Tag Archives: cape cod

Sandwich in the Civil War

Sandwich Civil War Plaque
Bill Daley inspecting the new Civil War plaque. The Historical Commission extends its highest praise and appreciation to Bill for spearheading this important project.

The Civil War Memorial Wall Plaque has been delivered and it now hangs on the wall of the first staircase case landing at Town Hall. It shows the full names of the 294 Sandwich men who served as soldiers and sailors. A gold star is beside the names of the 54 men who lost their lives because of the war.

As far as Cape Cod is concerned, Sandwich raised the first military unit on the Cape; the Sandwich Guards (Co. D 29th Regiment) saw the first military action; Sandwich had the most men join of any town on the Cape and sadly lost the most number of men. Sandwich was not alone in its losses; more than 600,000 Americans lost their lives during this 4 year nightmare.

Roster of Civil War Soldiers & Sailors, Sandwich, MA

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Plaque At Sandwich Town Hall Memorializes Sandwich Civil War Soldiers

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The Right Arm of Old Massachusetts:

The Right Arm of Massachusetts
(Click for Larger View)

On the morning of May 18, 1861, in front of Sandwich Town Hall, Major Sylvanus Phinney presented Captain Charles Chipman of Company D, 29th Massachusetts, with a blue flag that read “The Right Arm of Old Massachusetts. God Speed the Right.” In the flag’s center was an image of a raised arm holding a sword. The arm represented the Cape as Massachusetts’s right arm.
Shortly after the ceremony, Chipman’s unit left Sandwich for Boston and became the first military unit from Cape Cod to fight on the front lines of the Civil War.

By the end of the war, Sandwich had lost 54 men. By the time President Ulysses S. Grant visited Barnstable in 1876, only fragments of the banner remained.

right-arm-web
(Click for larger view.)

As part of the Sandwich 375th anniversary celebration, that flag they received was reproduced by William Diedering III and once again was presented to Captain Chipman (as portrayed by Michael Welch) by Major Phinney (Robert F. Sennott Jr.) in front of Town Hall on Saturday, July 19, 2014. Then at 10 AM, about 46 reenactors began a parade from the Henry T. Wing School (which was renamed Camp Chipman for the day) to Town Hall where the Cape Cod Chorale sang Civil War-era songs.

Following the flag ceremony, special attention was given to those soldiers who were killed in the war by means of a bell-ringing ceremony.

According to the director of Sandwich 375 and chairman of Bringing Alive Sandwich History (BASH) William F. Daley, many people are unaware of the significant role Sandwich played in the Civil War.

“If you look at our history, Sandwich was actually the first town on the Cape to send soldiers,” he said. “Sandwich had the most soldiers sign up for the war.”

DSCN5815The reenactors consisted of the Sandwich Guard, the 3rd Massachusetts Light Artillery Battery C, and the US Sanitary Commission. After the town hall ceremony, they made their way back to Camp Chipman, where there were military drills and cannon demonstrations from the 3rd Massachusetts Light Artillery.

 

William Eaton and the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Monument:

In 2011 Commission Chairman, William Daley, wrote an article on the History of Sandwich’s Civil War Monument. It was especially fitting in that year when we commemorated the Civil War sesquicentennial, that we remembered the 293 Sandwich men who served and 54 men (Civil War Dead – Sandwich MA) who died in service to the nation in that war.

History of Sandwich’s Civil War Monument

Sandwich and the Civil War

by William F. Daley


Sandwich to honor Civil War veterans

By Paul Gately
February 13. 2014 12:01AM

SANDWICH – There are large plaques of honor displayed in Town Hall, listing the names of Sandwich residents who served in World Wars I and II. Later this year, perhaps, a memorial listing of the town’s Civil War veterans and its war dead may also be displayed.

The Sandwich Historical Commission voted 7-0 Feb. 5 to request $8,000 in Community Preservation Act funds this winter to underwrite a Civil War listing of the 215 Sandwich residents who served in the Union Army during the war.

“I think this is a very good idea,” commission chairman David Schrader said. “If we look at this, Massachusetts was so much more than very well represented in preserving the Union cause. More than 1 percent of this town’s population was killed during that war.”

Commission member William Daley said he has documented 56 Sandwich residents who died in the war. He said the Town Hall war listing would include the names of all who served, including those from West Sandwich, which became the town of Bourne in 1884.

Daley said the listing would feature names and might include military ranks achieved.

If the CPA Review Committee votes to favorably recommend the $8,000, voters will consider the request at the May Town Meeting.

Bourne’s memorial to its Civil War enlistees is located outside Town Hall at Perry Avenue, Buzzards Bay. Mostly overlooked by people coming and going on routine business in the building, it includes the names of those from what was then West Sandwich. The statue was dedicated July 4, 1923, nine years after Bourne Town Hall was built on the north side of the new canal.

The Civil War statue in Sandwich, according to town records, went up May 30, 1911. The annual Town Meeting of 1867 considered efforts to remember Civil War veterans. A Union Army soldier statue was decided upon. But the project was not undertaken for decades. The idea was likely forgotten as the years passed and Civil War stories and memories faded.

Finally, William Eaton offered to pay for the memorial. Eaton’s only condition was that the area be named for his family. Townspeople agreed and the project was carried out.

“William Eaton was precise; he did not want the area named for himself,” Daley said. “He was a tremendously humble man.”

Today the statue commands the small park outside Town Hall, which has since been named Town Hall Square, a federally recognized designation.

A View From the Chair – April 2012

Our Home’s History Is Our History

We have two direct connections to history: our family and our home. Family members pass and leave us with cherished memories, but our beloved homes tend to outlive us. They are what remain of those who lived there long ago.

