Capt. Tom Custer poses with his two Medals of Honor.
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Among the Ohio troops that fought at the Battle of Stones River was one Yankee who went on to win two Congressional Medals of Honor.
His last name was a famous one, Custer. He was Thomas Ward Custer, the younger brother of George Armstrong Custer of Little Big Horn fame.
Tom was only 16, and living with his family in Ohio, when Armstrong and another brother, Nevin, went off to war. When illness waylaid Nevin, Tom sought and received permission from his parents to enlist.
On Sept. 2, 1861, he joined the ranks of the 21st Ohio Infantry in Gilead, Ohio. While Nevin predicted he would be rejected, Tom told the recruiting officer he was 18 and his word was accepted. He was soon mustered in with his unit at Findlay, Ohio.
The 21st Ohio was to gain great fame during the Civil War, not due to anything Tom Custer did, but because of the “Great Locomotive Chase,” also called Andrew’s Raid.
James J. Andrews was a civilian spy for the Union Army of Ohio, who devised a raid on the Western and Atlantic Railroad in the spring of 1862.
On April 12, 1862, Andrews, another civilian, William “Bill” Campbell, and 22 volunteers from three Ohio infantry regiments dressed as civilians, hijacked a steam locomotive named The General at Big Shanty, near Kennesaw, Ga.
They headed north, destroying tracks and telegraph wires to slow pursuit and render the railroad useless for supplying the Confederate troops in Tennessee. William Allen Fuller, the conductor of the stolen train pursued the train hijackers on foot, by handcar and the locomotive, “Texas,” which chased The General 51 miles in reverse. After an 87-mile chase, The General lost power just north of Ringgold, Ga.
Andrews and a number of the raiders were captured and executed. Several of the soldiers became the first Americans to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Custer didn’t participate in the raid and spent much of the spring and summer of 1862 guarding and moving Confederate prisoners of war. But Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg’s movement through Tennessee and invasion of Kentucky would soon change things for the 21st Ohio, commanded by Lt. Col. James M. Neibling.
Defeated at Perryville, Bragg fell back to Murfreesboro where he transformed what was once called the Army of Mississippi into the Army of Tennessee. The Union Army was reorganized as well with the army’s new commander, Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans planning the 21st Ohio’s role in combat.
The 21st Ohio was assigned to Col. John Miller’s brigade of Brig. Gen. James S. Negley’s Division and was placed in the Union center commanded by Gen. George H. Thomas. The brigade marched up the Nashville Pike and formed up to the right of Brig. Gen. Thomas L. Crittenden, who commanded the left wing of the Union army.
It was Rosecrans’ plan to let Crittenden lead the attack on the Confederate left, but Bragg struck first at daylight, driving the Union left in a pinwheel action.
As the Union left collapsed, the 21st Ohio was moved up and into a cornfield where they opened fire on the advancing Confederates, but with Brig. Gen. Phil Sheridan’s troops fighting in retreat on their left, Neibling had to move his men back. The 21st, and other units, anchored Sheridan’s deliberate retreat under fire near what is known now as Van Cleve Lane following the bitter fighting in the Slaughter Pen area.
Ultimately, the Ohio troops formed part of Rosecrans final line of defense near the Nashville and Chattanooga railroad and next to the Chicago Board of Trade artillery battery.
The 21st saw action again on Jan. 2, 1863 on the second day of Stones River. The 21st was ordered to ford icy Stones River and to end the threat posed by Gen. John C. Breckinridge’s charge.
Breckinridge was repulsed by Union infantry and heavy artillery fire from Mendenhall’s 52-cannon battery overlooking McFadden’s Ford. Stones River was over for the 21st Ohio, with 24 killed, 109 wounded and 26 missing.
Custer was reassigned as an escort “orderly” for General Negley following the battle. This was a hazardous, horseback assignment that involved scouting enemy positions and transporting important messages during the heat of a battle in unfamiliar territory in addition to serving as security for Negley.
The young horseman got caught up the chaos that was Chickamauga. Negley, suffering from an illness, pulled out of the fight and retreated to Rossville. A subsequent inquiry cleared Negley, but Custer missed out on the action, which found his old regiment, the 21st involved in the terrible fighting at Snodgrass Hill.
With Negley relieved of duty, Custer served as an orderly at Chattanooga and Missionary Ridge with Gen. U.S. Grant and with Maj. Gen. John Palmer during the Atlanta Campaign. He also served escort duties with Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas, Maj. Gen. Jefferson C. Davis and Maj. Gen. William S. Sherman.
Custer was promoted to corporal while with Sherman where he received news from his brother Armstrong. Tom mustered out of the Union Army of the Tennessee in October 1864 and accepted a commission as a first lieutenant with Company B of the 6th Michigan Cavalry. He became his brother’s aide-de-camp and accompanied him throughout the last year of the war.
Just barely 20 years old, Custer distinguished himself by winning successively the brevets of captain, major and lieutenant colonel.
He was awarded two Medals of Honor for capturing Confederate regimental flags (at Namozine Church on April 3, 1865, and again at Sayler’s Creek on April 6, 1865). He was one of only four soldiers or sailors to receive the dual honor during the Civil War, and one of just 19 in history.
An eyewitness account at Sayler’s Creek said:
“Custer crossed the line of temporary works on the flank of the road, where his unit was confronted by a supporting battle-line. In the second line he wrested the colors from an enemy color bearer. Advancing on another standard he received a shot in the face, which knocked him back on his horse. Despite his wounds, he continued his assault on the color bearer who began to fall from wounds he had also received. As he fell, the wounded Lieutenant Custer reached out to grasp this second standard of colors, bearing both off in triumph.”
Following the Civil War, both Custer brothers continued to serve with the U.S. Army, but at lesser ranks. Named a brigadier general of volunteers at age 23, Armstrong had risen to the rank of major general by the end of the war. His rank reverted to lieutenant colonel of the 7th Cavalry, a fact that rankled him.
Tom was wounded in the Washita campaign of the Indian Wars in 1868 and participated in the Yellowstone Expedition of 1873, where he fought in the Battle of Honsinger Bluff and the Black Hills Expedition of 1874.
In 1874, at Standing Rock Agency, Custer participated in the arrest of the Lakota Rain-in-the-Face for the 1873 murder of Dr. John Honsinger.
In 1875 he was promoted to captain and given command of Co. C of the 7th Cavalry, but during the Little Bighorn campaign, he served once more as an aide-de-camp to his brother. Lt. Henry Harrington actually led Co. C during the Custers’ last battle.
Both Tom and Armstrong Custer were killed at Little Bighorn, along with a third brother, Boston Custer, and other family members and friends.
Tom’s body was heavily mutilated and was only identifiable by a tattoo of his initials. It was widely rumored that Rain-in-the-Face, who had escaped from captivity and was a participant at the Little Bighorn, had cut out Tom Custer's heart as revenge.
Initially buried on the battlefield, Tom’s body was exhumed and reburied at Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery. |
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