Among the many brave and noble slain in defense of the right and liberty of our Southern
homes, few have been more regretted, or deserve more praise than Robert C. Nevitt, of Anderson,
SC.  The blood-stained field of Seven Pines contains no more gallant form than his, which
sleeps on the dark soil far away from home.
  Whilst pursuing his education at the Military Academy in this village, he ever won the
highest regard of his teachers and pupils for his upright character and his genial disposition,
being admired for his oratory in the exhibitions which the students frequently gave here.
Being too a devoted member of the Baptist Church at this place, his relations and friends
looked to him with the hope that he one day would make his mark on the age, and fill a high and
noble destiny.  But alas!  how are all these fair promises and ewpectations blighted forever!
  He was among the first to follow his teachers and fellow-students with many of our brave
fellow citizens into the ranks as volunteer into service of his country. At the beginning of
the war, bravely resolved to do his duty to the last, he joined our village company, the
"Palmetto Riflemen"  in which he held some office, attached to the Fourth South Carolina
Regiment, which was among the first to be sent to the defense of  Virginia, and has been ever
among the foremost in the battles fought on that historic soil!
   At Manassas they sustained the first onset of overwhelming numbers, and bravely repulsed the
daring foe.  There our young friend acted the part of one of the standard bearers of that
regiment, and he was one of the first to plant his colors on the far-famed Sherman battery,
passing through all those scenes of danger with many narrow escapes unharmed, and received
universal praise wherever known for his deeds of cool daring on that occasion.
  When our troops were called on to volunteer at the beginning of this year, he was the first
member of his company to step forward and pledge his life for the war and nobly has he kept
that vow so far as God permitted.
  This and jother companies from that regiment now attached themselves to Jenkins regiment of
P.S.S. and since then he with the others have most gloriously sustained their reputations as
"heroes in this strife" in that now distinguished regiment.  At Williamsburg he did his duty
bravely, and at Seven Pines, May 31, 1862 whilst at the close of that brilliant day's triumph,
on that desperately contested plain, and among thousands of other gallant dead, among the
foremost in making the gallant charge on a battery, 'tis said, fell pierced through the
forehead by a ball, and without a groan, with his face to the foe, he fell to rise no more on
earth.
   In the very morning of his manhood, in the hour of our country's need, when his friends were
looking forward to his success and safety with such certainty for he looked too strong and well
and brave to die as soon, yet a just providence decreed it should be so , and he is gone,
forever gone from the scenes of earth.
  To the great regret of his friends, his body was left on the field where it fell, and at the
moment, it could not be secured; and the enemy overunning that portion of the battleground, he
with others slept there, among the host of dead and dying foes, but slept as peacefully, no
doubt, as if lying  'neath the old popler tree where his mother was laid to rest in the family
burying ground.  He expressed a wish to rest beside her if he should fall in battle.  His
relatives have used every exertion to recover his remains, and I believe his body has at last
been and may be removed at some future time.
  They can rejoice in the knowledge of his preparations for that immortality of bliss of
knowing that he has joined the loved ones above, and the many noble spirits-his companions in
arms, some of his intimate friends, he had offered up too their lives on the altar of the
South-where there will be no more sin, or death or war forevermore.
August 10, 1862


My Aunt Francis told me that her grandmother Bettie Nevitt Crosby Clarke said that a wagon was
sent to Virginia for his body.  Robert Nevitt was brought back and buried in the Nevitt Family
Burial Grounds in Anderson, SC beside his mother Elizabeth Hutchison Nevitt.  Six years later
his father William Miles Nevitt, Jr. was buried there under the Poplar tree.  Robert Cornelius
Nevitt was my ggg-uncle.


--
Susan C. Johanson
Springfield, VA
[email protected]
Rootsweb sponsor-NEHGS member
http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=johanson
http://www.familytreemaker.com/users/j/o/h/Susan-C-Johanson/
    ...Searching for footprints in the sands of time...