To Fight for God and the Right: The Civil War Letterbooks of Emerson Opdycke

By John Haas, Ohio Historical Society

Presentation to CCWRT on 15 October 2009, Summarized by Mike Rhein

Photography by Shane Gamble

©Cincinnati CWRT, 2009

A letter is a personal missive that can also be a window into a period of a person’s life.

This writer has in his possession a collection of letters written by his father, William Rhein, to his mother (my grandmother) during World War II when he served in the U.S. Merchant Marine. When I have read samples from that collection from time to time, I would be reading my father’s words written by a man in his ‘20’s, going through a multitude of experiences: sailing over many oceans, at times on dangerous convoy duty (including being on ship on the Thames River near London during a raid by Hitler’s Luftwaffe), enduring ferocious storms at sea. My father’s letters helped clarify my perspective of him as a young man in a critical period of his life, encompassing his thoughts and emotions.

So, too, our October speaker, John E. Haas, reference archivist for the Ohio Historical Society, has helped us clarify our perspective of a Civil War soldier through his letters to his wife. Emerson Opdycke, lieutenant colonel of the 125th Ohio Volunteer Regiment, wrote many letters to his wife, Lucy (nee) Stevens from 1861 to 1865. In fact, according to Mr. Haas, who co-edited Opdycke’s letters with Glenn V. Longacre to put in book form (To Battle for God and the Right), there are 300 of them in the OHS collection. He said the title of the book was derived from the last paragraph of Opdycke’s first letter to his wife in August, 1861.

In response to a question asked during a “Q and A” session after his presentation, Mr. Haas noted that the typical themes in the letters revolved around “war news” and comments on “other generals” such as his intense dislike of Union General Alexander McCook (corps commander at the Battle of Chickamauga, Sept. 19-20, 1863) during which Opdycke solidified his fine reputation as an officer in leading the 125th Ohio in a valiant stand on Horseshoe Ridge as part of Gen. George Thomas’s famous rearguard action during which repeated Confederate assaults were repelled, thus saving the shattered Union Army from complete destruction).

Being a father himself, Opdycke, who began the war as a second lieutenant in Company A, 41st OVI (raised in the Cleveland area) would inquire about his son, Leonard: “how is the boy ?,” quoted by Mr. Haas from a sample letter. From time to time, Opdycke, after sustaining wounds in battles such as Shiloh (Tenn.) and Resaca (Ga.) would reassure Lucy that he was all right. For example, Mr. Haas said that Opdycke wrote to Lucy, “I didn’t lose the arm. It’s okay.” However, the speaker also commented that Opdycke, in writing about his horrific experience at the Battle of Franklin (Tenn.) in 1864, during which he led a counterattack near the Carter House in fierce hand-to-hand combat, did not mention “breaking his pistol” in striking a Confederate. In other letters, Mr. Haas commented, Opdycke would describe “camp life” and his routine “throughout the day.”

Like many men who fought in that war, Opdycke held strong opinions. Mr. Haas emphasized that Opdycke early in the war “was not an emancipationist” but by 1864, in a letter to Lucy, he stressed that “the South has to be crushed so slavery can end.”

The speaker gave a good background on Opdycke’s distinguished service record, referring to his rising throughout the war with promotions to captain (Jan., 1862), lieutenant colonel (Oct., 1862), colonel (Jan., 1863), brevet major general, and brigadier general (July, 1865). Mr. Haas referred to a monument that stands at Chickamauga in tribute to Opdycke’s 125th Ohio, noting that the monument is crested by a tiger. Union General Thomas Wood (Opdycke’s division commander), Mr. Haas said, witnessed Opdycke’s heroic leadership of the 125th at Horseshoe Ridge, commenting, “I saw Opdycke’s men fight like Tigers.” The speaker added that Opdycke was on his horse the entire time during that famous stand. Mr. Haas said that Opdycke led a demi-brigade at the subsequent Battle of Missionary Ridge (Nov., 1864), leading the 125th to the top of that ridge. There is also a monument dedicated to that unit at Missionary Ridge, he added.

This writer, in looking up Opdycke’s performance on that fateful day of Sept. 20, 1863 at Chickamauga, quotes from a description by Shelby Foote (The Civil War: A Narrative , Vol. II): “Thomas (Gen. George) rode on, and presently came to one of Harker’s regimental commanders, Colonel Emerson Opdycke. ‘This point must be held,’ he told him. The Ohio colonel agreed. ‘We will hold this ground,’ he said, ‘or go to heaven from it.’” Opdycke was true to his word. His 125th OVI held.

Opdycke was a sterling example of one, who had no previous military training before the Civil War, of the many volunteer officers who, through dedication, courage and hard work, provided outstanding leadership throughout that tragic conflict. In a cruel irony for Opdycke, his end did not come as a result of a rebel bullet (having survived wounds in several fierce battles) but his own after the war. Mr. Haas said that Opdycke ran a dry goods business in New York in his post-war life, “he died through cleaning his gun,” which discharged accidentally, the bullet entering his stomach.

In conclusion, this writer cites from a sample letter in a handout provided by Mr. Haas which illustrates Opdycke’s pride in his men, describing the 125th’s charge in retaking the breastworks at Franklin: “First Brigade forward to the works” (bayonets had already been fixed)……and the bayonets glistened in the sunlight—as they came down to a charge----Thank God the First Brigade formed (?) irresistible, the breastworks were ours, and several hundreds prisoners, and ten rebel battle flags were their trophies.” So, we are too, proud of the many men like Opdycke who stood steadfast to the last, not only in our turbulent national war, but in all other wars in which our American veterans who earned that, as author Stephen Crane termed it, the Red Badge of Courage.