Leavitt, Thomas Joseph

THOMAS JOSEPH LEAVITT. Private 6th Iowa Cavalry, October, 1862; Sergeant-Major; Second Lieutenant, January 31, 1863; died at White Stone Hill, Dacotah Territory, September 4, 1863, of wounds received September 3. THOMAS JOSEPH LEAVITT was the son of Joseph Melcher and Eliza (Yendell) Leavitt, and was born in Boston, October 31, 1840. His father died in 1848, after which his mother removed to Hampton Falls, N. H., and five years later to Woburn, Mass., where she still resides. The son was fitted for college at Rockingham Academy and at the Woburn High School. He entered college in I857, and continued there till December, 1860, when he was offered a situation in the employment of the Burlington and Missouri Railroad Company in Iowa. This offer seemed too good to be refused; and since, in accepting it, he would not be prevented from graduating with his Class, he decided to go. The decision was to cause an entire change in his life. Cambridge with its pleasures, and the home and friends which he dearly loved, were to be left, and he was to occupy a responsible place, in a new country and among new friends. But he was blessed with a happy, buoyant disposition, a hopeful nature, and the rare gift of attracting all people to himself. Add to these graces a strength of will which no difficulties could daunt, and his character appears well suited to his new experiences. A very short and inadequate idea of his Burlington life is all that can be given, and his own words shall give it. "BURLINGTON, IOWA, December, 1860. "Yesterday was such a glorious day that we went off for a long tramp through the woods and over the fields: sitting on fences, eating apples, and wandering here and there till we were tired, the day passed very quickly. And now the week's work has commenced again. I shall pay off this week, and if it is pleasant, next Friday, you can imagine me pegging over the road on a hand-car, and back gain Saturday, instead of walking home from Cambridge, as I was doing a year ago." "March, 1861. "Now what is there for me to think of, when I see the signs of spring, but that I shall soon be at home again? and how often do I consult the almanac, and calculate the months, weeks, and days! May hath thirty-one days, and April thirty, and in sixty-one days I shall be in the happy month of the year; for in that month, though the day and hour are not yet known, I with a light heart shall cross the river for the return trip. You who have considered it hard to be ten or twenty miles from home, can have no idea of being as many hundreds, and to be out of the land of familiar sights and faces. I am interested in my work, and find little time to think of anything but that, save when an occasional thought creeps in of home and you all." "April, 1861. "We are overflowing with excitement here, for we have just received news of the fall of Fort Sumter. I could almost cry over it. We may look for war now immediately, and probably before you read this things will reach a decided form. Our whole village has been at boiling point all this beautiful Sunday. Crowds at every corner; and in this Western-world, where we are somewhat primitive, the feeling is deep: and woe to the man who in these times broaches Secession doctrines! A sturdy Republican is sure to step up and lay him sprawling. I wish I could be in Boston now, for I expect great things of the dear old city. I am sorry enough for war, but I believe we shall have it; and had I the power, I would carry the thing to the bitter end. It is a dreadful thing; but I say, Let it come; for if we live through it, we shall have a stronger government, and possibly a country washed of slavery." In his new career of action he neither forgot nor was forgotten by his college friends. They still remember (in the felicitous words of a classmate) "his genial and neverfailing humor, his quick and grasping intellect, his ready decision, and his modest but firm independence of thought and action, which all combined to form a character of unusual strength and beauty, winning alike love and respect." He returned in June to graduate with his Class. Many of them were about to enter the army, and he desired above all things to be one of these. His mind was filled with the one thought of serving his country, and nothing prevented him from enlisting at this time but the dissuasions of his mother. He returned to Burlington in July, 1861, and remained there till the autumn of 1862; but not a letter was written during this time that did not show his ardor unabated, his earnest longing to engage in the struggle, for the rights and liberties dearest to his heart. Such enthusiastic zeal could only be restrained for a time; the day came when he could be kept back no longer, and he wrote home that he had decided to go, adding: "I am doing what for a long time I have thought my duty, - the thing which first of all you would wish me to do. I know, my dear mother, you would not have me stay here longer when I feel it unmanly so to do." In October, 1862, he