150 Years Ago This Month
Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library
Wed, 02 Dec 2015 16:02:23 +0000
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Friday, 1865 December 22, Charlottesville, Albemarle County, Virginia: “As Brother James Fife may be Pastor of the Charlottesville African Church, it is Competent for him, when in his judgement advisable, to invite any Preacher of the Gospel, without regard to Colour”
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Wed, 02 Dec 2015 16:02:23 +0000
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[Eight months after the war’s end, an African-American Baptist church petitions its white parent church for the right to invite licensed black ministers as public guest speakers.]
Friday Evening, December 22, 1865 [excerpts from the clerk’s minute book]
Brother N. Rickman, being present, presented a petition from the Charlottesville African Church asking for certain purposes, the use of the basement of the Church building.
After much discussion the following resolution, covering part of the ground of the Petition, was adopted—
“That so long as Brother James Fife may be Pastor of the Charlottesville African Church, it is Competent for him, when in his judgement advisable, to invite any Preacher of the Gospel, without regard to Colour, to take such part in the public services as he, the pastor, may think proper.”
[Editor: Charlottesville Baptist Church (now First Baptist Church, Park Street), founded by the town’s white Baptists in 1831, was also home for the town’s largest antebellum black congregation, mostly slaves owned by local residents and University of Virginia faculty, staff and students; several free blacks were also baptized members. In April 1863 (fifteen weeks after Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation), after meeting among themselves, the church’s 800 black members (comprising the majority of the congregation), with the approval of a church committee of white males, petitioned and were granted permission to establish “an independent African Church” that first held services in the parent church’s basement, then later at Delevan Baptist, formerly the site of a Confederate hospital named Delevan).
James H. Fife (1793-1876), whose farm near the University of Virginia included a brick mansion, was one of the African Church’s first three white pastors who oversaw the church until William Gibbons (1826-1886), who later claimed to have been a slave lay preacher during the 1840s, was ordained in 1866 and served as First Baptist’s first black pastor until 1868. Gibbons was a former a slave of both a university student and an anatomy professor during the 1840s-1860s; his wife Isabella Gibbons (1833-1889), an enslaved cook for University faculty families during the same period, became town’s first local black teacher in 1866 at the Charlottesville Freedmen’s primary school, which later became the Jefferson School. After several years of worship at Delevan (which they had purchased in 1868), the black congregation had it torn down, purchased property nearby, and erected a new building (1877-1883) where an African-American congregation continues today as First Baptist Church on Charlottesville’s West Main and Seventh Streets (also known as Delevan Baptist Church and First Colored Baptist Church), one of the city’s largest black congregations; it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.]
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Monday, 1865 November 20, Huntley, Fairfax County, Virginia: “My whole heart was in our struggle . . . God had a purpose in scourging us which I cannot now see, but it will doubtless be revealed in the future”
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Mon, 02 Nov 2015 15:12:23 +0000
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[An unemployed ex-Confederate officer and antebellum West Point graduate seeks employment with a Virginia railroad company.]
Huntley, November 20, 1865
Dear Sir:
Seeing by the papers that O. F. Slaughter [Daniel F. Slaughter], Esq., of Culpeper had been chosen one of the Directors of the Orange & Alexandria R. R. [Railroad] & thinking that possibly you may know him, I write to ascertain it, & if so would be very much obliged to you if you would find from him whether there is any prospect of my getting a position as supervisor on the Road. Should he wish for any recommendations, I would state that I graduated 6th in the class of 1861 at the U. S. Military Academy as __?__ __?__ & was recommended for the Engineer Corps of the Army, would also refer him to Mr. Anthony McClean [McLean] treasurer for the R. R. Company, & Mr. Cagenove [William G. Cazenove] one of the Directors who both know me.
[page 2]
I am now entirely without any Employment, being like many who were educated for the Amy deprived of my profession in Consequence of the unexpected termination of the War & loss of our glorious Cause. My whole heart was in our struggle & the reflection that the blessed [cause?] for which we fought is lost and almost heartbreaking to me, I can never become reconciled to it—it seems harder to bear as time passes on. God had a purpose in scourging us which I cannot now see, but it will doubtless be revealed in the future. How are Cousin Anna Sophie, Mary & Sophy? I should like to see them very much, give my best love to them. Will Hoxton is teaching in Halifax, with the view of beginning a preparation for the University. [University of Virginia?] Winslow is living with Sally & Alfred [Bishop A. M. Randolph, husband of Hoxton’s sister Sally?] is teaching him. Mary’s home is there also although she is now here (Dr. King’s place) [Dr. Benjamin King of Maryland?].
