Iowa Heritage Illustrated

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the first fire of the enemy before we reach their works 
and capture them at the point of a bayonet. . . yet in 
doing it our company of not over seventy men incurs 
a loss of twenty-six killed and wounded... . When 
the earth-works are gained and the enemy is in full 
retreat to second line of entrenchments, our balls fall 
thick and fast and do great execution."
—John T. Bell
"My duty [as lieutenant was] to cheer and encour­
age the men. . . .  1 was utterly unconscious of danger, 
and although the dead and dying were dropping at 
my feet, I felt no emotion nor sorrow—there was a 
strange, unaccountable lack of feeling with me that 
followed me through the entire action."
—John Quincy Adams Campbell
"You had no time to anticipate or think—you were 
killed or you were safe, and it was over."
—Unidentified soldier
"We were now within fifteen miles of Lexington, and 
were enabled to hear with startling distinctness the 
incessant war of the conflict, and during every instant 
from the morning of Wednesday till 2 o'clock of the 
morning of Thursday, there seemed to be a tremen­
dous thunder-storm playing on the verge of the hori­
zon. At a house where I stopped for a glass of water, 
the next day, a lady informed me that her daughter, 
on Wednesday, had counted before dark some three 
hundred and eighty distinct explosions."
—Franc Wilkie, Iowa war correspondent
"The Site of the battle was grand but Awful. . .  a per­
son looking on would think that ardly a Man could 
Escape in such a storm of shot and shell there was 
over 100 cannon just booming all the time."
—Edward Rolfe
"My musket became so dirty with the cartridge 
powder, that in loading it the ramrod stuck fast and 
I could neither get it up nor down, so 1 put a cap on, 
elevated the gun and fired it off. But now I had no 
ramrod, and throwing down my musket, I picked 
up a Belgian rifle lying at the side of a dead rebel, 
unstrapped the cartridge box from his body, and 
advanced to our company, taking my place with the
boys. While in this position I witnessed a wonderful 
sight—thickly-flying musket balls. I have never seen 
hail falling thicker than the minie balls were flying in 
the air above us, though too high to do any harm. Our 
ammunition soon ran out and the entire regiment was 
ordered to the rear to replenish our cartridge boxes."
—Alexander G. Downing
"Three columns . . . advanced on the forts . . . bend­
ing their heads against the awful storm of grape and 
canister from all our cannon. A perfect blaze of close 
range musketry, too, mowed them down like grass. 
Even a foe could feel pity to see brave men so cruelly 
slaughtered."
—Samuel H. M. Byers
"The 'zip' of the rifle balls have a particular stinging 
sound, and the shriek of bursting shells causes one 
to dodge instinctively . . . each soldier is impressed 
with the belief that he will not be struck.. . .  A feeling 
of intense hatred of the enemy possesses him as the 
charge is made and he sees his comrades falling about 
him, and he is carried away with a wild desire to kill 
and slay in turn. For the moment those opposing him 
are not human beings, but devils and demons whom 
it is his duty to slaughter without mercy."
—John T. Bell
"[I] have heard the booming cannon, bursting shell, 
whistling ball, the incessant deep sounding roll of 
musketry, each separately, and again all combined in 
one indescribably commingling, deafening sound, the 
falling branches, crashing trees. Around me the dead, 
the dying, the wounded, the cowards leaving the 
ranks, flying past me, seeking safety, officers and men 
cheering each other on. The dead on the field after the 
battle, digging of graves, the pursuit of a fleeing army, 
road filled with wagons broken and burning, tents, 
blankets, baggage of every description."
—Seneca Thrall
"Death had come in all imaginable shapes, in one 
case six of our men having been killed by a cannon 
ball which passed through the center of a solid oak 
tree eighteen inches in diameter, behind which they 
had taken shelter in a line."
—John T. Bell
Spring 2014 15
"Some of the wounds were horrible; some had the 
lower jaw shot away, others had arms torn off, oth­
ers came in with legs dangling over the sides of the 
wagon, all thirsty, and calling almost incessantly for 
water. A flag of truce went out soon after to bring in 
the wounded and bury the dead, and up to a late
hour the work still went on."
—Franc Wilkie, Iowa war correspondent
"I got behind our second battle line, found some of 
the Co. & we was set to gathering up wounded rebs.
. . .  I picked up a gun but it wasent the same kind 
as what I left up in front but I traded with the first 
wounded reb I come to. He was a middle age man 
wounded bad through the hips & would nead two 
men & a stretcher. His gun, an Enfield rifle, lay near 
by. I told him would like to trade guns with him. He 
said 'take them both. I donnot think 1 will have use 
for a gun anny more.' I have often wondered what 
became of that man/'
— Van Whipple Sargent
"At one point I met a tall confederate coming up the 
road with one leg hanging helpless and using two 
old muskets for crutches. The thigh of his left leg had 
been shattered by an exploded shell, and after receiv­
ing directions as to where he could find a surgeon 
he moved off, the noise of the broken ends of the 
bones distinctly heard as they were thrown past each 
other by the swinging limb, refusing all aid from the 
stretcher-bearers."
—John Quincy Adams Campbell
"We sent in a flag of truce to bring off dead this 
afternoon. Found 97 on the field, mostly stripped 
of their shoes & pants. Also 3 men who had lain out
2 days and night still alive & stripped to the skin."
—Alonzo Abernethy
"Several wounded were found, who had lain there for 
four days and nights, one, wounded in the arm and 
shoulder, had waited upon the others who could not 
move; had got a little water and food from the can­
teens and haversacks of dead men laying near."
—Seneca B. Thrall
"After dark, our regt was sent out to the right front. 
Should think near whare our first line was. We was 
cautioned to keep quiet & in our places but could lay 
down. I was awakned some time in the night & we 
silently went back the way we come. Every thing 
was quiet except ocasionaly a groan & cryes from 
wounded men left on the field."
—Van Whipple Sargent
16 Iowa Heritage Illustrated
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bulance crew practices a drill. For much of the war, civilian team-  
rove ambulances, and com m on soldiers and young musicians were  
d to move the wounded to field and regimental hospitals. Inventors 
*ged to develop vehicles that did not jostle and jolt the wounded. The  
ion of trained ambulance corps with non-combatant medics was one  
ial result of the war.
Spring 2014 17
An ambulance crew practices a drill. For much of the war, civilian te a m ­
sters drove ambulances, and com m on soldiers and young musicians were  
assigned to move the wounded to field and regimental hospitals. Inventors 
were urged to develop vehicles that did not jostle and jolt the wounded. The 
innovation of trained ambulance corps with non-combatant medics was one  
beneficial result of the war.
m
| . . Spring 2014 17

