Isaac Ball Feagin

(1833 - 1900)
Home State: Alabama
Command Billet: Commanding Regiment
Branch of Service: Infantry
Unit: 15th Alabama Infantry

Before the Antietam Campaign:
He became responsible for his family at his father's death when he was 14. He was elected Deputy Sheriff of Barbour County in 1854, and went into the "mercantile business" in Midway, Alabama. He helped organize the 'Midway Guards' infantry company before the War, and was its Captain. This unit became Company B of the 15th Alabama Regiment in May 1861 - Feagin elected 1st Lieutenant, then Captain. 1

In the Antietam Campaign:
He was in command of the Regiment at Sharpsburg, Colonel Oates then on sick call. He was wounded in action by a "shellburst" at Shepherdstown on 19 September.

The remainder of the War:
He was home in December 1862, evidenced by his marriage to Sallie Hall of Warren County, Georgia 1, likely on sick leave, but by Gettysburg Feagin was Lieutenant Colonel (appt. 1 May 63) with the Regiment. Of combat on Little Round Top there on 2 July 1863, Colonel Oates later remembered the "destructive" fire of the 20th Maine opposite, and "[m]y Lt. Col. I. B. Feagin, lost his leg; the heroic Capt. Ellison had fallen, while Capt. Brainard, one of the bravest and best officers in the regiment, fell ... Lieut. John A. Oates, my beloved brother, was pierced through with eight bullets and fell mortally wounded." 2

LCol Feagin was captured and spent 11 months in Federal Prison - he was exchanged in June 1864. He resigned or retired in December 1864.

After the War:
He was elected sheriff of Barbour County in 1866, known as "a democrat, Baptist, Royal Arch Mason, member of the Ancient Order of United Workmen".1

Birth Date: 7/17/1833 Place of Birth: Jones County, GA
Death Date: 5/2/1900 Burial Place: Union Springs, Bullock County, AL

Notes

1 Abstracted by John D. Feagin, posted by Linda Feagin Harwell on a family geneology forum.
Owen, Thomas McAdory, History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography, 4 Vols., Chicago: S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1921, Vol. 3 [AotW citation 51]

2 Quoted on the Gettysburg NMP Virtual tour site.
Oates, William C., The War Between the Union and the Confederacy, New York and Washington DC: The Neale Publishing Company, 1905, --- [AotW citation 50]

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