Gen. Samuel K. Zook Monument

Description

Sculpted by Gary Casteel
Size:  2 ¼” x 2 ½” x 12 ¼”
Weight:
2.1lbs
1863 Signed and Numbered Limited Edition Monument Replicas
General Samuel K. Zook had a reputation for being a disciplinarian and, despite his Mennonite background, a master of profanity.  While on the road to Chancellorsville, he was one half of a famous battle of profanity with General Winfield S. Hancock.  Wrote an enlisted man about the incident:
“It was the greatest cursing match I ever listened to; Zook took advantage of Hancock, by waiting until the latter got out of breath, and then he opened his pipe organ, and the air was very blue.”
On July 2, 1863, the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg, Brigadier General John C. Caldwell's division, including Zook's brigade, was sent to reinforce the crumbling Third Corps line that was being assaulted by the troops of Confederate Lieutenant General James Longstreet.  Zook was directed by one of the Third Corps staff officers toward the Wheatfield to reinforce the brigade of Colonel Régis de Trobriand and to fill a gap near the “Stony Hill”.  Zook, on horseback, led his men up the hill, which attracted the attention of the advancing 3rd and 7th South Carolina Infantry regiments of Joseph B. Kershaw's brigade.  Zook was struck by rifle fire in the shoulder, chest, and abdomen.  Dr. William Potter, a friend of the general, later wrote about Zook’s wounds: “fatally shot, a shell having torn open his left shoulder and chest, exposing the heart-beats to observation.”  Zook was taken behind the lines for medical treatment at a toll house on the Baltimore Pike.
He died from his wounds on July 3, 1863.
Upon his death, divisional commander John C. Caldwell recorded of Zook: “He fell in front of battle while driving back the invader, and lived long enough to know that his blood had not been shed in vain, but that the enemy had been driven back with terrible repulse.
A grateful country will remember his virtues and hold them up to posterity.”
General Zook is buried near the grave of General Hancock in Montgomery Cemetery in West Norriton Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, near Norristown, Pennsylvania.  He received a brevet promotion to major general for Gettysburg, awarded as of July 2, 1863.
This monument was dedicated on July 25, 1882 and is located south of Gettysburg on the south side of the Wheatfield Road.
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