behind AotW

This faded photograph is of Oneil Savant, wife Eliza, and sons Jean Baptiste and Louis, taken in about 1874. By then he was “in indigent circumstances” and blind. The picture was contributed to his Findagrave memorial by Ethel Sacker.

He was a farmer in St. Landry Parish before the war and enlisted in 1861 at age 17 or 18. As a Corporal in the 8th Louisiana Infantry, Savant was wounded and captured at Sharpsburg in September 1862. He returned to duty in October 1863 only to be captured and a prisoner again, from November to near the end of the war.