John W. St. Clair, Iron Brigade history

["Spirit One Email" <laurel@spiritone.com>]

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Oh, I'm so excited!!
Just bought a book called "A Brotherhood of Valor" by Jeffry D. Wert.  I
sneeked a look at the index and found my John Wesley St. Clair,Co. K 6th WI
listed. On that page was a letter from him to his father that  said, "the
South never will give up they air hard boys they fite well."
    I have copies of 4 other letters of his to his father.  This indicates
that the author has one or more letters that I don't have.  I have found his
address using my phone CD so will now contact him about what he has.
Perhaps I should read the book before I do, oh, I can't  wait that long.  I
can tell him some things I bet he doesn't know and maybe he can identify
some of the pictures I have.


 The 2nd,6th and 7th WI plus the 19th IN originally made up the IRON
BRIGADE.  This was the only all-western Brigade.  When it became so
depleated, a, MI reg. was added.
    The Iron Brigade was the outfit that wore the big black hats with the
long feather, a coronet (I think) pin on the front, the side of the hat
folded up with some sort of pin or emblem holding it there.  The hat was
their identifying mark.  I think all the regiments wore something different
for the same reason but you see men from the Iron Brigade more often became
they were stationed at Washington DC for over a year and were paraded out
for visiting dignataries to look at.  The men in the Brigade became more and
more upset with this because they knew their comrades were dying while they
were treated as prima donnas.  But all that changed.
    One other interesting fact about them taken from "Service With The Sixth
Wisconsin Volunteers" by Rufus R. Dawes:

"One of the reviews referred to in the foregoing letters was held at
Bailey's Cross Roads.  The troops were dismissed in the midst of the review,
owing to some reported movement of the enemy, and McDowell's division
marched back, taking the road toward Washington,  to our camp on Arlington
Heights.  With our column rodea a lady visitor; my authority is her own
account.  Our regiment marched at the head of the column, because we stood
on the extreme right of the line.  As we marched, the "evening dews and
damps" gathered, and our leading singer, Sergeant John Ticknor, as he was
wont to do on such occasions, led out with his strong, clear and beautiful
tenor voice, "Hang Jeff, Davis on a sour apple tree."  The whole regiment
joined the grand chorus, "Glory, glory hallelujah, as we go marching on."
We often sang this, the John Brown song.  To our visitor appear the "Glory
of the coming of the Lord," in our "burnished rows of steel" and in the
"hundred circling camps" on Arlington, which were before her.
    Julia Ward Howe, our visitor, has said that the singing of the John
Brown song by the soldiers on that march, and the scenes of that day and
evening inspired her to the composition of the BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC.
***And your cousin, John Wesley St. Clair b. 1840 PA, res. of Juneau Co., WI
was there.
=======

Laurel

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