Posted on 05/29/2005 4:09:10 AM PDT by leadpenny
Edited on 05/29/2005 4:18:45 AM PDT by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
Twelve-year odyssey connects family with fallen Confederate soldier.
By RUSTY DENNEN
The acrid aroma of burned black powder hung in the evening air as four men in blue and gray fired their muskets over the grave of a long-ago fallen soldier.
When a bugler sounded the somber notes of taps, a pelting rain ended and a beam of sunlight broke the gloom at Spotsylvania Confederate Cemetery.
Amid hugs, smiles and tears, a family’s 12-year journey to reclaim a missing part of its heart—and its legacy—came to an end.
On May 7, 2005, 141 years after being mortally wounded at the notorious Bloody Angle at Spotsyl-vania Court House, Pvt. Richard F. Humphreys, Company H of the 31st Virginia Infantry, had finally come home.
The Humphreys family’s quest began, as all great journeys do, with a nagging need to know, and the realization that nothing in life is guaranteed.
It started with Stacy Humphreys, a now 27-year-old historian and historic weapons specialist with Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park.
“When I came to work here at the park, I was looking through records of Confederate cemeteries. It always bothered me that we didn’t know where uncle Richard was buried,” Humphreys, a lifelong student of history and the Civil War, said in a recent interview.
Her great-great-great-grandfather, Thomas Humphreys, came to America from Ireland in the 1840s and soon married Matilda, a Welsh woman he had met in his newly adopted country.
Thomas and Matilda eventually settled in Philippi, Va. (now West Virginia). The couple had 13 children.
After the war’s first shots were fired at Fort Sumter, S.C., in April 1861, the two oldest boys, William and Lorenzo, joined the Barbour Greys, which became part of the the 31st Virginia Infantry. They survived the war.
The younger Richard didn’t join up until 1863, at age 19.
“I always thought it was odd that nobody knew what happened to him,” Stacy Humphreys said.
For the longest time, “I thought he was in an unmarked grave and that we would never find him.”
For many families that was the most likely scenario: Of the 15,300 federal soldiers buried in the national cemetery on the terraced hillside near the Fredericksburg Battlefield Visitor Center, 85 percent have never been identified.
Detective work
One day, poring through rosters of the dead, she came across the name—Richard Humphreys—and her heart leapt.
“I thought, ‘Oh, my gosh! This could be him.’’’
Then she noticed that this Richard Humphreys had fought for the 8th Louisiana.
She went to the Spotsylvania cemetery that evening after work. Sure enough, he was buried there, under a faded white marble stone, marked with the Louisiana unit’s identification, next to the circular gravel drive.
“I started crying. I was always drawn to the cemetery. I would walk through here, never dreaming he was mistakenly buried in the Louisiana plot.”
“I thought about it and pulled out battle maps to see where the 31st Virginia and the 8th Louisiana fought, and they were very near together” at what is known as the Mule Shoe Salient, the larger defensive position that encompassed the Bloody Angle, where soldiers on May 12, 1864, battled hand to hand in some of the fiercest fighting of the war.
“From there the story gets fuzzy. Was he taken to a hospital? Did he live a few hours and die? All it says in the record is that he was mortally wounded in action,” she said.
Her training as a historian kicked into gear, and a scenario of what might have happened began to jell.
“It makes sense that if he fell near a Louisianan and no one knew who he was and he was buried by the Louisianans ’’
Ecstatic at what she had found, she called her mom and dad, Max and Kitty, at the family home in Morgantown, W.Va.
“Dad got involved and called Jackson Barracks in New Orleans. He did find a Richard Humphreys who had served in the 8th Louisiana, as a hospital steward.”
Kitty, meanwhile, was scouring the Internet for more records and books on units and their whereabouts.
Soon, they found what they were looking for: the Richard Humphreys of Louisiana had survived the war.
“We checked the 1870 Census,” Stacy Humphreys said. “He was alive.” That, and the fact that the Spotsylvania cemetery was established between 1866 and 1868, gave them the proof they had been looking for for so long.
“We knew that it was our uncle. I was sad, but in peace that we’d finally found him.”
The family contacted Sarah Estes, head of the cemetery trustees, and offered the documentation. A new headstone was set in place, aptly, on Nov. 11, Memorial Day, last year. Estes said that while there have been other, minor, changes to headstones and occasions when unknown soldiers were identified, this was a first.
