Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, April 9, 1864 — Casualties and POWs from the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry

Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, April 9, 1864 (Harper’s Weekly, May 7, 1864, public domain).

Arriving at Pleasant Hill, Louisiana around 8:30 a.m. on April 9, 1864, after having retreated from the scene of the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads just before midnight on April 8, and with the enemy believed to be in pursuit, Union Major-General Nathaniel Banks ordered his troops (including the (47th Pennsylvania Volunteers) to regroup and ready themselves for a new round of fighting. That fight would later be known as the Battle of Pleasant Hill.

In his official Red River Campaign Report penned a year later, Banks described how the day unfolded:

A line of battle was formed in the following order: First Brigade, Nineteenth Corps, on the right, resting on a ravine; Second Brigade in the center, and Third Brigade on the left. The center was strengthened by a brigade of General Smith’s forces, whose main force was held in reserve. The enemy moved toward our right flank. The Second Brigade [including the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers] withdrew from the center to the support of the First Brigade. The brigade in support of the center moved up into position, and another of General Smith’s brigades was posted to the extreme left position on the hill, in echelon to the rear of the left main line.

Light skirmishing occurred during the afternoon. Between 4 and 5 o’clock it increased in vigor, and about 5 p.m., when it appeared to have nearly ceased, the enemy drove in our skirmishers and attacked in force, his first onset being against the left. He advanced in two oblique lines, extending well over toward the right of the Third Brigade, Nineteenth Corps. After a determined resistance this part of the line gave way and went slowly back to the reserves. The First and Second Brigades were soon enveloped in front, right, and rear. By skillful movements of General Emory the flanks of the two brigades, now bearing the brunt of the battle, were covered. The enemy pursued the brigades, passing the left and center, until he approached the reserves under General Smith, when he was met by a charge led by General Mower and checked. The whole of the reserves were now ordered up, and in turn we drove the enemy, continuing the pursuit until night compelled us to halt.

First State Color, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers (issued September 20, 1861, retired May 11, 1865).

The 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers had been ordered into a critically important defensive position at the far right of the Union lines that day (April 9, 1864), their right flank spreading up onto a high bluff. According to Bates, after fighting off a charge by the troops of Confederate Major-General Richard Taylor, the 47th was forced to bolster the buckling lines of the 165th New York Infantry—just as the 47th was shifting to the left of the massed Union forces.

Nearly two decades later, First Lieutenant James Hahn recalled his involvement (as a sergeant in that battle) for a retrospective article in the January 31, 1884 edition of The National Tribune:

A PENNSYLVANIA SOLDIER’S EXPERIENCE.

Lieutenant James Hahn, of the 47th Pennsylvania infantry, writing from Newport, Pa., refers as follows to the engagements at Sabine Cross-roads and Pleasant Hill:

‘The 19th Corps had gone into camp for the evening about four miles from Sabine Cross-Roads. The engagement at Mansfield had been fought by the 13th Corps, who struggled bravely against overwhelming odds until they were driven from the field. I presume the rebel Gen. Dick Taylor knew of the situation of our army, and that the 19th was in the rear of the 13th, and the 16th still in rear of the 19th, some thirteen miles away, encamped at Pleasant Hill. They thought it would be a good joke to whip Banks’ army in detail: first, the 13th corps, then 19th, then finish up on the 16th. But they counted without their hosts; for when the couriers came flying back to the 19th with the news of the sad disaster that had befallen the 13th corps, we were double-quicked a distance of some four miles, and just met the advance of our defeated 13th corps – coming pell-mell, infantry, cavalry, and artillery all in one conglomerated mass, in such a manner as only a defeated and routed army can be mixed up – at Sabine Cross-roads, where our corps was thrown into line just in time to receive the victorious and elated Johnnies with a very warm reception, which gave them a recoil, and which stopped their impetuous headway, and gave the 13th corps time to get safely to the rear. I do not know what would have been the consequence if the 19th had been defeated also, that evening of the 8th, at Sabine Cross-roads, and the victorious rebel army had thrown themselves upon the ‘guerrillas’ then lying in camp at Pleasant Hill. It was just about getting dark when the Johnnies made their last assault upon the lines of the 19th. We held the field until about midnight, and then fell back and left the picket to hold the line while we joined the 16th at Pleasant Hill the morning of the 9th of April, soon after daybreak. It was not long until the rebel cavalry put in an appearance, and soon skirmishing commenced. About 4 o’clock in the afternoon the engagement become general all along the line, and with varied success, until late in the afternoon the rebels were driven from the field, and were followed until darkness set in, and about midnight our army made a retrograde movement, which ended at Grand Ecore, and left our dead and wounded lying on the field, all of whom fell into rebel hands. I have been informed since by one of our regiment, who was left wounded on the field, that the rebels were so completely defeated that they did not return to the battlefield till late the next day, and I have always been of the opinion that, if the defeat that the rebels got at Pleasant Hill had been followed up, Banks’ army, with the aid of A. J. Smith’s divisions, could have got to Shreveport (the objective point) without much left or hindrance from the rebel army.’

According to Major-General Banks, “The battle of the 9th was desperate and sanguinary. The defeat of the enemy was complete, and his loss in officers and men more than double that sustained by our forces.”

Even so, casualties for the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry that day were high. The abridged lists below partially documents the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers who were declared as wounded in action, killed in action, missing in action, or captives of the Confederate States Army (POWs) after the Battle of Pleasant Hill:

Killed or Wounded in Action:

Lieutenant-Colonel George Warren Alexander, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, circa 1861 (public domain).

Alexander, George Warren: Lieutenant-Colonel and second in command of the regiment; struck in the left leg near the ankle by a shell fragment which fractured his leg; recovered and returned to duty; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 23, 1864.

Baldwin, Isaac: Corporal, Company D; twice wounded in action in 1864, he was first wounded during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company D; wounded in action the second time during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company D; subsequently promoted to the rank of sergeant on January 20, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Buss, Charles (alternate spelling: Bress): Private, Company F; initially declared missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, Union Army leaders ultimately determined that he had been captured by Confederate States Army troops during that battle; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas; held captive there as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: This was likely the “Charles Bress” shown on Camp Ford prisoner records as a private from Company D.) After recovering from his POW experience, he remained on the Company F rosters until he was honorably discharged in January 1865.

Clouser, Ephraim: Private, Company D; shot in the right knee and then captured by Confederate Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on November 25, 1864; placed on the sick rolls of the Army of the United States after his release from captivity, he was hospitalized at the Union Army’s Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis, Missouri before being transferred to a Union Army hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio for more advanced care for his battle wound — and possibly also for “Soldiers’ Heart”/post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); from there, he was sent home to Pennsylvania to convalesce at the Union Army’s general hospital in York, Pennsylvania; honorably discharged after that convalescence, his exact muster out date remains unclear; described, post-war, as “an insane veteran,” he was repeatedly institutionalized throughout his remaining years.

Crownover, James: Sergeant, Company D; survived slight breast wound during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862; sustained gunshot wound to the right shoulder and was captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Groce or Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held until he was released during a prisoner exchange on November 25, 1864; while he was being held as a POW, he was commissioned, but not mustered as a second lieutenant on August 31, 1864; recovered following medical treatment; returned to duty with Company C and was promoted to the rank of first sergeant on July 5, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Dingler, John: Private, Company E; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company E; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of enlistment on September 18, 1864; later re-enlisted with the 47th Pennsylvania’s B Company on February 13, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Dumm, William F. (alternate spellings: Drum or Drumm): Private, Company H; killed in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864.

Fink, Edward: Private, Company B; killed in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864.

Frack, William: Corporal, Company I; declared missing in action and “supposed dead” following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; was ultimately declared as killed in action.

Hagelgans, Nicholas: Private, Company K; killed in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864.

Hahn, Richard: Private, Company E; killed in action by a musket ball during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864.

Haltiman, William (alternate spellings: Haldeman or Halderman): Second Lieutenant, Company I; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company I; promoted to the rank of sergeant on January 1, 1865; promoted to the rank of second lieutenant on May 27, 1865; felled by sunstroke while on duty in mid-July 1865, he died in Pineville, South Carolina on July 21, 1865.

Hangen, Granville D.: Private, Company I; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company I; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Hartshorn, John (alternate spelling: Hartshorne): Private, Company H; initially listed as missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, Union Army officials ultimately determined that he had been captured by Confederate States Army troops and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: His surname was spelled as “Hartshorne” in Camp Ford’s prisoner records, which also described him as “illiterate” and incorrectly listed his company as “K.”) He subsequently died at a Union Army hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana on August 8, 1864.

Huff, James: Corporal, Company E; wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on August 29, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company E; was captured again by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1864; was marched or was transported to the Salisbury Prison Camp in Salisbury, North Carolina, where he was again held captive as a POW—this time, until his death on March 5, 1865. Per historian Lewis Schmidt, it was “reported [by a fellow soldier that] ‘he got his throat cut with a ball and I sott him up against stump to die.’” He was subsequently buried by Confederate States Army soldiers in one of the unmarked trench graves at the Salisbury Prison Camp.

Jones, John L.: Private, Company F; wounded in action and captured by Confederate troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas; promoted by his regiment on September 18, 1864 while he was still being held as a POW at Camp Ford, he was finally released during a prisoner exchange on September 24, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company F, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant on June 2, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Kennedy, James: Private, Company C; sustained gunshot fracture of the arm and gunshot wound to his side during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; was transported to the Union Army’s St. James Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana, where he died from his battle wounds on April 27, 1864.

Kern, Samuel M.: Private, Company D; wounded in action and captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held in captivity as a prisoner of war (POW) until he died on June 12, 1864.

Kramer, Cornelius: Private, Company C; wounded in the leg during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; was honorably discharged on December 16, 1865.

Matter, Jacob (alternate spelling: Madder): Private, Company K; initially reported as missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, his status was subsequently updated to “died of wounds” from that battle.

Mayers, William H. (alternate spellings: Mayer, Mayers, Meyers, Moyers; shown on regimental muster rolls as “Mayers, William H.” and “Meyers, William H.”; listed in Samuel P. Bates’ History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5 and various other records as “Moyers I, William H.”): Corporal, Co. I; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company I; promoted to the rank of sergeant on September 19, 1864; was subsequently wounded in action again—this time during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1864; recovered and returned to duty; promoted to the rank of first sergeant on May 27, 1865; was commissioned, but not mustered as a second lieutenant on July 25, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

McNew, John: Private, Company C; wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1964; marched to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas and held captive there as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: Camp Ford records incorrectly listed him as a member of Company D and also described him as “illiterate.”) Promoted to the rank of corporal on December 1, 1864; reduced to the rank of private on April 22, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Miller, George: Private, Company C; wounded in the side during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; was honorably mustered out upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864; died suddenly in his hometown in 1867.

Miller, John Garber: Corporal, Company D; wounded in action and captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, he was marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: Camp Ford records incorrectly listed him as a member of Co. G.) Recovered and returned to duty with Company D, he was subsequently promoted to the rank of sergeant on September 19, 1864; was honorably mustered out on December 25, 1865.

Moser, Peter (alternate spelling: “Moses”): Private, Company F; survived arm wound sustained during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862; was honorably discharged on a surgeon’s certificate of disability on February 24, 1863; recovered and re-enlisted with Company F on December 19, 1863; initially declared missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864. Union Army officers subsequently determined that he had been captured in battle at Pleasant Hill and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: His surname was listed on Camp Ford prisoner records as “Moses,” which also described him as “illiterate.”) Transported to New Orleans for treatment at a Union Army hospital, he remained “Absent and sick at New Orleans since 22 July 1864,” according to his Civil War Veterans’ Card File entry in the Pennsylvania State Archives, which also noted that he was “Supposed to be Dis. Under G.O. #77 A.G.O. W.D. Series 1865.” He ultimately survived the war and died in Pennsylvania in 1905.

O’Brien, William H.: Private, Company H; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company H; was honorably discharged on December 6, 1864.

Offhouse, William: Private, Company F; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company F; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Private Nicholas Orris, Company H, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, circa 1863 (public domain).

Orris, Nicholas: Private, Co. H; killed in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; burial location remains unknown.

