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History of the Oswego Unit

The Following summarization is directly quoted from the book: "Oswego: Its People and Events" by Anthony M. Slosk, Heart of the Lakes Publishing, Interlaken, New York, 1985.

Which is held in the Library of Michigan, Lansing, Michigan.

Address by H.H. Lyman, late Adjutant 147^th N.Y. Volunteers, at Oswego County Veteran’s Reunion at Pulaski, N.Y., August 24, 1895.

I have been requested by your Committee to make a brief statement as to what Oswego County did for the Union Cause as a sort of introducation to the more interesting exercises.

To many, this may seem unnecessary and perhaps a tedious part of the program, but it must be remembered that a full generation has elapsed since those terrible times, and that more than one-half of the people to-day only know of the War of the Rebellion by hear-say, tradition, and history.

I see in this little gathering, people who were not born when their fathers enlisted, and yet today they are here with their children, some of whom are almost men and women, to do honor to the old veterans, who have now mostly reached the point in life where age, if anything else should command veneration and respect. Other things being equal, all prefer to hear a matter discussed by those who have had experience and personal knowledge of their subject. This is especially true of the old soldier, who takes but little pleasure in hearing the scenes of war discussed by those who do not know a ramrod from a lanyard.

In this respect, we are particularly fortunate to-day in having with us two veteran soldiers, both of who are not only able and eloquent orators, but also comrades of our own local regiments, who will talk to us as friends and brothers having a common experience, and from whose patriotic lips many of us have before, and then, heard the grand old story of freedom, union, and loyalty, - men who in our country’s darkest days, with us risked their lives to uphold its flag and its principles, and who since the war have stood with us shoulder to shoulder upon the solid ground of fraternity, loyalty and charity, always ready and willing to defend the weakest, and honor and assist the poorest and most humble comrade of the Grand Army.

The population of Oswego County at the outbreak of the Rebellion was 75,600.

It was excelled by no county in the State, in promptly and fully responding to its country’s calls, and is credited with having furnished 12,500 men for the war, as shown by the records of our War Committee. Many of these, however, were re-enlistments of men who had served in short term regiments; and some even, who deserted, repented of their foolish action, and again entered the service.

As to the exact number of individual men furnished, I am unable to state, but in round numbers, not far from 11,000, or fifteen percent of its whole population, and seventy-five percent of its voting population.

These figures will seem almost incredible, until you know that nearly as many enlisted who were under the voting age as those who were over, - the average being about twenty-three years.

We had five regiments of infantry and two batteries of artillery, composed mostly, and some of them entirely, of Oswego County men, namely, the 24^th, 81^st, 110^th, 147^th and 184^th Infantry and Ames’ Battery and Barnes’ Battery. The 24^th Calvary was also called an Oswego Regiment, but actually had but three Oswego Companies, and they were largely re-enlistments from the old 24^th Infantry.

We furnished a battalion each for the 12^th Calvary and the 189^th and 193^rd Infantry. We sent 300 men into the 1^st Artillery and 241 into the United States Regulars, and being a lake country with at that time a large sailor population, sent hundreds into the navy, besides many to the Engineers and other branches of the service.

I have given considerable time and study to this matter and have traced out and looked up 80 separate organizations, in the field rather than to form new ones.

Many of our men served four years and some even five, and upon adjustment and final settlement, it was found that Oswego County had furnished in excess of her quota, when reduced of service, an equivalent to 5,000 years of service.

The law gave us re-payment for this at the rate of $300 per year or a total draw-back or refund due from the State in cash of $1,500,000; but the State disputed and repudiated its liability for excess of men and service furnished after July, 1864, and compromised by paying into our County Treasury $552,700 for this excess of 5,000 years service.

After furnishing the full quota of men required by the government and State, and doing their whole duty in the field and on the sea, they actually earned for our Country a million and half dollars, in what might be called as over-time, over half a million of which was actually accrued to its treasury, and it was not the soldiers' fault that the balance earned was lost to the County.

So much for the raising of Oswego County men for the Let us now briefly glance at what they did.

Oswego County was present, and helped open, the great struggle for the Union; and her "Old 24^th Regiment," that stalwart contingent of the "Iron Brigade," covered itself and its native county with glory through all the early campaigns of Pope, McCleean, Burnside, and Hooker from Bailey’s Cross through Sulphur Springs, Bull Run, South Mountain, and Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville; making for itself and us a record which will grow brighter and more glorious so long as mankind read history.

Oswego County was at the siege of Yorktown, and through all the weary marches and bloody battles of McClellan’s Peninsular Campaign. Under Grant, it lead the charge at Cold Harbor, where Oswego men of the gallant 81^st went down before rebel masked batteries and double lines of entrenched infantry like grass before the Mower’s scythe.

The remnants of this brave regiment, after a full score of desperate battles, was the first to enter conquered Richmond; and Oswego County boys were the first to raise and unfurl the old flag over that spiteful and rebellious Capitol City, for the possession of which so many thousand of lives had been sacrificed.

