In A Legend is Born at Brawner's Farm, Robert Thompson provides detailed account of the Battle at Second Manassas, where the Iron Brigade earned it's nickname fighting against Stonewall Jackson.
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| Road marker near Juneau City, Wisconsin (Located 5.2 mi south junction Hwy 82 southbound interstate 90-94 Juneau cty WI) |
THE IRON BRIGADE
The Iron Brigade became one of the most celebrated units of the Civil War (1861-1865). Of its five regiments, three came from Wisconsin: the Second, Sixth, and Seventh Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry. (The other two reinvents were, the Nineteenth Indiana and the Twenty-fourth Michigan.) Together, these units ranked among the most gallant and effective of the 3,559 regiments of the Union army.
The Iron Brigade earned its nickname during its first campaign at South Mountian in northern Virginia during the fall of 1862.. It thereafter fought in, all major campaigns of the. Army of the Potomac, the Union's principal force in the eastern. theater of war. The battles Of Second Manassas, Antietam, Gettysburg, -and Spottsylvania. were recorded on the Iron Brigades colors.
Iron Brigade casualties ranked among the highest of the war. The Twenty-fourth Michigan, for example, sustained casualties of 80 percent at Gettysburg, higher thin, any other Union regiment in the battle:- The Second Wisconsin suffered the greatest: percentage of loss of the entire Union army, and during the course of the war, the Seventh Wisconsin had more men killed in battle than any other Union regiment.
Erected 1992
This flag, the National Colors of the 7th Wisconsin, was carried at the Battle of Gettysburg. During the retreat through the town of Gettysburg, Sgt. Daniel McDermott, bearing the National Colors of the 7th Wisconsin, was severely wounded as Confederate canister rounds shattered the flagstaff in his hands. Placing him on a caisson to help him off the field, McDermott's comrades watched as he continued to wave the tattered flag in defiance of the foe. That night the remaining members of the regiment mounted the National Colors to a sapling they cut from their new positions on Culp's Hill.
From the Iron Brigade web site:
The majority of the Iron Brigade was composed of young men from Wisconsin. Three regiments from Wisconsin and one from Indiana were formed in to the best known fighting brigade in the Army of the Potomac. To offset heavy losses, a Michigan regiment was latter added to keep this brigade a uniquely "western" unit. On these pages and links you will find some of the more interesting facts and stories of these regiments -- and the men who lived and died so long ago, but to us, seem only to be just out of reach.
The men of the Iron Brigade first made a name for themselves simply as members of "Rufus King's Brigade". But as commanders and uniforms changed, and the conflict advanced to the war's most critical moment at Antietam, they earned some more titles. The men of the south knew them first as "That damn Black Hat Brigade" and latter to all as the "Iron Brigade" because they "stood like Iron" in the face of withering enemy fire. The truth is, the history of the Iron Brigade begins like a song of glory and victory assumed, and ends with the brigades virtual destruction on the first day of Gettysburg. The men were not of iron, but of flesh and blood and they anointed their nations fields with more of themselves than any other regiment in the Union.
From Wikipedia:
The Iron Brigade, also known as the Iron Brigade of the West or the Black Hat Brigade, was an infantry brigade in the Union Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War. Although it fought entirely in the Eastern Theater, it was composed of regiments from Western states (states that are today considered Midwestern). Noted for its strong discipline, its unique uniform appearance, and its tenacious fighting ability, the Iron Brigade suffered the highest percentage of casualties of any brigade in the war.The nickname "Iron Brigade", with its connotation of fighting men with iron dispositions, was applied formally or informally to a number of units in the Civil War and in later conflicts. The Iron Brigade of the West was the unit that received the most lasting publicity in its use of the nickname.
Brigade nickname
The Iron Brigade initially consisted of the 2nd, 6th, and 7th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiments, the 19th Indiana, Battery B of the 4th U.S. Light Artillery, and was later joined by the 24th Michigan. This composition of men from three Western states led it to be sometimes referred to as the Iron Brigade of the West. They were known throughout the war as the Black Hats because of the black 1858 model Hardee hats issued to Army regulars, rather than the bluekepis worn in most other units.The all-Western brigade earned its famous nickname while under the command of Brig. Gen. John Gibbon, who led the brigade in its first battle. On August 28, 1862, during preliminary phases of the Second Battle of Bull Run, it stood up against attacks from a superior force under Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson on the Brawner farm. The designation "Iron Brigade" is said to have originated during the brigade's action at Turners Gap, during the Battle of South Mountain, a prelude to the Battle of Antietam in September 1862. Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, commanding I Corps, approached Army of the Potomac commander Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, seeking orders. As the Western men advanced up the National Road, forcing the Confederate line all the way back to the gap, McClellan asked, "What troops are those fighting in the Pike?" Hooker replied, "[Brigadier] General Gibbon's brigade of Western men." McClellan stated, "They must be made of iron." Hooker said that the brigade had performed even more superbly at Second Bull Run; to this, McClellan said that the brigade consisted of the "best troops in the world". Hooker supposedly was elated and rode off without his orders. There are a few stories related to the origin, but the men immediately adopted the name, which was quickly used in print after South Mountain....
The brigade took pride in its designation, "1st Brigade, 1st Division, I Corps", under which it played a prominent role in the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg, July 1, 1863. It repulsed the first Confederate offensive through Herbst's Woods, capturing much of Brig. Gen. James J. Archer's brigade, and Archer himself. The 6th Wisconsin (along with 100 men of the brigade guard) are remembered for their famous charge on an unfinished railroad cut north and west of the town, where they captured the flag of the 2nd Mississippi and took hundreds of Confederate prisoners.[5]The Iron Brigade, proportionately, suffered the most casualties of any brigade in the Civil War. For example, 61% (1,153 out of 1,885) were casualties at Gettysburg. Similarly, the 2nd Wisconsin, which suffered 77% casualties at Gettysburg, suffered the 3rd highest total throughout the war; it was third behind the 24th Michigan (also an Iron Brigade regiment) as well as the 1st Minnesota in total casualties at Gettysburg. The Michigan regiment lost 397 out of 496 soldiers, an 80% casualty rate. The 1st Minnesota Regiment actually suffered the highest casualty percentage of any Union regiment in a single Civil War engagement during the battle of Gettysburg losing 216 out of 262 men (82%).