President Abraham Lincoln was concerned about his
re-election chances in 1864. The country
was in the middle of a terrible Civil War that had claimed the lives of hundreds
of thousands of citizens in the last three years. Despite victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg
the previous year there still seemed to be no end in sight for the war. Many people did not agree with Lincoln’s conciliatory
attitude towards the rebel states.
Others believed that he had gone too far when he issued the Emancipation
Proclamation effectively turning the war from a campaign to save the union into
one whose purpose was to abolish slavery.
Absolutely no one liked the draft.
In short, Lincoln needed votes and his
thoughts turned to Florida.
Florida
had become the 27th State on March 3, 1845. It entered the union as a “slave state” and
was highly dependent upon slave laborers for its agrarian economy. Almost half of Florida’s entire population was slaves who
worked on large plantations. In 1861, Florida seceded from the union and became one of the
original founders of the Confederate States of America.
Now in the third year of the Civil War, northern forces had
captured or blockaded most of Florida’s
port cities. Fort
Clinch and the Port
of Fernandina on Amelia Island
were captured in March, 1862. Others in
Union control were Key West, Pensacola,
St. Augustine and Jacksonville.
In addition to the strategic advantage these occupied ports provided
they were also a haven for a large number of Confederate deserters, escaped
slaves and Union sympathizers.
Although most of the Florida
coastline was secured by the Union, the
interior still very much belonged to the Confederacy. The plantations in central and north Florida
provided Confederate troops with much need supplies, including beef, pork,
corn, and molasses. This supply line
became especially important when the Union forces took control of the
Mississippi River cutting off the supply of cattle from Texas.
This article is reprinted from the book
South of the Saint Marys River - Stories from the History of Northeast Florida
Back in Washington DC
President Lincoln’s thoughts turned to Florida. If the Union
could control the whole state it would cut off the rebel’s main food
supply. Such a mission could also enlist
more freed slaves and Union sympathizers into the United States Army, which was
experiencing manpower shortages. Both of
these moves would strengthen the Union’s
position and hopefully help bring about an end to the war. In a best case scenario, Florida
would be brought back into the Union as a state and its electoral votes could help
with Lincoln’s
re-election.
The plan to re-take Florida
was a go. On January 13, 1864 Lincoln wrote to the commander of the Department of the
South, Major General Quincy Gillmore, asking him to conduct a campaign to
“reconstruct a loyal State Government in Florida.” In turn, Gillmore appointed General Truman
Seymour to carry out the expedition.
 |
| General Truman Seymour |
General Seymour set sail from Hilton Head, South Carolina, with a force of six thousand
troops including infantry, cavalry and artillery brigades. They landed at Jacksonville on February 7, 1864 and found
the city and surrounding countryside largely deserted and undefended. Over the next several days the Union Army
conducted short raids into the countryside where they found little resistance
from the war-weary inhabitants. Even Camp
Finegan, a Confederate outpost about
eight miles outside of Jacksonville,
was quickly abandoned in the wake of the approaching force. It appeared that the invasion was going to be
relatively painless.
General Seymour, who had a reputation both as an
accomplished commander and one prone to rash decisions, saw the successful
incursions as a sign that Florida
would offer little resistance. Although
under orders to not venture beyond the Little St. Marys River, about thirty
miles west of Jacksonville, he made the decision
to march his men across northern Florida and
take the capital city of Tallahassee. The first objective would be to destroy the
railroad bridge across the Suwannee River at Columbus. On February 17 Seymour’s troops set out on their westward
journey.
Seymour’s
men initially encountered almost no resistance.
At the time there were only about 1200 Confederate soldiers defending
all of East Florida under the command of General
Joseph Finegan. Aware of the Union advance, General Finnegan ordered his
scattered Confederate troops to gather at Lake City
hoping to stop, or at least slow down, the invaders.
