A Gloucester County Salute to its U.S. Colored Troops

Photo of Frank Kersey, a veteran of the Union Army's U.S. Colored Troops (USCT)
Jericho resident Frank Kersey was a USCT Infantry Regiment soldier and a member of the Union Army fraternal organization the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) after the war. Shown here in at a 1928 GAR reunion two years before his death.

A new exhibit honoring Black History Month at the Gloucester County Historical Society (GCHS) salutes the region’s African American residents that served in in the Union Army’s Colored Troop Regiments during the Civil War. The exhibit at the GCHS Museum in Woodbury in includes the names and biographies of some of those veterans.

Established in 1863 at the height of the Civil War, the U.S. Colored Troops (USCT) regiments made up 10% of the Union Army’s total manpower and played a pivotal role in the war’s outcome. More than 180,000 African Americans served in the infantry, cavalry, artillery and engineering units.

More than 2,900 of them were from New Jersey and hundreds were from Gloucester and the surrounding counties of southern New Jersey. Many local enlistees were trained and outfitted at Camp William Penn just outside of Philadelphia while many others enlisted elsewhere before being shipped out to participate in some of the most important battles of the war.

U.S. Colored Troop (USCT) soldiers who fought in the Battle of New Market Heights
There are a very limited number of photos of USCT infantrymen. Shown here are soldiers of Company E, 4th Infantry Regiment, USCT, a unit that fought in the Battle of New Market Heights.

Twenty percent of the USCT soldiers were killed in action or died of disease. Today, many are buried in local cemeteries including the Presbyterian Cemetery on North Broad Street in Woodbury, the Oddfellows Cemetery in Jericho, and the 22nd Regiment U.S. Colored Troops Cemetery in Franklinville, Gloucester County.

One of those buried in Oddfellows is Frank Kersey. A free Black man and farmer in Virginia, Kersey was 19 when he signed up in 1864 in the 10th USCT Infantry Regiment to fight against the armies of the Confederate slavocracy.

Grave stone of U.S. Colored Troops veteran Frank Kersey
Frank Kersey’s grave stone in Oddfellows Cemetery.

The 10th Regiment participated in the nine months of trench warfare along the James River that was part of the siege of Petersburg and Richmond that ultimately led to the Confederate Capital City’s fall in April 1865. The unit also participated in the Appomattox Campaign that concluded with the surrender of Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army that ended the war.

After his Army service, Kersey returned to Accomack County Virginia where he was recorded in the 1870 census as an oysterman. But Accomack had become a hotbed of violence. Many USCT veterans returned home with their government-issued weapons and were being targeted nightly by vigilante groups determined to disarm them.

Kersey and his wife Caroline and children — Gertrude, Verse, Isaiah, Kajak, and Kirk — moved to New Jersey and settled in Deptford Township, Gloucester County. When Kersey died in 1930, his obituary read: “Frank M. Kersey, 85-year-old Civil War veteran, died Sunday following an illness of several weeks. He will be buried from his home at Main and Woodbury Roads, in the Oddfellows Cemetery in Jericho. For many years, Kersey conducted a small farm, selling from his truck in the vicinity of Woodbury. He participated in many parades attired in his USCT uniform, often riding a horse.”

Recruitment poster for U.S. Colored Troops (USCT) regiments
The Gloucester County Historical Society exhibit includes the names and biographies of some of the local USCT veterans.

Other Local USCT Soldiers

In 2014, Dr. James Johnson, an Independent Scholar at the Center for Educational Excellence in Social Studies, and Adjunct Faculty Member at Rowan University, researched and published the biographies of a number of local African American Civil War Veterans. Dr. Johnson’s work is featured in the GCHS exhibit and includes the following:

Alexander Bailey was 21 years old when he volunteered at Camden during the final stage of the Civil War. He was born in Delaware and stood 5 feet 4 inches tall when he volunteered on March 20, 1865. In less than a month, the war ended when Lee surrendered his army to Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, on April 9.

