War Behind the Lines

Seldom told is the story of soldiers who fought to protect the vital supply lines that brought ammunition, food, clothing, medicine, equipment and provisions to the front-line troops.

The 115th Ohio Regiment was given the onerous task of guarding and protecting some 60 miles of the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad, the single-track line supplying Union General William T. Sherman's western army of some 100,000 soldiers.

Because of the rear-guard duty, the men of the 115th were often maligned by front line soldiers who called the regiment "feather bed soldiers" and other epitaphs-soldiers who were worthy of no respect. But respect and honor came to the 115th Regiment from the mouths of Confederate muskets and cannons.

At times tedious, and at times deadly, the soldiers of the 115th Regiment did their duty protecting the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad. Stationed in a dozen blockhouses and stockades, the men fought against Confederate bushwhackers, guerrillas, cavalry and infantry, all of whom were hell-bent on destroying the road.

General Sherman confessed that his "perfect success" of the capture of Atlanta, Georgia would have been impossible without the essential daily 1,600 tons of supplies the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad sent to his army. The long roll call of the 115th Regiment's dead and wounded gives truth to the statement that the 115th Ohio Regiment "protected the soldiers at the front by protecting the rear."

The story of the 115th Regiment covers recruitment, training, quelling of antiwar protests and draft riots, defense of the railroad, daily camp life and routines, Tennessee's guerrilla warfare, captured soldiers of the Regiment imprisoned at Andersonville and Cahaba prisons, the Sultana Steamboat tragedy (America's worst maritime disaster), a regimental roster, index, and period images.