This version of the website was created in 2025. See the Site Information Page for contact information, data downloads, and other details.
headquarters 125TH Illinois Volunteers, Atlanta, Ga.,
September
7, 1864
.
Sir: In compliance with orders, I have the honor to submit the following report of the part taken by this
command in the recent
campaign, from its commencement, in
May
, until its arrival at Atlanta, on the
4th instant
:
In order for me to make this report nearly accurate I must depend mainly upon the notes of
Col.
O.
F.
Harmon
and
Lieut. Col.
James
W.
Langley
, respectively, commanders of the regiment from the commencement of the campaign until the 1st day of the
present month, when the command fell to me. Forming a part of the Third
Brigade, Second Division, Fourteenth Army Corps, this regiment, commanded by
Col.
O.
F.
Harmon
, numbering 449 effective men, left
Lee
and Gordon's Mills, Ga., on the
3d day of May
last, where it had been doing, in connection with the brigade commanded by Co].
Daniel
McCook
, outpost duty, and marched to Ringgold, where it joined
the division then commanded by
Brig. Gen.
Jefferson
C.
Davis
.
After a day or two of rest at the last-named place the forward march was resumed and continued in until we faced
the enemy before Buzzard Roost.
On the road to this point we skirmished with the retreating foe at different points.
At Buzzard Roost we were most of the time during several days actively engaged with the enemy's skirmishers, but
lost no men.
The regiment participated in the flank movement through Snake Creek Gap,
which move gained Buzzard Roost.
This march was long and tedious, but was borne by all cheerfully and without complaint.
At Resaca we met the enemy and were engaged actively with him.
The regiment occupied a temporary line of works immediately in front
of and but a few hundred yards from the works of the opposing forces.
Here, as in previous instances, every man did his duty, until the flight of the enemy from Resaca, on the night of the 14th [15th] of
May
, opened on the following morning a new field of labor.
An expedition to Rome, Ga., was fitted out for our division, and
on the morning of the 15th [16th] the regiment was detailed, with one section of Battery I, Second Illinois Artillery, to command
and guard the division supply and ordnance train, in rear of the marching column of the division, to that city.
The regiment took no part in the fight at Rome on the
17th
; arrived with its important charge on the following day. Remained at Rome doing various duty until the
24th day of May
, when the entire division took up its line of march toward Dallas; joined the Army of the
Tennessee, to which the division was temporarily attached, near the last-named place on the
26th day of May
.
The next encounter with the enemy was at Dallas, on the night of
the
27th of May
, when we were attacked by a superior force while engaged in relieving the Twenty-second Indiana, who were doing picket duty.
The enemy succeeded in capturing, owing to the unavoidable unadjusted condition of the lines at the moment, 14
enlisted men and I commissioned officer, and wounding 3 others (enlisted men); but this temporary disaster was
quickly, though but partially, compensated by the capture of 1 captain, 1 lieutenant, and 25 enlisted men from
the enemy.
On the following morning the pickets drove the enemy back with a loss of 20 killed and wounded; but 2 men
wounded on our side.
Until we reached Kenesaw Mountain, on the
27th of June
, nothing worthy of note occurred, although we daily faced the foe. At Kenesaw Mountain, on the morning of the
27th of June
, the regiment, in connection with the brigade, formed a part of the attacking column that was on that
day hurled against
the enemy's works.
The One hundred and twenty-fifth Regiment was the foremost in the brigade.
The conflict was short and bloody, and it is painful to record that a repulse to our forces along the entire
line was the
result.
Never fought troops better than on that day, and attention is called to the casualties in this command alone,
which were 120 in the short space of twenty minutes, nearly one-half of which were in the list of killed; and
also that the brigade rallied within sixty yards of the enemy's works, threw up intrenchments under a heavy
fire, and held them until the night of
July
3
, when the enemy evacuated their lines and retreated toward Atlanta.
In the above-mentioned engagement we lost several brave officers and men, chief among whom was the colonel of
the regiment,
of whom it may not be inappropriate here to remark that a braver soldier or more efficient officer in line of
his peculiar
duties the Army of the Union does not contain.
The command at this point devolved upon
Lieut. Col.
James
W.
Langley
, who commanded the regiment through the engagement at the Chattahoochee River,
July
5
, and at Peach Tree Creek, on the
19th of July
, in both of which it was actively engaged, and subsequently until, in the midst of the battle of
Jonesborough,
September
1
, when
Colonel
Dilworth
, brigade commander, was wounded and carried off the field, the command of the brigade devolved upon him
(
Lieutenant-Colonel
Langley
), and that of the regiment upon myself.. During the whole of the engagement at Jonesborough the officers and men behaved with that high courage which marks the
soldier fighting in support of a good cause.
The regiment, while yet under command of
Lieut. Col.
James
W.
Langley
, reached the crest of the hill just in front of a rebel battery, engaged the enemy in the open field,
and contributed greatly
in aiding the Second Brigade, on our left, to scale the enemy's works.
Here they fought with the desperation ~f men determined to win, and they did win, though not until my regiment
had lost 1 officer and 3 men killed, 30 enlisted men woundedsome 6 or 8 of them mortally.
At dark my regiment was formed in line with the Eighty-fifth, Eighty-sixth, and the One hundred and tenth Illinois, when we built a strong line of works.
The troops were marched to Jonesborough and put in temporary
camp.
The regiment and brigade was ordered to Atlanta,
September
4
, in charge of nearly 2,000 prisoners, captured in the Jonesborough fight, and went into camp at this
place, where it now remains, and it is sincerely hoped that, if the campaign is over, it
will remain until, in the opinion of the powers that be, it is needed in the field for active operations.
I respectfully submit and herewith transmit a list of casualties in the command since
May
3
up to the close of this campaign.
In conclusion I would say in behalf of the officers and enlisted men of this regiment, that they, with few
exceptions, most
manfully and soldierly, in every engagement in which the regiment has participated, stood up and faced the foe,
while many
fell dead on the field.
It would be difficult to make special mention of names and do ample justice to all and i justice to none.
A grateful country will reward them all for their noble services.
The survivors of Kenesaw and subsequent battles can never forget
our patriotic dead.
Colonel
Harmon
,
Captains
Fellows
and
Lee
, and
Lieutenant
McLean
fell at the former place, where duty called them.
At Peach Tree Creek,
Lieutenant
Jones
, of Company D, commanding Company B, died as he had lived ��� a true Christian soldier.
Lieutenant
White
, who so nobly fell at the crossing of the Sandtown road,
was loved and respected by all whose good fortune it was to have his acquaintance.
Again, at Jonesborough, the daring and faithful
Captain
Charles
fell in the discharge of his immediate duty.
So with
Sergeant
Thralls
, who for more than two months had commanded Company B:
wounded in the leg during the hottest of the engagement, received his fatal blow from a stray bullet while his
wound was
being dressed.
My confidence in him as a company commander was always firm, because I knew him to be a brave man.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
List of casualties in the one hundred and twenty-fifth regiment
Illinois Volunteer Infantry from
May
3
to
September
6, 1864
.
Zzz
Respectfully submitted.
Geo. W. Cook, Captain, Commanding.