USA > New York > Monroe County > Rochester > History of Rochester and Monroe county, New York, from the earliest historic times to the beginning of 1907 > Part 10
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Still more was Rochester distinguished as one of the principal stations of the "underground rail- road." that mysterious route of travel from the bondage of the South to freedom beyond the border. For a great many years between one hun- dred and two hundred fugitives passed through here annually, and, while there were half a dozen houses, not many more, if any, ready to shelter them temporarily, they most frequently found their way to the residence of Mrs. Amy Post, on Sophia street, guided thither by the same recondite sys- tem of information that had directed them as far as this city. There they would lie hidden, some- times one at a time, once as many as fifteen in
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the party, sometimes for a few hours, sometimes for several days, until the watchfulness of govern- ment spies was relaxed and a peculiarly dark night had fallen, when they would be driven in a closed vehicle down to the foot of Buell avenue, from which point the regular steamer, sailing under the British flag, would carry them across the lake to Canada. It is remarkable that although these facts of concealment were known to many people, black and white, there was never any betrayal of the secret, and the warrants, of which there were many in the pockets of the officers, were never served. Scarcely less remarkable is it that the only rendi- tion that ever took place here was in 1823, long before there was any agitation on the subject or anything like a general migration had set in. A young woman who had escaped was living here in fancied security with her husband, but the human bloodhounds got after her, she was ar- rested, taken to Buffalo and put on a boat for Cleveland, whence she was to be carried to Wheel- ing, Virginia; knowing the fate that awaited he she gained her freedom at a stroke by cutting her throat. No other arrest was ever attempted in this city. The infamous fugitive slave law way paseed in 1851, but that instead of helping the South only served to increase the ill feeling at the North, until before a decade had passed the great war broke out.
THE CIVIL WAR.
When Abraham Lincoln passed through here on the way to his first inauguration in 1861 the thousands who poured down to the old Central station in the gray dawn of the morning to caten a glimpse of him on the rear platform of his train were not actuated by mere curiosity, but felt that it was the prelude to a coming struggle, and when his proclamation was issued on the 15th of April, calling for 75,000 volunteers to put down the southern rebellion, there was no surprise, but rather a feeling of relief that the great issue was to be decided at last. Rochester responded nobly ; the common council immediately appropriated $10,- 000 to defray urgent expenses, a public meeting was held in the city hall to pledge support to the Tinion, and over $40,000 was raised by subscrip- tion for the support of the families of volunteers. Nearly a thousand men were enlisted within a werk under the direction of Professor Isaac F.
Quinby, of the university; early in May they left for Elmira, where, with the addition of one com- pany from Livingston county, they were organized into what has always been here called affectionate- ly the "Old Thirteenth," being our first regiment; on the 30th they were sent to the front under command of Colonel Quinby, being the first vol- unteer regiment (in conjunction with the Twelfth New York) to pass through Baltimore after the attack on the Massachusetts Sixth on the 19th of April. On Thanksgiving day of that year the Eighth cavalry, which had been recruited during the summer, marched away. They, with the Thir- teenth, the One Hundred and Eighth and the One Hundred and Fortieth, were pre-eminently fight- ing regiments, the pride of Rochester, although no discrimination is thereby intended against the many others in which there were companies from this city and which distinguished themselves on many sanguinary fields.
