Theodore DeMars of Cromwell, Conn., was only 19 when he was killed at Antietam. He is buried in Kelsey Cemetery in Cromwell, Conn.
Antietam casualty listed printed in the Hartford Courant on Sept. 27, 1862. This list continued elsewhere on the page and did not include the 14th Connecticut.
(CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)
For a pretty cool project, I'm aiming to find graves of Connecticut soldiers killed or mortally wounded at the Battle of Antietam who are buried in the state. A little odd, yes, but it beats what these people do.
Using the casualty list from the Sept. 27, 1862 Hartford Courant as a macabre checklist, I have visited many Antietam graves in Connecticut during the past year and told the heart-rending stories of men such as Captain Newton Manross of Bristol, Lieutenant Marvin Wait of Norwich and Private John Bingham of East Haddam. (Find A Grave also is a terrific resource, by the way.)
Four regiments from Connecticut -- the 8th, 11th, 14th and 16th -- fought in the fields and woodlots outside Sharpsburg, Md., on Sept. 17, 1862. Scores of Connecticut men, including 19-year-old Thomas DeMars of Cromwell, were killed there. A private in Company A of the 16th Connecticut, DeMars is buried (above) in Cromwell's Kelsey Cemetery, once a quiet country graveyard but now airport runway loud thanks to nearby I-91.
Funerals for soldiers were a common occurrence in Connecticut in the days and weeks after Antietam. "It is seldom that we are called upon to bury so many braves in so short a space of time," the Hartford Courant noted on Oct. 13, 1862, nearly a month after the battle.
If you can help with my unusual detective work, shoot me an e-mail here.
A penny atop the gravestone of 19-year-old Theodore DeMars, killed at Antietam.
Like thousands of other Civil War soldiers, John C. Holwell wrote letters home.
Lots of them.
Often colorful and sometimes eloquent, the letters to his wife and sons back home in Connecticut mentioned preserving the Union, fishing, life in camps, the pleasure of receiving a family photo and even a pledge to stay away from "Demon Liquor."
"I have not got a drink of rum since I left Hartford or any other kind of spirits," the corporal in Company H of the 11th Connecticut wrote Rebecca Holwell on March 23, 1862, "but I should liked very much to had a good horn the day after battle as we needed it badly."
The 11th Connecticut's first major battle of the Civil War didn't come until March 14, 1862, nearly four months after the regiment was organized in Hartford. Attacking at New Bern, N.C., an important link in the Confederate supply chain, the Union army overwhelmed the outnumbered and ill-equipped rebels. The 11th Connecticut suffered six killed, including the well-regarded Edwin. R. Lee, a captain of Company D from Barkhamsted.
Holwell, who also served in the Mexican War, evidently was a better soldier than he was at gathering intelligence on the enemy.
"It was a wander we were not cut to pieces as the rebels had three times our number and stood behind giant breast works," he wrote of the New Bern battle in the March 23 letter. "But thank God I have escaped unhurt."
From the manufacturing town of Norwich, Holwell enlisted in the Union army on Nov. 21, 1861 and was mustered into Company H as a private two days later. John, a ropemaker before the war, and Rebecca had two children, Henry and Edward. Listed as 5 years old in the 1860 U.S. census, Eddie apparently was the apple of his father's eye.
His last name misspelled "Howell," John Holwell was listed as a ropemaker in the
1860 U.S. census. Holwell was married and had two children. (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)
In his letters home during the Civil War, Howell often mentioned his children.
"Kiss Edward and Henry for me and I hope they will be good boys," he wrote in one letter "...I will bring them a handsome present when I come home."
"Your dagerreotype and the children's look very natural and I was very glad to receive them. ..." he wrote in another. "I hope little Eddy will keep on going to school and be smart. The men down here all like his picture and praise it up highly."
TOP: The 11th Connecticut crossed this ground near Burnside Bridge
in this image taken by Civil War photographer James Gibson after
the Battle of Antietam. (Library of Congress Collection) BOTTOM:
Holwell was among nine men in Company H of the 11th Connecticut
listed as killed in the Hartford Courant on Sept. 26, 1862.
Thankfully, many of Holwell's letters home have survived, tucked away in a file in a box at the Connecticut Historical Society. I don't have a photo of John Holwell to accompany this post, but I think his letters to his family back in Connecticut, including the snippets below, help paint a picture of a hard-nosed patriot and a family man caught up in the swirl of a terrible war.
March 17, 1862 (from New Bern, N.C.) : "Rebecca, you wrote to know how we were living. We live a soldiers life. It is a hard life but what a soldier should expect. The day of the battle we had nothing at all to eat and had nothing till the next day. But I am pretty tough and can stand it pretty well. We have not received any money since January 1st. I hope you will get along and not want anything. Write and let me know if you need anything. We shall probably be paid in a short time.
"Please write soon and let me know all the children get along. Send Edward to school for I expect he will sometime endure all that I have gone through. Sing the "Red, White and Blue" till all the southern states have laid down their arms and our flag waves over every place in the Union. Do not get discouraged but keep up good courage. I want to come home but not till the whole south has laid down her arms. It will not be very long."
