Josiah Keplinger

Third of a cooper's seven sons, in 1860 he was an 18 year old living with his parents David and Catherine (Kate) and 5 brothers at Keedysville near the middle bridge over the Antietam near Sharpsburg, MD. Giving his occupation as miller, he enlisted in Baltimore on 21 June 1861 and mustered on 9 July as a Private in Company C, 2nd Maryland Infantry. He was 5 feet, 4 1/2 inches tall, with dark complexion, hazel eyes, and black hair. He was promoted to 5th Corporal in about February 1862.

He was with his company in Maryland and

On the advance from South Mountain [after 14 September 1862] Sergt. Keplinger Co. C, whose home was near Readysville [Keedysville], saw the contending forces engaged -- a battery in action about his fathers house. He was offered “leave” to succor and tender assistance to his family, but, as his command expected to be engaged, declined and remained with it until after the battle [at Antietam on 17 September], when he sought his parents and found them uninjured, although they had remained in the house during the severe shelling.

He reenlisted as a Veteran Volunteer on 2 January 1864, then 2nd Corporal of his company. By May he was acting company Commissary Sergeant and was promoted to 4th Sergeant on 10 July. He was appointed First Sergeant on 1 January 1865 but was killed in action by a gunshot

in the assault upon Petersburg, Va., April 2nd, 1865. In the charge on Fort Mahone he fell near its ditch and must have died instantly. In death he rested upon his knees where he had fallen, his head bowed and touching the ground in front. From the parapet of the fort, which he faced could be read upon the cap which still remained upon his head the legend in bright yellow metal characters “2nd Md.”

In 1891 his mother began receiving a US pension based on her son's service; she died in 1901.

His service from his Compiled Service Records,1 online from fold3. The quotes above from Colonel B F Taylor's typescript History of the Second Maryland Volunteer Infantry and Veteran Volunteers (1895), now in the Maryland Center for History and Culture (formerly Maryland Historical Society) [finding aid]. Personal details from family genealogists and the US Census of 1860. Thanks to Tim Snyder for the pointer to Keplinger, for sharing those quotes, and for the information about his brother Frisby.

William Frisby Keplinger (1849-1946) was 13 at the time of the battle, and later related that he fetched a drink of water from a nearby spring for Abraham Lincoln during the President's visit to the battlefield in October 1862.

David Keplinger's brother Jonathan - Josiah's uncle - lived near Sharpsburg ...

Mr. John Keplinger, who resided in a house that stood near the east end of the Bloody Lane, had gathered, after the battle, quite a number of shells and had broken 99 without any serious damage, but the 100th one exploded and tore him up so badly that he died from it [in April 1863]. A Miss Newcomer, who resided with her parents at the mill nearby, now in the West, on a recent visit said she assisted Dr. Biggs in dressing his wounds and he was terribly torn from the explosion.
- Stories of Antietam, as told to Mr. [O.T.] Reilly by veterans and eye-witnesses of the battle. In R.C. Miller's Battlefield of Antietam (1906).

c. 1842; Washington County, MD

04/02/1865; Petersburg, VA