Ezra A. Carman

Ezra A. Carman (1834 - 1909) was a Civil War Union officer.

He commanded a New Jersey regiment and (occasionally) a brigade in the American Civil War.

Military Career

Ezra Ayers Carman was born on February 27, 1834 near Oak Tree, New Jersey. He was educated at the Kentucky Military Institute and the University of Nashville. Then Carman became a merchant. At the outbreak of the Civil War he was commissioned lieutenant colonel of the 7th New Jersey Volunteer Infantry on September 19, 1861. In that role he was wounded in the Battle of Williamsburg on May 5, 1862. After recovering, Carman was appointed a colonel on July 8 of that year. At that rank, he organized and led the 13th New Jersey Volunteer Infantry. Carman led his regiment in the brigade of George H. Gordon in Alpheus Williams’s first division XII Corps at the Battle of Antietam. Carman next saw action in Thomas Ruger’s brigade of first division XII Corps. He fought at the Battle of Chancellorsville and the Battle of Gettysburg. In the latter action, he served on the right flank of the Army of the Potomac, except when Williams led the division, temporarily commanded by Ruger to the left flank of the Army on July 2, 1863. Later that year, Carman led a temporary brigade of three regiments sent to help quell the New York Draft Riots.

Carman went West with the XII Corps to the relief of the Army of the Cumberland, besieged at Chattanooga, late in 1863. His regiment was transferred to the newly-organized XX Corps under Joseph Hooker, serving in the first division under Williams. Carman served in the Atlanta Campaign, seeing action in several battles. He led a brigade of the first division during William T. Sherman’s March to the Sea. In this period XX Corps became a part of Henry W. Slocum’s Army of Georgia. After Savannah, Georgia fell to Sherman’s command, Carman was ordered to Nashville on “special duty.” (Whether the failure of XX Corps, especially of Carman's brigade, to prevent William J. Hardee’s escape from Savannah led to this transfer is open to question.) He was mustered out of volunteer service on March 13, 1865, having received brevet rank of brigadier general on March 13 of that year.

Post-war

After the war, Carman was a civil servant, serving as chief clerk of the United States Department of Agriculture in the years 1877 through 1885. He served as the historical expert for the Board created Antietam National Battlefield and later went on to assume the office of superintendent of Chickamauga-Chattnooga National Battlefield. Carman died in Washington, D. C. on December 25, 1909. He is buried at the Arlington National Cemetery.

Carman’s maps appear in: "Atlas of the battlefield of Antietam", ed. George W Davis and Charles H Ourand, Washington : Govt. Print. Off., 1904. Carman also wrote a study of the Antietam Campaign, which was published recently: "The Maryland Campaign of September 1862: Ezra A. Carman's definitive study of the Union and Confederate armies at Antietam", ed. Joseph Pierro, New York : Routledge, 2008. ISBN: 0415956285

Carman also was an author of D E Salmon, Ezra Ayers Carman, Hubert A Heath and John Minto, "Special Report on the History and Present Condition of the Sheep Industry of the United States" , Washington, DC: G.P.O., 1892.

References

* Eicher, John H., and Eicher, David J., "Civil War High Commands", Stanford University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
* Murfin, James V., "The Gleam of Bayonets: the Battle of Antietam and the Maryland Campaign of 1862", New York, T. Yoseloff, 1965.
* Sears, Stephen W., "Chancellorsville", Boston : Houghton-Mifflin Co., 1996.
* Toombs, Samuel, "New Jersey Troops in the Gettysburg Campaign", Organge, NJ: The Evening Mail Publishing House; reprint Hightstown, NJ: Longstreet House, 1988.