Hugh Boyle Ewing - Civil War

Civil War

In April 1861, Governor William Dennison appointed Ewing as the brigade-inspector of Ohio volunteers. He served under Rosecrans and McClellan in western Virginia. Ewing became colonel of the 30th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in August 1861. He was later promoted to Brigadier General, November 29, 1862, and major general by brevet in 1865.

In November 1861, when his brother-in-law William T. Sherman was relieved of his command in disgrace, Ewing aided his younger sister Ellen Ewing Sherman in making the rounds of Washington D.C., denying sensationalist media claims that Sherman was insane, and personally lobbying the President for Sherman's reinstatement. Ewing and his sister argued that Sherman's requests for men and material in Kentucky had been denied in Washington, and that the charges of insanity had been part of a conspiracy orchestrated by Adjutant General Lorenzo Thomas. Eventually the political influence of the Ewing family persevered, and with the assistance of Henry Halleck, Sherman was returned to command. President Abraham Lincoln praised Sherman's "talent & conduct" publicly to a large group of important officers, and later banished Thomas to a meaningless post on recruiting duty in the Trans-Mississippi Theater.

Under McClellan, Ewing commanded a regiment and then a brigade in the Kanawha Division in the IX Corps. In the Battle of South Mountain, he led the assault which drove the enemy from the summit; and at midnight of that day, he received an order placing him in command of the brigade of Colonel Eliakim P. Scammon, who was in temporary command of the Kanawha division after its commander Major General Jacob D. Cox had been elevated to command of the IX Corps, replacing the fallen Major General Jesse Lee Reno who was killed earlier that day. At Antietam his brigade was placed upon the extreme left of the army, where, according to the report of the commander of the left wing, General Ambrose Burnside, "by a brilliant change of front he saved the left from being completely driven in."

After Antietam, Ewing was placed on sick leave because of chronic dysentery. He transferred West and served throughout the campaign before Vicksburg, leading the assaults made by General Sherman; and upon its fall was placed in command of a division in the XVI Corps. At Chattanooga, he was given command of the 4th Division of the XV Corps, which formed the advance of Sherman's army and carried Missionary Ridge. Prior to the Battle of Chattanooga, Ewing's command led a diversionary raid that resulted in the destruction of the Empire State Iron Works in Dade County, Georgia, which was being refurbished to increase the South's manufacturing capability. Sherman considered Ewing his most reliable division commander.

In the aftermath of Vicksburg, Ewing's command wrecked Confederate President Jefferson Davis's Fleetwood Plantation, and Ewing turned over Davis' personal correspondence to his brother-in-law, Sherman. However, Ewing also sent copies of the letters to a few people he had known in Ohio, which, after the documents were published, permanently sullied the reputation of former President Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire. Their release coincided with that of Pierce's book, Our Old Home. As early as 1860, Pierce had written to Davis about "the madness of northern abolitionism", and other letters uncovered stated that he would "never justify, sustain, or in any way or to any extent uphold this cruel, heartless, aimless unnecessary war", and that "the true purpose of the war was to wipe out the states and destroy property."

In October 1863, Ewing was placed in command of the occupation forces in Louisville, Kentucky. He was unfortunate enough to serve during Maj. Gen. Stephen Gano Burbridge's "reign of terror," where martial law was declared several times. On August 11, 1864, Burbridge ordered soldiers from the 26th Kentucky to select four men to be taken from prison in Louisville to Eminence, Kentucky, to be shot for unknown outrages, and on August 20, several suspected Confederate guerrillas were also to be taken from Louisville and executed. General Ewing declared their innocence and sought a pardon from Burbridge, but he refused to give the pardon and the men were shot.

In his autobiography, Ewing describes an incident in October 1862 with Colonel Augustus Moor, who had struck a member of Ewing's regiment with his sword when the enlisted soldier had fallen out of a march. Ewing immediately confronted Moor. In his own words:

He was at the table with his Staff and Colonels, drinking Ohio wine from long-necked bottles, and smoking, and presented quite an old-time German scene. I Told him I would not tolerate the German custom of treating common soldiers, if applied to my men, by any officer. I preserved discipline by taking care of my troops, collectively and individually.

— Hugh Boyle Ewing

Colonel Moor quickly apologized. While General Ewing respected the discipline of the German regiment, he preferred a different atmosphere in his own command, better suited to Americans. He was capable of recognizing the military tradition of other units while accommodating the unique needs of his own. General Ewing was ordered to North Carolina in 1865, and was planning an expedition up the Roanoke river to co-operate with the Army of the James, when Lee surrendered.

In 1864, Ewing suffered an attack of rheumatism, and received treatment several times thereafter, often being confined to his chair. He was likely prostrated with illness as Commander of Louisville during Burbridge's madness in Kentucky. After leaving the Army, he experienced painful attacks for the rest of his life, often bedridden for periods of up to forty days.