Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 10, 1962)
MONDAY. SEPTEMBER 10, 1362 5 1 CIVIL WAR " " "n- Small THIS Worlds Around Us 5 t MEDFORD MAIL TRIBUNE. MEDFOHD. OREGON . it I r I 9 i FAMOUS LOST ORDER On Sept. 13. 1862, the 27th Indiana Volunteers camped at Frederick, Md., on a spot just vacated by the Confederates. On the camp grounds, a private soldier made a discovery an envelope containing three cigars and a piece of paper. The cigars were, put to good use immediately, but it wasn't until later that Uie paper was read. This is the way the famous "lost order'1 of Gen. R. E. Lee came into Union hands. The order detailed the positions of the Confederate forces and showed that Lee was about to divide his forces again and strike the Fed erals in a "pinccr." This map, courtesy of the U. S. Dept. of Interior, illustrates the "lost order," and shows what Lee planned. Mystery of Lee's Lost Order By MERTON T. AKERS United Press International Pvt. B. W. Mitchell, Co. F, 27th Indiana Volunteers, was tired when his outfit reached Frederick, Md on the morn ing of September 13, 1862. With his comrades he stack ed arms and lay down to rest. The Confederates invading Maryland had camped on the same spot the day before. The ground was littered. Mitchell saw an envelope on the grass. He picked it up. Three cigars and a paper fell out. Cigars were welcome finds any time. While looking for a match, Mitchell and his first sergeant, John Bloss, fell to reading the paper which had been around the cigars. What they saw sent them running to Silas Colegrove, colonel of the 27th. What the colonel saw sent him running to Gen. A S. Wil liams, division commander. The first man Colegrove saw at headquarters was Col. S. E. Pittman, Williams' adjutant. Post-haste What Pittman saw sent him post-haste to the headquarters of Maj. Gen. George B. Mc Clellan. That is the way the famous "lost order" of Gen. Robert E. Lee - Special Orders No. 191 - came into the hands of the commander of the Army of the Potomac. The "lost order" detailed the disposition of the Confederate army and revealed that Lee, as he had done two weeks be fore at the battle of Bull Run (Manassas), again was split ting his army in the face of superior forces. How did the "lost order" get lost? Actually no one to this day - 100 years later - knows. No one can say for sure how it happened nor who was respon sible. Facts iabout the "lost or ders" are few; surmises plentiful. With all the evidence in that I is likely to come in, the mys tery shapes up like this: Fact - The "lost order" was a genuine copy of Lee's or ders. Colonel Pittman recog nized the handwriting of Col. R. H. Chilton, Lee's adjutant. Fact - The order was ad dressed to Maj. Gen. Daniel Harvey Hill, whose division was under the direct command of Lec. Fact - Hill and his adju tants denied in later years that the orders ever reached him. Hill produced another copy of the orders in the handwriting of Maj. Gen. Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson who had personally copied it-for Hill because Hill's troops had been under his command a few days before. Fact - While couriers were supposed to get receipts for or ders they delivered, none ever was found for this order. (Af ter the war Lee was certain Hill's headquarters had re ceived the original copy with out saying how he knew it.) Surmise - One of Hill's men, knowing his chief already had the order from Jackson, wrap ped his cigars in it and drop ped it by accident. One ver sion is' that the spot where the order was found had been the camping grounds of D. H. Hill's troops. Another was that A. P. Hill's forces camp ed there - which may be a case of too many Confederate generals named Hill. Surmise - (By Lt. Col. G. Moxlcy Sorrel, aide to Gen. James Longstrcet) Hill, whose temper was short and who had dyspepsia, threw away the or der in a fit of irritation. (When Bloss read Sorrel's ver sion after the war he asked how it accounted for the ci gars.) Surmise - A courier lost the order and kept quiet about his mistake. (Lack of a receipt bolsters this theory but pres ence of the cigars lessens it.) WORDS fbac COMFORT J Thy word is