Unidentified Union brigadier general

[chubachus]

Nothing comes up in searches for him, who is he?

 

[Championhilz]

General Adelbert Ames - he was governor of Mississippi during reconstruction.

 

[East Tennessee Roots]

General Adelbert Ames - he was governor of Mississippi during reconstruction.

Colonel of the 20th Maine 8/20/1862-5/20/1863

Ames, Adelbert, brigadier-general, was born in Rockland,
Me., Oct. 31, 1835. He was graduated at West Point in 1861,
and assigned to the 5th artillery. At the battle of Bull Run
he was wounded, and was brevetted for gallantry in that
action. He was present at the siege of Yorktown, and the
battles of Gaines, mill, Malvern hill, Fredericksburg,
Chancellorsville, Antietam, and Gettysburg, besides many minor
engagements in Virginia throughout the Civil war. Having been
brevetted colonel for gallantry, he commanded a brigade and at
times a division, in the Army of the Potomac in the operations
before Petersburg in 1864. Gallant conduct at the capture of
Fort Fisher in 1865 won for him the brevet of major-general of
volunteers, and, later, he was brevetted major-general, U. S.
A., for "gallant and meritorious conduct in the field during
the rebellion." After the war he was promoted to the full
rank of lieutenant-colonel in the regular army, and on July
15, 1868, was appointed temporary governor of Mississippi, his
authority being extended later to include the 4th military
district. In 1870 he was elected United States senator, a
position which he resigned three years later to accept the
office of governor. This office he resigned in 1876, removing
to New York, and later to Lowell, Mass. On June 20, 1898, he
was appointed brigadier-general of volunteers, in which
capacity he served throughout the war with Spain.

Source: The Union Army, vol. 8

 

[chubachus]

General Adelbert Ames - he was governor of Mississippi during reconstruction.

Thanks. I can't believe how many of these guys NARA has left unidentified. As a result, many of their photographs simply never seem to be posted online anywhere outside of their collection.

 

[civilwarincolor]

Thanks for helping to put a name with the photo. Having spent a lot of time looking at the images from both the LOC and NARA I have been disappointed in the lack of detail in both description and scan that appear in the NARA images compared to the LOC. When you look at the NARA Flickr page they attribute all images to Mathew Brady and for images that are duplicates (not a lot but a few) with ones in the LOC and have a known photographer they give all the credit to Brady.

I would love to see the NARA images be allowed to be scanned by the LOC to their size and standards. I think the results would be very interesting. I also have suspected for a long time that a large number of the NARA images are only one half of a stereo image and that the other side was not scanned. I suspect this from having reviewed thousands of LOC images and the large number that have individual left/right plates is remarkable. The LOC took the time to scan both sides and you can reproduce the 3D content of the image.

With the NARA though only the images that the plate contains both side does the stereo exist (at least from what is public online). I would love to know if the other side exists and what their plans are to scan and release them. From the looks of it the only NARA stereo images we will see are the few that the left/right plate was not split.

The image of General Ames is a great example of a stereo from the period. Due to how the images are produced stereo images of the day had the left/right on opposite sides. To view the image in 3D you need to cross your eyes and the image will "pop" into 3D. There is more information on how to do this here.