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J.B. Clark
Home State: Pennsylvania
Command Billet: Commanding Regiment
Branch of Service: Infantry
Before Antietam
"The Rev. John B. Clark, at that time pastor of the Second United Presbyterian Church, in Allegheny [PA], and a clergyman of nearly eleven years' standing, at the close of his services on Sabbath, the 5th of August [1862], requested those of his congregation who were willing to enlist in the national armies, to meet him in the basement of the church on the following Monday evening. Many came, and in three days' time three companies were organized, of one of which, Mr. Clark was elected Captain."1
By the end of August the 123rd Regiment had been organized for 6-months' service, and Clark was appointed Colonel.
On the Campaign
He and the 123rd arrived at the battlefield of Antietam on the morning of 18 September, after a forced march from Frederick which began on the afternoon of the 17th.
The rest of the War
He led the regiment in a charge on Marye's Heights at Fredericksburg in December. He and the Regiment mustered out at the expiration of their 9-month term of service on 13 May 1863, at Harrisburg, PA.
After the War
He returned to Allegheny and his congregation, and was on the Presbyterian board of missions to the freedmen of the South (July 1863-64).
References & notes
The photograph above is from Under the Maltese Cross2.
1 Bates, Samuel Penniman, History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-65, Harrisburg: State of Pennsylvania, 1868-1871 [AotW citation 116]
2 Porter, John T. , Financial Secretary, and Charles F. McKenna, compiler & editor, Under the Maltese Cross, Antietam to Appomattox, the Loyal Uprising in Western Pennsylvania, 1861-1865: Campaigns of the 155th Pennsylvania Regiment, Pittsburgh: 155th Regimental Association, 1910, pg. 52 [AotW citation 1063]