For $45, did Georgia collector purchase Antietam history?

The photo of a Connecticut soldier bears a striking resemblance to 11th Connecticut Capt. John Griswold,
shown in an illustration from a book published in 1868. Griswold was mortally wounded at Antietam.
(Robert Wayne Elliott collection | Right: The Military and Civil History of Connecticut, The War of 1861-65)

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A war-time photograph of 11th Connecticut Captain John Griswold, object of my nearly decade-long search, finally may have surfaced. Unsurprisingly, the purported image of the officer mortally wounded at Antietam popped up on social media -- on Facebook's Civil War Faces page -- on Monday afternoon.

(Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg. Now about those political ads.)

Carte-de-visite, probably John Griswold, won on an eBay auction.
(Robert Wayne Elliott collection)

Robert Wayne Elliott, a 71-year-old retired commercial pest control account manager from Grayson, Ga., recently submitted the winning bid on eBay for a war-time carte-de-visite of a Connecticut soldier. Elliott, who believed before he bid that the image was Griswold, figured the CDV would go for perhaps $500 if someone connected it to a soldier who was killed at Antietam. His winning bid: $45.

The eBay seller, Elliott told me, said the image came from an album of 11th and 16th Connecticut soldiers, two of the four regiments from the state that fought at Antietam. Elliott's detective work included a visit to this 2011 post on Griswold on my blog. He compared the CDV to an illiustration of Griswold, which originally appeared in this 1868 book on Connecticut's Civil War role.

"I believe, without a doubt, this is Griswold," Elliott said.

Although not definitive proof, the illustration bears a strong resemblance to the soldier in Elliott's CDV, which has a backmark of a Hartford photographer. The 11th Connecticut organized in Hartford in late October 1861.

Elliott, a Civil War-era photograph collector since 1999, owns only has a handful of Union images. The Georgia native, whose ancestors fought for the 42nd Georgia, collects mostly Confederate photographs. Among his collection is a beautiful, post-war painting of 20th Georgia Lieutenant Arthur C. Ford, who was severely wounded at Burnside Bridge. Perhaps Ford, a dentist as a civilian, was among the Georgians who fired on Griswold from the bluffs along Antietam Creek.

       The 11th Connecticut attacked from right to left across this field on Sept. 17, 1862.
   Antietam Creek is at left, behind trees. (Click at upper right for full-screen experience.)

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View John Griswold may have had of Burnside Bridge on  morning of Sept. 17, 1862.

               PANORAMA: Confederates' view of Burnside Bridge and Antietam Creek. 
                                     (Click at upper right for full-screen experience.)     

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My interest in Griswold began in 2011, when I first came across his heart-rending story.

The 11th Connecticut had been ordered to storm Rohrbach Bridge (Burnside Bridge) and the Confederate position beyond on the morning of Sept. 17, 1862. Impatient, Griswold, a 25-year-old captain from Lyme, Conn., boldly led a group of skirmishers across the 4-foot deep creek.

It was a deadly move.

Backmark on Elliott's
CDV.

"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."

In an account written decades after the war, 11th Connecticut veteran Philo Pearce wrote:

"Our Capt. John Griswold was a brave man and jumped over the fence saying ‘come on boys!’ I, with some others, did jump. As we did, we got a volley of shots from the Rebel line. I had a ball cut through the top of my left side but did not cut the flesh. I fell into the road ditch where it had been plowed and scraped. This surely saved my scalp. Now it was time to do our duty. Capt. Griswold was hit and he rushed into the creek and kept plunging ahead until he got across. He shouted for us to come and get him but we had our hands full."

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Mayer claimed he summoned four privates, and together they forded the creek and climbed a fence while under fire to reach Griswold. The men carried the blood-soaked captain to a nearby small shed, Mayer wrote, where the surgeon from Hartford gave his "ashly pale" friend morphine to ease his pain. Griswold died the next day, probably on the Henry Rohrbach farm, a IX Corps hospital.

