Ahl's Independent Company, Heavy Artillery (officially known as the 1st Delaware Heavy Artillery) was a heavy artillery battery that served in the Union army in the American Civil War. The company was mainly composed of former Confederate prisoners of war who had sworn allegiance to the Union (over 200 so-called "galvanized Yankees").
The company (Delaware's only heavy artillery company during the war) was organized at Fort Delaware on July 27, 1863, not long after the Battle of Gettysburg. The company was assigned to garrison and guard duty at Fort Delaware during their entire period of service. Its commander was Capt. George W. Ahl, and nearly all the officers had come to the fort with Independent Battery G, Pittsburgh Heavy Artillery. The company mustered out on July 25, 1865.
Famous quotes containing the words heavy, artillery and/or company:
“The heavy sensual shoulders, the thighs, the blood-born flesh
and earth turning into color, rocks into their crystals,
water to sound, fire to form: life flickers
uncounted into the supple arms of love.”
—Muriel Rukeyser (1913–1980)
“Another success is the post-office, with its educating energy augmented by cheapness and guarded by a certain religious sentiment in mankind; so that the power of a wafer or a drop of wax or gluten to guard a letter, as it flies over sea over land and comes to its address as if a battalion of artillery brought it, I look upon as a fine meter of civilization.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I have noticed that doctors who fail in the practice of medicine have a tendency to seek one another’s company and aid in consultation. A doctor who cannot take out your appendix properly will recommend you to a doctor who will be unable to remove your tonsils with success.”
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)