Richard Smallwood’s “Virtual Cemetery of the Bager Scouts; Company G 1st USSS”
While searching for information about the Sharpshooters who came to the aid of the mortally wounded Sgt. Henry Lye at Gettysburg, I discovered a website created by Richard Smallwood entitled: 1st Regt. United States Sharpshooters (Berdan’s), Company G. A Virtual Cemetery. Mr. Smallwood has created a unique and fascinating study of the ninety-nine Wisconsin Sharpshooters known as the ‘Badger Scouts’. Building on the biographical information of Find A Grave, Richard has included muster record, wartime service and if the Sharpshooter was wounded, died of disease or killed in action. A white marble grave marker highlights the introduction of each Sharpshooter. Contributors, like Brian White and family descendants, have added wartime images of identified Sharpshooters. The scope of information Mr. Smallwood has been able to absorb for each Sharpshooter ranges from sparse to detailed.
Sgt. Willard M. Isham enlisted with Company G, 1st Regiment, United States Sharpshooters at Madison, Wisconsin on Sept. 19, 1861. During his service, Isham was promoted to Corporal then Sergeant, the rank he held when at Gettysburg. He was a friend of Sgt. Henry Lye and it was he who wrote Myra Sherrer a letter informing her of the circumstances of his death. He was absent in Hospital at the muster-out of the company in September of 1864.
Immediately following Sgt. Isham’s grave/bio was Private Levi Ingolsbee. It was Ingolsbee that assisted Isham carrying the mortally wounded Lye to the aide station. Mr. Smallwood clarified the correct spelling of the family’s name as Ingalsbee. Mr. Smallwood added: “Private Levi (Ingolsbee) Ingalsbee died August 16, 1864, at City Point hospital having received a mortal wound July 2 at Chancellorsville.”
This was one of the pieces of information I found incorrect. Levi Ingalsbee could not have been mortally wounded at Chancellorsville (May3-7, 1863) and die at City Point over a year later.
Berdans USSS in the Army of the Potomac lists Levi being mortally wounded during the Battle of Second Deep Bottom (August 13-20, 1864). Ironically, this was to be the last battle fought by the First U.S. Sharp Shooters as a regiment.
Lt. Gen. U.S. Grant ordered Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock’s Second Corps to make a demonstration north of the James River to draw Confederate troops away from Petersburg to reinforce the Richmond defenses. Simultaneously, Maj. Gen. Governor Warren’s Fifth Corps would swing out from their entrenchments and strike the Weldon Railroad, that provided critically needed supplies to the Army of Northern Virginia and the Capital. Warren’s raid was a resounding success, with 20 miles of track destroyed and his troops successfully blunting counterattacks by PTG Beauregard and A.P. Hill.
Things did not go so well for Maj. Gen. Hancock. On August 15th the Sharpshooters were detached to Maj. Gen. Birney’s 10th Corps, (Barlow’s division, Craigs brigade). The next day, the Sharpshooters marched to the extreme right flank of 10th Corps. Capt. Rudolf Ashmann (Co. A) reported the regiment was deployed as skirmishers, with their left flank on the Charles City road, with their right flank on a swamp north of it. The Sharpshooters were the farthest regiment on the line, dismounted cavalry covered their flank. Before them was maze of low-lying scrub pines. Lying in wait were dismounted cavalry from Maj. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee’s division. As the Sharpshooters came within range, the Rebels would fire a volley and then fall back to a new position. The Sharpshooters, giving back as good as they received, steadily drove back Lee’s cavalry before emerging from the timber to come face to face with Gen. McGown’s brigade. The Sharpshooters fell back.
Ironically, this last battle of the Sharpshooters, known as Deep Run or Four Mile Creek. claimed their most experienced officers; Capt. Rudolf Ashmann’s (Co. A) had his right leg was shattered by a Minie ball that required amputation; Lt. Richard Taylor (Co. K) lost an arm, and Capt. Andrews (Co. E) a permanently disabled arm. In all, twelve Sharpshooters were stricken; one killed, nine wounded, and one captured. On the opposite field, Colonel William Oates of the 15th Alabama/Little Round Top fame, would also lose an arm. Private Levi Ingalsbee was the only man of his company (G) to be struck down.
