USA > Ohio > Seneca County > History of Seneca County, Ohio; a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests, Vo. I > Part 22
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man of the little band of patriots was shot down. The Alamo was taken, but its capture cost Santa Ana four thousand men. Every man of the little American band of the defenders of the Alamo died at his post. Thermopylae had its messenger of defeat-the Alamo had none.
"Remember the Alamo." was the rallying cry of the Texan patriots. When General Houston defeated Santa Ana at Jacinto, which victory assured the independence of Texas and its annexation to the American union.
General Sam Houston, in after years, in a speech at San Antonio said that. "Whatever state gave us birth, we have one native land and one flag." This patriotic sentiment struck a responsive chord in the vast audience before him, and as the Ameri- can flag was displayed from the Alamo, thousands of smaller flags were waved-the greatest flag scene in American history. The thunder of cannon was answered by the thunder of voices and the clapping of hands. In answer to this demonstration. General Houston said : "Far off, far off. vet louder than any noise on earth. I hear from the dead years and the dead heroes of the Alamo the hurrahing of spirit voices and clapping of unseen hands."
There was a law in ancient Greece that "He who receives his death while fighting in the front of battle shall have an annual oration spoken in his honor." But Americans need no decree to honor their soldier dead. Prompted by the fullness of grateful hearts, the graves of American soldiers are decorated each return- ing May time. No matter if those graves are beneath the sweeping shadows of the pines, or in the sun-kissed verdure of the unsheltered sod, whether in the beautiful cemeteries of the north. or whether they are simply unmarked graves in the chastened south, or in the islands of the sea, whether the storms rage over them or whether the birds fill the air with the melody of their songs. the hallowed graves of American soldiers are everywhere revered and honored.
The famous charge of General John C. Fremont's Body Guard. under the leadership of Colonel Zagonvi at Springfield. Mo .. October 25, 1861, is referred to by some writers as being almost equal to the charge of the Light Brigade at Balaklava. The guard engaged in the famous charge numbered but a hundred and sixty men, while the rebel force was over three thousand. The
dash, daring and bravery of the guard is pointed to with pride by every American patriot. The loss of the guard was fifty-three out of one hundred and forty-eight men actually engaged in the charge.
- The rebel loss, was very great, but the number was never definitely ascertained. The march of the guard has been referred to as fol- lows: "With lips compressed. firmly clenching their sword-hilts, with quick tramp of hoof and clang of steel. honor leading and glory awaiting them, the young soldiers flew forward, each brave
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rider and each strange steed members of one huge creation, enor- mous, terrible, irresistable."
" 'Twere worth ten years of peaceful life, One glance at their array."
SENECA COUNTY IN THE WARS.
(By Captain Frank R. Stewart.)
A history of Seneca county would be incomplete that did not take cognizance of the loyalty and patriotism of its citizens. Since the organization of Seneca county in 1820. the nation as well as the state and county have passed through military conflicts, both at home and abroad, some of which have taxed to the utmost the loval and patriotic devotion of her people. In all these conflicts the people of Seneca county have ever been ready with their treasury and lives in the cause of liberty, of justice and the relief of the oppressed.
Seneca county came into the sisterhood of counties too late to participate in the Indian wars of the northwest, or in the war with Great Britian in 1812 to 1814. And yet the early settlers who afterward were instrumental in organizing the county were active participants in both of these wars. The first call to arms. after the organization of Seneca county, was in the Mexican war in 1846- 1848.
The majority of the people of Ohio were opposed to the course of the government in inaugurating and carrying out the measures which precipitated the Mexican war. £ The vexed question of slavery entered very largely into the action of the government. Iowa and Florida-the one a free and the other a slave state-had just been admitted into the Union. Florida in March. 1845, and Iowa in December. 1846. The balance of power which the two sections of the country watched with jealous eyes was thought to be nicely adjusted. If admitted to the Union Texas would become a slave state, by far the largest in the Union and capable of being subdivided into two or three slave states, thus giving increased power to the pro-slavery party. The Whig party in the northern and western states held that a war to annex Texas would be a war for the extension of slavery. The feeling of this party was elo- quently voiced by Ohio's Senator. Thomas Corwin.
