Charles T. Clark in Civil War

CHARLES T. CLARK AND THE 125TH O.V.I. IN THE CIVIL WAR

by Jonathan Smith

I have been accustomed, most of my life, to claim a closer relationship to America's Civil War than most of my generation (I was born in 1947), by virtue of the fact that my grandfather, Charles T. Clark, fought in it. To cover that span of years in two generations is a bit unusual, so it makes an interesting piece of family lore. Unfortunately beyond that single statement, for much of my life my ignorance of what my grandfather actually did in the Civil War was nearly absolute. I could not name a single battle in which he had fought; indeed, for many years I could not have named his regiment, though I knew that his regimental history sat on our bookshelves back home.

I began to remedy my ignorance by poking through some of the hundred-odd volumes of the War Department's official record of the "War of the Rebellion." Then later I took the opportunity to filch the regimental history (Opdyke Tigers) from the old home library, and discovered in it a piece of paper on which my late mother had begun indexing some page numbers. I supposed that, before she became ill, she might have been interested in reconstructing a narrative of her father's experience in the Civil War; and that is what I have endeavored to do for her.

Eighteen-sixty-two was the year in which the Union came to the realization that the "southern rebellion" was to be a full-scale and enduring war. As late as the spring of that year, volunteers were enlisted for three-month terms; but on July 6, President Lincoln called for 300,000 volunteers to enlist for a period of three years. Looking back, the initial short-term call was almost certainly myopic, but it served the useful purpose of giving some war experience to volunteers who would be spread through the much larger ranks of totally green recruits being organized after July.

Charles Theodore Clark was one of those soldiers with the 90 days of "seasoning" behind him that summer. A 17-year-old student at Mt. Union College, he had left school in the spring to enlist in the 85th Ohio Regiment of Volunteer Infantry. The move was typical for college students in Ohio at that time, but he must have exhibited some leadership, because, despite his youth, he entered the war as a sergeant.

His short term was spent principally in Kentucky, where General Bragg's Confederate army loomed ever larger as a threat to the north. In these early months, however, Clark found himself camped in the State House yard in Frankfort, "taking turns on picket duty, drilling a little, holding dress parades for the edification of the citizens, and enjoying the hospitality of unionist families" (Opdyke Tigers 11). At one point the 85th did intercept a cavalry charge, but the enemy took note of the relative numbers and did not stay to fight.

Clark returned to Ohio at the end of the three-month tour, and immediately re-enlisted, this time in the Ohio 87th. But Ohio had spread its manpower a bit thin in mustering well over a hundred regiments since the start of the war. Each regiment had to do its own recruiting, and tedious days could be spent in camp while waiting for the regiment to reach full strength. This is what happened during the Fall of 1862 to both the 87th and another, brand new, regiment camped in Cleveland--the 125th. Finally a solution was found in the merger of the two, and on December 5, 1862, Charles Clark marched into Camp Cleveland to take his place as a Second Lieutenant, Company F, 125th O.V.I.

The 125th had the good fortune to be commanded by an authentic, though little known, hero of the Civil War, Colonel Emerson Opdyke. Fighting with the 41st Ohio, Opdyke had already distinguished himself at the Battle of Shiloh (April, 1862), where he was wounded twice but did not leave the field. As a commander he was remembered many years later for "his untiring zeal and laborious efforts to perfect the drill and discipline of the command, his constant watchfulness and attention to the details of everything affecting the health and comfort of the men, and his ready sympathy with and interest in every soldier" (426).

The word "discipline" is repeatedly associated with the image of Opdyke, but he was no mere parade-ground martinet. His concern for drill was directly relevant to the demands of infantry line-fighting in the Civil War. The union infantryman, upon firing a shot with the standard Springfield musket, had to reach for a new cartridge, bring it to his mouth and bite off the end, pour the powder from it down the muzzle of the gun, press the cartridge back together, ram it into the muzzle with a ramrod, and place a percussion cap on the nipple of the gun, before he could fire another. Thus lines had to move forward and drop back with precision, and momentarily defenseless men had to act with cool efficiency, not to mention faith in the discipline of their companions. The 125th was never less than admirable under fire, and at Chickamauga, Missionary Ridge and Franklin the regiment performed exceptionally well. The nickname "Opdyke Tigers," unlike many such sobriquets, was not coined within the regiment, but was bestowed and personally authorized by General Wood, at Chickamauga.

