His is the face of youth—a bold young man whose body language evokes the cockiness of the Pennsylvanians who spent their first days and weeks of military service convinced they would easily whip any rebels they encountered during the opening months of the American Civil War, quickly ending the rebellion of the southern states that had seceded from the Union to bring a sense of stability and sanity back to the daily lives of their fellow Americans.

His stern gaze is the gaze of determination, fortified by the surety of youth that “real love and truth are stronger in the end than any evil or misfortune in the world,” as Charles Dickens wrote in David Copperfield.

His name was William Williamson and he was already a young adult when he was assigned to be a “drummer boy” for Company A of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry.

Formative Years

Born in Pennsylvania on 30 October 1840, William Williamson experienced hardship during his formative years. Researchers for 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story have made this educated guess, even though they have not uncovered much information about this 47th Pennsylvanian’s childhood, for two reasons. The first is that, by 1860, William Williamson was documented by a federal census enumerator as an unmarried laborer who lived at the Easton home of Northampton County physician John Sandt, M.D.—an indication that William’s parents may have either died or were struggling so much financially during the 1850s and early 1860s that they had encouraged their son to “leave the nest” to begin supporting himself—or had possibly even been forced by circumstances to hire their son out as an apprentice or indentured servant, which resulted in his subsequent residency with Dr. Sandt.

The second is that, later in life, William Williamson became a champion for an older woman who was struggling to convince officials of the federal government that she was worthy of U.S. Civil War Mother’s Pension after her son died while serving with the Union Army. William’s efforts to help his neighbor and the thoughts he expressed during that period of his life showed that he had a personal understanding of the unfairness of financial hardship and how crushing it could be to the human spirit.

What is also certain is that, like so many other young men from Northampton County, when President Abraham Lincoln issued his call for help to protect the nation’s capital from a likely invasion by Confederate States Army troops, he stepped forward, raised his hand, and stated the following:

I, William Williamson appointed a private in the Army of the United States, do solemnly swear, or affirm, that I will bear true allegiance to the United States of America, and that I will serve them honestly and faithfully against all their enemies or opposers whatsoever, and observe and obey the orders of the President of the United States, and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to the rules and articles for the government of the Armies of the United States.

Civil War

Before he spoke those words, however, William Williamson first had to enroll for military service. He did so at the age of twenty-one in Easton, Pennsylvania on 15 August 1861; he then officially mustered in for duty at Camp Curtin in Harrisburg, Dauphin County on 16 September 1861 as a private with Company A of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry.

Military records at the time described him as a twenty-one-year-old farmer residing in Stockertown, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, and noted that he was five feet, eight inches tall with light hair, blue eyes and a fair complexion.

* Note: Company A was officially formed on 15 September 1861 when Richard A. Graeffe processed the enrollments of ninety-three men that he had recruited from the Easton, Northampton County area. That enrollment took place at the Glanz saloon in Easton, which was operated by Charles Frederick William Glanz, an 1845 emigrant from Germany who became captain of the Northampton County militia unit known as the “Easton Jaegers” in the late 1850s and had then served as one of the commanding officers of the 9th Pennsylvania Volunteers during the opening months of the American Civil War. Graeffe, a fellow emigrant who had performed his own Three Months’ Service with the 9th Pennsylvania, was subsequently commissioned as captain and commanding officer of the 47th Pennsylvania’s Company A. His ninety-three men were all officially mustered in at Camp Curtin on 16 September 1861.

Following a brief training period in light infantry tactics at Camp Curtin, Private William Williamson and his fellow 47th Pennsylvanians hopped aboard a train at the Harrisburg depot on 20 September, and were transported by rail to Washington, D.C. Stationed roughly two miles from the White House, they began their next major phase of duty at “Camp Kalorama” by pitching their tents on the Kalorama Heights near Georgetown on 21 September.

The next day, Henry D. Wharton, a musician with the regiment’s C Company, penned the following update to his hometown newspaper, the Sunbury American:

After a tedious ride we have, at last, safely 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 sett [sic] of mortals as can possibly exist. On arriving at Washington we were marched to the ‘Soldiers Retreat,’ a building purposely 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 1861] 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 wrapt [sic] up were they in the horse, the rider wasn’t noticed, and the boys were considerably mortified this morning on dis-covering 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 to their new way of life, the members of the 47th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry became part of the U.S. Army when they were officially mustered into federal service on 24 September. (It was at that moment that Private William Williamson spoke the aforementioned oath of enlistment.)

On 27 September—a rainy day, the 47th Pennsylvania was assigned to the 3rd Brigade of Brigadier-General Isaac 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 fairly 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 September arrival through late January when their regiment would be shipped south.

Once again, Company C musician Henry Wharton recapped the regiment’s activities, noting, via his 29 September letter home to the Sunbury American, that the 47th had changed camps three times in three days:

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 this 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 very 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 the large chestnut tree located within their campsite’s boundaries. The site would eventually become known to the Keystone Staters 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 home, Captain John Peter Shindel Gobin (the leader of C Company who would be promoted in 1864 to lead the entire 47th Regiment) reported that companies D, A, C, F and I (the 47th Pennsylvania’s right wing) were ordered to picket duty after the 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, 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 letter of 17 November, Henry Wharton revealed still 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], 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]; 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….

On 21 November, the 47th participated in a morning divisional headquarters review overseen by the 47th Pennsylvania’s founder, Colonel Tilghman Good, followed by brigade and division drills all afternoon. According to historian Lewis 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 for the regiment’s impressive performance that day—and in preparation for the even bigger adventures and honors that were yet to come, Brigadier-General John Milton Brannan ordered his staff to ensure that brand new Springfield rifles were obtained and distributed to every member of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers.

1862

Next ordered to move from their Virginia encampment back to Maryland, Private William Williamson and his fellow 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 then transported by rail to Alexandria, Virginia, where they boarded the steamship City of Richmond and sailed to the Washington Arsenal. While there, they were re-equipped with weapons and ammunition before being marched off for dinner and rest at the Soldiers’ Retreat in Washington, D.C.

The next afternoon, they hopped aboard 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 (24-27 January 1862) loading their equipment and other supplies onto the steamship USS Oriental.

By the afternoon of Monday, 27 January, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers had commenced walking from the wharf to the Oriental for the final time. Ferried to the big steamship by smaller steamers, the enlisted men boarded first, followed by the officers. Then, per the directive of Brigadier-General Brannan, they steamed away for the Deep South at 4 p.m.—headed for Florida which, despite its secession from the United States, remained strategically important to the Union due to the presence of Forts Taylor and Jefferson in Key West and the Dry Tortugas.

Arriving in Key West in early February 1862, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers initially made camp on the beach, re-erecting their Sibley tents. Assigned to garrison Fort Taylor, they introduced their presence to Key West residents by parading through the streets of the city during the weekend of Friday, 14 February.

That Sunday, a number of soldiers from the regiment attended local church services, where they met and mingled with residents from the area as part of the first of many community outreach efforts to build support for the army’s efforts to preserve the nation’s Union. Drilling daily in heavy artillery tactics, they also strengthened the fortifications at this federal installation, felled trees and built new roads.

Sometime during this phase of service, a number of 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantrymen began suffering problems with chronic diarrhea. Diagnosed with typhoid fever, several members of the regiment were confined to the post hospital at the fort.

Next ordered to Hilton Head, South Carolina from mid-June through July, they camped near Fort Walker before relocating to the Beaufort District in the U.S. Army’s Department of the South, roughly thirty-five miles away. Frequently assigned to hazardous picket detail north of their main camp, Private William Williamson and other members of the 47th Pennsylvania were put at increased risk from enemy sniper fire when sent out on these special teams. According to historian Samuel P. Bates, during this phase of their service, the men of the 47th “received the highest commendation from Generals Hunter and Brannan” for their “attention to duty, discipline and soldierly bearing.”

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

During the second week of July, according to Schmidt, the regiment’s third-in-command—Major William H. Gausler—and F Company’s Captain Henry S. Harte returned home to Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley to resume the 47th Pennsylvania’s recruiting efforts. After arriving in Allentown on 15 July, they quickly re-established an efficient operation, which they would keep running through early November 1862. During this time, Major Gausler was able to persuade fifty-four new recruits to join the 47th Pennsylvania while Harte rounded up an additional twelve.

Meanwhile, the remainder of the regiment continued to soldier on. From 20-31 August 1862, companies of the 47th Pennsylvania resumed picket duty, including at “Barnwells” (so labeled by Company C Captain J. P. S. Gobin) while other companies from the regiment performed picket duty in the areas around Point Royal Ferry.

On 12 September, the 47th Pennsylvania’s founder and commanding officer Colonel Tilghman H. Good and his adjutant, First Lieutenant Washington H. R. Hangen, issued Regimental Order, No. 207 from the 47th Pennsylvania’s Headquarters in Beaufort, South Carolina:

I. The Colonel commanding desires to call the attention of all officers and men in the regiment to the paramount necessity of observing rules for the preservation of health. There is less to be apprehended from battle than disease. The records of all companies in climate like this show many more casualties by the neglect of sanitary post action then [sic] by the skill, ordnance and courage of the enemy. Anxious that the men in my command may be preserved in the full enjoyment of health to the service of the Union. And that only those who can leave behind the proud epitaph of having fallen on the field of battle in the defense of their country shall fail to return to their families and relations at the termination of this war.

