John Pendleton Hite

In 1860 he was 19 years old and lived with 4 siblings on his parents farm near Luray in Page County, VA. He enlisted there as a Private in Company H, 33rd Virginia on 1 June 1861.

He was captured at Sharpsburg on 16 September 1862:

We were taken in the evening before the general engagement. I went in with them but as I have not been exchanged yet to a certainty the Capt. sent me to the rear. I went out under a strong cannonading, had many shells to burst all around me, one solid cannon ball rolled between my legs; supposed it would have broken my leg if it had struck it ...

Capt. Walton will make out a report of my being captured, will send it to Jackson, then if I have not been exchanged I will be released immediately. I have not taken a gun yet, of course the officers will not let me until they know I have been exchanged.

He was appointed (acting) Sergeant Major of the regiment for two months in November and December 1862. He was mortally wounded at Gettysburg, PA on 2 July 1863 and died nearby on 5 July 1863.

He was originally buried where he died, at a field hospital on Henry A Picking's (1817-1883) farm near Gettysburg, and was reinterred in Hollywood Cemetery in June 1872.

His service from his Compiled Service Records,1 online from fold3, with death and burial information from the Buseys.2 Personal details from family genealogists, the US Census of 1860, and a letter he wrote home on 21 September 1862, source of the quote above. His gravesite is on Findagrave, source of his picture from a photograph of unknown provenance contributed by Bryan Watson.

The Painful News I Have to Write, Letters and Diaries of Four Hite Brothers of Page County in the Service of the Confederacy was compiled and edited by Harlan R. Jessup (Baltimore: Butternut and Blue, 1998).

Another wartime photograph of him, holding a North-Hall carbine, is in the collection of the University of Virginia [finding aid].

11/15/1840; Page County, VA

07/05/1863; Gettysburg, PA; burial in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, VA