The feverish enthusiasm of the first summer gave place to a grim determination in 1862, when another call for troops was made and Rochester settled down to the business. The plaza in front of the court-house was dotted with recruiting tents, while others were pegged down at the Four Cor- ners and in other places, even in the outlying wards, the people bearing with equanimity the in- convenience that was caused to travel and to traffic and the runaway accidents that were occasioned by horses getting entangled in the tent-ropes. For the temporary quarters of the regiments that were being raised Camp Hillhouse was established on the east side of the river, in Brighton, and when. that had to be abandoned Camp Fitzjohn Porter was installed on the west side, near the Rapidy In spite of all, the number of enlistments was not sufficient. and in August, 1863, the dreaded conseription took place, when .1,096 names were drawn from the wheel by Robert H. Fenn, a re- spected citizen who was totally blind. It then seemed as though the limit had been reached, that nothing further could be borne, but another call for troops was made, for three hundred thousand at first, the number demanded being increased to half a million before that new army was raised. Efforts unparalleled before were put forth to avert the calamity of another conscription, and they were successful; to each recruit the county gave three hundred dollars, the city something addi-
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tional to that and each ward still another bonus, besides which many persons secured their exemp- tion by paying large sums to substitutes. Promi- nent among the warlike episodes of this period were the frequent military funerale, of which the most impressive was that of Colonel Patrick H. O'Rorke, of the One Hundred and Fortieth, who fell at Gettysburg on the 2d of July, 1863, and was buried here on the 15th of that month. Some relief from these mournful spectacles, though with
similar associations, was afforded by the grand bazaar for the benefit of sick and wounded soi -. diers, held at Corinthian hall during the third week in December of that year, which will never be forgotten by those who visited it and which raised for the cause more than $15,000. As the quotas for troops were apportioned among the different counties, not among the cities, that subject falls more properly under the former political division and will be treated in the next chapter.
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CHAPTER VII
THE COUNTY IN THE GREAT WAR.
The Call to Arms-Monroe's Response-T'en Thousand Men Enlisted-Our Regiments, Bat- talions and Companies of Infantry, Cavalry, Ar- tillery, Sharpshooters and Engineers-Engage- ments in which they Participated-Their Losses and Their Achievements-General Of -. ficers-Grand Army of the Republic.
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Monroe county was one of the first in the state to respond to the call for troops in April, 1861. In some sections the militia were called at once into requisition and a whole regiment of the old citizen sobliery would be mustered into the ser- vice. with its organization intact, but, with few exceptions, such as that of the Seventh, of New York city, that policy did not work well and was speedily abandoned. In the first place, it led to confusion, as, for instance, in the case of the Thirteenth. A militia regiment of that number was sent into the field from the eastern part of the state, and at the same time the Thirteenth New York Volunteers was raised in this county and mustered in under that designation, the conse- quence being that when the Thirteenth New York was spoken of no one knew, except locally, which regiment was referred to. But a worse evil arose when the great majority of the members of some regiment with a local reputation that they wished to preserve by the retention of their title in which they took so much pride, desired to enlist in a body; that caused a strong moral pressure to be brought upon the other members, who if they stayed at home were subjected to much em-
harassment and mortification, while if they went to the war it might be at a sacrifice known only te themselves and their families. So the method of individual enlistments was found to be the best way, both in the Civil war and in the Cuban war a few years ago.
