From “Nelson Picnic Association” at their Thirty-Seventh Annual Gathering August 18, 1915 NOTE: The Nelson Picnic Association is now known as The Old Home Day Association which holds an annual week-long celebration of the history of Nelson and Munsonville, NH during the second full week of August.

“Names and Services of those, born or sometime resident in Nelson, New Hampshire, who, as Volunteers, answered the call to arms for the preservation of the Union – “that this Nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.””

Sumner P Fisher Birth: Feb. 26, 1843 Munsonville Cheshire County New Hampshire, USA Death: Nov. 4, 1910 Keene Cheshire County New Hampshire, USA

Second Regiment New Hampshire Infantry, Company B

Fisher, Howard, and Worth all left Munsonville together, bound for Concord, to enlist in Captain Griffin’s Company, which needed recruits from having been decimated at the Battle of Bull Run. That was the only company that Howard could think of because he had been Griffin’s pupil in the Nelson School. The others wished to be with Howard, and perhaps also were influenced by reports that, while the Second Regiment was one of the steadiest in the war’s first great battle, Company B had done a little better than any of the others.

They were as close friends as the famous “Three Musketeers” and, in their way, were destined to become equally good fighting men. It will be recalled that in Dumas’ great romance, the “Three” soon became four. Athos, Porthos, Aramid and D’Artagnan, so to our three was soon joined another, Edwin Richardson. They kept together throughout most of their service and made a wonderful record. Nothing but wounds ever kept any one of them out of battle. As far as size was concerned, Howard was the Porthos of the combination. Howard, though only twenty years of age, weighed about two hundred and thirty pounds.

Several others, whom they had known in Nelson, went to the Second at the same time as recruits for other companies. Silas L. Black, James W. Felt and Ara M. Wilson went to Company A; Phineas A. Parker to Company D; James F. Richardson and Leonard E. Robbins to Company G; and Lyman W. Wardwell to Company H.

When they arrived, in addition to Griffin they found Rufus Atwood, Edward N. Taft and Gilman E. White, who had been original members of the regiment.

The members of Company B were armed with Sharpe rifles and were the only company in the regiment that had breech loaders. As they could shoot farther and faster than the others they were almost invariably put on the skirmish line to begin the battles. This gave them many unique experiences.

During the latter part of 1861 the regiment was on the lower Potomac at Budd’s Ferry, Md., and there, on December 20th, occurred the death of Black, the first among those who had ever lived in Nelson. His body was shipped north for burial in Sullivan. Companies A and B paraded as escort to the boat.

In the spring of 1862 they went to the Peninsular and for a month took part in the siege of Yorktown, and, on its capture, pressed on toward Williamsburg where, on May 5th, in a cold drizzling rain, occurred their first battle.

The enemy had cut timber and constructed a strong abattis, behind which were the rifle pits and behind the latter redoubts, the largest of which was Fort Magruder.

Company B was called on and deployed as skirmishers while the brigade formed behind them.

A few moments later Howard was the first Nelson man to shed his blood on any battlefield. As he was struggling forward a bullet passed through his neck. The surgeon told him afterwards that a deviation of about a hair’s breadth would have severed the jugular. He dropped out and started for the rear, and then, when it suddenly occurred to him that he had left behind his precious rifle, turned and went back, found the gun and delivered it to Worth, who promised to take care of it. The latter loaned it to Lieutenant Henry of the First Massachusetts, who used it effectively that day and had it ready for Howard when he returned from the hospital a few weeks afterwards.

A little later in the day Robbins was seriously wounded and Taft was cut in two by a cannon ball from Fort Magruder. The latter was the first Nelson man killed in action.

Howard returned to the company before the first of June, and on the night of June 3rd marched with it to the trenches on the battlefield of Fair Oaks to relieve Sickles’ Excelsior Brigade, which had been fighting there continuously for three days.

It was raining and pitch dark. No lights of any kind were allowed. Howard dropped down just where he was halted, and, despite the continuous firing and the terrible stench of the battlefield, slept the sound sleep of exhaustion. When daylight came he found that the mound of earth which had served as a pillow was a grave, and that only a few inches of earth separated his head from its occupant, whose feet were entirely exposed. All around lay hundreds of corpses of which there had not even been a pretense of burial.

