| Unit Name: | 12th Virginia Infantry Regiment |
| Dates: | July 1861 - Spring 1865 |
| Type: | Regiment |
| Role: | Infantry |
| Battles: | American Civil War |
| Disbanded: | April 1865 |
| Notable Commanders: | William Mahone |
The 12th Virginia Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment mostly raised in Petersburg, Virginia, for service in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War, but with units from the cities of Norfolk and Richmond, and Greensville and Brunswick counties in southeastern Virginia. It fought mostly with the Army of Northern Virginia.
The 12th Virginia was organized at Norfolk in May, 1861, using the 4th Battalion Virginia Volunteers as its nucleus. Its members were mostly from Petersburg, with some men from Richmond and Norfolk. The regiment initially protected the main ports at Norfolk and Petersburg.
In response to the federal Peninsular Campaign in the spring 1862, it joined General William Mahone's Brigade in the Army of Northern Virginia, then participated in many conflicts from Seven Pines to Wilderness. It was involved in the nearly year-long Siege of Petersburg, and conclusion of the Appomattox Campaign.
The field officers were Colonels Everard M. Feild and David A. Weisiger; Lieutenant Colonels John R. Lewellen and Fielding L. Taylor; and Majors Edgar L. Brockett, Richard W. Jones, and John P. May. Future Virginia governors William E. Cameron and William Hodges Mann served in the 12th Virginia. Cameron had been a staff officer under Gen. Mahone and won election as a member of the Readjuster Party. Mann would be the last governor of Virginia to have fought in the Civil War.
By 1860, the Petersburg City Guard (that became Company A) was led by Col. David Weisiger, associated with the commission merchant firm John Rowlett and Company. He also was a prominent Freemason, the grand commander of the Appomattox Commandery, Knights Templar No. 6. Company A formally enlisted in the Virginia militia on April 19, 1861, shortly after the Virginia Secession Convention of 1861 approved a secession resolution. The Petersburg City Guard and the older established militia company, the Petersburg Grays (Company B) had been sent to Harper's Ferry, Virginia in 1859 to guard against civil unrest during the trial and execution of abolitionist John Brown.[1]
Upon their return, Petersburg expanded the Old Grays, and formed another unit, dubbed the "new" Petersburg Grays (Company C). Three additional companies were recruited within the city and began training. The Lafayette Guards became Company D,[2] and the Petersburg Riflemen became Company E. Eventually, all five Petersburg companies would become part of this unit, and would be joined by companies from Norfolk (a militia unit dating from 1802) and Richmond (a militia unit formed in 1844). In March 1862, before this regiment's combat service began, many men transferred from the Lafayette Guards into the new Petersburg Artillery (under Captain Branch), so that unit received many recruits from rural Patrick County in southwest Virginia. The final Petersburg-recruited company, "Archer's Rifles" was raised in May 1861 by Fletcher H. Archer, who had commanded a volunteer company in the Mexican War. Archer soon became lieutenant colonel of the 3rd Virginia Infantry Regiment, while his company became Company K of the 12th Virginia Infantry.[3]
The regiment was unusual in the Confederate army as a whole, because most of its members were educated and from cities, only Companies F and I were from rural counties (both served by a railroad line from Petersburg). The Huger Grays (Company F) and Meherrin Grays (Company I) were recruited mainly from Greensville and Brunswick Counties. The Richmond Grays had been Company A of the 1st Virginia Infantry, but became Company G of the 12th Virginia on July 12, 1861.[4] The oldest militia volunteers in Norfolk (founded in 1802), the Norfolk Junior Volunteers enlisted on April 19, 1861, for one year. When their home city fell to the Union Army & Navy in 1862, many deserted and rejoined their families. On July 1, 1861, this company was transferred from the 6th Virginia Infantry Regiment, to become Company H of the 12th Virginia Infantry.[5]
| Company | Nickname | Recruited at | First Commanding Officer | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Petersburg City Guard | Petersburg | Colonel David A. Weisiger | |
| B | Petersburg Old Grays | Petersburg | David Edmundson | |
| C | Petersburg New Grays | Petersburg] | Thomas H. Bond | |
| D | Lafayette Guards | Petersburg] | William H. Jarvis | |
| E | Petersburg Riflemen | Petersburg | Daniel Dodson | |
| F | Hugar Grays | Greensville Brunswick County | Everard M. Feild | |
| G | Richmond Grays | Richmond | ||
| H | Norfolk Juniors | Norfolk | A.F. Santos Finlay T. Ferguson | |
| I | Meherrin Grays | Greensville Brunswick County | Richard W. Jones | |
| K | Archer Rifles | Petersburg] | Fletcher Archer |
One soldier reminisced about their first assignment after their April 1861 enlistment, a train ride to Norfolk.
The next morning I volunteered in the "B" Grays of Petersburg, and on the 20th of April, 1861, we boarded a train enroute to Norfolk. Our organization was then known as the "Petersburg Battalion," comprising two companies of Grays (A and B), each 108 men, the "City Guard," "Petersburg Rifles," "The Lafayette Guards," and the "Nichols Battery of Artillery," The whole of Petersburg seemed to have turned out on that eventful April morning to bid us farewell, and mingled with tears, banners and handkerchiefs waving, we sped away over the Petersburg and Norfolk Railroad, as it was then known.
