Generals in Blue: Chamberlain

Joshua L. Chamberlain

The audacious charge panicked the Confederates; most dropped their weapons and surrendered or fled into the woods. A less harrowing but perhaps equally dramatic act by Chamberlain occurred at the end of the war. Picked by Grant to preside over the formal surrender at Appomattox, Chamberlain was moved by the solemn dignity of the defeated Army of Northern Virginia. Spontaneously he gave the order for Union soldiers to "carry arms" as a sign of military respect. A bugle call rang out and all along the road the Union soldiers raised their muskets to their shoulders in a salute of honor. Major General John B. Gordon, himself wounded five times during the war, was leading the Confederate troops at the ceremony. Gordon ordered his men to answer in kind. For several hours the soldiers in blue stood in respectful silence as their gray counterparts stacked their muskets, cartridge boxes and battle flags. After the war, Chamberlain was elected governor of Maine in 1866 and reelected three times; then for thirteen years he served as president of Bowdoin College. Never lacking in courage, as major general of the state militia, unarmed he faced down an angry mob in 1880. In 1893 he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his stubborn defense of Little Round Top. He died in 1914 at the age of eighty-five.
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Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain was born in Brewer, Maine in 1828. He attended Bowdoin College and Bangor Theological Seminary. He returned to Bowdoin as a professor of rhetoric in 1855. In 1862 he volunteered for military service and was commissioned lieutenant colonel of the 20th Maine volunteers. Chamberlain fought in a total of 24 engagements, including some of the fiercest battles of the war: Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor. He was wounded six times, including 1864 when a mini ball shattered his hipbone at Petersburg. There Grant gave him a field promotion to brigadier general on the spot and he was carried to the rear, where a surgeon determined that the wound was fatal (he died fifty years later). At Gettysburg, Chamberlain and the 20th Maine held Little Round Top for two hours, withstanding repeated assaults by Confederate infantry regiments. When his men ran out of ammunition he ordered a bayonet charge in a sweeping wheel-like line down the rocky, wooded slope.

© 2003 David C. Hanson, HIS 269 - Civil War and Reconstruction, Virginia W. Community College

Joshua L. Chamberlain
	The audacious charge panicked the Confederates; most dropped their weapons and surrendered or fled into the woods. A less harrowing but perhaps equally dramatic act by Chamberlain occurred at the end of the war. Picked by Grant to preside over the formal surrender at Appomattox, Chamberlain was moved by the solemn dignity of the defeated Army of Northern Virginia. Spontaneously he gave the order for Union soldiers to "carry arms" as a sign of military respect. A bugle call rang out and all along the road the Union soldiers raised their muskets to their shoulders in a salute of honor. Major General John B. Gordon, himself wounded five times during the war, was leading the Confederate troops at the ceremony. Gordon ordered his men to answer in kind. For several hours the soldiers in blue stood in respectful silence as their gray counterparts stacked their muskets, cartridge boxes and battle flags. After the war, Chamberlain was elected governor of Maine in 1866 and reelected three times; then for thirteen years he served as president of Bowdoin College. Never lacking in courage, as major general of the state militia, unarmed he faced down an angry mob in 1880. In 1893 he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his stubborn defense of Little Round Top. He died in 1914 at the age of eighty-five. Generals >
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain was born in Brewer, Maine in 1828. He attended Bowdoin College and Bangor Theological Seminary. He returned to Bowdoin as a professor of rhetoric in 1855. In 1862 he volunteered for military service and was commissioned lieutenant colonel of the 20th Maine volunteers. Chamberlain fought in a total of 24 engagements, including some of the fiercest battles of the war: Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor. He was wounded six times, including 1864 when a mini ball shattered his hipbone at Petersburg. There Grant gave him a field promotion to brigadier general on the spot and he was carried to the rear, where a surgeon determined that the wound was fatal (he died fifty years later). At Gettysburg, Chamberlain and the 20th Maine held Little Round Top for two hours, withstanding repeated assaults by Confederate infantry regiments. When his men ran out of ammunition he ordered a bayonet charge in a sweeping wheel-like line down the rocky, wooded slope.