When I lived in Connecticut, I visited Griswold's gravestone in a small, private cemetery cemetery in Old Lyme. The ornately carved marker is a work of art. And during many visits to Antietam over the years, I've walked in Griswold's footsteps, wondering about the remarkable courage the captain summoned on Sept. 17, 1862.

Elliott has visited Antietam three times. His most recent trip, in 2016, was especially eventful.

"I stepped up on Burnside Bridge with my camera to take some shots," he said. "Then I stepped backwards and fell off bridge flat on my back and literally knocked myself out. ... A group of school kids there said, 'Oh, my gosh. Is he OK?'"

Back in Georgia two days later, Elliott was in pain from the fall. By the third day, he said, "I thought I was dying." Thankfully, good meds and rest saved him.

And, thankfully, a descendant of Rebel soldiers may have saved an image of a Connecticut Yankee. Keeping history alive is what it's all about.

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.

A post-war painting of 20th Georgia Lieutenant Arthur C. Ford, who was severely wounded
in the right side during the fighting at Burnside Bridge on Sept. 17, 1862. Did he fire on John Griswold?
(Robert Wayne Elliott collection)

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SOURCES

--Hartford Courant, Oct. 6, 1862, Page 2

Letter from Sharpsburg: 'Buried him with my own hands'

The off-the-beaten path 11th Connecticut monument near Burnside Bridge.

       The 11th Connecticut attacked from right to left across this field on Sept. 17, 1862.
                                      (Click at upper right for full-screen experience.)


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During visits to Antietam, I always stop at Burnside Bridge early in the morning, perhaps the best time and place to contemplate the slaughter that took place in western Maryland long ago. I’ll touch the witness tree feet from the bridge, stare at the long-ago site of Yankee graves along the stone wall and marvel at mist hovering over Antietam Creek. Occasionally, I’ll walk about 150 yards or so, usually through tall grass, to visit the out-of-the-way 11th Connecticut monument.

No one’s ever around, so I’ll linger and read the names on the gray-granite monument, often running my fingers over the inscriptions of those who sacrificed their lives for the Union. Their stories I know so well.

Daniel Tarbox, 11th Connecticut
private, was mortally wounded
at Antietam. He was 18.
(Image courtesy Scott Hann)

• Captain John Griswold, from Old Lyme and the grandson of a Connecticut governor, was mortally wounded as he splashed across the creek in a hail of gunfire on the morning of Sept. 17, 1862. "I die as I have ever wished to die, for my country," he told IX Corps commander Ambrose Burnside shortly before his death.
• Private Daniel Tarbox, an 18-year-old private from Brooklyn, Conn., was shot through the bowels during the attack on the bridge. He died the next day in nearby Middletown, Md. In anticipation of fighting, he had written his father two weeks earlier, "If we go in, we can’t think of coming out."
• Private Fennimore Weeks, from Norwalk, lived a few moments after he was shot through the head. "His effects I will send to you as soon as I have an opportunity and will write you more of the particulars," his captain wrote the soldier's mother.
• And Private William Hall, from Mansfield, also killed in fighting at the bridge. More than 150 years later, the 17-year-old soldier's descendant cleaned his begrimed marker in a rural cemetery in Connecticut.  

And now a poignant letter -- auctioned on eBay -- has surfaced revealing how another soldier in the regiment died at what the 11th Connecticut hospital steward called "the creek of death." In the three-page letter to his brother Charles, written four days after the battle, a shaken George L. Dayton, an 11th Connecticut private, quickly got to the point.

"He is dead," he wrote about their brother Lewis, who was shot through the heart in the charge on the stone-arch bridge. The next day, George wrapped Lewis' body in "4 or 5 blankets" and buried the 11th Connecticut private where he fell.

Uninjured physically, George Dayton certainly suffered mental scars from the battle, perhaps lasting a lifetime. "I am unwell and about crazy," he concluded his letter, "so I will not write any more now."

Lewis, from Winchester, Conn., is buried in an unknown grave, but some believe his spirit may linger near the 11th Connecticut monument.

(Letter posted with permission of eBay seller.)

Sept. 21, 1862
Sharpsburg, Md.

