Samuel W. McNeese
1835-1864
Samuel W McNeese died as a American Prisoner Of War at Andersonville Prison during the Civil War.
Samuel W. McNeese was born in 1835 the son of Jonas McNeese and Ruth Babb, in the Lost Mountain Community of the northern part of Greene County, Tennessee. Sometime in 1858-1859 Samuel married a young Irish lass, Margaret Freeman, who had been born in Dublin Ireland. Samuel and Margaret had 3 sons, William H. (1859), Francis Marion (1861), and Samuel Wiley (1864), plus an infant who died at birth (early 1860's).
In March 1864 Samuel was living and farming on the land his father had cleared and settled the earlier part of the century with his lovely wife and three sons. Samuel's mother, Ruth, and his brother John E and family were also living on the farm.
In 1863 Samuel had joined the Union Army and served in Company G of 8th
Tennessee Calvary Regiment. The 8th TN fought in a number of skirmishes in
East Tennessee in August through December 1863 as part of Burnside's East
Tennessee Campaigns. It is thought Samuel was captured during one of these campaigns.
He eventually ended up at Andersonville Prison. Andersonville accepted it's first in late February
1864 from the Richmond Prison. We do not know when Samuel arrived in
Andersonville, but we think it was in February or March 1864.
We know 9 men of the 8th TN Calvary died at Andersonville.
Samuel languished in Andersonville for months under horrible conditions. By August 1864the population reached exceeded 33,000. It is estimated when the prison was at it's maximum, each prisoner had 6 square feet to live in, this is a little smaller that the average size recliner. There were no shelters in the Prison. By early September, Sherman's troops had occupied Atlanta and the threat of Union raids on Andersonville prompted the transfer of most of the Union prisoners to other camps in Georgia and South Carolina. If a prisoner was able to walk assisted or unassisted they were transferred out in early September. By September 17, the population was 12,834. The commander of Andersonville Captain Henry Wirz, was the only Southern soldier tried and executed after the war.
On September 17th Samuel was admitted to the Prison Hospital.
Samuel is the 7th person from the top and was the 12,481 patient. Note he is listed as "McNeese, S 8th TN.
The above list was in numerical sequence. Another alphabetical list by the letter "M" was made which is shown below.
Samuel is the last one listed on this page, note the spelling of his name as "McNeese" and his admittance number of 12481.
Samuel McNeese died September 17, 1864 in the Andersonville Prison Hospital. The cause of death is listed as Chronic Diarrhea. Basically he starved to death. The food at Andersonville was contaminated, and the area was totally contaminated. The hospital would only take patients as beds emptied. Very few patients were healed there, most of the beds became free because the patient died. The hospital had practically no medicine and couldn't do much for the patients.
The following document is a very important.
Samuel is the second from the bottom. Note he is listed as patient 12481. And is name is listed as "McNeese" . Now look at the person preceding him "Mulligan", and notice how the "g" in Mulligan extends to the "N" in McNeese and possibly making someone think his name is "McKeese".
Below is Samuel on the list of those who died in Andersonville.
Samuel was death 9140. Note his name is spelled "Sam'l McKeese", and his hospital number 12481. This proves beyond any doubt that the headstone number 9140 at the Andersonville Cemetery was Samuel McNeese, not a "McKeese"
All of the above are War Departments and located in Washington DC. The are available by microfilm.
Samuel McNeese was my great, great grandfather. His wife Margaret and our family never new what happened to Samuel. She was told he was captured, and was either killed or sent to a prison camp and died. She never knew where nor when.
In searching for what happened to Samuel for many years, I was never successful. In early 2010, while researching Jacob McNeese who was also a POW in Andersonville, I ran across the hospital record of Samuel McNeese. From there I checked over 10,000 War Department records from Andersonville and found the above documents. With the death list above I realized this could be our Samuel.
I researched all McKeese's in the US census from 1790 to 1900, and there are no Samuel McKeese listed. Also I check resources which list all Tennessean's who fought in the Civil War. There were none, nor were there any McKeese listed as ever fighting in the Civil War. There are just no records of any McKeese prior to 1900 in the US.