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English

Awakening to Battle

Swaim, Ginalie

Death
DEATH SWIRLED through American pM
society during the Civil War. The word i n
haunted letters and diaries. Names of J
the dead clogged newspaper columns. /
Corpses littered battlefields. «rHVflHI
"Saw many of the enemies dead 
lying around not more than half cov- - pp
ered. The ground in many places was 
white as snow with creeping worms/' 
wrote Iowa soldier Cyrus Boyd. On another day he 
wrote, "This evening 1 went over North to see the Reb­
el grave yard where lie buried 2500 Confederate sol­
diers. . . . They have been buried in trenches and laid 
one above another and some places are seven deep.''
Though death was familiar terrain to 19th-century 
Americans, the Civil War was a cataclysm, marking 
"the first time in American history in which large num­
bers of young men died (mangled and torn) far from 
their homes," writes historian Mark Schantz.
The country, writes historian Drew Gilpin Faust, 
was a "republic of suffering." The enormity of death 
forced Americans to "embark on a new relationship
with death," she says. "It violated prevailing assump­
tions about life's proper end—about who should die, 
when and where, and under what circumstances."
"Dying well" and the "good death" had long been 
ideals of American culture, Faust explains, in which 
one died at home, surrounded by family. Dying well 
implied a worthy life, an acceptance of death, and a 
final reconciliation with God. The last words of the dy­
ing were precious insights and lessons for the living. 
Preparing and burying the body were rituals of respect 
and dignity, as were adhering to mourning customs 
and prescribed periods of grief.
Contrast this ideal with a soldier's death far from
Top: “Here’s a health to the next one that dies,” by field artist Alfred Waud. Above: Union soldiers prepare to bury comrades.
28 Iowa Heritage Illustrated
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home, surrounded by carnage and agony rather than 
family. Fellow soldiers, doctors, chaplains, and nurses 
wrote letters to the bereaved family describing how "a 
calm repose" had come over the dying soldier, how 
his final moments revealed a worthy, patriotic man of 
courage and honor who had willingly sacrificed his life 
for the cause. Enclosing something tangible—a lock of 
hair, a diary, even a bullet—memorialized his sacrifice 
and gave the family a cherished keepsake. Perhaps this 
was as close to the ideal of the good death as Ameri­
cans could now hope for.
Hasty, haphazard burials denied the soldier a de­
cent burial, and the family, closure. "Burial was, of 
necessity, performed by fatigue parties from 
the line and little or no provision could be 
made for any systematic interment of re­
mains during a campaign or rapid move­
ment," remarks Therese Sammartino, an 
expert on national cemeteries. Iowan Marvin 
Varner wrote, "It Seems to be very trobelsom 
to get the Dead Deacently Intered as fast as 
they die. Several are dieing Every day."
Iowan Philip Goode described how 
"the Secesh buried at the corner of our tent 
is beginning to emit a very disagreeable 
odor. We had some more dirt thrown on 
him today. I suppose he was not put more 
than a foot under ground. That is the way 
the boys buried them. Our own men they 
put a little deeper and stick up a board to 
mark the spot."
Henry Clay McArthur wrote: "Saw where 33 rebs 
were burried in and . . .  where 24 of our men were hur­
ried the secesh feet were sticking out another place the 
men dug up two sculls of rebs ones brain was not dried 
up yet."
Families who wanted the remains shipped home 
could sometimes purchase air-tight coffins and India- 
rubber body bags, which were advertised in newspa­
pers, and hire itinerant embalmers, who traveled from 
one battlefield or field hospital to another. Iowa soldier 
Martin Varner noted in his diary, "After considerabel 
trobel we suceeded in obtaining a metallick line cof­
fin in which we placed the Body of William Warrick 
and Exprest it to Albia in care of Mrs. Wm. Warrick his 
companion."
Hundreds of thousands of war dead were never 
shipped home but were buried near troop concentra­
tions, hospitals, and sites of conflict. Proper identifica­
tion of bodies and record keeping, especially after a 
battle, were monumental tasks, and often impossible. 
Soldiers were not issued identification tags, although
they could buy their own. In any case, as Faust reminds 
us, cannon fire mostly "obliterated" men.
The national cemetery system began in 1862. Com­
manding generals were assigned to designate land for 
burials, with "headboards to the graves bearing num­
bers, and when practicable, the names of the persons 
buried in them." Part of the city cemetery in Keokuk, 
Iowa, was allotted for soldiers' graves. The town was 
a staging area for troops and the site of army hospitals.
According to Sammartino, in Keokuk and dozens 
of other sites, "burial grounds that first presented an 
unsightly appearance of bare mounded graves" with 
wooden grave markers were transformed into na­
LIBRARY OF C O N G R ESS
The national cemetery at the site of Andersonville prison in Georgia.
tional cemeteries similar to "stately parks, adorned 
with shrubs, trees, graveled paths, and driveways and 
vistas of shaded greensward carpeting the mounded 
graves."
These national cemeteries, "where men of varied 
backgrounds and means were memorialized side by 
side, with uniform markers," says one historian, "set 
these areas very much apart from secular cemeteries 
of the day." Creation of these new sacred spaces was a 
"striking act of democracy."
—by Ginalie Swann
NOTE ON SOURCES
Sources include Drew Gilpin Faust, “The Civil War Soldier and the Art 
of Dying ."Journal of Southern History 67 (Feb. 2001), and This Republic of 
Suffering: Death and the American Civil War,‘"A Pretty Hard Business': The 
Civil War Diary of Philip H. Goode,” transcribed by Edward W. Vollertsen, 
Palimpsest (Summer 1991 );ThereseT. Sammartino,"Civil War Era National 
Cemeteries," National Register of Historic Places Multiple Property 
Documentation Form, U.S. Dept, of the Interior. National Park Service, 
1994; James M. Schmidt." 'A Multiplicity of Ingenious Articles': Civil War 
Medicine and Scientific American Magazine." in Yeors of Change and Suffering; 
and Dorothy Denneen Volo and James M.Volo, Daily Life in Civil War America.
Spring 2014 29


