Chaplain William L. Hyde of the 112th New York Infantry Autograph Letter Signed on Casualties at Bermuda Hundred. ...

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"...the eye of the sharpshooter marked him and the fatal bullet quenched his life. He only groaned once. We have lost some very valuable men by chance shots within a few days... Thus we are constantly in the midst of death."

Chaplain William L. Hyde of the 112th New York Infantry Autograph Letter Signed on Casualties at Bermuda Hundred. Four pages of a bifolium, 5" x 8", Bermuda Hundred [Virginia]; June 29, 1864. Chaplain William H. Hyde of the 112th New York Infantry mustered into service with the regiment on September 11, 1862. While in Virginia during the Petersburg-Richmond campaign, the 112th was engaged in defense of Bermuda Hundred and were encamped behind a series of breastworks. In this letter to his wife, Elizabeth, Hyde describes the death of two soldiers from the regiment who were killed by Confederate sharpshooters after straying beyond the safety of the parapet. It reads, in part:

"You see by this letter's date that I am at this present moment at some distance in the rear of Petersburg. Another sorrowful event has brought me here. Lieut Saml Sherwin Co A & acting Adjt was shot dead yesterday in the forenoon by a sharpshooter concealed in a clump of trees ½ a mile distant from our breastwork. He had been very careful about exposing himself and had faithfully warned his men against doing so, but in the way of his duty he was giving some Regimental Orders when the eye of the sharpshooter marked him and the fatal bullet quenched his life. He only groaned once. We have lost some very valuable men by chance shots within a few days. Sunday a Mr. Bush was instantly killed. Tuesday Philips McEvoy Co C and Saml Sherwin & Hiram Vorce Co E was shot. McEvoy had not died when I left yesterday. Vorce was son of the late Sheriff of Chautauqua Co. His father & wife live in Westfield. Sherwin's wife lives in Jamestown. Thus we are constantly in the midst of death. Vorce had just eaten his supper and was I what he considered a safe place but he raised his head above the breastwork for a single moment and the work was done."

This letter was published in Jim Quinlan's Armed Only with Faith, a compilation of Chaplain Hyde's correspondence and journals.

Condition: Smoothed folds.

More Information: William Lyman Hyde (1819-1896) was born in Bath, Sagadahoc County, Maine, to Henry and Maria (Hyde) Hyde (third cousin to Henry). After attending public schools in Bath, Hyde taught for three years at a military and classical school in Ellsworth, Maine, before entering a program of theological study at Bangor Seminary, graduating in 1848. The following year, Hyde began a seven-year tenure as a minister at Gardner, Maine, and later was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Dunkirk, New York, for a number of years. On May 4, 1852 he wed Elizabeth Rice, daughter of Warren and Mary Webster of Wiscasset, Maine. Hyde resigned his ministry in 1862 to serve as Chaplain of the 112th New York Infantry, a position he held until the end of the Civil War. The regiment was organized at Jamestown, New York, and mustered in for three years-service on September 11, 1862. They participated in sixteen battles, including Cold Harbor, Petersburg, Chaffin's Farm, Fair Oaks and Darbytown Road, Fort Fisher, and the Carolinas Campaign. The 112th New York Infantry mustered out of service June 13, 1865. After the war, Hyde served as a pastor in Ripley and in Sherman, New York, until 1874, when he became principal of the Ovid (New York) Academy and Union School. In 1884, Hyde moved to Jamestown, New York, where he was associated with the Jamestown Journal, of which his son was an editor. In 1866, Hyde published a book, History of the One Hundred and Twelfth Regiment N.Y. Volunteers which remains the only regimental history concerning the 112th Infantry. Jim Quinlan edited and published a collection of his correspondence and journals in 2015 in Armed Only with Faith.