December 13-15, 2022 Collectible Firearms & Militaria
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 12/14/2022
Wonderful Civil War silver T-bar back corps badge in the foliate cross shape adopted June 7, 1864, by the 18th Army Corps, then under Gen. W.F. Smith. The badge has a line and check border very much nicer than later veteran’s versions and modern copies, with the impressed company and regimental designation colored black and reading “F / 23RD / MASS./ VOLS” in each trefoil terminus of the cross with flourishes, some foliate, and an impressed star at center filled with red paint, now partially chipped out, but with the center intact, the color indicating the First Division of that corps, and the star to membership in Heckman’s brigade, nicknamed the “Star Brigade.” The corps was organized in late 1862 and served in North Carolina. In Spring 1864, under Smith, it joined Butler’s Army of the James in Virginia, serving at Bermuda Hundred to threaten Richmond and then joining the Army of the Potomac to be heavily engaged at Cold Harbor and Petersburg, suffering continual casualties in trench fighting, though the First Division took part in the successful attack on Fort Harrison in late August and in October the corps fought at Second Fair Oaks, part of an attempt to attack Richmond defenses in coordination with an attack on Confederate lines at Petersburg. The corps was broken up in December 1864 in a move that segregated its units into the 24th and 25th Army Corps. The 23rd Massachusetts organized in Fall 1861 and served at Annapolis until January 1862. It took part in Burnside’s Coastal Expedition, fighting at Roanoke and New Bern, North Carolina, in early 1862, took part in several skirmishes that Summer and Fall, and was then engaged again at Kinston, lightly, and White Hall, heavily, in December as part of the Goldsboro expedition. In 1863, as part of Heckman’s Brigade it took part in expeditions to Charleston, Little Washington, and Trenton, and in the Fall moved to Fort Monroe, Virginia, where enough men re-enlisted for the regiment to veteranize. In April 1864 it fought at Smithfield, after which the regimental history says the brigade was nicknamed the “Star Brigade,” and then joined the Bermuda Campaign, where it fought at Port Walthall Junction, Arrowfield Church, and Drewry’s Bluff, where it suffered 23 killed, 20 wounded, and 51 captured. It joined the Army of the Potomac in June, losing 10 killed, 39 wounded and 2 missing in the attack at Cold Harbor on June 3, and in the trenches before Petersburg took frequent casualties until withdrawn in late August and returned to North Carolina in September. The regiment saw its last action in March 1865 at Wyse Fork, losing 3 killed and 10 wounded. It mustered out in late June and was discharged at Readville, Massachusetts in early July. This is a really nice, wartime corps badge from a fighting unit. A similar regimentally engraved 18th Corps badge, but made for sewn attachment, is illustrated by Phillips, pg. 80, number 6. CONDITION: Good.
Item Dimensions: 4 x 3 x 1"