CHAPTER XXVI

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DISTINGUISHED SERVICES OF JEWS ON BOTH SIDES OF THE STRUGGLE.

More “brothers in arms” and a larger proportion of officers in the Confederate Army than in that of the North, because most Southern Jews were natives of the country――Some distinguished officers――A gallant private who later became a rabbi――Paucity of Southern records――Generals Knefler, Solomon, Blumenberg, Joachimsen and other officers of high rank in the Union Army――New York ranks first, Ohio second and Illinois third in the number of Jews who went to the front――Two Pennsylvania regiments which started with Jewish colonels――Commodore Uriah P. Levy, the ranking officer of the United States navy at the time of the outbreak of the war, is prevented by age from taking part in it.

The disproportionately large number of Jews who served in the Confederate army was already alluded to in the former chapter. Another proof of it is the preponderance among the Jews in that army of instances of “brothers in arms” (as Mr. Wolf calls them), i. e., of groups of several brothers who went to the front with their neighbors to fight the battles of the state and the section of the country in which they lived. Six brothers Cohen――Aaron, Jacob H., Julius, Edward, Gustavus A. and Henry M.――came from North Carolina. South Carolina contributed the five brothers Moses――Percy, Joshua L., Horace, J. Harby and A. Jackson. The four brothers Jonas have been mentioned in a former chapter, but they also had a fifth brother who, like their father, embraced the Union cause. Raphael Moses and his three sons were four Southern soldiers from Georgia, while Alabama sent also three Moses brothers: Mordecai, Henry C. and Alfred. Three brothers Cohen came from Arkansas. Virginia and Louisiana each sent three brothers surnamed Levy, while of the three brothers Goldsmith two came from Georgia and one from South Carolina. The reason for the presence of so many brothers in arms in the Confederate army is given by the above named authority as due to the fact that the Jews of the Southern States were, in a much larger proportion than those of the North, natives of the soil or residents of long standing. While the Jews of the North were much more numerous, they were, for the most part, immigrants of a comparatively recent date, and therefore less intensely imbued with the spirit of the conflict.

Illustration: Hon. Simon Wolf. Photo by Harris & Ewing, Wash., D. C.

There were about twenty-three Jewish staff officers in the Confederate army, which is likewise a larger number than those who held similar positions in the Union army, and probably for the same reason given above. The most distinguished of them were: Surgeon-General David de Leon, who participated in the Mexican war (see page 162); Assistant Adjutant-General J. Randolph Mordecai, and Colonel Raphael J. Moses, who served on the staff of General Longstreet and was chief commissary for the State of Georgia. Adolph Meyer (b. in New Orleans, 1842; d. there 1908), who later served nine terms as a member of the House of Representatives in Washington from the First District of Louisiana (52d to 60th Congresses, inclusive), entered the Confederate army in 1862, and served until the close of the war on the staff of Brigadier-General John S. Williams of Kentucky. There were also about a dozen Jewish officers in the Confederate navy, one of whom, Captain Levy Myers Harby (b. in Georgetown, S. C., 1793; d. in Galveston, Tex., 1870), who had previously served in the war of 1812, in the Mexican war and in the Bolivian war, and, after resigning from the service of the United States and joining the Confederacy, distinguished himself in the defence of Galveston, and was in command of its harbor at the close of the Civil War.

Lionel Levy, a nephew of Judah P. Benjamin, served as Judge-Advocate of the Military Court of the Confederate Army. Among those who served as privates in the ranks who deserve to be mentioned was Samuel Ullman of the 16th Infantry Regiment of Mississippi, who served gallantly through the war, being twice wounded, and later (1891–94) was rabbi of Emanuel Congregation of Birmingham, Ala. There have also been preserved the names of twenty-five Jews among the Confederate prisoners who died in Elmira, N. Y., during the time which they were detained there. A list of seventeen soldiers interred at the Jewish burying ground of Richmond, Va., contains the names of one captain, three lieutenants, and one corporal, which is an exceptionally large ratio of officers for the Civil War on either side. Even in the South the Jews could at that time be numbered by tens of thousands, with a much larger proportion of poor men, or immigrants, than in former times, and the relative number of officers was perforce much smaller than at the time of the Revolution or of the War of 1812. Still the Jews of the South were then, as it was stated above, much more assimilated or Americanized than those of the North, and the records of the Confederate army were less carefully kept or preserved. Thus it happens that, while judging from inference and some general statements, it may appear that the number of Jews in the armies of the Confederacy was almost as large as, if not larger than, their number in the Union Army, the actual records compiled by Mr. Wolf tell an entirely different story. His lists contain about six thousand names of Jews who supported the Union cause, while among those who defended secession and slavery there were only about a fifth of that number whose names and identity he ascertained.

