GRAND ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC, GAR, CERAMIC PRESENTATION CANTEEN, 115^th OHIO VOLUNTEER INFANTRY, OVI,  NAMED

Large antique Grand Army of the Republic G.A.R. ceramic presentation canteen. The G.A.R. was a fraternity organization whose members had served as Union soldiers during the Civil War. 

This canteen is named to “F. Shauf”. Frederick Shauf, PVT, 18 years old, F Company, 1862.

BIRTH:  1847

DEATH: 1914 (aged 66–67)

BURIAL: Woodlawn Cemetery

Toledo, Lucas County, Ohio, USA

PLOT:  Section 28

The white ceramic presentation decanter is shaped like a Civil War Canteen and decorated with hand painted gilt accents and lettering.  Embossed and hand painted in the center of the canteen is the famous G.A.R. membership medal, featuring a gold gilt eagle grasping a sword with crossed cannons perched above a red, white and blue American flag.  Below the flag is a large gold gilt star. Painted around the G.A.R. medal, "F. SHAUF, Co F, 115th. O.V.I." The lower painted gild ceramic bracket or sling guides for a leather strap has been broken off. It is in very good condition other than some crazing, discoloration and worn gold gilt, all expected considering the age. This round decanter is meant to be hung. It is about 8” in diameter without the neck.  Including the neck its 9 ½” high and 10 ½” high. 

The 115th Ohio Infantry Regiment, sometimes 115th Ohio Volunteer Infantry (or 115th OVI) was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War. 

In the American Civil War, Ohio provided the federal government with 260 regiments of men, including infantry, artillery, and cavalry units. Ohioans also served in several other regiments from other states, most notably from Kentucky, West Virginia, and Massachusetts, as well as in federal units. Almost 330,000 Ohio men, including 5,092 African Americans, served in the Union military during the conflict.

Infantry regiments formed in Ohio became known as regiments of Ohio Volunteer Infantry. On September 18, 1862, officials mustered the 115th Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry into three years of service at Camp Massillon at Massillon, Ohio. On October 4, 1862, the regiment reported for duty at Cincinnati, Ohio. Five days later, authorities dispatched five companies to Camp Chase, in Columbus, Ohio, where the members of these companies served on prison guard duty. The remaining five companies stayed in Cincinnati, serving on provost-guard duty. These companies in Cincinnati, pursued General John Hunt Morgan during his Ohio raid of July 1863.

In November 1862, officials sent the Columbus companies to Maysville, Kentucky. The following month, these same companies moved to Covington, Kentucky, where their members served as provost guards until October 1863, when authorities reassigned the companies, along with those in Cincinnati, to Major-General William Rosecrans’s command at Chattanooga, Tennessee. The regiment did not reach Chattanooga. When passing through Murfreesboro, Tennessee, officials detained the 115th’s members, having them subdue Confederate guerrillas operating in the vicinity. Some members of the regiment became mounted infantry, while the other troopers served on garrison duty at Murfreesboro and then, in June 1864, occupied blockhouses along the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad. In August 1864, Confederate cavalry under Joseph Wheeler’s command attacked two of the blockhouses. The Confederate force captured the Northern troops in Blockhouse No.4, but the Union men in Blockhouse No. 5 repulsed the attack, having three men killed and seven wounded. In December 1864, During John Bell Hood’s Franklin-Nashville Campaign, Confederate cavalry under Nathan Bedford Forrest’s command captured Blockhouse Nos. 1, 3, and 4. Confederate forces also attacked Blockhouse Nos. 2, 5, 6, and 7, and the Northern troopers repulsed them or withdrew before the attacks took place. These men of the 115th Regiment regrouped at Murfreesboro, where Confederate forces attacked on December 5, 6, and 7, 1864 at the Battle of the Cedars, but the Northerners successfully defended the city. These companies of the 115th performed garrison duty at Murfreesboro or continued to guard the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad for the remainder of the war.

On June 23, 1865, officials mustered the 115th Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry out of service. The regiment then traveled to Cleveland, Ohio, where authorities discharged its members on July 7, 1865.

During the American Civil War, the 115th Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry lost nine men, including one officer, killed on the battlefield. An additional 142 men, including four officers, died due to disease or accidents. Eighty-three of these men perished when the Sultana exploded on April 27, 1865. The men who perished were former prisoners of the Confederate military and were returning to Ohio to be discharged.

Canteens like this were presented to delegates at national encampments as proof of their attendance and were sometimes sold by vendors at the encampments.  This canteen was large enough to hold a reasonable amount of liquid as hard drinking was common at the encampments as war stories were swapped and shared.

In the years following the American Civil War, veterans' organization such as the Grand Army of the Republic and the Union Veterans Union created iconic souvenir and presentation pieces modeled after the M1858 regulation canteen. Emphasizing their "fellowship in battle" these pieces usually bore the inscription "We drank from the same canteen." These pieces were of various sizes and differing materials ranging from inexpensive pot metal to stoneware and, in rare circumstances, porcelain. The piece shown here is of the highest quality. Made of fired porcelain, it is highly decorated with both hand painted designs and extensive gilding. While the surface glaze shows microscopic crazing, as expected in a piece of this age, the paint and gilt decoration is fresh, bright and at 85% of its original condition. In design, decoration, rarity and historical significance, this presentation canteen, in our opinion, is one of the finest examples of its kind.

Provenance: 

The back of this presentation canteen is marked 86.43.164. This number represents the catalog number from the Gettysburg Civil War Library and Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which has since closed its doors.

The Museum was housed at 18th and Pine Streets in Philadelphia from 1922 until 2008, when it closed in anticipation of building a new museum in Philadelphia. Since 2010 the collection has been cared for by the Gettysburg Foundation and stored at the Gettysburg Battlefield Museum and Visitors Center, where artifacts have been exhibited in the main galleries and in the special exhibition for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg.

In 1886, several Companions of MOLLUS (Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States) began the formation of a Civil War Library and Museum to serve as a repository for their records, relics, memorabilia, souvenirs, artifacts, and awards. A charter and Certificate of Incorporation were granted on May 2, 1888 for the War Library and Museum of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States. Companion Rutherford B. Hayes, 19th President of the United States, was its first President. The collection was kept in various locations in Philadelphia until a house was purchased at 1805 Pine Street in 1922 to house the collection and to serve as the MOLLUS Headquarters. The Museum closed in 2008.  The collection is the result of over a century of acquisition and conservation of a full range of artifacts, documentary material, books, and memorabilia of the Civil War.

The Civil War Museum of Philadelphia was chartered in 1888, but the Museum’s history and its collection had their beginnings as the Civil War ended in 1865. A group of Union officers in Philadelphia came together after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, fearing that the War might start again. When that concern was allayed, these officers served as the honor guard for President Lincoln’s body as it lay in state in Independence Hall. They soon determined that they could commemorate the sacrifices and service of Union officers by forming an organization, the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States [MOLLUS].  With headquarters in Philadelphia, “commanderies” were established in the states that supported the Union during the War.

The collection was created, for the most part, as a result of contributions of MOLLUS members, their families, and the leading citizens of the time. President Rutherford B. Hayes was the first President of what was then called the War Library and Museum. This provenance means that the personal stories, as well as, the war stories of these men can be told through the uniforms, diaries, weapons and other belongings in the collection. A bullet-struck pocket watch and bloody handkerchief tell as powerful a tale of the experience of battle, as the rifle and bayonet; a scrapbook with a letter from home and a lock of hair, as meaningful as a flag tattered by battle.