However, when the fiat of the nation was known, the state of Ohio was not behind others in cheerful compliance with war's necessities. And in proportion to her population Seneca sent its full share of volunteers. From Monterey to Chapultepec they
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shared in that singularly brilliant record, where not one defeat for the American arms was chronicled, and where the victories were always against odds, a record unparallelled in the history of wars. It is a matter of regret that sixty-two years have elapsed since that memorable epoch without any executive or legislative action being taken to gather a record of either of the company or individual service of these soldiers.
The fears of the majority of the northern people regarding the annexation of additional slave territory were justified by the intolerant attitude of the pro-slavery people of the southern states. The admission of Texas to the Union lent new impetus to their zeal for the extension of slavery and led to an uncompromising contest through all political and legislative avenues of the nation for the admission of slavery into the new states of Kansas and Nebraska, when these territories applied for statehood in the Union.
It would be impossible to embody in the history of Seneca coun- tv anything approaching a detailed account of the bitter contro- versy between the two great political parties of the nation, which led up to the pro-slavery element of the Democratic party making the election of Abraham Lincoln in the fall of 1860, the occasion, not the cause, of the attempted secession of the slave states of the south. While the sectional feeling, both north and south. had been running at high tension during the fall and early winter of 1860. no one, except the most radical leaders of the south, had any concep- tion of the magnitude to which the secession sentiment of the south
would grow. The John Brown raid, with his execution on the gal- lows and the firing on Fort Sumter. like a volcanic shock. startled the nation from ocean to ocean, and awoke the people to the danger of the storm clouds which had been gathering around the national horizon. Everybody realized that war was on. The time had now arrived when the great issues, which had been under discussion and which had created such intense excitement in the political arena, had passed the point of national debate and must now be settled, not in the halls of congress, but by the stern arbiter of arms.
. The whole nation was aroused as never before in the history of any people. Great men, leaders of the various political parties. heretofore had differed in their opinions in their interpretation of the constitution. Their opinions now began to crystalize. The time had now arrived when the question whether the institution of slavery was or was not to become a National Institution. could no longer remain as a matter of painful controversy. Whether the con- stitution adopted by our forefathers was a mere compact-a plastic league, or a permanent union of states-one and indivisible, was now to be determined by the oblation of blood. Every intelligent man and woman in the United States is more or less familiar with
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the history of the fearful struggle that followed. Very few realized at the beginning of the struggle the magnitude of the conflict. No one then believed that for four long years the whole continent would resound to the tread of mobilized armies; that devastation and death would reign from the Atlantic to the Pacific. A few realized that the nation was now about to pay the penalty of violated moral laws with the best blood of the land.
When the first call for seventy-five thousand volunteers was issued by President Lincoln the unanimity of the response was marvelous. From every village and cottage home; from every hillside and farm the tender loyal youths of the north impelled by a spontaneous patriotic impulse hurried to the nation's rescue. More than double the number asked for and offered their services to the government. Seneca county was not a whit behind the most enthusiastic in her willingness to contribute to the preservation of the Union and the integrity of the flag. In harmony with the call of the president Governor Dennison issued a call, on April 15, 1861, for volunteers to fill Ohio's quota of the seventy-five thousand. On the 19th, four days after the call of Governor Dennison, the organization of a military company was commenced at Fostoria by B. L. Caples, an old state militia general.
Frederick Werner. a young German tailor. has the honor of being the first man enrolled. a distinction and an honor of which he is justly proud.
