Bullet wrapped in paper with period ink inscription.

Inscription reads in full: "Carried through Baltimore Riot in April 17th 1861 by C.C. Atwood."

In the culmination of the secession crisis and the outbreak of the Civil War, riots erupted in Baltimore. Considered the first bloodshed of the war, violence broke out when several state militia units from Pennsylvania and Massachusetts passed through the city en route to Washington D.C. Maryland was a slave state but had not joined the southern states in secession. Baltimore was a divided city with a large population of free African Americans and white abolitionists, but also home to a large contingent of Democratic Copperheads and Southern sympathizers.

By April, several states had seceded from the Union, notably, for Maryland, their neighbor Virginia. Discontent reached a fever pitch when President Lincoln called for 75,000 troops to be raised on 15 April 1861. Unrest began in Baltimore on the 18th when several Pennsylvania militia volunteers arrived and began to march to Fort McHenry. A group of southern sympathizers gathered and hurled bricks at the troops, though they were generally well protected by the police force. The next day, tensions were elevated further, and the southern sympathizers again formed mobs to stop the progression of Massachusetts militia troops. When they found their way blocked while attacks began upon them, the troops fired into the mob, turning it into a full-blown riot resulting in the deaths of 4 soldiers and 12 civilians, with many more wounded.

C.C. Atwood is almost certain Charles C. Atwood (1833-1907), who was a member of the 6th Massachusetts Militia - one of the regiments attempting to traverse Baltimore. He had officially enlisted on 16 April 1861 with the 6th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Militia "Minute Men" who were summoned by Special Order No. 14. Moving rapidly, they arrived on the evening of April 17th. Atwood's Company H passed without major incident, but his colleagues in companies C, D, I, and L were set upon by a mob, resulting in four deaths and 36 wounded, the first soldiers to fall in the Civil War.

Atwood would go on to have long and devoted service throughout the war. After his initial three months of service, he joined the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry as a corporal of Company L. They saw heavy action throughout the Eastern Theater, including Antietam, Fredericksburg, and Gettysburg. On 12 February 1864, he transferred to Company L of the 4th Massachusetts Cavalry, before he was discharged on 24 September 1864. After the war, he was involved in GAR Post #42 (B.F. Butler) and #185 (Ladd & Whitney), both in Lowell, Massachusetts. 

Identified artifacts of the Baltimore riots are extremely rare.

[Civil War, Union, Confederate] [Manuscripts, Documents, Letters, Ephemera, Signatures, Autographs] [Relics, Militaria]