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via http://ift.tt/2hy5ceh:
I wrote to my mother asking permission to repost her self-pubbed book about the local Civil War veterans in an accessible format (it’s here [titled “Civil War”] as a .docx file if you can open those) and am waiting for her to check her email and get back to me, but in the meantime I’ve been reading more and more of it and just getting
so mad
so fucking mad about the Civil War
A bunch of our local guys died at Andersonville and reading about the prison camp there is so awful.
One of them, she’s like, oh, on find-a-grave I found that he’s buried here, but in the database it’s recorded that his widow listed his fate as unknown and his grave as unknown and how sad is it that I know this and his widow never knew it
and it’s just
these were people and they suffered horribly for this and how dare you erase that, John fucking Kelly.
And, ok, here’s an unauthorized excerpt while I wait to hear back.
Frederick Scharp
I am sad to have very little information on Fred Scharp or Sharp. I can’t even find him and his family in the 1860 census in Rensselaer County, though there are several families with that surname. What is sure is that Fred enlisted in Company K of the 125th in August. He lived in Greenbush and was 23 years old. He was 5’7” tall, with brown eyes and dark hair, and was born in Germany. He actually has no connection to Schaghticoke, but I don’t want him to be forgotten.
He was taken prisoner while on picket duty near Mine Run, Virginia on December 1, 1863, along with at least a half dozen other soldiers in Company K, and a total of 41 men from the regiment. Fred was unlucky and was shipped with most of the others to the new Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia, which began accepting prisoners in February of 1864. He and most of the other “Schaghticoke boys”, including Job Grant, W.O. Carr, John Conlon, Douglas Fisher, and C.E. Stratton died over the summer. Fred died of gangrene on September 18, 1864, and is buried at Andersonville. Conlon was the last of the group to die, just four days later.
Frederick’s mother, Christiana, applied for a pension based on his service on September 23, 1865, so at least she had some monetary compensation for his loss- and knew of his fate.
Another thing that’s mentioned is that a number of the men in the hometown regiment went on to be officers when the Union raised regiments of colored troops– it was a good opportunity for promotion but you had to be good and also very brave as it was known that the Confederates wouldn’t capture you, but would execute you along with your troops. Still, the men who volunteered for this were apparently very admired.
And the last thing about this project is how utterly crucial census records are. If the GOP fucks with the 2020 census, what an incalculable loss to future historians.
I wrote to my mother asking permission to repost her self-pubbed book about the local Civil War veterans in an accessible format (it’s here [titled “Civil War”] as a .docx file if you can open those) and am waiting for her to check her email and get back to me, but in the meantime I’ve been reading more and more of it and just getting
so mad
so fucking mad about the Civil War
A bunch of our local guys died at Andersonville and reading about the prison camp there is so awful.
One of them, she’s like, oh, on find-a-grave I found that he’s buried here, but in the database it’s recorded that his widow listed his fate as unknown and his grave as unknown and how sad is it that I know this and his widow never knew it
and it’s just
these were people and they suffered horribly for this and how dare you erase that, John fucking Kelly.
And, ok, here’s an unauthorized excerpt while I wait to hear back.
Frederick Scharp
I am sad to have very little information on Fred Scharp or Sharp. I can’t even find him and his family in the 1860 census in Rensselaer County, though there are several families with that surname. What is sure is that Fred enlisted in Company K of the 125th in August. He lived in Greenbush and was 23 years old. He was 5’7” tall, with brown eyes and dark hair, and was born in Germany. He actually has no connection to Schaghticoke, but I don’t want him to be forgotten.
He was taken prisoner while on picket duty near Mine Run, Virginia on December 1, 1863, along with at least a half dozen other soldiers in Company K, and a total of 41 men from the regiment. Fred was unlucky and was shipped with most of the others to the new Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia, which began accepting prisoners in February of 1864. He and most of the other “Schaghticoke boys”, including Job Grant, W.O. Carr, John Conlon, Douglas Fisher, and C.E. Stratton died over the summer. Fred died of gangrene on September 18, 1864, and is buried at Andersonville. Conlon was the last of the group to die, just four days later.
Frederick’s mother, Christiana, applied for a pension based on his service on September 23, 1865, so at least she had some monetary compensation for his loss- and knew of his fate.
Another thing that’s mentioned is that a number of the men in the hometown regiment went on to be officers when the Union raised regiments of colored troops– it was a good opportunity for promotion but you had to be good and also very brave as it was known that the Confederates wouldn’t capture you, but would execute you along with your troops. Still, the men who volunteered for this were apparently very admired.
And the last thing about this project is how utterly crucial census records are. If the GOP fucks with the 2020 census, what an incalculable loss to future historians.
