Floridians in the Sunken Road: The 8th Florida at Sharpsburg.

     Slowly the little band of twenty-eight enlisted men and four officers sloshed through the mud over the top of a hill and down into the hamlet of Appomattox Court House. On orders, they halted, front faced, fixed bayonets, and for a final time, stacked their rifled-muskets. Cartridge boxes were removed and placed beside the weapons. Some of their comrades placed their beloved banners across the stacks, but this stalwart band had lost that flag in battle a few days earlier. With the surrender over, the former soldiers made their way back to camp to await their paroles. Later, with prized papers in hand, they started back to their homes.

      Three-and-a-half years had passed since the once 1,122-man-strong regiment had made its way from the piney woods and swamps of Florida to the battlefields of Virginia. Companies from all over the state, including men from Orange, Hillsboro, Duval, and Madison counties, had answered the call from the Confederate government for more volunteers. On May 16, 1862, the companies were mustered into service at Lake City, Florida, and given the designation 8^th Florida Infantry Regiment. Richard F. Floyd, a fifty-two-year-old native of Georgia, was elected colonel.

     Like many units formed after the passage of the first Confederate conscription act, the regiment was almost immediately plagued by desertions. Company B, from Gadsden County and under the command of Captain Robert A. Walker, lost 16 men before the regiment could even leave the state.

     Despite the loss of unwilling soldiers, by early July, the regiment was in Virginia and soon assigned to Roger Pryor’s brigade. Their first taste of combat came during the battle of Second Manassas. Pryor’s brigade was assigned to Wilcox’s division, under the command of Longstreet, and made the march through Thoroughfare Gap to help save the embattled Jackson. During mid-afternoon on August 30, an opportunity arose on Wilcox’s front to destroy a portion of the exposed Federal flank. Wilcox ordered Brigadier General Winfield Featherston to take his own brigade, and Pryor’s, and attack. Much to the dismay of Wilcox, Featherston was slow in moving the two brigades, and nothing came of the action. Later that afternoon, events fell into place and Longstreet attacked.

     Pryor’s men, the 8^th Florida included, were subjected to a severe artillery fire from Dogan Ridge. At 6:00 pm, the brigades of Featherston (on the left), then Archer, Pender, and Pryor, formed for an assault. Pryor placed the 8^th Florida in the front, along with the 3^rd Virginia and 14^th Alabama. Featherston attacked the batteries in the flank while Pryor charged them head on. Many of the Federal gunners fled, and nine cannons were captured. The “Eighth Florida, though never under fire before, exhibited the cool and collective courage of veterans,” Pryor wrote in his official report.

Sunken Road, Sharpsburg 

     Little rest would follow for the men of the 8^th Florida. After participating in the investment of Harper’s Ferry, the regiment marched toward the town of Sharpsburg, Maryland. The regiment, still in Pryor’s brigade but now in Richard Anderson’s division, arrived just after sunrise on September 17, went into a reserve position, and was ordered to rest. Instead of an all-out assault by the Federals on the thin Confederate lines, the battle of Antietam was a series of disjointed attacks. The first had come early that morning on the Confederate left. The Southerners were able to hold, and during mid-morning, the second phase of the battle began, this one aimed at the center of the Confederate line. In this sector, the Confederate defensive line was located in an old sunken road. The area in front of the line was cleared and gradually rose. Behind the sunken road, the ground, planted in corn followed by an orchard, rose steeply. Occupying the old farm lane were regiments from D. H. Hill’s division.

     It is estimated that there were 2,500 men in the sunken lane, being attacked by 7,500 Federal soldiers. The Confederates were soon hard pressed, and General Robert E. Lee committed his only reserves: R. H. Anderson’s division. Anderson brought 3,400 men to the fight. The 8^th Florida was barely in any shape to participate. One officer estimated that there were only 120 men present. Colonel Floyd was seriously ill and had been left behind. Lieutenant Colonel John N. Pons was also out sick, and Major William I. Turner had resigned. Just prior to the battle, General Pryor had placed Lieutenant Colonel Georges Augustus Gaston de Coppens in charge of the 8^th Florida. At the beginning of the war, Coppens had organized a battalion of Zouaves. At Sharpsburg, this Zouave battalion was under the command of his brother, and Georges, being supernumerary, was placed in command of the 8^th Florida.

     Just as Anderson was receiving the orders to advance toward D. H. Hill’s position in the sunken lane, Anderson was wounded in the thigh, and Pryor assumed command of the division. Pryor was unaware of Anderson’s orders. Robert Rhodes, in command of one of the brigades in the sunken road, was at a loss as to the disposition of his reinforcements. He went back to find Pryor and when advised of the situation, Pryor ordered his own brigade, which was positioned on the crest of the hill, to advance. The brigade quickly formed. The 2^nd Florida was on the left, followed by the 8^th Florida, 5^th Florida, 3^rd Virginia, and 14^th Alabama. Colonel John C. Hately of the 5^th Florida was in command of the brigade.

8th Florida

     Pryor’s brigade advanced into the Piper orchard and beyond. As soon as the Confederates became visible targets, the Federals, not having much luck against the Confederates in the lane, turned their fire upon the reinforcements. Federal artillery across the creek did likewise, causing considerable damage. Finding the trees of the orchard and cornstalks did little to stop the combined artillery and small arms fire, the brigade pushed ahead. The color guard of the 8^th Florida was quickly struck down and the flag staff shot in two. Captain Richard A. Waller of Company B took the colors and wrapped them around his body. Lieutenant Colonel Coppens was killed, and Waller assumed command of the regiment, only to be “almost immediately” killed, the regimental banner still draped across his shoulders. Captain William Baya, of Company D, then assumed command of the regiment.

