A Life of Service: Mark Gordon of the 85th Pennsylvania

 

Experiences in the Civil War (link below)

      Like all Civil War soldiers, like soldiers of any war, 18-year old Marquis Lafayette “Mark” Gordon of Greene County pondered how he would react to being subjected to  enemy fire for the first time. Would he show bravery or cowardice or something in between? Would he stand and fight to protect his comrades and his cause or would he freeze or “skedaddle”?

        Gordon, a highly thoughtful young man and a member of Company G the 85^th Pennsylvania Volunteers, got his answer in 1862 on a chilly night during a battle in Virginia.

Battle of Williamsburg
85th PA is in Keyes Corps
Map Courtesy of Hal Jespersen  www.cwmaps,com

        On May 5, 1862 at Williamsburg, Virginia, Gordon’s regiment was called forward in reserve after the start of the first pitched battle of the Peninsula Campaign where  Union divisions under Joseph Hooker and Philip Kearny attacked the rearguard of the Confederate army during its escape from Yorktown. (The overall Union goal of the campaign was to make a water landing at Fort Monroe, march up the Virginia peninsula formed by the James and York Rivers and capture Richmond, the Confederate capital).

Colonel Joshua B. Howell
from Dickey's history of the 85th PA

        The 85^th Pennsylvania volunteer regiment had been organized in the fall of 1861 by Joshua Blackwood Howell, a prominent attorney from Uniontown, PA. Howell’s soldiers came from four counties in the southwest corner of Pennsylvania: Greene, Fayette, Washington and Somerset. 

     Gordon hailed from Waynesburg, the county seat of Greene County. Gordon was a young school teacher when the war broke out. He chose to volunteer into the Union army to help suppress the rebellion of eleven southern states and preserve the 85-year old republic.

    The "Pursley Guards" which became a part of Company G were organized by Gordon’s father, John “Adam” Gordon, a prominent Waynesburg citizen. Adam Gordon was serving as the first superintendent of schools for Greene County when hostilities broke out. Also serving in Company G were Mark Gordon, his uncle, John Crawford and two cousins, Reason Strosnider and Owen Pitcock.

John Adam Gordon
Experiences in the Civil War

           When they arrived at training camp in Uniontown, Adam Gordon and his son along with the rest of the Pursley Guards were consolidated with another undermanned company to form Company G. Isaac Abraham of Smithfield in Fayette County was chosen as captain and Adam Gordon became the new company’s first lieutenant.

        Seven months later, at Williamsburg, Mark Gordon was called forward during a cold, misty rain with the rest of his regiment. The 85^th Pennsylvania, stationed on the edge of a wooded area, was advanced 500 yards to relieve another Pennsylvania regiment, the 93rd. Some men in Gordon’s regiment had to step over the dead bodies of fallen soldiers to get to their assigned position, surely a sobering sight for these untested men. The 85^th PA and their brigade remained in reserve for the rest of the battle. The entire brigade stood in formation for eighteen hours during a bone-chilling night until the fighting ahead of them finally ceased. The battle ended in a draw, and Confederates continued their movement up the peninsula towards Richmond.

        The 85^th Pennsylvania was not directly engaged in the battle. They were subjected to cannon fire from a Confederate battery about a half-mile away. Most of these projectiles fell harmlessly in the trees in front of them or in their rear as the regiment fired several blind vollies of musket balls towards the Confederate position at Fort Magruder.  

        Two men in the regiment were nonetheless wounded, one severely. A piece of shrapnel cut the face of Captain John Morris of Company F, who was also from Greene County. More seriously, a shell struck down Sergeant Daniel Miller of Company K. Miller’s lower body was badly mangled. Both of his legs were amputated and he soon died in a Philadelphia hospital.

William Elliott Finley
from his memoir The Private's Life

         The wounds suffered by Morris and Miller were the only two casualties in the 85^th Pennsylvania regiment that night. But Corporal William Elliot Finley of Company I wrote that the experience was terrifying for these green troops. He wrote, “The cries of the wounded and dying, the incessant and doleful patter of the falling rain together with the irregular picket firing in front, all conspired to make it a night of horror and unrest.” [1]

     The briskly cold night also had a harmful effect on scores of troops, including Mark Gordon. Many became ill. One member of Company A, John Neill of Washington, PA, remembered hearing his comrades’ teeth chattering up and down the line during the long night of standing in formation.

         M.L. Gordon later wrote of this first battlefield experience nearly thirty years later in his memoir called “Experiences in the Civil War.”  This account was privately published after M.L. Gordon’s death by his son, Donald.

        Gordon was raised in a religious environment at Waynesburg. He attended church and sat in as his father taught a Bible class to adults on Sunday afternoons. At Williamsburg, Mark Gordon found that he was not overcome with a paralyzing fear of battle, nor sacrificial bravery either. Instead, he was enveloped by a sense of spiritual serenity. “I can remember now the thought came to me, ‘What if I should be killed?’ I think I had been a Christian before, but I can remember how clearly the thought came to me that while my death might be a loss to my friends, it could bring no loss to me.’”