Dear Brother Charles

I received your letter directed to Lewis whitch came to late for him ever to read, he is dead.

It is terrible news, but it is true. He was shot while we were making a charge on the rebels at Sharpsburg in the northwestern part of Maryland on the 17th of Sept. He was shot though the heart and fell saying I am killed ,,,

(Letter posted with permission of  eBay seller)

We were obliged to leave the ground where he fell and when we found him the next day the rebels had taken everything from his pockets.

I dug his grave and buried him with my own hands in the field where he fell after wrapping him in 4  or 5 blankets.

We have been in 4 of 5 skirmishes and battles lately and our regt. is terribly cut to pieces. Also the 8th Conn. and 16th [Conn.]. Our regt. lost about 50 killed and 200 wounded on the 17th of Sept. I escaped without a wound. We have driven Stonewall Jackson across the ...

(Letter posted with permission of eBay seller.)

... Potomac and I suppose we are to follow him. Their is no telling when or how this war will end.

I am unwell and about crazy so I will not write any more now.

Yours,

George L. Dayton.

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Teen's Antietam: Close calls, slumber on amputated limbs

11th Connecticut Private Philo S. Pearce survived the Battle of Antietam and the war.
(Hayes Research Library, Fremont, Ohio via Dan Masters)

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Nothing could have prepared 18-year-old Philo Stevens Pearce for the harrowing sights and sounds of Sept. 17, 1862.

Before an attack at Rohrbach Bridge, the 11th Connecticut private narrowly dodged a colonel's falling horse, victim of shrapnel from a Confederate artillery shell. "I can say it took some nerve to keep cool," he wrote decades later in his war memoir, "as shells were bursting all around us."

When Pearce and other skirmishers in companies A and B advanced through a cornfield near Antietam Creek, they happened upon an unusual sight: horns and other instruments left behind by a Rebel brass band that had skedaddled.

Then  the "fun commenced" about 10 a.m.

11th Connecticut Captain John Griswold
was mortally wounded near
the Rohrbach Bridge, commonly
known today as Burnside Bridge.

"Come on, boys!" 11th Connecticut Captain John Griswold shouted as he urged his Nutmeggers to plunge across Antietam Creek with him. 

On the bluff above the stone-arch bridge, Georgians poured hot lead into the 25-year-old officer and other skirmishers. Clipped in the left side by a bullet, Pearce dived into a ditch, avoiding a more serious wound -- or worse. "This," he recalled, "surely saved my scalp."

Severely wounded, Griswold — grandson of a Connecticut governor — somehow made it to the opposite bank. Firing all 60 of his rounds in his breech-loading Sharps rifle, Pearce borrowed more from a wounded comrade. 

"I fired so fast," he remembered, "that my rifle got hot and I had to pour water on it to cool it."

After the Rebels retreated from the bluff, Pearce and two other soldiers scrambled to the other bank, scooped up Griswold and carried the mortally wounded captain to a nearby field hospital — probably on the Henry Rohrbach farm. But Pearce's battle was far from over.

Ordered by a surgeon to aid with an amputation, the teenr administered chloroform to a severely wounded soldier. Then the surgeon quickly sawed off an arm and a leg, and the limbs were gruesomely tossed through an open window.

"I kept on holding chloroform for a few more," Pearce remembered. "I began to get dizzy from the effect. I staggered outside and when I came to my senses, I was laying on arms and legs.

"This was enough for me around there."

PHILO PEARCE'S 1925 ANTIETAM REMEMBRANCE

Post-battle image of Burnside Bridge by Alexander Gardner taken n 1862. In his 1925 memoir, 
11th Connecticut Private Philo Pearce writes he was one of three soldiers to carry mortally wounded 
11th Connecticut Captain John Griswold from the far bank after he was mortally wounded. 
(Library of Congress)

Account of Private Philo Stevens Pearce, Co. A, 11th Connecticut Volunteer Infantry of the Battle of Antietam: 

The battle of Antietam was fought September 17, 1862. On the day before, our army was marched into a large field probably one half mile in the rear from where the Rebel line was waiting for us across the creek. We all lay down on our arms that night. Some of the boys were detailed to fill canteens with water. They went to a house on a ridge beyond us to get water from a well. This house was between the two lines. The boys found the Rebels were after water, too. No one was armed. They agreed not to hurt each other. They got into quite a chat and the Rebels said, “We’uns won’t fight you now, but wait until morning and then we’uns will clean you’ns out!”