March 23, 1862 (from New Bern, N.C.): "I want you to send me a small parcel by express. Send me three yards of braid. Blue about about one inch and three yards half-inch wide blue and three yards half-inch wide red. I want it for stripes as I have been promoted to Corporal. Send me some fish hooks and lines. This is a good place to fish if we get to stop here."
June 30, 1862 (from New Bern, N.C.): "Do not at all be alarmed because we may go in a battle. That is what we came here for. We do not expect to run or shirk any duty."
July 14, 1862 (from Newport News, Va.): "I am now enjoying first-rate health. I hope you and the children are well. All the things you sent me in the box came in first rate and were acceptable on board the boat when we had nothing else to eat. I have no more to write now. Give my best respects to the neighbors. Tell Eddie to keep on going to school and be a good boy. If we succeed in reaching Richmond I shall soon be home to see him."
Nearly six months after he concluded a letter with "your husband to death," the ropemaker from Norwich was killed during the 11th Connecticut's attack at a small, stone-arch bridge over Antietam Creek.
Corporal John C. Holwell was one of 36 11th Connecticut men who died at the Battle of Antietam.
He was 41 years old.
His final resting place is unknown.
John Holwell concluded his March 23, 1862 letter to his wife with these words. Nearly
six months later, he was killed at the Battle of Antietam. (Connecticut Historical Society)
Van Buren Towle, a private in the 1st Massachusetts Heavy Artillery, died shortly after
being paroled from a Confederate POW camp. He was buried at sea.
Because the end of the year isn't complete without a top-10 list, I compiled my own. Here are the 10 most-trafficked posts on John Banks' Civil War blog in 2011:
1. Faces of the Civil War: Van Buren Towle (May 26): It took some digging in the National Archives to tell the story of Towle, a private in the 1st Massachusetts Heavy Artillery who was captured in Virginia in 1864 and sent to the notorious Rebel prisoner-of-war camp in Andersonville, Ga. Amazingly, his brother also was in Andersonville. A document in the Archives confirmed the circumstances of Towle's death after he was paroled from prison. "On board U.S. Transport 'Northern Light," a War Department casualty sheet reads, "and was buried at sea."
Earl Roulette's great-grandfather, William, owned this farmhouse at
Antietam. Many wounded soldiers were treated at the farm.
2. Gettysburg hidden history (May 6): If you know where to look, you'll discover a Gettysburg few ever see. Park volunteer Dick Kolmar helped me find a rock carving in the Spangler Spring meadow made by a North Carolina soldier.
3. Battle of Antietam memories: The Roulettes (May 14): Several years ago, I got to know Earl Roulette, who farmed in Sharpsburg, Md., for decades and whose great-grandfather owned a farm that bordered Bloody Lane at Antietam. Earl, who died in 2008, had a wealth of the knowledge about the battlefield. Many of the relics he and his ancestors collected over the years were donated to the Park Service at Antietam after Earl's death. Hopefully, they will be displayed there someday.
4. Faces of the Civil War: Justus Wellington: (June 5): A private in the 15th Massachusetts, Wellington was killed in the West Woods at Antietam. He's probably buried under a gravestone marked "Unknown" at Antietam National Cemetery in Sharpsburg, Md. The shoemaker from West Brookfield, Mass., was only 24 years old.
5. Faces of the Civil War: George Bronson (June 15): Special thanks to Mary Lou Pavlik of the Torrington (Conn.) Civil War Roundtable who supplied the photo and stories of her great-great grandfather, who was a hospital steward in the 11th Connecticut. His description of the 11th Connecticut's fight across Antietam Creek at Burnside Bridge sticks with me: "I do not know the name of the creek, but I have named it the creek of death," he wrote his wife.
The ornate front of John Griswold's gravestone in
Old Lyme, Conn. The captain in the 11th Connecticut
was mortally wounded at Antietam.
7. Brothers: Connecticut's Civil War sacrifice (Nov. 30):I have found eight sets of brothers from the state who died during the war, an incredible tragedy. An ancestor of three brothers from Litchfield who were killed during the Civil War e-mailed that their deaths still affect her family today.
8. Faces of the Civil War: John D. Griswold (Nov. 16): A captain in the 11th Connecicut, John Griswold was mortally wounded while attempting to cross Antietam Creek during the Battle of Antietam. Thanks to a descendant, I got into the small, private cemetery to view Griswold's beautiful grave marker.
9. Faces of the Civil War: The Bingham brothers (Nov. 26): A New England antiques dealer supplied much of the information for the story on these brothers from East Haddam, Conn. John Bingham of the 16th Connecticut was only 18 years old when he was killed at Antietam. He served in the 16th with his brother, Wells, who was physically unharmed but no doubt never got over the carnage he witnessed there. Friends of Wells gave him a special gift in memory of his brother 14 years after the 1862 battle.
