Delaware in the Civil War, by Gary Laing

DELAWARE IN THE CIVIL WAR
by Gary Laing
presented at the Civil War Lodge of Research #1865 meeting on July 14, 2001, in Delaware City, Delaware

Many people ask, Was Delaware a Northern state or a Southern state during the Civil War? To be certain, there is no definitive answer to that question. Was Delaware north or south of the Mason-Dixon Line? Well, there are those who claim it is the only state east of the Mason-Dixon Line, but it is also north of the line along Delaware’s southern border. The line forms the “L” shape of Delaware’s eastern and southern border, and there are various points where the original markers can be seen.

At the time the War broke out, the dominant political party in Delaware was the Democratic Party. Three brothers, Willard, Eli and Gove Saulsbury from Sussex County, were one faction vying for control of the party, opposed by the Bayards, James and his son Thomas. The Saulsburys, from the southern part of the state, had plenty of power in state government. Both factions were opposed to emancipation.

The Bayards and the Saulsburys were united though, in their support of John C. Breckenridge – a Mason – in the 1860 election. In the aftermath of that election, as secession began south of the Mason-Dixon Line, representatives from Confederate states came to Delaware and urged the state to follow along and secede. Northern states, of course, advised Delaware to remain in the Union.

Willard Saulsbury spoke out in the State Senate on December 30^th, 1860. “My state having been the first to adopt the Constitution," he said, “will be the last to countenance any act calculated to lead to a separation of the state and of the glorious Union.”

In his address to the Delaware Legislature in January, 1861, Governor William Burton – who was a member of Temple Lodge #9 in Milford – spoke about what he called “the deplorable fact of political condition which threatened the perpetuity of the Union.” Burton expressed hope that the “dark clouds of discontent may be dispelled and the restoration of peace and the preservation of the Union is my most earnest prayer to the Ruler of the Universe.”

In a letter to Maryland Governor Hicks, Burton explained the reason the Union must be preserved, and it was fairly pragmatic. While most of Delaware’s citizens, he said, sympathized with the south, most of Delaware’s trade was with the north.

Residents of the State were divided in their sympathies. Many Delawareans left and served in the Confederate army. Even more enlisted in defense of the Union, and Delaware troops distinguished themselves at Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg and other battlefields. Delaware’s reputation for valor, earned by the Blue Hen Regiment that served under Brother Washington during the Revolution, was upheld during the Civil War.

On the homefront – division. Peaceful little Camden, a small town south of Dover, was a town in which one resident after Bull Run claimed “one-half of the town did not speak or associate with the other half.” One-time governor William Ross of Seaford, whose mansion today is a tourist attraction, decided to sit out the war abroad rather than face possible imprisonment as a traitor after his son enlisted in the Confederate army.

Two companies of troops from Maryland arrived suddenly in Dover in 1862 and disarmed reputedly pro-Confederate militiamen. Fighting between Maryland and Delaware was avoided when the Governor appointed Republican Henry Dupont, a West Point graduate and president of the family’s gunpowder company, to be Major-General of the State Militia. Dupont made sure only loyal companies received arms.

Even worse, during the 1862 election, Republican businessmen in Wilmington claimed their rivals planned to steal the election by intimidating Loyalists, and asked the government in Washington to send troops to ensure order at the polls. Two days prior to the election, troops from New York and Maryland landed at Seaford and went to key sites in Kent and Sussex counties while Delaware militia covered New Castle County. With but three counties, Delaware thus was covered. Maryland soldiers camped inside and outside of Delaware’s State House on The Green in Dover. Voting was close but the Loyalists prevailed.

While no Civil War battles were fought in Delaware, the State played a number of roles in the conflict. Fort Delaware, which we will visit today, is remembered still for its part. And Delaware was a key route in the Underground Railroad, led by a large number of Quakers that lived in the state.

The First State contributed heroes to the war.

Captain James Parke Postles, born in Camden, Delaware, lived in Wilmington. He was a member of Eureka Lodge #23 and served as Worshipful Master in 1891. At the Battle of Gettysburg, Postles volunteered to deliver an order to the Bliss farm under heavy enemy fire. For his actions, Postles received the Medal of Honor.

Colonel Thomas Alfred Smyth was born in Ireland and died in Virginia. He received all three degrees in one day at Washington Lodge #1 in Wilmington, under special dispensation from Grand Master Allen V. Lesley. Smyth was a Mason for just 28 days. He had seen distinguished service at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville as a major with the 1^st Delaware Infantry. Smyth also commanded the 2^nd Brigade, 3^rd Division of the 2^nd Corps at Gettysburg, seeing plenty of action in the area of the Bliss farm.

But in April, 1865 at Farmville, Virginia, Smyth was shot through the mouth by a sniper, with the bullet shattering his cervical vertebra. Two days later he died, on the very same day that Lee surrendered at Appomattox. Smyth thus became the last Federal general killed in the War and was promoted posthumously to Brevet Major General. He was buried in Brandywine cemetery in Wilmington, at a service attended by over one-hundred brothers from Lodges in Delaware, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York and Virginia.

Doctor William Marshall, born in Milton, Delaware, went for a while to California during the gold rush, but returned home a few years later. He was a member of Franklin Lodge #12 in Georgetown, and was Worshipful Master in 1859. The following year he was elected Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Delaware.

When war broke out, Marshall was commissioned a surgeon in the Union army and assigned to the 3^rd Delaware Volunteer Infantry. Captured during the siege of Front Royal in 1862, Marshall made a daring escape on horseback. Closely pursued and shot at, Marshall was left for dead in a ditch.

He made his way back to Union lines, but his injuries caused so much suffering that President Lincoln personally ordered him to take a leave of absence. Home with family and friends he recovered, and when the 6^th Delaware Infantry was formed, Marshall was commissioned senior surgeon.

After the war, Marshall demitted to Temple Lodge in Milford and had a distinguished medical career. He served as Grand Master of Delaware in 1886 and 1887, and died in 1900.

Another Delaware Mason of note was Brigadier General Alfred T.A. Torbert, for whom a Demolay chapter in Milford, Delaware is named. He was born in Georgetown, Delaware and attended West Point. Torbert was a member of Temple #9 in Milford, and he fought in almost every major battle from Manassas to Appomattox, and served as commander of cavalry and infantry, a very unusual occurance.

Frustrated at his treatment after the war, Torbert resigned and became a Minister to Central America for the U.S. government, as well as Consul General at Havana in Paris. He served in a number of diplomatic posts until 1880, when he became president of a Mexican mining company. En route to New York, his ship was wrecked off the coast of Florida. His remains were found and buried in Milford.

Of course there were hundreds of Delawareans who fought in the war. Some did not return.

In his final address, Grand Master Lesley on June 27, 1865, told his Brethren, “Never in history has Masonry shown so brightly, for everywhere the necessity of its benign influence has been recognized, and everywhere that influence has been in active exercise. On the battle field, in the hospital, in the prison, in camp, on the march, Masons have rarely forgotten their duty; while at home, it wrought in the Lodge, and in the individual brother in the ordinary walks of life. Never were its benefits more widely recognized by the profane, who by thousands asked and received admittance into the order.”

“That a vast amount of human suffering has been relieved and prevented is patent, and with the increase of membership, we trust and must pray that, with more hands and hearts in the work, in like proportion more good may result.”

BILIOGRAPHY

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