Gettysburg Campaign: July 2009 Archives

As Major General J.E.B. Stuart's division of three brigades of Confederate cavalry departed Dover, Pennsylvania, on July 1, 1863, patrols fanned out in a wide swath to acquire fresh horses. More than 700 horses are known to have been taken in York County alone by Stuart's men, and another 500 by other Rebel troops that criss-crossed the county. Among Stuart's early victims as his troops left Dover was farmer Jacob Spangler, who owned this impressive characteristic red barn that still sits alongside Fox Run (not very far from two of my kids' houses in Dover Township). He lost a ten-year-old bay mare and a six-year-old black horse taken from his stable.

The Spangler clan was the hardest hit family in all of York County, as seventeen different men by that surname reported losing horses or trade goods to the Confederate raiders! In total, the Spanglers lost thirty horses, not to mention the contents of Charles Spangler's West Manchester Township store. Many of the Spanglers lived along Carlisle Road, the path that Stuart's column took to reach Dillsburg and then Carlisle. Fathers, sons, brothers, cousins, uncles - the interrelated group took a serious financial loss in terms of lost horseflesh right at the important summer harvest time.

Mount Olivet Cemetery is at 725 S. Baltimore Street in Hanover, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1859, the cemetery sits atop high ground southeast of downtown, and is a natural gun position from a military perspective. During the afternoon phase of the June 30, 1863, Battle of Hanover, horse-drawn Confederate horse artillery rumbled up the slope from the southwest and unlimbered. Gunners moved the cannon into position and sighted their distant targets, with a particular emphasis on a line of Union artillery on the heights immediately north of Hanover. Fuses were cut to the length appropriate for the distance, and the rounds loaded. Lieutenants sighted the target through field glasses, while crewmen prepared the guns for firing. The orders came, and the resulting detonation of the powder sent sound waves reverberating off houses, rattling windows and fraying nerves of the remaining citizens.

Mount Olivet Cemetery is in the foreground. Rebel guns placed there had to fire over the town of Hanover (note the church spire) to hit Yankee guns on the ridge north of town (the thin line of dark trees next to the spire and below the background Pigeon Hills). Some of the shells fell short and struck the town, or exploded over it. (Left click on the photo to enlarge it for better detail).

Background post: Wounded Ohio soldier boards the governor's special train at Hanover Junction.

Today we pick up Captain Nickerson's narrative of his excursion to see the dedication ceremony. It's just one of dozens of eyewitness accounts of Lincoln's speech, but it's one of the best commentaries.

The historic Cashtown Inn has been restored in the past few decades and, under new management since 2006, is a popular dining spot in the foothills of the South Mountain Range west of Gettysburg. Back in the summer of 1863, innkeeper Jacob Mickley was kept quite busy by the repeated passage of Confederate troops, and several leading officers of the Army of Northern Virginia paused at this tavern for refreshment. Prior to the arrival of the Confederates, the building was an outpost for Union cavalry videttes of Maj. Granville Haller. Some accounts suggest a party of four bushwhackers also steeled themselves for the task of sniping at oncoming Rebels by freely imbibing alcohol from Mickley's barroom. Photo courtesy of Dr. Thomas M. Mingus.

While many Pennsylvanians practiced passive resistance when the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia passed through the south-central tier, tens of thousands of others took matters into their own hands. They grabbed their hunting rifles and other weapons and joined informal local militia groups to help defend their hometowns in case the Rebels came near. In the Juniata River region, more than 5,000 civilians (including many former soldiers) took up arms and encamped in the mountain passes. Union authorities derisively called them nothing more than "an army of bushwhackers commanded by ex-officers." Near McKeesport, Pennsylvania, the local militia was so adept at stealing poultry from the area's farmers that they became known as the "Chicken Raiders."

Here in York County, one farmer near the hamlet of Big Mount took matters in his own hands. In circumstances that are not entirely clear, he savagely murdered a foraging Rebel from Louisiana (I document what is known of this incident from official Confederate records in my upcoming book on the Louisiana Tigers from LSU Press).

In Gettysburg, years after the war, the son of one of the local militia leaders gave this brief account of the bushwhacking in that region. Much of the account parallels (and adds to) my narrative of Union Major Granville O. Haller's efforts to organize the defense of Adams and York counties as Major General Jubal A. Early's powerful veteran division approached from the west.

