History of the 1st Vermont Cavalry Volunteers in the War of the Great Rebellion by Elliott W. Hoffman. 355 pp., hc, Index

History of the First Vermont Cavalry Volunteers in the War of the Great Rebellion

By Elliott W. Hoffman

After ten months in the Department of Washington, losing and winning skirmishes with partisan guerrilla John S. Mosby, the Vermonters became part of Elon Farnswothís First Brigade of Judson Kilpatrickís Third Cavalry Division and served with that unit throughout the Gettysburg Campaign. Farnsworth died at the head of Wellsís battalion on the afternoon of the third day of the battle while making a headlong charge on Confederate infantry that was ordered by Kilpatrick. Gettysburg became the bloodiest day of the war for the 1st Vermont Cavalry. As organized throughout 1863, the Vermonters employed two battalions of light cavalry carrying a mixture of Colt and Remington revolvers, sabres, and a few men armed with Sharps carbines. The Third Battalion was the dragoon battalion as all of the men carried carbines, but this battalion was detached at the headquarters of the Sixth Corps from October 1863 to April 1864 (Company M remained as Second Corps escort until September 1864). In a letter home on December 10, 1863, Major William Wells, then in command of the two battalions with the regiment, wrote ìAm trying to army my regiment with Spencer 9 [7] Shooting carbines. They can be reloaded as quick as a one shooter carbine ëSharps.í I have in the commd only about 50 Carbines & it is not at all pleasant to Picket with pistols against Infantry with Rifles.

After the close of the Gettysburg Campaign, the regiment joined George A. Custerís Michigan cavalry brigade and fought with the Wolverines until the following spring. The Vermonters had been trained to fight as light cavalry, to fight on horseback with pistols and sabres, rather than to dismount and operate as dragoons or mounted infantry. As such, the men of the regiment idolized Custer and his mounted tactics. In April 1864, when Kirkpatrick was transferred to Shermanís army, the Vermonters were the only regiment to march to his headquarters as a body to bid him goodbye, a tribute to a man they and others called ìKilcavalry.î

Transferred back to the Second Brigade, then under George Chapman, the 1st Vermon fought throughout the spring and summer as mounted infantry under the despised Chapman and overrated division commander James Harrison Wilson. Perhaps the highest point in the campaign was when Custer called upon Addison Preston to attack alongside the Michigan regiments at Yellow Tavern in the advance that killed J. E. B. Stuart, leaving a disgusted George Chapman in the rear complaining to Phil Sheridan about Custerís unwarranted interference with his brigade. The lowest point had to be the near destruction of the regiment (and the potential destruction of all Third Division regiments) during Wilsonís Raid upon the railroads in the rear of Petersburg in late June and early July. However, the 1st Vermont was one of just two of Wilsonís regiments to maintain their organization throughout those two weeks.

All the enlisted men carried carbines after the spring of 1864, mostly Sharps with a few Spencers. Men returning from the remount camp at Giesboro brought back Burnside carbines, so that the regiment needed three types of carbine ammunition in combat. Ide reports that he was able to fully issue Spencers to his company in February 1865 and then only because a fellow company commander ordered twice as many Spencers as he had men and Ide pounced on the overage.

The Vermonterís fought in the Shenandoah Valley from August 1864 to March 1865, inflicting great losses upon the Confederate forces at the Opequan, during the burning of the Valley, and at Cedar Creek. At Cedar Creek on October 19, 1864 the regiment set a record that may still stand for a United States Army regiment when, in a single charge, they captured twenty-four guns when Jubal Earlyís army collapsed. Altogether the regiment captured twenty-nine cannon from the Confederates throughout the war, which may be the greatest number of any federal regiment during the war. Ide lists the damage that the Vermonters inflicted on the Confederate military and infrastructure; it is quite possible that the regiment inflicted more damage on the Confederacy than any other Federal regiment.

From September 19, 1864 to Appomattox, Wellsís brigade claims to have inflicted more damage to the Confederacy than any other brigade in the Cavalry Corps and this claim, if correct, is higher than any other brigade in the armies of the Shenandoah, the James, and the Potomac, as well as outstripping claims from Shermanís troops.

After performing well at Five Forks and Namozine Church, it was only fitting that the 1st Vermont Cavalry formed the point of Custerís Third Division at Appomattox and had broken into a trot aimed at Confederate supply trains when the white flag went up. Colonel Josiah Hall, the regimentís last commander, had great difficulty in restraining the lead elements of his regiment from crushing the train guard and capturing the wagons.

The 1st Vermont Cavalry returned with the Corps to Washinington and was the first regiment of Grantís forces to pass in review at the Grand Review on May 23, 1865.

The dismounted regiment reached Vermont in June for muster-out, but a sizable detachment remained on guard duty along the Canadian border until August 9, 1865, when the last of the men received their discharges.

In 1889 William F. Fox in his Regimental Losses in the American Civil War tabulated the number of the regimentís killed in action and died of wounds at 134, a loss that stands the unit at number five in combat losses of all cavalry regiments in the Union army behind the 1st Maine and the 1st, 5th and 6th Michigan cavalry regiments. By using more sources than those available to Fox, I have determined that losses probably were 136 and might have been 141. I list those killed in action by engagements and their burial locations in Appendix One. I have found that although my casualty totals and those of Fox agree, Fox recorded many errors regarding which battles the casualties actually occurred.