Pure Heart

F. Quigley William

Description

In the summer of 1862, as Union morale ebbed low with home front division over war costs, coming emancipation, and demoralizing battlefield losses, 24-year-old William White Dorr enlisted as a lieu- tenant in the 121st Pennsylvania Volunteers, a new Union regiment organizing in Philadelphia. His father, the Reverend Benjamin Dorr, rector of Christ Church, Philadelphia, strived to prevent divisions in his congregation from sundering that Episcopal church historically tied to the nation's founding.William F. Quigley Jr. presents a narrative that remarkably encapsulates much of the North's experience of the war. Reverend Benjamin Dorr was one of the most important clergymen of the era, who strived to hold his warring parishioners intact. His efforts paralleled Lincoln's far greater but comparable challenge to preserve the Union. "The Nation's Church" was torn apart from within between a faction of Pennsylvania's leading anti-emancipation Democrats and a faction of the city's and state's leading Republicans. Like Lincoln, Dorr invoked a temperate faith apart from the civil religion with which most Americans crusaded against each other. Dorr prayed that war might be avoided. But, when war came, he stood faithfully in support of the Union and of the war as Lincoln waged it, emancipation included, even unto the most grievous of losses.William White Dorr was a young officer in a storied Union infantry regiment whose brave stand at Gettysburg was pivotal in the Union's preservation. Ten months later, wearing the second bar of an army captain, the rector's son would lead his company once more into the Wilderness, one of the most brutal and bloody campaigns of the war.By war's end, many Philadelphians came to praise the spirit of charity and forgiveness exemplified by Reverend Dorr. He was their shepherd through that political, constitutional, economic, and religious crisis, and to honor his memory they erected stone monuments in "The Nation's Church" to him and to Captain Dorr, "A Christian and a Patriot, 'Faithful unto death.'"Clearly and engagingly written, Pure Heart is unique in its narrative synthesis of home front political divisions and frontline infantry experiences. The emotional heart of the story lies in Reverend Dorr's relationship with his soldier son, poignantly revealed in a recently discovered collection of his son's wartime letters.

Sujets

• Histoire
• USA
• United States of America
• History of the Americas
• History of religions
• American Civil War
• États-Unis
• Guerre de Sécession

Informations

• Publié par: The Kent State University Press
• Date de parution: 10 octobre 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781631012242
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Pure Heart
CIVIL WAR IN THE NORTH
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Banners South: A Northern Community at War · Edmund J. Raus
“Circumstances are destiny”: An Antebellum Woman’s Struggle to Define Sphere · Tina Stewart Brakebill
More Than a Contest between Armies: Essays on the Civil War · Edited by James Marten and A. Kristen Foster
August Willich’s Gallant Dutchmen: Civil War Letters from the 32nd Indiana Infantry · Translated and Edited by Joseph R. Reinhart
Meade’s Army: The Private Notebooks of Lt. Col. Theodore Lyman · Edited by David W. Lowe
Dispatches from Bermuda: The Civil War Letters of Charles Maxwell Allen, U.S . Consul at Bermuda, 1861–1888 · Edited by Glen N. Wiche
The Antebellum Crisis and America’s First Bohemians · Mark A. Lause
Orlando M. Poe: Civil War General and Great Lakes Engineer · Paul Taylor
Northerners at War: Reflections on the Civil War Home Front · J. Matthew Gallman
A German Hurrah! Civil War Letters of Friedrich Bertsch and Wilhelm Stängel , 9th Ohio Infantry · Translated and Edited by Joseph R. Reinhart
“They Have Left Us Here to Die”: The Civil War Prison Diary of Sgt. Lyle G. Adair , 111th U.S. Colored Infantry · Edited by Glenn Robins
The Story of a Thousand: Being a History of the Service of the 105th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in the War for the Union, from August 21, 1862, to June 6, 1865 · Albion W. Tourgée, Edited by Peter C. Luebke
The Election of 1860 Reconsidered · Edited by A. James Fuller
“A Punishment on the Nation”: An Iowa Soldier Endures the Civil War · Edited by Brian Craig Miller
Yankee Dutchmen under Fire: Civil War Letters from the 82nd Illinois Infantry · Translated and Edited by Joseph R. Reinhart
The Printer’s Kiss: The Life and Letters of a Civil War Newspaperman and His Family · Edited by Patricia A. Donohoe
Conspicuous Gallantry: The Civil War and Reconstruction Letters of James W. King , 11th Michigan Volunteer Infantry · Edited by Eric R. Faust
Johnson’s Island: A Prison for Confederate Officers · Roger Pickenpaugh
Lincoln’s Generals’ Wives: Four Women Who Influenced the Civil War—for Better and for Worse · Candice Shy Hooper
For Their Own Cause: The 27th United States Colored Troops · Kelly D. Mezurek
Pure Heart: The Faith of a Father and Son in the War for a More Perfect Union · William F. Quigley Jr.
PURE HEART
The Faith of a Father and Son in the War for a More Perfect Union

