All In The Family

My mother’s maternal line is overwhelmingly southern, but her paternal line emigrated from Germany and settled in Illinois and I thought it might be interesting to see if the twain ever met in the War Over Rights.

And they did.

Charles W. Snider and Samuel Snider, both of Vermillion County, Illinois, were sons of my 4th GGU John Snider.

Samuel joined Company D of the 35th Illinois Voluntary Infantry Regiment in August 1861 and Charles followed him that September.Samuel SniderChales Snider

John Thomas Jefferson Culpepper of Lavaca County, Texas, was my 3rd GGU.  He joined Terry’s Texas Rangers (8th Texas Cavalry) in August 1861 and mustered into Company F at Houston, TX on September 7, 1861.  By August 1862 he had been promoted to 2nd Sergeant and not long after that he was elected 4th Sergeant.

Culpepper

Both the 35th Illinois Infantry and the 8th Texas Cavalry were engaged in both 1st and 2nd Murfreesboro, Chickamauga, Jonesboro, and Bentonville.

Charles W. Snider was slightly wounded in 1864 (place unknown), but survived and returned to his farm in Illinois and died in 1912. Samuel Snider, however, was mortally wounded at 2nd Murfreesboro (Stones River) in December 1862 and died in Nashville in February 1863.

John Thomas Jefferson Culpepper had been wounded in the ankle during a dismounted skirmish action supporting Ketchum’s Battery at Shiloh on April 6, 1862 and was again wounded at 2nd Murfreesboro.  He also received a contusion near Mossy Creek in December, 1863.

John survived all his injuries and went on to fight at Bentonville in 1865, which was a Union victory, and was captured there on March 21, 1865, but escaped and drifted back to Halletsville, Texas, where he died in 1902.

7/27/15