Here is his account... although please note in his old age, the writer has confused some details in his fading memory.

James E. B. Brown, CSA Major General, led three brigades of veteran cavalry through southwestern York County after a half-day battle at Hanover. Photo from the Library of Congress.

On July 13, 1863, even as Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia was retreating to Virginia, cavalry commander Major General J.E.B. Stuart wrote a letter to his beloved wife Flora. Criticism about being tardy and joyriding notwithstanding, the cavalier recounted, "I had a grand time in Pennsylvania and we return without defeat, to recuperate and reinforce, when, no doubt the role will be re-enacted. I shelled Carlisle and burnt the barracks. I crossed near Dranesville and went close to Georgetown and Washington, cutting four important railroads, joining our army in time for the battle of Gettysburg, with 900 prisoners and 200 wagons and splendid teams." [That wagon train, according to one subordinate, had become an "embarrassment" by the time the column passed through western York County]

Undaunted by the results at the Battle of Gettysburg, Stuart added, "We must invade again--it is the only path of peace. We were received well in Pennsylvania and our troops treated the population better than our own." [Tell that to the 500+ farmers in York County who lost horses, mules, livestock, forage, and supplies to Stuart's invading column!]

He added this note on the strategic importance of the summer campaign, "General Lee's maneuvering the Yankees out of Virginia is the grandest piece of strategy ever heard of. If they had only sent 10,000 reinforcements and plenty of ammunition to him here our crossing would have been with banners of peace." [Indeed Lee did get the Yankees out of Virginia for nearly two months. However, the price he paid in men and officers, not to mention in rejuvenating the Northern morale and war effort, was substantial, perhaps fatal to the Confederate cause.]

Dr. Henry Palmer played a prominent role in events in York, Pennsylvania, during the Gettysburg Campaign. He helped organize his patients into a fighting force that drilled each day on the hospital grounds. When the Confederates approached York, he hastened the removal of most of the non-ambulatory patients to Columbia under the supervision of his assistant surgeon. However, Dr. Palmer stayed behind in the hospital with a handful of men too badly wounded to be safely moved. He was captured by Jubal Early's Rebels on Sunday, June 28 when they occupied the hospital. Palmer later managed to escape during the Battle of Gettysburg and return to York.

After the Confederates left town, he began the process of sanitizing the hospital (it was filled with lice) and made it presentable by the time that trainloads of wounded men began arriving a week later from the Battle of Gettysburg. He stubbornly refused to treat any Rebels, however, and they were instead taken to the nearby Odd Fellows Hall.

During the war, Palmer's 5-year-old daughter, Kittie, died after a lingering illness of three weeks. She was buried in Prospect Hill Cemetery. Palmer and his wife Edna intended to exhume the body and take her home to Janesville, Wisconsin, after the war. According to Jim McClure's East of Gettysburg, the child's current gravesite is unknown.

Philadelphia Press, August 6, 1863.

This house sits at the northeastern corner of the intersection of N. Sherman Street and Druck Valley Road. It is located on the heights northeast of York near village of Pleasureville in what in today Springettsbury Township in York County, Pennsylvania. Back on Monday, June 29, 1863, the brick two-story structure housed the general store of a young merchant named Emanuel G. Keller.

In real estate, one often hears the term "location, location, location" in terms of desirability. The unfortunate Mr. Keller was in the wrong location at the wrong time.

Many of you know that a publisher has asked me to research and write yet another book in my popular series of human interest stories. In the never ending quest for fresh material, I was perusing an old copy of Confederate Veteran last night when I stumbled across a different account of John Gordon's brigade in Pennsylvania by an author I had previously used in Flames Beyond Gettysburg. Here are a couple of fresh anecdotes from Private Isaac G. Bradwell of the 31st Georgia Volunteers. The second one is particularly interesting, as it is the only known first-hand account from a Confederate of Gordon's campsite west of York on Monday night June 29, 1863.

Unlike other Rebel accounts, the young Georgian had some very positive things to say about the people of York...

Bradwell remembered, "At early dawn the rattle of the drum called us to ranks, and we set out on the march to York. This place was much larger than Gettysburg and the inhabitants did not shut themselves up in their houses through fear of us, but were so anxious to see us and converse with us that we had some difficulty in forcing our way through the city.

