Author's Note: Lysander Turner was my great-great grandfather. I descend from him through Mary Turner and Samuel Fletcher White, Wilmer Burton and Agnes Finison White, and Nancy White and Edgar Ray Green.
 | |
Born in Granville County, North Carolina, in 1835, Lysander Turner was one of the seven children of James Patrick Henry Turner (born around 1806, date of death unknown) and Margaret Elizabeth Hunt (date of birth unknown, died around 1860), who were married August 6, 1832. Lysander’s brothers were Lemon Thales Turner (born October 28, 1833; died August 7, 1903), Cicero Fidello Turner (born 1845, died 1914), Patrick Henry Turner (born February 8, 1849; died March 14, 1915), and Lewis Baws Turner (born 1855, died 1914). His sisters were Louisa Anna Turner (born around 1839, date of death unknown), Elizabeth Ann (or Anna) Turner (born July 22, 1841, died March 7, 1911), and Margaret Henrietta Turner (dates of birth and death unknown).
Known as “Sandy” to family members, Lysander was a schoolteacher prior to the War Between the States. Enrolling for active service on February 22, 1862, at the age of 26, his middle name is indicated to be Farrington in official, Confederate military records. This is the only known reference to his middle name and existing records demonstrate that he typically signed his name as “Lysander Turner” and occasionally “L Turner”.
On April 11, 1862, Lysander was mustered into service of the State of North Carolina, for a period of three years or for the duration of the War, at Camp Mangum (near Raleigh), as 2nd Sergeant in Company G of the 47th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry (N.C.T.). In October 1862, while his regiment served as provost guard of Petersburg, Virginia, Lysander wrote the following letter to his brother, Lemon Thales Turner, and his sister-in-law, Rosabella Wainwright Turner:
Petersburg V.A. Sunday
Oct the 12th 1862
Dear brother
It
is pleasure to me to inform you that I received a letter from you & sister
Rosa yesterday. I was truly glad to hear
from you & freely excuse you for not writing sooner. I am not well at present, but nothing ails me
more than cold. I have not been well
since I took that march towards Suffolk, I was on guard yesterday and last
night without any shelter from the beating rains, the Lord only knows the
consequences of such hardships. We have
not even the privileges of beasts these times, for they find some protection
against the beating storms. We have more
guard duty to perform than any Regt. that I know, for we have to stand about
every other day, either around the Regt or as a provost in town, and it is all
to little or no purpose. I hear nothing
said about winter quarters yet. We may
be ordered off at any time James Parrish
is quite unwell B_____ L_____ & two
others of our Co. went home a few days ago without permission. They stayed one week & returned & are
now in the guard house. B_____ walked
all the way home & stayed only two days.
There are several in the guard house at this time for leaving without
permission, no furloughs are given except to the sick, Father has been out to
see me lately, & brought me some apples potatoes butter & I have been
fairing very well ever since It is out
of the question to think about buying at present prices, apples in market are
worth 4 dollars per bush, potatoes ditto, green peas 8 butterbeans 8
etc, butter 75 cts to one 100 per pound, chicken one 25, eggs60, beef
25 mutton 30 per pound cabbage 25 and 30
ahead turnips 3 cts apiece etc etc I heard from home a day or two back. they were all well, There has been a revival at Gray Rock,
several converts, Cicero one of them, I
do not wish to discourage you, but my advice to you is to stay out of the army
just as long as you can honerably. You
will never know how little humanity men have for one another untill you get
there I do think hard of our officers
& I can not think otherwise as long as they treat me as they do. They punish the innocent for the guilty. There is a good deal to be seen out here I wish you could come out & see me &
bring sister Rosa, with you. The cotton
factory is a great sight to one who has never seen one. Cousin Ad & cousin Davy came out to
Richmond & obtained substitutes for 9 hundred dollars each. I wish I felt more like writing than I
do I would write more
Dear
sister I saw your brother last week or
rather week before last now, he was well
& has been gone home during the past week & was to return
yesterday I have not been to town today
& do not know whether he returned or not, he gave me the particulars of
Johs death & also of Louis Daniels.
I know you see a great deal of trouble.
