Small Talk-Trivia

“Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?”

By Stephen Davis · Originally published July 2018 · pp. 35–38

“Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?” ­—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Courtship of Miles Standish (1858) Speaking of “John,” here are ten of them from the War. You fill in John’s last name. 1. Captain of the USS Monitor in its historic battle with the Confederate ironclad Virginia, March 9, 1862, at Hampton Roads, was John L. _____. 2. As Confederate commissary general of prisoners in 1864, this brigadier general took on the administration of such Southern prison camps as Andersonville. He died, at the age of 65, on Feb. 6, 1865, in Florence, S.C. John who? 3. On May 9, 1864, this Federal general was shot in the head and killed after telling a soldier, “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this distance.” Maj. Gen. John ____. 4. In May 1861, this Confederate officer was put in charge of Southern troops on the James-York River peninsula. When McClellan and 100,000 Federals landed at Fort Monroe on April 2, 1862, Maj. Gen. John B. ____ had only 11,000 troops. Yet he forced McClellan to spend a month preparing for a siege of the Confederate position. Who was this officer, nicknamed “Prince John”? 5. This Union cavalry brigadier commanded a division in the Army of the Potomac on July 1, 1863. He contested the march of Lee’s infantry into Gettysburg that day, giving the Federal I Corps infantry time to deploy. Several months later he contracted typhoid fever and died in Washington on Dec. 13, 1863. John who? 6. This member of Jefferson Davis’ Cabinet was one of only two to hold his office, that of Postmaster General, throughout the Confederacy’s existence (the other was Naval Secretary Stephen Mallory). John ____ was a Texas lawyer, Indian fighter, and U.S. congressman before the war. Who? 7. John ____ was a West Pointer who as brigadier in the spring of 1862 won fame for capturing New Madrid and Island No. 10 on the upper Mississippi. Lincoln brought him east, promoted him to major general, and gave him command of a new army in Virginia. Aside from his humiliating defeat at Second Manassas, this officer is well known for the bombastic statement made to his troops in July 1862, “I have come to you from the west, where we have always seen the backs of our enemies.” Which John? 8. This Alabaman had moved to Kentucky before the war, and rose through the Confederate ranks as a talented cavalry officer. Appointed brigadier general in December 1862, he led a mounted force in July 1863 into Ohio, where he was captured and confined in the Ohio State Penitentiary. Which Confederate cavalryman? 9. This Union officer, a West Pointer, rose to a brigadier generalship in the Army of the Tennessee. He is best known for commanding the Federal forces defending Allatoona, Georgia, Oct. 5, 1864, against Confederate attack. In the battle, John M. ____ was creased by a rifle ball in the head. After the fight, he sent word to General Sherman, “I am short a cheek bone and an ear, but am able to whip all hell yet.” John who? 10. This John S. ____ raised a battalion of “partisan rangers” in early 1863 to harass Federal troops in northeastern Virginia. In March 1863, when he captured Union Brig. Gen. Edwin Stoughton, he spanked the sleeping Stoughton on the backside while asking “General, did you ever hear of ____?” “Yes, have you caught him?” a dazed Stoughton asked. “He has caught you,” replied the Confederate. Who? Answers found on page 38. Steve Davis is the Civil War News Book Review Editor. He can be contacted by email at:[email protected]

Small Talk Trivia Answers

1. John Lorimer Worden (1818-1897). In the naval battle, a projectile from the Virginia struck the Monitor’s pilot house, temporarily blinding Lieutenant Worden. (He eventually regained his eyesight.) (A. A. Hoehling, Thunder at Hampton Roads [1976], p. 165) 2. John Henry Winder (1800-1865). In his biography of Winder, Arch Blakey writes that General Winder, sixty-five years old, was “completely used up.” (Arch Fredric Blakey, General John H. Winder, C.S.A. [1990], p. 201) 3. John Sedgwick (1813-1864). Mark Boatner, in his Civil War Dictionary, writes that a statue to General Sedgwick is at West Point, sometimes drawing students. “Tradition has it that a cadet in danger of being ‘found deficient’ in academics will pass his final examination if he sneaks out after taps and twirls the rowels of Sedgwick’s spurs” (pp. 730-31). 4. John Bankhead Magruder (1810-1871). Biographer Paul Casdorph writes that Magruder got his princely sobriquet a few years before the war, when he was stationed at Fort Adams near Newport, R.I. There he fit in with Newport’s high society as a bon vivant, inviting guests to the fort, which one admirer termed “the most celebrated watering place in America.” (Casdorph, Prince John Magruder: His Life and Campaigns [1996], p. 102) 5. John Buford (1826-1863). Upon his death, a fellow officer termed Buford “the best cavalry general we had” (Stephen Z. Starr, The Union Cavalry in the Civil War, Vol. 2 [1981], p. 77). Buford received his major general’s commission on his deathbed. 6. John Henninger Reagan (1818-1905). In one of the few twists on the U.S. Constitution which the Montgomery convention made as it modeled the Confederate Constitution on the U.S. one, the C.S. Post Office Department was required to be financially self-sufficient in two years. (Ben H. Procter, Not Without Honor: The Life of John H. Reagan [1962], p. 131) 7. John Pope (1822-1892). The quote is in Peter Cozzens, General John Pope: A Life for the Nation (2000), p. 83. 8. John Hunt Morgan (1825-1864). Morgan met his end on Sept. 4, 1864, when he was surprised and killed by Union soldiers in east Tennessee. A Federal was heard to shout, “I’ve killed the damn horse thief!” (Dee Alexander Brown, The Bold Cavaliers: Morgan’s 2nd Kentucky Cavalry Raiders [1959], p. 270) 9. John Murry Corse (1835-1893). The quote is from Brad Butkovich, The Battle of Allatoona Pass (2014), p. 146. 10. John Singleton Mosby (1833-1916). The Stoughton story is told in Virgil Carrington Jones, Ranger Mosby (1944), pp. 94-95.