Henry Ambrose Bitner
- Enlisted in Company K, Pennsylvania 11th Infantry Regiment
on 24 Apr 1861.
- Mustered out on 31 Jul 1861 at Harrisburg, PA.
- Sgt. Company E, Pennsylvania 11th Infantry Regiment
on 04 Oct 1861.
- Mustered out on 20 Apr 1863.
- Commissioned 2nd Lieut in Company F, Pennsylvania
54th Mitilia Regiment on 30 Jun 1863.
- Mustered out on 17 Aug 1863.
- Appointed 1st Sgt of the 2nd Batt. of the Veteran
Reserve Corps 8 Oct 1863
- Mustered out on
Henry was born 14 May 1840 in the Ligonier
Valley of Westmoreland County, PA. He married Rebecca Jane Dunn on 25 Sep
1872 in Pleasant Co., WV. He went there to work in the logging industry
after the war.
Henry's Great Grandson, Tom Bitner, remembers hearing the following story:
After the war, Henry and a friend of his from PA went to WV looking
for work. They were told that there was a logging camp that needed help.
They were hired there. The foreman informed them that most of the workers
there were former Confederate soldiers, and he hoped that they wouldn't have
any trouble. They decided to stay. That evening after dinner, they were in
a room with a fireplace. Henry stood in front of the fire, with his hands
behind him - a habit of his. A man approached him, and asked if he had ever
been in charge of a prisoner train to Elmira, NY. Henry replied in the affirmative.
The man asked if Henry remembered standing on a train platform with a plug
of tobacco, when a prisoner walked up to him, and asked if it were possible
to get a chew. Henry gave him the plug of tobacco. While this conversation
was going on, Henry's partner was standing by a barrel full of axe handles
that was by the fireplace. Henry could hear him rattling around to get ahold
of an axe handle (just in case.) However, the man talking to Henry
said, "I was that fellow, and you'll have no trouble as long as you are here!"
(And they didn't!)
Henry and Rebecca moved back to the Ligonier Valley about
1880, where the last two of their five children were born.
Henry died 26 Jan 1908, and he and Rebecca rest in the Ligonier Valley
Cemetery, Westmoreland Co, PA.
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