NF "What I Saw at Shiloh", by Bierce

Non-Fiction

John Hartwell

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This memoir by Ambrose Bierce is one of the most beautiful pieces of descriptive writing I've read in a long time. Except for a few introductory paragraphs, the narrative is very much what the title says, it is the battle as seen by one man, rather than a sweeping overview. Bierce was a Lt. in the 9th Indiana, which was among Buell's troops, and the narrative really begins with the crossing at Pittsburg Landing.

http://www.classicreader.com/book/1165/1/

On the little steamer crossing the river, there was a young woman, of whom Bierce recalls:
She stood on the upper deck with the red blaze of battle bathing her beautiful face, the twinkle of a thousand rifles mirrored in her eyes; and displaying a small ivory-handled pistol, she told me in a sentence punctuated by the thunder of great guns that if it came to the worst she would do her duty like a man! I am proud to remember that I took off my hat to this little fool.
That last sentence is so beautiful, so genuine!

Read the whole thing, you'll be glad you did.

Cheers!

jno
 
Bierce is one of my favorite CW authors -- maybe my absolute favorite. He was a veteran himself, of course, and didn't get caught up in romanticizing the war like so many of his contemporaries did. I highly recommend this complete anthology of his CW writing.

Here is what Bierce wrote in June 1898, during the Spanish-American War, when someone asked him if black soldiers would fight:

A skeptical correspondent asks me for an opinion of the fighting qualities of our colored regiments. Really I had thought the question settled long ago. The Negro will fight and fight well. From the time when we began to use him in civil war, through all his service against Indians on the frontier, to this day he has not failed to acquit himself acceptably to his White officers. I the more cheerfully testify to this because I was at one time a doubter. Under a general order from the headquarters of the Army, or possibly from the War Department, I once in a burst of ambition applied for rank as a field officer of colored troops, being then a line officer of white troops. Before my application was acted on I had repented and persuaded myself that the darkies would not fight; so when ordered to report to the proper board of officers, with a view to gratification of my wish, I “backed out” and secured “influence” which enabled me to remain in my humbler station.
But at the battle of Nashville it was borne in upon me that I had made a fool of myself. During the two days of that memorable engagement the only reverse sustained by our arms was in an assault upon Overton Hill, a fortified salient of the Confederate line on the second day. The troops repulsed were a brigade of Beatty’s division and a colored brigade of raw troops which had been brought up from a camp of instruction at Chattanooga. I was serving on Gen. Beatty’s staff, but was not doing duty that day, being disabled by a wound — just sitting in the saddle and looking on. Seeing the darkies going in on our left I was naturally interested and observed them closely. Better fighting was never done. The front of the enemy’s earthworks was protected by an intricate abatis of felled trees denuded of their foliage and twigs. Through this obstacle a cat would have made slow progress; its passage by troops under fire was hopeless from the first — even the inexperienced black chaps must have known that. They did not hesitate a moment: their long lines swept into that fatal obstruction in perfect order and remained there as long as those of the white veterans on their right. And as many of them in proportion remained until borne away and buried after the action. It was as pretty an example of courage and discipline as one could wish to see. In order that my discomfiture and humiliation might lack nothing of completeness I was told afterward that one of their field officers succeeded in forcing his horse through a break in the abatis and was shot to rags on the slope on the parapet. But for my abjuration of faith in the Negroes’ fighting qualities I might perhaps have been so fortunate as to be that man!
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So what are doing still reading this? Go buy that book!
 
This memoir by Ambrose Bierce is one of the most beautiful pieces of descriptive writing I've read in a long time. Except for a few introductory paragraphs, the narrative is very much what the title says, it is the battle as seen by one man, rather than a sweeping overview. Bierce was a Lt. in the 9th Indiana, which was among Buell's troops, and the narrative really begins with the crossing at Pittsburg Landing.

http://www.classicreader.com/book/1165/1/

On the little steamer crossing the river, there was a young woman, of whom Bierce recalls:

That last sentence is so beautiful, so genuine!

Read the whole thing, you'll be glad you did.

Cheers!

jno
If you really want to feel what it was like to be there, this is the story to read. Most diarists seem to gloss over the actual battles (eg. Rhodes, Lyman, Jackman). Mr. Bierce puts it in living detail.
 
The Shiloh piece is outstanding: the wit and cynicism. His short stories often have a CW setting and are worth a look as well.

Ambrose Bierce had a biting wit and a good sense of sarcasm too. He would probably be the boy in the corner of the schoolroom for sassing his teacher and cracking his fellow students up while doing it. I love his Devil's Dictionary, the definitions in it will leave you laughing out loud on occasion and make you think too.
 
Bierce is one of my favorite CW authors -- maybe my absolute favorite. He was a veteran himself, of course, and didn't get caught up in romanticizing the war like so many of his contemporaries did. I highly recommend this complete anthology of his CW writing.
He is a good writer and gives excellent detail, but he seems to wrap himself in darkness; seems bitter, unhappy. But the details he gives of life in the army help bring things to life.
 
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is one of the best fictional stories of the war.
 
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