Lt. Colonel Henry Pearson: 'Left ... alone in his glory'

6th New Hampshire Lieutenant colonel Henry Pearson was killed at North Anna River
on May 26, 1864.  The case is not original to the image. (Author's collection)

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Soon after Lieutenant George E. Upton of the 6th New Hampshire spied a Confederate battery through his field glasses, 24-year-old Lieutenant colonel Henry H. Pearson stepped up on a stump and peered above the Union field works to have a look for himself.

The time was about 4 p.m. on May 26, 1864.  The 6th New Hampshire was part of the IX Corps of the Union Army, which was pressing the Confederates near the North Anna River, about 25 miles north of Richmond.

The sun shined on Pearson and reflected off his field glasses, possibly providing an excellent mark for a Rebel sharpshooter, who squeezed his trigger and sent a bullet crashing through the 6th New Hampshire officer's head, near the temple. Pearson fell backward and was caught in the arms of Upton and another lieutenant, Lyman Jackman, and laid upon the ground.

There was little doubt the wound was fatal.

Lieutenant Lyman Jackman on Pearson's
wound: "... the ball had passed directly
through his brain."
(Image courtesy Mike Pride)

"A stretcher was procured at once," Jackman recalled, "and he was taken to the field hospital in the rear, but we all knew as soon as we saw the wound that he was beyond help, for the ball had passed directly through the brain. He never spoke, and was unconscious till he died at eight o'clock in the evening.

"It was a sad night for the Sixth Regiment, and we all felt that it would indeed be hard to find another to fill our lost commander's place," Jackman added. "Major [Phineas] Bixby was quite overcome, and with misgivings succeeded as ranking officer to the command. He soon found accorded to himself the confidence and affection that had been so lavishly bestowed upon his predecessor." 

The lieutenant colonel's death was especially crushing for soldiers in Company C, the unit Pearson had commanded as captain when he joined the regiment in November 1861.

Captain Josiah Jones of the 6th New Hampshire was ordered by Bixby to arrange for the transport of Pearson's body to Washington. Unable to find the means, Jones ordered his men to dig a grave for the lieutenant colonel, whose remains were placed in a large, wooden box taken from an abandoned residence nearby. Because it was raining and the army was on the move toward Totopotomoy Creek and Cold Harbor,  Pearson was hastily buried on the eastern bank of the North Anna River. Jones and regimental chaplain John S. Dore remained behind to cover Pearson's grave, which was marked with a crude, wooden headboard made from a piece of a bread box.

Then  "...we left him alone," Jones noted, "in his glory."

On May 31, 1864, while the Union Army was on the move again, Dore hurriedly wrote a condolence letter from a military hospital in Virginia to Pearson's father in Illinois, where Henry grew up. Published June 21, 1864 in The Pantagraph of Bloomington (Ill.), it included a graphic description of Henry's wound and an account of the beloved officer's nighttime burial. Wrote the chaplain:

In 2016, I took my tintype of Pearson to his grave in Fredericksburg National Cemetery.

"The regiment lay during the afternoon of that day behind the breastworks, with sharpshooters in the advance. About 4 p.m., the fire between the sharpshooters becoming more brisk, and the bullets whistling thickly over our men, the Colonel arose from his seat where he had been reading, and, with that utter disregard for his personal safety so characteristic of the man, stood erect, looking at the enemy through his field glass. 

"He had been standing thus but a few moments, when the fatal shot was received, which was without doubt fired by a rebel sharpshooter. The bullet struck directly in front, crushing the left temple bone and passed through the head. Nearly one-third of the entire brain immediately protruded. He was brought to the division hospital, where he lived three hours. He was not probably sensible of any pain for a single moment after he was struck.

An illustration of Henry Pearson
based on a photograph appears
in the 6th New Hampshire
regimental history.

"He breathed his last at 7:15 p.m., May 26. We prepared a rude coffin and made arrangements to have the body taken to Belle Plain, where we thought it possible to have him embalmed and sent thence to his friends; but this could not be done, for already our forces had begun to re-cross the North Anna river, near which was our hospital, and to move down to this point where we now are, and the battle of the 30th and 31st, is now going on. We loaded our wounded in ambulances, and moved on also. 

"It was near midnight, and there was no alternative but to bury our beloved commander. Capt. Jones, of Co. F, and myself, with a few others, remained; and at that hour, with nothing to break the stillness save the muffled tread of our passing columns, we performed the last sad funeral rites. Could we help thinking of and comparing his burial to that of Sir John Moore?

"The surroundings of the spot where we buried him are such that I can give no description that would enable a stranger to find the same without difficulty."

Dore said Henry's comrades deeply admired him, noting, "We, as a regiment, loved him with a tenderness such as brothers are capable of loving." The chaplain  requested Mr. Pearson provide instructions for where to send Henry's effects and a plan for what to do with his horse. With the letter, Dore also included a few bloody locks of Pearson's hair.

After the war, Pearson’s body was disinterred from near the North Anna River and re-buried in Fredericksburg National Cemetery, where his remains rest under grave No. 4103. Perhaps he is among the lucky ones: Of the 15,243 Union soldiers buried at the national cemetery in Fredericksburg, only 2,473 are identified.

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SOURCES

• Jackman, Lyman, History of the Sixth New Hampshire Regiment in the war for the Union, Concord, N.H., Republican Press Association, 1891
• The Pantagraph of Bloomington (Ill.), June 21, 1864. (Hat tip: Dan Masters' Civil War Chronicles) 

(For more on Pearson and other New Hampshire Civil War soldiers, check out Mike Pride's excellent "Our War" blog.)