Three weeks later, not far from there, at Oak Grove, occurred an engagement which in war annuals only ranks as a skirmish, but it was a serious affair for Company B. As usual they were sent to drive in the enemies’ pickets. They did so, but only after the most desperate fighting. Of the forty-two men who went in twenty-two were killed or wounded. Richardson was wounded. Howard, Fisher, and Worth came out unscathed. Fisher was soon after captured and sent to Belle Isle*, but was exchanged and returned to the company within a few weeks.

Then, as the army retreated, battle succeeded battle in rapid succession. Peach Orchard, Va., June 29th; Glendale June 30th; and Malvern Hill from July 1st to August 5th. For six weeks they were almost constantly under fire. As Howard expressed it, “Company B skirmished all the way from Fair Oaks to Malvern Hill.”

After the close of the Peninsula campaign the Second went to join the army of General Pope and fought at Kettle Run, Va., August 27th, 1862, and Second Bull Run August 29th.

The brigade, of which it was the center regiment, was ordered to drive the enemy out of the woods. It encountered the first line of rebels in a railroad cut and received from them murderous fire. With a yell every man dashed forward, and in a moment the railroad was carried and those who had delivered their volley in a prone position were taken prisoners before they had time to rise. Howard says that this was the only charge in which he participated that actually went through. Here Worth was severely wounded in the arm.

Those who were unhurt dashed on for the second line, which rose and received them with a volley, but before they could realize it, the Second was in their midst and the line broke and fled. A third line still remained and the regiment pressed on and was just breaking through it once more when it was assailed on both flanks. In its impetuosity it had got far in advance of the rest of the brigade. It had to fall back and succeeded in doing so without losing its organization. Company B was left with no commissioned officer, Captain Littlefield having been killed and Lieutenant Ballard wounded.

The historian of the regiment says: “At this time a brigade of the Ninth Army Corps came up and advanced into the woods just to the right. The Second noted from its flags that one of the regiments wa the Sixth New Hampshire, but there was no time for visiting.”

In the great assault on the Heights of Fredericksburg, on December 13, 1962, the Second did not take part, as it was assigned to guard the pontoon bridges over the Rappahannock, but on Sunday, December 14, Company B had a little battle of its own. A battery of the enemy was shelling their brigade and they went out with the Sharpes and silenced it by shooting gunners and horses.

In the late spring of 1863 the regiment was granted a furlough and Fisher and his friends visited Nelson. When they returned Lee’s Campaign for the invasion of the North had already begun, and the army started on forced marches to head him off. In striving to overtake the others the Second was put to such a pace that Howard, with sore feet from new shoes, for the first and only time in his life, could not keep up and made the acquaintance of that despised class, the habitual stragglers, always behind to avoid any possible engagements. He, however, arrived in camp after nightfall and the next day held his own with the best.

At Gettysburg, on the second day, June 2, 1863, the regiment had its worst battle. They were in the Third Corps, commanded by General Daniel E. Sickles who, instead of forming on Cemetery Ridge with the rest of the battle line, stationed his corps, of about ten thousand men, a thousand yards in front, on the Emmettsburg road, where with both flanks exposed they were attacked by about thirty thousand confederates, and, after desperate fighting, were driven back to the position originally intended for them.

The Second New Hampshire behaved with gallantry and brilliancy, among other things making a charge that is historic. Company B was not in the charge. They had taken possession of a farmhouse from which they were sharpshooting at the enemy as it advanced across the open, repeatedly bringing down regimental colors. Even the wounded joined in the firing. When the regiment was driven back these wounded and some others who were slow in getting out were captured.

Captain Hubbard and First Lieutenant Ballard of Company B were both killed, and Second Lieutenant Shute was wounded. Corporal Worth was killed during the retreat, and his body, which could not be identified, is buried somewhere on the field. Edwin Richardson was wounded, and Corporal Lyman E. Wardwell captured.

On July 29, George W. Osgood, with the Sixth New Hampshire in Kentucky, wrote in his diary: “Reported that the Second New Hampshire was all cut to pieces at Gettysburg.” The report was true, and yet the old regiment had enough vitality left to fight on many a day afterwards. They gave a good account of themselves at Wapping Heights, Va., July 23, 1863, and Swift Creek, Va., May 9, 1864, and gained great distinction at Drurys Bluff, May 16, 1864.