a lamp into my feet, end alight unto my path. PSALM 119:105 PERL FUNERAL HOME CORNER SIXTH AND OAKDALE Spacious Parking Lot J ti e promptly rru pond to eft cnlht tiny or night. MEMBER BY INVITATION tfn3ntcrntdiMialdilialiai f7)cpcnJallchwitaL'I)ircclor Surmii - That the courier was a Union spy and dropped the envelope where it would be found. (An imaginative the ory but why would a spy take a chance on a dropped enve lope being overlooked'.') McClellan accepted the or der as authentic on the testi mony of Pittman and on the fact that the information in the order confirmed the intel ligence he already had. Few generals have been as fortunate as McClellan in hav ing the enemy's troop disposi tions handed to them - a gold en opportuntiy to annihilate an army. This was the Confederate situation at the moment: Jackson had taken his forc es south to capture Harper's Ferry. He had nearly half of Lee's army. Maj. Gen. James Longstreel's force had moved north to Hagerstown, Md., with Lee accompanying it. D. H. Hill with five bri gades - about 8,000 men -was left around Boonsboro, Md., to guard Turner's Gap across South Mountain, which was west of Frederick. Besides guarding the gap, Hill was to cut off any Federals re treating from Harper's Ferry and protect the wagon trains. Moved Forces On the morning of Sept. 14, a Sunday, McClellan moved two forces against the Confed erates, one to strike through Crampton's Gap toward Har per's Ferry and the other to force Turner's Gap to the north, The Federals forced Cramp ton's Gap without much trou ble but failed to follow up their advantage and flank one of the Confederate forces mov ing on Harper's Ferry from the north. The 23rd Ohio Volunteers spearheaded the drive into Turner's Gap, five miles north of Crampton's. The regiment was led by Lt. Col. Rutherford B. Hayes, who would become a president of the United States. One of his mess ser geants was William McKin ley, who also would become president. , Hayes' regiment made the first lodgment on the top of the gap and held on tenacious ly, losing more men than any iolher regiment in the battle. Hayes was seriously wounded but stayed on the field until ordered back by a superior. , More Federal troops were thrown into the battle as the day wore on. Hill's Confederates were having a hard time and ap peared close to being driven out of the gap but he received help from an unexpected quarter. Some time on the night of September 13-14 a civilian from Frederick rode into the cavalry camp of Maj. Gen. J. E. B. Stuart with the news that McClellan had a copy of Lee's Special Orders No. 191. Marching Back La Watkins IRtltt'er & Trlban Syndicate, lS:i Call of lh Mourning Di t Probably Naturi'i Saddest In Nature's wide and var ied repertoire of voices and sounds there are many sad and mournful calls. The cry of the greeti north ern loon on a lonely, forest encircled lake is an eerie call, a wild, melancholy cry, almost weird in its abject j loneliness, like a shrieking I laugh from a demented hu man. - But the haunting cry of the loon is known only to thu hunter, camper or woodsman, for it occurs only in the wild est and most isolated areas. I, has frightened some folks to death. ' Cry of Despair There is another sad and lonely call which is heard by nearly everyone. This is the call of the mourning dove. In i all the chorus of Nature, it is probably the saddest and the most plaintive. It is. so uni versally sad a sound that the bird is known everywhere by the common name of mourn ing dove. Its habitat range is wide, being found in nearly all of the United States and parts of Canada and Mexico, About the only departure from the use of the name mourning dove if found in a few sections where the pleas ant name "turtle-dove" is sub stituted. Even there the char acteristic call is the same. In some sections of its range this dove is considered a game bird and is hunted during the fall season. The mourning dove is about the size of the blue jay, a grayish-blue or fawn color, with reddish brown on the underside. The bird has a long tail, consisting of 14 feathers. The nest is a simpie struc ture composed of short sticks, placed crossways