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W.S. Ely
(1842 - 1911)
Home State: New York
Education: University of Rochester (1861), College of Physicians and Surgeons of New York, Class of 1867
Branch of Service: Infantry
Unit: 108th New York Infantry
Before Antietam
Enrolled at age 21 and mustered as Assistant Surgeon, 108th New York Infantry on 18 August 1862.
On the Campaign
He was with his Regiment on the battlefield at Antietam, treating wounded soldiers of his and other units. He remained at Sharpsburg into 1863 at the Smoketown Hospital there.
The rest of the War
Promoted Surgeon, US Volunteers 17 September 1863, and served at the US Army General Hospital, Annapolis, MD to the end of the War. He was honored by Brevet to Lieutenant Colonel, USA on 6 October 1865.
After the War
He was a physician practicing in Rochester, New York from 1867 until his death in 1911.
References & notes
Basic information from Washburn1. Service details from the State of New York2. His photograph from one in the collection of the New York State Military Museum. More detail from the introduction to a collection of his papers and ephemera - including a set of surgical instruments presented to him at Antietam by Dr. B.A. Vanderkieft - at the Edward G. Miner Library, University of Rochester.
Birth
1842; Rochester, NY
Death
01/15/1911; Rochester, NY; burial in Mount Hope Cemetery, Rochester, NY
1 Washburn, George H., A Complete Military History and Record of the 108th Regiment N.Y. Vols., Rochester (NY): Press of E.R. Andrews, 1894, pp, 215 - 227 [AotW citation 8881]
2 State of New York, Adjutant-General, Annual Report of the Adjutant General of the State of New York [year]: Registers of the [units], 43 Volumes, Albany: James B. Lyon, State Printer, 1893-1905, Issue 34 (for 1903), pg. 212 [AotW citation 8928]