Even in the 1800s the movement of a large number of troops
by sea from Hilton Head to Jacksonville
then marching eastward could not be kept secret, and the Confederate hierarchy
took notice. The Governor of Florida,
John Milton, urgently requested help from the Confederate Department of War in Richmond, Virginia. General P.G. Beauregard, commander of all of
the Confederate forces in the southeast, was already rushing reinforcements
having guessed correctly that Union General Seymour would overstep his orders
and make a play for the capital. On February 18, four regiments of Georgia and South Carolina
troops arrived in Lake
City having traveled
forty-eight hours by train and on foot.
There were now approximately 5500 Union troops vs. about 5200
Confederates.
 |
General Joseph Finegan
|
General Finegan repositioned his newly refortified troops at
Olustee Station, along the road and parallel railroad tracks that ran from
Jacksonville to
Tallahassee. There, between a lake to the north (Ocean
Pond) and swamps to the south, they constructed earthen defenses and awaited
the arrival of the Union force. General
Seymour was unaware of the Confederate troop concentration and, given that his
men had easily defeated small raids from Confederate civilian loyalists,
assumed that they would encounter little meaningful resistance along their
route.
On the morning of February 20, the Union troops continued
their march westward from their encampment at Barber’s Plantation
(now the town of MacClenny.) When Finegan learned of their approach he
ordered a cavalry party forward. Their
orders were to engage the enemy and lure them into the trap which had been set
at Olustee Station. In the early
afternoon, the advance force encountered the Union soldiers about two miles
east of the station.
That is when General Finegan’s plan went awry. Instead of drawing the Union forces into a
chase, the Confederate advance party found themselves in a full blown
firefight. Finegan was forced to commit
more of his troops. Seymour did the same not realizing the
strength, fighting prowess and determination of the Confederates.
This article is reprinted from the book
South of the Saint Marys River - Stories from the History of Northeast Florida
The battle raged on for the next four hours leaving carnage
on both sides. In the confusion some
Union orders were misunderstood and one regiment fell back. Others were moving forward at the same time
and the two groups collided, making either advancing or retreating
difficult. The Union
took severe losses from Confederate gunfire and artillery for two hours.
Realizing that he could not win, General Seymour ordered his
troops to retreat. He sent the 1st
North Carolina Colored Volunteers and the 54th Massachusetts (an all black regiment which
was later featured in the movie Glory starring Denzel Washington) to defend the
line as the others fell back. What was
left of these units eventually managed to withdraw from the battlefield and
rejoin the rest of the troops back at Barber’s Plantation.
 |
1st North Carolina Colored Volunteers
|
The Confederate soldiers did not immediately pursue the
retreating Union soldiers because they were busy executing the approximately
fifty wounded black Union soldiers who remained. By one account, when a Confederate officer
asked why there was still shooting going on he was told by a soldier, “Shooting
niggers, Sir. I have tried to make the
boys desist but I can’t control them.”
One Union soldier later described the scene: “I managed to crawl into a bush, where I
could see the rebels come to our wounded and take their money, watches and
whatever they found on their persons.
The wounded negroes they bayoneted without mercy. Close beside me was a fine looking negro who
was wounded in the leg. A rebel officer happened
to see him and says ‘Ah, you black rascal, you will not remain here long!’ and
dismounting from his horse, placed his revolver close to the negro’s head and
blew his brains out.”
By nightfall, the Union troops were back at Barber’s Plantation. The Confederate pursuit of the retreating
army was lackluster and most of the enemy that had survived the battle itself
had made it back to camp safely.
The defeated Union forces still had to march the 46 miles
back to the safety of Jacksonville. Two days after the battle, while en route,
they received word that the train carrying their wounded broke down. The 54th Massachusetts was ordered to reverse course
and aid the stranded soldiers, who would have been easy prey for the
Confederates. Upon arrival, they noted
that the locomotive was inoperable, so they tied ropes to the train and dragged
it entirely by hand for three miles to the previously captured Camp Finegan. There, they attached horses and together,
pulled the train of wounded another eight miles to Jacksonville.