How many soldiers did Monroe county send to the front? The question is not easy to answer with any exactitude. Some companies that were raised here were credited to regiments that were raised elsewhere, while, on the other hand, whole companies enlisted in other places were trans- ferred to Monroe county regiments. When a cer- tain quota had been apportioned to each county a deficiency in one county would be made up by the actual purchase of surplus enlistments in another. and sometimes the very county thus paying for outside recruits would find that it had an unneces- sary number and would dispose of them as best it could. Many actual residents of Monroe county enlisted elsewhere, while many joined the army here whose homes were in other places. This lat- ter was true on a large scale in 1864, when the immense bounties were offered that have been al- Inded to in the previous chapter, which were so powerful an inducement that many foreigners tem- porarily resident here joined the ranks and great numbers came over from Canada for that express purpose. The entire absence of patriotismn ren- dered these mercenary warriors of no great ac- count in the field, to say nothing of the frequent desertions that occurred before they got there. The nearest approach, then, that can be made to ar- riving at any estimate is to say that in all about ten thousand enlisted in the county, which, as the
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number of inhabitants was then in the neighbor- hood of one hundred thousand, was one for every ten, or about half of the entire voting population. The following may be considered as a roster of our troops, together with a statement of the principal engagements in which they served :*
Thirteenth Infantry .- The nucleus of this was the old Rochester Light Guard, from among which Captain Robert F. Taylor raised a large part of Company A on the very day after President Lincoln's proclamation reached this city. Other companies were soon en- listed in the county, under Captains Lebbeus Brown, Adolph Nolte (a company wholly Ger- man), Francis A. Schoffel and Henry B. Wil- liams. These five companies were mustered into the state service on the 25th of April, and a few days later five more were raised, under Captains Hiram Smith, George W. Lewis, William F. Tul- ley, Horace J. Thomas (a company raised wholly in Brockport) and Carl Stephan (recruited in Livingston county, mainly in Dansville). These ten companies were tranported to Elmira on the 4th of May and there organized as a reghuent, which on the 14th of May was mustered into the United States service for three months-though it actually served two years-with 780 officers and men, the regimental officers being Isaac F. Quin- by, of the faculty of the university and a grad- uate of West Point, colonel; Carl Stephan, lieu- tenant-colonel; Oliver L. Terry, major : Charles J. Powers, adjutant ; Montgomery Rochester, quar- termaster; David Little, surgeon; George W. Avery, assistant surgeon ; J. D. Barnes of Bing-
hamton, chaplain. On the 29th of May the regi- ment went through Baltimore, the company in ad- vance marching in full company front, the width of the madway, to guard against attack by the mob. The Thirteenth's first battle was that of Bull Run, where it lost sixty-five men in all. In August Colonel Quinby resigned and was sue- ceciled by John Pickell, an old regular army of- ficer, who left the service in the following spring when Elisha G. Marshall, also of the regulars, took the command. It participated in all the "seven days' battles" near Richmond, in one of which,
that of Gaines Mills, where its strength was only 400, it lost 101 in killed, wounded and missing. Having been engaged in the second battle of Bull Run, at Antietam and at Fredericksburg, it came home in May, 1863, with a loss in all its fights of 465 men. Its officers on the return were E. G. Marshall, colonel; F. A. Schoffel, lieutenant-col- onel ; George Hyland, jr., major; Job C. Hedges, adjutant; Samuel S. Partridge, quartermaster; David Little, surgeon ; Charles E. Hill and Isaac V. Mullen, assistant surgeons; E. M. Cooley, Mark J. Bunnell, Jerry A. Sullivan, John Weed, Charles C. Brown, A. Galley Cooper and Henry Lomb, captains; James Hutchinson, E. P. Becker, Homer Foote, J. Elliot Williams, J. M. Richardson, J. H. Wilson, John Marks, Edward Martin, W. R. Me- Kinnon, first lieutenants ; James Stevenson, James D. Bailey, Thomas Jordan, John Cawthra, Gustav Spoor, W. J. Hines, E. F. Hamilton, D. S. Barber and E. C. Austin, second lieutenants.
Twenty-Fifth Infantry .- This regiment , al- though it had no enlisted men from Mon hoe county, was largely officered from the Thirteenth, after the former had become de- moralized and its colonel, James E. Kerrigan, a New York city politician, had been dismissed from the service. The officers thus transferred were Lieutenant-Colonel E. S. Gilbert, Major Sheppard Gleason, Captains Benjamin F. Harris, Thomas E. Bishop, James S. Graham, W. W. Con- nor and Albert W. Preston; first lieutenants Thomas Coglan and W. W. Bates. It was brigaded with the Thirteenth and passed through the same battles after that.
Twenty-Sixth Infantry .- This was raised mostly in Utica, but two of its companies. under Captains Gilbert S. Jennings and Thomas Davis, were recruited in Monroe county. Its bat- tles were those of Bull Run, Centerville, Antietam and Fredericksburg.