[6]
Throughout the war, the regiment went through inconsistent reequipping, tending to leave the men with proper accoutrements and weapons, but without uniforms. The men were first supplied by the City of Petersburg, in April 1861, with new grey uniforms. However, that would be the only equipment that would be distributed throughout the regiment, until Christmas of 1862, again by the City Council of Petersburg. The men captured the weapons off of the dead and wounded U.S. Soldiers from the Seven Days battles, and had little proper clothing during the winter of 1862-1863, even into the spring. The 12th Virginia, again took new equipment from the federal dead at the Battle of Chancellorsville, but there is no mention of new uniforms issued even after the Battle of Gettysburg.[7]
The majority of the Regiment came from the cities and received formal education, unlike the majority of Confederate Army units, whose ranks consisted mainly of country men.[8]
1863
May. Col. Weisinger returns to duty, having recovered from wounds of Second Manassas
1864
1865
Fletcher Harris Archer was born on February 6, 1817, in Petersburg, one of the youngest of five sons and four daughters of Allen Archer, a prosperous miller, and Prudence Whitworth Archer. He attended school in Petersburg before entering the University of Virginia, where he received his bachelor of law degree on July 3, 1841. He then returned to his native city and established his practice.
On April 2, 1842, Archer was elected captain of the 7th Company, 39th Virginia Militia Regiment. He held that rank in December 1846, when he raised the Petersburg Mexican Volunteers, which became Company E of the 1st Virginia Volunteer Regiment. His was one of the few Virginia units that saw active military service during the Mexican War. The regiment reached Mexico early in 1847 and served on General Zachary Taylor's line until the end of the war. By August 1, 1848, the company was back in Petersburg, where Archer resumed his law practice. He married Eliza Ann Eppes Allen and they had one daughter, born shortly before her mother's death in April 1851.[23]
Within two days of Virginia's secession from the Union, Archer raised a company of one hundred men that was designated Company K, "Archer Rifles," 12th Virginia Infantry Regiment. He was elected its captain. Shortly thereafter, on May 5, 1861, he was appointed lieutenant colonel in the 3rd Virginia Infantry Regiment. After brief intervals of service in command of the Naval Hospital in Norfolk, as lieutenant colonel of the 5th Battalion Virginia Infantry, and as commander of the 1st Brigade, Department of Norfolk, Archer retired in May 1862 to civilian life in Petersburg. On March 31, 1863, he married Martha Georgianna Morton Barksdale, a widow with three sons and one daughter.
As the armies moved ever closer to the Richmond-Petersburg front, Archer again offered his military expertise to the Confederacy. On May 4, 1864, he was commissioned a major commanding the 3rd, or "Archer's Battalion," Virginia Reserves. Composed of men between the ages of sixteen and eighteen and between forty-five and fifty-five from Petersburg and the counties of Dinwiddie and Prince George, the reserves were to be used for state defense and detail duty. They participated in Archer's greatest military accomplishment, his defense of Petersburg on June 9, 1864, in what has come to be called the Battle of Old Men and Young Boys.
As more than 1,300 Union cavalry troops led by Brigadier General August Kautz attempted to ride into Petersburg from the south and Union infantry threatened the defenses east of the city, 125 members of Archer's unit and 5 men and one gun from an artillery unit answered a call for reserves and militia to assemble at Battery 29 on the Jerusalem Plank Road. Later Archer recalled that details for special service and guard duty in Richmond had left him with barely a company of inadequately armed men in civilian clothes, combining those "with head silvered o'er with the frosts of advancing years" and others who "could scarcely boast of the down upon the cheek." His command repelled the first attack by the Northern troops but a second assault forced him back into the city. The arrival of Confederate cavalry and artillery put a check to further Union movement, but at the cost of 76 casualties to the reserves, more than half of those who had gone into action.
Promoted to lieutenant colonel, Archer led his unit in the defense of Petersburg during the subsequent Union attack of June 15–18 and throughout the nine-and-one-half-month siege of the city. Wounded in the arm at Petersburg, he was hit again during the retreat to Appomattox, where his combined force of the 3rd and 44th Battalions of Virginia Reserves surrendered sixty-five men.
After the war ended Archer returned to Petersburg and began to rebuild his law practice. Active in the local Conservative Party, he eventually became its chairman. He sought the party's nomination for mayor in 1876 and 1878 but lost both times to William E. Cameron, who had remained with the 12th Virginia until war's end and later aligned himself with General Mahone and even later with the Readjuster movement. In 1879 Archer and tobacconist Charles A. Jackson were the Conservative nominees for seats in the House of Delegates, but both lost as the Readjusters carried the city with 55 percent of the vote.
