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It’s probably not a coincidence that the most dapper Civil War soldier/relative I’ve uncovered went on to become a prosperous shirt and collar manufacturer, but that’s the story of Charles A. Starbuck. He was born in Easton, New York, on June 2, 1841, the first of four sons born to Hiram & Charlotte (Safford) Starbuck. In the 1860 Census, a year before the war began, he is listed as a 19-year-old clerk in White Creek, New York, but when he volunteered to serve two years later, he listed his occupation as farmer.
Starbuck enlisted for 3 years’ service in the 123rd New York Volunteer Infantry, Company I, on August 11, 1862. He reported for duty at White Creek on August 22 and was mustered in, 164 years ago today. He was described as 21 years old, 5 feet 8 inches tall, with light complexion, light eyes, and light hair. The 132nd assembled at Camp Washington on the county fairgrounds on the outskirts of Salem, where on September 4 he was promoted to Fourth Corporal.
The regiment left for Washington, DC, on September 5, 1862. As it pulled out of the Salem station at 10 pm, Cor. Rice Bull of Company D observed, “the people lining the track were so wrought with their emotions they could scarcely find to cheer, but silently they waved their handkerchiefs, and we could see tears upon their cheeks.”
They arrived in New York City the following evening; boarded a steamer for Amboy, New Jersey; took a train to Camden; and crossed the Delaware River at Philadelphia. Here they were served breakfast at the Cooper Shop Volunteer Refreshment Saloon. After eating, they boarded a train for Havre de Grace, Maryland, and then Baltimore. They arrived September 7, marched through the city to the station where they embarked on the last leg of their journey to Washington, DC.
After arriving in the nation’s capital, the 123rd marched from the train station past the Capitol Building (its dome was then under construction) and on to Camp Chase. On September 13, they packed up and marched over the Long Bridge to Fort Albany in Arlington Heights, Virginia.
On September 29, the soldiers moved again, shipped in boxcars to Frederick, Maryland, and then on to Sandy Hook (near Harpers Ferry), where they camped until December 13. From there, it was on to Fredericksburg, Virginia, where they spent Christmas guarding the railroad lines around Fairfax Station.
In January 1863, Starbuck’s regiment participated in what became known as the Mud March, a disastrous effort by Gen. Ambrose Burnside to capture the Confederate capitol at Richmond, Virginia. On January 21, the day after the march began, the skies opened up, forcing the troops to slog through the mud and cold.
Union forces had not gotten far before news reached Robert E. Lee, who readied his Army of Northern Virginia for the coming attack. Rebel sharpshooters began picking off Northern soldiers, and on January 22, the Union retreated, bloodied and freezing. Lincoln replaced Burnside with Maj Gen. Joseph Hooker on January 25.
Charles Starbuck’s regiment wintered at Stafford Court House, Virginia, until April 27, 1863. While there, a sergeant in his company, George Clapp, deserted while on furlough. Cor. William McLean wrote his mother, “The reports here is that he got as far as Troy & then went to Canada. . . . If he has got away he is one of the smart ones. I suppose it is all Debby’s doings. No one supposed that he would leave but I guess he was pretty tired of soldiering.”
The 123rd New York Infantry saw its first action the first week of May 1863. According to The Union Army, Volume 2 (Federal Publishing Company, 1908): “It fought its first battle at Chancellorsville, where the 12th Corps was heavily engaged, the regiment losing 148 killed, wounded, and missing, Lieut. Col. Norton being among the mortally wounded.” As fate/luck would have it, the regiment was close to Gen. Stonewall Jackson on May 2 when he was mistakenly shot by his own troops.
After Chancellorsville, the Confederates pushed north, where they would meet Union forces at the Battle of Gettysburg in early July. The Union Army states, “The 123d was only slightly engaged at Gettysburg, where it lost 14.” But one of those 14 was Charles Starbuck; on July 2, in the middle of the battle, he was sent to a field hospital with heat stroke. The temperature had been in the high 80s with oppressive humidity. The injury put Starbuck in the hospital for a few weeks, most spent at Camp Tyler near Baltimore.
On February 8, 1864, Charles Starbuck was admitted to Armory Square U.S.A. General Hospital, Ward A, in Washington, DC, suffering from typhoid fever. It must have hit him hard, because he did not return to active duty for almost a year. (The Armory Square Hospital stood where the Smithsonian’s National Air & Space Museum stands today.) Poet Walt Whitman spent many days volunteering with the injured and sick at Armory Square, as he wrote to his mother: “I devote myself much to Armory Square Hospital because it contains by far the worst cases, most repulsive wounds, has the most suffering & most need of consolation—I go every day without fail, & often at night—sometimes stay very late—no one interferes with me, guards, doctors, nurses, nor any one—I am let to take my own course.”
