Joseph Newton Steele

A 26 year old merchant in Rock Hill, York District, he enlisted as Sergeant, Company H, 12th South Carolina Infantry, date not given.

He was slightly wounded in the head in action at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.

He was appointed Sergeant-Major of the regiment, date not given, and was wounded again, at Gettysburg, PA in July 1863 and in the Wilderness, VA in May 1864.

In 1870 he was farming with his father near Yorkville, SC but was a laborer in Yam Hill, a mining camp in Deer Lodge County, Montana in 1880. He was still listed as a miner there in 1900.

His service from the Rolls,1 as J.W. Steele, and the index to his Compiled Service Records via the Historical Data Systems database. His Sharpsburg wound detail from a casualty list in the Yorkville Enquirer of 8 October 1862. Personal details from family genealogists and the US Census of 1860-1900. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Martha Jane Partlow (1836-1862) in December 1858 and they had two sons. He married the widow Mary Garner Brice Roddey (1839-1872) in 1871, and she died soon after their daughter Lelia was born in 1872. She had a daughter from her previous marriage. He married a third time, to Sarah Martha Alexander (1848-1930) in 1872, and they had 3 children.

He was one of 4 brothers and two Steele cousins in Company H.

09/18/1833; York District, SC

10/09/1917; burial in Ebenezer Presbyterian Church Cemetery, Rock Hill, SC