[page 3]
Quite a number of the old Alexandria people have [returned?] & this place seems a little like its’ old self, though it is painful to see the blue uniforms constantly on the Streets. Hoping to hear from you shortly I remain
Yours truly
Llewellyn Hoxton
[To] Revd. Philip Slaughter
[Editor: Llewellyn G. Hoxton (1838-1891) was born in Alexandria, Virginia. After the deaths of their parents, he and his siblings became the wards of a Dr. Benjamin King of Maryland. A United States Military Academy at West Point cadet, July 1856- May 1861, Hoxton graduated sixth in the Class of 1861 and was commissioned a second lieutenant of ordnance but resigned to join the Confederate Army. Hoxton served on the staff of General William J. Hardee (1815-1873), as chief of artillery with the rank of captain and later major, eventually reaching the rank of lieutenant colonel and commanding Hoxton’s Artillery Battalion, Hardee’s Corps, Army of Tennessee. He was surrendered with General Joseph E. Johnston’s forces in North Carolina in April 1865. Later that year he taught mathematics at a private school in Catonsville, Maryland, until February 1867; he was unemployed until September when he began a three-year teaching career at a private school in Govanstown, Maryland. In1868 he married Fannie Robinson, of Jefferson County, West Virginia; in 1870 he began teaching mathematics at Alexandria’s Episcopal High School, becoming Associate Principal in 1886. Hoxton died, February 12, 1891, near Alexandria, aged fifty-three, and was buried at Ivy Hill Cemetery. Hoxton’s son Llewellyn Griffith Hoxton (1878-1966), taught at and later headed the University of Virginia’s department of physics, 1906-1949.
The Orange and Alexandria Railroad was established in 1848 and consolidated with other railroads beginning in 1873.
Philip Slaughter (1808-1890), a famed Virginia clergyman who published several works on Virginia history, religion, and genealogy. Daniel French Slaughter (?-1881), Virginia agriculturalist and slaveholder. [One online source identifies the parents of Virginia Military Institute Class of 1848 graduate and future Confederate army officer James Edwin Slaughter (1827-1900) Culpeper County, Virginia, as Daniel French Slaughter and Letitia Madison.]
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Thursday, 1865 October 12, Decatur, Morgan County, Alabama: “He will see that his command conduct themselves in an orderly manner . . .”
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Thu, 01 Oct 2015 13:16:39 +0000
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[A United States Colored Troops officer is ordered to investigate a postwar murder.]
Head [Quarters] Post
Decatur, Alabama October 12, 1865
Special Orders
No. [blank]
II. Lt. J. M. Warren, Co., D, 42nd
U. S. Colored Infantry, will take a squad of (7) seven
men and (1) one N. C. O. [noncommissioned officer] and proceed to the
scene of the recent murder for the purpose
of investigating the circumstances and
surroundings of the case and will return
as soon as this may be accomplished.
He will see that his command conduct
themselves in an orderly manner,
and that they commit no depredations.
By Command of
N. Milliken
Captain Commanding Post
J. F. Putnam
Lt. and A. A. A. G. [Acting Assistant Adjutant General]
Lt. J. M. Warren
Co. D 42nd U. S. C. I.
[Editor: The 42nd United States Colored Infantry (also known as 42nd Regiment Infantry, U.S. Colored Troops), organized in Nashville and Chattanooga, Tennessee, April-July 1864, served mostly on guard and garrison duty in Charleston and Chattanooga, Tennessee, until mustered out in January 1866 as part of the Department of Georgia. The officers mentioned in these orders: Lieutenant Joy M. Warren, Captain Noyes Milliken (1838-1910), and Lieutenant Julius F. Putnam. Joy Meggs Warren (November 26, 1842-April 24, 1911) of Macomb County, Michigan, began the war as a volunteer corporal in Company I, 9th Michigan Volunteer Infantry, September 1861, from which he was later discharged with the rank of sergeant in September 1864 to accept his commission as an officer with the 42nd U. S. C. I. During April 1864 a military board of examiners “of applicants for commission in Colored Troops” sitting in Chattanooga had recommended Corporal Warren’s promotion to second lieutenant. The 9th Michigan served in Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama, 1861-64, and was mustered out in September 1865. In August 1865, as a member of the 42nd U. S. C. I., Lieutenant Warren received orders to “exercise the utmost care and discretion” in arresting “noted murders and guerrillas.” Warren resigned in November 1865 with the rank of second lieutenant in the 42nd U. S. C. I.; after the war he became a minister and in 1888 a member of Michigan Post 154, Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.), serving as post chaplain and adjutant commander. He married Laura Priscentia Howe (1848-1930), February 1869, Ray, Macomb County, Michigan, and they had at least eight children: Jennie, Willard, Fannie, Otis, Axie, Eliza, Jennie, and Mary Warren. Having qualified for his military pension (1889), Reverend Warren died in 1911 from wounds suffered during the war; his widow Laura filed a pension request in May 1911.