Whose hands slid down the stair rail and spun around the newel post at the bottom? How many faces have gazed at winter storms held back by rippled glass in the window, and welcomed fresh breezes in the spring? American history can be studied in books, but houses have personal histories you can touch and feel. Small homes harbor the warmth and simplicity that most early American families shared. Those families made the glass, tilled the soil, built the schools, and filled the churches. Kitchen fires filled the air with the fragrance of meats, fruit pies, and home made breads. Their lives were full of the experience of everything they beheld.

Our historic houses are a vital connection to our heritage. Their preservation continues that connection to our descendents and becomes one of the few tangible bonds to our ancestors.

Terry Blake, Chair

A View From The Chair – Sand Hill School

Open House and Forum March 24, 2012
at Sand Hill School, 16 Dewey Ave, Sandwich, MA

A View From The Chair, Feb 15, 2010UPDATE – March 24, 2012  Many thanks to everyone who attended the events yesterday. Because of you, the day was a success. Please check back for further updates.

I want to thank the members of the commission responsible for helping to pull this together: Ellen Carlson, Jonathan Shaw, Don Bayley, Carolyn Crowell, and Jennifer Madden.

Any time a new plan in Sandwich is developed and future land use is changed every neighbor’s property is impacted.  Some residents accept that the impacts on their property or their neighborhood may have long range benefits to the community as a whole; others will see any impact as a direct threat to their rights as landowners. Both sides are equal parts of the planning debate.

The Sandwich Historical Commission is very fortunate to have as facilitator, co-vice chair, Ellen Carlson. The duties of her full-time career as community planner with the National Park Service make her uniquely qualified to coordinate the Sand Hill School community visioning event.

I hope you will have the opportunity to tour the building and participate in the public forum that follows.  See our NEWS page for more details.

If you are not able to attend the forum please send an email to Ellen Carlson at ecarlson[at]sandwichhistory.org with your comments and we will incorporate them into the discussion.

Terry Blake, Chair

A View From The Chair – February 2012

Moving into mid-winter, with several feet of snow on the ground and only the heartiest of travelers on the roads, being pulled along in open sleighs while wrapped in thick woolen blankets. The only sounds are the soft clop of horse hooves in the snow and church bells in the distance.

SleighTraveling west along the Old King’s Highway – you haven’t had a King on earth in over 70 years – you descend Sand Hill and cross Ford Swamp where the road curves inland toward the village. The road is known as Main Street here, and you pass the modest glass workers’ houses before you reach the Methodist Church, the Unitarian Church, larger houses, then the Central Hotel and the First Parish Church. Every church is ringing it’s bells and every respected citizen of the town is filing into one or the other – or perhaps the Catholic Church, down on James Street, near the glass factory.

There’s one more church up ahead. You round the corner toward the mill pond and SCREEEECH!! A policeman has traffic stopped as a large dump truck is directed Continue reading A View From The Chair – February 2012

Sand Hill School Clark-Haddad Building Will Not Be Moved!

Sand Hill School/Clark-Haddad BuildingThe Sandwich Board of Selectmen, on January 19, 2012, voted 4-0, with one abstention, to leave the Clark-Haddad building in place. A proposal by the Sandwich Chamber of Commerce to move the Clark-Haddad building and turn it into a visitors center was turned down.

Before the vote, Ellen Carlson, a member of the Sandwich Historical Commission said her board would seek public input at a yet-to-be scheduled meeting in March or April. The forum would include a building tour and would solicit ideas for possible uses. “It’s not in terrible shape. It’s not falling over,” Carlson said. “We have some time to think about this.”

Click here to view the entire article from the Cape Cod Times.

A View From The Chair – December 2011

 

View From The Chair-Dec-2011Looking Back

As 2011 draws to a close the Sandwich Historical Commission finds itself weighing the merits of two controversial issues and pursuing another that few people considered an issue at all.

The request from the Sandwich Chamber of Commerce for the town to give them the Sand Hill School/Clark-Haddad building for use as a visitor’s center is the most difficult problem the  SHC has faced in its forty years of existence. At the core of the problem is the question of the best way to preserve one of only two remaining historic school buildings in Sandwich. Continue reading A View From The Chair – December 2011

A View From The Chair – October 2011

View From The Chair-Oct-2011The Sandwich Historical Commission welcomes its newest member, Don Bayley. His appointment to the commission was approved by the Sandwich Board of Selectmen on Thursday, October 20 for a term of (almost) three years. Don has been doing several projects for us since joining as a volunteer in April of this year and we’re sure he will be a great asset for years to come.

Volunteers Welcomed

Our call for new volunteers has not gone unanswered. I have another fish taking a nibble at the bait right now and hope to have him on the hook and landed on the deck before the next meeting. So if you’re considering joining us, or just interested in what we do, please drop me an email. You will be in good company. My address is tblake[at]sandwichhistory.org
Of course, you will replace [at] with @.

Terry Blake, Chair

A View From the Chair – September 2011

View from the Chair-Sep-2011The Sandwich Historical Commission is entering an exciting phase. Thanks to the contributions of our members and volunteers, we have recently achieved some notable steps in our mission to document the town’s historical assets.

Looking Back

Just in the last few months we have seen the following accomplishments:

There are important projects in work as well, including a vital headstone restoration project and an archival documentation project. Continue reading A View From the Chair – September 2011

Historic Marker Program In The Sandwich Enterprise

Historic Marker Program Leads To Unusual Discoveries

On news stands now! Local news story encourages local pride in historic homes through inclusion in Historical Commission’s program.
Read what may be hidden under the old floorboards.

A feature article by Mary Stanley is on the front page of the April 22, 2011 issue of The Sandwich Enterprise. Capenews.net members can read the article on line. Get yours now.

Sandwich Enterprise 4/22/2011