Death

Huff, Kristina

Historical treasures from our collections
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A s t r o n o m i c a l  D I A R Y ,
d  0R' AN
A L M A N A C K
( r  ^or ttlc Ynr of our Lord CHRI9T, t
n . 1 7 4 3-
And from the Creation of the W orld 
according to the heft of prophane Hifioryi 5 ftp 3' 
And by theAccount of thctfoJyScrifturer, 5 ft 45 *
Being the third Year after ISifletttlC* 
Or, Leap YEAR,
And the Sixteenth Year of the Reign of oar 
rooft gracious Sovereign King G R 0  R  G E  II*
W herein is contained the Lunation*. Fclipfei of 
the Luminaries, Afpectr, Son & Moon‘> Urfing 
and Setting, Time of Hi?h W ater, Courti 
Spring 1 ides, Jodgraent of the W eather, fjc  f
’ Calculated for the Meridian of Boston to N bw- 
England, Lat. 42 Deg 25M in .North.
j By Nathanael Ames. '
, . fa fH á* » ¿ -----------------
G
REAT Nature’s watchful Eye, the Svv 
At GODT Commind aicendi the $klc\ 
Who comb'd hb beamy Locks with Gold 
Aid bid the wond'rons Planet rife, 
Around hnOrb in meafur’d dince 
T he circling Houn a*d Montis appear, 
The fwift wing'd Minutes lightly move,
And mirk the Periods of ihe rolling Year.
B O S T O N  in N  B W  + B b t G l  A  AT Z>:
Printed by Jo«* Draper, for the Bookfel’cn, 1743.
Pr.cThJ^it Pence Single] gTSiX Shillings per Dtsfn*
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A V I E W  of the 
Prcfcnt Seat o f  W A R, 
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Newark
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A G enera l H ' o f t m g t i n ’ i  L in e i on N c w -Y o rk  Ifland. 
B  F o rt at Powles H ook.
C  B u n k e r -H il l ,  near N e w -Y o rk .
D  T lie  Soond.
E  K ing '»  B ridge.
K  H ell G ate .
G  Fort  C o n fu ta t io n .
H  M o u n t  W a s h i n g t o n .'
1 G o v eru o i’i  »Aland.
A lm an acs  fro m  th e  18th cen ­
tu ry  re m in d  us o f o u r co lo ­
nial e ra . F ar left: T h e  cover 
o f th is a lm an ac  Is d a ted  “ th e  
S ix te e n th  Y ear o f th e  Reign o f 
o u r m o st gracious Sovereign  
King G EO R G E  II.”  T h e  n ext 
e x a m p le  shows a m ap  o f “ th e  
P resen t S ea t o f W a r ” and  
“ G e n e ra l W a s h in g to n ’s Lines 
on N e w -Y o rk  Island.”
S e lf-ru le  and nationhood  
can be tra c e d  in la te r  a lm a ­
nacs, w hich  listed locations  
and dates o f c ircu it courts , 
e lec tio n  re tu rn s , and nam es of 
office -ho lders .
A LOOK AT THE
American Almanac
By K ristina H uff
T
WO AND A HALF CENTURIES AGO, Nathaniel 
Ames sent a message on the last page of the 1758 
almanac he published in New England:
O! Ye unborn Inhabitants of America! Should this 
Page escape destin'd Conflagration at the Year's End, 
and these Alphabetical Letters remain legible, — when 
your Eyes behold the Sun after he has rolled the Sea­
sons round for two or three Centuries more, you will 
know that in Anno Domini 1758, we dream'd of your 
Times.
Ames was far removed in time and distance from 
the "unborn Inhabitants" who would make his vision of 
westward expansion and agricultural prosperity a reality. 
With visionary confidence, he imagined the possibilities 
of "that fertile Country to the West of the Appalachian 
Mountains . . .  all well provided with Rivers, a very fine 
wholesome Air, a rich Soil, capable of producing Food
and Physick, and all Things necessary for the Convenien- 
cy and Delight of Life: In fine, the Garden of the World!"
Ames and his son were perhaps the most successful 
developers of almanacs in the 18th century. Historian Jill 
Lapore estimates that "in the middle of the eighteenth 
century, about fifty thousand almanacs were printed in 
the colonies every year." Decade after decade, printers 
produced a smorgasboard of reasonably priced alma­
nacs sized for portability. These handy little booklets 
were kept close at hand—in log cabins in New England, 
later in wagons headed to Indiana, and still later in farm­
houses in Iowa. A few of Ames's 18th-century almanacs 
are among the dozens of almanacs in the State Historical 
Society of Iowa collections.
An almanac was a practical reference tool for the year, 
with detailed calendars, weather predictions, tide tables, 
astronomical charts, and more. Once the year was over, 
these particular features had outlived their usefulness. 
Despite this, almanacs were often kept into the following
90 Iowa Heritage Illustrated
t
years. An almanac, a Bible, and perhaps one or two devo­
tional books constituted many families' entire libraries. 
These texts became crucial tools for teaching children to 
read. And when paper was scarce, the worn pages of out­
dated almanacs were probably used for notes, messages, 
food wrappings, toilet paper, and kindling "destin'd [for] 
Conflagration at the Year's End," as Ames had feared.
Of the hundreds of American almanacs published, 
two series have proven especially memorable. One of 
these is Poor Richard's Almanac, published by Benjamin 
Franklin under the pseudonym Richard Saunders. Al­
though many almanacs offered advice on how to conduct 
one's life, Poor Richard's Almanac is particularly remem­
bered for advice on how to become "healthy, wealthy, and 
wise." Franklin specifically identified "industry and fru­
gality" as the cornerstone of Poor Richard's lessons.
Franklin's almanacs offered not only instruction in 
virtuous conduct, but also the foundations of a lifetime 
of literacy. As an older man looking back, he recalled the 
gratifying sales figures of his almanacs (nearly 10,000 
each year, according to his estimates) and their laudable 
educational and moral mission. Proudly, he explained, 
"Observing that it was generally read, scarce any neigh­
borhood in the province being without it, I consider'd it 
as a proper vehicle for conveying instruction among the 
common people, who bought scarcely any other books."
The most enduring American almanac series is The 
Old Farmer's Almanac, which in its younger years was 
simply known as The Farmer's Almanac. First published by 
Robert B. Thomas for the year 1793, it became an Ameri-
W.L EXAM PLES P A G E S  9 0 - 9 3  S H SI (IOWA CITY)
THE TWELVE SIGNS OF T1IE ZOLIAC
o p  A r ie s ,  a  R a m .  H e a d .
I t  Gemini, 
The Twins. 
Arms.
Q  Leo,
A Lion. 
Heart.
Libra,
A Balance. 
Reins.
^Sagittarius
Archer.
Thighs.
Aquarius, 
A Butler. 
Legs.
<Q
i _ - J
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V&
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Taurus, 
A Bull. 
Neck.
@ Cancer, 
A Crab. 
Breast.
UP Virgo, 
A Virgin 
Bowels.
Scorpio 
A .Scorpion 
Loins.
^  Capricorn, 
A Goat. 
Knees.
)-( Pisces, Fishc3. Feet.
T h e  “ Z o d iac  M a n ” o r  “ M an  o f Signs“ was a typ ica l fe a tu re  
in alm anacs fro m  co lon ia l days to  th e  la te  19th cen tu ry . A s ­
tronom y, how ever, had as s ign ificant a presence as astrology. 
D ates w ere  given fo r solstices and eclipses, m o rn in g  and eve­
ning stars, and phases o f th e  m o o n .
can institution. Continuously in print, The Old Farmer's 
Almanac reportedly still uses the same weather-prediction 
formula developed by Thomas in the early years.
Almanac users (even George Washington was one) often scribbled brief phrases in the generous mar­gins to mark significant events like births and 