Civil War ambulance   LOC

     Gordon became ill from exposure at Williamsburg and was sent to a nearby camp hospital. He was recovering at a larger hospital in Newport News when many sick men were transferred to New York City to make room for casualties from the battle of Seven Pines [also known as Fair Oaks] that began later that month. Gordon therefore missed this fight in which his regiment suffered close to a hundred men killed and wounded.

       Of his illness, Gordon later remembered, “I began to feel the effects of the night before Williamsburg. A heavy fever set in, and as we had no way of transport for sick men, I fell behind. From the time we left Yorktown, it had been raining much of the time, and the roads were simply awful. Late that night I fell in with an ammunition train, and one of the drivers was kind enough to let me ride on one of his wagons, though he had no right to do so. I suppose he saw how sick a boy I was.” [2]

       After some time at home in Waynesburg following his stay in New York City to recover, Gordon rejoined his regiment after an absence of three months.  Ironically, his father by this time had been transferred to an ambulance corps and the two would spend the rest of the war apart from each other. 

     Mark became ill several more times over the next two years. But unlike 300 men from the 85^th PA who were discharged for medical reasons between 1861 to 1864, Gordon returned to the regiment after each sickness and eventually finished his three-year enlistment.

         Gordon would be shot at and shelled many times during the campaigns in Charleston, South Carolina in 1863 and Bermuda Hundred, Virginia in 1864. The life-or-death realization of combat brought some soldiers closer to their faith. Others saw the horrific destruction around them and questioned a belief in a higher being. For his part, Gordon’s faith in God was strengthened by the war. Half of his postwar years would be spent overseas as a Christian missionary.

      Two years after his return from the war, Gordon finished his degree at Waynesburg College. He went on to achieve advanced degrees in both theology from Andover Theological Seminary in Massachusetts and in medicine from Columbia University. He spent 17 years of his postwar life in Japan and wrote two books about his time there. Prior to leaving for Japan, he married school teacher Agnes Donald in 1872. Together the couple had three children.

      In 1889, while serving in Japan, he was encouraged by his son, Donald, to write about his time in the Civil War. Mark Gordon died in Massachusetts in 1900 at the age of 57.

      Gordon’s Civil War memoir includes a dozen letters written to his uncle, William Gordon. It therefore offers the reader a contrast between Mark Gordon’s thoughts in real time (his letters and diary notes) and his narrative written a quarter-century later.

     Gordon occasionally offered political observations in his war letters. In 1863, referring to the Emancipation Proclamation which went into effect a few weeks earlier, he wrote, as a pro-Union Democrat, “He [Lincoln] has adopted measure which we believe ruinous, yet for his misdeeds shall we desert our country [?]” [3]

      Meanwhile, in the spring of 1863, western Pennsylvania was threatened with invasion as Confederate General William “Grumble” Jones led an expedition through western Virginia as far north as Morgantown, just five miles from the Greene County border. This Confederate raid had three purposes: to discourage western Virginians from carrying through with separation and statehood, to disrupt Union transportation and supplies, and to capture livestock for the Confederate cause.

       It was the latter goal that most alarmed the people of southwestern Pennsylvania, who were afraid that the raid would proceed up through their counties to the federal arsenal in Pittsburgh. Consequently, temporary militias were formed, bank holdings were sent away to safe locations, and farmers tried to hide their horses and cattle among the rolling hills of the area. In the end, the raiders stopped at Morgantown and then veered back into the western counties of West Virginia.

      Stationed on Folly Island near Charleston at the time, Gordon got a big chuckle when he read hometown newspapers of the panic caused by Jones’ marauders. He wrote to his uncle, “Our boys had a great time after the arrival of the last mail, laughing over the scare some of the people in Greene Co. had at the time of the threatened invasion by the Rebels, although I suspect, it was no laughing matter then…I think there were some men who should have shown more pluck than to run off with their horses and cattle & [potentially] leave their wives and children in the hands of a merciless, vagabond band of guerillas.” [4]

Union Camp on Morris Island    LOC

       While stationed on Morris Island, home of the famous Confederate stronghold Battery Wagner, Gordon crossed paths with Clara Barton, the most famous nurse of the Civil War and later the founder of the American Red Cross.

Clara Barton    LOC

     Barton was in the Charleston theater of the war to tend to the soldiers and also out of concern for her brother, David, a northern entrepreneur who had stayed in North Carolina when the war began to guard his various business ventures. Clara Barton set up a field hospital on Morris Island. While she tended to a wounded comrade from his company, Gordon wrote, “Away in the night Miss Barton came in and went round among the wounded, talking to them in such a nice way, that I could hardly repress the mental ‘God Bless You!’ that came to my lips and if I had followed my heart would have went up and kissed her right there before them all!” [5]

       While stationed on Morris Island, Gordon witnessed two failed infantry assaults on Battery Wagner in July of 1863 that resulted in thousands of Union casualties. In both cases, the 85^th Pennsylvania was slated to participate in secondary attacks on the battery once the battery walls were breached, but in each case, the follow-up assaults were called off due to massive Union losses.