10. Faces of the Civil War: The Hincks Family (July 31): An ancestor of the Hincks brothers supplied the stories of Elisha, Edward and William Hincks. William won the Medal of Honor for valor at Gettysburg. Brothers Elisha and Edward were wounded at Antietam.
Civil War soldiers John and James Willard lived in this house in Avon, Conn.
I told the story last week of a woman from Avon, Conn., who honored Civil War soldier John Willard by putting a scoop of Connecticut dirt on his grave at the national cemetery in New Bern, N.C.
The Willard house dates to 1760. Middle: The well-worn
front step may be original to the house. Bottom:
Revolutionary War-era buttons recently discovered
on the property by a local relic hunter.
Thanks to the generous current owners, I spent time this afternoon in the beautiful Avon house where John and his brother, James -- who also died during the Civil War -- lived with their mother. Jim and Maureen Dowse, who have lived in the 251-year-old house the past 10 years, also helped fill in gaps in the lives of both brothers and their family.
Damaris Williard, the matriarch of the family, endured her share of tragedy before and during the Civil War. Her husband Julius, a physician, died in September 1854, seven years before the start of the rebellion. Her youngest son, James, was only 20 when he was killed during the 7th Connecticut's rare nightime attack on Fort Wagner, near Charleston, S.C., on July 11, 1863. James, a private in Company A, was originally reported to have been missing and taken prisoner, but his body was never recovered. (1)
Fifteen months later, Damaris lost her eldest son.
Thirty-two-year-old John Willard was a wagoner in the 11th Connecticut, transporting ammunition, medicine, food and other supplies to help keep the Union army running. In late September and early October 1864, a yellow fever epidemic ripped through the Union army in New Bern, N.C., killing many soldiers -- including John. A farmer before the war, he died on Oct. 3, 1864, and was buried in New Bern. Sadly, his mother probably didn't have the means to return his body to Connecticut.
Maureen Dowse obtained copies of some of the trove of documents on the Willard brothers at the Avon Free Public Library. They reveal a family probably not atypical of most during the Civil War.
1860 census: Widow Damaris Willard lived with her sons, John (top) and James Willard (bottom). (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)
Fifty-four-year-old Widow Willard was dependent on John and James, so the enlistment of two sons in the army in 1861 undoubtedly was a hardship for her. But like any good sons, the brothers endeavored to help their mother while they were away at war. In notes to Damaris during the war, James wrote about sending money home and thoughts of not surviving the conflict: (2)
Jan. 14, 1862: "When we were at Hilton Island I sent fifteen dollars thinking you might need it."
June 10. 1862: "If I never get home, I wish you to have what property I have, and use what you need of that I send."
"I wish you to use what you want of the money that I send, and have sent, and if I never get home I wish you to have this, and what I have sent."
April 21, 1863: "I will send sixty dollars. Do what you think best with the money."
In the spring of 1863, John Willard, a wagoner
in the 11th Connecticut, sought a furlough to return home. (CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)
John, whose 3-year-old son Frank died five months before the war, also longed for home and his wife, Cordelia. In fact, in the spring of 1863 while he was in New Bern, he requested a furlough because "he was anxious to return home." (3) There is no record in the file I examined whether the furlough was granted.
Because James left no widow or children, Damaris Willard applied for a Mother's Pension after his death, and Uncle Sam evidently provided her with an $8-a-month-pension for many years. Widow Willard was 89 years old when she died June 5, 1890. She is buried in West Avon Cemetery near her husband Julius and the memorial markers for her sons, whose remains were never returned to their native soil.
Damaris Willard's husband, Julius, died seven years before the start of the Civil War. Her sons,
John and James, died during the conflict. Widow Willard lived in this house for many years.
Anita Marcotte is not related to Civil War soldier John Willard, but she feels a
special bond with him. She stands by his memorial marker in West Avon (Conn.) Cemetery.
Although the last shots of the Civil War were fired 146 years ago, the most traumatic event in our nation's history still tugs at us.
Anita Marcotte, a 40-year resident of Avon, Conn., knows that feeling.
Close-up of John Willard's memorial in Avon, Conn. He died of yellow fever in New Bern, N.C. on Oct. 3, 1864. He is buried in a national cemetery in New Bern.
Curious, she intently examined these beautifully carved words on John's marker:
Died In the service of his Country in Newbern, N.C. Oct. 3, 1864 Aged 32 He is buried in that City.
"John's struck me as I am from Cherry Point, N.C.," said Marcotte, whose father served in the Marines during World War II, Korea and Vietnam. "... I never had heard of any battles fought there, and I could not figure out how he died there.
"I tried to find his grave on one visit to New Bern, but the town hall had burned down and no records were available to me. They sent me to the town cemetery where Civil War soldiers were buried. A nice sexton showed us to the area where these graves were, but I had no luck. I finally told him that John Willard was a Northerner, to which he replied: 'We don't bury any Yankees here!'