Petre, Pete: Private, Company D; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company D; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Powell, Solomon: Private, Company D; possibly wounded in action, he was captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; he then died from his battle wounds at Pleasant Hill, Louisiana either that same day or on June 7, 1864 while still being held by Confederate troops as a prisoner of war (POW). According to historian Lewis Schmidt, “Privates Powell and Wantz were probably buried in a cemetery at Pleasant Hill, ‘at the rear of the brick building used for a hospital,’ and after the war reinterred at Alexandria National Cemetery at Pineville, Louisiana in unknown graves.”)

Pyers, William: Sergeant, Company C; wounded in the arm and side while saving the flag from fallen C Company Color-Bearer Benjamin Walls; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; killed in action during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1864.

Reinert, Griffin (alternate spelling: Reinhart, Griffith; known as “Griff”): Private, Company F; sustained a gunshot wound to his jaw during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; was transported to the Union Army Hospital in York, Pennsylvania for more advanced medical care; was discharged on a surgeon’s certificate of disability on December 28, 1864.

Reinsmith, Tilghman: Private and Field Musician—Bugler, Company B; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company B; promoted to the rank of corporal on October 1, 1864; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Scheetz, Robert (alternate spelling Sheats): Private, Company F; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company F; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Schleppy, Llewellyn J. (alternate spelling “Sleppy”): Private, Company F; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company F; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Shaver, Joseph Benson: Private, Company D; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company D; was honorably discharged at Washington, D.C. on June 1, 1865.

Smith, Frederick: Private, Co. D; possibly wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; captured by Confederate States Army troops during that battle and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until his death on May 4, 1864.

Sterner, John C.: Private, Company C; killed in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864.

Stewart, Cornelius Baskins: Corporal, Company D; after surviving a wound sustained during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862, he recovered, was released to the regiment on December 15, 1862, and returned to active duty on March 1, 1863; shot in the right hip during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, he recovered and returned to duty again with Company D; he was honorably discharged upon completion of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Wagner, Samuel: Private, Company D; wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, he was lost at sea while being transported for medical care aboard the USS Pocahontas when that steam transport foundered off of Cape May, New Jersey after colliding with the City of Bath on June 1, 1864.

Walls, Benjamin: Regimental Color-Sergeant, Company C; sustained gunshot wound to his left shoulder while trying to mount the 47th Pennsylvania’s flag on a piece of Confederate artillery that had been re-captured by the regiment; recovered and attempted to re-enlist, but was denied permission due to his age. (At sixty-seven, he was the oldest man to serve in the entire regiment.) Was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Wantz, Jonathan: Private, Company D; possibly wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; captured by Confederate States Army troops during that battle, he was then held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he died at Pleasant Hill—either the same day or on June 17, 1864 while he was still being held as a POW by Confederate troops. According to historian Lewis Schmidt, “Privates Powell and Wantz were probably buried in a cemetery at Pleasant Hill, ‘at the rear of the brick building used for a hospital,’ and after the war reinterred at Alexandria National Cemetery at Pineville, Louisiana in unknown graves.”)

Weiss, John: Private, Co. F; Wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until his death on July 15, 1864; his burial location remains unknown.

Wieand, Benjamin: Private, Company D; Survived wound to his right thigh during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862; recovered and transferred to Company D, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers on December 15, 1863; wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, he was marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange (possibly after July 1864); was honorably discharged on July 21, 1865.

Wolf, Samuel: Private, Company K; initially declared as missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, he was ultimately declared as having been killed in action during that battle after having been absent from muster rolls for a substantial period of time.

Zellner, Benjamin (alternate spelling: Cellner): Private, Company K; wounded in action four times in 1864; was shot in the leg and lost an eye during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; captured during that same battle by Confederate States Army troops, he was confined initially at Pleasant Hill and Mansfield before being marched or transported to Camp Ford near Tyler Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW). Note: Although Camp Ford records (under surname of “Cellner”) stated in 2010 that he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864, Zellner stated in multiple newspaper accounts after war’s end that he was one of a group of three to four hundred men who had been deemed well enough by Camp Ford officials to be shipped to Shreveport, Louisiana, where they were then processed and sent by rail to Andersonville, the notorious Confederate POW camp in Georgia. Finally released from Andersonville in September 1864, he recovered and returned to duty with Company K. He was then wounded in the leg and also suffered a bayonet wound during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1964; recovered from those wounds and returned to duty with Company K; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865. During a newspaper interview in later life, he told the reporter that his bayonet wound had never healed properly.

Captured and Held as Prisoners of War (POWs):

This image depicts life at Camp Ford, the largest Confederate Army prison camp west of the Mississippi River (Harper’s Weekly, March 4, 1865, public domain).

Brown, Francis or Charles: Private and Musician/Bugler, Company D and Regimental Band No. 2; captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864 and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford, near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864; subsequently awarded a furlough to recuperate, he was mistakenly listed on regimental rosters as having deserted while on leave on September 16, 1864 when, in fact, he had actually re-enlisted as a bugler with the 7th New York Volunteers in October 1864, signaling that there had either been a miscommunication with him about the furlough (his native language was German), or that he had developed a mental impairment during his captivity as a POW; he went on to serve with the 7th New York until he was honorably mustered out at Hart Island, New York on August 4, 1865

Buss, Charles (alternate spelling: Bress): Private, Company F; initially declared missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, Union Army leaders ultimately determined that he had been captured by Confederate States Army troops during that battle; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, he was held captive there as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: This was likely the “Charles Bress” shown on Camp Ford prisoner records as a Private from Company D.) After recovering from his POW experience, he remained on the Company F rosters until he was honorably discharged in January 1865.

Crownover, James: Sergeant, Company D; survived slight breast wound during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862; sustained gunshot wound to the right shoulder and was captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Groce or Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive until he was released during a prisoner exchange on November 25, 1864; while he was being held as a POW, he was commissioned, but not mustered as a second lieutenant on August 31, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; promoted to the rank of first sergeant on July 5, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

James Downs (circa 1880s, public domain).

Downs, James: Private, Company D; captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864 and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford, near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company D; promoted to the rank of corporal on July 5, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Fisher, Charles B.: Private, Company K; captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: Camp Ford’s prisoner records described him as “illiterate.”) Recovered and returned to duty with Company K; was honorably discharged upon expiration of his three-year term of service on September 18, 1864.

Huff, James: Corporal, Company E; wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on August 29, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company E; was captured again by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on October 19, 1864; was marched or transported to the Salisbury Prison Camp in Salisbury, North Carolina, where he was again held captive as a POW—this time, until his death on March 5, 1865. Per historian Lewis Schmidt, it was “reported [by a fellow soldier that] ‘he got his throat cut with a ball and I sott him up against stump to die.’” was buried by Confederate States Army soldiers in one of the unmarked trench graves at the Salisbury Prison Camp.

Jones, John L.: Private, Company F; wounded in action and captured by Confederate troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW); promoted by his regiment on September 18, 1864 while he was still being held as a POW at Camp Ford, he was finally released during a prisoner exchange on September 24, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company F, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant on June 2, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Kern, Samuel M.: Private, Company D; wounded in action and captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched or was transported to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he died on June 12, 1864.

McNew, John: Private, Company C; wounded in action and captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1964; marched to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas and held captive there as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: Camp Ford records incorrectly listed him as a member of Company D and also described him as “illiterate.) Promoted to the rank of corporal on December 1, 1864; reduced to the rank of private on April 22, 1865; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Miller, John Garber: Corporal, Company D; wounded in action and captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: Camp Ford records incorrectly listed him as a member of Co. G.) Recovered and returned to duty with Company D, he was subsequently promoted to the rank of sergeant on September 19, 1864; was honorably mustered out on December 25, 1865.

Moser, Peter (alternate spelling: “Moses”): Private, Company F; survived arm wound sustained during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on October 22, 1862; was honorably discharged on a surgeon’s certificate of disability on February 24, 1863; recovered and re-enlisted with Company F on December 19, 1863; initially declared missing in action following the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864, Union Army officers subsequently determined that he had been captured in battle at Pleasant Hill and marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864. (Note: His surname was listed on Camp Ford prisoner records as “Moses,” which also described him as “illiterate.”) Transported to New Orleans for treatment at a Union Army hospital, he remained “Absent and sick at New Orleans since 22 July 1864,” according to his Civil War Veterans’ Card File entry in the Pennsylvania State Archives, which also noted that he was “Supposed to be Dis. Under G.O. #77 A.G.O. W.D. Series 1865.” He ultimately survived the war and died in Pennsylvania in 1905.

Powell, Solomon: Private, Company D; possibly wounded in action, he was also captured during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; he then died from his battle wounds at Pleasant Hill, Louisiana either that same day or on June 7, 1864 while still being held by Confederate troops as a POW. According to historian Lewis Schmidt, “Privates Powell and Wantz were probably buried in a cemetery at Pleasant Hill, ‘at the rear of the brick building used for a hospital,’ and after the war reinterred at Alexandria National Cemetery at Pineville, Louisiana in unknown graves.”)

Smith, Frederick: Private, Company D; possibly wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; captured during that battle by Confederate States Army troops, he was marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until his death on May 4, 1864.

Smith, John Wesley: Private, Company C; captured by Confederates during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; was honorably discharged on December 25, 1865.

Smith, William J.: Private, Company D; captured by Confederate States Army troops during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1864; marched one hundred and twenty-five miles to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas, where he was held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on July 22, 1874. (Note: Camp Ford’s prisoner records described him as “illiterate.”) Honorably mustered out on December 25, 1865, he suffered from scurvy, which was likely attributable to his POW experience. Injured in a work-related accident in May 1891, he contracted tetanus due to that injury and died from lock-jaw in Duncannon, Pennsylvania on 3 June 1891.

Wantz, Jonathan: Private, Company D; possibly wounded in action during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana on April 9, 1863, he was then captured by Confederate States Army troops and held captive as a prisoner of war (POW) until he died at Pleasant Hill—either the same day or on June 17, 1864 while he was still being held as a POW by Confederate troops. According to historian Lewis Schmidt, “Privates Powell and Wantz were probably buried in a cemetery at Pleasant Hill, ‘at the rear of the brick building used for a hospital,’ and after the war reinterred at Alexandria National Cemetery at Pineville, Louisiana in unknown graves.”)

Sources:

“A Pennsylvania Soldier’s Experience.” Washington, D.C.: The National Tribune, January 31, 1884.
Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, vol. 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
Prisoner of War Records, Camp Ford and Camp Groce (47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry). Tyler Texas: Smith County Historical Society, 2010.
Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.

Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana, April 8, 1864 — Casualties and POWs from the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry

Apr9

Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana (Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, 14 May 1864, public domain).

At 4 p.m. Louisiana time on April 8, 1864, during the American Civil War, the left flank of the Confederate States Army, which was commanded by Major-General Richard Taylor, slowly began an echelon formation attack on troops commanded by Union Major-General Nathaniel Banks, forcing the Union’s cavalry line to buckle. During the first fourteen minutes of the opening charge of this combat engagement, which later became known as the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads (by Union troops) and the Battle of Mansfield (by Confederate troops), eleven out of fourteen Confederate officers were killed in action.

Shortly thereafter, Banks’ left Union flank also collapsed, and Taylor’s troops continued forward, puncturing a secondary Union Army position three quarters of a mile behind the Union’s front line.

In response, Banks ordered Brigadier-General William Emory to move his 1st Division, 19th U.S. Army Corps to the front. Among Emory’s 5,859 men were nine New York regiments, three from Maine—and the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry. Ninety minutes and seven miles of marching later, Emory’s men waited for the Confederates on the ridge above Chapman’s Bayou.

* Note: The 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were positioned behind the 161st New York, 29th Maine, and other Union regiments at or near the farm of Joshua Chapman, about five miles southeast of Mansfield, Louisiana. The battles here were termed the “Peach Orchard” fight by Confederates and “Pleasant Grove” by 47th Pennsylvanians—a name attributed by several historians to the live oak trees in front of Chapman’s house. The fighting at the peach orchard was particularly brutal.

19th U.S. Army Map, Phase 3, Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield (8 April 1864, public domain; click to enlarge).

Confederate troops next attacked the center of the Union line, causing the lines of the 161st New York Volunteers to buckle; the 29th Maine stood firm, however, and repulsed the enemy.

In response, Confederates from the 1st, 26th, 36th, and other Texas Cavalry units then attempted an end run on the Union’s right flank, but the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were ready for them. Initially positioned to the right of the 13th Maine Infantry, the 47th Pennsylvania and 13th Maine marched into the fray, pinwheeling to head off an attack by the cavalry group led by Confederate Brigadier-General Thomas Green, halting that flanking maneuver.

