b'dismissal, and they were now approaching Peachtree Creekgain his assent. However, the younger Stevens needed an on the outskirts of Atlanta. Hood envisaged a plan where hisimmediate, positive response, otherwise, the commission forces, two corps totaling over 20,000, would charge rightwould be offered to someone else. Not waiting to hear from out of the woods and smash the Union Army as it was stillWilliam, Jack McCaskey told Stevens that on behalf of his in the process of getting across the creek. brother he would take the commission - coming home, William McCaskey was stunned - and pleasantly surprised on Hood had originally planned to execute his attackobtaining a commission as a lieutenant in the 13th Infantry, at 1 pm on the afternoon of July 20, 1864, but due tothen based out at Fort Randall along the Upper Missouri miscommunication between him and one of his corpsRiver near the South Dakota-Nebraska line, thus beginning a commanders, the brilliant tactician William Hardee, whostraight over 40-year career in the Regular US Army.deeply resented Hood, the attack didn\'t get underway until 4 pm that afternoon. Hood also failed to make aBEGINNING SERVICE WITH THE "OLD ARMY"reconnaissance of the Union works, which led to heavyAccording to acclaimed Historian Gene Smith, in his casualties and a stalling of Hardee\'s advance. But on thebiography of McCaskey\'s contemporary John J. Pershing, extreme left of the Union line, the charge of GeneralMcCaskey reported to higher commandthe post Civil War United States Army, and its officer corps Alexander Stewart\'s Corps was much more successful,witnessing (on the very day of Custer\'sof former Union (and later Confederate) Army re-threads having dented and initially broken the ground held bydemise) a movement of Sioux and/orwere comprised of "fewer than twenty-five thousand usually Major General John Palmer\'s 14th Union Army Corps, semi-literate enlisted men, a large percentage Irish or of which McCaskey\'s 79th Pennsylvania was a part of. Cheyenne past the outskirts of FortGerman-born, and some two-thousand officers. Anyone The air was thick with musket and cannon fire, of Lincoln, going northwest towards theabove the rank of lieutenant was a Civil War veteran regiments charging back and forth along the wooded camps of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. spinning out the long years since the days when the army creek bed, with occasional bouts of fierce and bloody was the "Boys in Blue" who saved the Union. One could be hand-to-hand fighting. Soon though, the Union line verging on forty years\' service, have commanded a regiment was able to hold, and Palmer\'s divisional commandersMcCaskey would stay with the 79th, through the fallat Gettysburg (*as McCaskey\'s contemporary then-colonel called for local counterattacks against the of Atlanta and Sherman\'s March to the Sea. He wouldand subsequent Major General John Brooke did - author) stopped-in-their-tracks Confederates. participate in the desperate fighting at Bentonville, thewhile holding temporary wartime ran, led charges at last major battle of the Western Theater, and would beLookout Mountain, or seen Lee at Appomattox - and now One of these local counterattacks on the Confederate line wasmustered out on July 26, 1865, over three months afterbe a gray-haired captain each morning inspecting horses\' led by none other than Captain William Spencer McCaskeythe surrender of the Confederate Army of the Tennesseehooves" (Smith, Gene, Until the Last Trumpet Sounds: The and the 79th Pennsylvania. Despite a steady fire on his men,at Durham Station, North Carolina. He would see actionLife of General of the Armies John J. Pershing, John Wiley & Captain McCaskey showed no hesitation as he urged his menin over 28 major battles, but miraculously would never beSons, New York, 1998, p.27, see also, Rockman, Forty Miles forward into the brush. Under the young captain (he was butwounded, and outside of a brief furlough home followinga Day on Beans and Hay, Arizona Real Country Magazine,20 years old) the 79th was able to sweep over the Confederatethe November 1863 assault on Missionary Ridge, he wouldApril 2020, p. 45 Flipbook (arizonarealcountry.com).skirmish line, take their works, drive them back, and securenote"From the 19 April 1861 until July 26, 1865 ( I ) was the Union line. Observing the advance of McCaskey and hisalmost continuously in the service" (Ibid., p.30). And the recently married McCaskey (he had married men, Colonel Marshall Moore of Palmer\'s 1st Division noteda Nellie Garrison, a pretty but sometimes emotional that the 79th (and the nearby 69th Ohio regiment) "made aMcCaskey was an open admirer of President Lincoln andlady who, as will be noted during a critical period of splendid charge" that ultimately drove Stewart\'s Corps backhaving personally observed the bravery and determinationMcCaskey\'s life would not share all of McCaskey\'s to their original assault line (Ibid., p.24). Peachtree Creekof Black soldiers,he would be a foremost advocate of theenthusiasms for Army service) would find himself serving would cost the Union forces 1900 dead and wounded, therecruitment