Webster, Martin S., b. ca.1840
Rank:	Corporal; Sergeant (1863 June 10), 2nd Lieutenant (1865 March 30, with rank from February 18)
Regiment:	3rd New York Light Artillery. Battery I and C (1861-1865)
Service:	1861 May 9-1865 July 14

Background note:

A 20 year-old machinist from Auburn, N.Y., Martin S. Webster was among the first to respond to Lincoln's call for troops in April, 1861, to crush the southern rebellion. Five feet eight and a half inches tall with dark eyes and auburn hair, Wesbter mustered into the service on May 17 as Corporal of Co. I, 19th New York Infantry, a three months regiment whose enlistment was extended by the state to two years. Little more than a month after arriving in the Shenandoah Valley, however, Webster was taken prisoner on July 11, while on a scout between Martinsburg and Winchester. Confined in a series of Confederate prisons, including those at Tuscaloosa, Ala., and Salisbury, N.C., Webster was held for almost a year before receiving parole.

Upon is release, still suffering from the effects of dysentery and emaciation, Webster returned to his regiment (now redesignated as the 3rd New York Light Artillery) and fulfilled his two year obligation. Undaunted by his experiences in southern prisons, on June 4, 1863, he reenlisted for the duration of the war, accepting a promotion to sergeant of Battery I.

The various companies and detachments of the 3rd Artillery served virtually independently of one another during the war, and were often distributed in entirely different theaters. Battery I, more than most of the others, was comparatively sedentary. Having entered New Bern, N.C., during Burnside's expedition against the Carolina coast in March, 1862, Webster's battery rarely strayed far. As part of the artillery brigade of 18th Corps, the regiment formed part of the garrison force in New Bern, and with the exception of four months in 1863 when they were sent to South Carolina and the last few months of the war, the regiment remained near New Bern for its entire service.

Soldiers in the garrison at New Bern had a very different experience than their comrades in northern Virginia or the west. Although it was a federal base in hostile territory, New Bern was something of a backwater, with the most dramatic scenes of action taking place to the north, south, and west. For most of his service, Webster's life there was one of long periods of boredom punctuated by a few, intense episodes of extreme violence. Webster was present during the two most important of these -- the Goldsboro expedition of December, 1863, and the Confederate effort to retake New Bern on February 1 and 2, 1864 -- but was otherwise occupied with keeping his men as sober as possible, as well drilled as possible, and as healthy as possible. A tough soldier, Webster was often critical of the performance of his superiors and the enlisted men alike, accusing them of cowardice and laxness, writing, for example, that his "detchment gits all the Dead Beats of the Battrey" (1864 January 4).

In 1864, the daily round of drill and drink was broken mainly by drunken violence, petty larceny from civilians, and the punishment of deserters and thieves. After a Confederate assault was repulsed in May, the greatest danger facing the camp was a devastating yellow fever epidemic in the fall that took several dozens of lives. From July through September, Webster was hospitalized due to illness, and during October, he suffered what was almost certainly a malarial infection, though recovering sufficiently to continue duty. Boredom and protracted ill health, however, seem to have contributed to a creeping sense of frustration over his lot. After being denied by Col. C.H. Stewart in his effort to obtain a furlough to attend to unspecified personal business at home, Webster exploded : "Col. Stwart had no right to say who gos on Fourlougs but this was not Col S___t true reson that I know, I am sure of that. he dont want to let me go Home, and he knows why no true man would stop me, but this is but one mark that scores on my a count for Col. Stwart, and as God is a just Judg for all I will not let him go unpunished for this time and when wee air both out of the Servis and Soldiers no more then Mr. C.H.S. and me will squair the Yards..." (1864 December 2).

In December, 1864, Battery I was sent to Plymouth, N.C., to take part in an expedition to Rainbow Bluff, and in January, 1865, in several half-hearted forays toward Colerain. Led by Jones Frankel, these expeditions accomplished little, but Webster's battery did participate in the more significant engagements at Wise's Fork (March 7-10) and Bennett House (April 26), during the closing stages of the Carolina's Campaign.

After mustering out of the service in July, 1865, Webster appears to have returned to Auburn and resumed work as a machinist. He was employed for some time as a supervisor of the machine shop at Auburn Prison, but was removed in 1876 for what he claimed were reasons of politics and personal animosity. In 1882, he was rejected in his application for an invalid's pension due to "exposure and effects of said disease" while a prisoner of war, from the privations of life as a soldier, and from the bout of malaria he suffered at New Bern. In 1890, he renewed his efforts, this time meeting with success.

Scope and contents:

Martin Webster's journal offers an insightful venture into the thoughts and experiences of a working class man drawn into the back waters of the Civil War. The two volumes record his service with Battery I, 3rd New York Light Artillery, from September, 1863, through the beginning of March, 1865, during which the regiment was stationed in northeastern North Carolina, primarily at New Bern. The volume contains fine descriptions of two expeditions undertaken by the regiment from December, 1864 through March, 1865, and a fair, but myopic view of the Confederate assaults on New Bern in February and May, 1864. With these exceptions, however, the diary is more a chronicle of the doldrums of camp life and the effects of ill discipline, abysmal sanitation, and alcohol, than it is a record of martial achievement.

Rough handwriting combined with only a moderate degree of literacy make Webster's journal difficult to read, particularly in the earlier portions. Webster was apparently not much accustomed to writing, but while the language occasionally masters the sergeant, the sergeant nevertheless masters the language on several occasions. Of particular note are an excellent, long and detailed account of the mass execution of a group of deserters at New Bern (1864 August 14), and a memorable account of Webster and his friends stealing Thanksgiving dinner from local Black families (1864 November 23). The constant refrains of Webster's world are drill, drink, and (particularly in the fall of 1864) disease, and through these emerges a vivid picture of the seamy side of the war that many soldiers prefered to deemphasize. He is, for instance, one of the few soldiers in the Schoff Collections who admits to having taken a body part as a souvenir, the scalp blown off the head of a man hit by a 100 pound shell (May 9, 1864), and he is a soldier who plans openly to get even with his colonel for what he perceives as a slight.

The longest and, for most readers, the most significant part of the journal spans the period from December, 1864, through March, 1865, when Webster was engaged in expeditions to Rainbow Bluff, N.C., and in the vicinity of Plymouth and Colerain, N.C., the latter a half-hearted offensive led by Col. (later Brig. Gen.) Jones Frankle, and conducted as a northern extension of Sherman's Carolinas Campaign. The journal ends shortly before the engagement at Wise's Fork, and thus includes little information on the role that the 3rd N.Y. Artillery played in this decisive stage of the war.

Volume 1: 1863 September 29-1864 June 30, 192 pp.
Volume 2: 1864 July 1-1865 March 9, 193 pp.

Laid in the front of the first volume of Webster's journal are several loose manuscripts, including an 1876 deposition relating to Webster's work in the machine shop at Auburn Prison, and a series of documents relating to his application for an invalid's pension in 1890. The journal also includes a newspaper clipping dating from 1896, pertaining to the attempted murder of Isabelle Webster, probably a relative of Martin's.

Separation report:

A letter of Frederick Douglass of doubtful provenance (possibly collected as a souvenir) has been transfered to the African-American History Collection.

M-2965.1
Cat. 2/97 rsc

Link to subject index to the Martin S. Webster Journal

Alphabetic index to the Schoff Civil War Collections

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