RARE WAR DATE AES, MAJ. GEN. DAVID BELL BIRNEY

$345.00 SOLD

Quantity Available: None

Item Code: L14605

Autograph Endorsement Signed, on an inlaid 3.25” x 7/75” portion of a letter.  “HD. Qrs. 1st Div. 3rd Corps, May 15, 1863. The promotion of Lieut Briscoe is a deserved one & I trust will be immediately made.”  “D.B. Birney / Brig Genl / Comdg. Div”. Very fine condition.

Lieutenant James C. Briscoe received the requested promotion, served on Birney’s staff, and was brevetted brigadier general for gallantry at Fort Gregg, Virginia on 4/2/1865.

Birney was born in Huntsville, Alabama, the son of an abolitionist from Kentucky, James G. Birney. The Birney family returned to Kentucky in 1833, and James Birney freed his slaves. In 1835, the family moved to Cincinnati, where the father published an anti-slavery newspaper. Following numerous threats from pro-slavery mobs, the family moved again to Michigan, and finally to Philadelphia.   Following his graduation from Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts,[1] David Birney entered business, studied law, and was admitted to the bar. He returned to Philadelphia, practicing law from 1856 until the outbreak of the Civil War.

Birney entered the Union army just after Fort Sumter as lieutenant colonel of the 23rd Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regiment, a unit he raised largely at his own expense. Just prior to the war he had been studying military texts in preparation for such a role. He was promoted to colonel on August 31, 1861, and to brigadier general on February 17, 1862, clearly benefiting from political influences, not military merit. He commanded a brigade in Brig. Gen. Philip Kearny's division of the III Corps, which he led through the Peninsula Campaign. At the Battle of Seven Pines he was accused of disobeying an order from his corps commander, Maj. Gen. Samuel P. Heintzelman, allegedly for "halting his command a mile from the enemy." But this was simply a matter of orders misunderstood. Birney was court-martialed, but with strong positive testimony from Kearny, he was acquitted and restored to command.

Birney fought at the Second Battle of Bull Run in support of Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia, and at the Battle of Chantilly immediately following. When Kearny was killed in that battle, Birney took over command of his division. Stationed in Washington, D.C., he missed the Battle of Antietam, but his division returned to the Army of the Potomac to fight at Fredericksburg. There, he once again encountered military discipline problems, this time for allegedly refusing to support Maj. Gen. George G. Meade's division's attack on the left flank of the Union line. However, he was complimented in III Corps commander Maj. Gen. George Stoneman's official report for "the handsome manner in which he handled his division" on that same day and for a second time he escaped punishment. Birney led his division in heavy fighting at Chancellorsville, where they suffered more casualties (1,607) than any other division in the army. As a result of his distinguished service at Chancellorsville, he was promoted to major general on May 20, 1863.

At the Battle of Gettysburg, the III Corps commander was the notorious Maj. Gen. Daniel Sickles. On July 2, 1863, Sickles insubordinately moved his corps from its assigned defensive position on Cemetery Ridge. Birney's new position was from the Devil's Den, to the Wheatfield, to the Peach Orchard, part of a salient directly in the path of the Confederate assault, and it was too long a front for a single division to defend. Assaulted by the divisions of Maj. Gens. John Bell Hood and Lafayette McLaws, Birney's division was demolished. Army commander Meade rushed in reinforcements, but the line could not hold. His division and the entire corps were finished as a fighting force. As Birney watched the few survivors of his division gather about him on Cemetery Ridge, he whispered to one of his officers, "I wish I were already dead." Sickles was grievously wounded by a cannonball and Birney assumed temporary command of the corps, despite having received two minor wounds himself. He retained command until February 1864.

Birney started in the Overland Campaign as a division commander in the II Corps, his III Corps having been reorganized out of existence that spring. After good service in the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House (where he was wounded by a shell fragment), and Cold Harbor, on July 23, 1864, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant gave Birney command of the X Corps in the Army of the James. However, during the Siege of Petersburg, Birney fell ill with malaria (some accounts say dysentery and typhoid fever). He was ordered home to Philadelphia, and died three months later. He is buried there in Woodlands Cemetery.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

THIS ITEM, AS WITH ALL OTHER ITEMS AVAILABLE ON OUR WEB SITE,

MAY BE PURCHASED THROUGH OUR LAYAWAY PROGRAM.

FOR OUR POLICIES AND TERMS,

CLICK ON ‘CONTACT US’ AT THE TOP OF ANY PAGE ON THE SITE,

THEN ON ‘LAYAWAY POLICY’.

Inquire About RARE WAR DATE AES, MAJ. GEN. DAVID BELL BIRNEY

For inquiries, please email us at [email protected]

featured item

TIFFANY PRESENTATION SWORD TO WILLIAM S. MARBLE, 7th CONNECTICUT VOLS, WIA BERMUDA HUNDRED, IN COMMAND OF THE REGT. AT FT. FISHER

Tiffany & Company is acknowledged as the finest producer of presentation swords in the 1860s and this is good example of their work, showing detailed craftsmanship and refined taste. The deeply cast, chased, and engraved mounts along with the… (870-172). Learn More »

Upcoming Events

25
Mar

April 13-14: Spring Gettysburg Military Antiques Show Learn More »

Instagram