The Right Arm of Custer

Colonel James H. Kidd, 6th Michigan Cavalry

by Dan Waumbaugh

As the last of the apple blossoms were swept away by the groundskeepers, and the slight chill that had been in the Michigan air for over 6 months was finally gone, hundreds of young men scrambled this way and that, desperately trying to make it to their final exams. A young man named James H. Kidd, possessed of entirely common features, and standing five feet, nine inches tall, and weighing about 140 pounds, with eyes that reflected both a light-hearted by solemn spirit, rushed among them. Taking a shortcut through the square that formed the University of Michigan's school of law, Kidd was caught off guard by the sound of hundreds of feet rapidly hitting the stone, causing a sound nearly akin to rapid gunfire, a sound which Kidd would soon find all too familiar.

Born in 1840, James H. Kidd was the eldest child of James M. Kidd and his wife, Jane Stevenson Kidd. Living a rather normal life in Ionia Michigan, James was an academic boy, and no one was surprised when he went off to a university at age 18. Ending up at the University of Michigan after graduating from the Ypsilanti Union Seminary, Kidd enrolled in the classical course, the most popular majors at that time. This strenuous course included all of the classical literatures of western civilization, mathematics, and numerous foreign languages.

Towards the end of Kidd's junior year the Civil War broke out. Kidd decided to stay in school until he graduated, though a number of his friends marched off to war. In the meantime, Kidd joined the Tappan Guards, a militia unit consisting entirely of university students. Kidd's natural common sense and leadership ability quickly gained him the rank of second lieutenant. Here Kidd learned the basics of soldiering, and more importantly, of command. When President Lincoln called for 300,000 additional troops on July 2nd, 1862, Kidd was anxious to sign up. Trying to join a prestigious mounted unit then forming, Kidd was turned away because the unit had reached its maximum number of men. Soon his father, an influential merchant and local politician, intervened, and with a letter to Congressman F. W. Kellogg, and secured a commission for young James along with authorization to raise a company of cavalry. Kidd wasted no time in forming his unit., With great energy and ingenuity Kidd soon raised enough men, and on Tuesday, September 16th, the day before the bloodiest day in American history, one hundred and five strong Michigan men met in Ionia to take the oath of service to the United States government. From that day forward, they would be known as Company [E of the 6th Michigan Cavalry.

At the regimental rendezvous in Grand Rapids, the farmers, mechanics, merchants, and laborers learned their new trade, and when the regiment embarked a few months later on the train to Washington, they had become soldiers. Arriving in the nation's capitol about the same time Burnside was smashing his army against Lee's impenetrable wall 50 miles south, the Michigan men were amazed at the sights and sounds of such a large city, whose population had doubled, then doubled again in the last year. They soon learned that they were to be brigaded together with other regiments from Michigan, the 5th and 7th Michigan Cavalry Regiments, which had both formed at the same time that the 6th mustered in. Later, the veteran 1 st Michigan Cavalry would be added to their ranks. Additionally, the men of the 5th and 6th were soon issued state-of-the-art Spencer Repeating rifles. These seven- shot weapons could be loaded from the breach, and could fire more rounds than any gun carried at that time by any soldier, North or South. The Michigan men spent the next months drilling and parading, but seeing little action. At this time, Brigadier General J. T. Copeland, formerly of the 5th Michigan Cavalry, became the commander of the brigade, which was part of General Casey's Division, all under Maj. Gem Samuel P. Heintzelman, who commanded the Department of Washington. Kidd, with his regiment, made a number of fruitless raids into the neighboring area, where nothing was accomplished but the toughening of men and horses to the rigors of campaign.

At this time, Kidd admitted that the only way he was able to survive these hard marches was due to the bag of coffee he had received from home.

In June, after arriving back in Washington after another one of these fruitless raids, Kidd and his regiment were suddenly told to strike their tents and get ready to march. Lee's army was on the move north, and Brig. Gen. Julius Stahels independent cavalry division, to which the Michigan cavalry brigade belonged, as ordered north in pursuit as part of the Army of the Potomac. In a strenuous, but pleasant march, Kidd, with the Michigan Cavalry brigade, passed to the front of the Federal Army, and on Sunday, June 28th, 1863, Kidd, with the 5th and 6th Michigan Cavalry, all under General Copeland, moved into the quiet town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and received a true hero's welcome from the townspeople. That night Kidd commanded Companies E and H as they picketed the road to Cashtown. Little could any of those troopers imagine that in just a few days two-thirds of the Army of Northern Virginia would be swarming down that very road. The next day the regiments returned to Emmitsburg, and Kidd learned that some major changes had taken place. First, the commander of the Army of the Potomac, General Joseph Hooker, had been replaced by 5th Corps commander, Maj. Gen. George G. Meade, the third man to command the Army of the Potomac in 1863. More importantly, however, General Stahel had been relieved, and in his place a fiery young brigadier general named Judson Kilpatrick had been assigned. Along with Kilpatrick came two new brigade commanders in what was now known as the 3rd Division, the brilliant and capable Elon J. Farnsworth, and Monroe, Michigan native, George A. Custer, both of whom had just been promoted from Cavalry Corps commander General Alfred Pleasonton's staff.