The Seventh South Carolina Infantry Battalion was organized by combining five independent companies on February 22, 1862. These first five companies were mustered into Confederate service "for the war" between November 14, 1861 and January 2, 1862. Company A was initially assigned to the Holcombe Legion as Company K. Company B was also attached to the Holcombe Legion, but without a company designation. On May 27, 1862, two more companies were formed. Company F was composed principally from men transferred from Company A. Company G was formed from men from Companies B, C and D. The final company was initially raised as an independent Partisan company on July 14, 1862 and transferred to the battalion on October 13, 1862.

Specific information on the various companies when they were formed, other than that given above:

Company A - It was raised from Kershaw, Chesterfield and Lancaster Districts and was mustered in at Camden on November 14. Its commander was Captain Lovick W. R. Blair. When Blair became Major of the Battalion, he was replaced by Captain B. S. Lucas, Jr. [A report from the Hill College Confederate Research Center (CRC) says, "nicknamed the Washington Mounted Artillery; men from Camden; originally organized as a mounted artillery company but never served as such; sometimes confused with a similarly named company, the Washington Artillery Company."]

Company B - The Lyles' Rifles was raised in Fairfield District and was mustered in at Columbia December 9, 1861. Its commander was Captain James H. Rion.

Company C - It was raised in Richland District and mustered in near Columbia on December 28, 1861. Its commander was Captain William H. Sligh. [The CRC report says it was, "nicknamed the McCulloch Rifles.]

Company D - It was raised in Kershaw District and was mustered in near Columbia on January 2, 1862. Its commander was Captain John L. Jones. [The CRC reports says, "nicknamed the Kershaw Grays."

Company E - Had men from Kershaw, Sumter, Richland, Clarendon, Barnwell, Edgefield, Fairfield, Colleton, Lexington, Chesterfield and Orangeburg Districts. Its commander was Captain B. E. Boykin.

Company F - Made up of those men in Company A from Chesterfield and Lancaster Districts. Its commander was Captain Dove Segars.

Company G - Had men from Kershaw, Fairfield, Richland, Lancaster, Chesterfield and Chester Districts. Its commander was Captain William Clyburn.

Company H - Captain J. Hampden Brooks' Infantry Partisan company was raised by special authority of the Secretary of War on July 14, 1862 with men from Edgefield, Fairfield, Chester, Richland, Abbeville, Greeneville and Newberry. After service from August 1 in Columbia, it applied to be transferred to line service and joined the battalion on October 14.

Because all the companies of the battalion had been raised directly for Confederate service "for the war," they were designated to be equipped with Enfield Rifles, which were in short supply at the time. Thus, the battalion is often referred to as the 7th SC Battalion (Enfield Rifles). The battalion itself is also frequently referred to as Nelson's Battalion or Rion's Battalion as those men were its only commanders.

Patrick Henry Nelson, a Major General in the South Carolina Militia, commanded the 2nd Brigade of South Carolina Volunteers as a Brigadier General during the bombardment of Fort Sumter. On February 24, 1864, he was made Major of the five company 7th SC Battalion. After its increase to seven companies, he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel on July 10, 1862. He was in command of a 400-man skirmish line that preceded three regiments of Hagood's Brigade in an attack on the extreme right of the Union lines in front of Petersburg, between the Appomattox River and the City Point road, on June 24, 1864. When the supporting units failed to follow-up the initial attack, these three regiments (which did not include Nelson's Battalion) suffered heavily and Lieutenant Colonel Nelson was never seen again. Rumors reached General Hagood several days later through prisoners that he had been murdered by negro troops after he had been taken prisoner.

The 7th SC Battalion was mostly assigned on the coast of South Carolina until it went to Virginia in 1864. However, from December 15, 1862 to February 8, 1863, they were temporarily deployed as part of reinforcements sent from the Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida to Wilmington, NC. They were in a temporary brigade commanded by Colonel Peyton H. Colquitt in a temporary division commanded by Brigadier General States Rights Gist.

It became part of Brigadier General Johnson Hagood's Brigade on September 20, 1863, but the regiments/battalion of the brigade remained scattered around the Charleston Harbor defenses until the brigade began moving to Virginia on April 28, 1864. Enroute, the whole brigade came together for the first time at Wilmington, NC on May 4. Near Petersburg, VA they became part of Hoke's Division, Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia. On May 31, Hoke's Division was detached to reinforce the Army of Northern Virginia at Cold Harbor, but returned to Petersburg on June 15 and continued to serve there until September 28, when Hoke's Division was again sent to reinforce the Army of Northern Virginia, east of Richmond. They were temporarily assigned to the Longstreet's First Corps. They remained attached to the Army of Northern Virginia, north of the James River, until December 21, 1864, when they were dispatched to Wilmington, NC and became part of the Department of North Carolina under General Bragg. By March 31, 1865, the division had become part of Hardee's Corps, which became part of the Army Of Tennessee upon its reorganization on April 9, 1865, at Smithfield, NC. They would be surrendered as part of those forces on April 26, 1865. By the time the 7th Battalion began its trek home, after the surrender, it consisted of somewhat less than 100 men. They disbanded at Lancaster Court House, SC on the morning of May 7, 1865.

