Monthly Archives: December 2023

Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign: Camp Fairview, Charlestown, West Virginia (December 20, 1864 – early April 1865)

Charlestown West Virginia, circa 1863 (public domain).

Encamped in early December 1864 with the United States Army of the Shenandoah at its winter quarters at Camp Russell, which was located just west of Stephens City (now Newtown) and south of Winchester, Virginia, the members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were learning that their stay at this Union Army complex was destined to be shorter than they had hoped. Ordered to prepare for yet another march, they were informed by their superiors that they were being reassigned yet again—this time to help fulfill the directive of Major-General Philip H. Sheridan that the Army of the Shenandoah search out and eliminate the ongoing threat posed by Confederate States Army guerrilla soldiers who had been attacking federal troops, railroad systems and supply lines throughout Virginia and West Virginia.

So, after packing up and saying goodbye to the new friends they’d made at Camp Russell, they began a new, thirty-mile march, five days before Christmas. Trudging north during a driving snowstorm on December 20, 1864, they finally reached Charlestown, West Virginia, where they quickly established their latest “new home” at Camp Fairview, which was situated roughly two miles outside of the village.

Per an 1870 edition of The Lehigh Register, while marching for Charlestown, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers made their way through Winchester and followed the Charlestown and Winchester Railroad line “until two o’clock the following morning” when they were forced to sleep on their arms “until daylight, the guide having lost his way.”

Initially using this camp as the regiment’s winter quarters, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were soon “on constant active duty, guarding the railroad and constructing works for defense against the incursions of guerrillas. The regiment participated in a number of reconnoissances [sic] and skirmishes during the winter”—as the old year of 1864 became the New Year of 1865.

More specifically, by 1865, according to historians at the Pennsylvania State Archives, who had uncovered details about the 47th Pennsylvania’s time at Camp Fairview by reading the diaries of Jeremiah Siders of Company H, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers “were employed building blockhouses at all the railroad ‘posts’ (meaning loading stations).”

A Chaplain Expresses His Thoughts on the Ongoing War

Rev. William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock, chaplain, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida, 1863 (courtesy of Robert Champlin, used with permission).

On New Year’s Eve in 1864, the Rev. William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock, the regimental chaplain of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, penned the following words in a report to his superiors:

Camp, 47th Reg. Pa. Vet. Vol’s
Near Charlestown Va, Dec. 31st 1864

Brig. Gen’l L. Thomas,
Adj. Gen’l, U.S. Army

Sir.

I respectfully, beg leave to state that absence from the Reg. accounts for my failing to report for the previous month.

And in submitting my report for the present month it affords me great pleasure to state that the condition and morale of the Reg. is in every respect encouraging.

Of the large number of wounded in the terrible battle of Cedar Creek, Oct. 19th/64, comparatively few have died, probably fourteen, or even a less number will cover the entire loss, whilst nearly all the surviving ones, will be able to join our ranks.

No deaths have occurred in the Reg during the month, whilst few are sick in Hospital, and the health generally is good.

For some time past, the Reg. had been deficient in its quota of officers, but this deficiency is now being happily filled by suitable promotions from the ranks.

In the aggregate it now numbers 882 men. Of which 24 are officers.

In a moral and religious point of view, there is still a large margin for improvement and it is my earnest endeavor to devote all proper and available means for the spiritual welfare of the command.

Under its new organization and in the fourth year of its history, our Reg. has an encouraging future before it.

In conclusion, I may yet say that the review of our National life during the year that is about being numbered with the past, affords rare promise for the future. At no period in the history of our great contest for freedom and Unity has the prospect of returning peace, through honorable conflict, been so promising.

The efforts, the sacrifices, the patience of the loyal states and People are crowned, at last, with triumphs worthy of the holy cause of liberty.

Yet a little while, and we shall rejoice in a peace based on the everlasting foundations of Religion, Humanity, Nationality, and freedom.

For this defeat of traitors at home as well as of Rebels in arms and their sympathizers abroad, for this expression of stern and resolute purpose, for this unshrinking determination to make the last needed sacrifice, how can we be sufficiently grateful?

May the God of our fathers still smile upon us.

I have the honor, Gen’l, to remain,
Very Respectfully, Your Obed’t Serv’nt

W.D. C. Rodrock, Chap., 47th Reg. P.V.V.
2nd Brig. 1st Div. 19th A.C.

* Note: Chaplain Rodrock’s December 31, 1864 report to superiors had noticeable errors, including his significant underestimation of his regiment’s casualty figures during Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign. During the Battle of Cedar Creek alone, more than one hundred and seventy-four members of the 47th Pennsylvania were declared killed, wounded, captured, or missing (forty killed in action, ninety-nine wounded in action, fifteen of whom later died, twenty-five captured, ten of whom later died while still being held as POWs or shortly after their release by CSA troops, nine missing, one unresolved). While he may not yet have had full casualty figures by the time he penned the report above, he would certainly have been able to at least obtain accurate figures regarding the number of men who had been killed and mortally wounded.

Page one of a report written by the Rev. William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regimental Chaplain, from Camp Fairview, West Virginia to his superiors, January 31, 1865 (U.S. Army, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

Exactly one month later, Rev. Rodrock was putting the final touches on his latest report:

Camp Fairview.
Two miles from Charlestown, Va
January 31st, 1865

Brig. Gen’l L. Thomas
Adj. Gen’l, U.S. Army

Sir.

I have the honor respectfully, to submit the following report for the present month.

Although God is not in men’s thoughts; his law being violated with impunity and his authority contemned “at will”; yet as a nation, our God is the Lord. The mind rest with pleasure on the abounding proof of this great fact. The history of the past, how full of it!

From the first planting of our Fathers on this soil, onward to this day, the true God has been claimed as ours. The foundations of our government were laid in the full and firm apprehension and acknowledgment of this fact. There is one scene recorded in our history which more than all others prove this; we have it commemorated in the engraving of the First Prayer in Congress.

There were the sages and patriots of our land – the representations of the whole country. They had reached a most critical point in their deliberations. They felt the need of higher wisdom than their own. They call in the minister of God, the servant of Jesus Christ; and there and then, in most affecting, service, our country – our whole country is laid at the foot of the Divine throne.

If ever there was heartfelt acknowledgment of a living and true God, and most hearty and sincere invocation of his favor, it was there. For themselves, for their living countrymen, for those to come after them, they cast their all on God, and bound themselves and all to him! Most touching and ever-memorable scene! Worthy the occasion and worthy of a great nation. In this spirit the Christian and the patriot, whether in civic or military life strive to labor, and should fire all hearts and nerve all arms in our present fiery struggle for universal freedom.

I am happy to report the favorable and healthy condition of the Reg. Our aggregate is 891. Of these 19 are transiently on the sick list. No deaths have occurred during the month.

We employ all available means for promoting the temporal and spiritual welfare of the command.

Having a large library of select books, I am prepared to meet the wants of the men in this direction.