II. All the tents will be struck at 7:30 a.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday of each week. The signal for this purpose will be given by the drum major by giving three taps on the drum. Every article of clothing and bedding will be taken out and aired; the flooring and bunks will be thoroughly cleaned. By the same signal at 11 a.m. the tents will be re-erected. On the days the tents are not struck the sides will be raised during the day for the purpose of ventilation.

III. The proper cooking of provisions is a matter of great importance more especially in this climate but have not yet received from a majority of officers of the regiment that attention that should be paid to it.

IV. Thereafter an officer of each company will be detailed by the commander of each company and have their names reported to these headquarters to superintend the cooking of provisions taking care that all food prepared for the soldiers is sufficiently cooked and that the meats are all boiled or seared (not fried). He will also have charge of the dress table and he is held responsible for the cleanliness of the kitchen cooking utensils and the preparation of the meals at the time appointed.

V. The following rules for the taking of meals and regulations in regard to the conducting of the company will be strictly followed. Every soldier will turn his plate, cup, knife and fork into the Quarter Master Sgt who will designate a permanent place or spot for each member of the company and there leave his plate & cup, knife and fork placed at each meal with the soldier’s rations on it. Nor will any soldier be permitted to go to the company kitchen and take away food therefrom.

VI. Until further orders the following times for taking meals will be followed Breakfast at six, dinner at twelve, supper at six. The drum major will beat a designated call fifteen minutes before the specified time which will be the signal to prepare the tables, and at the time specified for the taking of meals he will beat the dinner call. The soldier will be permitted to take his spot at the table before the last call.

VII. Commanders of companies will see that this order is entered in their company order book and that it is read forth with each day on the company parade. All commanding officers of companies will regulate daily their time by the time of this headquarters. They will send their 1st Sergeants to this headquarters daily at 8 a.m. for this purpose.

Great punctuality is enjoined in conforming to the stated hours prescribed by the roll calls, parades, drills, and taking of meals; review of army regulations while attending all roll calls to be suspended by a commissioned officer of the companies, and a Captain to report the alternate to the Colonel or the commanding officer.

At 5 a.m., Commanders of companies are imperatively instructed to have the company quarters washed and policed and secured immediately after breakfast.

At 6 a.m., morning reports of companies request [sic] by the Captains and 1st Sgts and all applications for special privileges of soldiers must be handed to the Adjutant before 8 a.m.

By Command of Col. T. H. Good
W. H. R. Hangen Adj

In addition, First Lieutenant and Regimental Adjutant Hangen clarified the regiment’s schedule as follows:

• Reveille (5:30 a.m.) and Breakfast (6:00 a.m.)
• First and Second Calls for Guard (6:10 a.m. and 6:15 a.m.)
• Surgeon’s Call (6:30 a.m.)
• First and Second Calls for Company Drill (6:45 a.m. and 7:00 a.m.)
• Recall from Company Drill (8:00 a.m.)
• First and Second Calls for Squad Drill (9:00 a.m. and 9:15 a.m.)
• Recall from Squad Drill (10:30 a.m.) and Dinner (12:00 noon)
• Call for Non-commissioned Officers (1:30 p.m.)
• Recall for Non-commissioned Officers (2:30 p.m.)
• First and Second Calls for Squad Drills (3:15 p.m. and 3:30 p.m.)
• Recall from Squad Drill (4:30 p.m.)
• First and Second Calls for Dress Parade (5:10 p.m. and 5:15 p.m.)
• Supper (6:10 p.m.)
• Tattoo (9:00 p.m.) and Taps (9:15 p.m.)

As the one-year anniversary of the 47th Pennsylvania’s departure from the Great Keystone State dawned on 20 September, thoughts turned to home and Divine Providence as Colonel Tilghman Good issued Special Order, No. 60 from the 47th’s Regimental Headquarters in Beaufort, South Carolina:

The Colonel commanding takes great pleasure in complimenting the officers and men of the regiment on the favorable auspices of today.

Just one year ago today, the organization of the regiment was completed to enter into the service of our beloved country, to uphold the same flag under which our forefathers fought, bled, and died, and perpetuate the same free institutions which they handed down to us unimpaired.

It is becoming therefore for us to rejoice on this first anniversary of our regimental history and to show forth devout gratitude to God for this special guardianship over us.

Whilst many other regiments who swelled the ranks of the Union Army even at a later date than the 47th have since been greatly reduced by sickness or almost cut to pieces on the field of battle, we as yet have an entire regiment and have lost but comparatively few out of our ranks.

Certain it is we have never evaded or shrunk from duty or danger, on the contrary, we have been ever anxious and ready to occupy any fort, or assume any position assigned to us in the great battle for the constitution and the Union.

We have braved the danger of land and sea, climate and disease, for our glorious cause, and it is with no ordinary degree of pleasure that the Colonel compliments the officers of the regiment for the faithfulness at their respective posts of duty and their uniform and gentlemanly manner towards one another.

Whilst in numerous other regiments there has been more or less jammings and quarrelling [sic] among the officers who thus have brought reproach upon themselves and their regiments, we have had none of this, and everything has moved along smoothly and harmoniously. We also compliment the men in the ranks for their soldierly bearing, efficiency in drill, and tidy and cleanly appearance, and if at any time it has seemed to be harsh and rigid in discipline, let the men ponder for a moment and they will see for themselves that it has been for their own good.

To the enforcement of law and order and discipline it is due our far fame as a regiment and the reputation we have won throughout the land.

With you he has shared the same trials and encountered the same dangers. We have mutually suffered from the same cold in Virginia and burned by the same southern sun in Florida and South Carolina, and he assures the officers and men of the regiment that as long as the present war continues, and the service of the regiment is required, so long he stands by them through storm and sunshine, sharing the same danger and awaiting the same glory.

Saint John’s Bluff and the Capture of a Confederate Steamer

During a return expedition to Florida beginning 30 September, the 47th 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 area. Trekking and skirmishing through roughly twenty-five miles of dense swampland and forests after disembarking from ships at Mayport Mills on 1 October, the 47th captured artillery and ammunition stores (on 3 October) that had been abandoned by Confederate forces during the bluff’s bombardment by Union gunboats.

The capture of Saint John’s Bluff followed a string of U.S. Army and Navy successes which enabled the Union to gain control over key southern towns and transportation hubs. In November 1861, the Union’s South Atlantic Blockading Squadron had established a base at Port Royal, South Carolina to facilitate Union expeditions in Georgia and Florida, during which U.S. troops took possession of Fort Clinch and Fernandina, Florida (3-4 March 1862), secured the surrender of Fort Marion and Saint Augustine (11 March) and established a Union Navy base at Mayport Mills (mid-March).

That summer, Brigadier-General Joseph Finnegan, commanding officer of the Confederate States of America’s Department of Middle and Eastern Florida, ordered the placement of earthworks-fortified gun batteries atop Saint John’s Bluff and at nearby Yellow Bluff, hoping to disable the Union’s naval and ground force operations at Mayport Mills by deploying eighteen cannon, including three eight-inch siege howitzers and four eight-inch smoothbores and Columbiads (two of each).

After the U.S. gunboats Uncas and Patroon exchanged shell fire with the Confederate battery at Saint John’s Bluff on 11 September, Rebel troops were initially driven away, but then returned to the bluff. When a second, larger Union gunboat flotilla tried and failed to shake the Confederates loose six days later, Union military leaders ordered an army operation with naval support.

Backed by U.S. gunboats Cimarron, E. B. Hale, Paul Jones, Uncas, and Water Witch that were armed with twelve-pound boat howitzers, the fifteen-hundred-strong Union Army force of Brigadier-General Brannan moved up the Saint John’s River and further inland along the Pablo and Mt. Pleasant Creeks on 1 October 1862 before disembarking and marching for Saint John’s Bluff. But when the 47th Pennsylvanians reached Saint John’s Bluff with their fellow Union brigade members on 3 October 1862, they found the battery abandoned. (Other Union troops later discovered that the Yellow Bluff battery was also Rebel free.) According to Henry Wharton, “On the day following our occupation of these works the guns were dismounted and removed on board the steamer Neptune, together with the shot and shell, and removed to Hilton Head. The powder was all used in destroying the batteries.”

Meanwhile that same weekend (Friday and Saturday, 3-4 October 1862), Brigadier-General Brannan, who was quartered on board the Ben Deford as the Union expedition’s commanding officer, was busy penning reports to his superiors while also planning the next move of his expeditionary force. That Saturday, Brannan ordered several officers to direct their men to prepare rations and ammunition for a new foray that would take them roughly twenty miles upriver to Jacksonville. (A sophisticated hub of cultural and commercial activities with a racially diverse population of more than two thousand residents, the city had repeatedly changed hands between the Union and Confederacy until its occupation by Union forces on 12 March 1862.) Among the Union soldiers selected for this mission were 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers from Company C, Company E and Company K.

According to Schmidt, the small force steamed upriver roughly one to two hundred miles “to Lake Beresford, where they then assisted in capturing the [68-ton] steamer Governor Milton,” which had been renamed in honor of Florida’s governor after having been “formerly known as the George M. Bird [under its previous owners] a New England family named ‘Swift’, who were timber cutters and used it as a tug boat to tow rafts loaded with live oak to the lumber market.”

