18
Elijah Spencer, 23rd Missouri Infantry
May to September 1864
The last we heard of Elijah Spencer, he had been paroled by the Confederates after being captured at the battle of Shiloh. Men who were captured were sometimes sent to prison camps for the rest of the war, but often they were "paroled" instead. We don’t know if there was a system to this, or why one man would be sent to prison and another sent home. I think the parole system was more common in the early years of the war, when there was more of a feeling of chivalry and less real enmity on both sides.
The way the parole was supposed to work, was a man gave his word that he would go home and would not return to fighting, until he was "redeemed" by another prisoner sent back to the other side. In theory, if a man returned to active duty without being officially redeemed, and was then captured a second time and found out, it would be grounds for legal execution. In reality, it was all based on one’s word and honor, for how could anyone find out if a man captured in Virginia had once before been captured and released in Tennessee. For this reason, the parole system gradually died out as the war progressed.
Elijah would have been out of the war for some time, but I have not looked at any records yet and cannot say anything about where he was, or how long this lasted. All we have at this point is the unconfirmed family story. According to that, he was held at Corinth, Mississippi for a time, then paroled at Macon (I had thought Macon, Georgia, but this is wrong) on June 1, 1862. The next item in the family story is that Elijah is at the siege of Atlanta.
If we accept the family story, Elijah Spencer was back with Company A, 23rd Missouri Infantry, sometime after the battle of Chattanooga. Sherman started his campaign against Johnson from that place on May 7, 1864. Since I haven’t confirmed Elijah’s presence in the 23rd Missouri, nor the 23rd Regiment’s presence on this campaign, I won’t go into any details at this time. This section will be kept as a placeholder for future expansion, if and when I find out anything more.
The main battles on this campaign were: Dalton, May 9; Resaca, May 14; New Hope Church, May 25 to June 4; Pine Mountain, June 14; Kennesaw Mountain, June 27; Peachtree Creek, July 20; Atlanta, July 22. The initial assault on Atlanta was stopped, so Sherman put it under siege until the Confederates abandoned it on September 2.
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