Better Know a Soldier: Sigmund E. Wisner

Capt. Sigmund E. Wisner
79th Pa Officers Oval, Mathew Brady, 1865

Name: Sigmund E. Wisner
Birthplace: August 31, 1839 (Marietta, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania)
Occupation: Teacher, Postmaster, Grocer
Church/Religion: Methodist Episcopal
Political Beliefs: Republican
Term of Service: Private, 4/24-7/31/1861 with Company A, 10th PA Infantry; Sergeant, Sergeant Major, 1st Lieutenant, Captain, 9/23/1861-7/12/1865 with 79th Pennsylvania
Notable Events: Visit to Marietta in January 1864, Wounded in Battle of Atlanta
Post-war:  Teacher, Postmaster
Death: (>1910) Exact date and burial location unknown.

One of the soldiers in the 79th Pennsylvania to pick up his pen midway through the war and begin sending letters for publication in the hometown newspaper was Sigmund E. Wisner, then a sergeant in Company E.  Besides recounting the events around Murfreesboro, Tennessee, in the first half of 1863, Wisner also reflected on the war's greater meaning and historical context.  The front page of the May 16, 1863, edition of the Weekly Mariettian even featured a lengthy feature article, "The Present War," contributed by Wisner while in camp near Murfreesboro.  He began with the Pilgrims' landing at Plymouth and traced the nation's history to secession in 1860, and described the war's cause as follows:

The southern States have always cherished negro slavery as a favorite institution, with the mistaken idea that wealth forms the great dividing line in society. Thus the opulent became the aristocracy, and the poorer class are placed on a level with the slave. To make this distinction known to the world has been one of the chief aims of this rebellion. In the northern States, where the labor is performed by the mass, there is a dependent relation existing between the employer and the employed; in this way labor is elevated and becomes honorable. The northern people believing slavery to be socially and politically wrong, opposed its extension; this gradually produced a spirit of alienation between the north and south; and being constantly agitated in the halls of Congress by radicals of both sections led to a final seperation; on the part of the southern States, South Carolina was the first to pass the ``ordinance of secession,'' and declare herself out of the Union.

This is a useful quote for its articulation of the "median" Republican opinion of the war.  Slavery was wrong not so much as a violent system of racial ordering but as a production system that destroyed the dignity of labor and the opportunity of the laborer to claim its reward.  The was very much about economics, as slavery was very much a system of production.

At the time of the firing on Fort Sumter, Sigmund Wisner had just begun a twelve-week school session, which was advertised at a rate of $2 for primary students and $3 for second students.  He cut the term short to join the "Maytown Infantry" (Co. A, 10th Pa Infantry) on April 24, 1861 [Intel 5/7/1861; Pa Card File].  Upon his return after the regiment's three-months service, Wisner joined many other Lancaster County teachers in the "Normal Rifles" as fifth sergeant.  Better known as Company E, 79th Pennsylvania, the company was recruited mostly out of Mountville and Millersville, where a college to train teachers had been established a couple years earlier.

Wisner received regular promotions, reenlisting as a veteran in 1864 and attaining a promotion to captain of Company F by the end of 1864.  He was wounded in the attack on Atlanta, but finished the war in the field with the regiment.  Wisner continued writing to the Weekly Mariettian, and I count a total of nine letters between January 1863 and June 1864.  You can find them online at Pennsylvania Civil War Era Newspaper Collection.

In addition to serving for almost the entire duration of the war, Wisner stands out as one of Lancaster County's most active veterans.  He served on the committee in charge of erecting the Soldiers and Sailors Monument in Lancaster, which was completed in 1874 and still stands today on Penn Square.  When the regiment met for its first reunion on October 8, 1877 (fifteen years after the Battle of Perryville), Wisner gave a history of the regiment.  Wisner's handwritten copy is now in the possession of the Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh.  Furthermore, Company E was unique in that it hosted its own three-day camping trips led by Thomas Hambleton for survivors in the 1890s and 1900s, and Wisner joined in at these reunions.

Google Books and digitized newspapers provide a good list of Wisner's postwar activities, including:

• Commander of the William Child GAR Post, 1886 
• Sunday School Teacher/Superintendent in Marietta and Lay Delegate to Methodist Episcopal Church conference, 1890
• Postmaster of Marietta in 1891
• Attendance at dedication ceremony for 79th PA monument at Chickamauga

'One of the Happiest Days': New Flags for the 79th Pennsylvania

Regimental flag of the 76th Pennsylvania by Evans and Hassall (PA Capitol Preservation Committee)
One of the 79th Pennsylvania's "Lancaster flags" would have looked very similar to this one.

 On February 23, 1863, three citizens of Lancaster arrived at the camp of the 79th Pennsylvania near Murfreesboro, Tennessee.  Besides carrying a large box of articles and letters for distribution to men in the regiment, they carried another set of items eagerly anticipated by the regiment.  A set of four beautiful flags purchased by the collected donations of Lancaster's citizens had finally arrived. 