After serving his three months' enlistment, Comrade Werner re-enlisted in the Forty-ninth Ohio for three years in the initial organization of that regiment. He was severely wounded in the battle of Stone River December 31. 1862. Although badly crippled and a great sufferer during all these years. he still takes an active and intelligent interest. not only in the history of the rebellion, but in the marvelous development of the nation, as the result of the triumphs of the Union armies.
This first company raised in Seneca county was composed en- tirely of the boys of Fostoria and the immediate vicinity, with Dr. A. M. Blackman as captain; M. H. Chance, first lieutenant and Jonas Foster, second lieutenant. and. with one hundred enlisted men, was assigned as Company H. Twenty-first Ohio Volunteer In- fantry, which was organizing in Camp Taylor. near Cleveland, with Jesse S. Norton as colonel.
The military record of Company H, Twenty-first O. V. I., Seneca county's first contribution to the suppression of the rebel- lion, was a most creditable one serving through their three months enlistment along the Kanawha valley in West Virginia, under the command of General Cox. Seneca county furnished a few recruits to the Eighth Ohio Volunteer Infantry which was also at Camp Taylor, with Herman G. Daprey as colonel. Among these was Vol. I-13
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Thomas J. West from near Melmore, who, after serving four years entered the medical profession and became one of Tiffin's leading physicians, and throughout his whole life, an active worker in the Republican party and an aggressive worker for the uplift of man- kind.
It soon became apparent to the general government that the rebellion had assumed such gigantic proportions that it could not be suppressed in three months' time, neither with a small army of seventy-five thousand soldiers. In July a call was issued for three hundred thousand volunteers for three years' enlistment. The response to this call was equally prompt and spontaneous as the first, and again Seneca county proved her loyalty to the Union. Among the first to respond to the call for three year volunteers was Ohio's Silver Tongue Orator, William Harvey Gibson. He applied to Governor Dennison for a commission to raise a regiment and at once set to work in securing the enlistment of men. On the 25th day of July, 1861, he had a large poster printed for recruiting purposes. This poster was so unique in style and so characteristic of General Gibson that we print it as a part of the history of Seneca county.
"TO ARMS, TO ARMS.
"RALLY TO OUR FLAG. RUSH TO THE FIELD.
"Are we cowards that we must yield to traitors ? £ Are we worthy sons of heroic sires ? Come one, come all. Let us march as our forefathers marched. to defend the only Democratic Republic on earth.
"Impelled by the events of the past week. and assured from Washington that a regiment will be accepted, if enrolled and tendered, I have resolved, to organize The Buckeye Guards ir north- ern Ohio.
"Let us, as patriotic citizens of adjoining counties. form a regiment that shall be an honor to the state. the exploits of which, in defense of constitutional liberty. shall be recounted with pride by ourselves and our children. The command of the heroic Stead- man was organized in this way, and now at the close of three months' service, they return crowned with glory, to receive the homage of a grateful country.
(Then follows instructions concerning enlistment) "July 25, 1861. W. H. GIBSON."
The regiment was accepted by telegram from the war depart- ment at Washington on July 30, 1861. Headquarters were estab- lished on the old fair grounds just north of Tiffin, and named Camp Noble, in honor of Warren P. Noble, who at that time was the con-
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gressional representative of this district. Four companies, B, E, H, and K, were recruited in Seneca county :- Company B, at Tiffin, and officered by Captain Benjamin S. Porter, First Lieutenant John E. McCormack, Second Lieutenant Moses Abbott; companies E and H, at Fostoria, with Captain Wm. Calihan, First Lieutenant Jonas Foster. Second Lieutenant William Martin; Company E. Captain Orrin B. Hays. First Lieutenant Hiram Chance, Second Lieutenant Jehu L. Hollopeter. Company H. Company K was recruited in and around Fostoria, Tiffin and Green Springs, and officered by Captain James M. Patterson of Tiffin, First Lieutenant William C. Turner of Fostoria. and Second Lieutenant John C. Smith, of Green Springs.
