April 28 

 

          On this day in 1863, 22-year old Jarvis Buxton Lutterloh, a lieutenant in the 56th North Carolina Infantry, fell mortally wounded on the battlefield at Gum Swamp, near Kinston. Remembered as “a high-toned gentleman of great intelligence and wit,” Lutterloh was the son of a wealthy turpentine merchant and slave owner in Fayetteville. A graduate of the University of North Carolina in 1860, his future had once seemed bright, but war reshaped his destiny. He enlisted in the 1st North Carolina Infantry (6 months) regiment on April 17, 1861, as soon as he learned of the fight at Fort Sumter. After that enlistment expired, he accepted a commission as a lieutenant in Company E, 56th North Carolina Infantry. In that role, he commanded a small force of men manning a line of “badly constructed” breastworks about halfway between Kinston and New Bern where the Atlantic and North Carolina Railroad line intersected with Dover Road. When Union forces under General Innis Palmer launched a reconnaissance in force, Lutterloh’s detachment opposed them in a three-hour firefight. There were only sixteen total casualties in the battle, but one of them was Lutterloh. A minié ball struck the young officer in the chest, tearing through both lungs. He was carried to a hospital in Kinston. News of his wounding quickly reached Fayetteville, and his parents rushed off within the hour to go to him, but did not reach him in time. As his breath grew shallow shortly after dawn on April 29, a scribe reported that his final words were, “Open the shutters, that I may see the glorious sun once more.” 

 

 

 

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Sources:

Louis H. Mandarin and Weymouth T. Jordan, comps., North Carolina Troops, 1861-1865: A Roster, 3:43, 13: 638; Fayetteville Weekly Observer, May 4, 1863; 1860 U.S. Census: Cumberland County; Wiley J. Williams, “Gum Swamp, 1st and 2nd Battles of,” ncpedia.org.