Pike County GaArchives News.....Interesting Letter To The Pike County Journal December 4, 1925
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Lynn B. Cunningham http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00011.html#0002535 July 9, 2007, 10:49 pm

The Pike County Journal December 4, 1925

Brooks, Ga., Nov. 27, 1925
Editor Pike County Journal
My dear sir:

In the list you published of Co. ‘A’ 13th Ga., contains something like 100 
names. While the old list, kept by Sergeant Caldwell, contains something like 
150 or 60. 

The company left Zebulon in June 1861 with about 115 men. Many recruits came 
to us in winter, 61.

The Company fought something like thirty battles. The first man wounded was 
Jesse Green, shot through the neck, on Green Bryer River in north western Va.

The first man killed was James Pilkenton, killed in Picket fight at 
Thunderbolt 7 miles from Savannah on river.

We lost several in the 7 days fight around Richmond, 7 Pines, Frazer’s farm 
and Malvern Hill. It cost Lee 5000 men to force them back from Malvern Hill to 
their gunboats. McClelland felt so good and safe when he got on a gunboat he 
said every family should have a gunboat.

When I can copy it I will send you a list I have of those killed and where 
killed, so far as I can recollect.

James Manry was the only man of Co., “A” that was buried with military honors. 
He died at Hamilton’s Crossing, Va. I was one of the firing squad.

We were not in the school boys battle. In ‘64 General John C. Breckenridge, 
one of our best generals and smartest men, was in the Valley with a small 
force, and old Sedgwick was coming down on him with a large force. Most of the 
Confederate troops were with Lee in the Wilderness. Breckenridge sent the 
commander of the Military School at Lexington, 100 miles from New Market to 
take all the boys that were old enough and come and help him. He ordered the 
boys, some 250 or 300, in line and ordered all that were 15 years and younger 
to step out. He took the older boys and made all haste to New Market. When 
they reached Breckenridge he assigned them in the second line but when old 
Sedgwick formed his lines they over-reached the Confederate line, Breckenridge 
conceived the idea that it would be better for him to attack, it would give 
the impression he had been re-inforced [sp].

As they marched in line of battle the boys had to march through an open wheat 
field and drew the fire of the Yankee artillery. Forty of those brave boys 
were killed and wounded. One shell killed four of them but they marched on 
like veterans and gained a victory and drove the Yankees back.

Almost two years ago they decided they would fight a sham battle there so they 
advertised they wanted all men who fought on both sides to be there. The old 
man who fired the first shot in battle fired the first shot in the sham 
battle. There were over fifty thousand people to see the sham battle. They 
came in trains and cars. New Market during the war was not larger than Zebulon 
is now.

Please excuse the old man for transpassing [?]. Be a good boy.

J.Wilson Shivers

P.S. Excuse me for bothering you with my poor scribbling. We had two men shot 
through the neck and lived. Jesse Green was shot through the neck in West Va. 
George Reeves, of Zebulon, was shot through the neck at Sharpsburg, Md., and 
got up and walked off the field unaided. In neither case did the ball break 
the bone or cut the jugular vein.

[Transcribed 7/9/2007 Lynn Cunningham]


Additional Comments:

John Wilson Shivers - Co. A, 13th Regiment, Georgia Volunteer Infantry, Evans' 
Brigade, Gordon's Division, Army Of Northern Virginia, C.S.A., Pike County, 
Georgia, "Confederate Guards" Private July 8, 1861. Wounded at Sharpsburg, Md. 
September 17, 1862. Wounded and captured at Cedar Creek, Va. October 19,1864. 
Released at Point Lookout, Md. June 16,1865. (Born in Georgia January 23,1845. 
Died at Brooks, Ga. December 25, 1925.)

Although Mr. Shivers promised to send his list of the soldiers and where they 
were killed, he died less than a month later.



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