Civilians: July 2008 Archives

Tucked in a pleasant little valley not far from Spring Grove, this house was the home in 1863 of the Rev. Samuel L. Roth, a prominent area minister whose church was not far from his abode.

Background post: Confederate camp site - Jacob S. Altland House.

As an attorney, Civil War general, railroad executive, coal mine owner, U.S. Senator, and Governor of Georgia (as well as an early organizer of the KKK in Georgia by some accounts), John Brown Gordon met thousands of people during his busy lifetime. The vast majority were forgettable - common folks who elicited no special mention or recognition, consigned to be just another hand shaken by a veteran politician, or another nameless private saluting his commander.

However, a handful of York Countians received special recognition from Gordon in the years after the war during his popular speaking tours and his oft-quoted and somewhat controversial memoirs. And then there were his memorable encounters with Samuel Roth, a Jackson Township preacher whose persistence and never-give-up attitude stayed long in the memory of the Confederate general.

A few years ago, York County author and blogger Jim McClure and I briefly discussed a fellow by the name of John A. Wilson, who is thought to be the last black Civil War veteran from York County to have been laid to rest. I started digging into this man, researching what Jim had found and searching for a little more information. Not only was "Quil" Wilson the last surviving black ACW veteran, he was among the youngest men to take up arms against the Confederates during the Gettysburg Campaign, when he served as an unpaid volunteer manning the trenches defending Wrightsville against the Confederate brigade of Brig. Gen. John B. Gordon. There are no specific records of Wilson's individual service at Wrightsville, but his small company was noted by the Lancaster Examiner and Herald as having "fought bravely."

Historian Tim Smith of the Adams County Historical Society will be the guest speaker at this month's CWRT meeting in York.

Background post: 2008 speaker schedule - York CWRT

The monthly meeting of the York Civil War Round Table will feature author, historian, and Licensed Battlefield Guide Timothy H. Smith as the special guest speaker. He is speaking on his latest book, Farms at Gettysburg: The Fields of Battle: Selected Images From the Adams County Historical Society. Tim has a PowerPoint presentation, and he will interject, when appropriate, information about the Gettysburg civilians.

The meeting will be Wednesday evening, July 16, 2008, at 7:00 p.m. in the auditorium of the York County Heritage Trust's headquarters at 250 E. Market Street in downtown York. Parking and admission are free. Why not come and hear one of the most entertaining and knowledgeable Civil War experts in the region?

An early 20th century view of the replacement bridge and the immediate area where several railroad buildings had burned down in 1863 as an indirect result of the Rebel invasion. Out of view to the right of this scene would have been the vicinity of the old industrial complex and warehouses that were also destroyed on June 28, 1863.

While Columbia Bank officials lamented the loss of their cash cow, the Columbia-Wrightsville Bridge, after a six-hour blaze that entirely destroyed it, many residents of Wrightsville watched in horror as embers from the burning bridge were carried by the wind into the buildings along the York County riverbank. Soon, several structures were on fire, and, in one of the Civil War's more amazing acts of humanity and compassion, Confederate officers ordered their men to form a bucket bridge to dip water from the canal and river. Hand-over-hand, the Georgia infantrymen passed the heavy buckets to the end of the line, where the water was thrown onto the most threatened buildings, many of which were saved by this act of heroism from the Rebel invaders. The irony? Some of the Georgians hailed from Darien, Georgia, a town torched a few weeks before by Union troops, including black soldiers from Columbia, Pennsylvania, across the river from Wrightsville.

Bonfires are ablaze on the 145th anniversary of the burning of the Columbia-Wrightsville Bridge. The piers are the original ones from the covered bridge of Civil War days. Photos courtesy of Michael J. Belgie Sr. of Fire & Ice Photography. Used by written permission. Contact him to purchase this or other photographs.

Perhaps the most spectacular fire in the history of York and Lancaster counties was the June 28, 1863, blaze that fully consumed the world's largest covered bridge -- the venerable structure that had spanned the Susquehanna River between Wrightsville and Columbia. Union high command had ordered part of the bridge destroyed to prevent the Confederates from crossing the river (which was too swollen from recent rains to be forded, and the bridge was the only viable crossing between Harrisburg and Maryland). Attempts to blow up a single span failed, and the Pennsylvania militia resorted to Plan B - burn a section. The winds shifted, and the old bridge acted as a wind tunnel, carrying the flames eastward for six hours until the entire thing had collapsed as a smoldering wreckage into the river.

Cover art from a 1991 book, The Story of the Northern Central Railway, by Robert L. Gunnarsson, Greenberg Publications.

All over York County, from the outskirts of Abbottstown to the west across the turnpike to Wrightsville and from Hanover to the southwest up to Dillsburg (and dozens of other towns and hundreds of farms), residents took stock of their losses. For some, the damage was relatively light - as low as a single horse. For others, their livelihoods had been destroyed (for example, a large milling operation in Wrightsville that had burned down, displacing the workers). In the next few days, I will outline some of the damage in York County (and perhaps beyond) caused by the Confederates.

I thank York County railroad buff, author, and historian Ivan E. Frantz, Jr. (and a colleague of mine at work) for sharing the following very interesting information he has gleaned from the files of the Northern Central Railway, one of the hardest hit companies.

Life here in York County, Pennsylvania, was slowly returning to normal, although, for many, the trauma and scars from the Confederate invasion would go away slowly. Efforts continued to clean the U.S, Army Military Hospital on Penn Common, even as patients from the Battle of Gettysburg began arriving. Work crews assessed the damage to the county's railroad bridges, and telegraphers in Hanover and Hanover Junction worked to restore that vital communications link.

Jeb Stuart's three brigades of veteran Confederate cavalry rose in fields surrounding Dover and leisurely ate their breakfasts. Foraging patrols scoured neighboring farms for several miles looking for horses, mules, forage, horsehoes, and other supplies of military interest. They paid for them with worthless CSA currency or bank drafts to be paid by the Confederacy after the war ended. Scores of Union prisoners captured in Maryland or at the Battle of Hanover are paroled, released, and sent walking back down today's Route 74 to York. By early afternoon, Stuart's men are back in the saddle, as multiple columns wind their way through northwestern York County through Wellsville, Rossville, and Dillsburg, where the brigade of wealthy South Carolina planter and politician Wade Hampton III will camp for the night on the Mumper fruit farm.

Meanwhile, in the rest of the county...