deaths or to record relevant information, like these early 
jottings: "The Ship at Germantown Launched September 
21, 1789." "Planted Potatoes Planted french Turnips and 
Corn." "April 6 Bought a cow of uncle." "Bees swarmed 
10th." "Finished Flay-ing July 23/1789." The pages of 
some surviving almanacs are marked with initials, dots, 
and tick marks in pencil or ink—obviously meaningful 
to the user but a mystery to us today. Next to the official 
weather predictions, users jotted down the actual weath­
er. In a 1762 almanac one user noted "a grater drought 
this summer than last. Many streams were dry."
Coincidentally, one almanac told readers that rain 
was likely for July 4,1876—and to "Expect Thunder."
The familiar features of almanacs made them trust­
ed guides, even in unfamiliar territory. For those whose 
concerns ranged beyond the boundaries of a family farm, 
almanacs provided information for travelers, such as the 
distance between towns and the location of inns.
Household and horticultural advice was abundant, 
such as tips for fattening fowl, constructing beehives, 
growing grapes, and destroying bedbugs. Recipes and 
remedies were common fare. To treat sores, bruises, and 
burns, The Northwestern Farmer Almanac (published in Des 
Moines in 1862), recommended "Half a pound of rosin, 
half a pound of lard, quarter of a pound of beeswax; sim­
mer all slowly together and strain through a thin cloth."
Because rural America was a major audience, alma­
nacs often celebrated the benefits of farm life and dis­
couraged young people from abandoning their lives of 
husbandry for the allure of city living. An 1864 almanac 
published in Dubuque argued that farmers enjoy lives of 
virtuous labor and good health, while city-dwelling mer­
chants become nervous and eventually die "miserably."
Poking gentle fun at the aphorisms that were typical 
in almanacs, this same almanac presents this lighthearted 
story: "A mother admonishing a son, a lad seven years of 
age, told him that he should never defer till to-morrow 
what he could do to-day. The little urchin replied, 'Then, 
mother, let's eat the rest of the plum-pudding to-night.'"
An almanac often billed itself as a miscellany of 
"entertaining" material, such as a paragraph on British 
coal production or the lifespan of various mammals. (We 
might call these facts trivia today—though we're still like­
ly to read them in spare moments.) Quotations by famous 
authors dotted the pages, as did verse and humor. In fact, 
almanacs seemed to provide something for everyone,
Summer 2014 91
v
from charts for calculating interest to recipes for stewed 
celery. And for the bored, an almanac offered diversion. "I 
know of nothing new up here," an Iowa soldier in a Civil 
War camp wrote to his wife. "Times are quiet and dull. I 
have finished the almanac you sent me."
P
ublishers often had select audiences in mind. Immi­
grants could find almanacs printed in their native 
languages. The name of a denomination, Methodist 
or Presbyterian, for example, might appear in an almanac 
title. The partisan American Banner newspaper appealed 
to supporters of the anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic Know 
Nothing Party with its publication of The Know Nothing 
Almanac, and True Americans' Annual for 1855.
Increasing amounts of self-promotion and adver­
tising characterized almanacs as early as the 1860s and 
well into the next century. Lee & Walker, a music pub­
lisher, distributed an almanac with the standard com­
ponents of calendar and weather predictions, but they 
were followed by pages and pages of sheet music titles 
available for purchase. Horticultural periodicals pub­
lished almanacs that were little more than promotional 
spin-offs, with a selection of reprinted engravings and 
short articles that their subscribers would have already 
seen.
Ads sometimes filled half of the yearly booklets. An 
1882 Iowa almanac titled The Washington County Press 
Annual included an avalanche of advertisements for a lo­
cal millinery, grocery, butcher shop, hotel, and windmill 
company, as well as a tombstone carver, jeweler, and pho­
tographer. Ads for crockery, farm implements, furniture, 
clothes wringers, and stoves were similar to those in the 
local newspapers. In fact, local newspapers often pub­
lished almanacs and distributed them for free.
Patent medicine companies produced almanacs that 
were almost entirely promotional. They did not shy away 
from making lavish claims about their products. Ayer's 
American Almanac assured readers that Ayer's Cherry 
Pectoral "is annually the means of saving great numbers 
of valuable lives." The Ladies Birthday Almanac was filled 
with ads and testimonials for patent medicines to treat 
all manner of female maladies. Promoting Volcanic Oil 
Liniment, Dr. ]. H. McLean's Family Almanac promised that 
"Rheumatism, Neuralgia and Nerve Pains will immedi­
ately yield to its MAGIC influence." The Swamp-Root Alma­
nac made similar claims for its products. Patent medicine 
companies distributed thousands of these promotional 
almanacs to local pharmacies, which, in turn, had their 
own ads printed on the back, and then gave the little 
books free to their customers.
Published from our colonial era into the 20th century,
the ubiquitous almanac pro­
vides a window into the lives, 
values, buying habits, and even 
senses of humor of generations 
of Americans. In 1758, publish­
er Nathaniel Ames wondered if 
his modest little booklet could 
possibly survive for "two or 
three Centuries more." We can 
assure him that that almanac, 
as well as dozens of others, 
did indeed survive—here at 
the State Historical Society of 
Iowa.
om IL lcohol
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lished in B u rlin g to n  in 1884 by th e  H aw k-E ye  S tee l B arb  Fence Co.
Kristina Huff earned a Ph.D. in 
English from the University of 
Delaware in 2012. Her disserta­
tion is titled "Printing Friendship 
and Buying Feeling: Exchange 
and Gift Books in the Antebel­
lum United States." She worked 
as a reference librarian for the 
State Historical Society of Iowa 
in Iowa City.
92 Iowa Heritage Illustrated
T H O M P S O N  M cCO SlX . P r e s i d e n t J O H N  A .  M e C O S H ,  S oc’y  stud T rt*a.v
Sol. Kettering, ' ,
Lisbon, Iowa.
DRUGS AND MEDICINES, '
PAIVTS, OUS. VJUUJSBES. PTfcSTCm. HAIR X.*l> T.»/TU 3RC5HES. ff&WK-EYE MAN
BOUNDARY, OSBORN AND AGENCY STREETS, BURLINGTON, IOWA
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and b la ta n t p ro m o tio n . C lo ckw is e  fro m  to p  le ft: a Lisbon  
drugstore  ad; an en g rav ing  o f a B u rlin g to n  fa c to ry ; an ad fo r  
a d ea le r fo r cookstoves; and a te s tim o n ia l fo r  hogs.
ONE THOUSAND
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PER WE EK!
Is th e  n u m b e r  we c a n  now p r o d u c e .  D e a le r s  
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SUFFOLK BOAR PRINCE.
Imported by Jackson, of Newark, fox Col. Sherwood, of Auburn, 
N. Y. Now the property of C. I>. Beut and F. Kimball, of Iowa 
City, Iowa. -----------  ‘ ! : ■' 1
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Des M oines, la
CHESTER WHITE
BEO
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Summer 2014 93


