Alternate Spellings of Surname: Peter, Petre, Petrie, Petry

 

Born in 1842 in Perry County, Pennsylvania, Peter Petre (alternate surname spelling: “Petrie”), was a son of Dauphin County Pennsylvania native William Petre (1807-1885) and Sarah A. (Losh) Petre (1807-1884), a native of New Bloomfield, Perry County who was a daughter of Andrew Losh (1751-1849) and Mary Magdalena Haines (1771-1814).

Although he never knew his oldest sister, Catherine Petre (1830-1831), because she died before he was born, he did know all of his other Perry County-born siblings: Margaret Petre (1832-1877), who had been born on 30 January 1872 and would later wed Jeremiah D. Wilson (1833-1897); Lucetta Petre (1833-1913), who had been born on 18 December 1833 and would later wed Philip Umholtz (1830-1900); Lavinia F. Petre (1836-1909), who had been born in New Bloomfield on 20 February 1836 and would later wed Frederick Smith (1832-1880) in 1853 and migrate west with him to Indiana; Eliza Ann Petre (1838-1903), who had been born in New Bloomfield on 18 May 1838 and would later wed Henry Kitner (1832-1914); Nancy Petre (1840-1861), who had been born in 1840 but would die in her early twenties; Maria Petre (1846-1861), who had been born in New Bloomfield in 1846 but would also die on the same day as her sister, Nancy; Emma Ruth Petre (1850-1920), who had been born in New Bloomfield on 5 October 1850 and would later wed Henry Franklin Hardy (1851-1910); and Jemina Jane Petre (1854-1921), who had been born in New Bloomfield on 28 July 1854, would become known to family and friends as “Jemma” or “Jennie,” and would later wed Harrison A. Kuhn (1855-1923).

In 1860, Peter Petre was documented as the son of a successful farmer who was working his land in Shermans Dale, Carroll Township, Perry County. Living with Peter and his parents at that time were Peter’s sisters Nancy, Maria, Ruth, and Jemina.

Sadly, a twin tragedy struck the Petre family the following year, when Peter Petre’s older sister, Nancy Petre, and younger sister, Maria Petre, both died in Perry County on 19 January 1861. A young woman who was barely out of her teen years, Nancy Petre still rests at the Mount Gilead United Methodist Church Cemetery in Shermans Dale, Perry County.

During that terrible and historic year of 1861, Peter Petre was documented as an eighteen-year-old farmer who was living and working in Perry County.

American Civil War

On 20 August 1861, at the age of eighteen, Peter Petre enrolled for military service in Bloomfield, Perry County, Pennsylvania. He then mustered in for duty at Camp Curtin in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania as a private with Company D of the newly formed 47th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry on 31 August.

Military records throughout the war would spell his surname as “Petre,” while post-war newspaper accounts of his death would spell it as “Petrie.”

Following a brief training period in light infantry tactics, Private Peter Petre and his company were sent by train with the 47th Pennsylvania to Washington, D.C. where they were stationed at “Camp Kalorama” on Kalorama Heights near Georgetown, about two miles from the White House, beginning 20 September. Two days later, C Company Musician Henry D. Wharton penned these words to his hometown newspaper, the Sunbury American:

After a tedious ride we have, at last, arrived at the City of ‘magnificent distances.’ We left Harrisburg on Friday last at 1 o’clock A.M. and reached this camp yesterday (Saturday) at 4 P.M., as tired and worn out a setting [sic, set] of mortals as can possibly exist. On arriving at Washington we were marched to the ‘Soldiers Retreat,’ a building purposefully erected for the benefit of the soldier, where every comfort is extended to him and the wants of the ‘inner man’ supplied.

After partaking of refreshments we were ordered into line and marched, about three miles, to this camp. So tired were the men that, on marching out, some gave out, and had to leave the ranks, but J. Boulton Young, our ‘little Zouave,’ stood it bravely, and acted like a veteran. So small a drummer is scarcely seen in the army, and on the march through Washington he was twice the recipient of three cheers.

We were reviewed by Gen. McClellan yesterday [21 September] without our knowing it. All along the march we noticed a considerable number of officers, both mounted and on foot; the horse of one of the officers was so beautiful that he was noticed by the whole regiment, in fact, so adapt [sic, wrapped] up were they in the horse, the rider wasn’t noticed, and the boys were considerably mortified this morning on discovering they had missed the sight of, and the neglect of not saluting the soldier next in command to Gen. Scott.

Col. Good, who has command of our regiment, is an excellent man and a splendid soldier. He is a man of very few words, and is continually attending to his duties and the wants of the Regiment.

…. Our Regiment will now be put to hard work; such as drilling and the usual business of camp life, and the boys expect and hope for an occasional ‘pop’ at the enemy.

Acclimated somewhat to their new life, the soldiers of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry finally became part of the Army of the United States when they were officially mustered into federal service on 24 September. Three days later, they were assigned to the 3rd Brigade of Brigadier-General Isaac Ingalls Stevens, which also included the 33rd, 49th and 79th New York regiments. By that afternoon, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were on the move again.

Ordered onward by Brigadier-General Silas Casey, the Mississippi rifle-armed 47th Pennsylvania infantrymen marched behind their Regimental Band until reaching Camp Lyon, Maryland on the Potomac River’s eastern shore. At 5 p.m., they joined the 46th Pennsylvania in moving double-quick (one hundred and sixty five steps per minute using thirty-three-inch steps) across the “Chain Bridge” marked on federal maps, and continued on for roughly another mile before being ordered to make camp.

The next morning, they broke camp and moved again. Marching toward Falls Church, Virginia, they arrived at Camp Advance around dusk. There, about two miles from the bridge they had crossed a day earlier, they re-pitched their tents in a deep ravine near a new federal fort under construction (Fort Ethan Allen). They had completed a roughly eight-mile trek, were situated close to the headquarters of Brigadier-General William Farrar Smith (also known as “Baldy”) and were now part of the massive U.S. Army of the Potomac (“Mr. Lincoln’s Army”). Under Smith’s leadership, their regiment and brigade would help to defend the nation’s capital from the time of their arrival through late January when the men of the 47th Pennsylvania would be shipped south.

