CLARK NC: Wilmington NC Artillery at the Siege of Petersburg
Editor’s Note: The following excerpt comes from Walter Clark’s five volume Histories of the Several Regiments and Battalions from North Carolina in the Great War 1861-’65, published in 1901. The reference work provides mini regimental histories written mostly by men representing each unit, with gaps filled in by editor Clark. These histories often provide a surprising amount of detail on the Siege of Petersburg.
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On 9 April, 1864, it [the Wilimington NC Artillery aka Miller’s NC Battery, aka 1st North Carolina Light Artillery, Battery E] reported ninety-two present ready for duty, with twenty-four serviceable horses and four ten-pound Parrott guns.
It was, as Miller’s Battery, one of the four batteries constituting Mosely’s Battalion May 5 to 15, 1864, and was under Major-General Whiting in his defense of Petersburg. It took part in repelling Butler at Drewry’s Bluff and Bermuda Hundreds. On 10 June the battalion was a part of Bushrod Johnson’s Division, and was sharply engaged 16, 17 and 18 June [1864, at the Second Battle of Petersburg], and served its full share in the long and arduous defense of Petersburg. On 30 June, 1864, the battery reported one hundred and forty present for duty and four guns.
Major [Edgar F.] Moseley was killed 16 December, 1864, and Major Blount succeeded to command of the battalion. The battery followed the fortunes of the army to Appomattox, where the whole battalion of four companies numbered only twenty-four when paroled as a part of the Third Corps, to which it had so long been attached.1
Source/Notes:
- Clark, Walter. Histories of the Several Regiments and Battalions from North Carolina in the Great War 1861-’65, Volume 1 (Nash Brothers: 1901), pp. 581-582 ↩