It was February of 1863 when the regiment arrived at the front. The second half of 1862 had been good to the Union, but as late as August it had appeared otherwise. At that time Lee was set to invade Maryland and Pennsylvania, and Bragg, having made serious inroads in Kentucky, was posing a threat to the city of Cincinnati. The C.S.A. held the initiative in every theatre of the war, and was close to being granted recognition by Great Britain. As Bruce Catton says, in a football analogy, "the North had lost the ball and was deep in its own territory" (The Civil War 94). But with astonishing swiftness, the South fumbled it back again. First Lee at Antietam and then Bragg at Perryville fought bloody battles that were not exactly defeats, but were sufficient to send them packing. Then Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation on September 22 changed the war into a moral crusade for the North, and forestalled any foreign support for the Confederacy. The character of the war, from the standpoint of the Union, changed within two months from last-ditch defense to a general strategy (which essentially prevailed for the remainder of the war) of squeezing the Confederate forces into ever-smaller space, until the Rebel government itself would be forced to capitulate. One of the three main pressure points in early 1863 was central Tennessee, to where the Army of the Cumberland, under the new command of General Rosecrans, had followed Bragg; it was now encamped just south of Nashville. Here the 125th entered the war, having made the trip from Cincinnati by way of the Ohio and then the Cumberland Rivers.

The regiment had its first real combat on the same ground as its last real combat of the war (nearly two years later): near the town of Franklin, Tennessee. The former, on February 12, can hardly be compared with the latter, and was "too slight to be reported to the headquarters." Still, the regiment had to wade the Harpeth River after a march of 16 miles under pack, and then move forward in the face of enemy fire. All did so, "fairly demonstrating their fitness for service at the front" (O.T. 38). They also took a small part in what is called the First Battle of Franklin on April 10, but otherwise the spring was largely given over to fort-building. During this period the opposing armies were quite close together, but neither was ready to undertake a major offensive.

Then in June, with Union supply lines firm through the fortified depot of Murfreesboro, General Rosecrans opened a campaign to push Bragg back across the Tennessee River, to Chattanooga. Bragg's main supply base was already in Chattanooga, and that city was Rosecrans' ultimate objective. Eastern Tennessee was strongly pro-Union, and President Lincoln was eager to have his troops protecting the civilian population there. But first Bragg had to be dislodged from the key railroad depot of Tullahoma, between Nashville and Chattanooga. And this Rosecrans did, with consummate skill. With a series of fakes, he completely outflanked a bewildered Bragg, forcing him to fall back to Chattanooga. That retreat was virtually simultaneous with the Battle of Gettysburg, and also the surrender of Vicksburg to Grant, and, Charles Clark wrote later, "must have contributed to make many a southern man despondent of final success" (70). During the hiatus that followed, while Rosecrans waited for reinforcements, Lieutenant Clark made an advancement of his own, as he was given the command of Company H.


Opdyke	Thomas	Rosecrans	Bragg	Longstreet

The reinforcements never came, but in August Rosecrans moved suddenly and surprisingly into northern Alabama and then around to the south of Chattanooga, cutting off Bragg's supply line and forcing him to evacuate the city. It was an astonishing coup, but in one of those mercurial turns of fortune so characteristic of this war, it led almost immediately to Rosecrans' downfall and subsequent loss of command. He pressed his advantage too vigorously (he had, after all, replaced a commander who never pressed an advantage vigorously enough); his army became diffuse when it might have paused to consolidate in Chattanooga; and all of a sudden there was Bragg, not beating a retreat at all, but turning to counter-attack at Chickamauga Creek, just twelve miles south of Chattanooga.

The massive and climactic Battle of Chickamauga (September 19 and 20, 1863) was one of many anomalies of the war in Tennessee. From the Union perspective, it should not have been fought. Before the battle Rosecrans could have held Chattanooga triumphantly; afterwards he still held it, but now desperately. On the other hand, the difference was not as dire as it might have been, for in the days before September 20 Bragg lost many opportunities to decimate or even annihilate Rosecrans' army. The final outcome, along with enormous loss of life on both sides, was a necessary but orderly retreat by the Union forces on the night of the 20th. It could have been far, far worse.

Furthermore, in that "mad, irregular battle . . . resembling guerrilla warfare on a vast scale" (Catton, Never Call Retreat 246), on a wilderness terrain unsuited to movement of any sort, the 125th first distinguished itself as a fighting unit, and young Charles Clark first distinguished himself as a soldier.

