behind AotW

Here’s Private Samuel Lee Johnston who enlisted a month after his 17th birthday as a Private in Company E – the Indian Land Tigers – 17th South Carolina Infantry in November 1861. Johnston’s is one of the few happy-ending stories I’ve seen recently: he survived the fight at Turner’s Gap on 14 September 1862 and the rest of the war without apparent injury, and went home in April 1865 after the surrender at Appomattox Court House.

He lived to be 75 and had at least 9 children with two wives.

His photograph is a garage sale find shared on his Findagrave memorial by user Lanie in 2014.