Then, the task was to check if this Samuel was the son of Jonas McNeese. Having the largest collection of the McNeese surname data (mcneese.org), I searched every Samuel McNeese for a possible match, any Samuel who would have been the correct age for serving in the Civil War, that was not accounted for. All records ruled out any other Samuel.
Samuel was born and raised in the 16th Civil District (Lost Mountain) of Greene County, Tennessee. Samuel's brother gave 1 acre of land to form the New Lebanon Church and Cemetery. There are 3 men who fought in the 8th TN Calvary are buried there and were Samuel's neighbors. I am convinced that our Samuel is buried in Andersonville, regardless beyond any doubt it proves the Soldier who is buried in grave 9140 is Samuel McNeese not a McKeese.
While in Andersonville, Dorence Atwater was worked in the prison hospital and was assigned the responsibility of keeping a list of those who died and where they were buried. He rightly assumed the official list which he maintained for the Confederates might be destroyed, and the names and location of the brave men who died there might be lost, so he secretly made his own list. It is felt that Dorence misspelled Samuel's name based on the Hospital report. He put McKeese instead of McNeese. In 1866 his list was published by Horace Greely, the list shows 9140, Samuel McKeese. In July 1865, Dorence and Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross, headed to Andersonville along with 42 Headboard Carvers to mark the graves of he men buried there. They used Dorence's list and thus the grave was mismarked. Thus the mistake.
The story of how Clara Barton came to head the group to mark the graves Andersonville by authority of President Andrew Johnson, and Dorence Atwater efforts in preserving the Death List is absolute amazing. After spending a year as a Union Soldier POW in Confederate Camps, Dorence was court-martialed by his own Army for trying to preserve and publish the death list. He was sentenced to horrible jail by the government he served, until President Andrew Johnson gave him a pardon.
After extensive, careful, and exhausting research, on June 7, 2010 a letter was written to Mr. Jon Jarvis, Director of the National Park Service who has direct responsibility for Andersonville National Cemetery. (Note- the National Park Service is responsible for two active National Cemeteries. Andersonville and Andrew Johnson Cemetery located in Greeneville, Tennessee, just 15 miles where Samuel was born and raised.) Andersonville is also now home of the National Prisoner of War Museum.
Click here to see a copy of the letter. Letter to National Park Service
On July 9, 2010 a response was received from the National Park Service. Click here. Letter from National Park Service
If you look at the letter from the National Park
Service they deny the request for 2 reasons
1. "These inquires are often based on a
desire to "correct" information inscribed during the 19th century, and/or to add
new information found through modern research". We are not asking for new
information to be added to the headstone, but just to correct the name.
This is the man's grave, he fought for his country, starved and died as a POW.
The United States of America has an obligation to properly mark the grave of his
fallen, especially a POW. The data that the headstone was arrived from the
files of the War Department in Washington, DC. Not by modern means, just plain
hard work.
2. "Error in Fact". They have the
audacity to say that because the next of kin is not requesting it they cannot
make the change. Samuels wife Margret, died in 1911, and his son my
great grandfather died in 1926, how could they apply for a change. I
acclaim I am next of kin.
When the mistakenly marked graves in Arlington Cemetery was discovered a couple years the US Government used modern means to correct the mistakes, and spent millions of dollars, rightly so.
Millions have been spent by our Government in locating remains of servicemen who have been lost overseas, rightly so.
To correct this mistake will cost mere peanuts, far less then what it will cost the government to deny this request and future request.
We are in the process in asking the Director Jon Jarvis, Director of the National Park Service to reconsider their letter, and properly mark Samuel's grave. The goal is to have this completed by September 17, 2011, the 147 anniversary of his death.
The National Park Service is one of Americas finest departments of the US Goverment, and Director Jarvis seem to be doing an outstanding job. He rose from the ranks for park ranger to the Director which is admirable. We commend their work.
We only ask for the honor of our fallen POW, whose voice was silenced serving his country.
If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, you can send an email to bill@mcneese.org.