I deeply sympathyze with you & have done for a long time, but
remember that our light afflictions which are but for a moment shall work out
for us a far more exceding & eternal weight of eternal glory I was glad to hear of the meeting at Salem
& should have been more than glad to have been with you. I know I could have enjoyed a good meeting so
much better than this war. It seems as
though I should never have the opportunity of attending another my love to you both write soon.
L. Turner
Reduced to ranks on an
unknown date, Lysander was appointed sergeant on February 4, 1863, in place of
A.P. Duke. He was present July 1-3, 1863
at the Battle of Gettysburg. Captain
John H. Thorp, in his regimental history, recalled the 47th North
Carolina's participation in the Battle:
GETTYSBURG.
Early on 1 July the Forty-seventh was in the line which opened the
battle of Gettysburg. It is remembered
that Company A had eighty-two trigger pullers, each with forty rounds of
ammunition, and the other companies were perhaps as large. The
morale of the men was splendid, and
when it advanced to its first grand charge it was with the feelings of
conquerors. We were met by a furious
storm of shells and canister and further on by the more destructive rifles of
the two army corps confronting us. One
shell struck the right company, killing three men, and exploding in the line of
file closers, by the concussion, felled to the earth every one of them. The other companies were faring no
better. Still our line, without a
murmur, advanced, delivering its steady fire amid the rebel yells, and closed
with the first line of the enemv. After
a desperate struggle this yielded and the second line was met and quickly
broken to pieces. The day was a hot one,
and the men had difficulty in ramming down their cartridges, so slick was the
iron ram-rod in hands thoroughly wet with perspiration. All expedients were resorted to, but mainly
jabbing the ram-rods against the ground and rocks. This, with the usual causes, undressed our
advancing line; still all were yelling and pressing forward through the growing
wheat breast high, toward a body of the enemy in sight, but beyond the range of
our guns, when suddenly a third line of the enemy arose forty yards in front as
if by magic, and leveled their shining line of gun-barrels on the wheat
heads. Though taken by surprise the roar
of our guns sounded along our whole line.
We had caught the drop on them.
Redoubled our yells and a rush, and the work is done. The earth seemed to open and take in that
line which five minutes ago was so perfect.
Just then a Federal officer came in view and rode rapidly forward
bearing a large Federal flag. The
scattered Federals swarmed around him as bees cover their queen. In the midst of a heterogeneous mass of men,
acres big, he approached our left, when all guns in front and from right and
left turned on the mass and seemingly shot the whole to pieces. This hero was a Colonel Biddle, who (if he were
otherwise competent) deserved to command a corps. It was with genuine and openly expressed
pleasure our men heard he was not killed.
The day is not ended, but the fighting in our front is over, and the
Forty-seventh dressed its line and what remained of it marching to the place
whence it started on the charge, bivouacked for the night, intoxicated with
victory. Many were the incidents
narrated on that beautiful, moonlight night.
On the 2d we were not engaged save in witnessing the marshaling of hosts,
with much fighting during the day, and at night a grand pyrotechnic display,
this being the struggle on the slope of Little Round Top for the possession of
the hill.
On 3 July the Forty-seventh was put in the front line preparing to make
that celebrated, but imprudent charge, familiarly called Pickett's charge,
though just why called Pickett's instead of Pettigrew's charge, is not
warranted by the facts. And why it has
been said that Pettigrew supported Pickett instead of Pickett supported
Pettigrew, is also incomprehensible. It
is certain that the two divisions (Pettigrew led Heth's Division to-day)
started at the same time, in the same line.
Pickett's distance to traverse was shorter than that of Pettigrew. Both went to and over the enemy's breastworks,
but were too weak from loss of numbers to hold them. Pickett's Division was perfectly fresh. Pettigrew's had just passed through 1 July in
which even its commander (Heth) had been knocked out.
If further witness be sought, the respective numbers of dead men in the
correctly recorded spots where they fell, supply it. But let it be distinctly understood
Pettigrew's men appreciated that in as not the brave Pickett and his men, who
claimed for themselve pre-eminence in this bloody affair. They remember, vividly remember, how Pickett
chafed while waiting to make his spring, like an untamed lion for his prey.
Perhaps the assault was a Confederate mistake.
