behind AotW

John S. Jardine was born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1805 but was a farmer in Pennsylvania and a married father by 1833. He had 9 children altogether with his Pennsylvania-born wife Mary Moore Custer, the last born in 1852 in Lower Merion outside Philadelphia.

Ten years later, in July 1862, his third child and third son – 21 year old Amos C. Jardine – married Mary Ann Pearce, who was about 5 years his senior and very pregnant.

Very soon after the wedding, on July 21st, Amos and his older brother Bethel enlisted in West Chester in Company G of the 124th Pennsylvania Infantry. On August 12th they and their Company mustered for nine months service in Harrisburg. They were hurriedly equipped and packed off to Washington, DC, arriving there on the 15th. On the 17th they were at Camp Stanton just across the river in Arlington, VA.

Also on August 17th, Amos’ new wife Mary Ann Jardine bore him a daughter she named Mary. I very much hope Amos got a letter about that before the regiment left camp on 6 September on their march into Maryland.

They arrived near Sharpsburg on the 16th and the rookies of the 124th were in vicious combat in and near the now-famous Miller Cornfield on the morning of September 17th. It was there, exactly one month after his daughter was born, that Amos Jardine was mortally wounded. He died a few days later.

I’m glad to report that Amos’ widow and child survived him and had full lives – Mary Ann remarried in 1869 and daughter Mary lived to 1941 and had a son of her own.