To reach the aide stations on the James River, Levi and the wounded Sharpshooters endured a torturous four-mile ambulance ride. Once triaged, the wounded were loaded onto a hospital steamer and transported to City Point. The Depot Field Hospital comprised of twelve separate buildings covering 200 acres. By August 1864 it was the largest, best equipped and staffed medical facility operating in the United States; capable of treating 10-12 thousand patients at a time. Unfortunately, Private Levi Ingalsbee expired from his wound during the river crossing or shortly after arriving at the hospital.
Tragically, Levi’s brother, Israel had been mortally wounded three months earlier during the Battle of the Wilderness. Mr. Smallwood wrote: “
Private Israel Ingalsbee was wounded at the Battle of the Wilderness May 7 and died in a "Va. field hospital on May 13, 1864. His body was buried locally, probably near Spotsylvania, where it probably was intermingled with the countless unburied bodies of the dead from the battle there. Any remains of his were surely disinterred and buried in Fredericksburg National Cemetery as an unknown after the war”.
I did some additional research and discovered a fascinating pair of articles written by National Park historian and Fredericksburg resident, Noel Harrison, that present a more convincing location where Isreal was buried.
Mr. Harrison had become obsessed with the series of photographs taken by Timothy O’Sullivan, entitled “
Fredericksburg, Virginia; Burial of the Dead”. The photos show a burial detail preparing to inter the remains of Union soldiers within the city limits of Fredericksburg. The original research was by William Fansanito in his book
Grant and Lee. As a Fredericksburg resident, Harrison became consumed with attempting to locate WHERE the photographs were originally taken. This culminated in two articles, one in 2005 and a follow up in the blog
Conundrums and Controversy Blog His article;
A Quarter Century of Researching Fredericksburg’s Burial-of-the-Dead Photographs, he wrote: "
During a three-week period beginning on May 8, 1864, Fredericksburg housed more than 26,000 wounded and sick soldiers—the ghastly harvest carried in from battlefields to the west and southwest. Many of these men never left the town; images of some of their shrouded bodies were made by cameramen at a temporary cemetery someplace on the edge of a Fredericksburg neighborhood. Frassanito’s book discussed seven photographs of the cemetery, images that he found in the collections of the Library of Congress and the National Archives”.
Based Mr. Harrison’s research, 20,000 Federal wounded were transported and treated at Corps hospitals established in different public buildings or homes in and around Fredericksburg. Those that died of their wounds, like Israel Ingolsbee, were interred in open plots of land in town, including gardens, vacant lots and residential backyards. This is the most likely where Private Ingolsbee was initially buried, until his remains were later exhumed and interred in the Wilderness/Spotslyvania National Cemetery.
Sources: American Battlefield Trust. Second Deep Bottom, Virginia. August 13-17, 1864, [url]https://www.battlefields.org/learn/maps/second-deep-bottom-aug-16-1864
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Bank, J. Photo Detective: Inside An 1864 Burial Photo:
https://www.civilwarphotography.org/blog/show-item/photo-detective-inside-an-1864-burial-photo/Harrison, Noel G.: A Quarter Century of Researching Fredericksburg’s Burial-of-the-Dead Photographs, (Part 1):
https://npsfrsp.wordpress.com/2015/03/20/a-quarter-century-of-researching-fredericksburgs-burial-of-the-dead-photographs-pt-1/(Part 2):
https://npsfrsp.wordpress.com/2016/03/27/a-quarter-century-of-research-on-fredericksburgs-burial-of-the-dead-photographs-part-2/Library of Congress.
Fredericksburg, Virginia. Burial of Federal dead:
https://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/cwpb.01840/Smallwood, Richard: Virtual Cemetery of the Badger Scouts.
https://www.findagrave.com/virtual-cemetery/315235?page=1#sr-23248Bill Skillman
Berdan Sharpshooters Survivors Association
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