| Drury Wesley Venable was born on November 5,
1832, in Marion, Smyth County, Virginia, in the upper Shenandoah
Valley. He became a carpenter in Smyth County. Drury married Elizabeth
Anderson and was the father of several children when the War Between
the States began. On April 18, 1861, at age 28 (his enlistment record
says 33), he enrolled in CPT Albert G. Pendleton’s company,
the Smyth Blues, which became Company D of the 4th Virginia Infantry,
one of the regiments of the famous Stonewall Brigade.
The 4th Virginia Infantry was assembled at Winchester,
Virginia, in July 1861 and was comprised of companies from Smyth,
Grayson, Wythe, Pulaski, Montgomery, and Rockbridge counties. Its
first commander was COL James F. Preston, who died of wounds suffered
in the Battle of First Manassas, the regiment’s first action.
After Manassas, the regiment fought at Kernstown and in Stonewall
Jackson’s Valley Campaign before it joined Lee’s Army
of Northern Virginia at Richmond in June 1862. The 4th Infantry
fought in every battle of the Second Corps of the Army of Northern
Virginia, under Jackson, Ewell, Early, and Gordon, from the Seven
Days battles of June 1862 to the battles around Petersburg in the
final year of the war. Only 1 officer and 60 men were left in the
regiment when it surrendered with Lee’s army at Appomattox
Courthouse on April 9, 1865.
|
|
Private Drury W. Venable was not among the 60
men of his regiment who surrendered at Appomattox. After re-enlisting
in his company in April 1862, he was detailed as a baggage guard
and ambulance driver for the regiment on September 26, 1862. He
served in this capacity until three divisions of Yankee infantry
overran Early’s Second Corps at the infamous Bloody Angle near
Spotsylvania Courthouse on May 12, 1864. Private Venable was among
the 126 men of the 4th Infantry who fell into Union hands that morning,
a devastating blow to the regiment since only 175 men had mustered
for action that day. Private Venable spent eight months as a prisoner
of war, three of them at Point Lookout, Maryland, where he was exchanged
on February 13, 1865, less than two months before the surrender
at Appomattox.
After the war, despite disabilities suffered
while the Yankees held him prisoner, Drury W. Venable fathered more
children by his wife Elizabeth, including Abraham Kauffman Venable,
who was born on April 13, 1880, and lived to be nearly 80 years
old.
Drury W. Venable died at Danville, Virginia,
on June 17, 1908, at age 76. He was buried in Greenhill Cemetery
in Danville.
The memory of Private Drury Wesley Venable of
Company D, 4th Virginia Infantry is perpetuated in this camp by
his great-grandson, Compatriot Jerry L. Jennings.
|
