Col. Elijah Gates - 1st MO Cavalry on the Battle of Baker’s Creek (Champion Hill)

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Brev. Brig. Gen'l
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Dec 3, 2011
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Col. Elijah Gates, First Missouri Cavalry
HEADQUARTERS SECOND DIVISION,
Demopolis, Ala., August 1, 1863.

SIR: I have the honor, in obedience to the instructions of the lieutenant-general commanding to submit the following report of the action of the Second Brigade at the battle of Baker's Creek on May 16 last:

About 11 o'clock on the morning of May 12, the forces of the enemy attacked my pickets--- composed of three companies of infantry and a, section of artillery, commanded by Major [W. C.] Parker--some 4 miles south of Edwards Depot. The enemy opened upon us with skirmishers and artillery. I had possession of the creek where the road crosses leading to Port Gibson. I held them in check at this point for an hour or more, when we had to fall back slowly to the reserve (in order to keep them from flanking us), which was some 2 miles south of Edwards Depot. There I put my infantry and artillery in position, and telegraphed to General Bowen my idea of the enemy's movements. General Bowen dispatched me to hold the enemy in check, if possible, until night, then, if I could do no more, to burn the commissary stores then at the depot, and fall back to the bridge on Big Black. I called upon General Bowen for the wagon trains of both brigades, and I would save the stores that night. He did so, and by daylight next morning we had everything out of the depot--about seventy-five wagon loads. At the time General Bowen started the wagons to me he telegraphed me to hold my position; that General Green would be ordered to my support at once. Accordingly, at daylight General Green arrived, followed by Colonel [F. M.] Cockrell's brigade, also Generals Loring's and Stevenson's divisions. They formed line of battle 2 miles south of Edwards Depot.

About 12 o'clock, General Loring ordered me to take a battalion of sharpshooters: then commanded by Captain [W. S.] Catterson, move to the front and press the Federal pickets, and ascertain whether or not the enemy were there in force. I did so, and drove in the enemy's pickets, but soon had to fall back myself, for I was satisfied, from the force they brought up, that their whole force was there. I reported the same to Generals Green and Bowen.

About 12 o'clock on the 15th, we were ordered to move out on the road leading from the depot to Clinton. We followed the Clinton road until after crossing Baker's Creek. We then took a neighborhood road through some plantations, and about 11 p.m. bivouacked for the night and threw out skirmishers.

About sunrise the 16th, a skirmish commenced with General Grant's and General Pemberton's troops. I was ordered by General Green to call my men in line and move by the right companies to the rear, which we did, first and last, to the distance of about a mile. We halted, about-faced, and moved to the front some 600 yards and halted in the timber. I occupied the right of Green's brigade. General Green sent me word that General Loring was preparing for a charge, and did not want his brigade to be behind in the charge. We remained in this position, I suppose, about an hour. By this time the enemy had attacked General Stevenson, on our left. We were then moved by the left flank at a double-quick nearly three-fourths of a mile; were then put in line of battle and moved to the front 200 or 300 yards before we commenced firing. There Colonel Cockrell met me with his saber in hand, and exclaimed he was very glad to see me, for he had been under a desperate fire. I immediately ordered a charge, which my men obeyed as promptly as I ever saw troops in my life. We drove the enemy about a half or three-quarters of a mile through a corn-field and across some deep ravines before they brought us to a stand. This was under a desperate fire. They occupied one ridge and I another, with a deep, narrow ravine between us. There they shot my horse three times, and he lay down and died like a soldier. Three times I tried to drive them from their position, but my men were not able to ascend the hill on which the enemy's line was formed.

At different times my adjutant came to me to know what we were to do for ammunition. I told him to take the ammunition from the dead and wounded that lay on the field. My loss here was upward of 100 men.

We held our position until we were forced for the want of ammunition to fall back. This, I think, was about 3 o'clock. I then saw General Green. He said that the orders were to fall back beyond Baker's Creek, below the bridge over which we had crossed in going out the night before. We did so, and formed in an open field, to hold the crossing until General Loring could cross. The enemy crossed the creek above where we did, and commenced a heavy cannonade upon us, and soon drove us from our position, though in the mean while we replenished our ammunition. We then took the road toward Edwards Depot and Big Black Bridge. I got there about I 1 o'clock, and crossed the river to my wagon train.

Just after sunrise the 17th, I was ordered by General Green to put my men under arms and be ready to move to the east side of the river. In a few minutes I started. General Green accompanied me. The firing was then going on between the men who occupied the ditches that night and the enemy's skirmishers. We crossed over the bridge and moved up the river about half a mile. Here General Green halted and ordered me to move 400 or 500 yards higher up the river, and take my position in some rifle-pits next to the river, on the left of the line of battle, which we did at once. We commenced a heavy skirmish with the enemy. Here my horse received a very bad wound in the face, which brought him to the ground. I then went in the ditches myself. We skirmished with the enemy for about an hour before they made the charge. They formed their men on the river in the timber where we could not see them. They brought their men out by the right flank in column of fours about 140 yards in front of my regiment at a double-quick, Colonel [W. 11.] Kinsman's regiment (Twenty-third Iowa, General Lawler's brigade) leading the charge. I then opened a most terrific fire upon them, and kept it up until the brigade had passed out of my sight behind a grove of timber that stood immediately on my right. They moved so as to strike the ditches occupied by General Vaughn's brigade, so I am informed. I do not know whose troops were there, but it was immediately on the right of Green's brigade. After they had passed me, I listened for our men to open a heavy volley on my right and drive the enemy back. Upon not hearing any firing on the right, I directed Lieutenant-Colonel [George W.]Law to mount his horse and go to General Green and know whether the center were holding their position or not. Colonel Law returned in a few minutes, and said that General Green ordered me to fall back. I did so at once. After I had got back below the bend of the river, I discovered that they had crossed the ditches and were between me and the bridge. My lieutenant-colonel, being mounted, thought he could make his escape, and did so with the loss of the left arm. I told my men to swim the river. They all took the river except about 90 officers and men. One or two of my men were drowned in trying to swim the river. The officers and men who could not swim pleaded so hard for me to stay with them that I gave way to them, and we were all captured. I remained with the enemy three days and made my escape. I cannot give any account of anything that transpired after this until after the fall of Vicksburg.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

ELIJAH GATES,
Colonel First-Missouri Cavalry.

