Court-martial of Lt Bonsall (126th PA)

Toward daylight an order came to withdraw the command as speedily and cautiously as possible. Colonel Rowe had [page 23] hardly begun to put this order in execution before it was countermanded, and the men had to be put back. Then part of a company of the Ninety-First under Captain Lentz, and also a body of Berdan's sharpshooters were sent to him. Again the order came to withdraw, and again it was countermanded by fast-riding aide-de-camp. The army was not yet quite over the river. The Lieutenant Colonel was exceedingly fearful these movements among the pickets would draw the attention of the enemy. It was a long time growing light, but now at length it was broad-day, when, not too soon, the order came to hasten to the bridges. The regiment was hastily collected together. Lentz, with his men and the sharp-shooters, were to remain until the One Hundred and Twenty-Sixth should begin to move down the road to town and then fall in as skirmishers on the flank and rear. All this was happily executed (with one oversight), and the regiment, double-quicking, entered the town, found the lower bridge taken away, hastened to the upper bridge, without stopping for the knapsacks which had been stored when about to proceed to the charge. This bridge had also been swung out into the river, but was now put back, and the regiment crossed over to the other side. Then the bridge was again cut loose and Fredericksburg was abandoned by the Union army. The One Hundred and Twenty-Sixth was the last regiment to cross.

But Captain Lentz with six of his men was in the block-house. Lieutenant Bonsall, of F, the officer sent to withdraw the pickets and convey the orders to Lentz, had mistaken his lieutenant for him, and he was in utter ignorance of what was doing. Here he remained some time alone (he and his six men) of all the army, in front of the enemy. A rebel soldier, approaching cautiously, found six guns suddenly thrust out at him, and surrendered. Brought into the block-house he surprised Lentz with the news of the evacuation of Fredericksburg. Look- [page 24] ing out he saw the Union line deserted and the rebels gathering towards the block-house. He left suddenly with his prisoner, down the steep hill, across the canal, through the edge of town, the other end of which was swarming with rebels, hid behind the abutment of the destroyed bridge, until a gallant little fellow, a drummer, swan across for a skiff, which, brought back, saved most of Lentz's party. ...

Lieutenant Bonsall, of Captain Wharton's company, was in arrest from the time of the battle of Fredericksburg until the 29th of January, on the following charge and specification:

Charge: Failure to deliver orders entrusted to him by his commanding officer for delivery.

Specification: In this, that he, the said Lieutenant James C. Bonsall, of company F, One Hundred and Twenty-Sixth Pennsylvania Volunteers, whilst his company and regiment were on picket duty to the front and left of Fredericksburg, having been ordered by Lieutenant Colonel D. Watson Rowe, the officer commanding his regiment, to communicate an order of Brigadier General Humphreys' to the commanding officer of the Berdan Sharp-shooters, and to the commanding officer of a company of the Ninety-First Pennsylvania Infantry, on the picket line held by the said One Hundred and Twenty-Sixth regiment, in relation to the withdrawal of the said sharp-shooters and the said company of the Ninety-First, did fail to deliver said order to the commanding officer of the said company. This at or about 6 o'clock A.M., of the 16th day of December, 1862.

This charge was tried by a court-martial, and Lieutenant Bonsall was not found wholly blameless, but was restored to duty. His duties during the entire night of the 15th were of an arduous and dangerous character, being constantly sent with orders along the picket line, withdrawing and replacing the men; yet he performed them with fidelity and alacrity. The blame principally attached, in the opinion of the Court-Martial, to the officer of Lentz's party to whom Bonsall communicated the order, after asking for the officer commanding the party, and being referred to him as such, and who failed to notify his captain of its reception; and they found him guilty and inflicted upon him a sentence of extraordinary severity. This, however, General Humphreys did not approve. In consequence of the failure to receive Colonel Rowe's order, Lentz and his men were in great danger, and some of them were captured, as before narrated.