Close Calls: Divine Interventions?

FrazierC

First Sergeant
Joined
Sep 20, 2012
"'I have had three horses shot under me,' Confederate general Stephen D. Ramseur wrote to his wife about a recent battle he had survived. 'My saddle was shot through the pommel. I got four holes through my overcoat besides the ball that passed through my arm. I tell you these things, my Darling Wife, in order that you may be still more grateful to our Heavenly Father for his most wonderful and merciful preservation of my life.'

Many Civil War soldiers could describe near escapes experienced on the battlefield when an an enemy bullet tore through hat or clothes without causing bodily harm. In a similar indecent, Union soldier Iola Caleb of the 17th Maine got a 'close shave' when a musket ball tor through his beard without bringing 'more blud than many a barber.'

Another type of close call would come when a bullet headed for a soldier's body struck a belt buckle or scabbard instead, deflecting the missile or absorbing so much of its energy that it failed to penetrate his person. Walter G. Jones of the 8th New York Cavalry carried in his shirt pocket a small Bible that in two different battles stopped bullets that would most likely have inflicted fatal wounds. After a bullet that plunged into a deck of cards carried by Colonel Harry Gilmor in an inside coat pocket stopped at the last card- the ace of spades- his men never tired of asking him if 'spades are trump.'


One of the more remarkable experiences of the war was that of Confederate Private Finley P. Curtis, who caught a bullet with his hand, without injury, at the 1863 Battle of Chancellorsville. 'A molten hail of lead hissed like pronged serpents' fangs about my ears...' remembered Curtis. I marveled that I stood on hostile ground alive in the midst of a death hurricane so withering, seeing, as in a dream, hundreds of collapsing forms. A spent ounce ball caught the concave palm of my upraised loading had, faintly stinging. For a moment I held it thus, thinking nothing, then purposelessly threw it down. Again and again I wished I had kept it.'

'A merciful God, he who takes care of the fatherless and the widow, took care of the soldier,' said Private Albert Elmore after the fuse on a 300-pound artillery shell that landed at his feet went out without exploding."

Source:Foster, Stephen T. "Close Calls: Divine Interventions?" (n.d.): n. pag. Rpt. in Atlas Editions, USA. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
 
I recall reading of an elderly Catholic Priest around the time of WW1 being asked why he became a Priest. He explained that at the Battle of Chickamauga he had been advancing in the front rank across a field, the front and rear rank men to his left & right were all hit and fell. he lowered his head and made a prayer telling God if he made it through he would gift his life to Christ. As he said Amen he felt a tug upon his hat and the rear rank man behind him fell w/ a bullet in his head. He survived the battle and the war, upon his return home he entered the priesthood.
 
Colonel Chamberlain was shot in the sword scabbord and while charging down Little Round Top he was met by a CSA officer who tried to shoot him, but his pistol misfired
 
I cannot say what is "Divine Intervention" is or is not-however we humans seem to have a tendency to sometimes draw questionable conclusions based on faulty or circumstantial evidence at best.

Ever since Ancient times, shipwrecked sailors had credited porpoises with saving their lives. The usual story was that a sailor was struggling offshore in the water after his ship went down when a school of porpoises came along, saw the struggling sailor and somehow "magically" realized that the sailor was a "land animal." So they pushed him to shore, thereby saving his life. One might say, in the "Sailor Lore," porpoises were credited with being the "Good Samaritans of the Sea."

Modern research of porpoises has taught us that porpoises are very "playful" creatures and actually enjoy the "game" among themselves of occasionally pushing a piece of flotsam here and there for a while. As for the sailors that got pushed to shore by the porpoises-THEY WERE THE LUCKY ONES. Those sailors lived to tell the stories of their miraculous rescues by porpoises. No one ever heard FROM THE SAILORS THAT GOT PUSHED FURTHER OUT TO SEA BY THE PORPOISES!!!

Keep in mind that in your average ACW battle there were millions of lead bullets flying thru the air along with millions of pieces of artillery shrapnel. Just by the "odds," some soldiers would we killed by all of this flying medal, others wounded and a lucky few would have "close calls" when a bullet or piece of shrapnel cut their clothing without hitting their bodies.

IF I recall an old college course in Metaphysics correctly, I think it was Sir Issac Newton that came up with his theory of a "Clockwork Universe," i.e., God spent 6 days creating the Universe and ever since then, has just sat back watching the show put on by mankind. Which one must admit, is interesting and entertaining. While God could intervene in human affairs, IF he desired, he has refrained from any sort of "Divine Interventions."
 
An account from the appendix of The Unfinished Fight Essays on Confederate Material Culture tells of the loading lever on a Colt revolver in the waist band of a soldier at Vicksburg stopping a musket ball and saving his life. Also interesting because supposedly soldiers discarded all their revolvers as "useless." They were far from useless in the close quarter trench fighting. A subject for another day...
 
Back
Top