Besides I distribute several hundred religious papers among them every week. I am convinced, by experience, that this is one of the effectual and welcome means of gaining the attention of the mass of the men to religious truth, and keeping up the tie between them and the Church at home.

Ever striving to labor with an eye single to the glory of God and our country.

I have the honor,
Gen’l to remain
Your Obed’t Servant

W. D. C. Rodrock
Chaplain, 47th Reg. P.V.V.
2nd Brig. 1st Div. 19th Corps

Page one of a report written by the Rev. William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regimental Chaplain, from Camp Fairview, West Virginia to his superiors, February 28, 1865 (U.S. Army, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

While Rev. Rodrock’s next monthly report conveyed the following to his superiors:

Camp Fairview
Near Charlestown, Va
Feb. 28th 1865

Brig. Gen. L. Thomas
Adj. Gen’l U.S. Army

Sir.

I have the honor herewith, to present my report for the month of February.

That blessed peace whose type and emblem is our holy Gospel it is as yet not ours to enjoy. The stern alarums of war still resound in the ears of the nation. And as our victorious columns are marching on, they are sounding the death-knell of the so called Southern Confederacy.

In the strange system and series of paradoxes which make up human life, it often happens that the very disciples of “good will” and brotherly love must buckle on the harness of war. Such emphatically is the case in our present contest. Nor should it be otherwise.

Even our Saviour [sic] came not to bring peace, but a sword until the right should triumph and the sword be beat to a ploughshare. And as our present struggle involves on our side, all that is worthy living for and all that is worth dying for, it may very well fire all hearts and nerve all arms in its behalf.

The Flag which Hernando Cortes carried in that most extraordinary of expeditions in Mexico had for its device, flames of fire on a white and blue ground, with a red cross in the midst of the blaze, and the following words on the borders as a motto, ‘Amici, Crucem sequamur, et in hoc signo vincemur!’ Friends, let us follow the cross, and, trusting in that emblem we shall conquer!’

In these more enlightened times, with more intelligent soldiers, with a purer Church at our back, and with a holier cause, we will keep the motto of Cortes steadily before our eyes; and in personal as in national experience, we shall turn the war into a blessing to the country and to humanity.

It gives me great pleasure to report the improved condition and general good health of the Reg. A large influx of recruits has materially increased our numbers; making our present aggregate 954 men, including 35 commissioned officers.

The number of sick in the Reg. is 22; all of which are transient cases, and no deaths have occurred during the month.

Whilst in a moral and religious point of view there is still a wide margin for amendment and improvement; it is nevertheless gratifying to state that all practicable and available means are employed for the promotion of the spiritual and physical welfare of the command.

And in this connection, I desire to mention our indebtedness to the U.S. Christian Commission for furnishing us with a large supply of excellent reading matter and such delicacies as are highly useful for the Hospital.

That God is in this war of rebellion, that he has brought it upon us, that He over rules it, that its issues are in his hand, that he intends to teach us and the whole world some of the greatest and most sublime lessons ever taught in his providential dealings since the world began, is becoming more and more manifest.

To Him, we will ascribe all Honor and Glory, now and forever.

I have the honor, Gen’l, to remain
Respectfully, Your Obed’t Servant.

W. D. C. Rodrock,
Chaplain, 47th Reg. P.V.V.
2nd Brig. 1st Division, 19th A.C.

Page one of a report written by the Rev. William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regimental Chaplain, from Camp Fairview, West Virginia to his superiors, March 31, 1865 (U.S. Army, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

In his final report from Camp Fairview, Rev. Rodrock wrote:

Camp Fairview.
Near Charlestown, Va.
March 31st/65

Brig. Gen’l L. Thomas
Adj. Gen’l U.S. Army

Sir.
I have the honor herewith, to transmit my report for the present month.

Very Respectfully Yours,

W. D. C. Rodrock
Chapl’n, 47th Reg. P. Vols

 

Camp Fairview
Two Miles from Charlestown, Va.
March 5th/65

Brig. Gen’l L. Thomas
Adj. Gen., U.S. Army

Sir.

I hereby enclose my report for Feb. It having been returned from Brig. Hd. Qrts, to be forwarded direct. In accordance with Gen’l  Orders No 158, dated Apl. 13th 1864, I hitherto forwarded my reports through the “usual military channels”. Why I am now ordered to forward direct, is not clear to my mind. Would you have the kindness to forward me any orders issued since the one of the above date & bearing on the duties of Chaplains etc.

If any have been issued, I never recd [sic] them.

I have the honor, Gen’l
To remain, respectfully,
Your Obed’t Servant

W. D. C. Rodrock
Chap. 47th Reg. P.V.V.
2nd Brig. 1st Div. 19th Corps
Washington, D.C.

 

Camp Fairview, Va.
March 31st 1865

Brig. Gen’l L. Thomas
Adj. Gen’l, U.S. Army

Sir.

Amidst the general glory and success attending our arms on land and sea, it is my pleasant duty to report also the favorable and improved condition of our Reg. for the present month.

In a military sense it has greatly improved in efficiency and strength. By daily drill and a constant accession of recruits, these desirable objects have been attained. The entire strength of the Reg. rank and file is now 1019 men.

Its sanitary condition is all that can be desired. But 26 are on the sick list, and these are only transient cases. We have now our full number of Surgeons, – all efficient and faithful officers.

We have lost none by natural death. Two of our men were wounded by guerillas, while on duty at their Post. From the effects of which one died on the same day of the sad occurrence. He was buried yesterday with appropriate ceremonies. All honor to the heroic dead.

In a moral and religious point of view, we can never attain too great a proficiency. And in our Reg. like in all others, the vices incident to army life prevail to a considerable extent, whatever means may be employed for their restraint.

Still it affords me pleasure to state, that every possible facility is extended the men for moral and religious culture. Divine services are held whenever practicable, and a good supply of moral and religious reading matter, in the form of books and papers, is furnished to the command.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.

I have the honor, Gen’l
To remain, Respectfully
Your Obed’t. Servant.

W. D. C. Rodrock
Chapl’n, 47th Reg. P.V. Vols

Another New Mission, Another March

“The capitulation and surrender of Robt. E. Lee and his army at Appomattox C.H., Va. to Lt. Gen. U.S. Grant. April 9th 1865” (Kurz & Allison, 16 September 1885, U.S. Library of Congress, public domain).

According to The Lehigh Register, as the end of March 1865 loomed, “The command was ordered to proceed up the valley to intercept the enemy’s troops, should any succeed in making their escape in that direction.”

By April 4, 1865, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers had made their way back to Winchester, Virginia and were headed for Kernstown. Five days later, they received word that General Robert E. Lee had surrendered the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox on April 9, 1865. The long war appeared to be over.