In a subsequent report to his superiors, Brigadier-General Brannan noted that the Union party “returned on the morning of the 9th with a Rebel steamer, Governor Milton, which they captured in a creek about 230 miles up the river and about 27 miles north [and slightly west] from the town of Enterprise. Lt. Bacon, my aide-de-camp, accompanied the expedition… On the return of the successful expedition after the Rebel steamers… I proceeded with that portion of my command to St. John’s Bluff, awaiting the return of the Boston.”

This return trip did not happen without complications, however; in a letter penned to The New York Times on October 14, Wharton explained that:

Finding that the Cosmopolitan, which had been sent to Hilton Head for provisions, had struck heavily in crossing the bar, on her return to the St. John’s River, and was temporarily disabled for service, the Seventh Connecticut Regiment was sent to Hilton Head on the Boston, with the request that she should return for the remainder of the troops, and she got back on the 11th, when the command was reembarked, reaching this plane yesterday, excepting one company of the Forty-seventh Pennsylvania, which is left for the protection of the Cosmopolitan. The accident to this valuable steamer is severe. A large hole was made in her bottom and she filled, but she will not be a wreck, as was at first feared.

Integration of the Regiment

On 5 and 15 October 1862, respectively, the 47th Pennsylvania made history as it became an integrated regiment, adding to its muster rolls several Black men who had escaped chattel enslavement from plantations near Beaufort, South Carolina. Among the formerly enslaved men who enlisted at this time were 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 T. H. Good and Lieutenant-Colonel George W. Alexander, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers next engaged the heavily protected Confederate forces in and around Pocotaligo, South Carolina—including at Frampton’s Plantation and the Pocotaligo Bridge—a key piece of southern railroad infrastructure that Union leaders had ordered to be destroyed in order to disrupt the flow of Confederate troops and supplies in the region.

Harried by snipers en route to the Pocotaligo Bridge, they met resistance from an entrenched, heavily fortified Confederate battery which 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. The Union soldiers grappled with Confederates where they found them, pursuing the Rebels for four miles as they retreated to the bridge. There, the 47th relieved the 7th Connecticut. But the enemy was just too well armed. After two hours of intense fighting in an attempt to take the ravine and bridge, depleted ammunition forced the 47th to withdraw to Mackay’s Point.

The next day—23 October 1862—the regiment returned to Hilton Head, South Carolina, where a significant number of men were admitted to the Union Army’s general hospital for treatment of the wounds they had sustained in combat. That same day, the thoughts of Private William Williamson’s comrade and friend—Corporal William Schweitzer—turned to home as he pondered what to tell his parents about how he and his brother were faring:

Beaufort S.C. 23rd Oct. 1862
Dear Parents,

I now take the pleasure of writing a few lines to you to let you know that we are both well at Pressent [sic, present] and we both hope that those few lines may find you all in the same state of health, and further I let you know that we got paid of [sic, off] a few days ago and I expressed 30 dollars of my money. I Addressed it in care of Jacob Kreidler. There you can get it just tell Kreidler to receive it for you in Easton at the Express office.

Mother Edwin won’t sent [sic, send] any money home yet for this time. I don’t know whats [sic, what’s] his notion. Well mother I would have sent some more but we had to pay some for clothes that we got over our Allowance. Well mother I thought it was the best way to sent [sic, send] my money right of [sic, off] because we are going on an advance and we will stay 10 days maby [sic, maybe] longer. I expect we will see some heavy Fighting before we get through. Well the weather is very fine at Pressent [sic, present] and it is nice and warm yet. I suppose you will have snow before Long. I wish I could be at home for a couple of weeks to eat Apples and drink cider but here we have to stay without any such a thing but I hope till [sic, ‘til] next year by this time we will have some of our Apples and cider at home maby [sic, maybe] we will get some of this years crop yet but I have poor hopes about that. Well the boys are all well at Pressent [sic, present] and they all would like to have some of the good apples and cider but they have to do without it the same as I have.

Mother the box with tobacco which you have sent us we have received safe and we were very glad for it. Well I will now bring my letter to a close for this time hoping to have an answer soon again. I give my best respects to you all and to all Inquiring Friends.

Lewis Werkheiser sents [sic, sends] a letter inside of this one please and hand it to his Parents as soon as you receive this letter. So no more.

From your true sons
Wm. and Edwin Schweitzer

Direct to Beaufort as before and don’t forget to write.

* Note: According to A Company Drummer Boy William Williamson, this letter was actually penned by Company A Private Lewis Werkheiser, and had been written on William Schweitzer’s behalf because he was unable to write the letter himself.

Having been ordered back to Key West on 15 November 1862, the 47th Pennsylvanians did not know it, yet, but much of 1863 for them would be spent garrisoning federal installations in Florida as part of the 10th Corps, U.S. Army, Department of the South. Companies A, B, C, E, G, and I would once again garrison Fort Taylor in Key West, but this time, the men from 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 later 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, 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 a dangerous ground, and the reefs are no playthings. We were 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 sailor’s 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 river boat, 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]. 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, Private William Williamson and his fellow 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 A. Graeffe and stationed at newer facilities known as the “Lighthouse Barracks” on “Lighthouse Key.”

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

We landed here on last Thursday at noon, and immediately marched to quarters. Company I. and C., in Fort Taylor, 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 relieves 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 ends 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

From March through May of 1863, Private William Williamson and his A Company comrades continued to serve at Fort Taylor, along with members of Companies B, C, E, G, and I. Once again, men from the 47th were assigned to fell trees, build roads and continue strengthening the facility’s fortifications. In addition, they were also sent out on skirmishes and received training in operating the light and heavy artillery defenses of the fort.

On 22 May 1863, the thoughts of Private William Williamson’s friend—Corporal William Schweitzer—again turned to home. A dutiful son, he had enacted a plan to try to make his parents’ lives a bit easier, and wanted to tell them his thoughts about how he might be able to help. Asking their A Company comrade and friend, Private Lewis Werkheiser, for assistance in putting his thoughts to paper once again, Corporal Schweitzer knew full well that the audience for his letter would include not only his own family but the mothers, fathers and siblings of other soldiers from their hometown and county:

Key West May 22th 1868 [sic, May 22, 1863]
Dear Father and Mother

I now take the pleasure of writing a few lines to you to let you know that I and Edwin are both in a good state of health and we both hope that those few lines will reach you all in the same blessings. Further I let you know that we got paid off on the 19th of this month and we got our 8 month wages that is [illegible amount] on each man. Now mother me and Edwin are agoing to sent [sic, send] $101.00. I sent sixty and Edwin he sents [sic, sent] 50. We would sent [sic, send] more but we don’t know when we will have pay day again. Now the way we sent the money you can see Express and then it goes to Easton Express Mr. Frederick Seitz. There you can receive the money as soon as you receive this letter for I sent this letter and the money both at once. Well mother the weather is very warm and it is getting warmer every day. If we only don’t get no sickness here this summer for it will cost a good many lifes [sic, lives] if we do. Well the news is not is not much to day [sic, today] and so I will soon come to a close. Mother I want you to answer this as soon as it comes to hand and let me know wether [sic, whether] you received our money or not and give me all the news from Plainfield. Well, this is all for the Pressent [sic, present]. So we hereby give our best love and wishes to all of you. Hoping to hear from you soon.

Your true sons
Wm. and Edwin Schweitzer

You can receive the money from Mr. Seitz in Easton.
Amandus Sandt Sends his best respects to you.

Direct to Key West as you did before.

Uriah Belles and Tilman [sic, Tilghman] Keim and Lewis Werkheiser and all of the Belfast boys are all well and they all sent [sic, send] their best respect to you and to all of the Belfast folks.

Mother, this money is directed to you but for all you can tell some good man to receive it for you if you wish.

Although they chose not to go into detail about their living conditions, Corporal Schweitzer and Private Werkheiser did provide an important clue about one of their biggest worries when they wrote, “If we only don’t get no sickness here this summer,” and “for it will cost a good many lifes if we do.” This was because they had already witnessed a number of their friends and comrades fall ill and die—largely due to the lack of clean water for drinking and bathing—a situation that contributed to frequent outbreaks of chronic diarrhea and dysentery, and they wanted to prepare friends and family, in as calm a way as they could, for the possibilty of bad news in the future because their lives were at risk even when they weren’t engaged in combat.

Life for the men then went on, the hours taken up by training, drilling and inspections that were scheduled regularly to keep them in a perpetual state of readiness for anything that the Confederate Army or Navy could throw at them.

When Corporal William Schweitzer finally had the time to pull together his thoughts for another letter to his mother—this time in September 1863—he turned, once again to his friend, Private Lewis Werkheiser, for help in telling his parents what was on his mind. And, once again, his words illustrated just how worried he was about his family’s money problems—words that would prove to also be important for Private William Williamson later in his own life’s journey.

Key West, Fla. Sept. 21st 1863
Dear Mother,

I now take the pleasure to inform you a few lines to let you know that I am well at Present and so is Brother Edwin and all the rest of the boys by your acquaintance and we all hope when these few lines comes you to hand [sic, comes to your hand] that they will find you and all the rest in the same good State of health and blessings. Father I let you know Mother that we got paid off on the 15th of this Pressent [sic, present] month. Mother I have sent $25.00 off with the Pay Master and now when you receive this letter then you can go to Easton to Frederic [sic, Frederick] Seitz and receive the Money there the same as you did the other time.

