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Federal (USV)

Private

Robert E. Rich

(1845 - 1908)

Home State: Massachusetts

Branch of Service: Infantry

Unit: 19th Massachusetts Infantry

Before Antietam

A 16 year old spinner from Newburyport, giving his age as 18, he enlisted 26 July 1861 in Company B, 19th Massachusetts Infantry.

On the Campaign

He was wounded in the left knee in action at Antietam on 17 September 1862.

The rest of the War

He was treated at the Hoffman Farm hospital at Sharpsburg, then moved to the Carver General Hospital, Washington, DC, where he was discharged for wounds on 5 February 1863. His left leg was amputated.

After the War

He was librarian of the Portsmouth (NH) Public Library, serving til his death in 1908.

References & notes

Service information from Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines1 with Antietam casualty detail from Nelson.2 His post-War occupation from Hazlett's History of Rockingham County, New Hampshire, and Representative Citizens (1915). His gravesite is on Findagrave.

Birth

03/09/1845; Mount Desert, ME

Death

02/25/1908; Portsmouth, NH; burial in Harmony Grove Cemetery, Portsmouth, NH

Notes

1 Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Adjutant General, Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines in the Civil War, 8 Vols, Norwood (MA): Norwood Press, 1931-35, Vol. 2, pg. 426 [AotW citation 17748]

2 Nelson, John H., As Grain Falls Before the Reaper: The Federal Hospital Sites and Identified Federal Casualties at Antietam, Hagerstown: John H. Nelson, 2004, pg. 363 [AotW citation 17749]

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