In July 1864 the first Confederate Prisoners of War arrived at Elmira, N.Y., Prison Camp, sent from Maryland’s infamous Point Lookout to relieve overcrowded conditions there. In command of the prison, under Lt. Colonel Eastman was Major Henry V. Colt of the 104th N.Y. Vols. In Portals to Hell: Military Prisons of the Civil War by Lonnie R. Speers (University of Nebraska Press, 1997) Colt was remembered as “…fair and fat, of not quite forty, five and a half feet high with a florid complexion. He had a jaunty way of cocking his hat on the side of his head and a chronic attack of smoking cigars which he invariably holds in his mouth at about the angle at which mortars are ordinarily fired.”
It is worth mention that the vast majority of soldiers chosen for ‘prison duty’ were not the cream of the crop from West Point or even the best and brightest of the local rear guard militia. Generally, these assignments were given to volunteers who were not able to serve in the field for one reason or another. Major Henry V. Colt was the brother of the well-known Connecticut gun-maker, Samuel Colt. Major Colt enhanced his qualifications for the Elmira Prison post after he sustained a serious injury while jumping over a ditch marching towards a Virginia battlefield. He landed awkwardly and the tip of his scabbard stuck in the ground while his momentum drove the grip or
handle of the saber into his groin resulting in, among other problems, a chronic inguinal hernia. Major Henry Colt and his wife already had two children back in New York before the war which was fortunate because there is no mention in his biographical data of any more children after the war ended.
Most officers before, during, and after the Civil War-era did not wear a saber unless on parade or in battle, especially not while on the march. Officers had a baggage wagon and the cutlery generally rode in the “in the rear with the gear.” Perhaps avoiding such unfortunate accidents was a good reason why that was the case. His ditch jumping days behind him, Major Colt was generally well regarded by fellow officers as well as the Confederate prisoners at Elmira. He was considered a fair man and “a man of good judgment.”
Shootings at Union Civil War prison camps like Elmira were not unusual. The conditions at Elmira were overcrowded and the usual targets were unarmed Confederate prisoners who approached the so-called “dead line.” In an unusual but well documented case, a Union prison guard accidentally shoots two other guards while off duty. On the night of August 13, 1864 two privates of the 56th N.Y. Militia named Conauton and Burtis were in their quarters at Camp Chemung relaxing while off duty. They got
into an argument about who had the best fire engines in the city of Brooklyn, N.Y., of all things. The discussion grew more heated and the Corporal on guard duty that night (named Crummell) was summoned. He was armed with a loaded and capped “Enfield rifle” which was most likely the very commonly issued Enfield long rifle, pattern of 1853. The weapon somehow discharged in the direction of Conauton and Burtis, whether intentionally or accidentally, at more or less point blank range.
The Minié ball entered the chest of Conauton, exited at his shoulder blade and had enough steam to continue straight through Burtis. It then lodged in the knapsack of a third soldier, whose name has not been preserved. Since this particular Enfield rifle was serving the cause of the Union, the ammunition in question would have most likely been the standard three-ring, soft lead .58 caliber conical “Minié ball” that caused so much carnage to those unfortunate enough to be hit by one on a Civil War battlefield. The Union did not import .577 English cartridges specifically for the Enfield rifle, but issued mostly standard regulation .58 “rifle-musket cartridges” for both.
Conauton and Burtis were taken to one of the Elmira Prison hospital wards (there were six) for treatment of their wounds. The medical report states “Private Thomas Conauton, Co. F, 56th New York State Militia, aged 19 years, while on duty at “Rebel Camp,” Elmira, New York, August 13th, 1864, was wounded by the accidental discharge of an Enfield rifle. A conoidal ball entered half an inch to the right of and below the right nipple, passed through the lung, and emerged at the margin of the posterior border of the inferior angle of the right scapula. The same ball mortally wounded a second man. Conauton felt faint from the loss of blood which followed, but did not fall immediately. Cold-water dressings and bandage were applied. Half an hour later whiskey was administered, upon swallowing which, he raised blood, and, at each effort to cough, the blood ran freely from his mouth until he was nearly exhausted. Three hours after the reception of the injury, he was admitted to the hospital at Elmira. The anterior and posterior wounds were at once converted into incised wounds by Assistant Surgeon Charles A. Leale, U. S. V., and the edges brought together and retained in position by silk sutures and adhesive straps, and hermetically sealed with collodion. A bandage was then applied, producing moderate pressure over both wounds. An opiate having been administered, the patient was laid on his back. He passed a very comfortable night; on the next morning there was considerable febrile movement, increased bronchial respiration, and a slight cough Pulse 120. For four or five days, blood, of a bright arterial color, mingled with sputa, came away in mouthfuls, amounting to at least eight ounces a day. The dressings came off in three days; the wounds had both closed by adhesion; not the slightest suppuration took place from the anterior wound, and only a few drops from the integumentary surface of the posterior wound. Acute pneumonia supervened in the right side, which lasted between two and three weeks.”
Conauton ultimately survived his injuries. Oddly the second man hit, Burtis, was not as lucky. Other than plain old dumb luck, is there any possible explanation for why Conauton survived and Private Burtis did not? In terms of ballistics, the soft lead .58 caliber Minié ball immediately “mushroomed out” upon impact with tissue or bones. The flattened and sometimes splintered lead projectile caused a much larger exit wound leaving the body than it did entering it. Hence, the projectile that went straight through Conauton was much larger and flatter when it next struck Burtis with the most likely result being greater tissue, blood vessel and bone damage. This, more so than pure velocity, is why immediate surgical amputation was so often required when a projectile of this type struck the bone of an arm or leg.
five weeks from the reception of the wound. On March 19th, 1866, he was carefully examined. Externally, nothing could be seen except the cicatrices and marks of the sutures, while on auscultation and percussion, a dullness was found at the middle lobe of the right lung, confined to a space of about four inches in circumference, where pleuritic adhesion had taken place. Otherwise that lobe was perfectly healthy, as were the remaining lobes of both right and left lungs, he was in perfect health.”
Major Colt’s disability from his clumsy attempt to jump that ditch in Virginia is potentially one of the oddest and most embarrassing accidental self-inflicted wounds of the Civil War. One struggles to find any record of an incident remotely similar. As far as the final disposition in the case of Private Thomas Conauton, he was very fortunate compared to other soldiers struck at close range by a Minié ball fired from a Civil War-era rifle-musket. Corporal Crummell was placed under arrest, but subsequently charges were dropped when Conauton testified that the accident was unintentional. It was reported that “the camp was dispirited by the whole episode.” Such were the men assigned to run the Union prison of war camps.
Craig L Barry was born in Charlottesville, Va. He holds his BA and Masters degrees from the University of North Carolina (Charlotte). Craig served The Watchdog Civil War Quarterly as Associate Editor and Editor from 2003-2017. The Watchdog published both books and columns on the material culture of the mid-19th century and donated all funds from publications to battlefield preservation.