behind AotW

This is Private Drake Conklin Knapp shortly after he enlisted in Company H of the 51st New York Infantry in September 1862. At 37, he was slightly older than the average new recruit.

About two weeks later he was wounded at Antietam, probably during the charge of the “two 51sts” (NY and PA) across the lower bridge over Antietam Creek.

This photograph, which was once pinned to the wall in the State Capitol building in Albany, is now online thanks to the New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs, NY, via the New York Heritage portal.

Elanson Knapp Teed enlisted in September 1861 in the 51st New York Infantry, and probably had this picture taken at that time.

He was wounded at Antietam in 1862 and in the Wilderness in 1864, and was promoted successively from Private to First Sergeant by 1865.

This photograph is courtesy of Bill Watts, who probably found it on ebay and shared it on Teed’s memorial.

Private John S Downing of Company B, 51st New York Infantry was wounded at Antietam on 17 September 1862 – probably in the charge over what became known as Burnside Bridge – and survived the war, a Sergeant when he mustered out in July 1865.

After the war, though, his life took a terrible turn. In December 1878 his wife was found dead in their tenement home in Brooklyn, badly beaten, and he was charged with her murder. He pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter and on 17 January 1879 was sentenced to life in prison. He spent the years 1879 through 1903 in Sing Sing Prison in New York.

[touch for the full article]

He was finally released on New Year’s Day 1904, by then 72 years old, after a pardon – his sentence commuted by New York’s Governor Benjamin B Odell, Jr.

The Governor noted that

The long article here is from the New York Sun of 22 January 1903, page 10, online from the Library of Congress.

This brief notice of his pardon is from the Highland [VA] Recorder of 8 January 1904.