineage to Great-Grandpa John’s unit.  I know the experiences of serving in an artillery unit.  I stood at the same spot at Perryville where he stood and imagined what it was like being on top of that hill with the Confederates charging up towards him.
I know I can never fully comprehend what he went through, but I do want to record for my children, grandchildren, and his descendents the part he played in the battle that day.
John Huber and his comrades were unsung heroes.  Colonel Starkweather’s unit, of which he was a part, stopped the Confederate advance, when other units has failed, and helped save Kentucky for the Union at Perryville.  Historical author, James Lee McDonough, states, “ If anybody may be said to have saved the Union Army at Perryville, it is Starkweather’s command.”
John was born in 1841 in Switzerland.  He, with his brothers, left their homeland to seek a new life in America.  John could not have envisioned, when leaving Switzerland, that he would be involved in one of the most dramatic chapters in the history of our country.  At the age of 21, he fought and was wounded while defending his adopted country.
A butcher by trade, blood was part of his everyday surroundings, but nothing could have prepared him for scenes he would witness on the battlefield at Perryville.
President Lincoln, on April 15, 1861, called for 75,000 troops for the war effort, after the surrender of Fort Sumter, South Carolina.  The Governor of Kentucky, who was pro-Confederate, refused to raise troops in Kentucky.  But Lovell H. Rousseau, who was pro-Union, started to recruit men for a home guard to protect Louisville from attack.  The result of this was the famous Louisville Legion.
Rousseau received permission form President Lincoln to form a volunteer Union force.  In response to this, Huber joined the Third Kentucky volunteer Infantry, later to be renamed the Fifth Kentucky volunteer Infantry, on June 2nd or 3rd in Louisville.
No camps were allowed on Kentucky soil, as officially, Kentucky was still a neutral state.  This being the case, Rousseau, who had been made a colonel by President Lincoln, took six companies of the Louisville Legion, John’s Fifth Infantry included to Indiana.  They arrived on Monday morning, July 1, 1861, at what was to become Camp Joe Holt.
David C Stones’ Company A, First Regiment, Kentucky Artillery Volunteers, was formed out of the men of the Louisville Legion, with John Huber joining the battery on July 4, 1861, and remaining with this unit until he was wounded on October 8, 1862, at Perryville.
On the night of September 17th, a dramatic night march took John’s unit out of Camp Joe Holt.  The unit was never to return to the camp.  The order came to Rousseau to occupy Muldraugh Hill (which today forms a portion of the Marion-Taylor County Line), because armed band of Confederates had been operating as far north as the Hill and Nolin’s Creek. They were recruiting men, commandeering horses, and had taken away supplies.
The march to Muldraugh hill took place at night in secret.  Most everyone had retired for the night, as a river of steel flowed up Market Street with the tips of the long line of bayonets glinting in the moonlight.  Lovell Rousseau, who rode at the front of the column, had ordered that no unnecessary noise be made.  The only sound was the thump of feet on bricks and low mummers of command.
What pride and apprehension Great-Grandpa John must have felt as he marched off to face the unknown; the same apprehension that other troops must have felt throughout history.
The column passed by the Patterson home, where Mrs. Patterson; her daughter, Mrs. Ed J. Mitchell; and several other ladies stood under the shadow of the porch.  The ladies had been kind to the troops, and as they waved their handkerchiefs, hushed goodbyes were said by the soldiers.
The troops went by ferry, landing at the foot of Second Street in Louisville.  The brigade then marched on to the L&N Depot and arrive the next day to occupy Muldraugh Hill.
Newly-recruited men from Indiana and Illinois units relieved John’s unit of duty at Muldraugh hill.  He left with the Army of Ohio for southern Kentucky and on into Tennessee.  He stayed in Tennessee till word came that Confederate leaders Braxton Bragg and Kirby Smith were in Kentucky, hoping to tip the balance of power in the state to the Confederate cause.  General Buell, when hearing of this, marched the Army of Ohio across Kentucky, arriving in Louisville to counter the Confederate challenge.
In September 1862, Kentucky was in turmoil, Confederate forces, under the command of Kirby Smith, captured Frankfort, and the Confederate Army of the Mississippi under the command of Braxton Bragg, neared Louisville.