enlisted as a private in the Sixth Iowa Cavalry; within a month he was appointed Sergeant-Major and within three months, Second Lieutenant. He went into camp at Davenport, Iowa, in October, and was there during the winter, active and cheerful. Writing to a dear friend about his work, he says: " I glory in it daily. I feel at last I am doing a man's work in the world. Nothing could tempt me to leave it." The same friend tells how he would always go with his men when they had any hard, disagreeable duty to perform, - even if it were not necessary for him to be there,- for he wished them to feel that where they must be, there he was ready to be. The duty assigned to his regiment was that of guarding our broken frontier against the hostile Sioux of Minnesota and Dacotah [sic]. He had expected and hoped to be sent to Tennessee, as will be seen by the following letter. "CAMP HENDERSHOTT, March, 1863. "We have finally received marching orders; and where do you think we are going? To the frontier!!! An effort is being made to have the order changed, which may succeed, and which, I trust, will. We all want to go South. I want to get at the Rebels; that's what I enlisted for; but we are servants of the United States now, and must obey orders." The order was not changed, and the next letter is dated "CAMP KIRKWOOD, IOWA CITY, March, 1863. "We started from Davenport two weeks ago, and with infinite toil accomplished fifty-five miles in twelve days. The day we started was delightfully warm and bright, and we made our first day's march with flying colors, and in great good spirits, along the banks of the Mississippi, through pleasant woods and valleys. At night we made bur first encampment in a pleasant plain surrounded by high bluffs, and pitching our tents laid us down to sleep, persuaded that soldiering was a summer day's sport, and that there was nothing before us but bright days and pleasant wanderings. Alas for our hopes! at four o'clock the reveille for the second day's march sounded, and by six horses and wagons were well packed and the regiment moving. But no warm sun delighted us; and soon a comfortless rain began to fall, and the cold March wind to blow, - the beginning of the equinoctial storm, which pursued us for four days, with a fury which the inhabitants say they have not known for years. Cold, wet, and disconsolate, we dragged through the mud to our second camp, -a hard day's journey of but five miles. Our sorrows did not end here, for our wagons, containing all the provisions, tents, picket-ropes, and the necessaries of life, were hopelessly mired; and for weary hours the men stood in the mud and rain, holding their horses, till details of men could be sent back, with ropes and horses, to haul the teams out. We all thought this day pretty bad, but it was not a circumstance to the two days that followed: rain, snow, and hail soaked us through, the horses floundered in mud knee deep, wagons and mules gave out, and stuck hopelessly in the mud, and some horses, worn out, dropped by the wayside, and perished miserably in the deep sloughs. It was decided that it was impossible to go farther, and we camped in a little town on a bleak prairie, without wood for our fires or sufficient food for men or horses. The rain changed to sleet, and the horses were covered with a perfect sheet of ice. The wind threatened to overturn our tents and the water saturated our blankets. Here we stayed a night and a day, till our camp became uninhabitable, - a sea of mud. The rain ceasing in the afternoon, we moved on to a large forest. Our company were doing guard duty that day, and when I came up with the rear guard, the whole forest was lighted with immense camp-fires, and all comparatively happy. I made a supper off a slice of fat pork, which I roasted on the end of a stick; and then, weary, rolled myself in my blanket, and, without tent or other covering, slept soundly till morning. Our succeeding days' marches were much like these, only there was less rain. It was plain that it was useless attempting to journey, till the weather and roads became settled." "COUNCIL BLUFFS, IOWA, April, 1863. "Our journey since we left Iowa City has been a mere pleasure trip. We reached this place last night; to-morrow we start for Sioux City. I was never better or stronger in my life, and well content, only I should like to see more active service." He had now to endure two months of camp life in Dacotah Territory. His next letter is dated " CAMP ABOVE FORT RANDALL, July, 1863. "I don't know how I can tell you where we are, for really I don't know myself, except that we are about one hundred miles from Fort Randall and fifty from Fort Pierre, on the banks of the 'Big Muddy,' as the Missouri is fairly called. We are certainly as much isolated from the world as it is possible to be, in a wild, barren region, where want of rain and no lack of sun have dried and baked everything brown and bare.... "It seems as if our expedition had been peculiarly unfortunate. The intense heat has so dried up the grass, that