Twenty-Serenth Infantry. This was mainly a a Syracuse regiment with Henry W. Slocum as colonel, but one company was raised in Rochester, that of Captain George C. Wanzer, with Charles S. Baker and E. P. Gould as lientenants, Henry L. Achilles, jr., who lived in this city after the war, was in command of Company K, which was raised in Albion, Orleans county. The regiment suffered severely at Bull Run and was in the Seven days' battles, at Antietam and at Fredericksburg.
"The present writer had occasion, some twelve years ago, 10 prepare an account of Monroe county's war record. The in- formation desired was obtained, with a good deal of frararch, almost entirely from official sources, and as il Is unquestionably accurate, il is thought best to transfer it, with practically no alteration, from the pages of the book in which it first ap peared, the "Landmarks of Monroe County."
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HISTORY OF ROCHESTER AND MONROE COUNTY.
Twenty-Eighth Infantry .- Here there was no complete organization from this county, but many men were enlisted here, and Charles H. Fenn, of Rochester, was one of the captains. Its hardest fight was at Cedar Mountain, where it headed a brigade that charged three times against the en- emy's lines, and after the battle only 150 men of the regiment, could be mustered.
Thirty-Third Infantry .- In this case also, there was no complete company from Monroe, although 240 recruits were sent to it from Rochester and its colonel was R. F. Taylor, transferred from a cap- taincy in the Thirteenth. It lost heavily at An- tietam and at Fredericksburg, where it stormed the heights.
Eighty-Ninth Infantry .- One company from Monroe was in this regiment, which was raised principally in the southern tier and was called "the Dickinson Guards." Its first colonel was Harrison S. Fairchild of Rochester.
One Hundred and Fifth Infantry .- In this regiment, recruited in several of the western coun- tica, there were three Monroe companies, those of Captains McMahon (who became colonel of the One Hundred and Eighty-Eighth), Bradley and Purcell. Its first lieutenant-colonel was Henry L. Achilles, sr., of Albion, who was succeeded by Howard Carroll when it was consolidated with the Ninety-Fourth; its adjutant was Daniel A. Sharpe, he and Carroll being from Rochester. Captain Purcell's company issued from the second battle of Bull Run with only thirteen men out of thirty-three ; at Antietam Colonel Carroll, then in command, was mortally wounded.
One Hundred and Eighth Infantry .- This was the second regiment raised in the state under the call for 300,000 troops in 1862. Having been re- cruited in less than a month, it left Rochester on August 19th, under the folowing named officers: Colonel, Oliver H. Palmer; lieutenant-colonel, Charles J. Powers; major, George B. Force; ad- jatant, John T. Chumasero; quartermaster, Joseph S. Harris; surgeon, John F. Whitbeck ; assistant surgeon, William S. Ely; chaplain, James Nichols; captains, H. B. Williams, H. S. Hogoboom, William H. Andrews, J. G. Cramer, A. K. Cutler, F. E. Pierce, T. B. Yale, E. P. Fuller, William Graebe, Joseph Deverell. Receiving an ovation in New York city as it passed through, the regiment was, a month later, in its first battle
al Antietam, where it lost nearly 200 men, among the killed being Major Force and Lieutenants Tar- box and Holmes. The hardest fighting of the regiment was, perhaps, at Fredericksburg, where, after crossing the Rappahannock, it charged again and again, at the point of the bayonet, the line of the enemy ensconced behind a stone wall, but the constant fire of artillery and infantry that swept its ranks at last compelled it to retire and recross the river, where it remained in camp through the winter. In March, 1863, Charles J. Powers was made a colonel in place of Palmer, resigned, F. E. Pierce became lieutenant-colonel and Captain Hogoboom major. After distinguishing itself again by its firm stand at Chancellorsville, the regiment two months later made a forced march of thirty-eight miles to get to Gettysburg in time for the second day's fight there, in which it served the guns of a battery previously captured from the Confederates, of which the Federal artillerymen working