5th Louisiana: TROUBLE!

While conducting research work on the 8th Louisiana Infantry with my friend Wayne Cosby we came to the conclusion that the 5th Louisiana Infantry is a pretty obscure regiment. Very surprisingly with nine out of its ten companies all being from New Orleans it would seem there would exist significant accounts from that unit. Got curious, and did some searching of the 5th Louisiana in the Richmond Daily Dispatch. Ha! Found some interesting material on these guys...pfft, Wheat's and Coppens' Battalions! The 5th Regiment had some serious trouble makers. There are several stories here. See if you can see the very odd continual trend with members of the 5th Louisiana...seems they found an alternative and very illegal way to make money on the side.



December 30, 1861:
Fatal duel on the Peninsula.
A duel took place on Tuesday last, near Young's Mill, on the Peninsula, between Dr. Forward and Lieut. Jones, of the 5th Louisiana regiment. They fought with Mississippi rails, at forty pages; and both fell at the first fire. Lieut. Jones was killed instantly, and Dr. Forward survived only a few moments. We have not learned which was the challenging party. Dr F. was sutler of the regiment in which his antagonist was an officer, and the unfortunate affair grew out of a business difficulty. Their bodies were brought to this city in the shipsteamer Curtis Peck, (Capt.Freeman) and will be forwarded to Louisiana without delay.


March 19, 1862:
Arrests.
--The following parties were landed in the cage yesterday by the City Police: Wm. E. McGrady, for being a person of evil name, fame, and reputation, a graduate from the State prison, and deserter from the first RegimentVirginia Volunteers. Carter Winston and Thomas Jones, free mulattoes, were put in also for deserting from Captain Davis company, 5th Louisiana Regiment, and Edward Mullen, for stealing a pair of shoes from Mrs Kaughman South Main, between 17th and 18th streets. The last mentioned arrest was made by an officer of the 179th Regt.


March 20, 1862:
Mayor's Court, yesterday.
--Carter Winston, free negro, arrested as a deserter from the 5th Louisiana regiment, was let off.--Thomas Jones, free negro, a deserter from the same regiment, having no documentary evidence of his status, was set to work in one of the batteries near this city.--Edward Mullen, arrested for stealing a pair of shoes from Mrs. Morris Kaughman, was remanded for indictment for petty larceny.--A. Richards was fined $5 for employing his wagon on the streets without a license; Wm. Travis, $5, for failing to put his initials on his hack; W. K. Smith and Green White, $5 each, for employing their wagons for hire without a license.--Summons against other parties for like violations were dismissed, the proof being insufficient to convict. The military regulations have brought up the dishonest and unworthy portion of the hackmen all standing. They now have to go according to law, or not at all.


August 1, 1862:
Arrests.
--John Bulger, of the 5th Louisiana Regiment, has been put in prison here for having a pass under an assumed name.--Joel Sparks, for having in his house, below Richmond, near Read's battery, on theNine-mile road, a Yankee flag concealed.--Thomas Shechey and Thomas Fitzgerald, for attempting to get a passport on a forged voucher.--Henry Vogler, of Henrico, proprietor of "Vogler's Spring," is among the seven arrested for selling liquor to the soldiers, and now awaiting trial by Court-Martial.--Edward Courtney has also been imprisoned for inducing men to leave their regiments and obtaining passports for them under false pretenses.--Thomas Smith, for stealing blank pass ports from the Passport office.--H. B. Lipscomb, of King William, arrested on the charge of aiding and abetting the enemy, being-subject to the Conscript law, has been enrolled and sent to Camp Winder.

August 18, 1862:
By the Governor of Virginia — a Proclamation.
--Information having been received by the Executive that John E. Lehmony, John Fritz Kriebel, Richard Duff, Daniel Broderick, James Coyne, James M. Armour, Julius Sholly, George W. Cassiday, Charles Foster, William Amy, Michael Sheehan, Michael M. McLaughlin, and Thomas F. Eanes, have escaped from the jail of the city of Richmond, and are now going at large: Therefore, I do hereby offer a reward of three hundred and twenty-five dollars to any person or persons who shall arrest the said escaped prisoners and deliver them into the jail of said city of Richmond, or twenty-five dollars for such arrest and delivery of any one of them; and I do, moreover, require all officers of this Commonwealth, civil and military, and request the people generally, to use their best exertions to procure their arrest, that they may be brought to justice.

[There next appears a list of individuals wanted. I edited to show the one from the 5th Louisiana]

Thomas F. Eanes, charged with malicious stabbing, is about 5 feet10 inches high, light complexion, Roman nose, and rather sharp features, is about 30 years of age, and lately a Lieutenant in the 5th Louisiana regiment. au 18--3t.


October 30, 1862:
Shot.
--A soldier named James Jackson, belonging to the 5th Louisiana regiment, was shot yesterday, about 10 o'clock, near the corner of 1st and Cary streets, by a person with whom he got into an altercation on the merits of the soldiers from Louisiana. The ball took effect in Jackson's head, and it was supposed caused a mortal wound. The perpetrator of the deed escaped.

October 31, 1862:
Proceedings in the Courts. [Edited to show 5th Louisiana]
John Robinson, a member of the 5th Louisiana regiment, arrested for obtruding himself in the private office of J. P. Ballard, of the Exchange Hotel, and resisting the watchmen, was detained to be reported to Gen. Winder.


