John Wesley Hensley, 30th Battalion Virginia Sharpshooters/USS Kearsarge

WestCoastSB

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Oct 9, 2021
My fourth great grandfather, John Wesley Hensley, hailed from dangerously riven western Virginia. He enlisted in Company F, 30th Battalion Virginia Sharpshooters at age 26.

While on furlough in 1863, John was captured by Union scouts and sent as a prisoner of war to the Atheneum Prison in Wheeling, WV. From there, John was transferred to the infamous Camp Chase. Surrounded by grueling death and widespread sickness, and fearing that he might never see his young family again, John swore the oath of allegiance and enlisted in the Union Navy as a landsman in either May or June 1864.

From that point until April 1865, he was stationed onboard the USS Stettin; after decommissioning in Boston in April 1865, John was transferred to the USS Kearsarge, participating in the ship's cruises until 1866. This western Virginia man, "stranger to blue waters," saw great swaths of the world that year and a half. He was honorably discharged on August 18, 1866 upon the ship's return to Boston Harbor.

His father, Aaron Hensley, a private in Company E, 14th Virginia Cavalry, was also a prisoner of war at Camp Chase.

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