'Silent grief at work': Deaths of 16th Connecticut brothers

16th Connecticut Sergeant William Levaughn of Rocky Hill died in Andersonville.
(Connecticut State Library)

While imprisoned with his younger brother in Andersonville, Roland LeVaughn, a 24-year-old sergeant in the 16th Connecticut from Rocky Hill, was made responsible by the Rebels for distributing meager rations to about 90 men. He deftly accomplished the task, “keeping the men satisfied with his management even in the hungriest of days,” according to another 16th Connecticut soldier.

Like Roland, William LeVaughn also had languished at Andersonville since early May 1864. On September 5, 1864, the twenty-one-year-old sergeant in the 16th Connecticut died of dysentery.

“I was aroused from my sleep by one of the boys, who gave me the sad news that Orderly Sgt. L, of Co. C, was dead,” recalled 16th Connecticut Sgt. Robert Kellogg, who was also asked to break the news to Roland. “It was a hard task to go and do this, but I did it. Elder Shepherd conducted a very touching and beautiful funeral service over the body before it was carried out.” Roland attended, saying little.

“We all knew that silent grief was at work,” Kellogg recalled, “and we deeply sympathized with him.”

Moved from Andersonville to a camp in Charleston, South Carolina, Roland died there on September 22, 1864.

16th Connecticut Sergeant Roland Levaughn survived Andersonville but died in
 another Rebel camp. (Connecticut State Library)

SOURCES

“Military and Biographical Data of the 16th Connecticut Volunteers,” George Q. Whitney Papers, RG 69:23, Boxe 8, CSL, Hartford. Conn.

Kellogg, Robert, Life and Death in Rebel Prisons, Hartford, CT: L. Stebbins, 1865, Page 239.