APRIL 1862 – APRIL 1865

THREE YEARS IN THE LIFE OF

W. T. BRYANT

CONFEDERATE SOLDIER

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By

John A. Bryant

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Edited By

Brenda Bryant

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Instantpublisher.com Collierville, TN

2006

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Cover: “The Battle of Vicksburg” Illustration Courtesy Son of the South, www.sonofthesouth.net

Copyright © 2006 by John A. Bryant

All rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without written permission from the author. Extracts from Public Domain publications, previously copyrighted, are annotated in the text with original author/publisher. Southern Cross of Honor letterhead herein is a Registered ® Trademark of the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

ISBN 1-59872-483-5

Printed in the United States of America

by

Instantpublisher.com

Collierville, TN.

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In memory of our brother J.W. who generated this interest in our great-grandfather.

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W. T. (WILLIAM THOMAS) BRYANT

MAY 13, 1846 – APRIL 13, 1929

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ContentContentContentContent

Special Thanks 9

A tribute: “The Confederate Soldier” 11

Introduction 17

I 1862 – The Beginning of W.T.’s Adventure 21

II The Fight at Tazewell 33

III The Kentucky Campaign 37

IV The Battle of Chickasaw Bayou 51

V The Battle of Port Gibson 55

VI The Battle of Champion’s Hill/Baker’s Creek 57

and Big Black River Bridge

VII Vicksburg 63

VIII Parole and Exchange 71

IX Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge 79

X Change of Command and Wintering Over 91

at Dalton

XI Atlanta Campaign–The Hundred Days Battle 95

Rocky Face Ridge

Resaca

Cassville

New Hope Church

Big Shanty

Kennesaw Mountain

Buckhead and Peachtree Creek

Atlanta – The Siege

Jonesboro

XII Nashville Campaign 113

Decatur, Alabama

Columbia

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Franklin

Nashville

XIII Retreat to Tupelo 125

XIV The Carolina Campaign 131

Orangeburg, South Carolina

Kinston – W.T. Wounded

Bentonville – The Beginning of the End

XV Surrender and Farewell 141

BGen Pettus’ Farewell Address 145

The Southern Cross of the Legion of Honor 147

Resolution

W.T. Bryant – Southern Cross of Honor 151

Certification

Epilogue – General John Brown Gordon, CSA 153

Acknowledgements 155

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Special ThanksSpecial ThanksSpecial ThanksSpecial Thanks

Mr. Rex Miller for providing me with a copy of

his book “Hundley’s Ragged Volunteers: a Day-

by-Day Account of the 31st Alabama Infantry

Regiment, CSA (1861-1865).” This book greatly

helped me to organize and validate the piles of

notes and articles I had collected.

The United Daughters of the Confederacy: First

of all for their work in recognizing the

Confederate Veterans for their service so many

years ago, and for maintaining records of that

recognition. Secondly, for researching and

providing me with a copy of my great-grand

father’s “Southern Cross of Honor Certification”,

and thirdly, to the UDC President General, for

giving me permission to use the "Southern Cross

of Honor Resolution."

University of North Carolina Library: For

providing me with information and direction in

finding Colonel Hundley’s book “Prison Echoes of

the Great Rebellion.”

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“The Confederate Soldier”“The Confederate Soldier”“The Confederate Soldier”“The Confederate Soldier”

The stirring scenes and the dreadful

carnage of a memorable conflict have been

removed by the lapse of time into the hazy past,

and a new generation, however ready it may be

to honor those who fought the battles of the

South, is likely to form its idea of their

appearance from the conventional military type.

The Confederate soldier was not an ordinary

soldier, either in appearance or character. With

your permission I will undertake to draw a

portrait of him as he really appeared in the hard

service of privation and danger.

