Maj Nathan S Babcock

14 February 2020

Captain Nathan S Babcock of Company K commanded the undersized 77th New York Infantry at Antietam as senior officer present.

I entered the battle of Antietam Creek on the 17th instant with not more than 175 men all told, most of the regiment having been on picket for two days, a part of which joined us just as the brigade was ordered to charge upon the rebels … (from his Report)

This excellent photograph of him is from the New York State Military Museum, online from New York Heritage.

Babcock tried the Pennsylvania oil business after the war but “went under.” He then went West, settling in 1871 on a farm near Exeter, Nebraska. He’s circled in the picture below, from an Exeter Township history [pdf] in the Geneva Community Grange #403’s The Fillmore County Story (1968).

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