ANDREW B. CHISHOLM -- 96th INFANTRYTHE TRUE STORY FOR A LETTER - CCHA has been transcribing a set of about100 letters from a Civil War soldier, Francis Prairie, who enlisted inthe 96th Infantry in Chazy in February 1862. He faithfully wrote hometo his wife and often mentioned contemporaneous events. One such eventwas the drowning of their orderly sergeant. He mentioned it in hisletter of May 24, 1863 -- the quote is exactly the way it is written inthe letter."We Burried our ordly Sergeant to dayYesterday at half Past 3 o'clock in the afternoon he got out the companyto drill and in A very short time he was deadIt was very warm yesterday here and the Lieutenant told the Boys theymight go into the - Bath But he told them that any one of them that anythat could not swim must not go inSo, the ordly went in and he had A hold of the Boat and all to once helet go the Boat and he went right to the Bottom and he never came upagainThe place where he went down was thirty feet deep and they could not gethim outThey got out him last night about dark But all the world could not savehim thentime was come for him to die for him to dieour Ordly Sergeant's name was Andrew Chisholm.I presume you have seen him."In Andrew B. Chisholm's Muster Roll Abstract, the date of his drowningis noted as being July 10, 1863. Who are you going to believe a letterwritten at the time, or a government record?Andrew, a married farmer born in 1832 in New Hampshire, enlisted inEllenburg on October 20, 1861. He was mustered in as a sergeant onNovember 21st and fought with them through Virginia in 1862. At theend of the year, they went on the Expedition from New Berne toGoldsboro, NC. In the spring of 1863, they were still in North Carolina,and it was here that he drowned in the Roanoke River at a camp nearPlymouth. He was pronounced dead by the regiment's surgeon, François X.D'Avignon.