Although she's not related to the Willards, Marcotte decided to do some digging -- and thus plunged into a search that wasn't completed until more than a decade after she first found the brothers' granite markers.
This document shows John Willard was discharged for physical disability on Feb. 9, 1864. The period from February to his death merits further research.
(Conn. Historical Society) CLICK TO ENLARGE.
John Willard, a 28-year-old farmer, enlisted in the Union army on Oct. 23, 1861, six months after the first shots were fired at Fort Sumter in Charleston, S.C. The oldest son of Julius and Damaris Willard was mustered into Company D of the 11th Connecticut Infantry a month later in Hartford. John, who stood 5-10 and had blue eyes, brown hair and a dark complexion, was a wagoner in the 11th Connecticut, transporting ammunition, medicine, food and other supplies to help keep the massive Union army running. (1)
With the 11th Connecticut, John saw his share of the horrors of the Civil War during battles at Antietam and Fredericksburg. But nearly a year before the war started, John and his wife, Cordelia, faced a personal tragedy. Their 3-year-old son, Frank, died. (2)
Like his brother, James was probably caught up in the patriotic fervor of the day. He enlisted on Aug. 20, 1861, and nearly a month later was mustered into Company A of the 7th Connecticut Infantry as a private. From October 1861 to July 1863, the 7th Connecticut fought in small engagements against Confederates in fortifications along the South Carolina coast.
On July 11, 1863, the 7th Connecticut was part of a rare night attack against Fort Wagner, near Charleston. (A week later, in an attack made famous in the movie Glory, the black troops of the 54th Massachusetts were defeated after a fierce battle at Fort Wagner.) Greatly outnumbered, the Connecticut regiment suffered 105 killed, including the 20-year-old son of a physician from Avon. James' body, perhaps thrown into a burial trench by the rebels afterward, was never recovered.
"He sleeps where he fell," the memorial marker in West Avon Cemetery notes.
John Willard's occupation was listed as a farmer in the 1860 U.S. census. His
17-year-old brother James' occupation was listed a laborer. John's 3-year-old son, Frank, died later that year. He is buried to the left of John's marker.
A little more than a year later, the Willards lost another son.
Yellow fever swept through the Union army in New Bern, N.C., in the late summer and early fall of 1864, killing many soldiers. "In the history of this rebellion, no city which has been captured and occupied by our forces, situated as far North as New Berne, North Carolina, has been visited by a sweeping pestilence so completely decimating as the late terrible scourge of yellow fever," wrote a Union doctor in a book on the epidemic published in 1865. (3)
Among the victims was John Willard, who had transferred to North Carolina in late winter 1864. Likely contracting the disease in late September, the farmer from Avon died Oct. 3, 1864. His body was not returned to Connecticut, perhaps because his family didn't have the means.
"After the epidemic had passed, there remained two trunks of gold and silver watches, and a safe containing thirty thousand dollars left by these poor victims, " according to a post-war history of Connecticut's Civil War service, (4)
Markers for the Willard brothers are adjacent to each other in West Avon (Conn.) Cemetery. Neither brother, however, is buried in Connecticut.
Nearly 130 years later, Anita Marcotte finally discovered John Willard's final resting place in North Carolina. "I felt like he wanted to come home," said Marcotte, who sensed from her research that John was very homesick.
Before her visit to the tidy national cemetery in New Bern, Marcotte went back to West Avon Cemetery, grabbed a handful of dirt from near John Willard's marker and stored it away for a visit South.
After arriving at the national cemetery, Marcotte asked a caretaker for permission to honor the young man who died nearly 700 miles from home.
"The man at the cemetery said it was OK to put it on his grave," Marcotte said, "so I dug a little hole and placed the dirt there.
Several members of the Congregational Church of Avon who served in the Union army died
during the Civil War, including John Willard of the 11th Connecticut and James Willard
of the 7th Connecticut. West Avon Cemetery is out of the photo to the right.
John Griswold's final resting place in Griswold Cemetery in Old Lyme, Conn. His monument was described as "strikingly beautiful" in the Hartford Courant on Aug. 5, 1863.
Up to his armpits in swift-moving Antietam Creek and under fire from Georgians in woods and on the bluff above, John Griswold must have known he was living on borrowed time.
Captain John Griswold of Lyme, Conn., was mortally wounded at Antietam on Sept. 17, 1862.
The 11th Connecticut Infantry had been ordered to storm Rohrbach Bridge and the Confederate position beyond during the Battle of Antietam on Sept. 17, 1862, but their progress was frustratingly slow. Impatient, Griswold, a 25-year-old captain from Lyme, boldly led a group of skirmishers across the 4-foot deep creek.
It was a deadly move.
"In the middle of the creek a ball penetrated his body," Griswold's friend, Dr. Nathan Mayer of the 11th Connecticut, wrote in a letter from Sharpsburg to his brother on Sept. 29, 1862. "He reached the opposite side and lay down to die." (1)
Mayer quickly summoned four privates, and together they forded the creek and climbed a fence while under fire to reach Griswold. The men carried the soaked and bloody captain to a nearby small shed, where the surgeon from Hartford gave his "ashly pale" friend morphine to ease his pain. But they both knew the wound near his stomach was mortal.
