Thanksgiving 1864 St. Augustine, FL

While researching my book on St. Augustine during the Civil War I came across this short Thanksgiving remembrance. Written by Captain Albert W. Peck 17th Connecticut Co. D I think it shows the difficulties often faced by soldiers and their ingenuity in solving problems.

I remember Thanksgiving Day we had no meat for dinner so I took my gun and went up the river a mile or so and killed six nice ducks and I brought them home and our cook had them picked and roasted for dinner and we had a grand dinner.*

 

Albert Peck was born on February 7, 1838 in Bridgeport, Connecticut to Jabez and Henriette Peck. According to the 1850 United States Census he had two sisters and a brother. By 1860 he was living as a boarder in the home of Anna Banks. He was employed as a clerk and had personal property worth $300.

Peck enrolled in the 17th Connecticut Company D. According to the NPS Soldiers and Sailors website Peck enlisted as a First Sergeant in 1862. The 17th took part in battles at Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. They also took part in siege operations against Fort Wagner and Fort Sumter. They were later transferred to duty in Florida serving  the remainder of 1864 and part of 1865 in the Jacksonville and St. Augustine area. The regiment six officers and 122 enlisted men die to either wounds or disease during the war. Peck was mustered out of service on July 19, 1865 at Hilton Head, South Carolina as a 1st Lieutenant.



Headstone for Albert
and Louisa Peck located
in Newton Village
Cemetery.
Photo Courtesy TomKat
on Findagrave.com.

 By 1870 Albert Peck was working at a merchant in Newton, CT. He was married to a woman named Louisa Booth and had a three year old son named Robert. His personal estate totaled over $5,100. In 1880 Peck was working as a farmer, a job he would hold until after 1900. During this time he and Louisa had two more sons, Charles and Albert Jr, and a daughter, Grace. It can be assumed that the Peck family was doing well financially as both the 1880 and 1900 Census list them as having live in servants.

Louisa passed away on July 24, 1905. The widower Albert and his youngest son Albert Jr. became boarders living with the Hiltbrand family in Newton, CT. The Hiltbrand family operated a dairy farm. Albert Sr. passed away on April 7, 1918. He is buried in Newton Village Cemetery in Newton, CT.

*Source: Peck, Albert W. Civil War Reminiscences 1862-1865. State Library and Archives of Florida, Tallahassee, FL.

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What Kind of Fallout?

It is hardly news any more that author Thomas Lowry has admitted, and then recanted, that he lied about discovering an Abraham Lincoln pardon after having changed the date on the document himself. By changing the year on the pardon he made it seem as if the pardon were written on the day of Lincoln's assassination. All of this was done not on a fake document but on a holding of the National Archives. Bloggers everywhere have been commenting on this. Some of the most thorough that I have seen belong to Brooks Simpson at Crossroads and also to Harry Smeltzer at Bull Runnings where there is a great, and somewhat heated at times, exchange between Brooks and Harry. On these blogs you'll find links to others if you are so inclined.

Who's to blame? Well, it sure looks bad for the Lowry's. If you read through the National Archives press release it would be hard to find otherwise. As far as prosecution goes the statute of limitations has expired so Lowry is off the hook. Legally that is. His reputation is shot and he has been barred from all NARA facilities. As far as book sales, well we'll have to see.

The main issues on this are to be debated by men and women smarter and more involved than myself. I have large concerns about this though that I haven't really seen addressed though please let me know if I have missed this elsewhere. What will episodes like this do to those of us who are not scholars, academics, or grad students with reference letters from professionals? If a well known (at least to many NARA employees) researcher can manage to sneak a fountain pen in against all rules and damage an Abraham Lincoln document what do they think a small time blogger who hasn't published anything might try to do. Will damage such as this cause NARA to rethink it's policies regarding archive usage? And what of the thousands of other repositories, whether a state archive, a local historical society or what have you? Will they take this as a sign that they need to tighten access? Sure, your local county historical society is unlikely to have a Presidential pardon signed by Abraham Lincoln but what they do have is just as priceless and important to them.