The collected official reports of the battle are as difficult to traverse as the thickets in which it was fought, and indeed I have seen the comment that the battle may as well have been fought in the dark as far as any officer's view of it was concerned. But two clarifying landmarks were the Lafayette-Chattanooga road which ran north-south through the center of the battle, and was an obvious objective for both sides; and Snodgrass Hill, the center to which the Union troops were driven on the second day, but where (under command of General Thomas) they ultimately held their ground, preserving the road as an escape route north.

On the first day the 125th was held in reserve until fairly late in the afternoon, when a wheeling movement by the Confederates had outflanked the Union line on the south side and gained control of the road. The regiment was sent to meet a part of that flank, and emerged from a thicket into an open stand of timber, to find itself face to face with a rebel regiment:

Volleys were exchanged on the instant, followed by a sharp fusillade as the men reloaded. The enemy, however, gave way at once, their men running off in confusion, but leaving a few prisoners. Quite a number of them dropped their guns and ran through our line, going to our rear without escort. About the same time we heard volleys fired both to our right and left, indicating that all of Harker's regiments had come into action. (O.T. 94) The regiment had prevailed in direct face to face combat and the Lafayette Road was won back at the end of the day. General Harker, Opdyke's immediate superior, wrote that the regiment of "this gallant officer . . . did good service in punishing the enemy" (99).

Until about 2 A.M. that night, when strategic deployments for the following day began, most of the soldiers rested in place on the lines. For a time during the twilight men from both sides moved peaceably between the lines seeking comrades among the dead and wounded. Such a tacitly understood cease-fire was fairly routine in this war. But Chickamauga evoked real emotion and undoubtedly frustration, and as darkness fell an exchange of musket-fire, lasting several minutes, chased everyone back behind the lines. The night was cold, fires were not permitted, and the moans of the wounded, lying abandoned in the field, could be heard. The morning, even with its renewal of desperate and bloody fighting, must have come as something of a relief.

During the night Bragg had been reinforced by the arrival of General Longstreet with two divisions of Lee's Virginia army. These were among the best Confederate soldiers in the war, and the 125th, it turned out, would face them directly. This day there would be no rebels throwing down their guns and rushing into captivity, but awesome columns, moving with a regimented precision like their own. Opdyke, in his official report of the battle, does not disguise his admiration for this new opponent:

Another line of the enemy, more formidable than the first, appeared in the distance moving upon us. The terrible splendor of this advance is beyond the reach of my pen. The whole line seemed perfect as if moved by a single mind. (123) Opdyke's men met a match on this day--and still they held their own.

Their day began after one of the famous strategic blunders of the war. It was almost inevitable that someone would misread the alignments in this tangled wilderness, and it was Rosecrans who did, pulling troops out of the battle line directly in front of the main concentration of Longstreet's men. The rebels poured through the gap, and a rout was threatened. (In fact, Rosecrans himself fled to Chattanooga, and prematurely reported on the battle as another Bull Run.)

Harker's brigade, including Opdyke's regiment, took part in stemming the tide. Writes Clark:

Our Springfields spoke for the first time that day. "Aim low, aim well, waste no shots," was Opdyke's first exhortation. The fire was effective. [The enemy] found it necessary to pause in their victorious march, and before long we had the satisfaction of seeing them break and fall back before our advance. (106) The regiment was facing due south, and needed to advance in that direction to close up the north-south gap through which the rebels were pouring. One hundred and fifty yards to the south was a rail fence on the northern boundary of an open field (Dyer's Field). General Wood happened to be with the 125th at that moment, and gave the order to take the fence. Opdyke moved out in front of his lines and led the charge. Enemy fire was heavy, and many men went down, but the rest reached the fence and immediately pulled it down and started returning fire from behind it.

Presently, Wood ordered a second charge, this time to "advance, firing." It was a drill from Camp Cleveland days: the battle line formed up in four ranks, one behind the other, but staggered to leave space in front of each man. Each rank, in turn, would run forward a few steps, fire, and drop to the ground to re-load, as the most rearward rank would instantly rush out in front and do the same. Thus a continuous fusillade was maintained in spite of the need to re-load. The 125th was nothing if not well-drilled, and it was in following this advance that General Wood was moved to coin the nickname "Opdyke Tigers."