The idea for purchasing these flags seems to have had its origins in a proposal published in the November 18, 1862, Intelligencer, edited by Lancaster's Mayor George Sanderson.  Sanderson proposed taking up a subscription at $1 each to purchase a new stand of colors for $200 to "show a proper appreciation" of the regiment's actions at the Battle of Perryville a month earlier.  Within a week, the fund was over-subscribed and the colors were purchased from Evans & Hassall of Philadelphia.  Extra money was donated to the Union Dorcas Society to provide relief for soldiers' families.  [Intell 11/18/1862, DEE 1/24/1863]

The flags were completed and around the New Year arrived in Lancaster, where they were displayed in the court house.  The January 6, 1863, Intelligencer described them:

The flags are four in number, the principal being the State flag; the second the regimental, (or National) and two small guide flags.  The first is of blue silk and yellow silk fringe, with an eagle surrounded by a halo.  From the claws of the eagle depends a scroll with the inscription--"Presented by citizens of Lancaster, Pa., to the 79th Regiment, P. V., for gallant conduct at Chaplin Hills, Ky., October 8th, 1862."  On the reverse is the coat of arms of Pennsylvania, above which in a halo are the words in guilt letters--"Chaplin Hills, Ky., October 8th, 1862."  Underneath, in a scroll, is the same inscription as on the first side.  This flag is very handsome and strongly made, and free from an over quantity of paint which figures so many presentation flags."  

The Regimental or National flag is made of strong heavy silk, bordered with yellow fringe.  On the centre bar on both sides are the letters in gold--"79th Regiment P.V."  The guide flags are of blue silk with yellow silk fringe, with the number of the regiment in gold letters.

Chosen to escort the colors to Tennessee were three men from the committee in charge of procuring the colors.  Foremost among them was Lewis Haldy (bio), a fascinating man with a background in the freight and marble/tombstone business who tirelessly supported the Patriot Daughters of Lancaster and other aid operations in Lancaster during the war.  Over the past year, he had already made three other trips to the seat of war (to the Pennsylvania Reserves in summer 1862, 79th PA after Perryville, and the 122nd PA in February 1863), delivering car loads of goods on behalf of the Patriot Daughters, making connections with Lancaster's soldiers in hospitals, and arranging logistics for bringing dozens of soldiers' remains back to Lancaster.  Rounding out the committee were Andrew B. Meixell, a freight agent, and Robert A. Evans, a wealthy banker who later owned Rock Ford.

The flag presentation took place on March 1, 1863, delayed several days by rainy weather.  The whole brigade, its commander Col. John C. Starkweather, and the regiment's former brigade commander Gen. James A. Negley all witnessed the presentation.  Haldy "unwrapped and exposed to the eager gaze of every one the magnificent banner," and read an address to the regiment, which would be reprinted in Lancaster's newspapers (read it here).  Col. Hambright replied and accepted the flags, pledging "these splendid colors shall be borne by the stoutest arm to the thickest of the conflict, there to remind us of fond friends in our native county, to revive the most pleasing memories, and stimulate us to true, exalted, and patriotic duty."  Starkweather and Negley followed with addresses to the soldiers' delight.          

79th PA Monument
Featuring incident with
Lancaster flag at the
Battle of Chickamauga
(PA at Ch. & Ch.)

Following that, according to Company E soldier Elias H. Witmer, "Three hearty cheers were then given by the brigade--and thus closed one of the happiest days in the eventful history of the Seventy-Ninth."  (DEE, 3/12/1863)  Captain Morris D. Wickersham agreed writing, "Home, kindred, society--all were remembered.  The day was truly a happy one, and we returned to Camp uttering, 'Long live the good people of Lancaster.'"  (Intel, 3/17/1863)

The stand of flags replaced what I believe were more generic colors given by Gen. Negley in November 1861 and/or April 1862.  The situation is confusing given a controversy over regimental numbering between the 77th and 79th Pennsylvania in 1861 and I have found no evidence that the regiment carried what is listed as the "First State Color" was ever used.  The Lancaster flags were carried through the Battle of Chickamauga, where they were NOT captured*.  At Chickamauga, it was one of these flags that Corp. William F. Dostman was mortally wounded carrying in an incident that provided inspiration for regimental monument.  The flags were sent back to Lancaster after much use in 1864, and became a prized possession of GAR Post 84 in Lancaster to which many 79th PA veterans belonged.  Sadly, the post was destroyed by fire on February 10, 1910, and the flags were lost. 

* Reports of the capture of the 79th Pennsylvania's colors stem from an error in Confederate official reports of the Battle of Chickamauga (p. 154).   Various officers listed the 77th Indiana or Illinois and 79th Pennsylvania when they really meant 79th Illinois and 77th Pennsylvania.  Other Confederate reports correctly list the 77th Pennsylvania as having its flag captured.