The state legislature was pro-Union, while the governor was pro-Confederate.  The citizens of Louisville were in panic.  Many crossed the Ohio into Indiana with their valuables and belongings.
John Huber, with the Army of Ohio, marched out of Louisville with trepidation born of the atmosphere prevailing in the city.  He was leaving his beloved Hestor, whom he had married in Louisville only a few years before.
Also marching out of Louisville was his brother-in-law, John William Sutton, who had joined the Fifth Kentucky Infantry, along with Enos Sutton who had sighed as a witness to the marriage of John and Hestor.  Enos missed the Battle of Perryville, along with John William, as the Fifth Infantry did not become involved in the battle.

John Sutton survived his service in Kentucky, but was killed a few months later on December 31, 1862, at the battle of Stone River, near Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
The march out of Louisville, took Huber to Perryville for a day he would never forget.  Huber, who was fondly known as “Hubee” by his friends in Company A, saw many of his company killed or wounded at Perryville, having shared more than a year with them through the rigors of training, followed by service in Bowling Green, Kentucky; Nashville, Tennessee; the march to Savannah, Tennessee; and the siege of Corinth, Mississippi.  He remembered their last hours together with a heavy heart.  He survived, but many did not.

The Confederates hoped to take Kentucky and recruit within, with plans to further advance into the North’s heartland.  The Confederates divided their armies; Kirby Smith located forces in Central Kentucky, expecting to raise an army of Kentuckians loyal to the South.  Confederate General Bragg, hearing of reinforcements in Louisville, marched his troops toward Bardstown.

Great-Grandpa John, who was part of General Alex McCook’s I corps, with about 13,000 men, came from Louisville, marching down Taylorsville road.  Before Great-Grandpa John reached the battlefield he was faced with a confrontation that reflected the confusion in Kentucky during those trying times.  When his unit was in Taylorsville, two black slaves ran frantically into camp to escape their owners. The camp’s normal routine was completely disrupted when the two slave owners brandishing long whips pursued the runaway slaves into camp.  Sergeant John Henry Otto of the 21st Wisconsin ordered the owners to leave. The slave owners started to curse the Federals, calling them names with no understanding of the deep resentment some Northern troops had at the sight of the two men with whips, chasing their so called property.  The cursing just further inflamed some members of the 24th Illinois and the 21st Wisconsin, who were appalled at the potential beating and degradation of the black slaves and stated throwing corncobs at the owners. 
            Sergeant Otto was concerned if things went any further the Federals would lynch the slave owners.  He then told the owners to take the slaves and go.  General Lowell Rousseau appeared on the scene, after being alerted by an orderly and ordered the 21st Wisconsin to stack arms.  He then ordered the 79th Pennsylvania to stand, load and face the Illinois troops standing between the Illinois troops and their weapons.  Rousseau then ordered Captain Stones’ Battery, of which Grandpa John was a part, to station them selves to the rear of the Illinois troops.  It was a tense stand off, with Rousseau demanding the men obey orders.  Five men stepped forward and admitted harassing the slave owners.  The men said they would obey but would have no part in slave catching and the confrontation was quickly defused. 
Kentucky was a border state and had not withdrawn from the Union, but was a slave owning state and in fact had more slave per capita then all but one southern state.  President Lincoln had just finalized the Emancipation Proclamation, but it was not to take effect till January 1, 1863.  Although slave owning may have been reprehensible to many of the Federal troops, the Kentucky slave owners were within the law.  What Grandpa John thought at this moment, we will never know but no soldier wants to be drawn into a confrontation with his comrades in arms.   The troops later join together in a party that night and this provided a method for the men to let off steam and to heal the tension.

David Stones’ Battery A was late arriving at Perryville, due to the posting of the unit to guard wagons and supplies in the rear.  Once relieved of guarding supplies, the unit was placed on Starkweather’s Hill to the right of Bush’s Battery.
One of the main problems facing both armies was the lack of water.  In 1862 Kentucky was in a major drought.  John Huber experienced what most never do; a thirst causing your body to cry out for water under a blistering sun, the heat of battle, and exhaustion that followed.