About Edwins Money I don’t know. I don’t think that he will sent [sic, send] any this time. Please and tell Mrs. Werkheiser that Lewis is well and Tilman Keim [sic, Tilghman] the same and tell her that Lewis haint [sic, “ain’t”] agoing to sent [sic, send] any Money home this pay day so this is all. My best respects to you Mother and to Father and Brother and Sister. Hoping to have an answer soon so no more.

From your sons Wm. and Edwin Schweitzer in the Army

Direct to Key West the same so good Nocht [German/Pennsylvania Dutch for “Good Night”)

As this phase of garrison duty continued, another important element of the 47th Pennsylvania’s storied service began to emerge—the fact that, despite all of the hardships endured by the members of this regiment, more than half of its members chose to re-enlist when their respective, original terms of service expired. Among those making the decision to re-up was Private William Williamson, who was honorably discharged at Fort Taylor on 8 October 1863, per General Orders, No. 191, in order to re-enlist with his regiment. He was then officially re-mustered the next day as a private and promoted to the rank of musician, a day on which he officially became the “drummer boy” for his company—Company A of the 47th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry.

A week later, the thoughts of his friend, Corporal William Schweitzer, returned again to home, as he pondered what to tell his parents in yet another letter that was being written to them on his behalf by A Company Private Lewis Werkheiser:

Key West, Fla. 15 Oct. 1863
Dear Parents,

It is with greatest pleasure that I sit down to drop a few lines to let you no [sic, know] that I and Brother Edwin are well at present hoping that these few lines will find you in the same state of good health. And further I let you no [sic, know] that we had quiet [sic, quite] an excitement in Key West about enlisting to the [Wedren Chore?]. I have not much of a notion to reenlist again nor neither has Brother Edwin. Their [sic, there] was but fifteen enlisted from our Company And But two from our place. And that was Lewis Werkheiser and William Williamson. They had quiet [sic, quite] a time before they Left. Their [sic, there] was some of them that was pretty well steamed.

Eight or ten of them was left back. They [didn’t] git on board of the boat in time. They have to wait until something else leaves here for New York or Philadelphia.

And Father I let you no [sic, know] that I sent twenty five dollars to the same place that the other money was what I sent before please. And let me no [sic, know] weather [sic, whether] you received the money or not. The money was directed to mother.

And Father I let you no [sic, know] I sent a box to Howard’s Express. There is three shell boxes in one for Emma And one for mother and one for Catharine. You can do anything with the rest of the things but that their [sic, there] sailor shirt what I sent I want you to keep it till [sic, ‘til] I come home. And Father I would like to have a pair of calf skin shoes and two good woolen shirts but no white ones please and sent [sic, send] them with Lewis Werkheiser or with William Williamson the number of the shoes is number seven.

And Father I let you no [sic, know] that I don’t want Peter to come along with Lewis Werkheiser. I don’t want him to enlist. He can wait till [sic, ‘til] I come home and then if I go he can go along with me. I and Tilghman Keim are together on provose [sic, provost] guard. I just got on provost guard before they left fore [sic, for] home and Tilgh. he is on almost 6 month now.

I must now come to a close. Uriah Belles, Stephen Moyer, Tilghman Keim, Reuben Rader, and all the rest of the Belfast Boys are well and sent [sic, send] their best respects. The box I sent was directed to mother so no more at present.

From your affectionate son
William Schweitzer

P.S. Write as soon as this comes to house. Excuse poor writing.

Field Musician William Williamson had been allowed to return home for a thirty-day furlough, sometime in the latter part of 1863, thanks to a series of directives that had been issued by the Adjutant General’s Office of the U.S. War Department, beginning in June 1863. These directives offered new incentives to existing soldiers who chose to re-enlist upon expiration of their initial three-year terms of service. One of those incentives, according to General Orders, No. 191, was the offer of thirty-day furloughs, which were to “be granted to men who may enlist in accordance with the provisions of this order.”

Following the completion of his thirty-day furlough Field Musician William Williamson returned to duty with his regiment, which was still stationed at Fort Taylor. His job, as a drummer for Company A, required him to master a number of drum cadences that would be used to convey the directions of his company’s commanding officers to the company’s members. According to Civil War historian Michael Aubrecht:

Each drummer was required to play variations of the 26 rudiments. The rudiment that meant attack was a long roll. The rudiment for assembly was a series of flams while the rudiments for drummers call were a mixture of flams and rolls. The rudiment for simple cadence was open beating with a flam repeat. Additional requirements included the double stroke roll, paradiddles, flamadiddles, flam accents, flamacues, ruffs, single and double drags, ratamacues, and sextuplets….

Military drums were usually about 18” deep prior to the Civil War. Then they were shortened to 12”-14” deep and 16” in diameter in order to accommodate younger (and shorter) drummers. Ropes were joined all around the drum and were manually tightened to create tension that stiffened the drum head, making it playable. The drums were hung low from leather straps, necessitating the use of the traditional grip. Regulation drumsticks were usually made from rosewood and were 16”-17” in length. Ornamental paintings were very common for Civil War drums which often displayed pictures of Union eagles and Confederate shields.

…. The shells were usually made of ash, maple or similar pliable woods. Wooden hoops were used to reinforce the drum which was “tuned” by adjusting ropes that crisscrossed around the shell and provided tension on calfskin or sheepskin heads. The four strand snare was constructed from a bronze hoop-mounted strainer with a leather anchor. 

1864

In early January 1864, Company A underwent a significant transformation, following orders that the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry help to expand the Union’s reach across Florida. In response, Captain Graeffe selected a group of soldiers for a special duty assignment that required those A Company men to march north to Fort Myers and revitalize a federal installation that had been abandoned in 1858 after the U.S. government’s third war with the Seminole Indians.

Ordered to be reclaimed by General Daniel P. Woodbury, the commanding officer of the U.S. Army’s Department of the Gulf, District of Key West and the Tortugas, the fort would subsequently be used, under Captain Graeffe’s leadership, to support the Union’s Gulf Coast blockade and create a safe haven for pro-Union supporters, Confederate Army deserters and children and adults who were escaping chattel slavery. Captain Graeffe and his men were also charged with launching raids on cattle herds in the region around the fort in order to provide food for the growing Union troop presence across Florida. According to Schmidt:

Capt. Richard A. Graeffe, accompanied by Assistant Surgeon William F. Reiber, commanded the main portion of Company A which boarded ship on Monday, January 4 and sailed the following day, Tuesday, for Fort Myers, on the Caloosahatchee River fifteen air miles southeast of Charlotte Harbor. The company was transported on board the Army quartermaster schooner Matchless, after having embarked the day before, and was accompanied by the steamer U.S.S. Honduras commanded by Lt. Harris, and with Gen. Woodbury aboard. Lt. Harris was directed to tow the Matchless if necessary.

Punta Rassa was probably the location where the troops disembarked, and was located on the tip of the southwest delta of the Caloosahatchee River … near what is now the mainland or eastern end of the Sanibel Causeway… Fort Myers was established further up the Caloosahatchee at a location less vulnerable to storms and hurricanes. In 1864, the Army built a long wharf and a barracks 100 feet long and 50 feet wide at Punta Rassa, and used it as an embarkation point for shipping north as many as 4400 Florida cattle….

Capt. Graeffe and company were disembarked on the evening of January 7, and Gen. Woodbury ordered the company to occupy Fort Myers on the south side of the Caloosahatchee, about 12 miles from its mouth and 150 miles from Key West. Shortly after, [a detachment of men from the 47th Pennsylvania’s A Company stationed on Useppa Island] was also ordered to proceed to Fort Myers and join the main body of Company A, the entire command under direct orders of the General who was in the area…. Gen. Woodbury returned to Key West on the Honduras prior to January 19, and the command was left in charge of Capt. Graeffe who dispatched various patrols in search of refugees for enlistment and for activities involving Confederate cattle shipments.

Company A’s muster roll provides the following account of the expedition under command of Capt. Graeffe: ‘The company left Key West Fla Jany 4. 64 enroute to Fort Meyers Coloosahatche River [sic] Fla. were joined by a detachment of the U.S. 2nd Fla Rangers at Punta Rossa Fla took possession of Fort Myers Jan 10. Captured a Rebel Indian Agent and two other men.’

Schmidt also noted that Graeffe’s hand drawings included depictions of roughly twelve buildings “primarily situated along the river, with a log palisade protecting those portions not bounded by the Caloosahatchee; the whole in a densely wooded area and entered through an opening on the southeast protected by the river on the west near the area of the wharf, and a log blockhouse on the east.”

An 1856 survey of the fort contained in the Federal Register “suggest[ed] that the fort’s wooden stockade ran from just east of Broadway to just east of Royal Palm, and from Main Street on the south to the river bank, which meandered along what is Bay Street today,” according to Tom Hall, creator of a website about the arts in Southwest Florida:

It consisted of as many as three dozen hewn pine buildings which included officers’ quarters … barracks, administration offices, a 2½-story hospital with plastered rooms, warehouses for the storage of munitions and general supplies, a guard house … blacksmith’s and carpenter’s shops, a kitchen, bakery, laundry, a sutler’s store, stables for horses and mules, a gardener’s shack, and even a bowling alley and bathing pier and pavilion.

It also boasted a pier nearly 700 feet long that had wide dock and rails that enabled the soldiers to bring in supplies by tram without having to lighter them ashore. The buildings were sided and topped by cedar shingles shipped in from Pensacola and Apalachicola, together with doors, windows and flooring. The interior featured parade grounds, a carefully-tended velvety lawn, two immense vegetable gardens, rock-rimmed river banks, shell walks, lush palms and even citrus trees.