So good an authority as General Lee is quoted as saying this much, but
that the stakes for which he was playing was so great (it being Harrisburg,
Baltimore and Washington) he just could not help it. Later a similar excuse was plead by General
Grant for the slaughter at Second Cold Harbor.
The late Captain Davis, "Honest Joe," who led Company B in this
charge, and who charged over the enemy's breastworks and became a prisoner,
said the euciny was literally torn to pieces. But, then our "hind sights
are better than our foresights."
And may be, after all the best conclusion is that a kind Providence bad
heard the prayers for the Union that has ascended from both sides, though
uttered not so loud from the South, and in answer, just wrote down in the book
of Fate "Gettysburg, 3 July, 1863, the beginning of the end." The writer, who was in the line of sharpshooters
which preceded the main line of battle, witnessed an incident which (although
not belonging to the Forty-seventh Regiment) ought to be recorded. He saw Brigadier-General Jas. H. Lane, on
horseback, quite near the stone wall, riding just behind and up to his men, in
the attitude of urging them forward with his hand; a moment later a large spurt
of blood leaped from the horse as he rode up, and rider and horse went down in
the smoke and uproar. This was about the
time of the climax of the battle when darkness and chaos obscured what
followed.
Surely the rank and file of the army of Northern Virginia did not
realize the bigness of the event that had just happened; nor can we believe the
Army of the Potomac did, inasmuch as it behaved so nicely while we spent
several days in the same neighborhood.
The
Forty-seventh now had had its ups and its downs. On the 1st as it doublequicked on Reynolds,
it had an equal chance with the enemy and had hurled 30,000 bullets in their
faces. On the 3d they had attempted to
march 1,000 yards in quick time through a raking fire of cannon and minies,
with virtually no chance to use their minies--a soldier's main weapon. The skeleton of its former self it returned
to the place whence it began its charge and began business without a field
officer, and during the balance of the day and the succeeding night welcomed
the return of several of our members who, unscathed or wounded in various
degrees, crawled from the field of carnage, for the space between the armies continued
neutral ground, being covered by the wounded of both. On the 4th General Pettigrew told us that had
we succeeded the evening before, no doubt our army would have been on the road
to Washington and perhaps negotiations for peace would then be on foot. Surely the esprit de corps of our regiment
was undaunted….
As a result of his service
and subsequent wounds at Gettysburg, Lysander appeared in the Roll of Honor of
the 47th North Carolina Infantry.
He described his wounds in a pension application, dated July 5, 1904:
I was wounded at Gettysburg… the 1st
& 3rd days of July 1863.
The first day in my left breast having a rib broken. The third day having my left leg shot into…
above the knee. The lim [sic] was never
set causing it to be shortened & twisted.
Lysander's statement was
confirmed by Dr. A.E Ledbetter:
Shell wound of upper part of thorax causing
fracture of left 2nd rib.
Also gunshot wound of left thigh – ball entered from the left just above
the knee, apparently traversed the entire thickness of the limb, shattering
lower end of femur and making two wounds of exit – one on the front and the
other on the inner side of the thigh.
The limb is shortened, twisted on its axis, stiffened in the knee joint….
Captured by the Union,
Lysander was hospitalized at Gettysburg before being transferred to the General
Hospital at Baltimore, Maryland, on July 28, 1863; he was admitted with a “Gun
shot fracture of left Femur[.]” While
occupying bed 13 in ward 9, he was treated with “Simple dressings with
attention to position” and it was noted that “When admitted the leg was
short-ened 1 ½ inches.” Paroled at
Baltimore on August 22, 1863, he was received for exchange at City Point, Virginia and admitted to
the General Hospital at Petersburg, Virginia on August
24, 1863.
On August 29, 1863, he was furloughed for sixty days. Detailed at Oxford, North Carolina, January
1, 1864 and Camp Holmes, North Carolina, March 4, 1864, Lysander was retired to
the Invalid Corps on August 13, 1864.
Muster rolls for September and October 1864 indicate that he was still
detailed at Camp Holmes.
The following article,
written by McLester "Mac" Turner and published in Southern Independence, provides an
entertaining explanation of Lysander's mysterious reduction to ranks.
