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E.C. Baird
(1836 - 1874)
Home State: Pennsylvania
Branch of Service: Staff
Unit: 3rd Division, 1st Corps
Before Antietam
He was the second son and youngest child of Irish-born Thomas James Baird (1794-1842; USMA 1814), who came to America about 1800 and was Captain, 3rd United States Artillery (to 1828) and Captain of the National Light Infantry of Pottsville (1838-42). Edward's grandfather Henry Samuel Baird (1766-1847) and uncle Henry Samuel Baird, Jr. (1800-1875) were pioneering merchant and attorney, respectively, in Wisconsin from the 1820s.
Edward was a 25 year old bookseller in Pottsville, PA when he enlisted there on 22 April 1861, and he mustered the same day as 3rd Sergeant of Company H, 6th Pennsylvania Infantry for 3 months' service. He mustered out with them in Harrisburg on 26 July. He enrolled again, on 20 August 1861 and mustered as 2nd Lieutenant of Company H, 48th Pennsylvania Infantry on 19 September. He was appointed Captain and Assistant Adjutant General, US Volunteers on 19 September 1861 and assigned to Brigadier General George G Meade's staff.
On the Campaign
He was Assistant Adjutant General to General Meade on the Maryland Campaign of 1862.
The rest of the War
He was AAG to Major General Abner Doubleday at Chancellorsville in May 1863 and at Gettysburg in July, and was promoted to Major on 18 September 1863. He resigned his commission on 25 February 1865.
After the War
By 1870 he was a manufacturer of window sashes & doors in Green Bay, WI.
More on the Web
His service basics from Bates,1 the Card File,2 and Heitman.3 His service in Maryland from Meade's report. Personal details from family genealogists, the Blue Book of Schuylkill County (1916), and the US Census of 1870. His gravesite is on Findagrave. His picture from a CDV hosted by John Hoptak, originally from Ronn Palm.
He married Emily Jane Thompson (1838-1880) in October 1866 and they had a daughter Elizabeth Carey "Bessie" Baird (1867-1930).
Birth
04/03/1836; Pottsville, PA
Death
11/14/1874; Ashland, VA; burial in Charles Baber Cemetery, Pottsville, PA
1 Bates, Samuel Penniman, History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-65, Harrisburg: State of Pennsylvania, 1868-1871 [AotW citation 32160]
2 Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Adjutant-General, Pennsylvania Civil War Veterans' Card File, 1861-1866, Published <2005, first accessed 01 July 2005, <http://www.digitalarchives.state.pa.us/archive.asp?view=ArchiveIndexes&ArchiveID=17> [AotW citation 32161]
3 Heitman, Francis Bernard, Historical Register and Dictionary of the United States Army 1789-1903, 2 volumes, Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 1903, Vol. 1, p. 183 [AotW citation 32162]