Accounts of the battle tell of men wiping green scrum off stagnate pools to obtain water.  Men were so desperate for water they resorted to drinking out of standing pools, into which hogs had laid.  Some of the first shots fired at Perryville were at Doctor’s creek, with both armies looking for water.
John’s first taste of battle was at 1:30 p.m., when his battery fired on Confederate Colonel John Wharton’s Cavalry Brigade, which was leading an assault at Walker’s Bend of the Chaplin River.  Accounts tell of the cannon fire dispersing the cavalry in short order.  General Terrill, 33rd Brigade Commander, and General James Jackson advance on the river; claiming, in Terrill’s words, “That’s my water!”
Huber stood on top of Starkweather’s Hill, as he witnessed the battles taking place on Peter’s Hill.  The Confederate Ninth Tennessee and Maney’s Brigade wee behind a fence line at the bottom of Peter’s Hill.  On top, Union Lieutenant
Charles Parsons had an eight-cannon battery.  The attack began at 2:00 p.m.
The 136 men of Parson’s Battery where infantrymen pressed into duty with the artillery.  Parson’s men had little or no training or experience and were faced with battle-hardened Confederates, under Maney, attacking.  Although suffering many causalities, Maney’s Brigade was able to take the hill, with the inexperienced Union artillerymen running away, leaving their guns.
Between 2:20 and 2:50 p.m.; on the other side of the hill, battle again raged with the Confederates attacking other inexperienced Union troops.  The ranks of the Union line were in chaos, and the line collapsed with the survivors fleeing west.
Battle continued in the cornfield.  At approximately 3:00 p.m. General Terrill’s Union brigrade was in disarray and was fleeing up the side of the hill past the cornfield.  The 21st Wisconsin and Starkweather’s Brigade were lying in ambush in the cornfield, when the Confederates pushed through.
The Wisconsin men stood up and fired; however the Confederates continued to advance, and indiscriminate fire was coming from Union forces on the hill behind.  Faced with fire from all sides, the 21st Wisconsin fell back behind the hill, to their rear, in complete disarray.
John Huber was on top of Starkweather’s Hill and was in full view of the action below, where his battery had fired onto the cornfield in support.  The confederates were flush with victory.  They had beaten the Union forces on Peter’s Hill, pushed back the units at her bottom right of the hill, and now were in control of the cornfield.
The Union forces were inexperienced, and when retreating, had done so as individuals with no organization.  The only thing now between the Confederate forces and the Union’s supplies and ammunition was a ragtag band of men from units that had fallen apart in the earlier fighting, and Colonel Starkweather’s Units.
Huber’s commander, Colonel John C. Starkweather, managed to place his troops at Benton Road.  Stones’ Kentucky Battery A poured a destructive fir down upon Maney’s advancing line.  By coordinating with the artillery on top of the hill.  Starkweather managed to halt the Confederate advance.
Confederate forces, after fierce fighting up Peter’s Hill, which continued down to Benton Road, desperately needed rest.  Some were momentarily too exhausted to continue the battle up Starkweather’s Hill.  But Maney’s four Tennessee regiments, the cream of the Confederate forces, were a different matter.
The union had 12 cannons on top of Starkweather’s Hill, with Huber’s unit of company A included.  The Confederates were faced with a different foe on this hilltop, for included in Starkweather’s command were Kentucky volunteers; veterans fighting on their own soil, with Great-grandpa Huber being one.
Other of Starkweather’s troops were well-trained and disciplined.  As the Confederates advance up the hill, John’s battery fired round after round at the advancing troops, till artillery could no longer lower their guns to confront the Confederates.  The Confederates eventually fought their way up the hill, ending with hand-to-hand combat and capturing the guns.
The victory was short-lived as Union troops recaptured the hill.  A first-hand account describes the scene at the top of the hill:
“We moved up the hill and nestled close in under the guns.  Many of the artillerists had been killed, and the ground was slippery with blood; many a poor, dark-looking power-begrimed artilleryman lying stretched out upon the ground around us; torn and mutilated, their countenance plainly indicating the awful manner of their death.”
John Huber survived the attack, but lay wounded with many of this battery either dead or injured.  He was hit with a minie ball in the upper left leg.  A minie ball is a hollow bullet, which expands on impact.  Fired from a 58-caliber Springfield musket, it could cause tremendous damage.  When Grandpa John was felled by the projectile, it not only wounded him, but also broke his leg.