Here is a brief summary of the unit's history (with some errors) as given in "Units of the Confederate States Army," by Joseph H. Crute, Jr.:

"7th (SC) Infantry Battalion [also called Enfield Rifles] was organized in January, 1862, with eight companies. Some of the men were recruited in Kershaw County. It served in the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and was active at Pocotaligo and in the Charleston area. Assigned to Hagood's Brigade, the battalion moved to Virginia in the spring of 1864. Here it was active at Drewry's Bluff and Cold Harbor and in the long Petersburg siege. It ended the war in North Carolina. ... On April 26, 1865 it surrendered. Lieutenant Colonels Patrick H. Nelson and James H. Rion, and Major Lovick W. R. Blair were in command."

From the "Compendium of the Confederate Armies: South Carolina and Georgia" comes a listing of the battles in which the battalion was engaged:

Edisto Island (March 29, 1862)
Coosawhatchie (October 22-23, 1862) [Also called Pocotaligo]
Charleston Harbor (August-September 1863)
Swift Creek (May 9, 1864)
Drewry's Bluff (May 12, 1864)
Drewry's Bluff (May 16, 1864)
Petersburg Siege (June 1864-April 1865) [sic]
Weldon Railroad (August 21, 1864)
2nd Fort Harrison (September 30, 1864)
2nd Fort Fisher (January 13-15, 1865)
Carolinas Campaign (February-April 1865)
Bentonville (March 19-21, 1865)

This list also contains errors. The battalion was not engaged during 2nd Fort Harrison, even though it was on the field. It was, however, at the Battle of Cold Harbor (June 1-3, 1864). Hagood's Brigade was heavily engaged there, suffering 120 casualties, including a substantial number of killed and wounded in the 7th SC Battalion. Some of the other regiments of Hagood's Brigade were present at 2nd Fort Fisher, but the 7th SC Battalion was stranded on a boat aground in the Cape Fear River during the attempt to land the brigade as reinforcements for Fort Fisher the day before it fell.

There is a monument to Hagood's Brigade to commemorate its gallant charge in the Battle of Weldon Railroad south of Petersburg on August 21, 1864. Two views of the monument are in "Memoirs of the War of Secession" by Johnson Hagood.

On the four sides of the base of the monument are inscriptions; that on the east, or side fronting Halifax road, being as follows:

Halifax Road is current State Road 604. A comparison of a modern map to the map in Hagood's Memoirs leads me to believe the site is less than a mile south of where Interstate 85 crosses over Halifax Road. There is no exit there. The nearest exit appears to be 65 to Squirrel Level Rd.

If you have not already read it, Brig. Gen. Johnson Hagood's "Memoirs of the War of Secession," contains a history of Hagood's Brigade, which from September 1863, included the 7th SC Battalion and the 11th, 21st, 25th and 27th SC Regiments. Hagood's Memoirs were reprinted as part of the SC Regimentals Series and has undergone a second reprinting recently. The publisher is Jim J. Fox, 9 Precipice Rd, Camden, SC 29020-4811. The Battalion's exploits prior to joining Hagood's Brigade has to be pieced together from a number of other sources.

You may be interested in knowing that the Regimental flag of the 7th SC Battalion, which was of the First National pattern, purchased by the CSA government from the firm of Hayden & Whilden of Charleston on 10 February 1863, was captured by the 6th CT on Morris Island on 10 July 1863 and presented to the Governor of CT. The CT State Archives has not responded to my repeated requests for information about its current status. The 25th SC also lost their flags during the same Union assault. (This, remember, was before these units were brigaded together.) Ironically, these same two units, plus the 21st and 27th SC, had their flags again captured at Weldon Railroad, VA on 21 August 1864. The flags of the 7th SC Battalion, 21st and 25th SC Regiments are in the collection of the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond. There is, however, no way of telling which flag belonged to which unit, as there are no unit designations on them.

I also have an abstract of the Hoke's Division Surgeon's report for the casualties of Hagood's Brigade during the May through August timeframe.

NOTE1: This historical sketch was provided by James A. Gabel (jagabel@aol.com).