Let's hope this concern is all for naught. In many ways it probably is. Once the furor of this dies down, and it will, historical research will go on. While there may always be a bad seed, whether it be a forger, plagiarist, or scoundrel looking to get his name in lights, the large amount of historians out there are good people who would no more think of changing the date on an Abraham Lincoln pardon than they would hitting themselves with a hammer. Most historians want to present the truth though we may not always agree with their interpretation. Let's just hope this one bad apple doesn't spoil the whole bunch for historians.

Maine's Civil War Stories

This came through today compliments of Dick Eastman and his excellent genealogy blog. If you are at all interested in the state of Maine and it's contribution to the Civil War the site linked to below is for you.


The following announcement was written by the Maine State Archives:

 AUGUSTA - The stories of Maine people, the events, and issues of the Civil War are now available online. “The first installment of stories is ready. People all over the world will be able to learn about and appreciate the extraordinary involvement of Maine people in the Civil War,” State Archivist David Cheever said.

The stories begin with the results in the federal election of 1860, when all of the State’s electoral votes were won by Abraham Lincoln and his vice presidential running mate, Maine’s Hannibal Hamlin. “The voting here and across the country led to the secession of South Carolina and its sister states in the South. Maine sentiment against slavery and against secession fueled the response here following the bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, in April of 1861,” Cheever said.

The narratives, http://maine.gov/sos/arc/sesquicent/civilwarwk.shtml, address a wide range of events and issues. “The stories deal with Maine people, first, but they also address everything from health care, race relations, gender equity, intergovernmental relations, taxation policy, and, of course, the military,” Cheever said.

The stories each contain a Maine-based person, the location for which that person is known, an event or issue, and a follow-up question. “Our first audience is the public, but the stories have been produced with students in mind,” Cheever said.

The presentations online contain illustrations, primary source document transcripts, and accessible images of those documents. “Most of the stories come from the holdings at the Archives, but we have a growing number that come from historical societies, museums, and other repositories throughout Maine,” Cheever said.

More than 25 contributors, including student interns, volunteers from the public, and staff, have helped bring the project to fruition. The original goal for the project was to have one story for each week of the Civil War. “More than 150 stories are now available, and another 100 are in process. We expect that we will have more than 400 by the time the project ends,” Cheever said.

"The remarkable sequence of events that led to conflict is a matter of history we take for granted," said Maine Secretary of State Matt Dunlap. "In the election of 1860 and the subsequent re-election of Lincoln in 1864--remarkable for the fact that this nation conducted a presidential election in the midst of a terrible civil war--we have plenty to observe and be thankful for. Not many countries would see a peaceful change of power of the scope we have witnessed in the 2010 election cycle. Much of that is due to the sacrifice of Mainers on the battlefields of America those many generations ago."

Robert Partin update

A few days ago I posted about an interesting find I had made in my great great grandfathers Florida Confederate pension application. Jim Schmidt suggested contacting Chickamauga expert Dave Powell for his input. Dave was kind enough to reply and allow me to post his thoughts. Some great information especially considering I knew next to nothing about this battle. This is an area I hope to increase my knowledge on in the future especially with the family connection there!

Robert,

Thanks for the post.

Since Chickamauga was the first national military park, states created commissions starting in the late 1880s to determine how to site monuments. The northern states led the way here, with the goal of having most monuments in place when the park was scheduled to open in 1896.

The idea was that each regiment would form a committee to decide where their monument belonged and what text it should include. Then the ideas would be vetted at the state level, and finally by the park commission.

The ex-confederate states, having much less money to throw at monuments during this period, were slower to respond and often created a single state monument instead of individual regimental ones. Florida was one such - their monument stands just south of the Visitor's Center today.