A Look at the American Almanac

J
METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
After War
by Ginalie Swaim
T
he soldier returning from war "was like a man 
lost in a dream," wrote midwestern author Ham­
lin Garland in a short story titled "The Return of 
a Private." "His wide, hungry eyes devoured the scene. 
The rough lawn, the little unpainted house, the field 
of clear yellow wheat behind it, down across which 
streamed the sun." Garland continued, "His farm was 
weedy and encumbered . . . his children needed cloth­
ing, the years were coming upon him, he was sick and 
emaciated."
Garland was nearly five when his father returned 
from the war. "All was not the same as before,'' Hamlin 
wrote decades later. "My father brought back from his 
two years' campaigning . . . the temper and habit of a 
soldier."
Readjusting to home was not simple for Civil War
60 loica Heritage Illustrated
veterans. A few lines from a popular poem spoke of 
their bewilderment:
As soon as they mustered us out
I lost the old vigor, and wandered about;
Somehow I'm a failure and scarcely know why.
Unable to labor, too weary to roam.
"The chasm created bv the Civil War was uncross-
J
able. It was not just the distance from the battlefield," 
writes historian Susan Matt. "It was the experience, the 
knowledge of death, suffering, misery, and reality, that 
might forever keep them from going back to what they 
had been and believed before the war."
As much as the returning soldier was a symbol of 
victory for the North, and of valor for the South, he was
inghouse, became a community leader, and served as 
sheriff and tax assessor. The postwar transition of Iowa 
soldier Jacob Gantz seemed to be the model.
For decades after the war, chronic health prob­
lems—heart disease, rheumatism, dysentery, and tu­
berculosis—plagued thousands of soldiers. "One of 
the most common sights in postbell uni America was 
that of severely wounded amputees moving painfully 
along the street," writes historian Mark Schantz. Pelvic 
wounds were also common. "Imagine a young man," 
writes historian Harry Herr, "facing life soiled in urine 
and in constant pain, lame from destroyed pelvic bones 
and nerves, and sexually impotent or mentally scarred 
by disfigured genitals. Many men survived their pelvic 
wounds, but sometimes at a terrible cost."
Physicians during and after the war pondered 
puzzling symptoms exhibited by some veterans: rest­
lessness, anger, agitation, nausea, fear, irritability, 
paranoia, despair, nightmares, and illusions. In later 
wars, these nervous disorders would be called shell 
shock, combat fatigue, post-traumatic stress disorder. 
As Judith Anderson comments, "What is clear from 
ancient and modern wars is that the combination of 
exhaustion, hunger, marching and fighting, all done at 
the mercy of the elements, is a recipe for psychiatric 
casualties." Younger men were especially susceptible.
Spring 2014 61
also a problem to society. "Prisons of the late 1860s 
swelled with demobilized veterans," writes Todd De- 
Pastino. "Memories of the terrors and thrill of combat, 
as well as the camaraderie of camp life, caused more 
than a few veterans to chafe against what one soldier 
called the 'monotonous quiet of home' and turn to a 
life of unfocused wandering." Some became itinerant 
laborers on the margins of society. Although they were 
needed for seasonal work like harvesting wheat, they 
were perceived as thieving tramps and told to move on 
when the harvest was over.
Veterans with war-related disabilities struggled 
to find jobs, even though a federal law in 1865 gave 
them preference for government jobs. In step with the 
U.S. economy's transition from rural to urban, some 
veterans who had been manual workers before the 
war shifted to clerical jobs. Historian Russell Johnson 
wonders whether a soldier's life prepared him for a 
postwar industrial job. Both were "dangerous, semi- 
or unskilled, physically exhausting, and accompanied 
by oppressive smoke and noise, [with] poor housing, 
overcrowding, poor sanitation, and epidemic disease."
While Americans were grateful for what soldiers 
had sacrificed in the war, too much assistance, they 
feared, would make veterans dependent. The ethos of 
the Gilded Age promised that those who seized oppor­
tunities in those changing times would be rewarded. 
But could every ordinary soldier make as successful a 
transition as Iowan Jacob Gantz apparently did? Gantz 
had lost an arm in the war, so he could no longer farm. 
He rented out his land and opened a livery and board­
housands of homeless veterans resided in state 
and national institutions. In Marshalltown, the 
Iowa Soldiers' Home opened in 1887. It provided
ABOUT THE
The Veteran in a New Field, oil painting by Winslow Homer 
( 1865). Homer, 25 when the war began, was an artist for 
Harpers Weekly during the war. He painted this in the 
months after the Confederates’ surrender. The Union 
veteran has cast aside his life as a soldier; his army canteen 
and jacket, barely discernible, are in the right foreground.
“The optimistic spirit of Homer’s painting only makes 
its darker undertones more moving,” according to a Na­
tional Endowment for the Humanities scholar. “ The ’new 
field’ of the title can’t mean this field of grain, which is ob­
viously mature and ready to harvest. It must refer instead 
to the change in the veteran’s occupation— which neces­
sarily calls to mind his previous activity on the battlefield. 
Because some of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War 
had been fought in wheat fields, fields of grain, in popular 
consciousness, were associated with fields of fallen sol­
diers. One particularly disturbing photograph of soldiers
PAINTING
who had died in battle at Gettysburg was published with 
the title ‘A Harvest of Death.’
“ In keeping with those undertones, Homer’s veteran 
handles a single-bladed scythe. By 1865, that simple farm­
ing implement was already out of date; a farmer would 
have used the more efficient cradle to mow a field that
size__ [Homer depicted] a more archaic tool, and gave a
picture of a farmer in his field an unsettling reference to 
the work of the grim reaper, the age-old personification 
of death.
“ The Veteran in a New Field refers both to the desola­
tion caused by the war and the country’s hope for the 
future. It summons up the conflicting emotions that took 
hold of America— relief that the war was over, and grief 
for the many lives that had been lost.”
—from Picturing America, National Endowment for the Humanities
picturingamerica.neh.gov. Lesson 9a in “Galler/’


