Private Thomas S. Burgess -- Confederate Sharpshooter

 

Approximately 157 years ago, around 9 A.M. on the morning of Tuesday, May 9, 1864 during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, a Union officer dismounted from his horse and walked among men manning an artillery battery aimed at hastily erected Confederate earthworks just over 1,000 yards distance.

The commander of the Army of the Potomac's VI Corps, Major General John Sedgwick, known affectionately as "Uncle John" by his men, was directing the placement of the artillery battery against the left flank of the Confederate earthworks. In the distance, single shots rang out from Confederate sharpshooters sitting in trees and hiding behind the earthworks.

One of these sharpshooters was a 35 year old Confederate private from Jonesville, South Carolina named Thomas S. Burgess. He was among the skirmishers trading shots with members of the invading Union army's VI Corps along with the rest of Company F, 15th S.C. Infantry Regiment.

As a sharpshooter, his primary targets in combat were Yankee officers, easily identifiable by the rank insignia on the shoulders of their dark blue uniforms.

Most of the sharpshooters in the Army of Northern Virginia carried the new British-made Whitworth Rifle, one of the world's first real sniper weapons, equipped with a long brass telescopic scope for long range targets. Shots from the Whitworth rifles, easily identifiable due to the shrill whistling noises their hexagonal bullets made in flight, flew all around the artillery battery, causing members of Sedgwick's staff and nearby artillerymen to duck for cover.

Union Major General John Sedgwick.
Photo courtesy of the U.S. Library of Congress.

In both a show to contempt for the Southern "rebels" and an attempt to boost the morale of his men, Sedgwick strode around in the open. He reportedly looked down at an artillery sergeant who ducked behind his cannon and, with a good-natured laugh, was quoted as saying what would probably become one of the best examples of cruel irony in the war, "What? Men dodging this way for single bullets? What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you! They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance!"

A second later came the shrill sound of a Whitworth bullet in flight, followed by the sickening sound of a bullet finding its mark and "Uncle John" Sedgwick fell forward with a bullet just under his left eye and never regained consciousness.

The death of General Sedgwick made him, along with Major Generals James Birdseye McPherson, Joseph K. Mansfield, and John F. Reynolds, among the highest-ranking Union officers to be killed in the war. Of the four men mentioned Sedgwick was the most senior in rank in terms of commission.

Although five different (surviving) Confederate sharpshooters were claimed to have been responsible for killing Sedgwick, it has never been officially confirmed who actually took the most famous shot ever fired from a Whitworth rifle during the war.

The death of John Sedgwick at the Battle of Spotsylvania,
Tuesday, May 9, 1864.
Artwork courtesy of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS).

Of all the candidates who likely took the shot, Private Thomas Burgess was the only one who didn't brag about his actions during the battle. If he did in fact fire the shot that ended Sedgwick's life, the reasons he would not talk about it probably fell under several possibilities.

The main one being that most Civil War combat was blind with soldiers in massed groups firing wildly through a smoke-covered battlefield never truly being sure if they actually hit their target. This was not always true, of course, but for the most part a soldier will fire in the general direction of a target but never get confirmation they actually hit another enemy soldier.

With snipers, particularly those armed with a rifle with a scope, they usually get to bear witness to the results of their actions all too well. Like many other Southern-born men in the 19th century, Burgess was fighting because he felt it was his duty, but likely regarded this method of warfare as murder, and the idea of bragging about killing another man simply sickened him.

Or it could have been he feared some sort of retaliation after the war. Being responsible for killing one of the highest ranking Union officers of the war might have made him famous among fellow Confederate Veterans, but might also earn him scrutiny from other quarters he would have rather avoided.

Or perhaps he simply didn't want to talk about it because the memories were haunting to him, as they are to many veterans of warfare. There are many former soldiers and service-persons who will never speak of what they saw or did in war, probably for very good reasons given what we know today of PTSD.

For whatever reason, if Thomas Burgess was in fact the man who fired the shot that fell the Yankee general, he kept that detail to himself till the day he died.

Thomas Burgess survived the war, formally surrendering along with 161 other surviving members of the 15th South Carolina Infantry on Wednesday, April 26, 1865 at Bennett Place near Greensboro, North Carolina. He would return home to Union County, South Carolina where he would later marry his wife, Rachael Ward Burgess and have three sons: James, Hughes, and Oscar.

Burgess died on Saturday, April 4, 1908 (aged 79 years) and is buried in the graveyard at Gilead Baptist Church in Jonesville, South Carolina.

The grave of Private Thomas S. Burgess, Confederate sharpshooter,
Co. F, 15th SC Infantry Regiment at Gilead Baptist Church in Jonesville, SC.
Photo taken by C.W. Roden.