As darkness fell on April 8, 1864, the fighting gradually waned and then finally ceased as exhausted troops on both sides collapsed between the bodies of their dead comrades. Although the full scope of the carnage was not immediately evident, Union rosters were eventually updated, confirming that seventy-four men were dead, at least one hundred and sixty-one were wounded, and hundreds more were declared missing in action, including one hundred and eighty-eight soldiers from the 19th U.S. Army (to which the 47th Pennsylvania was attached). Some of these missing men (including men from the 47th Pennsylvania) were subsequently found and declared as wounded or dead; others (including 47th Pennsylvanians) ended up as prisoners of war (POWs), at Camp Ford, which was located near Tyler, Texas and was the largest Confederate prison located west of the Mississippi River.

Sadly, a significant number of 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers remain missing to this day, having been hastily interred somewhere on or near the Mansfield battlefield sites by fellow soldiers or local residents. (No remains were found during archaeological excavations of the area during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, but one possible answer to the mystery surrounding the burial locations of these men was in provided in 1996 by L. P. Hecht, who reported in Echoes from the Letters of a Civil War Surgeon, that wild hogs had eaten the remains of at least some of the federal soldiers who had been left unburied.)

The abridged lists below partially document the members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry who were declared as wounded in action, killed in action, missing in action, or captives of the Confederate States Army (POWs) after the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield:

Killed or Wounded in Action:

Second Lieutenant Alfred Swoyer, Company K, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, circa 1862 (public domain)

Barry, William: Private, Company H; killed in action during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864.

Fries, John: Private, Company B: Wounded in action during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; recovered and returned to service with Company B; honorably mustered out from the 47th Pennsylvania on 29 June 1865.

Haas, Jeremiah: Private, Company C; survived breast and face wounds sustained during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on 22 October 1862; killed in action during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864.

Marshall, Charles L. (alias: Lothard, Thomas): Private, Company C; survived gunshot wound(s) to his head and/or body during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on 22 October 1862; sustained additional gunshot wounds to the top of his head, the right side of his body and/or arm, and his left shin during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; recovered and returned to duty a second time; was honorably mustered out on 5 July 1865; lived out his later years at the U.S. National Soldiers’ Home in Marion, Indiana, and was interred at that Soldiers’ Home Cemetery following his death there.

McIntire, John (alternate spelling: McIntyre): Private, Company H; wounded in action during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company H; killed in action during the Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia on 19 October 1864.

Nipple, Thomas: Private, Company C; wounded in the stomach during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; was honorably discharged on 25 December 1865.

Sanders, Francis (alternate spellings: Xander, Xandres): Corporal, Company B; wounded in action during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; died shortly after being carried to the rear by his brother; burial location unknown; his death was documented in the obituary of his widow, Henrietta Susan (Balliet) Sanders, in the 15 May 1916 edition of Allentown’s Morning Call newspaper, which reported that Francis Sanders “enlisted in the Forty-seventh regiment and saw service for two enlistments until the battle of Sabine Cross Roads, La., where he was wounded and carried to the rear by his brother. From that day to this not a word was heard from him and the supposition was that he died from his wounds….” That obituary also stated that Francis Sanders was likely interred in an unknown, unmarked grave.

Seip, Lewis H.: Private, Company B; wounded in the leg during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company B; was promoted to the rank of corporal on 19 September 1864; although reported as having been dishonorably discharged on 4 October 1865 in Samuel P. Bates’ History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, per other records, he mustered out with his regiment on 25 December 1865.

Swoyer, Alfred P.: Second Lieutenant, Company K; killed instantly after being struck by a minié ball in the right temple during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1884; burial location unknown.

Captured and Held as Prisoners of War (POW):

This image depicts life at Camp Ford, the largest Confederate Army prison camp west of the Mississippi River (Harper’s Weekly, 4 March 1865, public domain).

Firth, John Wesley (known as “Wesley”): Captured by Confederate forces during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; marched by Confederate States Army troops to Camp Ford, near Tyler, Texas, and held there as a prisoner of war (POW) until released during a prisoner exchange sometime between July and November 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; was honorably discharged on 25 December 1865.

Holman, Conrad: Private, Company C; Survived being hit by a rifle ball to the face during the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina on 22 October 1862, which destroyed all of his teeth; received medical treatment, recovered and returned to duty with Company C; was captured by Confederate forces during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield on 8 April 1864 and marched to Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas; released during a prisoner exchange on 22 July 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; honorably discharged on 18 September 1864.

Matthews, Edward: Private, Company C; captured by Confederate forces during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; held as prisoner of war (POW) at Camp Ford, near Tyler, Texas until being released as part of a prisoner exchange on 22 July 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; honorably discharged on 1 October 1865.

Miller, Samuel W.: Private, Company C; captured by Confederate forces during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana on 8 April 1864; held as prisoner of war (POW) at Camp Ford near Tyler, Texas until being released as part of a prisoner exchange on 22 July 1864; recovered and returned to duty with Company C; honorably discharged on 25 December 1865.

Sources:

Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, vol. 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
“Henrietta Sanders Dies in Her 90th Year” (obituary of Francis Sanders’ widow). Allentown, Pennsylvania: The Morning Call, 15 May 1916.
Prisoner of War Records, Camp Ford and Camp Groce (47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry). Tyler Texas: Smith County Historical Society, 2010.
Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.

New Year, New Duty Station: Adjusting to Life at Fort Jefferson in Florida’s Dry Tortugas (Late December 1862 – Late February 1863)

Mar29

Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan, U.S. Army (public domain).

“It is hardly necessary to point out to you the extreme military importance of the two works now intrusted [sic, entrusted] to your command. Suffice it to state that they cannot pass out of our hands without the greatest possible disgrace to whoever may conduct their defense, and to the nation at large. In view of difficulties that may soon culminate in war with foreign powers, it is eminently necessary that these works should be immediately placed beyond any possibility of seizure by any naval or military force that may be thrown upon them from neighboring ports….

Seizure of these forts by coup de main may be the first act of hostilities instituted by foreign powers, and the comparative isolation of their position, and their distance from reinforcements, point them out (independent of their national importance) as peculiarly the object of such an effort to possess them.”

— Excerpt from orders issued by Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan, commanding officer, United States Army, Department of the South, to Colonel Tilghman H. Good, commanding officer of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry in December 1862

Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida, view from the sea, 1946 (vacation photograph collection of President Harry Truman, November 1946 U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

Having been ordered by Union Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan to resume garrison duties in Florida in December 1862, after having been badly battered in the Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina two months earlier, the officers and enlisted members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were also informed in December that their regiment would become a divided one. This was being done, Brannan said, not as a punishment for their performance, which had been valiant, but to help the federal government to ensure that the foreign governments that had granted belligerent status to the Confederate States of America would not be able to aid the Confederate army and navy further in their efforts to move troops and supplies from Europe and the Deep South of the United States to the various theaters of the American Civil War.

As a result, roughly sixty percent of 47th Pennsylvanians (Companies A, B, C, E, G, and I) were sent back to Fort Taylor in Key West shortly before Christmas in 1862 while the remaining members of the regiment (from Companies D, F, H, and K) were transported by the USS Cosmopolitan to Fort Jefferson, the Union’s remote outpost in the Dry Tortugas, which was situated roughly seventy miles off the coast of Florida. They arrived there in late December of that same year.

Life at Fort Jefferson

Union Army Columbiad on the Terreplein at Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida (George A. Grant, 1937, U.S. National Park Service, public domain).

Garrison duty in Florida proved to be serious business for the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers. Per records of the United States Army’s Ordnance Department, the defense capabilities of Fort Jefferson in 1863 were impressive—thirty-three smoothbore cannon (twenty-four of which were twenty-four pounder howitzers that had been installed in the fort’s bastions to protect the installation’s flanks, and nine of which were forty-two pounders available for other defensive actions); six James rifles (forty-two pounder seacoast guns); and forty-three Columbiads (six ten-inch and thirty-seven eight-inch seacoast guns).

Fort Jefferson was so heavily armed because it was “key in controlling … shipping in the Gulf of Mexico and was being used as a supply depot for the distribution of rations and munitions to Federal troops in the Mississippi Delta; and as a supply and fueling station for naval vessels engaged in the blockade or transport of supplies and troops,” according to historian Lewis Schmidt.

Large quantities of stores, including such diverse items as flour … ham … coal, shot, shell, powder, 5000 crutches, hospital stores, and stone, bricks and lumber for the fort, were collected and stored at the Tortugas for distribution when needed. Federal prisoners, most of them court martialed Union soldiers, were incarcerated at the fort during the period of the war and used as laborers in improving the structure and grounds. As many as 1200 prisoners were kept at the fort during the war, and at least 500 to 600 were needed to maintain a 200 man working crew for the engineers.

With respect to housing and feeding the soldiers stationed here:

Cattle and swine were kept on one of the islands nearest the fort, called ‘Hog Island’ (today’s Bush Key), and would be compelled to swim across the channel to the fort to be butchered, with a hawser fastened to their horns. The meat was butchered twice each week, and rations were frequently supplemented by drawing money for commissary stores not used, and using it to buy fish and other available food items from the local fishermen. The men of the 7th New Hampshire [who were also stationed at Fort Jefferson] acquired countless turtle and birds’ eggs … from adjacent keys, including ‘Sand Key’ [where the fort’s hospital was located]. Loggerhead turtles were also caught … [and] were kept in the ‘breakwater ditch outside of the walls of the fort’, and used to supplement the diet [according to one soldier from New Hampshire].

Second-tier casemates, lighthouse keeper’s house, sallyport, and lean-to structure, Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida, late 1860s (U.S. National Park Service and National Archives, public domain).

In addition, the fort’s “interior parade grounds, with numerous trees and shrubs in evidence, contained … officers’ quarters, [a] magazine, kitchens and out houses,” as well as a post office and “a ‘hot shot oven’ which was completed in 1863 and used to heat shot before firing,” according to Schmidt.

Most quarters for the garrison … were established in wooden sheds and tents inside the parade [grounds] or inside the walls of the fort in second-tier gun rooms of ‘East’ front no. 2, and adjacent bastions … with prisoners housed in isolated sections of the first and second tiers of the southeast, or no. 3 front, and bastions C and D, located in the general area of the sallyport. The bakery was located in the lower tier of the northwest bastion ‘F’, located near the central kitchen….

According to H Company Second Lieutenant Christian Breneman, the walk around Fort Jefferson’s barren perimeter was less than a mile long with a sweeping view of the Gulf of Mexico. Brennan also noted the presence of “six families living [nearby], with 12 or 15 respectable ladies.”

Balls and parties are held regularly at the officers’ quarters, which is a large three-story brick building with large rooms and folding doors.

Lieutenant-Colonel George Warren Alexander, second-in-command, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, standing next to his horse, with officers from the 47th, Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida, circa 1863 (public domain; click to enlarge).

Shortly after the arrival of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers at Fort Jefferson, First Lieutenant George W. Fuller was appointed as adjutant for Lieutenant-Colonel George Warren Alexander, who had been placed in command of the fort’s operations. Assistant Regimental Surgeon Jacob Scheetz, M.D. was appointed as post surgeon and given command of the fort’s hospital operations, responsibilities he would continue to execute for fourteen months. In addition, Private John Schweitzer of the 47th Pennsylvania’s A Company was directed to serve at the fort’s baker, B Company’s Private Alexander Blumer was assigned as clerk of the quartermaster’s department, and H Company’s Third Sergeant William C. Hutchinson began his new duties as provost sergeant while H Company Privates John D. Long and William Barry were given additional duties as a boatman and baker, respectively.

When Christmas Day dawned, many at the fort experienced feelings of sadness and ennui as they continued to mourn friends who had recently been killed at Pocotaligo and worried about others who were still fighting to recover from their battle wounds.

1863

Unidentified Union Army artillerymen standing beside one of the fifteen-inch Rodman guns installed on the third level of Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas, Florida, circa 1862. Each smoothbore Rodman weighed twenty-five tons, and was able to fire four-hundred-and-fifty-pound shells more than three miles (U.S. National Park Service, public domain).

