Shaw, Robert Gould, 1837-1863

Shaw was born in Boston to abolitionists Francis George and Sarah Blake (Sturgis) Shaw, who were well-known Unitarian philanthropists and intellectuals of Scottish descent. The Shaws had the benefit of a large inheritance left by Shaw's merchant grandfather and namesake Robert Gould Shaw (1775–1853). Shaw had four sisters—Anna, Josephine (Effie), Susanna, and Ellen (Nellie).

When Shaw was five years old, the family moved to a large estate in West Roxbury, adjacent to Brook Farm. During his teens he traveled and studied for some years in Europe. In 1847, the family moved to Staten Island, New York, settling among a community of literati and abolitionists while Shaw attended the Second Division of St. John's College, a preparatory school, at Fordham. These studies were at the behest of his uncle Joseph Coolidge Shaw, who had been ordained as a Roman Catholic priest in 1847. He converted to Catholicism during a trip to Rome, in which he befriended several members of the Oxford Movement, which had begun in the Anglican Church. Robert began his high school-level education at St. John's in 1850, the same year that Joseph Shaw began studying there for entrance into the Jesuits.

In 1851, while Shaw was still at St. John's, his uncle died from tuberculosis. Aged 13, Shaw had a difficult time adjusting to his surroundings and wrote several despondent letters home to his mother. In one of his letters, he claimed to be so homesick that he often cried in front of his classmates. While at St. John's, he studied Latin, Greek, French, and Spanish, and practiced playing the violin, which he had begun as a young boy.

He left St. John's in late 1851 before graduation, as the Shaw family departed for an extended tour of Europe. Shaw entered a boarding school in Neuchâtel, Switzerland where he stayed for two years. Afterward, his father transferred him to a school with a less strict system of discipline in Hanover, Germany, hoping that it would better suit his restless temperament. While in Hanover, Shaw enjoyed the greater degree of personal freedom at his new school, on one occasion writing home to his mother, "It's almost impossible not to drink a good deal, because there is so much good wine here."

While Shaw was studying in Europe, Harriet Beecher Stowe, an abolitionist friend of his parents, published her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852). Shaw read the book multiple times and was moved by its plot and anti-slavery attitude. Around the same time, Shaw wrote that his patriotism had been bolstered after encountering several instances of anti-Americanism among some Europeans. He expressed interest to his parents in attending West Point or joining the Navy. Because Shaw had had a longstanding difficulty with taking orders and obeying authority figures, his parents did not view this ambition seriously.

Shaw returned to the United States in 1856. From 1856 until 1859 he attended Harvard University, joining the Porcellian Club, and the Hasty Pudding Club, but he withdrew before graduating. He had been a member of the class of 1860. Shaw found Harvard no easier to adjust to than any of his previous schools and wrote to his parents about his discontent.

After leaving Harvard in 1859, Shaw returned to Staten Island to work with one of his uncles at the mercantile firm Henry P. Sturgis and Company. He found work life at the company office as disagreeable as some of his other experiences.

With the outbreak of the American Civil War, Shaw volunteered to serve with the 7th New York Militia. On 19 April 1861 Private Shaw marched down Broadway in lower Manhattan as his unit traveled south to man the defence of Washington, D.C. Lincoln's initial call up asked volunteers to make a 90-day commitment, and after three months Shaw's new regiment was dissolved. Following this Shaw joined a newly forming regiment from his home state, the 2nd Massachusetts Infantry.

On 28 May 1861 Shaw was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the regiment's Company H. Over the next year and a half, he fought with his fellow Massachusetts soldiers in the first Battle of Winchester, the Battle of Cedar Mountain and at the bloody battle of Antietam. Shaw served both as a line officer in the field and as a staff officer for General George H Gordon. Twice wounded, by the fall of 1862 he was promoted to the rank of captain.

Since the start of the war, abolitionists such as Massachusetts governor John A. Andrew urged enlistment of African Americans as soldiers to fight the Confederacy. This proposal was broadly opposed. Many men believed that colored troops would lack discipline, be difficult to train, and would break and run in battle. The general attitude in the North was that colored troops would prove to be an embarrassment and hindrance to regular army units.

