Revealing 'secrets' in a South Carolina cemetery photograph

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At first glance, this photograph of a small Southern cemetery appears unremarkable. A picket fence encloses the grounds, which hold at least 11 graves. Words can be seen on the headboard to the left in the back row, though they are indecipherable. A large tree branch juts into view, perhaps concealing other graves beyond. In the right background, freshly turned earth suggests that three of the burials are recent. Weeds choke the plots, evidence that maintenance was never a priority.

Timothy O'Sullivan captured the scene in South Carolina in 1862. The glass-plate image now resides in the Library of Congress,  which makes high-resolution digitized versions of Civil War photographs freely available on its excellent website. The negative sleeve for the original plate bears the caption: “Graves of Sailors Killed at Bombardment Hilton Head, S.C. Nov. 1861.”

The Library of Congress lists the photograph’s creation date as “1861 Nov.,” but that cannot be correct— one of the headboards clearly records a death in 1862. O’Sullivan took other photographs at Hilton Head in April 1862, the most likely time frame for this image.

Explore the high-resolution scan, and the cemetery begins to yield its "secrets."

U.S.S. Wabash

... A closer look at the large wooden headboard in the left background reveals the grave of Thomas Jackson, a coxswain aboard the flagship U.S.S. Wabash. Jackson met a gruesome end during the Union Navy’s assault on Port Royal Sound, South Carolina, on November 7, 1861, when the Wabash—a powerful steam frigate—came under fire from the Confederate batteries at Forts Beauregard and Walker. A “huge shot” shattered his leg, leaving it “dangling by a mere shred of quivering flesh and skin.” Perhaps in shock, Jackson tried to amputate the limb himself with a knife before shipmates rushed to his aid.

Lacking cannons of sufficient caliber and range to repel the assault, the Confederates were quickly overwhelmed and forced to abandon the forts, enabling the Union to tighten its blockade along the South Carolina coast. Casualties on both sides were relatively light: the Union Navy reported at least six killed and 20 wounded, while 11 Confederates were killed and forty-seven wounded within the forts.

“Rapidly he sunk away,” recorded an 1865 account of Jackson’s death in The Soldier's Casket, “and at last, with a short sigh, died.” Jackson was reportedly buried by his messmates only hours later and may have been reinterred afterward in the cemetery at Hilton Head, South Carolina. It remains unknown whether his remains were later disinterred and reburied nearby in Beaufort National Cemetery, established in 1863 as the final resting place for more than 7,500 Union servicemen — many of them unidentified. No record of Thomas Jackson appears there.

Here's the full account of Jackson's death in The Soldier's Casket: 

A 43-year-old seaman from Delaware, George W. Collins enlisted in the Union Navy in Philadelphia on Aug. 24, 1861. According to his enlistment record, he stood 5-foot-6, with blue eyes, brown hair and a fair complexion. His occupation was listed as carpenter. In the 1860 U.S. Census, however, Collins was identified as a “waterman,” living in Little Duck Hundred, Kent County, with his wife and two daughters, Lucy and Mary. At least four other individuals — whose relationship to the family remains unclear — also lived in the household.

Collins had blue eyes, brown hair and a fair complexion, according to this enlistment document.
CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE

In the 1860 census, George Collins' occupation was listed as waterman.
(Enlistment and census documents from fold3.com)

In March 1862, Collins and several other sailors from the U.S.S. Susquehanna were ordered to conduct scouting missions along two South Carolina rivers. On March 22, their party came under fire from Confederate pickets, who were quickly dispersed by a howitzer. Later that night, however, when the sailors went ashore at the junction of Pull-and-be-Damned Creek and the Cooper River, they were mistakenly fired upon by Union pickets. One of the shots struck Collins, killing him instantly—an act described by a a Union officer wrote in his report as one of “culpable carelessness.”

That spring, Collins’s body was brought back to Hilton Head. When his grave marker appeared in O’Sullivan’s photograph, it was already partially obscured by weeds.

... An enlargement of the tall headboard beside Collins’ marker reveals the words “Sacred to the Memory of” and “Killed on Board.” However, the sailor’s name, his vessel and the date of his death are too faint to read, preventing a positive identification. Was he among those killed the night Thomas Jackson died? If so, we may yet be able to pinpoint his name. For now, though, his identity remains a mystery.. ...

UPDATE: Eagle-eyed friend of the blog Craig Heberton, a board member of the Center for The Civil War Photography, provides a possible on this grave marker:

The marker which stumped you appears to read "W.H. FitzHue (FitzHugh)," who died "aged 23 years" onboard the "U.S.S. Pawnee." An account: "There were eight reported Union casualties in the successful naval effort to take Port Royal, South Carolina on November 7, 1861. Eight sailors died from wounds suffered during the four-hour bombardment of Confederate-held Forts Beauregard (on St. Helena) and Walker (on Hilton Head), which guarded the entrance to Port Royal harbor. One of those sailors was William H. Fitzhugh, a 1st-class boy on board the USS Pawnee. An enemy shell struck the ship and exploded at the waterline killing ordinary seaman John Kelly instantly. Splinters from the impact shattered Fitzhugh’s right leg. To save him, the surgeon amputated his leg, but Fitzhugh died later that evening probably never knowing of the Union victory that he participated in that day. He was buried with full military honors at Bay Point the next day with the other seven men killed in battle. William Fitzhugh was a contraband of war, that is, a recently, self-emancipated slave who found his way to the Union line in Virginia and enlisted in the Navy. Fitzhugh may be the first black casualty for the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron but he was in no way unique in his naval service."

... In another enlargement of the original O'Sullivan image, this man, dressed in a suit coat and wearing what appears to be a slouch hat, stands by two grave markers. Perhaps he was the cemetery caretaker or maybe someone who just came to pay his respects to Union sailors buried there.

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SOURCES

• Barratt, Peter, Circle of Fire: The Story of the USS Susquehanna in the War of the Rebellion, Columbiad Press, 2004, Page 97
• Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, vol. 12 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1902), 264.