Once again, Company C Musician Henry Wharton recalled the regiment’s activities, noting, via his 29 September letter to the Sunbury American:

On Friday last we left Camp Kalorama, and the same night encamped about one mile from the Chain Bridge on the opposite side of the Potomac from Washington. The next morning, Saturday, we were ordered to this camp [Camp Advance near Fort Ethan Allen, Virginia], one and a half miles from the one we occupied the night previous. I should have mentioned that we halted on a high hill (on our march here) at the Chain Bridge, called Camp Lyon, but were immediately ordered on this side of the river. On the route from Kalorama we were for two hours exposed to the hardest rain I ever experienced. Whew, it was a whopper; but the fellows stood it well – not a murmur – and they waited in their wet clothes until nine o’clock at night for their supper. Our Camp adjoins that of the N.Y. 79th (Highlanders.)….

We had not been in this Camp more than six hours before our boys were supplied with twenty rounds of ball and cartridge, and ordered to march and meet the enemy; they were out all night and got back to Camp at nine o’clock this morning, without having a fight. They are now in their tents taking a snooze preparatory to another march the morning…. I don’t know how long the boys will be gone, but the orders are to cook two days’ rations and take it with them in their haversacks….

There was a nice little affair came off at Lavensville [sic, Lewinsville], a few miles from here on Wednesday last; our troops surprised a party of rebels (much larger than our own.) killing ten, took a Major prisoner, and captured a large number of horses, sheep and cattle, besides a large quantity of corn and potatoes, and about ninety six tons of hay. A nice day’s work. The boys are well, in fact, there is no sickness of any consequence at all in our Regiment….

Sometime during this phase of duty, as part of the 3rd Brigade, the 47th Pennsylvanians were moved to a site they initially christened “Camp Big Chestnut,” in reference to a large chestnut tree growing there. The site would eventually become known to them as “Camp Griffin,” and was located roughly ten miles from Washington, D.C.

On 11 October, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers marched in the Grand Review at Bailey’s Cross Roads. In a mid-October letter to his own family and friends, Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin, the commanding officer of Company C, reported that Companies D, A, C, F, and I (the 47th Pennsylvania’s right wing) were ordered to picket duty after the regiment’s left-wing companies (B, E, G, H, and K) had been forced to return to camp by Confederate troops.

In his letter of 13 October, Musician Henry Wharton described the duties of the average 47th Pennsylvanian, as well as the regiment’s new home:

The location of our new camp is fine and the scenery would be splendid if the view was not obstructed by heavy thickets of pine and innumerable chesnut [sic, chestnut] 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 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….

On Friday morning, 22 October 1861, the 47th engaged in a divisional review, described by historian Lewis Schmidt as massing “about 10,000 infantry, 1000 cavalry, and twenty pieces of artillery all in one big open field.” On 21 November, the 47th participated in a morning divisional headquarters review that was monitored by the regiment’s founder and commanding officer, Colonel Tilghman H. Good — a formal inspection that was 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, Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan obtained new Springfield rifles for every member of the 47th Pennsylvania.

1862

Ordered to move from their Virginia encampment back to Maryland, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers left Camp Griffin at 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, 22 January 1862. Marching through deep mud with their equipment for three miles in order to reach the railroad station at Falls Church, they were transported to Alexandria, where they boarded the steamship City of Richmond and sailed the Potomac River to the Washington Arsenal, where they disembarked and were re-equipped. Subsequently marched to the Soldiers’ Rest in Washington, D.C., they were fed and given the opportunity to relax there. The next afternoon, they were marched to the railroad station, where they hopped aboard a train from the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and headed for Annapolis, Maryland.

Arriving around 10 p.m., they disembarked and were marched to a barracks at the United States Naval Academy, where they bedded down for the night. They then spent that Friday through Monday (24-27 January) loading their equipment and supplies onto the U.S.S. Oriental.

During the afternoon of 27 January, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers began boarding the Oriental, enlisted men first, and then, per the directive of Brigadier-General Brannan, they steamed away at 4 p.m. and headed for Florida, which, despite its secession from the United States remained strategically important to the Union due to the presence of several key federal installations.

Arriving in Key West, Florida by early February 1862, the men of Company D and their fellow 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers disembarked and were ordered to pitch their tents on the beach, where they rested and were subsequently directed to their respective quarters inside and outside of Fort Taylor. Assigned to garrison the fort, they drilled daily in infantry and artillery tactics, began strengthening the fortifications of this key federal installation and also began making infrastructure improvements to the city by felling trees and building new roads.

During the weekend of 14 February, the regiment introduced itself to area residents via a parade through the city’s streets. That Sunday, the 47th Pennsylvanians began mingling with locals at area church services.

Among the lighter moments, the regiment commemorated the birthday of President George Washington with a parade, a special ceremony involving the reading of Washington’s farewell address to the nation (first delivered in 1796), the firing of cannon at the fort, and a sack race and other games on 22 February. The festivities resumed two days later when the Regimental Band hosted an officers’ ball at which “all parties enjoyed themselves, for three o’clock of the morning sounded on their ears before any motion was made to move homewards,” according to Musician Henry Wharton. This was then followed by a concert by the regimental band on Wednesday evening, 26 February.

Next ordered to Hilton Head, South Carolina, from early June through July, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers camped near Fort Walker before relocating roughly thirty-five miles away in the Beaufort District in the U.S. Army’s Department of the South. Frequently assigned to hazardous picket duty north of their main camp, they faced an increased risk of enemy sniper fire. Despite this danger, though, the men of the 47th Pennsylvania “received the highest commendation from Generals Hunter and Brannan” for their “attention to duty, discipline and soldierly bearing,” according to historian Samuel P. Bates.

Detachments from the regiment were also assigned to the Expedition to Fenwick Island (9 July) and the Demonstration against Pocotaligo (10 July).

Capture of Saint John’s Bluff, Florida and a Confederate Steamer

During a return expedition to Florida, beginning 30 September, the 47th Pennsylvania joined with the 1st Connecticut Battery, 7th Connecticut Infantry and part of the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry in assaulting Confederate forces at their heavily protected camp at Saint John’s Bluff, overlooking the Saint John’s River. Trekking through roughly twenty-five miles of swampland and forests, after disembarking from their Union troop transports at Mayport Mills on 1 October, the 47th Pennsylvanians captured artillery and ammunition stores (on 3 October) that had been abandoned during the Union Navy’s bombardment of the bluff.

Men from the 47th Pennsylvania’s Companies E and K were then led by Captain Charles H. Yard on a special mission; initially joining with other Union troops in the reconnaissance and capture of Jacksonville, Florida, they were subsequently ordered to sail up the Saint John’s River to seek out and capture any Confederate ships they found. Departing aboard the Darlington, a former Confederate steamer, with protection by the Union gunboat Hale, they traveled two hundred miles upriver, captured the Governor Milton, a Confederate steamer that was docked near Hawkinsville, and returned back down the river with both Union ships and their new Confederate prize without incident. (Identified as a thorn that needed to be plucked from the Union’s side, that steamer had been engaged in ferrying Confederate troops and supplies around the region.)

