George W. Corliss was born around 1834 in Connecticut. He worked as a teacher and accountant, and he married Catherine Bunce on July 3, 1861. The couple apparently had no children.

 

In June 1861, he received a commission as a captain in Company C of the 5^th Connecticut Infantry. The regiment took part in the Battle of Cedar Mountain, and he was wounded during the battle. As he later recalled, “I led my company in front of the line, and when my Color Sergeant was killed I seized the National Color as it fell from his hands and bore it myself—still in front of the line—until wounded.” Confederates captured him soon afterward and imprisoned him at Libby Prison in Richmond, Virginia. He was exchanged several months later, and he resigned on January 21, 1863.

 

He applied for a federal pension in September 1863 and eventually received one. Then, in April 1864, he received a commission as a 1^st lieutenant in the 3^rd Veteran Reserve Corps. After the war, he worked for the Freedman’s Bureau in Mississippi, until December 1868. In 1867, he was reportedly “assaulted and beaten” by white southerners in Pass Christian, Mississippi. He served as sheriff of Rankin County, Mississippi, in the late 1860s, and white residents accused him of stealing a “large sum of money.” He was arrested, but friends posted bail, and he moved to New York City soon afterward.

 

He worked as a life insurance agent in New York, and he served as editor of The Insurance Critic. By 1870, he owned $200 of personal property. His wife probably died in the 1870s, and he married a woman named Grace around 1879. Their son Benjamin was born around 1891. On September 10, 1897, he received the Medal of Honor for his heroism at Cedar Mountain. He died in New York City on May 15, 1903.

 

Image: George W. Corliss (Civil War Soldier Records and Profiles, 1861-1865, available from Ancestry.com)

SOURCES