Noyes Milliken (1838-1910) may have served as a private in the 15th Indiana Infantry and the Signal Corps, U. S. Volunteers; after the war he resided at Topeka, Kansas, where he died, and was a member of a Grand Army of the Republic post in that state.
Julius F. Putnam (b. ca. 1838/1839-?) served as a private in Company I, 4th Minnesota Infantry, before being assigned to the 42nd U. S. C. I. According to a postwar 1865 state census, he resided in Minneapolis, Minnesota, after the war and qualified for a military pension.
As a postwar military occupation force, African-American soldiers were verbally and physically targeted by embittered racist white southerners. According to one historian, during December 1865 soldiers of the 42nd U. S. C. I. were fired upon by an irate ex-Confederate colonel who cursed and threatened to kill or re-enslave them after Yankee soldiers left the South, and prophesied Decatur’s streets “would run red with blood.” Gregory J. W. Urwin, ed., Black Flag Over Dixie: Racial Atrocities and Reprisals in the Civil War (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2004).]
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[no day] 1865 September, place unknown: “Where is the flag that once floated so proudly . . .”
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Mon, 31 Aug 2015 13:20:37 +0000
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[Postwar poem by an anonymous ex-Confederate soldier.]
The Lament
“Where is the flag that once floated so proudly,
Where the bright arms that once sung out so loudly?
Where the brave hearts that so long held at bay
All the hosts of the North? Where the jackets of gray?
Down is the flag that once floated high,
Low lie the hearts that would conquer or die;
Sheathed are the swords that oft-flashed in the van,
Lost is the cause of Truth, Freedom and Man.
Hope has departed, life has lost all its charms;
Our armies disbanded; Oh! comrades in arms,
Taunted and scorned in our jackets of gray,
We may envy the brave souls who fell in the fray.
Lonely and weary the soldier returns,
Tells he’s paroled, and his manly cheek burns.
Can life without liberty happiness yield?
Oh! would I had died on the red battle-field.
Hardships and toil for four long years endured,
Honor and triumphs by true hearts procured,
Now to be lost by cowards and knaves
Deserting their standard in haste to be slaves.
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Hush, hush, my poor heart! be at ease, be at rest!
One comfort is mine, that the noblest and best:
I stood by our banner, I heard the last gun,
And can now say with pride, I my duty have done.”
September 1865
[Editor: From the autograph album of University of Virginia student James A. Harden (b. 1841) of Richmond, Virginia. He attended during 1860 and studied Latin, chemistry and moral philosophy. Possibly a man of the same name enrolled at Virginia Military Institute in 1861. A Greenville, Virginia, native of the same name was appointed adjutant of the 23rd Battalion Virginia Infantry in May 1862 and served until his capture at the Battle of Winchester during September 1864 and became a prisoner of war at Fort Delaware until his June 1865 release. This Harden resided postwar in Augusta County, Virginia, and was employed by the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad; he lived in Dillwyn during 1901 and was still alive in 1905 at age sixty-four. Autograph albums (as precursors of college yearbooks) were a popular means of expressing friendship among nineteenth-century students, including those at the University. Harden’s unpaginated album, printed and sold by J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia, contains eight entries by his classmates, two unsigned postwar poems, and July 14-16 diary entries, year unknown.]
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Friday, 1865 August 4, New Orleans, Louisiana: “Business has changed very much, not only changed hands, but the very mode of carrying it out is so different from what it used to be”
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Mon, 03 Aug 2015 13:17:42 +0000
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[Impressions of business conditions in postwar New Orleans and Norfolk, Virginia, and the employment of African-American ex-slaves.]
