Maine at War: March 2020

Here’s what our friend Brian Swartz was up to in March at his blog, Maine at War:

March 4, 2020: Seven days in May shatter the 7th Maine

A week’s fighting in the Wilderness and at Spotsylvania Courthouse decimates the 7th Maine Infantry. As printed in Maine newspapers, the regiment’s casualty list includes 261 men.

March 11, 2020: Death knocked often at the chaplain’s door

Reverend Henry C. Henries, a Maine minister, served capably as the chief Army chaplain at the Annapolis-based United States General Hospital. He cared for the sick, wounded, and dying — and then one day death came looking for him/

March 18, 2020: That was my last picket line

While bringing the 20th Maine Infantry home to muster out in ’65, Col. Ellis Spear deployed armed pickets to make sure his men stayed out of trouble — not that they didn’t seek it!

March 25, 2020: Louisa May Alcott and a Mainer witness a soldier’s death

While working as a nurse at a Washington, D.C. hospital, Louisa May Alcott stood beside a hospital bed and witnessed her first death. She was not alone.