But it wasn’t. In a letter penned to the Sunbury American on April 12, 47th Pennsylvanian Henry Wharton described the celebration that took place following Lee’s surrender while also explaining to residents of his hometown that Union Army operations in Virginia were still continuing in order to ensure that the Confederate surrender would hold:

Letter from the Sunbury Guards.
CAMP NEAR SUMMIT POINT, Va.,
April 12, 1865

Since yesterday a week we have been on the move, going as far as three miles beyond Winchester. There we halted for three days, waiting for the return or news from Torbett’s cavalry who had gone on a reconnoisance [sic] up to the valley. They returned, reporting they were as far up as Mt. Jackson, some sixty miles, and found nary an armed reb. The reason of our move was to be ready in case Lee moved against us, or to march on Lynchburg, if Lee reached that point, so that we could aid in surrounding him and [his] army, and with Sheridan and Mead capture the whole party. Grant’s gallant boys saved us that march and bagged the whole crowd. Last Sunday night our camp was aroused by the loud road of artillery. Hearing so much good news of late, I stuck to my blanket, not caring to get up, for I suspected a salute, which it really was for the ‘unconditional surrender of Lee.’ The boys got wild over the news, shouting till they were hoarse, the loud huzzas [sic] echoing through the Valley, songs of ‘rally round the flag,’ &c., were sung, and above the noise of the ‘cannons opening roar,’ and confusion of camp, could be heard ‘Hail Columbia’ and Yankee Doodle played by our band. Other bands took it up and soon the whole army let loose, making ‘confusion worse confounded.’

The next morning we packed up, struck tents, marched away, and now we are within a short distance of our old quarters. – The war is about played out, and peace is clearly seen through the bright cloud that has taken the place of those that darkened the sky for the last four years. The question now with us is whether the veterans after Old Abe has matters fixed to his satisfaction, will have to stay ‘till the expiration of the three years, or be discharged as per agreement, at the ‘end of the war.’ If we are not discharged when hostilities cease, great injustice will be done.

The members of Co. ‘C,’ wishing to do honor to Lieut. C. S. Beard, and show their appreciation of him as an officer and gentleman, presented him with a splendid sword, sash and belt. Lieut. Beard rose from the ranks, and as one of their number, the boys gave him this token of esteem.

A few nights ago, an aid [sic] on Gen. Torbett’s staff, with two more officers, attempted to pass a safe guard stationed at a house near Winchester. The guard halted the party, they rushed on, paying no attention to the challenge, when the sentinel charged bayonet, running the sharp steel through the abdomen of the aid [sic], wounding him so severely that he died in an hour. The guard did his duty as he was there for the protection of the inmates and their property, with instruction to let no one enter.

The boys are all well, and jubilant over the victories of Grant, and their own little Sheridan, and feel as though they would soon return to meet the loved ones at home, and receive a kind greeting from old friends, and do you believe me to be

Yours Fraternally,
H. D. W.

Two days later, that fragile peace was shattered when a Confederate loyalist fired the bullet that ended the life of President Abraham Lincoln.

 

Sources:

  1. “Camp Russell.” The Historical Marker Database, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  2. “Civil War, 1861-1865.” Stephens City, Virginia: Newtown History Center, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  3. Diaries of Jeremiah Siders (Company H. 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry), in “Pennsylvania Military Museum Collections, 1856-1970” (MG 272). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State Archives.
  4. Dyer, Frederick H. A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion, p. 1589. Des Moines, Iowa: The Dyer Publishing Company, 1908.
  5. Letters home from ”H.D.W.” and the “Sunbury Guards.” Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1864-1865.
  6. Noyalas, Jonathan. “The Fight at Cedar Creek Was Over. So Why Couldn’t Union Troops Let Their Guard Down?” Arlington, Virginia: HistoryNet, 27 February 2023.
  7. Reports and Other Correspondence of W. D. C. Rodrock, Chaplain, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry (Record Group R29). Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, 1864-1865.
  8. “The History of the Forty-Seventh Regt. P. V.” Allentown, Pennsylvania: The Lehigh Register, July 20, 1870.

 

Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign: Camp Russell, Stephens City, Virginia (November 1864 – December 20, 1864)

General J. D. Fessenden’s headquarters, U.S. Army of the Shenandoah at Camp Russell near Stephens City (now Newtown) in Virginia (Lieutenant S. S. Davis, Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, December 31, 1864, public domain; click to enlarge).

Erected in November 1864 on grounds that were adjacent to the Opequon Creek, just west of Stephens City (now Newtown) and south of Winchester, Virginia, by Union Army troops operating under the command of Major-General Philip H. Sheridan, Camp Russell was the site where the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was housed from November 1864 until December 20, 1864, while it was still attached to the United States Army of the Shenandoah.

Named after Brigadier-General David A. Russell, who had been killed in action on September 19, 1864 during the Battle of Opequan (also known as “Third Winchester”), which had unfolded just over two miles away during the earlier part of Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign, Camp Russell was built using the lumber and bricks from a neighboring African American Methodist chapel that had been dismantled by Sheridan’s troops, according to historians at the Newtown History Center.

It quickly became a two-mile-long complex that consisted of separate encampments for each of the Army of the Shenandoah’s individual regiments, as well as a hospital system, and was protected by a roughly four-mile-long system of earthworks and trenches that had been installed on both sides of the Valley Pike (south of what, today, is the intersection of Interstate 81 and Virginia Route 37).

These earthworks and trenches were subsequently connected to the Carysbrooke Redoubt on the pike’s eastern side, which ensured that the southern end of Camp Russell was also well fortified (a critical planning component since the Confederate States Army troops of Lieutenant-General Jubal Early were positioned to the south during this point in time). In addition, Camp Russell was also heavily guarded around the clock by Union Army soldiers who were assigned to scouting duties and picket details.

During this same time, C Company soldier Henry Wharton penned a new letter to the Sunbury American, his hometown newspaper:

NEAR NEWTOWN, VA. 
November 14, 1864.

DEAR WILVERT:

The day after election the entire army of the Shenandoah left their old camps at Cedar creek and fell back to this place. The reason of this was the scouts reported a force coming down the Luray Valley and the removal enabled General Sheridan to get a better position and establish lines unknown to the enemy. Intrenchments [sic] have been, and are now being constructed that will baffle the ingeniousness of the best rebel Generals, and such, that behind them our forces can repel double their numbers, and if they have the temerity to make an attack, with the number not slain or crippled by our arms, few could escape being capture. – Such is the position we now occupy.

For the last three days a considerable number of the enemy’s cavalry have been bothering our pickets, with the purpose, no doubt, of finding out our position. Our Brigade, (the 2d) was sent out to give the Johnnies a chance for a fight, but on their arrival, the cavalry of Jefferson D. fell back out of range of our rifles. Since then our cavalry went out in several directions for the purpose of giving them fight or gobble them up, the latter if possible. Brigadier General Powell took the road to Front Royal, met the graybacks, whipped them, captured one hundred and sixty prisoners, two pieces of artillery, (all they had) their caissons, ammunition, ambulances, wagon train, and drove the balance ten miles from where they first met. Of the other cavalry we have had no report as yet, but from the fact that they are led by a man who knows not defeat, the daring General Custer, we can expect news that will cheer the hearts of all who are in favor of putting down the rebellion by force of arms.

