LE ROY PENNYSAVER & NEWS - AUGUST 28, 2022 by Lynne Belluscio In 2000, Bill Lane wrote an article about Judge Augustus Porter Hascall, who served in the United States Congress between 1851 and 1853. He was born in 1800 in Hinsdale Massachusetts, and his family came to Western New York in 1803. They moved to LeRoy in 1815. As a young man he worked as a surveyor and then studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1852. He served as a Justice of the Peace and Town Supervisor and he ran for Congress on the Whig ticket. He was a member of the Board of Trustees of the LeRoy Female Seminary and Ingham University. He had ten children and three of them served in the Civil War. His oldest son, Herman, had moved west to Kalamazoo, Michigan and was a successful newspaper publisher. When the war broke out, he served in the 1st Michigan Calvary, becoming a Captain. He was taken prisoner at the Second Battle of Bull Run. He was held in the “horrible old Tobacco House Prison at Richmond.” He wrote letters to his father, who had some of them reprinted in the LeRoy Gazette: “September 28, 1862, There are 90 prisoners in a room 40 x 100 feet. Not a chair, table, bed or blanket was furnished... ...When tired of standing, we lay down...The floor, in addition to its nastiness, grew unreasonably hard...not a dish or utensil for eating or cooking was provided... we had alternative of scooping hot soup from the buckets in our hands, or buying dishes at the sutler’s prices.” However, as an officer he was released before too long. He returned to a successful newspaper career, but suffered from depression. Tragically he committed suicide and is buried in the Myrtle Street Cemetery in the Hascall family plot. Hascall’s next oldest son, Herbert, was a graduate of West Point. He had entered the Military Academy when he was seventeen and graduated with honors in 1856. Interestingly, he attended West Point while Robert E. Lee was Superintendent of the Academy. Herbert Hascall was assigned to the Fourth Regiment of Artillery stationed at Fort Independence in Boston. He also served with the unit that dealt with the situation with the Mormons in Utah. He was known for a brilliant mind as a mathematician and returned to West Point asAssistant Professor of Mathematics. When the Civil War began, he requested that he return to his former unit and he served on the staff on General Keyes during the first battle of Bull Run. He was promoted and took part in several engagements and was assigned to the staff of General T.W. Sherman as Assistant Quartermaster. While serving in South Carolina, he contracted “coastal fever” and was ordered home on sick leave. Again, he returned to West Point to teach and in 1874 was placed on the retired list for disability. His obituary noted that he suffered from “mental troubles” before his death. He is buried in the Hascall family plot on Myrtle Street. Judge Haskell’s son Theodore was only 15 when the War began, nevertheless, he joined the Union Navy. His father accompanied him to Washington to see him off. Theodore’s letters to his mother were published in the Gazette: “November 4, 1861. We left Hamilton Roads the morning that I commenced this to you... I was taken seasick the next morning and for five days... Oct 27; sick, Oct 28; Sicker, Oct 29; Sickest, with a heavy gale blowing off Hatteras Inlet. Oct 30; Most sickest, Oct 31; Awful sickerest, I managed to get up on deck yesterday morning for the first time... We arrived off Port Royal entrance here yesterday.” He then described the exchange of gunfire between the shore batteries and the ships and the eventual Union victory. After the war, Theodore became a successful Wall Street Attorney and did not suffer from the depression of his two older brothers. The Hascall family plot in the Myrtle Street Cemetery, lies on the west side of the entry path. The gravestones tell the tragic stories of this family who lived in LeRoy. A Family’s Tragedy During the Civil War 57 East Main St. - Judge Hascall’s home Libby Prison, "Tobacco House Prison," where Herman Hascall was held after the second Battle of Bull Run Grave site of Augustus P. Hascall
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTQ2MjM=