Earlier I posted a picture of what appears to be the Company F canine companion. There are other "nonmilitary types" in various 3rd MA images but the one I find most intriguing is that of a boy, roughly 8-14 years of age, sitting at the edge of the "patio" where a group of Co. F & K officers posed after the war's end, awaiting the return to their Massachusetts homes. Presumably he was a Washington, DC local, employed by the officers to tend to their barracks, which the building appears to be. I'm sure he had quite a story to tell.
In case you hadn't noticed, it's an election year and a big one at that. Consequently, your local government is no doubt looking for polling place workers. The job hours and pay vary depending on your state and county but overall it is FUN, interesting, and you get to literally make history while you serve your community for a whole day. (Notice this is not a lifetime commitment.) You become part of the process prescribed in the U.S. and state constitutions for picking national leaders, deciding local issues, selecting judges, and determining who will be your voice at the city, county, and state level. (If that doesn't make you feel important and needed, I don't know what will.) If you have vote-by-mail where you live, my experience has been that the grouchy people just "mail it in" while the friendly voters who appreciate your service come out to vote AND thank you. Polling places are staffed by a cadre of volunteers with a mix of experience levels, so if you are a raw recruit, not to worry, someone there is smarter than you. In my county we have classes, in person and online, with hands-on training using the computers that make voter check-in overall very smooth. We also pay you for your time. You might check your county recorder's web site or just search online using terms like "election worker 2016" and the name of your county. In the Phoenix, AZ metro area, go to http://recorder.maricopa.gov/elections/electionboardworker.aspx. Thank you for supporting our democratic process!
I saw an ad today in the Arizona Republic, the largest newspaper in the state where I live, advertising a search feature for their archives, which the ad said dated back to 1862. That sounded like a decent source and the right time period to find images of Civil War veterans and GAR members. I checked it out, thinking I could find a new image source and pass it on to all of you. As it turns out, this is not really a new function of their online edition, azcentral.com, but enhanced capability due to an alliance with ProQuest and thus not free or particularly cheap. This is especially true if you live close to a major library or the state archive, which have the Republic and other newspapers archived on microfilm, already accessible to the public for free. If you are interested, check it out at pqasb.pqarchiver.com/azcentral/offers.html for details on pricing ($1.20 - $3.95 per item), then click on "About the Archive" for usage terms (personal use only, not to be republished - which means no using on your internet site) and time period covered (1890 forward, not 1862 as advertised.) Someone's attorney must have written this page because it includes the warning that "the information in any particular article may be outdated or superseded by additional information. The Arizona Republic does not make any warranties or representations regarding the accuracy, completeness, timeliness or reliability of the information in the articles that you retrieve."
The pictures on this site show 3rd MA Heavy Artillery soldiers at Ft. Stevens and Ft. Totten in Washington, D.C. Ft. Stevens was the scene of a battle in July 1864 when Lt. Gen. Jubal Early and his Confederate forces attacked. President Lincoln came out to watch as the artillerymen and the Sixth Army Corps repulsed the Confederates and he made history as the only sitting president to be fired on in battle. In a famous incident, the 6'4" president, wearing his trademark stovepipe hat, had to be ordered off the parapet on which he was standing by a soldier - he was drawing fire from Confederate sharpshooters on the grounds of what is today the Walter Reed military hospital. The Associated Survivors of the Sixth Army Corps installed a plaque 56 years later commemorating that "Get down, you fool!" moment. You can read more about the site and the Lincoln story on HMdb.org, the Historical Marker Database. It's a very interesting database where readers are invited to submit photos and information. Click on the "About Us" button at the top to see how you can get involved in documenting American history.
I stumbled across a very cool site online, the Woburn Public Library's "Woburn's Civil War Veterans: Carte-de-Visite Portraits from Woburn Post 161 G.A.R." This collection of photo calling cards depicts individual men in what looks like late middle age, based on the white hair, and gives his residency, occupation, and age at enlistment, and the unit in which he served. None were in the 3rd MA Heavy Artillery, but if you are looking for an ancestor who lived in Woburn, MA circa 1890, check out this site. More information is in the online finding aid. A salute to the Dr. Thomas J. Glennon Archives of the Woburn Public Library!
Co. F shared its space at Ft. Stevens with what looks like a mixed-breed, small-to-medium size dog of white and some dark color. It looks very happy, although it was probably stone deaf if it sat next to the cannons too often. Check her/him out in the new "Non-Military Personnel" section.
After 4 years of finding & identifying images of Mayflower descendants (700 and counting) on my other site, Mayflowerfaces.com, I am turning to more recent generations. For Baby Boomers like me, Civil War era ancestors were our great-great and great-great-great grandparents, not anyone we would have had an opportunity to me meet in our own lifetime. So I'm attempting to find and identify individuals associated with the 3rd MA Heavy Artillery and introduce them to their descendants and others interested in Civil War history. If you can identify any of these sergeants, relaxing with their brass cannon at Fort Totten, Washington, DC in August 1865 let me know. Photo Credit: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, LC-DIG-cwpb-04138. |
AuthorThe author is a historian with a Ph.D. in US history and a love for genealogy and old photos. Archives
August 2018
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