New Orleans, August 4, 1865
James W. Green Esq.
Rappahannock County, Virginia
Dear Sir:
I arrived here on 25 July on Steamship
“Star of the Union” from New York, and went to work next day
in Same office I was in prior to the War. I was enquiring
the other day about Charlie and learned that he was then
expected almost daily in Vicksburg so I presumed I shall soon
see him. New Orleans look very natural & there are many
more familiar faces to be met with on the streets than I
imagined. Business has changed very much, not only
changed hands, but the very mode of carrying it out is so
different from what it used to be. Trade is quite
brisk at this time in almost all its departments; Cotton is
Coming in very freely from the various points, and so long as it
lasts it will keep everything else moving—the growing Crop that
is very small, and the impression is that a Small Crop at
present rates pays as Well as a good large one used to. Planters
generally seem disposed to go to work with a will, and do
the best they can under existing circumstances—the freed labor
system is as yet somewhat problematical, but I think that
once the Negroes being to realize which end they stand upon, and
discover that they must work or starve that they will be very glad
to do at least as little as they possibly can, which might
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amount to something in the long run. I found
in Virginia that many believed it best for each Planter to hire
strange Negroes, for the reason that those previously owned were in
many cases indulged and allowed privileges altogether
incompatible with the new relation between Employer and Employed—
but which nevertheless they would still respect. I think
the idea good as a general rule.
I wrote you from Philadelphia
when I first arrived there, my stay however was very short,
from there I went to Norfolk [Virginia] and remained with a friend
[unintelligible] two miles outside Town, for about 5 Weeks, during all of
which time very much was absent from New Orleans on business
appertaining to the City Banks and did not Know anything
whatever of my whereabouts.
I trust you are all getting on
well at “the Shade” [Locust Shade] & have had a good Corn Season. When
you can make it convenient to write, I would be much
pleased to hear from you.
Please tell W. ? Green that
when the Express Companies get to Working Well, I will
write & ask him to have that piece of silk I left in
his charge forwarded to this place, as many are very
anxious to see it. I could easily have brought
it on myself had I only known.
With Kindest regards to all at “the
Shade” [Locust Shade]—
I Remain Dear Sir
Yours very sincerely,
Walter F. Irvine [signed]
address Care of
T. H. & J. M. Allen
New Orleans
[Editor: James W. Green (1829?-?) of Rappahannock County, Virginia; as a 35-year-old farmer in 1864 he received a Confederate exemption “as an Agriculturalist” for the counties of Campbell and Amherst; in January 1865 the Lynchburg provost marshal’s office (Confederate) granted him permission to visit Rappahannock; his father Col. Charles W. Green Sr. (1817?-1879) wrote to him in 1864 from “Locust Shade”—perhaps the family plantation/farm. (There is a Locust Shade Park near the Marine Corps Base Quantico, in Triangle, Prince William County, Virginia.) An April 1865 a New York Times article described the “Star of the Union” as a “magnificent steamer . . . on the route between New-York and New-Orleans . . . owned by E. A. Sorosa & Co. . . . 218 feet long, 34 feet beam, 18 feet 6 inches hold, and 1,202 tons . . . of white oak . . . a vertical direct engine.” A Walter F. Irvine (1836-1906) is buried in Elmwood Cemetery, Norfolk, Virginia; the 1900 U. S. Census identifies him as a native of Ireland and a merchant residing on the city’s Bank Street; two of his daughters (Margaret and Charlotte) were Louisiana natives. T. H. & J. M. Allen Company, a New Orleans cotton firm, ca. 1858-1876.]
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Monday, 1865 July 17, Toronto, Canada: “I will henceforth faithfully support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Union of the States thereunder”
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Thu, 02 Jul 2015 14:47:25 +0000
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[Loyalty oath by a former Confederate general in exile in Canada.]
U. S. Consulate
Toronto C. W. [Canada West]
I, John McCausland do solemnly swear or
affirm in the Presence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth
faithfully support and defend the Constitution of the United States and
the Union of the States thereunder; and that I will, in like manner,
abide by and faithfully support all laws and proclamations which
have been made during the existing rebellion with reference to the
emancipation of slaves, so help me God.
Jon. McCausland [signed: John McCausland]
Sworn before me at the Consulate of the USA
at Toronto this 17 day of July 1865, & of the
Independence of the United States the
ninetieth.