"He thanked me for my services in elegant phrase," Mayer wrote, "and attracted my attention to the number of wounded that now filled the shed, intimating that he feared that he had monopolized too much of the time of so good a surgeon on the day of battle." (2)
General Ambrose Burnside, commander of the Union left wing at Antietam and an acquaintance of Griswold, later visited. "I am happy, general," the captain said. "I die as I have ever wished to die, for my country."
Famed Civil War photographer Alexander Gardner shot this image after the battle. Soldiers
from the 11th Connecticut crossed this ground from right to left. Shot in the middle of
Antietam Creek, Griswold struggled to the opposite bank. (Library of Congress collection)
On Sept. 18, Griswold finally succumbed from his wounds, perhaps a quarter-mile away at the Henry Rohrbach farm that was used as a Federal field hospital. Griswold's death apparently had a strong effect on Burnside, who spoke about it years afterward, according to one account.
An uncommon soldier, John D. Griswold was a Renaissance man. From a prominent Connecticut family, he graduated from Yale in 1857. (He was one of many Yale men, from both sides, to die during the Civil War.) Fluent in Spanish and French, he had studied chemistry and mineralogy, enjoyed reading classical literature and was described as a skilled athlete, swordsman and draughtsman. After graduating from college, he went to Kansas to work as a surveyor and later traveled to Hawaii, where he had business, and other Pacific islands.
On July 31, 1863, the Hartford Courant included Griswold in a list of Yale graduates who died during the Civil War.
Yale men served the North and South.
When the Civil War broke out, Griswold hurriedly returned to the mainland in September 1861. He intended to join the Union army as a private, but friends insisted he see Gov. William Buckingham, who promised him a commission and encouraged him to return to Lyme to raise a company. (3) Griswold enlisted in the Union army on Dec. 16, 1861, eight months after the Rebels fired on Fort Sumter, and was commissioned in Company I of the 11th Connecticut Infantry 15 days later.
Like many men of the era, Griswold was described as fiercely patriotic. A major recalled walking with him to place flowers on the battlefield grave of Edwin Lee, a captain in the 11th Connecticut who was killed at New Bern, N.C. on March 14, 1862. (I posted last month about Lee's death and funeral.) "Poor Lee," the major said. "Not so," Griswold said. "I say happy Lee, fortunate Lee. What life could he or any of us lead better than to die for our country! Fortunate Lee!" (4)
As he admired the beautiful countryside on the march to Antietam in September 1862, Griswold discussed with Mayer philosophy and classic literature, from De Civatate De to Les Miserables. "Whoever approached him," Mayer wrote, "felt that he had entered a circle of refinement." Despite his affluent upbringing, Griswold "was particular in extending the same courtesies to the soldiers under his command," the surgeon wrote. (5)
Perhaps it's no surprise then that a refined gentleman such as Griswold has a tombstone that is a work of art.
Griswold Cemetery is small cemetery nestled in a strip of woods in Old Lyme, an historic town about an hour southeast of Hartford on Connecticut's coast. Generations of Griswolds are buried there, including John's grandfather, an early 19th-century Connecticut governor. A flood of bodies returned to Connecticut in late September and early October after Antietam, and sometime during that timeframe, Griswold was buried in his family cemetery. Months afterward, a permanent memorial created by Thomas Adams in Hartford was placed atop his grave.
The Hartford Courant raved about the work, advising "lovers of art to examine it" at Adams' Hartford establishment on the corner of Market and Temple streets before it was placed on Griswold's grave.
"We have never seen a monument more strikingly beautiful; more earnestly expressive in the design contemplated," the newpaper gushed on Aug. 5, 1863. "It is truly a finished production, giving evidence of the wonderful skill of the artist."
Thanks to a Griswold ancestor who still lives in the Lyme area, I gained access to the private cemetery this morning. The Courant nailed it nearly 150 years ago. Griswold's 6 1/2-foot gray marker is indeed special, one of the more ornate and beautiful Civil War memorials I have seen in Connecticut.
Especially poignant are the words carved near the bottom.
"Tell my mother," it reads, "I died at the head of my company."
John Griswold reportedly utttered these words, which are carved into the bottom of his memorial, after he was mortally wounded at Antietam.
Close-up of the top portion of John Griswold's memorial. After he was mortally wounded,
he told General Ambrose Burnside: "I die as I have ever wished to die, for my country."
Those words are carved on his memorial.
Close-up of the bottom of Griswold's memorial. The 25-year-old captain was mortally
wounded while crossing Antietam Creek on Sept. 17, 1862.
A close-up of the back of Griswold's memorial. He hurried back from Hawaii
to join the Union army in late 1861.
I took this photo at the off-the-beaten path 11th Connecticut monument at Antietam.
