William H. Holden

 

William H. Holden was the 3^rd Corporal of Company K of the 125^th. He enlisted at age 20.  He was born in Virginia, and had blue eyes and light hair and was 5’4” tall. He gave his occupation as “cradle maker” – referring to grain cradles. He had been living in Schaghticoke since at least 1850, when he was listed in the census, age 6, with his mother Maria, age 30, and sister Annette, age 4. By the 1855 N.Y.S. census, the three of them were living with his mother’s father, Harold W. Johnson. He was a 60- year- old widowed merchant. He had been living alone in the 1850 census, and listed his occupation as grocer.

By the 1860 US Census, our future soldier William was on his own.  He was a 17- year- old apprentice machinist living in the boarding house of George Clark. On the same census page were the families of Isaac Grant and Daniel Viall, proprietors of Grant and Viall, makers of grain cradles in Grant’s Hollow; so it is reasonable to assume that William was their apprentice and lived nearby.  He enlisted along with Isaac’s nephew Job Grant in the summer of 1862. (see previous post)By March 15, 1863, he was promoted to Corporal. He was captured in action on June 22, 1864 near Petersburg, Virginia, but unlike Job, he was paroled. He was evidently either wounded or ill later, as he was mustered out of the service on May 23, 1865 at Jarvis Hospital in Baltimore.

N.Y.S. Muster Card for William H. Holden

William returned to Grant and Viall, and is listed in the 1870 US Census as a grain cradle maker, aged 26. His wife was Dorcas A. Eddy. They had a daughter, Ella, age 1. Dorcas died in 1872 and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery.  With her are two other children who died as infants: Albert, who died aged 1 month in July 1865 and Cora, who died in July 1868 aged 9 months.  Albert’s birth date gives us evidence that William came home on leave in 1864, and that William and Dorcas had been married at least since then.

William continued to work at Grant’s. In the 1880 US Census, he had a new wife, Jennie.  The records of the 125^th Veterans Association state that he lived in Melrose. The 1890 Veterans Schedule states that he had scurvy of the mouth.  Scurvy is caused by lack of vitamin C.  Apparently soldiers on both sides of the Civil War suffered from it, though not to a huge extent. One of the results of scurvy is softening of the gums and loss of teeth. Was William saying that he suffered from the loss of teeth? I can’t see the scurvy continuing throughout his life, though the loss of teeth certainly would!

On April 11, 1887, William applied for an invalid pension.  That same August he participated in the reunion of the 125^th Regiment in Troy.   By the 1900 US Census, William, now 59, was widowed again and rented a place on 10^th Street in Troy with his daughter Ella Overocker, also widowed. Although his occupation was listed as carpenter, he had not worked at all in the previous year. Ella was a dressmaker.

William was a patient at the Soldiers and Sailors Home in Bath, Steuben County, New York from June to September in 1903. He was recorded as age 63, 5’5” tall with dark hair and blue eyes. He was a Protestant, and a laborer, suffering from cardiac issues and hemorrhoids. He gave his closest relative as Mrs. Jennie Wilson of Ballston Spa. I’m not sure who she was.  Very sadly, I find a William H. Holden in the 1910 census as a patient at the Utica State Hospital for the Insane. He was the correct age to be the same person, 69, and listed as born in Virginia, though his father was recorded has having been born in Massachusetts and his mother as in New York. William Holden did live until 1914, and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery with his first wife, Dorcas.

 

Tombstone of William Holden and Dorcas Eddy at Elmwood Cemetery

 

 

Job A. Grant

 

To me, the story of Job A. Grant is one of the saddest of many sad Civil War stories. Job enlisted as a Private in Company K of the 125^th with everyone else in August of 1862. He was born in Schaghticoke, with blue eyes, light hair and a fair complexion, 5’8” tall. He gave his occupation as mechanic, and his age as 21- though I think he was 19. By April of 1863 he had been promoted to Sergeant.

