Russell Merriman Cassaday and Nancy Ellen Sawyers
Images from the Matthew L. Oswalt M.D. Collection
On May 20, 1861, Russell Merriman Cassaday wrote to his cousin Nancy Ellen Sawyers: “I am well at present and I hope these lines may find you all well and doing well. This is perhaps the last news you will hear from me for some time to come. I may see you well on earth again but if I should not I hope we may unite in heaven. I send you my miniature with my uniform and weapons of war we are looking for a call every day.” The uniform worn by Cassaday shows the dark trim and flat-button jacket of the Lafayette Volunteers of Walker County, Georgia, a unit that entered Confederate service as Company G of the 9th Georgia Infantry and fought with the Army of Northern Virginia. Cassaday was wounded about the time of the Second Battle of Manassas in 1862, and again near Petersburg, Virginia, in June 1864, ending his active service. Cassaday returned to Lafayette and to his wife, Thomasina Amanda Wall, whom he had married while recuperating in 1863. They had two children before his death in 1874 at about age 36. Cousin Nancy (pictured here in the 1850s) died in 1916 at about age 70.
Ronald S. Coddington is publisher of Military Images, a magazine dedicated to showcasing and preserving photos of Civil War soldiers and sailors.
