During the Battle of Salem Church on May 3-4, 1863, Capt. Ira J. Lindsley was among 42 soldiers of the 15th New Jersey Infantry reported as killed in action. The regiment sustained 154 total casualties during the battle, and went on to amass one of the highest casualty rates in the entire Union army during the Civil War. Their horrifying rate of attrition resulted from having served in nearly all of the bloodiest battles of the Army of the Potomac, including Fredericksburg, Gettysburg, Brandy Station, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania (where they lost almost 300 of 429 effectives, including 116 killed), North Anna River, Cold Harbor, Sayler's Creek, and Appomattox, as well as in the Shenandoah Valley Campaigns of 1864-65. By the end of the Spotsylvania Campaign, the 947 soldiers listed on the original rolls had been reduced to just six officers and 136 enlisted men.

In the 1890, J. Frank Lindsley, a son of Capt. Lindsley, led his friends Harrie B. Hoffman, Dr. J. R. Hoffman, and Judge J. B. Vreeland to Salem Heights on the first of several tours to locate the resting place of his father, and to visit the battlefields on which the 15th New Jersey had fought. Despite the serious nature of their journey, Lindsley and his friends enjoyed themselves immensely, reminiscing about the past they shared in Civil War memories, and turning their tours into pleasure excursions as much as "pilgrimages." He and friends returned to more or less the same sites in April and November, 1891, and April, 1893, documenting their excursions with photographs of the battlefields that lay between or near Fredericksburg and Petersburg (Spotsylvania, Todd's Tavern, the Wilderness, Petersburg, Salem Church, and Fredericksburg), and paying visits to other sites of interest, including the Boydton Institute, a school for African-Americans modeled on the Tuskegee plan. In 1906, Lindsley published a brief account of one of his "pilgrimages," undertaken with the veterans' organization of the 15th New Jersey.

Scope and contents:

The 133 photographs in the Hoffman collection were apparently taken by an amateur photographer -- probably Dr. J. R. Hoffman -- between 1890 and 1894. The photographs -- which include 117 albumen images laid onto 4 x 5" mounts and 16 taken with a Kodak model 2 camera -- document four trips undertaken by Frank Lindsley, Harrie Hoffman, Dr. Hoffman, and Judge Vreeland to the vicinity of Fredericksburg, Va., in April, 1890, April and November, 1891, and April, 1893. These tours included visits to the battlefields of Fredericksburg, Salem Church (and Banks Ford, across which Sedgwick withdrew), Petersburg Crater, Spotsylvania, and the Wilderness. The photos provide an interesting record of the still-scarred appearance of some of the sites 30 years after the war's end, but more importantly, they reveal the manner in which a collective memory of the sites had evolved in the interim, as well as the manner in which the "hallowed ground" had become sanctified, not only in the eyes of the veterans, but their families, as well.

During these trips, Hoffman also took photos of the towns and local characters, African Americans, and scenes of general historical interest for the Civil War (e.g., Dutch Gap Canal, Richmond), and there are several photos of the travelers engaged in light-hearted pursuits, from attempting to ride a hog to shaking persimmons from a tree and encountering old acquaintances. Among the non-war related subjects are several fine images depicting the lives of African Americans in 1890s Virginia, among which are images of children and families, houses, and "characters" in Fredericksburg, including a young contortionist. Of particular interest is a series of photos taken of the students, faculty, and campus of the Boydton Institute, a school for African Americans sponsored, in part, by veterans of the 15th New Jersey. Chillingly, this series includes three images of a "mock auction" of students, recalling the slave auctions to which these men or their parents had been subjected. On a different note, the scenes of the farmers' marketplace in Richmond, April, 1890, suggest how prosperous the city had again become in the quarter century after the war's end.

The majority of the photographs have been attributed to Dr. J. R. Hoffman, who, unlike Harrie Hoffman, Lindsley, and Vreeland, seldom appears in them, and whose stamp appears on the back of many.

Reference:

Lindsley, J. Frank. Pilgrimage of the Fifteenth Regiment, New Jersey Volunteers' Veteran Association to White Oak Church Camp Ground and Battlefields of Fredericksburg, Va. and Vicinity, May 22 to 26, 1906. (Newark, N.J., [1906]).

Cat. 12/97 rsc

Link to subject index to the J. R. Hoffman Collection

Alphabetic index to the Schoff Civil War Collections

Return to:

Homepage	Manuscripts	Collections	Staff	Hours and policies