The Forty-ninth Regiment was mustered into the United States service on the 15th day of August, 1861, with the following com- plement of regimental officers and staff; Colonel, William H. Gib- son; lieutenant colonel, A. M. Blackman; major, Levi Drake; adjutant. Charles A. Norton ; quartermaster. H. A. Spayth; sur- geon, Dr. R. W. Shrift; assistant surgeon, Dr. Wm. H. Park; chap- lain, Rev. E. H. Bush ; sutler, Steven Dorsey.
The ten companies were officered; Company A, Captain A. Langworthy, Lieutenants S. F. Gray and James W. Davidson; Company B. Captain B. S. Porter. Lieutenants J. E. McCormack and Moses Abbott; Company C. Captain Amos Keller, Lieutenants A. H. Keller and A. B. Charlton ; Company D. Captain George W. Culver. Lieutenant Jacob Mosier and John Greer; Company E, Captain William Calihan, Lieutenants Jonas Foster and William Martin ; Company F. Captain Joseph R. Bartlett. Lieutenants M. C. Tylor and Timothy Wilcox ; Company G, Captain Luther M. Strong. Lieutenants Daniel Hartsock and Samuel M. Harper; Company H, Captain Orrin B. Hays. Lieutenants Hiram Chance and Jehu L. Hollopeter ; Company I. Captain George E. Lovejoy, Lieutenants L. M. Moe and Alonzo I. Prentice; Company K. Captain James M. Patterson. Lieutenants Wm. Turner and John C. Smith.
The regiment did not receive uniforms until September 8th and on the morning of September 10. broke camp and boarded the cars for Camp Dennison, near Cincinnati. where a full equipment of arms and amunition were issued.
After a short stay of about two weeks in Camp Dennison, the Forty-ninth was ordered to report without delay to Major Ander- son, the hero of Fort Sumter, at Louisville, Kentucky.
No volunteer organization raised in Seneca county during the Civil war attracted so much attention, or whose military history was so closely watched by all the people as was the membership of the Forty-ninth Ohio Volunteer Infantry. This is not surprising when we remember that the Forty-ninth entered the service with ten hundred and thirty-eight men, and about two-fifths of them
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were enlisted in Seneca. However, not all of those were Seneca county boys. A very large number of the membership of Com- panies II and E were Wood county boys, who enlisted at Fostoria.
The army record of the Forty-ninth Regiment is the strenuous but constantly victorious record of the Army of the Ohio and the Army of the Cumberland, in which it served from the beginning to the close of the war.
The Forty-ninth entered the service with thirty-eight commis- sioned officers and one thousand enlisted men. Five hundred and fifteen recruits were added to the regiment during its time of ser- vice, making a total enlistment of 1,553. The fatalities were un- usually heavy. The fact that the regiment received eleven hun- dred and fifty-two gunshot wounds would indicate the character of its service. When the regiment was mustered out on the last day of 1865 only two of the original commissioned officers remained to be mustered out with the regiment. All of the other thirty-six had succumbed to the ravages of war. With two exceptions, all the commissioned officers in command at the muster-out had come up out of the ranks by real merit.
Four days after the Forty-ninth Regiment left Tiffin for the front, Governor Dennison gave authority to recruit a regiment of infantry to be designated the Fifty-seventh Regiment, with Hon. William Mungen of Findlay, as colonel. and to rendezvous at Camp Vance, Findlay. Hancock county. Recruiting for this regiment was commenced on the 16th of September and was pushed forward rapidly. Of this regiment. Company B was recruited in Hancock, Seneca and Wood counties. with Captain Philip Faulhaber as com- mandant. Company H was recruited from Hancock and Seneca. Like all patriotic products of Seneca county, those who served in the Fifty-seventh Regiment reflected credit on the county and com- munity to which they belonged. In fact, the personnel of the volunteer soldiers of Seneca county differed but very little. They were all patriots, and if there was any difference in their heroic attainments, it was because of the difference in their opportunities and the manner in which they were disciplined and handled by their various commanders.
