The following letter was written by H. Alvin Hitchcock (1841-1864, the youngest son of Otis Hitchcock (1795-1873) and Sarah Delano (1796-1877) of Randolph, Cattaraugus county, New York.

Alvin was 21 years old when he enlisted in August 1862 as a private in Co. A, 154th New York Infantry. When he enlisted, he was described as a brown-haired, blue-eyed, single farmer. The 154th New York was recruited in the counties of Chautauqua and Cattaraugus, organized at Jamestown, mustered into the U. S. service on Sept. 24-26, 1862 and left the state shortly afterward. They were assigned to the 1st brigade, 2nd (Steinwehr’s) division, Howard’s 11th corps, which was stationed during the fall of 1862 in Northern Virginia in the vicinity of Centerville. The regiment went into winter quarters with the corps at Stafford, Va., and suffered severely in the disaster which befell the corps at the Battle of Chancellorsville, losing 32 killed, 81 wounded and 115 captured and missing. 

In his letter, Alvin gives a detailed eyewitness account of the Battle of Chancellorsville, from the time that his company helped the 15th New York Engineers lay the canvass pontoon bridge over the Rappahannock river at Kelly’s Ford, until his capture on the day after Stonewall Jackson’s flank attack that rolled up the 11th Corps. From his letter we learn that he was wounded while standing with others of the 154th New York on the “Buschbeck line” which held back Jackson’s men for over an hour while the high command attempted to stem the chaos of the fleeing soldiers.

For an excellent article describing the events Alvin witnessed and wrote about in his letter, readers are referred to Baptism of Fire: The 154th New York in the Chancellorsville Campaign by Mark H. Dunkelman published on American Battlefield Trust on 1 August 2022. I should also note that Dunkleman devoted an entire chapter to Alvin Hitchcock’s sad story in his book, War’s Relentless Hand: Twelve Tales of Civil War Soldiers (LSU Press, 2006)….After Alvin was exchanged and rejoined the 154th New York, he began to show signs of insanity. He was sent to the Government Hospital for the Insane at Washington, and from there–after a brief visit home–to the New York State Lunatic Asylum in Utica, where he died on July 13, 1864, of “Exhaustion–acute Mania.

Transcription

Camp Convalescent
Near Alexandria, Virginia
[Approx. May 20, 1863]

Dear Parents and friends,

It is with pleasure that I take my pen in hand once more to inform you of my welfare & whereabouts. I am a paroled prisoner of war and I am as well as usual, hoping these few lines will find you all well and enjoying yourselves.

I will try and give you a kind of a description of our spring campaign. We left our winter camp about the middle of April and went to a place called Kelly’s Ford. We lay there in camp about two weeks when we got orders to make an advance on the enemy. Our regiment was ordered out just at night of the 28th of April to go and help lay the pontoon bridge. Our company and one other company were detailed to help the [15th New York] Engineers lay down the bridge & the rest of the regiment crossed over to guard us while we were at work. It was the Rappahannock river that I am speaking of now.

We got the bridge done about 11 o’clock at night and our regiment come back and we went back to camp and stayed till morning. Then we got orders to have three days rations in our haversacks and five more in our knapsacks, making in all eight days rations. And we had to have 60 rounds of cartridges, 40 in our boxes and 20 in our knapsacks. So you see that we were pretty well loaded down with hardtack and lead.

Well we marched down and crossed the river and lay there that day till the next morning. Then we got orders to strike tents and march. Our brigade was guard of the baggage train so you see we had to be in the rear. We marched till noon when we came to the Rapidan river. We crossed on a narrow footbridge but the train had to ford it and it being a very rapid stream, it took till about 4 o’clock p.m. before we got ready to start again. Then we started and marched clear through to where we had the battle before we camped. We marched about 25 miles that [day] by marching till 11 o’clock at night and you better believe that I was a tired boy that night if I ever was.

Well we stayed there till about 3 o’clock the next day. Then we got orders to form in line of battle. We could hear the enemy firing. They were fighting then only about two miles from us. We were marched 20 rods out across the road to another field, then our company and another company had to go and guard the pioneers while they were throwing up breastworks. We had to lay on our arms that night. The rebs were shelling the woods just about 150 rods to our right. We could see and hear the shells burst just as plain as day but the next day was when we had our fun.

[It was] just about 5 o’clock p.m. that Old Stonewall Jackson come in on our rear and you had better believe that we had a rather warm time of it for a little while. I think we were managed rather bad on the start. We were formed in by divisions, closed en masse, and marched in front of our breastworks & ordered to lay down. We lay there about five minutes when we were ordered to fall back to the breastworks. We fell back there & waited till they come up in sight & then we blazed away at them, but they [had] so many more in number than we did that they rushed right up and flanked us both right and left, and we got the order to retreat, and then was when I got hit but it did not lame me much till the next day. So I got off the field and went about a mile and lay down and slept good till the next morning when the rebs made another attack on our men & I happened to be lying right where they come in, so I was right between the two fires. But I was behind an old log from the rebs fire. The balls struck the log pretty freely but I was alright. But it was not long before they had me prisoner. I shall have to close. Write soon. — H. A. H

[to] Otis and Sarah [Hitchcock]