Major [R. W.] MEMMINGER,
Asst. Adjt. Gen., Dept. of Mississippi and East Louisiana.


GAINESVILLE, ALA, August 15, 1863.

SIR: The number killed, wounded, and missing of Bowen's division is as follows:

At Baker's Creek: Killed, 16 officers and 115 enlisted men; wounded, 64 officers and 366 enlisted men; missing, 7 officers and 300 enlisted men.

At Big Black Bridge: Killed, I officer and 2 enlisted men; wounded, 9 enlisted men; missing, 46 officers and 427 enlisted men.

At Vicksburg: Killed, 24 officers and 166 enlisted men; wounded, 35 officers and 469 enlisted men; missing, 74 enlisted men.

The report of the Twenty-first Arkansas (Second Brigade) cannot be found; supposed to have been destroyed with other papers at the time of the surrender. All field and most of line officers captured at Big Black, which makes about 59 officers and 480 enlisted men missing at that place.

ELIJAH GATES,
Colonel, Commanding Division.

Lieutenant-General PEMBERTON.


http://www.battleofchampionhill.org/gates.htm
 
At the time, Col. Elijah Gates commanded the 1st MO Cavalry (Dismounted) in Martin Green's Brigade (Second Brigade) of John S. Bowen's Division. The First Brigade was Francis Cockrell's Missouri Brigade, which the 1st and 3rd MO Cavalry (Dismounted) would serve in after the Siege of Vicksburg. Both brigades led probably one of the most hard-hitting counterattacks of the war at Champion Hill/Baker's Creek.


This is the biography of him I typed up in my Men of the Missouri Brigade thread:

Elijah Gates was born on December 17, 1827, in Garrard County, Kentucky. He was the son of John Gates, owner of a large plantation there. Unfortunately, his father died when Elijah was only a year and a half old. He and his family later moved to Platte County, Missouri, in 1846, later settling on a farm in Buchanan County. In 1852 he married Maria Stamper, they having twelve children together.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Gates enlisted in St. Joseph and was soon elected a captain in the Missouri State Guard. When the Confederate 1st Missouri Cavalry was organized on December 30, 1861, he was elected colonel of the regiment. He would lead his men in the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, March 6-7, 1862, and in a number of skirmishes.

During the Iuka-Corinth Campaign in fall of 1862, Gates was acting commander of the 1st Missouri Brigade. He commanded it with distinction at the Battle of Corinth, Mississippi, on October 3-4, 1862. On the second day of the battle the 1st Missouri Brigade overran the earthen Battery Powell, advancing under a severe crossfire from artillery and small arms fire. For a period of time, they busted a giant gap in Gen. Rosecrans' final line around Corinth, temporarily capturing nearly every single Union artillery piece in and around Battery Powell, until driven out by counter-attacks.

Gates remained colonel of the 1st Missouri Cavalry and Cockrell took command of the 1st Missouri Brigade. During the Vicksburg Campaign, on May 16, 1863, he would lead his regiment in the devastating counter-attack by Cockrell's and Green's Brigades at Champion Hill. The following day at Big Black River, Gates and 90 of his men were cut off from the line of retreat and forced to surrender. Gates, however, managed to escape a few days later, rejoining the brigade after the Siege of Vicksburg. His 1st Missouri Cavalry would be consolidated with the 3rd Missouri Cavalry Battalion that fall.

Gates would command his dismounted Missouri cavalrymen throughout the Atlanta Campaign, Tennessee Campaign, and the Siege of Fort Blakely, Alabama. In the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee, November 30, 1864, Gates once again proved his sheer bravery. Shot through both arms in the charge, he nevertheless continued to lead his men forward, sitting upright on his horse and cheering them to the works. Lt. James R. Yerger of Sears' Brigade remembered, "I shall never forget the steady calm gaze of this old hero (Gates) as he sat his horse erect as a statue, his paralyzed arms hanging by his sides." Lt. Charles Cleveland of 1st-3rd MO Cav. eventually helped Gates off his horse and to the rear, where his left arm was amputated. He was later taken prisoner in a field hospital following the Confederate retreat from Nashville, but despite missing an arm, managed to escape capture yet again.

After recovering from his wounds, Gates returned to command his Missourians in the Siege of Fort Blakely, Alabama. He was captured with most of the brigade when a major Federal assault overran the fort on April 9, 1865 - the same day Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox.

Gates resumed farming when he returned to Buchanan county, and continued in that line until 1874. He was elected sheriff then on the Democratic ticket, and served four years. Gates was then elected treasurer of the state of Missouri, and served four years, residing in Jefferson City for a period of six years, during one year of which he was interested in the commission business in St. Louis. From 1884 to 1886 he was coal oil inspector. For a number of years he was in the transfer and bus business as a member of the firm of Piner & Gates of St. Joseph, but of late years had lived in retirement. He also remained close friends with Cockrell and other Missouri Brigade veterans after the war. Elijah Gates died on March 5, 1915, and is buried in Mount Mora Cemetery in Buchanan County, Missouri.
 
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