Integration of the Regiment

Meanwhile, back at its South Carolina base of operations, the 47th Pennsylvania was making history as it became an integrated regiment. On 5 and 15 October, the regiment added to its rosters several young Black men who had endured plantation enslavement near Beaufort and other areas of South Carolina, including Bristor Gethers, Abraham Jassum and Edward Jassum.

Battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina

From 21-23 October 1862, under the brigade and regimental commands of Colonel Tilghman Good and Lieutenant-Colonel George Warren Alexander, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers joined with other Union troops in engaging heavily protected Confederate troops in and around Pocotaligo, South Carolina, including at Frampton’s Plantation and the Pocotaligo Bridge, a key piece of Deep South infrastructure that senior Union military leaders felt should be eliminated.

Harried by snipers while en route to destroy the bridge, they met resistance from an entrenched, heavily fortified Confederate battery that opened fire on the Union troops as they entered an open cotton field.

Those headed toward higher ground at the Frampton Plantation fared no better as they encountered artillery and infantry fire from the surrounding forests. But the Union soldiers would not give in. Grappling with the Confederates where they found them, they pursued the Rebels for four miles as the Confederate Army retreated to the bridge. Once there, the 47th Pennsylvania relieved the 7th Connecticut.

Unfortunately, the enemy was just too well armed. After two hours of intense fighting in an attempt to take the ravine and bridge, the 47th Pennsylvanians were forced by depleted ammunition to withdraw to Mackay’s Point.

Losses for the 47th were significant. Two officers and eighteen enlisted men died; two officers and an additional one hundred and fourteen enlisted men were wounded.

Badly battered when they returned to Hilton Head on 23 October, a number of 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were subsequently selected to serve as the funeral honor guard for General Ormsby MacKnight Mitchel, the commander of the U.S. Army’s 10th Corps and Department of the South who had succumbed to yellow fever on 30 October. The Mountains of Mitchel, a part of Mars’ South Pole discovered by Mitchel in 1846 while working as a University of Cincinnati astronomer, and Mitchelville, the first Freedmen’s town created after the Civil War, were both later named for him. Men from the 47th Pennsylvania were given the honor of firing the salute over his grave.

Having been ordered back to Key West on 15 November 1862, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers would spend much of 1863 guarding federal installations in Florida as part of the 10th Corps, Department of the South. Companies A, B, C, E, G, and I would once again garrison Fort Taylor in Key West, while the men of Companies D, F, H, and K would garrison Fort Jefferson, the Union’s remote outpost in the Dry Tortugas off the southern coast of Florida.

After packing their belongings at their Beaufort, South Carolina encampment and loading their equipment onto the U.S. Steamer Cosmopolitan, the officers and enlisted members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry sailed toward the mouth of the Broad River on 15 December 1862, and anchored briefly at Port Royal Harbor in order to allow the regiment’s medical director, Elisha W. Baily, M.D., and members of the regiment who had recuperated enough from their Pocotaligo-related battle injuries at the Union’s general hospital at Hilton Head, to rejoin the regiment.

At 5 p.m. that same evening, the regiment sailed for Florida, during what was described by several members of the regiment as a treacherous and nerve-wracking voyage. According to Schmidt, the ship’s captain “steered a course along the coast of Florida for most of the voyage,” which made the voyage more precarious “because of all the reefs.” On 16 December, “the second night, the ship was jarred as it ran aground on one during a storm, but broke free, and finally steered a course further from shore, out in the Gulf Stream.”

In a letter penned to the Sunbury American on 21 December, Musician Henry Wharton provided the following details about the regiment’s trip:

On the passage down, we ran along almost the whole coast of Florida. Rather all dangerous ground, and the reefs are no playthings. We we jarred considerably by running on one, and not liking the sensation our course was altered for the Gulf Stream. We had heavy sea all the time. I had often heard of ‘waves as big as a house,’ and thought it was a sailors yarn, but I have seen ’em and am perfectly satisfied; so now, not having a nautical turn of mind, I prefer our movements being done on terra firma, and leave old neptune to those who have more desire for his better acquaintance. A nearer chance of a shipwreck never took place than ours, and it was only through Providence that we were saved. The Cosmopolitan is a good riverboat, but to send her to sea, loadened [sic, loaded] with U.S. troops is a shame, and looks as though those in authority wish to get clear of soldiers in another way than that of battle. There was some sea sickness on our passage; several of the boys ‘casting up their accounts’ on the wrong side of the ledger.

According to Corporal George Nichols of Company E, “When we got to Key West the Steamer had Six foot of water in her hole [sic, hold]. Waves Mountain High and nothing but an old river Steamer. With Eleven hundred Men on I looked for her to go to the Bottom Every Minute.”

Although the Cosmopolitan arrived at the Key West Harbor on Thursday, 18 December, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers did not set foot on Florida soil until noon the next day. The men from Companies C and I were immediately marched to Fort Taylor, where they were placed under the command of Major William Gausler, the regiment’s third-in-command. The men from Companies B and E were assigned to the older barracks that had been erected by the United States Army, and were placed under the command of B Company Captain Emanuel P. Rhoads, while the men from Companies A and G were placed under the command of A Company Captain Richard Graeffe, and stationed at newer facilities known as the “Lighthouse Barracks,” which were located on “Lighthouse Key.”

On Saturday, 21 December, Lieutenant-Colonel George W. Alexander, the regiment’s second-in-command, sailed away aboard the Cosmopolitan with the men from Companies D, F, H, and K, and headed south to Fort Jefferson, roughly seventy miles off the coast of Florida (in the Gulf of Mexico) to assume garrison duties there. According to Musician Henry Wharton:

We landed here [Fort Taylor] on last Thursday at noon, and immediately marched to quarters. Company I. and C., in Fort Taylor, Company E. and B. in the old Barracks, and A. and G. in the new Barracks. Lieut. Col. Alexander, with the other four companies proceeded to Tortugas, Col. Good having command of all the forces in and around Key West. Our regiment relieved the 90th Regiment N. Y. S. Vols. Col. Joseph Morgan, who will proceed to Hilton Head to report to the General commanding. His actions have been severely criticized by the people, but, as it is in bad taste to say anything against ones [sic, one’s] superiors, I merely mention, judging from the expression of the citizens, they were very glad of the return of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers….