    The second assault was led by the 54^th Massachusetts, a regiment of African Americans that suffered over 250 casualties but earned the respect of a generation of white Union soldiers like Mark Gordon. Shortly after the assault, Gordon wrote, “In regard to…arming the Negroes…I was opposed to many if not all of them but a close observation of the progress of the war has convinced me that in some instances, I was wrong.” [6]

54th storming Battery Wagner    LOC

        A year later, the 85^th Pennsylvania became part of the newly formed Army of the James under General Benjamin Butler and was transferred to the Bermuda Hundred peninsula in Virginia between Richmond and Petersburg.

      On May 20, 1864, the regiment became engaged in a vigorous skirmish with the enemy at Ware Bottom Church. Gordon wrote, “Here we had the hardest direct fighting of my whole experience. They advanced within a hundred yards of us determined to drive us, but we were as determined to hold our ground. I here shot so fast as to make my gun-barrel so hot that it was uncomfortable to hold – the only time I ever had such an experience.” [7]

Marquis Lafayette Gordon
Experiences in the Civil War

Doshisha U. regents
from Thirty Eventful Years

       Gordon's postwar career showed a commitment to his now strengthened religious ideals. In Japan, Gordon lived in Osaka and became a professor of theology at Doshisha University in Kyoto. Gordon’s arrival came just after the Mejia Restoration when Japan became less isolationist and opened its borders to western visitors and ideas. Christianity was allowed after a ban that lasted two centuries.

      In 1889, while the time of his service in Japan was coming to a close, he was encouraged by his son, Donald, to write about his time in the Civil War. Mark Gordon died in Massachusetts in 1900 at the age of 57 shortly after his return from overseas.

        Prior to his death, in 1891, he had began writing “An American Missionary in Japan.” In the preface, he gave two reasons for writing this book. One was to record “the wonderful manner in which the religion of Christ is approaching the minds and hearts and lives of the Japanese people.” The other reason was to “outline the way in which missionaries…carry on to success the work for which they are sent out.”  [8]

       During his time in Japan, the Asian nation was swinging back and forth between opening up to foreigners to acquire more technology and knowledge on one hand, to on the other shutting down its borders to outside influences. As a doctor as well as a religious teacher, foreigners like Gordon had been welcomed more for their medical knowledge than their Christian teachings. By the time he left Japan, Christianity was seen as a threat to a growing Japanese nationalism movement.

      During a trip to Massachusetts in 1892, Gordon delivered a church sermon gave a sermon, comparing his trip to America to a soldier in the field. Gordon “came [home] as a soldier who visits another part of the battlefield and tells his comrades how the battle is going.”

Gordon as a medical missionary
Thirty Eventful Years

       Gordon added, “We are working for a civilized people…The Japanese ideas of etiquette must be respected if we would influence them. Etiquette requires me to remove my hat when I enter an American house; the Japanese remove their shoes. The Japanese are a progressive nation. Railroads and telegraphs have been introduced…Two years ago, it seemed as though the days of the Japanese missions were nearly ended, but the pendulum has swung the other way and there is an earnest demand for American missionaries.” [9]

       The last year of his life, 1900, was an active one. He finished writing his second book on his missionary experiences called “Thirty Eventful Years: The Story of the American Board Mission in Japan, 1869-1899” which was posthumously published in 1901.

        In the preface to this second work, Gordon's son, Donald, wrote: “The toil of these years had unmistakenly left its mark upon him, and many of his friends wished he had spared himself this new labor... Later, he himself clearly recognized the unwisdom of the undertaking but kept himself bravely at his task though with great weariness of the flesh and although there was even then creeping in upon him the fatal disease which ended his life on November 4, 1900.” [10]

      In “Thirty Eventful Years in Japan,” Gordon was overwhelming upbeat about his missionary experience. Gordon nonetheless included one vignette that demonstrated the danger faced by his family and fellow western missionaries towards the end of his mission. The group had received a chilling letter from some Japanese citizens who wished to expel all foreigners from Japanese soil.

     The anonymous letter stated, “You have come from a far county with the evil religion of Christ... With bad teaching you are gradually deceiving the people but we know your hearts, and hence we shall soon with Japanese swords inflict the punishment of Heaven upon you...In ancient times, when Buddhism first came to Japan, those who brought it were killed; in the same way you must be killed. But we do not wish to defile the sacred soil of Japan with your abominable blood. Hence take your families and go quickly.” [11]

        Perhaps due to this admonition or to his failing health (or both), Gordon came home to the United States. Seven months prior to his death, Gordon delivered an address at an evangelical conference entitled, “The Best Method of Dealing Personally with Unconverted and Inquirers.”  One month later, he was invited by the American Board of Missions to lead missionary efforts in the Hawaiian Islands (that had a large population of Japanese field workers) but had to turn down the offer due to his declining physical condition.