Diary of Capt. E. D. Roath Published

Last summer I posted (link) about a series of auctions of that I missed related to Lancaster's Civil War history.  Immediately after posting that, I was pleasantly surprised to hear from John P. Mulcahy, a direct descendant of Capt. Emanuel D. Roath (bio) who had been able to purchase the items related to Capt. Roath to return to the family. 

John recently published an annotated version of the diary, which covers the year 1864 with the 107th Pennsylvania and Roath's experiences as a prisoner of war at Libby Prison.  John has done a great job, and I recommend the book, A Fine Day -- The Civil War Diary of Captain Emanual D. Roath, 107th PA Volunteers, especially to anyone interested in what was previously the Union Army First Corps or in the social network and duties of a Civil War captain from a small town. 

Gen. Rousseau Visits Lancaster

Late on the night of February 1, 1863, Major General Lovell H. Rousseau arrived in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for a brief but planned stop on a journey from Tennessee to New York. The general had received national attention as a loyal Democrat and border state warrior who helped secure Kentucky for the Union, but his Lancaster hosts knew the “gallant Rousseau” better for the men whom he commanded. Under Rousseau, the “Lancaster County Regiment”—more formally known as the 79th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry—had fought its first battle four months earlier near Perryville, Kentucky, on October 8, 1862. In that battle, the regiment lost over one-third of its number as casualties in a successful stand against repeated Confederate assaults.

After Rousseau's arrival was announced, an “immense concourse of citizens” gathered the next night to hear Rousseau at the Caldwell House in Lancaster.  The 79th Pennsylvania's former regimental band, the Fencibles band, played a number of airs, including "Auld Lang Syne" and "Hail to the Chief."  J. M. W. Geist, editor of the Express, remarked,  

There was an appropriety in the occasion which was felt  no less by the General than by every member of the Band.  He had heard them play these same airs when both together shared the privations and dangers of the battle field, and they had seen the gallant soldier as cheers from the whole line indicated how warm a place the Kentucky patriot and soldier held in the hearts of the men of his Division.  It was a meeting of old friends and a waking up of old reminiscences.  And we need hardly add that the Band did full justice to its reputation on this interesting occasion.

The general responded by praising the Lancaster County Regiment, saying "a better drilled, more thoroughly disciplined, and braver body of men could not be found in the army."  Furthermore, Lancaster should be proud of Col. Hambright, "for the rebels had never yet seen the backs of the 79th. P. V."  Afterwards, Rousseau greeted many Lancasterians in the parlor of the Caldwell House, sought treatment for the throat ailment for which he was traveling to find a cure, and left the following morning on a train to Washington (not New York, as originally intended) in the company of journalist Josiah Rinehart Sypher and Lieut. Samuel L. Hartman--a 79th Pa officer on his staff.   

Rousseau’s visit represented a public testimonial to the Lancaster County Regiment’s sacrifice at Perryville and the community’s commitment to remember it. It showed how a regiment’s participation in a battle, even one that received relatively little national attention, still impacted the community five hundred miles that sent it off to war.  Presumably, this was an opportunity for at least a few men and women from families directly impacted by the Perryville casualty list to publicly remember their loss.

Another event taking place a few blocks away showed how a unit’s experience in battle could play upon notions of loyalty in that unit’s hometown. Instead of attending General Rousseau’s reception which coincided with the eve of city elections, many of Lancaster’s Democrats crowded Fulton Hall for a partisan political rally. Stuart A. Wylie, editor of one Republican paper, the Lancaster Daily Inquirer, could not resist comparing the two assemblages. After reviewing the courage of and sacrifices made by Rousseau, Wylie noted, “At one place we had a Kentuckian advising the people to be faithful, and a few minute’s walk distant, we had men counseling factious opposition and denunciation of the Government.” A letter to another Republican paper vilified Lancaster’s Mayor George Sanderson—a prominent Democrat and editor of the Lancaster Intelligencer—wondering if the mayor intentionally avoided the general because Rousseau, also a Democrat, was “too vigorous in his prosecution of the war…to be palatable to the very questionable political sensibilities of the Mayor.” The letter concluded, “‘Tis a burning shame that our city which has sent forth so many noble, patriotic sons…could not have a man as its chief magistrate who would extend the hand of fellowship and welcome to a General, who had so brilliantly led those sons—some to victory, and some to death! but all to glory!”

In addition to showing the notion of battlefield sacrifice as a central theme in commemorative appeals, General Rousseau’s visit illustrates a complex and evolving relationship between home front activities and support for soldiers from that community. From a purely political perspective, though, the parties generally desired to tether Lancaster County’s natural support for its own regiment to their own party platforms. Both Democrats and Republicans, who aligned with War Democrats to form the Union Party, attempted to appear as the regiment’s true home front advocate and the soldier’s friend. As the battle’s memory formed in the weeks and months succeeding October 1862, a variety of factors helped Republicans to depict the Democrats as outsiders looking in, as exemplified by accusations surrounding General Rousseau’s February 1863 visit.