Key West has improved very little since we left last June, but there is one improvement for which the 90th New York deserve a great deal of praise, and that is the beautifying of the ‘home’ of dec’d soldiers. A neat and strong wall of stone encloses the yard, the ground is laid off in squares, all the graves are flat and are nicely put in proper shape by boards eight or ten inches high on the end sides, covered with white sand, while a head and foot board, with the full name, company and regiment, marks the last resting place of the patriot who sacrificed himself for his country….

1863

Although water quality was a challenge for members of the regiment at both of their duty stations in Florida throughout 1863, it was particularly problematic for the 47th Pennsylvanians who were stationed at Fort Jefferson. According to Schmidt:

‘Fresh’ water was provided by channeling the rains from the city’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, 1,231,000 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]….

As a result, the soldiers stationed there washed themselves and their clothes, using saltwater from the ocean. As if that weren’t 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 Col. Alexander and his surgeon.

As for daily operations in the Dry Tortugas, there was a fort post office and the “interior parade grounds, with numerous trees and shrubs in evidence, contained officers’ quarters, [a] magazine, kitchens and out houses,” per Schmidt, as well as “a ‘hot shot oven’ which was completed in 1863 and used to heat shot before firing.”

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….

Additional Duties: Diminishing Florida’s Role as the “Supplier of the Confederacy”

In addition to the strategic role played by the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers in preventing foreign powers from assisting the Confederate Army and Navy in gaining control over federal forts in the Deep South, the regiment was also called upon to play an ongoing role in weakening Florida’s abilities to supply and transport food and troops throughout areas held by the Confederate States of America.

Prior to intervention by the Union Army and Navy, the owners of plantations and livestock ranches, as well as the operators of small, family farms across Florida, had been able to consistently furnish beef and pork, fish, fruits, and vegetables to Confederate troops stationed throughout the Deep South during the first year of the American Civil War. Large herds of cattle were raised near Fort Myers, for example, while orchard owners in the Saint John’s River area were actively engaged in cultivating sizeable orange groves (while other types of citrus trees were found growing throughout more rural areas of the state).

Florida was also a major producer of salt, which was used as a preservative for food. As a result, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers and other Union troops across Florida were ordered to capture or destroy salt manufacturing facilities in order to further curtail the enemy’s access to food.

But they were undertaking all of these duties in conditions that were far more challenging than any they had previously faced (and that were far more challenging than what many other Union troops were facing up north). The weather was frequently hot and humid as spring turned to summer, mosquitos and other insects were an ever-present annoyance (and serious threat when they were carrying tropical diseases) and there were also scorpions and snakes that put the men’s health at further risk.

As part of their efforts to ensure the efficacy of their ongoing operations, regimental officers periodically tweaked the assignments of individual companies during that year of garrison duty. One of those changes occurred on 16 May 1863 when D Company Captain Henry D. Woodruff and his men marched to the wharf at Fort Jefferson and climbed aboard yet another ship — this time for their return to Fort Taylor in Key West, where they resumed garrison duties under the command of Colonel Tilghman H. Good.

Four days later, enlisted members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were finally given eight months’ worth of their back pay — a significant percentage of which was quickly sent home to family members who had been struggling to make ends meet.

Despite all of these hardships, when members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were offered the opportunity to re-enlist during the fall of 1863, more than half of the regiment’s personnel did so without hesitation. Among those choosing to re-up for an additional tour of duty was Private Peter Petre, who re-enlisted as a private with the same regiment and company at Fort Taylor in Key West on 10 October 1863.

1864

In early January 1864, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers experienced yet another significant change when members of the regiment were ordered to expand the Union’s reach by sending part of the regiment north to retake possession of Fort Myers, a federal installation that had been abandoned in 1858, following the federal government’s third war with the Seminole Indians. In response, A Company Captain Richard Graeffe and a group of soldiers from Company A traveled north, captured the fort and began conducting cattle raids to provide food for the growing Union troop presence across Florida. They subsequently turned the fort not only into their base of operations, but into a shelter for pro-union supporters, escaped slaves, Confederate deserters, and others fleeing Rebel troops.

Red River Campaign

Meanwhile, all of the other companies of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry had begun preparing for the regiment’s history-making journey to Louisiana. Boarding yet another steamer, the Charles Thomas, the men from Companies B, C, D, I, and K headed for Algiers, Louisiana (across the river from New Orleans), followed on 1 March by the men from Companies E, F, G, and H.

Upon the second group’s arrival, the now almost-fully-reunited regiment moved by train to Brashear City (now Morgan City, Louisiana) before Meanwhile, all of the other companies of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry had begun preparing for the regiment’s history-making journey to Louisiana. Boarding yet another steamer, the Charles Thomas, the men from Companies B, C, D, I, and K headed for Algiers, Louisiana (across the river from New Orleans), followed on 1 March by the men from Companies E, F, G, and H. to Franklin by steamer through the Bayou Teche. There, the 47th Pennsylvania Infantry joined the 2nd Brigade, 1st Division of the Department of the Gulf’s 19th Army Corps (XIX Corps), and became the only Pennsylvania regiment to serve in the Red River Campaign of Union Major-General Nathaniel P. Banks. (Unable to reach Louisiana until 23 March, the soldiers from Company A were assigned to detached duty while awaiting transport that enabled them to reconnect with their regiment at Alexandria, Louisiana on 9 April).

From 14-26 March, the 47th passed through New Iberia, Vermilionville (now part of Lafayette), Opelousas, and Washington while en route to Alexandria and Natchitoches. Often short on food and water, the regiment encamped briefly at Pleasant Hill the night of 7 April before continuing on the next day, marching until mid-afternoon.

Rushed into battle ahead of other regiments in the 2nd Division, sixty members of the 47th were cut down on 8 April during the volley of fire unleashed during the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads. The fighting waned only when darkness fell. Exhausted, those who were uninjured collapsed between the bodies of the gravely wounded and dead. After midnight, the surviving Union troops withdrew to Pleasant Hill.

The next day, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were ordered into a critically important defensive position at the far right of the Union lines, their right flank spreading up onto a high bluff. By 3 p.m., after enduring a midday charge by the troops of Confederate Major-General Richard Taylor (a plantation owner and son of Zachary Taylor, former president of the United States), the brutal fighting still showed no signs of ending. Suddenly, just as the 47th was shifting to the left side of the massed Union forces, the men of the 47th Pennsylvania were forced to bolster the 165th New York’s buckling lines by blocking another Confederate assault during what has since become known as the Battle of Pleasant Hill.