The election passed off quietly and without any military interference, not the influence of officers used in controlling any man’s vote. In the regiments from the old Keystone, the companies were formed by the first Sergeant, when he stated to the men the object for which they were called to ‘fail to,’ and then they proceeded to the election of officers to hold the election – the boys having the whole control, none of the officers interfering in the least.

Wharton went on to report the numbers of the election results by company as follows:

  • Company A (ten votes for Abraham Lincoln, one vote for George McClellan);
  • Company B (twenty-six votes for Abraham Lincoln, two votes for George McClellan);
  • Company C (twenty-nine votes for Abraham Lincoln, fifteen votes for George McClellan);
  • Company D (thirty-one votes for Abraham Lincoln, eleven votes for George McClellan);
  • Company E (twenty-four votes for Abraham Lincoln, three votes for George McClellan);
  • Company F (eighteen votes for Abraham Lincoln, sixteen votes for George McClellan);
  • Company G (nine votes for Abraham Lincoln, thirteen votes for George McClellan);
  • Company H (ten votes for Abraham Lincoln, twenty-four votes for George McClellan);
  • Company I (nineteen votes for Abraham Lincoln, sixteen votes for George McClellan); and
  • Company K (eighteen votes for Abraham Lincoln, twenty votes for George McClellan).
  • Lincoln’s Majority: 73 votes.

According to Wharton, “The battle at Cedar Creek thinned our ranks by which we lost many votes—this number and those away in hospitals would have increased the Union majority to three hundred.”

* Note: To read more of Henry Wharton’s letters from 1864, click here.

A Time of Celebration and Sadness

As evidenced by several of the letters that were written by 47th Pennsylvanians during this phase of duty, life at Camp Russell was a time of both celebration and profound heartache. According to Professor Jonathan A. Noyalas, director of Shenandoah University’s McCormick Civil War Institute:

In celebrating Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan’s triumph at the Battle of Cedar Creek on October 19, 1864, newspapers across the North enthusiastically conjectured that this latest in a series of spectacular Union successes would finally end military operations in the Shenandoah Valley…. On October 23, a correspondent for Iowa’s Muscatine Evening Journal concluded the same, proclaiming, ‘Sheridan’s victory at Cedar Creek makes the third he has gained during the present campaign in the Shenandoah Valley. This last defeat will, it is more than probable, end the campaign on the part of the enemy in that region.’

…. Yet in Sheridan’s army itself, the soldiers’ mood generally remained much more restrained, reflective, and somber. Veterans especially found it difficult to reconcile the joy of victory with the grief they felt….

Beyond such melancholy reflections, the army’s veterans also confronted the stark reality that Confederate Lt. Gen. Jubal Early likely wasn’t done yet….

In Cedar Creek’s immediate wake, continued harassment from Confederate partisans, irregulars, and bushwhackers only added to the uncertainty. Sheridan had been particularly annoyed by ‘guerrilla bands’ throughout the campaign [but] was confident these guerrillas could be curtailed by depriving them of potential manpower. On October 22, Sheridan ordered the arrest of every Confederate male civilian capable of bearing arms….

Significant Recognition for the 47th Pennsylvania’s Distinguished Service

Second State Colors, 47th Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers, showing the battles for which the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was honored for its distinguished service to the United States during the American Civil War (presented to the regiment 7 March 1865).

One of the more uplifting moments in the history of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry occurred in late November 1864 when this regiment’s members were honored by a senior Union Army officer, Brevet Major-General William H. Emory, for their valiant service during the Union’s spring 1864 Red River Campaign across Louisiana.

GENERAL ORDERS, HDQRS. NINETEENTH ARMY CORPS, No. 12.
Camp Russell, November 22, 1864.

The following-named regiments are hereby authorized to inscribe upon their colors the names of the engagements set opposite their respective names in which they bore a distinguished part:

Thirteenth, Fifteenth, Twenty-ninth, and Thirtieth Maine Volunteers-Sabine Cross-Roads, Pleasant Hill, Cane River Crossing, La.; One hundred and fourteenth, One hundred and sixteenth, One hundred and fifty-third, One hundred and sixteenth, One hundred and sixty-second, One hundred and sixty-fifth, and One hundred and seventy-third New York Volunteers-Sabine Cross-Roads, Pleasant Hill, Cane River Crossing, La; Forty-seventh Pennsylvania Volunteers-Sabine Cross-Roads, Pleasant Hill, Cane River Crossing, La.; Thirty-eight Massachusetts, Thirteenth Connecticut, and One hundred and twenty-eight New York Volunteers-Cane River Crossing, La.

By command of Brevet Major-General Emory:
PETER FRENCH, Acting Assistant Adjutant-General.”

A War That Still Needed to Be Won

Charlestown West Virginia, circa 1863 (public domain).

Rested and somewhat healed, thanks to their stay at Camp Russell, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were informed less than a month after being honored by Brigadier-General Emory that their stay at their new winter quarters was destined to be shorter than they had hoped. They were being reassigned yet again—this time to help fulfill Major-General Sheridan’s directive that the Army of the Shenandoah eliminate the continuing threat posed by Confederate guerrillas and their sympathizers.

And so, after packing up and saying goodbye to the new friends they’d made at Camp Russell, they began a new, thirty-mile march, five days before Christmas. Trudging north during a driving snowstorm, they finally reached Charlestown, West Virginia, where they quickly established their latest “new home” at Camp Fairview, and continued to soldier on.

 

Sources:

  1. “Camp Russell.” The Historical Marker Database, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  2. “Civil War, 1861-1865.” Stephens City, Virginia: Newtown History Center, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  3. “General Orders, No. 12” (Issued by Brigadier-General William H. Emory, Camp Russell, Virginia, November 22, 1864), in The War of the Rebellion: Official Records of the Civil War: Chapter LV: “Operations in Northern Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania: Correspondence.” Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1894.
  4. Noyalas, Jonathan . “The Fight at Cedar Creek Was Over. So Why Couldn’t Union Troops Let Their Guard Down?” Arlington, Virginia: HistoryNet, 27 February 2023.

 

 

 

Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign: Battlefield and Follow-up Medical Care (Sheridan Field Hospital)

“Thanksgiving 1864: Raising the Flag at the Sheridan Field Hospital Near Winchester, Virginia,” 1864 (James E. Taylor, Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, public domain).

In response to the stunning casualty count incurred by the Union Army following the Battle of Opequan, Virginia on September 19, 1864 (also known as “Third Winchester”), senior Union Army medical personnel realized that drastic improvements in federal military medical services were needed—and needed quickly—if Major-General Philip Sheridan and his Army of the Shenandoah were to continue waging successful war against the Confederate States Army troops commanded by Lieutenant-General Jubal Early.

Three days after that pivotal battle, U.S. Army Surgeon James T. Ghiselin, the medical director of the Army of the Shenandoah and Sheridan’s direct report, ordered one of his subordinates, U.S. Army Surgeon John H. Brinton, to plan and implement a new Union Army field hospital that would be capable of delivering higher quality medical care to the thousands of Union Army troops who would likely be wounded over the coming weeks and months.

