More on the 107th Ohio

Last night I got some time to do some reading on the 107th Ohio at Gettysburg, specifically on July 2nd. As I suspected they were in the Cemetery Hill area. In fact they were at the very northern tip of the line, Ames brigade formed a salient. They were attacked by Hays Brigade in the evening assault and were pushed back to a stone wall near Wiedrich's Battery (Battery I of the 1st New York Artillery).

Ames brigade had been positioned poorly, or maybe they just didn't have the men to form the position properly. At any rate when they were attacked their initial line crumpled. There was a bit of a gap in the brigade line which the Confederates were able to exploit. After falling back from this initial position they held their position at the stone wall and while it was a close affair they were not routed any further. During this fighting the 107th Ohio captured the 8th Louisiana's flag. This was the end of the main fighting for the 107th Ohio. They did some small skirmishing with Confederates in town on July 3rd but this was minor. Over the three days of battle they lost 23 killed, 111 wounded and 77 missing. A captain was the senior officer remaining and his report is a model of brevity. Basically he says they were engaged each day for a certain number of hours and that the fighting was severe. He gives very few details as to where they were or who was on their flanks.

Finally some clarification on how I'm related to Peter Reis. My dad's mother was Luella Goll, her mother was Caroline Illian, and her father was Lewis Illian. Lewis' father was Friederich Illian. Friederich was drafted in 1864 to serve in the 37th Wisconsin. At that same time his brother-in-law, Heinrich Kniebes was also drafted and served in the 6th Wisconsin. Both men were 44 years old and lived on the same farm. Friederich's mother and father in law also lived on the farm and when he was drafted were probably a big help to Friederich's wife, who had seven children aged 15 years to 14 months old to take care of. One of Friederich's daughters, Catherine married Wilhelm Reinheimer. Wilhelm's aunt Elisabeth was married to Peter Reis. Like I said yesterday, the relation is not direct at all but a line can still be traced.

Incidentally Wilhelm's uncles Jacob and Wilhelm were members of the Sandusky Schutzenverein (Rifle Club) founded in 1861. I don't know if the Sandusky Schutzenverein became a company in a regiment but these men did not serve in the army as both were in their 40s when the war began.

Here is a picture of Catherine Illian (my great-something aunt) and William Reinheimer with their three living children, William F., Cora, and Elmer (I believe that is the order from left to right). A fourth child, Elenor died at the age of 4 months.