Program

Legends & Lore®

Subject

Folklore, Legend, People

Location

310 Locust St, Wrightsville, PA 17368, USA

Lat/Long

40.02635, -76.53309

Grant Recipient

Historic Wrightsville, Inc.

When he enlisted in the Union Army, Silas Smith’s parents gave him a New Testament Bible (also known as a pocket testament) to carry into battle against the Confederate forces. Wounded in battle in the South, Smith died in a Confederate hospital.

Meanwhile, Confederate troops marched to Wrightsville in order to access a mile-long wooden covered bridge over the Susquehanna River. Their goal was to reach Philadelphia and Harrisburg. As the Confederate troops approached Wrightsville, the Smith family, along with other townspeople, fled their homes crossing the bridge to the Susquehanna’s eastern shore. Fighting back the Confederates, Union soldiers followed the townspeople, burning the bridge in their wake and halting the passage of Confederate troops. The Confederates bunked that night in Wrightsville’s abandoned homes. In the morning, they were called back toward York, Pennsylvania and points west. Upon returning to their home, the Smith family was surprised to find that while nothing had been taken or disturbed, lying on a table was the very Bible they had given their son Silas.

Records show there was indeed a man named Silas M. Smith who lived in Wrightsville and fought in the Civil War. Smith was a sergeant in Company I of the 76th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry Regiment and saw combat in South Carolina. He was wounded during the assault on Fort Wagner on July 11, 1863, and died of his wounds on July 15 in a Confederate hospital in Columbia, South Carolina. The house in which he lived is noted for Confederate cannonball damage, although it has since been repaired. The Confederate assault on Wrightsville, however, took place on June 28, 1863.