      In September of 1900, Gordon conducted the marriage of his son, Donald, to Louise Ayer in Boston. Gordon died a few weeks later from anemia at age 57 and is buried in Andover, Massachusetts.

        Today, M.L. Gordon’s legacy of achievement lives on among numerous descendants. These include his great grandson and namesake, Mark Gordon, who in 2018 was elected governor of Wyoming.

Governor Mark Gordon of Wyoming

   Endnotes

1.     1 The Private’s History, William Elliot Finley, 1867, p. 10

2.     2   Experiences in the Civil War, M.L. Gordon, edited by Donald Gordon, 1922, p.31

3.     3. Experiences in the Civil War, M.L. Gordon, p.7

4.     4. Experiences in the Civil War, p.34

5.     5. Experiences in the Civil War, p.39

6.     6.   Experiences in the Civil War, p.41

7.     7. Experiences in the Civil War, p. 59

8.     8. An American Missionary in Japan, M.L. Gordon, 1892, Cambridge, MA

9.     9. The Fitchburg (Mass.) Sentinel, March 17, 1892, page 6

1      10. Thirty Eventful Years in Japan, M.L. Gordon, 1901, Boston

        11. Thirty Eventful Years, p. 12

  

More to the Story of William Braden of Company B

        The Battle of Seven Pines near Richmond, VA in the spring of 1862 is one of the most overlooked yet significant fights of the Civil War. It was the closest major battle fought around Richmond, the Confederate capital, as well as the first fight between the Army of Northern Virginia and the Army of the Potomac. Each side suffered at least 5,000 casualties.

       Why has Seven Pines, also known as Fair Oaks, not been given more attention by scholars? One reason is that the three-day fight ended in significant losses but no distinct winner. Another is that Seven Pines was dwarfed when compared to the series of fights called the Seven Days’ Battles  that had 36,000 total casualties the following month and resulted in the end of Union General George McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign.

     Furthermore, little of the Seven Pines battlefield has been preserved other than a few homes used as hospitals and roadside markers. The landmark Twin Houses are long gone. Today, the battle site has been replaced by the town of Sandston and a portion of the Richmond International Airport.

The 85th PA is in Casey's Division in an exposed position when the fight began. Porter,
 Franklin and Sumner are all on the opposite side of the rushing Chickahominy River. 

                                                    Map by Hal Jespersen, www.cwmaps.com

     Seven Pines nonetheless had great significance in the story of the 85th Pennsylvania. It was not only their first taste of  the conflict  (other than standing in formation during the Battle of Williamsburg a month earlier) but also for being the largest battle in which they ever participated. 

    Battle losses coupled with sicknesses that plagued McClellan’s army on their trek up the Virginia peninsula towards Richmond proved the months of May and June of 1862 to be the most devastating for the 85th in terms of combined  deaths.

       One of those in the 85th killed during the first day of the battle was 22-year old William Braden of Company B from Washington County. Braden’s company had just been replaced on the picket line by Company D when the Confederates launched their attack in the early afternoon of May 31. The 85th PA was soon a part of two retreats in the early hours of the battle from the area around the Twin Houses. 

        We have two first-person accounts from this part of the fight that state that Braden was shot and killed while trying to assist his wounded officer, Lieutenant George H. Hooker, from the field. Hooker survived his wound, was promoted to captain, and lived another 45 years.

From the History of the 103rd Regiment PA Volunteers p. 174

         Private Manaen Sharp, himself a member of Company B, recorded that, “Comrade Braden was helping to carry his wounded captain [Hooker, then a lieutenant] to save him from capture. Another comrade who was assisting, J.F. Speer of Canonsburg heard that sickening thud of a minie ball strike Comrade Braden, who said, ‘I am hit.’ He staggered to the road side….”

     Manaen Sharp wrote his version of the incident in a brief tract called “Amity in the Great American Conflict” in commemoration of Memorial Day in 1903 in which he chronicled the Civil War service of local residents. Sharp owned several furniture stores in Washington County and died in 1920 at the age of 82.

       James F. Speer, who completed carrying Hooker to safety following Braden’s death, was later seriously wounded in the shoulder at the Battle of Second Deep Bottom in 1864 and survived. He returned home to Washington County and found work as a bricklayer and stone mason. Around the turn of the century he worked as a furniture salesman, perhaps in the employ of Manaen Sharp. Speer died in 1924 at the age of 82.

Lt. George H. Hooker

   Since Braden’s  body and those of hundreds of others on both sides were never recovered for individual  burials, Nancy Braden, William’s widow, needed the written testimony of Captain Hooker as proof of her husband’s death in order to qualify for a widow’s pension. In 1865, Hooker wrote, “I hereby certify that Wm. Braden, a private of Company B 85th Pa. Vols., was shot while assisting me from the field at the Battle of Fair Oaks, Virginia on the 31st of May, 1862. He fell severely wounded and is supposed to have died from the effects of his wound.” 

