Yankees: August 2009 Archives

This impressive line of artillery is in Willard Park on the grounds of the Washington Navy Yard. While most of the tubes were made on-site at the Naval Foundry and sent to Union Navy ships or land installations, the one second from the right served the Confederacy during the Civil War.

According to WIkipedia, the Washington Navy Yard is the oldest shore establishment of the U.S. Navy and currently serves as a ceremonial and administrative center, home to the Chief of Naval Operations. It is headquarters for the Naval Historical Center, the Department of Naval History, the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps, Naval Reactors, Marine Corps Institute, and numerous other naval commands.The Washington Navy Yard was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973, and designated a National Historic Landmark on May 11, 1976. nearly 400,000 people visit the U.S. Navy Museum annually.

Brigadier General George Armstrong Custer, a native of New Rumley in my native Ohio, remains one of the most colorful (and controversial) figures in American military history. Vilified by many for his stunning defeat at Little Bighorn, a fight that became immortal as "Custer's Last Stand," Custer was a lightning rod for adoration as well as hatred. Perhaps more books have been written about him than any other Western Indian fighter, and many also cover his extensive Civil War history where he rose from an obscure lieutenant to a renown major general in just three short years.

Custer's first battle as a brigadier general was here in York County, Pennsylvania, where he led his Michigan Brigade at the Battle of Hanover, where his men first became acquainted with the "boy general" in action. That same day, some of Custer's men traveled through southwestern York County and up into downtown York.

Here is this little known account of some of Custer's Wolverines visiting "Little York." It is adapted from Pennsylvania-born author Eric J. Wittenberg's interesting book Under Custer's Command: The Civil War Journal of James Henry Avery.

Jonathan Stayer, the head of the reference section of the Pennsylvania State Archives, is a long-time follower of the Cannonball blog and and even longer enthusiast for the history of York County. He asked if I would be willing to publish a list of those men in York County who declared themselves conscientious objectors and were exempted from military service during the Civil War.

The decision to make such a declaration was not taken lightly, either by the young men who took that position or by the government. According to Jonathan, "Among the instructions was a directive to secure an oath or affirmation from those seeking exemption for conscientious scruples based upon a provision in the State Constitution. Article VI, Section 2, of the 1838 Constitution, in effect at the time of the Civil War, stated that "those who conscientiously scruple to bear arms shall not be compelled to do so, but shall pay equivalent for service."
In some instances, the depositions show the age and the occupation of the objector...

The largest numbers of depositions were taken in the counties with traditionally large Quaker or Mennonite populations such as Lancaster, Bucks, Chester, Philadelphia and Montgomery-with 667 in Lancaster County alone. Since most of them came from religious backgrounds that prohibited taking oaths as well as performing military service, many of the documents indicate that the person "affirmed" his conscientious scruples.

Pennsylvania's records of Civil War conscientious objectors are unique. So far as is known, Pennsylvania is the only Northern state to have an extant file of depositions of men who refused military service on the basis of their religious convictions."

Although not in the top five counties in terms of numbers, York County had its share of men who were conscientious objectors.

Here is the continuation of the listing.

If anyone is aware of York County soldiers whose names are missing from this listing, please contact me or leave a comment.

Thanks!

Pennsylvania Volunteers of the Civil War is one of my favorite websites. I use it often as a reference site, as it contains a lot of useful information, including the text of Samuel Bates' classic History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, as well as the corresponding card file of the vast majority of Keystoners who served in the Union Army during the war. The webmaster also includes a list of soldiers hailing from York County, Pennsylvania, who served in the officially mustered units, as well as several independent companies. Biographies of several men are included in the website, as well as other pertinent information of value to the local researcher.

Even more impressive is a database at the York County Heritage Trust contributed by author and researcher Dennis Brandt, who compiled every known Civil War soldier from York County. For more information, please see the YCHT webpage.

Headstone of Private Ovid Stahl in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Hanover, Pennsylvania.

Ovid Stahl, a native of York, Pennsylvania, was an eighteen-year-old private in Company I of the 26th Pennsylvania Volunteer Militia, a company that was recruited in southern York County and included volunteers from several townships, as well as from Carroll County, Maryland. After being organized in Hanover and trained briefly near Harrisburg, the emergency regiment served in the Gettysburg Campaign. It was the largest military unit trying to defend Gettysburg the last week of June 1863 against the invading Confederates - the division of Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early.

