Soldier Highlight: The Curious Case of Captain Samuel Becker

 

On Christmas Eve of 1942 the oldest living Civil War Veteran in Berks County shuffled off this mortal coil.

Samuel B Becker was a native of Reading and a longtime resident of Strausstown PA where he taught school, worked at a hotel, sold farm machinery, and worked as a blacksmith.

In 1861 when the war broke out at the age of 14, he enlisted as a drummer boy in Philadelphia. He would serve through two enlistments with Company B of the 107^th Pennsylvania Infantry and the 53rd Pennsylvania infantry. He would transfer from a musician to a fighting roll and fight at Gettysburg and a few other engagements in Virginia eventually rising in the ranks to a Company Captain. 

He would attend the Gettysburg reunion.

He would fight at the famed “Devils Den” in Gettysburg and was cited many times for bravery once saving his regimental colors from capture. During this action he would be wounded numerous times, once in the leg where he would carry the bullet for 15 days before getting treatment.

Later in life he would procure a “Canon de 75 model 1897” WW1 artillery piece for a Veterans memorial at the end of town in Strausstown. His great-granddaughter would unveil the piece.

He was well liked and well respected, the story of his service was amazing…

                                 

                                                           If it were true…

 

You see, there was a problem with “Captain” Becker's story. When researching Zions Blue Mountain cemetery for my project I began to pull up information on him and things didn’t match.

First off let’s look at the regiments. He claimed to be in the 53^rd Pennsylvania Infantry and the 107^th (not specifying which one first). However, he also claimed to be at Gettysburg and fought at Devils Den which ruled out the 107^th which on the first day fought at Oak Ridge on the Northern side of the battlefield and spend the second day in a position near the “Bryan” house near the old location of the Cyclorama (near Meades Headquarters)

The 53^rd Pennsylvania showed up to the Gettysburg battlefield on the afternoon of July 2^nd and immediately moved to the position of the Wheatfield. Not Devils Den but close enough.

So, I dug into the 53^rd Pennsylvania. First, I looked at their muster rolls from 1865. I went to Company B and scanned down the list for Samuel Becker or anything that could be close (sometimes they spelled their names incorrectly).

 I searched the names and found no Becker present at all, weird but not unexpected. The closest was a John Baker who was 32 which didn’t fit. Throughout the course of my project there had been many names that were left off the muster rolls for one reason or another, so it was nothing new.

I went through the other company rolls just in case his company was misrepresented and found nothing.

Next, I turned to Samuel Bate’s “History of Pennsylvania Volunteers” considered to be the “Bible” of Pennsylvania Regiments. Nothing in there for a Samuel Becker in the 53^rd. So, then I did an OCR search for “Samuel Becker”.

The first hit that came up was for a Samuel B Becker….

that’s a match.

in the 53^rd Pennsylvania…

yup that’s a match too

Company B…

match again

emergency militia…

not a match

 Then I go to the official muster rolls of the 53^rd Pennsylvania Emergency Militia Company B

 

If he is claiming to have joined at 14 in 1861 this age would be close to correct (depending on his birthday)

 

In 1863 General Robert E Lee was working his way north to attack Pennsylvania after an immense victory at Chancellorsville to try to win a battle on Northern Soil and turn the tide of the war. On June 12^th 1863 Pennsylvania Governor Andrew Curtin quickly calling for the men of Pennsylvania to enlist in an emergency militia to protect their homes from Southern invasion. Thousands of men enlisted from all over the state but luckily didn’t see action because of the Union forces stopping General Lee at Gettysburg.

The 53^rd Pennsylvania Emergency Militia served from July 2^nd, 1863, to August 18^th 1863, a little over one month, and never set foot in Gettysburg.

Then I turn to his second claim, to be enlisted in the 107^th Pennsylvania Infantry which would have been the regiment that he rose to the rank of “Captain.”

First, I turn to the muster rolls for the 107^th Pennsylvania Company B where I find an 18-year-old Samuel “Baker”

Again, not uncommon for names to be misspelled on muster rolls and everything else matches. This is a Muster OUT roll from 1865 and shows his rank to be “Private.”

Then I turn to the Soldier and Sailors national database to double check

Rank in Private…Rank out…Private.

The other point found in the muster rolls was the description of his enrollment.

 

It seems mister Becker was DRAFTED into the 107^th Pennsylvania.

 

The final nail in the coffin for “Captain” Samuel Becker's story came from the 1890 census. In 1890 the US Pension Office requested this special enumeration to help veterans with pension claims and determine the number of survivors and widows for legislation.

This would be from Samuel Becker's own words to the person collecting the census.

 

Samuel Becker served in the 53^rd Emergency militia as a Private for one month (the numbers were reversed on the census), then was drafted, and served as an orderly in the 107^th Pennsylvania. Even though he claims to have served in the 107^th from June of 1863 (maybe to reinforce his claim that he was at Gettysburg) all other records show that he served from June 3^rd 1864 to July 13^th 1865 at the end of the war. This matches with the draft of the time. He participated in the Petersburg siege campaign until the end of the war one year later.

As far as any records show he was never promoted, never wounded, and never received any citations for bravery.

Private Samuel Becker would be honored as a hero in the little town of Strausstown. He would tell his tale of “heroism” to anyone that would listen and even travelled to join the soldier’s reunion of Gettysburg, a battle that he never participated in.

My goal here is not to smear the life of Samuel Becker. He undoubtedly should be remembered for his record of service. In fact, I am sure if he had shared his stories of Petersburg and his time there, I’m sure he would have received the same amount of respect from his fellow citizens.

This is a cautionary tale that in history sometimes you shouldn’t take things at face value and stresses the importance of trying to get the information right for future generations which is what I hope my project will do.

Cut from website not sure what newspaper this is from

                                                        Harrisburg Telegraph  December 1942