and per fectly flat on the upper sur face. About the only thing that keeps the eggs from roll ing off is the unevenncss of the sticks. The nest is usually built on the ground and, of course, falls easy prey to many va rieties of foraging predators. Even when built in a low tree, which docs occur occas ionally, it is seldom over four or five feet above the ground. Here too, it is raided by rats and other enemies which like baby birds or eggs. It is for tunate the dove is so prolific, otherwise the species would have long since disappeared. Worthy Purpose The mourning dove feeds on the ground, on weed seeds and insects. It serves a worthy purpose in helping to control noxious weeds. In the fail when the work of raising two or more fam ilies is finished, the birds as semble in flocks. Sometimes these flocks contain all the resident birds in a wide area; may even number several thousand. In areas where the bird is hunted, the flocks are scattered and only small groups arc seen. When startled, the mourn ing dove has the peculiar habit of striking the wings together over the back, pro ducing a loud slapping noise. This occurs just at take-off while the bird is accelerating at full speed. Literature is rich in refer ences to the dove family. Sup posedly it was the mourning dove that Noah sent out from the Ark to bring him the word of the flood's recession. -'A 1 IX 4 7LU& T. 'i UmmT l-ii " I 1 mtmm ' l i n" . MMLUABLE STAMPS 'V HV U.S. Number 2 Russets 20-lb. bag . . . POTA WW FLAME TOKAY GRAPES Sweet and loaded With Juice HO1 lb. TOMATOES EXTRA LARGE RED SLICERS LBS. 5 SWEET TENDER KERNE'.S Dozen Detergent TRI "Guaranteed Satisfaction" Vi GALLON 79' Orange Drink PURESUN FROZEN 6-OZ. 10' Orange Juice MCP 6-OZ. FROZEN 7:99' PEPSI-COLA Teem -Canada Sry 28-oz. Flour GOLD MEDAL 10-LB. BAG 89' Evaporated Milk CAL-BEST TALL TIN 10' Eggs "AA" Med. 39c CAkE MIX Betty Crocker All Reg. 39c Varieties PACKAGE BROADENED PROGRAMS Washington UPD A Senate subcommittee Saturday rec ommended greatly broadened federal programs to solve the housing probems of the na tion's 17 million older citizens. force on both flanks, making the Confederates untenable. His explanation was too forci ble to admit of further delib eration. General Lee ordered withdrawal, making Sharps burg the point of assembly." Casualties at South Moun tain (Boonsboro) were compar atively light. The Union lost 325 killed. 1,403 wounded, 85 missing. Confederate losses were estimated at 325 killed, 1,560 wounded, 800 missing. A battle was shaping up at 3ti,nrt l.,f i a courier to l ee. Xo r. Sharpsburg, a little Maryland cd Longstrect earlv and ,et his force marching back south toward Boonsboro and Tur ner s Gap, 13 miles away. The situation had boiled down to a race whether Long strect could get to Turners Gap before the Federals over-' whelmed Hill's small forces, j Longstreet's forces made It i in time to halt the Union troops by nightfall. After dark "General Lee in quired of the prospects of con tinuing the fight." Longstrcet wrote. "General Hill explain- ed the enemy was in great town on Antictam creek. Sharpburg and Antictam were only names on Sept. 14. j In three days they would be I as well known as Waterloo. Now Many Wear FALSE TEETH With More Comfort Paste FTH, a pieuiftnt Blkaltn fnon-ncirti powder, hold faint letih more firmly To eat and talk in mori comfort, Juat prltUle iml M8 TtETH on yoMr pint No tummy. KO"y. pny tat or ftfllnz Ch" plu'i! Mor" (denture ortathi. Otl FA&TfcfcTH t any drug omioier. 3 ONLY MOTOR, SPIT and HOOD... WESTGATE VARIETY STORE 22" BAR-B-C5JE RUBBER MATS Vz" GARDEN HOSE 1 8" x 26" - 6 Colors IDEAL FOR CAR OR HOME USE 50-Ft.-10 Yr. Guarantee Regular $2.49 $385 5149 5I3 SWIFT'S PREMIUM -J WIENERS MM0 Full Pound Package al " ARMOUR STAR Tv 71 SMOKED PICNICS Ahc We Slice Free " Real Lean Real Tasty GROUND ROUND ft WE BAKE TO PLEASE Ybu! WESTGATE BAKERY ' OLD FASHIONED . Donufs APPLE PIES Tasty Men Really Savor This Flavor EGG SESAME DOZEN BREAD ua Prices Effective Through Wednesday o We Reserve the Right to Limit Quantities OPEN 9 A.M. TO 9 P.M. MEDFORD Westgare Center MEDFORD 13th and Central ASHLAND Gateway Shop. Cntr. M it 1 I