Erected near Major-General Sheridan’s Winchester, Virginia headquarters, this new medical facility was initially referred to by the name of its location—Shawnee Springs—and was subsequently renamed as the Sheridan Field Hospital.

First opened with five hundred beds, it became so large that it stretched north from Shawnee Springs to the Church Ridge property of Jacob Senseny. Staffed by twenty physicians, it was stocked early on with enough medical supplies to care for five thousand troops, the first of whom were transported from regimental and other field hospital facilities near Winchester’s Northern railyard.

The grounds also included administrative buildings and housing for military and medical personnel. As late fall turned to winter, it was all kept warm by a radiant heating system, which appeared to be an improvement over the initial system of “Crimean Ovens” that were used to heat Union Army field hospitals during the first year of the war.

Regimental and division surgeons from the Union Army treat Union soldiers inside of the St. Thomas Episcopal Church near Winchester, Virginia, following the Battle of Cedar Creek, October 19, 1864 (James E. Taylor, Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, public domain).

In an almost constant state of expansion until mid-October 1864, Sheridan Field Hospital soon began to accept Union Army patients from battles farther away. The process often unfolded as follows:

  1. Regimental surgeons rendered immediate care to their units’ wounded, dressing wounds and performing amputations wherever they could find safe spaces—inside churches, farmhouses or tents—but still close enough to actual battlefields to provide the kinds of triage and emergency care that would stabilize soldiers enough for them to be transported to the Sheridan Field Hospital for more advanced treatment by better trained medical personnel.
  2. Once those patients arrived at Sheridan Hospital, the surgeons there frequently performed more intricate surgeries over extended periods of time for a range of grievous injuries (artillery and gunshot wounds to soldiers’ heads, bodies or limbs, for example), and also treated patients for fevers, gangrene, tetanus and other related complications.
  3. Physicians then collaborated with nurses and hospital stewards to help soldiers reach the point where they were able to be moved on to other Union Army hospitals in northern locations, where they were able to receive extended rehabilitative care while they were safely housed behind Union lines.

Commanded by U.S. Army Surgeon James Van Zandt Blaney, the physicians, nurses and hospital stewards stationed at Sheridan Field Hospital ultimately treated well over four thousand Union Army soldiers from the time of this temporary facility’s opening on September 28, 1864 until its closing on January 4, 1865, creating the largest field hospital operation during the American Civil War. They also secured help from the U.S. Sanitary Commission to feed and clothe soldiers in preparation for their honorable discharges on surgeons’ certificates of disabilities or their transfers to other facilities.

Among those cared for during this time, were more than three thousand casualties transported from multiple farms and other sites related to the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia, which took place on October 19, 1864.

Sheridan’s physicians finally sent their last remaining patient away to another facility on December 28, 1864.

Although few traces of this famed field hospital remain today, sharp-eyed visitors to the Shawnee Springs Preserve in Virginia will be able to find a wayside marker that was erected on Opequon Avenue in Winchester (on the right side of the street when traveling south), which commemorates this field hospital’s role in preserving America’s Union.

 

Sources:

  1. Bean, Robert, Bjarne W. Olesen, and Kwang Woo Kim. “History of Radiant Heating & Cooling Systems,” in ASHRAE Journal, vol. 52, no. 2 (2010). Peachtree Corners, Georgia: American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers, Inc. (ASHRAE).
  2. Beck, Brandon. “The Third Battle of Winchester.” New Market, Virginia: Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  3. Policastro, Anatoly. “Civil War Crimean Ovens: Origins, Models, and Modifications,” in The Journal of Civil War Medicine, vol. 21, no. 4, pp. 267-279, October/November/December 2017. Reynoldsburg, Ohio: The Society of Civil War Surgeons, Inc.
  4. “Shawnee Springs Hospital.” The Historical Marker Database, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
  5. “Stop 13—Shawnee Springs: Sheridan’s Field Hospital,” in “Winchester at War: Battlefield Driving Tour.” Washington, D.C.: History eLibrary, U.S. National Park Service, retrieved online December 27, 2023.

 

 

Thoughts of Home at Christmas: The Influence of Thomas Nast’s Art During a 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer’s Lifetime

“Christmas Eve,” 1862 (Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, Vol. 7, pp. 8-9, Christmas edition, 1862, public domain; click to enlarge).

When thinking about what life was like for the Pennsylvania volunteer soldiers who served their nation during the American Civil War, the influence of nineteenth century artists on their lives would likely not be the first thing that comes to mind. The orders they received from their superior officers in the Army and the “trickle down” effect of the directives issued by state and federal elected officials to those Union Army officers, yes, but visual artists? Probably not.

But artists and their artwork—paintings and illustrations created during and after the 1860s—did leave their mark on the psyches of soldiers in ways that were profoundly illuminating and long lasting.

Many of the most powerful artworks that were likely seen and reflected on by members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were those drawn by Thomas Nast (1840-1902), a native of Germany who had emigrated to the United States from Bavaria with his mother and siblings in 1846. He spent most of his formative years in New York City, where he took up drawing while still in school. As he aged, he came to view America as his homeland, but still grew up experiencing many German traditions—as had many 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers during their own formative years. (Company K, for example, was established in August 1861 as an “all-German company” of the 47th Pennsylvania.)

Nast’s first depiction of the Christmas season (shown above) was created for the cover and centerfold of the Christmas edition of Harper’s Weekly 1862, shortly after he was hired as a staff illustrator.

“Santa Claus in Camp,” 1863 (Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, January 3, 1863, public domain; click to enlarge).

He then continued to create illustrations of Santa for Harper’s Weekly in subsequent years. According to journalist Lorraine Boissoneault:

You could call it the face that launched a thousand Christmas letters. Appearing on January 3, 1863, in the illustrated magazine Harper’s Weekly, two images cemented the nation’s obsession with a jolly old elf. The first drawing shows Santa distributing presents in a Union Army camp. Lest any reader question Santa’s allegiance in the Civil War, he wears a jacket patterned with stars and pants colored in stripes. In his hands, he holds a puppet toy with a rope around its neck, its features like those of Confederate president Jefferson Davis….

According to historians at Grant Cottage, “In 1868, newly elected 18th President U.S. Grant paid tribute to Thomas Nast by saying, ‘Two things elected me, the sword of Sheridan and the pencil of Thomas Nast.’”

As a result, members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry had ample time to become well acquainted with Nast’s artistry and his support for their efforts, as part of the United States Army, to end the Civil War and preserve America’s Union. An ardent abolitionist, Nast also actively supported the federal government’s efforts to eradicate the brutal practice of chattel slavery.

Fort Taylor, Key West, Florida (Harper’s Weekly, 1864, public domain).

