Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 21, 1993 TAG: 9307210116
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ROBERT FREIS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Long
Recently, an Eagle Scout candidate hacked away some of the underbrush that flourishes atop the graves.
That revealed a broken headstone, toppled by vandals, atop the place where Col. Robert C. Trigg is buried.
His command, the 54th Virginia Infantry, was never keen on military formalities, such as standing in line. They were just country boys - farmers, merchants, tradesmen - who got more than they ever imagined when they volunteered to be soldiers in the 1860s.
Now they lie in perfect alignment, some beneath headstones, many in unmarked graves, in cemeteries near their homes or along the 54th's fateful line of march through the Civil War.
Betty Ann Rice came to know one of them. She inherited an old, faded letter written by a 54th officer that announces the death of her great-great uncle, William J. Caldwell. Caldwell, 19, was marching to battle in 1863 when he got typhoid fever; he died and was buried in a Georgia grave.
Rice grew up in Floyd County hearing relatives tell old war stories about her Civil War ancestors.
Kinfolk knew William died in the war, but never knew where he was buried.
Determined to find him, she followed an investigative path through libraries, archives and museums that led to an Atlanta graveyard - the same where "Gone With the Wind" author Margaret Mitchell is buried.
There, standing above William's headstone, "I literally cried," Rice said. "I'm sure I'm the only one to ever visit his grave."
Historical sleuthing by Rice and her husband, Clive, located William J. Caldwell's grave, and also contributed significantly to a new book about the unit in which 22 of her ancestors fought.
Titled "54th Virginia Infantry," the book is the latest in a series of Civil War regimental histories published by H.E. Howard Inc. of Lynchburg. It's of local interest because the 54th was organized in Christiansburg from young men who lived in Montgomery, Pulaski, Roanoke, Giles, Floyd, Carroll and Craig counties.
Most popular histories of the war focus only on the big picture. Generals personify their armies, and there's little mention of individual soldiers or their units.
Howard's regimental series brings the war closer to the soldier's level, allowing the reader to understand how history was influenced by ordinary people who otherwise might be overlooked.
Of particular value in the 54th Virginia book and others in the series are rosters that list the soldiers and brief service records.
"That's the important part of the book," said Betty Ann Rice. "People buy it because it has grandpa's name in it."
The Rices' investigative leg work on the 54th generated enough data to fill a filing-cabinet drawer. They located information on at least several hundred of the 1,800 men who were William Caldwell's comrades-in-arms.
"We wanted to know who was involved. What happened to them? Where did they go? What did they do?" Clive Rice said.
With a fascination for history but no expertise in research, the Rices, who are retired Roanoke residents, began to trace the 54th about five years ago.
They squinted at reels of microfilm in libraries in search of century-old records.
"Sometimes we'd forget to eat," said Betty Ann.
They tramped famous and obscure battlefields and cemeteries in five states. "It just snowballed," said Clive. "It became personal."
Their work wasn't intended for publication. "I just wanted to have information about the boys for our own sake," Clive said.
Meanwhile, Clive joined the Roanoke Civil War Round Table, a group of historical aficionados, and learned of the Howard series. He contacted the publisher to offer his material on the 54th.
Now, three years later, author Jeffrey C. Weaver writes in the book's foreword that the Rices "saved much research time and considerably improved the production and quality of this volume."
The 238-page book details the regiment's arduous campaigns and hard times.
About 800 men assembled in Christiansburg during the late summer of 1861 to form the 54th. As VMI graduate Trigg was the only member with any military training, he was elected colonel.
Few of them owned slaves. Most lived on small, isolated subsistence farms, and had little in common with the plantation aristocracy of Eastern Virginia and the Deep South - the fledgling nation's power-brokers.
The 54th's motivation for fighting had far more to do with preserving liberty and resisting Northern invaders than protecting the institution of slavery.
Expecting the war to last only a few months, they experienced an extended tour of boredom, exhaustion and terror. After four years of war, only 36 men answered the last roll-call to surrender.
Desiring to protect their homes, the 54th spent most of its time fighting out-of-state, among the few Virginians to serve in the Confederate Army of Tennessee.
A Union soldier compared the 54th to "long-flanked leopard cats."
The pay was $11 per month. They brought their own rifles and ate food so bad that, in the estimation of one soldier, "It was enough to take the worms out of a gasping chicken's throat."
Often the men marched barefoot, even in winter. Disease ravaged the ranks, fed by poor diet and primitive sanitation.
Army life was too much for many members of the 54th, who, lacking a strong philosophical allegiance to the Southern cause, deserted and returned home.
So many went AWOL that the army sent Trigg home to the New River Valley to reorganize the unit. There he found enough members of the 54th to form an unofficial regiment-in-exile.
As long as the fight was close to home, these men were game. They participated in several skirmishes and battles in Southwest Virginia toward the end of the war.
A Carroll County company took its own cure for drudgery by deserting en masse one night in Knoxville, Tenn., and reassembling at a local house of prostitution.
The entire unit was court-martialed, but only the general officer was kicked out of service.
An estimated 550 members of the unit were killed, wounded or captured.
Like most soldiers, they had both good and bad days. The 54th fought valiantly at the Battle of Chickamauga and during the Atlanta Campaign; they ran with the rest of the Southern army at the Battle of Missionary Ridge.
"I can tell you now I am tired of this way of living. I wish I was home with you all," one soldier wrote to his family.
When the end came in 1865, members of the 54th headed home to join others who had already made the trip, unofficially. Some deserters faced shame. Others just tended to their fields, as before.
Trigg, the leader, contracted hepatitis during the war. He died in 1872 and was buried in the Craig Cemetery, which sits on a hilltop surrounded by industrial buildings and a trailer park.
Like Trigg, all members of the unit ended up in the ground, some farther from home than others.
Betty Ann Rice carries little Virginia state flags with her, and places them on the out-of-state graves of 54th veterans she finds.
"Probably some poor fellow whose momma never knew where he was," she said.
by CNB