The entire operation took forty two hours of backbreaking work.
The Battle of Olustee resulted in thousands of dead and
injured on both sides. In the end 203 Union soldiers were killed
(including 84 from black regiments), 1152 were wounded and 506 were
missing. Confederate casualties were 93
killed, 847 wounded and 6 missing. In
all, casualties amounted to over twenty-five percent of everyone who
participated in the battle.
President Lincoln’s desire for Florida
to be reunited with the Union was dead. Although, the north held Jacksonville
and other cities, there were no more major battles in the state and Florida remained part of
the Confederacy until the end of the war.
Luckily for Lincoln, the political tide
had turned because of several other Union victories and he no longer needed the
extra votes that Florida
may have provided. He was re-elected
with ninety-two percent of the electoral vote.
When Lincoln
was asked about the prospect of returning escaped slaves to their owners as a
gesture of reconciliation with the south he stated emphatically, “There have been
men who have proposed to me to return to slavery the black warriors of Port
Hudson and Olustee to their masters to conciliate the south. I should be damned in time and in eternity
for so doing. The world shall know that
I will keep my faith to friends and enemies, come what will.”
The Civil War came to a conclusion the following Spring
when, on April 9, 1865 Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union
General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.
In 1866 a United States Army detachment was sent to the Olustee
battlefield to account for the graves of Union soldiers. Upon arrival they found that because most of
the soldiers had been hastily buried in shallow graves, animals were able to
dig up the bodies. There were bones of
the deceased scattered all around the site.
The detachment spent several days collecting all of the bones that they
could find and buried them in a mass grave.
A twelve foot high wooden monument was erected over the grave with the
inscription “To the memory of the
officers and soldiers of the United States
Army who fell in the Battle
of Olustee February 20, 1864.”
Over time, the wooden Union monument deteriorated, and the
land returned to its natural state. In
1909 at the urging of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, the Florida legislature acquired
three acres on which to build a memorial.
The memorial was unveiled in 1912 and reads, “To the men who fought and triumphed here in defense of their homes and
firesides. This monument is erected by
the United Daughters of the Confederacy aided by the State of Florida in
commemoration of their devotion to the cause of Liberty and State Sovereignty.” Many Confederate war veterans attended the
ceremony including Confederate General Evander Law who told the crowd “When you
cease to honor your heroes, you cease to produce them.” The Confederate monument was declared as Florida’s first historic
site.
 |
Dedication of Confederate Monument
|
Today, there is still no monument dedicated to the Union
soldiers who perished. The only Union
memorial is located in a privately-owned and mostly black cemetery adjacent to
the battlefield. In 2013 the Sons of
Union Veterans of Florida sought permission to erect a monument on the
battlefield site. Their request was met
with great outcry from Confederate descendants who viewed it as insulting to
the memory of their ancestors and permission was denied.
The Olustee battlefield became a Florida State Park
in 1949. Today, there is a visitor’s center
along with a walking trail with interpretive markers to educate the public
about the battle. Every year since 1977
a reenactment of the battle takes place that attracts thousands of spectators
and participants. In addition to the
reenactment itself, the event features demonstrations of living in authentic
Civil War camps. At night, there is a
grand ball where attendees dress in their finest period attire and dance the
night away to the sounds of a brass and string band playing popular songs of the
era.
The Battle of Olustee serves as a reminder of the terrible
cost of war. Men from both sides
suffered horrific losses on the blood-soaked field in Northeast
Florida. It is the story of
black soldiers, poorly trained and far from home, courageously defending the
unity of the United States
of America.
It is the story of resistance against invaders intent on disrupting a
sovereign state’s way of life and the brutality that men are capable of in
order to preserve it. In the end, while
the Union forces were defeated, there were no true victors, as the ghosts of
dead would surely attest.
This article is reprinted from the book
South of the Saint Marys River - Stories from the History of Northeast Florida
