Andrew Dickerson left Floyd County, Virginia and moved his wife and two young sons to Indiana in 1832. The couple prospered in the Hoosier state, having eight more children. One of them was Calvin Dickerson, born 1839. Though his family’s roots were in the south, when the Civil War commenced, Calvin joined the 51st Indiana Infantry and fought for the Union.
The 51st saw a lot of action, participating in the battles at Shiloh and Perryville and the siege of Corinth. In 1863 they were part of Streight’s Raid to Rome, Georgia. The raid suffered from poor planning, lack of supplies, poor communication and just plain bad luck. On May 3, Colonel Amos Streight seeing that his men were hungry, exhausted and that he was facing an overwhelming Rebel force, surrendered his entire brigade, 1700 men. Except that the Rebels only had 500 men; he was the victim of a ruse by General Bedford Forrest. Forrest had ordered his men to march in an out of the woods, appearing to be a much larger force. During negotiations with Streight, couriers from non-existent units rode up to give Forrest messages, again, making Streight over-estimate the size of the rebel army.
From the History of the Fifty-first Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry, “Terms of surrender included that the “men were to retain their haversacks, knapsacks and blankets and all private property to be respected and retained by the owner. These terms were fairly and fully agreed to by Forrest; and our brigade stacked arms and were prisoners of war. The surrender occurred at noon, Sunday, May 3, 1863.”
“Notwithstanding Forrest’s most sacred promise, made in the terms of surrender, no sooner were our troops turned over to the rebel authorities, than a system of robbing was instituted, which soon relieved our boys of everything of any value in their possession. Blankets, knapsacks, haversacks, overcoats, money, side-arms, colors and everything followed as fast as the brutal guards came to them.”
The men were then given parole papers to sign. The problem of what to do with captured prisoners would crop up over and over during the war. They were a burden on the resources of an army but to release them just allowed them to take up arms and fight again. The parole system attempted to solve the problem. The prisoners would be given the opportunity to sign a promise to not participate in active service until they were exchanged. They were then released to their own side. Sometimes paroled Union soldiers were given a furlough, allowing them to temporarily return home until they could be exchanged. But a great number of these soldiers just never returned to their units when recalled. So Union soldiers that had been prisoners were taken to parole camps in Northern states and assigned guard duty or other light duty until an official exchange occurred.
After signing their parole papers the captured 51st were sent to Rome, Georgia. “The next day the command was marched under guard to Rome . The citizens were delighted to see the boys and thronged the streets to greet them,” the author writes sarcastically. The prisoners were paraded through the streets “enduring every insult that such a low, ignorant, unprincipled, ill-born people could invent.”
The soldiers of the 51st were then transported to Atlanta. They had been prisoners for three days and not received anything to eat. On the morning of the fourth day they received quarter rations. They were loaded onto a train and sent to Knoxville, Tennessee where they were handed to the 54th Virginia to be guarded.
“They kindly divided their rations with our starving boys. This was a most gracious thing for them to do; and proved that even out of Sodom some good might come. And while it went far to modify the hardships incident to this journey, it also united the hearts of otherwise enemies by an inseparable bond. This band of hardy and big-hearted mountaineers was detailed to conduct the prisoners from Knoxville to Libby and Belle Isle. They saw at a glance the wasted conditions of our poor comrades, from fatigue and hunger and exposure and outrage; and they opened their big hearts and their haversacks; and for the first time in many days our boys enjoyed the rare pleasure of rest and plenty of food. This hearty and unexampled kindness continued till the prisoners were delivered to the rebel authorities at Richmond.”
These ‘big-hearted mountaineers’ included companies from Floyd County, Virginia. Calvin found that he was being guarded by his uncle and a cousin. In fact, the roster of the 54th Virginia contains the names of fourteen Dickersons, two of them uncles and four first cousins of Calvin. The rest, no-doubt, were of some relation.
The men were transported to a Rebel prison camp at Belle Isle until transportation could be arranged to return them north. Belle Isle was a barren, sandy tract of land, several acres in extent, situated in the James River. There was no barracks or shelter. They had already been robbed of almost all they owned and they suffered greatly from exposure and hunger.
Luckily, the situation was short-lived. In a few days the men were marched 35 miles to City Point, Virginia, for exchange. It was a weary and trying march, but they endured it knowing they would be going home. They sailed down to Baltimore, boarded a train for Columbus, OH and were held at Camp Chase until the end of their furloughs. Then they returned to Indianapolis where the 51st was reorganized.
Not all 51st soldiers returned home so quickly. Many of their officers had been separated from their men and sent to Libby Prison, considered second only to Andersonville in its hardships. There they suffered from filth, cold and disease and existed on starvation rations.
The reorganized 51st again went into the field. They were involved in the defense of Nashville against Hood’s Army of the Tennessee.
“We arrived at Nashville, about 1 p.m. Thursday, December 1, 1864. . . . Each day we looked for an attack, and increased vigilance was observed to prevent surprise by Hood, who had sworn to eat his Christmas dinner in Nashville or in hell. . .
Picket duty in front of Nashville was attended with unusual danger, as the rebels were continually on the alert for any surprise, and would shoot at anything that had the appearance of a Yankee. Corporal Calvin Dickerson, on picket on the 9th or 10, received a shot that went clear through both legs, just below the knees. . . his time would have expired on the 14th.”
Calvin was in the hospital in Nashville for three months. He was honorably discharged in May 1865. He returned home to Hendricks County, Indiana, and by August married Harriet Holley. They had six children. Harriet died in 1876 and the next year Calvin married Margaret Acton, they had one child. Calvin’s biography in a county history book noted that he received $16 per month military pension.
Postscript – History of the 51st Indiana Infantry noted that: “The rare treatment by the 54th Virginia boys was not forgotten; and when, on the final surrender of the traitor Lee, his misled and dishonored followers came to us up in East Tennessee, the 54th boys were received with genuine joy, by the remnants of the old provisional Brigade, and supplied with the best of everything the camp afforded.”
Connection: Calvin’s second wife, Margaret Acton, was my great-grandaunt.
familyconnectionsblog - 