Letters, papers, other neat stuff
Poor scan (sorry, folks) of a knapsack in the collection of the West Point Museum showing the Xth Legion/56th Regt. N.Y.S.V. lettering painted onto the front of the regiment's knapsacks. The Tenth Legion "X" patches were sewn to the first jackets issued to the men, but not to subsequent issues of coats or jackets. However, the unit's knapsacks were lettered in this fashion till the end of the war; it was a matter of unit pride.
Hugh Galbraith's (Co. G) Pension Application
Hugh Galbraith (Gilbrath) had re-enlisted as a veteran on February 20, 1864. He was promoted to the rank of corporal on October 15, 1864. Wounded in action on November 30, 1864 at the battle of Honey Hill, S.C. He died of his wounds on December 1, 1864.
Consolidated provisions return for the 56th N.Y. from Jan. 15-Jan. 20, 1862, while the regiment was stationed at Carver Barracks, Meridian Hill, in the defenses of Washington -- the regiment's first duty assignment. The regiment numbered 1,300 men at this point. During this five-day period, it was issued 1,500 portions of pork, 2,400 of salt beef, and 2,600 of fresh beef, among other things. The men lived high off the hog, figuratively and literally, during these early days of their service. These "luxuries," limited though they may seem today, would be greatly missed once the realities of life in the field set in.
Part of letter written by William H. Laurence of Co. E on Aug. 1, 1862, to his father. Laurence, who was 21 when he enlisted Sept. 1, 1861, in Middletown, N.Y., wrote this letter not long after the regiment's first major engagement, the Battle of Fair Oaks, Va, on May 31, 1862. In it, he describes the death from typhoid of comrade John Harkness of Co. E: "John Harkness dide very suden the other day [July 23, 1862] he went to the privey in the morning about 4. o,clock and was found dead on the ground[.] he had bin sick some time and his discharge came the same morning that he died but it was too late for him to go home for he was dead[.] there is about too hundred and fifty men in the regiment [down from 1,300 just months before.] " Laurence was promoted to sergeant March 1, 1865, and was mustered out Oct. 17, 1865, at Charleston, S.C.
Above and below, commissary manual owned by William Hawley Merphy, regimental commissary sergeant. Merphy, of Co. K, was quartermaster sergeant from April 1862 to Nov. 20, 1864.
Above and below, February 1865 enlistment forms for Daniel Ganon (spelled Gannon in regimental history), Co. A. Gannon enlisted at Goshen to serve one year and was mustered in as a private Feb. 15, 1865. He was mustered out Oct. 17, 1865, at Charleston, S.C. At the time of his enlistment, the blue-eyed, black-haired Gannon, 27, was listed as both a blacksmith and a boilermaker. Courtesy Dane Utter, Gannon's great-great-great-grandson.