     Even with such a small number of men, growing smaller each moment due to the destructive Union fire, the 8^th Florida surged ahead. The Florida soldiers came in behind the 14^th North Carolina, of George B. Anderson’s brigade. Some of the 8^th Florida fell in with the North Carolinians. Other members of the regiment surged past the sunken lane and engaged the Federals, but “were quickly driven back with great loss...” These brave men joined their comrades in the farm lane.

     Featherston’s brigade came in next, ordered by Pryor to support the three brigades already in the lane. The Mississippians came in behind Pryor and Anderson, but they did not stop in the lane. Colonel Carnot Posey took the Mississippians past the road and engaged the Irish Brigade. They advanced 30 to 40 yards, but after five minutes, were “driven back with great loss.” Fresh Federal troops began arriving. Colonel Posey tried to extract his brigade from the lane in an attempt to alleviate some of the overcrowding. Many men mistook this action as a call for the retreat, and the Confederate line began to collapse.

     Colonel Floyd, who had been left sick with chronic fever and diarrhea in Winchester, arrived on the field as the action of the 8^th Florida was drawing to a close. On September 22, he wrote to Gov. John Milton in Florida of the conditions that he found on the field: “Finally I met several of our poor fellows, coming [off] wounded, some mortally; and asking them for our Regt. they piteously replied [‘]They are all killed, wounded or dispersed[...’ The] remnant of the 8^th Regt... was in the thickest of the fight and were almost annihilated... The next day it was difficult to find any men at all of these Regts except the wounded who were brought off. All our dead remain there unburied.” 

      Casualties for the 8^th Florida during their struggle in the orchard and fields of the Piper farm and in the Bloody Lane are unknown. For the overall Maryland campaign, the regiment had suffered 12 killed and 56 wounded, the highest of the regiments in Pryor’s brigade. If Colonel Floyd was correct about the 120 men present, then the 8^th Florida suffered fifty-seven percent casualties.

     Following the fight at Sharpsburg, Pryor was relieved of brigade command and sent to Richmond. Governor Milton, worried about the condition of the three Florida regiments in the Army of Northern Virginia, asked that they be returned to the Sunshine State to rest and recruit. The petition was denied. However, Lee chose to place the 2^nd, 5^th, and 8^th Florida regiments into their own brigade, and promoted Colonel Edward A. Perry of the 2^nd to command. The new Florida brigade remained in Richard H. Anderson’s division, Longstreet’s corps. Perry, a Massachusetts native, graduate of Yale University, and a lawyer, had moved to Florida in 1857. David Lang, Captain of Company C, was promoted to colonel on September 17 and took command of the 8^th regiment.

     The small regiment continued to render gallant service. At Fredericksburg, on December 11, 1862, the 8^th Florida went to the support of two Mississippi regiments from Barksdale’s command. Fighting in the streets of the town, the regiment, probably numbering 200 men, lost 7 killed, 24 wounded, and 20 captured. Once again they were thrown into the fray at Chancellorsville and earned the praise of General Anderson, who wrote that “Brigadier-General Perry and his heroic little band of Floridians...showed a courage as intrepid as that of any others in their assault upon the enemy in his entrenchments on the third and in their subsequent advances on Chancellorsville.”

      When Lee reorganized his army following Chancellorsville, Anderson’s division became a part of the new Third Corps, commanded by A. P. Hill. Gettysburg followed, with Colonel Lang leading the brigade for an ailing Perry. During the action on July 2 along the Emmitsburg Road, the 8^th Florida’s color bearer, “made himself conspicuous advancing to the front and waving his flag.” The color bearer soon fell, along with his guard, consisting of two corporals. When the 8^th Florida fell back, the flag was not missed, and Sergeant Thomas Horan, of the 72^nd New York, picked the banner up “by the dead color-bearer.”  The 8^th Florida had lost 17 killed and 76 wounded during the fight. After the battle, Lang was only able to report “22 line officers and 233 enlisted men” in his entire brigade.

     The regiment continued to add laurels to its fame, fighting at battles now synonymous with the history of the Army of Northern Virginia. During the Wilderness campaign, General Perry was among the wounded and forced to retire. Colonel Lang commanded the brigade until June 1864, when Perry’s old brigade was consolidated with three new Florida regiments and placed under the command of Olustee hero Joseph Finegan. Finegan’s brigade, now composed of the 2^nd, 5^th, 8^th, 9^th, 10^th, and 11^th regiments, was in Mahone’s division of Hill’s corps. The fighting continued, and the 8^th Florida saw action along the Weldon Railroad, at Reams’s Station, and Hatcher’s Run. Finegan was relieved of command on March 20, 1865, at the request of the Florida governor. Colonel Lang resumed command of the brigade. On April 2, the line of breastworks surrounding Petersburg collapsed, and the 8^th Florida began making its way west with the rest of the once-mighty Army of Northern Virginia. After seeing action at Sailor’s Creek on April 6, where the 8^th Florida’s battle flag was captured by First Sergeant Albert A. Clapp of Company G, 2^nd Ohio Cavalry, the remnants of the regiment moved toward Appomattox Court House and the conclusion of their war.