Andrew Levering, graduate of Andover Newton Theological Seminary in Newton, Massachusetts, former Baptist pastor in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, and now living in St. Paul, Minnesota, musters in the St. Paul Pioneer Guard (later a part of Company A of the First Minnesota Infantry) as a private. He is 33 years old.
He got into trouble once … which caused him to be brought up before a court martial board. On Feb 1, 1862, he was charged with being drunk while on duty and for having unsoldierlike conduct. The specifications on the first charge were that he was drunk at Poolesville, Md. The specifications on the second charged stated further that when on duty as a clerk at headquarters, he got into the bed of the Brigadier General with all his clothes on and that he went to sleep drunk. He was found not guilty, because General Gorman said he had approved of the sleeping arrangements. This is probably a case where the commanding officer lied to protect one of the men from his former command from facing punishment. Gorman had a strict military background but may have found humor in what happened or he may have just decided to defend a man from his beloved First Minnesota. We don’t know, but, in any event Andrew, no doubt, felt indebted to General Gorman from then on.
The Rev Edward Neill, Chaplain of the First Minnesota had another take on the incident. He mentioned it in a letter to his wife. “Poor Andrew Levering & Weld are both in the guard house today on acct. of drunkenness. General Gorman with characteristic imprudence went to Washington last week, without leaving a single staff officer at headquarters. On Friday afternoon Col. Dana called there & found Levering & Weld dead drunk & asleep with their boots on in the General’s bed, a laughable sight if it was not so bad to see men this brutalized. The telegraph operator was also half-tipsy & the Colonel had them all arrested. I very much fear that Levering will die a drunkard. His appetite for drink tends to be morbid & he loses his self respect from day to day.”
Nonetheless, Levering later rises to the rank of 2nd Lieutenant in Company E. Still later, having survived the Battle of Gettysburg, he is promoted to 1st Lieutenant, effective July 30, 1863. He does not, however, survive the war. Suffering from “lung fever,” Levering dies in Sioux City on December 16, 1863, one of hundreds of thousands of soldiers who die from disease during the war rather than on the battlefield.
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