Two brothers cut down in maelstrom at Fredericksburg

5th New Hampshire Lieutenant Samuel B. Little was mortally wounded at Fredericksburg.
(Library of Congress | Liljenquist Family Collection)

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For Samuel Brown Little — the youngest of six hard-luck brothers from Newbury, Mass. — life was a battle long before he marched off to war. His father offered little stability, leaving the family "wholly dependent for support upon the industry and energy of a most excellent mother.” When she died, Samuel was only eight months old. The brothers — and presumably their father — were left to the "cold charity of the world." Somehow, Samuel survived it.

Historical markers note the U.S. Army crossing
of Rappahannock River at Fredericksburg, Va.
This is view from Fredericksburg side.

By 10 he was working a farm; by 16, painting houses. At 18, he struck out on his own in Brookline, Mass., before moving to Claremont, N.H., where he married Mary Gould in 1849 and partnered with his brother Joseph in the painting trade. Life finally seemed steady — until 1861 shattered that illusion.

On Sept. 27 of that year, Samuel enlisted in the 5th New Hampshire, pocketing a $10 state bounty and soon earning a sergeant’s stripes. A month earlier, his brother Moses — a 38-year-old shoemaker from West Newbury — had joined the 19th Massachusetts. The Littles would carry their family’s burden into battle.

At Antietam, in the hell of Bloody Lane on Sept. 17, 1862, Samuel — newly promoted to lieutenant for “bravery and meritorious conduct” — took a bullet through the thigh. Sent home to Claremont to heal, he instead defied doctor’s orders. On Dec. 8, still weak and limping, he forced himself south to rejoin the “Fighting Fifth” near Fredericksburg, where a long-awaited clash loomed.

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Union engineers and soldiers under fire during the building of a pontoon bridge at
 Fredericksburg on Dec. 11, 1862.  It's unclear whether this sketch is of  the Upper Crossing. 
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(Alfred Waud/Library of Congress)

Hours before dawn on Dec. 11, 1862, the Rappahannock lay wrapped in fog and cold as Union engineers crept to the water’s edge. They began laying a pontoon bridge across the 250-yard river while Mississippi and Florida sharpshooters watched from Fredericksburg’s cellars and rifle pits. 

As the sun rose, the work became deadly. Engineers fell one by one under Rebel fire.

"We remained undisturbed until the morning of December 11 when we were ordered to the banks of the Rappahannock opposite Fredericksburg," a 19th Massachusetts soldier recalled. "Here we found a pontoon bridge partially laid, and the engineers doing their best to complete it. Our batteries were posted on the hills in rear of our line, and were vigorously shelling the city, but the rebel sharpshooters were posted in cellars and rifle pits on the other side and would pick off the engineers as fast as they showed themselves at work."

One of the men struck that morning was Samuel’s brother Moses, helping the bridge-builders when a bullet found him. He died near the riverbank. The day before, his youngest child Carrie had turned two.

Colonel Edward Cross (above)
 tried to talk Samuel Little out
of fighting at Fredericksburg,
according to one account.

When Samuel reached Fredericksburg — reportedly just an hour before the Dec. 13 battle — the sight of him alarmed his superiors. Colonel Edward Cross and others begged the pale, weakened lieutenant to stay out of the fight. He refused.

In the slaughter at Marye’s Heights, after Capt. Jacob W. Keller of Claremont went down badly wounded, Samuel seized command of the company. Already weakened by Antietam, he was struck again — once in the left calf and then in the shoulder. The 5th New Hampshire, which had entered the field with 249 men, staggered away with 186 casualties.

“The Boys look down-hearted enough, I tell you,” a 5th New Hampshire soldier wrote to his mother in Claremont. “Lieut. [Samuel B.] Little was all cut up — hit in 3 places.”

Surgeons removed what they could, but one bullet lodged deep in Samuel’s shoulder and would not budge. Infection spread. On Christmas Eve, in the Lacy House across the river in Falmouth, he died. **

Days later, Claremont filled its town hall — the same room once packed with fiery Union supporters at the war’s outset — to honor Lieutenant Little. His body had been brought home, a small mercy for wife Mary. The Reverend Carlos Marston, Samuel’s friend, delivered what townspeople called a “most appropriate and impressive sermon,” quoting Revelation 14:13: “Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord… that they may rest from their labors; and their works do follow them.”

Pallbearers carried Samuel to Pleasant Street Cemetery and laid him beneath New Hampshire soil. His brother Moses lies in Greenwood Cemetery. in Haverhill, Mass. Two brothers gone — one at the riverbank, one near Christmas — their lives braided into the nation's darkest winter.

Lacy House, also known as Chatham Manor, where Lieutenant Samuel Little died
on Dec. 24, 1862. (Timothy O'Sullivan/Library of Congress collection)

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NOTES AND SOURCES

** Some accounts note Samuel Little died on Dec. 23, 1862.

• Moses Little widow's pension records, National Archives and Records Service, Washington, D.C.
• Samuel Little's widow's pension records, NARS
• History of the Nineteenth Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, 1861-1865, The Salem Press Co., Salem, Mass., 1906
• Waite, Otis F.R., History of the Town of Claremont, N.H., for a Period of One Hundred and Thirty Years, John B. Clarke Co., Manchester, N.H., 1895
• Waite, Otis F.R., Claremont, War History, April, 1861 to April, 1865, McFarland & Jenls Printers, Concord, N.H., 1868