Following this citywide defeat, Archer won election to the Petersburg City Council and fellow councillors elected him their president. By virtue of this position Archer became mayor on January 2, 1882, when Cameron was sworn in as governor.[24] At this point the council still had a Conservative majority, but Readjusters controlled all of the elective executive offices in Petersburg except the mayor's office and vowed to oust Archer in the May 1882 election.
To counter a Readjuster–Fusionist Republican coalition, the Conservatives formed an alliance with the Straightout Republicans and ran as the Citizens' Party. Archer received their nomination for mayor but lost to Thomas J. Jarratt, and the Readjusters won a narrow majority on the city council. The Conservatives then tried to keep the Readjusters from taking their seats by alleging a violation of the city charter, and on July 1 Archer refused to vacate his office at the end of his term. He did not finally step down as mayor until a lawsuit confirmed Jarratt in the office on March 23, 1883.
In 1884 Archer was a delegate to the state Democratic convention in Richmond and tried to encourage dissident white Readjusters to rejoin the Democratic Party. He did not run for another public office thereafter. Archer died at his home on High Street on August 21, 1902, after having been in "feeble health by reason of his advanced age for some months." He was interred in Petersburg's Blandford Cemetery.
Captain of Company H, the Norfolk Junior Volunteers, from April 1861 to May 1862.Born in 1804, married in 1842, had 3 children in 1860. Mayor of Norfolk in 1860.[25] (According to the Norfolk Public Library, he served from June 24, 1856, to 1858.) Died in 1863, and buried in Elmwood Cemetery, Norfolk, Virginia.
Enlisted on May 17, 1861, in Company B, the Petersburg Greys. Brother of Hugh Ritchie Smith and James Smith. Born in Petersburg on November 26, 1837. Moved to Nashville Tenn. before 1861, returned to enlist that year. Wounded at Crampton's Gap on September 14, 1862, captured and taken to the U.S. Army 6th Corps Hospital, in Burkittsville, Md. Date not recorded for parole/exchange to Confederacy. In Richmond Hospital, October to November, 1862. Promoted to Corporal on March 1, then Sergeant on August 1, 1863. Wounded during the Wilderness campaign, May 6, 1864, no recorded dates for hospital stay. Paroled at Appomattox after Lee's Surrender, he returned to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1865, becoming a building contractor and architect, built the early buildings at Vanderbilt University and the reproduction of the Parthenon in Nashville for the state centennial. Granted Colonelship of the 1st Tennessee Militia in 1896. Organized the 1896 Tennessee State Exposition. Became Colonel of the 1st Tennessee Infantry, U.S. Volunteers, from 1898 to 1899. Led his regiment in combat against Aguinaldo's Philippine insurrectionists in 1899. Fell dead from his horse, attributed to heat stroke, near Manila on February 5, 1899. He was known to be a Mason and a great reader. Buried at Mt. Olivet Cemetery, Nashville Tennessee, on April 19, 1899, following a huge state funeral, one of the largest ever seen in the city.[26]
William Hodges Mann was born in Williamsburg on July 31, 1843; as the son of John Mann and Mary Hunter Bowers. Went to Williamsburg Academy, and Brownsburg Academy in Rockbridge County. Became deputy clerk of the circuit court of Nottoway County, from 1859 to 1861. Enlisted on June 20, 1861, in Company E, the Petersburg Riflemen. Wounded at Seven Pines, on June 1, 1862. While recuperating, became temporary clerk to Confederate Treasury Dept. Served as a spy, behind Gen U.S. Grant's lines, during the Siege of Petersburg. After the war, in 1865, he was elected to clerk of the Virginia Circuit Court of Dinwiddie County. Admitted to the Bar in 1867. Married twice. Served as Judge of Nottoway County, from 1870 to 1892. Virginia State Senator from 1898 to 1910 and a Member of the Democratic State Executive Committee. Prominent Prohibitionist, and a promoter of public high schools. Established Bank of Crewe Va, was president to 1910. Owned a dairy farm in Burkeville. Was a Presbyterian elder, and friend to Rev. Theodorick Pryor, father of General Richard Pryor. Governor of Virginia from 1910 to 1914. Lawyer in Petersburg from 1914 to his death 1927. Died, on December 21, 1927, from a stroke at his law office desk. Buried in Blandford cemetery.[27]
Veterans of the 12th Virginia gained political power in Petersburg during Reconstruction, and such continued as the Re-Adjuster Party took power. Former Sergeant of Company E, William E. Hinton, became a local financier and political leader, first as a Conservative, then as a Re-Adjuster, including a term in the Virginia General Assembly. His brother, Drury A. Hinton, former captain of Virginia's 41st Infantry, served as the city's prosecutor (elected and re-elected as Commonwealth Attorney), and won a seat on the Virginia Supreme Court.
The 12th Virginia Infantry lives on today in the form of an incorporated living history and reenactment unit bearing its designation. Modern Companies 'B' and 'C' live on in the Richmond-Petersburg region of the Commonwealth of Virginia; with one company not associated having formed in California as company 'G'. The Virginia unit is a family-friendly, non-profit organization, and participates in numerous events in Virginia and bordering states.