5th Iowa Infantry In The Civil War

Colonel Samuel Rice

The 5th Iowa Infantry formed at Burlington in July 1861. Most of the men had never seen combat. Within a year, they would. Early on, the regiment was led by Colonel Samuel A. Rice, a Burlington lawyer who brought order to a green command. By the fall of 1862, they were in Mississippi with Rosecrans, facing Confederate forces at Iuka and Corinth.

At Iuka, the fight came fast and close. Thick timber broke the lines. Units lost contact. Reports from the field describe heavy fire and confusion. Grant later wrote that “the enemy made a stubborn resistance.” The 5th Iowa held its ground and took its first hard losses.

Corinth followed weeks later. On October 4, Confederate attacks hit the Union line hard. The 5th Iowa went forward in the counterattack. They helped drive the enemy back. In the advance, they captured the colors of the 40th Mississippi and took prisoners. Rosecrans reported that the Union forces “drove the enemy from every position.” Rice had the regiment in hand during the fight, keeping it steady as the line bent and then pushed forward.

In 1863, the regiment moved with Grant into Mississippi. At Raymond, the fight stretched across fields and woods. The Confederates held at first, then gave way under pressure. Grant again noted the resistance, calling it “stubborn.” Two days later, the army took Jackson after a quick fight.

Then came Champion Hill on May 16. This was the breaking point. The ground was rough; the fighting uneven. The 5th Iowa went in and stayed in. Fire came from the front and the flanks. Lines shifted. Men fell.

Colonel Jabez Banbury

Late in the fight, ammunition ran out. The regiment kept firing anyway. One report said they fought with “only such ammunition as could be obtained from the boxes of the dead and wounded.” Losses were heavy. Out of about 350 men, 19 were killed and 75 wounded.

Grant wrote that the battle was “stubbornly contested at every point.” It didn’t break until the Confederate line gave way. From there, the army pushed to the Big Black River. The enemy line collapsed. The road to Vicksburg opened.

The siege changed everything. No more charges. No open fields. The men dug. They worked under fire day and night. Reports from the campaign said the army was “engaged day and night in the construction of approaches and rifle-pits.” Iowa papers called it “a war of trenches rather than charges.”

The 5th Iowa stayed in the lines through it all. Heat, dirt, constant fire. When Vicksburg fell on July 4, the campaign ended, but not the war.

The regiment moved on. Tennessee. Chattanooga. More marching, more pressure, less attention in the reports. Still there. Still working.

Rice didn’t stay with the regiment through the entire war. His prior work shaped it—discipline, control, men who would hold under fire. He went on to higher command and later fell from wounds received in the field. By then, the regiment had passed to men like Jabez Banbury.

Banbury rose with the regiment. He enlisted in 1861, helped raise Company D, and moved up fast—Captain, then Colonel in 1862. He led during the hardest campaigns. Official records show him in command when the regiment needed steady leadership most.

The 5th Iowa’s story sits in reports and newspaper lines. Brief entries. Casualty lists. A few sharp sentences about fights that lasted hours. Iuka. Corinth. Raymond. Jackson. Champion’s Hill.

The words are brief. The service wasn’t.