Lost Cause
1st Lieutenant
- Joined
- Sep 19, 2014
Born in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on April 4, 1840, Sanders actually grew up in Clinton in Greene County. He enrolled in the University of Alabama as a student in 1858. At the outbreak of the war, he was still a student there. He left his studies to enlist in the Eleventh Alabama Infantry. He was quickly elected captain of his company.
Sanders was severely wounded at the battle of Frayser's Farm during the Seven Days' Battle with the regiment - a shell fragment tore into his leg. Nevertheless, he remained on the battlefield till after dark.
Returning to duty on August 11, he took command of the regiment, formally being promoted as its colonel after Sharpsburg, where he was slightly wounded in the face by rocks tossed into the air by artillery fire, at the age of just twenty-two. Sanders fought with great gallantry, serving at Fredericksburg, Salem Church, and Gettysburg. At Gettysburg, Sanders was wounded on July 2 in the knee by a minie ball but does not appear to have left the Army of Northern Virginia.
Sanders had shone brightest at Spotsylvania, taking over the brigade of the dying Abner Perrin and earning a brigadier’s promotion on May 31, 1864.
Assigned to Mahone’s Division, he had distinguished himself in the Petersburg siege, in the combat at the Crater and in leading his own and a North Carolina brigade at Deep Bottom.
On August 21, 1864, Sanders’s Brigade was involved in fierce fighting along the Weldon Railroad south of Petersburg. The railroad was one of Robert E. Lee’s crucial supply lines, linking Richmond and Petersburg with the Confederacy’s last major sea port of Wilmington North Carolina. But on August 19, the federals had seized a section of the tracks at Ream’s Station, forcing the Confederates to try to retake the line. Mahone’s Division, including Sanders, attacked two days later.
Sanders was leading his Alabamians on foot when a minie ball sliced through both of his thighs, ripping his femoral arteries. Despite his injuries, Sanders did not collapse, instead telling his adjutant, “Take me back.” Bleeding heavily, the general the general was carried a short distance to the rear before he asked to be laid down. He died minutes later and Mahone’s assault was repelled.
The Alabamians lamented the “sad loss” of Sanders, “our young and gallant brigadier, who gave his life to the cause,” one of his men recalled, “I knew that none were braver than he,” added a private in the 11th Alabama. “He was stern but kind, and always looked after the comfort and safety of his men, and as the war progressed he grew continually in their estimation.”
The Charleston Mercury described the battle casualties, stating that “none was more beloved, or will be more regretted, that the gallant” Sanders. The article added that he was “a thorough soldier…yet a gentleman and a patriot…devoted to his duties, modest in deportment, of no selfish disposition.”
His body was taken to Richmond the next day and was placed in a vault in Hollywood Cemetery. From there he was interred in the Maryland Section for a short while, but his family decided to move his body to lot O-9, which was owned by John C. Page, a wealthy shoe merchant who had cared for him in 1862 after he had been wounded at Frayser’s Farm. Somehow the exact location of his grave has been lost, and in 1971 a granite marker to his memory was erected in John C. C. Sanders Section R. The marker reads: IN THIS CEMETERY LIES GEN. JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN SANDERS C.S.A. APR. 4, 1840 - AUG. 21, 1864, LEE CHAPTER U.D.C. 123 1971
Wikepedia reports Sanders was reinturred in Alabama in 1918.
Source of information: And Then A.P. Hill Came Up; 1997-2010 by Jen Goellnitz, the life and career of General Ambrose Powell Hill. The website Geni.com.
http://www.hollywoodcemetery.org/john-c-c-saunders
Gallant Dead, The: Union and Confederate Generals Killed in the Civil War, pg. 296.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0811701328/?tag=civilwartalkc-20
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._C._Sanders
Sanders was severely wounded at the battle of Frayser's Farm during the Seven Days' Battle with the regiment - a shell fragment tore into his leg. Nevertheless, he remained on the battlefield till after dark.
Returning to duty on August 11, he took command of the regiment, formally being promoted as its colonel after Sharpsburg, where he was slightly wounded in the face by rocks tossed into the air by artillery fire, at the age of just twenty-two. Sanders fought with great gallantry, serving at Fredericksburg, Salem Church, and Gettysburg. At Gettysburg, Sanders was wounded on July 2 in the knee by a minie ball but does not appear to have left the Army of Northern Virginia.
Sanders had shone brightest at Spotsylvania, taking over the brigade of the dying Abner Perrin and earning a brigadier’s promotion on May 31, 1864.
Assigned to Mahone’s Division, he had distinguished himself in the Petersburg siege, in the combat at the Crater and in leading his own and a North Carolina brigade at Deep Bottom.
On August 21, 1864, Sanders’s Brigade was involved in fierce fighting along the Weldon Railroad south of Petersburg. The railroad was one of Robert E. Lee’s crucial supply lines, linking Richmond and Petersburg with the Confederacy’s last major sea port of Wilmington North Carolina. But on August 19, the federals had seized a section of the tracks at Ream’s Station, forcing the Confederates to try to retake the line. Mahone’s Division, including Sanders, attacked two days later.
Sanders was leading his Alabamians on foot when a minie ball sliced through both of his thighs, ripping his femoral arteries. Despite his injuries, Sanders did not collapse, instead telling his adjutant, “Take me back.” Bleeding heavily, the general the general was carried a short distance to the rear before he asked to be laid down. He died minutes later and Mahone’s assault was repelled.
The Alabamians lamented the “sad loss” of Sanders, “our young and gallant brigadier, who gave his life to the cause,” one of his men recalled, “I knew that none were braver than he,” added a private in the 11th Alabama. “He was stern but kind, and always looked after the comfort and safety of his men, and as the war progressed he grew continually in their estimation.”
The Charleston Mercury described the battle casualties, stating that “none was more beloved, or will be more regretted, that the gallant” Sanders. The article added that he was “a thorough soldier…yet a gentleman and a patriot…devoted to his duties, modest in deportment, of no selfish disposition.”
His body was taken to Richmond the next day and was placed in a vault in Hollywood Cemetery. From there he was interred in the Maryland Section for a short while, but his family decided to move his body to lot O-9, which was owned by John C. Page, a wealthy shoe merchant who had cared for him in 1862 after he had been wounded at Frayser’s Farm. Somehow the exact location of his grave has been lost, and in 1971 a granite marker to his memory was erected in John C. C. Sanders Section R. The marker reads: IN THIS CEMETERY LIES GEN. JOHN CALDWELL CALHOUN SANDERS C.S.A. APR. 4, 1840 - AUG. 21, 1864, LEE CHAPTER U.D.C. 123 1971
Wikepedia reports Sanders was reinturred in Alabama in 1918.
Source of information: And Then A.P. Hill Came Up; 1997-2010 by Jen Goellnitz, the life and career of General Ambrose Powell Hill. The website Geni.com.
http://www.hollywoodcemetery.org/john-c-c-saunders
Gallant Dead, The: Union and Confederate Generals Killed in the Civil War, pg. 296.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0811701328/?tag=civilwartalkc-20
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._C._Sanders