CIVIL WAR ANCESTORS
Private Alexander Springsteen, Company A, 14th New Jersey (left), and great-great grandfather to New Jersey’s Favorite Son, Bruce Springsteen By Jeffrey R. Biggs, editor of Hardtack Books
Staying rooted in New Jersey is a Springsteen family pastime. As far back as before the Civil War we find Monmouth County, New Jersey, peppered with the Springsteen surname. The Monmouth County Historical Association uncovered a document dating to 1801 signed by a John Springsteen, a patriot of the Revolution and direct ancestor to Bruce Springsteen. Of particular note to Bruce Springsteen’s Civil War heritage is that the grandson of John Springsteen was Alexander Springsteen (1822 - 1888), the great-great grandfather to Bruce Springsteen (1949 - ). The muster rolls of the 14th New Jersey shows Alexander Springsteen enrolled for service on August 14, 1862 and was discharged on June 18, 1865. The regiment was organized under the July 1862 call issued by President Lincoln for 300,000 troops to serve for three years or the remainder of the war after the disastrous retreat of McClellan’s army on the Virginia peninsula. The regiment received notoriety by delaying Jubal Early’s advance on Washington at the Battle of Monocacy, July 9, 1864, where it received its nickname of “The Monocacy Regiment”. In 1907, the 14th New Jersey was given the hon1
AS THE FREEHOLD, NEW JERSEY, NATIVE BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN HAS QUIPPED, DESPITE WRITING PERHAPS ONE OF THE ALL TIME GREAT ESCAPIST ROCK ANTHEMS IN “BORN TO RUN,” HE CURRENTLY LIVES TEN MILES FROM HIS HOMETOWN OF FREEHOLD, NEW JERSEY.
or of placing the first monument on the Monocacy Battlefield where 180 surviving members attended the ceremony. James McPherson called the regiment “one of the best regiments in one of the best fighting corps in the Union army - the 6th Corps of the Army of the Potomac”. A middle-aged man in 1862, Alexander Springsteen was an atypical candidate for going off to war. He enlisted at the age of forty with a wife at home in Ocean Township, New Jersey, and four young children (3 sons and 1 daughter) between the ages of three and ten. The 1860 census of Monmouth County lists Alexander Springsteen, a carpenter by trade, as a day laborer with a personal estate of only $100.00. At the time of his enlistment, the pay of a private in the Union army was competitive to that of a self-employed carpenter. In August 1862, each recruit was entitled to receive - after enlistment and swearing in - one month’s pay of $13.00 in advance and a bounty of $25.00 when the regiment was mustered into service. For a private with a wife or widowed dependent mother, the State of New Jersey paid an additional amount of $6 per month. Upon completion of his service, the federal government paid $75.00 for each volunteer honorably discharged. The 14th New Jersey was comprised of Monmouth County stock, many from the town of Freehold. The regiment was formed and drilled on the old Revolutionary War battleground of Monmouth just outside of Freehold. Its first year of service was a peaceful one spent guarding the railroad bridges near Monocacy, Maryland, and various points along the Upper Potomac River. Transferred to the Army of the Potomac after the Battle of Gettysburg, the regiment was involved in the pursuit of Lee in Pennsylvania and the later campaigns of that fall. After 15 months of service, the 14th New Jersey saw its first casualties near Culpepper, Virginia, on November 27, 1863. For the next year and a half, the fortunes of the 14th New Jersey were linked to the fighting 6th Corps. The New Jersey regiment saw action in Grant’s Overland Campaign, the Battle of 2
The Springsteen Family Tree
Pvt. Alexander Springsteen 1822 - 1888
Anthony Springsteen 1871 - 1959
Frederick H. Springsteen 1900 - 1962
Douglas Frederick Springsteen 1924 - 1998
Bruce Frederick Springsteen 1949 -
The 14th New Jersey Regiment, known as the “Monocacy Regiment” on account of its association with the defense of the rail juction and its winter encampment there, was considered one of the elite regiments of the 6th Corps, Army of the Potomac. The monument shown above was erected in 1907 to honor the regiment’s role in the Battle of Monocacy, July 9, 1864. Monocacy, Phil Sheridan’s Shenandoah Valley campaign and finally outside Petersburg culminating at Appomattox Court House. In the end, the 14th New Jersey would sustain casualties of 147 men killed or mortally wounded in action, placing it in the top 10 percent in casualties of Union regiments. The great-great grandfather of one of the most famous sons of New Jersey served his time in the regiment with honor, but little distinction and was granted a discharge from the service at the end of the war. In 1871, Alexander Springsteen and his wife Harriet would have another son, Anthony Springsteen (1871 - 1959) who would live to see the birth of his great-grandson, Bruce Springsteen, in 1949. Alexander returned home to New Jersey after the war and eventually took up residence in Howell Township where he died at the age of sixty-six in 1888. He was active in the local G.A.R. of Freehold, who took charge of his remains. He is buried in Monmouth County in the Ardena Baptist Cemetery.
credits: Alexander Springteen image is courtesy of Monmouth County Historical Association; Bruce Springsteen (Wikimedia Commons); 14th New Jersey monument, Jeffrey Biggs (author).
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