In this photo taken in October, the reflection of my outstretched hand holding my Blackberry pointed to Alvin Flint's name on the 11th Connecticut monument at Antietam. Throw in the sun rays, and that's a pretty neat shot. Flint, an 18-year-old private, was killed at Antietam. I will drive to Old Lyme, Conn., later this morning to find the grave of one of Flint's comrades, Captain John Griswold, who was mortally wounded near Burnside Bridge at Antietam.
My shadow eerily hovers by the tilted gravestones of Charles Lewis and his fiancee,
Sarah Hyde, in Carey Cemetery in Canterbury, Conn. Lewis, a sergeant in the
8th Connecticut Infantry, was killed at Antietam on Sept. 17, 1862.
Like many women in Connecticut in September 1862, Sarah Hyde anxiously awaited news from a terrible battle in Sharpsburg, Md., more than 400 miles away.
Large, bold headlines about an awful battle
in Sharpsburg, Md. three days earlier
jumped off the front page of the Hartford Courant on Sept. 20, 1862.
The second youngest of six children of Reverend Nehemiah and Rebecca Hyde of Canterbury, a small town about 50 miles east of Hartford, 21-year-old Sarah was engaged to a soldier from nearby Griswold. Charles E. Lewis, the 25-year-old son of Jedediah and Clarissa Lewis, was an apprentice carriage maker in 1860 and perhaps had many dealings with the reverend, a wagon maker by trade.
Before marrying, Charles, like many of his peers, heeded the call of his nation, enlisting in the Union army on Sept. 9, 1861. Lewis served with the 8th Connecticut Infantry during the Burnside Expedition in North Carolina, fighting in a battle near New Bern, N.C., on March 14 before the regiment was assigned to the Army of the Potomac in early July.
Antietam dwarfed any previous battle for the men of the 8th Connecticut, who as part of the Union left flank crossed Antietam Creek, marched through the 40-Acre Cornfield and then, unsupported, were overwhelmed on three sides and pushed back on the outskirts of Sharpsburg.
Lewis was listed as a carriage maker apprentice from Griswold, Conn., in the 1860 U.S. census.
"The wounded prop themselves behind the rude stone fence," a post-war account of the 8th Connecticut's fight at Antietam noted, "and hurl leaden vengeance at the foe. Even the chaplain snatches the rifle and cartridge box from a dead man, and fights for his life." Among those killed in the confusing fight was Lewis, who "had always fought in the front ranks of the Eighth."
Sergeant Charles Lewis' Civil War memorial
stone in Carey Cemetery in Canterbury, Conn.
I believe he is buried beneath a gravestone
behind this marker.
On Sept. 23, 1862, the Hartford Courant printed a long list of Antietam casualties from the 8th, 11th, 14th and 16th Connecticut regiments. How Sarah received the news about her fiance is not known, but she was "sickened upon hearing his death" and soon fell into a depression. On Oct. 16, 1862—almost a month to the day after Charles was killed—she also died, perhaps of a broken heart.
Three days later, two funerals were held at Canterbury's Carey Cemetery, not far from the center of town. Charles Lewis, his body likely recovered from the battlefield by his family, was laid to rest in a family plot. Immediately to the right of his final resting place is the grave of his fiancee, Sarah Hyde, described by the Courant as "a bright girl of twenty-one."
"They had been brought up together in life, in death they were not divided," the newspaper reported, "and together they sleep the last sleep."
Similar scenes played out thoroughout Connecticut as bodies flowed into the state in late September and October 1862 in the aftermath of Antietam. Funerals in towns from Lebanon to New Britain to Middletown and Rockvillle and elsewhere were commonplace.
"It is seldom that we are called upon to bury so many braves in so short a space of time," the Courant reported nearly a month after the battle.
Closeups of the well-worn gravestones of Charles Lewis (left) and Sarah Hyde. Although difficult to read, Lewis' date and place of death can still be read near the bottom of his tombstone. Sarah died Oct. 16, 1862, almost a month after Lewis was killed at Antietam.
Here are snapshots of funeral coverage and more from Hartford newspapers in the aftermath of Antietam:
Sept. 24:Yesterday was a day of sorrow, not only for Middletown (where the funeral took place), but for the whole State. One of Connecticut's bravest heroe's was consigned to the grave. Brig. General Joseph F. K. Mansfield, killed at the battle of Sharpsburg, and his body having been brought to Middletown, his native place, the funeral was announced for yesterday at 2 1/2 o'clock. Business in the town was generally suspended, and the stores and dwellings along the route of the procession were beautifully draped in mourning. On every side the National colors, draped in crape, met the eye. Across the main street hung in several places the American flag, also shrouded in black. Emblems of sorrow were seen in all directions."
Wadsworth A. Washburn's grave in tiny Denison Cemetery
in Berlin, Conn. Washburn, an orderly sergeant in the
16th Connecticut, was killed at Antietam. His father
retrieved his body from the battlefield.
