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UNION SOLDIER LETTER - SERGEANT WILLIAM B. HOITT, “I” CO., 19TH MASSACHUSETTS, WIA GETTYSBURG, 7/3/1863

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Dated “Camp 19^th Reg. Mass. Vols., before Yorktown, Va / Sunday April 13, 1862.”  Addressed to “Friend Harry.”3 pp., in pencil., 7.75” x 9.75. Exhibits fold-marks. Else VG.

Includes Siege of Yorktown w/battle content, including action by sharpshooters. Text:

“I will write you a few lines. We have seen some pretty rough times since I left ___--but expect to see some rougher ones before the end of the present week, as there is to be a big fight here.

The bold 19^th Mass had the pleasure of smelling gunpowder and being under the fire of a rebel battery for about half an hour. Most of the boys took quite cool. I don’t know but that I felt about the same as usual, not withstanding the bullets whistled over my head pretty rapidly.—but when the shells began to burst over our heads, I felt some solicitude for the boys if not for myself.

We started out last Monday morning for the purpose of reconnoitering and ascertaining the position and strength of some batteries. Some of our men already deployed as skirmishers, through a piece of woods, with the rest of the regiment close upon their heels. When at the edge of the woods, and near an open field, the rebels opened fire upon us from one of the forts, with small arms. Colonel Grimko was in charge of the regiment at the time, and it stood its ground like a brick, but it being useless for us to fire, as the rebels were protected by earth works, and our advance being merely to feel the strength of the Forts, he ordered us to fall back. He then rode out on an open field, and soon returned saying that he had discovered another battery.

He then filed us along the edge of the woods, and placed us in a small ravine. He then brought up some of Saunder’s Sharpshooters who stepped in view of the fort and drew a bead on those who were in sight. Their fire was soon returned by a shower of bullets from the fort. We were all right until they began to throw shells at us, which burst directly over our heads. When the first one came I though the devils in hell had made their appearance. There was but one killed and four or five wounded, and any quantity of narrow escapes. The sharpshooters succeeded in silencing the “Big Guns,” by drawing a bead on any one who made his appearance to load them. We got back to camp shortly after dark and heard that we were all cut to pieces.

Harry, there is going to be a big fight here and I suppose I shall take part in it. I hope I shall come out of it all right. Well, must trust to luck.

Gen. McClelland is here. He is a good looking fellow.

We have had a hard storm here for the past week. For the past week, and it has been rather hard for us, as we have to sleep and in the open air, having no tents with us. When I get home, I shall take my lodgings on the Common.

Give my regards to all, and tell John I would like to have him out here for the next week to come. Ho doubt that he would enjoy himself.

Yours in great haste / William B. Hoitt”

William Hoitt was a 31 year-old printer who enlisted as private and mustered into Co. “I”, 19^th Massachusetts Infantry, 8/28/ 1861. Promoted to sergeant, he was posted with his regiment on Gettysburg’s Cemetery Ridge on the afternoons of July 2^nd & 3^rd, 1863, where he was wounded in action. He was discharged for disability 3/3/1864.

Organized at Lynnfield in August 1861, the 19^th Mass. saw action at Ball’s Bluff that autumn and soon after was attached to the Army of the Potomac, with which it served in in all the major actions and Campaigns of that Army from McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign to Grant’s Overland Campaign through Appomattox. At Gettysburg the 19^th Mass. served with Hall’s Brigade, posted on Cemetery ridge, on 2^nd & 3^rd July, 1863, suffering 377 (40 % ) casualties. During service it lost 161 men killed and mortally wounded and 133 by disease for a total of 294.

Superb letter by a soldier of the 19^th Mass, later WIA at Gettysburg, containing battle content of earlier action at Williamsburg, VA, the opening battle of the 1862 peninsula campaign. Unquestionably, Sergeant Hoitt saw the elephant a number of times in a number of places and survived. In protective sleeve.  [jp][ph:L]

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