Once again casualties were severe. Among the men from D Company felled that day were Privates Ephraim Clouser, who had been shot in his right knee, Samuel Wagner, Joseph Benson Shaver, who had been severely wounded above the elbow of his left arm, and Peter Petre, who had been wounded in the side.

Initially treated by regimental surgeons near the battlefield where he was wounded, Private Peter Petre was transported to a Union General Hospital in the city of New Orleans, along with Privates Shaver and Wagner, where they were given more advanced care. Tragically, Private Wagner, who was subsequently discharged via a surgeon’s certificate of disability in late May 1864, died when the Union Army ship that was transporting him north (the U.S. Pocahontas) collided with another ship (the City of Bath) and sank off the coast of Cape May, New Jersey on 1 June 1864.

Equally tragic, Private Clouser, who had been shot in the right knee before being captured by Rebel troops with more than a dozen other 47th Pennsylvanians, was subsequently marched more than one hundred and twenty-five miles southwest to Camp Ford, the largest Confederate States prison camp west of the Mississippi River, where he languished in captivity as a prisoner of war (POW) until he was released during a prisoner exchange on 25 November 1864. (Subsequently confined to the Union Army’s hospital system, he was an emotionally-scarred shell of his former self who would later die by suicide.)

The outcome for Private Petre, however, was a somewhat better one.

A Long Recovery

Because he was so severely wounded during the Battle of Pleasant Hill, Private Peter Petre most certainly missed out on most, if not all, of the remaining Red River Campaign events in which his D Company comrades took part, including the Affair at Monett’s Ferry (23 April), the construction of Bailey’s Dam near Alexandria (26 April-12 May) and the Battle of Mansura near Marksville (16 May).

Moving on after that final battle, Private Petre’s fellow 47th Pennsylvanians were given time to rest at a large Union Army encampment at Morganza, Louisiana in June before they were ordered to head for New Orleans. (They finally arrived in the city on 20 June.)

On 4 July, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers received orders to return to the East Coast. Three days later, they began loading their men onto ships, a process that unfolded in two stages. Companies A, C, D, E, F, H, and I boarded the U.S. Steamer McClellan on 7 July and steamed away that day, while the members of Companies B, G and K remained behind, awaiting transport. (The latter group subsequently departed aboard the Blackstone, weighing anchor and sailing forth at the end of that month.)

As a result of this twist of fate, Private Peter Petre may have been one of the 47th Pennsylvania’s “early travelers” who subsequently had the good fortune to have a memorable encounter with President Abraham Lincoln on 12 July 1864. That group of 47th Pennsylvanians then took part in the mid-July Battle of Cool Spring near Snicker’s Gap, Virginia.

Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign

Attached to the Middle Military Division, Army of the Shenandoah beginning in August, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry was assigned to defensive duties in and around Halltown, Virginia during the opening days of that month, and then engaged in a series of back-and-forth movements over the next several weeks between Halltown, Berryville, Middletown, Charlestown, and Winchester as part of a “mimic war” being waged by the Union forces of Major-General Philip H. Sheridan with those commanded by Confederate Lieutenant-General Jubal Early.

From 3-4 September 1864, they took on Early’s Confederates again — this time in the Battle of Berryville. That month then also saw the departure of several 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers who had served honorably, including Company D’s Captain Henry Woodruff, First Lieutenant Samuel Auchmuty, Sergeants Henry Heikel and Alex Wilson, and Corporals Cornelius Stewart and Samuel A. M. Reed — many of whom mustered out on 18 September 1864, upon expiration of their respective service terms.

Those members of the 47th who remained on duty were about to engage in their regiment’s greatest moments of valor.

Battles of Opequan and Fisher’s Hill, September 1864

Together with other regiments under the command of Union Major-General Philip H. (“Little Phil”) Sheridan and Brigadier-General William H. Emory, commander of the 19th Corps, the members of Company D and their fellow 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers helped to inflict heavy casualties on Lieutenant-General Jubal Early’s Confederate forces at Opequan (also spelled as “Opequon” and referred to as “Third Winchester”). The battle is still considered by many historians to be one of the most important during Sheridan’s 1864 campaign; the Union’s victory here helped to ensure the reelection of President Abraham Lincoln.

The 47th Pennsylvania’s march toward destiny at Opequan began at 2 a.m. on 19 September 1864 as the regiment left camp and joined up with others in the Union’s 19th Corps. After advancing slowly from Berryville toward Winchester, the 19th Corps became bogged down for several hours by the massive movement of Union troops and supply wagons, enabling Early’s men to dig in. After finally reaching the Opequan Creek, Sheridan’s men came face to face with the Confederate Army commanded by Early. The fighting, which began in earnest at noon, was long and brutal. The Union’s left flank (6th Corps) took a beating from Confederate artillery stationed on high ground.

Meanwhile, the 47th Pennsylvania and the 19th Corps were directed by Brigadier-General William Emory to attack and pursue Major-General John B. Gordon’s Confederate forces. Some success was achieved, but casualties mounted as another Confederate artillery group opened fire on Union troops trying to cross a clearing. When a nearly fatal gap began to open between the 6th and 19th Corps, Sheridan sent in units led by Brigadier-Generals Emory Upton and David A. Russell. Russell, hit twice — once in the chest, was mortally wounded. The 47th Pennsylvania opened its lines long enough to enable the Union cavalry under William Woods Averell and the foot soldiers of General George Crook to charge the Confederates’ left flank.

Afterward, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were sent out on skirmishing parties before making camp at Cedar Creek. Moving forward, they would continue to distinguish themselves in battle, but would do so without two more of their respected commanders: Colonel Tilghman Good, founder of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers; and Good’s second-in-command, Lieutenant-Colonel George Alexander, who mustered out from 23-24 September upon the expiration of their respective terms of service.

Fortunately, they were replaced by others equally admired both for their temperament and their front line experience: Second Lieutenant George Stroop, who was promoted to lead Company D, and John Peter Shindel Gobin, Charles W. Abbott and Levi Stuber, who ultimately became the three most senior leaders of the regiment.

