Tag: Soldiers from Gettysburg
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You Can Never Go Home: Nicholas J. Codori, Gettysburg’s Prodigal Son
It might have seemed like a storybook ending. Just before Christmas in 1916, after fifty years missing, when friends and family had given him up for dead, Nicholas J. Codori returned to Gettysburg. The town’s wayward native son, relatives of which were still living in town or nearby, had come home. But this is not…
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Revealing John Wolford: His Legacy and Connection to Caroline Shenabrook
Previously, we looked at the case of Isadore Keefer, Caroline Shenabrook, and John Wolford. You may recall that Shenabrook had a child out of wedlock with Isadore Keefer—a girl named Annie that we’ll cover in a subsequent article. However, census and death records show she also had three other children out of wedlock with a…
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How Caroline Shenabrook Challenged Social Norms in 1869
The 1869 court case brought by Caroline Shenabrook may have been a landmark moment in the decline of Isadore Keefer. It remains a powerful illustration of the function of law in this era in dealing with “moral offenses.” But who was Caroline Shenabrook and what became of her after the case?
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From Union Soldier to Outcast: The Downfall of Isadore Keefer
In the tumultuous decades around the Civil War, the lives of three Adams County residents – Isadore Keefer, Caroline Shanabrook (later Wolford), and John Wolford – became unexpectedly intertwined. Their story, marked by war, scandal, and survival, offers a window into mid-19th-century life, morals, and policing in the Gettysburg area.
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Civil War Stories: Juliann Benner’s Courage on the Homefront
If Henry Benner was a war hero and civic leader, his sister Juliann Benner was his equal on the homefront and in a couple of different communities. She endured the death of her other brother, the capture of Henry, the severe wounding of her husband, and the deaths of several children, all while supporting her…
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The Remarkable Life of Henry Benner: Gettysburg Hero
In his time, Henry Benner was one of the best-known Gettysburg residents—a burgess of the town (like a mayor), a war hero with a trove of wild experiences and stories, and a respected business- and family man. Today, the hill bearing his family name is barely visited, and few people know of Henry, his prominent…
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Farmer, Tailor, Soldier, Poet: The Life of James A. Wade, Half-Brother of Jennie Wade
The life of James A. Wade started as a crime. It continued into the worst poverty—time in the Adams County Almshouse and a period of being bonded out. Then it pivoted to the Civil War, which was made worse by the death of his sister, Jennie Wade. And for all that, Jim, as he was…
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Till Mellinger: The Missing Woman in the Chambersburg Brothel Shooting
The story of Frank McLaughlin and Till Mellinger echoes other sexually charged crimes of the era, and like those crimes, it has a huge hole in the plot—who was the woman? And like Captain Wade’s former victim, we know almost nothing about the woman in the Kobler house case. In June 1859, Matilda “Till” Mellinger…
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Frank McLaughlin: From Youthful Indiscretion to Battlefield Sacrifice
The first shooting of Frank McLaughlin could not have been more pointless. In 1859, various local newspapers in Chambersburg and Gettysburg broke a salacious story: a plasterer from Gettysburg had been shot in the neck near a house of “bad repute” in Chambersburg. The wound was grave, and writers believed the man would die, though…
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Remembering Keller Culp: A Union Soldier’s Sacrifice at Andersonville
Known to friends and family as Keller, Benjamin Keller Culp was another cousin of John Wesley Culp whose fate added to the Culp family tragedy. Born on May 31, 1844, in Adams County, Pennsylvania, Keller’s life was profoundly shaped by the tumultuous events of the American Civil War. In the summer of 1862, responding to…