“We’ve never had anything like this. This is unique in my memory,” she said.
Deep roots
The private formal dedication of the tombstone two weeks ago gave the family time to prepare a fitting tribute and gave relatives time to make arrangements to attend.
Max Humphreys, 55, a fire marshal and pastor in Morgantown, is a Confederate re-enac-tor.
“When I was a kid I was fascinated by Civil War books,” he said as he waited for guests to arrive. He laughed, “The only thing I excelled in in school was history.”
He was dressed for the occasion in a seven-button shell jacket, slouch hat with a blue cord indicating infantry, wool trousers and socks, cartridge box, percussion-cap pouch and a 9-pound reproduction 1842 smoothbore Springfield rifle.
He’d always had hopes he’d see this day, and he remembered all the research, trips to cemeteries and libraries.
It was a poignant moment as he read some thoughts he had put down on paper for the occasion. At one point he paused, eyes closed and holding back tears.
“Not for home or reward, not for place or for rank, not lured by ambition or goaded by necessity but in simple obedience to duty as he understood it, Richard Humphreys, Company H, 31st Virginia Infantry surrendered all, sacrificed all, dared all. This is his final bivouac, and he sleeps under this hallowed ground ”
The mistaken headstone will be kept for posterity.
Other family members on hand included Dan and Mary Lou Humphreys Meyer and Neil Humphreys, of Morgantown, who had other relatives who fought in the war and who also were related to Richard Humphreys.
Frank O’Reilly, a friend of Stacy’s and a fellow National Park Service historian, provided a detailed account of Richard Humphreys’ unit’s wartime service, and put the family’s accomplishment in perspective.
“This really defies all odds it’s really a story of good detective work on the part of Mr. and Mrs. Humphreys and Stacy.
“Remember, this was wartime before dog tags.”
Soldiers used all kinds of identification techniques, including disks with their name, unit and address.
“The downside was that would cost a month’s pay,” O’Reilly said.
Often, soldiers would stitch their names in their jackets in the event they were killed, or even pin their names on their backs before a battle.
Identification was so difficult, O’Reilly said, in part because of the confusion during and after battles. For dead soldiers to be identified, a lot of things had to happen.
Men, including those of the 31st Virginia, were often related by either blood, marriage or business. Chances were, everyone knew each other.
“If I got killed, you’d have to live and know I went down for me to be identified,” O’Reilly said.
For Stacy Humphreys, finding Richard is a way of passing along a family treasure, horrific as it may be.
“I feel very blessed I now have a place I can take my children and grandchildren. I feel this story has come full circle.”
Interesting piece, especially this Holiday weekend. Thanks for posting it.
It's from last Sunday and I believe it was up all week. I just happen to see it this morning. There are now stories of some of Virginia's fallen in the WOT on the front page.
http://fredericksburg.com/
They are all very sad but the story of Army 2nd Lt. Jeff Graham is particularly painful.
I see someone posted the entire article. Thanks.
bump for later.
This is so neat. Thanks for posting it! We visited Spotsylvania last Jul. 4 weekend.
Twern't I. ;)
I just finished a book on Gettysburg and I was surprised how many Confederate dead are buried in unmarked graves all over the battlefield.
You are welcome. :-)
Thank you for finding and posting this fascinating story.
I didn't excerpt for this reason but like to see the Free Lance-Star get some hits on their site. They are one of my favorite.
bump
Thanks, I just don't know how I missed all week.
What a wonderful event for this family, but wouldn't that be Veterans Day, not Memorial Day? A friend of mine has a brother, MIA from Nam war. She would give anything to have the knowledge of what happened and where her brother is buried--or where he is being held.
bttt
. . . or Armistice Day. Good catch.
I know you probably can't but wish you could give his name so we could honor him. I wish your friend peace.
My grandfather always talked about his Uncle Jimmy, his grandmother's youngest brother who died in the War. The family never knew where he died or was buried although word had reached themm that he had been killed. I researched the records and was able to tell Grampa that Uncle Jimmy died at Chancellorsville and is buried in the Fredrickburg Confederate Cemetary. My family visited his grave, said a prayer and placed flowers. It was moving to realize that after 140 years someone from his finally answered the questions and found him and honored him. I hope he is resting in peace.
That Sultana event became more poignant with time. In the chaos at the end of the war it simply disappeared into the haze. I read somewhere that four or five times more Americans died in the Sultana explosion than died at the Battle of Midway.
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