unless we come to better grazing our horses must starve. The river has fallen so low that the steamboats have come to a stand still. And worse than all, it is feared that our whole stock of meal is spoiled. The Indians are burning the country north of us, to prevent our progress. Already we have surmounted difficulties which would have conquered many; but General Sully is an old soldier, and if mortal man can be pushed through, we shall go." " ABOVE FORT PIERRE, July, 1863. "Think of this letter travelling over a wilderness of two hundred miles to Fort Randall, in the keeping of a dusky Indian, wrapped in a red blanket and fringed buckskin. If it comes safely to you, you may know he is a good Indian. When we reached Fort Pierre, Major Ten Broeck's battalion received us with open arms, and Company B rushed out with most enthusiastic cheers to receive their Second Lieutenant. To-day we have received news confirming the capture of Port Hudson and reporting that Charleston is burned. Did ever one hear such glorious news? " The mail leaves this noon, and I have but time to assure you of my continued well-being. I am now the wonder of the regiment for health and strength." This was his last letter home. In September a letter received from Colonel Wilson of his regiment thus announced his death:" He fell in a battle in which we were engaged with the Sioux Indians, at a place called White Stone Hill. The battle occurred on the 3d of this month." Fuller intelligence was afterwards received. Major Ten Broeck writes: "It was in the first of the month of August that we commenced our march up from Fort Pierre. I was with your son every day, and he was happy and cheerful. He was away on several scouts, - one, only a few days before the fight. The day of September 3d I was talking and laughing with him when the call was sounded 'To horse,' and then every one was too busy to see what others were doing. I did not see him again till he was brought into camp, wounded. I inquired about him earlier, and learned that he was seen several times on the field, actively engaged driving in the Indians. When the first heavy firing was received, he disappeared, and I can find no one who saw him until morning. When I saw him he was too exhausted to talk, and I got him to rest, and left him, as I supposed, sleeping. In half an hour the Colonel sent for me, saying Leavitt wished to see me. I went, but found him too weak to speak; he took my hand and gave me a look that spoke more than words. It was his last good-by. Sad indeed was that hour, - our first fight, and the pride and flower of the regiment gone. The tent was filled with friends who but a few hours before had shared his danger, and seen man after man fall by his side without emotion; but now not an eye was dry, for one who was dear to all was leaving us forever. He passed away without pain or struggle, as quietly as if falling asleep. "He lies buried in a pleasant spot on the bank of the river, under a large oak-tree, fifteen miles above Fort Pierre." Another friend, writing after his death, says: - " During the whole of our fatiguing march, suffering from many hardships and exposures, Lieutenant Leavitt bore all with such uniform good spirits, and evinced such manly bearing, as to win the love and esteem of the whole regiment. He was especially noticed by General Sully, as well as by the Colonel of our regiment, and recognized on all occasions as a prompt, efficient, and accomplished officer."
He was too modest and simple to wish for fame. Nothing would have been dearer to him than to have deserved this high opinion of a valued friend in Burlington:" We were constantly and intimately together; I learned to know him as one of the truest and best of men. His manhood was of a high and noble kind. We see too few like him not to feel that the loss of one such is a very great loss to all of us. He had the power of making and keeping friends,- real friends. The regret which I hear constantly expressed by those who knew him is real. There was something so kind in his nature that all were attracted and held by it." At the time of his death Lieutenant Leavitt was acting Adjutant of his regiment, a position which, in its first battle, became one of great danger and responsibility. It is not definitely known how he received his mortal wound, for night fell on the conflict before it ended in victory. The courage displayed by him in the daylight encounter and the tragic circumstances of his death increased the respect and affection felt for him by his companions in arms. With much toil they brought his body many miles on their returning march, and laid it in the grave beside the Cheyenne. He did not live to complete his twenty-third year, nor to rejoice at the achieved success of his country in its great struggle. Placed where his duty called him, apart from the main current of the war, and from association with familiar friends, there is something peculiarly pathetic in his brief military career, terminating, as it began, on the outpost of civilized life.