Also according to Hall:

By the time Captain Richard A. Graeffe and his soldiers arrived at the fort, most of the wood stockade had disappeared, so he ordered his men to construct an earthen wall 15 feet wide by 7 feet tall. Three guard towers were also constructed: one where the hospital had been; a second by the garden and bowling alley; and the third between the stables and riverside warehouse. Then Captain Graeffe sent his troops across the river to begin rounding up the herds of scrub cows being raised by ranchers between Punta Gorda and Tampa. As they did, resistance began to grow. Captain Graeffe realized he needed reinforcements and Companies D and I of the [U.S. Colored Troop’s] 2nd Regiment were brought up from Fort Zachary Taylor in Key West.

A draft Environmental Impact Statement prepared in 2010 for the Everglades National Park partially documents the time of Richard Graeffe and the men under his Florida command this way:

A small contingent of 20 men and two officers from the Pennsylvania 47th Regiment, led by Captain Henry Crain of the 2nd Regiment of Florida, arrived at the fort on January 7, 1864. A short time later, the party was joined by another small detachment of the 47th under the command of Captain Richard A. Graeffe. Over a short period, increasing reinforcements of the fort led to increasing cattle raids throughout the region. A Union force so far into Confederate land did not go well with Confederate loyalists. The fact that so many men stationed at the post were black soldiers from the newly created U.S. Colored Troops was particularly aggravating. The raids were so antagonizing that the Confederates created a Cattle Guard Battalion called the “Cow Cavalry” to repulse Union raiders. The unit remained a primary threat to the Union soldiers carrying out raids and reconnaissance missions from Brooksville to as far south as Lake Okeechobee and Fort Myers.

Early on, according to Schmidt, Captain Graeffe sent the following report to Woodbury:

‘At my arrival hier [sic] I divided my forces in three detachment, viz one at the Hospital one into the old guardhouse and one into the Comissary [sic] building, the Florida Rangers I quartered into one of the old Company quarters, I set all parties to work after placing the proper pickets and guards at the Hospital i have build [sic] and now nearly finished a two story loghouse of hewn and square logs 12 inches through seventeen by twenty-two fifteen feet high with a cupola onto the roof of six feet high and at right angle with two lines of picket fences seven feet high. i shall throw up a half a bastion around it as soon as completed. around the old guardhouse i have thrown up a bastion seven feet through at the foot and three feet on the top nine feet high from the bottom of the ditch and five on the inside. I also build [sic] a loghouse sixteen by eighteen of two storys [sic] Southeast of the Commissary building with a bastion around it at right angles with a picket fence each bastion has the distance you recomandet [sic] from the loghouses 20 feet on the sides and 20 to the salient angle, i caused to be dug a well close to bl. houses and inside of the bastions at each Station inside they are all comfortable fitted up with stationary bunks for the men without interfering with the defence [sic] of the work outside of the Bastions and inside the picket fense i have erected small kitchens and messrooms for each station, i am building now a guardhouse build [sic] of square hewn logs sixteen by sixteen two storys high the lower room to be used for the guard and the upper one as a prison, the building to be used for defence [sic] (in case of attack) by the Rangers each work is within view and supporting distance from the other; Capt. Crane with a detachment of his men repaired the wharf, which is in good condition now and fit for use, the bakehouse i got repaired, and the fourth day hier [sic] we had already very good fresh bread; the parade ground is in a good condition had all the weeds mowed off being to [sic] green to burn. i intend to fit up a schoolroom and church as soon as possible.’

Muster rolls for Company A from this period noted that “a detachment of 25 men crossed over to the north west side of the river” on 16 January and “scoured the country till up to Fort Thompson a distance of 50 miles,” where they “encountered a Rebel Picket who retreated after exchanging shots.” Making their way back, they swam across the river, and reached the fort on 23 January. Meanwhile, while that group was still away, Captain Graeffe ordered a smaller detachment of eight men to head out on 17 January in search of cattle. Finding only a few, they instead took possession of four barrels of Confederate turpentine, which were later disposed of by other Union troops.

Graeffe’s men also captured three Confederate sympathizers at the fort, including a blockade runner and spy named Griffin and an Indian interpreter and agent named Lewis. Charged with multiple offenses against the United States, they were transported to Key West, where they were kept under guard by Major William Gausler, the officer who was third-in-command of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry who was serving as the provost marshal of Key West at that time.

This phase of duty lasted until sometime in February of 1864.

* Note: Researchers for 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers: One Civil War Regiment’s Story have not determined whether or not Field Musician William Williamson was among the A Company soldiers selected by Captain Richard Graeffe for the Fort Myers assignment or not, but theorize that he may very well have been part of Graeffe’s group because of his status as a “drummer boy”—a position that involved his performance of various drum cadences to announce orders to troops that were being directed in battle and in non-combat situations during the standard daily operations of an occupying Union Army unit. If Field Musician William Williamson was not chosen by Graeffe for this mission, he most likely remained behind at Fort Taylor, where he continued to perform his duties as a drummer in relation to his regiment’s normal garrison duties. Graeffe’s detachment at Fort Myers ultimately became known as the “Florida Rangers,” according to The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, prepared by Lieutenant Colonel Robert N. Scott, et. al. (1891). Graeffe’s hand-drawn sketches of Fort Myers were later published in Images of America: Fort Myers by Gregg Tuner and Stan Mulford.

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—on 25 February 1864, the men from Companies B, C, D, I, and K of the 47th Pennsylvania headed for Algiers, Louisiana (across the river from New Orleans), followed on 1 March by other members of the regiment from Companies E, F, G, and H who had been stationed at Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas.

Upon the second group’s arrival, the now almost-fully-reunited regiment moved by train on 28 February to Brashear City (now Morgan City, Louisiana) before heading to Franklin by steamer through the Bayou Teche. There, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer 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 men from Company A were effectively placed on a different type of detached duty in New Orleans while they awaited transport to enable them to catch up with the main part of their regiment. Charged with guarding and overseeing the transport of two hundred and forty-five Confederate prisoners, they were finally able to board the Ohio Belle on 7 April, and reached Alexandria, Louisiana with those prisoners on 9 April.

But they had missed the two bloodiest combat engagements that their regiment would endure during the Red River Campaign—the Battle of Sabine Cross Roads/Mansfield on 8 April and the Battle of Pleasant Hill on 9 April. According to Schmidt, they were so far away from the scene of those battles because they had been ordered to return the Confederate prisoners to New Orleans—a directive that extended their detached duty and kept them from rejoining the main regiment until they reached Alexandria, Louisiana on 27 April.

This means that the men from Company A also missed a third combat engagement—the Battle of Cane River (also known as “the Affair at Monett’s Ferry”), which took place on 23 April. They were able to participate in their regiment’s next major engagement, however. From late April through mid-May, they helped erect Bailey’s Dam on the Red River near Alexandria. In a letter penned from Morganza, Louisiana on 29 May, Henry Wharton described their mission and the weeks that followed:

We were at Alexandria seventeen days, during which time the men were kept busy at throwing up earthworks, foraging and three times went out some distance to meet the enemy, but they did not make their appearance in numbers large enough for an engagement. The water in the Red river had fallen so much that it prevented the gunboats from operating with us, and kept our transports from supplying the troops with rations, (and you know soldiers, like other people, will eat) so Banks was compelled to relinquish his designs on Shreveport and fall back to the Mississippi. To do this a large dam had to be built on the falls at Alexandria to get the ironclads down the river. After a great deal labor this was accomplished and by the morning of May 13th the last one was through the shute [sic], when we bade adieu to Alexandria, marching through the town with banners flying and keeping step to the music of ‘Rally around the flag,’ and ‘When this cruel war is over.’ The next morning, at our camping place, the fleet of boats passed us, when we were informed that Alexandria had been destroyed by fire – the act of a dissatisfied citizen and several negroes. Incendiary acts were strictly forbidden in a general order the day before we left the place, and a cavalry guard was left in the rear to see the order enforced. After marching a few miles skirmishing commenced in front between the cavalry and the enemy in riflepits [sic] on the bank of the river, but they were easily driven away. When we came up we discovered their pits and places where there had been batteries planted. At this point the John Warren, an unarmed transport, on which were sick soldiers and women, was fired into and sunk, killing many and those that were not drowned taken prisoners. A tin-clad gunboat was destroyed at the same place, by which we lost a large mail. Many letters and directed envelopes were found on the bank – thrown there after the contents had been read by the unprincipled scoundrels. The inhumanity of Guerrilla bands in this department is beyond belief, and if one did not know the truth of it or saw some of their barbarities, he would write it down as the story of a ‘reliable gentleman’ or as told by an ‘intelligent contraband.’ Not satisfied with his murderous intent on unarmed transports he fires into the Hospital steamer Laurel Hill, with four hundred sick on board. This boat had the usual hospital signal floating fore and aft, yet, notwithstanding all this, and the customs of war, they fired on them, proving by this act that they are more hardened than the Indians on the frontier.

