Husband Joshua Blackwood Howell 1
Born: 11 Sep 1806 - Woodbury, Gloucester Co, NJ 2
Christened:
Died: 14 Sep 1864 - near Petersburg, Fauquier Co, VA 3
Buried:
Father: [Father] Howell ( - )
Mother:
Wife
Born:
Christened:
Died:
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Children
General Notes: Husband - Joshua Blackwood Howell
He was a native of New Jersey, and pursued the study of the law in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he was admitted to the bar. In the latter part of 1827 he removed to Fayette County, and made his residence in Uniontown, where he was admitted to the bar Jan. 5, 1828. In 1831 he was appointed district attorney by Attorney-General Samuel Douglass, and served to and including the year 1833. He formed a law partnership with Judge Thomas Irwin, and later with Judge Nathaniel Ewing. Mr. Howell was a careful and able lawyer, a man of fine address, a good speaker, and very successful in his pleadings before juries.
He was born at "Fancy Hill," the site of the family mansion of the Howells, near Woodbury, New Jersey. He was educated in the academy of that place and in Philadelphia, where he studied law under the direction of Richard C. Wood, Esq., an able lawyer of that day, and after admission to the bar, removed in the autumn of 1828 to Uniontown, Fayette County, Pennsylvania, where he commenced the practice of his profession, and where he easily won eminence.
Trained in the Northern school, and having studied the national constitution with a lawyer's understanding, patriotic in instinct and education, and having some years prior occupied the rank of brigadier-general in the State militia, and withal having a more than ordinary love of martial exercises and skill therein, and knowledge of military tactics, as well as the history and plans of many of the great battles of the world, Gen. Howell, though nearly fifty-five years of age at the breaking out of the war of Rebellion, and therefore unlikely to be called upon by his fellow-citizens to lead them, as a duty devolving upon him, to the field of battle in the cause of the country, nevertheless promptly offered his services to the national government, and was authorized to raise a regiment, and soon presented himself at Washington at the head of the Eighty-fifth Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, of which he was commissioned colonel.
From November, 1861, until the spring of 1862 he was stationed at Washington, and meanwhile diligently trained his men for the field. As a part of Gen. Casey's division, his command was transferred to the Peninsula of Virginia, and participated in the marches, hardships, and battles of the first campaign against Richmond. His first battle was fought at Williamsburg, during the early part of which, in consequence of Gen. Keim's illness, Col. Howell commanded the brigade. On this occasion his services merited and received the distinction of special notice in the report of Gen. Peck, who commanded the division. At Fair Oaks the gallant Eighty-fifth, under his command, sustained the conflict with an overwhelming force of the enemy. In the subsequent retreat from the White Oak Swamp to Harrison's Landing its post was for a considerable part of the time in the rear of the retiring army and facing the exultant and advancing foe.
Upon the close of the Peninsular campaign, Col, Howell's health being seriously impaired, he was urged by his medical advisers to obtain leave of absence, which was granted for twenty days, which time he spent among the friends of his youth in New Jersey. Improved, but still unfit for duty, he hastened back to his command, then in the vicinity of Fortress Monroe, forming part of Gen. Peck's division. His regiment occupied Suffolk, occasionally engaging the enemy in that region, until the beginning of 1863, when, under command a Gen. Foster, he was placed, January 5th of that year, at the head of a brigade, a position which he retained until the end of his career. He was attached to the expedition organized under Gen. Hunter against Charleston, South Carolina. Here Howell with his brigade was the first to seize upon Folly Island, a foothold by means of which Gen. Gillmore, when placed in command, was enabled to capture Morris Island, the gateway to the harbor of Charleston. Shortly before the fall of Fort Wagner he suffered a concussion of the brain from the explosion of a ten-inch shell in a signal-station whence he was watching the effect of the firing therefrom, and which created an impediment in his speech with other symptoms of illness, constraining him to seek rest and recovery, which he did under a short furlough in New Jersey and at Uniontown.
He returned to his post greatly improved in health, although there is cause for suspecting that the concussion referred to bore a potential relation to the final catastrophe of his life. He was ordered with his brigade to Hilton Head to relieve Gen. Seymour, in command of that district, including Fort Pulaski and Tybee and St. Helena Islands, the approaches to Savannah. This command constituted in fact that of a major-general. Gen. Seymour had been ordered to Florida in command of that unfortunate expedition which resulted in the disaster of Olustee, upon the occasion of which he publicly remarked, "This would not have occurred if I had had Howell and his gallant boys with me." Gen. Howell remained in command at Hilton Head until ordered to Fortress Monroe to join the forces of Gen. Butler in the campaign against Richmond. There his name soon became a synonym for gallantry in our own army; and his noble form and whitening head were familiarly known and distinguished above all others by the foe, by whom he was alike admired and feared. Some time in August, 1864, he spent a short furlough in New Jersey, during which he caused to be repaired and adorned the graves of his kindred there. Anticipating that the war would soon end he returned to the field, and found a part of the Tenth Corps, including his brigade, with Hancock on the north side of the James River, accomplishing that diversion which enabled Grant to seize the Weldon Road. The very day after Gen. Howell's return the rebels assailed his position with terrific fury, but were driven back upon their own works in utter disorder. Upon the return of the expedition to the south side of the James, Gen. Wm. Birney, the division commander, having obtained a temporary leave of absence, Gen. Howell was assigned to the command of the division,-the Third Division of the Tenth Corps, a major-general's command,-which he held at the time of his death.
Having occasion to visit the headquarters of the corps during the night of Monday, the 12th of September, 1864, he mounted his horse between the hours of twelve at midnight and one in the morning to return to his own quarters. At starting the horse turned into a divergent path, and being suddenly checked reared and fell back upon his rider. The general was immediately borne to the tent of the medical director, by whom he was carefully examined in search of external injuries, but none appeared. At that time he was perfectly sensible, answering the questions of the surgeon, declaring that he felt no sense of pain, and freely moving his limbs as requested. But in about fifteen minutes after his accident vomit-ing supervened, the blood thrown from his stomach bearing testimony to internal injury. A state of stupor immediately ensued, from which the general was never aroused, and at seven o'clock in the evening of the 14th of September he breathed his last.
In closing this brief recital of Gen. Howell's military life, it is but fitting to append the following literal extract from a late letter of Maj.-Gen. Alfred H. Terry, in reply to one which had been written him inquiring his estimate of the late Gen. Howell as a military man. Gen. Terry's letter is dated at Fort Snelling, Minn., March 3, 1882:
"At this distance of time I cannot speak of particular incidents of Gen. Howell's military career; but my recollections of him as a man and an officer are as clear and distinct as they were eighteen years ago. I have never known a more courteous gentleman; I never saw a more gallant and devoted officer. The record of his service was without spot or blemish.
"In the army corps in which he served he was widely known and universally respected and admired.
"His untimely death was lamented by all his comrades as a loss well-nigh irreparable, not only to themselves, but to the country also."
Of Gen. Howell's personal attractions, his commanding carriage and graceful manners, and of the excellencies of his character as a private citizen, they of Uniontown and Fayette County who knew him preserved lively memory while they lived, for he was greatly admired and beloved by his friends, and it is believed that he had no foes.