Chancellorsville Battlefield To Exhibit Rare Family Artifacts
By Deborah Fitts
January 2003

SPOTSYLVANIA COUNTY, Va. - An extremely rare wooden grave marker is among a remarkable collection of artifacts that will go on view at the Chancellorsville unit of Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania National Military Park next spring.

The 2-foot board marked the body of John Williams Patterson, colonel of the 102nd Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, who was killed May 5, 1864, at the Wilderness. The chunk of wood, along with photographs, letters and other items preserved by Patterson's descendants will comprise the first major new exhibit in the visitor center in more than a decade.

"It's a terrific package of materials that show vividly that the war reverberated far beyond the battlefield," said Acting Superintendent John Hennessy. "The headboard is the only one of its kind we know to exist from these battlefields. Truly it is one of the top five artifacts in our collection."

Also among the items in the exhibit will be an 1861 recruiting poster for Patterson's regiment; two of his flasks; a bullet that passed through his chest at the battle of Fair Oaks, collapsing a lung and leading to reports that the wound was "probably fatal"; and a poster from the Orphan's Court, advertising the sale of the Patterson home when his death left his wife and children destitute.

The items are on 20-year loan to the park from Bill Phillis of Northville, Mich., Patterson's great-great-grandson. "I feel this is what the Colonel would have wanted," said Phillis, who sells
construction tools and machinery and teaches biology in a local college.

Phillis has made a lifelong passion of collecting memorabilia and information on his ancestor. He has retrieved 280 letters written by Patterson to his wife, letters from her to him, and poems that they wrote each other.

One "magnificent" find was a letter from an officer in Patterson's regiment describing his mortal wounding. "Here our beloved Colonel fell shot through the face, the ball passing entirely through and lodging in his shoulder, poor fellow," wrote Capt. D.A. Jones, who said the regiment that day was in "the hottest fire of Musketry that we ever experienced."

Jones went on to describe how a captain of the regiment made a coffin and cut a headboard for the colonel. "But enough, the bones of one of the bravest soldiers that ever battled in the cause of freedom now lie mouldering beneath the cold cold clods of the narrow house. The heart that was once so warm towards all his friends has ceased to beat and his form, once so manly, is now food for worms."

"Fortunately I come from a family of savers," said Phillis, explaining the wealth of items relating to his ancestor's service and the aftermath of his death. Phillis noted that the day he himself was
born, in the 1940s, the Patterson grave marker was placed on the dresser in the room as a silent message from the past. "That was the beginning of my interest in the Civil War - the day I was born."

His great-great-grandfather's death "destroyed that side of my family, financially," Phillis said. "It took two to three generations to recover." Patterson's death left his wife, Almira, a widow at 29. She never remarried. A child, the youngest of three, died in childhood. A 1908 photo just before Almira's death shows her reading one of Patterson's letters.

Phillis praised the work of Hennessy and park historian Don Pfanz in preparing text for the exhibit. "They are fantastic - what genuine, interesting and professional men," he said.

The park learned of Phillis's collection when he stopped at park headquarters one day a few years ago, bringing the head board. Pfanz realized at once that it was a unique artifact, and that Phillis's family collection could tell a universal story. Hennessy said he hopes that the exhibit will be up by the time of the battle anniversary in May, but delays are possible.

Once it is in place, however, "This will be a permanent part of the roomscape at Chancellorsville battlefield." The exhibit will demonstrate "the impact these battles had on people hundreds of miles away," Hennessy said. "There was an avalanche of sorrow that struck this family."

Patterson himself wrote in a letter that he hoped his name would be "cherished" by his family and friends "as one who nobly and honorably performed his duty."

Patterson died the day after returning to camp from leave, and one day before his 29th birthday. He was shot as he led the regiment against attacking Confederates at the intersection of the Brock and Orange Plank roads. His body was left on the field as the regiment fell back, but was retrieved the next day.

Patterson was first buried at the 6th Corps field hospital. In 1865 his body was moved to Wilderness Cemetery No. 2, near where he received his fatal wound. In 1869, when the cemetery was emptied for transfer of the bodies to Fredericksburg, Patterson's was taken north
to Pennsylvania.

The grave marker came with the body, Phillis said, possibly to demonstrate that the body was really Patterson's. The board reads, in black ink, "Col. Jno. W. Patterson, 102 Pa., Killed May 1864."

Today Patterson's remains lie in Southside Cemetery in Pittsburgh.