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(1844 - 1925)
Home State: Virginia
Branch of Service: Infantry
Unit: 31st Virginia Infantry
Before Sharpsburg
His father died when he was 5, and in 1860 at age 15, he lived with the McNemar family in Weston, Lewis County, VA. He enlisted at Skin Creek as a Private in Company I, 31st Virginia Infantry on 2 June 1861. He was promoted to 4th Sergeant, date not given.
On the Campaign
He was captured in action at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.
The rest of the War
He was paroled at Sharpsburg on 21 September and returned to duty, date not given. He was captured again, at Winchester, VA on 20 July 1864 and held in Wheeling until transferred to Camp Chase, OH on 28 July. He was sent to City Point, VA for exchange on 2 March 1865 and paroled on 15 March 1865, with no later military record.
After the War
He went west to Moultrie County, Illinois and farmed there. He moved to Mansfield, Blue Ridge Township in Piatt County, IL to farm in 1892, and by 1910 and to at least 1920 he was retired there.
References & notes
His service from Ashcraft,1 as Simon A. Blagg, and his Compiled Service Records,2 via fold3, also as Alderson Blagg. Personal details from a bio sketch in Charles McIntosh's Past and Present of Piatt County, Illinois ... (1903, online), family genealogists, and the US Census of 1860-1920. His gravesite is on Findagrave.
He married Martha Hardin (1848-1937) in July 1867 and they had 9 children.
Birth
11/29/1844; Weston, VA
Death
02/22/1925; Mansfield, IL; burial in Mansfield Cemetery, Mansfield, IL
1 Ashcraft, Jr., John M., 31st Virginia Infantry, Lynchburg (Va): H. E. Howard, Inc., 1899 [AotW citation 27918]
2 US War Department, Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers, Record Group No. 109 (War Department Collection of Confederate Records), Washington DC: US National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), 1903-1927 [AotW citation 27919]