William F. Quigley Jr.
The Kent State University Press • Kent, Ohio
© 2016 by The Kent State University Press, Kent, Ohio 44242
All rights reserved
Quotations from correspondence by William White Dorr and other text material in the Dorr Papers in the Pescosolido Library Archives appears courtesy of The Governor’s Academy, Byfield, MA. Quotations from Christ Church in Philadelphia’s website appear courtesy of the Rev. Timothy B. Safford, Rector, Christ Church in Philadelphia.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2016008093
ISBN 978-1-60635-286-1
Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Quigley, William F., Jr., author.
Title: Pure heart : the faith of a father and son in the war for a more perfect union / William F. Quigley Jr.
Description: Kent, Ohio : The Kent State University Press, 2016. | Series: Civil War in the North | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016008093 (print) | LCCN 2016033145 (ebook) | ISBN 9781606352861 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781631012242 (ePub) | ISBN 9781631012259 (ePDF)
Subjects: LCSH: United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Religious aspects. | Dorr, William White, 1837-1864. | Dorr, Benjamin, 1796-1869. | Fathers and sons--Pennsylvania--Philadelphia--Biography. | Soldiers--United States--Biography. | Clergy--Pennsylvania--Philadelphia--Biography. | United States. Army. Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, 121st (1862-1865) | Philadelphia (Pa.)--History--Civil War, 1861-1865. | Christ Church (Philadelphia, Pa.) | Philadelphia (Pa.)--Biography.
Classification: LCC E635 .Q54 2016 (print) | LCC E635 (ebook) | DDC 973.7/78--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016008093
20  19  18  17  16         5  4  3  2  1
Dedicated to my parents and to Leslie, Kelsey, and Annie for their faith and love
James Harrison Lambdin, sketch of Lt. William White Dorr, October 25, 1862. (Courtesy of the Pescosolido Library Archives, The Governor’s Academy. Photo by David Oxton.)
One, two, three hundred killed or mangled. It is awful to contemplate; and yet we must come down to the single cases to get at the heart of this matter.
—“Only One Killed,” Harper’s Weekly , 1862
Nothing can lift the heart of man Like manhood in a fellow-man.
The thought of heaven’s great King afar But humbles us—too weak to scan;
But manly greatness men can span, And feel the bonds that draw.
—Herman Melville, “On the Photograph of a Corps Commander,” 1866
Contents

Map Legend
Acknowledgments
Prologue
1 The Idol Is Party
2 To Dwell Together in Unity
3 I Will Pay My Vows
4 A Very Large Fight
5 Dethroning Their Ebon Idol
6 This Field Shall Be a Mecca
7 The Armour Is God’s Armour
8 I Pray I May Fall as Nobly
9 Proof That It Comes from God
10 Among the Pure, One of the Purest
Epilogue
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Map Legend
The following legend belongs to all the maps in this book.