Nast’s first illustrations of Santa Claus and depictions of soldiers longing for family at Christmas would initially have been seen by 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers while they were stationed far from home at Fort Taylor in Key West, Florida—just two months after the regiment had sustained a shockingly high rate of casualties during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862. More than one hundred members of the regiment had been killed in action, mortally wounded, grievously wounded, or wounded less seriously, but still able to continue their service.

So terrible was the outcome that it would have been enough to make an impression even on individual 47th Pennsylvanians who hadn’t been wounded. They were not only now battle tested, they were battle scarred, according to comments made by individual members of the regiment in the letters they wrote to families and friends back home during that Christmas of 1862.

No matter how strong their capacity for overcoming adversity had been before that battle, their hearts and minds would never be the same. It would take time to heal and move forward—time they were given while stationed on garrison duty for more than a year.

Fort Jefferson (Harper’s Weekly, August 26, 1865, public domain; click to enlarge).

By the time that the American Civil War was ending its third year, the mental wounds of Pocotaligo were far less fresh than they had been the previous Christmas. Still stationed in Florida on garrison duty in 1863, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was now a divided regiment. While slightly more than half of the regiment was still on duty at in Key West, as companies A, B, C, E, G, and I remained at Fort Taylor, the remaining members of the regiment—companies D, F, H, and K—were now even farther away from home—stationed at Fort Jefferson, the Union’s remote outpost that was situated so far off of Florida’s coast that it was accessible only by ship.

Letters penned to family and friends back in Pennsylvania during the early part of 1863 capture a sense of sadness and longing that pervaded the regiment—as 47th Pennsylvanians mourned the loss of their deceased comrades and thought about how deeply they missed their own families.

Gradually, as the year wore on, those feelings turned to acceptance of their respective losses and, eventually, frustration at still being assigned to garrison duty when they felt they could and should be helping the federal government bring a faster end to the war by defeating the Confederate States Army through enough tide-turning combat engagements that the Confederate States of America would finally surrender and agree to re-unify the nation.

By early 1864, the wish of those 47th Pennsylvanians was granted by senior Union Army officials. They were not only given the opportunity to return to combat, but to return to intense combat as a history-making regiment.

The only regiment from Pennsylvania to fight in the Union’s 1864 Red River Campaign across Louisiana, the 47th Pennsylvanians repeatedly displayed their valor as the blood of more and more of their comrades was spilled to eradicate slavery across the nation while also fighting to preserve the nation’s Union. By the fall of 1864, they were participating in such fierce, repeated battles across Virginia during Union Major-General Philip Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign that President Abraham Lincoln was able to secure his reelection and the tide of the American Civil War was decisively turned in the federal government’s favor once and for all.

Ruins of Charleston, South Carolina as seen from the Circular Church, 1865 (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

By April 1865, the Confederate States Army had surrendered, the war was over and President Lincoln was gone, felled by an assassin’s bullet that had too easily found its target. So, once again, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were in mourning.

Sent back to America’s Deep South that summer, they were assigned to Reconstruction duties in Savannah, Georgia and Charleston, South Carolina, where they helped to reestablish functioning local and state governments, rebuild shattered infrastructure, and reinvigorate a free press that was dedicated to supporting a unified nation—all while other Pennsylvania volunteer regiments were being mustered out and sent home.

Finally, after a long and storied period of service to their nation, the 47th Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers were given their honorable discharge papers at Camp Cadwalader in Philadelphia, and were then sent home to their own family and friends in communities across Pennsylvania in early January 1866.

Return to Civilian Life

“Santa Claus and His Works,” 1866 (Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, December 29, 1866, public domain; click to enlarge).

Attempting to regain some sense of normalcy as their post-war lives unfolded over the years between the late 1860s and the early 1900s, many of the surviving veterans of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry resumed the jobs they held prior to the war while others found new and better ways to make a living. Some became small business creators, pastors or other church officials, members of their local town councils or school boards, beloved doctors, or even inventors. One even became the lieutenant governor of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Most also married and began families, some small, some large. Still others made their way west—as far as the states of California and Washington—in search of fortune or, more commonly, places where war’s Grim Reaper would never find them again.

“‘Twas the Night Before Christmas,” 1866 (Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, December 25, 1886, public domain; click to enlarge).

As the years rolled on, they saw more and more of Thomas Nast’s work as it was published in Harper’s Weekly, particularly at Christmas. But the Santa Claus of war was now transformed by Nast as the Saint Nicholas of his childhood in Germany—kind, altruistic, loving, and jolly.

Over time, those illustrations collectively formed the “mind pictures” that the majority of American children and adults experienced when they imagined Santa Claus. So powerful has Nast’s influence been that, even today, when Americans encounter the many variations of Santa used to promote products in Christmas advertising campaigns, they see images that are often based on Nast’s nineteenth century drawings—drawings that had their genesis as beacons of light and hope during one of the darkest times in America’s history.

Like Abraham Lincoln, Nast has been helping Americans to summon and follow “the better angels of our nature” for more than one hundred and sixty years. May the power of his art help us all continue to do so this year and for the remainder of our days.

 

 

Sources:

 

  1. Boissoneault, Lorraine. “A Civil War Cartoonist Created the Modern Image of Santa Claus as Union Propaganda.” Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Magazine, December 19, 2018.
  2. “Drawn Together: The Friendship of U.S. Grant and Thomas Nast” (video). Wilton, New York: Grant Cottage, May 14, 2022.
  3. “Santa Claus,” in “Thomas Nast.” Columbus, Ohio: University Libraries, The Ohio State University, retrieved online December 23, 2023.
  4. “Santa Claus in Camp (from ‘Harper’s Weekly,’ vol. 7, p. 1).” New York, New York: The Met, retrieved online December 23, 2023.
  5. Vinson, J. Chal. “Thomas Nast and the American Political Scene,” in American Quarterly, vol. 9, no. 3, Autumn 1957, pp. 337-344. Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University Press.

 

 

 

Camp Griffin (also known as “Camp Big Chestnut”), Langley, Virginia

The Big Chestnut Tree, Camp Griffin, Langley, Virginia, 1861 (U.S. Library of Congress, public domain).

Located near Langley, Virginia, Camp Griffin was a key muster-in point for multiple Union Army units during the early years of the American Civil War. Originally named “Camp Big Chestnut” in recognition of the large chestnut tree that was one of the earliest defining features of the campground, it quickly became a major training base and staging area for multiple state volunteer infantry and artillery units that fought under the banner of the United States government.

During the fall of 1861, it was renamed as “Camp Griffin” to honor Captain Charles Griffin, who had distinguished himself in combat as the commanding officer of the United States Artillery’s 5th Regiment, Battery D (the “West Point Battery”) during the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. Griffin was then also later promoted to Brigadier-General of Volunteers on June 12, 1862.

The 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers at Camp Griffin

The Sibley tents of an unidentified Union Army regiment, Camp Griffin, Virginia, fall 1861 (U.S. Library of Congress, public domain; click to enlarge).