On Sunday, May 15, we left the river road and took a short route through the woods, saving considerable distance. The windings of Red river are so numerous that it resembles the tape-worm railroad wherewith the politicians frightened the dear people during the administration of Ritner and Stevens. – We stopped several hours in the woods to leave cavalry pass, when we moved forward and by four o’clock emerged into a large open plain where we formed in line of battle, expecting a regular engagement. The enemy, however, retired and we advanced ‘till dark, when the forces halted for the night, with orders to rest on their arms. – ‘Twas here that Banks rode through our regiment, amidst the cheers of the boys, and gave the pleasant news that Grant had defeated Lee.

Having entered Avoyelles Parish, they “rested on their arms” for the night, half-dozing without pitching their tents, but with their rifles right beside them. They were now positioned just outside of Marksville, Louisiana on the eve of the 16 May 1864 Battle of Mansura, which unfolded as follows, according to Wharton:

Early next morning we marched through Marksville into a prairie nine miles long and six wide where every preparation was made for a fight. The whole of our force was formed in line, in support of artillery in front, who commenced operations on the enemy driving him gradually from the prairie into the woods. As the enemy retreated before the heavy fire of our artillery, the infantry advanced in line until they reached Mousoula [sic, Mansura], where they formed in column, taking the whole field in an attempt to flank the enemy, but their running qualities were so good that we were foiled. The maneuvring [sic] of the troops was handsomely done, and the movements was [sic] one of the finest things of the war. The fight of artillery was a steady one of five miles. The enemy merely stood that they might cover the retreat of their infantry and train under cover of their artillery. Our loss was slight. Of the rebels we could not ascertain correctly, but learned from citizens who had secreted themselves during the fight, that they had many killed and wounded, who threw them into wagons, promiscuously, and drove them off so that we could not learn their casualties. The next day we moved to Simmsport [sic, Simmesport] on the Achafalaya [sic, Atchafalaya] river, where a bridge was made by putting the transports side by side, which enabled the troops and train to pass safely over. – The day before we crossed the rebels attacked Smith, thinking it was but the rear guard, in which they, the graybacks, were awfully cut up, and four hundred prisoners fell into our hands. Our loss in killed and wounded was ninety. This fight was the last one of the expedition. The whole of the force is safe on the Mississippi, gunboats, transports and trains. The 16th and 17th have gone to their old commands.

It is amusing to read the statements of correspondents to papers North, concerning our movements and the losses of our army. I have it from the best source that the Federal loss from Franklin to Mansfield, and from their [sic] to this point does not exceed thirty-five hundred in killed, wounded and missing, while that of the rebels is over eight thousand.

After the surviving members of the 47th made their way through Simmesport and into the Atchafalaya Basin, they moved on to Morganza, where they made camp again. While there, the nine formerly enslaved Black men who had enlisted with the 47th Pennsylvania in Beaufort, South Carolina (October-November 1862) and Natchitoches, Louisiana (5 April 1864) were officially mustered into the regiment between 20-24 June 1864.

But once again, disease was proving to be a formidable foe, sickening a significant number of 47th Pennsylvanians who had been weakened by the long, grueling marches across challenging terrain in difficult weather. Among those who fell ill during this period was A Company Corporal William Schweitzer. As his condition worsened, he was hospitalized on 20 June 1864 aboard the USS Laurel Hill, which was docked near Morganza. Diagnosed with typhoid fever, he died aboard that ship four days later, on 24 June (alternate death date: 23 June), from complications related to that disease.

Meanwhile, Corporal William Schweitzer’s brother, Private Edwin Schweitzer, and their friend and Company A comrade, Field Musician William Williamson, were expected to soldier on when the regiment was ordered to march for New Orleans—which they did. When the regiment was given new orders on the Fourth of July to return to the Eastern Theater of the war, they packed up their gear and then climbed aboard the U.S. Steamer McClellan three days later and prepared to sail away from America’s Deep South. Joining the men from the 47th Pennsylvania’s A Company on that voyage were the men from Companies C, D, E, F, H, and I. (The remaining companies then followed later that month, transported by the Blackstone.)

Following their arrival in Virginia and a memorable encounter with President Abraham Lincoln on 12 July, Field Musician William Williamson and his fellow 47th Pennsylvanians joined up with Major-General David Hunter’s forces at Snicker’s Gap in mid-July 1864. There, they fought in the Battle of Cool Spring and assisted in defending Washington, D.C. while also helping to drive Confederate troops from Maryland.

Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign

Attached to the Middle Military Division, U.S. Army of the Shenandoah from August through November of 1864, the men of the 47th Pennsylvania were about to engage in their regiment’s greatest moments of valor.

Records of the regiment confirm that the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were assigned to defensive duties in and around Halltown, Virginia in early August 1864, and engaged in a series of back-and-forth movements between Halltown, Berryville, Middletown, Charlestown, and Winchester as part of a “mimic war” being waged by the Union forces commanded by Major-General Philip Sheridan with those commanded by Confederate Lieutenant-General Jubal Early.

From 3-4 September, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers fought in the Battle of Berryville and engaged in related post-battle skirmishes with the enemy over subsequent days.

Battles of Opequan and Fisher’s Hill

Together with other regiments under the command of Union Major-General Sheridan and Brigadier-General William H. Emory, commander of the 19th Corps (XIX Corps), the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers next helped to inflict heavy casualties on the Confederate forces of Lieutenant-General Early in the Battle of 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. 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. Finally reaching the Opequon Creek, Sheridan’s men came face to face with Early’s Confederate Army. 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 Emory to attack and pursue Major-General John B. Gordon’s Confederate forces. Some success was achieved, but casualties mounted as a 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 subsequently opened its lines long enough to enable the Union cavalry under William Woods Averell and the foot soldiers of Brigadier-General George Crook to charge the Confederates’ left flank. As the 19th Corps began pushing the Confederates back, with the 47th involved in the thick of the fight, Early’s “grays” retreated. Sheridan’s “blue jackets” ultimately went on to win the day.

Leaving twenty-five hundred wounded behind, the Rebels retreated to Fisher’s Hill, eight miles south of Winchester (21-22 September). Following a successful early morning flanking attack by Sheridan’s Union men which outnumbered Early’s three to one, Early’s Confederates then fled to Waynesboro. The 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were among those sent out in skirmishing parties.

Afterward, the 47th Pennsylvanian Volunteers and other Union infantry regiments made camp at Cedar Creek. They would continue to distinguish themselves in battle, but they would do so without two more of their respected commanders: Colonel Tilghman H. Good and Good’s second-in-command, Lieutenant-Colonel George Alexander, who mustered out 23-24 September upon the expiration of their respective terms of service.

Battle of Cedar Creek

During the fall of 1864, Major-General Sheridan began the first of the Union’s true “scorched earth” campaigns, starving the enemy into submission by destroying Virginia’s 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 and win the day.

From a military standpoint, it was another impressive, but heartrending encounter. 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 rode 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!’”

In response, Union troops staged a decisive counterattack that punched Early’s forces into submission. Afterward, 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.

But, once again, casualties for the 47th were high. The 47th Pennsylvania alone lost the equivalent of nearly two full companies of soldiers—men who were killed, wounded, missing in action, or captured by Confederate troops. As a result, the next several weeks were weeks of mourning and reflection, involving further restructuring of the regiment. Among the changes made, Major John Peter Shindel Gobin was commissioned as a lieutenant-colonel and officially placed in charge of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry as the regiment’s commanding officer on 4 November 1864.

Six days later, on 10 November 1864, Field Musician William Williamson learned that his friend and A Company comrade, Private Edwin Schweitzer, had apparently decided that he had had enough of life as a soldier and had deserted. Private Schweitzer’s new-found freedom would prove to be short-lived, however; apprehended on 1 December of that same year, he was court martialed and sentenced to return to his unit to serve without pay (“all pay and allowance stopped”) until 27 January 1865. Then, once his pay resumed, according to that sentence, he would be required “to forfeit 10 Dols. [dollars] per month from his monthly pay for the period of one year and to make good all time lost by absent without leave,” and was also required to pay the federal government thirty dollars to cover the expense of his “apprehension for desertion.” He served the initial part of his sentence at Camp Russell, where Field Musician Williamson and the other members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry were stationed until 20 December 1865. Five days before Christmas, they all began a thirty-five-mile march as the 47th Pennsylvania trudged north to its next duty station—Camp Fairview, just outside of Charlestown, West Virginia.

1865 – 1866

Following the completion of his general court martial sentence for his 1864 desertion, Private Edwin Schweitzer continued to serve with Field Musician William Williamson in Company A of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry for the duration of the regiment’s tenure of service during the Reconstruction Era. Initially stationed at Camp Fairview near Charlestown, West Virginia, from late December 1864 through early April 1865, they and their fellow 47th Pennsylvanians were “on constant active duty, guarding the railroad and constructing works for defense against the incursions of guerrillas, “according to an 1870 edition of The Lehigh Register. The regiment also “participated in a number of reconnoissances [sic] and skirmishes during the winter.”

By February 1865, they were attached to the Provisional Division of the 2nd Brigade of the U.S. Army of the Shenandoah. 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 Pennsylvanians “were employed building blockhouses at all the railroad ‘posts’ (meaning loading stations)” during this phase of duty.

As the end of March 1865 loomed, according to The Lehigh Register, “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 4 April 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 9 April 1865. The long war appeared to be over.

In a letter penned to the Sunbury American on 12 April, 47th Pennsylvanian Henry Wharton described the celebration that took place following Lee’s surrender, adding 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, huzzahs] 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.

