Tag Archives: Charles Amory Clark

The 6th Maine Infantry’s heroes meet 50 years later

Ellsworth rolled out the red carpet when the 6th Maine Infantry’s elderly survivors converged on the Hancock County shiretown 50 years after going forth to defend the Union. When the 2nd Maine Infantry Regiment left Bangor for Washington, D.C. by train on May 14, 1861, five unattached companies remained at Camp Washburn. These companies were […]

Sumter’s 9/11 aftermath: “We fondly imaged ourselves soldiers”

When Confederates fired on Fort Sumter, “we were all young. The most of us had seen nothing of the world,” said 20-year-old Charles Amory Clark, whom no one in April 1861 would mistake for a warrior. Born in Sangerville on Jan. 26, 1841 and raised in that rural Piscataquis County town, Clark stood 5-7½ and […]

A hero emerges at Chancellorsville, part 2

As Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick extricated his trapped VI Corps overnight on May 4, 1863, orders went to the 6th Maine Infantry Regiment to defend the corps’ far right flank along the Rappahannock River, even if doing so meant capture or death. As the night passed, time ran out. Concealed in dark woods near Banks’ […]

A hero emerges at Chancellorsville, part 1

 Talk about bureaucratic delay: The federal government took 33 years to reward Charles Amory Clark for saving a Maine regiment at Chancellorsville. Born in rural Sangerville in Piscataquis County on January 26, 1841, Clark “was a student at Foxcroft Academy” when the Civil War began. “I was fairly well fitted for college, and would have […]