Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 23.djvu/48

 42 Southern Historical Society Papers.

[From the Charlotte, N. C., Observer, October 6, 13, 1895 ]

THE ELEVENTH NORTH CAROLINA REGIMENT.

The Successor of the First N. C. Volunteers (the Bethel Regiment).

Its History from Its Organization, March 31, 1862, to the Surrender at

Appomattox, Va., April 9, 1865, by Colonel W. J. Martin,

Davidson College, N. C.

For any inaccuracies or omissions in the statement of facts, and for the absence of anecdotic incidents which would have made the sketch more readable, the writer offers in advance the apology that at the close of the war his diaries and private letters to his family- were destroyed by a Federal raiding party. As a consequence he has had to rely mainly on the Rebellion Record very incomplete on the Confederate side and on the recollection of the few members of the regiment with whom he has been able to confer.

If his old comrades who detect material errors in this record will send report of the same to him at Davidson, N. C., so that they may be corrected in the proposed volume of sketches, he will be grateful for the favor.

The Eleventh North Carolina Regiment was the successor of the First North Carolina Volunteers, the Bethel Regiment. This latter was mustered into service for six months, and upon its disbindment was re-organized for the war as the Eleventh Regiment, North Caro- lina troops. It was composed in considerable degree of the mate- rial of the Bethel Regiment.

The reorganization took place at Camp Mangum, near Raleigh, March 31, 1862, by the election of C. Leventhorpe, Colonel; W. A. Owens, Lieutenant-Colonel, and W. A. Eliason, Major. Major Elia- son was at the same time elected to the Lieutenant-Colonelcy of the Forty-ninth, and accepted it, and Captain W. J. Martin, of the Twenty-eighth, was elected Major in his stead, and was promoted Lieutenant-Colonel May 6th, when Lieutenant-Colonel Owens was elected Colonel of the Fifty-third. At the same time, May 6th, Captain E. A. Ross, of Company A, was promoted to the majority.