      

               Hooker a native of the section of Virginia that became West Virginia during the war, was later  promoted to captain and served as an adjutant on the staff of Colonel Joshua B. Howell. Hooker returned home to West Virginia following the war and farmed in Wayne County. He died in 1907 at the age of 66. 

       Besides his young wife, William Braden was survived by a one-year old son, George W. Braden. William Braden also served in Company B with his Nancy’s brother, brother-in-law, George Bigler.

       Compared to the other hundred or so battlefield deaths in the 85th PA regiment during the war, the story of Braden’s battlefield demise is one with many details due to the accounts of Sharp and Hooker.

      Now, because of the diligent work of Doug Carter, a former investigator with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and a Civil war enthusiast, we can add to  Braden’s story.

       Carter has always had a fascination with the actions during the Civil War in his home state. His great grandfather,  Jesse Taliaferro Carter, enlisted into the 3rd Georgia Reserves at age 17. He served as a guard at the Andersonville and Camp Lawton Prison Camps and later was wounded in the neck in December of 1864 in South Carolina 

          How did Doug Carter become involved in the story of the 85th PA? In his research, Carter, who is also a relative of former President Jimmy Carter, has identified the Georgia  soldier who felled Braden at Seven Pines.

       When I wrote my book about the 85th Pennsylvania regiment, called “Such Hard and Severe Service,” I relied heavily on primary sources; mainly the letters, diaries and memoirs of the men in the that regiment. In the early stages of the war, like for the Battle of Seven Pines, sources were relatively  abundant for review. As the war dragged on however, more soldiers were killed, sent home with illnesses, or simply completed their three-year enlistments, which reduced the number of potential  sources from about a thousand to 150 by the time of Lee’s surrender at Appomattox.

       One recent Confederate source that  came of light through the work of Mr. Carter was a letter written by Private Thomas Inglett of the 28th Georgia regiment. 

First page and cover of Thomas Inglett letter, June 10, 1862
Courtesy of Doug Carter

         It was Inglett who fired the shot that struck down Braden, a fact that Carter  discovered 150 years later. It is a rare circumstance to be able to identify a dead soldier’s shooter so long after the event, if ever.

        Ten days after the battle began, Inglett wrote a letter to his wife.  “I killed one [Yankee] and got a letter out of his pocket that was wrote to him by his wife and I will send it to you and you can read it.”

      The letter that Inglett lifted from Braden’s lifeless body was in fact not written by the Union soldier’s wife. Part of it was written by Israel Bigler and another portion was written by  his13-year old Mary Bigler, whom Inglett thought was the dead soldier's wife.  The letter never actually mentioned Braden’s surname. 

Researcher Doug Carter

    Carter purchased the Inglett letter in 2007, knowing that the Union letter in the envelope was an added bonus. 

    “I like researching,” said Carter. “I was a special agent with the G.B.I. investigating crimes and I like digging. I was determined to find out who this guy [Braden] was.”

         Carter first realized the Union letter was four pages in length. He determined that most of the letter was written by Israel Bigler, a middle-aged farmer from Washington County to “Will” and “George.” The last page was written by “Mary Bigler” to  “Will.” He next had transcribed the Bigler letter, a task not made easy by its  blood-stained nature.  Carter initially thought Will and George were both sons of Israel. Carter’s next step was to  investigate the war services and  lives of both Inglett and Braden to gain a wider knowledge of both men. 

     Inglett’s letter described his role at Seven Pines before he took the fatal shot against Braden. “I got my cap shot off of my head in the fight but I did not get hurt. Our poor boys fell all around me. James Price was killed with a canister shot before we got [with]in six hundred yards of the yankees. Sam Cawley was my file leader and he got shot down and the ball through [threw] blood all over my face and in my mouth, but they did not stop me for I was mad. Our regiment charged them twice and we made them run like dogs from their batteries.”

Portion of letter that Inglett took from Braden's body.
Courtesy of Doug Carter

      But Carter’s investigation of census records of the Israel Bigler household prior to the Civil War indicated that Bigler had no son named William. Braden, however, is listed in the 1860 federal census as a member of the Bigler household who was working as a farm laborer. Other family members were daughters Mary and Nancy who would soon marry William. From the 1850 census, Carter discovered that Israel Bigler did have a son named George Bigler, who was also a member of Company B. The census revealed that  Israel Bigler also had a daughter named Nancy, who married William Braden in 1860. 

      Carter researched military records and found George Bigler and William Braden were in the same company of the 85th PA. By combing through the original 1913 history of the regiment, he determined that Bigler and Braden were both in Company B. He also discovered George had survived the war but that William was killed at Seven Pines. This was the key discovery that indicated that Braden was the owner of the letter confiscated by Inglett.

     

Wikipedia Commons

 Thomas Inglett, meanwhile, grew up near Augusta, Georgia. He spent over three years in the Confederate army. He lost two fingers on his left hand due to a war wound during the Seven Days Battles a month after Seven Pines but recovered and continued to in his regiment

      Inglett later suffered a leg wound at the First Battle of Darbytown Road on October 7, 1864 and was sent to a Richmond hospital. Ironically, the whole of the 85th PA fought in another battle at Darbytown Road just six days after Inglett was wounded. Most of the regiment went home the next day, having completed their three-year enlistments.

