Henry Otis Spalding

A 25 year old merchant's son from Sterling, CT, he enlisted on 3 September 1861 and mustered as a Corporal in Company F, 8th Connecticut Infantry on 23 September.

He was sightly wounded in the head in action at Antietam on 17 September 1862 and was promoted to Sergeant the next day.

He was reduced to Private while absent sick, on 1 November 1863, but transferred as a Sergeant to the 41st Company, 2nd Battalion, Veteran Reserve Corps on 2 December 1863. He was discharged at the end of his term of enlistment on 22 September 1864.

In 1870 he was a bookkeeper in Providence, RI and by 1880 he was a clerk in the post office there. He was admitted to the Soldiers' Home in Togus, ME on 8 January 1883, then age 47, and except for 4 brief furlough periods, was there to his death of pneumonia on Christmas Day 1901.

His service from the Record.1 Wound detail from Major Ward's after-action report, as Henry O Spaulding. Personal details from family genealogists, the US Census of 1850, 1870, and 1880, and the Historical Registers of the National Homes for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, online from fold3. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Lucy Martin Russell (later Dow, 1846-1918) at Christmas 1865 and they had 3 daughters by 1873. She married again in 1881, presumably after a divorce. He married again, Carrie Addie Patten Higgins (1855-), and they had 3 children between 1888 and 1897 (!).

His brother Frank Willis Spalding (1839-1904) was also a Sergeant in Company F, was promoted to First Sergeant on 18 September 1862 (probably opening a spot for Henry), and was commissioned 2nd Lieutenant of Company E on 23 December 1862.

10/19/1835; Plainfield, CT

12/25/1901; Togus, ME; burial in Togus National Cemetery, Chelsea, ME