On the sweltering afternoon of July 3, 1863, as Confederate artillery fell silent and thousands of infantrymen began their slow march across the open fields toward Cemetery Ridge, a 21-year-old Union lieutenant stood his ground despite being badly wounded. His name was Willie Pullman, and his actions that day at Gettysburg became one of the most overlooked acts of courage in the entire Civil War. Born in Borneo in 1842, Pullman had anything but an easy start in life. Multiple siblings died young, and his mother passed away during childbirth.
Facing difficult circumstances, his father made the painful decision to send Willie and his sister Mary to the United States to live with their aunt Elizabeth. The young boy traveled halfway around the world and would spend the rest of his life in America. Growing up in Albany, New York, Pullman attended Rutgers University to study theology. But when Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter in April 1861, the college president delivered a fiery speech that moved the young student deeply.
Pullman decided he had to fight for his adopted country and enlisted. His military career advanced quickly. He served with the First New Jersey, then the Signal Corps, and eventually the 59th New York Infantry. At just 21 years old, he became a lieutenant and staff officer for the regiment.
His enlisted men trusted him completely, and by the time of Gettysburg, he had already faced combat on 14 separate occasions. The fighting at Gettysburg tested the 59th New York severely. On July 2, the regiment’s lieutenant colonel, Max Thoman, fell mortally wounded while defending their position on Cemetery Ridge. Command shifted to an Ohioan named McFaden.
By July 3, when Pickett’s Charge came rolling across the field, Pullman was the only staff officer still standing for the regiment. The battlefield itself added to the horror. Unlike other battlefields Pullman had seen, Gettysburg sat in a natural bowl surrounded by mountain ranges. Wide-open farm fields stretched between the opposing lines, giving the Confederate advance a theatrical, almost surreal quality.
For a 21-year-old who had already seen terrible combat, the scene before him must have been overwhelming. As the Confederate attack surged toward the Union line, artillery fire began to find its mark. A shell exploded near Pullman, striking him in the right shoulder and blowing the wound wide open. His men saw the damage and pleaded with him to leave the field and seek help.
They respected him deeply and did not want to see the young officer die. Pullman refused to go back. Standing in the line of battle, bleeding heavily, he said the words that every man around him would remember: “Not while I have my sword in my left arm. ”
Shortly afterward, a minie ball struck his left arm, tearing it open as well.
With both arms now badly wounded and blood pouring from his body, he still struggled to remain with his men. Only after the combination of blood loss and shock became overwhelming did he finally allow himself to be taken from the field. He was moved to the Swoope mansion, where surgeons worked on him. The sword his aunt Elizabeth had given him before he went into combat was lost somewhere on the battlefield or in the chaos of the retreat.
Only the scabbard was recovered, blood-soaked and sent back home. The sword itself was never found. On July 4, Pullman dictated a letter home to his sister Mary, since he could not use his hands. Despite his grave condition, he wrote words that would become his final message to his family: “I bear honorable wounds in my country’s cause.
The wounds are slight, but still forbid my using a pen at present. I shall soon write again concerning my whereabouts. Until then, farewell. ”
He believed he would recover.
He never did. His wound became infected, and on July 21, 1863, Willie Pullman died at Camp Letterman in Gettysburg. He was 21 years old. His body was sent back home for burial.
The regiment’s monument at Gettysburg, dedicated in 1889, bears the names of the unit and its commanders and notes that four companies held their position on July 2 and 3, 1863, where Lieutenant Colonel Thoman fell mortally wounded. The monument records six killed and 28 wounded among the regiment’s casualties. But Pullman’s name is not written on that stone. His men, however, never forgot him.
Veterans who survived the war returned to Gettysburg and spoke of him often, remembering his courage and his refusal to leave his post even as he bled. Newspapers at the time covered his act of heroism, yet his story faded into history. A man born halfway around the world, sent to America as a child, adopted this country completely. In his final letter, facing death, he described his wounds as honorable ones suffered in his country’s cause.
For a man with every reason to despair, those words stand as a testament to a courage that deserves to be remembered every time someone stands at the 59th New York monument beside the copse of trees on Cemetery Ridge.