D. Thurston [signed: David Thurston]
U. S. Consul
Name Rank
John McCausland Brigadier General
Residence
Point Pleasant, West Virginia
D. Thurston
U. S. Consul
[Editor: John McCausland (1836-1927), born St. Louis, Missouri; graduate of Virginia Military Institute (1857) and the University of Virginia (1858); colonel of the 36th Virginia Infantry; promoted to brigadier general May 1864 and fought in Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia. He died at his “Grape Hill” farm near Point Pleasant, West Virginia, at age ninety-one and was buried in the Smith Cemetery, Henderson, Mason County. He was the next to last Confederate general to die. McCausland was apprehensive about returning to postwar America because of his July 1864 raid into Pennsylvania where, acting under orders of Lieutenant General Jubal A. Early, he burned the town of Chambersburg in retribution for destruction of homes and property in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley by Union Major General David Hunter. Although he refused to surrender with General Robert e. Lee at Appomattox, according to some published accounts he was paroled at Charleston, West Virginia, on May 22, 1865 but his Encyclopedia of Virginia biographical entry states “the prosecuting attorney of Franklin County, Pennsylvania . . . obtained a warrant against McCausland on the charge of arson.” Concerned about being tried and hanged for war crimes, McCausland fled to Canada, Mexico and Europe before returning to America in 1867 with personal assurances from Union General Ulysses G. Grant. McCausland’s 1865 loyalty oath during his Canadian sojourn may have been part of his stratagem to avoid arrest and prosecution and a prerequisite for his return to the United States.
According to the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, David Thurston (1818-1889) of Massachusetts immigrated to Montreal, Canada, in 1851 and later settled in Toronto where he (still an American citizen) was appointed U. S. consular agent (1864), serving in that capacity until 1869; American Secretary of State William Seward valued Thurston’s service, and so also during this period he served as vice-consul at Quebec and vice-consul general at Montreal. In 1869 Thurston began careers in lumber and insurance but retained his American citizenship. In 1878 he was appointed vice-consul in Toronto and retired in 1882 due to poor health; his date of death and fate after 1889 is unknown. In the oath Thurston incorrectly identified American independence as ninety years when it was actually eighty-nine years (1776).]
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Tuesday, 1865 June 20, Washington, D. C: “. . . a full pardon and amnesty for all offenses by him committed, arising from participation, direct or implied, in the said rebellion . . .”
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Mon, 01 Jun 2015 13:41:00 +0000
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[A presidential pardon for a former Kentucky member of the Confederate Congress.]
ANDREW JOHNSON,
PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, GREETING;
Whereas, Eli M. Bruce
of Kentucky, taking part in the
late rebellion against the Government of the United States, has
made himself liable to heavy fines and penalties;
And whereas, the circumstances of his case render him a
proper object of Executive clemency;
Now, therefore, be in known, that I, Andrew Johnson
President of the United States of America, in consideration of the premises,
divers other good and sufficient reasons therefore moving, do
hereby grant to the said E. M. Bruce,
a full pardon and amnesty for all offenses by him committed,
arising from participation, direct or implied, in the said rebellion,
conditioned as follows, viz: this pardon to being and take effect
from the day on which the said E. M. Bruce shall
take the oath prescribed in the Proclamation of the
President dated May 29th, 1865, and to be void and
of no effect if the said E. M. Bruce shall hereafter,
at any time, acquire any property whatever in
slaves or make use of slave labor.
And upon the further condition that the said
E. M. Bruce
shall notify the Secretary of State, in writing, that he has
received and accepted the foregoing pardon.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto signed my name and caused
the Seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the City of Washington, this
Twentieth day of June,
A. D. 1865, and of the Independence of the
United States the Eighty-ninth.