Bailey was assigned to Company A, 43rd U. S. Colored Infantry Regiment. At enlistment, the private received one third ($33.33) of a hundred dollar bounty. He received the remaining balance when discharged at Brownsville, Texas, on Oct. 20. After the war, Bailey lived in Woodbury with his wife, Ellen, and sons, John W. and Alexander Jr.

Alexander Cook was a landsman in the Union Navy. Using the alias John Johns, Cook enlisted in New York at age 26. He served aboard three ships, including the USS C.P. Williams, which performed blockade duty along the Georgia coastline. In December 1863, the Williams’ crew engaged Confederate batteries on the Stono River in South Carolina. Cook also served on the USS South Carolina and the USS Princeton.

A Union Army mortar schooner
USS C.P. Williams was a mortar schooner used to bombard Confederate shoreline fortifications.

Born in Delaware, Cook and his family lived in Sussex County in 1860. The family, including wife Zopora and children James and Elizabeth, had moved to Woodbury by 1870. Cook worked at a local brick yard in the post-war years and by 1880 was remarried and living with wife Lucy and several of their children. He passed away on Aug. 24, 1883. The pension file index indicates that Cook served under the Johns alias.

John Coy was born and raised in Salem, New Jersey. He was 43 years old when he went to Philadelphia on March 29, 1863, and joined Company F, of the 22nd Colored Infantry Regiment. This unit’s sterling record includes a gallant charge made against enemy breastworks at Petersburg on June 15, 1864.

For much of his enlistment, Coy worked as a company cook. He mustered out of service at Brownsville, Texas, on Oct. 16, 1865. The federal census shows the veteran living in Woodbury with five adopted children in 1880. Coy died in Deptford on March 4, 1884.

Charles H. Gibson‘s military unit may have been Company D, 19th Colored Infantry. In that case, Private Charles “W” Gibson mustered into service at Camp Stanton near Baltimore on May 19, 1864. Two months later, the 22-year-old recruit experienced the historic mine explosion and subsequent Battle of the Crater at Petersburg on July 30. The 19th Colored Infantry suffered 115 casualties in that event.

Illustration of the site of the Civil War's Battle of the Crater

Gibson was discharged in Texas in mid-January 1867. For most of his enlistment, he was a hospital attendant. He returned home with “one Enfield rifle musket complete with full set of equipment retained.”

Following the Civil War, Gibson became a trustee (and class leader) at Woodbury’s Bethel AME church. In 1880 he, along with four other trustees, signed a contract to buy land for a new church. In 1895 the Gibson household consisted of the 73-year-old veteran, his wife Mary, their sons Charles and Thomas and daughters Ellen, Sophia, and Celina.

Joseph Gibson was 17 years old when he mustered into Company B, 6th Infantry Regiment United States Colored Troops at Philadelphia on Aug. 15, 1864. Six weeks later, this regiment participated in the important Battle of New Market Heights in Virginia. Three men in Gibson’s regiment were awarded the Medal of Honor for heroic actions in that Sept. 29 engagement. Gibson sustained a gunshot wound in the leg and after months of recuperation returned to duty on March 5, 1865. He mustered out of service at Wilmington, North Carolina, on Sept. 20, 1865.

The New Jersey-born veteran married Catharine Barnes in 1868 and by 1880 this Woodbury family had grown to include their 7-year-old son Edward.

Artist Don Troiani’s painting titled, “Three Medals of Honor,” details a scene in the Battle of New Markets Heights. Troiani’s painting was unveiled on June 24, 2013, at the Philadelphia Union League. The engagement saw a total of 14 Medals of Honor awarded and Joseph Gibson was in the thick of the action.

Painting of a battle scene from the Battle of New Market Heights
Artist Don Troiani’s painting of the Battle of New Market Heights.

Carey Gilbert was born in Limestone, Alabama. On Jan. 23, 1864, Gilbert enlisted at Lebanon, in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, for a 3-year period. The 24-year-old private was assigned to Company E, 25th USCT. Gilbert was arrested for unauthorized absence from April 9 to June 4 and a reward of $30 was paid for his capture. Returned to duty at Camp William Penn without trial, Gilbert was hospitalized from June 24 to Aug. 24. Communicable diseases from measles to typhoid fever had plagued the training camp for several months. A number of soldiers died as a result of the epidemics. Corporal Gilbert was honorably discharged on Dec. 6, 1865.