Oct. 4:"Serg't E. A. Parmele -- The body of this much lamented young man, killed at the battle of Antietam, arrived in this city on Wednesday, and was temporarily placed in the receiving tomb of Spring Grove Cemetery. When found, the body was wrapt in the shelter tent in which he last slept. The funeral will take place at 11 o'clock to-day from his father's residence, No. 6 Chestnut street, after which the remains will be taken to Meriden for interment."
Oct. 13:"Three bodies of soldiers killed in battle, belonging to Rockville, arrived yesterday morning on the boat. We were unable to obtain their names. ... Their friends have the satisfaction of knowing that they have the sympathies of the city with them, and that their loved ones died in a glorious cause."
Oct. 13:"Rev. Mr. Washburn, of Berlin, having returned from the battle-field of Antietam with the remains of his son, Orderly Sergeant Wadsworth A. Washburn, of Co. G 16th regiment, C.V. Funeral services will be attended in the Congregational Church in Berlin, on Monday, (to-day) at 2 o'clock, P.M."
Oct. 27:"Never before have the citizens of Coventry been called upon to perform a more painful duty than they were last Thursday in cosigning the remains of Geo. W Corbit and Samuel L. Talcott, to their last resting-place. There two victims of this accursed rebellion were members of Co. D, 14th Reg't, and were wounded at the battle of Antietam, and after lingering some four weeks amid great pain and suffering have since died ... After the services the congregation viewed the remains, and the sad procession slowly wended its way to the cemetery. The flag draped in black was borne by the members of the Sunday School Class of Talcott, to whom he was strongly attached. Both of these young men were universally esteemed, and when the last call for troops was made, they manfully enlisted for the conflict."
Nov. 18:It is hardly two weeks since the citizens of Coventry performed the last sad duty of laying "neath the turf" the remains of George N. Corbit and Samuel L. Talcott, yet hardly had the sun of a fortnight set behind the western horizon, or the dread echoes of the rumbling hearse died away in the distance, than they were again called upon to perform a similar duty, and bear to his last resting place the remains of Henry Talcott, a brother and comrade of the above, and with them a victim of that blood-red field, Antietam. Finding his wound to be of too serious a nature to admit further service in the rank and file of our army, should he recover, when the remains of his fallen brother were started homeward, he obtained his discharge and came thither to seek his kindred and friends, and among the hills of his native town to recruit his fast wasting frame. But alas! his anticipations were not realized; he reached home only to breath his last, while near and dear friends tenderly watched beside him, and last Wednesday he was laid by the companions of his early days, beside his brother in the "city of the dead."
George Corbit, 25, and brothers Samuel, 20, and Henry Talcott, 26, were privates in Company D of the 14th Connecticut from Coventry. Henry was wounded when an artillery shell burst near a wall in the lane leading up to William Roulette's farmhouse, wounding three other men and killing three in his company. (4)
The death of second son was a huge blow for the Talcott brothers' parents, Erastus and Aurelia.
"Yet let us not dispair," the Courant noted in the Nov. 18, 1862 article, "the sun of Liberty will yet dawn, and its golden beams will yet shine with dazzling splendor o'er new made graves, and future generations will remember with pride those who have fallen in their country's behalf."
The brothers are buried next to each other in Center Cemetery in Coventry. Corbit also is buried there, 20 yards from the Talcotts.
The graves of the Talcott brothers, Samuel and Henry, and George Corbit are in
Center Cemetery in Coventry, Conn. Privates in Company D of the 14th Connecticut,
they died of wounds received at Antietam.
Center Cemetery in Coventry, Conn.
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Edwin R. Lee, killed at New Bern, N.C. on March 14, 1862, is buried in Riverside Cemetery, near the Farmington River, in Barkhamsted, Conn.
Worn by the elements, the words carved on Edwin Ruthven Lee's brownstone memorial still resonate nearly 150 years after he was laid to rest with military honors in Riverside Cemetery in tiny Barkhamsted, Conn.
"His last words were Go on for your Country.
"He died that his country might live."
Brothers Edwin and Henry Lee were killed during the Civil War. Edwin was never married. Henry left behind a wife and four children. (Photos from John Lee of Hartford Co. and His Descendants)
A captain in the 11th Connecticut Infantry, Lee was just 28 years old when he was killed in battle at New Bern, N.C. on March, 14, 1862. His body was buried near the battlefield and eventually brought back north for burial.
A little more than two years later, Edwin's oldest brother, Henry Bryan Lee, suffered the same fate. A 37-year-old lieutenant in the 7th Connecticut Infantry, Henry was mortally wounded at the Battle of Deep Run (also called Deep Bottom), near Richmond, on Aug. 16, 1864. Although his name and place and date of death are carved on the side of his brother's grave marker, Henry isn't buried next to Edwin. His final resting place is in Virginia in a grave marked "Unknown," the sad fate of many Civil War soldiers.