Lysander Turner
Before the
Lysander Turner story perhaps some background information would be
helpful. Lysander’s father was James
Patrick Henry Turner and was known as Henry.
This was supposedly the same Henry who was the partner of P. T. Barnum
in 1836, according to information provided by Edibet Overton Breedlove as told
to her by Elizabeth Morris Turner in the book,
Sketches Of Old Warrenton, and P. T. Barnum’s 1855 autobiography.
When the war began
Henry Turner’s wife Margaret Hunt Turner had been deceased for approximately
one year so, Henry, to do his share for the war effort, hired a dancing troupe
and other carnival acts performing at that time at Tar River Station about five
miles up-river from his home. He took
this carnival to Richmond to be able to better entertain the troops. Before the War Between the States Lysander
Turner was a school teacher. Because of
the influence of his Hunt grandparents and their large family he was also a
humble and devout Methodist. Lysander
enlisted in the 47th NC Regiment and rose to the rank of sergeant. All seemed to be well with Sergeant Turner
until there was a revival back home at Gray Rock, NC. Sergeant Turner at this time was a cold
porter, or distributor of religious tracts in his regiment, some what of an
assistant chaplain or battlefield chaplain.
When he failed to
gain leave to return home he went anyway.
Devout Methodists at this time did not let an opportunity pass to see
family saved. Upon his return he was promptly
jailed for being AWOL, or desertion. After a few days in the stockade, growing
worried about the charges against him and having lost all rank, he was left
with only his faith in Jesus. In my
opinion he probably prayed mightily that the Lord not forget where he was and
to send him an angel, or a hoard of angels to help. During this time he heard a great commotion
in the camp outside the stockade. As all
the prisoners were trying to peek out any crack they could find, Lysander was
able to find a crack to get a peek just as Pa Henry’s carriage flashed by. Lysander immediately fell upon his knees and
asked for forgiveness for asking for a hoard of angels when all that was
necessary was Pa Henry and his troupe of dancing girls. As a devout Methodist Lysander knew that the
Lord moved in mysterious ways. After Pa
Henry had entertained with the dancing troupe and other acts, he distributed
food and whiskey. Lysander was soon released
from the stockade and his rank restored.
Pa Henry also tried to have Lysander transferred to the 23rd NC regiment
in which Lysander’s first cousins Henry Gray Turner and Vines Edmunds Turner
were officers and Major Blacknall and Col. Christie were old family
friends. Lysander would have none of it,
having decided that the Lord had put him where the Lord wanted him. Until being wounded and captured at
Gettysburg, Lysander continued to assist with the chaplaincy.
After the war Lysander refused to share in the
family’s sudden wealth of the 1870’s but remained a humble and devout Methodist
all the days of his life never claiming to be more than a country preacher and
a distributor of religious tracts. To
Lysander Turner and his life I would like to add an amen.
McLester Turner
After the War, Lysander
became a local preacher and sold bibles and religious tracts. On April 1, 1871,
he became a Master Mason. Following his
marriage to Kate Clegg (born July 4, 1852; died January 26, 1917; date of
marriage unknown), Lysander had a son who died in infancy and two daughters:
Margaret Louise (known as “Lou”) Turner (born June 8, 1873; died January 21,
1934) and Mary Clegg Turner (born February 17, 1877; died April 22, 1940).
Lysander and Kate later separated.
Although it is not known for certain if Lysander and Kate were divorced,
he indicated that he was not married in his application to the North Carolina
Soldier’s Home on April 2, 1910.
Moving
to Greensboro, North Carolina around 1895, Lysander lived with his daughter,
Mary, and her husband, Samuel Fletcher White.
During this time, he cultivated grapes and strawberries and
distributed religious tracts until his death. Disabled from the leg
wound that he received at Gettysburg, Lysander was approved for a Confederate
pension by the Guilford County Pension Board in 1901, 1904, and 1909, due to
disability. In 1904, Lysander stated “My disability from wounds and otherwise
has prevented me from being able to support myself for several years and but
for the assistance of friends [I] don’t know what I should have done.” Lysander was buried at Green Hill Cemetery,
in the Westbrook plot, at Greensboro, North Carolina, following his death on
November 30, 1910.
No comments:
Post a Comment