The New Year arrived at Fort Jefferson with a bang—literally—as the fort’s biggest guns thundered in salute, kicking off a day of celebration designed by senior military officials to lift the spirits of the men and inspire them to continued service. Donning their best uniforms, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers assembled on the parade grounds, where they marched in a dress parade and drilled to the delight of the civilians living on the island, including Emily Holder, who had been living in a small house within the fort’s walls since 1860 with her husband, who had been stationed there as a medical officer for the fort’s engineers. When describing that New Year’s Day and other events for an 1892 magazine article, she said:

On January 1st, 1863, the steamer Magnolia visited Fort Jefferson and we exchanged hospitalities. One of the officers who dined with us said it was the first time in nine months he had sat at a home table, having been all that time on the blockade….

Colonel Alexander, our new Commander, said that in Jacksonville, where they paid visits to the people, the young ladies would ask to be excused from not rising; they were ashamed to expose their uncovered feet, and their dresses were calico pieced from a variety of kinds.

Two days later, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers’ dress parade was a far less enjoyable one as temperatures and tempers soared. The next day, H Company Corporal George Washington Albert and several of his comrades were given the unpleasant task of carrying the regiment’s foul-smelling garbage to a flatboat and hauling it out to sea for dumping.

As the month of January progressed, it became abundantly clear to members of the regiment that the practice of chattel slavery was as ever present at and beyond the walls of Fort Jefferson as it had been at Fort Taylor and in South Carolina. It seemed that the changing of hearts and minds would take time even among northerners—despite President Lincoln’s best efforts, as illustrated by these telling observations made later that same month by Emily Holder:

We received a paper on the 10th of January, which was read in turns by the residents, containing rumors of the emancipation which was to take place on the first, but we had to wait another mail for the official announcement.

I asked a slave who was in my service if he thought he should like freedom. He replied, of course he should, and hoped it would prove true; but the disappointment would not be as great as though it was going to take away something they had already possessed. I thought him a philosopher.

In Key West, many of the slaves had already anticipated the proclamation, and as there was no authority to prevent it, many people were without servants. The colored people seemed to think ‘Uncle Sam’ was going to support them, taking the proclamation in its literal sense. They refused to work, and as they could not be allowed to starve, they were fed, though there were hundreds of people who were offering exorbitant prices for help of any kind—a strange state of affairs, yet in their ignorance one could not wholly blame them. Colonel Tinelle [sic, Colonel L. W. Tinelli] would not allow them to leave Fort Jefferson, and many were still at work on the fort.

John, a most faithful boy, had not heard the news when he came up to the house one evening, so I told him, then asked if he should leave us immediately if he had his freedom.

His face shone, and his eyes sparkled as he asked me to tell him all about it. He did not know what he would do. The next morning Henry, another of our good boys, who had always wished to be my cook, but had to work on the fort, came to see me, waiting until I broached the subject, for I knew what he came for. He hoped the report would not prove a delusion. He and John had laid by money, working after hours, and if it was true, they would like to go to one of the English islands and be ‘real free.’

I asked him how the boys took the news as it had been kept from them until now, or if they had heard a rumor whether they thought it one of the soldier’s stories.

‘Mighty excited, Missis,’ he replied….

Henry had been raised in Washington by a Scotch lady, who promised him his freedom when he became of age; but she died before that time arrived, and Henry had been sold with the other household goods.

The 47th Pennsylvanians continued to undergo inspections, drill and march for the remainder of January as regimental and company assignments were fine-tuned by their officers to improve efficiency. Among the changes made was the reassignment of Private Blumer to service as clerk of the fort’s ordnance department.

Three key officers of the regiment, however, remained absent. D Company’s Second Lieutenant George Stroop was still assigned to detached duties with the U.S. Army’s Signal Corps aboard the Union Navy’s war sloop, Canandaigua, and H Company’s First Lieutenant William Wallace Geety was back home in Pennsylvania, still trying to recruit new members for the regiment while recovering from the grievous injuries he had sustained at Pocotaligo, while Company K’s Captain Charles W. Abbott was undergoing treatment for disease-related complications at Fort Taylor’s post hospital.

Disease, in fact, would continue to be one of the Union Army’s most fearsome foes during this phase of duty, felling thirty-five members of its troops stationed at Fort Jefferson during the months of January and February alone. Those seriously ill enough to be hospitalized included twenty men battling dysentery and/or chronic diarrhea, four men suffering from either intermittent or bilious remittent fever, and two who were recovering from the measles with others diagnosed with rheumatism and general debility.

Fort Jefferson’s moat and wall, circa 1934, Dry Tortugas, Florida (C. E. Peterson, U.S. Library of Congress; public domain).

The primary reason for this shocking number of sick soldiers was the problematic water quality. According to Schmidt:

‘Fresh’ water was provided by channeling the rains from the fort’s barbette through channels in the interior walls, to filter trays filled with sand; and finally to the 114 cisterns located under the fort which held 1,231,200 gallons of water. The cisterns were accessible in each of the first level cells or rooms through a ‘trap hole’ in the floor covered by a temporary wooden cover…. Considerable dirt must have found its way into these access points and was responsible for some of the problems resulting in the water’s impurity…. The fort began to settle and the asphalt covering on the outer walls began to deteriorate and allow the sea water (polluted by debris in the moat) to penetrate the system…. Two steam condensers were available … and distilled 7000 gallons of tepid water per day for a separate system of reservoirs located in the northern section of the parade ground near the officers [sic, officers’] quarters. No provisions were made to use any of this water for personal hygiene of the [planned 1,500-soldier garrison force]….

Consequently, soldiers were forced to wash themselves and their clothes using saltwater hauled from the ocean. As if that were not difficult enough, “toilet facilities were located outside of the fort.” According to Schmidt:

At least one location was near the wharf and sallyport, and another was reached through a door-sized hole in a gunport, and a walk across the moat on planks at the northwest wall…. These toilets were flushed twice each day by the actions of the tides, a procedure that did not work very well and contributed to the spread of disease. It was intended that the tidal flush should move the wastes into the moat, and from there, by similar tidal action, into the sea. But since the moat surrounding the fort was used clandestinely by the troops to dispose of litter and other wastes … it was a continuous problem for Lt. Col. Alexander and his surgeon.

When it came to the care of soldiers with more serious infectious diseases such as smallpox, soldiers and prisoners were confined to isolation roughly three miles away on Bird Key to prevent contagion. The small island also served as a burial ground for Union soldiers stationed at the fort.

* Note: During this same period, First Lieutenant Lawrence Bonstine was assigned to special duty as Post Adjutant at Fort Taylor in Key West, a position he continued to hold from at least January 10, 1863 through the end of December 1863. Reporting directly to the regiment’s founder and commanding officer, Colonel Tilghman H. Good, he was essentially Good’s right hand, ensuring that regimental records and reports to more senior military officials were kept up to date while performing other higher level administrative and leadership tasks.

On February 3, 1863, Colonel Tilghman Good, visited Fort Jefferson, in his capacity as regimental commanding officer and accompanied by the newly re-formed Regimental Band (band no. 2). Led by Regimental Bandmaster Anton Bush, the ensemble was on hand to perform the music for that evening’s officers’ ball.

Sometime during this phase of duty, Corporal George W. Albert was reassigned to duties as camp cook for Company H, giving him the opportunity to oversee at least one of the formerly enslaved Black men who had enlisted with the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry while the regiment was stationed in Beaufort, South Carolina. Subsequently assigned to duties as an “Under-Cook,” that Black soldier who fell under his authority was most likely Thomas Haywood, who had been entered onto the H Company roster after enrolling with the 47th Pennsylvania on November 1, 1862.

* Note: This was likely not a pleasant time for Thomas Haywood. One of the duties of his direct superior, Corporal George Albert, was to butcher a shipment of cattle that had just been received by the fort. Both men took on that task on Saturday, February 24—a day that Corporal Albert later described as hot, sultry and plagued by mosquitoes.

Based on Albert’s known history of overt racism, their interpersonal interactions were likely made worse that day by his liberal use of racial epithets, which were a frequent component of the diary entries he had penned during this time—hate speech that has all too often been wrongly attributed to the regiment’s entire membership by some mainstream historians and Civil War enthusiasts without providing actual evidence to back up those claims. There were a considerable number of officers and enlisted members of the 47th Pennsylvania who strongly supported the efforts of President Lincoln and senior federal government military leaders to eradicate the practice of chattel slavery nationwide with at least several members of the regiment known to be members of prominent abolitionist families in Pennsylvania.

Officers’ quarters and parade grounds, interior of Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida, 1898 (U.S. National Park Service and National Archives and Records Administration, public domain).

During this same period, Private Edward Frederick of the 47th Pennsylvania’s K Company was readmitted to the regimental hospital for further treatment of the head wound he had sustained at Pocotaligo. As his condition worsened, his health failed, and he died there late in the evening on February 15 from complications related to an abscess that had developed in his brain. He was subsequently laid to rest on the parade grounds at Fort Jefferson.

In a follow-up report, Post Surgeon Jacob H. Scheetz, M.D., the 47th Pennsylvania’s assistant regimental surgeon, provided these details of the battle wound and treatment that Frederick had endured:

Private Edward Frederick, Co. K, 47th Pennsylvania Vols, was struck by a musket ball at the battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina, October 22, 1862. The ball lodged in the frontal bone and was removed. The wound did well for three weeks when he had a slight attack of erysipelas, which, however, soon subsided under treatment. The wound commenced suppurating freely and small spiculae of bone came away, or were removed, on several occasions. Cephalgia was a constant subject of complaint, which was described as a dull aching sensation. The wound had entirely closed on January 1, 1863, and little complaint made except the pain in the head when he exposed himself to the sun. About the 4th of February he was ordered into the hospital with the following symptoms: headache, pain in back and limbs, anorexia, tongue coated with a heavy white coating, bowels torpid. He had alternate flashes of heat; his pupils slightly dilated; his pulse 75, and of moderate volume. He was blistered on the nape of the neck, and had a cathartic given him, which produced a small passage. Growing prostrate, he was put upon the use of tonics, and opiates at night to promote sleep; without any advantage, however. His mind was clear til [sic] thirty-six hours before death, when his pupils were very much dilated, and he gradually sank into a comatose state until 12 M. [midnight] on the night of the 15th of February when he expired.

Another twelve hours after death: Upon removing the calvarium the membranes of the brain presented no abnormal appearance, except slight congestion immediately beneath the part struck. A slight osseus deposition had taken place in the same vicinity. Upon cutting into the left cerebrum, (anterior lobe) it was found normal, but an incision into the left anterior lobe was followed by a copious discharge of dark colored and very offensive pus, and was lined by a yellowish white membrane which was readily broken up by the fingers. I would also have stated that his inferior extremities were, during the last four days, partially paralyzed.

Lieutenant-Colonel George Warren Alexander, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, circa 1861 (public domain).

As Private Frederick’s body was being autopsied, the unceasing routine of fort life continued as members of the regiment went about performing their duties and the USS Cosmopolitan arrived with a new group of prisoners. On February 25, 1863, Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander issued Special Order No. 17:

I. Company commanders are hereby ordered to instruct the chief of detachment in their respective companies to see that all embrasures in the lower tier, both at and between their batteries, are properly closed and bolted immediately after retreat.

II. As the safety of the garrison depends on the carrying out of the above order, they will hold chiefs of detachments accountable for all delinquencies.

In addition, orders were given to company cooks to relocate their operations to bastion C of the fort, which was a much cooler place for them to do their duties—a change that was likely appreciated as much or more by the under-cooks as the higher-ranking cooks who oversaw their grueling work.

This was the first of several initiatives undertaken by Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander who, according to Schmidt, “was having some difficulty in exercising proper control over Fort Jefferson as it related to the Engineering Department and persons in their employ.”

It was his duty to train the garrison, guard the prisoners, and provide the necessary protection for the fort and its environs, a situation fraught with many problems not always understood by other military and non-military personnel on station there. It was during this period that relationships between the various interests began to deteriorate, as overseer George Phillips, temporarily filling in for Engineer Frost, refused the request of Lt. Col. Alexander to have as many engineer workmen removed from the casemates as could be comfortably accommodated inside the barracks outside the walls of the fort. Phillips lost the argument and the quarters were vacated, but the tone of the several letters exchanged between the two commands left much to be desired. Differences were aired concerning occupations of the prisoners and their possible use by the engineers; the amount of water used by the workmen as Alexander limited them to one gallon per day per man; Engineer Frost arriving and reclaiming for his department the central Kitchen, and another kitchen near it that had been used by Capt. Woodruff and others; stagnant water in the ditches which involved the post surgeon [Jacob H. Scheetz, M.D.] in the controversy; uncovering of the ‘cistern trap holes’ located in the floors of the first or lower tier, which allowed the water supplies to become contaminated; who exercised jurisdiction over the schooner Tortugas of the Engineering Department; depredations of wood belonging to the engineers; and many other conflicts….