John’s unit, after the Union forces retook the hill assisted in forcing the fifth Tennessee into retreat.  Both Bush’s and Stones’ batteries were delivering round after round into the Confederates below and against their artillery positions on the next range of hills.  A number of artillerymen, as well as many horses in both units, now had been killed.
The final assault by the Confederates on the hill failed.  Colonel Starkweather quickly withdrew to the hilltop directly behind to keep the Confederates from flanking his forces.  Of the original 12 guns on the hilltop, only six survived to be pulled back.  The Union line had held.
When both sides disengaged, John Huber lay wounded on a portion of the battlefield that neither side controlled.  He may not have made it till morning, if not for a black man who brought John water and comfort.
Another wounded soldier from Hotchkiss’ Second Minnesota Battery, who like Huber, was wounded and had been left behind, found himself between the opposing lines and related the following:
“the moon came up in great splendor, and men could be distinguished for half a mile and presented a real panorama of a battlefield; which, once witnessed, could never be forgotten.  The cries for help; for water; the curses and prayers of the wounded as they sat up or reclined upon their arms in the beautiful moonlight, when all nature seemed hushed again to rest, after the strife and carnage of the day; presented a picture that no painter’s brush could reproduce.”
Evening came, and John Huber lay bathed in the light of almost a full moon, as be became part of the surreal landscape.  The deafening roar of cannon fire and the ear-splitting yells of charging troops had given way to the eerie silence of the dead, the feeble movements and forlorn cries of the wounded.  Lanterns, moving across the field looking for wounded, appeared like fireflies in the night.
All night long ambulances made rounds to the field, picking up the wounded survivors.  Most homes within ten miles served as treatment centers for the wounded.  All accounts tell of the same type scenes: floors slippery with gore and doctors working frantically treating the wounded.  Because of the type of bullet being used by both sides, if a soldier was hit in the arm of leg, the impact was so severe that amputation, many times, was the only solution. Amputated arms and legs were piled four and five feet high.  Cries of anguish could be heard coming from the men.
No one knows exactly how long Great-Grandpa Huber lay on the battlefield enduring the pain, the thirst, and the shock of what he had witnessed.  What terrible memories of that night he would have to live with!
John suffered with his wounded leg for days after the battle was over.  Amputation followed, while still in the area of the battlefield.  His leg had to be amputated, because the wound had developed gangrene from blood not getting to the injured area.
If a soldier survived the battle wound, gangrene, which was a common problem could prove fatal.  With no antibiotics available at the time of the Civil War, the bacteria would spread quickly, leaving no choice but to amputate.  John was treated in a private home, which had been converted to a hospital.
What had he witnessed that day?  We can only guess.  One survivor of the battle, Charles W. Carr, 24th Illinois Volunteer Infantry, said “You cannot imagine the horror of war.  No pen nor tongue can begin to tell the misery that I have seen.”
Great-Grandpa Huber was paid less than 50 cents for his part in the battle that day.  That was the pay for a private in the Union Army.
He experienced many loses during his early years.  He never saw his brothers again after the war.  He had frown close to Hestor’s family, with Enos Sutton a witness at his wedding and Samuel late signing for his disability.  Two of his brothers-in-law had joined the Fifth Kentucky Volunteer Infantry.
After the war he not only missed his own brothers, but lost his two brothers-in-law.  One was killed at the Battle of Stone River, the other at Dallas, Georgia.
Huber used a wooden leg after the amputation.  Two of his children died at an early age; Lewis Henry, at age two; and Dolly Lavenia, at 11.
Great-Grandma Hestor, needless to say, had to deal with the same difficulties.  What tears she must have wept, when she learned of her husband’s wounds.
No more than two months late, she face John W. Sutton’s death at Stone River, and later the news that Theaton Sutton was killed at Dallas.  How sad she must have been when the news of Theaton’s death, but also for the young widow he left behind.
Did Theaton’s widow, Clara, and “Hettie” (as those close to her called her) console each other?  I would suspect so, as both shared their losses.
John went on with his life, starting several businesses and raising a family.  He had ten children, but that’s another story.