Confederate Private William Savage Moore

Confederate private William Savage Moore poses in uniform in this hand-colored ambrotype made by the Richmond photographer Charles R. Rees between 1862 and 1865. A facing frame contains a lock of hair, probably from the soldier. Moore and his twin brother, John C. Moore, joined the Parker Light Artillery of the Confederate army on March 14, 1862, in Richmond. At sixteen years old, they required but did not have their mother’s consent to enlist. She took up a letter-writing campaign to have them released for being, in her words, "very sickly and delicately constituted," and the two were discharged due on October 8, 1862.

After turning eighteen, William Moore reenlisted on July 1, 1864, and joined the 1st Company, Richmond Howitzers Battalion, a light artillery unit. He was transferred to Company I of the 15th Virginia Infantry, promoted to second lieutenant on March 27, 1865, and then made a captain a few days later. During the siege of Petersburg, Moore was wounded in the left arm and taken prisoner. In early April 1865, he was transported to a hospital in Washington, D.C., where he signed an oath of allegiance to the United States and was released.

This image is part of the Liljenquist Family Collection of Civil War Photographs at the Library of Congress.