The boys returned back to us and reported it to the officers, who were fools to go with a squad of men and arrest a few of their men. Of course the Rebels reported this to their men. In a short time, a battery of Rebels opened fire on us, but being dark they couldn’t quite tell where we were. They had range so their shells caused some excitement. We were close together, but our side did not reply. Soon they quit firing but we well knew what would come in the morning. When we received our arms after being mustered into U.S. service in Hartford, Conn., our Co. A and B were presented by the people with Sharps’ breech loading rifles, while other companies had red Springfield rifles. Companies A and B most always were put on the head skirmish line.

On the morning of September 17th, we ate our hardtack without any coffee and were soon called to order. We were on the move, getting the lines formed for an advance, on the ridge above the creek. The Rebel battery got a range on us. Soon our batteries were swung into position and the artillery duel commenced. While our colonel was getting us into line and was on his horse, a shell from the Rebels broke and a piece struck his horse. As the horse fell, I had to dodge to keep it from falling on me. The colonel was not hurt and was soon on his feet, calling us to keep cool. I can say it took some nerve to keep cool as shells were bursting all around us.

       The 11th Connecticut attacked from right to left across this field on Sept. 17, 1862.
                                      (Click at upper right for full-screen experience.)

We were soon ordered forward. Cos. A and B as usual were put on the skirmish line ahead of the battle line.  We deployed in line, being about a rod apart and down the ridge toward the creek. Before we got to the creek, we came into a cornfield. This was quite a protection, but [it did] not last long. In this cornfield, we came upon a Rebel brass band who had run and left their horns and instruments laying on the ground. We came to the edge of the field where there was a rail fence along the road. The Rebel line was just across the creek from us. Now the ‘fun’ commenced.

I don’t think we were over 20 rods apart. Our Capt. John Griswold was a brave man and jumped over the fence saying ‘come on boys!’ I, with some others, did jump. As we did, we got a volley of shots from the Rebel line. I had a ball cut through the top of my left side but did not cut the flesh. I fell into the road ditch where it had been plowed and scraped. This surely saved my scalp. Now it was time to do our duty. Capt. Griswold was hit and he rushed into the creek and kept plunging ahead until he got across. He shouted for us to come and get him but we had our hands full. To say we worked well is putting it mildly. I fired every shot I had and Sgt. [Irving] Stevens, the man next to me, was hit through his left hand and couldn’t fire anymore. He shoved his cartridge box to me and said ‘I can’t fire anymore.’ I fired so fast that my rifle got hot and I had to pour water on it to cool it.

Georgians fired on the Union IX Corps
 from this position on the bluffs
above Antietam Creek.

I had a good view of their line across the creek on the ridge. Before our battle line got down, I had fired all my shells and what Sgt. Stevens had left. Each man had 60 rounds and all of our company who did not get over the fence fired all their shells. When the battle line came down, each one fell behind the fence. I lay in the ditch in the front as close as I could as the line was falling over me. This lasted until our men to the right charged the bridge with three charges. This forced the Rebel line back as our men kept crossing and driving the Rebels back. Our loss was heavy. Colonel [Henry] Kingsbury was killed, Lt. Col. [William] Moegling wounded and most all the staff officers killed or wounded.

After the bridge was taken, two men and myself waded the creek and brought Capt. Griswold back. He lived about an hour after we got him across. He gave his watch to the first one over who was Ira Taylor. The other one was Joe Mallory and myself. We carried him back to the hospital on the hill where he died.