On January 26, 1865, Starbuck returned to active duty, only to resign a few days later. On February 4, he accepted a commission as a 1st Lieutenant in the 8th U.S. Colored (Kentucky) Heavy Artillery, Company H. At the time, they were performing garrison duty at Fort Anderson in Paducah, Kentucky. (All Black Union regiments were required to have white officers.) He served in this regiment for a year, mustering out of the service on February 10, 1866, in Pulaski, Tennessee.
Later that year, back in Buskirk, New York, 25-year-old Charles Starbuck married 27-year-old Lydia Ann Frances Arnold on September 5, 1866. Fannie, as she preferred to be called, was our 2nd cousin 5x removed on the Dudley branch. The couple would have five children: Anna Lydia (1867), Hiram (1869), Katherine (1872), David Arnold (1874), and Frances (1878).
Charles worked various jobs, including “dealer in agriculture implements” and bookkeeper, before 1880, when he is first listed as a shirt manufacturer in Glens Falls, New York. Over the next 25 years, he is described as a foreman, manufacturer, supervisor, and owner at clothing factories around the city: Fowler & Robertson’s, C.E. Starbuck & Co., and others.
The Starbucks spent the rest of their lives in Glen Falls. At the time, one of their neighbors—5 miles south in Moreau—was Ulysses S. Grant, who was writing his memoir on the front porch of his mountain cottage, before dying on July 23, 1885. Two years earlier, Charles appeared in a story in the Glens Falls Post–Star (September 28, 1883):
Who Are to Decide the Fate of George H. Willett
Beginning on the half-dozen jurymen who occupy the rear row of seats, we first come to Charles Starbuck. He is well known in Glens Falls, being foreman of Fowler & Robertson’s Glen shirt factory. Mr. Starbuck is foreman of the jury; is about forty years of age; has an intelligent, thoughtful face, fringed with dark whiskers, slightly tinged with gray. He follows the evidence closely, his countenance indicating watchfulness and a determination to get at the bottom facts.
What did Willett reportedly do, and what was the verdict? He was accused of shooting a man named John Pair, whose daughter Willett wanted to marry. The jury found Willett guilty.
The Starbucks appeared in another story in the Post-Star on February 8, 1886:
A Lost Jaw—The Railroad Accident at Waterford Junction
[At Mechanicsville on February 4, the Starbucks] boarded the mixed [freight-and-passenger] south-bound local. Near Waterford Junction one of the freight cars left the track. The passenger car, directly behind, was also derailed, and after running for some distance on the ties tipped over on its side. The car was drawn in this condition for several rods, breaking the windows, tearing the seats from their places and wrecking the car badly. Mr. and Mrs. Starbuck were seated on the side of the car which came next to the ground. When the train was brought to a stop, Mr. Starbuck, assisted by other passengers, with some difficulty extricated his wife [next line obliterated] had fallen upon her. When released she did not realize that she had sustained serious injuries. . . . They took the next train to Albany, where they went to the residence of a friend. A physician was called in, and upon examination found the shoulder blade broken. It is thought the fracture was caused by one of the seats falling on her. . . .
The accident is attributed to the falling out of a jaw into which a journal of the freight car fitted, allowing the axle to “wobble” and throwing the car from the rails. The jaw was found on the track some distance from the wreck.
Factories in Glens Falls had a propensity for burning down and taking other establishments with them—in 1864, 1884, and 1902—but the businesses always rebuilt. The Fowler & Robertson operation was lost in 1902, but a new factory was constructed. It was the last place Charles Starbuck worked. He died at the College Arms Hotel in DeLand, Florida, on November 9, 1905, at the age of 64. His health had been declining for several years, so he went South for the warm climate, then died a week after arriving. According to his obituary in the Glens Falls Post-Star, November 11, 1905:
Pioneer Shirt Maker Dies in the South
. . . For a time after his arrival [in Glens Falls around 1870], he had the agency for the Wheeler & Wilson sewing machine. Later he began taking orders for shirts, which were manufactured at first in his own home. The business grew and he formed a partnership with a Mr. McDonald. They opened the first factory on the third floor of the old Peck block, and were in business there several years. The partnership was dissolved, and after conducting the business alone for a few years, he became connected in the same business with the late John Fowler, and later when Mr. Flowler and D.L. Robertson formed a partnership, he was in their employ. A few years afterward, he had charge of part of the Haskell factory, and was with that company when the new factory was built on Haskell Avenue.
Fannie (Arnold) Starbuck passed away in nearby Queensbury on September 30, 1918, at the age of 79. The Starbucks are buried in the Island Hill Cemetery in Buskirk, New York.
One final note: The final shirt factory where Charles Starbuck worked is still in business! No, they don't make shirts there, even though its called The Shirt Factory, they make art:
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