I have met a lot of the soldiers of the Maryland Campaign of 1862 and seen many of their stories, but this one may take the cake.
Irish-born Richard Rogers had been a shoemaker in Carroll (now East Carroll) Parish before the war and enlisted in New Orleans in May 1861 in the Tiger Bayou Rifles, later Company I of the 14th Louisiana Infantry.
He was left behind in a hospital in Frederick, MD when the Confederate army marched out on 12 September 1862 and was captured by Federal troops arriving that day or the next.
It’s what put him in the hospital that really surprises:
he was shot by some Col. [Colonel] in Maryland for misbehavior
Unfortunately, said Colonel was not named. I have found no direct documentation about this, but maybe I can narrow it down…
Colonel Richard Jones of the 14th Louisiana had resigned in August and Lieutenant Colonel David Zable probably led the regiment in Maryland. Though not a full Colonel, it could have been him.
The other regiments with the 14th Louisiana in H.T. Hays’ Brigade were the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th Louisiana regiments. In September 1862 these were commanded by :
- 5th: Colonel Henry Forno
- 6th: Colonel Henry Strong (killed at Sharpsburg 9/17)
- 7th: Colonel Davidson Penn (wounded at Sharpsburg)
- 8th: Major Trevanian Lewis (not a Colonel, wounded at Sharpsburg)
None of these officers left a report of operations on the Campaign – though I think it unlikely that a Colonel would mention such an incident in his official report.
I’ve not yet found a smoking gun, so to speak, but will dig a little further.
Private Rogers, by the way, survived his shooting, and a wound at Gettysburg, and was captured at Spotsylvania in May 1864. He almost immediately enlisted in a United States Regular Army unit, but there his trail goes cold.
Notes
The card at the top is a transcription of data about him from his company’s muster roll for September & October 1862. It is among Rogers’ Compiled Service Records at the National Archives. I found it online from fold3.
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