By 19 April 1864, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers were responsible, once again, for helping to ensure that the nation’s capital was safe—but this time, they were doing so in the wake of a presidential assassination that threatened to reignite the civil war they had just helped to end. Making camp near Fort Stevens, they were issued new uniforms and additional ammunition.

Letters sent to friends and family back home during this period and newspaper interviews that were conducted, post-war, with survivors of the 47th Pennsylvania confirm that at least one 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer was given the high honor of guarding President Lincoln’s funeral train while others may have guarded the Lincoln assassination conspirators during the early days of their imprisonment and trial.

Attached to Dwight’s Division of the 2nd Brigade, Department of Washington’s 22nd Corps, the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry also participated in the Union’s Grand Review of the Armies on 23-24 May.

On their final swing through the South, Field Musician William Williamson and his fellow 47th Pennsylvania Volunteers served in Savannah, Georgia from 31 May to 4 June. Attached again to Dwight’s Division, this time, they were assigned to the 3rd Brigade, Department of the South. Relieving the 165th New York in July, they were housed in a mansion formerly owned by the Confederate Secretary of the Treasury. But, once again, typhoid and other diseases stalked the men of the 47th, claiming still more men from its ranks.

Finally, on Christmas Day, 1865, Field Musician William Williamson, his friend and comrade, Private Edwin Schweitzer, and the majority of their fellow 47th Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers were honorably mustered out for the final time in Charleston, South Carolina—a process that continued through early January 1866. Following a stormy voyage north, they disembarked in New York City, and were then transported to Philadelphia by train, where the regiment was officially honorably discharged at Camp Cadwalader on 9 January 1866.

Return to Civilian Life

Following his honorable discharge from the military, Drummer Boy William Williamson returned home to Northampton County, where he tried to regain some semblance of normal life. Resuming work as a blue-collar laborer, he soon found work as a slater. According to a 2010 article about Pennsylvania’s “Slate Belt”:

While independent slate quarries had existed for decades in the region, the slate industry proper in Northampton County had its humble beginnings with the enterprising Robert M. Jones, an immigrant from north Wales. An experienced slate worker himself, Jones came to America in 1848 in search of an area in which to begin new slate quarries. The area he found was Bangor, Pennsylvania, so named by him because it resembled Bangor, Wales in its overall appearance and slate characteristics. The industry started in Bangor soon spread to its surrounding towns of Pen Argyl and Wind Gap, making up the majority of the region now known as the Slate Belt. Many small quarries began to open up, run by individuals rather than large corporations. The quarrying of slate required large amounts of labor, employing many men and contributing to the immigration of many groups interested in profiting from the industry. Slate quarrying in the region grew steadily through the late 1800’s and hit its peak in production around the turn of the 20th century….

…. A metamorphic rock formed from shale by the influences of heat and pressure, slate was formed over millions of years into a hard, resistant material suitable for use in many applications. It possesses a grain that contributes to distinctive physical characteristics, making it suitable for splitting into thin sheets. Depending on the mineral content within its precursor rocks, slate can take on many colors, including black, gray, red, green, purple, and other hues. In the Slate Belt, the mineral content led to the familiar dark blue-gray color.

Due to slate’s durability and resistance to hard wear, slate production became profitable in the Slate Belt for a myriad of uses. Blackboards, slate gravestones, and miniature slate boards for use in classrooms of the time were significant uses of the rock. However, the vast majority of the slate was mined for a singular purpose— the production of roofing tiles. Slate is highly resistant to weathering and can last hundreds of years after installation on a roof….

Sometime before the end of that decade, William Williamson chose to begin his own family when he wed Emma Schweitzer (1849-1923). The youngest sister of his 47th Pennsylvania comrades, Corporal William Schweitzer (1840-1864) and Private Edwin Schweitzer (1843-1909), Emma Schweitzer (1849-1923) had been born on 7 October 1848, and was a daughter of Thomas Schweitzer (1811-1875) and Elizabeth (Frey) Schweitzer. Her family had faced hardship ever since her father, Thomas, had been injured during an accident on the job during the early 1840s. Distracted while processing the grain he had harvested, his left hand was caught in a grain thresher, which amputated his middle fingers just above the knuckle joints. Although he survived, the injury left him permanently disabled and unable to work to support his family, leading to the family’s early reliance on money that their eldest son, William Schweitzer, had been able to bring in through his own work as a farm laborer (and later as a soldier with the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War).

Like William Williamson, Emma Schweitzer had been reared in the Northampton County town of Belfast. The young couple married in Northampton County and welcomed the birth of Peter Williamson (1869-1922) on 30 January 1869. He was the first of ten children.

By 1870, William Williamson was actively involved in trying to help his mother-in-law, Elizabeth (Frey) Schweitzer battle the U.S. Pension Bureau for the U.S. Civil War Mother’s Pension to which she was entitled as the mother of a son who had died in service to the nation. She had been fighting bureaucrats at the Pension Bureau since 1864 when her son, A Company Corporal William Schweitzer, had died aboard the Union’s hospital ship, the USS Laurel Hill, from typhoid fever. Required repeatedly to prove that he had actually been her son, she had also been forced to prove that her soldier-son had never married and had been celibate with no heirs.

Frustrated by the seemingly pointless hurdles that were being thrown up against his mother-in-law, who desperately needed the financial assistance that a U.S. Civil War Mother’s Pension would provide (to replace the funds that her soldier-son had been sending home from his Union Army paycheck), William Williamson filed an affidavit on 23 April 1879 in support of his mother-in-law’s pension claim in which he wrote the following:

I reside in Plainfield Township in said county [Northampton County]. I have resided there for more than twelve years. My P. O. is Belfast Northampton Co. Pa. I am twenty nine years of age. I am a Slater by occupation. I was a Private of said Company ‘A’ in said Regt. [the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry]. Most of the time I was Drummer of said Co. I was well acquainted with the above named decedent [William Schweitzer] for more than ten years. He was a sober industrious young man. I have been all along a near neighbor to the above named applicant [Elizabeth Schweitzer]. I reside since 1860 within a quarter of a mile from the above named applicant. I know she has been in part dependent on her said son for her support. I know prior to his enlistment he sent his mother flour and grain for her support and after he enlisted. I know he sent nearly all his wages to his mother for  her support. Lewis Werkheiser of the same Co. above named and others wrote letters for him to his Parents. (He had also a brother Edwin Schweitzer in said Co.) Werkheiser is dead. Said William did not write himself that said William sent money to her whenever he was paid as above stated, and that he informed by letter as can fully be seen by the four letters herewith inclosed [sic. Enclosed]. That the husband of said applicant got his left hand injured to such an extent that he is almost entirely disabled to do any manual labor with it by reason of said her husband hand and weakness of the arm. He has not been able to support himself since I know him her said husband. She was entirely dependent on her own & on her children’s labor for support. Her husband had no property of any kind exceeding $300 in value at any time since I know. She owns a House and Lot. Lot is about 22 acres of land—it is very poor land—worth in all not exceeding twelve hundred dollars. I would not give more. Their joint property since I am acquainted with them has never been worth more than $2000.

I further declare that I have no interest in said claim, and am not concerned in its prosecution.

Following the completion of the U.S. Pension Bureau’s review process on 2 September 1870, Elizabeth (Frey) Schweitzer was finally awarded a U.S. Civil War Mother’s Pension of eight dollars per month on 16 November 1870. Her pension award was also made retroactive to the date of her son’s death aboard the USS Laurel Hill (24 June 1864).

* Note: Elizabeth (Frey) Schweitzer’s battles with the U.S. Pension Bureau were still not over, however; in December 1881, she appeared before the Court of Common Pleas in Northampton County, with her new attorney, H. A. Mutchler, to re-state for the record that she was the mother of Corporal William Schweitzer, who had died in service to the nation during the American Civil War. Providing the same details about his service with the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry and the reasons for his prior financial support of his family before and during the war, she also stated that she had been receiving a Civil War Mother’s Pension of eight dollars per month and was still residing in Plainfield Township in Northampton County, but was now a sixty-six-year-old widow who was “dependent upon the Pension she now receives for maintenance & support.” She then made her mark on the affidavit that had been prepared for her, signaling that she was, like so many of the other mothers and wives of members of the 47th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, not fluent enough in English to read and write the documents she was expected to prepare when applying for U.S. Civil War Pension support. She was, most likely, someone who still spoke German or Pennsylvania Dutch in her home. Once again, William Williamson and other neighbors appeared in court with her to attest that she was, indeed, the person she claimed to be—a widowed mother of a former Union Army soldier from Pennsylvania who had died from typhoid fever aboard a U.S. Army hospital ship in 1864.

As those struggles were continuing to unfold, William Williamson and his wife, Emma (Schweitzer) Williamson were continuing to forge their own joint path through life. Supporting his wife and young son, Peter on the wages of a slater, he became a father for the second time on 25 June 1871, when his namesake William S. Williamson (1871-1929) was born in Belfast, Northampton County. Another son, Franklin T. Williamson (1873-1875) followed, but did not survive childhood. Following his death on 18 February 1875, little Franklin was buried at the Plainfield Cemetery.

It was the second of two tragedies to strike the Williamson-Schweitzer family in less than three weeks. The first—the death of William Williamson’s father-in-law, Thomas Schweitzer—had occurred on 31 January 1875, followed by funeral services and the interment of Thomas at the Plainfield Cemetery.