Around this same time, Corporal George Nichols, who had piloted the Confederate steamer, the Governor Milton, behind Union lines after it had been captured by members of the 47th’s Companies E and K in October, was assigned once again to engineering duties—this time at Fort Jefferson—but he was not happy about it, according to a letter he wrote to family and friends:

So I am detailed on Special duty again as Engineer. I cannot See in this I did not Enlist as an Engineer. But I get Extra Pay for it but I do not like it. So I must get the condencer redy [sic, condenser ready] to condece [sic, condense] fresh water. Get her redy [ready] and no tools to do it with.

Corporal Nichols’ reassignment was made possible when the contingent of 47th Pennsylvanians at Fort Jefferson was strengthened with the transfer there of members of Companies E and G from Fort Taylor on February 28. That same day, the men of F Company received additional training with both light and heavy artillery at the fort while the men from K Company gained more direct experience with the installation’s seacoast guns. In addition, members of the regiment finally received the six months of back pay they were owed.

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

It was also during this latest phase of duty that Regimental Chaplain William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock was transferred from Fort Taylor to Fort Jefferson—possibly to render spiritual comfort after what had been a brutal month in terms of hospitalizations. Among the seventy members of the 47th Pennsylvania who had been admitted to the post’s hospital in the Dry Tortugas were fifty-four men with dysentery and/or diarrhea, four men with remittent or bilious remittent fevers, three men suffering from catarrh, one man who had contracted typhoid fever, one man who had contracted tuberculosis and was suffering from the resulting wasting away syndrome known as phthisis, and three men suffering from diseases of the eye (two with nyctalopia, also known as night blindness, and one with cataracts).

One of the additional challenges faced by the men stationed in the Dry Tortugas (albeit a less serious one) was that there was no camp sutler available to them at Fort Jefferson, as there was for the 47th Pennsylvanians who were stationed at Fort Taylor. So, it was more difficult, if not impossible, to obtain their favorite foods, replacements for worn-out clothing, tobacco, and other items not furnished by the quartermasters of the Union Army—making their lives more miserable with each passing day as they depleted the care packages that had been sent to them by their families during the holidays.

Stationed farther from home than they had ever been, they could see no end in sight for the devastating war that had torn their nation apart.

Sources:

Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, vol. 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
“Florida’s Role in the Civil War: ‘Supplier of the Confederacy.’” Tampa, Florida: Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education, University of South Florida, retrieved online January 15, 2020.
Holder, Emily. “At the Dry Tortugas During the War.” San Francisco, California: Californian Illustrated Magazine, 1892 (part four, retrieved online, March 28, 2024, courtesy of Lit2Go, the website of the Educational Technology Clearinghouse at the Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education, University of South Florida).
“History: Crops (Historic Florida Barge Canal Trail).” Historical Marker Database, retrieved online December 30, 2023.
Malcom, Corey. “Emancipation at Key West,” in “The 20th of May: The History and Heritage of Florida’s Emancipation Day Digital History Project.” St. Petersburg, Florida: Florida Humanities, retrieved online March 28, 2024.
Owsley, Frank Lawrence, and Harriet Fason Chappell. King Cotton Diplomacy: Foreign Relations of the Confederate States of America. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press, 1959.
“Preventing Diplomatic Recognition of the Confederacy, 1861–1865,” and “The Alabama Claims, 1862–1872,” in “Milestones: 1861–1865.” Washington, D.C.: Office of the Historian, Foreign Service Institute, United States Department of State, retrieved online December 30, 2023.
Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.
Staubach, Lieutenant Colonel James C. “Miami During the Civil War: 1861-65,” in Tequesta: The Journal of the Historical Association of Southern Florida, vol. LIII, pp. 31-62. Miami, Florida: Historical Museum of Southern Florida, 1993.
Wharton, Henry D. Letters from the Sunbury Guards. Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1861-1868.

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

Dec29

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:

“Camp Russell.” The Historical Marker Database, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
“Civil War, 1861-1865.” Stephens City, Virginia: Newtown History Center, retrieved online December 27, 2023.
Diaries of Jeremiah Siders (Company H. 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry), in “Pennsylvania Military Museum Collections, 1856-1970” (MG 272). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State Archives.
Dyer, Frederick H. A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion, p. 1589. Des Moines, Iowa: The Dyer Publishing Company, 1908.
Letters home from ”H.D.W.” and the “Sunbury Guards.” Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1864-1865.
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.
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.
“The History of the Forty-Seventh Regt. P. V.” Allentown, Pennsylvania: The Lehigh Register, July 20, 1870.

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

Dec23

“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:

Boissoneault, Lorraine. “A Civil War Cartoonist Created the Modern Image of Santa Claus as Union Propaganda.” Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Magazine, December 19, 2018.
“Drawn Together: The Friendship of U.S. Grant and Thomas Nast” (video). Wilton, New York: Grant Cottage, May 14, 2022.
“Santa Claus,” in “Thomas Nast.” Columbus, Ohio: University Libraries, The Ohio State University, retrieved online December 23, 2023.
“Santa Claus in Camp (from ‘Harper’s Weekly,’ vol. 7, p. 1).” New York, New York: The Met, retrieved online December 23, 2023.
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

Dec2

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:

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

Late Winter through Early Spring 1862 (Florida): Serving as Soldiers and Surrogates for Family

May31

Drummer Boy William Williamson, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, Company A, circa 1863 (public domain).

Arriving with March 1862’s winds of change in America were career advancements for members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry who were settling into life as soldiers on garrison duty in America’s Deep South during the Civil War. Among those receiving word that their lives would be changing even while continuing to serve with their regiment at Fort Taylor, Camp Brannan and other duty stations in Key West, Florida were several members of Company A: Jacob Beck, who was promoted from the rank of corporal to quartermaster sergeant; drummer boy William Williamson, who took on additional duties with the regimental commissary; Private John J. Jones, who was ordered to report for daily duties at the fort’s hospital; and Private Peter Lewis, who was ordered by Colonel Tilghman H. Good to assist First Lieutenant Washington H. R. Hangen with his added duties as Adjutant General of the Union Army brigade to which the 47th Pennsylvania had been attached.

Meanwhile, G Company Sergeant Charles A. Hackman was advanced to the rank of first sergeant (sergeant-major) while the regiment continued to add to its rosters with the enrollment of several new members, including Charles Martin, an immigrant from Kent, England who became a private with Company B.

And Major William H. Gausler, the regiment’s third-in-command, also assumed a heavier burden, having been appointed as Provost Marshal of Key West—a position which required him to oversee the city’s police operations and judicial affairs—duties which he performed from an office located at Hick’s Wharf in Key West.

Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, Company C, circa 1862 (public domain).

On Monday, March 10, the 97 members of F Company were marched from Camp Brannan to Fort Taylor, where they would live and work moving forward. The next day, Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin of C Company penned a letter to Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin to inform him that:

“Gen. Brannan has appointed me Deputy Judge Advocate General of the Department of Key West, giving me Supervision of all law proceedings on the island. I have Samuel Haupt for my clerk, and it keeps us both busy. I have a splendid office in the barracks – everything nice as can be. It beats the one at home all to pieces…. The weather continues very warm.”

In fairly short order, though, a new hindrance—the lack of safe drinking water—gave renewed strength to the regiment’s old adversary—disease. This happened because soldiers at the fort were frequently required to rely on rainwater captured by above-ground cisterns—an unworkable situation both in terms of water quantity and quality. In response, Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan, the Union Army general in charge of all of the Key West-based regiments, ordered his subordinates to board schooners and sail for Havana, Cuba in mid-March in order to locate and purchase additional water supplies.

And, as if battling water shortages and disease were not enough, 47th Pennsylvanians were quickly learning that local flora and fauna would also prove to be a significant threat. According to H Company First Lieutenant William W. Geety, who penned a letter to his wife around this same time, the bite of just one six-inch-long centipede meant “certain death” for any Pennsylvanian not sharp-eyed enough to spot the insect and step away fast enough.

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

On Thursday, March 13, Regimental Chaplain William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock was in another contemplative mood, putting pen to paper to inform readers of Philadelphia’s The Press newspaper about what life was like as a Union soldier in America’s Deep South while also presenting his perspective on why the war was still being waged:

“In my former communication, I promised a more minute description of the beautiful island and city of Key West. I now do so; but cannot refrain, in the first place, from adverting to the glorious victories which have recently crowned our arms in the different divisions of the grand army of the Union. No wonder the whole country is wild with excitement and rejoicing. No wonder that cannons have been fired and bells tolled in every city, town, and hamlet, of the loyal States. For such successes and such victories as have recently crowned our flag with imperishable glory, are enough to thrill every fibre of the Republic and cause its great heart to beat with renewed life and activity. We have now passed the long line of checks and reverses and have made rapid advances on the broad, clear road that leads to complete and abiding triumph. Every true American breathes freer, walks firmer, and hopes brighter.

Whilst the year 1861 was one of trial, suffering, and discipline to the Government, it was to the rebel leaders, in a large measure, one of hope, of promise and success. But how different the opening of the year 1862! In the great cause of the Union, the bow of promise looms up on every side. There has been one continuous stream of success and victory.

To the rebel leaders all is discomfiture, disaster, and dismay. Every star of hope and promise has disappeared—defeat, ruin, and death, are closing around them on every side.

It is a marvelous [sic] fact in the history and warfare of the Anglo-Saxon race, that the side which suffers most grievously in the beginning is the side which triumphs most gloriously in the end. In not a single instance, during the last hundred years, has this rule varied. It was so in the ‘Old French War,’ when British arms sustained disaster after disaster, commencing with Braddock’s inglorious defeat, and running on through three campaigns, until the French had acquired possession of every foot of the disputed ground. But at Louisburg the tide turned, and Frontenac, and Ticonderoga, Niagara, and Quebec, soon drove the French from every standing place on the continent. A precisely similar experience attended the British operations in other quarters of the globe. Failure followed failure, but in due time gave place to a course of uninterrupted success by land and sea, such as has seldom fallen to the lot of any nation.

It was so in our Revolutionary war. The side beaten first was the side to win last. During the first twenty months of the war, up to the battle of Trenton, there was a continuous record of American discomfitures and retreats. In fact, there was little to lighten the dark page of that fierce struggle, until the battle of Saratoga and surrender of Burgoyne, the year afterward. Washington, and all the military chiefs of the Revolution, all through the first half of that military period, with all their lofty constancy, almost uniformly evince the painful consciousness of miscarriage and misfortune. The civilized world knows the grand success that at last crowned their efforts.

It was so in our last struggle with England. One of the first events of that war was the shameful surrender of Hull, at Detroit, by which the entire peninsula of Michigan passed into the hands of the enemy. He had been sent to invade and seize Upper Canada, but never was there a more ignominious failure. The first year’s land campaign, throughout, form the most discreditable chapter in our national annals. Yet the struggle, severe as it was, closed with the most memorable of all American victories at New Orleans, and has passed into history as a war completely successful for America.

However it be accounted for, the fact is undeniable, that, with the Anglo-Saxon family, opposite fates precide [sic] at the outset and upshot of their military undertakings; whilst success and victory invariably crown their close. The present wicked and lunatic rebellion is the last, but not the least illustration of this great fact. Much as I desire to elaborate this subject more fully, time and space both require me to leave it for the present, and give you as promised a brief description of

KEY WEST ISLAND AND CITY.

The island is six miles long and two miles broad, and nowhere more than twelve or fifteen feet above the sea level. It is of coral formation, and has a sandy, sterile soil, but in the few spots which are arable the vegetation is extremely rich. The greater part of it is covered with copsewood or low brushes. There are some vegetable gardens which produce through all the seasons, though less in winter than summer. The climate is well adapted for all kinds of tropical fruits. Cocoa nuts [sic], oranges, lemons, pomegranates, pine apples [sic], bananas, etc., are very abundant. There is an artificial salt pond on the island, 350 acres in extent. On the southwest point there is a lighthouse with a fixed light 70 feet above water.