The N.Y.S. Muster Card of Job A. Grant

Job’s father, John, was the brother of Isaac Grant, inventor, and proprietor of the factory which made grain cradles and fanning mills in what is now Grant’s Hollow. Isaac was about ten years older than John, and always employed him in the business. In the 1850 US Census, John was a mechanic, implying he worked making the machinery, while Isaac was a manufacturer. In the 1855 NY Census, the brothers lived next door, though Isaac owned a large house and John rented a small one. At that point John was 38, his wife Catherine 35, and they had four children. Job, the eldest, was 12. In the 1860 US Census, John was called a machinist. The family consisted of Job, 17, Mary, 15, Warren, 12, Nora, 10, Inez, 5, and Stella, 3. While the family was not wealthy: John owned no real estate and had a personal estate of just $300, brother Isaac certainly employed both John and then Job- as indicated by the occupation he gave when he enlisted.

John Grant and his wife were killed in a railroad accident on the Troy and Boston Railroad near Buskirk’s Bridge (Troy “Daily Times” January 16, 1862). They were on the way to the funeral of a friend in their carriage when a train struck their wagon, “sending its occupants high in the air, demolishing the vehicle into fragments….their sad untimely fate is regretted by all….Mr Grant was employed as superintendent of the large manufacturing establishment of his brother.” Who knows why the Grants didn’t see- or hear- the train coming? It was winter- maybe snowbanks? But they were in a carriage and not a sleigh, which implies pretty clear roads. They were able to travel in a vehicle with wheels, rather than one with runners.

I don’t understand why Job, eldest child in a large family, would go ahead and enlist in the Army in the summer after his parents had died, leaving him in charge of his young sisters.  He had a job, and he must have been a responsible young man, as he was quickly promoted to Sergeant in the Army. Another of Isaac Grant’s employees, William Holden, enlisted at the same time, so perhaps he was caught up in the patriotic fervor. His cousin, Job P. Grant, son of Isaac, registered for the draft as required, but did not enlist. He was a bit older (26 in 1862) and married, so perhaps that dissuaded him.

Not long after Job A. was promoted to Sergeant in the spring of 1863 he was absent ill for a while in the hospital in Washington, DC. He returned to duty and was out on picket duty near Mine Run, Virginia on December 1, 1863, when he was captured by the Confederates along with forty other men. He was the only Sergeant in the captive group.

According to the Regimental History, General Meade and the Union army were arrayed facing General Lee and the Confederates across the stream Mine Run, ready for battle. The night of December 1, Meade decided to withdraw his Army rather than attack the enemy under very adverse conditions. Due to an error of command, the 41 men on picket duty from the 125^th were not withdrawn with the rest of the regiment and the rest of the army and were captured. This constituted 1/7^th of the Regiment at the time. The men were prisoners at Belle Island, near Richmond, for two months, then at Richmond for two weeks, then were transferred to Andersonville, Georgia when it opened in February 1864. Only nine survived.   Job died of dysentery on July 23, 1864. Hopefully he and the other men of Company K of the 125^th who were there: W.O. Carr, Douglas Fisher, C.E. Stratton, John Conlin, Fred Scharp, Alexander Whyland, James K. Simon, Arteus Loomis, and Andrew Jackson Doty stuck together and supported each other. Stratton and Fisher died in June, Carr in August, and Conlon in September. Simon, plus Loomis and Doty, who arrived at Andersonville after the others, were transferred to Florence, South Carolina when Andersonville closed in September, as the Union army closed in, and survived the war.

Tombstone of Job A. Grant at Andersonville National Cemetery, Georgia

Vista of graves at Andersonville National Cemetery. Prisoners were buried in trenches, shoulder to shoulder. At the time Job Grant died, at least 100 men were dying each day.

Obverse of the N.Y.S. monument at Andersonville National Cemetery. More N.Y.                                              soldiers died there than from any other state.