The field was strewn with wounded. We had red stripes tied on our arms and were put to work taking care of the wounded. I carried water and helped the best I could. I was working on one of the worst wounded men who had one leg shattered and one arm broken. One of the surgeons ordered us to carry him to the hospital where they amputate. We laid him on the table where surgeons were working in great haste.  I held chloroform to his nose and mouth and soon they had one arm and one leg off, throwing the limbs out the window. As soon as this was done another man was laid on the table. I kept on holding chloroform for a few more. I began to get dizzy from the effect. I staggered outside and when I came to my senses, I was laying on arms and legs. This was enough for me around there.

I made a break back to find where our company was located. I had to pass over the field where our dead lay. Such a valley of death was enough to turn a man’s heart to stone. I could hardly step without stepping over a corpse. The field was literally strung with our dead. Two others and myself were pretty well exhausted and hungry for something to eat. I saw one of our dead soldiers had a knapsack with some coffee and hardtack, more than I had. I thought it was no more use to him. I took my knife and cut the strap, then taking it with me. We went down on the creek bank and made a fire to make some coffee. After eating, we had some strength and satisfied our hunger. Then we went to find our company. I found one of our boys’ rifles which I needed because I left mine on the bank when we carried our captain.

After he was wounded, 11th Connecticut Captain John Griswold was taken to "the hospital on 
the hill"  -- probably Henry Rohrbach's farm. Here are the Rohrbach farmhouse and barn.

When we found our company there were only 18 of the 75 going into action the morning before. The rest were killed, wounded, or missing. A sergeant took charge about 2 o’clock in the afternoon. We formed in line with some fresh troops who had not been engaged in the morning. The fresh ones were placed in advance and we were held in reserve to support them. The Rebel line had fallen back upon a ridge and formed their line again, throwing rail piles and whatever they could get for protection. They waited for us to advance. The green troops in front of us old troops -- all were ready.

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Lieutenant [Morris] Kraszynski took charge and said "Now boys, no man falls out to carry back the wounded. Plenty of men to the rear to do this." His language was broken, but he was a brave little officer. Our line was moving forward and our batteries opened fire on the Rebel line with shells cracking all around. We moved ahead on a double quick charge and were close to their heels. As we neared the top of the bridge, bullets were singing thick and sharp. We spotted a four foot wide woodpile in front of us and we were making for it. The first man shot was our lieutenant, struck through the rear part of his pants and hips. The first thing we heard was, ‘Oh my God, I’m shot! Two free men carry me back!’ Just about 10 minutes before, he cautioned us to fall out to carry men back. Some of the boys sang out, ‘You go to hell. Plenty of men to the rear to carry you back!’ We ran forward and covered ourselves behind the woodpile from which we could fire at the enemy with good advantage.

We didn’t remain there long as our boys were going forward at a double quick charge and we were following to support them. The new troops in front made a fine charge but they got impulsive so we had to hold them on our line. When they came back on us, we had a time to hold them and make them fall into our line. I know we had made good work of our guns to keep them from rushing over us. I can say a stampede like this is hard to keep men from pushing through anything. We held and made them get into our line.

Present-day image of Burnside Bridge, also known as Rohrbach Bridge.

The Rebels saw their chance and charged back on our line, thinking they could get our army routed and defeat us. Our batteries in position were waiting for the enemy. When we got in reach of our line, it was our time to make it hot for the Rebels. We broke their line, charged, and gained the rail piles from where they had started. We held them after they again formed but were repulsed and we gained our ground.

It was now getting towards evening and both sides were glad the bloody day was over. Such a sight as that field again where we fought in the forenoon. The field was filled with our men and Rebels. While we were behind the rail piles and the Rebels were making their last charge, in came our wild Irishman  Jim Conboy (of the shell incident). We were firing as fast as we could load and shoot and the bullets were coming over us like hail stones. Jim sang out, ‘Bejabers, hear those muskets sing!’ I can say they were singing but rather the bullets. This showed the grit of which Jim was made. This put us in, mad enough to give them our best licks.

Now evening closed on that bloody day of September 17, 1862. We laid down on our arms that night completely exhausted. Our loss was heavy and our regiment lost with about 250 killed, wounded, and missing.

