2nd Battle Of Bull Run

County's war vets honored

Armstrong County resident Daniel Slagle enlisted in the Union Army's 78th Pennsylvania Infantry Company B at the start of the Civil War in August of 1861.

In July 1862, he lost his right eye on an Alabama battlefield.

But Slagle refused a discharge and continued fighting for the remainder of the war. He was wounded again, this time in the right arm, during the famous battle of Stones River, Tenn., in which Union forces defeated the Confederates to turn the war in their favor.

He is buried at Cochran Cemetery near Templeton.

"That just shows you the dedication to the cause and the patriotism that the men from this county had during the Civil War," said Richard Essenwein, senior vice commander of the Pennsylvania Department of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War and a member of the group's John T. Crawford Camp 43. Essenwein is a living historian of Civil War people and events.

Slagle's story is one of many of Civil War soldiers from Armstrong County.

Essenwein told that story and some other stories of Civil War veterans for this Memorial Day weekend and with the 150th anniversary year of the war's start getting under way this year.

"It doesn't really matter where you turn in this county, in every little corner of this county, you're going to find Civil War stories," Essenwein said. "We were represented in every major theater of the war and practically every major battle."

Essenwein said 3,652 soldiers, one tenth of the county's population in the 1860 census, officially served in the Civil War.

There are 561 known who died serving in action in 12 different states and at 100 locations.

County soldiers served in more than 60 regiments. The largest were the 78th and 103rd regiments.

There are more than 2,300 graves of Civil War veterans in Armstrong County, according to Essenwein.

The county had one general, Samuel Jackson, and four colonels, William Sirwell, Theodore Lehmann, John Parr and John Finlay.

Essenwein said enlistees at the beginning of the war gathered in Kittanning to sign up with the 78th regiment. When it filled up, the next men to arrive were put into the 103rd.

"The 78th went on to fame and glory," he said. "Then you have the 103rd."

Things started out bad for the men from the 103rd and went from bad to worse, said Essenwein.

A feud broke out between the colonel of the 103rd and the commander of the training camp, Camp Orr, which was where the Kittanning High School is now, about who was in charge.

Jason's View from DC: Civil War 150, Manassas Second Battle

The second battle of Bull Run (or second battle of Manassas) was also a victory for the Confederates. In July, 1862, the Union Army of Virginia under Gen. John Pope threatened the town of Gordonsville, a railroad junction between Richmond and the Shenandoah valley. Gen. Robert E. Lee sent Stonewall Jackson to protect the town, and on Aug. 9, 1862, Jackson defeated Nathaniel Banks's corps, the vanguard of Pope's army, in the battle of Cedar Mt. (or Cedar Run). When Gen. George McClellan's army was gradually withdrawn from Harrison's Landing on the James River (where it had remained after the Seven Days battles) to reinforce Pope, Lee concentrated his whole army at Gordonsville. He planned to strike before Pope could be reinforced. Pope withdrew to the north side of the Rappahannock River. Lee followed to the south side and on Aug. 25 boldly divided his army. By Aug. 28, Jackson had marched to the Union right and rear, destroyed Union communications and supplies, and stationed his troops just west of the first Bull Run battlefield, where he awaited the arrival of James Longstreet with the rest of Lee's army. Pope was attacking Jackson when Longstreet came up on Aug. 29. The attack was repulsed, but Pope, mistaking a re-formation of Jackson's lines for a retreat, renewed it the next day. After the Union troops were again driven back, Lee ordered Longstreet to counterattack. Longstreet, supported by Jackson, swept Pope from the field. The Union forces retreated across Bull Run, badly defeated. Lee's pursuit ended at Chantilly, where the Union forces stopped Jackson on Sept. 1, 1862. Pope then withdrew to Washington.

The second battle of Bull Run, as connected with the Fitz-John Porter Case. A paper read before the Society of ex-army and navy officers of Cincinnati, February 28, 1882

A comprehensive sketch of the Battle of Manassas, or Second Battle of Bull Run, giving a brief account of one of the most important engagements of the late Civil War ; illustrated

The most fearful ordeal, original coverage of the Civil War

Our Campaigns, or, The marches, bivouacs, battles, incidents of camp life and history of our regiment during its three years term of service

History of the United States from the compromise of 1850 to the final restoration of home rule at the South in 1877