“Camp Big Chestnut” (later known as Camp Griffin) was the first “real home” of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry after its extended muster-in and basic training period at Camp Curtin in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania from August through mid-September 1861. Initially transported by rail to the Washington, D.C. area and stationed on the Kalorama Heights in the District of Columbia, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were ordered to set up and tear down their camps multiple times during their earliest weeks on the job, moving from Camp Kalorama to Camp Lyon, Maryland on the Potomac River’s eastern shore during an intense, two-hour rainstorm, and then across the “Chain Bridge” into Virginia, where they briefly encamped before marching for Camp Advance near Falls Church the next day. During their brief stay there, they were situated close to Fort Ethan Allen and the headquarters of Brigadier-General William Farrar Smith (also known as “Baldy”).

Shortly after that, they were ordered to move yet again—this time, to “Camp Big Chestnut” near Langley, Virginia. They couldn’t have known it at the time, but it was here where they would spend the bulk of their assigned duties from the fall of 1861 through early January 1862.

It was from this point that they were sent out to perform picket duties and skirmish with Confederate troops that were stationed nearby, and it was here and near this camp that they continued to drill daily and participate in Grand Reviews with multiple other Union Army units to demonstrate their readiness for battle to the most senior of Union Army leaders like General George B. McClellan, commanding officer of the U.S. Army of the Potomac—and even to their commander-in-chief, President Abraham Lincoln.

It was also here that they also served as part of that Army of the Potomac (“Mr. Lincoln’s Army”), ensuring that no troops from the Confederate States Army were ever able to breach the Union’s defensive lines and enter Washington, D.C. Quite simply put, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry’s job was to defend the nation’s capital—a task which its members performed well and faithfully. No Rebel ever carried a Confederate flag into the U.S. Capitol Building or White House during its time on the job.

On October 11, the 47th Pennsylvania marched in a review of massed troops that was held near the camp. In his letter of  October 13 to the Sunbury American newspaper, Henry Wharton described their duties, as well as their new home:

The location of our camp is fine and the scenery would be splendid if the view was not obstructed by heavy thickets of pine and innumerable chesnut [sic] trees. The country around us is excellent for the Rebel scouts to display their bravery; that is, to lurk in the dense woods and pick off one of our unsuspecting pickets. Last night, however, they (the Rebels) calculated wide of their mark; some of the New York 33d boys were out on picket; some fourteen or fifteen shots were exchanged, when our side succeeded in bringing to the dust, (or rather mud,) an officer and two privates of the enemy’s mounted pickets. The officer was shot by a Lieutenant in Company H [?], of the 33d.

Our own boys have seen hard service since we have been on the ‘sacred soil.’ One day and night on picket, next day working on entrenchments at the Fort, (Ethan Allen.) another on guard, next on march and so on continually, but the hardest was on picket from last Thursday morning ‘till Saturday morning – all the time four miles from camp, and both of the nights the rain poured in torrents, so much so that their clothes were completely saturated with the rain. They stood it nobly – not one complaining; but from the size of their haversacks on their return, it is no wonder that they were satisfied and are so eager to go again tomorrow. I heard one of them say ‘there was such nice cabbage, sweet and Irish potatoes, turnips, &c., out where their duty called them, and then there was a likelihood of a Rebel sheep or young porker advancing over our lines and then he could take them as ‘contraband’ and have them for his own use.’ When they were out they saw about a dozen of the Rebel cavalry and would have had a bout with them, had it not been for…unlucky circumstance – one of the men caught the hammer of his rifle in the strap of his knapsack and caused his gun to fire; the Rebels heard the report and scampered in quick time….

In his own mid-October letter home, Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin, the commanding officer of C Company, reported that the right wing of the 47th Pennsylvania (companies A, C, D, F and I) was ordered to picket duty after the left-wing’s companies (B, G, K, E, and H) were forced to return to camp by Confederate troops:

I was ordered to take my company to Stewart’s house, drive the Rebels from it, and hold it at all hazards. It was about 3 o’clock in the morning, so waiting until it was just getting day, I marched 80 men up; but the Rebels had left after driving Capt. Kacy’s company [H] into the woods. I took possession of it, and stationed my men, and there we were for 24 hours with our hands on our rifles, and without closing an eye. I took ten men, and went out scouting within half a mile of the Rebels, but could not get a prisoner, and we did not dare fire on them first. Do not think I was rash, I merely obeyed orders, and had ten men with me who could whip a hundred; Brosius [sic, Brosious], Piers [sic, Pyers], Harp and McEwen were among the number. Every man in the company wanted to go. The Rebels did not attack us, and if they had they would have met with a warm reception, as I had my men posted in such a manner that I could have whipped a regiment. My men were all ready and anxious for a “fight.”

On Friday, October 22, the 47th engaged in a Divisional Review, described by historian Lewis Schmidt as “about 10,000 infantry, 1000 cavalry, and twenty pieces of artillery all in one big open field.” Four days later, Company B’s drummer boy, Alfred Eisenbraun, was dead—the second “man” from the regiment to die since the 47th Pennsylvania’s formation. (The first was another drummer boy, John Boulton Young of C Company, who was felled by smallpox at the Kalorama eruptive fever hospital in Georgetown on October 17.)

Of all of the dangerous foes the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers would encounter during their stay at Camp Griffin, it seemed that disease would prove to be the most persistent—and deadliest. In subsequent letters home, Captain Gobin asked Sunbury residents to donate blankets for the Sunbury Guards (the men of Company C):

The government has supplied them with one blanket apiece, which, as the cold weather approaches, is not sufficient…. Some of my men have none, two of them, Theodore Kiehl and Robert McNeal, having given theirs to our lamented drummer boy when he was taken sick… Each can give at least one blanket, (no matter what color, although we would prefer dark,) and never miss it, while it would add to the comfort of the soldiers tenfold. Very frequently while on picket duty their overcoats and blankets are both saturated by the rain. They must then wait until they can dry them by the fire before they can take their rest.

In late October 1861, the men from Companies B, G and H woke at 3 a.m., according to Schmidt, assembled a day’s worth of rations, marched four miles from camp, and took over picket duties from the 49th New York:

Company B was stationed in the vicinity of a Mrs. Jackson’s house, with Capt. Kacy’s Company H on guard around the house. The men of Company B had erected a hut made of fence rails gathered around an oak tree, in front of which was the house and property, including a persimmon tree whose fruit supplied them with a snack. Behind the house was the woods were the Rebels had been fired on last Wednesday morning while they were chopping wood there.

Less than a month later, in his letter of 17 November, Henry Wharton revealed more details about life at Camp Griffin:

This morning our brigade was out for inspection; arms, accoutrements [sic], clothing, knapsacks, etc, all were out through a thorough examination, and if I must say it myself, our company stood best, A No. 1, for cleanliness. We have a new commander to our Brigade, Brigadier General Brannen [sic, Brannan], of the U.S. Army, and if looks are any criterion, I think he is a strict disciplinarian and one who will be as able to get his men out of danger as he is willing to lead them to battle….