After the War

Vogt, Michael

Civil War Weapons and Tactics

A Living Statue of Liberty at Camp Dodge

Holmgren, David

SH Si (D ES MOINES)
Henry Clay Dean
An Iowa Copperhead Lashes Out
by David Holmgren
H
e was called Dirty Shirt Dean, the Great Un­
washed, a raving maniac, a "nasty, dirty, greasy, 
pettifogging, locofoco Methodist preacher," 
and a depraved wretch. He was characterized as a 
demagogue, Southern sympathizer, scamp, scalawag, 
blackguard, slanderer, and, the ultimate, a traitor.
Henry Clay Dean knew how to respond in kind. He 
repeatedly denounced the beliefs and activities of anti­
slavery men such as Benjamin Wade, Salmon P. Chase, 
John Brown, and William Lloyd Garrison as wicked. He 
compared Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to a monster, 
Thaddeus Stevens and Horace Greeley to Robespierre. 
He called Secretary of State William Seward a "prince of 
liars and cunning demagogues."
Dean saved his greatest invectives for Abraham Lin­
coln, whom he maligned as a usurper, traitor, and tyrant. 
Four years after the Civil War, he declared that Lincoln's 
assassination was God's retribution for a "horrible reign of 
crime and terror," while his administration was a "resort of 
debauchees," the Treasury Department "a harem," and the 
president's public officers "stimulated by strong drink and 
inflamed by the indulgence of every other vice."
In a strongly pro-Union state such as Iowa, Henry 
Clay Dean and other critics of the Lincoln administra­
tion and the war effort stood out in stark contrast to 
prevailing public opinion. These Copperheads, as they 
were called by their Unionist detractors, were a small 
but very visible and noisy group. Their leaders includ­
ed former Iowa Supreme Court Chief Justice Charles 
Mason; Dennis Mahony, the fiery editor of the Dubuque 
Herald; and Laurel Summers and Gideon Bailey, both 
of whom had been leaders in the state legislature arid 
had served as U.S. marshals. Dean knew all these men 
well and corresponded with them routinely during the 
war. None of them, however, matched Dean, whose 
harsh rhetoric stood out like flashes of lightning in the 
middle of the night.
Born in Pennsylvania in 1822 and educated at Madi­
son College, Dean developed intellectual and political 
interests early in life, and he studied in great depth the 
leading Enlightenment thinkers such as Hume, Gibbon,
and Voltaire. Named for Henry Clay, the Whig political 
leader, Dean was also a Whig in his early years.
Alongside these developing interests and viewpoints, 
he experienced a profound religious awakening, which 
generated intense Christian convictions. After moving 
to Virginia, he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church 
of Virginia and soon thereafter became a minister in the 
state conference. Early in his career, he expressed some 
mildly antislavery views in Methodist publications such 
as the Pittsburgh Christian Advocate, in which he wrote that 
slavery retarded the onward march of new states such as 
Missouri. If indeed this was an antislavery view, it was 
modified by his comments that slavery would end only 
when it became unprofitable and that abolitionists had no 
power or influence to end it, nor should they try.
Just when his viewpoints on politics and slavery began 
to change is uncertain, but change they did. While still liv­
ing in Virginia, he became acquainted with Henry Wise, a 
thoroughgoing Jacksonian Democrat and former congress­
man, and later actively helped Wise win the governorship in 
Virginia, even though Dean was then living in Iowa.
In 1850, 28-year-old Dean moved to Iowa with his 
young wife, Christiana, and his growing family. During 
his first five years in Iowa, he pastored churches in Keo- 
sauqua, Muscatine, Middleton, Bloomfield, and Wapello 
Mission. He developed friendships with Iowa's two U.S. 
senators, Whig-Free-Soiler (later Republican) James Har­
lan and Democrat George Wallace Jones. Jones helped 
Dean win selection as chaplain of the U.S. Senate for the 
first session of the 34th Congress in 1854/1855. A Catho­
lic, Jones had been particularly impressed with Dean's 
denunciations of the nativist Know Nothing movement 
and the newly emerging Republican Party. Dean natu­
rally began to tilt to the Democrats. Withdrawing from 
the active ministry in favor of practicing law and giving 
public lectures, he settled in Mount Pleasant, where he 
would live for the next 15 stormy years.
Many people found Dean's appearance uncouth or 
comic when they first saw him. His hair and beard were 
frequently uncut, uncombed, and unclean. His clothes 
were usually dirty, fit poorly, and worn haphazardly. But
20 loum Heritage Illustrated
as with his nemesis Lincoln, people recovered quickly 
from the initial shock of his physical appearance when 
he began to speak. His flowing words and passionate de­
livery easily swayed audiences. For those who already 
agreed with him, his oratory could be utterly exhilarat­
ing. His listeners were spellbound. According to one 
story, while Dean delivered a prayer in great, hallowed 
earnestness, and with the entire congregation reverently 
affirming his every word with heads bowed and eyes 
closed, one communicant opened his eyes for just a mo­
ment and noticed Dean tying one of his shoes while still 
in fervent supplication to the Almighty.
His oratorical powers were so impressive that years 
later no less a celebrity than Mark Twain recounted a 
story from a friend who had watched Dean working an 
audience in Keokuk shortly after the outbreak of the Civil 
War. Dean's appearance at first caused ripples of laughter 
from the audience, but his oratory gained such intensity 
that the crowd began to change its mood, listened more 
and more closely, and then began erupting in applause. 
Twain wrote that Dean "stood there, like another Vesu­
vius, spouting smoke and flames, lava and ashes, rain­
ing pumice-stone and cinders, shaking the moral earth 
with intellectual crash upon crash, explosion upon explo­
sion, while the mad multitude stood upon their feet in 
a solid body, answering back with a ceaseless hurricane 
of cheers, through a thrashing snow-storm of waving 
handkerchiefs."
Jeffersonian and Jacksonian viewpoints came to dom­
inate Dean's political thinking. His views were dogmatic 
and extreme but not alwavs consistent. He had the mindj
of a logician, and when he reasoned his way to a conclu­
sion, no matter how fantastic or bizarre it may have ap­
peared to conventional opinion, or however much it may 
have clashed with his own professed views, he stuck to it 
with a ferocity that excited both admiration and disgust.
Perhaps the best way to understand Dean is to under­
stand the premises of his world-view. More than anything 
else, Dean insisted on the absolute rights of the individual, 
particularly free expression. He was hostile to the power 
of the federal government and believed the U.S. Constitu­
tion was primarily a guarantor of states' rights. He cham­
pioned the rural culture of an older America over that of 
the emerging urban industrial society. As a Jacksonian, he 
opposed currency, tariffs, and all banks.
Dean's inconsistencies over the years would perplex 
both friends and opponents. Here was a man of pro­
found Christian convictions who often resorted to ruth­
less name calling; who claimed Andrew Jackson as a hero 
yet denouced militant nationalism; who advocated peace 
and reason when the Civil War was approaching but was 
known for the violence of his rhetoric; who preached 
incessantly on the sanctity of individual rights and hu­
man dignity but increasingly excused slavery before and
This illustration of Henry Clay Dean speaking in Keokuk ap­
peared in Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi. Twain called Dean 
an “erratic genius’’ who dressed worse than a “wharf-rat.”
during the war. He never condoned physical cruelty to 
non-whites and was appalled when confronted with it 
directly, but nevertheless he insisted that constitutional 
rights applied only to white males. Once he tore into his 
Republican opponents in a speech in Des Moines with 
unbridled vehemence, but the next day he cheerily told 
the editors of the Republican Iowa State Register that he 
had meant nothing personally but had only intended to 
satisfy the audience's partisan passions.
There seems to be no consensus on the essence of 
Dean's character. His supporters were convinced of his 
sterling qualities; his detractors beheld only a ruthless 
cynic. Perhaps the fairest assessment is that he conscious­
ly saw himself as consistent in his attitudes and behavior, 
a view that could be sustained by the prevailing conser­
vative cultural views of the day, but that in an era when 
traditional views were being challenged, others saw great 
inconsistency between his professed values and his com­
ments on contemporary events.
A
larmed by a changing America, Dean grew more 
radical. He began speaking out on the growing 
slavery controversy. His ambiguous antislavery 
views began to change more in defense of the institution; 
in a speech at Fairfield in August 1860, he proclaimed 
that "since the crucifixion of Christ there has not been so 
benevolent an institution known among men as African 
slavery." Another time he said he approved of the tar and 
feathering of an antislavery clergyman in Missouri.
Guided by his belief in states' rights, Dean supported 
Senator Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois for president. Af­
ter Lincoln's election in November and the ensuing seces-
Spring 2014 21
sion crisis, Dean insisted that reason, mutual goodwill, 
and calm debate could settle sectional differences. When 
moderation failed and the war began at Fort Sumter, Dean 
pledged loyalty to the Union but quickly began criticizing 
the Lincoln administration. Yet he did not criticize any of 
the Confederate leaders, even though the war had started 