Key West City, on the same island, is the capital of Monroe county, Florida, and the southernmost settlement belonging to the United States. It is situated in latitude 21 deg. 32 min. N., longitude 81 deg. 48 min. W., and has a population of about 3,000. It has a fine harbor, accessible through several channels by the largest vessels drawing twenty-four feet of water; being the key to the best entrance to the Gulf of Mexico, it is strongly fortified. The principal work of defence [sic] is Fort Taylor, built on an artificial island within the main entrance to the harbor. It is a first-class fort, intended to mount upwards of two hundred guns of the heaviest calibre, and is now in excellent state of defence [sic]. The barracks are large and commodious buildings, forming three sides of a quadrangle, the opening facing the sea. Near these barracks our regiment is now comfortably quartered, and the camp presents a most romantic and picturesque appearance.

The streets of the city are wide and clean; the houses are generally of white frame of the cottage style, are neat and mostly embosomed in shrubbery. The flowers and roses are seen blooming around almost every house during the whole year. There are Episcopal, Methodist, Baptist, and Roman Catholic churches, a well arranged marine hospital 100 feet long by 45 feet wide, a customhouse, a court-house, and other public buildings. A large proportion of the population of Key West consists of natives or children of natives of the Bahama islands. These mostly sympathize with Secession, and had it not been for the prompt action of Captain, now Gen. Brannan, his handfull [sic] of men and the co operation [sic] of the loyal citizens, at the outbreak of the rebellion, the island and city with all the fortifications would have fallen into the hands of the rebels.

As a regiment, we have great reason to thank God for his watchful care over us, in sparing our lives. But with all, the unerring hand of death has not altogether left our ranks untouched. It is my painful duty to announce the death of three of our brethren-in-arms since we have pitched our tents in the sunny South.

Frederick Watt, Co. H, Captain Kacey’s, died in hospital February 13, of “brain fever,” contracted on board the Oriental. Aged 23 years. He enlisted in Perry county, Pennsylvania.

Andrew Bellisfield [sic], Co. A, Captain Graeffe’s, died in hospital of erysipelas. Aged 30 years. He was born, raised and enlisted In Northampton county, Pennsylvania.

Henry Beltz, Company B, Captain Rhoades [sic], died in hospital of typhoid fever. Aged 20 years. He was also a native of and enlisted in Northampton county, Pennsylvania.

Thus, three of our number have boon summoned from the field of strife and conflict, we trust, to the sweet fields and sunny banks of Canaan above.

They were buried with all the honors of war, and now sleep side by side, till the Resurrection morn. Although no kind father and mother, no affectionate sister and brother, were here to shed the tear of grief and sorrow over the graves of our departed brethren, yet there were few hearts in the ranks that were unmoved, and few cheeks that were dry, as we deposited their remains in the cold, silent earth.

‘Rest, soldiers, rest; your country comes,
With tender love and true,
Freely to deck your honored beds,
Her banner o’er its turf to spread,
And on your monuments to shed
Fond memory’s pearly dew.’

There are but few of our men now confined to the hospital, and these are doing very well.

Much yet remains to be said of our regiment, this post, etc., but as the mail will leave in a few moments by the Rhode Island, Captain Blanchard, I will close, promising to write again ere long.

‘In Peace or War, on land or sea,
Our flag, the aegis of the free,
Bright emblem of Columbia’s glory I
Shall tell to coming years the story,
How, stout of heart, and strong of hand,
The patriots of our native land
Bore it, the nation’s hope and life,
On tented field, ‘mid fearful strife,
Still on, till [sic] through the sulphurous [sic] cloud
It broke in triumph Treason’s shroud.'”

* Note: In point of fact, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers had come together on the afternoon of February 13, 1862 for what would be the regiment’s first funeral at Key West—that of Private Frederick Watt, a 19-year-old Perry County laborer who had fallen ill with measles while sailing aboard the S.S. Oriental and had been confined to the post hospital at Fort Taylor since disembarking. Following his interment with full military honors in grave number 27 of the post cemetery, hospital clerks muddied the documentation surrounding Watt’s passing, noting his cause of death as both brain fever and typhoid pneumonia. Watt’s body was later disinterred, in 1927, as part of a mass relocation of Union soldiers’ remains from Fort Taylor to the Fort Barrancas National Cemetery in Pensacola, Florida, and was subsequently reburied at that national cemetery in section 18, grave number 92.

In contrast, Private Andrew Bellis (not “Bellisfield”), succumbed to complications from erysipelas, which developed after Bellis had been bitten by a scorpion. Laid to rest in grave number 26 of the post cemetery following funeral services officiated by A Company Captain Richard A. Graeffe, Private Bellis’s cause of death was confirmed by B Company Private Jacob Apple in a letter to his own (Apple’s) family. As happened with Private Watt, Private Bellis’s body was disinterred in 1927 as part of the mass relocation of Union soldier, and was subsequently reinterred in section 17, grave number 97 at the Fort Barrancas National Cemetery.

As with those privates who preceded him in death, Private Beltz was also laid to rest in the post cemetery. Initially interred there in grave number 181, his body was similarly disinterred in 1927 as part of the mass relocation of Union soldiers’ remains; tragically, though, his remains were among those of multiple members of the 47th Pennsylvania that were mishandled. Unable to be re-identified upon transfer to staff at the national cemetery, Private Beltz’s remains were carelessly consigned to one of 228 graves marked as “unknown”—the majority of which still have not been identified as the centenary of that grave relocation project approaches.

As for the Key West lighthouse mentioned by Rev. Rodrock in his letter, the structure had been forced to darken twice after its 1822 construction authorization by the U.S. Congress to protect ships navigating the dangerous Straits of Florida. Initially illuminated on December 17, 1825, it ceased operating in July 1836 when its tower was heavily damaged during the Second Seminole War. Repaired in 1846, it continued to operate until August 1861 when supporters of the Confederacy sabotaged it by removing the system’s reflector while also wrecking its central prism. Determined to fix the problem, Brigadier-General John M. Brannan sent a team of carpenters and guards to the lighthouse in April 1862, but the mission was aborted when technicians determined that the light could not be repaired with the limited tools they had available at that time. Out of service until it was repaired in 1866, the light finally began functioning again on April 15 of that year.

As illness continued to ravage the ranks of the 47th Pennsylvania throughout the late winter and early spring of 1862, Company A’s First Lieutenant James Meyers was subsequently hospitalized for two months while F Company’s Private John Weiss was ordered to convalesce in his quarters.

On Monday, March 17, Assistant Regimental Surgeon Jacob H. Scheetz was placed in command of the 47th Pennsylvania’s medical unit when the 47th’s Regimental Surgeon Elisha W. Baily was reassigned to detached duty. (Scheetz would continue to fulfill this role until September 1862 when he was placed in charge of the Union Army’s General Hospital in Beaufort, South Carolina, where the 47th Pennsylvania was stationed.)

Two days later, Northampton County Journal readers learned from that day’s edition of their newspaper that fourteen men from their community would be returning home, including A Company Privates Christian Haldeman and George Muller, residents of Easton who had been respectively employed as a laborer and hostler, Stockertown blacksmith Enos Unangst, and Monroe County’s William Pucker—all of whom had been honorably discharged on surgeons certificates of disability. (Muller was released due to a foot injury.)

On Sunday, March 23, Captain Gobin informed family and friends back in Sunbury that:

“Two batteries of field Artillery have been landed on the Island, and we are drilling our Regiment to the use of them. The men have been supplied with new clothing, brass shoulder scales to protect them from cavalry, and everything betokens a readiness on our part to join in the grand encircling of the monster Rebellion. The trees are still being cut down, while artillery roads, thirty feet wide, are being run from one part of the island to another, at different points. Our men have been working hard, but we daily expect 500 contrabands from Port Royal, when we will have easy times.”

All the while, the regiment’s most fearsome foe continued its scything of the ranks as E Company Private Amandus Long and 29-year-old Second Lieutenant Henry H. Bush of F Company lost their respective battles with typhoid fever.

Beloved by his F Company subordinates, Lieutenant Bush “had just been presented a sword by his company a few days before,” according to Schmidt, “and left a widow and two little children behind.” In reporting the death of the Catasauqua millwright, editors of the New Era confirmed that Bush had initially been laid to rest at the post cemetery:

“It becomes our sad duty to record the death of Lt. H. H. Bush, of Company F, 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers. He died of Typhoid Fever on the 31st of March and was buried with Masonic and Military Honors in the soldiers burying ground near the barracks.”

The most enlightening glimpse into the funerary rituals of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, however, was Company Order Number 23:

“The Major commanding has the painful duty to announce to this command the death after a short illness of 2nd Lt. H. H. Bush of Company F stationed at this post. By his death the service has lost a good officer and efficient soldier. His remains will be buried at 5 PM (April 1). One half of company accompanied by subaltern will form escort. The usual badge of mourning will be worn by the officers of Company F for one month.”

* Note: Initially interred in grave number 3 of the post cemetery, Private Amandus Long was one of the 47th Pennsylvanians whose bodies were disinterred in 1927 as part of the mass relocation of Union soldiers’ remains from Fort Taylor to the Fort Barrancas National Cemetery in Pensacola, Florida. Tragically, his body was also among those that were mishandled. Unable to be reidentified upon transfer to the national cemetery, his remains were also carelessly consigned to one of 228 graves marked as “unknown.”

Unlike the remains of Private Long, however, those of Second Lieutenant Henry H. Bush were disinterred and brought back to the Keystone State at the request of his surviving family. Lieutenant Bush was then finally laid to rest at Catasauqua’s Fairview Cemetery.

The deaths of Beltz, Bush, Long, and so many other young men sorely tested the notion of 19th century Pennsylvanians that terminally ill loved ones “should die amidst family assembled around the deathbed,” according to American Civil War historian Drew Gilpin Faust, president emeritus of Harvard University and the author of This Republic of Suffering. Tradition had long dictated that “family members needed to witness a death in order to assess the state of the dying person’s soul” because the “critical last moments of life would epitomize his or her spiritual condition.”

“Kin would use their observations of the deathbed to evaluate the family’s chances for a reunion in heaven. A life was a narrative that could only be incomplete without this final chapter, without the life-defining last words.

Last words had always held a place of prominence in the Ars Moriendi [‘Good Death’] tradition. By the eighteenth century, ‘dying declarations’ had assumed—and still retain—explicit secular importance: a special evidentiary status excepting them from legal rules excluding hearsay. Final words were regarded as possessing an especially high truth status, both because it was believed that a dying person could no longer have any early motivation to lie and because those about to meet their Maker would not wish to expire bearing false witness…. Not only were last words important because of their assumed honesty, they also imposed a meaning on the life narrative they would conclude. At the same time that they exemplified a life, moreover, they communicated invaluable lessons or insights to those gathered around the deathbed. This educational function provided a critical means through which the deceased could continue to exist in the lives of the survivors. The teachings that last words imparted served as a lingering exhortation and a persisting tie between the living and the dead.”

But when members of the 47th Pennsylvania died far from home—as they were now doing at Fort Taylor in Florida—this immediate and long-lasting form of comfort and counsel was out of reach of the loving embrace of a dying soldier’s family and friends. And that, according to Faust, was utterly shocking and “unbearable to many nineteenth-century Americans left at home while their sons, husbands, and brothers died with their last words unrecorded or even unheard.”

As the war would continue to rage, according to Faust, a dying soldier’s regimental comrades would often become surrogates for far-away family, as would regimental and hospital chaplains, physicians, and army nurses, “struggling even amidst the chaos of the war to make it possible for men—and their loved ones—to believe they had died well. Spiritual wounds demanded attention as powerfully as did those of the flesh.”

Sadly, these realizations was being driven home to the members of the 47th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry time and again as the dawn of a second year of civil war loomed in America.

Sources:

1. Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, Vol 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.

2. Faust, Drew G. “The Civil War Soldier and the Art of Dying,” in The Journal of Southern History, Vol. 67, No. 1, pp. 3-38. Houston, Texas: Southern Historical Association (Rice University), 2001.

3. “Florida’s Role in the Civil War: ‘Supplier of the Confederacy.” Tampa, Florida: Florida Center for Instructional Technology, University of South Florida (College of Education), retrieved online January 15, 2020.

4. Gobin, John Peter Shindel. Personal Letters, 1861-1865. Northumberland, Pennsylvania: Personal Collection of John Deppen.