It is also to the Union army that we have to go to find Jewish officers who commanded regiments on the battlefields. Brevet Major General Frederick Knefler, a native of Hungary, who rose to the colonelcy of the 79th Indiana Regiment and subsequently became a Brigadier-General, and was made Brevet Major-General for meritorious conduct at Chickamauga, is classed as a Jew. Edward S. Solomon (known also as Salomon; b. in Sleswick-Holstein, 1826; d. 1909) emigrated to the United States after receiving a high school education in his native town, and settled in Chicago, where he was elected alderman in 1860. At the outbreak of the war he joined the 24th Illinois Infantry as second-lieutenant, participating in the battles of Frederickton and Mainfordsville, Kentucky, and was promoted to the rank of major in 1862. He then resigned and assisted in the organization of the Eighty-second Illinois Infantry, in which regiment he became lieutenant-colonel, and afterwards became its colonel. He took part, under General Howe, in the battles of Chancellorville, Gettysburg, Chattanooga, Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. In 1865 he was brevetted brigadier-general. When peace was restored he returned to Chicago and became clerk of Cook County, Ill. In 1870 he was appointed by President Ulysses S. Grant (1822–85) governor of Washington Territory, and held the position about four years. After resigning, in 1874, he settled in San Francisco, where he was twice elected to the Legislature of California, and also held the office of District Attorney of San Francisco.

Leopold Blumenberg (b. in Prussia, 1827; d. in Baltimore, 1876) served with distinction in the Prussian-Danish war of 1848–49 and was promoted to the rank of first lieutenant. He came to the United States in 1854 and settled in Baltimore, where he engaged in a profitable business, which he abandoned at the outbreak of the war. He helped to organize the Fifth Maryland Regiment, in which he became a major. His work for the Union cause excited the animosity of local secessionists, who attempted to hang him, and he was forced to have his house barricaded and guarded for several nights. Blumenberg was acting colonel of his regiment near Hampton Roads. He was later attached to Mansfield’s corps at the Peninsular campaign, and commanded his regiment as colonel at Antietam, where he was severely wounded. When he had partly recovered he was appointed by President Lincoln provost-marshal of the third Maryland district, which position he held for two years. President Andrew Johnson (1808–75) gave him a position in the revenue department and commissioned him brigadier-general, United States Volunteers, by brevet. General Blumenberg was a member of the Har-Sinai Congregation and of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum of Baltimore.

Philip J. Joachimsen (b. in Breslau, Germany, 1817; a. 1831; d. in New York, 1890) was appointed Assistant Corporation Attorney of the City of New York soon after his admission to the bar, in 1840, and fifteen years later he became Assistant United States District Attorney, being afterward appointed Substitute United States Attorney under a special provision of an act of Congress. (_Markens_ 223.) During his term of office he secured the first capital conviction for slave trading, and also the conviction of some Nicaraguan filibusterers. He organized and commanded the 59th New York Volunteer Regiment and was injured at New Orleans. He was made brigadier-general by brevet. In 1870 he was elected a Judge of the Marine Court of the City of New York and served a full term of six years. Judge Joachimsen was active in Jewish communal affairs, and was the first president of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum (1859). Twenty years later he organized the Hebrew Sheltering Guardian Society.

General William Mayer rendered valuable service during the Draft Riots in New York City, for which he received an autograph letter of thanks from President Lincoln. Subsequently General Mayer devoted himself to journalism and was the editor of several German newspapers.

Marcus M. Spiegel, the son of a rabbi of Oppenheim-on-the-Rhine, enlisted in the 67th Ohio Infantry Regiment and was promoted step by step until he became lieutenant-colonel, and for bravery manifested on the battle field, was appointed Colonel of the 120th Ohio Infantry. He was wounded at Vicksburg, and after joining his regiment again, fell at Snaggy Point, on the Red River, Louisiana. But for his untimely death, Colonel Spiegel would have been promoted to the rank of Brigadier-General, to which he was recommended by his superior officers.

Max Einstein (b. in ♦Würtemberg, 1822; a. 1844) had considerable military experience prior to the outbreak of the war. He was a silk merchant, and became First Lieutenant of the Washington Guards in 1852. In the following year he joined the Philadelphia (Flying) Artillery Company and was chosen its Captain. He became Aide-de-Camp (with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel) to Governor James Pollock of Pennsylvania in 1856. In 1860 he was elected Brigadier-General of the Second Brigade of Pennsylvania Militia. In the succeeding year he organized the 27th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, which was mustered into service May 31, 1861, for a three years’ term. This regiment, under Colonel Einstein’s command, succeeded in covering the retreat of the Union Army in the first battle of Bull Run and won credit by its conduct. Einstein was subsequently appointed by President Lincoln United States Consul at Nüremberg, Germany, and later served as United States Revenue Agent at Philadelphia.