The 4th Florida was in Stovall's Brigade, Breckinridge's Division, and fought very near where the state monument sits today. On September 20th 1863 Stovall's men routed part of John Beatty's Federal brigade (principally the 104th Illinois and part of the 15th Kentucky) and then turned south to strike into the flank of George Thomas' line at Kelly Field. The 4th did reach Kelly Field, but then Union reserves ejected them again. The 4th suffered 87 casualties out of 238 engaged, or 37%, in about an hour's fighting.

Dave Powell

Interesting Family Find

My father's side of the family contributed several soldiers to the Confederate effort through various Florida regiments. My great great grandfather was Robert Charles Partin.

Robert Partin was born March 15, 1840 in Tattnall County, Georgia the son of Hugh Gilmore Partin and Nancy Elizabeth Smith. The family moved to Florida in 1852. Partin enrolled in the Confederate Army on September 14, 1861 at Cedar Key, Florida joining Company F of the 4th FL Infantry. He served through the war apparently never being captured and injured only slightly. After the war he married Narcissus C. Ballard on July 19, 1876. I believe them to have had three children, Nellie B., Homer M, and Charles D. .According to his death certificate Robert worked as a farmer and died on June 14, 1927 from senility. He is buried in Rosehill Cemetery in Osceola County, FL.

An interesting find about him came from his Florida Confederate Pension application. It turns out that on December 14, 1906 Florida governor Napoleon Broward appointed Partin to be "Honorary Chickamauga Park Monument Commissioner for Osceola County, to exercise, perform, and enjoy all the duties and privileges appertaining to said position." I can't say I know what this means and have not done any further research on it or on Partin's service record. I just thought it was a neat item and the type that is not in every soldiers application. You may view the document here. If any readers have knowledge on this please feel free to comment.

Most information in this post came from Robert Charles Partin's Florida Confederate Pension application which may be viewed in PDF format here.

A photo I have found of Robert Partin's headstone and also a newspaper article in papers from my grandmother, Louise Redd. Unfortunately, I do not know the date or what newspaper this is from.

Collection of Civil War letters found by FL man

Interesting article from this weekends newspapers. John Snowden of Tampa discovered a large collection of family letters from the Civil War while going through his grandmothers papers recently. Some of the letters were written by George Shoop who is the writer of several letters in the UC-Santa Barbara special collection of letters of soldiers from the 102nd Pennsylvania Infantry. The article is a bit misleading in saying that Shoop was the only survivor of the war included in the UC-Santa Barbara collection. The website states he is the only one represented in the collection to remain in service until the end of the war. Not important to this article but I just wanted to clarify it after finding different information.

An interesting article and hopefully Mr. Snowden can achieve his goal of transcribing and posting these letters online. According to the article he would also like to publish them with a running narrative.

Interesting Research Find

One of my current research interests is in Confederate soldiers who are buried in Volusia County, Florida. There is nobody famous here that I have found. No Generals thought to retire to the beach at Daytona. My how times have changed. I am trying to photograph all known headstones, gather GPS coordinates, and put together some biographical information on each known Confederate. For some this will prove near impossible while others will of course have more information available.

Working in alphabetical order I am starting with Wiley Abercrombie from the state of Alabama. Abercrombie served both in the 2nd Georgia Infantry and then transferred to the 7th Alabama Cavalry. After obtaining his pension application I found he served as Aide de Camp to Major General Samuel G. French. This weekend I started  retrieving his military records through Footnote and found this interesting letter written by General French to Confederate President Jefferson Davis.  I have tried to keep the original spellings. I have attached a copy of the letter. I hope you are able to save it and see the original.




Montevallo, Ala
May 10th 1864

His Excellency
The President

Sir:

I have the honor to request that Wiley Abercrombie of Columbus Georgia be appointed one of my aids de camp. I have had but one aid for the past six months.

Wiley Abercrombie has served in the army as a private since the beginning of the war. I do not remember what company and regiment he belongs to, but he is at present at the Head Quarters of Brigadier General Clanton. His commission or appointment sent to General Clanton will reach him.

Very Respectfully
Your Faithful Servant

S. G. French
Maj. General