The successful charge left the regiment in its best field position of the day: in a small stand of timber that cut through Dyer's Field, offering both protection and a clear view southward across the rest of the field, where the now-vulnerable rebels were still advancing westward. They could have picked them off like sitting ducks. Instead, they fell victim to the confusion that was epidemic on that wretched weekend. Apparently a number of Longstreet's men wore blue jeans, and for the first time in the war the Ohioans saw Confederates in blue, and were fooled by it. Thinking they were friendly troops, and the gap had suddenly and providentially been closed, the regiment ceased fire and waved its banner "ostentatiously" (to quote the commanding officer of the opposing regiment). Even after this new wave of blue-jeaned troops commenced firing on them, they continued to display the colors in hopes of correcting what might still have been an error by friends. Within minutes, six of the color guards and several others were shot down while holding up the standard--one of them Lieutenant Clark (the war-story best remembered by his widow, who told it to me nearly a hundred years later): he was struck and knocked down by a minie ball fired straight at his heart, but he carried his belongings in a rubber poncho slung from his shoulder, and a silver watch stopped the ball; he was merely bruised.

The misidentification proved fatal to the regiment's stronghold. and soon they were themselves dangerously exposed. This gave rise to a youthful bit of war-rhetoric on Clark's part, which earned him a place in the official records of the war. Quoting Opdyke's report:

Numbers fell dead and more were seriously wounded, but the line maintained. Lieutenant Clark coolly remarked, "They can kill us, but whip us, never!" Seeing no relief I retired the regiment to the ridge in the rear. . . . This position was repeatedly assaulted during the day in the most terrific manner by heavy forces of Longstreet's corps, but it was triumphantly maintained until the battle was ended, and till after dark, when we were ordered to retire, which we did without molestation. (124)

The "ridge in the rear" was undoubtedly the southern side of Snodgrass Hill. Now under command of General Thomas, the Union forces made their last stand in a tight semi-circle on the north, east, and south rims of the hill. They were almost surrounded, but they held. Thomas was known ever after as the "Rock of Chickamauga," and within a few days he replaced Rosecrans as commander of the Army of the Cumberland. The army retreated to Chattanooga, beaten and now deeply in trouble, but significantly intact. No one would have guessed at the time, but the stage was being set for perhaps the greatest single achievement of the war.

Chickamauga Monument-125th O.V.I.

Chattanooga had been the Confederates' stronghold, but it quickly became clear that to the Army of the Cumberland it was a deadly trap. Bragg moved up to occupy the high ground surrounding the city, and cut off every single supply line. There was not even an avenue of retreat. It was only a matter of time until the army would be starved into surrender.

But this dire adversity became a crucial turning point in the war, for the whole force of the Union, now under the leadership of Grant, at last moved in unison to prevent the catastrophe. Grant himself came east from Vicksburg, and cut a makeshift supply route (the "cracker line") into Chattanooga. Two corps from the Army of the Potomac, under General Hooker, railroaded to the scene with unprecedented speed. General Sherman moved in from Memphis. By November 24 all was in readiness for the rescue of Thomas's army, who in fact had to endure some taunting jeers from the "rescuers" who had come so far to bail them out.

Yet, in the end they gloriously redeemed themselves. On the 24th of November, their lines faced east of Chattanooga, right up the steep and heavily fortified front of Missionary Ridge. The rebels had rifle pits at the foot of the ridge, artillery and their strongest concentration of troops above. To the south, Hooker's troops were driving a much smaller rebel contingent off of Lookout Mountain, in a battle that was eerie and spectacular to the men from both sides watching down below. In fact, the Confederate soldiers at the foot of Missionary Ridge complacently perched on the front edge of their trenches, apparently enjoying the fireworks and oblivious to the fate that was taking shape for them.

On the 25th, Sherman attacked the Confederate right, to the north, but without success, and Grant decided to try to give Sherman more breathing room by applying pressure in the middle. He ordered Thomas to advance and take the rifle pits at the foot of Missionary Ridge. Lieutenant Clark was in that advance, and his firsthand account provides some stirring reading:

When half the distance was gained the ground traversed was dotted with dead and wounded men. Stretcher bearers were already at work. From that on the effect of the fire was more deadly. . . . The skirmish line was then nearing the pits, the second line was near at hand. At such short range the aim of the Confederates was accurate. No lines can be held in check under such a fire. The men broke into a run and swept irresistibly to the works, capturing many of the occupants, while the rest fled to their friends in the lines above, subjected in their flight to the fire of both friend and foe. (165)

The objective had been taken, but for the men there was barely a pause. They had not been ordered further, but then it was customary for the line soldier to receive his orders only one step at a time. They had watched Hooker and Sherman trying to dislodge the enemy from the heights on either side, and just assumed they were to do the same. Besides, the rifle pits offered little protection from the artillery above. And beyond all of these immediate concerns, they had been cooped up and half-starved in Chattanooga since September and were more than ready to break out.