Andrew Johnson [signed]
By the President:
W. Hunter [signed: William Hunter Jr.]
Acting Secretary of State
[Editor: Eli Metcalfe Bruce (1828-1866) of Kentucky, member of the House Ways and Means Committee of the Confederate Congress. He died of heart disease at age 38 and is buried in Highland Cemetery, Fort Mitchell, Kenton County, Kentucky. Andrew Johnson (1808-1875) of Tennessee, 17th President of the United States (1865-1869). William Hunter, Jr. (1805–1886) of Rhode Island, Acting Secretary of State, 1865, and United States Second Assistant Secretary of State, 1866-1886. Hunter was serving in an acting capacity because Secretary of State William Seward (1801-1872) had been attacked in his home by Lewis Powell, a fellow conspirator of John Wilkes Booth, during the night of Lincoln’s assassination. Seward’s son, Assistant Secretary of State Frederick William Seward (1830-1915) was also seriously wounded while attempting to protect his father, and was assistant secretary of state 1861-1869 and 1877-1879. Despite Bruce’s pardon, martial law did not end in Kentucky until Johnson’s October 12, 1865 proclamation. On May 29, 1865, Johnson granted a presidential pardon to persons who directly or indirectly aided the Southern war effort and restored their property rights in the former Confederate South with the exception of slaves and upon swearing an oath of loyalty. Exempted taking the oath were fourteen ‘classes’ of individuals including Confederate civil or diplomatic officers and individuals who had conducted piracy against Union commerce; however, those in such ‘classes’ could apply directly to the president for a pardon.]
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Saturday, 1865 May 13, City Point, Virginia: “. . . having served Honestly and Faithfully with his Company to the present date . . .”
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Sat, 02 May 2015 19:16:00 +0000
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[Five hundred days after his enlistment and a month after the surrender of Lee’s army, an African-American soldier receives a certificate of disability and discharge from the Union Army.]
I certify, on honor, that Moses White, a Private of Captain Cunningham’s Company (A) of the 38th Regiment of U. S. Colored Troops Volunteers of the State of, born in Hertford County, State of North Carolina, aged 20 years; 5 feet 3 inches high; Dark complexion, Dark eyes, Dark hair, and by occupation a Farmer, who joined for service and was enrolled (see Note 9) on the 6th day of January, 1864, at Norfolk, Va., by D. E. Clapp [Lieutenant Colonel Dexter E. Clapp], for the period of Three years, and mustered into the service of the United States on the 23rd day of January, 1864, at Norfolk, Va., by Captain Gould; and having served HONESTLY and FAITHFULLY with his Company to the present date, is now entitled to a DISCHARGE by reason of Disability.
The said Moses White was last paid by Paymaster Howell, to include the 31st day of December, 1864, and has pay due him from that time to the present date; he is entitled to pay and subsistence for Traveling to place of enrollment, and whatever other allowances are authorized to volunteer soldiers, drafted men, or militia, so discharged. He was received from the United States Clothing amounting to Fifty nine [dollars and 43 cents], since the 6th day of January 1864, when his clothing account was never last settled. He has received from the United States__________ dollars advanced BOUNTY.
There is to be stopped from him, on account of the State of _________, or other authorities, for CLOTHING, &c., received on entering services, __________ dollars; and for other stoppages, viz; __________ dollars.
He has been furnished with TRANSPORTATION in kind from the place of his discharge to _________: and he has been SUBSISTED for TRAVELING to his place of enrollment, up to the __________, 186__.
He is indebted to ________, sutler, Five dollars.
He is indebted to ________, laundress, ___ dollars.
Given in Duplicate, at City Point, Va., this 13th day of May, 1865.
G. N. W. Cunningham [signature]
Captain
Commanding Company
[Editor: North Carolina farmer Moses White (ca. 1845-?) married, raised a family and worked as a fisherman and farmer in Princess Anne County [the city of Virginia Beach since 1963], Virginia, until the 1930s, becoming an octogenarian. The nature of his disability was not recorded. A separate document indicates White’s regular monthly pay as $16.00; for his final pay period of 1 January-13 March 1865 (four months and twelve days) he earned $70.40; to this was initially added $56.81 “for clothing not drawn” for a total of $127.21; from this amount $5.00 was deducted for money owned a sutler [civilian vendors who traveled by wagon with and sold eatables and luxuries to soldiers the field or in camp as supplements to their military rations] and $59.43 for “clothing withdrawn” resulting in a balance of $62.78. He signed his final pay voucher for this amount with his ‘X’ mark on May 16, 1865, three days after receiving his disability discharge certificate.
