Disabled soldiers from many states come to Camp Cameron

On May 16, 1862 between 200 & 300  sick and injured soldiers were sent from Gen. Butlers operations in New Orleans, via the ship "Undaunted" to Camp Cameron. these soldiers belonged to the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th Maine, the 26th, 30th and 31st Massachusetts, the 24th Indiana, the 4th Wisconsin, the 6th Michigan, the 8th New Hampshire, the 12th and 13th Connecticut Infantry, the 1st Maine Battery and the Everett Battery of Boston. They stayed at the camp until they where fit to return to service or could find transportation home. Some of the soldiers received their first pay here since joining the army.

This is the only instance I have found of either non-Massachusetts troops or troops returning from the front being stationed at Camp Cameron. Their stay would have varied depending on the severity of their condition and the availability of transportation either home or back to their regiment.

Around this time Gardner Green Hubbard purchased the property the camp sat upon from the Union Railway.

Not only did many of these recruits suffer from wounds and disease the trip home was also quite a hardship.

According to Henry Robinson of the NH 8th, the Undaunted lost its main mizzen mast in a storm of Cape Hatteras. They then began leaking water. They needed to be tugged into Boston Harbor. Mr. Robinson states in his account that the Undaunted did not arrive in Boston until June 2. the Boston Evening Transcript has the date as May 13th, then both this paper and the Cambridge Chronicle agree that the troops arrived at Cameron on the 16th of May. The Transcript also states that The Undaunted left Ship Island on April 21st. This was a trip of 24 days. I know the ship was damaged and would have been slowed but I do not think it made two trips. If it did, in the period between May 14, 1862 and June 2, 1862 it not only would have made another round trip from La. to Ma. but also finished significant repairs on the ship. Robinson did not write his book until 1893, over three decades after the event. I believe his memory may simply failed him on this one point. Though it is interesting that the Chronicle article does not mention any soldiers from the 8th NH., so it possible. 

The information for this post comes from:

The Cambridge Chronicle, May 17, 1862

The Boston Evening Transcript, May 16, pg. 2, 1862

History of Pittsfield, N.H. in the Great Rebellion, Robinson, H. L., pg. 131, Pittsfield, NH 1893

Dan Sullivan