High anxiety consumed Lt. Col. Lewis Minor Coleman at the Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862. As fierce fighting raged throughout the morning and into the afternoon, he and his battalion of reserve artillery were parked behind Gen. Stonewall Jackson’s Corps on the southernmost section of the Confederate right flank.
Coleman awaited orders to join the fray as the rhythmic pounding of cannon, the ripping of musketry, and the shouts of men mixed with the smell of sulfur and drifts of gunsmoke, permeating the cold air and muddy backroads littered with the debris of wrecked cannon and lifeless horses.
An energetic, active man driven not by ambition, but by a desire to occupy positions that made the best use of his abilities, the 35-year-old Coleman’s tension level rose with every cannon boom.
Coleman was not a warrior by instinct. Family, friends, and acquaintances knew him as a peacemaker, a benevolent, modest protector who never sought the spotlight. A humble Christian who lived the Golden Rule, he placed spiritual growth at the center of his existence.
Lessons learned…