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POSTSCRIPT: After the war, Pearce, from New Fairfield, Conn., lived in New York before he settled in Catawba Island, Ohio, where he married a woman named Ora Barnum, The couple had five children together. A prosperous farmer, he became one of the county's leading citizens. "His orchards are among the best cultivated and most productive," an account published in 1896 noted, "and by his sterling ability and amiable disposition he has won himself a host of friends."

At the request of "old friends," Pearce wrote the 36-page war memoir in 1925, when he was 80 or 81. A typescript copy of the memoir, believed to have never been published, was donated sometime in the 1980s to the Harris-Elmore Library in Elmore, Ohio. (Hat tip: Dan Masters.)

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Antietam panoramas: Burnside Bridge

                                            Click on image for full-screen panorama.

BURNSIDE BRIDGE (Confederate view): Here's an interactive panorama taken just steps to the left of a quarry  pit from which the rebels fired on the Federals attempting to cross the small stone-arch bridge. Confederate forces held off the Union IX Corps here for about three hours before retreating on Sept. 17, 1862. Capt. John Griswold of the 11th Connecticut led skirmishers across the creek just to the right of the bridge. Shot in the middle of the 4-foot deep stream, he staggered to the bank on the rebels' side. Surgeon Nathan Mayer and four privates rescued Griswold, carrying him to a nearby small shed. (The shed has long since been torn down.) The Lyme, Conn., officer died the next day from a bullet wound near the stomach. The Park Service has done terrific work here restoring this site to near its 1862 appearance.

                                               Click on image for full-screen panorama.

BURNSIDE BRIDGE (Union view):  As the 11th Connecticut fanned out here along Antietam Creek, aiming to pin down the rebels on the bluffs across the stream, it faced withering fire. "The air rang with whistling balls," an 1868 history of Connecticut's service during the war noted, "and the ground quaked with the hard breath of artillery." 11th Connecticut Pvt. Daniel Tarbox of Brooklyn, Conn., was mortally wounded in the attack, dying the next day.  (On this spot last spring, I read a portion of 18-year-old Daniel's final letter home to his father. You can watch that here.) Each time I visit Antietam, I am amazed by what the Confederates accomplished here. With a few hundred men, some firing from perches in the trees on the bluff, they held off the Union IX Corps for three hours, time their army sorely needed for A.P. Hill to bring up his boys from Harpers Ferry, about 17 miles away. The bluffs along Antietam Creek are not very imposing, but they were imposing enough that Wednesday for the Yankees.

Antietam: Captain John Griswold's grave a work of art

Capt. John Griswold's gravestone in Griswold Cemetery in Old Lyme, Conn.

The gravestone of 11th Connecticut Capt. John Griswold, mortally wounded at Antietam, is unquestionably one of the most beautiful markers for a soldier in the state. Thomas Adams carved the memorial in his Hartford studio at the corner of Market and Temple streets in 1863. The Hartford Courant raved about Adams' creation, advising "lovers of art to examine it" at Adams' establishment 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 reported on Aug. 5, 1863. "It is truly a finished production, giving evidence of the wonderful skill of the artist." I took these photos of Griswold's grave at Griswold Cemetery in Old Lyme, Conn., during a recent research trip. The captain is buried a few paces from the grave of his grandfather, Roger, who was governor of Connecticut from 1811-1812.

An inscription on the reverse of Griswold's gravestone notes that he "cheerfully gave his
young life, rich with health and strength, and adorned with all 
manly accomplishments, for his Country."

”

The inscription on the front of Griswold's gravestone notes that he was
"mortally wounded while gallantly leading his company" at Antietam.

Antietam: Where Connecticut soldiers met their demise

JARVIS BLINN, 14th CONNECTICUT CAPTAIN:
From New Britain, Conn., he was shot through the heart and died on William Roulette's farm.
The Roulette farmhouse is in the background. (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

In the fall, Central Connecticut State professor Matt Warshauer, co-chairperson of Connecticut's Civil War Commemoration Commission, his wife Wanda and I teamed to produce placards of the state's soldiers who were killed or mortally wounded at the Battle of Antietam. Perhaps you saw them staked in the ground at the Wickham Park encampment in Manchester in late September or at another Civil War event in the state. During a research visit to Antietam on Sunday, I remembered that I had a set of the placards in my car trunk, so I had an idea: How cool would it be to take each to the site on the battlefield where each soldier was killed or mortally wounded and photograph it?

