CONCLUSION OF THE PROFILE OF JOHN W. OGDEN.—The last of three installments of the story of John W. Ogden of the Thirteenth New Jersey Infantry, who suffered a wound at the Battle of Chancellorsville: At Chancellorsville eight months later, the Thirteenth “behaved admirably throughout, again showing that it was made of royal stuff,” declared a historian. Ogden left the field after a bullet struck him in the left cheek and was transported with other wounded from the regiment to Washington, D.C. for treatment. He was admitted to Judiciary Square General Hospital, a facility frequented by Walt Whitman. The “Good Gray Poet” observed in his book The Wound Dresser, “Some pompous and every way improper persons, of course, get in power in hospitals, and have full swing over the helpless soldiers. There is great state kept at Judiciary-square hospital, for instance. An individual who probably has been waiter somewhere for years past has got into the high and mighty position of sergeant-of-arms at this hospital; he is called “Red Stripe” (from his artillery trimmings) by the patients, of whom he is at the same time the tyrant and the laughing-stock. Going in to call on some sick New York soldiers here the other afternoon, I was stopped and treated to a specimen of the airs of this powerful officer. Surely the Government would do better to send such able-bodied loafers down into service in front, where they could earn their rations, than keep them here in the idle and shallow sinecures of military guard over a collection of sick soldiers to give insolence to their visitors and friends.” Ogden remained at Judiciary Square for the rest of 1863, an unusually long amount of time considering that his injury was only a flesh wound. Hospital records however indicated that chronic back issues and rheumatism plagued sidelined him. His condition resulted in a surgeon’s determination that Ogden was unfit for combat duty. Ogden never returned to the Thirteenth, which went on to fight at Gettysburg, and later served in Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman’s army. He instead transferred to the Veteran Reserve Corps. Originally known as the Invalid Corps, it was established for soldiers deemed unable to endure the rigors of life in camp and on campaign, but able to perform lighter duties. Ogden served the rest of the war as a clerk in the federal capital and mustered out of the army in June 1865. Ogden returned to New Jersey and reunited with his wife Anna in Newark. The couple had married a week before he had enlisted. They started a family that grew to include three children who lived to maturity. Later in life, Ogden expressed pride of his military service and four grandchildren in an 1899 letter to the U.S. Pension Bureau. “I not only fought for my Country to preserve it, but I worked as a clerk night and day to bring up a family of children, and when they reached the proper age I told them that the only foundation for this our Country to build upon must be virtuous marriages and virtuous home, which my Father fought in 1812 for me. My Honorable Discharge shows I did for them and they will for their children.” One of his grandchildren, George, served in the U.S. navy during World War I. Three years later, Ogden died of complications from an intestinal obstruction at age 63. His wife, children and grandchildren survived him. flickr/photos/8026096@N04/9351054046/in/photolist-ffjAzL
Posted on: Sat, 07 Sep 2013 12:27:56 +0000
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