During October and November of the same year, Colonel Ralph P. Buckland, of Fremont, recruited the Seventy-second Ohio Volun- teer Infantry Regiment. This regiment was rendezvoused at Fremont and was composed very largely of volunteers from the counties of Sandusky, Erie and Wood. True to her patriotic im- pulses, the northwest townships of Seneca furnished a goodly num- ber of volunteers to the Seventy-second. This regiment was ad- mirably handled and disciplined by Colonel (later General) Buck- land, and made an enviable record during its four years of active service.
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The Twenty-fifth Ohio Volunteer Infantry was composed of men from almost every section of the state, and yet Seneca county did not let even this regiment go to the front without contributing her full share to its ranks. Company G was recruited in and around Republic, with Captain Asa Way, Lieutenants Wesley Cham- berlin and Benjamin W. Blandy as commissioned officers. The regiment was organized at Camp Chase near Columbus by Colonel James A. Jones, and had a long and varied experience of five years of active campaigning. First in West Virginia, then in the Shenandoah Valley under Generals Fremont and Sigel; thence in eastern Virginia under General Pope in the plains of Manassas, at Second Bull Run; thence with the Potomac Army in the battles of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg; ending its services in South Carolina and being mustered out in June, 1866.
The Fifty-fifth Ohio Volunteer Infantry was another regiment which made a heavy draft on the patriotic resources of Seneca coun- ty. This regiment was organized and rendezvoused at Norwalk, with Colonel John C. Lee, one of Tiffin's most prominent and worthy citizens, in command. Companies B, G and H were recruited very largely in Seneca county-Company B at Fostoria by Captain A. S. Bement, First Lieutenant William D. Sherwood and Second Lieu- tenant Franklin J. Souder. Several of the members of this com- pany must be credited to Wood county, which never allowed any good thing to transpire without taking a hand in it.
Company G was recruited in the eastern and central part of the county by Captain Horace Robison. First Lieutenant Robert Bram- ley and Second Lieutenant Charles M. Stone. Company H was gathered largely from Scipio, Bloom and Reed townships, and officered by Captain James M. Stevens-afterward promoted to major and lieutenant colonel-and First Lieutenant Randolph East- man. The Fifty-fifth commenced its organization at Norwalk on October 17, 1861, but because of delay in recruiting and obtaining clothing and equipment, was not ready for the field until January 25, 1862, when it left Norwalk for Grafton in western Virginia. In June, 1862, the regiment was brigaded with the Twenty-fifth, Seventy-third and Seventy-fifth Ohio regiments. From this time on, its history was the history of the Union armies of the Shenan- doah and the Potomac, always reflecting credit on the county and state from which they enlisted.
The One Hundred and First regiment was one of the patriotic organizations which responded to their country's call in the dark days of 1862 when the national cause seemed to be drifting into final defeat. It was organized by one of Tiffin's noblest and best citizens, Colonel Leander Stem, who sacrificed his life on the altar of liberty, in the battle of Stone River. December 31, 1862, the second battle in · which his regiment was engaged. The regiment was recruited from
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the counties of Erie, Huron, Seneca, Crawford and Wyandotte. During its formation it rendezvoused at Monroeville during the month of August, 1862. Again Seneca county responded more liber- ally than any of the other four, contributing three of the ten com- panies which composed the regiment-Companies H, I and K. Com- pany H was raised largely in Clinton, Scipio and Reed townships and officered by Captain Jesse Shriver, First Lieutenant Herbert G. Ogden and Second Lieutenant James I. Neff. Company I was recruited largely in Clinton, Pleasant and Adams townships, with Captain Newcomb M. Barnes, First Lieutenant Robert Lysle, Jr., and Second Lieutenant Henry A. Boggart.
