May 21, 2018
Local History Talk:
MOWED DOWN AT MANASSAS
The Tragic Civil War Loss of Colonel Fletcher Webster & His 12th Massachusetts Volunteers
with historian Clay Feeter
Tuesday June 19 | 7 PM
The library’s Local History series features authors and experts on local history topics. The series continues with Civil War historian Clay Feeter of York, Maine. Feeter gives a riveting account of his 2nd cousin, Portsmouth native, Colonel Fletcher Webster's final moments of life, as his 12th Massachusetts Volunteers attempted to fight back Confederate General Longstreet's overwhelming assault against the Union left, during the Battle of 2nd Bull Run, August 30, 1862.
It was the most decisive victory of that war by Robert E. Lee. Fletcher Webster was born and raised in Portsmouth, NH. Fletcher Webster’s father, noted statesman and orator Daniel Webster (even though he had been dead for 8 years prior to the outbreak of the Civil War), played a surprisingly big role in his son’s regiment during the war and for the many decades to follow. Tragically, Daniel Webster was the nation's most outspoken pre-war advocate for keeping the Union intact and not fighting a civil war that would, ironically, take his son Fletcher's life.
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