As long as I removed the placards from the field when finished, the National Park Service had no problem with it. So Antietam battlefield guide Bill Sagle, an  ultra-enthusiastic student of the battle, and I traipsed the muddy field for three hours, gauging where each soldier met his demise and setting up the placards to photograph. Conditions were nearly perfect, with little wind and blue skies, for me to shoot images with my iPhone 4S.

I shot the photos of Captain Jarvis Blinn, Lieutenant George Crosby and Captain Jarvis Blinn in this post before I set off for the National Archives in Washington on Monday morning, just as the sun peeked through the clouds. If you're looking to honor Civil War soldiers in your town, you may wish to emulate the placard idea, a low-cost, low-tech  and educational initiative. I'll post the remainder of these Antietam images later this week.

GEORGE CROSBY, 14th CONNECTICUT LIEUTENANT:
From Middle Haddam, Conn., Crosby was mortally wounded on the William Roulette farm. He
had surgery in the Roulette spring house in the background. (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

JOHN GRISWOLD, 11th CONNECTICUT CAPTAIN:
From Old Lyme, Conn., he was mortally wounded while crossing Antietam Creek.
near Burnside Bridge. (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

FREDERICK BARBER: 16th CONNECTICUT CAPTAIN:
From Manchester, Conn., Barber was mortally wounded in the 40-acre Cornfield.
(CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE.)

Antietam: 11th Connecticut photo/video journal

11th Connecticut monument at Antietam. Thirty-six soldiers in the regiment were killed
in the battle, including Colonel Henry Kingsbury.

Close-up of reverse of the 11th Connecticut monument.

Daniel Tarbox was mortally wounded at Antietam.

His first name is listed incorrectly on the 11th Connecticut monument at Antietam, surely not the first time a soldier's name has been screwed up by the government. So to properly honor Daniel Tarbox at Connecticut Day on Saturday, I plan to read aloud his final letter home, a short note to his father that mentioned an imminent battle. (UPDATE: I read the letter Sunday.)

"If we go in," the private in the 11th Connecticut  wrote on Sept. 6, 1862, "we can't think of coming out. If I do fall, you take what money I have sent home and appropriate it to yourself as a present."

Eleven days later, Tarbox was mortally wounded near Burnside Bridge at Antietam. Only 18 years old, he died the next day.

Early this morning, I walked the ground young Daniel and his fellow soldiers fought on and visited the off-the-beaten path 11th Connecticut monument, approximately 150 yards southeast of Burnside Bridge. Daniel's name is listed as David near the bottom left corner, but there's no hope of correcting that, according to a Tarbox descendant.

Captain John Griswold and Corporal John Holwell, whose stories are told on my blog, also died near Burnside Bridge. A natural-born leader and a Yale graduate, Griswold was wounded in the middle of Antietam Creek as he led a group of 11th Connecticut skirmishers. After staggering to the opposite bank, he was rescued by four privates and a surgeon and carried to a small barn nearby.

"My first station was in a little barn by Antietam Creek," Surgeon Nathan Mayer wrote in a post-war account, "but the Rebel sharpshooters from behind the trees, across the creek, soon drove me out. There, however, I dressed Captain Griswold, shot through the belt and body fording the stream." (1)

Griswold died the next day.  "Tell my mother," the 25-year-old soldier from Lyme, Conn., said, "I died at the head of my company."

Holwell, in Company H of the 11th Connecticut, frequently wrote his wife back in Norwich, often mentioning his children. His young son, Eddy, apparently was his father's favorite.

Surgeon Nathan Mayer treated wounded
 soldiers at the Henry Rohrbach Farm.