The skirmishers passed on without even halting, and if the first line halted at all the pause was so brief as not to be observed. When the second line arrived, the works were empty, and it also swept on. . . . From the moment the skirmishers crossed the pits an incessant hailstorm of grape, cannister and minie balls from the works on the crest made every exposed place on the slope wholly impracticable, and the lines were broken at once, men passing right and left into the ravines, where depressions of the surface, stumps and rocks afforded partial shelter and havens of rest for those out of breath. (166) At one point in the ascent, the regiment to the left of the 125th fell back momentarily, exposing the 125th to a withering cross-fire. They were ordered to retreat to the same line, but many of them had no intention of climbing the same hill twice, and just held their ground until the assault was resumed.

At last the heads of the column are at the top of ravines, where further progress will bring them upon higher ground, and deprive them of the partial shelter they have thus far possessed. And now for the first time there is a noticeable pause in their progress. The spectators at Orchard Knob and on the forts must have looked with bated breath and wondered if it was possible for men to rise out of those ravines and cross the intervening space to the breastwork in the face of those blazing guns. . . . Then, with a mighty shout, up rose every man, and with one great surge forward the flags were on the crest, followed by their defenders, pouring over the breastwork, through the ever widening breaches, turning to right and left and fiercely assaulting every enemy in sight. (167)

If Clark's style tends toward the epic in this description, he had certainly earned his poetic license; for his part in the assault of Missionary Ridge was substantial. He was one of two officers singled out for commendation by his commanding officer (now Captain Bates, as Opdyke had assumed command of a demi-brigade), "whose cool management preserved order in the ranks, and whose hazardous examples emulated the boldest and encouraged the faltering" (War of the Rebellion, I, XXXI, ii 244). Shortly after, Clark was promoted from second to first lieutenant.

The storming of Missionary Ridge not only broke the stranglehold on Chattanooga, it very nearly broke the back of Bragg's army, whose part in the war thereafter would be defensive and futile. And this decisive stroke came unexpectedly, against overwhelming odds. Assistant Secretary of War Charles A. Dana, who witnessed the battle, eloquently captured its essence in his telegraphed report to Washington:

O.T.

The 125th deserved a better reward than it got after the Battle of Chattanooga. The regiment was part of a contingent sent to Knoxville to help out the rather hapless General Burnside, who had drawn a siege by Longstreet, despite the irrelevancy of his own movements. This was one of Bragg's errors at Chattanooga, but it was an annoyance that had to be dealt with before the campaign for Atlanta could get into full swing. There were a few battles, sharp but inconclusive, before Longstreet eventually returned to Virginia. But in the meantime, the troops in eastern Tennessee on both sides spent a winter comparable to Washington's at Valley Forge--if not worse. The combined armies were too large to be supported by the land (in fact, often the fighting that occurred was for forage-ground rather than any strategic objective), and yet--on the Union side at least--they were far too removed from the main theatres of action to receive adequate supplies or attention. Clark writes of the records of this period as "a store house of material full of romantic and tragic interest" (184), but the winter of discontent was ultimately of little importance to the progress of the war.

In May, 1864, the 125th re-joined the Atlanta Campaign under General Sherman. Grant had gone east to take on Lee face to face, and a new overall strategy had evolved: it was now clear that the survival of the C.S.A. depended squarely upon its two main armies in the field, and Grant intended to confront and destroy those armies without regard for territorial gain or strategic objectives. Counter to that policy, however, was the necessity of getting Lincoln re-elected in November if the war was to be won at all, and for that the symbols might be as important as the substance. So Sherman started the summer intent on capturing Joe Johnston (who had replaced Bragg), and ended it willing to settle for the capture of Atlanta instead.

The road from Tennessee to Atlanta was hot and hazardous, marked with frequent and indecisive battles in which Johnston would stand long enough to make the Union pay a toll for the next stretch of road--and then drop back to preserve his own strength. First there was Rocky Face Ridge, where the Confederates were again dislodged from high ground, but at a price of 48 casualties within the 125th. Colonel Moore, soon to take command of the regiment, withstood three separate wounds himself. Next Resaca, where Opdyke was wounded and turned the command over to Moore (thereafter Opdyke commanded at demi-brigade or brigade level for the rest of the war). Then on through Calhoun, Adairsville, Rome, and Cassville, under constant harassment; and two weeks of stalemated trench warfare at New Hope Church. An assault of Kenesaw Mountain failed, but the enemy, having done enough damage, fell back again. In July the Chattahoochee River was crossed. Finally the drawn-out struggle for Atlanta itself could begin, and it was decided when Sherman cut all the supply lines and the Confederates (now under General Hood) had to withdraw. On September 2 Sherman sent home the good news that Atlanta had fallen; Lincoln's election hopes were lifted. Opdyke moved over to assume command of the 1st Brigade, and his regiment changed brigades in order to stay under his command. Charles T. Clark had, on July 31, become a captain. He was now 19 years old.