5. Johnson, Rossiter and John Howard Brown. The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Vol. 1, p. 419: “Brannan, John Milton.” Boston, Massachusetts: The Biographical Society, 1904.

6. “Letter from Key West” (from “W. D. C. R., Chaplain, Forty-seventh Regiment, P. V.”; dated March 13, 1862). Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: The Press, March 31, 1972 (front page).

7. Rodrock, William DeWitt Clinton and Julia (Weldy) Rodrock. Photographs, Correspondence, Sermons, etc., 1849-1900. St. Louis, Missouri: “William DeWitt Clinton Rodrock Collection” held by Robert Champlin.

8. Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.

9. Sharp, Rebecca. Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion (video). Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, June 3, 2015.

10. Staubach, Lieutenant Colonel James C. “Miami During the Civil War: 1861-65,” in Tequesta: The Journal of the Historical Association of Southern Florida, LIII, 31-62. Miami: Historical Museum of Southern Florida, 1993.

11. Wharton, Henry D. Letters from the Sunbury Guards. Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1861-1868.

December 1861: A Young Regiment’s First Christmas and New Year’s Day Away from Home

Dec31

First State Color, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers (issued 20 September 1861, retired 11 May 1865).

Barely four months old when December 1861 arrived, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry continued its occupation of Virginia—just one of the many Union regiments attached to the Army of the Potomac charged with defending the nation’s capital from potential invasion by Confederate States Army troops during the first year of America’s Civil War. Encamped at Camp Advance near Fort Ethan Allen during late September and early October, the 47th Pennsylvania had spent a significant portion of its time reinforcing and expanding upon the basic training in Hardee’s light infantry tactics that it had received upon its muster at Camp Curtin.

On one typical day—Friday, October 4—the regiment drilled from just after reveille until roughly 7 a.m., repeated the drill between 10 and 11 a.m. and then again between 2 and 3 p.m., and then marched in a formal regimental parade from 5 to 6 p.m. Two days later, the regiment demonstrated its readiness yet again when its members were formally inspected by senior officers of its brigade. At midnight the next day—Monday, October 7—the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was ordered to engage the enemy.

Following behind the 79th New York Volunteers and trailed by the 33rd and 49th New York, as well as a Union cavalry unit and three Union artillery batteries, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers marched away from Camp Advance at 3 a.m.—excited to do more than mere drilling. Before they could reach their intended destination, however, the 79th New York Volunteers ran smack into Confederate skirmishers three miles outside of Lewinsville.

As battle lines began to form, the 47th Pennsylvania was ordered to move to the front and both sides of the road to shield the brigade’s other units. Initially stationed at the front, the 47th Pennsylvania’s F Company and A Company were shifted to protective positions at the brigade’s left and right, respectively, and Company D and Company I were then shifted to protect the brigade’s front. Advancing in this formation up and down three miles of the undulating, forested Virginia countryside, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers pushed the Confederate troops back toward Prospect Hill, where they stopped and held their brigade’s position for the remainder of the day and night.

Forming a new battle line the next morning at 8 a.m., the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were assigned, again, to guard both sides of their brigade. When neighboring Confederate troops failed to attack by 10 a.m., they were ordered to begin fortifying their brigade’s position, and proceeded to carve out a five-mile road and fell a substantial number of trees in order to construct earthen breastworks in front of the brigade’s artillery batteries. They were also assigned to dig holes to create rifle pits for brigade snipers—work which continued until they were relieved by a regiment from Vermont at sundown. Allowed to sleep until daylight via a procedure known as “laying on their arms,” they essentially held their rifles while napping lightly.

Unknown regiment, Camp Griffin, Virginia, fall 1861 (public domain, U.S. Library of Congress).

Ordered on toward Manassas Gap early that same week, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were next stationed between Lewinsville and Falls Church as part of this mission. Moving back and forth around this area, they reached as far as the Leesburg Turnpike, which was roughly two miles from the Chain Bridge they had first crossed when entering Virginia in September. Moving out again the next day, the 47th Pennsylvania’s right wing (Companies A, C, D, F, and I) were ordered to head for a new camp site in Fairfax County, Virginia. Marching to a site two miles outside of Falls Church, they began pitching regimental tents at “Camp Big Chestnut”—so named due to the looming presence of a large chestnut tree located there. This encampment would ultimately come to be known as Camp Griffin.

Meanwhile, the men from H Company and other units of the 47th Pennsylvania’s left wing were ordered out on a new, five-mile expedition. During this time, a six-man detail from H Company, commanded by Lieutenant William W. Geety, was sent out on reconnaissance toward the Richmond Turnpike, but nearly met with disaster when Confederate cavalry approached within 300 feet of that detail’s position around midnight. Fortunately, this detachment was saved by a thick fog which descended and obscured its position from the enemy’s view.

On Thursday, October 10, Geety’s party was joined by the regiment’s third-in-command, Major William H. Gausler, who ordered Geety to perform further reconnaissance. Spotting enemy pickets a quarter mile away from the main encampment of the 47th Pennsylvania’s expedition, Geety promptly returned to Gausler to report his findings. Men from G Company were then placed on picket duty, which they performed until they were relieved at 1 a.m. the next day.

According to regimental historian, Lewis Schmidt, Colonel Tilghman H. Good, the 47th Pennsylvania’s founder and commanding officer, reported to his superiors “that the work associated with being out on advanced picket duty was very difficult, and that the enemy pickets at times were too close to his camp, which gave his troops constant unrest.” Further adding to their stress, they were forced to wait so long for their tents to be brought from their former encampment that they ended up having to pitch those tents “during constant alarms from the enemy pickets.”

They’d barely finished when the rains came. Geety later reported that they’d endured such a hard downpour that he’d “slept in a puddle all night”; those of his subordinates who weren’t sent out on picket duty again spent the next two days trying unsuccessfully to dry their clothes.

Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin, Co. C, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, c. 1862 (public domain).

Many hours were, in fact, passed in similarly miserable conditions—so much so that camp life became a test of endurance. According to Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin, the commanding officer of the 47th Pennsylvania’s C Company, Friday, November 29 was “the most disagreeable time we have yet experienced.” Assigned to picket duty, he had been ordered to march his subordinates out and position them away from camp some distance in order to head off potential enemy attacks on the Army of the Potomac’s massive encampment by Confederate troops stationed in their vicinity.

“It rained hard all day and night, and was very cold. I had command of the first relief, which went to the special reserve at 12 midnight. By that time most of us were wet through, so I took possession of a minister’s house, near by, where I quartered my men until morning.”

Additional letters written by other 47th Pennsylvanians around this same time evoke similar shivers of empathy, transporting present day readers back in time and into the muddy shoes and heavy, sodden uniforms of the cold, sniffling soldiers who wearily set pen to paper once they were finally permitted to crawl back into their dry tents at camp.

Consequently, disease became an even more formidable foe than the Confederate States Army—and a fearsome one at that, scything multiple members of the regiment from its ranks, including two drummer boys, aged thirteen and fifteen, and a seasoned sergeant within days of each of their respective hospitalizations, followed by Daniel Foose, a 19-year-old private from Perry County’s H Company who was felled by typhoid or bilious fever; David Losch, a 22-year-old Allentown native and private from I Company; Daniel Biceline, a 23-year-old H Company private also felled by typhoid; and Private William Young of G Company.

Easing their distress somewhat was the long overdue news that members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry would finally be paid for the first time since enrolling for service. When the money arrived, many members of the regiment began transferring what they could home to parents and wives. C Company men sent $900 to their loved ones in Sunbury while those from Company A and Company D sent a whopping $2,500 and $2,000, respectively, to Northampton and Perry counties.

Additionally, the regiment was still stationed close enough to Pennsylvania that a significant number of 47th Pennsylvanians were able to personally return to their hometowns on brief furloughs while others were buoyed by family members who had the means to travel to their Virginia encampment for short visits.

Christmas

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

As a result, it was with a mixture of heavy hearts and hope that members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry welcomed the dawn of Christmas Day in 1861.

Among those making the time more bearable for his fellow 47th Pennsylvanians was Regimental Quartermaster and former Northumberland County sheriff James Van Dyke who, according to the December 21 edition of the Sunbury American, “came home on a short visit and returned to Camp Griffin 47th Regiment … taking with him three or four large boxes filled with various articles of comfort, for the inner as well as the outer man….”

The newspaper also included this important detail:

“Among the edibles, was a barrel of ‘sour krout,’ presented by William I. Greenough, Esq.”

In addition to being a beloved taste of home for the often hungry members of the regiment, the sauerkraut likely also served an important cultural function for the numerous German-Americans and German immigrants who had enrolled with the 47th. When paired with pork and eaten on New Year’s Day as part of an annual tradition, sauerkraut has been said to attract prosperity for the remainder of the year because it is made from green cabbage (green being the color of money) while eating pork ensures progress and good luck because pigs “root forward” with their snouts rather than backward with their feet as chickens do, according to a 2015 article by Billy Penn News.

Pvt. Abraham Nicholas Wolf, Company B, 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers, c. 1861 (public domain).

Food and other “articles of comfort” were, in fact, on the minds of pretty much all members of the regiment as they were about to spend their first Christmas and New Year’s holidays away from loved ones. While penning a letter to his family during regimental church services on Sunday, December 29, Private Abraham N. Wolf told his wife, Sarah, that the Regimental Band was playing a hymn as he wrote to her.

Noting that he’d received the gift box she’d sent him, Wolf’s joy was child-like when he added that “everything was in it yet what you said was in it and it came on the second day of Christmas.” Just that morning, he’d “fried some of the sausages” that she’d sent him “and took some sausages along for dinner” later because he’d been scheduled for duty—chopping wood for the regiment—“and they tasted pretty good to me for it was something new to me for it was from home.” And then he added that the day before:

“… the chicken cooked for dinner and so we had a good dinner for it was the best dinner that I had since I left home. And this morning I ate the last part of the chickens but I have some of your molasses candy yet which you sent to me. And I have the big cake yet. And that pocket handkerchief which your mother sent to me I got too.”

Their joy and respite were brief, however; by mid-January 1862, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were on the move again. When they finally stopped and were able to take in their new surroundings, they would suddenly gain an entirely different perspective on the meaning of “far from the comforts of home.”

For more Christmas and New Year’s-related content, please check out this sampling of our prior posts on 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story:

To see an image and read more of Abraham Wolf’s letter, read the article, “1861: Abraham Nicholas Wolf, Jr. to Sarah (Trexler) Wolf,” by Spared and Shared.

Sources:

Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, Vol 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
Gobin, John Peter Shindel. Personal Letters, 1861-1865. Northumberland, Pennsylvania: Personal Collection of John Deppen.
Schmidt, Lewis G. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.
Wharton, Henry D. Letters from the Sunbury Guards. Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 1861-1868.

A Nation Comes Together, Time and Again, to Give Thanks

Nov5

Samuel Adams (John Singleton Copley, circa 1772, public domain).

Well before the outbreak of America’s devastating Civil War, the concept of Thanksgiving was on the minds of the nation’s founding fathers. Among those who grasped the importance of inspiring shared feelings of unity and gratitude between residents of the United States was Samuel Adams, who drafted the nation’s first Thanksgiving proclamation, which was then officially issued by the Continental Congress on 1 November 1777:

“FOR AS MUCH as it is the indispensable Duty of all Men to adore the superintending Providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with Gratitude their Obligation to him for Benefits received, and to implore such farther Blessings as they stand in Need of: And it having pleased him in his abundant Mercy, not only to continue to us the innumerable Bounties of his common Providence; but also to smile upon us in the Prosecution of a just and necessary War, for the Defense and Establishment of our unalienable Rights and Liberties; particularly in that he hath been pleased, in so great a Measure, to prosper the Means used for the Support of our Troops, and to crown our Arms with most signal success:

It is therefore recommended to the legislative or executive Powers of these UNITED STATES to set apart Thursday, the eighteenth Day of December next, for SOLEMN THANKSGIVING and PRAISE: That at one Time and with one Voice, the good People may express the grateful Feelings of their Hearts, and consecrate themselves to the Service of their Divine Benefactor; and that, together with their sincere Acknowledgments and Offerings, they may join the penitent Confession of their manifold Sins, whereby they had forfeited every Favor; and their humble and earnest Supplication that it may please GOD through the Merits of JESUS CHRIST, mercifully to forgive and blot them out of Remembrance; That it may please him graciously to afford his Blessing on the Governments of these States respectively, and prosper the public Council of the whole: To inspire our Commanders, both by Land and Sea, and all under them, with that Wisdom and Fortitude which may render them fit Instruments, under the Providence of Almighty GOD, to secure for these United States, the greatest of all human Blessings, INDEPENDENCE and PEACE: That it may please him, to prosper the Trade and Manufactures of the People, and the Labor of the Husbandman, that our Land may yield its Increase: To take Schools and Seminaries of Education, so necessary for cultivating the Principles of true Liberty, Virtue and Piety, under his nurturing Hand; and to prosper the Means of Religion, for the promotion and enlargement of that Kingdom, which consisteth ‘in Righteousness, Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost.’