The deaths of the Lee brothers is another reminder of the immense toll the war took on some Connecticut families. During the past two years, I have found four western Connecticut families who lost multiple members during the Civil War. Three Wadhams brothers died in battle in Virginia in the summer 1864. Elijah Bacon, awarded the Medal of Honor for capturing a flag at Gettysburg, was killed in battle at the Wilderness, and his brother, Andrew, died in a prisoner-of-war camp in South Carolina. Brothers Alvin and George Flint, as well as their father, Alvin Sr., also died in service to their country.
I often pass by the Lee brothers' 10-foot marker, a stone's throw from the Farmington River, during bike rides along scenic River Road near People's State Forest. Until today, I knew little about them. Here's some of what I have uncovered:
Edwin Lee, described as a "young man of a clear head and earnest convictions," was a supporter of Abraham Lincoln, often making speeches for the Republican candidate during the 1860 presidential campaign. (1) Inspired by the Union cause, Edwin raised a company of men, enlisted from Hartford as a captain in the 11th Connecticut on Sept. 27, 1861, and was commissioned into Company D two months later. One of three brothers who served in the Union army (another brother was rejected as unfit to serve because of a disability), Edwin was a rifle maker before the war. (2) He was employed at the Colt Armory and Sharps Rifle Company in Hartford, both of which supplied a large number of small arms to the Union army during the war. (3)
After drilling in Hartford, Lee and his comrades headed for New York, where the 11th Connecticut left by steamer on Dec. 17, 1861, bound for Annapolis, Md. In early January, the 11th broke camp and eventually made its way to North Carolina as part of Gen. Ambrose Burnside's Expedition.
Edwin Lee's occupation was listed a rifle maker on the 1860 U.S. census.
In early March, the 11th Connecticut moved from Roanoke Island to take part in an attack near New Bern, an important link in the Confederate supply chain and thus a key military target. In helping overwhelm the poorly trained and hugely outnumbered rebels, the 11th Connecticut suffered 14 wounded and six men killed.
"It was a sickening sight that met us, dead horses, mangled men, broken cannons, knapsacks and guns were slung in every direction," an officer in the 11th Connecticut wrote of the battle's aftermath.
Among the dead was Captain Edwin R. Lee, struck in the abdomen by a shell that also killed five other men. Lee, just 44 days short of his 29th birthday, died shortly after being wounded as he was leading a company into line. "Tell my brother I died at the post of duty," he said shortly after suffering the mortal wound. "Good-by. Go on for your country!" (4)
Edwin Lee (upper right) was listed as killed in action at New Bern in the Hartford Courant on March 20, 1862.
A day after the battle, Lee was buried on the bank of the Neuse River. Because he was an officer, Lee's body probably was handled with care and eventually shipped back north, perhaps at the army's expense, for burial. "I was conversing with him the morning of the battle," Henry Roger Jones of New Hartford, a sergeant in the 8th Connecticut, wrote after the war. "He was killed about 9 o'clock a.m. ... He was a young man of talent, and a gallant soldier." (5)
Like his brother Edwin, Henry apparently also was well regarded by his comrades. A machinist who resided in Derby, Conn, about 45 miles southeast of Hartford, Henry was described as a "brave, faithful, uncomplaining soldier" and an "honest, conscientious, devoted patriot." (5) Henry, who enlisted as a sergeant on Sept. 9, 1861, was married to a woman from Massachusetts. He and wife Arre Ann had four young children under 10 years old at the start of the war in April 1861: Ellen, 7; Emma, 4; Charles, 2; and Maria, 2 months. (Another child, Henry, died shortly after he was born in March 1853.) (6)
Against his brother's wishes, Henry Lee re-enlisted in the army in 1864
When Henry's enlistment was up in 1864, William Wallace Lee, the brother who was rejected for service in the 2nd Connecticut Artillery because of a disability, urged him to stay at home with his young family. But Henry re-enlisted anyway and was promoted to Second Lieutenant on March 1, 1864.
"I will fight the enemies of my country while I live," Henry replied to William. "I'll see the end of this, or it shall see the end of me." (7)
Henry B. Lee, a lieutenant in the 7th Connecticut, died at Deep Run, Va., on Aug. 16, 1864.
The 7th Connecticut served in South Carolina, Georgia and Florida from April 1862 to late February 1864 before being moved to Virginia in May 1864. Believing he could end the siege of Petersburg and Richmond, General Ulysses Grant concentrated his forces, including the 7th Connecticut, on Rebel entrenchments near the James River beginning Aug. 13, 1864.
Three days later, Henry B. Lee, the father of four young children, was mortally wounded in another assault on Confederate entrenchments in the Battle of Deep Run. The eldest Lee brother died in enemy hands as the Union army hastily retreated, and was buried on the battlefield. (8). Henry was later reburied in Fort Harrison National Cemetery, near Richmond, where his body lies with many other Union soldiers whose tombstones are marked "Unknown." (9)
Two Grand Army of the Republic markers and two American flags adorn the gravesite of
Edwin R. Lee, a captain in the 11th Connecticut. The fate of Lee's brother, Henry, is also
carved into this brownstone memorial in Barkhamsted, Conn., but he is buried elsewhere.