with a Confederate attack.
As the war lengthened, Dean's attacks intensified. 
He argued with some justification, as did many antiwar 
Democrats, that Lincoln exceeded his constitutional au­
thority in suppressing the rebellion. During the first two 
years of the war, with the upper Mississippi valley in an 
economic slump due to Confederate control of the lower 
Mississippi, Dean drew large audiences of those opposed 
to the war or disaffected by it. He insulted most Union 
supporters when he said later, "The Yankees, for a peo­
ple who read as much, are the most ignorant class upon 
God's earth." After he addressed a Ladies Aid Society in 
Mount Pleasant in 1862, a group of soldiers from the 4th 
Iowa Cavalry tried to force him to take a loyalty oath.
In May 1863, as the story goes, Dean was surround­
ed by a mob in Keokuk that was determined to drown 
him in the Mississippi. He was given a chance to pray 
but was told not to make a speech. Instead he started to 
tell a long story about how he had promised to make his 
son a kite the following day and how the boy would be 
so distraught if he did not return home. He told the story 
at such great length that the mob wearied of it and lost 
interest in drowning him. Though the mob dispersed, his 
troubles in Keokuk were just beginning. At the end of the 
month, he was thrown into the local jail and kept there for 
14 days, though no charges were brought against him.
In August 1864, he attended the Democratic National 
Convention, where General George McClellan was nomi­
nated to oppose Lincoln. Firing up a crowd out on the 
street, Dean shouted that Lincoln and the Union armies 
had "failed! Failed!! FAILED!!! FAILED!!!!" The loss of 
life in the past three years "has never been seen since 
the destruction of Sennacherib by the breath of the Al­
mighty and still the monster usurper wants more men for 
his slaughter pens," he charged. "Blood had flown down 
in torrents, and yet the thirst of the old monster was not 
quenched. His cry was for more blood."
A week later, the rug was pulled out from under Dean 
and other antiwar Democrats when Atlanta fell, trigger­
ing a series of events that transformed the presidential 
campaign and led to Lincoln's triumphant re-election.
The defeat of the Confederacy and the end of the rebellion did not seem to faze Dean or temper his rhetoric. In many Iowa communities, including 
Keosauqua, Bloomfield, and Pella, he harped on the evils 
of military power and black suffrage. Although he drew
large audiences, it is likely that some came just for the 
perverse pleasure of watching him perform.
In 1869 Dean published his magnum opus, Crimes of 
the Civil War: and Curse of the Funding System, a 500-page 
diatribe against everything and everybody he held re­
sponsible for destroying the nation that he had known 
and cherished. Even old friends such as Edward H. Stiles, 
who had stumped with him in Iowa for Douglas, con­
cluded in 1916, "That Dean's tirades against Mr. Lincoln 
and the war were indefensible, is beyond question. All 
that can be said is, that in this respect he was false to his 
real nature." Stiles conjectured that the action of the mob 
and his imprisonment in Keokuk in 1863 was probably 
what had embittered Dean.
Indeed, his massive book began with an extended de­
scription of his days in the Keokuk jail and then launched 
into a long list of crimes by Lincoln and his administra­
tion. Dean saw no valid differences of opinion or ambi­
guities in interpreting the actions of the administration, 
Free Soilers, abolitionists, or Union military leaders. Con­
gress was a total captive of the administration, and yet 
congressmen "premeditatedly provoked, perpetuated 
and would yet continue civil war, as a source of profit, 
power and position." For Dean, the Civil War had not 
been a rebellion, insurrection, or revolution, but a War Be­
tween the States. He repeatedly invoked the Constitution 
yet supported his theories based on the acts of the British 
Parliament and the Articles of Confederation, both null 
and void under the U.S. Constitution.
As to issues regarding freedmen he said, "Different 
and unequal races cannot live happily or safely under the 
same government" and "it is then the duty of the superior 
race in the spirit of justice, to assume guardianship over 
the inferior race." The Freedmen's Bureau was causing 
"loss of time, vagrancy, crime, degradation and anarchy, 
which are unsettling the foundations of Southern society." 
He opposed extending suffrage to freedmen, conclud­
ing that "the claptrap of negro-voting is only to reduce 
the poor white people down to the level of the negroes." 
Those who supported it were the "mongrel party."
Two years after publishing Crimes of the Civil War, 
Dean left Mount Pleasant and moved just across the Mis­
souri state line, where he established a farm and com­
munity that he appropriately named "Rebels' Cove." He 
continued to fight for his old principles, still guided by his 
old hostility to banks and federal power. Uninvited and 
unwanted, he showed up at outlaw Frank James's trial in 
1883 in Gallatin, Missouri, to aid in his defense. Perhaps 
Dean was partial to former Confederate guerrillas Frank 
and Jesse James; some saw their robberies of banks and 
railroads as symbols of resistance to the Union.
Dean lived in Rebels' Cove until his death in 1887. 
Then and in the years that followed, both his friends 
and enemies commented on Dean's genius, oratorical
22 town Heritage Illustrated
\
abilities, and gift of persuasion. Many had mixed assess­
ments, ranging from repulsion to admiration. Yet when 
he died in 1887, Iowa newspapers that had denounced 
him during the war remarked mostly on his qualities as 
a leader of men, an intellectual, and a man of great per­
sonal warmth and a charitable nature. Numerous Union 
leaders in Iowa who had known him well published es­
sentially positive reviews of his life's work while noting 
his many quirks. It was also reported that late in his life 
Dean privately regretted his harshest rhetoric.
The storms of controversy that Dean had created and 
survived defined him. One day shortly before his death, 
as he sat on his front porch with a friend, he commented, 
"Do you see that large elm down there in the grove, doc­
tor? I've watched it grow from a tiny sprout. It has stood 
the assault of hailstorms, hurricanes and of lightning, and 
now it reaches up above all the rest, strong, sturdy, un­
afraid, like my life has been. That tree, doctor, is to be my 
headstone." ❖
James H. Williams
Iowa Legislator; Virginia Confederate
by David Connon
Twice elected state repre­
sentative as an independent 
Democrat, James also served 
as a correspondent for the 
Democratic Dubuque Herald.
Under the pen name "Lex," he 
reportedly wrote in December 
1860: "The abolition of slavery 
[should depend] upon more 
than the wish of the slave. The 
best interest of society, of both
races, enter[s] into the right to be free. Their superior 
condition in slavery [as compared] to freedom in the North 
must enter into it."
As war clouds loomed in March 1861, Williams's 
father in the Virginia legislature called for his state to 
secede. I he next month, South Carolina troops fired 
upon Fort Sumter, President Lincoln called for 75,000 
volunteers, and Virginia passed a secession ordi­
nance. In Iowa, Governor Samuel Kirkwood also cal­
led for Iowa volunteers and then a special legislative 
session to legitimize and fund Iowa's war effort. Ap-
On May 12, 1861, 25-year-old James Harrison Williams wrote in his diary: "Started for Des Moines this morning . . .  I go most reluctantly to 
the legislature. Want to be home, to get ready to go to Va. 
& espouse her cause."
The son of a well-connected state legislator and 
slave-owner, James H. Williams grew up in the Shenan­
doah Valley. A talkative ladies' man, he loved studying, 
smoking cigars, plaving board games, and hunting. In 
1857 he graduated near the top of the class at the Univer­
sity of Virginia Law School.
Later that year, James headed to Dubuque, Iowa, 
where he joined the law firm of native Virginian John T. 
Lovell, his future brother-in-law. Living in a state quite 
unlike Virginia, he cherished his "sacred memories of 
home," as his diary reveals, and on a visit in the spring of 
1859 he "saw old Va in all its glory."
As Williams entered Dubuque's political life, he met 
leading Democrats in and out of the courtroom. He also be­
came acquainted with 11 Dubuque men who later served 
the Confederacy. This group included a merchant and sev­
eral men practicing and studying law.
LIBRARY OF VIRGINIA
NOTE ON SOURCES
Special Collections. State Historical Society of Iowa (Des Moines) holds 
the papers of Henry Clay Dean. Charles Mason. Laurel Summers, and 
Gideon Bailey. Pertinent articles appeared in the Burlington Hawk-Eye, 
Iowa State Register, Davenport Democrat, Fairfield Ledger, Keokuk Daily 
Constitution, Keokuk Daily Gate City, [Mount Pleasant] Home Journal, and 
Tipton Advertiser. Useful secondary sources include several articles in the 
Annals of Iowa, Iowa Journal of History, and the Palimpsest (all published by 
the State Historical Society of Iowa), as well as books on Dean and Iowa 
Copperheads, particularly Hubert W. Wubben, Civil War Iowa and the 
Copperhead Movement. See also Boyd B. Stutler. “Henry Clay Dean— 
Inconsistent Rebel," West Virginia Review 9 (Jan. 1932); and Edgar White. 
“Henry Clay Dean, The Orator of Rebel Cove,'" Missouri Historical 
Review 22 (July 1928).
Complete annotations are in the Iowa Heritage Illustrated production 
files at the State Historical Society of Iowa (Iowa City).
David Holmgren volunteers at the State Historical Society 
of Iowa and writes often for this magazine. His article on 
Pammel Court received an honorable mention for the Mills/ 
Noun Award from the Board of Trustees of the State His­
torical Society of Iowa.
Spring 2014 23