Andrew traveled to Washington, DC in early January 1863 to meet with Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and repeat his argument for the use of colored troops in the Union army. Stanton was won to his side; on 26 January 1863 Stanton issued an order to Andrew to raise further volunteer regiments to fight for the Union, adding the new recruits "may include persons of African descent, organized into special corps." Andrew immediately set about doing so, and the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry began to be formed.

For the unit's officers, Andrew sought a certain type of white gentleman, "young men of military experience, of firm antislavery principles, ambitious, superior to a vulgar contempt for color, and having faith in the capacity of colored men for military service." Most importantly, he wanted men who understood the stakes, that the success or failure of the endeavor would elevate or depress the manner in which the character of colored persons were viewed throughout the world for many years to come. Andrew wrote to many individuals prominent in the abolitionist movement, including Morris Hallowell of Philadelphia and Francis Shaw of Boston.

To command the unit, Andrew already had Shaw's son in mind. Andrew wrote to Francis Shaw about the need to find a leader who would accept the responsibility of the command "with a full sense of its importance, with an earnest determination for its success." Included in Andrew's letter was a commission for Robert Shaw to take command of the new regiment.

Carrying the commission, Francis Shaw traveled to Virginia to speak with his son. Robert Shaw was hesitant to take the post, as he did not believe that authorities would send the unit to the front lines, and he did not want to leave his fellow soldiers. Finally he agreed to take the command. On 6 February he telegraphed his father with his decision. He was 24 years old. The command came with a colonelcy, the rank commensurate with the position of regimental commander.

Andrew had some difficulty finding enough colored volunteers in Massachusetts to form the regiment. Andrew assured recruits that they would receive the standard pay of 13 dollars a month, and that if they were captured, the government of the United States would insist they be treated as any other soldier. The Boston area provided enough recruits to form the regiment's "C" Company. The remainder of the regiment was formed with black recruits from all across the North. Few were former slaves from the South. Two sons of the prominent African-American abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass volunteered to serve with the 54th.

Captain Shaw arrived in Boston on 15 February 1863 and immediately assumed his position. He was a strict disciplinarian, determined to train the men to high standards. On 25 March 1863 Shaw wrote to his father of his fledgling regiment:

"Everything goes on prosperously. The intelligence of the men is a great surprise to me. They learn all the details of guard duty and camp service infinitely more readily than most of the Irish that I have had under my command. There is not the least doubt that we will leave the State with as good a regiment as any that has marched."

Shaw was promoted to major on 31 March 1863, and two weeks later on 17 April was made full colonel. On 30 April the regiment drew 950 Enfield rifled muskets and swords for non-commissioned officers (NCOs). By 11 May more troops had arrived in Boston than were required to man the regiment. The 55th Massachusetts was begun with the next round of new recruits.

On 28 May Shaw led the men of the 54th through the streets of Boston to the docks, where the regiment boarded a transport steamer and sailed south. The regiment was to be used in a Union campaign against Charleston, South Carolina, a major port. The 54th arrived at Port Royal Island on 4 June, and was placed under the overall command of Major General David Hunter. Initially the regiment was used to provide manual labor at the loading docks, but Colonel Shaw applied for action. Four days later his regiment boarded onto transport and was sent to Hilton Head, South Carolina. From there they moved further south to St. Simons Island, Georgia, which served as their base of operations.

On 11 June 1863, the 54th was sent with the 2nd South Carolina Volunteers (who were also of African-American descent) for a raid against the town of Darien, Georgia. Overall command of the force was with the senior officer, colonel James Montgomery of the 2nd South Carolina. Upon reaching the town, Montgomery set his troops to looting it. Shaw was outraged by this behavior by Union troops.

He ordered his troops to limit their seizures to those items that would be useful for the camp, and committed only one company to the task. After the town had been emptied of all valuables and livestock, Montgomery told Shaw, "I shall burn this town." To Shaw the burning of the town appeared to serve no military purpose, and he knew it would create a great hardship to its residents. In a letter to his family he recalled, "I told him I did not want to take the responsibility of it, and he was only too happy to take all of it on his own shoulders." Montgomery had the town burned to the ground.