The boys have plenty of work to do, such as piquet [sic] duty, standing guard, wood-chopping, police duty and day drill; but then they have the most substantial food; our rations consist of fresh beef (three times a week) pickled pork, pickled beef, smoked pork, fresh bread, daily, which is baked by our own bakers, the Quartermaster having procured portable ovens for that purpose, potatoes, split peas, beans, occasionally molasses and plenty of good coffee, so you see Uncle Sam supplies us plentifully….

A few nights ago our Company was out on piquet [sic, picket]; it was a terrible night, raining very hard the whole night, and what made it worse, the boys had to stand well to their work and dare not leave to look for shelter. Some of them consider they are well paid for their exposure, as they captured two ancient muskets belonging to Secessia. One of them is of English manufacture, and the other has the Virginia militia mark on it. They are both in a dilapidated condition, but the boys hold them in high estimation as they are trophies from the enemy, and besides they were taken from the house of Mrs. Stewart, sister to the rebel Jackson who assassinated the lamented Ellsworth at Alexandria. The honorable lady, Mrs. Stewart, is now a prisoner at Washington and her house is the headquarters of the command of the piquets [sic]….

Since the success of the secret expedition, we have all kinds of rumors in camp. One is that our Brigade will be sent to the relief of Gen. Sherman, in South Carolina. The boys all desire it and the news in the ‘Press’ is correct, that a large force is to be sent there, I think their wish will be gratified….

Springfield rifle, 1861 model (public domain).

On 20 November, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers marched in The Grand Review of the Army of the Potomac at Bailey’s Crossroads, Virginia. According to National Portrait Gallery historian James Barber:

For three hours some 70,000 polished troops marched passed the reviewing stand, where the president, members of his cabinet, and Washington dignitaries were in attendance. It was the largest military assemblage up to that time in North America. ‘The Grand Review went off splendidly,’ wrote McClellan that night in a letter to his wife, ‘not a mistake was made, not a hitch. I never saw so large a Review in Europe so well done—I was completely satisfied & delighted beyond expression.’

Among the 20,000 spectators to witness the Grand Review was the poet and social activist Julia Ward Howe of Boston, Massachusetts, who was visiting the Washington area with her husband, Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe.

After leaving the review, during the carriage ride back to Washington, she heard troops singing the song ‘John Brown’s Body.’ A companion suggested that she should write new lyrics to the song, the melody of which lingered in her mind that night in her room at Willard’s Hotel in Washington. She awoke ‘in the gray of the morning twilight’ with the song still in her head and ‘the long lines of the desired poem began to twine themselves in my mind.’ She arose quickly and in the dimness of the early hour she began scribbling the verses on stationery ‘almost without looking at the paper.’

Her poem, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, was first published in The Atlantic Monthly in February 1862; the magazine paid her five dollars. Soon thereafter her verse was set to music and her inspirational song became a wartime favorite….

The November 30, 1861 edition of the Sunbury American carried the good news of pay sent home to loved ones by Sunbury’s boys in blue (public domain; click to enlarge).

The next day, according to Schmidt, the regiment participated in a morning divisional headquarters review overseen by the 47th Pennsylvania’s commanding officer, Colonel Tilghman H. Good, followed by brigade and division drills all afternoon. According to Schmidt, “each man was supplied with ten blank cartridges.” Afterward, “Gen. Smith requested Gen. Brannan to inform Col. Good that the 47th was the best regiment in the whole division.” As a reward—and in preparation for bigger things to come, Brannan obtained new Springfield rifles for every member of the 47th Pennsylvania.

As November came to a close, Captain Gobin helped a number of Sunbury Guardsmen to send a total of $900 from their collective pay back home to their families and friends in Pennsylvania. The editors of the Sunbury American subsequently announced the names of the family members and others who could expect to receive the sorely needed financial support from their boys in blue via a special notice in the newspaper’s November 30, 1861 edition.

Winter Quarters at Camp Griffin

Sketch of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers’ winter quarters at Camp Griffin, near Langley, Virginia, by Second Lieutenant William H. Wyker, Company E, December 1861 (public domain).

As fall deepened and progressed into winter, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was ordered to batten down the hatches and establish its winter quarters—during a time when the guns on both sides of the war fell silent as snow blanketed Virginia, making it nearly impossible for Union and Confederate troops to march over the slippery, icy farm grounds around them—let alone drag their artillery into fighting positions in order to continue blasting away at one another.

It was simply too cold and too miserable to expend energy as combatants. But there were lighter moments as well.

Quartermaster James VanDyke procured a holiday surprise for the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers (Sunbury American, December 21, 1861, public domain).

According to the December 21, 1861 edition of the Sunbury American, Regimental Quartermaster James Van Dyke, who was enjoying an approved furlough at home in Sunbury, Pennsylvania, was able to procure “various articles of comfort, for the inner as well as the outer man.” Upon his return to camp, many of the 47th Pennsylvanians of German heritage were pleasantly surprised to learn that the well-liked former sheriff of Sunbury had thoughtfully brought a sizable supply of sauerkraut with him. The German equivalent of “comfort food,” this favored treat warmed stomachs and lifted more than a few spirits that first cold winter away from loved ones.

Also, in a letter written sometime around Christmas 1861, Captain Gobin reported that Private John D. Colvin had been detailed to special duty with the signal corps in Washington, D.C. while Musician Henry D. Wharton, increasingly known to folks back home for his letters to the Sunbury American, had assumed additional responsibilities as a clerk who was assigned to the staff of Brigadier-General Brannan at Brigade Headquarters.

As fall fell away, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers continued to wait for better weather, hunkered down in their sturdier, winter quarters at Camp Griffin, remaining here until January 22, 1862, when the regiment was ordered to pack up and march for the railroad station at Falls Church. Transported from there by rail to Alexandria, they then sailed the Potomac via the steamship City of Richmond to the Washington Arsenal, where they were reequipped before being marched off for dinner and rest at the Soldiers’ Retreat in Washington, D.C. The next afternoon, they hopped cars on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and headed for Annapolis, Maryland.

Arriving around 10 p.m., they were assigned quarters in barracks at the United States Naval Academy. They then spent that Friday through Monday (January 24-27, 1862) loading their equipment and other supplies onto the steamship Oriental, before sailing away at 4 p.m. that final afternoon. They were headed for America’s far warmer Deep South—and a very long time away from the arms of their loved ones and the comforts of home.

To learn more about the 47th Pennsylvania’s next phase of duty, read “Late Winter through Early Spring 1862 (Florida): Serving as Soldiers and Surrogates for Family.”

 

Sources:

  1. Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, vol 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
  2. Gobin, John Peter Shindel. Personal Letters, 1861-1865. Northumberland, Pennsylvania: Personal Collection of John Deppen.
  3. “Lincoln and McClellan: An Army Ready for War.” Washington, D.C.: National Portrait Gallery, retrieved online December 1, 2023.
  4. Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.
  5. Wharton, Henry D. Letters from the Sunbury Guards. Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1861-1868.