St. Charles is small, but its historic contributions are monumental.
Hop in for a ride to this Arkansas County town of 207, which sits along Arkansas 1 on the west bank of the White River. We'll visit a memorial to those who died in a horrendous Civil War engagement, and, as a bonus, drop in a museum and learn about a hero with St. Charles ties.
I meet up with Glenn Mosenthin of Searcy at a parking lot in Scott on a Friday morning in January. He grew up in Broken Arrow, Okla., but spent summers and part of his high school years with his Stuttgart grandparents. Among many other things, he is a board member of the Arkansas Historical Association, has written extensively about his beloved Arkansas County and wrote the Encyclopedia of Arkansas entry on St. Charles (see arkansasonline.com/26entry).
We first drive to Stuttgart to visit some of his old haunts and then head for a great grill in DeWitt, Kelly's on the Square, which, as you might guess, sits on the town square just across the street from one of Arkansas County's two courthouses. Bellies full of burgers, we get back on the road, drive past broad brown fields that have been flooded to attract waterfowl and by early afternoon arrive at St. Charles.
My main objective is to get an up-close look at that war memorial, which has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1996. Known as the St. Charles Battle Monument, it is a testament to what, by some accounts, was the most destructive single shot of the Civil War. I say "by some accounts" because while it has been reported widely as the most destructive shot of the war, one has to be careful in reporting that anything was the most or greatest or biggest anything. That said, there is no denying it was deadly.
On the fateful morning of June 17, 1862, the ironclad USS Mound City, with 175 men aboard, was part of a flotilla steaming up the river to rendezvous with Union forces
farther inland. In preparing to combat Federal movements on the White, Confederates had sunk three boats at a river bend near St. Charles and set up two artillery emplacements along the bluffs.
In the ensuing fight, a Rebel cannonball ripped through the ironclad's hull, hit the boiler and all Hades broke loose. The number of dead and injured varies from one source to another, but generally about 125 died: roughly 80 from the explosion or scalding steam, and about another 45 from drowning or being shot by Confederate sharpshooters while trying to swim to safety. Some 25 were seriously injured. Only about 25 of the 175 escaped unharmed.
Eventually, Union ground forces overran the Confederates, and the fighting came to an end.
The story was reported in newspapers across the country -- from Bangor, Maine, to Sacramento, Calif.
In 1919, some 57 years after that sad day, the St. Charles Battle Monument was dedicated. The National Register nomination makes this point about its significance: "It is unique among Civil War monuments in Arkansas in that it was built by a Northerner in memory of both Federal and Confederate soldiers."
We get to the memorial by turning off the main highway and taking a short drive over to the St. Charles Museum, then walking about a block.
FAITHFUL HEART
The impressive granite monument, 18 feet tall and 9 feet square at the base, is smack in the middle of town, in the center of the intersection of Arkansas Street and Broadway Avenue.
The monument's topmost portion looks like the back end of a cannon, facing downward, also perhaps resembling a boat's capstan.
The monument's northwest face offers a brief account of the battle, ending with this bit of poetry: "O, wheresoever these may be betwixt the slumber of the poles, to-day they count as kindred souls."
On its northeast side are etched the names of 104 who were aboard the Mound City and are known to have died. The southwest face bears the names of three Confederate soldiers who are known to have been killed in the engagement.
The southeast side offers a testament to William Hickman Harte, one of the boat's officers, born in 1826 in Limerick, Ireland. The tribute depicts four stags above the inscription "Coeur Fidele." Mosenthin notes that a stag is also known as a hart and that "Coeur Fidele" translates as faithful heart. So, Harte, hart, heart. Someone put some thought into that memorial.
There is some mystery about who actually commissioned the monument. The National Register nomination states that Harte's son visited the town in 1916 looking for his father's grave. It mentions, however, that one source says the visitor was Harte's nephew.
Mosenthin posits that it was Harte's son Richard. A physician, he served as a commanding officer in World War I at a U.S. Army hospital in France. When he was discharged from the Army in 1919, he received a citation from Gen. John J. Pershing.
The doctor would have had the means, and the timing would have been about right, Mosenthin says.
MOVIE HERO
We walk briskly on this cold, blustery day over to the warm confines of the museum, which shares space with City Hall, and it's there that my friend introduces me to Naomi Mitchell, the museum's volunteer director who recently retired after 24 years as St. Charles' city clerk/recorder/treasurer.
She enthusiastically shows us displays on a wide array of subjects, including the importance of hunting and fishing in the area, the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps camp located there in 1935 to establish a national wildlife refuge and notable people.
One of the latter that caught my eye featured Dr. Corydon M. Wassell.
Wassell, a Little Rock native, has St. Charles ties through serving as the CCC camp doctor.
He went on to serve as a Navy doctor and, according to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas, was one of the first national heroes of World War II (see arkansasonline.com/26cory). Under extremely dangerous conditions in the Netherlands East Indies (now Indonesia) in 1942, Wassell helped get about a dozen severely injured patients to safety.
He earned the Navy Cross for his heroism and was even mentioned during one of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's fireside chats. Director Cecil B. DeMille made a movie about him, "The Story of Dr. Wassell," starring Gary Cooper in the title role.
Among the museum's artifacts related to the doctor are an autographed picture of Wassell in his Navy uniform, a ticket stub from the movie's world premiere in Little Rock in 1944, and a shotgun given to him by members of the film's cast and crew.
Being a Cooper fan, I had heard of the movie but had never seen it, and had no idea who Dr. Wassell was.
[Gallery not showing? Click here to see photos » arkansasonline.com/26war/]
As our visit winds down, we muse about this little postage stamp of native soil (thanks for the phrase, Bill Faulkner) and about its heritage. Mitchell says, "There's a lot of history here if you dig for it."
Amen. You can take that to heart.
Sonny Rhodes is a (mostly) retired journalism professor in North Little Rock. He spends a lot of time walking and visiting historic sites.
Gallery: St. Charles remembers