Joy soon returned to the home of William Williamson and his wife, Emma (Schweitzer) Williamson, however, as daughter Alberta Williamson (1875-1943) opened her eyes for the first time in Stockertown, Northampton County on 4 September 1875. Another son, Charles E. Williamson (1878-1914), was then born on 14 September 1878, followed by John Benjamin Williamson (1879-1935), who was born on 5 November 1879; Emma C. Williamson (1881-1923), who was born on 6 September 1881; Fred Garfield Williamson (1883-1948), who was born in Belfast on 6 November 1883; Clara B. Williamson (1886-1938), who was born in Plainfield Township on 28 November 1886; and Raymond Harrison Martin Williamson (1888-1946), who was born in Plainfield Township on 6 May 1888.

By the spring of 1896, William Williamson’s mother-in-law, Elizabeth (Frey) Schweitzer, was still receiving a mother’s pension at the rate of twelve dollars per month, but her stressful life had taken its toll. She died in Plainfield Township on 8 May that year and was laid to rest beside her husband at the Plainfield Cemetery. She was subsequently reported by the U.S. Pension Bureau as having been dropped from its rolls on 30 September 1899. According to her obituary in Allentown’s Morning Call newspaper:

Mrs. Elizabeth Schweitzer, widow of the long-deceased Thomas Schweitzer, died at Easton yesterday morning of general debility in her 82d year. She was a native of Plainfield township, but had lived the past five years with her son, Peter Schweitzer, the saloonkeeper, No. 619 Northampton street, Easton. The surviving children are Peter, of Easton; Edwin, of Tatamy, and Mrs. Emma Williams, of Plainfield. These brothers and sisters also survive: Mrs. Leonora Bitz and Cyrus Frey, of Plainfield; Mrs. Emma Oakley and Mrs. Louisa Price, of Wilkes-Barre; John Frey, of Beaver Meadows; William Frey, of Weatherly, and Mrs. Mary Ann Shipe, wife of Jacob Shipe, the butcher, of Allentown. Burial will be made at Plainfield on Sunday.

Meanwhile, William Williamson had become a hotel keeper in Belfast—a job he would continue to hold for the remainder of his life. By late April 1890, however, his health had deteriorated to the point that he felt the need to file for a U.S. Civil War Pension. Subsequently awarded a pension of eight dollars per month that was then increased to twelve dollars per month in April 1898, in recognition of deteriorating health, his health had declined by June 1900 that, he was documented on that year’s census sheet as an “invalid.” Roughly a year later, he became paralyzed.

He answered his final tattoo cadence when he widowed Emma a year later. Following his death at the age of sixty years, seven months and seventeen days in Plainfield Township on 17 June 1901, he was laid to rest at the Belfast Union Cemetery on 20 June. Easton’s Daily Free Press reported that he had been a member of the Grand Army of the Republic’s Lafayette Post and had died following “a long illness.”

What Happened to William Williamson’s Widow and Children?

Sometime during the late 1890s, William Williamson’s son, Charles E. Williamson, wed Ellen Augusta Bonser (1879-1958), who was a daughter of Simon Bonser (1849-1917) and Anna Susanna (Serfass) Bonser (1853-1931). Their children were: Nellie Mae Owens Williamson (1897-1964), who was born on 12 September 1897) and later wed William J. Owens (1896-1937); Mabel June Williamson (1899-1970), who was born on 10 June 1899) and later wed Russell Gilbert Pennsyl (1897-1961); and Bessie I. Williamson (1904-1989), who was born on 13 November 1904 and later wed Gerald J. Jackson (1904-1967). Sadly, the life of William Williamson’s son, Charles, was also a short one. A hotel keeper like his father, Charles E. Williamson had managed the Indian Spring Hotel in Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania for a number of years before his death from heart failure at the age of thirty-seven on 23 April 1914. Following funeral services, he was interred at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

William Williamson’s first-born son, Peter, followed his brother in death eight years later, on 28 September 1922. Married to Emma L. Young (1868-1932) sometime during the 1880s, he had become “one of Pen Argyl’s leading businessmen” according to his obituary in Allentown’s Morning Call newspaper, and was the father of: Mamie Elsie Williamson (1887-1892), Ellis W. Williamson (1888-1894) and Anna S. Williamson (1891-1895), all of whom died during early childhood; Steward Peter Williamson (1898-1945), who was born on 4 March 1898 and later wed and began a family with Jessie Hill; Floyd F. Williamson (1901-1948), who was born on 13 June 1901 and later wed Irene K. Ford (1903-1993); and Russell R. Williamson, who was born in 1904 and later wed Eleanor Camps (1907-1989). A clothier by trade, Peter Williamson was an active member of multiple fraternal organizations, including the Patriotic Order Sons of America and Sons of Veterans. Following funeral services, he was also interred at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

Sadly, the year of 1923 would prove to be an even harder one for the Williamson clan. Roughly eighteen months after the death of Peter Williamson, William Williamson’s daughter, Emma C. (Williamson) Davis, died following a heart attack at the age of forty-one. Married to Thomas C. Davis (1872-1949), she had become the mother of: Edith M. Davis (1900-1973), who was born on 16 August 1900) and later wed William J. Powell (1902-1072); and Nellie Irene Davis (1906-1983), who was born on 22 April 1906) and later wed James Theodore Heskitt (1904-1987) circa 1844. Following her death, Emma C. (Williamson) Davis was buried at the Belfast Union Cemetery, where others from her family had previously been interred.

That same year (1923), William Williamson’s widow, Emma (Schweitzer) Williamson, died in Plainfield Township on 14 August. Her death came nearly a year after the passing of their son, Peter, and slightly six months after the tragic, sudden death of their daughter, Emma C. (Schweitzer) Davis. Following her death at the age of seventy-three in Plainfield Township, Emma (Schweitzer) Williamson, was laid to rest beside her Civil War soldier-husband at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

Before that decade came to a close, another member of the Williamson clan—William S. Williamson—was also gone. The husband of Clara Louise (Cope) Williamson (1871-1933) and the father of Frank Williamson (1891-1908), who was born on 19 April 1891, and Nellie Mae Williamson (1893-1896), who was born on 16 March 1893 but did not survive her early childhood, William S. Williamson died in Plainfield Township at the age of fifty-eight on 30 August 1929, and was also buried at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

The Williamson family subsequently mourned and moved on, but then experienced another loss when Civil War veteran William Williamson’s son, John Benjamin Williamson, died from stomach cancer at the age of fifty-five in Easton on 17 April 1935. The husband of Bertha S. (Walters) Williamson (1879-1943), he was the father of Anna E. Williamson (1898-1898), who had been born on 15 October 1898 but had died in infancy just over a month later on 21 November. Following his passing, John Benjamin Williamson was laid to rest beside his baby at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

The next of Civil War drummer William Williamson’s children to die, Clara B. (Williamson) Remmel, passed away in Plainfield Townshp at the age of fifty-one on 24 July 1938. Widowed by her first husband, Charles P. Eichman, circa 1920, she was subsequently married to Amandus Franklin Remmel (1874-1960), became an active member of Grace Lutheran Church in Belfast, and was survived by her husband and two daughters, Mrs. Elwood C. Hoch, a resident of Nazareth, Pennsylvania, and Mrs. Claude A. Jones, a resident of Belfast. Like her other family members before her, Clara B. (Williamson) Remmel was also laid to rest at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

The fourth oldest child of William Williamson, Alberta (Williamson) Rader, survived longer but then also died unexpectedly. Following a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of sixty-seven, she passed away in Allentown on 9 February 1943. The wife of Oscar Alfred Rader (1874-1950), she was the mother of: Paul W. Rader (1910-1954), who was born on 23 January 1910 and later wed Marion E. Minner (1911-1990); and Wilbur A. Rader (1915-2000), who was born on 16 December 1915 and later wed Betty Lorraine Newhard (1922-2012). Following funeral services, Alberta (Williamson) Rader was also interred at the Belfast Cemetery.

Three years later, Raymond Harrison Martin Williamson also died in Plainfield Township. Like his older sister, Alberta, he sufferred a cerebral hemorrhage. Following his death on 27 June 1946, he, too, was buried at the Belfast Union Cemetery. He was survived by his wife, Annie E. (Gold) Williamson (1890-1981), and their daughter, Grace Gold (Williamson) Young, who had been born in Belfast on 20 June 1913 and had later wed Chester O. Young. Grace then went on to live a long life with him, ultimately surviving to celebrate her fifty-first wedding anniversary with him.

Two years later, Fred G. Williamson, the final surviving child of Civil War drummer William Williamson, also crossed over. A bookkeeper by trade, Fred Williamson had wed Mary Rader, a daughter of William and Sabina Rader, in Lehigh County on 18 October 1906. Together, they welcomed the birth of Madge A. Williamson (1914-1973) on 6 May 1914, who later worked for her parents as a clerk in their variety store in Pen Argyl. Following his death in Pen Argyl at the age of sixty-four on 5 May 1948, Fred Williamson was also subsequently interred at the Belfast Union Cemetery.

 

* To view more of the key U.S. Civil War Military and Pension records related to William Williamson and Emma (Schweitzer) Williamson, visit our Schweitzer Family Collection.

 

Sources:

1. “Alberta Rader,” (daughter of William Williamson) in Death Certificates (file no.: 14568, registered no.: 199; date of death: 9 February 1943). Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Department of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics.
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