Battle of Cedar Creek, October 1864

It was during the fall of 1864 that Major-General Philip Sheridan began the first of the Union’s true “scorched earth” campaigns, starving the enemy into submission by destroying Virginia’s crops and farming infrastructure. Viewed through today’s lens of history as inhumane, the strategy claimed many innocents — civilians whose lives were cut short by their inability to find food. This same strategy, however, almost certainly contributed to the further turning of the war’s tide in the Union’s favor during the Battle of Cedar Creek on 19 October 1864. Successful throughout most of their engagement with Union forces at Cedar Creek, Early’s Confederate troops began peeling off in ever growing numbers to forage for food, thus enabling the 47th Pennsylvania and others under Sheridan’s command to rally.

From a military standpoint, it was another impressive, but heartrending day. During the morning of 19 October, Early launched a surprise attack directly on Sheridan’s Cedar Creek-encamped forces. Early’s men were able to capture Union weapons while freeing a number of Confederates who had been taken prisoner during previous battles — all while pushing seven Union divisions back. According to Bates:

When the Army of West Virginia, under Crook, was surprised and driven from its works, the Second Brigade, with the Forty-seventh on the right, was thrown into the breach to arrest the retreat…. Scarcely was it in position before the enemy came suddenly upon it, under the cover of fog. The right of the regiment was thrown back until it was almost a semi-circle. The brigade, only fifteen hundred strong, was contending against Gordon’s entire division, and was forced to retire, but, in comparative good order, exposed, as it was, to raking fire. Repeatedly forming, as it was pushed back, and making a stand at every available point, it finally succeeded in checking the enemy’s onset, when General Sheridan suddenly appeared upon the field, who ‘met his crest-fallen, shattered battalions, without a word of reproach, but joyously swinging his cap, shouted to the stragglers, as he road rapidly past them – “Face the other way, boys! We are going back to our camp! We are going to lick them out of their boots!’”

The Union’s counterattack punched Early’s forces into submission, and the men of the 47th were commended for their heroism by General Stephen Thomas who, in 1892, was awarded the Medal of Honor for his own “distinguished conduct in a desperate hand-to-hand encounter, in which the advance of the enemy was checked” that day. Bates described the 47th’s actions:

When the final grand charge was made, the regiment moved at nearly right angles with the rebel front. The brigade charged gallantly, and the entire line, making a left wheel, came down on his flank, while engaging the Sixth Corps, when he went “whirling up the valley” in confusion. In the pursuit to Fisher’s Hill, the regiment led, and upon its arrival was placed on the skirmish line, where it remained until twelve o’clock noon of the following day. The army was attacked at early dawn…no respite was given to take food until the pursuit was ended.

Once again, the casualties for the 47th were high. Sergeant William Pyers, the C Company man who had so gallantly rescued the flag at Pleasant Hill was cut down and later buried on the battlefield. Corporal Edward Harper of Company D was wounded, but survived, as did Corporal Isaac Baldwin, who had been wounded earlier at Pleasant Hill. Even Perry County resident and Regimental Chaplain William Rodrock of Perry County suffered a near miss as a bullet pierced his cap.

Following these major engagements, the 47th was ordered to Camp Russell near Winchester from November through most of December. On 14 November, Second Lieutenant George Stroop was promoted to the rank of captain.

Rested and somewhat healed, the 47th was then ordered to outpost and railroad guard duties at Camp Fairview in Charlestown, West Virginia five days before Christmas.

1865 — 1866

Still stationed at Camp Fairview in West Virginia as the New Year of 1865 dawned, members of the regiment continued to patrol and guard key Union railroad lines in the vicinity of Charlestown, while other 47th Pennsylvanians chased down Confederate guerrillas who had made repeated attempts to disrupt railroad operations and kill soldiers from other Union regiments.

Assigned in February 1865 to the Provisional Division of the 2nd Brigade of the U.S. Army of the Shenandoah, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers continued to perform their guerrilla-fighting duties until late March, when they were ordered to head back to Washington, D.C., by way of Winchester and Kernstown, Virginia.

Joyous News and Then Tragedy

As April 1865 opened, the battles between the Army of the United States and the Confederate States Army intensified, finally reaching the decisive moment when the Confederate troops of General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox on 9 April.

The long war, it seemed, was finally over. Less than a week later, however, the fragile peace was threatened when an assassin’s bullet ended the life of President Abraham Lincoln. Shot while attending an evening performance of Our American Cousin at Ford’s Theatre on 14 April 1865, he had died from his wound at 7:22 a.m. the next morning.

Shocked, and devastated by the news, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were given little time to mourn their beloved commander-in-chief before they were ordered to grab their weapons and move into the regiment’s assigned position, from which it helped to protect the nation’s capital and thwart any attempt by Confederate soldiers and their sympathizers to re-ignite the flames of civil war that had finally been stamped out.

So key was their assignment that the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were not even allowed to march in the funeral procession of their slain leader. Instead, they took part in a memorial service with other members of their brigade that was officiated by the 47th Pennsylvania’s regimental chaplain, the Reverend William D. C. Rodrock.

Present-day researchers who read letters sent by 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers to family and friends back home in Pennsylvania during this period, or post-war interviews conducted by newspaper reporters with veterans of the regiment in later years, will learn that the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were collectively heartbroken by Lincoln’s death and deeply angry at those whose actions had culminated in his murder. Researchers will also learn that at least one member of the regiment, C Company Drummer Samuel Hunter Pyers, was given the high honor of guarding President Lincoln’s funeral train, while other members of the regiment were assigned to guard duty at the prison where the key assassination conspirators were being held during the early days of their imprisonment and trial, which began on 9 May 1865.

The home base of the regiment during this phase of duty was Camp Brightwood, which was located in the Brightwood section of Washington, D.C. Attached to Dwight’s Division of the 2nd Brigade of the U.S. Department of Washington’s 22nd Corps, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers also participated in the Union’s Grand Review of the National Armies, which took place in Washington, D.C. on 23 May 1865.

Reconstruction

Afterward, Private Peter Petre and his fellow 47th Pennsylvanians were ordered to America’s Deep South. Stationed in Savannah, Georgia in early June, they were assigned again to Dwight’s Division, but this time, they were attached to the 3rd Brigade, U.S. Department of the South.

Subsequently ordered to relieve the 165th New York Volunteers in Charleston, South Carolina in July 1865, they were quartered in the former mansion of the Confederate Secretary of the Treasury.

Beginning on Christmas day of that same year, the majority of 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantrymen, including Private Peter Petre, began to honorably muster out in Charleston — a process which continued through early January 1866.

Following a stormy voyage home, the 47th Pennsylvanians disembarked in New York City and were then transported to Philadelphia by train where, at Camp Cadwalader on 9 January 1866, they were officially given their honorable discharge papers.

