Samuel Cole Wright was born on September 29, 1842, in Plympton, Massachusetts, to Winslow and Mary Wright. His father was a farmer who owned $1,500 of real estate and $400 of personal property. He grew up and attended school in Plympton, and by 1860, he was working as a shoemaker.
He enlisted as a private in the 3rd Massachusetts Militia. One writer later claimed that Wright “was actually plowing his father’s field when he left the work unfinished in order to enlist.” He was eventually transferred to the 29th Massachusetts Infantry. He was wounded in the head on June 30, 1862, during the Peninsula campaign, but he eventually recovered and rejoined the regiment. He took part in the Battle of Antietam and later received the Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions there. He denounced northern Peace Democrats, writing that they “ought to have their necks streched [sic]” for “doing all they can to put us back and help the South.”
In July 1863, he wrote that he did not “want to see the President back down one iota on his Emancipation Proclamation for as long as slavery exists there will be a quarrel between the North & South.” He was shot in the left arm during the Battle of Cold Harbor on June 2, 1864, and shot in the right eye during the Battle of the Crater on July 30, 1864. He was eventually promoted to sergeant, and he mustered out on February 3, 1865.
Wright returned to Plympton after the war. He married Mary E. Nickerson, and their daughter Mary was born around 1875. He earned a living as a clerk, and by 1870, he owned $750 of real estate and $1,100 of personal property. They moved to Boston, Massachusetts, around 1872, and he took a job in the customs house. As one writer explained, he “was successively employed as messenger, night inspector, assistant weigher, first assistant weigher, head weigher and inspector of customs.” He died of myocarditis in Plympton on July 6, 1906.
Image: Samuel Cole Wright (courtesy Library of Congress)