After the regiment's return to camp Shaw wrote to X Corps Assistant Adjutant General Lieutenant-Colonel Charles G. Halpine, seeking clarification of what was required of him. He asked if Montgomery was acting under orders from General Hunter, stating in part "I am perfectly willing to burn any place which resists, or gives some reason for such a proceeding; but it seems to me barbarous to turn women and children adrift in that way; and if I am only assisting Colonel Montgomery in a private enterprise of his own, it is very distasteful to me." It is not clear if Shaw ever received an answer from Halpine, but Montgomery was in fact carrying out a policy supported by Hunter.

Colonel Shaw and the 54th Regiment were placed under the command of General Quincy Adams Gillmore and sent to Charleston, South Carolina to take part in the second attempt to defeat the Confederate garrison stationed there. The fort was well armed with an assortment of heavy guns and whose overall strength was underestimated by Union command. At the battle, July 18, 1863, along with two brigades of white troops, the 54th assaulted Confederate batteries at Fort Wagner. As the unit hesitated in the face of overwhelming Confederate fire, Shaw led his men into battle by shouting, "Forward, Fifty-Fourth, forward!" He mounted a parapet and urged his men forward, but was shot through the chest three times and died almost instantly. According to the Color Sergeant of the 54th, he was shot and killed early in the battle while trying to lead the unit forward and fell on the outside of the fort. Some Confederate reports claim his body was hit a total of seven times. The battle had continued to 10 p.m. which ended with heavy Union losses. Among the other fatalities was Gen. George Crockett Strong, mortally wounded; Col. Haldimand S. Putnam shot and killed instantly; Col. John Lyman Chatfield, mortally wounded. Shaw's 54th Regiment suffered the heaviest losses. The Confederates buried Shaw in a mass grave with many of his men, an act they intended as an insult.

Two sons of Fredrick Douglass, Charles Douglass and his eldest son, Lewis Douglass, belonged to the 54th regiment. Lewis was wounded at the Battle of Fort Wagner shortly after Shaw fell, and barely managed to retreat to safety.

Following the battle, commanding Confederate General Johnson Hagood returned the bodies of the other Union officers who had died, but left Shaw's where it was, for burial in a mass grave with the black soldiers. Hagood told a captured Union surgeon that "Had he [Shaw] been in command of white troops ..." he would have returned Shaw's body, as was customary for officers, instead of burying it with the fallen black soldiers.

Although the gesture was intended as an insult by Hagood, Shaw's friends and family believed it was an honor for him to be buried with his soldiers. Efforts had been made to recover Shaw's body (which had been stripped and robbed prior to burial). His father publicly proclaimed that he was proud to know that his son was buried with his troops, befitting his role as a soldier and a crusader for emancipation.

In a letter to the regimental surgeon, Lincoln Stone, Frank Shaw wrote:

”We would not have his body removed from where it lies surrounded by his brave and devoted soldiers. ... We can imagine no holier place than that in which he lies, among his brave and devoted followers, nor wish for him better company. – what a body-guard he has!”

After the war, the Union Army disinterred and reburied all the remains—including, presumably, those of Col. Shaw—at the Beaufort National Cemetery in Beaufort, South Carolina. Their gravestones were marked as "unknown".

Shaw's sword had been stolen from the first gravesite but was recovered in 1865 and returned to his parents. It disappeared after being passed down within the family. In June 2017 it was discovered in a family attic of Mary Minturn Wood and brother Robert Shaw Wood, descendants of Shaw's sister Susanna. They donated it to the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Shaw met Anna Kneeland Haggerty in New York at an opera party given in 1861 by his sister Susanna before the war began. The two became engaged just after Christmas in 1862. Despite misgivings by both sets of parents because of the war, they were married 2 May 1863, less than a month before Shaw's regiment moved out. The ceremony was in New York City. The pair spent a brief honeymoon at the Haggertys' home of Vent Fort, in Lenox, Massachusetts.

Two and half years older than Shaw, "Annie" Shaw was widowed at the age of 28. She spent many years after the war living abroad in Europe, returning in later years when her health failed. The Haggerty property had been sold to George and Sarah Morgan, who built a large mansion there. They also kept the Haggerty home, and allowed Anna to live there when she returned from Europe. She spent the last two years of her life living at her former family house, and died in 1907, never having remarried. She is buried at the cemetery of Church-on-the Hill in Lenox.