The 38th United States Colored Infantry (United States Colored Troops) was organized in St. Mary’s County, Maryland, and Tidewater, Virginia, during January 1864; four percent of its 1,307 men enlisted in Union-occupied Norfolk. Initially assigned to Norfolk and Portsmouth, the regiment participated in the 1864-65 Petersburg Siege and the April 1865 occupation of Richmond; at the time of White’s discharge it had been assigned to 1st Brigade, 1st Division, XXV Corps since December; a week after White’s discharge the regiment was transferred Texas where in January 1867, after three years of existence, it was among the last African-American regiments mustered out of federal service. Three members of the 38th regiment, Private William Henry Barnes (c. 1840 or 1845-1866), Sergeant James H. Harris (1828–1898) and First Sergeant Edward Ratcliff (1835 –1915), became Medal of Honor recipients in April 1865 and February 1874 (Harris) for gallantry at Battle of Chaffin’s Farm, Virginia (September 1864).
Captain G. N. W. Cunningham was a member of the 13th Massachusetts Infantry, the 37th United States Colored Infantry (first lieutenant), and mustered out of the 38th USCI on October 17, 1866.
“Note 9” (included on reverse of this certificate in section “Final Statement of Regiment of Volunteers”): “If the soldier is a drafted man or substitute, the space for time, &c., of enrolled, should contain only the word drafted or substitute, as the case may be. If the Soldier is a “VETERAN,” (or RECRUIT), the words as a veteran, (or recruit,) as the case may be, should be interlined after the words mustered into the service of the U. S. A. A statement of all the instruments of Veteran or Recruit Bounty RECEIVED by the Soldier must be made up on the back of each final statement.”
Lieutenant Colonel Dexter Elisha Clapp (1830-1882), a native of North Bergen, Genesee County, New York, and a captain of Company C, 148th New York Infantry from September 1862 until promoted to a lieutenant colonelcy in the 38th USCI in March 1864; he resigned March 13, 1865 and later received the rank of brevet brigadier general, United States Volunteers, January 15, 1866 “for gallant and meritorious service.” Black newspaper reporter Thomas Morris Chester (1834-1892) of the Philadelphia Press characterized Clapp’s personal bravery during the Battle of Chaffin’s Farm as inspirational to the 38th USCI during the Battle of Chaffin’s Farm (New Market Heights). But according to historian Joseph T. Glatthaar’s Forged in Battle: The Civil War Alliance of Black Soldiers and White Officers (1990), Clapp’s abuse of his black troops, fellow officers and command authority caused a buildup of discontent and discipline problems in the 38th USCI resulting in courts-martial for himself and at least two lieutenants. Other postwar records suggest Clapp was apparently acquitted because on April 5, 1865, by appointment of Richmond, Virginia’s Union military governor he became a member of a commission constituted for the relief of destitute city families. He further redeemed himself in an October 1865 report on the release of wrongly incarcerated African-Americans in North Carolina. Clapp served as U. S. Consul in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 1871-1873; he died in 1882 and is buried at the Yates Center Cemetery, Woodson County, Kansas.
“Captain Gould” is unidentified; several white officers of that surname were assigned to various regiments of United States Colored Troops during the war. “Paymaster Howell” has not been identified.]
MSS 11505
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Wednesday, 1865 April 19, [Greensboro, North Carolina]: “Total Present—not Effective.”
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Wed, 01 Apr 2015 18:16:15 +0000
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Wednesday, 1865 April 19, [Greensboro, North Carolina]: “Total Present—not Effective.”
[Ten days after the surrender of Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox, Virginia, a Confederate staff officer prepared a list of 20,640 “not-effective” men from eleven former Confederate states.]
Head-Quarters
Greensboro No. Ca. [North Carolina] C. S. A. [Confederate States Army]
April 19th 1865
Virginia Richmond 289 men
North Carolina Raleigh 2,645
Tennessee Nashville 1,312
South Carolina Spartansburg 4,335
Georgia Macon 5,626
Florida Tallahassee 351
Alabama Montgomery 2,578
Mississippi Macon 2,137
Louisiana Baton Rouge 104
Arkansas Little Rock 741
Texas Austin 527
Total [Present] 20,640
J. M. W. [John Marshall Warwick] Otey [signed]
AAG [Assistant Adjutant General]
[Editor: Lynchburg, Virginia native John Marshall Otey (1839-1883) was a staff officer under Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard (1818-1893) with the rank of captain and assistant adjutant general, April-November 1862 and October 1864; he held the same under General Braxton Bragg (1817-1876) in 1862. By June 1864 Otey held the rank of lieutenant colonel; according to the National Park Service Civil War Soldiers and Sailors Database his final rank was that of lieutenant colonel and assistant adjutant general. He was paroled on April 26, 1865 (with the Army of Tennessee) and worked as a broker and insurance agent during the postwar era. Otey is buried in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia. “Not Effective” [Noneffectives] were soldiers unable to take up their military duties due to a variety of reasons (medical leave, desertion, missing in action, etc.) The cities and towns are written in pencil. Their significance—and the purpose of this list–is unknown—perhaps these were soldiers awaiting official paroles? Possibly Otey prepared it for General Joseph E. Johnston (1807-1891) as part of his April 17-18 and 26, 1865 negotiations with Union General William Tecumseh Sherman (1820-1891) resulting in the surrender of Johnston’s Army of Tennessee and Confederate forces in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida—nearly 90,000 soldiers.]