The 1865 NY Census reported Job’s death, listing him as the guardian of four dependent sisters. Brother Warren, only 17 by this point, must have been out on his own. I found Warren as a 22-year-old farm laborer in Canaan, Columbia County in 1870. He married and stayed there- even had a daughter named Inez like his sister- and died in 1914. In the 1865 NY Census, baby Stella was living with her uncle and aunt, Henry and Eliza Rose in Schaghticoke.  In 1880, she married a man named Charles Washington Williams, a dry goods merchant in Manhattan, and lived the rest of her life there, dying in 1898. Two of her sisters were also in Manhattan. Mary married a lawyer, John Vincent, who became a District Attorney. Nora married William Connel, also a merchant. Inez married Charles Jackson, who worked for Singer Sewing Machine Company, in 1882, and died just a year later.  The children did not apply for military benefits based on their brother’s service, but perhaps they didn’t need them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sgt. William VanSchaack

Continuing to write about the men of Schaghticoke who served in the Civil War…the officers of Company K. …..

William VanSchaack was the 2^nd Sergeant of Company K of the 125^th. According to Anderson’s “History of Rensselaer County,” he was born in Stillwater on January 31, 1822.   The 1855 NY Census for Schaghticoke lists William H. VanSchaack, age 34, born in Saratoga County as a mechanic, with a wife, Alice, age 29, born in Vermont, and two children, Theodore, age 8 and Chancy, age 6.  Anderson goes on to state that he was educated in the public schools, and married Alice A. Thayer of Bennington on December 2, 1846. They had three children, Theodore, Chauncy T., and Nettie O. This is confirmed by the 1860 US Census for the village of Schaghticoke, which lists the boys and adds that William had a personal estate of $300 and his wife Alice of $350. William was a master painter. This indicates he had served an apprenticeship.

According to New York State’s records, William enlisted as a Private at age 41, and was promoted to Sergeant on April 4, 1863. The muster card states he was born in Schaghticoke, and had gray eyes, black hair and was 5’7 ¾” tall.  One wonders why a family man with a set career would enlist at age 41 in the Army- he would never have been drafted. Perhaps this measured his patriotism.

The N.Y.S. Muster Card for William W. VanSchaack

 

During the winter of 1861-1862,  spent in Chicago after the 125^th surrendered at Harper’s Ferry, William went home on leave, according to George Bryan. In April, Bryan stated that “Jacob Force has been promoted to orderly sergeant, ….but it belongs to William VanSchaack.”  In fact, William also was promoted to Sergeant on April 16. He was wounded in the right side during the battle of Gettysburg on July 3, 1863, and ended up in the Patterson Park Hospital in Baltimore.  Bryan mentions that Lt. VanSchaack was wounded at Gettysburg- perhaps the designation as Lieutenant was just his error.  Byran also stated, “I do not think he will ever join the company again. I hope he will get his discharge and go home where he belongs. I think it is his place at home, and all men that got families depending on them for support. I do not think $13.00 go a great ways towards keeping a family for a month.” The standard military pay was $13 per month.

William went home on leave, but reported back to the hospital in Baltimore. In February 1864, Bryan stated, “I stopped in Baltimore and saw WM VanSchaack. He was looking quite well, and has a good place.” In March, he was transferred to the Veteran Reserves Corps, which defended the capitol area and was made up of men recovered from wounds, but not enough to go back to the front lines. He was soon discharged from the service. In the NY Register of Officers and Enlisted Men, compiled during the war, William reported himself has having his health permanently impaired by his service.

Evidently, William was able to pursue his painting career while in the Army, as in the 1865 NY Census he is listed in Schaghticoke as a painter, but with the note that he was usually in Baltimore. He and Alice lived in a brick house in the village of Schaghticoke, and had added a daughter, Nettie, to the family. In the 1870 US Census, he lived in a house on Main Street, on the west side, just north of Pleasant Avenue. I believe it is now gone. It was worth the considerable sum of $4800, and had a paint shop in the back. Anderson’s history states that he was a “house, carriage, sign, and ornamental painter.” Son Chauncey learned the trade as well.

from Beer’s Atlas of 1877. Main St. intersects with Pleasant Ave. at the right, School                                                                    Street at the left.

