"Now I see the white flag earnestly borne…"

"Now I see the white flag earnestly borne…". . , On the morning of April 9, 1865, Brigadier General Joshua Chamberlain and his brigade, the 185th NY and 198th PA, advanced toward Appomattox Court House from the ridge to the south to engage in one of the war's last struggles. After Chamberlain's men crossed Plain Run (across Route 24 in front of you) under fire, they saw 20-year-old Lieutenant Thomas Goode Jones carrying a white towel signaling a truce. Truce flags stopped the fighting, halting Chamberlain's brigade here at Mariah Wright's house. Three days later, Chamberlain and his command accepted the Confederate Infantry's arms in formal surrender., Chamberlain later wrote of receiving the truce flag:

"Now I see the white flag earnestly borne, and its possible purport sweeps before my inner vision like a wraith of morning mist. He comes steadily on, the mysterious form in gray, my mood whimsically sensitive that I could even smile at the material of the flag,, wondering where in the army was found a towel, and one so white. But it bore a mighty message…"

, (captions) , Lt. Hiram Clark enrolled at age 20 in Marathon, NY, in September 1864. He survived malaria, jaundice, and the Appomattox Campaign only to fall in the last minutes of the battle., Hiram Williams, a 24-year-old printer from Philadelphia, had his lower leg and part of his right foot "amputated on the field," after being struck by an artillery shell. Williams survived and lived until 1925., Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (top) and Thomas Goode Jones (bottom) were on opposite sides of the flag of truce on the morning of April 9. Both later became governors of their states, Maine and Alabama, respectively.