Battlefield gallantry earned U.S.'s highest honor for North Benderby Nathan Arneal Joseph Hanks was born April 22, 1843, in Chillicothe, Ohio. Civil War came to the United States when he was a young man, and at the age of 18 Hanks volunteered for the 37th Ohio Infantry Regiment on Sept. 4, 1861, as did many of his neighbors and friends. Among Hanks’ fellow volunteers was one of his oldest friends, Antone Eppenauer. The two life-long buddies from Chillcothe were assigned to Company E of the 37th, which was officially mustered in Sept. 19, 1861, at Camp Brown near Cleveland. Though registration records list both of their ages as 19 at the time of enlistment, Hanks was actually 18 and Eppenauer 17.
The 37th Ohio Infantry spent most of 1862 in western Virginia, which would become West Virginia within a year. In December 1862 the Ohio 37th was ordered south to Arkansas. Confederate Lieutenant-General John Pemberton, whom Grant had chased out of Jackson, retreated to Vicksburg, burning bridges along the way, where he was holed up with 18,000 troops. Grant arrived with 35,000 troops with more on the way. By mid-May, that number included the 37th Ohio Infantry Regiment, who joined Grant’s forces on the outskirts of Vicksburg. The Union army found a heavily fortified city in Vicksburg, with a defensive line running approximately six and a half miles of forts, trenches, gun puts and redoubts around Vicksburg. The rugged terrain of hills and steep slopes also played into the defenders’ hands. Grant wanted to attack before the Confederates had any more time to establish themselves, so on May 19 Union forces assaulted Stockade Redan, a fortification just northeast of Vicksburg along the ominously named Graveyard Road that led into town. The 37th Ohio was assigned to the Second Division under Major General Francis Blair as a part of the 3rd Brigade under Brigadier General Hugh Ewing. All of this was part of the XV Corps commanded by Major General William Tecumseh Sherman. The assault was primarily carried out by the Second Division and was rather easily repelled with the Union Army taking much greater casualties. Hanks and Eppenauer of the Ohio 37th, were not among the wounded and lived to fight another day. That day came three days later. The Union assault of May 22 was much more carefully planned. Throughout the night of the 21st, Union naval forces bombarded Vicksburg from the river. The bombardment resumed on the morning of the 22nd for four hours, ending at 10 a.m. when Union soldiers advanced along a 3-mile front. Again, Sherman’s Corps, including the 37th Ohio, attacked down Graveyard Road. Hanks, Eppenauer and their comrades again found themselves approaching Stockade Redan but were bogged down about 100 yards out. During the peak of the fighting, Eppenauer fell wounded. He called out to his captain to help him to the rear. The captain said it was too dangerous. “Absolutely impossible for a man to live in that hell,” the captain reportedly told Eppenauer. They would have to wait for the cover of darkness. Another version of the story, told by Eppenauer years later, said the captain didn’t think Eppenauer would survive moving to the back of the lines, so he laid there for several hours before Hanks came upon him. When the captain wasn’t looking, Hanks picked up his friend and staggered into the bullet-swept field. Protecting Eppenauer with his own body, Hanks helped him to safety behind the lines. He then returned through the same hail of lead to his previous position and participated in the battle. By midday, it was clear that this assault was also a failure, and Grant settled in for a siege that lasted for the next 47 days before the Confederates surrendered Vicksburg on July 4. After being taken to the hospital during the attack of May 22, Eppenauer lost track of his friend. Hanks continued to fight with the 37th for the remainder of the war, reenlisting when his original 3-year commitment was up. He and his regiment participated in the battle and siege of Atlanta in the summer of 1864 and Sherman’s March to the Sea that followed. On May 24, 1865, Hanks and his 37th Ohio Volunteer comrades participated in “the final march,” the Grand Review of the Armies in Washington, D.C. Over 145,000 victorious Union troops marched down Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol to the White House, passing a review stand occupied by President Andrew Johnson, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, Grant, Sherman and other dignitaries. When the war ended, Eppenauer attempted to find the former schoolmate and fellow solider that had saved his life, even taking out newspaper ads seeking his friend, but the efforts were unsuccessful. He didn’t give up, though.
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