A Regiment of New York Frenchmen at Tenleytown

On January 8, 1862 President and Mrs. Lincoln attended a celebration hosted by the 55th New York Infantry at Tennalytown, D.C. to mark their receipt of a new regimental flag.  Newspaper reports from the winter of 1861-62 are full of stories about various regiments being presented with regimental flags in events attended by prominent home state politicians.  What made this particular  flag presentation unique was that the regiment was comprised heavily of French-born New Yorkers who had answered their adopted homeland's call for volunteers.  The flag presentation ceremony was scheduled for January 8th to coincide with the anniversary of the battle of New Orleans, a battle in which French Creoles had fought with Americans against the British.  This at a time when Washington was stridently trying to ensure that England and France did not intervene in the war on the Confederacy's behalf.  Besides, this regiment also knew how to dine.

Photograph of the camp of the 55th New York Infantry, near Tennallytown, D.C.  At the time, the regiment was part of General Peck's Division. Civil War era records often spell the area as "Tennallytown."   (Library of Congress)

Christmas in Georgetown, 1861

150 years ago, Christmas was observed by soldiers encamped around Washington, including those in Georgetown. (See All Not So Quiet Along the Potomac for a good overview of how Christmas was observed throughout the military camps)  Somewhere between 7,000 to 15,000 Union soldiers-- including those in hospitals-- would be quartered in Georgetown, a town whose residents' loyalty to the Union was suspect.  For many soldiers, this would be their first Christmas away from home and for some it would be their last.

The Washington Evening Star reported that the holiday was "very generally and very properly observed" in Georgetown.  The Baltimore Sun noted that the retail stores on both sides of the Potomac were doing brisk business and that despite the war, "it seems all are bent on the full enjoyment of the holiday season, and there is every indication of a merry Christmas among our citizens and in the camps of the soldiers."  The day opened with celebratory gunfire and firecrackers, according to Washington diarist Horatio Nelson Taft.  To preserve the public peace, saloons in Washington were closed all evening.

In Union camps and hospitals near Georgetown, soldiers decorated their quarters with evergreens and held religious services.  The Catholic Church's Christmas services were well attended.  Soldiers were relieved from the monotony of drill on this day and feasted on turkeys, chickens and other meats.  Many were able to open packages delivered from home.

Less fortunate that Christmas Day were the workmen employed on converting the Aqueduct Bridge, which connected Georgetown to the Virginia shore, into a military roadway.  They were yielded to "military necessity" by working on the holiday to lay the bridge's flooring.

A 1861 view of Georgetown taken from the Virginia side of the Potomac..  The Aqueduct Bridge, located just north of today's Key Bridge, was being retrofitted with a plank roadway in December 1861 to facilitate military traffic.  Georgetown University is in the background up on the hill.  The Union soldiers in the foreground are posing on Mason's Island (now known as Roosevelt Island). (Library of Congress)


Sources
The Baltimore Sun
Diary of Horatio Nelson Taft, December 24, 1861 (online at Library of Congress)
Washington Evening Star, December 26, 1861.
 

U.S. Marine Corps Barracks

Today's 236th birthday of the  U.S. Marine Corps is an auspicious time to examine the role that the detachment at the U.S. Marine Corps Barracks in Washington played during the Civil War.  Ironically, the Marines' most famous action during the "recent unpleasantries," actually occurred two years before the war's outbreak  when Marines summoned from Washington put down John Brown's Harpers Ferry insurrection.

Harper's Weekly June 1861 engraving of "The United States Marines and Marine Barracks at Washington."