A face browned by exposure and heavily

bearded, or for some weeks unshaven, begrimed

with dust and sweat, and marked here and there

by the darker stains of powder - a face whose

stolid and even melancholy composure is easily

broken into ripples of good humor or quickly

flushed in the fervor and abandon of the charge;

a frame tough and sinewy, and trained by

hardship to surprising powers of endurance; a

form, the shapeliness of which is hidden by its

encumberments, suggesting in its careless and

unaffected pose a languorous indisposition to

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exertion, yet a latent, lion-like strength and a

terrible energy of action when aroused. Around

the upper part of the face is a fringe of unkempt

hair and above this an old wool hat, worn and

weather-beaten, the flaccid brim of which falls

limp upon the shoulders behind, and is folded

back in front against the elongated and

crumpled crown. Over a soiled shirt, which is

unbuttoned and buttonless at the collar, is a

ragged grey jacket that does not reach to the

hips, with sleeves some inches too short. Below

this, trousers of a nondescript color, without

form and almost void, are held in place by a

leather belt, to which is attached the cartridge

box that rests behind the right hip, and the

bayonet scabbard which dangles on the left. Just

above the ankles each trouser leg is tied closely

to the limb - a la Zouave - and beneath, reaches

of dirty socks disappear in a pair of badly used

and curiously contorted shoes. Between the

jacket and the waistband of the trousers, or the

supporting belt, there appears a puffy display of

cotton shirt, which works out further with every

hitch made by Johnny in his effort to keep his

pantaloons in place. Across his body from his

left shoulder there is a roll of threadbare

blanket, the ends tied together resting on or

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falling below the right hip. This blanket is

Johnny's bed. Whenever he arises he takes up

his bed and walks. Within this roll is a shirt, his

only extra article of clothing. In action the

blanket roll is thrown further back, and the

cartridge is drawn forward, frequently in front of

the body. From the right shoulder, across the

body pass two straps, one cloth the other

leather, making a cross with blanket roll on

breast and back. These straps support

respectively a greasy cloth haversack and a

flannel-covered canteen, captured from the

Yankees. Attached to the haversack strap is a tin

cup, while in addition to some odds and ends of

camp trumpery, there hangs over his back a

frying pan, an invaluable utensil with which the

soldier would be loath to part.

With his trusty gun in hand - an Enfield

rifle, also captured from the enemy and

substituted for the old flint-lock musket or the

shotgun with which he was originally armed -

Johnny Reb, thus imperfectly sketched, stands in

his shreds and patches a marvelous ensemble -

picturesque, grotesque, unique, the model

citizen soldier, the military hero of the

nineteenth century. There is none of the tinsel

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or trappings of the professional about him. From

an esthetic military point of view he must appear

a sorry looking soldier. But Johnny is not one of

your dress parade soldiers. He doesn't care a

copper whether anybody likes his looks or not.

He is the most independent soldier that ever

belonged to an organized army. He has respect

for authority, and he cheerfully submits to

discipline, because he sees the necessity of

organization to affect the best results, but he

maintains his individual autonomy, as it were,

and never surrenders his sense of personal pride

and responsibility. He is thoroughly tractable, if

properly officered, and is always ready to obey

necessary orders, but he is quick to resent any

official incivility, and is a high private who feels,

and is, every inch as good as a general. He may

appear ludicrous enough on a display occasion

of the holiday pomp and splendor of war, but

place him where duty calls, in the imminent

deadly breach or the perilous charge, and none

in all the armies of the earth can claim a higher

rank or prouder record. He may be outré and ill-

fashioned in dress, but he has sublimated his

poverty and rags. The worn and faded grey

jacket, glorified by valor and stained with the life

blood of its wearer, becomes, in its immortality

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of association, a more splendid vestment than

mail of medieval knight or the rarest robe of

royalty. That old, weather-beaten slouch hat,

seen as the ages will see it, with its halo of fire,

through the smoke of battle, is a kinglier

covering than a crown. Half clad, half armed,

often half fed, without money and without price,

the Confederate soldier fought against the

resources of the world. When at last his flag was

furled and his arms were grounded in defeat, the

cause for which he had struggled was lost, but

he had won the faceless victory of soldiership.