it on that field had been swept away. just before the arrival of the One Hundred and Eighth. At Morton's Ford Colonel Pierce lost an eye, and at the first day's battle of the Wilder- ness Colonel Powers was shot through the lungs, though he eventually recovered. The regiment was badly cut up at Spottsylvania and again at Cold Harbor, so that when it was serving in the front line before Petersburg it had shrunk to less than a hundred men fit for duty. On the 1st of June, 1865, it reached home, with 169 men all told, the following named officers being mustered out with the regiment: C. J. Powers, colonel; F. E. Pierce, lieutenant-colonel; F. B. Hutchinson, quartermaster ; Reuben H. Halstead, adjutant ; F. M. Wafer, surgeon ; Robert Stevenson, assistant surgeon; John B. Kennedy, W. H. Andrews, Sam- uel Porter, J. G. Cramer, S. P. Howard, A. J. Locke, A. J. Boyd, captains; W. H. Raymond, J. W. Smith, John O. Jewell, Chris. Traugott, James Westcott, Alfred Elwood, H. F. Richardson, Solo- mon Fatzer, first lieutenants; Alfred B. Hadley, John Galvin, second lieutenants.
One Hundred and Fortieth Infantry .- Even before its predecessor had left, recruiting began for this regiment, and it followed the other in just a month, with these officers: Lieutenant-col- onel, Lonis Ernst; major, Isaiah F. Force; adju- tant, Ira C. Clark ; quartermaster, William H. Crennell; surgeon, Theodore F. Hall; assistant
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surgeons, William C. Slayton and O. Sprague Paine; chaplain, Charles Machin ; captains, Milo L. Starks, Christian Spies, W. J. Clark, Elwell S. Otis, Monroe M. Hollister, Benjamin F. Har- mon, Perry B. Sibley, W. S. Grantsynn, William F. Campbell, Patrick J. Dowling; first lieuten- ants. Joseph M. Ixeper, August Meyer, Bartholo- mew Crowley, Henry B. Hoyt, Patrick A. McMul- len, James H. Knox, Henry E. Richmond, Joseph H. Suggett, Addison N. Whiting, Patrick H. Sullivan; second lieutenants, J. D. Decker, Charles P. Klein, John Buckley, Alex H. McLeod, Benja- min Ridley, Isaac Sinnons, Porter Farley, Charles H. Burtis, Lewis Hamilton, Hugh Me- Graw. Within a year the ranks were reinforced by seventy-six men, under Captain Willard Abbott, who had belonged to the Old Thirteenth. On the 8th of October the regiment received its first col- onel, Patrick O'Rorke, formerly a Rochester boy. a West Point graduate and an officer of brilliant promise, which he well fulfilled during his short life. Although present at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, the first battle in which it suf- fered any severe loss was that of Gettysburg, where it assisted in the retention of Little Round Top against all the assaults of the enemy, and where, in repelling a furious charge, Colonel O'Rorke was shot in the neck and fell dead without a word, the most illustrious sacrifice that this community had to make during the war; in the same action Captains Starks, Spies and Sibley were seriously wounded, Lieutenants Klein and McGraw fatally Lieutenant-Colonel Ernst and Major Force were then successively in command during the next month, until George Ryan, a captain in the Seventh regular infantry, was appointed colonel ; he was a strict disciplinarian and at the same time very careful of his men, so the regiment was soon raised to the highest degree of efficiency. In the battle of the Wilderness it was almost cut to pieces, losing eleven officers and 257 enlisted men within the space of half an hour, and three days later, at Spottaylvania, where Colonel Ryan and Major Starks were killed, it lost five more officers and 60 men, so in three days after starting out on this campaign, 600 strong, it was depleted by 333, more than half its number. It was present at Ice's surrender at Appomattox, Lieutenant-Col- onel E. S. Otis being then in command, and it reached home on the 6th of June, 1865, with 290
men. The following named were mustered out with the regiment : William S. Grantsynn, lieu- tenant-colonel; William J. Clark, major; Robert J. Lester, adjutant ; Eugene H. Shedd, quarter- master ; Henry C. Dean, surgeon; Matthias L. Lord and George I .. Menzie, assistant surgeons. The names of the line officers cannot be given, as the muster-out rolls are not accessible.