By 1870, Gilbert was a married barber in Woodbury. The 1880 census lists the barber, his wife Martha as well as three sons, Andrew, Van Buren and Jefferson.

John Handy Hearn volunteered for three years service on April 7, 1864. The Laurel, Delaware, native along with his wife and two daughters, Amanda and Ellen, moved to New Jersey sometime in the 1860s. Hearn enlisted for three years at the Camden recruiting office and was assigned to Company F, 43rd Infantry Regiment. Like Charles Gibson, Hearn also experienced the Battle of the Crater. Hearn resided in Woodbury until he passed away on May 17, 1896.

Isaac J. Hill journeyed from Woodbury to Norwich, Connecticut, where he enlisted in Company D, 29th Connecticut Infantry on March 4, 1864. The 29th Connecticut is one of few African American units identified as a state regiment during the war. Thirty-five years old at his enlistment, the Pennsylvania-born farmer and AME minister served as an orderly at regimental and divisional command centers in the South and at the 25th Army Corps headquarters in Texas. On Oct. 24, 1865, Hill mustered out of service at Brownsville, Texas.

Cover of Isaac Hill's Civil War memoir "A Skitch of the 29th Regiment of Connecticut Colored Troops.
Isaac Hill’s book is still in print through Amazon.

Returning home to Woodbury, Hill and his wife, Mary, resided with their children Jacob, 18, Sarah, 16, and Mary, 12. In 1866, Hill published a memoir of his military experiences. Titling his book, “A Sketch of the 29th Regiment of Connecticut Colored Troops,” the veteran wrote, “I pray that those who will read this book may be forever blessed in this world, and receive endless happiness in the world to come …”

As an itinerant AME minister, Hill preached in churches around South Jersey. He died from the effects of a stroke suffered while in the pulpit at Millville sometime in the 1880s.

William James married Mary Morris, of Greenwich in September 1860, seven months before the Civil War began. James enlisted in the army seven months before the war ended. On Sept. 14, 1864, he volunteered at Camden for one year’s service. He received $33.33 of a hundred dollar bounty and was one of a “detachment of Colored recruits forwarded to … Camp William Penn …” On June 17, James was assigned to Company C., 41st Infantry. He was discharged at Edinburg, Texas, on Sept. 30, 1865. In the post-war decades, William and Mary James raised several children in Greenwich Township (Gloucester County) and Paulsboro.

John Lewis, 43, joined Company I of the 22nd Infantry USCT on Jan. 5, 1864. A snowstorm and drafty barracks at Camp William Penn probably sparked the chronic rheumatism which hampered Lewis for more than a year. He was hospitalized on Feb. 10 for several weeks before shipping out in the spring to join his unit in Virginia. By May 4, Lewis was hospitalized again in Hampton, Virginia. In June, Lewis was transferred to Philadelphia’s Summit House Army Hospital. He was honorably discharged from there by surgeon’s order on March 5, 1865. Lewis lived in Buena Vista with his wife Nancy and their two young boys. He died on June 9, 1883, of complications related to chronic rheumatism.

Eben Money enlisted at Norristown, Pennsylvania, on Feb. 4, 1865. He signed up to serve one year in the army and received a $100 bounty. The 24th served guard duty at several locations in Virginia and at Point Lookout, Maryland, where Confederate prisoners, ironically, faced the compulsive scrutiny of black soldiers, some formerly enslaved. On Oct. 1, 1865, the 24th was mustered out at Richmond, Virginia. Like many of his comrades, Money brought his rifle home.

Money’s regiment was one of 11 black infantry units organized at Camp William Penn in Chelten Hills, Pennsylvania. Most black Union soldiers from Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey served in a regiment organized at that post, which was the largest camp for United States Colored Troops.