It was Sunday morning, and everybody was dressed in his very best. So great was the pressure that our officers marched us through the town in single column of twos. Handsomely dressed women extended their hands from each side, anxious to have a word with us; but our officers hurried us along as rapidly as possible. Among the men I saw several who were suffering from wounds, but these kept themselves well to the rear and did not seek to come in contact with us.

The people of York were the most refined and intelligent folk we met in the State and reminded us of our friends at home, both in manners and personal appearance. They did not seem to be a bit reserved, and if we had not known where we were, we might, from their conduct, have supposed ourselves in Dixie."

Bradwell and the brigade marched to Wrightsville, where they attacked Union militia entrenched west of town but failed to capture the Columbia-Wrightsville Bridge, which was burned by the retreating Yankees. On Monday afternoon about 4 PM, the Georgians marched back through downtown York and camped in the countryside along the Carlisle Road (Route 74 today).

The young private added some interesting details...

Many of you know I have a special fondness for human interest stories from the Gettysburg Campaign. Some of it stems from old family stories passed down from my paternal great-great-uncles who fought in the 7th West Virginia at Antietam and Gettysburg, or from my maternal great-great-grandfathers who fought in various Ohio regiments, mostly in the Western Theater. My father was born in 1914, and as a young lad, he heard many tales (perhaps exaggerated, but unfortunately not documentable) from the aged Civil War vets who lived in his home of Athens County, Ohio.

I am now n the process of writing a new Civil War book manuscript for Ten Roads Publishing entitled Gettysburg Glimpses 2: More Stories from the Gettysburg Campaign. I have been perusing old newspapers, books, journals, letters, etc. for fresh stories that have seldom been used (if at all) since they were written by the eyewitnesses in the 19th century. Some of these anecdotes take place here in south-central Pennsylvania, including a few interesting ones from that I found in Harrisburg in the state damage claims. There are also some fascinating incidents from this area that appear in the regimental histories of troops that passed through here en route to Gettysburg.

Here's one story from I particularly like, as it includes alleged dialogue between the soldiers and an unnamed Hanover area farmer. Was he one of the very men mentioned by Licensed Battlefield Guide John T. Krepps in an earlier post on the Union V Corps' movements through the region, perhaps even Jesse Keller, on whose Adams County farm Ayres' Division camped?

A while back, I posted an account of the 118th Pennsylvania Infantry of the Union V Corps entering southwestern York County on July 1, 1863. They were among a seemingly endless series of armed troops to pass through the region over a 5-day period, finishing with a portion of the First Troop, Philadelphia City Cavalry which approached Hanover from York on July 5. They passed through Spring Grove (then Spring Forge) according to the battalion historian, but did not make it all the way to Hanover as far as I know.

We are blessed in York County today to have several local men and women serving as Licensed Battlefield Guides at the nearby Gettysburg National Military Park, including Larry Wallace, Bobby Housch, and John Krepps of the Hanover area. I have been on some of Larry's battlewalks in the past. The Hanover contingent, and all LBGs, are experienced and well trained, and I recommend the services of an LBG if you are interested in a solid tour of the Gettysburg battlefield. Guided tours may be reserved in advance through the National Park Service at the new Gettysburg Visitors Center.

John Krepps has consolidated nearly all of the available information on the June 30, 1863, battle of Hanover in his excellent recent book, A Strong and Sudden Onslaught: The Cavalry Action at Hanover, Pennsylvania. A faithful reader of Cannonball, he was kind enough to offer some deeper insight in the route the 118th Pennsylvania, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and the 20th Maine, and the rest of the V Corps used to reach the Hanover area, as well as his best estimation of the roads they used and the places they camped. I will post some photos of these areas in some upcoming blog entries.

For now, here are John's scholarly and well researched comments on the V Corps at Hanover.

July 1, 1863, saw the opening actions of the Battle of Gettysburg in nearby Adams County, Pennsylvania. However, even while the artillery roared and musketry crackled from the fields and woods north and west of Gettysburg, thousands of troops from both armies were hustling to reach the scene.

Late in the afternoon the 146th New York Volunteer Infantry reached the picturesque town of Hanover, Pennsylvania. Near the crossroads were lying the bloated carcasses of half a dozen cavalry horses, slain in the brief skirmish between Judson Kilpatrick's and J.E.B. Stuart's cavalrymen the previous day. Close to the road, near the scene of the main cavalry fighting, stood an old farmhouse, at the gate of which was an old-fashioned pump and horse trough. The pump handle was in constant motion, as the weary, foot-sore soldiers flocked around it to quench their thirst with the delicious water that flowed into the mossy trough.