One Hundred and Fifty-First Infantry .- Al- though Colonel William Emerson of Rochester commanded this regiment, it had only one Monroe county company, under Captain Peter Imo, First Lieutenant John C. Schoen (who took the place of Imo, resigned, and who was killed while lead- ing his men in a charge at Cold Harbor), and Second Lieutenant George Oaks, who was bre- vetted major and came home in command of the company. In this company was Julius Arm- bruster, who, at the battle of Winchester, was shot directly between the eyes, the ball coming out at the back of his neck, yet he returned to the ranks a few weeks later and lived for many years afterward-one of the most singular surgical cases of the war.
Monroe County Sharpshooters .- This was a company formed in the early part of 1863 under Captain Abijah C. Gray; it was known as the Sixth company of Sharpshooters and was not attached to any regiment.
Third Cavalry .- During the summer of 1861 this regiment was recruited. One company was from Rochester, that of Captain Charles Fitz- simmons, which, with a company raised in Syra- cuse, was the first volunteer cavalry mustered into the United States service. Four other companies, under Captains Alonzo Stearns, Judson Downs, John M. Wilson and Nathan P. Pond, were raised in the county, mainly outside of the city, and an- other company was added just before the regiment started, that of George W. Lewis, who had been transferred from the Thirteenth. The officers were: Colonel, James H. Van Allen ; lieutenant- colonel, Simon H. Mix (appointed colonel on the resignation of Van Allen in 1863) ; major, John Mix (lieutenant-colonel in 1863) ; adjutant, Sam- uel C. Pierce (subsequently also lieutenant-col- onel) ; surgeon, William H. Palmer ; assistant sur- geon. Frederick Douglas. Captain Lewis became ranking major; the junior majors were Charles Fitzsimmons. Jephthah Garrard and George W.
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Cole; Alonzo Stearns and Israel Henry Putnam afterward became majors; Captain Pond became lientenant-colonel of the First United States col- ored cavalry, and among others who gained pro- motion were: Major Maurice Leyden, Adjutante George D. Williams and William L. Ogden; Cap- tains Walter S. Joy and James R. Chamberlin ; Lieutenants Milton H. Smith, Sherman Greig and John Gregory. The regiment was with Burnside in North Carolina and after that it performed good service in the army of the James.
Eighth Cavalry .- This was recruited in the aut- umn of 1861, very largely from the towns of Mon- roe, though some eulistmeuts were made in other counties. Its original enlistment was for our year, but at the end of that time the whole regi- ment was mustered in again and served during the war. Its first officers were Samuel J. Crooks, colo- nel (who resigned the next February) ; Charles K. Babbitt, lieutenant-coloned; William L. Markell and W. II. Benjamin, majors; James Chapman, surgeon ; Rev. Dr. John A. Van Ingen, chaplain. In 1862 Captain Benjamin F. Davis, of the regu- lar army, became its colonel, but he was shot dead at Beverly Ford by an ambushed Confederate who, in turn, was instantly killed by Adjutant E. Bloss Parsons. Colonel Davis was succeeded in command by Lieutenant-Colonel Markel, he by Lieutenant-Colonel Benjamin, and he by Ed- ward M. Pope as full colonel. Participating in nearly forty battles, the Eighth won its greatest distinction in charging General Early's entrench- ments at Waynesboro, where. under command of Major Hartwell B. Compton, it captured ten bat- tle-flaga, six guns and 1,300 prisoners. It re- turned home under command of Colonel Pope an -! Lieutenant-Colonel James Blies.
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