MSS 3272-D
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Monday, 1865 March 27, Tallahassee, Florida: “This will be carried to your outpost . . . under Flag of truce.”
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Mon, 02 Mar 2015 15:03:22 +0000
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[A Confederate general proposes an exchange of paroled Union prisoners of war in Florida and Georgia]
[Headquarters Military District of Florida]
Tallahassee, March 27, 1865
General:
This will be carried to your outpost
by Capt. John C. Rutherford C. S. A.
under Flag of truce. He is the bearer
of a letter from Brig. Genl. Pillow[,] Commissary
[General] of prisoners C. S. A. addressed to
the officer Commanding Federal forces
Jacksonville and Capt. Rutherford is
also charged with the duty of paroling
and sending within the lines occupied
by the U. S. troops for exchange, the prisoners
of war held by the C. S. and now
confined within certain states, Georgia
and Florida among others. This exchange
is in accordance with terms agreed
on between Lt. Gen. Grant Commanding
Armies of the United States, and the
proper authorities of the [Confederate] States.
Under existing circumstances the
prisoners in Georgia and this place
[page 2]
can be delivered more conveniently and
comfortably to themselves at Jacksonville
than Mobile. [Alabama]
If you will receive the prisoners
and receipt for them as paroled prisoners
for Exchange, I will do all in my
power to send them without delay to
Jacksonville.
I am very respectfully
Your [obedient servant]
[Samuel] Jones
Major General
To
Brig. Genl. E. P. Scammon
Commanding 4th [Separate] Brigade
Jacksonville Fla. [Florida]
[reverse endorsements]
Headquarters Military District of Florida
Tallahassee, Florida
March 27, 1865
Jones, Sam.
Major General
L. R. B. 23 JDF Vol.2
Transmits a letter
From Brig. Genl. Pillow
Commissary General Prisoners
C. S. A., proposing to
deliver prisoners at
Jacksonville for
exchange.
States that if the
prisoners will be
received, he will
do all in his power
to send them to
Jacksonville without
delay.
Stamped postmark “Received Hd, Qts. March 29, 1865.”
[Editor: Three days after Lee’s surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox, this prisoner exchange remained uncompleted though preliminary arrangements had been made between Scammon and Rutherford for an exchange to have taken place at Jacksonville pending General Grant’s approval. Mobile, Alabama, was occupied by Union troops on April 12, 1865. Confederate Captain John C. Rutherford, assistant adjutant general to Major General Howell Cobb (1815-1868) since January 10, 1863; he began his wartime service as a sergeant in Cobb’s Legion, organized 1861 by then-Colonel Thomas Reade Roots Cobb (1823-1862), brother of Howell Cobb, and composed of cavalry, infantry, and artillery. Brigadier General Gideon J. Pillow (1806-1878), commissary general of prisoners of war held by the Confederacy, February 1863. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885), general-in-chief of the armies of the United States since March 1864. Major General Samuel Jones (1819-1887), commander of the Confederate Department of South Georgia and Florida; paroled May 1865 after surrendering himself and the Department of Florida and South Georgia’s troops on May 10, 1865 at Tallahassee. Union Brigadier General Eliakim Parker Scammon (1816-1894), a West Point graduate (1837) and later a prisoner of war (February-August 1864), commanded the District of Florida at Jacksonville until war’s end. The Fourth Separate Brigade, assigned to Scammon’s District of Florida command as of a November 30, 1864 reorganization of Union troops in the Department of the South, consisted of eight regiments (17th Connecticut; 75th and 107th Ohio; 3d, 34th, and 35th U. S. Colored Troops; 4th Massachusetts Cavalry, and 3d New York Light Artillery, Battery F).]
MSS 3070-H
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