What follows is the memory of a veteran of the regiment, perhaps a bit fanciful, but it makes for a good human interest story...

G. Craig Caba will be speaking at the July 15th York Civil War Round Table meeting. His program is called "Aspects of the J.Howard Wert Gettysburg Collection." Free to the public, his presentation will be at 7:00 PM Wednesday evening in the auditorium of the York County Heritage Trust at 250 E. Market Street in York.

The July 15th meeting of the York CWRT will feature period artifacts collected by the Wert family of Adams County for over a span of four generations. This collection of early Americana will be presented by G. Craig Caba, who is the CEO and Chief Curator of the J.Howard Wert Gettysburg Collection.

The Werts were an 18th century colonial Pennsylvania-German family who saved important heirlooms marking their accomplishments in the new nation. They actively participated in the American Revolution, the French and Indian War, the War of 1812 and the Civil War. The family deeply cherished the American vision of liberty and equality, and the family slogan became "Preserve for posterity." Thus, a private collection of historical memorabilia was formed by one of Gettysburg's earliest families. This collection continued to grow well into the 20th century and these documented relics give tangible testimony to America's unique cultural heritage.

Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early arrived in York on the afternoon of Sunday, June 28, 1863. He established his headquarters in the sheriff's office in the columned York County Courthouse on East Market Street. He ordered an aide, William Thornton, to transcribe a requisition for supplies--165 barrels of flour or 28,000 pounds of baked bread; 3,500 pounds of sugar; 1,650 pounds of coffee; 300 gallons of molasses; 1,200 pounds of salt; 32,000 pounds of fresh beef or 21,000 pounds of bacon or pork. All were to be delivered at the market house on Main Street at 4:00 p.m. Early's chief quartermaster, Major Charles E. Snodgrass, wrote a second requisition, calling for clothing - 2,000 pairs of shoes or boots, 1,000 pairs of socks and 1,000 felt hats and $100,000.

Chief Burgess David Small informed Early that the town's banks had already sent off their assets, and could not raise that amount of cash. Snodgrass eventually wrote a receipt for $28,610 collected from York's citizens, as well as the remaining goods that had been requisitioned. Attorney James W. Latimer "very foolishly gave them one hundred dollars" John Evans donated $50, W. Latimer Small $25, and the firm of P. A. & S. Small contributed $752. Gettysburg resident Sallie Broadhead wrote in her diary that the people of York were "dunce-like" in paying this ransom to the Rebels, "which they pocketed."

Following the Battle of Gettysburg, Union cavalry of Judson Kilpatrick's division captured scores of Confederate supply wagons retreating across South Mountain near Monterey Pass. Among the diverse items in the wagons were supplies taken from York to fulfill General Early's controversial ransom, as well as personal property stolen from York County residents. However, the goods were never returned to their owners. Instead, most received the torch.

Cannonball reader Jim Brown is a long-time collector of old Civil War letters. He recently read my piece on the Amish and other conscientious objectors in York County, Pennsylvania, during the war. It reminded him of one of the letters in his extensive collection, which he was kind enough to transcribe, edit a bit for clarity of sentence structure, and then forward it to me to share with our readers.

He wrote,

Dear Mr. Mingus,

"Just finished reading your wonderful piece in "Viewpoints" about the Amish during the Civil War. Thanks for writing it; I learned a lot.

As a long time collector of Civil War letters, I immediately thought of a letter in my collection from an Amish (Pennsylvania Dutch ?) lady describing what the farmers were doing as two great armies advanced into Pennsylvania only to meet at a little town called Gettysburg. The letters date is June 26, 1863.

I must warn you that it is somewhat difficult to read. Many words are spelled phonetically and I have included punctuation for easier reading. It is transcribed exactly as it was written. It's most interesting to read what they were doing with their farm animals to hide them from the rebels.

I hope you enjoy it."

With Jim's permission, here is the fascinating letter from Phebe Angeline Smith, who lived in Washington Township in northwestern York County. Members of the Smith family were visited by the Rebels during the Gettysburg Campaign. Mrs. Smith writes to her sister on June 26, 1863, the day before the Confederates begin streaming into western York County on multiple roads from Adams County.