Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 168, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 July 1911 — AROUND THE AMP FIRE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

AROUND THE AMP FIRE

THREE JIMS OF PETERSBURG •tory of Strange Incident of. Civil Wan—Three Soldiers With Same Given Name Lose Legs. I----. - - .- a-a-Struck by fragments of the same shell, three New York soldiers with the same given name each lost a leg, and the story of "The Three fs Jims’* forms one of the memorable incidents of the siege of Petersburg, Va., June 21, 1864. Judge James A. Lawrence of Tecumseh, the only survivor of thia interesting trio, told the story recently. “The Army of the Potomac had but recently arrived from the bloody battle fields of Wilderness, Spottsylvania and Cold Harbor,” he said. “The Sixth Army corps was in line of battle south of the Appomattox river and th«-Sev-enty-seventh New York lnfantryi*bur regiment, was assigned to the right of the line. “For several hours the Confederates had been shelling our position and we had been replying. James G. Allen,

James E. Barnes and myself, all of Company A, were fighting side by side, our shoulders almost touching. About one o’clock p. m. we saw a big 32pound ifliell coming slowly through the air and knew It would land near us. There was considerable consternation in the company, but we held our position and the shell descended In our ranks and buried itself in the ground. The shock stunned us and in a few seconds the shell burst “We "Three Jims’ were hurled from eight to ten feet fn different directions and all knocked senseless. Allen was thrown on top of the breastworks gfed when picked up his teeth had a deathlike grip on the pipe he had been smoking. : ‘•Col. W. B. French approached and. ordered stretchers brought and Wh were earned back from the field to the temporary hospital. There our limbs were amputated by George T. Stevens, surgeon of the Seventy-sev-enth, assisted by other surgeons. Allen lost bls right leg and Barnes and myself the left. < : "I reached home in Westport, N. in November, 1864, just in time to cast my first vote for Abraham Lincoln, I parted from the other ‘Jlms’ in 1865 and went to Ohio, then came to W braska In 1874. Allen died in 1886 and Barnes September 14, 1890. Barnes and I exchanged letters until his death, and I saw him in 1890 at our regimental reunion at Glover*Ville, N. Y.. where the story of ‘The Three Jims’ was retold.”

The Shell Burst.