Key questions to the mystery is also determining who lost a flag...
... and did the 106th PV lose a flag to capture on June 22nd...
Additional in regards to the 106th PV historical witness account of the engagement:
(History of the One Hundred Sixth Pennsylvania Regiment, by Joseph Ward, 1906)
(pg.277)
"Several Rebels sprang for the colors in the hands
of Corporal John Houghton, of Company F, acting Color Sergeant,
who, seeing there was no chance of getting away with
them, assisted by Private Henry Weinert of Company C, tore
them from the staff and endeavored to hide them in their bosoms,
but were detected, and immediately a scuffle began for the possession
of them ; two or three other members of the Regiment
rushed to their assistance, and together they tore the colors to
pieces before the Rebs had time to get possession of them, hid the
pieces, and the staff was broken in two by others and thrown
over the works."
"The enemy had come down from the left flank
and rushed upon our men in the rifle-pits, who were steadily
loading and firing to the front. Major Anderson, of the Forty-
Seventh Georgia, stepped up to Captain Tyler, whom he took to
be in command of the Regiment, and said : "Colonel, I thank you
for your sword", and Captain Tyler surrendered his equipments
and at once gave the order to "cease firing". The Major then
directed him to get his men to the rear as soon as possible to avoid
further loss. This onslaught was so sudden that only a short
time before, orders were passed along the line "to hold their position
at all hazards", and a few minutes before. Captain Whitaker,
of the Seventy-Second Pennsylvania Brigade "Officer-of-the-day",
passed along the line and said : "Keep it up, boys, we're
driving them", and before he had time to get far, found himself
a prisoner. Our loss was almost the entire command, including
Privates Lukens, of Company A ; Webster of Company B ; Armstrong,
of Company D ; and Anderson and Smith, of Company H,
killed. Twelve were wounded, and three officers and seventy-two
men were captured, so that there was but one officer and twenty-eight
men in the Regiment reported present the next morning. A majority of these
were non-combatants, and so were not in the rifle-pits."
The history also provides Gen Humphreys report of the engagement also with
dispute of the inaccuracies the report apparently contains.
(pg 278)
"General Humphreys makes no mention of the heroic efforts of
the Philadelphia Brigade, the left of Gibbon's Division, to hold
their position repulsing the three different assaults in their front
;and at the time of their capture, the One Hundred and Sixth
Pennsylvania, the extreme left of Gibbon's line, were steadily
firing to their front, even while the enemy was in their rear ; and
ceased firing, upon order from Captain Tyler, after he had surrendered
his sword to Major Anderson; and there was no chance
for them to "follow the example of the troops on their left".
General Humphreys is in error, when he states that "the greatest
part of several regiments were captured with their colors", as only
the one regiment was captured, and that almost entire; but their
colors did not fall into the enemy's hands."
(pg.279)
"The Sixty-Ninth and Seventy-Second Regiments being on our
right and seeing the fate that befell our regiment, moved off rapidly
to the right and rear, saving their colors though losing some
of their officers and men."
"This was the last engagement of the "Philadelphia Brigade", in
fact, the Brigade may be said to have ceased to exist, the Seventy-
First Regiment having been mustered out. The remnants of the
other three regiments gathered together would not make a regiment
; and what a strange coincidence in its life, that its first and
last battles, "Ball's Bluff and Petersburg", should both result so
disastrously, not only in killed and wounded and the capture of
many of its members, but in the loss of one of its colors in each
fight, that of the senior Regiment, the "Seventy-First", at Ball's
Bluff, and that of the junior Regiment, the "One Hundred and
Sixth", at Petersburg. Yet neither fell into the hands of the
enemy."
Also of note that in this lengthy detailed account of the engagement in the unit history
that Capt Breitenbach is oddly not mentioned or referenced as being actually
present and engaged on the field when all this occured, yet nearly all the
other officers of the regiment known are commented upon. He was certainly the
only officer remaining in the regiment after the fact, and filed a report upon it.
But I would have to be reserved upon the total accuracy of his report since
he might not have been witness to the events as they occured, and no means
to reference same since all the others present were now POW's at the time
the report was written. In contrast to the above accounts which were collective
upon the soldiers that were actually present and witness to the events in question.
More fodder for consideration...
Frederick