Sherman, as everybody knows, continued on from Atlanta in his devastating march to the sea. But the 125th parted ways with him, for Thomas's Army of the Cumberland had inherited Sherman's original objective of destroying the midwestern branch of the Confederate Army. Hood, when he retreated from Atlanta, went north toward Chattanooga, leaving the Northerners with the frustrating task of fighting again over land they had previously won. October 8 found the 125th back in Chattanooga, and now for a time they shuttled about rapidly by rail, trying to anticipate Hood's movements. On the 18th they had the "novel experience" of eating breakfast in Alabama, lunch in Tennessee, and dinner in Georgia.

The armies did not meet in a fully pitched battle until November 29, at Spring Hill, near Franklin,. Tennessee. Opdyke's men had spent a lot of time around Franklin almost two years earlier, and on familiar ground they acquitted themselves well. But on this day Hood was the better strategist, and near the end of the day had the chance to cut the Union army in two and capture a good chunk of it. His subordinates blundered, however, and the Union soldiers slipped away in the night, re-establishing the battle lines at Franklin.

Hood was angry at his missed opportunity, and the next day he sent in 18,.000 men on a furious frontal assault. The hand-to-hand fighting was among the most vicious of the war. The Union lines buckled and momentarily broke. But here we pick up General Stanley's report:

War of the Rebellion

General Thomas saw Opdyke after the battle and said, "From what they tell me, Colonel, your brigade saved they day" (O.T. 351). Later Thomas would recommend Opdyke for a promotion, citing both his "signal personal gallantry," and his decisive command, without which "disaster instead of victory would have fallen on us at Franklin" (352).

The final battle for the 125th was at Nashville on December 15 and 16, where, according to Bruce Catton, "for the one and only time in all the war, a Confederate army [was] totally routed on the field of battle" (Civil War 263). (Clark, in his account, compares the success to that of Missionary Ridge, which Catton was perhaps overlooking.) The Confederates lost over 4,000 prisoners just in the battle itself, and thousands more on their headlong retreat to the Tennessee River. Hood's army would never fight as a unit again. The role of the 125th in this battle was relatively inconspicuous, as the regiment was not deployed until the charge of the enemy trenches had already succeeded. They took part in the pursuit of Hood, chasing him into Alabama, where both the year and the campaign came to an end. On January 17, 1865, Captain Clark turned 20 in camp in Huntsville, Alabama.

The war was coming to an end. That Spring Thomas's army moved back into Tennessee, anticipating a possible retreat in that direction by Lee. But on April 9, Lee surrendered. The news reached the regiment in Blue Springs, Tennessee, the following night, and one of them wrote in his diary: "The boys went wild. Everybody turned out. Ammunition was wasted recklessly. It will not be needed any more" (O.T. 383). A month later there was a grand review by General Thomas at Nashville. As Opdyke came forward with his brigade, Thomas asked him to deploy for battle, as he wished to see one last charge by his troops. Opdyke did so, and "In that order," writes the same diarist, "we made our last charge upon an imaginary foe, returning without loss to learn that General Thomas was pleased with the performance" (386).

Charles Clark's adult life had barely begun, but he was already a veteran soldier and an officer who had earned the respect of both his superiors and his men. That May he temporarily commanded the regiment in drill, and then was transferred to the staff office of the First Brigade, where he acted as Assistant Adjutant General until the end of his tour. He was one of the officers called upon to speak in the First Brigade's farewell event for General Opdyke. He mustered out in October, 1865, and eventually went on to become a lawyer in Columbus. He was elected Historian of the 125th regiment in 1885, and it is from the history that he compiled, and partly wrote, that I have gained most of the information in this account. He died in 1911 at the age of 66. Colonel Moore, at one time his commanding officer and now a Bishop, delivered the funeral sermon. My grandmother, thirty years Clark's junior, was his second wife, married in the last three years of his life. My mother was born two months after her father died. By this somewhat unusual circumstance I am only two generations removed from America's Civil War.

The 1888 reunion of the 125th Ohio. Charles T. Clark is in the front row, 4th from the left.