History of Butler County Pennsylvania - 1883

Transcribed by Pat Collins. For an explanation and caution about this transcription, please read this page.

Because this chapter is an extensive roster of military personnel, the surnames have not been included at the front of the chapter. The following abbreviations have been made use of in compiling the several rosters:   e., enlisted; dis., discharged; disab., disability; m., mustered in service; m.o., mustered out, m.o.w.c., mustered out with company; m.o.w.b., mustered out with battery; wd., wounded; m.wd., mortally wounded; nat. cem., national cemetery; P.V., Pennsylvania Volunteers; pro., promoted; Surg. cert., Surgeon's certificate; tr., transferred; vet., veteran; V.C., Volunteer Cavalry; V.I., Volunteer Infantry; V.R.C., Veteran Reserve Corp.

[p. 97]
This command, more commonly known as the Round Head Regiment, was recruited in the southwestern counties of the State, originally settled, for the most part, by descendents of the Round Heads of the English Revolution, and Scotch-Irish Seceders and Covenanters.

On the 2d of September, 1861, the regiment which had been recruited to the number of twelve companies, was ordered to Washington, D.C., and upon its arrival was encamped on Kalorama Heights. Soon after the following field officers were selected: Daniel LEASURE, Colonel; James ARMSTRONG, Lieutenant-Colonel; and David A. LECKEY, Major. On the 7th of October, it was brigaded with the Eighth Michigan and Fiftieth Pennsylvania, and a few days later the Seventy-ninth (Highlanders), New York, was attached, with Gen. Isaac I. STEVENS as brigade commander. The troops comprising this brigade formed part of an expeditionary force (Gen W.T. SHERMAN's), designed for operations along the South Atlantic seaboard, and after rendezvousing at Fortress Monroe, set sail from that point on the 29th of October, 1861. Accompanied by a powerful naval fleet, Forts Walker and Beauregard, near Hilton Head, were reached on the morning of the 7th of November and captured. One month later, Beauford was occupied, and the approaches to Charleston threatened. Here the regiment remained engaged in picket duty and occasional skirmishes with the enemy until June 1, 1862, when [p.98] it proceeded with a portion of STEVEN's brigade to Legareville, and driving the enemy from his works captured all his shore batteries. The regiment lost, however, in this action, twenty killed and wounded, and Capt. CLINE and fifteen men who were taken prisoners.

Early on the morning of June 16, the Union forces on James' Island moved forward to the assault of the Tower Fort, near Secessionville, a strong earthwork held by a large force, under the rebel Col. LAMAR, and commanding the approaches to Charleston by the James Island causeway. After a severe contest, lasting nearly an hour, during which a number of Highlander and Round Head regiments forced their way into the fort, a retreat was ordered. The narrow strip of land over which the troops advanced, was barely sufficient to deploy one regiment, and this was swept by the guns of the fort, and from the riflepits and defenses in the rear. Of the 421 officers and men of the regiment who went into the fight, one officer and eight enlisted men were killed, two officers and thirty men wounded, and six missing.

On the 4th of July, the regiment was ordered to Hilton Head; on the 13th, it returned to Beaufort, and soon after it proceeded on the ocean steamer Merrimac to Newport News, Va. From that place it was moved by transports to Acquia Creek, and thence by rail to Fredericksburg, where the troops under Gen. STEVENS from South Carolina, and those who had been operating in North Carolina under Gen. BURNSIDE, were united, and placed under the command of Gen. RENO, were subsequently known as the Ninth Army Corps. Thereafter, until the close of the war, it formed part of the corps (Ninth) made famous under the command of RENO and BURNSIDE. It participated in the second battle of Bull Run, during the last days of August, 1862, where it suffered heavy losses, and fought during the second day of battle under the command of Capt. James E. CORNELIUS of Company C, the field officers present all being disabled by wounds. During the rebel invasion of Maryland, which followed close upon the defeat of POPE in Virginia, the regiment proceeded thither, and fought the enemy at South Mountain and Antietam, losing in the two battles ten killed and thirty-two wounded. It was also present at the battle of Fredericksburg, fought in December, 1861.

When early in 1863 Gen. BURNSIDE was placed in command of the department of the Ohio, two divisions of his corps were ordered to Kentucky with him, and this force included the Round Head regiment. Proceeding via Baltimore, Parkersburg and Cincinnati, this command reached Lexington, Ky., on the 28th of March. Subsequently the regiment was stationed at Camp Dick Robinson, Middleburg and Columbia. Early in June of that year, however, the Ninth corps was ordered to the supposrt of Gen. GRANT's troops at Vicksburg, Miss., which point was reached via the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers.

After the fall of Vicksburg, the regiment engaged in the movement under Gen. William T. SHERMAN against Jackson, Miss., losing considerable in killed and wounded, but many more as a result of exposure in that climate, and using the execrable water of the Big Black and Yazoo Rivers. From Vicksburg, the corps, then under the command of Gen. Parke, was ordered to East Tennessee. It reached Cincinnati by water transportation, and thence marched to Camp Nelson, where many men of the regiment were attacked with malarial fever; numbers of them died, and when the march was resumed toward Knoxville, September 25, 1863, one-fourth of those composing the regiment were left behind in hospital, while others who marched with the column were greatly enfeebled by diseases.

The Round Heads were actively engaged during the siege of Knoxville by the rebels under LONGSTREET, and on the the 1st of January, 1864, while subsisting on less than two ears of corn a day per man, the entire regiment, with the exception of twenty-seven, re-enlisted, to the number of 366, for a second term of three years, and immediately started for home on a veteran furlough. The midwinter march over the Cumberland Mountains was very severe, many of the men being shoeless and without adequate clothing, no supply trains having reached Knoxville during the continuance of the siege. At Cincinnati, the regiment was paid, and on the 8th of January it reached Pittsburgh, where the men were dismissed for thirty days.

The veterans rendezvoused as ordered at Pittsburg February 8, and with them came recruits sufficient to raise the combined strength of the command to 977 men. A few days later it proceeded to Annapolis, Md., and rejoined the Ninth Army Corps. Not deeming it necessary, however, to further recapitulate the movements of the regiment and corps during the final campaigns, we will only add in concluding this article, that the One Hundredth Regiment continued to perform well its part until the rebel armies laid down their arms. It was engaged in 1864-65 in the battles of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania C.H., North Anna, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, Mine Explosion, Poplar Spring Church, Hatcher's Run, defense of Fort Steadman, and the final assault upon Petersburg. Soon after Lee's surrender, it marched to Washington, D.C., where it was mustered out of the service July 24, 1865. Following are the names of officers and enlisted men of the Round Heads in Butler County.

[p. 99]

[End of Chapter 12d--Butler County During War of 1861-65, 100th Regiment: History of Butler County, Pennsylvania. With Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of some of its Prominent Men and Pioneers. Waterman, Watkins, & Co., Chicago, 1883.]

Chapter 12--Butler County During War of 1861-65, 78th Regiment
Chapter 12--Butler County During the War of 1861-65, 102nd Regiment
1883 Butler County History Contents
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Edited 24 Nov 1999, 17:10