And it is further recommended, That servile Labor, and such Recreation, as, though at other Times innocent, may be unbecoming the Purpose of this Appointment, be omitted on so solemn an Occasion.”

Nearly twelve years later, on 3 October 1789, President George Washington also urged Americans to come together to express their gratitude, and proclaimed that that year’s celebration would be held on 26 November:

“By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation.

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor — and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be — That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks — for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation — for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war — for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed — for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted — for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions — to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually — to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed — to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord — To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us — and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.

George Washington

Thanksgiving, November 1863 (Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, 5 December 1863, public domain).

Nearly three quarters of a century later, Pennsylvania’s Civil War governor, Andrew Gregg Curtin, urged his fellow Keystone State residents to pray that God would “bestow upon our Civil Rulers, wisdom and earnestness in council and upon our military leaders zeal and vigor in action, that the fires of rebellion may be quenched, that we, being armed with His defense, may be preserved from all perils, and that hereafter our people living in peace and quietness, may, from generation to generation, reap the abundant fruits of His mercy; and with joy and thankfulness praise and magnify His holy name.”

A year later, President Abraham Lincoln penned the following words as part of his own sobering, yet hopeful proclamation:

“I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.”

So, with our common heritage in mind, and as an expression of deep gratitude for the ongoing support of our many wonderful readers and volunteers who have helped us build a loyal following for 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story, we present this collection of links to our most popular Thanksgiving-related content. With our best wishes from “our house” to yours, wherever you reside in this our United States of America, may you have a peaceful, bountiful and joyous holiday season. And in the New Year to come, may we all, finally, embrace the belief that one’s ability to show kindness and compassion in the face of adversity is a sign of strength, not weakness.

Thanksgiving Post Collection — 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story

A Thanksgiving Message from the Past (Andrew Gregg Curtin): Text of the “Proclamation of a Day of Thanksgiving” issued by Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin, 1862;
A Thanksgiving Message from the Past (Abraham Lincoln): Text of “By the President of the United States of America: A Proclamation” issued by U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, 3 October 1863;
Henry D. Wharton’s Thanksgiving Letter to the Sunbury American: Scroll down to entry for 23 August 1863 for image, and link to the full text of, C Company Musician Henry Wharton’s Thanksgiving letter to his hometown newspaper; and
Snyder Family Recipes: Turkey, Filling and Gravy (Thanksgiving and Christmas).

Sources:

1. Basler, Roy P., editor, et. al. Collected works, Vol. 6. The Abraham Lincoln Association/Springfield, Illinois. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1953.

2. Curtin, Andrew Gregg. “Proclamation of a Day of Thanksgiving – 1862,” in Pennsylvania Archives: Fourth Series, Vol. VIII: “Papers of the Governors, 1858-1871,” Samuel Hazard, John Blair Lynn, William Henry Egle, et. al., editors. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Wm. Stanley Ray, State Printer, 1902.

3. “Snyder Family Recipes: Turkey, Filling and Gravy (Thanksgiving and Christmas),” in 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story. Snyder Family Archives: © 2017-present. All rights reserved.

4. “Thanksgiving Proclamation, 1863: A primary source by Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Nast.” New York, New York: The Gilder Lehrman Institute of History, retrieved online 1 November 2017.

5. “Thanksgiving Proclamation 1777 By the Continental Congress: The First National Thanksgiving Proclamation.” Plymouth, Massachusetts: Pilgrim Hall Museum, retrieved online 4 November 2019.

6. “Thanksgiving Proclamation of 1789,” in “Education — Primary Sources.” Mount Vernon, Virginia: George Washington’s Mount Vernon, retrieved online 4 November 2019.

7. Wharton, Henry D. “Letter from the Sunbury Guards: Key West, Fla., 23 August 1863” (Henry Wharton’s Thanksgiving Update, 1863). Sunbury, Pennsylvania: Sunbury American, 5 September 1863.

Healing a Nation – A President’s Christmas Acts of Forgiveness and Compassion

Dec25

President Abraham Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862 (W. E. Winner, painter, J. Serz, engraver, circa 1864; public domain, U.S. Library of Congress).

1863 was a pivotal year for Abraham Lincoln and the United States of America. It began with the New Year’s Day execution of the President’s Emancipation Proclamation, which freed all people held as slaves in every state which had seceded from the Union, saw the course of the American Civil War swing in the federal government’s favor with the Union’s victory over Confederate States Army troops in the bloody, tide-turning Battle of Gettysburg in early July, and closed with Lincoln’s attempts to reunify both his nation and family in the days leading up to Christmas through two very different documents which shared the common threads of compassion and forgiveness – an Executive Letter designed to provide his wife’s cousin – a supporter of the Confederacy – to have safe passage to, and secure residency at, her home in Arkansas, and a proclamation intended to inspire similar CSA supporters to pressure their leaders to end the war and return to the Union fold.

The texts of both documents are shown below.

Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction (8 December 1863)

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
A PROCLAMATION.

WHEREAS, in and by the Constitution of the United States, it is provided that the President “shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States, except in cases of impeachment;” and

Whereas, a rebellion now exists whereby the loyal state governments of several states have for a long time been subverted, and many persons have committed, and are now guilty of, treason against the United States; and

Whereas, with reference to said rebellion and treason, laws have been enacted by congress, declaring forfeitures and confiscation of property and liberation of slaves, all upon terms and conditions therein stated, and also declaring that the President was thereby authorized at any time thereafter, by proclamation, to extend to persons who may have participated in the existing rebellion, in any state or part thereof, pardon and amnesty, with such exceptions and at such times and on such conditions as he may deem expedient for the public welfare; and

Whereas, the congressional declaration for limited and conditional pardon accords with well-established judicial exposition of the pardoning power; and

Whereas, with reference to said rebellion, the President of the United States has issued several proclamations, with provisions in regard to the liberation of slaves; and

Whereas, it is now desired by some persons heretofore engaged in said rebellion to resume their allegiance to the United States, and to reinaugurate loyal state governments within and for their respective states: Therefore–

I, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States, do proclaim, declare, and make known to all persons who have, directly or by implication, participated in the existing rebellion, except as hereinafter excepted, that a full pardon is hereby granted to them and each of them, with restoration of all rights of property, except as to slaves, and in property cases where rights of third parties shall have intervened, and upon the condition that every such person shall take and subscribe an oath, and thenceforward keep and maintain said oath inviolate; and which oath shall be registered for permanent preservation, and shall be of the tenor and effect following, to wit:–

“I, ______ , do solemnly swear, in presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth faithfully support, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Union of the States thereunder; and that I will, in like manner, abide by and faithfully support all acts of congress passed during the existing rebellion with reference to slaves, so long and so far as not repealed, modified, or held void by congress, or by decision of the supreme court; and that I will, in like manner, abide by and faithfully support all proclamations of the President made during the existing rebellion having reference to slaves, so long and so far as not modified or declared void by decision of the supreme court. So help me God.”

The persons excepted from the benefits of the foregoing provisions are all who are, or shall have been, civil or diplomatic officers or agents of the so-called Confederate government; all who have left judicial stations under the United States to aid the rebellion; all who are, or shall have been, military or naval officers of said so-called Confederate government above the rank of colonel in the army or of lieutenant in the navy; all who left seats in the United States congress to aid the rebellion; all who resigned commissions in the army or navy of the United States and afterwards aided the rebellion; and all who have engaged in any way in treating colored persons, or white persons in charge of such, otherwise than lawfully as prisoners of war, and which persons may have been found in the United States service as soldiers, seamen, or in any other capacity.

And I do further proclaim, declare, and make known that whenever, in any of the States of Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and North Carolina, a number of persons, not less than one tenth in number of the votes cast in such state at the presidential election of the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty, each having taken the oath aforesaid, and not having since violated it, and being a qualified voter by the election law of the state existing immediately before the so-called act of secession, and excluding all others, shall reestablish a state government which shall be republican, and in nowise contravening said oath, such shall be recognized as the true government of the state, and the state shall receive thereunder the benefits of the constitutional provision which declares that “the United States shall guaranty to every state in this Union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or the executive, (when the legislature cannot be convened,) against domestic violence.”

And I do further proclaim, declare, and make known that any provision which may be adopted by such state government in relation to the freed people of such state, which shall recognize and declare their permanent freedom, provide for their education, and which may yet be consistent as a temporary arrangement with their present condition as a laboring, landless, and homeless class, will not be objected to by the National Executive.

And it is suggested as not improper that, in constructing a loyal state government in any state, the name of the state, the boundary, the subdivisions, the constitution, and the general code of laws, as before the rebellion, be maintained, subject only to the modifications made necessary by the conditions hereinbefore stated, and such others, if any, not contravening said conditions, and which may be deemed expedient by those framing the new state government.

To avoid misunderstanding, it may be proper to say that this proclamation, so far as it relates to state governments, has no reference to states wherein loyal state governments have all the while been maintained. And, for the same reason, it may be proper to further say, that whether members sent to congress from any state shall be admitted to seats constitutionally rests exclusively with the respective houses, and not to any extent with the Executive. And still further, that this proclamation is intended to present the people of the states wherein the national authority has been suspended, and loyal state governments have been subverted, a mode in and by which the national authority and loyal state governments may be reestablished within said states, or in any of them; and while the mode presented is the best the Executive can suggest, with his present impressions, it must not be understood that no other possible mode would be acceptable.

Given under my hand at the city of Washington the eighth day of December, A.D. one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States of America the eighty-eighth.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:
WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State.

Executive Letter in Support of Mary Todd Lincoln’s First Cousin (21 December 1863)

Executive Mansion
Washington, December 21, 1863.

Mr. and Mrs. Craig, of Arkansas, whose plantation, situated upon the Mississippi River a few miles below Helena, has been desolated during the present war, purpose returning to reoccupy and cultivate said plantation; and it is my wish that they be permitted to do so, and that the United States military forces in that vicinity will not molest them, or allow them to be molested, as long as the said Mr. and Mrs. Craig shall demean themselves as peaceful, loyal citizens of the United States.

Abraham Lincoln

Letter Text: The Raab Collection (see “Sources” below)

Sources:

“An Original Christmas Week Letter from Abraham Lincoln During the Civil War Is Up for Sale for the First Time.” Ardmore, Pennsylvania: The Raab Collection, December 13, 2018.
“Civil War Timeline,” in “Gettysburg National Military Park. Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Park Service, retrieved online December 1, 2018.
“The Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction,” in “Freedmen & Southern Society Project.” College Park, Maryland: Department of History, University of Maryland, retrieved online December 1, 2018.
“Transcript of the Proclamation,” in “The Emancipation Proclamation,” in “Online Exhibits: Featured Documents.” Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, retrieved online December 1, 2018.
Sanger, George P., ed. The Statutes at Large, Treaties, and Proclamations of the United States of America from December 1863, to to December 1865, Vol. XIII, pp. 737–39. Boston, Massachusetts: Little, Brown and Company, 1866.

47th Pennsylvania Volunteers

ONE CIVIL WAR REGIMENT'S STORY

Category Archives: Holidays and Days of Remembrance

Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, April 9, 1864 — Casualties and POWs from the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry

Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield, Louisiana, April 8, 1864 — Casualties and POWs from the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry

New Year, New Duty Station: Adjusting to Life at Fort Jefferson in Florida’s Dry Tortugas (Late December 1862 – Late February 1863)

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

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

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

Late Winter through Early Spring 1862 (Florida): Serving as Soldiers and Surrogates for Family

December 1861: A Young Regiment’s First Christmas and New Year’s Day Away from Home

A Nation Comes Together, Time and Again, to Give Thanks

Healing a Nation – A President’s Christmas Acts of Forgiveness and Compassion