     Tragically, three of Inglett’s infant daughters died while he was in the Confederate service. Inglett died in 1910 at the age of 71 and is buried in the Fort Eisenhower Cemetery in Richmond, Georgia. 

    Nearly a hundred of Inglett’s other Civil War letters can be found at the “Private Voices” website.

       Combining the accounts of Inglett, Sharp and Hooker, several questions arise from the combination of the three stories.

        The Israel Bigler letter had been written at least four months prior to Seven Pines. Why was Braden carrying it in on his person? It seems that he might have possessed a more recent letter at the time of his death.

     Next, was Braden moving  when he was shot? Inglett makes no mention in his letter that Braden was helping to carry away the wounded Hooker with another soldier. If Braden and Speer were on either side of Hooker helping to carry him away, did Inglett aim for the mass of the three men and happened to strike Braden or did he aim for Braden?

Letter from Lt. Hooker in Nancy Braden's Pension File

        Or perhaps were the three Yankees stopped to rest when Braden fell? Sharp’s letter, which may have been directly related to him by Speer,  seems to indicate that Braden was struck fatally but did not die instantly. Hooker wrote that he “presumed” that Braden died quickly from his wound. Did Speer decide that Braden was dead or mortally wounded  when he staggered to the side of the road or was not going to survive, and thus carried on alone to help Hooker? 

      Inglett at  first struck me as a bit cold-blooded in his rather casual mention to his wife that he lifted the letter from Braden’s lifeless body and chose to send it home to her as a souvenir.

         However, when one reviews Inglett’s account of the fight prior to his targeting of Braden, the context makes his action a bit more understandable. Inglett mentioned the wounding of two of his comrades, one of whom splattered blood on his [Inglett’s] face and in his mouth. Inglett notes his own hat was shot from his head. He mentions that these events enraged him and encouraged him to press forward in the fight. This strikes me an a not uncommon reaction to being in a battle in which one’s friends have fallen around you.

        Why was Braden’s body not recovered for burial? The only soldier of the approximately 25 men in the 85th PA who died from the battle who is buried in the Seven Pines National Cemetery, which was later situated in the approximate location on the 85th PA regiment’s camp, is Corporal Joseph Wilgus of Company B. That is only because Wilgus was wounded in the battle and died later. The field on which the 85th fought was soon overrun by Confederates. There was no chance at the end of the battle to return and recover bodies for burial. Another 85th PA soldier who died in the fight, Lieutenant James Reynolds of Company H. His body was left behind near the huge pile of firewood hear the Twin Houses, but his body was also not recovered for burial.

    These questions will likely never be answered. However, due to Carter’s investigative diligence, we have a more complete story of the death of one soldier, William Braden of Washington County, who was one of thousands who died at Seven Pines.

     Below are several depictions of the burial of soldiers after the Battle of Seven Pines

Post-battle photo of the Twin Houses with the seven pine trees in the background.
The foreground was said to have been used to bury 400 soldiers, perhaps including Braden. LOC

View of Seven Pines prior to the battle with the Twin Houses and 7 pine trees to the left.
 The camp of several regiments including the 85th PA can be seen in the background. LOC

Sketch of mass burials being conducted after the battle of Seven Pines.
This view is from the direction of the first Confederate attack with the
pine trees in front of the Twin Houses. LOC

Lieutenant John Wishart Acheson

 

Lieutenant John W. Acheson
The Progessive Men of the Commonwealth of PA, Vol. 1, 1900, p. 269

         Lieutenant John Wishart Acheson was an ambitious, intelligent and courageous soldier. He survived the war but died shortly afterwards at the young age of 34. Nonetheless, the accomplishments of Acheson and his brothers as a members of various Union regiments are noteworthy.

      Lieutenant John Wishart Acheson of the 85th PA was the first son of Judge Alexander Wilson Acheson, a prominent member of the Little Washington community in western Pennsylvania

Judge Alexander W. Acheson
Commemortive Biographies of Washington County 1893

       Judge  Acheson was born in Philadelphia, but his parents hailed from Washington County. Young A.W. Acheson went to college in western Pennsylvania and remained in Washington, PA ("Little Washington") until his death over seven decades later.

     Just before passing away in 1890, Judge Acheson recalled a memory from his childhood. Mr. Acheson remembered from nearly 80 years beforehand, "One of my earliest recollections was when school took a recess to see the soldiers pass through town on their return from the War of 1812. Of that band of children which gathered on the pavement, I am probably the only one now living. The company which passed was the 'Ten Mile Rangers.' A black horse, which had belonged to one of their officers who was killed at Niagara Falls [also known as Lundy's Lane], was led in front. That must of have been in the fall of 1814." [Washington Semi-Weekly Reporter, July 12, 1890, page 6]

     Military service would become a very important in the lives of Judge Acheson's children. Judge Acheson himself did not have a military career. He was admitted to the bar in 1832. He served four terms as district attorney before becoming a regional county judge in 1866 and spent 23 years on the bench. Politically he began as a Democrat, although he switched to the Republican Party in the years just prior to the Civil War. 