Oswego was there when the grand and final assault was made up on Port Hudson, that strong fortress which had so long successfully blocked the Mississippi against the Union Armies. She not only gave Banks and Farragut efficient aid in opening this great water-way, but for a long time did important and valuable service the lower Mississippi Country.

Day after day, and month after month, her brave sons faced dangers more terrible that batteries, and more deadly than bullets; campaigning in a hot, malarious climate, to which they were unused; scouting and skirmishing through miasmatic bayous, swamps and low lands; doing coast and guard duty in the fever stricken districts of Florida and the Gulf, with men sinking down to their death daily, helpless and hopeless; conditions which could only be faced, a strain which could only be endured, without demoralization, by men of the mental, physical and moral stamina of Oswego’s 110^th Regiment.

July 1^st, 1863, Oswego was represented and made glorious at Gettysburg, where partly on the lands of freedom’s great champion, Thaddeus Stevens, she opened the great and decisive battle which marked the turn of the tide in America’s great war for human liberty.

Here 380 Oswego County boys desperately battled with a whole rebel brigade, with no immediate support for thirty minutes stubbornly holding their ground although flanked and nearly surrounded and tenaciously holding the position assigned them, until ordered to retreat.

At a cost of 72 killed and 144 seriously wounded, in that brief course of time, they had delayed and broken Lee’s advance division, broke up and rendered possible the capture of a large portion of two rebel brigades, and, what is of greater importance, gained valuable time, which secured to Mead the advantageous field of Gettysburg upon which to fight the greatest battle of the war.

On this identical spot, the people of the State of New York in grateful remembrance "of what they did there," have erected a noble granite shaft, which not only recites the facts above stated, but bears in large letters across its tablet, the legend "147^th N.Y. vols. Oswego County, N.Y."

The handful of its survivors did not rest upon their Gettysburg laurels, but recruited and reinforced, followed the blood red moon, that famous stand of Wadsworth, of Doubleday, of Reynolds, of Newton and of Warren, by day and by night, wherever it lead, from Gettysburg to Appomattox.

Again we find Oswego at Harrison’s landing and Bermuda Hundred during the eventful siege of Petersburg; and in the Shenandoah Valley at Fisher’s Hill, and the famous battle of Cedar Creek, where our boys of the 184^th were not like their glorious commander, Phil Sheridan "Twenty miles away," but on the front line, where they helped to turn back the strong tide of battle upon which Early was riding up this historic Valley, winning much praise for their cool bravery and soldierly conduct although this was their first engagement.

Our County was not only in the very first campaigns and battles of the War, but was nobly represented in Grant’s closing campaign from Petersburg to Appomattox, and the famous Apple Tree.

The 24^th Calvary, mostly old re-enlisted veterans, took the field with Grant in the Spring of ’64. During their one year’s service they were in 35 skirmishes and battles, and wound up their eventful service by opening the last day’s work of the Army of the Potomac at Appomattox.

They were on the skirmish line engaged with the rebel cavalry when orders were received to "cease firing." The white flag was advanced, and the shattered fragments of what was once Lee’s proud and victorious army laid down their arms, while cheer upon cheer, that fairly raised the roof of the heavens, rolled up and down the Union lines.

In the brief time allowed me, I cannot follow details. There were over 2,000 battles fought for the Union, and in most of these were to be found some of Oswego’s 11,000 soldier or sailor heroes.

Here men were present at the crucial test between the little Monitor and her powerful adversaries, the result of which revolutionized naval warfare. She had a representative on the Kearsarge, when she sent the piratical Alabama to the bottom of the sea; and a brave officer from the little village of Pulaski was with Farragut when he ran the batteries below New Orleans, and, as it were, tore open the mouth of the sluggish and sullen old Mississippi, and once and for all cured her of her rebel lockjaw.

No words of mine can do justice to the patriotism and loyalty of our Oswego County people during those dark days; neither is the credit and praise all due to those who enlisted. Our people as a body were enthusiastically patriotic and loyal from the start.

Our women were especially noted for their hearty support of the cause and their liberal contributions and zealous work for the relief of the sick and wounded.

I could speak at length of the many kind acts and brave deeds of Oswego’s noble and patriotic army nurse, Mrs. R.H. Spencer, who went with my own regiment, and who, for faithful and efficient service, was soon promoted to a wider field of usefulness New York State Agent, and later as United States Agent for the sick and wounded soldiers. "May God bless and comfort her in her old age," is the prayer of thousands of veterans who received kindness and relief at her hands in the days of their sickness and distress.

The many deeds of patriotism and acts of loyalty and devotion to the Union cause of numerous religious and civic bodies and citizens of our County generally, is a matter of record always be referred to with pride by Oswegonions.

Our Country was not saved by its men in arms, but by the unselfish patriotism, of its whole people, who stood solidly behind its soldiers at the front, always ready to furnish needed means and material or, if required, to fill the depleted ranks, caused by the waste and ravages of war. In this, Oswego County was example of zealous devotion. The results of their patriotic efforts and the part taken by the men representing them at the from truthfully stated in the figures and facts already presented.

Oswego County, in the war, had reason to be proud of her veterans, and her veterans had equal reason to be proud of Oswego County.