William applied for an invalid pension in December, 1872. He received the relatively small amount of $4.00 per month.  Unfortunately, William’s son Theodore had died in 1867. Chauncey also predeceased his father in 1878. William himself died in 1882, and daughter Nettie in 1885, but Alice lived until 1908.  In the 1900 US Census, she was living in the village of Schaghticoke in a house she owned. Her son-in-law George Beecroft, a butcher and widower of daughter Nettie, and her grandchildren lived with her. All are buried in Elmwood Cemetery.

 

Tombstone of William and Alice VanSchaack at Elmwood Cemetery, GAR marker at right

 

 

Lt. Col. Aaron B. Myer

 

 

 

I have included Lieutenant Colonel Myer here because George Bryan of Schaghticoke  mentions him frequently in his letters home to his friend Jennie Ackart.  Aaron was born in Westchester County in 1824, (or in Hudson, according to the History of the 125^th) and moved to Troy in 1827. His middle name was either Beekman or Bennett. The 1850 US Census for Troy listed him as a 27- year- old saddle and harness maker, with wife Julia, 22, born in Connecticut, and a son Albert L., age 4. Living with the little family were Julia’s parents, T.P. and Nancy Perkins. According to the History of the 125^th, he was an original member of the Franklin Hose Company, and was seriously injured by a wall falling on him in the Galusha fire of March 1845. He recovered to marry Julia that September.

By the 1860 US Census Aaron was a grocer with a personal estate of $1000. Son Albert, 14, was a clerk for his father, and the family had a second son, Francis, 4. Mr. Perkins had died, but grandma Nancy still lived with the family.

Meanwhile, Aaron had gotten involved with the Troy City Artillery, one of the local private militia companies. He was a Sergeant until 1861, then Captain until he enlisted in the 125^th. When the 125^th began to recruit, he raised Company B and became its Captain. He was promoted to Major in March 1863 and had a 30-day furlough about the same time. Aaron was slightly wounded at Gettysburg. According to the Division of Military and Naval Affairs website, the N.Y.S. Library owns some letters Aaron wrote home to Julia that summer in which he speaks of the extreme pain of his wound.

Aaron had three brothers in the war: 2^nd Lt. Robert Emmet Myer, also of the 125^th, and Captain Charles F. Myer and Thomas T.B. Myer, both of the 93^rd NY. Only Robert survived the war of the four brothers.

First N.Y.S. Muster card of Aaron B. Myer

 

 

Following the battle of Gettysburg, Aaron was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. He was wounded at the battle of the Wilderness on May 5, 1864 and died three days later. The Regimental History reports that he was leading part of the 125^th plus three other regiments, pushing the enemy a mile through underbrush until they were back in their earthworks. At that point he was shot, falling into the arms of Adjutant Merritt Miller and other comrades who carried him to the rear.  He survived for several days, but had been shot so high in the leg that it could not be amputated. His body was interred first at Chancellorsville, then moved to Troy’s Oakwood Cemetery.  His wife applied for a widow’s pension immediately.  An article in the Troy “Daily Times” reported his death and extolled his virtues as a prominent citizen of Troy. The Troy City Artillery met and did the same, voting to wear black armbands for a month in his honor and memory.

2^nd Muster Card of Aaron B. Myer

 

Illustration from the History of the 125^th.

 

                               

Tombstone of Aaron B. Myer at Oakwood Cemetery in Troy, thanks to Find-a-Grave

Aaron’s son Albert enlisted in the 11^th U.S. Infantry in the fall of 1865. He made a career of the Army, reaching the rank of Major by the Spanish American War, serving many years in Ponce, Puerto Rico, and ending his career as a Brigadier General at a post in Texas. He and his wife Wilhelmina, born of a Scottish father and Spanish mother, married in 1871 and had three children. Albert died in 1915 and she survived him.

Aaron’s widow Julia remained in Troy for the rest of her long life. Her mother lived with her until at least 1880, when Julia, 51, and her mother Nancy Perkins, 89, lived on Hoosick Street. Julia reported Aaron’s service to the 1890 Veterans Schedule of the census.  By 1900, Julia had moved in with her son Francis and his wife Margaret, who had no children. “Frank” was the foreman in a shirt factory. She lived until at least 1910.