Map Legend Confederate Union   Cavalry unit in battle line Infantry unit in battle line Army or Corps commander’s name Division or smaller Skirmish line/pickets/videttes Artillery batteries Forward movement Retreat/withdrawal Fortification (earthworks, rifle pit) Attack Repulsed attack
Acknowledgments
Where to begin?
Some twenty years ago, while hauling cardboard boxes from a flooding basement serving then for archival storage at The Governor’s Academy, my colleagues Leonard “Babe” Ceglarski Jr. and Kristen Snyder Vogel recovered the surviving remnant of a father’s scrapbook of his son’s service in the Union army during the Civil War. Their discovery of that historical treasure, including twenty letters from that young officer on the warfront, inspired two creations: a state-of-the-art archival facility at the academy and this book. I have, then, Babe and Kristen to thank first of all.
My curiosity about that collection eventually led me to Christ Church, Philadelphia, where Bruce Cooper Gill, a vestryman, graciously facilitated my multiple research visits. Bruce shared his prodigious knowledge of the historic church’s history, and during one of my visits he kindly extended the same courtesy to me and my youngest daughter, then 12, as he had to John Adams’s most eminent biographer. We clambered up the hollow core of the church’s bell tower, on rough-hewn wood ladders fixed to interior wall studs, and Bruce invited Annie to play a tune on the carillon, including the “sister” bell of the Liberty Bell: a high point of this adventure for me.
Assisting me with utmost cooperation and enthusiasm were the staff of the Christ Church Preservation Trust, particularly the Trust’s executive director, Don Smith; its archivist, Carol Smith; senior guide, Neil Ronk; and Linda Schrader.
I am indebted to the following libraries and archives, both for the skillful assistance of their staffs and for the priceless value of their collections: the Center for Archival Collections at Bowling Green State University; Gettysburg College Special Collections; Harvard University Libraries, particularly Houghton Library and Widener Library and especially Barbara Ann Burg; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; Jenkins Law Library, Philadelphia, particularly Executive Director Regina Smith; Louis T. Graves Memorial Library, Kennebunkport, ME, especially Director Mary-Lou Boucouvalas; the National Archives; Newbury (Mass.) Town Library; Newburyport (Mass.) Public Library; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts; Philadelphia City Hall, especially volunteer docent Greta Greenberger; Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries; the U.S. Army Military History Institute, particularly Dr. Richard Sommers; the University of Delaware Library, Special Collections; the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries; and the Venango County (Pa.) Historical Society.
Special thanks are due to the extraordinarily professional, patient, and helpful staff of the Carl A. Pescosolido Library at The Governor’s Academy. Over the years that I worked on this project, the academy and I benefited from the dedication and expertise of two library directors: Mary Leary, now retired, and Susan Chase. In more ways than I have space here to detail, I have been wonderfully assisted in this project by three directors of the first-class archive facility housed now in that library: past directors Kate Pinkham and Laurie DiModica, and now Sharon Slater.
In the course of my research, I happily encountered collectors and enthusiasts who granted me permission to study and make use of items from their Civil War collections and who generously shared their wealth of knowledge. In ways small and large, they contributed to this book: Ed and Faye Max, Ronn Palm, Karen Keane and Karen Langberg of Skinner Auctioneers, Alan S. Wilder, and Steve L. Zerbe, upon whose research skill and resourcefulness I relied at the start of this project when I could not afford to spend a lot of time in Pennsylvania. Thanks, also, to Marco Federico and Materials Conservation Co., Philadelphia, for permission to use their photographs.
I have taught history at the high school level for 30 years, the last 24 of them at the oldest non-sectarian boarding school in the United States. Without that historic academy’s support, I could not have written this book. The first draft constituted my master’s thesis in history; the academy fully funded my master’s studies over five years. The academ