According to regimental records, Private Petre’s military clothing account had never been settled. He still owed a Union Army sutler seven dollars for food and other supplies he had purchased during his tenure of service, and also still owed the federal government thirteen dollars and twelve cents for his uniform — plus an additional six dollars for his weapon and ammunition; however, he would not have been “left holding the bag” financially because the federal government still owed him back pay that would have covered those unpaid bills. (Although Private Petre had been eligible for a total of two hundred and sixty-two dollars in bounty payments for his initial enlistment and subsequent re-enlistment, he had only been paid one hundred and forty dollars of that bonus.)

Return to Civilian Life

Following his honorable discharge from the military, Private Peter Petre returned home to Pennsylvania, where he resumed life as a a farmer in Carroll Township, Perry County. Sometime in late December 1865 or early 1866, he wed Pennsylvania native Margaret A. Fenicle (1846-1917), who was a daughter of Adam Fenicle (1820-1892) and Eliza J. (Little) Fenicle (1821-1894).

Together, Peter and Margaret Petre subsequently welcomed the Carroll Township births of: Flora Petre (1866-1925), who was born on 8 August 1866 (alternate birth year: 1865) and later wed Henry M. Kitner (1858-1921; alternate spelling “Ketner”) in 1884; William Sheridan Petre (1866-1951), who was born on 15 December 1866 (alternate birth year: 1867) and later wed Nora Biddle Green (1865-1933) in 1887; and Elizabeth J. Petre (1868-1905), who was born in 1868 and later wed Edward A. Dundorf (1867-1922) in 1887.

Injury, Sudden Death and Interment

While working on his farm on 5 October 1869, twenty-six-year-old Peter Petre lifted a heavy barrel of cider off of a wagon, placed it on the ground and suddenly felt unwell. Realizing that he needed to take a break, he walked into his home and sat down. After a few minutes of rest, he “stooped down to pick up something and immediately fell forward and died,” according to his obituary in The Perry County Democrat, which added the following details:

He had been a soldier and was wounded in the side, from the effects of which wound some think his sudden death is attributable. He was a worthy member of Shermansdale Council of the O. U. A. M. and his remains were followed to the grave by many of the fraternity. He was aged 26 years and 10 days.

His grave is located at the Mount Gilead United Methodist Church Cemetery in Shermans Dale, Perry County.

What Happened to Peter Petre’s Parents and Siblings?

Peter Petre was survived by both of his parents. His mother, Sarah A. (Losh) Petre, died at the age of seventy-seven in Shermans Dale, Perry County, on 8 August 1884, and was laid to rest at the same cemetery where Peter had been buried (the Mount Gilead United Methodist Church Cemetery in Shermans Dale).

His father, William Petre, continued to earn a living as a farmer and shoemaker into the early 1880s. Finally, after a long full life, he died at the age of seventy-five in Shermans Dale, on 22 April 1885, and was interred at the same cemetery where his wife and son were buried (the Mount Gilead United Methodist Church Cemetery in Shermans Dale).

Following her marriage to Jeremiah D. Wilson, Peter Petre’s second oldest sister, Margaret (Petre) Wilson, welcomed the births of: Joseph P. Wilson (1860-1940), who was born on 9 September 1860; William H. Wilson (1863-1884), who was born on 4 March 1863); and Sarah Catharine Wilson (1864-1922), who was born on the Fourth of July in 1864 and later wed Samuel Smiley Shatto (1857-1943). The life of Margaret (Petre) Wilson was a short one, however; she died at the age of forty-five and was buried at the same cemetery where her parents were interred (Mount Gilead in Shermans Dale).

Following her marriage to Philip Umholtz, Peter Petre’s older sister, Lucetta (Petre) Umholtz, welcomed the births of: Hiram W. Umholtz (1855-1928), who was born on 24 July 1855; Lizzie Umholtz (1857-1863), who was born in 1857 but did not survive her early childhood; Annie E. Umholtz (1858-1929), who was born in 1858; Elwood L. Ulmholtz (1860-1863), who was born on 22 August 1860 but also did not survive early childhood; Minnie K. Ulmholtz (1864-1865), who was born in May 1864 but died before reaching her first birthday; Lillie L. Ulmholtz (1866-1881), who was born on 31 March 1866, but did not survive her teen years; and an unnamed infant (1869-1869), who was born on 27 October 1969 but died two days later. Despite having to bear the heartache of so many children who predeceased her, Lucetta (Petre) Umholtz went on to live a long, full life. Following her death in Carlisle, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania at the age of seventy-nine, on 18 May 1913, she was laid to rest at the Old Graveyard in that city.

Following her marriage to Frederick Smith, Peter Petre’s older sister, Lavinia F. (Petre) Smith, welcomed the 1857 birth of son Emery Smith (1857-1880). Having migrated west with her husband to Indiana, she made a new life for herself and her family in St. Joseph County. After a good life, she died there at the age of seventy-three, on 11 September 1909, and was laid to rest at the Mount Pleasant Cemetery in South Bend, St. Joseph County.

Following her marriage to Henry Kitner (1832-1914), Peter Petre’s older sister, Eliza Ann (Petre) Kitner, welcomed the births of: Mary Frances Kitner (1866-1945), who was born in New Bloomfield on 21 March 1866 and later wed Jesse Henry Cooper (1858-1938); Frederick Barnett Kitner (1868-1931), who was born in Crums Corners, Perry County on 1 March 1868; David W. Kitner (1870-1917), who was born on 15 July 1870; Rose Anna Kitner (1875-1949), who was born on 2 April 1875 and later wed Henry Calvin Foose (1874-1928) in 1896; George A. Kitner (1877-1902), who was born on 22 June 1877; Samuel Emery Kitner (1879-1952), who was born on New Year’s Day in 1879; Isaiah Jess Kitner (1883-1966), who was born on 29 August 1883; and Jesse Irvin Kitner (1889-1951), who was born in 1889. A lifelong resident of Perry County, Eliza Ann (Petre) Kitner died on 21 January 1903. Aged sixty-four at the time of her passing, she was also buried at the Mount Gilead Cemetery in Shermans Dale.

Following her marriage to Henry Franklin Hardy, Peter Petre’s younger sister, Emma Ruth (Petre) Hardy, migrated west with him to Indiana and made a new life with him in St. Joseph County — the same county where her older sister, Lavinia (Petre) Smith, had settled. A resident of that county’s Portage Township, Emma Ruth (Petre) Hardy died there at the age of sixty-nine, on 21 January 1920, and was laid to rest at the Lakeville Cemetery in St. Joseph County.