December 10, 1862:
Proceedings in the Courts. [Edited to show 5th Louisiana]
Wm. E. Dillard and John Kellar, two soldiers, belonging to the 5th Louisiana regiment, were brought up on the complaint of Adelis Marrin, a resident of Lumpkin's alley, who charged them with entering her house on Tuesdayevening and breaking up a valuable stove and French plate mirror. The defendants had nothing to offer in extenuation of their conduct, save the fact that both were drunk. They were committed for indictment by the Hustings Court Grand Jury.

January 26, 1863:
Prison Items. [Edited to show 5th Louisiana]
Capt. George Hedler, of company I, 5th Louisiana, who was taken in custody for being a substitute agent. Seventeen hundred dollars, paid by parties for substitutes to this person, was recovered from him.

March 16, 1863:
Arrest of swindlers.
--An important arrest of swindlers was accomplished by Messrs Maccubbin, Clackner, Mitchell, and Hammen, of the Provost Marshal's detective force, on Saturday, at the Star Saloon, on Main street. The parties, at the time of the arrest were in the act of swindling a Mr. Wingfield, of Hanover, out of a large sum of money by the substitute dodge. E. C. Ingalls, private in company A, 14th Louisiana, in the city on furlough, was decked out in the uniform of a Confederate Captain, and in the act of receiving John Booth, of company K, 5th Louisiana, into an imaginary company as a substitute for Wingfield. John Harton was present as Col. D. Zable to give his assent to the transaction, and Dave Summers, another substitute swindler, was present to witness the transaction. The detectives made their appearance in time to prevent the loss of Wingfield's money, and took the bogus Captain and Colonel, and their two accomplices, to the Provost Marshal's office, where the insight of the assumed rank of the officers was turn off them. They were all three sent to the military prison of the Eastern District for trial. Their crime, by law, is punishes by confinement in the Penitentiary. The proof against the above parties is direct and positive.


March 19, 1863:
Two men shot.
--Two men, named Lewis Sweigar and Frederick Gropes [solder of the 5th Louisiana], were shot and dangerously wounded about two o'clockyesterday at a confectionery store on South Main street, between 7th and 8th streets, by one of two men, whose names were given to officers John W. Davis and John D. Perrin, who, soon after the occurrence, arrested and conveyed them to the cage as William White and William Bowen. The circumstances leading to the affair, as far as we could learn, were as follows: Bowen and White, who are represented as belonging to a Mississippi regiment, came into Sweiger's store yesterday morning and purchased several loaves of bread and departed. They came back about the hour the shooting took place, when Sweiger, who had missed $15 of his funds from the front store room, charged them with taking it.--This led to an angry alternation, and signs of a fight being imminent, Sweiger retired behind a wooden partition, and so remained until he thought the two men were gone. He then came into the front store, Frederick Grope, a furloughed soldier of the 5th Louisiana, accompanying him and going behind the counter. Unluckily, the two men were still in the store, and on Sweiger's appearance they commerced an assault on him. In a few seconds one of them drew back and levelled his musket at Sweiger, when Grope, from behind the counter, reached out his hand to seize it. At this moment it went off, and the round shot with which it was loaded passed through Grope's arm just above the wrist, thence into the left side of Sweiger, and passed through his abdomen, and thence through the wooden partition against which he war standing, and through one in rear of that, flattening itself against the brick wall composing the house.--Sweiger is regarded as dangerously, if not mortally, wounded. The wound of Grope will unfit him for duty for a long time. As before related, the men were conveyed to the cage for examination before the Mayor this morning.


May 30, 1863:
Substitute Swindling.
--Two men, named Charles Felburg and Thomas Delan, were arraigned before the Mayor yesterday, charged with forging a substantia paper and obtaining $2,600 from John Smith, a German, under false pretences. Mr. Aylett, District Attorney, appeared against the prisoner, Mr. J. H. Gilmer for the defence. It appeared that Smith had been commissioned by a friend to get him a substitute, and had been furnished with a paper by Felburg certifying the reception of a man in the army for which he disbursed $2,000. From the evidence, it appeared that the signatures of the officers purporting to receive the substitute had been forged, also the name of John Withers, Assistant Adjutant-General, giving his assent to the transaction. It was intimated in Court that one of the prisoners (Felburg) was a regular substitute agent, and had accumulated considerable money in that way. The precise connection that Dolan had with the transaction did not appear. Sundry witnesses of responsibility and standing were examined in his behalf, and testified that he had been a gallant soldier and bating a disposition to get into bad company occasionally, was above suspicion. He had been a Captain in the 5th Louisiana regiment, and resigned, and in Nicaragua commanded the 1st Rifles, under Gen. Walker; was repeatedly wounded, and showed the most gallant bearing. The District Attorney being called away to attend another Court, the further examination was continued until next Thursday. Both parties were admitted to bail in the sum of $500. It appeared that the money paid by Smith to Felburg had been recovered by the detective officers, who took him in custody.

September 23, 1863:
Assault.
--John W. Taylor, a member of the 5th Louisiana regiment, was arraigned before the Mayor yesterday, charged with assaulting Joseph Kingalow in the street. A witness testified that the difficulty took place in the bar-room of James Gorman, on 12th street, between Main and Cary, upon the adjournment of which to the street the parties were arrested. Taylor was sent to Major Griswold for immediate transit to his company.