Henry Clay Dean: An Iowa Copperhead Lashes Out

Saving the Sick and Wounded
D
isease and battle laid waste to Civil War troops. 
Iowa soldier Cyrus Boyd reported that "the 
mumps are raging in the Army and every other 
disease known to human beings. I have the jaundice and 
am as yellow as a Yankee pumpkin." Historian James 
McPherson writes, "Disease reduced the size of most reg­
iments from their initial complement of a thousand men 
to about half that number before the regiment ever went 
into battle."
Historian Russell Johnson notes, "The men most 
vulnerable to disease were those who came to the army 
from mostly rural backgrounds." If they had grown up in 
urban areas, they would have been exposed to measles, 
mumps, smallpox, and other communicable diseases. In 
large, crowded camps with poor sanitation, malaria, ty­
phoid fever, diarrhea, and dysentery also took their share. 
"In one year, 995 of every thousand men in the Union 
army contracted diarrhea and dysentery," according to 
historian Geoffrey Ward. While serving in Arkansas, six 
Iowa companies of the U.S. Colored Troops lost a quarter 
of their men to disease.
Most soldiers used rifled muskets, which fired "soft- 
lead minie balls [that] lost their shape on impact, shat­
tered two to three inches of bone, and carried pieces of 
skin and clothing into the wound," according to histori­
ans Laurann Figg and Jane Farrell-Beck. Soldiers wound­
ed in the stomach, chest, or head were unlikely to survive; 
they were given morphine to keep them comfortable.
Doctors did not hesitate to amputate, especially be­
fore 48 hours, when infection set in. As one Civil War 
surgeon said, "Life is better than limb." In division hos­
pitals, often miles from battle, ether was used for surgery. 
But because ether was explosive, chloroform was used in 
field hospitals, which were much closer to battlefields— 
and to stray bullets and cannon shot.
As early as July 1862, Congress passed legislation to 
pay for artificial limbs, $50 for an arm or foot, and $75 for 
a leg. Historians Figg and Farrell-Beck contend that only 
a minority of soldiers with amputations actually used 
prosthetics. Many were probably unaware of the legis­
lation or didn't qualify. More fundamentally, artificial 
limbs were heavy and painful and often fit poorly. There 
was honor in pinning up the sleeve or pant leg, or using 
crutches, because it reminded the public of one's sacrifice 
on the battlefield. Iowan George C. Brad way wrote: "A 
Soldier from an [Illinois regiment] was run over by the 
cars and has his legs ground up, so he will have to have 
them taken off Above his knees.... He said he would not 
have cared if it had been done in battle but he did not
like to think he had been through 40 battles and then be 
wounded in that manner."
Honor also accrued to those with other kinds of battle 
wounds. Louisa May Alcott, a Civil War nurse and later 
author of the classic Little Women, assured a wounded pa­
tient that his sweetheart "would admire [his] honorable 
scar as a lasting proof that he had faced the enemy, for 
all women thought a wound the best decoration a brave 
soldier could wear."
Alcott was one of more than 21,000 women who 
worked in war-related medical settings. About 9,000 of 
that number provided bedside medical care. The rest 
cooked, cleaned, comforted soldiers, and tended to other 
tasks. Women nurses did not easily win acceptance or 
authority from doctors (or society), who believed that 
females lacked the necessary temperament, stamina, and 
intellect. They feared that women would get in the way, be 
shocked by gruesome injuries, and mortified by the sight 
of naked men. At first nurses had to be over 35 in age, 
plain in appearance, and maternal in attitude, to avoid 
providing temptation and risking social improprieties 
(although a Chicago Times writer contended that pretty 
nurses had a positive effect on hospitalized soldiers).
As the war progressed and the number of casualties 
mounted, hospitals jobs were opened up to more women. 
Stories and illustrations in magazines began to portray 
these women as heroic and capable. Historian Nina Sil- 
ber writes that women in hospital work "crossed a for­
midable divide, from a relatively safe and secure world 
[at home] to one of unknown horrors and difficulties." 
Looking back, Alcott wrote, "I was there to work, not to 
wonder or weep."
War also tested male doctors from civilian settings. 
One challenge was working within a complex military hi­
erarchy. More important, few doctors had experience in 
treating the kinds of injuries received in battle, much less 
the massive numbers of wounded soldiers that poured 
into hospitals at one time.
—by Ginalie Szvaim
NOTE ON SOURCES
Essential sources include Laurann Figg and Jane Farrell-Beck. “Amputation 
in the Civil War.“ Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 
48 (1993); Harry Herr. '"The Privates Were Shot’: Urological Wounds...," 
and James M. Schmidt, ‘"A Multiplicity of Ingenious Articles"’ both in 
Years of Change and Suffering, ed. James M. Schmidt and Guy R. Hasegawa; 
Russell L. Johnson, Warriors into Workers: The Civil War and the Formation 
of Urban Industrial Society in a Northern City. James M. McPherson, Battle 
Cry of Freedom: Scott Reynolds Nelson and Carol Sheriff, A People at War, 
Geoffrey C. Ward, The Civil War: An Illustrated History, and Nina Silber, 
Daughters of the Union: Northern Women Fight the Civil War.
Spring 2014 27


Saving the Sick and Wounded

Silag, Bill

Who Survived? 
Who Deserted?
by Bill Silag
W
hy did some Union prisoners-of-war die,
and others survive? In their book Heroes & 
Cowards: The Social Face of War, Dora L. Costa 
and Matthew E. Kahn tackle this question.
According to Costa and Kahn, the most important 
factor in a PO W ’s chances for survival was the size of 
the Confederate prison in which he was held; the big­
ger the prison, the dimmer his chances for getting out 
alive. But survival rates were also strongly influenced 
by the presence or absence of fellow soldiers from the 
same company. “ Having friends helped men survive,” 
Costa and Kahn conclude. “ Men’s ability to obtain 
food and shelter and to avoid disease also depended 
on their social networks, both the number of men 
in the network and the strength of their ties to each 
other.” Prisoners formed “ families” with men of their 
own company or regiment. “A group member could 
benefit from the extra food or clothing that his friends 
could provide, from the care his friends provided when 
he was sick, from moral support, and from protection 
against other prisoners.” POWs imprisoned without 
comrades in the larger camps fared worst of all.
Costa and Kahn come to these conclusions based 
on their use of the massive Union Army life cycle data 
set of more than 40,000 Union soldiers. The data for 
these soldiers includes basic personal information such 
as date and place of birth, ethnicity, and occupation, 
as well as information regarding the 303 companies in 
which they served. (Fifteen of the 303 companies were 
from Iowa.)
Union Army companies were recruited locally, 
and thus each company had a geographical identity.
The authors view each company (roughly 100 men) 
as an individual social order with specific characteris­
tics, such as age distributions, ethnic concentrations, 
length of time in combat, and the political notions of a 
company’s place of origin. In all, the source details 67 
individual- and community-level variables.
The statistics presented in Heroes & Cowards show 
that the strongest predictors of group loyalty within a 
company were common demographic characteristics 
(such as age and ethnicity and shared political notions 
back home). Ideology, morale, and leadership were
certainly among the factors determining which soldiers 
ran and which stood their ground, but Costa and Kahn 
found that no characteristic proved as important a de­
terminant of loyalty than a tightly knit company of men 
from a particular locale with a shared ethnic or occupa­
tional identity.
Logically enough, the companies with the highest 
mortality rates were also those more homogeneous de- 
mographically. In the authors’ view, companies in which 
the men were more alike one another were more likely 
to fight to the finish for each other. Loyalty and courage 
were thus two sides of the same coin.
The remarkable Union Army data set includes 
information from U.S. population censuses (1850 to 
1910) and federal health and pension records, permit­
ting Costa and Kahn to follow the life trajectories of 
the individual soldiers in their sample. They know if and 
when a soldier deserted or went absent w ithout leave; 
when and where he mustered out; where he settled 
after the war and what he did for a living; and when 
and where he died. The authors found that deserters 
originating from smaller communities— and particularly 
those more homogeneous— were more likely to head 
west for a new a start in life rather than return home. 
Deserters from larger cities would have found it easier 
to slip back into civilian life undetected.
Although Costa and Kahn, both professors of eco­
nomics, take a less conventional approach to Civil War 
history, their book delves into “ tests of adversity on 
the battlefield, on long marches and in the POW camps 
where so many soldiers died.” The “ common thread,” 
they explain, is “ how men interacted with their com­
rades, and how these interactions affected their deci­
sions and their outcomes.” ❖
Bill Silag, a former editor of The Palimpsest, is writing a biog­
raphy of Iowa novelist Ruth Suckow.
Heroes & Cowards: The Social Face of War was published by Princeton 
University Press in 2008. The Union Army life cycle data now includes 
socioeconomic and biomedical data on 6,000 African American men in the 
Union Army. The Union Army data Web site tells more about this rich 
source of information. Visit www.uadata.org.
50 Iowa Heritage Illustrated


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