The schoolboys and sales clerks of the 26th PVM had only been in uniform for three days when they met the veterans of the Army of Northern Virginia on the hills west of Gettysburg along Marsh Creek and then along Goldenville Road near the Henry Witmer farm. The site of the skirmish of Witmer Farm (and the red brick Witmer farmhouse) is still in pristine condition just east of the intersection of Goldenville and Table Rock roads about 3.5 miles northeast of Gettysburg. Many of the boys would be captured on Witmer's rolling farmland, rounded up by the pursuing 17th Virginia Cavalry. In all, 175 militiamen would become prisoners of war out of the 743 men in the new regiment.

A couple of the men and boys from southern York County were with the 26th PVM's commissary guard in downtown Gettysburg while their comrades were routed at Witmer Farm. They ended up back in Hanover before heading to York late on Friday night hours after the debacle at Witmer Farm. They wound up in Wrightsville and helped defend the Columbia-Wrightsville Bridge on Sunday, June 28.

Among those men fortunate enough to have escaped being swept up by the Rebel cavalry at Witmer Farm was 18-year-old Ovid Stahl.

Author Janet L. Bucklew will be speaking about her new book on Dr. Henry Janes at the York Emporium at 7:00 PM on Friday, September 4.

For the September "First Friday" celebration in downtown York, the York Emporium is hosting a talk/book signing by Janet L. Bucklew, historian and former seasonal ranger at the battlefield in Gettysburg. She has just completed research into primary sources and published a new work on Dr. Henry Janes, a surgeon/volunteer who was at the battle. Her talk is scheduled to take place on Friday, September 4 at 7:00 PM. It is free and open to the public, and light refreshments will be served.

Details and a little more info can be found on the York Emporium's webpage for the event.

The York Emporium is one of the finest used book stores in the region, and is located at 343 W. Market Street (the old Lincoln Highway) in York, Pennsylvania.

This impressive headstone in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Hanover, Pennsylvania, commemorates the brief life of one of York County's many Civil War veterans, Major William Slyder Diller of the 76th Pennsylvania Volunteers, also known as the "Keystone Zouaves". During his three years in the Union Army, Diller saw action in several significant engagements in Virginia, Georgia and South Carolina, including participating in the unsuccessful attacks on Fort Wagner (made famous in modern times through the Denzel Washington / Morgan Freeman movie Glory).

So, who was William Diller?

Downtown Hanover, Pennsylvania, has several Civil War markers and memorials along its main streets and in the traffic square, including a series of battle-related wayside markers erected a few years ago. Perhaps the most impressive (and most well known historically) is this well crafted bronze statue entitled "The Picket." It depicts one of Brig. Gen. H. Judson Kilpatrick's Union troopers who fought at the June 30, 1863, Battle of Hanover in southwestern York County.

For many years, this large equestrian statue was the focal point of the town square, as well as a large fountain (similar to what still graces downtown Chambersburg's very nice traffic circle). At some point, the town fathers decided to abandon the circle and go with a more traditional crossroads intersection, and The Picket and his later companion "Mike" the bronze dog were relegated to a corner where it is out of the way (and out of the mind and vision) of most passersby.

In my research for another unrelated Civil War topic, I stumbled onto a couple of old accounts of the installation of this memorial, as well as two nearby Army of the Potomac plaques.

Here are those snippets from a pair of old books:

Andrew Bentz Smith was a young saddle maker from northwestern York County who answered Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin's call to arms in mid-1861. He traveled to the nearest town, Wellsville, and enlisted on September 19, 1861, at the age of 21 as a corporal in Company H of the 87th Pennsylvania Infantry. In mid-winter 1863, his regiment was stationed in the Winchester, Virginia, region as part of the Eighth Corps division of Maj. Gen. Robert H. Milroy, an Indiana attorney turned soldier.

Milroy's heavy-handedness toward the civilians of the area earned him unmitigated hatred from Winchester's pro-Southern women, including the "devil diarists," whose anti-Union sentiments later became legendary. As spring approached, Smith received his first promotion, being elevated to First Sergeant on March 12.

In mid-June, the Confederate Second Corps crossed the Blue Ridge Mountains and entered the scenic Shenandoah Valley, unbeknown to Milroy's men. The 87th was among the troops garrisoning the town and surrounding regions, and some of the York County boys, including Andrew Smith, were deployed at Bunker Hill, a village not far from WInchester.

On June 13, trouble came for the regiment and for young Andrew...