Pee Dee Rifles

Captain George Thomas Parker, Company H (the “Gates County Minute Men”), 5th Regiment N.C. State Troops.

George Thomas Parker, a native of Gates County, is apparently identical to the individual of the same name and date of birth (also born in North Carolina) who resided in 1860 as a merchant in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi. However, by May 1861 George had returned to Gates County and mustered in as first sergeant of the “Gates County Minute Men” when that company enlisted for three years or the duration of the war on May 30, 1861. The “Minute Men” were assigned to the 5th Regiment N.C. State Troops as Company H on June 18-20 and George was appointed regimental sergeant major.

Just three months later he was promoted to “brevet second lieutenant” and transferred to Company G, a Wilson County command. That assignment continued until January 1862 when he was transferred back to Company H, still a second lieutenant. The 5th North Carolina sustained horrific casualties in a bungled attack at the Battle of Williamsburg on May 5, 1862, losing 258 casualties including eighty-seven men killed or wounded in action and 128 captured, many of whom were also wounded. George was apparently one of only four officers of the 5th North Carolina to survive the battle unscathed. He was wounded at the Battle of Seven Pines on May 31, but apparently not hospitalized. Promotion to first lieutenant followed on October 12.

George was chronically sick and frequently hospitalized with various enteric illnesses during much of 1863 and early 1864. However, he received promotion to captain on June 15, 1863. He was wounded in an unspecified battle in late May 1864 and wounded again in late August during General Jubal Early’s Shenandoah Valley campaign.* Hospitalization for that wound and a recurrence of his earlier illness kept him from returning to duty.

George was reported absent without leave in early January, but he was in fact still in a hospital, a matter he promptly cleared up by writing General Lee’s adjutant, Lieutenant Colonel Walter H. Taylor.**

More than 180 men and boys served in Company H, 5th Regiment N.C. State Troops, but just nine were present for the surrender at Appomattox Court House, April 9, 1865. From the original muster of 118 members in Gates County in May 1861 only Captain Georget Parker and Private Elbert Cross remained.

George Thomas Parker (May 6, 1836-January 18, 1911) is buried at Cedar Hill Cemetery, Suffolk, City of Suffolk, Virginia.

*Possibly at the Battle of Smithfield Crossing, August 25-29, 1864.
**See Comment 1, below.

Image: Digital file, courtesy Mr. Tom Nelson.

Source Note: 1860 US Census, Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, population schedule, p. 12, family 84, William R. Bothe household; Manarin et al., North Carolina Troops, 5:128, 209, 222-233; Mast, “North Carolina Casualties”; Mast, State Troops and Volunteers, 1:295; service record files of George Thomas Parker, 5th Regiment N.C. State Troops, Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers from the State of North Carolina (M270); https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/9799324/george-thomas-parler

We are glad to see the people of our State everywhere preparing for the crisis which is at hand. As an offset to the "Wide-Awakes" of the North, "Minute Men" are organizing in all the principal districts of South Carolina. Their object is to form an armed body of men, and to join in with our fellow-citizens, now forming in this and our sister States as "Minute Men," whose duty is to arm, equip and drill, and be ready for any emergency that may arise in the present perilous position of the Southern States.

In Kershaw, Abbeville and Richland Districts the organization is already complete and powerful, embracing the flower of the youth, and led on bv the most influential citizens. The badge adopted is a blue rosette – two and a half inches in diameter, with a military button in the centre, to be worn upon the side of the hat. Let the important work go bravely on, and let every son of Carolina in prepare to mount the blue cockade. – Charleston Mercury

The Camden (SC) Weekly Journal, 23 Oct. 1860