and the service of Black soldiers. He wouldat Fort Randall under one of these former Civil War line Confederates, 2,500.remain a steady and strong advocate of Black servicemenofficers, Major Hiram Dryer. His duties, mundane as they up to the end of his career, when he, initially voicing hiswere, were to oversee the Sioux prisoners of the bloody The surprise attack failed in great part due to the gallantrysupport of one of his Black regiments accused of rioting,1862 Minnesota Uprising who were then incarcerated of McCaskey and the 79th (as did several more the recklesswould personally end up at loggerheads with anotherat Fort Randall. McCaskey was said to be sympathetic Hood pushed out before Atlanta\'s fall). But Moore andpresident he admired, having seen him upfront as a fellowtowards his wards, a sympathy, which under the increasing Hambright failed to recommend McCaskey for anysoldier in the Spanish-American War. That president\'sfrontier violence as white and red men clashed, would higher decoration or even a battlefield commission, quitename was Theodore Roosevelt. soon be tempered to a sort of frontier realism. When unlike the better fate of 30th Indiana Infantry companyDryer died of pneumonia less than a year later, McCaskey commander and fellow Stones River and ChickamaugaBut we anticipate matters. For now, McCaskey was justand his company were transferred to the 20th Infantry veteran (then) Captain Henry Lawton, and while Lawton,another dismissed soldier, wondering what lay ahead.and to Fort Rice, a bit further north along the Missouri who would later become famous for his pursuit ofTrying to adjust to civilian life, McCaskey enrolled in awhere he was put in charge of recruiting Indian scouts. Geronimo and his exploits as a Brigadier General in thebusiness college in nearby New York. Not exactly thrilledAt Fort Rice (which several years later would become a San Juan Hill campaign in the Spanish-American Warwith the prospect of going into business, he was stillsecondary base for a 7th Cavalry he would soon be making (before, as a Major General, being shot out of the saddlespinning his wheels, the taste of new lands and adventurethe acquaintance of), he had an opportunity to see active and killed during the Philippine Insurrection) would almostthat he, (like the fictional Lieutenant Zeb Rawlingsservice as the Red Cloud uprising had just broken out but immediately be recommended - and receive the Medal of(George Peppard) in "How the West was Won") haduntil his fateful assignment at Fort Abraham Lincoln nine Honor, McCaskey received no such recognition even thoseexperienced fighting south and west, still in his mouthyears later, McCaskey would never engage a hostile in all of his immediate commanders did attest to his battlefielduntil a fortuitous encounter between his budding politicobattle - and not even then!bravery, and the second-in-command of the regiment,brother Jack and the namesake nephew of the famed a Lieutenant-Colonel Miles, would strongly urge hisThaddeus Stevens would change all that - and point theThe years went by like a runaway train. McCaskey yearning promotion to major in the Regular Army - but to no avail. way to a future Army career). for active service and promotion did get the promotion to captain of the 20th Infantry in the autumn of 1871, but not McCaskey would NOT even petition for the Medal ofYoung Thad Stevens had approached Jack McCaskey onthe active service engaging the hostiles. Yet the mundane Honor for his role in the Battle of Peachtree Creek untilbehalf of his uncle. The Congressman was able to offer agarrison life remained agreeable to McCaskey, until one almost 35 years later, in 1899 - and would be denied almostregular commission in the truncated post-war Regularfateful day in April 1876 when the 32-year-old captain and immediately.Perhaps it had been too late, or maybeArmy to anyone Jack McCaskey could name, and withouthis 20th Infantry Company received an urgent summons because even then, McCaskey, a loyal soldier, would neverhesitation, Jack McCaskey, perhaps mindful of his brother\'sto move upriver to Fort Abraham Lincoln (North) Dakota stop criticizing what he perceived were wrongdoings andrestless spirit, recommended him and offered to notifyTerritory, just outside of Bismarck. The Sioux were on the failures of higher command. his brother, up at the business school in Poughkeepsie towarpath, and the fort commander, a colonel of the 7th Cavalry who had been chomping at the bit to have a go at Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, had finally gotten his wishes McCaskey was said to be sympathetic towards Siouxand his orders for the 7th to be deployed against the Sioux.prisoners, a sympathy, which under the increasingHis name? George Armstrong Custer. And with the 7th sent to active duty on the field, a force of infantry was required to protect the fort\'s dependents, the sutlers, and frontier violence as white and red men clashed, wouldother civilians and non-active duty servicemen remaining behind at the fort. soon be tempered to a sort of frontier realism.Pick up our May issue for Part 2.ArizonaRealCountry.com April 2022 19'