It is worth noting as an example that this one regiment had nearly thirty Jewish officers, most of them in minor positions, and about sixty privates in the ranks. This was, of course, an exceptional case, but Jews were represented in most of the regiments, especially those of Philadelphia, almost if not quite as much as in the regiments of those states which sent a larger contingent of Jewish soldiers to the front than Pennsylvania. The first of those states was New York, with nearly two thousand, which had already at that time achieved the distinction of having the largest Jewish community in the New World. Ohio, which came second, with 1,134, and Illinois, with 1,076, clearly indicated the growing importance of the Middle West for the new immigration. Indiana contributed over five hundred――almost as many as Pennsylvania――while Michigan had more than two hundred of its Jewish inhabitants in the Union Army. New England had the smallest representation, for the number of Jews there was very small at that time.

There was still another Pennsylvania regiment, the 65th (Fifth Cavalry), known as the “Cameron Dragoons” (on account of its being recruited under the authority of an order issued by Secretary of War Simon Cameron (1799–1889) July 6, 1861), which first went to the front under the command of a Jewish colonel. His name was Max Friedman (b. in Mühlhausen, Germany, 1825), and he came to the United States in 1848, settling in Philadelphia. He served as Major of a Regiment in the State Militia prior to the Civil War. Colonel Friedman remained with his regiment in the field until a severe wound received at the battle of Vienna, Virginia, forced him to resign in the following month. He later (1869) settled in New York as the cashier of the Union Square National Bank, of which he was one of the organizers.

Abraham Hart (b. in Hesse-Darmstadt, 1832), who arrived in this country at the age of eighteen, was a captain in the 73d Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, and when Colonel Kolter, under whom he served, was elevated to the command of a brigade in General Blenker’s Division of the Army of the Potomac, Captain Hart was detailed as Adjutant-General of the brigade. Moses Isaac of New York attained the same rank, that of adjutant-general in the Third Army Corps of the Army of the Potomac, and participated in the battles of the Peninsular campaign, subsequently serving under General Banks. Another New York Jew, of whom little else is known besides a brief notice by Mr. Wolf (p. 285), was Lieutenant-♦Colonel Leopold C. Newman, of the 31st Infantry Regiment of that state, whose foot was shattered by a cannon ball in the battle of Chancellorville (May 2, 1863), and he was taken to Washington, where he died. President Lincoln visited him at his bedside, and brought along his commission promoting him to the rank of Brigadier-General.

While the number of Jewish soldiers was proportionally large, and many of them became distinguished for bravery and were promoted to responsible positions, it was in the other branch of the service, the Navy, in which a member of the Jewish community attained the highest rank up to that time. Commodore Uriah Phillips Levy (b. in Philadelphia, 1792; d. in New York, 1862) held the highest rank in the United States Navy prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, though his age prevented him from participating in that struggle. Levy sailed as a cabin boy before he was eleven years old, and at the age of fourteen he was apprenticed as a sailor, and also attended a naval school for one year, becoming a second mate four years later. He soon rose to be first mate, and was master of a schooner at twenty. While he was on a cruise on the “George Washington,” of which he was part owner as well as master, a mutiny took place, his vessel was seized and he was left penniless; but he managed to return to the United States, and after obtaining the necessary means, he secured the mutineers, brought them to the United States and had them convicted.

Levy received his commission from the United States Navy as sailing master in October, 1812, when the war with England had already begun. Until June 13 he served on the ship “Alert,” doing shore duty; then he went on the brig “Argus,” bound for France. The “Argus” captured several prizes, and Levy was placed in command of one, but the prize was recaptured by the English, and Levy and the crew were kept as prisoners for sixteen months in England. In 1816 he was assigned as sailing master to the “Franklin,” and in March, 1817, he was appointed lieutenant in the Navy, which appointment was confirmed by the Senate.

Illustration: Commodore Uriah P. Levy.

Levy had many difficulties in the Navy, partly due to his promotion from the line, which is never popular among officers who receive their training at the Naval Academy, and partly, as he himself and many others thought, on account of his faith and descent. He fought a duel, in which he killed his opponent, was court-martialed six times, and finally dropped from the list as captain, to which rank he had been promoted. He defended his conduct before a court of inquiry in 1855, which restored him to the navy as captain. Subsequently he rose to the rank of commodore.

Levy was the descendant of an old Philadelphia family, always acknowledged his Jewish allegiance, and was one of the charter members of the Washington Hebrew Congregation. He purchased Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, whom he greatly admired, and it is still owned by the family, the present owner being Congressman Jefferson M. Levy, a nephew of the commodore. A statue of Jefferson, presented to the government by Uriah P. Levy, is still standing in the Statuary Hall of the Capitol in Washington. Levy is buried in the portion of Cypress Hills Cemetery in New York which belongs to Congregation Shearit Israel (of which another nephew, Louis Napoleon Levy, a brother of the Congressman, is president), and on his imposing tombstone is recorded that “he was the father of the law for the abolition of the barbarous practice of corporal punishment in the United States Navy.”

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