Week 19: Service #52Ancestors
My husband has many ancestors who served in the military in the United States starting with a couple who served in colonial Maryland before there even was a United States. He has at least eleven who served in the Revolutionary War, five in the War of 1812, and seven in the Civil War with at least one serving for the Confederacy. My side of the family didn’t come to the U.S. until after the Civil War, with the exception of Charles Edward Spencer, my great-grandfather who came to the U.S. in 1846. I’ve written on Charles before and his claim he served a drummer boy in the Civil War. I am not sure why he made up this story, but I have found his some of his actual service records and they tell a much different story.
Charles came to the U.S. as an infant. I haven’t found the ship’s manifest showing his arrival, but in his naturalization papers he says he arrived at in New York in 1846 (at one-year-old).[1] He filed for naturalization in 1864 in Massachusetts and identified his occupation as “seaman.” The Massachusetts state census taken in May of 1865 also notes he was in the U.S. Navy.[2]
When I began researching his military history, I got stuck trying to find a Charles Spencer who served as a drummer boy in New Jersey. It wasn’t until completing more general research on Charles that I discovered he lived in Massachusetts before he moved to New Jersey. That lead me to the 1856 census which lead me to his actual military service records. Lesson learned – you may need a broader picture of your ancestor before you focus on the details.
Charles enlisted in the Navy for one year on 7 November 1863 when he was nineteen years old.[3] The enlistment return gives a nice description of what he looked like: he had hazel eyes, dark hair, a dark complexion, and stood 5’ 8 ¾” tall. He had an E.S.” tattooed on his right forearm.[4] His “rating” on the enlistment return said “Ld’s” which I have learned means “landsman,” or one with little or no experience at sea.[5]
Sadly, the Navy did not maintain personnel files for enlisted men until 1885. However, the Archives Specialist at the National Archives found a small file for him that she sent to me as a courtesy.[6] Identified as a “machinist” when he enlisted, Charles first served in the Navy as a nurse. According to this file his “receiving” ship was the USS Ohio to which he reported on 6 January 1864. He served on the USS Pequot and USS Stepping Stones for his term and discharged on 4 October 1864. In researching him further, I find a “card” that shows he also served as a “Surgeon’s Steward” from October 1864 to April 1865 on the USS Monadnock.[7] Cool.
In working on this blog post I discover (to my amazement) that the muster rolls for Civil War vessels have been digitized and are available on the National Archives website.[8] Awesome! While they are not indexed it takes me no time at all to locate the ships Charles served on and to review them page by page. This being my infamously unreliable ancestor, of course I am in for another mystery.
In reading through the muster rolls (several times) for the Pequot and Stepping Stones, I do not find Charles listed. Both ships did have nurses and surgeon’s stewards, but they were not Charles. How can that be? My best guess is that Charles served as a nurse from January to October 1864 on another vessel before being appointed to the Monadnock. Because these records are not yet indexed I will have to wait to find out where he served during those months (unless I want to spend the rest of the quarantine reading every single muster roll. Lolz).
The muster rolls of the Monadnock show that Charles was appointed “surgeon’s steward” on October 1, 1864 “for the cruise.”[9] Assigned to brigs and schooners, the “surgeon’s steward” held a rank equivalent to a petty officer.[10] Larger ships would have both a nurse and a surgeon’s steward. The surgeon’s steward performed a variety of duties including assisting the surgeon during an operation, manning the apothecary, and presiding over the sick bay.[11] After the war, the Navy abolished this title in favor of apothecary, a position which would require completion of a course in pharmacy.[12]
The USS Monadnock was a “twin-screwed, wooden-hull, double-turreted, ironclad monitor.”[13] Built by the Boston Navy Yard, it was launched in March 1863 and commissioned 4 October 1864, just when Charles was appointed to serve on her.[14]She participated in the attack on the Cape Fear River in North Carolina in December and January and several more campaigns in early 1865.[15] In April, the Monadnock traveled up the James River to join the last assault on Richmond which caused the Army of Northern Virginia to flee to Appomattox Court House and surrender.[16]
When I think about what Charles must have experienced aboard the Monadnock and the battles he must have witnessed, I wonder why he had to invent a different Civil War story for himself.
[1] U.S. Circuit Court, Massachusetts, Primary Declarations of Intention, vol. 14, 29 April 1864 declaration of intention by Charles E. Spencer; digital image, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 12 May 2020); citing to original data from Nationalization Records, National Archives at Boston, Waltham, Massachusetts. The fact that Charles was in Boston on this date when he was supposed to be aboard ship is interesting and deserves further inquiry.
[2] 1865 Massachusetts state census, Worchester County, population schedule, Blackstone township, Millville Village, dwelling 593, family 787, for Charles E. Spencer in household of Ezekiel Mortimer; digital image, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 12 May 2020).
[3] U.S. Navy, Weekly Returns of Enlistments at Naval Rendezvous, Enlistments at Boston, 7 November 1863, line 21, Charles E. Spencer; digital image, Fold3 (http://www.fold3.com : accessed 12 May 2020)
[4] This was a good clue that he may have gone by Edward instead of Charles.
[5] Wikipedia.org, “Landsman (rank),” rev. 15:05, 1 February 2020.
[6] Thank you Ms Kim Y McKeithan.
[7] “Index to Rendezvous Reports, Civil War, 1861-1865,” Charles E. Spencer; database with images, Fold3, Rendezvous Reports Index – Civil War” (http://www.fold3.com/title/887/rendezvous-reports-index-civil-war : accessed May 14, 2020).
[8] Record Group 24: Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, 1798-2007, Series: “Muster Rolls of Naval Ships, 1/1/1860-6/9/1900,” National Archives Catalog (https://catalog.archives.gov/id/563603 : accessed 12 May 2020).
[9] Department of the Navy, Bureau of Navigation, Series: “Muster Rolls of Naval Ships, Record Group 24: Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, 1798-2007, Muster Rolls of the U.S.S. Monadnock 1864-1866; digital image, NARA (https://catalog.archives.gov/id/134432576), National Archives Identifier 134432576, images 10-24.
[10] Michael A. Flannery, “Naval Pharmacy,” Civil War Pharmacy: A History (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2017), 170.
[11] HMCS(FMF) Mark T. Hacala, USNR, “History of the Hospital Corps, The U.S. Navy Hospital Corps: A Century of Tradition, Valor, and Sacrifice,” Navy Medicine 89, No. 3 (May-June 1998): 12-26, specifically 12-13; digital copy Google Books (https://www.google.com/books : accessed 14 May 2020).
[12] Wikipedia.org, “Hospital corpsman,” rev. 22:36, 31 March 2020.
[13] Wikipedia.org, “USS Monadnock (1863),” rev. 03:44, 3 July 2019.
[14] “USS Monadnock,” NavSource Naval History: Photographic History of the U.S. Navy (http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/monadnock1.htm : accessed 12 May 2020). The fact that it was launched in Boston supports the fact that Charles was back there and did not re-enlist at any other port.
[15] Wikipedia, “USS Monadnock (1863),” rev. 03:44, 3 July 2019.
[16] Wikipedia.org, “Third Battle of Petersburg,” rev. 19:06, 2 April 2020.
Charles Edward Spencer, 1914
Lithograph of the Monadnock published in 1864 by Endicott & Company, New York. “USS Monadnock,” NavSource Naval History: Photographic History of the U.S. Navy (http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/monadnock1.htm : accessed 12 May 2020); courtesy of Commander Charles Moran, 1935.