     Besides John, his eldest child, Judge Acheson had four other sons who served in the Union army during the Civil War. John Acheson was very ambitious for promotion during his three-plus years in the army. He knew the best way to advance was to show coolness, fortitude and leadership in battle, which he often displayed. He also seemed to have the political connections that would assure his furtherance in military.

     However, John became frustrated that his path to higher rank was proceeding slowly or maybe was blocked. This may have been due to political reasons, as Colonel Joshua B. Howell of the 85th PA was a member of a different political party. Acheson was a strong supporter of Howell early in the war but the relationship soured and John eventually transferred out. John's rise may also have been blocked for health reasons, which will be explored below. 

      However, John Acheson's patriotism, capability and bravery were above question. He came from one of the elite families of Little Washington, but he and his brothers displayed a sense of noblesse oblige regarding the war. John proved to be an effective leader while under fire. He was wounded three times, a testament to his commitment to the Union cause and to those who served under him.

     Following the war, John's life was cut short due to various addictions, including alcohol. Perhaps these dependencies came from his war service and difficulty in overcoming his physical wounds. Some soldiers also turned to the bottle out of boredom or due to the horrors of the battlefield. John's death came in 1872. This was ironic because his father was a strong advocate of the temperance movement throughout his political career.

       John Acheson graduated from Washington College (later Washington and Jefferson University) in 1857 and was a language instructor for several years before studying to become a lawyer. But he quickly enlisted a few days after Fort Sumter fell in 1861 into the 12th PA infantry for three months along with his brother, David. Their company was commanded by Colonel Norton McGiffin, who would later become the lieutenant colonel of the 85th PA. The 12th regiment, a three-month unit, saw no action at the First Battle of Bull Run in July of 1861. They were instead tasked to guard a railroad near York, Pennsylvania before disbanding. 

     While two brothers, David and Alexander "Sandie," soon joined the 140th PA, John enlisted for three years into Company A of the 85th Pennsylvania. 

      David Acheson became the captain of Company C of the 140th PA. On the second day of fighting at the Battle of Gettysburg, Captain Acheson was killed near Stoney Hill when engaged against a South Carolina regiment. His remains were later recovered after the battle and buried near the Weikert Farm. Near his gravesite, his company placed a small boulder and carved his initials, "D.A" into the stone along with "140th P.V." David Acheson was 22 years old. His body was eventually brought home and buried in Little Washington.

 

Captain David Acheson and the Gettysburg boulder marking his temporary grave
History of the 140th Regiment Pennsylvania, R.L. Stewart, 1912, P.124-5

        David Acheson was succeeded as the captain of Company C by his younger brother, Sandy. Sandy Acheson was shot in the face (but survived) at the Battle of Spotsylvania in 1864.

    

Sandy Acheson
History of the 140th PA 

Sandy became a doctor following the war, moved to Texas and died at the age of 91 in 1934.

      A fourth brother, Marcus "Mark" Acheson, was born in 1844 and enlisted into the 58th PA infantry in 1863, one day before his brother David was killed at Gettysburg. Marcus spent a few weeks in this three-month regiment and was mustered out in mid-August. 

Joseph M. Acheson
Progressive Men of PA

      A fifth son, Joseph, enlisted into Knapp's Battery in 1864 at the age of 16. He contracted malaria during his four months of service that troubled him for the rest of his life. He died at the age of 38 in Fairfield, Iowa. 

Ernest Acheson
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/ernest_acheson/400681

      Another brother, Ernest, was 10 years old when the war ended, too young for military service. Ernest later served for 14 years in the U.S. House of Representatives. 

      In 1986, librarian and local historian Jane Fulcher (1916-2005) published a collection of letters entitled "Family Letters in a Civil War Century." In her book, Ms. Fulcher, Ernest Acheson's granddaughter,  included about 20 letters written by John Acheson during the war.

[Note: All of the quotations below are from "Family Letters In a Civil War Century: Achesons, Wilsons, Brownsons, Wisharts and Others of Washington, Pa.", Jane Fulcher, Avella, PA, 1986.]

      Nine days after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, John Acheson heeded President Lincoln's call for 75,000 volunteers and enlisted into the 12th PA. From Pittsburgh, Acheson wrote, "I cannot describe to you the excitement that exists here...the people are wild, crazy...The military spirit of our state seems thoroughly aroused. Companies of volunteers are continually passing through the city en route to Harrisburg." [Page 299]

     After his brief enlistment in the 12th PA expired, John joined Company A of the 85th PA. Part of the reason may have been Colonel Howell, who organized the 85th, was a personal friend of Judge Acheson, which John Acheson probably hoped would benefit his pathway to promotion. 

