BENJAMIN FRANKLIN T. WOODWARD -- 86th INFANTRYFOUGHT ON THE PENINSULA CAMPAIGN - In 1860, twenty-one-year-old Benjamin Franklin T. Woodward was living on his parents farm in Beekmantown. He was born to Vermonter, Theophilus Woodward, and his wife, Polly Hicks who was born in Massachusetts, two brothers and a hired girl, Delia Garrow.Captain Darius M. Parsons personally recruited Benjamin to be his 2nd sergeant in Company B of the 96th Infantry. About six weeks after his enlistment, he was mustered into the regiment on November 21, 1861 in Plattsburgh. They drilled at the Plattsburgh Barracks until March 1862, when they left about 800 strong for Washington by train to serve for three years.Benjamin's whole military career was spent in Virginia. The 96th was part of General McClellan's Peninsula Campaign which started when they left the capital by ship and sailed to Fortress Monroe at the mouth of the James River. The objective of the campaign was to capture Richmond by fighting their way northwest up to the capital of the Confederacy.McClellan ordered his 102,000+-man Army of the Potomac to prepare for the Siege of Yorktown and were there from April 17th to May 4th. Just before the siege preparations were completed, the Confederates, under the direct command of General Joseph Johnston, began a withdrawal toward Richmond. The 96th was engaged at the Battle of Williamsburg on May 5th, after which the Confederates continued their withdrawal. The regiment followed them and had their first major battle at Fair Oaks where they had 58 casualties in a surprise attack by Johnston and his troops.Johnston was wounded by a Union artillery shell fragment at Fair Oaks and Robert E. Lee was his replacement. Lee reorganized the Army of Northern Virginia and prepared for offensive action in the final battles of June 25 to July 1, which are known as the Seven Days Battles. The regiment had 81 casualties during the Seven Days' Battles -- 80 of them captured by the enemy. Lee kept McClellan from reaching Richmond and the Army of the Potomac retreated to Harrison's Landing on the James about 25 miles to the southeast.The 96th then withdrew to Camp Hamilton just outside Fortress Monroe. Benjamin was discharged for disability on November 10, 1862, at Suffolk, VA, just before the regiment was ordered to North Carolina.He returned to Clinton County and farmed for the rest of his life. When he died in 1912, his wife, Helen Bowron, laid him to rest in the Glenwood Cemetery in Champlain next to their daughter who died in 1885. Helen received her Widows Pension starting in 1916 and received it for ten years before she died in Rouses Point in 1926.