"Your dagerreotype and the children's look very natural and I was very glad to receive them. ..." he wrote Rebecca Holwell. "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."

A Mexican War veteran, John Holwell was 42 years old when he was killed at Antietam. His gravesite is unknown.

Not far from the bridge is the Henry Rohrbach Farm, where many of the 11th Connecticut wounded -- including the beloved Colonel Henry Kingsbury -- were treated. Shot through the stomach and liver as he stepped from behind a tree, Kingsbury died the next day.

"Every room was soon filled (with wounded)," Mayer wrote of the Rohrbach farmhouse. "The barnyard and garden were crowded with wounded. And (I) should not have known where to place more." (2)

After his gruesome work was done that day, Mayer took advantage of the bounty of riches on the Rohrbach farm. "There were some 300 chickens and some calves about the place which the rebels had been too hurried to capture," he wrote. "And flour, and meal and bread." (3)

Connecticut Day visitors to Antietam will stop at the national cemetery, attend a short service at the church where soldiers from the state were treated and tour the battlefield. But I think the highlight of the day will be when descendants read aloud letters of their ancestors near the Visitors' Center. I'll share the best stories and photos later today.

(1) Reminescences of the Civil War, Nathan Mayer, M.D., Connecticut Historical Society Civil War Manuscripts Project.

(2) Ibid.

(3) Ibid.

Daniel Tarbox was mortally wounded approximately where the 'X' is in this photo I shot this morning.

Henry Rohrbach's barn was used as a field hospital during the Battle of Antietam.
Note the initials H.R. on the side of the brick barn wall.

Henry Rohrbach's farmhouse also was used as a field hospital.

Antietam: A grave(s) Connecticut outlook

 A collage of close-ups of the gravestones of soldiers buried in Connecticut who were killed or
mortally wounded at the Battle of Antietam.

Made of brownstone or marble and weathered by the elements for nearly 150 years, the gravestones of Connecticut soldiers killed or mortally wounded at Antietam often make for interesting photos. Some of these markers, such as the one for John Griswold at Griswold Cemetery in Old Lyme, Conn., are works of art. In fact, the Hartford Courant on Aug. 5, 1863 raved about the captain's memorial stone, advising "lovers of art to examine it" at Thomas 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," the newspaper gushed.

I am often struck by the craftsmanship of these gravestones, especially the ornate writing. I took the close-ups above at cemeteries throughout Connecticut during the past five months. My favorite is the one at the top for Samuel Willard, a 39-year-old captain from Madison who was killed during the 14th Connecticut's attack near Bloody Lane. Willard had embraced religion nine years before his death, and on the side of his gravestone is a moving excerpt from one of his final journal entries before he was killed Sept. 17, 1862.

 "My faith is in God if I die," it reads in part. "I die in the faith of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."

The side of the gravestone for Captain Samuel Willard of Company G of the 14th Connecticut
includes an excerpt from one of his final journal entries. Willard, 39 years old when he
was killed at Antietam, is buried at West Cemetery in Madison, Conn., near Long Island Sound.

---

MORE ON ANTIETAM: Read my extensive thread on the battle.

My top 10 Civil War posts of 2011

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.

6. Faces of the Civil War; Share your photos, stories (Dec. 10): Care to share a photo of one of your Civil War ancestors? I'd love to tell their story. I enjoyed making the collage of soldier photos.

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.

Faces of the Civil War: Captain John D. Griswold

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.

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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.

(1) Hartford Courant, Oct. 6, 1862, Page 2
(2) The Military and Civil History of Connecticut During the War of 1861-65, William Augustus Croffut, John Moses Morris 1869, Pages 280-81
(3) Edward Elbridge Salisbury, Family histories and genealogies. A series of genealogical and biographical monographs on the families of MacCurdy, Mitchell, Lord, Lynde, Digby, Newdigate, Hoo, Willoughby, Griswold, Wolcott, Pitkin, Page 12.
(4) Ibid
(5) The Military and Civil History of Connecticut During the War of 1861-65, William Augustus Croffut, John Moses Morris 1869, Pages 280-81

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.