      With his younger brother David already a captain of his own company, John yearned to be an officer as well. He wrote, "I am willing and anxious to join the army if I can secure a position. I do not believe it to be my duty to enter the service for three years as a private, nor will I do it." [Page 305]

Professor Thaddeus Lowe in His Balloon
Virginia Peninsula, 1862
Library of Congress

        During the Peninsula Campaign in 1862, Lieutenant Acheson led his company in helping Professor Thaddeus Lowe launch his observation balloon near Warwick Court House in Virginia. [Author's note: I have attended two presentations on Lowe's balloon and asked the speakers if they knew of any specific regiment that is recorded for helping Lowe. Both presenters noted the 85th PA had performed this duty.]

      Despite his reservations, it does appear John Acheson joined the 85th regiment as a private. Within the next six months, though, he won a series of promotions and became a 1st lieutenant in August of 1862. He had distinguished himself at the Battle of Seven Pines in Virginia, where he led his company and received two wounds in the wrist and leg. 

       In mid-1862, he asked his father to intervene to help him secure a commission as the permanent captain of Company A due to the medical resignation of Harvey Vankirk. "I think if anyone has claims on the Colonel for the captaincy of Company A, I have. I have shared its dangers and privations and was always with them no matter what duty was to be performed. Col. Howell knows all of this, and for this reason, he promised the captaincy should be mine. His conduct in the matter is very strange."  [Page 311] John Acheson was not named captain of Company A; the position instead went to William W. Kerr.

      A year later, David Acheson was killed and another younger brother, Sandie was voted to become the captain of David's old company in the 140th PA. John, still a lieutenant, wrote the following to his father in early 1864 from Hilton Head Island in South Carolina. Once an ardent supporter of his colonel, Joshua B. Howell, John Acheson became more and more incensed at his commanding officer for preventing his advancement in the 85th.

      "I would like to get a transfer to General [Absalom] Baird in order to show Colonel Howell that my success as an officer did not depend on his toadies. This is all the triumph I want....I can serve the balance of my term as First Lieutenant cheerfully, but I do not like to see men who have little or no qualification outstrip me." 

      "I want you to fully understand that your former friendship with Colonel Howell will not weigh a feather with him. He is a weak, vain, ambitious man, and insensible to everything that does not tend directly to further his prospects for a Brigadier Generalship...I long for the opportunity to show him that however regardless he may be to my interests, I have friends at home who are just as able as he to secure my position." [Page 313]

     Execution       Harper's Weekly

    While stationed in South Carolina, John earned the ire of General Quincy Gillmore, the commander of the Department of the South, for a clerical error during the court-martial of three soldiers from the 10th Connecticut who were slated for execution due to desertion. Two of the men were hanged, but a third stayed alive because his name was misspelled on the official record of the court matial. Gillmore was most upset and blamed Acheson for the oversight.

      Acheson was perhaps a bit nonchalant in the performance of this duty because he had already accepted a position with General Absalom Baird, a division commander in the western theater who happened to hail from Little Washington. With this unit, Acheson would participate in Sherman's March to the Sea. From Jonesboro, Georgia, in 1864, where he was wounded, John wrote, "General Baird was in the thickest of the melee. This end of the Confederacy is about caved in. Atlanta is ours. I will embrace the first opportunity to write you a long letter." [Page 317]

      Once Sherman's Army captured Savannah, Georgia on the Atlantic Ocean, they headed due north through South Carolina [see map below]. Two weeks before the end of the war, John wrote, "On the South Carolina side [of Savannah], huge torpedoes [land mines] had been placed in the mud. Little injury was done by them. Two or three soldiers had their legs blown off, but that was about all. But how silly was this conduct of the chivalrous citizens of the Palmetto State! Our soldiers swore revenge and every man supplied himself with an extra bunch of matches. Day after day while marching along the road past burning dwellings, barns and out-houses, the line of march of other columns might be discerned by the dense masses of black smoke darkening the heavens on every side. South Carolina, which hitherto has suffered so little from the war, has been terribly punished for her folly and crime." [Page 320]

David A. Scott, A School History of the U.S., NYC, Am. Book Co., 1884, p.371

       John Acheson was promoted to the rank of brevet major before his military career ended. He had studied before the war to become a lawyer but turned afterwards to a medical career, earning his degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1868. He could not, however, overcome his various addictions and died just seven years after the war ended.

     Only three days before his death, his brother Sandie wrote to their mother, "I have received a letter from Sadie [Sandie's wife] stating that John is seriously ill...If you think it best, and he is willing to come [home], he must make one vow before he starts and that is 'never to touch tobacco again.' If he'll do that, the alcoholic tendency can be controlled and the opium will not be so harmful or may be broken off. But if he persists in using tobacco, he will be liable to the day of his death to fits of depression (a result of the tobacco) which he cannot control and which will compel him to resort to stimulants. His only safety lies in quitting tobacco." [Page 332]

      John Acheson is buried in the Washington Cemetery in Little Washington, PA. 

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/157037892/john-wishart-acheson