Edwin Richardson was wounded again at Swift Creek. Fisher and Howard went safely through all three.

The night before Drurys Bluff Howard helped string a tangle of telegraph wire in front of the position held by the regiment and, when the enemy charged in the fog on the following morning, they suffered enormous losses. Major J. D. Cooper thus reported to the Adjutant General of New Hampshire: “In the battle of Drurys Bluff, on the sixteenth of May last, the regiment doubtless inflicted more serious damages than in any other fight in which it was engaged. It is estimated that our regiment alone killed over fifteen hundred rebels and wounded over three times that number. The ground was strewn for more than three hundred yards in our front so thick with rebels that it was difficult to move without treading on the dead.”

Then came the assault at Cold Harbor, June 3, 1864.** (See the notation from the Memoir of Ulysses S. Grant below). The total loss (to the Union) was nearly thirteen thousand men, most of them within the first twenty minutes. The wounded who then fell and were unable to crawl off without assistance, lay between the lines unaided for six days, or until they died.

As, just at daybreak, the line formed for the assault, Howard was acting as left guide of his regiment. A minie ball passed through his hip splintering his bone. As he reeled from the shock a General shouted, “Sergeant, get up into your place!” “Don’t you see the man is wounded?”, said his Adjutant, and then the General, in a different voice added, “This is no place for you. Get out of here!”

Howard tried his best to do so, but would have made sad work of it had not a hostler, who was taking the Colonel’s horse to the rear, seen his plight and given him assistance.

As they passed along they met a group of horsemen. In the center was a very ordinary-looking man, dressed hardly better than a private, almost slouchy in appearance. From the deference paid to him by his brilliant staff Howard concluded that he was someone of importance and, upon inquiry, was told that it was General Grant. Soon after he reached the field hospital who should be brought in but Fisher. Howard greeted him cordially, saying that he was glad to see him and now they could go home together.

They went together first to a hospital in Washington, then to another hospital in New Haven, Conn., and were finally furloughed and came back to Nelson.

From necessity Fisher’s fighting days were over. Howard however, recovered, re-enlisted, and went back. Eventually he was offered a Captain’s commission, but as the war was nearing its end, he was sick and tired of everything that would remind him of the horror of it, so he resigned on July 11, 1865.

Footnotes:

*Belle Isle: From Wikipedia ~ “The island served as a prison for Union soldiers during the American Civil War. Between 1862 and 1865, the island was home to about 30,000 POW's and as many as 1,000 died, though accounts vary with the South claiming the death rate was low, while the North claimed it was very high. A list of prisoners who died at Belle Isle is available. The Battle of Walkerton was the result of a failed Union attempt to free them. In April 1864, Peter DeWitt, Assistant Surgeon at Jarvis Hospital, Baltimore, received a number of prisoners recently released from the Prisoner of War camp at Belle Isle. He described the "great majority" of the patients as being: "in a semi-state of nudity...laboring under such diseases as chronic diarrhoea, phthisis pulmonalis, scurvy, frost bites, general debility, caused by starvation, neglect and exposure. Many of them had partially lost their reason, forgetting even the date of their capture, and everything connected with their antecedent history. They resemble, in many respect, patients laboring under cretinism. They were filthy in the extreme, covered in vermin...nearly all were extremely emaciated; so much so that they had to be cared for even like infants.”

** Assault at Cold Harbor "I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made. I might say the same thing of the assault of the 22d of May, 1863, at Vicksburg. At Cold Harbor no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained. Indeed, the advantages other than those of relative losses, were on the Confederate side. Before that, the Army of Northern Virginia seemed to have acquired a wholesome regard for the courage, endurance, and soldierly qualities generally of the Army of the Potomac. They no longer wanted to fight them "one Confederate to five Yanks." Indeed, they seemed to have given up any idea of gaining any advantage of their antagonist in the open field. They had come to much prefer breastworks in their front to the Army of the Potomac. This charge seemed to revive their hopes temporarily; but it was of short duration. The effect upon the Army of the Potomac was the reverse. When we reached the James River, however, all effects of the battle of Cold Harbor seemed to have disappeared." ~ Ulysses S. Grant, Personal Memoirs