Avery Billings Cain

From Vermont, he was commissioned 2nd then First Lieutenant, Company G, 4th US Infantry in August 1861. Present at Yorktown, Gaines Mill, Malvern Hill, and Manassas.

He commanded Company I at Antietam on 17 September 1862.

On recruiting duty December 1862. In action at Chancellorsville, and brevetted Captain for that action. Promoted to Captain in October 1863. In action at Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor, Petersburg, VA. Honored by brevet to Major on 24 May 1864 for action on the North Anna River, VA. With his regiment to the end of the War.

District Provost Marshal in Richmond, 1865. He served on the Canadian border, New York harbor and in the West. He commanded Company D, 4th Infantry on Crook's expedition against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians in the summer of 1876. He was stationed in Chicago during the riots of 1877.

Basic information from Powell1 and Heitman.2 His role at Antietam from Captain Dryer's Report. Details from Henry Perry Smith & William S. Rann's History of Rutland County, Vermont (1886). His picture from a photograph at the Vermont Historical Society, shared on Vermont in the Civil War by Tom Ledoux. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Anna Cooper, daughter of US Senator (1849-55) James Cooper of Pennsylvania, October 31, 1867, they had no children. Originally buried at Ft. Laramie, but later returned to Rutland, VT.

02/18/1840; Rutland, VT

03/16/1879; Fort Laramie, WY; burial in Evergreen Cemetery, Rutland, VT