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Re: Fighting side-by-side with the relatives

Tom, Two Beckmann brothers were wounded but not at the same time on April 7, 1862. The following will explain how the brothers understood the orders from Beauregard.

The following is from the newspaper Daily Democrat a Louisville, Kentucky paper dated April 25, 1862.

A note for the readers: Pittsburg, Pittsburg Landing, and Shiloh were all the same battle April 6th and 7th 1862.

"PITTSBURG BATTLE"

"HOW THE REBELS WERE INSTRUCTED TO ACT IN BATTLE"

"THE FOLLOWING GENERAL ORDER, FROM BEAUREGARD, WAS PICKED UP ON THE BATTLEFIELD OF SHILOH (PITTSBURG LANDING), ON MONDAY LAST. IT IS COPIED FROM THE ORIGINAL:"

"GENERAL ORDER NO. 14."

"HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE MISSISSIPPI, JACKSON, TENNESSEE, MARCH 14, 1862"

"I. Field and company officers are especially enjoined to instruct their men, under all circumstances, to fire with deliberation at the feet of the enemy. They will thus avoid overshooting, and besides, wounded men give more trouble to our adversary than dead, as they have to be taken from the field.
II. Officers in command must be cool and collected; hold their men in hand in action and caution them against useless, aimless firing. The men must be instructed and required each one to single out his mark. It was the deliberate sharp-shooting of our forefathers, in the Revolution of 1776, and New Orleans in 1813, which made them so formidable against the odds with which they were engaged.
III. In the beginning of a battle, except by troops deployed as skirmishers, the fire by file will be avoided. It excites the men, and renders their subsequent control difficult. Fire by wing or company should be resorted to instead. During the battle the officers and non-commissioned officers must keep their men in the ranks, enforce obedience, and encourage and stimulate them if necessary.
IV. Soldiers must not be permitted to leave the ranks, even to assist in removing our own dead, unless by special permission, which shall only be given when the action has been decided. The surest way to protect the wounded is to drive the enemy from the field. The most pressing, highest duty, is to win the victory.
V. Before the battle, the Quartermaster of the division will make all necessary arrangements for the immediate transportation of the wounded from the field. After consultation with the medical officers he will establish the ambulance depot in the rear, and give his assistants the necessary instructions for the efficient service of the wagons and other means of transportation.

VI. The ambulance depot to which the wounded are to be carried, directed for immediate treatment, should be established at the most convenient building nearest the field of battle. A red flag marks the place and the way to it.
VII. The active ambulance follows the troops, to secure the wounded and remove them to the depot. Before the engagement about five men, the least effective under arms to the company, will be detailed to assist the ambulance conductors in removing wounded, providing water, and otherwise assisting the wounded. These men will not loiter about the depots, but must always return to the field of battle as soon as practicable.
VIII. Before and immediately after the battle, the roll of each company will be called, and absentees must be strictly accounted for. To quit their standard on the battle field, under fire, under pretense of removing or aiding the wounded, will not be permitted. Any one persisting in it will be shot on the spot, and whosoever shall be found to have quit the field, or his regiment or company, without authority, will be regarded and proclaimed as a coward, and dealt with accordingly. By command of General Beauregard, Thomas Jordan, A.A.G."

By reading General Beauregard's General Order #14 it has helped me to understand why some of the soldiers who are buried at the Camp Chase Cemetery were listed as killed during the battle of Shiloh according to their Compiled Military Service Records. Not wanting to be shot or considered a coward if a Confederate soldier beside of him fell in battle he kept doing his duty as ordered. Because the Union won the field on the second day at Shiloh many Confederates were left where they fell. After the battle was over and roll was taken an officer might ask "Where is Private Baldwin?" as an example. The answer came from those who were next to Private Baldwin in battle and sometimes the answer was he was killed, not knowing he was still alive. If a soldier did not know the answer Private Baldwin may also be listed as a deserter or listed as missing. This was entered upon Private Baldwin's records and thus into his Compiled Military Service Records that began in 1886 by General Ainsworth and his staff in Washington, DC. Private Baldwin's next page of Compiled Military Service Records may have him listed at a hospital as an example in Camp Dennison, Cincinnati, Ohio. In rows 42 and 43 at the Camp Chase Confederate Cemetery are the Confederate dead who died as a result of their wounds at the Battle of Shiloh while at the hospital at Camp Dennison, Ohio. In May of 1869 their bodies were re-interred to their present graves at Camp Chase. Those who survived the hospital at Camp Dennison were later transferred to the Camp Chase Prison. Some of them also died due to their wounds at Shiloh and are buried in row 41. At total of 37 graves at the Camp Chase Cemetery were a direct result of the battle of Shiloh. See state by state breakdown of the Confederate Dead at Chase due to Shiloh.

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Fighting side-by-side with the relatives
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