Company K was recruited at Fostoria largely from Loudon, Jackson, Hopewell and Big Spring township, with a few from across the line in Wood county; Captain Montgomery Noble, First Lieutenant Milton N. Ebersole and Second Lieutenant Philip F. Cline, as its first commissioned officers. As soon as the organiza- tion was completed, the regiment was hurried by rail to Cincinnati, thence across the river to Covington, Kentucky, to assist in repell- ing a threatened raid by Kirby Smith. After lying in camp near Covington a couple of weeks the regiment was transferred by rail to Louisville, Kentucky, and there incorporated into General Buell's army, the Army of the Cumberland, and joined in its pursuit of Bragg. The One Hundred and First received its first baptism in blood at the battle of Perrysville, Kentucky, on the 8th of October, inside :of forty days after leaving Monroeville, Ohio. Although practically without drill or discipline the regiment in this, its first encounter with the enemy, bore itself admirably. From this on until the close of the war its history was that of the Cumberland army.
During the month following the organization of the One Hun- dred and First, another Ohio regiment was organized and rendez- voused at Monroeville, which made a heavy draft on Seneca county for volunteers. The One Hundred and Twenty-third Ohio Volun- teer Infantry, with Colonel William T. Wilson as commander, was organized and recruited at Monroeville during the month of Sep- tember, 1862. Colonel Wilson had seen a year's active service as lieutenant colonel of the Fifteenth Ohio Volunteer Infantry. Two companies, D and I, were recruited in Seneca county-Company D, at Tiffin, with Captain Frederick K. Shawhan, First Lieuten- ant Hugh L. McKey and Second Lieutenant Joshua Leonard, as its first commissioned officers; Company I, at Fostoria, and gathered very largely from. Big Spring, Loudon and Jackson townships. Quite a number from this company were recruited in and around Attica, because this was the home of Second Lieutenant J. F. Schuyler. Captain Richard A. Kirkwood, First Lieutenant Wil- liam H. Bender and Second Lieutenant Josephus F. Schuyler were
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the first commissioned officers, with George D. Acker of Fostoria, as first sergeant.
The One Hundred and Twenty-third broke camp at Monroe- ville on the 16th day of October, 1862, and was transported by rail to Zanesville; thence by boat down the Muskingum river to Mariet- ta; thence by rail to Clarksburg, Virginia, where it arrived on the 20th of October. The first year of service of this regiment was rath- er an unfortunate one. The regiment was well officered and com- posed of excellent men, but was unfortunate in the character of the service assigned them. During the winter of 1862-3 the regi- ment did service in West Virginia, operating along the line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, guarding it against the depredations of the guerrilla band of rebels under command of General Imboden. In January a small detachment of the One Hundred and Twenty- . third was captured near Romney, together with an entire company of the One Hundred and Sixteenth Ohio by the rebel cavalry. Early in March, 1863, the regiment was transferred to the Shenan- doah valley, under the command of General Milroy, at Winchester. On the 13th of June, Lee with the whole of the rebel army on the raid, which resulted in the battle of Gettysburg, struck Winchester. General Milroy made the best possible defense with his compara- tively small army; but after some severe fighting on the 13th and 14th, in which the One Hundred and Twenty-third Ohio lost in killed and wounded about 100 men, the Union forces were com- pelled to abandon the fort at Winchester and retreat northward. On the 15th the brigade to which the One Hundred and Twent: third was attached, being surrounded by the enemy, was compelled to surrender. In this the whole of the One Hundred and Twenty- third, except Company D, fell into the hands of the rebels as prisoners of war. The enlisted men of the regiment were ex- changed in a few months and were sent to the paroled camp at Annapolis, Maryland, and Camp Chase, Ohio. The commissioned officers were retained in Libby prison, and at Macon, Charleston and Columbia for about eleven months. From the latter place many of them made their escape. Among these was Lieutenant George D. Acher, of Fostoria. £ The scattered members of the regi- ment were reassembled and re-organized and did honorable service until mustered out in June, 1865.
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