05/25/2026
in 1861 the first Union officer casualty of the Civil War occurred with the shooting of Col. Elmer Ellsworth. Ellsworth, a personal friend of President Abraham Lincoln and colonel of the famous 11th New York Zouave regiment, was killed by Confederate sympathizer James Jackson, owner of the Marshall House Hotel in Alexandria, Virginia. Ellsworth was shot as he came downstairs after removing a Confederate flag from the roof of the hotel. Corporal Francis Brownell then immediately shot and killed Jackson. Lincoln arranged for Ellsworth’s body to lie in state in the East Room of the White House, before being taken to the City Hall in New York, where thousands of mourners filed passed his casket. Ellsworth became a martyr for the Union cause, with his image appearing on items such as plates, pitchers, statuary, and stationery, and many military units taking on nicknames such as “Ellsworth’s Avengers.”
Image: Death of Col. Ellsworth (Currier and Ives print, 1861)
