Smith, Jerome B.
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MILITARY SERVICE Age: 20, credited to Rutland, VT Unit(s): 7th VT INF, 2nd VT LARTY Service: enl 10/14/61, m/i 12/16/61, PVT, 2nd VT LARTY BTRY, dis/dsb 8/24/63; enl 2/23/65, m/i 2/23/65, Pvt, Co. G, 7th VT INF, m/o 8/23/66 See Legend for expansion of abbreviations VITALSBirth: 10/26/1844, Rutland, VT Death: 01/16/1921 Burial: Crystal Lake Cemetery, Gardner, MA Marker/Plot: Not recorded Gravestone researcher/photographer: Heidi McColgan Findagrave Memorial #: 0 (There may be a Findagrave Memorial, but we have not recorded it) MORE INFORMATION Alias?: None noted Pension?: Yes, 10/13/1890, MO Portrait?: Unknown College?: Not Found Veterans Home?: VT (If there are state digraphs above, this soldier spent some time in a state or national soldiers' home in that state after the war) Remarks: None DESCENDANTS (Are you a descendant, but not listed? Register today) |
BURIAL: Copyright notice   Crystal Lake Cemetery, Gardner, MA Check the cemetery for location/directions and other veterans who may be buried there. |
Jerome B. Smith
Bennington Banner
Jan. 17, 1921
JEROME B. SMITH
Fourth Death in Week Among Civil War Veterans.
Death's sorrows have fallen thickly of late on the Soldiers' Home, the latest victim being Jerome B. Smith, who died there Sunday afternoon. He had apparently been in his usual health until the middle of last week, when he was suddenly stricken with the disease pneumonia, which caused his death.
He was born on a farm in Rutland, Oct. 26, 1844, and his life until his enlistment was that of the farmer boy. In his young manhood he worked in various towns of Rutland county, West Rutland, Castleton and Pittsford. He first enlisted from Pittsford in the 2nd Vt. Battery, Oct.14, 1861, and was discharged for disability, Aug. 24, 1863. He next enlisted from Rutland for one year in Co. G, 7th Vt., Feb. 22, 1865,and was discharged exactly one year from that date. His entire service was in the Department of the Gulf, a battalion of his regiment having been sent to the Mexican border at the time of the Maximilian fiasco.
Leaving the army, he entered the railway service and was a locomotive engineer for many years in Vermont, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado and the Rocky Mountain region. His tales of adventure in that then wild section were extremely interesting. As he would have said of those days, "I was a wandering sheep, I did not love my home." But during his life at the Soldiers' home, which he entered March 28, 1911, he embraced the Christian faith, chiefly through the in- fluence of a band of Christian work- ers who held meetings there in which he was a frequent speaker, and there- after lived and died in that faith. He possessed a rugged eloquence which, but for his limited education, would have made him famous as an exhorter.
He married early in life, but his wife died some years ago, leaving a son, and was buried in Gardner, Mass., where his remains have been taken for burial under the G.A.R. ritual by Farragut Post of which he was a member.
Much more might be said of this more than ordinarily intelligent man, but these are the salient points of his life.
Contributed by Tom Boudreau.