Following her marriage to Harrison A. Kuhn, Peter Petre’s youngest sister, Jemina Jane (Petre) Kuhn, made a new life with her husband in Harrisburg, Dauphin County. She died there at the age of sixty-seven, on her birthday — 28 July — in 1921, and was laid to rest at the East Harrisburg Cemetery.

What Happened to Peter Petre’s Widow and Children?

Margaret A. (Fenicle) Petre (1846-1917) continued to reside in Perry County, where she continued to raise the children from her marriage to Peter Petre. Sometime during the early 1870s, she was remarried to Jeremiah Fair (1833-1876), and resided with him in Carroll Township, Perry County. Together, she and Jeremiah welcomed the Perry County birth of son Morgan Fair (1871-1933), who was born on 20 February 1971. Widowed by her second husband on 18 February 1876, she then wed Joseph B. McClintock (1838-1917). Their daughter, Bertha McClintock (1877-1952) was then born in 1877 and was known to family and friends as “Bertie.” (Bertie would later wed John W. Toomey.) In 1894, Margaret A. (Fenicle Petre Fair McClintock) was then married for a fourth time — to Samuel Nauman Brubaker (1837-1914) — and settled with him in Rapho Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. By the time that she was widowed by him (on 16 March 1914), she was residing in the city of Carlisle in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. Less than three years later, Margaret A. (Fenicle Petre Fair McClintock) Brubaker was also gone. Following her death in Carlisle from La Grippe (the flu), at the age of seventy, on 26 January 1917, she was laid to rest at that city’s Letort Cemetery.

Following her marriage to Henry M. Kitner (alternate spelling: “Ketner”), Peter Petre’s oldest child, Flora (Petre) Kitner was reportedly divorced by Henry during or before early January 1916, and was a resident of Youngstown, Ohio. Ailing with stomach cancer in her final years, she developed a bowel obstruction which hastened her death. Following her passing on 24 October 1925, while still in her late fifties, she was interred at the same cemetery in Carlisle, Pennnsylvania where her mother had been buried eight years earlier (Letort Cemetery).

Following his marriage to Nora Biddle Green in Cumberland County on 20 December 1887, William Sheridan Petre subsequently resided with her in that county, where he found work at a shoe manufacturing company. Divorced from her on 9 May 1893, he was then remarried less than a month later to Lulah V. Metz (1867-1916) in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania on the Fourth of July in 1893. Together, he and his second wife then welcomed the births of: Frank Petre, who resided in Carlisle during the 1950s; John Petre, who resided in Akron, Ohio during the 1950s; E. Biddle Petre, who also resided in Carlisle during the 1950s; and Hazel M. Petre (1900-1967), who was born in 1900. (Hazel would later go on to marry Charles Albert Hays.)

Widowed by his second wife, Lulah, on 4 November 1916, William S. Petre was then married for a third time — to fellow shoemaker Mary A. Hays (1870-1938). Following their wedding in Carlisle on 28 April 1917, the couple continued to live and work in Carlisle until Mary (Hays) Petre died on 27 March 1938. Employed by the Lindner and Bedford shoe companies prior to his retirement, William Sheridan Petre survived his third wife by more than a decade, finally passing away in Carlisle at the age of eighty-five on 17 December 1951. He, too, was then laid to rest at the Letort Cemetery in Carlisle.

Following her marriage to Edward A. Dundorf in 1887, Elizabeth J. (Petre) Dundorf was widowed by him in 1922. She then wed John W. Toomey (1868-1957) and began to make a new life with him in Carlisle. During a shopping trip to a dry goods store in the city in late September 1905, she fell ill with lung congestion and was confined to her home to convalesce, but died there on 2 October from congestion of the brain and hemorrhages. Following funeral services, she was laid to rest at the Old Graveyard in Carlisle.

 

Sources:

1. Bates, Samuel P. History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-5, vol. 1. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B. Singerly, State Printer, 1869.
2. Civil War Muster Rolls (Company D, 47th Pennsylvania Infantry). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State Archives.
3. Civil War Veterans’ Card File, 1861-1866 (Company D, 47th Pennsylvania Infantry). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania State Archives.
4. “Margret Brubaker” (the widow of Peter Petre), in Death Certificates (file no.: 1450, registered no.: 35, date of death: 26 January 1917). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics.
5. Mrs. Elizabeth J. Toomey (obituary of a daughter of Peter Petre). Carlisle, Pennsylvania: The Sentinel, 3 October 1905.
6. “Mrs. Margaret Brubaker Dies Here Friday” (obituary of Peter Petre’s widow). Carlisle, Pennsylvania: Carlisle Evening Herald, 27 January 1917.
7. “Orders of Sale Awarded” (notice of the court-ordered sale of the property of Jeremiah Fair, the second husband of Peter Petre’s widow, Margaret A. (Fenicle Petre) Fair). Bloomfield, Pennsylvania: The Perry County Democrat, 26 April 1876.
8. “Our Losses During the Campaign” (casualty report for the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers which mentioned “Peter Petre,” in “The War in Louisiana,” in “Very Latest News.” Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: The Philadelphia Inquirer, 25 April 1864.
9. Petre, William, Sarah, Margaret, Lucetta, Nancy, Peter, Maria, and Ruth, in U.S. Census (Carroll Township, Perry County, Pennsylvania, 1850). Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
10. Petry, Wm., Sarah, Peter, Nancy, Maria, Ruth, and Jeremiah [sic, Jemina], in U.S. Census (Shermans Dale, Carroll Township, Perry County, Pennsylvania, 1860). Washington, D.C.: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
11. “Samuel Fair” (funeral notice of the fourth husband of Peter Petre’s widow, Margaret A. (Fenicle Petre Fair McClintock) Brubaker). Lancaster, Pennsylvania: The Lancaster Daily Intelligencer, 18 March 1914.
12. Schmidt, Lewis. A Civil War History of the 47th Regiment of Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers. Allentown, Pennsylvania: Self-published, 1986.
13. “Sudden Death” (obituary of “”Peter Petrie”). Bloomfield, Pennsylvania: The Perry County Democrat, 13 October 1869.
14. “The 47th in Action” (casualty report for the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers which mentioned “Peter Petre”). New Bloomfield, Pennsylvania: The Democrat, 5 May 1864.
15. William S. Petre (obituary of a son of Peter Petre). Carlisle, Pennsylvania: The Sentinel, 18 December 1951.