“The Typical Confederate Soldier”, written by G.H. Baskett, Nashville, “The Typical Confederate Soldier”, written by G.H. Baskett, Nashville, “The Typical Confederate Soldier”, written by G.H. Baskett, Nashville, “The Typical Confederate Soldier”, written by G.H. Baskett, Nashville,

Tennessee. Published in Volume I, No. 12 of the Tennessee. Published in Volume I, No. 12 of the Tennessee. Published in Volume I, No. 12 of the Tennessee. Published in Volume I, No. 12 of the Confederate VeteranConfederate VeteranConfederate VeteranConfederate Veteran, , , ,

Dec. 1893.Dec. 1893.Dec. 1893.Dec. 1893.

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IIIIntroductionntroductionntroductionntroduction

As a young boy growing up on a farm in

Walker County, Alabama, on occasion, I heard

daddy talk about his “pap”. He said that pap

fought in the “War Between the States”. Well, we

learned that pap to daddy was our great-

grandfather. We knew our grandfather Bryant,

but our great-grandfather had died long before

any of us had come along. When papa Bryant

died, daddy got a picture of an old man with a

beard and a Bible on his knee, which from that

time on, hung on the bedroom wall. I thought

daddy was talking about the old man in the

picture when he referred to “pap” and it was just

left at that. It’s not that we didn’t believe him; I

guess we just were not interested in those “old”

things.

Sometime 30 years or more ago, our

oldest brother J. W. became interested in our

ancestors, and particularly our great-

grandfather. Probably intrigued by the fact that

he supposedly fought in the “War Between the

States”, J. W., knowing where our grandfather

had lived in Albertville and Arab, Alabama,

started asking about the family. I think daddy

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showed him where our great-grandfather was

buried between Heflin and Arbacoochee. After

daddy died in 1982, J. W. found a great uncle

and several cousins who gave him some

information and told him about various members

buried in the old cemetery behind New Harmony

Church. In it was our great-grandfather’s

headstone, marked “Co. D, 31st Alabama

Infantry, CSA”. There is a Southern Cross of

Honor carved in the headstone. He was also able

to photograph a picture of our great-grandfather

W. T., with the Southern Cross of Honor on his

lapel. This obviously sparked the desire to learn

more. J. W. went to the Department of Archives

and History in Montgomery, where he was able

to locate five transcript pages of our great-

grandfather’s service record with Company D,

31st Alabama Infantry, Confederate States Army.

One day, some years later while J. W. and I

were visiting a Confederate Cemetery and

Museum on the site of a Confederate Soldiers’

Home near Marbury, north of Prattville, we saw a

part of a Southern Cross of Honor. This spurred

our interest, so we proceeded to the Department

of Archives and History and began searching.

We found several things of interest, but nothing

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connecting our great-grandfather with anything.

Several years have past just wondering and

having very little information about our great-

grandfather. I now have the picture of the “old

man with the beard” hanging on a bedroom wall

along with a copy of the picture that J.W. took.

Looking very similar, I just thought this picture

and the one J.W. took were the same person at

different ages, probably because they both had a

beard. I was just recently told that the picture of

the old man with the Bible on his knee is actually

our great-great-grandfather Jason. As I now

remember, I heard mama mention Jason on

occasion, but it just did not register at the time.

After what I considered a close comparison with

the picture J.W. took of our great-grandfather

W. T. and this one, at first I thought it could

possibly be Jason. After studying this close

family resemblance, and given the approximately

thirty years age difference between the two

pictures and other facts, I am convinced that this

is in fact W.T., not Jason. It’s good to now get

the “old man” in the proper place in the family

and to know what daddy’s “pap” looks like.

With much more information available and

much better methods available for research, I

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decided to piece together the life of W. T. Bryant,

Confederate Soldier.

This account is in no way intended to delve

into the politics of the war, the command

abilities or failures of military leaders, nor who

should have or should not have done the things

they did. The intent is to track the adventures

and experiences of a teenage boy who became a

man the hard way.

John A. Bryant, son of John W. Bryant

son of John E. Bryant

son of W. T. Bryant